Queen Hortense by L. Muehlbach

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She did not reward him with words, but with gushing tears, as she
extended to the emperor both hands. She then begged him, with touching
earnestness, to accept from her a remembrance of this hour.

The emperor pointed to a cup, on which a portrait of Josephine was
painted, and begged her to give him that.

"_No_, sire," said she; "such a cup can be bought anywhere. But I wish
to give you something that cannot be had anywhere else in the world,
and that will sometimes remind you of me. It is a present that I
received from Pope Pius VII., on the day of my coronation. I present you
with this token in commemoration of the day on which you bring my
daughter the ducal crown, in order that it may remind you of mother and
daughter alike--of the dethroned empress and of the dethroned queen."

This present, which she now extended to the emperor with a charming
smile, was an antique cameo, of immense size, and so wondrously-well
executed that the empress could well say its equal was nowhere to be
found in the world. On this cameo the heads of Alexander the Great and
of his father, Philip of Macedonia, were portrayed, side by side; and
the beauty of the workmanship, as well as the size of the stone, made
this cameo a gem of inestimable value. And for this reason the emperor
at first refused to accept this truly imperial present, and he yielded
only when he perceived that his refusal would offend the empress, who
seemed to be more pale and irritable than usual.

Josephine was, in reality, sadder than usual, for the royal family of
the Bourbons had on this day caused her heart to bleed anew. Josephine
had read an article in the journals, in which, in the most contemptuous
and cruel terms, attention was called to the fact that the eldest son of
the Queen of Holland had been interred in the Cathedral of Notre-Dame,
and that the Minister Blacas had now issued an order to have the coffin
removed from its resting-place, and buried in an ordinary grave-yard.

Hortense, who had read this article, had hastened to Paris, in order
that she might herself superintend the removal of the body of her
beloved child from Notre-Dame, and its reinterment in the Church of
St. Leu.

While she informed the emperor of this new insult, Josephine's whole
figure trembled, and a deathly pallor overspread her countenance.
Josephine lacked the strength to conceal her sufferings to-day, for the
first time; Hortense was not present, and she might therefore, for once,
allow herself the sad consolation of showing, bereft of its smile and
its paint, the pale countenance, which death had already
lightly touched.

"Your majesty is ill!" exclaimed the emperor, in dismay.

With a smile, which brought tears to Alexander's eyes, Josephine pointed
to her breast, and whispered: "Sire, I have received the
death-wound here!"

Yes, she was right; she had received a fatal wound, and her heart was
bleeding to death.

Terrified by Josephine's condition, the emperor hurried to Paris, and
sent his own physician to inquire after her condition. When the latter
returned, he informed the emperor that Josephine was dangerously ill,
and that he did not believe her recovery possible.

He was right, and Alexander saw the empress no more! Hortense and
Eugene, her two children, held a sad watch at their mother's bedside
throughout the night. The best physicians were called in, but these
only confirmed what the Russian physician had said--the condition of the
empress was hopeless. Her heart was broken! With strong hands, she had
held it together as long as her children's welfare seemed to require.
Now that Hortense's future was also assured--now that she knew that her
grandchildren would, at least, not be compelled to wander about the
world as exiled beggars--now Josephine withdrew her hands from her
heart, and suffered it to bleed to death.

On the 29th of May, 1814, the Empress Josephine died, of an illness
which had apparently lasted but two days. Hortense had not heard her
mother's death-sigh; when she re-entered the room with Eugene, after her
mother had received the sacrament from Abbe Bertrand--when she saw her
mother, with outstretched arms, vainly endeavoring to speak to
them--Hortense fainted away at her mother's bedside, and the empress
breathed her last sigh in Eugene's arms.

The intelligence of the death of the empress affected Paris profoundly.
It seemed as though all the city had forgotten for a day that Napoleon
was no longer the ruler of France, and that the Bourbons had reascended
the throne of their fathers. All Paris mourned; for the hearts of the
French people had not forgotten this woman, who had so long been their
benefactress, and of whom each could relate the most touching traits of
goodness, of generosity, and of gentleness.

