A Residence in France: With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to SwitzerlandCooper, James Fenimore
History
A Residence in France: With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to Switzerland
Cooper, James Fenimore
France -- Description and travel; Germany -- Description and travel; Switzerland -- Description and travel
There was a wild pleasure in viewing a town in such an extraordinary
state, and I could not help comparing its present moody silence, to the
scenes we had witnessed when the government was still so young and
dependent as to feel the necessity of courting the people. I have
already mentioned to you many of the events of that period, but some of
them have been omitted, and some, too, which quite naturally suggest
themselves, at this moment, when the King has established military
tribunals in his very capital.
On one occasion, in particular, I was walking in the Tuileries, when a
noise attracted me towards a crowd. It was Louis-Philippe taking a walk!
This you will understand was intended for effect--republican
effect--and to show the lieges that he had the outward conformation of
another man. He wore a white hat, carried an umbrella (I am not sure
that it was red), and walked in as negligent a manner as a man could
walk, who was working as hard as possible to get through with an
unpleasant task. In short, he was condescending with all his might. A
gentleman or two, in attendance, could barely keep up with him; and as
for the rabble, it was fairly obliged to trot to gratify its curiosity.
This was about the time the King of England electrified London, after a
reign of exclusion, by suddenly appearing in its streets, walking about
like another man. Whether there was any concert in this coincidence or
not I do not know.
On another occasion, A---- and myself drove out at night to view a
bivouac in the Carrousel. We got ourselves entangled in a dense crowd in
the Rue St. Honoré, and were obliged to come to a stand. While
stationary, the crowd set up a tremendous cry of _Vive le roi!_ and a
body of dismounted cavalry of the National Guard passed the carriage
windows, flourishing their sabres, and yelling like madmen. Looking out,
I saw the King in their midst, patrolling the streets of his good city
of Paris, on foot! Now he has declared us all under martial law, and is
about to shoot those he dislikes.
The _fleur-de-lis_, as you know, is the distinctive symbol of the family
of France. So much stress is laid on trifles of this nature here, that
Napoleon, with his grinding military despotism, never presumed to adopt
one for himself. During the whole of his reign, the coins of the country
were decorated on one side with no more than an inscription and a simple
wreath, though the gradual progress of his power, and the slow degress
by which he brought forward the public, on these points, may yet be
traced on these very coins. The first that were struck bore his head, as
First Consul, with "_République Française_" on the reverse. After a time
it was "_Empereur_," with "_République Française_." At length he was
emboldened to put "_Empire Français_" on the reverse, feeling a true
royal antipathy to the word republic.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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