The Queen's Coronation was deferred till June 1838. It would be tedious to dwell on the splendour of the ceremonial. Perhaps the most readable, and not the least truthful, account has been preserved in one of Barham's Ingoldsby Legends—Mr. Barney Maguire's Ac count of the Coronation, set to the tune of The Groves of Blarney, and beginning-

" Och! the Coronation, what celebration For emulation with it can compare ?

When to Westminster the Royal Spinster

And the Duke of Leinster all in order did repair.

'Twas there ye'd see the new Polishemen,

Making a skrimmage at half afther four;

And the Lords and Ladies, and the Miss O'Gradys

All standing round before the Abbey door."

Two personages in the procession, who had met under far different circumstances in earlier years, met with a tremendous ovation wherever they moved. One of these was the Duke of Wellington—our Great Duke - and the other was the veteran Duke of Dalmatia - the puissant Marechal Soult of the Peninsula and Waterloo - once the redoubtable foe of England. Mr. Justin McCarthy has suggested that "the cheers of a London crowd on the day of the Queen's coronation did something genuine and substantial to restore the good feeling between this country and France, and efface the bitter memories of "Waterloo".  On the other hand, the anti-monarchical party in France attributed the popular reception of Soult in London to the prevalence of sympathy with Republican of views. Certain it is that when, in later years, Soult championed the English alliance in the French Assembly he referred with feeling to his reception at Queen Victoria's coronation : " I fought the English," he said, " down to Toulouse, when I fired the last shot in defence of national independence ; in the meantime I have been in London, and France knows how I was received. The English themselves cried Vive Soult ! ' They cried Soult - for ever I ' " One may formulate rules of diplomacy and international courtesy, but who shall weigh the effect of sympathy between a generous people and a former gallant foe ?

HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN RECEIVING THE SACRAMENT AFTER HER CORONATION IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

LA BELLE ALLIANCE.

This sketch represents Marshal Soult meeting his old antagonist, Lord Hill, at the Duke of Wellington's. "At last," he says, "I meet you, I, who have run after you so long I" "La Belle Alliance" is well known as the name of a particular spot, which was one of the points of attack at the Battle of Waterloo.

 

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