AN ENGLISHMAN 
 IN PARIS 
 
 (NOTES AND RECOLLECTIONS} 
 
 TWO VOLUMES IN ONE 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 1892
 
 Authorized Edition.
 
 DUKW 
 
 Annex 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Quartier-Latin in the late thirties The difference between then and 
 now A caricature on the walls of Paris I am anxious to be intro- 
 duced to the quarter whence it emanated I am taken to " La Childe- 
 bert," and make the acquaintance of the original of the caricature 
 The story of Bouginier and his nose Dantan as a caricaturist He 
 abandons that branch of art after he has made Madame Malibran burst 
 into tears at the sight of her statuette How Bouginier came to be im- 
 mortalized on the fa9ade of the Passage du Caire One of the first co- 
 operative societies in France An artists' hive The origin of " La 
 Childebert" Its tenants in my time The proprietress Madame 
 Chanfort, the providence of poor painters Her portraits sold after her 
 death High jinks at " La Childebert" The Childebertians and their 
 peacefully inclined neighbours Gratuitous baths and compulsory 
 douches at "La Childebert" The proprietress is called upon to re- 
 pair the roof The Childebertians bivouac on the Place St. Germain- 
 ues-Pres They start a " Society for the Conversion of the Mahomet- 
 ans" The public subscribe liberally What becomes of the subscrip- 
 tions? My visits to "La Childebert" breed a taste for the other 
 amusements of the Quartier-Latin Bobino and its entertainments 
 The audience The manager His stereotyped speech The reply in 
 chorus Woe to the bourgeois-intruder Stove-pipe hats a rarity in 
 the Quartier-Latin The dress of the collegians Their mode of living 
 Suppers -when money was flush, rolls and milk when it was not 
 A fortune-teller in the Eue de Tournon Her prediction as to the 
 future of Josephine de Beauharnais The allowance to students in 
 those days The Odeon deserted Students' habits The Chaumiere 
 Rural excursions Pere Bonvin's 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 My introduction to the celebrities of the day The Cafe de Paris The old 
 Prince Demidoff The old man's mania His sons The furniture and 
 attendance at the Cafe de Paris Its high prices A mot of Alfred de 
 Musset The cuisine A rebuke of the proprietor to Balzac A ver- 
 sion by one of his predecessors of the cause of Vatel's suicide Some 
 of the habitues Tneir intercourse with the attendants Their cour- 
 teous behaviour towards one another Le veau a la casserole What 
 Alfred de Musset, Balzac, and Alexandre Dumas thought of it A 
 silhouette of Alfred de Mussetr His brother Paul on his election as a 
 member of the Academic A silhouette of Balzac, between sunset and 
 sunrise A curious action against the publishers of an almanack A 
 
 (iii)
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 full-length portrait of Balzac His pecuniary embarrassments His 
 visions of wealth and speculations Ins constant neglect of hit* duties 
 as a National Guard His troubles in consequence thereof L'Hotel 
 des Haricots Some of his fellow-prisoners Adam, the composer of 
 " Le Postilion de Lonjumeau " Eugene Sue ; his portrait His dandy- 
 ism The origin of the Paris Jockey Club Eugene Sue becomes a 
 member The success of " Les Mysteres de Paris " The origin of " Le 
 Juif-Errant" Sue makes himself objectionable to the members of the 
 Jockey Club His name struck oil' the list His decline and disap- 
 pearance 24 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Alexandre Dumas pere Why he made himself particularly agreeable to 
 Englishmen His way of silencing people The pursuit he loved best 
 next to literature He has the privilege of going down to the kitchens 
 of the Cafe de Paris No one questions his literary genius, some ques- 
 tion his culinary capacities o)r. Veron and his cordon-bleu Dr. 
 Ve'ron's reasons for dining out instead of at home Dr. Veron's friend, 
 the philanthropist, who does not go to the theatre because he objects 
 to be hurried with his emotions Dr. Veron, instigated by his cook, 
 accuses Dumas of having collaborateurs in preparing his dishes as he 
 was known to have collaborateurs in his literary work Dumas' wrath 
 He invites us to a dinner which shall be wholly cooked by him in 
 the presence of a delegate to be chosen by the guests The lot falls 
 upon me Dr. Veron and Sophie make the amende honorable A din- 
 ner-party at Veron's A curious lawsuit in connection with Weber's 
 " Freyscnutz " Nestor Eoqueplan, who became the successor of the 
 defendant in the case, suggests a way out of it Ldon Fillet virtually 
 adopts it and wins the day A similar plan adopted years before by a 
 fireman on duty at the opera, on being tried by court-martial for hav- 
 ing fallen asleep during the performance of " Guido et Genevra " 
 Firemen not bad judges of plays and operas They were often con- 
 sulted both by Meyerbeer ana D'umas Dumas at work How he idled 
 his time away Dumas causes the traffic receipts of the Chemin de Fer 
 de 1'Ouest to swell during his three years' residence at Saint-Germain 
 M. de Montalivet advises Louis-Philippe to invite Dumas to Ver- 
 sailles, to see what his presence will do for the royal city Louis- 
 Philippe does not act upon the advice The relations between Dumas 
 and the d'Orleans family After the Revolution of '48, Dumas becomes 
 a candidate for parliament The story of his canvass and his address 
 to the electors at Joigny Dumas' utter indifference to money matters 
 He casts his burdens upon others Dumas and his creditors Writs 
 and distraints How they are dealt with Dumas' indiscriminate gen- 
 erosity A dozen houses full of new furniture in half as many years 
 Dumas' frugality at table Literary remuneration Dumas and his 
 son "Leave me a hundred francs" 43 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Dr. Louis Veron The real man as distinguished from that of his own 
 " Memoirs" He takes the management of the Paris Opera How it 
 was governed before hU advent Meyerbeer's "Robert le Diable" 
 underlined Meyerbeer and his, doubts upon the merits of his work 
 Meyerbeer's generosity Meyerbeer and the beggars of the Rue Le 
 Peletier Dr. V6ron, the inventor of the modern newspaper puff- 
 Some specimens of advertisements in their infancy D,r. Veron takes
 
 CONTENTS. v 
 
 PAGE 
 
 a leaf from the book of Molierc Dr. Veron's love of money His 
 superstitions His objections to travelling in railways lie quotes the 
 Queen of England as an example When Queen Victoria overcomes 
 her objection, Veron holds out ; ' Queen Victoria has got a successor : 
 the Veron dynasty begins and ends with me " Thirteen at table I 
 make the acquaintance of Taglioni The woman and the ballerian 
 Her adventure at Perth An improvised performance of " Nathalie, 
 la Laitiere Suisse " Another adventure in Russia A modern Claude 
 Du-Val My last meeting with Taglioni A dinner-party at De 
 Morny's A comedy scene between husband and wife Flotow, the 
 composer of " Martha" His family His father's objection to the com- 
 poser's profession The latter's interview with M. de Saint-Georges, 
 the author of the libretto of Balfe's " Bohemian Girl " M. de Saint- 
 Georges prevails upon the father to let his son study in Paris for five 
 years, and to provide for him during that time The supplies are 
 stopped on the last day of the fifth year Flotow, at the advice of M. 
 de Saint-Georges, stays on and lives by giving piano-lessons His 
 earthly possessions at his first success " Rob Eoy " at the Hotel Cas- 
 tellane Lord Granville's opinion of the music The Hotel Castel- 
 lane and some Paris salons during Louis-Pliiliupe's reign The Prin- 
 cesse de Lieven's, M. Tillers', etc. What Madame de Girardin's was 
 like Victor Hugo's Perpetual adoration ; very artistic, but nothing 
 to eat or to drink The salon of the ambassador of the Two Sicilies 
 Lord and Lady Granville at the English Embassy The salon of Count 
 Apponyi A story connected with it Furniture and entertainments 
 Cakes, ices, and tea; no champagne as during the Second Empire 
 The Hotel Castellane and its amateur theatricals Kival companies 
 No under-studies Lord Brougham at the Hotel Castellane His bad 
 French and his would-be Don Juanism A French rendering of 
 Shakespeare's " There is but one step between the sublime and the 
 ridiculous," as applied to Lord Brougham He nearly accepts a part in 
 a farce where his bad French is likely to produce a comic effect His 
 successor as a murderer of the language M. de Saint-Georges Like 
 Moliere, he reads his plays to his housekeeper When the latter is not 
 satisfied, the dinner is spoilt, however great the success of the play in 
 public estimation Great men and their housekeepers Turner, Jean 
 Jacques Rousseau, Eugene Delacroix 62 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 The Boulevards in the forties The Chinese Baths A favourite tobacconist 
 of Alfred de Musset The price of cigars The diligence still the usual 
 mode of travelling Provincials in Paris Parliamentary see-saw be- 
 tween M. Thiers and M. Guizot Amenities of editors An advocate 
 of universal suffrage Distribution of gratuitous sausages to the work- 
 ing man on the king's birthday The rendezvous of actors in search 
 of an engagement Frederick Lemaitre on the eve of appearing in a 
 new part The Legitimists begin to leave their seclusion and to mingle 
 with the bourgeoisie Alexandre Dumas and Scribe The latter's fer- 
 tility as a playwright The National Guards go shooting, in uniform 
 and in companies, on the Plaine Saint-Denis Vidocq's private in- 
 quiry office in the Rue Vivienne No river-side resorts The plaster 
 elephant on the Place de la Bastille The sentimental romances of 
 Loi'sa Puget The songs of the working classes Cheap bread and wine 
 How they enjoyed themselves on Sundays and holidays Theophile 
 Gautier's pony-carriage The hatred of the bourgeoisie Nestor Roque- 
 plan's expression of it Gavarni's M. Thiers' sister keeps a restaurant 
 at the corner of the Rue Drouot When he is in power, the members
 
 v i AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 of the Opposition go and dine there, and publish facetious accounts of 
 the entertainment All appearances to the contrary, people like Guizot 
 better than Thiers But few entries for the race for wealth in those 
 days The Rothschilds still live in the Kue Lafitte Favourite lounges 
 The Boulevards, the Rue Le Peletier, and the Passage de I'Ope'ra 
 The Opera The Rue Le Peletier and its attractions The Restaurant 
 of Paolo Broggi The Estaminet du Divan Literary waiters and Boni- 
 face Major Fraser The mystery surrounding his origin Another 
 mysterious personage The Passage de 1'Opera is invaded by the 
 stockjobbers, and loses its prestige as a promenade Bernard Latte's, 
 the publisher of Donizetti's operas, becomes deserted Tortoni's 
 Louis-Blanc His scruples as an editor A few words about duelling 
 Two tragic meetings Lola Montes Her adventurous career A 
 celebrated trial My first meeting with Gustave Flaubert, the author 
 of "Madame Bovary" and " Salambo " Emile de Girardin His 
 opinion of duelling My decision with regard to it The original of 
 "La Dame aux Came"lias" Her parentage Alexandre Dumas gives 
 the diagnosis of her character in connection with his son's play 
 L'Homme au Camellia M. Lautour-Mezerai, the inventor of children's 
 periodical literature in France Auguste Lireux He takes the manage- 
 ment of the Odeon Balzac again Hi schemes, his greed Lireux 
 more fortunate with other authors Anglophobia on the French stage 
 Gallophobia on the English stage 86 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Rachel and some of her fellow-actors Rachel's true character Her greedi- 
 ness and spitefulness Her vanity and her wit Her powers of fascina- 
 tion The cost of being fascinated by her Her manner of levying toll 
 Some of her victims, Comte Duchatel and Dr. Veron The story of 
 her guitar A little transaction between her and M. Fould Her sup- 
 posed charity and generosity Ten tickets for a charity concert How 
 she made them into twenty How she could have made them into a 
 hundred Baron Taylor puzzled Her manner of giving presents 
 Beauvallet's precaution with regard to one of her gifts Alexandre 
 Dumas the younger, wiser or perhaps not so wise innis generation 
 Rachel as a raconteuse The story of her debut at the Gymnase What 
 Rachel would have been as an actor instead of an actress Her comic 
 genius Rachel's mother What became of Rachel's money Mama 
 Felix as a pawnbroker Rachel's trinkets Two curious bracelets 
 Her first appearance before Nicholas I. A dramatic recital in the 
 open air Rachel's opinion of the handsomest man in Europe Rachel 
 and Samson Her obligations to him How she repays them How 
 she goes to Berryer to be coached in the fable of "The" Two Pigeons" 
 An anecdote of Berryer Rachel's fear of a " warm reception " on the 
 first night of " Adrienne Lecouvreur " How she averts the danger 
 Samson as a man and as an actor Petticoat-revolts at the Come'die- 
 Franc,aise Samson and Re'gnier as buffers Their different ways of 
 pouring oil upon the troubled waters Mdlle. Sylvanie Plessy A 
 parallel between her and Sarah Bernhardt Samson and Regnier's pride 
 in their profession The different character of that pride " Apollo 
 with a bad tailor, and who dresses without a looking-glass " Samson 
 gives a lesson in declamation to a procureur-imperial The secret of 
 Regnier's greatness as an actor A lesson at the Conservatoire Re'g- 
 nier on " make-up " Regnier's opinion of genius on the stage A mot 
 of Augustine Bronan Giovanni, the wigmaker of the Comedie-Fran- 
 aise His pride in his profession M. Ancessy, the musical director, 
 and his three wigs 128
 
 CONTENTS. vii 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Two composers, Auber and Felicien David Auber, the legend of his youth- 
 ful appearance How it arose His daily rides, his love of women's 
 society His mot on Mozart's "Don Juan" The only drawback to 
 Auber's enjoyment of women's society His reluctance to take his hat 
 off How he managed to keep it on most of the time His opinion 
 upon Meyerbeer's and Halevy's genius His opinion upon Gerard de 
 Nerval, who handed himself with his hat on His love of solitude- 
 His fondness of Paris His grievance against his mother for not hav- 
 ing given him birth there He refuses to leave Paris at the commence- 
 ment of the siege His small appetite He proposes to write a new 
 opera when the Prussians are gone Auber suffers no privations, but 
 has difficulty in finding fodder for his horse The Parisians claim it 
 for food Another legend about Auber's independence of sleep How 
 and where he generally slept Why Auber snored in Veron's com- 
 pany, and why he did not in that of other people His capacity for 
 work Auber a brilliant talker Auber's gratitude to the artists who 
 interpreted his work, but different from Meyerbeer's The reason why, 
 according to Auber Jealousy or humility Auber and the younger 
 Coquelin " The verdict on all things in this world mav be summed 
 up in the one phrase, 'It's an injustice'" Felicien David The man 
 The beginnings of his career His terrible poverty He joins the 
 Saint-Simoniens, and goes with some of them to the East Their re- 
 ception at Constantinople M. Scribe and the libretto of " L'Africaine " 
 David in Egypt at the court of Mehemet-Ali David's description 
 of him Mehemet's way of testing the educational progress of his sons 
 Woe to the fat kine Mehcmet- All suggests a new mode of teaching 
 music to the inmates of the harem Felicien David's further wander- 
 ings in Egypt Their effect upon his musical genius His return to 
 France He tells the story of the first performance of " Le Desert " 
 An ambulant box-office His success Fame, but no money He sells 
 the score of " Le Desert " He loses his savings " La Perle du Br6- 
 sil" and the Coup-d'Etat "No luck" Napoleon III. remains his 
 debtor for eleven years A mot of Auber, and one of Alexandre Du- 
 mas pere The story of " Aida " Why Fe"lieieu David did not com- 
 pose the music The real author of the libretto 152 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Three painters, and a school for pifferari Gabriel Decamps, Eugene De- 
 lacroix, and Horace Vernet The prices of pictures in the forties De- 
 lacroix' find no purchasers at all Decamps' drawings fetch a thousand 
 francs each Decamps not a happy man The cause of his unhappi- 
 ness The man and the painter He finds no pleasure in being popular 
 Eugene Delacroix His contempt for the bourgeoisie A parallel 
 between Delacroix and Shakespeare Was Delacroix tall or snort? 
 His love of flowers His delicate health His personal appearance 
 His indifference to the love-passion George Sand and Delacroix 
 A miscarried love-scene Delacroix' housekeeper, Jenny Leguillou 
 Delacroix does not want to pose as a model for one of George Sand's 
 heroes Delacroix as a writer His approval of Carlyle's dictum, 
 " Show me how a man sings," etc. His liumour tempered by his rev- 
 erence His failure as a caricaturist His practical jokes on would-be 
 art-critics Delacroix at home His dress while at work Horace Ver- 
 net's, Paul Delaroche's, Ingres' Early at work He does not waste 
 time over lunch How he "spent his evenings His dislike of being 
 reproduced in marble or on canvas after his death Horace Vernet
 
 viii AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The contrast between the two men and the two artists Vernet's ap- 
 pearance His own account of how he became a painter Moral and 
 mental resemblance to Alexandre Dumas pere His political opinions 
 Vernet and Nicholas I. A bold answer His opinion on the mental 
 state of the Eomanotfs The comic side of Vernet's character He 
 thinks himself a Vauban His interviews with M. Thiers His admira- 
 tion for everything military His worship of Alfred de Vigny His in- 
 effectual attempts to paint a scene in connection with the storming of 
 Constantino Laurent-Jan proposes to write an epic on it He gives a 
 synopsis of the cantos Laurent- Jan lives "on the fat of the land" 
 for six months A son of Napoleon's companion in exile, General Ber- 
 trand The chaplain of " la Belle-Poule "The first French priest who 
 wore the English dress Horace Vernet and the veterans of " la grande 
 armee " His studio during their occupancy of it as models His budget 
 His hatred of pifferari A professor The Quartier-Latin revisited . 164 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Louis-Philippe and his family An unpublished theatrical skit on his 
 mania for shaking hands with every one His art of governing, ac- 
 cording to the same skit' Louis-Philippe not the ardent admirer of 
 the bourgeoisie he professed to be The Faubourg Saint-Germain de- 
 serts the Tuileries The English in too great a majority Lord 's 
 
 opinion of the dinners at the Tuileries The attitude" of the bour- 
 geoisie towards Louis-Philippe, according to the King himself Louis- 
 Philippe's wit His final words on the death of Talleyrand His love 
 of money He could be generous at times A story of the Palais-Eoyal 
 Louis-Philippe and the Marseillaise Two curious stories connected 
 with the Marseillaise Who was the composer of it i Louis-Philippe's 
 opinion of the throne, the crown, and the sceptre of France as ad- 
 ditions to one's comfort His children, and especially his sons, take 
 things more easily Even the Bonapartists admired some of the latter 
 A mot of an Imperialist How the boys were brought up Their 
 nocturnal rambles later on The King himself does not seem to mind 
 those escapades, but is frightened at M. Guizot hearing of them Louis- 
 Philippe did not understand Guizot The recollection of his former 
 misery frequently haunts the King He worries Queen Victoria with 
 his fear of becoming poor Louis-Philippe an excellent husband and 
 father He wants to write the libretto of an opera on an English sub- 
 ject His religion The court receptions ridiculous Even the prole- 
 tariat sneer at them The entree ot the Duchesse d'OrWans into Paris 
 The scene in the Tuileries gardens A mot of Princesse Clementine 
 on her fathers too paternal solicitude A practical joke of the Prince 
 de Joinville His caricatures and drawings The children inherited 
 their talent for drawing and modelling from their mother The Due 
 de Nenours as a miniature and water-colour painter Suspected of 
 being a Legitimist All Louis-Philippe's children great patrons of art 
 How the oourgeoisie looked upon their intercourse with artists The 
 Due de Nemours' marvellous memory The studio of Eugene Lami 
 His neighbours, Paul Delaroche and Honore de Balzac The Due de 
 Nemours' bravery called in question The Due d'Aumale's exploits in 
 Algeria considered mere skirmishes A curious story of spiritism The 
 Due d'Aumale a greater favourite with the world than any of the other 
 sons of Louis-Philippe His wit The Due d'Orleans also a great fa- 
 vourite His visits to Decamps' studio An indifferent classical scholar 
 A curious kind of black-mail His indifference to money There 
 is no money in a Republic His death A witty reply to the Le- 
 gitimists 185
 
 The 
 
 CONTENTS. i x 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Kevolution of '48 The beginning of it The National Guards in all 
 their glory The Caf4 Gregoire on the Place du Cairo The price of a 
 good breakfast in '48 The palmy days of the Cuisine Bourgeoise 
 The excitement on the Boulevards on Sunday, February 20th, '48 
 The theatres A ball at Poirson's, the erstwhile director of the Gym- 
 nase A lull in the storm Tuesday, February 22nd Another visit to 
 the Cafe Greiroire On my way thither The Comedie-Francjaise closes 
 its doors Wliat it means, according to my old tutor We are waited 
 upon by a sergeant and corporal We are no longer " messieurs." but 
 " eitoyens " An eye to the main chance The patriots do a bit of busi- 
 ness in tricolour cockades The company marches away Casualties 
 " Le patriotisme " means the difference between the louis d'or and the 
 ecu of three francs The company bivouacs on the Boulevard Saint- 
 Martin A tyrant's victim " malgre lui " Wednesday, February 23rd 
 The Cafe Gregoire once more The National Guards en neglige A 
 novel mode of settling accounts The National Guards fortify the 
 inner man A bivouac on the Boulevard du Temple A camp scene 
 from an opera I leave My companion's account The -National 
 Guards protect the regulars The author of these notes goes to the 
 theatre The Gymnase and the Varietes on the eve of the Revolution 
 Boutte and Dejazet Thursday, February 24th, '48 The Boulevards 
 at 9.30 a. m. No milk The Revolutionaries do without it The Place 
 du Carrousel The sovereign people fire from the roofs on the troops 
 The troops do not dislodge them The King reviews the troops 
 The apparent inactivity of Louis-Philippe's sons A theory about the 
 difference in bloodshed One of the three ugliest men in France comes 
 to see the King Seditious cries The King abdicates Chaos The 
 sacking of the Tuileries Receptions and feasting in the Galerie de 
 Diane " Du cafe pour nous, des cigarettes pour les dames " The 
 dresses of the princesses The bourgeois feast the gamins who guard 
 the barricades The Republic proclaimed The riff-raff insist upon 
 illuminations An actor promoted to the Governorship of the Hotel 
 de Ville Some members of the " provisional Government" at work 
 Mery on Lamartine Why the latter proclaimed the Republic . . 208 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The Second Republic Lamartine's reason for proclaiming it Suspects 
 Louis-Napoleon of similar motives for wishing to overthrow it Tells 
 him to go back to England De Persigny's account o.f Louis-Napo- 
 leon's landing in France after February 24th, '48 Providential inter- 
 ference on behalf of Louis-Napoleon Justification of Louis-Napoleon's 
 belief in his "star" My first meeting with him The origin of a cele- 
 brated nickname Badinguet a creation of Gavarni Louis-Napoleon 
 and his surroundings at the Hotel du Rhin His appearance and dress 
 Lord Normanby's opinion of his appearance Louis-Napoleon's 
 French A mot of Bismarck Cavaignac, Thiers, and Victor Hugo's 
 wrong estimate of his character Cavaignac and his brother Godefroi 
 The difference between Thiers and General Cavaignac An elector's 
 mot Some of the candidates for the presidency of the Second Republic 
 Electioneering expenses Impecumosity of Louis-Napoleon A story 
 in connection with it The woman with the wooden legs The salons 
 during the Second Republic The theatres and their skits on the 
 situation "La Propriete c'est le "Vol" France governed by the Na- 
 tional A curious list of ministers and officials of the Second Repub- 
 lic Armand Marrast His plans for reviving business His receptions
 
 x AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 PAOK 
 
 at the Palais-Bourbon as President of the Chamber of Deputies 
 Some of the guests The Corps Diplomatique The new deputies, 
 their wives and daughters 232 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Guizot, Lamartine, and Be"ranger Public opinion at sea with regard to the 
 real Guizot People fail to see the real man behind the politician 
 Guizot regrets this false conception " I have not the courage to be 
 unpopular " A tilt at Thiers My first meeting with him A picture 
 and the story connected with it M. Guizot " at home " His apart- 
 ment The company M. Guizot on " the Spanish marriages " Ilia 
 indictment against Lord Palmerston An incident in connection with 
 Napoleon's tomb at the Invalides Nicolas I. and Napoleon My sub- 
 sequent intimacy with M. Guizot Guizot as a father His correspond- 
 ence with his daughters A story of Henry Murger and Marguerite 
 Thuillier M. Guizot makes up his mind not to live in Paris any longer 
 M. Guizot on " natural scenery " Never saw the sea until he waa 
 over fifty Why M. Guizot did not like the country ; why M. Thiers 
 did not like it Thiers the only man at whom Guizot tilted M. Guizot 
 died poor M. de Lamartine's poverty did not inspire the same re- 
 spect Lamartine's impecuniosity My only visit to Lamartine's house 
 Du Jellaby dore With a difference All the stories and anecdotes 
 about M. de "Lamartine relate to his improvidence and impecuniosity 
 Ten times worse in that respect than Balzac M. Guizpt's literary pro- 
 ductions and M. de Lamartine's The national subscription raised for 
 the latter How he anticipates some of the money Beranger My 
 first acquaintance with him Beranger's verdict on the Second Eepub- 
 lic Beranger's constant flittings Dislikes popularity The true story 
 of Beranger and Mdlle. Judith Frere 249 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Some men of the Empire Fialin de Persigny The public prosecutor's 
 opinion of him expressed at the trial for nigh treason in 1836 Superior 
 in many respects to Louis-Napoleon The revival of the Empire his 
 onljr and constant dream In order to realize it, he appeals first to 
 Jerome, ex-King of Westphalia De Persigny's estimate of him 
 Jerome's greed and Louis-Napoleon's generositv De Persigny's finan- 
 cial embarrassments His charity What the Empire really meant to 
 him De Persigny virtually the moving spirit in the Coup d'Etat 
 Louis-Napoleon might have been satisfied with the presidency of the 
 republic for life Persigny seeks for aid in England Palmereton's 
 share in the Coup d'Etat The submarine cable Preparations for the 
 Coup d'Etat A warning of it sent to England Count Walewski issues 
 invitations for a dinner-party on the 2nd of December Opinion in 
 London that Louis- Napoleon will get the worst in the struggle with 
 the Chamber The last funds from London General de Saint-Amaud 
 and Baron Lacrosse The Elysee-Bourbon on the evening of the 1st 
 of December I pass the Elysee at midnight Nothing unusual Lon- 
 don on the 2nd of December The dinner at Count Walewski's put oft 
 at the last moment Illuminations at the French Embassy a few hours 
 later Palmerston at the Embassy Some traits of De Persigny's char- 
 acter His personal affection for Louis- Napoleon Madame de Per- 
 signy Her parsimony Her cooking of the household accounts 
 Chevet and Madame de Persigny What the Empire might have been 
 with a Von Moltke by the side of the Emperor instead of Vaillant,
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Kiel, and Leboeuf Colonel (afterwards General) Fleury the only mod- 
 est man among the Emperor's entourage De Persigny's pretensions 
 as a Heaven-born statesman Mgr. de Merode De Morny His first 
 meeting with his half-brother De Morny as a grand seigneur The 
 origin of the Mexican campaign Walewski His fads Kouher My 
 first sight of him in the Quartier-Latin The Emperor's opinion of 
 him at the beginning of his career -Rouher in his native home, Au- 
 vergne His marriage Madame Kouher His father-in-law . . . 261 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Society during the Second Empire The Court at Compiegne The Eng- 
 lish element -Their opinion of Louis-Napoleon The difference be- 
 tween the court of Louis- Philippe and that of Napoleon III. The 
 luggage of M. Villemain The hunts in Louis-Philippe's time Louis- 
 Napoleon's advent Would have made a better poet than an Emperor 
 Looks for a La Valliere or Montespan, and finds Mdlle. Eugenie de 
 Montijo The latter determined not to be a La Valliere or even a Pom- 
 padour Has her great destiny foretold in her youth Makes up her 
 mind that it shall be realized by a right-handed and not a left-handed 
 marriage Queen Victoria stands her sponsor among the sovereigns of 
 Europe Mdlle. de Montijo's mother The Comtesse de Montijo and 
 Halevy's " Madame Cardinal " The first invitations to Compiegne 
 Mdlle. de Montijo's backers for the Imperial stakes No other entries 
 Louis-Napoleon utters the word " marriage " What led up to it 
 The Emperor officially announces his betrothal The effect it produced 
 The Faubourg St.-Germain Dupin the elder gives his views The 
 engaged couple feel very uncomfortable Negotiations to organize the 
 Empress's future household Kebuffs Louis Napoleon's retorts 
 Mdlle. de Montijo's attempt at wit and sprightliness Her iron will 
 Her beauty Her marriage She takes Marie-Antoinette for her model 
 She fondly imagines that she was born to rule She presumes to 
 teach Princess Clotilde the etiquette of courts The story of two de- 
 tectives The hunts at Compiegne Some of the mjse en scene and 
 dramatis personce The shooting-parties Mrs. Grundy not banished, 
 but specially invited and drugged The programme of the gatherings 
 Compiegne in the season A story of an Englishman accommodated 
 for the night in one of the Imperial luggage-vans 288 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Society during the Empire The series of guests at Compiegne The amuse- 
 ments the absence of musical taste in the Bonapartes The pro- 
 gramme on the first, second, third, and fourth days An anecdote of 
 Lafontaine, the actor Theatrical performances and balls The ex- 
 penses of the same The theatre at Compiegne The guests, male and 
 female " Neck or nothing " for the latter, uniform for the former 
 The rest have to take " back seats " The selection of guests among 
 the notabilities of Compiegne A mayor's troubles The Empress's 
 and the Emperor's conflicting opinions with regard to female cnarms 
 Bassano in " hot water " Tactics of the demi-mondaines Improve- 
 ment from the heraldic point of view in the Empress's entourage The 
 cocodettes Their dress Worth When every pretext for a change of 
 toilette is exhausted, the court ladies turn themselves into ballerinas 
 " Le Diable a Quatre " at Compiegne The ladies appear at the ball 
 afterwards in their gauze skirts The Emperor's dictum with regard to 
 ballet-dancers and men's infatuation for them The Emperor did not
 
 x ii AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 like stupid women The Emperor's " eye " for a handsome woman 
 The Empress does not admire the instinct William I. of Prussia acts 
 as comforter The hunt Actors, " supers," and spectators " La Com- 
 tesse d'Escarbagnas " The Imperial procession The Empress's and 
 Emperor's unpunctuality Louis-Napoleon not a " well-dressed man " 
 Tne Empress wished to get back before dark The reason of this 
 wish Though unpunctual, punctual on hunt-days The police meas- 
 ures at those gatherings M. Hyrvoix and M. Boitelle The Empress 
 did not like the truth, the Emperor did Her anxiety to go to St. 
 Lazare 304 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 The story of a celebrated sculptor and his model David d'Angers at the 
 funeral of Cortot, the sculptor How I became acquainted with him 
 The sculptor leaves the funeral procession to speak to a woman He 
 tells me the story David d'Angers' sympathy with Greece in her 
 struggle for independence -When Botzaris falls at Missolonghi, he 
 makes up his mind to carve his monument "Wishes to do something 
 original He finds his idea in the cemetery of Pere-la-Chaise In 
 search of a model Comes unexpectedly upon her in the Eue du Mont- 
 parnasse, while in company of Victor Hugo The model and her 
 mother The bronze Christ on the studio wail David gives it to his 
 model The latter dismissed A plot against the sculptor's life His 
 model saves him He tries to find her and fails Only meets with her 
 when walking behind the hearse of Cortot She appears utterly desti- 
 tute Loses sight of her again Meets her on the outer boulevards 
 with a nondescript of the worst character He endeavours to rescue 
 her. but fails Canler, of the Paris police, reveals the tactics pursued 
 with regard to " unfortunates " David's exile and death The Botzaris 
 Monument is brought back to Paris to be restored The model at the 
 door of the exhibition Her death 323 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Queen Victoria in Paris The beginning of the era of middle-class excur- 
 sions English visitors before that The British tourist of 1855 The 
 real revenge of Waterloo The Englishman's' French and the French- 
 man's English The opening of the Exhibition The lord mayor and 
 aldermen in Paris The King of Portugal All these considered so 
 much " small fry " Napoleon III. goes to Boulogne to welcome the 
 Queen The royal yacht is delayed The French hotel proprietor the 
 greatest artist in fleecing The Italian, the Swiss, the German, mere 
 bunglers in comparison Napoleon III. before the arrival of the Queen 
 Pondering the past Arrival of the Queen The Queen lands, fol- 
 lowed by Prince Albert and the royal children The Emperor rides 
 by the side of her carriage Comments of the population An old salt 
 on the situation An old soldier's retort The general feeling Arrival 
 in Paris The Parisians 1 reception of the Queen A description of the 
 route The apartments of the Queen at St. Cloud How the Queen 
 spent Sunday Visits the art section of the Exhibition on Monday 
 Ingres and Horace Vernet presented to her Frenchmen's ignorance 
 of English art in those days English and French art critics The 
 Queen takes a carriage drive" through Paris Not a single cry of" Vive 
 1'Angleterre ! " a great many of " Vive la Heine " England* making a 
 cats-paw of France Keception at the Elysee-Bourbon " Les Demoi- 
 selles de Saint-Cyr" at St. Cloud Alexandre Dumas would have
 
 CONTENTS. xiii 
 
 PAGE 
 
 liked to see the Queen Visit to Versailles State-performances at the 
 Opera Ball at the Hotel de Ville The Queen's dancing Canrobert 
 on " the Queen's dancing and her soldiers' fighting " Another visit to 
 the Exhibition Beranger misses seeing the Queen " I am not going 
 to see the Queen, but the woman " A review in the Champ-de-Mars 
 A visit to Napoleon's tomb Jerome's absence on the plea of illness 
 Marshal Vaillant's reply to the Emperor when the latter invites him 
 to take Jerome's place His comments on the receptions given by the 
 Emperor to foreign sovereigns Fetes at Versailles Homeward . . 336 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Marshal Vaillant The beginning of our acquaintance His stories of the 
 swashbucklers of the First Empire, and the beaux of the Kestauration 
 Kabelaisian, but clever Marshal Vaillant neither a swashbuckler 
 nor a beau ; hated both Never cherished the slightest illusions about 
 the efficiency of the French army Acknowledged himself unable to 
 effect the desired and necessary reforms To do that, a minister of war 
 must become a fixture Why he stayed Careful of the public moneys, 
 and of the Emperor's also Napoleon III.'s lavishness An instance of 
 it Vaillant never dazzled by the grandeur of court entertainments 
 Not dazzled by anything His hatred of wind-bags Prince de Canino 
 Matutinal interviews Prince de Canino sends his seconds Vaillant 
 declines the meeting, and gives his reason Vaillant abrupt at the best 
 of times A freezing reception A comic interview Attempts to shirk 
 military duty Tricks Mistakes A story in point More tricks 
 Sham ailments : how the marshal dealt with them When the marshal 
 was not in an amiable mood Another interview Vaillant's tactics 
 
 " D d annoying to be wrong "The marshal fond of science A 
 
 very interesting scientific phenomenon himself Science under the 
 later Bourbons Suspicion of the soldiers of the Empire The priest- 
 hood and the police The most godless republic preferable to a con- 
 tinuance of their regime -The marshal's dogr, Brusca Her dislike to 
 civilians Brusca's chastity Vaillant's objection to insufficiently pre- 
 paid letters His habit of missing the tram, notwithstanding his pre- 
 cautions His objection to fuss and public honours 351 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 The Franco-German War Friday, July 15,1870, 6 p.m. My friends "con- 
 fident of France being able to chastise the insolence of the King of 
 Prussia" I do not share their confidence; but do not expect a crush- 
 ing defeat Napoleon III.'s presence aggravated the disasters; his 
 absence would not have averted them He himself had no illusions 
 about the efficiency of the army, did not suspect the rottenness of it 
 His previous endeavours at reorganization The real drift of his pro- 
 posed inquiries His plan meant also compulsory service for every one 
 Why the legislature opposed it The makeshift proposed by it 
 Napoleon weary, body and soul His physical condition A great con- 
 sultation and the upshot of it -Dr. Kicord and what he told me I am 
 determined to see and hear, though not to speak I sally forth The 
 streets on the evening of Friday, the 15th of July The illuminations 
 Patriotism or Chauvinism The announcement of a bookseller 
 What Moltke thought of it The opinion of a dramatist on the war 
 The people ; no horse-play No work done on Saturday and Sunday 
 Cabmen "A man does not pay for his own funeral, monsieur "- 
 The northern station on Sunday The departing Germans The Em-
 
 xiv AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 peror's particular instructions with regard to them Alfred de Musset's 
 " Khin Allemand " Pr6 vost-Paradol aud the news of his suicide The 
 probable cause of it A chat with a superior officer The Emperor's 
 Sunday receptions at the Tuileries Promotions in the army, upon 
 what basis Good and bad officers The officers' mess does not exist 
 Another general officer gives his opinion Marshal Kiel and Leboauf 
 The plan of campaign suddenly altered The reason The Emperor 
 leaves St. Cloud His confidence shaken before then Some telegrams 
 from the commanders of divisions Thiers is appealed to, to stem the 
 tide of retrenchment; afterwards to take the portfolio of war The 
 Emperor's opinion persistently disregarded at the Tuileries Trochu 
 The dancing colonels at the Tuileries 367 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 The war Eeactipn before the Emperor's departure The moral effects of 
 the publication of the draft treaty " Bismarck has done the Em- 
 peror" The Parisians did not like the Empress The latter always 
 anxious to assume the regency A retrospect Crimean war The Em- 
 press and Queen Victoria Solferino The regency of '65 Bismarck's 
 millinery bills Lord Lyons Bismarck and the Due de Gramont 
 Lord Lyons does not foresee war The republicans and the war The 
 Empress Two ministerial councils and their consequences Mr. Pres- 
 cott-Hewett sent for Joseph Ferrari, the Italian philosopher The 
 Empress The ferment in Paris " Too much prologue to ' The Tam- 
 ing of the German Shrew ' " The first engagement The " Marseil- 
 laise " An infant performer The " Marseillaise " at the Comedie- 
 Fran<jaise The " Marseillaise" by command of the Emperor A patri- 
 otic ballet The courtesy of the French at Fontenoy The Cafe de la 
 Paix General Beaufort d'Hautpoul and Moltke Newspaper corre- 
 spondents Edmond About tells a story about one of his colleagues 
 News supplied by the Government^- What it amounted to The infor- 
 mation it gave to the enemy Bazaine, " the glorious" one Palikao 
 The fall of the Empire does not date from Sedan, but from Woerth 
 and Speicheren Those who dealt it the heaviest blow The Empress, 
 the Empress, and no one but the Empress 385 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 The 4th of September A comic, not a tragic revolution A burlesque 
 Harold and a burlesque Boadicea The news of Sedan only known 
 publicly on the 3rd of September Grief and consternation, but no rage 
 The latter feeling imported by the bands of Delescluze, Blanqui, 
 and Felix Pyat^-Blanqui, Pyat, & Co. versus Favre, Gambetta, & Co. 
 The former want their share of the spoil, and only get it some years 
 afterwards Kamail goes to the Palais-Bourbon His reports-Paris 
 spends the night outdoors Thiers a second-rate Talleyrand Hisjour- 
 ney to the different courts of Europe His interview with Lord Gran- 
 viile The 4th of September The Imperial eagles disappear The 
 joyousness of the crowd The Place de la Concorde The gardens of 
 the Tuileries The crowds in the Eue de Eivoli scarcely pay attention 
 to the Tuileries The soldiers fraternizing with the people, and pro- 
 ving the republic from the barracks' ' 
 Sampierro Gavini gives his opinion 
 
 press, and the crownless coronation of ' 
 
 the Tuileries How M. Sardou saved the palace from being burned and 
 sacked The republic proclaimed Illuminations as after a victory . 404
 
 CONTENTS. xv 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The siege The Parisians convinced that the Germans will not invest 
 Paris Paris becomes a vast drill-ground, nevertheless The Parisians 
 leave oft singing, but listen to itinerant performers, though the latter 
 no longer sing the " Marseillaise " The theatres closed The Come'die- 
 Franijaise and the Opera Influx of the Gardes Mobiles The Parisian 
 no longer chaffs the provincial, but does the honours of the city to 
 him The stolid, gaunt Breton and the astute and cynical Normand 
 The gardens of the Tuileries an artillery park The mitrailleuse still 
 commands confidence The papers try to be comic Food may fail, 
 drink will not My visit to the wine depot at Bercy An official's in- 
 formationCattle in the public squares and on the outer Boulevards 
 Fear with regard to them Every man carries a rifle The woods in 
 the suburbs are set on fire The statue of Strasburg on the Place de la 
 Concorde M. Prudhomme to his sons The men who do not spout 
 The French shopkeeper and bourgeois A story of his greed He 
 reveals the whereabouts of the cable laid on the bed of the Seine 
 Obscure heroes Would-be Kavaillacs and Balthazar Gerards In- 
 ventors of schemes for the instant annihilation of all the Germans A 
 musical mitrailleuse An exhibition and lecture at the Alcazar The 
 last train Trains converted into dwellings for the suburban poor 
 Interior of a railway station The spy mania -Where the Parisians 
 ought to have looked for spies I am arrested as a spy A chat with 
 the officer in charge A terrible-looking knife 414 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 The siege The food-supply of Paris How and what the Parisians eat 
 and drink Bread, meat, and wine Alcoholism The waste among 
 the London poor The French take a lesson from the alien The Irish 
 
 at La Villette A whisper of the horses being doomed M. Gagne 
 
 The various attempts to introduce horseflesh The journals deliver 
 their opinions The supply of horseflesh as it stood in '70 The Acad- 
 e"mie des Sciences Gelatine Kitchen gardens on the balcony M. 
 Lockroy's experiment^-M. Pierre Joigneux and the Englishman If 
 cabbages, why not mushrooms ? There is still a kitchen garden left- 
 Cream cheese from the moon, to be fetched by Gambetta His departure 
 in a balloon Nadar and Napoleon III. Carrier-pigeons An aerial 
 telegraph Offers to cross the Prussian lines The theatres A per- 
 formance at the Cirque National" Le Koi s'amuse," at the Theatre 
 de Montmartre A dejeuner at Durand's Weber and Beethoven- 
 Long winter nights without fuel or gas The price of provisions The 
 Parisian's good-humour His wit The greed of the shopkeeper- 
 Culinary literature More's ' : Utopia" An ex-lieutenant of the For- 
 eign Legion He gives us a breakfast He delivers a lecture on food- 
 Joseph, nis servant Milk The slender resources of the poor I in- 
 terview an employ^ of the State Pawnshop Statistics Hidden pro- 
 visions Bread Prices of provisions New Year's Day, and New Year's 
 dinners The bombardment No more bread The end of the siege . 429 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 Some men of the Commune Cluseret His opinion of Rossel His opinion 
 of Bergeret What Cluseret was fighting for Thiers and Abraham 
 Lincoln Raoul Eigault on horseback The'ophile Ferr^ Ferre and 
 Gil-Peres, the actor The comic men of the Commune Gambon
 
 xvi AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Jourde, one of the most valuable of the lot His financial abilities 
 His endeavours to save Jourde at Godillot's Colonel Maxime Lis- 
 bonne The Editor's recollectiona of him General Dombrowski and 
 General la Cecilia A soiree at the Tuileries A gala-performance at 
 the Opdra Comique The death-knell of the Commune .... 462
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 The Quartier-Latin in the late thirties The difference between then and now 
 A caricature on the walls of Paris I am anxious to be introduced to the 
 quarter whence it emanated I am taken to " La Chiklebert," and make the 
 acquaintance of the original of the caricature The story of Bouginier and 
 his nose Dantan as a caricaturist He abandons that branch of art after 
 he has made Madame Malibran burst into tears at the sight of her statuette 
 How Bouginier came to be immortalized on the facade of the Passage du 
 Cairo One of the first co-operative societies in France An artists' hive 
 The origin of" La Childebert" Its tenants in my time The proprietress 
 Madame Chanfort, the providence of poor painters Her portraits sold 
 after her death High jinks at "La Childebert "The Childebertians and 
 their peacefully inclined neighbours Gratuitous baths and compulsory 
 douches at "La Childebert" The proprietress is called upon to repair the 
 roof The Childebertians bivouac on the Place St. Germain-des-Pres 
 They start a " Society for the Conversion of the Mahometans " The pub- 
 lic subscribe liberally What becomes of the subscriptions? My visits to 
 " La Childebert " breed a taste for the other amusements of the Quartier- 
 Latin Bobino and its entertainments The audience The manager His 
 stereotyped speech The reply in chorus Woe to the bourgeois-intruder 
 Stove-pipe hats a rarity in the Quartier-Latin The dress of the col- 
 legians Their mode of living Suppers when money was Hush, rolls and 
 milk when it was not A fortune-teller in the Hue de Tournon Her pre- 
 diction as to the future of Josephine de Beauharnais The allowance to 
 students in those days The Odeon deserted Students' habits The Chau- 
 miere Eural excursions Pere Bonvin's. 
 
 LOXG before Baron Haussmann began his architectural 
 transformation, many parts of Paris had undergone changes, 
 perceptible only to those who had been brought up among 
 the inhabitants, though distinct from them in nationality, 
 education, habits, and tastes. Paris became to a certain ex- 
 tent, and not altogether voluntarily, cosmopolitan before the 
 palatial mansions, the broad avenues, the handsome public 
 squares which subsequently excited the admiration of the 
 civilized world had been dreamt of, and while its outer as- 
 pect was as yet scarcely modified. This was mainly due to 
 the establishment of railways, which caused in the end 
 large influxes of foreigners and provincials, who as it were 
 1 (i)
 
 2 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 drove the real Parisian from his haunts. Those visitors 
 rarely penetrated in large numbers to the very heart of the 
 Quartier- Latin. When they crossed the bridges that span the 
 Seine, it was to see the Sorbonne, the Pantheon, the Observ- 
 atory, the Odeon, and the Luxembourg ; they rarely stayed 
 after nightfall. The Prado, the Theatre Bobino, the stu- 
 dents' taverns, escaped their observation when there was 
 really something to see ; and now, when the Closerie des 
 Lilas has become the Bal Bullier, when the small theatre has 
 been demolished, and when the taverns are in no way distin- 
 guished from other Parisian taverns when, in short, com- 
 monplace pervades the whole people flock thither very 
 often. But during the whole of the forties, and even later, 
 the vive gauclie, with its Quartier- Latin and adjacent Fau- 
 bourg St. Germain, were almost entirely sacred from the 
 desecrating stare of the deliberate sightseer ; and, conse- 
 quently, the former especially, preserved its individuality, 
 not only materially, but mentally and morally immorally 
 would perhaps have been the word that would have risen to 
 the lips of the observer who lacked the time and inclination 
 to study the life led there deeper than it appeared merely on 
 the surface. For though there was a good deal of royster- 
 ing and practical joking, and short-lasted liaison, there was 
 little of deliberate vice, of strategic libertinism if I may be 
 allowed to coin the expression. True, every Jack had his 
 Jill, but, as a rule, it was Jill who had set the ball rolling. 
 
 The Quartier-Latin not only sheltered sucking lawyers 
 and doctors, budding professors and savans and litterateurs, 
 but artists whose names have since then become world-re- 
 nowned. It was with some of these that I was most thrown 
 in contact in that quarter, partly from inclination, because 
 from my earliest youth I have been fonder of pictures than 
 of books, partly because at that time I had already seen so 
 many authors of fame, most of whom were the intimate ac- 
 quaintances of a connection of mine, that I cared little to 
 seek the society of those who had not arrived at that stage. 
 I was very young, and, though not devoid of faith in possi- 
 bilities, too mentally indolent when judgment in that respect 
 involved the sitting down to manuscripts. It was so much 
 easier and charming to be able to discover a budding genius 
 by a mere glance at a good sketch, even when the latter was 
 drawn in charcoal on a not particularly clean " whitewashed " 
 wall.
 
 THE QUARTIER-LATIN IN THE FORTIES. 3 
 
 I was scarcely more than a stripling when one morning 
 such a sketch appeared on the walls of Paris, and consider- 
 ably mystified, while it at the same time amused the inhabit- 
 ants of the capital. It was not the work of what we in Eng- 
 land would call a " seascape and mackerel artist," for no such 
 individual stood by to ask toll of the admirers ; it was not an 
 advertisement, for in those days that mode of mural publicity 
 was scarcely born, let alone in its infancy, in Paris. What, 
 then, was this colossal, monumental nose, the like of which 
 I have only seen on the faces of four human beings, one of 
 whom was Hyacinth, the famous actor of the Palais-Royal, 
 the other three being M. d'Argout, the Governor of the Bank 
 of France ; M. de Jussieu, the Director of the Jardin des 
 Plantes ; and Lasailly, Balzac's secretary ? What was this 
 colossal nose, with a ridiculously small head and body at- 
 tached to it ? The nasal organ was certainly phenomenal, 
 even allowing for the permissible exaggeration of the carica- 
 turist, but it could surely not be the only title of its owner to 
 this sudden leap into fame ! Was it a performing nose, or 
 one endowed with extraordinary powers of smell ? I puzzled 
 over the question for several days, until one morning I hap- 
 pened to run against my old tutor, looking at the picture 
 and laughing till the tears ran down his wrinkled cheeks. 
 It was a positive pleasure to see him. " C'est bien lui, c'est 
 bien lui," he exclaimed ; " c'est absolument son portrait 
 crache !" " Do you know the original?" I asked. "Mais, 
 sans doute, je le connais, c'est un ami de mon fils, du reste, 
 toute le monde connait Bouginier." " But I do not know 
 him," I protested, feeling very much ashamed of my igno- 
 rance. " Ah, you ! that's quite a different thing ; you do not 
 live in the Quartier-Latin, but everybody there knows him." 
 From that moment I knew no rest until I had made the ac- 
 quaintance of Bouginier, which was not very difficult ; and 
 through him I became a frequent visitor to " La Childebert," 
 which deserves a detailed description, because, though it was 
 a familiar haunt to many Parisians of my time with a taste 
 for Bohemian society, I doubt whether many Englishmen, 
 save (the late) Mr. Blanchard Jerrold and one of the May- 
 hews, ever set foot there, and even they could not have seen 
 it in its prime. 
 
 But before I deal with " La Childebert," I must say a few 
 words about Bouginier, who, contrary to my expectations, 
 owed his fame solely to his proboscis. He utterly disap-
 
 4; AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 peared from the artistic horizon in a few years, but his feat- 
 ures still live in the memory of those who knew him through 
 a statuette in terra cotta modelled by Dantan the younger. 
 During the reign of Louis-Philippe, Dantan took to that 
 branch of art as a relaxation from his more serious work ; he 
 finally abandoned it after he had made Madame Malibran 
 burst into tears, instead of making her laugh, as he intended, 
 at her own caricature. Those curious in such matters may 
 see Bouginier's presentment in a medallion on the frontis- 
 piece of the Passage du Caire, amidst the Egyptian divinities 
 and sphinxes. As a matter of course, the spectator asks 
 himself why this modern countenance should find itself in 
 such incongruous company, and he comes almost naturally 
 to the conclusion that Bouginier was the owner, or perhaps 
 the architect, of this arcade, almost exclusively tenanted 
 until very recently by lithographers, printers, etc. The 
 conclusion, however, would be an erroneous one. Bouginier, 
 as far as is known, never had any property in Paris or else- 
 where ; least of all was he vain enough to perpetuate his own 
 features in that manner, even if he had had an opportunity, 
 but he had not ; seeing that he was not an architect, but 
 simply a painter, of no great talents certainly, but, withal, 
 modest and sensible, and as such opposed to, or at any rate 
 not sharing, the crazes of medievalism, romanticism, and 
 other isms in which the young painters of that day indulged, 
 and which they thought fit to emphasize in public and among 
 one another by eccentricities of costume and language, sup- 
 posed to be in harmony with the periods they had adopted 
 for illustration. This absence of enthusiasm one way or the 
 other aroused the ire of his fellow-lodgers at the " Childe- 
 bert," and one of them, whose pencil was more deft at that 
 kind of work than those of the others, executed their ven- 
 geance, and drew Bouginier's picture on the " fag end " of a 
 dead wall in the vicinity of the Church of St. Germain-des- 
 Pres. The success was instantaneous and positively over- 
 whelming, though truth compels one to state that this was 
 the only flash of genius that illumined that young fellow's 
 career. His name was Fourreau, and one looks in vain for 
 his name in the biographical dictionaries or encyclopedias of 
 artists. Fate has even been more cruel to him than to his 
 model 
 
 For the moment, however, the success, as I have already 
 said, was overwhelming. In less than a fortnight there was
 
 THE CHILDEBERTIANS ON THEIR TRAVELS. 5 
 
 not a single wall in Paris and its outskirts without a Bouginier 
 on its surface. Though Paris was considerably less in area 
 than it is now, it wanted a Herculean effort to accomplish 
 this. No man, had he been endowed with as many arms as 
 Briareus, would have sufficed for it. Nor would it have done 
 to trust to more or less skilful copyists they might have 
 failed to catch the likeness, which was really an admirable 
 one ; so the following device was hit upon. Fourreau himself 
 cut a number of stencil plates in brown paper, and, provided 
 with them, an army of Childebertians started every night in 
 various directions, Fourreau and a few undoubtedly clever 
 youths heading the detachments, and filling in the blanks by 
 hand. 
 
 Meanwhile summer had come, and with it the longing 
 among the young Tintos to breathe the purer air of the 
 country, to sniff the salt breezes of the ocean. As a matter 
 of course, they were not all ready to start at the same time, 
 but being determined to follow the same route, to assemble 
 at a common goal, the contingent that was to leave a fort- 
 night later than the first arranged to join the others wherever 
 they might be. 
 
 " But how ? " was the question of those who were left 
 behind. " Very simply indeed," was the answer ; " we'll go by 
 the Barriere d'ltalie. You'll have but to look at the walls 
 along the road, and you'll find your waybill." 
 
 So said, so done. A fortnight after, the second division 
 left head-quarters and made straight for the Barriere d'ltalie. 
 But when outside the gates they stood undecided. For one 
 moment only. The next they caught sight of a magnificent 
 Bouginier on a wall next to the excise office of a Bouginier 
 whose outstretched index pointed to the Fontainebleau road. 
 After that, all went well. As far as Marseilles their Bougi- 
 nier no more failed them than the clouds of smoke and fire 
 failed the Israelites in the wilderness. At the seaport town 
 they lost the track for a little while, rather through their want 
 of faith in the ingenuity of their predecessors than through 
 the latter's lack of such ingenuity. They had the Mediter- 
 ranean in front of them, and even if they found a Bouginier 
 depicted somewhere on the shore, his outstretched index 
 could only point to the restless waves ; he could do nothing 
 more definite. Considerably depressed, they were going 
 down the Cannebiere, when they caught sight of the features of 
 their guiding star on a panel between the windows of a ship-
 
 6 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 ping office. His outstretched index did not point this time ; it 
 was placed over a word, and that word spelt " Malta." They 
 took ship as quickly as possible for the ancient habitation of 
 the Knights-Templars. On the walls of the Customs in the 
 island was Bouginier, with a scroll issuing from his nostrils, 
 on which was inscribed the word "Alexandria." A similar 
 indication met their gaze at the Pyramids, and at last the 
 second contingent managed to come up with the first amidst 
 the ruins of Thebes at the very moment when the word 
 " Suez " was being traced as issuing from Bouginier's mouth. 
 
 Among the company was a young fellow of the name of 
 Berthier, who became subsequently an architect of some note. 
 The Passage du Caire, as I have already observed, was in 
 those days the head- quarters of the lithographic-printing busi- 
 ness in general, but there was one branch which flourished 
 more than the rest, namely, that of lettres de faire part* 
 menus of restaurants and visiting-cards. The two first- 
 named documents were, in common with most printed matter 
 intended for circulation, subject to a stamp duty, but in the 
 early days of the Second Empire Louis-Napoleon had it taken 
 off. To mark their sense of the benefit conferred, the litho- 
 graphic firms f determined to have the arcade, which stood 
 in sad need of repair, restored, and Berthier was selected for 
 the task. The passage was originally built to commemorate 
 Bonaparte's victories in Egypt, and when Berthier received 
 the commission, he could think of no more fitting faQade 
 than the reproduction of a house at Karnac. He fondly re- 
 membered his youthful excursion to the land of Pharaohs, 
 and at the same time the image of Bpuginier uprose before 
 him. That is why the presentment of the latter may be seen 
 up to this day on the frieze of a building in the frowsiest 
 part of Paris. 
 
 If I have dwelt somewhat longer on Bouginier than the 
 importance of the subject warranted, it was mainly to convey 
 an idea of the spirit of mischief, of the love of practical jok- 
 ing, that animated most of the inmates of " La Childebert." 
 
 * The "lettrc do faire part " is an intimation of a birth, marriage, or death 
 sent to the friends, and even mere acquaintances, of a family. EDITOR. 
 
 t The lithographers were almost the first in France to form a co-operative 
 society, but not in the sense of the .Rochdale pioneers, which dates from about 
 the same period. The Lacrampe Association was for supplying lithographic 
 work. It began in the Passage du Cairo with ten members, and in a short time 
 numbered two hundred workmen. EDITOR.
 
 TPIE POOR PAINTERS' PROVIDENCE. 7 
 
 As a rule their devilries were innocent enough. The pic- 
 torial persecution of Bouginier is about the gravest thing 
 that could be laid to their charge, and the victim, like the 
 sensible fellow he was, rather enjoyed it than otherwise. 
 Woe, however, to the starched bourgeois who had been de- 
 coyed into their lair, or even to the remonstrating comrade 
 with a serious turn of mind, who wished to pursue his studies 
 in peace ! His life was made a burden to him, for the very 
 building lent itself to all sorts of nocturnal surprises and of 
 guerilla sorties. Elsewhere, when a man's door was shut, ho 
 might reasonably count upon a certain amount of privacy ; 
 the utmost his neighbours could do was to make a noise over- 
 head or by his side. At the " Childebert " such privacy was 
 out of the question. There was not a door that held on its 
 hinges, not a window that could be opened or shut at will, 
 not a ceiling that did not threaten constantly to crush you 
 beneath its weight, not a floor that was not in danger of giv- 
 ing way beneath you and lauding you in the room below, not 
 a staircase that did not shake under your very steps, however 
 light they might be; in short, the place was a wonderful 
 illustration of " how the rotten may hold together," even if it 
 be not gently handled. 
 
 The origin of the structure, as it stood then, was wrapt in 
 mystery. It was five or six stories high, and must have at- 
 tained that altitude before the first Revolution, because the 
 owner, a Madame Legendre, who bought it for assignats 
 amounting in real value to about one pound sterling, when 
 the clergy's property was sold by the nation, was known 
 never to have spent a penny upon it either at the time of the 
 purchase or subsequently, until she was forced by a tenant 
 more ingenious or more desperate than the rest. That it 
 could not have been part of the abbey and adjacent monas- 
 tery built by Childebert I., who was buried there in 558, was 
 very certain. It is equally improbable that the Cardinal de 
 Bissy, who opened a street upon the site of the erstwhile 
 abbey in the year of Louis XIV.'s death, would have erected 
 so high a pile for the mere accommodation of the pensioners 
 of the former monastery, at a time when high piles were the 
 exception. Besides, the Nos. I and 3, known to have been 
 occupied by those pensioners, all of whose rooms communi- 
 cated with one another, were not more than two stories high. 
 In short, the original intention of the builder of the house 
 No. 9, yclept " La Childebert," has never been explained.
 
 8 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 The only tenant in the Kue Childebert who might have 
 thrown a light on the subject had died before the caravansary 
 attained its fame. He was more than a hundred years old, 
 and had married five times. His fifth wife was only eighteen 
 when she became Madame Chanfort, and survived him for 
 many, many years. She was a very worthy soul, a downright 
 providence to the generally impecunious painters, whom she 
 used to feed at prices which even then were ridiculously low. 
 Three eggs, albeit fried in grease instead of butter, for the 
 sum of three-half-pence, and a dinner, including wine, for 
 sixpence, could not have left much profit ; but Madame 
 Chanfort always declared that she had enough to live upon, 
 and that she supplied the art-students with food at cost price 
 because she would not be without their company. At her 
 death, in '57, two years before the " Childebert " and the 
 street of the same name disappeared, there was a sale of her 
 chattels, and over a hundred portraits and sketches of her, 
 " in her habit as she lived," came under the hammer. To 
 show that the various occupants of " La Childebert " could 
 do more than make a noise and play practical jokes, I may 
 state that not a single one of these productions fetched less 
 than fifty francs mere crayon studies ; while there were sev- 
 eral that sold for two hundred and three hundred francs, and 
 two studies in oil brought respectively eight hundred francs 
 and twelve hundred francs. Nearly every one of the young 
 men who had signed these portraits had made a name for him- 
 self. The latter two were signed respectively Paul Delaroche 
 and Tony Johannot. 
 
 Nevertheless, to those whose love of peace and quietude 
 was stronger than their artistic instincts and watchful admi- 
 ration of budding genius, the neighbourhood of " La Childe- 
 bert " was a sore and grievous trial. At times the street itself, 
 not a very long or wide one, was like Pandemonium let loose ; 
 it was when there was an " At Home " at " La Childebert," 
 and such functions were frequent, especially at the beginning 
 of the months. These gatherings, as a rule, partook of the 
 nature of fancy dress conversaziones ; for dancing, owing to 
 the shakiness of the building, had become out of the ques- 
 tion, even with such dare-devils as the tenants. What the 
 latter prided themselves upon most was their strict adherence 
 to the local colour of the periods they preferred to resuscitate. 
 Unfortunately for the tranquillity of the neighbourhood, they 
 pretended to carry out this revival in its smallest details, not
 
 THE CHILDBBERTIANS AT HOME. 9 
 
 only in their artistic productions, but in their daily lives. 
 The actor who blacked himself all over to play Othello was 
 as nothing to them in his attempted realism, because we may 
 suppose that he got rid of his paint before returning to the 
 everyday world. Not so the inmates of " La Childebert." 
 They were minstrels, or corsairs, or proud and valiant knights 
 from the moment they got up till the moment they went to 
 bed, and many of them even scorned to stretch their weary 
 limbs on so effeminate a contrivance as a modern mattress, 
 but endeavoured to keep up the illusion by lying on a rush- 
 bestrewn floor. 
 
 I am not sufficiently learned to trace these various and 
 succeeding disguises to their literary and theatrical causes, 
 for it was generally a new book or a new play that set the 
 ball rolling in * certain direction ; nor can 1 vouch for the 
 chronological accuracy and completeness of my record in 
 that respect, but I remember some phases of that ever-shift- 
 ing masquerade. When I was a very little boy, I was struck 
 more than once with the sight of young men parading the 
 streets in doublets, trunk hose, their flowing locks adorned 
 with velvet caps and birds' wings, their loins girded with 
 short swords. And yet it was not carnival time. No one 
 seemed to take particular notice of them ; the Parisians by 
 that time had probably got used to their vagaries. Those 
 competent in such matters have since told me that the " get- 
 up " was inspired by " La Gaule Poetique " of M. de Mar- 
 changy, the novels of M. d'Arlincourt, and the kindred stilt- 
 ed literature that characterized the beginning of the Restora- 
 tion. Both these gentlemen, from their very hatred of the 
 Greeks and Romans of the first Empire, created heroes of 
 fiction still more ridiculous than the latter, just as Metter- 
 nich, through his weariness of the word " fraternity," said 
 that if he had a brother he would call him " cousin." A few 
 years later, the first translation of Byron's works produced 
 its effect ; and then came Defauconpret, with his very credit- 
 able French versions of Walter Scott. The influence of Paul 
 Delaroche and his co-champions of the cause of romanticism, 
 the revolution of July, the dramas of Alexandre Dumas and 
 Victor Hugo, all added their quota to the prevailing confu- 
 sion in the matter of style and period, and early in the forties 
 there were at the " Childebert " several camps, fraternizing 
 in everything save in their dress and speech, which were the 
 visible and audible manifestation of their individual predi-
 
 10 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 lection for certain periods of history. For instance, it was 
 no uncommon thing to hear the son of a concierge, whose 
 real or fancied vocation had made him embrace the artistic 
 profession, swear by " the faith of his ancestors," while the 
 impoverished scion of a noble house replied by calling him 
 "a bloated reminiscence of a feudal and superstitious age." 
 
 At the conversaziones which I mentioned just now, the 
 guests of the inmates of " La Childebert " not only managed 
 to out-Herod Herod in diction and attire, but, to heighten 
 illusion still further, adopted as far as possible the mode of 
 conveyance supposed to have been employed by their proto- 
 types. The classicists, and those still addicted to the illus- 
 tration of Greek and Roman mythology, though nominally 
 in the minority at the " Childebert " itself, were, as a rule, 
 most successful in those attempts. The ass that had borne 
 Silenus, the steeds that had drawn the chariot of the tri- 
 umphant Roman warrior, the she-goat that was supposed to 
 have suckled Jupiter, were as familiar to the inhabitants of 
 the Rue Childebert as the cats and mongrels of their own 
 households. The obstructions caused by the former no longer 
 aroused their ire ; but when, one evening, Romulus and Re- 
 mus made their appearance, accompanied by the legendary 
 she-wolf, they went mad with terror. The panic was at its 
 height when, with an utter disregard of mythological tradi- 
 tion, Hercules walked up the street, leading the Nemsean 
 lion. Then the aid of the police was invoked ; but neither 
 the police nor the national guards, who came after them, 
 dared to tackle the animals, though they might have done 
 so safely, because the supposed wolf was a great dane, and 
 the lion a mastiff, but so marvellously padded and painted 
 as to deceive any but the most practised eye. The culprits, 
 however, did not reveal the secret until they were at the 
 commissary of police's office, enjoying the magnificent treat 
 of setting the whole of the neighbourhood in an uproar on 
 their journey thither, and of frightening that official on their 
 arrival. 
 
 In fact, long before I knew them, the inmates of the 
 " Childebert " had become a positive scourge to the neigh- 
 bourhood, while the structure itself threatened ruin to every- 
 thing around it. Madame Legendre absolutely refused to 
 do any repairs. She did not deny that she had bought the 
 place cheap, but she pointed out at the same time that the 
 rents she charged were more than modest, and that eight
 
 THE PROPRIETRESS OF "LA CHILDEBERT."- H 
 
 times out of ten she did not get them. In the beginning of 
 her ownership she had employed a male concierge, to pre- 
 vent, as it were, the wholesale flitting which was sure to fol- 
 low a more strenuous application for arrears upon which she 
 ventured now and then in those days. That was towards 
 the end of the Empire, when the disciples of David had been 
 reduced to a minority in the place by those of Lethiere, who 
 sounded the first note of revolt against the unconditional 
 classicism of the illustrious member of the Convention. If 
 all the disciples of the Creole painter had not his genius, 
 most of them had his courage and readiness to draw the 
 sword on the smallest provocation,* and the various Cerberi 
 employed by Madame Legendre to enforce her claims had to 
 fly one after another. The rumour of the danger of the situ- 
 ation had spread, and at last Madame Legendre could find 
 no man to till it, except on monetary conditions with which 
 she would not perhaps could not comply. From that day 
 forth she employed a woman, who was safe, because she had 
 been told to let " lawless impecuniosity " take its course, and 
 it was recorded that pecuniarily the proprietress was the bet- 
 ter off for this change of tactics. 
 
 I am willing to repeat that record, which, if true, did 
 credit to the head of the landlady and the hearts of her ten- 
 ants, but am compelled to supplement it by a different ver- 
 sion. When I saw the " Childebert " in '37 or '38, no man in 
 his senses would have paid rent for any one room in it on 
 the two top stories ; he might as well have lived in the streets. 
 It was an absolute case of the bottomless sedan chair in 
 which two of his fellow-porters put Pat ; " but for the hon- 
 our of the thing, he might have walked." Consequently 
 the tenants there were rarely harassed for their rent ; if they 
 paid it at all, it was so much unexpected gain. It happened, 
 however, that now and then by mistake a youngster was put 
 there who had scruples about discharging his liabilities in 
 that respect ; and one of these was Emile Lapierre, who sub- 
 sequently became a landscape-painter of note. One night, 
 after he had taken up his quarters there, the floodgates of 
 heaven opened over Paris. Lapierre woke up amidst a del- 
 
 * Guillaume Lethiere, whose real name was Guillen, was a native of Guade- 
 loupe, lie fought and seriously wounded several officers because the latter had 
 objected to "a mere dauber wearing moustaches." He was obliged to leave 
 Paris, but, thanks to the protection of Lucien Bonaparte, was appointed Direct- 
 or of the French Academie at Koine. EDITOK.
 
 12 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 uge. I need not say that there were no bells at the " Chil- 
 debert ; " nevertheless there was no fear of dying unattended, 
 provided one could shout, for there was always a party turn- 
 ing night into day, or hailing the smiling morn before turn- 
 ing in. Lapierre's shouts found a ready echo, and in a few 
 moments the old concierge was on the spot. 
 
 " Go and fetch a boat go and fetch a boat ! " yelled La- 
 pierre. " I am drowning ! " yelled Lapierre. 
 
 " There are none in the quarter," replied the old woman 
 innocently, thinking he was in earnest. 
 
 " Then go and fetch Madame Legendre, to show her the 
 pond she is letting me instead of the room for which I pay 
 
 L51 
 er. ' 
 
 " Madame would not come, not even for you, monsieur, 
 who are the only one punctual with your rent ; besides, if she 
 did come, she would have no repairs done." 
 
 " Oh, she'll have no repairs done ! We'll soon find out. 
 I think I'll make her," screamed Lapierre ; and he kept his 
 word. 
 
 It was the only instance of Madame Legendre having had 
 to capitulate, and I have alluded to it before ; it remains for 
 me to tell how it was done. 
 
 Lapierre, contrary to the precept, allowed the sun to go 
 down upon his wrath, in the hope perhaps of inducing Ma- 
 dame Legendre to change her oft- announced decision of doing 
 no repairs; but he rose betimes next morning, and when 
 there was no sign of workmen, he proceeded to carry out his 
 plan. The floors of the " Childebert " were made of brick, 
 and he simply removed three or four squares from his, after 
 which he went downstairs and recruited half a dozen water- 
 carriers, and bade them empty their full pails into the open- 
 ing he had made. I shall probably have some remarks to 
 make elsewhere about the water-supply of Paris ; at present 
 it is sufficient to say that in those days there was not a single 
 house in the capital which was not dependent upon those 
 Auvergnats who carried the commodity round in barrels on 
 carts drawn by hand or horse. These gentlemen, though as- 
 tonished at the strange task required of them, consented. In 
 less than ten minutes there was a string of water-carts sta- 
 tioned in the Eue Childebert, and in a few minutes more the 
 lower stories were simply flooded. Aime Millet, the sculptor, 
 whose room was situated immediately beneath that of La- 
 pierre, was the first victim. It was he who gave the alarm,
 
 THE PROPRIETRESS MAKES A CONCESSION. 13 
 
 but, as a matter of course, in the twinkling of an eye there 
 were one or two heads at every window, and though very 
 early, there was a stampede of very primitively clad models (?) 
 into the street, shouting and yelling out at the top of their 
 voices. Outside no one seemed to know exactly what had 
 occurred ; the prevailing impression was that the place was 
 on fire. Then Madame Legendre was sent for in hot haste. 
 By that time the truth had become known in the house. The 
 alarm had subsided, but not the noise. AVhen the report of 
 Madame Legendre's coming got wind, a deputation went to 
 the entrance of the street to welcome her. It was provided 
 with all sorts of instruments except musical ones, and the old 
 dame was conducted in state to Millet's room. The cause of 
 the mischief was soon ascertained, for the water-carriers were 
 still at work. The police had refused to interfere ; in reality, 
 they would not have been sorry to see the building come 
 down with a crash, for it was as great a source of annoyance 
 to them as to the peaceful burghers they were supposed to 
 protect. A move was made to the room above, where Lapierre 
 without a stitch of clothing stood directing the opera- 
 tions. 
 
 " What are you doing, Monsieur Lapierre ? " screeched 
 Madame Legendre. 
 
 " I am taking a bath, madame ; it is very warm. You 
 gave me one against my will the night before last ; and lest 
 I should be accused of selfishness, I am letting my neighbours 
 partake of the pleasure." 
 
 That is how Madame Legendre was compelled to repair 
 the roof of " La Childebert." 
 
 Such was the company amidst which I was introduced by 
 the son of my old tutor. Many years have passed since then, 
 during Avhich I have been thrown into the society of the great 
 and powerful ones of this world, rather through the force of 
 circumstances than owing to my own merits, but I have looked 
 in vain for the honest friendships, the disinterested actions, 
 the genuine enthusiasm for their art, underlying their devilry, 
 of which these young men were capable. The bourgeois vices, 
 in the guise of civic and domestic virtues, entered the souls of 
 Frenchmen early in the reign of Louis-Philippe, and have 
 been gnawing since, with ever-increasing force, like a cancer, 
 at everything that was noble and worthy of admiration in a 
 nation. But those vices never found their way to the hearts 
 of the inmates of " La Childebert " while they were there,
 
 14; AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 and rarely in after-life. Many attained world-wide reputa- 
 tions ; few gathered riches, even when they were as frugal as 
 the best among them Eugene Delacroix. 
 
 To have known these young men was absolutely a liberal 
 education. To the Podsnap and Philistine of no matter what 
 nationality, it seems a sad thing to have no thought for to- 
 morrow. And these youngsters had not even a thought for 
 the day. Their thoughts were for the future, when the world 
 mayhap would ring with their names ; but their physical or 
 mental hearing never strained for the ring of money. They 
 were improvident creatures, to be sure ; but how much more 
 lovable than the young painters of the present period, whose 
 ideal is a big balance at their bankers ; who would rather 
 have their names inscribed on the registers of the public debt 
 than in the golden book of art ; whose dreamt-of Eden is a 
 bijou villa in the Pare Monceaux or in the Avenue Villiers ; 
 whose providence is the richard, the parvenu, the wealthy 
 upstart, whose features they perpetuate, regardless of the per- 
 petuation of their own budding fame ! 
 
 When I began to jot down these notes, I made up my mind 
 to eschew comparisons and moralizing ; I find I have uncon- 
 sciously done both, but will endeavour not to offend again. 
 Still, I cannot help observing how the mere " moneyed no- 
 body " rushes nowadays to the eminent painter to have his 
 lineaments reproduced, when a guinea photograph would 
 serve his purpose just as well for " family use ; " for I take it 
 that no one, besides his relations and friends, cares or will 
 care to gaze upon his features. And yet our annual picture 
 exhibitions are crowded with the portraits of these nonentities. 
 They advertise themselves through the painters that transfer 
 them to canvas, and the latter are content to pocket heavy 
 fees, like the advertising agents they are. I am certain that 
 neither Holbein, Eubens, Van Dyck, Hals, nor Kembrandt 
 would have lent themselves to such transactions. When they, 
 or a Eeynolds, a Lawrence, a Gainsborough, conferred the 
 honour of their brush upon some one, it was because he or 
 she was already distinguished from his or her fellow-creat- 
 ures by beauty, social position, talents, genius, or birth ; not 
 because he or she wanted to be, or, in default of such distinc- 
 tion, wanted to attract the public notice at all costs. That, 
 I fancy, was the way in which painters of other days looked 
 upon the thing. I know it was the way in which the young 
 fellows at the " Childebert " did ; and woe to their comrade
 
 ART PATRONS AT "LA CHILDEBERT." 15 
 
 who ventured to apply in art the principle of international 
 maritime law, that " le pavilion couvre la marchandise " (the 
 flag covers the cargo) ! He was scouted and jeered at, and, 
 moreover, rarely allowed to reap the pecuniary benefit of his 
 artistic abasement. Hence the " patron for a portrait " sel- 
 dom found his way to " La Childebert." When he did, the 
 whole of the place conspired to make his life and that of his 
 would-be protege a misery. 
 
 To enumerate all the devices resorted to to make the sit- 
 tings abortive, to " distort the features that had donned the 
 bland smile of placid contentment " with the paralyzing fear 
 of some impending catastrophe, would be impossible ; the 
 mention of a few must suffice. That most frequently em- 
 ployed, and comparatively easy of execution, was the setting 
 alight of damp straw; the dense smoke penetrated every 
 nook and cranny of the crazy building, and the sitter, mad 
 with fright, rushed away. The chances were a hundred to 
 one against his ever returning. Another was the intrusion 
 of a male model offering his services as a Saint-Jerome, or a 
 female one offering hers as Godiva ; for, curious to relate, the 
 devotion of the wife of Leofric of Murcia was a favourite 
 subject with the Childebertians. As a matter of course, the 
 applicants were in the costume, or rather lack of costume, 
 appropriate to the character. The strait-laced bourgeois or 
 bourgeoise was shocked, and did not repeat the visit. The 
 cry that there was a mad dog in the house was a common one 
 on those occasions ; and at last the would-be portrait-painters 
 had to give in, and a big placard appeared on the frontis- 
 piece : " Le commerce des portraits a ete cede aux directeur 
 et membres de 1'Ecole des Beaux- Arts." 
 
 The most curious thing in connection with the " Childe- 
 bert " was that, though the place was inexpressibly ill kept, 
 it escaped the most terrible visitations of the cholera. I pre- 
 fer not to enter into details of the absolute disregard of all 
 sanitary conditions, but in warm weather the building became 
 positively uninhabitable. Long before the unsavoury spec- 
 tacle of " learned fleas " became a feature of the suburban 
 fairs, Emile Signol, who is best known as a painter of relig- 
 ious subjects, had trained a company of performers of a dif- 
 ferent kind of nocturnal pests. He averred in his opening 
 lecture that their ingenuity was too great to remain unknown, 
 and cited anecdotes fully proving his words. Certain is it 
 that they were the only enemies before which the combined
 
 16 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 forces of the Childebertians proved powerless. But even 
 under such trying circumstances the latter never lost their 
 buoyant spirits, and their retreats en masse were effected in 
 a manner the reports of which set the whole of Paris in a 
 roar. One Sunday morning, the faithful worshippers, going 
 to matins at the Church of St. Gerrnain-des-Pres, found the 
 square occupied by a troop of Bedouins, wrapt in their bur- 
 nouses, and sleeping the sleep of the just. Some had squatted 
 in corners, calmly smoking their chibouks. This was in the 
 days of the Algerian campaign, and the rumour spread like 
 wildfire that a party of Arab prisoners of war were bivouacked 
 round the church, where a special service would be given in 
 the afternoon as the first step to their conversion to Chris- 
 tianity. It being Sunday, the whole of Paris rushed to the 
 spot. The Bedouins had, however, disappeared, but a col- 
 lection was made in their behalf by several demure-looking 
 young men. The Parisians gave liberally. That night, and 
 two or' three nights after, the nocturnal pests' occupation was 
 gone, for the " Childebert " was lighted a giorno from base- 
 ment to roof, and the Childebertians held high festival. The 
 inhabitants of the streets adjacent to the Eue Childebert 
 spent as many sleepless nights, though their houses were per- 
 fectly wholesome and clean. 
 
 I had the honour to be a frequent guest at those gather- 
 ings, but I feel that a detailed description of them is beyond 
 my powers. I have already said that the craziness of the 
 structure would have rendered extremely dangerous any com- 
 bined display of choregraphic art, as practised by the Childe- 
 bertians and their friends, male and female, at the neighbour- 
 ing Grande- Chaumiere ; it did, however, not prevent a lady 
 or gentleman of the company from performing a pas seul now 
 and then. This, it must be remembered, was the pre-Rigol- 
 bochian period, before Chicard with his clialiut had been oust- 
 ed from his exalted position by the more elegant and graceful 
 evolutions of the originator of the modern cancan, the famous 
 Brididi ; when the Faubourg du Temple, the Bal du Grand 
 Saint-Martin, and " the descent of the Courtille " were pa- 
 tronized by the Paris jeunesse doree, and in their halcyon days, 
 when the habitues of the establishment of Le Pere Lahire con- 
 sidered it their greatest glory to imitate as closely as possible 
 the bacchanalian gyrations of the choregraphic autocrat on 
 the other side of the Seine. No mere description could do 
 justice to these gyrations ; only a draughtsman of the high-
 
 BOBINO AND ITS HABITUES. 17 
 
 est skill could convey an adequate idea of them. But, as a 
 rule, the soirees at the " Childebert " were not conspicuous 
 for such displays; theii programme was a more ambitious one 
 from an intellectual point of view, albeit that the programme 
 was rarely, if ever, carried out. This failure of the prear- 
 ranged proceedings mainly arose from the disinclination or 
 inability of the fairer portion of the company to play the pas- 
 sive part of listeners and spectators during the recital of an 
 unpublished poem of perhaps a thousand lines or so, though 
 the reciter was no less a personage than the author. In vain 
 did the less frivolous and male part of the audience claim " si- 
 lence for the minstrel ; " the interrupters could conceive no 
 minstrel without a guitar or some kindred instrument, least 
 of all a minstrel who merely spoke his words, and the feast 
 of reason and flow of soul came generally to an abrupt end by 
 the rising of a damsel more outspoken still than her compan- 
 ions, who proposed an adjournment to one of the adjacent 
 taverns, or to the not far distant " Grande-Chaumiere," " si 
 on continue a nous assommer avec des vers." The threat in- 
 variably produced its effect. The " minstrel " was politely 
 requested to " shut up," and Beranger, Desaugiers, or even 
 M. Scribe, took the place of the Victor Hugo in embryo until 
 the small hours of the morning ; the departure of the guests 
 being witnessed by the night-capped inhabitants of the Eue 
 Childebert from their windoAvs, amidst the comforting reflec- 
 tions that for another three weeks or so there would be peace 
 in the festive halls of that " accursed building." 
 
 My frequent visits to " La Childebert " had developed a 
 taste for the Bohemian attractions of the Quartier- Latin. I 
 was not twenty, and though I caught frequent glimpses at 
 home of some of the eminent men with whom a few years 
 later I lived on terms of friendship, I could not aspire to 
 their society then. It is doubtful whether I would have done 
 so if I could. I preferred the Theatre Bobino to the Opera 
 and the Comedie-Francaise; the Grande-Chaumiere or the 
 Chaumiere, as it was simply called to the most brilliantly 
 lighted and decorated ballroom ; a stroll with a couple of 
 young students in the gardens of the Luxembourg to a car- 
 riage-drive in the Bois de Boulogne ; a dinner for three 
 francs at Magny's, in the Rue Contrescarpe-Dauphine, or 
 even one for twenty-two sous at Viot's or Blery's, to the most 
 sumptuous repast at the Cafe Eiche or the Cafe de Paris. I 
 preferred the buttered rolls and the bowl of milk at the
 
 18 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Boulangerie Cretaine, in the Rue Dauphine, to the best sup- 
 pers at the Cafe Anglais, whither I had been taken once or 
 twice during the Carnival in short, I was very young and 
 very foolish ; since then I have often wished that, at the risk 
 of remaining very foolish for evermore, I could have pro- 
 longed my youth for another score of years. 
 
 For once in a way I have no need to be ashamed of my want 
 of memory. I could not give an account of a single piece I 
 saw during those two or three years at Bobino, but I am 
 certain that not one of the companions of my youth could. 
 It is not because the lapse of time has dimmed the recollec- 
 tion of the plots, but because there were no plots, or at any 
 rate none that we could understand, and I doubt very much 
 whether the actors and actresses were more enlightened in 
 that respect than the audience. The pieces were vaudevilles, 
 most of them, and it was sufficient for us to join in the 
 choruses of the songs, with which they were plentifully in- 
 terlarded. As for the dialogue, it might have been sparkling 
 with wit and epigram ; it was nearly always drowned by in- 
 terpolations from one side of the house or the other. "When 
 the tumult became too great, the curtain was simply lowered, 
 to be almost immediately raised, " discovering " the manager 
 in his dressing-gown. He seemed prouder of that piece of 
 attire than the more modern one would be of the most fault- 
 less evening dress. He never appealed to us by invoking the 
 laws of politeness; he never threatened to have the house 
 cleared. He simply pointed out to us that the police would 
 inevitably close the place at the request of the inhabitants of 
 the Rue de Madame if the noise rose above a certain pitch, 
 and disturbed their peaceful evening hours, spent in the 
 bosom of their families ; which remark was always followed 
 by the audience intoning as one man Gretry's " Ou peut-on 
 4tre mieux qu'au sein de sa famille?" the orchestra such 
 an orchestra ! playing the accompaniment, and the mana- 
 ger himself beating time. Then he went on. " Yes, messieurs 
 et mesdames, we are here en famille also, as much en famille 
 as at the Grande-Chaumiere ; and has not M. Lahire ob- 
 tained from the Government the permission de faire sa police 
 tout seul ! After all, he is providing exercise for your mus- 
 cles ; I am providing food for your brain." 
 
 The speech was a stereotyped one we all knew it by 
 heart ; it invariably produced its effect in keeping us com- 
 paratively quiet for the rest of the evening, unless a bour-
 
 COLLEGIANS AND THEIR DRESS. 19 
 
 geois happened to come in. Then the uproar became un- 
 controllable ; no managerial speech could quell it until the 
 intruder had left the theatre. 
 
 By a bourgeois was meant a man who wore broadcloth 
 and a top hat, but especially the latter. In fact, that head- 
 gear was rarely seen within the inner precincts of the Quartier- 
 Latin, even during the daytime, except on the head of a 
 professor, or on Thursdays when the collegians the term 
 "lyceen" was not invented were taken for their weekly 
 outing. The semi-military dress of the present time had not 
 been thought of then. The collegian wore a top hat, like 
 our Eton boys, a white necktie, a kind of black quaker coat 
 with a stand-up collar, a very dark blue waistcoat and trousers, 
 low shoes, and blue woollen stockings. In the summer, some 
 of them, especially those of the College Eollin, had a waist- 
 coat and trousers of a lighter texture, and drab instead of 
 blue. They were virtually prisoners within the walls of the 
 college all the week, for in their Thursday promenades they 
 were little more than prisoners taking exercise under the 
 supervision of their gaolers. They were allowed to leave on 
 alternate Sundays, provided they had parents, relations, or 
 friends in Paris, who could come themselves or send their 
 servants to fetch them in the morning and take them back at 
 night. The rule applied to all, whether they were nine or 
 double that number of years ; it prevails even now. I only 
 set foot in a French college of those days twice to see a young 
 friend of mine, and I thanked my stars that four or five years 
 of that existence had been spared to me. The food and the 
 table appointments, the bedrooms they were more like cells 
 with their barred windows would have been declined by the 
 meanest English servant, certainly by the meanest French 
 one. I have never met with a Frenchman who looks back 
 with fond remembrance on his school-days. 
 
 The evening was generally wound up with a supper at 
 Dagneaux's, Pinson's, or at the rotisseuse that is, if the 
 evening happened to fall within the first ten days of the 
 month ; afterwards the entertainment nearly always consisted 
 of a meat-pie, bought at one of the charcutiers', and washed 
 down with the bottles of wine purchased at the Hotel de 
 1'Empereur Joseph II., at the south-eastern angle of the Kue 
 de Tournon, where it stands still. The legend ran that the 
 brother of Marie Antoinette had stayed there while on a visit 
 to Paris, but it is scarcely likely that he would have done so
 
 20 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 while his sister was within a step of the throne of France ; 
 nevertheless the Count von Falkenstein which was the name 
 he adopted when travelling incognito was somewhat of a 
 philosopher. Did not he once pay a visit to Jean-Jacques 
 Kousseau without having apprised him of his call? Jean- 
 Jacques was copying music as the door opened to let in the 
 visitor, and felt nattered enough, we may be sure ; not so 
 Butfon, whom Joseph surprised under similar circumstances, 
 and who could never forgive himself for having been caught 
 in his dressing-gown he who never sat down to work except 
 in lace ruffles and frill. 
 
 If I have been unwittingly betrayed into a semi-historical 
 disquisition, it is because almost every step in that quarter 
 gave rise to one, even amongst those light-hearted companions 
 of mine, to the great astonishment of the fairer portion of 
 the company. They only took an interest in the biography 
 of one of the inhabitants of the street, whether past or 
 present, and that was in the biography of Mdlle. Lenormand, 
 a well-known fortune-teller, who lived at No. 5. They had 
 heard that the old woman, who had been the mistress of 
 Hebert of "Pere Duchesne" fame, had, during the First 
 Revolution, predicted to Josephine de Beauharnais that she 
 should be empress, as some gipsy at Grenada predicted a 
 similar elevation to Eugenie de Montijo many years after- 
 wards. Mdlle. Lenormand had been imprisoned after 
 Hebert's death, but the moment Napoleon became first 
 consul she was liberated, and frequently sent for to the Lux- 
 embourg, which is but a stone's throw frojn the Eue de 
 Tournon. As a matter of course her fame spread, and she 
 made a great deal of money during the first empire. Igno- 
 rant as they were of history, the sprightly grisettes of our 
 days had heard of that ; their great ambition was to get the 
 five francs that would open the door of Mdlle. Lenormand 's 
 to them. Mdlle. Lenormand died about the year '43. Jules 
 Janin, who lived in the same street, in the house formerly 
 inhabited by Theroigne de Mericourt, went to the fortune- 
 teller's funeral. The five francs so often claimed by the 
 etudiante^ so rarely forthcoming from the pockets of her 
 admirer, was an important sum in those days among the 
 youth of the Quartier-Latin. There were few whose allow- 
 ance exceeded two hundred francs per month. A great 
 many had to do with less. Those who were in receipt of five 
 hundred francs perhaps not two score among the whole
 
 RURAL EXCURSIONS. 21 
 
 number were scarcely considered as belonging to the fra- 
 ternity. They were called " ultrapontins," to distinguish 
 them from those who from one year's end to another never 
 crossed the river, except perhaps to go to one of the theatres, 
 because there was not much to be seen at the Odeou during 
 the thirties. With Harel's migration to the Porte St. Martin, 
 the glory of the second Theatre-Fra^ais had departed, and 
 it was not until '41 that Lireux managed to revive some 
 of its ancient fame. By that time I had ceased to go to the 
 Quartier-Latin, but Lireux was a familiar figure at the Cafe 
 Riche and at the divan of the Rue Le Peletier ; he dined now 
 and then at the Cafe de Paris. So we made it a point to 
 attend every one of his first nights, notwithstanding the 
 warnings in verse and in prose of every wit of Paris, Theo- 
 phile Gautier included, who had written : 
 
 " On a fait la dessus mille plaisanteries, 
 Je le sais ; il poussait de 1'herbe aux galeries ; 
 Trente-six varietes de champignons malsains 
 Dans les loges tigraient la mousse des coussins." 
 
 It was impossible to say anything very spiteful of a thea- 
 tre which had remained almost empty during a gratuitous 
 performance on the king's birthday; consequently while I 
 frequented the Quartier-Latin the students gave it a wide 
 berth. When they were not disporting themselves at Bobino, 
 they were at the Chaumiere, and not in the evening only. 
 Notwithstanding the enthusiastic and glowing descriptions 
 of it that have appeared in later days, the place was simple 
 enough. There was a primitive shooting-gallery, a skittle- 
 alley, and so forth, and it was open all day. The students, 
 after having attended the lectures and taken a stroll in the 
 gardens of the Luxembourg, repaired to the Chaumiere, 
 where, in fine weather, they were sure to find their " lady- 
 loves " sitting at work demurely under the trees. The re- 
 freshments were cheap, and one spent one's time until the 
 dinner hour, chatting, singing, or strolling about. The stu- 
 dents were very clannish, and invariably remained in their 
 own sets at the Chaumiere. There were tables exclusively 
 occupied by Bourguignons, Angevins, etc. In fact, life was 
 altogether much simpler and more individual than it became 
 later on. 
 
 One of our great treats was an excursion to the establish- 
 ment of Le Pere Bonvin, where the student of to-day would
 
 22 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 not condescend to sit down, albeit that the food he gets in 
 more showy places is not half as good and three times as dear. 
 Le Pere Bonvin was popularly supposed to be in the country, 
 though it was not more than a mile from the Barriere Mont- 
 parnasse. The " country " was represented by one or two 
 large but straggling plots of erstwhile grazing-lands, but at 
 that time dotted with chalk-pits, tumble-down wooden 
 shanties, etc. Such trees as the tract of " country " could 
 boast were on the demesne of Pere Bonvin, but they evi- 
 dently felt out of their element, and looked the reverse of 
 nourishing. The house of Pere Bonvin was scarcely distin- 
 guished in colour and rickettiness from the neighbouring 
 constructions, but it was built of stone, and had two stories. 
 The fare was homely and genuine, the latter quality being no 
 small recommendation to an establishment where the pro- 
 lific " bunny " was the usual plat de resistance. For sophis- 
 tication, where the rabbit was concerned, was part of the 
 suburban traiteur's creed from time immemorial, and the fact 
 of the former's head being visible in the dish was no guaran- 
 tee as to that and the body by its side having formed one 
 whole in the flesh. The ubiquitous collector of rags and 
 bottles and rabbits' skins was always anxiously inquiring for 
 the heads also, and the natural conclusion was that, thanks 
 to the latter, stewed grimalkin passed muster as gibelotte. 
 At Pere Bonvin's no such suspicion could be entertained for 
 one moment ; the visitor was admitted to inspect his dinner 
 while alive. Pere Bonvin was essentially an honest man, 
 and a character in his way. During the daytime he exer- 
 cised the functions of garde-champetre ; at night he became 
 the restaurateur. 
 
 In those days both his sons, Franqois and Leon, were 
 still at home, but the former had apparently already made 
 up his mind not to follow in his sire's footsteps. He was a 
 compositor by trade, but the walls of the various rooms 
 showed plainly enough that he did not aim at the fame of 
 an Aldine or an Elzevir, but at that of a Jan Steen or a 
 Gerard Dow. He has fully maintained the promise given 
 then. His pictures rank high in the modern French school ; 
 there are few of his contemporaries who have so thoroughly 
 caught the spirit of the Dutch masters. Leon was a mere 
 lad, but a good many among the habitues of Pere Bonvin 
 predicted a more glorious career for him than for his brother. 
 The word " heaven-born musician " has been often misap-
 
 PERE BONVIN'S. 23 
 
 plied ; in Leon's instance it was fully justified. The predic- 
 tions, however, were not realized. Whether from lack of con- 
 fidence in his own powers, or deterred by the never-ceasing 
 remonstrances of his father, Leon, unlike Franqois, did not 
 strike out for himself, but continued to assist in the business, 
 only turning to his harmonium in his spare time, or towards 
 the end of the evening, when all distinction between guests 
 and hosts ceased to exist, and the whole made a very happy 
 family. He married early. I lost sight of him altogether, 
 until about '64 I heard of his tragic end. He had committed 
 suicide.
 
 24 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 My introduction to the celebrities of the day The Cafe de Paris The old 
 Prince Demidort The old man's mania His sons The furniture and at- 
 tendance at the Cafe do Paris Its high prices A mot of Alfred de Musset 
 The cuisine A rebuke of the proprietor to Balzac A version by one of 
 liis predecessors of the cause of Vatel's suicide Some of the habitues 
 Their intercourse with the attendants Their courteous behaviour towards 
 one another Le veau a la casserole What Alfred de Musset, Balzac, and 
 Alexandre Dumas thought of it A silhouette of Alfred de Musset His 
 brother Paul on his election as a member of the Academic A silhouette 
 of Balzac, between sunset and sunrise A curious action against the pub- 
 lishers of an almanack A full-length portrait of Balzac His pecuniary 
 embarrassments His visions of wealth and speculations His constant 
 neglect of his duties as a National Guard His troubles in consequence 
 thereof L 'Hotel des Haricots Some of his fellow-prisoners Adam, the 
 composer of " Le Postilion de Loujumenu " Eugene Sue ; his portrait 
 His dandyism The origin of the Paris Jockey Club Eugene Sue becomes 
 a member The success of " Les Mysteres de Paris" The origin of "Le 
 Juif-Errant" Sue makes himself objectionable to the members of the 
 Jockey Club His name struck off the list His decline and disappearance. 
 
 IF these notes are ever published, the reader will gather 
 from the foregoing that, unlike many Englishmen brought 
 up in Paris, I was allowed from a very early age to mix with 
 all sorts and conditions of men. As I intend to say as little 
 as possible about myself, there is no necessity to reveal the 
 reason of this early emancipation from all restraint, which 
 resulted in my being on familiar terms with a great many 
 celebrities before I had reached my twenty-first year. I had 
 no claim on their goodwill beyond my admiration of their 
 talents and the fact of being decently connected. The con- 
 stant companion of my youth was hand and glove with some 
 of the highest in the land, and, if the truth must be told, 
 with a good many of the lowest ; but the man who was seated 
 at the table of Lord Palmerston at the Cafe de Paris at 
 8 p.m., could afford de s'encanailler at 2 a.m. next morning 
 without jeopardizing his social status. 
 
 The Cafe de Paris in those days was probably not only 
 the best restaurant in Paris, but the best in Europe. Com- 
 pared to the "Freres Proven9aux" Vefour and Very, the
 
 THE CAPE DE PARIS. 25 
 
 Cafe de Paris was young ; it was only opened on July 15, 
 1822, in the vast suite of apartments at the corner of the 
 Eue Taitbout and Boulevard de Italiens, formerly occupied 
 by Prince Demidoff, whose grandson was a prominent figure 
 in the society of the Second Empire, and whom I knew per- 
 sonally. The grandfather died before I was born, or, at any 
 rate, when I was very young ; but his descendant often told 
 me about him and his two sons, Paul and Anatole, both of 
 whom, in addition to his vast wealth, inherited a good many 
 of his eccentricities. The old man, like many Eussian grand 
 seigneurs, was never so happy as when he could turn his back 
 upon his own country. He inhabited Paris and Florence in 
 turns. In the latter place he kept in his pay a company of 
 French actors, who were lodged in a magnificent mansion 
 near to his own, and who enacted comedies, vaudevilles, and 
 comic operas. The London playgoer may remember a piece 
 in which the celebrated Ravel made a great sensation ; it was 
 entitled " Les Folies Dramatiques," and was founded upon 
 the mania of the old man. For he was old before his time 
 and racked with gout, scarcely able to set his feet to the 
 ground. He had to be wheeled in a chair to his entertain- 
 ments and theatre, and often fell into a dead faint in the 
 middle of the performance or during the dinner. " It made 
 no difference to his guests," said his grandson ; " they 
 wheeled him out as they had wheeled him in, and the play 
 or repast went on as if nothing had happened." In fact, it 
 would seem that the prince would have been very angry if 
 they had acted otherwise, for his motto was that, next to 
 enjoying himself, there was nothing so comfortable as to see 
 others do so. Faithful to this principle, he always kept some 
 one near, whose mission it was to enjoy himself at his ex- 
 pense. He was under no obligation whatsoever, except to 
 give an account of his amusements, most frequently in the 
 dead of the night, when he got home, because the old prince 
 suffered from insomnia ; he would have given the whole of 
 his vast possessions for six hours' unbroken slumber. 
 
 I have an idea that the three generations of these Demi- 
 doffs were as mad as March hares, though I am bound to say, 
 at the same time, that the form this madness took hurt no 
 one. Personally, I only knew Prince Anatole, the second son 
 of the old man, and Paul, the latter's nephew. Paul's father, 
 of the same name, died almost immediately after his son's 
 birth. He had a mania for travelling, and rarely stayed in 
 2
 
 26 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the same spot for forty-eight hours. He was always accom- 
 panied by a numerous suite and preceded by a couple of 
 couriers, who, nine times out of ten, had orders to engage 
 every room in the hotel for him. Being very rich and as 
 lavish as he was wealthy, few hotel proprietors scrupled to 
 turn out the whole of their guests at his steward's bidding 
 and at a moment's notice. Of course, people refused to put 
 up with such cavalier treatment ; but as remonstrance was of 
 no avail, they often brought actions for damages, which they 
 invariably gained, and were promptly settled by Boniface, 
 who merely added them to Prince Paul's bill. The most 
 comical part of the business, however, was that the prince as 
 often as not changed his mind on arriving at the hotel, and 
 without as much as alighting, continued his journey. The 
 bill was never disputed. Another of his manias was that his 
 wife should wash her hands each time she touched a metal 
 object. For a while Princess Demidoff humoured her hus- 
 band, but she found this so terribly irksome that she at last 
 decided to wear gloves, and continued to do so long after her 
 widowhood. 
 
 It must be obvious to the reader that this digression has 
 little or no raison d'etre, even in notes that do not profess to 
 tell a succinct story ; but my purpose was to a certain extent 
 to vindicate the character of one of the most charming women 
 of her time, who had the misfortune to marry what was un- 
 doubtedly the most eccentric member of the family. I am 
 referring to Princess Anatole Demidoff, nee Bonaparte, the 
 daughter of Jerome, and the sister of Plon-Plon. 
 
 To return to the Cafe de Paris and its habitues. First of 
 all, the place itself was unlike any other restaurant of that 
 day, even unlike its neighbour and rival, the Cafe Hardi, at 
 the corner of the Rue Laffitte, on the site of the present 
 Maison d'Or. There was no undue display of white and 
 gold ; and " the epicure was not constantly reminded that, 
 when in the act of eating, he was not much superior to the 
 rest of humanity," as Lord Palmerston put it when com- 
 menting upon the welcome absence of mirrors. The rooms 
 might have been transformed at a moment's notice into pri- 
 vate apartments for a very fastidious, refined family ; for, in 
 addition to the tasteful and costly furniture, it was the only 
 establishment of its kind in Paris that was carpeted through- 
 out, instead of having merely sanded or even polished floors, 
 as was the case even in some of the best Paris restaurants as
 
 A DISSERTATION ON RESTAURANTS. 7 
 
 late as five and six years ago (I mean in the seventies) Big- 
 non, the Cafe Foy, and the Lion d'Or, in the Rue du Helder, 
 excepted. The attendance was in every respect in thorough 
 keeping with the grand air of the place, and, albeit that 
 neither of the three or four succeeding proprietors made a 
 fortune, or anything approaching it, was never relaxed. 
 
 On looking over these notes, I arn afraid that the last 
 paragraph will be intelligible only to a small section of my 
 readers, consequently I venture to explain. Improved com- 
 munication has brought to Paris during the third quarter of 
 the century a great many Englishmen who, not being very 
 familiar either with French or with French customs in their 
 better aspect, have come to look upon the stir and bustle of 
 the ordinary Paris restaurant, upon the somewhat free-and- 
 easy behaviour of the waiters, upon their eccentricities of dic- 
 tion, upon their often successful attempts at " swelling " the 
 total of the dinner-bill as so much matter of course. The 
 abbreviated nomenclature the waiter employs in recapitulat- 
 ing the bill of fare to the patron is regarded by him as merely 
 a skilful handling of the tongue by the native ; the chances 
 are ten to one in favour of the patron trying to imitate the 
 same in his orders to the attendant, and deriving a certain 
 pride from being successful. The stir and bustle is attributed 
 to the more lively temperament of our neighbours, the free- 
 and-easy behaviour as a wish on the waiter's part to smooth 
 the linguistically thorny path of the benighted foreigner, the 
 attempt to multiply items as an irrepressible manifestation of 
 French greed. 
 
 Wherever these things occur, nowadays, the patron may 
 be certain that he is " in the wrong shop ; " but in the days 
 of which I treat, the wrong shop was legion, especially as far 
 as the foreigner was concerned ; the Cafe de Paris and the 
 Cafe Hardi were the notable exceptions. Truly, as Alfred de 
 Musset said of the former, " you could not open its door for 
 less than fifteen francs ; " in other words, the prices charged 
 were very high ; but they were the same for the representa- 
 tives of the nations that conquered as for those who were van- 
 quished at Waterloo. It would be more correct to say that the 
 personnel of the Cafe, from the proprietor and manager down- 
 ward, were utterly oblivious of such distinctions of nationality. 
 Every one who honoured the establishment was considered 
 by them a grand seigneur, for whom nothing could be too 
 good. I remember one day in '45 or '4G for M. Martin
 
 28 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Guepet was at the head of affairs then Balzac announcing 
 the advent of a Eussian friend, and asking Guepet to put his 
 best foot forward. "Assuredly, monsieur, we will do so," 
 was the answer, " because it is simply what we are in the 
 habit of doing every day." The retort was sharp, but abso- 
 lutely justified by facts. One was never told at the Cafe de 
 Paris that this or that dish " could not be recommended," 
 that " the fish could not be guaranteed." When the quality 
 of the latter was doubtful, it did not make its appearance on 
 the bill of fare. A propos of fish, there was a story current 
 in the Cafe de Paris which may or may not have been the 
 invention of one of the many clever literary men who fore- 
 gathered there. It was to the effect that one of Guepet's 
 predecessors Angilbert the younger, I believe had cast a 
 doubt upon the historical accuracy of the facts connected 
 with the tragic death of Vatel, the renowned chef of the 
 Prince de Conde. According to Angilbert, Vatel did not 
 throw himself upon his sword because the fish for Louis 
 XIV.'s dinner had not arrived, but because it had arrived, 
 been cooked, and was found "not to be so fresh as it might 
 be." The elimination of those dishes would have dis- 
 turbed the whole of the economy of the menu, and rather 
 than suffer such disgrace Vatel made an end of himself. 
 " For you see, monsieur," Angilbert is supposed to have 
 said, " one can very well arrange a perfect dinner without fish, 
 as long as one knows beforehand ; but one cannot modify 
 a service that has been thought out with it, when it fails at 
 a moment's notice. As every one of my chefs is a treasure, 
 who would not scruple to imitate the sacrifice of his famous 
 prototype ; and as I do not wish to expose him to such a 
 heroic but inconvenient death, we take the certain for the 
 uncertain, consequently doubtful fish means no fish." 
 
 Truth or fiction, the story accurately conveys the pride 
 of the proprietors in the unsullied gastronomic "traditions of 
 the establishment, and there is no doubt that they were ably 
 seconded in that respect by every one around them, even to 
 the clientele itself. Not a single one of the latter would have 
 called the waiters by their names, nor would these have vent- 
 ured to rehearse the names of the dishes in a kind of slang 
 or mutilated French, which is becoming more frequent day 
 by day, and which is at best but fit as a means of communi- 
 cation between waiters and scullions. Least of all, would 
 they have numbered the clients, as is done at present. A
 
 STILL THE CAFE DE PARIS. 29 
 
 gentleman sitting at table No. 5 was " the gentleman at table 
 No. 5," not merely " number five." There was little need for 
 the bellowing and shouting from one end of the room to 
 the other, because the head waiter himself had an eye every- 
 where. The word " addition," which people think it good 
 taste in the seventies and eighties to employ when asking for 
 their bills, was never heard. People did not profess to know 
 the nature of the arithmetical operation by which the total 
 of their liabilities was arrived at ; they left that to the cashier 
 and the rest of the underlings. 
 
 No coal or gas was used in the Cafe de Paris : lamps and 
 wood fires upstairs; charcoal, and only that of a peculiar 
 kind, in the kitchens, which might have been a hundred 
 miles distant, for all we knew, for neither the rattling of 
 dishes nor the smell of preparation betrayed their vicinity. 
 A charming, subdued hum of voices attested the presence of 
 two or three score of human beings attending to the inner 
 man ; the idiotic giggle, the affected little shrieks of the shop- 
 girl or housemaid promoted to be the companion of the quasi- 
 man of the world was never heard there. The cabinet par- 
 ticulier was not made a feature of the Cafe de Paris, and 
 suppers were out of the question. Now and then the frank 
 laughter of the younger members of a family party, and that 
 was all. As a rule, however, there were few strangers at the 
 Cafe de Paris, or what are called chance customers, as dis- 
 tinct from periodical ones. But there were half a score of 
 tables absolutely sacred from the invasion of no matter whom, 
 such as those of the Marquis du Hallays, Lord Seymour, the 
 Marquis de St. Cricq, M. Eomieu, Prince Rostopchine, Prince 
 Soltikoff, Dr. Veron, etc., etc. Lord Palmerston, when in 
 Paris, scarcely ever dined anywhere else than at the Cafe de 
 Paris of course I mean when dining at a public establish- 
 ment. 
 
 Almost every evening there was an interchange of dishes 
 or of wines between those tables ; for instance, Dr. Veron, of 
 whom I will have a good deal to say in these notes, and who 
 was very fond of Musigny vintage, rarely missed offering 
 some to the Marquis du Hallays, who, in his turn, sent him 
 of the finest dishes from his table. For all these men not 
 only professed to eat well, but never to suffer from indiges- 
 tion. Their gastronomy was really an art, but an art aided 
 by science which was applied to the simplest dish. One of 
 these was veau a la casserole, which figured at least three
 
 30 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 times a week on the bill of fare, and the like of which I 
 have never tasted elsewhere. Its recuperative qualities were 
 vouched for by such men as Alfred de Musset, Balzac, and 
 Alexandre Dumas. The former partook of it whenever it 
 was on the bill ; the others often came, after a spell of hard 
 work, to recruit their mental and bodily strength with it, and 
 maintained that nothing set them up so effectually. 
 
 These three men were particularly interesting to me, and 
 their names will frequently recur in these notes. I was very 
 young, and, though perhaps not so enthusiastic about litera- 
 ture as I was about painting and sculpture, it would indeed 
 have been surprising if I had remained indifferent to the 
 fascination experienced by almost every one in their society : 
 for let me state at once that the great poet, the great play- 
 wright, and the great novelist were even something more than 
 men of genius ; they were men of the world, and gentlemen 
 who thought it worth their while to be agreeable compan- 
 ions. Unlike Victor Hugo, Lamartine, Chateaubriand, and 
 Eugene Sue, all of whom I knew about the same time, they 
 did not deem it necessary to stand mentally aloof from ordi- 
 nary mortals. Alfred de Musset and Alexandre Dumas 
 were both very handsome, but each in a different way. With 
 his tall, slim figure, auburn wavy hair and beard, blue eyes, 
 and finely-shaped mouth and nose, De Musset gave one the 
 impression of a dandy cavalry officer in mufti, rather than of 
 a poet : the " Miss Byron " which Preault the sculptor ap- 
 plied to him was, perhaps, not altogether undeserved, if 
 judged intellectually and physically at first sight. There 
 was a feminine grace about all his movements. The " Con- 
 fessions d'un Enfant du Siecle," his play, " Frederic and 
 Bernerette," were apt to stir the heart of women rather than 
 that of men ; but was it not perhaps because the majority of 
 the strong sex cannot be stirred except with a pole ? And 
 the poet who was so sensitive to everything rough as to leave 
 invariably the coppers given to him in exchange, was un- 
 likely to take voluntarily to such an unwieldy and clumsy 
 instrument to produce his effects.* 
 
 * This reluctance to handle coppers proved a sore grief to his more econom- 
 ical and less fastidious brother Paul, who watched like a guardian angel over 
 his junior, whom he worshipped. It is on record that he only said a harsh 
 word to him once in his life, namely, when they wanted to make him, Paul, a 
 member of the Academic Francaise. " C'est bien assez d'un immortel dans la 
 famille," he replied to those who counselled him to stand. Then, turning to
 
 WALKS BEFORE SUNRISE. 31 
 
 Throughout these notes, I intend to abstain carefully 
 from literary judgments. I am not competent to enter into 
 them ; but, if I were, I should still be reluctant to do so in 
 the case of Alfred de Musset, who, to my knowledge, never 
 questioned the talent of any one. De Musset improved upon 
 better acquaintance. He was apt to strike one at first as 
 distant and supercilious. He was neither the one nor the 
 other, simply very reserved, and at the best of times very 
 sad, not to say melancholy. It was not affectation, as has 
 been said so often ; it was his nature. The charge of super- 
 ciliousness arose from his distressing short-sightedness, which 
 compelled him to stare very hard at people without the least 
 intention of being offensive. 
 
 I have said that Balzac often came, after a spell of hard 
 work, to recruit his forces with the veau a la casserole of the 
 Cafe de Paris ; I should have added that this was generally 
 in the autumn and winter, for, at the end of the spring and 
 during the summer, the dinner hour, seven, found Balzac 
 still a prisoner at home. Few of his acquaintances and 
 friends ever caught sight of him, they were often in total 
 ignorance of his whereabouts, and such news as reached 
 them generally came through Joseph Mery, the poet and 
 novelist, the only one who came across him during those 
 periods of eclipse. Mery was an inveterate gambler, and 
 spent night after night at the card-table. He rarely left it 
 before daybreak. His way lay past the Cafe de Paris, and 
 for four consecutive mornings he had met Balzac strolling 
 leisurely up and down, dressed in a pan talon a pieds (trousers 
 not terminating below the ankle, but with feet in them like 
 stockings), and frock coat with velvet facings. The second 
 morning, Mery felt surprised at the coincidence ; the third, 
 he was puzzled ; the fourth, he could hold out no longer, 
 and asked Balzac the reason of these nocturnal perambula- 
 tions round about the same spot. Balzac put his hand in 
 his pocket and produced an almanack, showing that the sun 
 did not rise before 3.40. " I am being tracked by the officers 
 
 his brother, " Jc ne comprends pas pourquoi tu t'es fourre 1 dans cette galere, si 
 clle cst assez grande pour moi, tu dois y etre joliment a l'4troit." It is difficult 
 to imagine a greater instance of brotherly pride and admiration, because Paul 
 de Musset was by no means a nonentity, only from a very early age he had al- 
 ways merged his individuality in that of Alfred. To some one who once re- 
 marked upon this in my hearing, he answered, " Quo voulez-vous ? c'cst comme 
 cela : Alfred a eu toujours la moitie du lit, seulement la moitie etait toujours 
 prise du milieu."
 
 32 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 of the Tribunal de Commerce, and obliged to hide myself 
 during ttie day ; but at this hour I am free, and can take a 
 walk, for as long as the sun is not up they cannot arrest 
 me." 
 
 I remember having read that Ouvrard, the great army 
 contractor, had done the same for many years ; nevertheless, 
 he was arrested one day, the authorities proved that the al- 
 manack was wrong, that the sun rose ten minutes earlier 
 than was stated therein. He brought an action against the 
 compiler and publishers. They had to pay him damages. 
 
 Though literary remuneration was not in those days what 
 it became later on, it was sufficiently large to make it diffi- 
 cult to explain the chronic impecuniosity of Balzac, though 
 not that of Dumas. They were not gamblers, and had not 
 the terrible fits of idleness or drinking which left De Musset 
 stranded every now and again. Lamartine suffered from the 
 same complaint, I mean impecuniosity. There is proof of 
 Balzac's industry and frugality in two extracts from his let- 
 ters to his mother, dated Angouleme, July, 1832, when he 
 himself was thirty-two years old, and had already written 
 half a dozen masterpieces. " Several bills are due, and, if I 
 cannot find the money for them, I will have them protested 
 and let the law take its course. It will give me breathing 
 time, and I can settle costs and all afterwards." 
 
 Meanwhile he works eight hours a day at " Louis Lam- 
 bert," one of the best things among his numberless best 
 things. His mother sends him a hundred francs, and, per- 
 haps with the same pen with which he wrote those two mar- 
 vellous chapters that stand out like a couple of priceless 
 rubies from among the mass of other jewels, he thanks her 
 and accounts for them. " For the copying of the maps, 20 
 f rs. ; for my passport, 10 frs. I owed 15 frs. for discount on 
 one of my bills, and 15 frs. on my fare. 15 frs. for flowers 
 as a birthday present. Lost at cards, 10 frs. Postage and 
 servant's tips, 15 frs. Total, 100 frs." 
 
 But these ten francs have not been lost at one fell swoop ; 
 they represent his bad luck at the gaming fable during the 
 whole month of his stay at Angouleme, at the house of his 
 friend and sister's schoolfellow, Madame Zulma Carraud, 
 hence, something like seven sous (3%d.) per day : for which 
 extravagance he makes up, on his return to Paris, by plung- 
 ing into work harder than ever. He goes to roost at 7 p.m., 
 " like the fowls ; " and he is called at 1 a.m., when he writes
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC. 33 
 
 until 8 a.m. He takes another hour and a half of sleep, and, 
 after partaking of a light meal, " gets into his collar " until 
 four in the afternoon. After that, he receives a few friends, 
 takes a bath, or goes out, and immediately he has swallowed 
 his dinner he " turns in," as stated above. " I shall be com- 
 pelled to lead this nigger's life for a few months Avithout 
 stopping, in order not to be swamped by those terrible bills 
 that are due." 
 
 These extracts are not personal recollections. I have in- 
 serted them to make good my statement that Balzac was 
 neither a gambler, a drunkard, nor an idler. 
 
 " How does he spend his money ? " I asked Mery, when 
 he had told us of his fourth meeting with Balzac on that 
 very morning. 
 
 " In sops to his imagination, in balloons to the land of 
 dreams, which balloons he constructs with his hard- won 
 earnings and inflates with the essence of his visions, but 
 which nevertheless will not rise three feet from the earth," 
 he answered. Then he went on explaining : '' Balzac is 
 firmly convinced that every one of his characters has had, or 
 has still, its counterpart in real life, notably the characters 
 that have risen from humble beginnings to great wealth ; 
 and he thinks that, having worked out the secret of their 
 success on paper, he can put it in practice. He embarks on 
 the most harum-scarum speculations without the slightest 
 practical knowledge; as, for instance, when he drew the 
 plans for his country-house at the Jardies (Ville d'Avray), 
 and insisted upon the builder carrying them out in every re- 
 spect while he was away. When the place was finished there 
 was not a single staircase. Of course, they had to put them 
 outside, and he maintained that it was part of his original 
 plan ; but he had never given a thought to the means of 
 ascent. But here is Monsieur Louis Lurine. If you would 
 like an idea of Balzac's impracticability, let him tell you what 
 occurred between Balzac and Kugelmann a few months ago." 
 
 Kugelmann was at that time publishing a very beautifully 
 illustrated work, entitled " Les Kues de Paris," which Louis 
 Lurine was editing. We were standing outside the Cafe 
 Eiche, and I knew Lurine by sight. Mery introduced me to 
 him. After a few preliminary remarks, Lurine told us the 
 following story. Of course, many years have elapsed since, 
 but I think I can trust to my memory in this instance. 
 
 " I had suggested," said Lurine, " that Balzac should do
 
 34 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the Rue de Richelieu, and we sent for him. I did not want 
 more than half a sheet, so imagine my surprise when Balzac 
 named his conditions, viz., five thousand francs, something 
 over six hundred francs a page of about six hundred words. 
 Kugelmann began to yell; I simply smiled; seeing which, 
 Balzac said, as soberly as possible, ' You'll admit that, in 
 order to depict a landscape faithfully, one should study its 
 every detail. Well, how would you have me describe the Rue 
 de Richelieu, convey an idea of its commercial aspect, unless 
 I visit, one after the other, the various establishments it con- 
 tains ? Suppose I begin by the Boulevard des Italiens : I'd be 
 bound to take my dejeuner at the Cafe Cardinal, I would have 
 to buy a couple of scores at Brandus', a gun at the gunsmith's 
 next door, a breastpin at the next shop. Could I do less than 
 order a coat at the tailor's, a pair of boots at the bootmaker's ? ' 
 
 " I cut him short. ' Don't go any further,' I said, ' or 
 else we'll have you in at " Compagnie des Indes," and, as 
 both lace and Indian shawls have gone up in price, we'll be 
 bankrupt before we know where we are.' 
 
 " Consequently," concluded Lurine, " the thing fell 
 through, and we gave the commission to Guenot-Lacointe, 
 who has done the thing very well and has written twice the 
 pages Balzac was asked for, without buying as much as a pair 
 of gloves." 
 
 When Balzac was not being harassed by the officials of 
 the Tribunal de Commerce, he had to dodge the authorities 
 of the National Guards, who generally had a warrant against 
 him for neglect of duty. Unlike his great contemporary 
 Dumas, Balzac had an invincible repugnance to play the 
 amateur warrior a repugnance, by- the- way, to which we owe 
 one of the most masterly portraits of his wonderful gallery, 
 that of the self-satisfied, bumptious ,detestable bourgeoise, who 
 struts about in his uniform ; I am alluding to Crevel of " La 
 Cousine Bette." But civil discipline could take no cogni- 
 zance of the novelist's likes and dislikes, and, after repeated 
 " notices " and " warnings,'' left at his registered domicile, his 
 incarceration was generally decided upon. As a rule, this 
 happened about half a dozen times in a twelvemonth. 
 
 The next thing was to catch the refractory national guard, 
 which was not easy, seeing that, in order to avoid an enforced 
 sojourn at the Hotel des Haricots,* Balzac not only disap- 
 
 * The name of the military prison which was originally built on the site of
 
 BALZAC AND THE NATIONAL GUARD. 35 
 
 peared from his usual haunts, but left his regular domicile, 
 and took an apartment elsewhere under an assumed name. 
 On one occasion, at a small lodgings which he had taken near 
 his publisher, Hippolyte Souverain, under the name of Ma- 
 dame Dupont, Leon Gozlan, having found him out, sent him 
 a letter addressed to " Madame Dupont, nee Balzac." 
 
 The sergeant-major of Balzac's company had undoubtedly 
 a grudge against him. He happened to be a perfumer, and 
 ever since the publication and success of " Cesar Birotteau " 
 the Paris perfumers bore Balzac no goodwill. That particu- 
 lar one had sworn by all his essences and bottles that he would 
 lay hands on the recalcitrant private of his company in the 
 streets, for only under such conditions could he arrest him. 
 To watch at Balzac's ordinary domicile was of no use, and, 
 when he had discovered his temporary residence, he had to 
 lure him out of it, because the other was on his guard. 
 
 One morning, while the novelist was hard at work, his old 
 housekeeper, whom he always took with him, came to tell 
 him that there was a large van downstairs with a case ad- 
 dressed to him. "How did they find me out here?" ex- 
 claimed Balzac, and despatched the dame to gather further 
 particulars. In a few moments she returned. The case con- 
 tained an Etruscan vase sent from Italy, but, seeing that it had 
 been knocking about for the last three days in every quarter 
 of Paris in the carman's efforts to find out the consignee, the 
 former was anxious that M. Balzac should verify the intact 
 condition of the package before it was unloaded. Balzac fell 
 straight into the trap. Giving himself no time even to ex- 
 change his dressing-gown, or rather his monk's frock he was 
 in the habit of wearing, for a coat, or his slippers for a pair 
 of boots, he rushed downstairs, watching with a benign smile 
 the carrier handling most delicately the treasure that had 
 come to him. 
 
 " Caught at last," said a stentorian vMce behind him, and 
 dispelling the dream as its owner laid his hand on the novel- 
 ist's shoulder, while a gigantic companion planted himself 
 in front of the street door and cut off all retreat that way. 
 
 " With a refinement of cruelty, which in the eyes of pos- 
 terity will considerably diminish the glory of his victory " 
 I am quoting Balzac's own words as he related the scene to 
 
 the former College Montaigu, where the scholars were almost exclusively fed 
 on haricot beans. Throughout its removals the prison preserved its nickname. 
 EDITOR.
 
 36 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 us at the Hotel des Haricots the sergeant-major perfumer 
 would not allow his prisoner to change his clothes, and while 
 the van with the precious Etruscan vase disappeared in the 
 distance, Balzac was hustled into a cab to spend a week in 
 durance vile, where on that occasion he had the company of 
 Adolphe Adam, the composer of " Le Postilion de Lonju- 
 meau." 
 
 However, " les jours de fete etaient passes," and had been 
 for the last five years, ever since the Hotel des Haricots had 
 been transferred from the town mansion of the De Bazan- 
 courts in the Eue des Fosses-Saint-Germain to its then locale 
 near the Orleans railway station. There were no more ban- 
 quets in the refectory as there had been of yore. Each pris- 
 oner had his meals in his cell. Joseph Mery, Nestor Roque- 
 plau, and I were admitted as the clock struck two, and had 
 to leave exactly an hour afterwards. It was during this visit 
 that Balzac enacted the scene for us which I have endeavoured 
 to describe above, and reminded Mery of the last dinner he 
 had given to Dumas, Jules Sandeau, and several others in 
 the former prison, which dinner cost five hundred francs. 
 Eugene Sue, who was as unwilling as Balzac to perform his 
 civic duties, had had three of his own servants to wait upon 
 him there, and some of his plate and silver brought to his 
 cell. 
 
 Seeing that the name of the celebrated author of " Les 
 Mysteres de Paris " has presented itself in the course of these 
 notes, I may just as well have done with him, for he forms 
 part of the least agreeable of my recollections. He was also 
 an habitue of the Cafe de Paris. A great deal has been 
 written about him ; what has never been sufficiently insisted 
 upon was the inveterate snobbishness of the man. When I 
 first knew him, about '42-'43, he was already in the zenith 
 of his glory, but I had often heard others mention his name 
 before then, and never very favourably. His dandyism was 
 offensive, mainly because it did not sit naturally upon him. 
 It did not spring from an innate refinement, but from a love 
 of show, although his father, who had been known to some 
 of the son's familiars, was a worthy man, a doctor, and, it 
 appears, a very good doctor, but somewhat brusque, like our 
 own Abernethy ; still much more of a gentleman at heart 
 than the son. He did not like Eugene's extravagance, and 
 when the latter, about '24, launched out into a cabriolet, he 
 shipped him off on one of the king's vessels, as a surgeon ;
 
 THE ORIGIN OP THE FRENCH JOCKY CLUB. 37 
 
 to which fact French literature owed the first novels of the 
 future author of " Les Mysteres de Paris " and " Le Juif- 
 Errant." 
 
 But the father was gathered to his fathers, and Eugene, 
 who had never taken kindly to a seafaring life, returned to 
 Paris, to spend his inheritance and to resume his old habits, 
 which made one of his acquaintances say that " le pere and 
 le fils had both entered upon a better life." It appears that, 
 though somewhat of a poseur from the very beginning, he 
 was witty and amusing, and readily found access to the circle 
 that frequented the gardens of the Tivoli and the Cafe de 
 Paris.* They, in their turn, made him a member of the 
 Jockey Club when it was founded, which kindness they 
 unanimously regretted, as will be seen directly. 
 
 The Tivoli gardens, though utterly forgotten at present, 
 was in reality the birthplace of the French Jocky Club. 
 About the year 1833 a man named Bryon, one of whose de- 
 scendants keeps, at the hour I write, a large livery stables 
 near the Grand Cafe, opened a pigeon-shooting gallery in the 
 Tivoli ; the pigeons, from what I have heard, mainly con- 
 sisting of quails, larks, and other birds. The pigeons shot at 
 were wooden ones, poised up high in the air, but motionless, 
 as we still see them at the suburban fairs around Paris. 
 Seven years before, Bryon had started a " society of amateurs 
 of races," to whom, for a certain consideration, he let a mov- 
 able stand at private meetings, for there were no others until 
 the Society for the Encouragement of breeding French 
 Horses started operations in 1834. But the deliberations at 
 first took place at Bryon's place in the Tivoli gardens, and 
 continued there until, one day, Bryon asked the fourteen or 
 fifteen members why they should not have a locale of their 
 own ; the result was that they took modest quarters in the 
 Eue du Helder, or rather amalgamated with a small club lo- 
 cated there under the name of Le Bouge (The Den) ; for 
 Lord Seymour, the Duke de Nemours, Prince Demidoff, and 
 the rest were sufficiently clear-sighted to perceive that a 
 Jockey Club governed on the English principle was entirely 
 out of the question. That was the origin of the French 
 Jockey Club, which, after various migrations, is, at the time 
 
 * There were two Tivoli gardens, both in the same neighbourhood, the site 
 of the present Quartier de 1'Europe. The author is alluding to the second, so 
 often mentioned in the novels of Paul de Kock. EDITOR.
 
 38 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 of writing, magnificently housed in one of the palatial man- 
 sions of the Hue Scribe. As a matter of course, some of the 
 fashionable habitues of the Cafe de Paris, though not know- 
 ing a fetlock from a pastern, were but too pleased to join an 
 institution which, with the mania for everything English in 
 full swing, then conferred as it were upon its members a 
 kind of patent of " good form," and, above all, of exclusive- 
 iiess, for which some, even amidst the flesh-pots of the cele- 
 brated restaurant, longed. Because, it must be remembered, 
 though the majority of the company at the Cafe de Paris 
 were very well from the point of view of birth and social po- 
 sition, there was no possibility of excluding those who could 
 lay no claim to such distinctions, provided they had the 
 money to pay their reckoning, and most of them had more 
 than enough for that. It appears that Eugene Sue was not 
 so objectionable as he became afterwards, when the wonder- 
 ful success of his " Mysteres de Paris " and the " Juif-Errant " 
 had turned his head ; he was made an original member of 
 the club. Election on the nomination by three sponsors was 
 not necessary then. That article was not inserted in the 
 rules until two year's after the foundation of the Paris Jockey 
 Club. 
 
 Of the success attending Sue's two best-known works, I can 
 speak from personal experience ; for I was old enough to be 
 impressed by it, and foolish enough to rank him, on account 
 of it, with Balzac and Dumas, perhaps a little higher than 
 the former. After the lapse of many years, I can only con- 
 sole myself for my infatuation with the thought that thou- 
 sands, of far greater intellectual attainments than mine, were 
 in the same boat, for it must not be supposed that the furore 
 created by " Les Mysteres de Paris " was confined to one 
 class, and that class the worst educated one. While it ap- 
 peared in serial form in the Debats, one had to bespeak the 
 paper several hours beforehand, because, unless one sub- 
 scribed to it, it was impossible to get it from the news-vendors. 
 As for the reading-rooms where it was supposed to be kept, 
 the proprietors frankly laughed in your face if you happened 
 to ask for it, after you had paid your two sous admission. 
 " Monsieur is joking. "We have got five copies, and we let 
 them out at ten sous each for half an hour : that's the time it 
 takes to read M. Sue's story. We have one copy here, and if 
 monsieur likes to take his turn he may do so, though he will 
 probably have to wait for three or four hours."
 
 EUGENE SUE. 39 
 
 At last the guileless demoiselle behind the counter found 
 even a more effective way of fleecing her clients. The cabi- 
 nets de lecture altered their fees, and the two sons, which 
 until then had conferred the right of staying as long as one 
 liked, were transformed into the price of admission for one 
 hour. Each reader received a ticket on entering, stating the 
 time, and the shrewd cassiere made the round every ten min- 
 utes. I may say without exaggeration that the days on which 
 the instalment of fiction was " crowded out," there was a 
 general air of listlessness about Paris. And, after the first 
 few weeks, this happened frequently ; for by that time the 
 Bertins had become quite as clever as their formidable rival, 
 the proprietor and editor of the Constitutionnel, the famous 
 Dr. Veron, whom I have already mentioned, but of whom I 
 shall have occasion to speak again and again, for he was one 
 of the most notable characters in the Paris of my early man- 
 hood. But to return for a moment to "Les Mysteres de 
 Paris " and its author. 
 
 The serial, then, was frequently interrupted for one or 
 two days, without notice, however, to the readers ; on its re- 
 sumption there was a nice little paragraph to assure the 
 " grandes dames de par le monde," as well as their maids, 
 with regard to the health of M. Sue, Avho was supposed to have 
 been too ill to work. The public took all this au grand serieux. 
 They either chose to forget, or were ignorant of the fact, that 
 a novel of that kind, especially in the early days of serial 
 feuilleton, was not delivered to the editor bit by bit. Sue, 
 great man as he was, would not have dared to "inaugurate the 
 system only adopted somewhat later by Alexandre Dumas the 
 Elder, namely, that of writing "from hand to mouth." 
 These paragraphs served a dual purpose they whetted the 
 lady and other readers' interest in the author, and informed 
 the indifferent ones how great that interest was. For these 
 paragraphs were, or professed to be, I really believe they 
 were, the courteous replies to hundreds of kind inquiries 
 which the author " could not acknowledge separately for lack 
 of time." 
 
 But this was not all. There was really a good excuse for 
 Eugene Sue " se prenant au serieux," seeing that some of the 
 most eminent magistrates looked upon him in that light and 
 opened a correspondence with him, submitting their ideas 
 about reforming such criminals as " le maitre d'ecole," and 
 praising Prince Eodolph, or rather Eugene Sue under that
 
 4:0 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 name, for " his laudable efforts in the cause of humanity." 
 In reality, Sue was in the position of Moliere's " bourgeois 
 gentilhomme " who spoke prose without being aware of it ; for 
 there was not the smallest evidence from his former Avork that 
 he intended to inaugurate any crusade, either socialistic or 
 philanthropic, when he began his " Mysteres de Paris." He 
 simply wanted to write a stirring novel. But, unlike M. Jour- 
 dain, he did not plead ignorance of his own good motives when 
 congratulated upon them. On the contrary, he gravely and 
 officially replied in the Debats without winking. Some of the 
 papers, not to be outdone, gravely recounted how whole fami- 
 lies had been converted from their evil ways by the perusal of 
 the novel ; ho w others, after supper, had dropped on their knees 
 to pray for their author ; how one working man had exclaimed, 
 " You may say what you like, it would be a good thing if Provi- 
 dence sent many men like M. Sue in this world to take up the 
 cudgels of the honest and struggling artisan." Thereupon 
 Beranger, who did not like to be forgotten in this chorus of 
 praise, paid a ceremonious visit to Sue, and between the two 
 they assumed the protectorship of the horny-handed son of toil. 
 It must not be supposed that I am joking or exaggerat- 
 ing, and that the engoiiment was confined to the lower classes, 
 and to provincial and metropolitan faddists. Such men as M. 
 de Lourdoueix, the editor of the Gazette de France, fell into 
 the trap. I have pointed out elsewhere that the republicans 
 and socialists of those days were not necessarily godless folk, 
 and M. de Lourdoueix fitly concluded that a socialistic writer 
 like Sue might become a powerful weapon in his hands against 
 the Jesuits. So he went to the novelist, and gave him a com- 
 mission to that effect. The latter accepted, and conceived the 
 plot of " The Wandering Jew." "When it was sketched out, 
 he communicated it to the editor ; but whether that gentle- 
 man had reconsidered the matter in the interval, or whether 
 he felt frightened at the horribly tragic conception with 
 scarcely any relief, he refused the novel, unless it was modi- 
 fied to a great extent and its blood-curdling episodes softened. 
 The author, taking himself au serieux this time as a religious 
 reformer, declined to alter a line. Dr. Veron got wind of the 
 affair, bought the novel as it stood, and, by dint of a system 
 of puffing and advertising which would even make a modern 
 American stare, obtained a success with it in the Constitu- 
 tionnel which equalled if it did not surpass that of the Debats 
 with the " Mysteres."
 
 DE MUSSET AND SUE. 41 
 
 " It is very amusing indeed," said George Sand one night, 
 " but there are too many animals. I hope we shall soon get 
 out of this menagerie." Nevertheless, she frankly admitted 
 that she would not like to miss an instalment for ever so 
 much. 
 
 "Meanwhile Sue posed and posed, not as a writer for, like 
 Horace Walpole, he was almost ashamed of the title but as 
 " a man of the world " who knew nothing about literature, 
 but whose wish to benefit humanity had been greater than his 
 reluctance to enter the lists with such men as Balzac and Du- 
 mas. After his dinner at the Cafe de Paris, he would gravely 
 stand on the steps smoking his cigar and listen to the conver- 
 sation with an air of superiority without attempting to take 
 part in it. His mind was supposed to be far away, devising 
 schemes for the social and moral improvement of his fellow- 
 creatures. These philanthropic musings did not prevent him 
 from paying a great deal of attention too much perhaps 
 to his personal appearance, for even in those days of beaux, 
 bucks, and dandies, of Counts d'Orsay and others, men could 
 not help thinking Eugene Sue overdressed. He rarely ap- 
 peared without spurs to his boots, and he would no more have 
 done without a new pair of white kid gloves every evening 
 than without his dinner. Other men, like Nestor de Koque- 
 plan, Alfred de Musset, Major Eraser, all of whose names will 
 frequently recur in these notes, did not mind having their 
 gloves cleaned, though the process was not so perfect as it is 
 now ; Eugene Sue averred that the smell of cleaned gloves 
 made him ill. Alfred de Musset, who could be very imperti- 
 nent when he liked, but who was withal a very good fellow, 
 said one day : " Mais enfin, mon ami, c.a ne sent pas pire que 
 les bouges que vous nous depeignez. N'y seriez vous jamais 
 
 In short, several years before the period of which I now 
 treat, Eugene Sue had begun to be looked upon coldly at the 
 Jockey Club on account of the " airs he gave himself ; " and 
 three years before the startling success of his work, he had 
 altogether ceased to go there, though he was still a member, 
 and remained so nominally until '47, when his name was re- 
 moved from the list in accordance with Eule 5. Owing to 
 momentary pecuniary embarrassments, he had failed to pay 
 his subscription. It may safely be asserted that this was 
 merely a pretext to get rid of him, because such stringent 
 measures are rarely resorted to at any decent club, whether in
 
 42 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 London or Paris, and least of all at the Jockey Clubs there. 
 The fact was, that the members did not care for a fellow- 
 member whose taste differed so materially from their own, 
 whose daily avocations and pursuits had nothing in common 
 with theirs ; for though Eugene Sue as early as 1835 had 
 possessed a race-horse, named Mameluke, which managed to 
 come in a capital last at Maisons-sur-Seine (afterwards Mai- 
 sons- Lafitte) ; though he had ridden his liaque every day in 
 the Bois, and driven his cabriolet every afternoon in the 
 Champs-Elysees, the merest observer could easily perceive 
 that all this was done for mere show, to use the French ex- 
 pression, "pose." As one of the members observed, "M. 
 Sue est toujours trop habille, trop carosse, et surtout trop 
 eperonne." 
 
 M. Sue was all that, and though the Jockey Club at that 
 time was by no means the unobtrusive body of men it is to- 
 day, its excesses and eccentricities were rarely indulged in 
 public, except perhaps in carnival time. A M. de Chateau- 
 villard might take it into his head to play a game of billiards 
 on horseback, or M. de Machado might live surrounded by a 
 couple of hundred parrots if he liked ; none of these fancies 
 attracted the public's notice : M. Sue, by his very profession, 
 attracted too much of it, and brought a great deal of it into 
 the club itself; hence, when he raised a violent protest 
 against his expulsion and endeavoured to neutralize it by 
 sending in his resignation, the committee maintained its 
 original decision. A few years after this, Eugene Sue disap- 
 peared from the Paris horizon.
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 Alexandre Dumas pere Why he made himself particularly agreeable to Eng- 
 lishmen His way of silencing people The pursuit he loved best next to 
 literature He has the privilege of going down to the kitchens of the Cafe 
 de Paris No one questions his literary genius, some question his culinary 
 capacities Dr. Veron and his cordon-bleu Dr. Veron's reasons for dining 
 out instead of at home Dr. Veron's friend, the philanthropist, who does 
 not go to the theatre because he objects to be hurried with his emotions 
 Dr. Veron, instigated by his cook, accuses Dumas of having collaborateurs 
 in preparing his dishes as he was known to have collaborateurs in his lit- 
 erary work Dumas' wrath He invites us to a dinner which shall be 
 wholly cooked by him in the presence of a delegate to be chosen by the 
 
 fuests" The lot falls upon me -Dr. Veron and Sophie make the amende 
 onorabte A dinner-party at Veron's A curious lawsuit in connection 
 with Weber's " Freyscnutz " Nestor Roqueplan, who became the successor 
 of the defendant in the case, suggests a way out of it Leon Fillet virtually 
 adopts it and wins the day A similar plan adopted years before by a fire- 
 man on duty at the opera, on being tried by court-martial for having fallen 
 asleep during the performance of " Guido et Genevra " Firemen not bad 
 judges of plays and operas They were often consulted both by Meyerbeer 
 and Dumas Dumas at work How he idled his time away Dumas causes 
 the traffic receipts of the Chemin de Fer de 1'Ouest to swell during his 
 three years' residence at Saint-Germain M. de Montalivet advises Louis- 
 Philippe to invite Dumas to Versailles, to see what his presence will do 
 for the royal citv Louis-Philippe does not act upon the advice The re- 
 lations between l)umas and the d'Orleans family -After the Revolution of 
 '48, Dumas becomes a candidate for parliament The story of his canvass 
 and his address to the electors at Joigny Dumas' utter indifference to 
 monev matters He casts his burdens upon others Dumas and his credit- 
 ors Writs and distraints How they are dealt with Dumas' indiscrimi- 
 nate generosity A dozen houses full of new furniture in half as many 
 years Dumas' frugality at table Literary remuneration Dumas and his 
 son " Leave me a hundred francs." 
 
 AMONG my most pleasant recollections of those days are 
 those of Alexandre Dumas. To quote his own words, " when- 
 ever he met an Englishman he considered it his particular 
 duty to make himself agreeable to him, as part of the debt 
 he owed to Shakespeare and Walter Scott." I doubt whether 
 Dumas ever made himself deliberately disagreeable to any 
 one ; even when provoked, he managed to disarm his adver- 
 sary with an epigram, rather than wound him. One evening, 
 a professor at one of the provincial universities had been din- 
 ing at the Cafe de Paris, as the guest of Koger de Beauvoir. 
 
 (43)
 
 44 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 He had a magnificent cameo breast-pin. It elicited the ad- 
 miration of every one, and notably that of Dumas. He said 
 at once that it was a portrait of Julius Csesar. 
 
 " Are you an archaeologist ? " asked the professor. 
 
 " I," replied Dumas, " I am absolutely nothing." 
 
 " Still," insisted the visitor, " you perceived at once that 
 it was a portrait of Julius Caesar." 
 
 " That is not very wonderful. Caesar is essentially a Eo- 
 man type ; and, besides, I know Caesar as well as most people, 
 and perhaps better." 
 
 To tell a professor of history especially a provincial one 
 that one knows Caesar as well as most people and perhaps 
 better, is naturally to provoke the question, "In what ca- 
 pacity ? " As a matter of course the question followed imme- 
 diately. 
 
 " In the capacity of Caesar's historian," said Dumas im- 
 perturbably. 
 
 We were getting interested, because we foresaw that the 
 professor would, in a few minutes, get the worst of it. Du- 
 mas' eyes were twinkling with mischief. 
 
 "You have written a history of Csesar?" asked the 
 learned man. 
 
 " Yes ; why not ? " 
 
 " Well, you won't mind my being frank with you : it is 
 because it has never been mentioned in the world of savans." 
 
 " The world of savans never mentions me." 
 
 " Still, a history of Caesar ought to make somewhat of a 
 sensation." 
 
 " Mine has not made any. People read it, and that was 
 all. It is the books which it is impossible to read that make 
 a sensation : they are like the dinners one cannot digest ; the 
 dinners one digests are not as much as thought of next morn- 
 ing." That was Dumas' way of putting a would-be imperti- 
 nent opponent hors de combat, and his repartees were fre- 
 quently drawn from the pursuit he loved as well, if not better 
 than literature, namely, cooking. It may sound exaggerated, 
 but I verily believe that Dumas took a greater pride in con- 
 cocting a stew than in constructing a novel or a play. Very 
 often, in the middle of the dinner, he would put down his 
 knife and fork. " Ca, c'est rudement bon : il faut que je 
 m'en procure la recette." And Guepet was sent for to au- 
 thorize Dumas to descend to the lower regions and have a 
 consultation with his chefs. He was the only one of the
 
 DR. VERON. 45 
 
 habitues who had ever been in the kitchens of the Cafe de 
 Paris. As a rule these excursions were followed by an invi- 
 tation to dine at Dumas' two or three days hence, when the 
 knowledge freshly acquired would be put into practice. 
 
 There were few of us who questioned Dumas' literary 
 genius ; there were many who suspected his culinary abili- 
 ties, and notably among them, Dr. Veron. The germs of 
 this unbelief had been sown in the doctor's mind by his own 
 cordon-bleu, Sophie. The erstwhile director of the opera 
 lived, at that time, in a beautiful apartment on the first floor 
 of a nice house in the Rue Taitbout, at the corner of which 
 the Cafe de Paris was situated. Sophie had virtually a sine- 
 cure of it, because, with the exception of a dinner-party now 
 and then, her master, who was a bachelor, took his dinners 
 at the restaurant. And with regard to the dejeuner, there 
 was not much chance of her displaying her talents, because 
 the man, who was reputed to be a very Apicius, was frugality 
 itself. His reasons for dining out instead of at home were 
 perfectly logical, though they sounded paradoxical. One 
 day, when I was remarking upon the seemingly strange habit 
 of dining out, when he was paying " a perfect treasure " at 
 home, he gave me these reasons. " My dear friend, depend 
 upon it that it is man's stomach which found the aphorism, 
 ' Qui va piano va sano, qui va sano va loniano? In your own 
 home the soup is on the table at a certain hour, the roast is 
 taken off the jack, the dessert is spread out on the sideboard. 
 Your servants, in order to get more time over their meals, 
 hurry you up ; they do not serve you, they gorge you. At 
 the restaurant, on the contrary, they are never in a hurry, 
 they let you wait. And, besides, I always tell the waiters not 
 to mind me ; that I like being kept a long while that is one 
 of the reasons why I come here. 
 
 " Another thing, at the restaurant the door is opened at 
 every moment and something happens. A friend, a chum, 
 or a mere acquaintance comes in ; one chats and laughs : all 
 this aids digestion. A man ought not to be like a boa-con- 
 strictor, he ought not to make digestion a business apart. 
 He ought to dine and to digest at the same time, and nothing 
 aids this dual function like good conversation. Perhaps the 
 servant of Madame de Maintenon, when the latter was still 
 Madame Scarron, was a greater philosopher than we suspect 
 when he whispered to his mistress, ' Madame, the roast has 
 run short ; give them another story.'
 
 46 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " I knew a philanthropist," wound up Dr. Veron, " who 
 objected as much to be hurried over his emotions as I object 
 to be hurried over my meals. For that reason he never went 
 to the theatre. When he wanted an emotional fillip, he wan- 
 dered about the streets until he met some poor wretch evi- 
 dently hungry and out of elbows. He took him to the near- 
 est wine-shop, gave him something to eat and to drink, sat 
 himself opposite to his guest, and told him to recount his 
 misfortunes. ' But take your time over it. I am not in a 
 hurry,' he recommended. The poor outcast began his tale ; 
 my friend listened attentively until he was thoroughly moved. 
 If the man's story was very sad, he gave him a franc or two ; 
 if it was positively heartrending and made him cry, he gave 
 him a five-franc piece ; after which, he came to see me, say- 
 ing, ' I have thoroughly enjoyed myself, and made the inter- 
 vals between each sensational episode last as long as I liked, 
 and, what is more, it has just cost me seven francs, the price 
 of a stall at the theatre.' " 
 
 To return to Dr. Veron's scepticism with regard to Du- 
 mas' culinary accomplishments, and how he was converted. 
 Dumas, it appears, had got the recipe for stewing carp from 
 a German lady, and, being at that moment on very friendly 
 terms with Dr. Veron, which was not always the case, had 
 invited him and several others to come and taste the results 
 of his experiments. The dish was simply splendid, and for 
 days and days Veron, who was really a frugal eater, could 
 talk of nothing else to his cook. 
 
 " Where did you taste it ? " said Sophie, getting some- 
 what jealous of this praise of others ; " at the Cafe de Paris '? " 
 
 " No, at Monsieur Dumas'," was the answer. 
 
 " Well, then, I'll go to Monsieur Dumas' cook, and get 
 the recipe." 
 
 " That's of no use," objected her master. " Monsieur Du- 
 mas prepared the dish himself." 
 
 " Well, then, I'll go to Monsieur Dumas himself and ask 
 him to give me the recipe." 
 
 Sophie was as good as her word, and walked herself off to 
 the Chaussee d'Antin. The great novelist felt flattered, and 
 gave her every possible information, but somehow the dish 
 was not like that her master had so much enjoyed at his 
 friend's. Then Sophie grew morose, and began to throw out 
 hints about the great man's borrowing other people's feathers 
 in his culinary pursuits, just as he did in his literary ones.
 
 DUMAS AS A COOK. 4.7 
 
 For Sophie was not altogether illiterate, and the papers at 
 that time were frequently charging Dumas with keeping his 
 collaborateurs too much in the background and himself too 
 much in front. Dumas had never much difficulty in meeting 
 such accusations, but Sophie had unconsciously hit upon the 
 tactics of the clever solicitor who recommended the barrister 
 to abuse the plaintiff, the defendant's case being bad, and she 
 put it into practice. " C'est avec sa carpe comme avec ses 
 romans, les autres les font et il y met son nom," she said 
 one day. " Je 1'ai bien vu, c'est un grand diable de vani- 
 teux." 
 
 Now, there was no doubt about it, to those who did not 
 know him very well, Dumas was " un grand diable de vani- 
 teux ; " and the worthy doctor sat pondering his cook's re- 
 marks until he himself felt inclined to think that Dumas had 
 a clever chef in the background, upon whose victories he 
 plumed himself. Meanwhile Dumas had been out of town 
 for more than a month, but a day or so after his return he 
 made his appearance at the Cafe de Paris, and, as a matter of 
 course, inquired after the result of Sophie's efforts. The doc- 
 tor was reticent at first, not caring to acknowledge Sophie's 
 failure. He had, however, made the matter public, alleging, 
 at the same time, Sophie's suspicions as to Dumas' hidden 
 collaborateur, and one of the company was ill advised enough 
 to let the cat out of the bag. During the many years of my 
 acquaintance with Dumas, I have never seen him in such a 
 rage as then. But he toned down in a very few minutes. " II 
 n'y a qu'une reponse a une accusation pareille," he said in a 
 grandiloquent tone, which, however, had the most comical 
 effect, seeing how trifling the matter was in reality " il n'y 
 qu'une reponse ; vous vieudrez diner avec moi demain, vous 
 choissirez un delegue qui viendra a partir de troi heures me 
 voir preparer mon diner." I was the youngest, the choice 
 fell upon me. That is how my life-long friendship with Du- 
 mas began. At three o'clock next day I was at the Chaussee 
 d'Antin, and was taken by the servant into the kitchen, where 
 the great novelist stood surrounded by his utensils, some of 
 silver, and all of them glistening like silver. With the ex- 
 ception of a soupe aux choux, at which, by his own confes- 
 sion, he had been at work since the morning, all the ingredi- 
 ents for the dinner were in their natural state of course, 
 washed and peeled, but nothing more. He was assisted by 
 his own cook and a kitchen-maid, but he himself, with his
 
 48 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 sleeves rolled up to the elbows, a large apron round his waist, 
 and bare chest, conducted the operations. I do not think I 
 have ever seen anything more entertaining, though in the 
 course of these notes I shall have to mention frequent vaga- 
 ries on the part of great men. I came to the conclusion that 
 when writers insisted upon the culinary challenges of Ca- 
 reme, Duglere, and Casimir they were not indulging in mere 
 metaphor. 
 
 At half-past six the guests began to arrive ; at a quarter 
 to seven Dumas retired to his dressing-room ; at seven punct- 
 ually the servant announced that "monsieur etait servi." 
 The dinner consisted of the aforenamed soupe aux choux, 
 the carp that had led to the invitation, a ragout de mouton 
 a la Hongroise, roti de faisans, and a salade Japonaise. The 
 sweets and ices had been sent by the patissier. I never dined 
 like that before or after, not even a week later, when Dr. 
 Veron and Sophie made the amende Jionorable in the Eue 
 Taitbout. 
 
 I have spent many delightful evenings with all these 
 men; I do not remember having spent a more delightful one 
 than on the latter occasion. Every one was in the best of 
 humours ; the dinner was very fine ; albeit that, course for 
 course, it did not come up to Dumas'; and, moreover, dur- 
 ing the week that had elapsed between the two entertain- 
 ments, one of Dr. Veron's successors at the opera, Leon 
 Fillet, had been served with the most ludicrous citation that 
 was ever entered on the rolls of any tribunal. For nearly 
 nineteen years before that period there had been several at- 
 tempts to mount Weber's " Freyschutz," all of which had 
 come to nought. There had been an adaptation by Castil- 
 Blaze, under the title of " Robin des Bois," and several others ; 
 but until '41, Weber's work, even in a mutilated state, was 
 not known to the French opera-goer. At that time, however, 
 M. Emilien Paccini made a very good translation ; Hector 
 Berlioz was commissioned to write the recitatives, for it must 
 be remembered that Weber's opera contains dialogue, and 
 that dialogue is not admissible in grand opera. Berlioz 
 acquitted himself with a taste and reverence for the com- 
 poser's original scheme that did great credit to both ; he 
 sought his themes in Weber's work itself, notably in the 
 " Invitation a la Valse : " but notwithstanding all this, the 
 " Freyschutz " was miserably amputated in the performance 
 lest it should " play " longer than midnight, though a ballet
 
 A MUSICAL LAW-SUIT. 49 
 
 was added rather than deprive the public of its so-called due. 
 Neither Paccini nor Berlioz had set foot in the opera-house 
 since their objections to such a course had been overruled, 
 and they made it known to the world at large that no blame 
 attached to them ; nevertheless, this quasi " Freyschutz "met 
 with a certain amount of success. M. Fillet was rubbing his 
 hands with glee at his own cleverness, until a Nemesis came 
 in the shape of a visitor from the Fatherland, who took the 
 conceit out of the director with one fell blow, and, what was 
 worse still, with a perfectly legal one. 
 
 The visitor was no less a personage than Count Tyszkie- 
 wicz, one of the best musical critics of the time and the edi- 
 tor of the foremost musical publication in the world ; namely, 
 Die Musikalische Zeitung, of Leipzig. The count, having 
 been attracted by the announcement of the opera on the bills, 
 was naturally anxious to hear how French artists would acquit 
 themselves of a work particularly German, and, having se- 
 cured a stall, anticipated an enjoyable evening. But alack 
 and alas ! in a very little while his indignation at the liber- 
 ties taken with the text and the score by the singers, musi- 
 cians, and conductor got the upper hand, and he rushed off 
 to the commissary of police on duty at the theatre to claim 
 the execution of Weber's opera in its integrity, as promised 
 on the bills, or the restitution of his money. Failing to get 
 satisfaction either way, he required the commissary to draw 
 up a verbatim report of his objections and his claim, deter- 
 mined to bring an action. Next morning, he sent a litho- 
 graphed account of the transaction to all the papers, re- 
 questing its insertion, with which request not a single one 
 complied. Finding himself baffled at every turn, he engaged 
 lawyer and counsel and began proceedings. 
 
 It was at that stage of the affair that the dinner at Dr. 
 Veron's took place. As a matter of course, the coming law- 
 suit gave rise to a great deal of chaff on the part of the 
 guests, although the victim of this badinage and defendant 
 in the suit was not there. It was his successor who took up 
 the cudgels and predicted the plaintiff's discomfiture. " The 
 counsel," said Koqueplan, " ought to be instructed to invite 
 the president and assessors to come and hear the work before 
 they deliver judgment : if they like it personally, they will 
 not decide against Fillet ; if they don't, they'll fall asleep and 
 be ashamed to own it afterwards. But should they give a 
 verdict for the plaintiff, Fillet ought to appeal on a question
 
 50 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 of incompetence ; a person with the name of Tyszkiewicz has 
 no right to plead in the interest of harmony." * 
 
 Among such a company as that gathered round Dr. 
 Veron's table, a single sentence frequently led to a host of 
 recollections. Scarcely had Roqueplan's suggestion to invite 
 the president and assessors of the court to the performance 
 of the " Freyschutz " been broached than our host chimed 
 in : "I can tell you a story where the expedient you recom- 
 mend was really resorted to, though it did not emanate from 
 half as clever a man as you, Eoqueplan. In fact, it was only 
 a pompier that hit upon it to get out of a terrible scrape. 
 He was going to be brought before a court-martial for neglect 
 of duty. It happened under the management of my imme- 
 diate successor, Duponchel, at the fourth or fifth perform- 
 ance of Halevy's ' Guido et Genevra.' Some of the scenery 
 caught fire, and, but for Duponchel's presence of mind, there 
 would have been a panic and a horrible catastrophe. Never- 
 theless, the cause of the accident had to be ascertained, and 
 it was found that the brigadier fireman posted at the spot 
 where the mischief began had been asleep. He frankly ad- 
 mitted his fault, at the same time pleading extenuating cir- 
 cumstances. ' What do you mean ? ' asked the captain, 
 charged with the report. ' Such a thing has never happened 
 to me before, mon capitaine, but it is impossible for any one 
 to keep his eyes open during that act. You need not take 
 my word, but perhaps you will try the effect yourself.' The 
 captain did try; the captain sat for two or three minutes 
 after the rise of the curtain, then he was seen to leave his 
 place hurriedly. The brigadier and his men were severely 
 reprimanded, but they were not tried. Out of respect for 
 Halevy the matter was kept a secret. 
 
 " I may add," said our host, " that the pompier is by no 
 means a bad judge of things theatrical, seeing that he is rarely 
 away from the stage for more than three or four nights at a 
 time. I remember perfectly well that, during the rehearsals 
 of ' Robert le Diablo,' Meyerbeer often had a chat with them. 
 Curiously enough he now and then made little alterations 
 
 * The latter plea was, in fact, advanced by Fillet's counsel in the first in- 
 stance, on Eoqueplan's advice, and perhaps influenced the court ; for though it 
 gave a verdict for the plaintiff, it was only for seven francs (the price of the 
 stall), and costs. The verdict was based upon the " consideration " that the 
 defendant had not carried out altogether the promise set forth on the pro- 
 gramme.
 
 DUMAS AT KEST. 51 
 
 after these conversations. I am not insinuating that the 
 great composer acted upon their suggestions, but I should 
 not at all wonder if he had done so." 
 
 Alexandre Dumas, in whose honour, it will be remem- 
 bered, the dinner was given, had an excellent memory, and 
 some years afterwards profited by the experiment. I tell the 
 story as it was given to us subsequently by his son. Only a 
 few friends and Alexandre the younger were present at the 
 first of the final rehearsals of " The Three Musketeers," at 
 the Ambigu Comique. They were not dress rehearsals proper, 
 because there were no costumes, and the scenery merely con- 
 sisted of a cloth and some wings. Behind one of the latter 
 they had noticed, during the first six tableaux, the shining 
 helmet of a fireman who was listening very attentively. The 
 author had noticed him too. About the middle of the seventh 
 tableau the helmet suddenly vanished, and the father remarked 
 upon it to his son. When the act was finished, Dumas went 
 in search of the pompier, who did not know him. " What 
 made you go away?" he asked him. "Because it did not 
 amuse me half as much as the others," was the answer. 
 " That was enough for my father," said the younger Dumas. 
 " There and then he went to Beraud's room, took off his coat, 
 waistcoat, and braces, unfastened the collar of his shirt it 
 was the only way he could work and sent for the prompt 
 copy of the seventh tableau, which he tore up and flung into 
 the fire, to the consternation of Beraud. ' What are you do- 
 ing?' he exclaimed. * You see what I am doing; I am de- 
 stroying the seventh tableau. It does not amuse the pom- 
 pier. I know what it wants.' And an hour and a half later, 
 at the termination of the rehearsal, the actors were given a 
 fresh seventh tableau to study." 
 
 I have come back by a roundabout way to the author of 
 " Monte-Christo," because, tout chemin avec moi inene a 
 Dumas ; I repeat, he constitutes one of the happiest of my 
 recollections. After the lapse of many years, I willingly ad- 
 mit that I would have cheerfully foregone the acquaintance 
 of all the other celebrities, perhaps David d'Angers excepted, 
 for that of Dumas pere. 
 
 After the lapse of many years, the elder Dumas still repre- 
 sents to me all the good qualities of the French nation and 
 few of their bad ones. It was absolutely impossible to be 
 dull in his society, but it must not be thought that these con- 
 tagious animal spirits only showed themselves periodically or
 
 52 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 when in company. It was what the French have so aptly 
 termed " la joie de vivre," albeit that they rarely associate 
 the phrase with any one not in the spring of life. With 
 Dumas it was chronic until a very few months before his 
 death. I remember calling upon him shortly after the din- 
 ner of which I spoke just o now. He had taken up his quar- 
 ters at Saint-Germain, and come to Paris only for a few days. 
 " Is monsieur at home ? " I said to the servant. 
 
 " He is in his study, monsieur," was the answer. " Mon- 
 sieur can go in." 
 
 At that moment I heard a loud burst of laughter from 
 the inner apartment, so I said, " I would sooner wait until 
 monsieur's visitors are gone." 
 
 " Monsieur has no visitors; he is working," remarked the 
 servant with a smile. "Monsieur Dumas of ten laughs like 
 this at his work." 
 
 It was true enough, the novelist was alone, or rather in 
 company with one of his characters, at whose sallies he was 
 simply roaring. 
 
 Work, in fact, was a pleasure to him, like everything else 
 he undertook. One day he had been out shooting, between 
 Villers-Cotterets and Compiegne, since six in the morning, 
 and had killed twenty-nine birds. " I am going to make up 
 the score and a half, and then I'll have a sleep, for I feel 
 tired," he said. When he had killed his thirtieth partridge 
 he slowly walked back to the farm, where his son and friends 
 found him about four hours later, toasting himself before the 
 fire, his feet on the andirons, and twirling his thumbs. 
 
 "What are you sitting there for like that?" asked his 
 son. 
 
 " Can't you see ? I am resting." 
 
 " Did you get your sleep ? ' : 
 
 " No, I didn't ; it's impossible to sleep here. There is an 
 infernal noise ; what with the sheep, the cows, the pigs, and 
 the rest, there is no chance of getting a wink." 
 
 " So you have been sitting here for the last four hours, 
 twirling your thumbs ? " 
 
 " No, I have been writing a piece in one act." The piece 
 in question was "Romulus," which he gave to Regnier to 
 have it read at the Comedie-Franqaise, under a pseudonym, 
 and as the work of a young unknown author. It was accept- 
 ed without a dissentient vote. 
 
 It is a well-known fact, vouched for by the accounts of
 
 DUMAS AS A CENTRE OF ATTRACTION. 53 
 
 the Compagnie du Chemin de Fer de 1'Ouest, that during 
 the three years Dumas lived at Saint-Germain, the receipts 
 increased by twenty thousand francs per annum. Of course, 
 it has been objected that railways being then in their infancy 
 the increment would have been just the same without Dumas' 
 presence in the royal residence, but, curiously enough, from 
 the day he left, the passenger traffic fell to its previous state. 
 Dumas had simply galvanized the sleepy old town into life, 
 he had bought the theatre where the artists of the Comedie- 
 Franqaise, previous to supping with him, came to play 
 " Mademoiselle de Belle-Isle " or the " Demoiselles de Saint- 
 Cyr," for the benefit of the poor. On such occasions, there 
 Avas not a room to be had at the hotels. After supper, there 
 were twice a week fireworks on the Terrace, which could be 
 seen from Paris and from Versailles, to the great astonish- 
 ment of Louis- Philippe, who really attributed the change to 
 the beneficence of his reign, although he failed to account 
 for the continued dulness of the latter royal borough, where 
 he himself resided, and whose picture-galleries he had restored 
 and thrown open to the public, besides having the great fount- 
 ains to play every first Sunday of the month. 
 
 One day the king sent for M. de Montalivet, and told 
 him that, though gratified at the revived prosperity of 
 Saint-Germain, he would like to see a little more gaiety at 
 Versailles. 
 
 "You really mean it, sire?" asked the minister. 
 
 " Not only do I mean it, but I confess to you that it 
 would give me great pleasure." 
 
 " Well, sire, Alexandre Dumas has lately been sentenced 
 to a fortnight's imprisonment for neglecting his duty in the 
 National Guards : make an order for him to spend that fort- 
 night in Versailles, and I guarantee your Majesty that Ver- 
 sailles will be lively enough." 
 
 Louis-Philippe did not act upon the suggestion. The 
 only member of the d'Orleans' family who was truly sympa- 
 thetic to Dumas was the king's eldest son, whose untimely 
 death shortly afterwards affected the great novelist very 
 much, albeit that he frankly acknowledged to regretting the 
 man and not the future ruler ; for while loudly professing 
 his republican creed, he never pretended to overlook his in- 
 debtedness to Louis- Philippe, when Due d'Orleans, for hav- 
 ing befriended him ; nay, I am inclined to think that Dumas' 
 gratitude was far greater than the case warranted. When, in
 
 54 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 1847, the fancy took him to go into parliament, he naturally 
 turned to the borough he had benefited so much by his stay 
 there Saint-Germain, and Saint-Germain denied him. 
 They thought him too immoral. Dumas waited patiently 
 for another opportunity, which did not come until the 
 following year, when Louis-Philippe had abdicated. Ad- 
 dressing a meeting of electors at Joigny, he was chal- 
 lenged by a M. de Bonneliere to reconcile his title of re- 
 publican with his title of Marquis de la Pailleterie, and the 
 fact of his having been a secretary to the Due d'Orleans, 
 although he had never occupied so important a position in 
 the Due d'Orleans' household. His reply was simply scath- 
 ing, and I give it in full as the papers of the day reproduced 
 it. " No doubt," he said, in an off-hand, bantering way, " I 
 was formerly called the Marquis de la Pailleterie, which was 
 my father's name, and of which I was very proud, being 
 unable then to claim a glorious one of my own make. But 
 at present, when I am somebody, I call myself Alexandre 
 Dumas and nothing more; and everybody knows me, you 
 among the rest you, you absolute nobody, who have merely 
 come to be able to boast to-morrow, after insulting me to- 
 night, that you have known the great Dumas. If such was 
 your ambition, you might have satisfied it without failing in 
 the common courtesies of a gentleman." 
 
 When the applause which the reply provoked had sub- 
 sided, Dumas went on : " There is also no doubt about my 
 having been a secretary to the Due d'Orleans, and that I 
 have received all kinds of favours from his family. If you, 
 citizen, are ignorant of the meaning of the term, ' the mem- 
 ory of the heart,' allow me at least to proclaim here in my 
 loudest voice, that I am not, and that I entertain towards 
 this royal family all the devotion an honourable man can 
 feel." ' 
 
 It is, however, not my intention to sketch Alexandre 
 Dumas as a politician, for which career I considered him 
 singularly unfit ; but the speech from which I extracted the 
 foregoing contains a few lines which, more than thirty-five 
 years after they were spoken, cannot fail to strike the reader 
 with his marvellous foresight. " Geographically," he said, 
 commenting upon the political state of Europe, " Prussia 
 has the form of a serpent, and, like it, she seems to be asleep, 
 and to gather her strength in order to swallow everything 
 around her Denmark, Holland, Belgium, and, when she
 
 DUMAS AS A POLITICIAN. 55 
 
 shall have swallowed all that, you will find that Austria 
 will be swallowed in its turn, and perhaps, alas, France 
 also." 
 
 The last words, as may be imagined, provoked a storm of 
 hisses ; nevertheless, he kept his audience spellbound until 
 midnight. 
 
 A parliamentary candidate, however eloquent, who flings 
 his constituents into the river when they happen to annoy 
 him, must have been a novelty even in those days, and that 
 is what Dumas did to two brawlers after said meeting, just 
 to show them that his " aristocratic grip " was worth their 
 " plebeian one." 
 
 A few years later, at a dinner at Dumas', in the Rue 
 d'Amsterdam, I met a Monsieur du Chaffault who had been 
 an eye-witness of this, as well as of other scenes during that 
 memorable day. Until the morning of that day, M. du 
 Chaffault had never set eyes on the great novelist; in the 
 evening, he was his friend for life. It only proves once more 
 the irresistible fascination Dumas exercised over every one 
 with whom he came in contact, because the beginning of that 
 friendship cost M. du Chaffault six hundred francs, the ex- 
 penses of that part of the electoral campaign. The story, as 
 told by M. du Chaffault the following afternoon in the Cafe 
 Riche to Dr. Veron, myself, and Joseph Mery, is too good to 
 be missed. I give it as near as I can remember. 
 
 " I was about twenty- four then, with nothing particular to 
 do, and a moderate private income. They were painting and 
 whitewashing my place, a few miles away from Sens, and I 
 had taken up my quarters in the principal hotel in the town. 
 The first elections under the second republic were being 
 held. There was a good deal of excitement everywhere, and 
 I liked it, though not taking the slightest interest in politics. 
 This was in May, 1848 ; and about six, one morning while I 
 was still in bed, the door of my room was suddenly opened 
 without knocking, and what seemed to me a big black 
 monster stood before me. There was a pistol lying by the 
 side of me, and I was reaching towards it, when he spoke. 
 ' Don't alarm yourself,' he said ; ' I am Alexandra Dumas 
 They told me you were a good fellow, and I have come to 
 ask you a service.' 
 
 " I had never seen Dumas in the flesh, only a portrait of 
 him, but I recognized him immediately. ' You have often 
 afforded me a great deal of amusement, but I confess you
 
 56 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 frightened me,' I said. ' What, in Heaven's name, do you 
 want at this unholy hour ? ' 
 
 " ' I have slept here,' was the answer. ' I landed here at 
 midnight, and am starting for Joigny by-and-by, to attend a 
 political meeting. I am putting up as a member for your 
 department.' 
 
 I jumped out of bed at once, Dumas handed me my 
 trousers, and, when I got as far as my boots, he says, ' Oh, 
 while I think of it, I have come to ask you for a pair of 
 boots ; in stepping into the carriage, one of mine has come 
 to utter grief, and there is no shop open.' 
 
 " As you may see for yourselves, I am by no means a 
 giant, and Dumas is one. I pointed this out to him, but he 
 did not even answer me. He had caught sight of three or 
 four pair of boots under the dressing-table, and, in the 
 twinkling of an eye, chose the best pair and pulled them on, 
 leaving me his old ones, absolutely worn out, but which I 
 have preserved in my library at home. I always show them 
 to my visitors as the thousand and first volume of Alexandre 
 Dumas.* 
 
 " By the time he got the boots on we were friends, as if 
 we had known one another for years ; as for Dumas, he was 
 ' theeing ' and ' thouing ' me as if we had been at school to- 
 gether. 
 
 " ' You are going to Joigny ? ' I said ; * I know a good 
 many people there.' 
 
 " ' All the better, for I am going to take you along with 
 me.' 
 
 " Having to go no further than Joigny, and being taken 
 thither in the conveyance of my newly-made friend, I did 
 not think it necessary to provide myself with an extra supply 
 of funds, the more that I had between five and six hundred 
 francs in my pocket. In a short time we were on our road, 
 and the first stage of three hours seemed to me as many min- 
 utes. Whenever we passed a country seat, out came a lot of 
 anecdotes and legends connected with its owners, interlarded 
 with quaint fancies and epigrams. At that first change of 
 horses Dumas' secretary paid. At the second, Villevailles, 
 Dumas says, 'Have you got twenty francs change?' With- 
 out a moment's hesitation, I took out my purse, paid the 
 money, and put down in my pocket-book, ' Alexandre Dumas, 
 
 * Alexandra Dumas had a marvellously small foot. EDITOB.
 
 DUMAS' IMPECUNIOS1TY. 5Y 
 
 twenty francs.' I might have saved myself the trouble, as I 
 found out in a very short time, for the moment he got out at 
 Joigny, he rushed off in a hurry without troubling about any- 
 thing. The postilion turned to me for his money, and I paid, 
 and put down once more, ' Alexandre Dumas, thirty francs.' 
 
 " The first meeting was fixed for four, at the theatre. 
 They applied to me for the hire of the building, for the gas. 
 I went on paying, but I no longer put down the items, saying 
 to myself, ' When my six hundred francs are gone, my little 
 excursion will be at an end, and I'll go back to Sens.' The 
 little excursion did not extend to more than one day, seeing 
 that I had to settle the dinner bill at the Due de Bourgogne, 
 Dumas having invited every one he met on his way. I am 
 only sorry for one thing, that I did not have ten thousand 
 francs in my pocket that morning in order to prolong my 
 excursion for a week or so. But next morning my purse was 
 empty, and ' our defeat was certain.' I had already identified 
 myself with Dumas' aspirations, so I returned to Sens by 
 myself, but overjoyed at having seen and spoken to this man 
 of genius, who is richer than all the millionnaires in the 
 world put together, seeing that he never troubles himself 
 about paying, and has therefore no need to worry about 
 money. Three months afterwards, the printer at Joigny 
 drew upon me for a hundred francs for electioneering bills, 
 which, of course, I could not have ordered, but which draft I 
 settled as joyfully as I had settled the rest. I have preserved 
 the draft with the boots ; they are mementoes of my first two 
 days' friendship with my dear friend." 
 
 At the first blush, all this sounds very much as if we were 
 dealing with a mere Harold Skimpole, but no man was more 
 unlike Dickens' creation than Alexandre Dumas. M. du 
 Chaffault described him rightly when he said that he did 
 not worry about money, not even his own. "My biog- 
 rapher," Dumas often said, " will not fail to point out that 
 I Avas ' a panier perce,' * neglecting, as a matter of course, 
 to mention that, as a rule, it was not I who made the holes." 
 
 The biographers have not been quite so unjust as that. 
 Unfortunately, few of them knew Dumas intimately, and 
 they were so intent upon sketching the playwright and the 
 novelist that they neglected the man. They could have had 
 
 * Literally, a basket with holes in it ; figuratively, the term applied to irre- 
 claimable spendthrifts. EDITOR.
 
 58 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the stories of Alexandre Dumas' improvidence with regard 
 to himself and his generosity to others for the asking from 
 his familiars. On the other hand, the latter have only told 
 these stories in a fragmentary way ; a complete collection of 
 them would be impossible, for no one, not even Dumas him- 
 self, knew half the people whom he befriended. In that 
 very apartment of the Rue d' Amsterdam which I mentioned 
 just now, the board was free to any and every one who chose 
 to come in. Not once, but a score of times, have I heard 
 Dumas ask, after this or that man had left the table, " Who 
 is he ? what's his name ? " Whosoever came with, or at the 
 tail, not of a friend, but of a simple acquaintance, especially 
 if the acquaintance happened to wear skirts, was immediately 
 invited to breakfast or dinner as the case might be. Count 
 de Cherville once told me that Dumas, having taken a house 
 at Varenne-Saint-Hilaire, his second month's bill for meat 
 alone amounted to eleven hundred francs. Let it be remem- 
 bered that his household consisted of himself, two secre- 
 taries, and three servants, and that money went a great deal 
 further than it does at present, especially in provincial France, 
 in some parts of which living is still very cheap. In conse- 
 quence of one of those financial crises, which were absolutely 
 periodical with Alexandre Dumas, M. de Cherville had pre- 
 vailed upon him to leave Paris for a while, and to take up 
 his quarters with him. All went comparatively well as long 
 as he was M. de Cherville's guest ; but, having taken a liking 
 to the neighbourhood, he rented a house of his own, and 
 furnished it from garret to cellar in the most expensive way, 
 as if he were going to spend the remainder of his life in it. 
 Exclusive of the furniture, he spent between fifteen thou- 
 sand and eighteen thousand francs on hangings, painting, 
 and repairs. The parasites and harpies which M. de Cher- 
 ville had kept at bay came down upon him like a swarm of 
 locusts. " And how long, think you, did Dumas stay in his 
 new domicile ? Three months, not a day more nor less. As 
 a matter of course, the furniture did not fetch a quarter of 
 its cost ; the repairs, the decorating, etc., were so much sheer 
 waste : for the incoming tenant refused to refund a cent for 
 it, and Dumas, having made up his mind to go to Italy, 
 would not wait for a more liberal or conscientious one, lest 
 he should have the rent of the empty house on his shoulders 
 also. Luckily, I took care that he should pocket the pro- 
 ceeds of the sale of the furniture."
 
 DUMAS AND THE BAILIFFS. 59 
 
 This last sentence wants explaining. As a rule, when a 
 man sells his sticks, he pockets the money. But the in- 
 stance just mentioned was the only one in which Dumas had 
 the disposal of his household goods. The presiding divinity 
 invariably carried them away with her when she had to make 
 room for a successor, and these successions generally oc- 
 curred once, sometimes twice, a year. ' La reine est morte, 
 vive la reine." The new sovereign, for the first few days of 
 her reign, had to be content with bare walls and very few 
 material comforts ; then the nest was upholstered afresh, and 
 " il n'y avait rien de change en la demeure, sauf le nom de 
 la maitresse." 
 
 Consequently, though for forty years Alexandre Dumas 
 could not have earned less than eight thousand pounds per 
 annum ; though he neither smoked, drank, nor gambled ; 
 though, in spite of his mania for cooking, he himself was the 
 most frugal eater the beef from the soup of the previous 
 day, grilled, was his favourite dish, it rained writs and sum- 
 monses around him, while he himself was frequently without 
 a penny. 
 
 M. du Chaffault one day told me of a scene a propos of 
 this which is worth reproducing. He was chatting to Dumas 
 in his study, when a visitor was shown in. He turned out 
 to be an Italian man of letters and refugee, on the verge of 
 starvation. M. du Chaffault could not well make out what 
 was said, because they were talking Italian, but all at once 
 Dumas got up and took from the wall behind him a mag- 
 nificent pistol, one of a pair. The visitor walked off with it, 
 to M. du Chaffault's surprise. When he was gone, Dumas 
 turned to his friend and explained : " He was utterly penni- 
 less, and so am I ; so I gave him the pistol." 
 
 " Great Heavens, you surely did not recommend him to 
 go and make an end of himself !" interrupted du Chaf- 
 fault. 
 
 Dumas burst out laughing. " Of course not. I merely 
 told him to go and sell or pawn it, and leave me the fellow 
 one, in case some other poor wretch should want assistance 
 while I am so terribly hard up." 
 
 And yet, in this very Eue d'Amsterdam, whether Dumas 
 was terribly impecunious or not, the dejeuner, which gen- 
 erally began at about half-past eleven, was rarely finished 
 before half-past four, because during the whole of that time 
 fresh contingents arrived to be fed, and communication was
 
 60 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 kept up between the apartment and the butcher for corre- 
 sponding fresh supplies of beefsteaks and cutlets. 
 
 Is it a wonder, then, that it rained summonses, and writs, 
 and other law documents ? But no one took much notice 
 of these, not even one of the four secretaries, who was spe- 
 cially appointed to look after these things. If I remember 
 aright, his name was Hirschler. The names of the other 
 three secretaries were Eusconi, Viellot, and Fontaine. 'Un- 
 fortunately, Hirschler was as dilatory as his master, and, 
 until the process-server claimed a personal interview, as in- 
 different. These "limbs of the law" were marvellously 
 polite. I was present one day at an interview between one 
 of these and Hirschler, for Dumas' dwelling was absolutely 
 and literally the glass house of the ancient philosopher 
 with this difference, that no one threw any stones from it. 
 There was no secret, no skeleton in the cupboard ; the im- 
 pecuniosity and the recurrent periods of plenty were both as 
 open as the day. 
 
 The "man of law" and Hirschler began by shaking 
 hands, for they were old acquaintances ; it would have been 
 difficult to find a process-server in Paris who was not an old 
 acquaintance of Dumas. After which the visitor informed 
 Hirschler that he had come to distrain. 
 
 " To distrain ? I did not know we had got as far as that," 
 said Hirschler. " Wait a moment. I must go and see." It 
 meant that Hirschler repaired to the kitchen, where stood a 
 large oaken sideboard, in a capacious drawer of which all the 
 law documents, no matter by whom received, were indiscrimi- 
 nately thrown, to be fished out when the " mauvais quart 
 d'heure " came, and not until then. 
 
 " You are right," said Hirschler, but not in the least wor- 
 ried or excited " I really did not know we had got as far as 
 that. . I must ask you to wait another minute. I suppose a 
 third or a fourth of the total amount will do for the pres- 
 ent?" 
 
 " Well, I do not know," said the process-server with most 
 exquisite politeness. " Try what you can do. I fancy that 
 with a third I may manage to stop proceedings for a while." 
 
 The third or fourth part of the debt was rarely in the 
 house ; messengers had to be despatched for it to Cadot, the 
 publisher, or to the cashier of the Moniteur, Constitutionnel, 
 or Siecle. Meanwhile the process-server was feasted in a 
 sumptuous way, and when the messenger returned with the
 
 THE TWO DUMASES. 61 
 
 sum in question, Hirschler and the process-server shook hands 
 once more, with the most cordial au revoir possible. 
 
 As a matter of course, the same process-server reappeared 
 upon the scene in a few months. The comedy had often as 
 many as a dozen representations, so that it may safely be said 
 that a great number of Dumas' debts were paid six or seven 
 times over. Even sixpence a line of sixty letters did not suf- 
 fice to keep pace with such terrible improvidence, though the 
 remuneration was much more frequently fourpence or five- 
 pence. It rarely rose to sevenpence halfpenny, but in all 
 cases a third went to Dumas' collaborateurs, another third to 
 his creditors, and the rest to himself. 
 
 I have allowed my pen to run away with me. One more 
 story, and then I leave Alexandre Dumas for the present. It 
 is simply to show that he would have squandered the fortune 
 of all the Rothschilds combined : I repeat, not on himself ; 
 he would have given it away, or allowed it to be taken. He 
 had no notion of the value of money. About a year after I 
 had made his acquaintance, he was ill at Saint-Germain, and 
 I went to see him. His dog had bitten him severely in the 
 right hand ; he was in bed, and obliged to dictate. His son 
 had just left him, and he told me, adding, " C'est un coeur 
 d'or, cet' Alexandre." Seeing that I did not ask what had 
 elicited the praise, he began telling me. 
 
 " This morning I received six hundred and fifty francs. 
 Just now Alexandre was going up to Paris, and he says, * I'll 
 take fifty francs.' 
 
 " I did not pay attention, or must have misunderstood ; 
 at any rate I replied, ' Don't take as much as that ; leave me 
 a hundred francs.' 
 
 " ' What do you mean, father ? ' he asked. ' I am telling 
 you that I am going to take fifty francs.' 
 
 " ' I beg your pardon,' I said. ' I understood you were 
 going to take six hundred.' " 
 
 He would have considered it the most natural thing in the 
 world for his son to take six hundred and leave him fifty ; 
 just as he considered it the most natural thing to bare his arm 
 and to have a dozen leeches put on it, because his son, when 
 a boy of eight, having met with an accident, would not con- 
 sent to blood-letting of that kind. In vain did the father tell 
 him that the leeches did not hurt. " Well, put some on your- 
 self, and then I will." And the giant turned up his sleeves, 
 and did as he was told.
 
 62 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Dr. Louis Ve>on The real man as distinguished from that of his own " Mem- 
 oirs" He takes the management of the Paris Opdra How it was gov- 
 erned before his advent Meyerbeer's " Robert le Diable " underlined 
 Meyerbeer and his doubts upon the merits of his work Meyerbeer's gen- 
 erosity Meyerbeer and the beggars of the Rue Le Peletier Dr. Veron, 
 the inventor of the modern newspaper putF Some specimens of advertise- 
 ments in their infancy Dr. Veron takes a leaf from the book of Moliere 
 Dr. Veron's love of money His superstitions His objections to travelling 
 in railways He quotes the Queen of England as an example When 
 Queen Victoria overcomes her objection, Veron holds out " Queen Vic- 
 toria has got a successor : the Veron dynasty begins and ends with me " 
 Thirteen at table I make the acquaintance of Taglioni The woman 
 and the ballerina Her adventure at Perth An improvised performance 
 of " Nathalie, la Laitiere Suisse " Another adventure in Russia A modern 
 Claude Du-Val My last meeting with Taglioni A dinner-party at De 
 Moray's A comedy scene between husband and wife Flotow, the com- 
 poser of "Martha" His family His father's objection to the composer's 
 profession The latter's interview with M. de Saint-Georges, the author of 
 the libretto of Balfe's "Bohemian Girl" M. de Saint-Georges prevails 
 upon the father to let his son study in Paris for live years, and to provide 
 for him during that time The supplies are stopped on the last day of the 
 fifth year Flotow, at the advice of M. de Saint-Georges, stays on and lives 
 by giving piano-lessons His earthly possessions at his first success " Rob 
 Roy" at the Hotel Castellane Lord Granville's opinion of the music 
 The Hotel Castellane and some Paris salons during Louis-Philippe's reign 
 The Princesse de Lieven's, M. Thiers', etc. What Madame de Girardin's 
 was like Victor Hugo's Perpetual adoration ; very artistic, but nothing 
 to eat or to drink The salon of the ambassador of the Two Sicilies Lord 
 and Lady Granville at the English Embassy The salon of Count Apponyi 
 A story connected with it Furniture and entertainments Cakes, ices, 
 and tea ; no champagne as during the Second Empire The Hotel Castel- 
 lane and its amateur theatricals Rival companies No under-studies 
 Lord Brougham at the Hotel Castellane His bad French and his would- 
 be Don Juanism A French rendering of Shakespeare's " There is but one 
 step between the sublime and the ridiculous," as applied to Lord Brougham 
 He nearly accepts a part in a farce where his bad French is likely to pro- 
 duce a comic effect His successor as a murderer of the language M. de 
 Saint-Georges Like Moliere, he reads his plays to his housekeeper When 
 the latter is not satisfied, the dinner is spoilt, however great the success of 
 the play in public estimation Great men and their housekeepers Turner, 
 Jean Jacques Rousseau, Eugene Delacroix. 
 
 NEXT to Dumas, the man who is uppermost in my recol- 
 lections of that period is Dr. Louis Veron, the founder of the 
 Revue de Paris, which was the precursor of the Revue des
 
 DR. VERON. 63 
 
 Deux Mondes ; Dr Veron, under whose management the 
 Paris Opera rose to a degree of perfection it has never at- 
 tained since ; Dr. Veron, who, as some one said, was as much 
 part and parcel of the history of Paris during the first half 
 of the nineteenth century as was Napoleon I. of the history 
 of France ; Dr. Veron, than whom there has been no more 
 original figure in any civilized community before or since, 
 with the exception, perhaps, of Phineas Barnum, to whom, 
 however, he was infinitely superior in education, tact, and 
 manners. 
 
 Dr. Veron has written his own " Memoirs " in six bulky 
 volumes, to which he added a seventh a few years later. 
 They are full of interesting facts from beginning to end, 
 especially to those who did not know intimately the author 
 or the times of which he treats. Those who did are tempted 
 to repeat the mot of Diderot when they gave him the portrait 
 of his father. " This is my Sunday father ; I want my every- 
 day father." The painter, in fact, had represented the worthy 
 cutler of Langres in his best coat and wig, etc. ; not as his 
 son had been in the habit of seeing him. The Dr. Veron of 
 the " Memoirs " is not the Dr. Veron of the Cafe de Paris, 
 nor the Dr. Veron of the avant-scene in his own theatre, snor- 
 ing a duet with Auber, and " keeping better time than the 
 great composer himself ; " he is not the Dr. Veron full of fads 
 and superstitions and uniformly kind, " because kindness is 
 as a rule a capital investment ; " he is not the cheerful pessi- 
 mist we knew ; he is a grumbling optimist, as the journalists 
 of his time have painted him ; in short, in his book he is a 
 quasi-philanthropic illusion, while in reality he was a hard- 
 hearted, shrewd business man who did good by stealth now 
 and then, but never blushed to find it fame. 
 
 The event which proved the starting-point of Dr. Veron's 
 celebrity was neither of his own making nor of his own seek- 
 ing. Though it happened when I was a mere lad, I have 
 heard it discussed in after-years sufficiently often and by very 
 good authorities to be confident of my facts. In June, 1831, 
 Dr. Veron took the management of the Paris Opera, which 
 up till then had been governed on the style of the old regime, 
 namely, by three gentlemen of the king's household with a 
 working director under them. The royal privy purse was 
 virtually responsible for its liabilities. Louis-Philippe shift- 
 ed the burden of that responsibility on the State, and 
 limited its extent. The three gentlemen of the king's house-
 
 Q AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 hold were replaced by a royal commissioner, and the yearly 
 subsidy fixed at 32,500 ; still a pretty round sum, which has 
 been reduced since by 500 only. 
 
 At Dr. Verou's advent, Meyerbeer's " Robert le Diable " 
 was, what they call in theatrical parlance, " underlined," or, 
 if not underlined, at least definitely accepted. Only one 
 work of his had at that time been heard in Paris, " II Crociato 
 in Egitto." 
 
 It is difficult to determine, after so many years, whether 
 Dr. Veron, notwithstanding his artistic instincts, was greatly 
 smitten with the German composer's masterpiece. It has 
 often been argued that he was not, because he insisted upon 
 an indemnity of forty thousand francs from the Government 
 towards the cost of its production. In the case of a man like 
 Veron, this proves nothing at all. He may have been 
 thoroughly convinced of the merits of " Eobert le Diable," 
 and as thoroughly confident of its success with the public, 
 though no manager, not even the most experienced, can be ; 
 it would not have prevented him from squeezing the forty 
 thousand francs from the minister on the plea that the per- 
 formance of the work was imposed upon him by a treaty of 
 his predecessor. To Dr. Veron's credit be it said that he 
 might have saved himself the hard tussle he had with the 
 minister by simply applying for the money to Meyerbeer 
 himself, who would have given it without a moment's hesita- 
 tion, rather than see the success of " Robert le Diable " jeop- 
 ardized by inefficient mounting, although up to the last 
 Meyerbeer could never make up his mind whether magnificent 
 scenery and gorgeous dresses were an implied compliment or 
 the reverse to the musical value of his compositions. A pro- 
 pos of this there is a very characteristic story. At one of the 
 final dress-rehearsals of " Robert le Diable," Meyerbeer felt 
 much upset. At the sight of that beautiful set of the cloister 
 of Sainte-Rosalie, where the nuns rise from their tombs, at 
 the effect produced by the weird procession, Meyerbeer came 
 up to Veron. 
 
 " My dear director," he said, " I perceive well enough that 
 you do not depend upon the opera itself ; you are, in fact, 
 running after a spectacular success." 
 
 " Wait till the fourth act," replied V6ron, who was above 
 all logical. 
 
 The curtain rose upon the fourth act, and what did Meyer- 
 beer behold? Instead of the vast, grandiose apartment he
 
 MEYERBEER'S CHARITY. 65 
 
 had conceived for Isabella, Princess of Sicily, he found a 
 mean, shabby set, which would have been deemed scarcely 
 good enough for a minor theatre. 
 
 "Decidedly, my dear director," said Meyerbeer, with a 
 bitter twinge in his features and voice, "I perceive well 
 enough that you have no faith in my score ; you did not even 
 dare go to the expense of a new set. I would willingly have 
 paid for it myself." 
 
 And he would willingly have paid for it, because Meyer- 
 beer was not only very rich, but very generous. 
 
 " It is a very funny thing," said Lord , as he came 
 
 into the Cafe de Paris one morning, many years afterwards ; 
 " there are certain days in the week when the Eue Le Pele- 
 tier seems to be swarming with beggars, and, what is funnier 
 still, they don't take any notice of me. I pass absolutely 
 scot-free." 
 
 " I'll bet," remarked Eoger de Beauvoir, " that they are 
 playing ' Eobert le Diable ' or ' Les Huguenots ' to-night, and 
 I can assure you that I have not seen the bills." 
 
 " Xow that you speak of it, they are playing ' Les Hugue- 
 nots ' to-night," replied Lord ; " but what has that to do 
 
 with it ? I am not aware that the Paris beggars manifest a 
 particular predilection for Meyerbeer's operas, and that they 
 are booking their places on the days they are performed." 
 
 " It's simply this," explained De Beauvoir : " both Eossini 
 and Meyerbeer never fail to come of a morning to look at the 
 bills, and when the latter finds his name on them, he is so 
 overjoyed that he absolutely empties his pockets of all the 
 cash they contain. Notwithstanding his many years of suc- 
 cess, he is still afraid that the public's liking for his music is 
 merely a passing fancy, and as every additional performance 
 decreases this apprehension, he thinks he cannot be suffi- 
 ciently thankful to Providence. His gratitude shows itself 
 in almsgiving." 
 
 I made it my business subsequently to verify what I con- 
 sidered De Beauvoir's fantastical statement, and I found it 
 substantially correct. 
 
 To return to Dr. Veron, who, there is no doubt, did the 
 best he could for " Eobert le Diable," to which and to the 
 talent of Taglioni he owed his fortune. At the same time, it 
 would be robbing him of part of his glory did we not state 
 that the success of that great work might have been less sig- 
 nal but for him ; both his predecessors and successors had
 
 66 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 and have still equally good chances without having availed 
 themselves of them, either in the interest of lyrical art or in 
 that of the public. 
 
 I compared Dr. Veron just now to Phiueas Barnum, and 
 the comparison was not made at random. Dr. Veron was 
 really the inventor of the newspaper puff direct and indirect 
 of that personal journalism which records the slightest 
 deed or gesture of the popular theatrical manager, and which 
 at the present day is carried to excess. And all his subor- 
 dinates and co-workers were made to share the advantages of 
 the system, because their slightest doings also reflected glory 
 upon him. An artist filling at a moment's notice the part of 
 a fellow-artist who had become suddenly ill, a carpenter sav- 
 ing by his presence of mind the situation at a critical junct- 
 ure, had not only his paragraph in next morning's papers, 
 but a whole column, containing the salient facts of his life 
 and career. It was the system of Frederick the Great and of 
 the first Napoleon, acknowledging the daring deeds of their 
 smallest as well as of their foremost aids with this differ- 
 ence, that the French captain found it convenient to sup- 
 press them now and then, and that Dr. Veron never at- 
 tempted to do so. When the idea of putting down these 
 notes first entered my mind, I looked over some files of news- 
 papers of that particular period, and there was scarcely one 
 between 1831 and 1835 that did not contain a lengthy refer- 
 ence to the Grand Opera and its director. I was irresistibly 
 reminded of the bulletins the great Napoleon dictated on the 
 battle-field. I have also seen a collection of posters relating 
 to the same brilliant reign at the Opera. Of course, com- 
 pared to the eloquent effusions and ingenious attempts of the 
 contemporary theatrical manager to bait the public, Veron's 
 are mere child's play ; still we must remember that the art of 
 puffing was in its infancy, and, as such, some of them are 
 worth copying. The public was not so blase, and it swallowed 
 the bait eagerly. Here they are. 
 
 " To-morrow tenth performance of . . . , which hence- 
 forth will only be played at rare intervals. 
 
 " To-morrow twentieth performance of . . . ; positively 
 the last before the departure of M. . . . 
 
 " To-morrow seventeenth performance of . . . ; reappear- 
 ance of Madame . . . 
 
 " To-morrow fifteenth performance of . . . by all the 
 principal artists who ' created ' the parts.
 
 PRIMITIVE PUFFING. 67 
 
 " To-morrow thirtieth performance of ... The third 
 scene of the second act will be played as on the first night. 
 
 " To-morrow twentieth performance of . . . , which can 
 only be played for a limited number of nights. 
 
 " To-morrow sixteenth performance of ... In the Bail- 
 Room Scene a new pas de Chales will be introduced. 
 
 " To-morrow thirtieth performance of ... This success- 
 ful work must be momentarily suspended owing to previous 
 arrangements." 
 
 Childish as these lines may look to the present generation, 
 they produced a fortune of 2000 a year to Dr. Veron in four 
 years, and, but for the outbreak of the cholera in '32, when 
 " Eobert le Diable " was in the flush cf its success, would have 
 produced another 1000 per annum. At that time Dr. Veron 
 had already been able to put aside 24,000, and he might 
 have easily closed his theatre during those terrible months ; 
 but, like Moliere, he asked himself what would become of all 
 those who were dependent upon him, and had not put aside 
 anything ; so he made his savings into ten parcels, intending 
 to hold out as many months without asking help of any one. 
 Five of the parcels went. At the beginning of the sixth 
 month the cholera abated ; by the end it had almost dis- 
 appeared. 
 
 Those who would infer from this that Dr. Veron was in- 
 different to money, would make a great mistake. But he 
 would not allow his love of it to get the upper hand, to come 
 between him and his conscience, to make him commit either 
 a dishonest or a foolish act. By a foolish act he meant head- 
 long speculation. When the shares of the Northern Kail- 
 way were allotted, Dr. Veron owned the Constitutionnel ; 
 150 shares were allotted to him, which at that moment repre- 
 sented a clear profit of 60,000 francs, they being 400 francs 
 above par. Dr. Veron made up his mind to realize there and 
 then. But it was already late ; the Bourse was closed, the 
 stockbrokers had finished business for the day. He, however, 
 met one on the Boulevards, who gave him a cheque for 55,000 
 francs on the Bank of France, which could only be cashed 
 next day. The shares were left meanwhile in Dr. Veron's 
 possession. Three minutes after the bargain was concluded 
 Dr. Veron went back to his office. " I must have ready 
 money for this, or decline the transaction," he said. The 
 stockbroker, by applying to two of his colleagues, managed 
 to scrape together 50,000 francs. Dr. Veron gave him a
 
 68 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 receipt in full, returned home, singing as he went the French 
 version of " A bird in the hand," etc. 
 
 Veron was exceedingly superstitious, and had fads. He 
 could never be induced to take a railway journey. It was 
 generally known in France at that time that, in the early 
 days of locomotion by steam, Queen Victoria had held a 
 similar objection. Veron, when twitted with his objection, 
 invariably replied, " I have yet to learn that the Queen of 
 England is less enlightened than any of you, and she will 
 not enter a railway carriage." But one day the report spread 
 that the queen had made a journey from Windsor to London 
 by the " iron horse," and then Veron was sorely pressed. He 
 had his answer ready. " The Queen of England has got a 
 successor : the Veron dynasty begins and ends with me. I 
 must take care to make it last as long as possible." He stuck 
 to his text till the end of his life. 
 
 On no consideration would Veron have sat down " thirteen 
 at table." Once or twice when the guests and host made up 
 that number, his coachman's son was sent for, dressed, and 
 made presentable, and joined the party ; at others he politely 
 requested two or three of us to go and dine at the Cafe de 
 Paris, and to have the bill sent to him. We drew lots as to 
 who was to go. 
 
 It was through Dr. Veron that I became acquainted with 
 most of the operatic celebrities Meyerbeer, Halevy, Auber, 
 Duprez, etc. ; for though he had abdicated his directorship 
 seven or eight years before we met, he was perhaps a greater 
 power then in the lyrical world than at the date of his 
 reign. 
 
 It was at Dr. Veron's that I saw Mdlle. Taglioni for the 
 first time off the stage. It must have been in 1844, for she 
 had not been in Paris since 1840, when I had seen her dance 
 at the Opera. I had only seen her dance once before that, in 
 '36 or '37, but I was altogether too young to judge then. I 
 own that in 1840 I was somewhat disappointed, and my dis- 
 appointment was shared by many, because some of my friends, 
 to whom I communicated my impressions, told me that her 
 three years' absence had made a vast difference in her art. 
 In '44 it was still worse ; her performances gave rise to many 
 a spiteful epigram, for she herself invited comparison between 
 her former glory and her decline, by dancing in one of her 
 most successful creations, " L'Ombre." Those most leniently 
 disposed towards her thought what Alfred de Musset so
 
 TAGLIOXA. gQ 
 
 gracefully expressed when requested to write some verses in 
 her album. 
 
 " Si vous ne voulez plus danser, 
 Si vous ue faites que passer 
 Sur ce grand theatre si sombre, 
 Ne courez pas apres votre ombre 
 Et tachez de nous la laisser." 
 
 My disappointment with the ballerina was as nothing, 
 however, to my disappointment with the woman. I had 
 been able to determine for myself before then that Marie 
 Taglioni was by no means a good-looking woman, but I did 
 not expect her to be so plain as she was. That, after all, was 
 not her fault ; but she might have tried to make amends for 
 her lack of personal charms by her amiability. She rarely 
 attempted to do so, and never with Frenchmen. Her recep- 
 tion of them was freezing to a degree, and on the occasions 
 few and far between when she thawed, it was with Russians, 
 Englishmen, or Viennese. Any male of the Latin races she 
 held metaphorically as well as literally at arm's length. Of 
 the gracefulness, so apparent on the stage, even in her decline, 
 there was not a trace to be found in private life. One of her 
 shoulders was higher than the other ; she limped slightly, 
 and, moreover, waddled like a duck. The pinched mouth 
 was firmly set ; there was no smile on the colourless lips, and 
 she replied to one's remarks in monosyllables. 
 
 Truly she had suffered a cruel wrong at the hands of men 
 of one man, bien entendu; nevertheless, the wonder to 
 most people who knew her was not that Comte Gilbert de 
 Voisins should have left her so soon after their marriage, but 
 that he should have married her at all. " The fact was," said 
 some one with whom I discussed the marriage one day, " that 
 De Voisins considered himself in honour bound to make that 
 reparation, but I cannot conceive what possessed him to com- 
 mit the error that made the reparation necessary." And I 
 am bound to say that it was not the utter lack of personal 
 attractions that made everyone, men and women alike, indif- 
 ferent to Taglioni. She was what the French call "une 
 pimbeche." * " Am I not a good-natured woman ? " said 
 Mdlle. Mars one day to Hoffman, the blood-curdling novelist. 
 " Mademoiselle, you are the most amiable creature I know 
 between the footlights and the cloth," he replied. No one 
 
 * The word " shrew " is the nearest equivalent. EDITOR.
 
 70 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 could have paid Taglioni even such a left-handed compli- 
 ment, for, if all I heard was true, she was not good-tempered 
 either on or off the stage. Dr. Veron, who was really a very 
 loyal friend, was very reticent about her character, and would 
 never be drawn into revelations. " You know the French 
 proverb," he said once, when I pressed him very closely. " ' On 
 ne herite pas de ceux que Ton tue ; ' and, after all, she helped 
 me to make my fortune." 
 
 That evening I was seated next to Mdlle. Taglioni at din- 
 ner, and when she discovered my nationality she unbent a 
 little, so that towards the dessert we were on comparatively 
 friendly terms. She had evidently very grateful recollections 
 of her engagements in London, for it was the only topic on 
 which I could get her to talk on that occasion. Here is a 
 little story I had from her own lips, and which shows the 
 Scotch of the early thirties in quite a new light. It may 
 have been known once, but has been probably forgotten by 
 now, except by the " oldest inhabitant " of Perth. In 1832 
 or 1833 I will not vouch for the exact year, seeing that it is 
 two score of years since the story was told to me the season 
 in London had been a fatiguing one for Taglioni. A ballet 
 her father had composed for her, " Nathalie, ou la Laitiere 
 Suisse," a very inane thing by all accounts, had met with 
 great success in London. The scene, however, had, as far as 
 I could make out, been changed from Switzerland to Scot- 
 land, but of this I will not be certain. At the termination 
 of her engagement Taglioni wanted rest, and she bethought 
 herself to recruit in the Highlands. After travelling hither 
 and thither for a little while, she arrived at Perth, and, as a 
 matter of course, put down her name in the visitors' book of 
 the hotel, then went out to explore the sights of the town. 
 Meanwhile the report of her arrival had spread like wildfire, 
 and on her return to the hotel she found awaiting her a depu- 
 tation from the principal inhabitants, with the request to 
 honour them with a performance. " The request was so gra- 
 ciously conveyed," said Taglioni, " that I could not but ac- 
 cept, though I took care to point out the difficulties of per- 
 forming a ballet all by myself, seeing that there was neither 
 a corps de ballet, a male dancer, nor any one else to support 
 me. All these objections were overruled by their promise to 
 provide all these in the best way they could, and before I had 
 time to consider the matter fully, I was taken off in a cab to 
 inspect the theatre, etc. Great heavens, what a stage and
 
 A SCRATCH PERFORMANCE. 71 
 
 scenery ! Still, I had given my promise, and, seeing their 
 anxiety, would not go back from it. I cannot tell where 
 they got their personnel from. There was a director and a 
 stage- manager, but as he did not understand French, and as 
 my English at that time was even worse than it is now, we 
 were obliged to communicate through an interpreter. His 
 English must have been bewildering, to judge from the man- 
 ager's blank looks when he spoke to him, and his French was 
 even more wonderful than my English. He was a German 
 waiter from the hotel. 
 
 " Nevertheless, thanks to him, I managed to convey the 
 main incidents of the plot of ' Nathalie ' to the manager, and 
 during the first act, the most complicated one, all went well. 
 But at the beginning of the second everything threatened to 
 come to a standstill. I must tell you that my father hit upon 
 the novel idea of introducing a kind of dummy, or lay figure, 
 on which this idiotic Nathalie lavishes all her caresses. The 
 young fellow, who is in love with Nathalie, contrives to take 
 the dummy's place ; consequently, in order to preserve some 
 semblance of truth, and not to make Nathalie appear more 
 idiotic than she is already, there ought to be a kind of like- 
 ness between the dummy and the lover. I know not whether 
 the interpreter had been at fault, or whether in the hurry- 
 scurry I had forgotten all about the dummy, but a few min- 
 utes before the rise of the curtain I discovered that there was 
 no dummy. ' You must do the dummy,' I said to Pierre, my 
 servant, ' and I'll pretend to carry you on.' Pierre nodded a 
 silent assent, and immediately began to don the costume, see- 
 ing which I had the curtain rung up, and went on to the 
 stage. I was not very comfortable, though, for I heard a 
 violent altercation going on behind the scenes, the cause of 
 which I failed to guess. I kept dancing and dancing, getting 
 near to the wings every now and then, to ask whether Pierre 
 was ready. He seemed to mo inordinately long in changing 
 his dress, but the delay was owing to something far more 
 serious than his careful preparation for the part. Pierre 
 had a pair of magnificent whiskers, and the young fellow 
 who enacted the lover had not a hair on his face. Pierre 
 was ready to go on, when the manager noticed the differ- 
 ence. ' Stop ! ' he shouted ; ' that won't do. You must 
 have your whiskers taken off.' Pierre indignantly refused. 
 The manager endeavoured to persuade him to make the 
 sacrifice, but in vain, until at last he had him held down on
 
 72 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 a chair by two stalwart Scotchmen while the barber did his 
 work. 
 
 " All this had taken time, but the public did not grow 
 impatient. They would have been very difficult to please 
 indeed had they behaved otherwise, for I never danced to 
 any audience as I did to them. One of the few pleasant 
 recollections in my life is that evening at Perth ; and, curi- 
 ously enough, Pierre, who is still with me, refers to it with 
 great enthusiasm, notwithstanding the cavalier treatment in- 
 flicted upon him. It was his first and last appearance on 
 any stage." 
 
 Here is another story Taglioni told me on a subsequent 
 occasion. I have often wondered since whether Macaulay 
 would not have been pleased with it even more than I was. 
 
 " The St. Petersburg theatrical season of '2-25 had been 
 particularly brilliant, and nowhere more so than at the Italian 
 Opera. I came away laden with presents, among others one 
 from the Czar a magnificent necklet of very fine pearls. 
 When the theatre closed at Lent, I was very anxious to get 
 away, in spite of the inclement season, and notwithstanding 
 the frequent warnings that the roads were not safe. When- 
 ever the conversation turned on that topic, the name of 
 Trischka was sure to crop up ; he, in fact, was the leader of 
 a formidable band of highwaymen, compared with whose 
 exploits those of all the others seemed to sink into insignifi- 
 cance. Trischka had been steward to Prince Paskiwiecz, and 
 was spoken of as a very intelligent fellow. Nearly every one 
 with whom I came in contact had seen him while he was still 
 at St. Petersburg, and had a good word to say for him. His 
 manners were reported to be perfect ; he spoke French and 
 German very fairly ; and, most curious of all, he was an ex- 
 cellent dancer. Some Avent even as far as to say that if he 
 had adopted that profession, instead of scouring the high- 
 ways, he would have made a fortune. By all accounts he 
 never molested poor people, and the rich, whom he laid 
 under contribution, had never to complain of violent treat- 
 ment either in words or deeds nay, more, he never took 
 all they possessed from his victims, he was content to 
 share and share alike. But papa n'ecoutait pas de cet' oreille 
 la ; papa etait tres peu partageur ; and, truth to tell, I was 
 taking away a great deal of money from St. Petersburg 
 which was perhaps another reason why papa did not see the 
 necessity of paying tithes to Trischka. If we had followed
 
 TAGLIONI'S HUSBAND. 73 
 
 papa's advice, we should have either applied to the Czar for 
 an armed escort, or else delayed our departure till the middle 
 of the summer, though he failed to see that the loss of my en- 
 gagements elsewhere would have amounted to a serious item 
 also. But papa had got it into his head not to part with any 
 of the splendid presents I had received ; they were mostly 
 jewels, and people who do not know papa can form no idea 
 what they meant to him. However, as we were plainly 
 told that Trischka conducted his operations all the year 
 round, that we were as likely to be attacked by him in sum- 
 mer as in winter, papa reluctantly made up his mind to go 
 in the beginning of April. Papa provided himself with a 
 pair of large pistols that would not have hurt a cat, and were 
 the laughing-stock of all those who accompanied us for the 
 first dozen miles on our journey ; for I had made many friends, 
 and they insisted on doing this. We had two very roomy 
 carriages. My father, my maid, two German violinists, and 
 myself were in the first ; the second contained our luggage. 
 
 " At the first change of horses after Pskoff, the postmaster 
 told us that Trischka and his band had been seen a few days 
 previously on the road to Dunabourg , at the same time, he 
 seemed to think very lightly of the matter, and, addressing 
 himself particularly to me, opined that, with a little diplo- 
 macy on my part and a good deal of sang-froid, I might be 
 let off very cheaply. All went well until the middle of the 
 next night, when all of a sudden, in the thick of a dense 
 forest, our road was barred by a couple of horsemen, while a 
 third opened the door of our carriage. It was Trischka him- 
 self. ' Mademoiselle Taglioni ? ' he said in very good German, 
 lifting his hat. ' I am Mademoiselle Taglioni,' I replied in 
 French. ' I know,' he answered, with a deeper bow than 
 before. ' I was told you were coming this way. I am sorry, 
 mademoiselle, that I could not come to St. Petersburg to see 
 you dance, but as chance has befriended me, I hope you will 
 do me the honour to dance before me here.' ' How can I 
 dance here, in this road, monsieur ? ' I said beseechingly. 
 ' Alas, mademoiselle, I have no drawing-room to offer you,' 
 he replied, still as polite as ever. ' Nevertheless,' he con- 
 tinued, ' if you think it cannot be done, I shall be under the 
 painful necessity of confiscating your carriages and luggage, 
 and of sending you back on foot to the nearest post-town.' 
 ' But, monsieur,' I protested, ' the road is ankle-deep in mud.' 
 ' Truly,' he laughed, showing a beautiful set of teeth, ' but 
 
 4
 
 74: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 your weight won't make any difference ; besides, I dare say 
 you have some rugs and cloths with you in the other car- 
 riage, and my men will only be too pleased to spread them 
 on the ground.' 
 
 " Seeing that all my remonstrance would be in vain, I 
 jumped out of the carriage. While the rugs were being laid 
 down, my two companions, the violinists, tuned their instru- 
 ments, and even papa was prevailed upon to come out, though 
 he was sulky and never spoke a word. 
 
 " I danced for about a quarter of an hour, and I honestly 
 believe that I never had such an appreciative audience either 
 before or afterwards. Then Trischka led me back to the car- 
 riage, and, simply lifting his hat, bade me adieu. ' I keep the 
 rugs, mademoiselle. I will never part with them,' he said. The 
 last I saw of him, when our carriages were turning a bend in 
 the road, was a truly picturesque figure on horseback, waving 
 his hand." 
 
 More than eight years elapsed before I met Taglioni 
 again, and then she looked absolutely like an old woman, 
 though she was under fifty. It was at the Comte (afterwards 
 Due) de Morny's, in '52, and, if I remember rightly, almost 
 immediately after his resignation as Minister of the Interior. 
 Taglioni and Mdlle. Rachel were the only women present. 
 Just as we were sitting down to dinner, Count Gilbert de 
 Voisins came in, and took the next seat but one on my left 
 which had been reserved for him. We were on friendly, 
 though not on very intimate terms. He was evidently not 
 aware of the presence of his wife, for after a few minutes he 
 asked his neighbour, pointing to her, " Who is this governess- 
 looking old maid ? " He told him. He showed neither sur- 
 prise nor emotion ; but, if an artist could have been found 
 to sketch his face there, its perfect blank would have been 
 more amusing than either. He seemed, as it were, to consult 
 his recollections; then he said, "Is it? It may be, after 
 all;" and went on eating his dinner. His wife acted less 
 diplomatically. She recognized him at once, and made a re- 
 mark to her host in a sufficiently loud voice to be overheard, 
 which was not in good taste, the more that De Moray, not- 
 withstanding his many faults, was not the man to have in- 
 vited both for the mere pleasure of playing a practical joke. 
 In fact, I have always credited De Moray with the good in- 
 tention of bringing about a reconciliation between the two ; 
 but the affair was hopeless from the very beginning, after
 
 VON FLOTOW. 75 
 
 Taglioni's exhibition of temper. I am far from saying that 
 Count Gilbert would have been more tractable if it had not 
 occurred, but his spouse shut the door at once upon every 
 further attempt in that direction. Nevertheless, whether out 
 of sheer devilry or from a wish to be polite, he went up to 
 her- after dinner, accompanied by a friend, who introduced 
 him as formally as if he and she had never seen one another. 
 It was at a moment when the Comte de Morny was out of 
 the room, because I feel certain that he was already sorry 
 then for what he had endeavoured to do, and had washed his 
 hands of the whole affair. Taglioni made a stately bow. " I 
 am under the impression," she said, " that I have had the 
 honour of meeting you before, about the year 1832." With 
 this she turned away. Let any playwright reproduce that 
 scene in a farcical or comedy form, and I am sure that three- 
 fourths of his audience would scout it as too exaggerated, and 
 yet every incident of it is absolutely true. 
 
 Among my most pleasant recollections of those days is 
 that connected with Von Flotow, the future composer of 
 " Martha." In appearance he was altogether unlike the 
 traditional musician ; he looked more like a stalwart officer 
 of dragoons. Though of noble origin, and with a very 
 wealthy father, there was a time when he had a hard strug- 
 gle for existence. Count von Flotow, his father, and an old 
 officer of Blucher, was nearly as much opposed to his son 
 becoming a musician as Frederick the Great's. Neverthe- 
 less, at the instance of Flotow's mother, he was sent to Paris 
 at the age of sixteen, and entered the Conservatoire, then 
 under the direction of Reicha. His term of apprenticeship 
 was not to extend beyond two years, " for," said the count, 
 " it does not take longer for the rawest recruit to become a 
 good soldier." " That will give you a fair idea," remarked 
 Von Flotow to me afterwards, " how much he understood 
 about it. He had an ill-disguised contempt for any music 
 which did not come up to his ideal. His ideal was that per- 
 formed by the drum, the fife, and the bugle. And the very 
 fact of Germany ringing a few years later with the names of 
 Meyerbeer and Ilalevy made matters worse instead of mend- 
 ing them. His feudal pride would not allow of his son's 
 entering a profession the foremost ranks of which were occu- 
 pied by Jews. 'Music,' he said, 'was good enough for 
 bankers' sons and the like,' and he considered that Weber 
 had cast a slur upon his family by adopting it."
 
 76 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 The two years grudgingly allowed by Count von Flotow 
 for his son's musical education were interrupted by the 
 revolution of 1830, and the young fellow had to return home 
 before he was eighteen, because, in his father's opinion, " he 
 had not given a sign of becoming a great musician;" in 
 other words, he had not written an opera or anything else 
 which had attracted public notice. However, towards the 
 beginning of 1831, the count took his son to Paris once 
 more ; " and though Meyerbeer nor Halevy were not so 
 famous then as they were destined to become within the 
 next three years, their names were already sufficiently well 
 known to have made an introduction valuable. It would 
 not have been difficult to obtain such. My father would not 
 hear of it. ' I will not have my son indebted for anything 
 to a Jew,' he said ; and I am only quoting this instance of 
 prejudice to you because it was not an individual but a typ- 
 ical one among my father's social equals. The remark about 
 ' his son's entering a profession in which two Jews had car- 
 ried off the highest prizes ' is of a much later date. Conse- 
 quently we landed in Paris, provided with letters of intro- 
 duction to M. de Saint-Georges.* Clever, accomplished, 
 refined as was M. de Saint-Georges, he was scarcely the 
 authority a father with serious intentions about his son's 
 musical career would have consulted; he was a charming, 
 skilful librettist and dramatist, a thorough man of the world 
 in the best sense of the word, but absolutely incapable of 
 judging the higher qualities of the composer. Nevertheless, 
 I owe him much ; but for him I should have been dragged 
 back to Germany there and then ; but for him I should have 
 been compelled to go back to Germany five years later, or 
 starved in the streets of Paris. 
 
 " My father's interview with M. de Saint-Georges, and 
 my first introduction to him," said Flotow on another occa- 
 sion, " were perhaps the most comical scenes ever enacted off 
 the stage. You know my old friend, and have been to his 
 rooms, so I need not describe him nor his surroundings to 
 you. You have never seen my father ; but, to give you an 
 idea of what he was like, I may tell you that he was an en- 
 larged edition of myself. A bold rider, a soldier and a 
 
 * Jules-Henri de Saint-Georges, one of the most fertile librettists of the 
 time, the principal collaborates of Scribe, and best known in England as the 
 author of the book of Balfe's " Bohemian Girl." EDITOR.
 
 VON FLOTOW'S FATHER. 77 
 
 sportsman, fairly well educated, but upon the whole a very 
 rough diamond, and, I am afraid, with a corresponding con- 
 tempt for the elegant and artistic side of Paris life. You 
 may, therefore, picture to yourself the difference between 
 the two men M. de Saint-Georges in a beautiful silk dress- 
 ing-gown and red morocco slippers, sipping chocolate from 
 a dainty porcelain cup ; my father, who, contrary to German 
 custom, had always refused to don that comfortable gar- 
 ment, and who, to my knowledge, had never in his life tasted 
 chocolate. For the moment I thought that everything was 
 lost. I was mistaken. 
 
 " ' Monsieur,' said my father in French, which absolutely 
 creaked with the rust of age, ' I have come to ask your advice 
 and a favour besides. My son desires to become a musician. 
 Is it possible ? ' 
 
 " ' There is no reason why he should not be,' replied M. 
 de Saint-Georges, ' provided he has a vocation.' 
 
 " ' Vocation may mean obstinacy,' remarked my father. 
 ' But let us suppose the reverse that obstinacy means voca- 
 tion : how long would it take him to prove that he has 
 talent?' 
 
 " ' It is difficult to say five years at least.' 
 
 " ' And two he has already spent at the Conservatoire will 
 make seven. I hope he will not be like Jacob, who, after 
 that period of waiting, found that they had given him the 
 wrong goddess ! ' growled my father, who could be grimly 
 humorous when he liked. ' Five years more be it, then, but 
 not a single day longer. If by that time he has not made 
 his mark, I withdraw his allowance. I thank you for your 
 advice ; and now I will ask a favour. Will you kindly supply 
 my place that is, keep an eye upon him, and do the best 
 you can for him ? Remember, he is but twenty. It is hard 
 enough that I cannot make a soldier of him ; from what I 
 have heard and from what I can see, you will prevent him 
 from becoming less than a gentleman.' 
 
 " M. de Saint-Georges was visibly moved. ' Let me hear 
 what he can do,' he said, * and then I will tell you.' 
 
 " I sat down to the piano for more than an hour. 
 
 " ' I will see that your son becomes a good musician, M. 
 le Comte,' said M. de Saint-Georges. 
 
 " Next morning my father went back to Germany. Noth- 
 ing would induce him to stay a single day. He said the 
 atmosphere of Paris was vitiated.
 
 78 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " I need not tell you that M. de Saint-Georges kept his 
 word as far as he was able ; he kept it even more rigorously 
 than my father had bargained for, because when, exactly on 
 the last day of the stipulated five years, I received a letter 
 demanding my immediate return, and informing me that my 
 father's banker had instructions to stop all further supplies, 
 M. de Saint- Georges bade me stay. 
 
 " ' I promised to make a musician of you, and I have 
 kept my word. But between a musician and an acknowl- 
 edged musician there is a difference. I say stay ! ' he ex- 
 claimed. 
 
 " ' How am I to stay without money ? ' 
 
 " ' You'll earn some.' 
 
 "'How?' 
 
 " ' By giving piano-lessons, like many a poor artist has 
 done before you.' 
 
 " I followed his advice, and am none the worse for the 
 few years of hardships. The contrast between my own pov- 
 erty and my wealthy surroundings was sufficiently curious 
 during that time, and never more so than on the night when 
 my name really became known to the general public. I am 
 alluding to the first performance of 'Le Due de Guise,' 
 which, as you may remember, was given in aid of the dis- 
 tressed Poles, and sung throughout by amateurs. The re- 
 ceipts amounted to thirty thousand francs, and the ladies of 
 the chorus had something between ten and twelve millions of 
 francs of diamonds in their hair and round their throats. 
 All my earthly possessions in money consisted of six francs 
 thirty-five centimes." 
 
 I was not at the Theatre de la Renaissance that night, 
 but two or three years previously I had heard the first opera 
 Flotow ever wrote, at the Hotel Castellane. I never heard 
 " Rob Roy " since ; and, curiously enough, many years after- 
 wards I inquired of Lord Granville, who sat next to me on 
 that evening in 1838, whether he had. He shook his head 
 negatively. " It is a great pity," he said, " for the music is 
 very beautiful." And I believe that Lord Granville is a very 
 good judge. 
 
 The Hotel Castellane, or " La Maison du Mouleur," as it 
 was called by the general public on account of the great 
 number of scantily attired mythological deities with which 
 its faqade was decorated, was one of the few houses where, 
 during the reign of Louis-Philippe, the discussion of polit-
 
 SOCIETY IN THE FORTIES. 79 
 
 ical and dynastic differences Avas absolutely left in abeyance. 
 The scent of party strife I had almost said miasma hung 
 over all the other salons, notably those of the Princesse de 
 Lieven, Madame Thiers, and Madame de Girardiu, and even 
 those of Madame Le Hou and Victor Hugo were not free 
 from it. Men like myself, and especially young men, who 
 instinctively guessed the hollowness of all this who, more- 
 over, had not the genius to become political leaders and not 
 sufficient enthusiasm to become followers avoided them ; 
 consequently their description will find little or no place in 
 these notes. The little I saw of Princesse de Lieven at the 
 Tuileries and elsewhere produced no wish, to see more. 
 Thiers was more interesting from a social and artistic point 
 of view, but it was only on very rare occasions that he consent- 
 ed to doff his political armour, albeit that he did not wear 
 the latter with unchanging dignity. Madame Thiers was an 
 uninteresting woman, and only the " feeder " to her husband, 
 to use a theatrical phrase. Madame Le Hon was exceedingly 
 beautiful, exceedingly selfish, and, if anything, too amiable. 
 The absence of all serious mental qualities was cleverly dis- 
 guised by the mask of a grande dame ; but I doubt whether 
 it was anything else but a mask. Madame Delphine de Gi- 
 rardin, on the other hand, was endowed, with uncommon 
 literary, poetical, and intellectual gifts ; but I have always 
 considered it doubtful whether even the Nine Muses, rolled 
 into one, would be bearable for any length of time. As for 
 Victor Hugo, no man not blessed with an extraordinary 
 bump of veneration would have gone more than once to his 
 soirees. The permanent entertainment there consisted of a 
 modern version of the " perpetual adoration," and of nothing 
 else, because, to judge by my few experiences, his guests were 
 never offered anything to eat or to drink. As a set-off, the 
 furniture and appointments of his apartments were more 
 artistic than those of most of his contemporaries ; but Becky 
 Sharp has left it on record that " mouton aux navets," dished 
 up in priceless china and crested silver, is after all but 
 " mouton aux navets," and at Hugo's even that homely fare 
 was wanting. 
 
 Among the few really good salons were those of the am- 
 bassadors of the Two Sicilies, of England, and of Austria. 
 The former two were in the Faubourg Saint-Honore, the lat- 
 ter in the Faubourg Saint-Germain. The soirees of the Due 
 de Serra-Cabriola were very animated ; there was a great deal
 
 80 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 of dancing. I cannot say the same of those of Lord and Lady 
 Granville, albeit that both the host and hostess did the honours 
 with charming and truly patrician grace and hospitality. 
 But the English guests would not throw off their habitual 
 reserve, and the French in the end imitated the manner of 
 the latter, in deference, probably, to Lord and Lady Gran- 
 ville, who were not at all pleased at this sincerest form of 
 French flattery of their countrymen. 
 
 There was no such restraint at Count Apponyi's, in the 
 Faubourg Saint-Germain, the only house where the old 
 French noblesse mustered in force. The latter virtually felt 
 themselves on their own ground, for the host was known to 
 have not much sympathy with parvenus, even titled ones, 
 though the titles had been gained on the battle-field. Had 
 he not during the preceding reign ruthlessly stripped Soult 
 and Marmont, and half a dozen other dukes of the first em- 
 pire, by giving instructions to his servants to announce them 
 by their family names ? Consequently, flirtation a la Mari- 
 vaux, courtly galanterie a la Louis XV., sprightly and witty 
 conversation, " minuetting " a la Watteau, was the order of 
 the day as well as of the night there, for the dejeuner dan- 
 sant was a frequent feature of the entertainment. No one 
 was afraid of being mistaken for a financier anobli ; the only 
 one admitted on a footing of intimacy bore the simple name 
 of Hope. 
 
 Nevertheless, it must not be thought that the entertain- 
 ments, even at the three embassies, partook of anything like 
 the splendour so noticeable during the second empire. The 
 refreshments elsewhere partook of a simple character ; ices 
 and cake, and lukewarm but by no means strong tea, formed 
 the staple of them. Of course there were exceptions, such 
 as, for instance, at the above-named houses, and at Mrs. 
 Tudor's, Mrs. Locke's, and at Countess Lamoyloff's ; but the 
 era of flowing rivers of champagne, snacks that were like 
 banquets, and banquets that were not unlike orgies, had not 
 as yet dawned. And, worse than all, in a great many salons 
 the era of mahogany and Utrecht velvet was in full swing, 
 while the era of white-and-gold walls, which were frequently 
 neither white nor gold, was dying a very lingering death. 
 
 The H6tel Castellane was a welcome exception to this, 
 and politics were rigorously tabooed, the reading of long- 
 winded poems was interdicted. Politicians were simply re- 
 minded that the adjacent Elysee-Bourbon, or even the Hdtel
 
 AMATEUR THEATRICALS. 81 
 
 Pontalba, might still contain sufficiently lively ghosts to dis- 
 cuss such all-important matters with them ; * poets who fan- 
 cied they had something to say worth hearing, were invited 
 to have it said for them from behind the footlights by rival 
 companies of amateurs, each of which in many respects need 
 not have feared comparison with the professional one of the 
 Comedie-Fram^aise. Amateur theatricals were, therefore, the 
 principal feature of the entertainments at the Hotel Castel- 
 lane ; but there were " off nights " to the full as brilliant as 
 the others. There was neither acting nor dancing on such 
 occasions, the latter amusement being rarely indulged in, ex- 
 cept at the grand balls which often followed one another in 
 rapid succession. 
 
 I have said rival companies, but only the two permanent 
 ones came under that denomination ; the others were what 
 we should term " scratch companies," got together for one 
 or two performances of a special work, generally a musical 
 one, as in the case of Flotow's " Eob Roy " and " Alice." 
 They vied in talent with the regular troupes presided over 
 respectively by Madame Sophie Gay, the mother of Madame 
 Emile do Girardin, and the Duchesse d'Abrantes. Each con- 
 fined itself to the interpretation of the works of its manager- 
 ess, Avho on such evening did the honours, or of those whom 
 the manageress favoured with her protection. The heavens 
 might fall rather than that an actor or actress of Madame 
 Gay's company should act with Madame d'Abrantes, and vice 
 versa. Seeing that neither manageress had introduced the 
 system of " under-studies," disappointments were frequent, 
 for unless a member of the Comedie-Fran9aise could be 
 found to take up the part at a moment's notice, the perform- 
 ance had necessarily to be postponed, the amateurs refusing 
 to act with any but the best. Such pretensions may at the 
 first blush seem exaggerated ; they were justified in this in- 
 stance, the amateurs being acknowledged to be the equals of 
 the professionals by every unbiassed critic. In fact, several 
 
 * The Elysee-Bourbon, which was the official residence of Louis-Napoleon 
 during his presidency of the second republic, was almost untenanted during 
 the reign of Louis- Philippe. 
 
 The Hotel Pontalba was partly built on the site of the former mansion of 
 M. de Morfontaine, a staunch royalist, who, curiously enough, had married the 
 daughter of Le Peletier de Saint-Farojeau, the member of the Convention who 
 had voted the death of Louis XVI., and who himself fell by the hand of an 
 assassin. Mdlle. le Peletier Saint-Fargeau was called " La Fille de la Nation." 
 EDITOR.
 
 82 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 ladies among the amateurs " took eventually to the stage," 
 notably Mdlles. Davenay and Mdlle. de Lagrange. The lat- 
 ter became a very bright star in the operatic firmament, 
 though she was hidden in the musical world at large by her 
 permanent stay in Russia. St. Petersburg has ever been a 
 formidable competitor of Paris for securing the best his- 
 trionic and lyrical talent. Madame Arnould-Plessy, Bressant, 
 Dupuis, and later on M. Worms, deserted their native scenes 
 for the more remunerative, though perhaps really less artistic, 
 triumphs of the theatre Saint-Michel; and when they re- 
 turned, the delicate bloom that had made their art so de- 
 lightful was virtually gone. " C'etait de 1'art Frau9ais a la 
 sauce Tartare," said some one who was no mean judge. 
 
 The Comte Jules de Castellane, though fully equal, and 
 in many respects superior, in birth to those who prof essed to 
 sneer at the younger branch of the Bourbons, declined to be 
 guided by these opponents of the new dynasty in their social 
 crusade against the adherents to the latter; consequently 
 the company was perhaps not always so select as it might 
 have been, and many amusing incidents and piquantes ad- 
 ventures were the result. He put a stop to these, however, 
 when he discovered that his hospitality was being abused, 
 and that invitations given to strangers, at the request of 
 some of his familiars, had been paid for in kind, if not in 
 coin. 
 
 As a rule, though, the company was far less addicted to 
 scandal-mongering and causing scandal than similarly com- 
 posed " sets " during the subsequent reign. They were not 
 averse to playing practical jokes, especially upon those who 
 made themselves somewhat too conspicuous by their eccen- 
 tricities. Lord Brougham, who was an assiduous guest at 
 the Hotel Castellane during his frequent visits to Paris, was 
 often selected as their victim. He, as it were, provoked the 
 tricks played upon him by his would-be Don- Juanesque be- 
 haviour, and by the many opportunities he lost of holding 
 his tongue in French. He absolutely murdered the lan- 
 guage of Moliere. His worthy successor in that respect was 
 Lady Normanby, who, as some one said, " not only murdered 
 the tongue, but tortured it besides." The latter, however, 
 never lost her dignity amidst the most mirth-compelling 
 blunders on her part, while the English statesman was often 
 very near enacting the buffoon, and was once almost in- 
 duced to accept a role in a vaudeville, in which his execrable
 
 M. DE SAINT-GEORGES. ^ 83 
 
 French would no doubt have been highly diverting to the 
 audience, but would scarcely have been in keeping with the 
 position he occupied on the other side of the Channel. 
 " Quant a Lord Brougham," said a very witty Frenchman, 
 quoting Shakespeare in French, " il n'y a pour lui qu'un pas 
 entre le sublime et le ridicule. C'est le pas de Calais, et il le 
 traverse trop souveut." 
 
 In 1842, when the Comte Jules de Castellane married 
 Mdlle. de Villontroys, whose mother had married General 
 Rapp and been divorced from him, a certain change came 
 over the spirit of the house ; the entertainments were as 
 brilliant as ever, but the two rival manageresses had to abdi- 
 cate their sway, and the social status of the guests was sub- 
 jected to a severer test. The new dispensation did not ostra- 
 cize the purely artistic element, but, as the comtesse tersely 
 put it, " dorenavant, je ne recevrai que ceux qui ont.de 1'art 
 ou des armoiries." She strictly kept her word, even during 
 the first years of the Second Empire, when pedigrees were a 
 ticklish thing to inquire into. 
 
 I have unwittingly drifted away from M. de Saint- 
 Georges, who, to say the least, was a curious figure in 
 artistic and literary Paris during the reigns of Louis-Phi- 
 lippe and his successor. He was quite as fertile as Scribe, 
 and many of his plots are as ingeniously conceived and 
 worked out as the latter's, but he suffered both in reputa- 
 tion and purse from the restless activity and pushing char- 
 acter of the librettist of " Robert le Diable." Like those of 
 Eivarol,* M. Saint-Georges' claims to be of noble descent 
 were somewhat contested, albeit that, unlike the eighteenth- 
 century pamphleteer, he never obtruded them ; but there 
 could be 110 doubt about his being a gentleman. He was 
 utterly different in every respect from his rival. Scribe was 
 not only eaten up with vanity, but grasping to a degree ; he 
 had dramatic instinct, but not the least vestige of literary 
 refinement. M. de Saint- Georges, on the contrary, was ex- 
 ceedingly modest, very indifferent to money matters, chari- 
 table and obliging in a quiet way, and though perhaps not 
 inferior in stage-craft, very elegant in his diction. When 
 he liked, he could write verses and dialogue which often 
 reminded one of Moliere. It was not the only trait he had 
 in common with the great playwright. Moliere is said to 
 
 * One of the great wits of the Kevolution. EDITOB.
 
 84 * AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 have consulted his housekeeper, Laforet, with regard to his 
 productions; M. de Saint-Georges was known to do the 
 same with this difference, however, that he did not always 
 attend to Marguerite's suggestions, in which case Marguerite 
 grew wroth, especially if the piece turned out to he a success, 
 in spite of her predictions of failure. On such occasions the 
 popular approval scarcely compensated M. de Saint-Georges 
 for his discomforts at home ; for though Marguerite was an 
 admirable manager at all times when she liked, though 
 there was no bachelor more carefully looked after than the 
 author of " La Fille du Begiment," he had now and then to 
 bear the brunt of Marguerite's temper when the public's 
 verdict did not agree with hers. 
 
 If under such circumstances M. de Saint-Georges ventured 
 to give a dinner, the viands were sure to be cold, the Bor- 
 deaux iced, and the champagne lukewarm. M. de Saint- 
 Georges, who, notwithstanding his courtly manners, was can- 
 dour itself, never failed to state the reasons of his discomfiture 
 as a host to his guests. " Que voulez vous, mes amis, la piece 
 n'a pas plu a Marguerite et le diner s'en ressent. Si je lui 
 faisais une observation, elle me repondrait comme elle m'a 
 repondu deja maintes fois. Le diner etait mauvais, vous 
 dites? C'est possible, il etait assez bien pour ceux qui ont 
 eu le bon gout d'applaudir votre piece hier-au-soir." Because 
 Mdlle. Marguerite had a seat in the upper boxes reserved for 
 her at all the first representations of her master's pieces. She 
 did not always avail herself of the privilege at the Opera, but 
 she never missed a first night at the Opera-Comique. I have 
 quoted textually the words of M. de Saint-Georges on the 
 morrow of the premiere of " Giselle," a ballet in two acts, 
 written in collaboration with Theophile Gautier. " ' Giselle ' 
 had been a great success; Marguerite had predicted a failure ; 
 hence we had a remarkably bad dinner." 
 
 I had had many opportunities of seeing Marguerite, 
 and often wondered at the secret of the tyranny she exer- 
 cised. She was not handsome scarcely comely; she was 
 not even as smart in her appearance as dozens of servants I 
 have seen, and her mental attainments, as far as I could 
 judge, were not above those of her own class. One can un- 
 derstand a Turner, a Jean Jacques Eousseau, submitting to 
 the influence of such a low-born companion, because, after 
 all, they, though men of genius, sprang from the people, and 
 may have felt awkward, ill at ease, in the society of well-bred
 
 AN IMPARTIAL CRITIC. 85 
 
 men and women, especially of women. Beranger sometimes 
 gave me that idea. But, as I have already said, no one could 
 mistake M. de Saint-Georges for anything but a well-bred 
 man. Notwithstanding his little affectations, his inordinate 
 love of scents, his somewhat effeminate surroundings, good 
 breeding was patent at every sentence, at every movement. 
 He was not a genius, certainly not, but the above remarks 
 hold good of a man who was a genius, and who sprang, 
 moreover, from the higher bourgeoisie of the eighteenth cent- 
 ury I am alluding to Eugene Delacroix.
 
 86 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 The Boulevards in the forties The Chinese Baths A favourite tobacconist of 
 Alfred de Musset The price of cigars The diligence still the usual mode 
 of travelling Provincials in Paris Parliamentary see-saw between M. 
 Thiers and M. Guizot Amenities of editors An advocate of universal 
 suffrage Distribution of gratuitous sausages to the working man on the 
 king's birthday The rendezvous of actors in search of an engagement 
 Frederick Lemaitre on the eve of appearing in a new part Thel^egitiniists 
 begin to leave their seclusion and to mingle with the bourgeoisie Alex- 
 anare Dumas and Scribe The latter's fertility as a playwright The 
 National Guards go shooting, in uniform and in companies, on the Plaine 
 Saint-Denis Vidocq's private inquiry office in the Kue Vivienne No 
 river-side resorts The plaster elephant on the Place de la Bastille The 
 sentimental romances of Loisa Puget The songs of the working classes 
 Cheap bread and wine How they enjoyed themselves on Sundays and 
 holidays Theophile Gautier's pony-carriage The hatred of the bpur- 
 
 feoisie Nestor Eoqueplan's expression of it Gavarni's M. Thiers' sister 
 eeps a restaurant at the corner of the Eue Drouot When he is in power, 
 the members of the Opposition go and dine there, and publish facetious 
 accounts of the entertainment All appearances to the contrary, people 
 like Guizot better than Thiers But few entries for the race for wealth in 
 those days The Eothschilds still live in the liue Lafitte Favourite 
 lounges The Boulevards, the Eue Le Peletier, and the Passage de 1'Opera 
 The Opera The Eue Le Peletier and its attractions The Eestaurant of 
 Paolo Broggi The Estaminet du Divan Literary waiters and Boniface 
 Major Fraser The mystery surrounding his origin Another mysterious 
 personage The Passage de 1'Opera is invaded by the stockjobbers, and 
 loses its prestige as a promenade Bernard Latte's, the publisher of Doni- 
 zetti's operas, becomes deserted Tortoni's Louis-Blanc His scruples as 
 an editor A few words about duelling Two tragic meetings Lola Montes 
 Her adventurous career A celebrated trial My first meeting with Gus- 
 tave Flaubert, the author of " Madame Bovary " and " Salambo " Emile 
 de Girardin His opinion of duelling My decision with regard to it The 
 original of "La Dame aux Came'lias" Her parentage Alexandre Dumas 
 gives the diagnosis of her character in connection with his son's play 
 L'Homme au Camellia M. Lautour-Mezerai, the inventor of children's 
 periodical literature in France Auguste Lireux He takes the manage- 
 ment of the Odeon Balzac again -His schemes, his greed Lireux more 
 fortunate with other authors Anglophobia on the French stage Gallo- 
 phobia on the English stage. 
 
 EVEN in those days " the Boulevards " meant to most of 
 us nothing more than the space between the present opera 
 and the Rue Drouot. But the Credit Lyonnais and other 
 palatial buildings which have been erected since were not as 
 much as dreamt of ; if I remember rightly, the site of that
 
 PARIS IN THE FORTIES. 87 
 
 bank Avas occupied by two or three " Chinese Baths." I sup- 
 pose the process of steaming and cleansing the human body 
 was something analogous to that practised in our Turkish 
 baths, but I am unable to say from experience, having never 
 been inside, and, curious to relate, most of my familiars were 
 in a similar state of ignorance. We rarely crossed to that 
 side of the boulevard except to go and dine at the Cafe An- 
 glais. At the corner of the Rue Lafitte, opposite the Maison 
 d'Or, was our favourite tobacconist's, and the cigars we used 
 to get there were vastly superior to those we get at present in 
 Paris at five times the cost. The assistant who served us was 
 a splendid creature. Alfred de Musset became so enamoured 
 of her that at one time his familiars apprehended an " im- 
 prudence on his part." Of course, they were afraid he would 
 marry her. 
 
