The Academy and the Emperor.

165

this. As to M. Guizot, with all his faults, with all his sourness, ignorance of France and Frenchmen, and unsusceptibility, he has courage, calmness, and à plomb enough to lecture an Emperor à la manière de l'Ecole de Genève, and to wield his professional ferula as he did forty years ago at the Sorbonne. There is also one man in the Academy, and the last admitted, too-Dufaure-who, if the Emperor Napoleon be introduced merely because he wears the purple, will repeat to the forty the allegorical apologue which the great lawyer and scholar and Academician Patru recited, when a lofty official was elected rather for his high position than for his literary merits: Un ancien Grec avait une lyre admirable à laqueble se 'rompit une corde; au lien d'en remettre une de boyau, il 'en voulat une d'argent, et la lyre n'ent plus d'harmonie.' There is a conscience d'esprit' as well as a moral conscience; and men like Montalembert, Berryer, and the Duke De Broglie, are likely to make an intruder feel who forces himself upon men of genius and learning, in virtue of his being the master of twenty legions, that he is but an Emperor-an Emperor after all by a Coup d'Etat. Homely truths of this kind are not pleasant to hear, and the Academy may be broken up after all. There is one sordid and servile old man, Dupin, on whom the Orleans family showered places and promotions which he loves well, and many gifts which he loves better, who would applaud this deed of his Emperor, and exclaim,—

'Vous leur fites, seigneur,

En les croquant beaucoup d'honneur.'

The truth is, that in good society in France nobody thinks the Emperor a very formidable entity, personally. It is because of the immense and uncontrolled power he wields, of the blindness and devotion of his instruments, and of the unscrupulous use he would make of them, that people dread him. It is not the army that is so formidable or dangerous, as courtiers, ministers, and functionaries. There is the President of the Legislative Chamber, a man of energy and intelligence, reckless and unscrupulous, fond of gold, and tenacious of power; and this personage has always exhibited the malignity of the very demon of absolutism towards any extension of popular power. has great influence over the first personage of the State, and in some respects they resemble each other. Such an admirer is a perilous counsellor, and all the more so from his vigour, intelligence, and tenaciousness. The Home Minister is not so dangerous a man as M. De Morny, for he has not his vigour or ability; but in blind devotion to the system, and the

He

person of the Emperor, in sincerity and fanaticism, he transcends any of the Cabinet.

There is no knowing what rash or violent measures such a favourite may propose; and the Emperor himself has been so drugged with fulsome flattery, and so intoxicated with absolute power, that he may be hurried into adhesion and approval of reactionary courses. It is a notorious fact that M. Fialin, calling himself Persigny, has counselled these measures, and has strongly insisted on the necessity of invalidating the Paris elections, and governing without a Chamber. The Emperor himself is as profoundly annoyed and irate at the turn things have taken as his Home Minister, but, with his usual desire for procrastination and delay, has determined to take no action in the matter till November or December. Meanwhile, with his usual good luck, when all looked dark and dreary at Mexico there comes the news of the taking of Puebla. But this cannot alter the fact of there being five-and-thirty opposition Deputies returned, nine of whom have been elected for the capital, for that Paris which in modern times has given the tone and law to France. This simultaneous and spontaneous effort, which seems to have been arrived at by instinct in the great towns, such as Marseilles, Lyons, and the capital, indicates an awakening of public opinion and a revival of public spirit. It is not the number of men in a Chamber that we are to look at, but the strong public opinion which they represent, as well as the character, courage, and ability of the representatives. In the early days of the reign of Charles X., when the opposition, led by Casimer Périer, were but a small handful, that remarkable statesman used these words: 'We are but an insignificant 'minority in the Chamber; we are but eighteen, I admit; but 'then we represent the feelings, the wishes, the desires, and the 'aspirations of thirty millions of Frenchmen.' The eighteen men of 1823 are not to be compared to the five-and-thirty of 1863. The ablest speakers and debaters, the most experienced public men and administrators, will be found among the five-and-thirty. First, there is Berryer, the most eloquent man in France; secondly, there is Thiers, the incarnation of French esprit and talent, and a man of large experience; thirdly, there is Jules Favre, confessedly, after Dufaure and Montalembert, the ablest debater and dialectician in France; besides Emile Oliver, Ernest Picard, and others whom it is needless to mention. There is every reason to hope, too, that as vacancies arise such men as Dufaure, Montalembert, De Rémusat, Odilon Barrot, and Casimer Périer, will be returned. Dufaure and Montalembert are men of such capabilities as speakers, that we would count them numerically as

The Propositions of Fialin Persigny.

