ts!_" Boulanger challenged him for this, and
the duel took place with swords. Floquet was slightly wounded,
but the general's foot slipped, and he received his adversary's
sword-point in his throat. It was almost a miracle that it did
not sever the jugular vein. For some time "Le brav' General's"
life was despaired of; but when he was pronounced out of danger,
Paris amused itself with the thought that the most prominent soldier
in the French army had nearly met his death at the hands of an
elderly lawyer.

Since the funds furnished to Boulanger for the election expenses
of his candidates, and even for his own personal expenses, came
from the Royalist party, he was more bound to it than ever; but he
pretended to be guided by a body that called itself the National
Republican Committee, which he assured his friends, the Monarchists,
he used only as a screen. When Madame d'Uzes threw her last million
into the gulf, it seemed expedient to the Royalists to exact more
definite pledges from Boulanger than his word as a soldier. "If
the present Government of France is overthrown," they said, "and
an appeal made to the people, who will fill the interregnum? Will
General Boulanger, if all power is intrusted to him, consent to give
it up, if the nation votes for monarchy? And with all the machinery
of government in his hands, is it certain that a _plebiscite_ would
be the free vote of the people?"

A general election was to take place in the summer of 1889, at the
height of the Universal Exposition. Hitherto the various elections
in which Boulanger had contended had been for vacant seats in the
old Assembly. He was anxious to test his popularity in Paris by
standing for the workman's quarter of Belleville; and in spite
of his being opposed by the Radicals in the Chamber, as well as
by the Government, he was elected by a large majority.

The Government then changed its method of attack. It brought in a
bill changing the selection of parliamentary candidates from the
_scrutin de liste_ to the _scrutin d'arrondissement._ Boulanger
therefore would be eligible for election only in the district in
which he was domiciled.

Besides the National Republican Committee (which the general called
his screen), there was formed all over France a Boulangist society
called the League of Patriots. This league was now attacked by the
Government as a conspiracy. A High Court of Justice was formed
by the Senate, before which its leaders were summo