’But I infer from his conduct that he thinks an insurrection against his tyranny possible, and that he is preparing to meet it by a popular war—­ that is to say, by a war with England.

’I found my opinion not so much on the enormous maritime preparations, as on the long-continued systematic attempts to raise against England our old national enmity.  All the provincial papers are in the hands of the Government.  The constantly recurring topic of every one of them is, the perfidy and the malignity of England.  She is described as opposing all our diplomacy, as resisting all our aggrandisement, as snarling and growling at our acquisition of Savoy, as threatening us if we accept Sardinia, as trying to drive the Pope from Rome because we protect him, as trying to separate the Danubian provinces because we wish to unite them, as preventing the Suez Canal because we proposed it—­in short, on every occasion and in every part of the world as putting herself in our way.  To these complaints, which are not without foundation, are added others of which our ignorant people do not see the absurdity.  They are told that the enormous conscription, and the great naval expenditure, are rendered necessary by the aggressive armaments of England.  That you are preparing to lay waste all our coasts, to burn our arsenals, to subsidise against us a new Coalition, and perhaps lead its armies again to Paris.

’The Emperor’s moderation, his love of England, and his love of peace, are said to be the only obstacles to, a violent rupture.  But they are prepared for these obstacles at length giving way.  “The Emperor,” they are told, “is getting tired of his insolent, and hostile, and quarrelsome allies.  He is getting tired of a peace which is more expensive than a war.  Some day the cup will flow over.  ‘Il en finira avec eux,’ will dictate a peace in London, will free the oppressed Irish nationality, will make England pay the expense of the war, and then having conquered the only enemy that France can fear, will let her enjoy, for the first time, real peace, a reduced conscription, and low taxation.”

’Such is the language of all the provincial papers and of all the provincial authorities, and it has its effect.  There never was a time when a war with England would be so popular.  He does not wish for one, he knows that it would be extremely dangerous, but he is accustomed to play for great stakes, and if submitting to any loss of his popularity, or to any limitation of his power is the alternative, he will run the risk.  He keeps it, as his last card, in reserve, to be played only in extremity, but to be ready when that extremity has arrived.’

Tuesday, August 13.—­We drove to La Prenelle, a church at the point of a high table-land running from Tocqueville towards the bay of La Hogue, and commanding nearly all the Cherbourg peninsula.  On three sides of us was the sea, separated from us by a wooded, well-inhabited plain, whose churches rose among the trees, and containing the towns and lofty lighthouses of Gatteville, Barfleur, Vast, and La Hogue.  We sat on the point from whence James II. saw the battle of La Hogue, and admired the courage of his English rebels.