Famous Affinities of History Part 20

Little did the great conqueror dream how deadly was the blow which this Austrian count was destined finally to deal him!

Neipperg, though his t.i.tle was not a high one, belonged to the old n.o.bility of Austria. He had proved his bravery in war and as a duelist, and he was a diplomat as well as a soldier. Despite his mutilation, he was a handsome and accomplished courtier, a man of wide experience, and one who bore himself in a manner which suggested the spirit of romance. According to Ma.s.son, he was an Austrian Don Juan, and had won the hearts of many women. At thirty he had formed a connection with an Italian woman named Teresa Pola, whom he had carried away from her husband. She had borne him five children; and in 1813 he had married her in order that these children might be made legitimate.

In his own sphere the activity of Neipperg was almost as remarkable as Napoleon's in a greater one. Apart from his exploits on the field of battle he had been attached to the Austrian emba.s.sy in Paris, and, strangely enough, had been decorated by Napoleon himself with, the golden eagle of the Legion of Honor. Four months later we find him minister of Austria at the court of Sweden, where he helped to lay the train of intrigue which was to detach Bernadotte from Napoleon's cause. In 1812, as has just been said, he was with Marie Louise for a short time at Dresden, hovering about her, already forming schemes. Two years after this he overthrew Murat at Naples; and then hurried on post-haste to urge Prince Eugene to abandon Bonaparte.

When the great struggle of 1814 neared its close, and Napoleon, fighting with his back to the wall, was about to succ.u.mb to the united armies of Europe, it was evident that the Austrian emperor would soon be able to separate his daughter from her husband. In fact, when Napoleon was sent to Elba, Marie Louise returned to Vienna. The cynical Austrian diplomats resolved that she should never again meet her imperial husband. She was made d.u.c.h.ess of Parma in Italy, and set out for her new possessions; and the man with the black band across his sightless eye was chosen to be her escort and companion.

When Neipperg received this commission he was with Teresa Pola at Milan. A strange smile flitted across his face; and presently he remarked, with cynical frankness:

"Before six months I shall be her lover, and, later on, her husband."

He took up his post as chief escort of Marie Louise, and they journeyed slowly to Munich and Baden and Geneva, loitering on the way. Amid the great events which were shaking Europe this couple attracted slight attention. Napoleon, in Elba, longed for his wife and for his little son, the King of Rome. He sent countless messages and many couriers; but every message was intercepted, and no courier reached his destination. Meanwhile Marie Louise was lingering agreeably in Switzerland. She was happy to have escaped from the whirlpool of politics and war. Amid the romantic scenery through which she pa.s.sed Neipperg was always by her side, attentive, devoted, trying in everything to please her. With him she pa.s.sed delightful evenings. He sang to her in his rich barytone songs of love. He seemed romantic with a touch of mystery, a gallant soldier whose soul was also touched by sentiment.

One would have said that Marie Louise, the daughter of an imperial line, would have been proof against the fascinations of a person so far inferior to herself in rank, and who, beside the great emperor, was less than nothing. Even granting that she had never really loved Napoleon, she might still have preferred to maintain her dignity, to share his fate, and to go down in history as the empress of the greatest man whom modern times have known.

But Marie Louise was, after all, a woman, and she followed the guidance of her heart. To her Napoleon was still the man who had met her amid the rain-storm at Courcelles, and had from the first moment when he touched her violated all the instincts of a virgin. Later he had in his way tried to make amends; but the horror of that first night had never wholly left her memory. Napoleon had unrolled before her the drama of sensuality, but her heart had not been given to him. She had been his empress. In a sense it might be more true to say that she had been his mistress. But she had never been duly wooed and won and made his wife-an experience which is the right of every woman. And so this Neipperg, with his deferential manners, his soothing voice, his magnetic touch, his ardor, and his devotion, appeased that craving which the master of a hundred legions could not satisfy.

In less than the six months of which Neipperg had spoken the psychological moment had arrived. In the dim twilight she listened to his words of love; and then, drawn by that irresistible power which masters pride and woman's will, she sank into her lover's arms, yielding to his caresses, and knowing that she would be parted from him no more except by death.

From that moment he was bound to her by the closest ties and lived with her at the petty court of Parma. His prediction came true to the very letter. Teresa Pola died, and then Napoleon died, and after this Marie Louise and Neipperg were united in a morganatic marriage. Three children were born to them before his death in 1829.

It is interesting to note how much of an impression was made upon her by the final exile of her imperial husband to St. Helena. When the news was brought her she observed, casually:

"Thanks. By the way, I should like to ride this morning to Markenstein. Do you think the weather is good enough to risk it?"

