Vienna, 1814: How the Conquerors of Napoleon Made Love, War, and Peace at the Congress of Vienna (25 page)

By all accounts, Marie Louise and Neipperg had become lovers on her way back to Vienna from the spas. Their affair had started perhaps by late August 1814, and almost certainly by late September, when they were staying at the inn, Zur Goldenner Sonne, in Küssnacht, just outside of Lucerne, Switzerland. This romantic liaison was, of course, carried on in utmost secrecy. Marie Louise’s secretary, the loyal Bonapartist Baron Méneval, already had his suspicions, though. “I can no longer fool myself,” he confessed, “that she is the pure and spotless angel whom I held above reproach.”

The French members of her suite must also have wondered about Neipperg’s growing influence over the former empress, and they, too, cold-shouldered the Austrian officer. The loyal Bonapartists were not inclined to receive him well, anyway. It was Neipperg, after all, who had helped negotiate the agreements that persuaded some of Napoleon’s most prominent marshals to desert to the Allies, including no less than Murat, the king of Naples, and Bernadotte, the Crown Prince of Sweden. And now he was trying to steal Napoleon’s wife.

Like many in Vienna, Marie Louise’s son, the little Napoleon, had no idea how important Neipperg was becoming in his mother’s life, of course. The young boy spent his time mainly with his governess, Madame de Montesquiou—“Mamam Q,” as he called her. He did, however, pick up some talk from the strongly Bonapartist suite that looked after him at Schönbrunn. The little prince was heard complaining about Louis XVIII, who had taken his father’s place back in Paris, and also all his toys. Louis had better return both at once, the little boy had demanded. Actually, the French king would soon send over some toys that had been left behind in the hurried retreat from the Tuileries the previous spring.

In truth, the little prince was lonely and bored. At this stage, few bothered to visit the family locked away in the palace, living symbols of French dominance and occupation. One of the few and, indeed, favorite guests that autumn, however, was Prince de Ligne, who put on his field marshal’s uniform spangled with medals from decades of military service. Once on a visit to the palace, the prince was greeted by the king of Rome’s obvious joy: The toddler jumped down from his chair, ran excitedly to the old man, and threw his arms around his frail, powdered neck. Separated by almost a century of history, the two played games on the floor with the miniature toy soldiers.

In the words of one observer, this little boy—“Napoleon II”—would tempt any painter with the “angelic cut of his face, the unblemished whiteness of his skin, his sparkling eyes, and the beautiful locks of his curly blond hair cascading down to his shoulders.” One of the spies, however, put it slightly differently: “that young Napoleon is an extremely wicked, stubborn child.” He must have inherited this quality from his father, many hastened to add.

The Austrian police were vigilant, reporting on all the activities of Marie Louise, Neipperg, little Napoleon Francis, and the French suite that surrounded them. They were also among the first to detect the new relationship between the former empress and Neipperg, whom the Austrian government had named as her lord chamberlain. The baron’s spies would have much to report from the west wing of Schönbrunn Palace.

Apparently, Marie Louise was having second thoughts about having returned to Vienna, and all she wanted now was to leave town again, preferably to the Duchy of Parma, though those who did not know of Neipperg thought she wanted to leave for Elba. But Emperor Francis now was refusing to allow her to go anywhere until the congress had wrapped up its affairs. In the meantime, both Marie Louise and her son, now called Franz to sound more Austrian, were being closely guarded. They were well on their way to becoming virtual prisoners in the palace.

The day of the masked ball at Metternich’s summer villa, November 8, was now nearing, and Metternich was going out of his way to make this celebration memorable, as the congress might end abruptly at any time. While the sovereigns wore black, women were asked to appear in regional costumes. Countesses appeared in peasant garb—peasants, that is, with diamonds sewn into their silk dresses. Others dressed as Venetians, Persians, Native Americans, or peasants elsewhere on the Continent. The Duchess of Sagan opted for Carinthian attire. No one was sure about Lady Castlereagh’s dress. Was it really supposed to be that of a vestal virgin?

