Page:Works of Thomas Carlyle - Volume 03.djvu/187

JUNE 21, 1791] the same manner, beautiful Princess de Lamballe set off, about the same hour; and will reach England safe:—would she had continued there! The beautiful, the good, but the unfortunate; reserved for a frightful end!

All runs along, unmolested, speedy, except only the new Berline. Huge leathern vehicle:—huge Argosy, let us say, or Acapulco ship; with its heavy stern-boat of Chaise-and-pair; with its three yellow Pilot-boats of mounted Bodyguard Combers, rocking aimless round it and ahead of it, to bewilder, not to guide! It lumbers along, lurchingly with stress, at a snail's pace; noted of all the world. The Bodyguard Couriers, in their yellow liveries, go prancing and clattering; loyal but stupid; unacquainted with all things. Stoppages occur; and breakages, to be repaired at Étoges. King Louis too will dismount, will walk up hills, and enjoy the blessed sunshine:—with eleven horses and double drink-money, and all furtherances of Native and Art, it will be found that Royalty, flying for life, accomplishes Sixty-nine miles in Twenty-two incessant hours. Slow Royalty! And yet not a minute of these hours but is precious: on minutes hang the destinies of Royalty now.

Readers, therefore, can judge in what humour Duke de Choiseul might stand waiting, in the village of Pont-de-Sommevelle [sic], some leagues beyond Châlons, hour after hour, now when the day bends visibly westward. Choiseul drove out of Paris, in all privity, ten hours before their Majesties' fixed time; his Hussars, led by Engineer Goguelat, are here duly, come 'to escort a Treasure that is expected': but, hour after hour, is no Baroness de Korff's Berline. Indeed, over all that Northeast Region, on the skirts of Champagne and of Lorraine, where the great Road runs, the agitation is considerable. For all along, from this Pont-de-Sommevelle Northeastward as far as Montmédi, at Post-villages and Towns, escorts of Hussars and Dragoons do lounge waiting; a train or chain of Military Escorts; at the Montmédi end of it our brave