Page:Helen Leah Reed - Napoleons young neighbour.djvu/291

Rh the centre of another brilliant ceremony. This is the day of his marriage with Maria Louisa, daughter of the Emperor of Austria. A year later fickle Paris is in a state of feverish excitement over the birth of the King of Rome. Napoleon, rejoicing in his little son, seems at the height of his power.

Looking at Napoleon now, we must admit that he has become an autocrat. Yet he is not a despot in the ordinary sense. Though he may like power in itself, for what it brings to him, he cares still for the prosperity of France. The country needs his strong guidance. Outside of France he has enemies on all sides. While he does not admit it, things are against him in Spain; and then, as if losing his head, he decides to march into Russia. The Emperor of Russia is now his bitter enemy. The kiss of Tilsit was soon wiped away.

If we could, we would close our eyes to the next terrible scene. Before us marches the best of the young manhood of France—hundreds of thousands of men—to a certain death. Here is the greatest army of the time, and at Borodino we see "the bloodiest