dinners). Our Aisne deputies and senators were not very mondains, didn't
care much to dine out. They were pleasant enough when they talked about
subjects that interested them. Henri Martin, senator of the Aisne, was
an old-fashioned Republican, absolutely convinced that no other
government would ever succeed in France, but he was moderate. St.
Vallier, also a senator from the Aisne, was nervous and easily
discouraged when things didn't go smoothly, but he too thought the
Republic was the only possible government now, whatever his preferences
might have been formerly.

W.'s ministry came to an end on the famous 16th of May, 1877, when
Marshal MacMahon suddenly took matters in his own hands and dismissed
his cabinet presided over by M. Jules Simon. Things had not been going
smoothly for some time, could not between two men of such absolute
difference of origin, habits, and ideas. Still, the famous letter
written by the marshal to Jules Simon was a thunderclap. I was walking
about the Champs-Elysees and Faubourg St. Honore on the morning of the
16th of May, and saw all the carriages, our own included, waiting at the
Ministry of the Interior, where the conseil was sitting. I went home to
breakfast, thought W. was later than usual, but never dreamed of what
was happening. When he finally appeared, quite composed and smiling,
with his news, "We are out of office; the marshal has sent us all about
our business," I could hardly believe it, even when he told me all the
details. I had known for a long time that things were not going well,
but there were always so much friction and such opposing elements in the
cabinet that I had not attached much importance to the accounts of
stormy sittings and thought things would settle down.

[Illustration: Theodor Mommsen. From a painting by Franz von Lenbach.]