The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1913-12-20

the emperor, ngnted by the faithful
mameluke through the deserted corri-
doris, enters the little kings apart
ments. With gesture, he dismisses
the nurse and the other women sud-
denly aroused from their sleep; and
he remains alone, standing beore the
cradle of the infant prodigy.
The king of Rome slumbers peace
fully on the white linen and laces,
crossed by the red ribbon of the
Legion of Honor, his delicate little
face with it's closed eyes rests on his
pillow, and his little hand, dainty,
plump, adorable, forms pretty spot
on the coverlet. Across this figure of
candor and purity the scarlet ribbon
passes like the stream of blood which
will one day be shed in the hope that
this fragile head may bear the heav-
| lest of crowns, and that this little
hand, now sweet as flower, may later
clutch cluster of scepters. Napoleon
contemplates his son. He dreams
and never did mortal pride caress
more deliciously the heart of man. He
sees the high dignitaries of his court,
his general, more illustrious than even
the heroes of Homer, his ministers, his
senators in their gold-laced uniforms
bowling before that cradle with tremb-
ling respect; the renegade Jacobins
themselves, the old regicides who now
wear the imperial livery, scarcely dar-
ing to covet the favor of kissing that
| little hand
He dreams and, in the instinct
| clamor of the bells ringing for the
midnight Mass, he thinks he hears
the footstep of troops and the roll of
canon far away upon the frozen roads
of Germany and Poland. In the in
toxication of his paternal ambition, he
thinks more than ever of the grand
army, of the conquest of Russia, of the
Indies. He has decided that his son
shall inherit all the thrones of the
old world. For his first toy has he
not already given him the city of st.
Peter? and soon he will add to it other
holy cities. Emir of Mecca! Rajah
of Benares! Those are titles worthy
of the king of Rome! Why do the
women of France not bear more sons?
Why has he not at his command-he
the invincible captain-one million,
two millions of soldiers? The whole
universe, the globe of the world, he
could then place in that tiny hand.
He dreams, deaf to the song of the
sacred bells. He thinks of Him who
reigns in Heaven, who looks down
upon the mightiest empires as if they
were nole-hills. He dreams-and he
sees not in the future his enormous
army buried under the SHOWS of Rus
| STA, swallowed under the ice of Bere-
zina. He sees not the last trophies of
his eagles, and the sacred battalion of
Waterloo mown down by the English
bullets. He sees not in the middle of
the ocean rock upon which are pre-
pared for him the tortures of Prone
theus. He sees not under an autumn
sky in the park of Schoenbrunn this
pale and sad young man wearing upon
| his white uniform the star of an Aus
trian order, who coughs while he walks
over the dead leaves.
And, while the emperor, pursuing
his monstrous chimera, dreams of the
reign of his son, of the heirs of his
son over the whole universe, and sees
himself at the end of the centuries
fabulous hero, myth, a new Mars,
Sun-God Respondent in the Zodiac,
surrounded by this twelve marshals,
the bells still ring joyously, triumph
antly, frantically in honor of the poor
/
nineteen hundred years ago, who
truly conquered the world, not through
blood and victories, but because He
brought with Him the word of peace
and love. And He shall reign over
souls, "in saecula saeculorum!'-
Translated from the French of Francois Con-
pee, bD Count ". LedocholUski.