That he _was_ madly infatuated, there can be no doubt. He loved her, and he never wholly ceased to love her. Never before, never afterward, did he meet a woman who inspired him with a feeling at all like that he felt for her. If he did not know at that time what she had been, he knew after the marriage what she continued to be, and he made a desperate effort to break the spell. He could not completely do so. She might betray his confidence, laugh at his love-letters, neglect his appeals, squander his money, sell his secrets, tell him all sorts of falsehoods, underrate his value, misconceive his character, and befoul his honor with shameless sin; but against her repentance and her childlike prayers for pardon, the iron of his nature became as wax. Before those quivering lips, before those tear-filled eyes, before that tenderly sweet voice, all broken with grief, he could rarely stand. “I will divorce her!” he said fiercely to his brothers, when they put before him proofs of her guilt, after the Egyptian campaign. But through the locked door came the sobs of the stricken wife, came her plaintive pleadings. “_Mon ami!_” she called softly, called hour after hour, piteously knocking at the door. It was too much; the cold resolution melted; the soldier was once more the lover, and the door flew open. When the brothers came next day to talk further about the divorce, they found little Josephine, happy as a bird, sitting on Napoleon’s knee, and nestling in his arms. “Listen, Bourrienne!” exclaimed Napoleon, joyously, on his return to Paris from Marengo, “listen to the shouts of the people! It is sweet to my ears, this praise of the French--as sweet as the voice of Josephine!” Even when cold policy demanded the divorce, it was he who wept the most. “Josephine! my noble Josephine! The few moments of happiness I have ever enjoyed, I owe to you!” And in the closing scene at St. Helena it was the same. The dying man thought no more of the Austrian woman. Even in his delirium, the wandering memory recalled and the fast freezing lips named “Josephine!” * * * * * Yet calculation played its part in Napoleon’s marriage, as it did in everything he undertook. He was made to believe that Josephine had fortune and high station in society. He weighed these advantages in considering the match. Both the fortune and the social position would be valuable to him. In fact, Josephine had no fortune, nor any standing in society. Men of high station were her visitors; their wives were not. All the evidence tends to show that Barras arranged the match between his two hangers-on, and that the appointment to the command of the Army of Italy became involved in the negotiation. Napoleon received this coveted commission March 7, 1796; two days later the marriage occurred.