Besides the National Republican Committee (which the general called his screen), there was formed all over France a Boulangist society called the League of Patriots.  This league was now attacked by the Government as a conspiracy.  A High Court of Justice was formed by the Senate, before which its leaders were summoned to appear.  Boulanger became seriously alarmed.  He did not see how he could act if shut up in prison.  His apprehensions were carefully augmented by the heads of the police, who had placed one of their agents about his person.[1] This man showed him a pretended order for his arrest on April 1, 1889.  The question of his retirement into Belgium if his liberty were threatened had been already debated by himself and his friends.  Nearly all of them were against it.  “Let not the people think our general could run away,” said some.  But others answered, “They will say it is a smart trick; that the general has cheated the Government.”

[Footnote 1:  Les Coulisses du Boulangisme.]

After seeing the false document which was shown him, with great pretence of secrecy, by the police agent, the general hesitated no longer.  On the evening of April 1, accompanied by Madame de Bonnemains, a lady to whom he was paying devoted attention, pending a divorce from his wife, he went to Brussels, followed by his friend Count Dillon, the go-between in financial matters between the Royalists and himself.  The Cabinet of M. Carnot had learned the value of the saying, “If your enemy wishes to take flight, build him a bridge of gold.”

The departure of the general threw consternation into the ranks of his followers.  “It cannot be!” they cried.  Then they consoled themselves with the reflection that he must soon return, as he had done once before under somewhat similar circumstances.

But he did not return.  The Government had triumphed.  Boulanger’s power was broken; like a wave, it had toppled over when its crest was highest.  The High Court of Justice condemned Deroulede the poet, Rochefort, and Dillon, to confinement for life in a French fortress.  The sentence, however, was simply one of outlawry, for they were all with Boulanger.

The exiles did not stay long in Brussels.  The Government of Belgium objected to their remaining so near the frontier of France,—­for in Brussels a telephone connected them with Paris,—­and they went over to London.  There, at the general’s request, he had an interview with the Comte de Paris.  But their conversation was limited to useless compliments and military affairs.  Boulanger’s power as a political leader was at an end; the friends of the prince would advance him no more funds, and in the elections, which took place very quietly in France during the summer, he and his friends suffered total defeat.