Josephine, now that she was dead, was once more enthroned as empress in
the hearts of the French people and thousands poured into Malmaison, to
pay their last homage to their deceased empress. Even the Faubourg St.
Germain mourned with the Parisians; these haughty and insolent
royalists, who had returned with the Bourbons, may, perhaps, for a
moment, have recalled the benefits which the empress had shown them,
when, as the mighty Empress of France, she employed the half of her
allowance for the relief of the emigrants. They had returned without
thinking of the thanks they owed their forgotten benefactress; now that
she was dead, they no longer withheld the tribute of their admiration.

"Alas!" exclaimed Madame Ducayla, the king's friend; "alas! how
interesting a lady was this Josephine! What tact, what goodness! How
well she knew how to do everything! And she shows her tact and good
taste to the last, in dying just at this moment!"

Immediately after the death of the empress, Eugene had conducted the
queen from the death-chamber, almost violently, and had taken her and
her children to St. Leu. The body of the empress was interred in
Malmaison, and followed to the grave by her two grandchildren only.
Grief had made both of her children severely ill, and the little princes
were followed, not by her relatives, but by the Russian General Von
Sacken, who represented the emperor, and by the equipages of all those
kings and princes who had helped to hurl the Bonapartes from their
thrones and restore the Bourbons.

The emperor passed his last night in France, before leaving for
England, at St. Leu; and, on taking leave of Eugene and Hortense, who,
at the earnest solicitation of her brother, had left her room for the
first time since her mother's death, for the purpose of seeing the
emperor, he assured them of his unchangeable friendship and attachment.
As he knew that, among those whom he strongly suspected, Pozzo di
Borgo[29], the ambassador he left behind him in Paris, was an
irreconcilable enemy of Napoleon and his family, he had assigned to duty
at the embassy as _attache_, a gentleman selected for this purpose by
Louise de Cochelet--M. de Boutiakin--and it was through him that the
emperor directed that the letters and wishes of the queen and of her
faithful young lady friend should be received and answered.

[Footnote 29: Upon receiving the intelligence of the death of the
emperor at St. Helena, Pozzo di Borgo said: "I did not kill him, but I
threw the last handful of earth on his coffin, in order that he might
never rise again."]

A few days later Eugene also left St. Leu and his sister Hortense, to
return, with the King of Bavaria, to his new home in Germany. It was not
until his departure that Hortense felt to its full extent the gloomy
loneliness and dreary solitude by which she was surrounded. She had not
wept over the downfall of all the grandeur and magnificence by which she
had formerly been surrounded; she had not complained when the whirlwind
of fate hurled to the ground the crowns of all her relations, but had
bowed her head to the storm with resignation, and smiled at the loss of
her royal titles; but now, as she stood in her parlor at St. Leu and saw
none about her but her two little boys and the few ladies who still
remained faithful--now, Hortense wept.

"Alas!" she cried, bursting into tears, as she extended her hand to
Louise de Cochelet, "alas! my courage is at an end! My mother is dead,
my brother has left me, the Emperor Alexander will soon forget his
promised protection, and I alone must contend, with my two children,
against all the annoyances and enmities to which the name I bear will
subject me! I fear I shall live to regret that I allowed myself to be
persuaded to abandon my former plan. Will the love I bear my country
recompense me for the torments which are in store for me?"

The queen's dark forebodings were to be only too fully realized. In the
great and solemn hour of misfortune, Fate lifts to mortal vision the
veil that conceals the future, and, like the Trojan prophetess, we see
the impending evil, powerless to avert it.

BOOK III.

_THE RESTORATION._

CHAPTER I.

THE RETURN OF THE BOURBONS.

On the 12th of April, Count d'Artois, whom Louis XVIII. had sent in
advance, and invested with the dignity of a lieutenant-general of
France, made his triumphal entry into Paris. At the gates of the city,
he was received by the newly-formed provisional government, Talleyrand
at its head; and here it was that Count d'Artois replied to the address
of that gentleman in the following words: "Nothing is changed in France,
except that from to-day there will be one Frenchman more in the land."
The people received him with cold curiosity, and the allied troops
formed a double line for his passage to the Tuileries, at which the
ladies of the Faubourg St. Germain, adorned with white lilies and white
cockades, received him with glowing enthusiasm. Countess Ducayla,
afterward the well-known friend of Louis XVIII., had been one of the
most active instruments of the restoration, and she it was who had first
unfolded again in France the banner of the Bourbons--the white flag. A
few days before the entrance of the prince, she had gone, with a number
of her royalist friends, into the streets, in order to excite the people
to some enthusiasm for the legitimate dynasty. But the people and the
army had still preserved their old love for the emperor, and the
proclamation of Prince Schwartzenberg, read by Bauvineux in the streets,
was listened to in silence. True, the royalists cried, _"Vive le roi!"_
at the end of this reading, but the people remained indifferent
and mute.

