Queen Hortense: A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era Part 14

These drawing-rooms, once the rendezvous of so many kings and princes, were now desolate, and bore on their soiled floors the footprints of the hostile soldiers who had recently been quartered there. At the czar's solicitation, they had now been removed; but the queen's household servants had also left it. Faithless and ungrateful, they had turned their backs on the setting sun, and fled from the storm that had burst over the head of their mistress.

The Emperor Alexander hastened to the queen's dwelling as soon as her arrival in Paris was announced, the queen advancing to meet him as far as the outermost antechamber.

"Sire," said she, with a soft smile, "I have no means of receiving you with due ceremony; my antechambers are deserted."

The appearance of this solitary woman, this queen without a crown, without fortune, and without protection and support, who nevertheless stood before him in all the charms of beauty and womanhood, a soft smile on her lips, made a deep impression on the emperor, and his eyes filled with tears.

The queen observed this, and hastened to say, "But what of that? I do not think that antechambers filled with gold-embroidered liveries would make those who come to see me happier, and I esteem myself happy in being able to do you the honors of my house alone. I have, therefore, only won."

The emperor took her hand, and, while conducting the queen to her room, conversed with her, with that soft, sad expression peculiar to him, lamenting with bitter self-reproaches almost that he was himself, in part, to blame for the misfortunes that had overtaken the emperor and his family. He then conjured her to abandon her intention of leaving France, and to preserve herself for her mother and friends. He told her that, in abandoning her country, her friends, and her rights, she would be guilty of a crime against her own children, against her two sons, who were ent.i.tled to demand a country and a fortune at her hands.

The queen, overcome at last by these earnest and eloquent representations, declared her readiness to remain in France, if the welfare of her sons should require it.

"Until now," said she, "I had formed all my resolutions with reference to misfortune. I was entirely resigned, and I never thought of the possibility of any thing fortunate happening for me; and even yet, I do not know what I can desire and demand. I am, however, determined to accept nothing for myself and children that would be unworthy of us, and I do not know what that could be."

With an a.s.suring smile, the emperor extended his hand to the queen.

"Leave that to me," said he. "It is, then, understood, you are to remain in France?"

"Sire, you have convinced me that the future of my sons requires it. I shall therefore remain."

CHAPTER XVI.

THE NEW UNCLES.

Malmaison, to which place Hortense had returned after a short stay in Paris, and where the Empress Josephine was also sojourning, was a kind of focus for social amus.e.m.e.nt and relaxation for the sovereigns a.s.sembled in Paris. Each of these kings and princes wished to pay his homage to the Empress Josephine and her daughter, and thereby, in a measure, show the last honors to the dethroned emperor.

On one occasion, when the King of Prussia, with his two sons, Prince Frederick William (the late king) and William, had come to Malmaison, and announced their desire to call on the empress, she sent them an invitation to a family dinner, at which she also invited the Emperor of Russia and his two brothers to attend.

The emperor accepted this invitation, and on entering, with the young archdukes, the parlor in which the d.u.c.h.ess de St. Leu was sitting, he took his two brothers by the hand and conducted them to Hortense.

"Madame," said he, "I confide my brothers to your keeping. They are now making their _debut_ in society. My mother fears their heads may be turned by the beauties of France; and in bringing them to Malmaison, where so many charming persons are a.s.sembled, I am certainly fulfilling my promise to preserve them from such a fate but poorly."

"Rea.s.sure yourself, sire," replied the queen, gravely; "I will be their mentor, and I promise you a motherly surveillance."

The emperor laughed, and, pointing to Hortense's two sons, who had just been brought in, he said: "Ah, madame, it would be much less dangerous for my brothers if they were of the age of these boys."

He approached the two boys with extended hands, and while conversing with them in a kindly and affectionate manner, addressed them with the t.i.tles "monseigneur" and "imperial highness."

