Engraved by Audouin, after Laurent. This portrait “Joséphine impératrice des Français, reine d’Italie,” is surrounded by an elaborate frame of Imperial emblems. After the divorce, Josephine’s portrait was erased from the plate, and that of Marie Louise inserted.
The rapid recovery of fortune which followed the reverse at Essling soon reassured Josephine. She saw from Napoleon’s letters that, however his critics might feel that his star was waning, he himself had not lost courage. He scorned their exultation. “They have made an appointment to meet at my tomb,” he said, “but they’ll not dare carry it out.” His deeds verified his words. In rapid succession, he sent Josephine announcements of the series of victories which marked the latter half of June, 1809, and which culminated in Wagram on July 6th. A week later she received notice of the suspension of hostilities.
Once more the Empress breathed freely; Napoleon was safe, and he was victorious. Now his letters were longer, gayer, tenderer than they had been for many months. He rejoiced in the reports she sent him from Plombières of her gaining strength. “I am glad the waters are doing you so much good,” he wrote; and again, “I hear that you are stout, rosy, and looking very well.” He made no objection to the plans she suggested for herself. Stay at Plombières if she wished, why not; and when she is ready in August, go to Paris. If her letters are long in coming, he chides her. “I have received no letters from you for several days. The pleasures at Malmaison, the beautiful hot-houses and gardens, make you forget me. That’s the way it goes, they say.” As the time approached for his return—the negotiations at Schönbrunn which followed the war lasted into October—he began to show something like eagerness. Every day he sent a brief note of his coming return. “I’ll let you know twenty-four hours before my arrival.” “I shall make a fête of our reunion. I am waiting for the moment impatiently.” True, there was nothing of the lover in these daily bulletins (it was hardly to be expected when we remember that, during most of the campaign of 1809, Mme. de Walewski was living in a palace in Vienna, where Napoleon saw her constantly); but there was confidence, affection, interest; no sign at all of an approaching separation; and yet Napoleon undoubtedly left Schönbrunn in October persuaded that the divorce was a necessity and resolved to tell Josephine of his decision as soon as he arrived in France.
CHAPTER VIII
NAPOLEON RETURNS TO FRANCE—JOSEPHINE’S UNHAPPINESS—NAPOLEON’S VIEW OF A DIVORCE—THE WAY IN WHICH THE DIVORCE WAS EFFECTED
Unhappily for the Empress, her reunion with Napoleon was marred by a delay which irritated the Emperor no little. Josephine was at St. Cloud when she received a note, about October 24th or 25th, from Napoleon, saying he would be at Fontainebleau on the 26th or 27th, and that she had better go there with her suite. A later courier set the evening of the 27th as the time of his arrival. What was Josephine’s terror on having a messenger ride rapidly in from Fontainebleau on the afternoon of the 26th, saying the Emperor had arrived that morning and there had been no one but the concierge to meet him! It could not be denied that such a reception was a poor one for a conquering Emperor who now for the first time in six months set foot in his kingdom. Josephine feared, with reason, that Napoleon would be irritated, and now of all times when she needed so much to please him!
Post haste she drove to Fontainebleau. The Emperor did not come to meet her, and she was forced to mount to his library, where his scant welcome chilled her to the heart. He meant to announce the divorce then. She soon found, however, that it was the Emperor’s resentment at what he considered her fault in failing to meet him that caused his coldness. A trembling explanation, a few tears, and he was appeased, and they passed a happy evening.
Napoleon had taken quite another means, and a most disquieting one, to hint to Josephine that the divorce was under consideration. The apartments of the Emperor and Empress at Fontainebleau, as at other places, were connected by a private staircase. When Josephine looked about her suite, which had been newly decorated, she discovered that this passage had been sealed up. In consternation, she sought a friend of hers in Napoleon’s household, and asked why this had been done, by whose orders. She could get no satisfaction, nothing but evasive answers, halting explanations. Alarmed, yet fearing to approach the Emperor, she showed a troubled face and tear-stained eyes. Now, nothing ever had disturbed Napoleon more than to see Josephine in sorrow. The sight, and the knowledge of the cause, unnerved him now. He took a course characteristic of an autocratic man, accustomed to implicit obedience from associates, when he has determined to force some one he loves to do a distasteful act; he avoided Josephine’s presence, scarcely ever exchanged a word with her that the etiquette of the court did not require, rarely met her gaze. The Empress felt that his coldness could mean but one thing. She soon began to hear whispers of the decision in the court, for the Emperor had made his resolution known to several persons, and the necessary preparations were already making. Josephine could not but see, at the same time, that her enemies—the Bonaparte family and their allies—and those about her who were mere time-servers had changed materially in their attitude toward her. There was more than one lord or lady who did not hesitate to neglect, even slight, the Empress. She was a person whom it was no longer necessary to cultivate; and, besides, might not the Emperor take it as a compliment to his judgment to see that she whom he was to discard was ignored by his followers?
