"Who has suggested that, madame?"

I

"All Paris says it; and I can read you, my son."

"And if I am not crowned, what other course is there? They call us upstarts, nouveaux riches. You yourself should resent that, madame, as a Ramolino if not a Bonaparte. As long as I am consul only, they will conspire against my life. If I become emperor, with a dynasty established, they will recognize us at last and cease plotting to restore the Bourbons. It means security for France. If I fall, she will be helpless."

"Oh, my son, do you not count too much on yourself. God can raise up others."

"He has not appeared to," he returned dryly and a little scornfully.

"But can you not see? If you are content to reign as First Consul, a republican ruler, a just and enlightened one, your name will go down to be blessed for all generations. Already you have glory and achievements enough. It may be cursed-"

"It is good of you to prophesy, signora," he retorted sarcastically.

"I do not prophesy," she began; but even as she spoke, the bust of Cæsar, dislodged by some sudden movement of Napoleon, dropped to the floor to be shattered in pieces. It was the slightest of accidents, of course, but it did not lighten the mood of either of the Corsicans. They stared at the shards, then rapidly she went on:

"Oh, you must not tempt fate by accepting the crown or killing this

She rose and for a few heart-beats stood in the gathering gloom, tall and as unyielding as her son, her dark gown so lost in the shadows that he could see nothing of her but her white face and pleading eyes.

"Farewell," she said at last. "I go to Italy to-morrow." "With Lucien ?" She nodded assent.

So bitter was he now at what he inwardly termed her defection, that he turned away.

She took one or two steps toward him, paused, then turned also and glided so softly out of the door that he did not know she had gone.

At six next day, the bells of the neighboring church broke on the morning air. He had been quite cynical at times about religion, professing it to be good for society, since it contented the poor, through immortal hope, with the present good fortunes of the rich. Again he had defended even orthodoxy quite warmly. The recent cynicisms may have been due to a love of argument, or they may have been proof of a growing materialism; but they were, in a way, only lip-service to skepticism. Never did he hear those bells without being stirred by childhood recollections-the mysteries of the altar, the sacrament, and the admonitions of his mother and that just old man, the archdeacon. He was stirred by more than mere esthetic sensations or the pathos of a youth one cannot recapture. And he was

moved now profoundly as he rose from his chair, hearing in ghastly counterpoint to the golden notes of the bells, sharp reports over a newlymade grave, a few leagues away.

A little earlier, a bewildered princeling had been taken from a dungeon, bidding his captors a courteous "Good morning!" and inquiring blithely where they were taking him. They led him down the staircase, followed by his dog, and through a postern into the dried-up moat, just as the sun rose. The sunshine was glorious, every twig and leaf on the plain seeming to reflect the light. Then he saw a heap of hastily piled up earth, a hollow beside it. He had his answer; he knew now where they were sending him. Still bewildered, he asked that his eyes be left unbound, as they stood him against the dripping walls, twelve long barrels pointing at his heart.

"Aim straight, messieurs!" he said gallantly.

They obeyed, though it is not easy to aim straight when one can see a handsome young face smiling bravely in the dawn.

The body tumbled. There was a sound of mattocks striking gravel. The earth fell, was heaped up. A little dog crawled toward it and whimpered.

And the shots and the sweet angelus on the morning air had been almost simultaneous. As the last bronze tongue grew still, Napoleon stirred in his chair and shivered. The fire had gone out.

23

Neither Lucien nor Letizia was present at the ceremony when they crowned her son emperor. The new

court painter David, painted her in; but that was an artistic white lie designed to please a ruler who might like to have any breach in the family healed, even pictorially.

This magniloquent event did not take place until December second, although he had been proclaimed in May. Meantime, Cadoudal, the leader of the great conspiracy, had been executed; Pichegru had strangled himself; and General Moreau had been sentenced to prison, but only for two years, later to be nobly pardoned by Napoleon, though this old rival had aimed at his life.

In preparing for the new order, there had been considerable trouble about titles. As marshals of the new empire, Murat, Masséna, Lannes, Berthier, Ney, Bernadotte, Augereau Lefèbre, Mortier, Jourdan, had to be content; so also the two associate consuls, Cambacèrés and Lebrun, as arch-chancellor and arch-treasurer respectively. "Prince Joseph, Grand Elector" sounded well, and "Prince Louis, Grand Constable of the Empire." Even Eugène was a prince and old Bacciochi a senator.