 In those days most of our journeys in the interior of 
 France had still to be made by the mails of Lafitte-Caillard, 
 and the people these conveyances brought up from the prov- 
 inces were almost as great objects of curiosity to us as we 
 must have been to them. It was the third lustre of Louis- 
 Philippe's reign. " God," according to the coinage, " pro- 
 tected France," and when the Almighty seemed somewhat 
 tired of the task, Thiers and Guizot alternately stepped in to 
 do the safeguarding. Parliament resounded with the elo- 
 quence of orators who are almost forgotten by now, except by 
 students of history ; M. de Genoude was clamouring for uni- 
 versal suffrage ; M. de Cormenin, under the nom de plume of 
 " Timon," was the fashionable pamphleteer ; the papers in- 
 dulged in vituperation against one another, compared to 
 which the amenities of the rival Eatanswill editors were com- 
 pliments. Grocers and drapers objected to the participation 
 of M. de Lamartine in the affairs of State. The Figaro of 
 those days went by the title of Corsaire- Satan, and, though 
 extensively read, had the greatest difficulty in making both 
 ends meet. In order to improve the lot of the working man, 
 there was a gratuitous distribution of sausages once a year on 
 the king's fete-day. The ordinary rendezvous of provincial 
 and metropolitan actors out of an engagement was not at the 
 Cafe de Suede on the Boulevard Montmartre, but under the 
 trees at the Palais-Royal. Frederick Lemaitre went to con- 
 fession and to mass every time he " created " a new role. The 
 Legitimists consented to leave their aristocratic seclusion, and 
 to breathe the same air with the bourgeoisie and proletarians
 
 88 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 of the Boulevard du Crime, to see him play. The Govern- 
 ment altered the title of Sue and Goubeaux's drama " Les 
 Pontons Anglais " into " Les Pontons," short, and made the 
 authors change the scene from England to Spain. Alexandre 
 Dumas chaffed Scribe, and flung his money right and left ; 
 while the other saved it, bought country estates, and produced 
 as many as twenty plays a year (eight more than he had con- 
 tracted for). The National Guards went in uniform and in 
 companies to shoot hares and rabbits on the Plaine Saint- 
 Denis, and swaggered about on the Boulevards, ogling the 
 women. Vidocq kept a private inquiry office in the Passage 
 Vivienne, and made more money by blackmailing or catch- 
 ing unfaithful husbands than by catching thieves. Bougival, 
 Asnieres and Joinville-le-Pont had not become riparian re- 
 sorts. The plaster elephant on the Place de la Bastille was 
 crumbling to pieces. The sentimental romances of Madame 
 Loi'sa Puget proved the delight of every bourgeoise family, 
 while the chorus to every popular song was " Larifla, larifla, 
 fla, fla, fla." 
 
 Best of all, from the working man's point of view, was 
 the low price of bread and wine ; the latter could be had at 
 four sous the litre in the wijie-shops. He, the working man, 
 still made excursions with his wife and children to the Arte- 
 sian well at Grenelle; and if stranded perchance in the 
 Champs-Elysees, stood lost in admiration at the tiny carriage 
 with ponies to match, driven by Theophile Gautier, who had 
 left off wearing the crimson waistcoats wherewith in former 
 days he hoped to annoy the bourgeois, though he ceased not 
 to rail at him by word of mouth and with his pen. He was 
 not singular in that respect. Among his set, the hatred of 
 the bourgeois was ingrained ; it found constant vent in small 
 things. Nestor Roqueplan wore jackboots at home instead 
 of slippers, because the latter chaussure was preferred by the 
 shopkeeper. Gavarni published the most biting pictorial 
 satires against him. Here is one. A dissipated-looking loaf- 
 er is leaning against a lamp-post, contemptuously staring at 
 the spruce, trim bourgeois out for his Sunday walk with his 
 wife. The loafer is smoking a short clay pipe, and some of 
 the fumes of the tobacco come between the wind and the 
 bourgeois' respectability. "Voyou!" says the latter con- 
 temptuously. "Voyou tant que vous voulez, pas epicier," is 
 the answer. 
 
 In those days, when M. Thiers happened to be in power,
 
 A LITERARY CAF& 89 
 
 many members of the Opposition and their journalistic cham- 
 pions made it a point of organizing little gatherings to the 
 table-d'hote kept by Mdlle. Thiers, the sister of the Prime 
 Minister of France. Her establishment was at the entrance 
 of the present Kue Drouot, and a sign-board informed the 
 passer-by to that effect. There was invariably an account of 
 these little gatherings in next day's papers of course, with 
 comments. Thiers was known to be the most wretched shot 
 that ever worried a gamekeeper, and yet he was very fond of 
 blazing away. " We asked Mdlle. Thiers," wrote the com- 
 mentators, " whether those delicious pheasants she gave us 
 were of her illustrious brother's bagging. The lady shook 
 her head. ' Non, monsieur ; le President du Conseil n'a pas 
 1'honneur de fournir mon etablissement ; a quoi bon, je 
 peux les acheter a meilleur marche que lui et au meme en- 
 droit. S'il m'en envoyait, il me ferait payer un benefice, 
 parcequ'il ne fait jamais rien pour rien. C'est uii peu le de- 
 faut de notre famille.' " I have got a notion that, mercurial 
 as was M. Thiers up to the last hour of his life, and even 
 more so at that period, and sedate as was M. Guizot, the 
 French liked the latter better than the former. 
 
 M. Guizot had said, " Enrichissez vous," and was known 
 to be poor ; M. Thiers had scoffed at the advice, and was 
 known to be hoarding while compelling his sister to earn her 
 own living. It must be remembered that at the time the 
 gangrene of greed had not entered the souls of all classes of 
 Frenchmen so deeply as it has now, that the race for wealth 
 had as yet comparatively few votaries, and that not every 
 stockjobber and speculator aspired to emulate the vast finan- 
 cial transactions of the Rothschilds. The latter lived, in 
 those days, in the Rue Lafitte, where they had three separate 
 mansions, all of which since then have been thrown into one, 
 and are at present exclusively devoted to business purposes. 
 The Rue Lafitte was, however, a comparatively quiet street. 
 The favourite lounges, in addition to the strip of Boulevards 
 I have already mentioned, were the Rue Le Peletier and the 
 galleries of the Passage de 1'Opera. Both owed the prefer- 
 ence over the other thoroughfares to the immediate vicinity 
 of the Opera, which had its frontage in the last-named street, 
 but was by no means striking or monumental. Its archi- 
 tect, Debret, had to run the gauntlet of every kind of satire 
 for many a year after its erection ; the bitterest and most 
 scathing of all was that, perhaps, of a journalist, who wrote
 
 90 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 one day that, a provincial having asked him the way to the 
 grand opera, he had been obliged to answer, " Turn down 
 the street, and it is the first large gateway on your right." 
 
 But if the building itself was uuimposing, the company 
 gathered around its entrance consisted generally of half a 
 dozen men whose names were then already household words 
 in the musical world Auber, Halevy, Rossini and Meyer- 
 beer, St. Georges, Adam. Now and then, though rarely to- 
 gether, all of these names will frequently reappear in these 
 notes. The chief attractions, though, of the liue Le Peletier 
 were the famous Italian restaurant of Paolo Broggi, patron- 
 ized by a great many singers, the favourite haunt of Mario, 
 in the beginning of his career, and 1'Estaminet du Divan, 
 which from being a very simple cafe Indeed, developed into 
 a kind of politico-literary club under the auspices of a num- 
 ber of budding men of letters, journalists, and the like, whose 
 modest purses were not equal to the charges of the Cafe 
 Riche and Tortoni, and who had gradually driven all more 
 prosaic customers away. I believe I was one of the few ha- 
 bitues who had no literary aspirations, who did not cast long- 
 ing looks to the inner portals of the offices of the National, 
 the bigwigs of which Armand Marrast, Baron Domes, 
 Gerard de Nerval, and others sometimes made their appear- 
 ance there, though their restaurant in ordinary was the Cafe 
 Hardi. The Estaminet du Divan, however, pretended to a 
 much more literary atmosphere than the magnificent estab- 
 lishment on the boulevard itself. It is a positive fact that 
 the waiters in the former would ask, in the most respectful 
 way imaginable, " Does monsieur want Sue's or Dumas' feu- 
 illeton with his cafe ? " Not once but a dozen times I have 
 heard the proprietor draw attention to a remarkable article. 
 Major Fraser, though he never dined there, spent an hour or 
 two daily in the Estaminet du Divan to read the papers. He 
 was a great favourite with every one, though none of us knew 
 anything about his antecedents. In spite of his English 
 name, he was decidedly not English, though he spoke the 
 language. He was one of the best-dressed men of the pe- 
 riod, and by a well-dressed man I do not mean one like Sue. 
 He generally wore a tight-fitting, short-skirted, blue frock- 
 coat, grey trousers, of a shape which since then we have de- 
 fined as " pegtops," but the fashion of which was borrowed 
 from the Cossacks. They are still worn by some French 
 officers in cavalry regiments, notably crack cavalry regiments.
 
 MAJOR PHASER. 91 
 
 Major Fraser might have fitly borrowed Piron's epitaph 
 for himself : " Je ne suis rien, pas meme Academicien." He 
 was a bachelor. He never alluded to his parentage. He 
 lived by himself, in an entresol at the corner of the llue La- 
 fitte and the Boulevard des Italiens. He was always flush of 
 money, though the sources of his income were a mystery to 
 every one. He certainly did not live by gambling, as has 
 been suggested since ; for those who knew him best did not 
 remember having seen him touch a card. 
 
 I have always had an idea, though I can give no reason 
 for it, that Major Fraser was the illegitimate son of some ex- 
 alted personage, and that the solution of the mystery sur- 
 rounding him might be found in the records of the scandals 
 and intrigues at the courts of Charles IV. and Ferdinand 
 VII. of Spain. The foreign " soldiers of fortune " who rose 
 to high posts, though not to the highest like Eichards and 
 O'Reilly, were not all of Irish origin. But the man himself 
 was so pleasant in his intercourse, so uniformly gentle and 
 ready to oblige, that no one cared to lift a veil which he was 
 so evidently anxious not to have disturbed. I only remem- 
 ber his getting out of temper once, namely, when Leon Goz- 
 lan, in a comedy of his, introduced a major who had three 
 crosses. The first had been given to him because he had not 
 one, the second because he had already one, and the third 
 because all good things consist of three. Then Major Fraser 
 sent his seconds to the playwright; the former effected a 
 reconciliation, the more that Gozlan pledged his word that 
 an allusion to the major was farthest from his thoughts. It 
 afterwards leaked out that our irrepressible Alexandre 
 Dumas had been the involuntary cause of all the mischief. 
 One day, while he was talking to Gozlan, one of his secre- 
 taries came in and told him that a particular bugbear of his, 
 and a great nonentity to boot, had got the Cross of the 
 Legion of Honour. 
 
 " Grand Dieu," exclaimed Gozlan, " pourquoi mi a-t-on 
 donne cette croix ? '> 
 
 " Vous ne savez pas ? " said Alexandre, looking very wise, 
 as if he had some important state secret to reveal. 
 
 " Assurement, je ne le sais pas," quoth Gozlan, " ni vous 
 non plus." 
 
 " Ah, par exemple, moi, je le sais." 
 
 " He bien, dites alors." 
 
 " On lui a donne la croix parceque il n'en avait pas."
 
 92 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 It was the most childish of all tricks, but Gozlan laughed 
 at it, and, when he wrote his piece, remembered it. He 
 amplified the very small joke, and, on the first night of his 
 play, the house went into convulsions over it. 
 
 Major Eraser's kindness and gentleness extended to all 
 men except to professional politicians, and those, from the 
 highest to the lowest, he detested and despised. He rarely 
 spoke on the subject of politics, but when he did every one 
 sat listening with the raptest attention ; for he was a perfect 
 mine of facts, which he marshalled with consummate ability 
 in order to show that government by party was of all idiotic 
 institutions the most idiotic. But his knowledge of political 
 history was as nothing to his familiarity with the social in- 
 stitutions of every civilized country and of every period. 
 Curiously enough, the whole of his library in his own apart- 
 ment did not exceed two or three scores of volumes. His 
 memory was something prodigious, and even men like 
 Dumas and Balzac confessed themselves his inferiors in that 
 respect. The mere mention of the most trifling subject 
 sufficed to set it in motion, and the listeners were treated to 
 a " magazine article worth fifty centimes la ligne au moins," 
 as Dumas put it. But the major could never be induced to 
 write one. Strange to -say, he often used to hint that his 
 was no mere book-knowledge. " Of course, it is perfectly 
 ridiculous," he remarked with a strange smile, " but every 
 now and again I feel as if all this did not come to me through 
 reading, but from personal experience. At times I become 
 almost convinced that I lived with Nero, that I knew Dante 
 personally, and so forth." 
 
 When Major Fraser died, not a single letter was found in 
 his apartment giving a clue to his antecedents. Merely a file 
 of receipts, and a scrap of paper attached to one the receipt 
 of the funeral company for his grave, and expenses of his 
 burial. The memorandum gave instructions to advertise his 
 demise for a week in the Journal des Debdts, the money for 
 which would be found in the drawer of -his dressing-table. 
 His clothes and furniture were to be sold, and the proceeds 
 to be given to the Paris poor. " I do not charge any one with 
 this particular duty," the document went on ; "I have so 
 many friends, every one of whom will be ready to carry out 
 my last wishes." 
 
 Another " mystery," though far less interesting than Ma- 
 jor Fraser, was the Persian gentleman whom one met every-
 
 LOUIS BLANC. 93 
 
 where, at the Opera, at the Bois de Boulogne, at the concerts 
 of the Conservatoire, etc. Though invariably polite and 
 smiling, he never spoke to any one. For ten years, the occu- 
 pant of the stall next to his at the Opera had never heard 
 him utter a syllable. He always wore a long white silk petti- 
 coat, a splendidly embroidered coat over that, and a conical 
 Astrakau cap. He was always alone ; and though every one 
 knew where he lived, in the Passage de 1'Opera, no one had 
 ever set foot in his apartment. As a matter of course, all 
 sorts of legends jvere current about him. According to some, 
 he had occupied a high position in his own country, from 
 which he had voluntarily exiled himself, owing to his detesta- 
 tion of Eastern habits ; according to others, he was simply a 
 dealer in Indian shawls, who had made a fortune. A third 
 group, the spiteful ones, maintained that he sold dates and 
 pastilles, and that the reason why he did not speak was be- 
 cause he was dumb, though not deaf. He died during the 
 Second Empire, very much respected in the neighbourhood, 
 for he had been very charitable. 
 
 Towards the middle of the forties the Passage de 1'Opera 
 began to lose some of its prestige as a lounge. The outside 
 stockjobbers, whom the police had driven from the Boule- 
 vards and the steps of Tortoni, migrated thither, and the 
 galleries that had resounded with the sweet warblings in a 
 very low key of the clients of Bernard Latte, the publisher 
 of Donizetti's operas, were made hideous and unbearable with 
 the jostling and bellowing of the money-spinners. Bernard 
 Latte himself was at last compelled to migrate. 
 
 In the house the ground-floor of which was occupied by 
 Tortoni, and which was far different in aspect from what it 
 is now, lived Louis Blanc. Toward nine in the morning he 
 came down for his cup of cafe au lait. It was the first cup 
 of coffee of the day served in the establishment. I was never 
 on terms of intimacy with Blanc, and least of all then, for I 
 shared with Major Fraser a dislike to politic-mongers, and, 
 rightly or wrongly, I have always considered the author of 
 " L'Histoire de Dix Ans " as such. Though Louis Blanc was 
 three or four and thirty then, he looked like a boy of seven- 
 teen a fact not altogether owing to his diminutive stature, 
 though he was one of the smallest men, if not the smallest 
 man, I ever saw. Of course I mean a man not absolutely a 
 dwarf. I have been assured, however, that he was a giant 
 compared to Don Martinoz Garay, Duke of Altamira, and
 
 94: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Marquis of Astorga, a Spanish statesman, who died about the 
 early part of the twenties. These notes do not extend be- 
 yond the fall of the Commune, and it was only after that 
 event that I met M. Blanc once or twice in his old haunts. 
 Hence my few recollections of him had better be jotted down 
 here. They are not important. The man, though but sixty, 
 and apparently not in bad health, looked desilhisione. They 
 were, no doubt, the most trying years to the Third Eepublic, 
 but M. Blanc must have perceived well enough that, grant- 
 ing all the existing difficulties, the men at the head of affairs 
 were not the Republicans of his dreams. He had, moreover, 
 suffered severe losses ; all his important documents, such as 
 the correspondence between him and George Sand and Louis- 
 Napoleon while the latter was at Ham, and other equally 
 valuable matter, had been destroyed at the fire of the North- 
 ern Goods Station at La Villette, a fire kindled by the Com- 
 munists. He was dressed almost in the fashion of the for- 
 ties, a wide-skirted, long, brown frockcoat, a shirt innocent 
 of starch, and a broad-brimmed hat. A few years later, he 
 founded a paper, L 'Homme- Libre, the offices of which were 
 in the Rue Grange-Bateliere. The concern was financed by 
 a Polish gentleman. Blanc gave his readers to understand 
 that he would speak out plainly about persons and things, 
 whether past or present ; that he would advance nothing ex- 
 cept on documentary proofs; but that, whether he did or 
 not, he would not be badgered into giving or accepting chal- 
 lenges in defence of his writings. " I am, first of all, too 
 old," he said ; " but if I were young again, I should not re- 
 peat my folly of '47, when I wanted to fight with Eugene 
 Pelletan on account of a woman whose virtue, provided she 
 had any, could make no difference to either of us. It does 
 not matter to me that we were not the only preux chevaliers 
 of that period, ready to do battle for or against the charms of 
 a woman whose remains had crumbled to dust by then." * 
 
 * M. Eugene Pelletan, the father of M. Camille Pelletan, the editor of La 
 Justice, and first lieutenant to M. Clemenceau, having severely criticized some 
 passages in M. Blanc's "Histoire de la Revolution," relating to Marie- Antoinette, 
 the author quoted a passage of Madame Campan's '' Memoires " in support of his 
 writings. The critic refused to admit the collusiveness of the proof, where- 
 upon M. Blanc appealed to the Societe 1 des Gens de Lettres, which, on the sum- 
 ming up of M. Taxile Delord, gave a verdict in his favour. M. Pelletan 
 declined to submit to the verdict, as he had refused to admit the jurisdiction, 
 of the tribunal. M. Blanc, who had at first scouted all idea of a duel, con- 
 sidered himself obliged to resort to this means of obtaining satisfaction, seeing
 
 LOUIS BLANC AS AN EDITOR. 95 
 
 M. Blanc's boast that lie would advance nothing except 
 on proof positive was not an idle one, as his contributors 
 found out to their cost. Every afternoon, at three, he arrived 
 at the office to read the paper in proof from the first line to 
 the last. Not the slightest .inaccuracy was allowed to pass. 
 Kind as he was, his reporters' lives became a burden. One 
 of the latter told me a story which, though it illustrates the 
 ridiculousness of M. Blanc's scruples when carried too far, is 
 none the less valuable. A dog had been run over on the 
 Boulevards, and the reporter, with a hankering after the 
 realistic method, had endeavored to reproduce onomato- 
 poeically the sounds uttered by the animal in pain. 
 
 " Are you quite sure, monsieur, about your sounds ? " 
 asked Blanc. 
 
 " Of course, I am as sure as a non-scientific man can be," 
 was the answer. 
 
 " Then strike them out ; one ought to be scientifically 
 sure. By-the-by, I see you have made use of the word 
 'howl ' (hurler). Unless I am mistaken, a dog when in pain 
 yelps (glapit}. Please alter it." 
 
 On another occasion, on going through the advertise- 
 ments, he found a new one relating to a cough mixture, set- 
 ting forth its virtues in the most glowing terms. Imme- 
 diately the advertisement canvasser was sent for, M. Blanc 
 having refused to farm out that department to an agency, as 
 is frequently done in Paris, in order to retain the absolute 
 control over it. 
 
 " Monsieur, I see that you have a new advertisement, and 
 it seems to me a profitable one ; still, before inserting it, I 
 
 that M. Pellctan stoutly maintained, his opinion. A meeting had been arranged 
 when the Revolution of '48 broke out. The opponents having both gone to the 
 H6tel-de-Ville, met by accident at the entrance, and fell into one another's 
 arms. " Thank Heaven ! " exclaimed Thiers, when he heard of it. " If Pelletan 
 had killed Blanc, I should have been the smallest man in France." 
 
 M. Blanc's allusion to other " preux chevaliers " aimed particularly at M. 
 Cousin, who, having become a minister against his will, resumed with a sigh of 
 relief his studies under the Second Empire. He was especially fond of the 
 seventeenth century, and all at once he, who had scarcely ever noticed a pretty 
 woman, became violently smitten with the Duchesse de Longueville, who had 
 been in her grave for nearly two centuries. He positively invested her with 
 every perfection, moral and mental ; unfortunately, he could not invest her with 
 a shapely bust, the evidence being too overwhelmingly against her having been 
 adorned that way. One day some one showed him a portrait of the sister of 
 the " grand Coude," in which she was amply provided with the charms the 
 absence of which M. Cousin regretted. He wrote a special chapter on the sub- 
 ject, and was well-nigh challenging all his contradictors. EDITOR.
 
 96 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 should like to be certain that the medicine does all it pro- 
 fesses to do. Can you personally vouch for its efficiency ? " 
 
 " Mon Dieu, monsieur, I believe it does all it professes to 
 do, but you can scarcely expect me to run the risk of bron- 
 chitis in order to test it upon myself ! " 
 
 " Heaven forbid that I should be so exacting and indif- 
 ferent to other people's health, but until you can bring me 
 some one who has been cured, we will not insert it." 
 
 Let me come back for a moment to that sentence of 
 Louis Blanc, about the practice of duelling, in connection 
 with one of the most tragic affairs of that kind within my 
 recollection. I am alluding to the Dujarrier-Beauvallon 
 duel. I have been in the habit for years, whenever an im- 
 portant meeting took place in France, to read every shade of 
 English opinion on the subject ; and while recognizing the 
 elevated sentiments of the writers, I have no hesitation in 
 saying that not a single one knew what he was writing about. 
 They could not grasp the fact that for a man of social stand- 
 ing to refuse a challenge or to refrain from sending one, save 
 under very exceptional circumstances, was tantamount to 
 courting social death. They knew not that every door would 
 henceforth be closed against him ; that his wife's best friends 
 would cease to call upon her, by direction of their husbands ; 
 that his children at school would be shunned by their com- 
 rades ; that no young man of equal position to his, were he 
 ever so much in love with his daughter, Avould ask her to 
 become his wife, that no parents would allow their daughter 
 to marry his son. That is what backing out of a duel meant 
 years ago ; that is what it still means to-day of course, I 
 repeat, with certain classes. Is it surprising, then, that with 
 such a prospect facing him, a man should risk death rather 
 than become a pariah ? Would the English leader-writer, if 
 he be a man of worth, like to enter his club-room without a 
 hand held out to welcome him from those with whom he was 
 but a few weeks ago on the most friendly footing, without a 
 voice to give him the time of day ? I think not ; and that 
 is what would happen if he were a Frenchman who neglected 
 to ask satisfaction for even an imaginary insult. 
 
 I knew M. Dujarrier, the general manager of La Presse, 
 and feel convinced that he was not a bit more quarrelsome 
 or eager " to go out " than Louis Blanc. It is, moreover, 
 certain that he felt his inferiority, both as a swordsman and 
 as a marksman, to such a practised shot and fencer as M. de
 
 DUELS. 97 
 
 Beauvallon ; and well he might, seeing that subsequent evi- 
 dence proved that he, Dujarrier, had never handled either 
 weapon. Yet he not only strenuously opposed all attempts 
 on the part of his friends to effect a reconciliation, but would 
 not afford a hint to his adversary of his want of skill, lest 
 the latter should make him a present of his life. The pres- 
 ent would not have been worth accepting. It would have 
 been a Xessus-shirt, and caused the moral death of the recip- 
 ient. Consequently, Dujarrier literally went like a lamb to 
 the slaughter rather than be branded as a coward, and he 
 made no secret of his contemplated sacrifice. " I have no 
 alternative but to fight," he said, two days before the meet- 
 ing, to Alexandre Dumas, who taxed all his own ingenuity, 
 and that of his son, to prevent, at any rate, a fatal issue. 
 The only way to effect this, according to the very logical 
 reasoning of the two Dumases, was to induce Dujarrier, who, 
 as the offended party, had the choice of weapons, to choose 
 the sword. They counted upon the generosity of Beauval- 
 lon, who, as a gentleman, on discovering his adversary's utter 
 lack of skill, would disarm, or inflict a slight wound on 
 him. Unfortunately, young Dumas, with the best inten- 
 tions, unburthened himself to that effect among those most 
 interested in the affair, namely, the staffs of La Presse and 
 Le Globe. These two journals were literally at daggers 
 drawn, and some writers connected with the latter went 
 hinting, if not saying openly, that Dujarrier was already 
 showing the white feather. Whether Dujarrier heard of the 
 comments in that shape, or whether he instinctively guessed 
 what they would be, has never been clearly made out, but it 
 is certain that from that moment he insisted upon the use of 
 pistols. "I do not intend my adversary to show me the 
 slightest favour, either by disarming me or by wounding me 
 in the arm or leg. I mean to have a serious encounter," he 
 said. Young Dumas, frightened perhaps at his want of reti- 
 cence in the matter, begged his father to go and see Grisier,* 
 and claim his intervention. Alexandre Dumas, than whom 
 no stauncher friend ever existed who would have willingly 
 risked his own life to save that of Dujarrier, had to decline 
 the mission suggested by his son. " I cannot do it," he said ; 
 "the first and foremost thing is to safeguard Dujarrier's 
 
 * The great fencing-master, whom Dumas immortalized in his "Maitre 
 d'Armes." EDITOK.
 
 98 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 reputation, which is the more precious because it is his first 
 duel." 
 
 " His first duel," here is the key-note to the whole of the 
 proceedings as far as Dujarrier and his personal friends were 
 concerned. Had Dujarrier been in the position of the edi- 
 tor of his paper, Emile de Girardin, had he been out before 
 and killed or severely wounded his man, as the latter killed 
 Armand Carrel nine years before, he might have openly an- 
 nounced his determination " never to go out again " under 
 no matter what provocation. Unfortunately, Dujarrier was 
 not in that position ; in fact, it is no exaggeration to say 
 that Dujarrier paid the penalty of M. de Girardin's decision. 
 A great deal of mawkish sentiment has been wasted upon 
 the tragic fate of Armand Carrel ; in reality, he had what he 
 deserved, albeit that no one more than M. de Girardin himself 
 regretted his untimely end. Most writers will tell one that 
 Carrel fell a victim to his political opinions; nothing is 
 farther from the truth. Armand Carrel fell a victim to a 
 " question of shop " of which he allowed himself, though 
 perhaps not deliberately, to become the champion. After 
 many attempts, more or less successful, in the way of popu- 
 lar journalism, M. de Girardin, in 1836, started La Presse, 
 a serious journal of the same size as the then existing ones, 
 but at half the subscription of the latter, all of which abso- 
 lutely banded at once against him. Armand Carrel, who 
 was a soldier, and a valiant soldier, a writer of talent, and a 
 gentleman to boot, ought to have stood aloof from that kind 
 of polemics. Emile de Girardin was not the likely man to 
 submit to open or implied insult. His best, albeit his least- 
 known book, " Emile," which is as it were an autobiography, 
 had given the measure of his thoughts on the subject of 
 duelling. " Emile " goes into society as a soldier would go 
 into an enemy's country. Not that he is by nature cruel or 
 bloodthirsty, but he knows that, to hold his own, he must be 
 always ready, not only for defence, but for attack. 
 
 " The secret one is bound to preserve with regard to the 
 preparations for a meeting, and those preparations them- 
 selves are simply horrible. The care, the precautions to be 
 taken, the secret which is not to leak out, all these are very 
 like the preparations for a crime," he says. " Nevertheless," 
 he goes on, " the horror of all this disappears, when the man, 
 impelled by hatred or resentment, is thirsting for revenge ; 
 but when the heart is absolutely without gall, and when the
 
 A CELEBRATED ENCOUNTER. 99 
 
 imagination is still subject to all the softer emotions, then, 
 in order not to recoil with fear at the ever horrible idea of a 
 duel, a man must be imbued with all the force of a preju- 
 dice which resists the Very laws that condemn it." 
 
 It was under the latter circumstances that M. de Girar- 
 din confronted his adversary. The two men had probably 
 never exchanged a word with one another, they felt no per- 
 sonal animosity ; nay, more, the duel was not an inevitable 
 one ; and yet it cost one man his life, and burthened the 
 other with lifelong regrets. 
 
 Had the issue been different, La Presse would probably 
 have disappeared, and all recrimination ceased. As it was, 
 unable to goad M. de Girardin into a reversal of his decision 
 " never to go out again," and that in spite of nine years of 
 direct insult from a so-called political party, of every kind of 
 quasi-legal vexation, M. de Beauvallon constituted himself a 
 second Armand Carrel, selecting Dujarrier as his victim, the 
 chief not being available. But here all resemblance to Ar- 
 maud Carrel ceased, and the law itself was anxious to mark 
 the difference. In the one case it had been set at nought by 
 two men of undoubted courage and undoubted honour, meet- 
 ing upon equal terms ; in the other, it was proved that, not 
 content with Dujarrier's well-known inferiority, De Beau- 
 vallon's pistols had been tried before the encounter. The 
 court could take no cognizance of this, but it marked its 
 disapproval by sentencing Beauvallon to eight years', and 
 one of his seconds, M. d'Ecquevilley, to ten years' imprison- 
 ment for perjury. Both had declared on oath that the pis- 
 tols had not been tried. The Dujarrier duel caused a deep 
 and painful sensation. I have dwelt upon it at greater length 
 than was absolutely necessary, because it inspired me with a 
 resolution from which I have never departed since. I was 
 twenty-seven at the time, and, owing to circumstances which 
 I need not relate here, foresaw that the greater part of my 
 life would be spent in France. I am neither more courage- 
 ous nor more cowardly than most persons, but I objected to 
 be shot down like a mad dog on the most futile pretext because 
 some one happened to have a grudge against me. To have 
 declined " to go out " on the score of my nationality would 
 not have met the case in the conditions in which I was liv- 
 ing, so from that moment I became an assiduous client at 
 Gosset's shooting-gallery, and took fencing lessons of Grisier. 
 I do not know that I became very formidable with either
 
 100 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 weapon, only sufficiently skilled not to be altogether defence- 
 less. I took care at the same time to let it go forth that a 
 duel to me not only meant one or both parties so severely 
 wounded as not to be able to continue the struggle, but the 
 resumption of the combat, when he or they had recovered, 
 until one was killed. Of course, it implied that I would only 
 go out for a sufficiently weighty reason, but that, if com- 
 pelled to do so for a trifling one, I would still adhere to my 
 original resolution. Only once, more than twelve years aft- 
 erwards, I had a quarrel fastened upon me, arising out of 
 the excitement consequent upon the attempt of Orsini. I 
 was the offended party, and, as such, could dictate the con- 
 ditions of the meeting. I declined to modify in the least 
 the rules I had laid down for my own guidance, and stated 
 as much to those who were to act for me General Fleury 
 and Alexandre Dumas. My adversary's friends refused to 
 accept the terms. I was never molested afterwards, though 
 an Englishman had not always a pleasant life of it, even un- 
 der the Second Empire. 
 
 In connection with Dujarrier's duel, I may say a few 
 words here of that quasi-wonderful woman, Lola Montes. 
 I say "quasi," because really there was nothing wonderful 
 about her, except perhaps her beauty and her consummate 
 impudence. She had not a scrap of talent of any kind ; 
 education she had none, for, whether she spoke in Eng- 
 lish, French, or Spanish, grammatical errors abounded, and 
 her expressions were always those of a pretentious house- 
 maid, unless they were those of an excited fishwife. She 
 told me that she had been at a boarding-school in Bath, 
 and that she was a native of Limerick, but that when quite a 
 child she was taken to Seville by her parents. Her father, 
 according to her account, was a Spaniard, her mother a 
 Creole. " But I scandalized every one at school, and would 
 not learn." I could quite believe that ; what I could not 
 believe was that a girl of her quick powers for she undoubt- 
 edly possessed those could have spent, however short a time 
 in the society of decent girls of her own age, let alone of 
 presumedly refined school-mistresses, without having ac- 
 quired some elementary notions of manner and address. Her 
 gait and carriage were those of a duchess, for she was natu- 
 rally graceful, but the moment she opened her lips, the illu- 
 sion vanished at least to me ; for I am bound to admit that 
 men of far higher intellectual attainments than mine, and
 
 LOLA MONTHS. 101 
 
 familiar with very good society, raved and kept raving about 
 her, though all those defects could not have failed to strike 
 them as they had struck me. I take it that it must have been 
 hei beauty, for, though not devoid of wit, her wit was that of 
 the pot-house, which would not have been tolerated in the 
 smoking-room of a club in the small hours. 
 
 When Dujarrier was carried home dying to the Rue 
 Lafitte, a woman flung herself on the body and covered his 
 face with kisses. That woman was Lola Montes. In his will 
 he left her eighteen shares in the Palais-Royal Theatre, amount- 
 ing in value to about 20,000 francs. She insisted afterwards 
 in appearing as a witness at the trial in Rouen, although her 
 evidence threw not the slightest light upon the matter. She 
 wanted to create a sensation ; and she accomplished her aim. 
 I was there, and though the court was crowded with men oc- 
 cupying the foremost ranks in literature, art, and Paris soci- 
 ety, no one attracted the attention she did. Even the sober 
 president and assessors sat staring at her open-mouthed when 
 she took her stand behind the little rail which does duty for 
 a witness-box in France. She was dressed in mourning not 
 the deepest, but soft masses of silk and lace and when she 
 lifted her veil and took off her glove to take the prescribed 
 oath, a murmur of admiration ran through the court. That 
 is why she had undertaken the journey to Rouen, and verily 
 she had her reward. 
 
 It was on that occasion that I became acquainted, though 
 quite by accident, with the young man who, ten or eleven years 
 later, was to leap into fame all of a sudden with one novel. 
 I have already said that the court was very crowded, and next 
 to me was standing a tall, strapping fellow, somewhat younger 
 than myself, whom, at the first glance, one would have taken 
 to be an English country gentleman or well-to-do farmer's son. 
 Such mistakes are easily made in Normandy. When Lola 
 Montes came forward to give her evidence, some one on the 
 other side of him remarked that she looked like the heroine 
 of a novel. 
 
 " Yes," he replied ; " but the heroines of the real novels 
 enacted in everyday life do not always look like that." 
 
 Then he turned to me, having seen me speak to several 
 people from Paris and in company of Alexandre Dumas 
 and Berryer, whom everybody knew. He asked me 
 some particulars about Lola Montes, which I gave him. I 
 found him exceedingly well-informed. We chatted for
 
 102 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 a while. When he left he handed me his card, and hoped 
 that we should see one another again. The card bore the 
 simple superscription of " Gustave Flaubert." I was told 
 during the evening that he was the son of a local physician 
 of note. Twelve years later the whole of France rang with 
 his name. He had written " Madame Bovary," and laid the 
 foundation of what subsequently became the ultra-realistic 
 school of French fiction. 
 
 To return for a moment to Lola Montes. The trial was 
 really the starting-point of her notoriety, for, in spite of her 
 beauty, she had been at one time reduced to sing in the streets 
 in Brussels. That was after she had fled from Calcutta, whith- 
 er her first husband, a captain or lieutenant James, in the serv- 
 ice of the East India Company, had taken her. She landed 
 at Southampton, and, during her journey to London, man- 
 aged to ingratiate herself with an English nobleman, by pre- 
 tending that she was the wife a Spanish soldier who had been 
 shot by the Carlists. She told me all this herself, because she 
 was not in the least reticent about her scheming, especially 
 after her scheming had failed. She would, however, not di- 
 vulge the name of her travelling companion, who tried to be- 
 friend her by introducing her to some of his acquaintances, 
 with the view of obtaining singing lessons for her. " But I 
 did not make my expenses, because you English are so very 
 moral and my patron was suspected of not giving himself all 
 that trouble for nothing. Besides, they managed to ferret out 
 that I was not the widow of a Spanish officer, but the wife of 
 an English one ; and then, as you may imagine, it was all up. 
 I got, however, an engagement at the Opera House in the bal- 
 let, but not for long ; of course, I could not dance much, but 
 I could dance as well as half your wooden ugly women that 
 were there. But they told tales about me, and the manager 
 dismissed me.'' * 
 
 * The English nobleman must have been Lord Malmesbury, who alludes to 
 her as follows : " This was a most remarkable woman, and may be said by her 
 conduct at Munich to have set fire to the magazine of revolution, which was 
 ready to burst forth all over Europe, and which made the year 1848 memorable. 
 I made her acquaintance by accident, as I was going up to London from Heron 
 Court, in the railway. The Consul at Southampton asked me to take charge of 
 a Spanish lady who had been recommended to his care, and who had just 
 landed. I consented to do this, and was introduced by him to a remarkably 
 handsome person, who was in deep mourning, and who appeared to be in great 
 distress. As we were alone in tne carriage, she, of her own accord, informed 
 me, in bad English, that she was the widow of Don Diego Leon, who had lately 
 been shot by the Carlists after he was taken prisoner, and that she was going to
 
 ROYAL CONJUGAL FELICITY. 1Q3 
 
 She fostered no illusions with regard to her choregraphic 
 talents; in fact, she fostered no illusions about anything, 
 and her candour was the best trait in her character. She 
 had failed as a dancer in Warsaw, whither she had gone from 
 London, by way of Brussels. In the Belgian capital, accord- 
 ing to her own story, she had been obliged to sing in the 
 streets to keep from starvation. I asked her why she had not 
 come from London to Paris, " where for a woman of her at- 
 tractions, and not hampered by many scruples," as I pointed 
 out to her, " there were many more resources than elsewhere." 
 The answer was so characteristic of the daring adventuress, 
 who, notwithstanding her impecuniosity, flew at the highest 
 game to be had, that I transcribe it in full. I am often re- 
 luctant to trust to my memory : in this instance I may ; I 
 remember every word of it. This almost illiterate schemer, 
 who probably had not the remotest notion of geography, of 
 history, had pretty well " the Almanach de Gotha " by heart, 
 and seemed to guess instinctively at things which said Al- 
 manach carefully abstained from mentioning, namely, the 
 good understanding or the reverse between the married royal 
 couples of Europe, etc. 
 
 London to sell some Spanish property that she possessed, and give lessons in 
 singing, as she was very poor. On arriving in London she took some lodgings, 
 and came to my house to a little concert which I gave, and sang some Spanish 
 ballads. Her accent was foreign, and she had all the appearance of being what 
 she pretended to be. She sold different things, such as veils, etc., to the party 
 present, and received a good deal of patronage. Eventually she took an en- 
 gagement for the ballet at the Opera House, but her dancing was very inferior. 
 At last she was recognized as an impostor, her real name being Mrs. James, 
 and Irish by extraction, and had married an officer in India. Her engagement 
 at the Opera was cancelled, she left the country, and retired to Munich. She 
 was a very violent woman, and actually struck one of the Bavarian generals as 
 he was reviewing the troops. The king became perfectly infatuated with her 
 beauty and cleverness, andT gave her large sums of money, with a title, which 
 she afterwards bore when she returned to England." (" Memoirs of an Ex- 
 minister," by the Earl of Malmesbury.) 
 
 Lord Malmesbury is wrong in nearly every particular which lie has got 
 from hearsay. Lola Monies did not retire to Munich after her engagement at 
 the Opera House had been cancelled, but to Brussels, and from there to War- 
 saw. Nor did she play the all-important part in the Bavarian riots or revolu- 
 tion he ascribes to her. The author of these notes has most of the particulars 
 of Lola Monies' career previous to her appearance in Munich from her own 
 lips, and, as he has already said, she was not in the least reticent about her 
 scneming, especially when her scheming had failed. For the story of the 
 events at Munich, I gather inferentially from his notes that he is indebted to 
 Karl von Abel, King Ludwig's ultramontane minister, who came afterwards 
 to Paris, and who, if 1 mistake not, was the father or the uncle of Herr von 
 Abel, the Berlin correspondent of the Times, some fourteen or fifteen years ago. 
 EDITOB.
 
 104: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " Why did I not come to Paris ! " she replied. " What 
 was the good of coming to Paris where there was a king, 
 bourgeois to his finger-nails, tight-fisted besides, and notori- 
 ously the most moral and best father all the world over ; with 
 princes who were nearly as much married as their dad, and 
 with those who were single far away? What was the good 
 of coming to a town where you could not bear the title of 
 ' la maitresse du prince ' without the risk of being taken to 
 the frontier between two gendarmes, where you could not have 
 squeezed a thousand louis out of any of the royal sons for 
 the life of you ? What was the good of trying to get a count, 
 where the wife of a grocer or a shoemaker might have ob- 
 jected to your presence at a ball, on the ground of your being 
 an immoral person ? No, I really meant to make my way 
 to the Hague. I had heard that William II. whacked his 
 wife like any drunken labourer, so that his sons had to in- 
 terfere every now and then. I had heard this in Calcutta, 
 and from folk who were likely to know. But as I thought 
 that I might have the succession of the whacks, as well as of 
 the lord, I wanted to try my chance at Brussels first ; besides, 
 I hadn't much money." 
 
 " But King Leopold is married, and lives very happily 
 with his wife," I interrupted. 
 
 " Of course he does they all do," was the answer ; " mais 
 ca n'empe'che pas les sentiments, does it ? I am very igno- 
 rant, and haven't a bit of memory, but I once heard a story 
 about a Danish or Swedish king I do not know the dif- 
 ference who married an adventuress like myself, though 
 the queen and the mother of his heir was alive. He com- 
 mitted bigmay, but kings and queens may do things we mayn't. 
 One day, he and his lawful wife were at one of their country 
 seats, and, leaning out of the window, when a carriage passed 
 with a good-looking woman in it, ' Who is this lady ? ' asked 
 the queen. ' That's my wife,' replied the king. ' Your wife ! 
 what am I, then ? ' said the queen. ' You ? well, you are my 
 queen.' * 
 
 " Never mind, whatever my intentions on Leopold's 
 money or affections may have been, they came to nothing ; 
 for before I could get as much as a peep at him, my money 
 
 * Lola Montes was perfectly correct. It was Frederick IV. of Denmark, 
 only the woman was not an adventuress like herself, but the Countess Kevent- 
 low, whom he had abducted. EDITOR.
 
 HER WANDERINGS. 105 
 
 had all been spent, and I was obliged to part with my clothes 
 first, and then to sing in the streets to get food. I was taken 
 from Brussels to Warsaw by a man whom I believe to be a 
 German. He spoke many languages, but he was not very 
 well off himself. However, he was very kind, and, when we 
 got to Warsaw, managed to get me an engagement at the 
 Opera. After two or three days, the director told me that I 
 couldn't dance a bit. I stared him full in the face, and 
 asked him whether he thought that, if I could dance, I would 
 have come to such a hole as his theatre. Thereupon he 
 laughed, and said I was a clever girl for all that, and that he 
 would keep me on for ornament. I didn't give him the 
 chance for long. I left after about two months, with a 
 Polish gentleman, who brought me to Paris. The moment 
 I get a nice round lump sum of money, I am going to carry 
 out my original plan ; that is, trying to hook a prince. I am 
 sick of being told that I can't dance. They told me so in 
 London, they told me in Warsaw, they told me at the Porte 
 Saint-Martin where they hissed me. I don't think the men, 
 if left to themselves, would hiss me ; their wives and their 
 daughters put them up to it : a woman like myself spoils 
 their trade of honest women. I am only waiting my chance 
 here ; for though you are all very nice and generous and all 
 that kind of thing, it is not what I want." 
 
 Shortly after this conversation, the death of Dujarrier 
 and his legacy to her gave her the chance she had been look- 
 ing for. She left for London, I heard, with an Englishman ; 
 but I never saw him, so I cannot say for certain. But, it 
 appears, she did not stay long, because, a little while after, 
 several Parisians, on their return from Germany, reported 
 that they had met her at Wiesbaden, at Homburg, and 
 elsewhere, punting in a small way, not settling down any- 
 where, and almost deliberately avoiding both Frenchmen and 
 Englishmen. The rumour went that her husband was on 
 her track, and that her anxiety to avoid him had caused her 
 to leave London hurriedly. In spite of her chequered career, 
 in spite of the shortcomings at Brussels, Lola Montes was by 
 no means anxious for the " sweet yoke of domesticity." In 
 another six months, her name was almost forgotten by all of 
 us, except by Alexandre Dumas, who now and then alluded 
 to her. Though far from superstitious, Dumas, who had 
 been as much smitten with her as most of her admirers, 
 avowed that he was glad she had disappeared. " She has
 
 106 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 * the evil eye,' " he said ; " and sure to bring bad luck to any 
 one who closely links his destiny with hers, for however 
 short a time. You see what has occurred to Dujarrier. If 
 ever she is heard of again, it will be in connection with some 
 terrible calamity that has befallen a lover of hers." "We all 
 laughed at him, except Dr. Veron, who could have given 
 odds to Solomon Eagle himself at prophesying. Fortunately 
 he was generally afraid to open his lips, for he was thoroughly 
 sincere in his belief that he could prevent the event by not 
 predicting it at any rate aloud. For once in a way, how- 
 ever, Alexandre Dumas proved correct. When we did hear 
 again of Lola Montes, it was in connection with the disturb- 
 ances that had broken out at Munich, and the abdication of 
 her royal lover, Louis I. of Bavaria, in favour of his eldest 
 son, Maximilian. 
 
 The substance of the following notes relating to said 
 disturbances was communicated to me by a political per- 
 sonage who played a not inconsiderable part in the events 
 themselves. As a rule it is not very safe to take interested 
 evidence of that kind, " but in this instance," as my inform- 
 ant put it, " there was really no political reputation to pre- 
 serve, as far as he was concerned." Lola Montes had simply 
 tried to overthrow him as Madame Dubarry overthrew the 
 Due de Choiseul, because he would not become her creature ; 
 and she had kept on repeating the tactics with every suc- 
 ceeding ministry, even that of her own making. But it 
 should be remembered that revolution was in the air in the 
 year '48, and that if Lola Montes had been the most retiring 
 of favourites, or Louis I. the most moral of kings, the upris- 
 ing would have happened just the same, though the upshot 
 might have been different with regard to Louis himself. 
 
 Here is a portrait of him, which, in my literary igno- 
 rance, I think sufficiently interesting to reproduce. 
 
 " Louis was a chip of the old Wittelsbach block ; that is, 
 a Lovelace, with a touch of the minnesinger about him. Age 
 had not damped his ardour; for, though he was sixty-one 
 when Lola Montes took up her quarters at Munich, any and 
 every ' beauty ' that came to him was sure of an enthusiastic 
 welcome. And Heaven alone knows how many had come to 
 him during his reign; they seemed really directed to him 
 from every quarter of the globe. The new arrival had her 
 portrait painted almost immediately; it was added to the 
 collection for which a special gallery had been set apart, and
 
 LOLA AND LOUIS I. OF BAVARIA. 107 
 
 whither Louis went to meditate by himself at least once a 
 day. He averred that he went thither for poetic inspiration, 
 for he took himself au serieux as a poet, and, above all, as a 
 classical poet modelling his verse upon those of ancient 
 times. He had published a volume of poems, entitled ' Wal- 
 halla's Genossen ' ; * but his principal study of antiquity was 
 mainly confined to the rites connected with the worship of 
 Venus. He was very good-natured and pleasant in his deal- 
 ings with every one; he had not an ounce of gall in the 
 whole of his body. He was, moreover, very religious in his 
 own way, and consequently the tool of the Jesuits, who really 
 governed the kingdom, but who endeavoured to make his 
 own life sweet and pleasant to him. They liked him to take 
 part in the religious processions, as any burgher of devout 
 tendencies might, but being aware of his tendency to be at- 
 tracted by the first pretty face he caught sight of, they took 
 care to relegate all the handsome maidens and matrons to 
 the first and second floors. In that way Louis's eyes were 
 always lifted heavenwards, and religious appearances were 
 preserved. 
 
 " Under such conditions, it was not difficult for a woman 
 of Lola Montes' attractions and daring to gain her ends. 
 She was not altogether without means when she came to 
 Munich, though the sum in her possession was far from a 
 hundred thousand francs, as she afterwards alleged it was. 
 At any rate, she was not the penniless adventuress she had 
 formerly been, and when, in her beautiful dresses, she ap- 
 plied to the director of the Hof -Theatre for an engagement, 
 the latter was fairly dazzled, and granted her request without 
 a murmur. She did, however, not want to dance, and, before 
 her first appearance, she managed to set tongues wagging 
 about her beauty, and, as a matter of course, the rumours 
 reached the king's ears. I am afraid I shall have to prefer 
 a grave charge, but I am not doing so without foundation. 
 It is almost certain by now that the Jesuits, seeing in her a 
 tool for the further subjugation of the superannuated royal 
 troubadour, countenanced, if they did not assist her in her 
 schemes ; they, the Jesuits, did many things of which a 
 Catholic, like myself, however firm in his allegiance to Eome, 
 could not but disapprove. At any rate, three or four days 
 after the king's first meeting with her, Lola Montes was pre- 
 
 * " Companions in Walhalla." EDITOR.
 
 108 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 sented at court, and introduced to the royal family and corps 
 diplomatique by the sovereign himself, as ' his best friend.' 
 Events proceeded apace. In August, '47, the king granted 
 her patents of ' special naturalization,' created her Baroness 
 von Eosenthal, and, almost immediately afterwards, Countess 
 von Landsfeld. She received an annuity of twenty thousand 
 florins, and had a magnificent mansion built for her. At 
 the instance of the king, the queen was compelled to confer 
 the order of St. Therese upon her. I, and many others, had 
 strenuously opposed all this, though not unaware that, up 
 till then, the Jesuits were on her side, rather than on ours. 
 "We paid the penalty of our opposition with our dismissal 
 from office, and then Lola Montes confronted the Jesuits by 
 herself. She was absolutely mad to invade Wurtemberg, not 
 for any political reason ; she could no more have accounted 
 for any such than the merest hind, but simply because, a few 
 months before her appearance at Munich, she had been, in 
 her opinion, slighted by the old king. The fact was, old 
 William, sincerely attached to Amalia Stubenrauch, the ac- 
 tress, had not fallen a victim to Lola Montes' charms, and 
 had taken little or no notice of her. The contemplated in- 
 vasion of Wurtemberg was an act of private revenge. But 
 mad as she was, there was some one more mad still King 
 Louis I. of Bavaria. 
 
 " The most ill-advised thing she did, perhaps, was to 
 change her supporters. Like the ignorant, overbearing wom- 
 an she was, she wo'uld not consent to share her power over 
 the king with the Jesuits ; she tried to form an opposition 
 against them among the students at the University, and she 
 succeeded to a certain extent. These adherents constituted 
 the nucleus of a corps which soon became known under the 
 title of * Allemanen.' But the more noble-minded and patri- 
 otic youths at the Munich University virtually ostracized the 
 latter, and several minor disturbances had already broken 
 out in consequence of this, when, in the beginning of Febru- 
 ary, '48, a more than usually serious manifestation against 
 ' Lola's creatures,' as they were called, took place. The wom- 
 an did not lack pluck, and she insisted upon defying the 
 rioters by herself. But they proved too much for her ; and, 
 after all, she was a woman. She endeavoured to escape from 
 their violence, but every house was shut against her ; the 
 Swiss on guard at the Austrian Embassy refused her shelter. 
 A most painful scene happened ; the king himself, the mo-
 
 TEE REVOLUTION AT MUNICH. 109 
 
 ment the news reached him, rushed to her rescue, and, hav- 
 ing elbowed his way through the threatening, yelling crowd, 
 offered her his arm, and conducted her to the church of the 
 Theatines, hard by. As a matter of course, several officers 
 had joined him, and all might have been well, if she had 
 taken the lesson to heart. But her violent, domineering, 
 vindictive temper got the better of her. No sooner did she 
 find herself in comparative safety, than, emboldened by the 
 presence of the officers, she snatched a pistol from one of 
 them, and, armed with it, leapt out of the building, confront- 
 ing the crowd, and threatening to fire. Heaven alone knows 
 what would have been the result of this mad act, but for the 
 timely arrival of a squadron of cuirassiers, who covered her 
 retreat. 
 
 " The excitement might have died out in a week or a fort- 
 night, though the year '48 was scarcely a propitious one for 
 a display of such quasi-feudal defiance, if she had merely been 
 content to forego the revenge for the insults she herself had 
 provoked ; but on the 10th of February she prevailed upon the 
 king to issue a decree, closing the University for a twelve- 
 month. The smouldering fire of resentment against her con- 
 stant interference in the affairs of the country blazed forth 
 once more, and this time with greater violence than ever. 
 The working men, nay, the commercial middle classes, 
 hitherto indifferent to the king's vagaries, which, after all, 
 brought grist to their mill, espoused the students' cause. 
 Barricades were erected ; the cry was not ' Long live the 
 Constitution,' or ' Long live the Republic,' but ' Down with 
 the concubine.' It was impossible to mistake the drift of 
 that insurrection, but, in order to leave no doubt about it in 
 the sovereign's mind, a deputation of the municipal council 
 and one of the Upper House waited upon Louis, and insisted 
 upon the dismissal of Lola Montes, who, in less than an hour, 
 left Munich, escorted by a troop of gendarmes, who, however, 
 had all their work to do to prevent her from being torn to 
 pieces by the mob. Her departure was the signal for the pil- 
 laging of her mansion, at which the king looked on as he 
 thought incognito. It is difficult to determine what prompt- 
 ed him to commit so rash an act. "Was it a feeling of relief at 
 having got rid of her for there was a good deal of cynicism 
 about that semi-philosophical, semi-mystical troubadour 
 or a desire to chew the cud of his vanished happiness? 
 Whatever may have been the reason, he paid dearly for
 
 HO AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 it, for some one smashed a looking-glass over his head, 
 and he was carried back to the palace, unconscious, and 
 bleeding profusely. It was never ascertained who inflicted 
 the wounds, though there is no doubt that the assailant 
 knew his victim. Meanwhile Lola Montes had succeeded 
 in slipping away from her escort, and three hours later she 
 re-entered Munich disguised, and endeavoured to make her 
 way to the palace. But the latter was carefully guarded, 
 and for the next month all her attempts in that direction 
 proved fruitless, though, audacious as she was, she did not 
 dare stop for a single night in the capital itself. Besides, 
 I do not believe that a single inhabitant would have 
 given her shelter. Unlike a good many royal favourites 
 of the past, she had no personal adherents, no faithful 
 servants who would have stood by her through thick and 
 thin, because she never treated any one kindly in the days 
 of her prosperity : she could only bribe ; she was incapable 
 of inspiring disinterested affection among those who were 
 insensible to the spell of her marvellous beauty." 
 
 So far the narrative of my informant. The rest is pretty 
 well known by everybody. A few years later, she committed 
 bigamy with another English officer, named Heald, who was 
 drowned at Lisbon about the same time that her real husband 
 died. Alexandre Dumas was right she brought ill-luck to 
 those who attached themselves to her for any length of time, 
 whether in the guise of lovers or husbands. 
 
 These notes about Lola Montes remind me of another 
 woman whom public opinion would place in the same cate- 
 gory, though she vastly differed in character. I am alluding 
 to Alphonsine Plessis, better known to the world at large as 
 " La Dame aux Camelias." I frequently met her in the so- 
 ciety of some of my friends between '43 and '47, the year of 
 her death. Her name was as I have written it, and not Marie 
 or Marguerite Duplessis, as has been written since. 
 
 The world at large, and especially the English, have al- 
 ways made very serious mistakes, both with regard to the 
 heroine of the younger Dumas' novel and play, and the au- 
 thor himself. They have taxed him with having chosen an 
 unworthy subject, and, by idealizing it, taught a lesson of 
 vice instead of virtue ; they have taken it for granted that 
 Alphonsine Plessis was no better than her kind. She was 
 much better than that, though probably not sufficiently good 
 to take a housemaid's place and be obedient to her pastors
 
 "LA DAME AUX CAMELIAS." 
 
 and masters, to slave from morn till night for a mere pit- 
 tance, in addition to her virtue, which was ultimately to 
 prove its own reward the latter to consist of a home of her 
 own, with a lot of squalling brats about her, where she would 
 have had to slave as she had slaved before, without the 
 monthly pittances hitherto doled out to her. She was not 
 sufficiently good to see her marvellously beautiful face, her 
 matchless graceful figure set off by a cambric cap and a calico 
 gown, instead of having the first enhanced by the gleam of 
 priceless jewels in her hair and the second wrapped in soft 
 laces and velvets and satins ; but, for all that, she was not the 
 common courtesan the goody-goody people have thought fit 
 to proclaim her the common courtesan, who, according to 
 these goody-goody people, would have descended to her grave 
 forgotten, but for the misplaced enthusiasm of a poetical 
 young man, who was himself corrupted by the atmosphere 
 in which he was born and lived afterwards. 
 
 The sober fact is that Dumas fils did not idealize anything 
 at all, and, least of all, Alphonsine Plessis' character. Though 
 very young at the time of her death, he was then already much 
 more of a philosopher than a poet. He had not seen half as 
 much of Alphonsine Duplessis during her life as is commonly 
 supposed, and the first idea of the novel was probably sug- 
 gested to him, not by his acquaintance with her, but by the 
 sensation her death caused among the Paris public, the female 
 part of which almost without distinction went to look at 
 her apartment, to appraise her jewels and dresses, etc. " They 
 would probably like to have had them on the same terms," 
 said a terrible cynic. The remark must have struck young 
 Dumas, in whose hearing it was said, or who, at any rate, had 
 it reported to him ; for if we carefully look at all his earlier 
 plays, we find the spirit of that remark largely pervading 
 them. 
 
 Alphonsine Plessis had probably learned even less in her 
 girlhood than Lola Montes, but she had a natural tact, and 
 an instinctive refinement which no education could have en- 
 hanced. She never made grammatical mistakes, no coarse 
 expression ever passed her lips. Lola Montes could not make 
 friends; Alphonsine Plessis could not make enemies. She 
 never became riotous like the other, not even boisterous ; for 
 amidst the most animated scenes she was haunted by the sure 
 knowledge that she would die young, and life, but for that 
 knowledge, would have been very sweet to her. Amidst these
 
 112 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 scenes, she would often sit and chat to me : she liked me, be- 
 cause I never paid her many compliments, although I was 
 but six years older than the most courted woman of her time. 
 The story of her being provided for by a foreign nobleman 
 because she was so like his deceased daughter, was not a piece 
 of fiction on Dumas' part ; it was a positive fact. Alphonsine 
 Plessis, after this provision was made for her, might have led 
 the most retired existence ; she might, like so many demi- 
 mondaines have done since, bought herself a country-house, 
 re-entered " the paths of respectability," have had a pew in 
 the parish church, been in constant communication with the 
 vicar, prolonged her life by several years, and died in the 
 odour of sanctity : but, notwithstanding her desperate desire 
 to live, her very nature revolted at such self-exile. When. 
 Alexandre Dumas read the " Dame aux Camelias " to his 
 father, the latter wept like a baby, but his tears did not drown 
 the critical faculty. " At the beginning of the third act," he 
 said afterwards, " I was wondering how Alexandre would get 
 his Marguerite back to town without lowering her in the es- 
 timation of the spectator. Because, if such a woman as he 
 depicted was to remain true to nature to her nature and 
 consequently able to stand the test of psychological analysis, 
 she could not have borne more than two or three months of 
 such retirement. This does not mean that she would have 
 severed her connection with Armand Duval, but he would 
 have become ' nn plat dans le menu ' after a little while, 
 nothing more. The way Alexandre got out of the difficulty 
 proves that he is my son every inch of him, and that, at the 
 very outset of his career, he is a better dramatist than I am 
 ever likely to be. But depend upon it, that if, in real life 
 and with such a woman, le pere Duval had not interfered, 
 la belle Marguerite would have taken the ' key of the street ' 
 on some pretext and that, notwithstanding the sale of her 
 carriages, the pledging of her diamonds and her furs in 
 order not to worry the man she loved, for the time being, 
 with money matters. Honestly speaking, it wanted my son's 
 cleverness to make a piece out of Alphonsine Plessis' life. 
 True, he was fortunate in that she died, which left him free 
 to ascribe that death to any cause but the right one, namely, 
 consumption. I know that he made use of it, but he took 
 care to show the malady aggravated by Armand Duval 's de- 
 sertion of her, and this is the only liberty he took with the 
 psychological, consequently scientific and logical, develop-
 
 THE GENEALOGY OF "LA DAME AUX CAMELIAS." H3 
 
 ment of the play. People have compared his Marguerite 
 Gautier to Mauon Lescaut, to Marion Delorme, and so forth : 
 it just shows what they know about, it. They might just as 
 well compare Thiers to Cromwell. Manon Lescaut, Marion 
 Delorme, Cromwell, knew what they wanted : Marguerite 
 Gautier and Thiers do not; both are always in search of 
 Vinconnu, the one in experimental politics, the other in ex- 
 perimental love-making. Still, my son has been true to Na- 
 ture ; but he has taken an episode showing her at her best. 
 He was not bound to let the public know that the frequent 
 recurrence of these love episodes, but always with a different 
 partner, constitutes a disease which is as well known to spe- 
 cialists as the disease of drunkenness, and for which it is im- 
 possible to find a cure. Messalina, Catherine II., and thou- 
 sands of women have suffered from it. When they happen 
 to be born in such exalted stations as these two, they buy 
 men ; when they happen to be born in a lowly station and 
 are attractive, they sell themselves ; when they are ugly and 
 repulsive they sink to the lowest depths of degradation, or 
 end in the padded cells of a mad-house, where no man dares 
 come near them. Nine times out of ten the malady is heredi- 
 tary, and I am certain that if we could trace the genealogy 
 of Alphonsine Plessis, we should find the taint either on the 
 father's side or on the mother's, probably on the former's, 
 but more probably still on both." * 
 
 * The following is virtually a summary of an article by Count G. de 
 Contades, in a French bibliographical periodical, Le Livre (Dec. 10, 1885), and 
 shows how near Alexandre Dumas was to the truth. I have given it at great 
 length. My excuse for so doing is the extraordinary popularity of Dumas' play 
 with all classes of playgoers. As a consequence, there is not a single modern 
 play, with the exception of those of Shakespeare, the genesis of which has 
 been so much commented upon. It is no exaggeration to say that most edu- 
 cated playgoers, not to mention professional students of the drama, have at 
 some time or other expressed a wish to know something more of the real 
 Marguerite Gautier's parentage and antecedents than is shown by Dumas, 
 either in his play or in his novel, or than what they could gather from the 
 partly apocryphal details given by her contemporaries. Dumas himself, in his 
 preface to the play, says that she was a farm servant. He probably knew no 
 more than that, nor did Alphonsine Plessis herself. In after-years, the eminent 
 dramatist had neither the time nor the inclination to search musty parish 
 registers ; Count de Contades has done so for him. Here are the results, as 
 briefly as possible, of his researches. Alphonsine Plessis' paternal grand- 
 mother, " moitie mendiante et moitie prostituee," inhabited, a little less than a 
 century ago, the small parish of Long^-sur-Maire, which has since become 
 simply Longe in the canton of Briouze, arrondissement of Argentan (about 
 thirty miles from Alenc/jn). She had been nicknamed "La Guenuchetonne," 
 a rustic version of the archaic French word guenippe (slattern). Louis Descours, 
 a kind of country clod who had entered the priesthood without the least voca-
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 There were few of us who, during Alphonsine Plessis' 
 lifetime, were so interested in her as to hare gone to the 
 length of such a psychological analysis of her pedigree. 
 Nevertheless, most men were agreed that she was no ordi- 
 
 tion, and just because his people wished him to do so, becomes enamoured of 
 " La Guenuchetonne," and early in January, 1790, the cure Philippe christens a 
 male child, which is registered as Marin Plessis, mother Louis- Kenee Plcssis, 
 father unknown. That the father was known well enough is proved by the 
 Christian name bestowed upon the babe, Marin, which was that of Louis 
 Descours' father. This gallant adventure of the country priest was an open 
 secret for miles around. 
 
 Marin Plessis grew into a handsome fellow, and when about twenty took to 
 travelling in the adjacent provinces of lower and upper Normandy with a pack 
 of small wares. Handsome and amiable besides, he was a welcome guest every- 
 where, and soon became a great favourite with the female part of the Normandy 
 peasantry. For a little while he flitted from one rustic beauty to another, until 
 he was fairly caught by one more handsome than the rest, Marie Deshayes. 
 She was not, perhaps, immaculately virtuous, but, apart from her extraordinary 
 personal attractions, she was something more than an ordinary peasant girl. 
 
 Some sixty years before Marin Plessis' union with Marie Deshayes, there 
 lived in the neighbourhood of Evreux a spinster lady of good descent, though 
 not very well provided with worldly goods. She was comely and sweet-tem- 
 pered enough, but then, as now, comeliness and a sweet temper do not count 
 for much in the French matrimonial market, and least of all in the provincial 
 one. Owing to the modesty of her marriage portion, she had no suitors for her 
 hand, and, oeing of an exceedingly amorous disposition, she bestowed her 
 affection where she could, " without regret, and without false shame," as the 
 old French chronicler has it. 
 
 The annals of the village for, curiously enough, these annals do exist, 
 though only in manuscripts are commendably reticent about the exact num- 
 ber and names of her lovers. It would seem that the author, a contemporary 
 of Mdlle. Anne du Mesnil d'Argentelles and the great-grandfather of the pres- 
 ent possessor of the notes, a gentleman near Bernay, was divided between the 
 wish of not being too hard upon his neighbour, wno was, after all, a gentle- 
 woman, and the desire to leave a record of a peculiar phase of the country 
 manners of those days to posterity. Be this as it may, Mdlle. d'Argentelles' 
 swains, previous to the very last one, have been doomed to anonymous ob- 
 scurity. But with the advent of Etienne Deshayes, the annalist becomes less 
 reticent, he is considered worthy of being mentioned in full, perhaps as a re- 
 ward for having finally " made an honest woman " of his inamorata. For that 
 is the final upshot of the love-story between him and Mdlle. d'Argentelles, 
 which, in its earlier stages, bears a certain resemblance to that between Jean- 
 Jacques Eousseau and Madame de Warens, with this difference that the Nor- 
 mand Jean-Jacques is considerably older than his mistress. 
 
 The children bom of this marriage were very numerous. One of them, 
 Louis-Deshayes, married a handsome peasant girl, Marie-Madeleine Marra, 
 who appears to have been somewhat too intimate with a neighbouring squire, 
 but who gave birth a few years after to a daughter, of whose paternity there 
 could not be the smallest doubt, seeing that she grew up into a speaking like- 
 ness of her maternal grandmother, the erstwhile Mdlle. Anne du Mesnil 
 d'Argentelles. Fate ought to have had a better lot in store for beautiful Marie 
 Deshayes than a marriage with a poor pedlar like Marin Plessis : but the latter 
 was very handsome, and, notwithstanding the opposition of the family, she 
 became his wife. On the 15th of January, 1824, tne child which was to be im- 
 mortalized as " La Dame aux Camelias " saw tne light, in a email village in 
 Lower Normandy. EDITOR.
 
 THE REAL ALPHONSINE PLESSIS. J15 
 
 nary girl. Her candour about her early want of education 
 increased the interest. " Twenty or twenty-five years ago," 
 said Dr. Veron, one day, after Alphonsine Plessis had left 
 the dinner table, "a woman of her refinement would not 
 have been phenomenal in her position, because at that period 
 the grisette, promoted to the rank of femme entretenue, had 
 not made her appearance. The expression 'femme entre- 
 tenue ' was not even known. Men chose their companions, 
 outside marriage, from a different class ; they were generally 
 women of education and often of good family who had made 
 a faux pas, and, as such, forfeited the society and counte- 
 nance of their equals who had not stumbled in that way, at 
 any rate not in the sight of the world. I confess, Alphon- 
 sine Plessis interests me very much. She is, first of all, the 
 best-dressed woman in Paris ; secondly, she neither flaunts 
 nor hides her vices; thirdly, she is not always talking or 
 hinting about money ; in short, she is a wonderful courte- 
 san." 
 
 The result of all this admiration was very favourable to 
 Alexandre Dumas fils when he brought out his book about 
 eighteen months after her death. It was in every one's 
 hands, and the press kept whetting the curiosity of those 
 who had not read it as yet with personal anecdotes about the 
 heroine. In addition to this, the title was a very taking one, 
 and, moreover, absolutely new ; for, though it was obvious 
 enough from Alphonsine Plessis' habit of wearing white 
 camellias the greater part of the year, no one had ever 
 thought of applying it to her while she was alive ; hence, 
 the credit of its invention belongs decidedly to Dumas fils. 
 
 I may return to the subject of " La Dame aux Camelias " 
 in connection with the play ; meanwhile, I will say a few 
 words of the only man among our set who objected to the 
 title, " because it injures my own," as he put it ; namely, M. 
 Lautour-Mezerai, who had been surnamed " L'Homme au 
 Camellia ; " in the singular, from his habit of never appear- 
 ing in public without that flower in his button-hole. And 
 be it remembered that in those days, the flower was much 
 more rare than it is at present, and consequently very expen- 
 sive. The plagiarist, if there was one, must have been 
 Alphonsine Plessis, for Dr. Veron, who was one of his oldest 
 friends, did not remember having ever seen him minus the 
 camellia, and theii friendship dated from the year 1831. It 
 is computed that during the nineteen years Mezerai was in
 
 116 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Paris, previous to his departure for the South of France and 
 afterwards for Algeria, in both of which provinces he fulfilled 
 the functions of prefect, he must have spent no less than 
 fifty thousand francs on his favourite floral ornament, for he 
 frequently changed it twice a day, and its price, especially 
 in the thirties and earlier part of the forties, was not less 
 than five francs. It is, therefore, not surprising that he re- 
 sented the usurpation of his title. M. Lautour-Mezerai was 
 one of the most elegant men I knew. He not only belonged 
 to a very good provincial stock, but his family on both sides 
 counted some eminent names in literature.* He was a most 
 charming companion, exceedingly generous; but he would 
 not have parted with the flower in his button-hole for any 
 consideration, not even to oblige his greatest friend, male or 
 female. It was more than an ornament to him, he looked 
 upon it as a talisman. He always occupied the same place 
 at the Opera, in the balcony, or what we call the " dress- 
 circle," and many a covetous glance from the brightest eyes 
 was cast at the dazzling white camellia, standing out in bold 
 relief against the dark blue coat, but neither glances nor 
 direct requests had any effect upon him. He became abso- 
 lutely savage in his refusal when too hardly pressed, because, 
 by his own admission, he was superstitious enough to believe 
 that, if he went home without it, something terrible would 
 happen to him during the night. 
 
 M. Lautour-Mezerai was, however, something more than 
 a mere man of fashion. To him belongs the credit of hav- 
 ing founded at any rate in France the children's periodi- 
 cal. For the comparatively small subscription of six francs 
 per annum, thousands of little ones received every month a 
 number of the Journal des Enfants, stitched in blue paper, 
 and with their own name on the wrapper. It flattered their 
 pride to be treated like their elders by having their literature 
 despatched to them in that way, and there is no doubt that 
 this ingenious device contributed, to a certain extent, to the 
 primary and enormous success of the undertaking. But M. 
 Lautour-Mezerai was too refined a litterateur to depend upon 
 such a mere trick, and a look at even the earlier numbers of 
 the Journal des Enfants, would prove conclusively that, in 
 the way of amusing children while instructing them a little, 
 
 * Curiously enough, he belonged to the same department, and died almost 
 on the very spot where Marin Plessis was born. EDITOK.
 
 A THEATRICAL MANAGER. 117 
 
 nothing better has been done since, whether in France, Eng- 
 land, or Germany. The editor and manager succeeded in 
 grouping around him such men as Paul Lacroix (le bibliophile 
 Jacob) and Charles Nodier, both of whom have never been 
 surpassed in making history attractive to young minds. 
 Emile Souvestre, Leon Gozlan, Eugene Sue, and even Alex- 
 andre Dumas told them the most wonderful stories. The 
 men who positively kept the adult population of France 
 spellbound by their stirring romances seemed to take a de- 
 light in competing with women like Virginie Ancelot, the 
 Duchesse d'Abrantes, and others on the latter 's ground. As 
 a consequence, it became the fashion to present the young 
 ones on Xew Year's Day with a receipt for a twelvemonth's 
 subscription, made out in their names, instead of the ever- 
 lasting bag of sweets. At one time the circulation of Le 
 Journal des Enfants was computed at 60,000, and M. Lau- 
 tour-Mezerai was said to make 100,000 francs per annum out 
 of it. 
 
 In a former note, I incidentally mentioned Auguste 
 Lireux. He is scarcely remembered by the present genera- 
 tion of Frenchmen ; I doubt whether there are a hundred 
 students of French literature in England who know his name, 
 let alone his writings : yet he is worthy of being remembered 
 by both. He had what a great many French writers of 
 talent, far greater than his own, essentially lack humour. 
 True, the latter was not subtle ; but it was rarely, if ever, 
 coarse. The nearest approach to him among the journalists 
 of the present day is M. Francisque Sarcey ; but the eminent 
 dramatic critic has had a better education. Nevertheless, if 
 Lireux had finished as he began, he would not be so entirely 
 forgotten. Unfortunately for his fame, if not for his ma- 
 terial welfare, he took it into his head to become a million- 
 naire, and he almost succeeded ; at any rate, he died very 
 well off, in a beautiful villa at Bougival. 
 
 I remember meeting with Lireux almost immediately after 
 he landed in Paris, at the end of '40 or the beginning of '41. 
 He came, I believe, from Rouen ; though, but for his accent, 
 he might have come from Marseilles. Tall, well-built, with 
 brown hair and beard and ruddy complexion, a pair of bright 
 eyes behind a pair of golden spectacles, very badly dressed, 
 though his clothes were almost new, very loud and very rest- 
 less, his broad-brimmed hat cocked on one side, he gave one 
 the impression of what in Paris we used to call a " departe-
 
 118 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 mental oracle." He was that to a certain extent, still he was 
 not really pompous, and the feeling of discomfort one experi- 
 enced at first soon wore off. He was not altogether unknown 
 among the better class of journalists in the capital, for it ap- 
 pears that he frequently contributed to the Paris papers from 
 the provinces. He had a fair knowledge of the French drama 
 theoretically, for he had never written a piece, and openly 
 stated his intention never to do so. But in virtue of his dra- 
 matic criticisms in several periodicals which, in spite of the 
 difference in education between the two men, read uncom- 
 monly like the articles of M. Sarcey in the Temps and his 
 unwavering faith in his lucky star, he considered himself des- 
 tined not only to lift the Odeon from the slough in which it 
 had sunk, but to make it a formidable rival to the house in 
 the Rue de Richelieu. He had no ambition beyond that. The 
 Odeon was really at its lowest depth Harel had enjoyed a 
 subsidy of 130,000 francs, M. d'Epagny eleven years later had 
 to content himself with less than half, and yet the authorities 
 were fully cognizant of the necessity of a second Theatre- 
 Franc.ais. Whether from incapacity or ill-luck, M. d'Epagny 
 did not succeed in bringing back the public to the old house. 
 The direction was offered then to M. Hippolyte Lucas, the 
 dramatic critic of Le Siecle, and one of the best English schol- 
 ars I have ever met with among the French, and, on his de- 
 clining the responsibility, given to Lireux, who for the sake 
 of making a point, exclaimed, " Directeur ! . . . au refus 
 d'Hippolyte Lucas ! " * 
 
 It was a piece of bad taste on Lireux's part, because M. 
 Lucas was his superior in every respect, though he would 
 probably have failed where the other succeeded at least for 
 a while. Save for this mania of saying smart things in and 
 out of season, Lireux was really a good-natured fellow, and 
 we were all glad that he had realized his ambition. The vent- 
 ure looked promising enough at the start. He got an excel- 
 lent company together, comprising Bocage, Monrose, Gil- 
 Peres, Maubant, Mdlles. Georges and Araldi, Madame Dorval, 
 etc. ; and if, like young Bonaparte's troops, they were badly 
 paid and wanted for everything, they worked with a will, be- 
 cause, like Bonaparte, Lireux inspired them with confidence. 
 He, on the other hand, knew their value, and on no pretext 
 
 * An imitation of the line of Don Carlos in Hugo's " Hernani " : " Empe- 
 reur ! . . . au refus de Fr6de>ic-le-Sage ! " EDITOR,
 
 LIREUX AND HIS PATRONS. 119 
 
 would allow them to be ousted from the positions they had 
 honourably won by their talents and hard work. Presump- 
 tuous mediocrity, backed either by influence or intrigue, found 
 him a stern adversary ; the intriguer got his answer in such a 
 way as to prevent him from returning to the charge. One 
 day an actor of reputed incapacity, Machanette, claimed the 
 title-role in Moliere's " Misanthrope." 
 
 " You have no one else to play Alceste," he said. 
 
 " Yes, I have. I have got one of the checktakers," re- 
 plied Lireux. 
 
 Auguste Lireux was one of those managers the race of 
 which began with Harel at the Porte Saint-Martin and Dr. 
 Veron at the Opera. Duponchel, at the latter house, Mon- 
 tigny at the Grymnase, Buloz and Arsene Houssaye at the 
 Comedie-Fran9aise, endeavoured as far as possible to follow 
 their traditions of liberality towards the public and their 
 artists, and encouragement given to untried dramatists. It 
 was not Lireux's fault that he did not succeed for any length 
 of time. Of course, there is a ridiculous side to everything. 
 During the terrible cholera visitation of 1832, Harel pub- 
 lished a kind of statistics, showing that not a single one of 
 the spectators had been attacked by the plague ; but all this 
 cannot blind us to the support given to the struggling play- 
 wright, Dumas, in the early part of his career. During the 
 winter of 1841-'42, which was a severe one, Lireux sent foot- 
 warmers to the rare audience that patronized him on a bit- 
 terly cold night, "when tragedy still further chills the 
 house " ; the little bit of charlatanism cannot disturb the fact 
 of his having given one of the foremost dramatists of the day 
 a chance with " La Cigue." I am alluding to the first piece 
 of Emile Augier. 
 
 This kind of thing tells with a general public, more so 
 still with a public composed of generous-minded, albeit some- 
 what riotous youths like those of the Qu artier-Latin in the 
 early forties. Gradually the latter found their way to the 
 Odeon, " sinon pour voir la piece, alors pour entendre Lireux, 
 qui est tou jours amusant " ; which, in plain language, meant 
 that come what may they would endeavour to provoke Lireux 
 into giving them a speech. 
 
 Flattering as was this resolve on their part to Lireux's 
 eloquence, the means they employed to encompass their end 
 would have made the existence of an ordinary manager a bur- 
 den to him. But Lireux was not an ordinary manager ; he
 
 120 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 possessed " the gift of the gab " to a marvellous degree : con- 
 sequently he made it known that he would be happy at any 
 time to address MM. les etudiants without putting them to 
 the expense of apples and eggs on the evening of the per- 
 formance, and voice-lozenges the next day, if they, MM. les 
 etudiants, would in return respect his furniture and the 
 dresses of his actors. The arrangement worked exceedingly 
 well, and for four years the management and the student 
 part of the audience lived in the most perfect harmony. 
 
 Lireux did more than that, he forestalled their possible 
 objections to a doubtful episode in a play. I remember the 
 first night of " Jeanne de Naples." The piece had dragged 
 fearfully. Lireux had made three different speeches during 
 the evening, but he foresaw a riot at the end of the piece 
 which no eloquence on his part would be able to quell. It 
 appears for we only found this out the next day that the 
 condemned woman, previous to being led to execution, had 
 to deliver a monologue of at least a hundred and fifty or two 
 hundred lines. The unhappy queen had scarcely begun, 
 when a herculean soldier rushed on the stage, took her into 
 his arms and carried her off by main force, notwithstanding 
 her struggles. It was a truly sensational ending, and the 
 curtain fell amidst deafening applause. It redeemed the 
 piece ! 
 
 Next day Lireux made his appearance at Tortoni's in the 
 afternoon, and, as a matter of course, the production of the 
 previous evening was discussed. 
 
 " I cannot understand," said Roger de Beauvoir, " how a 
 man with such evident knowledge of stagecraft as the author 
 displayed in that denoument, could have perpetrated such an 
 enormity as the whole of the previous acts." 
 
 Lireux was fairly convulsed with laughter. " Do you really 
 think that was his own invention?" he asked. 
 
 " Of course I do," was the reply. 
 
 "Well, it is not. His denoument was a speech which 
 would have taken about twenty minutes, at the end of which 
 the queen is tamely led off between the soldiers. I know 
 what would have been the result : the students would have 
 simply torn up the benches and Heaven knows what else. 
 You know that if the gas is left burning, if only a moment, 
 after twelve, there is an extra charge irrespective of the quan- 
 tity consumed. I looked at my watch when she began to 
 speak her lines. It was exactly thirteen minutes to twelve ;
 
 BALZAC AGAIN. 121 
 
 she might have managed to get to the end by twelve, but it 
 was doubtful. What was not doubtful was the row that would 
 have ensued, and the time it would have taken me to cope 
 with it. My mind was made up there and then. I selected 
 the biggest of the supers, told him to go and fetch her, and 
 you know the rest." 
 
 There were few theatrical managers in those days who 
 escaped the vigilance of Balzac. Among the many schemes 
 he was for ever hatching for benefiting mankind and making 
 his own fortune, there was one which can not be more fitly 
 described than in the American term of " making a corner " ; 
 only that particular " corner " was to be one in plays. 
 
 About two years before the advent of Lireux, and when 
 the house at Ville d'Avray, of which I have spoken elsewhere, 
 was completed, a party of literary men received an invitation 
 to spend the Sunday there. It was not an ordinary invita- 
 tion, but a kind of circular-letter, the postscriptum to which 
 contained the following words : " M. de Balzac will make an 
 important communication." Leon Gozlan, Jules Sandeau, 
 Louis Desnoyers, Henri Monnier, and those familiar with 
 Balzac's schemes, knew pretty well what to expect ; and when 
 Lassailly, one of the four men whose nose vied with the 
 legendary one of Bouginier, confirmed their apprehensions 
 that it was a question of making their fortunes, they resigned 
 themselves to their fate. Jules Sandeau, who was gentleness 
 itself, merely observed with a sigh that it was the fifteenth 
 time Balzac had proposed to make him a millionnaire ; Henri 
 Monnier offered to sell his share of the prospective profits for 
 7 francs, 50 centimes ; Leon Gozlan suggested that their host 
 might have discovered a diamond mine, whereupon Balzac, 
 who had just entered the room, declared that a diamond mine 
 was nothing to it. He was simply going to monopolize the 
 whole of the Paris theatres. He exposed the plan in a mag- 
 nificent speech of two hours' duration, and would have con- 
 tinued for two hours more had not one of the guests reminded 
 him that it was time for dinner. 
 
 " Dinner," exclaimed Balzac , " why, I never thought of 
 it." 
 
 Luckily there was a restaurant near, and the future 
 millionnaires and their would-be benefactor were enabled to 
 sit down to " a banquet quite in keeping, not only with the 
 magnificent prospects just disclosed to them," but with the 
 splendour actually surrounding them," as Mery expressed it.
 
 122 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 For it should be added that the sumptuous dwelling 
 which was to be, was at that moment absolutely bare of 
 furniture, save a few deal chairs and tables. The garden 
 was a wilderness, intersected by devious paths, sloping so 
 suddenly as to make it impossible to keep one's balance with- 
 out the aid of an Alpenstock or the large stones imbedded in 
 the soil, but only temporarily, by the considerate owner. 
 One day, Dutacq, the publisher, having missed his footing, 
 rolled as far as the wall inclosing the domain, without his 
 friends being able to stop him. 
 
 The garden, like everything else connected with the 
 schemes of Balzac, was eventually to become a gold-mine. 
 Part of it was to be built upon, and converted into a dairy ; 
 another part was to be devoted to the culture of the pine- 
 apple and the Malaga grape, all of which would yield an 
 income of 30,000 francs annually "at least" to borrow 
 Balzac's own words. 
 
 The apartments had been furnished in the same grandiose 
 way theoretically. The walls were, as I have already re- 
 marked, absolutely bare, but on their plaster, scarcely dry, 
 were magnificent inscriptions of what was to be. They were 
 mapped out regardless of expense. On that facing the 
 north there was a splendid piece of thirteenth-century 
 Flemish tapestry in writing, of course, flanked by two 
 equally priceless pictures by Raphael and Titian. Facing 
 these, one by Rembrandt, and, underneath, a couch, a couple 
 of arm-chairs, and six ordinary ones, Louis XV., and uphol- 
 stered in Aubusson tapestry subjects, Lafontaine's Fables. 
 Opposite again, a monumental mantel-piece in malachite (a 
 present of Czar Nicholas, who had expressed his admiration 
 of Balzac's novels), with bronzes and clock by De Gouttires. 
 The place on the ceiling was marked for a chandelier of 
 Venetian glass, and in the dining-room a square was drawn 
 on the carpetless floor for the capacious sideboard, whereon 
 would be displayed " the magnificent family plate." 
 
 Pending the arrival of the furniture, the building of the 
 dairy, hothouses, and vineries, the guests had to sit on hard 
 wooden chairs, to eat a vile dinner, supplemented, however, 
 by an excellent dessert. Balzac was very fond of fruit, and 
 especially of pears, of which he always ate an enormous 
 quantity. The wine was, as a rule, very inferior, but on that 
 particular occasion Balzac's guests discovered that their 
 host's imagination could even play him more cruel tricks in
 
 BALZAC'S VISIONS. 123 
 
 the selection of his vintages than it played him in his pursuit 
 of financial schemes and the furnishing of his house. 
 
 When the fruit was placed upon the table, Balzac assumed 
 a most solemn air. " Gentlemen," he said, " I am going to 
 give you some Chateau-Lafitte, such as you have never tasted 
 such as it has been given to few mortals to taste. I wish 
 you to sip it carefully I might almost say reverently, be- 
 cause the opportunity may not repeat itself in our lives." 
 
 Wherewith the guests' glasses were filled ; all of them 
 made horrible faces, for it was abominable stuff, but one 
 more outspoken than the rest gave his opinion there and 
 then 
 
 " This may be ' Chateau de la Rue Lafitte,' but it is 
 enough to give one the colic." 
 
 Any one else but Balzac would have been horribly discon- 
 certed ; he, on the contrary, did not budge. " Yes," he said 
 proudly, "you are right in one respect; this ambrosial 
 nectar comes in a straight line from the Hue Lafitte, for 
 it is Baron James de Rothschild who made me a present of 
 two barrels, for which I am profoundly grateful. Drink, 
 gentlemen, drink, and be thankful also." 
 
 Those who would consider this a clever piece of acting on 
 Balzac's part, would be greatly mistaken. His imagination 
 at times affected his palate as well as his other organs, 
 and at that moment he was under the distinct impression 
 that he was offering his guests one of the rarest vintages on 
 record. 
 
 I have endeavoured hitherto to digress as little as possible 
 in my recollections, though their very nature made it diffi- 
 cult. In this instance, digression was absolutely necessary 
 to convey an idea of the shock which would naturally result 
 from the contact of two such brains as those of Balzac and 
 Lireux ; for it was not long after the young manager's ad- 
 vent to the Odeon that Balzac found his way to his sanctum. 
 The play he offered him was " Les Eessources de Quinola." 
 Strange as it may seem to us, even as late as '42, Balzac's 
 name as a novelist did not rank first in the list with the 
 general public, still it is very doubtful whether any young 
 manager would have refused a stage play by him ; conse- 
 quently, Lireux accepted " Les Ressources de Quinola " 
 almost without fear. It is not to the purpose to say that it 
 was a bad play, and that he ought to have known better ; it 
 has been amply proved by now that the most experienced
 
 124 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 manager is not infallible ; but it is a moot point whether the 
 greatest masterpiece would have succeeded with the tactics 
 adopted by Balzac to insure its success. The following may 
 appear like a scene from a farcical comedy ; I can vouch for 
 the truth of every word of it, because I had it from the lips 
 of Lireux himself, who, after all, was the heaviest sufferer by 
 Balzac's incurable greed, or, to put it as leniently as one can, 
 by his constant chase after a capital stroke of business. His 
 resolve to pack the house on the first night was not due to a 
 desire to secure a favourable reception from a friendly audi- 
 ence, but to the determination to secure " a lump sum," let 
 come what might. In Balzac are found the two contradictory 
 traits of the money-grubber and the spendthrift. 
 
 The scene alluded to just now, took place when the re- 
 hearsals were far advanced ; the author and the manager 
 were discussing the invitations to be sent out, etc. All at 
 once Balzac declared that he would have none but Knights 
 of the Order of Saint-Louis in the pit. " I am agreeable," 
 replied Lireux, " provided you ferret them out."* 
 
 " I'll see to that," said Balzac. " Pray go on. What is 
 the next part of the house ? " 
 
 " Orchestra stalls." 
 
 " Nothing but peers of France there." 
 
 " But the orchestra stalls will not hold them all, Monsieur 
 de Balzac." 
 
 " Those who cannot find room in the house will have to 
 stand in the lobbies," said Balzac, imperturbably. 
 
 " Stage boxes ? " continued Lireux. 
 
 " They will be reserved for the Court." 
 
 " Stage boxes on the first tier ? " 
 
 " For the ambassadors and plenipotentiaries." 
 
 " The open boxes on the ground floor ? " 
 
 * It shows that Lireux was not very familiar with the royal edicts affecting 
 that order, and that Balzac himself exaggerated the social and monetary im- 
 portance of its wearers. For, though Louis- Philippe at his accession suppressed 
 the order, not less than twelve thousand new knights had been created by his 
 two immediate predecessors. They, the recently created knights, were allowed 
 to retain their honours and pensions ; but, even before the fall of the Bourbons, 
 the distinction had lost much of its prestige. After the Battle of Navarino, 
 Admiral de Eigny, soliciting rewards for his officers who had distinguished 
 themselves, tacitly ignored the order of Saint-Louis in favour of that of the 
 Legion of Honour. The order, as founded by Louis XIV. in 1693, was only 
 available to officers and Catholics. Several modifications were introduced 
 afterwards in its statutes. The Order of Saint-Louis and that of " Military 
 Merit" were the only two recognized by the Constituent Assembly of 1789; 
 but the Convention suppressed the former, only leaving the latter. EDITOR.
 
 ANGLOPHOBIA ON THE FRENCH STAGE. 125 
 
 " For the wives and families of the ambassadors." 
 
 " Upper circle ? " enumerated Lireux, not a muscle of his 
 face moving. 
 
 " For the deputies and grand officers of State." 
 
 " Third circle ? " enumerated Lireux. 
 
 " The heads of the great banking and financial establish- 
 ments." 
 
 " The galleries and amphitheatre?" 
 
 "A carefully selected, but varied, bourgeoisie," wound up 
 Balzac. 
 
 Lireux, who was a capital mimic, re-enacted the scene for 
 us four-aud-twenty hours after it had been enacted in his 
 o\vn room, and while he was still under the impression that 
 it was merely a huge joke on Balzac's part. He soon discov- 
 ered, however, that the latter was terribly in earnest, when, a 
 few days later, Balzac claimed the whole of the seats for the 
 first three nights, on the penalty of withdrawing his piece 
 there and then. Lireux foolishly submitted, the box office 
 was closed ; every one applying for tickets was referred to 
 Balzac himself, or rather to the shady individual who had 
 egged him on to this speculation. The latter, at the first ap- 
 plication, had run up the prices ; the public felt disgusted, 
 and wHen the curtain rose upon " Les Kessources de Quinola," 
 the house was almost empty. Thereupon a batch of nonde- 
 scripts was sent into the streets to dispose of the tickets at 
 any price ; the bait was indignantly rejected, and the curtain 
 fell amidst violent hisses. I repeat, a masterpiece would have 
 failed under such circumstances; but the short run of the 
 revival, almost a quarter of a century later at the Vaudeville, 
 proved that the piece was not even an ordinary money- 
 drawing one. It only kept the bills for about nine or ten 
 days. 
 
 Lireux was more fortunate with several other pieces, no- 
 tably with that of Leon Gozlan, known to students of the 
 French drama as " La Main Droite et la Main Gauche," but 
 which originally bore the title of " II etait une Fois un Koi et 
 nne Seine." There could be no doubt about its tendency in 
 its original form ; it was nothing less than an indictment for 
 bigamy both against Queen Victoria and her Consort ; and 
 the authorities had to insist not only upon the change of 
 title and the names of the dramatis persona, but upon the 
 action being shifted from London to Stockholm. The author 
 and manager had to comply ; but the public, who had got
 
 126 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 wind of the affair, crowded the house every night in order to 
 read between the lines. 
 
 One of my great sources of amusement for many years 
 has been the perusal of political after-dinner speeches, and 
 political leaders in the English papers, especially when the 
 speakers and writers have endeavoured to lay stress upon the 
 cordial relations between the French and the English, upon 
 the friendly feelings guiding their actions on both sides. I 
 am putting together these notes nearly fourteen years after 
 the conclusion of the Franco-German War, nearly three 
 quarters of a century after Waterloo. There is not a single 
 Frenchman, however Chauvinistic, who ever thinks, let alone 
 talks, of avenging Napoleon's defeat by Wellington ; while, 
 on the other hand, there is not a single Frenchman, however 
 unpatriotic, who does not dream now and then of wiping out 
 the humiliation suffered at Sedan. Well, in spite of the 
 almost entire oblivion of the one disaster, and the poignant 
 recollection of the other, the French of to-day hate the 
 English more than the Germans; or let me put it more 
 correctly they hate the Germans, they despise us. Nothing 
 that we can do will ever remove this dislike of us. 
 
 It has been thus as long as I can remember ; no royal 
 visits, no exchange of so-called international courtesies will 
 alter the feeling. It is ready to burst forth, the smallest 
 provocation or fancied one will set it ablaze. During the 
 forties there were a good many real or imaginary provoca- 
 tions on the part of England, and, as a consequence, the 
 hostile feeling against her broke forth where it is almost 
 always sure to break forth first in France on the stage and 
 in song. After " La Main Droite et la Main Gauche," came 
 Halevy's opera of " Charles VI." It is but fair to say that 
 the Government did all it could to stem the tide, but, not- 
 withstanding its positive orders to modify the chorus of the 
 famous war song in the first act, the song was henceforth re- 
 garded as a patriotic hymn. JSTor did the visit of the Queen 
 to Louis- Philippe at Eu, in 1843, effect much improvement 
 in this state of things ; and, as a matter of course, we on the 
 English side of the Channel retaliated the skits, etc., though 
 I do not think we took them au grand sSrieux. When, in 
 January, '44, 1 went to London for a few days, I found the 
 Christmas pantomime of " King Pippin " in full swing at 
 Drury Lane. I well remember a scene of it, laid in the shop 
 of a dealer in plaster figures. Two of these represented
 
 ANGLOPHOBIA ON THE ENGLISH STAGE. 137 
 
 rospectively the King of France and the Queen of Great 
 Britain and Ireland. At a given moment, the two statues 
 became animated, drew close to one another, and exchanged 
 the most profuse salutations. But meanwhile, at the back of 
 the stage, the Gallic cock and the British lion (or leopard) 
 assumed a threatening attitude, and at each mark of affection 
 between the two royal personages, shook their heads violently 
 and seemed to want desperately to come to close quarters. 
 The audience applauded vociferously, and it was very evident 
 to me that neither in Paris nor in London the two nations 
 shared the entente cordiale of their rulers.
 
 128 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Rachel and some of her fellow-actors Rachel's true character Her greediness 
 and spitefulness Her vanitv and her wit Her powers of fascination The 
 cost of being fascinated by lier Her manner of levying toll Some of her 
 victims, Comte Duchatel and Dr. Ve'ron The story of her g_uitar A little 
 transaction between her and M. Fould Her supposed chanty and gener- 
 osity Ten tickets for a charity concert How she made them into twenty 
 liow she could have made them into a hundred Baron Taylor puzzled 
 Her manner of giving presents Beauvallet's precaution with regard to 
 one of her gifts Alexandre Dumas the younger, wiser or perhaps not so 
 wise in his generation Rachel as a raconteuse The story of her debut at 
 the Gymnase What Rachel would have been as an actor instead of an 
 actress Her comic genius Rachel's mother What became of Rachel's 
 money Mama Felix as a pawnbroker Rachel's trinkets Two curious 
 bracelets Her first appearance before Nicholas I. A dramatic recital in 
 the open air Rachel's opinion of the handsomest man in Europe Rachel 
 and Samson Her obligations to him How she repays them How she 
 goes to Berryer to be coached in the fable of "The Two Pigeons" An 
 anecdote of Berryer Rachel's fear of a " warm reception " on the first night 
 of " Adrienne Lecouvreur " How she averts the danger Samson as a man 
 and as an actor Petticoat-revolts at the Comedie-Franc,aise Samson and 
 Regnier as buffers Their different ways of pouring oil upon the troubled 
 waters Mdlle. Sylvanie Plessy A parallel between her and Sarah Bern- 
 hardt Samson and Regnier's pride in their profession The different char- 
 acter of that pride " Apollo with a bad tailor, and who dresses without a 
 looking-glass" Samson gives a lesson in declamation to a procureur- 
 imperial The secret of Regnier's greatness as an actor A lesson at the 
 Conservatoire Regnier on '' make-up " Reguier's opinion of genius on 
 the stage A mot of Augustine Brohan Giovanni, the wigmaker of the 
 Come'die-Franc.aise His pride in his profession M. Ancessy, the musical 
 director, and his three wigs. 
 
 THERE were few authors of my time who came in contact 
 with Rachel without writing about her ; there were abso- 
 lutely none who have represented her in her true character. 
 Either her genins blinded them to her faults, or else they 
 were content to perpetuate the popular belief in her amia- 
 bility, good nature, generosity, etc. The fact is, that Eachel 
 off the stage was made of very ordinary clay. She had few 
 of the good qualities of her race, and a good many of the 
 bad ones; she was greedy to a degree, and could be very 
 spiteful. All these drawbacks, in the eyes of most of her 
 biographers, were redeemed by her marvellous tragic abilities
 
 RACHEL AND SOME OF HER FELLOW-ACTORS. 129 
 
 on the stage, by a wonderful " gift of the gab," by a " happy- 
 go-lucky," " hail-fellow, well-met " manner off the stage to 
 those whom she liked to propitiate. Nevertheless, there 
 were times when she had not a single friend at the Comedie^ 
 Fran9aise, and though her champions attributed this hostil- 
 ity to jealousy of her great gifts, a moment's consideration 
 would show us that such a feeling could scarcely have in- 
 fluenced the men who to a great extent shared her histrionic 
 triumphs, viz., Beauvallet, Regnier, Provost, Samson, and 
 least of all the latter. Still, all these would have willingly 
 kept her out of the Comedie-Fran9aise after she had left it 
 in a huff. She was difficult to get on with ; her modesty, 
 assumed in everyday life, was a sham, for woe to the host 
 who, deceived by it, did not at once make her the queen of 
 the entertainment ! And, in reality, nothing in her war- 
 ranted such a temporary elevation. She was witty in her 
 way and after her kind that is, she had the quick-witted- 
 ness of the French woman who is not an absolute fool, and 
 who has for many years rubbed elbows with everything dis- 
 tinguished in art and literature. Notwithstanding this inti- 
 macy, I am doubtful whether she had ever read, let alone 
 appreciated, any of the masterpieces by the writers of her 
 own days that did not directly bear upon her profession. I 
 exclude fiction I mean narrative fiction, and especially that 
 of a sensational kind, of which she was probably as fond as 
 the meanest concierge and most romantic milliner-girl. 
 
 Nevertheless, provided one did not attempt to analyze it, 
 the power of fascinating the coldest interlocutor was there. 
 To their honor be it said, her contemporaries, especially the 
 men, rarely made such an attempt at analysis. They ap- 
 plauded all she said (off and on the stage), they tolerated all 
 she did, albeit that they paid the cost of many of her so-called 
 " amiable tricks," which were mainly so many instances of 
 greed and nothing else. One evening she was dining at 
 Comte Duchatel's, the minister of Louis-Philippe. The ta- 
 ble was positively laden with flowers, but Rachel did not care 
 much about them ; what she wanted was the splendid silver 
 centre-piece. But she was too clever to unmask her batteries 
 at once, so she began by admiring the contents, then at last 
 she came to the principal point. The host was either in one 
 of his generous or foolish moods, and made her a present of 
 it there and then. Rachel knew, though, that even with a 
 grand seigneur like Comte Duchatel, there are " les lende-
 
 130 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 mains de J'enthousiasme," especially when he is a married 
 man, whose wife does not willingly submit to have her home 
 stripped of its art-treasures. The tragedienne came in a 
 hackney cab ; the comte offered to send her back in his car- 
 riage. She struck the iron while it was hot. " Yes, that 
 will do admirably ; there will be no fear of my being robbed 
 of your present, which I had better take with me." " Per- 
 fectly, mademoiselle," replied the comte ; " but you will send 
 me back my carriage, won't you ? " 
 
 Dr. Veron was despoiled with even less ceremony. Hav- 
 ing taken a fancy to some silver saucers or cups in which the 
 proprietor of the Constitutionnel offered ices to his visitors, 
 she began by pocketing one, and never rested until she had 
 the whole of the set. In short, everything was fish to her 
 net. She made her friends give her bibelots and knick- 
 knacks of no particular value, to which she attached some 
 particular legend absolute inventions for the greatest part 
 in order to sell them for a thousand times their original 
 cost. One day she noticed a guitar at the studio of one of 
 her familiars. " Give me that guitar ; people will think it is 
 the one with which I earned my living on the Place Eoyale 
 and on the Place de la Bastille." And as such it was sold 
 by her to M. Achille Fould for a thousand louis. The great 
 financier nearly fell into a fit when the truth was told to him 
 at Kachel's death ; he, in his turn, having wanted to " do a 
 bit of business." In this instance no Christian suffered, be- 
 cause buyer and vendor belonged to the same race. Of 
 course the panegyrists of Eachel, when the story came to 
 their ears, maintained that the thousand louis were employed 
 for some charitable purpose, without, however, revealing the 
 particular quarter whither they went ; but those who judged 
 Eachel dispassionately could not even aver that her charity 
 began at home, because, though she never ceased complain- 
 ing of her brother's and her sisters' extravagance, both 
 brother and sisters could have told very curious tales about 
 the difficulty of making her loosen her purse-strings for even 
 the smallest sums. As for Eachel's doing good by stealth 
 and blushing to find it fame, it was all so much fudge. Con- 
 trary to the majority of her fellow-professionals, in the past 
 as well as the present, she even grudged her services for a 
 concert or a performance in aid of a deserving object, al- 
 though she was not above swelling her own hoard by such 
 entertainments.
 
 HER SUPPOSED CHARITY. 131 
 
 The following instance, for the absolute truth of which I 
 can vouch, is a proof of what I say. One day the celebrated 
 Baron Taylor, who had been the director of the Comedie- 
 Franqaise, came to solicit her aid for a charity concert ; I am 
 not certain of the object, but believe it was in aid of the 
 Christians in Persia or China. The tickets were to be a 
 hundred francs each. Sontag, Alboni, Eosine Stoltz, Mario, 
 Lablache, Vieuxtemps, and I do not know how many more 
 celebrated artists had promised their services. 
 
 It was in 1850 when M. Arsene Houssaye was her di- 
 rector, and I am particular about giving the year, because 
 Eachel refused on the pretext that her director would never 
 give her leave to appear on any other stage. Now, it so 
 happened that no woman ever had a more devoted friend 
 and chivalrous champion than Kachel had in Arse"ne Hous- 
 saye. His friendship for her was simply idolatry, and I 
 verily believe that if she had asked him to stand on his 
 head to please her, he would have done so, at the risk of 
 making himself supremely ridiculous he who feared ridi- 
 cule above everything, who was one of the most sensible men 
 of his time, who was and is the incarnation of good-nature, 
 to whom no one in distress or difficulties ever appealed in vain. 
 
 Baron Taylor argued all this, but Eachel remained in- 
 flexible. " I am very sorry," he said at last, rising to go, 
 " because I am positive that your name on the bill would 
 have made a difference of several thousand francs in the 
 receipts." 
 
 " Oh, if you only want my name," was the answer, " yoii 
 may have it ; you can make an apology at the eleventh hour 
 for my absence on the score of sudden indisposition the 
 public at charity concerts are used to that sort of thing ; 
 besides, you will have so many celebrities that it will make 
 very little difference. By-the-by " as he was at the door 
 " I think my name is worth ten or twenty tickets." Taylor 
 knew Eachel too well to be in the least surprised at the de- 
 mand, and left ten tickets on the mantelpiece. 
 
 That same afternoon he met Count Walewski, and as a 
 matter of course asked him to take some tickets. 
 
 "Very sorry, cher baron, but I have got ten already. 
 You see, poor Eachel did not know very well how to get rid 
 of the two hundred you burdened her with as a lady pa.- 
 troness ; so she wanted me to have twenty, but I settled the 
 matter with ten. As it is, it cost me a thousand francs."
 
 132 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Taylor did not say another word he probably could not ; 
 he was struck dumb with astonishment at the quickness with 
 which Rachel had converted the tickets into money. But 
 what puzzled him still more was the fact of her having 
 offered Walewski double the quantity of tickets he had given 
 her. Where had she got the others from ? He was coming 
 to the conclusion that she had offered twenty in order to 
 place ten, when he ran against Comte Le Hon, the husband 
 of the celebrated Mdlle. Musselmans, the erstwhile Belgian 
 ambassador to the court of Louis-Philippe, who averred 
 frankly that he was the father of a family, though he had no 
 children of his own. 
 
 Taylor thought he would try another chance, and was 
 met with the reply, " Cher baron, I am very sorry, but I 
 have just taken five tickets from Mdlle. Rachel. It ap- 
 pears that she is a lady patroness, and that they burdened 
 her with two hundred ; fortunately, she told ine, people 
 were exceedingly anxious to get them, and these were the 
 last five." 
 
 " Then she had two hundred tickets after all," said Baron 
 Taylor to himself, making up his mind to find out who had 
 been before him with Rachel. But no one had been before 
 him. The five tickets sold to Comte Le Hon were five of the 
 ten she had sold to Comte Walewski. When the latter had 
 paid her, she made him give her five tickets for herself and 
 family, or rather for her four sisters and herself. Of Comte 
 Le Hon she only took toll of one, which, wonderful to relate, 
 she did not sell. This was Rachel's way of bestirring herself 
 in the cause of charity. 
 
 " Look at the presents she made to every one," say the 
 panegyrists. They forget to mention that an hour afterwards 
 she regretted her generosity, and from that moment she never 
 left off scheming how to get the thing back. Every one 
 knew this. Beauvallet, to whom she gave a magnificent 
 sword one day, instead of thanking her, said, " I'll have a 
 chain put to it, mademoiselle, so as to fasten it to the wall of 
 my dressing-room. In that way I shall be sure that it will 
 not disappear during my absence." Alexandre Dumas the 
 younger, to whom she made a present of a ring, bowed low 
 and placed it back on her finger at once. " Allow me to pre- 
 sent it to you in my turn, mademoiselle, so as to prevent you 
 asking for it." She did not say nay, but carried the matter 
 with one of her fascinating smiles. " It is most natural to
 
 THE STORY OP A FAILURE. 133 
 
 take back what one has given, because what one has given 
 was dear to us," she replied. 
 
 Between '46 and '53 I saw a great deal of Rachel, generally 
 in the green-room of the Comedie-Fran9aise, which was by 
 no means the comfortable or beautiful apartment people 
 imagine, albeit that even in those days the Comedie had a 
 collection of interesting pictures, busts, and statues worthy 
 of being housed in a small museum. The chief ornament of 
 the room was a large glass between the two windows, but if 
 the apartment had been as bare as a barn, the conversation of 
 Rachel would have been sufficient to make one forget all 
 about its want of decoration ; for, with the exception of the 
 elder Dumas, I have never met any one, either man or woman, 
 who exercised the personal charm she did. I have been told 
 since that Bismarck has the same gift. I was never sufficiently 
 intimate with the great statesman to be able to judge, having 
 only met him three or four times, and under conditions that 
 did not admit of fairly testing his powers in that respect, but 
 I have an idea that the charm of both lay in their utter indif- 
 ference to the effect produced, or else in their absolute con- 
 fidence of the result of their simplicity of diction. Rachel's 
 art of telling a story, if art it was, reminded one of that of 
 the chroniclers of the Niebelungen ; for notwithstanding her 
 familiarity with Racine and Corneille, her vocabulary was ex- 
 ceedingly limited, and her syntax, if not her grammar, off 
 the stage, not always free from reproach. 
 
 I do not pretend, after the lapse of so many years, to give 
 these stories in her own language, or all of them ; there are a 
 few, however, worth the telling, apart from the fascination 
 with which she invested them. 
 
 One evening she said to me, " Do you know Poirson ? " 
 
 I had known Poirson when he was director of the Gym- 
 nase. He afterwards always invited me to his soirees, one of 
 which, curiously enough, was given on the Sunday before 
 the Revolution of '48. So I said, " Yes, I know Poirson." 
 
 " Has he ever told you why he did not re-engage me ? " 
 
 " Never." 
 
 " I'll tell you. People said it was because I did not suc- 
 ceed in ' La Vendeenne ' of Paul Duport ; but that was not 
 the cause. It was something much more ridiculous; and 
 now that I come to think of it, I am not sure that I ought 
 to tell you, for you are an Englishman, and you will be 
 shocked."
 
 134 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 I was not shocked, I was simply convulsed with laughter, 
 for Eachel, not content with telling the story, got up, and, 
 gradually drawing to the middle of the room, enacted it It 
 was one of those ludicrous incidents that happen sometimes 
 on the stage, which no amount of foresight on the part of 
 the most skilful and conscientious manager or actor can pre- 
 vent, but which almost invariably ruins the greatest master- 
 piece. There were about eight or nine actors and actresses 
 in the room Regnier, Samson, Beauvallet, etc. It was 
 probably the most critical audience in Europe, but every one 
 shook, and Mdlle. Anai's Aubert went into a dead faint. 
 Kegnier often averred that if Rachel had been a man, she 
 would have been the greatest comic actor that ever lived ; 
 and it is not generally known that she once played Dorine in 
 " Tartuffe," and set the whole of the house into a perfect 
 roar ; but on that evening I became convinced that Rachel, 
 in addition to her tragic gifts, was the spirit of Aristopha- 
 nesque comedy personified. I am afraid, however, that I 
 cannot tell the story, or even hint at it, beyond mentioning 
 that Poirson is reported to have said that Rachel did not 
 want a stage-manager, but a nurse to take care of her. The 
 criticism was a cruel one, though justified by appearances. 
 It was Mama Felix, and not her daughter, who was to blame. 
 The child she was scarcely more than that had hurt her- 
 self severely, and instead of keeping her at home, she sent 
 her to the theatre, " poulticed all over," as Rachel expressed 
 it afterwards. 
 
 Mama Felix was the only one who was a match for her 
 famous daughter in money matters. What the latter did with 
 the enormous sums of money she earned has always been a 
 mystery. As I have already said, they were not spent in 
 charity. Nowadays, whatever other theatres may do, the 
 Comedie-Fran9aise dresses its pensionnaires as well as its 
 societaires from head to foot; it pays the bootmaker's as 
 well as the wigmaker's bill, and the laundress's also. Speak- 
 ing of the beginning of her career, which coincided with the 
 end of Rachel's, Madeleine Brohan, whose language was 
 often more forcible than elegant, remarked, " Dans ma 
 jeunesse, on nous mettait toutes nues sur la scene; nous 
 etions assez jolies pour cela." But Rachel's costumes varied 
 so little throughout her career as to have required but a 
 small outlay on her part. Nor could her ordinary dresses 
 and furniture, which I happened to see in April, 1858, when
 
 HER MONETARY AFFAIRS. 135 
 
 they were sold by public auction at her apartments in the 
 Place Eoyale, have made a considerable inroad on her earn- 
 ings. The furniture was commonplace to a degree; such 
 pictures and knickknacks as were of value had been given to 
 her, or acquired in the manner I have already described ; the 
 laces and trinkets were, undoubtedly, not purchased with 
 her own money. It is said that her brother Raphael was a 
 spendthrift. He may have been, but he did not spend his 
 celebrated sister's money ; of that I feel certain. Then what 
 became of it? I am inclined to think that Mdlle. Rachel 
 dabbled considerably in stocks, and that, notwithstanding 
 her shrewdness and sources of information, she was the 
 victim of people cleverer than she was. At any rate, one 
 thing is certain she was nearly always hard up ; and, after 
 having exhausted the good will of all her male acquaintances 
 and friends, compelled to appeal to her mother, who had 
 made a considerable hoard for her other four sisters, and 
 perhaps also for her scapegrace son ; for, curiously enough, 
 with Mama Felix every one of hei children was a goddess or 
 god, except the goddess. This want of appreciation on the 
 mother's part reminds me of a story told to me by Meison- 
 nier. His granddaughter, on her fifteenth or sixteenth birth- 
 day, had a very nice fan given to her. The sticks were ex- 
 quisitely carved in ivory, and must have cost a pretty tidy 
 sum, but the fan itself, of black gauze, was absolutely plain. 
 The donor probably intended the grandfather's art to en- 
 hance the value of the present, and the latter was about to 
 do so, when the young lady stopped him with the cry, " Voila 
 qu'il va me gater mon eventail avec ses mannequins ! " The 
 irony of non-appreciation by one's nearest and dearest could 
 no further go. 
 
 Mama Felix, then, was very close-fisted, and would never 
 lend her daughter any money, except on very good security, 
 namely, on her jewels. In addition to this, she made her sign 
 an undertaking that if not redeemed at a certain date they 
 would be forfeited ; and forfeited they were, if the loan and 
 interest were not forthcoming at the stipulated time, not- 
 withstanding the ravings of Rachel. This would probably 
 account for the comparatively small quantity of valuable 
 jewelery found after her death. 
 
 Some of the ornaments I have seen her wear had an 
 artistic value utterly apart from their cost, others were so 
 commonplace and such evident imitations as to have been
 
 136 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 declined by the merest grisette. One day I noticed round 
 her wrist a peculiar bracelet. It was composed of a great 
 number of rings, some almost priceless, others less valuable 
 but still very artistic, others again possessing no value what- 
 soever, either artistically or otherwise. I asked her to take it 
 off and found it to be very heavy, so heavy that I remarked 
 upon it. " Yes," she replied, " I cannot wear two of the 
 same weight, so I am obliged to wear the other in my 
 pocket." And out came the second, composed of nearly 
 double the number of rings of the first. I was wondering 
 where all those rings came from, but I refrained from asking 
 questions. I was enabled to form my own conclusions a 
 little while afterwards, in the following way : 
 
 While we were still admiring the bracelet, Rachel took 
 from her finger a plain gold hoop, in the centre of which 
 was an imperial eagle of the same metal. " This was given 
 to me by Prince Louis Napoleon," she said, " on the occasion 
 of my last journey to London. He told me that it was a 
 souvenir from his mother, and that he would not have parted 
 with it to any one else but me." 
 
 I cannot remember the exact date of this conversation, 
 but it must have been shortly after the Eevolution, when the 
 future emperor had just landed in France. About three or 
 four weeks afterwards we were talking to Augustine Brohan, 
 who had just returned from London, where she had fulfilled 
 an engagement of one or two months. Eachel was not there 
 that night, but some one asked her if she had seen Prince 
 Louis in London. " Yes," she replied ; " he was going away, 
 and he gave me a present before he went." Thereupon she 
 took from her finger a ring exactly like that of Rachel's. He 
 told me it was a souvenir from his mother, and that he would 
 not have parted with it to any one but me." 
 
 "We looked at one another and smiled. The prince had 
 evidently a jeweller who manufactured " souvenirs from his 
 mother" by the dozen, and which he, the prince, distributed 
 at that time, " in remembrance of certain happy hours." The 
 multiplicity of the rings on Rachel's wrist was no longer a 
 puzzle to me. I was thinking of the story in the " Arabian 
 Nights," where the lady with the ninety-eight rings bewitches 
 the Sultans Shariar and Shahzenan, in spite of the jealousy 
 and watchfulness of the monster to whom she belongs, and 
 so makes the hundred complete. 
 
 Among the many stories Rachel told me there is one not
 
 RACHEL AT THE PRUSSIAN COURT. 137 
 
 generally known that of her first appearance before Nicho- 
 las I. Though she was very enthusiastically received in Lon- 
 don, and though she always spoke gratefully of the many acts 
 of kindness shown her there, I am inclined to think that she 
 felt hurt at the want of cordiality on the part of the English 
 aristocracy when they invited her to recite at their entertain- 
 ments. This may be a mere surmise of mine ; I have no bet- 
 ter grounds for it than an expression of hers one day when 
 we were discussing London society. " Oui, les Anglais, ils 
 sont tres aimables, mais ils paraissent avoir peur des artistes, 
 comme des betes sauvages, car ils vous parquent comme elles 
 au Jardiu des Plantes." I found out afterwards that it was 
 a kind of grudge she bore the English for having invariably 
 improvised a platform or enclosure by means of silken ropes. 
 Certain is it that, beyond a few casual remarks at long inter- 
 vals upon London, she seemed reluctant to discuss the sub- 
 ject with me. Not so with regard to Potsdam after her return 
 whence in August, '51. In the beginning of July of that 
 year she told me that she had a special engagement to appear 
 before the court on the 13th of that month. I did not see 
 her until a few weeks after she came back, and then she gave 
 me a full account of the affair. I repeat, after the lapse of 
 so many years, I cannot reproduce her own words, and I 
 could not, even half an hour after her narrative, have repro- 
 duced the manner of her telling it ; but I can vouch for the 
 correctness of the facts. 
 
 "About six o'clock, Eaphael [her brother], who was to 
 give me my cues, and I arrived at Potsdam, where we were 
 met by Schneider, who had made the engagement with me. 
 You know, perhaps, that Schneider had been an actor him- 
 self, that afterwards he had been promoted to the director- 
 ship of the Koyal Opera House, and that now he is the private 
 reader to the king, with the title of privy or aulic councillor. 
 
 " Schneider is a very nice man, and I have never heard a 
 German speak our language so perfectly. Perhaps it was as 
 well, because I dread to contemplate what would have been 
 the effect upon my nerves and ears of lamentations in Teu- 
 tonized French." 
 
 " Why lamentations ? " I asked. 
 
 " Ah, nous voila ! " she replied. " You remember I was 
 in mourning. The moment I stepped out of the carriage, 
 he exclaimed, ' But you are all in black, mademoiselle.' ' Of 
 course I am,' I said, ' seeing that I am in mourning.' ' Great
 
 138 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Heaven ! what am I to do ? Black is not admitted at court 
 on such occasions.' I believe it was the birthday of the 
 Czarina, but of course I was not bound to know that. 
 
 " There was no time to return to Berlin, and least of all 
 to get a dress from there, so Eaphael and he put their heads 
 together ; the result of which conference was my being bun- 
 dled rather than handed into a carriage, which drove off at 
 full speed to the Chdteau de Glinicke. I could scarcely catch 
 a glimpse of the country around Potsdam, which seemed to 
 me very lovely. 
 
