On the subject of the dangers and disgraces which the democratic system was preparing for France, he spoke the strongest and most contemptuous words at every juncture. M. de Marcellus tells us how, in 1844, on a day when they were taking a little stroll together in his garden in the Rue du Bac, Chateaubriand said:
"The stream of the Monarchy disappeared in blood at the end of the last century. We have been carried away by the currents of Democracy, and have only a few times halted on the mud of the foul places. But the torrent will submerge us and it is all up, in France, with true political liberty and the dignity of man[511]."
On the 16th of August 1846, driving in the Champ de Mars, he was trying to alight from his carriage, when his foot slipped and he broke his collar-bone. This accident marked a new stage in his physical decay; from that time, he no longer walked. When he came to the Abbaye-aux-Bois, his footman and Madame Récamier's carried him from his carriage to the door of the drawing-room; he was then put into an arm-chair and rolled to the chimney-corner. This happened in the presence of Madame Récamier only, and the visitors who were admitted after tea found M. de Chateaubriand settled in his place; but, when leaving, he had to be moved before the strangers present. They pretended in vain to notice nothing; it was nevertheless a cruel torture to the old man that his infirmities should be seen[512].
The hour was now near at which death was to close that salon in the Abbaye-aux-Bois on which the shades of night were already falling:
Majoresque cadunt celsis de montibus umbræ.
Madame de Chateaubriand was the first one struck. She softly fell asleep in the Lord on the 9th of February 1847; Ballanche followed: on the 12th of June 1847, he expired with the calmness of a sage and the resignation of a saint, gentle towards death as he had been towards life. Madame Récamier, who had not left her post by his death-bed, thanks to the tears which she there shed ended by compromising her sight, which had been growing more and more weak. She was threatened with complete blindness; it was then that Chateaubriand offered to consummate his friendship by asking her to share his name. She refused that honour and, in doing so, was prompted by the noblest and nicest scruples.
He was to precede her to the grave[513]. In the month of June 1848, at the very moment when the cannon of civil war was thundering in the streets of the capital[514], he took to his bed never to rise again. He was given the Last Sacraments on the 2nd of July. He received the Viaticum "not only in full and perfect consciousness, but also with a profound sense of faith and humility[515]."
