The Court of the Empress Josephine Part 8

XVII.

PARIS IN THE BEGINNING OF 1806.

Napoleon arranged his return with the utmost skill. His prolonged stay at Munich kept alive the impatience of the Parisians for his return, and meanwhile there was a constant stream of flattery and enthusiasm. January 1, 1806, had just put an end to the Republican calendar, which had existed for thirteen years, three months, and a few days. The Year XIV. found itself suddenly interrupted by the return to the Gregorian calendar. Thus vanished the last trace of the Republic. The same day the new year was inaugurated with a patriotic ceremony. The Tribune carried with great solemnity to the Senate the forty-four Russian and Austrian flags which the hero of Austerlitz had entrusted to its care. All the houses in the streets through which the procession was to pa.s.s were decorated. In front of many of them were to be seen the Emperor's bust crowned with laurels.

The ever lyrical _Moniteur_ said: "At the sight of these n.o.ble spoils, these startling proofs of the heroism of the French army, all hearts seemed to meet in a common feeling of admiration and grat.i.tude which was but faintly expressed by the shouts issuing from the crowd and from every window, of 'Long live the Emperor!' 'Hurrah for the Grand Army!' 'Victory, victory!' 'Long live the Emperor!' It was in this way that the people of Paris, of all cla.s.ses, of both s.e.xes, of all ages, manifested in the most vivid and unanimous way their devotion and grat.i.tude to His Majesty and his victorious armies."

One Tribune, M. Joubert, exclaimed: "Is not Napoleon the man of history, the man of all ages? May we not say that there is something supernatural in him, since it is true that G.o.d disposes of the fate of empires, and that Napoleon the Great gladly submits everything to Providence and ascribes everything to religion?" In their official enthusiasm the Tribunes, as accomplished courtiers, made one motion after another. One proposed that the Emperor on his return should receive triumphal honors, like those of ancient Rome, and the city of Paris should go to meet him.

Another suggested that the sword which he wore at the battle of Austerlitz should be solemnly consecrated and placed in some public monument. Another expressed a desire that on one of the princ.i.p.al places in the city a column should be set up, bearing the Emperor's statue, with this inscription: "To Napoleon the Great, the grateful country." The Senate, with similar zeal, hastened to carry out the plan by a decree.

The Parisians, who always worship success of monarches, generals, or artists, then felt the wildest admiration for the victorious Napoleon. The _Moniteur_ was full of dithyrambic eulogies, in prose and verse. Flattery appeared as it had never appeared before. Bishops became conspicuous for their ardent praise; some phrases from their charges may be quoted. Thus the Bishop of Versailles said: "G.o.d says: 'No one shall resist him, whom I have clothed with a special mission to re-establish my worship, to lead my chosen people; no one will resist him because I am with him, and he is with me. _Dem c.u.m eo_.'"

The Bishop of Bayonne; "Behold our enemies ones more defeated. Let incredulity be silent and the atheist confounded. Our annals will be the story of the wonders of Providence... Widows, cease to bemoan the loss of a loved husband; you are not left alone; you belong to the country.

Orphans, you have found another father; Napoleon has adopted you."

The Bishop of Rennes: "Did not those kings know, or did they forget in their delirium, that the French nation is now the first nation in the world? Did they not know that the man who governs it is the most astounding man in the world, and the greatest warrior history has ever known?"

The Bishop of Coutances: "The Almighty wishes Napoleon to attain this new glory and hence impresses upon him a sort of divine character. He wishes him to attain it on the day and at the same hour that the Sovereign Pontiff, one year ago, poured on his brow the holy oil."

The Bishop of Montpellier: "Let the earth be shaken, and the mountains cast into the bosom of the seas; our G.o.d blesses the views, the wisdom, the talents, and the courage of our august monarch."

