Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume IV.djvu/297

CHAKLES (FRANCE) CHARLES (GERMANY) 289 ly suppressed by the reestablishment of the censorship. To divert public attention, the government resolved on assisting Greece in her war of independence, but the glory achieved by French arms failed to restore popularity to the cabinet ; and Charles X. at last consented to part with his ministers and choose new counsellors among the most liberal royalists. The Martignac ministry, formed Jan. 4, 1828, was the signal of a kind of reconciliation between the king and the nation. The measures then adopted were hailed with delight by the friends of constitutional liberty, but created the utmost dissatisfaction among the court party. The king, fearing the ascendancy of liberal principles and following the suggestions of the ultra royalists, dismissed the Martignac administration, and in- trusted Prince Polignac with the formation of a new cabinet. The prince was the truest rep- resentative of that old royalist party which had "forgotten nothing and learned nothing." His mere name was considered as a challenge offered by the king to the nation; every one foresaw the coming struggle. In vain the gov- ernment tried to assuage public opinion by the excitement of military success. The expedi- tion against Algiers was undertaken ; that stronghold of piracy was stormed on July 5, 1830. But all to no purpose ; the interest of the whole nation was engrossed by home af- fairs. On the opening of the chambers, March 2, the king had made use of threatening lan- guage, and to this a majority of 221 deputies answered by voting an address declaring their want of confidence in the ministry. The king declined to receive the address, on which the chambers were adjourned, and on May 16 they were dissolved. New elections took place, and resulted in a still more powerful opposition majority. Incensed at this, and encouraged by the triumph of the French army in Algeria, the king resorted to a coup d'etat. Decrees were promulgated suppressing entirely the freedom of the press, dissolving the newly elected but not yet opened chamber of deputies, and pre- scribing an essential modification in the mode of election, so as to secure the triumph of the court party. These ordinances fell like a thun- derbolt on Paris. Resistance was immediately organized ; barricades were built, and defended by bodies of workmen from the suburbs, and by artisans and printers, under the command of officers and young men from the polytech- nic school. The insurrection was emphatically popular, and not confined to any particular class. The royal troops, under Marshal Mar- mont, offered slight resistance, and were driven from the capital in less than three days (July 27-29). Charles X. was so little conscious of the danger of his situation that he remained quietly at the palace of St. Cloud ; he learned but gradually the defeat of his troops, being to the last under the impression that he had to deal only with a riot. But it was a revolution, and when he attempted to avoid its consequences it was too late. He recalled the fatal ordi- nances, appointed a liberal ministry, and even abdicated in favor of his grandson, the duke of Bordeaux, the present count of Chambord, his surviving son, the duke d'Angouleme, equally resigning his rights. But the chiefs of the rev- olution would not accept such proposals; the king had no alternative but to depart. He re- tired first to Trianon, then to Rambouillet, under the protection of his guards. In the latter place he made some show of resistance ; but on the appearance of 10,000 volunteers from Paris, he gave up entirely, and, accom- panied by commissioners sent by the chamber of deputies, he directed his course toward Cher- bourg. There, on Aug. 16, he embarked for England with his family and a few faithful ser- vants, on board of two American ships, the Great Britain and the Charles Carroll. He landed at Cowes under the name of count de Ponthieu, and immediately repaired to the palace of Holyrood, in Scotland, which had been assigned to him as a residence by the English government. In this retreat he de- voted his time to field sports, of which he was still very fond notwithstanding his old age, and to religious duties. After four years' resi- dence, he left Scotland for Bohemia, where he lived successively at Buschtierad and the Hradschin of Prague. Finally he resolved to retire to Gorz, and arrived there in October, 1836, but soon died of the cholera, after a sick- ness of five days. III. GERMANY. CHARLES I., Charlemagne, or Charles the Great (Ger. Karl der Grosse), emperor of the West and king of France, born according to some in Aix-la-Chapelle, according to others in the castle of Salzburg, near Neustadt, in the Ba- varian district of Lower Franconia, April 2, 742, died in Aix-la-Chapelle, Jan. 28, 814. The second son of Pepin, the Frankish king dom reverted to him and his brother Carlo- man on his father's demise in 768. Carlo- man dying three years later, Charles secured the undivided sovereignty. He now found himself master of the whole of Gaul and western Germany; his ambition, however, was unsatisfied, and a succession of fortunate wars in Italy, Spain, and Germany added largely to his already extensive dominion. His first conquest was that of Lombardy. Mo- tives of discontent and estrangement had for several years existed between him and Deside- rius, king of the Lombards. He had before his accession to the throne married Desi- derata, the daughter of the latter, and had recently sent her back in a scornful manner to her father. Desiderius himself had granted an asylum to the nephews and some of the bitter- est enemies of his son-in-law ; at the same time he assumed a hostile attitude toward the popes of Rome, whom Pepin had made firm allies of the Carlovingians by bestowing upon them the exarchate of Ravenna. Charlemagne, yielding to his own anger and to the entreaties of Pope