Quote

It little dreamed (though on the morrow of the 2d December, 1851, Prince von Schwartzenberg, congratulating Prince Louis Napoleon on a success, destined in seven years to be so fatal to Austria, had said: “You can do anything with bayonets but sit upon them"), it little dreamed the Empire, defended by half a million bayonets, entrenched in a city whose streets were laid out upon the strictest principles of military engineering striving for best attack and defence, should one day tumble like a castle of cards at the breath of men with brains—those despised fellows who could make good speeches.

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