You see the figure of "the man of destiny" in marble and bronze, sometimes on a level with the eye, sometimes piercing the sky, as it does in the Place Vendome, where it is perched on top of a lofty column, whose pedestal and sides are covered with panels in relief made from cannon captured by Napoleon in battle.
The gigantic Arch of Triumph on the Champs Elysees, commenced by Napoleon, in commemoration of his successes, testifies to the splendor of his conceptions.
But overshadowing all other Napoleonic monuments is his tomb on the banks of the Seine, adjoining the Invalides. Its gilded dome attracts attention from afar, and on nearer approach one is charmed with the strength of its walls and the symmetry of its proportions.
At the door the guard cautions the thoughtless to enter with uncovered head, but the admonition is seldom necessary, for an air of solemnity pervades the place.
In the center of the rotunda, beneath the frescoed vault of the great dome, is a circular crypt. Leaning over the heavy marble balustrade I gazed on the massive sarcophagus below which contains all that was mortal of that marvelous combination of intellect and will.
The sarcophagus is made of dark red porphyry, a fitly chosen stone that might have been colored by the mingling of the intoxicating wine of ambition with the blood spilled to satisfy it.
Looking down upon the sarcophagus and the stands of tattered battle flags that surround it, I reviewed the tragic career of this grand master of the art of slaughter, and weighed, as best I could, the claims made for him by his friends. And then I found myself wondering what the harvest might have been had Napoleon's genius led him along peaceful paths, had the soil of Europe been stirred by the plowshare rather than by his trenchant blade, and the reaping done by implements less destructive than his shot and shell.
Just beyond and above the entombed emperor stands a cross upon which hangs a life-size figure of the Christ, flooded by a mellow lemon-colored light, which pours through the stained glass windows of the chapel.
I know not whether it was by accident or design that this god of war thus sleeps, as it were, at the very feet of the Prince of Peace.