Josephine’s uncertainty as to precisely what the divorce meant made her alarm the greater. She undoubtedly saw in it at this time nothing but a disgrace and a punishment. She was to be cast out—her honors stripped from her, her friends driven away, her luxury at an end. Not only must she be separated from the Emperor, whom she loved and to whose happiness and success she believed superstitiously that she was necessary; but no doubt she would be driven from France. She saw herself in exile, poor, friendless, alone,—she who had been the Empress of France, the consort of Napoleon. And her children: her downfall meant theirs. Hortense, whose happiness had been wrecked by her marriage, what now would become of her? And Eugène, whom the Emperor had so loved and trusted and honored, what of him?
But Josephine’s idea of the divorce as a disgrace and punishment was not Napoleon’s. That he had never explained to her what he meant, was due to his own cowardice. In 1807, he had succumbed entirely, when the subject came up, and put the thought aside. Now he clung to his decision, but lacked courage to break it to her. He feigned irritation and coldness to hide his own faint-heartedness.
As a matter of fact, Napoleon regarded the divorce as a great state affair. To perpetuate France’s peace, stability, glory, an heir was necessary; therefore he and Josephine who loved each other parted. They suffered that France might live. The divorce then, was to be regarded as a sacrificial rite, and Josephine was to be placed before the country as a noble victim to whom the greatest honor then and ever should be shown. Such was Napoleon’s idea, and quietly, in this month after his return from Schönbrunn, he was preparing a ceremony which would put the affair in this light to the country. It was for this reason he summoned all the members of the Bonaparte and Beauharnais families from far and near; that he gathered in France all that was great in the Empire and among his allies; that he made Fontainebleau a veritable court of kings. To poor Josephine all of this looked like a cruel device to parade her grief and dishonor.
THE DIVORCE OF NAPOLEON AND JOSEPHINE.
About the middle of November, the court came to Paris; but still the Emperor delayed, he could not say the word. The constraint between the two became constantly greater; the suffering of both, it was evident to all their intimate friends, was increasing. At last, on November 30th, after a silent and wretched dinner, Napoleon led Josephine into a salon, dismissed their followers, and told her of his decision. Josephine grasping nothing in his broken words but that they were to be separated, burst into tears, and fell upon a couch, where she lay sobbing aloud. She was carried to her apartment, where her attendants vainly sought to check her wild grief. Nor was her calm restored until late in the evening, when Hortense came to her with an explanation of the situation, which seems to have been entirely new to her mind. The Emperor, overwhelmed by Josephine’s outburst, had strengthened his own mind by summoning immediately to his side certain advisors who favored the divorce. After talking with them, he had sent for Hortense, and begun rather brutally by telling her that tears would do no good, that he had made up his mind that the divorce was necessary to the safety of the Empire, and that she and her mother must accept it as inevitable. Hortense replied with dignity that the Empress, whatever her grief, would obey his will, and that she and Eugène would follow her into exile; that none of them would complain at their disgrace, that all would remember his past kindness. This seems to have been Napoleon’s first glimmer of the idea of the divorce which the Beauharnais entertained. He began to weep. “What!” he cried, “do you and Eugène mean to desert me? You must not do it, you must stay with me. Your position, the future of your children, require it. However cruel the divorce for both your mother and me, it must be consummated with the dignity which the circumstances require.” Everything which could be done to soften the situation for Josephine should be done, he said. She should remain the first in rank after the Empress on the throne. She should receive the honors due her sacrifice; she should remain in France. Her income should be fit for her rank, she should be given palaces, a retinue—all that a grateful France could do, in short, should be done. As for Hortense and Eugène, he looked upon them as his children, and should do for them as he would for his own.
This new idea of her fate had great effect on Josephine; and when her friends came to her to console her, weep as she might, she defended Napoleon, and presented the divorce as a sacrifice which they were together making for France. “The Emperor is as nearly heart-broken as I am,” she sobbed. “It cannot be helped. There must be an heir to consolidate the Empire.”
