tunes. At eighteen he became a dragoon in the Vendome Regiment,
and in 1792 he fought valiantly under Kellermann and Dumouriez at
Valmy and Jemappes. Then followed the treason, or defection, of
Dumouriez; but young Louis remained with the army for two years
longer, when, being proscribed, he went into exile, finding refuge
with other suspected officers and many refugees in Switzerland.
Thither Dumouriez himself had gone. Of the flight of young Louis,
Carlyle says: "Brave young Egalite reaches Switzerland and the Genlis
Cottage; with a strong crabstick in his hand, a strong heart in his
body: his Princedom is now reduced to _that_ Egalite the father sat
playing whist, in his Palais Egalite, at Paris, on the sixth day of
this same month of April, when a catchpole entered. Citoyen Egalite is
wanted at the Convention Committee!" What the committee wanted with
Equality Philip and what they did with him has been stated above.
Consider then that the Napoleonic era has at last set in blood.
Consider that the Restoration, with the reigns of Louis XVIII. and
Charles X., has gone by. Consider that the "Three Days of July,"
1830, have witnessed a bloodless revolution in Paris, in which the
House of Bourbon was finally overthrown and blown away. On the second
of August, Charles X. gave over the hopeless struggle and abdicated in
favor of his son. But the Chamber of Deputies and the people of France
had now wearied of Bourbonism in _all_ of its forms, and the nation
was determined to have a king of its own choosing.
The Chamber set about the work of selecting a new ruler for France. At
this juncture, Thiers and Mignet again asserted their strength and
influence by nominating for the throne Louis Philippe, Duke of
Orleans, representative of what is known as the Younger Branch of the
Bourbon dynasty. The prince himself was not loath to present himself
at the crisis, and to offer his services to the nation. In so doing,
he was favored greatly by his character and antecedents. At the first,
the Chamber voted to place him at the head of the kingdom with the
title of _Lieutenant-General_. The prince accepted his election, met
the Chamber of Deputies and members of the Provisional Government at
the Hotel de Ville, and there solemnly pledged himself to the most
liberal principles of administration. His accession to power in his
military relations was hailed with great delight by the Parisians, who
waved the tri-color flag before him as
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