As to these
details, Josephine St. Auban knew little. There was enough to
occupy her mind at the center of these affairs, where labors grew
rapidly and quite beyond her original plan.
As is always the case in such hopeless enterprises, the expenses
multiplied beyond belief. True, contributions came meagerly from
the North, here and there some abolitionist appearing who would do
something besides write and preach. In all, more than a half
million dollars was spent before the end of the year 1851. Then,
swiftly and without warning, there came the end.
One morning, almost a year after her return to Washington,
Josephine St. Auban sat in her apartments, looking at a long
document inscribed in a fine, foreign hand. It was the report of
the agent of her estates in Prance and Hungary. As she read it the
lines blurred before her eyes. It demanded an effort even of her
superb courage fairly to face and meet the meaning. In fact, it
was this: The revolution of Louis Napoleon of 1851 had resulted in
the confiscation of many estates in France, all her own included.
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