Says Edmund Yates, writing of the great folk in Hyde Park at a later date:—
“There, in a hooded cabriolet, the fashionable vehicle for men-about-town, with an enormous champing horse, and the trimmest of tiny grooms—‘tigers,’ as they were called—half standing on the footboard behind, half swinging in the air, clinging on to the straps, would be Count d’Orsay, with clear-cut features and raven hair, the king of the dandies, the cynosure of all eyes, the greatest ‘swell’ of the day. He was an admirable whip—he is reported on one occasion, by infinite spirit and dash, to have cut the wheel off a brewer’s dray which was bearing down upon his light carriage, and to have spoken of it afterwards as ‘the triumph of mind over matter’—and always drove in faultless white kid gloves, with his shirt wristbands turned back over his coat-cuffs, and his whole ‘turn-out’ was perfection. By his side was occasionally seen Prince Louis Napoleon, an exile too, after his escape from Ham, residing in lodgings in King Street, St James’—he pointed out the house to the Empress Eugénie when, as Emperor of the French, on his visit to Queen Victoria, he drove by it. He was a constant visitor of Lady Blessington’s at Gore House. Albert Smith, in later years, used to say he wondered whether, if he called at the Tuileries, the Emperor would pay him ‘that eighteenpence,’ the sum which one night at Gore House he borrowed from A. S. to pay a cabman.”
A strange, almost uncanny personage in some ways, this Louis Napoleon, with his dogged, not to be daunted belief in his high destiny.
George Augustus Sala thus describes him:—
“A short, slight form he had, and not a very graceful way of standing. His complexion was swarthily pale, if I may be allowed to make use of that somewhat paradoxical expression. His hair struck me as being of a dark brown; it was much lighter in after years; and while his cheeks were clean-shaven, the lower part of his face was concealed by a thick moustache and an ‘imperial’ or chin-tuft. He was gorgeously arrayed in the dandy evening costume of the period … he wore a satin ‘stock,’ green, if I am not mistaken; and in the centre of that stock was a breastpin in the image of a gold eagle encircled with diamonds.”
Shee notes in May 1839, of an evening at Gore House: “Among the company last night was Prince Louis Napoleon. He was quiet, silent, and inoffensive, as, to do him justice, he generally is, but he does not impress one with the idea that he has inherited his uncle’s talents any more than his fortunes. He went away before the circle quite broke up, leaving, like Sir Peter Teazle, ‘his character behind him,’ and the few remaining did not spare him, but discussed him in a tone that was far from flattering. D’Orsay, however, who came in later with Lord Pembroke, stood up manfully for his friend, which was pleasant to see.”
Said D’Orsay: “C’est un brave garçon, mais pas d’esprit”; yet stood manfully by him.
There is not the slightest doubt that very intimate relations existed between D’Orsay and Louis Napoleon during his days of exile in England. Napoleon III. was the son of Louis Napoleon, King of Holland and his wife Hortense, whom Lady Blessington met in Italy. Of this meeting the following entry from Lady Blessington’s Journal, dated Rome, March 1828, is a quite interesting account:—
“Though prepared to meet in Hortense Bonaparte, ex-Queen of Holland, a woman possessed of no ordinary powers of captivation, she has, I confess, far exceeded my expectations. I have seen her frequently; and spent two hours yesterday in her society. Never did time fly with greater rapidity than while listening to her conversation, and hearing her sing those charming little French romances, written and composed by herself, which, though I had always admired them, never previously struck me as being so expressive and graceful as they now prove to be. Hortense, or the Duchesse de St Leu, as she is at present styled, is of the middle stature, slight and well formed; her feet and ankles remarkably fine; and her whole tournure graceful, and distinguished. Her complexion and hair are fair, and her countenance is peculiarly expressive; its habitual character being mild and pensive, until animated by conversation, when it becomes arch and spirituelle. I know not that I ever encountered a person with so fine a tact, or so quick an apprehension, as the Duchesse de St Leu: these give her the power of rapidly forming an appreciation of those with whom she comes in contact; and of suiting the subjects of conversation to their tastes and comprehensions. Thus, with the grave she is serious, with the lively gay; and with the scientific, she only permits just a sufficient extent of her own savoir to be revealed to encourage the development of theirs. She is, in fact, ‘all things to all men,’ without at the same time losing a single portion of her own natural character; a peculiarity of which seems to be, the desire, as well as the power, of sending away all who approach her satisfied with themselves, and delighted with her. Yet there is no unworthy concession of opinions made, or tacit acquiescence yielded to conciliate popularity; she assents to, or dissents from, the sentiments of others, with a mildness and good sense that gratifies those with whom she coincides, or disarms those from whom she differs. The only flattery she condescends to practise is that most refined and delicate of all, the listening with marked attention to the observations of those with whom she converses; and this tacit symptom of respect to others is not more the result of an extreme politeness, than of a fine nature, attentive to the feelings of those around her.…
“It is not often that a woman so accomplished unites the more solid attraction of a highly-cultivated mind: yet in Hortense this is the case; for, though a perfect musician, a most successful amateur in drawing, and mistress of three languages, she is well read in history and belles-lettres; has an elementary knowledge of the sciences, and a general acquaintance with the works of the most esteemed authors of ancient and modern times. Her remarks denote an acute perception, and a superior understanding; and are delivered with such a perfect freedom from all assumption of the self-conceit of a bas-bleu, or the dictatorial style of one accustomed to command attention, that they acquire an additional charm from the modest grace with which they are uttered.…