is part, had a scheme in view. "Ibant obscuri," as Virgil says. France
observed, with a certain anxiety, these two men. What was in their
minds? Did not the one dream of Cromwell, the other of Monk? Men asked
one another these questions as they looked on the two men. In both of
them, there was the same attitude of mystery, the same policy of
immobility. Bonaparte said not a word, Changarnier made not a gesture;
this one did not stir, that one did not breathe; they seemed to be
playing the game of which should be the most statuesque.

This silence of his, Louis Bonaparte sometimes breaks; but then he does
not speak, he lies. This man lies as other men breathe. He announces an
honest intention; be on your guard: he makes an assertion, distrust
him: he takes an oath, tremble.

Machiavel made small men; Louis Bonaparte is one of them.

To announce an enormity against which the world protests, to disavow it
with indignation, to swear by all the gods, to declare himself an
honest man,--and then, at the moment when people are reassured, and
laugh at the enormity in question, to execute it. This was his course
with respect to the _coup d'etat_, with respect to the decrees of
proscription, with respect to the spoliation of the Princes of
Orleans;--and so it will be with the invasion of Belgium, and of
Switzerland, and with everything else. It is his way; you may think
what you please of it; he employs it; he finds it effective; it is
his affair. He will have to settle the matter with history.

You are of his familiar circle; he hints at a project, which seems to
you, not immoral,--one does not scrutinize so closely,--but insane and
dangerous, and dangerous to himself; you raise objections; he listens,
makes no reply, sometimes gives way for a day or two, then resumes his
project, and carries out his will.

There is in his table, in his office at the Elysee, a drawer,
frequently half open. He takes thence a paper; reads it to a minister;
it is a decree. The minister assents or dissents. If he dissents, Louis
Bonaparte throws the paper back into the drawer, where there are many
other papers, the dreams of an omnipotent man, shuts the drawer, takes
out the key, and leaves the room without saying a word. The minister
bows and retires, delighted with the deference which has been paid to
his opinion. Next morning the decree is in the _Moniteur_.

Sometimes with the minister's signature.

Thanks to this _modus operandi_, he has