On Monday evening, the city of Paris presented such a spectacle that one might have thought himself in an enchanted place. I have never seen such brilliant illuminations. It was a succession of magical decorations. Houses, hotels, palaces, churches, all were dazzling, even to the church towers, which seemed like stars or comets hung in air. The residences of the great dignitaries of the Empire, the ministers, the ambassadors of Austria and Russia, and that of the Duc d'Abrantes, vied with each other in splendor and good taste. Place Louis XV. presented an admirable spectacle. From the middle of this Place, surrounded by orange trees of flame, the eyes rolled alternately to the magnificent decoration of the Champs-Elysées, the Garde-Meuble, the temple of Glory, the Tuileries, and the Corps Législatif. The latter palace represented the temple of Hymen. The transparency of the pediment represented Peace uniting the august spouses. On either side of them were genii carrying bucklers on which were displayed the armorial bearings of the two empires; behind this group came magistrates, warriors, and the people, presenting them with crowns. At the two extremities of the transparency were the Seine and the Danube, surrounded with children, —— an image of fecundity. The twelve columns of the peristyle, and the flight of steps leading to it, were illuminated. The columns were united by chandeliers. The statues adorning the peristyle and perron were lighted up. The Louis XV. bridge, which conducted to this temple of Hymen, was itself an avenue whose double range of fires, colored lamps, obelisks, and its more than a hundred columns, each surmounted by a star and joined together by spiral garlands of colored lamps, were almost too insupportably brilliant to be looked at. The cupola of the dome of Sainte Geneviève was also magnificently illuminated. Each side of it was defined by a double row of lanterns. Between these were eagles, monograms in colored lamps, and fiery garlands depending from the torches of Hymen. The peristyle of the dome was lighted by chandeliers placed between the columns, and as the latter were not illuminated, the chandeliers seemed to be hanging in air. The lantern was all in fire, and the whole brilliant mass was surmounted by a tripod representing the altar of Hymen, whence escaped an immense flame produced by bituminous materials. At a great height above the platform of the observatory, an immense star, isolated from the platform, and caused to scintillate like a vast diamond by the variety of colored lamps which formed it, stood out against a black sky. The Senate house also attracted large crowds of sight-seers. But I have already lingered too long over this description of the marvellous sights that greeted the eye at every step.

The city of Paris presented Her Majesty the Empress with a toilet-service still more magnificent than that it had offered to the Empress Josephine. Everything was in silver-gilt, even to the armchair and the full-length dressing-glass. The designs for the different pieces of this truly admirable set of furniture had been made by the first artists, and the elegance and finish of the ornamentation surpassed even the richness of the metal.

Toward the end of April, Their Majesties visited the departments of the North together. This journey was a repetition of that which I had made in 1804, in the train of the Emperor; only, the Empress was not now the good and gracious Josephine. In passing through all these cities where I had seen her welcomed with so much enthusiasm, and whose good wishes and homage were now addressed to another sovereign; in revisiting the château of Lacken, Brussels, Antwerp, Boulogne, and many other places where I had seen Josephine passing in triumph, as Marie-Louise was doing now, I thought with sadness and regret of the isolation of the Emperor's first wife, and the anguish which could not fail to pursue her even in retirement when the story should arrive of the honors paid to her by whom she had been succeeded in the heart of the Emperor and on the imperial throne.

The King and Queen of Westphalia and Prince Eugène accompanied Their Majesties. At Antwerp we saw them launch a twenty-four-gun ship, which was blessed by M. de Pradt, Archbishop of Malines, before it left the stocks. The King of Holland came to join the Emperor at Antwerp. There was a coolness between this prince and His Majesty, who had quite recently demanded from him the cession of a part of his dominions, and who soon after laid hands on all the rest. Nevertheless he came to Paris during the marriage festivities of the Emperor, who had even sent him to meet the Empress Marie-Louise; but the two brothers had not relinquished their natural distrust; and it must be admitted that that of King Louis was but too well founded. What seemed to me most singular in their altercations was that the Emperor, in his brother's absence, would fly into the greatest passions and utter the most violent threats against him, while if they were to have an interview, they greeted each other in an amicable and familiar way like two brothers. Apart, one was the Emperor of the French, and the other the King of Holland; together, they were, if I may be allowed so to express myself, nothing but Napoleon and Louis, companions and friends from infancy.

