ound a man-of-war.

"At length the time arrived for me to bid adieu to Switzerland. It was
arranged that I should set out for Italy with a small party of my
Wolfberg friends. An evening or two before we departed we paid a
leave-taking visit to the duchess. She expressed much polite regret at
our intention, and gave us a cordial invitation to renew our
acquaintance with her in the winter at Rome. Her care, indeed, to leave
a good impression of her friendly disposition upon our minds, was
exceedingly gratifying. She professed to take an interest in the plans
which each of us had formed, and, when her experience qualified her,
gave us instructions for our travels.

"When we rose to depart, the night being fine, she volunteered to walk
part of the way home with us. She came about a quarter of a mile to
where she could command an uninterrupted view of the lake, above which
the moon was just then rising, a huge red orb which shot a burning
column to her feet. 'I will now bid you adieu,' she said; and we left
her to the calm contemplation of grandeur which could not fade, and
enjoyments which could not betray. This was the last time I saw, and
perhaps shall ever see Hortense; but I shall always remember my brief
acquaintance with her as a dip into days which gave her country the
character of being the most polished of nations."

Hortense, with her son Louis Napoleon, had been in the habit of passing
the severity of the winter months in the cities of Augsburg or Munich,
spending about eight months of the year at Arenemberg. But after the
death of her brother Eugene, the associations which those cities
recalled were so painful that she transferred her winter residence to
Rome or Florence. An English lady who visited her at Arenemberg writes:

"The style of living of the Duchess of St. Leu is sumptuous, without
that freezing etiquette so commonly met with in the great. Her household
still call her _Queen_, and her son _Prince_ Napoleon or _Prince_ Louis.
The suite is composed of two ladies of honor, an equerry, and the tutor
of her younger son. She has a numerous train of domestics, and it is
among them that the traces are still observable of bygone pretensions,
long since abandoned by the true nobleness of their mistress. The former
queen, the daughter of Napoleon, the mother of the Imperial
heir-apparent, has returned quietly to private life with the perfect
grace of a voluntary sacrifice.

"The duchess receives strangers