I was returning through the Carrousel, when chance made me the spectator of a laughable scene.  A body of these troops, honest, well-intentioned countrymen, with very equivocal equipments, were still in the court of the palace.  It would seem that one warrior had strayed outside the railing, where he was enjoying a famous gossip with some neighbours, whom he was paying, for their cheer, by a narrative of the late campaign.  A sergeant was summoning him back to his colours, but the love of good wine and a good gossip were too strong for discipline.  The more dignified the sergeant became, the more refractory was his neighbour, until, at last, the affair ended in a summons as formal as that which would be made to a place besieged.  The answer was truly heroic, being rendered into the vernacular, “I won’t.”  An old woman advanced from the crowd to reason with the sergeant, but she could get no farther than “Ecoutez, Mons. le Sergeant”—­for, like all in authority, he was unreasonable and impatient when his power was called in question.  He returned to the battalion, and tried to get a party to arrest the delinquent, but this was easier said than done.  The troops evidently had no mind to disturb a neighbour who had just done the state good service, and who was now merely enjoying himself.  The officer returned alone, and once more summoned the truant, if possible, more solemnly than ever.  By this time the mouth of the delinquent was too full to answer, and he just turned his back on the dignitary, by way of letting him see that, his mind was made up.  In the end, the soldier got the best of it, compelling the other to abandon the point.

The country people, of whom there were a good many present, looked on the matter seriously, but the Parisians laughed outright.  I mention this little incident, for it shows that men are the same everywhere, and because this was an instance of military insubordination directly under the windows of the palace of the King of France, at the precise moment when his friends were boasting that the royal authority was triumphant, which, had it occurred in the interior of America, would have been quoted as proof of the lawlessness of democracy!  I apprehend that militia, taken from their daily occupations, and embodied, and this, too, under the orders of their friends and neighbours, are pretty much alike, in their leading characteristics, all over the world.

LETTER VI.

Aspect of Paris.—­Visit to Lafayette.—­His demeanour.—­His account of the commencement of the Revolt.—­Machinations of the Police.—­Character of Lafayette.—­His remarkable expression to General—.—­Conversation on the Revolution of July.—­The Doctrinaires.—­Popular Sympathy in England and on the Rhine.—­Lafayette’s dismissal from the command of the National Guards.—­The Duke of Orleans and his Friends.—­Military Tribunals in Paris.—­The Citizen King in the Streets.—­Obliteration of the Fleur-de-lis.—­The Royal Equipage.—­The Duke of Brunswick in Paris.—­His forcible Removal from France.—­His Reception in Switzerland.—­A ludicrous Mistake.