reading to Madame. I rose and went into another room. Alone, in an
apartment from which there was no outlet, with no book but a Massillon,
which I had been reading to the Princess, happy in all the lightness and
gaiety of fifteen, I amused myself with turning swiftly round, with my
court hoop, and suddenly kneeling down to see my rose-coloured silk
petticoat swelled around me by the wind. In the midst of this grave
employment enters his Majesty, followed by one of the Princesses. I
attempt to rise; my feet stumble, and down I fall in the midst of my
robes, puffed out by the wind. 'Daughter,' said Louis XV., laughing
heartily, 'I advise you to send back to school a reader who makes
cheeses.'" The railleries of Louis XV. were often much more cutting, as
Mademoiselle Genet experienced on another occasion, which, thirty years
afterwards, she could not relate without an emotion of fear. "Louis XV.,"
she said, "had the most imposing presence. His eyes remained fixed upon
you all the time he was speaking; and, notwithstanding the beauty of his
features, he inspired a sort of fear. I was very young, it is true, when
he first spoke to me; you shall judge whether it was in a very gracious
manner. I was fifteen. The King was going out to hunt, and a numerous
retinue followed him. As he stopped opposite me he said, 'Mademoiselle
Genet, I am assured you are very learned, and understand four or five
foreign languages.'--'I know only two, Sire,' I answered, trembling.
'Which are they?' English and Italian.'--'Do you speak them fluently?'
Yes, Sire, very fluently.' 'That is quite enough to drive a husband mad.'
After this pretty compliment the King went on; the retinue saluted me,
laughing; and, for my part, I remained for some moments motionless with
surprise and confusion."
At the time when the French alliance was proposed by the Duc de Choiseul
there was at Vienna a doctor named Gassner,--[Jean Joseph Gassner, a
pretender to miraculous powers.]--who had fled thither to seek an asylum
against the persecutions of his sovereign, one of the ecclesiastical
electors. Gassner, gifted with an extraordinary warmth of imagination,
imagined that he received inspirations. The Empress protected him, saw
him occasionally, rallied him on his visions, and, nevertheless, heard
them with a sort of interest. "Tell me,"--said she to him one day,
"whether my Antoinette will be happy." Gassner turned pale, and remained
silent. Being still pressed by the Empress, and wishing to give a general
expression to the idea with which he seemed deeply occupied, "Madame," he
replied, "there are crosses for all shoulders."
The occurrences at the Place Louis XV. on the marriage festivities at
Paris are generally known. The conflagration of the scaffolds intended
for the fireworks, the want of foresight of the authorities, the avidity
of robbers, the murderous career of the coaches, brought about and
aggravated the disasters of that day; and the young Dauphiness, coming
from Versailles, by the Cours la Reine, elated with joy, brilliantly
decorated, and eager to witness the rejoicings of the whole people, fled,
struck with consternation and drowned in tears, from the dreadful scene.
This tragic opening of the young Princess's life in France seemed to bear
out Gassner's hint of disaster, and to be ominous of the terrible future
which awaited her.
In the same year in which Marie Antoinette was married to the Dauphin,
Henriette Genet married a son of M. Campan, already mentioned as holding
an office at the Court; and when the household of the Dauphiness was
formed, Madame Campan was appointed her reader, and received from Marie
Antoinette a consistent kindness and confidence to which by her loyal
service she was fully entitled. Madame Campan's intelligence and
vivacity made her much more sympathetic to a young princess, gay and
affectionate in disposition, and reared in the simplicity of a German
Court, than her lady of honour, the Comtesse de Noailles. This
respectable lady, who was placed near her as a minister of the laws of
etiquette, instead of alleviating their weight, rendered their yoke
intolerable to her.
"Madame de Noailles," says Madame Campan, "abounded in virtues. Her
piety, charity, and irreproachable morals rendered her worthy of praise;
but etiquette was to her a sort of atmosphere; at the slightest
derangement of the consecrated order, one would have thought the
principles of life would forsake her frame.
