BONAPARTE, NAPOLKON IIF. 



MVAPAKTK. NAPOLEON lit. 



the soldiers hesitated. Louis was separated from his friend* and 

 harried off a prisoner, and th affair was speedily at an end. 



Hn mother, 011 th instant of hearing of his arrest, hastened to 

 Pahs and her appeal*, and perhaps the want of sympathy which the 

 Parisians exhibited, induced the king to treat the aspirant to his throne 

 with singular forbearance. The only puoUlitn-nt inflicted wa banish- 

 meat from France. He was accordingly embarked on board a ship 

 bound fur th United States. He remained in the New \Vurld l.ut a 

 comparatively short time, though in that time ha travelled of era con- 

 siderable space in South as well as in North America. Hearing of the 

 illneie of his mother, he hastened back to Europe, and wai with her 

 at her death, which occurred at Arenenberg, October 5, 1837. Hor- 

 tense Bonaparte was devotedly attached to her eon. and her affection 

 was warmly returned. She was a woman of ardent feelings and of 

 cooai lentile mental power. She published some reminiscences of a 

 portion of her life, which will also be found to throw some light on 

 that period of the life of her son, under the title of ' La lieine Hor- 

 tens* en Italia, en Prance, et en Angleterre, pendant 1'anuee 1831,' 

 STO, Paris, 1834. SQJ was also fond of music, and composed several 

 airs which have been much admired ; among others the favourite one, 

 Partant pour la Syrie,' now become, from its having been made by 

 her son the national air of France, almost as familiar in this country 

 as our own ' God Save the Queen.' 



Louis Napoleon now set himself, by means of the press, to defend 

 bis conduct in regard to the affair at Strasburg, and the government 

 of Prince, fearing the effect of his pertinacity, demanded his extra- 

 dition from Switzerland. The cantons at fim refused to comply, and 

 expreued a determination to uphold his rights as a citizen of Thurgau. 

 liat Louis Philippe sent an army to enforce his demands, and Louis 

 Napoleon, not wiihing to involve Switzerland in difficulty, withdrew 

 to En.-land. Here for a couple of years he led the life apparently of 

 a man of pleasure, but bo was really revolving bis lofty schemes, 

 though he had as yet formed but a very inadequate notion of the 

 obstacles which had to be overcome. In 1S39 he published in London 

 his famous ' Idees Napoleoniennes,' a remarkable illustration of the 

 intensity of his own grand thought In August 1840 be sailed from 

 Margate in a hind steamer, accompanied by Count Montholin, the 

 attendant of Napoleon L at St Helena, a retinue of about fifty 

 persons, an 1 a tame eagle. He landed on the morning of the 6th of 

 August at Boulogne, ana marching with his followers straight to the 

 barracks, he summoned the few troops there to join him, or surrender. 

 The soldiers did neither, and Louis Napoleon retreated to the hill 

 on which stands tho Napoleon column. Meanwhile the garrison 

 mustered under anus, a few shots were fired, and the prince, in 

 attempting to get back to the steamer, was arrested with moat of his 

 follow, rs. 



This time the government was less placable. Louis Napoleon was 

 brought for trial before the House of 1'eern on a charge of treason. 

 Berryer appeared a* bis advocate, and defended him with boldness 

 and eloquence. The prince himself made a speech, exhibiting great 

 firmness and resolution. He was found guilty of a conspiracy to 

 overturn the government, and sentenced to perpetual imprisonment 

 in a French fortress. He was sent to Ham, and there he remained 

 till May 1846, when, in the dress of a workman, be succeeded, by the 

 assistance of Dr. Conneau, the present court physician, in effecting 

 bis escape. Once more be took refuge in England. The revolu- 

 tion of February 1848 found him ready to avail himself of any 

 favourable circumstance*. But he had learned caution, and he bided 

 his time. 



He had not to wait long. The vast power still remaining in the 

 name of Napoleon had been shown in the unbounded enthusiasm 

 very where displayed on the restoration to France of the body of the 

 great emperor, and Louis Napoleon's partisans bad taken care to keep 

 the nephew of tho emperor prominently before the public eye. At the 

 election of deputies to the National Assembly in June 1848 Louis 

 Napoleon wa chosen for the department of the Seine, and three other 

 departments. The prince applied to take his feat M. Lamartine on 

 the 12th of June moved the adoption of a decree banishing Ixmis 

 Napoleon from France. A warm debate ensued, and Paris got into a 

 state of great excitement The discussion was renewed on the next 

 day, ami ended in the admission of the prince, by a great majority, to 

 take hi* seat in the asuemblv. At the next election he was returned 

 hy an immense majority for the department of the Seine and five other 

 department-. He took bis seat on the 26th of September. 



Lonis Napoleon's election as president, for a term ending Hay 1852, 

 followed in December. From the moment of his election to this office 

 be took much more decided stand than ei'her of thone who had 

 preceded him as head of the executive. There were symptoms of red 

 republican discontent, but they were speedily checked. The contest 

 with the legislative assembly was more important and of longer con- 

 tinuance. Bat the prince-president was looking to popular support, 

 and be soon found the means of winning public favour by his progresses 

 through the country, bis sounding and significant addresses, and the 

 desire be constantly expressed for the exaltation of Franoe in the eye* 

 the surrounding nation*. His dismissal, at the beginning of 1851, 

 of a man so able and so |>opular as Changarnier from the command ol 

 the army in Paris, showed that he would. not permit himself to be 

 bearded with impunity ; and rash as it might at first glance seem, it 



served to strengthen his position. He wai met apparently by an 

 qually firm resolution in the National Assembly, who, after repeatedly 

 expressing want of confidence in his ministers, proceeded on the 10th 

 >f February 1351, by a majority of 102, to reject the president's 

 >otation Bill. In November the president sent a mesasge to the 

 assembly proposing to restore universal suffrage, and in accordance 

 ith the message a bill was introduced by the ministers, but thrown 

 out by a small majority. The contest was hastening to a close. In a 

 public speech the president had denounced the assembly as obstructive 

 of all amelioratory measures, and a government journal now plainly 

 accused that body of conspiracy against the prince-president, and of 

 designing to make Changarnier military dictator. Paris was filled with 

 roops. It was evident some decided measure was at hand. The 

 eaders of the assembly hesitated, and their cause was lost On the 

 2nd of December the prince-president issued a decree dissolving the 

 egislative assembly ; declaring Paris in a state of sie^e ; establishing 

 universal suffrage ; proposing the election of a president for ten year', 

 and a second chamber or senate. In the course of the ni^ht 180 

 members of the assembly were placed under arrest, and M. Tuien 

 and other leading statesmen, with generals Changarnier, Cavaignac, 

 Lainoriciore, 4c., were seized and sent to the castle of Viacennes. 

 This was the famous coup d'etat : and it was eminently successful, 

 f that can be called successful which was a violation of faith, and au 

 occasion of fearful slaughter. Numerous other arrests and banish- 

 ments occurred subsequently. Ou the 20th and 21st of December a 

 ' plebiscite,' embodying the terms of the decree, with tho name of 

 Louis Napoleon as president, was adopted by the French people, the 

 numbers, according to the official statement, being 7,43lV-lii in the 

 affirmative and 610,737 negative. A decree, published on the day 

 of the official announcement of the vote, restored the imperial 

 eagles to the national colours and to the cross of the Legion of 

 Honour. In January the new constitution was published; the 

 National Guard re-organised; and the titles of the French nobility 

 restored. 



It soon became evident that the restoration of the empire was only 

 a matter of time. Petitions which bad been presented to the senate 

 were printed in the news|pers, praying for the establishment of the 

 hereditary sovereign power in the Bonaparte family ; cries of ' Vive 

 I'Empureur' were heard in every public ceremonial in which the 

 president took part ; and at length the president himself in a speech 

 to the Chamber of Commerce of Bordeaux, declared that " the empire 

 is peace." Ou the 21st ami 22nd of November, the people were con- 

 voked to ncoept or reject a ' plebiscite,' resuscitating the imp. ri il 

 dignity in the person of Louis Napoleon, with heredicity in his direct 

 legitimate or adoptive descendant*. The affirmative was declared to 

 bo voted by 7,864,189 to 231,145. The prince in formally accepting 

 the imperial dignity assumed the title of Napoleon III. The new 

 emperor was at once acknowledged by England, and subsequently 

 though not till after a greater or less delay by the other leading powers 

 of Europe. 



The career of the emperor is too recent to require to be related in 

 detail As is well known it has hitherto been a career of unbroken 

 prosperity. In the January following bis acceptance of the empire 

 he married Eugenie Comtesse de Teba, a lady who had the good 

 fortune to win general popularity, before she presented the emperor 

 and the nation with an ' Enfant de France.' From the first, as president 

 as well as emperor, Napoleon displayed a strong desire to draw closer 

 the alliance with Great Britain. The feeling wai warmly recripro- 

 oated in this country, and the aggression of Russia, by leading the 

 two powers to unite their arms in resistance to the outrage, has served 

 to render the union as ardent as such a union could |><>~siUly \>,\ 

 Should it be as lasting as it is ardent, and as for the common good of 

 the two countries it is most earnestly to be desired it may be, it 

 cannot fail to form one of the mot abiding glories of the reign of 

 Napoleon. In March 1854 France, in conjunction with England, 

 declared war against Russia, and the soldiers of the two countries 

 have stood aide by side, winning equal renown, in many a famous 

 field. As was to be expected, in a war against such a colossal empire, 

 the war has proved a long and costly one. But the very expenditure 

 rendered necessary by it has served to show in the most striking 

 manner the deep hold the emperor h*a on the regard of the 1 

 people. It became necessary for the French government in December 

 1854 to ask for a loan of 600,000,000 francs : in ten days 2,176,000.000 

 were subscribed. Another loan was required in the following July 

 of 750,000,000 francs (30,000,0001.), the amount subscribed was 

 3,652,591,985 francs (146,103,6804), or nearly five times the amount 

 required, and of this no less than 231,920,155 franca were made up of 

 subscriptions of 60 franc* and under. 



In April 1855 the emperor and empress visited England, and in tho 

 following August Queen Victoria and Prince Albert visited Paris ; 

 and in each country the reception of the respective sovereigns was of 

 tho most splendid, and with the people of the most enthusiastic 

 character. In May 1855 the emperor opened a Temple of Concord, 

 the grand Exposition of the arts and industry of all nations, which 

 had tho effect of attracting to Paris the largest number of visitors 

 almost ever known there. Paris itself too has been improved by new 

 street* of almost unrivalled architectural splendour. 



In March 1866 the conference! fur negotiating a peace between the 



