Peer of France, field-marshal, ambassador, the Prince Jules de Polignac was one of the favorites of the Restoration.  On the proposition of M. de Chateaubriand, then Minister of Foreign Affairs, he had him named, in 1823, ambassador to London, where he had shown a genuine talent for diplomacy.  The example of England made him think that in France the liberties of the constitutional regime could be combined with the directing influence of an aristocracy.  That was his error and the cause of his fall.  Some weeks before his accession to the ministry, he had solemnly affirmed in the Chamber of Peers, that he considered the Charter as a solemn pact, on which rested the monarchical institutions of France, and as the heavenly sign of a serene future.  But the liberals did not believe his word, and accused him of striving to re-establish the old regime.

Even at court the accession of the Prince de Polignac did not fail to cause apprehension.  Charles X., having announced to the Duchess of Gontaut that he was going to appoint him minister, added:  “This news must give you pleasure; you know him well, I believe.”  The Duchess replied:  “He has been absent a long time.  I only knew him when very young.”  The King resumed:  “Do not speak of it; it is my secret as yet.”  Madame de Gontaut could not keep from smiling, for she held several letters from London in her hand, among others one from the sister-in-law of the Duke of Wellington, announcing the news.  Charles X. wished to see the letters.  “He is good, loyal,” they said, “loving the King as one loves a friend, but feeble, and with bad surroundings.  It is doubted whether he can ever rise to the height of the post in which the King wishes to place him.”

Charles X., wounded by the indiscretion of the Prince, and also by that of the Duke of Wellington, who divulged what he himself was keeping secret, returned the letter to Madame de Gontaut, and remarked:—­

“It is very thoughtless in Jules to have spoken of it so soon, and in the Duke to have published it.”  The Duchess of Gontaut, who was used to frank talk with the King, said:  “In the circumstances existing, I long for, I confess it frankly, and at the risk of displeasing Your Majesty, yes, I long for the Martignac ministry.”

Then, adds the Duchess in her unpublished Memoirs, the King, more impatient than ever, turned his back on me, and took his way to his apartment.  I had had the courage to tell him my thought and the truth.  I did not repent it.  When we saw each other again the same day he did not speak to me again of it.

One of those most devoted to the elder branch, the Duke Ambroise de la Rochefoucauld-Doudeauville, also says in his Memoirs:—­