The next morning they went to Raincy, where the Duke and M. de Sillery spent the whole of the day with them. The infatuation between the Duke and Mme. de Genlis seems to have been at an end, if we may trust her account of that last day.
ONE:[205]
TWO:Nothing but my will! said Napoleon sternly. You will go at once to Mme. Campans school at Saint-Germain; on your arrival you will ask for your intended bride, to whom you will be presented by her brother, General Leclerc, who is now with my wife, and will accompany you.
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ONE:The Regent Orlans was not, like the Princes of [8] Cond, Conti, Charolois, and others of the blood royal, cruel, haughty, or vindictive; on the contrary, he was good-natured, easy, and indulgent; but he was dissipated, extravagant, and licentious to such a degree that he himself, the court, and his family were the scandal of Europe. The same frenzied pursuit of enjoyment, the same lavish, sensual, reckless, luxurious life, characterised the whole of the reign of Louis XV.
TWO:Quite another sort of woman was the Duchesse de Fleury, with whom Lisette formed an intimate friendship. The Duchess, ne Aime de Coigny, was a true type of the women of a certain set at the old French court, and her history was one [98] only possible just at the time in which it took place.
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ONE:Having lost patience, and seeing nothing but ruin before him, M. de Puisieux appealed to [369] the King, got a lettre de cachet, and shut up his hopeful ward at the Chateau de Saumur, where he remained for five years, while half of what he owed was being paid off. At the end of this time he was ordered to Genlis, where an allowance of fifteen thousand francs was made to him while the remainder of his debts were gradually paid, after which he was allowed to spend three months of the year at Paris, but M. de Puisieux refused to remove the interdict until he had made a good marriage. That the lettres de cachet had their abuses is incontestable, but they had their advantages too.And yet there was one: a young, pale, sickly-looking Italian, who lived in a third-rate inn, wore a shabby uniform, and frequented the parties of Barras and the rest. He was not a conspicuous figure nor a particularly honoured guest; his military career had been apparently ruined by the spite of his enemies; he seemed to have no money, no connections, and no prospects. But in a few years all of themall France and nearly all Europewere at his feet, for it was Napoleon Buonaparte.
TWO:He also had been Conseiller du parlement, first at Bordeaux, then at Paris; though by no means a young man, he was exceedingly handsome, fascinating, and a well-known viveur, added to which he was an inveterate gambler. It was said that when he was not running after some woman he was always at the card-table; in fact his reputation was atrocious. But his charming manners and various attractions won Trzias heart. Mme. de Boisgeloup wrote to Count Cabarrus, who was then in Madrid, saying that the Marquis de Fontenay wished to marry his daughter, and did not care whether she had any fortune or not; the wedding took place, and the young Marquise was installed at his chateau of Fontenay near Paris. [83]
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TWO:
FORE:The three young Orlans princes were, the Duc de Valois, afterwards Louis Philippe, the Duc de Montpensier, and the Comte de Beaujolais. The eldest was eight years old.
FORE:Neither Napoleon nor any of his family had at all the manners and customs suitable to the position in which he had placed them, and he was quite aware of the fact. His mother, as he said, could speak neither French nor Italian properly, but only a kind of Corsican patois, which he was ashamed to hear. He did everything he could to win over the emigrs and those of the old noblesse who had remained [460] in France; his great wish was to mingle the new noblesse he soon began to create with the faubourg St. Germain, and his great disappointment and anger was excited by the non-success of his attempts. From the time he rose to supreme power he contemplated a court and a noblesse for the country and a crown for himself. And that a court formed out of the materials supplied by his generals and their families would be ridiculous he knew, and meant to avoid.
FORE:On the morning of the 4th Thermidor a dagger had been mysteriously sent to Tallien, without a word of explanation. No one knew who had brought it; there it was upon his table. But he knew the dagger, and what it meant. It was a Spanish poignard which belonged to Trzia. It was then that he went and made his last and useless appeal to Robespierre. Trzia had again been removed to La Force, and on the 7th Thermidor he received a letter from her.[28]
FORE:She tried to question the gaoler when he brought her breakfast of black bread and boiled beans, but he only put his finger on his lips. Every evening she went down to the courtyard and a stone with a note from Tallien was thrown to her. He had hired an attic close by, and his mother had, under another name, gained the gaoler and his wife. But at the end of a week the gaoler was denounced by the spies of Robespierre, and Trzia transferred to the Carmes.
FORE:No one can judge of what society in France was, wrote Mme. Le Brun in her old age, who has not seen the times when after the affairs of the day were finished, twelve or fifteen agreeable people would meet at the house of a friend to finish the evening there.
FORE:Their property had been confiscated, their estates seized, and their h?tels and chateaux either burnt or sold.[420]
FORE:And the marriage was decided.
FORE:Mme. Le Brun returned home, but dared not stay there, so she accepted the invitation of her brothers father-in-law, M. de Rivire, in whose house she thought she would be safe, as he was a foreign minister. She stayed there a fortnight, treated as if she were a daughter of the house, but she had resolved to get out of France before it was too late.
TWO:But nothing would ever have induced him as long as he lived to allow the States-General to be summoned. He regarded them with an unchanging abhorrence which seems prophetic.
TWO:Presently he stopped; said it was evident that she was an Englishwoman, that he did not wish [440] to cause them any further inconvenience; they could continue their journey, but he advised them to put out the lantern as it might be dangerous. He showed them a bye way by which they could reach the Austrian outposts without meeting any more French troops.You dont know who the person is, Monseigneur, or your hair would stand on end.
They only went out to church and to take country walks, but after a time some emigrs arrived at Zug, who, though they did not know them personally, had seen the Duc de Chartres at Versailles, recognised him, and spread the news all over the place.[175]He was then twenty-three.CHAPTER VII
TWO:
