At three o’clock in the afternoon, Madame embarked anew on the steamboat awaiting her at the point of Varades, and proceeded in this way to Nantes.  The inhabitants from the two banks of the stream greeted her upon her passage.  The red aprons and white caps of the women contrasted, in the landscape, with the sombre, costume of the men.  That she might be better recognized by the crowd, the Princess, clad in a simple robe of brown silk, with a long chain of gold at the neck, separated herself from her suite, mounted to the highest point on the boat, and greeted with voice and gesture all these faithful people.  The men waved banners and standards.  The women raised their little children in their arms and said:  “Look at her well; it’s the mother of the Duke of Bordeaux.”

The people seemed to walk upon the water to get a nearer view of Madame.  Not a rock pushing out into the stream that was not occupied.  Where the Loire was too wide for the features of the Princess to be seen from the shore, the dwellers on the banks had, so to speak, brought them together, by forming in the middle of the stream streets of boats, with their flags and their triumphal arches.  At a league from Saint Florent a rock juts into the water of the Loire.  Here was an aged Vendean, all alone, his white hair fluttering in the wind.  Erect upon the rock, he was holding a white flag, and at his feet was a dog.  It was, according to the Moniteur, a symbol of faithful Vendee.

The same day, June 22, at seven in the evening, the Princess reached Nantes.  She passed on foot from the Port Maillard to the Prefecture, and had difficulty in getting through the innumerable multitude.  The next day she was at Savenay, where, on leaving the church, she paused to contemplate the monument raised to the memory of the victims of the battle of the 23d of September, 1793.  The 24th, she went to Saint Anne d’Auray, a pilgrimage venerated throughout all Brittany, and visited the Champ des Martyrs, the little plain where thirty-three years before, the emigres taken at Quiberon had been shot, despite their capitulation.  When Madame appeared on the consecrated field, the crowd cheered her, then became still, and amid solemn silence, sang the de Profundis.

The 25th, the Princess was at Lorient, and there laid the corner-stone of the monument erected to Bisson, the lieutenant of the navy who, in the Greek expedition, October, 1827, being charged with the command of a brig taken from the Turks by Admiral de Rigny’s fleet, blew up the vessel, with the crew, rather than surrender.  After visiting Rennes, she returned to Nantes, the 28th of June.  A triumphal arch had been constructed on the Place des Changes, with this inscription:  “Lilies for our Bourbons.  Laurels for Henry.  Roses for Louise.”  The flower and fruit girls had written on their arch of verdure:  “Our flowers, our fruits, our hearts, are Madame’s.”  The 29th, the Duchess attended a magnificent ball given by the city.  The next day she visited the Trappist Convent at Melleray.  It was difficult to persuade her to go away.  “Where shall I find more happiness than here?” she said.  “Elsewhere there are pleasures and distractions, but none here.  Since I make them happy, I would remain; and I am very well pleased.”