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mestic servants, and of children. The signature of functionaries of all kinds was demanded, on pain of losing their place. Above all, the votes of the army and navy were collected, who have never been considered as entitled to a deliberative voice in matters of civil discussion. There was, therefore, no lack of votes, however ill qualified those who gave them might be to decide upon the nature of a con

stitution.

Each electoral assembly was direct ed to send up a deputation to the Champ, where an assembly also of the Chambers of Peers and Representatives was appointed, for the purpose of determining the grand result of the votes. This was of course fully anticipated; for never did a government have recourse to an appeal to the nation individually, without having the influence to ensure a favourable return. Yet, after all means had been used, the number of votes, out of a population of about ten millions of qualified persons, did not much exceed one million two hundred thousand; a fact which renders it strongly probable, that had it been possible to collect the real sense of the nation in this manner, the result would unquestionably have been unfavourable to Napoleon and his Additional Act. Preparations were in readiness for the approaching solemnity.

Joseph Buonaparte, Jerome, and other members of Napoleon's family, had now united themselves to him once more. Louis, modest and unambitious, refused to quit his retire

ment; and although Murat was just arrived at Cannes, his present plight of a defeated fugitive would have rendered him an eye-sore to the solemn festival. The only accession of real value, was Lucien Buonaparte, a man of acknowledged talents, which even the publication of his epic poem has not been able to bring into absolute discredit. This person had been long estranged from his brother, preferring the enjoyment of literary ease, and of the wealth arising from millions unaccounted for during his administration under the republic, to the ruling a subordinate kingdom, or perhaps playing the part of Joseph in Spain. "Charlemagne," however, was now finished, and given to an ungrateful public; and ambition seems once more to have had charms for Lucien, the rather that Fouché, Carnot, and other old republican friends, now enjoyed a place in his brother's cabinet. He made some stay on the frontiers of Switzerland, and was sup posed there to have awaited the execution of the plot which was to se cure for Napoleon the person of his son. Upon its discovery, he hastened to Paris.

With these auspices, the Champ de Mai opened; and that it might be incongruous in all respects, it was held on the 1st of June. It was partly intended to give that excitation to the mind of the people, which had been produced by similar exhibitions in the earlier part of the revolution, when such stage-tricks were animating novelties, and partly to give confidence

dictory to all moral ideas, and hostile to the constituent principles of nations. Item, Because the important restriction contained in the 67th article is a disgustingly awkward precaution resorted to by a suspicious tyranny, and can be adhered to only by the accomplices of that tyrauny. Always recognising, however, that the martial disposition of the nation and the alternately heroic and laughable part it has performed during those 25 years on the theatre of Europe, requires it to have a monarch who sits well on his horse-1 propose FRANCONI and his DYNASTY."-Franconi is the conductor of a circus, where they exhibit pantomimes, tumbling, and feats of horsemanship.

by the imposing display of an immense armed force, devoted to victory or death, under the emperor's commands. For this latter purpose, the solemn delivery of the eagles to the various regiments, an augury of instant war, was substituted for the promised presence and inauguration of the empress, a pledge of twenty years' peace.

The scene of this spectacle, for into such the Champ de Mai had degenerated, was a large amphitheatre in the exercising ground, in front of the Hotel des Invalids, erected of temporary materials. The electors, real or supposed, were distributed in benches set apart for each department of the kingdom. But into these seats, to make up the show, were introduced all spectators of decent appearance, and it was supposed that scarce one half of the persons occupying them were really deputies. This range of elevated benches surrounded a sort of stage, and a throne, where menials and courtiers, in antique Spanish dresses, with feathered bonnets and fantastic mantles, for a time occupied the eye, till the appearance of the grand actor and the members of his family. These august personages wore the Roman tunic, and were involved in the folds of long mantles, Napoleon's being purple, and those of his brothers white. This absurd and theatrical costume could scarce be hung around more awkward and plebeian figures, than were exhibited by the members of the blood-royal of Ajaccio; and thus the parade lost even the momentary effect which might have been produced by the handsome person of Murat. It was not only ridiculous in itself, but became laughable by its contrast with the appearance of those whom this mummery disguised. These are trifles, but we are writing of Paris and of a public fete, and they gain some importance in such circumstances. The general feeling was, that

the show was ill imagined, lang, unanimated, and wearisome; and in the Parisian phrase, une piece tombée.

