Empress Josephine: An Historical Sketch of the Days of Napoleon Part 41

Further on, speaking of her character, he continues:

"Goodness was as inseparable from her character as grace from her person. Good even to weakness, sensitive beyond all expression, generous to extravagance, she was the delight of all those who were round about her; certain it is that there never was a woman more loved and more deservedly loved by those who approached her than Josephine. As she had known what adversity was, she was full of compa.s.sion for the sorrows of others; with a pleasant, equable temperament, full of condescension alike to foe and friend, she carried peace wherever discord or disunion existed; if the emperor was displeased with his brothers, or with any other person, she uttered words of affection, and soon restored harmony.

She possessed a wondrous tact, a rare sentiment of what was becoming, and the soundest and most unerring judgment one can possibly imagine.

Besides all this, Josephine had a remarkable memory, to which the emperor would often appeal. She was a good reader, and had a peculiar charm of her own which accorded with all her movements. Napoleon preferred her to all his other readers." [Footnote: Constant, "Memoires," vol. i., pp. 21, 39; vol. ii., p. 70.]

The Duke de Rovigo, the d.u.c.h.ess d'Abrantes, Mdlle. Ducrest, the niece of the Countess de Genlis, Mdlle. d'Avrillon, General Lafayette, in a word, all who have written about that period who knew Josephine, bear similar testimony to her amiable disposition and her superior virtues.

In the same manner the man for whom, as Mdlle. Ducrest says, "she would gladly have given her life," Napoleon, in his conversations with his confidential friends at St. Helena, ever spoke of her. "In all positions of life, Josephine's demeanor and actions were always pleasant or bewitching," said he. "It would have been impossible ever to surprise her, however intrusive you might be, so as to produce a disagreeable impression. I always found her in the same humor; she had the same amiable complacency; she was good, gentle, and ever devoted to her husband in true affection. He never saw her in bad humor; she was always constantly busy in endeavoring to please him." [Footnote: "Memorial de Ste. Helene," vol. i. pp. 38, 79.]

And she pleased him more than any other woman; he loved her in these happy days of the consulate with all the affection of the first days of his marriage; his heart might now and then be drawn aside from her to other women, but it always returned true and loving to her.

And this woman, whom the future King of France called an "angel of goodness," and the future Emperor of France, "grace in person," is the one who entered the Tuileries at Bonaparte's side to bring again into France the tone of good society, refinement of manners, intellectual conversation, and a love for the arts and sciences.

She was fully conscious of this mission, and devoted herself with all the strength, energy, and perseverance of her character. Her drawing-room soon became the central rendezvous of men of science, art, learning, politics, and diplomacy, and to each Josephine knew how to address friendly and captivating words; she knew how to encourage every one by her n.o.ble affability, by her respectful interest in their works and plans--so much so that all strove to do as well as possible, and in her presence appeared more amiable than they otherwise would perhaps have been. Alongside of the distinguished men of every rank were seen the choicest company of ladies, young, beautiful, and captivating; the most intelligent women of the Faubourg St. Germain were not ashamed to appear in the drawing-room of the wife of the first consul, and thought that the glory of their old aristocratic names would not be tarnished by a.s.sociation with Madame Bonaparte, who by birth belonged to them, and formed a sort of connecting link between the departed royalty of the last century and the republicans of the present.

This republicanism was soon to hide itself behind the columns and mirrors of the large hall of reception in the Tuileries. Bonaparte--the first consul, and shortly to be consul for life--would have nothing to do with this republicanism, which reminded him of the days of terrorism, anarchy, and the guillotine; and the words "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity," which the revolution had written over the portals of the Tuileries, were obliterated by the consul of the republic. France had been sufficiently bled, and had suffered enough for these three words; it was now to rest under the shadow of legal order and of severe discipline, after its golden morning-dream of youth's enchanting hopes.

Bonaparte was to re-establish order and law; Josephine was to remodel society and the saloon; her mission was to unite the aristocracy of ancient France with the parvenues of the new; she was to be to the latter a teacher of refinement, and of the genuine manners and habits of so-called good society.

To accomplish this, the wife of the first consul needed the a.s.sistance of some ladies of those circles who had remained in lofty, haughty isolation; she needed the co-operation of the ladies of the Faubourg St. Germain. It is true they made their morning calls, and invited the former Viscountess de Beauharnais, with her daughter, to their evening receptions; but they carefully avoided being present at the evening circles of Madame Bonaparte, where their exclusiveness was beset with the danger of coming in contact with some "parvenu," or with some sprig of the army, or of the financial bureaus. Josephine therefore had to recruit her troops herself in the Faubourg St. Germain, so as to bring into her saloon the necessary contingent of the old legitimist aristocracy, and she found what she desired in a lady with whom she had been acquainted as Viscountess de Beauharnais, and who then had ever shown herself kind and friendly. This lady was the Countess de Montesson, the morganatic wife of the Duke d'Orleans, the father of the Duke Philippe Egalite, who, after betraying the monarchy to the revolution, was betrayed by the revolution, and, like his royal relatives, Louis and Marie Antoinette, had perished on the scaffold!