The Prussian diplomat Humboldt had chosen to remain at home, buried in his work. He needed to draft a number of policy papers for the upcoming meetings, and that meant research, marshaling arguments, and putting the final touches on Prussian policy statements. Grand as Metternich’s ball was, Humboldt was not sorry to have missed it. “I hate those social affairs unto death.”

This time, however, Humboldt missed out. The masked ball had all the color, the excitement, and indeed the magic of many other masquerades—but it also had a special attraction. At midnight, many revelers had switched masks and enjoyed the mischief that followed in the delightful confusion of mistaken identities. At another point that evening, when the dignitaries lined up as usual to march off in the polonaise through the rooms of the villa, the stately promenade degenerated into drunken chaos. The head and tail of the march collided in one of the drawing rooms. The king of Denmark, for one, “laughed so hard he could barely stand up.”

Most interesting, despite swearing to the contrary, the Russian tsar had in fact come to Metternich’s villa. Alexander and the king of Prussia, together as usual, were seen enjoying themselves, like the fifteen hundred other guests that evening. Even Gentz came out, and did not return home until after four in the morning.

Yet however successful the ball had been, Metternich was almost at his wits’ end, suffering what Gentz called a real “state of crisis.” It was, of course, impossible for Metternich and the duchess to end their relationship as neatly as their letters claimed. Meetings were inevitable in the close-knit society of the congress, and they were often awkward. The duchess wrote to Metternich:

Everything is so completely changed in us that it is not at all surprising that our thoughts and our feelings no longer meet in anything, and that we find ourselves in a situation more than strange to one another. I begin to believe that we never did know one another. We were both pursuing phantoms.

As she further explained, Metternich had only seen her as an idealized lady, “a model of perfection.” She, in turn, had reciprocated, seeing Metternich before as representing “all there is of beauty and of intellectual grandeur, something well above honor.” Metternich’s false idealization was now swinging to the opposite extreme.

While the duchess denied that she had succumbed to outside pressure to abandon him, Metternich did not believe it. The tsar must have had a role in the breakup, and despite everything, Metternich still hoped to regain his lover. He was consumed as ever. Gentz found the whole situation exasperating. “Long conversation with Metternich,” he wrote in his diary for the eleventh of November, “always more on that cursed woman than on business.”

The exhaustion, physical strain, and sheer mental anguish were taking a toll on Metternich, and this at a time when the Congress of Vienna needed the full attention of its president. He confessed:

As to my health, there is no question of it any longer! I am completely ill, my body attacked, my soul has not protected it for a long time. I am still needed for a few weeks more; those weeks will bring to an end the most painful years of my life, and if they finish my life, the world will lose only the sad remnants of an existence which I myself deserved to lose.

W
HILE THE DELEGATES
wrangled over Poland and Saxony, teetering on the verge of war, another major dispute had been uncomfortably placed on hold: the future of Italy. But it was now becoming increasingly difficult to avoid this delicate subject.

Napoleon had entered the peninsula back in 1796 promising to break the people’s “chains of bondage.” But by the time the last French troops straggled back across the Alps eighteen years later, the Italian states were left in near chaos. The land had been stripped of valuables, treasure vaults were looted, and countless masterpieces were carted off to Paris.

The extent of Napoleon’s looting was shocking. Everything from the Belvedere Apollo to the Medici Venus, the Dying Gaul to
Laocoön and His Sons
—these were just some of the masterpieces in the 288 cartloads of treasures that comprised Napoleon’s
first
raid of Italy. They were soon joined by other treasures, including Raphael’s
Leo X,
Titian’s
Death of Saint Peter Martyr,
Veronese’s gigantic
Marriage at Cana,
and the four bronze horses atop St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice. Every campaign had added to the collection. As one critic put it, the French would have carried off the Colosseum and the Sistine Chapel, too, if they could have figured out how to do so.

