listened with a willing ear, and began, as she admits, to have flattering ideas floating through her brain. She still, however, defended herself, as well as she could, against her friends' reasons; but so feebly that to her great joy she was easily discomfited; and the assiduities of the general began to displease her less. She now discovered a certain charm in his conversation; and by degrees her heart suffered itself to be conquered, till at last she consented to marry the hero who should one day be victorious over so many nations. This is her version of the story, but her biographer tells a different tale in her notes. She says that Josephine's impression of him was unfavourable, and that she used to ridicule him before her friends, but her bonne amie, Madame Chat- Ren-, saw in the face of the young Corsican something that showed him to be an extraordinary man. Barras requested her to interest herself in bringing about the match; but Josephine really was in love at the time with General Hoche, whom she infinitely preferred to the hero of Vendemaire. "If you were free, Madame," said Bonaparte to the interesting and lovely Madame Chat- Ren-, "it would be on you I would fix my affections. I would overthrow the universe itself, if it were necessary, to have the honour of calling you mine! Accomplish in part my wishes, and I shall be the happiest of menlet me obtain the hand of your friend." Josephine, however, rejected his proposals for a long time. At last they thought of the expedient of intercepting the correspondence of the lovers for a month, within which, Josephine, piqued to see herself thus neglected by Hoche, consented to receive the hand of Bonaparte. Thus was this poor man entrapped, as Beauharnais had been before him, to marry a woman whose heart was another's. But what is mysterious to us in all this, is the decided influence which Barras had, in inducing her to accept his protegé, this soldier of fortune.

Josephine was not a little ashamed of her engagement, and concealed it at first very carefully even from her friend Madame Chat-Ren-. She was afraid of losing caste. She says she associated with many nobles of high distinction, who though divested of their titles, still held a lofty rank, and observed the same etiquette that prevailed under Louis XVI; and to have disclosed to them that she had formed the design of marrying the conqueror of the Sections of Paris, would have been too mortifying to her self-love. She herself delivered to Bonaparte the offer of the Directory to give him the command of the army of Italy, with which he was delighted. He had now but a few days to prepare for the passage of the Alps, and two days before his departure, Josephine united her fate to his, through the

ministration of M. Colin, a municipal officer, in the presence of Tallien and Carundel. When they called on Colin for the purpose, he made them wait some time, for he was asleep. As soon as they entered, Bonaparte, in Petruchio's vein, gave him a rude slap on the shoulder, and said impatiently, "Wake up, M. Assistant-make haste and finish my marriage." "His bride," says the sibyl, "drew a favourable augury from this impatience, which, when profoundly analized, only discloses a sign of the will of a man who wishes to be obeyed!" Knowing that he was indebted to her for his nomination as commander-in-chief of the army of Italy, in taking leave of her he said, "I owe you much, Josephine, and I shall either lose my head, or they shall see me return a much greater man than they expect." From this period, she says, she thought herself the happiest of women. Her marriage, however, produced a great sensation. Many loudly disapproved of it, and her family joined in the cry. She had soon no other consolation than that which Tallien and his wife kindly extended to her. She removed to Bonaparte's delightful hotel, where she received the best company, consisting of deputies and generals, but they banished politics from the circle. They talked of the victories of Bonaparte, which every courier confirmed.

We shall not follow this victorious general, as our business is with his wife. After he had overrun Lombardy, he wrote to her to join him and embellish his triumph. Three weeks only had elapsed since their union, and his deeds had surpassed all expectation. After the battle of Lodi, orders were given to accelerate Josephine's departure. Her route was very agreeable, presenting successive scenes of enchantment to her enraptured vision. In passing the Alps, her heart beat with violence. The views that nature now disclosed were new to her-they elevated her thoughts, and developed her ideas. She was received by her victorious husband at Milan with enthusiasm. Great was the admiration he excited throughout Lombardy, and she partook of it—it was a continued and gaudy triumph. At this early period, Josephine begins to boast of her influence over the mind of her husband-an influence always exerted for good and never for evil, if she is to be credited. She induced him, she says, to do an act of generosity to the conquered, in consenting to receive, as the consideration of an armistice, those valuable contributions in money, and the spoils of art which he obtained in Italy. His real object was to enrich and adorn France with the trophies of his glory. His repose, consequent on his success, was, as we well know, of short duration. The cities of Italy suddenly united their forces with the Germans under Marshal

Wurmser, and attacking the French army, put it to flight with considerable slaughter, compelling Bonaparte to raise the siege of Mantua, and to order his generals to rejoin him at Brescia. Josephine was there with him, and thus, as she says, she commenced the campaign against Wurmser. On arriving at Verona she witnessed the first attack of musquetry. Returning from Castel-nuovo, and seeing the passage of the wounded, she was anxious to get back to Brescia, but was stopped by the enemy's obtaining possession of Ponte-San-Marco. In the agitation of the moment she was seized with fear, and wept bitterly on leaving Bonaparte. He pressed her to his heart, and with a sort of inspiration said, "Console yourself, my wife, Wurmser shall pay very dear for the tears he has made you shed." She was compelled to pass very near to Mantua, and they fired on her from the city. She crossed the Po, and proceeding rapidly through Bologna and Ferrara, reached Lucca in safety, though frightened half to death: she was kept up, however, by her extreme confidence, as she says, in her star, and the singular destinies of her husband. At Lucca she was received with all the pomp and circumstance of royalty, which so pleased the general, that he yielded to her intercession and granted the city very generous terms. Wurmser was soon defeated and shut up in Mantua. Bonaparte wrote to his wife, "I have beaten him well, but I must admit the old Marshal was badly served by his officers: the gold which I knew how to slip apropos into the hands of certain favourites, has done him more harm than the republican bayonets." On this event tranquillity, was generally restored in Italy.