The Emperor, in dividing the flags which he had captured from Russia and Austria, had given fifty-four to the Senate, eight to the Tribunes, eight to the city of Paris, and fifty to the church of Notre Dame, which he wished to adorn with his trophies as the Marshal of Luxembourg had done in the reign of Louis XIV. The day when these fifty flags were given to the Cathedral the Cardinal Archbishop of France said, "O Posterity, when you read our history you will imagine that you are reading anew the fall of the walls of Jericho, and listening to the miraculous deeds of Joshua, David, and Judas Maccabaeus. _Benedictus Dominus qui facit mirabilia solus_.... G.o.d of Marengo, you declare yourself the G.o.d of Austerlitz; and the German eagle, the Russian eagle, abandoned by you, became the prey of the French eagle, which you never cease to protect." A singular piece of flattery this, to call the Creator of the universe--of which this earth is not a millionth part--the G.o.d of a village, because near this village a man has wrought the death of many other men!

Paris seemed to have recovered its ardor of the first days of the Revolution in order to salute the triumphant hero. The day of his arrival, January 27, 1806, the managers of the bank, anxious that his presence should be the signal for public prosperity, ordered the resumption of specie payments. The Opera celebrated his return and that of the Empress by a grand performance which took place February 4. The bills announced the _Pretendus_ and a divertis.e.m.e.nt, The public knew that this divertis.e.m.e.nt was to be a sort of apotheosis in honor of the Imperial glories. The house was crowded, and the pa.s.sages themselves were crammed by the enthusiastic crowd. During the second act of the _Pretendus_ there was great excitement over the arrival of Napoleon and Josephine. Applause resounded from every side. Ladies distributed laurel branches, which all the spectators waved, shouting, "Long live the Emperor!" Musicians played the chorus of the _Caravan_. Meanwhile, the scenery of the _Pretendus_ disappeared, and applause began over the magnificent decorations that took its place. It was a semicircular enclosure with trophies forming a colonnade showing the course of the Seine from the Pont Neuf to the western limit of Paris, showing the Louvre, which Napoleon had promised to complete, the Pont des Arts, the Palais de la Monnaie, the Tuileries, and in the misty distance the Champs Elysees overlooking this fine view. The interior of the enclosure was adorned with garlands and crowded with people, awaiting the return of the Grand Army. This appeared with a military march: the sappers in front with their axes and white ap.r.o.ns; the grenadiers of the Guard with their high fur caps; the artillerymen with their black caps; the dragoons with their double armor; the Mamelukes with their scimetars. Then came the Bavarians, worthy comrades of Napoleon's soldiers. The people applauded their defenders. Pupils of the military schools sprang into the ranks to welcome their fathers, while old men embraced their children. A general chorus was heard. Then a warrior came to the front of the stage and celebrated in a hymn the marvels of the campaign of Austerlitz. This was followed by a ballet of foreign nations, in which joined French peasants and girls in the dress of their provinces, from Caux and Alsace, Provence, Bearn, Auvergne, and the Alps. After the dances came songs,--the words by Esmenard, author of the _Navigation_, the music by Stobelt. The marches, evolutions, and ballet were arranged by Gardel. The princ.i.p.al stanzas were sung by the most distinguished artists, Lainez, Las, Madame Armand, Madame Branchu. When it was all over, the Emperor and the Empress withdrew amid applause, and there was sung the _Vivat_ of Abbe Rose which had made such a success at Notre Dame on Coronation Day, and was as warmly applauded at the Opera as it had been in the Cathedral.

XVIII.

THE MARRIAGE OF THE PRINCE OF BADEN.

If anything is capable of proving the admiration, terror, and fascination that the hero of Austerlitz exercised over Europe, and especially over Germany, in 1806, it is certainly the marriage of the hereditary Prince of Baden with Mademoiselle Stephanie de Beauharnais. It was a curious sight!

