rit was certain to obtain her
support whether it had been manifested under the old or the new regime;
but she had not the influence she was supposed to have, and I doubt if
she tried to acquire it."

One day the Princess was talking to the Prefect of the Oise about the
great noblemen who had possessions in the Department.

"Have they any influence over the people?" she asked him.

"No, Madame, and it is their own fault. M. de La Rochefoucauld is the
only one who is popular, but his influence is against you. As to the
others, greedy of the benefits of the court, they come to their estates
only to save money, to regulate their accounts with their managers, and
the people, receiving no mark of their interest, acknowledge no
obligation to them."

"You are perfectly right," replied the Dauphiness, "that is not the way
with the English aristocracy."

"She saw with pain," adds M. de Puymaigre, "the marriages for money
made by certain men of the court, but not when they allied themselves
with an honorable plebeian family; her indignation was justly shown
toward those who took their wives in families whose coveted riches came
from an impure source."

The extraordinary catastrophes that had fallen on the daughter of Louis
XVI. and Marie Antoinette had been a great experience for her, and she
was not surprised at the recantations of the courtiers. The Hundred
Days had, perhaps, suggested even more reflections to her than her
captivity in the Temple or her early exile. She could not forget how,
in 1815, she had been abandoned by officers who, but the day before,
had offered her such protestations and such vows. In the midst of
present prosperity she had a sort of instinct of future adversity.
Something told her that she was not done with sorrow, and that the cup
of bitterness was not drained to the dregs. While every one about her
contemplated the future with serene confidence, she reflected on the
extreme mobility of the French character, and still distrusted
inconstant fortune. The morrow of the birth of the Duke of Bordeaux one
of her household said to her:--

"Your Highness was very happy yesterday."

"Yes, very happy yesterday," responded the daughter of Louis XVI., "but
to-day I am reflecting on the destiny of this child."

To any one inclined to be deceived by the illusions of the prestige
surrounding the accession of Charles X., it ought to have sufficed to
cast a glance on the austere countenance of the Orphan o