  Persons of the way of thinking of M. and Mme. de RÉmusat had no sacrifice to make in casting in their lot with the new rÉgime. They had neither the extravagant sentiments of the Royalists, nor the austerity of the Republicans. No doubt their attitude of mind approached more nearly to that of the Royalists than to that of the Republicans, but their royalism reduced itself to pious veneration for Louis XVI. The misfortunes of that unhappy prince rendered his memory sacred, and his person had always been regarded in the family of M. de Vergennes with peculiar respect; but “Legitimacy” had not yet been invented, and those persons who most deeply deplored the fall of the old rÉgime, or rather that of the ancient dynasty, did not hold themselves under any obligation to believe that everything done in France in the absence of the Bourbons was null and void. Pure and unalloyed admiration was inspired by the young general who was reËstablishing material, if not moral order, with such brilliant success, in a society which was disturbed after a fashion very different from that of those successive later times, in which so many worthless “saviours” have turned up. Public functionaries in those days adhered to the opinion which was very natural under the old rÉgime, that an official is responsible only for what he does, and not for either the acts or the origin of the Government. The sense of “solidarity” does not exist in absolute monarchies. The parliamentary rÉgime has happily rendered us more sensitive, and all honest people now admit the collective responsibility of all the agents of a power. One could not nowadays serve a government whose tendency and general policy one did not approve; but it was otherwise in former times. My father—who had more right than any one else to be strict in these matters, and who, perhaps, owed somewhat of his extreme political scrupulousness to the difficult position in which he had seen his parents placed during his own childhood, between their private impressions and their official duties—explains these shades of difference in an unpublished letter to M. Sainte Beuve, to whom he had communicated certain biographical details for an article in the “Revue des Deux Mondes.” “It was not a pis aller, from necessity, weakness, or as a temporary expedient, that my parents attached themselves to the new rÉgime. Of their free will and with entire confidence they united themselves with its fortunes. If you add to that all the pleasures of an easy and prominent position to be stepped into from one of poverty and obscurity, the curiosity which a court of so novel a kind inspired, the incomparable interest of the spectacle of a man like the Emperor at an epoch when he was irreproachable, young, and still amiable, you can easily conceive the attraction which induced my parents to overlook all that was in reality opposed to their tastes, their reason, and even their true interests in this new position. At the end of two or three years, they had learned too well that a court is always a court, and that all is not pleasure in the personal service of an absolute master, even though he may charm and dazzle. But this did not prevent their being for a long time well enough satisfied with their lot. My mother especially was much amused with all that passed before her eyes, and she was on very good terms with the Empress, who was extremely kind and generous, while she enthusiastically admired the Emperor. He treated my mother with flattering distinction. She was almost the only woman with whom he ever talked. My mother would sometimes say, after the Empire had ceased to exist: ‘Va, je t’ai trop aimÉ pour ne pas te haÏr!’” Of the impressions made by the new Court upon the new Lady of the Palace we have no record. The security of the Post-office was very doubtful. Madame de Vergennes burned all her daughter’s letters, and the correspondence of the latter with her husband does not commence until some years later, during the Emperor’s journeys in Italy and Germany. Nevertheless, we can perceive from her Memoirs, although they do not abound in personal details, how strange and novel everything seemed to so very young a woman, transplanted all of a sudden into this palace, and an eye-witness of the private life of the glorious chief of an unknown government. She was very serious, as, when they are not very frivolous the young are apt to be, and much disposed to observation and reflection. She seems to have had no taste for display, no great solicitude about external things, no turn for gossip or the running down of other people, no love of talking or display. What was thought of her at that time? We can not tell. We only know, from certain passages in sundry letters and memoirs, that she was considered clever, and that people were a little afraid of her. Probably, however, her companions thought her pedantic rather than dangerous. She had a considerable “success,” especially at first; for in its early days the Court was not numerous—there were few distinctions or favors to be schemed for, rivalry was not very brisk or ardent. Little by little, however, this little society became a real court. Now, courtiers are always afraid of intellect, and especially of that disposition, unintelligible to them, which clever people have to interest themselves in a disinterested manner, so to speak, in knowing things and judging characters, without even thinking of turning their knowledge to their own advantage. Courtiers always suspect that every opinion has a hidden aim. Persons of quick intellect are very strongly impressed by the spectacle of human affairs, even when they are merely looking on at them. And that faculty is the most incomprehensible to those who do not possess it, and who attribute its effects to some personal motive, or interested calculation. They suspect intrigue or resentment every time that they observe a movement in any direction, but they have no idea of the spontaneous and gratuitous action of the mind. Every one has