been given to admit Maud whenever she
might present herself.

"Miss Desmond?" said the porter.
"Lady Gale begs you will go up-stairs.
This way, if you please."

The man directed a waiter to conduct
Miss Desmond to Lady Gale's apartment.
Hugh gave her a hurried pressure of the
hand, whispered, "At nine, Maud," and
stood watching her until her slight figure
had disappeared, passing lightly and
noiselessly up the thickly-carpeted stairs.

PARIS IN 1830.

IN TWO CHAPTERS. CHAPTER I.

As early as 1827 sagacious observers
(including several English travellers) had seen
symptoms of the approaching downfall of
Charles the Tenth. In March, 1814, just
as Louis the Eighteenth was setting his
gouty feet on the beach at Calais, with a
firm belief that Heaven was smiling
graciously on his pursy incompetence, Count
d'Artois (afterwards Charles the Tenth)
entered Vesoul, and once more treading on
French earth, exclaimed: "At length I see
my natal country again—that country which
my ancestors governed in mildness. I will
never quit it more." It remained from
that time the firm belief of his shallow
Chinese mind, that the Bourbons had never
as yet governed with sufficient severity.

Sir A. B. Faulkner, an English gentleman,
who visited Paris in 1827, wrote some
observations on the times, which were
literally prophecies. "Nothing but mischief
can ensue," said this keen and thoughtful
outside observer, "from M. Peyronnet's
projects for trammelling the press. The
insane abettors of this bill appear to
have forgotten that they live in the
nineteenth, not the sixteenth, century. The
benefit of all history is thrown away upon
them. It is thrown away upon them also,
that England has experimentally proved
that the liberty of the press is the best
bulwark of our religion and our constitution,
and the best means of enlightening
men to appreciate the value of both. The
fact is lost upon them, moreover, that there
is no possible mode for governors getting at
an acquaintance with the true interest of the
governed, but through the free publication
of opinion. If the minister cannot manage
to carry his project by any other means,
fair or foul, he has advised the king to
create sixty new peers. Better (or I am
far astray in my French politics), better,
Charles the Tenth, you had never left your
quiet pension in Holyrood House!"

In August, 1829, the king dismissed M.
Martignac's administration, because it
would not go all lengths against the
people, and appointed a crew of Jesuits
and ultra-royalists, under the so-called
guidance of his natural son, the rash and
weak-minded Prince de Polignac.

In March, 1830, the king, in answer to a
request from the Deputies to dismiss
Polignac and the Jesuit ministers, haughtily
dissolved the Chambers. The king was mad
with the madness that the gods send upon
men whom they have determined to destroy.
On Sunday, July 25th, 1830, the king
signed at St. Cloud three memorable
ordinances, which were worthy of our Charles
the First himself, and breathed the true
spirit of absolute power. Number one
abolished the freedom of the press. The second
(each of these was a blow clenching the
coffin-lid of monarchism) dissolved the
chamber newly elected, and convoked for the
third of August. The third abrogated the
chief rights of the elective franchise. The
ministers' report was signed by Polignac,
Chantelauze, D'Haussez, Peyronnet, Montbel,
Guernon Ranville, and Capelle. This
mischievous and imbecile report denounced
the press as exciting confusion in upright
minds, and endeavouring to subjugate the
sovereignty; and reviled it for pursuing
religion and its priests with its poisoned darts.
It accused the journals of ceaseless sedition,
blasphemy, scandal, and licentiousness, and
of exciting fermentation and fatal dissensions
which might by degrees throw France
back into barbarism. The public safety was
endangered; strong and prompt repression
was needed; and the last only argument
was—cannon.

The perusal of Monday (26th July) morning's
Moniteur, announcing these desperate
and tyrannical ordinances, struck Paris like
a stroke of lightning. Timid men ran
off instantly, to see their brokers before the
Rentes went down, or the frightened Bank
stopped its discounts. Resistance was
instantly threatened, and men's hands closed
on invisible weapons. The Bourse was
crowded to excess; on every face there was
either stupefaction or alarm. Even Rothschild
lost, by the headlong and sudden fall
of the funds. Only one man looked rosy
and jovial; he was the notorious jobber,
Ardrard, who having been entrusted with
the secret of the coup-d'état, made
thousands by the fall.

The stormy petrels soon began to show.