This sombre silence alarmed Countess Ducayla; it seemed to indicate a
secret discontent with the new order of things. She felt that this
sullen people must be inflamed, and made to speak with energy and
distinctness. To awaken enthusiasm by means of words and proclamations
had been attempted in vain; now the countess determined to attempt to
arouse them by another means--to astonish them by the display of a
striking symbol--to show them the white flag of the Bourbons!

She gave her companion, Count de Montmorency, her handkerchief, that he
might wave it aloft, fastening it to the end of his cane, in order that
it should be more conspicuous. This handkerchief of Countess Ducayla,
fastened to the cane of a Montmorency, was the first royalist banner
that fluttered over Paris, after a banishment of twenty years. The
Parisians looked at this banner with a kind of reverence and shuddering
wonder; they did not greet it with applause; they still remained silent,
but they nevertheless followed the procession of royalists, who marched
to the boulevards, shouting, _"Vive le roi!"_ They took no part in their
joyful demonstration, but neither did they attempt to prevent it.

This demonstration of the royalists, and particularly of the royalist
ladies, transcended the bounds of propriety, and of their own dignity.
In their fanaticism for the legitimate dynasty, they gave the allies a
reception, which almost assumed the character of a declaration of love,
on the part of the fair ladies of the Faubourg St. Germain, for all the
soldiers and officers of the allied army. In a strange confusion of
ideas, these warriors, who had certainly entered France as enemies,
seemed to these fair ones to be a part of the beloved Bourbons; and they
loved them with almost the same love they lavished upon the royal family
itself. During several days they were, in their hearts, the daughters of
all countries except their own!

Louis XVIII. was himself much displeased with this enthusiasm of the
ladies of the Faubourg St. Germain, and openly avowed to Countess
Ducayla his dissatisfaction with the ridiculous and contemptible
behavior of these ladies at that time. He was even of the opinion that
it was calculated to injure his cause, as the nation had then not yet
pronounced in his favor.

"They should," said he, "have received the allies with a dignified
reserve, without frivolous demonstrations, and without this
inconsiderate devotion. Such a demeanor would have inspired them with
respect for the nation, whereas they now leave Paris with the conviction
that we are still--as we were fifty years ago--the most giddy and
frivolous people of Europe. You particularly, ladies--you have
compromised yourselves in an incomprehensible manner. The allies seemed
to you so lovable _en masse,_ that you gave yourselves the appearance of
also loving them _en detail_; and this has occasioned reports concerning
you which do little honor to French ladies!"

"But, _mon Dieu!_" replied Countess Ducayla to her royal friend, "we
wished to show them a well-earned gratitude for the benefit they
conferred in restoring to us your majesty; we wished to offer them
freely what we, tired of resistance, were at last compelled to accord to
the tyrants of the republic and the sabre-heroes of the empire! None of
us can regret what we have done for our good friends the allies!"

Nevertheless, that which the ladies "had done for their good friends the
allies" was the occasion of many annoying family scenes, and the
husbands who did not fully participate in the enthusiasm of their wives
were of the opinion that they had good cause to complain of their
inordinate zeal.

Count G----, among others, had married a young and beautiful lady a few
days before the restoration. She, in her youthful innocence, was
entirely indifferent to political matters; but her step-father, her
step-mother, and her husband, Count G----, were royalists of the
first water.

On the day of the entrance of the allies into Paris, step-father,
step-mother, and husband, in common with all good legitimists, hurried
forward to welcome "their good friends," and each of them returned to
their dwelling with a stranger--the husband with an Englishman, the
step-mother with a Prussian, and the step-father with an Austrian. The
three endeavored to outdo each other in the attentions which they
showered upon the guests they had the good fortune to possess. The
little countess alone remained indifferent, in the midst of the joy of
her family. They reproached her with having too little attachment for
the good cause, and exhorted her to do everything in her power to
entertain the gallant men who had restored to France her king.

