[Footnote 384: After ravaging Asia and then Russia, Poland, Bohemia, Galicia, Austria, the cholera, passing over Western Europe, swooped down upon England. It declared itself on the 12th of February 1832 in London, whence it was not to disappear until the first week in May. On the 15th of March, it was noted at Calais. It struck its first victim in Paris, in the Rue Mazarine, on the 26th of March. The epidemic did not come to an end before the 30th of September, having lasted 189 days, during which the number of deaths from cholera amounted to 18,406. The population of Paris at that time was only 645,698 souls: the death-rate from cholera alone, therefore, was over 23 per 1,000.--B.] [Footnote 385: M. de Bondy's letter ran as follows: "MONSIEUR LE VICOMTE, "I regret that I cannot accept, in the name of the City of Paris, the 12,000 francs which you have done me the honour to send me. In the origin of the funds which you offer, people would see, beneath an apparent benevolence, a political combination against which the entire population of Paris would protest by its refusal. "I am, etc. "The Comte de BONDY, "Prefect of the Seine."--B.] [Footnote 386: The _Constitutionnel_ announced that M. Berger, the Mayor of the 2nd Ward, had proposed to the Princess' envoy, "a former aide-de-camp of the Duc de Berry," to give the thousand francs offered in the Duchess' name "to the widow of a combatant of July, the mother of three children, to whom this relief would be very useful." The envoy whom the _Constitutionnel_ thus transformed into an aide-de-camp of the Duc de Berry was none other than the worthy Hyacinthe Pilorge, Chateaubriand's secretary. Pilorge at once wrote to the _Quotidienne_: "PARIS, 20 _April_ 1832. "SIR, "M. de Chateaubriand, although suffering from illness, is at this moment occupied in writing a general reply with reference to the gift of Madame la Duchesse de Berry; this reply will appear shortly. Meantime, I owe it to the interests of truth to say that M. the Mayor of the 2nd Ward did not present the widow of a combatant of July to me and did not propose that I should give her the thousand francs; he merely refused them: that is all. M. de Chateaubriand instructs me to add that if the _widow_ of the _Constitutionnel_ will be good enough to call on him, he is prepared to give her a share in the bounty of the _mother_ of the Duc de Bordeaux. You see, Sir, that I have not the honour of having been an aide-de-camp of M. le Duc de Berry and that I am only the poor and faithful secretary of a man as poor and as faithful as myself. "Pray accept, Sir, the assurance of my most distinguished regard, "HYACINTHE PILORGE."--B.]