le of its more moderate and parliamentary opponents. His
speeches in the years between 1863 and 1870 were filled with taunts of
the Empire on account of the loss of prestige which had marked its
history, and these must not be left out of account when blame has to be
apportioned among the authors of the war of 1870, although he opposed it
when declared by the Ollivier ministry, and predicted defeat.

The collapse of the Second Empire, however, enabled Thiers to play the
greatest of all his parts, that of "liberator of the territory." He
declined, after Sedan, to become a member of the Government of National
Defence; but he voluntarily undertook diplomatic journeys to Great
Britain, Russia, Austria, and Italy, on behalf of France--a self-imposed
mission in which he was unsuccessful, but by which he obtained the
gratitude of his countrymen. He was largely instrumental in securing for
his country that armistice which permitted the holding of a national
assembly with a view to the negotiation of a peace. Twenty
constituencies chose him as their deputy. Electing to sit for Paris, he
was made head of the provisional government. He had great difficulty in
persuading the colleagues of the Assembly, and his countrymen generally,
to agree to peace on terms that were practically dictated by Germany.
But he succeeded; peace was voted March 1, 1871. No sooner had he
accomplished this task than he was face to face with the sanguinary
madness of the Commune. But this difficulty also he set himself to
surmount with characteristic energy, and succeeded. When the seat of
government was once more removed from Versailles to Paris, Thiers was
formally elected (August 30) President of the French Republic. He held
office only till 1873, but during this brief period he was probably of
greater service to his country than at any previous time in his life. He
was mainly instrumental in securing the withdrawal of the Germans from
France and the payment of the war indemnity, and in placing both the
army and the civil service on a more satisfactory footing. But in course
of time the gratitude of the country exhausted itself, and Thiers, who
was old-fashioned in many of his opinions, and as opinionative as he was
old-fashioned, did not make any new friends. He was specially detested
by the Extreme Left, whose chief, Gambetta, he styled a _fou furieux_.
As a result, a coalition of Reactionaries and Radicals was formed
expressly, as it seemed, to harass