arliamentary local interest. Then does the
repressed valor of the party of Order break forth, then it tears away
the curtain from the scene, then it denounces the President, then it
declares the republic to be in danger,--but then all its pathos appears
stale, and the occasion for the quarrel a hypocritical pretext, or not
at all worth the effort. The parliamentary tempest becomes a tempest in
a tea-pot, the struggle an intrigue, the collision a scandal. While the
revolutionary classes gloat with sardonic laughter over the humiliation
of the National Assembly--they, of course, being as enthusiastic for the
prerogatives of the parliament as that body is for public freedom--the
bourgeoisie, outside of the parliament, does not understand how the
bourgeoisie, inside of the parliament, can squander its time with such
petty bickerings, and can endanger peace by such wretched rivalries with
the President. It is puzzled at a strategy that makes peace the very
moment when everybody expects battles, and that attacks the very moment
everybody believes peace has been concluded.

On December 20, Pascal Duprat interpellated the Minister of the Interior
on the "Goldbar Lottery." This lottery was a "Daughter from Elysium";
Bonaparte, together with his faithful, had given her birth; and Police
Prefect Carlier had placed her under his official protection, although
the French law forbade all lotteries, with the exception of games for
benevolent purposes. Seven million tickets, a franc a piece, and the
profit ostensibly destined to the shipping of Parisian vagabonds to
California. Golden dreams were to displace the Socialist dreams of the
Parisian proletariat; the tempting prospect of a prize was to displace
the doctrinal right to labor. Of course, the workingmen of Paris did
not recognize in the lustre of the California gold bars the lack-lustre
francs that had been wheedled out of their pockets. In the main,
however, the scheme was an unmitigated swindle. The vagabonds, who meant
to open California gold mines without taking the pains to leave Paris,
were Bonaparte himself and his Round Table of desperate insolvents. The
three millions granted by the National Assembly were rioted away; the
Treasury had to be refilled somehow or another. In vain did Bonaparte
open a national subscription, at the head of which he himself figured
with a large sum, for the establishment of so-called "cites ouvrieres."
[#3 Work cities.] The hard-hearted bourgeo