Josephine tenderly loved Madame de Montesquieu, and when they were parted wrote to her often; this correspondence lasted till Josephine’s death.  One day Madame de Montesquieu received orders from the Emperor to take the little king to Bagatelle, where Josephine then was.  She had obtained permission to see this child, whose birth had covered Europe with fetes.  It is well known how disinterested Josephine’s love for Napoleon was, and how she viewed everything that could increase his glory and render it more durable; and there entered into the prayers she made for him since the burning disgrace of the divorce, even the hope that he might be happy in his private life, and that his new wife might bear this child, this firstborn of his dynasty, to him whom she herself could not make a father.

This woman of angelic goodness, who had fallen into a long swoon on learning her sentence of repudiation, and who since that fatal day had dragged out a sad life in the brilliant solitude of Malmaison; this devoted wife who had shared for fifteen years the fortunes of her husband, and who had assisted so powerfully in his elevation, was not the last to rejoice at the birth of the King of Rome.  She was accustomed to say that the desire to leave a posterity, and to be represented after our death by beings who owe their life and position to us, was a sentiment deeply engraved in the heart of man; that this desire, which was so natural, and which she had felt so deeply as wife and mother, this desire to have children to survive and continue us on earth, was still more augmented when we had a high destiny to transmit to them; that in Napoleon’s peculiar position, as founder of a vast empire, it was impossible he should long resist a sentiment which is at the bottom of every heart, and which, if it is true that this sentiment increases in proportion to the inheritance we leave our children, no one could experience more fully than Napoleon, for no one had yet possessed so formidable a power on the earth; that the course of nature having made her sterility a hopeless evil, it was her duty to be the first to sacrifice the sentiments of her heart to the good of the state, and the personal happiness of Napoleon sad but powerful reasoning, which policy invoked in aid of the divorce, and of which this excellent princess in the illusion of her devotion thought herself convinced in the depths of her heart.

The royal child was presented to her.  I know nothing in the world which could be more touching than the joy of this excellent woman at the sight of Napoleon’s son.  She at first regarded him with eyes swimming in tears; then she took him in her arms, and pressed him to her heart with a tenderness too deep for words.  There were present no indiscreet witnesses to take pleasure in indulging irreverent curiosity, or observe with critical irony the feelings of Josephine, nor was there ridiculous etiquette to freeze the expression of this tender soul; it was a