"I have seen the King's entry; I have seen pass the gilt coaches of the monarch who but lately had not a horse to ride; I have seen those carriages roll by filled with courtiers who were not able to defend their master. This herd went to the church to sing the _Te Deum_, and I went to look at a Roman ruin and to walk by myself in a wood of elm-trees called the 'Wood of Love.' I heard from afar the jubilation of the bells, I contemplated the towers of the Cathedral, secular witnesses of that ceremony which is always the same and yet so different through history, the times, ideas, manners, usages and customs. The Monarchy perished, and the Cathedral was for some years turned into a stable. Does Charles X., who sees it again to-day, remember that he saw Louis XVI. anointed in the same place where he is to be anointed in his turn? Will he believe that a coronation yields protection against misfortune? There is no longer a hand virtuous enough to heal the king's evil, no longer a sacred phial salutary enough to render kings inviolable." I hurriedly wrote what has just been read on the half-blank pages of a pamphlet entitled, _Le Sacre; par Barnage de Reims, avocat_, and on a printed letter of the Grand Referendary, M. de Sémonville[257], saying: "The Grand Referendary has the honour to inform His Lordship, Monsieur le Vicomte de Chateaubriand, that places in the chancel of Rheims Cathedral are intended and reserved for those of Messieurs the Peers who wish to be present to-morrow at His Majesty's consecration and coronation, at the ceremony of the reception of the Chief and Sovereign Grand Master of the Orders of the Holy Ghost and of St. Michael and of the reception of Messieurs the Knights and Commanders." Charles X. nevertheless had intended to conciliate me. The Archbishop of Paris[258] spoke to him at Rheims of the men in the Opposition; the King said: "Those who will have nothing to do with me, I leave alone." The Archbishop rejoined: "But, Sire, M. de Chateaubriand?" "Oh, him I regret!" [Sidenote: Coronation of Charles X.] The Archbishop asked the King if he might tell me so; the King hesitated, took two or three turns in the room, and replied, "Well, yes, tell him," and the Archbishop forgot to speak to me about it. At the ceremony of the knights of the Orders, I was kneeling at the King's feet at the moment when M. de Villèle was taking his oath. I exchanged two or three words of politeness with my companion in knighthood[259], with regard to a feather that had come loose from my hat. We left the Sovereign's knees, and all was done. The King, finding a difficulty in removing his gloves to take my hands in his, had said to me, laughing: "A gloved cat catches no mice."