272.51
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V.I
HISTORY
OF THE
NATIONAL
CONSTITUENT
ASSEMBLY
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VOL. I.
LONDON
BENTLEY
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​HISTORY
OF THE
NATIONAL
CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY.
VOL. I.
DC
272.5
.C8
HISTORY
***,
OF THE
NATIONAL
CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY.
FROM MAY 1848.
335-47
ok:
BY J. F. CORKRAN, ESQ.
2636
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET.
Publisher in Ordinary to Her Majesty.
1849.
LONDON 1
Printed by Schulze and Co., 13, Poland Street.
PREFACE.
THE Author of this history had been for some
months in almost daily attendance at the National
Assembly, when, repeated questions put to him
about the style, manner, and appearance of such
members as were attracting public attention, sug-
gested the idea of writing sketches, calculated in
some degree to satisfy the curiosity of friends. A
consideration of persons led naturally to an exposé
of such subjects as had become identified with par-
ticular names; and as the recent Revolution has had
the effect of throwing down all that had been taken
for granted, and of causing most political and social
questions to be brought into light and examining as
if in themselves new a Work which aimed not
beyond simple portraiture, unavoidably assumed
a certain politico-philosophical texture. Having,
for purposes of his own, taken notes of the many
speeches he had heard, the Author can truly
describe this to be an original effort at painting a
vi
PREFACE.
series of scenes, which it was given to but few of
his countrymen to witness.
.
The debates of the Assembly, from the first day
of meeting to the invasion by the Clubs on the
15th of May, and from that day to the Insurrection
of June, receive daily notice, for the sake of showing
how far the proceedings of this body tended to
bring about that terrible struggle, in which the
question at stake was-civilization itself.
From
that period, only such debates as serve to throw
light on great or interesting questions, or to bring
out remarkable individuals, are at all noticed. In
fine, the Assembly chosen by Universal Suffrage,
and occupied with questions of a political or
social character, was composed of the most varied
characters and persons. The parties known under
the names of Republicans-Moderate and Red,
Socialists, Communists, Bonapartists, and Monar-
chists, all enter readily into the reader's classifica-
tion. Then for the personnel: there were men
whose names had never before been heard of, by
the side of well-established reputations: there were
lawyers and doctors, from town and country;
bishops, priests, friars, and pasteurs; nobles and
workmen, even to the humblest proletaire. Not
the least curious part of the study opened by such
various persons, was the comparative effect produced
by the new lamps and the old, on an Assembly
PREFACE.
MAY, 1849.
vii
whose temper changed with its age, and was
modified by the strangely shifting events with
which it was bound up. Before it was a fortnight
old, this Assembly had to withstand an assault
upon its existence; later, again, it had to defend
society from a fearful uprising of the masses,
instigated and led by perverted intelligence and
corrupted talents. So far, it was triumphant; but
then it had to struggle, and in vain, against au
heir of the Emperor, and it had to struggle against
its own strong instinctive tendencies to become a
Convention. To follow the Assembly through these
struggles and efforts, to mark the men who in-
fluenced its career, for good or evil-such is the
task into which the Author found himself almost
insensibly drawn :-certain, at all events, that
whatever may be the extent of his own failure to
exhibit becomingly the drama, and the dramatis
personæ, yet that if he has succeeded in making
his sketches of a suggestive character to the reader's
mind, his labour will not have been thrown away,
nor his reader's time lost.
Ma
CONTENTS
OF
THE FIRST VOLUME.
CHAPTER I.
Meeting of the National Assembly-Its physiognomy-
General Courtais' strange proposal-Proclamation of the
Republic from the steps of the Chamber.
1
CHAPTER II.
First operations-M. Buchez-Newspaper influence-The
men of the National,' and the men of the Ré-
forme'
20
CHAPTER III.
The members of the Provisional Government-Their
Reports-Lamartine-Portrait of Crémieux-Of Louis
Blanc-Of Carnot
28
•
•
X
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IV.
Garnier Pagès-Arago-Marie, the real author of the
National Ateliers-Lamartine-Béranger—A parliamen-
tary hurricane-The Mountain' and Barbès-The his-
tory of the conspirators-The Provisional Government
declared to have merited well of their country.
CHAPTER V.
M. Peupin, ouvrier-Workmen in the Assembly-M.
L'Herbette―The serious consequences of his accusation
against the Ex-King regarding the Forests of the State-
Cormenin-Power of the Pamphlet-Bac-Jules Favre
-Father Lacordaire-Odilon Barrot-On the Parliamen-
tary storm-The Executive Committee formed
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VII.
45
The Executive Commission-Decline of Lamartine-Its
-M. Wolowski raises the Workman's Question-
Peupin, a workman, opposes Louis Blanc-Feeling in
the Clubs
93
CHAPTER VIII.
T
M. Berryer-Napoleon Bonaparte, son of Jerome
68
Influence of eminent men-M. Vivien-The new Ministry
-Their deficiencies-M. Flocon, their spokesman . 103
P
. 111
•
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IX.
Petition in favour of Poland-Bad feeling towards the
National Guards-The Fête de la Fraternité postponed—
Agitation out of doors-Procession of the Clubs-Inva-
sion of the Assembly-Its attempted overthrow-Raspail,
Blanqui, Huber, &c.-A revolution of an hour-Sobrier's
expedition-Panic in Paris-Arrest of the conspirators-
Night scene
A stormy sitting
CHAPTER X.
Irritation of the Assembly-Marc Caussidière-Surrender
of the Prefecture of Police-M. Ducoux-Lucien
Murat
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
Lugubrious miscellanies-M. Dupin
CHAPTER XIII.
•
•
+
xi
•
116
150
. 162
. 164
Anger of the Assembly not yet appeased-Singular debate.
about the manner of wearing scarfs-The Fête de la
Concorde'-The Parisians a theatrical people-Adapta-
tion of Paris for spectacles-What took place in the day,
and what at night
. 172
xii
CONTENTS.
General Baraguay d'Hilliers-Appearance of Cavaignac-
The Marquis de la Rochejacquelin-M. de Lamartine's
speech on Italy and Poland-Absurd resolution . 181
W
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XV.
Decree banishing the family o Louis-Philippe-Jealousy
shown towards the Bonapartes-Agitation in the Na-
tional Ateliers-Attempts to cure growing abuses-How
received-Disappearance of Emile Thomas, Chief Direc-
tor of the Ateliers-Application to prosecute Louis
Blanc
194
•
44
CHAPTER XVI.
Report of the Committee on Louis Blanc-Ill-will towards
the Bonapartes-The Cross of the Legion of Honour-
Prosecution of Louis Blanc refused-Split between
Crémieux and Favre
205
CHAPTER XVII.
The Clubs out of doors-A razzia-Law against attroupe-
ments-Elections for vacant seats-Curious contrasts
shown by the returns-Defeat of the Republicans-
Returns of Conservatives, Bonapartists, and Commu-
nists-The attroupements continue-Alarm caused by
the popularity of Louis Napoleon-Animated debate-
M. Duprat-M. Babaud-Laribière-New Republican
literature-General Bodeau-A Bonapartist plot-A
decree against Louis Napoleon stopped by General
Lavalet.
212
•
S
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XVIII.
M. Marrast
Agitation on the subject of Louis Napoleon-Debate in
the Assembly regarding his admission-Portrait of
Ledru-Rollin
230
CHAPTER XIX.
Louis Napoleon resigns-His letter excites anger-Bill
affecting old officers causes dissatisfaction-Fatal colli-
sion at Gueret-Pierre Leroux, the Communist
. 245
CHAPTER XX.
xiii
CHAPTER XXI.
CHAPTER XXII.
257
Victor Hugo-Léon Faucher-Debate on the National
Ateliers-Agitation without-Manœuvres of the Clubs
to precipitate the Insurrection-Apathy of the middle
classes, and its causes
. 266
Insurrection of June-First day, the 23rd-The As-
sembly
. 291
HISTORY
NATIONAL CONSTITUENT
A
OF THE
ASSEMBLY.
CHAPTER I.
MEETING OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY-ITS PHYSIOG-
NOMY GENERAL COURTAIS' STRANGE PROPOSAL-
PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC FROM THE STEPS
OF THE CHAMBER.
P)
It was an extraordinary sight, the meeting of the
French National Assembly on the 4th of May, 1848.
How unlike in its composition to what is generally
understood by a House of Commons, or Chamber of
Deputies, returned by constituencies more or less
limited, to support certain principles or poli-
tical systems with clearly indicated names, and per-
sonified in tried and well known leaders. That
Assembly was created by universal suffrage, its
principles all to be sought after, and its leaders
but dimly indicated. Principles, laws, leadership,
VOL. I.
B
2
ลง
MEETING OF THE ASSEMBLY.
systems, influences were to be determined by
struggle. The ground was cleared of all opposing
prejudices. The race was open to all. There was
no established pre-eminence to frown down, sneer
down, censure down, or smile down, any sort of
disputant, be he whom he might; no doctrine could
startle, no language seem strange. The world
expected some new unknown prophet-some one
capable of reading the mystery supposed to be
hidden in the great popular convulsion which
had taken place. There was a religious awe over
that Assembly, for it was deeply impressed on the
minds of many, if not of all, that Providence had
not permitted so astounding a change, one threaten-
ing to be so boundless in its effects, unless for
the bringing of some wonderful purpose to light,
by unfamiliar instruments. The order of established
parliaments was reversed, the difficulties were in
the way of reputation and eminence. All the faci-
lities were for the unknown.
The building in which the nine hundred repre-
sentatives met, was provisional. It was run up for
the occasion, slight and pretentious-a sort of well-
ordered scaffolding-to facilitate the elaboration
of the Constitution, and then to be thrown down.
There are strange coincidences in localities. That
Tennis Court at Versailles, into which the States-
General, when the doors of their place of meeting
THE MEETING PLACE.
3
were shut against them, rushed and joined in the
immortal oath of the jeu de paume, was not inap-
propriate. The naked and harsh simplicity of such
a place was not unsuited to men sternly marching
to equality of condition. The game of rude rivalry
so often played there, had no unfitting associations.
There must have been some harmony between the
place and the actors, to have so strongly fired the
genius of the artist, and to have fascinated the
cyes of all who had ever seen the work, original or
engraved. It was in keeping with the character of a
people who reverence law, that the first battle about
ship money should have been in the Court of Exche-
quer. The Gracchi and Tell had scenes associated
with their first endeavours. Even in modern
maiden parliamentary meetings, be it by accident or
design, some place consecrated by the occasion will be
visited in time to come; but the great, or monstre
temporary shed, in which the National Assembly
of France first met, with its paste-board figures
without, and its paste-board presidential canopy
within, its endless tri-coloured flags in faisceaux,
and its scenic decorations, partaking partly of the
Circus and partly of the Bal Morel, will disappear
like a mimic stage scene, carrying with it no unapt
commentary on the no less fragile performance
beneath its roof.
Let this passing reflexion on ephemeral architec-
is
B 2
4
CC
VIVE LA RÉPUBLIQUE!"
ture be forgiven-for those who were not present
on that day, can hardly estimate the feverish state
of observation to which the minds of beholders
present were raised. People looked at every one
and every thing with a strange inexplicable curiosity.
Those who had read and heard of that mightiest
event in all history, the first French Revolution,
and had speculated often, wondering many a time,
how those who then lived had thought and
felt, and how they bore the emotions which each
hour awakened, and how some must have grown
callous, some careless, and others mad-such
persons found to their amazement that, may be,
they too were destined to pass through the fiery
trial of similar experience!
But the Assembly has met. IIow is it to be clas-
sified? What guide has the eye through that mass
of nine hundred legislators? The only thing certain
is, that all have accepted the Republic.
Although the actors were present, the drama did
not properly begin until the members of the Provi-
sional Government appeared. The shout of Vive
la République! burst from the Assembly as they
entered. It was loud, it was unanimous, and it
was repeated; yet it may be doubted if it was heart-
felt. To my car it did not sound so. I shall never
forget that cry-the first audible voice of that uni-
versal-suffrage-elected body. My ear retained it
GENERAL PHYSIOGNOMY.
5
well, and my mind criticized, and, as it were, handled
that sound, as if it were a material substance; but
there was a something in the tone that the sure,
yet impalpable test of sympathy, pronounced to
be factitious. The majority who uttered that cry,
did so under the fierce suspicious surveillance, not
only of fellow members, but of lynx eyes in the
gallery. There are vehement shouts that are the
act of the will, determined by calculation and
reflection, and self-imposed; but they do not awaken
a response, like the deep heart-felt music of a holy
sentiment through unmistakeable sincerity of voice.
Run the eye rapidly along these benches. There
is the comely face of De la Rochejacquelin, resting
on an unsullied expanse of snow-white neck-cloth
and waistcoat, as if he had come to a royal
sitting in the time of Charles X. M. Berryer was
there, the brilliant leader of the legitimist party as
it had been constituted in the Chamber of Deputies.
Odilon Barrot, whose last public effort was in favour
of the Regency, stood near to Dupin, the confiden-
tial law adviser of Louis-Philippe. Duvergier de
Hauranne, Malleville, Remusat, Faucher, and many
friends of M. Thiers stood there, brooding over
the organized ostracism of which their brilliant
leader had been made the victim, and they cried
Vive la République !
mat
M. Dufaure, who had refused to assist at a Reform
banquet; Count Montalembert, the vigorous cham-
:
6
THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT,
pion of the Swiss Jesuits; the Abbé Lacordaire, in
his white Dominican robes; the Bishop of Orleans,
the sober Abbé Fayet, from Brittany, the land of Ven-
deans and Chouans ;* the Protestant pastor Coquerel
-all joined in the cry. Is it to be wondered at, that
to the watchful ear it was the harmony of science,
not of soul; the accent of resignation, not of joy.
And it was repeated again and again on the chal-
lenge of those who wished to be satisfied, that they
heard a true sound, and the challenge was un-
blenchingly answered, by priests, lawyers, states-
men, thrown so incongruously together by an
inexplicable coup-de-main.
The members of the Provisional Government
naturally attracted the eyes of all who were present.
The aged Dupont de l'Eure, bending under the
weight of four-score years, leant on the arm of the
boyish-looking little Louis Blanc. The burly
Ledru Rollin held the arm of a mean-looking
person, who was Flocon. The noble old philoso-
pher, Arago, contrasted with the somewhat pert,
theatrical looking Marrast; and the elegant ima-
ginative-faced Lamartine, made the little ugly
Crémieux look more ugly, and the heavy Pagnerre
more heavy. Garnier Pagès, to whose common, yet
sickly features, his locks curling to his shoulders,
P
made
* Since the above was written, the Abbé Fayet fell a
victim to cholera.
THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT.
7
gave an air of coxcombry that sat ill on the Finance
Minister of a country in a revolution, contrasted
with the grave and truly elegant demeanour
of the avocat, Marie. Carnot, the son of the
Conventionalist, called the organizer of victory,
exhibited his pale, ascetic features by the side
of the dogged and sinister looking Albert, the
workman.
Thus, as far as appearances went, the Provisional
Government resembled any similar number of men,
showing, as it did, the average mixture of well and
ill-favoured countenances. But where was the pilot,
who was to weather the storm? In that group
there was poetry, science, heroism, with violence,
ambition, and low vices; there was noble self-
deception and reckless illusion; there was angel and
devil, good and evil; lofty aspirations and deep
designs; there was the incarnation of all the sen-
timents, passions, aspirations, and vices of human
society, but with a solemn vow to make the better
triumph; there was wanting in each and all,
political experience and political knowledge, nay
there was a contempt for both, as for a broken galley-
chain, that had only served to bind mankind to
systems from which he was to break for ever, and
launch into the unknown-believing his excited
hopes to be heavenly inspirations.
The following address was read from the tribune
ос
ITS ADDRESS TO THE ASSEMBLY.
in a weak voice by the aged Dupont de l'Eure.
"Citizens! representatives of the people! the Provi-
sional Government of the Republic comes to incline.
itself before the nation, and to render conspicuous
homage to the supreme power with which you are
invested. Elect of the people! welcome to the
great capitol where your presence excites a senti-
ment of happiness and hope that will not be disap-
pointed. Depositaries of the National Sovereignty,
you are about to found new institutions upon the
wide basis of the democracy, and to give to France
the only Constitution that is suitable to her-that
of the Republic. But after having proclaimed the
grand political law, which is henceforth to definitively
constitute the country, you will endeavour to
employ the efficacious action of the Government, as
far as possible, in the relations that the necessity of
labour establishes amongst all citizens, and which
ought to have for base, the holy laws of Justice and
Fraternity. In fine, the moment has arrived for
the Provisional Government to place in your hands.
the unlimited power with which it was invested by
the Revolution. For us, the dictatorship was only
treated as a moral power in the midst of the difficult
circumstances we have traversed. Faithful to our
origin and our personal convictions, we have all
been called to proclaim the rising Republic of
February. To-day we inaugurate the labours of
9
the Assembly, with the cry that always rallies us
together, Vive la République !"
At the close, the shouts of Vive la République !
were repeated. M. Crémieux, the Minister of
Justice, invited the members to enter the Bureaux,
to have their elections validated, and the first scene
of the great drama closed.
The verification of the elections was a simple and
rapid process, limited merely to proof of identity
and citizenship; and it was well that it was so, for
had a handle for litigation been offered, through com-
plex conditions, there can be no doubt that it would
have been seized hold of by the old Republican
party, who had already manifested their disappoint-
ment at the character of the returns.
So com-
pletely had the Revolution been the work of a party
in the capital, and so little did the departments
sympathise with it, that it was deemed necessary by
the Minister of the Interior to send Commis-
sioners through the provinces, to make themselves
acquainted with the state of feeling, to preach up
Republicanism, and to get themselves returned.
As these Commissioners were indicated for the most
part by the Clubs, they were animated with the
violent spirit of these assemblages, and their rude
bearing and subversive doctrines, excited angry
resistance and passionate resentment. The Com-
missioners were armed with unlimited power, which
LEDRU ROLLIN'S COMMISSIONERS.
B 3
10 RESISTANCE TO THE COMMISSIONERS.
they exercised in the full sense of the word, dis-
placing local authorities, overruling local councils,
giving forced currency to the notes of local banks,
and, in fact, ruling with dictatorial power. Their
march into the departments had been heralded by
a circular, which immediately acquired celebrity
from the distinction that it drew between Répu-
blicains de la veille and Républicains du lendemain,
to the disadvantage of the latter.
Now, as the mass of the inhabitants of every
portion of France ranged under the latter category,
not only was exclusion pronounced against the
majority, but as there is in every neighbourhood
some busy, idle, turbulent, and needy agitator, the
people saw themselves threatened with that unen-
durable evil, their prostration at the feet of an
obnoxious member; and the consequence was
distrust of the new Government, and resistance
to its emissaries. In several places there were
collisions, generally excited by the partizans of the
Government Commissioner; but at Rouen there
was a fierce contest between the military and
National Guards on the one side, and the workinen
on the other. The latter threw up barricades, that
had to be taken by cannon.
Generally speaking, it must be confessed, the
voting went on with a degree of order that, con-
sidering the circumstances under which a whole
THE ELECTION RETURNS.
11
people were called upon to exercise such a privilege
as that of universal suffrage, was truly admirable;
and proved, indeed, that the Revolution ought not to
have been challenged on a mere question of a
noderate extension of the franchise.
The returns,
too, instead of marking a revolutionary disposition,
were such as might have been expected under the
monarchy itself, being composed of mayors, manu-
facturers, farmers, officers on half-pay, the judges,
law officers, doctors, or notaries of the locality:
in a word, the notabilities of the place, or names
already celebrated in the eyes of the public at large.
Of course the Government Commissioners were
very many of them returned, but it was evident
that the Républicains de la veille would form a
sinall minority in the National Assembly.
Although the Revolutionists had relied chiefly
on the sympathies of the working classes, yet very
few operatives were returned, and the Assembly
presented a fair image of French society as at
present constituted, which is only another way of
saying that it was by its very nature Conservative.
There was indeed a difference, amounting to a con-
trast, between the National Assembly of 1789 and
that of 1848. The first came charged with the
elements of class struggles: the latter had derived,
as the result of those struggles an equality of
condition and partition of agricultural property,
12 WHY THE REPUBLIC WAS ACCEPTED.
so that division of the soil had been pushed to such
a point, as to interfere with the full development
of its capabilities. The latter being in this posi-
tion, had nothing to gain, if not everything to lose,
by the social theories that had made cities dens of
idleness and schools of civil war, and so they came
to maintain, and not to overthrow.
Although it may look like a paradox to assert
that it was the Conservative disposition of the
country that caused the Republic to be so readily
accepted, yet the fact is so. There had been so
many changes of Government in France within
sixty years, that peculiar prestige for any had long
ceased. It did not follow in the minds of people,
familiar alike with Republic, Directory, Consulate,
Emperor, Restoration, Legitimacy, and Legitimacy
set aside in 1830, that a relapse into one or other
of the same phases should inevitably lead to ruin.
The Republic had, like all new governments,
announced that nothing would be changed-that
the Revolution was a reaction against corruption,
that was leading to financial ruin-that there
would be fewer expenses, more economy, less taxa-
tion, and that, in fact, there was only in a
monarch's overthrow a Frenchman de moins, as
Louis XVIII. had called himself a Frenchman de
plus. Such was, in fact, the first language used by
the Provisional Government; for although very soon
ELEMENTS OF DISTRUST.
13
indeed the socialist element broke out, yet there had
been an interval which, short as it was, between the
sudden declaration of the Republic and the Com-
munism of Louis Blanc, was yet sufficient to enable
the assent of the provinces to be obtained, on a
belief in the truth of the moderate sentiments
propounded, in the first instance, by the Provisional
Government.
From this general view of the subject, it will
be seen that at the very moment the National
Assembly met, there was a general and common
feeling of distrust. There was a still smouldering
conspiracy at work on the part of the Socialist
faction in conjunction with the Clubs. That con-
spiracy had already failed in two instances: on
the 17th of March, when the workmen marched
to the Hôtel-de-Ville, and mistaking the views of
their leaders, shouted for the Provisional Govern-
ment, which their demonstration was, as they
thought, meant to support-although their leaders
contemplated its subversion, and would have over-
thrown it, had the chief conspirator not lost heart :
and again, on the 16th of April, when a plan for
destroying the same Government was defeated
by the prompt and energetic conduct of Ge-
neral Changarnier, who called out the National
Guard.
In ten days from the meeting of the National
A
4
14
DOUBLE PLOT-OTHER ACTORS.
Assembly, the same conspiracy was to be directed
against the Assembly itself. But we are antici-
pating. Was there not, let it now be asked,
sufficient ground for trusting the evidence of the
senses, that that cry of Vive la République! which
met the Provisional Government on its entry, was
on the one side a challenge, on the other a con-
strained and resigned effort to disarm hostility
and suspicion, and not the blended harmony of
joyous and happy souls, identified in a common
sympathy.
The first inauguratory scene of the great drama
of the National Assembly was, as has already been
told, of short duration, nor was it particularly
impressive. But there was a double plot in the
piece, which was not visible to the public eye. As
the representatives of the people passed from the
great stage, they encountered on the way to their
respective bureaux, persons whose manner and cos-
tume showed that they too had their parts assigned,
and were already performing them. Men, with
long beards, pointed hats, and pieces of red cloth
on their arms, met the representatives, who, by the
way, wore such of them, at least, as chose to
attend to a fantastical decree of the Provisional
Government on the subject-pieces of red ribbon,
with gold tinsel thereon, at their button-hole; and
the men of decorated arms gazed broadly on the
ARROGANCE OF THE CLUBS.
15
men of decorated and undecorated coats, rudely
examined their air, their features and general appear-
ance, accompanied them to their bureaux, and even
essayed to violate the sanctuary of the Committee-
room.
Members complained and inquired, when they
learned to their astonishment and indignation, that
a deputation from the Clubs had waited on the
Minister of the Interior, that they demanded that a
portion of the public gallery should be assigned to
Club delegates, charged with a commission to watch
the proceedings of the Assembly; and that for the
more easy communication with the Clubs, arrogating
to themselves, as they did, the true expression of
public opinion, two bureaux should be assigned to
the delegation, with pen, ink, paper, and all ap-
pliances and means to boot; and to this imperious
demand the Minister of the Interior had courteously
yielded.
Thus, the representatives of the people, elected
by universal suffrage, found the elements prepared
for renewing the worst scenes of the first Con-
vention. The galleries, or tribunes, as they are
called, were to be brought to bear on the delibera-
tions of the Assembly. The representatives were
to meet under the muzzles of the sans-culotte
artillery. The leaders of the Clubs, and the leaders
of the Mountain, were to have their understood
:
16
SINISTER RUMOURS.
signals and mystic organization. While orations
were uttering within, the aides-de-camp of Dema-
gogueism would be scouring through the streets,
and the Assembly would find itself in the unrelaxing
gripe of the mob.
A fact, coming hard and strong upon the senses,
tells more than the best authenticated communica-
tions. It had been whispered, that Monsieur un tel
had said, in one place, that suspected Moderates, or
doubtful Republicans, would, on crossing the bridge
that leads to the Chamber, be thrown into the
Seine; that officers, before they had been elected to
command companies of National Guards, had had to
subscribe to a declaration, that in case of a division
of opinion between the people and the Assembly,
they would act with the former; that the Guard
Mobile, in clubs, had uttered their credo, as to the
circumstances in which revolt would become the
most sacred of duties. All this had been said in
one shape or another, and had been listened to
listlessly, or proudly, or contemptuously, according
to the temperament; but when the eye has to
pierce into physiognomy, and read more than lan-
guage can convey; when the Club-man stands there,
the representative of mysterious power, and shows
by his demeanour that resolves have been made that
shall be carried into execution, that there exists an
illegitimate legislative and executive-rival, if not
G
GENERAL COURTAIS' PROPOSAL.
17
W
master, of the constituted authority itself—it is not
permitted to the hardiest man to treat such auda-
city with indifference. The consequence was, that
when the Assembly proceeded to regulate its in-
ternal form, a resolution was taken not to allow any
interruption from the gallery, and, on a remon-
strance from the members, the Clubs were deprived
of their ex-officio rights within the walls.
As the several elections became verified, the
Chamber filled, and on the prompting of some
or other enthusiastic Republican, the shout of Vive
la République! would be raised. This was not, how-
ever, sufficient for the most ardent. The Comman-
der-in-Chief of the National Guards, General Cour-
tais, a good-looking elderly man, with an agreeable
expression of face, in whose naturally handsome
features there was a mixture of audacity and
levity, the latter amounting to giddiness, ascended
the tribunc; and although, as he said, they had
proclaimed the Republic seventeen times that day,
yet the people desired that they should go out-
side, that all might blend their voices together.
What a strange part this for the Commander of
the National Guards, charged with the protection
of the Assembly itself, to intimate to that body a
message from the sovereign people, with an implied
penalty for disobedience! But there
there was no
time for reflection at such a
moment. The
G
<<
kas
18
PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC.
people had for more than two months been too
much accustomed to be petted and humoured to
make it safe to refuse such a proposal; so the
Assembly proceeded en masse to the peristyle of
the old Chamber of Deputies, and the scene that
occurred was, in all external respects, of the most
animated, beautiful, and had it been sustained
by moral grandeur-would have been of the most
sublime kind.
The scene from the bridge of the Chamber of
Deputies is at all times imposing; but at sunset,
when the weather is fine, indescribably beautiful.
""Tis beautiful exceedingly!" Fancy a gorgeous
sun immediately over, and enveloping that superb
monument, the Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile, send-
ing its rays upon the sparkling fountains of the
Place de la Concorde, and converting the red
Egyptian column, the Luxor, into a pillar of dull
flame; the chaste architecture of the Madeleine
becomes sweet silver; the windows of the Tuileries
glitter like the robes of a Queen Sheba; and then,
far down on the river, in sober contrast with modern
architectural beauties, the old Paris, behind its ram-
part, the Pont-Neuf, looking still a city of the
Middle Ages, with the holy fane of St. Louis tem-
pering the stiff pike-like turrets of the Conciergerie,
and behind all, the two saint-like towers of Notre
Dame, sentinels of religion and of time, receiving
Kat
SCENE OUTSIDE THE CHAMBER.
19
on their brows, softly and chastely, the retiring
light, with many gems from old casements darting
through the evening mist; fancy all this, and then
people the foreground, the steps of the Chamber,
the bridge, the quays, the Place de la Concorde,
with National Guards, Deputies, and a population
suddenly surprised by a spectacle altogether created
by a combination of novel and accidental circum-
stances, with bands of music, leaving no sense
ungratified, and you will understand that the uni-
versal shout of Vive la République was then, at all
events, as heartfelt as it was universal.
And so closed the first meeting of the National
Assembly.
20 THE ASSEMBLY'S SECOND MEETING.
FIRST
CHAPTER II.
OPERATIONS
Jag
M.
BUCHEZ
Kė
NEWSPAPER
INFLUENCE-THE MEN OF THE NATIONAL,' AND
THE MEN OF THE 'REFORME.'
THE Assembly met, for the second time, on
Friday the 5th of May, in order to appoint, by
ballot, their various officers, such as president, vice-
presidents, secretaries, and questors.
The opera-
tion was extremely tedious, owing to the clumsy
manner in which the votes had to be collected; a
system subsequently abandoned for a more expert
mode, but worthy of notice in this instance, be..
cause it served to show, in a striking manner, the
materials of which the Assembly was composed.
The balloting urns were placed on the tribune, and
as it became necessary for each member to ascend
and drop his vote into the urn, it will be seen that
the time necessary for eight or nine hundred mem-
bers to ascend and descend would be considerable.
The mob-like manner in which so many had to
ELECTION OF PRESIDENT.
21
crowd to the foot of the tribune, was not favourable
to quiet deportment, and so, on the very first day,
there was a dispute provoked by the rude conduct
of Barbès, of whom we shall have more to say here-
after, in which the exchange of names "Aristocrats"
and "Factieux" were heard.
There was, as we have had to notice, dissatisfac-
tion, on the part of the Revolutionists, at the
character of the returns; and although time had
not been afforded for parties to group together,
or for friends to recognize one another, yet the first
nomination of officers would, it was fairly calcu-
ated, help to throw some light on the numerical
strength of parties. Hence it was, that when the
greater part of the day had been consumed in the
election of president, which resulted in the defeat
of the ultra party, the latter would not listen to
an adjournment for the succeeding election, thus
occasioning the ferment in which the hard names
were exchanged, such as we have just noticed.
The Revolutionists gained their point, for the pro-
ceedings were carried far into the evening, a half
hour having been allowed to intervene for refresh-
ments. The first scrutiny for President showed
that 727 had voted. M. Buchez obtained 382;
M. Trelat, 234; and M. Recurt, 91; M. Buchez
was thus declared first monthly President of the
Assembly.
22
FRENCH NEWSPAPER PRESS.
The two defeated members had each figured as
political conspirators under the late reign, yet
their titles were set aside for those of a Christian
Socialist, of wavering opinions. M. Buchez was,
moreover, a man of the National, favourably known
by a history of the debates of the Convention,
which he had compiled with M. Bastide, one of the
editors of that now-governing paper; and here let
us make some observations with respect to news-
paper influence, which, were we to omit, one of the
main-springs of these present movements would be
lost sight of altogether. The Revolution of Fe-
bruary had hardly been accomplished, when a con-
troversy arose upon the question, whether it was the
men of the National, or the men of the Réforme,
who made that revolution. We are not to infer
that it was the writing contained in either or both
of those journals that had produced such an effect.
It is generally supposed in England, that because the
writer of newspaper articles in France is an avowed,
recognized, responsible person, his journal is there-
fore marked with a stamp of personality, which
causes the paper to be regarded as the expression of
an individual, rather than the manifesto of a party.
Yet the truth is, that however well known the writer
may be, he merges into the particular political sect
of which the paper is, as it were, the pulpit. For
years the National had been the organ of the
THE NATIONAL'-THE 'REFORME.' 23
Kad
Republican party, acting on the principles of their
famous leaders, Armand Carrel and Godefroy Ca-
vaignac, both of whom died young. After their
death, the party was without a leader, properly
speaking; and although the paper continued to be
conducted with remarkable talent, its circulation
was extremely low, and its writers exercised no
great influence upon the people.
Sometime after M. Ledru Rollin had started
in public life, a division arose in the republican
party the National was too tame for so fiery
a tribune, and the Réforme was founded by
that gentleman, in conjunction with M. Flocon.
On the famous night of the 23rd of February, the
bureaux of the National and of the Réforme were
the scenes of busy intrigue and agitated councils,
Whether the fiat went forth from the National or
from the Réforme, is still a question. The former
journal asserts, that on the morning of the fatal
day, the watchwords "A bas les Bourbons "«Vive
la République !" were printed on slips in the office,
and circulated; so far compromising the paper, that
had the Republic not been declared, the crime of
high treason hung over the heads of all concerned.
The Réforme lays claim to rougher and deeper
work; in fact, to having raised the barricades and
incited the attacks.
The men of the National were the first to enjoy
24
THE NATIONAL' WRITERS.
the fruits of the revolution which the men of the
Réforme claim to have made. While Ledru Rollin,
and Flocon, and Caussidière, stumbled in the race,
General Cavaignac, the brother of Godefroy, who
adhered to the National party, rose to the highest
office. Marrast, the chief writer, became succes-
sively Mayor of Paris and President of the As-
sembly, and, what was perhaps a more gratifying
honour, President of the Committee of the Constitu-
tion, and author of the great Charter of the Re-
public, to draw up which Cormenin and Lamennais
had aspired in vain. Bastide, another writer, be-
came Minister for Foreign Affairs; Duclerc, a con-
tributor, Minister of Finance. In fact, the highest
and most honourable situations, at home and abroad,
seats in the Cabinet, Prefectures, and embassies,
devolved on the happy clique who wrote in the
National. The dislike expressed by the Réforme is
not the trading rivalry of shop with shop, but clique
against clique. Although every paper has the
stamp of personality upon it, yet the writer, unless
he be a man of very great eminence, is not so much
considered as the party leader whose organ the
paper professes to be. The Siècle is not M. Cham-
bole's, but Odilon Barrot. The Constitutionnel is
not Véron or Merruan, but Thiers; although
neither Barrot nor Thiers wrote except on rare
occasions in these organs of their partics. Le Bien
Sent
INFLUENCE OF JOURNALISM.
25
Public is not M. Pelletan, but Lamartine; and the
Réforme is Ledru-Rollin.
Thus it happened under the monarchy, that, as
there could not be political associations or clubs, the
journal became the central point of parties and fac-
tions—the voice, the rendezvous, the government of
the political sect. The journal was not a mere mer-
cantile speculation, seeking to attract customers,
and its writers obscure unknown men, drudging in
the dark, or uttering mysterious oracles under the
plural mask, but an active power, aspiring to rule
and government. On this account the personality
of the paper is, in France, as indispensable as is
the personality of a political association in England.
Men must know their leaders when they can call
meetings and speak; those leaders speak and have
little need of personal displays in the press. As
speeches fill the columns of papers, so leading articles
diminish in importance. It was often remarked,
that even Paris journals lost their influence when
the Chambers met. A consideration of these cir-
cumstances may help to explain the abiding con-
nexion that has so long existed between French
statesmen and the press. The journal being the
only means through which a politician can make
himself heard, every distinguished statesman
begins his career by making himself heard through
that channel without disguise, and never after-
VOL. I.
C
!
26
BUCHEZ AND
wards separates himself from it, but, like a lec-
turer at the Sorbonne, transplanted to the Cabinet,
continues to speak through a suppliant, while his
name figures on the sessional programme.
M. Buchez, the happy colleague of M. Bastide,
became the first President of the Assembly. His
appearance was bluff and homely, but his natural
indecision of conduct rendered him less able to
grapple with the difficulties of keeping so demo-
cratic a body in order than he had perhaps con-
ceived, or than his broad, plain physiognomy
would have seemed to indicate. The unimaginable.
turbulence of the early meetings of the Assembly
used to bewilder him, and the nervous and unpre-
meditated way in which he would ring the large
hand-bell with which he was furnished, (and it was
his only resource,) used to render confusion more
confounded. One day the tongue of the bell gave
way in his efforts to restore order; and that incident
did more towards the desired effect, by creating a
laugh, than his most claborate efforts would have
effected. As the Revolution had repeatedly been
pronounced social rather than political, the nomina-
tion of M. Buchez, himself a sort of mystic Socialist,
was calculated to give a certain degree of satisfac-
tion to those who looked for social modifications in
society; while his well-known studious, religious,
and humane character, took away the alarm with
OTHER OFFICERS ELECTED.
27
which those who viewed all classes of Socialists
with fear and dread, might have regarded so im-
portant a nomination.
The Vice-Presidents, Secretaries, and Quæsteurs,
were chiefly taken from the more moderate Republican
section, which, it is now unnecessary to repeat,
means here the party represented by the National.
0 2
28
THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT.
CHAPTER III.
THE MEMBERS OF THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT-
OF CRE-
THEIR REPORTS-LAMARTINE-PORTRAIT
MIEUX OF LOUIS BLANC-OF CARNOT.
K
ON Saturday the 6th of May, after a considerable
number of elections had been verified, the members
of the Provisional Government proceeded each to
render an account of his stewardship. Owing to
the extreme age of M. Dupont de l'Eure, the Pre-
sident of the Council, M. de Lamartine undertook to
read what purported to be the general report of the
head of the Government. The style, however, betrayed
the real author. Having described the Revolution
as the act of the people, the orator proceeded to
state, that their first idea was to restore order in
Paris; in which work, that would have been difficult
or meritorious in any other country, they had been
aided by that magnanimous people, who, with the
one hand having overturned Royalty, raised with
DUPONT DE L'EURE'S REPORT.
29
the other the wounded and vanquished, protected
the life and property of the inhabitants, and pre-
served the public monuments. Posterity, he said,
which did not flatter, would not be able to find
expression equal to the dignity of the people of
Paris. It was the people who had inspired the first
decree of the Provisional Government-the abolition
of capital punishment for political offences.
"France and Europe comprehended that God
revealed his inspirations in the crowd, and that a
Revolution, inaugurated by greatness of soul, would
be pure as an idea, magnanimous as a sentiment,
holy as a virtue."
And this was said, notwithstanding that the
Palais Royal had been sacked, its treasures of art
destroyed; that the post of municipal guards of
the Chateau d'Eau, opposite the Palais Royal, had
been burned, and the sixty-five municipal guards
roasted and suffocated; that the Palace of Neuilly
had been sacked and burned to the ground, and a
mass of incendiaries, who had polluted the bed-
rooms of the Queen and Princesses, died, surfeited,
in the cellars; that the chateau of M. de Rothschild
at Suresne, worth 50,000l., had been wantonly
destroyed; and that attempts had been made to
set the Tuileries on fire.
"We have founded," said the orator, "the Re-
public; a form of Government declared to be impos-
30
sible in France, on any other conditions than those
of war abroad, civil war, anarchy, the prisons and
the scaffold. We have exhibited the Republic hap-
pily compatible with European peace, with national
peace, with voluntary order, with individual liberty,
with the gentleness and serenity of manners of a
nation, in whose eyes hatred is a punishment, and
harmony a natural instinct."
This was said nine days only before the invasion of
the Chamber, followed by the insurrection of June.
Want of foresight may be pardonable; but what
follows?
ITS DELUSIVE STATEMENTS.
"We have passed forty-five days without any
other executive force than that of moral authority,
entirely disarmed, but condescendingly recognized
by the nation, and the people allowed itself to be
governed by words, by our counsels, by its own
generous inspiration.'
And this was gravely uttered, notwithstanding
the two conspiracies of the 17th of March and the
16th of April; the first of which had failed through
misconception, and the second, baffled by the
promptitude and energy of General Changarnier.
Such statements read now most strangely, and show
the magnitude of the delusion under which all
laboured at the moment when they were not only
credited, but received with acclamation.
The moment is not opportune for judging M. de
رو
LEDRU-ROLLIN'S REPORT.
31
Lamartine, yet we are not far from the fitting time;
for revolutions either stamp their men with the seal
of immortal glory, or reject them rapidly: in the
moments of a nation's crisis much time is not
allowed for weighing and balancing doubtful merit.
M. Ledru-Rollin succeeded M. de Lamartine,
and for the present we shall confine ourselves to
a brief review of the topics he addressed to his audi-
tory. Having declared that he had always been a
Republican, he proceeded at once to justify his
having sent commissioners, armed with unlimited
powers, into the departments, for the purpose of
innoculating the country with Republican ideas.
This measure had fearfully damaged the Minister
of the Interior, and he felt the necessity of explain-
ing it as one of conciliation, and not as it had been
regarded-a reminiscence of the Convention. He
then took credit for his laborious administration,
and appealed to his successful reconstruction of the
national guards and the police, the creation of the
garde mobile, and the organization of universal
suffrage, as affording the best replics to what he
called the infamous calumnies of which he had
been the object. While he proclaimed his Repub-
lican principles, he yet avowed himself a lover of
order, and took credit for having called out the
national guard on the 16th of April. In conclusion,
he touched on the delicate ground of Socialism,
32
CREMIEUX'S REPORT.
saying that the Revolution should not be considered
a barren conquest of political forms. These forms
were but an instrument for realizing, in the social
order, the dogma of equality and fraternity.
The report of M. Ledru-Rollin, of which the fore-
going is the substance, was read by that gentleman
with excessive vehemence, and was received with un-
sympathizing coldness.
j)
The portly and rather prematurely corpulent
M. Ledru-Rollin, who had succeeded the slim,
graceful, and ideal form of Lamartine, was followed
by the unprepossessing Crémieux, (of Jewish
birth,) Minister of Justice, the very expression
of an avocat, whose factitious warmth could rise
with the amount of his fees, and on whose face and
bearing, the professional necessity of adulation to
courts and juries had stamped an artificial bon-
hommie, which offspring of cunning, as it were, dis-
armed any disposition to hostility. The habit of
seeking to exercise influence by look and voice, does
become influence eventually. With the easy assur-
ance of one habituated to extemporaneous effusion,
he quickly abandoned his written report, and in an
unembarrassed, colloquial fashion, described the
good deeds of his ministry. Now, these good deeds
might be resolved into two that were very bad. He
audaciously violated the principle of the permanency
of judges, justly regarded, under well-regulated go-
CREMIEUX'S EXORDIUM.
vernment, as the best security for their independence;
and he excited a ferment throughout the length and
breadth of the land by an intimation of his intention
to facilitate divorce. Apologizing for the first and
main branch of his administration regarding the
magistracy, he dwelt upon the corruption of the
monarchy, which had, he alleged, inseparably bound
up politics with the administration of justice. With-
out stopping to inquire into the truth of his asser-
tions, it must yet be said, that, of all the audacious
usurpations of the Provisional Government, antici-
patory of rights belonging to the National Assembly,
this violation of the magistracy was one of the most
unjustifiable; but for a moment it was allowed, like
all the rest, to pass. It is right to notice, that
M. Crémicux's exordium, like M. Ledru-Rollin's
peroration, contained a Socialist flourish, for he
described the first duty of the Republic to be the
providing of the instruments of labour for all mem-
bers of the community; another mode of expressing
le droit du travail, the consequences involved in which
were in all probability but little suspected by the
avocat at the time, and only uttered because the
Revolution had, at the very moment of its achieve-
ment, taken a Socialist form. It behoved the
Minister of Justice to make profession of the new
faith; and he did so, like many a hasty convert
33
c 3
34
at the sword's point, without understanding very
clearly what he was about.
