he finds himself misplaced in the elevated rank to which he
has attained. You desire that he should imitate his brother.
Give him, first of all, the same temperament. You have not
failed to remark that almost our entire existence depends
upon our health, and that upon our digestion. Let poor Louis
digest better, and you would find him more amiable. But,
such as he is, there can be no reason for abandoning him, or
making him feel the unbecoming sentiments with which he
inspires you. Do you, whom I have seen so kind, continue to
be so at the moment when it is precisely more than ever
necessary. Take pity on a man who has to lament that he
possesses what would constitute another's happiness; and,
before condemning him, think of others who, like him, have
groaned beneath the burden of their greatness, and bathed
with their tears that diadem which they believed had never
been destined for their brow."

This, surely, was admirable counsel, and, had Hortense followed it, she
would have saved herself many a long year of loneliness and anguish. But
the impetuous and thoughtless bride could not repress the repugnance
with which she regarded the cold exterior and the exacting love of her
husband. Louis demanded from her a singleness and devotedness of
affection which was unreasonable. He wished to engross all her faculties
of loving. He desired that every passion of her soul should be centered
in him, and was jealous of any happiness she found excepting that which
he could give. He was even troubled by the tender regard with which she
cherished her mother and her brother, considering all the love she gave
to them as so much withheld from him. Hortense was passionately fond of
music and of painting. Louis almost forbade her the enjoyment of those
delightful accomplishments, thinking that she pursued them with a
heartfelt devotion inconsistent with that supreme love with which she
ought to regard her husband. Hortense, proud and high-spirited, would
not submit to such tyranny. She resisted and retaliated. She became,
consequently, wretched, and her husband wretched, and discord withered
all the joys of home. At last, the union of such discordant spirits
became utterly insupportable. They separated. The story of their
domestic quarrels vibrated upon the ear of Europe. Louis wandered here
and there, joyless and sad, till, weary of a miserable life, alone and