The Evening dispatch. [volume] (Provo, City, Utah) 1891-1895, 1895-06-21
YOUNG NAPOLEON DgsPoNDENT.
sad News From Bis Home Made the Az
tilleryman Talk of Suicide.


tilleryman Talk of Suicide.
Early in August, 1887, little rebel
lion, known as the "Two Cent Revolt, "
broke out in Lyons over an attempt to
reassert an ancient feudal right concern
ing the sale of wine which had long
been in allegiance. The neighboring gar.
risons were ordered to furnish their re-
spective quotas for its suppression.
Bonaparte's company was sent among
the others, but the disturbance was al
ready auelled when he arrived, and the
month he spent at Lyons was SO agree
able that, as he wrote his uncle Fesch,
he left the city with regret ''to follow
his destiny" His regiment had been
ordered northward to Douay, in Flan-
ders, and there he rejoined it about the
middle Of October.
The short time he spent under the in.
clement skies of that frontier fortress
was dreary one Bad news came from
home. Joseph had some time before
turned his eyes toward Tusc~ny for a
possible career. In order to test his
chances of success at court, he had made
application for an empty decoration
The answer to his request had been
gracious permission to prove his Tuscan
nationality, which was Of course equiv
alent to repulse. Utterly without suo-
cess in finding occupation in Corsica
and hopeless as &c France, he was now
about to make a final desperate effort,
and, decorated or not, to go in person to
Florence and to seek employment of any
kind which offered. Lucien, the arch.
deacon, was seriously i'll, and General
Marbeuf, the last influential friend Of
the family, was dead. Louis had been
promised scholarship in one of the
royal artillery schools. Deprived Of his
patron, he would probably lose the ap-
pointment
Finally the pecuniary affairs of Nine.
Ge Bonaparte were again entangled and
now appeared hopeless. She had for
some time received state bounty for
planting mulberry trees, as France was
Introducing silk culture into the island.
The inspectors had condemned the years
work and were withholding the allow.
ance. Her letter put an end for time
to all study, historical or political. Ma
poleon Immediately applied, as his
mother requested, for leave of absence,
that he might instantly set out to her
relief His request was refused. He
oouId obtain no leave until January.
Dependent and anxious, he moped,
grew miserable and contracted slight
malarial fever, which for the next six
or seven years never entirely relaxed
its hold on him. The pages of his jour-
nal for the ensuing weeks show how
dispirited he was, and contain, among
other things, long, wild, pessimistic
rhapsody, in which there is talk of sui
eide The plant is of the degeneraoy
among men, of the destruction of prim-
tive simplicity in Corsica by the French
occupation, of his own isolation and OF
his yearning to see his friends onte
more. Life is no longer worth while.
His country gone, patriot has naugh3 to
live for, specially when he has no pleas
IRE and all is pain, when the ohGao-
ter of those about him is to his own al
moonlight to sunlight. If there wers
but single life in his way, he would
bury the avenging blade Of his oountry
and her violated laws in the bosorn Of
the tyrant Some Of his complaining
was even less coherent than this. 1t is
absurd to take the morbid outpouring
seriously, except in so far az it goes to
prove that its writer was victim Of
the sentimental egoism into which the
psychological studies of tie eighteenth
century had degenerated and to sug
gest that possibly if he had not been
Napoleon he might have been Wer.
ther.-ProfessoI Sloane's Life of Napo
leon" in Century.