The true hero of this day's scene, M. Louis Blanc,
ascended the tribune next. The true hero, because
the truly dangerous man. Figure to yourself a
very small person--the very smallest you had ever
seen above the species of the dwarf. With his
back turned to you; you would be inclined to
suppose that the glossy black hair and drooping
shoulders belonged to a girl in male disguise; the
face turned round, you were struck by the promi-
nent, clear, dark eyes, the olive complexion, and
the disappearance of effeminacy in the strong jaw
and chin. The general expression was rather
melancholy. Had you heard of him only as the
author of the "Histoire des Dix Ans," a book so
polished and so piquant, of such lively narration,
such sparkling antithesis, such finished portraiture,
you would rather have believed that you had a
hero of the salons, than the president of the dele-
gates of workmen-the evil genius of the Revolution.
The work which formed Louis Blanc's title to a
seat at the table of the Provisional Government was
probably, in the minds of Lamartine and Marrast,
the elegant satire that had done so much to under-
mine and discredit Louis-Philippe and his family ;
but the work which gave him credit in the eyes of the
LOUIS BLANC.
(૮
HIS ORGANISATION DU TRAVAIL.”
35
working classes, and on which he himself took his
stand, was a brochure, unknown or forgotten by the
republic of letters, on the organization of labour.
It has been said that Louis Blanc possesses the
sensuality and sensibility of the southern races, with
a deep-seated pride that induces him rather to
shrink from the society of gross men; that he is
touched with misanthropy, and little respects the
masses whose champion he became. Such incon-
sistencies find their explanation in marked sensi-
bility and deep-seated ambition. It is not the
philosophical temperament; and no man can be less
a philosopher than the ardent apostle of a new
society. The "Organisation du travail" is a true
picture of the author's mind. His analysis of the
composition of society, his painful statistics of
beggary, prostitution, ill-regulated labour, of lives
closed in hospitals--all this is in the most painfully
fascinating style of narration; the cry that rises
from his pierced soul against society thrills through
the reader; but there stops the part of the
inquirer.
paki
When he comes to reconstruct that which he
has knocked down, when he essays to remould
the materials that lie molten in the furnace of his
fiery indignation, the poverty of his invention
becomes apparent; he stops short, incapable of
36
HIS VIEW OF SOCIAL EVILS
advancing into the pure regions of philosophic
thought. He may invoke justice, but cannot apply
it. Tracing all the evils of society to one cause,
only one cause, he proposes to eradicate them,
although society should come tumbling down, by
the removal of an essential part of its foundation.
That one cause is competition, or concurrence.
Competitors can never be fairly matched in society,
because of the advantages inherently appertaining to
capital that is to say, the man who brings much
money to the working of a factory or trade, must
crush the rival who brings but little. A great quantity
of money in the hands of a man, or company of
men, secures for that man or company an actual
monopoly. The labouring man, who has no money
or capital, is placed by his necessities at the mercy
of those who have; so that slavery, although
banished from modern society, exists in fact under
a disguised form. According to this view, society
is a system of strife and contest, in which the
strong devour the weak, through a horrible com-
petition, which divides the whole into two classes;
the new aristocracy of finance, called bourgeoisie,
and the proletaires, whom they hold in serfage.
As competition could not exist without capital,
M. Louis Blanc would, if he could not destroy
capital, at least neutralize its effect by making it the
+
37
duty of the State to provide the working classes
with the instruments of labour; in other words, by
making the State find capital through a popular
system of credit. As, for example, instead of a
factory being under the direction of a moneyed
employer, it should be worked by the men, not
longer the employés of another, but on their own
personal account, the State supplying the means.
But this is not all, for inasmuch as concurrence or
competition would still exist, the State should
interfere once more so to regulate prices, as that no
one social establishment should outsell another, or
be outsold by rival capitalists. In aid of the
general plan, he would oblige the working people
to live together, mess together, amuse themselves
together, have schools, infirmaries, and all necessary
institutions attached to their several factories, on a
perfect footing of equality and fraternity, and con-
trive exchanges between one sort of manufactured
articles and another, so as to make the social
machine, in a great degree, work itself.
AND HIS REMEDY.
M
Taking for granted that he had thus destroyed
competition on the whole, the discovery is made
that competition may yet exist individually; for it
would so happen, that in these new monasteries
one man would be stronger than another, or be
brighter or more ingenious; would it be just that
the share falling to the skilful or industrious should
38
OBJECTIONS TO HIS SCHEME.
not be more than that claimed by the dull or the
lazy? To this objection the author boldly answers,
by affirming perfect equality in wages, laying it
down as an axiom, held generally by Communists,
that each should be paid according to his wants,
and not according to the quantity of his production.
But, it was asked, how could you force a man
of strength and industry to put forth his powers,
and weary himself with toil, when he would be
deprived of the stimulus of reward, and see the
indifferent as well remunerated as himself? This
question was pressed hard upon M. Blanc at one of
the meetings of Delegates at the Luxembourg, and
his answer betrayed a simplicity becoming a recluse,
rather than a practical philosopher. He would, he
said, have conspicuously inscribed on a placard
that the "idler is a robber," le paresseux est un
voleur. The whole plan, therefore, rested on two
pillars-the State taking the place of the capitalist,
and the most perfect individual honour of self-
denial; or upon human nature, different from
what human nature has ever been known to be-
upon human nature deprived of the natural stimulus
to exercise its powers by the invention of reward.
As the object is here to make an expository state-
ment rather than an argument, the objections to this
scheme are not fully noticed. They are, however,
sufficiently apparent.
HIS APPEARANCE IN THE ASSEMBLY.
39
When M. Louis Blanc made his appearance at
the tribune of the National Assembly, it was not
so much the author that fixed attention as the
It
man of active, effective, pernicious influence.
was generally believed that he had, by his doc-
trines, at the Luxembourg, turned the heads of the
working classes; and he was strongly suspected of
having been implicated in the conspiracy of April.
He was looked upon as a dangerous fanatic, pre-
pared to carry out his views at all hazards. Had a
serpent reared its crest at the tribune, it could have
hardly excited more fear and aversion, than did that
juvenile-looking man, with shining, well-brushed
hair, and fashionable blue coat, glittering with
bright buttons, and for whose accommodation a
stool had to be introduced, to raise him to a
level with his audience. Material circumstances
influence even oratorical effects. French orators
habitually employ much gesticulation; but as it
would not be safe to gesticulate upon a stool, the
little man was constrained to preserve throughout
the same stiff attitude. His voice was loud and
clear, but monotonous; so that the whole effect was
that of a recitation of an exercise, learned by rote,
and delivered by a youth at a public examination.
Nor were encouraging friends wanting. A cele-
brated lady, of known Communist opinions, as
remarkable for the brilliant beauty of her style,
40
LOUIS BLANC'S ADDRESS.
as the corrupting laxity of her sentiments, sat
conspicuously in the front of the gallery, wearing
broad, red ribbons, as a sign of her sympathy with
the République Rouge. There was something of a
provoking character in the well-assumed fierceness
of tone and aspect, with which the orator faced the
Assembly. Referring to the proclamation of the
Republic, he told them that the people had pro-
claimed it before them; and so far from seeking to
win favour by deference or insinuation, he looked
and spoke as if he held the force of the revolution
in his small hand, and could, and would, let loose.
the destroying storm on the Assembly, should it
not respond to popular expectation.
The contrast between M. Ledru-Rollin and Louis
Blanc, so far as personal appearance was concerned,
was striking enough. But the burly appearance of
the former his frowns and threats, failed to indi-
cate strength of purpose, or overbearing will. Not
so the latter. The slight person was one who could
not be smiled at, for there was expressed subtlety,
daring ambition, and unflinching determination.
Of mingled French and Corsican blood, there stood
before the Assembly a Communist-Bonaparte, ready
to perpetrate another 18th Brumaire-to carry out
the policy of a Robespierre.
The address of Louis Blanc was a reproach. He
began by referring to the demand made by the
P
LOUIS BLANC'S ADDRESS.
41
people on the Place de Grève, immediately after the
Revolution of February, who, with the drapeau
waving over their heads, on which was inscribed
Organisation du Travail, demanded the creation
of a Ministère du Progrès-that was to say, an
administration devoted to the study of the Labour
Question; or, in point of fact, an administration
charged with the task of carrying into execution
Louis Blanc's own plans for the organisation of
labour, such as we have already sketched them from
his book. But to return to the orator: he proceeded
to say, that the Provisional Government, not feeling
itself authorised to create a new administration-an
act properly belonging to the National Assembly—
decided upon appointing a Commission for the
working classes, which should hold its sittings at
the Luxembourg, under the direction of his noble
friend, the workman, Albert, and himself. He
then summed up the difficulties they had to
encounter in presence of men whose hopes had been
so violently excited, and which they had no means
of meeting; but it became clear, through the hints
he threw out, that the Assembly could not escape
the promises that had been made to the working
classes. Having glanced at the fraternal associa-
tion of tailors that had been installed in the debtors"
prison of the Rue de Clichy, and which was
intended to be the practical commencement of the
42
CITIZEN CARNOT.
system prescribed in his work on the " Organisa-
tion du Travail"-an experiment that, by the way,
proved a melancholy failure-the orator announced
that the inquiries made at the Luxembourg, had
for result, that the whole scheme which would be
communicated to the Assembly, embracing industry,
commerce, agriculture, colonies, and taxation, would
be found to rest on two grand bases: Association,
and the tutelary intervention of the State. This
statement was received with marked coldness. The
conclusion did not startle by its novelty, for it was
precisely that of the "Organisation du Travail,"
the contents of which had already been read and
judged.
Citizen Carnot, Minister of Public Instruction,
next rose.
Carnot, the son of the member of the
Committee of Public Safety, the 'Organiser of Vic-
tories,' as he was called by Napoleon, bore a great
republican name. He was a cold, ascetic-looking
man, of a fair, pale complexion, and somewhat bald.
M. Carnot read his Report in a shy, unpretending
manner. Although his appearance was not calcu-
lated to excite suspicion of violence of temperament,
or of extravagance of mind, yet there was a strong
feeling of prejudice against him, founded upon an
electioneering circular that he had addressed to the
heads of colleges, and other educational institutions,
in which he broached the odd doctrine-coming
HIS EDUCATIONAL NOTIONS.
43
from such a Minister, and to such men that
education did not necessarily qualify a man to
be a representative of the people. To make the
inconsistency more complex, he recommended the
poor, ill-requited provincial Instituteur to stand as
candidates. But the political object at which the
Minister aimed, or seemed to aim, would have been
equally accomplished in either case; for illiterate
men, who could not make speeches, and who would
become the submissive tools of ministers, and
schoolmasters looking for promotion, who could not
think of thwarting the Minister of Public Instruc-
tion, would have equally served the purpose of the
party who were ambitious of governing the Republic.
As if for the purpose of removing the evil effect of
the circular in question, the Minister began by
professing respect for the Clergy, and declared that
he felt "strongly convinced in his conscience, that
belief in God is the very principle of all serious
faith in the grandeur of human destiny." He then
struck out a plan of reform, such as he conceived
became necessary to put education in harmony with
Republican Institutions; for he considered, that as
the offices of the State should henceforward be
thrown open to all classes of the people without
reserve, so should all be instructed in a manner to
fit them for public employments. Education should,
according to the principles involved in this scheme,
44
M. BETHMONT.
assume a political form, and political instruction be
made to predominate in academic teaching.
The Minister of Agriculture and Commerce next
read his Report; but as M. Bethmont resigned
very soon after, on account of ill-health, there is no
necessity for noticing a gentleman, whose brief
career has left no trace; the more especially as his
Report opened no great question of speculation or
practice. It was confined and technical.
With that Report, terminated the proceedings of
the day.
GARNIER PAGES.
CHAPTER IV.
45
GARNIER PAGES-ARAGO-MARIE, THE REAL AUTHOR
OF THE NATIONAL ATELIERS-LAMARTINE-BERAN-
MOUN-
GERA PARLIAMENTARY HURRICANE-THE
TAIN' AND BARBES-THE HISTORY OF THE CONSPIRA-
GOVERNMENT DECLARED
TORS—THE PROVISIONAL
TO HAVE MERITED WELL OF THEIR COUNTRY.
THE adjourned meeting of the National Assembly
on Monday, the 8th of May, proved highly inte-
resting and curious. It became the turn of M. Gar-
nier Pagès, the Finance Minister of the Provisional
Government, to tell what feats he had performed.
This M. Garnier Pagès had been an agent de
change or broker, who on the death of his brother,
a republican member of some celebrity, was elected
his successor to the vacant seat. He is a tall, thin,
and somewhat sickly-looking man, with small yet
clumsy features, a little pert, and yet a little prim,
while his sleek hair falling in curls to the nape of
46
HIS FINANCIAL STATEMENT.
the neck, gives to the whole physiognomy a fan-
tastic expression. He is what he looks, presump-
tuous and shallow, and yet not morose nor unkind.
A man who would not cause individual ruin, but
not a man to save a state. His address was very
long, very elaborate, and cast into divisions or
chapters, with appropriate headings in a business-
like fashion.
He laboured to prove, that the systematic corrup-
tion of the monarchy was conducting the country to
an abyss, from which it had been saved by the
Republic. The preceding speakers had taken a
more or less socialist view of the Revolution; but
M. Garnier Pagès saw in it, merely a reaction
against corruption. It was thus that he became
the expression of the République modérée et honnête.
He opposed successfully the scheme of M. Ledru-
Rollin for a return to assignats, because he could
not see any deeper change effected by the Republic,
than a departure from corrupt practices. So little
derangement did he contemplate, that he ventured
to make a financial statement with the calm,
satisfied air of a Chancellor of the Exchequer, in
times the most untroubled; and showed that, at the
end of the year 1848, a year to be marked apart
in the great chronicle of the world's history, there
would be a very respectable surplus of some eleven
millions of francs in the national Treasury. No
C
47
FRANÇOIS ARAGO's report.
one ventured to probe this statement, to ask
questions, or to throw out doubts; and although it
was not possible that such a statement could have
been swallowed, yet it was allowed to pass, for the
apparent reason, that any soothing mystification
was welcome; and proof was soon afforded, by
the votes that placed this gentleman in the Execu-
tive Commission, that optimism at such a moment
was the best of parliamentary virtues.
After M. Garnier Pagès, there ascended the tri-
bune a man in all respects his opposite, the vener-
able François Arago, who detailed what he had
done as Minister of War and Minister of Marine,
to place the forces of the country in a position
to meet the eventualities that might arise out of the
gencral state of perturbation into which Europe had
been thrown. The account, so far as related to the
army, was formidable enough; but that which was
left out of consideration was, after all, the serious
point,-viz., the heavy military burthen which the
country had incurred rendered nugatory the fine
flourishes in which the Finance Minister had just
been indulging. A country thrown into such a
state as France had been, with commerce arrested,
trade stopped, enterprize paralyzed, and industry
languishing, without credit abroad or confidence at
home, might feel happy in regarding the aspect of
her military strength; but on reflection must have
48
FRANÇOIS ARAGO.
discovered that the test was ruinous.
We have,
however, more to do with the speaker than with the
subject. François Arago is a fine, stalwart old man,
tall, dark and sinewy; his head is magnificent, and
when he is seated by other men, its vast size strikes
with astonishment amounting to awe. Standing
alone, this great development of head is not so
remarkable, because it is symmetrical, for no
object of fine symmetry ever strikes the eye as dis-
proportioned; this noble dome is furnished with thin
hair, once jetty black, and not yet grey; the large
eye is bold and thoughtful; the features massive
and well shaped, and altogether Arago looks a man
of iron frame and great intellectual power.
padd
His history is full of mistakes, as must ever be
that of a man marked out so unmistakeably by
Providence for one great object--and that object
the interpretation of the mysteries of Nature's most
sublime work,-who must needs turn aside to bend his
knee to the pitiful idols of human passion or folly.
Why should an Arago desert the Observatory for
the Chamber? Why leave the telescope for the
lorgnette, through which to read the mysteries of
ministerial benches. Nature denied him the gift
of speech. He who could plunge into the
infinity of space, and take his pupils along with
him, was forbidden the tribune. Scientific eloquence
sank into dribbling political bavardage. The whole
FRANÇOIS ARAGO.
49
of Arago's political life, had only served to make him
a great prize for a pack of revolutionists, whom he
soon learend to despise. Any one who doubted
that his eyes had been opened, as by a great shock,
needed only to look at his dejected aspect. What
an inheritance had he not, we will not say sold,
but perilled for a mess of potage? Only think of
this sage being obliged to plead his grey hairs to
Louis Blanc, and implore that the latter would not
expose, as he was doing by his conduct at the Hôtel-
de-Ville, his throat to the knife of the mob; and
yet there was not a particle of cowardice in that
energetic soul. When we hear of some bold act
done at a critical moment by the Government, be
sure that it was inspired by Arago. More than
once has he taken a ruffian mob leader by the collar,
and paralyzed his wicked intentions. At the Hôtel-
de-Ville he announced his readiness to descend into
the street, and do battle with the Red Republic.
He was the first member of the Government to
mount the barricades in June.
When a young
man he was made prisoner by Barbary corsairs,
while engaged on a scientific expedition, a romantic
adventure full of peril, which probably endeared
many a forgotten romance to his memory, for
before the age of Edgeworth and Scott, the Barbary
corsair was the great resource of all romancers in
difficulty. This event, mayhap, gave him that
VOL. I.
D
W
50
ATELIERS NATIONAUX.
mingled love of action and science, such as might
seize a surgeon who had assisted at a campaign. It
was not fortunate for his fame. Whenever Arago
thought to aid a party move, he covered himself
with as much unenviable wonder as did Newton,
when he wrote commentaries on the book of Daniel.
On the fortifications-of-Paris question, Arago not
only gave to the cannons of the surrounding forts
an impossible range, but he filled the trenches with
water from impossible sources, and destroyed the
advanced works of an enemy with showers of small
rain; such freaks and more could be forgiven a man
like Arago; and if his name served, in the first
instance, to give lustre and power to a mob-made
Provisional Government, his prompt disdain, and
deep mournful condemnation served subsequently the
cause of order by the influence of his great exam-
ple-that order for which, he observed, that he
could offer himself a martyr. May the close of his
life be devoted to science, and be as glorious as
untroubled!
M. Maric, the Minister of Public Works, came
next. This gentleman it was who had organized
the Ateliers Nationaux, which furnished the insur-
gent soldiers of June, and not Louis Blanc, as has
been erroneously supposed. The national work-
shops were a necessity of the times, and not the
commencement of a communist plan. The Revolu-
kada
ATELIERS NATIONAUX.
51
tion had, as an inevitable consequence, caused a
temporary stoppage of works of all kinds. Com-
merce was struck with paralysis, trade had ceased,
the mills stopped, and ordinary business came to
a stand still. The work people were thrown out of
employment in thousands, and as they must be
fed, and it would be an indignity to offer them
charity, it became necessary to find employment.
As the State was not prepared to order watches
from watchmakers, rings, and chains, and neck-
laces, and bracelets from jewellers, as it could
in fact only set men to dig, all the work-
people were furnished with spades, pick-axes and
wheel-barrows. It would be cruel to task house-
hold servants, working jewellers, or those whose soft
hands would bleed at such toil, and if persisted in be
rendered unfitted for their former avocations; the
inspector, therefore, winked at idleness; the example
of tolerated idleness became infectious, the workmen
passing their day in talking, joking, amusing them-
selves, and discussing licentious papers, found life
so agreeable, that even when private employment
offered, they would not take it. The very form of
organization of these Ateliers was vicious. It
was military. The men were assembled in brigades
and companies under officers. They marched to
work preceded by banners, and having passed the
day in the manner described, they proved in the
v 2
52
MARIE.
evening how much their imaginations had been
affected by the military regime, for they spent the
long summer evening at ball practice, and when
this pleasing occupation was over, the pensioned
Sybarites would club together and return home in
carriages. The head-quarters, or état-major of this
army of travailleurs set the example of licentious-
ness; so that the city of Paris had to witness the
dangerous spectacle of a surrounding army of idling
people, pensioned by the State, learning ball prac-
tice and drill, with the certainty that there were
active demagogues and agents of revolt amongst
them, preparing for an invasion as perilous as that
of the barbarians who destroyed Rome.
M. Marie was not blind to these dangers. Having
drawn a picture of the sufferings of the working
classes, and of the insufficiency of the Mairies to
afford relief, he mentioned that the idea of employ-
ing all on some common work, gave rise to the
National Ateliers. "I know," said he, "the ob-
jections that are raised against them; that consi-
derable sums of money are swallowed up without
profit, that the workman is acquiring injurious
habits;" but on the other hand, he knew the
quantity of misery that had been relieved. Still he
did not deceive himself: it was no longer Ateliers,
but an army of workmen that had grown up, yet it
was an army that, enjoying all the rights of citizens,
B
MARIE.
53
universal suffrage, and membership of the National
Guard was political, resigned and friendly to order.
Ateliers had also been opened for women, and
worked well."
M. Marie was a distinguished advocate, who had
been frequently employed by the National news-
paper, to defend it against Crown prosecutions for
libel. It was to his successful speeches on these
occasions, that he owed his rude and loose election
on the 24th of February, to be one of the Provi-
sional Government. The line of defence that he
used to take for the National on trial for libel, was
as singular as efficacious. He would make copious
quotations from the most vigorous opposition
speeches, delivered at times of the greatest party
heat in the British House of Commons, and repro-
duced with added bitterness of commentary in the
British Press. He would take the trials for libel
in British Courts of Justice: show how great was
the licence allowed by constitutional lawyers and
judges; dwell on the love of liberty that signalized
Englishmen, show how their respect for law had
been increased by freedom in expression of opinion,
and challenge French jurymen to mark that they
were not less lovers of such liberty than their Saxon
neighbours. As it was generally the case, that the
incriminated articles looked pale by the side of
54
LAMARTINE.
M. Marie's judicious specimens of blunt speech, the
jury would feel themselves piqued into acquittal.
This gentleman's manner and appearance are
more English than French. He has a fine bald
head with a copious fringe of curly sandy hair, the
only approach to the golden lock in an Assembly,
which cannot boast one red head. His features are
blunt and bold, but nevertheless refined. His dress
is always neat, and his high white neckcloth raises.
his chin in a stiff quakerly fashion. His action is
free from the redundant gesticulation, so much
indulged in by French orators; and he looks what
he is, a firm, intelligent gentleman.
We have now before us M. de Lamartine going
to speak in his own name, or rather to read; and
as regards M. de Lamartine, the distinction is worth
making. When this gentleman puts on a pair of
little black spectacles, and droops his shoulders, with
which expressive action he is forced to read, he is an
old man.
While delivering an harangue with his
shoulders thrown back, his arm extended, his grace-
ful figure like marble set on its socle, his voice of
trumpet-like sonorousness vibrating through the ears.
of his audience, he is ever young. The written address
was very fine; but so necessary is it to captivate
attention by appropriate action, that yielding to his
own weariness as much as to the flagging attention
"
HIS DIPLOMACY.
55
of the Assembly, he skipped over considerable por-
tions of his review of the foreign policy of the
Government, throwing out comfortable assurances,
that all would be found next day in the Moniteur.
His description of that policy amounted to a grand,
and if true, sublime self-abnegation on the part of
France, which renounced all ideas of territorial
aggrandizement, yet incurred the incumbrance of
an armed diplomacy for the pure purpose of coun-
tenancing the efforts of the democratic idea in
other countries. That attitude alone had produced
all the consequences of armed interference, and it
was, he said, for the first time in history, that a
principle disarmed and purely spiritual, presented
itself to Europe, organized, armed, and allied for
a different principle, and that the political world
became shaken and modified of itself, before the
power, not of a nation, but of an idea. The vague-
ness of M. de Lamartine's diplomatic circular, was
reproduced in his speech; and for this vagueness
he has been much blamed. An English statesman,
patriot, or demagogue thinks of England;
German thinks of Fatherland; an Italian of Italy;
but a Frenchman thinks of all the world. As soon
as the Revolution of February took place, there
was hardly a Frenchman who did not declare war
to be unavoidable; not that the least apprehension
was felt on the score of invasion by a coalition, but
a
56
FRENCH PROPAGANDISM.
because France would feel herself bound, according
to her own code of honour, to carry her Koran in
one hand, and her sword in the other, that all
people might taste of the doctrinal blessings of
liberty, equality, and fraternity, and all Kings and
Rulers, who would stand in the way, be smitten to
the earth for the glory of the Gaul.
In respect of what M. de Lamartine calls "ideas,"
a term significant enough to the minds of his
countrymen, the French are at once Quixotic and
intolerant. A Communist, a Socialist, or political
discoverer of any kind, as soon as he has persuaded
himself that his Utopia is realizable, thinks that he is
justified in taking gun and sword, and carrying
his views into execution by force. What political
sects think and feel with regard to their own ideas,
the whole nation felt as regarded their revolution
in relation to neighbouring states. When M. de
Lamartine, therefore, preached that the Revolution
would, by its own inherent beauty, attract worship-
pers from all countries, and force its way morally,
he was doing service to the cause of humanity and
peace, for which the rest of the world has not given
him sufficient credit.
It would not do for M. de Lamartine to talk
like an Englishman or a German, for, in order to
acquire influence over his countrymen, he must
not merely speak as they speak, but he must think
ATTITUDE OF FRANCE.
57
and feel as they do. It is not by breaking with his
countrymen upon an idea which has taken strong
hold of their minds, that he could retain an
ascendancy, but by presenting the same idea in a
new and more beautiful light, and advancing it
further than it had ever been advanced before.
Had it not been for M. de Lamartine, there would
not have been presented a fascinating and elevating
lure from the vulgar, and yet all-captivating project
of a double invasion of Italy and Germany; nor
could he break altogether from a prospect which he
perhaps abhorred; and so, while he spoke of the
moral effects produced by the Revolution, and drew
a dazzling panorama of the happily infectious march
of the principles of February through all the realms
of Italy-through all the various provinces of the
Austrian empire-and through the old states
of the Germanic confederation; while he showed
ideas, bearing the name of France, invading the
greater portion of Europe, he yet painted this same
France as animated at once by a democratic and
sympathetic principle, with one hand upon the
rights of the people, and the other upon what
he called "the inaggressive faisceau of four armies
of observation, regarding this movement of the
continent, without ambition as without weakness,
ready to negociate or combat, according as her
D 3
58 LAMARTINE'S IDEAL REVOLUTION
right, her honour, or the security of her frontiers
might demand."
Here again he touched upon a delicate subject in
speaking of the frontiers of France-those frontiers
that had been narrowed as the Empire crumbled,
until in 1814, there was no frontier but what
had been traditionally regarded as such, and which
in 1815 had been narrowed, so as to hurt pride
and inflict humiliation. M. de Lamartine had laid
it down that the treaties of 1815 had been can-
celled. Then there should be war? No, not at
all there should be patient negociation, based on
right and justice; but in the meantime, there was
this ennobling consolation:
"Her frontiers! I use a word that has lost a
portion of its signification. Under the Republic, it
is the democratic and fraternal principle that
becomes the veritable frontier of France. (Applause.)
It is not her soil that extends-it is her influence-
it is her sphere of radiance and of attraction upon
the continent-it is the number of her natural
allics-it is the disinterested and intellectual
patronage that she shall exercise upon the people-
it is the French system, in fine, that has been
substituted in three days, and in three months, for
the system of the holy alliance. The Republic has
comprehended, from the first moment, the new policy
TRANSITORY.
59
that the philosophy, the humanity, the reason of
the age ought to inaugurate by the bands of our
country amongst nations. I would ask no other
proof that democracy has had her divine inspira-
tion, and that she shall triumph in Europe as
rapidly and gloriously as she has triumphed in
Paris. France will have changed the character of
her glory-voilà tout !''
Such was the glorious ideal that the poet, orator,
statesman had figured to himself. If he did not
believe in it himself, it should be regarded as the
nicest and most perfect piece of subtle tact ever
presented to a people. All the attractions that war
ever had were stripped for the embellishment of
peace. The latent craving was still gratified by the
aspect of the sword glittering in the light of law.
Those who worshipped glory were still invited to the
shrine, there to find unveiled a new divinity of
hitherto uncomprehended beauty. Alas! the poet
was too credulous; the prophet, as usual, was to
end in the martyr; the sweet words that enchanted
the ear, and shed harmony over the soul, could not
transform the deep corruptions that were but
stilled, not subdued into holy desires and lofty
sentiments. Yet the good that was done by M.
de Lamartine ought never to be forgotten. He
flung golden balls in the path of the impetuous
racers to the armory of war; and if the trivial,
60
BÉRANGER.
but somewhat familiar metaphor might be used
for sake of more perfect comprehension of meaning,
we would say that never was such " a test thrown
the while" to amuse and distract the dangerous.
monster, and give time for security, as was that
magnificent scheme of policy, traced in such
luminous language by the greatest master of
phraseology of our times.
Although the statement of M. de Lamartine had
the disadvantage of being read, it yet produced a
great effect. The venerable Dupont de l'Eure rose
from his scat, and embraced him like a son, amidst
general expressions of admiration. Lamartine was
at that moment at the apogée of his Republican fame;
but, instead of the Assembly being allowed to retire
impressed with his rich diction, it was to happen
that they were to part affected, perhaps afflicted, by
one of those vulgar storms, that became afterwards
of too frequent recurrence.
We must pause to notice an incident that found
its place between the oration and the storm. The
President announced that he had received a letter
from the citizen Béranger, which he had no doubt
would afflict them. He resigned his seat, on the
ground that neither his meditations nor his studies
had fitted him for the part of representative. The
Assembly refused to accept the poet's resignation,
which, however, even such a mark of esteem could
BÉRANGER.
61
not induce him to withdraw. Some thought that
the privileged old man had been coquetting; yet, to
those who had watched him, his resolution was evi-
dently sincere. Béranger was not in his place in
such a crowd: as he said himself, he was never at
home except when chatting with a few friends.
There was something exceedingly winning in the
aspect of Béranger. He dresses in a plain, homely
fashion. His head was a fine bald one.
His eyes
(and it was a pity) were hidden by large green
goggles, from under which peeped a glowing, funny
little nose, that well became a smiling, gracious
mouth, beaming with kindliness and pleasant hu-
mour. Why should a mouth, overflowing with
mellifluous good things, turn, after half a century
of song, to political haranguing? It would not do,
and Béranger felt it would not do; and he wisely
took himself to his own little snug temple, identified
with fancies, and dreams, and visitings from crea-
tures very shy and reserved in their favours. Yet
how the old man was sought after and listened to,
and how restlessly he would turn on his seat, and
quit it, to seek Lamennais or some other old friend,
with whom to whisper in a corner, until at length
he slipped away, and would not return!
It is M. Dornès who is in possession of the tri-
bune-M. Dornès, destined to fall, a few weeks
after, in the Insurrection of June. He lauded the
DORNÈS' PROPOSAL.
addresses that had been heard; so far so well. He
moved that those who read them had, by their con-
duct, deserved well of their country: nothing better;
the cheers were unanimous. He thought that the
sovereignty of the Assembly should be exercised
through a delegation of five members, forming an
executive Commission of Government, until such
time as the Constitution should be formed. There
was no sign of opposition; but when he proceeded
to give the names of the five whom he undertook to
propose, there was a burst of disapprobation. "Let
me read the names." "No, no." "No names."
62
They are, Lamartine, Francis Arago." ("No
names! no names !") "Ledru-Rollin, Garnier Pagès,
and Marie.”—(Shouts of disapprobation.) The Pre-
sident himself could not obtain a moment's atten-
tion. At length the aged Dupont de l'Eure suc-
ceeded in getting a little silence, when he gently
reproved his friend, M. Dornès, for compromising
names. M. Dornès felt nettled, and attempted to
assert the parliamentary propriety of his conduct.
He declared that the liberty of the tribune had been
infringed upon the noise and confusion became
tremendous. M. Dornès was about to leave the tri-
bune, when other members, tempted by the pro-
mised vacancy, rushed to get possession of the place
as soon as it should be unoccupied. His friends
shouted to him to keep his ground. One cried out
(C
S
CONFUSION IN THE CHAMBER.
63
that the liberty of the tribune had been violated;
another, that the question had been badly put.
The President essayed in vain to induce a moment's
attention, until he should put the question, whether
the names would be heard or not.
At length
he saw that the only way to stop the clamour was
to put on his hat-the sign that the meeting was
suspended. The last frail hold on order seemed
then to have given way. The members, as by a
common impulse, rose from their seats, and rushed
headlong to the floor of the house, vociferating
altogether. The wildest mob could not have exhibited
more ungovernable want of temper. The manners
of the demagogical clubs, and of the streets, were
fully represented in that universal-suffrage-elected
assembly. It was an ill-omened and menacing scene.
After a suspension of half an hour, M. Dornès again
spoke. He said that he would not propose names,
but would move his decrec, that the members of
the Provisional Government had deserved well of
their country, and that they be replaced by an
executive commission of five members. All seemed
then plain-sailing; but, no-there was yet to be
discord. The boiling was over, but the bitterness
was to come. From the highest bench of the ex-
treme left, which had already been called "the
Mountain," in imitation of the language of the
Convention, there descended Barbès, the idol of
64
BARBÈS.
the ultra-revolutionary clubs. Barbès had taken
a leading part in the émeute of May, 1839, an
émeute which might have been a revolution. There
had been a long ministerial crisis; the executive was
embarrassed and weak, the National Guards apa-
thetic and discontented, and the secret societies.
well organized. The Revolutionists hoped to suc-
ceed; but, after an ill-combined effort, they failed ;
and Barbès, one of the ringleaders, was arrested.
The main charge against him destroyed the
romance of the political conspirator:-it was a
cold-blooded assassination. He had drawn up to
a military post in the cité, in a cabriolet, with a
brother-conspirator, hoping to effect a hardy coup-
de-main, by frightening the officer in command into
a surrender. While parleying with the officer, and
on his refusal to surrender, Barbès drew a pistol,
and shot him. Such a dastardly act destroyed all
sympathy in his fate. He, himself, became ashamed
of it, and pleaded that the murder had been com-
mitted by his companion, who fell, subsequently, in
the combat. He was found guilty by the Chamber
of Peers, and condemned to death. His sister, who
loved him dearly, was the means of saving his life.
She obtained an interview with the King, and so
wrought on the feelings of the Monarch, that
although it was resolved at a Cabinet Council, to
resist all recommendation to mercy, his Majesty
Star
65
declared that having suffered his hand to be
bathed by the tears of the man's sister, he could
not sign his death-warrant." The sentence was
commuted to imprisonment in the Luxembourg,
and the convict was so touched with the King's
clemency, that he declared his political career to be
for ever over. His own account is, that in his cell
he offered up his orisons to Saint Robespierre,
Saint Couthon, and Saint Just.
BARBÈS.
The Revolution of February freed Barbès, and
the Provisional Government, with that studied love.
of effect which characterised so many of their
actions, created the prisoner of the Luxembourg
the Governor of the Palace, from which had already
been expelled the Peers who had tried and con-
demned him. A more startling freak, in the way
of poetic justice, was to strike the citizens of Paris.
The National Guards of the 12th arrondissement,
composed now of all classes, of one of the poorest
and most populous divisions of the city, elected
Barbès for their Colonel! Thus was this victim of
the tyranny of the Monarchy, invested with rank
and honour, and, as it may be called, military
power, and subsequently elected to a seat in the
National Assembly.
He looked, as he impetuously ascended the
tribune, like a man whose head could easily have
been turned. Report says that he was once a
66
BARBÈS.
handsome man. He did not now look very prepos-
sessing. His figure was light and active, and he
might be considered within forty years; but his face
had that peculiarly pallid colour, produced by long
close confinement-the colour of the cold wall,
with that banishment of open cheerfulness, replaced
by a dark brooding over his position, such as cannot
fail of producing a repulsive effect. His forehead was
high, but narrow, and somewhat bald.
His speech
was rapid and thick, as if he gargled his words in
his throat, and sounded like vulgar scolding.
This Barbès made his début, by demanding an
explanation of what he called the massacres of
Rouen; and he, a Colonel of National Guards,
allowed plainly enough to be seen, what might
have been expected from him in case of a collision,
as he continued: "Yes, in the name of the people,
we have to demand from the Government an
account of the murders committed on the people
of Rouen, by the National Guards." This speech
was interrupted by exclamations from all sides; but
the orator continued to say, that the people would
furthermore have to demand an account, why their
German, Polish, Italian, and Belgian brethren had
been abandoned? and when all these accounts were
settled, it would be time enough to talk of thanking
the Provisional Government.
M. Sénard, member for Rouen, vindicated, in a
67
warm speech, the conduct of the National Guards at
Rouen. The Minister of Justice showed that the
Government had done all that was proper. After
some confused conversation, the vote that the
Provisional Government had merited well of their
country, was carried by acclamation. The question
regarding the formation of an intermediate execu-
tive power, was agreed to be referred to a Com-
mittee, and the Assembly adjourned to the following
day.
CLOSE OF THE SITTING.
68
PEUPIN, OUVRIER.
M
CHAPTER V.
M. PEUPIN, OUVRIER-WORKMEN IN THE ASSEMBLY-
M. L'HERBETTE-THE SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES OF HIS
ACCUSATION AGAINST THE EX-KING REGARDING THE
FORESTS OF THE STATE-CORMENIN-POWER OF THE
PAMPHLET-BAC-JULES FAVRE FATHER LACOR-
DAIRE ODILLON BARROT-ON THE PARLIAMENTARY
STORM THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE FORMED.
J
THE Committee that had been appointed to con-
sider what would be the best form of intermediate
Executive Government, confided the preparation and
presentation of its Report to a working mechanic,
M. Peupin, by trade a watchmaker. Thus, the
first act of the National Assembly fell into the
hands of a working man; and the first Parlia-
mentary debate was led by a member of the ouvrier
class.
pa
Notwithstanding that the General Election had
been by Universal Suffrage, that the Revolution had
HIS REPORT.
69
been pronounced the working man's revolution, that
the operatives were bidden to the Parliamentary
Feast, for the first time, and that the tempting
allowance of twenty-five francs a-day, was ordained
on the Democratic principle of paying the legislator
a fair day's wages for a fair day's work, so that
no man should be obliged to decline the favour of
his fellow-citizens on the score of want of fortune,
it yet happened that very few operatives were
returned.
M. Peupin proved himself worthy of the
choice of his fellow-citizens, by his gentleman-
like demeanour, his easy address, and intelligence.
His report concluded in favour of a choice of
Ministers directly by the Assembly; and, at the
first blush, the proposition to hold all power,
executive and legislative, was wonderfully pleasing
to a new body, the more jealous of its rights,
because they were undefined, unsettled, uncertain,
and almost beyond the power of being ascer-
tained.
Curiously enough, a proposition that seemed so
thoroughly Democratic, and which was conceived
in so Democratic a spirit-for it implied that the
sovereignty being in the nation itself, should only
be exercised by the Assembly, the delegates of the
universal people, and not confided to any power
that might be tainted with the image of royalty,
70
TENDENCIES OF THE ASSEMBLY.
or exploded constitutionalism, with its division of
power, and checks, and balances-this proposition
was destined to be combatted by the revolutionists,
and supported by ex-members of the dynastic
opposition of the old Chamber of Deputies:
M. L'Herbette, and M. Odillon Barrot, took the
affirmative, and M. Jules Favre, and M. de Lamar-
tine, the negative.
G
Our object is not to dwell more on speeches and
debates than will serve our leading purpose, which
is to mark the tendencies and dispositions of the
new Assembly, to show how the new men acted,
and how the old were received, to mark the hopes,
sentiments or designs of the former, and how far
they were responded to by the latter, to observe the
turbulent fermentation of ill-assorted elements, and
their reduction to order, as much by dangerous
menaces from without, as from internal influences,-
those influences being the chief object of our clas-
sification and care-to paint in fact a wildly disposed
Assembly, sobered by degrees at the sight of the
sword that was brandished in its face by a still
wilder demagogie.
We have just had occasion to notice the excessive
susceptibility regarding its own omnipotent power,
manifested by the Assembly in the very report pre-
sented by Citizen Peupin; as we proceed, we shall
see the jealousy marked by the extravagant and
wha
L'HERBETTE.
(C
fantastic awkwardness of parvenus, when their
suddenly-acquired rights were not recognized, or
were made the subject of satirical smiles, or
ominous suspicions that peradventure they could
not hold them long.
G
We have in the second place to notice that in
order to quiet and keep down sensations not easily
mastered, all parties made the most desperate pro-
fessions of fraternal conciliation; the very word
party" was reproved, and the assumption as-
serted that the purest patriotic Republicanism being
the sole directing power of the many-voiced machine,
its separate discords, like the various sounds of
nature, or of a crowd heard from a distance, would
blend into an imposing effect. The intentions were
good; we shall see how they were carried out in
practice. We pass by those devoid of any particular
characteristic to come to M. L'Herbette.
71
1
M. L'Herbette is a gentleman of large fortune,
who in the old Chamber of Deputies sat on the
opposition side-although not so far left as to be
entitled to the honour of being a Républicain de la
veille,—and derived a share of that spurious sort of
fame, called notoriety, by having preferred against
Louis-Philippe, or in the then more constitutional
jargon, the liste civile, the dishonouring accusation
of purloining from the State forests, more timber
than he was by law privileged to take. The
72
CORRUPTION AND CRIME.
accuser cited the various State forests of Villar-
Coterets, Compiègne, Fontainebleau, &c., and he
declared, that so extensive were the depredations
committed, that in some places, the aspect was as
if a hostile invasion had ravaged the ground.
Charges so circumstantial and distinct coming
from a member of the legislature, a man of mature
age, and of the weight that fortune seldom fails to
bestow, produced a deep impression. True it is,
that the Count de Montalivet, Intendant of the
Civil List, answered the charges, and showed that
a misapprehension had arisen from changing the
old French mode of thinning forests, for that of
the German method, which consisted of making
clearances; but it is equally true that at the time
of this unfortunate controversy, which was the
year preceding the fate of the monarchy, a
strong prejudice had been raised against the
upper classes of society, by an exposure of a series
of crimes-some of the deepest turpitude, from
peculation and corruption by ministers of state and
men of fortune to the last crowning deed-the
murder of the Duchess of Praslin by her husband;
so that it was no longer possible to interpose the
barrier of the loftiest rank to the voice of calumny;
and the conviction became general that all classes
of people, the highest and the lowest, were con-
founded in a common and general corruption. The
73
charge against the King was fatally timed. It was
but too generally accepted, and with the hastiness
of prejudice, it was concluded that the corruption
and viciousness, the prevalence of which was proved
in Courts of Justice, had their source in Royalty
itself. It was affirmed that corruption had been
reduced to a political system, and that those who
directed the machinery, did a little business on
their own account. M. de Montalivet not only
afforded the requisite technical explanations, but he
showed, what was perfectly true, that the King so
far from having a griping, had a bountiful hand;
that he expended not merely the surplus of the
allowances of the Civil List, but drained his private
resources in the restoration and adornments of
public monuments. That he gave Versailles and
Fontainebleau to the people; and that his memory
would be associated with museums, libraries, tem-
ples, and cities. This was all true; nevertheless
the accusation worked its poisonous way, and it
may be truly said that all the attacks of the news-
paper press put together did not produce the
fatal effect of M. L'lIerbette's parliamentary
Philippe-ics.
