The Sun.
London, England, 1864-07-11 00:00:00

THE RUE QUINCAMEOIX.

The crowd in the Rue Quincampoix-was like no other
crowd. Never before had such a motley assemblage been
brought together—nor will ever be again. Such was the
variety of costumes and characters that the scene resembled
a grand carnival, except that the majority of the actors
came for purposes of speculation, and not for amusement.
Where but in the Rue Quincampoix. could have been
seen nobles and manants, priests and valets, magistrates,
philosophers, and chevaliers d'industrie, bargaining toge-
ther ? Where but in this street could be seen richly-attired
women of high rank, and of great beauty, mingling with
such a crowd, and transacting business with any one they
met? Nothing but the frenzy for gain which had seized
persons of all classes could account for such proceedings.
The wonderful fortunes known to have been made in the
Rae Quincampoix caused every one to rush there, hoping
to be equally lucky. Business was universally neglected.
Nothing was thought of but stock-jobbing. Nothing
talked of but the price of actions—how they rose—how they
fell. Even in our speculating times it is scarcely possible
to form a notion of the frenzy which then prevailed—which
spread like a contagion through Paris—through all the
provinces of France, and indeed throughout Europe.

Iu evidence of the agonising interest excited, let us
quote the following

ARTFUL STRATAGEM.

A handsome carriage, provided with a pair of fine horses,
was standing at a little distance from the entrance of the
hotel. Inside it was a lady, richly dressed, but with no
pretension either to youth or beauty. Her features were
quite unknown to Law. No sooner, however, did he show
himself, than, being descried by the lady, she thrust her
head and shoulders out of the carriage window, and screamed
to tha coachman,
"There is It. Law I Don't you see him? Do as I bade
yon, drole I—quick I
Upon this, to Law's infinite surprise and consternation,
the coachman lashed his horses furiously, and driving the
carriage against a high stone placed at the edge of the
pavement near the entrance of the port::-cochere, instantly
overturned the vehicle.

Law flew to the poor lady's assistance, and succeeded in
extricating her from the carriage, which luckily had not
sustained much damage, and was soon set right by the
Swiss porters, who now rushed forth.
Meanwhile, after conveying the lady into the vestibule,
and offering her a seat, Law inquired with much solicitude
whether she had sustained any injury, upon which she re-
plied that she was only a little shaken.
"To confess the truth, M. Law," she added, "I have
tried in vain to obtain admittance to you, and so was obliged
to have recourse to this stratagem. I hope you will pardon
me, and let me have fifty shares."
" Well, madam," replied Law, laughing, "since you
have incurred all this risk, you shall not go away empty-
handed."

And taking out his porte-feuille, he gavo her the shares
she required.
While contemplating the anxiety of the crowd we
become acquainted with the following startling—

CHANGES OF FORTUNE.

Madame Chaumont, a widow who had come to Paris about
a lawsuit, had already pined a hundred millions by her
speculations in this street. She was surrounded by Mis-
sissippians, with all of whom she appeared to be dealing.
Not far from the lucky Madame Chaumont stood the
Prince de Conti, who was now as regularly to be seen in the
Rue Quincampoix as any other jobber. At this moment
the prince was selling shares to a stoat, well looking man,
whose countenance, though he could not recal it, was
familiar to Evelyn. This stout personage was no other
than Law's ci-d event coachman, Hippolyte.

The next person to attract Evelyn's notice was M. Chirac,
the Regent's principal physician, a man ordinarily
of grave exterior and extremely dignified deportment,
but he now appeared to be in a state of great excitement
and was gesticulating furiously to M. Chambery, a specu-
lator with whom he was dealing. Like Madame Chaumont,
Chambery was a singular instance of the caprice of fortune.
A poor Savoyard, he gained a bare livelihood by acting as
a commissioner, but since the commencement of the system
he had contrived to amass forty millions, and at this par-
ticular junction he was endeavouring to purchase an office
in the royal household.

Close to Chambery, and now availing himself of the broad
omoplate of Martial to jot down his calculations, was
Vincent Leblanc, another speculator, who had profited to
the extent of many millions by the System. The two per-
sons with whom Leblanc was now transacting business were
no other than Montesquieu and Fontenelle. These two
celebrated men were kept in countenance by a pair of the
ripest scholars of the day—namely, the Abbe Terrason and
ht. de la Mothe.
A striking feature in the crowd was the number of richly-
dressed persons, and these were by no means people of the
highest rank, for those who made money invariably ex-
pended it in costly stuffs, and clothed themselves in em-
broidered velvets and silks, And even in cloth of gold, wear-
ing buttons of solid gold and silver. This extravagance
was carried to such a point that all the warehouses in the
Rue St. Honore were emptied of their stores of silks,
velvets, tissues, lace, and embroidery, and it was found
necessary to check the over•indulgenee in rich stuffs by a
sumptuary law.
Here is a glimpse of. Law at the moment of suc-
cess—.

