A VALENTINE. HAT shall I send my sweet to-day, I'll send a locket full of hair; But no, for it might chance to lie Near to her heart, and I should die Of Love's sweet envy to be there! A violet were meet to give ; Yet stay!-she'd touch it with her lips, I'll send a kiss, for that will be The quickest sent, the lightest borne, She'll send another back to me. Go, happy winds, ah! do not stay, M. BETHAM-EDWARDS. THE MAJORCAN ORIGIN OF THE FAMILY OF BUONAPARTE. IVE-AND-TWENTY years ago, situated behind the parochial church of San Jaime, at Palma, the capital of the Balearic Islands, there stood a house which still presented the appearance of having once been a handsome edifice, and which from time immemorial had borne the name of Casa Buonaparte. In 1846 a journal of Palma, El Propog idor Balear, took occasion therefrom, and from the corroborative testimony of the documents produced and cited upon the following occasion, to establish the certainty that the family of Napoleon I. was originally native of that island, i.e. Majorcan. The article appeared to me so interesting at the time that I transcribed it, and reproduce it here in an English dress from one of my old "note-books": "A traveller strolling one day through the streets of Palma, on arriving in front of the Casa Buonaparte was observed by an aged ecclesiastic, who at the moment was looking out of one of the windows, to stop suddenly; and, after surveying the house from base to roof, contemplate with marked interest the architectural grandeur of its front. "The bearing of the stranger, no less than the decorations on his breast, of which one was the crimson ribbon and cross of the Legion of Honour, indicated him to be a French military officer of distinguished rank who had passed through the wars of the Empire. Too much engrossed with the interesting object of his contemplation, some moments elapsed before he became conscious that he was himself an object of marked attention to the venerable ecclesiastic at the open window, who, as he now caught the less occupied gaze of the stranger, with a courteous inclination of the head, addressed him in the French language as follows:-- "Your surprise, monsieur, seems great at the architectural beauty of the façade of this house, and you may with reason consider it worthy of admiration. But you would admire it yet more if you knew that it is the house whence issued the progenitors of the man who has filled the world with his fame, and made his name a proud title to the admiration and love of your countrymen. If you would desire to see the interior, I shall be most happy to gratify your wish. Pray enter; and I will show you the apartment where the ancestors of Napoleon were born, and the roof, now blackened by time, beneath which the life, traditions, and fortunes of his family were fostered during three centuries.' "While thus addressed by the venerable and sympathising ecclesiastic, the manly countenance of the enthusiastic Buonapartist was lit up with the deep-felt joy and sentiment of thankfulness which the words and courteous invitation of the speaker had kindled in his breast. The name of Napoleon, coupled with circumstances of such local and historical interest, could not other than deeply move him, dispelling the doubt and uncertainty on the subject of the identity of that house of which he had received some vague information from the host of his hotel on the previous evening. As one whom the bullets of Jena and Mont St. Jean had respected, he felt privileged in the gratification of his curiosity, courteously accepting the welcome invitation. "The officer at once entered the house, and ascended the stone staircase, at the top of which the ecclesiastic received him with the most charming geniality of manner. The first object to which he directed the attention of his visitor was a large, stone-sculptured armorial shield placed above the door which gave entry into the spacious salon of the 'Casa Buonaparte.' "Look at that escutcheon,' said the priest; 'you will there see that same eagle that you have beheld gleaming above the standards of the great man of our age. The eagle was the military insignia which the Majorcan Buonapartes bore upon their banners and shields; and if the armies of Napoleon added thereto the thunderbolt of Jupiter in the claws of the king of birds, it was to indicate that Napoleon was the bearer of war's thunder, or rather to announce to the nations his Imperial apotheosis, after the manner of the emperors of Ancient Rome. The glory your countrymen have acquired on the battlefield they owe to Napoleon; and, as I perceive, you have served under him for many years. I can comprehend and excuse the pride you feel at thus being beneath its roof. This is the cradle of his race!' "To dispel any doubt you may have entertained on the subject, I will here show you a document I am possessed of,' taking it from an antique carved oaken bookcase, the shelves of which were filled in compact array with volumes and parchment-bound MSS. Here,' Majorcan Origin of the Family of Buonaparte. 221 said he, is the Royal Decree by which, on the 23rd July, 1409, Martin I., King of Aragon, rewarded the services of Doctor Hugo Buonaparte, Majorcan, by nominating him Regente (Chief Judiciary President) of Corsica. That magistrate, born in this very house, is the direct ancestor of Napoleon, and the first of that family who established himself in the other island. He it was who there founded the illustrious stock from which in course of time was to issue the great man whose war-genius humbled the proudest thrones of continental Europe. "What I have now told you is furthermore proved by this other document,' taking from the same compartment of the MSS. another similarly skin-bound collection of parchments. Here you will see the legal powers given and conferred by the same Regente upon the 27th May, 1419, to his brother, Bartoloméo Buonaparte, to sell all the possessions and properties which he had left but still held in Majorca, and to remit to him the product, by reason of his resolve to remain and settle definitively in Corsica with the children already borne to him by his wife, Juana de Saucis. These two documents bear, as you will perceive, in themselves every authenticity necessary to obtain and give credit to their contents. They prove that in the second decennium of the fifteenth century a Buonaparte passed from Majorca into the Island of Corsica, where he established himself and begot children, who became the stock and progenitors of the Corsican family of the Buonapartes, and of Napoleon. "Now lend me your attention yet a little longer, and listen to this letter, written to the author of 'The Chronicles of Majorca,' Don Geronimo Alemany, by a learned Jesuit of the College of Trilingue, whom various affairs having relation to his society had obliged to proceed to Corsica : "To Señor D. Geronimo de Alemany. "Ajaccio, May 23, 1752. "MY DEAR SENOR,-Desirous to fulfil the commission that M. Herarger charged me to execute for you, I visited and searched all the public archives of this city. As result of my labours, I have to inform you that from several documents preserved therein it is attested that the family of Buonaparte, originally from Majorca, first began here in the person of Hugo Buonaparte, who was Regente of this island about the year 1418, and before whom no similar name is to be found in Corsica. In further result of my researches, I found that the sons of that Regente, by name Stephano, Ferdinando, and Andréa, became persons of distinction; that they obtained upon several occasions offices of mark in the Republic,* in the class of patricians; and that since the fifteenth century until the present day the Buonapartes have been lords of Baetria. I think that this will suffice to convince you of the identity of the Majorcan and Corsican families. 66 6 They are most assuredly one and the same race, if what M. Herarger has told me on your part be true. But he added before my departure for Marseilles that the Majorcan house was become extinct. That of Corsica still subsists, and reckons many members, of whom Hermanno and Carlos Buonaparte are both established in Tuscany. "That God, our Lord, may preserve your life, is the prayer of your Servant and Brother in Jesus Christ, "EUSEBIO CAssar, "Of the Society of Jesus.' "Do you not see, monsieur,' said the venerable ecclesiastic, 'do you not see in that Charles Buonaparte the husband of Lætita Ramolino, and in both the parents of the First Consul, of the Emperor and King of Italy ?"" JOHN LEIGHTON, F.S.A. • Corsica was at this time a dependency of the Genoese Republic. |