Page:Coubertin - France since 1814, 1900.djvu/83

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
THE GREAT JUGGLING OF 1830
67

way of retaliation for this failure (June 1827) ; but it was well known that the Duc d'Angoulême, the heir to the throne, who at this time took part with his father in the Ministerial councils, had plainly declared himself against the measure. It was not forgotten that after his accession Charles X. had, by his own authority, suppressed this very law passed by Villèle in the latter months of Louis XVIII.'s reign. So it was to the Minister, and not to the King, that the grudge was owing. The dissolution of the National Guard had been for the Parisian bourgeoisie (of which it was almost entirely composed) a still severer blow. On the 29th of April the King reviewed the National Guard on horseback in the Champ de Mars, when he was received with mingled cries of " Vive le Roi ! À bas Villèle ! " The next day this outburst of political emotion was punished with an order for dissolution.

Nevertheless, when in the autumn of the same year Charles X. visited the camp at Saint Omer, and made a tour of the principal towns in the North of France, he was greeted with enthusiastic loyalty. Shortly afterwards news arrived of the glorious battle of Navarino, which gave Greece her independence, and