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Page 7
or terrorists. Madame Bonaparte opposed with fortitude the influence of
counsels which she believed fatal to her husband. He indeed spoke
rarely, and seldom confidentially, with her on politics or public
affairs. "Mind your distaff or your needle," was with him a common
phrase. The individuals who applied themselves with most perseverance in
support of the hereditary question were Lucien, Roederer, Regnault de St.
Jean d'Angely, and Fontanel. Their efforts were aided by the conclusion
of peace with England, which, by re-establishing general tranquillity for
a time, afforded the First Consul an opportunity of forwarding any plan.
While the First Consul aspired to the throne of France, his brothers,
especially Lucien, affected a ridiculous pride and pretension. Take an
almost incredible example of which I was witness. On Sunday, the 9th of
May, Lucien came to see Madame Bonaparte, who said to him, "Why did you
not come to dinner last Monday?"--"Because there was no place marked for
me: the brothers of Napoleon ought to have the first place after him."--
"What am I to understand by that?" answered Madame Bonaparte. "If you
are the brother of Bonaparte, recollect what you were. At my house all
places are the same. Eugene world never have committed such a folly."
--[On such points there was constant trouble with the Bonapartist
family, as will be seen in Madame de Remusat's Memoirs. For an
instance, in 1812, where Joseph insisted on his mother taking
precedence of Josephine at a dinner in his house, when Napoleon
settled the matter by seizing Josephine's arm and leading her in
first, to the consternation of the party. But Napoleon, right in
this case, had his own ideas on such points, The place of the
Princess Elisa, the eldest of his sisters, had been put below that
of Caroline, Queen of Naples. Elisa was then only princess of
Lucca. The Emperor suddenly rose, and by a shift to the right
placed the Princess Elisa above the Queen. 'Now,' said he, 'do not
forget that in the imperial family I am the only King.' (Iung's
Lucien, tome ii. p. 251), This rule he seems to have adhered to,
for when he and his brothers went in the same carriage to the Champ
de Mai in 1815, Jerome, titular King of Westphalia, had to take the
front seat, while his elder brother, Lucien, only bearing the Roman
title of Prince de Canino, sat on one of the seats of honour
alongside Napoleon. Jerome was disgusted, and grumbled at a King
having to give way to a mere Roman Prince, See Iung's Lucien, tome
ii. p, 190.]--
At this period, when the Consulate for life was only in embryo,
flattering counsels poured in from all quarters, and tended to encourage
the First Consul in his design of grasping at absolute power.
Liberty rejected an unlimited power, and set bounds to the means he
wished and had to employ in order to gratify his excessive love of war
and conquest. "The present state of things, this Consulate of ten
years," said he to me, does not satisfy me; "I consider it calculated to
excite unceasing troubles." On the 7th of July 1801, he observed, "The
question whether France will be a Republic is still doubtful: it will be
decided in five or six years." It was clear that he thought this too
long a term. Whether he regarded France as his property, or considered
himself as the people's delegate and the defender of their rights, I am
convinced the First Consul wished the welfare of France; but then that
welfare was in his mind inseparable from absolute power. It was with
pain I saw him following this course. The friends of liberty, those who
sincerely wished to maintain a Government constitutionally free, allowed
themselves to be prevailed upon to consent to an extension of ten years
of power beyond the ten years originally granted by the constitution.
They made this sacrifice to glory and to that power which was its
consequence; and they were far from thinking they were lending their
support to shameless intrigues. They were firm, but for the moment only,
and the nomination for life was rejected by the Senate, who voted only
ten years more power to Bonaparte, who saw the vision of his ambition
again adjourned.
The First Consul dissembled his displeasure with that profound art which,
when he could not do otherwise, he exercised to an extreme degree. To a
message of the Senate on the subject of that nomination he returned a
calm but evasive and equivocating answer, in which, nourishing his
favourite hope of obtaining more from the people than from the Senate,
he declared with hypocritical humility, "That he would submit to this new
sacrifice if the wish of the people demanded what the Senate authorised."
Such was the homage he paid to the sovereignty of the people, which was
soon to be trampled under his feet!
An extraordinary convocation of the Council of State took place on
Monday, the 10th of May. A communication was made to them, not merely of
the Senate's consultation, but also of the First Consul's adroit and
insidious reply. The Council regarded the first merely as a
notification, and proceeded to consider on what question the people
should be consulted. Not satisfied with granting to the First Consul ten
years of prerogative, the Council thought it best to strike the iron
while it was hot, and not to stop short in the middle of so pleasing a
work. In fine, they decided that the following question should be put to
the people: "Shall the First Consul be appointed for life, and shall he
have the power of nominating his successor?" The reports of the police
had besides much influence on the result of this discussion, for they one
and all declared that the whole of Paris demanded a Consul for life, with
the right of naming a successor. The decisions on these two questions
were carried as it were by storm. The appointment for life passed
unanimously, and the right of naming the successor by a majority. The
First Consul, however, formally declared that he condemned this second
measure, which had not originated with himself. On receiving the
decision of the Council of State the First Consul, to mask his plan for
attaining absolute power, thought it advisable to appear to reject a part
of what was offered him. He therefore cancelled that clause which
proposed to give him the power of appointing a successor, and which had
been carried by a small majority.
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