Napoleonic Literature
Memoirs of Constant - Vol. III
Chapter XXI
Marie-Louise— Her portrait— What she was in private and in public— Her relations with the ladies of the court— Her character— Her sensitiveness— Her education— She detested idleness— How she gained her knowledge of public affairs— Comparison with Josephine— Beneficence of Marie-Louise— The sum she devoted monthly to the poor— Napoleon affected by her beneficent actions— How she spent the day— Her first breakfast— Her morning toilet— Her visits to Madame de Montebello— She plays billiards— Her excursions on horseback— Portrait of the Emperor Francis— The King of Rome— His character— His goodness— Quarrel between the little King and Albert Froment— The woman in mourning and the little boy— Docility of the King of Rome— His fits of anger— The Emperor and his son— Grimaces before the mirror— The three-cornered hat— The Emperor plays with the little King on the grass- plot at Trianon— The little King in the council hall— The little King and the usher— A king ought not to be afraid— Singular caprice of the King of Rome.

MARIE-LOUISE was a very beautiful woman. Her figure was majestic, her bearing noble, her complexion very fresh, her hair blonde, and her eyes blue and full of expression; her feet and hands were the admiration of the court; but she was possibly a little too plump. She lost a little flesh during her stay in France, but it is true to say that she gained its equivalent in grace and beauty.

Such she was in her exterior. In her relations with those who formed her most habitual society, she was affable and expansive: then all the happiness she experienced in the freedom of these conversations was depicted in her face, which became animated, and assumed an infinite grace. But on the occasions when she was obliged to receive company she became extremely timid. Fashionable society seemed to isolate her from herself, and as persons not by nature lofty are always ungracious when they try to seem so, Marie-Louise, who was invariably much embarrassed on reception days, frequently gave rise to rather unjust remarks; for, as I have said, her coldness really sprang from an excessive timidity.

It was when she first arrived in France that this air of embarrassment was most evident. That can be readily imagined on the part of a princess suddenly transported into a new society whose tastes and customs she is bound to assume. And besides, although her high position ought naturally to attract people to her, she is obliged to make some advances toward them. This explains the stiffness of her first relations with the ladies of the court. But when meetings of this sort had become more frequent, and the young Empress had made her selections in free compliance with her heart, then the grand airs of coolness were reserved solely for grand occasions. Marie-Louise was of a calm and reflective character. Little was needed to awaken her sensibilities, and yet, though easily affected, she was not very demonstrative. The Empress had received a very careful education. Her mind was cultivated and her tastes very simple. She had every faculty of pleasing; she detested those vapid hours which pass in idleness. Hence she liked to be occupied, because her tastes inclined her that way, and also because she saw in the good employment of time the sole means of avoiding ennui. I think she was undoubtedly the woman to suit the Emperor. She was too fond of her own home life to meddle with political intrigues, and often all she knew of public affairs, she, empress and queen, was what she read in the newspapers. The Emperor, at the close of his perturbed days, could nowhere find a little relaxation but in a peaceful home which recalled him to the happiness of the family. An intriguing woman, a political chatterer, would have annoyed him.

Still the Emperor sometimes complained of the lack of amiability displayed by the new Empress toward the ladies of the court. He was the sufferer from her excessive reserve in a country where, perhaps, we err by the opposite excess; and that is why he sometimes thought a little about the past, about the Empress Josephine, whose unalterable gaiety was what made the court charming. He must have been struck by the contrast, but was there not, after all, a trifle of injustice in the thought? The Empress Marie-Louise was the daughter of an emperor; she had seen and known none but courtiers, and common people not at all. Hence her sympathies did not go beyond the walls of the palace of Vienna. One fine day she had arrived at the Tuileries, amidst a people whom she had never seen except in military uniforms: this is why the stiffness of her manners with the persons composing the brilliant society of Paris, seems to me excusable to a certain point. It appears, moreover, that the Empress had been habituated to a rigorous plainness of speech and absence of affectation totally out of place. By dint of repeatedly enjoining her to be natural, they had impeded in her that easy compliance with established customs so befitting in great personages, who cannot be sought unless they make the first advances. The Empress Josephine loved the people because she had belonged to them. On ascending a throne, her native kindliness had everything to gain, because it found a wider field.

