Further proofs were therefore required; and several were afterwards afforded.  The details of the first are somewhat singular.  At this time (July 1832) there lived in the village of Gallardon, at the extremity of Beauce, a peasant named Martin, who had the reputation of receiving revelations from above, which he acquired so far back as 1818, when Mathew Burneau and other spurious princes made their appearance.  One Sunday in that year, during mass, Martin saw a vision in which he said an angel commanded him to get an interview with Louis XVIII., the purport of which should be afterwards revealed to him.  Immediately after his return from church, Martin having taken leave of his wife and family, commenced his journey on foot to Paris.  On the fifth day he arrived there, went straight to the palace of the Tuileries, and demanded to be admitted to the king.  In the simplicity of his heart, he told the guards that his mission was of a celestial nature; but they, not finding messengers from above among the list of visitors set down in the orders of the day, handed poor Martin over to the municipal authorities, who transferred him to the Bicetre lunatic asylum.  Here he remained for some time, during which his exemplary piety and touching resignation attracted the attention and respect of the principal physician, who often made him the subject of general conversation.  At the end of two months Louis heard of the circumstance, and actually consented to see the harmless man.  At the interview, he imparted to the king the substance of a second revelation; which was, that his majesty’s nephew, Louis XVII., was still alive, and would return at no very distant period; and that if the king he addressed attempted to undergo the ceremony of coronation, the direst calamities would follow; amongst others the dome of the cathedral (of Rheims) would fall in, and crush every soul taking part in the rites.  Whether the majesty of France took any serious heed of this enthusiast’s warning, it is impossible to say; but one thing is certain—­Louis XVIII. never was formally crowned.  When Martin returned to his village, he found that the king had bought the house which he rented, and presented it to him to live in for the rest of his days.  This, together with his interview with royalty—­of which he of course made no secret—­elevated the poor visionary to the character of a prophet amongst the population of that part of the country; many of whom indeed formed themselves into a sect called Martinists, and devoutly expected the re-appearance of the son of Louis XVI.

As these facts were notorious in 1818, they had not been forgotten in 1832, and it was not at all unnatural that the least credulous of the Comtesse de R.’s friends should suggest that Neuendorf should be shown to the Beauce prophet.  Accordingly, in September, a journey to St Arnould, near Dourdan, was undertaken; and without saying who he was, or pretended to be, Neuendorf was there confronted with Martin.  In an instant, it is said, the prophet recognised him as the person he had seen in his second vision as Louis XVII.  His enthusiasm knew no bounds; he embraced the ‘prince’ with tears of joy, and in the evening the whole party heard mass at the modest little church of St Arnould.