Dino Dorothée - Memoirs of the Duchesse De Dino (Afterwards Duchesse de Talleyrand et de Sagan), 1841-1850

On February 16, 1841, King William I. of the Low Countries contracted a morganatic marriage with the Comtesse d' Oultremont-Vegimont, after abdicating in 1840, in favour of his son, King William II.

Extract from a letter.

The Sub-Prefect of Chinon at that time was M. Viel.

During the Canadian rebellion in 1837 and 1838, the steamship Caroline had been burnt on the Niagara River, and an Englishman, Mr. Amos Durfee, was killed. Mr. Alexander MacLeod, a United States citizen, was accused as his murderer, but Mr. Gridley, judge at Utica succeeded in proving his innocence.

See p. 22 for the announcement of the marriage of Lord Beauvale with Mlle. Maltzan.

Benais, the country residence near Rochecotte, then belonged to M. and Madame de Messine, the parents of Madame du Ponceau.

Extract from a letter.

Dr. Andral was a son-in-law of M. Royer-Collard.

This letter from M. de Talleyrand to King Louis XVIII. and the reply sent to him by M. de Villèle in the King's name, may be found in the appendix of the third volume of the Memoirs of the Prince de Talleyrand .

Count Pahlen.

See p. 15 (February 12, 1841). A judicial inquiry had been begun against M. de Montour, the manager of the newspaper la France , which had published the false letters. The matter was long delayed by the defence, and did not come before a jury until April 24. M. Berryer cleverly pleaded good faith on the part of M. de Montour, who had thought the letters authentic, though he had taken no pains to verify his belief. In the result the manager of la France was acquitted by six votes to six.

The Comte de Paris, born on August 24, 1838, was privately baptized at the Tuileries on his birthday. He was not admitted into the church until nearly three years later, when the ceremony took place at Notre Dame with great splendour.

The Marquise de Castellane was then seriously ill with quinsy, from the effects of which she suffered for a long time.

These letters are addressed to M. de La Gervaisais, a young Breton gentleman, an officer of carbineers of Monsieur's regiment. The Princesse de Condé had made his acquaintance in 1786 at Bourbon l'Archambault, where she had been to take the waters, and her feeling for him was both deep and pure.

Queen Adelaide.

The Comtesse d'Oultremont.

In Shakspere's Merchant of Venice .

Prince Anton Radziwill had been sent to Göttingen to conclude his studies, and while he was then staying in Germany in 1794, he made the acquaintance of Goethe, who was already working at the first part of Faust . Prince Radziwill was profoundly attracted by the beauty of this work, and as he was himself a most enthusiastic musician he undertook to put certain scenes of the great poet's creation to music, and completed the work of composition by degrees. The Prince was on terms of personal intimacy with Goethe, who slightly modified the garden scene between Faust and Margaret at his request. The first performance of Faust with Prince Radziwill's music was given at Berlin in 1819, at the Palace Theatre of Monbijou, before the whole of the Prussian court. The Berlin Academy of Music, to which the Prince presented his work, has performed it almost annually since that date.

The author had accompanied the Prince de Talleyrand to Vienna for the Congress of 1815, and the Prince refers to the incident in his Memoirs as follows: "I also thought that it was necessary to destroy the hostile prejudice with which imperial France had inspired the high and influential society of Vienna; for this purpose the French Embassy must be made a social centre. I therefore asked my niece, the Comtesse Edmond de Périgord, to accompany me and do the honours of my house. Her readiness and tact caused general satisfaction, and were highly useful to me." (Vol. II. p. 208.)

Extract from a letter.

This lamentable scene, the sad event which marked the last evening which Charles X. and the Dauphin spent at Saint-Cloud, is related at length in the memoirs of the Duc de Raguse, to which reference is here made (Vol. VIII. Book XXIV.), and is partly reproduced in a book by M. Imbert de Saint-Amand, entitled The Duchesse de Berry and the Revolution of 1830 , which appeared in 1880.

The Queen of Hanover was the Duchess of Cumberland, by birth a Princess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. She died on June 29, after suffering for three months from a form of consumption.

Hohlstein was the estate of the Princess of Hohenzollern Hechingen, by birth a Princess of Courlande.

La Jonchère was the property of M. Thiers at La Celle Saint-Cloud.

This protocol, which concluded the Egyptian question, was signed on July 13, 1841, by England, Austria, Prussia, Russia, and Turkey. The Straits Convention, which was signed at the same time, added the signature of the French plenipotentiary to the rest.

On July 9 and 10 the inhabitants of Toulouse were disturbed by the question of the census. The agitation seemed to have died away when a serious rising broke out upon the 12th. Large bodies of people marched about the streets, and barricades were raised, and the 13th was a very threatening day. The town was saved by the wisdom of the temporary mayor, M. Arzac, who was able, by means of tact, to restore tranquillity.

The Duchesse de Talleyrand was born on August 21, 1793.

Where the Foreign Office is situated.

The revolutionary factions which were still seething, pursued their plan of destroying the Royal Family. On September 4, 1841, a pistol-shot was fired at the Duc d'Aumale as he was going down a street of the Faubourg Saint Antoine at the head of his regiment, the 17th Light Horse. The horse of Lieutenant-Colonel Levaillant, who was by the side of the Prince was killed by the ball.

The census at Clermont-Ferrand, as at Toulouse, was a pretext for disturbances which broke out on September 13, 1841, and continued the whole of the next day. The rioters attacked the armed force, and many soldiers were killed or wounded; the gates of the town were burnt, and a desperate combat ensued. It became necessary to send considerable military forces to the town to overwhelm the rebels and restore order.

The Marquis and Marquise de Castellane were now resident in Auvergne at their estate of Aubijou.

The National had published a correspondence concerning the disturbances at Clermont, full of falsehoods and invectives against the monarchy, and was accused of attacking the King's majesty and brought to trial. On September 24, 1841, a verdict of "Not Guilty" was passed by the jury of the Seine.

On October 7, 1841, at eight o'clock in the evening, Generals Leon and Concho took advantage of the fact that a regiment, formerly commanded by the latter, had arrived at Madrid. As the regiment was devoted to him the two Generals proposed to make a sudden attempt to carry off the Queen and the Infanta. They went to the palace at the head of a squadron of the Royal Guard, and while the regiment surrounded the palace they mounted to the Queen's apartments; these were fortunately guarded by halberdiers who offered a vigorous resistance, received them with rifle-shots, and drove them back several times. Espartero crushed this military plot, and had General Diego Leon shot on October 15.