Being so good as she was, the Empress Marie-Louise must have tried to make others happy. People will long talk of her beneficence, and above all of her delicate way of doing good. Every month she laid aside ten thousand francs for the poor from the sum appropriated to her toilet. Nor did her charities stop there; she always welcomed with keen interest all who spoke to her of unfortunate persons to be assisted. By the alacrity with which she went to listen to solicitors, you would have thought she had suddenly been reminded of a duty: and yet it was merely the sensitive chord of her heart that had been touched.

I do not know whether any one ever met a refusal from her for requests of this description. The Emperor was profoundly moved whenever he heard of one of her beneficent actions.

At eight o'clock in the morning the curtains were drawn aside and the blinds half opened in the apartment of the Empress Marie-Louise; the journals were handed to her and she ran them over. Next she was served with chocolate or coffee, and a sort of pastry which was called conque; she took this first breakfast in bed. At nine o'clock Marie-Louise arose, made her morning toilet, and received those persons who had a right to the little receptions. When the Emperor was absent, the Empress went up every day into the apartment of Madame de Montebello. At eleven o'clock she breakfasted, nearly always alone, and then occupied herself with music or some little piece of work; sometimes she played billiards. At two o'clock she rode, or else went out in a carriage with Madame de Montebello, her lady of honor, followed by her attendants, who comprised a chevalier of honor and several ladies of the palace. On returning to her apartments after this promenade, she ate a light repast of pastry and fruits. After taking her lessons in drawing, painting, and music, she began her grand toilet. Between six and seven o'clock she dined with the Emperor, or in his absence with Madame de Montebello. The dinner comprised but one course. The evening was spent in receptions, concerts, plays, etc. The Empress retired at eleven o'clock. One of her women always slept in the apartment which preceded the bedchamber; and the Emperor had to pass this lady whenever he wished to sleep with Marie-Louise.

When the Emperor was present, the habitudes of the Empress were sometimes unsettled; but when alone, she was punctual in everything and did exactly the same things at the same hours. Her private attendants seemed much attached to her. She was cold and grave, but they found her good and just.

In the Emperor's absence, the portrait of the Duchesse de Montebello adorned the chamber of the Empress, with those of all the members of the Austrian imperial family. When the Emperor returned, the portrait of the Duchess was withdrawn; during the war that took place between the Emperor and the Emperors of Austria and Russia, the portrait of Francis was removed from his daughter's apartment by His Majesty's orders, and was, I think, put into penitential retirement in some hidden place.

The King of Rome was a very handsome child; but he resembled the Emperor less than the son of Queen Hortense did. His features presented a very agreeable blending of those of his father and mother. I knew him only in his early childhood. What was most noticeable in him at that age was a great goodness and strong attachment for those who surrounded him. He was very fond of a young and pretty person, the daughter of a first lady, Mademoiselle Fanny Soufflot, who seldom quitted him. He always wanted to see her well-dressed, and would ask the Empress Marie-Louise, or his governess, Madame the Countess de Montesquiou, for trifling pieces of finery which he thought pretty, and wished to give to his young friend. He made her promise to follow him to war when he should be big, and addressed her in those charming words which portray a kindly heart.

A young child, likewise belonging to a first lady, had been left with the little King (as he called himself); I think it was Albert Froment. One morning when they were playing together in the garden on which the King's apartment at Saint-Cloud opened, with Mademoiselle Fanny Soufflot watching them, but not interfering with their plays, Albert wanted the King's wheelbarrow. The latter would not give it up, and Albert struck him. The King said to him at once: "If any one saw thee! but I won't tell." I believe this trait was characteristic.

One day he was at the windows of the chateau with his governess, greatly amused in watching the people go by, and pointing out to her with his finger all that most attracted his attention. In looking down below his windows, he saw a woman in mourning who held by the hand a little boy of three or four years. This child had a petition in his hand which he was showing to the prince, and seemed entreating him to receive it. The black clothes puzzled the young prince greatly. He asked his governess why that poor little fellow was dressed all in black. "Doubtless because his father is dead," replied the governess. The child displayed a great desire to speak to the little solicitor. Madame de Montesquiou, who had it greatly at heart to encourage this disposition to benevolence on the part of her young pupil, gave orders to have the mother and child brought upstairs. This woman was the widow of a brave man who had been killed in the last campaign. His loss had reduced her to want; she was soliciting a pension from the Emperor. The young prince took the petition and promised to hand it to his papa. The next day he went as usual to pay his respects to his father, and give him all the petitions of the day before with which he was charged; one only was kept apart; it was that of his little protégé. "Papa," said he to his father, "this is the petition of a little boy whose father is dead because of thee; give him a pension." Napoleon, much affected, embraced his son. The warrant for the pension was sent that day. Here, beyond all contradiction, is the token of a soul that was excellent betimes.

