of Rome. Then suddenly the pageantry dissolves, and Emperor, kings, and
queens become subjects again. Has imagination ever dreamed anything
wilder than this? The dramatic interest of this story will always
attract, but there is a deeper one. The secret spring of all those rapid
changes, and the real cause of the great interest humanity will always
feel in the story of those eventful times, is to be found in Napoleon's
own explanation--"A career open to talents, without distinction of
birth." Till that day the accident of birth was the key to every honor
and every position. No man could hold even a lieutenancy in the army who
could not show four quarterings on his coat of arms.

It was as the "armed apostle of democracy" that Napoleon went forth
conquering and to conquer. He declared at St. Helena that he "had always
marched supported by the opinions of six millions of men."

The old woman who met him incognito climbing the hill of Tarare, and
replying to his assertion that "Napoleon was only a tyrant like the
rest," exclaimed, "It may be so, but the others are the kings of the
nobility, while he is one of us, and we have chosen him ourselves,"
expressed a great truth. As long as Napoleon represented popular
sovereignty he was invincible; but when, deeming himself strong enough to
stand alone, he endeavored to conciliate the old order of things, and,
divorcing the daughter of the people, took for a bride the daughter of
kings and allied himself with them--at that moment, like another Samson,
"his strength departed from him." Disasters came as they had come to him
before, but this time the heart of the people was no longer with him. He
fell.

This man has been studied as a soldier, a statesman, an organizer, a
politician. In all he was undeniably great. But men will always like to