had very serious consequences, for all the officers of the Swiss guards were about to send in their resignations. As ex-colonel-general of the Swiss, Charles X. was too partial to them not to reprimand his son severely for the scandal he had caused. To make the matter up, and give satisfaction to the corps of officers, he desired the dauphine to send for the insulted lieutenant, and, in presence of that princess, who anxiously desired to see her husband's unpardonable act atoned for and forgotten, the king addressed the young officer with great affability. Sir,' he said, my son has behaved most culpably towards you, and towards me, your former colonel-general. Accept these captain's epaulets, which I have great pleasure in offering you, and forget the past?' With much emotion the dauphine added a few gracious words, and the officer, not without reluctance, continued in the royal guard as captain. The dauphin, who was good in the main, did not fail, the next time he saw the new made captain, to offer him his hand in sign of reconciliation, and, by a singular chance, this officer was one of the last Swiss on duty with the royal family when it departed for Cherbourg on its way into exile."

How striking the picture of regal dignity here presented to us! The heir to the French throne scuffling in his own palace yard with a subaltern of foreign mercenaries, and rescued by his wife from possible chastisement at the hands of his opponent. The king compelled to apologize for his son's misconduct, and almost to crave the acceptance of a captain's commission as plaster for the wounded honour of the Swiss guardsman. There is an unmistakeable Bourbon character about the story. And truly, both in great things and small, what a pitiful race of kings were those older Bourbons! Fit only to govern some petty German state of a few dozen square miles, where they might revel in etiquette, surround themselves with priests and flatterers, and play by turns the tyrant and the fool. High time was it that a more vigorous branch

should oust them from the throne of a Francis, a Henry, and a Napoleon. The hour of their downfal was at hand, although they, as ever, were blind to the approaching peril. And little thought the glittering train of gay courtiers and loyal ladies who thronged to Rheims to the coronation of Charles the Tenth, that this ceremony was the last sacrifice offered to the last descendant of St. Louis, and that the corpse of Louis XVIII. would wait in vain, in the regal vault at St. Denis, for that of his successor.*

In 1826, M. Appert was elected member of the Royal Society of Prisons, of which the Dauphin was president, and about the same time he became a frequent visiter at the Palais Royal. The Duke of Orleans took much notice of him, and begged him to pay particular attention to the schools and prisons upon his extensive domains. Madame Adelaide (Mademoiselle d'Orleans, as she was then styled) desired his assistance for the establishment of a school near her castle of Randan; and the Duchess of Orleans craved his advice in the distribution of her charities. He passed some time at Randan, where the whole Orleans family were assembled, and he describes their rational, cheerful, and simple manner of life. It was that of opulent and well-educated country gentlemen, hospitable, charitable, and intellectual. Kingly cares had not yet wrinkled the brow of Louis Philippe; neither had sorrow, anxiety, and alarm furrowed the cheeks of the virtuous Marie Amélie. "At that time, both Mademoiselle and Monseigneur were gay and cheerful. Since royalty has replaced that life of princely retirement, I have never seen them enjoy such calm and tranquil days; I might say, never such happy ones." From Randan, M. Appert started on a tour to the south of France, and to visit the galleys. When he returned to Paris, he undertook to assist the Duchess of Orleans and Mademoiselle in their charities; and from that time he saw them every two or three days, sometimes oftener. At last came the

July Revolution. The Orleans family were at Neuilly, and whilst the result of the fight between king and people was still uncertain, the duke, apprehensive of violence from the royalist party, shut himself up in a little pavilion in the park. There his wife and sister secretly visited him, and took him the news as it arrived from Paris. From his retreat, he plainly heard the din of battle raging in the streets of the capital. On the 28th of July, a cannon-ball, fired from Courbevoye, fell near the palace, and at a short distance from the duchess and her sister-in-law. There could be little doubt of the intention of the shot. This circumstance made Mademoiselle think, that in their fury the royalists might attack Neuilly, and carry off the family. Accordingly, the duke, accompanied only by his faithful adherent Oudard, left his retreat, and crossed the country on foot to Raincy, another of his seats, situated near Bondy. This was on the 29th July; the duke was dressed very simply, and wore a gray hat with a tri-colored cockade. As soon as the cannon shot was fired from Courbevoye, Mademoiselle said to the duchess, "My dear, we cannot stand by those people any longer; they massacre the mob, and fire at us; we must take a decided part." Hastening to her wardrobe, she tore up several silk dresses, white, blue, and red, made them into cockades, and distributed them to the household. From that moment, it is evident, that if the royalists had had the upper hand, the house of Orleans was ruined.

