On the second day of August 1802 the Senate declared Napoleon Bonaparte Consul for Life, with the power to name his successor. The decree conveyed to him, in its official terms, the expression of “the confidence, the admiration, and the love of the French people.” In the plébiscite he received the votes of over three and a half million Frenchmen, with less than nine thousand in the negative.

At the same time the government gave him as a summer residence the royal château of Saint-Cloud. This palace was built at the edge of a magnificent park, on a long terrace overlooking the Seine, with the city of Paris at a distance in the background. The main building and the two projecting wings framed the court of honor; in the rear was a beautiful French garden, bordered on one side by an extension of the palace, and on the other by an alley shaded by magnificent trees. The property, which had previously belonged to private parties, was purchased by Louis the Fourteenth and presented to his brother the Duc d’Orléans. In 1785, Calonne, the prodigal controller of the finances, bought the château for six million francs, and the King gave it to Marie-Antoinette. She made extensive alterations in the building, and frequently resided there before the Revolution. Her last visit was in the summer of 1790, at which time she had her celebrated interview with Mirabeau. During the Revolution all of the furniture and hangings disappeared, and the palace had to be refurnished for the First Consul. As soon as the work was completed, Napoleon moved there, on the 20 September.

At Saint-Cloud, Joséphine occupied the apartments of Marie-Antoinette in the left wing. The suite of the First Consul was on the ground floor in the other wing. His cabinet was a large room, with the walls covered with books from floor to ceiling. He usually sat on a small sofa, placed near the mantel, which was decorated with two bronze busts of Scipio and Hannibal. Behind the sofa, in the corner of the room, was the desk of his secretary, Méneval, who had taken the place of Bourrienne, discharged for dishonesty. Adjoining the cabinet was a small salon, where the First Consul received his ministers and gave private audiences. In this salon there was a fine portrait of Gustavus Adolphus, the favorite hero of Napoleon. The only ornament of his bedroom, which faced on the garden, was an antique bust of Cæsar.

From the first, a rigid court etiquette was established at Saint-Cloud. Duroc, who was appointed governor of the palace, had a table for the officers, the aides de camp, and the ladies on duty. The First Consul took his meals alone with his wife, but gave formal dinners twice a week for important officials of the government. The military household was composed of the four generals commanding the Consular Guard, Lannes, Bessières, Davout and Soult, and the seven aides de camp, among whom were Caulaincourt, Rapp and Savary. There were four prefects and the same number of ladies of the palace, of whom the best known were M. de Rémusat, and his wife, the author of the celebrated memoirs. The usages of the Court of Versailles had been copied so closely that there was even a serious idea of reviving the custom of powdered hair, but Napoleon could not bring himself to this, so hair was worn au naturel.

For the first time since the Revolution, religious practices were renewed; the First Consul insisted that on Sunday every one should go to Mass, and the Chapel at Saint-Cloud recalled that at Versailles.

The last of October Napoleon and Joséphine made a fortnight’s trip to Normandie. The first day they went over the field of battle where Henry the Fourth gained the victory of Ivry. Then they passed a week at Rouen, where the First Consul visited all of the principal manufactories, and held a review of the National Guard. Another week was spent at Havre and Dieppe, inspecting the ports, the fortifications, and the ships under construction. On the evening of the 14 November the party was again back at Saint-Cloud.

The following ten weeks were spent at Saint-Cloud, except one day, the first week in December, when the First Consul went to the Tuileries to receive the English ambassador, Lord Whitworth, who presented his credentials. On the 23 January 1803 Napoleon and Joséphine returned to the Tuileries for the winter.

In 1803 Joséphine was forty years of age. Her beauty was somewhat faded, but she was so adroit in the use of cosmetics, she dressed with so much taste, that with her charm of manner and her air of distinction she could still be called a very attractive woman. No sovereign was ever more to the manner born. She received so well; she possessed in so high a degree the art of saying something appropriate and pleasant to every one; she had so much tact, and so much presence of mind, that any one would have thought she was born on the steps of a throne. She was popular with all parties and all factions. Fouché, who represented the element of the Revolution, was her friend, and all the personages of the Ancien Régime regarded her as their ally. She had done much good in her life, and had never injured anybody; even the severest critics of Bonaparte had only words of praise for his wife. All classes of society united in rendering her homage. She was not only popular, but she deserved her popularity. She was so much loved and admired that even the most rigid moralists had no words of reproach for her past indiscretions.

No woman ever justified better than Joséphine the saying that the eyes are the mirror of the soul. Her own, of a deep blue color, were almost always half-closed by her long eyelids fringed with the most beautiful eyelashes in the world; and her glance was absolutely irresistible. Another of her great charms was her voice, which was soft and musical, with the slightest Creole accent. She read well, and loved to read aloud. Napoleon preferred her to all other readers.

