Empress Josephine

“ These were the first letters which Josephine received from her loving, tender husband. They are a splendid monument of affection with which love adorns the solitary grave of the departed empress; and surely in the dark hours of her life, the remembrance of these days of happiness, of these letters so full of passionate ardor, must have alleviated the bitterness of her grief and given her the consolation that at least she was once loved as perhaps no other woman on earth can boast! ”

“ Napoleon was unhappy, and she was forbidden to comfort him! He was exiled, and she was forbidden to follow him! The Empire she had seen so magnificent she was to see conquered, invaded, dismembered. No one was to mourn the woes of her country more than she. She was to die of grief, and when, May 29, 1814, she had breathed her last after uttering in her death agony these three words which sum up the anguish of her soul: "Napoleon! Elba! Marie Louise!" Mademoiselle Avrillon, the First Lady of her Bedchamber, was to say, "I have seen the Empress Josephine's sleeplessness and her terrible dreams. ”

“ So long as Josephine was true, no other woman could have existed for him. Such is the strange exclusiveness in love, of a nature, brutal, sweet, and strong like Napoleon’s. It should never be forgotten, however, that when the poor little creole realized, that to keep her position she must be faithful, she never after gave offense, and that as the years went on her devotion to her husband became a cult. Nothing indeed in the history of women is more pathetic than the patience, the sweetness, with which Josephine performed all the exacting and uncongenial duties of her position as Empress. ”

“ These words of Napoleon are the most beautiful epitaph of the Empress Josephine, the much-loved, the much-regretted, and the much-slandered one. Even while Napoleon won battles, while with lofty pride he placed his foot on the neck of the conquered, took away from princes their crowns, and from nations their liberty—while Europe trembling bowed before him, and despite her admiration cursed him—while hatred heaved up the hearts of all nations against him—even then none could refuse admiration to the tender, lovely woman who, with the gracious smile of goodness, walked at his side ”

“ The emperor answered not—a terrible glance fell upon the bold maestro, without, however, annihilating him: then Napoleon entered into Josephine’s cabinet, and Spontini walked away slowly and with uplifted head.
Spontini, the famous composer of the “Vestals,” whose score he had dedicated to the Empress Josephine, remained after her divorce a true and devoted admirer of the empress; and in Malmaison, as well as in the castle of Navarra, he showed himself as faithful, as ready to serve, as submissive, as he had once been in the Tuileries, or at St. Cloud, in the days of Josephine’s glory. ”

“ Josephine stood on the pinnacle of life; she saw the princes of foreign states come to France as conquered, as captives, and as allies, to bring to her husband and to herself the homage of subjects; she saw devoted courtiers and flatterers; pomp and splendor surrounded her on every side.
Amid this glory she remained simple and modest—she never gave up her cheerful gentleness and mildness; she never forgot the days which had been; she never allowed herself to be exalted by the brilliancy of the moment to an ambitious pride or to a lofty self-conceit. ”

“ At last the ceremony of dinner was over, the attendants were dismissed, and Napoleon, rising, and closing the door with his own hand, was left alone with Josephine. Another moment of most painful silence ensued, [Pg 288] when the emperor, pale as death, and trembling in every nerve, approached the empress. He took her hand, placed it upon his heart, and in faltering accents said, "Josephine! my own good Josephine! you know how I have loved you. It is to you alone that I owe the only few moments of happiness I have known in the world. Josephine! my destiny is stronger than my will. ”

“ It touches the woman Josephine only. As for the Empress Josephine, she is only a name. She held her throne by the accident of her marriage and never took it seriously. She never comprehended the ideas it stood for in the mind of the great tyrant who established it. The prosperity of the French people—the glory of French arms, the spread of just laws, the establishment of a stable system, all those notions for which Napoleon was struggling, meant nothing to her save as they affected the tenure of her own position. ”

