1818. The year previous to the writing of the letter of my mother just quoted, i.e. on February 23, 1843, Marie, daughter of the Grand-duchess had been married to William Alexander, Duke of Hamilton and Brandon, and of Châtelherault, a nobleman of real metal and not one of the pinchbeck manufacture by Napoleon.
The Grand-duchess never acquired even a smattering of German, so that at Court all conversation was carried on in French.
Another daughter, Louise, in 1830 had been married to Gustavus, Prince of Wasa, but was divorced on August 14, 1844.
The late Grand-duke Carl had been a most disreputable character, sunk in debauchery and drunkenness—a born blackguard, incapable of rising out of the slough in which he was immersed. Napoleon had said of him: "Ce prince est indécrotissable." His chamberlain, Baron von Erde, had figured in the trial of Queen Caroline, and had been stigmatized by Lord Brougham in terms as true as they were discreditable.
The Grand-duchess Stephanie had been singularly beautiful, and as we saw her in her old age had a strikingly noble appearance. With the polish and grace of a French woman she must have felt herself to have been relegated to the society of clowns when made to associate with the nobles of the Court of Baden. Her face was full of intelligence, and there was on her countenance the softening and sweetening token of suffering and sorrow having been gone through.
The Palace is a very dreary structure, and looks as though no number and size of stoves could bring warmth into it; but the Grand-duchess brightened and warmed it by her presence. Rachel wrote of her, that she had "the only philosophical head she had ever met with among women, that in everything she was reasonable and capable." She was all esprit and intelligence, and her husband all flesh and stupidity. At the outset she and her husband lived together in passable content. Napoleon wrote in his Memorial of St. Helena: "Elle vécut avec son mari à peu-près comme la reine Hortense avec le sien, montrant des caprices, affichant l'indépendance, ce que Josephine blâmait fort." Later, after the fall of Napoleon, when Carl was broken in health through his debauches, she nursed him tenderly to his death. Neither of their sons lived to succeed.