All who knew Joséphine unite in speaking of her kindness. Madame de Rémusat says: “She had a remarkable evenness of temper, much good-will, and the faculty of forgetting any wrong done her.” Constant, the valet de chambre of Napoleon, bears the same testimony. “Kindness,” he writes, “was as inseparable from her character, as grace was from her person; generous to the point of prodigality, she made every one around her happy. No woman was ever more loved by those near her, or more deserved to be.”

Without having great intelligence, Joséphine possessed the most perfect savoir faire. She always found, without searching, the exact word for the occasion, the expression which touched and charmed, and this is better than esprit, because it comes, not from the head, but the heart. She was also a good listener, a trait both rare and remarkable. She never forgot a name or a face, and on meeting some one whom she had not seen in years, could always recall some pleasant incident connected with him.

As nearly always happens, Joséphine had the defects of her qualities: she was generous and charitable to a fault, but she was also prodigal to excess. As we shall see later, only the revenues of Imperial France could ever have sufficed to pay her debts.

At this time the First Consul and his wife made quite a happy household. At Saint-Cloud they always occupied the same chamber. About eight o’clock Napoleon arose, and went to his cabinet, where he breakfasted alone. Then he began his day’s work, which generally occupied him until six o’clock, when he went for a drive with Joséphine. They dined together, and he usually remained for a short chat afterwards. Then he returned to his cabinet, while Joséphine played cards, to finish the evening. Between ten and eleven, a chamberlain came to announce, “Madame, the First Consul has retired.” Joséphine immediately dismissed her company, and went to rejoin her husband.

After their return to the Tuileries this year, Napoleon decided to have his own room, separate from his wife. In this connection Madame de Rémusat recounts a scene which constitutes one of the strangest episodes in her interesting, but not always trustworthy, memoirs. That season a new actress, named Mlle. Georges, had made her début. She had very little talent, but great beauty, and Napoleon was seduced by her charms. Joséphine was informed that the young actress, on several evenings, had been secretly conducted to a quiet apartment in the Château. One night Joséphine kept Madame de Rémusat later than usual, and talked of her grievances. At one o’clock in the morning, they were alone in her salon, and the most complete silence reigned over the Tuileries. Suddenly Joséphine exclaimed: “I cannot keep quiet any longer. Mlle. Georges is certainly upstairs, and I am going to surprise them. Follow me; we will go up together.” The lady of the palace protested, and tried, but in vain, to turn Joséphine from her purpose. They silently ascended the private staircase which led to the suite of Napoleon on the first floor. Suddenly they heard a slight noise, and stopped in their course. “It may be Roustan, who is guarding the door,” said Joséphine. “The wretch is capable of cutting both our throats.” Pale with terror, at these words Madame de Rémusat rushed back to the salon, carrying the candle which she held in her hand, and leaving Joséphine in the dark. She followed, after a few minutes, and burst into laughter at the sight of her maid’s discomposed countenance. After this they abandoned their enterprise.

Before adopting this change in his habitudes Napoleon one day asked Madame de Rémusat if she thought a husband should yield to the caprices of a wife who wished always to share his bed. The lady of the palace returned an evasive answer. Bonaparte began to laugh, and, pulling her ear, a favorite trick of his when in good humor, said: “You are a woman, and you are all in league together.”

A recent biographer tells us that there is a pretty picture of Joséphine at this time, as she appeared at the wedding of Napoleon’s sister Pauline: “With her short sleeves, bare arms, and her hair enclosed in a gilt net, she looked like a Greek statue.” The first Consul led her to a mirror, that he might see her on all sides at once, and, kissing her shoulder, said: “Ah, Joséphine, I shall be jealous. Why are you so beautiful to-day?” It is really a pity to destroy so idealistic a picture, but as a matter of fact Napoleon was not present at his sister’s wedding.

The first day of January 1803, Pauline returned from the disastrous expedition to Saint-Domingue, where her husband, Leclerc, had succumbed to the unhealthy climate. She herself was suffering from a grave malady, from which she never entirely recovered. For two months after her return to Paris, Pauline lived with Joseph at his town house, but in April she purchased for four hundred thousand francs the magnificent Hôtel Charost in the Faubourg-Saint-Honoré, a few doors from Joseph’s Hôtel Marbeuf.