A Prince belonging to one of the oldest and most ill.u.s.trious families in the world, whose three sisters had married, one, the Emperor of Russia; another, the King of Sweden; the third, the King of Bavaria; a Prince who might have allied himself with the oldest reigning houses had come to regard as an honor a marriage with, the plain daughter of a French senator,--a girl not united by any ties of blood with Napoleon, but only by adoption; that is to say, by a whim. One might have supposed that the Empire of the new Charlemagne was centuries old, and the German Princes bowed before it like devoted va.s.sals before their suzerain. What a vast power he had attained, and how easily he could have kept it, if he had limited his ambition, and put bounds to his power, and had not asked of docile Germany more than it could give him!

The marriage of Mademoiselle Stephanie de Beauharnais with the hereditary Prince of Baden was at first warmly opposed by the Margravine, this Prince's mother. M. Ma.s.sias, French charge d'affaires at Baden, had written on this matter to M. de Talleyrand, Minister of Foreign Affairs, January 6, 1806: "My Lord,--For some days there has been a rumor quietly circulating among the princ.i.p.al persons of the court of Carlsruhe that the object of M. de Thiard's last journey was to arrange the marriage of the Electoral Prince of Baden with the daughter of Senator Beauharnais. Last evening arrived a messenger from the Electress of Bavaria for the Margravine, the mother of this Prince. I have learned by chance the contents of this missive to his mother. She says substantially that she has had a talk of more than an hour with the Emperor Napoleon; that His Majesty promised that the marriage of the Electoral Prince of Baden with Mademoiselle Beauharnais should never take place without the consent of the Margravine; and in case of her refusal of this consent, he would only reserve to himself the right of being consulted on the choice of the wife to be given to this young Prince.... The Electoral Prince called on his mother after she had received this despatch, and was with her alone for two hours; he came away in great dejection. When he got to his grandfather's, he exclaimed, involuntarily, 'That woman is lost; she wants to ruin herself!'"

The charge d'affaires ended his letter with this sketch of the Margravine: "I have known the Margravine for six years, and I think I can say that if she judges the match in question opposed to the pride inspired by the first ideas of her education, no persuasion can move her. She possesses to a very marked degree the confident obstinacy of feeble and timid spirits.

She does not dare to dismiss an incompetent footman; and when she has once made up her mind, which is only possible in matters about which her opinions are rigidly formed, neither force nor persuasion can modify her.

That is my reading of her character, and I think it the true one."

The more the Margravine opposed this match which the Emperor had suggested, the more the young Prince of Baden and his grandfather, the Elector, desired it. M. Ma.s.sias wrote again to M. de Talleyrand, January 9, 1806: "His Most Serene Highness, the Prince Electoral of Baden, is to leave tomorrow for Ulm and Augsburg, to invite, in his grandfather's name, His Majesty the Emperor and King to honor Carlsruhe with his presence, and to stay at the castle on his way back to France. But, he tells me himself, the main object of his journey is to convince His Majesty that the marriage of which I had the honor to speak to Your Excellency in my last letter, is far from opposing his desires; and he hopes to dissipate without difficulty the doubts which it has been sought to raise regarding this in the mind of His Majesty, for whom he always manifested a profound devotion and a sincere attachment."

What was the origin of this young girl whose hand was thus sought by the hereditary Prince of Baden? The Marquis of Beauharnais, the father of the Viscount of Beauharnais, the first husband of the Empress Josephine, had a brother, Count Claude de Beauharnais, who was a commodore, and married Mademoiselle f.a.n.n.y Mouchard. Countess f.a.n.n.y, a friend of Dorat and Cubieres, took much interest in literature and wrote many novels. She was a blue-stocking, and it was about her that Lebrun wrote the malicious epigram:--

"Egle, fair and a poetess, has then two slight faults: She makes her face and does not make her verses."

By her marriage with Count Claude de Beauharnais, the Countess f.a.n.n.y (born in 1738, died in 1813) had one son, named Claude after his father, who married the daughter of the Count of Lezay-Marnesia. They had a daughter, Stephanie de Beauharnais, born August 28, 1789, who was adopted by Napoleon, married the hereditary Prince of Baden, became the grandd.u.c.h.ess of this country, and died in 1860, much loved by her family and the people of Baden. Her father, Claude de Beauharnais, was a senator in the Empire, a peer of France at the Restoration, and died in 1819.

