the tent drawing-room, where I found
Josephine and Hortense. When I entered Josephine stretched out her hand
to me, saying, "Ah! my friend!" These words she pronounced with deep
emotion, and tears prevented her from continuing. She threw herself on
the ottoman on the left of the fireplace, and beckoned me to sit down
beside her. Hortense stood by the fireplace, endeavouring to conceal her
tears. Josephine took my hand, which she pressed in both her own; and,
after a struggle to overcome her feelings, she said, "My dear
Bourrienne, I have drained my cup of misery. He has cast me off!
forsaken me! He conferred upon me the vain title of Empress only to
render my fall the more marked. Ah! we judged him rightly! I knew the
destiny that awaited me; for what would he not sacrifice to his
ambition!" As she finished these words one of Queen Hortense's ladies
entered with a message to her; Hortense stayed a few moments, apparently
to recover from the emotion under which she was labouring, and then
withdrew, so that I was left alone with Josephine. She seemed to wish
for the relief of disclosing her sorrows, which I was curious to hear
from her own lips; women have such a striking way of telling their
distresses. Josephine confirmed what Duroc had told me respecting the
two apartments at Fontainebleau; then, coming to the period when
Bonaparte had declared to her the necessity of a separation, she said,
"My dear Bourrienne; during all the years you were with us you know I made
you the confidant of my thoughts, and kept you acquainted with my sad
forebodings. They are now cruelly fulfilled. I acted the part of a good
wife to the very last. I have suffered all, and I am resigned! . . .
What fortitude did it require latterly to endure my situation, when,
though no longer his wife, I was obliged to seem so in the eyes of the
world! With what eyes do courtiers look upon a repudiated wife! I was
in a state of vague uncertainty worse than death until the fatal day when
he at length avowed to me what I had long before read in his looks! On
the 30th of November 1809 we were dining together as usual, I had not
uttered a word during that sad dinner, and he had broken silence only to
ask one of the servants what o'clock it was. As soon as Bonaparte had
taken his coffee he dismissed all the attendants, and I remained alone
with him. I saw in the expression of his countenance what was passing in
his mind, and I knew that my hour was come. He ste