Now that Josephine knew his decision, Napoleon’s reserve and coldness passed. He gave her every attention, tried to anticipate every wish, enveloped her in tenderness. This change of demeanor surprised and confused the court, where as yet the divorce was a matter of conjecture to all save Napoleon’s confidential advisors. Had he changed his mind? As they saw the Empress smilingly going through the great fêtes, they began to say that after all he had not had the courage to make the separation. Napoleon’s kindly attitude seems to have given Josephine a hope that he had changed his mind. But a week after her interview with him, Eugène arrived in Paris, and she knew soon that divorce was inevitable and that the first steps were already taken to consummate it. Another distressing interview between herself and the Emperor followed, at which Eugène was present, and here again Napoleon promised her his care, his affection, a continued interest in her children. When she left this interview, she knew that in a few days more the court, Paris, France, would know of her fate. Overwhelmed as she was, weak with constant weeping in private, a prey to a hundred unreasonable fears as to her future, Josephine nevertheless went through her duties in these last days with a brave face and a sweet smile. Never did she win more favor from the better part of the court; never did she deserve it more than for her courage at this moment.
December 15th was set for the first act in the official part of the drama. At nine o’clock in the morning, Josephine went to the salon of the Emperor, accompanied by Eugène and Hortense. Here she found assembled all of the members of the Bonaparte family, who were in Paris, Napoleon, King Louis, King Jerome, King Murat and the Queens of Spain, Naples, and Westphalia, together with the French Arch-Chancellor and the Minister of State. The ceremony was opened at once by Napoleon. If any of the Bonapartes hoped to see Josephine humiliated at last, they must have been grievously disappointed. Every word of the Emperor was intended to place her in the eyes of France as its chief benefactor and friend—the woman who sacrificed herself for the country’s good. Napoleon’s remarks to the little company show exactly the interpretation he wished placed on the act, and there is no reason to believe that he was not sincere in what he said at this time. In a voice broken by agitation, he announced that he and the Empress had resolved to have their marriage annulled. Addressing the Arch-Chancellor, he said:
“I sent you a sealed letter dated to-day, directing you to come to my study, in order to make known to you the resolution that the Empress, my most dear wife, and I have taken. I am glad that the kings, queens, and princes, my brothers and sisters, my brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law, my step-daughter and my step-son, my son by adoption, as well as my mother, are present at the interview. My politics, the interest and need of my people, which have always guided my actions, make it necessary that I should leave children behind me, heirs of my love for this people and of this throne where providence has placed me. However, I have abandoned all hope now for several years of having children by my beloved wife, the Empress Josephine. It is this which has led me to sacrifice the sweetest affections of my heart and to listen only to the idea of the good of the State, and consequently to dissolve our marriage. Arrived at the age of forty years, I dare hope that I shall live long enough to rear, according to my own ideas, the children that it shall please Providence to give me. God knows how much this resolution has cost me; but there is no sacrifice that is beyond my courage when I am convinced that it will be useful to France. I must add, that far from ever having had any reason to complain of my wife, I can only praise her love and tenderness. For fifteen years she has been the ornament of my life. The recollection will always remain engraved on my heart; she has been crowned by my hand, and I mean that she shall preserve the rank and title of Empress, and I hope that above all she will never doubt my feelings toward her and that she will always consider me her best and truest friend.”
When the Emperor ceased to speak, Josephine attempted to read the little address which had been prepared for her, but her voice failed her, and she passed her paper to one of the party:—
“With the permission of my august and dear husband,” so her speech read, “I declare that having given up all hope of bearing the children which would satisfy the political needs and the welfare of France, I am glad to give to him the greatest proof of attachment and devotion which has ever been given in this world. All that I have I hold because of his goodness; it was his hand which crowned me, and from my throne I have received only affection and love from the French people. I believe I am showing my gratitude for these benefits by consenting to the dissolution of a marriage which henceforth is an obstacle to the welfare of France, which deprives her of the happiness of being one day governed by the descendants so evidently raised up by Providence to wipe out the evils of a terrible revolution and reëstablish the altar, throne, and social order; but the dissolution of my marriage can never change the feelings of my heart. In me the Emperor will always have his best friend. I know how much this act, demanded by politics and by high interests, has wounded his heart, but we both glory in the sacrifice that we make for the good of the country.”
