Generally speaking, diamonds under one carat were worthless, and even a one-carat diamond was beyond the means of ordinary citizens. Yet Napoleon's wedding ring for Josephine had consisted of two one-carat diamonds. To Bonaparte now, that was nothing at all, but back then, it had been the limit of what he could afford.
Georgiana looked at the amethyst ring on her hand, its setting encircled by tiny diamonds. It was her "spoils" from earlier. It was who knew how much larger than that little wedding ring, yet she did not feel happy in the slightest.
Many memories lay dormant. They were not useless information the brain cleared away each day and quickly forgot. They had been recorded, though one normally could not sense their existence, until something suddenly brought them to mind.
Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace was a very thick book. Though it had been written around 1870, it told the story of the War of 1812. One scene described the protagonist, Pierre Bezukhov, observing a huge, brilliant comet in the sky. Some believed that comet foretold all manner of hardship and the end of the world. Not long afterward came Napoleon's invasion of Russia and the War of 1812.
The ancients believed that the relative positions and movements of celestial bodies could explain human destiny. Astrologers and prophets alike could predict the future. Comets were usually regarded as bad omens, but people after the French Revolution did not believe in such superstition.
The original prophecy spoke of a prince appearing in a ravaged Europe. He would resist the obscurantism and political persecution that threatened people without restraint, becoming a protector of humanity, justice, and culture. That prince did not refer to the Bourbons, much less specifically name the Duke of Enghien. After disbanding the armies formed by the