Napoleon BonaparteAbbott, John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot)
History
Napoleon Bonaparte
Abbott, John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot)
Emperors -- France -- Biography; Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, 1769-1821
Napoleon has been accused of an improper affection for Hortense. The
world has been filled with the slander. Says Bourrienne, "Napoleon
never cherished for her any feeling but a real paternal tenderness.
He loved her after his marriage with her mother, as he would have
loved his own child. At least for three years I was a witness
to all their most private actions, and I declare I never saw any
thing that could furnish the least ground for suspicion, nor the
slightest trace of a culpable intimacy. This calumny must be classed
among those which malice delights to take in the character of men
who become celebrated, calumnies which are adopted lightly and without
reflection. Napoleon is no more. Let his memory be accompanied only
by that, be it good or bad, which really took place. Let not this
reproach be made a charge against him by the impartial historian.
I must say, in conclusion, on this delicate subject, that his
principles were rigid in an extreme degree, and that any fault of
the nature charged, neither entered his mind, nor was in accordance
with his morals or his taste."
At St. Helena Napoleon was one day looking over a book containing
an account of his amours. He smiled as he glanced his eye over the
pages, saying, "I do not even know the names of most of the females
who are mentioned here. This is all very foolish. Every body knows
that had no time for such dissipation."
One beautiful evening, in the year 1815, the parish priest of San
Pietro, a village a few miles distant from Sevilla, returned much
fatigued to his little cottage, where he found his aged housekeeper,
the Senora Margarita, watching for him. Notwithstanding that one is
well accustomed to the sight of poverty in Spain, it was impossible
to help being struck by the utter of destitution which appeared
in the house of the good priest; the more so, as every imaginable
contrivance had been restored to, to hide the nakedness of the
walls, and the shabbiness of the furniture. Margarita had prepared
for her master's super a rather small dish of olla-podriga , which
consisted, to say the truth, of the remains of the dinner, seasoned
and disguised with great skill, and with the addition of some sauce,
and a name . As she placed the savory dish upon the table, the
priest said: "We should thank God for this good supper, Margarita:
this olla-podriga makes one's mouth water. My friend, you ought
to be grateful for finding so good a supper at the house of your
host!" At the word host, Margarita raised her eyes, and saw a
stranger, who had followed her mater. Her countenance changed, and
she looked annoyed. .......... She glanced indignantly first at
the unknown, and then at the priest, who, looking down, said in a
low voice, and with the timidity of a child: "What is enough for
two, is always enough for three; and surely you would not wish that
I should allow a Christian to die of hunger? He has not tasted food
for two days."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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