Last night there was a party at the Embassy, at which Thiers and Duvergier were present. Thiers had been with Normanby in the morning. He made an attack on me for believing all Madame de Lieven told me; said I was 'une Èponge trempÈe dans le liquide de Madame de Lieven,' and tried his best to persuade me that Guizot was weak, his majority not worth a rush, and that the King could and would get rid of him whenever he found himself in any sort of danger. 'Tell Lord Palmerston,' he said, 'when he speaks, to say "beaucoup de bien de la France, et beaucoup de mal de Monsieur Guizot."' I said I should give him one-half the advice and not the other, and that Palmerston's wisest course would be to hold moderate language, tell his story, and leave everybody to draw the inferences. I have no doubt he will make a very powerful speech and present an admirable _rÈsumÈ_ of the whole question. But this new vigour infused into the Opposition, which will bring on an acrimonious debate, though it may cover Guizot with mud, will not shake him from his seat. I told Thiers he was quite mistaken in supposing that I took my opinions from Madame de Lieven or believed one half she told me, but nevertheless I could not believe that the King would part with Guizot if he could possibly help it, for he would look in vain for so supple an instrument, and one so well able to defend him and his measures in the Chambers. However, Thiers thinks of nothing but mischief, of gratifying his own personal passions and resentments. He has evidently persuaded Normanby, and I have no doubt Normanby tries to persuade Palmerston of the same. The cool people here meanwhile tell me that Guizot will not be turned out, and I am inclined to believe it. I leave the Embassy in certainly a very painful and unbecoming condition. Normanby seems not to care who sees his intimacy with Thiers, and he has none whatever with Guizot. They do not and cannot converse on anything but the merest matters of business, and their relations get worse, and seem likely to do so; the obstacles to an understanding sufficiently frank to be useful appear almost insurmountable. Thiers, having got Normanby into his clutches, will not easily let him go again, and the resentment of Guizot will hardly be appeased, nor do I see any chance of their ever being on really good terms. So ends my _mission_, and it only now remains for me to give the truest account I can of the state of affairs here to those whom it most concerns to know it; but then it will be very difficult for them to adopt any decisive and satisfactory course. CHAPTER XXIV.