men, ventured to resist the Prussian crown-prince with a hundred thousand, and lost consequently a large part of his army, and opened a passage through the northern Vosges to the German troops.  On the same day Frossard’s corps was defeated by Prince Frederic Charles near Saarbruecken, while the French emperor remained at Metz irresolute, infatuated, and helpless.  On the 12th of August he threw up the direction of his armies altogether, and appointed Marshal Bazaine commander-in-chief,—­thus proclaiming his own incapacity as a general.  Bazaine still had more than two hundred thousand men under his command, and might have taken up a strong position on the Moselle, or retreated in safety to Chalons; but he fell back on Gravelotte, when, being defeated on the 18th, he withdrew within the defences of Metz.  He was now surrounded by two hundred and fifty thousand men, and he made no effort to escape.  McMahon attempted to relieve him, but was ordered by the government at Paris to march to the defence of that city.  On this line, however, he got no farther than Sedan, where all was lost on September 1,—­the entire army and the emperor himself surrendering as prisoners of war.  The French had fought gallantly, but were outnumbered at every point.

Nothing now remained to the conquerors but to advance to the siege of Paris.  The throne of Napoleon III. was overturned, and few felt sympathy for his misfortunes, since he was responsible for the overwhelming calamities which overtook his country, and which his country never forgave.  In less than a month he fell from what seemed to be the proudest position in Europe, and stood out to the eye of the world in all the hateful deformity of a defeated despot who deserved to fall.  The suddenness and completeness of his destruction has been paralleled only by the defeat of the armies of Darius by Alexander the Great.  All delusions as to Louis Napoleon’s abilities vanished forever.  All his former grandeur, even his services, were at once forgotten.  He paid even a sadder penalty than his uncle, who never lost the affections of his subjects, while the nephew destroyed all rational hopes of the future restoration of his family, and became accursed.

It is possible that the popular verdict in reference to Louis Napoleon, on his fall, may be too severe.  This world sees only success or failure as the test of greatness.  With the support of the army and the police—­the heads of which were simply his creatures, whom he had bought, or who from selfish purposes had pushed him on in his hours of irresolution and guided him—­the coup d’etat was not a difficult thing, any more than any bold robbery; and with the control of the vast machinery of government,—­that machinery which is one of the triumphs of civilization,—­an irresistible power, it is not marvellous that he retained his position in spite of the sneers or hostilities of statesmen out of place, or of editors whose journals were muzzled