THE DIVORCE—A NEW WIFE—AN HEIR TO THE CROWN
To further the universal peace he desired, to prevent plots among his
subordinates who would aspire to his crown in case of his sudden death,
and to assure a succession, Napoleon now decided to take a step long in
mind—to divorce Josephine, by whom he no longer hoped to have heirs.
In considering Napoleon’s divorce of Josephine, it must be remembered
that stability of government was of vital necessity to the permanency of
the Napoleonic institutions. Napoleon had turned into practical
realities most of the reforms demanded in 1789. True, he had done it by
the exercise of despotism, but nothing but the courage, the will, the
audacity of a despot could have aroused the nation in 1799. Napoleon
felt that these institutions had been so short a time in operation that
in case of his death they would easily topple over, and his kingdom go
to pieces as Alexander’s had. If he could leave an heir, this disaster
would, he believed, be averted.
Then, would not a marriage with a foreign princess calm the fears of his
Continental enemies? Would they not see in such an alliance an effort on
the part of new, liberal France to adjust herself harmoniously to the
system of government which prevailed on the Continent?
Thus, by a new marriage, he hoped to prevent at his death a series of
fresh revolutions, save the splendid organization he had created, and
put France in greater harmony with her environment. It is to
misunderstand Napoleon’s scheme, to attribute this divorce simply to a
gigantic egotism. To assure his dynasty, was to assure France of liberal
institutions. His glorification was his country’s. In reality there were
the same reasons for divorcing Josephine that there had been for taking
the crown in 1804.
Josephine had long feared a separation. The Bonapartes had never cared
for her, and even so far back as the Egyptian campaign had urged
Napoleon to seek a divorce. Unwisely, she had not sought in her early
married life to win their affection any more than she had to keep
Napoleon’s; and when the emperor was crowned, they had done their best
to prevent her coronation. When, for state reasons, the divorce seemed
necessary, Josephine had no supporters where she might have had many.
Her grief was more poignant because she had come to love her husband
with a real ardor. The jealousy from which he had once suffered she now
felt, and Napoleon certainly gave her ample cause for it. Her anxiety
was well known to all the court, the secretaries Bourrienne and Méneval,
and Madame de Rémusat being her special confidants. Since 1807 it had
been intense, for it was in that year that Fouché, probably at
Napoleon’s instigation, tried to persuade the empress to suggest the
divorce herself as her sacrifice to the country.
After Wagram it became evident to her that at last her fate was sealed;
but though she beset Méneval and all the members of her household for
information, it was only a fortnight before the public divorce that she
knew her fate. It was Josephine’s own son and daughter, Eugène and
Hortense, who broke the news to her; and it was on the former that the
cruel task fell of indorsing the divorce in the Senate in the name of
himself and his sister.
Josephine was terribly broken by her disgrace, but she bore it with a
sweetness and dignity which does much to make posterity forget her
earlier frivolity and insincerity.
“I can never forget [says Pasquier] the evening on which the
discarded empress did the honors of her court for the last time. It
was the day before the official dissolution. A great throng was
present, and supper was served, according to custom, in the gallery
of Diana, on a number of little tables. Josephine sat at the centre
one, and the men went around her, waiting for that particularly
graceful nod which she was in the habit of bestowing on those with
whom she was acquainted. I stood at a short distance from her for a
few minutes, and I could not help being struck with the perfection
of her attitude in the presence of all these people who still did
her homage, while knowing full well that it was for the last time;
that in an hour she would descend from the throne, and leave the
palace never to reënter it. Only women can rise superior to such a
situation, but I have my doubts as to whether a second one could
have been found to do it with such perfect grace and composure.
Napoleon did not show so bold a front as did his victim.”
There is no doubt but that Napoleon suffered deeply over the separation.
If his love had lost its illusion, he was genuinely attached to
Josephine, and in a way she was necessary to his happiness. After the
ceremony of separation, he was to go to Saint Cloud, she to Malmaison.
While waiting for his carriage, he returned to his study in the palace.
For a long time he sat silent and depressed, his head on his hand. When
he was summoned he rose, his face distorted with pain, and went into the
empress’s apartment. Josephine was alone.
When she saw the emperor, she threw herself on his neck, sobbing aloud.
He pressed her to his bosom, kissed her again and again, until
overpowered with emotion, she fainted. Leaving her to her women, he
hurried to his carriage.
Méneval, who saw this sad parting, remained with Josephine until she
became conscious. When he left, she begged him not to let the emperor
forget her, and to see that he wrote her often.
[Illustration:
NAPOLEON.
Engraved in 1841 by Louis, after a painting made in 1837 by Delaroche,
now in the Standish collection, and called the “Snuff-box.” Probably
the finest engraving ever made of a Napoleon portrait.]