As I have the Vicomte de Cormenin in my eye,
the man who gave the first blow of a similar kind
to the Monarchy of July, I may be allowed to say
a word of him, especially as his total absence
VOL. I.
E
MONTALIVET'S EXPLANATION.
ܐ
74
from the tribune will prevent any opportunity of
sketching his oratorical physiognomy. The fall of
the Soult Ministry in 1840, which paved the way
to Thiers, and led to the breach of the English
alliance on the Eastern question, was caused by the
rejection of the dotation demanded for the Duc de
Nemours; the author of the rejection of that
dotation was undoubtedly M. de Cormenin, better
known under his pamphleteering name of Timon.
The pamphlet has been for ages in France a most.
effective weapon in the hands of whoever can wield
it well. It requires very peculiar talents for its
exercise, so much so indeed that the men of genius.
in that way may be counted on one's fingers, as you
do the names of great poets, or of any other true
greatness. Timon is the pamphleteer of this day,
as Paul Louis Courier was the pamphleteer of the
Restoration. Voltaire it was who swept the ground
with this fire of raillery, satire, sarcasın, and pun-
gent common-sense reasoning; that blending of
seething fire and hard substance, scalding, irony and
racy playfulness, with knowledge of mankind and
their affairs, and withal solid logic, which make up
the pamphlet, as it is managed and understood by
Timon. As Voltaire was the precursor of 1789,
Timon was the precursor of 1848; those who came
after, battered the building and did the rough work :
he laid the mine. Whether his calculations were
CORMENIN.
75
true or false, whether his elaborate figures were
calumnies or mistakes, whether the fortune of
Louis-Philippe was overrated, and ought to be
applied to the support of his family, whether all
this was true or not, the project of the dotation fell
before the pamphlet of Timon, and the cutting
away of all dotations for the future was small evil
compared with the discredit that attended the
failure. The Ministry were themselves paralyzed,
and put the question to the vote without a speech-
were beaten and fell.
CORMENIN.
""
.
Mga Madres
Now look at Timon, he is a man of mild thought-
ful countenance, of a fair brow, and quiet, reflective
eye. His attire is plain and unostentatious. He
looks as if he would not hurt a fly. His voice is
never heard, and yet he does not look unsocial.
How could he be who has written the "Livre des
Orateurs.' He who cannot speak himself, has
glorified his more gifted colleagues. How graphi-
cally has he pourtrayed them!-how cordially
has he dwelt on the rare powers of his own poli-
tical opponents!-loving talent for its own sake.
Now look at L'Herbette the Omega of this Alpha;
his little features are as hard as flint, and his voice
cuts like a saw. He called on the Assembly to
name directly their own Ministers, because it would
be an act of energy, and because they could then
call their Ministers to account. This was putting
E 2
76
L'HERBETTE'S PROPOSITION.
the question on no gracious grounds. Such a man
was not made for conciliation, and so he went on :
"I know perfectly that attempts are making to
intimidate us, (murmurs from the left); for the
intimidatory system has not departed with the old
Chamber." (Explosion of murmurs from the left).
Le Citoyen Jean Reynaud." Instead of speaking
of conciliation, you speak of intimidation. It is an
injustice to the party sitting on these benches."
Le Citoyen Sarrut.-"There are no parties
here there is no other desire than that of concilia-
tion." Procceding a little further, he went on to
assume, that in case their decisions should bring
about a conflict, they would, in consequence of their
nomination by universal suffrage, have the people.
under the uniform of the National Guard and all
the workmen against them. Here again he touched
a discordant note.
Le Citoyen Basinier, subsequently distinguished
as a Red Republican, shouted out: "No provoca-
tion, or we shall reply."
Le Citoyen Vignerte." I protest against
alarmists. They are enemies of the Republic."
Le Citoyen Jules Favre.-"It is an incitement
to civil war. Keep to the question."
Le Citoyen L'Herbette.-" You protest then
against what I say?"
Numerous voices from the left.---" Yes, yes."
THEODORE BAC.
77
And, after a few words of explanation, Citoyen
L'Herbette withdrew.
It was now evident that even the claims of such
a man as M. L'Herbette could not absolve him in
A
the eyes of the new men, the Républicains de la veille;
and that the loud professions that there were no
parties, could not prevent explosions of party humour
on the slightest provocation.
We pass over some intermediate speakers of no
note, to come to Theodore Bac; and we come to
Theodore Bac because he is one of the new public
men, for whom, on account of his extreme opinions,
there was no place under the monarchy. M. Bac,
like Barbès, descended from the Mountain to the
tribune. His manner is earnest,—earnestness
which is not put on by the advocate, for he is a
member of the bar. He has a fresh, florid counte-
nance, but weak, irresolute eye, betraying that his
heat of style is transitory rather than habitual.
His language, although forcibly delivered, is not
terse, but diffuse. His conclusion was for an
adjournment of the question until such time as
the members of the Assembly should come to know
one another better. M. Bac, although Red Repub-
lican and Socialist of the school of Louis Blanc, does
not seem destined to play a notable part in the
stormy scenes of a revolution. Some one said of
78
him that he was a Girondist who had strayed into
a club of Jacobins.
JULES FAVRE.
Citoyen Jules Favre is a different sort of man.
He entered the Assembly with a certain amount of
reputation. Known to the bar, he was taken by
the hand by the Republican Minister of the Interior,
who made him his secretary, guide, councillor, and
friend. Favre was identified with the worst acts of
M. Ledru-Rollin's government-if he were not.
indeed their prompter. For a young man, his
appearance is peculiarly disagreeable; not that he
is not possessed of the advantages of a good figure ;
but there is in the hard immobility of his pale
features a concentrated white heat of malevolent
anger, that, provoked, would be implacable. His
look through his spectacles is fixed and coldly
searching, and his stiff manner of holding his head,
with the chin drawn in, so that when he turns the
head, the shoulders and body go together, as if all
were of a piece without joints, gives him a dogmatic
air, by no means captivating. His voice is, never-
theless, flexible and clear, his reasoning strong, his
logic piercing and sure, and would be perfect in its
way, only for the occasional diffuseness, the besetting
sin of avocats, and the bad faith of the unquiet,
ambitious partizan. Such a man was never made
to be a tribune of the people. As the active agent
79
of a well-grounded, unquestioned power, he would
be at home. You might expect to meet such a
combination of intolerance and affected suppleness
in the innermost sanctuary of a General of the
Jesuits, or by the side of a De Retz, pulling the
wires at once of the populace and the Court; but
it is a singular proof of Ledru-Rollin's want of
insight that he should have placed his impetuous
and imprudent nature in the hands of so young
a Mephistophiles.
M. Favre is of that order of democrats who are so
from jealousy of those above, rather than from love
of those beneath them. His liberty is but the mask
of his intolerance; and it is highly characteristic
of the man that, from the first moment, he assumed
an air of authoritative domineering that revolted
the Assembly, and lost him the place which, with a
little modesty, his undoubted talents would have
secured him. Nevertheless, it cannot be predicted
of such a man, as of Theodore Bac,-should the
Republic last for some years-what position he might
be called upon to sustain, for he has talents and
force of character to make him a formidable foe,
and he has no scruples to withhold his vindictive-
ness.
JULES FAVRE.
The reasoning of Jules Favre was that of a man
who, despite his democratic professions, leant to
the exercise of strong executive powers. He would
80 SPEECH AGAINST THE COMMISSION.
not admit the introduction of so strange a principle
as that of a loose assembly of nine hundred persons,
standing in the place of a monarch or president,
making and revoking ministers, according to
passion or whim. It was a barbarous method,
contrary to that of civilized societies, which had all
agreed on placing an intermediate power between
the legislation and administration-a power ever
armed and ever ready to execute the national will
with rapidity and security.
It is not necessary to detail the reasons pre-
sented by M. Favre for rejecting the conclusion of
the commission, because there are few English
readers who would not admit at once its absurdity;
but it deserves to be noted as a curious fact, that
this conclusion, so agreeable to a new popular body,
fancying itself endowed with all virtues, and full of
expansive sentiments of fraternity and zeal, should
have been encouraged by old practised legislators.
It was, therefore, no easy task encountered by M.
Favre, and he accomplished it with signal ability.
He did not omit to season his discourse with
epigramis, at the expense of men of recent con-
victions, recalling thus with bad taste his own too
notorious distinction of Républicains de la veille.
He showed, too, that he was not a man to be blinded
by illusions; while his friends were indulging in
philanthropic visions for having shown the necessity
81
present
ABBÉ LACORDAIRE.
of a compact execution in case of war, he proceeded
to argue, that it would be no less necessary in case
of civil commotion, and to civil commotion he looked
forward. "What!" asked he, "do you believe that
we shall found a Republic without agitations and
shocks? Do you
think that there will be no
resistances to dread? Do you believe that we shall
not see conspiracies and émeutes? (cries of No,
and Yes, and prolonged movement). If you believe
that you can found a popular government three
months after the fall of a monarchy, without any
emotion being caused in the country, then I descend
from this tribune, I quit the Assembly, and I leave
you alone in your opinion." This was language
calculated to bring people to their senses, and it
succeeded.
If truth be stranger than fiction, there are, in
public assemblies, contrasts more dramatic than
stage writers have fancied. This was exemplified
in the figure and character of the individual
whom one of the pointed epigrams of the last speaker
excited to the tribune. His thin figure, attired in
the white robe of a Dominican friar—which he never
exchanged for any other-the Abbé Lacordaire
descended not slowly, but impetuously, from his
seat on the left, halted for a moment in the midst
of the salle, and, with a hand raised towards the
President, from which fell the large drapery, sig-
E 3
82
ABBÉ LACORDAIRE.
.
nified his intention to speak. No theatrical entrée
could have been more striking. The looks of curio-
sity which followed him from all sides, made him
the central figure of a highly-ornamented picture.
No clumsy or vulgar-looking monk-no sour, or
wild, or stupid fanatic was he; but, in appearance,
one of the most distingué and gentlemanly persons
it was ever one's good fortune to see. A handsome
oval face, large lustrous eyes, and fine head, rose
above the tribune; and when he spoke, it was not
with the cold insinuating tone of the confessor.
He declared that he would not have addressed them,
but for an insinuation of the pre-opinant, that there
were persons in that Assembly who were actuated
by lurking motives of a hostile character. For hist
own part, so far was he from being there to join in
a vote injurious to the Republic, he would vote
for the Executive Commission. He acknowledged
that he was not a Republican before the 24th of
February; and although he now fully adopted the
Republic, yet he felt that the Government properly
belonged to those whose opinions were of older date
than his own but while he did this act of justice
to elder Republicans, he claimed for the minority
respect; for they had seen that majorities might
perish, and minorities make their principles prevail.
The sentiments were good, but the delivery was little
in accordance with received notions of parliamentary
ABBÉ LACORDAIRE.
83
manner. It was extremely impassioned and vehe-
ment. As he complained of the insinuations that
he repelled, his voice was as piercing as if he were
wrenching, with both hands, from his breast, a dart
that was there rankling. As a pulpit oration, or an
exhortation to subduc animosity to forget and for-
give, and to join fraternally to heal the wounds of
the country, it was not unworthy of the Dominican's
fame; but, as a parliamentary speech, it was a
failure, and that from no fault of the orator.
There are rules of harmony applicable to all situa-
tions, any violation of which will not be atoned for
separate excellence. In the frenzied times of 1789,
the fantastic was in its place; but in the National
Assembly, where the fantastic was only acted badly
by a few, and saddened the sober many, there was
no encouragement even for sincerity in an anti-
quated costume. The shrill voice of the speaker,
his attenuated figure, and nervous vivacity, gave
him more the appearance of an Arab chief in his
bournou, exhibiting for his conquerors, than a divine,
anxious to infuse the spirit of charity, and good
feeling, among an auditory profoundly divided
amongst themselves, and distrustful of one another.
It was whispered about at the time (for there are
always romantic traditions at the service of any
handsome man who enchains to his heel the society
he has renounced) that Lacordaire was in carly youth
84
ODILON BARROT.
smitten with a love for the stage, and took lessons
from Talma, from whom he derived his taste for
costume and knowledge of effect; that he forsook
the tragic muse for the bar, and deserted the bar
for the Church-a love tale, of course, accounts
for his disgust for the world. When in the Church,
he accompanied Lamennais to the brink of heresy,
from which he started back affrighted; yet the
poetry of his nature led him to the Order over
which the fate of Savonarola sheds an immortal
interest. Methinks we have found, at length, the
key to the citizen friar's conduct-he would be the
modern Savonarola; he would reconcile democracy
with the Church; he makes brave efforts to do so
in his journal, the Ere Nouvelle; and has brought
on his shoulders the anger of the Univers, and of
that doughty layman, the Count de Montalembert.
The Assembly was only permitted to have a passing
glimpse of this brilliant and interesting meteor, for,
after the invasion of the Chamber, from which we
are separated but by a few days, he formally resigned,
horror-struck at what he had witnessed.
Let us pass a couple of intermediate combatants,
to come to Odilon Barrot, opposed to Lacordaire on
the question of the Executive Commission. He,
too, had been stung by the same sneer at recent
conversions to the Republic and sinister motives.
His first words were in the orator's most manly
ODILON BARROT.
85
manner :-~ "I am not stopped by this scruple; the
country is juster than parties; it sees none other
amongst us than men profoundly devoted to the
liberty of their country and to the foundation of
the Republic." This told well. His argument
was, in its way, no less powerful. He showed that
an Executive Commission of five members, appointed
by the Assembly, and revocable by the Assembly,
amounted to the same thing as a ministry appointed
and revocable on the same principle; and, for his
part, he would rather, if called on to act as minis-
ter, be answerable to the Assembly, than if ap-
pointed by the Assembly. It was a double ma-
chinery, for which there was no use, and which
created complexity, without answering any consti-
tutional purpose. Subsequent events proved Odilon
Barrot to be right; for when a great danger arose
some weeks afterwards, the Assembly, without
wasting time in discussion, broke the Executive
Commission, and substituted a single chief, iden-
tified with the ministry which he should form.
Thus the force of circumstances led to the point
which escaped general deliberation, of a ministry
directly answerable to the Assembly; but created
through the simple agency of a chief of the executive
power, whose own views were in accordance with
those of the majority.
To return to Odilon Barrot. What strange
S
Q
16
86
ODILON BARROT.
reflections must have passed through his mind!
It was he who presided over the series of Reform
Banquets, which, organized by Duvergier de Hau-
ranne, led to the fall of the Monarchy. It was the
course which he himself adopted relative to the last
of the series, that decided the fate of the dynasty.
It was he who uttered the last words in the Chamber
of Deputies on behalf of the Regency of the Duchess
of Orleans, when that respected lady, in those
widowed robes that recalled the premature death of
her popular husband, and with her two children by
the hand, offered the mute appeal of her respectable
life as the best guarantee of a prudent and honour-
able discharge of the trust she was ready to accept.
It was he, who, on the morning of the 24th of Febru-
ary, was the King's Minister in the palace-" the
father of the people," out of doors; in the evening, was
hooted by an armed mob from the tribune of the
Chamber he would have saved by timely reform.
Never had a public man been so buffeted and over-
whelmed in the midst of illusions, and all owing to
a want of that perspicuous power which enabled
Napoleon to perceive the very moment of action,-
a moment that will not stay upon the slippery
brink; it must be seized by the prompt hand
of resolute genius with the rapidity with which
lightning cleaves the oak, or it is gone.
M. Odilon Barrot is an orator, and a great one;
87
well versed in constitutional lore, and with a bold,
round voice, that goes home to the hearts of men; but
he is not a man of ready judgment. After Lafayette,
he took his place naturally at the head of that portion
of the opposition that sought and laboured in vain
to accomplish the veteran's sponsorial promise for
Louis-Philippe, that he would surround the throne
with Republican institutions; for it is a fact, that
Lafayette never did believe that France was fitted
for an unmixed Republic. There was this difference
between the views of Odilon Barrot and M. Thiers,
that while the former exerted himself to obtain
a parliament purged of placemen, and a widely-
extended suffrage, the latter cared not for reform
at all, or rather was opposed to it; satisfied, if he
could obtain for the Chamber, such as it was, the
virtual government of the country. He wanted to
deprive the King of his personal influence over
ministers, and to erect the minister into an inde-
pendent agent of the majority in parliament. "The
King should reign, but not govern." M. Odilon
Barrot thought it quite idle to seek to enforce such
a maxim, so long as the Chamber contained fifty-
five direct dependants on the Crown; and a great
number of functionaries besides, dependent, more or
less, on the minister of the day. So long as the
King could, through his own influence, undermine
an obnoxious minister, it was idle to expect that he
ODILON BARROT.
88
ODILON BARROT.
would voluntarily accept for rule of conduct, the
"Le Roi règne mais ne gouverne pas" of M. Thiers.
Thus it was that M. Thiers was ready to take the
Chamber as it was, provided that he should have
the direction of the instrument, unsound as it might
be; while M. Barrot never would take office, except
on the express terms of reform in parliament. True
to his principles, and of disinterested probity,
M. Odilon Barrot might, with more energy of cha-
racter, have formed a party to which the country
would have looked for guidance, and have carried to
power; but, wanting the reputation of a practical
aptitude for affairs, the most that was accorded them
was an inactive esteem. There was enough of senti-
mental sympathy, but not enough of encouraging
support.
It happened unfortunately for M. Barrot's admi-
nistrative reputation, that he filled the high office of
Prefect of the Seine, in the year 1832, when the
palace of the Archbishop of Paris was sacked; and
when, with worse than Gothic barbarity, not merely
the furniture and building were destroyed, but the
books, some of them of rare value, were torn, or
burnt, or flung into the Seine. The Prefect, armed
by his situation with executive powers for the sup-
pression of disturbance in the good city of Paris,
did not put forth his authority in the right way, or
at the right moment; and, although it may be
ODILON BARRot.
89
going too far, even in the way of hyperbole, to say
that he looked on an impassive spectator, yet
never did Odilon Barrot recover the impression that
was made by that event.
His conduct on the 22nd of February, is con-
sidered to have been deficient-fatally deficient in
tact. He ought to have accepted the conditions.
offered by the Government, namely to allow the
guests to go separately to the Banquet, instead of
forming a procession calculated to cause a distur-
bance of the peace; and as soon as the guests were
scated, a Commissaire de Police would protest
against the meeting, and his procès verbal be made
the ground of a proceeding at law, for the sake of
testing the legality of Reform Banquets. To a man
whose mind was imbued with constitutional lore,
himself a lawyer, such a proposition ought to have
been peculiarly tempting. Pleading in a Court of
Justice, there was afforded to him the opportunity
of achieving a moral victory, and, perhaps, of laying
the foundation of a plan for working through the
institutions for the correction of institutions, instead
of by appeals to brute force. By refusing the offer
made to him, M. Barrot did the great harm of
allowing the mass of the people to fall into the
error that the Banquet had been forbidden, and that
the Government had drawn the sword. His last
act, wise as it was in conception, and noble as it
90
was in its attempted execution, only served to com-
promise M. Barrot with the Republic. He disap-
peared in the tumultuous finale of the Monarchy, a
beaten, repudiated, humiliated man, whose name,
inscribed for a moment on the list of the Provisional
Government, was disdainfully erased; and one of
the most unpopular of men on the night of the
24th, was the powerful orator and patriot-the
leader of the Reform party for eighteen years.
M. Odilon Barrot, as his name indicates, is of
Irish descent. His features are unmistakeably
Hibernian, and of that order which proves that
the native comparison to the once favourite-for
now it is, alas! but a treacherous-esculent was
well justified by resemblances that could not escape
an acute and witty people. But although the
countenance be of ordinary Celtic, the forehead
and fine bald head are of a highly intellectual
order. The voice is in accordance with so noble a
temple of legal and constitutional thought-it is of
the church-organ, rather than of the trumpet kind.
The orator's manner is somewhat ostentatious, and
his dress and walk are indicative of a strong tinge
of self-satisfaction, so far not belying the Celtic
blood, either in its Hibernian or Gallic develop-
ment. Such is M. Odilon Barrot, an effective
orator, yet inoperative leader; an honest man, but
vacillating politician; bold and noble in his move-
ODILON BARROT.
kund
LAMARTINE'S REPLY TO BARROT. 91
ment, until the moment of action comes, and then
lost. So powerful was his language on the present
occasion, that by a striking coincidence, it brought
M. de Lamartine to the tribune.
It was Lamartine who repelled the Regency-it
is Lamartine who makes his first Republican speech
in reply to the last defender of the Monarchy. He
acknowledged the power of M. Odilon Barrot,
whose word, he said, had much authority over his
mind on such subjects. He had nothing to add to
the force of M. Jules Favre's reasoning on the
necessity of an Executive Commission,-for he
could not comprehend the position of a Minister
obliged to come every minute to take the opinion
of the Assembly upon an act that might require
speed and secrecy; but there his accordance with
that unsentimental man stopped. Referring to
social dangers, he could see none.
"I proclaim
aloud, that I do not fear parties; the parties were
vanquished, from the day when you appeared
within these walls, before the whole nation, from
which you have been evoked by Universal Suffrage,
bringing with you not only all rights, but all forces.
I do not fear to affirm to my country, and to his-
tory, that there is no party to-day, there are no
factions who can prevail for one hour in this
country."
The Assembly was too young, too fresh, and too
92
CONFUSION IN THE ASSEMBLY.
ardent, not to relish such optimist sentiments;
even M. Ledru-Rollin, in a few ardent words,
showed himself an eclectic; but when the debate.
was closed, and an opportunity was afforded to the
mass to show ingenuity by amendments, sub-amend-
ments, suggestions, criticisms, and small speeches,
the scene that ensued was of the most confused and
stormy description, and such as filled the observing
public with despair. The President rang his
deep-toned hand-bell, till it sounded like the tocsin
over a city in rebellion. Laying it down, he pro-
tested that no human strength could suffice for his
duties. The guttural notes of Barbès, especially,
were heard amidst the din, like the crackling
and spattering of wood in the roar of a conflagra-
tion. At length, after extraordinary efforts, the
resolution to have an Executive Commission, to be
composed of five members, chosen by ballot, was
fairly rescued from this scene of confusion and
trouble.
THE EXECUTIVE COMMISSION.
CHAPTER VI.
93
THE EXECUTIVE COMMISSION-DECLINE OF LAMARTINE
-ITS CAUSE-M. WOLOWSKI RAISES THE WORKMAN'S
A WORKMAN, OPPOSES
QUESTION-PEUPIN,
BLANC-FEELING IN THE CLUBS.
Number of voters
794
Absolute (or necessary) majority 398
LOUIS
ON Wednesday, 10th of May, the National
Assembly elected, by ballot, the Executive Com-
mission of Government. The operation was very
tedious; but as the names of the five Executive
Commissioners had been already settled, by that
sort of subterraneous understanding of which par-
liamentary parties have the secret, the sole subject
of curiosity was as to the relative numbers. At
a little after four o'clock the result was made
known.
94
The Citizen Arago
رد
رد
")
THE EXECUTIVE COMMISSION.
رد
ور
رز
""
"J
Garnier Pagès
Marie
Lamartine
Ledru-Rollin
725 votes.
715
702
643
458
""
""
رو
55
These five were consequently declared Members
of the Executive Commission of the Government of
the Republic.
Lamartine below Arago, Garnier Pagès, and
Marie The result caused extreme surprise, both
!
in and out of doors. Ledru-Rollin, longo intervallo,
last of all! The character of the Assembly was
significantly determined. It had been returned
under the auspices of Ledru-Rollin, who, as Minister
of the Interior, was charged with the management of
the elections. He had set himself to the work with his
accustomed energy and characteristic indiscretion.
His Commissioners, with no other responsibility
than their own consciences," and with "un-
limited powers," traversed the country; and their
acts showed, that while they literally interpreted
their authority, they had, in conscience, a blind or
treacherous monitor. They overdid their business,
and instead of subduing, or deluding the people
of the provinces, they excited their distrust, and
aroused their vengeance
LAMARTINE'S POLITICAL DECLENSION. 95
From fear, or prudence, the representatives-
truly expressing the sentiments of their consti-
tuents, joined in proclaiming the Republic, did
well their parts of factitious enthusiasts; but when
their act was shrouded in the mystery of the ballot-
ing urn, they revealed, unwittingly, the true senti-
ments of the majority, by marking their disdain for
the Coryphon of the revolution. Had it not been
for Lamartine, there can be no doubt that Ledru-
Rollin would have been extinguished, and the nume-
rical weakness of his party in an Assembly, returned
in the very ardour of a fresh revolution, exposed
beyond doubt or question. If Lamartine had, on
the other hand, listened to the overtures that had
been made to him, and had he made a declaration
satisfactory to the sense of the country, which was
anxious only for peace and security, and trembled
at the perspective opened by those who were sub-
sequently called Red Republicans; had he given
palpable pledge, by an act that was conservative of
property, family, and religion; had he, in a word,
separated himself from Ledru-Rollin, he would
have found himself at the head, instead of being
but within one of the foot of the Commission; he
would have had the darling ambition of his heart
gratified, by being made the first President of the
Republic; he would have been at the head of the
country, and have taken his place in history
a
J
96
PALLIATIONS FOR LAMARTINE.
amongst those great men who-themselves the
best expression of the best feelings of their own
times-carry their country on a great step
further in its progress to good, and stamp
their immortal image on their generation, as if,
god-like, they had moulded it all themselves. Be
it strength, or be it weakness, be it true generosity,
be it self-sacrificing magnanimity, or be it self-
deception-be it theatrical assumption of an atti-
tude intended to win admiration, be it goodness
or amiability, be it what it might-Lamartine in
covering Ledru-Rollin with his own blazing shield,
and lifting him to power with himself, received that
fatal whisper "Cassio, I forgive thee, but never
more be officer of mine."
Very much might certainly have been said in jus-
tification of Lamartine's decision. Ledru-Rollin,
thrown out of the Government would, it must be
allowed, have been received in the arms of the
Revolutionists, already dissatisfied with the compo-
sition of the Assembly. He would have afforded
them a leader and a name. He was the unmixed
democrat, the very expression of the Republic in
February. Expelled from the Government, he
would have been the expression of the Revolution
conquered by reaction. A struggle must have
come. In the Government he could form but a
He would be bound by honour and interest.
97
to his colleagues, and yet neutralized by their
influence. But the answer to all this was quickly
furnished by events; for the struggle followed im-
mediately, while the Executive was weakened by the
distrust of the Assembly.
Lamartine did not probably estimate the depth
of parliamentary dislike for the Ultra-Republicans.
His car had been confounded by the din of Vive la
République, and his eye dazzled by the breadth and
extent of fresh Republican devotion; but palliations
of error will not do for men who take upon them-
selves the initiative of crises involving the fate of
nations. His sagacity was at fault. His moral
courage did not come up to the mark. He could
not part with his distrusted companions. He failed
to see the latent power that only awaited the voice
of a competent chief to show itself in its immensity.
He would have been reproached? true, and he
might have been stabbed by a ruffian. But the
confusion, and the complexity, and the danger
besetting his situation, would have made the strong
decision he might have taken his title-deed to the
Chieftainship of the French people. From this day
forth Lamartine was no more the same man. He
who forbade the Regency, and who like an impro-
vised Cromwell, put his foot on the bauble of the
Crown, and led the people to the Hôtel-de-Ville,
might have acted under the momentary intoxication
VOL. I.
HIS MISTAKES.
[
-
98
HIS INFLUENCE.
of a poetic frenzy, or he might have taken a clear,
well-calculated view of the future. He was a rash
or a bold man, according to the way in which he
would sustain thenceforward the post he had seized.
Was he a Rienzi, a Masaniello, or a Cromwell, or
Washington, or Bonaparte? The first act of the
author of the " History of the Girondists," only
raised a presumption that he was a man of decision.
His next, when he struck down the red flag and
inaugurated the tri-color in a burst of eloquence,
that can never die, was a brave act. From that
moment the eloquent member of the Provisional
Government had won his spurs. The marvellous
eloquence with which he enchanted, subdued, and
ruled France, will ever remain the most striking
illustration of the sober truth of Milton's descrip-
tion:
Resistless eloquence wielded at will
The fierce democracy.
His replies to the various addresses from people of
all countries, and his diplomatic papers were alike
models of that prudence and eloquence that flow
from exalted wisdom. It would be idle to deny that
the career of M. de Lamartine, from the morrow of
the Revolution to the day of which we are now
speaking, was beneficial to his country. He
directed the extravagances of excited passions.
QUESTIONS FOR THE COMMISSION.
99
into the channels of philanthropic sympathy, by
He
opening prospects of chivalrous adventure.
put a check upon the long-brooding enmity felt
towards England, when, had he hinted invasion,
the hint would have been obeyed, although ruin
One act more-
should have been the consequence.
an understanding and appreciation of the majority
of the Assembly, a separation from the Ultra-
Republicans, a defiance of the consequences, moral
and physical—and Lamartine was at the head of the
country. Conciliation was the desire and excuse of
Lamartine. He wished to reconcile irreconcileable
elements. He fancied that he could talk down all
difficulties, for he had talked down many. He who
could still the passions of mobs, thought he had
only to take a mob leader, or ruthless demagogue,
submit him to the mesmerism of his influence, and
take him into a paradise of pure visions, where he
would leave the dross of his demagogueism. The
Assembly estimated the motives, but their more
practical estimate of men suggested that Lamar-
tine was mistaken, and that the fate of the country
could not be trusted to a self-deluding statesman.
As soon as the Executive Commission was formed,
it was at once challenged to the consideration of the
two questions to which the Republic stood com-
mitted. The great foreign question of the emanci-
pation of nationalities, and the great domestic ques-
Ma
F 2
100
WOLOWSKI.
tion of the organization of labour. M. Wolowski
opened both questions in the same speech. As
a Pole who had become a naturalized Frenchman,
he presented a petition from the Poles of Posen,
Cracow, and Gallicia; as a Professor in the Insti-
tution des Arts et Métiers, he deemed himself
competent to treat the workman's question. The
man who stood forward so prominently to stir up
danger, the extent of which he did not suspect, was a
Professor and nothing more. His language was
sententious, his manner cold, and neither were
improved by an elaborate effort at warmth. The
Poles, however admired as a people, do not enjoy
much esteem as individuals in Paris-the needy and
the proscribed seldom do. The needy must have
recourse to shifts, that strip even the proscribed of
romance. To M. Wolowski these observations do
As
ot apply, for he had won for himself, by the exer-
cise of talents and acquirements, an honoured posi-
tion; but he was not effective in the Assembly,
and that was all which was then wanted.
the Italian Question was held to be intimately
connected with that of Poland, M. de Lamartine, as
Ex-Minister for Foreign Affairs, announced his
intention of treating both on the following Monday,
destined to become memorable.
The Labour Question was seized on by a more
redoubtable champion. Louis Blanc proposed and
***
THE LABOUR QUESTION.
101
argued strenuously for the formation of a new admi-
nistrative department, devoted exclusively to the
Labour Question, under the name of Ministère du
Progrès. The erection of such a department
had been his dream from the moment that he
formed one of the Provisional Government. Had
he pressed it, and made an appeal to his partizans
out of doors, he would have provoked a collision.
The Provisional Government, in order to give him
and Albert employment, invented the magnificently
deceptive delegation of tradesmen to take their seats
in the Chamber of the Ex-Peers, with Louis Blanc
in the place of the Chancellor, Duc Pasquier. Had
it not been for this brilliant invention, the other
members of the Provisional Government might have
been thrown out of the windows of the Hôtel-de-
Ville.
Upon the meeting of the National Assembly, M.
Louis Blanc dissolved the delegation, and demanded
the formation of this administration, as the fulfil-
ment of the pledge made to the working classes,
and as the only effective means, moreover, of
arriving, through official and scientific approaches,
at the final completion of the organization of labour.
He was now coldly received by the Assembly, a
regularly organized representative body, protected
by the armed National Guard; and he was replied
to by M. Peupin, the operative, who substituted
J
:
102
COMMITTEE OF INQUIRY.
the more harmless resolution of a Committee of
Inquiry. They had, he said, Ministers of Public
Works, and of Agriculture; they did not want to go
on voyages of discovery; the workmen wanted work,
and only work, and that would come with a revival
of confidence and credit. Yet the Assembly felt
that the question could not be disposed of lightly;
they knew that at that moment there were loose
assemblages of workmen in their neighbourhood,
who were watching anxiously and menacingly the
mode in which their question would be treated. To
set it aside would have been impossible, and while
a Commission of Inquiry was substituted, great
care was taken to let it be understood that it was
a serious and substantial inquiry. M. Freslon,
subsequently a Cabinet Minister, hazarded the
following declaration: "The National Assembly
will, of necessity, pose all the great basis of the
organization of labour; and if it did not do so, it
would be cursed by posterity, and be despised by
France." There can be no doubt that the Assembly
was tried for the acts of the day in the Clubs of
Paris, and condemned.
SITTING OF THE 11TH MAY.
CHAPTER VII.
SPOKESMAN.
103
INFLUENCE OF EMINENT MEN-M. VIVIEN-THE NEW
MINISTRY-THEIR DEFICIENCIES-M. FLOCON, THEIR
THE sitting of Thursday, the 11th of May, was
not remarkable. The rules for regulating the
manner of their debates were discussed and agreed
to. They differed little from those which had been
followed by the old parliament. There was a great
deal of confusion, disorder, and irregularity. A
multitude of propositions, more or less trivial, were
presented, showing generally how completely unac-
customed to parliamentary usages, or to the usages
of public meetings of any kind, were a very great
portion of the Assembly. It was evident that there
had been no previous training, and the want of
popular political education was not compensated for
*3
104
VIVIEN.
by any apparent aptitude for debate. There was much
squabbling-much talking-much badly improvised
suggestion, and criticism, and for the President the
Herculean task of keeping order.
There was one gratifying sign, however, amidst
this Babel of tongues and moral chaos. Whether it
arose from curiosity on the part of the provincial
members, or whether it was owing to the influence
always exercised by real superiority, certain it was,
that as soon as a man of eminence ascended the
tribune, he was sure to obtain a deferential hearing.
M. Vivien, who had been a Cabinet Minister under
Molé, and again under Thiers, and of course
no Républicain de la veille, was nevertheless chosen
to be Chairman, or as it is called, Reporter of the
Committee for preparing rules for the government
of the debates. He is a tall, mild, fresh-com-
plexioned man, wearing his hair in that flowing way
which the possessors take to be symptomatic of
their Frank and aristocratic descent. For the
Franks are to the Celts, what the Normans in
England are to the Saxons-that is, the ancestral
source of great houses.
M. Vivien's established reputation for probity,
his temperate liberalism, the freedom of his name.
from factious efforts, and his sober bonhommie, won
their way calmly and persuasively; and this mild
triumph effected much, for it set the example of
THE NEW MINISTERS.
105
influence on the part of the members of the old
parliament, who would have been proscribed by
the Ledru-Rollins, had the temper of the country
only proved what they had expected to find it. The
names of the new Ministry were announced in the
course of the day. They were some of them under-
secretaries of the members of the Executive Com-
mission, while they had themselves filled the posts
of ministers in the Provisional Government. Thus
M. Jules Bastide, the secretary of M. de Lamartine,
was created Minister for Foreign Affairs; M.
Duclere, the secretary of Garnier Pagès, was made
Finance Minister; Colonel Charras, a secretary in
the War Department, was made Minister of War
Admiral Casy, Minister of Marine. The Ministry
of the Interior was given to M. Recurt, a medical
doctor. Not one of these ministers was capable of
delivering himself of two consecutive sentences at
the tribune.
M. Bastide, although he had been a writer in the
National, was obliged to commit to paper the shortest
ministerial explanation. M. Duclerc, a young man of
formal exterior, and wearing a long beard, as little in
accordance with his years as was the solemn foppery
of this capricious fashion in accordance with the
plainness of mind and manner expected in a Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, the most dangerous of all
F 3
106
THE NEW MINISTERS.
dealers in folly. He could stammer through a state-
ment indeed, but the matter would be as bad as the
nanner. Doctor Recurt, like many other doctors,
could only shake his head. The Minister of War
could not speak daggers; and he of the Marine
exhibited indeed a benevolent rubicundity of visage,
but as innocent of political expression as the figure-
head of a frigate. Now although M. Bastide is a
worthy, honest, and even religious man; and M.
Duclerc a gentleman of good intentions; and all the
rest honourable men; yet, in the eyes of the public,
they were still but the under-secretaries of the
Executive Commission; and, whatever mistake might
have been committed by all or either, could not
have been atoned for by a change of ministers. A
power, not in harmony with opinion, cannot last
long; and the shape that the Government had taken
was odd and unsatisfactory in the eyes both of the
advocates for a ministry directly elected by the
House, and in the view of those who looked in
vain for an Executive relieved of responsibility by
the mere removal of an obnoxious Cabinet. The
other posts were assigned to members of the ex-
Provisional Government. M. Crémieux resumed
the Ministry of Justice; M. Carnot, that of Public
Instruction; M. Bethmont took the portfolio of
Public Worship, which was separated from that of
↓
Al
S
107
Justice because of the Jewish faith of the Justice
Minister; and the Ministry of Commerce was given
to M. Flocon. Another doctor, M. Trélat, was
made Minister of Public Works. M. Marrast was
created Mayor of Paris; M. Pagnerre was ap-
pointed Secretary-General of the Executive Com-
mission, with a deliberative voice in Council;
and Caussidière to the Police. All the members
of the Provisional Government were provided for,
with the exception of Louis Blanc and Albert. Even
with the help of these supplementary names, there
was perhaps never an instance of a Cabinet obliged
to expound, explain, and defend its acts before a
popular assembly so deplorably deficient as was this
first legitimate Ministry of a Republic, about to
propound the most momentous questions that had
ever shaken society.
FLOCON.
The leadership of the House devolved on M.
Flocon, for neither the Foreign Minister nor Home
Minister could answer the simplest question; and
who and what was M. Flocon? His own descrip-
tion of himself is, that "he had been a conspirator
all his life." He did not look a Pierre; he was not
"a bold-faced villain." Fancy a small, bent, thick-
set figure a white, swollen visage-a dull,
smoked eye; and yet this habitué of the estaminet
had, by his attendance in the stenographer's gallery
108
FLOCON.
of the Chamber of Deputies, and his subsequent
contributions to the Réforme journal, acquired suffi-
cient use of speech and language to enable him
to shine, by comparison with his colleagues,
although his shining was not brilliant. Flocon be-
longed, by sentiment and temperament, to the
democrats of the Blanc and Albert school; but he
could not make up his mind to separate himself
from Ledru-Rollin, who had appointed him editor
of his journal, the Réforme. It was in the office of
this, then obscure paper, that the conspirators met
on the night of the 23rd of February, and resolved
upon striking a blow for the Republic. Flocon
shouldered his gun bravely, and next day fought at
the Château d'Eau, and helped to burn and destroy
that post opposite the Palais Royal, in which, for a
long hour and a half, some threescore Municipal
Guards resisted till they perished to a man.
Heated
with this achievement, the mob, comparatively a hand-
ful of desperadoes, rushed to the Tuileries, through
an army that might have crushed them, but which
stood without leaders or orders; entered the Cha-
teau; caused a panic that at this day appears absurd;
frightened away the Royal Family, in presence of a
magnificent display of horse, foot, and artillery;
crossed the undefended bridge of the Chamber of
Deputies; smote down the Regency; were about to
H
109
TRELAT, BETHMONT, &c.
shoot M. de Lamartine by mistake; then followed
him to the Hôtel-de-Ville. When a dynasty fell so,
Flocon deserved to rise! Between cigars, billiards,
and the leadership of the Assembly, how pleasantly
must have passed away the brief period of his
ministerial existence !
Dr. Trélat could speak pretty well on the subject
with which he was worried to death-the Ateliers
Nationaux. He is a thin, sallow man, with a me-
lancholy voice, and began his speeches as if he was
about to cry; and doleful, truly, was the burthen of
his lachrymose lament to which recurrence will
have to be frequently made, as we approach the days
of June. Well and appropriate as he could speak
upon his special theme, he could not fill the part
of orator for the Cabinet.
M. Bethmont soon resigned, and the portfolio of
Public Worship was re-attached to that of Justice,
to the satisfaction of Crémieux, who felt the stigma
on his creed. M. Carnot was too cold, too reserved,
too phlegmatic, for a speaker; and thus it happened
that the oratorical team of the Cabinet, to drag it
through the deep ruts and the mire in which it was
so often to sink, and to show off on gala-days, was
composed of Crémieux and Flocon, personally the
least attractive of the lot.
The members of the Directory could undoubtedly
descend from their imperial state to the tribune;
110
DILEMNA OF THE EXECUTIVE.
but, by marking more completely the insufficiency
and mediocrity of their Ministers, they but served to
show, that, in establishing one sort of constitutional
fable, they had set up another of a very inferior
kind.
BERRYER.
CHAPTER VIII.
111
M. BERRYER-NAPOLEON BONAPARTE, SON OF JEROME.
A DISCUSSION as to the manner of electing a Com-
mittee to prepare a draft of the Constitution, filled
up the greater part of Friday, the 12th of May.
M. Berryer took an active part in the proceeding.
M. Berryer, although his presence excited no mark
of hostility, yet was he received coldly, indeed indif-
ferently. He seldom interfered afterwards, al-
though, had he obtained sufficient encouragement,
there can be little doubt that he would have been
tempted to indulge in the ample floods of his mag-
nificent elocution. The chivalrous leader of the
Legitimist party, throughout so many weary years,
has been compared with Mirabeau. The com-
parison is only just to the extent, that neither were
reading men; that both loved society, and drew
their information from the conversation of well-
GA
112
BERRYER.
instructed men, who acted as store-ships for those
mightier vessels of war. The tongue of scandal,
which was once so busy with the ugly, Medusa-
headed aristocrat, Mirabeau, whose fiery pas-
sions hurried him into a revolutionary leadership,
and whose insatiate wants subdued him into the
secret pensioner of a doomed King-that poisonous
tongue has spared the handsome and luxurious bar-
rister.
A fortuneless man, who clings to a fallen cause,
especially when highly gifted, makes great sacri-
fices, for which he is no doubt repaid by those half-
sad, half-hopeful moments of solitary indulgence,
so dear to the finely-toned soul, and for which,
perhaps, the tumultuous duties and pleasures of
successful public life could not afford compensation.
