I do not like them. They are my enemies,
and prove it by defaming."
This was but the morning twilight of that imperial splendor which
afterward dazzled the most powerful potentates of Europe. Hortense,
who subsequently became the wife of Louis Bonaparte, and the mother
of Louis Napoleon, who, at the moment of this present writing, is
at the head of the government of France, was then seventeen years
of age. "She was," Madame Junot, "fresh as a rose. Though her fair
complexion was not relieved by much color, she had enough to produce
that freshness and bloom which was her chief beauty. A profusion of
light hair played in silken locks around her soft and penetrating
blue eyes. The delicate roundness of her figure, slender as
a palm-tree, was set off by the elegant carriage of her head. But
that which formed the chief attraction of Hortense was the grace
and suavity of her manners, which united the Creole nonchalance
with the vivacity of France. She was gay, gentle, and amiable. She
had wit, which, without the smallest ill-temper, had just malice
enough to be amusing. A polished and well-conducted education had
improved her natural talents.
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