Catherine, our ardent royalist dedicated to Napoleon’s overthrow, seemed more than willing to help with the winter’s coronation, since I’d persuaded her we had no choice. She came back from a meeting with Josephine positively giddy at her brush with celebrity. “I can spy from inside their family!” she justified.
The latest gossip was that Napoleon’s sisters had refused to carry Josephine’s coronation train and didn’t relent until their brother threatened to cut them off. More than pride was at stake; the coronation would put Josephine ahead of the emperor’s blood relatives in honor and inheritance. Napoleon was also replacing the fleur-de-lis, the lily symbol of French royalty, with the bee, emblematic of his own industry and hive-like order.
“He says the Invalides presentation in July was entirely inadequate, and that he wants a coronation more magnificent than any in history,” Catherine reported. “No expense is being spared. The coronation costumes for the royal couple will each exceed one hundred thousand francs. The jeweler for the crowns is Marguerite, with Nitot jealous he’s contracted for lesser ornaments. There are companies and platoons of costumers, tailors, and embroiderers. Nuremburg, Aix-la-Chapelle, and Saint-Denis all offered what they claimed was Charlemagne’s original sword, so to avoid choosing one and insulting the others, Napoleon is having a new one made. The planned music consumes 17,738 pages, and if every oath, prayer, and hymn that people propose is offered, the coronation will last until the Second Coming.”
She gave these breathless reports with censor and envy. “Napoleon has had dolls made of the invited dignitaries, and he and his wife move them around on a plan of Notre Dame like toy soldiers.”
“Astiza and I kept our shipboard wedding simple. A scrap of sail for a bridal train and ‘Yankee Doodle’ as wedding march.”
The comtesse shuddered. “I’d seek annulment. Or stab you in your sleep.”
Both women were so busy that more of Harry’s care fell to me. I was proud that even at four he could puzzle out some words in books, convinced that his genius reflected the supple seed of his father. All parents hope their children will prove, in the face of contradictory evidence, the brilliance of themselves.
I met again the mathematician Gaspard Monge, who’d made himself an expert on cannon and who lightened and simplified the French artillery train. Monge was one of many savants employed in state service. While Fulton’s experimental steamboat sat abandoned on the Seine and his submarine rested at the bottom of Tripoli harbor, resulting in the American decamping for England, different French schemes were being pushed to dig tunnels under the Channel or lay a pontoon bridge across it. Another proposal was to drift in vast “floating forts” that would fight off English ships with stupendous batteries of artillery. I was directed to contact Jean-Charles Thilorier, who proposed balloons that could lift three thousand men and horses.
It was at the end of September that I introduced myself to Thilorier with a letter from Napoleon’s staff that described me as a Franklin protégé, expert in electricity, military consultant, and scholar of Aztec flying machines. I showed him the gold model.
“It clearly shows the ancients were masters of the air,” he told me. He turned it about. “Unless this is merely one of their gods, like a winged Mercury. Or a bird. Or an insect. Or a child’s toy. Or something entirely else altogether.”
“The ancients did do a poor job of leaving explanatory notes.”
“Was the past more advanced than the present, in your opinion, Monsieur Gage?”
“One would hope so. And that the future is not even further downhill.”
“You and I are men of tomorrow, so we must invent devices to make life better, not worse.”
“I’m not sure aerial machines will accomplish that.”
“Perhaps your electricity?”
“It will get hair to stand on end, and can make a magnet out of a spike wrapped with electrical wire. I invented an electric sword, but it was the devil to keep powered. It’s difficult to see how electricity will ever be practical, though it’s great fun at dinner parties. I smack the ladies with an electric kiss.”
He looked at me warily. “Perhaps we’ll have more practical success with balloons. Here’s my idea: why spend hundreds of million of francs trying to defeat the English navy when we might fly over it? If we simply scale up existing hydrogen balloons, I calculate we could transport a regiment at a time. Wait for a favorable wind, hoist them aloft, and descend on London.”