ABSTRACT
That the so-called Entente Cordiale is celebrating its hundredth birthday proves at least that it has a tougher skin than its forerunner in the early years of Queen Victoria. That earlier entente owed a great deal to LouisPhilippe. He adored Britain, and dismissed his prime minister, Adolphe Thiers, for his readiness to break with it over Egypt. But many French people found that the price of peace was too high, and the return to the Foreign Office of the unemotional Lord Palmerston soon put an end to an idyll that had included reciprocal visits by the two sovereigns.
