I fell into the little cortége standing about the queen, and watched the interesting party dancing the head quadrille for an hour. The Duke of Orleans, who is nearly twenty, and seems a thoughtless, good-natured, immature young man, moved about very gracefully with his handsome figure, and seemed amused, and quite unconscious of the attention he drew. The princesses were vis-a-vis, and the second one, a dark-haired, slender, interesting girl of nineteen, had a polytechnic scholar for her partner. He was a handsome, gallant-looking fellow, who must have distinguished himself to have been invited to court, and I could not but admire the beautiful mixture of respect and self-confidence with which he demanded the hand of the princess from the lady of honor, and conversed with her during the dance. If royalty does not seal up the affections, I could scarce conceive how a being so decidedly of nature's best nobility, handsome, graceful, and confident, could come within the sphere of a sensitive-looking girl, like the princess Christine, and not leave more than a transient recollection upon her fancy. The music stopped, and I had been so occupied with my speculations upon the polytechnic boy, that I had scarcely noticed any other person in the dance. He led the princess back to her seat by the dame d'honneur, bowing low, colored a little, and mingled with the crowd. A few minutes after, I saw him in the gallery, quite alone, leaning over the railing, and looking down upon the scene below, having apparently abandoned the dance for the evening. From something in his face, and in the manner of resuming his sword, I was certain he had come to the palace with that single object, and would dance no more. I kept him in my eye most of the night, and am very sure he did not. If the little romance I wove out of it was not a true one, it was not because the material was improbable.
As I was looking still at the quadrille dancing before the queen, Dr. Bowring took my arm and proposed a stroll through the other apartments. I found that the immense crowd in the Salle des Marechals was but about one fifth of the assembly. We passed through hall after hall, with music and dancing in each, all crowded and gay alike, till we came at last to the Salle du Tróne where the old men were collected at card-tables and in groups for conversation. My distinguished companion was of the greatest use to me here, for he knew everybody, and there was scarce a person in the room who did not strongly excite my curiosity. One half of them at least were maimed; some without arms, and some with wooden legs, and faces scarred and weather-burnt, but all in full uniform, and nearly all with three or four orders of honor on the breast. You would have held your breath to have heard the recapitulation of their names. At one table sat Marshal Grouchy and General Excelmans; in a corner stood Marshal Soult, conversing with a knot of peers of France; and in the window nearest the door, General Bernard, our country's friend and citizen, was earnestly engaged in talking to a group of distinguished-looking men, two of whom, my companion said, were members of the chamber of deputies. We stood a moment, and a circle was immediately formed around Dr. Bowring, who is a great favorite among the literary and liberal people of France. The celebrated General Fabvier came up among others, and Cousin the poet. Fabvier, as you know, held a chief command in Greece, and was elected governor of Paris pro tem. after the "three days." He is a very remarkable-looking man, with a head almost exactly resembling that of the bust of Socrates. The engravings give him a more animated and warlike expression than he wears in private. Cousin is a mild, retired-looking man, and was one of the very few persons present not in the court uniform. Among so many hundred coats embroidered with gold, his plain black dress looked singularly simple and poet-like.
I left the diplomatist-poet conversing with his friends, and went back to the dancing rooms. Music and female beauty are more attractive metal than disabled generals playing at cards; and encountering in my way an attaché to the American legation, I inquired about one or two faces that interested me, and collecting information enough to pass through the courtesies of a dance, I found a partner and gave myself up, like the rest, to amusement.
Supper was served at two, and a more splendid affair could not be conceived. A long and magnificent hall on the other side of the Salle du Tróne was set with tables, covered with everything that France could afford, in the royal services of gold and silver, and in the greatest profusion. There was room enough for all the immense assemblage, and when the queen was seated with her daughters and ladies of honor, the company sat down and all was as quiet and well regulated as a dinner party of four.
After supper the dancing was resumed, and the queen remained till three o'clock. At her departure the band played cotillons or waltzes with figures, in which the Duke of Orleans displayed the grace for which he is celebrated, and at four, quite exhausted with fatigue and heat, I went with a friend or two into the long glass verandah, built by Napoleon as a promenade for the Empress Maria Louisa during her illness, where tea, coffee, and ices were served to those who wished them after supper. It was an interesting place enough, and had my eyes and limbs ached less, I should have liked to walk up and down, and muse a little upon its recollections, but swallowing my tea as hastily as possible, I was but too happy to make my escape and get home to bed.
LETTER XVIII.
CHOLERA—UNIVERSAL TERROR—FLIGHT OF THE INHABITANTS—CASES WITHIN THE WALLS OF THE PALACE—DIFFICULTY OF ESCAPE—DESERTED STREETS—CASES NOT REPORTED—DRYNESS OF THE ATMOSPHERE—PREVENTIVES RECOMMENDED—PUBLIC BATHS, ETC.
Cholera! Cholera! It is now the only topic. There is no other interest—no other dread—no other occupation, for Paris. The invitations for parties are at last recalled—the theatres are at last shut or languishing—the fearless are beginning to be afraid—people walk the streets with camphor bags and vinaigrettes at their nostrils—there is a universal terror in all classes, and a general flight of all who can afford to get away. I never saw a people so engrossed with one single and constant thought. The waiter brought my breakfast this morning with a pale face, and an apprehensive question, whether I was quite well. I sent to my boot-maker yesterday, and he was dead. I called on a friend, a Hanoverian, one of those broad-chested, florid, immortal-looking men, of whose health for fifty years, violence apart, one is absolutely certain, and he was at death's door with the cholera. Poor fellow! He had fought all through the revolution in Greece; he had slept in rain and cold, under the open sky, many a night, through a ten years' pursuit of the profession of a soldier of fortune, living one of the most remarkable lives, hitherto, of which I ever heard, and to be taken down here in the midst of ease and pleasure, reduced to a shadow with so vulgar and unwarlike a disease as this, was quite too much for his philosophy. He had been ill three days when I found him. He was emaciated to a skeleton in that short time, weak and helpless, and, though he is not a man to exaggerate suffering, he said he never had conceived such intense agony as he had endured. He assured me, that if he recovered, and should ever be attacked with it again, he would blow out his brains at the first symptom. Nothing but his iron constitution protracted the disorder. Most people who are attacked die in from three to twenty-four hours.
For myself, I have felt and still feel quite safe. My rooms are in the airiest quarter of Paris, facing the gardens of the Tuileries, with windows overlooking the king's; and, as far as air is concerned, if his majesty considers himself well situated, it would be quite ridiculous in so insignificant a person as myself to be alarmed. With absolute health, confident spirits, and tolerably regular habits, I have usually thought one may defy almost anything but love or a bullet. To-day, however, there have been, they say, two cases within the palace-walls, members of the royal household, and Casimir Perier, who probably lives well and has enough to occupy his mind, is very low with it, and one cannot help feeling that he has no certain exemption, when a disease has touched both above and below him. I went to-day to the Messagerie to engage my place for Marseilles, on the way to Italy, but the seats are all taken, in both mail-post and diligence, for a fortnight to come, and, as there are no extras in France, one must wait his turn. Having done my duty to myself by the inquiry, I shall be content to remain quiet.