 "When we got to Glinicke, which belongs to Prince 
 Charles, I was handed over to some of the ladies-in-waiting of 
 the princess. Handed over is the only word, because I felt 
 more like a prisoner than anything else, and they tried to 
 make ' little' Rachel ' presentable according to their lights. 
 One of them, after eyeing me critically, suggested my wear- 
 ing a dress of hers. In length it would have done very well, 
 only I happen to be one of the lean kine, and she decidedly 
 was not, so that idea had to be abandoned. They may be 
 very worthy women, these German ladies, but their inventive- 
 ness with regard to dress is absolutely nil. When the idea 
 suggested by the first lady turned out to be impracticable, 
 they were a bout de ressources. You may gather from this, 
 mon ami, that the beginning and the end of their strategic de 
 la toilette are not far apart. There was one thing that con- 
 soled me for this sudden exhaustion of their limited inge- 
 nuity. Between the half-dozen for they were half a dozen 
 they could not find a single word when the first and only 
 device proved impossible of realization. Had there been the 
 same number of French women assembled, it would have 
 been a kind of little madhouse; in this instance there was a 
 deep silence for at least ten minutes, eventually broken by 
 the knocking at the door of one of the maids, with Herr 
 Schneider's compliments, and wishing to know what had 
 been decided upon. The doleful answer brought him to the 
 room, and what six women could not accomplish, he, like the 
 true artist, accomplished at once. ' Get Mdlle. Rachel a black 
 lace mantilla, put a rose in her hair, and give her a pair of 
 white gloves.' In less than ten minutes I was ready, and in 
 another ten, Raphael, Schneider, and I embarked on a pretty 
 little steam-yacht lying ready at the end of the magnificent 
 garden for Tile des Paons ' (Pfauen-Insul, Peacock Island), 
 where we landed exactly at eight. But my troubles and sur-
 
 A CURIOUS DRAMATIC RECITAL. 139 
 
 prises were not at au end. I made sure that there would be 
 at least a tent, an awning, or a platform for me to stand un- 
 der or upon. Ah, oui ! not the smallest sign of either. 
 ' Voila votre estrade,' said Schneider, pointing to a small 
 lawn, separated from the rest of the gardens by a gravelled 
 walk three or four feet wide. I declined at once to act un- 
 der such conditions, and insisted upon being taken back im- 
 mediately to the station, and from thence to Berlin. Poor 
 Schneider was simply in despair. In vain did he point out 
 that to any one else the total absence of scenery and adjuncts 
 might prove a drawback, but that to me it would only be an 
 additional advantage, as it would bring into greater relief my 
 own talent ; I would not be persuaded. Finding that it was 
 fruitless to play upon my vanity as an artist, he appealed to 
 me as a femme du monde. * The very absence of all prepa- 
 rations,' he said, ' proves that their majesties have not en- 
 gaged Mdlle. Rachel of the Comedie-Frai^aise to give a reci- 
 tation, but invited Mdlle. Rachel Felix to one of their soirees. 
 That Mdlle. Rachel Felix should be kind enough, after hav- 
 ing partaken of a cup of tea, to recite something, would only 
 be another proof of her well-known readiness to oblige ; ' and 
 so forth. Let me tell you, mon cher, that I have rarely met 
 with a cleverer diplomatist, and Heaven knows I have seen a 
 lot who imagined themselves clever. They could not hold a 
 candle to this erstwhile actor ; nevertheless I remained as 
 firm as a rock, though I was sincerely distressed on Schnei- 
 der's account." 
 
 " What made you give in at last? " I inquired. " Was it 
 the idea of losing the magnificent fee ? " 
 
 " For once you are mistaken," she laughed, " though 
 Schneider himself brought that argument to bear as a big 
 piece of artillery. ' Remember this, mademoiselle,' he said, 
 when he could think of nothing else ; ' remember this that 
 this soiree may be the means of putting three hundred 
 thousand or four hundred thousand francs into your pocket. 
 You yourself told me just now on board the yacht that you 
 were very anxious for an engagement at St. Petersburg. I 
 need scarcely tell you that, if you refuse to appear before 
 their majesties to-night, I shall be compelled to state the 
 reason, and Russia will be for ever closed to you. Apart from 
 pecuniary considerations, it will be said by your enemies 
 and your very eminence in your profession causes you to have 
 many that you have failed to please the Empress. After
 
 140 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 all, the fact that all the ordinary surroundings of the actress 
 have been neglected proves that you are not looked upon as 
 an actress by them, but as une femme du monde.' " 
 
 " That persuaded you ? " I remarked. 
 
 " Not at all." 
 
 " Then it was the money." 
 
 " Of course you would think so, even if I swore the con- 
 trary a hundred times over ; but if you were to guess from 
 now till to-morrow, you would never hit upon the real reason 
 that made me stay." 
 
 " Well, then, I had better not try, and you had better tell 
 me at once." 
 
 " Strange as it may seem to you, it was neither the grati- 
 fication of being treated en femme du monde nor the money 
 that made me stay ; it was the desire to see what I had been 
 told was the handsomest man in Europe. I did see him, and 
 for once in a way rumour had not exaggerated the reality. I 
 had scarcely given my final consent to Schneider, when the 
 yacht carrying the imperial and royal families came alongside 
 the island, and the illustrious passengers landed, amidst an 
 avalanche of flowers thrown from the other vessels. Schneider 
 presented me to the King, who was also good-looking, and 
 the latter presented me to the Czar. 
 
 " Immediately afterwards the recital began. At the risk 
 of taxing your credulity still further, I may tell you that I, 
 Kachel, who never knew what ' stage-fright ' meant, felt nerv- 
 ous. That man to me looked like a very god. Fortunately 
 for my reputation, the shadows of night were gathering fast ; 
 in another twenty minutes it would be quite dark, and I felt 
 almost rejoiced that my audience could scarcely distinguish 
 my features. On the other hand, Eaphael, who only knew 
 the part of Hippolyte by heart, and who was obliged to read 
 the others, declared that he could not see a line, and candles 
 had to be brought in. It was a glorious evening, but there 
 was a breeze nevertheless, and as fast as the candles were 
 lighted, they were extinguished by the wind. To put ordi- 
 nary lamps on the lawn at our feet was not to be thought of 
 for a moment ; luckily one of the functionaries remembered 
 that there were some candelabra with globes inside, and by 
 means of these a kind of ' float ' was improvised. Still the 
 scene was a curious one. Eaphael close to me on the edge of 
 the lawn, with one of these candelabra in his left hand. Be- 
 hind, to the left and right of us, a serried crowd of generals,
 
 RACHEL AND SAMSON. 
 
 court dignitaries in magnificent uniforms. In front, and 
 separated by the whole width of a gravel walk, the whole 
 group of sovereigns and their relations, and behind them the 
 walls of the mansion, against which the tea-table had been 
 set, and around which stood the ladies-in-waiting of the 
 Queen of Prussia and the Empress of Eussia. A deep silence 
 around, only broken by the soft soughing of the wind in the 
 trees, and the splashing of a couple of fountains near, playing 
 a dirge-like accompaniment to Raphael's and my voice. 
 
 " The recital lasted for nearly an hour ; if I had liked I 
 could have kept them there the whole night, for never in my 
 career have I had such an attentive, such a religiously atten- 
 tive, audience. The King was the first to notice my fatigue, 
 and he gave the signal for my leaving off by coming up and 
 thanking me for my efforts. The Emperor followed his ex- 
 ample, and stood chatting to me for a long while. In a few 
 minutes I was the centre of a circle which I am not likely 
 to forget as long as I live. Then came the question how 
 Raphael and I were to get back to Berlin. The last train 
 was gone. But Schneider simply suggested a special, and a 
 mounted messenger was despatched then and there to order 
 it. After everything had been arranged for my comfortable 
 return, the sovereigns departed as they had come, only this 
 time the yacht, as well as the others on the lake, were splen- 
 didly illuminated. This was my first appearance before 
 Nicholas I." 
 
 There was no man to whom Rachel owed more than to 
 Samson, or even as much ; but for him, and in spite of her 
 incontestable genius, the Comedie-FranQais might have re- 
 mained closed to her for many years, if not forever. Fre- 
 derick Lemaitre and Marie Dorval were undoubtedly, in their 
 own way, as great as she, yet the blue riband of their profes- 
 sion never fell to their lot. And yet, when she had reached 
 the topmost rung of the ladder of fame, Rachel was very 
 often not only ungrateful to him, but her ingratitude showed 
 itself in mean, spiteful tricks. When Legouve's " Adrienne 
 Lecouvreur" was being cast, Samson, who had forgiven 
 Rachel over and over again, was on such cool terms with her 
 that the authors feared he would not accept the part of the 
 Prince de Bouillon. Nevertheless, Samson, than whom there 
 was not a more honourable and conscientious man, on or off 
 the stage, accepted ; he. would not let his resentment inter- 
 fere with what he considered his duty to the institution of
 
 1-12 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 which he was so eminent a member. This alone ought to 
 have been sufficient to heal the breach between the tutor and 
 the pupil ; any woman with the least spark of generosity, in 
 the position of Eachel towards Samson, would have taken the 
 first step towards a reconciliation. Rachel, as will be seen 
 directly, was perfectly conscious of what she ought to do 
 under the circumstances ; she was too great an actress not to 
 have studied the finer feelings of the human heart, and yet 
 she did not do it. On the contrary, she aggravated matters. 
 Every one knows the fable of " The Two Pigeons " which 
 Adrienne recites at the soiree of the Princesse de Bouillon. 
 Now, it so happened that the great barrister and orator, Ber- 
 ryer, was considered a most charming reciter of that kind of 
 verse. Berryer, a most simple-minded man, took special de- 
 light in sharing the most innocent games of young children. 
 He was especially fond of the game of " forfeits " ; and so 
 great was his fame as a diseur, that the penalty generally im- 
 posed upon him was the reciting of a fable. But great diseur 
 as he was, he himself acknowledged that Samson could have 
 given him a lesson. 
 
 At every new part she undertook, Eachel was in the habit 
 of consulting with her former tutor ; this time she went to 
 consult Berryer instead, and, what was worse, took pains that 
 every one should hear of it. " Then my heart smote me," 
 she said afterwards, when by one of those irresistible tricks 
 of hers she had obtained her tutor's pardon once more. It 
 was as deliberate a falsehood as she ever uttered in her life, 
 which in Rachel's case means a good deal. The fact was, 
 the affair, as I have already said, had been bruited about, 
 mainly by herself at first ; the public showed a disposition to 
 take Samson's part, and she felt afraid of a " warm reception " 
 on the first night. 
 
 Under these circumstances she had recourse to one of her 
 wiles, which, for being theatrical, was not less effective. At 
 the first rehearsal, when Adrienne has to turn to Michonnet, 
 saying, " This is my true friend, to whom I owe everything," 
 she turned, not to Regnier, who played Michonnet, and to 
 whom the words are addressed, but to Samson, at the same 
 time holding out her hand to him. Samson, who, notwith- 
 standing all their disagreements, very felt proud of his great 
 pupil, who was, moreover, of a very affectionate disposition, 
 notwithstanding his habitual reserve, fell into the trap. 
 He took her proffered hand ; then she flung herself into his
 
 A DIRECTOR OP THE COMEDIE. 143 
 
 arms, and the estrangement was at an end, for the time 
 being. Rachel took great care to make the reconciliation as 
 public as possible. 
 
 I was never very intimate with Samson, but the little I 
 knew of him I liked. I repeat, he was essentially an honour- 
 able and honest man, and very tolerant with regard to the 
 foibles of the fair sex. There was need for such tolerance in 
 those days. Augustine Brohan, Sylvanie Plessy, Rachel, and 
 half a dozen other women, all very talented, but all very way- 
 ward, made Buloz' life (he was the director of the Comedie- 
 Fran9aise, as well as the editor of the Revue des Deux 
 Mondes] a burden to him. He who could, and often did, dic- 
 tate his will to men who already then were famous throughout 
 Europe, frequently found himself powerless against women, 
 who, however celebrated, were, with the exception of Rachel, 
 nothing in comparison with the former. He was, it is true, 
 overbearing to a degree, and disagreeable besides, but his 
 temper proved of no avail with them ; it only made matters 
 worse. "Apres tout," he said one day to Madame Allan, 
 who was the most amenable of all, " je suis le maitre ici." 
 " !a se peut, monsieur," was the answer, " mais nous sommes 
 les contres maitre." * 
 
 In nearly all such troubles Regnier and Samson had to 
 act as buffers between the two contending parties; but, 
 as Augustine Brohan explained once, the two were utterly 
 different in their mode of casting oil upon the troubled waters. 
 " Regnier," she said, " c'est le bon Dieu des Chretiens, qui se 
 fait tres sou vent mener par le nez par des mots. Du reste son 
 nez s'yprete. f Samson c'est le Dieu juste, mais vengeur des 
 Juifs, qui veut bien pardonner, mais seulement apres soumis- 
 sion complete et entiere. Samson ne vous promet pas le ciel, 
 il vous offre des compensations solides ici bas." 
 
 It would be difficult to paint the contrast between two 
 characters in fewer words. In 1845, when Mdlle. Sylvanie 
 Plessy seceded from the Comedie-Frangaise, Regnier wrote a 
 kind epistle, recommending her to come and explain matters 
 either personally or by letter. " Let your letter be kind and 
 
 * The play upon the word is scarcely translatable. " Centre -maitre " in the 
 singular means foreman ; as it is used here it means against the master. 
 EDITOR. 
 
 t R6gnier's nose was always a subject of jokes among his fellow-actors. " It 
 is not because it is large," said Beauvallet, " but because it is his principal or- 
 gan of speech." EDITOR.
 
 14:4: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 affectionate, and be sure that things will right themselves 
 better than you expect." 
 
 Samson also wrote, but simply to say that if she did not 
 come back at once all the terrors of the law would be invoked 
 against her. Which was done. The Comedie-Franqaise insti- 
 tuted proceedings, claiming two hundred thousand francs dam- 
 ages, and twenty thousand francs " a titre de provision." * The 
 court cast Mdlle. Plessy in six thousand francs provision, defer- 
 ring judgment on the principal claim. Two years later Mdlle. 
 Plessy returned and re-entered the fold. Thanks to Sam- 
 son, she did not pay a single farthing of damages, and the 
 Comedie bore the costs of the whole of the lawsuit, f 
 
 Both Samson and Regnier were very proud of their profes- 
 sion, but their pride showed itself in different ways. Regnier 
 would have willingly made any one an actor that is, a 
 good actor ; he was always teaching a great many amateurs, 
 staging and superintending their performances. Samson, on 
 the other hand, had no sympathy whatsoever with that kind 
 of thing, and could rarely be induced to give it aid, but he 
 was very anxious that every public speaker should study elo- 
 cution. " Eloquence and elocution are two different things," 
 he said ; " and the eloquent man who does not study elocu- 
 tion, is like an Apollo with a bad tailor, and who dresses 
 without a looking-glass. I go further still, and say that 
 every one ought to learn how to speak, not necessarily with 
 the view of amusing his friends and acquaintances, but with 
 the view of not annoying them. I am a busy man, but 
 should be glad to devote three hours a week to teach the rising 
 generation, and especially the humbler ones, how to speak." 
 
 In connection with that wish of Samson, that every man 
 whose duties compelled him, or who voluntarily undertook to 
 speak in public, should be a trained elocutionist, I remember 
 a curious story of which I was made the recipient quite by 
 accident. It was in the year '60, one morning in the sum- 
 mer, that I happened to meet Samson in the Rue Vivienne. 
 We exchanged a few words, shook hands, and each went his 
 own way. In the afternoon I was sitting at Tortoni's, when a 
 gentleman of about thirty-five came up to me. " Monsieur," 
 
 * Damages claimed by one of the parties, pending the final verdict. ED- 
 ITOR. 
 
 ras Emile Augier's " Aventuriere " that caused 
 as it did thirty-live years later, in the case of 
 Mdlle. Sarah" Bernhardt. EDITOR. 
 
 t Curiously enough, it wa 
 Mdlle. Plessy's secession, just
 
 SAMSON. 145 
 
 Cer- 
 I 
 
 this 
 
 morning talking to some one whose name I do not know, 
 but to whom I am under great obligations. I was in a great 
 hurry and in a cab, and before I could stop the cabman both 
 of you had disappeared. Will you mind telling me his 
 name ? " "I recollect being in the Eue Vivienne and meet- 
 ing with M. Samson of the Comedie-Fra^aise," I answered. 
 "I thought so," remarked my interlocutor. "Allow me to 
 thank you, monsieur." With this he lifted his hat and went 
 out. 
 
 The incident had slipped my memory altogether, when I 
 was reminded of it by Samson himself, about three weeks 
 afterwards, in the green-room of the Comedie-Fran9aise. I 
 had been there but a few moments when he came in. " You 
 are the man who betrayed me," he said with a chuckle. " I 
 have been cudgelling my brain for the last three weeks as to 
 who it could have been, for I spoke to no less than half a 
 dozen friends and acquaintances in the Eue Vivienne on the 
 morning I met you, and they all wear imperials and mous- 
 taches. A nice thing you have done for me ; you have bur- 
 dened me with a grateful friend for the rest of my life ! " 
 
 And then he told me the story, how two years before he 
 had been at Granville during the end of the summer ; how 
 he had strolled into the Palais de Justice and heard the pro- 
 cureur-imperial make a speech for the prosecution, the deliv- 
 ery of which would have disgraced his most backward pupil 
 at the Conservatoire. " I was very angry with the fellow, 
 and felt inclined to write him a letter, telling him that there 
 was no need to torture the innocent audience, as well as the 
 prisoner in the dock. I should have signed it. I do not 
 know why I did not, but judge of my surprise when, the same 
 evening at dinner, I found myself seated opposite him. I 
 must have scowled at him, and he repaid scowl for scowl. It 
 appears that he was living at the hotel temporarily, while his 
 wife and child were away. I need not tell you the high 
 opinion our judges have of themselves, and I dare say he 
 thought it the height of impertinence that I, a simple mor- 
 tal, should stare at him. I soon came to the conclusion, how- 
 ever, that if I wanted to spare my fellow-creatures such an 
 infliction as I 
 the man's anger. 
 7 
 
 ?T i.ti-1.1. UV/1-4. U\J U JJC4JA *_ 4A1 T J-^HW T WJ. V^C4IW<_*XV-<^ tJV*.^**. WMi 
 
 had endured that day, I ought not to arouse 
 !r. So I looked more mild, then entered into
 
 146 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 conversation with him. You should have seen his face when 
 I began to criticize his tone and gestures. But he evidently 
 felt that I was somewhat of an authority on the subject, and 
 at last I took him out on the beach and gave him a lesson in 
 delivering a speech, and left him there without revealing my 
 name. Next morning I went away, and never set eyes on 
 him again until three weeks ago, when he left his card, ask- 
 ing for an interview. He is a very intelligent man, and has 
 profited by the first lesson. During the three days he re- 
 mained in Paris I gave him three more. He says that if ever 
 I get into a scrape, he'll do better than defend me prosecute 
 me, and I'm sure to get off." 
 
 I have never seen Samson give a lesson at the Conserva- 
 toire, but I was present at several of Regnier's, thanks to Auber, 
 whom I knew very well, and who was the director, and to 
 Regnier himself, who did not mind a stranger being present, 
 provided he felt certain that the stranger was not a scoffer. I 
 believe that Samson would have objected without reference to 
 the stranger's disposition ; at any rate, Auber hinted as much, 
 so I did not prefer my request in a direct form. 
 
 I doubt, moreover, whether a lesson of Samson to his 
 pupils would have been as interesting to the outsider as one 
 of Regnier's. Of all the gifts that go to the making of a 
 great actor, Regnier had naturally only two taste and in- 
 telligence ; the others were replaced by what, for want of a 
 better term, one might call the tricks of the actor ; their ac- 
 quisition demanded constant study. For instance, Regnier's 
 appearance off the stage was absolutely insignificant; his 
 voice was naturally husky and indistinct, and, moreover, 
 what the French call nasillarde, that is, produced through the 
 nose. His features were far from mobile ; the eyes were not 
 without expression, but these never twinkled with merriment 
 nor shone with passion. Consequently, the smallest as well 
 as largest effect necessary to the interpretation of a character 
 had to be thought out carefully beforehand, and then to be 
 tried over and over again materially. Each of his inflections 
 had to be timed to a second ; but when all this was accom- 
 plished, the picture presented by him was so perfect as to 
 deceive the most experienced critic, let alone an audience, 
 however intelligent. In fact, but for his own frank admis- 
 sion of all this, his contemporaries and posterity would have 
 been never the wiser, for, to their honour be it said, his fellow- 
 actors were so interested in watching him " manipulate him-
 
 REGNIER AND HIS ART. 14.7 
 
 self," as they termed it, as to never breathe a word of it to 
 the outside world. They all acknowledged that they had 
 learned something from him during rehearsal. For instance, 
 in one of his best-known characters, that of the old servant 
 in Madame de Girardin's " La Jpie fait peur," * there is 
 a scene which, as played by Regnier and Delaunay, looked 
 to the spectator absolutely spontaneous. The smallest detail 
 had been minutely regulated. It is where the old retainer, 
 while dusting the room, is talking to himself about his young 
 master, Lieutenant Adrien Desaubiers, who is reported dead. 
 
 " I can see him now," says Noel, who cannot resign him- 
 self to the idea ; " I can see him now, as he used to come in 
 from his long walks, tired, starving, and shouting before he 
 was fairly into the house. ' Here I am, my good Noel ; I am 
 dying with hunger. Quick ! an omelette.' " At that mo- 
 ment the young lieutenant enters the room, and having 
 heard Noel's last sentence, repeats it word for word. 
 
 Short as was the sentence, it had been arranged that De- 
 launay should virtually cut it into four parts. 
 
 At the words, "It is /," Regnier shivered from head to 
 foot ; at "Here I am, my good Noel" he lifted his eyes heav- 
 enwards, to make sure that the voice did not come from 
 there, and that he was not labouring under a kind of hallu- 
 cination ; at the words, "/ am dying with hunger" he came 
 to the conclusion that it was a real human voice after all ; 
 and at the final, " Quick! an omelette" he turned round 
 quickly, and fell like a log into the young fellow's arms. 
 
 I repeat, the whole of the scene had been timed to the 
 fraction of a second ; nevertheless, on the first night, Regnier, 
 nervous as all great actors are on such occasions, forgot all 
 about his own arrangements, and, at the first sound of De- 
 launay's voice, was so overcome with emotion that he literally 
 tumbled against the latter, who of course was not prepared 
 to bear him up, and had all his work to do to keep himself 
 from falling also. Meanwhile Regnier lay stretched at full 
 length on the stage, and the house broke into tumultuous 
 applause. __- 
 
 " That was magnificent," said Delaunay after the perform- 
 ance. " Suppose we repeat the thing to-morrow ? " 
 
 * There are several English versions of the play, and I am under the im- 
 pression that the lare Tom Kobertson was inspired by it when he adapted 
 " Caste." I allude to that scene in the third act, where George d'Alrov returns 
 unexpectedly and where Polly Eccles breaks the news to her sister. EDITOB.
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 But Regnier would not hear of it ; he stuck to his original 
 conception in four tempi. He preferred trusting to his art 
 rather than to the frank promptings of nature. 
 
 That is why a lesson of Kegnier to his pupils was so in- 
 teresting to the outsider. The latter was, as it were, initiated 
 into all the resources tKe great actor has at his command 
 wherewith to produce his illusion upon the public. Among 
 Regnier's pupils those were his favourites who never allowed 
 themselves to be carried away by their feelings, and who 
 trusted to these resources as indicated to them by their tutor. 
 He was to a certain extent doubtful of the others. " Feel- 
 ings vary ; effects intelligently conceived, studied, and carried 
 out ought never to vary," he said. Consequently it became 
 one of his theories that those most plentifully endowed with 
 natural gifts were not likely to become more perfect than 
 those who had been treated niggardly in that respect, pro- 
 vided the vocation and the perseverance were there. The re- 
 verse of Samson, Avho was proudest of Eachel, Regnier was 
 never half as proud of M. Coquelin as of others who had given 
 him far more trouble. Augustine Brohan explained the feel- 
 ing in her own inimitable way : " Regnier est comme le grand 
 seigneur qui s'enamourache d'une paysanne a qui il faut tout 
 enseigner; si moi j'etais homme, j'aimerais mieux une de- 
 moiselle de bonne famille, qui n'aurait pas besoin de tant 
 d'enseignement." 
 
 Mdlle. Brohan exaggerated a little bit. Regnier's pupils 
 were not peasant children, to whom he had to teach every- 
 thing ; a great many, like Coquelin, required very little 
 teaching, and all the others had the receptive qualities which 
 make teaching a pleasure. The latter, boys and girls, had to 
 a certain extent become like Regnier himself, " bundles of 
 tricks," and, what is perhaps not so surprising to students of 
 psychology and physiology, their features had contracted a 
 certain likeness to his. At the first blush one might have 
 mistaken them for his children. And they might have been, 
 for the patience he had with them. It was rarely exhausted, 
 but he now and then seemed to be waiting for a new supply. 
 At such times there was a frantic clutch at the shock, grey- 
 haired head, or else a violent blowing of the perky nose in a 
 large crimson chequered handkerchief, its owner standing all 
 the while on one leg ; the attitude was irresistibly comic, but 
 the pupils were used to it, and not a muscle of their faces 
 moved.
 
 HIS PRIDE IN HIS PROFESSION. 149 
 
 Those who imagine that Regnier's courses were merely so 
 many lessons of elocution and gesticulation would be alto- 
 gether mistaken. Regnier, unlike many of his great fellow- 
 actors of that period, had received a good education : he had 
 been articled to an architect, he had even dabbled in painting, 
 and there were few historical personages into whose characters 
 he had not a thorough insight. He was a fair authority upon 
 costume and manners of the Middle Ages, and his acquaint- 
 ance with Roman and Greek antiquities would have done 
 credit to many a professor. He was called " le comedien 
 savant" and "le savant comedien." As such, whenever a 
 pupil failed to grasp the social or political importance of one 
 of the dramatis persona of Racine's or Corneille's play, there 
 was sure to be a disquisition, telling the youngster all about 
 him, but in a way such as to secure the attention of the 
 listener a way that might have aroused the envy of a uni- 
 versity lecturer. The dry bones of history were clothed by a 
 man with an eye for the picturesque. 
 
 " Who do you think Augustus was ? " he said one day 
 when I was present, to the pupil, who was declaiming some 
 lines of " Cinna." " Do you think he was the concierge or 
 le commissionnaire du coin ? " And forthwith there was a 
 sketch of Augustus. Absolutely quivering with life, he led 
 his listener through the streets of Rome, entered the palace 
 with him, and once there, became Augustus himself. After 
 such a scene he would frequently descend the few steps of the 
 platform and drop into his armchair, exhausted. 
 
 Every now and then, in connection with some character 
 of Moliere or Regnard, there would be an anecdote of the 
 great interpreter of the character, but an anecdote enacted, 
 after which the eyes would fill with tears, and the ample 
 chequered handkerchief come into requisition once more. 
 
 Regnier was a great favourite with most of his fellow- 
 actors and the employes of the Comedie-Franqaise, but he 
 was positively worshipped by Giovanni, the wigmaker of the 
 establishment. They were in frequent consultation even in 
 the green-room, the privilege of admission to which had been 
 granted to the Italian Figaro. The consultations became 
 most frequent when one of the members undertook a part 
 new to him. It was often related of Balzac that he firmly 
 believed in the existence of the characters his brain had 
 created. The same might be said of Regnier with regard to 
 the characters created by the great playwrights of his own
 
 150 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 time and those of the past. Of course, I am not speaking of 
 those who had an historical foundation. But Alceste, Harpa- 
 gon, Georges Dandin, Sganarelle, and Scapin were as real to 
 him as Orestes and CEdipus, as Augustus and Mohammed. 
 He would give not only their biographies, but describe their 
 appearance, their manners, their gait, and even their com- 
 plexion. The first time I heard him do so, I made sure that 
 he was trying to mystify Giovanni; but Rachel, who was 
 present, soon undeceived me. And the Italian would sit 
 listening reverently, then start up, and exclaim, "Ze sais ce 
 qu'il vous faut, Monsu Regnier, ze vais faire oune parruque a 
 etonner Moliere lui-meme." And he kept his word, because 
 he considered that the wig contributed as much to, or de- 
 tracted from, the success of an actor as his diction, and more 
 than his clothes. When Delaunay became a societaire his 
 first part was that of the lover in M. Viennet's " Migraine." 
 " Voila Monsu Delaunay, oune veritable parruque di societaire. 
 Zouez a present, vous etes sour de votre affaire." 
 
 One day Beauvallet found him standing before the win- 
 dow of Brandus, the music-publisher in the Rue de Richelieu. 
 He was contemplating the portrait of Rossini, and he looked 
 sad. 
 
 "What are you standing there for, Giovanni?" asked 
 Beauvallet. 
 
 " Ah, Monsu Bouvallet, I am looking at the portrait of 
 Maestro Giovanni Rossini, and when I think that his name 
 is Giovanni like mine, when I see that abominable wig which 
 looks like a grass-plot after a month of drought, I feel 
 ashamed and sad. But I will go and see him, and make him 
 a wig for love or money that will take twenty years off his 
 age. He went, but Rossini would not hear of it, or rather 
 Madame Rossini put a spoke in his wheel. Giovanni never 
 mentioned his name again. It was Ligier who brought Gio- 
 vanni to Paris, and for a quarter of a century he worked un- 
 remittingly for the glory of the Comedie-Frangaise, and 
 when one of the great critics happened to speak favourably 
 of the " make-up " of an actor, as Paul de St. Victor did 
 when Regnier " created Noel," Giovanni used to leave his 
 card at his house. It was Giovanni who made the wigs for 
 M. Ancessy, the musical director at the Odeon, who, under 
 the management of M. Edouard Thierry, occupied the same 
 position at the Comedie-Frangaise. M. Ancessy was not only 
 a good chef d'orchestre, but a composer of talent ; but he had
 
 GIOVANNI AND RfeGNIER. 151 
 
 one great weakness he was as bald as a billiard-ball and 
 wished to pass for an Absalom." Giovanni helped him to 
 carry out the deception by making three artistic wigs. The 
 first was of very short hair, and was worn from the 1st to the 
 10th of the month; from the llth to the 20th M. Ancessy 
 donned one with hair that was so visibly growing as to cover 
 his ears. From the 20th to the last day of the month his 
 locks were positively flowing, and he never failed to say on 
 that last evening in the hearing of every one, " What a terri- 
 ble nuisance my hair is to me ! I must have it cut to-mor- 
 row."
 
 152 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Two composers, Auber and Felicien David Auber, the legend of his youthful 
 appearance How it arose His daily rides, his love 01 women's society 
 His mot on Mozart's "Don Juan" The only drawback to Auber's enjoy- 
 ment of women's society His reluctance to take his hat off How he man- 
 aged to keep it on most of the time His opinion upon Meyerbeer's and 
 Halevjr's genius His opinion upon Gerard de Nerval, who hanged himself 
 with his hat on His love of solitude His fondness of Paris His griev- 
 ance against his mother for not having given him birth there He refuses 
 to leave Paris at the commencement of the siege His small appetite He 
 proposes to write a new opera when the Prussians are ^one Auber suffers 
 no privations, but has difficulty in finding fodder for his horse The Pari- 
 sians claim it for food Another legend about Auber's independence of 
 sleep How and where he generally slept Why Auber snored in Veron's 
 company, and why he did not in that of other people His capacity for 
 work Auber a brilliant talker Auber's gratitude to the artists who inter- 
 preted his work, but different from Meyerbeer's The reason why, accord- 
 ing to Auber Jealousv or humility Auber and the younger Coquelin 
 " The verdict on all tilings in this world may be summed up in the one 
 phrase, 'It's an injustice'" Fe"licien David The man The beginnings 
 of his career His terrible poverty He joins the Saint-Simoniens, and goes 
 with some of them to the East Their reception at Constantinople M. 
 Scribe and the libretto of "L'Africaine" David in Egypt at the court of 
 Mehemet-AH David's description of him Mehemet's way of testing the 
 educational progress of his sons Woe to the fat kine Mehemet-Ali sug- 
 gests a new mode of teaching music to the inmates of the harem Felicien 
 David's further wanderings In Egypt Their effect upon his musical genius 
 His return to France He tells the story -of the first performance of " Le 
 De'sert " An ambulant box-office His success Fame, but no money He 
 sells the score of " Le De'sert " He loses his savings "LaPerledu Bre 1 - 
 sil " and the Coup-d'Etat " No luck " Napoleon III. remains his debtor 
 for eleven years A mot of Auber, and one of Alexandre Dumas pere 
 The story of " A'ida " Why Fe"licieu David did not compose the music 
 The real author of the libretto. 
 
 I KNEW Auber from the year '42 or '43 until the day of 
 his death. He and I were in Paris during the siege and the 
 Commune ; we saw one another frequently, and I am positive 
 that the terrible misfortunes of his country shortened his life 
 by at least ten years. For though at the beginning of the 
 campaign he was close upon ninety, he scarcely looked a 
 twelvemonth older than when I first knew him, nearly three 
 decades before ; that is, a very healthy and active old man, 
 but still an old man. So much nonsense has been written
 
 AUBER. 153 
 
 about his perpetual youth, that it is well to correct the error. 
 But the ordinary French public, and many journalists be- 
 sides, could not understand an octogenarian being on horse- 
 back almost every day of his life, any more than they under- 
 stood later on M. de Lesseps doing the same. They did not 
 and do not know M. Mackenzie-Grieves, and half a dozen 
 English residents in Paris of a similar age, who scarcely ever 
 miss their daily ride. If they had known them, they might 
 perhaps have been less loud in their admiration of the fact. 
 
 What added, probably, to Auber's reputation of possess- 
 ing the secret of perpetual youth was his great fondness for 
 women's society, his very handsome appearance, though he 
 was small comparatively, and his faultless way of dressing. 
 He was most charming with the fairer sex, and many of the 
 female pupils of the Conservatoire positively doted on him. 
 Though polite to a degree with men and I doubt whether 
 Auber could have been other than polite with no matter 
 whom his smiles, I mean his benevolent ones, for he could 
 smile very sceptically, were exclusively reserved for women. 
 When he heard Mozart's " Don Juan " for the first time, he 
 said, " This is the music of a lover of twenty, and if a man 
 be not an imbecile, he may always have in a little corner of 
 his heart the sentiment or fancy that he is only twenty." 
 
 There was but one drawback to Auber's enjoyment of the 
 society of women he was obliged to take off his hat in their 
 presence, and he hated being without that article of dress. 
 He might have worn a skull-cap at home, though there was 
 no necessity for it, as far as his hair was concerned, for up to 
 the last he was far from bald ; but he wanted his hat. He 
 composed with his hat on, he had his meals with his hat on, 
 and though he would have frequently preferred to take his 
 seat in the stalls or balcony of a theatre, he invariably had a 
 box, and generally one on the stage, in order to keep his hat 
 on. He would often stand for hours on the balcony of his 
 house in the Eue Saint-Georges with his hat on. " I never 
 feel as much at home anywhere, not even in my own apart- 
 ment, as in the synagogue," he said one day. He frequently 
 went there for no earthly reason than because he could sit 
 among a lot of people with his hat on. In fact, those fre- 
 quent visits, coupled with his dislike to be bareheaded, made 
 people wonder now and then whether Auber was a Jew. The 
 supposition always made Auber smile. " That would have 
 meant the genius of a Meyerbeer, a Mendelssohn, or a Hale-
 
 154: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 vy," he said. " No, I have been lucky enough in my life, 
 but such good fortune as that never fell to my lot." For 
 there was no man so willing nay, anxious to acknowledge 
 the merit of others as Auber. But Auber was not a Jew, and 
 his mania for keeping on his hat had nothing to do with his 
 religion. It was simply a mania, and nothing more. When, 
 in January, '55, Gerard de Nerval was found suspended from 
 a lamp-post in the Kue de la Vieille-Lanterne, he had his hat 
 on his head ; his friends, and even the police, pretended to 
 argue from this that he had not committed suicide, but had 
 been murdered. " A man who is going to hang himself does 
 not keep his hat on," they said. " Pourquoi pas, mon Dieu ? " 
 asked Auber, simply. "If I were going to kill myself, I 
 should certainly keep my hat on." In short, it was the only 
 thing about Auber which could not be explained. 
 
 Auber was exceedingly fond of society, and yet he was 
 fond of solitude also. Many a time his friends reported that, 
 returning home late from a party, they found Auber standing 
 opposite his house in the Rue Saint-Georges, with apparently 
 no other object than to contemplate it from below. After 
 his return to Paris from London, whither he had been sent 
 by his father, in order to become conversant with English 
 business habits, he never left the capital again, though at the 
 end of his life he regretted not having been to Italy. It was 
 because Rossini, who was one of his idols, had said " that a 
 musician should loiter away some of his time under that 
 sky." But almost immediately he comforted himself with 
 the thought that Paris, after all, was the only city worth liv- 
 ing in. " I was very fond of my mother, but I have one 
 grievance against her memory. What did she want to go to 
 Caen for just at the moment when I was about to be born ? 
 But for that I should have been a real Parisian." I do not 
 think it made much difference, for I never knew such an in- 
 veterate Parisian as Auber. When the investment of Paris 
 had become an absolute certainty, some of his friends pressed 
 him to leave ; he would not hear of it. They predicted dis- 
 comfort, famine, and what-not. "The latter contingency 
 will not affect me much, seeing that I eat but once a day, 
 and very little then. As for the sound of the firing disturb- 
 ing me, I do not think it will. It has often been said that 
 the first part of my overture to ' Fra Diavolo ' was inspired 
 by the retreating tramp of the regiment ; there may be some 
 truth in it. If it be vouchsafed to me to hear the retreating
 
 AUBER'S INDEPENDENCE OP SLEEP. 155 
 
 tramp of the Germans, I will write an overture and an opera, 
 which will be something different, I promise you." 
 
 I do not suppose that, personally, Auber suffered any pri- 
 vations during the siege. A man in his position, who re- 
 quired but one meal a day, and that a very light one, was 
 sure to find it somewhere ; but he had great trouble to find 
 sufficient fodder for his old faithful hack, that had carried 
 him for years, and when, after several months of scheming 
 and contriving to that effect, he was forced to give it up as 
 food for others, his cup of bitterness was full. " Us m'ont 
 pris mon vieux cheval pour le manger," he repeated, when I 
 saw him after the event ; " je 1'avais depuis vingt ans." It 
 was really a great blow to him. 
 
 There is another legend about Auber which is not founded 
 upon facts, namely, that he was pretty well independent of 
 sleep. It was perfectly true that he went to bed very late 
 and rose very early, but most people have overlooked the 
 fact that during the evening he had had a comfortable doze, 
 of at least an hour and a half or two hours, at the theatre. 
 He rarely missed a performance at the Opera or Opera-Co- 
 mique, except when his own work was performed. And 
 during that time he slumbered peacefully, " en homme du 
 monde," said Nestor Roqueplan, " without snoring." 
 
 " I never knew what it meant to snore," said Auber, 
 apologetically, " until I took to sleeping in Veron's box ; and 
 as it is, I do not snore now except under provocation. But 
 there would be no possibility of sleeping by the side of 
 Veron without snoring. You have to drown his, or else it 
 would awaken you." 
 
 Auber was a brilliant talker, but he scarcely ever liked to 
 exert himself except on the subject of music. It was all in 
 all to him, and the amount of work he did must have been 
 something tremendous. There are few students of the his- 
 tory of operatic music, no matter how excellent their memo- 
 ries, who could give the complete list of Auber's works by 
 heart. We tried it once in 1850, when that list was much 
 shorter than it is now ; there was not a single one who gave 
 it correctly. The only one who came within a measureable 
 distance was Roger, the tenor. 
 
 In spite of his world-wide reputation, even at that time, 
 Auber was as modest about his work as Meyerbeer, but he 
 had more confidence in himself than the latter. Auber was 
 by no means ungrateful to the artists who contributed to his
 
 156 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 success ; " but I don't ' coddle ' them, and put them in cot- 
 ton-wool, like Meyerbeer," he said. " It is perfectly logical 
 that he should do so. The Nourrits, the Levasseurs, the 
 Viardot-Garcias, and the Rogers, are not picked up at street- 
 corners ; but bring me the first urchin you meet, who has a 
 decent voice, and a fair amount of intelligence, and in six 
 months he'll sing the most difficult part I ever wrote, with 
 the exception of that of Masaniello. My operas are a kind 
 of warming-pan for great singers. There is something in 
 being a good warming-pan." 
 
 At the first blush, this sounds something like jealousy in 
 the guise of humility, but I am certain that there was no 
 jealousy in Auber's character. Few men have been so uni- 
 formly successful, but he also had his early struggles, " when 
 perhaps I did better work than I have done since." The last 
 sentence was invariably trolled out when a pupil of the Con- 
 servatoire complained to him of having been unjustly dealt 
 with. I remember Coquelin the younger competing for the 
 " prize of Comedy " in '65 or '66. He did not get it, and 
 when we came out of Auber's box at the Conservatoire, the 
 young fellow came up to him with tears in his eyes. I fancy 
 they were tears of anger rather than of sorrow. 
 
 " Ah, Monsieur Auber," he exclaimed, " that's an injus- 
 tice!" 
 
 " Perhaps so, my dear lad," replied Auber ; " but remem- 
 ber that the verdict on all things in this world may be 
 summed up in the words you have just uttered, ' It's an injus- 
 tice.' Let me give you a bit of advice. If you mean to become 
 a good Figaro, you must be the first to laugh at an injustice 
 instead of weeping over it." Wherewith he turned his back 
 upon the now celebrated comedian. In the course of these 
 notes I shall have occasion to speak of Auber again. 
 
 Auber need not have generalized to young Coquelin ; he 
 might have cited one instance of injustice in his own profes- 
 sion, to which, fortunately, there was no parallel for at least 
 thirty years. In the forties the critics refused to recognize 
 the genius of Felicien David, just as they had refused to 
 recognize the genius of Hector Berlioz. In the seventies 
 they were morally guilty of the death of Georges Bizet, the 
 composer of " Carmen." 
 
 I knew little or nothing of Hector Berlioz, but I fre- 
 quently met Felicien David at Auber's. It was a pity to be- 
 hold the man even after his success a success which, how-
 
 FELICIEN DAVID. 157 
 
 ever, did not put money in his purse. His moral sufferings, 
 his material privations, had left their traces but too plainly 
 on the face as well as on the mind. David had positively 
 starved in order to buy the few books and the paper neces- 
 sary to his studies, and yet he had the courage to say, " If I 
 had to begin over again, I would do the same." The respect- 
 ability that drives a gig when incarnated in parents who re- 
 fuse to believe in the power of soaring of their offspring 
 because they, the parents, cannot see the wings, has assur- 
 edly much to answer for. Flotow's father stops the supplies 
 after seven years, because his son has not come up to time 
 like a race-horse. Berlioz' father does not give him so long 
 a shrift ; he allows him three months to conquer fame. Fe- 
 licien David had no father to help or to thwart him in his 
 ambition. He was an orphan at the age of five, and left to 
 the care of a sister, who was too poor to help him ; but he 
 had an uncle who was well-to-do, and who allowed him the 
 magnificent sum of fifty francs per month for a whole 
 quarter and then withdrew it, notwithstanding the assur- 
 ance of Cherubini that the young fellow had the making of 
 a great composer in him. And the worst is that these young 
 fellows suffer in silence, while there are hundreds of benevo- 
 lent rich men who would willingly open their purses to them. 
 When they do reveal their distressed condition, it is gener- 
 ally to some one as poor as themselves. These rich men buy 
 the autographs of the deceased genius for small or large sums 
 which would have provided the struggling ones with com- 
 forts for days and days. I have before me such a letter which 
 I bought for ten francs. I would willingly have given ten 
 times the amount not to have bought it. It is written to a 
 friend of his youth. "As for money," it says, " seeing that 
 I am bound to speak of it, things are going from bad to worse. 
 And it is very certain that in a little while I shall have to 
 give it up altogether. I have been ill for three weeks with 
 pains in the back, and fever and ague everywhere. I dare 
 say that my illness was brought on by my worries, and by 
 the bad food of the Paris restaurants, also by the constant 
 dampness. Why am I not a little better off? I fancy that 
 the slight comforts an artist may reasonably expect would 
 do me a great deal of good. I am not speaking of the 
 body, though it is a part of ourselves which considerably 
 affects our intellect, but my imagination would be the better 
 for it, for how can my brain, constantly occupied as it is with
 
 158 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the worry of material wants, act unhampered ? Keally, I do 
 not hesitate to say that poverty and privation kill the imagi- 
 nation." 
 
 They did not kill the imagination in David's case, but 
 they undermined his constitution. It was at that period that 
 he fell in with the Saint-Simoniens, to the high priest of 
 which, M. Enfantin, who eventually became the chairman of 
 the Paris, Lyons, and Mediterranean Eailway Company, he 
 took me many years later. After their dispersion, the group 
 to which he belonged went to the East, and it is to this ap- 
 parently fortuitous circumstance that the world owes not 
 only " Le Desert," " La Perle du Bresil," and " L'Eden," but 
 probably also Meyerbeer's " Af ricaine." Meyerbeer virtually 
 acknowledged that but for David's scores, so replete with the 
 poetry of the Orient, he would have never thought of such a 
 subject for one of his operas. M. Scribe, on the other hand, 
 always maintained that the idea emanated from him, and 
 that it dated from 1847, when the composer was given the 
 choice between " La Prophete " and " L'Africaine," and 
 chose the former. One might almost paraphrase the accusa- 
 tion of the wolf against the lamb in La Fontaine's fable. 
 " M. Scribe, if you did not owe your idea to Felicien David, 
 you owed it to Montigny, the director of the Gymnase, who 
 in the thirties produced a play with a curious name, and a 
 more curious plot, at the Ambigu-Comique." ' One thing 
 is certain, that " L'Africaine " was discarded, if ever it was 
 offered, and would never have been thought of again but for 
 Meyerbeer's intense and frankly acknowledged admiration of 
 Felicien David's genius. 
 
 To return for a moment to Felicien David, whose melan- 
 choly vanished as if by magic when he related his wanderings 
 
 * I have taken some plains to unearth this play. It was called " Amazampo; 
 or, The Discovery of Quinine." The scene was laid in Peru in 1636. Ama- 
 zampo, the chief of a Peruvian tribe, is in love with Maida, who on her part is 
 in love with Ferdinand, the son of the viceroy. Amazampo is heart-broken, 
 and is stricken down with fever. In his despair and partial delirium he tries 
 to poison himself, and drinks the water of a pool in which several trunks of a 
 tree called kina, reported poisonous, have been lying for years. He feels the 
 effect almost immediately, but not the effect he* expected. He recovers, and 
 takes advantage of his recovered health to forget his love passion, and to be 
 avenged upon the oppressors of his country, many of whom are dying with 
 fever. Lima becomes a huge cemetery. Then the wife of the viceroy is stricken 
 down. Maida wishes to save her, but is forestalled by Amazampo, who compels 
 Dona Theodora to drink the liquor, and so forth. But Amazampo and Maida 
 die. EDITOR.
 
 DAVID AND THE SAINT-SI MONIENS.' 159 
 
 in the East. I do not mean the poetical side of them, which 
 inspired him with his great compositions, but the ludicrous 
 one. I do not remember the dress of the Saint-Simoniens, I 
 was too young at the time to have noticed it, but am told it 
 consisted of a blue tunic and trousers to match, a scarlet jer- 
 sey, which buttoned at the back, and could not be undone 
 except with the aid of some one else. It was meant to sym- 
 bolize mutual dependence upon one another. "As far as 
 Marseilles everything went comparatively well," said David ; 
 " we lived by giving concerts, and though the receipts were 
 by no means magnificent, they kept the wolf from the door. 
 Our troubles began at Constantinople. Whether they did not 
 like our music, or ourselves, or our dresses, I have*hever been 
 able to make out, but we were soon denounced to the authori- 
 ties, and marched off to prison, though our incarceration did 
 not last more than a couple of hours, thanks to our ambassa- 
 dor, Admiral Eoussin. Our liberation, however, was condi- 
 tional ; we had to leave at once. We made our way to Smyr- 
 na, where my music seemed to meet with a little more favour. 
 I performed every night, but in the open air, and some one 
 took the hat round, just as if we had been a company of 
 ambulant musicians to the manner born. We were, however, 
 not altogether unhappy, for we had enough to eat and to 
 drink, which with me, at any rate, was a paramount consid- 
 eration. Up till then sufficient food had not been a daily 
 item in my programme of life. My companions, neverthe- 
 less, became restless ; they said they had not come to eat and 
 drink and play music, but to convert the most benighted 
 part of Europe to their doctrines ; so we moved to Jaffa and 
 Jerusalem, then to Alexandria, and finally to Cairo. By the 
 time we got there, only three of us were left ; the rest had 
 gone homeward. Koenig-Bey had just at that moment un- 
 dertaken the tmtion of Mehemet-Ali's children there were 
 between sixty and seventy at that time ; it was he who pre- 
 sented me to their father, with a view of my becoming the 
 professor of music to the inmates of the harem. " It is of no 
 use to try to get you the appointment of professor of music 
 to the young princes, because Mehemet, though intelligent 
 enough, would certainly not hear of it. He would not think 
 it necessary that a man-child should devote himself to so 
 effeminate an accomplishment. I am translating his own 
 thoughts on the subject, not mine. When I tell you that 
 my monthly report about their intellectual progress is invari-
 
 160 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 ably waved off with the words, " Tell me how much they 
 have gained or lost in weight," you will understand that I am 
 not speaking at random. The viceroy thinks that hard study 
 should produce a corresponding decrease in weight, which is 
 not always the case, for those more or less inclined to obesity 
 make flesh in virtue of their sitting too much. Consequent- 
 ly the fat kine have a very bad time of it, and among the lat- 
 ter is one of the most intelligent boys, Mohammed-Said.' ' ; 
 
 " Those who would infer from this," said David one day, 
 referring to the same subject, " that Mehemet-Ali was lack- 
 ing in intelligence, would commit a grave error. I am con- 
 vinced, from the little I saw of him, that he was a man of 
 very great flat ural parts. His features, though not absolutely 
 handsome, were very striking and expressive. He was over 
 sixty then, but looked as if he could bear any amount of fa- 
 tigue. His constitution must originally have been an iron 
 one. Instead of the Oriental repose which I expected, there 
 was a kind of semi-European, semi-military stiffness about 
 him, which, however, soon wore off in conversation. I say 
 advisedly conversation, albeit that he did not understand a 
 word of French, which was the only language I spoke, and 
 that I could not catch a word of his. But in spite of Koenig- 
 Bey's acting the interpreter, it was a conversation between us 
 both. He seemed to catch the meaning of my words the mo- 
 ment they left my lips, and every now and then smiled at my 
 remarks. He as it were read the thoughts that provoked 
 them, and I do not wonder at his having been amused, for I 
 myself was never so amused in my life. Perhaps you will be, 
 when I tell you that I was not to see the ladies I had to teach ; 
 my instruction was to be given to the eunuchs, who, in their 
 turn, had to transmit them to the viceroy's wives and daugh- 
 ters. Of course, I tried to point out the impossibility of such 
 a system, but Mehemet-Ali shook his head jvith a knowing 
 smile. That was the only way he would have his womenkind 
 initiated into the beauties of Mozart and Mendelssohn. I 
 need not tell you that the arrangement came to nought." 
 
 Nearly all these conversations which I have noted down 
 here, without much attempt at transition, took place at dif- 
 ferent times. One day, when he was relating some experi- 
 ences of his wanderings through the less busy haunts of 
 Egypt, I happened to say, " After all, Monsieur David, they 
 did you good ; they inspired you with the themes of your most 
 beautiful works."
 
 FIRST PERFORMANCE OF "LE DESERT." 161 
 
 It was a very bitter smile that played on his lips, but only 
 for a moment ; the next his face resumed its usual melan- 
 choly expression. " Yes, they did me good. Do you know 
 what occurred on the eve of the first performance of ' Le De- 
 sert,' on the morrow of which I may say without undue pride 
 that I found myself famous ? Well, I will tell you. But for 
 Azevedo, I should have gone supperless that night.* I met 
 him on the Boulevards, and I almost forced him to take some 
 tickets, for I was hungry and desperate. I had been running 
 about that morning to dispose of some tickets for love or 
 money, for what I feared most was an empty house. I had 
 sold half a dozen, perhaps, but no one had paid me. Azevedo 
 said, ' Yes, send me some this afternoon.' ' I can give them 
 to you now,' I replied, ' for I carry my box office upon me.' 
 Then he understood, and gave me the money. May God bless 
 him for it, for ever and ever ! 
 
 " Now would you like to hear what happened after the 
 performance ? " he continued. " The place was full and the 
 applause tremendous. Next morning the papers were full of 
 my name ; I was, according to most of them, ' a revelation in 
 music.' But for all that I was living in an attic on a fifth 
 floor, and had not sufficient money to pay my orchestra, let 
 alone to arrange for another concert. As for the score of ' Le 
 Desert,' it went the round of every publisher but one, and was 
 declined by all these. At last the firm of Escudier offered me 
 twelve hundred francs for it, which, of course, I was glad to 
 take. They behaved handsomely after all, because they ar- 
 ranged for a series of performances of it, which I was to direct 
 at a fee of a thousand francs per performance. Those good 
 Saint-Siinoniens, the Pereiras, Enfantin, Michel Chevalier, 
 had not lifted a finger to help me in my need ; nevertheless, 
 I was not going to condemn good principles on account of the 
 men who represented them not very worthily. Do you know 
 what was the result of this determination not to be unjust if 
 others were ? I embarked my little savings in a concern pre- 
 sided over by one of them. I lost every penny of it ; since 
 then I have never been able to save a penny." 
 
 Felicien David was right he never made money ; first of 
 all, " because," as Auber said, " he was too great an artist to 
 
 * Alexis Azevedo, one of the best musical critics of the time, as enthusiastic 
 in his likes as unreasoning in his dislikes. He became a fervent admirer of 
 Felicien David. EDITOR.
 
 162 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 be popular ; " secondly, because the era of cantatas and ora- 
 torios had not set in in France ; thirdly, because he composed 
 very slowly ; and fourthly, " because he had no luck." The 
 performances of his principal theatrical work were inter- 
 rupted by the Coup-d'Etat. I am alluding to " La Perle du 
 Bresil," which, though represented at the Opera-Comique in 
 1850, only ran for a few nights there, divergencies of opinion 
 having arisen between the composer and M. Emile Perrin, 
 who was afterwards director of the Grand Opera, and finally 
 of the Comedie-Fran9aise. When it was revived, on Novem- 
 ber 22, 1851, the great event which was to transform the 
 second republic into the second empire was looming on the 
 horizon. In 1862, Napoleon III. made Felicien David an 
 officer of the Legion d'Honneur; Louis-Philippe had be- 
 stowed the knighthood upon him in '46 or '47, after a per- 
 formance of his " Christophe Colomb " at the Tuileries. 
 When Auber was told of the honour conferred, he said, 
 " Napoleon is worse than the fish with the ring of Polycrates ; 
 it did not take him eleven years to bring it back." Alex- 
 andre Dumas opined that " it was a pearl hid in a dunghill 
 for a decade or more." When, towards the end of the Em- 
 pire, a street near the projected opera building was named 
 after Auber, and when he could see his bust on the f a9ade of 
 the building, the scaffolding of which had been removed, 
 Auber remarked that the Emperor had been good enough to 
 give him credit. " Now we are quits," he added, " for he 
 was David's debtor for eleven years. At any rate, I'll do my 
 best to square the account, so you need not order any hat- 
 bands until '79." When '79 came, he had been in his tomb 
 for nearly eight years. 
 
 I wrote just now that Felicien David composed very 
 slowly. But for this defect, if it was one, Verdi would have 
 never put his name to the score of " Aida." The musical 
 encyclopedias will tell you that Signor Ghislanzoni is the 
 author of the libretto, and that the khedive applied to 
 Signor Verdi for an opera on an Egyptian subject. The 
 first part of that statement is utterly untrue, the other part 
 is but partially true. Signor Ghislanzoni is at best but the 
 adapter in verse and translator of the libretto. The original 
 in prose is by M. Camille du Locle, founded on the scenario 
 supplied by Mariette-Bey, whom Ismail-Pasha had given 
 carte blanche with regard to the music and words. Mariette- 
 Bey intended from the very first to apply to a French play-
 
 THE ORIGIN OF VERDI'S "AlDA." 163 
 
 wright, when one night, being belated at Memphis in the 
 Serapeum, and unable to return on foot, he all at once re- 
 membered an old Egyptian legend. Next day he committed 
 the scenario of it to paper, showed it to the khedive, and ten 
 copies of it were printed in Alexandria. One of these was 
 sent to M. du Locle, who developed the whole in prose. 
 
 M. du Locle had also been authorized to find a French 
 composer, but it is very certain that Mariette-Bey had in his 
 mind's eye the composer of " Le Desert," though he may not 
 have expressly said so. At any rate, M. du Locle applied to 
 David, who refused, although the " retaining fee " was fifty 
 thousand francs. It was because he could not comply with 
 the first and foremost condition, to have the score ready in 
 six months at the latest. Then Wagner was thought of. It 
 is most probable that he would have refused. To Mariette- 
 Bey belongs the credit furthermore of having entirely stage- 
 managed the opera. 
 
 Thus Felicien David, who had revealed "the East in 
 music " to the Europeans, no more reaped the fruits of his 
 originality than Decamps, who had revealed it in painting. 
 Was not Auber right when he said to young Coquelin that 
 the verdict on all things in this world might be summed up 
 in the one phrase, " It's an injustice"?
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 Three painters, and a school for pifferari Gabriel Decamps, Eugene Delacroix, 
 and Horace Vernet The prices of pictures in the forties Delacroix' find no 
 purchasers at all Decamps' drawings fetch a thousand francs each De- 
 camps not a happy man The cause of his unhappiness The man and the 
 painter He finds no pleasure in being popular Eugene Delacroix His con- 
 tempt for the bourgeoisie A parallel between Delacroix and Shakespeare 
 Was Delacroix tall or short? His love of flowers His delicate health His 
 personal appearance His indifference to the love-passion George Sand 
 and Delacroix A miscarried love-scene Delacroix' housekeeper, Jenny 
 Leguillou Delacroix does not want to pose as a model for one of George 
 Sand's heroes Delacroix as a writer His approval of Carlvle's dictum, 
 " Show me how a man sings," etc. His humour tempered by his reverence 
 His failure as a caricaturist His practical jokes on would-be art-critics 
 Delacroix at home His dress while at work Horace Vernet's. Paul Dela- 
 roche's, Ingres' Early at work He does not waste time over lunch How 
 he spent his evenings His dislike of being reproduced in marble or on 
 canvas after his death Horace Vernet The contrast between the two men 
 and the two artists Vernet's appearance His own account of how he be- 
 came a painter Moral and mental resemblance to Alexandre Dumas pere 
 His political opinions Vernet and Nicholas I. A bold answer His 
 opinion on the mental state of the Komanoffs The comic side of Vernet's 
 character He thinks himself a Vauban His interviews with M. Thiers 
 His admiration for everything military His worship of Alfred de Vigny 
 His ineffectual attempts to paint a scene in connection with the storming of 
 Constantino Laurent-Jan proposes to write an epic on it He gives a sy- 
 nopsis of the cantos Laurent- Jan lives " on the fat of the land " for six 
 months A son of Napoleon's companion in exile. General Bertrand The 
 chaplain of " la Belle-Poule " The first French priest who wore the English 
 dress Horace Vernet and the veterans of " la grande arme'e " His studio 
 during their occupancy of it as models His budget His hatred of pifferari 
 A professor The Q'uartier-Latin revisited. 
 
 A FEW weeks ago,* when rummaging among old papers, 
 documents, memoranda, etc., I came upon some stray leaves 
 of a catalogue of a picture sale at the Hotel Bullion f in 1845. 
 I had marked the prices realized by a score or so of paintings 
 signed by men who, though living at that time, were already 
 more or less famous, and many of whom have since then ac- 
 quired a world-wide reputation. There was only one excep- 
 
 * Written in 1882. 
 
 t The Hotel Bullion was formerly the town mansion of the financier of that 
 name, and situated in the Rue Coquilliere. EDITOR.
 
 THE PRICE OP PICTURES IN THE FORTIES. 165 
 
 tion to this that of Herrera the Elder, who had been dead 
 nearly two centuries, and whose name was, and is still, a 
 household word among connoisseurs by reason of his having 
 been the master of Velasquez. The handiwork of the irascible 
 old man was knocked down for three francs seventy-five 
 centimes, though no question was raised as to the genuine- 
 ness of it in my hearing. It was a saint the catalogue said 
 no more, and I have been in vain trying to recollect why I 
 did not buy it. There must have been some cogent reason 
 for my not having done so, for " the frame was no doubt 
 worth double the money," to use an auctioneer's phrase. 
 Was it suspicion, or what ? At any rate, two years later, I 
 heard that it had been sold to an American for fourteen 
 thousand francs, though, after all, that was no guarantee of 
 its value. 
 
 In those days it was certainly better to be a live artist 
 than a dead one, for, a little further on among these pages, I 
 came upon a marginal note of the prices fetched by three 
 works of Meissonier, " Le Corps de Garde," " Une partie de 
 piquet," and " Uii jeune homme regardant des dessins," all 
 of which had been in the salon of that year,* and each of 
 which fetched 3000 francs. I should not like to say what 
 their purchasing price would be to-day, allowing for the 
 difference in the value of money. Further on still, there is a 
 note of a picture by Alfred de Dreux, which realized a similar 
 amount. Allowing for that same difference in the value of 
 money, that work would probably not find a buyer now among 
 real connoisseurs at 200 francs. f At the same time, the 
 original sketch of David's " Serment du Jeu de Paume " did 
 not find a purchaser at 2500 francs, the reserve price. A 
 landscape by Jules Andre, a far greater artist than Alfred de 
 Dreux, went for 300 francs, and Baron's " Oies du Frere 
 Philippe " only realized 200 francs more. There was not a 
 
 * The annual salon was hold in the Louvre then ; in 1849 it was transferred 
 to the Tuileries. In 1850, '51, and '52 it was removed to the galleries of the 
 Palais- Koyal ; in 1853 and '54 the salon was held in the Hotel des Menus- 
 Plaisirs, in the Faubourg Poissonniere, which became afterwards the storehouse 
 for the scenery of the Grand Opera. In 1855 the exhibition took place in a 
 special annex of the Palais de 1'Industrie ; after that, it was lodged in the Palais 
 itself. EDITOR. 
 
 t Alfred de Dreux was not an unknown figure in London society. He came 
 in 1848. He was a kind of Comte d'Orsay, and painted chiefly equestrian fig- 
 ures. After the Coup d'Etat he returned to Paris, and was patronized by society, 
 and subsequently by Napoleon III. himself, whose portrait he painted. He was 
 killed in a duel, the" cause of which has never been revealed. EDITOR.
 
 106 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 single " bid " for : Eugene Delacroix' " Marc-Aurele," and 
 when he did sell a picture it was for 500 or 600 francs ; now- 
 adays it would fetch 100,000 francs. On the other hand, the 
 drawings of Decamps' admirable " Histoire de Samson " 
 realized 1000 francs each. 
 
 Yet Gabriel Decamps was a far unhappier man than 
 Eugene Delacroix. The pictures rejected by the public be- 
 came the " apples " of Delacroix' eyes, with which he would 
 not part, subsequently, at any price, as in the case of his 
 " Marino Faliero." Decamps, one day, while he lived in the 
 Faubourg Saint-Denis, deliberately destroyed one hundred 
 and forty drawings, the like of which were eagerly bought 
 up for a thousand francs apiece, though at present they 
 would be worth four times that amount. Delacroix was con- 
 tent with his God-given genius ; " he saw everything he had 
 made, and behold it was very good." Decamps fumed and 
 fretted at the supposed systematic neglect of the Govern- 
 ment, which did not give him a commission. " You paint 
 with a big brush, but you are not a great painter," said Sir 
 Joshua to a would-be Michael- Angelo. To Gabriel Decamps 
 the idea of being allowed or invited by the State to cover a 
 number of yards of canvas or wall or ceiling was so attractive 
 that he positively lost his sleep and his appetite over it. It 
 was, perhaps, the only bitter drop in his otherwise tolerably 
 full cup of happiness, but that one drop very frequently em- 
 bittered the whole. He had many good traits in his charac- 
 ter, though he was not uniformly good-tempered. There 
 was an absolute indifference as to the monetary results of his 
 calling, and an inherent generosity to those who " had fallen 
 by the way." But he was something of a bear and a recluse, 
 not because he disliked society, but because he deliberately 
 suppressed his sociable qualities, lest he should arouse the 
 suspicion of making them the stepping-stone to his ambition. 
 No man ever misread the lesson, " Do well and fear not," so 
 utterly as did Decamps. He was never tired of well-doing ; 
 and he was never tired of speculating what the world would 
 think of it. There is not a single picture from his brush 
 that does not contain an original thought; he founded an 
 absolutely new school no small thing to do. The world at 
 large acknowledged as much, and yet he would not enjoy the 
 fruits of that recognition, because it lacked the " official 
 stamp." When Decamps consented to forget his real or 
 fancied grievances he became a capital companion, provided
 
 EUGENE DELACROIX. 167 
 
 one had a taste for bitter and scathing satire. I fancy Jona- 
 than Swift must have been something like Gabriel Decamps 
 in his daily intercourse with his familiars. But he rarely 
 said an ill-natured thing of his fellow-artists. His strictures 
 were reserved for the political men of his time, and of the 
 preceding reign. The Bourbons he despised from the bottom 
 of his heart, and during the Kestauration his contempt found 
 vent in caricatures which, at the moment, must have seared 
 like a red-hot iron. He had kept a good many of these 
 ephemeral productions, and, I am bound to say, they struck 
 one afterwards as unnecessarily severe. " If they " (meaning 
 the Bourbons) " had continued to reign in France," he said 
 one day, " I would have applied for letters of naturalization 
 to the Sultan." 
 
 Decamps was killed, like Gericault, by a fall off his 
 horse, but long before that he had ceased to work. " I 
 cannot add much to my reputation, and do not care to add 
 to my store," he said. In 1855, the world positively rang 
 with his name, but I doubt whether this universal admi- 
 ration gave him much satisfaction. He exhibited more 
 than fifty works at the Exposition Universelle of that year, 
 a good many of which had been rejected by the " hanging 
 committees " of previous salons. True to his system, he 
 rarely, perhaps never directly, called the past judgment in 
 question, but he lived and died a dissatisfied man. Unlike 
 Mirabeau, who had not the courage to be unpopular, De- 
 camps derived no gratification from popularity. 
 
 I knew Eugene Delacroix better than any of the others 
 in the marvellous constellation of painters of that period, 
 and our friendship lasted till the day of his death, in De- 
 cember, 1863. I was also on very good terms with Horace 
 Vernet; but though the latter was perhaps a more lively 
 companion, the stronger attraction was towards the former. 
 I was one of the few friends whom he tolerated whilst at 
 work. Our friendship lasted for nearly a quarter of a cent- 
 ury, and during that time there was never a single unpleas- 
 antness between us, though I am bound to admit that Dela- 
 croix' temper was very uncertain. Among all those men 
 who had a profound, ineradicable contempt for the bour- 
 geois, I have only known one who despised him even to a 
 greater extent than he ; it was Gustave Flaubert. Though 
 Delacroix' manners were perfect, he could scarcely be polite 
 to the middle classes. With the exception of Dante and
 
 168 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Shakespeare, Delacroix was probably the greatest poet that 
 ever lived ; a greater poet undoubtedly than Victor Hugo, in 
 that he was absolutely indifferent to the material results of 
 his genius. If Shakespeare and the author of the " Infer- 
 no " had painted, they would have painted like Delacroix ; 
 his " Sardanapale " is the Byronic poem, condensed and 
 transferred to canvas. 
 
 Long as I knew Delacroix, I had never been able to make 
 out whether he was tall or short, and most of his friends and 
 acquaintances were equally puzzled. As we stood around his 
 coffin many were surprised at its length. His was decidedly 
 a curious face, at times stony in its immobility, at others 
 quivering from the tip of chin to the juncture of the eye- 
 brows, and with a peculiar movement of the nostrils that 
 was almost pendulum-like in its regularity. It gave one the 
 impression of their being assailed by some unpleasant smell, 
 and, one day, when Delacroix was in a light mood, I re- 
 marked upon it. " You are perfectly right," he replied ; " I 
 always fancy there is corruption in the air, but it is not 
 necessarily of a material kind." 
 
 Be this as it may, he liked to surround himself with 
 flowers, and his studio was often like a hothouse, apart from 
 the floral decorations. The temperature was invariably very 
 high, and even then he would shiver now and again. I have 
 always had an idea that Delacroix had Indian blood in his 
 veins, which idea was justified to a certain extent by his ap- 
 pearance, albeit that there was no tradition to that effect in 
 his family. But it was neither the black hair, the olive skin, 
 nor the peculiar formation of the features which forced that 
 conclusion upon me ; it was the character of Delacroix, which 
 for years and years I endeavoured to read thoroughly, with- 
 out succeeding to any appreciable degree. There was one 
 trait that stood out so distinctly that the merest child might 
 have perceived it his honesty ; but the rest was apparently 
 a mass of contradiction. It is difficult to imagine a poet, 
 and especially a painter-poet, without an absorbing passion 
 for some woman not necessarily for the same woman ; to 
 my knowledge Delacroix had no such passion, for one can 
 scarcely admit that Jenny Leguillou, his housekeeper, could 
 have inspired such a feeling. True, when I first knew Dela- 
 croix he was over forty, but those who had known him at 
 twenty and twenty-five never hinted at any romantic attach- 
 ment or even at a sober, homely affection. And assuredly a
 
 EUGENE DELACROIX AND GEORGE SAND. 169 
 
 man of forty is not invulnerable in that respect. And yet, 
 the woman who positively bewitched, one after another, so 
 many of Delacroix' eminent contemporaries, Jules Sandeau, 
 Alfred de Musset, Michel de Bourges, Chopin, Pierre Leroux, 
 Cabet, Lammenais, etc., had no power over him. 
 
 Paul de Musset, perhaps as a kind of revenge for the 
 wrongs suffered by his brother, once gave an amusing de- 
 scription of the miscarried attempt of George Sand " to net " 
 Eugene Delacroix. 
 
 It would appear that the painter had shown signs of yield- 
 ing to the charms which few men were able to withstand, or, 
 at any rate, that George Sand fancied she could detect such 
 signs. Whether it was from a wish on George Sand's part 
 to precipitate matters or to nip the thing in the bud, it would 
 be difficult to determine, but it is certain that she pursued 
 her usual tactics that is, she endeavoured to provoke an ad- 
 mission of her admirer's feeling. Though I subsequently 
 ascertained that Paul de Musset's story was substantially 
 true, I am not altogether prepared, knowing his animosity 
 against her, to accept his hinted theory of the lady's desire 
 " de brusquer les fian9ailles." 
 
 One morning, then, while Delacroix was at work, George 
 Sand entered his studio. She looked out of spirits, and al- 
 most immediately stated the purpose of her visit. 
 
 " My poor Eugene ! " she began ; " I am afraid I have 
 got sad news for you." 
 
 " Oh, indeed," said Delacroix, without interrupting his 
 work, and just giving her one of his cordial smiles in guise 
 of welcome. 
 
 " Yes, my dear friend, I have carefully consulted my own 
 heart, and the upshot is, I am grieved to tell you, that I feel 
 I cannot and could never love you." 
 
 Delacroix kept on painting. " Is that a fact ? " he said. 
 
 " Yes, and I ask you once more to pardon me, and to give 
 me credit for my candour my poor Delacroix." 
 
 Delacroix did not budge from his easel. 
 
 " You are angry with me, are you not ? You will never 
 forgive me?" 
 
 " Certainly I will. Only I want you to keep quiet for ten 
 minutes ; I have got a bit of sky there which has caused me 
 a good deal of trouble, it is just coming right. Go and sit 
 down or else take a little walk, and come back in ten min- 
 utes."
 
 170 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Of course, George Sand did not return ; and equally, of 
 course, did not tell the story to any one, but somehow it 
 leaked out. Perhaps Jenny Leguillou had overheard the 
 scene she was quite capable of listening behind a screen or 
 door and reporting it. Delacroix himself, when " chaffed " 
 about it, never denied it. There was no need for him to do 
 so, because theoretically it redounded to the lady's honour ; 
 had she not rejected his advances ? 
 
 I have noted it here to prove that the poetry of Delacroix 
 n'allait pas se faufiler dans les jupons, because, though we 
 would not take it for granted that where George Sand failed 
 others would have succeeded, it is nevertheless an authenti- 
 cated fact that only one other man among the many on whom 
 she tried her wiles remained proof against them. That man 
 was Prosper Merimee, the author of " Colomba " and " Car- 
 men," the friend of Panizzi. " Quand je fais un roman, je 
 choisis mon sujet ; je ne veux pas que 1'on me decoupe pour 
 en faire un. Madame Sand ne met pas ses amants dans son 
 coeur, elle les mets dans ses livres ; et elle le fait si diable- 
 ment vite qu'on n'a pas le temps de la devancer." Merimee 
 was right, each of George Sand's earlier books had been 
 written with the heart's blood of one of the victims of her 
 insatiable passions for I should not like to prostitute the 
 word " love " to her liaisons ; and I am glad to think that 
 Eugene Delacroix was spared that ordeal. It would have 
 killed him ; and the painter of " Sardanapale " was more 
 precious to his own art than to hers, which, with all due 
 deference to eminent critics, left an unpleasant sensation to 
 those who were fortunate enough to be free from incipient 
 hysteria. 
 
 A liaison with George Sand would have killed Eugene 
 Delacroix, I am perfectly certain ; for he would have staked 
 gold, she would have only played with counters. It would 
 have been the vitiated atmosphere in which the cradle of his 
 life and of his genius which were one, in this instance 
 would have been extinguished. 
 
 As it was, that candle burned very low at times, because, 
 during the years I knew Delacroix, he had nearly always one 
 foot in the grave ; the healthy breezes of art's unpolluted air 
 made that candle burn brightly now and again ; hence the 
 difference in quality, as striking, of some of his pictures. 
 
 Perhaps on account of his delicate health, Delacroix was 
 not very fond of society, in which, however, he was ever
 
 DELACROIX AS A WHITER. 171 
 
 welcome, and particularly fitted to shine, though he rarely 
 attempted to do so. I have said that Dante and Shakespeare, 
 if they had painted, would have painted as Delacroix did ; I 
 am almost tempted to add that if Delacroix' vocation had 
 impelled him that way, he would have sung as they sang of 
 course, I do not mean that he would have soared as high, but 
 his name would have lived in literature as it does in painting, 
 though perhaps not with so brilliant a halo around it. For, 
 unlike many great painters of his time, Delacroix was essen- 
 tially lettre. One has but to read some of his critical essays 
 in the Revue des Deux Mondes of that period, to be con- 
 vinced of that at once. Theophile Gautier said, one even- 
 ing, that it was " the style of a poet in a hurry." The sen- 
 tences give one the impression of newly-minted golden coins. 
 Nearly every one contains a thought, which, if reduced to 
 small change, would still make an admirable paragraph. He 
 gives to his readers what he expects from his authors a sen- 
 sation, a shock in two or three lines. The sentences are 
 modelled upon his favourite prose author, who, curious to re- 
 late, was none other than Napoleon I. I often tried to in- 
 terest him in English literature. Unfortunately, he knew no 
 English to speak of, and was obliged to have recourse to 
 translations. Walter Scott he thought long-winded, and, 
 after a few attempts at Shakespeare in French, he gave it up. 
 " Qa ne peut pas etre cela," he said. But he had several 
 French versions of " Gulliver's Travels," all of which he read 
 in turn. One day, I quoted to him a sentence from Carlyle's 
 " Lectures on Heroes : " " Show me how a man sings, and I 
 will tell you how he will fight." " C'est cela," he said ; " if 
 Shakespeare had been a general, he would have won his bat- 
 tles like Napoleon, by thunderclaps " (par des coups de 
 foudre). 
 
 Delacroix had what a great many Frenchmen lack a 
 keen sense of humour, but it was considerably tempered by 
 what, for the want of a better term, I may call the bump of 
 reverence. He could not be humorous at the expense of 
 those he admired or respected, consequently his attempts at 
 caricature at the early period of his career in Le Nain Jaune 
 were a failure ; because Delacroix' admiration and respect 
 were not necessarily reserved for those with whom he agreed 
 in art or politics, but for everyone who attempted something 
 great or useful, though he failed. The man who, at the age 
 of sixty, would enthusiastically dilate upon his meeting forty
 
 172 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 years before with Gros, whose hat he had knocked off by 
 accident, was not the likely one to hold up to ridicule the 
 celebrity of the hour or day without malice prepense. And 
 this malice prepense never uprose within him, except in the 
 presence of some bumptious, ignorant nobody. Then it posi- 
 tively boiled over, and he did not mind what trick he played 
 his interlocutor. The latter might be a wealthy would-be 
 patron, an influential Government official, or a well-known 
 picture-dealer ; it was all the same to Delacroix, who had an 
 utter contempt for patronage, nepotism, and money. It was 
 as good as a clever scene in a comedy to see him rise and 
 draw himself up to his full height, in order to impress his 
 victim with a sense of the importance of what he was going 
 to say. To get an idea of him under such circumstances, one 
 must go and see his portrait in the Louvre, painted by him- 
 self, with the semi-supercilious, semi-benevolent smile play- 
 ing upon the parted lips, and showing the magnificent regu- 
 lar set of teeth, of which he was very proud, beneath the 
 black bushy moustache, which reminds one curiously of that 
 of Kembrandt. Of course, the victim was mesmerized, and 
 stood listening with all attention, promising himself to 
 remember every word of the spoken essay on art, with the 
 view of producing it as his own at the first favourable oppor- 
 tunity. And he generally did, to his own discomfiture and 
 the amusement of his hearers, who, if they happened to know 
 Delacroix, which was the case frequently, invariably detected 
 the source of the speaker's information. I once heard a 
 spoken essay on Holbein reproduced in that way, which 
 would have simply made the fortune of any comic writer. 
 The human parrot had not even been parrot-like, for he had 
 muddled the whole in transmission. I took some pains to 
 reproduce his exact words, and I never saw Delacroix laugh as 
 when I repeated it to him. For, as a rule, and even when he 
 was mystifying that kind of numskull in the presence of half 
 a dozen well-informed friends, Delacroix remained perfectly 
 serious, though the others had to bite their lips lest they 
 should explode. In fact, it would have been difficult at any 
 time to guess or discover, beneath the well-bred man of the 
 world, with his charming, courtly, though somewhat distant 
 manner, the painter who gave us " La Barque de Dante," 
 and " Les Massacres de Scio ;" still, Delacroix was that man 
 of the world, exceedingly careful of his appearance, particu- 
 lar to a degree about his nails, which he wore very long,
 
 DELACROIX AT HOME. 173 
 
 dressed to perfection, and, in spite of the episode with George 
 Sand, recorded above, most ingratiating with women. 
 
 Different altogether Avas he in his studio. Though he 
 was " at home " from three till five, to visitors of both sexes, 
 it was distinctly understood that he would not interrupt his 
 work for them, or play the host as the popular painter of 
 to-day is supposed to do. The atelier, encumbered with 
 bric-a-brac and sumptuous hangings and afternoon tea, had 
 not been invented : if the host wore a velvet coat, a Byronic 
 collar, and gorgeous papooshes, it was because he liked these 
 things himself, not because he intended to impress his visit- 
 ors. As a rule, the host, though in his youth perhaps he had 
 been fond of extravagant costumes, did not like them : Hor- 
 ace Vernet often worked in his shirt-sleeves, Paul Delaroche 
 nearly always wore a blouse, and Ingres, until he became " a 
 society man," which was very late in life, donned a dressing- 
 gown. Delacroix was, if anything, more slovenly than the 
 rest when at work. An old jacket buttoned up to the chin, 
 a large muffler round his neck, a cloth cap pulled over his 
 ears, and a pair of thick felt slippers made up his usual 
 garb. For he was nearly always shivering with cold, and 
 had an affection of the throat, besides, which compelled him 
 to be careful. " But for my wrapping up, I should have 
 been dead at thirty," he said. 
 
 Nevertheless, at the stroke of eight, winter and summer, 
 he was in his studio, which he did not leave until dark, dur- 
 ing six months of the year, and a little before, during the 
 other six. Contrary to the French habit, he never took 
 luncheon, and generally dined at home a little after six the 
 fatigue of dining out being too much for him. 
 
 I may safely say that I was one of Delacroix' friends, 
 with whom he talked without restraint. I often went to 
 him of an evening when the weather prevented his going 
 abroad, which, in his state of health, was very often. He 
 always chafed at such confinement ; for though not fond of 
 society in a general way, he liked coming to the Boulevards, 
 after his work Avas over, and mixing with his familiars. De- 
 lacroix smoked, but, unlike many addicted to tobacco, could 
 not sit idle. His hands, as well as his brain, wanted to be 
 busy ; consequently, when imprisoned by rain or snow, he 
 sat sketching figures or groups, talking all the while. By 
 then his name had become familiar to every art student 
 throughout the world, and he often received flattering letters
 
 174 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 from distant parts. One evening, shortly after the death of 
 David d' Angers, to an episode in whose life I have devoted 
 a considerable space in these notes, Delacroix received an 
 American newspaper, the title of which I have forgotten, 
 but which contained an exceedingly able article on the great 
 sculptor, as an artist, and as a man. It wound up with the 
 question, "And what kind of monument will be raised to 
 him by the man who virtually shortened his life by sending 
 him into exile, because David remained true to the repub- 
 lican principles which Napoleon only shammed or, if not 
 shammed, deliberately trod underfoot to ascend a tyrant's 
 throne?" 
 
 I translated the whole of the article, and, when I came to 
 the last lines, Delacroix shook his head sadly. " You re- 
 member," he said, " the answer of our friend Dumas, when 
 they asked him for a subscription towards a monument to a 
 man whom every one had reviled in the beginning of his 
 career. ' They had better be content with the stones they 
 threw at him during his existence. No monument they can 
 raise will be so eloquent of their imbecility and his genius.' 
 I may take it," he went on, " that such a question will be 
 raised one day after my death, perhaps many years after I 
 am gone. If you are alive you will, by my will, raise your 
 voice against the project. I have painted my own portrait ; 
 while I am here, I will take care that it be not reproduced ; 
 I will forbid them to do so after I am at rest. There shall 
 not be a bust on my tomb." 
 
 About a fortnight before his death he made a will to that 
 effect, and up to the present hour (1883) its injunctions have 
 been respected. Delacroix lies in a somewhat solitary spot 
 in Pere-Lachaise. Neither emblem, bust, nor statue adorns his 
 tomb, which was executed according to his own instructions. 
 " They libelled me so much during my life," he said one day, 
 " that I do not want them to libel me after my death, on 
 canvas or in marble. They flattered me so much afterwards, 
 that I knew their flattery to be fulsome, and, if anything, I 
 am more afraid of it than of their libels." 
 
 It would be difficult to find a greater contrast than there 
 existed between Eugene Delacroix, both as a man and an 
 artist, and Horace Vernet. The one loved his art with the 
 passionate devotion of an intensely poetical lover for his way- 
 ward mistress, whom to cease wooing for a moment might 
 mean an irreparable breach or, at least, a long estrangement ;
 
 HORACE VERNET. 175 
 
 the other loved his with the calm affection of the cherished 
 husband for the faithful wife who had blessed him with a 
 numerous offspring, whom he had known from his very in- 
 fancy, a marriage with whom had been decided upon when he 
 was a mere lad, whom he might even neglect for a little while 
 without the bond being in any way relaxed. According to 
 their respective certificates of birth, Vernet was the senior by 
 ten years of Delacroix. When I first knew them, about 1840, 
 Vernet looked ten years younger than Delacroix. If they 
 had chosen to disguise themselves as musketeers of the Louis 
 XIII. period, Vernet would have reminded one of both Aramis 
 and d'Artagnan ; Delacroix, of Athos. 
 
 Montaigne spoke Latin before he could speak French; 
 Vernet drew men and horses before he had mastered either 
 French or Latin. His playthings were stumpy, worn-out 
 brashes, discarded palettes, and sticks of charcoal ; his alpha- 
 bet, the pictures of the Louvre, where his father occupied a 
 set of apartments, and where he was born, a month before 
 the outbreak of the first Revolution. He once said to me, 
 "Je suis peintre comme il y des hommes qui sont rois 
 parceque ils ne peuvent pas etre autre chose. II fallait un 
 homme de genie pour sortir d'un pareil bourbier et malheu- 
 reusement je n'ai que du talent." By the " bourbier " he 
 meant his great-grandfather, his two grandfathers, and his 
 father, all of whom were painters and draughtsmen. 
 
 Posterity will probably decide whether Horace Vernet 
 was a genius or merely a painter of great talent, but it will 
 scarcely convey an approximate idea of the charm of the man 
 himself. There was only one other of his contemporaries 
 who exercised the same spell on his companions Alexandre 
 Dumas pere. Though Vernet was a comparative dwarf by 
 the side of Dumas, the men had the same qualities, physical, 
 moral, and mental. Neither of them knew what bodily 
 fatigue meant ; both could work for fourteen or fifteen hours 
 a day fo.* a fortnight or a month ; both would often have " a 
 long bout of idleness," as they called it, which, to others not 
 endowed with their strength and mental activity, would have 
 meant hard labour. Both were fond of earning money, 
 fonder still of spending it ; both created almost without an 
 effort. Dumas roared with laughter while writing ; Vernet 
 sang at the top of his voice while painting, or bandied jokes 
 with his visitors, who might come and go as they liked at all 
 hours. Dumas, especially in the earlier days of his career,
 
 176 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PAEIS. 
 
 had to read a great deal before he could catch the local 
 colour of his novels and plays he himself has told us that he 
 was altogether ignorant of the history of France. But when 
 he had finished reading up the period in question, he wrote 
 as if he had been born in it. Vernet was a walking cyclo- 
 paedia on military costume ; he knew, perhaps, not much 
 more than that, but that he knew thoroughly, and never had 
 to think twice about the uniforms of his models, and, as he 
 himself said, " I never studied the thing, nor did I learn to 
 paint or to draw. According to many people, I do not know 
 how to paint or to draw now : it may be so ; at any rate I 
 have the comfort of having wasted nobody's time in trying 
 to learn." 
 
 Like Dumas, he was very proud of his calling and of the 
 name he had made for himseli in it, which he would not 
 have changed for the title of emperor least of all for that of 
 king ; for, like his great contemporary, he was a republican 
 at heart. It did not diminish either his or Dumas' admira- 
 tion for Napoleon I. " I can understand an absolute mon- 
 archy, nay, a downright autocracy, and I can understand a 
 republic," said Vernet, " but I fail to understand the use of a 
 constitutional king, just because it implies and entails the 
 principle of succession by inheritance. An autocracy means 
 one ruler over so many millions of subjects ; a constitutional 
 monarchy means between five and six hundred direct rulers, 
 so many millions of indirect ones, and one subject who is 
 called king. Who would leave his child the inheritance of 
 such slavery ? A la bonne heure, give me a republic such as 
 we understand it in France, all rulers, all natural-born kings, 
 gods in mortals' disguise who dance to the piping of the 
 devil. There have been two such since I was born ; there 
 may be another half-dozen like these within the next two 
 centuries, because, before you can have an ideal republic, you 
 must have ideal republicans, and Nature cannot afford to 
 fritter away her most precious gifts on a lot of down-at-heels 
 lawyers and hobnail-booted scum. She condescends now 
 and then to make an ideal tyrant she will never make a 
 nation of ideal republicans. You may just as well ask her to 
 make a nation of Raffaelles or Michael Angelos, or Shake- 
 speares or Molieres." 
 
 Both men, in spite of their republican opinions, were 
 personally attached to some members of the Orleans family ; 
 both had an almost invincible objection to the Bourbons.
 
 VERNET AND NICHOLAS I. 177 
 
 Vernet had less occasion to be outspoken in his dislike than 
 Dumas, but he refused to receive the Due de Berri when the 
 latter offered to come and see the battle-pieces Vernet was 
 painting for the then Duke of Orleans (Louis-Philippe). 
 Vernet had stipulated that his paintings should illustrate 
 exclusively the campaigns of the first Eepublic and the 
 Empire, though subsequently he depicted some episodes of 
 the Algerian wars, in which the son of the king had distin- 
 guished himself. " Tricolour cockades or no pictures," he 
 remarked, and Louis-Philippe good-humouredly acquiesced. 
 Though courteous to a degree, he never minced matters to 
 either king or beggar. While in Russia Nicholas took a 
 great fancy to him. It appears that the painter, who must 
 have looked even smaller by the side of the Czar than he 
 did by that of Dumas, had accompanied the former, if not 
 on a perilous, at least on a very uncomfortable journey in 
 the middle of the winter. He and the Emperor were the 
 only two men who had borne the hardships and privations 
 without grumbling, nay, with Mark Tapleyean cheerfulness. 
 That kind of fortitude was at all times a passport to Nich- 
 olas' heart, doubly so in this instance, by reason of Vernet's 
 by no means robust appearance. From that moment Nich- 
 olas became very attached to, and would often send for, him. 
 They would often converse on subjects even more serious, 
 and, one day, after the partition of Poland, Nicholas pro- 
 posed that Vernet should paint a picture on the subject. 
 
 " I am afraid I cannot do it, sire," was the answer. " I 
 have never painted a Christ on the cross." 
 
 " The moment I had said it," continued Vernet, when he 
 told me the story, which is scarcely known, " I thought my 
 last hour had struck. I am positively certain that a Russian 
 would have paid these words with his life, or at least with 
 lifelong exile to Siberia. I shall never forget the look he 
 gave me ; there was a murderous gleam in the eyes ; but it 
 was over in an instant. Nevertheless, I feel convinced that 
 Nicholas was mad, and, what is more, I feel equally convinced 
 that there is incipient madness throughout the whole of the 
 Romanoff family. I saw a good many of its members during 
 my stay in Russia. They all did and said things which would 
 have landed ordinary men and women in a lunatic asylum. 
 At the same time there was an unmistakable touch of genius 
 about some of them. I often endeavoured to discuss the 
 matter with the resident foreign physicians, but, as you may
 
 178 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 imagine, they were very reticent. But mark my words, one 
 day there will be a terrible flare-up. Of course, the foreigner, 
 who sees the superstitious reverence, the slavish respect with 
 which they are surrounded, scarcely wonders that these men 
 and women should, in the end, consider themselves above, 
 and irresponsible to, the millions of grovelling mortals whom 
 they rule ; in spite of all this, the question can only be one of 
 time, and when the Russian empire falls, the cataclysm will 
 be unlike any other that has preceded it." 
 
 There was a comic side to Horace Vernet's character. By 
 dint of painting battle-pieces he had come to consider him- 
 self an authority on strategy and tactics, and his criticisms 
 on M. Thiers' system of fortifications used to set us roaring. 
 I am under the impression though I will not strictly vouch 
 for it that at the recommendation of one or two of the in- 
 veterate jokers of our set, Laurent- Jan * and Mery, he had a 
 couple of interviews with M. Theirs, but we never ascertained 
 the result of them. It was almost certain that the minister of 
 Louis-Philippe, who at one period of his life considered himself 
 a Napoleon and a Vauban rolled into one, did not entertain 
 Vernet's suggestions with the degree of enthusiasm to which 
 he thought them entitled ; at any rate, from that time, the 
 mention of M. Thiers' name generally provoked a contempt- 
 uous shrug of the shoulders on Vernet's part. " C'est tout a fait 
 comme Napoleon et Jomini, mon cher Vernet," said Laurent- 
 Jan ; " mais, apres tout, qu'est que cela vous fait ? La pos- 
 terite jugera entre vous deux, elle saura bien debrouiller la 
 part que vous avez contribute d ces travaux immortels." 
 
 Much as Horace Vernet admired his great contemporaries 
 in art and literature, his greatest worship was reserved for 
 Alfred de Vigny, the soldier-poet, though the latter was by 
 no means a sympathetic companion. Next to his society, 
 which was~ rarely to be had, he preferred that of Arthur 
 Bertrand, the son of Napoleon's companion in exile. Arthur 
 Bertrand had an elder brother, Napoleon Bertrand, who, at 
 the storming of Constantine, put on a new pair of white kid 
 gloves, brought from Paris for the purpose. Horace Vernet 
 made at least fifty sketches of that particular incident, but he 
 
 * Laurent-Jan was a witty, though incorrigibly idle journalist. He is en- 
 tirely forgotten now save by such men as MM. Arsene Houssaye and Roger de 
 Beauvoir, who were his contemporaries. He was the author of a clever parody 
 on Kotzebue's " Menschenhasz und Kcue," known on the English stage as " The 
 Stranger." EDITOB.
 
 A PROJECTED EPIC. 179 
 
 never painted the picture. " I could not do it justice," he 
 said, when remonstrated with for his procrastination. " I 
 should fail to realize the grandeur of the thing." Thereupon 
 Laurent- Jan, who had no bump of reverence, proposed a poem 
 in so many cantos, to be illustrated by Vernet. I give the 
 plan as developed by the would-be author. 
 
 1. The kid in its ancestral home among the mountains. 
 A mysterious voice from heaven tells it that its skin will be re- 
 quired for a pair of gloves. The kid objects, and inquires why 
 the skin of some other kid will not do as well. The voice 
 reveals the glorious purpose of the gloves. The kid consents, 
 and at the same moment a hunter appears in sight. The kid, 
 instead of taking to its heels, assumes a favourable position to 
 be shot. It makes a dying speech. 
 
 2. A glove-shop on the Boulevard. Enter Napoleon Ber- 
 trand, asking for a pair of gloves. The girl tells him that 
 she has only one pair left, and communicates the legend 
 connected with it. The price is twenty francs. Napoleon 
 Bertrand demurs at it, and tells her, in his turn, what the 
 gloves are wanted for. The girl refuses to take the money, 
 and her employer, overhearing the conversation, dismisses her 
 there and then. He keeps the wages due to her as the price 
 of the gloves. Napoleon Bertrand puts the latter in his 
 pocket, offers the girl his arm, and invites her to breakfast in 
 a cabinet par ticulier, " en tout bien, en tout, honneur." To 
 prove his perfectly honourable intentions, he tells her the 
 story of Jeanne d'Arc. The girl's imagination is fired by the 
 recital, and after luncheon she goes in search of a book on the 
 subject. An unscrupulous, dishonest second-hand bookseller 
 palms off an edition of Voltaire's " La Pucelle." The girl 
 writes to Napoleon Bertrand to tell him that he has made a 
 fool of her, that Jeanne d'Arc was no better than she should 
 be, and that she is going to join the harem of the Bey of 
 Constantine. 
 
 3. Napoleon Bertrand stricken with remorse before Con- 
 stantine. Orders given for the assault. Napoleon Bertrand 
 looks for his gloves, and finds that they are too small. He can 
 just get them on, but cannot grasp the handle of his sword. 
 His servant announces a mysterious stranger, a veiled female 
 stranger. She is admitted ; she has made her escape from 
 the harem ; a mysterious voice from heaven the same that 
 spoke to the kid having warned her the night before that 
 the gloves would be too small, and that she was to let a piece
 
 180 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 in. Keconciliation. Tableau. The bugles are sounding 
 " boot and saddle." Storming of Constantine. 
 
 I have reproduced the words of Laurent-Jan ; I will not 
 attempt to reproduce his manner, which was simply inimi- 
 table. Horace Verret and Arthur Bertrand shook with 
 laughter, and the laU'er offered Laurent- Jan to keep him for 
 a twelvemonth if he would write the poem. Jan consented, 
 and lived upon the fat of the land during that time, but the 
 poem never saw the light. 
 
 Arthur Bertrand was one of the most jovial fellows of his 
 time. He, Eugene Sue, and Latour-Mezerai were the best 
 customers of the florist on the Boulevards. It was he who 
 accompanied the Prince de Joinville to St. Helena to bring 
 back the remains of Napoleon. After their return a new 
 figure joined our set now and then. It was the Abbe Coque- 
 reau, the chaplain of " La Belle-Poule." The Abbe Coque- 
 reau was the first French Catholic priest who discarded the 
 gown and the shovel hat, and adopted that of the English 
 clergy. He was a charming man, and by no means straight- 
 laced, but he drew the line at accompanying Arthur in his 
 nightly perambulations. One evening he, Arthur Bertrand, 
 and Alexandre Dumas were strolling along the Boulevards 
 when the latter tried to make the abbe enter the Varietes. 
 The abbe held firm, or rather took to his heels. 
 
 In those days there were still a great many veterans of 
 the grande armee about, and a great deal of Horace Vernet's 
 money went in entertaining them at the various cafes and 
 restaurants especially when he was preparing sketches for 
 a new picture. The ordinary model, clever and eminently 
 useful as he was at that period, was willingly discarded for 
 the old and bronzed warrior of the Empire, some of whom 
 were even then returning from Africa. " They may just as 
 well earn the money I pay the others," he said ; consequently 
 it was not an unusual thing to see a general, a couple of colo- 
 nels, half a dozen captains, and as many sergeants and pri- 
 vates, all of whom had served under Napoleon, in Vernet's 
 studio at the same time. Of course, the officers were only 
 too pleased to give their services gratuitously, but Vernet had 
 a curious way of making up his daily budget. Twenty mod- 
 els at four francs for models earned no more then eighty 
 francs. Fifteen of them refused thier pay. The eighty 
 francs to be divided between five. And the five veterans en- 
 joyed a magnificent income for weeks and weeks at a time.
 
 A PROFESSOR OF STREET MUSIC. 181 
 
 Truth compels me to state, however, that during those 
 weeks " the careful mother could not have taken her daugh- 
 ter " to Vernet's studio. A couple of live horses, not unfre- 
 quently three, an equal nnmber of stuffed ones, camp kettles, 
 broken limbers, pieces of artillery, an overturned ammuni- 
 tion waggon, a collection of uniforms, that would have made 
 the fortune of a costumier, scattered all over the place ; 
 drums, swords, guns and saddles : and, amidst this confusion, 
 a score of veterans, some of whom had been comrades-in-arms 
 and who seemed oblivious, for the time being, of their hard- 
 earned promotion in the company of those who had been less 
 lucky than they, every man smoking his hardest and telling 
 his best garrison story : all these made up a scene worthy of 
 Vernet himself, but somewhat appalling to the civilian who 
 happened to come upon it unawares. 
 
 Vernet was never happier than when at work under such 
 circumstances. Perched on a movable scaffolding or on a 
 high ladder, he reminded one mnch more of an acrobat than 
 of a painter. Like Dumas, he could work amidst a very Ba- 
 bel of conversation, but the sound of music, however good, 
 disturbed him. In those days, itinerant Italian musicians 
 and pifferari, who have disappeared from the streets of Paris 
 altogether since the decree of expulsion of '81, were numer- 
 ous, and grew more numerous year by year. I, for one, feel 
 sorry for their disappearance, for I remember having spent 
 half a dozen most delightful evenings listening to them. 
 
 The thing happened in this way. Though my regular 
 visits to the Quartier- Latin had ceased long ago, I returned 
 now and then to my old haunts during the years '63 and '64, 
 in company of a young Englishman who was finishing his 
 medical studies in Paris, who had taken up his quarters on 
 the left bank of the Seine, and who has since become a phy- 
 sician in very good practice in the French capital. He had 
 been specially recommended to me, and I was not too old to 
 enjoy an evening once a week or a fortnight among my jun- 
 iors. At a cafe, which has been demolished since to make 
 room for a much more gorgeous establishment at the corners 
 of the Boulevards Saint-Michel and Saint-Germain, we used 
 to notice an elderly gentleman, scrupulously neat and exqui- 
 sitely clean, though his clothes were very threadbare. He 
 always sat at the same table to the right of the counter. His 
 cup of coffee was eked out by frequent supplements of water, 
 and meanwhile he was always busy copying music at least,
 
 182 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 so it seemed to us at first. We soon came to a different con- 
 clusion, though, because every now and then he would put 
 down his pen, lean back against the cushioned seat, look up 
 at the ceiling and smile to himself such a sweet smile ; the 
 smile of a poet or an artist, seeking inspiration from the spir- 
 its supposed to be hovering now and then about such. 
 
 That man was no copyist, but an obscure, unappreciated 
 genius, perhaps, biding his chance, hoping against hope, 
 meanwhile living a life of jealously concealed dreams and 
 hardship. For he looked sad enough at the best of times, 
 with a kind of settled melancholy which apparently only one 
 thing could dispel the advent of a couple or trio of pifferari. 
 Then his face would light up all of a sudden, he would gently 
 push his music away, speak to them in Italian, asking them 
 to play certain pieces, beating time with an air of content- 
 ment which was absolutely touching to behold. On the other 
 hand, the young pifferari appeared to treat him with greater 
 deference than they did the other customers ; the little girl 
 who accompanied them was particularly eager for his approval. 
 
 In a little while we became very friendly with the old gen- 
 tleman, and, one evening, he said, "If you will be here next 
 Wednesday, the pifferari will give us something new." 
 
 On the evening in question he looked quite smart ; he had 
 evidently " fait des f rais de toilette," as our neighbours have 
 it ; he wore a different coat, and his big white neckcloth Avas 
 somewhat more starched than usual. He seemed quite ex- 
 cited. The pifferari, on the other hand, seemed anxious and 
 subdued. The cafe was very full, for all the habitues liked 
 the old gentleman, and had made it a point of respond- 
 ing to his quasi-invitation. They were well rewarded, for I 
 have rarely heard sweeter music. It was unlike anything we 
 were accustomed to hear from such musicians ; there was an 
 old-world sound about it that went straight to the heart, and 
 when we looked at the old gentleman amidst the genuine ap- 
 plause after the termination of the first piece, there were two 
 big tears coursing down his wrinkled cheeks. 
 
 The pifferari came again and again, and though they 
 never appealed to him directly, we instinctively guessed that 
 there existed some connection between them. All our efforts 
 to get at the truth of the matter were, however, in vain, for 
 the old gentleman was very reticent. 
 
 Meanwhile my young friend had passed his examinations, 
 and shifted his quarters to my side of the river. He did not
 
 THE QUARTIER-LATIN REVISITED. 183 
 
 abandon the Quartier-Latin altogether, but my inquiries 
 about the old musician met with no satisfactory response. 
 He had disappeared. Nearly two years went by, when, one 
 afternoon, he called. " Come with me," he said ; " I am 
 going to show you a curious nook of Paris which you do not 
 know, and take you to an old acquaintance whom you will be 
 pleased to see again." 
 
 The " curious nook " of Paris still exists to a certain ex- 
 tent, only the pifferari have disappeared from it. It is situ- 
 ated behind the Pantheon, and is more original than its 
 London counterpart Saffron Hill. It is like a corner of old 
 Borne, Florence, or Naples, without the glorious Italian sun 
 shining above it to lend picturesqueness to the rags and tatters 
 of its population ; swarthy desperadoes with golden rings in 
 their ears and on their grimy fingers, their greasy, soft felt 
 hats cocked jauntily on their heads, or drawn over the flash- 
 ing dark eyes, before which their womankind cower and shake ; 
 old men who but for the stubble on their chins would look 
 like ancient cameos ; girls with shapely limbs and handsome 
 faces ; middle-aged women who remind one of the witches in 
 Macbeth ; women younger still, who have neither shape nor 
 make ; urchins and little lassies who remind one of the pict- 
 ures of Murillo ; in short, a population of wood-carvers and 
 modellers, vendors of plaster casts, artist-models, sugar-bakers 
 and mosaic- workers, living in the streets the greater part of 
 the day, retiring to their wretched attics at night, sober and 
 peaceful generally, but desperate and unmanageable when in 
 their cups. 
 
 The cab stopped before a six-storied house which had seen 
 better days, in a dark, narrow street, into which the light of 
 day scarcely penetrated. The moment we alighted we heard 
 a charivari of string instruments and voices, and as we 
 ascended the steep, slimy, rickety staircase the sound grew 
 more distinct. When we reached the topmost landing, my 
 friend knocked at one of the three or four doors, and, without 
 waiting for an answer, we entered. It was a scantily furnished 
 room with a bare brick floor, an old bedstead in one corner, 
 a few rush-bottomed chairs, and a deal table ; but every- 
 thing was scrupulously clean. Behind the table, a cotton 
 nightcap on his head, his tall thin frame wrapt in an old 
 overcoat, stood our old friend, the composer ; in front, half a 
 dozen urchins, in costumes vaguely resembling those of the 
 Calabrian peasantry, grimy like coalheavers, their black hair
 
 184 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 standing on end with attention, were rehearsing a new piece 
 of music. Then I understood it all. He was the proi'essor 
 of pifferari, an artist for all that, an unappreciated genius, 
 perhaps, who, rather than not be heard at all, introduced a 
 composition of his own into their hackneyed programme, and 
 tasted the sweets of popularity, without the accompanying 
 rewards which, nowadays, popularity invariably brings. This 
 one had known Paisiello and Eossini, had been in the thick 
 of the excitement on the first night of the " Barbiere," and 
 had dreamt of similar triumphs. Perhaps his genius was as 
 much entitled to them as that of the others, but he had 
 loved not wisely, but too well, and when he awoke from the 
 love-dream, he was too ruined in body and mind to be able 
 to work for the realization of the artistic one. He would 
 accept no aid Three years later, we carried him to his 
 grave. A simple stone marks the place in the cemetery of 
 Montparnasse.
 
 LOUIS PHILIPPE AND HIS FAMILY. 185 
 
 CHAPTEK IX. 
 
 Louis-Philippe and his family An unpublished theatrical skit on his mania 
 for shaking hands with every one His art of governing, according to the 
 same skit Louis-Philippe not the ardent admirer of the bourgeoisie he 
 professed to be The Faubourg Saint-Germain deserts the Tuileries The 
 
 English in too great a majority Lord 's opinion of the dinners at the 
 
 Tuileries The attitude of the bourgeoisie towards Louis-Philippe, accord- 
 ing to the King himself Louis-Philippe's wit His final words on the 
 death of Talleyrand His love of money He could be generous at times 
 A story of the Palais-Royal Louis-Philippe and the Marseillaise Two 
 curious stories connected with the Marseillaise Who was the composer of 
 it ? Louis-Philippe's opinion of the throne, the crown, and the sceptre of 
 France as additions to one's comfort His children, and especially his sons, 
 take things more easily Even the Bonapartists admired some of the latter 
 A mot of an Imperialist How the boys were brought up Their noctur- 
 nal rambles later on The King himselt does not seem to mind those esca- 
 pades, but is frightened at M. Guizot hearing of them Louis-Philippe did 
 not understand Guizot The recollection of his former misery frequently 
 haunts the King He worries Queen Victoria with his fear of becoming 
 poor Louis-Philippe an excellent husband and father He wants to write 
 the libretto of an opera on an English subject His religion The court 
 receptions ridiculous Even the proletariat sneer at them The entree of 
 the Duchesse d'Orleans into Paris The scene in the Tuileries gardens A 
 mot of Princesse Clementine on her father's too paternal solicitude A 
 practical joke of the Prince de Joinville His caricatures and drawings 
 The children inherited their talent for drawing and modelling from their 
 mother The Due de Nemours as a miniature and water-colour painter 
 Suspected of being a Legitimist All Louis-Philippe's children great pa- 
 trons of art How the bourgeoisie looked upon their intercourse with artists 
 The Due de Nemours' marvellous memory The studio of Eugene Lami 
 His neighbours, Paul Delarochc and Honore de Balzac The Due de 
 Nemours' bravery called in question The Due d'Aumale's exploits in 
 Algeria considered mere skirmishes A curious story of spiritism The Due 
 d'Aumale a greater favourite with the world than any of the other sons of 
 Louis-Philippe His wit The Due d'Orle"ans also a great favourite His 
 visits to Decamps' studio An indifferent classical scholar A curious kind 
 of black-mail His indifference to money There is no money in a Eepub- 
 lic His death A witty reply to the Legitimists. 
 
 As will appear by-and-by, I was an eye-witness of a good 
 many incidents of the Kevolution of '48, and a great many 
 more have been related to me by friends, whose veracity was 
 and still is beyond suspicion. Neither they nor I have ever 
 been able to establish a sufficiently ralid political cause for
 
 186 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 that upheaval. Perhaps it was because we were free from 
 the prejudices engendered by what, for want of a better term, 
 I must call " dynastic sentiment." We were not blind to 
 the faults of Louis-Philippe, but we refused to look at them 
 through the spectacles supplied in turns by the Legitimists, 
 the Imperialists, and Kepublicans. How far these spectacles 
 were calculated to improve people's vision, the following 
 specimen will show. 
 
 I have lying before me a few sheets of quarto paper, 
 sewn together in a primitive way. It is a manuscript skit, 
 in the form of a theatrical duologue, professing to deal with 
 the king's well-known habit of shaking hands with every one 
 with whom he came in contact. The dramatis persona are 
 King Fip I., Roi des Epiciers-read, King of the Philistines 
 or Shopkeepers, and his son and heir, Grand Poulot (Big 
 Spooney). The monarch is giving the heir-apparent a lesson 
 in the art of governing. " Do not be misled," he says, " by 
 a parcel of theorists, who will tell you that the citizen-mon- 
 archy is based upon the sovereign will of the people, or upon 
 the strict observance of the Charter ; this is merely so much 
 drivel from the political Rights or Lefts. In reality, it does 
 not signify a jot whether France be free at home and feared 
 and respected abroad, whether the throne be hedged round 
 with republican institutions or supported by an hereditary 
 peerage, whether the language of her statesmen be weighty 
 and the deeds of her soldiers heroic. The citizen-monarchy 
 and the art of governing consist of but one thing the 
 capacity of the principal ruler for shaking hands with any 
 and every ragamuffin and out-of-elbows brute he meets." 
 Thereupon King Fip shows his son how to shake hands in 
 every conceivable position on foot, on horseback, at a gallop, 
 at a trot, leaning out of a carriage, and so forth. Grand 
 Poulot is not only eager to learn, but ambitious to improve 
 upon his sire's method. " How would it do, dad," he asks, 
 " if, in addition to shaking hands with them, one inquired 
 after their health, in the second person singular ' Comment 
 vas tu, mon vieux cochon ? ' or, better still, ' Comment vas tu, 
 mon vieux citoyen?" "It would do admirably," says 
 papa; '"but it does not matter whether you say cochon or 
 citoyen, the terms are synonymous." 
 
 I am inclined to think that beneath this rather clever 
 banter there was a certain measure of truth. Louis- Philippe 
 was by no means the ardent admirer of the bourgeoisie he
 
 LOUIS-PHILIPPE'S COURT. 187 
 
 professed to be. He did not foster any illusions with regard 
 to their intellectual worth, and in his inmost heart he re- 
 sented their so-called admiration of him, which he knew to 
 be would-be patronage under another name. They had 
 formed a hedge round him which prevented any attempt on 
 his part at conciliating his own caste, the old noblesse. It is 
 doubtful whether he would have been successful, especially 
 in the earlier years of his reign ; but their ostracism of him 
 and his family rankled in his mind, and found vent now and 
 again in an epigram that stung the author as much as the 
 party against which it was directed. " There is more diffi- 
 culty in getting people to my court entertainments from 
 across the Seine than from across the Channel," he said. 
 
 The fact is, that the whole of the Faubourg St.-Germain 
 was conspicuous by its absence from the Tuileries in those 
 days, and that the English were in rather too great a 
 majority. They were not always a distinguished company. 
 I was little more than a lad at this time, but I remember 
 
 Lord 's invariable answer when his friends asked him what 
 
 the dinner had been like, and whether he had enjoyed him- 
 self : " The dinner was like that at a good table-d'hote, and I 
 enjoyed myself as I would enjoy myself at a good hotel in 
 Switzerland or at Wiesbaden, where the proprietor knew me 
 personally, and had given orders to the head waiter to look 
 after my comforts. But," he added, " it is, after all, more 
 pleasant dining there, when the English are present. At 
 any rate, there is no want of respect. When the French sit 
 round the table, it is not like a king dining with his sub- 
 jects, but like half a hundred kings dining with one subject." 
 Allowing for a certain amount of exaggeration, there was a 
 good deal of truth in the remarks, as I found out afterwards. 
 " The bourgeoisie in their attitude towards me," said Louis- 
 Philippe, one day, to the English nobleman I have just 
 quoted, " are always reminding me of Adalberon of Eheims 
 with Hugues Capet : ' Qui t'as fait roi ? ' asked the bishop. 
 ' Qui t'as fait due ? ' retorted the king. I have made them 
 dukes to a greater extent, though, than they have made me 
 king." 
 
 For Louis-Philippe was a witty king wittier, perhaps, 
 than any that had sat on the throne of France since Henri 
 IV. Some of his mots have become historical, and even his 
 most persistent detractors have been unable to convict him 
 of plagiarism with regard to them. What he specially ex-
 
 188 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 celled in was the " mot de la fin " anglice the clenching of 
 an argument, such as, for instance, his final remark on the 
 death of Talleyrand. He had paid him a visit the day be- 
 fore. When the news of the prince's death was brought to 
 him, he said, " Are you sure he is dead ? " 
 
 " Very sure, sire," was the answer. " Why, did not your 
 majesty himself notice yesterday that he was dying ? " 
 
 " I did, but there is no judging from appearances with 
 Talleyrand, and I have been asking myself for the last four 
 and twenty hours what interest he could possibly have in 
 departing at this particular moment." 
 
 To those who knew Louis-Philippe personally, it was 
 very patent that he disliked those who had been instrumental 
 in setting him on the throne, and who, under the cloak of 
 " liberty, fraternity, and equality," were seeking their own 
 interest only, namely, the bourgeoisie. He knew their quasi- 
 good will to him to be so much sheer hypocrisy, and perhaps 
 he and they were too much alike in some respects, in their 
 love of money for the sake of hoarding it. It was, perhaps, 
 the only serious failing that could be laid to the charge of 
 the family, because none of its members, with the exception 
 of the Due d'Orleans, were entirely free from it. It must 
 not be inferred, though, that Louis- Philippe kept his purse 
 closed to really deserving cases of distress. Far from it. I 
 have the following story from my old tutor, to whom I am, 
 moreover, indebted for a great many notes, dealing with 
 events of which I could not possibly have had any knowledge 
 but for him. 
 
 In 1829 the greater part of the Galerie d'Orleans in the 
 Palais-Royal was completed. The unsightly wooden booths 
 had been taken down, and the timber must have been decid- 
 edly worth a small fortune. Several contractors made very 
 handsome offers for it, but Louis-Philippe (then Due d'Or- 
 leans) refused to sell it. It was to be distributed among the 
 poor of the neighbourhood for fuel for the ensuing winter, 
 which threatened to be a severe one. One day, when the 
 duke was inspecting the works in company of his steward, 
 an individual, who was standing a couple of yards away, be- 
 gan to shout at the top of his voice, " Vive Louis-Philippe ! " 
 " Go and see what the fellow wants, for assuredly he wants 
 something," said the duke, who was a Voltairean in his way, 
 and had interpreted the man's enthusiasm aright. Papa 
 Sournois was one of those nondescripts for whom even now
 
 LOUIS-PHILIPPE AND THE MARSEILLAISE. 189 
 
 there appear to be more resources in the French capital than 
 elsewhere. At the period in question he mainly got his liv- 
 ing by selling contre-marques (checks) at the doors of the 
 theatre. He had heard of the duke's intention with regard 
 to the wood, hence his enthusiastic cry of "Vive Louis- 
 Philippe ! " A cartload of wood was sent to his place ; papa 
 Sournois converted it into money, and got drunk with the 
 proceeds for a fortnight. When the steward, horribly scan- 
 dalized, told the duke of the results of his benevolence, the 
 latter merely laughed, and sent for the wife, who made her 
 appearance accompanied by a young brood of five. The 
 duke gave her a five-franc piece, and told her to apply to 
 the concierge of the Palais-Eoyal for a similar sum every 
 day during the winter months. Of course, five francs a day 
 was not as much as a drop of water out of the sea when we 
 consider Louis-Philippe's stupendous income, and yet when 
 the Tuileries were sacked in 1848, documents upon docu- 
 ments were found, compiled with the sole view of saving a 
 few francs per diem out of the young princes' " keep." 
 
 " I am so sick of the word ' fraternity,' " said Prince 
 Metternich, after his return from France, " that, if I had a 
 brother, I should call him cousin." Though it was to the 
 strains of the Marseillaise that Louis-Philippe had been con- 
 ducted to the H6tel-de-Ville on the day when Lafayette 
 pointed to him as " the best of all republics," a time came 
 when Louis-Philippe got utterly sick of the Marseillaise. 
 
 But what was he to do, seeing that his attempt at intro- 
 ducing a new national hymn had utterly failed ? The mob 
 refused to sing " La Parisienne," composed by Casimir de 
 la Vigne, after Alexandre Dumas had refused to write a na- 
 tional hymn ; and they, moreover, insisted on the King 
 joining in the chorus of the old hymn, as he had hitherto 
 done on all public occasions.* They had grumblingly re- 
 signed themselves to his beating time no longer, but any 
 further refusal of his co-operation might have been resented 
 in a less peaceful fashion. On the other hand, there was 
 
 * When there was no public occasion, his political antagonists or merely 
 practical jokers who knew of his dislike invented one, like iTdouard d'Ourliae, 
 a well-known journalist and the author of several novels, who, whenever he 
 had nothing better to do, recruited a band of street arabs to go and sing the 
 Marseillaise under the king's windows. They kept on singing until- Louis- 
 Philippe, in sheer self-defence, was obliged to come out and join in the song. 
 EDITOR.
 
 190 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the bourgeoisie who were of opinion that, now that the mon- 
 archy had entered upon a more conservative period, the in- 
 toning of the hymn, at any rate on the sovereign's part, was 
 out of place, and savoured too much of a republican mani- 
 festation, " It was Guizot who told him so," said Lord , 
 
 who had been standing on the balcony of the Tuileries on 
 the occasion of the king's " saint's day," * and had heard the 
 minister make the remark. 
 
 " And what did the king reply ? " was the question. 
 
 " Do not worry yourself, monsieur le ministre ; I am only 
 moving my lips ; I have ceased to pronounce the words for 
 many a day." 
 
 These were the expedients to which Louis- Philippe was 
 reduced before he had been on the throne half a dozen years. 
 " I am like the fool between two stools," observed the king 
 
 in English, afterwards, when speaking to Lord , " only 
 
 I happen to be between the comfortably stuffed easy-chair of 
 the bourgeois drawing-room and the piece of furniture 
 seated on which Louis XIV. is said to have received the 
 Dutch ambassadors." 
 
 While speaking of the Marseillaise, here are two stories 
 in connection with it which are not known to the general 
 reader. The first was told to me by the old tutor already 
 mentioned ; the second aroused a great deal of literary curi- 
 osity in the year 1860, and bears the stamp of truth on the 
 face of it. It was, however, never fully investigated, or, at any 
 rate, the results of the investigation were never published. f 
 
 " We were all more or less aware," said my informant, 
 " that Eouget de 1'Isle was not the author of the whole of 
 the words of the Marseillaise. But none of us in Lyons, 
 where I was born, knew who had written the last strophe, 
 commonly called the ' strophe of the children,' and I doubt 
 whether they were any wiser in Paris. Some of my fellow- 
 students for I was nearly eighteen at that time credited 
 Andre Chenier with the authorship of the last strophe, oth- 
 ers ascribed it to Louis-Francois Dubois, the poet.J All this 
 was, however, so much guess-work, when, one day during the 
 
 * In France it is the Patron Saint's day, not the birthday, that is kept. 
 
 | I have inserted them here in order not to fall into repetitions on the same 
 subject. EDITOR. 
 
 t Louis-Francois Dubois, the author of several heroic poems, " Ankarstrom," 
 " Genevieve et Siegfried," etc., which are utterly forgotten. His main title to 
 the recollection of posterity consists in his having saved, during the Eevolution,
 
 A STORY OF THE MARSEILLAISE. 
 