Soon after his entrance into the Tuileries, the first consul invited, through his wife, the Countess de Montesson to visit him, and when she was announced he advanced to meet her with an unusual expression of friends.h.i.+p, and endeavored with great condescension to make her say in what manner he could please her or be of service to her.

"General," said Madame de Montesson, much surprised, "I have no right whatever to claim any thing from you."

Bonaparte smiled. "You are mistaken," said he; "I have been under many obligations to you for a long time past. Do you not know that to you I am indebted for my first laurels? You came with the Duke d'Orleans to Brienne for the purpose of distributing the prizes at the great examination, and when you placed on my head the laurel-crown, which has since been followed by others, you said, 'May it bring you happiness!'

It is commonly believed that I am a fatalist; it is therefore very natural that I should not have forgotten my first coronation, and that it is still fresh in my memory. It would afford me much pleasure to be of service to you; besides, you can be useful to me. The tone of good society has nearly perished in France; we would like to renew it again with your a.s.sistance. I need some of the traditions of days gone by--you can a.s.sist my wife with them; and when a distinguished foreigner comes to Paris you can give him a reception which will convince him that nowhere else can so much gentleness and amiableness be found."

[Footnote: "Memoires de Mdlle. Ducrest," vol. i., p. 9.]

That Madame de Montesson might have a striking proof of Bonaparte's good-will, he renewed her yearly pension of one hundred and eighty thousand francs, which the duke had donated to her in his will, and which Bonaparte restored to her as the property which the revolution had confiscated for the nation's welfare. She manifested her grat.i.tude to the first consul for this liberal pension by opening the saloons to the "parvenues of the Tuileries;" and leading the aristocrats of the Faubourg St. Germain into the drawing-rooms of Josephine, and then a.s.sisting her to form out of these elements a court whose lofty and brilliant centre was to be Josephine herself. The ladies of the Faubourg St. Germain were no longer ashamed to appear at the new court of the Tuileries, but excused themselves by saying: "We flatter Josephine, so as to keep her on our side, and to strengthen her loyalty to the king.

She will, by her entrancing eloquence, persuade the consul to recall our King Louis XVIII., and give him his crown."

But too soon, alas! were they made aware of their error. It was not long before they became convinced that, if Bonaparte's hands were busy in raising a throne, in lifting up from the earth the fallen crown of royalty, he was not doing this to place it on the brow of the Count de Lille; he had a nearer object in view--he considered his own head better suited to wear it.

The conqueror of terrorism and of the revolution was not inclined to be defeated by the enemies of the republic, who were approaching the frontiers of France, to restore the Bourbons. He took up the glove which Austria had thrown down--for she had made alliance with England.

On the 6th of May, 1800, Bonaparte left Paris, marched with his army over Mount St. Bernard, and a.s.sumed the chief command of the army in Italy, which recently had suffered so many disastrous defeats from Suwarrow and the Archduke Charles.

At Marengo, on the 14th of June, Bonaparte obtained a brilliant triumph.

Soon after, at Hohenlinden, Moreau also defeated the Austrians. These two decisive victories forced Austria to make peace with France, to abandon her alliance with England--that is to say, with the monarchical principles; and, at the peace ratified in the beginning of the year 1801 at Limeville, to concede to France the grand-duchy of Tuscany.

In July, Bonaparte returned in triumph to France, and was received by the people with enthusiastic acclamations. Paris was brilliantly illuminated on the day of his return, and round about the Tuileries arose the shouts of the people, who with applauding voices demanded to see the conqueror of Marengo, and would not remain quiet until he appeared on the balcony. Even Bonaparte was touched by this enthusiasm of the French people; as he retreated from the balcony and retired into his cabinet, he said to Bourrienne. "Listen! The people shout again and again; they still send their acclamations toward me. I love those sounds; they are nearly as sweet as Josephine's voice. How proud and happy I am to be loved by such a people!" [Footnote: Bourrienne, vol.

v., p. 35.]

CHAPTER x.x.xIV. THE INFERNAL MACHINE.

