Memoirs of the Empress Josephine Bonaparte. Madame de Rémusat

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Claire Elisabeth Jeanne Gravier de Vergennes was born on the 5th of January, 1780. Her father was Charles Gravier de Vergennes, Counselor to the Parliament of Burgundy, Master of Requests, afterward Intendant of Auch, and finally Director of the Vingtièmes.^[1] My great-grandfather was not, therefore, as it has been frequently but erroneously stated, the minister who was so well known as the Comte de Vergennes. That minister had an elder brother who was called “the Marquis,” the first of the family, I believe, who bore such a title. This marquis had quitted the magistracy to enter upon a diplomatic career. He was acting as minister in Switzerland in 1777, when the French treaties with the Helvetian Republic were renewed. Afterward he was given the title of ambassador. His son, Charles Gravier de Vergennes, who was born at Dijon in 1751, married Adelaide Françoise de Bastard, born about 1760. This lady’s family came originally from Gascony, and a branch of it, whose members distinguished themselves at the bar and in the magistracy, was settled at Toulouse. Her father, Dominique de Bastard, born at Laffitte (Haute-Garonne), had been one of the counselors to the parliament, and was the senior counselor at the time of his death. His bust is in the Salle des Illustres in the Capitol. He took an active part in the measures of Chancellor Maupeou. His daughter’s husband, M. de Vergennes, being a member of the legal profession, bore, as was the custom under the old régime, no title. It is said that he was a man of only ordinary ability, who took his pleasure in life without much discrimination, but also that he had good sense and was a useful official. He belonged to that administrative school of which MM. de Trudaine were the leaders.

      Madame de Vergennes, of whom my father constantly spoke, was a person of more individuality of character; she was both clever and good. When he was quite a child, my father was on most confidential terms with her, as grandsons frequently are with their grandmothers. In his bright and kindly nature, his pleasant raillery, which was never malicious, he resembled her; and from her he also inherited his musical gifts, a good voice for singing, and a quick memory for the airs and couplets of the vaudevilles of the day. He never lost his habit of humming the popular songs of the old régime. Madame de Vergennes had the ideas of her time—a touch of philosophy, stopping short of incredulity, and a certain repugnance to the Court, although she regarded Louis XVI. with affection and respect. Her intellect, which was bright, practical, and independent, was highly cultivated; her conversation was brilliant and sometimes very free, after the manner of the period. Nevertheless, she gave her two daughters, Claire and Alix, a strict and indeed rather solitary education, for it was the fashion of that day that parents should see but little of their children. The two sisters studied in a large, fireless room, apart from the rest of the house, under the inspection of a governess, and were instructed in what may be called the frivolous arts—music, drawing, and dancing. They were seldom taken to see a play, but they were occasionally indulged with a visit to the opera, and now and then with a ball.

      M. de Vergennes had not desired or foreseen the Revolution; but he was neither displeased nor alarmed by it. He and his friends belonged to that citizen class, ennobled by holding public offices, which seemed to be the nation itself, and he can not have found himself much out of his place among those who were called “the electors of ’89.” He was elected a member of the Council of the Commune, and made a major in the National Guard. M. de Lafayette, whose granddaughter was to become the wife of M. de Vergennes’s grandson, forty years after, and M. Royer-Collard, whom that grandson was to succeed at the French Academy, treated him like one of themselves. His opinions were more in accordance with those of M. Royer-Collard than with those of M. de Lafayette, and the French Revolution soon shot far ahead of him. He did not, however, feel any inclination to emigrate. His patriotism, as well as his attachment to Louis XVI., led him to remain in France; and thus he was unable to elude that fate which, in 1793, threatened all who were in positions similar to his and of the same way of thinking. He was falsely accused of intending to emigrate, by the Administration of the Départment of Saône et Loire; his property was placed under sequestration; and he was arrested in Paris, at the house in the Rue Saint Eustache which he had inhabited since 1788. The man who arrested him had no warrant from the Committee of Public Safety except for the arrest of M. de Vergennes’s father. He took the son because he lived with the father, and both died on the same scaffold on the 6th Thermidor (24th July, 1794), three days before the fall of Robespierre.

      M. de Vergennes’s death left his unhappy wife and daughters unprotected, and in straitened circumstances, as he had sold his estate in Burgundy a short time previously, and its price had been confiscated by the nation. There remained to them, however, one friend, not powerful, indeed, but full of zeal and good will. This was a young man with whom M. de Vergennes had become acquainted in the early days of the Revolution, whose family had formerly been of some importance in the commercial world, and also in the civic administration of Marseilles, so that the younger members were taking their places in the magistracy and in the army, in short, among “the privileged,” as the phrase then went. This young man, Augustin Laurent de Rémusat, was born at Valensoles, in Provence, on the 28th of August, 1762. After having studied, with great credit, at Juilly, the former seat of that Oratorian College which still exists near Paris, he was nominated, at twenty years of age, advocate-general to the Cour des Aides and the Chambre des Comptes Réunies of Provence. My father has sketched the portrait of that young man, his arrival in Paris, and his life in the midst of the new society. The following note tells, better than I could, how M. de Rémusat loved and married Mademoiselle Claire de Vergennes:

      “The society of Aix, a city in which nobles dwelt and a parliament assembled, was of the brilliant order. My father lived a great deal in society. He was of an agreeable presence, had a great deal of pleasant humor, fine and polished manners, high spirits, and a reputation for gallantry. He sought and obtained all the social success that a young man could desire. Nevertheless, he attended sedulously to his profession, which he liked, and he married, in 1783, Mademoiselle de Sannes, the daughter of the Procureur-Général of his Compagnie. This marriage was dissolved by the death of Madame de Rémusat, who died shortly after the birth of a daughter.

      “The Revolution broke out; the supreme courts were suppressed; and the settling of their business was a serious and important affair. In order to carry it through, the Cour des Aides sent a deputation to Paris. My father was one of the delegates. He has often told me that he then had occasion to see M. de Mirabeau, deputy for Aix, on the business of his mission; and, notwithstanding his prejudices as an adherent of the old parliaments, he was charmed with Mirabeau’s pompous politeness. My father never told me details of his manner of living, so that I do not know what were the circumstances under which he went to the house of my grandfather Vergennes. He passed through the terrible years of the Revolution alone and unknown in Paris, and without any personal mishaps. Society no longer existed. His company was therefore all the more agreeable, and even the more useful to my grandmother (Madame de Vergennes), who was involved in great anxieties and misfortunes. My father used to tell me that my grandfather was a commonplace sort of man, but he soon learned to appreciate my grandmother very highly, and she conceived a liking for him. She was a wise, moderate-minded woman, who entertained no fancies, cherished no prejudices, and gave way to no impulses. She distrusted everything in which there was any exaggeration, and detested affectation of every kind, but she was readily touched by solid worth and by genuine feeling; while her clear-headedness and her practical, somewhat sarcastic turn of mind preserved her from everything that lacked prudence or morality. Her head was never betrayed by her heart; but, as she had suffered from the neglect of a husband to whom she was superior, she was disposed to make inclination and choice the ruling motives of marriage.

      “Immediately after the death of my grandfather, a decree was issued, by which all nobles were ordered to quit Paris. Madame de Vergennes retired to Saint Gratien, in the valley of Montmorency, with her two daughters, Claire and Alix; and she gave my father permission to follow her thither. His presence was precious to them. His bright and cheerful nature, his amiability, and careful attentions to those he loved, made him a charming companion. His taste for a quiet life, the СКАЧАТЬ