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The recollections of Alexis de Tocqueville
The recollections of Alexis de Tocqueville Author:Alexis de Tocqueville Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III TROUBLES OF THE 2 2ND OF FEBRUARY—THE SITTING OF THE 23RD—THE NEW MINISTRY—OPINIONS OF M. DUFAURE AND M. DE BEAUMONT. I Did not perceive anythi... more »ng on the 22nd of February calculated to give rise to serious apprehensions. There wasjt crowd m the streets, but it seemed to be composed rather of sight-seers andfault-finders d : the soldier and the townsman chaffed each other when they met, and 1 heard more jokes than cries uttered by the crowd. I know that it is not safe to trust one's self to these appearances. It is the street-boys of Paris who generally commence the insurrections, and as a rule they do so light-heartedly, like schoolboys breaking up for the holidays. When I returned to the Chamber, I found a seeming listlessness reigning there, beneath which one could perceive the inner seething of a thousand restrained passions. It was the only place in Paris in which, since the early morning, I had not heard discussed aloud what was then absorbing all France. They were languidly discussing a bill for the creation of a bank at Bordeaux ; but in reality no one, except the man talking in the tribune and the man who was to reply to him, showed any interest in thematter. M. Duchatel told me that all was going well. He said this with an air of combined confidence and nervousness which struck me as suspicious. I noticed that he twisted his neck and shoulders (a common trick with him) much more frequently and violently than usual; and I remember that this little observation gave me more food for reflection than all the rest. I learnt that, as a matter of fact, there had been serious troubles in many parts of the town which I had not visited ; a certain number of men had been killed or wounded. People were no longer accustomed to this sort of incident, as they...« less