M. Berryer was made for the Church. Had he
appeared in the pulpit, he would have been the legi-
timate successor of the Bossuets, Massillons, Flé-
chiers, and Fénélons. He would have had no rival
in his day. His voice is beautiful, and of that
unctuous fulness which would have carried to the
soul the cheering and comforting messages of the
New Testament. Language bubbles on his lips,
and flows forth with a copiousness that seems inde-
pendent of will; and when language comes out with
clear and rapid spontaneousness, so the man, appear-
ing not to invent, looks a vessel of abundance; then
BERRYER.
113
it is that people believe in inspiration. The speaker
has not time, or seems not to have time, to arrange
his words, pregnant though they be with mind,
expanded to genius. With such a one, an argu-
ment may fail in logical precision; but an exhorta-
tion would be as a chorus of heavenly harps.
Berryer is in appearance a perfect gentleman.
He is remarkably handsome, of the Canning style
of graceful, manly beauty. He is too liberal to
suit the tastes of every one of his party; for, like
all great natural orators, he must be more or less
imbued with popular leanings; and is not his instru-
ment the congregated people in the persons of their
representatives? The Legitimists preserve the tra-
ditions of courtiership, and of a courtiership such as
was practised under Charles X., rather than under
Louis XVIII., whose mind was touched with the
philosophy of the eighteenth century. To the mind
of Berryer, the Monarchy is a magnificent chain,
binding, from St. Louis to the Martyr of the Revo-
lution, the chivalrous history of France. To de-
stroy the Monarchy, is to quench the sun of the
national records. There is nothing in the Monarchy,
no more than in the Church, incompatible with the
easy development of popular institutions. Though
all men should vote, there is no reason why
royalty should fall. Berryer is no political bigot ;
he has no personal antipathies. He can enjoy the
114
BONAPARTE, SON OF JEROME.
witty talk of Thiers, and leave it to the public
judgment to deal with the admirer of Danton and
the worshipper of Napoleon. So expansive a nature
ought to have won upon the National Assembly;
but, as the advocate's position and popular disposi-
tion stand between him and some of his own party,
so does his sensitive repulsion of low-bred coarseness
make it impossible for him to place himself on a
familiar footing with so undisciplined an audience.
In the course of this day the Assembly was
startled by the appearance at the tribune of Citizen
Napoleon Bonaparte, son of Jerome, the Ex-King
of Westphalia. The resemblance to his great uncle
is truly remarkable. He has the same massive clas-
sicality of head and features, the same deep olive
complexion--it was the very head that is seen on
the Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile, and cast, as it
were, in living bronze. Had Louis-Napoleon such
a head, his popularity would have been hero-
worship. As you examine the countenance, the
impression is weakened, and the more weakened as
you watch the nan moving about. He is young,
but not slight, as his uncle was at the same age;
his look indicates quickness and wile, rather than
profound talent. He seems clever, but of no high
order of cleverness. Were it not for the likeness to
the Napoleon, he would pass for a fashionable young
gentleman, neither better nor worse than most
BONAPARTE, SON OF JEROME.
115
fashionable young gentlemen are. As he walks
along the passage on the height of the right, pre-
senting only his profile and shoulders between the
back bench and wall, the moving bust might be
taken for a spectral appearance of the Emperor.
His business at the tribune was not ominous of
good. He moved to have all diplomatic papers
connected with Poland and Italy produced, to
enable members to take part in the discussion of
the Polish and Italian Questions, fixed for the fol-
lowing Monday-a day to be for ever memorable.
116
POLISH PETITION.
CHAPTER IX.
PETITION IN FAVOUR OF POLAND-BAD FEELING TO-
WARDS THE NATIONAL GUARDS-THE FETE DE LA
FRATERNITÉ POSTPONED AGITATION OUT OF DOORS
CLUBS-INVASION OF THE
JANE
A
·PROCESSION OF THE
ASSEMBLY-ITS ATTEMPTED OVERTHROW-RASPAIL,
BLANQUI, HUBER, &c.—A REVOLUTION OF AN HOUR
-SOBRIER'S EXPEDITION-PANIC IN PARIS-ARREST
OF THE CONSPIRATORS-NIGHT SCENE.
A GREAT muster of the Clubs of Paris was to
have taken place on Saturday morning, the 13th of
May, for the alleged purpose of carrying a petition
to the Assembly in favour of Poland. Whether it
was that time had not been afforded for preparation,
or that Saturday being a precious day to the work-
man, while Monday is traditionally the great Satur-
nalia of the idle, or for the sake of masking their
real intentions, only a very small body of persons
assembled at the Column of February on the Place
THE 15TH MAY.
117
de la Bastille. As the procession moved along, it
was swelled in its course by the ever ready contri-
butions of the flaneurs, and by the time it reached
the Madeleine, the crowd was pretty considerable.
There a halt took place, out of affected respect for
the Assembly; a deputation merely took the peti-
tion, which, by preconcerted arrangement, was
received by M. Vavin, representative, a gentleman
conspicuous for his zeal in the Polish cause.
The petition was received as coolly as if the
Assembly had been the House of Commons; and
there can be little difficulty in believing that the
manner of its reception was watched and reported,
and employed as a motive for a further more
powerful demonstration on Monday. It so hap-
pened that the day was exceedingly hot, and the
wine-shops were filled in all directions with the
members of this experimental expedition. The
men drank and discussed, and the more they dis-
cussed the more they drank; and what with drink-
ing and talking and the burning weather, and the
incitements of malignant agents amongst them,
they conducted themselves in such a way as to
alarm the neighbourhood, and the rappel was beaten
for calling out the National Guards. Such offence
did the beating of the rappel give, that the drums
were seized and smashed on the Boulevards, oppo-
site the Foreign Office itself. This was reported
-
118
FETE DE LA FRATERNITÉ.
far and wide, and that enmity against the civic force,
which already had begun to display itself amongst
the blouses, although they might be National
Guards if they chose, was very much increased.
A grand fête had been announced for the next
day, under the title of Fête de la Fraternité. The
project was marred by a public announcement on
the part of Louis Blanc, and of the delegates of
workmen who had sat at the Luxembourg, that
inasmuch as the promises made to the workmen at
the barricades of February had not been fulfilled,
they would not take the places assigned to them in
the Champs de Mars. This notification added of
course to the prevailing excitement; and there was
so much reason to apprehend that the fraternal feast
would be of a Cain and Abel kind, that it was
adjourned.
The proceedings of the Assembly on this day
were, with reference to the internal regulations of
the Chamber, with respect to its standing Com-
mittee, another matter; but the evident ascendancy
which the old experienced ex-deputies of the liberal
opposition continued to acquire, became remarkable.
Only for such men as Odilon Barrot, Vivien, and
Dupin, it would have been hardly possible to have
extricated any subject out of the confusion and
chaos in which all propositions became involved.
The Ministers could not lead the Assembly; and
POPULAR PRESENTIMENT.
119
when their spokesman, M. Flocon, hazarded a
proposition of his own, it was sure to fall beneath
the courteous assaults of some Républicains de la
veille.
Such a spectacle was not calculated to raise the
Assembly in the eyes of the Clubs, who had indeed
settled the matter in their own minds, that it was
not up to the Robespierrcian revolutionary mark.
In such a frame of mind, as the reader may easily
imagine, did the Club leaders pass Sunday, which,
like some of the eves of the most dreadful events
of the first Revolution, was marked by a terrific
thunder-storm. This had the agrecable effect of
tempering the burning atmosphere, and Monday
opened with all the fresh geniality of mid-May.
The newspapers that morning betrayed the presenti-
ments of the public with regard to this Polish
Question. It was well understood that a powerful
effort would be made to commit France to the
hazardous chances of a war with the governments of
Europe-a war for war's sake-a war that would
turn the Revolution into a Dictatorship-transform
the Assembly into a Convention, and cause the
Government to be exercised through Committees of
Public Safety, while it placed the bourgeoisie at
the feet of revolutionary tribunals. The banner of
the Red Republic was to be raised, and planted on
the ruins of European society.
120
THE POLISH QUESTION.
There were two parties in the Government, and
these two parties were called after the newspapers,
which having been the instruments of their eleva-
tion, became now the organs of their policy and
opinions. The Réforme pronounced for war; the
National for peace. The language of the former,
speaking, as was well known, the sentiments of
Ledru-Rollin, was well calculated to stir up the
passions. "The people," it said, "could not under-
stand the policy of the Government; the people
were indignant at seeing Poland in blood and tears.
Were the people to see the promises made at the
Hôtel-de-Ville evaporate in smoke? They did not
desire to sit at ease within their walls, enjoying
selfishly the benefit of their institutions. There
should be an arined propaganda; for a close alliance
with all people was the great law of French
democracy. Hence it was that the bulletins from
Posen and from Cracow had caused such emotion
amongst the masses; the people wept and blushed.
Would the Government," it asked in conclusion,
"make their Republic selfish and cowardly?"
The National laboured elaborately to show that
the Polish Question affected Germany more than
France. Poland was close to Germany, and Ger-
many lay between her and France. French legions
on the Rhine would stir up the old German
prejudices, and they would have to march through
MARCH OF THE CLUBS.
121
a country converted into hostility by a rash and
precipitate act of intervention. The power of
democratic ideas to force their own way was repeated
after M. de Lamartine, and council given, which
was probably derived from the bureau of M.
Bastide, that an address should go forth from
the National Assembly to Germany and Poland,
impressing on the one the justice of the cause of
a violated nationality, and assuring the other of the
sympathies of France. While the organs of the
two parties in the Government shadowed in the
press the divisions of the Council Board, the walls
of the city were covered with proclamations from
the Government, calling on the people to refrain
from those assemblages, which, by disturbing public
tranquillity, were keeping down trade and per-
petuating private misery.
The Clubs, however, had formed their own reso-
lution. They assembled at an early hour at the
Place de la Bastille, each Club following its own
standard-bearer, and some time after ten o'clock,
the procession proceeded on its march. The inha-
bitants dwelling along the whole line of the
Boulevards were astonished at the spectacle that
met their eyes. The banners were, some of them,
large and tawdry; all of red silk, with the names
of the Clubs worked in gold, and adorned with
VOL. I.
G
122
MARCH OF THE CLUBS.
gold fringe. The crowd was immense, and marched
in regimental order.
There was the Club of "The Rights of Man,"
from which had issued, a few days before, a trucu-
lent manifesto against the rich. On another banner
was inscribed the title "Père Duchesne"-the name
of Hebert's infamous journal, under the first Revolu-
tion-a journal written in the slang talk of the
lowest people, and conceived in the worst spirit of
the wildest Demagogueism. It would not be easy
to call to mind all the names and titles, nor is it,
indeed, necessary for the statistics of brutality
have but little attraction. It is enough to know
the general spirit, for sake of guarding against it.
Without prejudice, it may be said that worse faces
were never beheld than appeared in that crowd,
whose dream was of 1793, whose God was Robes-
pierre, whose symbol was the bonnet-rouge, and
whose weapon la sainte guillotine.
There were faces which fascinated by their very
ugliness-the ugliness of brooding minds and cal-
lous hearts, filled with diabolical passions. At a
moment of halt, I was spoken to by a man in a
blouse, whose cold, glittering eye left an impression,
as if a snake had nestled in one's bosom. There
was that dead smile about the mouth, which is the
unmistakeable scal of villany. It is as the corus-
kad
S
Just
MARCH OF THE CLUBS.
123
cation of corruption compared with the glowing
and gorgeous fresh sunlight of benevolence and
innocence. I was relieved when the order to march
took him away to join his hissing demons of
war.
The fellow who bore the bonnet-rouge, or rather
a piece of red-painted wood, cut into that shape,
was the picture of a human brute. He had a small,
turned-up nose, and a huge under-jaw, with more
good humour, however, than others. The standard-
bearer of the Republicans, who had been wounded
in the émeute of the Cloître St. Mery, in 1834,
carried his head on one side, and looked in that
half-sleepy, watching way, given to the pictures of
Talleyrand. Indeed, he appeared to be a common,
coarse copy of the cold-blooded original, and was, no
doubt, one of the springs of the movement. Of
a man who was intent on a newspaper, all that could
be seen of his features, hidden by an immense filthy
beard, was an occasional glance of a scowling and
troubled eye.
A young man, evidently a leader, was
so thin, that his clothes hung loosely about him;
.
but his small, pinched features were lighted by a
pair of large, wild eyes, indicating the utmost au-
dacity and promptitude.
The master of the ceremonies sat in a low cabrio-
leta fierce Revolutionist, a stout fellow, with a
thick beard, named Iluber; but suffering under in-
G 2
?
124
THE CHAMBER INVADED.
It
disposition, the effect of long imprisonment.
was expected that the procession, on arriving at the
Madeleine, would have halted, and with an appear-
ance, at least, of respect for the Assembly, have sent
forward a delegation, as had been done by the
avant-garde on Saturday. No such thing! They
marched forward coolly, and with intrepid indiffer-
ence. The bridge facing the Chamber had been
occupied by some companies of the Garde Mobile,
with General Courtais, Commander-in-chief of the
National Guards, at their head. General Courtais
old man, with a handsome face, whose
mingled expression was, as before noticed, that of
sauciness and levity. Pleasant and brave, without
sense or judgment, was this man; and with a
craving after popularity that unfitted him for his
post. The leaders, who knew their man, dashed for-
ward, whispered into his ear some revolutionary
freemasonry, all-powerful over the initiated, and
the Garde Mobile were ordered to draw the bayonets
is an
from their guns. The bridge was quietly passed:
the foremost of the party scaled the perystile of the
Chamber, others rushed into the doors at all sides,
and in a moment the galleries of the Assembly were
filled to suffocation with a mob that electrified the
Senate. All the avenues were alike quickly filled.
This vast mass, vast by comparison with the gal-
lery dimensions of the building, formed but the
K
THE CHAMBER INVADED.
125
head of the advancing column, the main body
remaining in ignorance of the capture of the out-
works. Those that followed, quietly marched along
to the entrance at the rear, where copious room is
afforded by a square, in the centre of which sits a
plaster figure of the Republic, looking like all the
cold unimaginative efforts of artists who believe not
in Heaven, to give to abstraction a heavenly look,
and only serving the purposes of moralising reflec-
tion, by standing upon a basement, which had been
destined under Charles X. to a statue of the mar-
tyred Louis XVI. Around this brittle image mar-
shalled the Clubs. The grille had been shut against
them, as were all the doors, and for some time
there was decent patience, until it was ascertained
that the invasion of the outworks had been carried
into the heart of the Assembly, when there arose a
very laudable desire to take part in the triumph,
and to wave their banners over the vanquished.
During the altercation at the grille, a shot was fired,
which caused a terrible panic for a few moments,
but happily did not lead to serious consequences.
It had an electric effect, although but for a moment.
on the Assembly, and on the mob within. That
shot never was explained; no more than the shot
that on the night of the 23rd of February rang the
knell of the Monarchy. There is reason to suspect
that it was systematically discharged to pro-
S
126
voke retaliation, cause a mêlée, and justify an over-
throw of the Government, by exciting popular
indignation. By a remarkable coincidence, it hap-
pened that about the time this shot was fired, a
man was seized and made prisoner in the neigh-
bourhood of the Panthéon, who was spreading the
cry that at the National Assembly they were
cutting the throats of the people. So much for
what had passed outside. We must now look
within.
THE ASSEMBLY.
J
The Assembly had met at twelve o'clock, and as
soon as the ordinary formalities had been gone
through, M. Lacrosse ascended the tribune for the
purpose of complaining of the conduct of General
Courtais, who had issued a most unwarrantable
order of the day, informing the National Guards
that it was the National Assembly that had decided
on postponing the second grand fête of the Republic.
The fact was not so, for all that the Assembly had
done, was to receive an intimation to that effect
from the Minister of the Interior. The circum-
stance implied certainly strange levity on the part
of the General, and although the fact might not,
under ordinary circumstances, have been entitled to
much importance, yet at a moment when efforts
were notoriously making to excite the people against
the Assembly, it did look suspicious. In the
absence of General Courtais, who at that moment
127
was about to commit an indiscretion of a more
serious and suspicious kind, the incident was not
long dwelt upon.
A number of petitions in favour of Poland were
then presented. At length the regular business of
the day commenced by an interpellation from
M. Arago, on the affairs of Italy, which brought
M. Bastide, Minister for Foreign Affairs, to the
tribune. France, he said, had inaugurated in Europe
the dogma of the Sovereignty of the People; that
dogma they desired to see propagated, nor would
they in fact esteem their own emancipation com-
plete, so long as there were nations around them
whose people were suffering. It would be to the
eternal honour of France, he pursued, that her
people, instead of thinking of their own financial
and commercial embarrassments, pressed forward in
favour of their brethren of Italy and of Poland.
Yes, they owed aid and assistance to Governments
whose origin was like their own. France, by her
geographical position and national genius, ought to
be at the head of a happy confederation of free
people. Nevertheless, they had no right to go
unbidden into other countries. If they did so, the
prejudices and alarms of nations would be excited
by the recollection of former invasions. They
should first endeavour to reassure the minds of
their neighbours, so that they might be persuaded
THE POLISH QUESTION.
C
128
that France did not desire any territorial advantages
for herself. They, the French, ought to wait upon
their arms, ready upon the first invitation to join
in the divine work of the emancipation of people.
The treaties of Vienna were, to be sure, a dead
letter; but he had no doubt that the day was at
hand when there would be a Congress composed
of the representatives of free nations, to regulate in
a sure and permanent manner the relations of
countries with one another. The answer of which
this is the substance, not having satisfied M. Ara-
go, M. de Lamartine announced that he would
wait for the interpellation regarding Poland, to
answer both together; on which M. Wolowski
ascended the tribune.
THE ASSEMBLY.
He had not proceeded more than a few sentences,
when he became agitated and nervous; shouts of
Vive la Pologne! were heard outside from the
crowd, that had by this time forced the bridge,
and from the light structure of the building, being,
as the reader is aware, composed of wood and very
spacious, the shouts sounded as from a mob within
the square on which the building was situated.
Several members quitted their seats, and were
rushing out to see what was the matter, when a
voice was heard distinctly to exclaim: "The duty
of the National Assembly is to be at its post in so
grave a circumstance as this." The warning was
vớ
THE POLISH QUESTION.
129
timely and had the intended effect, for the members
of the Assembly, throughout the scene that followed,
never quitted their seats, and exhibited admirable
composure and dignity.
M. Wolowski endeavoured to master his emotion,
and proceeded clearly with his statement, but the
attention of his audience was otherwise directed,
and the shouts of the advancing column, increasing
more and more, at length enveloped the whole
building as in a whirlpool of passionate exclamation.
M. Degoussée, Questor of the Chamber, suddenly
entered, and mounting the tribune, stood by the
side of the advocate of Poland. A member begged
of him to get down, and not make a ridiculous
scene. Now M. Degoussée was just the man to
make a ridiculous scene. Tall, thin, and sombre,
with a sepulchral voice, and very ceremonious, he
might have been taken for Don Quixotte himself;
but in truth, he had encountered something more
serious than a wind-mill. The protection of the
Assembly had, he said, been assigned to the Pre-
sident and the Questors; and yet, contrary to the
orders of the Questors, the Commander-in-Chief of
the National Guards had ordered the Garde Mobile
to sheath their bayonets. A murmur of indigna-
tion ran through the benches. A cry was heard
that the "Salle was invaded!" "Summon the
Commander-in-Chief to the bar!" exclaimed a mem-
G 3
130
THE MOB INVASION.
ber. Clément Thomas, Colonel of the National
Guards rushed to the tribune, and made his sten-
torian voice resound. A considerable mass of people,
moved by a sentiment of sympathy for Poland, had
forced their way into the Assembly, in order to
present a petition.
This apparent palliation of violence was met by
expressions of anger, and before the speaker had
time to explain his meaning, the galleries were
filled with a wild mob, bearing banners, shouting
for Poland, and elbowing and thrusting the
affrighted occupants out of their way. "Presi-
dent, clear the tribune, it is your duty!" exclaimed
some, "There is no liberty here!" cried others.
"Let Clément Thomas take the supreme com-
mand of the National Guards," boldly proposed
M. Dupin.
Barbès rushed to the tribune, and endeavoured
to take the place of Clément Thomas. Several
members hurried to the foot of the tribunc, calling
on Thomas not to give way, and Thomas held his
ground. He is a fine, tall, handsome fellow, with
a fair beard, of not very polished manners, and a
good match for Barbès. The National Assembly
ought, he said, to protest against the violation of
which it was the object. At this moment, the gal-
leries were filled to suffocation. Amidst the shouts
of the Clubs, were heard shrieks from women,
THE MOB INVASION.
131
although the greater number, it deserves to be
recorded, displayed admirable courage and presence
of mind. By and bye the men in blouses, and in
shabby attire, were seen to drop from the tribunes
into the seats of the members, and before there was
time for expostulation, the doors were forced open,
and the salle was filled as by a flood that had burst
its dykes.
It appears that just previous to this invasion, the
last fillip had been given to the hesitation of the
masses, by the appearance of Barbès, Albert and
Louis Blanc, bound together by a large flag, in a
fraternal embrace. This theatrical action, with some
appropriate words by Louis Blanc, fired the fancies
of the audience, who at this burlesque spectacle,
took Louis Blanc on their shoulders, and rushed
into the salle.
At the head of the mob, appeared Sobrier,
Blanqui, Raspail, and several other leaders of the
Clubs. Louis Blanc addressed the Clubs, telling
them that if they wished to have the sacred right
of petition ratified, they would act with moderation.
It was Raspail who presented the petition, but on
his mounting the tribune, there was a burst of
indignant exclamation from the Assembly, not-
withstanding the menaces employed against mem-
bers in all directions by the mob, armed with
132
RASPAIL.
knives and pistols, which they openly displayed.
One of the invaders stood upon the tribune.
M. Corbon, the editor of the organ of the work-
man, called the "Atelier," himself formerly a
working man, left his seat, and forcing his way to
the chair of the President, took his stand by his
side, hoping perhaps to save him by his influence,
or to share his dangers; and there he stood, showing
his dark, mild, thoughtful face, in brave serenity.
After considerable delay and great tumult, Raspail
succeeded in reading the petition. Raspail is a
man of European celebrity as a chemist, although
of a somewhat spurious kind. He can boast no
diplomas or University degrees, and is what would
be glorious, if regarded as an unfriended conquest
over difficulties of patient force of will-a self-
taught man; but which, if it signify a presumptuous
self-confidence, unwarranted by extraordinary na-
tural abilities, is only another name for what some
call him a quack.
For a genius who broke a lance with Orfila, on
a point in which Orfila is an authority, that of
arsenic-which Raspail said could be found of itself
in the human body, or in old chairs and tables, and
so protested against Orfila's evidence in the case of
Madame Lafarge, on whose testimony she was
condemned for having poisoned her husband,-(into
RASPAIL.
133
what pleasant by-paths of parenthesis are we not
occasionally diverted!)—for so bold a genius, it has
to be recorded, that his name is not associated
with any higher discovery than that of camphor for
migraines, and camphor substitutes for cigars.
He is a bold man, however, this Raspail, and
headed a mob, determined to overthrow the Pro-
visional Government when there was a whisper of
backing into a regency. Like Marat, he lived
among the Faubourgians of the left bank of the
Seine, and set up a journal, which he called, after
that of the victim of Charlotte Corday, L'Ami du
Peuple. Such was the man who audaciously
usurped the tribune of the National Assembly,
from which he fulminated a decree for war, con-
veyed in the affected guise of a petition. As soon
as it was read, the President was about to signify
that it should be referred to the proper bureau, but
he could not make himself heard in the deafening
confusion.
Barbès joined his efforts to those who sought
to have the salle cleared, now that the right of
petition had been recognised, and that the people
had defiled before the Assembly; but while the
tribune was crowded, and the galleries were crack-
ing (it is surprising how they held together) and
the Clubs were marching, and the representatives
were receiving insults, menaces, and even blows,
134
BLANQUI.
while weapons were brandished about, and while
wanton strokes, as if of hammers, suggested the
fear that there were some diabolical enough to
endeavour to knock away the supports from the
great wooden shed itself, the famous Club-leader,
Blanqui, was fairly lifted over the heads of the
crowd into the tribune, not to talk of Poland, but
of a more intensely exciting subject, that of the
miseries of the people.
Blanqui, like Barbès, was an old conspirator,
and bore, like him, that unmistakable clay-cold
colour, which is communicated by the constant
presence of the prison wall. His features, when
examined, were spirited and regular; a long, thin
face, high nose, and high, but narrow forehead,
such as marks men of enterprise rather than
thought. But there invested the whole counte-
nance a sardonic expression-an intense enjoyment
of mischief-that would have formed a model for a
Mephistophiles. This man had founded, in June
1835, the secret society called Des Familles, which
merged subsequently into that of Des Saisons.
He had known Pépin, who was executed for the
part he had taken in the Fieschi massacre, and had
been apprised in the morning of that fearful attempt,
by Pépin himself, of the intention to fire an infernal
machine. Blanqui was the leader of the émeute of
the 12th of May, in which Barbès covered himself
BLANQUI.
135
with infamy by that cold-blooded assassination of
an officer, to which reference has been already
made. Over this Blanqui there hung a cloud of
suspicion. In the archives of the police had been
found by the Provisional Government, a paper
giving the history and composition, the designs,
attempts, and causes of failures of the conspirators'
agents and followers; and it was concluded that
Blanqui had furnished this confession to the Govern-
ment of Louis-Philippe, for the purpose of having
his own life spared, and the rigours of his confine-
ment mitigated. The Provisional Government
knew so well the dangerous power of Blanqui, that,
in order to destroy his influence, they gave it to
the "Revue Retrospective." The paper produced
an immense sensation; but Blanqui protested with
such energy that the whole had been concocted to
ruin so great a patriot, that he contrived to main-
tain a certain leadership. The consciousness that
he was not wholly trusted made him more desperate,
and it would not be going too far to assert that
this man, in whose heart, according to the energetic
expression of Ledru-Rollin, was not blood, but
gall, was capable of equalling the most bloody
prototype that could be found in the revolutionary
list, from Marat to Couthon.
Such was the man
who had been lifted into the tribune. He began, in
his dry, caustic voice, by an allusion to the mas-
136
DEMANDS OF THE MOB.
sacres of Rouen; but, as if the thread of his dis-
course had been broken by the wild shout of
execration the allusion had raised, he turned to the
subject of the miseries of the people; and his
words being lost again in the shouts and tumult,
he took up the cause of Poland, and demanded an
immediate decree that France should not return her
sword to the sheath until Poland had been re-
established.
This speech was followed by frightful tumult.
Ledru-Rollin at length obtained, if not silence,
a mitigation of the fury. He declared, that he did
not appear as a member of the Government, but as
a simple representative. He assured them that their
feelings for Poland found an echo in his heart; he
also responded to their wishes regarding the claims
of labour. He flattered the people on account of
their good sense, prudence, &c., and got himself
insulted for his pains; for he was told that he
betrayed the people on the 17th of March. He
would propose, he said, that the Assembly should
declare itself en permanence, on condition that the
people should retire. Some cried "Yes," and some
cried "No." Many demanded the formation of at
Ministry of Labour. Some said, "Let us retire ;"
and some menacingly demanded an immediate an-
swer to their demands. Raspail and Blanqui endea-
voured to make the people withdraw. Huber shouted
J
137
that they would withdraw, but that they would de-
file two by two, so that the Assembly should see
that 300,000 citizens were watching them. An
artillery officer, with drawn sword, leading half-a-
dozen fellows, took his station behind the President,
whom he treated as a prisoner. The President re-
fused peremptorily to adjourn the Assembly; for
he clearly saw, that if he did so, the mob would
remain, and declare the Government dissolved.
DEMANDS OF THE MOB.
Barbès, who until this moment had tried to
soothe the people, now lost his self-possession, and
fulminated the wildest propositions: an immediate
army for Poland, and a forced contribution of a mil-
liard on the rich. A shout of exultation hailed the
latter proposition. The mob began to dance and
cut capers-some bellowing for two hours' leave of
pillage of Paris. At this moment drums were heard
beating outside, which raised the excitement to
frenzy. "Whoever beats the rappel," shouted
Barbès, amidst roars of applause, "is a traitor!"
The President, encouraged by the approach of suc-
cour, made his voice heard:-" I order you," said
he, "to leave, and allow the Assembly to deli-
berate." Fists were shaken at him, and he was
threateningly told to hold his tongue; still he re-
peated the order. One shouted for the organiza-
tion of labour. Huber shouted for the défilé; while
Raspail laboured to induce the mob to retire. "I
138
TUMULT AT ITS HEIGHT.
""
will have no more to do with you,” shouted he, "if
you do not vacate the salle." Still the shouts for a
Ministry of Labour-for Louis-Blanc, who had
been seized and carried in triumph-for vengeance
on the murderers of the people of Rouen-for Poland
-arose, while the drums were heard to beat nearer
and nearer.
The President was threatened with summary ven-
geance if he did not order the rappel to cease. It
was then half-past three o'clock, at which time a
whisper was given to the President that he would have
relief within a quarter of an hour. The President,
in order to borrow time, affected to give the order to
stop the rappel; and, had he not done so, he
might have been murdered. Louis-Blanc, having
undergone a triumphant ovation, was now placed
standing upon a table within the salle. A
sudden cry, that the galleries were giving way
sobered the mob for a moment, but only for a ino-
ment; for the fury was revived by the red flag of the
Jacobins being brought in, surmounted by a picce
of crape. At this mo
At this moment, Huber, who from ex-
haustion had fainted, and lain in the front for half-
an-hour, rushed forward, seized the drapeau rouge,
and, waving it, declared the National Assembly dis-
solved. Some, stricken with an act of audacity that
went beyond their intentions, shouted "No, no!”
But there was only a glimmer of sense now. The
A
Qual
THE MOB EXPELLED.
139
excitement grew beyond all bounds. A piece of
paper was conveyed on a pike to Huber, who was
shaking his fist at the President. He took the paper;
it was a decree, drawn up in form, for the dissolu-
tion of the Provisional Government. At this mo-
ment the President was turned out of his seat,
which was taken by the artillery officer before-
noticed; before whom was raised a standard, with
the bonnet rouge, by a man who held a drawn
sword; and President, Vice-President, and Secre-
taries, retired, followed by several members. On
seeing this, one proposed that the representatives
who left should be declared traitors to their country.
Several read lists of names which they proposed as
members of the Provisional Government. A general
shout was raised, "To the Hôtel-de-Ville !" and
"Aux armes !" At this moment, while they were
squabbling about the names of the Provisional Go-
vernment, the drums were heard. A cloud seemed
to have filled the place, caused by the steam that
arose from the dense and heated mass, and gave
the finishing hue to so sinister a scene. The Garde
Mobile suddenly entered, with fixed bayonets; and,
as if by magic, the salle was cleared of the panic-
stricken mob. To the Hôtel-de-Ville they went,
proclaiming that the National Assembly was dis-
solved, and that a new Revolution had been effected.
So like was the manner of its accomplishment
HÔTEL-DE-VILLE INVADED.
to that of the Revolution of February, by a sudden
invasion of the Chamber, that the report was be-
lieved; and so paralyzed were the National Guards
at the Hôtel-de-Ville, that the insurgents encoun-
tered very little resistance as they entered the build-
ing, which has ever been regarded as the head-
quarters of new governments. The conspirators
were now seated in a room of the Hôtel-de-Ville,
which they deemed in their possession. From
the windows they were throwing slips of paper
with the names of the Provisional Government,
which, strange to say, differed from one another—
showing hasty and divided councils-but all agreeing
with respect to some names, enough to make the
blood of the citizens freeze with horror-when
there set forth as strange an expedition from a house
in the Rue de Rivoli, as ever occurred in a civilized
city.
At No. 16 in that street there is a house,
which, as it commands some windows of the Tui-
leries, had been purchased by the Intendant of the
Civil List, that it might not become a den of conspi-
rators. As the property of the Crown, it became spoil
for the Republicans, and was taken possession of
by M. Sobrier, who, not having the Prefecture of
Police all to himself, set up on his own account an
independent authority. This house Sobrier turned
into a fortress, which he garrisoned with a hundred
Montagnards, who followed the fortunes of so hardy
140
SOBRIER.
141
an adventurer. He filled the cellars with arms and
ammunition; and, so far from making any secret of
his proceedings, he called on his old chum, Caussi-
dière, for supplies, and got them.
Sobrier, a man of talent-and, if M. de Lamar-
tine be not yielding to his amiable credulity, a man
of religious enthusiasm, full of the poetry and
passion of revolutionary idealism-issued a news-
paper from his fortress, called the Commune de
Paris, and it would be hard to say whether this
paper, or the aspect of the wild and savage sentinels,
in their red sashes, holding guard over their myste-
rious magazine, inspired more anxiety. There were
strange whispers about the doings inside. It was
said, that indulging in some drunken freak one
night, a body of myrmidons seized on passers by,
bandaged their eyes, and led them before a revo-
lutionary tribunal, at which the future Coffinhals of
a coming Reign of Terror were rehearsing their
parts. After a severe warning against bourgeois
selfishness, the prisoners were released, with a hint
to hold their tongues.
So soon as it was announced that the National
Assembly was dissolved, Sobrier, who had been
disappointed at not being made Minister of Police
in February, determined to secure for himself, by
the laws of conquest, the Ministry of the Interior,
and he marched, at the head of his expedition,
142
PARIS IN A PANIC.
against the magnificent seat of the Home Depart-
ment, in the Faubourg St. Germain. Had he
succeeded, the telegraph would have been in the
hands of the insurgents, and the provinces kept
in the dark; for, at the same moment, another
expedition was organizing by an ambitious Post-
master-General. Sobrier failed, and was made
prisoner; the energetic Etienne Arago protected
the Post-Office, and the provinces were saved from
alarm.
:
While lists of a Provisional Government were
emanating from the Hôtel-de-Ville, and while
the National Guards were assembling in the most
resolute manner, as yet ignorant of the true state.
of things, the people of Paris were in the wildest
alarm the Boulevards were filled with people, the
evening was beautiful, the whole population were
out of doors, and in groups, asking what was the
news? For half an hour it was believed that the
Government was overthrown, and that men were
standing on the brink of a massacre; all were
heart-sick; but said that it could not last, for the
provinces would march on Paris. What! Barbès,
the assassin; and Blanqui, the desperate conspi-
rator; and Louis Blanc, the Communist; and Ras-
pail, the quack; and Caussidière, and Ledru-Rollin,
masters of France! It could not be! But what
misery might not be pressed into even a little week
THE ASSEMBLY.
143
by such inen! The masses of National Guards
marching from all sides towards the National
Assembly, and looking so thoughtful and resolute,
inspired confidence; and before an hour had
elapsed from the period of the announcement that
a revolution had been accomplished, the gladden-
ing intelligence was circulated that the traitors
were arrested.
Let us return to the Assembly. As soon as the
salle was cleared of the mob, M. Duclerc at once
took the chair of the President, and announced,
amidst loud cheers, that the Assembly was not
dissolved, and would resume its proceedings. At
this moment, General Courtais, in his uniform of
Commander-in-Chief of the National Guards,
entered, and was received with every mark of
indignity; his epaulettes were torn off, he was
called a traitor, and but for the interference of
some members, who took him away, might have
suffered severely from the enraged National Guards.
M. Corbon, who had behaved so well during the
trying scene that had preceded, now took the chair
as Vice-President; and Clément Thomas, in his
uniform of Colonel of National Guards, entered,
and as his hand was bleeding from a wound
received in defending the Assembly, he was received
with enthusiasm. He announced that the Assem-
bly was under the protection of the National
144
NATIONAL GUARDS.
Guards, with the command of which he had just
been invested.
M. de Lamartine now entered. During the
invasion by the mob he had been observed to sit
for a while on his seat, composed and tranquil as
usual, but profoundly saddened. How his illusions.
must have been shattered! He did not allow him-
self to remain long under such impressions, but
disengaged himself from the mob, and set about
active duty. On his return he was hailed with
cordial cheers, and having proposed resolutions of
thanks to the National Guards, he proceeded to
state that the conspirators were, at that moment,
at the Hôtel-de-Ville, endeavouring to form a
Government. "At such a moment," he added,
"the Government is no longer in Council-the
Government, Citizen National Guards, is at your
head-it is at your head in the street, or if necessary,
in the field of battle."
mak
This speech was received with acclamation by the
National Guards, now occupying the salle and the
gallerics, and every vacant spot. "Comrades to
the Hôtel-de-Ville !" became the cry. The drums
beat. Lamartine and Ledru-Rollin left the Assem-
bly, and having mounted horses, proceeded to what
they expected to find a scene of battle; but at that
moment the traitors were in the hands of justice,
and Lamartine enjoyed his last ovation.
The
p
EXCITEMENT IN THE ASSEMBLY.
145
Assembly was declared in permanence.
manence. A con-
fused and irregular discussion ensued on the
profanation to which the Assembly had been sub-
jected. Every half hour some angry or indignant
speaker would be interrupted with fragments of
intelligence: "Barbès, Blanqui, Raspail, and Gene-
ral Courtais had been arrested !" "Intelligence had
been sent through the telegraph to all parts of the
country that the Assembly had been invaded; but
that order had been restored." "The regular de-
parture of the mails had been secured." "Sobrier
had been taken." Then the Procureur-Général
applied for the sanction of the Assembly to the
arrest of its members, Barbès, Albert, and Courtais;
and this was followed by long debates on the powers
of the Assembly. Lamartine re-appeared, announc-
ing that the conspiracy had been destroyed. At
length Louis Blane entered, and was received with
no less indignity than Courtais. He asserted his
innocence, yet announced that he sympathized
with the object of the demonstration; apologized
for the conduct of his friends, Barbès and Blanqui ;
but was obliged to cut short explanations that every
moment were interrupted by expressions of anger.
In this excited way the Assembly sat until nine
o'clock, when it adjourned to the following morning.
At this time the scene out of doors was singularly
animated. The National Guards were all under
VOL. I.
II
146
SCENE OUT OF DOORS.
arms; and wherever a detachment was met, it
was cheered by the people, which cheers would be
returned by shouts of " Vive la République !" The
National Guards, conscious that they had done the
state some service, were happy, and, like truly happy
persons, not revengefully disposed. The shocked
and frightened people were not in quite so kindly a
mood; and had the National Guards taken them
prisoners, tried them by Court-Martial, and dealt
with them summarily, they would have only re-
sponded to the impulses of the moment. That they
contented themselves with handing over the insur-
gent leaders to justice speaks well for a body against
which had so long been directed the malice of the
Clubs. There was no possibility of approaching the
Hôtel-de-Ville, where the prisoners were, all the
avenues being blocked up with the armed civic
legions. Many inhabitants of houses in the neigh-
bourhood illuminated their windows, in testimony of
their joy at the great deliverance of the Republic
from so imminent and fearful a danger.
It remains now to be asked-whether the occur-
rence of the day was the result of a premeditated
design? Had it been so, would not preparations
have been made to follow it up? It is certain, that
many who had joined the procession were not at all
aware that it was to have been more than a demon-
stration in favour of Poland. The National Guards,
147
who had come up from the provinces to assist at the
ceremonial appointed for the day preceding, helped
to swell the procession, and they assuredly har-
boured no design against the Assembly. On the
other hand, how explain the written decree put
into Huber's hand for the dissolution of the As-
sembly? How explain the march of Sobrier on the
Ministry of the Interior? How explain the docu-
ments found at his house, consisting of decrees
prepared for promulgation on the Government being
overthrown; and among which was a very remark-
able one, stating, among other considerations why
the Assembly was dissolved, "that the people, going
peaceably with a petition in favour of Poland, had
been fired upon."
WAS THE ATTACK PREMEDITATED.
The attack of the 15th of May was the third of
the kind. There was one on the 17th of March,
which failed because the great mass of the persons
composing the procession to the Hôtel-de-Ville,
were in ignorance of the intention of their leaders.
The attempt of the 16th of April failed, because
the plot having got wind, General Changarnier, with
wonderful promptitude, called out the National
Guards. Ignorance on the part of the mass, of
the intention of the leaders, affords no presumption
of absence of design. It is to be presumed rather
that the leaders were not agreed amongst them-
selves, and that because they were jealous and
HI 2
148
VIEWS OF THE LEADERS.
suspicious of cach other. Sobrier, it can hardly
be doubted, was prepared to push for an overthrow
of the Assembly, and for the re-establishment of
1794 in its integrity, Dictatorship, revolutionary
tribunals, Committee of Public Safety, War, and
all so was Huber. Raspail was evidently not pre-
pared to go so far. Barbès was hurried by the impe-
tuosity of the torrent into a premature line of con-
duct. Louis Blanc would have been satisfied had
the right of petition been established, as it was
understood at the time of the Convention; namely,
the right of the people to march to the Assembly,
and dictate its wishes. This being established, the
real power would have lain with the Clubs, while
the Assembly would have afforded the decency of
legislative form. At the same moment, his desired
"Ministry of Labour and Progress" would have.
been extorted, and he and Albert made Cabinet
Ministers, and the real governing power of a So-
cialist-Communist administration.
The matter having gone beyond his intention,
his subsequent conduct was marked with hesitation.
He buzzed about the Hôtel-de-Ville, as
a moth
round a taper; but whether he dropped down to
the Council Board with Barbès and Blanqui, is a
disputed point. He denies that he did; but there
is positive contradiction of his word by a Colonel
of National Guards, who says he saw him; yet he
THE MONTAGNARDS-CAUSSIDIERE.
149
might have been mistaken. There is reason to
believe that the levity or treason at the head of the
National Guards, the treason at the Assembly,
perhaps the ready treason at the Council Board,
was also lying in waiting at the Prefecture of
Police.
On the approach of the Insurgents to the Hôtel-
de-Ville, the Montagnards of the Prefecture, as if
by common accord, drew out each man a red sash,
which he flourished about his head, and then
girded round his body. M. Caussidière, the Pre-
fect, of course knew nothing of the traitorous dis-
position of his body-guard, and of their intentions
to support the coming Dictatorship of Barbès,
Blanqui and Sobrier, with the aid of Raspail, Cabet,
Thoré, and Proudhon. He, poor man, lay ill in
bed; but not so ill as to prevent our having the
pleasure of describing his appearance the next day
at the tribune of the National Assembly.
150
IRRITATION OF
CHAPTER X.
IRRITATION OF THE ASSEMBLY—MARC CAUSSIDIERE-
SURRENDER OF THE PREFECTURE OF POLICE-
DUCOUX-LUCIEN MURAT.
Splet p
M.
THE appearance of the Assembly on Tuesday,
the 16th, was sombre, agitated, and irritable. A
corporate body feels precisely like an individual.
This body had been outraged in its own house ;
and although it had courageously looked the armed
ruffian in the face, and maintained a decent air of
composure, whilst a trusty scrvant was fetching the
police, it felt, nevertheless, a sense of humiliation.
Poor Louis XVI. felt not more overwhelmed with
grief and shame when, on a similar invasion of his
palace of the Tuileries sixty years before, the
bonnet-rouge had been mockingly placed on his head.
