y of
princely rank, most of its better rooms being unfinished, and are
occupied as cabinets or museums. A small palace, called the Elysee
Bourbon, is fitted up as a residence for the heir presumptive, the Duc
de Bordeaux; but, though it contains his princely toys, such as
miniature batteries of artillery, etc., he is much too young to maintain
a separate establishment. This little scion of royalty only completed
his seventh year not long after our arrival in France; on which occasion
one of those silly ceremonies, which some of the present age appear to
think inseparable from sound principles, was observed. The child was
solemnly and formally transferred from the care of the women to that of
the men. Up to this period, Madame la Vicomtesse de Gontaut-Biron had
been his governess, and she now resigned her charge into the hands of
the Baron de Damas, who had lately been Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Madame de Gontaut was raised to the rank of Duchess on the occasion. The
boy himself is said to have passed from the hands of the one party to
those of the other, in presence of the whole court, _absolutely naked_.
Some such absurdity was observed at the reception of Marie Antoinette,
it being a part of regal etiquette that a royal bride, on entering
France, should leave her old wardrobe, even to the last garment, behind
her. You will be amused to hear that there are people in Europe who
still attach great importance to a rigid adherence to all the old
etiquette at similar ceremonies. These are the men who believe it to be
essential that judges and advocates should wear wigs, in an age when,
their use being rejected by the rest of the world, their presence cannot
fail, if it excite any feeling, to excite that of inconvenience and
absurdity. There is such a thing as leaving society too naked, I admit;
but a _chemise_, at least, could not have injured the little Duke of
Bordeaux at this ceremony. Whenever a usage that is poetical in itself,
and which awakens a sentiment without doing violence to decency, or
comfort, or common sense, can be preserved, I would rigidly adhere to
it, if it were only for antiquity's sake; but, surely, it would be far
more rational for judges to wear false beards, because formerly Bacon
and Coke did not shave their chins, than it is for a magistrate to
appear on the bench with a cumbrous, hot, and inconvenient cloud of
powdered flax, or whatever may be the material on his poll, because our
ancestors, a