m, as she placed her
hand in mine, and said,--

"It is yours!"

These words ended the story of a life whose trials were many, and
encountered at an age in which few have braved the world's cares.
The lessons I had learned, however, were acquired in that
school,--adversity,--where few are taught in vain; and if the morning of
my life broke in clouds and shadow, the noon has been not less peaceful
and bright. And the evening, as it draws near, comes with an aspect of
calm tranquillity, ample enough to recompense every vicissitude of those
early days when the waves of fortune were roughest.

A PARTING WORD.

Dear Friends,--Time has hallowed the custom of a word at
parting, and I am unwilling to relinquish the privilege. In
the tale I have just concluded, my endeavor was to portray,
with as little aid from fiction as might be, some lights and
shadows of the most wonderful and eventful period of modern
history,--the empire of Napoleon. The character I selected
for my hero was not all imaginary, neither were many of the
scenes, which bear less apparent proofs of reality. The
subject was one long meditated on before undertaken; but as
the work proceeded, I felt at some places, the difficulty of
creating interest for persons, and incidents removed both by
time and country from my reader; and at others, my own
inadequacy to an effort, which mere zeal could never
accomplish. These causes induced me to deviate from the plan
I originally set down for my guidance; and combined with
failing health, have rendered what might have been a matter
of interest and amusement to the writer, a task of labor and
anxiety.

It is the first time I have had to ask my reader's
indulgence on such grounds; nor should I now allude to it,
save as affording the only apology I can render for the many
defects in a story, which, in defiance of me, took its
coloring from my own mind at the period, rather from the
reflex of the events I related.

The moral of my tale is simple,--the fatal influence crude
and uncertain notions of liberty will exercise over a
career, which, under happier direction of its energies, had
won honor and distinction, and the impolicy of the effort,
to substitute an adopted for a natural allegiance.

My estimate of Napoleon may seem to som