nistration of its property, the king's private domaius, and the endowment of the princes and princesses of the royal family. For the latter purpose the annual sum of 8,000,000 of francs was assigned to serve instead of apenage. This law was adopted in the chamber of deputies by a majority of 185 votes to 4.

The same minister appeared before the chamber on the 29th of November, to lay before it a statement of the king's, debts. Those of his majesty, and of the princes of his family, with those left by Louis XVI. amounted to about 30,000,000 of francs, which he justly said was no great sum considering the number of years during which the principal and interest had been accumulating. The interest of these debts the king offered to pay provisionally out of the civil list, so that no alteration would be required in the budget. The count then alluding to the law which restored to the companions of the king's exile such of their property as was not alienated, said, that his majesty only felt the more strongly the obligations which it laid upon hire to fulfil towards those who had nothing to ect from the measures to which the legislati ody had been obliged to confine itself. It belonged therefore to him alone to succour the honorable indigence of these persons; and confiding in the co-operation which the generosity of this body promised him, he would endeavour to discharge this debt contracted by misfortune. The count then read the plan of a law presented to the chamber in the name of the king. After stating the amount of the debt, it proposed a commission to be appointed by his majesty to examine the titles of the creditors, according to whose decision they should be inscribed in the book of the public debt, the interest up to January 1, 1816, to be paid out of the civil list, and after that date to be provided for in the budget. This faw being discussed in the chamber on December 15, an amendment, proposed by the central committee, was taken into consideration, namely, that it would not be proper to accept his majesty's generous offer of paying the interest of the debt for 1815 out of the civil list; and the law thus amended passed only with a single negative..

We shall now close this chapter with a biographical sketch of Louis Stanislaus Xavier, the XVIIIth, King of France. He was born on the 17th of November, 1755, being the second son of the then Dauphin of France.

From a long line of ancestors he inherited the name of Louis; that of Stanislaus was derived from his great grandfather, Stanislaus Duke of Lorraine and King of Poland, whose only daughter, Maria Lesinski, was queen to Louis XV. whilst that of Xavier was taken from the electoral family of Saxony, his own mother, Ma

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ria Josepha, being daughter to the duke of that BOOK XIV. ancient division of the German empire. Whilst yet a cliild, he was designated by the title of Count de Provence, which he changed for Monsieur, when the death of his grandfather, Louis XV. left the throne for his elder brother, the late unfortunate monarch; and, in consequence of the death of his father, a loss of a most serious nature, as the dauphin was of the most estimable character, both as a man and a parent, he was thrown amidst all the blandishments of a voluptuous court, at an age when reason is generally supposed to yield to the passions. Notwithstanding the danger of this situation, those who knew him best declare that his regard for virtue and religion was real and permanent, and that his respect for the rights and liberties of his countrymen was one of his earliest characteristics. Indeed, so conspicuous, yet so unostentatious, was his deportment in general, that the Duc de Richelieu is said to have given him the name of the young Cato at an old court; an appellation which, whether prompted by admiration or by sarcasm, was equally honorable to the subject of it.

Even during his grandfather's life-time, as well as during the whole reign of his brother, the present French monarch was alike distinguished for his attention to science and literature, and for his patronage of genius..

Monsieur appears not to have taken any active part in the politics of his native land until the year 1787, when, in the assembly of the notables, then first called together by Calonne, the French premier, he declared himself hostile to all interference with noble and ecclesiastical privileges; but, at the same time, he was not forgetful of the welfare of the people, steadily maintaining that there was no necessity for any additional taxes to be laid on their industry, and always expressing his conviction that a few years of peace, of economy, and of regularity, would remove every financial difficulty.

