CHAPTER SEVENTEENNapoleon returned to Paris from Dresden on 27 July r8o7. The next six
weeks saw imperial triumphalism and conspicuous consumption at their
apogee. First came the lavish preparations fo r the Emperor's thirty
eighth birthday on 15 August, which he celebrated with the most
glittering fete seen since the days of the ancien regime. There fo llowed a
series of self-satisfied speeches to the Assembly, in which Napoleon
assured his countrymen that the influence of England in Europe was a
thing of the past; henceforth perfidious Albion would be confined to its
island fastness, at least until the Continental blockade fo rced her to
surrender. Finally, at the end of August, there was another coruscating
round of celebrations, this time fo r the marriage of Jerome, the new King
of Westphalia, with Princess Catherine, daughter of the King of
Wiirttemberg.
It was his family in its narrowest sense that commanded the emperor's
immediate attention on his return from Tilsit. Napoleon decided that he
needed an heir and must therefore divorce the barren Josephine. Two
factors seemed to have weighed with him. First, there was the fact of
Eleonore Denuelle's son, which seemed to suggest that he would have no
problem about begetting issue, even though his spies kept him informed
and he realized that Murat could have been the father. Then there was
the impact of Tilsit itself. He had discussed with Alexander I the
possibility of a marriage to the Czar's sister to cement the alliance.
Josephine's days seemed to be numbered.
On his return to Paris Napoleon also came under extreme pressure
from both Talleyrand and Fouche, especially the latter. The two old
rivals made common cause on the necessity fo r the removal of Josephine
but differed on who should replace her. Talleyrand, secretly in the pay of
Austria, wanted a Habsburg empress; Fouche vehemently opposed this
and favoured a Russian alliance, both to prevent Bonaparte's useless
brothers from succeeding to the purple and to preclude the return of the
Bourbons. The Emperor's table talk convinced Fouche that he had carte
blanche to resolve the matter, so one Sunday after Mass at Fontainebleau