During the childhood of Mademoiselle Stephanie de Beauharnais no one would have predicted the lofty destiny that awaited her. Her father, having lost his wife, entrusted her to a pious old aunt, who lived at Montauban, and there she remained in obscurity until it occurred to her uncle, M. de Lezay-Marnesia, to take her to Paris, and present her to the wife of the First Consul. Josephine, her cousin once removed, thought her pretty and bright, became very fond of her, and sent her to finish her education at Madame Campan's boarding-school at Saint Germain. Madame Campan wrote to Madame Louis about her young pupil as follows: "I am certainly surprised at the way Mademoiselle Stephanie has turned out since she returned from Saint Leu. She may become a very charming woman, but not if she stays at Saint Cloud. Royal palaces have never been good schools; pleasures, the taste for excitement and flattery, corrupt not merely those who are young, but even those who go there already matured, unless they are protected by the highest principles. If you have the power, do try to let me keep Stephanie until she marries; you will thereby render her a great service, and to me, too; for the result will condemn me in the eyes of the Emperor, who will say, with a sharp glance, 'That's very bad'; and will not have time to ascertain the real reason. I can a.s.sure you that in a year she will be very charming, if I can only keep my hand on her."

In the letter Madame Campan thus describes her pupil's character: "It is a curious compound of ease at learning, self-love, emulation, idleness, amiability, clear-mindedness, levity, haughtiness, and piety. There are a good many qualities to dispose of, and on this proper arrangement depends her happiness or unhappiness, and my success or failure." In personal appearance Mademoiselle de Beauharnais was very charming; she had a good figure, an expressive countenance, a brilliant complexion, bright blue eyes, light hair, and an agreeable voice. Moreover, her manners were good, she had keen mother wit, much gaiety and enthusiasm, and was, in short, a very attractive young person.

The Emperor had a sort of infatuation for her, and treated her with exceptional kindness that did not fail to excite comment. Although her father was still living, he decided to adopt her, and this was thought a singular thing to do. The young Stephanie became an Imperial Highness and took precedence of the Emperor's sisters, while her father was merely one of the herd of senators. In the decree of March 3, 1806, it was said: "Our intention being that our daughter the Princess Stephanie Napoleon, shall enjoy all the prerogatives due to her rank; at receptions, festivities, and at table she shall sit at our side, and in our absence she shall take her place at the right of Her Majesty the Empress." Josephine possibly thought that her young relative was a little too well treated by the Emperor, and that his feelings for her were not wholly paternal. Evil tongues a.s.serted that Napoleon was in love with his adopted daughter, but in spite of those malicious insinuations, no serious charge can be brought against her innocence. Her betrothed, the Prince of Baden, was madly in love with her, and showed by his conduct that it was he who was making a fine marriage. Mademoiselle de Beauharnais from the moment that she a.s.sumed the name of Napoleon imagined that nothing was too good for her.

It was only by condescension that she married the son of an elector, for she was never tired of saying, to her adopted father's great delight, that an emperor's daughter could marry either a king or a king's son.

The marriage was celebrated with great pomp in the chapel of the Palace of the Tuileries, April 8, 1806, at eight in the evening. The witnesses for the bridegroom were the Crown Prince of Bavaria, Baron de Gueusau, and M.

