The Duke of Parma remained therefore the sovereign of his duchy, because it so pleased Bonaparte; but Bonaparte was led into error when he thought that, as his people rebelled not, they therefore loved their duke, and were satisfied with him.  The women and the priests controlled entirely the feeble duke; and not only the people, but the better classes and the aristocracy, submitted to all this with great unwillingness.  Once, when Joseph Bonaparte, whom the French republic had sent to give assurance of protection and recognition to the little Duke of Parma, was walking with a few cavaliers in the gardens around the duke’s palace in Colorno, he expressed his admiration at the symmetry and beauty of the buildings.

“That is true,” was the answer, “but just look at the buildings of the neighboring cloister! do you not see how superior that dwelling is to that of the sovereign?  Wretched is the country where this can take place!” [Footnote:  “Memoires du Roi Joseph,” vol. i., p. 65.]

Even the representatives of the republic of Venice came to Bonaparte.  They came not only to secure his friendship, but also to complain that the French army, in its advance upon Brescia, had done injury to the neutral territory of Venice.

Bonaparte directed at them a look of imperious severity, and, instead of laying stress on their neutrality, he asked in a sharp tone, “Are you for us, or against us?”

“Signor, we are neutral, and—­”

“Do not be neutral,” interrupted Bonaparte, with vehemence, “be strong, otherwise your friendship is useful to none.”

And, with imperious tone, he reproached them for the vacillating, perfidious conduct which, since 1792, had been the policy of Venice, and he threatened to punish and destroy that republic if she did not immediately prove herself to be the loyal friend of the French.

While Bonaparte used the few short weeks of rest to bring Italy more and more under the yoke of France, it was Josephine’s privilege to draw to herself and toward her husband the minds of the Italians, to win their hearts to her husband, and through him to the French republic, which he represented.  She did this with all the grace and affability, all the genial tact and large-heartedness of a noble heart, which were the attributes of her beautiful and amiable person.  She was unwearied in well-doing, in listening to all the petitions with which she was approached; she had for every complaint and every request an open ear; she not only promised to every applicant her intercession, but she made him presents, and was ever ready, by solicitations, flatteries, and expostulations, and, if necessary, even with tears, to entreat from her husband a mitigation of the punishment and sentence which he had decided upon in his just severity; and seldom had Bonaparte the courage to oppose her wishes.  These were for Josephine glorious days of love and triumph.  She depicts them herself in a letter to her aunt in plain, short words.