Page:Coubertin - France since 1814, 1900.djvu/84

 threw new splendour on our Navy. Villèle now thought that the time had come to steady his tottering power. He obtained an order from the King for the dissolution of the Chamber of Deputies and the creation of no less than seventy-six peers. This last measure was designed to modify the majority in the Upper Chamber.

What happened then is noteworthy. Nothing could better show the amazing and rapid progress of monarchical stability since the death of Louis XVIII. ; it went hand in hand with the development of a political sense in the electoral body. Villèle brought a lively pressure to bear on the electors ; administrative centralisation gave him the means and he had no scruples in using them. In spite of that, the Ministry obtained only 170 seats; the Extreme Right 70 ; and the Left 180. On the other hand, it was felt that the new peers, some of whom had been rather unhappily chosen, so far from exercising any influence on their colleagues, were influenced by them in the most wholesome manner, and were changed by contact with that chastened and moderate milieu. At Paris something very like a revolt broke out, and professional agitators suddenly