Bonaparte family

“ To this day many men of ancient and honorable name in France have not ceased to bemoan the destruction of primogeniture by the Revolution and the Code Napoléon. They are proud to transmit their title untarnished to their descendants, are ready to make serious sacrifices in its behalf, to exercise the rigid self-denials of family control for its sake, and to engrave the motto of "noblesse oblige" on their hearts in order to sustain it ”

“ It is true I am young, but I am all they have! And besides, I have set my heart on being of service to the poor little Citizen Dauphin in prison, if I can. We owe that debt to him and to his parents, who helped us in our hour of need."
"You speak truly!" said Bonaparte. "Your family is your first concern, and nothing appeals to me more than the desire to pay a debt, whether of money or gratitude. But should the opportunity ever come, I'll take you with me in the army, lad, for I like your spirit. Would that Paris had in her many more such! ”

“ Among all the numerous hordes of authors who have been paid, recompensed, or encouraged by Bonaparte, none have experienced his munificence more than the Italian Spanicetti and the German Ritterstein. The former presented him a genealogical table in which he proved that the Bonaparte family, before their emigration from Tuscany to Corsica, four hundred years ago, were allied to the most ancient Tuscany families, even to that of the House of Medicis; and as this house has given two queens to the Bourbons when Sovereigns of France, the Bonapartes are, therefore, relatives of the Bourbons ”

“ You can readily believe that Napoleon was made much of by all his family because of his action. "That is the stuff that makes brave soldiers, leaders, and patriots, my son," his "Mamma Letitia" said. "Would that we all had more of it!"
For Madame Bonaparte knew that there was but little of the heroic in her handsome husband, "Papa Charles." ”

“ Ever since we had learned that the Pope would come to Paris for the coronation of the Emperor, the Bonaparte family had been exceedingly anxious to prevent Mme. Bonaparte from having a personal share in the ceremony. The jealousy of our Princesses was strongly excited on this point. It seemed to them that such an honor would place too great a distance between themselves and their sister-in-law, and, besides, dislike needs no motive of interest personal to itself to make anything which is a gratification to its object distasteful. ”

“ Josephine herself was in the greatest anxiety as to whether the wish of the Bonaparte family that she should be divorced would carry the day with her husband. When she had gained her cause for the time and after the Pope had engaged to crown her, she seems to have most cleverly managed to get the Pope informed that she was only united to Napoleon by a civil marriage. The Pope insisted on a religious marriage. Napoleon was angry, but could not recede, and the religions rite was performed by Cardinal Fesch the day, or two days, before the Coronation. ”

“ The Bonaparte family had always been much attached to Paoli, and he in his turn had professed particular respect towards Madame. It is, however, but just to remark 214that he employed persuasion before he resorted to force. “Renounce this opposition,” said he, “it will prove the ruin of yourself, your family, and your fortune; you will bring irreparable misery on yourself.” The Emperor, indeed, affirmed that, but for the chance of the revolution, the family could never have recovered from their misfortunes. ”

“ Holding now the chief military position in Paris, Bonaparte was much courted by every one, but he continued his simple manner of living as of yore, overlooking his laundry and other bills as unostentatiously as when he had been a poor and insignificant subaltern, and daily waxing more taciturn and prone to irritability.
"You are becoming gloomy, General," said Barras one morning, as the two men breakfasted. "It is time for you to marry and become a family man."
"Peste!" said Napoleon, "man of family! It takes too long—it is tedious. Families are delightful when the children are grown up ”

“ There is indeed an immense difference between the statements of a women—trusting her fears and her hopes to the sole confidant of her family secrets, and the tardy declaration of a man who, after seeing the vast edifice of his ambition leveled with the dust, is only anxious, in his compulsory retreat, to preserve intact and spotless the other great edifice of his glory. Bonaparte should have recollected that Caesar did not like the idea of his wife being even suspected. ”

“ Great was the excitement in the United States, when, in 1853, it was confidently announced by a New York magazine writer that the long lost prince had at last been discovered, in the person of the middle-aged Eleazer Williams, an Episcopal missionary to the Oneida Indians at Little Kaukauna, in the lower valley of the Fox.
The Bonaparte family, represented by Louis Napoleon, were just then in control of France; but the Bourbon [197] family, of which Louis the XVII., were he alive, would naturally be the head, considered themselves rightful hereditary masters of that country. ”

“ Elise Bonaparte might be called the Semiramis of Italy; Caroline might intrigue for Empires; Pauline might be the most beautiful woman of France; but their mother combined all their good qualities with very few of their bad ones. To bring up a family of eight children thoroughly well on an income of less than one hundred pounds a year in a revolution-torn country like Corsica is in itself a remarkable feat, though hardly likely in unfavourable circumstances to gain mention in history, but to do it when handicapped by a husband like Carlo Bonaparte is more remarkable still. ”

“ I have already spoken of Mme. Bonaparte’s family. In the first years of her elevation she had brought four nephews and a niece to Paris from Martinique. These all bore the name of Tascher. For the young men situations were found, and the young lady was lodged in the Tuileries. She was by no means deficient in beauty, but the change of climate affected her health, and rendered impossible all the plans which the Emperor had formed for a brilliant marriage for her. At first he thought of marrying her to the Prince of Baden; then for some time he destined her for a prince of the house of Spain. ”

“ The following interesting trait of Napoleon's childhood is derived from the 'Memoirs of the Duchesse d'Arbranes':—"He was one day accused by one of his sisters of having eaten a basketful of grapes, figs, and citrons, which had come from the garden of his uncle the Canon. None but those who were acquainted with the Bonaparte family can form any idea of the enormity of this offence. To eat fruit belonging to the uncle the Canon was infinitely more criminal than to eat grapes and figs which might be claimed by anybody else. ”

