Empress Josephine Part 29

Roses were to crown her brow-a cheerful smile was to beam on her countenance; with joyous spirit, she was to take part in the festivities and pleasures-that the Milanese might see with what earnest confidence she believed in Napoleon's star! But Bonaparte, with all the instinct of a genuine lover, had read the deepest secret of her soul; he was envious and jealous, because he felt that Josephine did not belong to him with her whole heart, her whole being, all her emotions and thoughts. Her heart, which had received from the past so many scars and wounds, could not yet have blossomed anew; it had been warmed by the glow of Bonaparte's love, but it was not yet thoroughly penetrated with that pa.s.sion which Bonaparte so painfully missed, so intensely craved.

The earnest, unfettered nature of his love intimidated her, while it ravished and flattered her vanity; but her heart was not entirely his, it had yet room for her children, for her friends, for the things of this world!

Josephine loved Bonaparte with that soft, modest, and retiring affection, which only by degrees-by the storms of anguish, jealousy, agony, and the possibility of losing him-was to be fanned into that vitality and glow which never cooled again in her heart, and which at last gave her the death-stroke.

She therefore thought she was fulfilling her task when she, while Bonaparte was fighting with weapons, conquered with smiles, and received the homage of the conquered only as a tribute which they brought through her to the warlike genius of her husband.

Meanwhile Bonaparte had taken vengeance for his defeat at Caldiero. Through a ruse of war, he had decoyed Alvinzi from his safe and impregnable position into one where he could meet him with his army anxious for the fray, and give him battle.

The gigantic struggle lasted three days-and the close of the third day brought to the conqueror, Bonaparte, the laurel-wreath of undying glory, which, more enduring and dazzling than an imperial crown, surrounded with a halo the hero's brow long after that crown had fallen from it.

This was the victory of Arcola, which Bonaparte himself decided by s.n.a.t.c.hing from the flag-bearer the standard of the retreating regiment, and rushing with it, through a shower of b.a.l.l.s, over the bridge of death and destruction, and, with a voice heard above the thundering cannon, shouting jubilant to his soldiers-"En avant, mes amis!" And bravely the soldiers followed him-a brilliant victory was the result.

Elevated by this deed, the grandest and most glorious of his heroic career, Napoleon returned to Verona on the 19th November. The whole city-all Lombardy-sang to his praise their inspired hymns, and greeted with enthusiasm the conqueror of Arcola. He, however, wanted a sweeter reward; and. after obtaining a second victory, on the 23d of November, by defeating Wurmser near Mantua, he longed to rest and enjoy an hour's happiness in the arms of his Josephine.

From Verona he wrote to her on the day after the battle of Mantua, on the 24th of November:

"I hope soon to be in your arms, my beloved one; I love you to madness! I write by this courier for Paris. All is well. Wurmser was defeated yesterday under Mantua. Your husband needs nothing but the love of his Josephine to be happy. BONAPARTE."

But the most terrible doubts hung yet over this love. The letter in which Napoleon announced his coming had not reached Josephine; and, as the next day he came to Milan with all the cravings and impatience of a lover, he did not find Josephine there.

She had not suspected his coming; she had not dreamed that the commanding officer could stop in his victorious course and give way to the lover. She thought him far away; and, ever faithful to Bonaparte's direction to a.s.sist him in the conquest of Italy, she had accepted an invitation from the city of Genoa, which had lately and gladly entered into alliance with France. The most brilliant festivities welcomed her in this city of wealth and palaces, and "Genova la superba" gathered all its magnificence, all the splendor of its glory, to offer, under the eyes of all Europe, her solemn homage to the wife of the celebrated hero of Arcola.

While Josephine, with joyous pride was receiving this homage, Bonaparte, gloomy and murmuring, sat in his cabinet at Milan, and wrote to her:

"MILAN, the 7th Frimaire, Year V.," Three o'clock. afternoon (November 27, 1796).

"I have just arrived in Milan, and rush to your apartments. I have left every thing to see you, to press you in my arms; .... you are not there! You are pursuing a circle of festivities through the cities. You go away from me at my approach; you trouble yourself no more about your dear Napoleon. A spleen has made you love him; inconstancy renders you indifferent.

