Napoleon's Young Neighbour. By Helen Leah Reed. (Little, Brown, and
Co., Boston, U.S. 6s.)—In 1841 a Mrs. Abell pub- lished a book entitled "Recollections of Napoleon at St. Helena." Mrs. Abell was one of the daughters of a Mr. Balcombe, who was a resident at St. Helena when Napoleon was brought there in the autumn of 1815. The ex-Emperor's residence at Longwood was under process of repair, and Mr. Balcombe offered the use of a house adjoining his own. His children, terrified as they had been when they first heard who was coming to the island, soon became friends, " Betsy " being the leader among them. The friendship was kept up when Napoleon took up his residence at Longwood, and continued till the Balcombe family left the island. This " Betsy " became in after days Mrs. Abell. "The present writer," says Miss Reed in her preface,' "without alterin'g any words of Napoleon's, has, so far as possible, given a vivid form to conversations and incidents related undramati- cally, and has rearranged incidents that Mrs. Abell told without great attention to chronology." We must own that we should have preferred a reprint of the work as it stands. " Betsy " was a most audacious young person, and we should like to see what she says for herself. On one occasion she showed Napoleon a portrait of the Due d'Enghien. The great man thought it worth while to lie to the child. "I ordered his execution, for he was a conspirator, and had landed troops in the pay of the Bourbons to assassinate me." Every syllable of that is false. We have no sympathy with Miss Reed's sentimental complaints of British treatment of the ex-Emperor. If he had surrendered to any other Power he would have been shot at once.
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