 Reign of Terror, the report spread that a ci-devant priest, 
 or rather a priest who had refused to take the oath to the 
 Republic, had been caught solemnizing a religious marriage, 
 and that he was to be brought before the Revolutionary Tri- 
 bunal that same afternoon. Though you may not think so, 
 merely going by what you have read, the appearance of a 
 priest before the Tribunal always aroused more than com- 
 mon interest, nor have you any idea what more than com- 
 mon interest meant in those days. A priest to the Revo- 
 lutionaries and to the Terrorists, they might hector and 
 bully as they liked, was not an ordinary being. They looked 
 upon him either as something better than a man or worse 
 than a devil. They had thrown the religious compass they 
 had brought from home with them overboard, and they had 
 not the philosophical one to take its place. You may work 
 out the thing for yourself; at any rate, the place was 
 crammed to suffocation when we arrived at the Hotel de 
 Ville. It was a large room, at the upper end of which stood 
 an oblong table, covered with a black cloth. Seated around 
 it were seven self-constituted judges. Besides their tricolour 
 scarfs round their waists, they wore, suspended by a ribbon 
 from their necks, a small silver axe. 
 
 " As a rule there was very little speechifying. ' La mort 
 sans phrase,' which had become the fashion since Louis XVI.'s 
 execution, was strictly adhered to. Half a dozen prisoners 
 were brought in and taken away without arousing the slight- 
 est excitement, either in the way of commiseration or hatred. 
 After having listened, the judges either extended their hands 
 on the table or put them to their foreheads. The first move- 
 ment meant acquittal and liberation, the second death ; not 
 always by the guillotine though, for the instrument was not 
 perfect as yet, and did not work sufficiently quickly to please 
 them. All at once the priest was brought in, and a dead si- 
 lence prevailed. He was not a very old man, though his hair 
 was snow-white. 
 
 " ' Who art thou ? ' asked the president. 
 
 " The prisoner drew himself up to his full height. ' I 
 am the Abbe Pessoneaux, a former tutor at the college at 
 Vienne, and the author of the last strophe of the Marseillaise,' 
 he said quietly. 
 
 a great many literary works of value, which he returned to the State afterwards. 
 EDITOR.
 
 192 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " I cannot convey to you the impression produced by those 
 simple words. The silence became positively oppressive ; you 
 could hear the people breathe. The president did not say 
 another word ; the priest's reply had apparently stunned him 
 also : he merely turned round to his fellow-judges. Soldiers 
 and gaolers stood as if turned into stone ; every eye was di- 
 rected towards the table, watching for the movement of the 
 judges' hands. Slowly and deliberately they stretched them 
 forth, and then a deafening cheer rang through the room. 
 The Abbe Pessoneaux owed his life to his strophe, for, 
 though his story was not questioned then, it was proved true 
 in every particular. On their way to Paris to be present at 
 the taking of the Tuileries on the 10th of August, the Mar- 
 seillais had stopped at Vienne to celebrate the Fte of the 
 Federation. On the eve of their arrival the Abbe Pessoneaux 
 had composed the strophe, and but for his seizure the author- 
 ship would have always remained a matter of conjecture, for 
 Eouget de PIsle would have never had the honesty to ac- 
 knowledge it." 
 
 My tutor was right, and I owe him this tardy apology ; it 
 appears that, after all, Rouget de 1'Isle had not the honesty to 
 acknowledge openly his indebtedness to those who made his 
 name immortal, and that his share in the Marseillaise amounts 
 to the first six strophes. He did not write a single note of 
 the music. The latter was composed by Alexandre Boucher, 
 the celebrated violinist, in 1790, in the drawing-room of Ma- 
 dame de Mortaigne, at the request of a colonel whom the 
 musician had never met before, whom he never saw again. 
 The soldier was starting next morning with his regiment for 
 Marseilles, and pressed Boucher to write him a march there 
 and then. Rouget de 1'Isle, an officer of engineers, having 
 been imprisoned in 1791, for having refused to take a second 
 oath to the Constitution, heard the march from his cell, and, 
 at the instance of his gaoler, adapted the words of a patriotic 
 hymn he was then writing to it. 
 
 One may fancy the surprise of Alexandre Boucher, when 
 he heard it sung everywhere and recognized it as his own 
 composition, though it had been somewhat altered to suit the 
 words. But the pith of the story is to come. I give it in 
 the very words of Boucher himself, as he told it to a Paris 
 journalist whom I knew well. 
 
 "A good many years afterwards, I was seated next to 
 Rouget de 1'Isle at a dinner-party in Paris. "We had never
 
 WHO WROTE THE MUSIC. 193 
 
 met before, and, as you may easily imagine, I was rather in- 
 terested in the gentleman, whom, with many others at the 
 same board, I complimented on his production ; only I con- 
 fined myself to complimenting him on his poem. 
 
 " ' You don't say a word about the music,' he replied ; ' and 
 
 ;t, being a celebrated musician, that ought to interest you. 
 o not you like it ? ' 
 
 " ' Very much indeed,' I said, in a somewhat significant 
 tone. 
 
 " ' Well, let me be frank with you. The music is not 
 mine. It was that of a march which came, Heaven knows 
 whence, and which they kept on playing at Marseilles during 
 the Terror, when I was a prisoner at the fortress of St. Jean. 
 I made a few alterations necessitated by the words, and there 
 it is.' 
 
 " Thereupon, to his great surprise, I hummed the march 
 as I had originally written it. 
 
 " ' Wonderful ! ' he exclaimed ; ' how did you come by it ? ' 
 he asked. 
 
 " When I told him, he threw himself round my neck. But 
 the next moment he said 
 
 " ' I am very sorry, my dear Boucher, but I am afraid that 
 you will be despoiled for ever, do what you will ; for your 
 music and my words go so well together, that they seem to 
 have sprung simultaneously from the same brain, and the 
 world, even if I proclaimed my indebtedness to you, would 
 never believe it.' 
 
 " ' Keep the loan,' I said, moved, in spite of myself, by his 
 candour. ' Without your genius, my march would be forgot- 
 ten by now. You have given it a patent of nobility. It is 
 yours for ever.' " 
 
 I return to Louis-Philippe, who, at the time of my tutor's 
 story, and for some years afterwards, I only knew from the 
 reports that were brought home to us. Of course, I saw him 
 several times at a distance, at reviews, and on popular holi- 
 days, and I was surprised that a king of whom every one 
 spoke so well in private, who seemed to have so much cause 
 for joy and happiness in his own family, should look so care- 
 worn and depressed in public. For, young as I was, I did 
 not fail to see that, beneath the calm and smiling exterior, 
 there was a great deal of hidden grief. But I was too young 
 to understand the deep irony of his reply to one of my rela- 
 tives, a few months before his accession to the throne : " The
 
 194 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 crown of France is too cold in winter, too warm in summer ; 
 the sceptre is too blunt as a weapon of defence or attack, it 
 is too short as a stick to lean upon : a good felt hat and a 
 strong umbrella are at all times more useful." Above all, I 
 was too young to understand the temper of the French where 
 their rulers were concerned, and though, at the time of my 
 writing these notes, I have lived for fifty years amongst them, 
 I doubt whether I could give a succinct psychological ac- 
 count of their mental attitude towards their succeeding re- 
 gimes, except by borrowing the words of one of their cleverest 
 country-women, Madame Emile de Girardin : " When Mar- 
 shal Soult is in the Opposition, he is acknowledged to have 
 won the battle of Toulouse ; when he belongs to the Govern- 
 ment, he is accused of having lost it." Since then the Ameri- 
 cans have coined a word for that state of mind " cussed- 
 ness." 
 
 Louis-Philippe's children, and especially his sons, some of 
 whom I knew personally before I had my first invitation to 
 the Tuileries, seemed to take matters more cheerfully. Save 
 the partisans of the elder branch, no one had a word to say 
 against them. On the contrary, even the Bonapartists ad- 
 mired their manly and straightforward bearing. I remember 
 being at Tortoni's one afternoon when the Due d'Orleans and 
 his brother, the Due de Nemours, rode by. Two of my 
 neighbours, unmistakable Imperialists, and old soldiers by 
 their looks, stared very hard at them ; then one said, " Si le 
 petit au lieu de filer le parfait amour partout, avait mis tous 
 ses oeufs dans le meme panier, il aurait eu des grands comme 
 cela et nous ne serions pas dans 1'impasse oil nous sommes." 
 
 " Mon cher," replied the other, " des grands comme cela 
 ne se font qu'a loisir, pas entre deux campagnes." * 
 
 The admiration of these two veterans was perfectly justi- 
 fied : they were very handsome young men, the sons of Louis- 
 Philippe, and notably the two elder ones, though the Due 
 d'Orleans was somewhat more delicate-looking than his 
 brother, De Nemours. The boys had all been brought up 
 very sensibly, perhaps somewhat too strict for their position. 
 They all went to a public school, to the College Henri IV., 
 
 * It reminds one of the answer of the younger Dumas to a gentleman whose 
 wife had been notorious for her conjugal faithlessness, and whose sons were all 
 weaklings. " Ah, Monsieur Dumas, c^est un fils comme vous qu'il me fallait," 
 he exclaimed. " Mon cher monsieur," came the reply, " quand on veut avoir 
 un filg comma moi, il faut la faire Boi-mome." EDITOB'.
 
 LOUIS-PHILIPPE'S DREAD OF POVERTY. 195 
 
 and I remember well, about the year '38, when I had occasion 
 of a morning to cross the Pont-Neuf, where there were still 
 stalls and all sorts of booths, seeing the blue-and-yellow car- 
 riage with the royal livery. It contained the Dues d'Aumale 
 and de Montpensier, who had not finished their studies at 
 that time. 
 
 But though strictly brought up, they were by no means 
 milksops, and what, for want of a better term, I may call 
 " mother's babies : " quite the reverse. It was never known 
 how they managed it, but at night, when they were supposed 
 to be at home, if not in bed, they were to be met with at all 
 kinds of public places, notably at the smaller theatres, such 
 as the Vaudeville, the Varietes, and the Palais-Koyal, one of 
 which, at any rate, was a goodly distance from the Tuileries. 
 It was always understood that the King knew nothing about 
 these little escapades, but I am inclined to doubt this : I fancy 
 
 he connived at them ; because, when Lord told him 
 
 casually one day that he had met his sons the night before, 
 Louis- Philippe seemed not in the least surprised, he only 
 anxiously asked, "Where?" 
 
 " At the Cafe de Paris, your majesty." 
 
 The king seemed relieved. " That's all right," he said, 
 laughing. " As long as they do not go into places where they 
 are likely to meet with Guizot, I don't mind ; for if he saw 
 them out in the evening, it might cost me my throne. Gui- 
 zot is so terribly respectable. I am afraid there is a mistake 
 either about his nationality or about his respectability ; they 
 are badly matched." 
 
 The fact is, that though Louis- Philippe admired and re- 
 spected Guizot, he failed to understand him. To the most 
 respectable of modern kings not even Charles I. and William 
 III. excepted if by respectability we mean an unblemished 
 private life Guizot's respectability was an enigma. The man 
 who, in spite of his advice to others, " Enrichissez vous, en- 
 richissez vous," was as poor at the end of his ministerial 
 career as at the beginning, must have necessarily been a puz- 
 zle to a sovereign who, with a civil list of 750,000, was 
 haunted by the fear of poverty, and haunted to such a degree 
 as to harass his friends and counsellors with his apprehen- 
 sions. " My dear minister," he said one day to Guizot, after 
 he had recited a long list of his domestic charges " My dear 
 minister, I am telling you that my children will be wanting 
 for bread." The recollection of his former misery uprose too
 
 196 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 frequently before him like a horrible nightmare, and made 
 him the first bourgeois instead of the first gentilhomme of 
 the kingdom, as his predecessors had been. When a trades- 
 man drops a shilling and does not stoop to pick it up, his 
 neglect becomes almost culpable improvidence ; when a prince 
 drops a sovereign and looks for it, the deed may be justly 
 qualified as mean. The leitmotif of Louis- Philippe's conver- 
 sation, witty and charming as it was, partook of the avari- 
 cious spirit of a Thomas Guy and a John Overs rather than 
 of that of the great adventurer John Law. The chinking of 
 the money-bags is audible through both, but in the one case 
 the orchestration is strident, disagreeable, depressing ; in the 
 other, it is generous, overflowing with noble impulses, and 
 cheering. I recollect that during my stay* at Treport and 
 Eu, in 1843, when Queen Victoria paid her visit to Louis- 
 Philippe, the following story was told to me. Lord and 
 
 I were quartered in a little hostelry on the Place du Chateau. 
 
 One morning Lord came home laughing till he could 
 
 laugh no longer. " What do you think the King has done 
 now ? " he asked. I professed my inability to guess. '' About 
 an hour ago, he and Queen Victoria were walking in the gar- 
 den, when, with true French politeness, he offered her a 
 peach. The Queen seemed rather embarrassed how to skin 
 it, when Louis-Philippe took a large clasp-knife from his 
 pocket. 'When a man has been a poor devil like myself, 
 obliged to live upon forty sous a day, he always carries a 
 knife. I might have dispensed with it for the last few years; 
 still, I do not wish to lose the habit one does not know what 
 may happen,' he said. Of course, the tears stood in the Queen's 
 eyes. He really ought to know better than to obtrude his 
 money worries upon every one." 
 
 I must confess that I was not as much surprised as my 
 interlocutor, who, however, had known Louis-Philippe much 
 longer than I. Not his worst enemies could have accused the 
 son of Philippe Egalite of being a coward : the bulletins of 
 Valmy, Jemmappes, and Neerwinden would have proved the 
 contrary. But the contempt of physical danger on the battle- 
 field does not necessarily constitute heroism in the most ele- 
 vated sense of the term, although the world in general fre- 
 quently accepts it as such. A man can die but once, and the 
 semi-positivism, semi-Voltaireanism of Louis-Philippe had 
 undoubtedly steeled him against the fear of death. His re- 
 ligion, throughout life, was not even skin-deep ; and when
 
 LOUIS-PHILIPPE'S RELIGION. 197 
 
 he accepted the last rites of the Church on his death-bed, he 
 only did so in deference to his wife. " Ma femme, es-tu con- 
 tente de moi ? " were his words the moment the priests were 
 gone. 
 
 Nevertheless, he was too good a husband to grieve his 
 wife, Avho was deeply religious, by any needless display of 
 unbelief. He always endeavoured, as far as possible, to find 
 an excuse for staying away from church. He, as well as the 
 female members of his family, were very fond of music ; 
 and Adam, the composer, was frequently invited to come and 
 play for them in the private apartments. In fact, after his 
 abdication, he seriously intended to write, in conjunction 
 with Scribe, the libretto of an opera on an English historical 
 subject, the music of which should be composed by Halevy. 
 The composer of " La Juive " and the author of " Les Huge- 
 nots " came over once to consult with the King, whose death, 
 a few months later, put an end to the scheme. 
 
 On the occasion of Adam's visits the princesses worked 
 at their embroidery, while the King often stood by the side 
 of the performer. Just about that period the chamber organ 
 was introduced, and, on the recommendation of Adam, one 
 was ordered for the Tuileries. The first time Louis- Philippe 
 heard it played he was delighted : " This will be a distinct 
 gain to our rural congregations," he said. " There must be 
 a great many people Avho, like myself, stay away from church 
 on account of their objection to that horrible instrument, the 
 serpent. Is it not so, my wife ? " 
 
 The ideal purpose of life, if ever he possessed it, had been 
 crushed out of him first, by his governess, Madame de Gen- 
 lis ; secondly, by the dire poverty he suffered during his ex- 
 ile : and, notwithstanding all that has been said to the con- 
 trary, France wanted at that moment an ideal ruler, not the 
 rational father of a large family who looked upon his mon- 
 archy as a suitable means of providing for them. He was an 
 usurper without the daring, the grandeur, the lawlessness of 
 the usurper. The lesson of Xapoleon I.'s method had been 
 thrown away upon him, as the lesson of Xapoleon III.'s has 
 been thrown away upon his grandson. AVhen I said France, 
 I made a mistake, I should have said Paris; for since 1789 
 there was no longer a King of France, there was only a King 
 of Paris. Such a thing as a Manchester movement, as a 
 Manchester school of politics, would have been and is still 
 an impossibility in France.
 
 198 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 And, unfortunately, Paris, which had applauded the glo- 
 rious mise-en-scene of the First Empire, which had even 
 looked on approvingly at some of the pomp and state of 
 Louis XVIII. and Charles X., jeered at Louis-Philippe and 
 his court with its ridiculous gatherings of tailors, drapers, 
 and bootmakers, " ces gardes nationaux d'un pays ou il n'y a 
 plus rien de national a garder," and their pretentious spouses 
 " qui," according to the Duchesse de la Tremoille, " ont plus 
 de chemises que nos ai'eules avaient des robes." * She and 
 the Princesse Bagration were the only female representa- 
 tives of the Faubourg St. Germain who attended these gath- 
 erings ; for the Countess Le Hon, of whom I may have occa- 
 sion to speak again, and who was the only other woman at 
 these receptions that could lay claim to any distinction, was 
 by no means an aristocrat. And be it remembered that in 
 those days ridicule had still the power to kill. 
 
 Nor was the weapon wielded exclusively by the aris- 
 tocracy ; the lower classes could be just as satirical against 
 the new court element. I was in the Tuileries gardens on 
 that first Sunday in June, 1837, when the Duchesse d'Orleans 
 made her entree into Paris. The weather was magnificent, 
 and the set scene as distinguished from some of the prop- 
 erties, to use a theatrical expression in keeping with the 
 weather. The crowd itself was a pleasure to look at, as it 
 stood in serried masses behind the National Guards and the 
 regular infantry lining the route of the procession from the 
 Arc de Triomphe to the entrance of the Chateau. All at 
 once an outrider passes, covered with dust, and the crowd 
 presses forward to get a better view. A woman of the people, 
 in her nice white cap, comes into somewhat violent contact 
 with an elegantly dressed elderly lady, accompanied by her 
 daughter. The woman, instead of apologizing, says aloud 
 that she wishes to see the princess : " You will have the op- 
 portunity of seeing her at court, mesdames," she adds. The 
 elegant lady vouchsafes no reply, but turns to her daughter : 
 " The good woman," says the latter, shrugging her shoul- 
 ders, " is evidently not aware that she has got a much greater 
 
 * She had unconsciously borrowed the words from the Duchesse de Coislin, 
 who, under similar circumstances a few years before, said to Madame de Cha- 
 teaubriand, " Cela sent la parvenue ; nous autres, femmes d_e la cour, noua 
 n'avions que deux chemises ; on les renouvelait quand elles e'taient use'es ; nous 
 etions vetues de robes de soie et nous n'avions pas 1'air de grisettes comine ces 
 demoiselles de maintenant." EDITOR.
 
 A PRACTICAL JOKE OF PRINCE DE JOIXVILLE. 199 
 
 chance of going to that court than we have. She has only 
 got to marry some grocer or other tradesman, and she will be 
 considered a grande dame at once." Then the procession 
 p asses first the National Guards on horseback, then the 
 King and M. de Montalivet, followed by Princesse Helene, 
 with her young husband riding by the side of the carriage. 
 So far so good : the first three or four carriages were more 
 or less handsome, but Heaven ^ave us from the rest, as well 
 as from their occupants ! They positively looked like some 
 of those wardrobe-dealers so admirably described by Bal- 
 zac. 
 
 When all is over, the woman of the people turns to the 
 elegant lady : " I ask your pardon, madame ; it was really not 
 worth while hurting you. If these are grandes dames, I pre- 
 fer les petites whom I see in my neighbourhood, the Rue 
 Xotre-Dame de Lorette. Comme elles etaient attifees ! " 
 Anglice, " What a lot of frumps they looked ! " 
 
 In fact, Louis-Philippe and his queen sinned most griev- 
 ously by overlooking the craving of the Parisians for pomp 
 and "display. Xo one was better aware of this than his chil- 
 dren, notably the Due d'Orleans, Princess Clementine,* and 
 the Due de Nemours. They called him familiarly " le pere." 
 " II est trop pere," said the princess in private ; " il fait con- 
 currence au Pere Eternel." She was a very clever girl per- 
 haps a great deal cleverer than any of her brothers, the Solon 
 of the family, the Due de Xemours, included but very fond 
 of mischief and practical joking. She found her match, 
 though, in her brother, the Prince de Joinville, the son of 
 Louis-Philippe of whom France heard most and saw least, 
 for he was a sailor. One day, his sister asked him to bring 
 her a complete dress of a Red-Skin chieftain's wife. His 
 absence was shorter than usual, and, a few days before his 
 return, he told her in a letter that he had the costume she 
 
 * The mother of Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, the present ruler of Bul- 
 garia. She was a particular favourite of Queen Victoria, and Louis-Philippe 
 himself not only considered her the cleverest of his three daughters, but the 
 most likely successor to his sister Adelaide, as his private adviser. That the 
 estimate of" her abilities was by no means exaggerated, subsequent events have 
 proved. The last time I saw'the princess was at the garden party at Sheen- 
 House, on the occasion of the silver wedding of the Count and Countess de 
 Paris. I did not remember her for the moment, for a score of years had made 
 a difference. I asked an Austrian attache who sho was. The answer came 
 pat, " Alexander III.'s nightmare, Francis-Joseph's bogy, and Bismarck's sleep- 
 ing draught ; one of the three clever women in Europe ; Bulgaria's mother." 
 EDITOR.
 
 200 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 wanted. " Here, Clementine, this is for you," he said, at his 
 arrival, putting a string of glass beads on the table. 
 
 "Very pretty," said Clementine, " but you promised me 
 a complete dress." 
 
 " This is the complete dress. I never saw them wear any 
 other." 
 
 I did not see the Prince de Joinville very often, perhaps 
 two or three times in all ; once on the occasion of his mar- 
 riage with Princess Fraii9oise de Bourbon, the daughter of 
 Dom Pedro I. of Brazil, and sister of the present emperor, 
 when the prince brought his young bride to Paris. lie was 
 a clever draughtsman and capital caricaturist; but if the 
 first of these talents proved an iinfailing source of delight to 
 his parents, the second frequently inspired them with terror, 
 especially his father, who never knew which of his ministers 
 might become the next butt for his third son's pencil. I 
 have seen innumerable sketches, ostensibly done to delight 
 his young wife and brothers, which, had they been published, 
 would have been much more telling against his father's pic- 
 torial satirists than anything they produced against the sov- 
 ereign. For in those days, whatever wisdom or caution they 
 may have learnt afterwards, the sons of Louis- Philippe were 
 by no means disposed to sit down tamely under the insults 
 levelled at the head of their house. In fact, nearly the whole 
 of Louis- Philippe's children had graphic talents of no mean 
 order. The trait came to them from their mother, who was 
 a very successful pupil of Angelica Kauffman. Princesse 
 Marie, who died so young, executed a statue of Jeanne 
 d'Arc, which was considered by competent judges, not at all 
 likely to be influenced by the fact of the artist's birth, a very 
 creditable piece of work indeed. I never saw it, so I cannot 
 say, but I have seen some miniatures by the Due de Nemours, 
 which might fairly rank with performances by the best mas- 
 ters of that art, short of genius. 
 
 It is a curious, but nevertheless admitted fact that the 
 world has never done justice to the second son of Louis- 
 Philippe. He was not half as great a favourite with the 
 Parisians as his elder brother, although in virtue of his re- 
 markable likeness to Henri IV., whom the Parisians still 
 worship probably because he is dead, he ought to have 
 commanded their sympathies. This lukewarmness towards 
 the Due de Nemours has generally been ascribed by the par- 
 tisans of the Orleanist dynasty to his somewhat reticent dis-
 
 THE DUG DE NEMOURS. 201 
 
 position, which by many people was mistaken for hauteur. 
 I rather fancy it was because he was suspected of being his 
 father's adviser, and, what was worse, his father's adviser in 
 a reactionary sense. He was accused of being an anti-par- 
 liamentarian, and he never took the trouble to refute tho 
 charge, probably because he was too honest to tell a lie.* I 
 met the Due de Nemours for the first time in the studio of 
 a painter, Eugene Lami, just as I met his elder brother in 
 that of Decamps. In fact, all these young princes were sin- 
 cere admirers and patrons of art, and, if they had had their 
 will, the soirees at the Tuileries would have been graced 
 by the presence of artists more frequently than they were ; 
 but, preposterous and scarcely credible as it may seem, the 
 bourgeoisie looked upon this familiar intercourse of the 
 king's sons with artists, literary men, and the like, as so much 
 condescension, if not worse, of which they, the bourgeoisie, 
 would not be guilty if they could help it. It behoves me, 
 however, to be careful in this instance, for the English 
 aristocracy at home was not much more liberal in those 
 days. 
 
 The first thing that struck one in the Due de Nemours 
 was the vast extent of his general information and the mar- 
 vellous power of memory. Eugene Lami had just returned 
 from London, and, in the exercise of his profession, had 
 come in contact with some members of the oldest families. 
 The mere mention of the name sufficed as the introduction 
 to the general and anecdotal history of such a family, and I 
 doubt whether the best official at Herald's College could 
 have dissected a pedigree as did the Due de Nemours. Eu- 
 gene Lami was at that time engaged upon designing some 
 new uniforms for the army, many of which disappeared only 
 after the war of 1870. He lived in the Eue des Marais, the 
 greater part of which was subsequently demolished to make 
 room for the Boulevard de Magenta, and in the same house 
 with two men whose names have become immortal, Honore 
 de Balzac and Paul Delaroche. I have already spoken of 
 both, but I did not mention the incident that led to the 
 
 * There was a similar divergence of dvnastic opinion during the Second 
 Empire between the sovereign and those placed very near him on the throne. 
 When Alphonse Daudet came to Paris to make a name in literature, the Duo 
 de Morny offered him a position as secretary. " Before I accept it, monsieur le 
 due, I had better tell you that I am a Legitimist," replied the future novelist. 
 " Don't let that trouble-you," laughed Delrtorny ; " so am 1 to a certain extent, 
 and the Empress is even more of a Legitimist than I am." EDITOR.
 
 202 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 painter's acquaintance with the novelist, an incident so ut- 
 terly fanciful that the boldest farce- writer would think twice 
 before utilizing it in a play. It was told to me by Lami him- 
 self. One morning, as he and Paul Delaroche were working, 
 there was a knock at the door, and a stout individual, dressed 
 in a kind of monastic garb, appeared on the threshold. Dela- 
 roche remembered that he had met him on the staircase, but 
 neither knew who he was, albeit that Balzac's fame was not 
 altogether unknown to them. " Gentlemen," said the vis- 
 itor, " I am Honore Balzac, a neighbour and a confrere to 
 boot. My chattel^ are about to be seized, and I would ask 
 you to save a remnant of my library." 
 
 Of course, the request was granted. The books were 
 stowed away behind the pictures; and, after that, Balzac 
 often dropped in to have a chat with them, but neither Dela- 
 roche nor Lami, the latter least of all, ever conceived a sin- 
 cere liking for the great novelist. Their characters were 
 altogether dissimilar. I have seen a good many men whose 
 names have become household words among the refined, the 
 educated, and the art-loving all the world over ; I have seen 
 them at the commencement, in the middle, and at the zenith 
 of their career: I have seen none more indifferent to the 
 material benefits of their art than Eugene Lami and Paul 
 Delaroche, not even Eugene Delacroix and Decamps. Balzac 
 was the very reverse. To make a fortune was the sole am- 
 bition of his life. 
 
 To return for a moment to Louis-Philippe's sons. I 
 have said that the Due de Nemours was essentially the grand 
 seigneur of the family ; truth compels me to add, however, 
 that there was a certain want of pliability about him which 
 his social inferiors could not have relished. It was Henri 
 IV. minus the bonhomie, also perhaps minus that indiscrimi- 
 nate galauterie which endeared Kavaillac's victim to all 
 classes, even when he was no longer young. In the days of 
 which I am treating just now, the Due de Nemours was very 
 young. As for his courage, it was simply above suspicion ; 
 albeit that it was called in question after the revolution of 
 '48, to his father's intense sorrow. No after-dinner encomi- 
 um was ever as absolutely true as that of Sir Robert Peel on 
 the sons and daughters of the last King of France, when he 
 described them as respectively brave and chaste. Neverthe- 
 less, had the Due de Nemours and his brothers been a thou- 
 sand times as brave as they were, party spirit, than which
 
 THE DUG DE NEMOURS' BRAVERY. 203 
 
 there is nothing more contemptible in France, would have 
 found the opportunity of denying that bravery. 
 
 If these notes are ever published, Englishmen will smile 
 at what I am about to write now, unless their disgust takes 
 another form of expression. The exploits of the Due d'Au- 
 male in Algeria are quoted by independent military authori- 
 ties as so many separate deeds of signal heroism. They 
 belong to history, and not a single historian has endeavoured 
 to impair their value. Will it be believed that the Opposi- 
 tion journals of those days spoke of them with ill-disguised 
 contempt as mere skirmishes Avith a lot of semi-savages? 
 And, during the Second Eepublic, many of these papers re- 
 turned to the charge because the Due d'Aumale, being the 
 constitutionally-minded son of a constitutionally-minded 
 king, resigned the command of his army instead of bringing 
 it to France to coerce a nation into retaining a ruler whom, 
 ostensibly at least, she had voluntarily accepted, and whom, 
 therefore, she was as free to reject. 
 
 In connection with these Algerian campaigns of the Due 
 d'Aumale, I had a story told to me by his brother, De Mont- 
 pen sier, which becomes particularly interesting nowadays, 
 when spiritualism or spiritism is so much discussed. He had 
 it from two unimpeachable sources, namely, from his brother 
 D'Aumale and from General Cousin-Montauban, afterwards 
 Comte de Palikao, the same who was so terribly afraid, after 
 the expedition in China, that the emperor would create him 
 Comte de Pekin, and who sent an aide-de-camp in advance 
 to beg the sovereign not to do so.* 
 
 It was to General Montauban that Abdel-Kader surren- 
 dered after the battles of Isly and Djemma-Gazhouat. It 
 was in the latter engagement that a Captain de Gereaux fell, 
 and when the news of his death reached his family they 
 seemed almost prepared for it. It transpired that, on the 
 very day of the engagement, and at the very hour in which 
 Captain de Gereaux was struck down, his sister, a young and 
 handsome but very impressionable girl, started all of a sudden 
 from her chair, exclaiming that she had seen her brother, 
 surrounded by Arabs, who were felling him to the ground. 
 Then she dropped to the floor in a dead swoon. 
 
 A few years elapsed, when General Montauban, who had 
 
 * In order to understand this dread on Montauban's part, the English reader 
 should be told that the term pekin is the contemptuous nickname for the civil- 
 ian, with the French soldier. EDITOB.
 
 204 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 become the military Governor of the province of Oran, re- 
 ceived a letter from the De Gereaux family, requesting him 
 to make some further inquiries respecting the particulars of 
 the captain's death. The letter was written at the urgent 
 prayer of Mdlle. de Gereaux, who had never ceased to think 
 and speak of her brother, and who, on one occasion, a month 
 or so before the despatch of the petition, had risen again 
 from her chair, though in a more composed manner than 
 before, insisting that she had once more seen her brother. 
 This time he was dressed in the native garb, he seemed very 
 poor, and was delving the soil. These visions recurred at 
 frequent intervals, to the intense distress of the family, who 
 could not but ascribe them to the overstrung imagination of 
 Mdlle. de Gereaux. A little while after, she maintained 
 having seen her brother in a white robe and turban, and in- 
 toning hymns that sounded to her like Arabic. She implored 
 her parents to institute inquiries, and General Montauban 
 was communicated with to that effect. He did all he could ; 
 the country was at peace, and, after a few months, tidings 
 came that there was a Frenchman held prisoner in one of 
 the villages on the Morocco frontier, who for the last two or 
 three years had entirely lost his reason, but that, previous to 
 that calamity, he had been converted to Islamism. His 
 mental derangement being altogether harmless, he was an 
 attendant at the Mosque. As a matter of course, the infor- 
 mation had been greatly embellished in having passed through 
 so many channels, nor was it of so definite a character as I 
 have noted it down, but that was the gist of it. 
 
 Meanwhile, Montauban had been transferred to another 
 command, and for a twelvemonth after his successor's arrival 
 the inquiry was allowed to fall in abeyance. When it was 
 finally resumed, the French prisoner had died, but, from a 
 document written in his native language found upon him and 
 brought to Oran, there remained little doubt that he was 
 Captain de Gereaux. 
 
 To return for a moment to the Due d'Aumale, who, curi- 
 ously enough, exercised a greater influence on the outside 
 world in general than any of his other brethren an influence 
 due probably to his enormous wealth rather than to his per- 
 sonal qualities, though the latter may, to some people, have 
 seemed remarkable. I met him but seldom during his 
 father's lifetime. He was the beau-ideal of the preux cheva- 
 lier, according to the French notion of the modern Bayard
 
 THE DUG D'ORLfeANS. 205 
 
 that is, handsome, brave to a fault, irresistibly fascinating 
 with women, good-natured in his way, and, above all, very 
 witty. It was he who, after the confiscation of the d'Orleans' 
 property by Napoleon III., replied to the French Ambassador 
 at Turin, who inquired after his health, " I am all right ; 
 health is one of the things that cannot be confiscated." 
 Nevertheless, upon closer acquaintance, I failed to see the 
 justifying cause for the preference manifested by public 
 opinion, and, upon more minute inquiry, I found that a 
 great many people shared my views. I am at this moment 
 convinced that, but for his having been the heir of that ill- 
 fated Prince de Conde, and consequently the real defender 
 in the various suits resulting from the assassination of that 
 prince by Madame de Feucheres, he would have been in no 
 way distinguished socially from the rest of the D'Orleans. 
 
 The popularity of his eldest brother, the Due d'Orleans, 
 was, on the contrary, due directly to the man himself. As 
 far as one can judge of him, he was the reverse of Charles II., 
 in that he never said a wise thing and never did a foolish 
 one. He was probably not half so clever as his father, nor, 
 brave as he may have been, would he have ever made so dash- 
 ing a soldier as his brother D'Aumale, or so rollicking a sailor 
 as his brother De Joinville. He did not pretend to the wis- 
 dom of his brother De Nemours, nor to the mystic tendencies 
 of his youngest sister, nor to the sprightly wit of Princesse 
 Clementine, and yet withal he understood the French nation 
 better than any of them. Even his prenuptial escapades, se- 
 crets to no one, were those of the grand seigneur, though by 
 no means affichees ; they endeared him to the majority of the 
 people. " Chacun colon-ise a sa faqon," was the lenient ver- 
 dict on his admiration for Jenny Colon, at a moment when 
 colonization in Algeria was the topic of the day. On the 
 whole he liked artists better, perhaps, than art itself, yet it 
 did not prevent him from buying masterpieces as far as his 
 means would allow him. Though still young, in the latter 
 end of the thirties, I was already a frequent visitor to the 
 studios of the great French painters, and it was in that of 
 Decamps' that I became alive to his character for the first 
 time. I was talking to the great painter when the duke came 
 in. We had met before, and shook hands, as he had been 
 taught to do by his father when he met with an Englishman. 
 But I could not make out why he was carrying a pair of trou- 
 sers over his arm. After we had been chatting for about ten
 
 206 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 minutes, I wondering all the while what he was going to do 
 with the nether garment, he caught one of my side glances, 
 and burst out laughing. " I forgot," he said ; " here, Decamps, 
 here are your breeches." Then he turned to me to explain. 
 '' I always bring them up with me when I come in the morn- 
 ing. The concierge is very old, and it saves her trudging up 
 four nights of stairs." The fact was, that the concierge, be- 
 fore she knew who he was, had once asked him to take up 
 the painter's clothes and boots. From that day forth he 
 never failed to ask for them when passing her lodge. 
 
 I can but repeat, the Due d'Orleans was one of the most 
 charming men I have known. I always couple him in my 
 mind with Benjamin Disraeli, and Alexandre Dumas the 
 elder. I knew the English statesman almost as well during 
 part of my life as the French novelist. Though intellectu- 
 ally wide apart from them, the duke had one, if not two traits 
 in common with both ; his utter contempt for money affairs 
 and the personal charm he wielded. I doubt whether this 
 personal charm in the other two men was due to their intel- 
 lectual attainments ; with the Due d'Orleans it was certainly 
 not the case. He rarely, if ever, said anything worth remem- 
 bering; in fact, he frankly acknowledged his very modest 
 scholarship, and his inability either to remember the epi- 
 grams of others or to condense his thoughts into one of his 
 own. " I should not like to admit as much to my father, 
 who, it appears, is a very fine Greek and Latin scholar," he 
 said " that is, if I am to believe my brothers, De Nemours 
 and D'Aumale, who ought to know ; for, notwithstanding the 
 prizes they took at college, I believe they are very clever. Ah, 
 you may well look surprised at my saying, ' notwithstanding 
 the prizes they took,' because I took ever so many, although, 
 for the life of me, I could not construe a Greek sentence, and 
 scarcely a Latin one. I have paid very handsomely, however, 
 for my ignorance." And then he told us an amusing story 
 of his having had to invent a secretaryship to the duchess for 
 an old schoolfellow. " You see, he came upon me unawares 
 with a slip of paper I had written him while at college, ask- 
 ing him to explain to me a Greek ipassage. There was no 
 denying it, I had signed it. What is worse still, he is sup- 
 posed to translate and to reply to the duchess's German cor- 
 respondence, and, when I gave him the appointment, he did 
 not know a single word of Schiller's language, so I had to pay 
 a German tutor and him too."
 
 HIS INDIFFERENCE WITH REGARD TO MONEY. 207 
 
 I have said that the Due d'0r!6ans was absolutely indiffer- 
 ent with regard to money, but he would not be fleeced with 
 impunity. What he disliked more than anything else, was 
 the greed of the shop-keeping bourgeois. One day, while 
 travelling in Lorraine, he stopped at the posting-house to 
 have his breakfast, consisting of a couple of eggs, a few 
 slices of bread and butter, and a cup of coffee. Just before 
 proceeding on his journey, his valet came to tell him that 
 mine host wanted to charge him two hundred francs for the 
 repast. The duke merely sent for the mayor, handed him a 
 thousand-franc note, gave him the particulars of his bill of 
 fare, told him to pay the landlord according to the tariff, and 
 to distribute the remainder of the money among the poor. 
 It is more than probable that mine host was among the first, 
 in '48, to hail the republic : princes and kings, according to 
 him, were made to be fleeced ; if they objected, what was the 
 good of having a monarchy ? 
 
 The popular idol in France must distribute largesse, and 
 distribute it individually, or be profitable in some other way. 
 Greed, personal interest, underlies most of the political strife 
 in France. During one of the riots, so common in the reign 
 of Louis- Philippe, Mimi-Lepreuil, a well-known clever pick- 
 pocket, was shouting with all his might, " Vive Louis- 
 Philippe ! a bas la Republique ! " Asa rule, gentlemen of his 
 profession are found on the plebeian side, and one of the 
 superintendents of police on duty, who had closely watched 
 him, inquired into the reason of his apostasy. " I am sick of 
 your Republicans," was the answer. " I come here morning 
 after morning " it happened on the Place de la Bourse, 
 " and dip my hands into a score of pockets without finding a 
 red cent. During the Revolution of July, at the funeral of 
 General Lamarque, I did not make my expenses. Give me a 
 royal procession to make money." These were his politics. 
 
 It would be difficult to say what the Due d'Orleans would 
 have done, had he lived to ascend the throne. One thing is 
 certain, however, that on the day of his death, genuine tears 
 stood in the eyes of all classes, except the Legitimists. As I 
 have already said, they ascribed the fatal accident to God's 
 vengeance for the usurpation of his father. " If this be the 
 case," said an irreverent but witty journalist, " it argues but 
 very little providence on the part of your Providence, for 
 now He will have to keep the peace between the Due de Berri, 
 the Due de Reichstadt, and the Due d'Orleans."
 
 208 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 The Revolution of '48 The beginning of it The National Guards in all their 
 glory The Cafe" Gregoire on the Place du Caire The price of a good 
 breakfast in '48 The palmy days of the Cuisine Bourgeoise The excite- 
 ment on the Boulevards on Sunday, February 20th, '48 The theatres A 
 ball at Poirson's, the erstwhile director of the Gymnase A lull in the 
 storm Tuesday, February 22nd Another visit to the Cafe" Gregoire Ou 
 my way thither The Coine!die-Francaise closes its doors What" it means, 
 according to my old tutor We are waited upon by a sergeant and corporal 
 We are no longer " messieurs," but " citoyens " An eye to the main 
 chance The patriots do a bit of business in tricolour cockades The com- 
 pany marches away Casualties " Le patriotisme " means the difference 
 between the louis d'or and the e"cu of three francs The company bivouacs 
 on the Boulevard Saint-Martin A tyrant's victim " malgre lui " Wednes- 
 day, February 23rd The Cafe Grdgoire once more The National Guards 
 en neglige A novel mode of settling accounts The National Guards for- 
 tify the inner man A bivouac on the Boulevard du Temple A camp 
 scene from an opera I leave My companion's account Ihe National 
 Guards protect the regulars The author of these notes goes to the theatre 
 The Gymnase and the Variety's on the eve of the Revolution BoufFe and. 
 D^jazet Thursday, February 24th, '48 The Boulevards at 9.30 a.m. No 
 milk The Revolutionaries do without it The Place du Carrousel The 
 sovereign people fire from the roofs on the troops The troops do not dis- 
 lodge them The King reviews the troops The apparent inactivity of 
 Louis-Philippe's sons A theory about the difference in bloodshed One of 
 the three ugliest men in France comes to see the King Seditious cries 
 The King abdicates Chaos The sacking of the Tuileries Receptions and 
 feasting in the Galerie de Diane " Du cafe" pour nous, des cigarettes pour 
 les dames " The dresses of the princesses The bourgeois feast the gamins 
 who guard the barricades The Republic proclaimed The riff-raff insist 
 upon illuminations An actor promoted to the Governorship of the Hotel 
 de Ville Some members of the " provisional Government " at work Mery 
 on Larnartine Why the latter proclaimed the Republic. 
 
 I WAS returning home earlier than usual on Saturday 
 night, the 19th of February, '48, when, at the corner of the 
 Eue Lafitte, I happened to run against a young Englishman 
 who had been established for some years in Paris as the rep- 
 resentative of his father, a wealthy cotton-spinner in the 
 north. We had frequently met before, and a cordial feeling 
 had sprung up between us, based at first I am bound to say 
 on our common contempt for the vanity of the French. 
 
 " Come and breakfast with me to-morrow morning," he
 
 THE BEGINNING OP THE REVOLUTION OF '48. 209 
 
 said ; " I fancy you will enjoy yourself. We will breakfast 
 in my quarter, and you will see the National Guards in all 
 their glory. They will muster very strong to-morrow, if it 
 be fine." 
 
 " But why to-morrow?" I replied. " I was under the im- 
 pression that the idea of the Keformist banquet iu the 
 Champs-Elysees had been abandoned, so there will be no 
 occasion for them to parade? Besides, that would be on 
 Tuesday only." 
 
 " It has been abandoned, but if you think that it will 
 prevent them from turning out, you are very much mis- 
 taken ; at any rate, come and listen to the preliminaries." 
 
 I promised him to come, but I had not the slightest idea 
 that I was going to witness a kind of mild prologue to a rev- 
 olution 
 
 Next morning turned out very fine balmy spring weath- 
 er and as I sauntered along the Boulevards Montmartre 
 and Poissonniere to the place of appointment the streets were 
 already crowded with people in their Sunday clothes. The 
 place where I was to meet my English friend was situated in 
 the midst of a busy quarter, scarcely anything but ware- 
 houses where they sold laces, and flowers, and silks ; some- 
 thing like the neighbourhood at the back of Cheapside. The 
 wealthy tradesmen of those days did not live in the outskirts 
 of Paris, as they did later on ; and when my friend and I 
 reached the principal cafe and restaurant on the Place du 
 Caire I think it was called the Cafe Gregoire there was 
 scarcely a table vacant. The habitues were, almost to a man, 
 National Guards, prosperous business men, considerably more 
 anxious, as I found out in a short time, to play a political 
 part than to maintain public tranquillity. If I remember 
 rightly, one of them, a chemist and druggist, who was pointed 
 out to me then, became a deputy after the fall of the Second 
 Empire ; and I may notice en passant that this same spot 
 was the political hothouse which produced, afterwards, Mon- 
 sieur Tirard, who started life as a small manufacturer of imi- 
 tation jewellery, and who rose to be Minister of Finances 
 under the Third Republic. 
 
 The breakfast was simply excellent, the wine genuine 
 throughout, the coffee and cognac all that could be wished ; 
 and, when I asked my friend to let me look at the bill, out 
 of simple curiosity, or, rather, for the sake of comparing 
 prices with those of the Cafes de Paris and Riche, I found
 
 210 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 that he had spent something less than eleven francs. At the 
 Cafe Riche it would have been twenty-five francs, and, at the 
 present time, one would be charged double that sum. These 
 were the palmy days of the Cuisine Fran9aise, or, to call it 
 by another name, the Cuisine Bourgeoise, for which, a few 
 years later, a stranger in Paris would have almost sought 
 in vain. Luckily, however, for my enjoyment and digestive 
 organs, I was no stranger to Paris and to the French ; if I 
 had been, both the former would have been spoilt, the excite- 
 ment of those around me being such as to lead the alien to 
 believe that there would be an instantaneous departure for 
 the Tuileries, and a revival of the bloody scenes of the first 
 revolution. It has been my lot, in after-years, to hear a great 
 deal of political drivel in French and English, but it was 
 sound philosophy compared to what I heard that morning. 
 I have spoken before of the Hotel des Haricots, where men 
 like Hugo, Balzac, Beranger, and Alfred de Musset chose to 
 be imprisoned rather than perform their duties as National 
 Guards. After that, I could fully appreciate their reluc- 
 tance to be confounded with such a set of pompous wind- 
 bags. 
 
 It came to nothing that day, but I had become interested, 
 and made an appointment with my friend for the Tuesday, 
 unless something should happen in the interval. Still, I did 
 not think that the monarchy of July was doomed, though, 
 on returning to the Boulevards, I could not help noticing 
 that the excitement had considerably increased during the 
 time I had been at breakfast. By twelve o'clock that night 
 I was convinced that I had been mistaken, and that the 
 dynasty of the D'Orleans had not a week to live. All the 
 theatres were still open, but I had an invitation to a ball, 
 given by Poirson, the then late director of the Gymnase 
 Theatre, at his house in the Faubourg Poissonniere. " Nous 
 ne danserons plus jamais sous Louis-Philippe ! " was the 
 general cry, which did not prevent the guests from thoroughly 
 enjoying themselves. 
 
 Next morning, Monday, there seemed to be a lull in the 
 storm, but on the Tuesday the signs of the coming hurricane 
 were plainly visible on the horizon. The Ministry of Marine 
 was guarded by a company of linesmen. I had some busi- 
 ness in the Rue de Rivoli, which at that time ended almost 
 abruptly at the Louvre ; and, on my way to the Cafe Gre- 
 goire, I met patrol upon patrol of National Guards beating
 
 THE CAFE GREGOI11E. 211 
 
 the " assembly." I had occasion to pass before the Corned ie- 
 Franqaise. The ominous black-lettered slip of yellow paper, 
 with the word Relaclie, was pasted across the evening's bill. 
 That was enough for me. I remembered the words of my 
 old tutor : " When the Comedie-Fran9aise shuts its doors in 
 perilous times, it is like the battening down of the hatches 
 in dirty weather. There is mischief brewing." When I got 
 to the Place du Caire, I was virtually in the thick of it. 
 With the exception of my friend and I, there was not a man 
 in mufti. Even the proprietor had donned his uniform. 
 Our fillet of beef was brought to us by a corporal, and our 
 coffee poured out by a sergeant. Whether these warrior- 
 waiters meant to strike one blow for freedom and to leave 
 
 citoyens." I was tempted to say, 
 words of Dupin the one who was President of the Cham- 
 ber on the day of the Coup d'Etat, and who was Louis-Phi- 
 lippe's personal friend, " Soyons citoyens, mais restons mes- 
 sieurs," but I thought it better not. My friend had given 
 up all idea of attending to business. " It will not be of the 
 least use," he said. " If I had ribbons to sell instead of cot- 
 tons, I might make a lot of money, though ; for I am open 
 to wager that some of our patriotic neighbours, while they 
 are going to bell the cat outside, have given orders to their 
 workpeople to manufacture tricolour cockades and rosettes 
 with the magic E. F. (Republique Franqaise) in the centre." 
 
 " You do not mean that they would think of such a thing 
 at such a critical moment, even if the republic were a greater 
 probability than it appears to be ? " I remonstrated. 
 
 " I do mean to say so," he replied, beckoning at the same 
 time to a sleek, corpulent lieutenant, standing a few paces 
 away. " Can you do with a nice lot of narrow silk ribbon ? " 
 he asked, as the individual walked up to our table. 
 
 " What colour ? " inquired the lieutenant. 
 
 My friend gave me a significant look, and named all the 
 hues of the rainbow except white, red, and blue. 
 
 " Won't do," said the lieutenant, shaking his head. " If 
 it had been red, white, and blue I would have bought as much 
 as you like, because I am manufacturing rosettes for the good 
 cause." After this he walked away. 
 
 On the Thursday afternoon the Boulevards and principal 
 thoroughfares swarmed with peripatetic vendors of the re-
 
 212 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 publican insignia, and some of my friends expressed their sur- 
 prise as to where they had come from in so short a time. See- 
 ing that they were Frenchmen, I held my tongue, even when 
 one professed to explain, " They have come from England ; 
 they are always speculating upon our misfortunes, though 
 they do it cleverly enough. They got scent of what was com- 
 ing, and sent them over as quickly as they could. Truly they 
 are a great nation of shopkeepers ! " I was reminded of 
 Beranger's scapegrace, when he was accused of being drunk. 
 
 " Qu'est que cela me fait, a inoi f 
 
 Que Ton m'appeile ivrogne ? " 
 he sings. 
 
 As the afternoon wore on, the excitement increased ; the 
 news from the Boulevards became alarming, and at about 
 three o'clock the company marched away. As a matter of 
 course we followed, and equally, as a matter of course, did not 
 leave them until 2.30 next morning. Casualties to report. A 
 lai-ge scratch in one of the drummer's cheeks, made by an 
 oyster-shell, flung at the company as it turned round the cor- 
 ner of the Rue de Clery. No battles, no skirmishes, a great 
 deal of fraternizing with " le peuple souverain," whom, in 
 their own employ, the well-to-do tradesmen would have or- 
 dered about like so many mangy curs. 
 
 From that day forth I have never dipped into any history 
 of modern France, professing to deal with the political causes 
 and effects of the various upheavals during the nineteenth 
 century in France. They may be worth reading ; I do not 
 say that they are not. I have preferred to look at the men 
 who instigated those disorders, and have come to the conclu- 
 sion that, had each of them been born with five or ten thou- 
 sand a year, their names would have been absolutely wanting 
 in connection with them. This does not mean that the dis- 
 orders would not have taken place, but they would have al- 
 ways been led by men in want of five or ten thousand a year. 
 On the other hand, if the D'Orleans family had been less 
 wealthy than they are there would have been no firmly set- 
 tled third republic ; if Louis-Napoleon had been less poor, 
 there would, in all probability, have been no second empire ; 
 if the latter had lasted another year, we should have found 
 Gambetta among the ministers of Napoleon III., just like 
 Emile Ollivier, of the " light heart." " Les convictions po- 
 litiques en France sont basees sur le fait que le Ipuis d'or vaut 
 sept fois plus que 1'ecu de trois francs." This is the dictum
 
 A MILITARY SPECTACLE. 213 
 
 of a man who never wished to be anything, who steadfastly 
 refused all offers to enter the arena of public life. 
 
 My friend and I had been baulked of the drama we ex- 
 pected for we frankly confessed to one another that the 
 utter annihilation of that company of National Guards 
 would have left us perfectly unmoved, and got instead, a 
 kind of first act of a military spectacular play, such as we 
 were in the habit of seeing at Franconi's. The civic war- 
 riors were ostensibly bivouacking on the Boulevard St. Mar- 
 tin; they stacked their muskets and fraternized with the 
 crowd ; it would not have surprised us in the least to see a 
 troupe of ballet dancers advance into our midst and give us 
 the entertainment de rigueur the intermede. It was the 
 only thing wanting to complete the picture, from which even 
 the low comedy incident was not wanting. An old woebe- 
 gone creature, evidently the worse for liquor, had fallen 
 down while a patrol of regulars was passing. He was not a 
 bit hurt ; but there and then the rabble proposed to carry 
 him to the Hotel de Ville, and to give him an apotheosis as 
 a martyr to the cause. They had already fetched a stretcher, 
 and were, notwithstanding his violent struggles, hoisting 
 him on it, when prevented by the captain of the National 
 Guards. 
 
 Still, we returned next day to the Cafe Gregoire. In the 
 middle of the place there lay an old man that one, stark 
 dead, who had been fired upon without rhyme or reason by a 
 picket of the National Guards. It was only about eleven 
 o'clock, and those valiant defenders of public order were still 
 resting from their fatigue at any rate, there were few of 
 them about. There was a discussion going on whether they 
 should go out or not a discussion confined to the captain, 
 two lieutenants, and as many sub-lieutenants. They ap- 
 peared not to have the least idea of the necessity to refer 
 for orders to the colonel or the head-quarters of the regiment 
 or the legion, as it was called. They meant to settle the 
 matter among themselves. The great argument in favour of 
 calling out the men was that one of them, while standing at 
 his window that very morning, was fired at by a passing rag- 
 amuffin, who, instead of hitting him, shattered his window- 
 panes. 
 
 " "Well," said one of the lieutenants, who had been op- 
 posed to the calling out of the men, " then we are quits after 
 all; for look at the old fellow lying out there."
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " No, we are not," retorts the captain ; " for he was shot 
 by a mistake, so he doesn't count." 
 
 " L'esprit ne perd jamais ses droits en France ; " so, in 
 another moment or two, the bugle sounded lustily through- 
 out the quarter. We followed the buglers for a little while, 
 it being still too early for our breakfast, and consequently 
 enjoyed the felicity of seeing a good many of the warriors 
 " in their habit as they lived " indoors namely, in dressing- 
 gown and slippers and smoking-caps. For most of them 
 opened their windows on the first, second, and third floors, 
 to inquire whether the call was urgent. The buglers entered 
 into explanations. No, the call was not urgent, but the cap- 
 tain had decided on a military promenade, just to reassure 
 the neighbourhood, and to stimulate the martial spirit of the 
 lagging members of the company. The explanation invari- 
 ably provoked the same answer, and in a voice not that of 
 the citizen- warrior : " Que le capitaine attende jusqu'apre's le 
 dejeuner." 
 
 Davoust has said that the first condition of the fitness of 
 an army is its commissariat. In that respect every one of 
 these National Guards was fit to be a Davoust, for their forti- 
 fying of the inner man was not accomplished until close upon 
 two o'clock. By that time they marched out, saluted by the 
 cries of " Vive la Keforme ! " of all the ragtag and bobtail 
 from the Faubourgs du Temple and St. Antoine, who had in- 
 vaded the principal thoroughfares. The " Marseillaise," the 
 " Chant des Girondins," " La Eepublique nous appelle " re- 
 sounded through the air ; and I was wondering whether 
 they were packing their trunks at the Tuileries, also what 
 these National Guards had come out for. They only seemed 
 to impede the efficient patrolling of the streets by the regu- 
 lars, and, instead of dispersing the rabble, they attracted 
 them. They were evidently under the impression that they 
 made a very goodly show, and at every word of command I 
 expected to see the captain burst asunder. When we got to 
 the Boulevard St. Martin, the latter was told that the sixth 
 legion was stationed on the Boulevard du Temple. A move 
 was made in that direction. 
 
 Now " Eichard is himself again ; " he is among the crowd 
 he likes best the crowd of the Boulevard du Crime, with its 
 theatres, large and small, its raree and puppet shows, its 
 open-air entertainments, its cafes and mountebanks ; and, 
 what is more, he is there in his uniform, distinguished from
 
 THE CIVIC WARRIOR IN HIS GLORY. 215 
 
 the rest, and consequently the cynosure of all the little ac- 
 tresses and pretty figurantes who have just left the rehearsal 
 for by this time it is after three and who are but too will- 
 ing to be entertained. Appointments are made to dine or to 
 sup together, without the slightest reference as to what may 
 happen in the interval. All at once there is an outcry and 
 a rush towards the Porte Saint-Martin ; our warriors are 
 obliged to leave their inamoratas, and when they come to 
 look for their muskets, which they. have placed in a corner 
 for convenience' sake, they find that a good many have disap- 
 peared. The customers belonging to the sovereign people 
 have slunk off with them. Nevertheless they join the ranks, 
 for the bugle has sounded. At the corner of the Faubourg 
 Saint-Martin, whence the noise proceeded, they are met by 
 three or four score of the sovereign people, ragged, unkempt, 
 who are pushing in front of them two of the students of the 
 Ecole Polytechnique. The two young fellows are very pale, 
 and can scarcely speak. Still they manage to explain that 
 the Municipal Guard at the Saint-Martin barracks have fired 
 upon the people : then they go their way. "Whither ? Heaven 
 only knows. But our captain, in the most stentorian of 
 voices, gives the word of command, " To the right, wheel ! " 
 and we are striding up the faubourg, which is absolutely 
 deserted as far as the Eue des Marais. A collision seems 
 pretty inevitable now, the more that the Municipal Guards 
 are already taking aim, when all at once pur captain and one 
 of the lieutenants rush forward, and fling themselves into 
 the arms of the officers of the Municipal Guards. Tableau ; 
 and I am baulked once more of a good fight. I leave my 
 friend to see the rest of this ridiculous comedy, and take my 
 departure there and then. 
 
 The following is my companion's account of what hap- 
 pened after I left. I am as certain that every word of it is 
 true as if I had been there myself, though it seems almost 
 incredible that French officers, whose worst enemies have 
 never accused them of being deficient in courage, should 
 have acted so inconsiderately. 
 
 " The officers of the National Guards appear to have as- 
 sumed at once the office of protectors of the regulars against 
 the violence of the crowd. Why the regulars should have 
 submitted to this, seeing that they were far better armed 
 than their would-be guardians, I am unable to say. Be this 
 as it may, the regulars consented, the flag floating above the
 
 216 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 principal door of the barracks was taken down, and I really 
 believe that the Municipal Guards stacked their arms and 
 virtually handed them over to the others. But I will not 
 vouch for it. At any rate, a few hours afterwards, while the 
 company had gone to dinner, the barracks were assailed, the 
 men and officers knocked down by the people, and the build- 
 ing set on fire. When the fifth legion returned about eleven 
 o'clock to the Faubourg Saint-Martin, the flames were leap- 
 ing up to the sky, so they turned their heels contentedly 
 in the direction of the Boulevard du Temple, where they 
 bivouacked between the Theatre de la Gaite and the Ambigu- 
 Comique, while those who had made appointments with the 
 little actresses went round by the stage doors to keep them. 
 That, as far as I could judge, was the part of the fifth legion 
 in the day's proceedings. I left them in all their glory, 
 thinking themselves, no doubt, very fine fellows. 
 
 " On the Thursday morning " my companion told me 
 all this on Saturday evening, the 26th of February " I was 
 up betimes, simply because the drumming and bugling pre- 
 vented my sleeping. At eight, the Cafe Gregoire was already 
 very full, the heroes of the previous night had returned to 
 perform their ablutions, and also, I suppose, to reassure their 
 anxious spouses ; but they had no longer that conquering air 
 I noticed when I left them the night before. Whether they 
 had come to the conclusion that both in love and war they 
 had reaped but barren victories, I cannot say, but their re- 
 publican ardour, it seemed to me, had considerably cooled 
 down. I am convinced that, notwithstanding the events of 
 Wednesday night in the Faubourg Saint-Martin, they were 
 under the impression that neither the people nor the military 
 would resort to further extremities. I cannot help thinking 
 that, after I left, not a single man could have remained at his 
 post, because not one amongst them seemed to have an idea 
 of the horrible slaughter on the Boulevard des Capucines.* 
 
 * The author, as will be seen directly, saw nothing of that massacre, though 
 he must have passed within a few hundred yards of the spot immediately be- 
 fore it began. It would have been the same'if he had ; he could not have ex- 
 plained the cause, seeing that the most painstaking historians who have con- 
 sulted the most trustworthy eye-witnesses have failed to do so. It will alwavs 
 remain a mystery whence the first shot came, whether from the military who 
 were drawn up "across the Boulevard des Capucines, on the spot where now 
 stands the Grand Cafe, or from the crowd that wanted to pass, in order to pro- 
 ceed to Odilon-Barrot's to serenade him, because, notwithstanding the opposi- 
 tion of the king, he was to be included in the new ministry, which Mole had 
 been instructed to form. It may safely be said, however, that, but for that shot
 
 THE EVE OP THE REVOLUTION. 17 
 
 They were not left very long in ignorance of the real state of 
 affairs, and then they saw at once that they had roused a 
 spectre they would be unable to lay. From that moment, it 
 is my opinion, they would have willingly drawn back, but it 
 was too late. While they were still debating, an individual 
 rushed in, telling them that one or two regiments, command- 
 ed by a general (who turned out to be General Bedeau), had 
 drawn up in front of the barricade which had been thrown 
 up during the night in the Boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle, and 
 was being defended by a detachment of the fifth legion. 
 They all ran out, and I ran with them. When we got to the 
 boulevard, matters had already been arranged, and they were 
 just in time to join the escort General Bedeau had accepted, 
 after having consented not to execute the orders with which 
 he had been entrusted. By that time I began to perceive 
 which way the wind was blowing : the canaille had uncere- 
 moniously linked their arms in those of the National Guards, 
 and insisted, courteously but firmly, on carrying their fire- 
 arms. When we got to the Rue Montmartre, they took the 
 horses out of the gun-carriages, and the soldiers looked tame- 
 ly on, notwithstanding the commands of their officers. When 
 the latter endeavoured to enforce their orders by hitting 
 them with the flat of their swords, they simply left the ranks 
 and joined the rabble. I had had enough of it, and made 
 my way home by the back streets. I had had enough of it, 
 and kept indoors until this afternoon." 
 
 Thus far my informant. As for myself, I saw little on 
 the Wednesday night of what was going on. It was my own 
 fault : I was too optimistic. I had scarcely gone a few 
 steps, after my dinner, when, just in front of the Gymnase, 
 they began shouting, "La Patrie, Journal du soir; achetez 
 La Patrie. Voyez le nouveau ministere de Monsieur Mole." 
 I remember giving the fellow half a franc, at which he grum- 
 bled, though it was three times the ordinary price. On 
 opening the paper, I rashly concluded from what I read that 
 the revolution was virtually at an end, and I was the more 
 confirmed in my opinion by the almost instantaneous light- 
 ing up of the Boulevards. It was like a fairy scene : people 
 were illuminating a little bit too soon, as it turned out. 
 Being tired of wandering, and feeling no inclination for bed, 
 
 and the slaughter consequent upon it, the revol 
 then after all, perhaps, only temporarily. EDI 
 
 olution might have been averted 
 TOR. 
 
 10
 
 218 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 I turned into the Gymnase. There were Bressant and Rose 
 Cheri and Arnal; I would surely be able to spend a few 
 pleasant hours. But alack and alas ! the house presented a 
 very doleful appearance dead-heads, to a man ; and very 
 few of these, people who, if they could not fiddle themselves, 
 like Nero while Rome was burning, would go to hear fiddling 
 under no matter what circumstances, provided they were not 
 asked to pay. I did not stay long, but when I came out into 
 the streets the noise was too deafening for me. The " Mar- 
 seillaise " has always had a particularly jarring effect upon 
 my nerves. There are days when I could be cruel enough to 
 prefer " the yells of those ferocious soldiers, as they murder 
 in cold blood the sons and the companions " of one section 
 of defenceless patriots, to the stirring strains of the other 
 section as they figuratively rush to the rescue ; and on that 
 particular evening I felt in that mood. So, when I got to the 
 Boulevard Montmartre, I turned into the Theatre des Varie- 
 tes. I remember the programme up to this day. They were 
 playing " Le Suisse de Marly," " Le Marquis de Lauzun," 
 " Les Extremes se touchent," and " Les Vieux Peches." I had 
 seen the second and the last piece at least a dozen times, but 
 I was always ready to see them again for the sake of Virginie 
 Dejazet in the one, of Bouffe in the other. The lessee at 
 that time was an Englishman. Bouffe and I had always 
 kept up our friendship ; so I made up my mind to go and 
 have a chat with him, hoping that Dejazet, whose conversa- 
 tion affected one like a bottle of champagne, would join us. 
 The house, like the Gymnase, was almost empty, but I made 
 my way behind the scenes, and in about half an hour forgot 
 all about the events outside. Bouffe was telling me anec- 
 dotes about his London performances, and Dejazet was imi- 
 tating the French of some of the bigwigs of King Leopold's 
 court ; so the time passed pleasantly enough. At the end of 
 the performance we proposed taking supper, and turned 
 down the Rue Montmartre. It was late when I returned 
 home, consequently I saw nothing of the slaughter on the 
 Boulevard des Capucines. 
 
 Though I had gone to bed late, I was up betimes on the 
 Thursday morning. A glance at the Boulevards, as I turned 
 the corner of my street about half- past nine, convinced me 
 that the illuminations of the previous night had been pre- 
 mature, and that before the day was out there would be an 
 end of the monarchy of July. A slight mist was still hang-
 
 THE SOLDIERS AND THE PEOPLE. 219 
 
 ing over the city as I strolled in the direction of the Made- 
 leine, and the weather was damp and raw, but in about half 
 an hour the sun broke through. A shot was heard now and 
 then, but I myself saw no collision then between the troops 
 and the people. On the contrary, it looked to me as if the 
 former would have been glad to be left alone. As I had been 
 obliged to leave home without my usual cup of tea for want 
 of milk the servant had told me there was none I went 
 back a little way to Tortoni's, where I was greeted with the 
 same answer. I could have tea or coffee or chocolate made 
 with water, but milk there was none on that side of Paris, 
 and, unless things took a turn, there would be no butter. The 
 sovereign people had thrown up barricades during the night 
 round all the northern and north-western issues, and would 
 not let the milk-carts pass. They, no doubt, had some more 
 potent fluids to fall back upon, for a good many, even at that 
 early hour, were by no means steady in their gait. The 
 Boulevards were swarming with them. Since then, I have 
 seen these sovereign people getting the upper hand twice, 
 viz. on the 4th of September, '70, and on the 18th of March, 
 '71. I have seen them during the siege of Paris, and I have 
 no hesitation in saying that, for cold-blooded, apish, monkey- 
 ish, tigerish cruelty, there is nothing on the face of God's 
 earth to match them, and that no concessions wrung from 
 society on their behalf will ever make them anything else 
 but the fiends in human shape they are. 
 
 After my fruitless attempt to get my accustomed break- 
 fast, I resumed my perambulations, this time taking the Eue 
 Vivienne as far as the Palais-Eoyal. It must have been be- 
 tween half -past ten and eleven when I reached the Place du 
 Carrousel, which, at a rough guess, was occupied by about 
 five thousand regular infantry and horse and National Guards. 
 The Place du Carrousel was not then, what it became later 
 on, a large open space. Part of it was encumbered with nar- 
 row streets of very tall houses, and from their windows and 
 roofs the sovereign people according to an officer who had 
 been on duty from early morn had been amusing themselves 
 by firing on the troops, not in downright volleys, but with 
 isolated shots, picking out a man here and there. " But," I 
 remonstrated, " half a dozen pompiers and a score of lines- 
 men could dislodge them in less than ten minutes, instead of 
 returning their shots one by one." " So they could," was the 
 reply, " but orders came from the Chateau not to do so, and
 
 220 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 here we are. Besides," added my informant, " I doubt very 
 much, if I gave my men the word of command to storm the 
 place, whether they would do so; they are thoroughly de- 
 moralized. On our way hither I had the greatest difficulty 
 in keeping them together. Without a roll-call I could not 
 exactly tell you how many are missing, but as we came along 
 I noticed several falling out and going into the wine-shops 
 with the rabble. They did not come back again. I had to 
 shut my eyes to it. If I had attempted to prevent it, there 
 would have been a more horrible slaughter than there was 
 last night on the Boulevards, and, what is worse, the men 
 who remained staunch would have been in a minority, and 
 not able to stand their ground. The mob have got hold of 
 the muskets of the National Guards. I dare say, as you 
 came along, you noticed on many doors, written up in chalk, 
 'Arms given up,' and on some the words 'with pleasure' 
 added to the statement." It was perfectly true; I had 
 noticed it. 
 
 I was still talking to the captain when the drums began 
 to beat and the buglers sounded the salute. At the same 
 moment I saw the King, in the uniform of a general of the 
 National Guards, cross the court-yard on horseback. I no- 
 ticed a great many ladies at the ground-floor windows of the 
 palace, but could not distinguish their faces. I was told aft- 
 erwards that they were the Queen and the princesses, endeav- 
 ouring to encourage the septuagenarian monarch. Louis-Phi- 
 lippe was seventy-five then. 
 
 I have often heard and seen it stated by historians of the 
 revolution of '48, that the Duke d'Aumale and the Prince de 
 Joinville, had they been in Paris, would have saved their fa- 
 ther's crown. This is an assumption which it is difficult to 
 disprove, seeing how popular these young princes were then. 
 But if the assumption is meant to convey that the mob at the 
 sight of these brave young fellows would have laid down their 
 arms without fighting, I can unhesitatingly contradict it. 
 What the National Guard might have done it is impossible to 
 say. The regulars, no doubt, would have followed the princes 
 into battle, as they would have followed their brother, De Ne- 
 mours, notwithstanding the latter's unpopularity. There 
 would have been a great deal of bloodshed, but the last word 
 would have remained with the Government. Louis-Philippe's 
 greatest title to glory is that of having prevented such blood- 
 shed. But to show how little such abnegation of self is un-
 
 EXIT LOUIS-PHILIPPE. 221 
 
 derstood by even the most educated Frenchmen, I must re- 
 late a story which was told to me many years afterwards by a 
 French officer who, at that time, had just returned from the 
 Pontifical States, where he had helped to defeat the small 
 army of Garibaldi. He was describing the battle-field of 
 Mentana to Napoleon III., and mentioned a prisoner he had 
 made who turned out to be an old acquaintance from the 
 Boulevards. " He was furious against Garibaldi, sire," said 
 the officer, " because the latter had placed him in the neces- 
 sity, as it were, of firing upon his own countrymen in a strange 
 land. Said the prisoner, ' I am not an emigre ; I would not 
 have gone to Coblenz ; I am a Frenchman from the crown of 
 my head to the sole of my foot. If it came to fighting my 
 countrymen in the streets of Paris, that would be a different 
 thing. I should not have the slightest scruple of firing upon 
 the Imperial Guards or upon the rabble, as the case might 
 be, for that would be civil war.' That's what he said, sire." 
 
 Napoleon nodded his head, and with his wonderful, sphinx- 
 like smile, replied, " Your prisoner was right ; it makes all the 
 difference." The Orleans princes, save perhaps one, never 
 knew these distinctions ; if they had known them, the Comte 
 de Paris might be King of France to-day. 
 
 To return for a moment to Louis-Philippe as I saw him 
 at the last moments of his reign. He felt evidently disap- 
 pointed at the lukewarm reception he received, for though 
 there was a faint cry among the regulars of " Vive le Hoi ! " 
 it was immediately drowned by the stentorian one of the rab- 
 ble of " Vive la Kef orme ! " in which a good many of the Na- 
 tional Guards joined. He was evidently in a hurry to get 
 back to the Tuileries, and, when he disappeared in the door- 
 way, I had looked upon him for the last time in my life. An 
 hour and a half later, he had left Paris for ever. 
 
 Personally I saw nothing of the flight of the King, nor of 
 the inside of the Tuileries, until the royal family were gone. 
 The story of that flight was told to me several years later by 
 the Due de Montpensier. What is worse, in those days it 
 never entered my mind that a time would come when I should 
 feel desirous of committing my reminiscences to paper, con- 
 sequently I kept no count of the hours that went by, and can- 
 not, therefore, give the exact sequence of events. I do not 
 know how long I stood among the soldiers and the crowd,
 
 222 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 scarcely divided from one another even by an imaginary line. 
 It was not a pleasant crowd, though to my great surprise there 
 were a great many more decently dressed persons in it than I 
 could have expected, so I stayed on. About half an hour 
 after the King re-entered the Tuileries, I noticed two gentle- 
 men elbow their way through the serried masses. I had no 
 difficulty in recognizing the one in civilian's clothes. Though 
 he was by no means so famous as he became afterwards, there 
 was hardly a Parisian who would not have recognized him on 
 the spot. His portrait had been drawn over and over again, 
 at least as many times as that of the King, and it is a posi- 
 tive fact that nurses frightened their babies with it. He was 
 the ugliest man of the century. It was M. Adolphe Cre- 
 mieux.* His companion was in uniform. I learnt after- 
 wards that it was General Gourgaud, but I did not know him 
 then except by name, and in connection with his polemics 
 with the Duke of Wellington, in which the latter did not 
 altogether behave with the generosity one expects from an 
 English gentleman towards a fallen foe. As they passed, the 
 old soldier must have been recognized, because not one, but 
 at least a hundred cries resounded, " Vive la grande armee ! 
 Vive PEmpereur ! " In after years I thought that these cries 
 sounded almost prophetic, though I am pretty sure that those 
 who uttered them had not the slightest hope of, and perhaps 
 not even a desire for, a Napoleonic restoration ; at any rate, 
 not the majority. There is one thing, however, which could 
 not have failed to strike the impartial observer during the 
 next twenty years. I have seen a good many riots, small and 
 large, during the Second Eepublic and the Second Empire. 
 " Seditious cries," as a matter of course, were freely shouted. 
 I have never heard a single one of " Vivent les D'Orleans ! " 
 or " Vivent les Bourbons ! " I have already spoken more than 
 once about the powerful influence of the Napoleonic legend 
 in those days ; I shall have occasion to refer to it again and 
 again when speaking about the nephew of the first Napoleon. 
 Cremieux and Gourgaud could not have been inside the 
 Tuileries more than a quarter of an hour when they rushed 
 out again. They evidently made a communication to the 
 troops, because I beheld the latter waving their arms, but, of 
 
 * The author is slightly mistaken. The two ugliest men in France in the 
 nineteenth century were Andrieux, who wrote " Les Etourdis," and Littre" ; but 
 Cremieux ran them very hard. EDITOR.
 
 SCENES AT THE TUILERIES. 223 
 
 course, I did not catch a word of what they said ; I was too 
 far away. It was, I learnt afterwards, the announcement of 
 the advent of a new ministry, and the appointment of a new 
 commander of the National Guards. When I saw hats and 
 caps flung into the air, and heard the people shouting, I 
 made certain that the revolution was at an end. I was mis- 
 taken. It was not Cremieux's communication at all that had 
 provoked the enthusiasm ; it was a second communication, 
 made by some one from the doorway of the Tuileries im- 
 mediately after the eminent barrister had disappeared among 
 the crowd, to the effect that the King had abdicated in 
 favour of the Comte de Paris, with the Duchesse d'Orleans 
 as regent. Between the first and second announcements 
 there could not have elapsed more than five or six minutes, 
 ten at the utmost, because, before Phad time to recover from 
 my surprise, I saw Cremieux and Gourgaud battle through 
 the tightly wedged masses once more, and re-enter the 
 Tuileries to verify the news. I am writing this note espe- 
 cially by the light of subsequent information, for, I repeat, it 
 was impossible to understand events succinctly by the quickly 
 succeeding effects they produced at the time. Another ten 
 minutes elapsed ten minutes which I shall never forget, be- 
 cause every one of the thousands present on the Place du 
 Carrousel was in momentary danger of having the life 
 crushed out of him. It was no one's fault ; there was, if I 
 recollect rightly, but one narrow issue on the river-side, and 
 there was a dense seething mass standing on the banks, not- 
 withstanding the danger of that position, for the insurgents 
 were firing freely and recklessly across the stream. Egress 
 on the opposite side of the Place du Carrousel, that of the 
 Place du Palais-Eoyal, had become absolutely impossible, for 
 at that moment a fierce battle was raging there between the 
 people and the National Guards for the possession of the 
 military post of the Chateau d'Eau ; * and those of the non- 
 combatants who did not think it necessary to pay for the fall 
 or the maintenance of the monarchy of July with life or 
 limb, tried to get out of the bullets' reach. There was but 
 one way of doing so, by a stampede in a southerly direction ; 
 the Rue de Rivoli, at any rate that part which existed, was 
 
 * So called after a large ornamental fountain : the same, I believe, which 
 subsequently was transferred to what is now called the Place de la Eepublique, 
 and which finally found its way to the Avenue Daumesnil, where it stands at 
 present. EDITOR.
 
 224 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 entirely blocked to the west, the congeries of streets that 
 have been pulled down since to make room for its prolonga- 
 tion to the east were bristling with barricades : hence the 
 terrible, suffocating crush, in which several persons lost their 
 lives. The most curious incident connected with these awful 
 ten minutes was that of a woman and her baby. When 
 Cremieux issued for the second time from the Tuileries, it 
 was to confirm the news of the King's abdication. Almost 
 immediately afterwards, the masses on the quay were making 
 for the Place de la Concorde and the Palais-Bourbon, 
 whither, it was rumoured, the Duchesse D'Orleans and her 
 two sons were going ; and gradually the wedged-in mass on 
 the Place du Carrousel found breathing space. Then the 
 woman was seen to fall down like a ninepin that has been 
 toppled over; she was dead, but her baby, which she had 
 held above the crowd, and which they had, as it were, to 
 wrench from her grasp, was alive and well. 
 
 I stood for a little while longer on the Place du Carrousel, 
 trying to make up my mind whether to proceed to the Place de 
 la Concorde or to the Place de 1'Hotel de Ville. I knew that 
 the newly-elected powers, whosoever they might be, would 
 make their appearance at the latter spot, but how long it 
 would be before they came, I had not the least idea. I was 
 determined, however, to see at any rate one act of the drama 
 or the farce ; for even then there was no knowing in what 
 guise events would present themselves. I could hear the 
 reports of firearms on both sides of me, though why there 
 should be firing when the King had thrown up the sponge, 
 I could not make out for the life of me. I did not know 
 France so well then as I know her now. I did not know 
 then that there is no man or, for that matter, no woman on 
 the civilized earth so heedlessly and obdurately bloodthirsty 
 when he or she works himself into a fury as the professedly 
 debonnaire Parisian proletarian. Nevertheless, I decided to 
 go to the Hotel de Ville, and had carefully worked my way 
 as far as the site of the present Place du Chatelet, when I 
 was compelled to retrace my steps. The elite of the Paris 
 scum was going to dictate its will to the new Government ; 
 it was marching to the Chamber of Deputies with banners 
 flying. One of the latter was a red-and- white striped flannel 
 petticoat, fastened to a tremendously long pole. I had no 
 choice, and if at that moment my friends had seen me they 
 might have easily imagined that I had become one of the lead-
 
 THE SACKING OP THE T [TILERIES. 225 
 
 ers of the revolutionary mob. We took by the Quai de la Me- 
 gisserie, and just before the Pont des Arts there was a mo- 
 mentary halt. The vanguard, which I was apparently lead- 
 ing, had decided to turn to the right ; in other words, to 
 visit the abode of the hated tyrant. Had I belonged to the 
 main division, I should have witnessed a really more im- 
 portant scene, from the historical point of view ; as it was, I 
 witnessed 
 
 THE SACKING OF THE TUILEKIES. 
 
 The idea that " there is a divinity that hedgeth round a 
 king" seemed, I admit, preposterous enough at that mo- 
 ment; but I could not help being struck with its partial 
 truth on seeing the rabble invade the palace. When I say 
 the rabble, I mean the rabble, though there were a great 
 many persons whom it would be an insult to class as such, 
 and who from sheer curiosity, or because they could not help 
 themselves, had gone in with them. The doors proved too 
 narrow, and those who could not enter by that way, entered 
 by the windows. The whole contingent of the riff-raff, male 
 and female, weltering in the adjacent streets and such 
 streets ! was there. Well, for the first ten minutes they 
 stood positively motionless, not daring to touch anything. 
 It was not the fear of being caught pilfering and punished 
 summarily that prevented them. The minority which might 
 have protested was so utterly insignificant in numbers, as to 
 make action on their part impossible. No, it was neither 
 fear nor shame that stayed the rabble's hands ; it was a sen- 
 timent for which I can find no name. It was the conscious- 
 ness that these objects had belonged to a king, to a royal 
 family, which made them gaze upon them in a kind of 
 superstitious wonder. It did not last long. We were on the 
 ground floor, which mainly consisted of the private apart- 
 ments of the household of Louis- Philippe. We were wander- 
 ing, or rather squeezing, through the study and bedroom of 
 the King himself, through the sitting-rooms of the princes 
 and princesses. I do not think that a single thing was taken 
 from there at that particular time. But as if the atmosphere 
 their rulers had breathed but so very recently became too 
 oppressive, the crowd swayed towards the vestibule, and 
 ascended the grand staircase. Then the spell was broken. 
 The second batch, that entered through the windows, when 
 we had made room for them, were apparently not affected
 
 226 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 by wonder and respect, for, half an hour later, when I came 
 down again, every cupboard, every wardrobe, had been forced, 
 though it is but fair to say that very little seems to have been 
 taken ; the contents, books, clothing, linen, etc., were scat- 
 tered on the floors ; but the cellars, containing over four 
 thousand bottles of wine, were positively empty. Two hours 
 later, however, the clothing, especially that of the princesses, 
 had totally disappeared. It had disappeared on the backs 
 of the inmates of St. Lazare, the doors of which had been 
 thrown open, and who had rushed to the Tuileries to deck 
 themselves with these fine feathers which, in this instance, 
 did not make fine birds. I saw some of them that same 
 evening on the Boulevards, and a more heart-rending spec- 
 tacle I have rarely beheld. 
 
 The three hours I spent at the Tuileries were so crowded 
 with events as to make a succinct account of them altogether 
 impossible. I can only give fragments, because, though at 
 first the wearers of broadcloth were not molested, this toler- 
 ance did not last long on the part of the new possessors of 
 the Tuileries ; and consequently the former gradually dropped 
 off, and those of them who remained had to be very circum- 
 spect, and, above all, not to linger long in the same spot. 
 This growing hostility might have been nipped in the bud 
 by our following the example of the National Guards, and 
 taking off our coats and fraternizing with the rabble ; but I 
 frankly confess that I had neither the courage nor the stom- 
 ach to dp so. I have read descriptions of mutinous sailors 
 stowing in casks of rum and gorging themselves with vict- 
 uals ; revolting as such scenes must be to those who take no 
 active part in them, I doubt whether they could be as revolt- 
 ing as the one I witnessed in the Gallerie de Diane. 
 
 The Gallerie de Diane was one of the large reception 
 rooms on the first floor, but it generally served as the dining 
 and breakfast room of the royal family. The table had been 
 laid for about three dozen persons, because, as a rule, Louis- 
 Philippe invited the principal members of his military and 
 civil households to take their repasts with him. The break- 
 fast had been interrupted, and not been cleared away. When 
 I entered the apartment some sixty or seventy ruffians of 
 both sexes were seated at the board, while a score or so were 
 engaged in waiting upon them. They were endeavouring to 
 accomplish Avhat the Highest Authority has declared impos- 
 sible of accomplishment, namely, the making of silken purses
 
 THE SOVEREIGN PEOPLE AT TABLE. 227 
 
 out of sows' ears. They were " putting on " what they con- 
 sidered " company manners," and, under any other circum- 
 stances but these, the attempt would have proved irresistibly 
 comic to the educated spectator ; as it was, it brought tears 
 to one's eyes. I have already hinted elsewhere that the cui- 
 sine at the Tuileries during Louis-Philippe's reign was ex- 
 ecrable, though the wine was generally good. Bad as was 
 the fare on that abandoned breakfast-table, it must, never- 
 theless, have been superior to that usually partaken of by 
 the convives who had taken the place of the fugitive king 
 and princes. They, the convives, however, did not think so ; 
 they criticized the food, and ordered the improvised attend- 
 ants " to give them something different ; " then they turned 
 to their female companions, filling their glasses and paying 
 them compliments. But for the fact of another batch ea- 
 gerly claiming their turn, the repast would have been indefi- 
 nitely prolonged ; as it was, the provisions in the palace were 
 running short, and the deficiency had to be made up by sup- 
 plies from outside. The inner man being refreshed, the la- 
 dies were invited to take a stroll through the apartments, 
 pending the serving of the cafe and liqueurs. The prepa- 
 ration of the mocha was somewhat difficult, seeing the uten- 
 sils necessary for the supply of so large a company were 
 probably not at hand, and the ingredients themselves in the 
 store-rooms of the palace. Nothing daunted, one of the 
 self-invited guests rose and said, in a loud voice, " Permettez 
 moi d'offrir ]e cafe a la compagnie," which offer was re- 
 ceived with tumultuous applause. Suiting the action to the 
 word, he pulled out a small canvas bag, and took from it 
 two five-franc pieces. " Qu'on aille chercher du cafe et du 
 meilleur," he said to one of the guests who had stepped for- 
 ward to execute his orders, for they sounded almost like it ; 
 and I was wondering why those professed champions of 
 equality did not tell him to fetch the coffee himself. Then 
 he added, " Et pendant que tu y es, citoyen, apporte des 
 cigarres pour nous et des cigarettes pour les dames." The 
 " citoyen " was already starting on his errand, when the 
 other " citoyen " called him back. " Ecoute," he said ; " tu 
 n'acheteras rien a moins d'y etre force. Je crois que tu 
 n'auras qu'a demander a la premiere epicerie venue ce qu'il 
 te faut, et ainsi au premier bureau de tabac. Us ont si peur, 
 ces sales bourgeois qu'ils n'oseront pas te refuser. En tout 
 cas preuds un fusil ; on ne sait pas ce qui peut arriver ; mais
 
 228 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 ne t'en sers pas qu'en cas de necessity : " which meant 
 plainly enough, " If they refuse to give you the coffee and 
 the tobacco, shoot them down." 
 
 Of course, I am unable to say how these two commodities 
 were eventually procured ; but I have every reason to believe 
 that this messenger had only " to ask and have," without as 
 much as showing his musket. There is no greater cur at 
 troublous times than the Paris shopkeeper. The merest 
 urchin will terrify him. Even on the previous day I had 
 seen bands of gamins who had constituted themselves the 
 guardians of the barricades and there was one in nearly 
 every street levy toll without the slightest resistance, when 
 a few well-administered cuffs would have sent them flying, 
 so I have not the slightest doubt that our friend had all the 
 credit of his generosity without disbursing a penny unless 
 his delegate fleeced him also, on the theory that a man who 
 could " fork out " ten francs at a moment's notice was 
 nothing more or less than a bourgeois. However, when I 
 returned after about forty minutes' absence, it was very evi- 
 dent that both the coffee and the tobacco had arrived, because 
 the Galerie de Diane, large as it was, was full of smoke, and 
 three saucepans, filled with water, were standing on the fire, 
 while two or three smaller ones were arranged on the almost 
 priceless marble mantelpiece. Another batch of ravenous 
 republicans had taken their seats at the board, their predeces- 
 sors whiling the time away in sweet converse with the " ladies." 
 Some of the latter were more usefully engaged ; they were 
 rifling the cabinets of the most rare and valuable Sevres, and 
 arranging the cups, saucers, platters on their tops to be ready 
 for the beverage that was being brewed. I was wondering 
 how they had got at these art treasures, having noticed an 
 hour before that their receptacles were locked and the keys 
 taken away The doors had simply been battered in with the 
 hammer of the great clock of the Tuileries. 
 
 It was of a piece with the wanton destruction I had wit- 
 nessed elsewhere, during my absence from the Galerie de 
 Diane. Before I returned thither, I had seen the portrait of 
 General Bugeaud in the Salle des Marechaux, literally stabbed 
 with bayonets ; the throne treated to a similar fate, and car- 
 ried off to the Place de la Bastille to be burned publicly ; the 
 papers of the royal family mercilessly flung to the winds ; the 
 dresses of the princesses torn to ribbons or else put on the 
 backs of the vilest of the vile.
 
 THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT. 229 
 
 There was only one comic incident to relieve the horror 
 of the whole. In one of the private apartments the rabble 
 had come upon an aged parrot screeching at the top of its 
 voice, " A bas Guizot ! " The bird became a hero there and 
 then, and was absolutely crammed with sweets and sugar. 
 That one comic note was not enough to dispel my disgust, 
 and after the scene in the Galerie de Diane which I have 
 just described, I made my way into the street. 
 
 I had scarcely proceeded a few steps, when I heard the 
 not very startling news that the republic had been formally 
 proclaimed in the Chamber by M. de Lamartine, who had 
 afterwards repaired to the Hotel de Yille. At the same time, 
 people were shouting that the King had died suddenly. I 
 endeavoured to get as far, but, though the distance was cer- 
 tainly not more than half a mile, it took me more than an 
 hour. At every few yards my progress was interrupted by 
 barricades, the self-elected custodians of which were particu- 
 larly anxious to show their authority to a man like myself, 
 dressed in a coat. At last I managed to get to the corner of 
 the Rues des Lombards and Saint- Martin, and just in time 
 to enjoy a sight than which I have witnessed nothing more 
 comic during the succeeding popular uprisings in subsequent 
 years. I was just crossing, when a procession hove in sight, 
 composed mainly of ragged urchins, dishevelled women, and 
 riff-raff of both sexes. In their midst was an individual on 
 horseback, dressed in the uniform of a general of the First 
 Republic, whom they were cheering loudly. The stationary 
 crowd made way for them, and mingled with the escort. The 
 moment I had thrown in my lot with the latter, retreat was 
 no longer possible, and in a very short time I found myself in 
 the courtyard of the Hotel de Ville, and, in another minute 
 or so, in the principal gallery on the first floor, where, it 
 appears, some members of the Provisional Government were 
 already at work. I had not the remotest notion who they 
 were, nor did I care to inquire, having merely come to look 
 on. The work of the members of the Provisional Government 
 seemed mainly to consist in consuming enormous quantities 
 of charcuterie and washing them down with copious libations 
 of cheap wine. The place was positively reeking with the 
 smell of both, not to mention the fumes of tobacco. Every 
 one was smoking his hardest. The entrance of the individual 
 in uniform caused, some what of a sensation ; a member whom 
 I had never seen before and whom I have never beheld since
 
 230 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 stepped forward to ask his business. The new-comer did 
 not appear to know himself ; at any rate, he stammered and 
 stuttered, but his escort left him no time to betray his con- 
 fusion more plainly. " C'est le citoyen gouverneur de 1'Hotel 
 de Ville," they shouted as with one voice ; and there and 
 then the new governor was installed, though I am perfectly 
 sure that not a soul of all those present knew as much as his 
 name. 
 
 Subsequent inquiries elicited the fact that the man was a 
 fourth or fifth-rate singer, named Chateaurenaud, and en- 
 gaged at the Opera National (formerly the Cirque Olympique) 
 on the Boulevard du Temple. On that day they were having 
 a dress rehearsal of a new piece in which Chateaurenaud was 
 playing a military part. He had just donned his costume 
 when, hearing a noise on the Boulevards, he put his head out 
 of the window. The mob caught sight of him. " A general, 
 a general ! " cried several urchins ; and in less time than it 
 takes to tell, the theatre was invaded, and notwithstanding 
 his struggles, Chateaurenaud was carried off, placed on horse- 
 back, and conducted to the Hotel de Ville, where, for the 
 next fortnight, he throned as governor. For, curious to re- 
 late, M. de Lamartine ratified his appointment (?) on the 
 morning of the 25th of February. Chateaurenaud became 
 an official of the secret police during the Second Empire. I 
 often saw him on horseback in the Bois de Boulogne, when 
 the Emperor drove in that direction. 
 
 I did not stay long in the Hotel de Ville, but made my 
 way back to the Boulevards as best I could ; for by that time 
 darkness had set in, and the mob was shouting for illumina- 
 tions, and obstructing the thoroughfares everywhere. Every 
 now and then one came upon a body which had been lying 
 there since the morning, but they took no notice of it. 
 Their principal concern seemed the suitable acknowledgment 
 of the advent of the Second Kepublic by the bourgeoisie by 
 means of coloured devices, or, in default of such, by coloured 
 lamps or even candles. Woe to the houses, the inhabitants 
 of which remained deaf to their summons to that effect. In 
 a very few minutes every window was smashed to atoms, 
 until at last a timid hand was seen to arrange a few bottles 
 with candles stuck into them on the sill, and light them. 
 Then they departed, to impose their will elsewhere. 
 
 That night, after dinner, the first person of my acquaint- 
 ance I met was Mery. He had been in the Chamber of
 
 WHY LAMART1NE MADE A REPUBLIC. 231 
 
 Deputies from the very beginning of the proceedings ; it was 
 he who solemnly assured me that the first cry of " Vive la 
 Republique ! " had been uttered by M. de Lamartine. I was 
 surprised at this, because I had been told that early in the 
 morning the poet had paid a visit to the Duchesse d'Orleans 
 to assure her of his devotion to her cause. " That may be 
 so," said Mery, to whom I repeated what I had heard ; " but 
 you must remember that Lamartine is always hard up, and 
 closely pursued by duns. A revolution with the prospect of 
 becoming president of the republic was the only means of 
 staving off his creditors. He clutched at it as a last re- 
 source." 
 
 Alexandre Dumas was there also, but I have an idea that 
 he would have willingly passed the sponge over that incident 
 of his life, for I never could get him to talk frankly on the 
 subject. This does not mean that he would have recanted 
 his republican principles, but that he was ashamed at having 
 lent his countenance to such a republic as that. I fancy 
 there were a great many like him.
 
 232 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The Second Republic Lamartine's reason for proclaiming it Suspects Louis- 
 Napoleon of similar i ---- *- 
 back to England- 
 France after February 
 Louis-Napoleon Justification of Louis-Napoleon's belief in his " star " 
 My first meeting with him The origin of a celebrated nickname Badin- 
 guet a creation of Gavarni Louis-Napoleon_and his surroundings at the 
 
 of 
 
 vaignac, 
 jnac and 
 
 his brother Godefroi The difference between Thiers and General Ca- 
 vaignac An elector's mot Some of the candidates for the presidency of the 
 Second Republic Electioneering expenses Impecuniosity of Louis-Napo- 
 leon A story in connection with it The woman with the wooden legs 
 The salons during the Second Republic The theatres and their skits on 
 the situation " La Propri^te" c'est le Vol "France governed by the Na- 
 tionalA curious list of ministers and officials of the Second Republic 
 Armand Marrast His plans for reviving business His receptions at the 
 Palais-Bourbon as President of the Chamber of Deputies Some of the 
 
 uests The Corps Diplomatique The new deputies, their wives and 
 aughters. 
 
 I KNEW Louis-Napoleon, if not intimately, at least very 
 well, for nearly a quarter of a century, and I felt myself as 
 little competent to give an opinion on him on the last as on 
 the first day of our acquaintance. I feel almost certain of 
 one thing, though ; that, if he had had very ample means of 
 his own, the Second Empire would have never been. Since 
 its fall I have heard and read a great deal about Louis-Napo- 
 leon's unfaltering belief in his star ; I fancy it would have 
 shone less brightly to him but for the dark, impenetrable 
 sky of impecuniosity in which it was set. Mery said that 
 Lamartine proclaimed the Second Republic as a means of 
 staving off his creditors ; and the accusation was justified by 
 Lamartine's own words in the Assemblee Nationale itself on 
 the llth of September, 1848 : " Je declare hautement que le 
 24 Fevrier a midi, je ne pensais pas a la Republique." To 
 use a popular locution, the author of " L'Histoire des G-iron- 
 dins " suspected, perhaps, that Louis-Napoleon might take a
 
 THE SECOND REPUBLIC. 233 
 
 leaf from his, the author's, book ; for the needy man, though 
 perhaps not a better psychologist than most men, has a very 
 comprehensive key to the motives of a great number of his 
 fellow-creatures, especially if they be Frenchmen and pro- 
 fessional politicians. I am speaking by the light of many 
 years' observation. Furthermore, the pecuniary embarrass- 
 ments of Louis-Napoleon were no secret to any one. " I 
 have established a republic for money's sake," Lamartine said 
 to himself; "some one will endeavour to overthrow it for 
 money's sake." I am aware that this is not a very elevated 
 standard whereby to judge political events ; but I do not pro- 
 fess to be an historian mine is only the little huckster shop 
 of history. 
 
 It is more than probable that this was the reason why 
 Lamartine told Louis-Napoleon to go back to England, in 
 their interview a secret one on the 3d of March, 1848. 
 
 It was M. de Persigny who told me this many years after- 
 wards. " The Prince could afford to humour De Lamartine 
 in that way," he added, " for if ever a man was justified in 
 believing in his star it was he. I'll tell you a story which is 
 scarcely known to half a dozen men, including the Emperor 
 and myself ; I am not aware of its having been told by any 
 biographer. The moment we ascertained the truth of the 
 news that reached us from Paris, we made for the coast, and, 
 on Saturday morning, we crossed in the mail-packet. It was 
 very rough, and we had a good shaking, so that when we got 
 to Boulogne we were absolutely ' done up.' But we heard 
 that a train was to start for Paris, and, as a matter of course, 
 the Prince would not lose a minute. We had to walk to 
 Neufchatel, about three miles distant, because there was 
 something the matter with the rails, I do not know what. 
 We flung ourselves into the first compartment, which already 
 contained two travellers. Almost immediately we had got 
 under weigh, one of these, who had looked very struck when 
 we entered, addressed the Prince by name. He turned out to 
 be Monsieur Biesta, who had paid a visit to Napoleon during 
 his imprisonment at Ham, and who immediately recognized 
 him. Monsieur Biesta had just left the Due de Nemours. 
 I do not know whether he was at that time a Republican, a 
 Monarchist, or an Imperialist, but he was a man of honour, 
 and it was thanks to him that the son of Louis-Philippe 
 made his escape. The other one was the Marquis d'Arragon, 
 who died about a twelvemonth afterwards. All went well
 
 234: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 until we got to Amiens, where we had to wait a very long 
 while, the train which was to have taken us on to Paris hav- 
 ing just left. For once in a way the Prince got impatient. 
 He who on the eve of the Coup d'Etat remained, at any rate 
 outwardly, perfectly stolid, was fuming and fretting at the 
 delay. One would have thought that the whole of Paris was 
 waiting at the Northern station to receive him with open 
 arms, and to proclaim him Emperor there and then. But 
 impatient or not, we had to wait, and, what was worse or bet- 
 ter, the train that finally took us came to a dead stop at 
 Persan, where the news reached us that the rails had been 
 broken up by the insurgents at Pontoise, that a frightful ac- 
 cident had happened in consequence to the train we had 
 missed by a few minutes at Amiens, in which at least thirty 
 lives were lost, besides a great number of wounded. But for 
 the merest chance we should have been among the passen- 
 gers. Was I right in saying that the Prince was justified in 
 believing in his star ? " 
 
 I did not meet with Louis-Napoleon until he was a candi- 
 date for the presidency of the Second Republic, and while he 
 was staying at the Hotel du Rhin in the Place Vendome. Of 
 course, I had heard a great deal about him, but my inform- 
 ants, to a man, were English. While the latter were almost 
 unanimous in predicting Louis-Napoleon's eventual advent 
 to the throne, the French, though in no way denying the in- 
 fluence of the Napoleonic legend, were apt to shrug their 
 shoulders more or less contemptuously at the pretensions of 
 Hortense's son ; for few ever designated him by any other 
 name, until later on, when the nickname of "Badinguet" 
 began to be on every one's lips. Consequently, I was anxious 
 to catch a glimpse of him ; but before noting the impressions 
 produced by that first meeting, I will devote a few lines to the 
 origin of that celebrated sobriquet. 
 
 Personally, I never heard it in connection with Louis- 
 Napoleon until his betrothal to Mdlle. Eugenie de Montijo 
 became common " talk ; " but I had heard and seen it in 
 print a good many years before, and even as late as '48. 
 There was, however, not the slightest attempt at that time 
 to couple it with the person of the future Emperor. Three 
 solutions have made the round of the papers at various 
 times : (1) that it was the name of the stonemason or brick- 
 layer who lent Louis-Napoleon his clothes to facilitate his 
 escape from Ham in June, 1845 ; (2) that it was the name of
 
 THE ORIGIN OF AN HISTORIC NICKNAME. 235 
 
 the soldier who was wounded by the Prince on the 5th of 
 August, 1840, at Boulogne, when the latter fired on Captain 
 Col-Puygellier ; (3) that about the latter end of the forties a 
 pipe-manufacturer introduced a pipe, the head of which re- 
 sembled that of Louis-Napoleon, and that the pipemaker's 
 name was Badinguet. 
 
 The latter solution may be dismissed at once as utterly 
 without foundation. "With regard to that having reference 
 to the stonemason, no stonemason lent Louis-Napoleon his 
 clothes. The disguise was provided by Dr. Conneau from a 
 source which has never been revealed. There was, moreover, 
 no stonemason of the name of Badinguet at Ham, and, when 
 Louis- Napoleon crossed the drawbridge of the castle, his face 
 partially hidden by a board he was carrying on his shoulder, 
 a workman, who mistook him for one of his mates, exclaimed, 
 " Hullo, there goes Bertoux." Bertoux, not Badinguet. 
 
 The name of the soldier wounded by Louis-Napoleon was 
 Geoffroy ; he was a grenadier, decorated on the battle-field ; 
 and shortly after Napoleon's accession to the throne, he 
 granted him a pension. There can be no possible mistake 
 about the name, seeing that it was attested at the trial subse- 
 quent to the fiasco before the Court of Peers. 
 
 The real fact is this : Gavarni, like Balzac, invented many 
 names, suggested in many instances by those of their friends 
 and acquaintances, or sometimes merely altered from those 
 they had seen on signboards. The great caricaturist had a 
 friend in the Departement des Landes named Badingo ; about 
 '38 he began his sketches of students and their companions 
 (" Etudiants et Etudiantes "), and in one of them a medical 
 student shows his lady-love an articulated skeleton. 
 
 " Look at this," says the former ; " this is Eugenie, the 
 former sweetheart of Badinguet that tall, fair girl who was 
 so fond of meringues. He has had her mounted for thirty- 
 six francs." 
 
 The connection is very obvious ; it only wanted one single 
 wag to remember the skit when Napoleon became engaged to 
 Eugenie de Montijo. He set the ball rolling, and the rest 
 followed as a matter of course. 
 
 At the same time, Gavarni had not been half as original, 
 as he imagined, in the invention of the name. Badinguet 
 was a character in a one-act farce entitled " Le Mobilier de 
 Eosine," played for the first time in 1828, at the Theatre 
 Montansier ; and there is a piece of an earlier date even, in
 
 236 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 which Grassot played a character by the name of Badinguet. 
 In 1848, there was a kind of Jules Vernesque piece at the 
 Porte Saint-Martin, in which Badinguet, a Parisian shop- 
 keeper, starts with his wife Euphemie for some distant isl- 
 and. 
 
 To return to Louis-Napoleon at the Hotel du Rhin, and 
 my first glimpse of him. I must own that I was disappoint- 
 ed with it. Though I had not the slightest ground for ex- 
 pecting to see a fine man, I did not expect to see so utterly 
 an insignificant one, and badly dressed in the bargain. On 
 the evening in question, he wore a brown coat of a peculiar 
 colour, a green plush waistcoat, and a pair of yellowish 
 trousers, the like of which I have never .seen on the legs of 
 any one off the stage. And yet Lord Normanby, and a good 
 many more who have said that he looked every inch a king, 
 were not altogether wrong. There was a certain gracefulness 
 about him which owed absolutely nothing either to his tailor, 
 his barber, or his bootmaker. "The gracefulness of awk- 
 wardness " sounds remarkably like an Irish bull, yet I can 
 find no other term to describe his gait and carriage. Louis- 
 Napoleon's legs seemed to have been an after-thought of his 
 Creator they were too short for his body, and his head ap- 
 peared constantly bent down, to supervise their motion ; con- 
 sequently, their owner was always at a disadvantage when 
 compelled to make use of them. But when standing still, or 
 on horseback, there was an indescribable something about 
 the man which at once commanded attention. I am not 
 overlooking the fact that, on the occasion of our first meet- 
 ing, my curiosity had been aroused; but I doubt whether 
 any one, endowed with the smallest power of observation, 
 though utterly ignorant with regard to his previous history, 
 and equally sceptical with regard to his future destiny, could 
 have been in his company for any length of time without be- 
 ing struck with his appearance. 
 
 When I entered the apartment on the evening in ques- 
 tion, Louis-Napoleon was leaning in his favourite attitude 
 against the mantelpiece, smoking the scarcely ever absent 
 cigarette, and pulling at the heavy brown moustache, the 
 ends of which in those days were not waxed into points as 
 they were later on. There was not the remotest likeness to 
 any portrait of the Bonaparte family I had ever seen. He 
 wore his thin, lank hair much longer than he did afterwards. 
 The most startling features were decidedly the aquiline
 
 LOUIS-NAPOLEON'S FRENCH. 237 
 
 nose and the eyes ; the latter, of a greyish-blue, were com- 
 paratively small and somewhat almond-shaped, but, except at 
 rare intervals, there was an impenetrable look, which made it 
 exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to read their owner's 
 thoughts by them. If they were "the windows of his soul," 
 their blinds were constantly down. The " I am pleased to 
 see you, sir," with which he welcomed me, holding out his 
 hand at the same time,* was the English of an educated 
 German who had taken great pains to get the right accent 
 and pronunciation, without, however, completely succeeding ; 
 and when I heard him speak French, I detected at once his 
 constant struggle with the same difficulties. The struggle 
 lasted till the very end of his life, though, by dint of speak- 
 ing very slowly, he overcame them to a marvellous extent. 
 But the moment he became in any way excited, the/'s and 
 the 's and the p's, were always trying to oust the v's, the d's 
 and the &'s from their newly-acquired positions, and often 
 gained a momentary victory. There is an amusing story to 
 that effect, in connection with Napoleon's first interview 
 with Bismarck. I will not vouch for its truth, but, on the 
 face of it, it sounds blunt enough to be genuine. The Em- 
 peror was complimenting the German statesman on his 
 French. 
 
 " M. de Bismarck, I have never heard a German speak 
 French as you do," said Napoleon. 
 
 " Will you allow me to return the compliment, sire ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " I have never heard a Frenchman speak French as you 
 do."* 
 
 When Prince Louis-Napoleon held out his hand and I 
 looked into his face, I felt almost tempted to put him down 
 as an opium-eater. Ten minutes afterwards, I felt convinced 
 that, to use a metaphor, he himself was the drug, and that 
 every one with whom he came in contact was bound to yield 
 to its influence. When I came away that evening, I could 
 have given Cavaignac, Thiers, Lamartine, Hugo, and the 
 rest, who wanted to make a cat's-paw of him, a timely Avarn- 
 ing, if they would have condescended to listen to, and profit 
 
 * In the documents relating to the affair at Strasburg, there is the report to 
 Louis- Philippe by an officer in the 46th regiment of the line, named Pleignd, 
 in which the latter, borrowing the process of Balzac as applied to the French of 
 the Baron de Nucingeir, credits Louis-Napoleon with tnc following phrase: 
 " Fo !/ Ite-s tecore de CJiuillet ; fous tefezetre unprafe,che vous tecore." 1 " 1 EDITOR.
 
 238 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 by it, which I am certain they would not have done. Strange 
 as it may seem, every one of these men, and, with the excep- 
 tion of one, all undoubtedly clever, thought Louis-Napoleon 
 either an imbecile or a secret drunkard. And, what is 
 more, they endeavoured to propagate their opinion through- 
 out the length and breadth, not only of France, but of 
 Europe. 
 
 As usual, the one who was really the greatest nonentity 
 among the latter was most lavish in his contempt. I am 
 alluding to General Cavaignac The nobodies who have 
 governed or misgoverned France since the Fall of Sedan 
 were, from an intellectual point of view, eagles compared to 
 that surly and bumptious drill-sergeant, who had nothing, 
 absolutely nothing, to recommend him for the elevated posi- 
 tion he coveted. He was the least among all those brilliant 
 African soldiers whose names and prowess were on every 
 one's lips ; he had really been made a hero of, at so much 
 per line, by the staff of the National, where his brother 
 Godefroy wielded unlimited power. He was all buckram ; 
 and, in the very heart of Paris, and in the midst of that 
 republic whose fiercest watchword, whose loudest cry, was 
 " equality," he treated partisans and opponents alike, as he 
 would have treated a batch of refractory Arabs in a distant 
 province of that newly-conquered African soil. He disliked 
 every one who did not wear a uniform, and assumed a critical 
 attitude towards every one who did. His republicanism was 
 probably as sincere as that of Thiers it meant " La Eepu- 
 blique c'est moi : " with this difference, that Thiers was ami- 
 able, witty, and charming, though treacherous, and that 
 Cavaignac was the very reverse. His honesty was beyond 
 suspicion ; that is, he felt convinced that he was the only 
 possible saviour of France : but it was impaired by his equally 
 sincere conviction that bribery and coercion of cajoling he 
 would have none were admissible, nay, incumbent to attain 
 that end. " Thiers, c'est la republique en ecureuil, Cavai- 
 gnac c'est la republique en ours mal leche," said a witty 
 journalist. He and Louis-Napoleon were virtually the two 
 men who were contending for the presidential chair, and the 
 chances of Cavaignac may be judged by the conclusion of 
 the verbal report of one of Lamoriciere's emissaries, who 
 canvassed one of the departments. 
 
 " ' The thing might be feasible,' said an elector, ' if your 
 general's name was Genevieve de Brabant, or that of one of
 
 HIS RIVALS FOR THE PRESIDENTSHIP. 339 
 
 the four sons of Aymon.* But his name is simply Cavaignac 
 Cavaignac, and that's all. I prefer Napoleon ; at any rate, 
 there is a ring about that name.' And I am afraid that 
 eleven-twelfths of the electors are of the same opinion." 
 
 As for Ledru Rollin, Raspail, Changarnier, and even La- 
 martine and the Prince de Joinville, some of whom were candi- 
 dates against their will, they were out of the running from the 
 very start, though, curiously enough, the son of the monarch 
 whom the republic had driven from the throne obtained 
 more votes than the man who had proclaimed that republic. 
 These votes were altogether discarded as unconstitutional, 
 though one really fails to see why one member of a preceding 
 dynasty should have been held to be more eligible than 
 another. Be this as it may, the votes polled by the sailor 
 prince amounted to over twenty-three thousand, showing 
 that he enjoyed a certain measure of popularity. It is doubt- 
 ful whether the Due d'Aumale or the Due de Nemours would 
 have obtained a fifth of that number. As I have already said, 
 the latter was disliked by his father's opponents for his sus- 
 pected legitimist tendencies, and tacitly blamed by some of 
 the partisans of the Orleanist regime for his lack of resistance 
 on the 24th of February ; the former's submission " to the 
 will of the nation," as embodied in a manifesto " to the in- 
 habitants of Algeria," provoked no enthusiasm either among 
 friends or foes.f Perhaps public rumour was not altogether 
 wrong, when it averred that the D'Orleans were too tight- 
 fisted to spend their money in electioneering literature. The 
 expense involved in that item was a terrible obstacle to Louis- 
 Napoleon and his few faithful henchmen ; for, though the 
 Napoleonic idea was pervading all classes of society, there 
 was^ correctly speaking, no Bonapartist party to shape it for 
 the practical purposes of the moment. The Napoleonic idea 
 was a fond remembrance of France's glorious past, rather 
 than a hope of its renewal in the future. Even the greatest 
 number of the most ardent worshippers of that marvellous 
 soldier of fortune, doubted whether his nephew was suffi- 
 ciently popular to obtain an appreciable following, and those 
 who did not doubt were mostly poor. While Dufaure and 
 
 * The four knights of a Carlovingian legend, who were mounted on one 
 horse named Bayard. EDITOR. 
 
 t During the sacking of the Tuileries, the mob ruthlessly destroyed the 
 busts and pictures of every living son of Louis-Philippe, with the exception of 
 those of the Prince de Joinville. EDITOR.
 
 240 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Lamoriciere were scattering money broadcast, and using 
 pressure of the most arbitrary kind, in order to insure Cavai- 
 gnac's success, Louis-Napoleon and his knot of partisans were 
 absolutely reduced to their own personal resources. Miss 
 Howard afterwards Comtesse de Beauregard and Princesse 
 Mathilde had given all they could ; a small loan was obtained 
 from M. Fould ; and some comparatively scanty supplies had 
 been forthcoming from England it was said at the time, 
 with how much truth I know not, that Lords Palmerston and 
 Malmesbury had contributed : but the exchequer was virtu- 
 ally empty. A stray remittance of a few thousand francs, 
 from an altogether unexpected quarter, and most frequently 
 from an anonymous sender, arrived now and then ; but it 
 was what the Germans call " a drop of water in a very hot 
 frying-pan ; " it barely sufficed to stop a hole. Money was 
 imperatively wanted for the printing of millions upon millions 
 of handbills, thousands and thousands of posters, and their 
 distribution; for the expenses of canvassers, electioneering 
 agents, and so forth. The money went to the latter, the rest 
 was obtained on credit. Prince Louis, confident of success, 
 emptied his pockets of the last five-franc pieces ; when he 
 had no more, he promised to pay. He was as badly off as 
 his famous uncle before the turn of fortune came. 
 
 In connection with this dire impecuniosity, I remember a 
 story for the truth of which I can vouch as if I had had it 
 from Louis-Napoleon's own lips. In front of Siraudin's con- 
 fectioner's shop at the angle of the Boulevard des Capucines 
 and the Eue de la Paix, there sits an old woman with two 
 wooden legs. About '48, when she was very pretty and 
 dressed with a certain coquettishness, she was already there, 
 though sitting a little higher up, in front of the wall of the 
 Ministry for Foreign Affairs, which has since made room for 
 the handsome establishment of Giroux. Behind her, on the 
 wall, were suspended for sale some cheap and not very ar- 
 tistically executed reproductions of Fragonard, " Le Coucher 
 de la Mariee," etc., all of which would fetch high prices 
 now ; also songs, the tunes of which she played with great 
 taste on her violin. It was reported that she had been killed 
 during the attack on the ministry, but to people's great sur- 
 prise she reappeared a few days afterwards. Prince Louis, 
 who was staying at the Place Venddme, then used to take a 
 short cut by the Rue Neuve des Capucines to the Boulevards, 
 and it seems that he never passed her without giving her
 
 PARIS UNDER THE SECOND REPUBLIC. 241 
 
 something. In a few weeks she came to look upon his con- 
 tributions as a certain part of her income. She knew who 
 he was, and, curiously enough, seemed to be aware not only 
 of his political preoccupations, but of his pecuniary embar- 
 rassments. I am unable to say whether she was in sympathy 
 with the former, but she was evidently concerned about the 
 latter ; for, one evening, after thanking Louis-Napoleon, she 
 added, " Monseigneur, je voudrais vous dire un mot." 
 
 " Parlez, madame." 
 
 " On me dit que vous tes fort gene dans ce moment. 
 J'ai trois billets de mille francs chez moi, qui ne font rien. 
 Voulez-vous me permettre de vous les offrir ; vous me les 
 rendrez quand vous serez empereur." 
 
 Prince Louis did not accept them, but he never forgot a 
 kindness, and when he did become Emperor, he offered her 
 a small annuity. The answer was characteristic of her inde- 
 pendence. " Dites a 1'empereur qu'il est bien bon de se rap- 
 peler de moi, mais je ne puis pas accepter son offre. S'il 
 avait accepte mon argent, je ne dis pas, maintenant, non." 
 And while I am writing these notes, she still sits in her usual 
 place, though I have heard it said more than once that she 
 is the owner of one or two houses in the Avenue de 1'Opera, 
 and that she gave a considerable marriage portion to her 
 daughter, who has remained ignorant of the sources of her 
 mother's income, who was educated in the country, and has 
 never been to Paris. One of the conditions of her marriage 
 was that she should emigrate to Australia. For the latter 
 part of the story, I will, however, not vouch. 
 
 During the months of October and November, '48, I saw 
 Prince Louis at least a dozen times, though only once away 
 from his own apartments. There was really " nowhere to 
 go," for most of the salons had closed their doors, and those 
 which remained open were invaded by political partisans of 
 all shades. Conversation, except on one topic, there was 
 little or none. Social entertainments were scarcely to be 
 thought of after the bloody disorders in June : Paris trade 
 suffered in consequence, and the whole of the shop-keeping 
 element, which virtually constituted the greater part of the 
 Garde Rationale, regretted the fall of the Orleans dynasty to 
 which it had so materially contributed. After these disor- 
 ders in June, the troops bivouacked for a whole month on 
 the Boulevards ; on the Boulevard du Temple with its seven 
 theatres ; on the Boulevard Poissonniere, almost in front of 
 11
 
 242 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the Gymnase ; on the Boulevard Mohtmartre, in front of the 
 Varietes ; on the Place de la Bourse, in front of the Vaude- 
 ville. The new masters did not care to be held up to ridi- 
 cule ; they insinuated, rather than asserted, that the insults 
 levelled from the stage had contributed to the insurrection ; 
 and seeing that the bourgeoisie, very contrite already, did 
 not care to hear " the praise of the saviours of the country " 
 by command, they deserted the play-houses and kept their 
 money in their pockets. The Constituent Assembly was 
 compelled to grant the managers an indemnity ; but, as it 
 could not keep the soldiers there for ever, and as it cared still 
 less to vote funds to its enemies while its supporters were 
 clamouring for every cent of it, the strict supervision gradu- 
 ally relaxed. The first to take advantage of this altered state 
 of things was Clairville, with his " La Propriete c'est le Vol " 
 (November 28, '48), a skit on the celebrated phrase of Proud- 
 hon. It is very doubtful whether the latter had uttered it in 
 the sense with which the playwright invested it ; but fear is 
 proverbially illogical, and every one in Paris ran to see the 
 piece, trusting probably that it might produce a salutary 
 effect on those who intended to take the philosopher's axiom 
 literally. 
 
 " La Propriete c'est le Vol " was described on the bills as 
 " a socialistic extravaganza in three acts and seven tableaux." 
 The scene of the first tableau represents the garden of Eden. 
 The Serpent, who is the Evil Spirit, declares war at once 
 upon Adam, who embodies the principle of Property. The 
 Serpent was a deliberate caricature of Proudhon with his 
 large spectacles. 
 