F3RTUNE'S FAVOURITE.

All difficulties being removed, the Regent conferred upon
Law the title of Comptroller-General of Finance, and
D'Argenson had the bitter mortification of surrendering bin
post to the rival he detested, and was obliged to content
himself with the office of keeper of the seals,
Law had now reached the pinnacle of his ambition. lie
had become the equal of the highest nobility of the kingdom
—nay, their superior. Ilad triumphed over all his enemies,
and as the Regent was entirely guided by his counsels, he
might be said to hold the reins of government in his own
hands. In the space of four years, to employ the language
of Voltaire, he had literally become, from a Scotohman, a
Frenchman by naturalisation; frem a Protestant, a Catholio;
from an adventurer, the lord of the finest estate in the king.
dora ; and from a banker, prime minister.
The power and ability of the new comptroller-general
were not merely recognised by the nation thus placed under
his governance, but by all the great states of Europe, and
the British ministry, finding that Lord Stair had irritated
him, and was personally disagreeable to him, determined to
recall that ambassador, and with this design immediately
despatched Earl Stanhope, one of the secretaries of state, to
Paris.

The popular enthusiasm, which found expression in a
hundred different ways, satisfied the Regent that his choice
of a minister was eminently agreeable to the nation at
large. All ranks of society vied with each other in paying
court to the new comptroller-general. Honours were
showered upon him more thickly than ever, and his por-
trait was everywhere to be seen.

After all this, of course, comes "the deluge"
when
the bubble has burst, and when ruin follows upon
profaeion. Mr Ainsworth quotes from Levasseur
and other authorities, to throw a light upon the
conception and conduct of Law—

"The conception of Law," says AL Gambier, in the
" Encyclopedic) de Droit," "in spite of its original
errors, which rendered success impossible, in spite of the
blind temerity and grave mistakes which rendered its fall
so sudden and terrible, nevertheless attests in its author, in
addition to a powerful and inventive genius, a distinct per-
ception of three of the most fertile, though then unknown,
sources of the greatness of mit:ens—maritime commerce,
credit, and the spirit of sssociatioa."
With the following epitaph on the celebrated
financier, happily styled 'Py Mr Warburten "The

Napoleon of the Gambling World," the third
volume closes ;-
4, Ci-git cet Ecossais ctllebro
Ce calculateur sans egal
Qui, par les rcgles de l'aigUre
A mis la France a l'hopital,"

The Adventures of a Man of Family. By Lord
William Lennox. 3 vols. Hunt and Blackett.

As David Copperfield, in recounting the actual
experiences of his memorable career, begins at the
beginning, " I am born," so does the hero of Lord
William Lennox's new novel give us an accurate
history of his earliest adventures. The fall, true,
and particular accounts of the Christening festivi-
ties, and the tirade of compliments showered,
according to custom, upon the " lovely baby," are
amusing, as are also the records cf the school-boy
misdeeds of the youthful hero. The " Man of
Family" does not do much justice to his early
education in his after career. His adventures are
full of vicissitude and his love affairs
betray cossiderable instability of sentiment.
We shall not, however, betray the mysteries of the
plot. Some of the most interesting chapters of this
work are those in which the author, by the mouth
of his hero; describes to us some of the scenes at
home and abroad evidently familiar to himself. In
his travels in France, for example, Mr. Carleton is
struck by the

EDUCATION or THE FRENCH PEASA.NMY;
We had not talked long before she (the peasant girl)
informed me that the day on which we had entered wa■
the anniversary of the death of Henry IV., of France,
OA my expressing astonishment at her being aware of
this, she replied,
"Ali, par exemple I Does Monsieur think I know no-
thing ? Henry the Fourth was a great king."

