reconquer, but also a million
francs which she wished to have paid to her out of the French treasury.

Her father, Minister Necker, had loaned his suffering country a million
francs, at a time of financial distress and famine, to buy bread for the
starving people, and Louis XVI. had guaranteed, in writing, that this
"national debt of France" should be returned.

But the revolution that shattered the throne of the unfortunate king,
also buried beneath the ruins of the olden time the promises and oaths
that had been written on parchment and paper.

Madame de Stael now demanded that the emperor should fulfil the promises
of the overthrown king, and that the heir of the throne of the Bourbons
should assume the obligations into which a Bourbon had entered with
her father.

She had once called Napoleon a god descended from heaven; and she even
now wished that he might still prove a god for her, namely, the god
Pluto, who should pour out a million upon her from his horn of plenty.

As she could not go to France herself, she sent her son to plead with
the emperor, for herself and her children.

Well knowing, however, how difficult it would be, even for her son to
secure an audience of the emperor, she addressed herself to Queen
Hortense in eloquent letters imploring her to exert her influence in her
son's behalf.

Hortense, ever full of pity for misfortune, felt the warmest sympathy
and admiration for the genius of the great poetess, and interceded for
Madame de Stael with great courage and eloquence. She alone ventured,
regardless of Napoleon's frowns and displeasure, to plead the cause of
the poor exile again and again, and to solicit her recall to France, as
a simple act of justice; she even went so far in her generosity as to
extend the hospitalities of her drawing-rooms to the poetess's son, who
was avoided and fled from by every one else.

Hortense's soft entreaties and representations were at last successful
in soothing the emperor's anger. He allowed Madame de Stael to return to
France, on the condition that she should never come to Paris or its
vicinity; he then also accorded Madame de Stael's son the long-sought
favor of an audience.

This interview of Napoleon with Madame de Stael's son is as remarkable
as it is original. On this occasion, Napoleon openly expressed his
dislike and even his hatred as well of Madame de Stael as of her father,
although he listened with generous composure to the warm defence o