effect on josephine of disasters in russia—anxiety during campaign of 1813—flight from paris—death in 1814
by the spring of 1812 josephine had adjusted herself admirably to her new life. she had conquered her suspicions, acquired self-control, taken up useful duties. her position was recognized by all france. in every quarter she was loved and honored. never indeed in all her disordered, changeful existence was she so worthy of respect and affection. with every week her power of self-control, her capacity for happiness seemed to grow. in the spring she spent some time with hortense at the chateau of saint leu, the latter’s country home. after she returned to malmaison, she wrote back a letter which shows to what a large degree she had regained contentment. “the few days i spent with you,” she wrote hortense, “were very happy, and did me great good. everybody who comes to see me says that i never looked better, and i am not surprised at it. my health always depends on my experiences, and those with you were sweet and happy.”
in june, the campaign against russia, for which napoleon had been preparing for several months, began; but there is no indication that josephine had any anxiety in seeing the grand army set out. had she not seen the emperor return from italy, from austerlitz, jena, and wagram? in july she went to milan, to remain with the princess augusta, eugène’s wife, through her confinement. she seemed to 441get great pleasure from her visit. the princess she found charming, the children could not be better, everybody treated her with a consideration and an affection which touched her deeply. she seems to have been happy at milan for the most natural, wholesome reasons—because her son’s wife is a good woman and loves her husband; because the new granddaughter is a healthy child; because the good people of milan remember her, and love her.
josephine took great satisfaction at this time, too, in eugène’s success. he was, in fact, justifying fully in russia the good opinion the emperor had always had of him, and his letters to his mother were almost exultant. “the emperor gained a great victory over the russians to-day,” he wrote her on september 8th. “we fought for thirteen hours, and i commanded the left. we all did our duty, and i hope the emperor is satisfied.” and again, “i write you only two words, my good mother, to tell you that i am well. my corps had a brilliant day yesterday. i had to deal with eight divisions of the enemy from morning until night, and i kept my position. the emperor is pleased, and you can believe that i am.”
but the joy of victory was not long continued. moscow was entered on september 15th, 1812. the exultation that the capture of the enemy’s capital caused in france was short-lived. close upon it came reports of the burning of the city, of the awful cost of the march inland, of the suffering the army was undergoing. when josephine reached paris in october, the city was full of sinister reports of defeat. a plot to seize the government, based on a report of napoleon’s death, had just been suppressed. her letters from eugène had talked only of victory. what could it mean? as she listened to the reports afloat and came under the spell of the city’s foreboding, a deadly despair seized her. at the mere mention of napoleon’s name she wept. her face carried such woe that her household feared that worse evils had befallen them than they knew of, and malmaison for weeks was wrapped in gloom.
442
eugene de beauharnais, napoleon’s stepson. (“eugenio napoleone, prince di francia, vice re d’italia, 1813.”)
engraved by longhi, after gérard, milan, 1813.
443this was her condition when suddenly it was reported that napoleon had returned unannounced from russia. amazed at the extent of the conspiracy which had arisen in his absence and at the instability of the throne at the mere report of his own death, and fearing still more serious results when the full news of the catastrophe in russia reached france, the emperor had driven night and day across europe to paris. his presence inspired courage, but it could not close the ears of france to the ghastly stories of the retreat from moscow, nor blind her eyes to the haggard remnants of men who daily flocked into the city. there was an appearance of gaiety, because the emperor ordered it; but there was little heart in the winter’s merry-making.
napoleon’s return did not restore josephine’s confidence. her superstition, always lively, asserted itself to the full. the first day of the new year, 1813, was on friday. josephine’s presentiments were the darkest. this year would bring napoleon sorrow and loss, she declared. france was to suffer. nothing could restore her calm. in all this grief the thought was ever present with her that the divorce was the cause of napoleon’s misfortunes. he had destroyed his star. nor was she by any means alone in this theory. indeed, it is probable that she had adopted it from others, for many people in france had always believed it. even in the grand army, during the campaign against russia, soldiers said, after reverses began, that it was because of the divorce. “he shouldn’t have left the old girl,” they put it; “she brought him luck—and us too.”
