I believe, after all, one should be as lenient in their judgment of men’s change of fealty in France as they are indulgent to the capricious fancies of a spoiled beauty. The nation, like a coquette, had every thing its own way. The cold austerities of principle had yielded to the changeful fortunes of success for so many years, that men very naturally began to feel that instability and uncertainty were the normal state of things, and that to hold fast one set of opinions was like casting anchor in a stream when we desired to be carried along by the current. Who are they who have risen in France since the time of the Great Revolution? Are they the consistent politicians, the men of one unvarying, unaltered faith? or are they the expediency makers, the men of emergencies and crises, yielding, as they would phrase it, to “the enlightened temper of the times”--the Talleyrands, the Soults, the Guizots of the day?--not to speak of one higher than them all, but not more conspicuous for his elevation than for the subserviency that has placed him there. Poor Chateaubriand! the man who never varied, the man that was humblest before his rightful sovereign, and prouder than the proudest Marshal in presence of the Emperor, how completely forgotten is he--standing like some ruined sign-post to point the way over a road no longer travelled! A more complete revolution was never worked in the social condition of a great kingdom than has taken place in France since the time of the Emperor. The glorious career of conquering armies had invested the soldier’s life with a species of chivalry, that brought back the old days of feudalism again. Now, it is the _bourgeoisie_ are uppermost. Trade and money-getting, railroads and mines, have seized hold of the nation’s heart; and where the _bâton_ of a Maréchal was once the most coveted of all earthly distinctions, a good bargain on the Bourse, or a successful transaction in scrip, are now the highest triumphs. The very telegraph, whose giant limbs only swayed to speak of victories, now beckons to an expectant crowd the rates of exchange from London to Livorno, and with a far greater certainty of stirring the spirits it addresses. I fell into all this moody reflection from thinking of an incident--I might almost call it story--I remembered hearing from an old cuirassier officer some years ago. I was passing through the north of France, and stopped to dine at Sedan, where a French cavalry regiment, three thousand strong, were quartered. Some repairs that were necessary to my carriage detained me till the next day; and as I strolled along the shady boulevards in the evening, I met an old soldier-like person, beside whom I dined at the table-d’hôte. He was the very type of a _chef-d’escadron_ of the Empire, and such he really proved to be.