ld and
gilded silver, covered with white enamel, having the beak and claws in
red, the wings spread, a little phial of glass of reddish color about
an inch and a half high corked with a piece of crimson damask. I
examined this phial attentively in the light, and I perceived a great
number of marks of a needle on the sides; then I took from a crimson
velvet bag, embroidered with fleurs-de-lis in gold, the needle used at
the time of the consecration of our kings, to extract the particles of
balm, dried and clinging to the glass. I detached as many as possible,
of which I took the larger part, and remitted the smaller to M.
Hourelle."

The particles thus preserved were given into the hands of the
Archbishop of Rheims, who gathered them in a new reliquary.

Sunday, the 22d of May, 1825, the day of the feast of the Pentecost,
the Archbishop of Rheims assembled in a chapel of that city the
metropolitan clergy, the principal authorities, and the persons who had
contributed to the preservation of the particles of the precious relic,
in order to proceed, in their presence, to the transfusion of those
particles into the holy chrism, to be enclosed in a new phial. A
circumtantial report of this ceremony was prepared in duplicate.

"Thus," said the Moniteur, May 26, "there remains no doubt that the
holy oil that will flow on the forehead of Charles X. in the solemnity
of his consecration, is the same as that which, since Clovis, has
consecrated the French monarchs."

The day of the consecration approached. The Mayor of Rheims, M. Ruinard
de Brimont, had not a moment's rest. At the consecration of Louis XV.,
about four hundred lodgings had been marked with chalk. For that of
Charles X. there were sixteen hundred, and those who placed them at the
service of the administration asked no compensation. The 19th of May
was begun the placing of the exterior decorations on the wooden porch
erected in front of the door of the basilica. It harmonized so
completely with the plan of the edifice that "at thirty toises," it
seemed a part of the edifice. The centrings and the interior portieres
of this porch presented to the view a canopy sown with fleurs-de-lis in
the midst of which stood out the royal cipher and the crown of France,
modelled in antique fashion. These decorations were continued from the
portal along the beautiful gallery that led to the palace. The palace
itself, whose apartments had been adorned and furnished with royal
mag