s, not only with his old party, but amongst the masses; every
hand was raised towards him, as to a plank of safety in a shipwreck. The
people care little for consistency. At this time I saw, in the northern
departments, the same popularity surround the exiled King and the
vanquished army. Napoleon had abdicated in Paris, and, notwithstanding a
few unworthy alternations of dejection and feverish excitement, of
resignation and momentary energy, he was evidently incapable of renewing
the struggle. The Chamber of Representatives, which, from its first
institution, had shown itself unfavourable to the Imperial system, and
opposed to revolutionary excesses, appeared to be earnestly occupied in
threading a perilous defile, by avoiding all violence and every
irrevocable engagement. Popular passion sometimes murmured, but suffered
itself to be easily restrained, and even stopped voluntarily, as if
unaccustomed to action or dominion. The army, the scattered corps of
which had successively re-united round Paris, had given itself up to
patriotic fervour, and, together with France, had plunged into an abyss
to prove its devotion and avenge its injuries: but amongst its oldest
and most illustrious chiefs, some--such as Gouvion St. Cyr, Macdonald,
and Oudinot--had refused to join Napoleon, and openly espoused the Royal
cause; others--like Ney, Davoust, Soult, and Massena--protested with
stern candour against fatal delusions, considering that their well-tried
courage entitled them to utter melancholy truths, to offer sage advice,
and to repress, even by the sacrifice of party credit, military
excitement or popular disorder; others, in fine, like Drouot, with an
influence conferred by true courage and virtue, maintained discipline in
the army in the midst of the mortifications of the retreat behind the
Loire, and secured its obedience to the authority of a detested civil
power. After so many mistakes and misfortunes, and in the midst of all
differences of opinion and situation, there existed still a spontaneous
desire and a general effort to preserve France from irreparable errors
and total ruin.

But tardy wisdom does not avail, and, even when they wish to become
prudent, political genius is wanting to those nations who are not
accustomed to decide their own affairs or their own destiny. In the
deplorable state into which the enterprise of an heroic and chimerical
egotism had thrown France, there was evidently only one line of conduct