About this time she inspired the most violent passion in a gentleman of very good family, but whose brain was already, I think, somewhat deranged before he took this foolish love into his head. This unfortunate incessantly prowled about Malmaison; and as soon as Mademoiselle came out, he would run to the side of the carriage and, with the liveliest demonstrations of affection, throw flowers, locks of his hair, and verses of his composition in through the door. Whenever he met Mademoiselle on foot, he would throw himself on his knees before her with a thousand passionate gestures, and call her by the most touching names. In spite of everybody, he followed her even into the court of the château, and gave himself up to all his folly. At first, Mademoiselle, being young and gay, amused herself with the affectations of her adorer. She read the verses he sent her, and gave them to the ladies who accompanied to read also. Such poetry was calculated to produce laughter; hence she found no fault with it at first; but after these first transports of gaiety, Mademoiselle Hortense, who, like her mother, was good and charming, never failed to say, with a compassionate look and accent: "That poor man is very much to be pitied!" In the end, however, the importunities of this wretched madman multiplied so that they became insupportable. In Paris he would stand at the door of the theatres whenever Mademoiselle Hortense was to go there, and prostrate himself at her feet, supplicating, weeping, laughing, and gesticulating all at once. This spectacle amused the crowd too much to continue to amuse Mademoiselle de Beauharnais any longer; Carrat was ordered to get rid of the unfortunate man, who was, I think, placed in an asylum.

Mademoiselle would have been only too happy if she had never known love except through the burlesque effects it produced in a deranged brain. In that case she would have seen it only on its comic and amusing side. But the moment came when she had to feel all the sorrow and bitterness there is in the disappointments of this passion. In January, 1802, she was married to M. Louis Bonaparte, brother of the First Consul. This alliance was suitable as far as age was concerned. M. Louis was hardly twenty-four, and Mademoiselle de Beauharnais not more than eighteen; and yet it was the source of long and interminable vexations to both of them. M. Louis was, however, good and sensible, full of benevolence and wit, studious and a friend of letters, like all his brothers except one; but his health was poor, he was ill almost constantly, and had a melancholy disposition. All of the First Consul's brothers resembled him more or less, and M. Louis more than the others, especially in the days of the consulate, and before the Emperor Napoleon grew fat. At the same time, not one of his brothers had that incisive and imposing glance, and that rapid and imperious gesture which came to him at first by instinct and afterwards through the habit of command. M. Louis had peaceful and modest tastes. It has been claimed that at the time of his marriage he had a keen attachment for a person whose name could not be discovered and is, I believe, a mystery still. Mademoiselle Hortense was extremely pretty, with a charming and mobile countenance. Moreover, she was full of grace, talents, and affability; benevolent and lovable like her mother, she had not that excessive facility, or, better, that feebleness of character which sometimes detracted from Madame Bonaparte. Yet this is the woman whom the evil rumors spread abroad by wretched libellers have so outrageously calumniated! One's gorge rises with disgust and indignation when such revolting absurdities are told and repeated. If these worthy fabricators are to be believed, the First Consul must have seduced his wife's daughter before giving her in marriage to his own brother. One has only to put such a thing into words to make its falsity comprehended. I know the love affairs of the Emperor better than anybody; in that sort of clandestine connections he dreaded scandal and hated the boastings of vice, and I can affirm on my honor that the infamous desires which have been attributed to him never germinated in his heart. Like all those, and even better than all those who approached Mademoiselle de Beauharnais, because he knew his stepdaughter more intimately, he had the tenderest affection for her; but this sentiment was entirely paternal, and Mademoiselle responded to it with that respectful fear which a well-bred girl experiences in the presence of her father. She could have obtained all she desired from her stepfather if extreme timidity had not prevented her from asking; but, instead of addressing herself directly to him, she would in the first place have recourse to the secretary and attendants of the Emperor. Would she have acted in this way if the evil rumors scattered by her enemies and those of the Emperor had had the least foundation?