The day following this scene, the necessary formalities were gone through in the Senate. Eugène, then Viceroy of Italy, took the oath of Senator that day, and later spoke on the divorce. The interpretation he gave of the separation was that which Napoleon had devised. “You have just listened to the reading of the project which the Senate submits to you for deliberation,” Eugène said. “Under the circumstances, I think that it is my duty to express to you the feelings of my family. My mother, my sister, and myself owe everything to the Emperor; he has been a veritable father to us; he will find in us at all times devoted children and submissive subjects. It is essential to the happiness of France that the founder of this fourth dynasty should be surrounded by direct descendants who will be a guarantee to everybody, a safeguard of the people, of the country. When my mother was crowned before the whole nation by the hands of her august husband, she contracted the obligation to sacrifice all her affections to the good of France; she has fulfilled her duty with courage, nobility, and dignity; her heart has often been wrung by the painful struggles of a man accustomed to conquer fortune and to march forward always with a firm step toward the accomplishment of great designs. The tears that this resolution has cost the Emperor are sufficient to glorify my mother. In her new situation she will not be a stranger to the new prosperity that we expect, and it will be with a satisfaction mingled with pride that she will look upon the happiness that her sacrifices have brought to the country and to the Emperor.”
The articles annulling the marriage and fixing Josephine’s future state were passed at the same session. They read:—
Article I. The marriage contracted between the Emperor Napoleon and the Empress Josephine is hereby dissolved.
Article II. The Empress Josephine will preserve the title and the rank of a crowned Empress.
Article III. Her annual income is fixed at two million francs [$400,000], to be paid from the treasury of the State.
Article IV. All the obligations taken by the Emperor for the Empress Josephine out of the public treasury are obligatory upon his successors.
Article V. The present senatus-consulte shall be sent by a messenger to Her Majesty, the Empress Queen.
That afternoon Napoleon, after a heart-breaking scene with Josephine, left the Tuileries for the Trianon. A few hours later Josephine, exhausted by weeping, entered her carriage, and in a heavy storm was driven to Malmaison.
CHAPTER IX
AFTER THE DIVORCE—NAVARRE—JOSEPHINE’S SUSPICIONS OF THE EMPEROR—HER GRADUAL RETURN TO HAPPINESS
Although divorced, Josephine was still Empress of the French People, and her income and her position were in keeping with her title. By the decree of the Senate, her income was fixed at 2,000,000 francs ($400,000), but the Emperor found means of increasing this, by making her many splendid presents, and by ordering that any unusual outlay, such as that for repairs at Malmaison, be paid from the civil list. She was to have three separate homes: Malmaison, always her favorite residence, upon the chateau and grounds of which she had for years lavished money, and in which she had carried out every fantasy of building, decoration and gardening, that entered her head; the Elysée Palace in Paris, at present the residence of the presidents of the French Republic; and Navarre, a chateau near Evreux.
Not only did Josephine receive money and property; Napoleon took care that her suite was in keeping with her rank. It was as large, indeed, as that of many of the reigning sovereigns of Europe, and included some of the cleverest and wittiest men and women of France. To the Emperor’s honor, the persons chosen were all of them in sympathy with the Empress and loved by her. More than one of those in Josephine’s household, indeed, would have been welcomed in the suite of Marie Louise; but being offered their choice, remained with Josephine. Mme. de Remusat was a notable example. She stayed with Josephine solely because of her affection and sense of loyalty and in spite of the fact that her husband was the First Chamberlain of Napoleon.
If Josephine had any idea that her divorce was going to separate her from Paris and the society of her friends, she immediately found out her mistake. The day after her arrival at Malmaison, in spite of a heavy shower, the road from Paris was one long line of carriages of persons hastening to the chateau to pay her their respects. Those persons who did stay away because uncertain whether the Emperor was sincere in his declaration that Josephine was to keep her rank as Empress had to submit to severe reproofs. “Have you been to see the Empress Josephine?” he began to ask, after a day or two, and if the courtier said no, the Emperor frowned and said, “You must go, sir!” And as a result everybody did go, and continued to go. Indeed, later in the winter, when Josephine came to the Elysée for a short time, her house was a veritable court.
But Josephine had received a blow which wealth, rank, and friends could not cure. The man who once had wearied her by his passion and who had had to beg and threaten to persuade her to pass a week with him in Italy, had in turn become the object of as passionate affection as she was capable of feeling. She had for years now regarded his slightest wish. In devoting herself to Napoleon in order to save her position she had learned to love him. Her pain now was the greater because she could not believe that Napoleon meant it when he said that he still should love and protect her and that he should honor her for her sacrifice as never before. She seemed to feel that, after she had said good-by to him at the Tuileries, she would never see him again. She gave way utterly to her grief, weeping night and day. Napoleon kept his word, however. Two days after her arrival at Malmaison he came to see her and frequently in the days that followed, up to the time of his marriage with Marie Louise, at the end of March, he made her little visits. They were always formal, in the presence of attendants, but they did much to persuade the Empress that Napoleon intended to keep his promises to her. After every visit however, came paroxysms of weeping. Napoleon kept himself informed of Josephine’s state, and wrote her frequent notes, chiding her for this weakness, assuring her of his love, and begging her to have courage.