So anxious was Calonne to have his plan of finance adopted, that he even went so far as to use the king's name in its favor, whilst conversing with Monsieur upon the subject; but the answer of the latter was as rational as it was dignified"My heart is like my brother's and the people's; but my understanding is my own; as for my head; it is the king's." He went much further in conversing with Calonne upon the subject; and it is generally believed that the minister was induced,. by the force of his reasoning, to lay aside much of the speculative and visionary part of his plans. Calonne, however, went out, and the succeeding ministers did not choose to pay attention to the modest advice of the urostentatious prince, who mixed but little either with the gay or the political world, until he found it necessary, not only to sup

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BOOK XIV. port ́the just rights of the people, but also the necessary prerogatives of the prince, well convinced that the two must stand or fall together. Hitherto Monsieur had resided some distance from Paris; but no sooner did the horrors of the revolution commence, in 1789, by the personal insults to the king obliging him to remove from Versailles to the capital, than he gave up his retirement, and became a resident in the Luxembourg palace, where he was, perhaps, of men, the only real friend left to the unhappy Louis, as the Count d'Artois, now Monsieur, was then in Germany, whither he had emigrated with several others of the blood royal.

The conspirators little knew the real spirit and resolution of the late unfortunate monarch; and, supposing that the advice of Monsieur alone had prompted him to the dignified conduct of the moment, they used every means in their power to separate them, or at least to destroy the mutual confidence which subsisted between the two brothers. For that purpose, it is said La Fayette, and his party, trumped up a plot about a Marquis de Favres, in which they boldly asserted that Monsieur was implicated. Favres was tried; and as Monsieur knew his innocence, he actually attended upon his trial to give evidence in his favor: but the municipal judges paid no attention to his protestations, and the unfortunate Favres fell a victim to the ambitious plans of La Fayette and Mirabeau, who, by this first revolutionary measure -this first revolutionary trial and condemnation, succeeded in imposing such a belief on the people as they wished, and raised such an odium against the unfortunate prince, that a regard to his own personal safety, when his exertions could no longer be of use to his brother, forced him to emigrate, which he was only able to do through the assistance of a friendly Swede, the Count de Fersen, passing by the way of Valenciennes into Brabant; but not until he had actually heard the act of accusation against himself and all the Bourbons publicly cried about, having been printed at a jacobin press, evidently for the purpose of insuring his and their condemnation. Nor did he even then desert his brother, for the escape of the royal family was at the same time concerted, though it did not finally succeed.

No sooner did Monsieur arrive at Coblentz, where he found his now surviving brother, and the other Bourbon branches, than he immediately applied himself to the military arrangements necessary for raising and organizing au emigrant force, under the auspices of the German emperor and other friendly monarchs-a force which he took under his own immediate command, when the national assembly thought proper to declare war against the world.

No sooner was it known that Monsieur had emigrated, than the new legislative government

decreed that he had forfeited his eventual right to the regency, if he did not return within two months: but he knew too well the character of those he had to deal with to trust to their mercy; an opinion too fatally verified in the murder of so many of the other branches of his family.

It is unnecessary to recapitulate the events of the period between that and the year 1795, (being already recorded in this work) when the death of the dauphin, or rather of Louis XVII., presented a vacant but outraged throne to the subject of our biography-a throne to which he was proclaimed the rightful heir, not only amongst the loyal emi grants in Germany, but even in La Vendée, in the west of France itself.

Little prospect, however, appeared of his being able to recover the throne of his ancestors; and accordingly he made no serious attempts for it, but resided quietly at the court of Turin, having been for some years married to the daughter of the Sardinian monarch. But even from this retreat he was driven by the advance of the republican armies; when he retired, in 1796, to Verona, a city in the Venetian territories, where he lived incognito, as the Count de Lille: here, indeed, his residence was of very short duration, as the insolence of the usurper, then General Bonaparte, prompted him to demand his dismissal from the Venetian protection. To this demand the senate of that ancient and once powerful state was obliged to agree; but not until the unhappy yet spirited monarch had demanded admission to the Golden Book of the senate, which contained the names of all the Venetian nobles, In that book his great-grandfather's grandfather, the gallant Henry IV. had once inscribed his name, and the name of Bourbon, and these the insulted monarch disdainfully and justly erased from their records.

