The _coup d'etat_ was approaching a state of despair.

The hour for supreme resolutions was come.

What did he intend doing?
It was necessary that he should strike a great blow, an unexpected blow, a terrible blow.

He was reduced to this alternative: to perish, or to save himself by a frightful expedient.
"Louis Bonaparte had not quitted the Elysee.

He was in a cabinet on the ground floor, near the splendid gilt saloon, where, as a child, in 1815, he had been present at the second abdication of Napoleon.