Napoleon, on his side, pa.s.sed through agonies of doubt and longing when no letters came to him from Marie Louise. She was constantly in his thoughts during his exile at St. Helena. "When his faithful friend and constant companion at St. Helena, the Count Las Casas, was ordered by Sir Hudson Lowe to depart from St. Helena, Napoleon wrote to him:

"Should you see, some day, my wife and son, embrace them. For two years I have, neither directly nor indirectly, heard from them. There has been on this island for six months a German botanist, who has seen them in the garden of Schoenbrunn a few months before his departure. The barbarians (meaning the English authorities at St. Helena) have carefully prevented him from coming to give me any news respecting them."

At last the truth was told him, and he received it with that high magnanimity, or it may be fatalism, which at times he was capable of showing. Never in all his days of exile did he say one word against her. Possibly in searching his own soul he found excuses such as we may find. In his will he spoke of her with great affection, and shortly before his death he said to his physician, Antommarchi:

"After my death, I desire that you will take my heart, put it in the spirits of wine, and that you carry it to Parma to my dear Marie Louise. You will please tell her that I tenderly loved her-that I never ceased to love her. You will relate to her all that you have seen, and every particular respecting my situation and death."

The story of Marie Louise is pathetic, almost tragic. There is the taint of grossness about it; and yet, after all, there is a lesson in it-the lesson that true love cannot be forced or summoned at command, that it is destroyed before its birth by outrage, and that it goes out only when evoked by sympathy, by tenderness, and by devotion.

END OF VOLUME TWO

THE WIVES OF GENERAL HOUSTON

Sixty or seventy years ago it was considered a great joke to chalk up on any man's house-door, or on his trunk at a coaching-station, the conspicuous letters "G. T. T." The laugh went round, and every one who saw the inscription chuckled and said: "They've got it on you, old hoss!" The three letters meant "gone to Texas"; and for any man to go to Texas in those days meant his moral, mental, and financial dilapidation. Either he had plunged into bankruptcy and wished to begin life over again in a new world, or the sheriff had a warrant for his arrest.

The very task of reaching Texas was a fearful one. Rivers that overran their banks, fever-stricken lowlands where gaunt faces peered out from moldering cabins, bottomless swamps where the mud oozed greasily and where the alligator could be seen slowly moving his repulsive form-all this stretched on for hundreds of miles to horrify and sicken the emigrants who came toiling on foot or struggling upon emaciated horses. Other daring pioneers came by boat, running all manner of risks upon the swollen rivers. Still others descended from the mountains of Tennessee and pa.s.sed through a more open country and with a greater certainty of self-protection, because they were trained from childhood to wield the rifle and the long sheath-knife.

It is odd enough to read, in the chronicles of those days, that amid all this suffering and squalor there was drawn a strict line between "the quality" and those who had no claim to be patricians. "The quality" was made up of such emigrants as came from the more civilized East, or who had slaves, or who dragged with them some rickety vehicle with carriage-horses-however gaunt the animals might be. All others-those who had no slaves or horses, and no traditions of the older states-were cla.s.sed as "poor whites"; and they accepted their mediocrity without a murmur.

Because he was born in Lexington, Virginia, and moved thence with his family to Tennessee, young Sam Houston-a truly eponymous American hero-was numbered with "the quality" when, after long wandering, he reached his boyhood home. His further claim to distinction as a boy came from the fact that he could read and write, and was even familiar with some of the cla.s.sics in translation.

When less than eighteen years of age he had reached a height of more than six feet. He was skilful with the rifle, a remarkable rough-and-tumble fighter, and as quick with his long knife as any Indian. This made him a notable figure-the more so as he never abused his strength and courage. He was never known as anything but "Sam." In his own sphere he pa.s.sed for a gentleman and a scholar, thanks to his Virginian birth and to the fact that he could repeat a great part of Pope's translation of the "Iliad."

His learning led him to teach school a few months in the year to the children of the white settlers. Indeed, Houston was so much taken with the pursuit of scholarship that he made up his mind to learn Greek and Latin. Naturally, this seemed mere foolishness to his mother, his six strapping brothers, and his three stalwart sisters, who cared little for study. So sharp was the difference between Sam and the rest of the family that he gave up his yearning after the cla.s.sics and went to the other extreme by leaving home and plunging into the heart of the forest beyond sight of any white man or woman or any thought of h.e.l.las and ancient Rome.

Here in the dimly lighted glades he was most happy. The Indians admired him for his woodcraft and for the skill with which he chased the wild game amid the forests. From his copy of the "Iliad" he would read to them the thoughts of the world's greatest poet.

It is told that nearly forty years after, when Houston had long led a different life and had made his home in Washington, a deputation of more than forty untamed Indians from Texas arrived there under the charge of several army officers. They chanced to meet Sam Houston.

One and all ran to him, clasped him in their brawny arms, hugged him like bears to their naked b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and called him "father." Beneath the copper skin and thick paint the blood rushed, and their faces changed, and the lips of many a warrior trembled, although the Indian may not weep.

In the gigantic form of Houston, on whose ample brow the beneficent love of a father was struggling with the sternness of the patriarch and warrior, we saw civilization awing the savage at his feet. We needed no interpreter to tell us that this impressive supremacy was gained in the forest.