" Yes," I replied; "but he lived two hundred years
ago, or more."
" What does that matter?" she rejoined ; " would it not
be a shame to have no idea of the history of this beau pays,
not to know what it was formerly, and how our nation has
arrived at the state in which it now is ? We French adore
the history of our country, Since the French name is be-
come celebrated all over Europe, when foreigners even like
to stilly our history, it is not allowable for any French
person to be ignorant of it.
When I heard these remarks, I felt completely taken
aback, and did not dare to say anything more for fear of
showing my ignorance.
Such is not, I am certain, an exceptional case of know-
ledge. You cannot find a French peasant unable to talk
to you about the crusades, about the battle of Brenneville,
the troubles of France during the reigns of Philippe de
Valois and Jean le Boa; the glories of Du Gnesclin, the
heroism of Joan of Arc, the battles of Marignan, Ivry,
Fleurus, Steinkerque; the great men who fiourLhed in the
reign of Louis the Fourteenth—such as Conde, Luxem-
bourg, Corneille, Racine, Moli6re, succeeded by Voltaire
and Rousseau; whilst with all the later events of import.
ance, from the reign of Louis the Sixteenth to their own
time, French peasants are wonderfully conversant.

How very different, too, is the style of music and song
which they love, compared to that which suits the tastes and
comprehension of Englishmen in their position of life. Tho
latter_ knows and is contented with something like " The
days we went a-gypsying," an old hunting song or two,
and " God save the Queen," whilst the former possesses an
almost inexhaustless collection of pretty songs ever present
to his memory—the theme of his lively airs being love and
spring flowers, love hnd shady arbours, and laughing val-
leys, and fair soenery of all sorts that can be associated with
" l'amour ;" and the gems of Beranger sound just as
pretty when adapted to the " wild-notes wild" of French
peasant girls, as when sung in the moat exquisite way by
finished artists, or when warbled forth by the cultivated
voices of rank and fashion.

Where will you find a village girl in any department
who cannot valse and dance the polka unimpeded by bad
music and thick shoes ? Whereas an English villager of
either sex, whe can perform well upon " the light fantastic
toe," is a rarity seldom to be found.

Here is a sketch of the Bois de Boulogne some 30
years back :--

THE BOIS DE BOULOGNE.

I liked to drive cut beyond the barrier, when I would
dismiss the vehicle and take a solitary ramble in the Bois
de Boulogne, which was not then ornamented, as it is now,
with artificial lakes, adorned with monster rocks, trans-
ported, like obelisks, from their native home and picturesque
chalets—the whole scene resembling some pantomime re-
presentation of Fairy land more than anything else, waved
Into existence, as it seems to have been, by a shake of his
Imperial hand. Neither was it yet laid out, as it now ist
as an extensive pleasure-ground for beauty and fashion to
air itself in.

The Bois de Boulogne was a magnificent wood, which
art and the landscape-gardener had not yet re-construoted.
Its trees and uuderwood were allowed to mat together hi
any sort of way that pleased them. Wild flowers and weeds
were permitted to flourish in unrestrained luxuriance. Toe
merry grisette walked about undisturbed on the arm of her
favourite and favoured ' blouse.'

Part of the hero's adventures are of a theatrical
character'. Among them are some interesting
reminiscenes of Cheitanham and its

PRIMATE THEATRICALS.

Earl Fit zhardinge gave the most laborious study to
every part ho undertook; he got thoroughly acquainted
with the author's meaning, and was always letter perfect.
Nor would he allow any play to be represented until it had
been attentively rehearsed. His height was, however, very
much against him, especially in such small theatres as
Cheltenham and Tewkesbury, an 4 there was a stilted man-
ner which seemed to be put on with a costume character,
from which the noble lord was exempt when in plain mo-
dern attire.

A few exceptions to this ruling may be made, for he
looked "every inch a king" in " Henri Quatro ;" as Brutus
he appeared " the noblest Roman of them all ;" and was
equally successful as Faulconbridge in "King John;" it
was in characters like Bromley in " Simpson and Co. :" and
My Lord Duke in " High Life below Stairs," that he greatly
excelled. His conception of the henpecked husband Jerry
Sneak was perfect, but his appearance rendered the farce
too broad and ridiculous,

