As the crowd poured from the Chambers, Victor de Mauleon and Savarin, who had been among the listeners, encountered.
"No chance for my friends the Orleanists now," said Savarin. "You who mock at all parties are, I suppose, at heart for the Republican—small chance, too, for that."
"I do not agree with you. Violent impulses have quick reactions."
"But what reaction could shake the Emperor after he returns a conqueror, bringing in his pocket the left bank of the Rhine?"
"None—when he does that. Will he do it? Does he himself think he will do it? I doubt—"
"Doubt the French army against the Prussian?"
"Against the German people united—yes, very much."
"But war will disunite the German people. Bavaria will surely assist us —Hanover will rise against the spoliator—Austria at our first successes must shake off her present enforced neutrality?"
"You have not been in Germany, and I have. What yesterday was a Prussian army, to-morrow will be a German population; far exceeding our own in numbers, in hardihood of body, in cultivated intellect, in military discipline. But talk of something else. How is my ex-editor—poor Gustave Rameau?"
"Still very weak, but on the mend. You may have him back in his office soon."