in the spring of 1813, the emperor was off again at the head of the army which by feverish efforts he had gathered and equipped. josephine saw the new campaign begin with 444foreboding; she watched its doubtful progress with growing dismay, and finally when in november, the french army, defeated, and with its allies daily deserting, crossed the rhine, her anguish was pitiful. napoleon’s name was incessantly on her lips, and of everybody who came within her range that knew anything of him she asked a hundred eager questions. how did he look? was he pale? did he sleep? did he believe his star had deserted him?
when eugène’s father-in-law, the king of bavaria, abandoned his alliance with the emperor, josephine urged upon her son loyalty and energy; and when louis bonaparte moved by his brother’s misfortunes, hurried to offer his services, josephine pointed out to hortense, who, she thought, might reasonably expect new annoyance if louis’s offer was accepted, that her husband’s act was a noble one and that hortense should view it so. hortense seems as a matter of fact, to have felt more respect for her husband when she heard of his offer to return than she had for many years.
during the advance of the allies towards paris and the wonderful resistance napoleon offered for many weeks, josephine remained at malmaison feverishly questioning everybody who came. as the battles grew nearer, she interested herself in hospital work, and set her household to making lint. now and then she received a note from the emperor—a characteristic note of triumph—never of fear or complaint. these notes she always retired to read and to weep over, and afterwards she spent hours talking of them to her women.
as the end of march approached the allies were so near paris that josephine saw bodies of strangely uniformed men passing and repassing near malmaison—cossacks, austrians, prussians. what could it all mean? hortense, at the court of marie louise, sent her daily notes, telling her of 445the hopes and fears of paris. invariably these notes were courageous, showing perfect confidence in the final triumph of napoleon. when at last, on march 28th, hortense learned that marie louise and the court were leaving the city, her indignation was intense. she could do nothing, however. it was her duty to accompany marie louise, and she had only time before departing to send a note to josephine, urging her to go to navarre.
“my dear hortense,” josephine replied, “up to the moment i received your letter i kept my courage. i cannot endure the thought that i am to be separated from you, and god knows for how long! i am following your counsel; i shall go to-morrow to navarre. i have only sixteen men in my guard here, and they are all wounded. i shall keep them; but as a matter of fact, i do not need them. i am so wretched at being separated from my children that i am indifferent about what happens to myself. try to send me word how you are, what you will do, and where you will go. i shall try to follow you from afar, at least.”
early on march 29th, the little household started through rain and mud. josephine’s terror was complete. she fancied she would be waylaid by cossacks; and once when she saw a band of soldiers approaching, she jumped from her carriage, and fled across the fields alone. it was with difficulty that her attendants convinced her that the strangers were french, not foreign soldiers.
once at navarre, she spent much of her time alone—a practice quite unlike her,—reading and re-reading napoleon’s letters. one of them she carried always in her bosom. it had been sent from brienne, only a short time before the abdication, and contained the most touching expressions of his affection for her to be found in any of his later letters: “i have sought death in numberless engagements; i no longer dread its approach; i should now hail it as a boon.... 446nevertheless, i still wish to see josephine once more.”
a few days after josephine’s arrival at navarre, hortense joined her, and there the two learned of napoleon’s abdication and of the return of the bourbons. after the first paroxysm of grief was over, they began planning for the future. hortense would go to america, with her children, she declared. there she could rear them so that they would be fit for any future. but josephine was not for renouncing her position. she began to write feverishly in every direction, apparently hoping to interest her friends in saving something for her in the general overthrow. the allies had no disposition, however, to take from josephine either her rank or all her income. the emperor alexander, who was the real umpire of the game, believed it wise to look after the material interests of the bonaparte family, and in the treaty arranged that josephine should have an annual income of 1,000,000 francs and that she should keep all of her property, disposing of it as she pleased. alexander showed a strong desire to win josephine’s favor, in fact. learning that she was at navarre, he invited her to malmaison, giving her every assurance that she would be safe there. before the end of april, she came with hortense, and here eugene joined them. alexander soon came to malmaison to see the empress. his attentions to her set the vogue for the court, and repeated assurances came from all sides to josephine that her position and that of her children was safe with the new régime. but josephine could not believe it so. her days and nights were full of foreboding—of laments over the fate of the emperor. one day, after dining with alexander at the chateau of st. leu, she returned to her room in complete collapse.
