Napoleon, Churchill letters kept in laundry room

One of the word's greatest collections of historical letters, including a note written by Napoleon to his lover Josephine, has been found in a filing cabinet tucked away in a Swiss laundry room.

The treasure trove of almost 1,000 documents, collected by a wealthy Austrian banker, includes letters written by Winston Churchill, Peter the Great, Mahatma Gandhi, Alexander Pushkin and Queen Elizabeth I.

One of the most touching of the collection is a passionate letter written by Napoleon to his wife to be, Josephine, the morning after an argument.

"I send you three kisses - one on your heart, one on your mouth and one on your eyes," wrote the chastened lover in a spidery scrawl full of corrections and crossings out.

The letters, which cover more than 500 years and range across art, science, literature and philosophy, are to be auctioned by Christie's in London on July 3 and are expected to raise up to $4.6 million.

The owner, Albin Schram, began amassing the archive in the early 1970s. The letters were kept in an old metal cabinet in the laundry room of his villa in Lausanne, Switzerland.

His interests spanned Russian poets, Argentine authors, French philosophers, English politicians and Italian sculptors.

Another lot of interest is a letter written by Ernest Hemingway to the American poet and critic Ezra Pound in 1925, explaining why bulls are better than literary critics.

"Bulls don't run reviews. Bulls of 25 don't marry old women of 55 and expect to be invited to dinner. Bulls do not get you cited as co-respondent in Society divorce trials. Bulls don't borrow money. Bulls are edible after they have been killed."

Source: China Daily/Agencies