“BONAPARTE.”
This is the last letter of Bonaparte to Josephine during his first Italian campaign—the last at least in the series of letters which Queen Hortense has made public, as the most beautiful and most glorious monument to her mother. [Footnote: “Lettres de Napoleon a Josephine et de Josephine a Napoleon et a sa fille. Londres et Leipzic, 1833.”]
We have dwelt upon them because these letters, like sunbeams, throw a bright light on the new pathway of Josephine’s life—because they are an eloquent and splendid testimony to the love which Josephine had inspired in her young husband, and also to her amiableness, to her sweetness of disposition, to her grace, and to all the noble and charming qualities which procured her so much admiration and affection, and which still caused her to be loved, sought for and celebrated, when she had to descend from the height of a throne, and became the deserted, divorced wife of the man who loved her immeasurably, and who so often had sworn to her that this love would only end with his life!