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received with not less enthusiasm. In the course of the royal journey, his majesty visited the mines of Charlon, belonging to M. Casimir Perier; and nothing was omitted to render the visit of his majesty delightful. Shortly after, M. Perier received from his majesty the decoration of the Legion of Honour.

The reception experienced by the king in these progresses established the influence of Martignac. Charles X. began to indulge in the hope that the nation would at length do justice to his intentions. But, alas! all this was a complete and systematic delusion, of which Martignac was the first dupe, and the King the second.

Inspirited by his reception in the Provinces, and desirous of establishing the good understanding which at length seemed to prevail between the Bourbons and the party which had apparently so long aimed at the transfer, if not the overthrow, of the crown, the king authorised the minister to prepare a popular project of a law on the Communes. It were useless to trouble an English reader with the dry details of this measure: but what was the mortification and despair of Charles X. when he found, to his astonishment, that his popular minister, recently greeted with the unanimous plaudits of the country, was in a minority, and on

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a law which he had been led to suppose was equally necessary and satisfactory to all parties? and when insult upon injury he was told that all this time he had been gulled that the popular reception which looked so spontaneous had all been arranged at Paris, and that the enthusiasm was a mere piece of acting la comedie of M. Odillon Barrot!

From first to last, the Martignac ministry was a stream of concessions, and the very day that its chief perceived his danger, and hesitated whether he ought to proceed further, he instantly encountered the opposition of the very men against whom his predecessor had so long, so boldly, and so ably struggled, and whom he fancied (good easy man) that he had conciliated. In a moment all was changed, and M. Royer de Collard, a prime champion of the school of concession, who, a few months before the "deplorable" address of March, 1830, had been elected for nine departments at the same timewho had been chosen, by a triumphant majority, president of the chamber who was styled the representative of the felicity and content of France, and quoted by the youth, as the personification of their opinions M. Royer de Collard could now, with difficulty, steal into the chamber by a single nomination. Such is French popularity!

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And all for what? Because the minister ventured to oppose an amendment insidiously proposed to defeat his project of the law of the Communes,a very liberal project, even according to the liberals, and intended by the Crown as a great concession to the liberal party. This was the pretext; the truth was, that M. de Martignac had sufficiently served their purpose, and they were now ready to precipitate the last act of the comedy. In this instance, the party of the royalist defection again combined with the liberals, and destroyed the ministry of Martignac, as they had before destroyed the ministry of Villèle.

At the moment this amendment was proposed, M. de Martignac perceived all the consequences of his previous system of concession; he plainly saw that France was lost, that the King could never consent to an amendment of a direct revolutionary tendency, and had lost the means of resisting it; and he quitted the Chamber, while it was yet sitting, to solicit an audience of the sovereign. The minister was absent about twenty minutes; all foresaw the resulta grim smile of triumph played upon the lips of the adverse faction. In half an hour, M. de Martignac returned; that return I witnessed, and shall never forget. Pale and discomfited, Martignac announced to the

house that he was commanded by the King to withdraw the law entirely. Great joy among the faction! Le commencement de la fin was whispered along the revolutionary benches. Their system was clear; if they could only succeed in preventing the proposal of liberal laws, by terrifying the Court with ultra liberal amendments, in time the Court finding it impossible to work with the Chamber, must be driven either to coups d'état or

to abdication. So much for all those silly reflections that you are daily favoured with, from superficial ignorance on the position of the King under the Martignac administration. We are even instructed to-day (April 7.) by a violent tirade in the Times newspaper, against "the black perfidy" of this unhappy monarch in deserting the popular minister, who would have maintained his throne. Poh!

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My readers may, perhaps, therefore, begin to suspect that it is not entirely to the Bourbons that the misfortunes of France are to be attributed, and that it is possible, in our extreme zeal, we may have occasionally mistaken a place-hunter and an intriguer for a patriot and a philosopher. A short time after the fatal farce of the amendment, proofs were laid before the King of a matured conspiracy against the dynasty, by a strong party

in the state, organised by a press with whose outrageous career the law could not grapple, and comprising high functionaries in almost every department; a conspiracy against which it appeared impossible to struggle by regular means. This conspiracy had overthrown the ministry of Villèle, an administration based upon the principle of directing the national energies from foreign conquests and internal innovations into the channels of industry and commerce. This conspiracy had overthrown the ministry of Martignac, an administration based upon the principle of conciliating the innovators by concession, and bearing the motto of L'ordre legal.* Under these circumstances, finding it impossible to satisfy or conciliate the party, who, by the press, of which they were the proprietors, had corrupted the public mind, the King believed that the general interest required a minister who would boldly oppose the torrent. The charter had invested him with the right of changing his minister at his pleasure, and the King nominated M. de Polignac, who was

*"The Liberals," who christened M. Villèle, deplorable, finally rewarded their enfant gaté, Martignac, by the epithet incapable, and reserved epouvantable for M. de Polignac. For M. Perier there only remains coupable.

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