The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-03-28
Al ACCI0.
LOCAL TALES or THE BONd-
 PARTIES.

PARTIES.
 t The House in St. Charles Street as 1
 Was When All the Family Were a
 Home-Letitia, the Peasant Mother O
 Kings, and Her Husband. the Impov.
 erished Notary-Tho Boy Napoleone
 Whom His PIaymates Nicknamed
 "straw-Nose."
 V Especial Correspondence of the Journal
 and Courier)
 Aiaccio Corsica, March 1-Asida
 from it's natural beauties, this seques- 7 tered island capital is not rich in
 points of interest"-its one attraction
 being the boyhood home of the greatest
 man of modern times. The guide-book
 says 1t is in the Rue San Carlo, Place de
 Letitia; and on seeking the locality, z you are surprised to find a dirty alley,
 barely eight feet wide, faced by a
 square the size of a bedblanket, but
 brilliant with flowers The celebrated house is in no way distinguished from
 Its neighbors of equally unprepossess-
 ing exterior, except by marble tablet
 above it's closed door, inscribed in weather dimmed letters Casa de Bon
 aparte." Yet it was evidently one of X the best houses of it's day in Corsca---a four-storied, plain-fronted structure
 succeed yellowish- grey, with tiled flat
 roof topped by a square observatory,
 and many windows shaded by the ever lasting grey jalousies that cover every
 easement in Ajaccio. Both square and street are entirely deserted and your knocks upon the heavily timbered door # being no response until at last a fe- male voice, behind the shutters at the end of the Place." Thither you hie; with the result that the Bonaparte door is finally unlocked by dilatory old wo- man of voluable tongue whose strange ratois of mingled French, Spanish and Italian renders the information sine pours forth we'll nigh null and void
 As in all the older houses of the Lat in world, there is little to be seen on the first floor of the historic home-even the Kitchens being on the second. A short flight of stone stairs goes straight up from the front entrance, without the preliminary of libby or hall. Under the stairs are closed doors, suggesting off, 3ces. The house runs back long way, and all this ground space once an- swered the manifold purpose of Stable, barn yard and wood-shed, she1tering the family cow, horses, pigs and fowls, according to universal Corsican custom. Beneath this ground f1oor--so says the Corcierage-are extensive wine vaults and storage cellars, having side doors opening into the streets that surround the place on three sides. Like a flash, a long forgotten incident of history re- CUTS ito your mind-how the young off, ccr Napoleon, who had not yet won his spurs, escaped this way after his quar- rel with the patriot, General Paoli The | latter was sent to arrest him as a trai tor to the Corsican cause. By trap | door in the floor of his room, the future 1 emperor descended to the wine vaults and thence made his way to a vessed ly- ing in port, already hoisting her sails. l Had he been taken he would surely | have been shot-and the history of Eu- rope for the next quarter of century would have made very different reading from that of to-day.
 Following the guide up the stairs ynur hand on the same rusty iron rail which tile hands of all the Bonapartes have pressed, and your feet in hollows of the stones which their feet have worn--you come to broad landing at the second floor. On either side are slightly ornamented, double folding doors and, looking lip, you observe the n+ lao iy,1 oA fourth floors of shallow steps doubling back upon themselves to landings. Af- ter much fumbling with her keys-now- allays seldom used-the woman throws open the right-hand door, and you enter a great, square drawingroom. There IS but one window, and that is curtain less Dingy tapestry adorns the walls, Dn which are several mirrors and small pictures In frames of tarnished gilt. The floor Is ,inlaid with hexagonal red nags in the Corsican fashion. In the center, under a crystal chandelier, stands table of dark wood, with white marble top that looks like a tomb stone; and around the four sides of the roon1, ranged in straight rows, as for a 'uneral, are at least twenty chairs and .wo high -backed sofas, all upholstered n faded green silk brocade and with ,lender, claw-footed legs. Nothing lere looks the least bit home-like, hough said to have been restored to ! precisely it's former state by the ex- Empress Eugenie, who owns the house, t having been willed to her by Napole- III III. Adjoining this is the study, or private Iffice, of Napoleon's father, M. Carlo :, Maria Bonaparte, who, as you know, vas solicitor, without much practice ind proud as he was poor If this was V lis furniture, he must have been rath- I r extravagant for an impecunious mo- | ary. Even the dressing-case is a gem,eJ T of purest ray serene" It is very large h nd elaborate made of choicest inlaid t woods, all the borders and pigeonholes e eweled with elegant little plaques of c apis lazuli and other stones. How E ne yearns to run away with that bu- t eau. whose counterpart, aside from Il istoric associations, probably does not u xist! The several mirrors--(how fond r nose Bonapartes must have been of D joking at themselves, for there are at u ,ast a hundred in the house)-are in cl nlicates frames of lace-work filagree Is ,e gliding long since darkened, like the u ,.4,,,,at, of tba fa y,1iI1r Tha ayolliSita1V w