de Dalberg; those of the bride were M. de Talleyrand, M. de Champagny, and M. de Segur. The procession went from the grand apartments to the chapel in the following order: the Empress, preceded by the officers of the Princesses, accompanied by the Prince of Baden, the Princesses, and the Crown Prince of Bavaria, and followed by the ladies of her household and of those of the Princesses; the Emperor, conducting the bride, and preceded by the officers of the Princes, his own officers, the Grand Dignitaries of the Empire, the Ministers, the High Officers of the Crown, and followed by the colonel-general of the guard on duty. At the chapel door the clergy received Napoleon and Josephine beneath a canopy, and they took their places on two small thrones in front of the altar, while the Prince of Baden and the bride took their places on two stools at the foot of its steps. The ceremony began with the blessing of thirteen pieces of gold which the Cardinal Caprara, Legate _a latere_, gave to the Prince of Baden, who presented them to his bride. The Cardinal gave them the nuptial blessing. Meanwhile Monsignor Charier-Lavoche, Bishop of Versailles, the Emperor's First Almoner, and Monsignor de Broglie, Bishop of Acqui, his Almoner in Ordinary, were holding a canopy of silver brocade over the head of the kneeling Prince and Princess. These two prelates wore a camail and rochet. Cardinal Caprara and his a.s.sistant, Monsignor de Rohan, the Empress's Almoner, wore the golden cape.

During the ceremony, which lasted about an hour, the front of the Tuileries and the garden were illuminated. At nine o'clock there were fireworks on the Place de la Concorde, which the Emperor and Empress watched from the balcony of the Hall of the Marshals. As they appeared on the balcony with the young people, they were greeted with warm applause from the dense crowd in the garden. The Empress, who was clad in a dress embroidered with gold, wore on her head, besides the Imperial crown, a million francs' worth of pearls. Princess Stephanie was charming in her white tulle dress, with silver stars, trimmed with orange flowers, and her diamond frontlet. After the fireworks came a concert and ballet in the Hall of the Marshals. But little attention was paid to the concert, although silence prevailed; the ballet, which was rendered by the best dancers from the Opera, was very successful. Then the company went to the Gallery of Diana, where tables had been set for two hundred ladies, and a magnificent supper was served. The grace and distinction of the bride aroused general admiration. Her father, Senator Beauharnais, kept silence and wept for joy.

Never had the court been more dazzling with its glittering uniforms, gorgeous dresses, and sumptuous pomp. The Emperor in his gala dress, the Empress in her Imperial splendor, the Princesses vying in luxury, the new Queen of Naples staggering under her load of precious stones, the Princess Louis covered with turquoises set in diamonds. Princess Caroline Murat decked with a thousand rubies, Princess Pauline with all the Borghese diamonds besides her own, the amba.s.sadors, grand dignitaries, marshals, generals, with their coats covered with gold and decorations, the chamberlains in red, the master of ceremonies in violet, the masters of the hounds in green, the equerries in blue, all the ladies in dresses with long trains; the two fashionable women, Madame Maret and Madame Savary, who each spent fifty thousand francs a year in dress; Madame de Canisy, tall, black-haired, bright-eyed, with her aquiline nose and her impressive air; Madame Lannes, with her gentle face like one of Raphael's Madonnas; Madame Duchatel, fair, with blue eyes; and that proud d.u.c.h.ess of the Faubourg Saint Germain, a lady of the palace in spite of herself, the d.u.c.h.ess of Chevreuse, who, if not the most beautiful woman there, had perhaps the grandest air. It was a most animated festivity, with its flowers, lights, and splendor. The Hall of the Marshals was radiant with its military portraits, its chandeliers, and air of triumph.... Now consider the ruins of this palace of Caesar, this Olympus of Jupiter, this sanctuary of glory, majesty, and dominion. See and reflect! Nothing is left of all that pomp and grandeur! The proudest buildings have vanished!

Such is the end of human splendor!

XIX.

THE NEW QUEEN OF HOLLAND.

At the beginning of 1804, Napoleon regarded himself the absolute master of fortune. His twofold t.i.tle of Emperor of the French and King of Italy no longer sufficed him; he yearned for that of Emperor of the West. He created kings, grand dukes, sovereign princes. He made his brother Joseph King of the Two Sicilies; his brother-in-law Murat Grand Duke of Berg and Cleves; his sister Pauline Princess of Guastalla; he conferred the princ.i.p.ality of Ma.s.sa upon his sister Elisa, who was already in possession of the Duchy of Lucca; his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Talleyrand, became Prince of Benevento; his Major-General, Berthier, Prince of Neufchatel; and his brother Joseph's brother-in-law, Bernadotte, Prince of Ponte Corvo. He also elevated members of his wife's family as well as of his own to high positions. Josephine's son was Viceroy and son-in-law of a king.

