The Sun.
London, England, 1868-10-28 00:00:00

ROYAL ALHAMBRA PALACE. THREE BILLETS,
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open from 11 to 4.

ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS, Regent's-park, OPEN daily (ex
eept Sundays). Admission, Is.; on Mondays, 6d.; Children
under twelve, Gil.

7 (17-,
4;i017 •
111+

LOIVDOIV, TUESDAY, OCT. 27, 1868.

Whether or not NAPOLEON 111. received the ex-
Queen of SPAIN, ISABELLA 11., the other day at St.
Cloud, upon a visit so strictly incognito that the only
recognition of her Majesty's royalty was the silent
presentation of arms by the sentry on guard—it is
rather curious to remember, in regard to the Empe-
ror of the FRENCH, that he has had personal inter-
course with, that he has received indications of
personal amity, friendship, and affectionate inti-
macy from, one after another, the whole of the
Sovereigns of Christendom. When, almost upon the
morrow of the restoration of the French Empire,
NAPOLEON 111. announced his intended marriage with
EUGENIE, Countess de TEBA, the EMPEROR, it may
be remembered, spoke of himself, rather inappro-
priately, almost absurdly, as a parvenu. NAPOLEON
the Great might so have spoken of himself with a
little more reason—he, the founder or creator of a
new dynasty. Not so the heir to his imperial for-
tunes, who may be said, quite literally, that is in the
ordinary acceptation of the phrase, to have been born
in the purple. The very place of his birth, even, was
the Palace of the Tuileries. There he was born when
the Great NAPOLEON'S power was in its very zenith.
And as it happened, he who was destined by PROVI-
DENCE to be the restorer of the Second Empire, was
the first Prince born under the dispensation of the
First Empire. lie was the first infant of the Impe-
rial family born after the transformation of the
Consular fasces of the Republic into the sceptre of
the modern CHARLEMAGNE. Prince CHARLES LOUIS
NAPOLEON was, in point of fact, the first of that
race whose birth was announced with military
honours, with the roll of drums, and the presentation
of arms, and the firing of cannon—beginning at the
Palace of the Tuileries, and dying away (as the news
spread) to the furthest confines of the enormous empire
then owning allegiance to NAPOLEON, an empire ex-
tending in the north-west to the shores of the Baltic
and in the south-east to the coast of Illyria. This
was on the 20th of April, 1808. Remembering those
antecedents of the present Emperor of the FRENCH,
it was almost by an affectation that he spoke of him-
self as a parvenu immediately before his marriage to
EUGENIE on the 29th of January, 1853, in the Cathe-
dral of Notre Dame. Upon his removal from the
Palace of the Ely; des to that of the Tuileries, not long
previously, he was simply returning home ! And there,
at the Tuileries, or at one or other of his numerous
other palaces, chiefly at St. Cloud, at Compiegne, or
at Fontainebleau, this soi-disant parvenu sovereign
has, during the last few years, received as his guests
nearly every reigning sovereign in Christendom.
It may be interesting, as a mere matter of histori-
cal retrospect, to enumerate here the chief of the
visits paid thus to NAPOLEON 111. by the Sovereigns
of Europe—more particularly bearing in remem-
brance the coldness with which the restoration of the
Empire under his rule was (more or less reluctantly)
recognised in so many of the continental capitals.
The Queen of ENGLAND, it is worthy of remark, was
the very first of the European Sovereigns to adventure
upon an interchange of hospitalities with NAPOLEON
111. Between the 7th and the 22d of April, 1855,
the French EMPEROR and EMPRESS were the guests
of her MAJESTY here in England. And in that
same year, only four months later, i.e. between the
18th and 27th of August, the Queen of ENGLAND
was the guest (in company with the Prince CONSORT) of
the Emperor NAPOLEON M. Two years afterwards,
viz., between the Gth and 10th of August, 1857, the
French Sovereigns were again the guests of Queen
VICTORIA—the latter twelve months after that,
namely, on the 4th and sth of August, 1858, being
received by the EMPEROR at Cherbourg.
The Emperor of RUSSIA, besides meeting NAPO-
LEON 111. at Stutgardt as far back as 1857, on the
25th of September, and besides being the guest of
the Frdnch EMPEROR at Nice on the 27th and 28th
of October, 1864, was, still more recently,
the guest of NAPOLEON at Paris—upon the memorable
occasion, in point of fact, when, while riding in the
same carriage, they passed together through immi-
nent peril of assassination.
The King of PRUSSIA was not only the guest of
NAPOLEON 111. at Compiegne in 1861, but after-
wards, only a year ago in Paris, at the last Great
International Exhibition.
The Emperor of AUSTRIA and the Emperor NAP 0-
L EON 111., it is still within the remembrance of
all, enjoyed the pleasure of intimate communication
with one another, when the latter was the guest of
FRANCIS JOSEPH in the Kaiser's own dominions on
the 18th of August, 1867, at Saltzburg.
The King of SWEDEN, more than seven years ago,
visited NAPOLEON 111. on the Gth of August, 1851.
The King of HOLLAND was welcomed as a guest
by the French EmPeßok during that same year, 1861,
on the 12th of October.
The King of ITALY—King of SARDINIA as he was
then—not only partook of the hospitalities of
NAPOLEON 111. immediately after the Crimean war,
but may be said to have virtually received his title
as King of ITALY from the Emperor of the FRENCH,
after the entrance of NAPOLEON 111. and VICTOR
EMMANUEL, side by side, in triumph into Milan on
the Bth of June, 1859, immediately prior to the
EMPEROR banding over to the KING (rather a splendid
present by the way) the whole of conquered Lom-
bardy.
The King of SPAIN—as he was then, not as now
the ex-King—was the guest of NAPOLEON 111. at St.
Cloud in 1864, on the 16th of August—the EMPEROR
meeting the Queen of SPAIN on the 9th of Septem-
ber, 1865, at St. Sebastian. Since when—in fact
within the last few weeks—NAPOLEON, besides re-
ceiving ISABELLA 11. at the railway station at
Biarritz, set apart his palace at Pau as a home dur-