Before this marriage Mademoiselle had an inclination for General Duroc. He was barely thirty, well made, and a favorite of the head of the State, who, knowing him to be prudent and reserved, had entrusted several important missions to him. An aide-de-camp of the First Consul, a general of division, and governor of the Tuileries, he had long been living in intimate familiarity with Malmaison and the home of the First Consul. During his obligatory absences he kept up a regular correspondence with Mademoiselle Hortense, and yet the indifference with which he allowed her marriage with M. Louis proves that he shared but feebly in the affection which he had inspired. It is certain that he might have had Mademoiselle de Beauharnais for his wife if he had been willing to accept the terms on which the First Consul offered him his stepdaughter's hand. But he expected something better, and his usual prudence failed at the moment when it might have shown him a future easy to foresee, and calculated to crown the wishes of an ambition more exalted than his own. Hence he flatly refused, and the entreaties of Madame Bonaparte, which had already shaken her husband, took decidedly the upper hand. Madame Bonaparte, who found herself not treated in a very friendly manner by the brothers of the First Consul, sought to create a support for herself in this family against the troubles constantly accumulated around her by those who sought to deprive her of her husband's affection. It was with this end in view that she did all she could to bring about a marriage between her daughter and one of her brothers-in-law.

General Duroc probably repented in the end of the precipitancy of his refusal when crowns began to rain into the August family with which he might have allied himself; when he saw Naples, Spain, Westphalia, Upper Italy, the duchies of Parma, Lucca, etc., becoming the appanages of the new imperial dynasty; when the beautiful and gracious Hortense herself, who had loved him so much, ascended the throne which she would have been so happy to share with the object of her first affections. As for him, he married Mademoiselle Hervas d'Alménara, daughter of the banker of the court of Spain, a little woman, very brown, very thin, and not very graceful; but, on the other hand, of the most vixenish, haughtiest, most exacting and capricious temper. As she was to have an enormous dowry in marriage, the First Consul asked her hand for his first aide-de-camp. I have been told that Madame Duroc forgot herself so far as to beat her servants, and even to fly into the strangest passions with people in nowise dependent on her. When M. Dubois came to tune her piano, if she was unfortunately present, as she could not endure the noise required by this operation, she would drive the tuner away with the utmost violence. In one of these singular fits, she one day broke all the keys of her instrument; at another time, M. Mugnier, clockmaker to the Emperor, and the first artist in Paris of his profession, with M. Bréguet, having brought her a very costly watch, which had been ordered by the Duchess de Frioul herself, this bijou did not please her, and in her rage she threw the watch on the floor, began to dance on it, and broke it into pieces in M. Mugnier's presence. She would never pay for it, and the Marshal was obliged to settle the bill himself. Thus the mistaken refusal of General Duroc and the not very disinterested calculations of Madame Bonaparte caused the misery of two households.

For the rest, the portrait I have just drawn, and which I think true, although not much flattered, is simply that of a young woman spoiled like an only daughter, harsh-tempered like a Spaniard, and brought up with that indulgence and even with that absolute negligence which injures the education of all the compatriots of Mademoiselle d'Alménara. Time has calmed this vivacity of youth, and Madame the Duchess de Frioul has since given an example of the most tender devotion to all her duties, and of a great strength of soul in the frightful misfortunes she has had to endure. For the loss of her husband, most sorrowful though it was, glory had at least some consolations to offer to the widow of the grand marshal. But when a young girl, sole heiress to a great name and an illustrious title, is suddenly carried away by death from all the hopes and all the love of her mother, who would dare to speak to her of consolations? If there could be any (which I do not believe), it must needs be the remembrance of the cares and tenderness lavished to the end by a maternal heart. This memory, the bitterness of which is mingled with a certain sweetness, cannot be lacking to Madame the Duchess de Frioul.

