probable, if not certain, was the Russian marriage. That day--the day
when there appeared in the _Moniteur_ the decree of the Senate relative
to the divorce--a new despatch had been sent from Paris to Saint
Petersburg by the Duke of Cadore, to demand a speedy reply from the
Russian court, yes or no. The answer of the Duke of Vicenza to the first
despatch, that of November 22, 1809, did not reach Paris until December
28. The Ambassador said that the Czar had received his overtures very
amiably, but that the affair needed much discretion and a little
patience. The Emperor Alexander, he went on to say, was personally
favorable; but his mother, whom he did not wish to offend, refused her
consent, and the Czar asked for a few days before giving a final answer.
This delay vexed Napoleon, who nevertheless resolved to wait, although
waiting suited neither his tastes nor his character.
In short, at the beginning of 1810, the matrimonial alliance with
Austria was not settled. The initiative steps had not been taken by the
monarch, the ministers of Foreign Affairs, or by the ambassadors. It is
a curious and characteristic detail, that it was the divorced Empress,
Josephine, who gave the signal. She summoned the Countess Metternich
to Malmaison, January 2, 1810, and said to her: "I have a plan which
interests me to the exclusion of everything else, and nothing but its
success can make me feel that the sacrifice I have just made is not
wholly thrown away: it is that the Emperor shall marry your Archduchess;
I spoke to him about it yesterday, and he said that his choice was
not yet made. But I think it would be made, if he were sure of being
accepted by you." Madame de Metternich was much surprised by this
overture, which she hastened to communicate to her husband in a letter
dated January 3, 1810, which began thus: "To-day I have some very
extraordinary things to tell you, and I am almost sure that my letter
will make a very important part of your despatches. In the first place,
I must tell you that I was presented to the Emperor last Sunday. I had
only mentioned the matter in conversation with Champagny when I received
a letter from M. de Ségur, telling me that the Emperor had appointed
Sunday, and that I was to choose a lady-in-waiting to present me. In my
wisdom I selected the Duchess of Bassano, and after waiting in company
with twenty other women, among whom were the Princess of Isenburg,
Madame de Tyskiewitz and others, from two till half-past six in the
evening, I was introduced first, and the Emperor received me in a way I
could not have expected. He seemed really glad to see me again, and glad
that I had stayed here during the war; he spoke about you and said, 'M.
de Metternich holds the first place in the Empire; he knows the country
well and can be of service to it.'"
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. "Yes," she said, "we must try to arrange it." Then she expressed
her regret that M. de Metternich was not in Paris; for if he had been,
doubtless he would bring the affair to a happy conclusion. "Your Emperor
must be made to see," she went on, "that his ruin and the ruin of his
country are certain if he does not give his consent to this marriage. It
is perhaps the only way of preventing Napoleon from breaking with the
Holy See."
The letter of the Countess Metternich ended thus: "I have not seen
the Queen of Holland again, because she is ill. Hence I have nothing
positive to tell you concerning the matter in question; but if I wanted
to tell you all the honors that have been showered upon me, I should
not stop so soon. At the last levee I played with the Emperor; you may
imagine that it was a serious matter for me, but I managed to come
off with glory. He began by praising my diamond headband, and that
everlasting gold dress, then he asked me a number of questions about my
family and all my relatives; he insisted, in spite of all I could say,
that Louis von Kaunitz was my brother. You can't imagine what effect
that little game of cards had. When it was over, I was surrounded and
paid court to by all the great dignitaries, marshals, ministers, etc. I
had abundant material for philosophical reflections on the vicissitude
of human affairs."
Nevertheless, in spite of the overtures which Josephine had made to the
Countess Metternich, Napoleon had come to no decision about his new
wife. One day when he had been working with M. Daru, whom he highly
esteemed, he had the following conversation with him:--
"In your opinion which would be the better for me, to marry the Russian
or the Austrian?"
"Neither."
"The devil! You are very hard to please."