His first education was very easy. Madame de Montesquiou had acquired a great empire over him. She owed it to the manner, at once grave and gentle, in which she reprimanded him whenever he committed any fault. The child was usually docile; and yet he had at times violent fits of anger. His governess had adopted an excellent means of correcting him for them; it was to remain impassible, allowing his little furies to quiet down of themselves. When the child came to her, an observation made with severity and unction would make a little Cato of him for all the rest of the day. One day when he was rolling on the ground and screaming, without paying any attention to the remonstrances of his governess, she closed the outside shutters and the windows. The child, much astonished at this alteration in the appearance of the room, forgot what had annoyed him, and asked her why she did that. "I am afraid lest any one might hear you," she replied; "do you think the French would have a prince like you, if they knew you put yourself into such a temper?" "Dost thou suppose any one heard me?" he exclaimed; "I would be very sorry for that. Pardon, Mamma Quiou [that was what he called her]; I won't do it again."

The Emperor passionately loved his son; he would take him in his arms every time he saw him, lift him forcibly from the ground, put him down, take him up again, and amuse himself greatly with his joy. He would tease him, carry him in front of a mirror and often make a thousand grimaces at which the child would laugh till he cried. When he was breakfasting, he would take him on his knee, dip a finger into the sauce, make him suck it, and daub his face with it. The governess would scold, the Emperor laugh more heartily, and the child, who enjoyed the game, demand in noisy joy that his father should repeat it. This was the propitious moment for petitions to arrive at the château. They were always well received, thanks to the all-powerful credit of the little mediator.

The Emperor, in his caresses, was sometimes more childish than his son. The young prince was only four months old when his father would put his three-cornered hat on the pretty nursling. The infant would usually cry; and then the Emperor, embracing him with a force and pleasure which none but an affectionate father can feel, would say: "What, Sire, you are crying! A king, a king cry! fie; that is villanous!" He was a year old when one day at Trianon, on a grass-plot in front of the château, I saw the Emperor who had put his sword-belt on the shoulder of the King and his hat on his head. He placed himself at a short distance, holding out his arms to the child, who tottered forward until he reached him. Sometimes his little feet would get entangled in his father's sword. Then you should see the promptness with which His Majesty would extend his arms to save him from a fall.

Once, in his cabinet, the Emperor was lying on the carpet; the King, striding across his knees, would go by jumps as far as his father's face, and then embrace him. Another time the child went into the salon of the Council, which was just over. The councillors and ministers were still there. The King ran into his father's arms without paying attention to any one else. The Emperor said to him, "Sire, you have not saluted these gentlemen." The child turned round, saluted with grace, and his father lifted him in his arms. When he came to see the Emperor, he would run into the apartment in a way that left Madame de Montesquiou far behind. He would say to the cabinet usher: "Open the door for me, I want to see papa." The usher would reply: "Sire, I cannot open it." "But I am the little King." "No, Sire, I will not open it." While this was going on, his governess would arrive, and proud then of her protection, he would say: "Open, the little King desires it."

Madame de Montesquiou had made the child end his morning and evening prayers with these words: "My God, inspire papa to make peace for the welfare of France." One day when the Emperor was present at his son's bedtime, he made the same prayer. The Emperor embraced him, said nothing, but smiled in a manner full of kindliness as he looked at Madame de Montesquiou.

The Emperor would say to the King of Rome when he had frightened him by his noise and his grimaces: "How's this! how's this! a king ought not to be afraid."

I remember another anecdote concerning the Emperor's young son, which was told me by His Majesty himself one evening, when I was undressing him as usual. The Emperor laughed heartily over it. "You would never guess," said he to me, "the singular recompense that my son has requested from his governess for having been very good. He wanted her to let him go and dabble in the mud!" The thing was true, and it seems to me to prove that the grandeurs with which the cradles of princes are surrounded is not sufficient to destroy the strange oddity often found in the caprices of children.


1.  Ship construction.  Peter the Great is the Father of the Russian Navy.  He went to Holland and, under an assumed name, learned the art of warship construction so that he could build his own navy. [My footnote.] Return to paragraph text.
(If you surfed directly to this page, please go to the Napoleonic Literature Home Page to see the wealth of information that's available on this website.)