“I found you weaker than you should have been,” he wrote one day. “You have shown some courage; you must find a way of keeping it up. You must not give up to melancholy, you must try to be contented, and above all, take care of your health, which is so precious to me. If you love me, you ought to try to be strong and happy. You must not doubt my constant and tender friendship. You misunderstand entirely my feelings if you suppose that I can be happy when you are not happy, and above all, when you are not contented.”
“Savary told me that you were weeping yesterday,” he wrote another day. “I hope that you have been able to go out to-day. I am sending you the results of my hunt yesterday. I will come to see you just as soon as you will promise me that you have regained your self-control and that your courage has the upper hand. Good-by, dear; I am sad to-day, too, for I have need of knowing that you are satisfied and courageous.”
After returning to the Tuileries, he wrote her:—“Eugène told me that you were sad yesterday. That is not well, dear; it is contrary to what you promised me. It has been a sorrow to me to see the Tuileries again; the great palace seems empty, and I am lost here.”
The visits, the gifts, the letters of the Emperor really made the Empress worse rather than better; and finally Mme. de Remusat took the matter in hand.
“The Empress passed a most unhappy morning,” she wrote to her husband; “she received a few visits which only increased her grief, and then every time anything comes from the Emperor she goes off into a terrible paroxysm. Some way must be found to persuade the Emperor to moderate his expressions of regret and affection, for whenever he gives a sign of his own sadness she falls into despair, and really her head seems turned. I take care of her as well as I can, but she causes me the greatest sorrow. She is sweet, suffering, affectionate; in fact, everything that is calculated to tear one’s heart. In showing his affection, the Emperor only makes her worse. However she suffers, there is never a complaint escapes her; she is really as gentle as an angel.... Try, if you can, to have the Emperor write to her so as to encourage her, and let him never send anything in the evening, because that gives her a terrible night. She cannot endure his expressions of regret. Doubtless, she could endure coldness still less, but there must be a medium way. She was in such a state yesterday after the last letter of the Emperor that I was on the point of writing him myself at the Trianon.”
As time went on and Josephine found that she really had no reason to suspect the Emperor of withdrawing the friendship he had promised, she began to imagine that he meant to keep her always at Malmaison, never to allow her to go again to Paris. This alarm probably was due to gossip that reached her. She no doubt would have preferred remaining at Malmaison if this fear had not arisen. She was so overcome by suspicion that she tested his sincerity by asking permission to go to Paris. She did this in spite of the fact that the talk of the forthcoming marriage—not yet settled, but in full negotiation—was in everybody’s mouth. The Emperor’s reply to her request was kind. “I shall be glad to know that you are at the Elysée, and happy to see you oftener, for you know how much I love you.” In the course of this correspondence about her coming he could not help scolding her a little, however. “I have just told Eugène that you would rather listen to the gossip of the town than to what I tell you.”
And yet, even in this period of distress, Josephine was not idle; nor was she so selfish in her grief that she forgot her friends. Napoleon’s letters to her record more than one promise of a favor she had asked for somebody. She even interested herself actively in securing a princess for the Emperor. Summoning the Countess de Metternich of Austria, just arrived in Paris, she told her frankly that she should consider the sacrifice she had made a pure waste if the Emperor did not marry the Archduchess of Austria. At that time Napoleon had not decided on his future Empress; but the negotiations thus opened by Josephine enabled Metternich to prepare the way in Austria so that, when the time came, there were none of the delays which had irritated Napoleon in applying for the hand of the Russian princess as he did first. The negotiations for the hand of Marie Louise terminated favorably, and the wedding was set for March.