"Neither, I say, but a Frenchwoman; and provided the new Empress does
not have too many relatives who will have to be made princes and given a
large fortune, France will approve your choice. The throne you occupy is
like no other; you have erected it with your own hands. You are at the
head of a generous nation; your glory and its glory ought to be
shared in common. It is not by imitating other monarchs, it is by
distinguishing yourself, that you find your real greatness. You do not
rule by the same title that they do; you ought not to marry as they do.
The nation would be flattered by your looking at home for an Empress,
and it would always see in your line a thoroughly French family."
"Come, come! that's nonsense! If M. de Talleyrand should hear you, he
would form a very poor idea of your political sagacity. You don't treat
this question like a statesman. I must unite in defence of my crown
those at home and abroad who are still hostile to it; and my marriage
furnishes a chance. Do you imagine that monarchs' marriages are matters
of sentiment? No; they are matters of politics. Mine cannot be
decided by motives of internal policy; I must try to establish my
influence outside, and to extend it by a close alliance with a powerful
neighbor."
No answer had come from Russia, no official overture had been made to or
by Austria; still Napoleon continued to believe, or at least pretended
to believe, that his only difficulty was to make the best choice. The
idea that two emperors and a king--without counting the other sovereigns
on whom he did not deign to cast a glance--were simultaneously disputing
the honor of allying their family with him, greatly flattered his pride.
In fact, what he desired was the Austrian marriage; but he was anxious
to keep his preferences secret, in order to prolong in the eyes of his
principal councillors, an uncertainty in which his pride did not suffer.
He convoked them to an extraordinary session, at the Tuileries, after
mass, Sunday, January 21, 1810. The great dignitaries of the Empire,--
Champagny, Minister of Foreign Affairs; the Duke of Cadore; Maret, the
Secretary of State; the Duke of Bassano; M. Gamier, the President of the
Senate; and M. de Fontanes, President of the Corps Législatif,--all took
part in this solemn council. The relative advantages and disadvantages
of the Russian, the Saxon, and the Austrian marriage were considered at
great length. The Archtreasurer Lebrun and M. Gamier favored the
daughter of the King of Saxony; the Archchancellor Cambacérès and King
Murat, the Grand Duchess of Russia; M. de Champagny, Prince Talleyrand,
Prince Eugene, the Prince of Neufchâtel and the Duke of Bassano, the
Archduchess Marie Louise. Murat especially distinguished himself by his
violent opposition to the Austrian alliance. Doubtless he was averse to
the selection for Empress of the French of the granddaughter of Queen
Marie Caroline of Naples, whose throne he was occupying. Napoleon
remained calm and impassive. When the meeting was over, he dismissed the
councillors, simply saying: "I shall weigh in my mind the arguments that
you have submitted to me. In any case, I remain convinced that whatever
difference may exist in your views, each one has formed his opinion only
from a desire for the good of the country and devotion to my person."
Thus it was that seventeen years to a day after a king of France who had
married an Austrian archduchess had died on the scaffold, there was
discussed the alliance of a new French ruler with another archduchess,
the grandniece of the other.
Some time later, Cambacérè's, in the course of a conversation with M.
Pasquier, then Counsellor of State, gave utterance to his regret at
having failed to impress upon his hearers the superior advantages of the
Russian alliance. "I am not surprised," he said; "when a man has only
one argument to give, and it is impossible to give it, he must expect to
be beaten.... And you will see that my argument is so good that a single
sentence will show you all its weight. I am morally sure that in less
than two years we shall be at war with the Emperor whose relative we do
not marry. Now war with Austria causes me no anxiety; but I dread war
with Russia; its consequences are incalculable. I know that the Emperor
is familiar with the road to Vienna, but I am not so sure that he will
find the road to St. Petersburg."
