.

It happened before Mantua, in which city Wurmser, after the battle of
Rivoli, was forced to shut himself up with twenty-eight thousand men;
General Miollis, with four thousand only, was investing the place.
During a sortie attempted by the Austrians, Murat, at the head of five
hundred men, received an order to charge three thousand. Murat charged,
but feebly. Bonaparte, whose aide-de-camp he then was, was so irritated
that he would not suffer him to remain about him. This was a great blow
to Murat, all the more because he was at that time desirous of becoming
the general's brother-in-law; he was deeply in love with Caroline
Bonaparte.

How had that love come about? It can be told in two words. Perhaps
those who read our books singly are surprised that we sometimes dwell on
certain details which seem somewhat long drawn out for the book in which
they appear. The fact is, we are not writing isolated books, but, as we
have already said, we are filling, or trying to fill, an immense frame.
To us, the presence of our characters is not limited to their appearance
in one book. The man you meet in one book may be a king in a second
volume, and exiled or shot in a third.

Balzac did a great and noble work with a hundred aspects, and he
called it the "Comedie Humaine." Our work, begun at the same time as
his--although, be it understood, we do not praise it--may fitly be
called "The Drama of France."

Now, let us return to Murat, and tell how this love, which had so
glorious and, possibly, so fatal an influence on his destiny, came to
him.

In 1796, Murat was sent to Paris, charged with the duty of presenting
to the Directory the flags and banners taken by the French army at the
battles of Dego and Mondovi. During this voyage he made the acquaintance
of Madame Bonaparte and Madame Tallien. At Madame Bonaparte's house he
again met Mademoiselle Caroline Bonaparte. We say _again_, for that was
not the first time he had met the woman who was to share the crown of
Naples with him. They had met in Rome, at her brother's house, and, in
spite of the rivalry of a young and handsome Roman prince, she had shown
him a marked preference.

The three women combined to obtain for him the rank of general of
brigade from the Directory. Murat returned to the Army of Italy, more in
love than ever, and, in spite of his new rank, he solicited and obtained
the favor of remaining with the general-in-chief as aide-de-camp.
Unhappily, the fatal