At this same time there arrived in Paris the Prince Camillo Borghèse, the chief of one of the richest and most illustrious Roman families. At a house party at Mortefontaine in June he was presented to Pauline. By this time the young widow, who was not yet twenty-three, had somewhat recovered from her real grief over the loss of Leclerc, and was tired of wearing mourning, which did not become her style of beauty. She was much attracted by the personality of Borghèse, but perhaps even more by the idea of being a real princesse, and taking the pas over her dear sisters Bacciochi and Murat, as well as her sisters-in-law, Joséphine and Hortense. A few days after their first meeting, she authorized Joseph to make overtures to the prince. The matter was quickly arranged, and on the 21 June Borghèse formally announced to Joseph his desire to marry Pauline. He only asked that the proposed alliance should remain a secret until he had time to obtain his mother’s consent. At the same time Pauline wrote the First Consul to ask his approval. The mother of the prince was delighted with the alliance, and on the first day of August the engagement was announced by the Paris journals. On the 23 August the marriage contract was signed, only by Pauline and Borghèse, at the Hôtel Charost. On the 14 August, and again a week later, the banns were published at Mortefontaine. It was generally anticipated that the marriage would take place on the 28 August, but just then a difficulty arose: they had forgotten Leclerc! He had died on the second day of November 1802, and the social rules, reëstablished and formally promulgated by the First Consul himself, forbade a widow to remarry during a period of one year and six weeks after the death of her husband. In this dilemma Madame Bonaparte, who was as domineering and imperious as her great son, took charge of affairs, and ordered the marriage to take place. On the 28 August, or perhaps four days later, the ceremony was performed at Mortefontaine by an Italian priest, who may have been Cardinal Caprara himself. The exact date is uncertain, as the certificate was never filed.

This “marriage of conscience” was known only to the mother, and two of the brothers of the bride, Joseph and Lucien. Napoleon was so ignorant of the matter that on the 25 September he gave Pauline a dinner of two hundred converts at the Tuileries, and afterwards took her to Saint-Cloud to pass several days with him. A month later, the 23 October, he gave another large dinner to his sister, to which Borghèse was invited. Napoleon intended on this occasion to announce formally the date of the marriage. He was still ignorant of the fact that a religious ceremony had taken place, without a previous civil contract as required by law.

The official marriage was finally celebrated at Mortefontaine on the 6 November, but the First Consul was not present. He had left for Boulogne three days before, to inspect the fleet, and did not return to Saint-Cloud until after the middle of the month. This absence was intentional: Napoleon was enraged at having been thus deceived by his favorite sister, by his mother and his brothers, in short, by everybody.

At the wedding there were present all the members of the family except Napoleon, and Lucien, who ten days before had secretly contracted another alliance, which was to disgrace him with his brother. The wedding of Pauline was announced by only two lines in the official journal: “Madame Leclerc has married Prince Borghèse; the marriage was celebrated at Mortefontaine.” Napoleon pressed the departure of the newly married couple, and several days before his return from Boulogne they were on their way to Italy.

The marriage of Pauline had wounded the heart of Napoleon, but almost at the same time there occurred two other weddings in the family which brought other cares; which disturbed the family harmony, and exercised a decisive influence on the fortunes of two of the brothers.

In May or June 1802, Lucien had met, while on a visit in the country, a young woman with whom he became desperately enamored. Her name was Alexandrine de Bleschamp, and at the age of nineteen she had married a certain Monsieur Jouberthou. Later she had been abandoned at Paris, almost without resources, when her husband sailed for Saint-Domingue to try and retrieve his fortunes. A few months later she met Lucien. Affairs moved quickly, and in August Madame Jouberthou was installed in Lucien’s mansion at Plessis. When he returned to Paris she was lodged in a house which communicated by a subterranean passage with Lucien’s hôtel in the Rue Saint-Dominique. There, on the 23 May 1803, was born a child who was declared before the municipality under the name of Jules-Laurence-Lucien. This eldest son of Lucien was subsequently legitimized by the marriage of his parents, and he was later called Charles after his grandfather. This ceremony, however, was not performed until the 23 October 1803, after Lucien had finally succeeded in obtaining a certificate of the death of Jouberthou at Port-au-Prince the 15 June 1802.

If the affair of Lucien was serious, in the eyes of Napoleon that of his youngest brother was worse. In February 1802, Jérôme sailed with the French fleet for the West Indies. Born the 15 November 1784, he was then only seventeen years of age. Two months later he returned to Paris as bearer of despatches from Leclerc. Promoted to the rank of ensign, he sailed again on the 18 September for Martinique. Soon tiring of his naval career, Jérôme decided to return to France by way of New York, and sailed for Virginia on an American pilot boat. He landed at Norfolk the 20 July 1803, and a week later he was in Washington. During his stay there he met at Baltimore a very attractive girl of about his own age, named Elizabeth Patterson, the daughter of a wealthy merchant, and on the 24 December they were married. The chargé d’affaires at Washington, Pichon, had done everything in his power to prevent the marriage. He wrote Mr. Patterson and Jérôme to point out that any marriage contracted without the consent of Madame Bonaparte, during her lifetime, under the French law would be absolutely null and void. Jérôme was too much in love to hesitate, and the young lady and her father were willing to take a chance.

When the news reached France, the First Consul sent his brother peremptory orders to return, but owing to various causes Jérôme did not reach Europe until over a year later.