242 THE CITIZEN KING. of the British flag. While here the fugitive gained the affections of Amelia, the second daughter of king Ferdinand, and was married to her in November, 1809. At the downfall of Napoleon, in 1814, he returned to Paris, and was restored to his honours and property; but the reappearance of the emperor, and "the reign of the hundred days," necessitated another flight, and he again sought refuge at Twickenham, until he was summoned to attend in the chamber of peers. His continuance in France was however but of short duration. Having in the chamber of peers successfully protested against the extreme measures which were employed against those who had been engaged in the revolution, he fell under the displeasure of Louis XVIII., who indeed always regarded him with jealousy. The princes of the blood being forbidden by the king to appear in the chamber, he once more returned to Twickenham, where he continued until 1827; but in the same year returned and lived in seclusion at his palace at Neuilly, till "the revolution of the three days," and the abdication of Charles, called him out again to the cares of public life. When Louis Philippe ascended the throne in August, 1830, as "citizen king," every thing for a time seemed to be fair and promising. He hoped that he was secure in the affections of the people, and that his dignity, for which some writers contend he had been intriguing, would only terminate with his life. The people thought that one who had been nursed in adversity, and who owed his crown to the elective choice of the people, would prove to be what he promised-a really constitutional monarch. But both parties were deceived; insurrections occurred, and indicated the unsettled state of public feeling. One especially, which broke out in Paris, was of a serious kind. It having been unwisely determined to keep the anniversary of the assassination of the duke de Berri, by the observance of a religious service, some one fastened a portrait of the youthful duke de Bourdeaux on the drapery of the funeral car in the church, surmounting it with a crown of "everlasting" flowers. In consequence of the excitement produced by this circumstance, the national guards were obliged to clear the church. The mob outside immediately directed EXTENSION OF POPULAR PRIVILEGES. 243 their violence against the archbishop, whose residence they sacked and destroyed. One singular result of this emeute, was the discontinuance of the fleur-de-lis as the emblem of royalty. It had hitherto, in addition to its innumerable other uses, been twined around the crosses, as expressive of the union of loyalty and devotion; but fearing that cross and lily would be destroyed together, the flower was removed, a new state-seal prepared, from which it was omitted, and the time-honoured fleur-de-lis finally and for ever proscribed. The peerage question, which had been postponed, was now discussed, and a bill carried through the chamber of deputies abolishing hereditary titles; while the power of the king to create peers was restricted to those who possessed sufficient wealth, or had rendered a certain length of service. This bill met with considerable opposition in the upper chamber, and thirty-six new peers were created in order to carry it. This again caused discontent; among the peers because of the loss of their rank, and among the liberals because of the means by which the measure had been carried. Another question, which excited considerable feeling, was the new electoral law, or, as will be more intelligible to ourselves, the French reform bill. Out of a population of thirty millions of inhabitants, the deputies had hitherto been elected by a constituency, the aggregate number of which did not exceed ninety-four thousand. The ministers proposed to double the numbers, and to take the additional electors from the largest tax-payers. This of course did not meet with general approval; and a measure was ultimately carried, by which the qualification of the electors was lowered to the payment of taxes to the amount of £9 annually, and the number increased to about two hundred thousand. The king expressed his satisfaction with this arrangement, and congratulated the people on the extension of their privileges; but throughout his reign the policy he pursued was to neutralize the power of the representative principle as much as possible, by the extension of the royal patronage at every favourable opportunity. The press, the violation of whose freedom had been the immediate cause of the revolution, found no friend 244 ANOTHER REVOLUTION. in Louis Philippe. Throughout his reign, from the year 1832, prosecutions were continual and innumerable, and the writers of articles in the newspapers, or indeed of any paragraph in a pamphlet, having a reference apparently inimical to the king, were subjected to long imprisonment. Within the first three years of this reign, four hundred and eleven prosecutions of the press were undertaken by the government, of which number one hundred and fortythree were convictions. These proceedings, together with the fortifying Paris, the Spanish marriages, by which Louis Philippe sought to establish the supremacy of his power in the continent, the seizure of Tahiti, and the well-known covetous proceedings of the king, produced a feeling of dislike against him. His unwise oppo sition to the reform banquets, in after years, completed the alienation, hurled him from his throne, and sent him once more a fugitive to England, where he had so often found protection, and where at last (1850) he died, unwept save by those whom he had involved in the catastrophe which his want of honesty and truth had produced. CHAPTER II. The Holy Alliance and its Fruits.-A.D. 1814-1837. GERMANY. AUSTRIA. THE TREATY OF CONGRESS OF VIENNA. CHAUMONT.-MEASURES ADOPTED BY THE CONGRESS. -ESCAPE OF NAPOLEON FROM ELBA.-FRANCIS II.HIS HUMANE SPIRIT TOWARDS POLAND.-ANNEXATION OF LOMBARDY TO AUSTRIA. -ITALIAN CONSPIRACIES. DEATH OF FRANCIS. FERDINAND. — HIS ABDICATION. PRUSSIA.-FREDERIC WILLIAM III.-LARGE ACCESSION LANDSTANDE.-DEATH OF THE KING. SAXONY.-FREDERIC AUGUSTUS I.-FIDELITY TO NAPO WÜRTEMBERG. FREDERIC. ANTHONY. ERECTED INTO A KINGDOM UNDER IMPORTANT ADDITIONS OF TERRITORY. -WILLIAM I.-FREE CONSTITUTION GRANTED TO THE PEOPLE. BAVARIA.-MAXIMILIAN JOSEPH.-THE NEW CONSTITUTION. THE EDICT OF RELIGION."-LUDWIG.-LOLA MONTES. ABDICATION OF THE KING. AUSTRIA. WHEN Napoleon had retired to Elba, after his abdication at Fontainebleau, and Louis XVIII. had ascended the throne of his ancestors, the representatives of the allied powers met at Vienna to re-arrange the map of Europe. 246 THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. This was necessary after the convulsions and confusion caused by the victorious course of the imperial despot; and had the congress been influenced by liberal and patriotic principles, they might, by a wise and equitable disposition of the various kingdoms, have secured to themselves the unqualified approbation, and lasting gratitude of mankind. Never was a more favourable opportunity offered for settling questions which had produced years of warfare, and ages of discontent. The nations were wearied and exhausted with the long and arduous struggle they had maintained against a despotism unparalleled in the modern history of the world. Earnest aspirations after liberty, though neutralized by the lawless licentiousness of the closing period of the last century, and repressed by the military successes of Napoleon, were still existing; and many hearts were throbbing with hopes of freedom, now that the enslaver of the nations had been overcome. A meeting of the kings and rulers of those states which had been the victims of the emperor's ambition, but which had at length successfully resisted his power, seemed an event calculated to encourage the most sanguine hope of a righteous and lasting arrangement. But these expectations were doomed to disappointment; the principles of a so-called legitimacy and absolute authority prevailed, and the good which might have been secured was neglected, notwithstanding the vast amount of blood and treasure which had been sacrificed to obtain it. Kingdoms, countries, and states, were shifted like pawns on a chessboard; but the popular will was entirely overlooked. Pursuing an imaginary scheme for settling the balance of power, the members of the congress forgot the fact that it is not territorial distribution which ensures peace, and prevents aggression; but the internal condition of the several nations in relation to liberty, religion, and commercial prosperity. The congress of Vienna proceeded on other considerations; it was really a diplomatic struggle for political supremacy. In March, 1814, while war was still raging, the representatives of Austria, Great Britain, Russia, and Prussia, formed what was termed "the treaty of Chaumont;" in which it was declared that the four great powers had transmitted to the French government proposals for con |