“Bonaparte.”

But Josephine, in her depressed state of mind, and her nervous irritability, did not have the courage to draw nearer the scenes of war, and she dreaded to face again such dangers as once she had encountered in Brescia and on her journey to Florence.  She had not been able to overcome the indolence of the Creole so much as to write to Bonaparte.  Fully conscious of his love and pardon, she relied upon them when, in her reluctance to every exertion, she announced to him, through the physician Moscati, that she would not come to Ancona, but would wait for him in Bologna.

This news made a very painful impression upon Bonaparte, and filled him with sorrow, though it reached him on a day in which he had obtained a new triumph, a spiritual victory without any shedding of blood.  The pope, frightened at the army detachments approaching Rome, as well as at the menacing language of the victor of Arcola, signed a peace with the French republic, and with the general whose sword had bowed into the dust all the princes of Italy, and freed all the population from their duties as subjects.  Bonaparte announced this to Josephine, and it is evident how important it was to him that this news should precede even his love-murmurings and reproaches.  His letter was dated

“Tolontino, the 1st Ventose, Year V. (February 19,1797).

“Peace with Rome is signed.  Bologna, Ferrara, Romagna fall into the hands of the French republic.  The pope has to pay us in a short time thirty millions, and gives us many precious objects of art.

“I leave to-morrow for Ancona, and then for Rimini, Ravenna, and Bologna.  If your health permits, come over to meet me in Ravenna, but, I implore you, spare yourself.

“Not a word from your hand!  What have I done?  To think only of you, to love but you, to live but for my wife, to enjoy only my beloved’s happiness, does this deserve such a cruel treatment from her?  My friend, I implore you, think of me, and write to me every day.  Either you are sick, or you love me no longer.  Do you imagine, then, that my heart is of marble?  Why do you have so little sympathy with my sorrow?  You must have a very poor idea of me!  That I cannot believe.  You, to whom Nature has imparted so much understanding, so much amiability, and so much beauty, you, who alone can rule in my heart, you know, without doubt, what power you have over me!

“Write to me, think of me, and love me.

“Yours entirely, yours for life,

“Bonaparte.”

This is the last letter of Bonaparte to Josephine during his first Italian campaign—­the last at least in the series of letters which Queen Hortense has made public, as the most beautiful and most glorious monument to her mother. [Footnote:  “Lettres de Napoleon a Josephine et de Josephine a Napoleon et a sa fille.  Londres et Leipzic, 1833.”]