HKB
circumstances invite them to perform miracles. Infidelity is, indeed, the deadly enemy of these supposed heroes and real saints. Hence their virtuously proud indignation at the unenthusiastic wits and scoffers.
That same evening the Ministers were summoned to the Elysee; Bonaparte presses the removal of Changarnier; five Ministers refuse to sign the order; the “Moniteur” announces a Ministerial crisis; and the party of Order threatens the formation of a Parliamentary army under the command of Changarnier. The party of Order had the constitutional power hereto. It needed only to elect Changarnier President of the National Assembly in order to make a requisition for whatever military forces it needed for its own safety. It could do this all the more safely, seeing that Changarnier still stood at the head of the Army and of the Parisian National Guard, and only lay in wait to be summoned, together with the Army. The Bonapartist press did not even dare to question the right of the National Assembly to issue a direct requisition for troops;—a legal scruple, that, under the given circumstances, did not promise success. That the Army would have obeyed the orders of the National Assembly is probable, when it is considered that Bonaparte had to look eight days all over Paris to find two generals—Baraguay d’Hilliers and St. Jean d’Angley—who declared themselves ready to countersign the order cashiering Changamier. That, however, the party of Order would have found in its own ranks and in the parliament the requisite vote for such a decision is more than doubtful, when it is considered that, eight days later, 286 votes pulled away from it, and that, as late as December, 1851, at the last decisive hour, the Mountain rejected a similar proposition. Nevertheless, the burgraves might still have succeeded in driving the mass of their party to an act of heroism, consisting in feeling safe behind a forest of bayonets, and in accepting the services of the Army, which found itself deserted in its camp. Instead of this, the Messieurs Burgraves betook themselves to the Elysee on the evening of January 6, with the view of inducing Bonaparte, by means of politic words and considerations, to drop the removal of Changarnier. Him whom we must convince we recognize as the master of the situation. Bonaparte, made to feel secure by this step, appoints on January 12 a new Ministry, in which the leaders of the old, Fould and Baroche, are retained. St Jean d’Angley becomes Minister of War; the “Moniteur” announces the decree cashiering Changarnier; his command is divided up between Baraguay d’Hilliers, who receives the First Division, and Perrot, who is placed over the National Guard. The “Bulwark of Society” is turned down; and, although no dog barks over the event, in the Bourses the stock quotations rise.