But for the Parisians there was a calamity in reserve, which sank deeper into their souls than the fluttering of hostile banners in their streets, or the clanging tread of an armed enemy on their door-stones.  It was decided that the Gallery of the Louvre should be despoiled, and that the works of art, which had been collected from all nations, making that receptacle the marvel of the age, should be restored to their legitimate owners.  A wail went up from the universal heart of France at this sad judgment.  It was felt that this great loss would be irreparable.  Time, the soother of all sorrow, might restore her worn energies, recruit her wasted population, cover her fields with abundance, and, turning the activity of an intelligent people into industrial channels, clothe her with renewed wealth and power.  But the magnificence of that collection, once departed, could never come to her again; and the lover of beauty, instead of finding under one roof whatever genius had created for the worship of the ages, would have to wander over all Europe, seeking in isolated and widely-separated positions the riches which at the Louvre were strewed before him in congregated prodigality.  But lamentations were in vain.  The miracles of human inspiration were borne to the congenial climes which originated them, to have, in all after time, the tale of their journeyings an inseparable appendage to their history, and even their intrinsic merit to derive additional lustre from the perpetual boast, that they had been considered worthy a place in the Gallery of Napoleon.

In the general amnesty which formed an article in the capitulation of Paris, there was no apprehension that revenge would demand an atonement.  But hardly had the Bourbons recommenced their reign, when, in utter disregard of the faith of treaties, they sought satisfaction for their late precipitate flight in assailing those who had been instrumental in causing it.  Many of their intended victims found safety in foreign lands.  Labedoyere, who joined the Emperor with his regiment, was tried and executed.  Lavalette was condemned, but escaped through the heroism of his wife and the generous devotion of three Englishmen.  Ney was shot in Paris.  I would dwell a moment on his fate, not only because circumstances gave me a peculiar interest in it, but from the fact that it had more effect in drawing a dividing line between the royal family and the French people than any event that occurred during their reign.  It was treasured up with a hate that found no fit utterance until the memorable Three Days of 1830; and when the insurgents stormed the Tuileries, their cries bore evidence that fifteen years had not diminished the bitter feeling engendered by that vindictive, unnecessary, and most impolitic act.