A depressed but well-dressed Juppe hands over palace privileges to a rumpled Jospin

THE REPUBLICAN guards of the French gendarmerie's second infantry regiment were waiting on the steps of the Matignon palace for its new occupant to arrive. Their black riding boots and silver spurs were polished, their sabres held against their gold-braided shoulders to salute the two prime ministers.

The mansion built in 1721 for the Marechal de Montmorency-Luxembourg was mirrored in the hussars' red-plumed silver helmets, with their gold crests and flowing horse tails. The French economy might be in a parlous state, but the country has lost none of its talent for ceremony.

A liveried and very unsocialist doorman glided forward to open the door of Mr Lionel Jospin's blue Renault. As he stepped onto the red carpet, Mr Alain Juppe was there to shake the victor's hand and lead him into his new home and office, the seat of French governments since Gen Charles de Gaulle established the Fifth Republic in 1958.

Outside, on the pavement in the Rue de Varenne, Socialist supporters waved red roses and shouted "Jospin avec nous!" (Jospin with us). The two men paused a moment for the cameras so that this transition could be witnessed by all French people, for history's record. Mr Juppe was, as ever, impeccably dressed, while Mr Jospin had that slightly rumpled socialist look that befits him. Lest anyone doubt that he intended to start work immediately, Mr Jospin's cabinet secretary followed him with files under his arm. The aide seemed to hesitate at the threshold, and Mr Juppe indicated that he should come in.

The 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen is engraved on the wall above the Matignon's cobblestone courtyard, framed by two semi-reclining Jacob in women in revolutionary bonnets. Mr Juppe and Mr Jospin had other preoccupations, but few texts could have explained more appropriately what this changing of the guard was about: "The representatives of the French people, constituted in a National Assembly, considering that to ignore, forget or disdain the rights of man are the sole causes of public misfortune and the corruption of governments, have resolved to set down, in a solemn declaration, the natural, inalienable and holy rights of man.

The French left claimed, of course, that the Juppe government ignored, forgot and disdained the rights of its citizens. The Jacobin tradition has come down through two centuries, and the French do not tolerate being governed from on high. Maybe Mr Juppe should have looked up at the wall outside his office more often. In the hours after their victory on Sunday night, newly-elected Socialist members of parliament accused the Gaullists of having ruled for the benefit of their party and the privileged few.

While Mr Juppe and Mr Jospin spent a brief quarter of an hour alone inside the Matignon palace, Mr Juppe's silver Peugeot waited at the edge of the red carpet. A Matignon security officer mused out loud that he'd never seen so many people come to watch a handover.

It was more interesting with a "cohabitation", he told me. Then he added, shaking his head as if he still couldn't believe it: "This election - it was like a wave of panic spread over France.

When the two prime ministers reappeared, Mr Juppe wore his pinched smile of difficult moments. With a timid little wave and a barely audible `merci' towards the Matignon staff who applauded him equally-timidly - the most unpopular prime minister in French history drove off towards the National Assembly, to register as the new member of parliament for Bordeaux. He still had that, and the mayor's office. But his Acquitaine region too has fallen to the Socialists.

Mr Jospin turned and walked back into the Matignon, to commence his Herculean labours. In the Rue de Varenne a civil servant predicted that this government too would be short-lived. "The problems are too big," he said. "There's no solution to unemployment."

Mr Juppe's personal staff emerged from the palace, looking every bit as depressed as their former boss. They were heading for the nearest bar, one of Mr Juppe's top advisors told me, to begin their new life with a stiff double whisky.