“i cannot overcome the frightful sadness which has taken possession of me,” she said. “i make every effort to conceal 447it from my children, but only suffer the more. i am beginning to lose my courage. the emperor of russia has certainly shown great regard and affection for us, but it is nothing but words. what will he decide to do with my son, my daughter and her children? is he not in a position to do something for them? do you know what will happen when he has gone away? nothing he has promised will be carried out. i shall see my children unhappy, and i cannot endure the idea; it causes me the most dreadful suffering. i am suffering enough already on account of the fate of the emperor napoleon, stripped of all his greatness, sent into an island far from france, abandoned. must i, besides this, see my children wanderers? stripped of fortune? it seems to me this idea is going to kill me.... is it austria who opposes my son’s advancement? is it the bourbons? certainly they are under obligations enough to me to be willing to pay them by helping my children. have i not been good to all of their party in their misfortunes? to be sure, i never imagined they would come back to france; nevertheless, it pleased me to be their friend; they were frenchmen, they were suffering, they were former acquaintances, and the position of those princes that i had seen in their youth touched my heart. did i not ask bonaparte twenty times to let the duchess of orleans and the duchess of bourbon come back? it was through me that he succored them in their distress, that he allowed them a pension which they received in a foreign country.”
the attention paid her by the allies seemed to leave no ground for any of these anxieties. the king of prussia and his sons, the grand-dukes of russia, every great man in paris, in fact, sought josephine repeatedly. she distrusted it all, and one moment wept over the fate of herself and children; the next over napoleon alone on his island—repeatedly she declared she would join him if she did not fear 448it would cause a misunderstanding between him and marie louise, and so prevent the latter from going to elba, as josephine thought she ought to do. in her nervous state she searched for signs of the neglect and discourtesy which she believed were in store for her. she planned to sell her jewels. everyone in the household became thoroughly disturbed over her condition. “my mother is courageous and amiable, when she is receiving,” hortense said one day; “but as soon as she is alone, she gives up to a grief which is my despair. i am afraid that the misfortunes which have fallen upon us have affected her too deeply and that her health will never reassert itself.”
josephine was in this nervous condition when she took a severe cold, and on may 25th her condition was so serious that the best physicians of paris were summoned. the emperor of russia sent his private physician, and went himself frequently to malmaison. everything that could be done was done, but poor josephine’s power of resistance was at an end. restlessly tossing hour after hour on her pillow, murmuring at intervals—“bonaparte”—“elba”—“marie louise”—she lay for four days. on the morning of the 29th, it was evident to hortense and eugene, evident to josephine herself, that she could not live long. the priest was summoned, and alone with him she confessed for the last time, while in the chapel below her children knelt and listened to the mass said for their mother. after the confession, the members of the household gathered about her bed while the sacrament was administered. a few moments after the last words of the solemn service were said, the empress was pronounced dead.
the news of the death of josephine produced a profound impression in paris. she had died of grief, they said, grief at napoleon’s downfall. even those who had no sympathy 449for her in life were moved by the tragic circumstances of her end and hastened to pay a last tribute to her memory. for three days the body of the empress lay on a catafalque in the vestibule of the chateau at malmaison, and in that time over 20,000 persons looked upon it.
at the funeral, which took place on june 2nd, in the little church at reuil, near malmaison, royal honors were accorded josephine; though the really touching feature of the procession and service was the presence of hundreds of people—soldiers, peasants, old men, children—who came to pay the only tribute possible to them to the “good josephine,” the “star” of the emperor.
the empress still lies in the little church at reuil, where she was laid eighty-six years ago, and her grave and the chateau of malmaison have remained until to-day, places of pilgrimage for those who knew and loved her in life as well as for many thousands whose hearts have been touched by the melancholy story of her life of adventure, glory, and sorrow. in june, 1815, before departing for waterloo, napoleon visited the chateau. hortense, who had not been there since her mother’s death, received him. for an hour he walked in the park talking of josephine; then he went over the chateau, looking at every room, at almost every article of furniture. at the door of the room where josephine had died, it is told that he stopped and said to hortense, “my daughter, i wish to go in alone.” when he came out his eyes were wet.
