The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-07-26
THACKERAY's LECTURES ON THE GEORGES.

! THACKERAY'S LECTURES ON THE GEORGES
The first of the lectures the Four Georges, which
were delivered by Mr.. Thackeray several years
ago in this country and in England, but which
have never before been published appears in the
July number of the CornhW Magazine, and also ir
the last number of Harper's Monthly. We quote from
it the following extracts descriptive of the state
society in Europe in the early part Of the last
tury:
'fEvery prince initiated the French king and
had his Versailles, his Wilhelmshohe or Ludwigs-
lust; bis court and its splendors; his gardens laid
out with statues; his fountains, and water-works
and Iritons; his actors, and dancers and singers,
and fddlers; his harem, with its inhabitants; his
diamonds and duchies for these latter his enor-
nous festivities, his gaming tables, tournaments
masquerades, and banquets lasting week long,
for which the people paid with their money, when
the poor wretches had it, with their bodies and
very blood when they had none; being sold in
thousands by their lords and masters, who gavly
dealt in soldiers, staked regiment upon the red
at the gambling table; swapped battalion against
dancing girls diamond neck lace; and, as it were
pocketed their people.
As views Europe through contemporary
books of travel in the early part of last century
the landscape is awfu-wretched wastes, beggar-
ly and plundered; halfburned cottages and trem-
bling peasants gathering piteous harvests; gangs
OF such tramping along with bayonets behind
them, and corporals with canes and cats ofnine-
lords gilt carriage aoundering through the ruts
he swears at the posiillions, and tolls on to the
residenz. Hard by, but away from the noise
and brawling of the citizens and buyers, is Will
helmslust, or Ludwigsruhe, or Monbjou, or Yer
sailles--it scarcely matters which-near to the
city, shut out by woods from the beggared coun-
try, the enormous, hideous, gilded, monstrous
marble palace, where the prince is, and the court,
ana the trim gardens, and huge fountains, and
the forest where the ragged peasants are beating
the game in, ut is death to them to touch feath-
er:) ana the Jolly hunt sweeps by with its uni
form OF crimson and geld; and the prince gal
lops ahead pulling his royal horn; and his lords
and mistresses ride after him; and the stap is
pulled down; and the grand huntsman gives the
knife in the midst of chorus of bugles, and tits
time the court go home to dinner, and our noble
traveller, it may be the Baron of Pollnitz, or the
Count de konigsmarck, or the excellent Chevalier
de Seingalt sees the procession cleaning through
the trim avenues Of the wood, and hastens to the
inn and sends his noble name to the marshal ofthe
court Their our nobleman arrays himself in green
and gold, or pink and silver, in the richest Paris
mode, and is introduced by the chamberlain, and
makes his bow to the Jolly prince and the gracious
princess; is presented to the chief lords and ladies'
and then comes supper and bank at faro, where
he loses or wins thousand pieces by daylight. If
it is German court, you may add not little
drunkenness to this picture of high life; but Ger
man, or French, or Spanish, if you can out of
your palace-windows beyond the trm-cut forest
vistas, misery is lying outside; hunger is stalking
about the bare villages, listlessly following preca
riOus husbandry; plowng stony fields with starved
cattle; or fearfuy taking in scanty harvests. Au-
gustus is fat and jolly his throne; he can knock
down an OK, and eat one almost; his mistress
Aurora Konigsmarck, is the loveliest, the wit
tiest creature; his diamonds the biggest and
most brilliant in the world and his easts as splen-
did as those of Versailles As for Louis the Great
he is more than mortal Lift up your elances res
pectfuy, and mark him eyeing Madame de Fon-
tonges or Madame de Montespan from under his
sublime periwig, as he passes through the great
gallery where Villars, and Vendome, and Berwick,
and Bossuet and Massillon are waiting Can
court be more splendid; mobiles and knights more
gallant and superb; ladies lovely? A
grander monarch, or a more miserable, starved
wretch than the peasant his subject you cannot
look on. Let us bear both these types in mind, if
we wish to estimate theAd society properly. =
Remember the glory and the chivalry? Yes!
Remember the grace and beauty, the splendor
and lofty poteness; the gallant courtesy of
Fountenoy, where the French line bids the gen.
tlemen Of the English guard to fire first; the noble
consancy of the old king and Villars, his general,
who fits out the last army with the last crown
piece from the treasury, and goes to meet the enc
my and die or conquer for France at Demain. But
round all that royal splendor lies nation ensaved
and ruined; there people robbed of their rights
communities laid waste; faith, justice, commerce
trampled upon, and well.nigh destroyed; nay, in
the very centae ofr0yaltv itself, what horrible
stains and meanness, crime and shame! 1t is but
to a silly harlot that some of the noblest gentle
men, and some of the proudest women in the world,
bowling down; it is the price of miserable pro-
vince that the king ties in diamonds round his
mistress's white neck In the first half of the last
century, say, this is going all Europe over
Saxony is a waste as well as Picardy or Artos;
and Versailles is only larger and not worse than
Herrenhausen.
'That was n curious state of morals and politics
in Europa queer consequence of the triumph of
the monarcbia principle. Feudalism was beaten
down. The nobility in its quarres with the crown,
had pretty well succOmbed, and the monarch was
all in all. He became almost divine; the proudest
and most ancient gentry of the land did mental
service for him. Who should carry Louis XIV.'s
candle when he went to bed? What prince of the
Dloou shou,a noid the kings shirt when his Most
Ghrlsuan Majesty changed that garment? The
of such details and squa6btes The tradition is not
yet extinct in Europe Any of you who were pres
ent, myriads were at that splendid pageant, the
opening of our Crystal Palace in London, must
have seen two noble lords, great officers of the
household, with ancient pedgrees, with embroid-
cred coats, and stars their breasts and wands in
their hands, walking backward for the space
of mile, while the royal procession made its pro-
gress. Shall we wonder-shal we be angry-shaIl
we laugh at these old world ceremonies? View
them as you WILL according to your mood; and
with scorn or with respect or with anger and sor-
row, as your temper leads you. Up goes Geser's
hat upon the pole Salute that symbol of sove-
reigntv with heartfelt awe; with sulky shrug
of acquiescence, or with grinung obeisance;
with stout rebeous no--clap your beaver
down on your pate, and refuse to dof it to that
spanged velvet and Haunting feather. | make no
comment upon the spectators behavior all | say
is, that Geslers cap is still up in the market place
of Europe, and not few folks still kneeling to