The bulk of them are
worshippers of wealth, or ease, or pleasure, or safety. The only
unselfish feeling which they cherish is attachment to their hereditary
sovereign. They revere Henri V. as the ruler pointed out to them by
Providence: they love him as the representative of Charles X. the
champion of their order, who died in exile for having attempted to
restore to them the Government of France. They hope that on his
restoration the _canaille_ of lawyers, and _litterateurs_, and
adventurers, who have trampled on the _gentilshommes_ ever since 1830,
will be turned down to their proper places, and that ancient descent will
again be the passport to the high offices of the State and to the society
of the Sovereign. The advent of Henri V., which to the Orleanist branch
of the Fusionists is a painful means, is to the Legitimist branch a
desirable end. The succession of the Comte de Paris, to which the
Orleanists look with hope, is foreseen by the Legitimists with
misgivings. The Fusionist party is in fact kept together not by common
sympathies but by common antipathies; each branch of it hates or
distrusts the idol of the other, but they co-operate because each
branch hates still more bitterly, and distrusts still more deeply, the
Imperialists and the Republicans.
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