Of all the questions regarding Italy—from old republics destroyed in the war, such as Genoa and Venice, to magnificent art collections ruthlessly plundered, namely, in Florence and the Vatican—the most difficult challenge at this point lay in the southern part of the peninsula. One of Bonaparte’s former marshals, Joachim Murat, still ruled as king of Naples, having been placed on the throne in 1808 by Napoleon himself. To allow King Joachim to remain in power was tantamount to “rewarding crime.” Conquest, as Talleyrand argued, should not bestow any rights. For the good of Europe, that notion had to be banished forever.

Another problem in allowing Murat to retain his crown was the fact that his presence placed all the states of Italy at risk of another war. Murat was one of the bravest and undoubtedly one of the most talented cavalry officers alive. He was also an unpredictable hothead with the touchiness of someone who had not a shred of legitimacy to his throne. Like Napoleon, Murat would probably have to keep fighting in order to maintain his authority.

Yet to deprive him of the throne would require military intervention, and a large one at that. Murat would certainly not go down without a fight, and after the long war, few wanted to take up arms again over this issue, even if the money were to be readily available, which it was not.

Murat’s main supporter at the congress was actually Prince Metternich. This was, by no means, a surprise to insiders at the congress. Salon gossip traced his support back to the fact that Metternich had earlier carried on a passionate affair with Murat’s wife, Napoleon’s sister Caroline. Many believed that he was still supporting his former mistress. Metternich had certainly had that affair, and he had stayed in contact with her over the years, but he also had many other reasons for hesitating to remove Murat.

Most notably, back in January 1814, during a critical stage in the war, Metternich had signed an agreement regarding Naples: If Murat would desert Napoleon, Metternich would guarantee his right to the throne. Murat had deserted, to the benefit of the Allies. Now Metternich was trying to stick to his end of the bargain, though he did not personally like Murat, and he was taking a lot of heat, from Talleyrand in particular.

In early November, the Committee of Eight had held its first meeting to discuss the fate of Italy. Talleyrand, representing France on this committee, had participated fully. His argument, no surprise, was to remove Murat the usurper, “the last excrement of the revolution,” and replace him with the legitimate king, Ferdinand IV.

Metternich reminded him that it would require a bloody campaign. Peasants all over the region were rushing to Murat’s support, and who knew what he might do. He could very well call for the unification of Italy, rally the people behind his banner, and end up causing a massive civil war.

“Organize Italy,” Talleyrand responded, and Murat would no longer have any supporters. Restore the
legitimate
crown, and Murat would be “no more to Italy than a brigand.”

The Austrian foreign minister continued to speak of “complications”—which Talleyrand interpreted as a stratagem employed to “keep up the vagueness which his weak policy requires.”

By the end of the meeting, the committee had decided to approach the problems of Italy in a methodical fashion, or at least a geographical one. They would begin their discussions in the north with the fate of the old republic of Genoa, which had been destroyed in the revolution. They would proceed down the peninsula, through Rome and the papacy, until they reached the murky areas of the south, ending with the issue of Naples.

Both Metternich and Talleyrand were happy with this arrangement. France’s minister planned to use the time to gain support for his principles of legitimacy, and Austria’s minister hoped to flatter, tack, hedge, and stall the whole uncomfortable subject right out of the congress.

O
NE EVENING, A
few days after this meeting, Talleyrand returned to Kaunitz Palace and found a troubled Saxon minister waiting impatiently. The guest, Count Schulenburg, held a dispatch straight from the king of Saxony. It was not the usual lament about being uninvited to the congress or imprisoned outside of Berlin. The king had some other disturbing news.

We have just learnt with great sorrow that our Kingdom of Saxony is to be temporarily occupied by the troops of His Prussian Majesty.

According to this report in Talleyrand’s hands, the governor-general of Russian-occupied Saxony, Prince Nicolas Grégoriévitch Repnin-Wolkonski, had ordered the army to pull out and hand over the entire kingdom to the king of Prussia. The Prussians were to assume control of Saxony, effective immediately.