*

were occupied in arranging the marriage of the Infanta of Spain to the Duke of Montpensier. The public revenues were anticipated, and the annual deficit annually increased. The Catholic clergy were gradually allowed to steal into power, and the education of the people, so necessary to render them capable of the enjoyment of civil liberty, was shamefully neglected. In short, "during a reign in which his real authority and influence were immense, he did little for his country, little for the moral and intellectual elevation of his people, and nothing for the gradual improvement of the political institutions of the kingdom, because his time and attention were absorbed in seeking splendid foreign alliances for his children, and in manœuvring to maintain a supple majority in the Chambers, and to keep those ministers at the head of affairs, who would second most heartily his private designs." +

Soon after the unsuccessful insurrection in 1839, the Legitimists, the Republicans, the renegade Conservatives, and the faction of Odilon Barrot, had combined their motley forces under the supreme command of Monsieur Thiers. Unsuccessful in his attempts to become Prime Minister in

*To form a more correct idea on this subject, it may be well to look at the state of instruction in France. Official returns divide in 1845 the whole population into six classes - three degrees of ignorance, and three of instruction as follows:

4th - Reading and writing correctly

5th-Having the elements of classical education 6th-Having completed their classical studies

Total

† North American Review for July, 1848.

1840, he passed several years, like the genii who lay incarcerated beneath the seal of Solomon, in magnificent promises. At last, in March, 1846, he took a decided stand against Louis Philippe in the Chamber of Deputies, where he advocated electoral reform, and a curtailment of the royal prerogative. The discussion was on a bill to exclude public functionaries from the Chamber of Deputies, where 179 of the 376 members were then in the pay of government, and 132 of them obliged to act in obedience to ministerial orders, or forfeit their places. Monsieur Thiers did not, like Lafitte, "ask pardon from God and man for having aided in the revolution of 1830," but boldly declared: "Some pretend to say that a representative government is impossible in France, on account of her deeplyrooted aristocracy. Ah! if that is true, it should have been told us in 1830; it should have been told us then we, who were signing a protestation which might have cost us our heads; it should have been told us, then, that the difficulty was above our hopes, and that we risked our lives for an illusion. It would have been preferable to have had no revolution - and I only decided in favor of one, because I thought a representative government possible." "You know well," he remarked, in conclusion, "that England has passed through the same train of events- that she also killed a King-that she had her revolution of 1830 in 1668 after which William of Holland took the throne of England; and it is from that, the true representative government dates in England. Well, William would be master, HE, ALSO! He claimed that power which all princes claim – and I say, on this subject, truly foolish are those who are astonished truly feeble those who submit."

This speech was a masterpiece of eloquence, and from that moment the days of Louis Philippe's reign were numbered. It was thus commented on by the "National," which was established as the King's organ, but was at this time the leading opposition paper :

"Never have we found him so full of life and spirit, of happy, brilliant, and frequently elevated inspirations. His language, which is sometimes erratic, beating about the bush, and breaking out into eccentric sparklings, was condensed, but animated; tracing, in one direct line, its luminous course, it went on and on, following its path, without fearing to push aside whatever obstacle it might meet with; and we may add, that when the throne came in its way, the throne did not stop it. It is not permitted to us, who are not free, to point with the finger at the figure so clearly designed under a veil of transparent gauze. The whole speech of M. Thiers was an accusation against the personal government. We might have fancied ourselves brought back to the times of those tempestuous debates in which the coalition launched its thunderbolts."