After the surrender of Mantua, Bonaparte visited his wife at Bologne, and passed some days with her. She had, by her judicious conduct, obtained great influence over the Milanese, and, as she says, induced them to repulse the Tyrolese, who had advanced to the very gates of the city. The general expressed his complete satisfaction at the manner in which she had watched over his interests in his absence; but he could not conceal his surprise at her expenditures. She justified herself by urging the necessity she was under, as his wife, of eclipsing the courts of the sovereigns that were at war with the French Republic. He listened to her, but still murmured at what he termed her prodigality. He was now ordered by the Directory to Rome, and Josephine accompanied the army. She wished to be constantly with him, and it was in vain that he tried to convince her that it was, as to her, exposure without glory. In fact, on the march she was repeatedly in danger. When the general reconnoitered the position of the enemy, or climbed the

heights, who was not accustomed to such slippery work, often stopped, and sometimes fell. Bonaparte at this would burst into a broad laugh. "It is the trade of war," he would say; "courage, Madame, laurels are not to be gathered by slumbering on down. To be worthy of me you must console the wounded, and tend them with your own hands. Above all, set your women to make lint." One day he led her further in advance than usual, when a bomb fell near her and killed several persons. She uttered a piercing shriek, and disengaging her arm from Bonaparte, turned to fly, when he detained her. "You will never be a Jean Hachette," said he, "a bullet frightens you." "If I am called to defend our fire sides," replied she with great seriousness, "I would undoubtedly imitate the example of Clessons' sister, who fought against the English; but here, my dear, you torment peaceable people for the pleasure of acquiring for yourself a great reputation. As for me, I have for it neither courage nor inclination." She was so moved by seeing the blood gush from the wounds of those who were hurt under her eyes, that she became sick. She looked faintly at her husband and saw in his countenance, that he was distressed at her situation. He assisted her as well as he could, and then gave her in charge to her attendants. He ordered the wounded to be taken care of, and he swore that no ladies, and particularly his own, should be allowed to come within twenty leagues of head-quarters.

The estates of the church were soon overrun, and the Pope was compelled to submit to the conqueror. "All I have is yours," said the holy pontiff: "a servant of God ought to despoil himself of his temporal riches, whenever they can be used to redeem the life or the liberty of his brothers in Jesus Christ." When Josephine saw this old man prostrate at Bonaparte's feet, she was moved with pity at his distress, and implored her husband to be generous to the vanquished. The answer she received was in the bitterest strain of irony, though she does not appear to have seen it in that light. "It is the fortune of war; but be tranquil, Josephine, I have only taken away that superfluity which he can casily spare. I have reduced him to the simplicity of the Apostles, and the good cardinal will take it kindly of me. Besides, it is for the good of his soul that I have looked into all this; and one day, to make amends, the Roman martyrology will, for his noble disinterestedness, rank him among the number of the holy confessors of the faith." Josephine thinks he was softened at length by her entreaties, for he promised that the safety of the city should be preserved; "but," adds she, with much naiveté, "he did not take an article less of VOL. VI.-NO. 12.

42

plate, jewels and diamonds, which he found in the episcopal palace."

Marmont sent to Bonaparte the Madonna he had carried off from Loretto, and he despatched it to the Directory, after stripping it of some precious reliques. He sportively offered Josephine one of those broken porringers that constituted part of the mènage of the virgin; but she refused it, and never would sanction the pillage of the temples; on the contrary she often obtained from her husband the restitution to Italian churches of the sacred vases which had been taken off. Her biographer asserts that she did accept from him a piece of the robe of the Virgin Mary, which she had inclosed in a medallion, as an antique curiosity.

On leaving Rome, the General and his wife visited, alternately, the cities of Mantua, and the Tyrol, where triumphal rejoicings awaited them. Josephine says, with great modesty, that though she took part in them with all her heart, no woman perhaps ever inhaled the incense of adulation with more indifference: but her husband was made drunk by it. His greatest glory was not to gain battles, but to exalt himself above other men-to command them-to attach them to his fortunes, and interest them in his success. He was himself the idol of his worship. She boasts that at this period she was the confidant of his most secret thoughts; that their sentiments, tastes, inclinations, were identical; that the same soul seemed to animate both, and she was happy in repaying his attachment by the most tender return. This was the confidential language in which he addressed her: "I wish to be the great ruler of the destinies of Europe, or the first among the citizens of the globe. I feel in myself the power to overturn all, even to the new world, and soon the astonished universe shall receive my laws!" Had one of Josephine's sibyls opened the book of fate, and shown him the rock of St. Helena, it might have restored him to his

senses.

At Milan, poor Josephine, in spite of this boasted identity of souls, was wounded, for the first time, by his jealous suspicions. The object was one de Botot, secretary to Barras, with whom she kept up a secret correspondence, in order to discover, as she says, the designs of the Directory towards her husband. She had great difficulty in concealing from him that it was in this way she arrived at the knowledge of the intention of the government to deprive him of his command whenever they dared to do so for he was an object of fear and hatred to the Directors. Bonaparte, however, had the meanness to place one of his aids as a spy upon his wife, and in this way he obtained regular reports