"Accustomed to dangers, I know a remedy against ennui and the troubles of life. The wretchedness I endure is not to be measured; I am ent.i.tled not to expect it.

"I will wait here until the 9th. Do not trouble yourself. Pursue your pleasures; happiness is made for you. The whole world is too happy when it can please you, and your husband alone is very, very unhappy.

"BONAPARTE."

But this cry of anguish from this crushed heart did not reach Josephine; and the courier, who next day came to Milan from Genoa, brought from Josephine only a letter with numerous commissions for Berthier. Bonaparte's anger and sorrow knew no bounds, and he at once writes to her with all the utterances of despair and complaint of a lover, and the proud wrath of an injured husband:

"MILAN, the 8th Frimaire, Year V., eight o'clock, evening.

"The courier whom Berthier had sent to Milan has just arrived. You have had no time to write to me; that I can understand very well. In the midst of pleasures and amus.e.m.e.nts it would have been too much for you to make the smallest sacrifice for me. Berthier has shown me the letter you wrote to him. It is not my purpose to trouble you in your arrangements or in the festivities which you are enjoying; I am not worth the trouble; the happiness or the misery of a man you love no longer has not the right to interest you.

"As regards myself, to love you and you alone, to make you happy, to do nothing that can wrong you in any way, is the desire and object of my life.

"Be happy, have nothing to reproach me, trouble not yourself about the felicity of a man who only breathes in your life, who finds enjoyment only in your happiness. When I claim from you a love which would approach mine, I am wrong: how can one expect that a cobweb should weigh as much as gold? When I sacrifice to you all my wishes, all my thoughts, all the moments of my life, I merely obey the spell which your charms, your character, your whole person, exercise over my wretched heart. I am wrong, for Nature has not endowed me with the power of binding you to me; but I deserve from Josephine in return at least consideration and esteem, for I love her unto madness, and love her exclusively.

"Farewell, adorable wife! farewell, my Josephine! May fate pour into my heart every trouble and every sorrow; but may it send to my Josephine serene and happy days! Who deserves it more than she? When it is well understood that she loves me no more, I will garner up into my heart my deep anguish, and be content to be in many things at least useful and good to her.

"I open this letter once more to send you a kiss.... ah! Josephine.

... Josephine! BONAPARTE."

Meanwhile it was not yet well understood that Josephine loved him no more; for as soon as she knew of Bonaparte's presence in Milan, she hastened to dispatch him a courier, and to apprise him of her sudden departure.

Bonaparte did not leave Milan on the 9th; he remained there, waiting for Josephine, to lift her up in his arms from her carriage, and to bear her into her apartments; to enjoy with her a few happy days of a quiet, domestic, and mutual love, all to themselves.

His presence with the army, however, soon became a matter of necessity; for Alvinzi was advancing with considerable re- enforcements, with two army corps to the relief of Mantua, and Bonaparte, notwithstanding his pressing remonstrances to the Directory, having received but few re-enforcements and very little money, had to exert all his powers and energy to press a few advantages from the superior forces of the enemy. Everywhere his presence and personal action were needed; and, constantly busy with war, ever sword in hand, he could not, for long weeks, even once take pen IN HAND and write to his Josephine. His longings had to subside before the force of circ.u.mstances, which claimed the general's whole time.

On the 3d of February, 1797, he again finds time to send her a few lines, to say that he is breaking up and going to Rimini. Then, after Alvinzi had been again defeated, after the fortress of Mantua had capitulated, Bonaparte had to break up again and go to Rome, to require from the pope the reason why he had made common cause with Austria, and shown himself the enemy of the French republic. In Bologna he lingered a few days, as Josephine, in compliance with his wishes, had come there to make amends by her presence for so long a separation.

She remained in Bologna, while Bonaparte advanced toward the city of the Church. But the gloomy quietude, the constant rumors of war, the threatening dangers, the intrigues with which she was surrounded, the hostile exertions of the priests, the want of society, of friendly faces, every thing had a tendency to make Josephine's residence in Bologna very disagreeable, and to bring on sadness and nervousness.

