Napoleon's Letters To Josephine Part 72

The latter was, however, celebrated both for her beauty and her intrigues;[60] and when, in 1799, Bonaparte seized supreme power the fair lady[61] invaded Barras in his bath to inform him of it; but found her indolent Ulysses only capable of ejaculating, "What can be done? that man has taken us all in!" Napoleon probably remembered this, and may refer to her rather than to the Queen of Prussia in the next letter, where he makes severe strictures on intriguing women.

Moreover, Napoleon in his early campaigns had played a ridiculous part in some of Gillray's most indecent cartoons, where Mmes. Tallien and Josephine took with Barras the leading roles; and as Madame Tallien was not considered respectable in 1796, she was hardly a fit friend for the Empress of the French ten years later. In the interval this lady, divorced a second time, had married the Prince de Chimay (Caraman). Napoleon knew also that she had been the mistress of Ouvrard, the banker, who in his Spanish speculations a few months earlier had involved the Bank of France to the tune of four millions sterling, and forced Napoleon to make a premature peace after Austerlitz. The Emperor had returned at white heat to Paris, and wished he could build a gallows for Ouvrard high enough for him to be on view throughout France. Madame Tallien's own father, M. de Cabarrus, was a French banker in Spain, and probably in close relation with Ouvrard.

No. 10.

Written from Berlin.

_The bad things I say about women._--Napoleon looked upon this as a woman's war, and his temper occasionally gets the mastery of him. No war had ever been so distasteful to him or so personal. Prussia, whose alliance he had been courting for nearly ten years, was now worthless to him, and all because of petticoat government at Berlin. In the Fifteenth Bulletin (dated Wittenburg, October 23rd) he states that the Queen had accused her husband of cowardice in order to bring about the war. But it is doubtless the Sixteenth Bulletin (dated Potsdam, October 25th) to which Josephine refers, and which refers to the oath of alliance of the Emperor Alexander and the King of Prussia in the death chamber of Frederick the Great. "It is from this moment that the Queen quitted the care of her domestic concerns and the serious occupations of the toilet in order to meddle with the affairs of State." He refers to a Berlin caricature of the scene which was at the time in all the shops, "exciting even the laughter of clodhoppers."

The handsome Emperor of Russia was portrayed, by his side the Queen, and on his other side the King of Prussia with his hand raised above the tomb of the Great Frederick; the Queen herself, draped in a shawl nearly as the London engravings represent Lady Hamilton, pressing her hand on her heart, and apparently gazing upon the Emperor of Russia."

In the Eighteenth Bulletin (October 26th) it is said the Prussian people did not want war, that a handful of women and young officers had alone made this "tapage," and that the Queen, "formerly a timid and modest woman looking after her domestic concerns," had become turbulent and warlike, and had "conducted the monarchy within a few days to the brink of the precipice."

As the Queen of Prussia was a beautiful woman, she has had nearly as many partisans as Mary Stuart or Marie Antoinette, but with far less cause. Napoleon, who was the incarnation of practical common sense, saw in her the first cause of the war, and considered that so far as verbal flagellation could punish her, she should have it. He had neither time nor sympathy for the "Please you, do not hurt us"

att.i.tude of a bellicose new woman, who, as Imogen or Ida, have played with edged tools from the time of Shakespeare to that of Sullivan.

As an antidote, however, to his severe words against women he put, perhaps somewhat ostentatiously, the Princess d'Hatzfeld episode in his Twenty-second Bulletin (Berlin, October 29th). A year later (November 26th, 1807), when his Old Guard return to Paris and free performances are given at all the theatres, there is the "Triumph of Trajan" at the Opera, where Trajan, burning with his own hand the papers enclosing the secrets of a conspiracy, is a somewhat skilful allusion to the present episode.

No. 11.

Magdeburg had surrendered on November 8th, with 20 generals, 800 officers and 22,000 men, 800 pieces of cannon, and immense stores.