h gThheer
as Hao nt
roeugreabdi le
ah
aAhudgeuosmt uesd
eßerkeley s rankedh r
emh
t huecr;
indeed in many characters he could not have been excelled
on the regular boards. His Othello would have immorta •
Head any professional actor, both as to his expression, in
grandeur of soul, and gentleness of nature ; as Mark An-
tony, he was dignified; as the impassioned Romeo, he was
the beau Weal of the Veronese youth, who " was beloved
and loved again;" as the Italian villain lachimo he was
pre-eminently- great, and his melodramatic acting is that
difacult scene,when he approaches the chaste bed of Imogen,
was a master-piece ; as the fat knight Falsteff, I may quote
from the poet, and say " the world will never (among ama-
teurs) look upon his like again."
Cheltenham is thus graphically described :
Cheltenham in those days was the most delightful town
in the world ; the sportsmen found pleasure with the Ber-
keley, Badminton, and Warwickshire hounds, the races,
steeplechases, and pigeon shooting; the gourmet could revel
in the most luxurious repasts—le ben vivant was never at a
loss for an excellent dinner; while the bad liver from the
East could procure an appetite by recruiting his enfeebled
constitution at the bubbling spring, which Nature has so
lavishly bestowed on this favoured spot. Dowagers with
their penniless daughters had ready access to thew hist
table and ball rooms; and heiresses were there to be run
down by needy fortune hunters. Veterans from India
could indulge in Oriental grandeur, free from monsoon and
mosquito—idle men about town could flirt and dance with
some of the prettiest girls in England ; young ladies could
lad objects of romance and sentiment, as they promenaded
under the beautiful avenues of lime-trees under the old
`yells; while invalids could regain their strength and
vigour from the salubrity of the climate. In short, old
and young, patricians and plebeians, rich and poor. mar-
ried and single, the healthy end the infirm, the robust and
the maimed, drew life and spirit and glory from the radiant
smiles of this Queen of Spas."
From the above extracts it will readily be seen that
the " Adventures of a Man of Family," apart from
its interest as a tale, abounds in lively descriptions
and pleasant reminiscences.

.Rathlynn, By the Author of "The Saxon in
Ireland." Three Vols. Hurst and Blackett.
Another " Saxon in Ireland," namely, Mr. Frank
Wyville, here recounts to us, in a very delightful
manner, his experiences during a very serious under-
taking, namely, that of reclaiming and cultivating
the waste lands and neglected estate of Rathly nn, the
purchase of his father, "the Admiral." These experi-
ences Mr Frank relates to a very good-natured uncle
who sympathises with good humoured dismay in hi;
nephew's love affairs with two charming Irish lassies
—Mary Donovan and Florence Fitzpatrick, com-
plicate(' by the counter mac ceuvres of the faithful
Larry and the treacherous Thady. The story, as
related to the uncle, terminates in
raid career, and
in the denouement, which later
on takes place, this
uncle is called upon to play a very important part,
for which his accidental acquaintance with his
nephew's perplexities renders him fortunately well
adapted. We take leave of " The Saxon" with the
regret one feels on parting with a pleasant acquain-
tance.

TIIE FAMOUS BANK FORGER Gtrand of Gate-
bourse, whose talent in counterfeiting Bank of
France notes was so notorious, escaped on the Sth Septem-
ber last from Cayenne, where he was undergoing the punish-
ment of hard labour for life. The banks have a shiver come
over them at the bare awaouneemeut.

%Mr
ittrillrry
Tr °;,

HER MAJESTY.

WINDSOR CASTLE, July 9.
Their Royal Highnesses the Count and Countess
of Paris, attended by the Marchioness de Cela and
Captain Mohain, arrived at the Castle yesterday.
The Count and Countess o`►' Paris dined with her
Majesty and the Royal family.

The Beig,ian Minister and Madame van delireyer
also had the honour of dining with the Queen and
Royal family on Friday.

The Queen, accompanied by their Royal High..
nesses the Princess Louis of Hesse, Princess Louise,
and the Countess of Paris, drove out in a carriage
and four this morning, attended by Colonel the Hon,
A, Hardinge,

His Royal Highness Prince Louis of Hesse, acs
companied by the Count of Paris, went out riding,
The Queen had a Council to-day at one o'clock,
Present—the Earl Granville, Lord Stanley cf
Alderley, and the Right Hon, Sir George Grey,
Mr, Helps was the Clerk of the Council.
Earl Granville had an audience of the Queen.

JULY 10.

Her Majesty the Queen, their Royal Highnesses
Prince and Princess Louis of Hesse, Princess
Helena, Princess Louise, Princess Beatrice, and
Prince Leopold, with the ladies and gentlemen in
waiting, attended Divine service this morning in
the private Chapel.
The Rev. W. H. Brookfield, chaplain in ordinary
to the Queen, officiated.
Their Royal Highnesses Prince and Princess Louis
of Hesse, attended by Madlle. de Graney and Capt.
von Westerweller, honoured the Belgian Minister
and Madame van de Weyer with their company at
dinner at New Lodge, on Saturday.
Their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princess
of Wales, attended by the Marchioness of Carmar-
then and Captain Grey, arrived at the Castle this
afternoon on a visit to the Queen.