The victory of Marengo, which had pleased the people, had filled the royalists with terror and fear, and destroyed their hopes of a speedy restoration of the monarchy, making them conscious of its fruitless pretensions. With the frenzy of hatred and the bitterness of revenge they turned against the first consul, who was not now their expected savior of the monarchy, but a usurper who wanted to gain France for himself.

The royalists and the republicans united for the same object. Both parties longed to destroy Bonaparte: the one to re-establish the republic of the year 1793, and the other the throne of the Bourbons.

Everywhere conspiracies and secret a.s.sociations were organized, and the watchful and active police discovered in a few months more than ten plots, the aim of which was to murder Bonaparte.

Josephine heard this with sorrow and fear, with tears of anxiety and love. She had now given her whole heart and soul to Bonaparte, and it was the torment of martyrdom to see him every day threatened by a.s.sa.s.sins and by invisible foes, who from dark and hidden places drew their daggers at him. Her love surrounded him with vigilant friends and servants, who sought to discover every danger and to remove it from his path.

When he was coming to Malmaison, Josephine before his arrival would send her servants to search every hiding-place in the park, to see if in some shady grove a murderer might not be secreted; she entreated Junot or Murat to send scouts from Paris on the road to Malmaison to remove all suspicious persons from it. Yet her heart trembled with anxiety when she knew him to be on the way, and, when he had safely arrived, she would receive him with rapture, as if he had just escaped an imminent danger, and would make him laugh by the exclamations of joy with which she greeted him as one saved from danger.

In the anxiety of her watchful love she made herself acquainted with all the details of the discovered conspiracies of both the Jacobins and royalists. She knew there were two permanent conspiracies at work, though their leaders had been discovered and led into prison.

One of these conspiracies had been organized by the old Jacobins, the republicans of the Convention; and these bands of the "enraged," as they called themselves, numbered in their ranks all the enemies of const.i.tutional order, all the men of the revolution of 1789; and all these men had sworn with solemn oaths to kill Bonaparte, and to deliver the republic from her greatest and most dangerous enemy.

The other conspiracy, which had its ramifications throughout France, was formed by the royalists. "The Society of the White Mantle" was mostly composed of Chouans, daring men of Vendee, who were ever ready to sacrifice their lives to the mere notion of royalty, and who like the Jacobins had sworn to murder Bonaparte.

Chevalier, who, with his ingenious infernal machine, sought to kill Bonaparte on his way to Malmaison, belonged to the Society of the White Mantle. But he was betrayed by his confidant and a.s.sociate Becyer, who a.s.sisted the police to arrest him. To the conspiracy of the "enraged"

belonged the Italians Ceracchi, Arena, and Diana, who at the opera, when the consul appeared in his loge, and was greeted by the acclamations of the people, were ready to fire their pistols at him. But at the moment they were about to commit the deed from behind the side-scenes, where they had hidden themselves, they were seized, arrested, and led to prison by the police. Josephine, as already said, knew all these conspiracies; she trembled for Bonaparte's life, and yet she could not prevent him from appearing in public, and she herself, smiling and apparently unsuspecting, had to appear at Bonaparte's side at the grand parades, in the national festivities, and at the theatrical performances; no feature on her face was to betray the anxiety she was enduring.

One day, however, not only Bonaparte's life but also that of Josephine, was imperilled by the conspirators; the famous infernal machine which had been placed on their way to the opera, would have killed the first consul and his wife, if a red Persian shawl had not saved them both.

At the grand opera, that evening, was to be performed Joseph Haydn's masterpiece, "The Creation." The Parisians awaited this performance with great expectation; they rushed to the opera, not only to hear the oratorio, the fame of which had spread from Vienna to Paris, but also to see Bonaparte and his wife, who it was known would attend the performance.

Josephine had requested Bonaparte to be present at this great musical event, for she knew that the public would be delighted at his presence.

He at first manifested no desire to do so, for he was not sufficiently versed in musical matters for it to afford him much enjoyment; and besides, there was but one kind of music he liked, and that was the Italian, the richness of whose melody pleased him, while the German and French left him dissatisfied and weary. However, Bonaparte gave way to the entreaties of Josephine, and resolved to drive to the opera.

The dinner that day had been somewhat later than usual, for besides Josephine, her children, and Bonaparte's sister Caroline, Murat, the Generals Bessieres and Lannes, as well as Bonaparte's two adjutants, Lebrun and Rapp, had been present. Immediately after dinner they wanted to drive to the opera; but as Josephine lingered behind, busy with the arrangement of her shawl, Bonaparte declared he would drive in advance with the two Generals Bessieres and Lebrun, while Rapp was to accompany the ladies in the second carriage. With his usual rapidity of action he seized his hat and sword, and, followed by his companions, left the room to go to the carriage, which was waiting.