It was not on the head of buffeted and doomed
THE ASSEMBLY.
151
monarchy, that the sign of martyrdom was now
thrown. It was not even on law and legislation that
sentence of death was passed by a mob, when an
armed artilleryman took the chair of the ejected
President, under the shadow of the mock Phrygian
cap. No, worse again: it was society, as constituted
amongst civilized man, that was destined to perish
in a whirlwind of anarchy. Religion, rule, legisla-
tion, and law, with family and property, were to
have gone together. Civilization would have dis-
appeared, and cities given place to a desolate
wilderness, for the tiger, the monkey, and the
serpent-for blood, lust, and grovelling debase-
ment.
The irritation of the Assembly broke out at
once, and was manifested in a series of sharp inter-
rogations, addressed to the President, relative to
his having issued an order not to have the rappel
beaten. His explanation was, that he did so to
gain time, as he knew that. in a quarter of an hour
more relief would arrive. The explanation was met
with expressions of anger and affected contempt,
which were hardly deserved. M. Garnier Pagès
gave a better direction to the excitement, by an-
nouncing the arrest of the leading conspirators, and
detailing the measures that had been taken for the
preservation of order. Anger was again excited,
when it was told that the rioters arrested by the
152
CAUSSIDIERE.
National Guards were liberated by the police, while
the Garde Républicaine, a new police force, were
manifesting what their feelings were by shouting
"Vive Barbès !” ..
Why was not Caussidière,
the Prefect of Police, in his place to explain such
conduct?" If he was not there, Lamartine was, to
vindicate his conduct, and answer for the loyalty
of his intentions. Lamartine the apologist of
Caussidière! A deep whisper ran from bench
to bench. Lamartine had given a stab to his
own reputation. Already had he suffered by his
obstinate adherence to Ledru-Rollin; he now
suffered infinitely more by his marked protection
of Caussidière. M. Baroche, an advocate of emi-
nence, declared openly that the Assembly saw with
dissatisfaction such a man at the head of
of the
police. But an indescribable sensation was produced
when M. de Mornay rose and affirmed that Huber,
the man who had pronounced the dissolution of the
Assembly had been released from arrest; and not
only Huber, but Blanqui, had been arrested, and
afterwards set free. At length, Caussidière ap-
peared, and as he limped, or affected to limp, to
the tribune, the Assembly assumed an aspect, which
it was impossible to mistake; it was that of pro-
found distrust, mingled with aversion.
Marc Caussidière is a study. Even in so thickly
clustering a gallery of revolutionary portraits, he
J
CAUSSIDIERE.
153
stands out alone. He is the melo-dramatic hero
of the Revolution; a sort of Grindoff, such as we
recollect to have taken in our boyish days as the
type of pleasant picturesque ferocity, in that perfect
mockery of the unities called the "Miller and his
Men." Perhaps it is the hat that suggests Grindoff;
for Caussidière, has inaugurated a broad-brimmed,
slouched beaver, with a high-pcaked crown, around
which there ought, for sake of perfection, to curl
a red feather. This hat was not chosen out of
indulgence of a capricious taste; it was the rallying
sign of the chief of a new-hatted party, to which
it was to be in the day of battle as the white
panache of Henry IV. at Ivry. As Caussidière is
a tall man, the hat added to his height, and he
looked, as he desired, remarkable.
This tribune of the people-whose soul lay with
the very poorest of the poor; who had himself in
that weary chase after a calling, so often the lot of
men, who brought up to no honest business, are
afforded the opportunity of displaying a versatile
aptitude for all-from coaxing orders for goods
or advertisements, to anything within the range of
the world of politics, from the premiership to the
police this now emancipated man from the galling
chain of want, bedecked his ample person in the
gewgaws of the newest fashions. The best dressed,
most varnish-booted, white-waistcoated and fancy-
I 3
154
CAUSSIDIERE.
cravatted man on town, was the great champion of
the République Démocratique et Sociale. Like
George in the opening chapter of Kenilworth, he
might enact the gentleman as he pleased, but under
all, the ci-devant commis-voyageur was present. The
head of the man is set on a short thick neck,
which, with the low brow, looked animal-like and
sensual. He, of all the fierce democrats, wore no
beard, because his satiny, soft, florid cheek, could
not put forth so Oriental an appendage in sufficiently
becoming luxuriousness. Besides, this hero was
not a man of half-measures; he would be bearded
like the Grand Turk, or not bearded at all. The
artful, yet daring soul, looked through a sly watch-
ful eye-the eye of the crouching leopard. So
much for the external man, which pictured harmo-
niously the inner. The mind was well supplied
with samples of all kinds of knowledge, and exhi-
bited with the incoherent profusion of an agent
pressed for time in pursuit of customers. He
seemed to have picked up some loose scraps of the
heathen mythology, some disjointed axioms of
moral and political philosophy, with a copious
capital of slang, which he did his best to hide under
the choicest Arabesque imagery, but which would
ever keep oozing out, like damp from mortar, in
which had mingled sea-sand. Like another chief
to whom he bore a sort of resemblance, for he
CAUSSIDIERE.
E
155
might be called the Rob Roy of the Faubourgs,
he would, when excited, drop into the real emphasis
of his native dialect; and even the imposing aspect.
of the National Assembly could not restrain Caus-
sidière from a rolling fire of sacrés that would rival
a Gallic driver exercising his brutality on a horse ;
for of all men, the French drivers are the most
cruel to their animals. As a specimen of style to
which no description could do justice, we need only
repeat one conciliatory adjuration from Caussidière,
when collapsing into softness: "Let us put our
differences into a sack, and throw them into the
river Lethe." Perhaps we should add a profound
political reflection in favour of brilliantly illustrated
emigration: “That society was like a bladder, and
when too full will burst."
A man so active and so accomplished, whose pen
and sword made him a Faubourgian Cæsar, ran
through all the casualties of a life devoted to the
working classes, through the effective principles of
conspiracy. He had been tried and imprisoned,
and when let out, returned to wallowing in the
mire. He was one of the Council that sat at the
Réforme, on the night of the 23rd of February,
and voted for battle. The victory was such as sur-
passed the wildest expectations or the deepest
calculations, and Caussidière won with his good
sword the Prefecture of Police. Installed there, he
156
CAUSSIDIERE.
1
set about the erection of a Prætorian Guard of his
own, who took the name of the Garde Républicaine,
acknowledged no allegiance to any but their Chief,
and amused their leisure hours doing police duties
in the way we have seen, by letting loose such
falsely" accused prisoners as Huber and Blanqui,
until Marc should sound the signal for the Répu-
blique Démocratique et Sociale.
(C
.
Such was the man, who, like an overgrown
hexameter or wounded snake, or sea-sick ser-
pent, dragged his slow length along to the tribune.
His exordium dropped so languidly, like thawing
honey, that cries of plus haut! rose from all
sides. He apologized for a throat that had been
hoarse for two months, which as he naïvely added,
was not his fault; and then he ran through a detail
of the services he had rendered the State, which was
not wanting in terseness and vigour. He reminded
the Assembly of the rapidity, and indeed it was
marvellous, with which order had been restored in
February. Within three days the barricades had
been taken down, and the streets repaired; the
markets were supplied through his means; the price.
of bread and of all necessaries kept down; robbery,
assassination and incendiarism prevented; gaming-
houses closed; and that through the agency of
dangerous men. He had, to use an expression,
which although it has been severely criticised, was
157
no bad antithesis, "made order with disorder;" he
had no other than a disorderly instrument in his
hands, and with it he did do good in the first
instance, at the same time that it was felt how little
such an instrument could be depended upon for any
time. It might have proved an Aaron's rod, that
having swallowed up all other rods, would become
no longer a rod of Justice, but a scourge for society.
Having, however, cleared the ground of defence,
he turned accuser, and proclaimed aloud that he
had demanded authority to arrest Blanqui, the
leader of the conspirators, and was refused. So far
so good; but when he stated his own plan for pre-
venting what had taken place, namely, that he
would have moved for a deputation of members of
the Assembly to go outside and address the people,
while a deputation from the people should come in
and address their petition to the Assembly, the
dissatisfaction of the majority broke out in loud
murmurs against so accommodating a Minister of
Police.
CAUSSIDIERE.
Finding he had touched on dangerous ground,
he artfully returned to his accusation against the
Executive, who had reduced him to the part of a
mere gens-d'arme. The Procureur-Général, as if
stung by the accusation, retorted by repeating the
charge, that at the Prefecture of Police, the rioters.
bad been liberated, while the policemen wore the
158
CAUSSIDIERE.
bonnet-rouge.
It was in vain that Caussidière
could struggle against such an exposure, by plead-
ing that his policy was one of conciliation, and
that he was keeping order with disorder. M. Ba-
roux exposed the existence of a fortress in the Rue
de Rivoli, by the connivance of the police, and
Caussidière openly defended Sobrier. A letter was
produced describing the seizure of ammunition and
arms at this house, which caused much agitation of
feeling, until Caussidière, pressed on all sides,
roared forth a sacré bleu, that set the seal to the
impression made by his explanations.
Much of the romantic interest of this day's pro-
ceedings would be lost if we did not mention, that
while Caussidière, like a stag at bay, was butting at
the angry pack of interlocutors and cross-examiners,
by whom the flowing elegance of his discourse was
broken into the fragmentary, but more lively dashes
of dramatic dialogue, there hung over the whole
the mystery of a siege and battle at the Prefecture.
Many an ear thought it had heard cannon, and
some looked for an explosion in the same direction.
The Minister of Finance was about taking up the
gauntlet in defence of the Government, when
M. Fayre announced that the Prefecture was in the
hands of the National Guards and the troops.
are completely in error," firmly interrupted a bold
voice. "The Prefecture of Police," retorted M.
"You
159
Favre, considerably modifying his information, "is
occupied by the National Guard and by La Garde
Républicaine." That altered the matter; there was
a compromise; the Montagnards had made their
own conditions. The Minister of the Interior now
arrived, and announced that the Prefecture of Police
was in the hands of the National Guards and the
troops. Caussidière then rose, and angrily declar-
ing that having just heard that cannon had been
pointed against the Prefecture, he gave in his resig-
nation. The fact was not so: nevertheless, the
manner of the resignation was too good a coup-de-
théâtre to spoil; the Prefect was out, and the
Assembly too well pleased to call him back.
The ordinary business of the day was then re-
sumed; it related to the national regulation of the
Assembly in the matter of its debates; and, after
some progress had been made, the sententiousness
of parliamentary debate was turned into drama by
the abrupt appearance of M. Ducoux, a fat, fussy,
round-built man, with a fat round face, a fat round
nose, and a big round voice. As an ex-veterinary
surgeon, he was a better horseman than most French-
men are, and so he had been, en amateur, on a tour
of inspection. He found at the Prefecture only
one hundred and thirty men of the Garde Ré-
publicaine; the rest, composing a force of fifteen
DUCOUX.
160
LUCIEN MURAT.
hundred men,
were disseminated in barracks.
The Montagnards were in the Caserne St. Victor.
The son of Murat appeared now at the tribune for
the first time, and his appearance naturally excited
much interest. He is an exceedingly large man,
very tall, and very corpulent, and in no other
respect remarkable. He came to recount an adven-
ture that had almost proved fatal. He had been
to the Prefecture, which he had found guarded
by only fifty-three National Guards. He had
parleyed with the commander of the Republican
Guard, with whom he had remonstrated on the
folly of a resistance that would cause French blood
to flow. He invoked him to a surrender which
could imply no dishonour. The answer was, "With-
out Caussidière's order, we never will surrender: we
number fifteen hundred." Murat answered, "I will
return to the Assembly, and procure an order from
Caussidière." "Never!" returned the officer,
"unless he gives the order in person.' Murat,
however, resolved on going back to the Chamber,
where he expected to find Caussidière under arrest;
and as he approached a legion of National Guards,
he happened to be mistaken, of all men in the world,
for Caussidière himself; and such was the rage.
which the presence of the supposed Prefect inspired,
that a sword was at his breast, and would have been
""
C
THE PREFECTURE OF POLICE.
161
passed through his body, had not a voice exclaimed
at the moment, "C'est Murat!"
Here, then, was a distinct statement, that fifteen
hundred desperadoes held the Prefecture of Police.
Seeing that an unpleasant altercation was likely to
arise, some members interfered, and the order of the
day was resumed. Before the close of the regular
business of the day, the state of the Prefecture was
again brought in by a more reassuring report, and
the Assembly adjourned.
162
STORMY SITTING.
CHAPTER XI.
A STORMY SITTING.
THE sitting of Wednesday, the 17th, need not
detain us long. It was confused, boisterous, and
self-damaging; and, viewed in that respect, suffered
in general estimation; a sad circumstance, at a
moment when the Assembly was the sole governing
power. Let us make a rapid résumé of the day's
proceedings. The resignation of Caussidière was
received, put from the chair, and accepted, and his
successor named-M. Trouvé Chauvel. The Garde
Républicaine was declared to be disbanded, and an
appointment announced, of which the Assembly were
far from divining the importance-that of General
Cavaignac to be Minister of War. Exceptional laws
were presented affecting the Clubs-exceptional laws.
presented by the Ministry of the Republic, within a
dozen days from the meeting of the.Assembly! A
STORMY SITTING.
163
law for the exclusion of the ex-Royal Family of
France from the territories of the Republic was pre-
sented. The Minister of Finance presented a bill for
the resumption of railways by the State. The Minister
of Public Works asked for a grant for the national
ateliers, where the number of hands employed on
unprofitable labour had swelled from eighty thousand
to one hundred and fifteen thousand. All these were
presented as of urgency, and were suggestive enough
of a hapless state of society.
The confusion that had prevailed throughout the
day was raised to a perfect storm, when M. Favre
undertook to admonish the Assembly, saying,
"This sitting must finish in a dignified and proper
manner. The systematic disorder in which the
Assembly seems to take pleasure must have an end :
you must and you shall hear me.” The admonition
might be well-founded; but in the mouth of a young
man, of singularly arrogant and presumptuous bear-
ing, it excited universal anger. The members rose,
as by common accord, from their seats-plunged
into the centre of the salle-rushed towards the tri-
bune, about which the angry stream foamed as about.
a rock. The President put on his hat, and the
sitting was suspended, until calm was restored,
when the astounded Favre offered an apology.
s
:
164
SAD COMMUNICATIONS.
CHAPTER XII.
LUGUBRIOUS MISCELLANIES-M. DUPIN.
OPENING with lugubrious communications, and
then falling into noise and confusion, so passed the
sitting of Thursday, the 18th. A body of National
Guards had entered an armed Club, situated in a
passage in the Rue Faubourg St. Martin; the lights
were suddenly extinguished, with the exception of
one of gas, which flamed forgotten or unobserved,
or was allowed to remain as a lure; the members
had disappeared; the National Guards began a
search, were fired upon, and some were killed.
The funeral of the victims was to take place at
three o'clock, and a letter to the Assembly asked
for a deputation to do honour to these martyrs in
the cause of society.
Another communication related to the town of
DUPIN,
165
Limoges, where a collision had taken place, caused
by Communist manœuvres. This town was
described to be a focus of Communism. A procla-
mation, expressive of the thanks of the Assembly
to the National Guards and the people, for their
conduct on Monday, gave rise to such a Babel
of sounds, that the President at one moment
declared his strength was exhausted. M. Dupin
extricated the unfortunate proclamation, by a timely
suggestion to allow it to be returned to the Com-
mittee for correction; and, in due time, it was
corrected accordingly.
M. Dupin comes so frequently to the rescue, and
with such success, that a word is due to so promi-
nent an actor on the agitated scene. It has been
remarked more than once, how promptly the public
men of well-established political reputation obtained.
an ascendancy over the Assembly, despite their
newly-adopted Republicanism. Immediately after
the invasion of the 15th, this ascendancy became
more marked, and kept steadily on the increase,
while the influence of the more fresh and fiery
parliamentary novelties declined in a corresponding
proportion. The parts which men take in public
proceedings are induced as much by their own
characters, as by the necessities which beckon them
to their aid. M. Dupin assumed at once the part
which ought properly to have devolved on the
166
DUPIN.
.
President that of eliciting order out of disorder,
of disentangling the many threads of discourse, of
taking up the poor belaboured question, and, with
patience and skill, restoring it to shape. M. Dupin
did all this in the most natural and inoffensive way;
and this was the more remarkable from the contrast
which it presented to the manner employed by the
same gentleman in the more punctilious Chamber
of Deputies, where his word was ever barbed with
sarcasm, and his look as sharp as his word,
In the chair of the old Chamber, when M. Dupin
filled that chair, a call to order would have been a
chastisement for the offender. A question rescued
from confusion, would come out avenged on the
blunderers, as it emerged into light through a
galling discharge of brilliant, but stinging words.
The Jupiter of the Deputies stood in the Assembly
stripped of his forked thunderbolts. His bearing
before that rude and riotous body was that of a
novice. He looked as if he felt admitted upon
sufferance. I cannot forget M. Dupin's first
appearance at the tribune: he walked up so diffi-
dently, with his hat in his hand, which he laid on
the floor; stood sideways, as if prepared to descend
immediately; stooped as the noise continued, took
up his hat, and, with a short, graceless bow, was
making his exit, when the homage of a sudden
silence, broken only by invitations to proceed,
DUPIN.
167
induced him to go on with his favourite work—
that of placing the lost question in its proper
light.
M. Dupin was always well received, although he
was no longer the same Dupin, with whose caustic,
wayward, unsocial nature, no party could combine ;
and whose eccentricity, or infirmity of temper,
shewed that a mind of a high order was deprived
of its beneficial influences on mankind by the
admixture of some strange element. Whence pro-
ceeded that colouring matter which jaundiced an
incomparable range of view? What was it that
repelled with such subtlety, while there were SO
many gifts of cloquence and wit to attract? How
could the judgment be so sure, and so false ?—the
feelings so warm, and so perverse? What nerve is
astray in that vigorous, intellectual form? How
is it that the strength that can deal with particulars
in an all-searching analysis, yet cannot combine the
whole? These are moral phenomena which cause
our wonder, but baffle our explanation.
Dupin was, in the old Chamber, the one whose
hand was against every man, and every man's
hand against him. It took the Revolution of
February to sober him-the strange aspect of the
National Assembly to reduce to the harmony of a
plain-reasoning, reconciling man. No man was,
however, viewed with more disfavour than was
168
DUPIN.
Dupin ;-he was not so hated, because he was
not so dreaded, as Thiers. Like Lamartine, he
had long ceased to be of any party-he stood
alone; whilst, unlike Lamartine, his proper con-
nections never ceased to regard his isolation with
regret, and would have won his support if they
could. A man who, from no matter what motive,
repels the attractions of office, and place, and
power, possesses a certain claim on the respect of
politicians. He may be cross-grained, or disagreea-
ble, but he is pure ;-or if not pure, he is self-
punished. The fact of Dupin being the friend and
adviser of the King rather raised him, for it
was plain to all how easily he might have taken
advantage of such a position for self-elevation;
and this position showed, moreover, that he was
worthy of trust. But there was one damning fault
in the character of Dupin, his supposed identification
with the bourgeoisie. He was regarded as the incarna-
tion of the middle class, on which had rested the
throne of July. He had that vulgar sense of the
bourgeois which hc, unfortunately for himself, re-
sumed in an often-quoted, and never-to-be-forgotten
expression, "Chacun pour soi, chacun chez soi,"
which is, in point of fact, the counterpart of Alder-
man Brooke's famous moral axiom, "Lord! every
man is for himself in this world."
It was perhaps that instinctive sense of what was
Kangg
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DUPIN.
169
most prudent for sake of self-interest, that guided
M. Dupin into an accommodation with a new
Assembly. He laid before them that plain reason-
ing, and in that plain way, which if it be not
common sense, looks very like it; for common sense
is, after all, most frequently the basis of grand views,
and grand views shape for themselves grand
language-bold, simple, and yet ornate. The well-
read man, if he be at the same time a deep thinker,
is led to that discovery for himself, which has ever
been the charm of highly cultivated intellects,
namely, the analogies which run through Nature,
harmonising and combining all things through the
pervading activity of some few elements or princi-
ples, and connecting as by a fine chain the world of
matter with the world of spirits, until he arrive at
the comprehension; that what we see only in parts
may be seen by immortals as a whole-as one
temple of finest proportions, filled with divinest
harmony. The most dry subject may, in the hands
of such a man as a Bacon, a Shakespeare, or a
Burke, become most metaphorical, most adorned
with happy similitudes, most plain at the same
time, by means of well chosen analogies from the
great storehouse of knowledge and reflection,
into which shines the sun of imagination. But as
the audience must be able to follow, or at all events.
appreciate this manner of stating questions, and as
VOL. I.
I
Pa
170
all audiences do not-why then it follows, that the
speaker, whose confined acquirements are most in
accordance with ill-taught listeners will be the
most relished. Burke was "the dinner-bell," even
of a British House of Commons. For reasons indi-
cated by these views, even lawyers can hardly be
first-rate orators. Their range of reading is too
special and narrow, their only analogies are those
of analogous cases and decisions, not frankly sought
after, but too often pressed and strained into the
service of sophistry.
A mere lawyer was M. Dupin-a lawyer built
upon the basis of bourgeoisie-as such he was a most
apt adviser for the Ex-King Louis-Philippe, a
monarch who would have made a model of a plain
wise country gentleman. The King, with the same
sort of shrewdness that belonged to his legal
adviser, knew what his instrument was fitted for;
and although he never would choose him for Minis-
ter, yet never would he part from such a lawyer.
I confess that the appearance of Dupin disappointed
I expected to see an eccentric figure, slovenly
and careless in attire, but flinging from the pockets
of his greasy suit, handfulls of the coin of a
quaint, biting humour. He is no such thing. He
dresses plainly it is true, but not remarkably so;
very much like a man of mercantile pursuits; and
when he puts on a little bonnet grec to cover his
me.
DUPIN.
4
171
strong bald head from the cold of the vast wooden
hall-with his deep sensible eye searching through
his spectacles, and his harsh-looking mouth, ready
for plain truth or bitter reply-he looks like the
man of that maxim, chacun pour soi-chacun chez
soi. It was in the sitting of this day, that the Com-
mittee of Fifteen, for drawing up the Constitution,
was ballotted for. It was composed of members
taken from nearly all parties; in which, however,
the well-known old names predominated.
DUPIN.
་
1 2
172
MISCELLANEOUS DISCUSSIONS.
CHAPTER XIII.
ANGER OF THE ASSEMBLY NOT YET APPEASED-SINGU-
LAR DEBATE ABOUT THE MANNER OF WEARING
SCARFS-THE FETE DE LA CONCORDE'-THE PARI-
SIANS A THEATRICAL PEOPLE-ADAPTATION OF PARIS
FOR SPECTACLES-WHAT TOOK PLACE IN THE DAY,
AND WHAT AT NIGHT.
A
THERE was nothing of a marked character in the
sitting of Friday the 19th of May. The Assembly
manifested at the opening the same irritability
relating to the events of Monday that had pre-
vailed since that day. The subject of the conduct
of the President was revived, and a good deal of
angry
altercation ensued about the order which he
had given not to beat the rappel. The address of
thanks to the National Guards was discussed, para-
graph by paragraph, and, after an incoherent con-
versation, adopted. The rest of the day was chiefly
passed in the presentation of projects by private
ན་
Add
173
members, most of which were strangled on the
spot, or entombed in a reference to Committees.
The proceedings of Saturday were of a miscella-
neous character; an incident occurred, which excited
some ridicule.
The Questor of the Assembly,
Degoussée, the most sombre of triflers, occupied a
portion of the day with a decree relative to a ribbon
which he had designed for the button-holes of
members, and without which they could not appear
in the Assembly. He had also a plan of a scarf to
be worn on occasions of ceremony like that of the
fête, fixed for the following day. A grand dif
ficulty, however, arose as to whether the scarf
should be worn en sautoir, en écharpe, or en cein-
ture. The Assembly voted for the en écharpe, but
like the famous decree of the Provisional Govern-
ment relative to the white waistcoat and rolling
collar, the law was quietly abrogated by the pas-
sive resistance of members. The day closed with
the important announcement from M. de Lamar-
tine, that he would on the following Tuesday treat
of the questions of Poland and Italy, interrupted
by the invasion of the last Monday.
We must now follow the National Assembly to
the Champ de Mars, where it marched on Sunday
the 21st, to take part in the Fête de la Concorde.
There, mounted upon an estrade raised against the
Ecole Militaire, the members of the Executive Com-
THE SCARF QUESTION.
174
FRENCH THEATRICALITY.
mission in front, the National Guards of Paris and
the Provinces were passed in review.
The French are a theatrical people; that is to say,
a people fond of representations that strike the
senses agreeably. Their fancy takes its light
through the eye. As Sheridan could only write.
his witty artificialities in the midst of a blaze of
wax-tapers, so French enthusiasm requires military
display as an artistical setting by day, and fire-
works by night. When Napoleon wanted to turn
off attention from the disasters of Moscow, he
ordered the dome of the Invalides to be gilded.
For two months, M. de Lamartine ruled or amused,
which was the same thing, the French by imagery.
The panoramic picture of " the tri-coloured flag
making the tour of the world," amused the people,
and did the purposes of Government until the
great Magician was prepared with another dissolv-
ing view. The more matériel associates in the
Government, got up processions to the Bastille,
monster reviews, and monster fêtes; but novelty is
the law of the theatrical art, invention must flag
betimes, and then the people are apt to turn actors
on their own account, and their dramas have a
fearful reality, very unlike the pageantry of charla-
tan rulers at their wit's end.
If the French be a theatrical people, assuredly
Paris is the theatre of cities. Never did a city
S
175
shape itself better to refined sensual necessities. For
a procession to the Column of February, what more
picturesque line could be found than the Boule-
vards, which, with unvarying width, presents alter-
nations of elevation and descent, and follows the
zig-zag deviations of the bulwark from which the
name is derived. The houses and buildings of
white stone, softened and harmonised by green
trees-that wedding of Art and Nature, that sweet
blending of town and country, of freshness with
heat and hardness; these houses and buildings so
varied as to feast the eye with archæological
studies—with contrasts between old and new, and
new imitating old.
THE BOULEVARDS.
The Boulevards de la Madeleine, des Capucines,
and des Italiens, have all the luxuriousness and pre-
tention of the parvenus of finance. The Boulevards
Montmartre and Poissonnière retain the air of sub-
stantial bourgeoisie. The great arches of the Porte
St. Denis and St. Martin mark the admixture of
the petite bourgeoisie and turbulent working-classes.
We then get into the quarter of the people's
theatres, where, side by side, or very nearly so,
stand those modern substitutes of the Mediaval
temples, in whose performances may be read the
taste, aye, and sources of the perversion of the
taste of a people intensely devoted to amusement.
As usual, where the audiences are composed of the
176
less refined, the performances are either extravagant
tragedy, or broad humour, or pantomime. The
Parisians are not stained with the vice of drunken-
ness; but what scalding drink of gin or whisky
can be more maddening and demoralizing than
the sombre licentiousness of the Porte St. Martin,
Gaîté, Ambigu, or Historique. But our business is
now with externals. These theatres diversify the
promenade. Then there is a magnificent fountain
and odorous flower-market; and wherever an old
house has been pulled down, as, for instance,
that tainted den opposite the Turkish Garden, from
which Fieschi discharged on a royal procession his
infernal machine, a new house springs up, carved
all over with the fanciful tracery of the renais-
FÊTE DE LA CONCORDE.
Gal
sance.
As there is always a reigning historical model, it
is pleasant to see the classic stiffness affected at the
Revolution give way to the models of Italian taste,
introduced by François Premier at the revival,
although it proved but a temporary revival, of arts
and letters. Now it happened, unfortunately for
the Fête de la Concorde, that the charming pictorial
line of the Boulevards was abandoned
on the
pretext of the unusual heat prevailing, and a short
cut was made by the Assembly to the Champ de
Mars. There was reason to suspect that some
graver motive suggested the alteration; a plot was
FÊTE DE LA CONCORDE.
177
said to have been discovered, the object of which
was to seize some forty members of the Assembly,
and hold them as hostages for the delivery of the
prisoners at Vincennes. In aid of this plot, fire
was to have been set to several theatres. Our task
is pleasanter than to have to record a scene of
wickedness; its close neighbourhood, however, to
the gigantic trifling of the day, gives that trifling
the sort of interest we would be disposed to take in
a rope-dancer, who narrowly escaped a broken neck.
Paris little thought she was dancing that day upon
a cord which an effort had been made to cut half
through.
The Assembly got safe to the Champs Elysées.
The members of the Institute having, with the
simplicity of literary men, put on their cocked hats,
and oakleaf-embroidered coats, got well hooted
for aristocrats. The few old soldiers of the Empire,
that appeared here and there in costumes only
known through pictures, fared better; and so long
as the National Guards of town and country filled
the Place de la Concorde and the Quays, the scene
was animated enough. At the Champ de Mars
the appearance was different. Viewed merely as a
frame in which to place an exhibition, it is totally
unfit. It is a naked, sandy square, so large as to
merit the name of a plain. It looks as if it could
not be filled. People seem like atoms spilled about;
I 3
178
CHAMP DE MARS.
and in this shadeless, unpictorial place, a heathenish
sort of procession was arranged, that if seen in the
Boulevards, or Champs Elysées, might have pro-
duced a certain sort of effect; but in the Champ de
Mars, it was mean and paltry.
There was a great theatrical waggon, with corn-
trees and plants, bedecked with gold-leaf and paint,
drawn by sixteen plough-horses, and attended by four
hundred choice damsels, singing to Nature, or Ceres,
or some philosophical abstraction or heathen deity.
The ladies were to have worn that sort of Olympian
costume which the grand opera assigns, on we
know not what authority, to creatures of the other
world, too innocent to discover improprietics of
dress. An émeute of mothers stopped the scandal,
and the young ladies appeared in salle de bal cos-
tume. Specimens of native manufacture were
borne as offerings to the gods: the best got up
shrine was that of the tobacconists, the sale of
cigars being a monopoly of the fair sex, which
accounts for the tasteful accompaniments attending
an incense more prized in modern times than
frankincense or myrrh. Colossal statues in plaster,
colossal tripods of pasteboard, with a thirty-feet-
high, and made in proportion, figure of the Re-
public, bedecked this unroofed temple, of Heaven
knows what sort of worship. And while this monster
tomfoolery was going on, the National Guards
Pa
ILLUMINATIONS.
179
were anxiously on the alert, lest some coup-de-main
should turn a dull farce into a deep tragedy.
The illuminations at night made up for the
failure of the day. The Place de la Concorde was
enclosed in a festoonry of variegated lamps, which,
carried up each side of the Champs Elysées to
Rond Point, with lustres suspended over head,
converted that magnificent allée into a fairy hall,
that realized the dream of an Arabian fancy; while
the Arch of Triumph, looking like the Queen of the
City, with its brilliant bandeau of lights, was beheld
through a varying atmosphere of blue and red
flame, or golden rain. The Champ de Mars was
itself converted, as by a magic wand, into a fairy
scene. In the morning the properties were removed,
the stage was cleared for another representation;
but whether for a terrible reality, on which it should
be the turn of all Europe to gaze thrilled with
horror and wonder, or for another rarce-show to
keep the mischievous children out of harm's way,
afforded an anxious problem to many an aching
head.
This being an English account, it would not be
perfect without a statement of the cost, which, as
presented to the National Assembly in the year's
budget of blunders and expenditure, amounted to
the round sum of 950,000 francs, or £38,000.
"Vive la Bagatelle !"
180
THE ASSEMBLY.
The next day's sitting of the Assembly was occu-
pied throughout with the discussion of various
financial schemes for meeting the state of public
distress, caused by the decline of credit and confi-
dence, but which, as they were in no case adopted,
having been civilly referred to Committees engaged
in study, need not detain us from the important
sitting of Tuesday, the 23rd of May, devoted to
the consideration of Poland and Italy.
d
GENERAL
BARAGUAY D'HILLIERS.
-M.
CHAPTER XIV.
D'HILLIERS-APPEARANCE OF
CAVAIGNAC-THE MARQUIS DE LA ROCHEJACQUELIN
LAMARTINE'S SPEECH ON ITALY AND
DE
BARAGUAY
181
POLAND-ABSURD RESOLUTION.
THE sitting of Tuesday, the 23rd of May, opened
with a skirmish which brought out a couple of those
secondary, but respectable personages, who serve to
the enlivenment as well as to the advance of the
political drama, and afford an agreeable share of life
and harmony to our moving canvass.
M. Bastide having acknowledged in suitable
terms the handsome manner in which the great
Trans-Atlantic Republic had recognized the new
Government of France, General Baraguay d'Hilliers
ascended the tribune for the purpose of laying down
the command with which he had been invested.
The General had been appointed Commander-in-
Chief of the troops charged with the protection of
182
CAVAIGNAC.
the Assembly; and he now found, that, by an order
in a subordinate
Such position he
of the President, he was placed
position to the Minister of War.
would not accept.
"What !" exclaimed M. de la
Rochejacquelin, “an authority that had emanated
from the Assembly itself, over-ruled!" He should
like to know who it was that considered he had
a right to nullify an act of the Assembly! General
Cavaignac, the new Minister of War, explained that
there had been no intention to nullify the command
given by the Chamber; the object was to place all
forces in the hands of the Minister of War, reserv-
ing to those who held special command their full
rights. The explanation was not deemed satis-
factory by the General whose interests were affected.
The Assembly desired not to receive his resignation,
and on his persisting in his resolution, passed him
a vote of thanks.
This was the first appearance of General Cavaignac;
and it was little suspected that so mild-looking a
man-one giving evidence of the shyness of an
officer who had passed his life in Algeria, and who
appeared for the first time in a public assembly,
charged with the high functions to which he was so
suddenly elevated-it was little suspected how much
strength of character, invincibility of will, and in-
tegrity of purpose, lay under a demeanour so modest.
Nevertheless, this first act showed how well he un-
LA ROCHEJACQUELIN.
183
.
derstood the necessity of unity of command, and
how resolved he was to act as he understood.
General Baraguay d'Hilliers might have been some
fifteen years the senior of the new Minister of War.
His figure is that of a grenadier, and the loss of his
left arm, on the disastrous field of Leipsic, gave an
unfailing interest to his appearance.
The French have great respect for a military
manchot, to whom many a hat is touched in his
promenades. The General never forgot this slight,
as he conceived it to be, and he became one of the
most tenacious opponents of the Government. He
was not eloquent, and so it was not at the tribune
that he manifested the bitterness of his hostility;
his work lay in another field. The combined sec-
tions of the old parliamentary parties, Conservatives,
Centre Gauche, Gauche, and Legitimists, having
formed a club, which, meeting in the Rue de
Poictiers, soon rendered itself formidable, made
the dissatisfied General their chairman. Within
doors he showed considerable activity in carrying on
communications with the allied army under his com-
mand, and towards supporters of the Government.
evinced rather crankiness than hauteur. In fact,
the good General's talents were not of that high
order which gives power to disdain. M. de la
Rochejacquelin, who rushed in as at once the
champion of the Assembly and of the General,
184
LA ROCHEJACQUELIN.
figures on all occasions of etiquette. He is the
Marquis de la Rochejacquelin of the ex-Chamber of
Deputies, and composed one of the five Legitimist
members who made what was called the pilgrimage
to Belgrave-square, on the occasion of the visit of
the Duc de Bordeaux to London. An allusion
to this visit having been made in the King's Speech,
and the unhappy term flétri applied to the pilgrims,
the Marquis, with his usual parliamentary heroism,
in connexion with his quadruple allies, gave in his
resignation, only to re-appear with a brow washed
in the electoral urn from the Ministerial stigma put
into the mouth of Royalty. The Noble Marquis
entered the National Assembly without being able
to throw off the fastidious grace of a courtier. He,
the Legitimist, was one of the very few who obeyed
the order to appear in a white waistcoat and white
cravat; and he raised his hand for the Republic as
he would have sworn fealty to the descendant of
St. Louis.
There is no name, amongst all the glorious names
of France, around which cluster so many charming
associations as about that of the Bayard of La
Vendée, fated to fall at the age of a Gaston de Foix.
The most profoundly moving, the most inspiring of
all that unique literary series, the Chronicles and
Memoirs of the French, are the "Memoirs of Ma-
dame la Marquise de la Rochejacquelin." It was in
LA ROCHEJACQUELIN.
the west of France that loyalty glowed and blazed,
after the Monarchy had set in blood; and if that
region was comparatively spared the horrors which
were visited on a Lyons or a Nantes, upon its bor-
der, it was because the Republic had committed its
subjugation to a young chief, alive to heroic impres-
sions—the gallant Hoche. The present Marquis,
with all the courage of his kind, has yet the aspect
of a "carpet knight." Fifty years, although they
have carried locks from his crown, have yet spared
the ailes de pigeon. His face is full and good-
natured; his eye clear, but not intellectual. He
is corpulent, but never did soldier mount the breach
with more ardour than does that large, light-footed
Marquis, when the cause to be defended is that of
good manners, or the enemy to be cut down is the
violater of parliamentary propriety. As the arbiter
elegantiarum of the Assembly, the Marquis (we
cannot throw him in amongst the ex's) has a very
busy time. His indignation, from over-use, is be-
coming ineffective, and he has no other weapon.
His is not the light, stinging, railleur vein; he is
always King Cambyses. It is not the column of
water the leviathan throws up through his dilated
nostril—it is the close, gentle rain, that calms the
sea. Many a great, but ineffective splash does our
indignant Marquis make upon that storm-tossed
Assembly; yet the Assembly could not do without.
1
$
J
3
185
+
I
S
186
ITALY AND POLAND.
its Marquis, no more than the House of Commons
without its Sibthorp, or the Court of Denmark
without Polonius. He is a relic of the past, and
serves the purpose of admonition, lest Republican
tumult should descend into a Saturnalia.
We need not remind our readers of what the
Egyptians hung up at their feasts, to sober them
into propriety; nothing can be more unlike the
Egyptian recipe for counteracting the wine of Cyprus
than the portly presence of the Marquis de la
Rochejacquelin. He stands a living proof that there
may be cordiality, warmth and earnestness com-
bined with elegance of manner, and propriety of
speech.
The incident on which we have been tempted to
dwell having been disposed of, M. d'Aragon renewed
his interpellation regarding Italy, and M. Wolowski
his interpellation regarding Poland, and was sup-
ported by M. Vavin, M. Sarrans, M. Guichard, and
M. Napoleon Bonaparte, in speeches of a more or
less warlike complexion; the last was particu-
larly so.
M. de Lamartine at length took the tribune. His
speech was based upon the celebrated diplomatic
circular which, shortly after the revolution, he had
addressed to the representatives of France at foreign
Courts, and of which his reply to the interpella-
tions of the day, was in fact an amplified para-
-
187
phrase. In that circular, it was laid down that
while France would not shrink from war, if declared
by other powers, yet she would not declare war
against any; that while she negociated in favour of
nationalities, she yet kept her hand on her sword;
and that although she declared the Treaties of 1815
abrogated, she would yet trust to reason and the
power of patient negociation for a restitution of
rights; her military power being at the same time
kept to such a height, as to show that it would not
be safe, to oblige a recurrence to the ultima ratio.
The motives assigned by M. de Lamartine, for pre-
ferring negociation to war, were founded chiefly on
the suspicion that might be excited on the part of
those very "oppressed nationalities," whom it was
their disinterested object to relieve. The nations of
Europe had not forgotten the inflictions caused by
the invasion of the Empire, and the selfish way in
which so many fine promises were perverted to the
aggrandizement of one power. Republican France
was now paying the penalty of the Empire, in the
exhibition of a distrust which she no longer merited.
Nor was this a theoretical surmise, for since that
circular had been addressed, several expeditions
had been got up by foreigners, in which Frenchmen
had mingled; one had been directed against Bel-
gium, another against Savoy, and many parts of
the frontier of Germany had been violated; the
LAMARTINE'S SPEECH.
188
LAMARTINE'S SPEECH.
consequence of all which, was an exhibition of irri-
tation among the people of these different countries,
sufficient to warn France of the misapprehension to
which imprudent or premature intervention might
give rise.
With regard to Italy, he argued that in conse-
quence of the change of policy that had taken place
upon the fall of the Monarchy, that country was
by an internal movement-in which the Pope, the
Grand Duke of Tuscany, the Dukes of Parma,
Plaisance and Modena shared, and of which the
King of Piedmont had become the arm-almost
delivered from the yoke of Austria. How far the
orator was from foreseeing the defeat of Charles
Albert, and the flight of the Pope! The then
actual position of things in Italy, the declaration
of Charles Albert that Italy was able to free her-
self, the refusal of the Italian powers to invite
French aid, all this happily enabled M. de Lamar-
tine to turn from the difficulties of the Italian
Peninsula, to the question of Poland. This Polish
question, he acknowledged, to present one of the
main difficulties of French policy. Turning to the
Instructions addressed to French agents at the
Northern Courts, he quoted the spirited injunctions
that had been given to them-to state frankly to
the Russian, the Prussian, and the Austrian Govern-
ments: "We desire peace with you, we will even
S
LAMARTINE'S SPEECH.
189
seck your alliance on conditions equitable for all,
and beneficial for intermediate nations; but the
first condition for the solidity of this peace, and for
rendering intimate our alliance, is that usurped and
oppressed Poland, without proper nationality, with-
out civil or religious independence, should not rise.
between ourselves and you." At that price, he
said, was the peace of the world. He then pro-
ceeded to show that the views of France, regarding
the restitution of Poland, had been responded to,
particularly by the King of Prussia, who had con-
sented to the administrative independence of Posen ;
and if those beneficent intentions had not been
already carried out, it was owing to an outbreak of
local hatreds between families, of hostile races,
different languages and different nationalities, such
as had ever formed the plague of Poland, and had
ever proved fatal to the heroism of that generous
people.
Next with regard to Cracow and Austrian Poland,
he had only to point to the then threatened state of
decomposition into which the Austrian Empire
was falling, and which would, as a matter of course,
lead to the emancipation of her Polish provinces ;
and he dwelt particularly on the fraternal feelings
of the Bohemians, who were ready to rise in vindi-
cation of their own nationality, and to aid the Poles
in a similar attempt.
190
LAMARTINE'S SPEECH.
Here again, how far was the orator from fore-
seeing Windischgrätz, and the removal of the Aus-
trian Diet to a Bohemian town! Reviewing the
general state of things, as they appeared to the
Provisional Government, he asked, if they ought
to have raised by a premature declaration of war,
the susceptibilities of all Continental nations, which
would have had for effect, the re-constitution of a
coalition against France. Suppose, he said, that
they had launched an army of 120,000 men across
Germany, what would they not have had to en-
counter? They would have found 500,000 Ger-
mans on cach flank, before they could have reached
Poland; and when there, they would have found
250,000 Russians ready to meet them, they having
previously annihilated Poland herself.