 In the subsequent tableaux, Adam, by a kind of metem- 
 psychosis, had been changed into Bonichon, an owner of 
 house property in the Paris of the nineteenth century. The 
 Serpent, though still wearing his spectacles, had been equally 
 transformed into a modern opponent of all property. We 
 are in February, '48. Bonichon and some of his fellow-bour- 
 geois are feasting in honor of the proposed measures of reform, 
 when they are scared out of their wits by the appearance of 
 the Serpent, who informs them that the Republic has sidled 
 up to Reform, managed to hide itself beneath its cloak, and 
 been proclaimed. The next scene brings us to the year 1852 
 (four years in advance of the period), when the right of 
 every one to live by the toil of his hands has become law. 
 Bonichon is being harassed and persecuted by a crowd of
 
 A SATIRICAL PLAY. 24:3 
 
 handicraftsmen and others, who insist on working for him 
 whether he likes it or not. The glazier smashes his windows, 
 in order to compel him to have new panes put in. The paper- 
 hanger tears the paper off his walls on the same principle. The 
 hackney coachman flings Bonichon into his cab, takes him 
 for a four hours' drive, and charges accordingly. A dentist 
 imitates the tactics of Peter the Great with his courtiers, 
 forces him into a chair and operates upon his grinders, though, 
 unlike Peter, he claims the full fee. A dozen or so of modistes 
 and dressmakers invade his apartments with double the num- 
 ber of gowns for Madame Eve Bonichon, who, the reverse of 
 her husband, does not object to this violent appeal for her 
 custom. Perhaps Madame Octave, a charming woman who 
 played the part, did well to submit, because during the first 
 tableau, the audience, though by no means squeamish, had 
 come to the conclusion that Madame Eve would be all the 
 better for a little more clothing. 
 
 And so the piece goes on. The first performance took 
 place twelve days before the presidential election, when 
 Cavaignac was still at the head of affairs. Notwithstanding 
 his energetic suppression of the disorders in June, every one, 
 with the exception of the journalistic swashbucklers of Le 
 National, hoped to get rid of him ; and a song aimed at him 
 cruelly dissected his utter insignificance from a mental, 
 moral, and political point of view. When Louis-Napoleon 
 gained the day, the song was changed for a more kindly 
 one. 
 
 It is no exaggeration to say that during those days France 
 was absolutely governed by the National. I made a list, by 
 no means complete, at the time, of the various appointments 
 and high places that had fallen to the members of the staff 
 and those connected with it financially and otherwise. I 
 have kept it, and transcribe it here with scarcely any com- 
 ment. 
 
 Armand Marrast, the editor, became a member of the 
 Provisional Government, Mayor of Paris, and subsequently 
 President of the National Assembly. 
 
 Marrast (No. 2) became Procureur- General at Pan. 
 
 Marrast (No. 3), who had been a captain of light horse 
 during the reign of Louis-Philippe, was given a colonelcy 
 unattached. 
 
 Marrast (No. 4) became Vice - Principal of the Lycee 
 Corneille.
 
 244 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Bastide, one of the staff, became Minister for Foreign 
 Affairs. 
 
 Vaulabelle, one of the staff, became Minister of Public 
 Education. 
 
 Goudchaux, the banker of the National, became Minister 
 of Finances. 
 
 Recurt, the chief physician to the staff, became Ministei 
 of the Interior and subsequently Minister of Public Works 
 (President of the Board of Works). 
 
 Trelat, another physician, became Minister of Public 
 Works. 
 
 Marie, the solicitor to the National, became a member 
 of the Provisional Government, a member of the Ex- 
 ecutive Committee, and subsequently Minister of Jus- 
 tice. 
 
 Genin, one of the staff, became chief of the literary de- 
 partment at the Ministry of Public Education. 
 
 Charras, one of the staff, became Under-Secretary of State, 
 at the Ministry for War. 
 
 Degouve-Denuncques, one of the staff, became Prefect of 
 the Department of the Somme. 
 
 Buchez, third physician and an occasional contributor, be- 
 came Deputy Mayor of Paris and subsequently President of 
 the Assembly up to the 15th of May ( when he had to 
 make room for M. Armand Marrast himself). As will be 
 seen, within a month of the republicans' advent to power, 
 M. Buchez had been raised to one of the highest functions 
 in the State, though absolutely devoid of any political or 
 parliamentary talent, as was shown later on by his " Histoire 
 Parlementaire de la Revolution Fran9aise," an utterly com- 
 monplace production. 
 
 Dussart, one of the staff, became Prefect of the Seine- 
 Inferieure. 
 
 Adam, one of the staff, became Chief Secretary of the 
 Prefecture of the Seine. 
 
 Sain de Bois-le Comte, one of the staff, became minister 
 plenipotentiary at Turin. 
 
 Felicien Mallefille, one of the staff, became minister 
 plenipotentiary at Lisbon. 
 
 Anselme Petetin, one of the staff, became minister pleni- 
 potentiary at Hanover. 
 
 Auguste Petetin ( his brother ), one of the staff, became 
 Prefect of the Department of the C6te-d'0r.
 
 A CURIOUS LIST OF MINISTERS. 245 
 
 Frederic Lacroix, one of the staff, became chief secre- 
 tary for civil affairs in Algeria. 
 
 Hetzel, one of the staff, became chief secretary to the 
 Minister for Foreign Affairs. 
 
 Rousset, one of the staff, became Prefect of the Depart- 
 ment of the Loire. 
 
 Duclerc, shorthand reporter, became for a little while 
 Minister of Finances. 
 
 Pagnerre, publisher of the National, and bookseller, be- 
 came a mayor, a member of the Provisional Government, 
 a member of the Executive Committee, and finally Director 
 of the Comptoir d'Escompte. 
 
 Achille Gregoire, the printer of the National, became 
 Prefect of the Department of the Upper-Saone. 
 
 Clement Thomas, called the Constable of the National, 
 became the Commander-in-chief of the National Guard of 
 the Seine. 
 
 There are a few score more, friends and allies, such as 
 Lalanne, who was made director of the national workshops ; 
 Levrault, who was sent to Naples as minister plenipoten- 
 tiary ; Carette, who became Civil-Chief at Constantine ; Car- 
 teron, who was appointed keeper of the national archives, etc. 
 
 As a matter of course, all these adventurers had revolving 
 around them a number of satellites, as eager as the former to 
 reap the fruits of the situation. Most of them, like the cat 
 of Heine's epigram, had to devour their steak raw ; they did 
 not know how to cook it. Ministers, prefects, and high dig- 
 nitaries of State as they were, they felt awkward in the so- 
 ciety of those to whom no illusion was possible with regard 
 to their origin and that of their political fortunes. 
 
 They haunted, therefore, by preference, the less well fre- 
 quented restaurants and cafes, the wings of the minor 
 theatres, on the pretext that they were the elect of the peo- 
 ple, and that the people were their fittest companions. Their 
 erstwhile leader and chiet scorned to stoop to such tricks. 
 He was an educated man, with a thick veneer of the gentle- 
 man about him, which, however, did not prevent him from 
 being one of the two most arrant snobs I have met anywhere. 
 I advisedly say anywhere, for France herself does not pro- 
 duce that objectionable genus to any appreciable extent. 
 You may find a good many cads, you will find comparatively 
 few snobs. Compared to Armand Marrast, Eugene Sue was 
 nowhere as a snob. He was a thickset man with a rubicund
 
 246 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 face, with a mass of grey woolly hair and a kind of stubbly, 
 small moustache. His manners were supposed to be mod- 
 elled on those of the nobles of the old regime ; said manners 
 mainly consisting of swaggering impudence to those whom 
 he considered his equals, and freezing insolence to those he 
 deemed his inferiors. The latter, I need not say, were by far 
 the most numerous. He who bellowed most loudly that 
 birth should carry no privilege, never forgot to remind his 
 hearers, by deeds, if not by words, that he was of noble 
 descent. " Si sa famille etait noble, sa mere s'est surement 
 endormie dans 1'antichambre un jour qu'un valet-de-chambre 
 entreprenant etait trop pers," said the Marquis d'Arragon 
 one evening.* He felt greatly flattered at the caricaturists of 
 the day representing him in the court dress of Louis XVI.'s 
 reign, though to most people he looked like a " marquis de 
 quatre sous." f 
 
 He professed to be very fond of antique furniture and 
 decorations, and this fondness was the main cause of his 
 ousting his formei subaltern, Buchez, from the presidential 
 chair of the Assembly, for, shortly before the revolution of 
 '48, the official residence of that functionary had been put in 
 thorough repair, its magnificent furniture had been restored, 
 etc. 
 
 The depression of business inspired M. Armand Marrast 
 with the happy thought of giving some entertainments in 
 the hope of reviving it. During the Third Eepublic, though 
 I had ceased to live in France permanently, I have seen a 
 good many motley gatherings at the Elysee-Bourbon, and at 
 the H6tel-de-Ville, especially in M. Grevy's time, though 
 Mac-Mahon's presidency offered some diverting specimens 
 also ; but I have never seen anything like the social functions 
 at the Palais-Bourbon during the months of September, Oc- 
 tober, and November, 1848. They were absolutely the fes- 
 tive scenes of Paul de Kock on a large scale, amidst Louis 
 XIV. and Louis XV. furniture, instead of the bourgeois 
 mahogany, and with an exquisitely artistic background, in- 
 stead of the commonplace paperhangings of the lower mid- 
 dle-class dwellings. The corps diplomatique was virtually 
 
 * The remark was not original. The Marquise d'Espreme'nil said it of her- 
 self when she saw her son join the Kevolution of '89. EDITOR. 
 
 t The peripatetic vendors of songs_, dressed as nobles, who up till '60 were 
 frequently singing their compositions in the street. EDITOB.
 
 A BALL AT THE PALAIS-BOURBOX. 247 
 
 on the horns of a dilemma. After the February revolution, 
 the shock of which was felt throughout the whole of Europe, 
 and caused most of the sovereigns to shake on their thrones, 
 it had stood by M. de Lamartine, and even by his successor at 
 the French Foreign Office, M. Bastide, if not with enthusi- 
 asm, at least with a kind of complacency. The republic pro- 
 claimed by the former, might, after all, contain elements of 
 vitality. The terrible disorders in June tended to shake this 
 reluctant confidence ; still, there was but little change in the 
 ambassadors' outward attitude, until it became too evident 
 that, unless a strong dictator should intervene, mob rule was 
 dangerously nigh. Then the corps diplomatique began to 
 hold aloof. Of course there were exceptions, such as, for 
 instance, Mr. Richard Rush, the minister of the United 
 States, who had been the first to congratulate the Provisional 
 Government, and the various representatives of the South- 
 American republics ; but even the latter could scarcely refrain 
 from expressing their astonishment at the strange company 
 in which they found themselves. The women were perhaps 
 the most remarkable, as women generally are when out of 
 their element. The greater part had probably never been 
 in a drawing-room before, and, notwithstanding M. Taiue's 
 subsequently expressed dictum about the facility with which 
 a Parisien grisette, shopwoman, or lady's-maid may be trans- 
 formed at a few moments into a semblance of a grande dame, 
 these very petites bourgeoises and their demoiselles made a 
 very indifferent show. Perhaps the grisette, shopwoman, or 
 lady's-maid would have acquitted herself better. Her natural 
 taste, sharpened by constant contact with her social superiors, 
 might have made up for the slender resources of her ward- 
 robe ; and, as the French say, " one forgives much in the 
 way of solecism to the prettily dressed woman." As it was, 
 the female section of M. Marrast's guests could advance no 
 valid plea for mercy on that score. The daughters looked 
 limp with their choregraphic exertions : the emblem of inno- 
 cence, " la sainte mousseline," as Ambroise Thomas called it 
 afterwards, hung in vague, undefined folds on angular figures, 
 perhaps because the starch necessary to it had been appropri- 
 ated by the matrons. The latter were rigid to a degree, and 
 looked daggers at their spouses and their friends at the slight- 
 est attempt to stir them to animation. " Fais done danser 
 ma vieille," was the consecrated formula with which a not 
 very eager cavalier was dragged to the seat where said
 
 248 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 "vieille" was reposing in all the majesty of her unaccus- 
 tomed finery, considerably impaired in the wearer's transit 
 on foot from her domicile at Montrouge or Menilmontant to 
 the banks of the Seine ; for the weather that year was almost 
 tropical, even in the autumn, and consequently the cab had 
 been dispensed with. It would appear, from a remark I over- 
 heard, that Jehu, in the way of business, preferred as fares 
 the partisans of and adherents to the fallen regimes, even of 
 the latest one. Said a portly dame to her neighbour, allud- 
 ing to the cabman, " II a absolument refuse de nous prendre. 
 II a dit qu'il etait dans 1'opposition, et qu'il ne voulait pas 
 trahir ses principes a moins de dix francs. Dix francs, ma 
 chre, nous aurions pu souper chez nous, et sans compter les 
 frais de toilette et de blanchissage. Quant a 1'honneur d'etre 
 ici, 9a ne compte pas pour grand'chose, vu que tout le quar- 
 tier y est; nous demeurons a Batignolles, et il a fallu de- 
 scendre en ville ce matin pour avoir une paire de gants 
 blancs. Chez nous, partout la me'me reponse : ' Des gants 
 blancs, madame, nous n'en avops plus. Presque toutes les 
 dames du quartier vont au Palais-Bourton ce soir, et depuis 
 hier il nous reste que des petites pointures (sizes), des sept et 
 des sept et demies.' " 
 
 As for the " elu du peuple souverain," when he had failed 
 to draw his " vieille " into the mazy dance, and been snubbed 
 for his pains in the bargain, he returned to his fellow-depu- 
 ties, many of whom might be easily recognized by the golden- 
 fringed tricolour rosette in their buttonholes, though some 
 had merely kept it in their pockets. The " 61u du peuple " 
 did not dance himself. Perhaps the most curious group was 
 that of the young attaches and clerks of the Foreign Office 
 who had come to enjoy themselves, who, even at that time, 
 were nearly all of good birth, and who, to use a colloquial 
 expression, looked not unlike brass knockers on a pigsty. 
 This was the society Louis-Napoleon was to sweep away with 
 the aid of men, some of whom I have endeavoured to sketch 
 in subsequent notes. I would fain say a few words of a 
 " shipwrecked one," of the preceding dynasty, whose ac- 
 quaintance I did not make until the vessel he had steered so 
 long had foundered, and of the self-constituted pilot of the 
 interim regime. I am alluding to MM. Guizot and de La- 
 martine.
 
 GU1ZOT, LAMARTINE, AND H&BAN&E&, 249 
 
 CHAPTEK XII. 
 
 Guizot, Lamartine. and Beranger Public opinion at sea \vith regard to the real 
 Guizot People fail to see the real man behind the politician Guizot re- 
 grets this false conception " I have not the courage to be unpopular " A 
 tilt at Thiers My first meeting with him A picture and the story con- 
 nected with it M. Guizot " at home " His apartment The company M. 
 Guizot on " the Spanish marriages " His indictment against Lord Palmer- 
 ston An incident in connection with Napoleon's tomb at the Invalids 
 Nicolas I. and Napoleon My subsequent intimacy with M. Guizot Guizot 
 as a father His correspondence with his daughters A story of Henry 
 Murger and Marguerite Thuillier M. Guizot makes up his mind not to live 
 in Paris any longer M. Guizot on " natural scenery " Never saw the sea 
 until he was over fifty "Why M. Guizot did not like the country ; why M. 
 Thiers did not like it Thiers the only man at whom Guizot tilted M. 
 Guizot died poor M. de Lamartine's poverty did not inspire the same re- 
 spect Lamartine's impecuniosity My only visit to Lamartine's house 
 I)u Jellaby dore With a difference All the stories and anecdotes about 
 M. de Lamartine relate to his improvidence and impecuniosity Ten times 
 worse in that respect than Balzac M. Guizot's literary productions and M. 
 de Lamartine's The national subscription raised for the latter How he 
 anticipates some of the money Beranger My first acquaintance with him 
 Beranger's verdict on the Second Republic Beranger's constant flittings 
 Dislikes popularity The true story of Beranger and Mdlle. Judith 
 Frere. 
 
 THAT sentence of Louis-Philippe to Lord , quoted 
 
 elsewhere : " Guizot is so terribly respectable ; I am afraid 
 there is a mistake either about his nationality or his respecta- 
 bility, for they are badly matched," reflected the opinion of 
 the majority of Frenchmen with regard to the eminent 
 statesman. The historian who was supposed to know Crom- 
 well and Washington as well as if he had lived with them, was 
 credited at last with being a stern rigid Puritan in private 
 life like the first, impatient of contradiction like the second 
 in short, a kind of walking copy-book moral, who never un- 
 bent, whose slightest actions were intended by him to convey 
 a lesson to the rest of mankind. Unable to devote much 
 time to her during the week, Guizot was in the habit of 
 taking his mother for a stroll in the Park of St. Cloud on 
 Sundays. The French, who are never tired of shouting, 
 " Oh, ma mere ! oh, ma mere ! " resented such small atten-
 
 250 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 tions on the part of the son, because, they maintained, they 
 were meant as exhibitions. Even such a philosopher as 
 Ernest Eenan failed to see that there were two dissimilar 
 men in Guizot, the Guizot of public life and the Guizot of 
 home life ; that, behind the imperious, haughty, battlesome 
 orator of the Chamber, with his almost marble mask, there 
 was a tender and loving heart, capable of the most deep- 
 seated devotion ; that the cares of State once thrown off, the 
 supercilious stare melted like ice beneath the sun of spring 
 into a prepossessing smile, captivating every one with whom 
 he came in contact. 
 
 Guizot regretted this erroneous conception the world had 
 formed of his character. " But what can I do ? " he asked. 
 " In reality, I haven't the courage to be unpopular any more 
 than other people ; but neither have I the courage to prance 
 about in my own drawing-room as if I were on wires " this 
 was a slight slap at M. Thiers, " nor can I write on subjects 
 with which I have no sympathy " that was a second, " and 
 I should cut but a sorry figure on horseback " that was a 
 third ; " consequently people who, I am sure, wish me well, 
 but who will not come and see me at home, hold me up as a 
 misanthrope, while I know that I am nothing of the kind." 
 
 With this he took from his table an article by M. Eenan 
 on the first volume of his " Memoires," an article couched in 
 the most flattering terms, but giving the most conventional 
 portrait of the author himself. " Why doesn't he come and 
 see me? He would soon find that I am not the solitary, 
 tragic, buckram figure that has already become legendary, 
 and which, like most legendary figures, is absolutely false." 
 
 This conversation or rather monologue, for I was care- 
 ful not to interrupt him took place in the early part of the 
 Second Empire, in the house in the Hue de la Ville-Leve'que 
 he occupied for five and twenty years, and until 1860. The 
 Coup d'Etat had irretrievably shattered Guizot's political 
 career. It had destroyed whatever hopes may have remained 
 after the flight of Louis-Philippe. Consequently Guizot's 
 proper place is among the men of that reign ; the reason why 
 I insert him here is because my acquaintance with him only 
 began after his disappearance from public life. 
 
 It occurred in this way. One evening, after dinner at M. 
 de Morny's, we were talking about pictures, and especially 
 about those of the Spanish school, when our host turned to 
 me. " Have you ever seen ' the Virgin ' belonging to M.
 
 GUIZOT "AT HOME." 251 
 
 Guizot ? " he asked. I told him I had not. " Then go and 
 see it," he said. " It is one of the finest specimens of its 
 kind I ever saw, I might say the finest." Next day I asked 
 permission of M. Guizot to come and see it, and, almost by 
 return of post, I received an invitation for the following 
 Thursday night to one of his " at homes." 
 
 Until then I had never met M. Guizot, except at one of 
 his ministerial soirees under the preceding dynasty. The 
 apartment offered nothing very striking : the furniture was 
 of the ordinary kind to be found in almost every bourgeois 
 drawing-room, with this difference that it was considerably 
 shabbier ; for Guizot was poor all his life. The man who had 
 said to the nation, " Enrichissez vous, enrichissez vous," had 
 never acted upon the advice himself. I know for a fact that, 
 while he was in power, he was asked to appoint to the post 
 of receiver-general of the Gironde one of the richest finan- 
 ciers in France, who had expressed the intention to share the 
 magnificent benefits of the appointment with him. M. Guizot 
 simply and steadfastly refused to do anything of the kind. 
 
 On the evening in question, a lamp with a reflector was 
 placed in front of the picture I had come to see, probably in 
 my honour. M. de Morny had not exaggerated the beauty 
 of it, but it bore no signature, and M. Guizot himself had no 
 idea with regard to the painter. " There is a curious story 
 connected with it," he said, " but I cannot tell it you now ; 
 come and see me one morning and I will. As an English- 
 man it will interest you ; especially if you will take the trouble 
 to read between the lines. I will tell you a few more, perhaps, 
 but the one connected with the picture is ' la bonne Douche.' " 
 
 The company at M. Guizot's, on that and other occasions, 
 mainly consisted of those who had been vanquished in the 
 recent struggle with Louis-Napoleon, or thought they had 
 been ; for a great many were mere word-spinners, who had 
 been quite as vehement in their denunciations of the man 
 they were now surrounding when he was in power, as they 
 were in their diatribes against the man who, after all, saved 
 France for eighteen years from anarchy, and did not indulge 
 more freely in nepotism, peculation, and kindred amenities 
 than those who came after him. But, at the outset of these 
 notes, I took the resolution to eschew politics, and I will en- 
 deavour to keep it as far as possible. 
 
 As a matter of course, I soon availed myself of M. Guizot's 
 permission to call upon him in the morning, and it was then
 
 252 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 that he told me the following story connected with the pict- 
 ure. 
 
 " After the Spanish marriages, Queen Isabella wished to 
 convey to me a signal mark of her gratitude for what, 
 Heaven alone knows, because it is the only political transac- 
 tion I would willingly efface from my career. So she con- 
 ferred upon me the dukedom of San Antonio, and sent me 
 the patent with a most affectionate letter. Honestly speak- 
 ing, I was more than upset by this proof of royal kindness, 
 seeing that I had not the least wish to accept the title. I felt 
 equally reluctant to offend her by declining the high distinc- 
 tion offered, I felt sure, from a most generous feeling. I 
 went to see the King, and explained my awkward position, 
 adding that the name of Guizot was all sufficient for me. 
 * You are right,' said the King. ' Leave the matter to me ; 
 I'll arrange it.' And he did, much to the disgust of M. de 
 Salvandy, who had received a title at the same time, but who 
 could not accept his while the Prime Minister declined. 
 
 " Then she sent me this picture. Some witty journalist 
 said, at the time, that it was symbolical of her own married 
 state ; for let me tell you that the unfitness of Don Francis 
 d'Assis was ' le secret de polichinelle,' however much your 
 countrymen may have insisted that it only leaked out after 
 the union. Personally I was entirely opposed to it, and, in 
 fact, it was not a ministerial question at all, but one of court 
 intrigue. Lord Palmerston chose to make it the former, and 
 he, and your countrymen through him, are not only morally 
 but virtually responsible for the subsequent errors of Isabella. 
 Do you know what his ultimatum was when the marriage 
 had been contracted, when there was no possibility of going 
 back ? You do not. Well, then, I will tell you. ' If Isabella 
 has not a child within a twelvemonth, then there will be war 
 between England and France.' I leave you to ponder the 
 consequences for yourself, though I assure you that I washed 
 my hands of the affair from that moment. But the French 
 as well as the English would never believe me, and history 
 will record that ' the austere M. Guizot,' for that is what they 
 choose to call me, ' lent his aid to proceedings which would 
 make the most debased pander blush with shame.' 
 
 " It is not the only time that my intentions have been 
 purposely misconceived and misconstrued ; nay, I have been 
 taxed with things of which I was as innocent as a child. In 
 1846, almost at the same period that the Spanish imbroglio
 
 NICHOLAS I. AND NAPOLEON. 253 
 
 took place, Count de Montalembert got up in the Upper 
 House one day and declared it a disgrace that France should 
 have begged the tomb of Napoleon I. from Russia. Now, 
 the fact was that France had not begged anything at all. 
 The principal part of the monument at the Invalides is the 
 sarcophagus. The architect Visconti was anxious that it 
 should consist of red porphyry; M. Duchatel and myself 
 were of the same opinion. Unfortunately, we had not the 
 remotest notion where such red porphyry was to be found. 
 The Egyptian quarries, whence the Romans took it, were ex- 
 hausted. Inquiries were made in the Vosges, in the Pyre- 
 nees, but without result, and we were going to abandon the 
 porphyry, when news arrived at the Ministry of the Interior 
 that the kind of stone we wanted existed in Russia. 
 
 " Just then my colleague, M. de Salvandy, was sending 
 M. Leouzon le Due to the north on a special mission, and I 
 instructed him to go as far as St. Petersburg and consult 
 Count de Rayneval, our ambassador, as to the best means of 
 getting the porphyry. A few months later, M. le Due sent 
 me specimens of a stone from a quarry on the banks of the 
 Onega Lake, which, if not absolutely porphyry, was the near- 
 est to it to be had. M. Visconti having approved of it, I for- 
 warded further instructions for the quantity required, and so 
 forth. 
 
 " The quarry, it appears, belonged to the Crown, and had 
 never been worked, could not be worked, without due per- 
 mission and the payment of a certain tax. After a great 
 many formalities, mainly raised by speculators who had got 
 wind of the affair, and had bribed various officials to oppose, 
 or, at any rate, intercept the petition sent by M. le Due for the 
 necessary authorization, Prince Wolkonsky, the Minister of 
 State, acquainted the Czar himself with the" affair, and Nicho- 
 las, without a moment's hesitation, granted the request, re- 
 mitting the tax which M. le Due had estimated at about six 
 thousand francs. This took place at a cabinet council, and, 
 unfortunately for me, the Czar thought fit to make a little 
 speech. ' What a strange destiny ! ' he said, rising from his 
 seat and assuming a solemn tone ' what a strange destiny 
 this man's ' alluding to Napoleon ' even in death ! It is 
 we who struck him the first fatal blow, by the burning of our 
 holy and venerable capital, and it is from us that France asks 
 his tomb. Let the French envoy have everything he requires, 
 and, above all, let no tax be taken.'
 
 254: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " That was enough ; the German and French papers got 
 hold of the last words with the rest ; they confounded the 
 tax with the cost of working, which amounted to more than 
 two hundred thousand francs ; and up to this day, notwith- 
 standing the explanations I and my colleagues offered in re- 
 ply to the interpellation of M. de Montalembert, the story 
 remains that Eussia made France a present of the tomb of 
 Napoleon." 
 
 From that day forth I often called upon M. Guizot, espe- 
 cially in the daytime, when I knew that he had finished 
 working ; for when he found that his political career was 
 irrevocably at an end, he turned very cheerfully I might 
 say gladly to his original avocation, literature. Without 
 the slightest fatigue, without the slightest worry, he produced 
 a volume of philosophical essays or history every year ; and 
 if, unlike Alexandre Dumas, he did not roar with laughter 
 while composing, he was often heard to hum a tune. " En 
 effet," said one of his daughters, the Countess Henriette de 
 Witt (both his daughters bore the same name and titles when 
 married), " notre pere ne chante presque jamais qu'en tra- 
 vaillant." This did not mean that work, and work only, had 
 the effect of putting M. Guizot in good humour. He was, 
 according to the same authority, uniformly sweet-tempered 
 at home, whether sitting in his armchair, surrounded by his 
 family, or gently strolling up and down his library. " C'est 
 la politique qui le rendait mechant," said Madame de Witt, 
 " heureusement il la laissait a la porte. Et 'tres souvent il 
 1'oubliait de parti-pris au milieu du conseil et alors il nous 
 ecrivait des lettres, mais des lettres, comme on n'en ecrit 
 plus. En voila deux qu'il m'a ecrites lorsque j'etais tres 
 jeune fille." Whereupon she showed me what were really 
 two charming gossiping little essays on the art of punctua- 
 tion. It appears that the little lady was either very indiffer- 
 ent to, or ignorant of the art ; and the father wrote, " My dear 
 Henriette, I am afraid I shall still have to take you to task 
 with regard to your punctuation : there is little or none of it 
 in your letters. All punctuation, commas or other signs, 
 mark a period of repose for the mind a stage more or less 
 long an idea which is done with or momentarily suspended, 
 and which is being divided by such a sign from the next. 
 You suppress those periods, those intervals; you write as 
 the stream flows, as the arrow flies. That will not do at 
 all, because the ideas one expresses, the things of which we
 
 GUIZOT ON THIERS. 255 
 
 speak, are not all intimately connected with one another like 
 drops of water." 
 
 The second letter showed that Mdlle. Guizot must have 
 taken her revenge, either very cleverly, or that she was past 
 all redemption in the matter of punctuation ; and as the lat- 
 ter theory is scarcely admissible, knowing what we do of her 
 after-life, we must admit the former. The letter ran as 
 follows : 
 
 " MY DEAE HEXKIETTE, 
 
 " I dare say you will find me very provoking, but let me 
 beg of you not to fling so many commas at my head. You 
 are absolutely pelting me with them, as the Komans pelted 
 that poor Tarpeia with their bucklers." 
 
 It reminds one of Marguerite Thuillier, who " created 
 Mimi " in Miirger and Barriere's " Vie de Boheme," when 
 Miirger fell in love with her. " I can't do with him," she 
 said to his collaborateur, who pleaded for him, " I can't do 
 with him ; he is too badly dressed, he looks like a scarecrow." 
 Barriere advised his friend to go to a good tailor and have 
 himself rigged out in the latest fashion. The advice was 
 acted upon ; Barriere waited anxiously for the effect of the 
 transformation upon the lady's heart. A fortnight elapsed, 
 and poor Miirger was snubbed as usual. Barriere interceded 
 once more. " I can do less with him than before," was the 
 answer ; " he is too well dressed, he looks like a tailor's 
 dummy." 
 
 To return to M. Guizot, whom, in the course of the whole 
 of our acquaintance, I have only seen once " put out." It 
 was when the fiat went forth that his house was to come 
 down to make room for the new Boulevard Malesherbes. 
 The authorities had been as considerate as possible; they 
 had made no attempt to treat the eminent historian as a sim- 
 ple owner of house-property fighting to get the utmost value ; 
 they offered him three hundred thousand francs, and M. 
 Guizot himself acknowledged that the sum was a handsome 
 one. "But I have got thirty thousand volumes to remove, 
 besides my notes and manuscripts," he wailed. Then his 
 good temper got the better of him, and he had a " sly dig " 
 at his former adversary, Adolphe Thiers. " Serves me right 
 for having so many books ; happy the historian who prefers 
 to trust to his imagination."
 
 256 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 M. Guizot made up his mind to have his library removed 
 to Val- Richer and never to live in Paris again ; but his chil- 
 dren and friends prevailed upon him not to forsake society 
 altogether, and to take a modest apartment near his old 
 domicile, in the Faubourg St. Honore, opposite the English 
 embassy, which, however, in those days had not the monu- 
 mental aspect it has at present. 
 
 " It is doubtful," said M. Guizot afterwards to me, 
 " whether the idea of living in the country would have ever 
 entered my mind ten or fifteen years ago. At that time, I 
 would not have gone a couple of miles to see the most mag- 
 nificent bit of natural scenery : I should have gone a thou- 
 sand to see a man of talent." 
 
 And, in fact, up till 1830, when he was nearly forty-four, 
 he had never seen the sea, " And if it had not been for an 
 electoral journey to Normandy, I might not have seen it 
 then." I pointed out to him that M. Thiers had never had 
 a country house ; that he did not seem to care for nature, for 
 birds, or for flowers. 
 
 " Ah, that's different," he smiled. " I did not care much 
 about the country, because I had never seen any of it. Thiers 
 does not like it, because the birds, the flowers, the trees, live 
 and grow without his interference, and he does not care that 
 anything on earth should happen without his having a hand 
 in. it." 
 
 Thiers was the only man at whom M. Guizot tilted in 
 that way. Though brought up in strict Protestant, one 
 might almost say Calvinistic principles, he was an ardent ad- 
 mirer of Eoman Catholicism, which he called " the most ad- 
 mirable school of respect in the world." No man had suf- 
 fered more from the excesses of the first Revolution, seeing 
 that his father perished on the scaffold, yet I should not like 
 to say that he was not somewhat of a republican at heart, but 
 not of a republic " which begins with Plato and necessarily 
 ends with a gendarme." " The republic of '48," he used to 
 say, " it had not even a Monk, let alone a Washington or a 
 Cromwell ; and Louis-Napoleon had to help himself to the 
 throne. And depend upon it, if there had been a Cromwell, 
 he would have crushed it as the English one crushed the 
 monarchy. As for Washington, he would not have meddled 
 with it-at all." 
 
 " Yes," he said on another occasion, " I am proud of one 
 thing of the authorship of the law on elementary educa-
 
 DE LAMARTDsE. 257 
 
 tion ; but, proud as I am of it, if I could have foreseen the 
 uses to which it has been put, to which it is likely to be put 
 when I am gone, I would sooner have seen half of the nation 
 unable to distinguish an ' A from a bull's foot,' as your coun- 
 trymen say." 
 
 With Guizot died almost the last French statesman, 
 " who not only thought that he had the privilege to be poor, 
 but who carried the privilege too far ; " as some one remarked 
 when he heard the news of his demise. Towards the latter 
 years of his life, he occupied a modest apartment, on the 
 fourth floor, in the Rue Billaut (now the Rue Washington). 
 Well might M. de Falloux exclaim, as he toiled up that stair- 
 case, " My respect for him increases with every step I take." 
 
 Since M. de Falloux uttered these words, and very long 
 before, I have only known one French statesman whose stair- 
 case and whose poverty might perhaps inspire the same reflec- 
 tions and elicit similar praise. I am alluding to M. Rouher. 
 
 M. de Lamartine's poverty did not breed the same re- 
 spect. There was no dignity about it. It was the poverty 
 of Oliver Goldsmith sending to Dr. Johnson and feasting 
 with the guinea the latter had forwarded by the messenger 
 pending his own arrival. Mery had summed up the situa- 
 tion with regard to Lamartine's difficulties on the evening of 
 the 24th of February, '48, and there is no reason to suspect 
 that his statement had been exaggerated. The dynasty of 
 the younger branch of the Bourbons had been overthrown 
 because Lamartine saw no other means of liquidating the 
 350,000 francs he still owed for his princely journey to the 
 East. I had been to Lamartine's house once before that 
 revolution, and, though his wife was an Englishwoman, I felt 
 no inclination to return thither. The household gave me 
 the impression of " Du Jellaby dore." The sight of it would 
 have furnished Dickens with as good a picture as the one 
 he sketched. The principal personage, however, was not 
 quite so disinterested as the future mother-in-law of Prince 
 Turveydrop. Of course, at that time, there was no question 
 of a republic, but the politics advocated and discussed during 
 the lunch were too superfine for humble mortals like myself, 
 who instinctively felt that 
 
 " Quelques billets de mille francs feraient bien mieux 1'affaire " 
 
 of the host. And the instinct was not a deceptive one. 
 Four months after February, 1848, M. de Lamartine had
 
 258 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 virtually ceased to exist, as far as French politics were con- 
 cerned. From that time until the day of his death, the 
 world only heard of him in connection with a new book or 
 new poem, the avowed purpose of which was, not to make 
 the world better or wiser, but to raise money. He kept sing- 
 ing like the benighted musician on the Russian steppes keeps 
 playing his instrument, to keep away the wolves. 
 
 I knew not one but a dozen men, all of whom visited M. 
 de Lamartine. I have never been able to get a single story 
 or anecdote about him, not bearing upon the money question. 
 He is ten times worse in that respect than Balzac, with this 
 additional point in the latter's favour that he never whines 
 to the outside world about his impecuniosity. M. Guizot 
 produces a volume every twelvemonth, and asks nothing of 
 any one ; he leaves the advertising of it to his publisher : M. 
 de Lamartine spends enormous sums in publicity, and sub- 
 sidizes, besides, a crowd of journalists, who devour his cred- 
 itors' substance while he keeps repeating to them that his 
 books do not sell. " If, henceforth, I were to offer pearls 
 dissolved in the cup of Cleopatra, people would use the 
 decoction to wash their horses' feet." And, all the while, 
 people bought his works, though no one cared to read the 
 later ones. The golden lyre of yore was worse than dumb ; 
 it emitted false and weak sounds, the strings had become re- 
 laxed, the golden tongue alone remained. 
 
 When a national subscription is raised to pay his debts, 
 the committee are so afraid of his wasting the money that 
 they decide to have the proceeds deposited at the Comptoir 
 d'Escompte, and that de Lamartine shall not be able to draw 
 a farthing until all his affairs are settled. One morning he 
 deputes a friend to ask for forty thousand francs, in order to 
 pay some bills that are due. They refuse to advance the 
 money. De Lamartine invites them to his own house, but 
 they stand firm at first. Gradually they give way. " How 
 much do you really want ? " is the question asked at last. 
 " Fifty thousand francs," is the answer ; " but I fancy I shall 
 be able to manage with thirty thousand francs." 
 
 " If we gave you fifty thousand francs," says M. Emile 
 Pereire, " would you give us some breathing-time ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 And Lamartine pockets the fifty thousand francs, thanks 
 to his eloquence. 
 
 A better man, though not so great a poet, was Beranger,
 
 BfiRANGER. 259 
 
 whom I knew for many years, though my intimacy with him 
 did not commence until a few months after the February 
 revolution, when I met him coming out of the Palais-Bour- 
 bon. " I shall feel obliged," he said, " if you will see me 
 home, for I am not at all well ; these violent scenes are not 
 at all to my taste." Then, with a very wistful smile, he went 
 on : "I have been accused of having held ' the plank across 
 the brook over which Louis-Philippe went to the Tuileries.' 
 I wish I could be the bridge across the channel on which he 
 would return now. Certainly I would have liked a republic, 
 but not such a one as we are having in there," pointing to 
 the home of the Constituent Assembly. A short while after, 
 Beranger tendered his resignation as deputy. 
 
 He lived at Passy then, in the Rue Basse ; the number, if 
 I mistake not, was twenty-three. He had lived in the same 
 quarter fifteen years before, for I used to see him take his 
 walks when I was a lad, but it was difficult for Beranger to 
 live in the same spot for any length of time. He was, first 
 of all, of a very nomadic disposition ; secondly, his quondam 
 friends would leave him no peace. There was a constant 
 inroad of shady individuals who, on the pretext that he 
 was "the people's poet," drained his purse and his cellar. 
 Previous to his return to Passy, he had been boarding with a 
 respectable widow in the neighbourhood of Vincennes. He 
 had adopted the name of Bonnin, and his landlady took him 
 to be a modest, retired tradesman, living upon a small 
 annuity. When his birthday came round, she and her daugh- 
 ters found out that they had entertained an angel unawares, for 
 carriage after carriage drove up, and in a few hours the small 
 dwelling was filled with magnificent flowers, the visitors 
 meanwhile surrounding Beranger, and offering him their con- 
 gratulations. As a matter of course, the rumour spread, and 
 Beranger fled to Passy, where he invited Mdlle. Judith Frere 
 to join him once more. The retreat had been discovered, 
 and he resigned himself to be badgered more than usual for 
 the sake of the neighbourhood the Bois de Boulogne was 
 hard by ; but the municipal council of Passy, in considera- 
 tion of the honour conferred upon the arrondissement and 
 Beranger's charity, took it into their heads to pass a resolu- 
 tion offering Beranger the most conspicuous place in the 
 cemetery for a tomb. The poet fled once more, this time to 
 the Quartier-Latin ; but the students insisting on pointing 
 hifn out to their female companions, who, in their enthusiasm,
 
 260 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 made it a point of embracing him on every possible occasion, 
 especially in the " Closerie des Lilas " for to the end 
 Beranger remained fond of the society of young folk, 
 Beranger was compelled to flit once more. After a short 
 stay in the Hue Vendome, in the neighbourhood of the 
 Temple, he came to the Quartier-Beaujon, where I visited 
 him. 
 
 There have been so many tales with regard to Beranger's 
 companion, Mdlle. Judith Frere, and all equally erroneous, 
 that I am glad to be able to rectify them. Mdlle. Frere was 
 by no means the kind of upper servant she was generally 
 supposed to be. A glance at her face and a few moments 
 spent in her company could not fail to convince any one that 
 she was of good birth. She had befriended Beranger when 
 he was very young, they had parted for some time, and they 
 ended their days together, for the poet only survived his 
 friend three months. Beranger was a model of honesty and 
 disinterestedness. Ambition he had little or none ; he was 
 somewhat fond of teasing children, not because he had no 
 affection for them, but because he loved them too much. 
 His portrait by Ary Scheffer is the most striking likeness I 
 have ever seen ; but a better one still, perhaps, is by an artist 
 who had probably never set eyes on him. I am alluding to 
 Hablot Browne, who unconsciously reproduced him to the 
 life in the picture of Tom Pinch. As a companion, Beranger 
 was charming to a degree. I have never heard him say a 
 bitter word. The day I saw him home, I happened to say to 
 him, " You ought to be pleased, Victor Hugo is in the same 
 regiment with you." " Yes," he answered, " he is in the 
 band." He would never accept a pension from Louis- Napo- 
 leon, but he had no bitterness against him. Lamartine was 
 very bitter, and yet consented to the Emperor's heading of 
 the subscription-list in his behalf. That alone would show 
 the difference between the two men.
 
 SOME MEN OF THE EMPIRE. 261 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Some men of the Empire Fialin de Persigny The public prosecutor's opinion 
 of him expressed at the trial for high treason in 1836 Superior in muny 
 respects to Louis-Napoleon The revival of the Empire his only and con- 
 stant dream In order to realize it, he appeals first to Jerome, ex-King of 
 Westphalia De Persigny's estimate of him Jerome's greed and Louis- 
 Napoleon's generosity De Persigny's financial embarrassments; His char- 
 ity What the Empire really meant to him De Persigny virtually the 
 moving spirit in the Coup d'Etat Louis-Napoleon might have been satis- 
 fied with the presidency of the republic for life Persigny seeks for aid in 
 England Palmerston's share in the Coup d'Etat The submarine cable 
 Preparations for the Coup d'Etat A warning of it sent to England Count 
 Walewski issues invitations for a dinner-party on the 2nd of December 
 Opinion in London that Louis-Napoleon will get the worst in the struggle 
 with the Chamber The last funds from London General de Saint-Arnaud 
 and Baron Lacrosse The ElyseVBourbon on the evening of the 1st of 
 December I pass the Elysee at midnight Nothing unusual London on 
 the 2nd of December The dinner at Count Walewski's put oft at the last 
 moment Illuminations at the French Embassy a few hours later Palmer- 
 Bton at the Embassy Some traits of De Persigny's character His personal 
 affection for Louis-Napoleon Madame de Persigny Her parsimony Her 
 cooking of the household accounts Chevet and Madame de Persigny 
 What the Empire might have been with a Von Moltke by the side of the 
 Emperor instead of Vaillant, Niel, and Lebo3uf Colonel (afterwards Gen- 
 eral) Fleury the only modest man among the Emperor's entourage De 
 Persigny's pretensions as a Heaven-born statesman Mgr. de Merode De 
 Morny His first meeting with his half-brother De Morny as a grand 
 seigneur The origin of the Mexican campaign Walewski His fads 
 Rouber My first sight of him in the Quartier-Latin The Emperor's 
 opinion of him at the beginning of his career Rouher in his native home, 
 Auvergne His marriage Madame Rouher His father-in-law. 
 
 " A MA:sr endowed with a strong will and energy, active 
 and intelligent to a degree, with the faculty of turning up at 
 every spot where his presence was necessary either to revive 
 the lagging plot or to gain fresh adherents ; a man better 
 acquainted than all the rest with the secret springs upon 
 which the conspiracy hung." 
 
 This description of M. de Persigny is borrowed from the 
 indictment at the trial for high treason in 1836. Every par- 
 ticular of it is correct, yet it is a very one-sided diagnosis of 
 the character of Napoleon's staunchest henchman. If I had 
 had to paint him morally and mentally in one line, I should,
 
 262 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 without intending to be irreverent, have called him the John 
 the Baptist of the revived Napoleonic legend. There could 
 be no doubt about his energy, his activity, and his intelli- 
 gence ; in respect to the former two he was absolutely supe- 
 rior to Louis- Napoleon, but they, the activity and energy and 
 intelligence, would only respond to the bidding of one voice, 
 that of the first Napoleon from the grave, which, he felt sure, 
 had appointed him the chief instrument for the restoration 
 of the Empire. It was the dream that haunted his sleep, 
 that pursued him when awake. Let it not be thought, though, 
 that Louis- Napoleon appeared to him as the one selected by 
 Providence to realize that dream. Loyal and faithful as he 
 was to him from the day they met until his (Persigny's) 
 death, he would have been equally loyal and faithful, though 
 perhaps not so deeply attached, to Jer6me, the ex-King of 
 Westphalia, to whom he appealed first. But the youngest of 
 the great Napoleon's brothers did not relish adventures, and 
 he turned a deaf ear to Persigny's proposals, as he did later 
 on to those of M. Thiers, who wished him to become a candi- 
 date for the presidency of the Second Republic. 
 
 I was talking one day on the subject of the latter's refusal 
 to De Persigny, several years after the advent of the Empire, 
 and commending Jerome for his abnegation of self and his 
 fealty to his nephew. There was a sneer on Persigny's face 
 such as I had never seen there before ; for though he was by 
 no means good-tempered, and frequently very violent, he 
 generally left the members of the Imperial family alone. He 
 noticed my surprise, and explained at once. " It is very evi- 
 dent that you do not know Jerome, nor did I until a few 
 years ago. There is not a single one of the great Napoleon's 
 brothers who really had his glory at heart ; it meant money 
 and position to them, that is all. Do you know why Jerome 
 did not fall in with my views and those of M. Thiers ? Well, 
 I will tell you. He was afraid that his nephew Louis and the 
 rest of the family would be a burden on him ; he preferred 
 that others should take the chestnuts out of the fire and that 
 he should have the eating of them. That is what his self- 
 abnegation meant, nothing more." 
 
 I am afraid that De Persigny was not altogether wrong in 
 his estimate of the ex-King of Westphalia. He was insa- 
 tiable in his demands for money to his nephew. In fact, with 
 the exception of Princesse Mathilde, the whole of the Em- 
 peror's family was a thorn in his side.
 
 PEESIGNY AND THE COUP D'ETAT. 263 
 
 The Emperor himself was absolutely incapable of refusing 
 a service. I have the following story on very good authority. 
 De Persigny, who was as lavish as his Imperial master, was 
 rarely ever out of difficulties, and in such emergencies natu- 
 rally appealed to the latter. He had wasted on, or sunk 
 enormous sums in, his country estate of Chamarande, where 
 he entertained with boundless hospitality. As a matter of 
 course, he was always being pursued by his creditors. One 
 early morn Persigny always went betimes when he wanted 
 money he made his appearance in the Emperor's private 
 room, looking sad and dejected. Napoleon refrained for a 
 while from questioning him as to the cause of his low spirits, 
 but finally ventured to say that he looked ill. 
 
 " Ah, sire," was the answer, " I am simply bent down with 
 sorrow. This Chamarande, which I have created out of noth- 
 ing as it were " it had cost nearly two millions of francs 
 "is ruining me. I shall be forced to give it up." 
 
 De Persigny felt sure that he would be told there and 
 then not to worry himself ; but the Emperor was in a jocu- 
 lar mood, and took delight in prolonging his anxiety. " Be- 
 lieve me, my dear due," said Napoleon with an assumed air 
 of indifference, " it is the best thing you can do. Get rid of 
 Chamarande ; it is too great a burden, and you'll breathe 
 more freely when it's gone." 
 
 De Persigny turned as white as a ghost ; whereupon Na- 
 poleon, who was soft-hearted to a degree, took a bundle of 
 notes from his drawer and handed them to him. De Per- 
 signy went away beaming. 
 
 It must not be inferred from this that De Persigny was 
 grasping like Prince Jerome and others, who constantly 
 drained Napoleon's purse. De Persigny's charity was pro- 
 verbial, but he gave blindly, and as a consequence, was fre- 
 quently imposed upon. When young he had joined the 
 Saint-Simoniens ; his great aim was to make everybody happy. 
 To him the restoration of the Empire meant not only the re- 
 vival of Napoleon's glory, but the era of universal happiness, 
 of universal material prosperity. As a rule, he was thorough- 
 ly unpractical ; the whole of his life's work may be summed 
 up in one line he conceived and organized the Coup d'Etat. 
 As such he was virtually the founder of the Second Empire. 
 In that task practice went hand in hand with theory ; when 
 the task was accomplished, his inspiration was utterly at fault. 
 
 Historians have been generally content to attribute the
 
 264: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 principal role in the Coup d'Etat, next to that of Louis-Na- 
 poleon, to M. de Morny. Of course, I am speaking of those 
 who conceived it, not of those who executed it. The parts 
 of Generals Magnan and De Saint- Arnaud, of Colonel de Be- 
 ville and M. de Maupas, scarcely admit of discussion. But the 
 fact is that De Morny did comparatively nothing as far as the 
 conception was concerned. The prime mover was undoubtedly 
 De Persigny, and it is a very moot question whether, but for 
 him, it would have been conceived at all. I know I am tread- 
 ing on dangerous ground, but I have very good authority for 
 the whole of the following notes relating to it. In De Per- 
 signy's mind the whole of the scheme was worked out prior to 
 Louis-Napoleon's election to the presidency, though of course 
 the success of it depended on that election. He did not want 
 a republic, even with Louis-Napoleon as a president for life ; 
 he wanted an empire. I should not like to affirm that Prince 
 Louis would not have been content with such a position ; it was 
 Persigny who put down his foot, exclaiming, "Aut Ccesar, 
 aut nullus ! " That the sentence fell upon willing ears, there 
 is equally no doubt, and when the Prince-President had his 
 foot upon the first rung of the ladder, he would probably have 
 rushed, or endeavoured to rush, to the top at once, regardless 
 of the risk involved in this perilous ascent, for there would 
 have been no one, absolutely no one, to steady the ladder at 
 the bottom. De Persigny held him back while he busied 
 himself in finding not only the personnel that was to hold 
 the latter, but the troops that would prevent the crowd from 
 interfering with the ladder-holders. It was he who was the 
 first to broach the recall of De Saint- Arnaud from Africa ; it 
 was he who drew attention to M. de Maupas, then little 
 more than an obscure prefect ; it was he who was wise enough 
 to see that " the ladder-holders " would have to be sought for 
 in England, and not in France. " The English," he said to 
 Napoleon, " owe you a good turn for the harm they have done 
 to your uncle. They are sufficiently generous or sufficiently 
 sensible to do that good turn, if it is in their interest to do 
 so ; look for your support among the English." 
 
 I fancy it was Lord Palmerston's dislike of Louis- Philippe 
 on account of " the Spanish marriages," rather than a senti- 
 ment of generosity towards Louis-Napoleon, that made him 
 espouse his cause, but I feel certain that he did espouse it. I 
 have good ground for saying that his interviews with Comte 
 Walewski were much more frequent than his ministerial col-
 
 PREPARATIONS FOR THE COUP D'ETAT. 265 
 
 leagues suspected, or the relations between England and 
 France, however friendly they may have been, warranted. 
 But everything was not ready. Palmerston and Walewski 
 on the English side of the Channel, Louis-Napoleon and De 
 Persigny on the French side, were waiting for something. 
 What was it? Nothing more nor less than the laying of 
 the submarine cable between Dover and Calais, the con- 
 cession for which was given on the 8th of January, 1851, and 
 on which occasion the last words to Mr. Walker Breit were 
 to hurry it on as much as possible, " seeing that it is of the 
 utmost importance for th.e French Government to be in direct 
 and rapid communication with the Cabinet of St. James" 
 The Cabinet meant Lord Palmerston. Nevertheless, it is 
 not until ten months later that the cable is laid, and from 
 that moment events march apace. Let us glance at them for 
 a moment. Telegraphic communication between Dover and 
 Calais is established on the 13th of November. On the 15th, 
 General Saint- Arnaud gives orders that the degree of 1849, 
 conferring on the president of the National Assembly the 
 right of summoning and disposing of the military forces 
 which had hitherto been hung up in every barracks through- 
 out the land, shall be taken down. On the 16th, Changar- 
 nier, Leflo, and Baze, with many others, decide that a bill 
 shall be introduced immediately, conferring once more that 
 right on the president of the Assembly. The opponents of 
 the Prince-President are already rubbing their hands with 
 glee at the thought of their success, for it means that Prince 
 Louis and his adherents will be in their power, and in their 
 power means removal to Vincennes or elsewhere, as prisoners 
 of State. On the 18th, the bill is thrown out by a majority 
 of 108, and the Assembly is virtually powerless henceforth 
 against any and every attack from the military. It was on 
 that very evening that the date of the Coup d'Etat was fixed 
 for the 2nd of December, notwithstanding the hesitation and 
 wavering of Louis-Napoleon. On the 26th a young attache 
 is despatched from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to the 
 French Embassy in London, instead of the ordinary cabinet 
 (or queen's) messenger, which proves that the despatches are 
 more important than usual. They contain letters from the 
 Prince-President himself to Comte Walewski, the contents of 
 which are probably known to the Marquis de Turgot, but 
 which are despatched in that way, instead of being sent di- 
 rectly from the Elysee by a trustworthy person, because the 
 
 12
 
 "266 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 presidential residence is watched day and night by the " coun- 
 ter-police " of the Assembly. The reason why the Marquis 
 de Turgot selects a young aristocrat is because he feels cer- 
 tain that he cannot be tampered with. On the 29th of No- 
 vember a connection of mine receives a letter from a friend 
 in London, who is supposed to be behind the scenes, but who 
 this time is utterly in the dark. It is to the following effect : 
 " There is something in the wind, but I know not what. 
 Both yesterday morning (27th) and to-day Walewski has 
 been closeted for more than two hours each time with Pal- 
 merston. There is to be a grand dinner at Walewski 's on the 
 second of next month, to which I received an invitation. Can 
 you tell me what mischief is brewing ? " 
 
 The recipient of the letter was neither better nor worse 
 informed than the rest of us, and in spite of all the assertions 
 to the contrary which have been made since, no one foresaw 
 the crisis in the shape it came upon us. On the contrary, the 
 general opinion was that in the end Louis-Napoleon would 
 get the worse, in spite of the magic influence of his name 
 with the army. It was expected that if the troops were called 
 upon to act against the National Assembly, they would re- 
 fuse and turn against their leaders. I am by no means cer- 
 tain that the Prince-President did not entertain a similar 
 opinion up to the last moment, for I have it on excellent 
 authority that as late as the 26th of November he endeav- 
 oured to postpone the affair for a month. It was then that 
 De Persigny showed his teeth, and insisted upon the night 
 of the 1st or 2nd of December as the latest. The interview 
 was a very stormy one. On that very morning De Persigny 
 had received a letter from London, not addressed to his 
 residence. It contained a draft for 2000, but with the inti- 
 mation that these would be the last funds forthcoming. He 
 showed the Prince-President the letter, and Napoleon gave in 
 there and then. The letters spoken of just now were de- 
 spatched on the same day. It was with that money that the 
 Coup d'Etat was made, and all the stories about a million 
 and a half of francs being handed respectively to De Morny, 
 De Maupas, Saint-Arnaud, and the rest are so much in- 
 vention. 
 
 Up to six o'clock in the afternoon of the 1st of December, 
 General de Saint-Arnaud was virtually undecided, not with 
 regard to the necessity of the Coup d'Etat, but with regard 
 to the opportuneness of it within the next twelve hours. I
 
 LOUDON ON THE DAY OP THE COUP D'ETAT. 267 
 
 have the following story from the lips of Baron Lacrosse, 
 who was one of the actors in it. On the eve of the Coup 
 d'Etat he was Minister of Public Works, and as such was 
 present at the sitting of the Assembly on the 1st of December. 
 A member ascended the tribune to interpellate the Minister 
 for War, and, the latter being absent, the question was de- 
 ferred until next day. That same evening, 1st of December, 
 there was an official dinner at M. Daviel's, the Minister of 
 Justice, and at the termination of the sitting, M. Lacrosse 
 called in his carriage at the Ministry for War to take his col- 
 league. " You may make up your mind for a warm half- 
 hour to-morrow," he said with a smile, as he entered General 
 Saint- Arnaud's room. "Why? "asked the general. "You 
 are going to be interpellated." " I expected as much, and 
 was just considering my answer. I am glad you warned me 
 in time. I think I know what to say now." 
 
 I do not believe that Baron Lacrosse had the faintest ink- 
 ling of the real drift of the remark, nor have I ever asked him 
 directly whether he had. As far as I could gather afterwards 
 from one or two people who were there, the Elysee presented 
 no unusual feature that night. The reception was well at- 
 tended, as the ordinary receptions on Mondays generally were, 
 for the times had gone by when the courtyard was a howling 
 wilderness dotted with two, or perhaps three, hackney cabs. 
 It would appear that a great many well-known men and a 
 corresponding number of pretty women moved as usual 
 through the salons, only one of which was shut up, that at 
 the very end of the suite, and which did duty as a council- 
 chamber, and contained the portrait of the then young Em- 
 peror of Austria, Francis-Joseph. But this was scarcely 
 noticed, nor did the early withdrawal of the Prince-President 
 provoke any comment, for it happened pretty often. Very 
 certain is it that at twelve o'clock that night the Elysee was 
 wrapt in darkness, for I happened to pass there at that hour. 
 Standing at the door, or rather inside it, was the captain of 
 the guard, smoking a cigar. I believe it was Captain De- 
 sondes of the " Guides," but I will not be sure, for I was not 
 near enough to distinguish plainly. The Faubourg St. Ho- 
 nore was pretty well deserted, save for a few individuals 
 prowling about ; they were probably detectives in the pay of 
 the Prince- President's adversaries. 
 
 Let me return for a moment to London, and give an ac- 
 count of what happened there on the 2nd of December, as
 
 268 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 supplied by the writer of the above-mentioned letter, in an 
 epistle which reached Paris only on the 7th. 
 
 It appears that on the day of the Coup d'Etat London 
 woke up amidst a dense fog. Virtually the news of what 
 happened in Paris early that morning did not spread until 
 between two and three o'clock. Our informant had been in- 
 vited to a dinner-party at the French Embassy that night, 
 and though in no way actively connected with politics, he 
 was asking himself whether he should go or stay away, when, 
 at five o'clock, he received a note from the Embassy, saying 
 that the dinner would not take place. The fact was that tit 
 the eleventh hour the whole of the corps diplomatique had 
 sent excuses. Our friend went to his club, had his dinner, 
 and spent part of the evening there. At about eleven a crony 
 of his came in, and seeing him seated in the smoking-room, 
 exclaimed, " Why, I thought you were going to Walewski's 
 dinner and reception." " So I was," remarked our friend, 
 " but it was countermanded at five." " Countermanded ? 
 Why, I passed the Embassy just now, and it was blazing with 
 light. Come and look." 
 
 They took a cab, and sure enough the building was posi- 
 tively illuminated. Our friend went in, and the salons were 
 crammed to suffocation. Lord Palmerston was talking ani- 
 matedly to Count Walewski ; the whole corps diplomatique 
 accredited to the court of St. James was there. The fact 
 was that about nine or half-past the most favourable news 
 from Paris had reached London. The report soon spread 
 that Lord Palmerston had officially adhered to the Coup 
 d'Etat, and that he had telegraphed in that sense to the vari- 
 ous English embassies abroad without even consulting his 
 fellow-ministers. 
 
 I believe our friend was correctly informed, for it is well 
 known that Palmerston did not resign, but was virtually dis- 
 missed from office. He never went to Windsor to give up 
 the seals ; Lord John Eussell had to do it for him. Persigny, 
 therefore, considered that he had fallen in the cause of Louis- 
 Napoleon, and as such he became little short of an idol. The 
 Prince- President himself was not far from sharing in that 
 worship. Not once, but a hundred times, his familiars have 
 heard him say, " Avec Palmerston on peut faire des grandes 
 choses." Nevertheless, Palmerston appealed more to De Per- 
 signy's imagination than to Louis-Napoleon's. After all, he 
 was perhaps much more of a Richelieu than a constitutional
 
 DE PERSIGNY AND LOUIS NAPOLEON. 269 
 
 minister in a constitutional country has a right to be now-a- 
 days, and that was what Persigny admired above all things. 
 His long stay in England had by no means removed his in- 
 herent dislike to parliamentary government, and, rightly or 
 wrongly, he credited Palmerston with a similar sentiment. 
 
 De Persigny was amiable and obliging enough, provided 
 one knew how to manage him, and with those whom he liked, 
 but exceedingly thin-skinned and often violent with those 
 whom he disliked. He was, moreover, very jealous with re- 
 gard to Louis-Napoleon's affection for him. I doubt whether 
 he really minded the influence wielded by the Empress, De 
 Morny, and Walewski over the Emperor, but he grudged 
 them their place in the Emperor's heart. This was essen- 
 tially the case with regard to the former. He would have 
 been glad to see his old friend and Imperial master contract 
 a loveless marriage with some insignificant German or Eus- 
 sian princess, who would have borne her husband few or many 
 children, in order to secure the safety of the dynasty, but the 
 passion that prompted the union with Eugenie de Montijo he 
 considered virtually as an injury to himself. I give his opin- 
 ion on that subject in English, because, though expressed in 
 French, it had certainly been inspired by his sojourn in Eng- 
 land. " When love invades a man's heart, there is scarcely 
 any room left for friendship. You cannot drive love for a 
 woman and friendship for a man in double harness, you are 
 obliged to drive them tandem ; and what is worse in a case 
 like that of the Emperor, friendship becomes the leader and 
 love the wheeler. Of course, to the outsider, friendship has 
 the place of honour ; in reality, love, the wheeler, is in closest 
 contact with the driver and the vehicle, and can, moreover, 
 have a sly kick at friendship, the leader. Personally, I am an 
 exception I may say a phenomenal exception because my 
 affection for the Emperor is as strong as my love for my 
 wife." 
 
 Those who knew both the Emperor and Madame de Per- 
 signy might have fitly argued that this equal division of 
 affection was a virtual injustice to the sovereign, who was 
 decidedly more amiable than the spouse. The former rarely 
 did a spiteful thing from personal motives of revenge ; I 
 only know of two. He never invited Lady Jersey to the 
 Tuileries during the Empire, because she had shown her dis- 
 like of him when he was in London ; he exiled David d'An- 
 gers because the sculptor had refused to finish the monu-
 
 270 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 merit of Queen Hortense after the Coup-d'Etat. David 
 d' Angers was one of the noblest creatures that ever lived, 
 and I mean to speak of him at greater length. On the other 
 hand, Madame de Persigny made her husband's life, not- 
 withstanding his love for her, a burden by her whimsical dis- 
 position, her vindictive temperament, and her cheeseparing 
 in everything except her own lavish expenditure on dress. 
 She was what the French call "une femme qui fait des 
 scenes ; " she almost prided herself upon being superior in 
 birth to her husband, though in that respect there was really 
 not a pin to choose between her grandfather, Michel Ney, 
 the stable-boy, who had risen to be a duke of the First Em- 
 pire, and her husband, the sergeant-quartermaster Fialin, 
 who became Due de Persigny under the second. She was 
 always advocating retrenchment in the household. " True," 
 said Persigny, " she cuts down her dresses too, but the more 
 she cuts, the more they cost." For in his angry moments he 
 would now and then tell a story against his wife. Here is 
 one. Persigny, as I have already said, was hospitable to a 
 fault, but he had always to do battle when projecting a grand 
 entertainment. " There was so much trouble with the serv- 
 ants, and as for the chef, his extravagance knew no bounds." 
 So said madame; and sick at last of always hearing the 
 same complaints, he decided to let Chevet provide. All 
 went well at first, because he himself went to the Palais- 
 Koyal to give his orders, merely stating the number of guests, 
 and leaving the rest to the famous caterers, than whom there 
 are no more obliging or conscientious purveyors anywhere. 
 After a little while he began to leave the arrangements to 
 madame ; she herself sent out the invitations, so there could 
 be no mistake with regard to the number. He soon per- 
 ceived, however, that the dinners, if not inferior in quality 
 to the former ones, were decidedly inferior in quantity. At 
 last, one evening, when there were twenty-six people round 
 the board, there was not enough for twenty, and next day 
 De Persigny took the road to the Palais-Eoyal once more 
 to lodge his complaint personally. " Comment, monsieur le 
 comte," was the reply of one of the principals, " vous dites 
 qu'il y avait vingt-six convives et qu'il n'y avait pas de quoi 
 nourrir vingt ; je vous crois parfaitement ; voila la com- 
 mande de madame la comtesse, copiee dans notre registre : 
 ' Diner chez M. de Persigny pour seize personnes.' ' : 
 
 Madame had simply pocketed, or intended to pocket, fif-
 
 DE PERSIGNY AND HIS WIPE. 271 
 
 teen hundred francs for Chevet rarely charged less than a 
 hundred and fifty francs per head, wines included and had 
 endeavoured to make the food for sixteen do for twenty-six. 
 Of course there was a scene. Madame promised amendment, 
 and the husband was only too willing to believe. The amend- 
 ment was worse than the original offence, for one night the 
 whole of the supper-table, set out a la Fran9aise, i. e., with 
 everything on it, gave way, because, her own dining-table 
 having proved too small, she had declined Chevet's offer of 
 providing one at a cost of seven or eight francs, and sent for 
 a jobbing carpenter to put together some boards and trestles 
 at the cost of two francs. Chevet managed to provide an- 
 other banquet within three quarters of an hour, which, with 
 the one that had been spoiled, was put in the bill. Within 
 a comparatively short time of her husband's death, early in 
 the seventies, Madame de Persigny contracted a second mar- 
 riage, in direct opposition to the will of her family. 
 
 Most of the men in the immediate entourage of the Em- 
 peror were intoxicated with their sudden leap into power, 
 but of course the intoxication manifested itself in different 
 ways. A good many considered themselves the composers of 
 the Napoleonic Opera for it was really such in the way it 
 held the stage of France for eighteen years, the usual tragic 
 finale not even being wanting. With the exception of De 
 Persigny, they were in reality but the orchestral performers, 
 and he, to give him his utmost due, was only the orchestra- 
 tor of the score and part author of the libretto. The origi- 
 nal themes had been composed by the exile of St. Helena, 
 and were so powerfully attractive to, and so constantly haunt- 
 ing, the ears of the majority of Frenchmen as to have re- 
 quired no outward aid to remembrance for thirty-five years, 
 though I do not forget either Thiers' works, Victor Hugo's 
 poetry, Louis-Philippe's generous transfer of the great cap- 
 tain's remains to France, nor Louis-Napoleon's own attempts 
 at Strasburg and Boulogne, all of which contributed to that 
 effect. Nevertheless, all the artisans of the Coup d'Etat 
 considered themselves nearly as great geniuses as the intel- 
 lectual and military giant who conceived and executed the 
 19th Brumaire, and pretended to impose their policy upon 
 Europe by imposing their will upon the Emperor, though 
 not one could hold a candle to him in statecraft. Napoleon 
 with a Moltke by his side would have been a match for Bis- 
 marck, and the left bank of the Khine might have been
 
 272 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 French ; Alsace-Lorraine would certainly not have been Ger- 
 man. It is not my purpose, however, to enter upon politics. 
 I repeat, De Persigny, De Morny, and to a certain extent 
 Walewski, endeavoured to exalt themselves into political Na- 
 poleons at all times and seasons ; De Saint- Arnaud felt con- 
 vinced that the strategical mantle of the great warrior had 
 fallen upon him ; De Maupas fancied himself another Fouche. 
 The only one who was really free from pretensions of either 
 kind was Colonel (afterwards General) Fleury. He was the 
 only modest man among the lot. 
 
 The greatest offender in that way was, no doubt, De Per- 
 signy. During his journey to Eome in 1866 he did not hesi- 
 tate to tender his political advice to such past masters in 
 diplomacy as Pius IX. and Cardinal Antonelli. Both pre- 
 tended to profit by the lesson, but Mgr. de M erode,* who was 
 not quite so patient, had many an animated discussion with 
 him, in which De Persigny frequently got the worst. One 
 evening the latter thought fit to twit him with his pugna- 
 ciousness. " I suppose, monsignor," he said, " it's the ancient 
 leaven of the trooper getting the upper hand now and then." 
 " True," replied the prelate ; " I was a captain in the foreign 
 legion, and fought in Africa, where I got my cross of the 
 Legion of Honour. But you, monsieur le due, I fancy I 
 have heard that you were more or less of a sergeant- quarter- 
 master in a cavalry regiment." 
 
 Mgr. de Merode could have done De Persigny no greater 
 injury than to remind him of his humble origin. He al- 
 ways winced under such allusions ; his constant preoccupa- 
 tion was to make people forget it, and he often exposed him- 
 self to ridicule in the attempt. He knew nothing about art, 
 and yet he would speak about it, not as if he had studied the 
 
 * Frederic. Xavier de Merode was the descendant of an ancient Flemish 
 family, and became an influential member of the Prelatura. He took an active 
 share in the organization of the Papal troops which fought at Mentana. There 
 is a romantic but absolutely true story connected with his military career. He 
 was from his very youth intended, for the priesthood, but one day, when he was 
 but nineteen, he had a quarrel with a fellow-student, who gave him a box on 
 the ears. M. de Merode was too conscientious a Catholic to fight a duel, and 
 still his pride forbade him to remain under the imputation of being a coward. 
 So he enlisted first in a Belgian, subsequently in a foreign regiment, and proved 
 his courage. He was very hot-tempered, and had frequent disagreements with 
 Generals Lamoriciere and De Guyon, and even with Pius IX. himself, who, on 
 the occasion of the promulgation of the decree of infallibility, positively forbade 
 him to enter the Vatican again. But he soon afterwards made his peace with 
 the Pontiff. His worst enemies and he had many never questioned his sin- 
 cerity and loyalty. EDITOR.
 
 DE MORNY. 273 
 
 subject, but as if he had been brought up in a refined society, 
 where the atmosphere had been impregnated with it. As a 
 matter of course, he became an easy victim to the picture- 
 dealers and bric-a-brac merchants. I remember his silver 
 being taken to the mint during the Siege. He had paid an 
 enormous price for it on the dealer's representation that it 
 was antique : " C'est du Louis XV. tout pur." " Tellement 
 pur que c'est du Victoria," said a connoisseur ; and he was 
 not mistaken, for it had been manufactured by a firm of 
 London silversmiths. But it was a compliment for all that 
 to the Queen. 
 
 With all his faults, De Persigny was at heart a better 
 man than De Morny, who affected to look down upon him. 
 True, the latter had none of his glaring defects, neither had 
 he any of his sterling virtues. One evening, in January, 
 1849, when the Prince- President had been less than a month 
 at the Elysee, a closed carriage drove into the courtyard and 
 stopped before the flight of steps leading to the hall, which, 
 like the rest of the building, was already wrapt in semi- 
 darkness. A gentleman alighted who was evidently ex- 
 pected, for the officer on duty conducted him almost without 
 a word to the private apartments of the President, where the 
 latter was walking up and down, the usual cigarette between 
 his lips, evidently greatly preoccupied and visibly impatient. 
 The door had scarcely opened when the Prince's face, gener- 
 ally so difficult to read, lighted up as if by magic. Before 
 the officer had time to announce the visitor, the prince 
 stepped forward, held out his hand, and with the other 
 clasped the new-comer to his breast. The officer knew the 
 visitor. It was the Comte Auguste de Morny. As a matter 
 of course he retired, and saw and heard no more. I had the 
 above account from his own lips, and he felt certain that this 
 was the first time the brothers had ever met. 
 
 The Comte de Morny was close upon forty then, and for 
 at least half of that time had been emancipated from all 
 restraint ; he was a well-known figure in the society of Louis- 
 Philippe's reign ; he had been a deputy for one of the con- 
 stituencies in Auvergne ; at the period of his first meeting 
 with Louis-Napoleon he was at the head of an important in- 
 dustrial establishment down that way, and one fain asks one's 
 self why he had waited until then to shake his brother's 
 hand. The answer, is not difficult. There is an oft-repeated 
 story about De Morny having been at the Opera-Comique
 
 274 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 during the evening of the 1st of December, 1851. Rumours 
 of the Coup d'Etat were rife, and a lady said, " II parait qu'on 
 va donner un fameux coup de balai. De quel c6te serez 
 vous, M. de Morny ? " " Soyez sure, madame, quo je serai du 
 cote du manche." Morny always averred that he had said 
 nothing of the kind. " They invented it afterwards, perhaps 
 because they credited me with the instinctive faculty of being 
 on the winning side, the side of the handle, in any and every 
 emergency." 
 
 I think one may safely accept that version, and that is 
 why he refrained from claiming his brother's friendship and 
 acquaintance until he felt almost certain that the latter was 
 fingering the handle of the broom that was to make a clean 
 sweep of the Second Republic. It is difficult to determine 
 how much or how little he contributed to the success of that 
 sweep, but I have an idea that it was very little. One thing 
 is very certain, for I have it on very good I may say, the 
 best authority. He did not contribute any money to the 
 undertaking ; he endeavoured to raise funds from others, but 
 he himself did not loosen his purse-strings ; when, curiously 
 enough, he was the only one among the immediate entou- 
 rage of Louis-Napoleon whose purse-strings were worth loos- 
 ening. 
 
 Allowing for the difference of sex, better breeding and 
 better education, De Morny often reminded one of Eachel. 
 They possessed the same powers of fascination, and were, I 
 am afraid, equally selfish at heart. To read the biographies 
 of both I do not mean those that pretend to be historical 
 one would think that there had never been a grande dame 
 on the stage of the Comedie-Fran9aise before Rachel or con- 
 temporary with her, though Augustine Brohan was decidedly 
 more grande dame than Rachel in every respect. It is the 
 same with regard to De Morny. To the chromqueur during 
 the Second Empire he was the only grand seigneur the rest 
 were only seigneurs; but I am inclined to think that the 
 chroniqueur of those days had seen very few real grand sei- 
 gneurs. To use a popular locution, " they did not go thirteen 
 to the dozen " at the court of Napoleon III. ; and among the 
 people with whom De Morny came habitually in contact, in 
 the course of his financial and industrial schemes, a grand 
 seigneur was even a greater rarity than at the Tuileries. If 
 a kind of quiet impertinence to some of one's fellow-creatures, 
 and a tacitly expressed contempt for nearly the whole of the
 
 DE MORNY " THE GRAND SEIGNEUR. 275 
 
 rest, constitute the grand seigneur, then certainly Do Morny 
 could have claimed the title. I have elsewhere noted the 
 meeting of Taglioiii with her husband at De Moray's dinner- 
 party. If it had been arranged by the host with the view of 
 effecting a reconciliation between the couple, then nothing 
 could have been more praiseworthy ; but I am not at all sure 
 of it. If it were not, then it became an unpardonable joke 
 at the Avoman's expense, and in the Avorst taste ; but the 
 chroniqueur of those days Avould have applauded it all the 
 same. 
 
 Here are two stories Avhicli, at different times, Avere told 
 by De Moray's familiars and sycophants in order to stamp 
 him the grand seigneur. Late in the fifties he Avas an as- 
 siduous frequenter of the salons of a banker, Avhose sisters- 
 in-law happened to be very handsome. One evening, Avhile 
 talking to one of them, they came to ask him to take a hand 
 at lansquenet. He had evidently no intention of leaving the 
 society of the lady for that of the gaming-table, and said so. 
 Of course, his host Avas in the wrong in pressing the thing, 
 nevertheless one has yet to learn that " two Avrongs make one 
 right," 
 
 " What Avill you play ' J . " they asked, when they had as 
 good as badgered him away from his companion. 
 
 " The simple rouge and the noir. That's the quickest," 
 
 "How much for?" 
 
 " Ten thousand francs." 
 
 The stake seemed somoAvhat high, and no one cared to 
 take it up. But the host himself felt bound to set the ex- 
 ample, and the sum Avas made up. De Moray lost, and Avas 
 about to rise from the table, Avhen they said 
 
 "Have your revenge." 
 
 " Very well ; ten thousand on the black." 
 
 He lost again. Most grand seigneurs Avould have got up 
 without saying anything. Twenty thousand francs Avas, after 
 all, not an important sum to him, and I feel, moreover, cer- 
 tain that it A?as not the loss of the money that A'exed him. 
 But he felt bound to emphasize his indifference. 
 
 " There, that Avill do. I trust I shall be left in peace 
 now." 
 
 My informant considered this exceedingly talon rouge; 
 I did not. 
 
 A story of a similar kind, when he was a simple deputy. 
 A bigwig, Avith an inordinate ambition to become a minister,
 
 276 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 invited him to dinner. He had been told that his host was 
 in the habit of drinking a rare Bordeaux which was only 
 offered to one or two guests, quietly pointed out by the for- 
 mer to the servant. At the question of the latter whether 
 he (M. de Morny) would take Brane-Mouton or Ermitage, 
 he pointed to the famous bottle that had been hidden away. 
 The servant, as badly trained as the master, looked embar- 
 rassed, but at last filled De Morny's glass with the precious 
 nectar. De Morny simply poured it into a tumbler and di- 
 luted it with water. 
 
 Eidiculous as it may seem, De Morny often spoke and 
 acted as if he had royal blood in his veins, and in that re- 
 spect scarcely considered himself inferior to Colonna Walew- 
 ski, of whose origin there could be no doubt. A glance at 
 the man's face was sufficient. Both frequently spoke and 
 acted as if Louis-Napoleon occupied the Imperial throne by 
 their good will, and that, therefore, he was, in a measure, 
 bound to dance to their fiddling. Outwardly these two were 
 fast friends, up to a certain period ; I fancy that their com- 
 mon hatred of De Persigny was the strongest link of that 
 bond. In reality they were as jealous of one another and of 
 their influence over the Emperor as they were of De Per- 
 signy and his. The latter, who was well aware of all this, 
 frankly averred that he preferred Walewski's undisguised and 
 outspoken hostility to De Morny's very questionable cordial- 
 ity. " The one would take my head like Judith took Holo- 
 fernes', the other would shave it like Delilah shaved Sam- 
 son's, provided I trusted myself to either, which I am not 
 likely to do." 
 
 It was De Persigny who told me the substance of the fol- 
 lowing story, and I believe every word of it, because, first, I 
 never caught De Persigny telling a deliberate falsehood; 
 secondly, because I heard it confirmed many years after- 
 wards in substance by two persons who were more or less di- 
 rectly concerned in it. 
 
 In the latter end of 1863 one of the sons of Baron James 
 de Kothschild died ; I believe it was the youngest of the four, 
 but I am not certain. The old baron, who was generosity 
 itself when it came to endowing charitable institutions, was 
 absolutely opposed to any waste of money. Amidst the 
 terrible grief at his loss, he was still the careful administra- 
 tor, and sent to M. Emile Perrin, the then director of the 
 Grand Opera, and subsequently the director of the Comedie-
 
 A STORY OP THE MEXICAN CAMPAIGN. 277 
 
 Francaise, asking him to dispose of his box on the grand 
 tier, under the express condition that it should revert to him 
 after a twelvemonth. It was the very thing M. Perrin was 
 not empowered to do. Though nominally the director, he 
 was virtually the manager under Comte Bacciochi, the super- 
 intendent of the Imperial theatres; that is, the theatres 
 which received a subsidy from the Emperor's civil list. The 
 subscriber who wished to relinquish his box or seat, for how- 
 ever short a time of course without continuing to pay for 
 it forfeited all subsequent claim to it. In this instance, 
 though, apart from the position of Baron James, the cause 
 which prompted the application warranted an exception be- 
 ing made ; still M. Perrin did not wish to act upon his own 
 responsibility, and referred the matter to Comte Bacciochi, 
 telling him at the same time that Comte Walewski would be 
 glad to take the box during the interim. The latter had but 
 recently resigned the Ministry of State by reason of an un- 
 expected difficulty in the " Koman Question ; " * the ministe- 
 rial box went, as a matter of course, with the appointment, 
 and Comte Walewski regretted the loss of the former, which 
 was one of the best in the house, more than the loss of the 
 latter, and had asked his protege M. Perrin owed his posi- 
 tion at the Opera to him to get him as good a one as soon 
 as possible. 
 
 It so happened that Comte Bacciochi had a grudge 
 against Walewski for having questioned certain of his pre- 
 rogatives connected with the superintendence of the Opera. 
 The moment he heard of Walewski's wish, he ~eplied, " M. 
 de Morny applied to me several months since for a better 
 box, and I see no reason why Comte Walewski should have 
 it over his head." 
 
 Vindictive like a Corsican, he laid the matter directly 
 before the Emperor, and furthermore did his best to exas- 
 perate the two postulants against one another. De Morny 
 had the box ; Bacciochi had, however, succeeded so well that 
 the two men were for a considerable time not on speaking 
 terms. 
 
 Meanwhile the Mexican question had assumed a very 
 serious aspect. In spite of his undoubted interest in the 
 
 * If Comte Walewski ruled Napoleon III., the second Comtesse "Walewska, 
 who was an Italian by-birth and very handsome, absolutely ruled her husband. 
 The first Comtesse Walewska was Lord Sandwich's daughter. EDITOK.
 
 278 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Jecker scheme, or probably because it had yielded all it was 
 likely to yield, De Morny had of late been on the side of 
 Walewski, who strongly counselled the withdrawal of the 
 French troops. But the moment the incident of the opera- 
 box cropped up, there was a change of front on his part. 
 He became an ardent partisan for continuing the campaign, 
 systematically siding against Walewski in everything, and 
 tacitly avoiding any attempt of the latter to draw him into 
 conversation. Walewski felt hurt, and gave up the attempt 
 in despair. A little before this, Don Gutierrez de Estada 
 had landed in Europe with a deputation of notable Mexicans 
 to offer the crown to Maximilian. The latter made his ac- 
 ceptance conditional on the despatch of twenty thousand 
 French troops and the promise of a grant of three hundred 
 millions of francs. 
 
 lii a council held at the Tuileries these conditions were 
 unhesitatingly declined. " That was, if I am not mistaken, 
 on a Saturday," said De Persigny ; " and it was taken for 
 granted that everything was settled. On Monday morning 
 the council was hurriedly summoned to the Tuileries, and 
 having to come from a good distance, Walewski arrived when 
 it had been sitting for more than an hour. What had hap- 
 pened meanwhile ? Simply this. Don Gutierrez had been 
 informed of the decision of the Emperor's advisers, and 
 Maximilian had been communicated with by telegraph to 
 the same effect. On the Sunday morning the Archduke 
 telegraphed to the Mexican envoy that unless his conditions 
 were subscribed to in toto he should decline the honour. 
 Don Gutierrez, determined not to return without a king, 
 rushed there and then to De Morny's and offered him the 
 crown. The latter immediately accepted, in the event of 
 Maximilian persisting in his refusal. The Emperor was 
 simply frantic with rage, but nothing would move De Morny. 
 The only one who really had any influence over him was ' the 
 other prince of the blood,' meaning Walewski, for, according 
 to him, the real and legitimate Bonapartes counted for noth- 
 ing. Walewski was telegraphed for, as I told you, early in 
 the morning. When he came he found the council engaged 
 in discussing the means of raising a loan. The Empress 
 begged him to dissuade De Morny from his purpose, telling 
 him all I have told you. Walewski refused to be the first to 
 speak to De Morny. I think that both Walewski and De 
 Morny have heaped injury and insult upon me more than
 
 WALEWSKI. 279 
 
 npon any man ; I would have obeyed the Empress for the 
 Emperor's sake, but ' the two princes of the blood ' only con- 
 sulted their own dignity. I need not tell you what effect the 
 elevation of De Moray to the throne of Mexico would have 
 produced in Europe, let alone in France. Kather than risk 
 such a thing, the money was found ; Bazaine was sent, and 
 that poor fellow, Maximilian, went to his death, because M. 
 Bacciochi had sown dissension between the brother and the 
 cousin of the Emperor about an opera-box. Such is history, 
 my friend." 
 
 I repeat, De Persigny was a better man at heart than 
 De Moray, or perhaps than Walewski, though the latter had 
 only fads, and never stooped to the questionable practices of 
 his fellow "prince of the blood" in the race for wealth. 
 The erstwhile sergeant-quartermaster refrained from doing 
 so out of sheer contempt for money-hunters, and from an in- 
 born feeling of honesty. The son of Napoleon I., though 
 illegitimate, felt what was due to the author of his being, and 
 absolutely refused to be mixed up with any commercial trans- 
 actions. He was never quietly insolent to any one, like the 
 natural son of Hortense ; he rarely said either a foolish or a 
 wise thing, but frequently did ill-considered ones, as, for in- 
 stance, when he wrote a play. " What induced you to do 
 this, monsieur le comte ? " said Thiers, on the first night. 
 " It is so difficult to write a play in five acts, and it is so 
 easy not to write a play in five acts." Among his fads was 
 the objection to ladies in the stalls of a theatre. In 1861 he 
 issued an order forbidding their admission to that part of the 
 house, and could only be persuaded with difficulty, and at the 
 eleventh hour, to rescind it. In many respects he was like 
 Philip II. of Spain ; he worried about trifles. One day he 
 prevailed upon M. de Boitelle, the Prefect of police, a thor- 
 oughly sensible man, to put a stop to the flying of kites, be- 
 cause their tails might get entangled in the telegraph wires, 
 and cause damage to the latter. I happened to meet him on 
 the Boulevards on the very day the edict was promulgated. 
 He felt evidently very proud of the conception, and asked 
 me what I thought of it. I told him the story of "the cow 
 on the rails," according to Stephenson. Napoleon, when he 
 heard of Walewski's reform, sent for Boitelle. " Here is an 
 ' order in council ' I want you to publish," he said, as serious- 
 ly as possible. It was to the effect that " all birds found 
 perching on the wires would be fined, and, in default of pay-
 
 280 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 ment, imprisoned." Curiously enough, though a man of 
 parts, and naturally intelligent, satire of that kind was lost 
 upon him, for not very long after he prevailed upon M. de 
 Boitelle to revive an obsolete order with regard to the length 
 of the hackney-drivers' whips and the cracking thereof. It 
 was M. Carlier, the predecessor of M. de Maupas, who had 
 originally attempted a similar thing. He was rewarded with 
 a pictorial skit representing him on the point of drowning, 
 while cabby was trying to save him by holding out his whip, 
 which proved too short for the purpose. 
 
 "Walewski had none of the vivacity of most of the Bona- 
 partes. I knew him a good many years before, and after the 
 establishment of the Second Empire, and have rarely seen 
 him out of temper. I fancy he must have made an admirable 
 ambassador with a good chief at his back; he, himself, I 
 think, had little spirit of initiative, though, like a good many 
 of us, he was fully convinced of the contrary. He was, to 
 use the correct word, frequently dull ; nevertheless, it was 
 currently asserted and believed that he was the only man 
 Eachel ever sincerely cared for. " Je comprends cela," said 
 George Sand one day, when the matter was discussed in her 
 presence ; " son commerce doit lui reposer 1'esprit." 
 
 It is worthy of remark that during the reign which suc- 
 ceeded that of Louis-Philippe, the man who wielded the 
 greatest power next to the Emperor was, in almost every re- 
 spect but one, the mental and moral counterpart of "the 
 citizen king." I am alluding to M. Eugene Rouher, some- 
 times called the vice-emperor.* I knew Eugene Eouher 
 some years before he was thought of as a deputy, let alone as 
 a minister when, in fact, he was terminating his law courses 
 in the Quartier- Latin ; but not even the most inveterate Pum- 
 blechook would have dared to advance afterwards that he 
 perceived the germs of his future eminence in him then. He 
 was a good-looking young fellow, in no way distinguished 
 from the rest. He was a not unworthy ornament of " La 
 Chaumiere," and did probably as much or as little poring 
 over books as his companions. Still, there could be no doubt 
 as to his natural intelligence, but the dunces in my immediate 
 circle were very few. He was not very well off ; but, as I 
 
 * It is equally curious to note, perhaps, that M. Grevy, who occupied the 
 presidential chair of the Third Republic for a longer period than his two prede- 
 cessors, was in many respects like Louis-Philippe, notably in his love of money. 
 EDITOR.
 
 EUGENE ROUHEE. 281 
 
 have said elsewhere, the Croesuses were also rare. At any rate, 
 Eugene Rouher had entirely passed out of my recollection, 
 and when, eleven or twelve years later, I saw his name in the 
 list of Odilon Barrot's administration as Minister of Justice, I 
 had not the remotest idea that it was the Eugene Rouher of 
 my Quartier-Latin days. I am certain that a great many of our 
 former acquaintances were equally ignorant, because, though 
 I met several of them from time to time on the " fashionable 
 side " of the Seine, I do not remember a single one having 
 drawn my attention to him. It was only at one of the presi- 
 dential receptions at the Elysee, in 1850, that I became aware 
 of the fact. He came up to me and held out his hand. " II 
 me semble, monsieur, que nous nous sommes deja rencontres 
 au Quartier-Latin," he said. Even then I was in the dark 
 with regard to the position he was fast assuming ; but the 
 Prince-President himself enlightened me to a great extent in 
 the course of the evening. "It appears that you and Rouher 
 are old acquaintances," he said in English ; and on my nod- 
 ding in the affirmative, he added, " If you were a Frenchman, 
 and inclined to go in for politics, or even an Englishman in 
 need of patronage or influence, I would advise you to stick to 
 him, for he is a very remarkable man, and I fancy we shall 
 hear a good deal of him within the next few years." I may, 
 therefore, say without exaggeration that I was one of the first 
 who had a trustworthy tip with regard to a comparatively 
 " dark political horse," and from a tipster in whom by that 
 time I was inclined to believe. 
 
 Though I was neither " a Frenchman inclined to go in 
 for politics," nor " even an Englishman in need of patronage 
 or influence," my curiosity had been aroused ; for, I repeat, 
 at the time of our first acquaintance I had considered Eugene 
 Rouher a fairly intelligent young fellow ; but his intelligence 
 had not struck me as likely to make a mark, at any rate so 
 soon, seeing that he was considerably below forty when I met 
 him at the Elysee. It is idle to assert, as the republicans 
 have done since, that he gained his position by abandoning 
 the political professions to which he owed his start in public 
 life. Among the nine hundred deputies of the Second Re- 
 public, there were at least a hundred intelligent so-called re- 
 publicans ready and willing to do the same with the prospect 
 of a far less signal reward than fell eventually to Rouher's lot. 
 
 My curiosity was doomed to remain unsatisfied until two 
 or three years later, when Rouher had already become a fix-
 
 282 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 ture in the political organization of the Empire. It was De 
 Morny himself who gave me the particulars of Rouher's be- 
 ginnings, and I have no reason to suppose that he painted 
 them and the man in deliberately glowing colours, albeit that 
 in one important crisis they acted in concert. Clermont- 
 Ferrand was only about twelve miles from Riom, Rouher's 
 native town. I have already remarked that De Morny, at the 
 time he met with his brother for the first time, was at the 
 head of an important industrial establishment. It was at the 
 former place; De Morny, therefore, was in a position to 
 know. 
 
 Eugene Rouher, it appears, like a good many men who 
 have risen to political eminence, belonged to what, for want 
 of a better term, I may call the rural bourgeoisie that is, 
 the frugal, thrifty, hard-headed, small landowner, tilling his 
 own land, honest in the main, ever on the alert to increase 
 his own property by a timely bargain, with an intense love of 
 the soil, with a kind of semi-Voltairean contempt for the 
 clergy, an ingrained respect largely admixed with fear for 
 " the man of the law," to which profession he often brings 
 up his son in order to have what he likes most litigation 
 for nothing. Rouher's grandfather was a man of that stamp ; 
 he made an attorney of his son, and the latter established 
 himself in the Rue Desaix, in a small, one-storied, uninviting- 
 looking tenement, where, in the year 1814, Eugene Rouher 
 was born.* Rouher's father was not very prosperous, yet he 
 managed to send both his sons to Paris to study law. The 
 elder son, much older than the future minister, had succeeded 
 in getting a very good practice at the Riom bar, but he died 
 
 * Before that it bore the name of the Rue des Trois-Hautbois, and in the 
 
 great that his carriages had to be removed from Kiom lest they 
 should be burned by the mob, and the street resumed its old appellation. In 
 November, 1887, three years after Rouher's death, I happened to be at Clermont- 
 Ferrand waiting for General Boulanger to go to Pans. I went over to Riom 
 and had a look at the house. It was occupied by a carpenter or joiner, to 
 whose father it had been sold years previously by the express wish of one of 
 Eugene Rouher's daughters. I got into conversation with an intelligent inhab- 
 itant of the town, who told me that on the 4th of September, 1870, the feeling 
 against Rouher was much stronger than against Louis- Napoleon himself, yet 
 that feeling was an implied compliment to Rouher. u He was the cleverer of 
 the two," the people shouted ; " he ought not to have allowed the Emperor to 
 engage in this war. He could have prevented it with one word." Neverthe- 
 less, in a little while it abated, and Rouher was elected & member of the Na- 
 tional Assembly. EDITOR.
 
 HIS COURTSHIP. 283 
 
 a short time before Eugene returned from Paris, leaving a 
 widow and a son, who, of course, was too young to take his 
 father's place. The young barrister, therefore, stepped into 
 a capital ready-made practice, and being exceedingly amiable, 
 bright, hard-working, and essentially honest, soon made a 
 host of friends. 
 
 "I have frequently found myself opposed to Eouher," 
 said De Moray ; " but his unswerving loyalty to the Empire 
 and the Emperor is beyond question. I should not wonder 
 but what he died poor.* 
 
 "As you know, Eugene Eouher was really very hand- 
 some. Mdlle. Conchon that is Madame Eouher's maiden 
 name thought him the handsomest man in the world. 
 True, her world did not extend beyond a few miles from 
 Clermont-Ferrand ; but I fancy she might have gone further 
 and fared worse. You know old Conchon, and the pride he 
 takes in his son-in-law. "Well, he would not hear of the 
 marriage at first. Conchon was a character in those days. 
 Though he had but a poor practice at the Clermont bar, he 
 was clever ; and if he had gone to Paris as a journalist, in- 
 stead of vegetating down there, I am sure he would have 
 made his way. He was very fond of his classics of Horace 
 and Tibullus above all and turned out some pretty Anacre- 
 ontic verses for the local ' caveau ; ' for Clermont, like every 
 other provincial centre, prided itself on its 'caveau.' f 
 
 " A time came, however, when Conchon's fortunes took a 
 turn for the better. You can form no idea of the political 
 ignorance that prevailed in the provinces even as late as the 
 reign of Louis- Philippe. Any measure advocated or pro- 
 mulgated by the Government was sure to be received with 
 suspicion by the populations as affecting their liberties, and, 
 what was of still greater consequence to them, their property. 
 The First Republic had given them license to despoil others ; 
 any subsequent measure of the monarchies was looked upon 
 
 * De Morny's prophecy turned out correct. M. Eugene Eouher died a poor 
 man. There is a comic story connected with this poverty. At the beginning 
 of the Kepublic, and during the presidency of Thiers, Rouher's house was con- 
 stantly watched by detectives. The weather was abominably bad ; it rained 
 constantly. Madame Rouher sent them some cotton umbrellas, excusing her- 
 self for not sending silk ones, because she could not afford it. EDITOR. 
 
 t The diminutive of " cave " (cellar). Really a gathering of poets and song- 
 writers, which reached its highest reputation in" Paris during the early part of 
 the present century. The Saturday nights at the Savage Club are perhaps the 
 nearest approach to it in London. EDITOR.
 
 284: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 by them as an attempt at reprisal. In 1842 a general census 
 was ordered. You may remember the hostility it provoked 
 in Paris ; it was nothing to its effect in the agricultural and 
 wine-growing centres. The Eepublican wire-pullers spread 
 the report that the census meant nothing but the thin end 
 of the wedge of a bill for the duties upon wine to be paid by 
 the grower. There was a terrible row in Clermont-Ferrand 
 and the neighbourhood ; the ' Marseillaise ' had to make way 
 for the still more revolutionary ' Ca-ira.' Conchon was maire 
 of Clermont-Ferrand, and he who was as innocent of all this 
 as a new-born babe, had his house burned over his head. 
 The Government argued that if the mob had burned the 
 maire's dwelling in preference to that of the prefect, it was 
 because the former was a more influential personage than 
 the latter ; for there could be no other reason for their giving 
 him the ' Legion of Honour,' and appointing him to a puisne 
 judgeship on the bench of Kiom, seeing that he had neither 
 made an heroic defence of his property, nor endeavoured to 
 carry out the provisions of the census bill by armed force. 
 In fact, the latter step would have been an impossibility on 
 Conchon's part. You and I know well enough how difficult 
 it is to make Frenchmen hold their tongues by means of 
 troops ; to endeavour to make them speak in distinction to 
 yelling by similar means is altogether out of the question. 
 You cannot take every head of a family, even in a compara- 
 tively small town like Clermont-Ferrand, and put him be- 
 tween two gendarmes to make him tell you his name, his 
 age, and those of his family. I fancy, moreover, that Con- 
 chon was not at Clermont at all when the mob made a bon- 
 fire of his dwelling ; it was on a Sunday, and he had prob- 
 ably gone into the country. At any rate, as I told you, they 
 gave him the cross and a judgeship. It never rains but it 
 pours. Contrary to the ordinary principles of French mobs 
 of hating a man in proportion to his standing well with the 
 Government, they started a subscription to indemnify Con- 
 chon for the loss of his house, which subscription amounted 
 to a hundred thousand francs. 
 
 " Conchon had become a somebody, and refused to give 
 his daughter to a mere provincial barrister now that he 
 belonged to ' la magistrature assise.' * The young people 
 
 * The term for the French bench, consisting of judges ; the parquet, i. e. 
 those to whom the public prosecution is confided, are called " la magistrature
 
 ROUHER AS A STATESMAN. 85 
 
 were, however, very fond of one another, and had their way. 
 They were a very handsome couple, and became the life and 
 soul of the best society of Clermont-Ferrand, which, exclu- 
 sive as it was, admitted them as they had admitted the 
 widow of the elder brother. The younger Madame Rouher 
 was by no means as sprightly or as clever as she has become 
 since. She was somewhat of a spoilt child, but her husband 
 was a very brilliant talker indeed, though, unlike many 
 brilliant talkers, there was not an ounce of spite in his 
 cleverest remarks. The electors might have done worse 
 than send him to Paris the first time he invited their suf- 
 frages in '46, under the auspices of Guizot. Nevertheless, 
 he was beaten by a goodly majority, and he had to wait 
 until after the Revolution of February, when he was re- 
 turned on the Republican list." 
 
 So far l)e Morny. Consulting my personal recollections 
 of Eugene Rouher, whom I still see now and then, I find 
 nothing but good to say of him. I am not prepared to 
 judge him as a politician, that kind of judgment being 
 utterly at variance with the spirit of these notes, but I 
 know of 110 French statesman whose memory will be en- 
 titled to greater respect than Rouher's, with the exception, 
 perhaps, of Guizot's. Both men committed grave faults, but 
 no feeling of self-interest actuated them. The world is apt 
 to blame great ministers for clinging to power after they 
 have apparently given the greatest measure of their genius. 
 They do not blame Harvey and Jenner for having continued 
 to study and to practise after they had satisfactorily demon- 
 strated/the one the theory of the circulation of the blood, 
 the other the possibility of inoculation against small-pox ; 
 they do not blame Milton for having continued to write after 
 he 'had given " Paradise Lost," Rubens for having con- 
 tinued to paint after he had given " The Descent from the 
 Cross," Michael- Angelo for not having abandoned the sculp- 
 tor's chisel after he had finished the frescoes of the Sistine 
 Chapel. The bold stroke of policy that made England a 
 principal shareholder 171 the Suez Canal, the Menai Bridge, 
 the building of the Great Western Railway, were achieve- 
 ments of great men who had apparently given all there was 
 
 debout." As a rule, the latter have a great deal more talent than the former. 
 " What are you going to do with your son ? " asked a gentleman of his friend. 
 " I am going to make a magistrate of him ' debout,' if he is strong enough to 
 keep on his legs ; ' assis.' if he be not." EDITOR.
 
 286 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 in them to give ; why should Rouher have retired when he 
 was barely fifty, and not have endeavoured to retrieve the 
 mistake he evidently made when he allowed Bismarck to 
 humiliate Austria at Sadowa, and to lay the foundations of a 
 unified Germany ? Richelieu made mistakes also, but he re- 
 trieved them before his death. 
 
 Be this as it may, Rouher was both in public and private 
 life an essentially honourable and honest man as honest as 
 Louis-Philippe in many respects, far more honest in others, 
 and absolutely free from the everlasting preoccupation about 
 money which marred that monarch's character. He was as 
 disinterested as Guizot, and would have scorned the tergiver- 
 sations and hypocrisy of Thiers. He never betrayed his 
 master's cause ; he never consciously sacrificed his country to 
 his pride. The only blame that can be laid to his charge is 
 that he allowed his better sense to be overruled by a woman ; 
 but that woman was the wife of his sovereign. 
 
 He was, above all, a staunch friend to those who had 
 known him in his early days. " There will be no Auvergnats 
 left in Clermont-Ferrand and Riom if this goes on," said a 
 witty journalist, seeing Rouher constantly surrounded by the 
 natives of that particular province, to the exclusion of every 
 one else. " We'll send an equal quantity of Parisians to Au- 
 vergne ; it will do them good, and teach them to work," re- 
 plied Rouher, when he heard of the remark. " And in 
 another generation or two Paris will see what it has never 
 seen before, namely, frugal Parisians, doing a day's labour 
 for a day's wage, for we'll have their offspring back by then." 
 For Rouher could be very witty when he liked, and never 
 feared to hit out straight. He was a delightful talker, and, 
 next to Alexandre Dumas, the best raconteur I have ever met. 
 It was because he had a marvellous memory and a distinct 
 talent for mimicry. Owing to this latter gift, he was unlike 
 any other parliamentary orator I have ever heard. He would 
 sit perfectly still under the most terrible onslaught of his 
 opponents, whoever they were. No sign of impatience or 
 weariness, not an attempt to take a note ; his eyes remained 
 steadily fixed on his interlocutor, his arms folded across his 
 chest. Then he would rise slowly from his seat and walk to 
 the tribune, when there was one, take up the argument of 
 his adversary, not only word for word, but with the latter's 
 intonation and gestures, almost with the latter's voice which 
 used to drive Thiers wild and answer it point by point.
 
 ROUHER'S GAME OF PIQUET. 287 
 
 He used to call that " fair debating ; " in reality, it was 
 the masterly trick of a great actor, who mercilessly wielded 
 his power of ridicule ; but we must remember that he had 
 originally been a lawyer, and that the scent of the French 
 law-courts hung over him till the very end. " I am not always 
 convinced of the honesty of my cause, but I hold a brief for 
 the Government, and I feel convinced that it would not be 
 honest to let the other party get the victory," he said. 
 
 He was, and remained, very simple in his habits. He 
 would not have minded entertaining his familiars every night 
 of the week, but he did not care for the grand receptions he 
 was compelled to give. He was very fond of the game of 
 piquet. His father-in-law, who had been promoted to a 
 judgeship in one of the Paris courts, had been a foeman 
 worthy of his steel ; " but I am afraid," laughed Kouher, 
 " that his exaggerated admiration for me affects his play." 
 
 Rouher was right ; M. Conchon was inordinately proud 
 of his son-in-law. He lived, as it were, in the Minister of 
 State's reflected glory. His great delight was to go shopping, 
 in order to have the satisfaction of saying to the tradesmen, 
 " You'll have this sent to my son-in-law, M. Rouher." The 
 stir and bustle of the Paris streets confused him to the last, 
 but he did not mind it, seeing that it afforded him an oppor- 
 tunity of inquiring his way. " I want to get back to the 
 Ministry of State to my son-in-law, M. Rouher." It was 
 not snobbishness ; it was sheer unadulterated admiration of 
 the man to whom he had somewhat reluctantly given his 
 daughter.
 
 288 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Society during the Second Empire The Court at Compiegne The English 
 element Their opinion of Louis-Napoleon The difference between the 
 court of Louis-Philippe and that of Napoleon III. The luggage of M. 
 Villemain The hunts in Louis-Philippe's time Louis-Napoleon's advent 
 Would have made a better poet than an Emperor Looks for a La Val- 
 liere or Montespan, and finds Aldlle. Eugenie de Montiio The latter deter- 
 mined not to be a La Valliere or even a Pompadour Has her great destiny 
 foretold in her youth Makes up her mind that it shall be realized bv a 
 right-handed and not a left-handed marriage Queen Victoria stands "her 
 
 tions to Compiegne Mdlle. de Montijo's backers for the Imperial 
 No other entries Louis-Napoleon utters the word " marriage " What led 
 up to it The Emperor othcially announces his betrothal The effect it 
 produced The Faubourg St.-Germain Dupin the elder gives his views 
 The engaged couple feel very uncomfortable Negotiations to organize the 
 Empress's future household Rebuffs Louis Napoleon's retorts Mdlle. de 
 Montijo's attempt at wit and sprightliness Her iron will Her beauty 
 Her marriage fehe takes Mane-Antoinette for her model She fondly 
 imagines that she was born to rule She presumes to teach Princess Clo- 
 tilde the etiquette of courts The story of two detectives The hunts at 
 Compiegne Some of the raise en scene and dramatis persona The shoot- 
 ing-parties Mrs. Grundy not banished, but specially invited and drugged 
 The programme of the gatherings Compiegne in the season A story 
 of an Englishman accommodated for the night in one of the Imperial lug- 
 gage-vans. 
 
 I WAS a frequent visitor to Compiegne throughout the 
 
 Second Empire. I doubt whether, besides Lord H and 
 
 myself, there was a single English guest .there who went for 
 the mere pleasure of going. Lords Palmerston, Cowley, and 
 Clarendon, and a good many others whom I could name, had 
 either political or private ends to serve. They all looked 
 upon Napoleon III. as an adventurer, but an adventurer 
 whom they might use for their own purpose. I am afraid 
 that the same charge might be preferred against persons in 
 even a more exalted station. Prince Albert averred that 
 Napoleon III. had sold his soul to the devil ; Lord Cowley, 
 on being asked by a lady whether the Emperor talked much, 
 replied, " No, but he always lies." Another diplomatist opined 
 " that Napoleon lied so well, that one could not even believe 
 the contrary of what he said."
 
 COMPIEGNE DURING THE SECOND EMPIRE. 89 
 
 Enough. I went to the Compiegne of Napoleon III., just 
 as I had gone to the Compiegne of the latter years of Louis- 
 Philippe simply to enjoy myself ; with this difference, how- 
 ever, that I enjoyed myself much better at the former than 
 at the latter. Louis-Philippe's hospitality was very genuine, 
 homely, and unpretending, but it lacked excitement espe- 
 cially for a young man of my age. The entertainments were 
 more in harmony with the tastes of the Guizots, Cousins, and 
 Villemains, who went down en redingote, and took little else ; 
 especially the eminent professor and minister of public edu- 
 cation, whose luggage consisted of a brown paper parcel, con- 
 taining a razor, a clean collar, and the cordon of the Legion 
 of Honour. There were some excellent hunts, organized by 
 the Grand Veneur, the Comte de Girardin, and the Chief 
 Ranger, the Baron de Larminat ; but the evenings, notwith- 
 standing the new theatre built by Louis-Philippe, were fright- 
 fully dull, and barely compensated for by the reviews at the 
 camp of Compiegne, to which the King conducted his Queen 
 and the princesses in a tapissiere and four, he himself driv- 
 ing, the Due and Duchesse de Montpensier occupying the 
 box seat, the rest of the family ensconced in the carriage, 
 " absolument en bons bourgeois." With the advent of Louis- 
 Napoleon, even before he assumed the imperial purple, a spirit 
 of change came over the place Hortense's second son would 
 probably have made a better poet than an emperor. His whole 
 life has been a miscarried poem, miscarried by the inexorable 
 demands of European politics. He dreamt of being L'Em- 
 pereur-Soleil, as Louis XIV. had been Le Eoi-Soleil. Visions 
 of a nineteenth-century La Valliere or Montespan, hanging 
 fondly on his arm, and dispelling the harassing cares of State 
 by sweet smiles while treading the cool umbrageous glades of 
 the magnificent park, haunted his brain. He would have 
 gone as far as Louis le Bien-Aime, and built another nest for 
 another Pompadour. He did not mean to make a Maintenon 
 out of a Veuve Scarron, and, least of all, an empress out of a 
 Mademoiselle Eugenie de Montijo. Mdlle. de Montijo, on 
 the other hand, was determined not to be a Mdme. de Main- 
 tenon, let alone a La Valliere or a Pompadour. At any rate, 
 so she said, and the man most interested in putting her asser- 
 tion to the test was too infatuated to do so. " Quand on ne 
 s'attend a rien, la moindre des choses surprend." The proverb 
 holds good, more especially where a woman's resistance is con- 
 cerned. Mdlle. de Montijo was a Spaniard, or at least half a 
 
 13
 
 290 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 one, and that half contained as much superstition as would 
 have fitted out a score of her countrywomen of unmixed blood.- 
 One day in Granada, while she was sitting at her window, a 
 gipsy, whose hand " she had crossed with silver," is said to 
 have foretold her that she should be queen. The young girl 
 probably attached but little importance to the words at that 
 time ; " but," said my informant, " from the moment Louis- 
 Napoleon breathed the first protestations of love to her, the 
 prophecy recurred to her in all its vividness, and she made 
 up her mind that the right hand and not the left of Louis- 
 Napoleon should set the seal upon its fulfilment." My in- 
 formant was an Englishman, very highly placed, and dis- 
 tinctly au courant of the private history of the Marquise de 
 Montijo y Teba, as well as that of her mother. Without the 
 least fear of being contradicted, I may say that the subsequent 
 visit of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert was due to his di- 
 rect influence. I will not go as far as to assert that Louis- 
 Napoleon's participation in the Crimean war could not have 
 been had at that moment at any other price, or that England 
 could not have dispensed with that co-operation, but he, my 
 informant, considered then that the alliance would be more 
 closely cemented by that visit. Nor am I called upon to an- 
 ticipate the final verdict of the social historian with regard 
 to " that act of courtesy " on the part of the Queen of Eng- 
 land, not the least justified boast of whose reign it is that she 
 purified the morals of her court by her own example. Still, 
 one may safely assume, in this instance, that the virtue of 
 Mdlle. de Montijo would have been proof against the " bland- 
 ishments of the future Emperor," even if she had not had 
 the advice and countenance of her mother, whose Scotch 
 blood would not have stood trifling with her daughter's affec- 
 tions and reputation. But to make the fortress of that heart 
 doubly impregnable, the Comtesse de Montijo scarcely ever 
 left her second daughter's side. It was a great sacrifice on 
 her part, because Mdlle. Eugenie de Montijo was not her 
 favourite child ; that position was occupied by her elder, the 
 Duchesse d'Albe. " Mais, on est mesre, ou on ne Test pas?" 
 says Madame Cardinal.* 
 
 Mdlle. de Montijo, then, became the guiding spirit of the 
 
 * The author alludes to the Madame Cardinal of Ludovic Halevy, who se- 
 questrates her daughter because the baron, her would-be protector, is hanging 
 back with the settlements. EDITOR.
 
 LOUIS-NAPOLEON'S COURTSHIP. 291 
 
 fetes at the Elysee. She and her mother had travelled a great 
 deal, so had Louis-Napoleon ; the latter not enough, appar- 
 ently, to have learnt the wisdom of the French proverb, 
 " Gare a la femme dont le berceau a etc une malle, et le pen- 
 sionnat une table d'hote." 
 
 I have spoken elsewhere of the Coup d'Etat and of the 
 company at the Elysee, immediately previous to it and after- 
 wards ; early in 1852 
 
 " The little done did vanish to the mind, 
 Which forward saw how much remained to do." 
 
 The Prince-President undertook a journey to the southern 
 parts of France, which he was pleased to call " an interroga- 
 tion to the country." It was that to a certain extent, only 
 the country had been crammed with one reply to it, " Vive 
 1'empereur." Calmly reviewing things from a distance of a 
 quarter of a century, it was the best reply the nation could 
 have made. " Society has been too long like a pyramid 
 turned upside down. I replaced it on its base," said Louis- 
 Napoleon, on the 29th of March, 1852, when he opened the 
 first session of the Chambers, and inaugurated the new con- 
 stitution which was his own work. " He is right," remarked 
 one of his female critics, " and now we are going to dance on 
 the top of it. A quand les invitations ? " 
 
 The invitations were issued almost immediately after the 
 journey just mentioned, and before the plebiscite had given 
 the Prince- President the Imperial crown. One of the first 
 was for a series of fetes at Compiegne. The chateau was 
 got ready in hot haste ; but, of course, the " hunts " were 
 not half so splendid as they became afterwards. 
 
 The most observed of all the guests was Mdlle. de Mon- 
 tijo, accompanied by her mother, but no one suspected for a 
 single moment that the handsome Spanish girl who was gal- 
 loping by Louis-Napoleon's side would be in a few months 
 Empress of the French. Only a few knowing ones offered 
 to back her for the Imperial Stakes at any odds ; I took them, 
 and, of course, lost heavily. This is not a figure of speech, 
 but a literal fact. There were, however, no quotations " for 
 a place," backers and bookies alike being agreed that she 
 would be first or nowhere in the race. 
 
 How it would have fared with the favourite had there 
 been any other entries, it would be difficult to say, but there 
 were none; the various European sovereigns declined the
 
 292 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 honour of an alliance with the house of Bonaparte, so Mdlle. 
 Eugenie de Montijo simply walked over the course. One 
 evening the rumour spread that Louis-Napoleon had uttered 
 the magic word " marriage," in consequence of a violent fit 
 of coughing which had choked the word " mistress " down 
 his throat. Not to mince matters, the affair happened in 
 this way, and I speak on excellent authority. The day be- 
 fore, there had been a hunt, and between the return from 
 the forest and the dinner-hour, Napoleon had presented him- 
 self unannounced in Mdlle. de Montijo's apartment. Neither 
 I nor the others who were at the chdteau at the time could sat- 
 isfactorily account for the prologue to this visit, but that there 
 was such a prologue, and that it was conceived and enacted 
 by at least two out of the three actors in the best spirit of 
 the " comedie d'intrigue," so dear to the heart of Scribe, ad- 
 mits of no doubt ; because, though the first dinner-bell had 
 already rung, Mdlle. de Montijo was still in her riding-habit, 
 consequently on the alert. Nay, even her dainty hunting-crop 
 was within her reach, as the intruder found to his cost ; and 
 reports were rife to the effect that, if the one had failed, the 
 mother, who was in the next room, would have come to the 
 rescue of her injured daughter. 
 
 The Comtesse de Montijo was spared this act of heroism ; 
 Lucrece herself sufficed for the task of defending her own 
 honour : nevertheless, the mother's part was not at an end, 
 even when the decisive word had been pronounced. Accord- 
 ing to her daughter, she objected to the union, from a sincere 
 regard for her would-be-son-in-law, from an all-absorbing 
 love for her own darling. The social gulf between the two 
 was too wide ever to be bridged, etc. " And though it will 
 break my heart to have to obey her, I have no alternative," 
 added Mdlle. de Montijo, if not in these selfsame words, at 
 least in words to that effect. " There remains but one hope. 
 Write to her." 
 
 And Louis- Napoleon did write. The letter has been re- 
 ligiously preserved by the Montijo family. In less than three 
 mouths afterwards France was officially or semi-officially ap- 
 prised of the Emperor's intended union ; but, of course, the 
 news had spread long before then, and a very varied effect it 
 produced. Candidly speaking, it satisfied no one, and every 
 one delivered judgment in two separate, if not different, ca- 
 pacities as private citizens and as patriotic Frenchmen. The 
 lower classes, containing the ultra-democratic element, would
 
 THE ANNOUNCEMENT OF HIS MARRIAGE. 293 
 
 have perhaps applauded the bold departure from the old tra- 
 ditions that had hitherto presided at sovereign unions, if the 
 bride had been French, instead of being a foreigner. They 
 were sensible enough not to expect their new Emperor to 
 choose from the bourgeoisie ; but, in spite of their prejudices 
 against the old noblesse, they would, in default of a princess 
 of royal blood, have liked to see one of that noblesse's daugh- 
 ters share the Imperial throne. They were not deceived by 
 Napoleon's specious argument that France had better assume 
 openly the position of a parvenu rather than make the new 
 principle of the unrestricted suffrage of a great nation pass 
 for an old one by trying to introduce herself at any cost into 
 a family of kings. 
 
 The bourgeoisie itself was more disgusted still. Incred- 
 ible as it may seem, they did resent Napoleon's slight of their 
 daughters. " A defaut d'une princesse de sang royal, une de 
 nos filles eut fait aussi bien qu'uue etrangere, doiit le grand 
 pere, apres tout, etait negociant comme nous. Le premier 
 empire a ete fait avec le sang de gallons d'ecurie, de tonnel- 
 liers ; le second empire aurait pu prendre un peu de ce sang 
 sans se mesallier." The bourgeois Voltairien was more biting 
 in his sarcasm. In his speech to the grand officers of State 
 and corporations, Napoleon had alluded to Empress Jospehine : 
 " France has not forgotten that for the last seventy years 
 foreign princesses have only ascended the steps of the throne 
 to see their race scattered and proscribed, either by war or 
 revolution. One woman alone appears to have brought the 
 people better luck, and to have left a more lasting impression 
 on their memory, and that woman, the modest and kindly 
 wife of General Bonaparte, was not descended from royal 
 blood." Then, speaking of the empress that was to be, he 
 concluded, " A good and pious Catholic, she will, like myself, 
 offer up the same prayers for the welfare and happiness of 
 France ; I cherish the firm hope that, gracious and kind as 
 she is, she will, while occupying a similar position, revive 
 once more the virtues of Josephine." All of which refer- 
 ences to the undoubtedly skittish widow of General de Beau- 
 harnais made the satirically inclined bourgeois, who knew 
 the chronique scandaleuse of the Directoire quite as well as 
 Louis-Napoleon, sneer. Said one, " It is a strange present 
 to put into a girl's trousseau, the virtues of Josephine ; the 
 Nessus-shirt given. to Hercules was nothing to it." 
 
 The Faubourg St.-Germain made common cause for once
 
 294: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 with the Orleanists salons, which were avenging the confisca- 
 tion of the princes' property; and both, if less brutal than 
 the speaker just quoted, were not less cruel. The daughter 
 had to bear the brunt of the mother's reputation. Public 
 securities went down two francs at the announcement of the 
 marriage. There was but one man who stood steadfast by 
 the Emperor and his bride, Dupin the elder ; but his ironical 
 defence of the choice was nearly as bad as his opposition to 
 it could have been. " People care very little as to what I say 
 and think, and perhaps they are right," he remarked ; " but 
 still, the Emperor acts more sensibly by marrying the woman 
 he likes than by eating humble-pie and bargaining for some 
 strait-laced, stuck-up German princess, with feet as large 
 as mine. At any rate, when he kisses his wife, it will be be- 
 cause he feels inclined, and not because he feels compelled." * 
 
 Nevertheless, amidst all this flouting and jeering, the 
 Emperor and his future consort felt very uncomfortable, but 
 they showed a brave front. He inferred, rather than said to 
 one and all who advanced objections, that his love for Mdlle. 
 de Montijo was not the sole motive for his contemplated 
 union. He wished to induce them into the belief that po- 
 litical motives were not foreign to it that he was, as it 
 were, flinging the gauntlet to monarchical Europe, which, not 
 content with refusing him a wife, was determined to throw a 
 spoke in his matrimonial wheel. 
 
 Unfortunately, he and his bride felt that they could not 
 altogether dispense with the pomp and circumstance of 
 courts. Like his uncle, Napoleon III. was exceedingly fond 
 of grand ceremonial display, and he set his heart upon his 
 Empress having a brilliant escort of fair and illustrious 
 women on the day of her nuptials. To seek for such an 
 escort among the grandes dames of the old noblesse would, 
 he knew, be so much waste of time ; but he was justified in 
 the hope that the descendants of those who owed some of 
 their titles and most of their fortunes to his uncle would 
 prove more amenable. In this he was mistaken : both the 
 Duchesse de Vicence and the Duchesse des Lesparres, besides 
 several others to whom the highest positions in the Empress's 
 
 * Dupin's feet were enormous, and, furthermore, invariably shod in thick, 
 hobnailed bluchers. He himself was always jestingly alluding to them ; and 
 one day, on the occasion of a funeral of a friend, which he could not possibly 
 attend, he suggested sending his boots instead. " People send their empty con- 
 veyance : I'll send mine," he said. EDITOR.
 
