fty and eternal lights as she approached
the evening of life, and the diviner mysteries of thought. This style
no longer paints, no longer chants; it adores.... Her name will live
as long as literature, as long as the history of her country."

Meantime, great changes had taken place in France. Napoleon had been
defeated at Leipsic, leaving a quarter of a million murdered on his
battle-fields; he had abdicated, and was on his way to Elba. She
immediately returned to Paris, with much the same feeling as Victor
Hugo, when he wept as he came from his long exile under "Napoleon the
Little." Again to her _salon_ came kings and generals, Alexander of
Russia, Wellington, and others.

But soon Napoleon returned, and she fled to Coppet. He sent her an
invitation to come to Paris, declaring he would now live for the peace
of Europe, but she could not trust him. She saw her daughter, lovely
and beautiful, married to the Duc de Broglie, a leading statesman,
and was happy in her happiness. Rocca's health was failing, and they
repaired to Italy for a time.

In 1816 they returned to Paris, Napoleon having gone from his final
defeat to St. Helena. But Madame de Stael was broken with her trials.
She seemed to grow more and more frail, till the end came. She said
frequently, "My father awaits me on the other shore." To Chateaubriand
she said, "I have loved God, my father, and my country." She could
not and would not go to sleep the last night, for fear she might never
look upon Rocca again. He begged her to sleep and he would awaken her
often. "Good night," she said, and it was forever. She never wakened.
They buried her beside her father at Coppet, under the grand old
trees. Rocca died in seven months, at the age of thirty-one. "I
hoped," he said, "to have died in her arms."

Her little son, and Rocca's, five years old, was cared for by Auguste
and Albertine, her daughter. After Madame de Stael's death, her
_Considerations on the French Revolution_ and _Ten Years of Exile_
were published. Of the former, Sainte-Beuve says: "Its publication was
an event. It was the splendid public obsequies of the authoress.
Its politics were destined to long and passionate discussions and
a durable influence. She is perfect only from this day; the full
influence of her star is only at her tomb."

Chateaubriand said, "Her death made one of those breaches which the
fall of a superior intellect produces once in an age, and which can
never be closed."