The remaining events which marked the ministry of Marshal Soult were the project of fortifying Paris by a series of detached forts of great strength, entirely surrounding the city, the liberal expenditure of money for public improvements, and the maintenance of the colony of Algeria.  The first measure was postponed on account of the violent opposition of the Republicans, and the second was carried out with popular favor through the influence of Thiers.  The Arc de l’Etoile was finished at an expense of two million francs; the Church of the Madeleine, at a cost of nearly three millions; the Pantheon, of 1,400,000; the Museum of Natural History, for which 2,400,000 francs were appropriated; the Church of St. Denis, 1,350,000; the Ecole des Beaux Arts, 1,900,000; the Hotel du Quay d’Orsay, 3,450,000; besides other improvements, the chief of which was in canals, for which forty-four millions of francs were appropriated,—­altogether nearly one hundred millions of francs, which of course furnished employment for discontented laborers.  The retention of the Colony of Algeria resulted in improving the military strength of France, especially by the institution of the corps of Zouaves, which afterward furnished effective soldiers.  It was in Africa that the ablest generals of Louis Napoleon were trained for the Crimean War.

In 1834 Marshal Soult retired from the ministry, and a series of prime ministers rapidly succeeded one another, some of whom were able and of high character, but no one of whom made any great historical mark, until Thiers took the helm of government in 1836,—­not like a modern English prime minister, who is supreme so long as he is supported by Parliament, but rather as the servant of the king, like the ministers of George III.

Thiers was forty years of age when he became prime minister, although for years he had been a conspicuous and influential member of the Chamber of Deputies.  Like Guizot he sprang from the people, his father being an obscure locksmith in Marseilles.  Like Guizot, he first became distinguished as a writer for the “Constitutional,” and afterward as its editor.  He was a brilliant and fluent speaker, at home on all questions of the day, always equal to the occasion, yet without striking originality or profundity of views.  Like most men who have been the architects of their own fortunes, he was vain and consequential.  He was liberal in his views, a friend of order and law, with aristocratic tendencies.  He was more warlike in his policy than suited either the king or his rival Guizot, who had entered the cabinet with him on the death of Casimir Perier.  Nor was he a favorite with Louis Philippe, who was always afraid that he would embroil the kingdom in war.  Thiers’ political opinions were very much like those of Canning in later days.  His genius was versatile,—­he wrote history in the midst of his oratorical triumphs.  His History of the French Revolution was by far the ablest and most trustworthy that had yet appeared.  The