THE EMPRESS AND HER ONEEYED LOVER.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LX, Issue 17061, 14 August 1917, Page 6

THE EMPRESS AND HER ONEEYED LOVER.

TEE STORY OF A WOMAN WHO COULD NOT LIVE WITHOUT LOVE.

When Napoleon 1., his Imperial throne tumbled in the dust, was on -is tragic way to Elba and exile, hh :•;.:,- press, Marie Louise, accompanied • ■ brilliant retinue and with an escort ... Austrian soldiers, was making a plp-.s-ure-jaunt through Europe, revelling >n her freedom and in the regal entertainments that everywhere awaited her. She was without a thought for the husband who had placed a crown on her head and surrounded her with splendour and affection. That his life and his dreams lay in ruins only served to aou a zest to her pursuit of gaiety. Three delightful months she spent on her journey before she came to Aix, where she was to take the waters; aim here she was welcomed at the entrance to the' town by a man who, althouga she little suspected it, was destined to play a very important part in her life, and who, as he stooped in courtly fashion over her hand, gave his name as Adam Albert de Neipperg.

A GALLANT SOLDIER

Verging on middle-age, with the erect, stalwart figure of a soldier, with fair curly hah- and a ruddy complexion, de Neipperg was a goodly man to look upon, in spite of the black bandage which he always wore over his right eye destroyed in battle. He was, in fact, Austria's most gallant soldier, a man who had won laurels on many battlefields ; a corn-tier, too, to the tips of his fingers, and an "Admiral Crichton" in accomplishments, with a reputation for gallantry such as few men in Europe enjoyed.

Such was the man whom Prince Metternich had deputed to play host and entertainer in his place to the ex,-Emprej»s during her stay in Aix, with the disappointing result that, we are told, "ne produced a disagreeable impression on the mind of Marie Louise, and she made no attemot to conceal it."

So far, however, from being chilled fry her coldness, which was tinged with ill-concealed contempt, Niepperg was so assured of his powers that, a few days later, he wrote to a friend: " Before two months are over I shall be her lover, and, not long after that, her husband."

At Aix Marie Louise found her appetite for distraction and gaiety abundently satisfied. Eveyr holr was crowded with pleasure, and in all her splendours, whether presiding oyer her brilliant Court, or when she would fling aside her royal dignity, and join r'n. some bourgeois dance or revels, her oneeyed cavalier was always 'by her side whispering flatteries into her ears and surrounding her with delicate ministrations.

HOPELESSLY IN LOVE

Under the influence of his subtle tongue and his courtly homage, her coldness had already given way to admiration and friendship, which in turn were succeeded by love and a consuming passion.

Thus it was that, when she turned her back on Aix, she left behind her her retinue and her escort and contfiued her journey with Niepperg alone for companion. And while Napoleon 'n distant Elba was counting the hours before his wife would join him, she was spending halcyon days among the glories of Switzerland, the Comte de Neipperg supporting her among the perils of precipices and glaciers, or watching her with his guitar and love-songs "s they floated, the world forgetting, on some moonlit laJ\e.

For Marie Louise there was now but one man in all the world. She was, we are told, hopelessly in love with her one-eyed Comte, and no longer even took the trouble to hide her strange in« fatuation for the man to whom she belonged heart and soul.

To the letters of Napoleon, eating his heart out in distant Elba, she returned no answer. For the most part they were destroyed unread. His protestations of undying love, his pathetic appeals to her to come to him, only provoked laughter and expressions of impatience and contempt. Her one ambition now was to secure the Duchy of Parma, thatt she might have a kingdom of her own to share with her beloved Neipperg; and.when this ambition was realised her cup c happiness was full to overflowing. But her triumph was short-lived, for, before her jubilation wa.^ nvinv day* i*'". i■■ -

terrible news flashed through Europe that Napoleon had escaped from Elba and was on his way back to France. And, worse still, Neipperg was soon taken from her s~ae to lead the Austrian army to oppose Murat's advance in ItaLv.

Then for Marie Louise followed a few months of terrible anrdety for her lovsr exposed to the perils of war, before she was restored to happiness by the " glorious news" that her husband had beeu finally crushed on the field of Waterloo and was on his way to his last exile ?n St. Helena.

Then followed the crowning day of her life, when she made her. royal entry into Parma, with her warrior, "in a gorgeous costume embroidered with gold," by her side, to the clashing of bells from sixty steeples, the jubilant blare of trumpets and the tmultnous cbeers of her subjects crowding the gaily-flagged streets of her capital. Sho had now reached the supreme goal of her happiness; she was a queen n'n her own right, and she had for consort in all but name the man she loved.

FORGOT HER HUSBAND

No thought of the husband whose life was ebbing out in loneliness and i>ain on St. Helena came to shadow the lie of splendiur and gaiety that was1 now hers.

And 'when, one day in 1820, the Church blessed her union with Neinperg the fact that Napoleon was still draining the dregs of his life, in St. Helena, did not disturb "the pride and pleasure with which the joy of her life wo-, consummated."

When a year later news reached her that Napoleon—loyal to her and loving her devotedly to her la«t grasp—was rl^nd php w"i,te to her "Chere Victoire.1' "I confers I am extremely shocked. Although I never had any deep feeling for him, T. cannot forget thnt he is the father of my son. You will be sorry to l?arn that T have been so dreadfully bitten in the face by gnats that I look a monster, and am r*lad not to be nli''-void to show rnvself."

Thus heartlessly did she refer to the death of thp husband whose last wish. oonfHed to his doctor, was. "I wish you to nlace my heart in spirits of wine. nnd take it to mv beloved Louise a+. Parma. You will tell her that T loved her dearly and have never ceased to do so.

OTHER LOVERS

Thus in the frivolous pursuit of rjle.ns'U'p passed another dn7.en years befor? Neinnpre was taken from her. and she was left diseovisolnte +n mourn th" I<~>ss of "the best husband, the most faithful friend. pvA nil my worldly harrpiness"; and to rni=p oVp.r his cri^avo p monument in Cnrrara marble for which