it was with them, as Metternich said, "a
principle never to tolerate another Napoleon on the throne."

The European powers had signified to the King of France, through their
diplomatic agents, their readiness to acknowledge him, but they exacted
one condition--the condition that Louis Philippe should confirm or renew
the decree of exile fulminated by the Bourbons against the Bonapartes.

Louis Philippe had accepted this condition; and the Bonapartes, whose
only crime was that they were the brothers and relatives of the deceased
emperor, before whom not only France, but all the princes of Europe, had
once bent the knee--the Bonapartes were once more declared strangers to
their country, and condemned to exile!

CHAPTER IV.

THE REVOLUTION IN ROME, AND THE SONS OF HORTENSE.

It was a terrible blow to the Bonapartes, this new decree of banishment!
Like a stroke of lightning it entered their hearts, annihilating their
holiest hopes and most ardent desires, and their joy over the glorious
and heroic revolution of July gave place to a bitter sense of
disappointment.

Nothing, therefore, remained for them but to continue the life to which
they had become somewhat accustomed, and to console themselves, for
their new disappointment, with the arts and sciences.

At the end of October, in the year 1830, Hortense determined to leave
Arenenberg and go to Rome with her son, as she was in the habit of doing
every year.

But this time she first went to Florence, where her elder son, Napoleon
Louis, recently married to his cousin, the second daughter of King
Joseph, was now living with his young wife. The heart of the tender
mother was filled with anxiety and care; she felt and saw that this new
French Revolution was likely to infect all Europe, and that Italy, above
all, would be unable to avoid this infection. Italy was diseased to the
core, and it was to be feared that it would grasp at desperate means in
its agony, and proceed to the blood-letting of a revolution, in order to
restore itself to health. Hortense felt this, and feared for her sons.

She feared that the exiled, the homeless ones who had been driven from
their country, and were not permitted to serve it, would devote their
services to those who were unhappy and who suffered like themselves. She
feared the enthusiasm, the generous courage, the energy of her sons, and
she knew that, if a revolution should break out in Italy, it would
gladly adorn itself with t