affection in a victor's captive. She was too natural to simulate love where she felt only obedience, terror, and resignation. History will blame her; nature will pity her.... She was expected to play a part; she failed as an actress, but as a woman she has survived." The Marie Louise who is thus described by Lamartine is not the Marie Louise of the beginning of 1812; then the young Empress did not regard herself as "a victor's captive," nor as "a foreign decoration attached to the columns of the throne." Napoleon did not inspire her with terror, and she knew none of the constraint which "lessened her natural charms, darkened her expression, dimmed her wit, and burdened her heart." She did not look upon her court as a "magnificent but rude exile." These thoughts may have occurred to her in misfortune, but hardly, we think, before the Russian campaign. If Lamartine had read the letters which she wrote to her father in 1810, 1811, and the beginning of 1812, he would doubtless have acknowledged that for some time Napoleon's second wife was happy on the French throne. To this portrait drawn by the great poet we prefer the one we find in Méneval's Memoirs: "The better Napoleon learned to know the Empress, the more he applauded his choice. Her character seemed made for him; she brought him happiness and consolation amid the cares of his stormy career. In ordinary life she was simple and kindly, yet with no loss of dignity. No word of complaint or blame ever crossed her lips. Gentle, but reserved and discreet, she never expressed her feelings with any vivacity. She was kind and generous, simple and astute at the same time; her gayety was gentle, her wit without malice. Though well-informed, she made no parade of her acquirements, fearing to be accused of pedantry. Her wifely devotion had won the Emperor's affection, and her unfailing gentleness had attracted all his friends. In this estimate I am confirmed by my recollections, and I am not inspired by any partiality, by what has happened, or by any present interest. It would be a mistake to suppose that her duty and her inclinations were at variance; she was perfectly natural and could not conceal her real impressions; but events have shown that while she inclined to virtue when it was easy, she yet lacked the strength to practise it when it was hard."