re earnestly sought and more passionately striven
for the fall of the Empire than Victor de Mauleon; and perhaps no man
was more dissatisfied and disappointed by the immediate consequences
of that fall, In first conspiring against the Empire, he had naturally
enough, in common with all the more intelligent enemies of the dynasty,
presumed that its fate would be worked out by the normal effect of civil
causes--the alienation of the educated classes, the discontent of
the artisans, the eloquence of the press and of popular meetings,
strengthened in proportion as the Emperor had been compelled to relax
the former checks upon the license of either. And De Mauleon had no less
naturally concluded that there would be time given for the preparation
of a legitimate and rational form of government to succeed that which
was destroyed. For, as has been hinted or implied, this remarkable man
was not merely an instigator of revolution through the Secret Council,
and the turbulent agencies set in movement through the lower strata of
society;--he was also in confidential communication with men eminent for
wealth, station, and political repute, from whom he obtained the funds
necessary for the darker purposes of conspiracy, into the elaboration of
which they did not inquire; and these men, though belonging like himself
to the Liberal party, were no hot-blooded democrats. Most of them
were in favour of constitutional monarchy; all of them for forms of
government very different from any republic in which socialists or
communists could find themselves uppermost. Among these politicians were
persons ambitious and able, who, in scheming for the fall of the Empire,
had been prepared to undertake the task of conducting to ends compatible
with modern civilisation the revolution they were willing to allow a mob
at Paris to commence. The opening of the war necessarily suspended
their designs. How completely the events of the 4th September mocked the
calculations of their ablest minds, and paralysed the action of their
most energetic spirits, will appear in the conversation I am about to
record. It takes place between Victor de Mauleon and the personage
to whom he had addressed the letter written on the night before the
interview with Louvier, in which Victor had announced his intention of
reappearing in Paris in his proper name and rank. I shall designate this
correspondent as vaguely as possible; let me call him the Incognito. He
may yet play so c