FRANCE. (HISTORY.) 



267 



France, which was chiefly directed against the Jesn- I 

 its. They pronounced this law to be a conspiracy j 

 against the Catholic religion ; the bishop of Tou- 

 louse even announced his intention of opposing it in 

 his diocese, but the pope prevailed upon the clergy 

 to submit. The session was closed August 18 ; and 

 reflecting men were of opinion, that this ministry 

 could not probably stand. We have seen that they 

 had little unquestionable support in the chamber. 

 The ultra-royalists and Jesuits were still more vio- 

 lent against the present administration, than against 

 Villele's. The left side by no means entertained 

 a full confidence in it ; and the court was under the 

 influence of the clergy, which seemed to abhor every 

 thing liberal. In general, it must be said that the 

 ministry had no strong interest for its foundation. 



During this year (1828), the French troops 

 returned from Spain, and formed a part of the expe- 

 dition, consisting of from 13 to 14,000 men, which 

 sailed for the Morea under general Maison, in the 

 month of August, for the purpose of delivering 

 Greece from the hands of the Turks. The Morea 

 was soon occupied (see Greece) by the French forces. 

 The ministry determined not to remove any officer 

 for his political opinions. This truly liberal measure 

 offended the warm partisans, and probably contri- 

 buted, with the other causes above mentioned, to their 

 downfall. 



The session of 1829 began January 27. The most 

 important subject touched on in the king's speech, was 

 the promise to propose laws " for placing the muni- 

 cipal and departmental organization in harmony with 

 the existing institutions" the want of which had 

 been felt ever since the restoration of the Bourbons. 

 Royer-Collard was again elected president of the 

 deputies. Martignac, the minister of the interior, 

 presented, early in February, two projets ; one regu- 

 lating the organization of the communes; the other, 

 respecting the councils of the departments and arron- 

 dissements. After a long discussion, the ministers 

 withdrew the projets a measure which undoubtedly 

 hastened their approaching overthrow. The discus- 

 sion of these important points of government exposed 

 the ministry to the assaults of the right and left 

 sides at the same time. An unpopular law was 

 passed by a majority of ninety votes, in the chamber 

 of deputies, providing pensions for such peers as had 

 not 30,000 francs clear income. These pensions 

 were made unalienable rentes, and transmissible to 

 the successor to a peerage, only in the event of his 

 not having a clear revenue of 30,000 francs. It 

 appeared, also, that 50,000,000 francs had been dis- 

 tributed in the chamber of peers, in conformity with 

 the act of 1825, for indemnifying the emigrants. 

 On this occasion, the liberal journals attacked the 

 ministry with violence. Before the close of the ses- 

 sion, M. Portalis had been appointed minister of 

 foreign affairs, and M. Bourdeau keeper of the seals. 

 The ministry became more and more embarrassed, 

 as the session advanced ; the supplies which they 

 asked for were not granted. A few days after the 

 prorogation of the chamber, the ministry was dis- 

 solved. M. Portalis had kept open for himself the 

 office of first president of the court of cassation, the 

 highest judicial station in France. Messrs Bour- 

 deau and Vatismenil received neither decorations, 

 pensions, nor even the usual title of minister of state. 



On August 9, 1829, the following appointments 

 were announced : prince Polignac, minister of foreign 

 affairs ; M. Courvoisier, keeper of the seals and 

 minister of justice ; count Bourmont, minister of 

 war ; count Rigny, minister of marine and the colo- 

 nies ; count de la Bourdonnaye, minister of the inte- 

 rior ; baron de Montbel, minister of ecclesiastical 

 affairs and public instruction ; count Chabrol de 



Crousol, minister of finance. The departments of 

 commerce and manufactures were suppressed. 

 Rigny, the commander of the French fleet at Nava- 

 rino, declined the offered portfolio, and M. d'Haus- 

 sey, prefect of the Gironde, and a deputy of the 

 light side, was named in his place. 



The ministry was decidedly ultra-royalist. Bour- 

 mont had served under Napoleon, declared for 

 Louis XVIII., had again taken office under Napo- 

 leon, whom he deserted on the field of Waterloo, fled 

 to the Bourbons, whom he joined at Ghent, had been 

 created a peer, and commanded the army of occupa- 

 tion in Spain, after the return of the duke d'Angou- 

 leme. Prince Polignac was completely identified with 

 the ancient regime. Attached, from his very birth, to 

 the person and fortunes of Charles X., Polignac was, 

 in his religious and political sentiments, a royalist. 

 He and his brother Armand were implicated in 

 Pichegru's conspiracy, but were pardoned by Napo- 

 leon. Since 1823, he had been ambassador at Lon- 

 don, and always showed a great predilection for Eng- 

 land, without entering at all into the liberal spirit of 

 her institutions. It was also suspected that he owed 

 his elevation to British influence, and particularly to 

 that of Wellington ; and, as the prince had no re- 

 deeming qualities, the majority of the nation at once 

 pronounced against him. M. de la Bourdonnaye, 

 minister of the interior, was next in importance to 

 prince Polignac. He had always been one of the 

 most active and violent members of the extreme 

 right. As soon as the ministry was composed, the 

 question arose, how it was to procure a majority in 

 the chamber. La Bourdonnaye proposed to try the 

 dangerous policy of Villele, viz. to dissolve the cham 

 her, and to procure a majority in the new elections 

 by the active and united exertions of the royalists, 

 using, of course, all means in the power of the minis- 

 try. But this proposal was not adopted by his col- 

 leagues, and, in fact, there is no doubt that they 

 would have been entirely baffled, although the clergy 

 would have done every thing in their power to se- 

 cure the victory to Polignac. The rejection of this 

 proposition, and the creation of prince Polignac, 

 president of the ministerial council, induced M. la 

 Bourdonnaye to resign. Baron Montbel, who had 

 been elected a member of the chamber by the con- 

 greganistes of Toulouse, was transferred to the 

 department of the interior, and M. Ranville, distin- 

 guished at Caen among the agents of the re-action 

 of 1815, was made minister of ecclesiastical affairs 

 and public instruction. Thus was the ministry con- 

 stituted at the end of the year 1829. 



Let us pause to take a survey of France, before we 

 enter on the memorable year 1830. 



Though the Bourbons had endeavoured to build up 

 an aristocratical and absolute monarchy, many of 

 their measures had the contrary effect. The nobles 

 had ceased, in France, to form an aristocracy. 

 Their great numbers and little wealth ; the mixture 

 of political elements they present, the noblesse of 

 the ancien regime and of the imperial dynasty, the 

 one the offspring of feudalism, the other of the 

 revolution the soldier of Conde, and the officer of 

 the republican army, who encountered him in the 

 field ; their total want of any political privileges; 

 these, with some other circumstances, had left the 

 noblesse entirely without consequence. Even the peers 

 did not contain many aristocratical elements. One 

 of the measures of the late dynasty, which had recoil- 

 ed upon themselves, was the allowing only those to 

 vote, and t6 be eligible to office, who paid the 

 highest taxes. As the nobility were not rich, it very 

 often happened that barons and counts could neither 

 he eligible nor even electors, while rich manufac- 

 turers, bankers, &c., enjoyed these privileges. Those 