"One day I unintentionally threw this poor lady into a terrible agony. The
Queen was receiving I know not whom,--some persons just presented, I
believe; the lady of honour, the Queen's tirewoman, and the ladies of the
bedchamber, were behind the Queen. I was near the throne, with the two
women on duty. All was right,--at least I thought so. Suddenly I
perceived the eyes of Madame de Noailles fixed on mine. She made a sign
with her head, and then raised her eyebrows to the top of her forehead,
lowered them, raised them again, then began to make little signs with her
hand. From all this pantomime, I could easily perceive that something was
not as it should be; and as I looked about on all sides to find out what
it was, the agitation of the Countess kept increasing. The Queen, who
perceived all this, looked at me with a smile; I found means to approach
her Majesty, who said to me in a whisper, 'Let down your lappets, or the
Countess will expire.' All this bustle arose from two unlucky pins which
fastened up my lappets, whilst the etiquette of costume said 'Lappets
hanging down.'"
Her contempt of the vanities of etiquette became the pretext for the first
reproaches levelled at the Queen. What misconduct might not be dreaded
from a princess who could absolutely go out without a hoop! and who, in
the salons of Trianon, instead of discussing the important rights to
chairs and stools, good-naturedly invited everybody to be seated.
[M. de Fresne Forget, being one day in company with the Queen Marguerite,
told her he was astonished how men and women with such great ruffs could
eat soup without spoiling them; and still more how the ladies could be
gallant with their great fardingales. The Queen made no answer at that
time, but a few days after, having a very large ruff on, and some 'bouili'
to eat, she ordered a very long spoon to be brought, and ate her 'bouili'
with it, without soiling her ruff. Upon which, addressing herself to M.
de Fresne, she said, laughing, "There now, you see, with a little
ingenuity one may manage anything."--"Yes, faith, madame," said the good
man, "as far as regards the soup I am satisfied."--LAPLACE's "Collection,"
vol. ii., p. 350.]
The anti-Austrian party, discontented and vindictive, became spies upon
her conduct, exaggerated her slightest errors, and calumniated her most
innocent proceedings. "What seems unaccountable at the first glance,"
says Montjoie, "is that the first attack on the reputation of the Queen
proceeded from the bosom of the Court. What interest could the courtiers
have in seeking her destruction, which involved that of the King? Was it
not drying up the source of all the advantages they enjoyed, or could hope
for?"
[Madame Campan relates the following among many anecdotes illustrative of
the Queen's kindness of heart: "A petition was addressed to the Queen by a
corporation in the neighbourhood of Paris, praying for the destruction of
the game which destroyed their crops. I was the bearer of this petition
to her Majesty, who said, 'I will undertake to have these good people
relieved from so great an annoyance.' She gave the document to M. de
Vermond in my presence, saying, 'I desire that immediate justice be done
to this petition.' An assurance was given that her order should be
attended to, but six weeks afterwards a second petition was sent up, for
the nuisance had not been abated after all. If the second petition had
reached the Queen, M. de Vermond would have received a sharp reprimand.
She was always so happy when it was in her power to do good."
The quick repartee, which was another of the Queen's characteristics, was
less likely to promote her popularity. "M. Brunier," says Madame Campan,
"was physician to the royal children. During his visits to the palace, if
the death of any of his patients was alluded to, he never failed to say,
'Ah! there I lost one of my best friends! 'Well,' said the Queen, 'if he
loses all his patients who are his friends, what will become of those who
are not?'"]
When the terrible Danton exclaimed, "The kings of Europe menace us; it
behooves us to defy them; let us throw down to them the head of a king as
our gage!" these detestable words, followed by so cruel a result, formed,
however, a formidable stroke of policy. But the Queen! What urgent
reasons of state could Danton, Collot d'Herbois, and Robespierre allege
against her? What savage greatness did they discover in stirring up a
whole nation to avenge their quarrel on a woman? What remained of her
former power? She was a captive, a widow, trembling for her children! In
those judges, who at once outraged modesty and nature; in that people
whose vilest scoffs pursued her to the scaffold, who could have recognised
the generous people of France? Of all the crimes which disgraced the
Revolution, none was more calculated to show how the spirit of party can
degrade the character of a nation.
The news of this dreadful event reached Madame Campan in an obscure
retreat which she had chosen. She had not succeeded in her endeavours to
share the Queen's captivity, and she expected every moment a similar fate.