The children regarded him wonderingly, for the Russian emperor was the first to address the little Napoleon and his younger brother, Louis Napoleon, with these imposing t.i.tles. The queen had never allowed them to be called by any but their own names. She wished to preserve them from vain pride, and teach them to depend on their own intrinsic merit.

Shortly afterward the King of Prussia and his sons were announced, and the emperor and his brothers left the young princes, and advanced to meet the king.

While the emperor and the king were exchanging salutations, Hortense's two sons inquired of their governess the names of the gentlemen who had just entered.

"It is the King of Prussia," whispered the governess; "and the gentleman who has just spoken with you is the Emperor of Russia."

The little Louis Napoleon regarded the tall figures of those princes thoughtfully for a moment, by no means impressed by their imposing t.i.tles. He was so accustomed to see his mother surrounded by kings, and these kings had always been his uncles.

"Mademoiselle," said the little Louis Napoleon, after a short pause, "are these two new gentlemen, the emperor and the king, also our uncles, like all the others and must we call them so?"

"No, Louis, you must simply call them 'sire.'"

"But," said the boy, after a moment's reflection, "why is it that they are not our uncles?"

The governess withdrew with the two children to the back of the parlor, and explained to them, in a low voice, that the emperors and kings then in Paris, far from being their uncles, were their vanquishers.

"Then," exclaimed the elder boy, Napoleon Louis, his face flus.h.i.+ng with anger, "then they are the enemies of my uncle, the emperor! Why did this Emperor of Russia embrace us?"

"Because he is a n.o.ble and generous enemy, who is endeavoring to serve you and your mother in your present misfortune. Without him you would possess nothing more in the world, and the fate of your uncle, the emperor, would be much sadder than it already is."

"Then we ought to love this emperor very dearly?" said the little Louis Napoleon.

"Certainly; for you owe him many thanks."

The young prince regarded the emperor, who was conversing with the empress Josephine, long and thoughtfully.

When the emperor returned to Malmaison on the following day, and while he was sitting at his mother's side in the garden-house, little Louis Napoleon, walking on tiptoe, noiselessly approached the emperor from behind, laid a small glittering object in his hand, and ran away.

The queen called him back, and demanded with earnest severity to know what he had done.

The little prince returned reluctantly, hanging his head with embarra.s.sment, and said, blus.h.i.+ng deeply: "Ah, _maman,_ it is the ring Uncle Eugene gave me. I wished to give it to the emperor, because he is so good to my _maman_!"

Deeply touched, the emperor took the boy in his arms, seated him on his knees, and kissed him tenderly.

Then, in order to give the little prince an immediate reward, he attached the ring to his watch-chain, and swore that he would wear the token as long as he lived[28].

[Footnote 28: Cochelet, vol. i., p. 355.]

CHAPTER XVII.

DEATH OF THE EMPRESS JOSEPHINE.

Since Napoleon's star had grown pale, and himself compelled to leave France as an exile, life seemed to Josephine also to be enveloped in a gloomy mourning-veil; she felt that her sun had set, and night come upon her. But she kept this feeling a profound secret, and never allowed a complaint or sigh to betray her grief to her tenderly-beloved daughter.

Her complaints were for the emperor, her sighs for the fate of her children and grandchildren. She seemed to have forgotten herself; her wishes were all for others. With the pleasing address and grace of which age could not deprive her, she did the honors of her house to the foreign sovereigns in Malmaison, and a.s.sumed a forced composure, in which her soul had no share. She would have preferred to withdraw with her grief to the retirement of her chambers, but she thought it her duty to make this sacrifice for the welfare of her daughter and grandchildren; and she, the loving mother, could do what Hortense's pride would not permit--she could entreat the Emperor Alexander to take pity on her daughter's fate.

When, therefore, the czar had finally succeeded in establis.h.i.+ng her future, and had received the letters-patent which secured to the queen the duchy of St. Leu Alexander hastened to Malmaison, to communicate this good news to the Empress Josephine.

She did not reward him with words, but with gus.h.i.+ng 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 workmans.h.i.+p, 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.