lemma into which my confidence and dependence on you had
brought me, I should have made a fine figure indeed on the first day of
my emperorship. Have patience, Madame; you have plenty of books to
divert you, but you must remain where you are until I am inclined to
release you." So saying, Napoleon locked the door and put the key in his
pocket.

It was near two o'clock in the afternoon when she was thus shut up.
Remembering the recent flattery of her courtiers, and comparing it with
the unfeeling treatment of her husband, she found herself so much the
more unfortunate, as the expressions of the former were regarded by her
as praise due to her merit, while the unkindness of the latter was
unavailingly resented as the undeserved oppression of a capricious
despot.

Business, or perhaps malice, made Napoleon forget to send her any dinner;
and when, at eight o'clock, his brothers and sisters came, according to
invitation, to take tea, he said coldly:

"Apropos, I forgot it. My wife has not dined yet; she is busy, I
suppose, in her philosophical meditations in her study."

Madame Louis Bonaparte, her daughter, flew directly towards the study,
and her mother could scarcely, for her tears, inform her that--she was a
prisoner, and that her husband was her gaoler.

"Oh, Sire!" said Madame Louis, returning, "even this remarkable day is a
day of mourning for my poor mother!"

"She deserves worse," answered Napoleon, "but, for your sake, she shall
be released; here is the key, let her out."

Madame Napoleon was, however, not in a situation to wish to appear before
her envious brothers and sisters-in-law. Her eyes were so swollen with
crying that she could hardly see; and her tears had stained those
Imperial robes which the unthinking and inconsiderate no doubt believed a
certain preservative against sorrow and affliction. At nine o'clock,
however, another aide-de-camp of her husband presented himself, and gave
her the choice either to accompany him back to the study or to join the
family party of the Bonapartes.

In deploring her mother's situation, Madame Louis Bonaparte informed her
former governess, Madame Cam---n, of these particulars, which I heard her
relate at Madame de M----r's, almost verbatim as I report them to you.
Such, and other scenes, nearly of the same description, are neither rare
nor singular, in the most singular Court that ever existed in civilized
Europe.

LETTER VII.

PARIS, August, 1805