For he always had the power, mind you,
of crossing the seas at one straddle.
"Was that a human man? Bah!
"So, one minute he is at Frejus, the next in Paris. There, they all
adore him; but he summons the government. 'What have you done with my
children, the soldiers?' he says to the lawyers. 'You're a mob of
rascally scribblers; you are making France a mess of pottage, and
snapping your fingers at what people think of you. It won't do; and I
speak the opinion of everybody.' So, on that, they wanted to battle
with him and kill him--click! he had 'em locked up in barracks, or
flying out of windows, or drafted among his followers, where they were
as mute as fishes and as pliable as a quid of tobacco. After that
stroke--consul! And then, as it was not for him to doubt the Supreme
Being, he fulfilled his promise to the good God, who, you see, had kept
His word to him. He gave Him back His churches, and reestablished His
religion; the bells rang for God and for him: and lo! everybody was
pleased; _primo_, the priests, whom he saved from being harassed;
_secundo_, the bourgeois, who thought only of their trade, and no longer
had to fear the _rapiamus_ of the law, which had got to be unjust;
_tertio_, the nobles, for he forbade they should be killed, as,
unfortunately, the people had got the habit of doing.
"But he still had the Enemy to wipe out; and he wasn't the man to go to
sleep at a mess-table, because, d'ye see, his eye looked over the whole
earth as if it were no bigger than a man's head.
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