“ Napoleon was proud of Josephine, and often said that there was no woman in the world to be compared with her. The empress was happy. All France was filled with stories of her active benevolence and her sympathy with the sorrowful. Wherever she made her appearance, she was greeted with the acclamations of the most enthusiastic attachment. ”

“ Yours has been the true balm for me. Be happy, be as much so as you deserve; it is my whole heart which speaks to you. You have also just given me my share of happiness, and a share which I value the most, for nothing can equal in my estimation a proof that you still remember me.
Adieu, dear; I again thank you as affectionately as I shall always love you.
Josephine.
No. 2a.
To the Empress Josephine, at the Château Navarre. ”

“ XXI. THE RETURN OF THE EMPRESS TO PARIS. The Empress Josephine was much loved in France, and especially in Paris, where her gentleness, amiability, and great kindliness had won for her all sympathies, even those of people who were hostile to the Emperor. Her return to the capital was greeted with pleasure, and her presence awakened it from its previous gloom. The Moniteur thus describes her passage through the chief town of the department of the Lower Rhine. "Strassburg, January 23, 1807. ”

“ Yes, madame, the public sentiment acknowledges the good which you are ever performing; that you are always accessible to the unfortunate; that you use your influence with the chief magistrate only to diminish evil, and to procure a hearing to those who seek it; and that your majesty with this well-doing combines the most amiable tenderness, rendering thankfulness a pleasant duty. These noble qualities of your majesty foretell that the name of the Empress Josephine will be a watchword of trust and hope ”

“ In spite of all these splendid ceremonies Josephine, though idolized, was not happy. "In general," Mademoiselle Avrillon says with justice, "the public has a very faint knowledge of the real feelings of those in the highest station. Being often on show, they are obliged to assume a fictitious character, just as they dress themselves for great ceremonies. I have seen the Empress's sufferings, whom nothing could console for her separation from her children, whom she loved above everything. Ambitions were less to her than maternal love, her strongest feeling. ”

“ In one of these romps the little, low silk slippers which the Empress always wore slipped off, and Napoleon, seizing them, threw them into the surf, making Josephine walk back to her carriage in stocking feet. It was with such frolics that the two enlivened the days at Marrac, in the summer of 1808. Their journey back to Paris was a triumphal procession, wherein Josephine, by her tact, her amiability, her unflagging interest, won every heart. Never had she seemed more admirable to Napoleon as an Empress, never more charming as a woman. ”

“ Then the Countess went on to narrate what the Empress Josephine and Queen Hortense had said the evening before at Malmaison. She had been received by Hortense while waiting in the drawing-room for Josephine to come down, and she had been much astounded to hear the Queen of Holland say with much warmth: "You know that we are all Austrians at heart, but you would never guess that my brother has had the courage to advise the Emperor to ask for the hand of your Archduchess." Josephine frequently referred to this projected marriage, on which she seemed to have set her heart. ”

“ Hortense’s youth made it hopeful that she would add to the new branch of the Napoleonic dynasty new leaves and new boughs.
Josephine could now rejoice in her happiness and her glory; she could abandon herself to the new splendors of her life with all the enjoyment of her sensitive and excitable nature. She could now receive with smiles and with affable condescension the homage of France, for she was not only empress by a nation’s vote, but she was also empress by the choice of Napoleon her husband. ”

“ Be worthy of me and show more character. Make a proper appearance at Paris, and above all, be contented. I am very well, and I love you much; but if you are always in tears, I shall think you have no courage and no character. I do not love cowards; an Empress ought to have some spirit."
Napoleon's will was not to be altered. Josephine was forced to leave her daughter and to return to Paris. Her husband wrote to her from Warsaw: "I have your letter of January 15. It is impossible for me to let women undertake such a journey: bad roads, unsafe, and a slough of mud. Go back to Paris ”