After escaping, almost miraculously, from the murderous fury of the
Marseillais; after being denounced and pursued by Robespierre, and
entrusted, through the confidence of the King and Queen, with papers of
the utmost importance, Madame Campan went to Coubertin, in the valley of
Chevreuse. Madame Auguid, her sister, had just committed suicide, at the
very moment of her arrest.
[Maternal affection prevailed over her religious sentiments; she wished to
preserve the wreck of her fortune for her children. Had she deferred this
fatal act for one day she would have been saved; the cart which conveyed
Robespierre to execution stopped her funeral procession!]
The scaffold awaited Madame Campan, when the 9th of Thermidor restored her
to life; but did not restore to her the most constant object of her
thoughts, her zeal, and her devotion.
A new career now opened to Madame Campan. At Coubertin, surrounded by her
nieces, she was fond of directing their studies. This occupation caused
her ideas to revert to the subject of education, and awakened once more
the inclinations of her youth. At the age of twelve years she could never
meet a school of young ladies passing through the streets without feeling
ambitious of the situation and authority of their mistress. Her abode at
Court had diverted but not altered her inclinations. "A month after the
fall of Robespierre," she says, "I considered as to the means of providing
for myself, for a mother seventy years of age, my sick husband, my child
nine years old, and part of my ruined family. I now possessed nothing in
the world but an assignat of five hundred francs. I had become responsible
for my husband's debts, to the amount of thirty thousand francs. I chose
St. Germain to set up a boarding-school, for that town did not remind me,
as Versailles did, both of happy times and of the misfortunes of France.
I took with me a nun of l'Enfant-Jesus, to give an unquestionable pledge
of my religious principles. The school of St. Germain was the first in
which the opening of an oratory was ventured on. The Directory was
displeased at it, and ordered it to be immediately shut up; and some time
after commissioners were sent to desire that the reading of the Scriptures
should be suppressed in my school. I inquired what books were to be
substituted in their stead. After some minutes' conversation, they
observed: 'Citizeness, you are arguing after the old fashion; no
reflections. The nation commands; we must have obedience, and no
reasoning.' Not having the means of printing my prospectus, I wrote a
hundred copies of it, and sent them to the persons of my acquaintance who
had survived the dreadful commotions. At the year's end I had sixty
pupils; soon afterwards a hundred. I bought furniture and paid my debts."
The rapid success of the establishment at St. Germain was undoubtedly
owing to the talents, experience, and excellent principles of Madame
Campan, seconded by public opinion. All property had changed hands; all
ranks found themselves confusedly jumbled by the shock of the Revolution:
the grand seigneur dined at the table of the opulent contractor; and the
witty and elegant marquise was present at the ball by the side of the
clumsy peasant lately grown rich. In the absence of the ancient
distinctions, elegant manners and polished language now formed a kind of
aristocracy. The house of St. Germain, conducted by a lady who possessed
the deportment and the habits of the best society, was not only a school
of knowledge, but a school of the world.
"A friend of Madame de Beauharnais," continues Madame Campan, "brought me
her daughter Hortense de Beauharnais, and her niece Emilie de Beauharnais.
Six months afterwards she came to inform me of her marriage with a
Corsican gentleman, who had been brought up in the military school, and
was then a general. I was requested to communicate this information to
her daughter, who long lamented her mother's change of name. I was also
desired to watch over the education of little Eugene de Beauharnais, who
was placed at St. Germain, in the same school with my son.
"A great intimacy sprang up between my nieces and these young people.
Madame de Beauharnaias set out for Italy, and left her children with me.
On her return, after the conquests of Bonaparte, that general, much
pleased with the improvement of his stepdaughter, invited me to dine at
Malmaison, and attended two representations of 'Esther' at my school."
He also showed his appreciation of her talents by sending his sister
Caroline to St. Germain. Shortly before Caroline's marriage to Murat, and
while she was yet at St. Germain, Napoleon observed to Madame Campan: "I
do not like those love matches between young people whose brains are
excited by the flames of the imagination. I had other views for my
sister. Who knows what high alliance I might have procured for her! She
is thoughtless, and does not form a just notion of my situation. The time
will come when, perhaps, sovereigns might dispute for her hand. She is
about to marry a brave man; but in my situation that is not enough. Fate
should be left to fulfil her decrees."