been exposed to mistrust of this kind, which is more to be dreaded when a woman, endowed with excessive activity of imagination, and drawn on by her intelligence to form opinions on matters out of her sphere, is in question. Many persons, especially in that somewhat coarse society, would detect egotism and pretension in her life and conversation, and accuse her unduly of ambition. That her husband was entirely devoid of ambition, and free from any disposition to intrigue, was evident to all. The position in which the favor of the First Consul had placed him did not suit him; he would, no doubt, have preferred some laborious administrative function to one which demanded nothing of him but suavity and a graceful demeanor. From the “Memoirs,” from his own letters, and from my father’s account of him, we gather that M. de RÉmusat was a man of discreet conduct, with keen wits, and a cheerful and even temper—not at all a person calculated to make enemies. Indeed, he would never have had any, but for a certain shyness, which, little as it seems to harmonize with conversational powers and an agreeable manner, is, nevertheless, occasionally allied with them. His taste for quiet life, and some indolence and timidity of character, had impelled him more and more toward retirement and isolation. Modesty and self-esteem mingled in his nature; and, without rendering him insensible to the honors of the post which he had obtained, they sometimes made him ashamed of the solemn trifles to which that very post forced him to devote his life. He believed himself to be made for better things, but he did not care for toiling in search of that which did not come to him of itself. He took but little pleasure in expressing the art, in which he was probably not deficient, of managing men. He did not love to put himself forward, and his indolent temperament induced him to let things take their chance. He afterward became a hard-working prefect, but he was a negligent and inactive courtier. He employed his skill simply to avoid disputes, and he discharged his official functions with quiet good taste. After having had many friends, and entered into numerous relations, he let them drop through, or at least he never seemed to do anything to retain them. Unless great care be taken, ties are loosened, recollections are effaced, rivalries are formed, and all the chances of ambition escape one’s grasp. M. de RÉmusat had no skill in playing a part, forming connections, bringing people together, or contriving the opportunities of fortune or success. He seems never to have regretted this. It would be easy for me to trace his motives—to depict his character in detail, and to narrate his errors, his grievances, and even his sufferings; for was he not my grandfather? The first severe trial which M. and Mme. de RÉmusat had to endure in their new position was the murder of the Duc d’Enghien. How profound was the grief which they felt when the man whom they ardently admired, as the express image of power and genius, and whom they strove to love, stained his hands with innocent blood, and they were forced to recognize that such a deed was simply the result of a cold and inhuman calculation, the following narrative will prove. It will, indeed, be seen that the impression made by the crime upon all honest persons at the Court was even deeper than that which it produced outside among the general public, who had become almost indifferent, through custom, to deeds of this kind. Even among the Royalists, who were absolutely inimical to the Government, the event caused more sorrow than indignation, so perverted had the public mind become in political matters and respecting State expedients! Where could the men of that day have acquired principles? Was it the old rÉgime or the Terror which could have instructed them? A short time afterward, the Sovereign Pontiff came to Paris, and, among the reasons which made him hesitate to crown the new Charlemagne, it is very doubtful whether this one was ever even weighed for a moment. The press was dumb, and men must be possessed of information before they are aroused to anger. Let us hope that civilization has now made so much progress that a repetition of similar incidents would be impossible. We should, however, be restrained from optimism on this point by the remembrance of what we have witnessed in our own time. The following Memoirs are an exact record of the life of the author, and the history of the early years of the present century. They show us what changes the establishment of the Empire effected at the Court, and how life there and its relations became more difficult and embarrassing; how by degrees the prestige of the Emperor declined, in proportion as he misused his great gifts, his power, and his chances. Mistakes, reverses, and failures were multiplied; and at the same time the adhesion of the earliest admirers of the Emperor became less fervent, and the manner of serving reflected the mode of thinking. Two parties, the Beauharnais and the Bonapartes, disputed the favor of the sovereign master with each other; and M. and Mme. de RÉmusat were regarded as belonging to the former, by reason of their natural feelings and their family relations. Their position was consequently affected in no small degree by the downfall and departure of the Empress Josephine. Everything was, however, much changed, and, when her lady-in-waiting followed her into her retirement, the Emperor seems to have made but little effort to detain Mme. de RÉmusat. Perhaps he was glad that a person of good sense and quick intelligence should watch over his forsaken and somewhat imprudent wife; but it must also be taken into account that my grandmother’s delicate health, her love of quiet, and her distaste for all festivities, had isolated her almost entirely from court life. Her husband, wearied and disgusted, gave way every day more and more to his discontent, and to his inability to lay himself out to please the great personages who were either cold or