Parliamentary opposition. His first impulse will be to go a step further
in imitation of his uncle, and abolish the Corps Législatif, as Napoleon
did the Tribunat.

'But nearly half a century of Parliamentary life has made the French of
1853 as different from those of 1803 as the nephew is from his uncle.

'He will scarcely risk another _coup d'état_; and the only legal mode of
abolishing, or even modifying, the Corps Législatif is by a plébiscite
submitted by ballot to universal suffrage.

'Will he venture on this? And if he do venture, will he succeed? If he
fail, will he not sink into a constitutional sovereign, controlled by an
Assembly far more unmanageable than we deputies were, as the Ministers
are excluded from it?'

'Will he not rather,' I said, 'sink into an exile?'

'That is my hope,' said Tocqueville, 'but I do not expect it quite so
soon as Thiers does,'



CORRESPONDENCE.

St. Cyr, July 2, 1853.

I am not going to talk to you, my dear Senior, about the Emperor, or the
Empress, or any of the august members of the Imperial Family; nor of the
Ministers, nor of any other public functionaries, because I am a