The restoration of the Bourbons operated powerfully upon society; all former animosities that had been kindled in silence, and smothered by prudence, broke forth with an uncontrolled fury. The monarch was reluctantly obliged to allow the freedom of the press, and the public journals became the daily vehicle of slander and insult. The French were unaccustomed to this licentiousness, which, from ancient usage, is overlooked in general by British legislation,--lawyers and newspaper writers could not brook these open insults, and literary duels marked this period by their frequent occurrence. The return of the emigrants was also the source of many duels; these unfortunate gentlemen, “who had nothing learnt, and nothing forgotten” during their exile, assumed a haughty bearing towards the officers of the republic and the empire who were without birth or any name but that which their valour had rendered noble, which could not be brooked by these soldiers of fortune. Few duels between the _ancienne noblesse_ and the _parvenus_, it is true, took place at court; but they were not unfrequent in the army, until the sons of the olden times began to respect the children of the revolution for their glorious deeds of arms, the narration of which formed a great part of their conversation. Yet much blood had been shed ere this reconciliation had taken place: the noble youth of France who now surrounded the restored throne, devoted their time to obtain some skill in swordsmanship, and in many of their quarrels with the old officers, who had been for years out of practice, they displayed a superiority which the former severely felt. Ancient animosities and disappointed ambition now reigned paramount; one party seeking to recover by violence and power what they had lost by flight; and the other, to preserve what they had acquired at the price of their blood and that of their families. All the wisdom and prudence of Louis XVIII. could not restrain this impetuous torrent, to which no bounds could be assigned, since the want of solidity of the throne was felt in the vacillating state of every part of the social edifice.