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Is it possible? can the Emperor forget? We don’t like to break it to him, but has he forgotten all about the farm at Pizzo, and the garden of the Observatory? Yes, truly: there he lies on his golden shield, never stirring, never so much as lifting his eyelids, or opening his lips any wider.

O vanitas vanitatum! Here is our Sovereign in all his glory, and they fired a thousand guns at Cherbourg and never woke him!

However, we are advancing matters by several hours, and you must give just as much credence as you please to the subjoined remarks concerning the Procession, seeing that your humble servant could not possibly be present at it, being bound for the church elsewhere.

Programmes, however, have been published of the affair, and your vivid fancy will not fail to give life to them, and the whole magnificent train will pass before you.

Fancy then, that the guns are fired at Neuilly: the body landed at daybreak from the funereal barge, and transferred to the car; and fancy the car, a huge Juggernaut of a machine, rolling on four wheels of an antique shape, which supported a basement adorned with golden eagles, banners, laurels, and velvet hangings. Above the hangings stand twelve golden statues with raised arms supporting a huge shield, on which the coffin lay. On the coffin was the imperial crown, covered with violet velvet crape, and the whole vast machine was drawn by horses in superb housings, led by valets in the imperial livery.

Fancy at the head of the procession first of all–

The Gendarmerie of the Seine, with their trumpets and Colonel.

The Municipal Guard (horse), with their trumpets, standard, and Colonel.

Two squadrons of the 7th Lancers, with Colonel, standard, and music.

The Commandant of Paris and his Staff.

A battalion of Infantry of the Line, with their flag, sappers, drums, music, and Colonel.

The Municipal Guard (foot), with flag, drums, and Colonel.

The Sapper-pumpers, with ditto.

Then picture to yourself more squadrons of Lancers and Cuirassiers. The General of the Division and his Staff; all officers of all arms employed at Paris, and unattached; the Military School of Saint Cyr, the Polytechnic School, the School of the Etat-Major; and the Professors and Staff of each. Go on imagining more battalions of Infantry, of Artillery, companies of Engineers, squadrons of Cuirassiers, ditto of the Cavalry, of the National Guard, and the first and second legions of ditto.

Fancy a carriage, containing the Chaplain of the St. Helena expedition, the only clerical gentleman that formed a part of the procession.

Fancy you hear the funereal music, and then figure in your mind’s eye–

THE EMPEROR’S CHARGER, that is, Napoleon’s own saddle and bridle (when First Consul) upon a white horse. The saddle (which has been kept ever since in the Garde Meuble of the Crown) is of amaranth velvet, embroidered in gold: the holsters and housings are of the same rich material. On them you remark the attributes of War, Commerce, Science, and Art. The bits and stirrups are silver-gilt chased. Over the stirrups, two eagles were placed at the time of the empire. The horse was covered with a violet crape embroidered with golden bees.

After this came more Soldiers, General Officers, Sub-Officers, Marshals, and what was said to be the prettiest sight almost of the whole, the banners of the eighty-six Departments of France. These are due to the invention of M. Thiers, and were to have been accompanied by federates from each Department. But the government very wisely mistrusted this and some other projects of Monsieur Thiers; and as for a federation, my dear, IT HAS BEEN TRIED. Next comes–

His Royal Highness, the Prince de Joinville.

The 600 sailors of the “Belle Poule” marching in double file on each side of

THE CAR.

[Hush! the enormous crowd thrills as it passes, and only some few voices cry Vive l’Empereur! Shining golden in the frosty sun–with hundreds of thousands of eyes upon it, from houses and housetops, from balconies, black, purple, and tricolor, from tops of leafless trees, from behind long lines of glittering bayonets under schakos and bear-skin caps, from behind the Line and the National Guard again, pushing, struggling, heaving, panting, eager, the heads of an enormous multitude stretching out to meet and follow it, amidst long avenues of columns and statues gleaming white, of standards rainbow-colored, of golden eagles, of pale funereal urns, of discharging odors amidst huge volumes of pitch-black smoke,