His eyes were half-closed and
his gaze absolutely dulled. The dressed and waxed moustache, which ran
to a needle-like point, looked doubly tasteless against his wax mask of
a face. He was the incarnation of walking decrepitude, vapid and slack.
Quite evidently he had committed the blunder of trusting to a split in
Germany. In his blindness he explained that he had come to free the
Germans, who had, against their will, been incorporated into Prussia,
and all Germany rose like one man against him. And in his foolish
proclamation he declared that he was waging this war for the sake of the
civilising ideals of the first Republic, as if Germany were now going to
be civilised for the first time, and as if he, who had made an end of
the second Republic by a _coup d'etat_, could speak in the name of
Republican freedom. His whole attitude was mendacious and mean, and the
wretched pretext under which he declared war could not but prejudice
Europe against him. In addition to this, as they knew very well in
England, from the earlier wars of the Empire, he had no generals; his
victories had been soldier victories.
I was very deeply impressed, in the next place, by the suicide of
Prevost-Paradol. I had studied most carefully his book, _La France
Nouvelle_; I had seen in this friend and comrade of Taine and of
Renan the political leader of the future in France.
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