After quoting this conversation between Cambacérès and M. Pasquier in
his admirable book, _The Church of Rome and the First Empire_, the Count
d'Haussonville indulges in some philosophic reflections: "If it is
curious to come upon this profound and accurate summary, compressed into
a few clear and precise words by a man of remarkable sagacity dealing
with a future still completely hidden, it is no less strange to think
that the prospect of the Austrian marriage, destined to be so fatal to
the Empire, should be suddenly discussed in a five minutes' talk between
two men who met by chance on the steps of the Tuileries, at the very
moment when the unhappy Josephine was about to leave this spot which
had been so long her home. When we reflect on the course of all the
following events, we may perhaps say that the fate of the Empire was
settled in this eventful quarter of an hour; for if the Emperor had
married the Grand Duchess instead of Marie Louise, probably the campaign
of 1812, which Cambacérès foresaw, would not have taken place, and
Heaven knows what part this unhappy expedition played in the fall of the
First Empire!"
How insufficient is human wisdom, how false its calculations! This
Austrian marriage which discouraged the bitterest enemies of the hero of
Austerlitz, of Jena, of Wagram, this magnificent marriage which was to
have been the safeguard of the Empire, proved its ruin. This great event
which called forth abundant congratulations and outbursts of noisy
delight was the main cause of the most tremendous and most
disastrous war of modern times. If he had not blindly counted on
his father-in-law's friendship, would Napoleon, in spite of all his
audacity, have ventured to march to the Russian steppes, without even
taking the precaution of reviving Poland? He himself has said it:
his marriage with the Austrian Archduchess was an abyss covered with
flowers.
January was drawing to a close; and while in Paris many people were
beginning to regard Napoleon's marriage with Marie Louise as very
probable, the young princess herself had no suspicion of his intentions.
Count Metternich who, like his sovereign, had maintained secrecy about
this delicate matter, wrote to his wife, January 27, 1810: "The
Archduchess is still ignorant, as indeed is proper, of the plans
concerning her, and it is not from the Empress Josephine, who gives
us so many proofs of her confidence, who with so many noble qualities
combines those of a tender mother, that I shall conceal the many
considerations which necessarily present themselves to the Archduchess
Marie Louise when the matter is laid before her. But our princesses
are little accustomed to choose their husbands according to their own
inclinations, and the respect which so fond and so well-trained a
daughter feels for her father's wishes, makes me confident that she will
make no opposition."
The same day, January 27, 1810, the Count Metternich wrote to Prince
Charles of Schwarzenberg, the Austrian Ambassador in Paris, a despatch
which proves that the negotiations concerning the marriage had not yet
begun: "It is with great interest that his Imperial Majesty has heard
the details which Your Highness has communicated to him in his last
despatches, on the question of the marriage of the Emperor of the
French. It would be difficult to form any definite conclusion from the
different data that reach us. It is impossible not to see a certain
official character in the explanations, vague as they are, which the
Minister of Foreign Affairs has had with Your Highness. M. de Laborde's
uninterrupted zeal, the remarks of so many persons connected with the
government, all tending in one direction, and especially the very direct
overtures made by the Empress and the Queen of Holland to Madame de
Metternich, would incline us to suppose that Napoleon's mind was made
up, as the Emperor said, if our August master should consent to give him
Madame the Archduchess. On the other hand, the demands commonly reported
to have been addressed to Russia conflict with this supposition. The
question must, at any rate, become clearer shortly after the arrival of
the next courier, if indeed not before then. So much has been said, that
it is impossible to deny that an alliance with the Imperial House of
Austria has entered into the designs of the French court. By following a
very simple calculation and comparing the great publicity given to the
alleged demand on Russia with the secrecy exercised towards us in this
matter, we may possibly be authorized to suppose that at present their
views tend in our direction; but probability is of very little account
in a transaction of this sort to which Napoleon is a party, and we can
only go on in our usual course, and the result, in one way or another,
must inure to our advantage."
While the court of Vienna thus maintained a position of prudent and
dignified reserve, Napoleon, annoyed by the delays of the Russian court,
and now only anxious to have nothing more to do with it, impatiently
awaited the despatches from Saint Petersburg. These arrived February 6,
but they brought no satisfactory news. The first delay of ten days which
the Czar had asked of the Duke of Vicenza came to an end January 6, but
on the 2lst the Emperor Alexander had not yet replied. He said, to be
sure, that his mother had withdrawn her opposition; but he combined
the affairs of the marriage with the political negotiations concerning
Poland, and doubtless in the desire of affecting Napoleon's decision, he
let the matter drag, as if he wanted to be urged. The Duke of Vicenza
also said in his despatches that, according to the physicians, the Grand
Duchess was yet too young to bear children, and that since she was
averse to changing her religion, she insisted on having a Greek chapel
and Greek priests at the Tuileries.