As the day drew near, a sense of the impropriety of Josephine remaining at Malmaison during the ceremonies, grew on Napoleon, and he asked her to spend the month of April at Navarre. She arrived there the very day that Marie Louise entered Paris. Navarre was not an attractive place to take possession of with a large household like Josephine’s at that season of the year, and the company, used to the luxury of Malmaison, found themselves obliged to camp out in great discomfort in an old, damp, half-furnished chateau, where neither doors nor windows would shut securely and where every chimney smoked. Repairs were quickly made, however, and furniture in quantities was sent from Paris. In the interval, the whole suite seems to have endured the experience good-naturedly, and Josephine made a really brave effort to adapt herself to her new situation and to forget her grief. She set herself to finding out the resources of her new estate, driving daily through the parks; she superintended the gardens, planned repairs and improvements in the chateau, looked up the poor and sick, invited in the people of Evreux whom she wanted to know, and every night played her favorite game of tric-trac with the bishop of the diocese. It was a good beginning for a useful and eventually a happy life for her, and all would have gone very well if she could have dismissed the idea that after all Napoleon did not mean to keep his promises to her—that it was only a question of time when he would lose his interest, withdraw his support, drive her from France.
Two weeks passed after the marriage, and no word came to her from the Emperor. In the meantime, she was receiving letters from Eugène and Hortense, who were required to be present at the ceremonies, and every member of her suite had daily bulletins of the gaieties at the capital and of its gossip. Hints reached her that it was probable the Emperor would not consider it proper for her to return soon to Malmaison, if he did at all. Her worry became a veritable panic, and before she had been three weeks at Navarre, she asked permission to return to Malmaison. It was granted at once; thereupon she sent the Emperor a stilted letter of thanks. Her letter and the reply it brought from the Emperor are excellent examples of the masculine and feminine ways of looking at the same situation. Josephine’s letter read:—
Sire:—I have just received from my son the assurance that your Majesty consents to my return to Malmaison and that you have been good enough to advance to me the money that I have asked to make the Chateau of Navarre habitable. This double favor, Sire, dissipates largely the unrest and even the fears that the long silence of your Majesty had awakened. I was afraid of being entirely banished from your mind; I see that I have not been. I am less unhappy to-day in consequence; I am even as happy as it will ever be possible for me to be.
At the end of the month I shall go to Malmaison since your Majesty sees no objection to it, but I should say to you, Sire, that I should not so soon take advantage of the liberty which your Majesty has given me if the house at Navarre did not need so many repairs, both on account of my health and that of my suite. My plan is to stay at Malmaison a very short time. I shall soon go to the Springs. But while I am at Malmaison your Majesty may be sure I shall live as if I were a thousand leagues from Paris. I have made a great sacrifice, Sire and each day I feel it more. However, this sacrifice shall be complete; your Majesty shall not be disturbed in your happiness by any expression of regrets on my part. I shall pray ceaselessly for your Majesty’s happiness, but your Majesty may be sure that I shall always respect his new situation; I shall respect it in silence, having confidence in the feeling that he once had for me. I shall not try to awaken any new proof of it; I shall trust in your justice and in your heart. I ask but one favor; it is that your Majesty shall deign to give me now and then some proof that I have a small place in your thoughts and a large place in your esteem and your friendship. This will soften my grief without, it seems to me, compromising that which is much more important than all to me, the happiness of your Majesty.
Napoleon replied:—
My Dear:—I received your letter of the 19th of April. The style is very bad. I am always the same; men like me never change. I do not know what Eugène could have said to you. I did not write you because you had not written me; my only desire is to be agreeable to you. I am glad that you are going to Malmaison and that you are contented. I shall go there to find out how you are and to give you news of myself. Now compare this letter with yours, and after that I will let you judge which is the more friendly, yours or mine. Good-bye, my dear. Take care of yourself, and be just to yourself and to me.
Having permission to return to Malmaison, Josephine was satisfied to remain at Navarre. In fact, she was beginning to enjoy the place and particularly the plans for its improvements. It was not until May that she returned to Malmaison, where she remained a month. Later she spent three months at Aix-En-Savoy and then made a trip in Switzerland.
On the whole, the summer and fall of 1810 were not unpleasant. She had dismissed, for the time, her doubt of the Emperor, and suffered only from the separation from him. That separation Napoleon did as much as the situation allowed to soften. In May, after her return to Malmaison, he went to see her, and the visit seems to have been as free from restraint and grief as could be expected. Josephine was greatly pleased by the Emperor’s attention. “Yesterday was a day of joy for me,” she wrote to Hortense. “The Emperor came to see me. His presence made me happy, though it awakened my sorrow. As long as he stayed with me I had the courage to keep back my tears, but when he was gone, I was not able to restrain them, and I found myself very wretched. He was as good as ever to me, and I hope he read in my heart all the devotion and tenderness I feel for him.”