The religious ceremony of the marriage took place January 7, in the house on the rue de la Victoire, and the marriage of General Murat with Mademoiselle Caroline Bonaparte, which had only been contracted before the officer of the civil law, was consecrated the same day. The two spouses (M. Louis and his wife) were very melancholy: the latter wept bitterly during the ceremony, and her tears were not stanched afterward. She was far from seeking her husband's eyes, and on his side, he was too proud and too embittered to pursue her with his attentions. The good Josephine did all she could to unite them. Feeling that this union which commenced so badly was her work, she would have liked to reconcile her own interest, or at least what she considered such, with the happiness of her daughter. But her efforts, like her advice and entreaties, accomplished nothing. I have a hundred times seen Madame Louis Bonaparte seek the solitude of her own apartment and the bosom of a friend to shed her tears there. They escaped from her even in the salon of the First Consul, where one sorrowfully beheld this brilliant and gay young woman, who had often done the honors and relaxed the stiffness of etiquette so graciously, now retiring into a corner, or into the embrasure of a window, with some person in whom she trusted, to confide her troubles to her. During this interview, from which she emerged with red and humid eyes, her husband kept himself, pensive and taciturn, at the opposite end of the salon.

People have greatly censured the errors of Her Majesty the Queen of Holland, and all that has been said or written against this princess bears the marks of gross exaggeration. So lofty a fortune drew all eyes upon her and excited a jealous malevolence; and yet those who have envied her would not have failed to pity themselves if they had been put in her place on condition of sharing her afflictions. The misfortunes of Queen Hortense began with her life. Her father dead on the revolutionary scaffold, her mother thrown into prison, she found herself, when yet a child, isolated and without other support than the fidelity of the former servants of the family. Her brother, the noble and worthy Prince Eugène, had been obliged, they say, to apprentice himself to a trade; she had some years of happiness, or at least of repose, during the time that she was confided to the motherly cares of Madame Campan, and also after leaving her boarding school. But fate was now released from obligations: her inclinations thwarted, an unhappy marriage opened for her a new train of misfortunes. The death of her first son, whom the Emperor had intended to adopt, and whom he had designated as his successor to the Empire, the divorce of her mother, the cruel death of her dearest friend, Madame de Brocq, 1 who fell down a precipice before her eyes, the overthrow of the imperial throne which caused her to lose her title and her rank as queen, a loss which she felt much less sensibly than she did the misfortune of him whom she regarded as her father; finally, the continual annoyances of her domestic disputes, the vexatious trial, and her sorrow at beholding her eldest son taken from her by her husband's order; such have been the principal catastrophes of a life which one might have thought destined to much happiness.

On the day after the marriage of Mademoiselle Hortense, the First Consul started for Lyons, where the deputies of the Cisalpine Republic, assembled for the election of a president, were awaiting him.

Everywhere along his passage he was received amidst fêtes and by the felicitations which people were eager to express to him on the miraculous manner in which he had escaped from the plots of his enemies. This journey did not differ in any way from those he made afterward as emperor. On arriving in Lyons, he received the visit of all the authorities of the constituted bodies, deputations from the neighboring departments, and members of the Italian council. Madame Bonaparte, who went on this journey, accompanied her husband to the theatre, and shared with him the honors of the magnificent fête offered him by the city of Lyons. The day when the council elected and proclaimed the First Consul president of the Italian republic, he reviewed the troops of the garrison on the Place des Brotteaux, and recognized several soldiers of the army of Egypt, with whom he talked for some time. On all these occasions the First Consul wore the same costume which he did at Malmaison, and which I have described elsewhere. He rose early, mounted his horse, and visited the public works, among others those of the Place Belcour, the first stone of which he had laid on his return from Italy. He went through the Brotteaux, inspecting and examining everything, and, always indefatigable, worked on coming in again as if he had been at the Tuileries. He seldom changed his dress; that only happening when he received the authorities at his table or the principal inhabitants. He received all requests kindly. Before leaving he presented the mayor of the city with a scarf of honor, and the Pope's legate with a rich snuff-box ornamented with his portrait. The deputies of the council also received presents, and were not backward in returning them. They offered Madame Bonaparte some magnificent ornaments in diamonds and precious stones and the most costly jewels.

The First Consul, on arriving in Lyons, had been keenly afflicted by the sudden death of a worthy prelate whom he had known in his first Italian campaign. The Archbishop of Milan had come to Lyons, in spite of his great age, to see the First Consul whom he loved tenderly; so much so that in conversation the venerable old man had been heard to address the young General as "my son." The peasants of Pavia having revolted, because they had been fanaticized by being told that the French wished to destroy their religion, the Archbishop of Milan, to prove to them that their fears were groundless, had often shown himself in the carriage with General Bonaparte.

