In the course of this sitting, as we shall see, I did not always agree with Emile de Girardin.  All the more reason that I should record here how greatly I appreciate the mind formed of light and of courage.  Emile de Girardin, whatever his failings may be, is one of those men who do honor to the Press of to-day; he unites in the highest degree the dexterity of the combatant with the serenity of the thinker.

I went up to him, and I asked him,—­

“Have you any workmen of the Presse still remaining?”

He answered me,—­

“Our presses are under seal, and guarded by the Gendarmerie Mobile, but I have five or six willing workmen, they can produce a few placards with the brush.”

“Well then,” said I, “print our decrees and our Proclamation.”  “I will print anything,” answered he, “as long as it is not an appeal to arms.”

He added, addressing himself to me, “I know your Proclamation.  It is a war-cry, I cannot print that.”

They remonstrated at this.  He then declared that he for his part made Proclamations, but in a different sense from ours.  That according to him Louis Bonaparte should not be combated by force of arms, but by creating a vacuum.  By an armed conflict he would be the conqueror, by a vacuum he would be conquered.  He urged us to aid him in isolating the “deposed of the Second December.”  “Let us bring about a vacuum around him!” cried Emile de Girardin, “let us proclaim an universal strike.  Let the merchant cease to sell, let the consumer cease from buying, let the workman cease from working, let the butcher cease from killing, let the baker cease from baking, let everything keep holiday, even to the National Printing Office, so that Louis Bonaparte may not find a compositor to compose the Moniteur, not a pressman to machine it, not a bill-sticker to placard it!  Isolation, solitude, a void space round this man!  Let the nation withdraw from him.  Every power from which the nation withdraws falls like a tree from which the roots are divided.  Louis Bonaparte abandoned by all in his crime will vanish away.  By simply folding our arms as we stand around him he will fall.  On the other hand, fire on him and you will consolidate him.  The army is intoxicated, the people are dazed and do not interfere, the middle classes are afraid of the President, of the people, of you, of every one!  No victory is possible.  You will go straight before you, like brave men, you risk your heads, very good; you will carry with you two or three thousand daring men, whose blood mingled with yours, already flows.  It is heroic, I grant you.  It is not politic.  As for me, I will not print an appeal to arms, and I reject the combat.  Let us organize an universal strike.”

This point of view was haughty and superb, but unfortunately I felt it to be unattainable.  Two aspects of the truth seized Girardin, the logical side and the practical side.  Here, in my opinion, the practical side was wanting.