Is Napoleon really happier now than when he roamed, a fearless boy, over the rough hills of Corsica? Is Josephine as contented wearing the crown of an Empress as she was wandering light-hearted in the forests of Martinique? Josephine is indeed fond of jewels and beautiful clothes, and nothing could be more splendid than her coronation robe of white satin and silver and gold, with its ornaments of pearls and diamonds. But Josephine has a long memory. She often recalls the poverty of her childhood, of her early married life. When Empress she tells one of the ladies in attendance on her that no present ever made her happier than a pair of shoes given her for Hortense, her little daughter, who otherwise would have had to go barefoot part of her voyage from Martinique to France.
Josephine is a sensible woman. She is not ashamed of her early poverty. Like Napoleon she had suffered during the Revolution and had even for a time been thrown into prison. Like Napoleon she, too, had sometimes not known when she should get her next meal. She had even had to borrow money to pay her rent. She had suffered everything, when the execution of her first husband, Alexandre de Beauharnais, during the Reign of Terror, had left her and her two children destitute.
All the circumstances of her past life may not have flashed before Josephine's mind at the moment of the Coronation. Yet it is not improbable that wearing the crown and realizing the responsibilities of her new position, she may have sighed for a day of freedom from care, such as she had known in Martinique.
On that December day in 1805 when Napoleon puts on the Imperial crown more than three years have passed since England signed the short-lived Peace of Amiens. The war that is now renewed between France and England is to continue until Waterloo. As Emperor, however, Napoleon seems to be master of Europe. All the European courts, except England, Russia, and Sweden, acknowledge his new title.
So we turn to a new picture. It is the eve of Austerlitz. Napoleon walks among the soldiers, who are resting in camp, awaiting the struggle. When his men recognize him, they surround him, they rush ahead of him, holding aloft long poles on which are fastened burning wisps of straw.