CHAPITRE VINGTIÈME

Voyages d’Hortense à Rome.—Elle fixe son habitation sur les bords du Lac de Constance.— Visites d’Eugène à Hortense.—La Princesse de Leuchtemberg vient passer près d’elle le tems que l’ Empereur d'Autriche passe à la cour de Bavière. — Mort d'Eugène.—Chagrin d’Hortense.— Tableau de la situation actuelle de la Duchesse de St.-Leu par une dame Anglaise.

Depuis que les orages politiques sont tout-à-fait calmés, Hortense a pu aller souvent à Rome et revoir la famille de Napoléon ; elle à aussi quitté Augsbourg comme résidence habituelle: elle lui a préféré un château de plaisance situé au bord du Lac de Constance; c’est dire combien ses environs sont enchanteurs ; combien est admirable la vue dont on y jouit ; il s'appelle Lindau.

C’est là maintenant qu'Hortense passe toute la belle saison.

Son frère Eugène venait l'y voir quelquefois avec la vice-reine d’Italie; mais une fois entr’autres Hortense eut le plaisir de les garder plus long-tems que de coutume: voici à quelle occasion. L'Empereur d'Autriche avait épousé en troisième noce une princesse de Bavière fille de Maximilien Joseph ; étant venu avec l’impératrice faire une visite à son beau-père, l'étiquette Germanique, qui l’accompagnait partout, dut régler le cérémonial d’après lequel seraient traités tous ses parens: quand vint le tour de sa belle sœur, l'épouse du prince Eugène, il hésita à lui rendre les mêmes honneurs qu’à ses sœurs; sans doute l’inflexible étiquette a fait changer de la même manière les préséances relatives au rang de sa fille Marie Louise. Depuis qu’elle a été impératrice des Français et reine d'Italie, elle ne doit prendre rang à la cour impériale qu'après la dernière des archiduchesses.

Sitôt que la vice-reine d'Italie eut connaissance des scrupules de son beau-frère Francois, elle avisa un moyen très simple de le mettre entièrement à son aise, et de s’épargner à elle-même des affronts non mérités. Elle quitta Munich avec son mari, et alla demeurer à Lindau chez sa belle sœur jusqu’au départ de l'Empereur.

L’attachement et l’estime que cette excellente princesse professa toujours pour son mari reçurent quelque tems après une éclatante et dernière preuve dans la douleur qu’elle éprouva en le perdant. Le prince Eugène fut emporté presque

subitement par une attaque d’apoplexie. Cette perte rappela au cœur sensible d’Hortense toutes celles qu’elle avait essuyées déjà. Eugène était si bon, si aimant, si aimé ! accoutumée à le voir toujours près d’elle dans les hivers qu’elle passait à Munich ou à Augsboursg, il eut été trop pénible de ne plus le retrouver: elle songea dès-lors à passer ses hivers ailleurs ; elle alterna entre Rome et Florence, revenant toujours passer la belle saison sur les bords de son lac favori. Ce fut à Rome et à Arrenenberg, ses maisons de campagne, qu’elle reçut une dame Anglaise d’un esprit fort distingué, et qui à notre prière a rassemblé dans les lignes suivantes une partie des impressions recueillies pendant ses visites.

Ce fut sur les bords du lac de Constance que la duchesse de St.-Leu vint former son principal établissement. Là dumoins elle cessait d’être exposée au plus injurieux système d’espionage; loin du tumulte d’un monde où elle avait régné elle sut se créer une éxistence délicieuse; elle y. passait huit mois de l’année, et les autres à Munich ou Augsbourg,. Après la mort du prince Eugène, sa sœur cessa de visiter des lieux qui lui retraçaient de déchirans souvenirs, et ce fut à Rome ou à Florence que dès-lors elle se rendit l'hiver. La belle saison la ramenait à Arrenenberg où plusieurs des objets de son affection s’entendaient pour embellir sa vie, entr'autres la Grande Duchesse de Bade Stéphanie Beauharnais, et Madame Pasquier, autrefois attachée à la cour de Hollande. La duchesse de St.-Leu tient un riche état de maison sans mélange aucun de cette étiquette glaciale entourage ordinaire des grands. Ceux qui demeurent avec elle l’appèlent encore /a reine, et ses fils prince Napoléon ou Louis, mais on voit que c’est une habitude que le respect conserve, que l’amitié accepte. Deux dames d'honneur, un écuyer et le gouverneur du plus jeune des princes, composaient la suite de la duchesse. Son domestique est nombreux, et ce n’est que là qu’on retrouve la trace obstinée des prétentions d’un autre tems, rejetées par leur noble maîtresse. Celle qui fut reine, qui fut la fille de Napoléon, la mère de l'héritier de la couronne impériale, l’alliée de vingt rois, a su rentrer dans l’existence commune avec la bonne grâce d’un entier sacrifice. .

