e laid to the charge of the Emperor.

'Of course,' he continued, 'I do not desire the perpetuation of the
present tyranny. Its duration as a dynasty I believe to be absolutely
impossible, except in one improbable contingency--a successful war.

'But though, I repeat, I do not desire or expect the permanence of the
Empire, I do not wish for its immediate destruction, before we are
prepared with a substitute. The agents which are undermining it are
sufficiently powerful and sufficiently active to occasion its fall quite
as soon as we ought to wish for that fall.'

'And what,' I said, 'are those agents?'

'The principal agents,' he answered, 'are violence in the provinces and
corruption in Paris. Since the first outbreak there has not been much
violence in Paris. You must have observed that freedom of speech is
universal. In every private society, and even in every _cafe_ hatred or
contempt of the Government are the main topics of conversation. We are
too numerous to be attacked. But in the provinces you will find perfect
silence. Anyone who whispers a word against the Emperor may be
imprisoned, or perhaps transported. The prefects are empowered by one of
the decrees made immediately after the _coup d'etat_ to dissolve any
Conseil communal in which there is the least appearance of disaffection,
and to nominate three persons to administer the commune. In many cases
this has been done, and I could point out to you several communes
governed by the prefect's nominees who cannot read. In time, of course,
tyranny will produce corruption; but it has not yet prevailed extensively
in the country, and the cause which now tends to depopularise him _there_
is arbitrary violence exercised against those whom his agents suppose to
be their enemies.

'On the other hand, what is ruining him in Paris is not violence, but
corruption.

'The French are not like the Americans; they have no sympathy with
smartness. Nothing so much excites their disgust as _friponnerie_. The
main cause that overthrew Louis Philippe was the belief that he and his
were _fripons_--that the representatives bought the electors, that the
Minister bought the representatives, and that the King bought the
Minister.

'Now, no corruption that ever prevailed in the worst periods of Louis
XV., nothing that was done by La Pompadour or the Du Barry resembles what
is going on now. Duchatel, whose organs are not over-acute, tells me that
he shudders at what is forced on h