In this gloomy state of mind she writes to Bonaparte that she feels sick, exhausted and helpless; that she is anxious to return to Paris. He answers her from Ancona:

"The 8th Pluviose, Year V. (February 16, 1797).

"You are sad, you are sick, you write to me no longer, you wish to return to Paris! Do you no longer love your friend? This thought makes me very unhappy. My dear friend, life is intolerable to me, since I have heard of your sadness.

"I send you at once Moscati to take care of you. My health is somewhat feeble; my cold hangs on. I pray you spare yourself, and love me as much as I love you, and do write every day. My restlessness is horrible.

"I have given orders to Moscati to accompany you to Ancona, if you will come. I will write to you and let you know where I am.

"I may perhaps make peace with the pope, and then will soon be with you; it is the most intense desire of my life.

"I send a hundred kisses. Think not that any thing can equal my love, unless it be my solicitude for you. Write to me every day yourself, my dearly-beloved one!

"BONAPARTE."

But Josephine, in her depressed state of mind, and her nervous irritability, did not have the courage to draw nearer the scenes of war, and she dreaded to face again such dangers as once she had encountered in Brescia and on her journey to Florence. She had not been able to overcome the indolence of the Creole so much as to write to Bonaparte. Fully conscious of his love and pardon, she relied upon them when, in her reluctance to every exertion, she announced to him, through the physician Moscati, that she would not come to Ancona, but would wait for him in Bologna.

This news made a very painful impression upon Bonaparte, and filled him with sorrow, though it reached him on a day in which he had obtained a new triumph, a spiritual victory without any shedding of blood. The pope, frightened at the army detachments approaching Rome, as well as at the menacing language of the victor of Arcola, signed a peace with the French republic, and with the general whose sword had bowed into the dust all the princes of Italy, and freed all the population from their duties as subjects. Bonaparte announced this to Josephine, and it is evident how important it was to him that this news should precede even his love-murmurings and reproaches. His letter was dated

"TOLONTINO, the 1st Ventose, Year V. (February 19,1797).

"Peace with Rome is signed. Bologna, Ferrara, Romagna fall into the hands of the French republic. The pope has to pay us in a short time thirty millions, and gives us many precious objects of art.

"I leave to-morrow for Ancona, and then for Rimini, Ravenna, and Bologna. If your health permits, come over to meet me in Ravenna, but, I implore you, spare yourself.

"Not a word from your hand! What have I done? To think only of you, to love but you, to live but for my wife, to enjoy only my beloved's happiness, does this deserve such a cruel treatment from her? My friend, I implore you, think of me, and write to me every day. Either you are sick, or you love me no longer. Do you imagine, then, that my heart is of marble? Why do you have so little sympathy with my sorrow? You must have a very poor idea of me! That I cannot believe. You, to whom Nature has imparted so much understanding, so much amiability, and so much beauty, you, who alone can rule in my heart, you know, without doubt, what power you have over me!

"Write to me, think of me, and love me.

"Yours entirely, yours for life,

"BONAPARTE."

This is the last letter of Bonaparte to Josephine during his first Italian campaign-the last at least in the series of letters which Queen Hortense has made public, as the most beautiful and most glorious monument to her mother. [Footnote: "Lettres de Napoleon a Josephine et de Josephine a Napoleon et a sa fille. Londres et Leipzic, 1833."]

We have dwelt upon them because these letters, like sunbeams, throw a bright light on the new pathway of Josephine's life-because they are an eloquent and splendid testimony to the love which Josephine had inspired in her young husband, and also to her amiableness, to her sweetness of disposition, to her grace, and to all the n.o.ble and charming qualities which procured her so much admiration and affection, and which still caused her to be loved, sought for and celebrated, when she had to descend from the height of a throne, and became the deserted, divorced wife of the man who loved her immeasurably, and who so often had sworn to her that this love would only end with his life!

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE COURT OF MONTEBELLO.