“My dear Hortense,” Josephine replied, “up to the moment I received your letter I kept my courage. I cannot endure the thought that I am to be separated from you, and God knows for how long! I am following your counsel; I shall go to-morrow to Navarre. I have only sixteen men in my guard here, and they are all wounded. I shall keep them; but as a matter of fact, I do not need them. I am so wretched at being separated from my children that I am indifferent about what happens to myself. Try to send me word how you are, what you will do, and where you will go. I shall try to follow you from afar, at least.” Early on March 29th, the little household started through rain and mud. Josephine’s terror was complete. She fancied she would be waylaid by Cossacks; and once when she saw a band of soldiers approaching, she jumped from her carriage, and fled across the fields alone. It was with difficulty that her attendants convinced her that the strangers were French, not foreign soldiers. Once at Navarre, she spent much of her time alone—a practice quite unlike her,—reading and re-reading Napoleon’s letters. One of them she carried always in her bosom. It had been sent from Brienne, only a short time before the abdication, and contained the most touching expressions of his affection for her to be found in any of his later letters: “I have sought death in numberless engagements; I no longer dread its approach; I should now hail it as a boon.... Nevertheless, I still wish to see Josephine once more.” * * * * *