the sword-hilt," as Bismarck called it, was the joint draft of the whole cabinet; the original draft presented by Gramont was judged to be too "elliptical" in its conclusion and not sufficiently vigorous; the reference to a revival of the empire of Charles V was suggested by Ollivier; the paragraph asserting that France would not allow a foreign power to disturb to her own detriment the actual equilibrium of Europe was inserted by the emperor. So far, then, as this declaration is concerned, it is clear that Gramont's responsibility must be shared with his sovereign and his colleagues (Ollivier op. cit. xii. 107; see also the two given on p. 570). It is clear, however, that he did not share the "passion" of his colleagues for "peace with honour", clear also that he wholly misread the intentions of the European powers in the event of war. That he reckoned upon the active alliance of Austria was due, according to Ollivier, to the fact that for nine years he had been a persona grata in the aristocratic society of Vienna, where the necessity for revenging the humiliation of 1866 was an article of faith. This confidence made him less disposed than many of his colleagues to make the best of the renunciation of the candidature made, on behalf of his son, by the prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen. It was Gramont who pointed out to the emperor, on the evening of the 12th, the dubious circumstances of the act of renunciation, and on the same night, without informing Ollivier, despatched to Benedetti at Ems the fatal telegram demanding the king of Prussia's guarantee that the candidature would not be revived. The supreme responsibility for this act must rest with the emperor, "who imposed it by an exercise of personal power on the only one of his ministers who could have lent himself to such a forgetfulness of the safeguards of a parliamentary regime." As for Gramont, he had "no conception of the exigencies of this regime; he remained an ambassador accustomed to obey the orders of his sovereign; in all good faith he had no idea that this was not correct, and that, himself a parliamentary minister, he had associated himself with an act destructive of the authority of parliament." "On his part," adds Ollivier, "it was the result only of obedience, not of warlike premeditation" (op. cit. p. 262). The apology may