Read Eugénie: The Empress & her Empire Online
Authors: Desmond Seward
However, Worth was not entirely responsible for ending the bonnet’s long tyranny. Eugénie had worn broad-brimmed ‘Vandyke’ hats with plumes before she was even aware of his existence – Viel
Castel recorded that in July 1857 she and her ladies rode through Paris in them. But he introduced other types of hat that finally killed off the bonnet. In 1860 he persuaded Princess Metternich to wear a little pillbox toque he had designed, and soon the empress could be seen in one, and then even in a bowler (derby) hat. The ubiquitous shawl was replaced by a scarf or a mantilla, a fashion pioneered by Pauline, who appeared without a shawl at the Longchamps race meeting.
The empress’s patronage made Worth’s clothes not merely popular but essential for every rich lady who wanted to be fashionable. In consequence the Maison Worth in the rue de la Paix was besieged daily by the smartest women in Paris, especially on days before the balls at the Tuileries. While each lady sat with her maid in one of its luxurious fitting rooms, waiting for the great man to give a dress his finishing touches or to suggest yet another, she was regaled with a lavish helping of foie-gras and a glass or two of Sauternes.
‘The men believe in the Bourse and the women believe in Worth’, observed Felix Whitehurst. ‘I confess that, opposed as I am to the “unbridled extravagance of women”, I look on with supreme pleasure at a luxury which, while reminding me of the decadence of Rome, now indicates only the wealth of France.’ The ‘master of the robes’, as some courtiers called him sardonically, became indispensable. Eugénie showed her appreciation by inviting his wife to all the Tuileries balls while Princess Metternich asked her to all the receptions at the Austrian embassy – both made a point of talking ostentatiously to Mme Worth, so that no one dared to snub her.
Worth’s prices soared, and, understandably, his name was loathed by husbands or fathers who had to foot the bills. Some people saw the funny side, however. ‘I am informed that the last thing in dress is a “puff-petticoat”, which sticks out like a bunch, and causes the female form divine to look rather like the Gnathod or Dodo’, Whitehurst reported irreverently in the
Daily Telegraph
in March 1868 after the bustle had made its appearance. ‘It is said to have routed sleep from the couch of oft-recorded Worth, who laboured night and day at its invention. When this truly great man is composing, he reclines on a sofa, and one of the young ladies of the establishment plays “Verdi” to him; he composes chiefly in the evening and says that the rays of the setting sun gild his conceptions.’
It has to be admitted that success turned Mr Worth’s head. He liked to pose as one of history’s more memorable artists, wearing floppy cravats and enormous velvet berets that scarcely suited his walrus moustache and bottle nose. Taine heard that the dressmaker was comparing himself to Delacroix and Ingres, even to the first Emperor Napoleon. Yet never for one moment did he forget that he owed his success and his millions to Eugénie’s patronage. As long as he lived, he sent her Bonapartist violets every year on her birthday and when the Second Empire fell he continued to insist that she was still his empress, stubbornly displaying the imperial warrant over the main entrance to the Maison Worth and ignoring the risk of having his windows broken. When he died in 1895 Eugénie sent a telegram to his widow – ‘In my prosperity and in my sorrow, he was always my most devoted friend.’
Republicans and even royalists claimed, wrongly, that Eugénie’s expenditure on clothes during her reign rivalled Marie-Antoinette’s, that she was a symbol of unbridled luxury, ignoring the prestige she gave to French fashion. Yet any fair-minded observer realised that she could not afford to dress cheaply – had she done so, the opposition would have been the first to criticise. ‘The empress’s taste for luxury was wildly exaggerated’, writes Mme Carette indignantly. ‘Luxury is an attribute of monarchs – beautiful and intelligent women are supposed to dress well.’ And what other imperial or royal lady of 1860 would have dared to be the first to patronise a ‘man-milliner’?
Bertrand Russell once observed that spiritualism was the suburban form of witchcraft, but it was considered neither suburban nor witchcraft during the Second Empire. Even the great Dominican Lacordaire, the most brilliant preacher of the day and a member of the Académie Française, thought there might be something in it. In 1854 Princesse Mathilde and Pietri, the Prefect of Police, both tried table-turning. Napoleon and Eugénie experimented soon after, without much enthusiasm.
Three years later, an unusually gifted medium named David Dunglas Hume arrived in Paris, a young Scot who had discovered his powers while living in the United States. Twenty-two, haggard
and skeletal, with nice manners, he not only communicated with the dead but foretold the future. Converted to Catholicism by a celebrated Jesuit, Fr Ravignan, he confessed that he was tormented by spirits but promised to give them up. They returned, however – at least, he said they did – and he began to talk to them.
