When
the time came to break up, someone suggested that a carriage should be
sent for to convey the King and his two companions to the Palace.
Whereat the monarch laughed aloud and right joyously.
"By my faith!" he exclaimed; "You, my friends, would actually pamper me
already, by offering me a luxury which you yourselves do not propose to
enjoy! Ah, my friends, here comes in the mischief of the monarchical
system! What of your 'Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity'? Do I ask to
have anything different to yourselves? Can I not walk, even as you do?
Have I not walked to, and from these meetings often? And even so, I
purpose to walk now! If you are true Revolutionists--as I am--do not
reverse your own theories! You complain,--and justly,--that a king is
over-flattered; do not then flatter him yourselves by insisting on such
convenience for him as he does not even demand at your hands!"
"You take us too literally, Sir," said Louis Valdor; "Even
Revolutionists owe respect to their chief!"
"Sergius Thord is your Chief, my friend!" replied the monarch; "And,
from a Revolutionary point of view, mine! But you have never thought of
sending _him_ anywhere in a carriage! Ah!--what children we are!
What slaves of convention! 'Liberty, Equality and Fraternity' have been
the ideals of ages;--yet despite them, we are always ready to follow a
Leader,--and form ourselves into one body under a Head!"
"Provided the Head has brains in it!" said Zouche.
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