"But, if we do not unite with Austria and England, will the Emperor Nicholas then go to Constantinople? Will the equilibrium of Europe then be shattered? "Let us, to repeat once again, leave these feigned or genuine fears to England and Austria. That the former should fear to see Russia seize upon the trade of the Levant and become a naval Power matters little to us. Is it, then, so necessary that Great Britain should remain in possession of the monopoly of the seas, that we should spill French blood to preserve the sceptre of the ocean for the destroyer of our colonies, our fleets and our commerce? Is the Legitimate Dynasty to move armies in order to protect the House which coalesces with the illegitimacy and which is, perhaps, reserving for times of discord the means which it believes itself to possess to disturb France? A fine equilibrium for us is that of Europe, when all the Powers, as I have already shown, have increased their own bulk and, with one accord, diminished the weight of France! Let them return within their old boundaries, as we have done; then we shall fly to the aid of their independence, if that independence be threatened. They made no scruples to join hands with Russia, in order to dismember us and incorporate the fruit of our victories; let them then suffer us to-day to draw closer the bonds formed between us and that same Russia, in order to recover suitable boundaries and restore the real balance of Europe! "Besides, if the Emperor Nicholas were desirous and able to go to sign a peace in Constantinople, would the destruction of the Ottoman Empire be the strict consequence of that fact? Peace has been signed under arms in Vienna, in Berlin, in Paris; almost all the capitals of Europe have been taken in these latter days: have Austria, Bavaria, Prussia, Spain perished? Twice have the Cossacks and the Pandoors come to camp in the court-yard of the Louvre; the Kingdom of Henry IV. has been under military occupation during three years; and yet we should be quite touched to see the Cossacks in possession of the Seraglio, and we should show for the honour of barbarism the susceptibility which we did not display for the honour of civilization and for our own country! Let the pride of the Porte be humbled, and then perhaps it will be obliged to recognise some of the rights of humanity which it outrages! "I have now made evident whither I am tending and the consequence which I am preparing to deduce from all the foregoing. Here is this consequence: