The ice-cold water reminds me of a ridiculous incident that occurred in the garden of the Tuileries. M. Ouvrard and I were walking together in the direction of the palace, when we saw a Frenchman going towards it with his eyes fixed on the edifice. He was so entirely absorbed by his architectural studies that he did not notice the basin just in front of him. The stone lip of the basin projects a little on the land side, so that if you catch your foot in it no recovery is possible. This he did, and was thrown violently full length upon the thin ice, which offered little resistance to his weight. The basin is not more than a yard deep, so he got out and made his way along the Rue de Rivoli, his clothes streaming on the causeway. Some spectators laughed, and others smiled, but M. Ouvrard remained perfectly grave, saying that he could not understand how people could be so unfeeling as to laugh at a misfortune, for the man would probably take cold. Perhaps the reader thinks he had no sense of humor. Yes, he had; he was very facetious and a hearty laugher, but his delicacy of feeling was so refined that he could not laugh at an accident that seemed to call rather for his sympathy.
A French gentleman who was staying at the hotel had a friend who came occasionally to see him, and this friend was an amiable and interesting talker. He had at the same time much natural politeness, and seeing that I wanted to practise conversation he indulged me by patiently listening to my bad French, and giving me his own remarkably pure and masterly French in return. His name, I learned, was Gindriez, and he was living in Paris by the tolerance of the Emperor. He had been Prefect of the Doubs under the second Republic, and had resigned his prefecture as soon as the orders emanating from the executive Government betrayed the intention of establishing the Empire. As a member of the National Assembly he had voted against the Bonapartists, and was one of the few representatives who were concerting measures against Napoleon when he forestalled them by striking first. After the _coup d'état_ M. Gindriez fled to Belgium, but returned to Paris for family reasons, and was permitted to remain on condition that he did not actively set himself in opposition to the Empire. M. Gindriez looked upon his own political career as ended, though he could have made it prosperous enough, and even brilliant, by serving the power of the day. A more flexible instrument had been put into his prefecture, a new legislative body had been elected to give a false appearance of parliamentary government, and an autocratic system had been established which M. Gindriez believed destined to a prolonged duration, though he felt sure that it could not last forever. Subsequent events have proved the correctness of his judgment. The Empire outlasted the lifetime of M. Gindriez, but it did not establish itself permanently.