ber should hold the head while the operation
was performed.

"You will see the body properly embalmed?" said the gentleman of the
bed-chamber to the surgeon.

"Certainly," was the reply; "and you will hold the head?"

Each bowed politely to the other, without the exchange of another word.
The body, unopened and unembalmed, was placed by a few under servants in
a coffin, which was filled with the spirits of wine, and hurried,
without an attendant mourner, to the tomb. Such was the earthly end of
Louis XV. In an hour he was forgotten, or remembered but to be despised.

At four o'clock of that same morning, the young king and queen, with the
whole court in retinue, left Versailles, in their carriages, for Choisy.
The morning was cold, dark, and cheerless. The awful death of the king,
and the succeeding excitements, had impressed the company with gloom.
Maria Antoinette rode in the carriage with her husband, and with one or
two other members of the royal family. For some time they rode in
silence, Maria, a child of impulse, weeping profusely from the emotions
which moved her soul. But, ere long, the morning dawned. The sun rose
bright and clear over the hills of France, and the whole beautiful
landscape glittered in the light of the most lovely of spring mornings.
Insensibly the gloom of the mind departed with the gloom of night.
Conversation commenced. The mournful past was forgotten in anticipation
of the bright future. Some jocular remark of the young king's sister
elicited a general burst of laughter, when, by common consent, they
wiped away their tears, banished all funereal looks, and, a merry party,
rode merrily along, over hill and dale, to a crown and a throne. Little
did they dream that these sunny hours and this flowery path but
conducted them to a dungeon and the guillotine.

The coronation soon took place at Rheims, with the greatest display of
festive magnificence. The novelty of a new reign, with a youthful king
and queen, elated the versatile French, and loud and enthusiastic were
the acclamations with which Louis and Maria Antoinette were greeted
whenever they appeared. They were both, for a time, very popular with
the nation at large, though there was in the court a party hostile to
the queen, who took advantage of every act of indiscretion to traduce
her character and to expose her to ignominy. In these efforts they
succeeded so effectually as to overwhelm themselves in the same ruin
which they had b