Wherever men understood the tremendous issues that were about to be fought out; wherever there was an intelligent comprehension of the consequences that were inevitably connected with the triumph of the Allied Kings, there was intense longing for the triumph of the French. The French masses eagerly besought the Emperor to give them arms--but he shrank from the menace of Communism, even as he had done when he refused to arm the Russian serf against his lord. * * * * * In the hours of trial, three of Napoleon’s brothers had drawn to him again. They had been much to blame for his downfall. Joseph had abandoned Paris in 1814, when there was no urgent necessity for it, and when Napoleon was flying toward it, on horseback, at headlong speed. Lucien had been wrong-headed, turbulent, making trouble at Rome and elsewhere. Jerome’s management in Westphalia had incensed and disgusted Germany. As to Louis, the fourth brother, that impossible dolt and ingrate did not show his face, but retired into Switzerland. He was the younger brother with whom Napoleon had shared his slender pay when lieutenant, and who had lived with the elder brother and been taught by him, and in every way treated by him as a father treats a son. As to Madame Mère, the heroic old mother, she had refused to come to Paris to take part in the gorgeous ceremonial of Napoleon’s Coronation; she stayed away, at Rome, where Lucien Bonaparte, in temporary disgrace, drew the maternal sympathy to the less fortunate son. No, she would not go to Napoleon in 1800, when all Europe was at his feet, and he was the King of Kings. She stayed at Rome with Lucien. But when the awful reverses came, when the scepters were broken in the hands of the Bonapartes, when Napoleon was prostrate and outlawed, Madame Letitia,--Madame Mère,--remembered only that he was her son. Josephine, frail at first, but at last loyal and loving, could not go to Elba; she was dead. Maria Louise, the Austrian wife, frail as well as false, would not go to Elba; she had already turned her lewd eyes toward the gallant Neipperg. But Madame Mère could go to Elba, and she went. And when Napoleon left for France, she soon followed. So, she is with him now, heart and soul. For the day is dark and dreary. The somber clouds hang low. Thunder rolls in the distance--rolls with sullen menace and ominous reverberation. And because the whole world is against her son, Madame Mère turns from the whole world _to him_! Heroic old woman! From her adamantine character was drawn the strength which laid Europe at Napoleon’s feet. In the “Barrington Sketches” is drawn a vivid picture of the last public occasion on which appeared together the most remarkable mother and son that ever lived. It was on the 8th of June, four days before Napoleon left Paris to join his army.