The royalists welcomed with exultation the dawn of the 31st.  Together with the proclamation of Schwartzenberg, they circulated one of Monsieur, and another of Louis XVIII. himself; and some of the leading gentlemen of the party, the Montmorencys, the Noailles, the Rohans, the Rochefoucalds, the Polignacs, the Chateaubriands, were early on horseback in the streets; which they paraded without interruption from any, either of the civil authorities, or of the National Guard, decorated with the symbols of their cause, and appealing with eloquence to the feelings of the onlookers.  As yet, however, they were only listened to.  The mass of the people were altogether uncertain what the end was to be:  and, in the language of the chief orator himself, M. Sosthenes de Rochefoucald, “the silence was most dismal.”  At noon the first of the Allied troops began to pass the barrier and enter the city.  The royalist cavaliers met them; but though many officers observing the white cockade exclaimed “la belle decoration!” the generals refused to say anything which might commit their sovereigns.  Some ladies of rank, however, now appeared to take their part in the scene; and when these fair hands were seen tearing their dresses to make white cockades, the flame of their enthusiasm began to spread.  Various pickets of the National Guard had plucked the tricolor badge from their caps, and assumed the white, ere many of the Allies passed the gates.

At noon, as has been mentioned, this triumphal procession began, and it lasted for several hours.  The show was splendid; 50,000 troops, horse, foot, and artillery, all in the highest order and condition, marched along the boulevards; and in the midst appeared the youthful Czar and the King of Prussia, followed by a dazzling suite of princes, ambassadors, and generals.  The crowd was so great that their motion, always slow, was sometimes suspended.  The courteous looks and manners of all the strangers—­but especially the affable and condescending air of Alexander, were observed at first with surprise; as the cavalcade passed on, and the crowd thickened, the feelings of the populace rose from wonder to delight, and ended in contagious and irresistible rapture.  No sovereigns entering their native capitals were ever received with more enthusiastic plaudits; and still, at every step, the shouts of Vive L’Empereur Alexandre!—­Vive le Roi de Prusse! were more and more loudly mingled with the long-forgotten echoes of Vive le Roi!—­Vive Louis XVIII.—­Vivent les Bourbons!

The monarchs at last halted, dismissed their soldiers to quarters in the city, saw Platoff and his Cossacks establish their bivouack in the Champs Elysees, and retired to the residences prepared for them; that of Alexander being, as we have mentioned above, in the hotel of Talleyrand.