the first Dauphin, who died the 4th of June, 1789, at the
beginning of the Revolution,--the disinterrers of kings violated
the grave of this child and threw his bones on the refuse heap.
Iconoclasts, jealous of death, disputed its prey, and they
profaned among others the sepulchres of Madame Henrietta of
England, of the Princess Palatine, of the Regent, and of Louis XV.

In the midst of these devastations, some men, less insensate than
the others, sought at least to rescue from the hands of the
destroyers what might be preserved in the interest of art. Of this
number was an artist, Alexandre Lenoir, who had supervised the
demolition of the tombs of Saint-Denis. He could not keep from the
foundry, by the terms of the decree, the tombs of lead, copper,
and bronze; but he saved the others from complete destruction--
those that may be seen to-day in the church of Saint-Denis. He had
them placed first in the cemetery of the Valois, near the ditches
filled with quicklime, where had been cast the remains of the
great ones of the earth, robbed of their sepulchres. Later, a
decree of the Minister of the Interior, Benezech, dated 19
Germinal, An IV., authorizing the citizen Lenoir to have the tombs
thus saved from destruction taken to the Museum of French
Monuments, of which he was the conservator, and which had been
installed at Paris, Rue des Petits Augustins. From thence they
were destined to be returned to the Church of Saint-Denis, under
the reign of Louis XVIII.

At the height of his power, Napoleon dreamed of providing for
himself the same sepulture as that of the kings, his predecessors.
He had decided that he would be interred in the Church of Saint-
Denis, and had arranged for himself a cortege of emperors about