atment of this amiable
female, and in the midst of their ecstasy of compassion and wrath they
hand down to posterity a record of unheard-of woes. There is little
doubt Napoleon's remark that "the Neckers were an odd lot, always
comforting themselves in mutual admiration," is well merited. The
daughter utilised the name of the father with lavish persistence. Her
ambition and impudence were boundless, and were the cause of Napoleon
bestowing some wholesome discipline upon her, which, like a true
heroine, she resented, and sent forth from her exile streams of
relentless wailing, adorned by a fluency of venom that would have put
the most militant suffragette in our time to the blush.

But suddenly her hysteria subsided, and after a brief repose she
switched off the truculent side and sought the pity of the man whose
life she had set herself to make one long ache if he did not yield to
her arrogant pretensions. She had written in a perpetual scream of his
iniquities, and was thrown over by her former associates, who saw
clearly enough that no real good could be accomplished by whining
about cruelty when stern flawless justice only existed. They
recognised that she was a personality, but her antics puzzled them,
and well they might. She bewailed her isolation with a throbbing
heart, and after committing indiscretions that Robespierre would have
sent her head flying for, she was suddenly bereaved of her neglected
husband. This event gave Benjamin Constant a better chance, but the
Baroness aimed at higher game. She was held in the grip of a delusion
that she had it in her power to hypnotise the First Consul and cause
him to become her lover. She had an uncontrollable idolatry for this
august person, whom she hoped to win over by writing for the
consumption of his enemies the many reasons for her aversion to him.
Without a doubt the woman was madly in love with the object of her
supposed aversion, and was driven to frenzy by his obvious distaste
for her.

In 1811 she secretly married a young officer called M. de Rocca, who
had fallen desperately in love with her. He was amiable and brilliant;
became an officer of Hussars in the French Army; did valiant deeds
amongst the hills in Andalusia in 1809; and was awarded the Cross of
the Legion of Honour. Subsequently he was shot down by guerillas,
badly wounded in the thigh, foot, and chest; had a romantic
deliverance; was hidden in a chapel by a young lady, and nursed into
consciou