On one occasion, in particular, I was walking in the Tuileries, when a noise attracted me towards a crowd.  It was Louis-Philippe taking a walk!  This you will understand was intended for effect—­republican effect—­and to show the lieges that he had the outward conformation of another man.  He wore a white hat, carried an umbrella (I am not sure that it was red), and walked in as negligent a manner as a man could walk, who was working as hard as possible to get through with an unpleasant task.  In short, he was condescending with all his might.  A gentleman or two, in attendance, could barely keep up with him; and as for the rabble, it was fairly obliged to trot to gratify its curiosity.  This was about the time the King of England electrified London, after a reign of exclusion, by suddenly appearing in its streets, walking about like another man.  Whether there was any concert in this coincidence or not I do not know.

On another occasion, A——­ and myself drove out at night to view a bivouac in the Carrousel.  We got ourselves entangled in a dense crowd in the Rue St. Honore, and were obliged to come to a stand.  While stationary, the crowd set up a tremendous cry of Vive le roi! and a body of dismounted cavalry of the National Guard passed the carriage windows, flourishing their sabres, and yelling like madmen.  Looking out, I saw the King in their midst, patrolling the streets of his good city of Paris, on foot!  Now he has declared us all under martial law, and is about to shoot those he dislikes.

The fleur-de-lis, as you know, is the distinctive symbol of the family of France.  So much stress is laid on trifles of this nature here, that Napoleon, with his grinding military despotism, never presumed to adopt one for himself.  During the whole of his reign, the coins of the country were decorated on one side with no more than an inscription and a simple wreath, though the gradual progress of his power, and the slow degress by which he brought forward the public, on these points, may yet be traced on these very coins.  The first that were struck bore his head, as First Consul, with “Republique Francaise” on the reverse.  After a time it was “Empereur,” with “Republique Francaise.”  At length he was emboldened to put “Empire Francais” on the reverse, feeling a true royal antipathy to the word republic.

During the existing events that first succeeded the last revolution, no one thought of the fleur-de-lis with which the Bourbons had sprinkled everything in and about the capital, not to say France.  This omission attracted the attention of some demagogue, and there was a little emeute, before the arch of the Carrousel, with threats of destroying these ornaments.  Soon after, workmen were employed to deface everything like a fleur-de-lis in Paris.  The hotel of the Treasury had many hundreds of them in large stone rosettes, every one of which disappeared before the chisel!  The King actually laid down his family arms, causing the brush to be put to all his carriages.  Speaking to Lafayette on this subject, he remarked, pithily—­“Well, I told his Majesty I would have done this before there was a mob, and I would not have done it afterwards.”