On their way to Raincy, the duke and Oudard fell in with a peasant, digging his field as if nothing extraordinary was occurring. They asked him the news. "Ma foi, Monsieur," replied the man, "they say that the people are thrashing the royal guard, that those stupid Bourbons have run, and that liberty will once more triumph."

"And the Duke of Orleans?" was the next question. "What do they say of him?"

"No doubt he is with his cousins, since he has not shown himself at his Palais Royal. He's no better than the rest; a fine talker, and nothing else."

Not overpleased at the peasant's reply, the duke asked no more questions, but continued his pedestrian journey. Forty-eight hours afterwards, however, he was at the Palais Royal, with the men of July for his body-guard; and ten days later he was King of the French. How far he owed his elevation to intrigues and manœuvres of his own-how far he had aimed at the crown which thus suddenly settled upon his brows—are questions that have been much discussed, but never satisfactorily elucidated. M. Appert's opinion is worth recording. To us it appears a temperate and rational one.

"I consider it proved that the Duke of Orleans did not, as many believe, work for the overthrow of his cousins. As a shrewd and clever man, he could not forget the chances given to his family by the retrograde policy of the Bourbons; he remembered that he had five sons, brought up in the public colleges, partaking the intelligence and opinions of the rising generation, and therefore secure of public sympathy; he bore in mind also, that the Duke of Bordeaux, who alone stood above his sons, in the sense of legitimacy, but far below them in the opinion of the masses, was still very young, and liable to the diseases of childhood. All these were so many motives for him to court that popularity which the Tuileries each day lost. He did not omit to do so. He showed himself cordial and affable with the popular members of the Chambers, adopted and sustained the system of mutual instruction, which was protected by the liberal section of the nation, in opposition to the priests, and founded schools on that plan on his estates. A generous patron of artists and men of letters, for political refugees, Poles, Greeks, and Italians, he was ever ready to subscribe. In short, without conspiring, the Duke of Orleans did as much to advance the royal destiny of his family as the elder branch, by a completely contrary line of conduct, did to compromise theirs."

If these were the sole arts and conjurations used by Louis Philippe to compass his ends, certainly no crown was ever more fairly come by than his. And verily so uneasy a station,

so thorny a seat as that of King of the French, was scarce worth more active efforts; it would have been dearly bought by a sacrifice of honour and principle. The life of Louis Philippe is one of incessant toil and anxiety; his leisure is less, his work harder, than that of his meanest subject. Late to bed, he rises early, rarely sleeping more than four hours; after a careful, but rapid toilet, his day's labour begins. He seldom breakfasts with his family; it would take too much time; but has his frugal repast brought on a tray to the room where he happens to be. When he was Duke of Orleans, he read all the letters and petitions addressed to him, writing upon each an opinion or an order for the guidance of his secretaries. This practice he was of course obliged to discontinue when he became king. At the commencement of his reign, the number of letters and applications of various kinds, sent to the different members of the royal family, amounted to the astonishing number of a thousand or twelve hundred a-day. Although, upon an average, not above fifty of these possessed the least interest, or deserved an answer, the mere reading and classing of such a chaos of correspondence gave employment to several secretaries. After a while, the flood of petitions abated, but M. Appert estimates them, in ordinary times, at six to eight hundred daily. Of the letters, only the important ones are laid before the King, who answers many of them himself. He examines the reports, projects, and nominations brought to him by his ministers, and, at least twice or thrice a-week, presides at the councilboard. Private audiences occupy much of his time; his conferences with architects, with the intendants of the civil list and of his private estates, are of frequent occurrence. The galeries of Versailles, and the improvements at Fontainebleau-all made after his plans, and in great measure under his personal superintendence-courtballs and dinners, diplomatic audiences, correspondence with foreign courts, journeys of various kinds, visits to the castle of En and to military camps—such are a portion of the inEumerable claims upon the time of the

King of the French. But, by a clearheaded, active, and earnest man, endowed with the faculty of order, which Louis Philippe possesses in a very high degree, much is to be got through in a day of twenty hours; and, after doing all that has been enumerated, and many other things of less importance, the king still finds time to devote to his family, for the necessary healthful exercise, and for the perusal of the principal newspapers and publications, both English and foreign. · Each morning, either before or after breakfast, all the newspapers, political pamphlets, even caricatures, were laid upon the table, and the king and the princes were the first to read aloud the articles published against them. They examined the caricatures, and passed them to the bystanders, saying, 'What do you think of this?""

