He was therefore reduced to another course: in order to get the measures of the Government passed, he executed a series of alliances, now with one, now with another party.

In these, however, he had to give as well as to receive, and it is curious to see how easily his pride was offended and his anger roused by any attempt of the party with which at the time he was allied to control and influence his policy.

No one of the alliances lasted long, and he seems to have taken peculiar pleasure in breaking away from each of them in turn when the time came.
The alliance with the Conservatives which he had inherited from the older days had begun to break directly after 1866.

Many of them had been disappointed by his policy in that year.

The grant of universal suffrage had alarmed them; they had wished that he would use his power to check and punish the Parliament for its opposition; instead of that he asked for an indemnity.