The extreme Bonapartists--_plus royalistes que le roi_--all along wished to gain prestige for their sovereign by inflicting an open humiliation on King William and through him on Prussia.

They were angry that he had evaded the snare, and now brought pressure to bear on the Ministry, especially the Duc de Gramont, so that at 7 P.M.of that same day (July 12) he sent a telegram to Benedetti at Ems directing him to see King William and press him to declare that he "would not again authorise this candidature." The Minister added: "The effervescence of spirits [at Paris] is such that we do not know whether we shall succeed in mastering it." This was true.

Paris was almost beside herself.

As M.Sorel says: "The warm July evening drove into the streets a populace greedy of shows and excitements, whose imagination was spoiled by the custom of political quackery, for whom war was but a drama and history a romance[28]." Such was the impulse which led to Gramont's new demand, and it was made in spite of the remonstrances of the British ambassador, Lord Lyons.
[Footnote 28: Sorel, _Hist.

diplomatique de la Guerre Franco-Allemande_, vol.i.chap.