Une bonté inexprimable préside à l'accueil que les étrangers reçoivent de la Duchesse de St.-Leu, toujours aimable et obligeante, elle est de plus tellement simple qu’elle inspire tout d’abord une confiance qui semblerait n’appartenir qu'aux affections intimes.

Elle sait écouter, elle sait se souvenir, et chaque fois qu’on l’approche il est facile de sentir qu’on a fait un pas plus près de son cœur, un mot sensible prouve qu’elle n’a point oublié ce qui s’est déjà dit, des questions pleines d’intérêt

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engagent a en dire davantage; elle parle volontiers des jours brillants de sa prospérité, et alors l’histoire se place si naturellement sur ses lèvres qu’on s’instruit en l’écoutant bien mieux que par la lecture de tant d’ouvrages faux ou exagérés. L’indulgence, l’abnégation de soi-même président à tous ses discours. La reine détronée sait faire la part des circonstances et voir les choses d’assez haut pour que rien ne se place entr’elle et le vrai. De cette impartialité naït une grandeur réelle, préférable mille fois à celle dont elle fut dépouillée à la fleur de son âge.

J’ai été admise dans l’intérieur de la Duchesse de St.-Leu et à la campagne et à Rome. Je l’ai vue s’exaltant en présence des beautés de la nature, ou entourée du faste de la représentation, et jamais je ne l'ai trouvée au dessous d’ellemême, jamais une parole moins élevée, une réflexion moins désintéressée ne sont venues affaiblir l'enthousiasme que m'avait d’abord inspiré son caractère, :

Il est impossible de plus et de mieux aimer les arts que la Duchesse de St.-Leu ; chacun connait les romances charmantes qu’elle a composées, et que sa voix tendre et pénétrante rend plus touchantes encore ; presque toujours elle chante debout accompagnée par une de ses dames, bien qu’elle même sache jouer de la harpe et du piano. La peinture occupe aussi ses loisirs, la miniature, le paysage et les fleurs lui sont également familiers. Elle déclame et joue la comédie à ravir, improvise des rôles de proverbe avec une rare perfection, et je ne connais aucune femme qui fasse mieux tous les ouvrages d’aiguille.

Sans avoir jamais été régulièrement belle, la Duchesse de St.-Leu est très agréable : ses yeux d’un bleu d’azur, sont doux et les plus expressifs du monde ; ses cheveux d’un blond clair contrastent avec ses longs cils et ses sourcils d’une couleur foncée, elle a le teint frais et très wni; la taille d’une extrême élégance; ses pieds et ses mains sont parfaits ; enfin, tout son ensemble est gracieux, elle a la parole brêve, les gestes rapides, les mouvemens souples et balancés, ses habillemens sont riches, elle s’est cependant défait de la plus grande partie de ses pierreries et bijoux ; parmi ceux qui lui restent j'ai eu entre les mains l’énorme quantité de chainons de Venise qui ceignait les drapeaux de cette fière république lorsque Napoléon les envoya à Paris, destinant ce beau présent à la jeune Hortense.

[The following little Sketch, by a writer of eminence, presents a memorial so exact, and at the same time so graceful and touching, of the demeanour and habits maintained in privacy by the distinguished lady it seeks to pourtray, that its introduction here (from the New Monthly Magazine) will doubtless be welcomed by the reader. It will be found most pleasingly confirmatory of the impression which the preceding Memoir is calculated to convey.]