Josephine's daughter was about to become a queen.

France, which, fourteen years before, had wanted to convert every monarchy into a republic, was now endeavoring to turn the oldest republics into monarchies. The ill.u.s.trious republics of Genoa and Venice had become an integral part, the one of the French Empire, the other of the Kingdom of Italy. The Batavian Republic was about to be transformed into the Kingdom of Holland. When it became known in Paris that this new kingdom was to be created by the Emperor's will, people wondered who was to fill the throne; some were betting on Louis Bonaparte; others on his brother Jerome; still others on Murat. The Emperor, however, had settled the question, and without even consulting him, had decided that Louis was to be King of Holland.

This new monarch, who was born September 2, 1778, was then twenty-seven years old. Four years before he had married Josephine's daughter, Hortense de Beauharnais, but the marriage had been an unhappy one. As he himself wrote, his marriage was celebrated in sadness. The author of a very remarkable study, _Holland and King Louis_, M. Albert Reville, says with great truth: "Like Hortense, Louis had literary tastes; but there the resemblance ceases. It was not that there was nothing romantic in Hortense's character; she was among the first to become interested in the Middle Ages, the Gothic revival, the imitation of the troubadours; but her romanticism was wholly different from that of her husband. Her ideal was, perhaps, a young and handsome soldier, pensive when away from the lady of his thoughts, but not when in her company." M. Reville goes on: "Such a character could not understand the sensitiveness, the shrinking, morbid melancholy of the husband thrust upon her. Her gaiety, her devotion to pleasure, the frivolity of her talk, could only pain more and more a man of a gloomy temperament, who took the greatest care of his health, who fretted himself over the most trivial details, and whose distrust amounted to injustice."

Hortense was expansive, merry, ardent, enthusiastic, young in heart and mind, a thoroughly open nature. Her husband, on the other hand, was of a morose, sombre, melancholy, reserved nature. In spite of her superior intelligence Hortense had a sort of childlike air; but Louis, though young in years, had the character and appearance of an old man. As much as Hortense loved liberty, her suspicious husband wished to hold firmly the reins of conjugal authority. He was prematurely afflicted with various infirmities, almost always morbidly nervous and impressionable, disposed to take a dark view of everything, and bore no resemblance to the type of hero which Hortense had imagined. Moreover, the unhappy husband endured a hidden anguish which he had to conceal from every one and which tortured his heart; he imagined that his rival with his wife was his own brother, Napoleon. Thiers says in discussing this delicate subject: "Louis, ill, puffed-up with pride, a.s.suming virtue and really upright, pretended that he was sacrificed to the infamous necessity of covering, by his marriage, the weakness of Hortense de Beauharnais for Napoleon,--an odious calumny, invented by the emigres, spread abroad in a thousand pamphlets, about which Louis did wrong to betray such anxiety that he seemed to believe it himself."

In a word, there existed between husband and wife a real incompatibility of temper, and the constraint of their position only added to the mutual repulsion which they felt for each other in private, though they did not dare confess it through fear of Napoleon's reproaches. They were married January 4, 1802, and had a son born the next October, whom their enemies a.s.serted was the son of the Emperor, and the greater the interest and affection the Emperor showed to this child, the more freely were calumnies circulated. Louis Bonaparte imagined his honor tainted, and suffered tortures.

As for Hortense, she was unhappy, but she had consolations. Her mother's love, the society of her old schoolmates, her interest in art, worldly successes, the distractions of Paris life, made her forget some of her domestic troubles. The thought of leaving that congenial spot to live alone with her husband in the cold dampness of Holland filled her with gloom. She did not care for a throne, for she felt that a royal palace would be for her nothing but a prison.

