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"Besides, remember that those whom the gods destroy they first make mad, and note the terrible coincidence by which Barthou began to run after he was wounded and then a distraught officer placed the tourniquet below instead of above the wound."
Obviously Astrologer Privat's account of his warning to Statesman Barthou can neither be confirmed nor denied by the dead man, but Statesman Mussolini last week was very much alive. Said M. Privat boldly: "I consider Mussolini a man fatally stricken. The 27th of January 1936 is ominous for him. From that day on he will fall rapidly. I wrote to him at the beginning of 1934 to undertake nothing during the year, because the conjunction of the stars was sinister for him. And I am sure that he was answering me in his speech of last October when he declared: 'We are strong enough to defy Destiny.' And he has defied it, with a bad astral conjunction."
As to Premier Laval, Astrologer Privat merely exhibited the Laval horoscope, exclaiming, "You see that is a marvelous horoscope!"
"Laval is a strange man," continued Privat. "He never says anything, but he always does what I tell him. His feelings are entirely in accord with mine. The year 1935 was an exceptionally good year for him. This year 1936 will be less good for him. He will shortly suffer a setback. Thereafter his comeback will be tremendous. He will live a long time and die a great statesman."
All ready to set back Pierre Laval last week was the potent cabal inside the Radical Socialist Party which is violently hostile to the Premier. As a party the Radical Socialists, who hold a balance of power in the French Chamber, are supposed to be anti-Laval, but as individuals enough of them favor him to have made possible his Cabinet's dance on the tightrope of Power all these months. Last week the anti-Laval cabal forced a showdown within the party, demanding that hereafter Radical Socialists vote as a unit in the Chamber. At this showdown it was first decided by a party majority of one to do as the cabal demanded. Then the decision was reversed by a party majority of one. By this last of innumerable flukes Pierre Laval remained Premier of France.
He immediately faced another possible setback, as he nearly always has during his tenure as Premier.
For internal Radical Socialist Party reasons, great and moderate Edouard Herriot ("Edouard I") was succeeded as President of the party this week by harsh and extremist Edouard Daladier ("Edouard II"). Six members of the Laval Cabinet were Radical Socialists. Of these M. Herriot resigned from the Cabinet in which he held the honorary portfolio Minister of State. The other five gloomily read a nonmandatory order of the day from the Executive Committee of the Radical Socialist Party implying that they should also resign from the Cabinet and excoriating M. Laval in complicated verbiage, saying that the Radical Socialist Party is "resolved to crush this crisis by substituting the rights of labor for the privileges of money."