However, Prince Louis was habitually sad and melancholy; the contrarieties he experienced on the throne, where he had been placed in spite of himself, added to his domestic griefs, rendered him evidently unhappy; and all who knew him commiserated him most sincerely, for King Louis was an excellent master, a meritorious and an honest man. It has been said that when the Emperor had decreed the reunion of Holland to France, King Louis resolved to defend himself to the last extremity in the city of Amsterdam, and to break the dikes and inundate the whole country in order to prevent the invasion of French troops. I do not know whether that is true; but from what I have seen of the character of this prince, I am very sure that, although he had sufficient personal courage to expose himself to all the chances of so desperate a step, his natural kindliness and humanity would have prevented him from carrying such a plan into execution.

At Middelburg the Emperor went aboard the Charlemagne to visit the mouths of the Scheldt, the port of the island of Flushing. During this excursion, we were assailed by a terrible squall. Three anchors were broken in succession. We sustained other damages, and incurred great danger. The Emperor was very sea-sick; he was constantly throwing himself on his bed, and making repeated efforts to vomit without being able to succeed, which rendered his condition still more distressing. Fortunately, I was not at all inconvenienced, and was therefore able to render him all the assistance which his case required. All the members of his suite were likewise ill. My uncle, who was the usher on duty, and consequently obliged to remain standing at the door of His Majesty's cabin, fell down every minute, and suffered horribly. During this torment, which lasted three days, the Emperor was boiling with impatience: "I think," said he, when we could at last approach him, "that I would have made a rather indifferent admiral."

Shortly after our return from this journey, the Emperor wished Her Majesty the Empress to learn how to ride. She went to the riding-school of Saint-Cloud; several members of the household were in the tribune to see her take her first lesson. I was among them, and I saw the tender solicitude evinced by the Emperor for his young wife. She was mounted on a gentle and very well broken horse. The Emperor never let go her hand, and M. Jardin held the horse's bridle. At the first step it made, the Empress screamed with alarm; and the Emperor said to her: "Come on! Louise, be brave; what canst thou fear? Am I not here?" The lesson passed in encouragements on one side and frights on the other. The next day the Emperor ordered those who were in the tribunes to be sent away, because their presence intimidated the Empress. She soon got used to it, and ended by riding very well. She often rode in the park with her ladies of honor and Madame the Duchesse de Montebello, who also rode with grace. The Empress was followed by several ladies in an open carriage. Prince Aldobrandini, her equerry, never left her in these excursions.

The Empress was at the age when one has a fondness for balls and festivities, and the Emperor dreaded above all things that she should be bored. Hence diversions and entertainments abounded at court and in the city. A fête offered to Their Majesties by Prince Schwarzenberg, the Austrian ambassador, had a frightful termination.

The Prince occupied the former hotel de Montesson, in the rue Chaussée d'Antin. For the purposes of his ball, he had added to the already existing apartments a vast hall and a wooden gallery, decorated with a profusion of flowers, draperies, chandeliers, etc. At the moment when the Emperor was about to retire, after spending two or three hours at the fête, a draught of air caught one of the curtains and blew it into the flame of some candles placed too near the windows, and it ignited instantly. Several young men made vain efforts to extinguish the fire by tearing down the draperies and stifling the flame with their hands. In the twinkling of an eye the paper wreaths and garlands were consumed and the woodwork had begun to burn.

The Emperor was among the first to perceive the fire and foresee its consequences. He approached the Empress, who had already risen to go to him, and went out with her, but not without difficulty, on account of the crowds precipitating themselves toward the doors. The Queens of Holland, Naples, Westphalia, the Princess Borghese, etc., followed Their Majesties. The Vice-Queen of Italy, who was far advanced in pregnancy, had remained in the hall, on the platform where the imperial family were seated. The Viceroy, dreading the crush for his wife almost as much as the fire, took her out through a small door contrived on the platform for the purpose of bringing refreshments to Their Majesties. No one had thought of this exit before Prince Eugène, but several persons availed themselves of it to depart when he did. Her Majesty the Queen of Westphalia did not think herself in safety when she had reached the terrace, and in her fright ran into the rue Taitbout, where she was picked up by a passer-by.