hostile to him. He neglected his functions as Chamberlain in order to concentrate himself on his duties as “Administrator of Theatres,” but the latter he fulfilled admirably. A great part of the actual organization of the ThÉÂtre FranÇais is due to him. My father, born in 1797, and very young when his father was Chamberlain to the Emperor, was remarkable as a child for his intelligence and his observation, and he retained a very distinct recollection of that period of discouragement and ennui. He has told me that he frequently knew his father to return from Saint Cloud utterly worn out, and tried beyond his patience by the burden which the arbitrariness and the ill temper of the Emperor laid upon all who approached him. That the child was an eye-? ?and ear-witness of his complaints at those moments in which restraints are cast off is evident, for, when he was more master of himself, he was fain to represent himself as satisfied with his master and his position, and he endeavored to conceal his vexations from his son. Perhaps he was better calculated to serve the simple, tranquil, sober, intellectual Bonaparte, while still a novice in the pleasures of sovereignty, than the blasÉ and intoxicated Napoleon, who exhibited the worse taste possible on all State occasions, and became more exacting every day in the matter of ceremonial and adulatory observance. An apparently trifling circumstance, whose gravity was not at first perceived by those whom it concerned, increased the difficulties of the situation, and hurried on the inevitable catastrophe. Although the history of the affair is insignificant, it will not be read without interest, and it sheds a light upon times now happily far removed from us, and which Frenchmen, if the lessons of the past are to avail, will not suffer to return. The celebrated Lavoisier was very intimate with M. de Vergennes. He died, as every one knows, on the scaffold on the 19th Floreal, year 2 (9th May, 1794). His widow, who contracted a second marriage with M. Rumford, a German savant, or at least a commercial man aiming at science—for he was the inventor of the Prussian stoves, and also of the thermometer that bears his name—remained on terms of close friendship with Madame de Vergennes and her family. This second marriage had not been happy, and compassion was, very justly, excited on behalf of the ill-treated wife, who was compelled to invoke the protection of the law against unendurable tyranny and exaction. As M. Rumford was a foreigner, it was in the power of the police to procure information respecting him from his own country, to reprimand him severely, and even to oblige him to leave France. This, I believe, was eventually done, and it was at the request of my grandmother that M. de Talleyrand and M. FouchÉ took up the matter. Madame Rumford was anxious to evince her gratitude to those personages, and the following is my father’s account of the results of her wish: “My mother consented to invite Madame Rumford to dinner, to meet M. de Talleyrand and M. FouchÉ. Surely, it was not an act of opposition to entertain the High Chamberlain and the Minister of Police at her table! Nevertheless, that meeting—so naturally brought about, the motive of which was as insignificant as it was harmless, but which was, I acknowledge, unusual, and never occurred again—was represented to the Emperor, in the reports that were sent out to him in Spain, as a political conference, and the proof of an important coalition. Although I do not contend that it was impossible for M. de Talleyrand and M. FouchÉ to have taken advantage of the opportunity of talking together; or deny that my mother, perceiving the respective inclinations of the two, or put upon the scent by something that was said by M. de Talleyrand, might have regarded the occasion as a favorable one for bringing about an interview which amused herself at the same time that it was useful to one of her friends, I have not the slightest reason for supposing that such was the case. I am, on the contrary, perfectly certain of having heard my father and mother quote this incident, when reverting to it some years afterward, as an instance of the unexpected importance which may be assumed by a fortuitous and insignificant matter, and say, smilingly, that Madame Rumford little knew what she had cost them. “They added that on that occasion the word ‘triumvirate’ had been uttered, and my mother had said, laughingly, ‘My dear, I am sorry for it; but your lot could only be that of Lepidus.’ My father also said that certain persons of the Court, not enemies of his, had sometimes spoken of ‘the Conference’ to him as a fact, and had said, though without any hostile intention, ‘Now that it is all over, tell us what it was about, and what it was you really meant to do?’” This narrative gives us an insight into the life of Courts, and also testifies to the intimacy of my grandparents with M. de Talleyrand. Although the former Bishop of Autun does not seem to have been actuated in this particular instance by that kind of feeling which he habitually carried into his relations with women, he both liked and admired Mme. de RÉmusat I have found amusing evidence of his sentiments in a sketch of her which he wrote, on the official paper of the Senate, during the leisure time of a sitting at which he presided as “Vice-Grand Elector,” probably in 1811: “Conservative Senate, } “Luxembourg, April 29th. } “I have a fancy for commencing the portrait of Clari. She is not what the world calls a beauty, but every one agrees in pronouncing her an agreeable woman. She is twenty-eight or twenty-nine years old, and she is neither more nor less blooming than she ought to be at twenty-eight. Her figure is good, her carriage is graceful and unaffected. Clari is not thin; she is only slight and refined. Her complexion is not brilliant, but she has the special charm of looking fairer in proportion as she is in a stronger light. To describe Clari in a sentence, let me say that the better she is known