The Idler in FranceBlessington, Marguerite, Countess of
History
The Idler in France
Blessington, Marguerite, Countess of
France -- Description and travel; France -- Social life and customs
Crowds were hurrying through the streets, many of the shops were
closed, and not above three or four carriages were to be seen. Never
did so great a change take place in the aspect of a city in so few
hours! Yesterday the business of life flowed on in its usual current.
The bees and the drones of this vast hive were buzzing about, and the
butterflies of fashion were expanding their gay wings in the sunshine.
To-day the industrious and orderly seem frightened from their usual
occupations, and scarcely a person of those termed fashionable is to be
seen. Where are all the household of Charles the Tenth, that vast and
well-paid crowd who were wont to fill the anterooms of the Tuileries on
gala days, obsequiously watching to catch a nod from the monarch, whose
slightest wish was to them as the laws of the Modes and Persians? Can
it be that they have disappeared at the first cloud that has darkened
the horizon of their sovereign, and increased the danger that menaces
him by shewing that they have not courage to meet it? Heaven send, for
the honour of France, that the _noblesse_ of the court of Charles the
Tenth may not follow the disgraceful example furnished by that of his
unfortunate brother, Louis the Sixteenth! In England how different
would it be if danger menaced the sovereign!
---- has just been here, and, in answer to my question of where are the
men on whose fidelity the king could count, and in whose military
experience he might confide in such a crisis as the present, he told me
that for the purposes of election interests all the general officers
who could be trusted had unfortunately been sent from the court.
The sound of firing has announced that order, far from being restored,
seems less likely than ever to be so. People are rushing wildly through
the streets proclaiming that several persons have been killed by the
military. All is confusion and alarm, and every one appears to dread
what the coming night may produce.
Intelligence has just reached us that the mob are demolishing the
lanterns, and that they have broken into the shops of the gunsmiths,
and seized all the arms they could find. The Duc de Raguse commands the
troops, and already several charges have taken place. This selection,
under present circumstances, is not considered to be a good one.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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