A court was to be constructed, and that right speedily. After the gloomy tragedy of the overthrow of the Republic, France was to be treated to the grand spectacular piece of the Second Empire. And for that a _corps de ballet_ and trained supernumeraries were needed. The rôle of leading lady, too, was vacant. An empress was to be sought for without delay. Negotiations were opened with several princely houses for the hands of damsels of royal birth, but speedily came to naught. As yet, the new-made emperor was a parvenu amid his royal contemporaries. The negotiations for the hand of the Swedish princess Vasa did indeed promise at one time to be crowned with success. But the emperor sent his physician to take a look at the lady, and to judge if her physique promised healthful and numerous offspring; and this fact, coming to the ears of her family, caused a sudden stop to be put to the whole affair. Meantime, at the reunions of Compiègne, the personality of a young and lovely foreign countess was coming prominently into notice, owing to the evident impression that her charms had made upon the susceptible heart of Napoleon III. This lady, Eugénie Montijo, countess de Teba, was no longer in the first bloom of girlhood, having been born in 1826. But she was in the full meridian of a beauty which, had the crown matrimonial of France, like the apple of Até, been dedicated to the fairest, would have ensured her the throne by sheer right divine. It is indeed said that as a young girl her charms were in no wise remarkable: on her first appearance in society at the court of Madrid she created no sensation whatever. She was too pale and quiet-looking to attract attention. But one day, the court being at Aranjuez, during a _fête champêtre_, Mademoiselle de Montijo had the good or ill fortune to fall into one of the ornamental fishponds in the garden. She was taken out insensible, and her wet and clinging garments revealed a form of such statuesque perfection that all Madrid went raving about her beauty. She plunged a commonplace girl--she rose a Venus. And when she first attracted the notice of Napoleon she was indisputably one of the loveliest women in Europe. She was tall, slender, exquisitely proportioned, and her walk was that of a goddess. Her features were delicate and regular; her eyes long, almond-shaped, and full of a tender and dreamy sweetness: her small and faultlessly-shaped head was set upon a long, slender neck with the swaying grace of a lily upon its stalk; her shoulders were sloping and beautifully moulded, notwithstanding her lack of embonpoint, for in those days she was as slight as a reed. A profusion of fair hair--which she wore turned back from the face in the graceful style known as "à la Pompadour," but speedily to be rechristened "à l'Impératrice"--and a hand and foot of truly royal beauty completed an ensemble of charms that were well calculated to drive poor masculine humanity out of its seven senses.