"decides every thing; it is the question of "the standard under which the nation shall

rally; that question will appear in the eyes "of the nation the triumph of a party over "her; the colour of the ribbon will seem to "decide the colour of the reign.

"This sacrifice is for the King what that of "the mass was for Henry IV.; the three co"lours, besides, were those of that prince."

They continued to ask counsel of the Duke of Otranto, but they had not the resolution to follow any of them, as they suffered themselves to be hurried on by the passions, the Duke retired to his country seat. All parties blamed this resolution. A man who had had much influence, and who began to lose it, proposed to the Duke of Otranto to enter into a plan for effecting a change; he was written to in order to engage him in a secret committee. He wrote on the note of invitation which he had received, this single sentence: "I do not work "in hot-houses; I will do nothing which

66

may not appear in open air to the whole "nation."

Several important persons of the court were in correspondence with the Duke, particularly Mr. Malouet, his friend and his former companion at the Oratory. His most trifling notes were laid before the King. There were remarked, at that time, the following passages of one of his letters to the Count d'Artois :

"The oblivion of the past, which has been already proclaimed, cannot be too often and "too solemnly proclaimed; it should instantly "be rendered a law of the nation and put at "the head of all its laws.

0

"And what would become of us, what "would become of France, if it were permit❝ted to compel the delivery of the registers of "the past, from which we wish for ever to "sepa rate ourselves! We should replunge "ourselves again into it, and it would be "still more frightful. The accusations pro"ceeding from the throne would be sent back

"to the throne with facts of which the evi"dence has penetrated every mind and every "conscience in Europe. All has been ex"aggerated, liberty and power. There have "been faults, excesses, perhaps even crimes; "but there have been some on all sides; " and in all sublime virtues were allied with "excesses.

"The King will imitate the example of Henry IV., and not that of Charles II., "who, after having promised oblivion, shame

86

fully perjured himself and prepared for the

dynasty of the Stuarts a new forfeiture "which was accomplished under his brother, "and which was, for that time, irrevocable.”

On the 23d of June, the Duke of Otranto wrote to Mr. de Blacas, who had commenced a correspondence with him on the part of the King:

"The agitation of France has for causes; "in the people, the fear of the return of the "feudal rights; in the possessors of national

"domains, who form so great a portion of our

66

'population, the uneasiness as to their pos"sessions; in those who have pronounced "themselves strongly in favour of the Re

public or for Bonaparte, the doubt as to "their personal safety; in the army, the loss "and the regret of so many hopes of glory "and of fortune, which Bonaparte incessantly "presented to the ambition and to the imagi"nation of the soldiers and the generals; in "the class of those who desired for France "that which England has possessed for many "centuries, the surprise in which they are left by the constitutional charter, which the

66

66

King has wished to render an emanation "from the hereditary power of his throne.

"Among these causes, the most dangerous "was precisely that the action of which all the "wisdom of the King and of his ministers "could not have foreseen nor entirely hinder"ed. The discontent of the troops, an incon"venience which takes place, more or less, at

"the conclusion of all wars, must necessarily "act with much more extent and danger at the "end of the wars of Bonaparte, which seemed "to promise the division of Europe among his "lieutenants: but it is only through other 66 causes that the action of this one can become very serious.

66

66

"An army, and above all an army formed by conscription, always assumes the spirit of "the nation in the midst of which it lives. In "the end it always becomes contented or dis" contented along with and like the nation; and "if when it has lost all at once the chances of "fortune which the wars of a conqueror of"fered it, the soldiers who have returned to "their habitations, hear their fathers and "mothers, their brothers and their friends

express fears for their property, for their

safety, and for their liberty, then the government, however strong it may be, and how"ever dear it ought to be to the nation, ought "also to fear every thing for itself: it will in