Napoleon decides to sell in latest panel of floodwall mural

This latest completed mural on Cape Girardeau's downtown floodwall represents the Louisiana Purchase. The mural is located between the mural of Louis Lorimier meeting Meriwether Lewis and the creation of the Missouri flag.

The Louisiana Purchase treaty, signed in 1803, marked the United States' purchase of more than 800,000 miles of French land -- extending from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains -- for about $15 million.

In the mural, the man in the bath is French military leader and future emperor Napoleon Bonaparte. According to Napoleon's brother, Lucien, both he and other brother Joseph visited Napoleon to convince him not to sell the Louisiana Territory. Reportedly, Napoleon was in the bath at the time of the visit and, after splashing his brothers with water, said he would sell the territory to the United States.

The other half of the mural depicts French soldiers overseeing -- some tearfully -- the changing of the French flag to an American flag at the Cabildo (built in the 1790s to house the Spanish city hall and now the Louisiana State Museum) in New Orleans.

-- Kathryn Alfisi