“ Greatness has its inconveniences. An Empress can't go about everywhere like a commoner."
The greatness which the Emperor spoke about was no consolation to Josephine. She was unhappier beneath the gilded ceilings of the Tuileries than a peasant woman in a hovel. She besought her husband to let her join him in Poland, and wrote to him despairing letters.
Napoleon answered from Osterode, March 27: "My dear, I am much pained by your letters. You must not die: you are well and have no real cause of grief. I think you ought to go to Saint Cloud in May. but you ought to spend April in Paris.... ”

“ The emperor and empress dined at Fontainebleau alone. She seems to have had a presentiment that her doom was sealed, for all that day she had been in her retired apartment, weeping bitterly. As the dinner-hour approached, she bathed her swollen eyes, and tried to regain composure. They sat down at the table in silence. Napoleon did not speak. Josephine could not trust her voice to utter a word. Neither ate a mouthful. Course after course was brought in and removed untouched. A mortal paleness revealed the anguish of each heart. ”

“ To prevent their being with each other alone, and to avoid this horrible solitude, dreaded alike by Napoleon and Josephine, the emperor sent the next day for all the princes and princesses of his family to come to Fontainebleau. His sisters, no longer kept in control by the domineering will of the emperor, made Josephine feel their malice and enmity; they found pleasure in letting the empress see their own ascendency, their secure position, and in treating her with coldness and disrespect. ”

“ The Emperor from the first took the severest precautions that no one, and especially no man, should approach the Empress, except in the presence of witnesses.
During the time of the Empress Josephine, there were four ladies whose only duty was to announce the persons received by her Majesty. The excessive indulgence of Josephine prevented her repressing the jealous pretensions of some persons of her household, which gave rise to endless debates and rivalries between the ladies of the palace and those of announcement. ”

“ Josephine awaited with impatience and fear an event on which, she felt, her future fate depended. The Pope, that mysterious and holy person, had started. Was he to prove her saviour? Was she to be a repudiated wife or a crowned Empress? The clergy were untiring in their laudations of Napoleon's glory. Bishops, in their charges, spoke of him as God's elect. One prelate, speaking of the Empire, had said: "One God and one monarch! As the God of the Christians is the only one deserving to be adored and obeyed, you, Napoleon, are the only man worthy to rule the French!" ”

“ As the pope, agreeably affected by this respect and emotion of the empress, offered her his hand with a genial smile, Josephine, humble as a little girl, sank down on her knees before him, kissed his hand, and with streaming eyes implored his benediction. Pius, in his soft, winning manner, promised to love her as a daughter, and that she should ever find in him a father. ”

“ Round about her were her young female slaves, watching with their brilliant dark eyes their young mistress, ever ready to read every wish upon that dreamy, smiling countenance, and by their swarthy tinge heightening the soft, tender whiteness of her own complexion.
Then, wearied with the stillness and with her dreams, Josephine would spring up from the hammock, dart into the house with all the lightness of the gazelle to enliven the family with her own joyousness, her merry pleasantry, and accompanied by her guitar to sing unto them with her lovely youthful voice the songs of the Creoles. ”

“ Good to excess, as everyone knows, sympathetic beyond all expression, generous even to prodigality, the Empress made the happiness of all who surrounded her; loving her husband with a devotion which nothing ever changed, and which was as deep in her last moments as at the period when Madame Beauharnais and General Bonaparte made to each other a mutual avowal of their love. Josephine was long the only woman loved by the Emperor, as she well deserved to have ever been; and for several years the harmony of this imperial household was most touching. ”

“ The past, with its sad memories, its deceptions and errors, had sunk behind her, and a luminous future sent its rays upon her at the side of the man whom jubilant Italy proclaimed “her deliverer,” and whom Josephine’s joyous heart acknowledged to be her hero, her beloved. For now she loved him truly, not with that love of fifteen years past, with the marmoreal pulse, of which Bonaparte had spoken to her in his letters, but with all the depth and glow of which a woman’s heart is capable, with all the passion and jealousy of which the heart of a creole alone is susceptible. ”