Napoleon hesitated no longer. That same day he sent word to the Russian
Ambassador, Prince Kourakine, that, being unable to accept a longer
delay, he broke off the negotiation; and that evening he had the
Austrian Ambassador, Prince Schwarzenberg, asked if the contract of his
marriage with the Archduchess Marie Louise could be signed the next day.
The Austrian diplomatist had never expected that events were going to
move at any such speed. He knew the favorable disposition of his court,
but he had received no authorization to conclude the business. The
general instructions which had been sent to him regarding the marriage
were dated December 25, 1809, and they had not since been modified.
These left the Ambassador free to discuss the question only in
accordance with the restrictions which Count Metternich had thus
formulated.
"1. Every overture is to be received by you in an unofficial capacity.
Your Highness must take cognizance of it only by expressing your
personal willingness to see how the land lies here.
"2. You will then make it clear, as if it were a remark of your own,
that if no secondary consideration, no prejudice, influence the
Emperor's decision, there are laws which he will always obey. His
Majesty will never force a beloved daughter to a marriage which she
might abhor, and will never consent to a marriage not in conformity with
the principles of our religion.
"3. You will endeavor, moreover, to get a definite statement of the
advantages which France would offer to Austria in the case of a family
alliance."
When, in the evening of February 6, 1810, Napoleon's Minister of Foreign
Affairs asked Prince Schwarzenberg if he was ready to sign the marriage
contract at the Tuileries the next morning, the Ambassador was
delighted, but surprised, and perhaps, for a moment, perplexed. If he
regarded the instructions conveyed in the despatch of December 25, 1809,
he certainly had no authority to sign anything. In fact, not merely did
he not know whether the Archduchess had given her consent, he did not
know whether she had ever been informed of the projected marriage.
Besides, he had no information as to the way in which the Austrian
court looked on the annulment of the religious marriage of Napoleon
and Josephine by the officials of the diocese of Paris, who had acted
independently of the Pope. Finally, he was not in condition to stipulate
for any political advantage to his government as the price of the
alliance. A timid diplomatist would have hesitated. But might not there
arrive the next moment a courier from Saint Petersburg, bringing a
definite answer from the Czar? Would Napoleon, impatient as he was and
unused to delay--would he accept the slightest postponement on the part
of Austria? Prince Schwarzenberg burned his ships; he said to himself
that if his action were disavowed, he could go and raise cabbages on his
estate; but if it were approved, he would be at the top of the wave.
Abandoning then the customary slowness and scruples of diplomacy, he
answered without hesitation that he was ready, and made an engagement
with the Duke of Cadore, Minister of Foreign Affairs, for the next day,
at the Tuileries, to sign the marriage contract of the Emperor of the
French, King of Italy, and of Marie Louise, Archduchess of Austria. IV.
THE BETROTHAL.
February 7, 1810, M. Champagny, Duke of Cadore, the French Minister
of Foreign Affairs, and Prince Charles of Schwarzenberg, met at the
Tuileries, and signed, without the slightest hitch, the marriage
contract of Napoleon and the Archduchess Marie Louise. The text was a
copy almost word for word of Marie Antoinette's marriage contract, which
had been signed forty years before.
On leaving the Tuileries, Prince Schwarzenberg despatched a messenger to
Vienna to announce the momentous news, which possibly would arouse
more surprise than delight. "Count," he wrote to M. de Metternich, "in
signing the marriage contract, while protesting that I was in no way
clothed with power _ad hoc_, I believe that I have merely signed a paper
which can guarantee to the Emperor Napoleon the determination already
formed by my August Sovereign of meeting him half-way in negotiation on
this subject. The despatches with which you have honored me made the
course that I was to follow perfectly clear. His Majesty, as Your
Excellency assures me, approves of my conduct by bidding me follow
the same course; hence the marriage is an affair which my government
naturally regards as one of the greatest interest, and one which it
desires to see arranged. It will be evident to those who know the
character of Emperor Napoleon that if I had shown the slightest
hesitation, he would have abandoned this plan and have formed another.
