g the solution--at least for that sitting. All the guests crowded
to the door. "His Majesty was going to Drury-Lane!" It was a performance
"by command." The never-failing pulse in the foreign heart was touched.
Lafontaine crushed his correspondence into his bosom, sprang on his feet,
wiped his eyes of all their sorrows, and proposed that we should see the
display. I was rejoiced to escape a topic too delicate for my handling. A
carriage was called, and by a double fee we contrived, through many a
hazard, in the narrowest and most dangerous defiles of any Christian city,
to reach the stately entrance, just as the troopers were brushing away the
mob from the steps, and the trumpets were outringing the cries of the
orangewomen.

By another bribe we contrived to make our way into a box, whose doors were
more unrelenting than brass or marble to the crowd in the lobby, less
acquainted with the mode of getting through the English world; and I had
my first view of national loyalty, in the handsomest theatre which I have
ever seen. How often it has been burnt down and built since, is beyond my
calculation. It was then perfection.

We had galloped to some purpose; for we had distanced the monarch and his
eight carriages. The royal party had not yet entered the house; and I
enjoyed, for a few minutes, one of the most striking displays that the
opulence and animation of a great country can possibly produce--the
_coup-d'oeil_ of a well-dressed audience in a fine and spacious theatre.
Multitudes spread over hill and dale may be picturesque; the aspect of
great public meetings may be startling, stern, or powerfully impressive;
the British House of Lords, on the opening of the session, exhibits a
majestic spectacle; but for a concentration of all the effects of art,
beauty, and magnificence, I have yet seen nothing like one of the English
theatres in their better days. To compare it in point of importance with
any other great assemblage, would in general be idle. But at this time,
even the assemblage before me, collected as it was for indulgence, had a
character of remarkable interest. The times were anxious. The nation was
avowedly on the eve of a struggle of which no human foresight could
discover the termination. The presence of the king was the presence of the
monarchy; the presence of the assemblage was the presence of the nation.
The house was only a levee on a large scale, and the crowd, composed as it
was of the most distinguis