Ix the early part of last summer, I chanced to find at Paris the advertisement of a Swiss retreat, which, for vagrants like myself in search of a few months repose, struck me as being all in all. There was something picturesque even in the name of it, the Chateau de Wolfsberg ; and then it was situated by the comparatively untravelled Lake of Constance, and was the property of an old soldier, who had been chosen from his bravery to command the body-guard of Napoleon, and was married to a ci-devant dame d'honneur of the expatriated Hortense. It was just the place, I fancied, to roll upon the grass and hear strange stories till the hot weather was over ; in a few days, therefore, I had glided through the green vineyards of France, toiled through the beautiful gloom of the Black Forest, and was standing upon the mountain-top which looked down upon my journey’s end. ‘The prospect had none of the abrupt outline and surprising effect which is the general character of Switzerland, It looked like the native land of repose, and its blue undulations, intersected by the distant Lake, and melting into the sun-lighted snow-peaks of the Tyrol, seemed to melt into the heart likewise with a home-giving welcome. The prospect inspired no expectation which was not amply fulfilled. The chateau was not unlike one of our elegant country-houses in England, and looked down upon a slope of a quarter of a mile, which varied from wood to vineyard till it stole into the calm waters, and left the eye to wander with white sails and hunt out little steeples on the opposite coast of Germany. To the right and the left, it was but a moment’s walk to be lost amongst nut-grown dells and mazy rivulets ; and if you made an adventurous ride of a few hours, you might hear the Tyrolean song of liberty chanted above the clouds.

The lady of the house had lived all her life in courts, and her husband had never before been out of a camp; so that neither the one nor the other had been exposed to the contaminating plague of ordinary English and French society :

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they could think other nations nearly as good as their own, could form an opinion without adopting a prejudice, and know how to be polite and attentive without being unnatural and officious. Ramble where I may, I shall never find more interesting amusement than I did in the conversation of this well-sorted pair. The vicissitudes of their lives, keeping pace with those of their patrons, had brought them, it seemed, into contact with all the interesting people in the world, and I contrived to pick up in my idleness a fund of biographical knowledge, which it is odds if IE could have collected from books by hard study. The cause for such unlikely persons for a life of seclusion being in this retired situation was a praiseworthy fidelity to Hortense, the Duchess of St.-Leu, who had a house not far distant, and their reason for establishing a home for stray travellers was that of having overlooked, in their zeal, the inconveniences of one some twenty times too big for themselves.

There were, in addition to this society, two or three young French women, who had been brought up in the same school with Madame, and were making a temporary residence at the chateau from the same motive. I shall never forget the romantic pleasure which I used to derive from scrambling about the woods with this light-hearted company, —the mirthful sereams with which they surmounted their petty perils, and the horror with which one slipped into the rivulet, or another was caught in a bramble. Then we had a stud of docile ponies, belonging to the establishment, which we used to canter to a stand-still, and then we used to finish the day by gliding over the placid lake, and singing and sentimentalizing by the light of the stars.

In these little voyages we used frequently to pass beneath the calm and unpretending abode of the Ex-queen of Holland. It was situated half-way up a green hill, well wooded with ornamental timber, through which it afforded a partial peep, just sufficient to remind my companions of their favourite theme of conversation. The affectionate veneration with which they described their former patroness as living a life of content and simple enjoyment, under banishment from her native country, and the calumny of a world with which she had reason to be tired, inspired me with a wish to be presented to her. It was, however, rather difficult of accomplishment. There was no pride in her, it was said, beyond the dignity of a superior mind, but this had obtained such an influence over those about her, that she was no less a queen in her retirement than when she had really possessed the power. All, therefore, that my friends could promise me was to let it drop that there was a stranger in the neighbourhood, leaving it to Hortense’s knowledge of the interest attached to her to suggest the meaning of such information.

Meantime I was taught every day something more interesting respecting her. The fortune which she had been enabled to save from the wreck of her family, was devoted mainly to,the service of those of its followers who had been less successful ; her house was the rendez-vous of talent, whatever might be its description; and her powers of rivalling it were not inferior to her taste and generosity in its patronage.

