Had any one of the court expressed the slightest doubt as
to the future destiny of the CHILD OF MIRACLE, he would have been
looked upon as an alarmist or a coward. The royalists were simple
enough to believe that, thanks to this child, the era of
revolutions was forever closed. They said to themselves that
French royalty, like British royalty, would have its Whigs and its
Tories, but that it was forever rid of Republicans and
Imperialists. At the accession of Charles X. the word Republican,
become a synonym of Jacobin, awoke only memories of the guillotine
and the "Terror." A moderate republic seemed but a chimera; only
that of Robespierre and Marat was thought of. The eagle was no
longer mentioned; and as to the eaglet, he was a prisoner at
Vienna. What chance of reigning had the Duke of Reichstadt, that
child of thirteen, condemned by all the Powers of Europe? By what
means could he mount the throne? Who would be regent in his name?
A Bonaparte? The forgetful Marie Louise? Such hypotheses were
relegated to the domain of pure fantasy. Apart from a few
fanatical old soldiers who persisted in saying that Napoleon was
not dead, no one, in 1824, believed in the resurrection of the
Empire. As for Orleanism, it was as yet a myth. The Duke of
Orleans himself was not an Orleanist. Of all the courtiers of
Charles X., he was the most eager, the most zealous, the most
enthusiastic.
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