Not only did Napoleon go to visit her, he conceived a notion incomprehensible to a feminine mind of some day taking Marie Louise, and broached the subject one day as the two were driving near Malmaison in Josephine’s absence, by asking the Empress if she would not like to go over the chateau. Marie Louise immediately began to cry, and Napoleon, overwhelmed by what he had done, though probably not understanding at all, never ventured to go further. He probably saw no reason why the two women could not in private be friends.
Everywhere that Josephine went in these first journeys after her divorce she was received with such expressions of devotion and interest that she must have been convinced that the people had adopted the Emperor’s view of the divorce and looked upon her as one who had sacrificed herself for the country. Curiously enough, they brought petitions to her praying her to remit them to the Emperor; her influence over him and her relation to him were thus publicly acknowledged. In all the interviews Josephine gave to persons who sought her as she traveled she was exceedingly discreet; especially admirable was the way in which she talked of the Emperor. It was as of a brother whom she loved dearly and whose interests she had deeply at heart. Although, as a rule, she received cordially all who sought her, she did refuse, if she believed the person hostile to Napoleon. In September, while Josephine was in Switzerland, Mme. de Staël, then in exile, tried to secure an interview. Josephine declined. “I know her too well,” she said, “to wish an interview. In the first book she published, she would report our conversation, and the Lord only knows how many things she would make me say of which I never thought.”
Daughter of Josephine, wife of Louis, King of Holland, and mother of Napoleon III.
One real and serious cause of unhappiness for Josephine was removed in part this summer. It was her daughter Hortense’s trouble. The poor Queen of Holland had for a long time been hopelessly embroiled with the King, Louis Bonaparte, and her daily letters to her mother during the winter and spring were hysterical cries of bitterness and despair. Josephine shows nowhere in better light than in her replies. During all this period of her own sorrow she wrote constantly to Hortense letters full of cheer, of wise counsel, and of the tenderest affection. The doubt of the Emperor which seized her now and then she never allowed Hortense to entertain. She never advised anything but courage and forbearance in her relations to King Louis. She held before her her duty to her little sons, to the people of Holland, who had always loved her, and to her mother. In July, Louis put an end to the sad situation by abdicating his throne, which by the Constitution went to the Queen. Napoleon promptly annexed Holland to France. “This emancipates the queen,” the Emperor wrote to Josephine, “and your unhappy daughter can come to Paris, where, with her sons, she will be perfectly happy.” It was not going to Paris, however, that pleased Hortense; it was release from Louis, the care of her sons, and rejoining her mother. Indeed, Louis Bonaparte’s cowardly conduct in Holland brought great relief to both Hortense and Josephine, especially was the latter happy at being able to have the children, Napoleon Louis and Louis Napoleon, or little Oui-oui, as she called him, (afterwards Napoleon III.) with her. She really was an ideal grandmother, everybody conceded, the children first of all. Their opinion was happily expressed once by Louis, who, when a lady of the court was leaving to see her husband, said soberly, “She must love M. A—— very much if she will leave grandmama to go and see him.”
When Josephine left Malmaison in June, she had intended traveling in Italy, after Switzerland, and spending the winter at Milan with her son. Her old terror of being forgotten by the Emperor and driven from France seized her in September, however, and for weeks she tormented herself with the notion that it was Napoleon’s plan not to allow her to return to France. She had no reason for the supposition beyond the gossip which came to her and the fears of her own sore heart; but this was enough to persuade her so thoroughly that she was to be exiled that her health began to fail. She succeeded, too, in communicating her fears to the ladies of her suite, and the little company made themselves wretched in the classical feminine way over a possibility for which there was no foundation whatever.
King of Holland in 1806. Abdicated in 1810, taking the title of Comte de St. Leu.
Finally, Josephine wrote a humble letter to Napoleon, asking permission to spend the winter at Navarre. He replied at once, that of course she might go there if she would. The household were thrown in hysterical transports of joy by this permission, and they hastened northward for a long winter in a provincial chateau as if Italy was a prison and the honors they would have received there mockery and insult.