Even in his retreat from Verona he seems to have been followed by republican vengeance; for we have seen it recorded, that in the summer of 1797, whilst on his route through Germany, a foreign assassin, or a female regicide, watched for him there, and whilst standing at the window of an inn in an obscure village, a shot was fired, which wounded him slightly in the head. His conduct on this occasion was most magnanimous, forbidding all search to be made after the villain, and saying, that "it must either be a mistake, or a premeditated crime: in the former case, it would be cruel to pursue; and, in the latter, as I have done no harm to any human being, the person who would murder me has punishment enough in his own bosom, and wants my forgiveness more than I do his death!"

In the contest which Russia had with France, in 1798, the late Emperor Paul found it expedient to acknowledge Louis XVIII. as the just claimant to the throne of that country; and it was

his intention to assist him in recovering the throne of his ancestors: he offered him an asylum at Mittau, in Livonia, a proposal which the unhappy prince gladly accepted, his health being considerably impaired by the privations, distresses, fatigues, and even the penury and want, which he experienced in his noble adherence to the unfortunate loyalists of the Condean army, at whose particular request it was that he was persuaded to indulge in a temporary repose.

The conduct of the Emperor Paul was, at first, magnanimous and generous in the extreme, as his royal guest was received and treated with all the honours which a sovereign in his situation could possibly wish for, having not only a guard of native Russians appointed to attend upon him, but also one formed from the French noblesse; besides being permitted to draw around him as many of his loyal countrymen as he pleased, with whom the generous prince shared, in the most bounteous manner, the liberal allowance which Paul had appropriated to his use.

Indeed, so anxious was the emperor to make every arrangement for his comfort and influence, at the place of his residence, that the Governor of Mittau was actually placed under his orders; and he was even encouraged to assume so much of the personal functions of royalty, as to have regular levees, at which the noblesse of the neighbouring provinces were proud to attend: but such events could not long remain =unknown to the French republicans, who were successful, at length, in acquiring an undue influence over the councils of Paul, whom they I persuaded, first, to distress the unhappy moarch, by withholding the payment of his pension, and afterwards to send him orders to depart from the Russian dominions; a journey for which they allowed him only a week's preparation. All this was done at the instigation of that man whose recent downfall has restored Louis to the throne of his ancestors. With a pride highly honourable to himself, the insulted monarch determined not to remain twenty-four hours longer in the Russian dominions; be felt not for himself, but he felt for those unhappy loyalists whose sole dependence was upon his bounty; and as he could not relieve them, he resolved to set them a bright example of resignation to the will of Heaven.

But it was not only for his faithful subjects that Louis felt anxiety, for part of his own family claimed his attention; particularly the amiable Duchess of Angouleme, his illustrious niece, who had long resided with him at Mittau, accompanied by her young husband. To her he explained his sad situation, and assured her, that, as he had not the means of travelling as he had formerly done, and, as the little that he possessed would be necessary for the daily maintenance of those

an example how to bear misfortune, and would BOOK XIV. the next day leave Mittau with them on foot.

However the duchess might venerate the mag nanimity of her uncle, yet she dutifully determined to save him, if possible, from personal inconvenience, and actually sold to a Jew a valuable bow of diamonds, presented to her as a nuptial gift by her imperial relations at Vienna; by which means she raised a sum that enabled her uncle to travel comfortably, and also to provide for the present wants of those unhappy loyalists who were obliged to remain in the place.

In Prussia, Louis was treated rather as an enemy than as a friend: in fact, the Prussian cabinet were afraid to shew him protection, and it was only at length by the forbearance of Napoleon Bonaparte that the King of France was permitted to reside for some time at Warsaw, in the habitation of a monarch who had also been driven from his throne.

While residing at Warsaw, in 1804, Napoleon had the audacity to send several messengers to him with proposals for a formal abdication of his claims to the French crown; but the prudent and virtuous indignation of Louis guarded him from so mean a compliance: and when Meyer, the Prussian president, had the audacity to repeat the same proposal on the part of the Corsican, it has been well observed, that the dignified answer of Louis was sufficient to convince the world, that though fortune may desert virtue, and render it distressed or miserable, yet still she is unable to degrade or dishonor it.

