Le Cap. The emperor’s feast: church service, speeches, banquet and ball at the palace.

In the afternoon of the same day the forts of the town of Le Cap each announced with a salvo the emperor’s feast, which was to be celebrated the next day. The armed barges repeated the salute. On 25 July, Saint James’s day, the civil and military authorities assembled at General Christophe’s residence to proceed to the imperial palace. They were to form the procession of His Majesty, who had announced the day before that he would attend divine service. But Dessalines, who since his entry into Le Cap had been telling his intimate favorites how displeased he was with the pomp Christophe displayed, pleaded an indisposition so as not to go to the church. He feared that during the ceremony Christophe might be, even in his presence, the object of public attention. General Christophe went to the church accompanied by the authorities of the town, and stood beside the emperor’s throne, which had been set up near the high altar. After the ceremony the procession went to the imperial palace. Dessalines received all the officials with a noble courtesy, and listened with the greatest calm to the following speech that General Christophe addressed to him:

“Sire, the feast of Your Majesty returns under the happiest auspices. This day, so dear, sees throughout the whole extent of the empire every Haitian heart drawn toward its avenger and liberator, paying him the tribute of praise, respect, love and gratitude that is due to true virtue, to the paternal heart of Your Majesty, who every day gives his people marks of his solicitude, and who devotes to their happiness and felicity the labors, the vigils, the fatigues and all the immense duties that the art of governing entails. And so, within your States, the fruits of the most touching concord, of amiable fraternity, of the gentle equality that reigns, form the precious pledge of the prosperity and duration of your empire. Immortal thanks be rendered to you, Jacques the well-beloved, father of the people. Posterity will confirm to you these dear and sacred titles that your contemporaries delight in giving you! May God almighty, protector of our sacred cause, deign to pour his holy blessings upon your days, and upon those of Her Majesty the Empress and of all your august family, and may he long preserve you to the affection of your army and of the people, your second family. I rejoice to be, before Your Majesty, the echo of the public voice, and I take the occasion of this day’s solemnity to renew to Your Imperial Majesty the assurance of the most profound respect, the most sincere attachment and the perfect submission with which I am filled.”