ing her pleasure for the last of the BOURBONS imme-

diately after her ignominious discrowning and de-

thronement by the Spanish Revolution.
The SULTAN CALIPH only this last year was the
guest of the Emperor NAPoLgoN 111. at the Tuileries

on the unprecedent occasion of the Grand Turk's visit-
ing Western Europe, and, as it happened, ABDUL-

Aztz was seated beside the French EMPEROR upon the
very day when the latter visited in state in the Champ

de Mars the magnificent temporary palace of the

great International Exhibition.

The German Sovereigns, it is also worthy of re-
membrance, met NAPOLEON M. between the 15th

and 17th of June, 1860, at. Baden-Baden—none of

them dreaming then, we may be sure, of that

blinding, blighting fusillade at Sadowa!

From the Prince of WALES, NAPOLEON III• re-
ceived a visit on the 12th of June, 1862, at Fon-
. _ _

tainbleau. And, since then, his MAJESTY has had visits

of courtesy or of ceremony from the Crown Prince
of Prussia, from the Viceroy of EGYPT, and others.
During the year of the Paris Exhibition, nearly all
the Sovereigns of Europe were at one time or another
the guests of the EMPEROR either at St. Cloud or at the
Tuilei ies.

If, as the one solitary exception, the Sovereign
PONTIFF has been debarred, by his very position as
Sovereign PONTIFF, from any participation in these
interchanges of hcspitality between NAPOLEON 111.
and the crowned heads of Europe, his Holiness Plus
IX. has given a far more signal attestation of his
personal cordiality towards the French Emperor,
(and as such the Eldest Son of the Church) by becom-

ng godfather to the Prince Imperial, the future

NAPOLEON IV.

The parvenu (as he calls himself)---besides winning
all these evidences of personal recognition from one
after another of the Sovereigns who are his contem-

poraries —has received from them also, one after