some kind of verbal assurance that the police would not observe
too closely when we wished to put on guns and men we would gladly
avail ourselves of it." To this, the imperial trickster replied,
"Why could you not have them built as for the Italian Government?
I do not think it would be difficult but will consult the
Minister of Marine about it."

Slidell left the Emperor's presence confident that things would
happen. And they did. First came Napoleon's proposal of
intervention, which was declined before the end of the year by
England and Russia. Then came his futile overtures to the
Government at Washington, his offer of mediation--which was
rejected early in 1863. But Slidell remained confident that
something else would happen. And in this expectation also he was
not disappointed. The Emperor was deeply involved in Mexico and
was busily intriguing throughout Europe. This was the time when
Erlanger, standing high in the favor of the Emperor, made his
gambler's proposal to the Confederate authorities about cotton.
Another of the Emperor's friends now enters the play. On January
7, 1863, M. Arman, of Bordeaux, "the largest shipbuilder in
France," had called on the Confederate commissioner: M. Arman
would be happy to build ironclad ships for the Confederacy, and
as to paying for them, cotton bonds might do the trick.

No wonder Slidell was elated, so much so that he seems to have
given little heed to the Emperor's sinister intimation that the
whole affair must be subterranean. But the wily Bonaparte had not
forgotten that six months earlier he had issued a decree of
neutrality forbidding Frenchmen to take commissions from either
belligerent "for the armament of vessels of war or to accept