r any rights
of their own, but for the suppression of the rights of others. They
denounced the extension of the suffrage to the rural population, and, as
they were in a very small minority themselves, they protested against
the right of any majority to outvote them, though they were preparing
all the while to impose their own will on a constituency of ten times
their number.
Such are my summary reflections concerning that gigantic insurrection.
Now, my Dear, that I have brought my daily correspondence to an end,
happy shall I be, if such as may happen to read my small volume can find
the perusal of it as interesting as you told it was to you.
I don't expect to stay much longer abroad: I shall soon return to
England but quite heart-rent at what my eyes have witnessed, and
notwithstanding my admiration for the noble qualities of the french
nation, more than once, I fear, I shall not be able to refrain
exclaiming: _Poor France!_
THE END.
HISTORICAL INFORMATIONS ABOUT THE PRINCIPAL BUILDINGS BURNT
The Palais Royal, built on the site of Cardinal Richelieu's Palace,
faces the Louvre, and adjoins the Place des Victoires. Given by Louis
XIV, to his brother the Duke of Orleans, it passed from him to the
Regent Duke. Here, but not in the existing edifice, the Regent and his
daughter held their incredible orgies; here lived his grandson Egalite,
who rebuilt the palace after a fire, and relieved his embarrassments by
erecting the ranges of shops. The Palais Royal Gardens were the nursery
of the First Revolution; they were the favourite resort of Camille
Desmoulins and the other mob orators not yet sitting in Convention; and
in them was unfurled, on the 13th of July, 1789, that tricolour flag
which was to prove even a deadlier symbol than the red and white roses
plucked once for England's woe in our own Temple-gardens. At the Palais
Royal Egalite hatched the plots which ended in his execution, when it
was disposed of by lottery, to be bought back, repaired, and beautified
by the Orleans family after the Restoration, and inhabited by them till
the second death of the Monarchy, in 1830, removed them to the
Tuileries. In 1848 the palace was plundered and the interior destroyed
by the mob, who at the same time burnt Louis Philippe's fine library.
The Palais was turned into a barrack, but when the new Republic
developed into an Empire, it naturally changed back again into a palace.
The Emperor made it over to his u
|