If this affair was hurried, it was because that is the way in which
Napoleon acts, and it seemed to me best to seize the favorable moment.
I have the most profound conviction of having been of service to my
sovereign on this occasion; and if by any possibility I have had the
misfortune to displease him by the course that I took in perfect
sincerity, His Majesty can disavow it, but in that case I shall
instantly demand my recall."
The next day Prince Schwarzenberg sent to Vienna one of his secretaries,
M. de Floret, with this letter to M. de Metternich: "Paris, February
8, 1810. I send to you, dear Count, M. de Floret, who will give you an
account of everything that has happened. You will soon see that I could
not have acted otherwise without spoiling the whole business. If I had
insisted on not signing, he would have broken the affair off, to treat
with Russia or Saxony. I formally declared that I had full power to give
the most positive assurances that the propositions of marriage would be
favorably received by my court; but that if I was not ready to sign
a contract, it was only on account of the impossibility in which my
minister found himself of supposing that a matter scarcely touched
upon should so soon come to a head. I beg of you, my dear friend, to
arrange that there shall be no obstacle to this important business, and
that it be arranged with a good grace.... I pity the Princess, it is
true; but yet she must not forget that it is a noble deed to give peace
to such good nations, and to give a guarantee of general peace and
tranquillity. Floret will give you our records, and will explain it to
you by word of mouth; we have not had time to have it copied. You
will not object to this, inasmuch as we wish Floret to leave at once.
Conclude this matter nobly, and you will render an incalculable service
to our country."
At the diplomatic reception which was held at the Tuileries, February 8,
Napoleon walked up to the Austrian Ambassador and said to him, in the
most friendly way, "You have been very busy lately, and I think you have
done a good piece of work." Prince Kourakine, the Russian Ambassador,
was much annoyed at the turn events had taken, and did not attend the
reception, under the pretext that he was not well. The evening before
Prince Schwarzenberg had dined at the house of Napoleon's mother with
the King of Holland, Louis Bonaparte, who was loudspoken in his praise
of the Emperor Francis and the Imperial house of Austria. At the court
of the Tuileries there was general satisfaction. Napoleon thought that
he had never achieved a greater triumph. The messenger whom Prince
Schwarzenberg had despatched on the day he had signed the contract,
reached Vienna February 14. The populace had not the faintest idea of
the possibility of a marriage between the Archduchess Marie Louise and
the Emperor of the French; the Austrian monarch and M. de Metternich, in
their anxiety to keep their secret, lest some opposition should manifest
itself, had not breathed a word about the overtures made at Vienna by
Count Alexandre de Laborde, and at Malmaison by the Empress Josephine.
Neither the Viennese nor the Diplomatic Body suspected anything. As M.
de Metternich put it, Count Shouvaloff, the Russian Ambassador at the
Austrian court, was literally petrified. The English breathed fire
and flame. The sudden outburst of a volcano would not have been more
startling than this piece of news which came from a clear sky. The
impression made upon the populace was one of surprise which amounted to
disbelief. People stopped in the streets to ask one another if the thing
was possible.
Marie Louise had given her consent more with resignation than with
pleasure. Metternich recounts in his Memoirs his speech to Francis II.:
"In the life of a state, as in that of a private citizen, there are
cases in which a third person cannot put himself in the place of one
who is responsible for the resolutions he has to take. These cases are
especially such as cannot be decided by calculation. Your Majesty is a
monarch and a father; and Your Majesty alone can weigh his duties as
father and emperor." "It is my daughter who must decide," answered
Francis II. "Since I shall never compel her, I am anxious, before I
consider my duties as a sovereign, to know what she means to do. Go find
the Archduchess, and then let me know what she says. I am unwilling to
speak to her of the demand of the French Emperor, lest I should seem to
be trying to influence her decision."