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156 ble a military tent, and furnished with heroic simplicity. On the second floor were the private apartments of Napoleon and those of Josephine. There was a little door between these, used only by the occupants; and later, when Napoleon had made up his mind to divorce Josephine, the sealing up of this door was one of the delicate and manly methods he took to prepare her for the sacrifice.

It was a proud boast of Josephine that she never kept any one waiting half a minute where punctuality depended upon herself. This consideration for the pleasure of others, the never-failing mark of refined breeding, was signally wanting in Napoleon. When the established hour for dining at Malmaison was six o'clock, and though etiquette forbade any one to approach the table before the announcement of the head of the house, he often failed to appear before seven, eight, or even ten o'clock. A chicken or some other article was placed on the spit every fifteen minutes by order of the cook, who knew well the habits of the emperor. The table manners of Napoleon may have been those of the hero: they were certainly anything but those of the gentleman. He completed the process of cramming—it could scarcely be called eating—in six or seven minutes, as a rule. Ignoring the use of knives and forks as regarded his own plate, he did not stop there, but "helped himself with his fingers from the dishes nearest him, and dipped his bread in the gravy." Knowing the time necessary for the emperor to dine, the shrewder ones took care to dine in advance. Eugene once confessed this at the dinner-table, much to the amusement of the emperor. Josephine always quitted the table with Napoleon, but with her never-failing consideration for the comfort of others she commanded the rest, by a gesture as she rose, to remain.

No one can excuse Napoleon for that domineering spirit toward Josephine which made him forbid her to receive, when she became empress, her old associates who he knew were tried and true friends. A letter from Josephine to the duchesse d'Aguillon, a former fellow-captive and a sincere friend, throws some light upon Napoleon's motive. She writes, among other things on the same subject, "The more I think of what my friends did for me, the greater is my sorrow at being unable to do now what my heart dictates. The empress of France is but the first slave in the empire, and cannot pay the debts of Madame de Beauharnais. This constitutes the torture of my life, and will explain why you