[The Idler in France by Marguerite Gardiner]@TWC D-Link bookThe Idler in France CHAPTER XXIII 2/11
The Marechal was the Commandant appointed by the King, and as such, bound to treat as rebels those who opposed themselves to his government; instead of which, he seemed more like the _confident_ of a party who, it is alleged, owe their victory to his supineness. The Duc de Guiche has not left his post, near the royal family, since the 26th, except to pass and repass with instructions from the King to the Duc de Raguse, twice or thrice a-day.
He has been repeatedly recognised by the people, though in plain clothes, and experienced at their hands the respect so well merited by his honourable conduct and devotion to his sovereign.
How often have I heard this noble-minded man censured for encouraging the liberal sentiments of the Dauphin; and heard this, too, from some of those who are now the first to desert Charles the Tenth in the emergency which is the result of the system they advocated! -- -- has been here; he tells me that to Marshal Marmont the king has confided unlimited power, and that Paris has been declared in a state of siege. He says that the military dispositions are so defective, that there is not a young officer in the army capable of committing a similar mistake.
The regiments are crowded into narrow streets, in which even children may become dangerous enemies, by throwing from the windows every missile within their reach on the heads of the soldiers.
He is of opinion that, in twenty-four hours, the populace will be in possession of Paris.
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