167

fifty voices each. The speaking Ministers, Baroche and Billault, as it is, are quite unable to deal with Thiers and Jules Favre. What must it come to when these oppositionists are reinforced by five-and-thirty others, among whom are more than half a dozen able speakers? As to Baroche, he is already used up; his oftrepeated platitudes have become wearisome; and even the points and syllogisms of Billault have become stale and unprofitable. The truth is, that the Empire has entered on a new phasis; and it remains to be seen whether it is a phasis of liberal progress or of desperate and absolutist reaction. The Government has not yet determined which of these two lines it will take. The highest personage in the State, the courtiers, flatterers, and partisans of absolute power, are all profoundly irritated; but they know not whether to yield before the irresistible force of public opinion, or to resist and overbear it by brute force. The Home Minister has held, and still holds, haughty and menacing language. He contends that there is only salvation, first, in annulling by decree the elections of Paris; secondly, in the suppression of four opposition Journals; thirdly, in the abrogation of the decree of the 24th November; fourthly, in an appeal to the people, calling upon them to confide to the Emperor a new Dictatorship. These projects, vehemently and persistently urged by the Minister of the Interior, have not been accepted, but they have not been rejected, and nothing will be done within the next four months. Meanwhile public opinion is day by day becoming more anxious, eager, and awakened, and the aspiration for liberty, six months ago vague and indefinite, has become now certain and well-defined. The movement is at once liberal and democratic; but it is neither revolutionary, nor socialist, nor communistic. Every sane man now wishes to peaceably make the best of existing circumstances, without disorder, anarchy, or bloodshed, and firmly to unite the form of democracy with the substance of liberty. If Cæsarism oppose itself to this manifestation of the volition of the thinking and influential among the people, tant pis pour Césarisme. That Cæsarism has hitherto done so there can be no doubt. The Home Minister has resorted to the most unscrupulous and odious measures. The details which have become known in Paris since the 1st June sufficiently prove the fact. There are only two courses open to the Emperor: either to extend liberty of speech, of discussion, of the Press, and to render Ministers responsible to the country, or to commence a system of retrogression and reaction. There has been now a halt of twelve years, the Parisians feel and know, in the road of progress, and they will bear this stand-still system no longer.

The higher and more intellectual classes of society—the society of the Faubourg St. Germain, Faubourg St. Honoré, and Chaussée d'Antin-are weary of the terrorism and espionage which have spread their meshes and snares over public and private life, destroying everything like public feeling, everything resembling wit and free social intercourse. Day by day the first people in the land have found their books, newspapers, and pamphlets seized and confiscated. The Saturday Review is uniformly seized, the Daily News is often seized, and 'Fraser's 'Magazine' for the past month was seized and confiscated because it contained an article on Paris abounding with truth. It is idle to say that there is any love or affection for the Emperor among the better classes, among the professions, or among the trading classes of Paris, if we except the Jockey Club and the agents de change. The workman and the common soldier tolerate the Emperor, rather approve of him than disapprove; but there is no enthusiasm, there is no honest conviction, no abiding faith. When he appears there are no hearty demonstrations, nothing to prove that his name or his dynasty have taken root in the soil. One thing is abundantly clear that nothing is solidly or durably settled in France. Men do not see into the future; they do not hope much from the future; for they are disenchanted: but they look about them anxiously for uneasy times, unless there be wisdom and moderation in high places, and that progress which it is right to expect after seventy-four long years of vicissitudes and struggles. The Emperor should consider that France before his time enjoyed thirty-three years of freedom, and he should not allow to be inscribed on his tomb the words of Cornelius Nepos: Omnes autem et habentur et dicuntur tyranni qui potestate sunt perpetua in ea civitate quæ libertate usa est. The elections in Paris, in May, 1863, ought to be taken as a warning by a wise man. A sensible ruler ought to see that the favours of Fortune are never permanent.

"Volat ambiguis Mobilis alis hora, nec ulli

Præstat velox Fortuna fidem.'

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ART. VIII.-The Naturalist on the River Amazons: a Record of Eleven Years' Residence and Travel under the Equator. By HENRY WALTER BATES. Two Volumes. London: John Murray.

1863.

IN April, 1848, Mr. Bates left England with his friend Mr. Wallace for an expedition to the river Amazons. Their object was to explore the Natural History of its banks, to collect objects, and to gather facts 'towards solving the problem of the origin of species.' Mr. Bates remained seven years after Mr. Wallace's return, explored some thousands of miles which the latter never trod, and found himself once more in England in the summer of 1859. The results of his zealous and most praiseworthy researches are before us in these volumes. They are replete with interest and novelty. The pathless wilds of virgin forest, their exuberance of beauty and variety, their damp, warm moisture, and their extraordinary wealth of insectlife, the solemn shade of their heaven-kissing palms, and the impenetrable arch of foliage they sustain; the far-stretching Amazons, with a drainage of more than a million and a half of square miles, the sparse and motley population found at intervals upon their banks, their incredible volume, and the half-savage charm of life upon their waters are all reproduced in these pages, and make one feel as if one had almost seen and known for himself the scenes which the author has described.

In a desire to convey to our reader some not very inadequate idea of the ground traversed by this book, we are met at the very outset by a difficulty which we do not know how to surmount. It is the difficulty of excess of materials. Recommending our reader, therefore, to procure the book and read for himself, we shall limit ourselves to the indication of some of the author's more notable facts and observations, and to a very brief glance at their supposed bearing on the Darwinian theory of the origin of species.

And commencing with the human portion of the Fauna, we observe that Mr. Bates gives what at the present time is unusually important testimony to the character and capacity of the numerous negroes he met with. The slavery permitted in Brazil is less severe than that of most of the plantations of the Slave States of North America, and the qualities of the average negro are higher in proportion. Pará, a little to the south of the mouths of the Amazons, was the city of Mr. Bates's primary destination; and as his residence there extended over quite eighteen months, his evidence as to the various classes of its