must "se soumettre ou se demettre," became a password all through
the country.




V


A REPUBLICAN VICTORY AND A NEW MINISTRY

The elections took place in October-November, 1877, and gave at once a
great Republican majority. W. and his two colleagues, Count de St.
Vallier and Henri Martin, had an easy victory, but a great many of their
personal friends, moderates, were beaten. The centres were decidedly
weaker in the new Chambers. There was not much hope left of uniting the
two centres, Droite et Gauche, in the famous "fusion" which had been a
dream of the moderate men.

The new Chambers assembled at Versailles in November. The Broglie
cabinet was out, but a new ministry of the Right faced the new
Parliament. Their life was very short and stormy; they were really dead
before they began to exist and in December the marshal sent for M.
Dufaure and charged him to form a Ministere de Gauche. None of his
personal friends, except General Borel at the War Office, was in the new
combination. W. was named to the Foreign Office. I was rather
disappointed when he came home and told me he had accepted that
portfolio. I thought his old ministry, Public Instruction, suited him so
well, the work interested him, was entirely to his taste. He knew all
the literary and educational world, not only in France but everywhere