’I agree with you that the Constitution was a detestable one.  But even now, looking back to the times, and to the conditions under which we made it, I do not think that it was in our power to make a good one.’

‘Tocqueville,’ I said, ’told me that Cormenin was your Solon, that he brought a bit of constitution to you every morning, and that it was usually adopted.’[1]

‘Tocqueville’s memory,’ answered Beaumont, ’deceived him.  Cormenin was our president.  It is true that he brought a bit of constitution every morning.  But it scarcely ever was adopted or capable of being adopted.  It was in general bad in itself, or certain to be rejected by the Assembly.  He wished to make the President a puppet.  But he exercised over us a mischievous influence.  He tried to revenge himself for our refusal of all his proposals by rendering our deliberations fruitless.  And as the power of a president over a deliberative body is great, he often succeeded.

’Many of our members were unaccustomed to public business and lost their tempers or their courage when opposed.  The Abbe Lamennais proposed a double election of the president.  But of thirty members, only four, among whom were Tocqueville and I, supported him.  He left the committee and never returned to it.  Tocqueville and I were anxious to introduce double election everywhere.  It is the best palliative of universal suffrage.’

‘The double election,’ I said, ’of the American President is nugatory.  Every elector is chosen under a pledge to nominate a specified candidate.’

‘That is true,’ said Beaumont, ’as to the President, but not as to the other functionaries thus elected.  The senators chosen by double election are far superior to the representatives chosen by direct voting.

’We proposed, too, to begin by establishing municipal institutions.  We were utterly defeated.  The love of centralisation is almost inherent in French politicians.  They see the evil of local government—­its stupidity, its corruption, its jobbing.  They see the convenience of centralisation—­the ease with which a centralised administration works.  Feelings which are really democratic have reached those who fancy themselves aristocrats.  We had scarcely a supporter.

’We should perhaps have a few now, when experience has shown that centralisation is still more useful to an usurper than it is to a regular Government.’

[Footnote 1:  See Vol.  I. p. 212.—­ED.]

August 18.—­We drove in the afternoon to the coast, and sat in the shade of the little ricks of sea-weed, gazing on an open sea as blue as the Mediterranean.

We talked of America.

‘I can understand,’ said Madame de Tocqueville, ’the indignation of the North against you.  It is, of course, excessive, but they had a right to expect you to be on their side in an anti-slavery war.’

‘They had no right,’ I said, ’to expect from our Government anything but absolute neutrality.’