Page:Napoleon (O'Connor 1896).djvu/312

296 an outspokenness that may prove a little, trying even to an age that has grown so much less squeamish than it used to be. I should say at once that M. Masson is a devoted and almost blind worshipper of the central figure of his book; and that if one were to believe the picture which he presents—I am sure in perfect good faith—one would be obliged to regard Napoleon as one of the gentlest, sweetest, and most amiable men. His faults would be an excess—instead of a defect—of sensibility. Of that other side of Napoleon—which we know from many pages—in his relations to women, M. Masson gives us not even a trace.

Let us take M. Masson's very interesting and very industriously compiled volume as we find it; if we cannot accept his conclusions or his portrait, at least let us be grateful to the superabundance of material for forming our own conclusions and our own image which his marvellous industry has placed at our disposal.

In spite of all I have already written about Josephine, I make no apology for quoting largely from M. Masson's description of her.

There is an everlasting fascination about the story of her life with that strange and marvellous creature whom she married. Even her defects of character lend an additional interest to the subject; a woman quiet, decorous, certain, stable, would have been a much worthier person, and, perchance, would have made Napoleon much