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156 if his brother had not interfered with his affairs after his second entry into Madrid, he would be still governing Spain. This is explained by another striking trait of the character of the Bonapartes. No sooner had they set their feet on the path leading to Royal honours, than those most intimate with them were never to see them for a single instant belie the seriousness with which they took the highest positions; they even ended in believing that they had been called to them as a matter of course. They had the instinct of their greatness. Joseph displays at the very outset of the elevation of his brother such impatience to see himself in possession of a rank worthy of him that Napoleon was wont to say laughingly: 'I do believe that Joseph is sometimes tempted to think that I have robbed my eldest brother of the inheritance of the King, our father.

Napoleon's sisters behaved in a similar way:—

"Of the three sisters the eldest almost reigned in Tuscany under the title of Grand Duchess. She made herself beloved there, and this fortunate province owed to her a gentle treatment denied to all other countries then united with France. She has left a pleasant memory behind her, in spite of