 SOME EPIGRAMS OF LOUIS NAPOLEON. 295 
 
 household were offered, declined the honour. The Due de 
 Bassano did worse. Much as the De Caulaincourts and the De 
 Lesparres owed to the son of the Corsican lawyer, the Marets 
 owed him infinitely more. Yet their descendant, but a few 
 days before the marriage, went about repeating everywhere 
 that he absolutely objected to see his wife figure in the suite 
 of the daughter of the Comtesse de Montijo, " who " (the 
 daughter) " was a little too much of a posthumous child." 
 He not only relented with regard to the duchesse at the 
 eleventh hour, but accepted the office of Grand Chambellan, 
 which office he filled to the end of his life. 
 
 In fact, honours and titles went absolutely a-begging in 
 those days. Let me not be misunderstood. There were 
 plenty of men and women ready to accept both, and to deck 
 out their besmirched, though very authentic, scutcheons 
 with them ; but of these the Empress, at any rate, would 
 have none. She would have willingly thrown overboard the 
 whole of her family with its doubtful antecedents, which 
 naturally identified it with that brilliant and cosmopolitan 
 society, " dans laquelle en fait d'hommes, il n'y a que des 
 declasses, et en fait de femmes que des trop-bien classees." 
 The Bonapartes themselves had, after all, a by no means 
 cleaner bill of health, but, as usual, the woman was made the 
 scapegoat ; for though a good many men of ancient lineage, 
 such as the Prince Charles de Beauveau, the Due de Crillon, 
 the Due de Beauveau-Craon, the Due de Montmorency, the 
 Marquis de Larochejaquelein, the Marquis de Gallifet, the 
 Due de Mouchy, etc., rallied to the new regime, most of them 
 refused at first to bring their wives and daughters to the 
 Tuileries, albeit that they went themselves. When a man 
 neglects to introduce his womenkind to the mistress of the 
 house at which he visits, one generally knows the opinion he 
 and the world entertain rightly or wrongly of the status 
 of the lady ; and the rule is supposed to hold good every- 
 where throughout civilized society. Yet the Emperor tol- 
 erated this. 
 
 Knowing what I do of Napoleon's private character, I am 
 inclined to think that, but for dynastic and political reasons, he 
 would have willingly dispensed with the rigidly virtuous 
 woman at the Tuileries, then and afterwards. But at that 
 moment he was perforce obliged to make advances to her, and 
 the rebuffs received in consequence were taken with a sang- 
 froid which made those who administered them wince more
 
 296 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 than once. At each renewed refusal he was ready with an 
 epigram : " Encore nne dame qui n'est pas assez sure de son 
 passe pour braver 1'opinion publique ; " " Celle-la, c'est la 
 femme de Cesar, hors de tout soupqon, comme il y a des 
 
 criminels qui sont hors la loi ; " " Madame de ; il n'y a 
 
 pas de faux pas dans sa vie, il n'y a qu'un faux papa, le p^re 
 de ses enfants." 
 
 For Louis-Napoleon could be exceedingly witty when he 
 liked, and his wit lost nothing by the manner in which he 
 delivered his witticisms. Not a muscle of his face moved 
 he merely blinked his eyes. 
 
 " Si on avait voulu me donner une princesse allemande," 
 he said to his most intimate friends, " je 1'aurais epousee : si 
 je ne 1'avais pas autant aimee que j'aime Mademoiselle de 
 Montijo, j'aurais au moins etc plus sur de sa betise; avecune 
 Espagnole on n'est jamais sur." 
 
 Whether he meant the remark for his future consort or 
 not, I am unable to say, but Mademoiselle de Moutijo was 
 not witty. There was a kittenish attempt at wit now and 
 then, as when she said, " Ici, il n'y a que moi de legitimiste ; " 
 but intellectually she was in no way distinguished from the 
 majority of her countrywomen.* On the other hand, she 
 had an iron will, and was very handsome. A woman's beauty 
 is rarely capable of being analyzed ; he who undertakes such 
 a task is surely doomed to the disappointment of the boy who 
 cut the drum to find out where the noise came from. 
 
 I cannot say wherein Mdlle. de Montijo's beauty lay, but 
 she was beautiful indeed. 
 
 Her iron will ably seconded the Emperor's attempts at 
 gaining aristocratic recruits round his standard, and when 
 the Due de Guiche joined their ranks the Due de Guiche 
 whom the Duchesse d'Angouleme had left close upon forty 
 thousand pounds a year Mdlle. de Montijo might well be 
 elated with her success. Still, at the celebration of her nup- 
 tials, the gathering was not le dessus du panier. The old 
 noblesse had the right to stay away ; they had not the right 
 to do what they did. I am perfectly certain of my facts, else 
 I should not have committed them to paper. 
 
 * MMme'e, the author of " Carmen," who knew something of Spanish 
 women, and of the female members of the Montijo family in particular, said 
 that God had given them the choice between love and wit, and that they had 
 chosen the former. EDITOR.
 
 THE EMPRESS AND PRINCESS CLOTILDE. 297 
 
 As usual, on the day of the ceremony, portraits of the new- 
 Empress and her biography were hawked about. There was 
 nothing offensive in either, because the risk of printing any- 
 thing objectionable would have been too great. In reality, 
 the account of her life was rather too laudatory. But there 
 was one picture, better executed than the rest, which bore the 
 words, "The portrait and the virtues of the Empress; the 
 whole for two sous ; " and that was decidedly the work of the 
 Legitimists and Orleanists combined. I have ample proof of 
 what I say. I heard afterwards that the lithograph had been 
 executed in England. 
 
 For several months after the marriage nothing was spoken 
 or thought of at the Tuileries but rules of precedence, court 
 dresses, the revival of certain ceremonies, functions and en- 
 tertainments that used to be the fashion under the ancien 
 regime. The Empress was especially anxious to model her 
 surroundings, her code of life, upon those of Marie-Antoi- 
 nette, " mon type," as she familiarly called the daughter of 
 Marie-Therese. If, in fact, after a little while, some one had 
 been ill-advised enough to tell her that she had not been born 
 in the Imperial purple, she would have scarcely believed it. 
 When a daughter of the House of Savoy had the misfortune 
 to marry Napoleon's cousin, the Empress thought fit to give 
 the young princess some hints as to her toilette and sundry 
 other things. " You appear to forget, madame," was the an- 
 swer, " that I was born at a court." Empress Eugenie was 
 furious, and never forgave Princess Clotilde. Her anger re- 
 minds me of that of a French detective who, having been 
 charged with a very important case, took up his quarters 
 with a colleague in one of the best Paris hotels, exclusively 
 frequented by foreigners of distinction. He assumed the 
 r61e of a retired ambassador, his comrade enacted the part of 
 his valet, and both enacted them to perfection. For a fort- 
 night or more they did not make a single mistake in their 
 parts. The ambassador was kind but distant to his servant, 
 the latter never omitted to address him as " Your Excel- 
 lency." When their mission was at an end, they returned to 
 their ordinary duties ; but the " ambassador " had become so 
 identified with his part that, on his colleague addressing him 
 in the usual way, he turned round indignantly, and exclaimed, 
 " You seem to forget yourself. What do you mean by such 
 familiarity ? " 
 
 Of all the entertainments of the ancien regime lending
 
 298 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 themselves to sumptuary and scenic display, " la chasse " was 
 undoubtedly the one most likely to appeal to the Imperial 
 couple. Louis- Napoleon had, at any rate, the good sense not 
 to attempt to rival Le Roi-Soleil in spectacular ballet, or to 
 revive the Eglinton tournament on the Place du Carrousel. 
 But 
 
 " II ne fallait au fier Remain 
 
 Que des spectacles et du pain ; 
 
 Mais aux Frangais, plus que Remain, 
 
 Le spectacle suffit sans pain." 
 
 No one was better aware of this tendency of the Parisian 
 to be dazzled by court pageants than the new Emperor, but 
 he was also aware that, except at the risk of making himself 
 and his new court ridiculous, some sort of raison d'etre would 
 have to be found for such open-air displays in the capital ; 
 pending the invention of a plausible pretext, "les grandes 
 chasses " at Compiegne were decided upon. They were to be 
 different from what they had been on the occasion referred 
 to above : special costumes were to be worn, splendid horses 
 purchased ; the most experienced kennel and huntsmen, im- 
 bued with all the grand traditions of " la Venerie," recruited 
 from the former establishments of the Condes and Rohans ; 
 in short, such eclat was to be given to them as to make 
 them not only the talk of the whole of France, but of Europe 
 besides. The experiment was worth trying. Compiegne was 
 less than a hundred miles from Paris ; thousands would flock, 
 not only from the neighbouring towns, but from the capital 
 also, and the glowing accounts they would be sure to bring 
 back would produce their effect. There would be, moreover, 
 less risk of incurring the remarks of an irreverent Paris mob, 
 a mob which instinctively finds out the ridiculous side of 
 every ceremonial instituted by the court, except those calcu- 
 lated to gratify its love of military pomp and splendour. As 
 yet, it was too early to belie the words, " L'empire, c'est la 
 paix ; " we had not got beyond the " tame eagle " period, 
 albeit that those behind the scenes, among others a near con- 
 nection of mine, who was more than half a Frenchman him- 
 self, predicted that the predatory instincts would soon reveal 
 themselves, against the Russian bear, probably, and in con- 
 junction with the British lion, if not in conjunction with 
 the latter, perhaps against him. 
 
 At any rate, les grandes chasses et fetes de Compiegne 
 formed the first item of that programme of " La France qui
 
 FETES AT CAMPIEGNE. 299 
 
 s'amuse," a programme and play which, for nearly eighteen 
 years, drew from all parts of the civilized world would-be 
 critics and spectators, few of whom perceived that the theatre 
 was undermined, the piece running to a fatal denoument, and 
 the bill itself the most fraudulent concoction that had ever 
 issued from the sanctum of a bogus impressario. But had 
 not Lamartine, only a few years previously, suggested, as it 
 were, the tendency of the piece, when, in the Chamber of 
 Deputies, he said, " Messieurs, j'ai 1'honneur et le regret de 
 vous avertir que la France s'ennuie " ? Louis-Napoleon was 
 determined that no such reproach should be made during his 
 reign. He probably did not mean his fireworks to end in the 
 conflagration of Bazeilles, and to read the criticism on his own 
 drama at Wilhelmshohe, but he should have held a tighter 
 hand over his stage-managers. Some of these were now get- 
 ting their reward for having contributed to the efficient rep- 
 resentation of the prologue, which one might entitle " the 
 Coup d'Etat." General Magnan was appointed grand veneur 
 let us say, master of the buckhounds, with a stipend of a 
 hundred thousand francs ; Comte Edgar Ney, his chief coad- 
 jutor, with forty thousand francs. History sees the last of 
 the latter gentleman on a cold, dull, drizzly September morn- 
 ing, of the year 1870. He is seated in an open char-a-bancs, 
 by the side of some Prussian officers, and the vehicle, in the 
 rear of that of his Imperial master, is on its way to the Bel- 
 gian frontier, en route for Cassel. He is pointing to some 
 artillery which, notwithstanding its French model, is being 
 driven by German gunners. " A qui ces canons-la ? " " Us 
 ne sont pas des notres, monsieur," is the courteous and guard- 
 ed reply. Verily, his father's exit, after all is said and done, 
 was a more dignified one. Michel Ney, at any rate, fell 
 pierced by bullets ; the pity was that they were not the ene- 
 my's. In addition to the grand veneur and premier veneur, 
 there were three lieutenants de venerie, a capitaine des chasses 
 a tir, whom we will call a sublimated head-gamekeeper ; 
 and all these dignitaries had other emoluments and charges 
 besides, because Louis-Napoleon, to his credit be it said, never 
 forgot a friend. 
 
 The whole of the " working personnel " was, as I have 
 already said, recruited from the former establishments of the 
 Condes at Chantilly, of the late Due d'Orleans, the Dues de 
 Nemours and d'Aumale ; and such men as La Feuille, whose 
 real name was Fergus, and La Trace could not have failed to
 
 300 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 make comparisons between their old masters and the new, 
 not always to the advantage of the latter. For though the 
 spectacle was magnificent enough, there was little or no hunt- 
 ing, as far as the majority of the guests were concerned. 
 After a great deal of deliberation, dark green cloth, with crim- 
 son velvet collars, cuffs, and facings, and gold lace, had been 
 adopted. In Louis XV.'s time, and in that of the latter Bour- 
 bons, the colour had been blue with silver lace ; but for this 
 difference the costume was virtually the same, even to the 
 buckskins, jackboots, and the "lampion," also edged with 
 gold instead of silver.* The Emperor's and Empress's had 
 a trimming of white ostrich-feathers. The dress could not 
 be worn, however, by any but the members of the Imperial 
 household, without special permission. The latter, of course, 
 wore it by right ; but even men like the Due de Vicence, the 
 Baron d'Offremont, the Marquis de Gallifet, the Marquis de 
 Cadore, women like the Comtesse de Pourtales, the Comtesse 
 de Brigode, the Marquise de Contades, who held no special 
 charge at court, had to receive " le bouton " before they could 
 don it.f 
 
 The locale of these gatherings differed according to the 
 seasons. Eontainebleau was chosen for the spring ones, but 
 throughout the reign Compiegne always offered the most 
 brilliant spectacle, especially after the Crimean war, when 
 Napoleon III. was tacitly admitted to the family circle of the 
 crowned heads of Europe. The shooting-parties were a trib- 
 ute offered to the taste of the English visitors, who, after 
 that period, became more numerous every succeeding autumn, 
 and who, accustomed as they were to their own magnificent 
 meets and lavish hospitality at the most renowned country 
 seats, could not help expressing their surprise at the utterly 
 reckless expenditure ; and, if the truth must be told, enjoyed 
 the freedom from all restraint, though it was cunningly hid- 
 den beneath an apparently very formidable code of courtly 
 etiquette. As one of these distinguished Englishmen said, 
 " They have done better than banish Mrs. Grundy ; they have 
 given her a special invitation, and drugged her the moment 
 she came in." 
 
 * The lampion was the three-cornered hat, cocked on all sides alike in the 
 shape of a spout, and stiffened with wire. EDITOR. 
 
 \ " Wearing the king's button " is a very old French sporting term, signify- 
 ing permission to wear the dress or the buttons or both, similar to those of the 
 monarch when following the hounds. EDITOR.
 
 COMPIEGNE IN THE SEASON. 301 
 
 The Court invariably arrived on the first of November, 
 and generally stayed for three weeks or a month, according 
 to the date fixed for the opening of the Chambers. From 
 that moment the town, a very sleepy though exceedingly 
 pretty one, became like a fair. Unless you had engaged your 
 room beforehand at one of the hotels, the chances were a 
 thousand to one in favour of your having to roam the streets ; 
 for there were hundreds and hundreds of sight-seers, French 
 as well as foreign, desirous of following the hounds, which 
 every one was free to do. In addition to these, many func- 
 tionaries, not sufficiently important to be favoured with an 
 invitation to the Chateau, but eager for an opportunity of 
 attracting the notice of the sovereign for Napoleon was a 
 very impulsive monarch, who often took sudden fancies 
 had to be accommodated, not to mention flying columns of 
 the demi-monde, " pas trop bien assurees sur la fidelite de 
 leurs protecteurs en-titre et voulant les sauvegarder contre les 
 attaques de leurs rivales dans 1'entourage imperial." What 
 with these and others, a room, on the top story, was often 
 quoted at sixty or seventy francs per day. I know a worthy 
 lieutenant of the cavalry of the Garde who made a pretty 
 sum, for two years running, by engaging three apartments at 
 each of the five good hotels, for the whole of the Emperor's 
 stay. His regiment was quartered at Compiegne, and, as a 
 matter of course, his friends from Paris applied to him. 
 
 An amusing incident happened in connection with this 
 scarcity of accommodation. The French railways in those 
 days got a great many of their rails from England. The 
 representative of one of these English makers found out, 
 however, that the profits on his contracts were pretty well be- 
 ing swallowed up by the baksheesh he had to distribute 
 among the various government officials and others. In his 
 perplexity, he sought advice of an English nobleman, who 
 had his grandes et petites entre esto the Tuileries, and the 
 latter promised to get him an audience of the Emperor. It 
 so happened that the Court was on the eve of its departure, 
 but Napoleon wrote that he would see the agent at Com- 
 piegne. On the day appointed, the Englishman came. Hav- 
 ing made up his mind to combine pleasure with business, he 
 had brought his portmanteau in order to stay for a day or so. 
 Previous to the interview he had applied at every hotel, at 
 every private house where there was a chance of getting a 
 room, but without success. His luggage was in a cab on the
 
 302 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Place du Chateau. Napoleon was, as usual, very kind, prom- 
 ised him his aid, but asked him to let the matter rest until 
 the next day, when he would have an opportunity of consult- 
 ing a high authority on the subject who was coming down 
 that very afternoon. " Give me your address, and I will let 
 you know, the first thing in the morning, when I can see 
 you," said the Emperor in English. 
 
 The Englishman looked very embarrassed. " I have no 
 address, sire. I have been unable to get a room anywhere," 
 he replied. 
 
 "Oh, I dare say we can put you up somewhere here," 
 laughed the Emperor, and called to one of his aides-de-camp, 
 to whom he gave instructions. 
 
 The Englishman and the officer departed together, but 
 the Chateau was quite as full as the rest of the town. 
 
 " I'll ask Baptiste," said the officer at last, having tried 
 every possible means. 
 
 Baptiste was one of the Emperor's principal grooms, and 
 very willing to help ; but, alas ! he had only a very small room 
 himself, and that was shared by his wife. 
 
 " If monsieur don't mind," said Baptiste, " I will make 
 him up a good bed in one of the f ourgons " one of the lug- 
 gage-vans. 
 
 So said, so done. The Englishman slept like a top, being 
 very tired, too much like a top, for he never stirred until 
 he found himself rudely awakened by a heavy bundle of rugs 
 and other paraphernalia being flung on his chest. He was 
 at the station. Baptiste had simply forgotten to mention 
 the fact of his having transformed the fourgon into a bed- 
 room ; the doors that stood ajar during the night had been 
 closed without the servant looking inside ; and when the 
 occupant was discovered he was, as Racine says 
 
 " Dans le simple appareil 
 D'une beaute qu on vient d'arracher au sommeil." 
 
 When he told the Emperor, the latter laughed, " as he had 
 never seen him laugh before," said the aide-de-camp, who 
 had been the innocent cause of the mischief by appealing to 
 Baptiste. 
 
 The victim of the misadventure did not mind it much. 
 For many years afterwards, he averred that the sight of Com- 
 piegne in those days would have compensated for the incon- 
 venience of sleeping on a garden seat. What was more, he
 
 A NOVEL BEDROOM. 303 
 
 and his firm were never troubled any more with inexorable 
 demands for baksheesh. 
 
 He was right ; the sight of Compiegne in those days was 
 very beautiful. There was a good deal of the histrionic 
 mixed up with it, but it was very beautiful. In addition to 
 the bands of the garrison, a regimental band of the infantry 
 of the Garde played in the courtyard of the Chateau ; the 
 streets were alive with crowds dressed in their best ; almost 
 every house was gay with bunting, the only exceptions being 
 those of the Legitimists, who, unlike Achilles, did not even 
 skulk in their tents, but shut up their establishments and flit- 
 ted on the eve of the arrival of the Court, after having de- 
 spatched an address of unswerving loyalty to the Comte de 
 Chambord. After a little while, Napoleon did not trouble 
 about these expressions of hostility to his dynasty, though he 
 could not forbear to ask bitterly, now and then, whether the 
 Comte de Chambord or the Comte de Paris under a regency 
 could have made the country more prosperous than he had 
 attempted to do, than he succeeded in doing. And truth 
 compels one to admit that France's material prosperity was 
 not a sham in those days, whatever else may have been ; for 
 in those days, as I have already remarked, the end was still 
 distant, and there were probably not a thousand men in the 
 whole of Europe who foresaw the nature of it, albeit that a 
 thirtieth or a fortieth part of them may have been in Com- 
 piegne at the very time when the Emperor, in his elegantly 
 appointed break, drove from the Place du Chateau amidst 
 the acclamations of the serried crowds lining the roads. 
 
 On the day of the arrival of the Emperor the train 
 reached Compiegne about four there was neither dinner- 
 party nor reception at the Chateau. The civil and military 
 authorities of Compiegne went to the station to welcome the 
 Imperial couple, the rangers of Compiegne and Laigue forests 
 waited upon his Majesty to arrange the programme, and 
 generally joined the Imperial party at dinner ; but the fetes 
 did not commence until the second day after the arrival, i. e. 
 with the advent of the first batch of guests, who reached the 
 Chateau exactly twenty-four hours after their hosts.
 
 304: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Society during the Empire The series of guests at Compiegne The amuse- 
 ments the absence of musical taste in the Bonapartes The programme 
 on the first, second, third, and fourth days An anecdote of Lafoutaine, the 
 actor Theatrical performances and balls The expenses of the same The 
 theatre at Compiegne The guests, male and female "Neck or nothing" 
 for the latter, uniform for the former The rest have to take " back seats " 
 The selection of guests among the notabilities of Compiegne A mayor's 
 troubles The Empress's and the Emperor's conflicting opinions with re- 
 gard to female charms Bassano in " hot water " Tactics of the demi- 
 mondaines Improvement from the heraldic point of view in the Empress's 
 entourage The cocodettes Their dress Worth When every pretext for 
 a change of toilette is exhausted, the court ladies turn themselves into bal- 
 lerinas "Le Diable a Quatre" at Compi|gne The ladies appear at the 
 ball afterwards in their gauze skirts The Emperor's dictum witn regard to 
 ballet-dancers and men's infatuation for them The Emperor did not like 
 stupid women The Emperor's " eye " for a handsome woman The Em- 
 press does not admire the instinct William I. of Prussia acts as comforter 
 The hunt Actors, " supers," and spectators" La Comtesse d'Escar- 
 bagnas" The Imperial procession The Empress's and Emperor's un- 
 punctuality Louis-Napoleon not a " well-dressed man " The Empress 
 wished to get back before dark The reason of this wish Though unpunct- 
 ual, punctual on hunt-days The police measures at those gatherings M. 
 Hyrvoix and M. Boitell e The Empress did not like the truth, the Em- 
 peror did Her anxiety to go to St. Lazare. 
 
 THE guests were divided into five series, each of which 
 stayed four days exclusive of the day of their arrival and that 
 of their departure. Each series consisted of between eighty 
 and ninety guests. 
 
 The amusements provided were invariably the same for 
 each series of guests. On the day of their arrival there was 
 the dinner, followed by charades, and a carpet dance to the 
 accompaniment of the piano or, to speak by the card, of the 
 piano-organ. It was an instrument similar to that which 
 nowadays causes so much delight to the children in the 
 streets of London, and, as far as I can remember, the first of 
 its kind I had ever seen. The male guests, and not always 
 the youngest, relieved one another in turning the handle. 
 Mechanical as was the task, it required a certain ear for time, 
 and they were often found sadly wanting in that respect. It
 
 THE SERIES OP GUESTS AT COMPIEGNE. 3Q5 
 
 was rather comical to see a grave minister of State solemnly 
 grinding out tunes, and being called to task every now and 
 again for his incapacity. The worst offender, the most hope- 
 less performer, was undoubtedly the Emperor himself. The 
 Bonapartes are one and all devoid of the slightest taste for 
 music. I think it is De Bourrienne but I will not be cer- 
 tain who speaks of the founder of the dynasty humming as 
 he went along from one apartment to another. " Et Dieu 
 sait comme il chantait faux," adds the chronicler in despair. 
 That part of the great man's mantle had decidedly fallen 
 upon his nephew. I remember the latter trying to distin- 
 guish himself on that piano-organ one evening. M. de Mau- 
 pas, who was the prefect of police at the time of the Coup 
 d'Etat, and minister of police afterwards, was among the 
 guests. The ambulant musician in Paris has to get a kind 
 of licence from the prefecture of police, the outward sign of 
 which is a brass badge, which he is bound to wear suspended 
 from his button-hole. While the Emperor was trying to 
 make the company waltz, one of the ladies suddenly turned 
 round to M. de Maupas : " Si jamais Fempereur vous demande 
 la permission de jouer dans la rue, refusez lui, monsieur ; re- 
 fusez lui, pour 1'amour du ciel et de la musique," she said 
 aloud : and the Emperor himself could not help smiling at 
 the well-deserved rebuke. " Madame," he replied, " if ever I 
 am reduced to such a strait, I will take you into partnership : 
 I will make you sing, and I will collect the pence." In spite 
 of his musical deficiencies the Emperor was right ; the lady 
 was Madame Conneau, who had and has still one of the most 
 beautiful voices ever heard on the professional or amateur 
 stage. 
 
 On the first day following that of the arrival of the guests, 
 there was a shooting-party, or, rather, there were two one 
 in the home park for the Emperor himself, who was not a 
 bad shot, and a dozen of the more important personages ; 
 another in the forest. Those who did not care for sport 
 were at liberty to remain with the ladies, who, under the di- 
 rection of the Empress, proceeded to the lawn. Croquet, as 
 far as I know, had not been invented then, but archery lent 
 itself to posing and flirtation quite as well, and the costumes 
 worn on such occasions were truly a sight for the gods. 
 
 On the evening of that day, there was a performance in 
 the theatre, built for the express purpose by Louis-Philippe, 
 but which had been considerably embellished since. The
 
 306 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 companies of the Comedie-Frangaise, the Odeon, the Gym- 
 nase, the Vaudeville, and the Palais-Koyal took it in turns. 
 Only the members of the Comedie-Fran9aise had the privi- 
 lege of paying their respects in the Imperial box. It was 
 during one of the performances of the Gymnase company 
 that the following amusing incident occurred. They were 
 playing " Le Fils de Famille " of Bayard and De Bieville,* 
 and the Emperor was strolling in the lobbies before the per- 
 formance, when he noticed an old colonel of lancers, whom 
 he did not remember to have seen among the guests during 
 the daytime, but who seemed perfectly at home. He had 
 not even donned his full regimentals. 
 
 " Voila un vrai, beau militaire," said the sovereign to one 
 of his aides-de-camp ; " allez demander son nom." 
 
 The aide-de-camp returned in a moment. " II s'appelle 
 Lafontaine, sire ; et il appartient au regiment du Gymnase." 
 " Comment, au regiment du Gymnase ? " 
 " Mais oui, sire ; c'est Lafontaine, le comedien." 
 In fact, the assumption was so thoroughly realistic, that 
 even a better judge than Louis-Napoleon might have been 
 deceived by it. 
 
 Those performances were really most brilliant affairs, and 
 an invitation to them was only less highly prized than that 
 to the ball which always followed the play on November 15th, 
 the Empress's fete-day. f The cost of each performance was 
 estimated at between twenty and thirty thousand francs, ac- 
 cording to the company performing. I am repeating the 
 official statement, though inclined to think it somewhat ex- 
 aggerated. Except the Opera or Opera-Comique, there was 
 not then, nor is there now, a theatre in Paris whose nightly 
 receipts, with " the greatest success," exceed seven or eight 
 thousand francs. Allowing for an additional three thousand 
 francs for railway travelling and sundry expenses, I fail to 
 see how the remainder of the sum was disbursed, unless it 
 was in douceurs to the performers. There is less doubt, 
 however, about the expenses of the Chateau during this an- 
 nual series of ftes. It could not have been less than forty- 
 five thousand francs per diem, and must have often risen to 
 
 * Known on the English stage as the " Queen's Shilling," by Mr. Godfrey. 
 EDITOR. 
 
 t The Sainte-Euge"nie, according to the Church Calendar. In France, it is 
 not the birthday, but the day of the patron-saint whose name one bears, which 
 is celebrated. EDITOR.
 
 THE THEATRE. 307 
 
 fifty thousand francs, exclusive of the cost of the theatrical 
 performances, because the luxe displayed on these occasions 
 was truly astonishing I had almost said appalling 
 
 The theatre was built on the old-fa?hioned principle, and 
 what we call stalls were not known in those days. There was 
 something analogous to them at the Opera and the Theatre- 
 Francais, but they were exclusively reserved to the male sex. 
 Both these theatres still keep up the same traditions in that 
 respect. At Compiegne the whole of the ground floor, par- 
 terre, or pit, as we have misnamed it " groundlings " is a 
 much more appropriate word, perhaps, than " pittites " was 
 occupied by the officers of all grades of the regiments quar- 
 tered at Compiegne and in the department. The chefs de 
 corps and the chief dignitaries of State filled the amphithe- 
 atre, which rose in a gentle slope from the back of the par- 
 terre to just below the first tier of boxes, or rather to the 
 balcony tier, seeing that the only box on it was the Imperial 
 one. The latter, however, took up much more than the 
 centre, for it had been constructed to seat about two hundred 
 persons. Only a slight partition, elbow high, divided it from 
 the rest of the tier, whence the sterner sex was absolutely 
 banished. The display of bare arms and shoulders was some- 
 thing marvellous, for they were by no means equally worthy 
 of admiration, and the stranger, ignorant of the court regu- 
 lations, must have often asked himself why certain ladies 
 should have been so reckless as to invite comparison with 
 their more favoured sisters. It was because there was no 
 choice. The slightest gauze was rigorously prohibited, and 
 woe to the lady who ventured to disobey these regulations. 
 One of the chambellans was sure to request her to retire. 
 " L'epaule ou 1'epaulette " was the title of a comic song of 
 those days, in allusion to the Empress's determination to suf- 
 fer none but resplendent uniforms and ball dresses within 
 sight of her. If I remember aright, the chorus went like 
 this 
 
 " Je ne porte pas 1'epaulette, 
 Je ne puis me decoll'ter, 
 Je ne suis qu'un vieux bonhomme, 
 Done, je ne suis pas invite." 
 
 For even the guests in plain evening dress were mercilessly 
 relegated to the tier above that of the Imperial box, and, 
 even when there, were not permitted to occupy the first
 
 308 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 rows. These also were reserved for the fairer portion of 
 humanity. 
 
 This fairer portion of humanity, thus ostensibly privi- 
 leged, embittered the lives of the poor mayor and sub-pre- 
 fect of Compiegne. The wives of the local notabilities and 
 of the government officials, in addition to those of some of 
 the landed gentry of the Empire, were not only anxious to 
 be present at these gatherings, but generally insisted on hav- 
 ing the front seats, at any rate in the second circle. Their 
 applications, transmitted by these dignitaries to the Due de 
 Bassano, were always in excess of the room at his disposal, 
 and, being an utter stranger to all these ladies, he had vir- 
 tually to choose at random, or, if not at random, to be guided 
 by the mayor and sub-prefect, who were consulted, not with 
 regard to the greater or lesser degree of opulent charms and 
 comeliness of features of these fair applicants, but with re- 
 gard to their social status and fair fame. Now, it so hap- 
 pens that in France " L'amour fait des siennes " in the prov- 
 inces as well as in the capital ; he only disdains what Mira- 
 beau used to call " les fees concombres." The Empress, pro- 
 vided the shoulders and arms were bare, did not trouble 
 much about either their colour or " moulded outline ; " the 
 Emperor, on the contrary, objected, both from personal as 
 well as artistic reasons, to have the curved symmetry of the 
 two circles marred by the introduction of so many living 
 problems of Euclid; and it really seemed as if the devil 
 wanted to have all the good shapes to himself, for the re- 
 putedly virtuous spinsters, widows, and matrons were angular 
 enough to have satisfied a tutor of mathematics. There was 
 a dilemma : if they were put in the front rows, the Emperor 
 scolded Bassano, who in his turn scolded the mayor and the 
 sub-prefect. If the less virtuous but more attractive were 
 put in the front rows, there was frequently a small scandal ; 
 for the Empress, at the first sight of them, had them ex- 
 pelled, after which she scolded Bassano, who avenged him 
 self for his having been reprimanded on the mayor and sub- 
 prefect. Furthermore, the contingent from Paris, some of 
 whom were often provided with letters of introduction from 
 influential personages to the latter gentleman, were not al- 
 ways without reproach though ever without fear ; but how 
 were two provincial magistrates to know this ? Those sirens 
 could almost impose upon them with impunity, and did ; so, 
 upon the whole, the magistrates did not have a pleasant time
 
 "MARIVAUDAGE" AND WORSE. 309 
 
 of it, for in the case of the former damsels or veuves de Mala- 
 bar both the Emperor and the Empress were equally strict 
 though, perhaps, from utterly different motives. 
 
 Nevertheless, the esclandres were comparatively rare, and 
 the house itself presented a sight unparalleled perhaps 
 throughout the length and breadth of Europe. At nine 
 o'clock, Comte Bacciochi, the first chambellan, in his court 
 dress descended the few steps leading from the foyer to the 
 Imperial box, and, advancing to the front, announced, " The 
 Emperor." Every one rose and remained standing until the 
 Emperor and Empress, who entered immediately afterwards, 
 had seated themselves in the crimson velvet and gilt arm- 
 chairs which the gentlemen-in- waiting (les chambellans de 
 service) rolled forward. 
 
 I have spoken elsewhere of the immediate entourage of 
 the Imperial hosts, and may therefore pass them over in 
 silence here. As the Napoleonic dynasty became apparently 
 more consolidated both at home and abroad, this entourage 
 gradually changed though no truthful observer could have 
 honestly averred that the change was for the better. The 
 decaves and the declassees of the first period disappeared al- 
 together, or underwent a truly marvellous financial and social 
 metamorphosis : the men, by means of speculations, chiefly 
 connected with the " Haussmannizing " of Paris, the success- 
 ful carrying out of which was greatly facilitated by their posi- 
 tion at court ; the women by marriages, the conditions of 
 which I prefer not to discuss. An undoubtedly genuine 
 leaven of names to be found in " D'Hozier," * came to swell 
 the ranks of the hitherto somewhat shady courtiers of both 
 sexes. Unfortunately, their blood was not only thicker than 
 water, and consequently more easily heated, but they pre- 
 sumed upon the blueness of it to set public opinion at defi- 
 ance. 
 
 " Ce qui, chez les mortels, est une effronterie 
 Entre nous autres demi-dieux 
 N'est qu'honnete galanterie." 
 
 Thus wrote the Duchesse du Maine f to her brother, of whom 
 she was perhaps a little more fond than even their blood-rela- 
 
 * " D'Hozier," the French " Burke," so named after its founder, Pierre D'Ho- 
 zier, the creator of the science of French genealogy. EDITOR. 
 
 t Anne, Louise, Benedicte de Bourbon, Princesse de Conde, who married the 
 Due du Maine, the illegitimate son of Louis XIV. and Madame de Montespan.
 
 310 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 tionship warranted. This privilege of stealing the horse, 
 while the meaner-born might not even look over the hedge, 
 was claimed by the sons and the daughters of the old noblesse, 
 who condescended to grace the court of Napoleon III., with 
 a cynicism worthy of the most libertine traditions of the 
 ancien regime ; and neither the Empress nor the Emperor 
 did anything to discountenance the claim. The former, pro- 
 vided that " tout ce passait en famille," closed her eyes to 
 many things she ought not to have tolerated. At the Tuile- 
 ries, a certain measure of decorum was preferred ; at Com- 
 pie"gne and Fontainebleau, where the house was " packed " 
 as it were, the most flagrant eccentricities, to call them by 
 no harsher name, were not only permitted, but tacitly en- 
 couraged by the Empress. This was especially the case 
 when the first series of guests was gone. It generally in- 
 cluded the most serious portion of the visitors, " les ennuy- 
 eurs, les empecheurs de dauser en rond,"* as they were 
 called. The ladies belonging to, or classed in that category, 
 presented, no doubt, a striking contrast to those of the suc- 
 ceeding series, in which the English element was not always 
 conspicuous by its absence. The costumes of the latter were 
 something wonderful to behold. The cloth skirt, which had 
 then been recently introduced from England, and the cloth 
 dress, draped elegantly over it, enabled their wearers to defy 
 all kinds of weather. And as they went tramping down the 
 muddy roads, their coquettish little hats daintily poised on 
 enormous chignons, their walking boots displaying more than 
 the regulation part of ankle, the less sophisticated Compi6- 
 gnois stared with all their might at the strange company from 
 the Chateau, and no wonder. Still, the surprise of the in- 
 habitants was small compared to that of the troopers of the 
 garrison at the invasion of their riding-school by such a con- 
 tingent, which indulged in ring-tilting, not unfrequently in 
 tent-pegging, and, more frequently still, " in taking a header 
 into space," to the great amusement of their companions. 
 
 In those days, Worth was not quite king ; the cocodettes 
 of the Imperial circle were still prophesying on their own ac- 
 count. The " arsenal des modes," as Madame Emile de Gi- 
 
 She disliked her husband, whom she considered socially beneath her, and who 
 was very ugly besides. The lines quoted above are probably not hers, but 
 Malezieu's, " her poet in ordinary," who also organized her amateur theatricals. 
 EDITOR. 
 
 * Idiomatically, " the bores, the spoil-sports, or wet-blankets." EDITOB.
 
 HIGH-BORN BALLERINAS. 311 
 
 rardin had boastingly called Paris but ten years previously, 
 had as yet not been boldly taken by storm by a native of 
 bucolic Lincolnshire. But in a very short time he became 
 the absolute autocrat in matters of feminine apparel. It was 
 not even an enlightened despotism. His will Avas law. Every 
 different entertainment required its appropriate costume, and 
 the costume was frequently the sole pretext for the entertain- 
 ment. And when the ingenuity in devising both was in 
 danger of becoming exhausted, the supreme resource of these 
 ladies was to turn themselves into ballerinas ; no into balle- 
 rinas as King Bomba, or the Comte Sosthene de la Eoche- 
 foucauld, or M. Eouher would have had them, but into balle- 
 rinas with the shortest of gauze skirts and pink silk flesh- 
 ings. 
 
 One year, I am not certain of the exact one, I know that 
 the future Emperor of Germany was there, the ladies hit 
 upon the idea of giving a surprise to the Emperor and Em- 
 press on the occasion of the latter's fete-day. A ballet-master 
 was sent for in hot haste from Paris, and " Le Diable a Qua- 
 tre " put in rehearsal. Unlike Peter the Great, who had a 
 soldier hanged he said shooting was too good for him for 
 having represented a disreputable character on the stage, the 
 Emperor professed himself exceedingly pleased; and the 
 ladies, among whom was Princess von Metternich, were sent 
 for from the Imperial box to be complimented by the sover- 
 eign. At the ball which followed the entertainment, they ap- 
 peared in their theatrical dresses. Every one was delighted. 
 " Apres tout," said Napoleon, blinking his eyes, " avec cette 
 manie des hommes de courir apres des danseuses, il vaut 
 mieux leur en fournir de bonne maison." 
 
 The philosophy was unassailable, and, to a certain extent, 
 acted upon by its professor. Napoleon only admired dancers 
 on the stage. He thought, with Balzac, that the extraordi- 
 nary physical strain upon the lower extremities necessarily in- 
 terfered with the intellectual development " at the other end." 
 " L'esprit de la danseuse est dans ses jambes, et je n'aime pas 
 les femmes betes," he remarked ; for the Emperor, like most 
 of the members of his family, did not scruple to apply the 
 right word, when talking to his familiars. 
 
 Nevertheless, until he was assured of the stupidity of a 
 woman by more intimate acquaintance, he was too much in- 
 clined to be attracted by the first handsome face he saw, or, 
 to speak by the card, by the first handsome face he picked out
 
 312 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 for himself. The moment he was seated by the side of the 
 Empress in the Imperial box, during one of those perform- 
 ances I mentioned just now, he swept the house with his 
 opera-glass, and unerringly the glass stopped at what was 
 really the handsomest woman in the house, whether she was 
 seated on the tier with him or in the upper one of course, I 
 mean " the handsomest woman " among the strangers, be- 
 cause on such occasions the Emperor paid but little attention 
 to those who were generally around him. The Empress was 
 fain to put up with these peccadilloes : she could not be al- 
 ways running away to Schwalbach or to Scotland ; besides, 
 she knew that she would have to come back again. Some 
 months previous to the performance of " Le Diable a Quatre," 
 she went to the former place to hide her mortification. Will- 
 iam of Prussia was at Baden-Baden at the time, and he im- 
 mediately left the delightful society and the magnificent rou- 
 lades of Pauline Lucca to offer his sympathies to the Griselda 
 who had fled from her home troubles, forgetting that there 
 was another one at home, who would have even been more 
 glad of his company. 
 
 On the day after the shooting-party and the theatrical per- 
 formance, there was generally an excursion to Pierref onds, and 
 afterwards to the magnificent Koman remains at Champlieu. 
 In the evening there were charades and carpet dances as 
 usual. 
 
 The third day was always reserved for the most important 
 part of the programme the stag-hunt. Candidly speaking, 
 I doubt whether Napoleon, though a very excellent horseman, 
 cared much for this sport, as conducted on the grand tradi- 
 tional lines of the French " code of venerie." His main ob- 
 ject personally was a good stiff run with the hounds, such as 
 he had been used to in England, troubling himself little 
 whether the pack kept the scent or not. In fact, there were 
 generally two packs out, one of purely English breed, which 
 was followed by the Emperor and his guests; the other 
 French, followed by the serious lovers of sport, who, as a rule, 
 caught at every pretext to get away from the magnificently 
 apparelled crowd, driving or riding in the wake of the sover- 
 eign. Among the former there was a considerable sprinkling 
 of the landed gentry of the neighbourhood, monarchists and 
 legitimists to a man, some of whom did not even condescend 
 to honour the Emperor with a salute. Compiegne, Senart, 
 etc., were, after all, public property, and they could do as they
 
 THE STAG-HUNT. 313 
 
 liked, though I have got an idea that this wilful slight was 
 an instance of singular bad taste on the part of these gentle- 
 men. 
 
 The spot fixed for the meet was invariably the large clear- 
 ing known as the Carref our du Puits-du-Koi, whence radiated 
 eight immense avenues, stretching as far as the uttermost con- 
 fines of the forest of Compiegne. The spot, apart from its 
 associations with royalty, from the days of Clovis up to our 
 own, was admirably chosen, the mise-en-scene worthy of the 
 greatest stage-manager on record. The huge centre itself was 
 kept clear by the gendarmes de chasse a cross between a 
 mounted constable and a ranger from any but the officers 
 of the garrison on horseback and other persons privileged to 
 join the Emperor's suite. Six of the avenues were free to 
 the pedestrians, who could watch every movement from their 
 vantage point ; the seventh was set apart for carriages of all 
 sorts, from the humble shandrydan of the local notary and 
 doctor to the magnificent break of the neighbouring landed 
 proprietor, or the less correctly but more showily appointed 
 barouches of the leaders of provincial society, who rarely 
 missed an opportunity of attending these gatherings, where 
 'there were so many chances of coming in contact with the 
 court. Eelegated for at least ten months of the year allow- 
 ing for an annual visit to the capital to the dull, humdrum, 
 though often pretentious round of entertainments of her own 
 circle, the Comtesse d'Esbargnas,* whether young or old, 
 handsome or the reverse, matron or widow, of patrician or 
 plebeian origin, sedulously watched the yearly recurring time 
 and tide that might lead to a permanent footing at the Tuil- 
 eries. What has happened once may happen again. Agnes 
 Sorel, Diane de Poitiers, Gabrielle d'Estrees, Louise de la Val- 
 liere, let alone Jeanne Becu and Jeanne Poisson,f had by no 
 means exhausted the possibilities of sudden elevations to with- 
 in a step of the throne. These new aspirants would be con- 
 tent with a less giddy position. And who could say what 
 might happen ? Had not Alfred de Musset, the daring poet 
 of " les grandes passions," written a play entitled " II ne faut 
 jurer de rien"? Assuredly what had happened once might 
 happen again. Meanwhile the pleasure of watching all this 
 splendour was worth coming for. 
 
 * A character of one of Molie're's plays, who lends her name to the play itself, 
 and who, with her provincial clique, ap'es the manners of the court, 
 t Hesdames Du Barry and Pompadour. 
 14
 
 314: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 The latter proposition hardly admitted of discussion. 
 The sight was truly worth coming for. Though the Impe- 
 rial suite never made its appearance before one, the main 
 arteries of the forest became crowded as early as eleven. 
 Half an hour later came La Trace and La Feuille with their 
 Equipage.* The kennelmen and huntsmen in full dress 
 gathered round a roaring fire, their hounds lying at their 
 feet. The stablemen and grooms, in undress livery of green 
 and brown, walking the hunters of the Emperor and his suite 
 to and fro, presented a picture full of colour and animation. 
 
 As a rule the Imperial cortege was punctual on those oc- 
 casions, though it was often remiss in that respect at gather- 
 erings of a different nature. Among the familiars at the 
 Tuileries the blame for this general unpunctuality was at- 
 tributed in an equal measure to both the Emperor and the 
 Empress. The latter dressed very slowly, and the former 
 wanted to dress too quickly. The result of this difference of 
 habit was always manifest to the most casual observer. The 
 Empress, after the most fatiguing day or soiree, always looked 
 as if she had just left her dressing-room, the Emperor at the 
 beginning of the same as if he had scarcely been in it. But 
 on " grand hunt-days " the Empress was never a minute late ; 
 and the reason, apart from the natural wish to exercise " la 
 politesse des rois," exactitude, was a curious one, but for the 
 truth of which I can vouch. It gets dark early in Novem- 
 ber, and the Empress dreaded to be overtaken by darkness 
 in the forest, even amidst a crowd. It reminded her of a 
 disagreeable episode during her first stay at Compie"gne, when 
 she was still Mdlle. Eugenie de Montijo. She and her future 
 husband had got separated from the rest of tlie party. It 
 was never accurately known what happened, but she was 
 found sitting quietly but sorely distressed on her horse by 
 M. de Saint-Paul, the sub-ranger, who escorted her back to 
 the Chateau. She explained her lonely and uncomfortable 
 position by the fact that her companion's horse had suddenly 
 taken the bit between its teeth. The explanation was a 
 lame one, seeing that the Prince-President, on his .return, 
 hours before, had looked perfectly composed and not as much 
 as mentioned her name. The truth leaked out afterwards. 
 Enraged at Mdlle. de Montijo's refusal to grant him a clan- 
 
 * " Equipage" is the right word. Applied to any but military or hunting 
 uses, it is out of place, though frequently thus used. EDITOR.
 
 THE EMPRESS'S TEMPER. 315 
 
 destine interview for that night, her princely suitor had left 
 her to find her way back as best she could. 
 
 Invariably, then, at the stroke of one, the Imperial pro- 
 cession was signalled, for it was nothing less than a proces- 
 sion. At its head rode the chief ranger of Compiegne, Baron 
 de "VYlmpffen, in a magnificent hunting-coat of green and 
 gold, the laced tricornered hat, surmounted by a bunch of 
 black plumes, jackboots, and white doeskins. Then came 
 the Imperial break, drawn by six horses, mounted by postil- 
 ions in powdered wigs, the Imperial host and hostess on the 
 front seat, the members of the family, or some illustrious 
 guests, behind ; the rest of the breaks were only four-horsed, 
 and the procession was closed by the carriage of M. Hyrvoix, 
 the chief of the secret police. In Paris this arrangement 
 was reversed, and M. Hyrvoix, who had the rank of a prefect, 
 and took his place as such at all public functions, preceded 
 instead of following the Imperial carriage. 
 
 I am inclined to think, notwithstanding the frequent out- 
 cries against the secret police during the second empire, that 
 M. Hyrvoix was a thoroughly upright and conscientious 
 servant. Unfortunately for himself and his Imperial mas- 
 ters, his position was a difficult one ; for though professedly 
 employed to gauge public opinion with regard to the dynas- 
 ty, his reports to that effect were not always received with 
 the consideration due to honest truth, at any rate by the 
 Empress. Throughout these pages, I have endeavoured as 
 far as possible to jot down my recollections in a kind of 
 chronological order, rather than in the order they occurred 
 to me ; but in this, as in many other instances, I have been 
 obliged to anticipate the course of events lest they should 
 slip my memory, for I had no documents to go by, and also 
 to avoid unnecessary repetitions. This particular part of 
 my somewhat disjointed narrative was meant to deal with 
 the festivities at Compiegne and the company there ; on 
 reading it over, I find that it has developed into a fragment 
 of biography of the Emperor and his Consort. As such, the 
 following stories will throw a valuable side light on their 
 different dispositions. 
 
 When the news of Emperor Maximilian's death reached 
 Paris, there was the rumbling of a storm which foreboded no 
 good. For days before, there had been vague rumours of 
 the catastrophe. It. had been whispered at the annual dis- 
 tribution of prizes at the College de France, where one of
 
 316 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the young Cavaignacs had refused to receive his reward at 
 the hands of the Prince Imperial. In short, indignation 
 was rife among all classes. The Empress, on hearing of the 
 insult, had burst into hysterical tears, and been obliged to 
 leave the reception-rooms. In short, a dark cloud hung over 
 the Tuileries. I have spoken elsewhere of the Mexican ex- 
 pedition, so need not enlarge upon it here. We will take it 
 that both Napoleon and his wife were altogether blameless 
 in the affair which was by no means the case, but a mo- 
 ment's reflection ought to have shown them that appearances 
 were against them, and that the discontent expressed was so 
 far justified. I am under the impression that Napoleon him- 
 self looked at it in that way ; he bowed to the storm ; he re- 
 gretted, but did not resent people speaking ill of him. Not 
 so the Empress ; the truth was only welcome to her when it 
 flattered her ; she really fancied herself an autocrat by the 
 Grace of God, as the previous Bourbons interpreted the 
 term. In spite of all that has been said about her amia- 
 bility, about her charity, Eugenie was in reality cruel at 
 heart. No woman, not cruel, could have taken the prin- 
 cipal part in a scene which I will describe presently. But 
 she was vindictive also, and, what was worse, blindly vin- 
 dictive. Though firmly convinced that she reigned by right 
 divine, she had felt more than once that private revenge on 
 " the people " who abused her was beyond her power. She 
 not only fretted accordingly, but often vented her wrath on 
 the first victim that came to hand, albeit that the latter was 
 generally the mere innocent conveyance through which the 
 voice of " the people " reached her. M. Hyrvoix, in virtue 
 of his functions, often found himself the echo of that voice. 
 He was generally the first of all the officials to present his 
 daily report. The Emperor gave him his cue by asking, 
 " What do the people say ? " 
 
 On that particular morning, after the death of Maxi- 
 milian had become known, the answer came not as readily as 
 usual ; for the chief of the secret police was not in the habit 
 of mincing matters. This time, however, M. Hyrvoix kept 
 silent for a while, then replied, " The people do- not say any- 
 thing, sire." 
 
 Napoleon must have noticed the hesitating manner ; for 
 he said at once, " You are not telling me the truth. What 
 do the people say ? " 
 
 " Well, sire, if you wish to know, not only the people, but
 
 THE VICTIMS OF IT. 317 
 
 every one is deeply indignant and disgusted with the conse- 
 quences of this unfortunate war. It is commented upon 
 everywhere in the selfsame spirit. They say it is the fault 
 of " 
 
 " The fault of whom ? " repeated Napoleon. 
 
 Whereupon M. Hyrvoix kept silent once more. 
 
 " The fault of whom ? " insisted Napoleon. 
 
 "Sire," stammered M. Hyrvoix, "in the time of Louis 
 XVI. people said, ' It is the fault of the Austrian woman.' " 
 
 " Yes, go on." 
 
 " Under Napoleon III. people say, ' It is the fault of the 
 Spanish woman. ' ' 
 
 The words had scarcely left M. Hyrvoix' lips, when a 
 door leading to the inner apartments opened, and the Em- 
 press appeared on the threshold. " She looked like a beauti- 
 ful fury," said M. Hyrvoix to his friend, from whom I have 
 got the story. " She wore a white dressing-gown, her hair 
 was waving on her shoulders, and her eyes shot flames. She 
 hissed, rather than spoke, as she bounded towards me ; and, 
 ridiculous as it may seem, I felt afraid for the moment. 
 ' You will please repeat what you said just now, M. Hyrvoix,' 
 she gasped in a voice hoarse with anger. 
 
 " ' Certainly, madame,' I replied, ' seeing that I am here to 
 speak the truth, and, as such, your Majesty will pardon me. 
 I told the Emperor that the Parisians spoke of ' the Spanish 
 woman,' as they spoke seventy-five and eighty years ago of 
 ' the Austrian woman.' " 
 
 " ' The Spanish woman ! the Spanish woman ! ' she jerked 
 out three or four times and I could see that her hands were 
 clenched ; ' I have become French, but I will show my 
 enemies that I can be Spanish when occasion demands it.' 
 
 " "With this she left as suddenly as she had come, taking 
 no notice of the Emperor's uplifted hand to detain her. 
 When the door closed upon her, I said to the Emperor, ' I 
 am more than grieved, sire, that I spoke.' 
 
 " ' You did your duty,' he said, grasping my hand." 
 
 As a matter of course, the threat to show her enemies 
 that she could be Spanish when occasion required was, in 
 this instance, an empty one, because " the enemies " hap- 
 pened to be legion. A scapegoat was found, however, in the 
 honest functionary who had, in the exercise of his duty, 
 frankly warned the Emperor of the ugly things that were 
 said about her. Next morning, M. Hyrvoix was appointed
 
 318 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Keceiver-General for one of the departments that is, exiled 
 to the provinces. 
 
 This system of ostracism was indiscriminately applied 
 to all who happened to offend her. Unfortunately, the 
 slightest divergence of opinion on the most trifling matter 
 was construed into an offence ; hence in a few years the so- 
 called counsellors around the Emperor were simply so many 
 automata, moving at her will, and at her will only. Men who 
 ventured to think for themselves were removed, or else volun- 
 tarily retired from the precincts of the court sooner than 
 submit to a tyranny, not based like that of Catherine II. 
 or Elizabeth upon great intellectual gifts, but upon the way- 
 ward impulses of a woman in no way distinguished mentally 
 from the meanest of her sex, except by an overweening am- 
 bition and an equally overweening conceit. 
 
 And as nothing is so apt to breed injustice as injustice, 
 men, who might have proved the salvation of the Second 
 Empire in its hour of direst need, were absolutely driven 
 into opposition, and so blinded by resentment as to be unable 
 to distinguish any longer between France and those who 
 impelled her to her ruin. 
 
 Lest I should be taxed with exaggeration, a few instances 
 among the many will suffice. One evening, in the course of 
 those charades of which I have already spoken, some of the 
 performers, both men and women, had thrown all decorum 
 to the winds in their improvised dialogue. A young colonel, 
 by no means strait-laced or a hypocrite, who was a great 
 favourite with the Emperor and Empress, professed himself 
 shocked, in the hearing of the latter, at so much licence in 
 the presence of the sovereigns. In reality, it was an honest 
 but indirect comment upon the Empress's blamable latitude 
 in that respect. The Empress took up the cudgels for the 
 offenders. " Vous n'e'tes pas content, colonel ; he bien ! je 
 m'enjiche, refiche et contrefiche" (" You don't like it, colo- 
 nel ; well, I "don't care a snap, nor two snaps, nor a thou- 
 sand snaps." *) The Emperor laughed, and applauded his 
 Consort ; the colonel took the hint, and was seen at court no 
 more. Shortly afterward he went to Mexico, where all who 
 saw him at work concurred in saying that he was not only 
 
 * My translation by no means renders the vulgarity of the sentence. The 
 French have three words to express their contempt for a speaker's opinion, *? 
 moquer, se ficher, and se . . . I omit the latter, but even the second is rarely 
 used in decent society. EDITOR.
 
 M. BOITELLE. 319 
 
 a most valuable soldier, but probably the only one in the 
 French army, of those days, capable of handling large masses. 
 Nevertheless, when the war of '70 broke out, he was still a 
 colonel, and no attempt at offering him a command was 
 made. The republicans, for once in a way, were wiser in 
 their generation : at this hour he holds a high position in 
 the army, and is destined to occupy a still higher. It was he 
 who counselled Bazaine, in the beginning of the investment 
 of Metz, to leave twenty or thirty thousand men behind to 
 defend the fortress, and to break through with the rest. 
 According to the best authorities of the German general staff, 
 the advice, had it been followed, would have materially 
 altered the state of affairs. It is not my intention to enlarge 
 upon that soldier's career or capabilities ; I have merely men- 
 tioned them to show that, when her resentment was roused, 
 Eugenie threw all considerations for the welfare of France 
 to the winds, and systematically ostracized men, whatever 
 their merits ; for I may add that the young colonel, at the 
 time of the scene described above, was known to be one of 
 the ablest of strategists. 
 
 "We have heard a great deal of the Empress's charity. 
 Truth to tell, that charity was often as indiscriminate as her 
 anger ; it was sporadic, largely admixed with the histrionic 
 element, not unfrequently prompted by sentimentalism rather 
 than by sentiment ; and woe to him or to her who ventured 
 to hint that it, the charity, was misplaced. In those days 
 there was a prefect of police, M. Boitelle. He was a worthy 
 man, endowed with a great deal of common sense, and, above 
 all, honest to a degree. Belonging to the middle classes, he 
 was free from the vulgar greed that so often distinguishes 
 them in France ; and, after leaving the army as a non-com- 
 missioned officer, had settled on a small farm left to him by 
 his parents. Now, it so happened that M. de Persigny, 
 whose real name was Fialin, had been a sergeant in the same 
 regiment, and one day, after the advent of the Empire, being 
 in the north, went to pay his former comrade a visit. I am 
 perfectly certain that M. Boitelle, whom I knew, and with 
 whose son I have continued the amicable relations subsisting 
 between his father and myself, did not solicit any honours or 
 appointment from the then powerful friend of the Emperor ; 
 nevertheless, Persigny appointed his fellow-messmate to the 
 sub-prefectorship ef St. Quentin. The emoluments, even in 
 those days, were not large, but M. Boitelle was only a small
 
 320 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 farmer, and the promise of quick preferment may have in- 
 duced him to leave his peaceful homestead ; in short, M. Boi- 
 telle accepted, and, after several promotions, found himself 
 at last at the Paris Prefecture of Police. In this instance 
 the choice was really a good one. I have known a good 
 many prefects of police, among others M. de Maupas, who 
 officiated on the night of the Coup d'Etat, and who was also 
 a personal friend ; but I never knew one so thoroughly fitted 
 for the arduous post as M. Boitelle. Though not a man of 
 vast reading or brilliant education, he was essentially a man 
 of the world in the best sense of the word. He was not a 
 martinet, but a capable disciplinarian, and, what was better 
 still, endowed with a feeling of great tolerance for the foibles 
 of modern society. The soldier and the philosopher were 
 so inextricably mixed up in him, that it would have been 
 difficult to say where the one ended and the other began. 
 M. de Maupas was at times too conscious of his own impor- 
 tance; there was too much of the French official in him. 
 His successful co-operation in the Coup d'Etat had imbued 
 him with an exaggerated notion of his own capabilities of 
 " taking people by the scruff of the neck and running them 
 in" (a empoigner les gens). An English friend of mine, to 
 whom I introduced him, summed him up, perhaps, more fitly. 
 " He is like the policeman who ran in a woman of sixty all 
 by himself, and boasted that he could have done it if she had 
 been eighty." 
 
 But M. Boitelle, though kind-hearted, had no sympathy 
 whatsoever with mawkish philanthropy. The Empress, on 
 the other hand, had absolute paroxysms of it. She was like 
 the Spanish high-born dame who insisted upon a tombstone 
 for the grave of a bull, the killing and torturing of which in 
 the ring she had frantically applauded. One day she ex- 
 pressed her wish to M. Boitelle to pay a visit to Saint- Lazare. 
 There is nothing analogous to that institution in England. 
 The " unfortunate woman " who prowls about the streets be- 
 fore or after nightfall is except in a few garrison towns 
 tacitly ignored by our legislators, and when she offends 
 against the common law, treated by our magistrates like any 
 other member of society. We have no establishments where 
 the moral cancer eats deeper into the flesh and the mind by 
 the very attempt to isolate those who suffer most from it ; we 
 have no system which virtually bars the way to a reformed 
 life by having given official authority to sin, and by record-
 
 THE EMPRESS VISITS SAINT-LAZARE. 321 
 
 ing for evermore the names of those whom want alone com- 
 pelled to have themselves inscribed as outcasts on those hell- 
 ish registers. We have no Saint-Lazare, and Heaven be 
 praised for it ! 
 
 M. Boitelle knew the moral and mental state of most of 
 the inmates of Saint-Lazare sufficiently well to foster no illu- 
 sions with regard to the benefit to be derived by them from 
 the solitary visit of so exalted a personage, while, on the 
 other hand, he felt perfectly aware that it was morbid curi- 
 osity, however well disguised, that prompted the step. At 
 the same time, the respect due to his sovereign made him 
 reluctant to expose her, needlessly, to a possible, if not to a 
 probable insult ; in short, he considered the projected " tour 
 of inspection " an ill-concerted one. He also knew that it 
 would be idle to bring his fund of shrewd philosophy to bear 
 upon the Empress, to make her relinquish her design, so 
 he adopted instead the outspoken method of the soldier. 
 " Whatever your charitable feelings may be for those who 
 suffer, madame," he said, " your place is not among them." 
 The words sound a shade more abrupt in French, but a 
 moment's reflection would have shown the most fastidious 
 lady that no offence on the speaker's part was intended. 
 The Empress, however, drew herself up to her full height. 
 " Charity can go any and everywhere, monsieur," she replied. 
 " You will please take me to Saint-Lazare to-morrow." 
 
 I would fain say as little as possible about the occupants 
 of that gloomy building at the top of the Faubourg St. Denis, 
 but am compelled to state in common fairness that, when 
 once they are incarcerated and behave themselves of course, 
 according to their lights they are not treated with unneces- 
 sary harshness. I will go further, and say that they are 
 treated more leniently than female prisoners in other penal 
 establishments. The milder method is due to the presence 
 in greater numbers than elsewhere of that admirable angel 
 of patience, the Sister of Charity, who has no private griev- 
 ances to avenge upon her own sex, who does not look upon 
 the fallen woman as an erstwhile and unsuccessful rival for 
 the favours of men, who consequently does not apply the VCB 
 victis, either by sign, deed, or word. During my long stay 
 in Paris, I have been allowed to visit Saint-Lazare twice, and 
 I can honestly say that, though the laws that relegate these 
 women there are -a disgrace to nineteenth-century civiliza- 
 tion, their application inside Saint-Lazare is not at all brutal.
 
 322 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 This does not imply that they lie upon down beds, and that 
 their food is of the most delicate description ; but they are 
 well cared for bodily. The Empress, however, in a gush of 
 misplaced charity, thought fit to take objection to their daily 
 meals not being concluded with dessert. Thereupon, M. Boi- 
 telle, whose sound common sense had already been severely 
 tried during that morning, could not help smiling. " Keally, 
 madame," he said ; " you allow your kindness to run away 
 with your good sense. If they are to have a dessert, what 
 are we to give to honest women ? " 
 
 Next day, M. Boitelle was appointed a senator; that is, 
 removed from his post as prefect of police, which he had so 
 worthily filled, and where he had done a great deal of un- 
 ostentatious good. The next time M. Boitelle came in con- 
 tact with the Empress was at the last hour of the Empire, 
 when he tried, but in vain, to overcome her resentment, caused 
 by his unhappy speech of many years before. 
 
 Yet the woman who could indulge in sentiment about the 
 absence of dessert in the Saint-Lazare refectory, would, at the 
 end of the hunt, deliberately jump off her horse, plunge the 
 gleaming knife in the throat of the panting stag, and revel 
 in the sight of blood. Many who saw her do this argued that 
 in the hour of danger she would as boldly face the enemies 
 of herself and her dynasty. I need not say that they were 
 utterly mistaken. She slunk away at the supreme hour; 
 while the princess, whom she had presumed to teach the 
 manners of a court, left like a princess in an open landau, 
 preceded by an outrider. I am alluding to Princess Clotilde.
 
 THE STORY OF A CELEBRATED SCULPTOR. 323 
 
 CHAPTEK XVI. 
 
 The story of a celebrated sculptor and his model David d 1 Angers at the funeral 
 of Cortot, the sculptor How I became acquainted with him The sculptor 
 leaves the funeral procession to speak to a woman He tells me the story 
 David d'Angers' sympathy with Greece in her struggle for independence 
 When Botzaris falls at'Missolonghi, he makes up his mind to carve his 
 monument AVishes to do something original He finds his idea in the 
 cemetery of Pere-la-Chaise In search of a model Comes unexpectedly 
 upon her in the Rue du Montparnasse, while in company of Victor Hugo 
 The model and her mother The bronze Christ on the studio wall David 
 gives it to his model The latter dismissed A plot against the sculptor's 
 life His model saves him He tries to find her and fails Only meets with 
 her when walking behind the hearse of Cortot She appears utterly desti- 
 tute Loses sight of her again Meets her on the outer boulevards with a 
 nondescript of the worst character He endeavours to rescue her, but fails 
 Canler, of the Paris police, reveals the tactics pursued with regard to 
 " unfortunates " David s exile and death The Botzaris Monument is 
 brought back to Paris to be restored The model at the door of the exhibi- 
 tion Her death. 
 
 IN connection with the treatment of " fallen women " in 
 Paris, I may give the following story, which becomes inter- 
 esting in virtue of the personality of one of the actors. In 
 1843 the sculptor Cortot died, and I followed his funeral on 
 foot, as was the custom in those days. I walked by the side 
 of one of the greatest artists France, or, for that matter, the 
 world, has ever produced David d'Angers. The name of 
 his native town was adopted to distinguish him from his cele- 
 brated namesake, the painter. I had become acquainted with 
 the great sculptor a twelvemonth previously, in Delacroix's 
 studio. All at once, as the procession went along the Quai 
 Malaquais, I saw him start violently, and break through what, 
 for want of a more appropriate term, I must call the ranks of 
 mourners. For a moment only ; the next, he was back by my 
 side : but I noticed that he was f rightf ully agitated. He prob- 
 ably saw my concern for him in my face, for, though I asked 
 him no questions, he said of his own accord, " It is all right. 
 I just caught sight of a woman who saved my life, and, by 
 the looks of her, she is in great straits, but, by the time I got
 
 324 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 out of the crowd, she had disappeared. I have an idea of the 
 errand she was bent upon, and will inquire to-morrow, but I 
 am afraid it will be of very little use." 
 
 I kept silent for a moment or two, but my curiosity was 
 aroused, for," I repeat, at that time, the artistic world was 
 ringing with the name of David d' Augers. 
 
 " I did not know you had been in such great danger," I 
 said at last. 
 
 "Very few people do know it," he replied sadly; "be- 
 sides, it happened a good many years ago, when you were 
 very young. The next time we meet I will tell you all 
 about it." 
 
 A week or so afterwards, as I was leaving the Cafe de 
 Paris one evening, and going to the tobacconist at the corner 
 of the Hue Laffite, I ran against the celebrated sculptor. The 
 weather was mild, and we sat outside Tortoni's, where he 
 told me the story, part of which I give in his own words, as 
 far as I can remember them after the lapse of more than 
 forty years. 
 
 " If there were any need," he began, " to apologize to an 
 Englishman for my sympathy with the Philhellenism which 
 shortened the life of Byron, I might say that I sucked the 
 principle of the independence of nations with the mother's 
 milk, for I was born in 1789. Be that as it may, when 
 Marcos Botzaris fell at Missolonghi I felt determined that 
 he should have a monument worthy of his heroism and pa- 
 triotism, as far as my talents could contribute to it. I was 
 sufficiently young to be enthusiastic, and, at the same time, 
 sufficiently presumptuous to imagine that I could do some- 
 thing which had never been done before. You have seen the 
 engraving of the monument ; you may judge for yourself 
 how far I succeeded. But the idea of the composition, how- 
 ever out of the common, was, I am bound to admit, not the 
 offspring of my own imagination. I was, perhaps, clever 
 enough to see the poesy of it when presented to me, and to 
 appropriate it ; but the young, fragile girl lying on the tomb- 
 stone and tracing the name of Marcos Botzaris was suggested 
 to me by a scene I witnessed one day at Pere-la-Chaise. I 
 saw a child stooping over a gravestone, and trying to spell 
 out the words carved on it. It was all I wanted. I own, 
 from that moment, my composition took shape in my mind. 
 I was, however, still at a loss where to find the ideal child. 
 The little girl of whom I had caught a glimpse would not
 
 IN SEARCH OF A MODEL. 325 
 
 have done at all for my purpose, even if her parents would 
 have consented to let her sit, which was not at all likely she 
 was the prosperous-looking demoiselle of a probably prosper- 
 ous bourgeoise family, well-fed, plump, and not above seven 
 or eight. I, on the contrary, wanted a girl double that age 
 just budding into womanhood, but with the travail of the 
 transition expressed in every feature, in every limb. She was 
 to represent to the most casual observer the sufferings en- 
 gendered by the struggle against tutelage for freedom. She 
 was to bend over the tomb of Botzaris to drag the secret of 
 that freedom from him. Dawning life was to drag the secret 
 from the dead. 
 
 " That was my idea, and for several days I cudgelled my 
 brain to find among my models one that would, physically 
 and morally, represent all this. In vain ; the grisettes of the 
 Sue Fleurus and the Quartier-Latin, in spite of all that has 
 been said of them by the poets and novelists of that time, 
 were not at all the visible incarnations of lofty sentiment ; 
 whatever pain and grief an unrequited romantic passion 
 might entail, they left no appreciable traces on their com- 
 plexions or in their outline ; they were saucy madams, and 
 looked it. I had communicated my wants to some of my 
 friends, and one of them sent me what he thought would 
 suit. The face was certainly a very beautiful one, as an ab- 
 solutely perfect ensemble of classical features I have never 
 seen the like ; but there was about as much expression in it 
 as in my hand, and, as for the body, it was simply bursting 
 out of its dress. I told her she would not do, and the reason 
 why. ' Monsieur can't expect me to go into a consumption 
 for two francs fifty an hour,' she remarked, bouncing out of 
 the room. 
 
 " I was fast becoming a nuisance to all my cronies, when, 
 one day, going to dine with Victor Hugo at La Mere Saget's, 
 which was at the Barriere du Maine, I came unexpectedly, 
 in the Rue du Montparnasse, upon the very girl for which I 
 had been looking out for months. Notwithstanding her 
 rags, she was simply charming. She was not above fourteen 
 or fifteen, and, although very tall for her age, she had 
 scarcely any flesh on her bones. I only knew her Christian 
 name Clementine : I doubt whether she had any other. 
 Next morning she came with her mother, an old hag, dissi- 
 pation and drunkenness written in every line of her face. 
 But the child herself was perfectly innocent at any rate, as
 
 326 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 innocent as she could be with such a parent, and tractable to 
 a degree. After a little while the old woman, tired of twirl- 
 ing her thumbs, disgusted, perhaps, at my want of hospitality 
 in not offering her refreshments, left off accompanying her ^ 
 Clementine came henceforth alone. 
 
 " My studio was in the Rue de Fleurus in those days, and 
 on the wall hung a very handsome bronze Christ on a velvet 
 panel and in a dark satin frame. Curiously enough, I often 
 caught the mother watching it ; it seemed to have an irre- 
 sistible fascination for her : and, one day, while the child was 
 dressing, after two or three hours of hard work, she suddenly 
 exclaimed, ' That's why my mother will not come here ; she 
 says she'd commit a robbery. She never leaves off talking 
 about it. I wonder whether you'd like to part with it, M. 
 David ? A Christ like that would be beautiful in our attic. 
 It would comfort and cheer me. If you like, I'll buy it of 
 you. Of course, I have no money, but you can deduct it 
 from my sittings. You can have as many as you like, not 
 only for this statue, but for any other you may want later 
 on.' 
 
 " We democrats, professed republicans, and more than 
 suspected revolutionaries, are not credited by the majority 
 with a great reverence for religious dogma ; we are generally 
 branded as absolute freethinkers, not to say atheists. This is 
 frequently a mistake.* I have no occasion to recite my 
 credo to you, but a great many of the republicans of '89 and 
 of to-day were and are believers. At any rate, I fondly 
 imagined that the Christ for which the mother and child 
 were longing might exercise some salutary influence on their 
 lives, so I simply took down the frame and its contents and 
 handed them to her She staggered under the weight. 
 ' You want that Christ,' I said ; ' here it is : and when you 
 are tempted to do evil look at it, and think of me, who gave 
 it you as a present.' 
 
 " * As a present ? ' she shrieked for joy ; and hurried away 
 as fast as her legs would carry her. 
 
 " In about six months from that day the statue was fin- 
 ished. I had no further need of Clementine's services, and 
 
 * It is a mistake. Not to mention Camille Desmoulins, who, when asked 
 his age by his iudge, replied, "The age of another sans-culotte, Jesus," Esquiros 
 frequently spoke of " that good patriot, Christ ; " Lammenais began the draft of 
 his constitution with " In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, 
 and by the will of the French people." EDITOB.
 
 THE MODEL FOUND. 327 
 
 gradually all thought of her slipped from my mind. You 
 may have heard that some time after my work was despatched 
 to Greece, I was assaulted one night in the Hue Childebert, 
 on my way to Gerard de N"erval's. My skull was split open 
 in two places, I was left for dead in the street, and but for a 
 workman who stumbled over me, took me home, and sat up 
 with me until morning, I might not have lived to tell the 
 tale. From the very first I suspected the identity of my 
 assailant, though I have never breathed his name to any one. 
 I am glad to say I never had many enemies, nor have I now, 
 as far as I am aware ; but I had offended the man by with- 
 holding my vote in a prize competition. He was, however, 
 not responsible for his actions ; for even at that time he 
 must have been mad. A few years afterwards, the suspicion 
 both of his madness and his attempt upon my life became a 
 certainty, for he repeated the latter. You are very young, 
 and youth is either very credulous or very sceptical. "\Ve 
 should be neither. If what I am going to tell you now were 
 to be represented to you at the Ambigu or Porte Saint- 
 Martin, you, as an educated man, would shrug your shoulders, 
 and look with a kind of good-natured contempt upon the 
 grisette or workman or bourgeois who would sit spellbound 
 and take it all in as so much gospel. Providence, fate, call 
 it what you will, concocts more striking dramatic situations 
 and a greater number of them than M. Scribe and all his 
 compeers have constructed in the course of their professional 
 careers. Listen, and you shall judge for yourself. 
 
 "About seven years after the attack in the Eue Childe- 
 bert, I received a letter one morning, inviting me to attend a 
 meeting that same night between twelve and one, at a house 
 in the Faubourg Saint- Jacques, near the hospital of the Val- 
 de-Grace. The letter told me how to proceed. There being 
 no concierge in the house, I was to provide myself with a 
 ' dark lantern,' and to go up four nights of stairs, where I 
 should find a door with a cross chalked upon it. It would 
 be opened by my giving a particular knock. My previous 
 danger notwithstanding, I had not the least suspicion of this 
 being a trap. I did not for one moment connect the letter 
 with the other event, the recollection of which, strange as it 
 may seem to you, did not obtrude itself at all then. But 
 there was another reason for the absence of caution on my part. 
 In one of its corners the letter bore a sign, not exactly that 
 of a secret society, but agreed upon among certain patriots.
 
 328 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " In short, a little before twelve o'clock that night, I went 
 to the place appointed. I had no difficulty in finding the 
 house, and reached the fourth story without meeting a soul. 
 There was the door, with the cross chalked on it. I knocked 
 once, twice, without receiving an answer. Still, the thought 
 of evil never entered my head. I began to think that I, had 
 been the victim of a hoax of some youngsters of the Ecole 
 des Beaux- Arts, most of whom were aware of my political 
 opinions. I was just turning round to go down again, when 
 a door by the side of that indicated was slowly opened, and a 
 young girl with a lighted candle appeared on the threshold. 
 Though both the candle and my lantern did not shed much 
 light, I perceived that, at the sight of me, she turned very pale, 
 but, until she spoke, I failed to recognize her. Then I saw it 
 was Clementine, my model. She scarcely gave me time to 
 speak. ' It is you, M. David,' she said, in a voice trembling with 
 fear and emotion. * You,' she repeated. ' For Heaven's sake, 
 go ! go as quickly as you can ! If you stay another moment, 
 you will be a corpse ; for God's sake, go ! And let me beg of 
 you not to breathe a word of this to any one ; if you do, my 
 mother and I will pay for this with our lives. For God's 
 sake, go. I did not know that you were the person expected. 
 Go go ! ' 
 
 " I do not think I answered a single word. I felt instinct- 
 ively that this was no hoax, as I had imagined, but terrible 
 reality. I went downstairs as fast as I could, but it was not 
 until I got into the street that a connection between the two 
 events presented itself to me. Then I decided to wait and 
 watch. I hid myself in the doorway of a house a few steps 
 away. Scarcely ten minutes had elapsed when half a dozen 
 individuals arrived, one by one, and disappeared into the 
 house that sheltered Clementine and her mother. One of 
 them, I feel sure, was the man whom I suspected of having 
 attempted my life before. A few years more went by, dur- 
 ing which I often thought of my former model ; and then, 
 one day, I felt I would like to see her again. In plain day- 
 light this time, I repaired to the house of the Faubourg Saint- 
 Jacques, clambered up the stairs, and knocked at the door I 
 had such good cause to remember. The door was opened by 
 a workman, and a rapid glance at the inside of the room 
 showed me that he was a lastmaker. ' Mademoiselle Clemen- 
 tine ? ' I asked. The man stared at me, and said, * No such 
 person lives here.' I made inquiries on all the lower floors
 
 HER DOWNWARD CAREER 329 
 
 nobody had ever heard of her. Clementine had disappeared. 
 I never saw her again until a few days ago, when I walked by 
 your side behind the body of Cortot. I should not have rec- 
 ognized her but for the bronze Christ she carried under her 
 arm, and which attracted my notice. If what I surmise be 
 correct, she must have reached the last stage of misery ; for I 
 feel convinced that nothing but absolute want would make 
 her part with it. I have, however, failed to trace it in any of 
 the bric-a-brac shops on the quays, and I believe that I have 
 pretty well inquired at every one ; so I must fain be content 
 until fate throws her again across my path." 
 
 So far the story as told by the great sculptor himself. 
 During the next eight years, in fact up to the Coup d'Etat, 
 I met him frequently, and, curiously enough, rarely failed to 
 inquire whether in his mauy wanderings through Paris he 
 had caught a glimpse of his former model. I felt unaccount- 
 ably interested in the fate of that woman whom I had never 
 seen, and, if we had been able to find her, would have en- 
 deavoured to find a decent home for her. But for about 
 three years my inquiries always met with the same answer. 
 Then, one evening in the latter end of '46 or beginning of 
 '47, David told me that he had met her on the outer boule- 
 vards, arm in arm with one of those terrible nondescripts of 
 which one is often compelled to speak again and again, and 
 which, as far as I am aware, are nowhere to be found as a 
 class except in the French metropolis and great provincial 
 centres. Clementine evidently wished to avoid David. A 
 little while after, he met her again, and this time followed 
 her, but, though by no means a coward, lacked the courage 
 to enter the hovel into which she had disappeared with her 
 companion. The last time he saw her was in the middle of 
 '47, in the Rue des Boucheries. She seemed to have returned 
 to her old quarters, and she was by herself. Until she spoke, 
 David did not recognize her. Her face was positively seamed 
 with horrible scars, "wounds inflicted by her lovers" Heav- 
 en save the mark ! She asked him to help her, and he did ; 
 but she had scarcely gone a few steps when she was arrested 
 and taken to the prison of 1'Abbaye de St. Germain, hard by, 
 whither David followed to intercede for her. He was told to 
 come back next morning, and that same evening communi- 
 cated the affair to me. I decided there and then to accom- 
 pany him, in order- to carry out my plan of redeeming that 
 human soul if possible. I failed, though through no fault of
 
 330 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 my own, but my attempt brought me in contact with a per- 
 sonage scarcely less interesting in his own way than David, 
 namely, M. Canler, the future head of the Paris detective 
 force. It was through him that I got an insight into some of 
 the most revolting features of criminal life in Paris. But, 
 before dealing with that subject, I wish to devote a few more 
 lines to David, whom I had the honour of numbering among 
 my friends till the day of his death, albeit that the last few 
 years of his life were spent away from France, whither he re- 
 turned, however, to die in '56. After the Coup d'Etat he 
 was exiled by Louis- Napoleon ostensibly, for his political 
 opinions ; in reality, because he had refused to finish the 
 monument for Queen Hortense's tomb after her son's fiasco 
 at Boulogne. 
 
 Writing about France and Frenchmen, I feel somewhat 
 reluctant to make too lavish a use of the words " patriot " 
 and " patriotism," especially with the patriots and the patri- 
 otism of the Third Eepublic around me. But I have no 
 hesitation in saying that, to David d' Angers, these words 
 meant something almost sacred. Sprung from exceedingly 
 poor parents, he had amassed, by honest work, a fortune 
 which, to men born in a higher sphere and with far more ex- 
 pensive tastes, might seem sufficient. Seeing that he was 
 frugality and simplicity personified, that his income was 
 mainly spent in alleviating distress, and that his daughter 
 was even more simple-minded than her father, he had noth- 
 ing to gain by the advent of a republic, nothing to lose by 
 the establishment of a monarchy or empire, and his ardent 
 championship of republican institutions such as he con- 
 ceived them was prompted solely by his noble nature. That 
 Louis-Napoleon should have exiled such a man was an error 
 his warmest friends could scarcely forgive him. But David 
 never complained, any more than he ever uttered a harsh 
 word against the memory of Flaxman, who, in his youth, 
 had shut his doors against him under the impression that he 
 was a relation of Louis David who had voted for the death 
 of Louis XVI. On the contrary, the memory of the great 
 English sculptor was held in deep reverence. 
 
 And so David departed, a wanderer on the face of the 
 earth with his daughter. He first endeavoured to settle in 
 Brussels, but the irresistible desire to behold once more what 
 he himself considered his greatest work, the monument to 
 Marcos Botzaris, attracted him to Greece. A friend, to whom
 
 DAVID IN GREECE. 331 
 
 he communicated his intention, wrote to him, " Do not go." 
 He gave him no further reason ; he even withheld from him 
 the fact that he had been at Missolonghi a twelvemonth pre- 
 viously. The explanation of this reticence may be gathered 
 from David's letter to him a few days after his, David's, re- 
 turn. I have been allowed to copy it, and give it verbatim. 
 
 " Long before our vessel anchored near the spot where 
 Byron died, I caught a glimpse of the tumulus erected at the 
 foot of the bastion, in honour of Botzaris and his fellow- 
 heroes. It made a small dark spot on the horizon, and above 
 it was a speck, much smaller and perfectly white. I knew 
 instinctively that this was my statue of the ' young Greek 
 girl,' and I watched and watched with bated breath, fancying 
 as the ship sped along that the speck moved. Of course, it 
 was only my imagination, the presumptuous thought that 
 the marble effigy would start into life at the approach of its 
 creator. 
 
 "Alas, would I had proceeded no further that I had 
 been satisfied with the mirage instead of pushing on in hot 
 haste towards the reality ! For the reality was heart-rend- 
 ing, so heart-rending that I wept like a child, and clenched 
 my fists like a giant in despair. The right hand of the statue, 
 the index finger of which pointed to the name, had been 
 broken ; the ears had disappeared, one of the feet was broken 
 to atoms, and the face slashed with knives. It was like the 
 face of the girl that had sat for me, when I last saw it, under 
 the circumstances which, you may remember, I told you. 
 The whole was riddled with bullets, and some tourists, Brit- 
 ish ones probably, had cut their names on the back of the 
 child. And so ends the most glorious chapter of my artist's 
 career the model itself fallen beyond redemption, the work 
 mutilated beyond repair, the author of it in exile. 
 
 " I felt powerless to repair the mischief. I did not stay 
 long. Perhaps I ought not to complain. I knew that Byron 
 had been buried near the fortifications at Missolonghi, but 
 all my efforts to find the spot have proved useless.* The 
 house where he breathed his last had been pulled down. 
 Why should the Greeks have more reverence for Botzaris or 
 Mavrocordato than they had for the poet ? and if these three 
 are so little to them, what must I be, whose name they proba- 
 
 * Of course, David meant the spot where the remains had been interred at 
 first. EDITOR.
 
 332 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 bly never heard ? Still, as I stood at the stern of the depart- 
 ing vessel, I felt heart-broken. I have no illusions left." 
 
 I firmly believe that the injury done to the statue hastened 
 David's death. His work has since been restored by M. Ar- 
 mand Toussaint, his favourite pupil, who gave his promise to 
 that effect a few days before the great sculptor breathed his 
 last. The monument was, however, not brought to Paris 
 until 1861, and when M. Toussaint had finished his task, he 
 invited the press and the friends of his famous master to 
 judge of the results. It was at the door of his studio that I 
 saw the woman, whose adventures I have told in the preced- 
 ing notes, for the first time. A fortnight later, she died at 
 the hospital of La Charite, at peace, I trust, with her Maker. 
 " Fate, Providence, call it what you will," as David himself 
 would have said, had brought me to the spot just in time to 
 alleviate the last sufferings of one who, though not alto- 
 gether irresponsible for her own errors, was to a still greater 
 extent the victim of a system so iniquitous as to make the 
 least serious-minded provided he be endowed with the faint- 
 est spark of humanity shudder. I allude to the system 
 pursued by the Paris detective force in their hunt after 
 criminals a system not altogether abandoned yet, and the 
 successful carrying out of which is paid for by the excrucia- 
 ting tortures inflicted upon defenceless though fallen women 
 but women still by the souteneur. I refrain from Angli- 
 cizing the word; it will suggest itself after the perusal of 
 the following facts, albeit that, fortunately with us, the creat- 
 ure itself does not exist as a class, and, what is worse, as a 
 class recognized by those whose first and foremost duty it 
 should be to destroy him root and branch. 
 
 The morning after Clementine's arrest, David and I re- 
 paired to the prison of FAbbaye Saint-German. When the 
 sculptor sent in his name, the governor himself came out to re- 
 ceive us. But the woman was gone ; she had been transferred, 
 the previous night, to the depot of the prefecture de police, 
 " where," he said, " if you make haste, you will still find 
 her." He gave us a letter of introduction for the official 
 charged to deal with refractory " filles soumises," or offend- 
 ing insoumises, because, then as now, these unfortunates 
 were not tried by an ordinary police magistrate in open 
 court, but summarily punished by said official, the sentences
 
 A GLIMPSE AT THE PARIS POLICE. 833 
 
 being subject, however, to revision or confirmation by his 
 superior, the chief of the municipal police. Nay, the de- 
 cisions were not even communicated to these women until 
 they were safely lodged in Saint- Lazare, lest there should be 
 a disturbance ; for they were not examined one by one ; and, 
 as may be imagined, the contagion of revolt spread easily 
 among those hysterical and benighted creatures. 
 
 When we reached the prefecture de police the judging 
 was over, but, on our sending in our letter, we were admitted 
 at once to the official's room. After David's description, he 
 remembered the woman, and told us at once that she had 
 not been sent to Saint-Lazare, but liberated. Some one had 
 interceded for her no less a personage than Canler, who, 
 though at the time but a superintendent, was already fast 
 springing into notice as a detective of no mean skill. " What 
 had he done with her?" was David's question. "I could 
 not tell you," was the courteous reply ; " but I will give you 
 his address, and he will no doubt give you all the information 
 in his power and consistent with his duty." With this we 
 were bowed out of the room. 
 
 We did not succeed in seeing Canler until two days after- 
 wards, or, rather, on the evening of the second day ; for, at 
 that period, he was entrusted with the surveillance of the 
 theatres on the Boulevard du Temple. .1 may have occasion 
 to speak of him again, so I need not give his portrait here. 
 He was about fifty, and, unlike one of his successors, M. 
 Claude, the type of the old soldier. Of his honesty there 
 never was, there could have never been, a doubt, nor was his 
 intelligence ever questioned. And yet, this very honest, in- 
 telligent man, in his all-absorbing pursuit, the detection and 
 chasing of criminals, was sufficiently dishonest and unintelli- 
 gent to foster, if not to inaugurate, a system subversive of all 
 morality. 
 
 David's name was a passport everywhere, and, no sooner 
 had it been sent in, than Canler came out to him. The 
 sculptor stated his business, and the police officer made a 
 wry face. " I am afraid, M. David, I cannot help you in this 
 instance. To speak plainly, I have restored her to her sou- 
 teneur." We both opened our eyes very wide. " Yes," came 
 the remark, " I know what you are going to say. I can sum 
 up all your objections before you utter them. But I could 
 not help myself ; the fellow rendered me a service, and this 
 was the price of it. Without his aid, one of the most des-
 
 334 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 perate burglars in Paris would still be at large. As it is, I 
 have got him safe under lock and key. Very shocking, no 
 doubt ; mais, a la guerre comme a la guerre." Then, seeing 
 that we did not answer, he continued : " As a rule, I do not 
 explain my tactics to everybody ; but you, M. David, are not 
 everybody, and, if you like to meet me when the theatre is 
 over, I shall be pleased to have a chat with you." 
 
 At half-past twelve that night we were seated at a res- 
 taurant near the Porte Saint-Martin, and, after a few prelimi- 
 nary remarks, Canler explained. 
 
 However great an artist you may be, M. David, you could 
 not produce a statue without the outlay for the marble, or for 
 the casting of it in bronze. You, moreover, want to pay 
 your praticien, who does the rough work for you. Our 
 praticiens are the informers, and they want to be paid like 
 the most honest workmen. The detection of crime means, no 
 doubt, intelligence, but it means also money. Now, money 
 is the very thing I have not got, and yet, when I accepted 
 the functions I am at present fulfilling, I gave my promise to 
 M. Delessert not to neglect the detective part of the business. 
 I wish to keep my word, first of all, because I pledged it ; 
 secondly, because detection of crime is food and drink to 
 me ; thirdly, because I hope to be the head of the Paris de- 
 tective force one day. The Government allows a ridiculously 
 small sum every year for distribution among informers, and 
 rewards among their own agents ; it is something over thirty 
 thousand francs, but not a sou of which ever reached my 
 hands when I accepted my present appointment, and scarcely 
 a sou of which reaches me now. I was, therefore, obliged to 
 look out for auxiliaries, sufficiently disinterested to assist me 
 gratuitously, but, knowing that absolute disinterestedness is 
 very rare indeed, I looked for my collaborateurs among the 
 very ones I was charged to watch, but who, in exchange foi 
 my protection in the event of their offending, were ready to 
 peach upon their companions in crime and in vice. I need 
 not trouble you by enumerating the various categories of my 
 allies, but the souteneur, the most abject of them all, is, per- 
 haps, the most valuable. 
 
 " He is too lazy to work, and, as a rule, has not got the 
 pluck of a mouse, consequently he rarely resorts to crime, 
 requiring the smallest amount of energy or daring. He fur- 
 thermore loves his Paris, where, according to his own lights, 
 he enjoys himself and lives upon the fat of the land; all
 
 A GLIMPSE AT THE PARIS POLICE. 335 
 
 these reasons make him careful not to commit himself, albeit 
 that at every minute of the day he comes in contact with 
 everything that is vile. But he gets hold of their secrets, 
 though the word is almost a misnomer, seeing that few of 
 these desperadoes can hold their tongue about their own busi- 
 ness, knowing all the while, as they must do, that their want 
 of reticence virtually puts their heads into the halter. But 
 if they have done ' a good stroke of business,' even if they do 
 not brag about it in so many words, they must show their 
 success by their sudden show of finery, by their treating of 
 everybody all round, etc. The souteneur is, as it were, jeal- 
 ous of all this ; for though he lives in comparative comfort 
 from what his mistress gives him, he rarely makes a big haul. 
 His mistress gone, the pot ceases to boil ; in fact, he calls her 
 his marmite. In a few days he is on his beams' ends, unless 
 he has one in every different quarter, which is not often the 
 case, though it happens now and then. But, at any rate, 
 the incarceration of one of them makes a difference, and, 
 under the circumstance, he repairs, as far as he dares, to the 
 prefecture, and obtains her liberation in exchange for the 
 address of a burglar or even a murderer who is wanted. I 
 have known one who had perfected his system of obtaining 
 information to such a degree as to he able to sell his secrets 
 to his fellow-souteneurs when they had none of their own 
 wherewith to propitiate the detectives. He has had as much 
 as three or four hundred francs for one revelation of that 
 kind, which means twenty or thirty times the sum the police 
 would have awarded him. Of course, three or four hundred 
 francs is a big sum for the souteneur to shell out ; but, when 
 the marmite is a good one, he sooner does that than be de- 
 prived of his revenues for six months or so. I have diverted 
 some of those secrets into my own channel, and Clementine's 
 souteneur is one of my clients ; that is why I gave her up. 
 Very shocking, gentlemen, but a la guerre comme a la 
 guerre." 
 
 M. Canler furthermore counselled us to leave Clementine 
 alone. He positively refused to give us any information as 
 to her whereabouts ; that is why I did not meet with her until 
 five years after David's death, too late to be of any use to her 
 in this world.
 
 336 AN -ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Queen Victoria in Paris The beginning of the era of middle-class excursions 
 English visitors before that The British tourist of 1855 The real revenge 
 of Waterloo The Englishman's French and the Frenchman's English 
 The opening of the Exhibition The lord mayor and aldermen in Paris 
 The King of Portugal All these considered so much " small fry " Napo- 
 leon III. goes to Boulogne to welcome the Queen The royal yacht is de- 
 layed The French hotel proprietor the greatest artist in fleecing The 
 Italian, the Swiss, the German, mere bunglers in comparison Napoleon 
 III. before the arrival of the Queen Pondering the past Arrival of the 
 Queen The Queen lands, followed by Prince Albert and the royal chil- 
 dren The Emperor rides by the side of her carriage Comments of the 
 population An old salt on the situation An old soldier's retort The 
 general feeling Arrival in Paris The Parisians' reception of the Queen 
 A description of the route The apartments of the Queen at St. Cloud 
 How the Queen spent Sunday Visits the art section of the Exhibition on 
 Monday Ingres and Horace Vernet presented to her Frenchmen's igno- 
 rance of English art in those days English and French art criticsThe 
 Queen takes a carriage drive through Paris Not & single cry of " Vive 
 1'Angleterre ! " a great many of " Vive la Keine " England making a cats- 
 paw of France Keception at the Elysee-Bourbon " Les Demoiselles de 
 Saint-Cyr" at St. Cloud Alexandre Dumas would have liked to see the 
 Queen Visit to Versailles State-performances at the Opera Ball at the 
 Hotel de Ville The Queen's dancing Canrobert on " the Queen's dancing 
 and her soldiers' fighting " Another visit to the Exhibition Be'ranger 
 misses seeing the Queen " I am not going to see the Queen, but the 
 woman " A review in the Champ-de-Mars A visit to Napoleon's tomb 
 Jerome's absence on the plea of illness Marshal Vaillant's reply to the 
 Emperor when the latter invites him to take Jerome's place His comments 
 on the receptions given by the Emperor to foreign sovereigns Fetes at 
 Versailles Homeward. 
 
 MAGNIFICENT as were the quasi-private entertainments 
 at Compiegne, and the more public ones at the Tuileries, 
 they were as nothing to the series of fetes on the occasion of 
 Queen Victoria's visit to Paris, in 1855. For nearly three 
 months before, the capital had assumed the aspect of a fair. 
 The Exposition Universelle of '55 virtually inaugurated the 
 era of " middle-class excursions," which since then have as- 
 sumed such colossal proportions, especially with regard to 
 the English. Previous to this the development of railways 
 had naturally brought many of our countrymen to Paris, 
 but they were of a different class from those who now invad-
 
 QUEEN VICTORIA IN PARIS. 337 
 
 ed the French metropolis. They were either rnen of busi- 
 ness bent on business, though not averse to enjoying them- 
 selves in the intervals, or else belonging or pretending to 
 belong to " the upper ten," and travelling more or less en 
 grand seigneurs. They came singly, and left their cards at 
 the Embassy, etc. The new visitors came in groups, though 
 not necessarily acquainted or travelling with one another ; 
 they knew nothing of the Hotel Meurice and the Hotel Bris- 
 tol or their traditions ; they crowded the Palais-Koyal and its 
 cheap restaurants, and had, so to speak, no French at their 
 command. Notwithstanding the exclamation of the French- 
 man when he saw the statue of Wellington opposite Apsley 
 House, it was then, and then only, that the revanche of 
 Waterloo began. It has lasted ever since. It was '55 that 
 marked the appearance in the shop-windows of small cards 
 bearing the words, " English spoken here." Hitherto the 
 English visitor to Paris was commonly supposed to have had 
 a French tutor or governess, and though the French he or 
 she did speak was somewhat trying to the ear, it was heaven- 
 ly music compared to the English the Parisian shopkeeper 
 now held it incumbent upon himself to " trot out " for the 
 benefit of his customers, or that of the guide or valet de place, 
 legions of whom infested the streets. 
 
 The Exhibition was opened on the 15th of May, but 
 Queen Victoria was not expected until the middle of August. 
 Meanwhile, the Parisians were treated to a sight of the Lord 
 Mayor Sir F. Moon, I believe and the aldermen, who 
 came in the beginning of June, and who were magnificently 
 entertained by the Paris municipality, a deputation of which 
 went as far as Boulogne to welcome them. Still, it was very 
 evident that neither their visit nor that of the King of Portu- 
 gal and his brother was to tax the ingenuity of upholsterers, 
 carpenters, and caterers, or of the Parisians themselves in 
 the matter of decoration; the watchword had apparently 
 been given from the highest quarters to reserve their greatest 
 efforts for what Napoleon up till then considered " the most 
 glorious event of his reign." The Emperor, though he had 
 gone to join the Empress, who was by this time known to be 
 enceinte, at Eaux-Bonnes and Biarritz, returned to Paris at 
 the end of July, and for more than a fortnight occupied 
 himself personally and incessantly with the smallest details 
 of the Queen's visit, the whole of the programme of which 
 was settled by him. 
 
 15
 
 338 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 I was one of the few privileged persons who travelled 
 down to Boulogne with Louis-Napoleon, on Friday, the 17th 
 of August, 1855. When we got to our destination, the yacht 
 was not in sight, but we were already informed that, owing to 
 its heavy tonnage, it would not be able to enter the harbour 
 except at high tide, which would not be until 1 p. m., on Sat- 
 urday. Shortly after that hour the vessel, accompanied by 
 its flotilla, appeared in the offing ; but the Queen remained 
 on board, and we had to enjoy ourselves as best we could, 
 which was not difficult, seeing that the whole of the town 
 was absolutely in the streets, and that the latter were decid- 
 edly preferable to the stuffy attics at the hotels, for which 
 we were charged the moderate sum of forty francs each. 
 Uneventful as my life has been, it is only worth recording 
 by reason of the celebrity of the persons with whom I have 
 come in contact ; nevertheless, I have travelled a good deal, 
 and been present at a great many festive gatherings both in 
 England and on the Continent. Commend me to the French 
 hotel-proprietor for fleecing you in cold blood. The Swiss 
 and the Italians, no mean masters of the art, are not in it 
 with him ; and as for the Germans, they are mere 'prentices 
 compared with him. The Italian despoils you, like his coun- 
 tryman of operatic fame, Fra-Diavolo ; the Swiss, like an 
 English highwayman of the good old sort ; the German, like 
 a beggar who picks your pocket while you are looking in 
 your purse for a coin to give him ; the Frenchman, like the 
 money-lender who is " not working for himself, but for a 
 hard-hearted, relentless principal." 
 
 On the Saturday, the Emperor was astir betimes, and 
 went to the camp occupied by the troops under the command 
 of Marshal Baraguey-d'Hilliers. Louis- Napoleon's counte- 
 nance was at all times difficult to read ; I repeat, his eyes, 
 like those of others, may have been " the windows of his 
 soul," but their blinds were down most of the time. It was 
 only at rare intervals that the impenetrable features were 
 lighted up by a gleam from within, that the head, which 
 generally inclined to the right, became erect. On that morn- 
 ing, the face was even a greater blank than usual. And yet 
 that day, even to the fatalist he was, must have seemed a 
 wonderful one ; for the blind goddess of fortune, the " lucky 
 star " in which he trusted, had never rewarded a mortal as 
 she had rewarded him. A few years previously, during one 
 of his presidential journeys, he had been hailed with enthu-
 
 LOUIS-NAPOH&ON A FATALIST. 339 
 
 siasm at Strasburg, the city in which the scene of one of his 
 bitterest fiascos had been laid. The contrast between those 
 two days was startling indeed : on the one, he was hurried 
 into a post-chaise as a prisoner to be taken to Paris, with an 
 almost certain terrible fate overhanging him ; on the other, 
 he was greeted as the saviour of France, the Imperial Crown 
 was within his grasp. But, startling as was this contrast, it 
 could but have been mild compared to that which must have 
 presented itself to his mind that autumn morning at Bou- 
 logne, when, a few hours later, the legions his legions 
 took up their positions from Wimereux on the right to Por- 
 sel on the left, to do homage to the sovereign of a country 
 which had been the most irreconcilable foe of the founder of 
 his house ; on the very heights at the foot of which he him- 
 self had failed to rouse the French to enthusiasm ; on the 
 very spot where he had become the laughing-stock of the 
 world by his performance with that unfortunate tame eagle.. 
 
 And yet, I repeat, not a gleam of pride or joy lighted up 
 the Sphinx-like mask. To see this man standing there un- 
 moved amidst the highest honours the world had to bestow, one 
 could not help thinking of Voltaire's condemnation of fatal- 
 ism as the guiding principal of life : " If perchance fatalism 
 be the true doctrine, I would sooner be without such a cruel 
 truth." 
 
 A regiment of lancers and one of dragoons lined the route 
 from the landing-stage to the railway station, for in those 
 days the trains did not stop alongside the boats ; while on 
 the bridge crossing the Liane, three hundred sappers, bearded 
 like the Pard, shouldering their axes, wearing their white 
 leathern aprons, stood in serried ranks, three deep. 
 
 The Queen's yacht had been timed to enter the harbour 
 at one, but it was within a minute or so of two before it was 
 moored amidst the salutes from the forts. The Emperor, 
 who had been on horseback the whole of the morning who, 
 in fact, preferred that means of locomotion on all important 
 occasions, as it showed him off to greater advantage, had 
 been standing by the side of his charger. He crossed the 
 gangway, beautifully upholstered in purple velvet and carpet 
 to match, at once, and, after having kissed her hand, offered her 
 his arm to assist her in landing, Prince Albert and the royal 
 children coming immediately behind the Imperial host and 
 his principal guest. A magnificent roomy barouche, capable 
 of holding six persons and lined with white satin, but only
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 drawn by two horses such horses ! for in that respect Xapoleon 
 had spent his time to advantage in England, stood waiting 
 to convey the Royal family. The Emperor himself, though, 
 mounted his horse once more, and took his place by the 
 right of the carriage, the left being taken by Marshal Bara- 
 guey-d'Hilliers. The head of the procession started amidst 
 tremendous cheers from the crowd, but we who came on be- 
 hind heard some curious comments upon this popular mani- 
 festation. Knowing that there would be a considerable 
 delay in getting the train off, I walked instead of driving. I 
 was accompanied by Lord , who was never averse to hav- 
 ing his little joke. " He bien, mon ami," he said to an old 
 weather-beaten sailor, who was short of his left leg " he bien, 
 mon ami, nous voila reconcilies." 
 
 " Oui, oui, je t'en fiche," was the answer ; " mais puisqu'il 
 en sont a se faire des m'amours, ils devaient bien me rendre 
 ma jambe que j'ai perdue dans leurs querelles." 
 
 " Imbecile," remarked an old soldier-looking man, who, 
 though old, was evidently younger than the first speaker, and 
 who was short of an arm, " ta jambe ne t'irait pas plus que 
 mon bras ; c'etait ta jambe de gar9on." 
 
 " C'est vrai," nodded the other philosophically ; " tout 
 de meme, c'est drole que nous nous soyons battus comme des 
 chiens," pointing across the Channel in the direction of Eng- 
 land, " pour en arriver a cela. Si le vieux (Napoleon I.) 
 revenait, il serait rudement colere." And I may say at once 
 that, notwithstanding the friendly attitude throughout of the 
 rural as well as of the Parisian populations, that was the 
 underlying sentiment. "Waterloo est arrange, non pas 
 venge," said a Parisian ; " il parait qu'il y a des accommode- 
 ments avec les rois, aussi bien qu'avec le ciel." 
 
 As a matter of course, we did not leave Boulogne much 
 before three the original arrangement had been for half -past 
 one, and when we reached Paris it was dark, too early for 
 the illuminations which had been projected along the line of 
 boulevards from the recently open Boulevard de Strasbourg 
 to the Madeleine, not so much as a feature in the programme 
 of reception, as in honour of the Queen generally. On the 
 other hand, there was not sufficient daylight for the crowds 
 to distinguish the sovereign's features, and a corresponding 
 disappointment was the result. The lighted carriage lamps 
 did not improve matters much. But the Parisians to their 
 credit be it said knowing that Queen Victoria had expressed
 
 THE QUEEN'S RECEPTION IN PARIS. 341 
 
 her wish to be conveyed to St. Cloud in an open carriage, in- 
 stead of the closed 'State one used on such occasions, took 
 note of the intention, and acknowledged it with ringing cheers. 
 Victor Hugo has said that the Parisian loves to show his 
 teeth he must either be laughing or growling ; and at the 
 best of times it is an ungrateful task to analyse too thoroughly 
 such manifestations of enthusiasm. There are always as 
 many reasons why nations should hate as love each other. 
 The sentiment, as expressed by the sailor and soldier alluded 
 to just now, did exist of that I feel sure ; but amidst 
 the truly fairy spectacle then presented to the masses that 
 crowded the streets, it may have been forgotten for the 
 moment. 
 
 For, in spite of the gathering darkness, the scene was 
 almost unique. I have only seen another one like it, namely, 
 when the troops returned from the Franco-Austrian War; 
 and people much older than I declared that the next best 
 one was that on the occasion of the return of the Bourbons 
 in 1814. 
 
 Though the new northern station, erected on the site of 
 the old, had been virtually finished for more than a twelve- 
 month, the approaches to it were, if not altogether magnifi- 
 cent projects, little more than magnificent mazes, stone and 
 mortar Phoenixes, in the act of rising, not risen, from Brob- 
 dignagian dust-heaps, and altogether unfit for any kind of 
 spectacular procession. Consequently, it had been decided to 
 connect the northern with the eastern line immediately after 
 entering the fortifications. The Strasbourg Station did not 
 labour under the same disadvantages ; the boulevard of that 
 name stretched uninterruptedly as far as the Boulevard St. 
 Denis, although, as yet, there were few houses on it. I have 
 seen a good many displays of bunting in my time ; I have 
 seen Turin and Florence and Rome beflagged and decorated 
 on the occasions of popular rejoicings ; I have seen historical 
 processions in the university towns of Utrecht and Leyden ; 
 I have seen triumphal entries in Brussels ; I was in London 
 on Thanksgiving day, but I have never beheld anything to 
 compare with the wedged masses of people along the whole 
 of the route, as far as the Bois de Boulogne, on that Satur- 
 day afternoon. The whole of the suburban population had, 
 as it were, flocked into Paris. The regulars lined one side of 
 the whole length of the Boulevards, the National Guards the 
 other. And there was not a single house form the station to
 
 34:2 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the southernmost corner of the Rue Royale that had not its 
 emblems, its trophies, its inscriptions of " welcome." With 
 that inborn taste which distinguishes the Parisians, the deco- 
 rator had ceased trying to gild the gold and to paint the lily 
 at that point, and had left the magnificent perspective to pro- 
 duce its own effect a few Venetian masts along the Avenue 
 de Champs-Elysees and nothing more. Among the notable 
 features of the decorations in the main artery of Paris was 
 the magnificent triumphal arch, erected by the management 
 of the Opera between the Eue de Eichelieu and what is now 
 the Rue Drouot. It rose to the fourth stories of the. adjacent 
 houses, and looked, not a temporary structure, but a monu- 
 ment intended to stand the wear and tear of ages. No de- 
 scription could convey an idea of its grandeur. The inside 
 was draped throughout with bee-bespangled purple, the top 
 was decorated with immense eagles, seemingly in full 
 flight, and holding between their talons proportionately large 
 scutcheons, bearing the interlaced monograms of the Imperial 
 hosts and the Royal guests. In front of the Passage de 1'Opera 
 stood an allegorical statue, on a very beautiful pedestal draped 
 with flags ; and further on, at the back of the Opera-Comique, 
 which really should have been its front,* an obelisk, the base 
 of which was a correct representation, in miniature, of the 
 Palais de 1'Industrie (the then Exhibition Building). By the 
 Madeleine a battalion of the National Guards had erected, 
 at their own cost, two more allegorical statutes, France and 
 England. A deputation from the National Guards had also 
 presented her Majesty with a magnificent bouquet on alight- 
 ing from the train. 
 
 By a very delicate attention, the private apartments of the 
 Queen had, in many ways, been made to look as much as 
 possible like those at Windsor Castle ; and where this trans- 
 formation was found impossible by reason of their style of 
 decoration such as, for instance, in the former boudoir of 
 Marie- Antoinette, the mural paintings and those of the 
 ceiling had been restored by two renowned artists. In addi- 
 tion to this, the most valuable pictures had been borrowed 
 
 * In 1782, when Heurtier, the architect, submitted his plan of the building 
 which was intended for the Italian singing-actors, the latter offered a deter- 
 mined opposition to the idea of the theatre facing the Boulevards, lest they 
 should be confounded with the small theatres on the Boulevard du Temple and 
 in the direction of the present Boulevard des Filles-du-Calvaire. This extraor- 
 dinary vanity was lampooned on all sides, and especially in a quatrain, which 
 I forbear to quote even in French. EDITOR.
 
 SUNDAY AT ST. CLOUD. 343 
 
 from the Louvre to enhance the splendour of the reception 
 and dining rooms, while none but crack regiments in full 
 dress were told off for duty. 
 
 The day after the Queen's arrival being Sunday, the en- 
 tertainment after dinner consisted solely of a private concert ; 
 on the Monday the Queen visited the Fine Arts' Section of 
 the Exhibition, which was located in a separate building at 
 the top of the Avenue Montaigne, and connected with the 
 main structure by beautifully laid-out gardens. The Queen 
 spent several hours among the modern masterpieces of all 
 nations, and two French artists had the honour of being pre- 
 sented. I will not be certain of the names, because I was not 
 there, but, as far as I can remember, they were Ingres and 
 Horace Vernet. 
 
 While on the subject of art, I cannot help digressing for 
 a moment. I may take it that in 1855 a good many English- 
 men of the better middle classes, though not exactly ama- 
 teurs or connoisseurs of pictures, were acquainted with the 
 names, if not with the works, of the French masters of the 
 modern school. "Well, in that same year, the English school 
 burst upon the corresponding classes in France like a revela- 
 tion nay, I may go further still, and unhesitatingly affirm 
 that not a few critics, and those of the best, shared the as- 
 tonishment of the non-professional multitude. They had 
 heard of Sir Joshua Reynolds and Gainsborough, perhaps of 
 Turner, but Constable and Moreland, Wilkie and "Webster, 
 Mulready, and the rest of the younger school, were simply so 
 many names. But when the critics did become aware of 
 their existence, their criticisms were simply a delightful series 
 of essays, guiding the most ignorant to a due appreciation of 
 those Englishmen's talents, not stinting praise, but by no 
 means withholding blame, instinctively focussing merits and 
 defects in a few brilliant paragraphs, which detected the 
 painter's intention and conception as well as his execution 
 both from a technical, as well as dramatic, graphic, and pic- 
 torial point of view ; which showed, not only the influence of 
 general surroundings, but dissected the result of individual 
 tendencies. Many a time since, when wading through the 
 adipose as well as verbose columns dealing with similar sub- 
 jects in English newspapers, have I longed for the literary 
 fleshpots of France, which contained and contain real nour- 
 ishing substance, not the fatty degeneration of an ignoramus's 
 brain, and, what is worse, of an ignoramus who speaks in
 
 34:4 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 numbers from a less valid reason than Pope's ; for the most 
 repellant peculiarity of these effusions are the numbers. It 
 would seem that these would-be critics, having no more than 
 the ordinary auctioneer's intellect, endeavour as much as 
 possible to assimilate their effusions to a catalogue. They 
 are an abomination to the man who can write, though he 
 may know nothing about painting, and to the man who 
 knows about painting and cannot write. The pictorial 
 art of England must indeed be a hardy plant to have sur- 
 vived the approval and the disapproval of these barba- 
 rians. 
 
 To come back to the Queen, who, after leaving the Palais 
 de 1'Industrie, drove to several points of interest in Paris, 
 notably to la Sainte-Chapelle. The route taken was by the 
 Kue de Eivoli and the Pont-N"euf ; the return journey was 
 effected by the Pont-aux-Changes and the eastern end of the 
 same street, which had only been opened recently, as far as 
 the Place de la Bastille. Then, and then only, her Majesty 
 caught sight of the Boulevards in the whole of their extent. 
 The decorations of the previous day but one had not been 
 touched, and the crowds were simply one tightly wedged-in 
 mass of humanity. A journalistic friend had procured me a 
 permis de circuler in other words, " a police pass," and I 
 made the way from the Boulevard Beaumarchais to Tortoni 
 on foot. It may be interesting to those who are always prat- 
 ing about the friendship between England and France to 
 know that I heard not a single cry of " Vive 1'Angleterre ! " 
 On the other hand, I heard a great many of " Vive la Eeine ! " 
 Even the unthinking crowd, though yielding to the excite- 
 ment of the moment, seemed to distinguish between the 
 country and her ruler. I am not commenting upon this : I 
 am merely stating a fact. Probably it is not England's fault 
 that she has not been able to inspire the French nation as a 
 whole with anything like a friendly feeling, but it is as well 
 to point it out. During the whole of the Crimean War, nine 
 out of every ten educated Frenchmen openly asserted that 
 France had been made a cat's-paw by England, that the alli- 
 ance was one forced upon the nation by Napoleon from dy- 
 nastic and personal, rather than from patriotic and national, 
 motives ; there were some who, at the moment of the Queen's 
 visit, had the candour to say that this, and this only, would 
 be France's reward for the blood and money spent in the 
 struggle. At the same time, it is but fair to state that these
 
 ALEXANDRE DUMAS AND THE QUEEN. 345 
 
 very men spoke both with admiration and respect of Eng- 
 land's sovereign. 
 
 At three o'clock there was a brilliant reception at the 
 Elysee, when the members of the corps diplomatique accred- 
 ited to the Tuileries were presented to the Queen. Shortly 
 after five her Majesty returned to Saint-Cloud, where, in the 
 evening, the actors of the Comedie-Fran9aise gave, at the 
 Queen's special request, a performance of " Les Demoiselles 
 de Saint- Cyr." She had seen the piece in London, and been 
 so pleased with it that she wished to see it again. Though I 
 was on very intimate terms with Dumas, we had not met for 
 several weeks, which was not wonderful, seeing that I was 
 frequently appealed to by the son himself for news of his 
 father. " What has become of him ? He might be at the 
 antipodes for all I see of him," said Alexandre II. about a 
 dozen times a year. However, two or three days after the 
 performance at Saint-Cloud, I ran against him in the Chaus- 
 see d Antiu. " Well, you ought to be pleased," I said ; " it ap- 
 pears that not only has the Queen asked to see your piece, 
 which she had already seen in London, but that she enjoyed 
 it even much better the second than the first time." 
 
 " C'est comme son auteur," he replied : "plus on le con- 
 nait, plus on 1'aime. Je sais pourtant bien ce qui 1'aurait 
 amusec meme d'avantage que de voir ma piece, c'eut ete de 
 me voir moi-meme, et franchement, 9a m'aurait amuse aussi." 
 
 " Then why did not you ask for an audience ? I am cer- 
 tain it would have been granted," I remarked, because I felt 
 convinced that her Majesty would have been only too pleased 
 to confer an honour upon such a man. 
 
 " En effet, j'y ai pense," came the reply ; " une femme 
 aussi remarquable et qui deviendra probablement la plus 
 grande femme du siecle aurait du se rencontrer avec le plus 
 grandhomme en France, mais j'ai eu peur qu'on ne me 
 traite comme Madame de Stae'l traitat Saint-Simon. C'est 
 dommage, parcequ'elle s'en ira sans avoir vu ce qu'il y de 
 mieux dans notre pays, Alexandre, Eoi du Monde roma- 
 nesque, Dumas Pignorant." Then he roared with laughter 
 and went away.* 
 
 * Alexandra Dumas referred to a story in connection with the Comte de 
 Saint-Simon and Madame de Stael which is not very generally known. One 
 
 plus remarquable. Si nous nous arrangions
 
 346 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 On Tuesday, the 21st, the Queen went to Versailles to in- 
 spect the picture-galleries established there by Louis-Philippe, 
 and, in the evening, she was present at a gala-performance at 
 the Opera. Next day, she paid a second visit to the Palais 
 de 1'Industrie, but to the industrial section only. In the 
 evening, there was a performance of " Le Fils de Famille " 
 (" The Queen's Shilling "). On the 23rd, she spent several 
 hours at the Louvre ; after which, at night, she attended the 
 ball given in her honour by the Municipality of Paris. I shall 
 not attempt to describe that entertainment, the decorations 
 and flowers of which alone cost three hundred and fifty thou- 
 sand francs. The whole had been arranged under the super- 
 intendence of Ballard, the architect of the Halles Centrales. 
 But I remember one little incident which caused a flutter of 
 surprise among the court ladies, who, even at that time, had 
 already left off dancing in the pretty old-fashioned way, and 
 merely walked through their quadrilles. The royal matron 
 of thirty-five, with a goodly family growing up around her, 
 executed every step as her dancing master had taught her, 
 and with none of the listlessness that was supposed to be the 
 " correct thing." I was standing close to Canrobert, who had 
 been recalled to resume his functions near the Emperor. 
 After watching the Queen for a minute or so, he turned 
 round to the lady on his arm. " Pardi, elle danse comme ses 
 soldats se battent, ' en veux-tu, en voila ; ' et corrects jusqu'a 
 la fin." There never was a greater admirer of the English 
 soldier than Canrobert. The splendour of that fete at the 
 H6tel-de-Ville has only been surpassed once, in 1867, when 
 the civic fathers entertained a whole batch of sovereigns. 
 
 On the 24th, there was a third visit to the Exhibition, 
 and I remember eight magnificent carriages passing down the 
 Avenue des Champs-Elysees. They were, however, only 
 drawn by two horses each. I was making my way to the 
 Champ de Mars, where a review was to be held in honour of 
 her Majesty, and had told the cab to wait in the Eue Beau- 
 jon, while I stepped into the main road to have a look at the 
 beautiful scene. The moment the carriages were past I re- 
 turned to the Hue Beaujon, and ran up against Beranger, 
 
 mois ensemble, nous aurions peut-etre 1'enfant le plus remarquable sur la terre.' 
 Madame de Stael politely declined the honour. As for the epithet of " 1'igno- 
 rant " which Dumas was' fond of applying to himself, it arose from the fact of 
 Dumas, the celebrated professor or chemistry, being spoken of as " Dumas le 
 savant." " Done," laughed the novelist, " je suis Dumas 1'ignorant." EDITOR.
 
 BERANGER AND THE QUEEN. 34.7 
 
 who was living there. The old man seemed in a great hurry, 
 which was rather surprising, because he was essentially phleg- 
 matic, and rarely put himself out for anything. So I asked 
 him the reason of his haste. " I want to see your queen," 
 he replied. A year or two before he had refused to go to the 
 Tuileries to see the Empress, who had sent for him ; and the 
 latter, who could be most charming when she liked, had paid 
 him a visit instead. 
 
