The young king was not less affected than his elder brother;
he threw himself about in his fauteuil, and could not find a
single word of reply.

Charles II., to whom ten years in age gave a superior
strength to master his emotions, recovered his speech the
first.

"Sire," said he, "your reply? I wait for it as a criminal
waits for his sentence. Must I die?"

"My brother," replied the French prince, "you ask me for a
million -- me, who was never possessed of a quarter of that
sum! I possess nothing. I am no more king of France than you
are king of England. I am a name, a cipher dressed in
fleur-de-lised velvet, -- that is all. I am upon a visible
throne; that is my only advantage over your majesty. I have
nothing -- I can do nothing."

"Can it be so?" exclaimed Charles II.

"My brother," said Louis, sinking his voice, "I have
undergone miseries with which my poorest gentlemen are
unacquainted. If my poor Laporte were here, he would tell
you that I have slept in ragged sheets, through the holes of
which my legs have passed; he would tell you that
afterwards, when I asked for carriages, they brought me
conveyances half-destroyed by the rats of the coach-houses;
he would tell you that when I asked for my dinner, the