But Elisa, Pauline and Caroline made quite a to-do when, at a dinner at Malmaison, Duroc announced each of the relatives by the new labels. Now Pauline had reveled in being called the Princess Borghese when Josephine was still only Madame la Première Consul. But now Josephine was Her Majesty, Hortense not only a princess, but Her Imperial Highness-a distinction with a difference-while Caroline was only Madame la Maréchale and Eliza plain Madame la Sénatrice. All through the dinner they sat eyeing like Cinderella's stepsisters, their

sister-in-law. All through dinner, too, Napoleon twitted them, preceding every sentence addressed to the Beauharnais faction by the new titles, and looking at the three sisters slyly to see the effect.

It was too much. With the sweets Caroline fainted. And the imperial brother, as he bent over her, whispered, "As usual, you women have won!" and aloud to the guests, "Do not fear, Her Imperial Highness will come to." Then, as Caroline opened her eyes at the magic words, he called, with finger raised in mock admonition,_"Announce them all over again, Duroc. And remember now, it is Their Imperial Highnesses. One slip and off with your head!"

Weather did not favor the coronation festivities. It was a cold and frosty morning when Constant pulled aside the draperies to awaken the one-time sous-lieutenant. So chill it was in fact that Constant advised an extra pair of cassimere, as he began slowly to array his impatient master, first with the exquisite cambric shirt which he patted lovingly, silk stockings embroidered in gold with diamond buckles to clasp them; and in prompt order, the white silk breeches and braces studded with gems. Then he got down on his knees to lace the velvet boots, Napoleon keeping up a running fire of comment the while, "What! gems even on the braces! The devil! Odiotte and Marguerette will send us a pretty bill!" but nevertheless not altogether displeased.

And now came the white velvet vest with diamonds in the buttons, and an under-coat of crimson velvet faced with white and caught with double clasps of diamonds. Finally,

for this man who once had polished his own boots in Auxonne, the coronation robe, crimson, too, lined with white velvet and studded all over with gold bees and held by a golden cord and tassel! The little valet staggered under it, for it weighed eighty pounds.

Thus bravely arrayed in clothes costing more than a million francs, not counting the crowns awaiting him in the cathedral, he emerged with Josephine from the great entrance where the rabble had slain the Swiss Guard, and entered a coach, drawn like Cinderella's, by eight creamcolored horses. He, however, had no thought of the glory vanishing when his clock struck twelve.

And it looked like a pumpkin, this wondrous vehicle with its great gilt body surmounted by four gold eagles supporting a gold crown. Waisthigh, the panels were painted in pink and blue; the rest was glass, so that the royal pair might be viewed, as is the casket in an undertaker's wagon.

The old pope, who had been inveigled into crowning him, Napoleon had sent on ahead, in a gilt coach preceded by a man on a mule bearing the historic cross. Then from the Carrousel by the Rue St. Honoré, where at Vendémiaire he had ordered his guns to speak, the great man rode on, led by Murat's beet-red plumes and clattering dragoons clad in green with glittering casques, through lines of red and blue footsoldiers stationed at the sides to keep the populace back. Windows along the way rented at three hundred francs, and from cornice and ledge and pinnacle everywhere streamed gaudy-colored paper flowers and festoons. They had culled out a

holiday, but one not nearly so exciting as those the crowd remembered. The tumbrel had given way to a pumpkin-coach.

The head of the long colorful serpent at last reached the bishop's palace by the Seine, which stood at the left of the cathedral with its dark towers, its peaceful saints and leering gargoyles; then the imperial party passed in.

The musicians, three hundred of the choicest from opera and stage, now struck up; the organ rolled; and to royal marches composed for the occasion, the conqueror took his place on a dais reached by twentytwo steps. Under a crimson canopy, close to a great throne he stood, facing a glittering throng of jeweled head-dresses, and gilt epaulets, that filled the farthest recess of aisle and nave and vault with myriad sparkles. On one side of him stood the archtreasurer with the arch-chancellor; on the right, Joseph and Louis, princes both, and grand elector and grand constable respectively. Josephine stood a step below, surrounded by her ladies-in-waiting.

