omen reached their highest development, while her beauty attained a
perfection which may justly be called unique.

No one speaks of Pauline Bonaparte's character or of her intellect, but
wholly of her loveliness and charm, and, it must be added, of her utter
lack of anything like a moral sense.

Even as a child of thirteen, when the Bonapartes left Corsica and took
up their abode in Marseilles, she attracted universal attention by her
wonderful eyes, her grace, and also by the utter lack of decorum which
she showed. The Bonaparte girls at this time lived almost on charity.
The future emperor was then a captain of artillery and could give them
but little out of his scanty pay.

Pauline--or, as they called her in those days, Paulette--wore
unbecoming hats and shabby gowns, and shoes that were full of holes.
None the less, she was sought out by several men of note, among them
Freron, a commissioner of the Convention. He visited Pauline so often
as to cause unfavorable comment; but he was in love with her, and she
fell in love with him to the extent of her capacity. She used to write
him love letters in Italian, which were certainly not lacking in ardor.
Here is the end of one of them:

I love you always and most passionately. I love you for ever, my
beautiful idol, my heart, my appealing lover. I love you, love you,
love you, the most loved of lovers, and I swear never to love any one
else!

This was interesting in view of the fact that soon afterward she fell
in love with Junot, who became a famous marshal. But her love affairs
never gave her any serious trouble; and the three sisters, who now
began to feel the influence of Napoleon's rise to power, enjoyed
themselves as they had never done before. At Antibes they had a
beautiful villa, and later a mansion at Milan.

By this time Napoleon had routed the Austrians in Italy, and all France
was ringing with his name. What was Pauline like in her maidenhood?
Arnault says:

She was an extraordinary combination of perfect physical beauty and the
strangest moral laxity. She was as pretty as you please, but utterly
unreasonable. She had no more manners than a school-girl--talking
incoherently, giggling at everything and nothing, and mimicking the
most serious persons of rank.

General de Ricard, who knew her then, tells in his monograph of the
private theatricals in which Pauline took part, and of the sport which
they had behind the scenes. He says:

The Bonaparte gir