will help him to command higher terms for the sale of the remaining
shares in the journal he now edits, for the new book which you told me he
intended to write, and for the new journal which he will be sure to set
up as soon as he has disposed of the old one. You say that, as a
politician, Savarin, an Orleanist, will not aid in an ultra-democratic
revolution. Who asks him to do so? Did I not imply at the meeting that
we commence our journal with politics the mildest? Though revolutions
are not made with rose-water, it is rose-water that nourishes their
roots. The polite cynicism of authors, read by those who float on the
surface of society, prepares the way for the social ferment in its deeps.
Had there been no Voltaire, there would have been no Camille Desmoulins;
had there been no Diderot, there would have been no Marat. We start as
polite cynics. Of all cynics Savarin is the politest. But when I bid
high for him, it is his clique that I bid for. Without his clique he is
but a wit; with his clique, a power. Partly out of that clique, partly
out of a circle beyond it, which Savarin can more or less influence, I
select ten. Here is the list of them; study it. _Entre nous_, I esteem
their writings as little as I do artificial flies; but they are the
artificial flies at which, in this particular season of the year, the
public rise. You must procure at least five of the ten; and I leave you
carte blanche as to the terms. Savarin gained, the best of them will be
proud of being his associates. Observe, none of these messieurs of
brilliant imagination are to write political articles; those will be
furnished to you anonymously, and inserted without erasure or omission.
When you have secured Savarin, and five at least of the collaborateurs in
the list, write to me at my office. I give you four days to do this; and
the day the journal starts you enter into the income of fifteen thousand
francs a year, with a rise in salary proportioned to profits. Are you
contented with the terms?"