Let us stop! have we not in this drowning argu-
ment of M. de Lamartine, the celebrated twenty-
first final reason of the Governor of Tilbury Fort,
for not having fired a salute in honour of Queen
Elizabeth, who having enumerated his twenty diffi-
culties, came to the last, that he had no powder.
M. de Lamartine might have spared a vast deal of
eloquent circumlocution, by coming at once to the
point, and stating, that they did not march to
Poland, because they could not. Had he done so,
of what an absurd inconsequence might he not have
spared himself the exhibition! It would not be
PR
—
191
LAMARTINE'S MISTAKE.
easy to do justice to so eloquent a speaker, through
a meagre outline; but there are two parts of the
speech which we give faithfully, the one in which
he puts a quasi-declaration of war into the mouths of
French Republicans against the Northern Courts,
on account of Poland; and the other, in which he
makes that declaration so much mere mouthing and
imbecile impertinence, by a statistical demonstra-
tion of the impossibility in which France found
herself to undertake a crusade for Poland's libera-
tion.
M. de Lamartine fancied that the same principle
of Government, which he had found so successful
at home, could be applied to foreign diplomacy;
and that he could cajole, convince, or frighten with
eloquent "pellets of the brain," as he had soothed
and ruled from the Revolution to the meeting of
the Assembly by words. His was to have been the
moral agitation of O'Connell, with a mystic refc-
rence to physical force. Foreign powers would
have blown aside the painted cloud, and numbered
the battalions. Young France would have cheered
the music, but sharpened her sword.
The only
one deceived would be the Magician himself. He
who like the man in the Eastern tale, had let escape
the imprisoned smoke, would have found himself
in the presence of a giant.
M. de Lamartine exerted himself in an extraor-
192
RESOLUTION OF THE ASSEMBLY.
dinary degree on this day, as if he had before him
an unwilling audience, whom it required all his
powers to convince. It was no such thing. The
invasion of the previous Monday week, in the name
of Poland, had settled the Polish question. It had
done more, it turned attention away from foreign
politics. The danger lay at home-the enemy was
within the gates. The Republic could not under-
take a crusade, except on the condition of a sur-
render of society to the bonnet-rouge. The speech
was valuable as affording a covering for retreat
under a brilliant fire. The discussion ended in the
adoption of a resolution, inviting the Government
to take as its rule of conduct: "Fraternal compact
with Germany; re-constitution of Poland, free and
independent; the enfranchisement of Italy."
This was
a confused resolution. France had
pledged herself, or allowed herself to be pledged in
general terms, to answer the invitation of any
struggling nationality to come to its assistance.
In making this pledge, Poland and Italy were par-
ticularly understood. As regards Poland, we find
the fulfilment of the pledge was impossible, because
Germany lay in the way, and with Germany, France
was seeking a fraternal compact. Italy, however,
had no interposing barrier; she was approachable
by sea and by land, and so there was nothing to
prevent an Italian invitation being accepted. Not
pl
THE POLISH QUESTION.
VOL. I.
so fast! From what yoke was Italy to be enfran-
chised? Why from that of Austria; but Austria is
a great German power; her integrity, necessary
to German strength, is bound up with German
sentiment, and with Germany France seeks frater-
nal compact. The resolution was therefore a mys-
tification and a juggle.
193
K
194
DECREE OF BANISHMENT
CHAPTER XV.
DECREE BANISHING THE FAMILY OF LOUIS-PHILIPPE-
THE
BONAPARTES-
BLANC.
JEALOUSY SHOWN TOWARDS
AGITATION IN THE NATIONAL ATELIERS-ATTEMPTS
TO CURE GROWING
GROWING ABUSES-HOW RECEIVED—DIS-
APPEARANCE OF EMILE THOMAS, CHIEF DIRECTOR OF
THE ATELIERS-APPLICATION TO PROSECUTE LOUIS
THE sitting of Wednesday, the 24th of May,
was rendered remarkable by the communication of
a letter from the Duc d'Aumale and the Prince de
Joinville, protesting against the intended project of
excluding the family of Louis-Philippe for ever
from the soil of France. The Duc d'Aumale had
been Governor-General of Algeria, at the time
when the Revolution was accomplished. The Prince
de Joinville was on a visit with his brother,
having, as it appeared afterwards, left the Tuileries
in sorrow and disgust, on account of the policy he
195
was obliged to witness, without being able to
restrain, while he clearly foresaw its fatal termina-
tion.
AGAINST THE ROYAL FAMILY.
The Duc d'Aumale, upon the first summons
from the Republican Minister of War, laid down
his authority without a murmur; his more fiery
brother manifested equal prudence; and they
pleaded as of right, their conduct on this occasion,
against the hard banishment about to be decreed
against them. The protest proved of no avail.
On the day next but one following, the law
banishing for ever the family of Louis-Philippe was
brought forward and discussed. The feebleness of
the opposition to it may be judged from the divi-
sion, which gave 631 for the decree, and 63 against
it. The law was so conceived, that it pleaded its
own cause with terrible laconic retaliation. It ran
thus: "The territory of France and her Colonics,
interdicted for ever to the elder branch of the Bour-
bons, by the law of the 10th of April, 1832, is
equally interdicted to Louis-Philippe and his
family." It was perhaps felt by those whose syn-
pathies were with the Ex-King and his family, that
it was not worth their while to have their profession
of Republicanism called in question by an opposi-
tion that would have done no good. They well
knew, morcover, that if the time should come for
a restoration of either branch, the decree of the
Trang
K 2
A
196
THE BONAPARTES.
Assembly would prove but a barrier of straw. Still
there was something startling in the almost unani-
mity with which a sentence was passed, that sounds
the most awful next to that of death.
<
An incident occurred in this sitting, which by
the light of subsequent events, possesses a reflec-
tive interest. An allusion was made to the Bona-
parte family, by one of the ultra-democratic party,
of a threatening kind-inasmuch as by insinuating
that they were in that Assembly provisionally or
by sufferance, a hint was to be inferred, that their
continuance would depend on good behaviour.
Pierre and Napoleon Bonaparte, who stood among
a group collected on the floor, at the right of the
chair, manifested great excitement, particularly the
former; but as he has not the free elocution of his
cousin, the latter rushed to the tribune, and
asserted his rights of citizenship, he being there
returned by universal suffrage. This was the first
manifestation of the disagreeable effect produced on
the Republicans by the presence of the Bonapartes,
of whose name they had an instinctive apprehen-
sion, which subsequent events proved to have been
somewhat well-founded.
Saturday, the 27th of May,
was a day of consi-
The Assembly was
derable agitation in Paris.
surrounded by troops, similar precautions were
taken for the protection of the Hôtel-de-Ville, the
DELUSION OF THE OUVRIERS.
197
Prefecture of Police, and other public establish-
ments. The cause of this agitation was some dis-
turbances that had broken out in the national
ateliers, the prodigious development of which had
begun to excite serious uneasiness. The Franken-
stein of the Revolution had begun to move. The
situation was just this. The leaders of the Revo-
lution of February, as much unprepared for the
Republic as any other party, were obliged by the
Socialists, and indeed by the want of a good cry, to
base the Republic upon the working classes. A
vision of wealth, case, and social and political im-
portance, had suddenly opened upon the eyes of
the operatives. Their reason became disturbed,
and their energies directed from their daily avoca-
tions, turned into the vortex of revolutionary agita-
tion. The workmen were the masters of the city,
awaiting to become the trustees of the State. All
who had any thing to lose and could fly-fled.
Employment shrank away, and even if employment
had been abundant, steady application became im-
possible. How could men whose passions had been
thrown into fever, and whose imaginations had
been kindled-how could they work? The State,
which had undertaken to make these men
" Kings
who should ride in coaches,"* was obliged to tind
*The words of Louis Blanc.
J
198
them bread. The transition from toil to sove-
reignty, was to be beggary. The beggary was to
be disguised under unprofitable toil, and dignified
by military organization. The men rallied, each
company under its banner, and followed their
officers. They worked as much as they pleased;
when they did not work, read cheap publications of
the most subversive character, finished the day with
rifle practice, and clubbed their money to go home
in coaches.
LIFE IN THE ATELIERS.
The workmen took the State at its word, and
lived royally. The Civil List, however, became
rather burthensome; the State was becoming every
day less able to pay; the army was increasing,
swelled by habitual beggars, by the country
labourers, who deserted their work and their fields.
for the spoil, which was to fall some fine day to the
share of the proletaires, and by all those whom a
perishing commerce threw on alms. The terrible
outbreak that occurred in June, took no one by
surprize, for the question of insurrection was one of
time. When would that army which hung like
thunder clouds over the beleaguered city, burst in
When would those irritated, excited,
upon it?
and demoralized workmen rush upon their prey,
and having gloated on all the available wealth of
the capital, endeavour to accomplish for themselves.
the Social and Democratic Republic that had been
THREATENING AGITATION.
199
promised? Such questions occupied the anxious.
attention of all who knew what was passing. The
panic which appeared to-day was caused by a pro-
clamation of the Minister of Public Works, that
there should be a rigid review of the national ate-
liers, for the purpose of diminishing the numbers,
by weeding away those who had no claim to support
from the State, by checking the frauds that were
committed by persons practising personation, and
by forcing those who remained to execute task-
work. This proclamation was just and necessary;
and it dissipated the illusion under which the
workmen had so long been allowed to labour. They
were no longer lords and masters-they were re-
ceivers of charity. They were a burthen to the
State, a source of confusion and ruin.
The agitation continued throughout Sunday and
Monday, and many thought that the struggle had
come at last. While this fermentation was going
on, the Assembly was occupied with discussing pro-
positions and reports relating to these national
ateliers. The vices of the institution were unspar-
ingly exposed, particularly by M. Léon Faucher
and M. de Falloux; still no measure could be taken
that would not look harsh and offensive to the poor
deluded objects of suspicion. The Clubs, that were
speculating on the demoralization and discontent of
200
the national ateliers, stirred up the flame-gathered
every strong speech made in the Assembly,
every hard word, and barbed and poisoned them.
While the decree regarding the purification of the
ateliers, by the removal of cheats and idlers, was
producing its effect, a thrill of astonishment was
caused by the disappearance of the Chief of the
Ateliers. M. Emile Thomas, a young engineer of
talent, had first suggested the plan of the Ateliers
Nationaux to the Minister of Public Works; and
when the plan was approved of, the direction was
bestowed upon him. A charming villa, which had
been the private property of Louis-Philippe, situated
in a beautiful park, called Monceau, in the faubourg
of that name, was assigned to the young Director,
and became the head-quarters of the institution.
If report speak truth, the villa was restored to the
festivities practised under the Regency that preceded.
and prepared the first great Revolution. The example
set to the rank and file of the national ateliers was
by no means one of self-denial, while waiting the
coming millenium of the République Démocratique
et Sociale. Luxury ran riot at Monceau, while
beggary trundled its wheelbarrow on the Champ
de Mars. M. Thomas was taken without ceremony
by the Republican Government, put into a coach, and
carried off to Bordeaux, after the fashion in which a
EMILE THOMAS.
STRANGE DISAPPEARANCE.
201
Duc d'Enghien would have been seized by a Napoleon.
The romance was heightened by a letter written
with a pencil to Madame Thomas, the mother of the
captive, who committed it to the winds and the
high road, as a sinking mariner commits the
secret of his fate to a bottle cast into the sea;
and, strange to say, the letter arrived. Such
being the state of things, it became impossible
for the National Assembly to avoid feeling its
share of the agitation which prevailed so generally
without.
On Monday, the 29th of May, M. Taschereau.
brought the subject before the Assembly. The
Minister of Public Works gave an explanation,
which showed there was something behind the
curtain, of which it might be as well to avoid the
He declared that he never could obtain
exposure.
proper returns of the whole of the ateliers; that his
remonstrances against the exorbitant increase of num-
bers produced no effect. He assured the Assembly
that Thomas was in constant apprehension of assassi
nation, or affected to be so; that he gave in his resig-
nation voluntarily; and that it was altogether in
the interest of his personal safety that he was so
suddenly, but altogether with his own consent, sent
off to Bordeaux. Whatever mystery was enveloped
in the strange circumstance, one point was clear,
K 3
202
that the national ateliers formed a serious danger
for the commonwealth.
The remaining portion of this day was passed in
regulating the relation that ought to subsist between
the Assembly and the Executive power. We have
already had to notice the feebleness of the Ministry
that had been chosen by the Executive. The ex-
Ministers, now become Supreme Directors, had, as
before described, put their secretaries in their places-
these secretaries, plain plodding men, without
oratorical powers. It was hoped, however, that
their want of elocution would be supplied, on all
necessary occasions, by Lamartine or Ledru-Rollin,
Garnier Pagès or Maric. But no!-the Directory
was now in the place of the Monarchy. It had
ambassadors to receive, and all the dignity of su-
preme surveillance weighed upon its god-like respon-
sibility. The Directory prayed accordingly to be
excused from taking part in debates, and its prayer
was granted. The Ministers, then, were real inde-
pendent Ministers, although of the poorest possible
kind.
THE DIRECTORY.
The following day, the 30th, was occupied with
the same topics. A law for regulating the national
ateliers, the chief feature of which was the impo-
sition of task-work, was discussed; and, after expo-
sures of the demoralization caused by these esta-
CHARGE AGAINST LOUIS BLANC. 203
blishments, passed. It was shown, that, owing to
some design not then quite apparent, however it
might have been suspected, the men of the national
ateliers exercised a complete system of tyranny over
the well-disposed workmen, who were turned out of
factories in which they were willingly doing their
duty, and obliged to swell the mass of idleness
by which the State was encumbered. Orders in
several branches of trade had to be renounced, owing
to want of hands, and there was an utter disorgani-
zation of the working classes.
The salient point of the sitting of the 31st was a
written application, by the law officers of the Re-
public, for leave to prosecute Louis Blanc for the
part attributed to him in the affair of the 15th of
May. The charge against him was, that he had
on that day, by his speeches particularly, been im-
plicated in the invasion and oppression of the As-
sembly. It had been proved that he had said,
"I congratulate you on having recognized the right
of bearing your own petition to the Chamber—a
right that henceforward remains incontestable."
Other circumstances, confirmatory of the accusation,
were stated to have taken place, but not specified in
the Act of Accusation. M. Louis Blanc defended
himself, by offering a flat contradiction to the ex-
pressions attributed to him. The witnesses, mem-
KLIK
204
REFERRED TO A COMMITTEE.
bers of the Assembly, re-asserted the expressions;
and a scene of tumult was provoked by the scandal
of mutually-attributed falsehood, which was put an
end to by the application being referred to a Com-
mittee, to inquire into and report thereupon.
:
COMMITTEE'S REPORT.
CHAPTER XVI.
205
REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON LOUIS BLANC-ILL-
WILL TOWARDS THE BONAPARTES-THE CROSS OF
THE LEGION OF HONOUR-PROSECUTION
HONOUR-PROSECUTION OF LOUIS
BLANC REFUSED-SPLIT BETWEEN CREMIEUX AND
FAVRE.
THE Assembly did not meet, out of respect for
Ascension Thursday, one of the few holidays which.
the French strictly observe by a cessation from all
business and an attention to religious duties; both
which marks of respect are but indifferently paid
to the Sabbath.
On Friday, the 2nd of June, the report on
M. Louis Blanc's case was brought up by M. Favre.
After an elaborate preliminary, in which it was laid
down that scrupulous care had been taken that the
application for leave to prosecute was not conceived
in a spirit of reaction or personal malice, but was
founded on a pure love of justice; and after a dose
206
LOUIS BLANC.
of cruel compliments to the accused, delivered in
the most insidious tone, the conclusion was come to,
that the Assembly ought not to interpose a barrier
of privilege against the claims of justice. All eyes
were turned to Louis Blanc, and invitations to speak
arose from all sides; which he answered by a sign
that he would say a few words from his place; but
the calls to ascend the tribune became so vehement,
that he complied. He looked haggard with agita-
tion, and only uttered a few phrases, declaring that
he would not say a word in his own vindication
then, warning the Assembly that they had entered
on a disastrous course, left the tribune, to the dis-
appointment of those who had reckoned upon that
great parliamentary luxury, an impassioned per-
sonal debate.
This incident was not to end with injury con-
fined to Louis Blanc; but we must interrupt the
unity of narration, for the purpose of noting the
proceedings that occupied the rest of the day. They
were composed of three distinct categories-a dis-
cussion relating to the Bonaparte family, a financial
bill between M. Billault and M. Duclerc, and a
scene about the cross of the legion of honour.
The Bonaparte family were excluded from France
by a distinct law which had not been abrogated.
Now there can be no doubt, seeing the suspicious
excitement and jealousy that broke out whenever
g
207
the name of this family was introduced, that had
the Revolutionists not been swept unexpectedly into
their tumultuous carcer before they had time
to take note of the future, they would have
guarded the Republic against the pretensions of
the successors of Napoleon. As it was, the at-
tention of the Republican party was concentrated
upon Louis-Napoleon alone, on account of the
two attempts that, as heir to the Emperor, he had
made on the Crown of France.
THE BONAPARTES.
Under cover of this pre-occupation, two cousins
of the Prince had been allowed to take their seats
unquestioned in the National Assembly, as well as
the son of Murat. Possession has been truly said
to be nine points of the law. They were there,
and although men may be induced to maintain
a barrier already existing, yet expulsion from a
place entered and secured, is an ungracious act
from which people revolt. If this be true with
regard to persons of ordinary interest, how much
more powerful must the feeling have been with
reference to the illustrious name of Bonaparte,
rendered tender by defeat, dethronement, and
exile. There were few, indeed, who could have
brought themselves to put their hands on the
shoulder of Jerome's son, the living image of the
Emperor, and turn him out of a society of French-
men.
Kat
208
CROSS OF THE
The Minister of Justice thought to put a good
face on the matter, and to bring the House to
the adoption of a proposition, tagged to a piece
of false sentiment, that the law excluding the
Bonaparte family being a Monarchical Act, had
fallen with the Monarchy.
It would not do.
He tried a second "dodge," proposing that the law
had been virtually abrogated by the admission of
three members of the Bonaparte family. That
would not do either. The Assembly with the true.
instincts towards plain truth which animate aggre-
gate masses of men, even senators, preferred the
more straightforward abrogation of the law by
a direct declaration to that effect.
We should like to say a few words touching
M. Billault, but we have him in view for another.
day, and so skip from the Bonaparte family to
the Cross of the Legion of Honour. Citizen Rey
proposed that the effigy of Napoleon should be
restored to the Cross-a reasonable proposition
if the institution of the Legion of Honour was
to be continued at all-for of all the anachronisms
invented by the Restoration, that of attaching the
Legion of Honour to the memory of Henry IV.
was the most absurd-more absurd even than the
quiet assumption of the non-existence of the Em-
pire, and of victories gained by General Bonaparte,
Commander-in-Chief of the King's armies the
A g
LEGION OF HONOUR.
209
King being Louis XVIII., restored by the victories
of foreign bayonets over this General Bonaparte
himself. The staunch Republicans desired to see
the Cross dispensed with altogether, because it had,
under the Monarchy, formed the small-change of
corruption, and been deprived of its value by the
ridiculous profusion with which it was bestowed
on Treasury clerks, and other wretchedly remune-
rated servants of the Crown.
The revival of the image of Napoleon in a way
so striking to the imagination was also appre-
hended. The old soldiers in the Assembly defended
the Cross, and when Clément Thomas, in his rough
stentorian voice, described it as a hochet de la vanité,
he not only excited a storm, which our readers
have discovered by this time was never very diffi-
cult, but exposed himself to positive danger,
for had he not explained away his words, there
was more than one whiskered décoré, ready to
avenge the stigma. This matter may be disposed
of here, by stating that some months afterwards,
General Cavaignac, while at the head of the Go-
vernment, ordered the effigy of Napoleon to be
reinstated on the Cross of the Legion of Honour.
The next day, Saturday, the 14th of June, the
report on M. Louis Blanc's case was again brought
forward, and the conclusion of the report of the
Committee, recommending an authorisation by the
210
CREMIEUX AND JULES FAVRE.
Assembly of the demand made by the law officers
for leave to prosecute, warmly contested by the
friends of the inculpated gentleman. Upon the
question being put to the vote, to the surprise
of every one, M. Crémieux, the Minister of Justice,
who had sanctioned the application, and without
whose sanction the proceeding could not have been
taken, rose and voted with the opposition, and
leave was refused by a small majority.
As a
consequence of this vote, the law officers sent in
their resignation.
On the next meeting of the Assembly, M. Jules
Favre showed that his anger had been raised to
white heat. What he the associate of Ledru-
Rollin, the most compromised in all the dictatorial
and illegal proceedings of the Provisional Govern-
ment-he, the friend of Louis Blanc, had been
gently urged into the ungracious position of his
accuser, in the belief that his colleagues, for he was
Under-secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, were
identified with himself, and that he was interpreting
the will of the Government, yet there he stood
reproved in the presence of the whole Assembly,
by the Minister of Justice voting against him!
It was too much, and he resigned; but before
he did so, he gave M. Crémieux a mortal stab.
He accused the Minister of Justice and Religion
of a violation of his solemn engagement with respect
FINANCIAL PROJECTS.
211
to himself and the law officers of the Republic,
who in turn equally charged the Minister with
a breach of his word; and as the Assembly could
not resist such testimony, M. Crémieux felt obliged,
in shame and confusion, to resign office. A less
dignified functionary never filled a post pre-
eminently demanding the possession of those high
moral qualities that give dignity to the least
favoured.
The sitting of Tuesday, the 6th of June, was
occupied with a scrambling discussion relating to
the different financial projects of the Government
affecting the Savings' Banks, Treasury Bonds, Rail-
ways, &c., regarding which much anxiety and
irritation were felt in and out of doors, for the
doctrines held by the Government were considered
to be of the subversively revolutionary kind. The
proper time to refer to one of these measures more
particularly, will be when they came in a definite
shape before the House.
212
AGITATION AND ALARM.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE CLUBS OUT OF DOORS—A RAZZIA-LAW AGAINST
ATTROUPEMENTS-ELECTIONS FOR VACANT SEATS--
CONTRASTS SHOWN BY THE RETURNS-
CURIOUS
DEFEAT OF THE REPUBLICANS-RETURNS OF CONSER-
VATIVES, BONAPARTISTS, AND COMMUNISTS-THE
ALARM CAUSED BY
ATTROUPEMENTS CONTINUE
THE POPULARITY OF LOUIS NAPOLEON—ANIMATED
DEBATE M. DUPRAT-M. BABAUD-LARIBIERE-NEW
BEDEAU—A
REPUBLICAN
LITERATURE-GENERAL
BONAPARTIST PLOT—A DECREE AGAINST LOUIS NAPO-
LEON STOPPED BY GENERAL LAVALET.
THE agitation and alarm caused by the insubor-
dination of national ateliers, by the total suspension
of all commerce, by the demoralization of the whole
working population and the activity of the Clubs,
began about this time to assume a most menacing
form. Ever since the Revolution of February, the
city had been converted into a vast Club, or cau-
series of Clubs. The Boulevards, Palais Royal,
-
ATTROUPEMENTS.
213
Gardens of the Tuileries, and corners of streets
and thoroughfares, presented groups of talkers and
listeners. A placard, or any object that caused
one or two persons to stop, would serve as the
nucleus for a group. In consequence of the laxity
of the police, all sorts of wares might be seen
spread out in what used to be the haunts of
fashion, and tended, with other causes, to impede
the general circulation.
Such congregated masses of filth and idleness
contrasted miserably with the external brilliancy
of the once rich and gay city. It was as if by
a convulsion of Nature a fair navigable stream
had been suddenly filled and choked up with ruins,
through which the waters roared more vehemently
than before; but there was an end to the pleasant
and useful interchange that gave to life the no
less sweet than profitable commerce which lived
upon it.
For a while this peripatetic indulgence in the
delights of street democracy had to be tolerated;
but about the period at which we have
arrived, the nuisance assumed a most dangerous
and perplexing form. The masses of people who
thus congregated in the sweet summer evenings
on the Boulevards, unable to remain quiet at their
homes, too many of which only served to remind
the inmates of their destitution, were calculated
now
214
LAW AGAINST ATTROUPEMENTS.
to inspire some serious reflections. The chief
haunt of the politicians in blouses used to be
the Porte St. Denis and the Boulevards, and the
adjacent streets became at night impassable. Several
attempts had been made to clear the thoroughfares
by charges of National Guards, Mobile Guards and
police, but with only temporary effect. In order to
frighten well-disposed people away, a razzia was
made one night, and every person on whom hands
could be laid was arrested.
At length the Government resolved upon having
recourse to measures of coercion, and on Wednesday
the 7th of June, a law was presented of a very
stringent character, affecting attroupements. As
the Minister of Justice, and the law officers of the
Republic had resigned, owing to causes already
explained, it devolved on M. Marie, one of the
Executive Commission, to conduct the bill through
the Assembly. He did his duty in the most manly
and unflinching manner, and notwithstanding the
strenuous opposition of the Ultra-Republicans, the
law for the suppression of attroupements was passed
by an immense majority. M. Lamartine and
M. Ledru-Rollin refrained from giving the sanction
of their presence to this vigorous act of their col-
league, and the one and the other suffered alike.
in the estimation of the friends of order. Public
feeling happened to be put to the test at this time,
MA
PARTY DISORGANIZATION.
215
by several elections having taken place, chiefly
owing to double returns on the occasion of the
general election.
For Paris there had been no fewer than eleven
vacancies, and the manner in which they were filled
up, curiously exemplified the disorganization and
confusion of parties. M. Caussidière, who had
resigned his seat along with the Prefecture, came in
at the head of the list, by a coalition of parties sup-
porting him, because of their dislike to the Govern-
ment. The others were Moreau, Goudchaux, Pierre
Leroux, the Communist; General Changarnier,
Thiers, Proudhon, Communist; Lagrange, Com-
munist; Victor Hugo, Boissel, and Louis Napo-
leon Bonaparte. For Rouen, Thiers was returned
with Charles Dupin, Ex-Peer of France.
He was
also returned for his own department, Bouches-
du-Rhône. Louis Bonaparte was nominated for
five different places. These nominations for Paris
were clear in one respect; they shewed that the
Moderate Republican party had lost ground. The
National acknowledged its defeat. The consti-
tuency was separated into three parts-the Mo-
narchists, the Bonapartists, a hitherto unsuspected
party, and the Communists; nor could there be a
doubt, that the return of three such men as Pierre
Leroux, Proudhon, and Lagrange, greatly en-
couraged and stimulated the partisans of the Social
-
216
LOUIS NAPOLEON ELECTED.
and Democratic Republic, now on the eve of bring-
ing their forces to the test of a trial at arms. The
agitation that prevailed in the city was not in the
least discouraged by the passing of this measure.
The attroupements continued. The printed procla-
mation of the law was torn down, and trampled on
with contumely.
The house of M. Thiers was
assailed by the mob.
The Assembly continued to sit and discuss a
variety of topics, connected generally with financial
projects and economical schemes, enough to show
where lay the evils, but without sufficient force to
apply the necessary remedies.
While the Assembly seemed to be involved in an
entangled maze of minor propositions, in presence
of a society that required some great overmastering
example of courage and self-reliance, in order to
rally all who yet felt well, and who would, under
proper leaders, take their stand on the side of order-
the Executive Commission of Government, which
ought to have afforded a proper impetus to the
parliament, was itself distracted, and that not so
much by the disorganization of the working classes,
as by the ominous rising of the star of Napoleon
through the menacing chaos.
The return of Louis Napoleon for the city, and
at the same time for several departments, showed
that a moment of hesitation, at least, had arrived,
217
which if not corrected, would speedily take a decided
colour in a reactionary sense against the Republic.
The Executive Commission resolved, therefore, to
bring in a decree for the expulsion of this member
of the Bonaparte family, from the throne of France,
or rather that he should be excepted from the
benefit of the repeal of that law, by which the
excluded family was allowed to return. The ground
of the exclusion was to be the attempts that he had
made at Strasbourg and Boulogne, in the name of
the Senatus Consulte of the Year XIII. to have
himself made Emperor with Republican Institutions.
He was held, therefore, by the Executive Commis-
sion of Government, to come within the category
of Pretenders.
DECREE TO EXCLUDE HIM.
The time chosen for the presentation of this law,
was coincident with a demand for a vote of confi-
dence, raised upon an application for a grant of
100,000 francs a month, partly for necessary expen-
diture, and partly for secret service. The Govern-
ment had felt, that it was losing ground in the
opinion of the Assembly, as well as out of doors.
The presence of Ledru-Rollin at the supreme direc-
tion, and of such men as Flocon and Recurt in the
ministry, with the Clubs openly at work, a liccn-
tious press, the unlimited mob agitation of the
streets, and the occasional expressions from Minis-
ters themselves, at once grovelling before the new
VOL. I.
L
218
VOTE OF CONFIDENCE.
power of demagogucism, and alarming to men of
property, whose rights were treated with that kind
of sans façon, that implied sympathy with the pre-
judices against capitalists raised by the Socialists.
and Communists. M. de Lamartine took upon
himself the task of entering into a sort of family
explanation with the Assembly; but the history of
the debate and of the day-of the incidents within,
and the events without having formed one of those
dramatic combinations, so curiously characteristic
of the march of the Revolution, that we must en-
deavour to bring the scene before our readers.
Napoleon Bonaparte, at the opening of the pro-
ceedings, claimed attention, for the purpose of dis-
claiming the agitation that had been excited in the
name of his cousin, and of answering for the
loyalty, not only of his intentions, but of those of
all the Bonaparte family, with respect to the
Republic: he was supported by Pierre Bonaparte,
who echoed the sentiments expressed by Napoleon.
After a few ominous hints from M. Flocon about
measures taken for the security of the Republic,
M. Pascal Duprat opened the serious business of
the day by presenting the report of the Committee,
to whom, according to usage, had been referred
the consideration of the demand for 100,000 francs
a month, in which was involved the vote of confi-
dence.
Jand
ma
DUPRAT.
219
This M. Duprat was a gentleman who came
forward in the carly meetings of the Assembly, and
seemed destined to be one of the young promising
school of statesmen, who were to supersede the
worn out veterans of the parliament; but like the
stars of Béranger, he appeared only that he might
file, file, et disparait. He was one of those half-
socialist, half-mystic writers, who would have been
of the school of Lamartine, had Lamartine been
able to found a school. He was of a tall, gentle-
manly appearance, well suited to follow in the train
of so distingué a philosopher. On M. Duprat
devolved the occasional task of provoking explana-
tions arranged before-hand behind the curtain; and
no man could perform the part better of an impar-
tial friend, who had suspended his judgment, but
ready, though his heart-strings should be torn, to
join in a vote of condemnation, should such be
deserved. A young man who can throw back his
clustering locks, with well-affected resolution, and
keep his countenance, is an invaluable ministerial
ally, a most graceful master of ceremonies to lead
in the blushing delinquent, ready to plead inno-
cence, and finish with a pirouette before an enrap-
tured auditory.
M. Duprat led in M. de Lamartine, and so well,
that he was soon afterwards raised from a socialist,
or half-socialist reviewer-for all the Lamartineites
Bath
L 2
220
BABAUD-LARIBIERE.
delighted in demi-tints-to be ambassador extraor-
dinary to Vienna, whither he never went. It was
into more obscure quarters, that this star did file,
file et disparaît. The report of course was favour-
able to ministers. It was, nevertheless, disputed.
by M. Paul Sevaistre, whose physiognomy is lost
to memory. He accused the Clubs of being the
true source of present evils, and attacked the
Government for its weak indulgence of these foci of
agitation. The street mobs were but symptoms of
the evil, but the evil itself lay in these Clubs.
If we forget the countenance of M. Sevaistre, we
can well call to mind that of Babaud-Laribière, one
of the most zealous defenders of the Republican
Executive. He is a small, neat, pretty man, with
an enormous beard, to which he bears a lover's
devotion. No pet cat was ever treated with more
affectionate tenderness; all the perfumes of Arabia
nestled like spirits of the air about it. Such a
beard promenaded, as the French idiom has it,
through a field of nightingales, might tempt them
from the bosoms of roses. His strength lay in his
hair; for he had the city-shuffling, rather than the
round, rolling, oriental gait; and except the beard
and head, but little more could be seen above the
tribune. As a writer of feuilletons, Babaud was
sentimental, and introduced a new line, for the
purpose of doing away prejudices about més-
BEDEAU.
221
alliance. In his soft, semi-columns at the foot of
the newspaper, Counts abandoned the prejudices
that had clouded the misunderstood perfection of
the blanchisseuse; and if the coronet was for ever
dashed from the brow of high-born beauty, the
superior grisette-steeped to her pretty little bonnet
in philosophy-would not stoop to pick it up. At
the tribune, Babaud was a Boanerges-a son of
thunder. He blamed the Government for its
longanimity. It had left the enemies of the
Republic in the enjoyment of situations bestowed
by the Monarchy, and had neglected those who had
sacrificed all in its service-"even their honour."
There was an escapade!-A sacrifice of honour!
What a letting out of the cat! But we must not
be vulgar in the presence of Babaud-Laribière.
We pass by another speaker to come to General
Bedeau. The Citizen-General who now appeared at
the tribune, is one of the most distinguished of
that young school of Generals, brought into light
by the long military occupation of Algeria. His
characteristic is said to be administrative power.
His head is large and massive, his eye deep-sunk
and shrewd, and his voice of that clear, sharp
character, that gives the impression of keenness.
Yet this able, active General, who was to fall
severely, although not mortally wounded, in defend-
ing the cause of order, within a few days, had
+
LAMARTINE'S DEFENCE
shared the fatal fatuity with which all seemed to
have been seized in February. He allowed, because
his orders bewildered him from their contradictory
character, the mob to rush across the bridge leading
to the Chamber, and to turn out the Deputies. His
present speech could hardly be more unfortunate
for his interests, for he not only rose to make a
declaration of Republican faith, but to throw ridi-
cule on the pretenders who would parody the
Emperor, and to answer for the fidelity of the
army, should its services be required. His adhe-
sion to the Report was not, however, unqualified.
He called for a practical performance of the pro-
mises which had been made for the repulsion of the
fomenters of anarchy, and reserved the grant of
his support until such promises were carried
out.
222
M
So direct a challenge as this, gave the signal to
M. de Lamartine that the moment had arrived for
him to make his promised speech. He began by
stating, that what was wanting at the present
moment, was light upon the questions that were
engaging public attention. Was it true, he asked,
that the Government was divided, and leading
different ways? No! It was true, he acknow-
ledged, that when the Provisional Government was
suddenly formed, and in a manner and under cir-
cumstances so extraordinary, persons of diffe-
COL
I
OF THE GOVERNMENT.
223
rent views were necessarily thrown together; but
as soon as an intermediate government was installed,
If there was,
there was no longer dissentiment.
they would feel it to be their duty, as honourable
men, to bring their differences before the Assembly.
While he admitted that dissensions prevailed among
the Provisional Government, he yet pronounced the
warmest eulogies on all its members, whom he held
up as inevitably exposed to calumnies from the
nature of their position, for which they could only
hope to be recompensed by the impartial judgment
of posterity. He then drew a large and brilliant
picture of the acts that had been accomplished,
showing how, out of disorder, had been recomposed
the political, administrative, material, financial,
diplomatic, and military forces of the country.
Exhausted by the effort he had made, the
orator claimed permission to repose. While he was
seated, with Republican simplicity, on the steps
of the tribune, and chatting unceremoniously with
his friends, an incident occurred without, which
was calculated, as had now become usual, to operate
upon proceedings within.
From the time of the invasion of the Chamber,
on the 15th of May, the military defence of the
Chamber had become a matter of serious preoccu-
pation. At all times, there was a strong force in
the immediate neighbourhood, but in addition to
224
RENEWED AGITATION.
this, precautions would be had recourse to accord-
ing as the reports of the police indicated more or
less danger. At times, the bridge leading to the
Chamber would be barred to passengers. At other
times, not merely the bridge, but the Place de la
Concorde itself, would be closed. Occasionally,
some pieces of artillery would be pointed in the
faces of imaginary mobs. In fact, the exterior of
the Chamber had been converted into a barometer,
from which might be calculated the mercurial state
of Club-feeling.
<
The clection of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte for
Paris, and several departments, had opened a fresh
source of agitation, which came mingling with the
currents of Socialism, Communism, and all those
other turbid springs that descended from the Fau-
bourgs. The doubt as to what the Assembly might
do, attracted masses of people towards that quarter.
Large groups would form near the bridge, on the
bridge, and particularly on the Place de la Con-
corde, whenever the sun was endurable; and when
the heat proved too oppressive, the marroniers of
the Tuileries Gardens would throw their softly
magnificent and delicious shade over the politicians
in blouses, with their stunted black pipes, poisoning
the odours of flowers, that used to breathe for play-
ful children, and their nurses and mothers. Among
those groups might be seen a new race of agitating
G
BONAPARTISM.
225
Propagandists. Hard-cheeked men, wearing stiff
military stocks, and with the old unmistakeable
whisker, cut to the boot-like shape that Italy
presents on a map of Europe. These men told
how fields were won. They had served under the
Empire.
On this day, there were crowds on the Place de
la Concorde, among whom it was evident a rising
Bonapartist sympathy was beginning to manifest
itself. It was deemed necessary to push back
these groups from time to time; and as Clément
Thomas, the Commander-in-Chief of the National
Guards a decided Anti-Bonapartist-was perform-
ing his duty, with an ill-relished zeal, a pistol-shot
was fired at him, accompanied by a cry of Five
l'Empereur! The person was arrested, and there
was an end of it. Rumour, that seldom takes a
story as she finds it, or who-not to be too unjust
to the lady of the hundred tongues-never waits to
know the truth, but takes the head or the tail
thereof, whichever first comes to mouth, and then
fits on the fragment to the best body she can
fabricate—while running at full speed, this rumour
trebled the shots, and trebled the cries, and per-
suaded herself into the belief that a Bonapartist
conspiracy had broken out.
We left M. de Lamartine seated on the steps of
the tribune, as simply as a boy tired at play: sud-
L 3
226
LAMARTINE'S COUP DE THEATRE.
denly he was seen to spring to his feet, in the full
recovery of his native dignity. There was a hurry-
ing to and fro, a whisper thrilling along the benches;
the President rang his bell, and the members were
exhorted to take their places; the galleries were
subdued into awe, the fair ones in front leaning
over, with wonder-stricken faces. M. de Lamartine
began
"Citizen representatives,-a fatal circumstance
has just interrupted the speech that I had the honour
to address to the Assembly. While I was speaking
of the conditions necessary for the reconstitution of
order, and of the securities that we felt every day
disposed to make for the preservation of authority
and public morality, in all the faculties given by
the Revolution to the nation-a shot, several gun-
shots, it is said, were fired close to the Commander
of the National Guard of Paris; another was fired
on one of the brave officers of the army; and a third,
I am assured, struck the breast of an officer of the
National Guard. These, gun-shots were accom-
panied by cries of Vive l'Empereur! This,"
he continued to say, strangely forgetful of the
émeutes at Rouen and Limoges, was the first
drop of blood that had stained the Revolution of
the 24th of February." He then proceeded, while
the Assembly was in a state of consternation, to
announce that the Government had, even before
<
[C
fatt
LARABIT'S PROTEST.
227
this occurrence, prepared a project of law, closing
France against the Pretender, who believed himself
the heir of the Emperor. He would present it at
once; and he added, "When the audacity of fac-
tion is thus concocted in flagrant délit, and taken
with its hand in French blood, the law ought to be
applied by acclamation."
This proposition was itself as much a coup-de-
théâtre as a coup-d'état; rather, it was a coup-d'état,
carried under favour of a coup-de-théâtre. The
Assembly rang with applause, mingled with shouts
of "Vive la République !" In a moment that law
would have been carried, and Louis Napoleon Bona-
parte deprived of his right to sit in the Assembly,
and of all his rights. Republican fury and fierce
thoughtlessness would, in a moment of surprise, of
passing emotion, and quick credulity, have scaled
the more slowly-deliberated and coldly-weighed
decree of the Monarchy. Yes; all this would have
been perpetrated in an instant, only for the voice of
General Larabit, which was heard in its shrill, hiss-
ing tone, protesting against such a monstrosity as
a law voted by acclamation. He is a man of some-
what eccentric bearing, this brave General Larabit,
and must have been handsome, with his regular
features and fine black hair; but his teeth are gone,
and he looks faded rather than old. This living
fragment of the Empire stopped the triumphant
228
LAMARTINE'S WEAKNESS.
oratorical judgment that was about to crush the
son of the good King of Holland and the beloved
Hortense. Lamartine read the decree, but shrunk
from demanding its immediate adoption. He missed
his blow by the postponement. He committed a
worse fault than that, if we may call it a fault: he
resumed his speech. The man of wit will sacrifice
a friend to his jest. The orator sacrifices the repu-
tation of the man of action, and the statesman, to a
speech. M. de Lamartine spoke what had been
prepared, because it was prepared; but that which
would have been pure spirit without the intervening
incident was now but a weak dilution.* He had
armed himself with a grand image, and he could
not refrain from flashing it on the eyes of the As-
sembly. From the proud position of the vindicator
of the Republic from a threatened Emperor, he fell
back into the common-place clap-trap of defence
against an imaginary charge. He had been accused
of conspiracy; yes, he had "conspired with Sobrier
and with Blanqui; but did they know he had con-
spired? He had conspired as the conductor con-
spires with the lightning, in order to attract the
electricity and give it an innocent direction." He
J
* Lord Erskine knew better when he stopped short in
an oration after a quarter of an hour, seeing that the point
he had made told on the Jury. He disappointed his
audience, but won his cause.
VOTE OF CONFIDENCE PASSED.
229
had, in plain language, converted these men, as he
fondly imagined, from their resolution to set up a
Dictatorship; and, after all, the whole of the day's
exciting proceedings did no more than win for M. de
Lamartine the soubriquet of the Paratonnerre.
The two Bonapartes again renewed the expression
of their democratic sentiments, and protested against
their cousin being held answerable for acts done in
his name.
The vote of confidence was eventually accorded by
569 to 112.
230
QUESTION AS TO ADMISSION
CHAPTER XVIII.
}
SION-PORTRAIT OF LEDRU-ROLLIN.
;
AGITATION
ON THE SUBJECT OF LOUIS NAPOLEON-
DEBATE IN THE ASSEMBLY REGARDING HIS ADMIS-
ܝ
THE next day, Tuesday, the 10th of June, was
all agitation within and without the Assembly. The
question of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte's admission
was on the order of the day. There was an im-
mense display of military force about the Assembly.
At one moment the shops in the neighbourhood
of the Tuileries and Madeleine were closed, owing
to a panic caused by a charge of the Garde Mobile
upon an offensive mob, but which happily led to no
bloodshed. There could be no doubt whatever that
the rejection of Louis Napoleon would have produced
an émeute.
There were three reports from Committees ap-
pointed to examine as many returns. Two were for
the admission--one for exclusion.
The reporter
OF LOUIS NAPOLEON.
