g ceased to be
your wife, dare I felicitate you on becoming a father? Yes,
sire, without hesitation, for my soul renders justice to
yours, in like manner as you know mine. I can conceive every
emotion you must experience, as you divine all that I feel
at this moment, and, though separated, we are united by that
sympathy which survives all events.

"I should have desired to have learned the birth of the King
of Rome from yourself, and not from the sound of the cannon
of Evreux, or from the courier of the prefect. I know,
however, that, in preference to all, your first attentions
are due to the public authorities of the state, to the
foreign ministers, to your family, and especially to the
fortunate princess who has realized your dearest hopes. She
can not be more tenderly devoted to you than I am. But she
has been enabled to contribute more toward your happiness
by securing that of France. She has, then, a right to your
first feelings, to all your cares, and I who was but your
companion in times of difficulty--I can not ask more than
for a place in your affections far removed from that
occupied by the empress, Maria Louisa. Not till you have
ceased to watch by her bed--not till you are weary of
embracing your son, will you take the pen to converse with
your best friend. I will wait.

"Meanwhile, it is not possible for me to delay telling you
that, more than any one in the world, do I rejoice in your
joy. And you will not doubt my sincerity when I here say
that, far from feeling an affliction at a sacrifice
necessary for the repose of all, I congratulate myself on
having made it, since I now suffer alone. But I am wrong; I
do not suffer while you are happy, and I have but one
regret, in not having yet done enough to prove how dear you
were to me. I have no account of the health of the empress.
I dare to depend upon you, sire, so far as to hope that I
shall have circumstantial details of the great event which
secures the perpetuity of the name you have so nobly
illustrated. Eugene and Hortense will write me, imparting
their own satisfaction; but it is _from you_ that I desire
to know if your child be well, if he resembles you, if I
shall one day be permitted to see him. In short, I expect
from you unlimited confidence, an