should, therefore, be made commander-in-chief of the French army.

M. de Chateaubriand exclaimed, with noble indignation, that the first
step to be taken by the government was to punish severely a ministry
that was so short-sighted, and had committed so many faults. Laine
declared, with a voice tremulous with emotion, that all was lost, and
that but one means of confounding tyranny remained; a scene, portraying
the whole terror, dismay and grief of the capital at the approach of the
hated enemy, should be arranged. In accordance with this plan, the whole
population of Paris--the entire National Guard, the mothers, the young
girls, the children, the old and the young--were to pass out of the
city, and await the tyrant; and this aspect of a million of men fleeing
from the face of a single human being was to move or terrify him who
came to rob them of their peace!

In her enthusiastic and energetic manner, Madame de Stael pronounced an
anathema against the usurper who was about to kindle anew, in weeping,
shivering France, the flames of war.

All were touched, enthusiastic, and agitated, but they could do nothing
but utter fine phrases; and all that fell from the eloquent lips of
these celebrated poets and politicians was, as it were, nothing more
than a bulletin concerning the condition of the patient, and concerning
the mortal wounds which he had received. This patient was France; and
the royalists, who were assembled in the house of Count de la Pere, now
felt that the patient's case was hopeless, and that nothing remained to
them but to go into exile, and bemoan his sad fate[47]!

[Footnote 47: Memoires d'une Femme de Qualite, vol. i., p. 99.]



CHAPTER XI

LOUIS XVIII.'S DEPARTURE AND NAPOLEON'S ARRIVAL.

While the royalists were thus considering, hesitating, and despairing,
King Louis XVIII. had alone retained his composure and sense of
security. That is to say, they had taken care not to inform him of the
real state of affairs. On the contrary, he had bee