Array Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne - The Collected Works of Napoleon Bonaparte

Later, Marie Louise became jealous of this, and poor Josephine had to go to the château of Navarre, and finally to leave France.

Queen of Naples. —For some reason Napoleon had not wanted this sister at Paris this winter, and had written her to this effect from Schoenbrunn on October 15th. "If you were not so far off, and the season so advanced, I would have asked Murat to spend two months in Paris. But you cannot be there before December, which is a horrible season, especially for a Neapolitan." 83But sister Caroline, "with the head of a Cromwell on the shoulders of a pretty woman," was not easy to lead; and her husband had in consequence to bear the full weight of the Emperor's displeasure. Murat's finances were in disorder, and Napoleon wrote Champagny on December 30th to tell Murat plainly that if the borrowed money was not returned to France, it would be taken by main force. 84

The hunt. —In pouring rain, in the forest of St. Germain.

No. 4.

Thursday, December 21st, is the date.

The weather is very damp. —Making Malmaison as unhealthy as its very name warranted, and rendering more difficult the task which Madame de Rémusat had set herself of resting Josephine mentally by tiring her physically. This typical toady—Napoleon's Eavesdropper Extraordinary—had arrived at Malmaison on December 18th. She writes on the Friday (December 22nd), beseeching her husband to advise the Emperor to moderate the tone of his letters, especially this one (Thursday, December 21st), which had upset Josephine frightfully. Surely a more harmless letter was never penned. But it is the Rémusat all over; she lives in a chronic atmosphere of suspicion that all her letters are read by the Emperor, and therefore, like Stevenson's nursery rhymes, they are always written with "one eye on the grown-up person" 85—on the grown-up person par excellence of France and the century. The opening of letters by the government was doubtless a blemish, which, however, Napoleon tried to neutralise by entrusting the Post Office to his wife's relative, Lavalette, a man whose ever-kind heart prevented this necessary espionage degenerating into unnecessary interference with individual rights.

No. 5.

Date probably Sunday, December 24th.

King of Bavaria. —Eugène had gone to Meaux to meet his father-in-law, who had put off the "dog's humour" which he had shown since the 16th.

No. 6.

Josephine had gone by special invitation to dine at the little Trianon with Napoleon on Christmas Day, and Madame d'Avrillon says she had a very happy day there. "On her return she told me how kind the Emperor had been to her, that he had kept her all the evening, saying the kindest things to her." Aubenas says, "The repast was eaten in silence and gloom," but does not give his authority. Eugène, moreover, confirms Madame d'Avrillon in his letter to his wife of December 26th: "My dear Auguste, the Emperor came on Sunday to see the Empress. Yesterday she went to Trianon to see him, and stayed to dinner. The Emperor was very kind and amiable to her, and she seemed to be much better. Everything points to the Empress being more happy in her new position, and we also." On this Christmas Day Napoleon had his last meal with Josephine.

No. 7.

Tuileries. —His return from Trianon to this, his official residence, made the divorce more apparent to every one.

No. 8.

A house vacant in Paris. —This seems a hint for Josephine. She wishes to come to Paris, to the Élysée, and to try a little diplomacy of her own in favour of the Austrian match, and she sends secretly to Madame de Metternich—whose husband was absent. Eugène more officially is approaching Prince Schwartzenberg, the ambassador. Josephine, like Talleyrand, wished to heal the schism with Rome by an Austrian alliance; while Cambacérès, foreseeing a war with the power not allied by marriage, would have preferred the Russian match.

No. 9.

Thursday, January 4th.

Hortense. —Louis had tried to obtain a divorce. Cambacérès was ordered on December 22nd to summon a family council ( New Letters of Napoleon I. , No. 234); but the wish of the King was refused (verbally, says Louis in his Historical Documents of Holland ), whereupon he refused to agree to Josephine's divorce, but had to give way, and was present at what he calls the farewell festival given by the city of Paris to the Empress Josephine on January 1st. The ecclesiastical divorce was pronounced on January 12th.

No. 10.

January 5th. He duly visits Josephine the next day.

No. 11.

January 7th is the date.

What charms your society has. —Her repertoire of small talk and scandal. He had also lost in her his Agenda, his Journal of Paris. Still the visits are growing rarer. This long kind letter was doubtless intended to be specially so, for two days later the clergy of Paris pronounced the annulment of her marriage. This was far worse than the pronouncement by the Senate in December, as it meant to her that she and Napoleon had never been properly married at all. The Emperor, who hated divorces, and especially divorcées , had found great difficulty in breaking down the barriers he had helped to build, for which purpose he had to be subordinated to his own Senate, the Pope to his own bishops. Seven of them allowed the annulment of the marriage of 1804 on account of (1) its secrecy, (2) the insufficiency of consent of the contracting parties, and (3) the absence of the local parish priest at the ceremony. The last reason was merely a technical one; but with respect to the first two it is only fair to admit that Napoleon had undoubtedly, and perhaps for the only time in his life, been completely "rushed," i.e. by the Pope and Josephine. The coronation ceremony was waiting, and the Pope, secretly solicited by Josephine, insisted on a religious marriage first and foremost. The Pope suffered forthwith, but the other bill of costs was not exacted till five years after date.

No. 12.

Wednesday, January 12th.

King of Westphalia. —Madame Durand ( Napoleon and Marie Louise ) says that, forced to abandon his wife (the beautiful and energetic Miss Paterson) and child, Jerome "had vowed he would never have any relations with a wife who had been thus forced upon him." For three years he lavished his attentions upon almost all the beauties of the Westphalian court. The queen, an eye-witness of this conduct, bore it with mild and forbearing dignity; she seemed to see and hear nothing; in short, her demeanour was perfect. The king, touched by her goodness, weary of his conquests, and repentant of his behaviour, was only anxious for an opportunity of altering the state of things. Happily the propitious moment presented itself. The right wing of the palace of Cassel, in which the queen's apartments were situated, took fire; alarmed by the screams of her women the queen awoke and sprang out of her bed, to be caught in the arms of the king and carried to a place of safety. From that time forth the royal couple were united and happy.

No. 13.

Saturday, January 13th.

Sensible. —This was now possible after a month's mourning. In the early days, according to Madame Rémusat, her mind often wandered, But Napoleon himself encouraged the Court to visit her, and the road to Malmaison was soon a crowded one. As the days passed, however, life became sadly monotonous. Reading palled on Josephine, as did whist and the daily feeding of her golden pheasants and guinea-fowls. Remained "Patience"! Was it the "General" she played or the "Emperor," or did she find distraction in the "Demon"?

No. 14.

D'Audenarde. —Napoleon's handsome equerry, whom Mlle. d'Avrillon calls "un homme superbe." His mother was Josephine's favourite dame du palais . Madame Lalaing, Viscountess d'Audenarde, née Peyrac, was one of the old régime who had been ruined by the Revolution.