Of course, the effect of this vote was in every
way bad. No worse insolence to a constitutional body than the Ministerial order to the authorities in the provinces to refuse their co-operation to the official investigation ordered by the Chamber of Deputies, was ever offered. And the Senate, if they did not precisely approve of this order, yet having heard it defended by the Prime Minister, re- fused to condemn it,—a course necessarily regarded by the Chamber as a deliberate and carefully-considered snub. Yet it does not mean that the Orleanists will vote for a second dissolution. Apparently, indeed, the history of the negotiation proves that they have declined to do so, and even declined to express confidence in a Government which the Chamber of Deputies has condemned. What the Orleanists really wish to do is to combine incompatible objects,—to be constitutional, and yet to give a certain support to a procedure highly unconstitutional,—to go half-way with the Chamber and half-way with the Marshal,—to unsay in one breath what they say in another,—to split hairs between liberty and despotism, between good and evil. Unfortunately, this wishy- washy, whitey-brown party holds the balance in the Senate.
