ould
have electrified the world in subsequent days, and have given scope to
the talents of actors and authors who are eager for dramatic copy.

I think Cardinal Ruffo would have been a supporter of imposing some
form of disciplinary restraint on Emma Hamilton. He did strongly
insist on the treaty being honourably adhered to, but his view was
overruled, and he retired in consequence in bitter indignation.

So much for the vaunted fairness and impartiality of our treatment of
Napoleon!

It is only when we come to study the life of this man that we realize
how he towered above all his contemporaries in thought, word, and
deed. Napoleon's authentic doings and sayings are wonderful in their
vast comprehensiveness and sparkling vision, combined with flawless
wisdom. When we speak or think of him, it is generally of his military
genius and achievements and of what we term his "gigantic ambition";
and in this latter conclusion the platitudinarians, with an air of
originality, languidly affirm that this was the cause of his ruin, the
grandeur of which we do not understand. But never a word is said or
thought of our own terrible tragedies, nor of the victories we were
compelled to buy in order to secure his downfall. His great gifts as a
lawgiver and statesman are little known or spoken of. Nelson's views
of him were of a rigid, stereotyped character. He only varied in his
wild manner of describing him as a loathsome despot, whose sole aim
was to make war everywhere and to invade England and annihilate her
people.

II

In the light of what is happening now in the world-war 1914-1917, and
the world-wide views expressed about the German Kaiser, it may be
interesting to write Pitt's opinion of Napoleon, though they are
scarcely to be mentioned in the same breath. The former, who is the
creator of the world-tragedy, is a mere shadow in comparison to the
great genius of whom Mueller, the Swiss historian, says: "Quite
impartially and truly, as before God, I must say that the variety of
his knowledge, the acuteness of his observations, the solidity of his
understanding (not dazzling wit), his grand and comprehensive views,
filled me with astonishment, and his manner of speaking to me with
love for him. By his genius and his disinterested goodness, he has
also conquered me." But I give another authority, Wieland, the German
author, who was disillusioned when he had the honour of a conversation
with Napoleon on the field of Jena.