The report of votes collected on this occasion announced that the constitution was accepted by a majority of 1,288,357 affirmative, to 4,207 negative. No one wondered at the number of the majority, but some surprise was excited that upwards of four thousand Frenchmen had ventured to give a negative voice. It was remarked, that the number of dissentients in Paris bore a smaller proportion than elsewhere to the affirmative votes. The royalists of the capital were numerous, but being more immediately under Buonaparte's power, they cared not to exercise the privilege of free-will, with which they were indulged. Several departments sent no representatives whatsoever. In others, the votes bore no proportion to the population. And as upon a grand average the number of the votes inscribed did not bear the proportion of one to ten, when compared with the number of Frenchmen of mature age, the whole was justly regarded as a solemn imposition on the public.

This report of the votes was followed by the usual display of empty ceremony. The drums rolled, the cannon thundered, while the emperor and his brothers, and his courtiers and his functionaries, and the mass of electors, real or pretended, swore oaths as unmeaning as the sounds of the drum, and as empty and delusive as the smoke of the artillery. In one part of the scene only, Buonaparte seemed to rush into his part with the eagerness of real feeling; it was when he distributed the eagles to the soldiers, in whom, and not in these pitiful ceremonies, lay his real heart and hope. He leaped from his throne, and hastily advanced to meet the standards,-emblems of past, and, as he might hope, auguries of future victories. He was lost in the blaze

of uniforms, eagles, and banners, until he again assumed the throne, "which seemed a glittering pyramid of standards, and arms, and military habits, crowned by his own white plumes, while bayonets, cuirasses, and helmets, flashing as far as the eye could reach, the flags of the lancers fluttering, and the music bursting from the plain, announced that the scene began to

move!"

It was soon shifted, and, except the magnificence of the coup d'euil, to describe which we have borrowed the language of an eye-witness,* had nothing in it either to interest or to elevate. The acclamations, few and far from enthusiastic, shewed that the spectators, and even the actors, took little share in a scene which had been so often repeated under different auspices and on different principles, and was now only remarkable from being prolonged till it became tedious. In short, the Champ de Mai was a wearisome farce, which was soon succeeded by a bloody tragedy.

The constitution, however, was accepted, in semblance sufficient to prejudge that important question, and exclude, as Buonaparte hoped, any tampering with it on the part of the jacobins. The next point was to assemble the chambers. No part of Buonaparte's conduct gave so much displeasure as the component materials of the House of Peers, whom he now put into nomination according to the power which he had taken care to reserve to himself by the Additional Act, or new form of constitution. These new dignitaries were considerably upwards of a hundred in number, of whom more than one half were military men; most of the

others were selected from the old creatures of Buonaparte's former reign, or from men of letters supposed to be devoted to his cause. The residuum consisted of some few republicans (Count Carnot, and the good old Abbé Sieyes, at their head,) who had bartered for coronets and titles their red caps and the emphatic qualification of citizen; Lucien, late the republican, the insignificant Josepi, and the paltry Jerome Buonaparte, Cardinal Fesch, &c. took rank as princes of the blood-royal of the illustrious house of Ajaccio. The punsters of Paris selected Labedoyere, Drouot, Ney, and L'Allemand as the quatre pair fides (perfides), while Vandamme and others were termed the Pairs siflés.

In the Chamber of Representatives, all the exertion and art of Buonaparte's instruments had not prevented the jacobins from attaining a deci ded preponderance. They understood elections; and as most of the voters who acted, (for the royalists stood aloof,) were either constitutionalists or actual jacobins, their pretence of zeal for liberty, and the well-known turbulence of their tempers, gave to these self-entitled friends of freedom a decided superiority. Old La Fayette emerged as if from under ground. Barrere, Gallien, Merlin, Cambon, Drouet, Thibaudeau, with almost all the regicides who had survived the various hazards of the revolution, were to be found in this venerable assembly. Here also we read the names of those old idolizers of the revolution, La Rochefoucault-Liancour, and Latour-Maubourg, and others, who had waited upon all its phases with the same unwearied devotion, though

*The author of two volumes, containing the Substance of Letters written from Paris during the last Reign of Napoleon,-a curious work, in which the writer's facts, which he details fairly, and his reasoning on particular points, are singularly at variance with his conclusions. Some inconsistence may be pardoned, however, to a man who is at once a devotee to freedom and to Buonaparte!

there never darted from any one of them a single ray auspicious to real liberty. This nest of old hornets, warmed into life by the new revolution from the torpidity to which they had long been condemned, speedily intimated that they had neither forgotten to buzz nor to sting. It was soon evident that they were suspicious of Buonaparte's authority, and dissatis fied with the Additional Act, or newmodelled constitution. Their brief intercourse with the emperor was marked by a scrupulous and captious jealousy on the part of the Chamber, and by sullen haughtiness on that of Napoleon.