On 13 March 1857 Horace de Viel Castel wrote, ‘All Paris is talking about the American sorcerer.’ Hume had been taken up by Prince and Princesse de Beauvau-Craon, holding seances at their house where, when he went into trances, claps of thunder sounded, bells pealed, tables and chairs danced round the room, pianos and accordions played, while handkerchiefs came out of the guests’ pockets and tied themselves in knots.
Fascinated, Eugénie invited Mr Hume to hold seances at the Tuileries, the first taking place in a seldom-used room. A heavy armchair suddenly lumbered across the room towards him and then the chair on which he was sitting rose slowly into the air – he also floated out of the window. Later the spirits of Napoleon I and Queen Hortense spoke to him, together with those of Pascal, Rousseau and St Louis. So, too, did Don Cipriano, who held the empress’s hand – ‘It’s my father’s hand!’ she cried. The emperor grasped it too, exclaiming, ‘My God, it’s cold!’ The Duc de Mortemart actually saw the spectral fingers.
Not everybody was convinced, however. Comte Walewski, minister for foreign affairs, warned that Hume was known to use conjuring tricks, was wanted by the police in several countries and was believed to be a Prussian agent. The Tuileries indignantly refused to credit these allegations, especially after scientists called in to investigate could find no explanation.
Throughout her life Eugénie was inclined to believe in messages from the world beyond. She took fortune-tellers very seriously indeed, and leafed through the Bible to find texts hinting at the future. It was a sign of her growing influence over Napoleon that, for a moment, he too was taken in by the ‘American sorcerer’.
‘Have you ever heard of a certain charlatan by name Hume, half English and half American, who pretends to raise spirits, etc.?’, Cowley asked Lord Clarendon. ‘He has been here for the last month and has complete hold over the emperor and empress who both believe in his spiritual powers.’ The ambassador added that after the emperor had asked Hume to raise the spirits of Napoleon I and Louis-Philippe, he was told they were both in the room with him.
‘“Wait a little”, said Hume, “and Your Majesty will feel their presence.” Soon afterwards H.M. experienced a violent kick on an unmentionable part of his sacred person.’
‘But, seriously speaking’, Cowley continues, ‘it is impossible to conceive that such a man should be so easily gulled, and as he receives this Hume at all times and
alone
, the Police are seriously alarmed.’
Eventually, Hume went too far, foretelling that the Prince Imperial would never become emperor. Eugénie immediately insisted on Napoleon calling the police. On 28 March Viel Castel noted with relish that the sorcerer, ‘who summoned up the dead in the presence of the emperor and empress’ had been sent to the Mazas prison ‘as a thief and sodomite’, and would be expelled from France to avoid a highly embarrassing trial.
Dr Barthez suspected that privately Eugénie continued to think he was genuine enough but had lost his powers. In 1862 Lord Malmesbury and the emperor discussed ‘Home [
sic
] and spiritualism, which I saw he half believed in; and as he had been speaking of the many doubtful pictures in the Louvre, I suggested that it was desirable that Mr Home should call up Titian’s spirit and ask him whether he really painted the portrait of Francis I.’ Malmesbury adds that Napoleon III ‘looked displeased’.
It is only fair to remember that others besides Eugénie believed in Hume. Among them was the exiled Victor Hugo, whom the sorcerer visited in the Channel Islands and obligingly put in touch with Molière.
Not even Eugénie’s admirers could deny that she was excitable. Prince Metternich (Hübner’s successor as Austrian ambassador) refers to her ‘
fougue caractéristique
’, her natural fieriness. Sometimes she was alarmingly impatient and irritable, controlling with difficulty an anger which verged on hysteria. Most of it was caused by Napoleon’s infidelity.
In many ways he was an ideal husband. Gentle and considerate, rarely losing his temper and never shouting, he shared his triumphs, was supportive and had a good sense of humour. In addition, he was obviously very proud of his wife. He possessed one
fault, a weakness for pretty girls. Princesse Mathilde told Viel Castel (or a mutual friend) how in 1857 at a ball at the Tuileries she saw the emperor looking worried and asked him why.
‘I have a bad headache,’ he answered. ‘And I’m being chased by three women.’
‘What!’, gasped Mathilde. ‘How did you get yourself into such a mess? Three women! It’s madness.’