231
for admission was Jules Favre, representing the Com-
mittee appointed to test the validity of the nomina-
tion for La Charente Inférieure. M. Buchez, re-
presenting the tenth bureau, opposed his admission
for the Department of the Seine. M. Desmares,
representing the sixth bureau, recommended his
admission for the Department of l'Yonne.
M. Jules Favre, the ex-Secretary of Ledru-Rollin,
and ex-Under-Secretary of the Minister for Foreign
Affairs, in supporting the admission of Louis Napo-
leon, found himself in his proper element. He
had his vengeance to take for the mortification to
which he had been exposed by the cruel isolation
in which he had been left, on the application for
leave to prosecute Louis Blanc. In the well-assumed
attitude of an impartial judge, and independent
vindicator of the rights of the people to choose their
representatives, he was dealing the severest condem-
nation upon his own tyrannical interference with
the rights of electors, exhibited in his Ministerial
circulars and dictatorial delegation to irresponsible
Commissioners. What matter? The Government
he wanted to punish stood committed to the intro-
duction of a decrce for the exclusion of Louis-
Napoleon, while a vote of the Assembly for the
admission of the Prince would nullify such decree,
and shake the Executive Commission to pieces.
A well-devised scheme of vengeance was dressed in
232
QUESTION AS TO ADMISSION
the dignified trappings of law and popular rights.
"Louis-Napoleon was a representative of the people.
Let him come and repeat the generous expressions
that had been pronounced in that tribune by mem-
bers of his family."
To such a masterly dialectician, it was idle to
oppose the loose, though warm and carnest decla-
mation of poor M. Buchez, the Ex-President of the
Assembly, already made scape-goat for those whose
personal dignity had suffered in the invasion of the
15th of May. M. Viellard, the aged tutor of Louis
Napoleon, read a letter from his pupil, protesting
against his name being used as an excuse for
intrigue, and expressing how ardently he desired
to see the Republic established on a sure basis.
M. Fresneau, a young member, who gave promise of
ability, protested at once in favour of the Republic,
and in favour of the heir of so much glory. Louis
Blanc, whose ambition it was to stand well with
Corsica, for which he had made great and success-
ful efforts to be returned, and who was connected,
remotely it was said, with the Bonapartes and the
Pozzo di Borgos, carried the Montagnards with
him to the side of Louis Napoleon. In doing so,
he broached a doctrine touching the Presidency of
the Republic, which was afterwards adopted by his
party, that there ought to be no President at all;
that the sovereignty should lie with the people,
OF LOUIS NAPOLEON.
233
through their representatives, and that Presidency,
except simple Presidency of the Assembly, would be
Monarchy in another shape.
Ledru-Rollin came forward now in the name of
the Government to support the report, which went
for the exclusion of Louis Napoleon. How could
they call the votes of a few departments, the voice
of the whole people? Were they, he continued to
ask, better Revolutionists than the authors of the
Declaration of Rights of 1793, and they laid it
down, that the sovereignty of the people lay in
the whole people, and that when that sovereignty,
existing in the whole, was violated, insurrection
became justifiable. If one department might elect
Louis Napoleon, another department might elect
the Prince de Joinville, or the Duc de Bordeaux;
and if all the other departments protested against
such an act, the sovereignty of the people in its
ensemble should be respected. He approved of the
act, by which the Bonaparte family had been re-
instated in their rights, it was a magnanimous act,
and worthy of the Republic; but when they found,
with respect to one member a flagrant conspiracy
against the Republic, they were called on to main-
tain the law, as it existed against him. He then
went on to state, that an examination was going
forward which had led to arrests. At Paris there
was a system of organized seduction, by which per-
M
3
234
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
sons were entrapped, in order to form a new Impe-
rial Guard; money was distributed; wine given in
profusion to drink the toast of the Emperor Napo-
leon. An attempt had been committed the day
before in their own neighbourhood. They might
have all heard, as he had, between the Porte St.
Denis, and the Porte St. Martin, the cries of Vive
l'Empereur ! Three Napoleonist journals had
appeared within the last few days. In presence of
such facts their duty was clear. They should main-
tain the law of 1832.
.
Ledru-Rollin and the Government were beaten.
And now a word about Ledru-Rollin. Notwith-
standing that I was under the influence of prejudice
against this gentleman, entirely on account of his
public conduct, a prejudice too generally shared, to
make the avowal a shame, I must confess that his
oratorical power took me by surprize. Sincerity of
conviction, is admittedly a main element of orato-
rical success, and there could be no doubt of the
sincerity of Ledru-Rollin's love for the Republic,
and of his apprehension of a second Bonaparte.
The Revolution had thrown up many men, but of
those who had hitherto lain in obscurity, very few
proved of any value, even in the way of talent.
The names that still shone out most conspicuously
were old familiar names. The Republic had not
yet found its incarnation. The nearest represen-
Ka
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
235
as a new man.
tation of its spirit, seemed to be Ledru-Rollin.
In his novel position, this revolutionist exhibited
qualities, such as almost caused him to be regarded
The Chamber of Deputies was not
his sphere. He entered it under the repugnant
fame of a prosecuted, and if not pardoned, neglected.
speech. Violence so great, as to provoke the arm
of the law, and so pointless, as on mature reflexion,
to inspire but contempt, proved but an unpropi-
tious herald. Nor did the new hero, who aspired to
the leadership of the Republican party, inspire
much reverential dread. He looked a man that
would elbow others out of his way, take the first
place by storm, lose his breath, slip, and tumble
amidst jibes and laughter.
His person is large and bulky, his face full,
round and ruddy, his eye small and restless; and
taken altogether, one would say that he was a jovial,
reckless fellow, full of animal spirits, who while
aspiring to lead, was likely to become an instru-
ment in the hands of acute schemers, whose bidding
he would do, be that bidding what it might, rather
than not be chief. His nature is rather thought-
less than bad; but capable of badness, through a
readiness to accept, as inevitable necessities, the
most perverse rules of political conduct. He might
be used as the powerful, blind battering ram of
factions, to level the walls of the State, but never
236
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
could he rise to the rank of an intelligent leader,
or evince firmness sufficient to act as moderator.
M. Ledru-Rollin possesses one quality, which of
itself explains much of his showy, but ephemeral
success. He has concentrated his attention upon
one subject that of the history of the Revolution.
He knows it in all its details. He has it at his
fingers' ends. Few Frenchmen ever so concentrate
their faculties upon one point; more generally do
they imitate the versatility of their Voltaire,
aspiring to be thought acquainted with all possible
subjects.
In this respect they differ widely from the
Englishman, whose characteristic boast is that he
knows his business, and feels no sense of humilia-
tion, but often the contrary, that he knows nothing
else. This generality of range makes the French-
man the more agreeable talker, but the worse doer.
He skims the field, but cannot sink the mine-shaft.
A debate on foreign politics will set a multitude of
French deputies, on making the tour of the globe.
In the English House of Commons, it is listened to
with languid inattention. For the same reason a
question of law that would excite all the interest of
the English Parliament, because of its local per-
sonal bearing on individual rights, would pass un-
heeded in the Chamber of Deputies. The English
like law debates; the French rail against avocas-
J
Jou
237
serie. Ledru-Rollin would be shocked to learn
that he possessed any quality in common with
Englishmen, yet he owes his influence to the
limited, but accurate range of his information
regarding the great Revolution. The best, perhaps
the only good speech he ever made in the Chamber
of Deputies was his last. It turned upon a law of
the Convention. M. Hébert, the Minister of Jus-
tice, sought to justify the prohibition of the right of
public meeting by a law of the Convention, of
doubtful application, and which had fallen into
disuse. The Minister had, moreover, broached
some flagrant heresies, and had by the arbitrary
character of his doctrines, tended not only to pre-
cipitate the Revolution, but to give it the sanctity
of violated principles, warranting any sacrifice for
their assertion on the part of a spirited and free
people.
M. Paillet, an eminent member of the Paris bar,
and a very elegant speaker, was walking to the
tribune, when Ledru-Rollin, with characteristic.
audacity, sprang before him. It must be confessed,
that if the evidence of perfect aptitude for the task
he had undertaken could justify his assumption,
he stands acquitted of the charge of gentle violence,
which his eminent legal rival might have brought
against him. Instead of declamation or sarcasm,
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
238
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
M. Ledru-Rollin confined himself to a clear, terse
exposition of the law, and with perfect tact and
judgment, estimated the effect to be produced on
the public mind, by an easy confutation of the
Minister of Justice. It was from this opening,
made from the firm footing of law, that we next
see Ledru-Rollin leading the armed democracy into
the temple of his own triumph. As the Revolution
formed all his knowledge, so was it his passion;
he worshipped its excesses, with the blind par-
tiality of a lover; and as it was natural for such an
admirer to imitate, and choose for himself a model
from his own mythology, in which the Dantons,
Couthons, St. Justs, and Robespierres, were the
Jupiters, Neptunes, and Apollos-he chose Dan-
ton, and so acted, as if according to some metemph-
sycosis, the spirit of the great tribune had passed
into his own not less herculean frame. Ledru-
Rollin desires to pass for the Danton of February,
and he has so far succeeded, that he is to Danton,
what 1848 is to 1793. The former is to the latter,
what a tragedy on the stage is to a tragedy in real
life; only that there did happen in this instance,
what sometimes has occurred before the curtain,-the
buttons slipped from the foils and real blood was
shed.
A people too long steeped in voluptuousness,
›
1
i
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
239
and who pant for enjoyments after the over-excited
sensibility has been relaxed, get a taste for crime,
coloured by romance. Besotted voluptuousness in
power has marked the coming fall of sceptres and
thrones, by cruelties. A besotted people acts in the
same way, unless restrained by the authority and
example of some sound part. When Louis XIV.
passed the plough over the monastery of the en-
lightened, but ascetic Jansenists, he gave full rein
to licence and bigotry: when he revoked the Edict
of Nantes, he deprived his people, in the same way,
of the wholesome rivalry of Protestant example.
Priesthood and people alike ran rapidly into cor-
ruption, and the consequence was, the catastrophes
of 1793 and 1794. There was a gloomy grandeur
in the crimes of the Convention, calculated to stimu-
late the jaded fancies of a well-read, but ill-taught
generation. The theatres of the Boulevards, the
Roman-feuilleton of Dumas and Sue, the hybrid
German-Gallican-Spanish horrors of Hugo, had left
their coppery taste on parched and thirsty tongues.
A real drama was wanted, of which Paris should be
the theatre, with a general licence of imitation to the
provinces. The only difficulty was, as to the cast of
parts. So many had been deifying Robespierre-
the last chaunt of Lamartine, which, from making
him high-priest of his fame, converted him into the
K
de
240
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
high-priest of February-that intoxicating melody,
confounding the groans of the guillotine; this,
with more prosaic efforts, had raised up a host of
candidates for the part.
Louis Blanc appeared to have distanced all com-
petitors; but although only one grown viper might
look triumphant, there was yet a full nest, with ready
poison and ready fangs. There were fewer candi-
dates, although still too many for the Heberts and
Couthons. There was but one for Vergniaud, the
orator of the Girondists; and no one disputed the
claim of Ledru-Rollin to Danton. One reason was,
that Danton was but the rude pioneer, the unintel-
ligent precursor of his more subtle pseudo-philoso-
phical rival. His death was but the removal of the
machine, that, having battered the wall, lay an
obstacle in the breach, across the tide of the ad-
vancing victors. Another reason was, that there
were few who could dress the part.
Even French Revolutionists cannot turn out a
large stock of very big men. Ledru-Rollin was big
enough to fill the part to which he aspired. He
wanted the lion-like roar of his awful prototype,
and, affecting it, made himself hoarse; so that,
after a short while speaking, if the eyes were shut,
the ears would fancy that they listened to the
croaking of a gigantic frog. Let him roar like any
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
241
S
nightingale, our Bully Bottom never could inspire
terror, or create any impression more unfavourable
than that of an enfant brutal. When the rude,
blustering bon enfant had possessed himself of the
sword of State and the key of the treasury together,
people naturally feared that the joke might be car-
ried too far. The quantity of unaccounted-for money
that had been spent was something real, although
the brandishing of the sword might give no more
than fright; and at length sober people began to
conclude that Monsieur Ledru-Rollin was a very
dangerous man. Like Danton, he was a politician
-not a Socialist. He had nothing in common with
the Blancs, Leroux, and Proudhons-the Cabets,
Raspails, and Blanquis. His idea of revolution
was not spuriously philosophical. He wanted to
create armies of the north, and armies of the
south. He panted to see the Republican flag, red
or tri-colour, borne at the same time over the Alps
and across the Rhine. He panted to deluge Ger-
many with troops, and give the hand to the Poles,
on the understanding of destroying Monarchy in
Europe. He adored even the assignats. He would
re-enact the Revolution, with all its consequences.
He would continue the Convention, and make it
perpctual. In all this he was thoroughly in carnest,
and so far had the advantage of earnestness; but,
VOL. I.
ΜΕ
242
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
as he was obliged to tamper with Socialist and Com-
munist sects, whose doctrines he could not compre-
hend, and must have hated and despised for the
obstacles they threw in his way, so did his earnest-
ness give way to temporizing, for which he was
unfitted, and by degrees he became weak, and more
weak.
wła
Upon the day which first brought Ledru-Rollin
before us, he appeared to most advantage. He was
not at that period compromised by damaging nego-
ciations with Socialists. He had the feeling of the
thoroughly Republican part of the Assembly with
him against the threatened Empire. And was that
Republic, for which he had so long, and at length
so victoriously struggled, about to merge into a
new sort of Monarchy? Was it to be sacrificed
to the shadow of a name-to a popular delusion?
Had they been engaged in making for themselves
a trap into which they were to fall, amidst the
laughter of the world? So thought, so felt, so
feared, the disciple of Danton; and in the reality of
his fear he became eloquent, touching, powerful,
and rose to the dignity of first champion of the
French Republic. The Assembly responded to every
sentence-the audience and the orator were at home;
as he felt, they felt; as he spoke, they responded;
he was master of the Assembly. As he descended,
LEDRU-ROLLIN.
243
he was complimented by a throng of admirers; he
was congratulated, and embraced, and-beaten. The
mysterious murmur of the rising émeute shook each
hand as it dropped the ball into the urn. Never-
theless, the orator had fairly won a triumph, and it
was his greatest, and indeed last; for he was
nearer the edge of dismissal than he could have
dreamed.
We have seen that upon occasion M. Ledru-
Rollin could assume the cold manner of a law
pleader, and adapt himself to the proprieties of
parliamentary discussion. As a demagogue, he
ought to be effective; but, curiously enough, the
Revolution that opened wide the Clubs, and gave
the thoroughfares to spouters of all kinds, has not
proved favourable to that style which would appear
so popular in its character. M. Ledru-Rollin has
warmth, fluency, look, action, such as ought to
strike a mixed assembly; but he has not drank at
the well of the new philosophy; his brain does not
reel with the mystic materialism of the school of
anti-property and anti-family profligates, who fancy
that they are filled with a holy fanaticism. He
sees too clearly what he wants, although that which
he wants is extravagant and unattainable. The
gentleman, the man of the world, the sharer in the
pleasures of society, the sympathiser with the con-
M 2
244
LEDRU-ROLLIN
ventionalisms and rules of the civilized world, all cry
out against him. Not being a moderate Republican,
and not being a Socialist, he is nothing. The huge
painted reputation that was to have borne the flag of
the Red Republic aloft, has already burst-M.
Ledru-Rollin has ceased to be anything in the
revolutionary world.
LOUIS NAPOLEON'S RESIGNATION. 245
CHAPTER XIX.
LOUIS NAPOLEON RESIGNS-HIS LETTER EXCITES ANGER
-BILL AFFECTING OLD OFFICERS CAUSES DISSATIS-
FACTION-FATAL
Cat
COLLISION AT GUERET-PIERRE
LEROUX, THE COMMUNIST.
Ir was fully expected that, on the following day,
Wednesday the 14th, some communication would
have taken place relative to the vote admitting
Louis Napoleon. It was known, in fact, that the
Executive Commission of Government had held
a consultation with Ministers, on the propriety
of resigning. The design was abandoned, and,
by a tacit agreement not to embarrass the Govern-
ment at such a moment, no notice was taken in the
Assembly of the rumours afloat.
The next day was not, however, to pass over
without a scene. The debate turned on Algeria,
which it was proposed to assimilate to France, a
proposition resisted, and not carried into effect
246
HIS LETTER.
when the Chairman announced that he had received
a letter from the Citizen Louis Napoleon Bona-
parte. This letter, from the extraordinary emotion
it caused, we beg to introduce.
CC
London, 14th June, 1848.
"Monsieur le Président,
"I was about to leave for my post, when I learn
that my election serves as a pretext for deplorable
troubles, and fatal errors. I have not sought the
honour of becoming a representative of the people,
because I was aware of the unjust suspicions of
which I have been the object; and I should feel
even less disposed to seck for power. If the people
impose duties upon me, I shall know how to fulfil
them; but I disavow all those who lend me ambi-
tious intentions, such as I have not. My name is
a symbol of order, of nationality, and of glory; and
it is with the greatest pain I should see it serve to
augment the troubles and divisions of the country.
To avoid so great a misfortune, I should prefer
remaining in exile: I am ready to make any sacri-
fice for the sake of the happiness of France. Have the
goodness, M. le Président, to communicate this
letter to my colleagues. I send you a copy of my
letter of thanks to the Electors. Receive the assu-
rance of my distinguished sentiments.
"CHARLES LOUIS NAPOLEON BONAPARTE."
ITS EFFECT ON THE ASSEMBLY.
313
در
247
This letter excited indescribable indignation.
General Cavaignac, then Minister of War, said that
his emotion was so great that he could not give it
adequate expression. What he remarked, he said,
in a piece destined to become historical was, that
the word Republic was not once mentioned. This
remark was hailed with shouts of Vive la Répu-
blique! M. Baune exclaimed, that he would protest
against the declaration of war made by a Pretender.
They did not fear an 18th Brumaire. This was
met by loud cries of "No-no!" and "Let him
come and try it.' M. Anthony Thouret signalised
particularly the phrase, 'If the people impose duties
upon me, I shall know how to fulfil them' that
phrase he considered a call to revolt against the
French Republic, and demanded, on the instant,
that Louis Napoleon be declared traitor to his
country. M. Flocon disdainfully reminded the
Assembly that they did not manifest emotion on
the 15th of May, and ought not now to exhibit
such before an individual. The Minister of War
moved, that no resolution should be taken on the
spot, but that they should adjourn till next day.
M. Jules Favre, who had been mainly instrumental
in having the election of Louis Napoleon ratified,
moved that the letter be placed in the hands of the
Minister of Justice. The Minister of Finance sup-
ported the motion for adjournment, contemptuously
248
SECOND LETTER FROM
telling the Assembly that they were, by their anger,
doing the Pretender too much honour. M. Duprat
denounced the address to the Electors as fac-
tious.
The Commander of the National Guards next
ascended the tribune, and stated that to-morrow,
if his information idd not mislead him, it was
probably a battle in the streets they might have
to fight. He would advise them to be prepared
for a battle as well as a discussion to-morrow. This
announcement produced much additional agitation,
which, when it had a little subsided, General
Thomas proposed that they should declare that
whoever took up arms in the cause of a pretender
to despotism, and for foreign gold, should be pro-
nounced a traitor to his country. This was hailed
with acclamation. The Finance Minister rose,
amidst violent tumult, to state that measures amply
sufficient for the preservation of the public peace
had been taken, and that the Assembly might
adjourn till next day, when he was quite sure there
would be no battle; upon which this agitated
Assembly separated at seven o'clock, amidst cries
of Vive la République !
When the Assembly met the following day, the
renewal of the debate relative to Louis Napoleon
was stopped by the following letter of resigna-
tion:
"S
LOUIS NAPOLEON.
249
"London, June 15, 1848.
"Monsieur le Président,
"I felt pride in having been elected representa-
tive of the people in Paris, and in three other
departments. It was in my opinion an ample
reparation for thirty years' exile, and six years'
captivity. But the injurious suspicions to which
my election has given rise, the disturbance of which
it was the pretext, and the hostility of the Executive
Power, impose upon me the duty of refusing an
honour which I am supposed to have obtained by
intrigue. I desire order and the maintenance of a
wise, great, and liberal Republic; and since I invo-
luntarily cause disorder, I deposit, not without
regret, my resignation in your hands. Calmness,
I trust, will now be restored, and enable me to
return to France as the humblest of citizens, but
also as one the most devoted to the repose and
prosperity of his country.
"CHARLES LOUIS NAPOLEON BONAPARTE."
This letter caused no particular mark of interest,
although it relieved the Assembly from the renewal
of an unpleasant discussion. The Assembly took
up an election petition, and concluded with Algeria.
The city too, presented no deviation from its
M 3
250
THE ASSEMBLY.
habitual scenes, and all apprehension about Louis
Napoleon, appeared to have subsided. How well it is
we cannot read the future, and are allowed to enjoy
things as they come! So flat a termination of a
formidable incident warrants a flat remark.
With the resignation of Louis Napoleon, the city
returned to an apparent state of tranquillity, and
his name seems to have passed out of recollection,
as if the whole incident was but a lively episode, the
interest of which had served only to form a momen-
tary diversion from the main plot of the revolu-
tion.
Th
The proceedings in the Assembly, on Saturday
the 17th of June, were sufficiently animated. There
was, in the first place, a sharp discussion with
regard to a petition addressed by a number of
officers of rank, who had been forced into retire-
ment for ever from active service, by a decree of
the Provisional Government—a measure which gave
great offence to the superior officers of the army,
and tended to turn them against the Republic.
The measure was, however, maintained; for it was
the members of the Provisional Government that
were still in power.
A more serious subject, because it bore upon the
passions of the lower order already in such a
dangerous state of fermentation-was that intro-
PIERRE LEROUX.
251
duced by the new Communist member, M. Pierre
Leroux, relative to a collision that had taken place
in the department of La Creuse, owing to the
resistance of the people to the collection of the
45 centimes additional tax, imposed by the Provi-
sional Government in its financial necessities. At
a place called Gueret, the pcople converted a tree of
liberty into a gallows, by suspending to it a rope,
replaced the tri-color by a black flag, and announced
that any person committing the crime of paying the
odious impost should be hung. The National
Guards were called out, and after an irritating
parley of some hours, a couple of shots came from
the crowd, on which the National Guards fired,
when ten were killed, and five wounded.
Such was
the circumstance that the lately-elected Commu-
nist member for Paris brought under the notice
of Government, and the Government could only
deplore so fatal an occurrence, whilst it was declared
to be impossible to renounce the tax.
M. Pierre Leroux had already made a speech on
the subject of colonizing Algeria-a fruitful subject
for a practical statesman. The French are not gifted
with colonizing powers; they have not the patient
industry and laborious self-denial suited for co-
lonists. Paris is the paradise of Frenchmen, and
to leave it, is exile and misery. In Paris the well-
252
THE FRENCH NO COLONISTS.
instructed and refined find salons; and the work-
men, clubs.
All find promenades and theatres;
all are easily indulged, and all must have indul-
gence. The animal spirits of Frenchmen are of
the light, effervescing kind, that run off in chat,
gossip, and criticism, and play off their emotions
on kindred spectacles and bespangled puerilities.
It is all expansion, and no concentration-no
settled and deep purposes, long looked at, and
calmly resolved. The consequence is, that the
northern coast of Africa, opposite the shores of
France, and forming another arm of that basin to
which the wealth of the old world converges, to
whose banks on all sides civilization has repaired-
that tempting, gifted country, the site of old Carth-
age, the residence of Saint Augustine, the early
seat of Christianity, is, after eighteen years in the
hands of the French, what barbarism has made it!
In their hands it is a vast military hunting-ground,
like that torn from the Amcers of Scinde, in which
the wild sons of the desert are the prey. It is
a mere military possession—a burthen and a drain
on France; a fiery furnace, in which her young
conscripts are annually devoured; a school of demo-
ralization for her army, perhaps by way of compen-
sation; a safety-valve for Europe. It is an outlet
for French enterprize, but a shame to French ability.
Magda
Act
B
Bl
PIERRE LEROUX.
253
M. Pierre Leroux, when treating this vast sub-
ject, treated it exactly as he did the émeute at
Gueret, and, in fact, as he did every other question
on which he subsequently spoke. M. Leroux would
think of nothing, or speak of nothing, but his own
model scheme of society. He saw in Algeria a fine
theatre, where to establish a colony of Communists.
He saw in the fatal collision at Gueret, evidence
afforded of the hollow foundation on which a per-
verted civilization, as he took it to be, stood. The
workmen of Paris had taken a dreamer from his
closet, and made him their representative. Among
a set of Germans, who had passed their lives in the
seclusion of a university, smoking and building
cloudy realms for the imagination to wander in,
Pierre Leroux might have found disciples. Amongst
a set of tradesmen he proved a bore-ni plus ni
moins. A less dangerous Diogenes never rolled his
tub into the haunts of civilized men.
His appear-
ance was that of a man innocent of the ways of the
world, and absent even to the point of forgetting
the wash-hand basin and brush. Beneath a prodi-
gious mass, or mop of black hair, as wild and
entangled as the brushwood of a virgin forest,
slumber a pair of misty, dreamy eyes, while the
spectator's cars are regaled with the sounds of a
sing-song voice, going through an interminable
And
254
PIERRE LEROUX.
history of human society, from the earliest days to
present times, for the purpose of showing that the
world has hitherto been on a wrong social track,
and struggling in the toils of a great mistake. So
little have Leroux's treatises been read, that a couple
of speeches were listened to with comparative atten-
tion. By degrees, they began to be as tedious as
twice-told tales. The auditory would begin to
doubt if they had not heard the same sentences
before. Memory that people call treacherous, by a
modest self-application, proved doubly treacherous
with regard to her devoted worshipper, Leroux,
all whose efforts proved to be but one well-learned
theme. No; he did not learn his lesson by heart,
but used to read it. If he did not tax his memory,
as we were by a strange lapse of our own forgetting,
he was not sparing of his industry, for he used to
commit to paper his endless dissertations. One
day, however, a wicked wight determined to extin-
guish our light, produced one of the philosopher's
printed books, and proved that the essay or speech
to which they had been listening was a mere tran-
script by the philosopher himself from his printed
publications.
Pierre Leroux never well recovered this blow.
When he attempted to read afterwards, a resolution
was gravely proposed that no books should be read at
·
PIERRE LEROUX.
255
the tribune. Well do I recollect the scowl with
which the philosopher slowly ascended the Moun-
tain.
The return of Leroux was an indication of a dan-
gerous state of feeling amongst the lower orders;
but a better antidote to his pernicious doctrines
could not have been afforded than his investment
with power, which enabled him to make himself and
his books equally ridiculous by a public performance
in the National Assembly.
Let us conclude with an example which paints of
itself the mind of this fantastic monomaniac.
In a
project of a Constitution which he published, there
appeared the following odd article:-
"Article 100.-Poplars shall be planted, and
kept up with care, in all the communes of the
Republic. The State shall have for its seal a cylin-
drical altar, surmounted by a cone, on which shall
be a spherical ray. This seal shall be placed in
the hands of the National Management, to be
stamped, en relief of wax, on all treaties with foreign
nations, and on all laws. Each of the three corps
of the representation shall have for scal one of the
solides of Revolution, whose unity composes the
seal of the State. The Executive body shall have
for seal the cylinder, or its cubical profile; the
Legislative Corps, the cone on its profile, the equi-
43
256
lateral triangle; the Scientific Corps, the sphere,
with rays on its profile, the circle surrounded with
rays. The seal of each of these three bodies of the
national representatives shall be placed in the hands
of the president of the corps, to be applied to all its
acts."
!
PIERRE LEROUX.
1
MARRAST.
CHAPTER XX.
M. MARRAST.
257
ON Monday, the 19th of June, M. Marrast
ascended the tribune, with a draft of the Constitu-
tion in his hand. We shall speak more of M.
Marrast, for the present, than of his work. This
gentleman owes his fame and his position to the
National newspaper, which in his hands suffered
nothing from the reputation it had acquired by its
having served as the political pathway of Thiers,
and the powerful organ of Armand Carrel. If the
coarser, although not bolder hands, of the disciples.
of Godefroy Cavaignac, in the Réforme, thrust the
mob upon the devoted Gardes Municipaux, who
were butchered in the Château d'Eau-beckoned
on the infuriated victors to the Tuileries, and then
led them, intoxicated with triumph, to the Chamber
of Deputies, and from thence to the Hôtel-de-Ville
258
MARRAST.
-it was the succèssor of Armand Carrel who had
pre-
pared the way for such surprisingly facile triumphs.
Godefroy Cavaignac and Armand Carrel loom
through the past like the demigods of Republicanism.
The former leant to Socialism; the latter was a pure
Republican, who regarded the social institutions of
society as the results of feelings and habits venerable
and sacred, and to be modified by society as it
advanced, instead of being savagely dealt with by
the State. Cavaignac and Carrel were on the point
of separating, because the latter would not accept
the doctrines with which the former was affected,
rather than imbued, for he eventually yielded to
the clear reasoning of his commanding friend.
The successors of Cavaignac in the Réforme took
up the discarded errors of their master, which fitted
their coarse natures perfectly. Marrast and his
friends remained true to the teachings and example
that had been set them. For years before the
Revolution of February, the National newspaper
was, beyond all comparison, the most attractively, if
not the best written in France. It was singularly
terse and graphic. The year 1847 gave ample scope
to the chief writer of this formidable journal; it
was a year of corruption in all classes-the
year
of
persecutions of Ministers, and their associates and
agents-of disgusting exposures, of rapid specula-
tions for sake of boundless luxury. The National,
MARRAST.
259
while treating these matters with perfect power, yet
did so with perfect propriety. There was intense
disgust, but the feeling was never allowed the free-
dom of coarse or overstrained language. Neat was
the operation, and skilful the exposure. It was the
hand of science that laid bare the plague-spots.
Calm and earnest, but, oh! how cutting was the
language of this journal, all through this melan-
choly year! It could be playful too, and never so
dangerous as when in play. How slyly would a
corner of the château drapery be raised, and the
public allowed to peep at the performance of some
family intrigue-political, of course. It would not
be fair now to revert to scenes that might be sum-
moned to deserted halls, under the shadow of mis-
fortune.
If the Réforme did the rough work of knocking
down the pillars of the Monarchy, and did it easily,
it was because the National had corroded them.
If there was no fervour of friendship, no sympathy,
no zeal to answer the royal summons in the hour of
need, it was because a subtle dissolvent had been
operating too long, and had made the heart dry,
and unnerved the hand.
Marrast is the Voltaire who preceded the Revolu-
tion of February. Well for him would it have been
that the analogy had become perfect, by his not
260
MARRAST.
being called to make himself an actor in the work
he did so much to prepare.
Marrast, from having
been so popular, is now one of the most unpopular
of public men, and yet I could never learn why.
Before the Assembly met, Marrast was well spoken
of. It was said, that at the Board of the Provisional
Government he had manifested remarkable ability;
that he had prevented many sad mistakes. The
best proof that there must have been good founda-
tion for the favourable opinion entertained of Mar-
rast amongst the better classes is, the fierce hatred
that the Socialists began to evince towards him,
because he had, in fact, defeated their designs. It
is on record, that when Barbès, Blanqui, and
their adherents, forced their way into the Hôtel-de-
Ville, on the 15th of May, after the invasion of the
Chamber, the cry was, "We must finish with Mar-
rast!" The object of their search was at the time
surrounded by a strong body of friends in a room,
which was not discovered, where they were deter-
mined to sell their lives dearly, for they were well
armed.
As the moderate Republican became unpopular,
not only with the Socialists, but with all other
parties, so Marrast suffered proportionally in repute,
for he was believed to be the virtual adviser of the
different moderate administrations that succeeded
MARRAST.
261
each other from June to December. In order to
complete our picture, we must anticipate a little
the order of time. M. Marrast was elected Presi-
dent of the Assembly, and immediately installed in
the princely residence allotted under the Monarchy,
to the President of the Chamber of Deputies. He
at once fixed his weekly reception night, on which
his salons were thrown open for company, amidst
a blaze of light and luxury, such as would not pro-
bably be witnessed at Washington in the official
residence of a Polk, or a Taylor. The palaces of
the ex-royal family were obliged to pay tribute to
the Presidency, and scones, vases, and bronzes
spoke eloquently for the taste and love of luxury
of the ex-editor of the National. It was said that it
was not only in the salons destined to the recep-
tion of the public, that were found these regal
spoils. This might be scandal. The silver cradle
of an heir to the Crown, rocked to Republican
dreams, it was said, the offspring of the monthly
President of the Assembly. The brevity of the
official tenure of office, added to the ridicule. It
was so like making the most of an unaccustomed
feast. It was the amusing dream of the cobbler's
wife in the play and pantomime, who, in her brief
assumption of the fine lady, does make the most of
her opportunity. Ridicule is killing in France-
262
MARRAST.
our Voltaire the second handled the weapon with
too much effect, to need being told that; and yet
blinded by his own evil star, he was weak enough
to give his enemies a ludicrous handle. Envy had
much to do with all this, for the friends of Marrast
urged with truth, that at a moment, when there
was a suspension of soirées, to the ruin of the petit
commerce, the man who set the marchands selling
gloves, and shoes, and dresses, and revived the
motion of hackney-coaches, was doing the State
some service.
To add to the confusion of Marrast, he asked for
an increase of pay, that he might spend more for
the pleasure of honourable members, and for the
benefit of the good citizens of Paris, and was
refused. His good intentions were not even acknow-
ledged. Although M. Marrast was a Republican,
and had suffered imprisonment and exile for his
opinions, and although not a whisper had ever been
breathed against his probity, yet he had a meri-
dional love of music, fine arts, and luxury, and
was consequently a poor man. There is something
of theatrical pomp in his air and manner. His
entry into the National Assembly, so slow and
measured, while he rolled his remarkably fine black
eyes about, reminded the English spectator of
Kean the lesser: his manner of taking the chair in
-
MARRAST.
1.
263
the Assembly was so awfully dignified, as to make
one smile. Yet his mode of conducting business
was a great improvement on that of his predeces-
sors. He abandoned the odious hand-bell, which,
whether in the old Chamber, or in the new Assem-
bly, used to be the sole noisy stupid resource of
parliamentary chairmen. It was about as happy an
expedient, as if a big dog was set to bark to silence
a pack in chorus. Marrast ruled the house by his
eye, which he directed towards the most noisy; and
by nominative appeals, accompanied by some slily
satirical allusion, but by no means offensive, gene-
rally succeeded in a task, under which a stronger
man of less tact and art, would have succumbed.
Marrast would have probably been more happy in
this sort of bye play, had he been encouraged; but
urbanity formed no characteristic of the Assembly.
The rising play of his features was but too often
checked by some individual burst of savage rude-
ness, which he could bear well, or spiritedly repel
if necessary. The repeated re-elections of this
gentleman to the Presidential chair, showed how
much the Assembly valued his real merits. The
greatest compliment of all, was afforded by the
Committee of the Constitution, which confided to
his practised pen, the preparation of so important
a document. When he appeared in the tribune, our
264
MARRAST.
readers must now be aware, the Assembly had
not to encounter the awful brow of a Solon or
Lycurgus. The French had, with characteristic
appreciation of the fitness of things, chosen an
homme d'esprit, to lay the foundation deep in time
of their Republican Constitution.
The author did his work neatly, as might have
been expected, and gave out all the articles in a
delicate flute-like voice, that, had the subject been a
chapter of Racine, would without doubt have been
effective. This Constitution, be it remarked, was
produced on the first day of a week, which was to
be marked by one of the most fearful insurrections
of which history makes mention. It would not be
easy to determine, how far this project of a Consti-
tution might have been an element in the causes
that led to this insurrection. Perhaps it was
regarded with profound indifference, perhaps no
greater weight was attached to it than that of
being the enunciated proof of what the workmen
had already long known, that the droit au travail,
which alone gave the Republic or the Constitution
any value in their eyes, formed no part of the
design of the Committee, over which the ex-editor
of the National presided. Had the bonnet-rouge
triumphed, the first victim of Socialist rage and
disappointment, would in all probability have been
MARRAST.
this man, whose whole life had been devoted to the
cause of Republicanism.
VOL. I.
265
More practical and positive motives than appear
in a mere string of maxims, artistically attached
into a code of political duties, are now gathering
upon us, and give to our notes, of the next few
days, a considerable degree of interest.
N
266
VICTOR HUGO.
CAUSES.
CHAPTER XXI.
VICTOR HUGO—LEON FAUCHER—DEBATE ON THE NA-
TIONAL ATELIERS-AGITATION WITHOUT-MANŒU-
VRES OF THE CLUBS TO PRECIPITATE THE INSURREC-
TION—APATHY OF THE MIDDLE CLASSES, AND ITS
THE state of the national ateliers, which had
been frequently referred to of late, in discussions
arising incidentally, and generally expressive of
dissatisfaction, was formally brought before the
Assembly, on Tuesday the 20th of June, upon a
demand for a grant of three millions of francs. It
was Victor Hugo who opened the debate. This
celebrated writer was returned for Paris only a little
while before, amongst that strangely contrasted
batch of members, to which we have had occasion to
point attention.
Victor Hugo had been created a Peer of France
by Louis-Philippe, a short time only before the
267
fall of the Monarch, and it was fondly hoped by his
admirers, that the Upper House had been gifted
with a Lamartine; which would have been a
right royal gift. Victor Hugo was to have been a
Lamartine only in the sense of an oratorical, and
literary rival. As a politician, his presence was
to have made, what Hugo rejoices in so much, an
antithesis. His steady Monarchical brilliancies
were to have outshone the eccentric Semi-Socialist
flashes of the wandering star, that having visited
all systems, and dallied a while within the sphere
of their influence, resumed its lonely way through
sublime solitudes, until it found a more powerful
attraction in Robespierrian Republicanism-Robes-
pierre with the idea bien entendu, and without the
guillotine. Victor Hugo, it must be said in plain
terms, failed in the Chamber of Peers. His eccen-
tric bearing was not suited to an Assembly, where
convenance presided with extreme rigour. Elderly
gentlemen who had passed into the Chamber,
through the magistracy, or the ministry, or the
stern discipline of the camp, did not view with
much favour, the entry of a writer whose freedom
with history and what is more sacred still in the eyes
of even French courtiers, with language even, was
not atoned for by his genius. That dangerous shaft,
a mot was shot over the head of the poet, more
spirituel than any thing he had ever himself said,
VICTOR HUGO.
N 2
268
for Victor Hugo with all his acknowledged power is
not spirituel. By an allusion to the name of a
tragedy, which is one of the most absurd and
grotesque perversions of history on record, and in
reply to the question, why did the King make
Victor Hugo a Peer? it was said, Le Roi s'amuse.
The qualities which had unfitted the chief of the
romantic school of literature for the exclusive bon
ton of the tribune of the Peers, might perhaps have
served him with the National Assembly, only that
he had been a Peer, and one so fresh from the
hands of Louis-Philippe.
An ode on the birth-day of the Duc de Bordeaux,
stood registered likewise against him, for it is one
of the responsibilities, as it is one of the penalties
of genius, that no act it ever does, can ever be
covered with oblivion for sake of personal conve-
nience. Genius is doomed by the rigorous fame
awarded by the vox populi, to a glorious consistency
of conduct. The great man cannot be exhibited in
fragments-he must be seen all of a piece. The
brighter the light, the darker the spot, and the
more fascinating to the eye. The poet laureate of
the legitimate Heir to the Crown, might after a
certain lapse of time, pay court to the Monarch of
July; but it would be a temptation to public faith,
to proclaim too abruptly his new-born Republica-
nism; a greater still, to see him turn with the levity
VICTOR HUGO.
VICTOR HUGO.
269
of disappointed self-love to a rising Imperialism.
There can be no harmony in such a life, although it
should be passed in the melody of the sweetest ver-
sification; nor could the richest painting of the
imagination give tone to such patch-work.
M. Victor Hugo is a born actor. His writings
have the florid varnish of an acted style. The highı
gifts with which he has been endowed by Provi-
dence, have been perverted into a sleight of hand
dealing with language. Where he might have
soared, he has stooped to pick up odd discoveries,
and make the queerest contrasts. His mind has
become a kaleidescope, and his tongue can only
utter puerile conceits. He believes that he has dis-
covered the antithesis, or that at least he has
revealed its power, and he thinks, speaks and acts,
by a sort of double key—a new found harmony
created from a forced consonance of things, the
highest with things the most mean.
He swoops
from an Alpine altitude, to pick up a bauble; and
although he may display agility, he is no longer
the cagle looking unblenchingly at the sun. In
the Chamber of Peers, the Vicomte Victor Hugo
acted with an overstrained deferential courtesy.
In the Assembly he tried to put on the air of a
great champion, at one moment of the Republic,
at another of endangered society. His large promi-
nent, fair, and remarkable brow, would seem
270
charged with frowns; his voice would issue like
avenging thunder, and his gestures perform their
fitting accompaniments of extravagance. Yet he
failed. With a good appearance, good voice, com-
manding action, and high fame, Victor Hugo
utterly failed. More than once has he been driven
from the tribune by clamorous impatience. Why?
Because he is an actor, because he is artificial, vain
and inconstant; because he thinks more of himself
than of his cause, because he is not animated by a
lofty self-sacrificing sincerity.
It is remarkable how few of the popular novel
writers of France found their way into the National
Assembly. Alexandre Dumas tried constituency after
constituency, and failed. Eugène Sue, whose romances
were written with a view of advancing Socialist doc-
trines, and which were imprudently admitted into
such Journals as the Débats, Presse and Consti-
tutionnel, was mentioned on some lists, but hardly
attracted attention. Victor Hugo, who did find
his way into the Assembly, received little respect.
Dumas and Sue certainly did much to corrupt,
the one the morals, the other to pervert the ideas
of the reading and play-going public-and what
part of the Parisian public is not feuilleton-reading
and play-going?-and by this double corruption
to prepare the Révolution Démocratique et Sociale;
and yet these precursors of ruin were thrown aside
VICTOR HUGO.
HIS SPEECH.
271
into obscurity and neglect the moment that their
disciples began to put their doctrines into practice.
Their own tales present no moral so good. The
fanatic may find favour, but never the mere cor-
rupter. With this introduction of Victor Hugo,
we come to his speech regarding the national
ateliers.
He acknowledged that those ateliers were the
result of a necessity. Nevertheless, he could not
conceal from himself that the money expended on
them was so much lost. The result of four months
had been nothing, or rather worse.
The Monarchy
had made oisifs-the Republic, fainéants. Such
fainéantisme was fatal to civilization in Constan-
tinople or Naples, but never would the reading
and thinking workmen of Paris act like Lazzaroni
in time of peace, to become Janissaries for a day of
combat. Having paid many handsome compliments
to the Parisian workmen, he proceeded to show
that the civilization of Europe would be affected
by the deterioration of the character of the Parisian
populace. What Rome was formerly, he considered
Paris to be now. What the thinkers of Paris pre-
pared, the workmen of Paris executed. The work-
man was the soldier of the idea, and not of the
émeute. It became, therefore, necessary that the
national ateliers should be transformed promptly
from a hurtful, into a useful institution.
