LOUIS PHILIPPE. 249 



each other, and thus the mobility of the lower classes could not be 

 easily put in action at any time. 



In fact, if we survey with impartiality the conduct of Louis Philippe 

 during the last forty-five years, we find that if he served under the re- 

 publican standard with Kellerman and Dumouriez it was only because 

 he thought that his father, by corruption, intrigue, and Macchiavelism, 

 would possess himself of the throne which he himself had been the 

 principal instrument in destroying ; but as soon as Robespierre, having 

 become the all-powerful dictator of the committee of public safety 

 and of the convention, destined to the scaffold old Egalite, the won- 

 drous hero of Gemappe and Valmy, forgetting his oath, deserted 

 with arms and baggage, and retired into Switzerland, there to imi- 

 tate the tyrant of Syracuse. But this was also an act of deception, 

 because at that epoch young Egalite had in his possession nearly a 

 million of francs, sent to him by the duchess of Penthievres a few 

 days before his desertion. 



If from Switzerland we follow him to England, we shall see him 

 courting the exiled Bourbons, and, all contrition, begging forgiveness 

 of Louis XVIIL, under the plea that critical circumstances alone 

 had forced him, against his will and inclination, to be carried away 

 by the revolutionary torrent, which however he heartily abhorred 

 and detested. 



If we visit him at Palermo, we find him not only surrounded by 

 many money-lenders, accumulating his wealth by all sorts of specu- 

 lations and usury, but in the mean time, under the cloak of religion, 

 humbugging his ignorant and bigoted cousin Ferdinand IV., in 

 order to obtain for his wife one of his daughters. 



Having succeeded in this project, Louis Philippe began to play 

 double game, and according to his principles, through the medium of 

 his father-in-law and of the exiled royal inhabitants of Hartwell, en- 

 deavoured to be appointed commander-in-chief of the Anglo-Sicilian 

 army, which was then combatting in Spain under the present duke of 

 Wellington ; while, on the other hand, through his friends in France, 

 he was represented at the Thuilleries as a man who had not only 

 forgotten the past, but who, being a great admirer of Napoleon, ar- 

 dently wished to return to his country, there to live as a private 

 faithful subject of the existing government. 



When Napoleon, abandoned by the majority of the French nation, 

 already too much tired of his despotism, ambition, and continual 

 wars, was conquered by the gold of England and by the allied powers 

 of Europe, Louis Philippe left Palermo and hastened to Paris to 

 offer his congratulations and servile submission to Louis X VIII. and 

 his court. However, soon after, the Palais Royal became ,the ren- 

 dezvous of the most influential members of the opposition of that 

 epoch. 



At the sudden, unexpected, and almost incredible reappearance of 

 Napoleon in the French territory in 1815, and when it was thought 

 almost impossible that he could again place himself at the head of 

 the French nation, Louis Philippe demanded and obtained the com- 

 mand of a French division ; but as soon as Napoleon took possession 