the more amiable she appears. “Clari has large, black eyes; their long lids give an expression of mingled tenderness and vivacity which is striking, even when her mind is inactive and she does not want to express anything. Those occasions are, however, very rare. Lively ideas, quick perception, a vivid imagination, exquisite sensibility, and constant kindness are expressed in her glance. To give an idea of that, it would be necessary to paint the soul which depicts itself in it, and then Clari would be the most beautiful of beings. I am not sufficiently well versed in the rules of drawing to know whether Clari’s features are quite regular. I believe her nose is too thick; but I know that she has beautiful eyes, lips, and teeth. A great part of her forehead is generally hidden by her hair, and that is a pity. Her smile is rendered as arch as it is sweet by her two dimples. Her dress is often careless, but never in bad taste, and she is scrupulously neat. That neatness forms part of the system of order and decorum from which Clari never deviates. Clari is not rich, but as she is moderate in her tastes and above caprice and fancy, she despises extravagance, and has never perceived that her fortune is limited, except when she has been obliged to restrain her benevolence. But, besides the art of giving, she has a thousand other ways of conferring kindnesses. Always ready to commend good deeds and to excuse faults, her mind is always bent on beneficent purposes. Clari affords us a striking proof of how much superior a kindly wit is to talent which produces only severity, criticism, and satire. She is more ingenious in her manner of passing favorable judgments than ever was malignity in the art of suggesting the false and suppressing the true. “Clari always vindicates those whose part she takes, but without offending those whom she confutes. Clari has a large and cultivated mind. I know no one who can talk better than she; but she exhibits her superior information only when she is giving one a proof of her confidence and friendship. Clari’s husband knows that he possesses a treasure, and has the good sense to appreciate it. Clari is a good mother; that is her reward.” The Emperor was displeased at the intimacy between the Grand Chamberlain and the First Chamberlain, and these Memoirs will show that he tried more than once to set the two at variance. He even succeeded for a time in alienating them. But their intimacy was unbroken when M. de Talleyrand fell into disgrace. It is well know that honorable motives on his part led to a violent altercation between himself and his imperial master in January, 1809, at the period of the Spanish war, which was the beginning of the misfortunes of the empire, and the result of the Emperor’s errors. Both M. de Talleyrand and M. FouchÉ predicted, or at least foreboded, that public disapprobation and suspicion would be aroused. “Throughout the whole empire,” writes M. Thiers, “hate was beginning to take the place of love.” This change was taking place among officials as well as citizens. Moreover, M. de Montesquiou, a member of the Legislature, who succeeded M. de Talleyrand in his place at court, was a less important personage than the latter, who had relegated to the First Chamberlain not only the troublesome portions of the duties of his post, but also those which were agreeable, and which conferred distinction. It was a “come-down” to lose a chief whose own importance enhanced that of the position next below him. Truly this was a strange time! Talleyrand, though in disgrace as a minister, and as the holder of one of the highest posts at Court, had not forfeited the Emperor’s confidence. The latter would send for him every now and then, and freely disclose the secret of the question or the circumstance on which he desired his advice. These consultations went on to the end, even at those times when the Emperor was talking of sending M. de Talleyrand to Vincennes. In return, M. de Talleyrand would enter into his views, and advise him with perfect frankness; and so this strange intercourse was carried on as if nothing had happened between them. State policy and the greatness of his own position afforded certain privileges and consolations to M. de Talleyrand which were beyond the reach of a chamberlain or a lady-in-waiting. Those who are in close contact with absolute power do not foresee that the day must come when their feelings will clash with their interests, and some of their duties with others. They forget that there are principles of government which must be guarded by constitutional guarantees. They yield to the natural desire to be “somebodies” in the state, to serve the established authority; they do not study the nature and conditions of that authority. So long as it exacts nothing against their conscience, they serve it in the sphere to which it has appointed them. But the hour comes when, without exacting anything new from them, it carries extravagance, violence, and injustice to such a height that it becomes hard to obey it, even in things of no moment; they remain, nevertheless, bound to obedience, while in their inmost soul they are full of indignation and of pain. Then comes actual desire for its fall. It may be said that their course is simple; let them resign. But they are afraid of giving rise to rumor and scandal, of being neither understood nor approved by public opinion. Moreover, no contract binds the servants of the state to the conduct of the chief of the state. Having no rights, they would seem to have no duties. They are powerless for prevention, and are, therefore, not afraid of having to expiate errors. Thus people thought in the reign of Louis XIV., and thus they still think in a great part of Europe; it was thus they thought under Napoleon, and perhaps they will be of the same opinion again. So shameful and wretched a thing is absolute power! It paralyzes both the honest scruples and the real duties of honest men. |
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