The mass was now performed, the orotund Latin rolled out; the organ boomed; the crimson coronation robe was placed on the conqueror's shoulders; the laurel crown, the sword and scepter sparkling with brilliants, were blessed, and a frail old man reached out pale hands for the crown. But brusquely, for such a ceremony, Napoleon seized the golden laurel and placed it on his brow. At once a murmur ran through the crowd-one might have sworn it was from the ghostlike lips of the sainted who once had trod these aisles and whose likenesses now stood sculptured in stone

-a protest at this throwing down the gage to the established traditions, this gesture signifying that at last the Church was inferior to the State and to that little man from Corsica. But at once his eyes swept the throng. Here were the lordliest and the most powerful in the land, but his creatures. "Defy me," the glance said, "who dare!" And one understood why they were below those steps and he above them.

But now it was Josephine's turn. The dames-du-palais and ladies-inwaiting had carefully robed her in silver brocade, studded, too, with gold bees, a little smaller than Napoleon's, while wrists, shoulder and brow were scintillant with richly gemmed bracelets, clasps and bandeau.

Softly lustrous were the dark blue eyes; and in bearing, Marie Antoinette was not more queenly. But Josephine had this advantage; she showed no hauteur, but a soft glance for every one there. All were glad to see her happy, all but Savary and cynical Talleyrand and Fouché, ever the death's-head at any banquetand her emperor's relatives.

She herself was very happy. The shoals of divorce seemed to be safely past. Had not her lord and master said to his brothers when they urged the parting—oh, she had heard it— one can hear everything in a palace"Why, now that I am powerful, should I put her away? My wife is now a good wife who does no harm. She will merely play at being empress, have diamonds, fine dresses, the trifles that will please her age. To give her these is but bare justice. I will not make her unhappy. She shall be crowned if it costs me one hundred thousand men!" Perhaps,

like the Hindu holy men, he thought thus to acquire merit; perhaps he protested too much. At any rate the lady was reassured.

She too had a coronation robe, the train entrusted to Hortense and, by a cruel irony, to Eliza, Pauline and Caroline. It was very heavy with its seed pearls, but the fair Hortense held up her corner nobly. Not so the three sisters. When the signal came for Josephine's advance to the dais, they held fast, budging not an inch; their weight on the robe almost tore the diamond clasps from Josephine's shoulder and ludicrously threw her out of step. Napoleon from the throne saw the trick, glanced at his sisters-once-and the procession moved forward.

Before him Josephine knelt, and with some affection he placed the diadem, topped by a gold ball and studded with emeralds and amethysts, on the chestnut coils He appeared genuinely glad so to please her, and not a little proud of the impression she made.

It was the only softly human note in the proceedings. Sometimes he himSometimes he himself appeared bored, stifling a yawn; and when the pope had poured the sacred oil on his head and it ran down his cheek, he brushed it away in irritation. He had been eager to hurry through with it all, perhaps because something was missing. His mother and Lucien were not there to see him crowned.

Whatever the reason, he did hurry the gorgeous spectacle just a little; and at last he marched out to more hosannas, and rode back in the pumpkin-coach to slip off his robes and don with a sigh of relief the green

In another capital, far to the South, sat a woman who in spite of her toil-worn hands, looked as though she should have been an empress. Advance descriptions of the grand festivities had come to her, but she had not been impressed. Indeed she had called it a circus, though sorrow lay in her heart. So that afternoon, while the organ rolled and Te Deums rose to high heaven, she counted her hoard of gold louis. Not for herself, but for this imperious son who rode so high over the world, but who one day might have need of them and of her.

And now it was night. The mists rose, beautiful in the moonlight streaming over the seven hills, but very deadly. By the beams she could see broken pillars where other Cæsars had trod. Where were they? Where was he, her son? Already his story was told, though he knew it not.

Thus they sat, leagues apart, the two who should have been together

his pen still scratching, while the valet replaced the burned-out tapers, -she by the window, watching those ghostly legions wheeling and countermarching through the mists and down the broad pathway of the moon. . . . She drew her shawl around her and fell once more to counting.