Her Majesty the Queen of Naples had been sent to Brannan, by the Emperor to receive the Empress. Queen Caroline, of whom the Emperor once said that she was a man among her sisters, as Prince Joseph was a woman among his brothers, mistook, it is said, the timidity of Marie Louise for weakness, and thought that she would only have to speak and her young sister-in-law would hasten to obey. On her arrival at Brannan the formal transfer was solemnly made; and the Empress bade farewell to all her Austrian household, retaining in her service only her first lady of honor, Madame de Lajanski, who had reared her and never been absent from her. Etiquette required that the household of the Empress should be entirely French, and the orders of the Emperor were very precise in this regard; but I do not know whether it is true, as has been stated, that the Empress had demanded and obtained from the Emperor permission to retain for a year this lady of honor. However that may be, the Queen of Naples thought it to her interest to remove a person whose influence over the mind of the Empress she so much feared; and as the ladies of the household of her Imperial Majesty were themselves eager to be rid of the rivalry of Madame de Lajanski, and endeavored to excite still more the jealousy of her Imperial highness, a positive order was demanded from the Emperor, and Madame de Lajanski was sent back from Munich to Vienna.
The Empress obeyed without complaint, but knowing who had instigated the blow, cherished a profound resentment against her Majesty the Queen of Naples. The Empress traveled only by short stages, and was welcomed by fetes in each town through which she passed. Each day the Emperor sent her a letter from his own hand, and she replied regularly. The first letters of the Empress were very short, and probably cold, for the Emperor said nothing about them; but afterwards they grew longer and gradually more affectionate, and the Emperor read them in transports of delight, awaiting the arrival of these letters with the impatience of a lover twenty years of age, and always saying the couriers traveled slowly, although they broke down their horses.
The Emperor returned from the chase one day holding in his hands two pheasants which he had himself killed, and followed by footmen bearing in their hands the rarest flowers from the conservatory of Saint-Cloud. He wrote a note, and immediately said to his first page, "In ten minutes be ready to enter your carriage. You will find there this package which you will give with your own hand to her Majesty the Empress, with the accompanying letter. Above all do not spare the horses; go as fast as possible, and fear nothing. The Duke of Vicenza shall say nothing to you." The young man asked nothing better than to obey his Majesty; and strong in this authority, which gave him perfect liberty, he did not grudge drink money to the postilions, and in twenty-four hours had reached Strasburg and delivered his message.
I do not know whether he received a reprimand from the grand equerry on his return; but if there was any cause for this, the latter would not have failed to bestow it, in spite of the Emperor's assurance to the first page. The Duke of Vicenza had organized and kept in admirable order the service of the stables, where nothing was done except by his will, which was most absolute; and it was only with the greatest difficulty that the Emperor himself could change an order which the grand equerry had given. For instance, his Majesty was one day en route to Fontainebleau, and being very anxious to arrive quickly, gave orders to the outrider who regulated the gait of the horses, to go faster. This order he transmitted to the Duke of Vicenza whose carriage preceded that of the Emperor; and finding that the grand equerry paid no attention to this order, the Emperor began to swear, and cried to the outrider through the door, "Let my carriage pass in front, since those in front will not go on." The outriders and postilions were about to execute this maneuver when the grand equerry also put his head out of the door and exclaimed, "Keep to a trot, the first man who gallops I will dismiss on arriving."
It was well known that he would keep his word, so no one dared to pass, and his carriage continued to regulate the pace of the others. On reaching Fontainebleau the Emperor demanded of the Duke of Vicenza an explanation of his conduct. "Sire," replied the duke to his Majesty, "when you allow me a larger sum for the expenses of the stables, you can kill your horses at your pleasure."
The Emperor cursed every moment the ceremonials and fetes which delayed the arrival of his young wife. A camp had been formed near Soissons for the reception of the Empress. The Emperor was now at Compiegne, where he made a decree containing several clauses of benefits and indulgences on the occasion of his marriage, setting at liberty many condemned, giving Imperial marriage dowries to six thousand soldiers, amnesties, promotions, etc. At length his Majesty learned that the Empress was not more than ten leagues from Soissons, and no longer able to restrain his impatience, called me with all his might, "Ohe ho, Constant! order a carriage without livery, and come and dress me." The Emperor wished to surprise the Empress, and present himself to her without being announced;
and laughed immoderately at the effect this would produce. He attended to his toilet with even more exquisite care than usual, if that were possible, and with the coquetry of glory dressed himself in the gray redingote he had worn at Wagram; and thus arrayed, the Emperor entered a carriage with the King of Naples. The circumstances of this first meeting of their Imperial Majesties are well known.
In the little village of Courcelles, the Emperor met the last courier, who preceded by only a few moments the carriages of the Empress; and as it was raining in torrents, his Majesty took shelter on the porch of the village church. As the carriage of the Empress was passing, the Emperor made signs to the postilions to stop; and the equerry, who was at the Empress's door, perceiving the Emperor, hastily lowered the step, and announced his Majesty, who, somewhat vexed by this, exclaimed, "Could you not see that I made signs to you to be silent?" This slight ill-humor, however, passed away in an instant; and the Emperor threw himself on the neck of Marie Louise, who, holding in her hand the picture of her husband, and looking attentively first at it, then at him, remarked with a charming smile, "It is not flattered." A magnificent supper had been prepared at Soissons for the Empress and her cortege; but the Emperor gave orders to pass on, and drove as far as Compiegne, without regard to the appetites of the officers and ladies in the suite of the Empress.