She had staying with her at the time, hesides her two dames de compagnie, with her younger son and his tutor, the poet Casimir Delavigne, his brother, who is also a distinguished dramatist, and other friends whose tastes lay in the same way. Amongst other amusements, therefore, it was determined to get up a theatre, with a variety of little Vaudeville pieces, that all in turns might have characters to their liking. One of my rambling companions, a black-eyed piece of witchcraft, whom Nature had made for nothing but sportive idleness, was to play a part, and consequently the affairs of the green-room possessed a double interest for me. I used to walk with her through the vineyards to her rehearsals, and approach as near the house as I could, in the hope of being asked in. I could never contrive to be seen, however, and was obliged to lie down under à tree, or catch fish in the lake, till my little friend was ready to return. At last, in spite of having been described as #rès distingué, in my own country, for something or other which could not exactly be remembered, I began to give up all hope of an introduction, when, one fine evening, as we were all distributed about the lawn in little groups (for our party had been increased by several errant English), there was an alarm that Hortense was coming to visit Madame. As I saw her winding slowly up the hill, with all her company in three little summer-carriages, the elegance of the cavalcade, in scenes where elegance was so rare, was exceedingly striking ; and I could not help thinking that she meditated a call of ceremony upon the stranger part of our community. L was well pleased to find my surmise correct.

The appearance of Hortense was such as could not fail of exciting admiration and kind feeling. Her countenance was full of talent, blended with the mild expression of a perfect gentlewoman ; and her figure, though not beyond the middle height, was of a mould altogether majestic. She lamented that she had not sooner known the purposed length of our stay in that part of Switzerland, as, having conceived that we were merely passing a few days, she had been unwilling to occupy our time; she then spoke of her regret at not being able to entertain us according to her wishes; and finally told us that she had in agitation some little theatricals, which, if we could bear with such trifles, we should do her pleasure in attending. All this was said with a simple and winning elegance, which made one’s heart ache, not

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so much for her banishment, as for the taste of the epicurean old gentleman who banished her. And yet, if he had really surmised that she was guilty of plotting the return of his great rival, he was not altogether without excuse. The seductions of such a traitress might possibly have unloyalized his whole court.

At last the evening of the play arrived, and I really got beyond the gate of Hortense’s abode. It was a favourite bijou, upon which no taste had been spared. All that terraces and trellice-work and woodbines and exotics could do was seen in perfection. And then the views which were in some places afforded through the woods, and in others, by their rapid descent, carried over them, were broken in a manner which rendered them doubly beautiful. From one peep you caught the small vine-clad island of Reichnau, with its cottage gleams trembling upon the twilighted lake. From another you had a noble reach of the blue Rhine going forth from its brief resting.place to battle its way down the falls of Schaffhausen, and beyond it the eye reposed upon the tender outline of the Black Forest melting warmly in the West. In a third direction you saw the vapoury steeples of Constance apparently sinking in the waters which almost surrounded them, and far away you distinguished the little coast villages, like fading constellations, glimmering fainter and fainter, till land and lake and sky were blended together in obscurity.

When I entered, T found the suite of three or four small rooms filled with company, but Hortense was engaged in her theatre. The walls of the principal apartment were ornamented with pictures, amongst which I was shown an exceedingly interesting full-length portrait of Joséphine. She was a pale, graceful woman, full of melancholy expression, and reclining in a corresponding attitude upon a bank overshadowed by a sombre shrubbery. I should imagine (for I forgot to inquire) from the sadness which pervaded the picture, that it must have been painted after its hardlyused original had ceded her honours to her husband’s unfeeling views of policy, and had been taught by solitude and sorrow the true value of human greatness. The sentiment of resignation was so well expressed, so tender and so touching, with such a delicious absence of the usual melodramatic style of the French school, that the sight of it was quite a lesson in philosophy. In the next room I found more pictures and a few busts, amongst the latter of which was one of Lord Byron, with whose works I afterwards found the Duchess to be perfectly familiar, for, though I never heard her attempt to speak English, she was able to read it with facility. Upon a pedestal in the midst of a saloon beyond, two sides of which were open to the precipitous landscape, was Joséphine again—a piece of breathing marble which seemed to advance through the dim twilight like a spirit. There was an increased interest in this duplicate proof of Hortense’s