[Madame Murat one day said to Madame Campan: "I am astonished that you are
not more awed in our presence; you speak to us with as much familiarity as
when we were your pupils!"--"The best thing you can do," replied Madame
Campan, "is to forget your titles when you are with me, for I can never be
afraid of queens whom I have held under the rod."]
Madame Campan dined at the Tuileries in company with the Pope's nuncio, at
the period when the Concordat was in agitation. During dinner the First
Consul astonished her by the able manner in which he conversed on the
subject under discussion. She said he argued so logically that his talent
quite amazed her. During the consulate Napoleon one day said to her, "If
ever I establish a republic of women, I shall make you First Consul."
Napoleon's views as to "woman's mission" are now well known. Madame
Campan said that she heard from him that when he founded the convent of
the Sisters of la Charite he was urgently solicited to permit perpetual
vows. He, however, refused to do so, on the ground that tastes may
change, and that he did not see the necessity of excluding from the world
women who might some time or other return to it, and become useful members
of society. "Nunneries," he added, "assail the very roots of population.
It is impossible to calculate the loss which a nation sustains in having
ten thousand women shut up in cloisters. War does but little mischief;
for the number of males is at least one-twenty-fifth greater than that of
females. Women may, if they please, be allowed to make perpetual vows at
fifty years of age; for then their task is fulfilled."
Napoleon once said to Madame Campan, "The old systems of education were
good for nothing; what do young women stand in need of, to be well brought
up in France?"--"Of mothers," answered Madame Campan. "It is well said,"
replied Napoleon. "Well, madame, let the French be indebted to you for
bringing up mothers for their children."--"Napoleon one day interrupted
Madame de Stael in the midst of a profound political argument to ask her
whether she had nursed her children."
Never had the establishment at St. Germain been in a more flourishing
condition than in 1802-3. What more could Madame Campan wish? For ten
years absolute in her own house, she seemed also safe from the caprice of
power. But the man who then disposed of the fate of France and Europe was
soon to determine otherwise.
After the battle of Austerlitz the State undertook to bring up, at the
public expense, the sisters, daughters, or nieces of those who were
decorated with the Cross of Honour. The children of the warriors killed
or wounded in glorious battle were to find paternal care in the ancient
abodes of the Montmorencys and the Condes. Accustomed to concentrate
around him all superior talents, fearless himself of superiority, Napoleon
sought for a person qualified by experience and abilities to conduct the
institution of Ecouen; he selected Madame Campan.
Comte de Lacepede, the pupil, friend, and rival of Buffon, then Grand
Chancellor of the Legion of Honour, assisted her with his enlightened
advice. Napoleon, who could descend with ease from the highest political
subjects to the examination of the most minute details; who was as much at
home in inspecting a boarding-school for young ladies as in reviewing the
grenadiers of his guard; whom it was impossible to deceive, and who was
not unwilling to find fault when he visited the establishment at
Ecouen,--was forced to say, "It is all right."
[Napoleon wished to be informed of every particular of the furniture,
government, and order of the house, the instruction and education of the
pupils. The internal regulations were submitted to him. One of the
intended rules, drawn up by Madame Campan, proposed that the children
should hear mass on Sundays and Thursdays. Napoleon himself wrote on the
margin, "every day."]
"In the summer of 1811," relates Madame Campan, "Napoleon, accompanied by
Marie Louise and several personages of distinction, visited the
establishment at Ecouen. After inspecting the chapel and the refectories,
Napoleon desired that the three principal pupils might be presented to
him. 'Sire,' said I, 'I cannot select three; I must present six.' He
turned on his heel and repaired to the platform, where, after seeing all
the classes assembled, he repeated his demand. 'Sire,' said I, 'I beg
leave to inform your Majesty that I should commit an injustice towards
several other pupils who are as far advanced as those whom I might have
the honour to present to you.'
"Berthier and others intimated to me, in a low tone of voice, that I
should get into disgrace by my noncompliance. Napoleon looked over the
whole of the house, entered into the most trivial details, and after
addressing questions to several of the pupils: 'Well, madame,' said he, 'I
am satisfied; show me your six best pupils.'" Madame Campan presented
them to him; and as he stepped into his carriage, he desired that their
names might be sent to Berthier. On addressing the list to the Prince de
Neufchatel, Madame Campan added to it the names of four other pupils, and
all the ten obtained a pension of 300 francs. During the three hours
which this visit occupied, Marie Louise did not utter a single word.
M. de Beaumont, chamberlain to the Empress Josephine, one day at Malmaison
was expressing his regret that M. D-----, one of Napoleon's generals, who
had recently been promoted, did not belong to a great family. "You
mistake, monsieur," observed Madame Campan, "he is of very ancient
descent; he is one of the nephews of Charlemagne. All the heroes of our
army sprang from the elder branch of that sovereign's family, who never
emigrated."
When Madame Campan related this circumstance she added: "After the 30th of
March, 1814, some officers of the army of Conde presumed to say to certain
French marshals that it was a pity they were not more nobly connected. In
answer to this, one of them said, 'True nobility, gentlemen, consists in
giving proofs of it. The field of honour has witnessed ours; but where
are we to look for yours? Your swords have rusted in their scabbards.
Our laurels may well excite envy; we have earned them nobly, and we owe
them solely to our valour. You have merely inherited a name. This is the
distinction between us."
[When one of the princes of the smaller German States was showing Marechal
Lannes, with a contemptuous superiority of manner but ill concealed, the
portraits of his ancestors, and covertly alluding to the absence of
Lannes's, that general turned the tables on him by haughtily remarking,
"But I am an ancestor."]
Napoleon used to observe that if he had had two such field-marshals as
Suchet in Spain he would have not only conquered but kept the Peninsula.
Suchet's sound judgment, his governing yet conciliating spirit, his
military tact, and his bravery, had procured him astonishing success. "It
is to be regretted," added he, "that a sovereign cannot improvise men of
his stamp."
On the 19th of March, 1815, a number of papers were left in the King's
closet. Napoleon ordered them to be examined, and among them was found
the letter written by Madame Campan to Louis XVIII., immediately after the
first restoration. In this letter she enumerated the contents of the
portfolio which Louis XVI. had placed under her care. When Napoleon read
this letter, he said, "Let it be sent to the office of Foreign Affairs; it
is an historical document."
Madame Campan thus described a visit from the Czar of Russia: "A few days
after the battle of Paris the Emperor Alexander came to Ecouen, and he did
me the honour to breakfast with me. After showing him over the
establishment I conducted him to the park, the most elevated point of
which overlooked the plain of St. Denis. 'Sire,' said I, 'from this point
I saw the battle of Paris'--'If,' replied the Emperor, 'that battle had
lasted two hours longer we should not have had a single cartridge at our
disposal. We feared that we had been betrayed; for on arriving so
precipitately before Paris all our plans were laid, and we did not expect
the firm resistance we experienced.' I next conducted the Emperor to the
chapel, and showed him the seats occupied by 'le connetable' (the
constable) of Montmorency, and 'la connetable' (the constable's lady),
when they went to hear mass. 'Barbarians like us,' observed the Emperor,
'would say la connetable and le connetable.'
"The Czar inquired into the most minute particulars respecting the
establishment of Ecouen, and I felt great pleasure in answering his
questions. I recollect having dwelt on several points which appeared to
me to be very important, and which were in their spirit hostile to
aristocratic principles. For example, I informed his Majesty that the
daughters of distinguished and wealthy individuals and those of the humble
and obscure mingled indiscriminately in the establishment. 'If,' said I,
'I were to observe the least pretension on account of the rank or fortune
of parents, I should immediately put an end to it. The most perfect
equality is preserved; distinction is awarded only to merit and industry.
The pupils are obliged to cut out and make all their own clothes. They
are taught to clean and mend lace; and two at a time, they by turns, three
times a week, cook and distribute food to the poor of the village. The
young girls who have been brought up at Ecouen, or in my boarding-school
at St. Germain, are thoroughly acquainted with everything relating to
household business, and they are grateful to me for having made that a
part of their education. In my conversations with them I have always
taught them that on domestic management depends the preservation or
dissipation of their fortunes.'