scarcely more than two weeks later he returned to malmaison. defeated at waterloo, he was an outcast unless france rallied to him. that the country could not do. it was thus from the home of josephine that napoleon went into captivity.
in 1824, eugène and hortense, both exiles from france since 1815, bought one of the chapels in the church at reuil 450and placed in it the beautiful monument to josephine which is to be seen there to-day. in 1831, hortense crossed france incognito with louis-napoleon, and the two then, for the first time, saw the monument. from reuil they went to malmaison, but only to the gates. five years before, the chateau had been sold to a swedish banker, and the porter refused hortense admission because she had no pass from the proprietor.
seven years after this sad visit, hortense was brought to reuil to be laid beside her mother. but it was not until twelve years later, when her son, josephine’s beloved oui-oui, louis-napoleon, had become emperor, that a monument was placed in the church to her memory. with the return of the bonapartes to power, the memory of josephine became a cult. it was she alone of all the women who for seventy years had ruled france, napoleon iii. told his people, who had brought them happiness. her statue was reared in paris; her name was given to a grand avenue; malmaison was bought, made more brilliant than ever, and thrown open to visitors. on every hand her life was extolled, her character glorified. as a result of this attempt at canonization, josephine became for the world a pure and gentle heroine, the victim of her own unselfish devotion to the man she loved. with the passing of the napoleonic dynasty, it has become possible to study her life dispassionately. the researches show her to have been much less of a saint than napoleon iii. wished the world to believe.
josephine was by birth and training the victim of a vicious system. her nature was essentially shallow, her strongest passions being for attention, gaiety, and the possession of beautiful apparel and jewels. nothing in her early surroundings showed her that there were better things in life to pursue. none of the hard experiences of later life dimmed these passions. to gratify them she was willing to 451adapt herself to any society, and freely give her person to the lover who promised most. it would be unjust to judge her by the orderly standards of present-day anglo-saxon morality—she, an eighteenth century creole, cast almost a child into the chaotic whirl of the french revolution. what purity or dignity could be expected of a child of her nature when her chief protectors, her father, her aunt, and her husband, were all notoriously unfaithful to the most sacred relations of life! if josephine, when abandoned by her husband and later thrown on her own resources in a society which was honey-combed with vice, went with her world, one can only pity.
there is little doubt that if she had been faithful to napoleon from the beginning of their married life, her future with him would have been different. the fatal disillusion he suffered in 1797 made the divorce possible for him. so long as josephine was true, no other woman could have existed for him. such is the strange exclusiveness in love, of a nature, brutal, sweet, and strong like napoleon’s. it should never be forgotten, however, that when the poor little creole realized, that to keep her position she must be faithful, she never after gave offense, and that as the years went on her devotion to her husband became a cult. nothing indeed in the history of women is more pathetic than the patience, the sweetness, with which josephine performed all the exacting and uncongenial duties of her position as empress.
although josephine possessed none of those qualities which make a heroic soul, knew nothing of true self-denial, was a coward in danger, never lost sight of personal interest, was an abject time-server, few women have been loved more sincerely by those surrounding them. there was good reason for this. no word of malice ever crossed her lips, she took no joy in seeing an enemy suffer, she never intrigued, she never flagged in kindly service. if she was incapable of 452heroic deeds at least her days were filled with small courtesies, kind words, generous acts. a candid survey of her life destroys the heroine, but it leaves a woman who through a stormy life kept a kindly heart towards friend and enemy and who at last attained rectitude of conduct.
and this is the most that can be said for her. it touches the woman josephine only. as for the empress josephine, she is only a name. she held her throne by the accident of her marriage and never took it seriously. she never comprehended the ideas it stood for in the mind of the great tyrant who established it. the prosperity of the french people—the glory of french arms, the spread of just laws, the establishment of a stable system, all those notions for which napoleon was struggling, meant nothing to her save as they affected the tenure of her own position. the one distinguished opportunity she had of serving the napoleonic idea—the divorce—she accepted only when she realized that she could not escape it. that her graciousness and her kindly spirit smoothed napoleon’s way in the difficult task of manufacturing a court and a nobility is unquestionable. but this was the service of a tactful woman of the world rendered to a husband, not of an empress to her people. the french people indeed meant no more to her than her throne. they merely filled the background of the stage where she played her part. she was an empress only in name, never in soul.