This determined opposition was for a time quieted by sympathy. A forest-keeper, an ill-conditioned and discontented man, who had seen better days, and who had been an officer in Greece (though but a game-keeper at Fontainbleau,) fired two shots from his double-barrelled gun into the carriage of the royal family of France. He was one of the best shots in the forest, and how the eight or ten persons in the char-à-banc so completely escaped this fire was a miracle. "There is a salute for grandpapa!" said the little Prince of Wurtemberg, in the simplicity of his heart, but a second afterwards, his grandmother picked the smoking wadding of this first shot from her bosom with a trembling hand, and gave it to the King. While he was reassuring her, the assassin again fired, but again without effect, and the unhappy Queen fainted. The char-à-banc went its way the would-be-regicide was captured, and soon afterwards beheaded, though all efforts to trace the crime to party feeling failed. It is the worst of centralized systems of administration, that all ill or wrong can be attributed to the head of the state, more especially when that head is active and dictatorial; so that in France, where so large a portion of the population are employed by government, there were perhaps a million of malcontens, who by

a little exaggeration of each one's personal importance might have been led to consider the King as their personal enemy. This seems to have been the madness of Lecomte; fortune jilted him, and he sought to avenge himself on Louis Philippe, and, instead of harming him, contributed immensely to consolidate his throne. It insured the monarchy three months of that strong popularity which is elicited by sympathy, at the important moment of the elections.

It was owing in part to this sympathy, but in a great measure to the monstrous system of corruption organized throughout France, that at the election in September, 1846, two hundred and eighty-six ministerial candidates were returned, to one hundred and seventy-three of the opposition. In eighteen of the eighty-six departments not a single opposition candidate was returned. And yet the various shades of the opposition were indefatigable in their exertions; but the condition of the official influence shows in a still stronger light the inevitable action of the throne upon the independence of the nation. It is distinctly stated that, of the 240,000 electors of France, 160,000 shared among themselves and their families no less than 628,000 offices, held at the pleasure of Ministers, with emoluments amounting to nearly one hundred and ten millions of dollars. It was also well known that honors were bought and sold, titles bartered for political and literary support, and privileges, both commercial and theatrical, bargained for, and bestowed for a price.

The only gain for France, which the royalists attempted to show, was the marriage of the Duke of Montpensier to the Infanta of Spain by a dark series of intrigues, and the most immoral contrivance that has disgraced the history of modern Europe. Her dowry of thirty millions of francs was paid into the coffers of the Orleans family, but it was an inadequate compensation for political embarrassments of the most serious nature, for England could not forget that she had been deceived by a royal falsehood. It was in vain

that Guizot attempted to clear up his master's prevarication by a wretched subterfuge. Queen Victoria continued inexorably indignant, even after Louis Philippe himself undertook to cajole her by sending a large doll to her eldest child, with a wardrobe of all the different peasant-costumes of France, and an autograph letter. This epistle of the "old cousin" read thus:

"PARIS, JANUARY 27, 1846.

"To her Royal Highness Princess Victoria.

"My dearest little Cousin: -Your charming little letter has given me the greatest pleasure; and I am very happy to have received from you a proof of that precious affection which your illustrious parents feel for me, and which I entertain so deeply for them. If I have been so long in replying to you, it is because I wished my letter to go at the same time with a little Parisienne, whose services I thought might be agreeable to you, without giving you any trouble, or exciting any jealousy on the part of those about you. The little wardrobe, however, which I ordered Madame Bassine [a marchande des modes in the Place Vendome] to arrange for her, in order that she might appear before you with all the fashions in use among forty-six of her fellow countrywomen, has taken so long a time to complete, that it is only just now that the Queen has begged me to come to her, to see her before she is sent to Lord Cowley for her passport. I hope you will be kind enough to receive my little protégée. I am very glad that your brother Albert has not forgotten me also, and I hope that he still uses his gun to go through the exercise. I do not know whether I can flatter myself that Princess Alice has not forgotten me; but as to Prince Alfred [then a baby of a year and a half,] it is quite out of the question [in English.] But what is in the question is, that I love you all very tenderly, and that I take the liberty of kissing you all as your old cousin,

"LOUIS PHILIPPE."

On the first of January, 1847, Louis Philippe, in replying to the fulsome congratulations of the diplomatic corps, prayed God to preserve other nations from revolutionary struggles, and hypocritically hoped that the example of France might "convince States and Kings that monarchy