Napoleon III and Eugénie Receive the Siamese Ambassadors, 1864

At a splendid gathering of their court, the emperor Napoleon III, his consort Eugénie, and their son and heir greet ambassadors from Siam, whose exoticism and servility before the imperial family are the centerpiece of this depiction by Jean-Léon Gerome. How might a middle-class French citizen have reacted to this scene? (Chateau de Versailles, France / Bridgeman Images.)