In spite of the fact that Navarre was not a suitable winter residence even when in the best condition, and that the changes and repairs planned were still incomplete, Josephine and her household passed a really happy winter and spring there. The life was a simple and wholesome one, free from the exacting ceremonies and the tiresome restraints of the court, and the health of them all, and notably of Josephine, improved. Instead of late hours and heated rooms and great crowds, there were the healthy habits of the country, constant outdoor sports, the plain people of Evreux. Josephine found the headaches, which for so long a time had tormented her, almost totally disappearing. As her health improved she wept less, and her eyes, which she had seriously injured since the divorce, by her constant tears, grew better. The unfailing sweetness of her disposition in her trial had, up to this time, been combined with such weakness and suspicions that its beauty had been obscured. When, one after another, her alarms proved to be unfounded; when each time she found she received what she asked; when Napoleon continued to write her as a dear friend, to visit her from time to time, to do for her children; when, after the birth of the King of Rome, he even arranged that she should see the child, and when from every side she continued to hear praise for her sacrifice which had made an heir possible, she took courage. With the return of peace to her distracted heart, she began to fill her life fuller of useful and pleasant occupations. She established a school at Navarre, where poor children were taught; she improved the town promenade, and built a little theater; she fed the hungry, cared for the sick; proved herself, indeed, a veritable providence to the whole country-side.
Bronze from the collection of Prince Victor. This elegant figure is a faithful reproduction of a medallion made by Andrieu, on the birth of the King of Rome.
In her own family, too, she was a good genius. Hortense was now at the court of Marie Louise, and Josephine was as ever her confidant and adviser. The two little princes she kept much with her, relieving Hortense of their care. Napoleon was particularly pleased with this arrangement, knowing how much it would do to make Josephine happy, and feeling, too, that her training was an excellent thing for the lads. Even when the children were with Hortense, much of her time was taken up with providing playthings for them and for the little folks at Milan. Mlle. Ducrest says that the salon at Malmaison often looked like a warehouse in the Rue du Coq, so full was it of toys, and there was no surer way of pleasing Josephine than admiring the trifles she was constantly buying for her grandchildren.
Eugène frequently made brief visits to Napoleon, and Josephine’s pride in him and in the place he held in the Emperor’s respect and affection was great. She rejoiced that Eugène was happy in his married life, loved his wife, the good and beautiful Augusta, daughter of the King of Bavaria; and when she went to Italy to visit the court at Milan, as she did in Eugène’s absence in 1812, at the confinement of the princess, she came away with her heart abrim with maternal joy.
Indeed, Josephine grew more and more beloved throughout the years 1811 and 1812 as she added cheerfulness and courage to her amiability. “You are adored at Milan,” wrote Eugène to her once. “They are writing me charming things about you. You turn the head of everybody who comes near you.” Even Marie Louise laid aside her jealousy of Josephine after the birth of the King of Rome, and by many little attentions to Hortense added to Josephine’s happiness. She was something in France, she felt; she was honored, her place was secure.
Nobody was better satisfied than Napoleon himself at seeing Josephine take the position he had conceived she should have, and her returning cheerfulness was a constant pleasure to him. Only one subject of contention seems to have occurred between them at this period that was the old one of Josephine’s extravagance. She could not be persuaded to live within her income, and finally Napoleon took the matter rigorously in hand, writing to the Minister of the Public Exchequer the following letter:—
You will do well to send privately for the Empress Josephine’s comptroller and make him aware that nothing will be paid over to him, unless proof is furnished that there are no debts; and, as I will have no shilly-shallying on the subject, this must be guaranteed on the comptroller’s own property. You will therefore notify the comptroller, that from the 1st of January next, no payment will be made, either in your office, or by the Crown Treasury, until he has given an undertaking that no debts exist, and made his own property responsible for the fact. I have information that the expenditure in that household is exceedingly careless. You will, therefore, see the comptroller, and put yourself in possession of all facts regarding money matters; for it is absurd that instead of saving two millions of money, as the Empress should have done, she should have more debts to be paid. It will be easy for you to find out the truth about this from the comptroller, and to make him understand that he himself might be seriously compromised.
Take an opportunity of seeing the Empress Josephine yourself, and give her to understand that I trust her household will be managed with more economy, and that if any debts are left outstanding, she will incur my sovereign displeasure. The Empress Louise has only 100 000 crowns; she pays everything every week; she does without gowns, and denies herself, so as never to owe money.
My intention is, then, that from the 1st of January, no payment shall be made for the Empress Josephine’s household without a certificate from the comptroller, to the effect that she has no debts. Look into her budget for 1811, and that prepared for 1812. It should not amount to more than a million. If too many horses are kept, some of them must be put down. The Empress Josephine, who has children and grandchildren, ought to economise, and so be of some use to them, instead of running into debt.
I desire you will not make any more payments to Queen Hortense, either on account of her appanage, or for wood-felling, without asking my permission. Confer with her comptroller too, so that her household may be properly managed, and that she may not only keep out of debt, but regulate her expenditure in a fitting manner.