Was that natural? Bah! The very minute he reached Frejus, he had his
foot, so to speak, in Paris. There, of course, everybody worships him.
But the first thing he does is to summon the government. "What have you
been doing with my children the soldiers?" he said to the lawyers. "You
are nothing but a lot of poll-parrots, who fool the people with your
gabble, and feather your own nests at the expense of France. It is not
right; and I speak in the name of all who are dissatisfied."
They thought, at first, that they could get rid of him by talking him
to death; but it didn't work. He shut 'em up in the very barrack where
they did their talking, and those who didn't jump out of the windows he
enrolled in his suite, where they soon became mute as fish and pliable
as a tobacco-pouch. This coup made him consul; and as he wasn't one to
doubt the Supreme Being who had kept good faith with him, he hastened to
fulfil his own promise by restoring the churches and reestablishing
religion; whereupon the bells all rang out in his honor and in honor of
the good God.
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