a!" the curtain was closed up, and my last
impression rendered unfavourable by a vulgar, graceless figure in
nankeen breeches and top-boots hurrying in from a side scene, dropping a
swing bow in the centre of the stage, and then hurrying out again.

Theatres are to Frenchmen what flowers are to bees: they live _in_ them
and _upon_ them, and the sacrifice of liberty appears to be a tribute
most willingly paid for the gratification they receive; for, to be sure,
never can there exist a more despotic, arbitrary government than that of
a French theatre. A soldier stands by from the moment you quit your
carriage till you get into it; you are allowed no will of your own; if
you wish to give directions to your servant, "Vite! Vite!" cries a
whiskered sentry. Are you looking through the windows of the lobbies
into the boxes for your party, you are ordered off by a gendarme. I saw
one gentleman-like-looking man remonstrating; in a trice he was in
durance vile. A Frenchman at his play must sit, stand, move, think, and
speak as if he were on drill, and yet he endures the intolerance for
doubtful benefits derived from this rigid regularity.

In this play of "Manlius" were many passages highly applicable to
Buonaparte, and Talma, who is supposed to be (_avec raison_) a secret
partisan, gave them their full effect, but the listening vassals struck
no octaves to his vibration. A few nights before we were at the Play in
which were allusions to the Bourbons, and couplets without end of the
most fulsome, disgusting compliments to the Duc de Berri, &c. These
(shame upon the trifling, vacillating, mutable crew!) were received with
loud applause by the majority of the pit. I did observe, however, that
in that pit did sit a frowning, solemn, silent nucleus, but a nucleus of
this description can never be large; a few Messieurs at 3 francs _par
jour_ would soon, when dispersed amongst them, like grains of pepper in
tasteless soup, diffuse a tone of palatibility over the whole and render
it more agreeable to the taste of a Bourbon.

_A propos_, we have seen the Bourbons. The King is a round, fat man, so
fat that in their pictures they dare not give him the proper "_contour_"
lest the police should suspect them of wishing to ridicule; but his face
is mild and benevolent, and I verily believe his face to be a just
reflection of his heart. Then comes Monsieur,[118] a man with more
expression, but I did not see enough to form any opinion of my own