_Lubeck._--This capitulation was that of Blucher, who had escaped after Jena through a rather dishonourable ruse. It had taken three army corps to hem him in.

No. 13.

Written from Berlin, but not included in the _Correspondence_.

_Madame L----_, _i.e._ Madame de la Rochefoucauld, a third or fourth cousin (by her first marriage) of Josephine, and her chief lady of honour. She was an incorrigible Royalist, and hated Napoleon; but as she had been useful at the Tuileries in establishing the Court, Napoleon, as usual, could not make up his mind to cause her dismissal.

In 1806, however, she made Josephine miserable and Mayence unbearable.

She foretold that the Prussians would win every battle, and even after Jena she (to use an expression of M. Ma.s.son), "continued her music on the sly" (_en sourdine_). See Letters 19 and 26 of this Series.

No. 17.

_December 2_, the anniversary of Austerlitz (1805) and of Napoleon's coronation (1804). He now announces to his soldiers the Polish campaign.

No. 18.

Not in the _Correspondence_.

_Jealousy._--If Josephine's letters and conduct had been a little more worthy of her position, she might have saved herself. Madame Walewski, who had not yet appeared on the scene.

No. 19.

_Desir de femme est un feu qui devore._--The quotation is given in Jung's "Memoirs of Lucien" (vol. ii. 62). "Ce qu'une femme desire est un feu qui consume, celui d'une reine un vulcan qui devore."

No. 23.

_I am dependent on events._--He says the same at St. Helena.

"Throughout my whole reign I was the keystone of an edifice entirely new, and resting on the most slender foundations. Its duration depended on the issue of my battles. I was never, in truth, master of my own movements; I was never at my own disposal."

No. 26.

_The fair ones of Great Poland._--If Berthier and other regular correspondents of Josephine were like Savary in their enthusiasm, no wonder the Mayence coterie began to stir up jealousy. Here is the description of the Duke of Rovigo (vol. ii. 17): "The stay at Warsaw had for us something of witchery; even with regard to amus.e.m.e.nts it was practically the same life as at Paris: the Emperor had his concert twice a week, at the end of which he held a reception, where many of the leading people met. A great number of ladies from the best families were admired alike for the brilliancy of their beauty, and for their wonderful amiability. One may rightly say that the Polish ladies inspired with jealousy the charming women of every other civilised clime. They united, for the most part, to the manners of good society a fund of information which is not commonly found even among Frenchwomen, and is very far above anything we see in towns, where the custom of meeting in public has become a necessity. It seemed to us that the Polish ladies, compelled to spend the greater part of the year in their country-houses, applied themselves there to reading as well as to the cultivation of their talents, and it was thus that in the chief towns, where they went to pa.s.s the winter, they appeared successful over all their rivals." St. Amand says: "In the intoxication of their enthusiasm and admiration, the most beautiful among them--and Poland is the country of beauty--lavished on him, like sirens, their most seducing smiles...." Josephine was right to be jealous, for, as the artist Baron Lejeune adds, "They were, moreover, as graceful as the Creole women so often are."

_A wretched barn_, reached over still more wretched roads. The Emperor and his horse had nearly been lost in the mud, and Marshal Duroc had a shoulder put out by his carriage being upset.

_Such things become common property._--So was another event, much to Josephine's chagrin. On this date Napoleon heard of a son (Leon) born to him by Eleanore, a former schoolfellow of Madame Murat. M. Ma.s.son thinks this event epoch-making in the life of Napoleon. "Henceforth the charm is broken, and the Emperor a.s.sured of having an heir of his own blood."

No. 27.

