THE NAPOLEON VIOLETS.
There are three profiles of famous persons to be found among the outlines of this picture, which was drawn as long ago as the year 1815. One of the profiles is of Napoleon Bonaparte, a great soldier, who made himself emperor of France; another profile is of his wife, Marie Louise; and another of his son, Napoleon Francis Charles Joseph Bonaparte, styled King of Rome, and by his father proclaimed Emperor of the French, under the title of Napoleon II., in the year 1815, when he was only about four years old.
Owing to the defeats and disappointments of his father, the child Napoleon never actually became either King of Rome, or Emperor of France. He died in the year 1832, in Austria, where his grandfather was emperor.
Now, which of our readers will be able to discover the three portraits hidden in this symbolical bunch of violets?
"Oh, dear! What a big word is this! What does Uncle Charles mean by symbolical?" I fancy some of my little friends will exclaim. Well, then, a symbol is merely a sign, or mark, by which one knows a thing. When you see an umbrella in a man's hand, it is a symbol, or sign, that he expects a shower. So the profiles in this bunch of violets make it symbolical; that is, suggestive of a family group, who, it was hoped, would be renewed like the violets, and once more fill a large space in the history of France.
Uncle Charles.
