Napoleon's Letters to Josephine, 1796-1812
April 12th from Boulogne, having left Dunkirk on the 11th.
_The day after to-morrow._--This fete was the distribution of the
Legion of Honour at Boulogne and a review of 80,000 men. The
decorations were enshrined in the helmet of Bertrand du Guesclin,
which in its turn was supported on the shield of the Chevalier
Bayard.
_Hortense_ arrived at Boulogne, with her son, and the Prince and
Princess Murat, a few days later, and saw the Emperor. Josephine
received a letter from Hortense soon after Napoleon joined her
(September 2nd), to which she replied on September 8th. "The Emperor
has read your letter; he has been rather vexed not to hear from you
occasionally. He would not doubt your kind heart if he knew it as well
as I, but appearances are against you. Since he can think you are
neglecting him, lose no time in repairing the wrongs which are not
real," for "Bonaparte loves you like his own child, which adds much to
my affection for him."
_I am very well satisfied ... with the flotillas._--The descent upon
England was to have taken place in September, when the death of
Admiral Latouche-Treville at Toulon, August 19th, altered all
Napoleon's plans. Just about this time also _Fulton_ submitted his
steamship invention to Bonaparte. The latter, however, had recently
been heavily mulcted in other valueless discoveries, and refers Fulton
to the savants of the Institute, who report it chimerical and
impracticable. The fate of England probably lay in the balance at this
moment, more than in 1588 or 1798.
Napoleon and Josephine leave Aix for Cologne on September 12, and it
is now the ladies' turn to institute a hunt--the "real chamois hunt";
for each country inn swarms with this pestilence that walketh in
darkness, and which, alas! is no respecter of persons.
No. 5.
Two points are noteworthy in this letter--(1) that like No. 1 of this
series (see note thereto) it commences _Madame and dear Wife_; and (2)
it is signed Bonaparte and not Napoleon, which somewhat militates
against its authenticity.
_Arras, August 29th._--Early on this day he had been at St. Cloud. On
the 30th he writes Cambaceres from Arras that he is "satisfied with
the spirit of this department." On the same day he writes thence to
the King of Prussia and Fouche. To his Minister of Police he writes:
"That detestable journal, _Le Citoyen francais_, seems only to wish to
wallow in blood. For eight days running we have been entertained with
nothing but the Saint Bartholomew. Who on earth is the editor
(_redacteur_) of this paper? With what gusto this wretch relishes the
crimes and misfortunes of our fathers! My intention is that you should
put a stop to it. Have the editor (_directeur_) of this paper changed,
or suppress it." On Friday he is at Mons (writing interesting letters
respecting the removal of church ruins), and reaches his wife on the
Sunday (September 2nd) as his letter foreshadowed.
_I am rather impatient to see you._--The past few months had been an
anxious time for Josephine. Talleyrand (who, having insulted her in
1799, thought her his enemy) was scheming for her divorce, and wished
Napoleon to marry the Princess Wilhelmina of Baden, and thus cement an
alliance with Bavaria and Russia (Constant, vol. i. 240). The
Bonaparte family were very anxious that Josephine should not be
crowned. Napoleon had too great a contempt for the weaknesses of
average human nature to expect much honesty from Talleyrand. But he
was not as yet case-hardened to ingratitude, and was always highly
sensitive to caricature and hostile criticism. Talleyrand had been the
main cause of the death of the Duc d'Enghien, and was now trying to
show that he had wished to prevent it; but possibly the crowning
offence was contained in a lady's diary, that fell into the emperor's
hands, where Talleyrand is said to have called his master "a regular
little Nero" in his system of espionage. The diary in question is in
Constant's "Memoirs," vol. i., and this letter helps to fix the error
in the dates, probably caused by confusion between the Revolutionary
and Gregorian Calendars.
No. 6.
_T._--This may be Talleyrand, whom Mdme. de Remusat in a letter to her
husband (September 21st) at Aix, hinted to be on bad terms with the
Emperor--a fact confirmed and explained by Meneval. It may also have
been Tallien, who returned to France in 1802, where he had been
divorced from his unfaithful wife.
_B._--Doubtlessly Bourrienne, who was in disgrace with Napoleon, and
who was always trying to impose on Josephine's good nature. No sooner
had Napoleon left for Boulogne on July 14th than his former secretary
inflicts himself on the wife at Malmaison.
Napoleon joins Josephine at St. Cloud on or before October 13th, where
preparations are already being made for the Coronation by the
Pope--the first ceremony of the kind for eight centuries.
FOOTNOTES
[57] The Emperor had himself planned the Itinerary, and had mistaken a
projected road for a completed one, between Rethel and Marche.
SERIES F
No. 1.
_To Josephine._--She was at Plombieres from August 2 to September 10,
but no letter is available for the period, neither to Hortense nor
from Napoleon.
_Strasburg._--She is in the former Episcopal Palace, at the foot of
the cathedral.
_Stuttgard._--He is driven over from Ludwigsburg on October 4th, and
hears the German opera of "Don Juan."
_I am well placed._--On the same day Napoleon writes his brother
Joseph that he has already won two great victories--(1) by having no
sick or deserters, but many new conscripts; and (2) because the
Badenese army and those of Bavaria and Wurtemberg had joined him, and
all Germany well disposed.
No. 2.
_Louisburg._--Ludwigsburg.
_In a few days._--To Talleyrand he wrote from Strasburg on September
27: "Within a fortnight we shall see several things."
