rant districts thus formed the majority. And yet even in these districts agitation and discontent contrived to penetrate. The emissaries of the clubs arrayed the poor against the rich and excited the working classes with strange doctrines, whilst the educated and professional, denied even electoral rights, looked on and augmented the growing disaffection.*

The obvious remedy for this was reform. It is a dangerous thing when a whole country comes to concentrate its grievances in one word, and mad must be a government that would not pay attention to it. M. Guizot himself at one moment appeared not deaf. In addressing his electors at Lisieux, he declared that, whilst opposition merely favoured progress, the government would give it. The session therefore that opened in the first days of 1847 soon rang with echoes of Reform. Duvergier de Hauranne, the friend more of Guizot than of Thiers, took the lead. He proposed to lower the franchise to 100 francs, augmenting the number of deputies, and fix 400 as the requisite number of electors for a district. The motion produced an animated debate of many days, but was negatived by a majority of nearly a hundred. M. Guizot in the course. of it refused to promise even at a future time to make any the least concession. There ensued another debate on the incompatibility of being placeman and deputy. On this the majority of 100 sank to 50. Many friends of the throne thought it might yield on this point. M. de Morny was one of them. When he pressed his advice upon the monarch, Louis-Philippe observed that France could not be governed except by its functionaries in and out of the Chamber.

The King, the minister, and the Chamber thus presenting an immovable barrier to the one desire and demand of all parties, these coalesced. Left Centre,

* See Dupin, t. iv.

CHAP.

XLVII.

XLVII.

CHAP. Dynastic Left, Radical or Republican Left, not only agreed, but met. And in April, at Barrot's, they proposed to form a comité central, to get up petitions, and above all banquets. These apparently convivial meetings became the great means of opposition: the government, at first miscalculating their importance or uncertain of the law, felt doubtful of their right to interfere and prevent them. The first manifestation of the kind took place in the garden of the Château rouge, a tavern near Montmartre. Twelve hundred persons, under the presidency of the veteran Lasteyrie, gathered round the table on the 10th of July. Odilon Barrot and Duvergier de Hauranne were the principal speakers. Ledru-Rollin refused to attend, Barrot and Duvergier being too moderate and monarchic for him. The two parties were afterwards to meet at the banquet of Lille, but their respective journals taunted both, and Barrot would not dine except a toast was given to the Institutions of July, which the Republicans declined. The schism was indeed much deeper between moderate and exalted Republicans than between both and the Monarchic Liberals. The National, edited by Marrast, was for such a republic as would conciliate and include middle and educated classes. The Réforme was for resuscitating 1792, without bloodshed indeed, but still putting the people, as at that epoch, dominant over the upper classes. In the bureaux of the Réforme itself there were also shades of difference, for whilst Louis Blanc was for gaining the support of the labouring classes by assuring them not only a right to labour, but a participation in the capital which employed it, others, Ledru-Rollin himself included, looked with doubt and mistrust on the sanity or realisation of such doctrines.

But however differing in principles and aims, all agreed in denouncing the King and his ministers, who were universally devoted to the infernal gods during the last six months of 1847. A signal proof how much

influential men were impressed with the necessity of
the court yielding to the general demand was a vote of
the Council-General of the Seine, strongly impressing
this opinion on the government. The advice of M. de
Morny has been mentioned. The old friendship of
Marshal Sebastiani for the King emboldened him to
offer more urgent counsel. It was repelled in a manner
that offended Sebastiani, who never saw the King after.
The Prince de Joinville's letter spoke the sentiments
of the King's own family. The Queen commissioned
Montalivet to make representations upon the grave
subject. Madame Adélaïde, the King's sister, was forced
to do the same. And her death at the close of 1847
was in this respect a great loss to Louis-Philippe.
fact, the only persons inexorably decided on not mak-
ing the least concession were the King and M. Guizot,
who on that account no doubt had been declared presi-
dent of the council, a supremacy previously denied
to him.

In

It has been generally supposed that M. Guizot was as resolute in non-concession as the King, and that for this merit he was proclaimed president of the council during the recess. In his Memoirs, however, that statesman declared that he was fully alive to the pressing nature of the demands, and that he warned the King that circumstances might arise during the ensuing session which would render it advisable to yield at least on some points. Had M. Guizot accompanied this admonition by adding that he would be, or was, ready to propose a moderate measure of reform, the King might have given way. But, on the contrary, M. Guizot said that if any amount of reform was deemed necessary, he must resign. This surely intimated disapproval and encouraged the monarch in resistance.*

* M. Guizot seems to say that his objection was less to Reform than

to the dissolution of the majority. If
the conservative majority could have

CHAP.

XLVII.

CHAP.
XLVII.

Nothing indeed could have been more easy than to have divided the coalition and disarmed opposition. Far from attempting it, the government managed to keep them more united and persistent. The King's speech on opening the Chamber (December 28, 1847) stigmatised reformers as factious and blind, and expressed the conviction that "the present institutions unchanged were quite sufficient to satisfy all the moral and material wants of the country." The address produced two-and-twenty days of fierce debate, in which King and government were accused in every department of foreign and domestic policy of weakness, corruption, incapacity, and obstinacy. This no doubt hardened their determination not to yield. Yet they might have done so with a good grace. M. Sallandrouze, one of their partisans, prepared an amendment in these words: "In the midst of these manifestations, if the government must recognise what are the real and legitimate desires of the country, it will, we think, take the initiative of wise and moderate changes which will satisfy public opinion, especially in the matter of parliamentary reform." This was eventually rejected by over 222 votes against 189. Had the government accepted it, the amendment would have passed, and would have proved to them that a moderate measure of reform would have satisfied and broken up a large portion of the opposition. The amendment, however, as well as all others, was rejected, making it evident that the decision and opinion of the majority of the Chamber were the reverse of those of the country and the public at large. The fiercest debate was on the subject of the banquets, which ministers claimed the right to prevent for the future. This led to a fierce interchange of threats.

agreed in a measure of reform, he the conservative party with him
might have adopted it. It became and preserved his cherished ma-
subsequently evident that, had he
jority almost intact.
adopted it, he could have brought

Hebert, who had succeeded to the seals of justice, was most provocative, or, as M. Duchâtel afterwards admitted, trop absolu. Barrot said that the present ministry was worse than that of Polignac, and a greater enemy of the public liberties. He prophesied to them the same fate. Duchâtel in a note to Guizot confessed that the debates were "leading directly to émeute.”

The dispute was soon transferred from the Chamber to the streets. It had always been the intention of the Coalition to wind up the provincial banquets by one in the capital. It was announced to take place in the 12th district, a popular quarter. The police signified that it prohibited the banquet by virtue of a law passed in 1790!

The propriety of persevering or abstaining was seriously discussed at a meeting of the Coalition, but it being argued, especially by Lamartine, that to desist was to acknowledge defeat, the majority expressed the determination to meet at this banquet, whilst the government seemed as determined to disperse them. The inevitable collision that must ensue, and must end in a tumult, alarmed certain provident spirits, and especially M. de Morny. He determined to act as mediator, and M. Vitet, the friend of Duchâtel, joined him. They proposed, with the assent of the home minister, to M. Barrot that the meeting should take place for the banquet, that the police would then interfere, and that if the deputies thereupon withdrew, the whole dispute would be referred to the law courts and the right of meeting be decided by them. Barrot and his moderate friends of the Left accepted this arrangement, as did the council of ministers.*

It might have been foreseen that this would not suit the turbulent, and these instantly imagined a procession previous to the banquet, at which deputies, national

* Guizot s Memoirs.

CHAP.

XLVII.