sonorous tones.

Napoleon pressed her hands in his own, and gazed at her long and
fixedly; and then, with the same firmness, he said: "My mother, adieu!"

Once more they gazed at each other; then the emperor let her hand fall.
Letitia turned to go, and at this moment General Bertrand appeared at
the door to announce that all was prepared for the journey[54].

[Footnote 54: This leave-taking was exactly as above described, and
Talma himself narrated it to Louise de Cochelet. See her Memoires, vol.
iii, P. 173.]

BOOK IV.

_THE DUCHESS OF ST. LEU_.

CHAPTER I.

THE BANISHMENT OF THE DUCHESS OF ST. LEU.

For the second time, the Bourbons had entered Paris under the protection
of the allies, and Louis XVIII. was once more King of France. But this
time he did not return with his former mild and conciliatory
disposition. He came to punish and to reward; he came unaccompanied by
mercy. The old generals and marshals of the empire, who had not been
able to resist their chieftain's call, were now banished, degraded, or
executed. Ney and Labedoyere paid for their fidelity to the emperor with
their blood; and all who were in any way connected with the Bonapartes
were relentlessly pursued. The calumnies that had been circulated in
1814 against the Duchess of St. Leu were now to bear bitter fruit. These
were the dragon's teeth from which the armed warriors had sprung, who
now levelled their swords at the breast of a defenceless woman.

King Louis had returned to the throne of his fathers, but he had not
forgotten that he had been told on his flight: "The Duchess of St. Leu
is to blame for all! Her intrigues have brought Napoleon back!" Now that
he was again king, he thought of it, and determined to punish her. He
requested it of Alexander, as a favor, that he should this time not call
on the Duchess of St. Leu.

The emperor, dismayed by the odious reports in circulation concerning
Hortense, and already enchained in the mystic glittering web with which
Madame de Kruedener had enveloped him, and separated from the reality of
the world, acceded to the wishes of the Bourbons, and abandoned the
queen. This was the signal that let loose the general wrath of the
royalists; they could now freely utter their scorn and malice. By low
calumnies they could now compensate themselves for their humiliation of
the past, for having been compelled to approach the daughter of
Viscountess de Beauharnais with the reverence due to a queen