SARAN
272
VICTOR HUGO'S SPEECH.
While the orator was thus indulging in general
reflections, he was interrupted by voices remind-
ing him that they were all agreed as to what
he was saying, but wanted a practical plan
for accomplishing what all equally wished; but
the orator could only throw out those general
recommendations which were on every tongue,
although by few expressed so eloquently. What
added, he continued, to his inexpressible grief was,
that while Paris was struggling in her paroxysm,
London was rejoicing-her commerce had trebled;
luxury, industry and wealth had there found refuge.
Yes, England was seated laughing at the edge of
the abyss into which France had fallen.
This speech resumed with completeness the vain
prejudices of the café. Paris, the modern Rome-
although Rome was the powerful organiser of
ancient times although Rome gave municipal
government, and multiplied life throughout her
members, while Paris cannot colonize abroad, and
the French have yet to learn how to manage their
local affairs without a full reliance on the capital!
Paris, the great initiator in literature and philo-
sophy !-although she has borrowed not only from
the classics, but from England, from Spain, from Ger-
many-and notwithstanding the attempt to revive
the diatribes of the café against England and re-
excite popular hatred, which had subsided in presence
Ka mā
1
273
of the calm impartiality and perfect good faith
of England, while France was in the throes of
her revolution ! It is enough to say that the
character of the statesman was in this speech.
One of the most prosaic and practical of men,
M. Léon Faucher, rose after Victor Hugo. This
gentleman had long been distinguished for the
unwearied industry with which he applied himself
to those economical questions, to the perfect under-
standing of which he attributes the commercial
prosperity of England. He had visited the seats of
our manufacturing industry. He had plunged
boldly into our blue-books, through whose vo-
luminous details he threaded his way sagaciously.
He attended public meetings, conversed with public
men, and gave to France the result of his labours
in a couple of sound, well-written volumes, which
have raised and established his fame. From Eng-
land, M. Faucher returned a free-trader, and
with his usual energy and strength of conviction
laboured to break down the narrow and exclusive,
the miserably exclusive spirit in which French com-
mercial laws are conceived. With the wise little
Duc d'Harcourt, he founded a society, which
was the first effort made in France at getting up
a regular series of public meetings for the dis-
cussion of political questions.
M. Faucher is a man of healthy mind, and
LEON FAUCHER.
N 3
274
high courage-of which his appearance at this
moment on the unpopular side of a most dan-
gerously exciting question, might in itself be taken
as proof. He entered at once upon the details of
the question. They knew, he said, how from
13,000 men, who at first had been received in the
national ateliers, the number had swelled to
120,000, which had been reduced to 105,000 or
107,000 by the late recensement: but what they
did not know was, that there were from 50,000
to 60,000 persons at that moment demanding ad-
mission. Misery had, in fact, invaded all classes,
and if they did not take care, all Paris would be
sunk in it, and the provinces would soon follow.
The case at that moment was, that one half of
society was living on the other. He had made
inquiries, and found that the national ateliers
could not provide work for more than 10,000
persons. It was therefore an illusion to talk of
assistance given in the shape of labour; it was
charity under another name. He would prefer,
therefore, while they were waiting more radical
remedies, that they should give what they did
give as charity, instead of under the form of pre-
tended labour.
FAUCHER'S SPEECH.
Having adverted to certain measures contem-
plated by Government, such as the resumption
of railways by the State (to which we shall make
275
FAUCHER'S SPEECH.
separate reference to his treating of that subject,)
M. Faucher proceeded to say, that upon taking
a census of the national ateliers, he found that
there were in them from 40,000 to 50,000 persons
connected with the different branches of building,
and he argued, that the only way to give these
men adequate employment would be to revive the
business of building, which was then dead. The
question, then, resolved itself into a revival of credit
and confidence, and in order to do that, they should
begin by erasing from their laws and decrees,
all the bad principles that had been introduced into
them-those attacks on property which had thrown
the country into trouble and affright. So long as
the State would not pay its debts and establish
its own credit, so long would private credit be
rendered impossible, and without credit there could
be no work.
The state of the ateliers nationaux, the state of
trade and commerce, and indeed the whole state
of society were so succinctly put forward in this
speech of M. Faucher, that it is unnecessary to
pursue the subject further. What is most im-
portant for our present purpose to observe is, that
it became evident to the workmen in the ateliers
themselves, and to the Government, that the system
would no longer be tolerated. The Assembly
granted the demand, but added an article to the
276
bill, that for the future no larger sum than one
million of francs could be asked for at one and the
same time. It became then incumbent on the Minister
of Public Works to find some means of thinning
those establishments; nor was he taken unawares,
for he had already made arrangements for sending
several bodies of men to the provinces, to work
at the canalisation of the Marne, and the Upper
Seine, as well as on roads and buildings.
As the sitting of Wednesday, the 21st of June,
was devoted to miscellaneous subjects, we may
pause here for the purpose of following out the
consequences of this discussion and vote affecting
the national ateliers and the Clubs.
AGITATION OF
It was not within-doors to-day, but without
that the interest really lay. Great agitation was
remarked in the Faubourgs, as well as in the
national ateliers. An immense mob collected
before the Hôtel-de-Ville, and the police were
beaten and ill used. Active agents from the Club
of the Droits de l'Homme, the organisers of the
coming struggle for the République Démocratique
et Sociale, and some of the recognized chiefs of
the movement passed the day in negociation back
and forward between the national ateliers and the
faubourgs. All means were put in force to stop
the departure of the brigades or companies of men
destined for the works of the Marne, the Upper
277
Seine, and other places. They were told that the
country people were ill using those who had already
departed.
THE OUVRIERS.
A company of these men who had gone as far as
Fontainebleau, where they were to have been met by
agents from the Government, with the necessary in-
structions and advances of money, either from having
been made to wait too long, or acting on previous
instructions, grew, or pretended to grow indignant,
returned to Paris, and helped to swell the excite-
ment and agitation. A meeting had been fixed for
the following evening at the Place du Panthéon,
for the actual purpose of settling the question of
insurrection, which indeed under any circumstances
was only one of time. By an artful move, to take
place previously, it was so combined that the
resolution to appeal to the god of the barricades
should be made to seem to depend on acts of the
Government-for the worst party pays unconscious
homage to the spirit of peace and humanity by
desiring to appear to be provoked. The combatant
ever seeks to have the sun at his back!
A large body of workmen went to the Luxem-
bourg, the seat of the Executive Commission of
Government, and close, as our readers know, to the
Place du Panthéon, and demanded an interview
with M. Marie, who as Minister of Public Works
278
in the Provisional Government, had organized the
national ateliers. M. Marie, as was probably fore-
seen, refused to receive such a host, but allowed a
deputation to be admitted. A few forming the
deputation had an interview with this member of
the Executive Commission, in which they con-
ducted themselves with premeditated insolence.
One member of the deputation interfered so grossly
while M. Marie was remonstrating, that the latter
exclaimed: "Surely you do not allow yourselves to
be the slaves of this man?" The compromising
expression that was wanted, was now found; the
deputation returned, and falsely proclaimed amongst
their companions, that the Minister had called
them a set of slaves. Orders were immediately
issued to have about sixty persons arrested, which
orders were not executed, for in point of fact, the
police agents were generally disaffected. The mob
outside continuing to menace under the very nose
of the Government, was dispersed by the military,
only to scatter over the faubourgs, and through
the national ateliers, the perverted word of M.
Marie, slaves," which was to serve as the tocsin
of insurrection, and the insurrection was resolved
upon.
..
THE IMPENDING STRUGGLE.
This, then, was the situation of things. The
Revolution of February, effected by a surprize, had
*
THE IMPENDING STRUGGLE.
279
to be bolstered up by a series of expedients and
delusions, which led, as a matter of necessity, to a
struggle, either that society might be replaced on
its old footing, or carried further into fresh adven-
tures. This supposes that there were two parties,
neither of whom viewed with favour what had been
established: the one wishing a return to, if not to
a past order of things, at least to a past order of
ideas; the other desiring to launch into the un-
known. If the latter party did not exist, the
Republic would probably have fallen before the
regularly organized determination of the former.
The fear of losing all Government, and of seeing
society thrown into a state of chaos, kept the friends
of order to the side of the Republic, but with a
dearth of zeal, which gave great advantage to the
insurrection.
It was only, when it was seen that society was
menaced with barbarism-that the two hours' pil-
lage, threatened in the Assembly, on the day of the
invasion of the 15th of May, was literally to be
accomplished-that the rich quarters of Paris,
comprising the 1st and 2nd arrondissements, at
one side of the water, and the 10th, or aristocratic
Faubourg St. Germain at the other, were doomed
to fire, blood, and rapine-that the National Guards.
rose against the barricades, which their apathy
allowed to be erected.
f
280
FRENCH CENTRALIZATION.
The National Guards cared little for the Govern-
ment, but they did care for society. We are now
to seek the causes of this apathy of the middle
classes, in the very debate, that by a singular coin-
cidence, opened on the evening of Thursday, the
evening preceding the insurrection, although the
subject, in its simple prosaic designation, will
hardly strike the reader as having the magnitude
that really did belong to it: the debate was on a
project of law, introduced by the Government for
the resumption of railways by the State.
The principle of forming companies for the carry-
ing on of public works, was but little understood
in France only a few years ago. So little, indeed,
had the French advanced in commercial enter-
prize, that England, Germany, and even Belgium,
hardly divided by a perceptible boundary from
France, were covered with railways, before this
great country, pretending to take the lead in civi-
lization, could exhibit more than a few leagues of
rail connecting Versailles and St. Germain, with
the capital. The cause lay chiefly in the habits,
that the system of centralization had rooted in the
people, of an entire dependence on the Government
for the execution of public works. The Govern-
ment of which Marshal Soult was the head, and
Messrs. Guizot and Duchâtel the animating and
virtual chiefs, determined to introduce the English
kos
281
principle of association, as it is now called, for the
carrying on of great enterprizes, and to begin their
experiments with railways. The principle had, like
most new principles, to be connected with the old.
The Government struck out the whole scheme of
railways, executed, through the instrumentality of
its own admirably organized corps of engineers of
the ponts et chaussées, the preliminary surveying;
undertook to execute all scientific works, such as
tunnelling and carth-works, and masonry; and then
invited the formation of public companies, for
taking by public biddings, the several lines, on
condition of laying down rails, building carriages,
and station houses, and working the traffic for a
given series of years.
The idea was good; for if the principle once took,
there could be no doubt of its extension to other
undertakings, and France would find herself even-
tually launched into those grand commercial enter-
prizes, which employ the activity that used to be
wasted in military contests. The French owing to
the great subdivision of property, and their little
acquaintance with the new principle, were rather
indifferent at first, and it so happened, that their
more enterprizing and richer, and in this respect at
all events, better informed neighbours, the English,
became the shareholders and proprietors of some of
the first lines that were made. The advantages
ENGLISH ASSOCIATION.
282
RAILWAY MANIA.
became so apparent, that the apathy manifested at
first, turned into a fury of speculation. The
Bourse became so crowded that an early attendance
was requested for those who wished to secure a corner
in this handsome temple of Mammon. The days of
Law and of Mississippi fury were revived, and the
summer of 1846, when England was bitten with the
railway mania, saw France running wild in the same
career of grasping delusion.
It must be confessed, that in the vast market
of railway share buying and selling, the greater
number were actuated by a mere love of gambling,
and the corruption of which the public press was
so vehemently complaining, received so great a
stimulus from this new method of gratification, that
it served to excite a prejudice against the system, and
to attach a large party the more strongly to the
old plan of centralization. The readiness of the
French to take to gambling was not evidenced by
the sole historical example of what took place under
the Regency of the Duc d'Orléans; a similar fury
prevailed at the time of the great Revolution, and
was exercised even under the Terror, with desperate
effrontery in the matter of flour and bread, the exces-
sive scarcity of which, made them regarded as
most precious in the sense of gambling materials.
It is probably in consequence of the manifestation
of this disposition, that the Puritans of the Repub-
Jad
HOSTILE PRINCIPLES.
283
lican party have ever discouraged the introduction
of speculation, which they think diverts the people
from the exercise of their warlike instincts, on
which they fancy that the influence of France and
her greatness depends.
The duel between Girardin and Carrel, had its
rise in the severity with which the latter dealt with
the former, because he treated newspapers on com-
mercial principles, to the degradation of the press.
The successors of Carrel in the National, proved
determined enemies to the introduction of the prin-
ciple of association, and contended that the State
ought to make the railways, and apply the profits
to the benefit of the State. Such doctrine was but
little attended to. The principle of association pre-
vailed, and when the Revolution of February broke
out, the savings of the trading classes were found
to be extensively invested in railway undertakings.
When the Republicans in power manifested a dispo-
sition to take the railways into their hands, it may
be said, that they were acting consistently on their
own doctrines; but it may be with force advanced
on the other hand, that there is a wide difference
in the situation which presents itself before and
after the fait accompli. Property had run into that
channel, and had settled in it, and could not be
diverted without inconvenience and loss. A great
portion of the property belonged to Englishmen,
284 INSURANCE COMPANIES THREATENED.
and was secured by public faith, and there had
grown up ties between the English and French
commercial classes of so beneficial a character, that
it would be unwise to tear them asunder. Such a
disturbance of affairs could not take place without
causing deep dissatisfaction to all whose interests
were either mediately or immediately involved.
But it so happened, that the previous financial acts
of the Republican Government were such as took
out of view and destroyed the benefit of principle,
on which they might otherwise have claimed to
have acted, and placed this measure in the light of
one more desperate expedient, added to the long
series of make-shifts by which they were trying to
keep society from falling asunder. A remedy, in
fact, of that sort which only becomes another form
of disease.
It was not the railway question alone that was
before the public. A few days previously the
Finance Minister gave notice of an intention on the
part of the Government, to take up Insurance
Companies, and become themselves the life-insurers
and insurers against accidents by fire, for all
France. This measure was more startling than
even that connected with railways. Taken by itself,
the railway resumption plan might have been
defended on special grounds, but this measure
affecting Insurance Companies, carried with it a
STATE COMMUNISM.
285
principle, which would have justified the State in
abolishing all public companies of every nature and
kind, or rather of seizing upon and appropriating
their carefully elaborated machinery, for the sake
of turning private profits into State revenue, with
an augmentation beyond all bounds of State
patronage. The question how far corruption, keep-
ing pace with augmented means of patronage,
would not be worse than any prejudice derivable
from private speculation, may be left out of view,
for sake of the alarming Communist principle in-
volved in such schemes.
Katal
The main doctrine of the Communists and
Socialists, it needs to be borne in mind, for carry-
ing out their principles, consists in throwing the
whole direction of the community upon the Govern-
ment. There is this much simplicity in Commu-
nism, that it accepts fully and without reserve or
qualification all the consequences of its principles.
Society had never to deal with a foe of more
straightforward audacity. If all men are to have
an equal share of all property, there must exist
somewhere a superintending power, charged with
the surveillance of this distribution. It is from this
power, be it called State or Government, that pro-
perty must be derived, and in whose hands pro-
perty must settle.
w
286
STATE COMMUNISM.
In a Communist State, which is democracy car-
ried to its extreme consequences, the Government
would be the managers of the firm, a chosen Com-
mittee or Board of Directors, and as such should be
the chiefs of all enterprises, the receivers of all
profits, and the declarers of the shares to each and
all alike. There is this advantage in dealing with
Communism, that no time need be frittered away
in preliminary explanations. We know what we
have to deal with. The arguments turn upon con-
sequences and results, for there is no difficulty in
the statement of premises. Now as this Com-
munism hovered over the Republic-as it was its
danger, as well as the danger of Society-any step
made in advance towards it by the Republican
Government, gave evidence of fear, or compromise,
or treacherous intent, and filled society with trebly
increased alarm.
K
K
The railway resumption plan taken in connexion
with the Insurance Company seizure plan, and
read by the light which the latter threw upon it,
took a moral magnitude, of the most fearful pro-
portions. These two measures were the application,
so far as they went, of the means indicated by the
Communists, for the political carrying out of their
plans with regard to society. The Government
would have shrunk perhaps from the admission
287
that any such principle had entered its head. But
it is no comfort to society to be told that Govern-
ment is blind to the extent to which a false prin-
ciple, no matter how unconsciously adopted, may
lead it. No one would have believed that having
seized upon one public company for sake of its
profits, it would not seize upon another and another;
and this effect would at least have followed, that
having, by the resumption of railways, destroyed
the spirit of association, as borrowed from England
and applied by the Monarchy, and having banished
foreign capital, the Government would also have de-
stroyed private companies or firms for commercial
purposes, and reduced commerce to mere huxtering.
The Government had, on sundry occasions, marked
its hostility to what it was pleased to denominate
the aristocracy of finance. It had declared, that it
had no bowels of compassion for capitalists. The
Finance Minister drew a line of distinction between
the claims of the depositors of money in Savings'
Banks, and those who had discounted the Treasury
bills.
STATE COMMUNISM.
The former were treated with more consideration
than the latter, because it was presumed that the
holders of Treasury bills could not be poor. Be
the fact true or false, it mattered not, a principle
was let loose, and in language and tone, that
288
PARIS BEFORE THE INSURRECTION.
showed hostility to capitalists. And whatever feel-
ing of justice or humanity might have lain in the
distinction between the two classes of plundered
Savings' Bank depositors, and plundered and withall
insulted Treasury bond-holders, this feeling was
neutralized by the concession that it implied to
Communists, Socialists, and Red Republicans, all
of whom, however differing on other points, were
agreed in their war against capital.
The discouragement under which the middle
classes were labouring, at the moment when the
insurrection broke out, may account for the apathy
manifested by the National Guards in the first
instance, and for the ease with which the insur-
gents were allowed to make barricades. The ques-
tion was as we have before indicated, introduced on
Thursday, the 22nd of June, and after an elaborate
debate, adjourned to the following day. Thus,
while the insurgents were preparing for their battle,
the state of parties in Paris was such, as to
authorize their encouraging the wildest hopes.
All who could leave Paris had gone. All wealthy
strangers had quitted in fear and disgust. All
wealthy natives, had with few exceptions, retired to
their chateaux. Commerce was dead; the middle
classes profoundly discouraged, and estranged from
the Government; the police filled with the disaf-
THE APPROACHING CRISIS.
289
fected myrmidons of Caussidière; the feelings of
the National Garde Mobile, formed of the enfants
de Paris, and turned into a civic form to take them
out of harm's way, suspected. The Government
itself without moral force, tampering with the
enemies of society on the one hand, and showing
hostility to the bourgeoisie on the other; the work-
men without employ; the idle, the disaffected, the
licentious, the hardened convict, all swept and
gathered into licensed gangs, armed and practised
in the use of arms; moved by the mysterious orders
of Clubs, with the traditional revolutionary pres-
tige that hung over the names of Jacobins, and
Rights of Man; officered by the officers of the
national ateliers, whom they were accustomed to
obey, and commanded by well-skilled leaders. For
the fanatical, there was the kindling abstraction of
Communism; for the licentious, the wealthy or
reputed wealthy quarters of the city for plunder,
and the freest reading of the rights of the assailants
of a sacked city.
The greatest crisis in the history of modern civi-
lization had come; and if we might be allowed to
put into abstract forms, and as it were, spiritual
incarnation, those great communities whose inte-
rests were involved in the battle of June, we might
imagine the genius of Berlin, and of Frankfort,
and of Vienna, and of all those historical cities of
VOL. I.
O
290
Italy, so full of accumulated treasures, the bequests
of ages, watching and waiting the result of a
struggle, on which depended the widest spread
desolation and mourning, and whose sole chance of
cure, would rest in another irruption of northern
barbarism-the spear of the Cossack to cut the
proud flesh of degraded minds and morals.
THE APPROACHING CRISIS.
THE INSURRECTION OF JUNE.
CHAPTER XXII.
291
INSURRECTION OF JUNE-FIRST DAY, THE 23rd-THE
ASSEMBLY.
WHEN the Assembly met on Friday, the 23rd of
June, at one o'clock, the barricades had already been
raised, and blood had flowed. The insurrection had
begun. Its extent was not, however, known, and its
real nature but imperfectly understood. Business
was proceeded with as if nothing was occurring out
of doors of more importance than a vain disturbance,
which would be easily suppressed. It was not until
General Lebreton, who, having disposed of a ques-
tion relating to pensions, made a proposition that a
deputation should go amongst the troops, that a
hint of the real state of things was dropped. The
proposition was received with marks of impatience,
especially from the ultra-democratic benches, and
a series of notices of laws, and drafts of decrees,
.
0 2
292 THE INSURRECTION-THE ASSEMBLY.
were read, of the coldest and most unexciting
description. In the midst of an uninteresting
conversation, the President begged to interrupt pro-
ceedings to make a communication, which was, that
news of a most unsatisfactory kind had reached him
from all parts of Paris. Two barricades, that had
been raised in the Rue Planche-Mibray, a street
near the Hôtel-de-Ville, had been taken by the
Republican and National Guards, marching together,
and the barricades raised on the boulevards and
quays had been demolished without much trouble.
There had been some firing at the Porte St. Denis.
The Garde Mobile at the post Bonne Nouvelle had
spontaneously fired on the insurgents. It was said
that some shots had been fired from windows in the
Rue de la Hachette. The Hôtel-de-Ville was sur-
rounded by an imposing force, and, in general, the
émeute had met but little sympathy from the popu-
lation.
G
Having made this satisfactory communication, the
President of the Assembly withdrew, in order to
return, as he said, to his post; and the Assembly,
with well-assumed sang froid, resumed the debate
on the railways resumption, which the bourgeoisie
called, in their hearts, the Railway Robbery Bill.
The discussion had made some progress, when it
was interrupted by the appearance of M. Flocon,
Minister of Commerce, who wished to inform the
THE INSURRECTION-THE ASSEMBLY.
293
Assembly, in order to satisfy some questions he
had heard raised, that the members of the Execu-
tive Commission were at that moment seated in
council within the precincts of the Assembly, natu-
rally become the centre of action, in order to watch
the course of events outside. The Minister pro-
ceeded to say, that the insurgents were composed of
all the enemies of the Republic, pushed on by the
hands of the foreigner, and sustained by foreign
gold. For this audacious assertion, by the way, the
British Ambassador demanded and obtained an apo-
logetic explanation from the Minister of Foreign
Affairs, who in a letter, handsomely acknowledging
the good faith of the English in all late occurrences,
threw his colleague unceremoniously overboard.
M. de Falloux next rose to present a decree for
the dissolution of the national ateliers. It is a
curious coincidence, that the Assembly should be
engaged in two measures, the one so hateful to the
bourgeoisie, the other giving the last blow to the
illusions of the working people, on the very day
that both classes were in arms against each other.
M. Corbon presented a decree that he deemed calcu-
lated to take the sting out of that proposed by M. de
Falloux, and which went to authorize associations
by workmen, for the sake of carrying on enterprizes
on their own account-the State making advances
of money in the first instance, in order to encourage
294 THE INSURRECTION-THE ASSEMBLY.
such attempts. This led to a confused and angry
discussion, showing how little the proposition was
generally relished, and it ended in an under-
standing that a day would be fixed for debating the
matter. This incident being over, the President
announced that he had received several letters from
the Prefect of Police. They were to the same effect
as that which had been made previously, and pointed
to a prompt suppression of the émeute. M. Creton
then presented himself with a project of law, the
object of which was to call on the ex-Provisional
Government for an account of expenses-a sore and
irritating point-which threw the friends of Ledru-
Rollin into a passion. This matter was disposed of
by reference to the Financial Committee, and the
debate on the Railways Resumption Bill was regu-
larly resumed.
Three long speeches, stuffed with
figures and calculations, had actually been made in the
coolest possible fashion. A worthy citizen reprc-
sentative was at length interrupted by the entry
of the Executive Commission of Government, with
General Cavaignac. It might then have been about
four o'clock; and, as if to inspire the Assembly
with feelings of seriousness about interests more
valuable than even railway property, a tremendous
thunder-storm began. At first the thunder-claps
were for a moment taken for discharges of artillery,
and a panic seized all hearts. General Cavaignac
Jand
-
THE INSURRECTION-THE ASSEMBLY. 295
asked leave to speak, and the tribune was vacated
by the railway orator, not to be resumed again.
The General, in a low, mild voice, which is now
remembered as remarkable by those who were pre-
sent, mentioned that the insurrection had begun in
the faubourgs St. Denis and St. Martin; that troop
had been sent there sufficient to maintain order;
and that there was nothing of any consequence to
be apprehended for the moment in that quarter.
There was still insurrection and strife in the Rue
St. Antoine, and part of the Rue St. Jacques; but
measures had been taken to conquer resistance, and
he hoped soon to have satisfactory news to comniu-
nicate. The disposition manifested by the troops,
National Guards, and Garde Mobile, was excellent.
As soon as this tranquillizing communication had
been made, Garnier Pagès ascended the tribune.
At this moment the rain fell in torrents, and beating
on the slight roof of the temporary wooden building,
in which the Assembly was seated, rendered it neces-
sary for this gentleman to pitch his weak, shrill voice
to its utmost stretch. His manner betrayed that
there was something more serious and dangerous
at work than had been indicated by the gentle
demeanour of the man of war. He said that the
time was come for acting, not speaking; that they
should act with force and energy. Vigorous mea-
Kadan
296
sures had been taken, and measures more vigorous
still were in contemplation.
It was generally expected that a speech so vehe-
mently delivered, and so charged with promises of
vigour, and menaces of punishment, would have
terminated by the announcement that Paris was
declared in a state of siege. But, no !—there were
words, and nothing but words; gesticulation, and
nothing but gesticulation. Action!-the action of
mountebankism; and the Government sank in esti-
THE INSURRECTION-THE ASSEMBLY.
mation.
M. de Lamartine made a short speech, which
sounded like a call for confidence in the Govern-
ment. The President of the Assembly proposed
that they should sit en permanence; and as this
was so far a practised resolution, it tended to settle
the wildness and uncertainty with which the As-
sembly was filling. M. Bonjean urged that the
representatives should go amongst the troops, and
his persistance caused a tumult, which was put an
end to by a suspension of the sitting till eight
o'clock.
In order to understand what had been passing,
and that we may be able to pursue the proceedings of
the Assembly, with which we have chiefly to do,
we will proceed to take a view of the insurrection.
Any one who has viewed Paris from an elevated
THE INSURGENTS' POSITION.
297
point will recollect, that the banks of the Seine, on
which the city is built, rise to a considerable height
on each side of the river. The insurgents took up
a position which extended from the Barrières Roche-
chouart and Poissonnière, lying close to each other,
on a very high point of the right bank, to the Pan-
théon, situated on the highest elevation of the left
bank. The barrières on the right bank, and the
Panthéon on the left, formed the fortified wings of
the insurgent ariny. The main body lay in the
Faubourg St. Antoine, which was the citadel of the
insurrection. The principal object of the insurgents
was to gain the Hôtel-de-Ville; above which their
main line, cutting the city in almost two equal parts,
would have run.
If we suppose the insurgents to descend the right
bank, by the Rue Faubourg St. Martin and Rue
St. Martin on the right, they would pass through
the Rue Planche Mibray a little in advance of the
Hôtel-de-Ville; and if we suppose the insurgents
to descend from the Panthéon by the Faubourg
St. Jacques and the Rue de la Cité, and crossing
the bridge, they would meet exactly face to face,
and give each other the hand. An insurgent body,
descending at the same time by the Rue St. Antoine,
would take the Hôtel-de-Ville in the rear; and that
building, regarded as the head-quarters of all revo-
03
CAVAIGNAC'S PLANS.
lutionary government, would be enveloped, and the
victory won.
298
General Cavaignac knew beforehand the nature of
the battle he would have to fight. He was aware
that the Club leaders openly boasted of having an
army of 100,000 men, composed chiefly of the
national ateliers, and that a struggle had been
resolved upon.
He had determined in his own
mind not to pursue the errors that had been com-
mitted by the Generals of Charles X. and Louis-
Philippe; and he substituted a plan of concentration
of troops for one of dissemination. This plan he
submitted to his friends, General Bedeau and General
de Lamoricière, and it received their approbation.
Taking his measures accordingly, orders were issued.
to the troops stationed in the different barracks in
the immediate neighbourhood of the city, that they
should, as soon as they received intimation respec-
tively of the émeute having broken out, march
directly to the positions specifically understood, and
which were the Hôtel-de-Ville and the National As-
sembly. These orders were obeyed with such preci-
sion, that the soldiers passed through the barricades.
which they found erected in their way, without
stopping to throw them down; so that at an carly
hour of the day the General had his troops under
his hand, while orders were transmitting by the
CAVAIGNAC'S PLANS.
299
telegraph for reinforcements of soldiers and Na-
tional Guards; so that, should it have so happened
that he could not hold the city, he would have
retired outside, and awaited the arrival of those suc-
cours that he knew to be on their way. The sol-
diers were provided with provisions for some days,
and the cavalry had ample provender for their horses.
We saw the General at the Assembly at four o'clock,
which he immediately left to commence active opera-
tions, by marching at the head of seven battalions,
taken from the forces concentrated at the National
Assembly, to the relief of General de Lamoricière, who
was engaged in the Faubourg St. Martin. Why he
took that direction is plain. The Hôtel-de-Ville
was protected, because it was one of the points of
concentration ; there were considerable forces ou
the left bank, because the Luxembourg, which was
the seat of Government, lay close to the Panthéon,
and could not on any account be allowed to fall into
the hands of the insurgents. His first concern would
then be for General de Lamoricière, who was engaged
in the faubourgs of the right bank, into which he had
marched in the morning, at the head of a small force
of a couple of thousand men. His intention was to
leave some of those troops with Lamoricière, and
then proceed to other points. He found, however,
that whilst the latter was contending with the insur-
gents in the Faubourg St. Martin, the Faubourg de
300
MILITARY OPERATIONS.
Temple had risen on his right, and it became neces-
sary for General Cavaignac to cover that General's
menaced flank.
A canal runs across the Faubourg du Temple,
over which there is a bridge for carriages; and,
raised to a considerable elevation, there is another
bridge for pedestrians, in order that they should not
have to wait while the lower bridge would be opened
to allow boats to pass. At this place the houses
form a semi-circle at each side, from which streets
radiate, and these streets were barricaded, and some
of the houses held by the insurgents. General Ca-
vaignac mounted this high bridge, and for several
minutes was the mark for showers of bullets, while
he coolly took observations. He descended unhurt.
On ascending the Faubourg du Temple, you come
to the Rue St. Maur, on the right; and as the street
runs directly into the Faubourg St. Antoine, the
citadel of the insurrection, it became of the utmost
importance to the insurgents to bar the passage,
and they did so with an almost impregnable bar-
ricade. It resisted a cannonade of several hours,
during which nearly all the men at the guns were
killed, as well as the horses. The first gun was for
a moment abandoned, and then a second gun was
brought up. So obstinate was the resistance, that
General Cavaignac had to send for reinforcements
to General Lamoricière; and it required a move-
MILITARY OPERATIONS.
301
ment, by which the barricade was turned, before it
fell into the hands of the troops.
Not far from this street, General Foucher, attack-
ing barricades near the Barrière de Belleville, was
wounded, and General François received his death.
A horse was shot under Pierre Bonaparte. Four
superior officers were wounded. At this time Ge-
neral Lamoricière had conquered, apparently, the
insurrection in the faubourgs. The first shot that
had been fired on the right bank was at the Porte
St. Denis, some time about eleven o'clock in the
morning. The barricade was taken by the National
Guards; and by the time that Lamoricière came
up, the affair was over. Having entered the fau-
bourg, which he cleared with extraordinary vigour
(for the courage of the General was most heroic
throughout) he turned to the left into the Faubourg
Poissonnière, across which an immense barricade had
been raised, from which the insurgents were beaten
into the Place Lafayette, in which is situated the
magnificent church of St. Vincent de Paul, and
near it the débarcadère of the Northern Railway.
This place forms a circle, from which streets
radiate, all of which were barricaded and defended
from the houses as well; here the battle raged
for an hour and a half, and the insurgents, beaten,
fell back on La Villette; so that, at the time General
302
THE INSURRECTION—THE ASSEMBLY.
Cavaignac had to call on Lamoricière for assistance,
the latter was in possession of the Faubourgs St.
Martin, St. Denis, and Poissonnière.
At ten o'clock at night the sitting of the
Assembly was resumed for the purpose of receiving
a report from General Cavaignac. The gallant
General, in his accustomed quaint way, stated that
he regretted that he had not complete details to
afford them. He had counted upon being able to
remain all day in the neighbourhood of the
Assembly to receive the different reports, but so
serious a resistance had broken out in the Faubourg
du Temple, that he had felt it his duty to lead
there the greater part of the forces that were
around the Assembly. He could not therefore
tell what had passed in the Rue St. Antoine, or
in the Rue St. Jacques, but he would go there
directly, and communicate his information to the
Assembly. At that moment the troops were masters
of the Boulevards to within a quarter of a league of
the Temple, without having met any serious re-
sistance. The resistance had been more serious in
the Faubourgs Poissonnière, St. Denis, St. Martin,
and especially in the Faubourg du Temple. General
Lamoricière and General Lafontaine had, with the
troops he had left them, been able to master the
three first-named faubourgs. The resistance in the
THE INSURRECTION-THE ASSEMBLY. 303
fourth, so unfortunately energetic, had been com-
pletely surmounted. The portions of the town
between the Boulevards and northern barriers were,
to his knowledge, subdued in point of fact-but
he had no doubt the insurgents would recommence
if left to themselves. Measures had however been
taken to prevent them.
.
Having made this communication, the General dis-
appeared. M. Garnier Pagès added some further in-
formation. He said that M. Arago had marched at the
head of the troops engaged in the twelfth Arrondisse-
ment (the Panthéon quarter), that he had mounted
several barricades, in order to parley with the insur-
gents; that having vainly summoned them to sur-
render, he was obliged to have recourse to cannon ;
that at that moment the insurgents had possession
only of a few points in the eleventh and twelfth
Arrondissements, and he had no doubt that General
Damesme, who commanded in that quarter, would
the next morning extinguish the insurrection on
that side. He mentioned that he had himself
been over from the first to the eighth Arrondisse-
ments inclusive, and could say that throughout
the circulation was free. M. de Lamartine had
accompanied General Cavaignac in the Faubourg
du Temple, and shared his dangers. He paid a
like compliment to General Lamoricière, and stated
mak
-
304
that he had no doubt that the only barricades on
that side, those of the Faubourg St. Antoine, would
be taken in the morning. He announced that
General Thomas, commanding the National Guards,
had been wounded. General Bedeau, commanding
at the Hôtel-de-Ville, had also been wounded.
Two members of the Assembly, M. Dornès and
M. Bixio had both been grievously wounded, (the
former mortally), and he concluded with an as-
surance of the persevering activity of the Go-
Kat
vernment.
After he had spoken, M. Degoussée demanded the
arrest of the anarchical Journalists, and some called
for the state of siege, on which M. Duclerc, the
Finance Minister, who also had been present at
the Faubourg du Temple, rose and said, that the
Government would not have recourse to a coup d'état.
It being then midnight the sitting was declared sus-
pended until eight o'clock the following morning.
When General Cavaignac left the Assembly, he
proceeded immediately to the Hôtel-de-Ville, where
he found General Bedeau, who had been wounded
at seven o'clock, and having received from him an
account of the measures that had been taken to
clear the environs of this great centre of operations,
he remitted the command to General Duvivier.
A more judicious appointment could not have been
THE INSURRECTION-THE ASSEMBLY.
305
made, for it was this officer who had organised the
Garde Mobile, which was in much force on this
point.
CAVAIGNAC AND DAMESME.
General Cavaignac next proceeded to the Sor-
bonne, the head-quarters of General Damesme, to
whom was committed the command of the left bank,
and he found this gallant officer, fated to fall the
next morning, quictly seated on a borne of the Rue
de la Harpe. The interview between these two
soldiers in that ancient narrow street, remarkable
for possessing the remains of the Roman baths of
the Emperor Julian, hallowed as the highway of
ecclesiastical and philosophical scholarship, and
now the Boulevard of more savage barbarians
than those who extinguished Roman civilization—
this interview was more interesting than that which
awaited the Minister of War on his visiting the
Presidency of the Assembly at two o'clock in the
morning.
We have already had glimpses of some members
of the Provisional Government: M. de Lamartine
braved the barricades like a soldier; M. Garnier
Pagès scampered through the streets, making
speeches to the National Guards; both one and
the other had to encounter the most chilling re-
gards and cold dissatisfaction. The sensitive poct,
it is said, would gladly have retrieved his errors
306
LEDRU-ROLLIN'S DANGER.
by a glorious death. We shall find that fine old
man, and great master of science, M. Arago, acting
with his usual energy, but for the present we must
accompany General Cavaignac. Having reached
the Presidency, and done there what was necessary,
he was about to leave for his last station, the War
Office, his official residence, but his departure was
opposed by M. Ledru-Rollin. That gentleman's his-
tory for some hours previous, presents a curious
picture of earthly purgatorial misery.
As it was necessary for some member of the
Executive Commission to remain at his post,
M. Ledru-Rollin did not quit the Presidency, nor
did M. Marie; but unfortunately for the former,
the National Guards conceived the suspicion that
he was deep in the conspiracy, and instead of being
treated as a governor, he was regarded rather as a
prisoner, desirous of making his escape.
He was
harassed with questions, to which he could give no
answer in absence of the War Minister, and his
ignorance was treated as hypocrisy. It was well
that he escaped safe and sound, for a member of
the Assembly, M. de Maleville, nearly fell a victim
to an unfortunate resemblance which he bore to the
unpopular Executive Commissioner. The cool
General Cavaignac did not afford the victim-
relieved by his presence-the satisfaction of a
307
sympathising state of excitement; he answered
briefly and with propriety, according to his con-
ception of duty under such grave circumstances,
and when Ledru-Rollin protested against his going
away, and leaving him exposed to a renewal of
danger, he threw himself on a sofa, and sought for
a revival of energy in a short sleep.
Having followed the operations on the right
bank, and kept in view the imposing figure of
Cavaignac-the man destined to save French society
in its greatest hour of peril, we now propose to
notice the corresponding movements of the insur-
gents on the left bank. We have already men-
tioned, that supposing the insurgents of the right
bank to descend the Rue St. Denis, and the insur-
gents of the left to descend the Rue St. Jacques,
they would both meet immediately above the Hôtel-
de-Ville, at the Pont Notre-Dame; but to reach
this bridge, there is another bridge to be crossed,
leading still in pretty nearly a right line from the
Faubourg St. Jacques to the Rue de la Cité, this
intermediate street being on an island. It became
important to defend this bridge, called St. Michel,
and here, consequently, one of the severest engage-
ments of the first day was fought. At an early
hour of the morning, the 11th Legion of National
Guards assembled before the Luxembourg, where
INSURGENT OPERATIONS.
M
308
they remained several hours in a state of inaction,
during which such excited controversies prevailed
amongst them, that a collision was apprehended.
To put an end to such a state of anarchy in a legion
of that force to which the defence of society was
entrusted, a Captain of the 3rd Company marched
to the scene of action, followed by the 4th Company,
the officers of the latter being many of them Red
Republicans. They marched to the Pont St. Michel,
on which they took up their station, close to that
gloomy receptacle in which are exposed bodies
found murdered, called the Morgue. From this
they could perceive that on another bridge, a little
lower down, called from its small size the Petit
Pont, which connects the quay with the Hôtel-
Dieu, and Notre-Damc, an enormous barricade had
been raised, upwards of eight feet in height, and so
strongly built that it could only be destroyed by
cannon.
At this time a company of soldiers appeared, and
while the officers were deliberating firing was heard.
A detachment of the Garde Républicaine had
attacked the barrier from the side of the hospital.
Instead of proceeding to make a diversion, the
officers of the National Guards began to dispute,
some shewing that their sympathies were with the
insurgents, and the opportunity was lost, for after a
THE NATIONAL GUARDS.
Sand
SEVERAL BARRICADES TAKEN.
309
fight of about twenty minutes the Garde Républi-
caine withdrew. The Captain of the soldiery called
on such of the National Guards as were well-dis-
posed to join him, to advance against the barricades
which protected that end of the Faubourg St. Jac-
ques. The attack was made, and the barricade
was found to be impregnable, except to cannon.
All this time, General Bedeau was attacking the
barricades around the Hôtel-de-Ville, while General
Damesme was clearing the neighbourhood of the
Sorbonne, and the approaches to the Panthéon-
which was destined subsequently to be attacked—
with the intention then of uniting their forces
eventually, for a move on the Faubourg St. An-
toine on the one side, while General Lamoricière
came down from the other.
It was to General Damesme that M. Arago joined
himself, and acted in the way described in the com-
munication made to the Assembly by M. Garnier
Pagès. It was in the Rue des Mathurins that
M. Arago mounted a barricade, and summoned the
insurgents to surrender; but having failed to pro-
duce effect, a piece of cannon was brought up, and
the barricade was taken. At nightfall, the barri-
cade of the Petit Pont, already described, was taken
with cannon, and the bridge and quay of Saint
Michel occupied by the troops of General Bedeau.
A
310
THE INSURRECTION-CLOSE OF
There had been killed in the course of this day,
on the side of the Government thirty-five, and one
hundred and sixty wounded, although the fighting
had not commenced before twelve o'clock, and was
over for the day at eight o'clock. It was evident
that the fighting would be renewed next day, and
that cannon would have to play a conspicuous part
in the battle. Orders were accordingly issued by
General Cavaignac to have cannon and ammunition
brought in from the great arsenal of Vincennes,
but it was no easy matter to accomplish such a
task. The expeditionary party were obliged, for
the purpose of diverting suspicion, and of not losing
time by attacking barricades, to make a journey of
four leagues and a half on going, and nearly five
returning, being about three times the ordinary
distance. Such then was the state of Paris on the
nights of the 23rd-24th of June.
On one side of the Seine, the insurgents pre-
paring to regain the advantages they had lost;
on the other, the General ready to open the morn-
ing with the siege of the Panthéon. The inhabi-
tants of one half of the city, ignorant of the formi-
dable forces in the hands of the other half, who would,
if victorious, exercise their power with the merciless
brutality of the conquerors of a sacked city. The
members of the National Assembly, preparing in
S
THE FIRST DAY.
their agitated beds, to give the last blow to a dis-
credited Government. General Cavaignac calmly
awaiting the progress of measures, the effect of
which he had calculated with the science of genius.
And in the dawn of the summer morning, a watch-
ful expeditionary party moving on Paris, with artil-
lery charged with the merciless thunderbolts of
man.
END OF VOL. I.
311
LONDON
Printed by Schulze and Co., 13, Poland Street.
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Miss Costello's Pilgrimage to Auvergue.
Miss Costello's Bearn and the Pyrenees
Mrs. West's Summer in Ireland
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Facts and Figures from Italy
Cozens's Adventures of a Guardsman..
Madagascar, Past and Present
Forbes's Eleven Years in Ceylon
Craven's Excursions in Abruzzi
Paddiana, or Sketches of Iri
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