The spirit of discontent which had long been brooding now rose in loud and angry clamor everywhere around the throne. The court was blind to its peril; but thoughtful men perceived that the elements for a moral earthquake were fast accumulating. In the midst of these hourly increasing perils, the Duke of Orleans, on the 31st of May, 1830, gave a ball at the Palais Royal in honor of his father-in-law, the King of Naples. This festival was of such splendor as to astonish even splendor-loving Paris, and was long remembered as one of the most brilliant entertainments the metropolis had ever witnessed. The immense fortune of the duke, his refined taste, and the grandeur of the saloons of his ancestral palace, enabled him almost to outvie royalty itself in the brilliance of the fete. Vast amphitheatres bloomed with flowers in Eden-like profusion. The immense colonnades of the Palais Royal were crowded with orange-trees, whose opening buds filled the air with fragrance, and whose clusters of golden fruit enhanced the beauty of the scene. The spacious roofs and rotundas of glass sparkled with thousands of wax-lights, creating a spectacle so gorgeous and glittering that even those who were accustomed to royal splendor were reminded of the enchanter's palace in Oriental fable. The marriage of the Duke de Berri, the son of Charles X. with Caroline Mary, niece of the Duchess of Orleans, had produced some reconciliation between the Bourbon and the Orleans branches of the royal family. The king and his family this evening, for the first time, in regal state visited the Palais Royal. As the duke was receiving the congratulations of his guests upon the marvellous splendor which the palace presented, thronged with courtiers sparkling with jewels and decorated with all the costly and glittering costumes of the old regime, one of the guests, M. Salvandy, shrewdly observed to the duke, "It is, indeed, quite a Neapolitan fete, your highness, for we dance upon a volcano." The duke with some emotion replied, "That there is a volcano here I believe as firmly as you do. But I know that the fault is not mine. I shall not have any occasion, hereafter, to reproach myself for not having endeavored to open the eyes of the king. But what could be expected when nothing is listened to? God only knows where all this will end--I certainly do not foresee what is about to happen. I can not tell where all those who are producing this state of things will be in six months hence; but one thing I do know, which is, where I shall be myself. "Under all circumstances or changes which may occur, my family and myself will remain in this palace. This is our throne. Whatever may be the peril of so doing, I shall not move from the home of my fathers. I shall never again consent to separate the fate and fortune of myself and children from those of my country. This is my unchangeable determination."