When Napoleon returned from Elba, the situation of Marie Louise, so far
from improving, became only more difficult. She had no illusions about
the fate that awaited her audacious husband, who was unable to contend,
single-handed, against all Europe. She knew better than any one, not
only that he had nothing to hope from the Emperor of Austria, his
father-in-law, but that in this sovereign he would find a bitter,
implacable foe. As to the Emperor Alexander, he swore that he would
sacrifice his last ruble, his last soldier, before he would consent to
let Napoleon reign in France. Marie Louise knew too well the feeling
that animated the Congress at Vienna, to imagine that her husband had
the slightest chance of success. She was convinced that by returning
from Elba, he was only preparing for France a new invasion, and for
himself chains. Since she was a prisoner of the Coalition, she was
condemned to widowhood, even in the lifetime of her husband. She cannot
then be blamed for remaining at Vienna, whence escape was absolutely
impossible.

Marie Louise committed one great error; that, namely, of writing that
inasmuch as she was entirely without part in the plans of the Emperor
Napoleon, she placed herself under the protection of the Allies,--Allies
who at that very moment were urging the assassination of her husband,
in the famous declaration of March 13, 1815, in which they said: "By
breaking the convention, which established him on the island of Elba,
Bonaparte has destroyed the only legal title on which his existence
depended. By reappearing in France, with plans of disturbance and
turmoil, he has, by his own act, forfeited the protection of the laws,
and has shown to the world that there can be no peace or truce with him
as a party. The Powers consequently declare that Napoleon Bonaparte has
placed himself outside of all civil and social relations, and that as an