“ They had allied themselves with the oldest families in France, and the haughtiness of family pride led them to feel condescension for the great adventurer whose blood so far flowed in no aristocratic veins. It seemed to Napoleon that in order to secure popular good will he must restore prosperity, which was not easy, and to assert a moral ascendancy over his court he must make a suitable match, which was easy enough. ”

“ The Revolution had overthrown the old régime completely, and the ruins of society were without form and void. From this chaos Napoleon painfully gathered the substantial materials of a new structure, and out of these reconstructed the family, the state, and the church. He revived the domestic spirit, made marriage a solid institution, and reëstablished parental authority while destroying parental despotism. In civil society he restored the right of property and fixed the sanctity of contract, thus assuring respect for the individual and the ascendancy of the law. ”

“ Madame Bonaparte 18brought her husband no great name, but she did bring him health, beauty, and remarkable qualities. Tall and imposing, Mademoiselle Lætitia Ramolino had a superb carriage, which she never lost, and a face which attracted attention particularly by the accentuation and perfection of its features. She was reserved, but of ceaseless energy and will, and though but fifteen when married, she conducted her family affairs with such good sense and firmness that she was able to bring up decently the eight children spared her from the thirteen she bore. ”

“ In remaining near Napoleon, or in receiving from him a throne, you will be useful to him. He will marry your daughters; [Pg 171] and so long as he can find, in the members of his family, the instruments for executing his projects and his policy, he will not choose strangers. We must not treat with the master of the world as with an equal. Nature made us the children of the same father, and his prodigies have rendered us his subjects. Although sovereigns, we hold every thing from him. ”

“ Madame Bonaparte became calm, and Bonaparte resumed his wonted confidence. The events of the day naturally formed the subject of our conversation. Josephine, who was much attached to the Gohier family, mentioned the name of that Director in a tone of kindness. "What would you have, my dear?" said Bonaparte to her. "It is not my fault. He is a respectable man, but a simpleton. He does not understand me!—I ought, perhaps, to have him transported. He wrote against me to the Council of the Ancients; but I have his letter, and they know nothing about it. Poor man! ”

“ Two brothers cannot be placed at the same time in the military schools." When Napoleon was fifteen he was sent to Paris until he should attain the requisite age for entering the army. Lucien was not received into the College of Brienne, at least not until his brother had quitted the Military School of Paris.
Bonaparte was undoubtedly a man of good family. I have seen an authentic account of his genealogy, which he obtained from Tuscany. A great deal has been said about the civil dissensions which forced his family to quit Italy and take refuge in Corsica. ”

“ The family of General Bonaparte were assiduous in their attentions; but it was known among us that they had no love for Madame Bonaparte, of which fact I had many proofs. Mademoiselle Hortense never left her mother, and they were devotedly attached to each other.
Besides men distinguished by their posts under the government or in the army, there gathered others also who were not less distinguished by personal merit, or the position which their birth had given them before the Revolution. It was a veritable panorama, in which we saw the persons themselves pass before our eyes. ”

“ Bonaparte wished to give his stepdaughter to Duroc, and his brothers were eager to promote the marriage, because they wished to separate Josephine from Hortense, for whom Bonaparte felt the tenderest affection. Josephine, on the other hand, wished Hortense to marry Louis Bonaparte. Her motives, as may easily be divined, were to gain support in a family where she experienced nothing but enmity, and she carried her point. ”

“ Joseph had been made King of Naples in 1806. Eliza was Princess of Lucques and Piombino. Louis, married to Hortense, had been King of Holland since 1806. Pauline had been the Princess Borghese since 1803; Caroline, the wife of Murat, was Grand Duchess of Cleves and Berg; Jerome was King of Westphalia; Eugène de Beauharnais, Viceroy of Italy, was married to a princess of Bavaria.
The members of Napoleon’s family were elevated only on condition that they act strictly in accordance with his plans. They must marry so as to cement the ties necessary to his kingdom. ”

“ It is as true that the young Prince, for whom the Emperor of Austria stood sponsor at the font, was the son of Napoleon and the Archduchess Maria Louisa as it is false that Bonaparte was the father of the first child of Hortense. The birth of the son of Napoleon was hailed with general enthusiasm. The Emperor was at the height of his power from the period of the birth of his son until the reverse he experienced after the battle of the Moskowa. The Empire, including the States possessed by the Imperial family, contained nearly 57,000,000 of inhabitants ”

“ It declared that, Bonaparte being a man superior to either Cromwell or Monk and comparable only to Cæsar, the office of First Consul should be made hereditary in his family. This was the real purport of the manifesto, that France should already hail a Bonaparte dynasty; if fate destroyed Napoleon, a brother ought to succeed him. The tract was written by Fontanes, its revision and theatrical publication were the work of Lucien. Fouché as the republican standard-bearer had already avowed himself against the principle and practice of heredity. ”

“ If the family of Bonaparte, in its later days, found a refuge beside the Father of the Faithful, with still greater reason must hospitality be shown to the family of the Most Christian Kings."
I am no great believer in this dispatch, but I was keenly struck by one contrast: in France, the Government lavishes insults upon a woman of whom it is afraid; in Italy, they remember only the name, the courage and the misfortunes of Madame la Duchesse de Berry. ”

“ Besides the sentiments of these confidential counsellors, upwards of two hundred memoirs, for or against the Christian religion, were presented to the First Consul by uninvited and volunteer counsellors,—all differing as much from one another as the members of his own Privy Council.
Many persons do Madame Bonaparte, the mother, the honour of supposing that to her assiduous representations is principally owing the recall of the priests, and the restoration of the altars of Christ. She certainly is the most devout, or rather the most superstitious of her family, and of her name ”