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Rh believe, was not confined to the courtesies of the palace.

The position of the Duke was a difficult one. In the first place, he had to curb the vindictive vandalism of Blucher and his army, who would have levelled the city of Paris to the ground, if they could have done so; on the other hand, he had to practise a considerable amount of diplomacy towards the newly-restored King. At the same time the Duke's powers from his own Government were necessarily limited. A spirit of vindictiveness pervaded the restored Court against Napoleon and his adherents, which the Duke constantly endeavoured to modify. I must not forget to give an illustration of this state of feeling. It was actually proposed by Talleyrand, Fouché, and some important ecclesiastics of the ultra-royalist party, to arrest and shoot the Emperor Napoleon, who was then at Rochfort: so anxious were they to commit this criminal, inhuman, and cowardly act, on an illustrious fallen enemy who had made the arms of France glorious throughout Europe, that they suggested to the Duke, who had the command of the old wooden-armed semaphores, to employ the telegraph to order what I should have