His family had been at first alarmed by his stay among the Indians; but when after a time he returned for a new outfit they saw that he was entirely safe and left him to wander among the red men. Later he came forth and resumed the pursuits of civilization. He took up his studies; he learned the rudiments of law and entered upon its active practice. When barely thirty-six he had won every office that was open to him, ending with his election to the Governorship of Tennessee in 1827.

Then came a strange episode which changed the whole course of his life. Until then the love of woman had never stirred his veins. His physical activities in the forests, his unique intimacy with Indian life, had kept him away from the social intercourse of towns and cities. In Nashville Houston came to know for the first time the fascination of feminine society. As a lawyer, a politician, and the holder of important offices he could not keep aloof from that gentler and more winning influence which had hitherto been unknown to him.

In 1828 Governor Houston was obliged to visit different portions of the state, stopping, as was the custom, to visit at the homes of "the quality," and to be introduced to wives and daughters as well as to their sportsman sons. On one of his official journeys he met Miss Eliza Allen, a daughter of one of the "influential families" of Sumner County, on the northern border of Tennessee. He found her responsive, charming, and greatly to be admired. She was a slender type of Southern beauty, well calculated to gain the affection of a lover, and especially of one whose a.s.sociations had been chiefly with the women of frontier communities.

To meet a girl who had refined tastes and wide reading, and who was at the same time graceful and full of humor, must have come as a pleasant experience to Houston. He and Miss Allen saw much of each other, and few of their friends were surprised when the word went forth that they were engaged to be married.

The marriage occurred in January, 1829. They were surrounded with friends of all cla.s.ses and ranks, for Houston was the a.s.sociate of Jackson and was immensely popular in his own state. He seemed to have before him a brilliant career. He had won a lovely bride to make a home for him; so that no man seemed to have more attractive prospects. What was there which at this time interposed in some malignant way to blight his future?

It was a little more than a month after his marriage when he met a friend, and, taking him out into a strip of quiet woodland, said to him:

"I have something to tell you, but you must not ask me anything about it. My wife and I will separate before long. She will return to her father's, while I must make my way alone."

Houston's friend seized him by the arm and gazed at him with horror.

"Governor," said he, "you're going to ruin your whole life! What reason have you for treating this young lady in such a way? What has she done that you should leave her? Or what have you done that she should leave you? Every one will fall away from you."

Houston grimly replied:

"I have no explanation to give you. My wife has none to give you. She will not complain of me, nor shall I complain of her. It is no one's business in the world except our own. Any interference will be impertinent, and I shall punish it with my own hand."

"But," said his friend, "think of it. The people at large will not allow such action. They will believe that you, who have been their idol, have descended to insult a woman. Your political career is ended. It will not be safe for you to walk the streets!"

"What difference does it make to me?" said Houston, gloomily. "What must be, must be. I tell you, as a friend, in advance, so that you may be prepared; but the parting will take place very soon."

Little was heard for another month or two, and then came the announcement that the Governor's wife had left him and had returned to her parents' home. The news flew like wildfire, and was the theme of every tongue. Friends of Mrs. Houston begged her to tell them the meaning of the whole affair. Adherents of Houston, on the other hand, set afloat stories of his wife's coldness and of her peevishness. The state was divided into factions; and what really concerned a very few was, as usual, made everybody's business.

There were times when, if Houston had appeared near the dwelling of his former wife, he would have been lynched or riddled with bullets. Again, there were enemies and slanderers of his who, had they shown themselves in Nashville, would have been torn to pieces by men who hailed Houston as a hero and who believed that he could not possibly have done wrong.

However his friends might rage, and however her people might wonder and seek to pry into the secret, no satisfaction was given on either side. The abandoned wife never uttered a word of explanation. Houston was equally reticent and self-controlled. In later years he sometimes drank deeply and was loose-tongued; but never, even in his cups, could he be persuaded to say a single word about his wife.

The whole thing is a mystery and cannot be solved by any evidence that we have. Almost every one who has written of it seems to have indulged in mere guesswork. One popular theory is that Miss Allen was in love with some one else; that her parents forced her into a brilliant marriage with Houston, which, however, she could not afterward endure; and that Houston, learning the facts, left her because he knew that her heart was not really his.

But the evidence is all against this. Had it been so she would surely have secured a divorce and would then have married the man whom she truly loved. As a matter of fact, although she did divorce Houston, it was only after several years, and the man whom she subsequently married was not acquainted with her at the time of the separation.

Another theory suggests that Houston was harsh in his treatment of his wife, and offended her by his untaught manners and extreme self-conceit. But it is not likely that she objected to his manners, since she had become familiar with them before she gave him her hand; and as to his conceit, there is no evidence that it was as yet unduly developed. After his Texan campaign he sometimes showed a rather lofty idea of his own achievements; but he does not seem to have done so in these early days.