ands are formed as in Britanny and Mayenne.

"In fine, all kinds of writings, that can discourage the weak,
embolden the factious, shake confidence, divide the nation, bring the
government into contempt; all the pamphlets, that issue from the
printing-offices of Belgium, or the clandestine presses of France; all
that the foreign newspapers publish against us, all that the
party-writers compose; are distributed, hawked about, and diffused
with impunity, for want of restrictive laws, and from the abuse of the
liberty of the press.

"Firm in the system of moderation, which your Majesty had adopted, you
have thought it right, to wait for the meeting of the chambers, that
legal precautions only might be opposed to manoeuvres, which by the
ordinary course of law are not always punishable, and which it could
neither foresee, nor prevent......"

The Duke of Otranto, entering on the subject, then discussed the laws,
which, issued under analogous circumstances, might have been applied
on the present occasion; and, as these laws appeared to him,
impolitic, dangerous, and inadequate, he concluded, that it was
indispensable for the chambers, immediately to set about framing new
laws, which were necessary to check the licentiousness of the press,
and circumscribe personal liberty, till internal peace and order were
restored.

This report did not make the impression, that might have been expected
from it. The deputies, accurately acquainted with what was passing in
their departments, knew, that facts had been misrepresented. They
persuaded themselves, that the melancholy picture of the situation of
France, presented to them by M. Fouche, had been drawn up by order of
the Emperor, with the view to alarm them, and render them more docile
to his will.

The separate committees of the chamber rung with the contradictions,
more or less direct, that each representative gave to the assertions
of the minister. One of the members of the deputation from Calvados,
would not rest satisfied with this civil way of giving him the lie,
but declared openly from the tribune, that the agents of the minister
had deceived their principal, by describing to him a personal quarrel
of no consequence, and quelled on the spot, as a general insurrection
of the royalists. They might have spared themselves the trouble of
telling M. Fouche, that his report exaggerated the truth, and
transformed private occurrences into public events: he knew this.
Already dev