Project Gutenberg's Famous Affinities of History, V2, by Lyndon Orr

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Title: Famous Affinities of History, V2
The Romance of Devotion

Author: Lyndon Orr

Posting Date: August 24, 2009 [EBook #4690]
Release Date: November, 2003
First Posted: March 3, 2002

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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FAMOUS AFFINITIES OF HISTORY

THE ROMANCE OF DEVOTION

BY

LYNDON ORR

VOLUME II of IV.

CONTENTS

THE EMPRESS CATHARINE AND PRINCE POTEMKIN
MARIE ANTOINETTE AND COUNT FERSEN
THE STORY OF AARON BURR
GEORGE IV. AND MRS. FITZHERBERT
CHARLOTTE CORDAY AND ADAM LUX
NAPOLEON AND MARIE WALEWSKA
THE STORY OF PAULINE BONAPARTE
THE STORY OF THE EMPRESS MARIE LOUISE AND COUNT NEIPPERG

THE EMPRESS CATHARINE AND PRINCE POTEMKIN

It has often been said that the greatest Frenchman who ever lived was
in reality an Italian. It might with equal truth be asserted that the
greatest Russian woman who ever lived was in reality a German. But the
Emperor Napoleon and the Empress Catharine II. resemble each other in
something else. Napoleon, though Italian in blood and lineage, made
himself so French in sympathy and understanding as to be able to play
upon the imagination of all France as a great musician plays upon a
splendid instrument, with absolute sureness of touch and an ability to
extract from it every one of its varied harmonies. So the Empress
Catharine of Russia--perhaps the greatest woman who ever ruled a
nation--though born of German parents, became Russian to the core and
made herself the embodiment of Russian feeling and Russian aspiration.

At the middle of the eighteenth century Russia was governed by the
Empress Elizabeth, daughter of Peter the Great. In her own time, and
for a long while afterward, her real capacity was obscured by her
apparent indolence, her fondness for display, and her seeming
vacillation; but now a very high place is accorded her in the history
of Russian rulers. She