Louis Napoleon erzählt Hortense, dass das einzige, was ihn am Leben hielt, sie war.
Napoleon Louis Bonaparte
This is the story of how Hortense Bonaparte’s sons were lured into a revolution they couldn’t win which resulted in the death of her beloved son.
…
At the moment I retrace my steps. The shortest route must lead me near my son.
I have only one idea; fly close to him, treat him if there is still time, alas! and I feel seized by a deep frustration.
The blow has already been beyond my strength. I may say to myself: "I was too unhappy, no, that is not possible!
The sky is fair; that would be too much! Ah! No, he won't die!” He will be returned to me, and yet I remain without strength and without courage.
This messenger sent from Forli, the figure of all those around me, augers me a terrible misfortune!
I dare not question! Uncertainty is another blessing. However, I hear these dreadful words at each post, constantly repeated by the people around my car: "Napoleon dead! Napoleon dead!”
I can hear it and I don't believe it ... I was dead too, no doubt, because I felt nothing, I asked nothing. I don't know where I am being taken for a day and a night, and everything seems to be indifferent to me.
I arrive however in Pesaro, in the palace of my nephew. I am carried inanimate on a bed, and it is there that my unhappy son Louis comes to rush into my arms, bursting into tears, and informs me that he is now alone in this world, that he has lost his brother, his best friend, and that without me he would also have also died of grief but he didn’t want to cause me to die too.
I cannot paint these heartbreaking moments! My hand trembles, and I find it hard to continue! ... Ah! a mother's despair is eternal! Nothing calms it, nothing diminishes it.
The only consolation of a mother is in the hope of the short duration of her existence! But in this dreadful moment, I remembered that the state in which I saw the son I had left. It alone forced me to recall my courage.
He had to be saved, he who lost the tender companion of his life, he who wanted to die too! I still don't know where I could find the strength I needed; but finally I got it.
…
C’est l’histoire de la façon dont les fils d’Hortense Bonaparte ont été attirés par une révolution qu’ils n’ont pas pu gagner, ce qui a entraîné la mort de son fils bien-aimé.
Dies ist die Geschichte, wie Hortense's Söhne in eine Revolution gelockt wurden, die sie nicht gewinnen konnten, was zum Tod ihres geliebten Sohnes führte.
