Hunt, Henry, 1773-1835; Social reformers -- Great Britain -- Biography
Although Napoleon had retired, it yet required very considerable address
to replace on the Throne of France the Bourbons--a race that was
deservedly despised and execrated by the whole French nation, with the
exception of the lazy, indolent, rapacious, and profligate priesthood,
and a few of the old bigotted nobility. The provisional Government
presented to the Conservative Senate a CONSTITUTION, and proposed that
Louis, the brother of Louis the Sixteenth, should, on the acceptance of
that constitution, be declared King of France. It is time now to turn
our eyes towards England, from the affairs of which the reader will
remember that I broke off at the period when the Parliament had settled
that corn should not be imported, unless the price was above eighty
shillings a quarter. Motions were now made to address the Prince Regent,
to seize the favourable opportunity to procure from the allied Powers
some salutary regulations respecting the slave trade. The country, both
in and out of Parliament, was mad drunk with GLORY. The House manifested
its intoxication by a profligate and extravagant grant of the public
money to Wellington, who was also created a Duke. While this was going
on within the walls of Parliament, the farmers were drunk and mad
without, and were amusing themselves by burning and hanging Napoleon in
effigy. Deputies had already arrived in England, to invite Louis the
Eighteenth to return to France. He entered London on the 20th of April,
with great pomp and state; he came from his retreat at Hartwell,
attended by the Life Guards and many of the King's carriages, and
accompanied by our magnanimous conqueror, the Prince Regent. He took up
his residence at Grillon's hotel, in Albemarle-street, where be held
his Court, and was congratulated by the Lord Mayor (Sir William
Domville), and the citizens of London, and also by many of the nobility,
all of whom would no doubt have as readily paid their devoirs to a
mastiff dog, if he had been called a King. Louis left London in great
state, to embark for France, on the 23d of April, and he set sail from
Dover on the 24th, in the Royal yacht, and landed at Calais in four
hours. His public entry into Paris took place on the 3d of May, and
on the 14th of the same month a grand farce, or funeral service, was
performed in France for the Kings Louis the Sixteenth and Seventeenth,
the Queen and the Princess Elizabeth. Louis was no sooner in possession
of power, than he discovered that the Constitution which had been
framed, and on his presumed acceptance of which he had been restored,
was NOT PRACTICABLE, and that the people of France must submit to
receive as a boon, one of his own manufacture. "Put not your trust in
Princes." The Marshals had been brought over one by one, and peace was
at length settled upon the terms which the Allies dictated. By this
treaty France was to keep her ancient boundary, with some additions; the
navigation of the Rhine was to be free; the territory of Holland and the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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