Josephine, who imagined that Bonaparte was waiting for her at the carriage, hurriedly put on, without troubling herself any longer about the becoming arrangement of the folds, a red Persian shawl, which Bonaparte had sent her as a present from Egypt. She was going to leave, when Rapp, with the openness of a soldier, made the remark that she had not put on her shawl to-day with her accustomed elegance. She smiled, and begged him to arrange it after the fas.h.i.+on of Egyptian ladies. Rapp laughingly hastened to comply with her wishes; and while Josephine, Madame Murat, and Hortense, watched attentively the arrangement of the shawl in the hands of Rapp, Bonaparte's carriage was heard moving away.

This noise put a speedy end to all further movements, and Josephine, with the ladies and Rapp, hastened to follow Bonaparte. Their carriage had no sooner reached the Place de Carrousel, than an appalling explosion was heard, and a bright flame like a lightning-flash filled the whole place with its glare; at the same moment the windows of the carriage were broken into fragments, which flew in every direction into the carriage, and one of which penetrated so deep into the arm of Hortense, that the blood gushed out. Josephine uttered a cry of horror--"Bonaparte is murdered!" At the same moment were heard loud shrieks and groans.

Rapp, seized with fear, and only thinking that Bonaparte was in danger, sprang out of the carriage, and, careless of the wounded and bleeding, who lay near, ran onward to the opera to find out if Bonaparte had safely reached there. While the ladies, in mortal agony, remained on the Place de Carrousel, not knowing whether to return to the Tuileries or to drive forward, a messenger arrived at full speed to announce that the first consul had not been hurt, and that he was waiting for his wife in his loge, and begged her to come without delay. Meanwhile Rapp had reached the opera, and had penetrated into the box of the first consul.

Bonaparte was seated calmly and unmoved in his accustomed place, examining the audience through his gla.s.s, and now and then addressing a few words to the secretary of police, Fouche, who stood near him.

No sooner did Bonaparte see Rapp, than he said hastily, and in a low voice--"Josephine?"

At that moment she entered, followed by Madame Murat and Hortense.

Bonaparte saluted them with a smile, and with a look of unfathomable love he extended his hand to Josephine. She was still pale and trembling, although she had no conception of the greatness of the danger which had menaced her.

Bonaparte endeavored to quiet her by stating that the explosion was probably the result of some accident or imprudence; but at this moment the prefect of the police entered who had been on the spot, and had come to give a report of the dreadful effects of the explosion. Fifteen persons had been killed, more than thirty had been severely wounded, and about forty houses seriously damaged. This was all the work of a so-called infernal machine--a small barrel filled with powder and quicksilver--which had been placed in a little carriage at the entrance of the Hue St. Nicaise.

Until now Josephine did not realize the extent of the danger which had threatened her and her husband. Had the explosion taken place a few moments before, it would have killed the consul; if it had been one minute later, Josephine and her companions would have been involved in the catastrophe. It was the shawl which Rapp was arranging on her shoulders according to the rules of art, which caused them to r.e.t.a.r.d their departure, and thus saved her life.

An inexpressible horror now seized her and made her tremble; her looks, full of love and deep anguish, were fixed on Bonaparte, who, in a low voice, entreated her to compose herself, and not to make her distress public. Near Josephine sat Hortense, pale and agitated, like her mother; around her wounded arm was wrapped a handkerchief, stained here and there with blood. Madame Murat was quiet and composed, like Bonaparte, who was then giving instructions to the prefect of police to provide immediate a.s.sistance for the unfortunate persons who had been wounded.

No one yet in the audience knew the appalling event. The thundering noise had been heard, but it was presumed to have been an artillery salute, and no evil was suspected, for Bonaparte, with his usual guards, had entered his box, and, advancing to its very edge, had saluted the public in a friendly way. This act of the first consul had its ordinary effect: the audience, indifferent to the music, rose and saluted their hero with loud acclamation and applause. Not till Josephine entered the loge had the acclamations subsided, and the music begun again. A few minutes after, the news of the fearful event spread all over the house: a murmur arose, and the music was interrupted anew.

The d.u.c.h.ess d'Abrantes, who was present at this scene, gives a faithful, eloquent, and graphic picture of it:

"A vague noise," says she, "began to spread from the parterre to the orchestra, and from the amphitheatre to the boxes. Soon the news of the occurrence was known all over the house, when, like a sudden clap of thunder, an acclamation burst forth, and the whole audience, with a single undivided look of love, seemed to desire to embrace Bonaparte.

What I am narrating I have seen, and I am not the only one who saw it.