itable in regard to Fouche, had swerved concerning the
Emperor."

The wrath of Napoleon was confined to the Lower House, the Peers, from
the nature of their composition, being complacent and passive enough.
The vast majority of them were in fact mere shadows gathered round the
solid persons of Joseph, Lucien, Louis, and Jerome Bonaparte, and Sieyes,
Carnot, and the military men of the Revolution. As a political body
Napoleon despised them himself, and yet he wanted the nation to respect
them. But respect was impossible, and the volatile Parisians made the
Peers a constant object of their witticisms. The punsters of Paris made
the following somewhat ingenious play upon words. Lallemand, Labedogure,
Drouot, and Ney they called Las Quatre Pairs fides (perfides), which in
pronunciation may equally mean the four faithful peers or the four
perfidious men. The infamous Vandamme and another were called
Pair-siffles, the biased peers, or the biased pair, or (persiffles) men
made objects of derision. It was thus the lower orders behaved while
the existence of France was at stake.

By this time the thunder-cloud of war had gathered and was ready to
burst. Short as the time at his disposal was Napoleon prepared to meet
it with his accustomed energy. Firearms formed one of the most important
objects of attention. There were sufficient sabres, but muskets were
wanting. The Imperial factories could, in ordinary times, furnish
monthly 20,000 stands of new arms; by the extraordinary activity and
inducements offered this number was doubled. Workmen were also employed
in repairing the old muskets. There was displayed at this momentous
period the same activity in the capital as in 1793, and better directed,
though without the same ultimate success. The clothing of the army was
another difficulty, and this was got over by advancing large sums of
money to the cloth manufacturers beforehand. The contractors delivered
20,000 cavalry horses before the 1st of June, 10,000 trained horses had
been furnished by the dismounted gendarmerie. Twelve thousand artillery
horses were also delivered by the 1st of June, in addition to 6000 which
the army already had.

The facility with which the Ministers of Finance and of the Treasury
provided for all these expenses astonished everybody, as it was necessary
to pay for everything in ready money. The system of public works was at
the same time resumed throughout France. "It is easy to see," said the
workme