France in the Nineteenth Century

in the Nineteenth Century, by
Elizabeth Latimer

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Title: France in the Nineteenth Century
Author: Elizabeth Latimer
Release Date: November 28, 2004 [EBook #14194]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FRANCE
IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ***

Produced by Robert J. Hall

[Illustration: EMPEROR NAPOLEON I.]

FRANCE

IN
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
1830-1890
BY ELIZABETH WORMELEY LATIMER
AUTHOR OF "SALVAGE," "MY WIFE AND MY WIFE'S SISTER,"
"PRINCESS AMÉLIE," "FAMILIAR TALKS ON SOME OF
SHAKESPEARE'S COMEDIES," ETC.

NOTE
The sources from which I have drawn the materials for this book are
various; they come largely from private papers, and from articles
contributed to magazines and newspapers by contemporary writers,
French, English, and American. I had not at first intended the work for
publication, and I omitted to make notes which would have enabled me
to restore to others the "unconsidered trifles" that I may have taken
from them.
As far as possible, I have endeavored to remedy this; but should any
other writer find a gold thread of his own in my embroidery, I hope he
will look upon it as an evidence of my appreciation of his work, and
not as an act of intentional dishonesty.
E. W. L.
SEPTEMBER, 1892.

CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
CHARLES X. AND THE DAYS OF JULY II. LOUIS PHILIPPE

AND HIS FAMILY III. LOUIS NAPOLEON'S EARLY CAREER IV.
TEN YEARS OF THE REIGN OF THE CITIZEN-KING V. SOME
CAUSES OF THE REVOLUTION OF 1848 VI. THE DOWNFALL
OF LOUIS PHILIPPE VII. LAMARTINE AND THE SECOND
REPUBLIC VIII. THE COUP D'ÉTAT IX. THE EMPEROR'S
MARRIAGE X. MAXIMILIAN AND MEXICO XI. THE EMPEROR
AND EMPRESS AT THE SUMMIT OF PROSPERITY XII. PARIS
IN 1870,--AUGUST AND SEPTEMBER XIII. THE SIEGE OF
PARIS XIV. THE PRUSSIANS IN FRANCE XV. THE COMMUNE
XVI. THE HOSTAGES XVII. THE GREAT REVENGE XVIII. THE
FORMATION OF THE THIRD REPUBLIC XIX. THREE FRENCH
PRESIDENTS XX. GENERAL BOULANGER

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
EMPEROR NAPOLEON I CHARLES X LOUIS PHILIPPE, DUKE
OF ORLEANS DUCHESSE DE BERRY QUEEN MARIE AMÉLIE
LOUIS PHILIPPE, "THE CITIZEN KING" ALPHONSE DE
LAMARTINE LOUIS NAPOLEON, "THE PRINCE PRESIDENT"
DUC DE MORNY EUGÉNIE EMPEROR MAXIMILIAN EMPEROR
NAPOLEON III EMPRESS EUGÉNIE JULES SIMON JULES
FAVRE MONSEIGNEUR DARBOY, ARCHBISHOP OF PARIS
PRESIDENT ADOLPH THIERS LÉON GAMBETTA COMTE DE
CHAMBORD PRESIDENT JULES GRÉVY PRESIDENT
SADI-CARNOT GENERAL BOULANGER

FRANCE IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.
1830-1890.
* * * * *
CHAPTER I.
CHARLES X. AND THE DAYS OF JULY.

Louis XVIII. in 1815 returned to his throne, borne on the shoulders of
foreign soldiers, after the fight at Waterloo. The allied armies had a
second time entered France to make her pass under the saws and
harrows of humiliation. Paris was gay, for money was spent freely by
the invading strangers. Sacrifices on the altar of the Emperor were over;
enthusiasm for the extension of the great ideas of the Revolution had
passed away; a new generation had been born which cared more for
material prosperity than for such ideas; the foundation of many fortunes
had been laid; mothers who dreaded the conscription, and men weary
of war and politics, drew a long breath, and did not regret the loss of
that which had animated a preceding generation, in a view of a peace
which was to bring wealth, comfort, and tranquillity into their own
homes.
The bourgeoisie of France trusted that it had seen the last of the Great
Revolution. It stood between the working-classes, who had no voice in
the politics of the Restoration, and the old nobility,--men who had
returned to France full of exalted expectations. The king had to place
himself on one side or the other. He might have been the true Bourbon
and headed the party of the returned émigrés,--in which case his crown
would not have stayed long upon his head; or he might have made
himself king of the bourgeoisie, opposed to revolution, Napoleonism,
or disturbances of any kind,--the party, in short, of the Restoration of
Peace: a peace that might outlast his time; et après moi le déluge!
But animals which show neither teeth nor claws are seldom left in
peace, and Louis XVIII.'s reign--from 1814 to 1824--was full of
conspiracies. The royalty of the Restoration was only an ornament
tacked on to France. The Bourbon dynasty was a necessary evil, even
in the eyes of its supporters. "The Bourbons," said Chateaubriand, "are
the foam on the revolutionary wave that has brought them back to
power;" whilst