A master who gave such strict attention to the prosperity of his kingdom would not, of course, overlook its industries. In fact, they were one of Napoleon’s chief cares. His policy was one of protection. He would have France make everything she wanted, and sell to her neighbors, but never buy from them. To stimulate the manufactories, which in 1799 were as nearly bankrupt as the public treasury, he visited the factories himself to learn their needs. He gave liberal orders, and urged, even commanded, his associates to do the same. At one time, anxious to aid the batiste factories of Flanders, he tried to force Josephine to give up cotton goods and to set the fashion in favor of the batistes; but she made such an outcry that he was obliged to abandon the idea. For the same reason he wrote to his sister Eliza: “I beg that you will allow your court to wear nothing but silks and cambrics, and that you will exclude all cottons and muslins, in order to favor French industry.” Frequently he would take goods on consignment, to help a struggling factory. Rather than allow a manufactory to be idle, he would advance a large sum of money, and a quantity of its products would be put under government control. After the battle of Eylau, Napoleon sent one million six hundred thousand francs to Paris, to be used in this way. To introduce cotton-making into the country was one of his chief industrial ambitions. At the beginning of the century it was printed in all the factories of France, but nothing more. He proposed to the Council of State to prohibit the importation of cotton thread and the woven goods. There was a strong opposition, but he carried his point. “As a result,” said Napoleon to Las Cases complacently, “we possess the three branches, to the immense advantage of our population and to the detriment and sorrow of the English; which proves that, in administration as in war, one must exercise character.... I occupied myself no less in encouraging silks. As Emperor, and King of Italy, I counted one hundred and twenty millions of income from the silk harvest.” In a similar way he encouraged agriculture; especially was he anxious that France should raise all her own articles of diet. He had Berthollet look into maple and turnip sugar, and he did at last succeed in persuading the people to use beet sugar; though he never convinced them that Swiss tea equalled Chinese, or that chicory was as good as coffee. [Illustration: BONAPARTE, FIRST CONSUL. One of the best portraits of the First Consul—the _truest_ of all, perhaps. Unlike Bouillon, Van Brée, Géhotte, Isabey, Boilly painted him in his real aspect, without any striving after the ideal. This is really the determined little Corsican, tormented by ambition and a thirst for conquest. This fine portrait has been admirably etched by Duplessis-Bertaux.—A. D.]