After the accession of the present Russian monarch to the throne of his ancestors, an agreeable change took place in the situation of the French king, as ample and liberal allowances were made for the support of his household, but of which Louis availed himself very sparingly with respect to his own accommodation; for, as a judicious biographer has observed, there religion was his only solace, consoling him by its promises, whilst study improved the knowledge of one of the most humane and best informed amongst modern princes

a sovereign whose constancy and courage, during a long and unexampled adversity, have been only surpassed by his modesty and moderation, when surrounded by every thing that made rank illustrious, ambition tempting, and life desirable.

But even at Warsaw he was not permitted to remain undisturbed; for, in the month of July, 1805, a plot was formed by the now degraded Napoleon, to get rid of those fears which hung about his usurped throne-a man of the name of Coulon, the keeper of a billiard-table at that place, was offered a large sum if he would take an opportunity, in consequence of his intimacy with the cook of the royal kitchen, to throw some

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BOOK XIV. tail all the particulars of this plot would far exceed our limits; but those who are curious about it will find a long and interesting detail in the third volume of the Revolutionary Plutarch, where a system of premeditated murder against every legitimate prince in Europe is disclosed upon authority which can scarcely be doubted: nay, such was Napoleon's determination to get rid of all the members of the house of Bourbon, that Coulon was offered additional rewards in case the Duchess of Angouleme and, her husband should also fall victims to the same treachery! Subsequent political events rendered it unsafe for Louis to reside upon the continent, and his only resource was the land of real liberty; since which period, he always resided in this country, gaining the esteem and exciting the admiration of all ranks and parties in the state: for though

political reasons, and the uncertainty of the issue. of the war, rendered it prudent, that our govern ment should not ostensibly sanction the Bourbon claims, nor that the princes of that house should be received at court on public days, yet a great degree of private friendship has always subsisted between the princes of two once rival houses,

We have already noticed that Louis XVIII whilst Monsieur, was married to a daughter of the King of Sardinia: a match, however, which was not blessed with any issue. Since his ma jesty's taking up his residence in this country, he had the misfortune to lose this very estimable woman, who bore the misfortunes both of her ternal and maternal family with a degree of for titude honorable to her rank, and to the sex of which she was an ornament.

pa

Island.

THE impolitic language of Count Ferraud, one of the ministers of the king, respecting national property, which we noticed in our last chapter, produced an immediate and fatal impression. The disaffected eagerly availed themselves of it, and circulated it through the provinces with a thou sand exaggerations. The two pamphlets, written by Messrs. Dard and Falconnet, which condemned the alienation of the property of the emigrants, and recommended its restitution, had an extensive and almost incredible circulation. The emigrants hoped that the public mind would be prepared for a measure which formed the consummation of all their hopes, and the enemies of the Bourbons rightly judged that they could adopt no better means of exciting general apprehension and discontent. The French ministry at length found it necessary to interfere; and the authors were ordered to be imprisoned; but when it was soon afterwards announced that they had been released without punishment and without censure, the suspicion was too naturally excited, that the court was secretly favorable to the cause which these writers advocated. Persons were sent by the disaffected through the departments under the pretext of purchasing land. They were instructed

to reject with contempt every offer of what had been national property, and diligently to propa gate the report that it was the determination of the court soon to reclaim the estates of all the noblesse. Indeed, it must be acknowledged that various germs of a design to encroach on the new order of things had really sprung up, and were already visible. It had been whispered about by some of the emigrant nobles, that Louis only waited till he felt himself secure on his throne, when he would eject the unlawful occu pants of the national domains, and restore bis faithful followers to the patrimony of their an cestors. Considerable alarm spread among all the proprietors. Their estates were suddenly and strangely depreciated in value. They were not considered to be worth more than two or three years' purchase. To alarm, speedily succeeded discontent, alienation of affection, and a wish for the return of that government under which their estates had been acquired, and under which alone they appeared to be secure.

It was not to be expected, that the king and his court could feel much affection for those who owed their honors and their wealth to the active part which they had borne in the various scenes of the