"No doubt it will exert a most baneful influence," bitterly rejoined Debray. "Without containing a syllable to which the Ministry can object, at least sufficiently to warrant its suppression, it yet abounds with principles, sentiments and theories of the most incendiary description, well calculated to rouse the disaffection of the laboring classes to frenzy. Its inevitable effect will be to give them a false and exaggerated idea of their wrongs and their rights, and to stimulate them to revolution. Oh! these men have much to answer for. They are drawing down an avalanche."
"They are the champions of human liberty," said Beauchamp, warmly, "and will be blessed by posterity, if not by the men of the present generation."
"Truce to politics, Messieurs!" cried the Deputy, observing that his friends were becoming excited. "I had heard of this play and its powerful character. Who's the author, Beauchamp?"
"The production is attributed to M. Dantès, the Deputy from Marseilles, with what truth I know not; but he is fully capable of composing such a drama. To-morrow night, it is supposed, the author, whoever he may be, will be compelled by the people to appear and claim the laurels ready to be showered on him in such profusion. But it is nearly three o'clock," continued Beauchamp, "and M. Dantès is expected to speak in the early part of the sitting."
"To the Chamber, then," said the others, and the trio mingled with the crowd hurrying in the same direction.
"What a glorious thing is popularity!" exclaimed the Count.
"What a glorious thing to be the champion of the people!" rejoined Beauchamp.
"And how glorious is that champion's glorious career!" cried the Secretary. "Let the hydra alone. Like the antique god of mythology, it eats up its own children as soon as they get large enough to be eaten. It is a fickle beast, and the idol of to-day it crushes to-morrow."
The hall of the Chamber of Deputies was crowded when the three friends entered. Although the hour for the President to take the chair had not yet arrived, the benches were full, and the galleries, public and private, were overflowing. Strong agitation was visible among the Ministerial benches of the extreme left. The Premier himself was present, although his cold countenance, like the surface of a frozen lake, betrayed neither apprehension nor the reverse. Self-reliant, self-poised, calm, seemingly insensible to surrounding objects and events, this man of iron, with a heart of ice and a brain of fire, glanced quietly and fixedly around him, with his cold, dark eye, which, from time to time, rested on the Communist benches of the extreme right, unmoved by the stern glances hurled at him by his many fierce opponents and the almost tumultuous excitement by which they were agitated.
At length President Sauzet took the chair. The house came to order, and the sitting opened with the usual preliminary business. A large number of petitions from the workmen of Paris for employment by the Government were presented and referred, and one immense roll containing a hundred thousand names, which came from the manufacturing districts, was brought in on the shoulders of two men and placed in the area before the President's chair, escorted by a deputation from the artisans; it was received with an uproar of applause from the centre of the extreme right of the benches, and from the throngs of blouses in the galleries. The tumult having, at length, subsided, the order of the day was announced to be the discussion of the bill introduced by M. Dantès, having for its purpose the general amelioration of the condition of the industrial classes in the Kingdom; and M. Dantès was himself announced to be the first on the list to occupy the tribune. A deep murmur of anticipation ran around the vast hall at this announcement. The multitudes in the galleries leaned forward to gain a better view of this idol, and to catch every syllable that might fall from his lips; and every eye among the members was turned to the seat of M. Dantès, on the centre right of the benches.