The Emperor accompanied the Empress as far as the entrance of the Champs-Elysées. There he left her, in order to return to the fire, and did not re-enter Saint-Cloud until nearly four o'clock in the morning. We had been in a fearful state of alarm since the arrival of the Empress. Not a soul in the château but was a prey to keen anxiety concerning the Emperor. At last he arrived without accident, but very much fatigued, his clothes in disorder and his face heated by the conflagration; his shoes and stockings were scorched and blackened by the fire. He went straight to the apartment of the Empress, to assure himself if she had entirely recovered from the fright she had experienced. Then he came to his own room, and throwing his hat on to his bed, and dropping into an armchair, he exclaimed: "My God! what a fête!" I noticed that the Emperor's hands were all blackened; he had lost his gloves at the fire. His Majesty was profoundly depressed. While I was undressing him, he asked whether I had been at the Prince's fête; I told him no; whereupon he deigned to give me some details of the deplorable event. The Emperor spoke with an emotion I never beheld in him more than two or three times in his life, and which he did not experience for his own misfortunes. "This night's conflagration," said His Majesty, "has consumed a heroic woman. The sister-in-law of Prince Schwarzenberg, hearing cries from the burning hall which she thought to be those of her eldest daughter, plunged into the midst of the flames. The floor, already reduced to charcoal, broke under her feet; she disappeared. The poor mother had been in error! all her children were out of danger. Unheard-of efforts were made to extricate her from the flames; but she was dead when these succeeded, and all the attempts of the physician to recall her to life were lavished in vain. The unhappy princess was with child, and far advanced in pregnancy; I advised the Prince myself to endeavor to save the life of the infant at least. It was taken living from its mother's corpse; but it lived only a few minutes."

The emotion of the Emperor redoubled at the close of this recital. I had taken care to have a bath all ready for him, knowing that he would need it on his return. His Majesty did in fact take one, and after the customary frictions, he found himself, as they say, quite set up again. I recollect, however, that he expressed a fear lest the terrible accident of this night might be the harbinger of disastrous events, and he long retained this apprehension. Three years afterwards, during the deplorable Russian campaign,

it was one day announced to the Emperor that the army corps commanded by Prince Schwarzenberg had been destroyed, and that the Prince himself had perished. It turned out, happily, that the tidings were false: but when they were brought to His Majesty, he exclaimed, as if in answer to an idea that had long preoccupied him: "Then it was HE that was menaced by that evil omen!"

Toward morning, the Emperor sent pages to the houses of all those who had suffered from the catastrophe, to present them with his compliments and make inquiries for their health. Sad replies were returned to His Majesty: Madame the Princesse de La Layen, niece of the Prince-primate, had succumbed to her wounds. The lives of General Touzart, his wife, and his daughter were despaired of, and they did in fact die that day. There were still other victims of this disaster. Among those who escaped after long sufferings, were Prince Kourakin and Madame Durosnel, wife of the general of that name.

Prince Kourakin, always noticeable for the brilliancy, as well as the singular taste of his attire, had dressed himself for the ball in a coat of cloth-of-gold. It was this that saved him. Sparks and firebrands slipped over his coat and the decorations by which it was covered, as if it had been a cuirass. The Prince kept his bed for several months however. In the tumult caused by the fire, he had fallen on his back, and was for a long time trodden under foot and bruised by the crowd; he owed his life solely to the presence of mind and strength of a musician who had picked him up and carried him out of the throng.

General Durosnel, whose wife had fainted in the ball-room, sprang into the midst of the flames and reappeared almost at once with his precious burden in his arms. He carried Madame Durosnel in this way to a house in the boulevard, where he laid her down in order to go and look for a carriage in which she might be taken back to his residence. Madame the Countess Durosnel had been cruelly burned, and was ill for more than two years in consequence. While the General was crossing over from the house of the ambassador to the boulevard, he saw by the light of the fire a robber stealing the comb from his wife's head as she lay fainting in his arms. This comb was enriched with diamonds and very costly.

Madame Durosnel had an affection for her husband which equalled that he entertained for her. At the close of a sanguinary combat of the second Polish campaign, General Durosnel was missing for several days, and some one wrote to France that he was believed to be dead. The disconsolate countess fell ill with grief and was at the point of death. But not long after, word was received that the General had been found, grievously wounded but not fatally so, and that his recovery would be prompt. When Madame Durosnel received these happy tidings, her joy almost reached delirium. She made a heap of all her mourning apparel and that of her servants in the court of her residence, set fire to it, and watched the burning of these lugubrious vestments with transports and ebullitions of extravagant gaiety.

Two days after the destruction of Prince Schwarzenberg's hotel, the Emperor received news of the abdication of his brother Louis. At first, His Majesty seemed much annoyed by this event, and said to some one who entered his chamber just after he had been informed of it: "I had foreseen this foolishness on the part of Louis, but I did not think he would be in such a hurry about it." Nevertheless, the Emperor soon came to a decision on the subject, and a few days later, His Majesty, who had not opened his lips during his toilet, suddenly emerged from his reverie just as I handed him his coat, and giving me two or three of his familiar taps: "M. Constant," he said to me, "do you know what are the three capitals of the French Empire?" And without giving me time to answer, he went on: "Paris, Rome, Amsterdam. That makes a good effect; don't you think so?"