6 Historical Introduction
is, he favoured the abolition of the monarchy. He was head of the village liberal
party, and after the return to the throne of Louis XVIII in 1814, Nicolas became
town mayor.
´
Evariste’s mother Adelaide-Marie (n
´
ee Demante) was the daughter of
a jurisconsult—a legal expert who gives opinions about cases brought before them.
She was a fluent reader of Latin, thanks to a solid education in religion and the clas-
sics.
For the first twelve years of his life, Galois was educated by his mother, who
passed on to him a thorough grounding in the classics, and his childhood appears to
have been a happy one. At the age of ten he was offered a place at the College of
Reims, but his mother preferred to keep him at home. In October 1823