houses, were scarcely seen amid this profusion of lights with which
public gratitude had lighted every window. The boatmen gave an impromptu
fete which lasted part of the night, and to witness which an immense
crowd covered the shore, testifying the most ardent joy. This people,
who for thirty years had passed through so many different emotions, and
who had celebrated so many victories, showed as much enthusiasm as if it
had been their first fete, or a happy change in their destiny. Verses
were sung or recited at all the theaters; and there was no poetic
formula, from the ode to the fable, which was not made use of to
celebrate the event of the 20th of March, 1811. I learned from a well-
informed person that the sum of one hundred thousand francs from the
private funds of the Emperor was distributed by M. Dequevauvilliers,
secretary of the treasury of the chamber, among the authors of the poetry
sent to the Tuileries; and finally, fashion, which makes use of the least
events, invented stuffs called roi-de-Rome, as in the old regime they had
been called dauphin. On the evening of the 20th of March at nine o'clock
the King of Rome was anointed in the chapel of the Tuileries. This was a
most magnificent ceremony. The Emperor Napoleon, surrounded by the
princes and princesses of his whole court, placed him in the center of
the chapel on a sofa surmounted by a canopy with a Prie-Dieu. Between
the altar and the balustrade had been placed on a carpet of white velvet
a pedestal of granite surmounted by a hand some silver gilt vase to be
used as a baptismal font. The Emperor was grave; but paternal tenderness
diffused over his face an expression of happiness, and it might have been
said that he felt himself half relieved of the burdens of the Empire on
seeing the august child who seemed destined to receive it one day from
the hands of his father. When he approached the baptismal font to
present the child to be anointed there was a moment of silence and
religious contemplation, which formed a touching contrast to the
vociferous gayety which at the same moment animated the crowd outside,