This prelate had stood the journey perfectly. M. de Talleyrand, who had arrived in Lyons some days before the First Consul, had given a dinner to the Cisalpine deputies and the principal notabilities of the city. The Archbishop of Milan was on his right. Hardly seated, and as he was bending toward M. de Talleyrand to speak to him, he died in his chair.

January 12, the city of Lyons offered to the First Consul and Madame Bonaparte a magnificent ball, preceded by a concert. At eight o'clock in the evening, the three mayors, accompanied by the commissioners of the fête, came to seek their guests at the government palace. I seem still to see that immense amphitheatre, magnificently decorated, and illuminated by chandeliers and candles without number; those seats draped with the richest tapestries from the manufactories of the city, and covered with thousands of brilliant women, some of them young and beautiful, and all of them ornamental. The theatre had been selected as the place for the entertainment. At the entry of the First Consul and of Madame Bonaparte, who came forward giving an arm to one of the mayors, there rose a thunder of applause and acclamations. All at once the theatrical decorations disappeared and gave way to the Place Bonaparte {the former Place Belcour), such as it had been restored by order of the First Consul. In the middle of it arose a pyramid surmounted by the statue of the First Consul, who was represented as leaning on a lion. Trophies of arms and of bas-reliefs figured on one of the faces the battle of Arcola, and on the other that of Marengo.

When the first transports excited by this spectacle, which simultaneously recalled the good deeds and the victories of the hero of the fête, had quieted down, a great silence fell, and then delightful music, blended with chants all celebrating the glory of the First Consul, his wife, the warriors surrounding him, and the representatives of the Italian republics, was heard. The singers and players were all of them amateurs of Lyons. Mademoiselle Longue, M. Gerbet, postoffice director, and M. Théodore, a merchant, each of whom had sung his part in a ravishing manner, received the felicitations of the First Consul and the most gracious thanks of Madame Bonaparte.

What I noticed most in the couplets which were sung on this occasion and which resembled all occasional verses, was that the First Consul was extolled in the same terms that all the poets of the Empire have since employed. All the exaggerations of flattery were exhausted in the time of the Consulate; in the years that followed it was necessary to repeat them. Thus, in the Lyons couplets the First Consul was the god of victory, the conqueror of the Nile and of Neptune, the savior of the country, the peacemaker of the world, the arbiter of Europe. The French soldiers were transformed into friends and companions of Alcides, etc. This was to cut the grass from under the feet of future poets.
The Lyons fête terminated by a ball which lasted until daybreak. The First Consul remained two hours, during which time he conversed with the city magistrates.

While the more considerable inhabitants were offering to their guests this magnificent entertainment, the people, in spite of the cold, were devoting themselves to dancing and pleasure in the public squares.

Toward midnight, some very fine fireworks were set off the Place Bonaparte.

After spending fifteen or eighteen days at Lyons, we resumed the road to Paris. The First Consul and his wife still continued to reside by preference at Malmaison. It was, I think, shortly after the return of the First Consul, that a man not at all well dressed, solicited an audience. He was ushered into the cabinet and asked what he wanted. "General," responded the solicitor, intimidated by his presence, "it was I who had the honor to give you writing lessons at the school of Brienne." "The fine pupil that you made there!" quickly interrupted the First Consul, "I compliment you on it." Then he was the first to laugh at his vivacity, and addressed some good-natured remarks to this honest man, whose timidity had not been lessened by such a compliment. A few days later, the master received from the worst, doubtless, of all his pupils of Brienne (every one knows how badly the Emperor wrote), a pension sufficient for his needs.

Another of the former teachers of the First Consul, M. l'Abbé Dupuis, had been placed by him at Malmaison in the capacity of private librarian. He lived and died there. He was a modest man and had the reputation of being well informed. The First Consul often visited him in his apartment and always showed him every imaginable regard and attention.