_Warsaw, January 3._--On his way from Pultusk on January 1, he had received a Polish ovation at Bronie, where he first met Madame Walewski. The whole story is well told by M. Ma.s.son in _Napoleon et les Femmes_; but here we must content ourselves with the mere facts, and first, for the sake of comparison, cite his love-letters to the lady in question:--(1.) "I have seen only you, I have admired only you, I desire only you. A very prompt answer to calm the impatient ardour of N." (2.) "Have I displeased you? I have still the right to hope the contrary. Have I been mistaken? Your eagerness diminishes, while mine augments. You take away my rest! Oh, give a little joy, a little happiness to a poor heart all ready to worship you. Is it so difficult to get a reply? You owe me one.--N." (3.) "There are moments when too high rank is a burden, and that is what I feel. How can I satisfy the needs of a heart hopelessly in love, which would fling itself at your feet, and which finds itself stopped by the weight of lofty considerations paralysing the most lively desires? Oh, if you would! Only you could remove the obstacles that lie between us. My friend Duroc will clear the way. Oh, come! come! All your wishes shall be gratified. Your native land will be dearer to me when you have had pity on my poor heart,--N." (4.) "Marie, my sweet Marie! My first thought is for you, my first desire to see you again. You will come again, will you not? You promised me to do so. If not, the eagle will fly to you. I shall see you at dinner, a friend tells me. Deign, then, to accept this bouquet; let it become a mysterious link which shall establish between us a secret union in the midst of the crowd surrounding us. Exposed to the glances of the crowd, we shall still understand each other. When my hand presses my heart, you will know that it is full of thoughts of you; and in answer you will press closer your bouquet. Love me, my bonny Marie, and never let your hand leave your bouquet.--N." In this letter, in which he has subst.i.tuted _tu_ for _vous_, there is more pa.s.sion than we have seen since 1796.

The fair lady now leaves her decrepit old husband, nearly fifty years her senior, and takes up her abode in Finckenstein Castle, for nearly two months of the interval between Eylau and Friedland. "In order,"

says Pasquier, "that nothing should be lacking to characterise the calm state of his mind and the security of his position, it was soon known that he had seen fit to enjoy a pleasurable relaxation by calling to him a Polish gentlewoman of excellent birth, with whom he had contracted a _liaison_ while pa.s.sing through Warsaw, and who, as a consequence of this journey, had the honour of bearing him a son."

Repudiated by her husband, she came to Paris, where she was very kindly treated by Josephine, who, having once seen her, found in her no rival, but an enthusiastic patriot, "sacrificed to Plutus," as Napoleon told Lucien at Mantua a few months later, adding that "her soul was as beautiful as her face."

No. 28.

_Be cheerful--gai._--This adjective is a favourite one in letters to his wife, and dates from 1796.

No. 29.

_Roads unsafe and detestable._--The French troops used to say that the four following words const.i.tuted the whole language of the Poles: _Kleba?_ _Niema._ _Vota?_ _Sara._ ("Some bread? There is none. Some water? We will go and fetch it.") Napoleon one day pa.s.sed by a column of infantry suffering the greatest privations on account of the mud, which prevented the arrival of provisions. "Papa, kleba?"

exclaimed a soldier. "Niema," replied the Emperor. The whole column burst into a fit of laughter; they asked for nothing more. Baron Lejeune, Constant, and Meneval have variants of the same story.

No. 35.

Written from Warsaw, and omitted from the _Correspondence_.

_I hope that you are at Paris._--Madame Junot hints that her husband, as Governor of Paris, was being sounded by Bonaparte's sister, Murat's wife (with whom Junot was in love), if he would make Murat Napoleon's successor, in lieu of Eugene, if the Emperor were killed. If Napoleon had an inkling of this, he would wish Josephine to be on the spot.

_T._--Is probably Tallien, who had misconducted himself in Egypt.

Madame Junot met him at Madrid, but she and others had not forgotten the September ma.s.sacres. "The wretch! how did he drag on his loathsome existence?" she exclaims.

No. 36.

_Paris._--Josephine arrived here January 31st; Queen Hortense going to the Hague and the Princess Stephanie to Mannheim.