[CHAPTER VII]
The Duc d'Orléans is given the title of Royal Highness—The coronation of Charles X.—Account of the ceremony by Madame la Duchesse d'Orléans—Death of Ferdinand of Naples—De Laville de Miremont—Le Cid d'Andalousie—M. Pierre Lebrun—A reading at the camp at Compiègne—M. Taylor appointed a royal commissioner to the Théâtre-Français—The curé Bergeron—M. Viennet—Two of his letters—Pichat and his Léonidas
My mother never knew anything of the story of my duel; she would have died of grief had she had the faintest suspicion of it. As we did not return to the office until nearly one o'clock, we had to tell Oudard everything; and he appeared quite content, after hearing Betz and Tallancourt's account, with the way his employé had conducted himself. Besides, the Palais-Royal had been in a constant state of fête since the accession of His Majesty Charles X. to the throne. The duc d'Orléans had just been granted the title of Royal Highness from the new king—a favour he had begged in vain from Louis XVIII. As we have already mentioned, Louis XVIII. persistently refused everybody who asked him to grant M. le Duc d'Orléans this privilege.
"He will always be sufficiently close to the throne," he would reply.
And in other ways, Charles X. made himself most popular.
As a pendant to his phrase, "Nothing is changed in France, there is simply one more Frenchman in it," he added another dictum, simpler still, and quite as much appreciated—
"My friends, let there be wider criticism!"
And in the midst of the general merrymaking the preparations for his coronation went on in sumptuous style.