‘Do you see that one, over there,’ replied Napoleon, ‘that blonde on the ground floor? I’m trying to disentangle myself from her.’ This was Mme de la Bedoyère, one of Eugénie’s ladies-in-waiting.
‘Next, I have a lady on the first floor, who is certainly very beautiful, but has no personality. She’s insipid – she bores me.’ This was the Piedmontese Mme de Castiglione.
‘Then there’s the blonde on the second floor who’s marked me down and is hunting me.’ This was Mme Walewska, the foreign minister’s wife.
‘But the empress?’ asked Mathilde.
‘Ah, yes, the empress.’ He explained. ‘I was faithful to her during the first six months of our marriage, but I need my little distractions, even if I always go back to her with pleasure.’
Virginie de Castiglione was the first rival of whom Eugénie was aware. The affair began just before the Prince Imperial’s birth. A magnificent creature who dressed outrageously in transparent muslins, she had an oval face, sultry dark green eyes and luxuriant black hair, while according to Viel Castel her nymph-like waist did not need corsets and ‘her bust bids defiance to the rest of her sex’. Lord Hertford paid a million francs for a night with her, which was so vigorous that she was prostrate for three days.
In July 1856 at a
fete champêtre
near Saint-Cloud – ‘a regular orgy’, reported Cowley, ‘the men dancing with their hats on’ – the emperor took Mme de Castiglione rowing in a small boat, then disappeared into the woods with her. Eugénie was so angry that although weak from child-bearing she tried to dance, but fell over. Virginie and her husband were invited to Compiègne. Previously on the edge of bankruptcy, a smiling Count Castiglione commented, ‘I’m a model spouse who sees nothing and hears nothing.’ But his wife caused a sensation by storming out of the Palace theatre, Napoleon running after her and leaving the empress alone in their box. In February 1857 her costume as ‘Queen of Hearts’ at a ball at the Quai d’Orsai thrilled the men and horrified their wives, a see-through
shift of gold muslin with golden hearts outlining her splendid bosom. ‘The heart is a little low tonight’, observed Eugénie.
Gossip said Virginie had been ordered by her husband’s cousin Count Cavour (the Piedmontese prime minister) to seduce the emperor and win him over to the cause of Italian unity. But Cavour knew she was too stupid for such a task, even if she bragged later that united Italy was her creation. Her job was simply to report anything she heard in bed.
Her boasting alerted her lover’s enemies to the fact that he visited her house in the avenue Marceau by night. It nearly cost him his life. When he was leaving at three in the morning in April 1857 men armed with knives (Italians, hired by exiled republicans) ambushed his carriage, seizing the horses’ heads. The coachman managed to beat them off with his whip, galloping back to the Tuileries. Napoleon had already been growing tired of the brainless Virginie, whose sole charm lay in her sensuality, and soon after he ordered her to leave France. She bore him a son whom he entrusted to his dentist. Evans brought the boy up to be a dentist, too, under the name of Dr Hugenschmidt.
In January 1858 Viel Castel wrote, ‘Almost none of the younger ladies at court fails to set her cap at the emperor and, since he isn’t too discreet, people quickly know whom he fancies.’ Napoleon waited for them to chase him, choosing the one he wanted. ‘I don’t believe in attack’, he would say. ‘I defend myself and sometimes I give in.’ He gave in rather a lot.
‘The emperor’s ladies are all open-mouthed at having found a very pretty Pole in high favour at Plombières’, Cowley wrote on 15 July 1857. The first to capture him after Virginie’s dismissal, this was Comtesse Walewska – the ‘blonde on the second floor’ whom the emperor had mentioned to Mathilde.
The Comtesse’s vain, venal husband was Napoleon I’s son by his Polish mistress Walewska, and he looked a bit like his father, which was where the resemblance ended. A former ambassador to London – Queen Victoria could not stand him – he had recently replaced Drouyn de Lhuys as foreign secretary, although Napoleon did not think too highly of his abilities. ‘I tell him to do something and he does it in a disobliging or an extravagant manner’, he grumbled to Lord Cowley. In contrast, his elegant wife Marie-Anne (a Florentine, not a Pole) was intelligent and very good company. ‘With the exception of Mme Walewski, the ladies who surround the empress are decidedly vulgar’, thought Lord Malmesbury, Bismarck said she was the only amusing woman in France besides Eugénie, and even Morny respected her. A natural diplomat, while Mme Drouyn was insulting Eugénie during Napoleon’s courtship, Marie-Anne was whispering in her ear, ‘I congratulate you on the destiny that awaits you.’