Page:EB1911 - Volume 05.djvu/859

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
  
CHAMBORD—CHAMELEON
823

protest against the bombardment of Paris had on the Germans. Yet fortune favoured him. The elections placed the Republican party in a minority in the National Assembly; the abrogation of the law of exile against the royal family permitted him to return to his castle of Chambord; and it was thence that on the 5th of July 1871 he issued a proclamation, in which for the first time he publicly posed as king, and declared that he would never abandon the white standard of the Bourbons, “the flag of Henry IV., Francis I., and Joan of Arc,” for the tricolour of the Revolution. He again quitted France, and answered the attempts to make him renounce his claims in favour of the comte de Paris by the declaration (January 25, 1872) that he would never abdicate. In the following month he held a great gathering of his adherents at Antwerp, which was the cause of serious disturbances. A constitutional programme, signed by some 280 members of the National Assembly, was presented for his acceptance, but without result. The fall of Thiers in May 1873, however, offered an opportunity to the Royalists by which they hastened to profit. The comte de Paris and the prince de Joinville journeyed to Frohsdorf, and were formally reconciled with the head of the family (August 5). The Royalists were united, the premier (the duc de Broglie) an open adherent, the president (MacMahon) a benevolent neutral. MM. Lucien Brun and Chesnelong were sent to interview the comte de Chambord at Salzburg, and obtain the definite assurances that alone were wanting. They returned with the news that he accepted the principles of the French Revolution and the tricolour flag. But a letter to Chesnelong, dated Salzburg, 27th of October, declared that he had been misunderstood: he would give no guarantees; he would not inaugurate his reign by an act of weakness, nor become “le roi légitime de la Révolution.” “Je suis le pilote nécessaire,” he added, “le seul capable de conduire le navire au port, parce que j'ai mission et autorité pour cela.” This outspoken adherence to the principle of divine right did credit to his honesty, but it cost him the crown. The duc de Broglie carried the septennate, and the Republic steadily established itself in popular favour. A last effort was made in the National Assembly in June 1874 by the duc de la Rochefoucauld-Bisaccia, who formally moved the restoration of the monarchy. The comte de Chambord on the 2nd of July issued a fresh manifesto, which added nothing to his former declarations. The motion was rejected by 272 to 79, and on the 25th of February 1875 the Assembly definitely adopted the Republic as the national form of government. From this time the comte de Chambord, though continuing to publish letters on political affairs, made no further effort to regain the throne. He died at Frohsdorf on the 24th of August 1883.

See Manifestes et programmes politiques de M. le comte de Chambord, 1848–1873 (1873), and Correspondance de la famille royale et principalement de Mgr. le comte de Chambord avec le comte de Bouillé (1884). Of the enormous literature relating to him, mention may be made of Henri V et la monarchie traditionnelle (1871), Le Comte de Chambord étudié dans ses voyages et sa correspondance (1880), and Henri de France, by H. de Pène (1885).  (H. Sy.) 


CHAMBORD, a village of central France, in the department of Loir-et-Cher, on the left bank of the Cosson, 10 m. E. by N. of Blois by road. The village stands in the park of Chambord, which is enclosed by a wall 21 m. in circumference. The celebrated château (see Architecture: Renaissance Architecture in France) forms a parallelogram flanked at the angles by round towers and enclosing a square block of buildings, the façade of which forms the centre of the main front. The profusion of turrets, pinnacles, and dormer windows which decorates the roof of this, the chief portion of the château, constitutes the main feature of the exterior, while in the interior are a well-preserved chapel of the 16th century and a famous double staircase, the construction of which permits two people to ascend and descend respectively without seeing one another. There are 440 apartments, containing pictures of the 17th century and souvenirs of the comte de Chambord. The château was originally a hunting-box of the counts of Blois, the rebuilding of which was begun by Francis I. in 1526, and completed under Henry II. It was the residence of several succeeding monarchs, and under Louis XIV. considerable alterations were made. In the same reign Molière performed Monsieur de Pourceaugnac and Le Bourgeois gentilhomme for the first time in the theatre. Stanislaus, king of Poland, lived at Chambord, which was bestowed by his son-in-law, Louis XV., upon Marshal Saxe. It was given by Napoleon to Marshal Berthier, from whose widow it was purchased by subscription in 1821, and presented to the duc de Bordeaux, the representative of the older branch of the Bourbons, who assumed from it the title of comte de Chambord. On his death in 1883 it came by bequest into the possession of the family of Parma.


CHAMBRE ARDENTE (Fr. “burning chamber”), the term for an extraordinary court of justice in France, mainly held for the trials of heretics. The name is perhaps an allusion to the fact that the proceedings took place in a room from which all daylight was excluded, the only illumination being from torches, or there may be a reference to the severity of the sentences in ardente, suggesting the burning of the prisoners at the stake. These courts were originated by the Cardinal of Lorraine, the first of them meeting in 1535 under Francis I. The Chambre Ardente co-operated with an inquisitorial tribunal also established by Francis I., the duty of which was to discover cases of heresy and hand them over for final judgment to the Chambre Ardente. The reign of Henry II. of France was particularly infamous for the cruelties perpetrated by this court on the Huguenots. The marquise de Brinvilliers (q.v.) and her associates were tried in the Chambre Ardente in 1680. The court was abolished in 1682.

See N. Weiss, La Chambre Ardente (Paris, 1889), and F. Ravaisson, Archives de la Bastille (Paris, 1866–1884, 16 vols.).


CHAMELEON, the common name of one of the three suborders of Lacertilia or lizards. The chief genus is Chamaeleon, containing most of the fifty to sixty species of the whole group, and with the most extensive range, all through Africa and Madagascar into Arabia, southern India and Ceylon. The Indian species is Ch. calcaratus; the dwarf chameleon of South Africa is Ch. pumilus; the giant of the whole tribe, reaching a total length of 2 ft., is Ch. parsoni of
Left Forefoot of Chamaeleon
o’shaughenesii
, outer view.
Madagascar. The commonest species in the trade is Ch. vulgaris of North Africa, introduced into southern Andalusia. A few queer genera, with much stunted tail, e.g. Rhampholeon, in tropical Africa and Brookesia in Madagascar are the most aberrant. The common chameleon is the most typical. The head is raised into a pyramidal crest far beyond the occiput, there is no outer ear, nor a drum-cavity. The limbs are very long and slender, and the digits form stout grasping bundles; on the hand the first three form an inner bundle, opposed to the remaining two; on the foot the inner bundle is formed by the first and second toe, the outer by the other three toes. The tail is prehensile, by being rolled downwards; it is not brittle and cannot be renewed. The eyeballs are large, but the lids are united into one concentric fold, leaving only the small pupil visible. The right and left eyes are incessantly moved separately from each other and literally in every direction, up and down, forwards and straight backwards, producing the most terrible squinting. Chameleons alone of all reptiles can focus their eyes upon one spot, and conformably they alone possess a retinal macula centralis, or spot of acutest, binocular vision. The tongue has attained an extraordinary development. It is club-shaped, covered with a sticky secretion, and based upon a very narrow root, which is composed of extremely elastic fibres and telescoped over the much elongated, style-shaped, copular piece of the hyoid. The whole apparatus is kept in a contracted state like a spring in a tube. When the spring is released, so to speak, by filling the apparatus with blood and by the play of the hyoid muscles, the heavy thick end shoots out upon the insect prey and is withdrawn by its own elasticity.