The taunt of parsimony has ever been prominent amongst the weapons of offence employed against the July monarchy by the French opposition press. The avarice of the Civil List. the candle-end economies of the Château, the maigre chère of M. de Montalivet, have been harped upon till they have become bywords in the mouths of the mob, always eager to detect the petty failings of their superiors. They have been a fertile subject of pun, sneer, and witticism for those pasquinading periodicals which care little for truth or justice so long as they can tickle the popular palate, and keep up their circulation; a perfect treasure for such loose and ephemeral prints as the Charivari and the Corsaire, the Figaro and the Tintamarre. Even graver journals, the dull and fanatical organs of the Legitimatists, have, in a graver tone, made scornful reference to degrading and unkingly avarice, whilst that witty monomaniac, the editor of the " Mode," has launched the keen shafts of his unsparing ridicule against the mesquinerie of the usurping princes. It is easy to get up and sustain such a cry as this, against which it would be beneath the dignity of the persons assailed, and of their newspaper organs, to contend; and, when supported by a rattling fire of squib and jeer, daily printed for the reading of a people who, of all others, are most apt to prefer their jest to their friend, it is any thing but sur

prising that a fabrication should acquire credit, a falsehood be accepted as truth. We believe there is no ground for accusing the Orleans family of avarice. True, they do not, in imitation of some of their predecessors, indulge in a reckless prodigality, and squander enormous sums upon profligate courtiers and lewd women. They better understand the proper distribution of their great wealth. They do not gamble, or maintain petites maisons, or establish a Parc-aux-cerfs, or commit any other of the disgraceful extravagancies for which so many Bourbons have made themselves conspicuous. In this respect they have improved upon the traditions even of their own house. Louis Philippe must be admitted to be a great improvement, both as a private and public man, upon his dissolute and disreputable forefathers, even by those bitter and malicious foes who convert his habits of order and proper economy into a grave offence. We learn from M. Appert to what extent he sins in these particulars. To preserve his health, which is excellent, he lives very simply. At dinner, he rarely eats any thing but soup and a solid slice of roast beef; but the twenty-five or thirty persons who daily surround his board are subjected to no such frugal diet. The royal table is perfectly well served; the wines, especially, are old and delicious, and the king takes as much care of his guests as if he were a private gentleman giving a dinner. The intendant of the household submits each day's bill of fare for the queen's approval. Such, at least, was the custom in the time of M. Appert, whose personal experience of the court, as far as we can judge from his Memoirs, -for he is sparing of dates,-extends up to the year 1837.

"The king takes particular care of his clothes; and I once saw him in a very bad humour because he had torn his coat against a door. The papers in his private study, the books in his library, are arranged with great order, and he does not like to have their places changed in his absence. Whilst conversing, his majesty amuses himself by making envelopes for letters, and often makes those for the large despatches serve twice, by turning

them. He has the habit of wasting nothing, not even a thing of small value, that can again be made available. He loves neither play nor fieldsports: of an evening, in his domestic circle, he sometimes amuses himself with a game at billiards, but seldom for long together; for it is very rare that he can get more than an hour to himself, uninterrupted by the arrival of important despatches, by the visits of ministers or foreign ambassadors."

We discern nothing very reprehensible in the harmless little peculiarities here enumerated. It may be stingy and unkingly to dislike being robbed, and in that case Louis Philippe is to blame, for we are told that he keeps a watchful eye over the expenses of his household. On the other hand, he is generous to prodigality in the repairs and embellishments of his palaces and domains; thus giving employment to many, and preparing for posterity monuments of his magnificence and of his princely encouragement of the artists and men of genius of his day. He has no abstract love of gold, no partiality for gloating over moneybags: his expenses, on the contrary, often exceed his income, and entail debts upon his civil list and private fortune. He has an open hand for his friends, a charitable heart for the poor. Party feeling should not blind us to private virtue. Even those who least admire the public conduct of Louis Philippe, who dislike his system of government, and blame his tortuous foreign policy, may, whilst censuring the conduct of the king, admit and admire the good qualities of the individual.