_A new bride._--This letter, in the collection of his Correspondence
ordered by Napoleon III., concludes at this point.
_Electress._--The Princess Charlotte-Auguste-Mathilde (1766-1828),
daughter of George III., our Princess Royal, who married Frederick I.
Napoleon says she is "not well treated by the Elector, to whom,
nevertheless, she seems much attached" (Brotonne, No. 111). She was
equally pleased with Napoleon, and wrote home how astonished she was
to find him so polite and agreeable a person.
No. 3.
_I have assisted at a marriage._--The bride was the Princess of
Saxe-Hildburghhausen, who was marrying the second son of the Elector.
No. 5.
Written at Augsburg. On October 15th he reaches the abbey of
Elchingen, which is situated on a height, from whence a wide view is
obtained, and establishes his headquarters there.
No. 6.
_Spent the whole of to-day indoors._--This is also mentioned in his
Seventh Bulletin (dated the same day), which adds, "But repose is not
compatible with the direction of this immense army."
_Vicenza._--Massena did not, however, reach this place till November
3rd. The French editions have _Vienna_, but _Vicenza_ is evidently
meant.
No. 7.
He is still at Elchingen, but at Augsburg the next day. On the 21st he
issues a decree to his army that Vendemiaire,[58] of which this was
the last day but one, should be counted as a campaign for pensions and
military services.
_Elchingen._--Meneval speaks of this village "rising in an amphitheatre
above the Danube, surrounded by walled gardens, and houses rising one
above the other." From it Napoleon saw the city of Ulm below,
commanded by his cannon. Marshal Ney won his title of Duke of Elchingen
by capturing it on October 14th, and fully deserved it. The Emperor
used to leave the abbey every morning to go to the camp before Ulm,
where he used to spend the day, and sometimes the night. The rain
was so heavy that, until a plank was found, Napoleon sat in a tent
with his feet in water (Savary, vol. ii. 196).
_Such a catastrophe._--At Ulm General Mack, with eight field-marshals,
seven lieutenant-generals, and 33,000 men surrender. Napoleon had
despised Mack even in 1800, when he told Bourrienne at Malmaison,
"Mack is a man of the lowest mediocrity I ever saw in my life; he is
full of self-sufficiency and conceit, and believes himself equal to
anything. He has no talent. I should like to see him some day opposed
to one of our good generals; we should then see fine work. He is a
boaster, and that is all. He is really one of the most silly men
existing, and besides all that, he is unlucky" (vol. i. 304). Napoleon
stipulated for Mack's life in one of the articles of the Treaty of
Presburg.
No. 9.
_Munich._--Napoleon arrived here on October 24th.
_Lemarois._--A trusty aide-de-camp, who had witnessed Napoleon's civil
marriage in March 1796, at 10 P.M.
_I was grieved._--They had no news from October 12th to 21st in Paris,
where they learnt daily that Strasburg was in the same predicament.
Mdme. de Remusat, at Paris, was equally anxious, and such women, in
the Emperor's absence, tended by their presence or even by their
correspondence to increase the alarms of Josephine.
_Amuse yourself._--M. Masson (_Josephine, Imperatrice et Reine_, p.
424) has an interesting note of how she used to attend lodge at the
Orient in Strasburg, to preside at a "loge d'adoption sous la
direction de Madame de Dietrich, grand maitresse titulaire."
_Talleyrand has come._--He was urgently needed to help in the
correspondence with the King of Prussia (concerning the French
violation of his Anspach territory), with whom Napoleon's relations
were becoming more strained.
No. 10.
_We are always in forests._--Baron Lejeune, with his artist's eye,
describes his impressions of the Amstetten forest as he travelled
through it with Murat the following morning (November 4th). "Those
of us who came from the south of Europe had never before realised
how beautiful Nature can be in the winter. In this particular
instance everything was robed in the most gleaming attire; the
silvery rime softening the rich colours of the decaying oak leaves,
and the sombre vegetation of the pines. The frozen drapery, combined
with the mist, in which everything was more or less enveloped, gave
a soft, mysterious charm to the surrounding objects, producing a
most beautiful picture. Lit up by the sunshine, thousands of long
icicles, such as those which sometimes droop from our fountains and
water-wheels, hung like shining lustres from the trees. Never did
ball-room shine with so many diamonds; the long branches of the
oaks, pines, and other forest trees were weighed down by the
masses of hoar-frost, while the snow converted their summits into
rounded roofs, forming beneath them grottoes resembling those of the
Pyrenean mountains, with their shining stalactites and graceful
columns" (vol. i. 24).
_My enemies._--Later in the day Napoleon writes from Lambach to the
Emperor of Austria a pacific letter, which contains the paragraph, "My
ambition is wholly concentrated on the re-establishment of my commerce
and of my marine, and England grievously opposes itself to both."
No. 11.
Written from Lintz, the capital of Upper Austria, where Napoleon was
on the 4th.
No. 12.
Napoleon took up his abode at the palace of Schoenbrunn on the 14th,
and proves his "two-o'clock-in-the-morning courage" by passing through
Vienna at that time the following morning.
No. 13.
_They owe everything to you._--Aubenas quotes this, and remarks (vol.
ii. 326): "No one had pride in France more than Napoleon, stronger
even than his conviction of her superiority in the presence of other
contemporary sovereigns and courts. He wishes that in Germany, where
she will meet families with all the pride and sometimes all the
haughtiness of their ancestry, Josephine will not forget that she is