ng coarse. He possesses good native common sense; is affable,
polite, and very good humored. Saying to my informant on another
occasion, 'your friend, such a one, dined with me yesterday, and I made
him damned drunk;' he replied, 'I am sorry for it; I had heard that your
royal highness had left off drinking;' the Prince laughed, tapped him on
the shoulder very good-naturedly, without saying a word, or ever after
showing any displeasure. The Duke of York, who was for some time
cried up as the prodigy of the family, is as profligate, and of less
understanding. To these particular traits, from a man of sense and
truth, it would be superfluous to add the general terms of praise or
blame, in which he is spoken of by other persons, in whose impartiality
and penetration, I have less confidence. A sample is better than a
description. For the peace of Europe, it is best that the King should
give such gleamings of recovery, as would prevent the regent or his
ministry from thinking themselves firm, and yet, that he should
not recover. This country advances with a steady pace towards the
establishment of a constitution, whereby the people will resume the
great mass of those powers, so fatally lodged in the hands of the King.
During the session of the _Notables_, and after their votes against the
rights of the people, the Parliament of Paris took up the subject, and
passed a vote in opposition to theirs, (which I send you.) This was not
their genuine sentiment: it was a manoeuvre of the young members, who are
truly well disposed, taking advantage of the accidental absence of many
old members, and bringing others over by the clause, which, while it
admits the negative of the States General in legislation, reserves still
to the parliament the right of enregistering, that is to say, another
negative. The _Notables_ persevered in their opinion. The Princes of the
blood (Monsieur and the Duke d'Orleans excepted) presented and published
a memoire, threatening a scission. The parliament were proposing to
approve of that memoire (by way of rescinding their former vote), and
were prevented from it by the threat of a young member, to impeach
(_denoncer_) the memoire and the Princes who signed it. The vote of the
_Notables_, therefore, remaining balanced by that of the parliament,
the voice of the nation becoming loud and general for the rights of the
_Tiers-Etat_, a strong probability that if they were not allowed one
half the representation, t