happy in his alliance with Talleyrand and content to grow fat on his real
estate investments. Joseph was full of a sense of his own importance,
which Napoleon encouraged. His warm feelings for Joseph are surprising
in light of his youthful desire to push Joseph aside, to take his place and
in effect to become Joseph. Freud is probably correct in assuming that
the childhood hatred had become transmogrified in love, thus requiring
compensation in other-directed aggression: 'Hundreds of thousands of
strangers had to pay the penalty of this little fiend having spared his first
enemy.'
Napoleon may have revered Joseph but he never liked Lucien,
doubtless because of the younger brother's insane jealousy. A third-rate
politician with a taste for intrigue, Lucien had been a dismal failure as the
short-lived Minister of the Interior and particularly angered Napoleon in
r8oo by publishing a pamphlet entitled Paraltele entre Cesar, Cromwell et
Bonaparte, arguing for the establishment of the Bona partes as an imperial
dynasty - in effect letting the cat out of the bag. Nevertheless, when
Napoleon sacked him at the end of r8oo, Letizia intervened to see that he
got the lucrative post of French ambassador to Spain. In Madrid Lucien
became notorious for the massive bribes he took from the Spanish and
Portuguese to further their interests. Growing bored, he returned to Paris
at the end of r8or, simply throwing up his embassy on a whim, without
permission from Napoleon or anyone else.
Returning with an immense fortune and with a German mistress (the
so-called Marquesa de Santa Cruz) on his arm, Lucien set about buying
up real estate in Paris and investing his ill-gotten gains in England and
the U.S.A. A familiar figure at his 'town house', the Hotel de Brienne on
the rue St-Dominique, the short-sighted and small-headed Lucien was
tall and swarthy, always a favourite among the Bonaparte women. He told
all who would listen that Napoleon was an ingrate and that the coup on
r8 Brumaire had been entirely his work. He especially loathed Josephine,
but was outpointed in this particular contest, since Josephine's ally
Fouche, who also despised Lucien, leaked the details of his sordid
business details and his anti-Napoleon outbursts to the First Consul.
Napoleon responded by keeping Lucien at arm 's length and showering
his largesse on Louis. Although he revered Joseph, he liked Louis most of
all his brothers, his habitual vacuous and quasi-moronic expression
notwithstanding, possibly because he was most comfortable with one who
did not challenge him in any way. Louis was a neurotic fantasist, an idler
and wastrel, forever on leave on grounds of 'ill health', forever dreaming
of a literary career or some other absurd fantasy. Misanthropic and
mentally precarious, Louis suffered from jealous fits and paranoid
marcin
(Marcin)
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