On the first meeting of the June 4. Chamber, they chose for their president Lanjuinais, the same who had in the preceding year drawn up the reasons which rendered Buonaparte unworthy to reign. The choice could not be agreeable to Napoleon. In a mis-timed fit of illhumour, he caused the temporary president who made the communication to be told, that he would learn the emperor's pleasure the next day, by applying to the chamberlain or page in waiting. The Chamber took fire at this reference, and the sitting was suspended until a categorical answer was obtained from the emperor. A sort of apology was given by the ministers, the obnoxious answer was explained into a mistake, and the imperial ratification of the appointment of the president, couched in the laconic phrase, "I approve," was presented in atonement. A representative, called Sibuet, indulged himself in a jacobinical boutade on the equality to be observed among the representatives of the people, and on the atrocity of recognizing in the Chamber the epithets of princes, dukes, barons, and so forth. He proceeded to invite these dignitaries to a surrender of their invidious titles, when,

fortunately, it was discovered that the orator was reading his extemporary burst of eloquence on the subject of liberty and equality, from a manu script copy, upon which point of form the delicate discussion was quashed in its commencement. A bickering also took place between Carnot and the Chamber, upon their demanding from him a list of the persons nominated to the peerage, which he declined to communicate till the session had commenced. A great deal of clamour and violence ensued, in the course of which the newly elected president in vain rung his tocsin, in order to procure order. The next meeting of the assembly was nearly as stormy as the first; the terms of the oath to be taken by the deputies was scrutinized as accurately as if it had stood any chance of being long binding. It was carried by the imperialists that fidelity should be sworn to the constitution, and to the emperor, without mention of the nation, as contended by the jacobins.

June 8.

But the most blunt expression of their mistrust of the emperor, was given upon the proposal of the parasitical Felix-Lepelletier, that they should decree to Buonaparte the title of Saviour of the Country. One member exclaimed, that the title was not yet merited, since the country was not saved; and, in consequence of a general clamour, the Chamber passed by acclamation to the order of the day. These disputes occurring so immediately on convening the Chambers, and at such an important national crisis, made it plain that there remained much to be disputed between Buonaparte and his representative government.

The imperialists, in case of a collision among the bodies composing the legislature, which these proceedings gave much reason to apprehend,

placed little confidence in the House of Peers, although they were considered as effectually the partisans of Buonaparte, because their greatness was so immediately the work of his own creation, that it could have little influence with the nation. Instead of a body of hereditary legislators, distinguished by high birth, long descent, ample fortunes, and an education corresponding to their rank and expectations, in which particulars the British House of Peers may be compared to a grove of oaks, the growth of ages, and superior to the force of tempests, this upper chamber of Buonaparte was a crop of mushrooms, whom the rain of one night had brought up, and whom the frost of the next might reduce to their primitive nothingness. But the partisans of Buonaparte knew that his "voice was in his sword," and that, should he return from the contest with the allies victorious, former experience had taught him, how speedily the clamours of five hundred bold talkers is silenced by half the number of bayonets.

quested their assistance in finance, and demanded from them a general exam. ple of confidence, energy, and patriotism.

The address, which replied to this speech, was carried with great ease in the Chamber of Peers; for that respectable assembly had fallen at once into the quiet, regular habits of dispatching public business, which so long characterized the senate of the former empire. But the Chamber of Representatives was composed of less tractable materials. The very mention of the address called up once more Monsieur Sibuet, with his speech against titles, June 10. which he had now got by heart, and to which the Chamber, therefore, was under the necessity of listening. The motion was got rid of with difficulty, and an address, in reply to the speech of Napoleon, was carried through, after many fierce debates; but which, whatever the friends of Buonaparte could do, retained a strong tincture of the sentiments of the opposite party. The Chamber promised unanimous support in repelling the foIt was, however, necessary that reign enemy. But in allusion to the Buonaparte should for the present constitutions of the empire, which were address the spirits which he had call- recognized by the Additional Act, they ed together, with the confidence announced, that national deliberation which old legends say that wizards would, as speedily as possible, point out must use to the fiends they have evo- the defects and imperfections which the ked, and whom they dread even while urgency of the national situation had they command them. He either produced, or suffered to subsist surrendered, in the pre- without correction. Having thus insence of both Chambers, timated their dissatisfaction with the the absolute power, with which cir- constitution, as modelled for them by cumstances had invested him since Buonaparte, and their intention of rehis return. He professed himself a considering it, they added a moderafriend to liberty. He mentioned the ting hint against the fervour of his amcoalition of monarchs against France, bition, in case the war should prove the commencement of the war by the successful. "The nation," they said, capture of the Melpomene by an Eng-" nourishes no scheme of ambition. lish ship of war, and the internal divisions of the country. He stated the strong necessity there was for regulating the freedom of the press, re

June 7.

Not even the will of a victorious prince will be sufficient to draw it on beyond the limits of just defence."

Buonaparte, in his reply, suffered

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