Louis, too, seemed devoid of ambition for the crown that was held before him. Annoyed at not being consulted in the negotiations on which depended his call to the throne, he maintained a pa.s.sive att.i.tude. But as he was accustomed to comply with every wish of a brother who had taken charge of his education, and thereby acquired special authority over him, he invariably obeyed his orders. The Batavian deputation, of which the most important member was Admiral Verhuel, had just arrived in Paris, and with it the Emperor was settling the fate of Holland. Baron Duca.s.se, in an interesting paper In the _Revue Historique_ for February, 1880, has recounted all the unfortunate Louis Bonaparte's attempts to escape having royalty forced upon him. He gave as a pretext, for his reluctance, the rights of the old Stadtholder. The Batavian deputation in reply announced to him the death of that official, "The hereditary Prince," they said, "has received in compensation Fulda; hence you can have no reasonable objection. We come, in accordance with the votes of nine-tenths of the nation, to beg of you to ally your fate with ours, and to prevent our falling into other hands." Napoleon used even plainer language. He declared to his brother without beating the bush that he had accepted for him, and that, even if he had not consulted him, a subject could not refuse obedience.

A few days later, Talleyrand, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, went to Saint Cloud and read to Louis and Hortense the treaty with Holland, and the const.i.tution of that country. It was of no use for the King to say that he could not judge such important doc.u.ments from a simple reading, he was not granted a moment's reflection. In vain he pleaded his health, which could not fail to suffer from the damp climate of Holland. Napoleon was inflexible, and said, "It is better to die on a throne than to live a French Prince." There was nothing for him to do but to give his consent.

The new King's proclamation was delivered at the Palace of the Tuileries in the Throne Room, June 5, 1806. Early in the same day, the Emperor had formally received Mahib Effendi, Amba.s.sador of the Sultan Selim. The Oriental diplomatist had greeted him as "the first and greatest of Christian monarchs, the bright star of glory of the western nations, the one who held in a firm hand the sword of valor and the sceptre of justice." Napoleon had replied: "Whatever good or bad fortune may befall the Ottomans will be fortunate or unfortunate for France. Report, I beg of you, my words to the Sultan Selim. Bid him never to forget that my enemies, who are also his, would like to get at him. He has nothing to fear from me; united with me, he need not fear the power of any of his enemies." When the audience was over, the Amba.s.sador made three deep bows and withdrew, but stopped in the next room, where the presents of the Grand Porte were set out on a table; they consisted of an aigret of diamonds, and a costly box set with gems and adorned with the monogram of the Sultan. Mahib Effendi, after offering the presents to the Emperor, showed him those sent to the Empress. They were a pearl necklace, perfumes, and Oriental stuffs. Napoleon examined them, and then went to the window to see some superbly harnessed Arabian horses, presented to him in the name of the Sultan.

The proclamation of the King of Holland was read a few moments later.

Admiral Verhuel took the floor and began to speak of the happiness a.s.sured to his country when it should have made fast the ties that bound it to the "immense and immortal Empire." The Emperor said to the Dutch representatives: "France has been so generous as to renounce all the rights over you which were given it by the events of the war, but I cannot confide the fortresses that guard my northern frontiers to any unfaithful or even uncertain hands. Representatives of the Batavian people, I grant the prayer you present to me, and proclaim Prince Louis King of Holland."

Then turning to his brother, he said: "You, Prince, reign over this people; their fathers acquired their independence only by the constant aid of France. Since then Holland was the ally of England; it was conquered; and still owes its existence to us. She will owe to us the kings who protect its laws, its liberties, its religion! But do not ever cease to be a Frenchman. The dignity of Constable of the Empire will ever belong to you and to your descendants; it will define for you your duties towards me and the importance I attach to the guard of the fortresses protecting the north of my states, which I confide to you. Prince, maintain among your troops that spirit which I have seen in them on the field of battle.

Encourage in your new subjects the feelings of union and love which they ought always to have for France. Be the terror of evil-doers and the father of the upright; that is the character of a great king."