ourbons. "But at the Prince of Benevento's," said Laborde, "the Emperor
will best acquire a knowledge of all this--it is there that our chief
statesmen assemble habitually." This conversation is supposed to have
fixed Alexander's choice of a residence; and as we have already seen
that Talleyrand was ere now committed in the cause of Louis, the result
of this choice may be anticipated.

The history of what La Vallette had called "the secret intrigues with
the stranger" has not yet been cleared up--nor is it likely to be so for
some time. If there was one of the Allied Princes on whose disposition
to spare himself, or at least his family, Napoleon might have been
supposed to count,--it must have been the Emperor of Austria; and yet,
at daybreak this very morning, a proclamation was tossed in thousands
over the barriers of Paris, in which several phrases occurred, not to be
reconciled with any other notion than that he and all the Allies agreed
in favouring the restoration of the Bourbons, ere any part of their
forces entered the capital. This document spoke of the anxiety of "the
sovereigns" to see the establishment of "a salutary authority in
France": of the opportunity offered to the Parisians of "accelerating
the peace of the world"; of the "conduct of Bordeaux" as affording "an
example of the method in which foreign war and civil discord might find
a common termination"; it concluded thus: "It is in these sentiments
that _Europe in arms_ before your walls addresses herself to you. Hasten
then to respond to the confidence which she reposes in your love for
your country, and in your wisdom;" and was signed "SCHWARTZENBERG,
_Commander-in-Chief of the Allied Armies_."

There was a circumstance of another kind which assisted in stimulating
the hopes and swelling the adherents of the royal cause. The Allies had,
in the early part of the campaign, experienced evil from the
multiplicity of uniforms worn among the troops of so many nations and
tongues, and the likeness which some of the dresses, the German
especially, bore to those of the French. The invading soldiers had
latterly adopted the practice of binding pieces of white linen round
their left arms; and this token, though possibly meant only to enable
the strangers to recognise each other, was not likely to be observed
with indifference by the Parisians, among whom the Bourbonists had
already begun to wear openly the white cockade.

Finally, a vivid sensation was exci