I LAST DAYS OF JOSEPHINE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11644, 4 May 1901, Page 5 (Supplement)

I LAST DAYS OF JOSEPHINE.

tNo. in. THE STAGE-MANAGEMENT OF A DIVORCE. h> spite of his omnipotence, Napoleon ha to make a pretence of giving obedience t the laws, temporal and sacred, which a! ways stand between a married couple an, the divorce. There are, in consequence, - number of ceremonies, many intrigues, earn difficulties, and delays, before the separa tun between Napoleon and Josephine i finally pronounced. Napoleon decides that the first step shal Ire a family council, in which the family wil officially sanction the divorce, and in wind Josephine herself will take part. Napoleon in calling this council together, avowed tha he had some thoughts on posterity; and hi foresaw already how all this epoch in hi: career would seize the always romantic imagination of the public, and would inspire the pens of the novelist and the dramatist. Through these preparations for the divorce, you have a curious impression of looking on at a theatrical scene rather than at something in real life. You have the constant sense of a great stage manager fixing the ja-sonages and regulating the scenery, in the fashion in which the theatrical lessee arranges his pantomime or pieces together his melodrama. And the first— perhaps, the most moving and picturesque of these scenes—was on thenight of November 15—-the night after that last appearance of Josephine as Empress in the Tuileries. For the.: ceremony a. letter of invitation was sent which was curt in its simplicity, and which really in itself gave no indication whatever of the -ivat and strantre scene which was about to be enacted. The invitation bore the signature of the Lord High Chamberlain of the Com:, and it was in these words : — I have the honour to inform Your Excellency that the Emperor desires your presence at nine o'clock this eveniui: in the Hall of the Throne P~om, in the Palace of the Tuileries. , When the moment canto there was a strange contrast between the work which was to be done and the mise-en-seene. For the rooms of the pal.i e were brilliantly lit. and everybody present ivas in g-ala costume. The ladies were in evening dress: the men wore their uniforms, and their clothes were resplendent with jewels, ribbons, and '" the insignia of their orders. A STKRS* FAMILY COVSCT7.. The Emperor and the Empress enl:r {he Throne Room: then are "introduced, in order of precedence, the members of the Imperial family—the grim old mother, still Corsican peasant in her love of money, her love of simplicity, and her terrors for a future of rnssible want: Louis, the siekly and obstinate brother, who throws tip after- ; wards a throne rather than accept the advice of his brother: Jeiomo. the lighthearted debauchee, who survived to "tbj Second Empire and to our own dav. titBenjamin of the race: Mr.rat. the innkeeper, who. by marrying a sister of Napoleon, becomes a monarch and afterwards dies under the bullets of a military execution; Eugene, the son of the victim: Hortense, the daughter; Caroline, the sister of Napoleon, who had courage, want of scruple, ambition almost- as gigantic as his own. perfidious enough to desert him in his hour of distress in the hope of saving her own skin; Pauline, the statuesque and perfect beauty, whose form the genius of nova has preserved for all the worlds destined to set hundreds of heads, on fire, and to end in broken nerves and ruined health, after she had run the whole gamut of pleasure, and given to the world of female conquest the same insatiable spirit that her brother devoted to the conquest of the world. Among all that cohort of upstart kings and queens, whom Napoleon's breath had made, whom Napoleon's downfall destroyed and dissolved as quickly as snow before the sun—in all the brilliant crowd there was net one generous heart that had s- thought for Josephine except the children of her own body. HT3 SPEECHAND HERS. For such a ceremonial everything had beei rehearsed, even to the words of the two, speeches which had to be made by the principal personages in the drama. But human nature broke through these shackles and the strait waistcoats of convention — cither because their hearts were too full or because they had lost command of their nerves, or because they were both thinking of the dramatic proprietiesthe strait waistcoats of convention were burst asunder. For Napoleon his Minister had prepared a short speech— terse, confined the barest statement'of the facts. But Napoleon rejected this model, and burst forth with apparent spontaneity and feeling into words which spoke of the bitterness of the sacrifice end of the depth of the affection he still felt- for the woman who had embellished fifteen years of his life. It was now Josephine's turn to speak. She also had been furnished with an official »pv of the words it was held appropriate ihe'should speak. But she found the words, drawn up by the obsequious hands of courtiers, wounding to her pride and to her dignity; and she substituted others of her own. It was remarked even then that she had taken care to transfer these words from the probably rough official paper on which it had been given 'her to that tiny, delicate wad perfumed notepapf-r which had always been one of her luxuries. She began to read; but she had spoken only a few sentences when she broke down—intentionally or in soke of herself— her place on the throne where she was still seated at the side of the Emperor, burst into sobs, and Reginald—one of the high court officialshad to continue and to end the reading of the document. The declaration is very much an echo of that of the Emperor— political necessity of giving him a chance of. having heirs for the throne of France; the trial it was to her affections the assurance that she would ever remain the best friend of the Emperor even after she had ceased to be his wife. Then Cambaceres, one of the leading Ministers, and formerly one of Napoleons co'eagu-is in the Consulate, took up the Word; took legal note of the declarations of the Emperor and Empress; drew up a report of these declarations: presented it ~i>iT the si-nature of the husband and wife "»-;d of all the Princes and Princesses; and ben the ceremony was over. The Empress ilrerdv showed that she had ceased to ho.d her Imperial crown, for she left, not with the Emperor, with whom she had entered, but with her son and daughter. The separation aftc: 80 close a union had already begun. THE PKO.VOtTN"CSME> of tub church. The Church had still to be counted with, una its assent was bv no mu'-ns so certain or so easily obtained' as that of the servile courtiers forming the Senate, or of the helpless woman and her equally helpless children. And the whole business was almost mined by the precipitancy of some of the Ministers", of Napoleon, who did not perceive that the Canon law raised difficulties a little greater and graver than those laws which an autocrat had made and an autocrat could make. Napoleon, however, had a staunch friend in Cardinal Fesch—:i cousin who had been almost like a father to him in the far-off Corsica! days, and who, through the influence of his omnipotent relatives, had obtained a cardinal's hat and the archbishopric of Lyons. At first it was suggested as a canonical reason for the divorce that Napoleon had acted under duress; that he had not been ,i willing participant in that religious ceremony which Josephine had insisted upon, and 'had obtained—as has been seen—on the memorable evening before the coronation and consecration in Notre Dame. But when this plea was put forward even—the stern countenances of the ecclesiastics burst, into smiles at the idea of accepting the picture of Napoleon as a suffering and timid lamb led to the slaughter, at the very moment when they and everyone in Fra'uccj tremble.! before 'his very glance. However, the affaii was ended soine'hovr.or other, and the divorce was pronounced by the Church *s well as by the .State. JOSEPHINE DEPARTS. At two o'clock in the afternoon of December 16, in the midst of a dreadfulshowei of rain. Josephine left the Tnilenes, ami started oat on that, new, strange, 1

lonely life, to which the hard necessities of politics and the supreme genius and position of her husband • had condemned her. As in everything, Josephine remained hersell even at. this ghastly hour. For one of the carnages was entirely taken up with her pets—a, parrot in its cage, two dogs she had bought in Strasburg and their numerous family several carriages were required to convey the many nick-nacks of the opulent and miscellaneous toilette of the most coquettish and feminine of women. (To be continued.)