The husband requested the Englishman to instruct the young countess in
riding; the marquise begged the Prussian to escort her daughter to the
ball, and teach her the German waltz; and, finally, the marquis, who had
discovered a fine taste for paintings in the Austrian, appealed to this
gentleman to conduct the young wife through the picture-galleries.

In short, every opportunity was given the young countess to commit a
folly, or rather three follies, for she did not like to give the
preference to any one of the three strangers. She was young, and
inexperienced in matters of this kind. Her triple intrigue was,
therefore, soon discovered, and betrayed to her family; and now husband,
step-father, and step-mother, were exasperated. This exceeded even the
demands of their royalism; and they showered reproaches on the head of
the young wife.

"It is not my fault!" cried she, sobbing. "I only did what you
commanded. You ordered me to do everything in my power to entertain
these gentlemen, and I could therefore refuse them nothing."

But there were also cases in which the advances of the enthusiastic
ladies of the Faubourg St. Germain were repelled. Even the high-born and
haughty Marquise M---- was to experience this mortification. She stepped
before the sullen, sombre veterans of the Old Guard of the empire, who
had just allowed Count d'Artois to pass before their ranks in dead
silence. She ardently appealed to their love for the dynasty of their
fathers, and, in her enthusiasm for royalism, went so far as to offer
herself as a reward to him who should first cry _"Vive le roi!"_ But the
faithful soldiers of the emperor stood unmoved by this generous offer,
and the silence remained unbroken by the lowest cry!

The princes who stood at the head of the allied armies were, of course,
the objects of the most ardent enthusiasm of the royalist ladies; but it
was, above all, with them that they found the least encouragement. The
Emperor of Austria was too much occupied with the future of his daughter
and grandson, and the King of Prussia was too grave and severe, to find
any pleasure in the coquetries of women. The young Emperor Alexander of
Russia, therefore, became the chief object of their enthusiasm and love.
But their enthusiasm also met with a poor recompense in this quarter.
Almost distrustfully, the czar held himself aloof from the ladies of the
Faubourg St. Germain; and yet it was they who had decided the fate of
France with him, and induced him to give his vote for the Bourbons; for
until then it had remained undetermined whom the allies should call to
the throne of France.

In his inmost heart, the Emperor of Russia desired to see the
universally-beloved Viceroy of Italy, Eugene Beauharnais, elevated to
the vacant throne. The letter with which Eugene replied to the
proposition of the allies, tendering him the ducal crown of Genoa, had
won for Josephine's son the love and esteem of the czar for all time.
Alexander had himself written to Eugene, and proffered him, in the name
of the allies, a duchy of Genoa, if he would desert Napoleon, and take
sides with the allies. Eugene Beauharnais had replied to him in the
following letter:

* * * * *

"SIRE,--I have received your majesty's propositions. They are
undoubtedly very favorable, but they are powerless to change my
resolution. I must have known how to express my thoughts but poorly when
I had the honor of seeing you, if your majesty can believe that I could
sully my honor for any, even the highest, reward. Neither the prospect
of possessing the crown of the duchy of Genoa, nor that of the kingdom
of Italy, can induce me to become a traitor. The example of the King of
Naples cannot mislead me; I will rather be a plain soldier than a
traitorous prince.

"The emperor, you say, has done me injustice; I have forgotten it; I
only remember his benefits. I owe all to him--my rank, my titles, and
my fortune, and I owe to him that which I prefer to all else--that which
your indulgence calls my renown. I shall, therefore, serve him as long
as I live; my person is his, as is my heart. May my sword break in my
hands, if it could ever turn against the emperor, or against France! I
trust that my well-grounded refusal will at least secure to me the
respect of your imperial majesty. I am, etc."

* * * * *

The Emperor of Austria, on the other hand, ardently desired to secure
the throne of France to his grandson, the King of Rome, under the
regency of the Empress Marie Louise; but he did not venture to make this
demand openly and without reservation of his allies, whose action he had
promised to approve and ratify. The appeals of the Duke of Cadore, who
had been sent to her father by Marie Louise from Blois, urging the
emperor to look after her interests, and to demand of the allies that
they should assure the crown to herself and son, were, therefore,
fruitless.

The emperor assured his daughter's ambassador that he had reason to hope
for the best for her, but that he was powerless to insist on any action
in her behalf.

