• Paperback
• Condition: Very Good
• 265 pages
• Non-Fiction: Biography, History

The liaison between the twenty-year-old Countess Marie Walewska and Napoleon, the thirty-seven-year-old conqueror of Europe, is one of the most famous love affairs of history. The day after they met at a ball, Marie received a letter covered with the green imperial seals, which left her in no doubt as to the Emperor's intentions: 'I saw no one but you, I admired only you; I want no one but you; I beg you to reply promptly to calm my ardour and impatience. Napoleon.'

But this breathtaking romance would lead to Napoleon's downfall, for Napoleon had previously believed himself to be infertile. When Marie conceived a child his ambitions changed: he made a dynastic marriage to the Archduchess Marie Louise of Austria and so put in train the events that would lead to Elba.