"I remember," says M. Appert, when speaking of the subordinate officers of the royal household, "that one

of these gentlemen, having amassed, a great deal too rapidly, a certain competency, asked the king's permission to leave his service, and return to his own province, where an aunt, he said, had left him a pretty income. I have not the least objection,' replied his majesty; I only hope that I have not been your uncle!"" And with this good-humoured remark, the heir, whether of dead aunt or living uncle, was allowed to retire upon his new-found fortune. Another anecdote, highly characteristic of him

of whom it is told, may here be introduced. The burial-place of the house of Orleans is at Dreux. From an exaggerated feeling of regard or friendship, or whatever it may be called, the dowager-duchess, mother of the king, inserted in her will an earnest wish, indeed an injunction, that her intendant, M. de Folleville, should be buried in the outer vault, which precedes that of the Orleans family, and that a slab with his name and quality should close his grave. The king duly complied with his mother's wish, but caused the inscribed side of the slab to be placed inwards, thus fulfilling the desire of the duchess without exposing her to the ill-natured comments of future generations.

M. Appert takes us even into the royal bed-chamber. He does so with all proper discretion, and we will venture to follow him thither.

"The king and queen always occupy the same bed, which is almost as broad as it is long, but whose two halves are very differently composed. On one side is a plain horse-hair mattress, on the other an excellent feather-bed. The latter is for the queen. The princes and princesses are accustomed, like the king, to sleep on a single mattress. There is always a light in their majesties' apartment, and two pistols are placed upon a table near the king."

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown!" In this instance, however, the pistol practice is the result probably of an old habit rather than of any apprehension of a night attack upon the Tuileries. We have passed the days when kings were stabbed in their beds or poisoned in their cups; and the attempts of the Fieschis and Lecomtes do not appear to prey upon the robust health or dwell upon the imagination of their intended victim. With Marie Amélie it is very different. The anxieties and sorrows she has experienced since 1830 have been terrible; and doubtless she has wished many times that her husband had never exchanged his retirement at Neuilly, his circle of friends at the Palais Royal, for his present exalted bat difficult and dangerous station. Ah! M. Appert," she more than once exclaimed, "he who invented the proverb, Happy a a king,' had

certainly never worn a crown!" When we contemplate the careworn and suffering, but benevolent and interesting countenance of the virtuous Queen of the French, and call to mind. all her trials during the last fifteen years, the constant attempts on the king's life, the death of the Princess Mary and of the much-loved Duke of Orleans, and the perils incurred by her other sons in Africa, how can we doubt the sincerity of this exclamation? In unaffected piety, and in charity that blushes to be seen, this excellent princess finds consolation. M. Appert becomes enthusiastic when he speaks of her unassuming virtues, to which, however, his testimony was scarcely needed. not even her husband's greatest enemies, have ever ventured to deny them.

None, we believe,

M.

"The queen disposes of five hundred thousand francs a-year for all her personal expenses; and certainly she gives more than four hundred thousand in charity of all kinds. Appert,' she would sometimes say to me, give those five hundred francs we spoke of, but put them down upon next month's list, for the waters are low, my purse is empty.'" Imposture, ingratitude, even the insolent form of the petitions addressed to her, fail to discourage her in her benevolent mission. "Madam," an old Bonapartist lady one day wrote to her, "if the Bourbons had not returned to France

for the misfortune of the nationmy beloved mistress and protectress, the Empress Maria Louisa, would still be upon the throne, and I should not be under the humiliating necessity of telling you that I am without bread, and that the wretched mattress upon which I sleep is about to be thrown out of the garret I inhabit, because my year's rent is unpaid! I dare not ask you for assistance, for my heart is with my real sovereign, and I cannot promise you my gratitude. If, however, you think proper to preserve a life which, since the misfortunes of my country, has been so full of bitterness, I will accept a loan: I should blush to receive a gift. I am, madam, your servant, Ch-r."

Here was a pretty letter to set before a queen; a mode of imploring alms that might well have disgusted the most charitable. But what was