ate; and finding that, instead of consoling, she
only embarrassed the Empress Marie Louise, she hastened to relieve her
of her presence.

And now, at last, Hortense bowed her proud, pure heart beneath the yoke
of necessity; now, at last, she listened to the prayers and
representations of her mother, who had returned to Malmaison, and of her
friends, and went to Paris. It had been too often urged upon her that
she owed it to her sons to secure their fortune and future, not to
overcome her personal repugnance, and conform herself to this new
command of duty.

She had, therefore, returned to Paris for a few days, and taken up her
abode in her dwelling, whose present dreariness recalled, with sorrowful
eloquence, the grandeur of the past.

These drawing-rooms, once the rendezvous of so many kings and princes,
were now desolate, and bore on their soiled floors the footprints of the
hostile soldiers who had recently been quartered there. At the czar's
solicitation, they had now been removed; but the queen's household
servants had also left it. Faithless and ungrateful, they had turned
their backs on the setting sun, and fled from the storm that had burst
over the head of their mistress.

The Emperor Alexander hastened to the queen's dwelling as soon as her
arrival in Paris was announced, the queen advancing to meet him as far
as the outermost antechamber.

"Sire," said she, with a soft smile, "I have no means of receiving you
with due ceremony; my antechambers are deserted."

The appearance of this solitary woman, this queen without a crown,
without fortune, and without protection and support, who nevertheless
stood before him in all the charms of beauty and womanhood, a soft smile
on her lips, made a deep impression on the emperor, and his eyes filled
with tears.

The queen observed this, and hastened to say, "But what of that? I do
not think that antechambers filled with gold-embroidered liveries would
make those who come to see me happier, and I esteem myself happy in
being able to do you the honors of my house alone. I have, therefore,
only won."

The emperor took her hand, and, while conducting the queen to her room,
conversed with her, with that soft, sad expression peculiar to him,
lamenting with bitter self-reproaches almost that he was himself, in
part, to blame for the misfortunes that had overtaken the emperor and
his family. He then conjured her to abandon her intention of leaving
France, and to preserv