“I left her,” that naïve admirer and apologist of Napoleon goes on,
“grieved at so deep a sorrow and so sincere an affection. I felt very
miserable all along my route, and I could not help deploring that the
rigorous exactions of politics should violently break the bonds of an
affection which had stood the test of time, to impose another union full
of uncertainty.”
Josephine returned to Malmaison to live, but Napoleon took care that she
should have, in addition, another home, giving her Navarre, a château
near Evreux, some fifty miles from Paris. She had an income of some four
hundred thousand dollars a year, and the emperor showed rare
thoughtfulness in providing her with everything she could want. She was
to deny herself nothing, take care of her health, pay no attention to
the gossip she heard, and never doubt of his love. Such were the
recommendations of the frequent letters he wrote her. Sometimes he went
to see her, and he told her all the details of his life. It is certain
that he neglected no opportunity of comforting her, and that she, on her
side, finally accepted her lot with resignation and kindliness.
Over two years before the divorce a list of the marriageable princesses
of Europe had been drawn up for Napoleon. This list included eighteen
names in all, the two most prominent being Marie Louise of Austria, and
Anna Paulowna, sister of Alexander of Russia. At the Erfurt conference
the project of a marriage with a Russian princess had been discussed,
and Alexander had favored it; but now that an attempt was made to
negotiate the affair, there were numerous delays, and a general
lukewarmness which angered Napoleon. Without waiting for the completion
of the Russian negotiations, he decided on Marie Louise.
[Illustration:
MARRIAGE OF THE EMPEROR NAPOLEON AND MARIE LOUISE, ARCHDUCHESS OF
AUSTRIA, AT THE PALACE OF THE LOUVRE, APRIL 2, 1810.
By Rouget in 1836. On the emperor’s right hand and at the lower end of
the platform, stood the King of Holland; the King of Westphalia; the
Prince Borghese; Murat, King of Naples; Prince Eugène Napoleon,
Viceroy of Italy; the hereditary Grand Duke of Baden; the Prince
Arch-chancellor; the Prince Arch-treasurer; the Prince
Vice-constable; the Prince Vice-Grand Elector. To the left of the
empress, Madame _mère_; the Queen of Spain; the Queen of Holland;
the Queen of Westphalia; the Grand Duchess of Tuscany; the Princess
Pauline; the Queen of Naples; the Grand Duke of Würzburg; the
Vice-Queen of Italy; the Grand Duchess of Baden. The nuptial
benediction was given by Cardinal Fesch. This picture was exhibited
in the _Salon_ of 1832.]
The marriage ceremony was performed in Vienna on March 12, 1810, the
Archduke Charles acting for Napoleon. The emperor first saw his new wife
some days later on the road between Soissons and Compiègne, where he had
gone to meet her in most unimperial haste, and in contradiction to the
pompous and complicated ceremony which had been arranged for their first
interview. From the beginning he was frankly delighted with Marie
Louise. In fact, the new empress was a most attractive girl, young,
fresh, modest well-bred, and innocent. She entirely filled Napoleon’s
ideal of a wife, and he certainly was happy with her.
Marie Louise in marrying Napoleon had felt that she was a kind of
sacrificial offering, for she had naturally a deep horror of the man who
had caused her country so much woe; but her dread was soon dispelled,
and she became very fond of her husband. Outside of the court the two
led an amusingly simple life, riding together informally early in the
morning, in a gay Bohemian way; sitting together alone in the empress’s
little _salon_, she at her needlework, he with a book. They even
indulged now and then in quiet little larks of their own, as one day
when Marie Louise attempted to make an omelet in her apartments. Just as
she was completely engrossed in her work, the emperor came in. The
empress tried to conceal her culinary operations, but Napoleon detected
the odor.
“What is going on here? There is a singular smell, as if something was
being fried. What, you are making an omelet! Bah! you don’t know how to
do it. I will show you how it is done.”
And he set to work to instruct her. They got on very well until it came
to tossing it, an operation Napoleon insisted on performing himself,
with the result that he landed it on the floor.
On March 20, 1811, the long desired heir to the French throne was born.
It had been arranged that the birth of the child should be announced to
the people by cannon shot; twenty-one if it were a princess, one hundred
and one if a prince. The people who thronged the quays and streets about
the Tuileries waited with inexpressible anxiety as the cannon boomed
forth; one—two—three. As twenty-one died away the city held its breath;
then came twenty-two. The thundering peals which followed it were
drowned in the wild enthusiasm of the people. For days afterward,
enervated by joy and the endless _fêtes_ given them, the French drank
and sang to the King of Rome.
In all these rejoicings none were so touching as at Navarre, where
Josephine, on hearing the cannon, called together her friends and said,
“We, too, must have a _fête_. I shall give you a ball, and the whole
city of Evreux must come and rejoice with us.”
Napoleon was the happiest of men, and he devoted himself to his son with
pride. Reports of the boy’s condition appear frequently in his letters;
he even allowed him to be taken without the empress’s knowledge to
Josephine, who had begged to see him.