Page:A French Volunteer of the War of Independence.djvu/293

Rh vengeance. He existed to work out the designs of Providence. He thought that he was actuated by his own wishes and passions, and he was really executing the decrees of heaven. Before he fell he had time to ruin peoples and nations, to set fire to the four comers of the earth, to spoil the present and the future by the evils which he did, and by the examples which he left."

How could Balzac, who died in 1655, write that about Cromwell? He certainly foresaw the existence of Napoleon the Great, and,—without excepting Bonaparte himself,—it may be said that he was the only person in France or Europe to show that foresight. But my quotation is only inserted to draw attention to a little-known and singular fact in history, for from the great political giant of the Nineteenth Century I have personally received neither benefit nor injury.

The year 1814 came, and with it the restoration of the legitimate monarchy. I have called this restoration miraculous, and I blessed it with all my heart, with all