[345] {576}[From Pope's line on Lord Peterborough, Imitations of Horace, Sat. i. 132.]
[346] [Marie Louise, daughter of Francis I. of Austria, was born December 12, 1791, and died December 18, 1849. She was married to Napoleon, April 2, 1810, and gave birth to a son, March 29, 1811. In accordance with the Treaty of Paris, she left France April 26, 1814, renounced the title of Empress, and was created Duchess of Parma, Placentia, and Guastalla. After Napoleon's death (May 5, 1821). "Proud Austria's mournful flower" did not long remain a widow, but speedily and secretly married her chamberlain and gentleman of honour, Count Adam de Neipperg (ce polisson Neipperg, as Napoleon called him), to whom she had long been attached. It was supposed that she attended the Congress of Verona in the interest of her son, the ex-King of Rome, to whom Napoleon had bequeathed money and heirlooms. She was a solemn stately personage, tant soit peu declassée, and the other potentates whispered and joked at her expense. Chateaubriand says that when the Duke of Wellington was bored with the meetings of the Congress, he would while away the time in the company of the Orsini, who scribbled on the margin of intercepted French despatches, "Pas pour Mariée." Not for Madame de Neipperg.]
[347] [Napoleon Francçois Charles Joseph, Duke of Reichstadt, died at the palace of Schönbrunn, July 22, 1832, having just attained his twenty-first year.]
[348] [Count Adam Albrecht de Neipperg had lost an eye from a wound in battle.]
[349] {577}[La Quotidienne of December 4, 1822, has a satirical reference to a passage in the Courrier, which attached a diplomatic importance to the "galanterie respectueuse que le duc de Wellington aurait faite à cette jeune Princesse." We read, too, of another victorious foe, the King of Prussia, giving "la main à l'archduchesse Marie-Louise jusqu'à son carrosse" (Le Constitutionnel, November 19, 1822). "All the world wondered" what Andromache did, and how she would fare—dans ce galère. It is difficult to explain the allusion to Pyrrhus. Andromache was the unwilling bride of Pyrrhus or Neoptolemus, whose father had slain her husband, Hector; Marie Louise the willing bride of Neipperg, who had certainly fought at Leipsic, but who could not be said to have given the final blow to Napoleon at Waterloo. Pyrrhus must stand for the victorious foe, and the right arm on which the too-forgiving Andromache leant, must have been offered by "the respectful gallantry" of the Duke of Wellington.]
She comes the Andromache of Europe's Queens,
And led by Pyrrhus arm on which she leans.—[MS. M.]
[350] {578}[Sir William Curtis (1752-1805), maker of sea-biscuits at Wapping, was M.P. for the City of London 1790-1818, Lord Mayor 1795-6. George IV. affected his society, visited him at Ramsgate, and sailed with him in his gorgeously appointed yacht. When the king visited Scotland in August, 1822, Curtis followed in his train. On first landing at Leith, "Sir William Curtis, who had celtified himself on the occasion, marched joyously in his scanty longitude of kilt." At the Levee, August 17, "Sir William Curtis again appeared in the Royal tartan, but he had forsaken the philabeg and addicted himself to the trews" (Morning Chronicle, August 19, 20, 1822). "The Fat Knight" was seventy years of age, and there was much joking at his expense. See, for instance, some lines in "Hudibrastic measure," Gentleman's Magazine, vol. 92, Part II. p. 606—
"And who is he, that sleek and smart one