"I love my daughter," said the good emperor, "and I love my son-in-law,
and I am ready to shed my heart's blood for them."

"Majesty," said the duke, interrupting him, "no such sacrifice is
required at your hands."

"I am ready to shed my blood for them," continued the emperor, "to
sacrifice my life for them, and I repeat it, I have promised the allies
to do nothing except in conjunction with them, and to consent to all
they determine. Moreover, my minister, Count Metternich, is at this
moment with them, and I shall ratify everything which he has
signed[30]."

[Footnote 30: Bourrienne, vol. x., p. 129.]

But the emperor still hoped that that which Metternich should sign for
him, would be the declaration that the little King of Rome was to be the
King of France.

But the zeal of the royalists was destined to annihilate this hope.

The Emperor of Russia had now taken up his residence in Talleyrand's
house. He had yielded to the entreaties of the shrewd French diplomat,
who well knew how much easier it would be to bend the will of the
Agamemnon of the holy alliance[31] to his wishes, when he should have
him in hand, as it were, day and night. In offering the emperor his
hospitality, it was Talleyrand's intention to make him his prisoner,
body and soul, and to use him to his own advantage.

[Footnote 31: Memoires d'une Femme de Qualite.]

It was therefore to Talleyrand that Countess Ducayla hastened to concert
measures with the Bonapartist of yesterday, who had transformed himself
into the zealous legitimist of to-day.

Talleyrand undertook to secure the countess an audience with the Russian
emperor, and he succeeded.

While conducting the beautiful countess to the czar's cabinet,
Talleyrand whispered in her ear: "Imitate Madame de Lemalle--endeavor
to make a great stroke. The emperor is gallant, and what he denies to
diplomacy he may, perhaps, accord to the ladies."

He left her at the door, and the countess entered the emperor's cabinet
alone. She no sooner saw him, than she sank on her knees, and stretched
out her arms.

With a knightly courtesy, the emperor immediately hastened forward to
assist her to rise.

"What are you doing?" asked he, almost in alarm. "A noble lady never has
occasion to bend the knee to a cavalier."

"Sire," exclaimed the countess, "I kneel before you, because it is my
purpose to implore of your majesty the happiness which you alone can
restore to us; it will be a double pleasure to possess Louis XVIII. once
more, when Alexander I. shall have given him to us!"

"Is it then true that the French people are still devoted to the Bourbon
family?"

"Yes, sire, they are our only hope; on them we bestow our whole love!"

"Ah, that is excellent," cried Alexander; "are all French ladies filled
with the same enthusiasm as yourself, madame?"

"Well, if this is the case, it will be France that recalls Louis XVIII.,
and it will not be necessary for us to conduct him back. Let the
legislative bodies declare their will, and it shall be done[32]."

[Footnote 32: Memoires d'une Femme de Qualite, vol. i., p. 179.]

And of all women, Countess Ducayla was the one to bring the legislative
bodies to the desired declaration. She hastened to communicate the hopes
with which the emperor had inspired her to all Paris; on the evening
after her interview with the emperor, she gave a grand _soiree_, to
which she invited the most beautiful ladies of her party, and a number
of senators.

"I desired by this means," says she in her memoirs, "to entrap the
gentlemen into making a vow. How simple-minded I was! Did I not know
that the majority of them had already made and broken a dozen vows?"

On the following day the senate assembled, and elected a provisional
government, consisting of Talleyrand, the Duke of Dalberg, the Marquis
of Jancourt, Count Bournonville, and the Abbe Montesquieu. The senate
and the new provisional government thereupon declared Napoleon deposed
from the throne, and recalled Louis XVIII. But while the senate thus
publicly and solemnly proclaimed its legitimist sentiments in the name
of the French people, it at the same time testified to its own
unworthiness and selfishness. In the treaty made by the senate with its
recalled king, it was provided in a separate clause, "that the salary
which they had hitherto received, should be continued to them for life."
While recalling Louis XVIII., these senators took care to pay themselves
for their trouble, and to secure their own future.

CHAPTER II.

THE BOURBONS AND THE BONAPARTES.

The allies hastened to consider the declaration of the senate and
provisional government as the declaration of the people, and recalled to
the throne of his fathers Louis XVIII., who, as Count de Lille, had so
long languished in exile at Hartwell.

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