had become the personal joy of every household.

At half-past ten Madame Blanchard set out from L'Ecole Militaire in a
balloon for the purpose of carrying into all the towns and villages
through which she passed, the news of the birth of the King of Rome.

The telegraph carried the happy news in every direction; and at two
o'clock in the afternoon replies had already been received from Lyons,
Lille, Brussels, Antwerp, Brest, and many other large towns of the
Empire, which replies, as may well be imagined were in perfect accord
with the sentiments entertained at the capital.

In order to respond to the eagerness of the crowd which pressed
continually around the doors of the palace to learn of the welfare of the
Empress and her august child, it was decided that one of the chamberlains
should stand from morning till evening in the first saloon of the state
apartments, to receive those who came, and inform them of the bulletins
which her Majesty's physicians issued twice a day. At the end of a few
hours, special couriers were sent on all roads leading to foreign courts,
bearing the news of the delivery of the Empress; the Emperor's pages
being charged with this mission to the Senate of Italy, and the municipal
bodies of Milan and Rome. Orders were given in the fortified towns and
ports that the same salutes should be fired as at Paris, and that the
fleets should be decorated. A beautiful evening favored the special
rejoicings at the capital where the houses were voluntarily illuminated.
Those who seek to ascertain by external appearances the real feelings of
a people amid events of this kind, remarked that the topmost stories of
houses in the faubourgs were as well lighted as the most magnificent
hotels and finest houses of the capital. Public buildings, which under
other circumstances are remarkable from the darkness of the surrounding