 " I thought you did not trouble yourself much about 
 royalty," I remarked. " You refused to go and see the Em- 
 press, and you rush along to see the Queen ? " 
 
 " Non ; je vais voir la femme : s'il y avait beaucoup de 
 femmes comme elle, je leur pardonnerais d'etre reines." 
 
 Her Majesty has never heard of this. It was the most 
 magnificent and, at the same time, most witty tribute to 
 her private virtues. All this happened many, many years 
 ago. Since then I have often wondered why Prince Albert, 
 who, I feel certain, knew the worth of all these men as well 
 as he knew the merit of the litterateurs of his own country, 
 did not suggest to his august consort a reception such as she 
 gave to the corps diplomatique. It would have been a most 
 original thing to do ; the recollection of it would have been 
 more delightful even than the most vivid recollections of that 
 very wonderful week. 
 
 In those days, France was still looked upon as the first 
 military power in Europe. Her soldiers were probably not 
 superior to those who fell in the Franco-German war, but 
 their prestige had not been questioned. They were also more 
 sightly than the ill-clad legions of the Third Republic, so the 
 review was a very splendid affair. At its termination, her 
 Majesty repaired to the Invalides, to the tomb of Napoleon, 
 which, though it had been begun, as I have incidentally 
 stated, under the premiership of M. Guizot in 1846-47, was 
 not finished then, and only officially inaugurated nearly six 
 years afterwards. 
 
 My ticket for the review had been given to me by Mar- 
 shal Vaillant, the minister for war, and the only Marshal of 
 the Second Empire with whom I was, at that time, intimately 
 acquainted ; though I became on very friendly terms with 
 Marshals MacMahon and Lebrun subsequently. 
 
 I will devote, by-and-by, a few notes to this most original 
 soldier-figure he was only a type in some respects ; mean- 
 while, I may mention here an anecdote, in connection with
 
 348 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 this visit of the Queen, characteristic of the man. The 
 
 fovernor of the Invalides was the late King of Westphalia, 
 erome Bonaparte. It was but natural that he should have 
 been chosen as the custodian of his brother's last resting- 
 place. It was equally natural that he should feel reluctant 
 to meet at that tomb the sovereign of a country which, he con- 
 sidered, had tortured that brother to death. Consequently 
 the last survivor of the elder Bonapartes, the one who had 
 also fought at Waterloo, foreseeing, as it were, this pilgrim- 
 age on the part of her Majesty, had, a fortnight or so before 
 the date of her intended visit, gone to Havre, whither he had 
 been ordered by his doctor on account of his health, and 
 whence he only returned when the Queen of England had 
 left France. 
 
 The deputy-governor of the Invalides was, perhaps, not 
 considered sufficiently important to do the honours to so 
 illustrious a visitor, and Marshal Vaillant was sounded wheth- 
 er he would undertake the functions. He declined. " Je 
 n'ai pas 1'honneur, sire," he said, " d'appartenir a votre 
 illustre famille et personne sauf la famille d'un grand homme 
 a le droit d'oublier les souffrances que ses ennemis lui ont in- 
 fligees." He was an honest, upright soldier, abrupt and self- 
 willed, but kindly withal, and plainly perceived the faults of 
 Louis-Napoleon's policy and of his frequently misplaced 
 generosity above all, of his system of conciliating the sov- 
 ereigns of Europe by f6tes and entertainments. " Quand 
 1'autre leur donnait des fetes et des representations de thed- 
 tre, c'etait chez eux, et pas chez nous, ils en payaient les 
 frais." More of him in a little while. 
 
 At the Queen's first visit to Versailles the second took 
 place on the Saturday before she left she had been deeply 
 moved at the sight of the picture representing her welcome 
 at Eu by Louis-Philippe, to which ceremony I alluded in one 
 of my former notes. But even before this she had expressed 
 a wish to see the ruins of the Chateau de Neuilly, and the 
 commemorative chapel erected on the spot where the Due 
 d'Orleans met with his fatal accident. " La femme qui est si 
 fiddle a ses vieilles amities au milieu des nouvelles, surtout 
 quand il s'agit de dynasties rivales, comme en ce moment, et 
 quand cette femme est une reine, cette femme est une amie 
 bien precieuse," said Jerome's son. Both the Emperor and 
 the Empress found that their cousin had spoken truly. 
 
 Saturday, the 25th, had been fixed for the f6te at Ver-
 
 FETES AT VERSAILLES. 34.9 
 
 sailles. In the morning, the Queen went to the palace of 
 Saint-Germain, which no English sovereign had visited since 
 James II. lived there. She returned to Saint-Cloud, and 
 thence to the magnificent abode of Louis XIV., which she 
 reached after dark the Place d'Armes and the whole of the 
 erstwhile royal residence being brilliantly illuminated. 
 
 The Imperial and Koyal party entered by the Marble 
 Court, in the centre of which the pedestal to the statue of 
 Louis XIV. had been decorated with the rarest flowers. The 
 magnificent marble staircase had, however, been laid with 
 thick purple carpets, and the balustrades almost disappeared 
 beneath masses of exotics ; it was the first time, if I remem- 
 ber rightly, that I had seen mosses and ferns and foliage in 
 such profusion. The Cent Gardes and the Guides de 1'Im- 
 peratrice were on duty, the former on the staircase itself, the 
 latter below, in the vestibule. At the top, to the right and 
 left, the private apartments of the Empress had been ar- 
 ranged, the Queen occupied those formerly belonging to 
 Marie-Antoinette. I was enabled to see these a few days 
 later ; they were the most perfect specimens of the decorative 
 art that nourished under Louis XVI. I have ever beheld. 
 The boudoir was upholstered in light blue, festoons of roses 
 running along the walls, and priceless Dresden groups dis- 
 tributed everywhere ; the dressing-rooms were hung with 
 pale green, with garlands upon garlands of violets. The 
 toilet service was of Sevres, with medallions after Lancret 
 and Watteau. The historical Salle de l'(Eil-de-Bceuf, which 
 preceded her Majesty's apartments, had been transformed 
 into a splendid reception-room for the use of the Imperial 
 hosts and all their Royal guests, for there were one or two 
 foreign princes besides, notably Prince Adalbert of Bavaria. 
 
 The ball was to take place in the famous Galerie des 
 Glaces ; the Empress herself had presided at its transforma- 
 tion, which had been inspired by a well-known print of " Une 
 Fete sous Louis Quinze." More garlands of roses, but this 
 time drooping from the ceiling and connecting the forty 
 splendid lustres, which, together with the candelabra on the 
 walls, could not have contained less than three thousand wax 
 candles. At each of the four angles of the vast apartment a 
 small orchestra had been erected, but very high up, and sur- 
 rounded by a network of gilt wire. 
 
 At the stroke of ten those wonderful gardens became all 
 of a sudden ablaze with rockets and Chinese candles ; it was
 
 350 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the beginning of the fireworks, the principal piece of which 
 represented Windsor Castle. After this, the ball was opened 
 by the Queen and the Emperor, the Empress and Prince 
 Albert ; but though the example had been given, there was 
 very little dancing. I was a comparatively young man then, 
 but I was too busy feasting my eyes with the marvellous 
 toilettes to pay much heed to the seductive 1 strains, which at 
 other times would have set me tripping. I fancy this was 
 the case with most of the guests. 
 
 On the Monday the Queen left for home.
 
 MARSHAL VAILLANT. 351 
 
 CHAPTER XVIIL 
 
 Marshal Vaillant The beginning of our acquaintance His stories of the swash- 
 bucklers of the First Empire, and the beaux of the Kestauration Eabe- 
 laisian, but clever Marshal Vaillant neither a swashbuckler nor a beau ; 
 hated both Never cherished the slightest illusions about the efficiency of 
 the French army Acknowledged himself unable to effect the desired and 
 necessary reforms To do that, a minister of war must become a fixture 
 Why he'staved Careful of the public moneys, and of the Emperor's also 
 Napoleon lll.'s lavishness An instance of it Vaillant never dazzled by 
 the grandeur of court entertainments Not dazzled by anything His hatred 
 of wind-bags Prince de Canino Matutinal interviews Prince de Canino 
 sends his seconds Vaillant declines the meeting, and gives his reason 
 Vaillant abrupt at the best of times A freezing reception A comic inter- 
 view Attempts to shirk military duty Tricks Mistakes A story in 
 point More tricks Sham ailments : how the marshal dealt with them 
 When the marshal was not in an amiable mood Another interview Vail- 
 lant's tactics " D d annoying to be wrong " The marshal fond of sci- 
 ence -A very interesting scientific phenomenon himself Science under 
 the later Bourbons Suspicion of the soldiers of the Empire The priest- 
 hood and the police The most godless republic preferable to a continuance 
 of their regime The marshal's dog, Brusca Her dislike to civilians 
 Brusca's chastity Vaillant's objection to insufficiently prepaid letters His 
 habit of missing the train, notwithstanding his precautions His objection 
 to fuss and public honours. 
 
 ABOUT two or three days after the ball at Versailles, I 
 went to see Marshal Vaillant at the War Office, to thank him 
 for his kindness in sending me the ticket for the review. 
 Our acquaintance was already then of a couple of years' 
 standing. It had begun at Dr. Veron's, who lived, at the 
 time, at the corner of the Rue de Rivoli and the Rue de 
 Castiglione. The old soldier he was over sixty then had 
 a very good memory, and used to tell me garrison stories, 
 love-adventures of the handsome swashbucklers of the First 
 Empire and of the beaux of the Restauration. The language 
 was frequently that of Rabelais or Moliere, vigorous, to the 
 point, calling a spade a spade, and, as such, not particularly 
 adapted to these notes, but the narrator himself was neither 
 a swashbuckler nor a beau ; he hated the carpet-knight only 
 one degree more than the sabi*ur, and when both were com- 
 bined in the same man not an unusual thing during the
 
 352 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Second Empire, especially after the Crimean and Franco- 
 Austrian wars he simply loathed him. He fostered not the 
 slightest illusions about the efficiency of the French army, 
 albeit that, to an alien like myself and notwithstanding his 
 friendship for me, he would veil his strictures. At the same 
 time, he frankly acknowledged himself unable to effect the 
 desired reforms. " It wants, first of all, a younger and abler 
 man than I am ; secondly, he must become a fixture. No 
 change of ministry, no political vicissitudes ought to affect 
 him. I do not play a political role, and never mean to play 
 one ; and if I could find a man who would carry out the re- 
 forms at the War Office, or, rather, reorganize the whole as 
 it should be reorganized, I would make room for him to- 
 morrow I know what you are going to say. I derive a very 
 comfortable income from my various offices, and I am a 
 pluralist. If I did not take the money, some one else would 
 who has not got a scrap more talent than I have. There is 
 not a single man who dare tell the nation that its army is 
 rotten to the core, that there is not a general who knows as 
 much as a mere captain in the Austrian and Prussian armies ; 
 and if he had the courage to tell the nation, he would be 
 hounded out of the country, his life would be made a burden 
 to him. That is one of the reasons why I am staying, be- 
 cause I can do no good by going; on the contrary, I might 
 do a good deal of harm. Because, as you see it, the three 
 hundred and fifty thousand francs of my different appoint- 
 ments, I save them by looking after the money of the State. 
 Not that I can do much, but I do what I can." 
 
 That was very true : he was very careful of the public 
 moneys, and of the resources of the Emperor also, entrusted 
 to him by virtue of his position as G-rand-Marechal du Palais ; 
 it was equally true that he could not do much. Napoleon 
 was, by nature, lavish and soft-hearted ; as a consequence, he 
 became the butt of every impostor who could get a letter con- 
 veyed to him. His civil list of over a million and a half 
 sterling was never sufficient. He himself was simple enough 
 in his tastes, but he knew that pomp and state were dear to 
 the heart of Frenchmen, and he indulged them accordingly. 
 But his charity was a personal matter. He could have no 
 more done without it than without his eternal cigarette. He 
 called the latter " safety-valve of the brain ; the former the 
 safety-valve of pride." I renumber an anecdote which was 
 told to me by some one who was in his immediate entourage
 
 LOUIS-NAPOLEON'S GENEROSITY. 353 
 
 when he was only President. It was on the eve of a journey 
 to some provincial town, and at the termination of a cabinet 
 council. While talking to some of his ministers, he took a 
 couple of five-franc pieces from his waistcoat, and spun them 
 English fashion. " C'est tout ce qui me reste pour mon voy- 
 age de demain, messieurs," he said, smiling. One of them, 
 M. Ferdinand Barrot, saw that he was in earnest, and bor- 
 rowed ten thousand francs, which the President found on his 
 dressing-table when retiring for the night. Four and twenty 
 hours after, Napoleon had not even his two five-franc pieces : 
 they and M. Barrot's loan had disappeared in subscriptions to 
 local charities. Among the papers found at the Tuileries 
 after the Emperor's flight, there were over two thousand beg- 
 ging letters, all dated within a twelvemonth, and all marked 
 with their answer in the corner that is, with the amount 
 sent in reply. That sum amounted to not less than sixty 
 thousand francs. And be it remembered that these were the 
 petitions the Emperor had not entrusted to his secretaries or 
 ministers as coming within their domain. The words of 
 Marshal Vaillaut, spoken many years before, " I cannot do 
 much, but I do what I can," are sufficiently explained. 
 
 On the day alluded to above, the marshal was seriously 
 complaining of the Emperor's extravagance. He did not 
 hold with entertaining so many sovereigns. " I do not say 
 this," he added, " with regard to yours, for her hospitality de- 
 served such return as the Emperor gave her ; but with regard 
 to the others who will come, you may be sure, if we last long 
 enough. Well, we'll see; perhaps you'll remember my 
 words." 
 
 In fact, the old soldier was never much dazzled by the 
 grandeur of those entertainments, nor did he foster many 
 illusions with regard to their true value in cementing inter- 
 national friendships. The marshal was not dazzled by any- 
 thing ; and though deferential enough to the members of the 
 emperor's family, he never scrupled to tell them his mind. 
 The Emperor's cousin (Plon-Plon) could tell some curious 
 stories to that effect. The marshal had a hatred of long- 
 winded people, and especially of what Carlyle calls wind-bags. 
 Another of Louis-Napoleon's cousins came decidedly under 
 the latter description : I allude to the Prince de Canino. In 
 order to get rid as much as possible of wordy visitors, Vaillant 
 had hit upon the method of granting them their interviews 
 at a very, very early hour in the morning ; in the summer at
 
 354: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 6.30 in the morning, in the winter at 7.15. " People do not 
 like getting out of bed at that time, unless they have some- 
 thing serious to communicate," he said ; and would not relax 
 his rule, even for the softer sex. The old warrior, who had 
 probably been an early riser all his life, found the arrange- 
 ment work so well, that he determined at last not to make 
 any exceptions. "I get the day to myself," he laughed. 
 Now, it so happened that the Prince de Canino asked him 
 for an interview ; and, as a matter of course, Vaillant ap- 
 pointed the usual hour. Next morning, to Vaillant's great 
 surprise, instead of the Prince, came two of his friends. The 
 latter came to ask satisfaction of Vaillant for having dared 
 to disturb a personage of the Prince's importance at so early 
 an hour. " Mais je ne 1'ai pas derange du tout : il n'avait 
 qu'a ne pas venir, ce que du reste, il a fait," said Vaillant ; 
 then he added, " Mais, meme, si je consentais a donner raison 
 au prince de mon offense imaginaire, je ne me battrai pas a 
 quatre heures de 1'apres-midi ; done, il aurait a se deranger ; 
 il vaut mieux qu'il reste dans son lit. Je vous salue, mes- 
 sieurs." With which he bowed them out. When the Em- 
 peror heard of it, he laughed till the tears ran down his 
 cheeks, and Napoleon did not laugh outright very often or 
 easily. 
 
 There are a great many stories about this objection of 
 Marshal Vaillant to be troubled for nothing ; and, as usual, 
 they overshoot the mark. He is supposed to have acted very 
 cavalierly with highly placed personages, and even with ladies 
 in very high society. Of course, I was never present at in- 
 terviews of that kind, but during my long acquaintance with 
 him, I was often seated at his side when less exalted visitors 
 were admitted. At the best of times his manner was abrupt, 
 though rarely rude, unless there was a reason for it, albeit 
 that the outsider might fail to fathom it at the first blush. 
 I remember being with him in his private room, somewhere 
 about the sixties, when his attendant brought him a card. 
 
 " Show the gentleman in," said Vaillant, after having 
 looked at it. 
 
 Enter, a tall, well-dressed individual, the rosette of the 
 Legion of Honour in his button-hole, evidently a retired 
 officer. 
 
 " What is it you want with me ? " asked the marshal, who 
 had remained seated with his back towards the visitor. 
 
 " Being in Paris for the Christmas and New Year's holi-
 
 VAILLANT AT HIS WORST. 355 
 
 days, your excellency, I thought it my duty to pay my re- 
 spects to you." 
 
 " Is that all you want with me ? " asked the marshal. 
 
 " That is all, your excellency," stammered the visitor. 
 
 " Very well : then I'll wish you good morning." 
 
 I suppose I must have looked somewhat shocked at this 
 very unceremonious proceeding, for, when the door was closed, 
 the marshal explained. 
 
 " You need not think that I have done him an injustice. 
 "When fellows like this present their respects it always means 
 that they want me to present them with something else ; that 
 is why I cut them short." 
 
 Sometimes these interviews took a comical turn, for the 
 marshal could be very witty when he liked. In the land of 
 " equality," everybody is always on the look-out for greater 
 privileges than his fellows, and in no case were and are 
 favours more indiscriminately requested than with the view 
 of avoiding military service. A thousand various pretexts, 
 most of them utterly ridiculous, were brought forward by the 
 parents to preserve their precious sons from the hated bar- 
 rack life. In many instances, a few years of soldiering would 
 have done those young hopefuls a great deal of good, be- 
 cause those who clamoured loudest for exemption were only 
 spending their time in idleness and mischief. In the prov- 
 inces there was a chance of influencing the conseil de re- 
 vision by means of the prefet, if the parents were known to 
 be favourable to the government ; by means of the bishops, 
 if they still had a hankering after the former dynasties ; and, 
 not to mince matters, if they were simply rich, by means of 
 bribery. In Paris the matter was somewhat more difficult ; 
 the members of the council were frequently changed at the 
 last moment, and at all times the recruits to be examined 
 were too numerous for a parent to trust to the memory of 
 those members. The military authorities had introduced a 
 new rule, to the effect that the names of the recruits to be 
 examined should not be called out until their examination 
 was finished ; and, with the best will in the world, it is often 
 difficult to distinguish between un fils de famille and a down- 
 right plebeian if both happen to come before you " as God 
 made them." Consequently, notwithstanding the considerable 
 ingenuity of the parties interested to let the examining sur- 
 geon-major known." who was who," mistakes frequently oc- 
 curred ; the young artisan, who had no more the matter with
 
 356 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 him than the young wealthy bourgeois, was dismissed as unfit 
 for the service, while the latter was pronounced apt in every 
 respect. 
 
 Apropos of this, I know a good story, for the truth of 
 which I can vouch, because it happened to a member of the 
 family with which I became connected by marriage after- 
 wards. He had a son who was of the same age as his coach- 
 man's. Both the lads went to draw at the same time, both 
 drew low numbers. The substitute system was still in force, 
 but, just at that moment, there was a war-scare not without 
 foundation and substitutes reached high prices. It would 
 not have mattered much to the rich man. Unfortunately, 
 he was tight-fisted, and the mother pleaded in vain. The 
 wife was just as extravagant as the husband was mean ; she 
 had no savings, and she cudgelled her brain to find the means 
 of preserving her darling from the vile contact of his social 
 inferiors without putting her hand in her pocket which, 
 moreover, was empty. She went a great deal into society, 
 was very handsome, clever, and fascinating. By dint of 
 ferreting, she got to know the probable composition of the 
 conseil de revision barring accidents. History does not 
 say how, but she wheedled the surgeon-major into giving her 
 a distinct promise to do his best for her dear son. Of course, 
 in order to do some good, the surgeon had to see the young 
 fellow first; and there was the difficulty, because madame 
 had made the acquaintance of the officer under peculiar cir- 
 cumstances, and could not very well introduce him to her 
 home : besides, just on account of the war-scare, the authori- 
 ties had become very strict, the practices of many officers 
 were suspected, and it would never have done for the gentle- 
 man to give his superiors as much as a loophole for their 
 suspicion by visiting the lady. Time was getting short ; the 
 acquaintance had ripened into friendship very quickly, be- 
 cause, three days before the time appointed for the sitting of 
 the council, madame had never seen the surgeon, and on the 
 eve of that sitting the final arrangement had been concluded. 
 It was to this effect : that madame's son would pretend to 
 have hurt his hand, and appear with a black silk bandage 
 round his wrist. The thing is scarcely credible, but the 
 coachman's son, an engine-fitter, had hurt his wrist, and put 
 a strip of black ribbon round it. The coachman's family 
 name began with a B, the lady's name with a C. The coach- 
 man's son was taken for the other, and declared unfit for
 
 TRICKS TO AVOID MILITARY SERVICE. 357 
 
 military service by reason of his chest, to his great surprise 
 and joy, as may be imagined. But the surprise, though not 
 the joy, of the examining officer was greater still when, in 
 the next batch, another young fellow appeared with a strip 
 of black ribbon round his wrist. To ask his name was an 
 impossibility. The surgeon was afraid that he had been be- 
 trayed, or that his secret had leaked out, and, without a mo- 
 ment's hesitation, declared the real Simon Pure sound in 
 lungs and limb. 
 
 I am afraid I have drifted a little bit from Marshal Vail- 
 lant's comical interviews, but am coming back to them in a 
 roundabout way. The common, or garden trick to get those 
 young fellows exempted, where bribery was impossible or 
 private influence out of the question, was to make them sham 
 short-sightedness, or deafness, or impediment in the speech. 
 We have heard before now of professors who cure people of 
 stammering : it is a well-known fact that in those days there 
 was a professor who taught people to stammer ; while, per- 
 sonally, I know an optician on the Boulevard des Italians 
 whose father made a not inconsiderable fortune by spoiling 
 young fellows' sights that is, by training them, for a twelve- 
 month before the drawing of lots, to wear very powerful 
 lenses. Of course, this had to be done gradually, and his fee 
 was a thousand francs. I have known him to have as many 
 as twenty or thirty pupils at a time. No doubt the authori- 
 ties were perfectly aware of this, but they had no power to 
 interfere. The process for " teaching deafness ' was even a 
 more complicated one, but it did succeed for a time in im- 
 posing upon the experts, until, by a ministerial decree, it 
 was resolved to draft all these clever stammerers, and even 
 those who were really suffering from the complaints the others 
 simulated, into the transport and medical services. 
 
 It was then that Marshal Vaillant was overwhelmed with 
 visits from anxious matrons who wanted to save their sons, 
 and that the comical interviews took place.. 
 
 " But, excellency, my son is really as deaf as a post," one 
 would exclaim. 
 
 " All the better, madame : he won't be frightened at the 
 first sound of serious firing. Nearly all young recruits are 
 terror-stricken at the first whizzing of the bullets around 
 them. I was, myself, I assure you. He'll make an admira- 
 ble soldier." 
 
 "" But he won't be able to hear the word of command."
 
 358 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 " Not necessary, madame ; he'll only have to watch the 
 others, and do as they do. Besides, we'll draft him into the 
 cavalry : it is really the charger that obeys the signals, not the 
 trooper. It will be an advantage to him to be deaf in the 
 barrack-room, for there are many things said there that 
 would bring a blush to his nice innocent cheeks ; and, upon 
 the whole, it is best he should not hear them. I have the 
 honour to wish you good morning, madame." 
 
 And though the woman knew that the old soldier was 
 mercilessly chaffing her and her milksop son, the thing was 
 done so politely and so apparently seriously on the marshal's 
 part, that she was fain to take no for an answer. 
 
 On one occasion, it appears for the marshal liked to tell 
 these tales, and he was not a bad mimic he had just dis- 
 missed a lady similarly afflicted with a deaf son, when an- 
 other entered whose offspring suffered from an impediment 
 in his speech. " Madame," the marshal said, without mov- 
 ing a muscle, " your son will realize the type of the soldier 
 immortalized by M Scribe in ' Les Huguenots.' You know 
 what Marcel sings." And, striking a theatrical attitude, he 
 trolled 
 
 " ' Un vieux soldat sait souffrir et se taire 
 Sans murmurer.' 
 
 With this additional advantage," he went on, " that your 
 son will be a young one. I can, however, promise you an- 
 other comfort. A lady has just left me whose son is" as deaf 
 as a post. I'll not only see that your son is drafted into the 
 same company, but I'll make it my special business to have 
 their beds placed side by side. The young fellow can go on 
 stammering as long as he likes, it won't offend his comrade's 
 hearing." 
 
 " But my son is very short-sighted, as blind as a bat, you* 
 excellency ; he won't be able to distinguish the friend from 
 the foe," expostulated a third lady. 
 
 " Don't let that trouble you, madame," was the answer ; 
 "we'll put him in the infantry: he has only got to blaze 
 away, he is sure to hit some one or something." 
 
 These were the scenes when the marshal was in an amia- 
 ble mood; when he was not, he would scarcely suffer the 
 slightest remark ; but, if the remark was ventured upon, it 
 had to be effectual, to be couched in language as abrupt as 
 his. " Soft-sawder " he hated above all things ; and even
 
 VAILLANT AT HIS BEST. 359 
 
 when he was wrong, he would not admit it to any one who 
 whined or spoke prettily. On the other hand, when the vis- 
 itor or petitioner became as violent as he was himself, he 
 often reversed his decision. One day, while waiting for the 
 marshal, I met in the anteroom an individual who, by his 
 surly looks, was far from pleased. After striding up and 
 down for a while, he began to bang on the table, and to 
 shout at the top of his voice, calling the old soldier all kinds 
 of names. Out came the marshal in his shirt-sleeves the 
 moment the lady-visitors were gone he always took off his 
 coat. " Come back, monsieur," he said to the individual. 
 In a few moments, the latter came out of the marshal's pri- 
 vate room, his face beaming with joy. Then I went in, and 
 found the marshal rubbing his hands with glee. " A capital 
 fellow, after all, a capital fellow," he kept on saying. 
 
 " He may be a capital fellow," I remarked, " but he is not 
 very choice in his language." 
 
 " That's only his way ; he does not like to be refused 
 things, but he is a capital fellow for all that, and that's why 
 I granted his request. If he had whined about it, I should 
 not have done so, though I think he is entitled to what he 
 came for." 
 
 Strategical skill, in the sense the Germans have taught us 
 since to attach to the word, Marshal Vaillant had little or 
 none. Most of his contemporaries, even the younger gen- 
 erals, were scarcely better endowed than their official chief. 
 They were all good soldiers when it came to straightforward 
 fighting, as they had been obliged to do in Africa, but there 
 was not a great leader, scarcely an ordinary tactician, among 
 them. As I have already shown, among the men most pain- 
 fully aware of this was the marshal himself ; nevertheless, 
 when he once made up his mind to a course of action, it was 
 almost impossible to dissuade him from it. He had set his 
 heart upon Marshal Niel occupying the Aland island during 
 the winter of '54-55, in the event of Bomarsund falling into 
 French hands. He did not for a moment consider that the 
 fourteen thousand troops were too few to hold it, if the Rus- 
 sians cared to contest its possession, too many, if they mere- 
 ly confined themselves to intercepting the supplies, which 
 they could have done without much difficulty. A clever 
 young diplomatist, who knew more about those parts than 
 the whole of the intelligence department at the Ministry for 
 War, at last made him abandon his decision. I came in as
 
 3GO AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 he went out; the marshal was as surly as a bear with a sore 
 head. " Clever fellow this," he growled, " very clever fel- 
 low." And then, in short jerky sentences, he told me the 
 whole of the story, asking my opinion as to who was right 
 and who was wrong. I told him frankly that I thought that 
 the young diplomatist was right. " That's what I think," 
 
 he spluttered ; " but you'll admit that it is d d annoying 
 
 to be wrong." 
 
 It would be wrong to infer that the marshal, though defi- 
 cient as a strategist, was the rough-and-ready soldier, indif- 
 ferent to more cultured pursuits, as so many of his fel- 
 low-officers were. He was very fond of certain branches of 
 science, and rarely missed a meeting of the scientific section 
 of the Academic, of which he was a member. What at- 
 tracted him most, however, was astronomy ; next to that 
 came entomology and botany. Still, though an enthusiast, 
 and often risking a cold to observe an astral phenomenon, he 
 objected to wasting thousands of pounds for a similar pur- 
 pose ; in fact, when it came to disbursing government money 
 for a scientific or other vaguely defined purpose, his economic 
 tendencies got the better of him. " I am a very interesting 
 scientific phenomenon myself," he used to say, " or, at any rate, 
 I was ; and yet no one spent any money to come and see me." 
 
 He was alluding to a fact which he often told me him- 
 self, and afterwards narrated in his " memoirs." 
 
 " For a long while, especially from 1818 to 1830, when 
 the weather happened to be very dry and cold, and when I 
 returned to my grateless, humble room, after having spent 
 the day in heated apartments, I was both the spectator and 
 the medium of strange electrical phenomena. 
 
 " The moment I had undressed and stood in my shirt, 
 the latter began to crackle and became absolutely luminous, 
 emitting a lot of sparks ; the tails stuck together, and re- 
 mained like that for some time." 
 
 I asked him, on one occasion, whether he had ever com- 
 municated all this to scientific authorities. His answer, 
 though not a direct one to my question, was not only very 
 characteristic of the mental and moral attitude of the sol- 
 diers of the Empire towards the Bourbons, but, to a great 
 extent, of the attitude of the Bourbons themselves towards 
 everybody and everything that was not absolutely in accord- 
 ance with the policy, sociology, and religious tenets of their 
 adherents, whether laymen or priests.
 
 VAILLANT ON THE LATER BOURBONS. 3d 
 
 "You must remember, my dear fellow," he replied, "the 
 regime under which we lived when I was subject to those 
 electrical manifestations; you must further remember that 
 I had fought at Ligny and at Waterloo, and, though not ab- 
 solutely put on the retired list in 1815, I and the rest of the 
 Emperor's soldiers were watched, and our most innocent acts 
 construed into so many small attempts at conspiracy. You 
 have not the slightest idea what the police were like under 
 the Kestauration, let alone the priesthood. If I couple these 
 two, I am not speaking at random. If I had communicated 
 the things I told you of, to no matter what savant, he would 
 necessarily have published the result of his observations and 
 experiments, and do you know what would have happened ? 
 I should have been tried, and perhaps condemned, for witch- 
 craft yes, for witchcraft, or else I should have been taken 
 hold of by the priests, not as a scientific phenomenon, but as 
 a religious one, a kind of stigmatise. They would have 
 made it out to their satisfaction that I was either half a 
 saint, or a whole devil, and in either case my life would 
 have become a burden to me. Only those who have lived 
 under the Bourbons can form an idea of the terrorizing 
 to which they lent themselves. People may tell you that 
 they were kind and charitable, and this, that, and the other. 
 There never were greater tyrants than they were at heart ; 
 and if the Due d'Angouleme or the Comte de Chambord 
 had come to the throne, France would have sunk to the 
 intellectual level of Spain. I would sooner see the most 
 godless republic than a return of that state of things, and I 
 need not tell you that I firmly believe that not a sparrow 
 falls to the earth without God's will. No, I held my tongue 
 about my electrical sensations ; if I had not, you would not 
 now be talking to Marshal Vaillant I should have become a 
 jabbering idiot, if I had lived long enough." It is the 
 longest speech I have ever heard the marshal make. 
 
 The marshal's own rooms were simply crammed with 
 cases full of beetles, butterflies, etc. The space not taken 
 up by these was devoted to herbariums; and in the midst 
 of the most interesting conversation interesting to the 
 listener especially, for the old soldier was an inexhaustible 
 mine of anecdote he, the listener, would be invited to look 
 at a bit of withered grass or a wriggling caterpillar. 
 
 After the Franco- Austrian war, there was an addition 
 to the marshal's household I might say family, for the old 
 
 16
 
 362 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 man became as fond of Brusca as if she had been a human 
 being. The story went that she had been bequeathed to 
 him at Solferino by her former master, an Austrian general ; 
 and the marshal did not deny it. At any rate, he found 
 Brusca sitting by the dying man, and licking the blood 
 oozing from his wounds. 
 
 Brusca was not much to look at, and you might safely 
 have defied a committee of the most eminent authorities on 
 canine breeds to determine hers, but she was very intelligent, 
 and of a most affectionate disposition. Nevertheless, she 
 was always more or less distant with civilians : it took me 
 many years to worm myself into her good graces, and I am 
 almost certain that I was the only pekin thus favoured. The 
 very word made her prick up her ears, show her teeth, and 
 straighten her tail as far as she could. For the appendage 
 did not lend itself readily to the effort ; it was in texture like 
 that of a colley or Pomeranian, and twisted like that of a 
 pug. Curiously enough, her objection to civilians did not 
 extend to the female portion, but the sight of a blouse drove 
 her frantic with rage. On such occasions, she had to be 
 chained up. As a rule, however, Brusca's manifestations, 
 whether of pleasure or the reverse, were uttered in a minor 
 key and unaccompanied by any change of position on her 
 part. She mostly lay at the marshal's feet, if she was not 
 perched on the back of his chair, for Brusca was not a large 
 dog. She accompanied the marshal in his walks and drives, 
 she sat by his side at table, she slept on a rug at the foot of 
 his bed. Now and then she took a gentle stroll through the 
 apartment, carefully examining the dried plants and beetles. 
 But one day, or rather one evening, there was a complete 
 change in her behaviour : it was at one of the marshal's 
 receptions, on the occasion of Emperor Francis-Joseph's visit 
 to Paris. Some of the officers of his Majesty's suite had 
 been invited, and at the sight of the, to her, once familiar 
 uniforms her delight knew no bounds. She was standing at 
 the top of the landing when she caught sight of them, and 
 all those present thought for a moment that the creature 
 was going mad. As a matter of course, Brusca was not 
 allowed to come into the reception-rooms, but on that night 
 there was no keeping her out. Locked up in the marshal's 
 bed-room, she made the place ring with her barks and yells, 
 and they had to let her out. With one bound she was in the 
 drawing-rooms, and for three hours she did not leave the side
 
 VAILLANT AND HIS DOG. 363 
 
 of the Austrian officers. When they took their departure, 
 Brusca was perfectly ready, nay eager, to abandon her home 
 and her fond master for their sake, and had to be forcibly 
 prevented from doing so. The marshal did not know 
 whether to cry or to laugh, but in the end he felt ready to 
 forgive Brusca for her contemplated desertion of him in 
 favour of her countrymen. Some one who objected to the 
 term got the snub direct. "Je maintiens ce que j'ai dit, 
 compatriotes ; et je serais rudement fier d'avoir une com- 
 patriote comme elle." 
 
 If possible, Brusca from that moment rose in the mar- 
 shal's estimation ; she was a perfect paragon. " Cette chi- 
 enne n'a pas seulement toutes les qualites de son genre, elle 
 n'a meme pas les vices de son sexe. Elle m'aime tellement 
 bien qu'elle ne veut e'tre distraite par aucun autre amour. 
 Elle vit dans le plus rigoureux celibat. La malheureuse," 
 he said every now and then, "elle a failli se compro- 
 mettre." 
 
 In spite of the marshal's boast about Brusca's morals, he 
 was one day compelled to admit a faux pas on her part, and 
 for some weeks the " vet " had an anxious time for it. " Elle 
 a mal tourne, mais que voulez-vous, je ne vais pas 1'abandon- 
 ner." And when the crisis was over : " Son incartade ne 
 lui a pas porte bonheur. Esperons que la leqon lui pro- 
 fitera." 
 
 Brusca had her portrait painted by the " Michael-Angelo 
 of dogs," Jadin, and when it was finished the visitors were 
 given an opportunity of admiring it in the drawing-room, 
 where it was on view for several consecutive Tuesdays. 
 After that, a great many of the marshal's familiars, supposed 
 to be capable of doing justice to Brusca's character in verse, 
 were appealed to, to write her panegyric, but though several 
 Academicians tried their hands, their lucubrations were not 
 deemed worthy to be inscribed on the frame of Brusca's por- 
 trait, albeit that one or two the first in Greek were en- 
 grossed on vellum, and adorned the drawing-room table. 
 The effusion that did eventually adorn the frame was by an 
 anonymous author it was shrewdly suspected that it was by 
 the marshal himself, and ran as follows : 
 
 " Si je suis pres de lui, c'est que je le merite. 
 Revez mon sort brilliant ; revez, ambitieux ! 
 Du bien de mon raaitre en ami je profile, 
 J'aimerais son pain nor s'il etait malheureux."
 
 361 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Another peculiarity of Marshal Vaillant was never to ac- 
 cept a letter not prepaid or insufficiently paid. The rule 
 was so strictly enforced, both in his private and official ca- 
 pacity, that many a valuable report was ruthlessly refused, 
 and had to be traced afterwards through the various post- 
 offices of Europe. 
 
 Seven times out of ten the marshal, when travelling by 
 himself, missed his train. This would lead one to infer that 
 he was unpunctual; on the contrary, he was the spirit of 
 punctuality. Unfortunately, he over-did the thing. He 
 generally reached the station half an hour or three-quarters 
 before the time, seated himself down in a corner, dozed off, 
 and did not wake up until it was too late. The marshal was 
 a native of Dyon ; and at Nuits, situated between the former 
 town and Beaune, there lived a middle-aged spinster cousin 
 whom he often went to visit. He nearly always returned by 
 the last train to Dyon, where he had his quarters at the 
 Hotel de la Cloche ; and although often in the midst of a 
 pleasant family party, insisted upon leaving long before it 
 was necessary. As a matter of course, the station was in 
 semi-darkness for Nuits is not a large place and the book- 
 ing-office was not open. One night, it being very warm, he 
 stretched himself leisurely on a grass plot, instead of on the 
 hard seat, and there he was found at six in the morning ; 
 several trains had come and gone, but no one had dared to 
 wake him. " Mais, monsieur le marechal, on aurait cru vous 
 manquer de respect en vous eveillant. Apres tout, vous 
 n'tes pas tout le monde, il y des distinctions," said the sta- 
 tionmaster apologetically. "La mort et le sommeil, mon- 
 sieur," was the answer, " font table rase de toute distinction." 
 It was a French version of our " Death levels all : " the mar- 
 shal was fond of paraphrasing quotations, especially from the 
 English, of which he had a very fair knowledge, having 
 translated some military works many years before. How- 
 ever, from that day forth, instructions were given to take no 
 heed of his rank, and to awaken him like any other mortal, 
 rather than have him miss his train. 
 
 In fact, the marshal did not like to be constantly remind- 
 ed of his rank ; if anything, he was rather proud of his very 
 humble origin, and, instead of hiding his pedigree like a good 
 many parvenus, he took delight in publishing it. I have 
 seen a letter of his to some one who inquired on the subject, 
 not from sheer curiosity. " My grandfather was a silkmercer
 
 VAILLANT FINDS HIS MATCH. 335 
 
 in a small way on the place St. Vincent, at Dyon. His 
 father had been a coppersmith. I am unable to trace back 
 further than that ; my quarters of nobility stop there. Let 
 me add, at the same time, that there is no more silly proverb 
 than the one ' Like father like son.' My father died poor, 
 and respected by every one. I do not believe that he had a 
 single enemy. His friends called him Christ, he was so good 
 and kind to everybody. I am not the least like him. He 
 was short and slim, I am rather tall and stout ; he was gen- 
 tle, and people say that I am abrupt and harsh. In short, he 
 had as many virtues as I am supposed to have faults, and I 
 am afraid the world is not at all mistaken in that respect." 
 
 I, who knew him as well as most people, am afraid that 
 the world was very much mistaken. As a matter of course, 
 the old soldier had many faults, but his good qualities far 
 outweighed the latter. He was modest to a degree, and the 
 flatteries to which men in his position are naturally exposed 
 produced not the slightest effect upon him. When in an 
 amiable mood, he used to cut them short with a " Oui, oui ; 
 le marechal Vaillant est un grand homme, il n'y a pas de 
 doute ; tout le monde est d'accord sur ce chapitre la, done, 
 n'en parlons plus." When not in an amiable mood, he 
 showed them the door, saying, " Monsieur, si je suis aussi 
 grand homme que vous le dites, je suis trop grand pour 
 m'occuper de vos petites affaires. J'ai 1'honneur de vous 
 saluer." 
 
 He was fond of his native town, one of whose streets bore 
 or still bears his name, though, according to all authorities, 
 it never smelt sweet by whatsoever appellation it went. But 
 he objected to being lionized, so he never stayed with the 
 prefect, the maire, or the general commanding the district, 
 and simply took up his quarters at the hotel, insisting on be- 
 ing treated like any other visitor. The maire respected his 
 wishes ; the population did not, which was a sore point with 
 the marshal. Nevertheless, when, in 1858, during their Ex- 
 hibition, they wanted him to distribute the prizes, he con- 
 sented to do so, on condition that his reception should be of 
 the simplest. The Dyonnais promised, and to a certain ex- 
 tent kept their word. Next morning the prefect, accompa- 
 nied by the authorities, fetched him in his carriage. The 
 ceremony was to take place in the park itself, and at the en- 
 trance was posted General Picard, accompanied by his staff, 
 and at the head of several battalions. The moment the mar-
 
 366 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 shal set foot to the ground, the general saluted, the drums 
 rolled, and the bands played. The marshal felt wroth, and 
 at the conclusion of the distribution sent for the general, 
 whom, not to mince matters, he roundly bullied. 
 
 General Picard did not interrupt him. " Have you fin- 
 ished, monsieur le marechal ? " he asked at last. 
 
 " Of course, I have finished." 
 
 "Very well; the next time you come out as a simple 
 bourgeois, you had better leave the grand cordon of the 
 Legion of Honour at home. If I had not saluted you as I 
 did, I should have had the reprimand of the minister of war, 
 and of the chancellor of the Legion of Honour. After all, I 
 prefer yours." 
 
 " But I am the minister for war." 
 
 " I know nothing about that. I only saw an old gentle- 
 man with the grand cordon. If you are the minister for war, 
 perhaps you will be good enough to tell Marechal Vaillant, 
 when you see him, that he must not tempt old soldiers like 
 myself to forget their duty." 
 
 " You are right, general. But what a hot fiery lot these 
 Dyonnais are, aren't they ? " Picard was a native of Dyon 
 also.
 
 THE WAR. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 The Franco-German War Friday, July 15, 1870, 6 p. m. My friends " confi- 
 dent of France being able to chastise the insolence of the King of Prussia " 
 I do not share their confidence ; but do not expect a crushing defeat 
 Napoleon III.'s presence aggravated the disasters ; his absence would not 
 have averted them He himself had no illusions about the efficiency of the 
 army, did not suspect the rottenness of it His previous endeavours at re- 
 organization The real drift of his proposed inquiries His plan meant also 
 compulsory service for every one Why the legislature opposed it The 
 makeshift proposed by it -Napoleon weary, body and soul His physical 
 condition A great consultation and the upshot of it Dr. Kicord and what 
 he told me I am determined to see and hear, though not to speak I sally 
 forth The streets on the evening of Friday, the 15th of July The illumi- 
 nations Patriotism or Chauvinism The announcement of a bookseller 
 What Moltke thought of it The opinion of a dramatist on the war The 
 people ; no horse-play No work done on Saturday and Sunday Cabmen 
 " A man does not pay for his own funeral, monsieur " The northern 
 station on Sunday The departing Germans -The Emperor's particular 
 instructions with regard to them Alfred de Musset's " Khin Allemand " 
 Prevost-Paradol and the news of his suicide The probable cause of it A 
 chat with a superior officer The Emperor's Sunday receptions at the Tui- 
 leries -Promotions in the army, upon what basis Good and bad officers 
 The officers' mess does not exist -Another general officer gives his opinion 
 Marshal Niel and Lebosuf The plan of campaign suddenly altered The 
 reason -The Emperor leaves St. Cloud His confidence shaken before then 
 Some telegrams from the commanders of divisions Thiers is appealed 
 to, to stem the tide of retrenchment: afterwards to take the portfolio of war 
 The Emperor's opinion persistently disregarded at the Tuileries Trochu 
 The dancing colonels at the Tuileries. 
 
 AFTER the lapse of thirteen years, it is difficult to put the 
 exact hour and date to each exciting incident of a period 
 which was absolutely phenomenal throughout. I kept no 
 diary, only a few rough notes, because at that time I never 
 thought of committing my recollections to paper, and have, 
 therefore, to trust almost wholly to my memory ; neverthe- 
 less I am positive as to main facts, whether witnessed by my- 
 self or communicated to me by friends and acquaintances, 
 I remember, for instance, that, immediately after the decla- 
 ration of war, I was warned by my friends not to go abroad 
 more than I could help, to keep away as much as possible 
 from crowds. " You are a foreigner," said one, " and that
 
 368 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 will be sufficient for any ragamuffin, who wants to do you a 
 bad turn, to draw attention to you. By the time you have 
 satisfactorily proved your nationality you will be beaten black 
 and blue, if not worse." 
 
 The advice was given on Friday, the loth of July, about 
 six in the afternoon ; that is, a few hours after the news of 
 the scenes in the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate had 
 spread, and when the centre of Paris was getting gradually 
 congested with the inhabitants of the faubourgs. My friends 
 were men of culture and education, and not at all likely to 
 be carried away by the delirium which, on that same night 
 and for the next week, converted Paris into one vast lunatic 
 asylum, whose inmates had managed to throw off the control 
 of their keepers ; yet there was not a single civilian among 
 them who had a doubt about the eventual victory of France, 
 about her ability " to chastise the arrogance of the King of 
 Prussia," to put the matter in their own words. 
 
 " To try to be wise after the event " is a thing I particu- 
 larly detest, but I can honestly affirm that I did not share 
 their confidence, although I did not suspect for a moment 
 that the defeat would be so crushing as it was. I remem- 
 bered many incidents that had happened during the previous 
 four years of which they seemed conveniently oblivious ; I 
 was also aware, perhaps, of certain matters of which they 
 were either profoundly ignorant, or professed to be; but, 
 above all, I took to heart the advice, tendered in the shape 
 of, " You are a foreigner ; " and though I feared no violence 
 or even verbal recrimination on their part, I chose to hold 
 my tongue. 
 
 I hold no brief for the late Emperor, but I sincerely be- 
 lieve that he was utterly averse to the war. I, moreover, think 
 that if he had consented to remain in Paris or at St. Cloud, 
 the disaster would have happened all the same. He had no 
 illusions about the efficiency of his armies, though he may 
 not have been cognizant of the thorough rottenness of the 
 whole. But to have said so at any time, especially during 
 the last four years, would have been simply to sign the death- 
 warrant of his dynasty. He endeavoured to remedy the de- 
 fects in a roundabout way as early as October, '66, by appoint- 
 ing a commission to draw up a plan for the reorganization of 
 the army. Apparently, Napoleon wanted larger contingents ; 
 in reality, he hoped that the inquiry would lay bare such evi- 
 dence of corruption as would justify him in dismissing several
 
 THE EMPEROR OPPOSED TO WAR. 3 69 
 
 of the men surrounding him from their high commands. But 
 both those who only saw the apparent drift as well as those 
 who guessed at the real one were equally determined in their 
 opposition. It was the majority in the Legislature which 
 first uttered the cry, immediately taken up by the adversaries 
 of the regime, "If this bill becomes law there will be an end 
 of favourable numbers." In fact, the bill meant compulsory 
 service for every one, and the consent of the deputies to it 
 would at once have forfeited their position with their elect- 
 ors, especially with the peasantry, to whom to apply the 
 word " patriotism " at any time is tantamount to the vilest 
 prostitution of it. 
 
 Of the makeshift for that law I need say little or nothing. 
 Without a single spy in France, without a single attache in 
 the Eue de Lille, Bismarck was enabled by that only to de- 
 termine beforehand the effects of one serious military defeat 
 on the dynasty of the Emperor ; he was enabled to calculate 
 the exact strength of the chain of defence which would be 
 offered subsequently. The French army was like the Scotch 
 
 lad's porridge, " sour, burnt, gritty, cold, and, it, there 
 
 was not enough of it." It is not underrating Bismarck's 
 genius to say that a man of far inferior abilities than he 
 would have plainly seen the course to pursue. 
 
 Was Napoleon III. steeped in such crass ignorance as not 
 to have had an inkling of all this ? Certainly not ; but he 
 was weary, body and soul, and, but for his wife and son, he 
 Avould, perhaps willingly, have abdicated. He had been suf- 
 fering for years from one of the most excruciating diseases, 
 and a fortnight before the declaration of war the symptoms 
 had become so alarming that a great consultation was held 
 between MM. Nelaton, Ricord, Fauvel, Gr. See, and Corvisart. 
 The result was the unanimous conclusion of those eminent 
 medical men that an immediate operation was absolutely 
 necessary. Curiously enough, however, the report embody- 
 ing this decision was only signed by one, and not communi- 
 cated to the Empress at all. It may be taken for granted 
 that, had she known of her husband's condition, she would 
 riot have agitated in favour of the war, as she undoubtedly 
 did. 
 
 It was only after the Emperor's death at Chislehurst that 
 the document in question was found, but I happened to know 
 Dr. Eicord intimately, and most of the facts, besides those 
 stated above, were known to me on that memorable Friday,
 
 370 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the 15th of July, 1870. As I have said already, I thought it 
 wiser to hold my tongue. 
 
 But though determined not to speak knowing that it 
 would do no earthly good I was equally determined to see 
 and to hear; so, at about eight, I sallied forth. The heat 
 was positively stifling, and it was still daylight, but, m their 
 eagerness to show their joy, the Parisians would not wait for 
 darkness to set in, and, as I went along, I saw several matrons 
 of the better classes, aided by their maids, make preparations 
 on the balcony for illuminating the moment the last rays of 
 the sun should set behind the horizon. I distinctly say ma- 
 trons of the better classes, because my way lay through the 
 Chausse'e d'Antin, where the tenancy of an apartment on the 
 first, second, or third floor implied a more than average in- 
 come. I was, and am, aware that neither refinement nor good 
 sense should be measured by the money at one's command, 
 but under similar circumstances it is impossible to apply any 
 other valid test. In the streets there was one closely wedged- 
 in, seething mass, and the noise was deafening ; nevertheless, 
 at the sight of one of those matrons thus engaged there was 
 a momentary lull, followed immediately by vociferous applause 
 and the cry of " Les meres de la patrie." From a cursory 
 glance upward, I came to the conclusion that the progeny of 
 these ladies, if they were blessed with any, could as yet con- 
 tribute but very little to the glory of the nation ; still, I re- 
 flected, at the same time, that they had probably brothers and 
 husbands who, within a few hours, might be called to the 
 front, " nevermore to return ; " that, therefore, the outburst 
 of patriotism could not be called an altogether cheap one. 
 In fact, none but the thoroughly irreclaimable sceptic could 
 fail to be struck with the genuine outburst of national resent- 
 ment against a whole nation on the part of another nation, 
 which, as I take it, means something different from unalloyed 
 patriotism. It was a mixture of hatred and chauvinism, rather 
 than the latter and more elevated sentiment. The " sacred 
 soil of France " though why more sacred than any other 
 soil, I have never been able to make out was not threatened 
 in this instance by Prussia ; carefully considered, it was not 
 even a question of national honour offended for which Paris 
 professed itself ready as one man to draw the sword, and yet 
 the thousands in the street that night behaved as if each of 
 them had a personal quarrel to settle, not with one or two 
 Germans, but with every son and daughter of the Fatherland.
 
 THE STREETS ON FRIDAY NIGHT, JULY 15. 371 
 
 It was, perhaps, a quarter after eight when I found myself 
 in the Chaussee d'Antin, and the distance to the Boulevard 
 des Italiens was certainly not more than two hundred and 
 fifty yards ; nevertheless, it took me more than half an hour 
 to get over it, for immediately on my emerging into the main 
 thoroughfare I looked at a clock which pointed to nine. Two 
 things stand out vividly in my memory : the first, the prepa- 
 rations of several business houses to illuminate on a grand 
 scale, there and then ; i.e. the putting up of the elaborate 
 crystal devices used by them on the loth of August, the Em- 
 peror's fete-day. It was exactly a month before that date, 
 and a neighbour of an enthusiastic tradesman remarked upon 
 the fact. " I know," was the answer ; " I'll leave it there till 
 the 14th of next month, and then I'll add two bigger ones to 
 it." On the day proposed, not only were there none added, 
 but the original one had also disappeared, for by that time 
 the Second Empire was virtually in the throes of death. The 
 second thing I remember was the enormous strip of calico 
 outside a bookseller's shop, with the announcement, " Dic- 
 tionnaire Franqais-Allemand a 1'usage des Franqais a Berlin." 
 In less than two months I read the following ; it was an ex- 
 tract from the interview between Bismarck and Moltke on 
 the one side and General de Wimpffen on the other, on the 
 eve of the capitulation of Sedan : " You do not know the 
 topography of the environs of Sedan," replied General von 
 Moltke ; " and, seeing that we are on the subject, let me give 
 you a small instance which thoroughly shows the presump- 
 tion, the want of method, of your nation. At the beginning 
 of the campaign, you provided your officers with maps of 
 Germany, when they utterly lacked the means of studying 
 the geography of their own country, seeing that you had no 
 maps of your own territory." I could not help thinking of 
 the bookseller, and wondering how many dictionaries he sold 
 during those first few days. 
 
 I did not get very fa/that night, only as far as the Maison 
 d'Or, where I was perforce obliged to stop and look on. I 
 stood for nearly an hour and a half, for there was no possi- 
 bility of getting a seat, and during that time I only heard one 
 opinion adverse to the war. It was that of a justly celebrated 
 dramatist, who is by no means hostile to either the Emperor 
 or the Empire, albeit that he had declined several years ago 
 to be presented to. Napoleon when Princess Mathilde offered 
 him to do so. He positively hates the Germans, but his hatred
 
 372 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 did not blind him to their great intellectual qualities and to 
 their powers of organization. " It is all very fine to shout 
 ' A Berlin ! ' " he said ; " and it is very probable that some of 
 these bellowers (braillards) will get there, though not in the 
 order of procession they expect ; they will be in front, and 
 the Germans at their backs." He spoke very low, and begged 
 me not to repeat what he had said. " If I am mistaken, I do 
 not want to be twitted with having thrown cold water on the 
 martial ardour of my countrymen ; if I am right, I will will- 
 ingly forego the honour of having prophesied the humilia- 
 tion of my countrymen." That is why I suppress his name 
 here, but I have often thought of his words since ; and when 
 people, Englishmen especially, have accused him of having 
 contributed to the corruption of the Second Empire by his 
 stage works, I have smiled to myself. With the exception of 
 one, he has never written a play that did not teach a valuable 
 moral lesson ; but he is an excellent husband, father, and son, 
 though he is perhaps not over generous with his money. 
 
 I am bound to say that, though the noise on the Boulevards 
 was terrific, and the crowds the densest I have ever seen in 
 Paris or anywhere, they refrained from that horse-play so ob- 
 jectionable in England under similar circumstances. Of course 
 there were exceptions ; such as, for instance, the demonstra- 
 tion at the Prussian Embassy : but, in the main, the behav- 
 iour was orderly throughout. I do not know what might 
 have been the result of any foreigners German or otherwise 
 showing themselves conspicuously, but they were either al- 
 together absent, or else concealed their nationality as much 
 as possible by keeping commendably silent. 
 
 Nevertheless, the Parisian shopkeeper, who is the most 
 arrant coward on the face of the earth where a crowd is con- 
 cerned, put up his shutters during the whole of Saturday and 
 Sunday, except those who professed for cater for the inner man. 
 I doubt whether, on the first-named day, there was a single 
 stroke of work done by the three or four hundred thousand 
 of Parisian artisans. I exclude cabmen, railway porters, and 
 the like. They had their hands full, because the exodus be- 
 gan before the war news was four and twenty hours old. Our 
 own countrymen seemed in the greatest hurry to put the 
 Channel between themselves and France. If the enemy had 
 been already at the gates of Paris their retreat could have 
 been scarcely more sudden. The words " bouches inutiles " 
 had as yet not been pronounced or invented officially ; but I
 
 "BOUCHES INUTILES." 373 
 
 have a notion that a cabman suggested them first, in a con- 
 versation with a brother Jehu. " Voila des bouches utiles 
 qui s'en vont, mon vieux," he said, while waiting on the Place 
 Vendome to take passengers to the railway. Until then I had 
 never heard the word used in that sense. 
 
 Apropos of cabmen, I heard a story that day for the truth 
 of which I will, however, not vouch. There was a cab-stand 
 near the Prussian Embassy, and most of the drivers knew 
 every one of the attaches, the latter being frequent customers. 
 On the Saturday morning, a cab was called from the rank to 
 take a young attache to the eastern railway station. He was 
 going to join his regiment. On alighting from the cab, the 
 attache was about to pay his fare; the driver refused the 
 money. " A man does not pay for his own funeral, monsieur ; 
 and you may take it that I have performed that office for you. 
 Adieu, monsieur." With that he drove off. True or not, the 
 mere invention of the tale would prove that, at any rate, the 
 lower middle classes were cocksure of the utter annihilation 
 of the Germans. 
 
 I happened to have occasion to go to the northern station 
 on the Sunday, to see some one off by the mail. That large, 
 cold, bare hall, which does duty as a waiting-room, was crowd- 
 ed, and a number of young Germans were among the passen- 
 gers ; respectable, stalwart fellows who, to judge by their dress, 
 had occupied good commercial positions in the French capi- 
 tal. Most of them were accompanied by friends or relations. 
 They seemed by no means elated at the prospect before them, 
 and scarcely spoke to one another. As a matter of course, 
 they were scattered all over the place, in groups of three and 
 four. I noticed that there was an exceedingly strong con- 
 tingent of sergents de ville, and several couples of officiers de 
 paix what in England we should call superintendents of po- 
 lice. The latter had evidently received particular instruc- 
 tions, for they had posted, as much as possible, a sergent de 
 ville close to every group. At first I mistook the drift of the 
 supervision, but it was soon explained to me when one of the 
 officiers de paix came up to a group somewhat larger than the 
 others. " Messieurs," he said very politely, " vous 6tes Alle- 
 mands, et je vous prierai de vous mettre ensemble, afin de 
 pouvoir vous proteger, s'il y a besoin." I heard afterwards 
 that, amidst all his weighty occupations, the Emperor him- 
 self had given orders to have the Germans especially protect- 
 ed, as he feared some violence on the part of the Parisians.
 
 374: 
 
 ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 During the next week the excitement did not abate, but, 
 save for some minor incidents, it was the same thing over and 
 over again : impromptu processions along the main thorough- 
 fares to the singing of the " Marseillaise " and the " Chant 
 du Depart," until the crowds had got by heart Alfred de 
 Musset's " Ehin Allemand," of which, until then, not one in 
 a thousand had ever heard. 
 
 Meanwhile the news had spread of the suicide of Prevost- 
 Paradol, the newly appointed French ambassador at Wash- 
 ington, and the republicans were trying to make capital out 
 of it. According to them, it was political shame and re- 
 morse at having deserted his colours, despair at the turn 
 events were taking, that prompted the step. These false- 
 hoods have been repeated until they became legends con- 
 nected with the fall of the Second Empire. To the majority 
 of Englishmen, Prevost-Paradol is not even a name ; talented 
 as he was, Frenchmen would have scarcely known more about 
 him if some politicians, for purposes of their own, had not 
 chosen to convert him into a self-immolated martyr to the 
 Imperialist cause or, rather, to that part of the cause which 
 aimed at the recovery of the left banks of the Rhine. I knew 
 Prevost-Paradol, and he was only distinguished from hun- 
 dreds of thousands of Frenchmen in that his " France Nou- 
 velle " was a magnificent attempt to spur his countrymen's 
 ambition in that direction ; but this very fact is an additional 
 argument against the alleged cause of his self-destruction. 
 He shot himself during the night of the 10th and llth of 
 July, when not the most pessimistically inclined could fore- 
 see the certainty of a war, and, least of all, the disastrous re- 
 sult of it to France. Those who would know the real cause 
 of Prevost-Paradol's suicide had better read a short tale that 
 appeared anonymously in the Revue des Deux Mondes of 
 February, 1860. The hero of " Madame de Marqay " is none 
 other than the brilliant journalist himself, and the germs of 
 suicidal mania were so plainly discernible in him, as to make 
 those who knew the writer wonder that he had not killed 
 himself long before he did. 
 
 I have already said that the excitement did not abate, but 
 the more serious-minded began to look critical, and, among 
 the latter, curiously enough, there were a good many superior 
 officers in the army. They were too loyal to express openly 
 their want of confidence in their leaders, but it was evident 
 enough to the careful listener that that want of confidence
 
 THE EMPEROR AND HIS GENERALS. 375 
 
 did exist. I had a conversation during that week with one 
 of the former, whose name, for obvious reasons, I must sup- 
 press ; and this is, as far as I can remember, what he said, 
 knowing that he could trust me. "There is not a single 
 properly drawn ordnance map of France at the War Office ; 
 and if there were, there is not a single man in power there 
 who would know how to use it. I doubt whether there is a 
 settled plan of campaign ; they'll endeavour to conduct this 
 war as they conducted the Crimean, Italian, and Mexican 
 wars that is, on the principle which stood them in such 
 good stead in Algeria, though they ought to know by this 
 time how very risky those experiments turned out, especially 
 in '59 ; and I have no need to tell you that we are going to 
 confront a different army from that of the Austrians or the 
 Kussians, Todleben notwithstanding. The African school of 
 warfare ought to be played out by now, but it is not. To a 
 certain extent, the Emperor is to blame for this. You re- 
 member what his uncle said : ' There is not a single general 
 of whose draught I am not aware. Some will go up to their 
 waists ; others up to their necks ; others, again, to over their 
 heads ; but the latter number is infinitely small, I assure you.' 
 The Emperor is not in the same position with regard to the 
 capacity of his generals, let alone of his officers." 
 
 " But he ought to be," I objected ; " he interviews a great 
 many of them on Sunday mornings." I was alluding to the 
 informal levee held at the Tuileries every week, to which the 
 generals and the general officers by sea and by land were ad- 
 mitted. 
 
 " You are right he ought to be," was the answer ; " and 
 if a great deal of conscientious trouble on his part could have 
 put him in possession of such knowledge, he would have had 
 it by this time. Of course, you have never been present at 
 such a reception ; for all civilians, with the exception of a 
 few ministers, are rigorously excluded. I repeat, the inten- 
 tion is a good one, but it is not carried out properly. The 
 very fact that at the outset it met with the most strenuous 
 opposition from nearly all the ministers and high dignitaries 
 of the Imperial household ought to have shown his Majesty 
 the necessity of interviewing these officers alone, without as 
 much as a chambellan in waiting. As it is, do you know 
 what happens ? I will tell you. The Emperor passes before 
 these officers as they are standing around the room, stops be- 
 fore nearly every one to ask a question, inviting him, at the
 
 3T6 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 same time, to lodge a protest if necessary against any stand- 
 ing abuse or to suggest a measure of reform. But the cham- 
 bellan is close at his heels ; the minister for war, the marshal 
 commanding the Imperial, Guard, the military governor of 
 Paris, are standing but a few steps away. The officer to 
 whom the question is addressed feels himself tongue-tied ; he 
 knows that all these can hear every word he says, and, rather 
 ,than be marked by his superiors as a tiresome meddler, he 
 prefers to hold his tongue altogether that is, if he be com- 
 paratively honest. Call it cowardice if you like, but most 
 men will tell you that such cowardice exists in all adminis- 
 trations whether civil or military. Consequently, the Em- 
 peror, though he may know a good many officers by name 
 and by sight, in reality knows nothing of their capacities. I 
 may safely say that, for the last fifteen or sixteen years, there 
 have not been a dozen important promotions, either in the 
 army or the navy, justified by the ' record of service ' of the 
 officer promoted. Divisions nay, whole army corps have 
 been confided to men who, in the hour of need, will, no doubt, 
 prove very dashing and very plucky, but who have no more 
 notion of handling large masses of men than an ordinary 
 drill-sergeant. To use a more striking metaphor they have 
 selected the most desperate punters at baccarat to work out 
 complicated chess problems. What the result will be with 
 such a champion as Von Moltke, Heaven only knows. There 
 are men at the head of our cavalry forces who can scarcely 
 hold themselves on horseback ; there are others commanding 
 divisions and even corps-d'armee who know all about bridges, 
 pontoons, artillery, and so forth, but who could no more exe- 
 cute a regularly organized retreat or advance than a child. 
 The theory is that their dash and courage, their reckless, 
 happy-go-lucky, but frequently successful African system, 
 will make up for their ignorance of tactics and strategy. 
 Naturally this is an implied rather than an expressed opin- 
 ion, for many of those favourites believe themselves to be the 
 equals in these latter sciences of Jomini and Napoleon, per- 
 haps of Moltke also. Do not misunderstand me ; there are a 
 number of officers in the French army who have made a care- 
 ful study of the science of war, and who, in that respect, 
 would favourably compare with an equal number of the best 
 instructed German officers, but they have by this time re- 
 signed themselves to keep in the background, because any 
 attempt on their part to raise the standard of military knowl-
 
 A GLANCE AT THE FRENCH ARMY. 377 
 
 edge has for years been systematically discountenanced by 
 those nearest to the throne. On the other hand, the men 
 thus kept at arm's length have not been altogether satisfied 
 to suffer in silence. I do not mean to say that they have 
 given vent to their grievances openly ; they have done worse, 
 perhaps, from the point of view of maintaining the discipline 
 of the army. They have adopted a semi-critical, semi-hostile 
 attitude towards their superiors. The officers' mess, such 
 as it exists in England, is virtually unknown on the Conti- 
 nent, and least of all in France. The unmarried officer 
 takes his daily meals at the table d'hote of an hotel, and he 
 does talk ' shop ' now and then in the presence of civilians. 
 The criticisms he utters do find their way to the barrack- 
 room, so that by now the private has become sceptical with 
 regard to the capabilities of the generals and marshals. The 
 soldier who begins to question the fitness of his chiefs is 
 like the priest who begins to question the infallibility of the 
 pope ; he is a danger to the institution to which he be- 
 longs." 
 
 In reality, my informant told me little that was new, 
 though he perhaps did not suspect that I was so well in- 
 formed. I had heard most of all this, and a great deal be- 
 sides, from a connection of mine by marriage, whose strictures 
 in the same direction came with additional force, seeing that 
 he was a frequent and welcome guest at the Tuileries. He 
 was a general officer, but, with a frankness that bordered on 
 the cynical, maintained that but for his capital voice and 
 skill at leading " the cotillon " he would probably have never 
 risen beyond the rank of captain ; " for there are a thousand 
 captains that know a great deal more than I do, a couple of 
 thousand that know as much as I do, and very few who 
 know less, none of whom have ever been promoted, and never 
 will be, unless they earn their promotion at the point of the 
 sword." According to him, the "records of service" were 
 not as much as looked into at the periods of general promo- 
 tions. " A clever answer to one of the Emperor's questions, 
 a handsome face and pleasing manners, are sufficient to estab- 
 lish a reputation at the Chateau. The ministers for war take 
 particular care not to rectify those impulsive judgments of 
 the Emperor and Empress, because they rightly think that 
 careful inquiries into the candidates' merits would hurt their 
 own proteges, and those of their fellow-ministers. This 
 happy-go-lucky system for a system it has become founded
 
 378 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 upon the most barefaced nepotism, is condoned, by those who 
 ought to have opposed it with all their might and main at 
 the very outset, on the theory that Frenchmen's courage is 
 sure to make up in the end for all shortcomings, which theory 
 in itself is a piece of impertinence, or at any rate of overween- 
 ing conceit, seeing that it implies the absence of such courage 
 in the officers of other nations. But there is something else. 
 All these favourites are jealous of one another, and, mark my 
 words, this jealousy will in this instance lead to disastrous 
 results, because the Emperor will find it as difficult to comply 
 with as to refuse their individual extravagant demands. The 
 time is gone by for radical reforms. ' You cannot swap 
 horses while crossing a stream,' said Abraham Lincoln ; and 
 we are crossing a dangerous stream. The Emperor has, be- 
 sides, a horror of new faces around him, and to extirpate the 
 evil radically he would have to make a clean sweep of his 
 military household." 
 
 I must preface the following notes by a personal remark. 
 For private reasons, which I cannot and must not mention, I 
 have decided not to put my name to these jottings, whether 
 they are published before or after my death. I am aware 
 that by doing this I diminish their value ; because, although 
 I never played a political or even a social part in France, I 
 am sufficiently well known to inspire the reader with confi- 
 dence. As it is, he must take it for granted that I was prob- 
 ably the only foreigner whom Frenchmen had agreed not to 
 consider an enemy in disguise. 
 
 While my relative was giving me the above resume, I was 
 already aware that there existed in the French War Office a 
 scheme of mobilization and a plan of campaign elaborated 
 by Marshal Mel, the immediate predecessor of Marshal Le- 
 bceuf. I knew, moreover, that this plan provided for the 
 formation of three armies, under the respective commands of 
 Marshals MacMahon, Bazaine, and Canrobert, and that the 
 disposition of these three armies had been the basis of nego- 
 tiations for a Franco- Austrian alliance which had been started 
 six weeks previous to the declaration of war by General Le- 
 brun in Vienna. Up till the 22nd or 23rd of July the prepa- 
 rations were carried out in accordance with that original pro- 
 ject ; the respective staffs that had been appointed, the vari- 
 ous regiments and brigades distributed long ago, were already 
 hurrying to the front, when all of a sudden the whole of this 
 plan was modified ; the three armies were to be fused into
 
 NAPOLEON'S MARSHALS. 379 
 
 one, to be called " 1'armee du Eliin," under the sole and ex- 
 clusive command of the Emperor. 
 
 Whence this sudden change ? The historians, with their 
 usual contempt for small causes, have endeavoured to explain 
 it in various ways. According to some, the change was de- 
 cided upon in order to afford the Emperor the opportunity 
 of distinguishing himself ; the " armee du lihin " was to re- 
 vive the glories of the " grande armee ; " there was to be a 
 second edition of the Napoleonic epic. After the first start- 
 ling successes, the Emperor was to return to the capital, and 
 Marshal Kiel's plan was, if practicable, to be taken up once 
 more, that is, the French troops, having established a foot- 
 hold in the enemy's country, were to be divided again under 
 so many Klebers, Soults, and Keys. 
 
 According to others, the Emperor, who until then had 
 been living in a fool's paradise with regard to the quantity, if 
 not with regard to the quality, of the forces at his disposal, 
 suddenly had his eyes opened to the real state of affairs. The 
 six hundred and fifty thousand troops supposed to be at his 
 disposal had their existence mainly on paper : the available 
 reality did not amount to more than a third ; i.e. to about 
 two hundred and fifteen thousand troops of all arms. 
 
 The facts advanced by these historians are true, but they 
 did not determine the change referred to at any rate, not so 
 far as the assumption of the supreme command by the Em- 
 peror himself was concerned. Anxious as the latter may have 
 been, in the interest of his dynasty, to reap the glory of one 
 or two successful battles fought under his immediate super- 
 vision, he was fully aware of his unfitness for such a task, 
 especially in his actual state of health. Louis-Napoleon be- 
 lieved in his star, but he was not an idiot who counted upon 
 luck to decide the fate of battles. If ho had ever fostered 
 such illusions, the campaign of 1859 must have given a rude 
 shock to them, for there he was, more than once, within an 
 ace of defeat; and no one knew this better than he did. The 
 fusing of the three armies into one was due, first, to the diffi- 
 culty, if not impossibility, of constituting three armies with 
 considerably less than three hundred thousand troops; 
 secondly, to the inveterate jealousy of his marshals of one 
 another. Napoleon feared, and justly, that if those three 
 armies went forth under three separate commands, there 
 would be a repetition of the quarrels that had occurred during 
 the Austro-Franco war, when Kiel accused Canrobert of not
 
 380 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 having properly supported him at the right time, and so 
 forth. It will be remembered that the Emperor himself 
 had to intervene to heal those quarrels. Under those cir- 
 cumstances, the Emperor thought it better to risk it, and to 
 take the whole responsibility upon himself. 
 
 The Emperor left St. Cloud on the 28th of July. It is 
 very certain that, even before his departure, his confidence in 
 the late Marshal Mel as an organizer must have been con- 
 siderably shaken, and that the words of Lebo3uf, " We are 
 ready, more than ready," sounded already a hollow mockery 
 to his ear. Here are some of the telegrams which, after the 
 4th of September, were found among the papers at the Tui- 
 leries. They were probably copies of the originals, though I 
 am by no means certain that they were forwarded to St. Cloud 
 at the time of their reception. It would have been better, 
 perhaps, if they had been. 
 
 " Metz, 20 July, 1870, 9.50 a.m. From Chief of Commis- 
 sariat Department to General Blondeau, War Office, Paris. 
 There is at Metz neither sugar, coffee, rice, brandy, nor salt. 
 We have but little bacon and biscuit. Despatch, at least, a 
 million rations to Thionville." 
 
 " General Ducrot to War Office, Paris. Strasburg, 20 July, 
 1870, 8.30 p.m. By to-morrow there will be scarcely fifty 
 men left to guard Neuf-Brisach ; Fort-Mortier, Schlestadt, 
 la Petite-Pierre, and Lichtenberg are equally deserted. It is 
 the result of the orders we are carrying out. The Garde 
 Mobile and local National Guards might easily be made avail- 
 able for garrison duty, but I am reluctant to adopt such 
 measures, seeing that your excellency has granted me no 
 power to that effect. It appears certain that the Prussians 
 are already masters of all the passes of the Black Forest." 
 
 " From the General commanding the 2nd Army Corps to 
 War Office, Paris. Saint-Avoid, 21 July, 1870, 8.55 a.m. 
 The depot sends enormous parcels of maps, which are abso- 
 lutely useless for the moment. We have not a single map of 
 the French frontier. It would be better to send greater 
 quantities of what would be more useful, and which are abso- 
 lutely wanting at this moment." 
 
 "From General Michael to War Office, Paris. Belfort, 
 21 July, 1870, 7.30 a.m. Have arrived at Belfort ; did not 
 find my brigade, did not find a general of division. What 
 am I to do? Do not know where are my .regiments." 
 
 " From General commanding 4th Army Corps to Major-
 
 SOME TELEGKAMS. 
 
 381 
 
 General, Paris. Thionville, 21 July, 9.12 a.m. The 4th 
 Corps has as yet neither canteens, ambulances, nor baggao-e- 
 waggons, either for the troops or the staff. There is*an 
 utter lack of everything." 
 
 _ I need quote no further ; there were about two hundred 
 missives in all, all dated within the week following the offi- 
 cial declaration of war. It would be difficult to determine 
 how many of these the Emperor was permitted to see, but 
 there is no doubt that he had a pretty correct idea of the 
 state of affairs, for here is a fact which I have not seen 
 stated anywhere, but for the truth of which I can vouch. 
 For full two years before the outbreak of hostilities, the 
 Legislature seemed bent upon advocating all kinds of retrench- 
 ment in the war budget. During the first six months of 
 1870, the thing had almost become a mania with them, and 
 the Emperor appealed to M. Thiers, through the interme- 
 diary of Marshal Lebceuf himself, to help him stem the tide 
 of this pseudo-economy. Thiers promised his support, and 
 faithfully kept his word ; but his aid came too late. The 
 Emperor, however, felt grateful to him, and, only thirty-six 
 hours before his departure for the seat of war, he offered him 
 the portfolio of war, again through the intermediary of Mar- 
 shal Leboeuf. The offer was respectfully declined, but what 
 must have been the state of mind of Louis-Napoleon with 
 regard to his officers, to prefer to them a civilian at such a 
 critical moment ? I may state here that it was always the 
 height of M. Thiers' ambition to be considered a great 
 strategist and tactician, and also a military engineer. " Jo- 
 mini was a civilian," he frequently exclaimed. Those who 
 were competent to judge, have often declared that Thiers' 
 pretensions in that direction were, to a certain extent, jus- 
 tified by his talents. Curiously enough, M. de Freycinet is 
 affected by a similar mania. 
 
 Here is a certain correlative to the above-mentioned fact. 
 When, a few months after the Commune, things were get- 
 ting ship-shape in Paris, a large bundle of printed matter 
 was unearthed in the erstwhile Imperial (then National) 
 Printing Works. It contained, amongst others, a circular 
 drawn up by the Emperor himself, entitled " A Bad Piece 
 of Economy ; " it was addressed to the deputies, and dated 
 May, 1870 ; it showed the presumptive strength of the army 
 of the North-German Confederation as compared with that 
 of France, and wound up with the following sentence : " If
 
 382 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 we compare the military condition of North- Germany with 
 ours, we shall be able to judge how far those who would still 
 further reduce our national forces are sufficiently enlightened 
 as to our real interests." 
 
 It has always been a mystery to me, and to those who 
 were aware of its existence, why this circular was not dis- 
 tributed at the proper time ; though, by the light of subse- 
 quent events, one fails to see what good it could hare done 
 then. Were these events foreseen at the Tuileries as early 
 as May ? I think not. The majority of the Emperor's en- 
 tourage wore confident that war with Germany was only a 
 matter of time ; very few considered it to be so imminent. 
 One cannot for a moment imagine that the suppression of 
 this circular was due to accidental or premeditated neglect ; 
 for the sovereign, though ailing and low-spirited, was still 
 too mindful of his prerogatives not to have visited such neg- 
 lect of his wishes, whether intentional or not, with severe 
 displeasure. Nor can one for a moment admit that the Em- 
 peror was hoodwinked into the belief that the circular had 
 been distributed. His so-called advisers probably prevailed 
 upon him to forego the distribution of the document, lest it 
 should open the eyes of the nation to the inferiority of 
 France's armaments. The only man who had dared to point 
 out that inferiority, three years previously, was General 
 Trochu, and his book, " 1'Armee Franqaise," had the effect 
 of ostracizing him from the Tuileries. The smart and swag- 
 gering colonels who surrounded the Empress did not scruple 
 to spread the most ridiculous slanders with regard to its au- 
 thor ; but the Emperor, though aware that Trochu was sys- 
 tematically opposed to his dynasty, also knew that he was an 
 able, perhaps the ablest soldier in the country. The subse- 
 quent failure of Trochu does not invalidate that judgment. 
 " I know what Trochu could and would do if he were un- 
 hampered ; but I need not concern myself with that, seeing 
 that he will be hampered," said Von Moltke at the beginning 
 of the siege. Colonel Stoffel, the French military attache 
 at Berlin, was severely reprimanded by Marshal Niel and by 
 Lebceuf afterwards for his constant endeavours to acquaint 
 the Emperor with the magnificent state of efficiency of the 
 Prussian army and its auxiliaries. Ostensibly, it was because 
 he had been guilty of a breach of diplomatic and military 
 etiquette; in reality, because the minister for war and his 
 "festive" coadjutors objected to being constantly harassed
 
 A WOULD-BE MARIA-THERESA. 333 
 
 in their pleasures by the sovereign's suspicions of their men- 
 tal nakedness. " Xous 1'avons eu, votre Ehin allemand. . . . 
 Ou le pere a passe, passera bien 1'enfant," was their credo ; 
 and they continued to dance, and to flirt, and to intrigue for 
 places, which, in their hands, became fat sinecures. They 
 would have laughed to scorn the dictum of the first Napo- 
 leon, that " there are no bad regiments, only bad colonels ; " 
 in their opinion, there were no bad colonels, except those 
 perhaps who did not constantly jingle their spurs on the 
 carpeted floors of the Empress's boudoir, and the parqueted 
 arena of the Empress's ball-room. The Emperor was too 
 "much of a dreamer and a philosopher for them ; he could 
 not emancipate himself from his German education. The 
 best thing to do was to let him write and print whatever he 
 liked, and then prevail upon him at the last moment not to 
 publish, lest it might offend national vanity. Contemptuous 
 as they were of the German spirit of plodding, they had, 
 nevertheless, taken a leaf from an eminent German's book. 
 " Let them say and write what they like, as long as they let 
 me do what I like," exclaimed Frederick the Great, on one 
 occasion. They slightly reversed the sentence. "Let the 
 Emperor say and write what he likes, as long as he lets us do 
 what we like ; and one thing we will take care to do, namely, 
 not to let him publish his writings." They had forgotten, if 
 ever they knew them for their ignorance was as startling as 
 their conceit the magnificent lines of the founder of the 
 dynasty which they had systematically undermined for years 
 by their dissipation, frivolity, and corruption : " The general 
 is the head, the all in all of the army. It was not the Eoman 
 army that conquered Gaul, but Cassar ; it was not the Car- 
 thaginian army that made the republican army tremble at 
 the very gates of Rome, but Hannibal ; it was not the Mace- 
 donian army that penetrated to the Indus, but Alexander ; 
 it was not the French army which carried the war as far as 
 the Weser and the Inn, but Turenne ; it was not the Prus- 
 sian army which defended, during seven years, Prussia against 
 the three greatest powers in Europe, but Frederick the 
 Great." 
 
 And she who aspired to play the role of a Maria-Theresa, 
 when she was not even a Marie-Antoinette, and far more 
 harmful than even a Marie-Louise, applauded the vapourings 
 of those misguided men. " Le courage fait tout," had been 
 the motto for nearly a score of years at the Tuileries. It did
 
 384: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 a good deal in the comedies a la Marivaux, in the Boccacian 
 charades that had been enacted there during that time ; she 
 had yet to learn that it would avail little or nothing in the 
 Homeric struggle which was impending.
 
 THE WAR. 385 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 The war Keaction before the Emperor's departure The moral effects of tho 
 publication of the draft treaty " Bismarck has done the Emperor" The 
 Parisians did not like the Empress The latter always anxious to assume 
 the regency A retrospect Crimean war The Empress and Queen Vic- 
 toria Solferino The regency of '65 Bismarck's millinery bills Lord 
 Lyons Bismarck and the Due de Gramont Lord Lvons does not foresee 
 war The republicans and the war The Empress Two ministerial coun- 
 cils and their consequences Mr. Prescott-Hewett sent for Joseph Ferrari, 
 the Italian philosopher The Empress The ferment in Paris" Too much 
 prologue to ' The Taming of the German Shrew ' " The tirst engagement 
 - The " Marseillaise " An infant performer The " Marseillaise " at the 
 Comedie-FranQaise The " Marseillaise" by command of the Emperor A 
 patriotic ballet The courtesy of the French at Fontenoy The Cafe de la 
 Paix General Beaufort d'liautpoul and Moltke Newspaper correspond- 
 ents Edmond About tells a story about one of his colleagues News sup- 
 plied by the Government What it amounted to The information it gave 
 to the enemy Bazaine, " the glorious" one Palikao The fall of the Em- 
 pire does not date from Sedan, but from Wocrth and Speicheren Those 
 who dealt it the heaviest blow The Empress, the Empress, and no one but 
 the Empress. 
 
 before the Emperor started for the seat of war it 
 was very evident, to those who kept their eyes open, that a 
 reaction had set in among the better classes. They were no 
 longer confident about France's ability to chastise the arro- 
 gance of the King of Prussia. The publication of the fa- 
 mous " draft treaty " had convinced them " qne Bismarck 
 avait roule 1'empereur," anglice, " that the Emperor had 
 been bone;" and, notwithstanding their repeated assertions 
 of being able to dispense with the moral support of Europe, 
 they felt not altogether resigned about the animosity which 
 the revelation of that document had provoked. Honestly 
 speaking, I do not think that they regretted the duplicity of 
 Louis- Napoleon in having tried to steal a march upon the 
 co-signatories of the treaty guaranteeing the protection of 
 Belgium ; but it wounded their pride that he should have 
 been found out to no purpose. The word " imbecile " began 
 to circulate freely ; -and when it became known that he had 
 conferred the regency upon the Empress, the expression of 
 17
 
 386 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 contempt and disapproval became stronger still. In spite of 
 everything that has been said to the contrary, the Parisians 
 did not like the Empress. I have already noted elsewhere 
 that those frankly hostile to her did not scruple to apply the 
 word " I'Espagnole " in a depreciating sense ; those whose 
 animosity did not go so far merely considered her " une fem- 
 me a la mode," and by no means fitted to take the reins of 
 government, especially under circumstances so grave as the 
 present ones. On the other hand, the Empress always showed 
 herself exceedingly anxious to exercise the functions of re- 
 
 gent. The flatterers and courtiers around her had imbued 
 er with the idea that she was a kind of Elizabeth and a 
 Catherine in one, and the clerical element in her entourage 
 was not the least blamable in that respect. 
 
 During the Crimean war, Lord Clarendon had already 
 been compelled to combat the project, though he could not 
 do so openly. Napoleon III. had several times expressed his 
 intention of taking the command of the army. His minis- 
 ters, and especially MM. Troplong and Baroche, begged of 
 him not to do so. Even Queen Victoria, to whom the idea 
 was broached while on her visit to Paris, threw cold water 
 upon it as far as was possible. But the Empress encouraged it 
 to her utmost. " I fail to see," she said to our sovereign, " that 
 he would be expose d to greater dangers there than elsewhere." 
 It was the prospect of the regency, not of the glory that 
 might possibly accrue to her consort, that appealed to the 
 Empress ; for in reality she had not the least sympathy with 
 the object of that war, any more than with that of 1859. 
 Eussia was ostensibly fighting for the custody of the Holy 
 Sepulchre ; and the defeat of Austria, she had been told by 
 the priests, would entail the ruin of the temporal power of 
 the pope. And Empress Eugenie never attained to anything 
 more than parrot knowledge in the way of politics. 
 
 However, in 1859 she had her wish, and, before the open- 
 ing of the campaign, she declared to the Corps Legislatif 
 that " she had perfect faith in the moderation of the Em- 
 peror when the right moment for peace should have arrived." 
 Her ladies-in-waiting and the male butterflies around her 
 openly discounted the political effects of every engagement 
 on the field of battle. The Emperor, according to them, 
 would make peace with Austria with very few sacrifices on 
 the latter's part, for it was a Conservative and Catholic power, 
 which could not be humiliated to the bitter end, while Italy
 
 HENPECKED SOVEREIGNS. 337 
 
 was, after all, but a hotbed of conspiracy, revolutionary, anti- 
 Catholic, and so forth. 
 
 And I know, for a positive fact, that the Emperor was, 
 as it were, compelled to suspend operations after Solferino, 
 because the Minister for War had ceased to send troops and 
 ammunitions " by order of the regent." The Minister for 
 Foreign Affairs endeavoured by all means in his power to 
 alarm his sovereign. 
 
 Nevertheless, in 1865, when he went to Algeria to seek 
 some relief from his acute physical sufferings, Napoleon III. 
 was badgered into confiding the regency once more to his 
 wife. There is no other word, because there was no necessity 
 for such a measure, seeing that he did not leave French terri- 
 tory. We have an inveterate habit of laughing at the " hen- 
 pecked husband," and no essayist has been bold enough as 
 yet to devote a chapter to him from a purely historical point 
 of view. The materials are not only at hand in France, but 
 in England, Germany, and Russia also ; above all, in the lat- 
 ter country. He, the essayist, might safely leave Catherine 
 de Medici out of the question. He need not go back as far. 
 He might begin with Marie de Medici and her daughter, 
 Henrietta-Maria. Sometimes the "henpecking" turns out 
 to be for the world's benefit, as when Sophie-Dorothea wor- 
 ries her spouse to let her first boy wear a heavy christening 
 dress and crown, which eventually kill the infant, who makes 
 room for Frederick the Great. But one could have very well 
 spared the servant-wench who henpecked Peter the Great, 
 and Scarron's widow who henpecked Louis XIV., and Marie- 
 Antoinette and the rest. 
 
 The regency of '65, though perhaps not disastrous in it- 
 self, was fraught with the most disastrous consequences for 
 the future. It gave the Empress the political importance 
 which she had been coveting for years ; henceforth she made 
 it a habit to be present at the councils of ministers, who in 
 their turn informed her personally of events which ought to 
 have remained strictly between them and the chief of the 
 State. This went on until M. Emile Ollivier came into 
 power, January 2, 1870. The Italian and Austrian ambas- 
 sadors, however, continued to flatter her vanity by constantly 
 appealing to her ; the part they played on the 4th of Septem- 
 ber shows plainly enough how they profited in the interest of 
 their governments by these seemingly diplomatic indiscre- 
 tions on their own part.
 
 338 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 As for Bismarck, as some one who was very much behind 
 the political scenes in Berlin once said, " His policy consist- 
 ed in paying milliners' and dressmakers' bills in Paris for 
 ladies to whosa personal adornment and appearance he was 
 profoundly indifferent." I am bound to say that Lord Lyons 
 courteously but steadfastly refused to be drawn out " diplo- 
 matically " by the Empress. While paying due homage to 
 the woman and to the sovereign, he tacitly declined to con- 
 sider her a pawn in the political game, and, though always 
 extremely guarded in his language, could scarcely refrain 
 from showing his contempt for those who did. I do not 
 know whether Lord Lyons will leave behind any " memoirs ; " 
 if he do, we shall probably get not only nothing but the 
 truth, but the whole truth, with regard to the share of the 
 Empress in determining the war ; and we shall find that that 
 war was not decided upon between the Imperial couple be- 
 tween the 14th and loth of July, '70, but between the 5th 
 and 6th of July. Meanwhile, without presuming to antici- 
 pate such revelations on the part of our ambassador, I may 
 note here my own recollections on the subject. 
 
 On Tuesday, the 5th of July, about 2.30 p. m., I was walk- 
 ing along the Faubourg Saint-Honore, when, just in front 
 of the Embassy, I was brought to a standstill by Lord Lyons' 
 carriage turning into the courtyard from the street. His 
 lordship was inside. We were on very good terms, I may say 
 on very friendly terms, and he beckoned me to come in. I 
 was at the short flight of steps leading to the hall almost as 
 soon as the carriage, and we went inside together. I do not 
 suppose I was in his private room for more than ten min- 
 utes, but I brought away the impression that, although the 
 Due de Gramont and M. Emile Ollivier might think it ne- 
 cessary to adopt a bellicose tone in face of the Hohenzollern 
 candidature, there was little or no fear of war, because the 
 Emperor was decidedly inclined to peace. I remember this 
 the more distinctly, seeing that Lord Lyons told me that he 
 had just returned from an interview with the Minister for 
 Foreign Affairs. I am not certain of the exact words used 
 by his lordship, but positive as to the drift of one of his re- 
 marks ; namely, that the Due de Gramont was the last per- 
 son who ought to conduct the negotiations. " There is too 
 much personal animosity between him and Bismarck, owing 
 mainly to the latter having laughed his pretensions to scorn 
 as a diplomatist while the duke was at Vienna." I am cer-
 
 A TALK WITH LORD LYOXS. 339 
 
 tain the words were to that effect. Then he added, " I can 
 understand though I fail to approve De Gramont's personal 
 irritation, but cannot account for Ollivier's, and he seems as 
 pugnacious as the other. Nevertheless, I repeat, the whole 
 of this will blow over : William is too wise a man to go to 
 war on such a pretext, and the Emperor is too ill not to want 
 peace. I wish the Empress would leave him alone. I am 
 going to Ollivier's to-night, and I'll know more about it by 
 to-morrow morning." 
 
 It is very evident from this that the historians were sub- 
 sequently wrongly informed as to M. Emile Ollivier's attitude 
 at that moment, which they have described as exactly the re- 
 verse from what Lord Lyons found it. I knew little or noth- 
 ing of M. Ollivier, still he did not give me the impression of 
 being likely to adopt a hectoring tone just in order to please 
 the gallery, the gallery being in this instance the clientele of 
 the opposition, whom the Emperor feared more than any one 
 else. From all I have been able to gather since, Louis-Na- 
 poleon seemed racked with anxiety, but, as one of my inform- 
 ants, who was scarcely away from his side at the time, said 
 afterwards, he was not pondering over the consequences of 
 war which he fancied he was able to prevent, he was ponder- 
 ing the consequences of peace. Translated into plain lan- 
 guage, it meant that the republican minority, with its recent 
 accession of representatives in the chambers and its still more 
 unscrupulous adherents outside, were striving with might and 
 main, not to goad the Emperor into a war, but to make him 
 keep a peace which, if they had had the chance, they would 
 have denounced as humiliating to France. 
 
 Unfortunately for France, they found an unexpected ally 
 in the Empress. The latter urged on the war with Prussia, 
 in order to secure to her son the imperial crown which was 
 shaking on the head of her husband ; the former were play- 
 ing the game known colloquially as " Heads, I win ; tails, you 
 lose." Peace preserved by means of diplomatic negotiations 
 would give them the opportunity of holding up the Empire 
 to scorn as being to weak to safeguard the national honour ; 
 war would give them the opportunity of airing their plati- 
 tudes about the iniquity of standing armies and the sacrifice 
 of human life, etc. I go further still, and unhesitatingly af- 
 firm that, if any party was aware of the corruption in the 
 army, it was the republican one. The plebiscite of May, with 
 its thousands of votes adverse to the Imperial regime among
 
 390 
 
 ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 which votes there were those of a great many officers had not 
 only given them a chance of counting their numbers, but of 
 obtaining information, not available to their adversaries in 
 power. This is tantamount to an indictment of having de- 
 liberately contributed to the temporary ruin of their country 
 for political purposes, and such I intend it to be. I am not 
 speaking without good grounds. 
 
 On the day I met Lord Lyons, two ministerial councils 
 were held at Saint-Cloud, both presided over by the Emperor. 
 Between the first and the second, the peaceful sentiments of 
 the chief of the State underwent no change. So little did 
 the Emperor foresee or desire war, that on the evening of 
 that same day, while the second council of ministers was 
 being held, he sent one of his aides-de-camp to my house for 
 the exact address of Mr. Prescott-Hewett, the eminent Eng- 
 lish surgeon. I was not at home, and on my return, an hour 
 later, sent the address by telegraph to Saint-Cloud. I have 
 since learnt that, on the same night, a telegram was despatched 
 to London, inquiring of Mr. Hewett when it would be con- 
 venient for him to hold a consultation in Paris. An appoint- 
 ment was made, but Mr. Hewett eventually went in August, 
 to the seat of war, to see his illustrious patient. I believe, 
 but am not certain, that he saw him at Chalons. 
 
 On the 6th of July, there was a third council of ministers 
 at Saint- Cloud, at ten o'clock in the morning, in order to 
 draw up the answer to M. Cochery's interpellation on the 
 Hohenzollern candidature. The latter was supposed to have 
 been inspired by M. Thiers, but I will only state what I know 
 positively with regard to the Emperor. At a little after two 
 that afternoon, I happened to be at the Cafe de la Paix, when 
 my old friend, Joseph Ferrari, came up to me.* He was a 
 great friend of Adolphe and Elysee, the brothers of Emile 
 Ollivier. He looked positively crestfallen, and, knowing him 
 to be a sincere advocate of peace, I had no need to ask him 
 for the nature of the news he brought. I could see at a 
 glance that it was bad. He, however, left me no time to put 
 a question. 
 
 " It's all over," he said at once, " and, unless a miracle 
 happens, we'll have war in less than a fortnight." He im- 
 
 * Joseph Ferrari was an Italian by birth, but spent a great part of his time 
 in France. He is best known by his " Philosophes Salaries," and died in Rome, 
 1876. EDITOR.
 
 THE EMPRESS STILL. 39! 
 
 mediately went on. " Wait for another hour, and then you'll 
 see the effect of De Gramont's answer to Cochery's interpel- 
 lation in the Chamber. Xot only the Prussians, but the 
 smallest nation in Europe would not stand it." 
 
 "But," I remarked, "about this time yesterday I w r as 
 positively assured, and on the best authority, that the Em- 
 peror was absolutely opposed to any but a pacific remon- 
 strance." 
 
 " Your informant was perfectly correct," was the answer ; 
 " and as late as ten o'clock last night, at the termination of 
 the second council of ministers, his sentiments underwent no 
 change. Immediately after that, the Empress had a conver- 
 sation with the Emperor, which 1 know for certain lasted till 
 one o'clock in the morning. The result of this conversation 
 is the ans\ver, the text of which you will see directly, and 
 which is tantamount to a challenge to Prussia. Mark my 
 words, the Empress will not cease from troubling until she 
 has driven France into a war with the only great Protestant 
 power on the Continent. That power defeated, she will 
 endeavour to destroy the rising unity of Italy. She little 
 knows that Victor-Emanuel will not wait until then, and 
 that, at the first success of the French on the Rhine, he will 
 cross the Alps at a sign of Prussia; that at the first success 
 of Prussia, the Italian troops will start on their march to 
 Rome. Xay, I repeat, it is the Empress who will prove the 
 ruin of France." 
 
 That playful cry of the Empress, which she was so fond of 
 uttering in the beginning of her married life, " As for my- 
 self, I am a Legitimist," without understanding, or endeavour- 
 ing to understand its import, had gradually grafted itself on 
 her mind, although it had ceased to be on her lips. Impa- 
 tient of contradiction, self-willed and tyrannical, both by 
 nature and training, her sudden and marvellous elevation to 
 one of the proudest positions in Europe could not fail to 
 strengthen those defects of character. Superstitious, like 
 most Spaniards, she was firmly convinced that the gipsy who 
 foretold her future greatness was a Divine messenger, and 
 from that to the conviction that she occupied the throne by 
 a right as Divine as that claimed by the Bourbons there was 
 but one short step. A corollary to Divine right meant, to 
 her, personal and irresponsible government, That was her 
 idea of legitimism." Though by no means endowed with high 
 intellectual gifts, she perceived well enough, in the beginning,
 
 392 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 that the Second Empire was not a very stable edifice, either 
 with regard to its foundations or superstructure, and, until 
 England propped it up by an alliance, and a State visit from 
 our sovereign, she kept commendably coy. But from that 
 moment she aspired to be something more than the arbiter 
 of fashion. As I have already said, she failed in prevailing 
 upon the Emperor to go to the Crimea. In '59 she was more 
 successful, in '65 she was more successful still. In the former 
 year, she laid the foundation of what was called the Empress's 
 party; in the latter, the scaffolding was removed from the 
 structure, henceforth the work was done inside. She, no 
 more than her surroundings, had the remotest idea that 
 France was gradually undergoing a political change, that she 
 was recovering her constitutional rights. Her party was like 
 the hare in the fable that used the wrong end of the opera- 
 glass, and lived in a fool's paradise with regard to the distance 
 that divided them from the sportsman, until he was fairly 
 upon them, in the shape of the liberal ministry of the 2nd 
 of January, 1870. 
 
 M. Emile Ollivier, to his credit be it said, refused to be 
 guided by his predecessors. He studiously avoided informing 
 the Empress of the affairs of State, let alone discussing them 
 with her. Apart from the small fry of the Imperial party, 
 he made two powerful enemies the Empress herself, and 
 Eouher, who saw in this refusal to follow precedent an im- 
 plied censure upon himself. Eouher, I repeat once more, 
 was honest to the backbone, but fond of personal power. 
 The Empire to him meant nothing but the Emperor, the 
 Empress, and the heir to the throne ; just as Germany meant 
 nothing to Bismarck but the Hohenzollern dynasty. He 
 was one of the first to proclaim, loudly and openly, that the 
 plebiscite of the 8th of May meant an overwhelming mani- 
 festation, not in favour of the liberal Empire, but in favour 
 of the Emperor; and when the latter, to do him justice, 
 declined to look at it in that light, he deserted him for the 
 side of his wife. It is an open secret that the first use the 
 Empress meant to make of her power as regent, after the 
 first signal victory of French arms, was to sweep away the 
 cabinet of the 2nd of January. The Imperial decree con- 
 ferring the regency upon her, "during the absence of the 
 Emperor at the head of his army," and dated the 22nd of 
 July, invested her with very limited power. 
 
 Meanwhile, pending the departure of the Emperor, Paris
 
 SPECTACULAR PROLOGUES. 393 
 
 was in a ferment, but, to the careful observer, it was no 
 longer the unalloyed enthusiasm of the first few days. There 
 were just as many people in the streets ; the shouts of " A 
 Berlin ! " though, perhaps, not so sustained, were just as loud 
 every now and then ; the troops leaving for the front received 
 tremendous ovations, and more substantial proofs of the peo- 
 ple's goodwill ; the man who dared to pronounce the word 
 "peace" ran a great risk of being rent to pieces by the 
 crowds a thing which almost happened one night in front 
 of the Cafe de Madrid, on the Boulevard Montmartre : still, 
 the enthusiasm was not the same. " There seems to be a 
 great deal of prologue to 'The Taming of that German 
 Shrew,' " said a French friend, who was pretty familiar with 
 Shakespeare ; and he was not far wrong, for the Christopher 
 Sly abounded. The bivouacs of the troops about to take 
 their departure reminded one somewhat more forcibly of 
 operatic scenes and equestrian dramas of the circus type than 
 of the preparations for the stern necessities of war with this 
 difference, that the contents of the goblet were real, and 
 the viands not made of cardboard. " They are like badly 
 made cannons, these soldiers," said some one else : " they are 
 crammed up to the muzzle, and they do not go off." In 
 short, the more sensible of the Paris population began to 
 conclude that a little less intoning of patriotic strophes and 
 a good deal more of juxtaposition with the German troops 
 was becoming advisable. The reports of the few preliminary 
 skirmishes that had taken place were no doubt favourable to 
 the French; at the same time, there was no denying the 
 fact that they had taken place on French and not on Ger- 
 man territory, which was not quite in accordance with the 
 spirit of the oft-repeated cry of "A Berlin ! " In accordance 
 with the programme of which that cry was the initial quota- 
 tion, the French ought, by this time, to have been already 
 half on their way to the Prussian capital. That is what sen- 
 sible, nay, clever people expressed openly. Nevertheless, the 
 cry continued, nor was there any escape from the " Marseil- 
 laise," either by day or night. Every now and then a more 
 than usually dense group might be seen at a street corner. 
 The centre of the group was composed of a woman, with a 
 baby in her arms ; the little one could scarcely speak, but its 
 tiny voice reproduced more or less accurately the air of the 
 " Marseillaise : " & deep silence prevailed during the perform- 
 ance in order to give the infant a fair chance ; deafening ap-
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 plause greeted the termination of the solo, and a shower of 
 coppers fell into the real or pseudo mother's lap. On the 
 18th of July, the day of the official declaration of war in 
 Paris, the Comedie-Fran9aise performed " Le Lion Amou- 
 reux " of Ponsard.* At the end of the second act, the public 
 clamoured for the "Marseillaise." There was not a single 
 member of the company capable of complying with the re- 
 quest, " so the stage manager for the week " had to come 
 forward and ask for a two-days' adjournment, during which 
 some one might study it. Of course, the honour of sing- 
 ing the revolutionary hymn was to devolve upon a woman, 
 according to the precedent established in '48, when Eachel 
 had intoned it. From what I learnt a few days afterwards, 
 the candidates for the distinguished task were not many, in 
 spite of the tacit consent of the Government. The ladies of 
 the company, most of whom, like their fellow-actors, had 
 been always very cordially treated by the Emperor on the 
 occasion of their professional visits to Saint-Cloud, Com- 
 piegne, and Fontainebleau, instinctively guessed the pain the 
 concession must have caused the chief of the State, and un- 
 der some pretext declined. Mdlle. Agar accepted, and sang 
 the " Marseillaise," in all forty-four times, from the 20th of 
 July to the 17th of September, the day of the final invest- 
 ment of the capital by the German armies. 
 
 It must not be supposed, though, that the Government 
 had waited until the day of the official declaration of war to 
 sanction the performance of the " Marseillaise " in places of 
 public resort. I remember crossing the Gardens of the Tui- 
 leries in the afternoon of Sunday, the 17th of July. One of 
 the military bands was performing a selection of music. The 
 custom of doing so during the summer months has prevailed 
 for many years, both in the capital and in the principal gar- 
 rison towns of the provinces. All at once they struck up the 
 " Marseillaise." I looked with surprise at my companion, a 
 member of the Emperor's household. He caught the drift 
 of my look. 
 
 " It is by the Emperor's express command," he said. " It 
 is the national war-song. In fact, it is that much more than 
 a revolutionary hymn." 
 
 " But war has not been declared," I objected. 
 
 * I believe there exists an English version of the play, entitled " A Son of 
 the Soil." I am not certain of the title. EDITOB.
 
 THE MARSEILLAISE. 395 
 
 " It will be to-morrow," was the answer. 
 
 The public, which in this instance was mainly composed 
 of the better classes, apparently refused to consider the " Mar- 
 seillaise " a national war-song, and applause at its termination 
 was but very lukewarm. 
 
 I have already spoken of the scene I witnessed in connec- 
 tion with the departure of the Germans on that same Sunday 
 early in the morning, and have also noted the demonstration 
 in front of the German Embassy on the previous Friday night. 
 I will not be equally positive with regard to the exact dates 
 of the succeeding exhibitions of bad taste on the part of the 
 Parisians, but I remember a very striking one which hap- 
 pened between the official declaration of war and the end of 
 July. It was brought under my notice, not by a foreigner, 
 but by a Frenchman, who was absolutely disgusted with it. 
 We were sitting one evening outside the Cafe de la Paix, 
 which, being the resort of some noted Imperialists, I had 
 begun to visit more frequently than I had done hitherto. 
 There was a terrible din on the Boulevards : the evening 
 papers had just published a very circumstantial account of 
 that insignificant skirmish which cost Lieutenant Winslow 
 his life, and in which the French had taken a couple of 
 prisoners. " They " (the prisoners), suggested an able edi- 
 tor, " ought to be brought to Paris and publicly exhibited 
 as an example." " And, what is more," said my friend who 
 had read the paragraph to me, "he means what he says. 
 These are the descendants of a nation who prides herself 
 on having said at Fontenoy, ' Messieurs, les Anglais tirez les 
 premiers,' which, by-the-by, they did not say.* If you care 
 to come with me, I'll show you what would" be the probable 
 
 * It was, in fact, an English officer who shouted, " Messieurs des gardes 
 franchises, tirez ; " to which the French replied, " Messieurs, nous ne tirons 
 jamais les premiers ; tirez vous memes. ' But it was not politeness that dic- 
 tated the reply ; it was the expression of the acknowledged and constantly in- 
 culcated doctrine that all infantry troops which fired the first were indubitably 
 beaten. We find the doctrine clearly stated in the infantry instructions of 
 1672, and subsequently in the following order of Louis XIV. to his troops : 
 " The soldier shall be taught not to fire the first, and to stand the fire of the 
 enemy, seeing that an enemy who has fired is assuredly beaten when his ad- 
 versary has his powder left." At the battle of Dettingen, consequently, two 
 
 point to praise 
 
 colonel who, in order to prevent his troops from firing, constantly made them 
 shoulder their muskets. EDITOR.
 
 396 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 fate of such prisoners if the writer of that paragraph had his 
 will." 
 
 So said ; so done. In about a quarter of an hour we- were 
 seated at the Cafe de FHorloge, in the Champs Elysees, and 
 my friend was holding out five francs fifty centimes in pay- 
 ment for two small glasses of so-called " Fine Champagne," 
 plus the waiter's tip. The admission was gratis; and the 
 difference between those who went in and those who remained 
 outside was that the latter could hear the whole of the per- 
 formance without seeing it, and without disbursing a farthing ; 
 while the former could see the whole of the performance 
 without hearing a note, for the din there was also infernal. 
 Shortly after our arrival, the band struck up the inevitable 
 " Marseillaise," but the audience neither listened nor ap- 
 plauded. 
 
 This was, after all, but the overture to the entertainment 
 to which my friend had invited me, and which consisted of a 
 spectacular pantomime representing an engagement between 
 a regiment or a battalion of Zouaves and Germans. As a 
 matter of course, the latter had the worst of it ; and, at the 
 termination, a couple of them were brought in and compelled 
 to sue for mercy on their knees. I am bound to say that the 
 thing hung fire altogether, and that, but for the remarkable 
 selection of handsome legs of the Zouaves, not even the hare- 
 brained young fellows with which the audience was largely 
 besprinkled would have paid any attention. 
 
 In the whole of Paris there was no surer centre of infor- 
 mation of the state of affairs at the front than the Cafe de la 
 Paix. It was the principal resort of the Bonapartists. There 
 were Pietri, the prefect of police, Sampierro, Abatucci, and a 
 score or two of others ; all cultivating excellent relations with 
 the Chateau. There was also the General Beaufort d'Haitt- 
 poul, to whom Bismarck subsequently, through the pen of 
 Dr. Moritz Busch, did the greatest injury a man can do to a 
 soldier, in accusing him of drunkenness when he came to 
 settle some of the military conditions of the armistice at Ver- 
 sailles. He was, as far as I remember, one of the two supe- 
 rior French officers who estimated at its true value the 
 strategic genius of Von Moltke. The other was Colonel 
 Stoffel. But General d'Hautpoul was even better enabled to 
 judge ; he had seen Moltke at work in Syria more than thirty 
 years before. He was in reality the Solomon Eagle of the 
 campaign, before a single shot had been fired. " I know our
 
 A SOLOMON EAGLE. 397 
 
 army, and I know Helmuth von Moltke," he said, shaking 
 his head despondingly. " If every one of our officers were 
 his equal in strategy, the chance would then only be equal. 
 Moltke has the gift of the great billiard-player ; he knows 
 beforehand the exact results of a shock between two bodies 
 at a certain angle. We are a doomed nation." 
 
 As a matter of course, his friends were very wroth at 
 what they called " his unpatriotic language," and when the 
 news of the engagement at Saarbruck arrived they crowed 
 over him ; but he stuck to his text. " It is simply a feint on 
 Moltke's part, and proves nothing at all. In two or three 
 days we'll get the news of a battle that will decide, not only 
 the fate of the whole campaign, but the fate of the Empire 
 also." 
 
 Two days afterwards, I met him near the Rue Saint- 
 Florentin ; he looked absolutely crestfallen. " We have suf- 
 fered a terrible defeat near Wissembourg, but do not breathe 
 a word of it to any one. The Government is waiting for a 
 victory on some other point, and then it will publish the two 
 accounts together." 
 
 The Government was reckoning without the newspapers, 
 French and foreign. The latter might be confiscated, and 
 in fact were, such as the Times and T Independance Beige ; 
 but the French, notwithstanding the temporary law of M. 
 Emile Ollivier, were more difficult to deal with. I am in- 
 clined to think that if they had foreseen the terrible fate that 
 was to befall the French armies they would have been more 
 amenable, but in the beginning they anticipated nothing but 
 startling victories, and, as such, looked upon the campaign in 
 the light of a series of brilliant spectacular performances, 
 glowing accounts of which were essentially calculated to in- 
 crease their circulation. When MM. Cardon and Chabrillat, 
 respectively of the Gaulois and Figaro, were released by the 
 Prussians, "they told many amusing stories to that effect, un- 
 consciously confirming the opinion I have already expressed ; 
 but the following, which I had from the lips of Edmond 
 About himself, is better than any I can remember. 
 
 A correspondent of one of the best Paris newspapers, on 
 his arrival at the head-quarters of " the army of the Rhine," 
 applied to the aide-major-general for permission to follow the 
 operations. He had a good many credentials of more or less 
 weight ; nevertheless the aide-major-general, in view of the 
 formal orders of the Emperor and Marshal Leboeuf, felt
 
 398 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 bound to refuse the request. The journalist, on the other 
 hand, declined to take " no " for an answer. " I have come 
 with the decided intention to do justice, and more than jus- 
 tice, perhaps, to your talent and courage, and it would be a 
 pity indeed if I were not given the opportunity," he said. 
 
 " I am very sorry," was the reply ; " but I cannot depart 
 from the rules for any one." 
 
 " But our paper has a very large circulation." 
 
 "All the more reason to refuse you the authorization to 
 follow the staff." 
 
 The journalist would not look at matters in that light. 
 He felt that he was conferring a favour, just as he would 
 have felt in offering the advantage of a cleverly written puff 
 of a premiere to a theatrical manager. Seeing that his argu- 
 ments were of no avail, he delivered his parting shot. 
 
 " This, then, general, is your final decision. I am afraid 
 you'll have cause to regret this, for we, on our side, are de- 
 termined not to give this war the benefit of publicity in our 
 columns." 
 
 M. Emile Ollivier's original decision was the right one, 
 but, instead of embodying it in a temporary and exceptional 
 order, he ought to have made it a permanent law in times of 
 peace as well as war. On Saturday, the 16th of July, Count 
 Culemburg, the Prussian Minister of the Interior, addressed 
 a circular to the German papers, recommending them to ab- 
 stain from giving any news, however insignificant, with re- 
 gard to the movements of the troops. As far as I remember, 
 the German editors neither protested, nor endeavoured to 
 shirk the order ; they raised no outcry against " the muzzling 
 of the press." Five days later, the French minister was at- 
 tacked by nearly every paper in France for attempting to do 
 a similar thing, and, rather than weather that storm in a tea- 
 cup, he consented to a compromise, and condescended to ask 
 where he might have commanded. In addition to this, he 
 undertook that the Government itself should be the pur- 
 veyor of war-news to the papers. Every editor of standing 
 in Paris knew that this meant garbled, if not altogether 
 mythical, accounts of events, and that even these would be 
 held back until they could be held back no longer. In a 
 few days their worst apprehensions in that respect were con- 
 firmed. While Paris was still ignorant of the terrible dis- 
 aster at "Wissembourg, the whole of Europe rang with the 
 tidings. Then came the false report of a brilliant victory
 
 WAR CORRESPONDENTS. 399 
 
 from the Government agency. It made the Parisians frantic 
 with joy, but the frenzy changed into one of anger when the 
 truth became known through the maudlin and lachrymose 
 despatches from the Imperial head-quarters, albeit that they 
 by no means revealed the whole extent of the defeats suffered 
 at Woerth and Spicheren. 
 
 Nevertheless, the agency continued the even or rather 
 uneven tenor of its way up to the last. The Kepublicans 
 subsequently adopted the tactics of the Imperial Government, 
 the Communists adhered to the system of those they had 
 temporarily ousted. In the present note, I will deal only 
 with events up to the 4th of September. Patent as it must 
 have been to the merest civilian, that the commanders were 
 simply committing blunder after blunder, the movements of 
 Bazaine were represented by the agency as the result of a 
 masterly and profound calculation. Even such a pessimist 
 as General Beaufort d'Hautpoul was taken in by those repre- 
 sentations. He considered the " masterly inactivity " of Ba- 
 zaine as an inspiration of genius. " He is keeping two hundred 
 thousand German troops round Metz," he said several times. 
 " These two hundred thousand men are rendered absolutely 
 useless while we are recruiting our armies and reorganizing 
 our forces." He seemed altogether oblivious of the fact that 
 these two hundred thousand Germans were virtually the 
 gaolers of France's best army. 
 
 I am unable to say whether General d'Hautpoul was in 
 direct or indirect communication with the agency r , or whether 
 some ingenious scribe belonging to it had overheard his ex- 
 pressions of admiration and wilfully adopted them ; certain 
 it is that the agency was the first to inspire the reporters of 
 those papers who took their cue from it with the flattering 
 epithet of "glorious Bazaine." 
 
 It was the same with regard to Palikao. His sententious 
 commonplaces were reported as so many oracular revelations 
 dragged reluctantly from him. Had they been more familiar 
 with Shakespeare than they were, or are, the scribes would 
 have made Palikao exclaim with Macbeth, " The greatest is 
 behind." And all the while the troops were marching and 
 countermarching at haphazard, without a preconceived plan, 
 jeering at their leaders, and openly insulting the " phantom " 
 Emperor, as they did at Chalons, for he was already no more 
 than that. The fall of the Empire does not date from Sedan, 
 but from Woerth and Spicheren ; and those most pertinently
 
 400 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 aware of it were not the men who dealt it the final blow less 
 than a month later, but the immediate entourage of the Em- 
 press at the Tuileries. 
 
 For from that moment (the 6th or 7th of August) the en- 
 tourage of the Empress began to think of saving the Empire 
 by sacrificing, if needs be, the Emperor. " There is only one 
 thing that can avert the ruin of the dynasty," said a lady-in- 
 waiting on the Empress, to a near relative of mine ; " and 
 that is the death of the Emperor at the head of his troops. 
 That death would be considered an heroic one, and would 
 benefit the Prince Imperial." 
 
 I do not pretend to determine how far the Empress shared 
 that opinion, but here are some facts not generally known, 
 even to this day, and for the truth of which I can unhesi- 
 tatingly vouch. 
 
 The Empress did not know of the consultation that had 
 taken place on the 1st of July, and to which I have already 
 referred. But she did know that the Emperor was suffering 
 from a very serious complaint, and that the disease had been 
 aggravated since his departure through his constantly being 
 on horseback. M. Franceschini Pietri, the private secretary 
 of the Emperor, had informed her to that effect on the 7th 
 of August, when Forbach and Woerth had been fought. He 
 also told her that the Emperor was not unwilling to return 
 to Paris, and to leave the command-in-chief to Bazaine, but 
 that his conscience and his pride forbade him to do so, unless 
 some pressure were brought to bear upon him. I repeat, I 
 can vouch for this, because I had it from the lips of M. 
 Pietri, who was prefect of police until the 4th of Septem- 
 ber. 
 
 Meanwhile, others, besides M. Franceschini Pietri, had 
 noticed the evident moral and mental depression of the Em- 
 peror, increased, no doubt, by his acute physical sufferings, 
 which were patent to almost every one with whom he came 
 in immediate contact ; for an eye-witness wrote to me on the 
 4th of August : " The Emperor is in a very bad state ; after 
 Saarbruck, Lebrun and Lebcauf had virtually to lift him off 
 his horse. The young prince, who, as you have probably 
 heard already, was by his side all the time, looked very dis- 
 tressed, for his father had scarcely spoken to him during the 
 engagement. But after they got into the carriage, which 
 was waiting about a dozen yards away, the Emperor put his 
 arm round his neck and kissed him on the cheeks, while two
 
 THE EMPEROR'S ILLNESS. 40! 
 
 large tears rolled down his now. I noticed that the Emperor 
 had scarcely strength to walk that dozen yards." 
 
 Lebceuf, who, like a great many more, has suffered to a 
 certain extent for the faults of Marshal Mel, perceived well 
 enough that something had to be done to cheer the Emperor 
 in his misfortunes. It was he who proposed that the latter 
 should return to Paris, accompanied by him, while the corps 
 d'armee of Frossard, which had effected its retreat in good 
 order, and several other divisions that had not been under 
 fire as yet, should endeavour to retrieve matters by attacking 
 the armies of Von Steinmetz and Frederick- Charles, which 
 at that identical moment were only in " course of formation." 
 But Louis-Napoleon, while admitting the wisdom of the 
 plan, sadly shook his head, and declared that he could not 
 relinquish the chief command in view of the double defeat 
 the army had suffered under his leadership. 
 
 What had happened, then, during the twenty-four hours 
 immediately following the telegram of M. Franceschini Pie- 
 tri? Simply this: not only had the Empress refused to 
 exercise the pressure which would have afforded her husband 
 an excuse for his return, but she had thrown cold water on 
 the idea of that return by a despatch virtually discountenan- 
 cing that return. The cabinet had not been consulted in this 
 instance. 
 
 Nay, more ; the cabinet on the 7th of August despatched, 
 in secret, M. Maurice Richard, Minister of Arts, which at 
 that time was distinct from the Ministry of Public Instruc- 
 tion, to inquire into the state of health of the Emperor and 
 the degree of confidence with which he inspired the troops. 
 That was on the 7th of August. He went by special train to 
 Metz. Two hours after he was gone, Adolphe Ollivier told 
 me and Ferrari at the Cafe de la Paix. A few hours after 
 his return next day, he told us the result of those inquiries. 
 M. Eichard had brought back the worst possible news. 
 
 At a council of ministers, held early on the 9th, M. Emile 
 Ollivier, in view of the communication made to him by his 
 colleague, proposed the immediate return of the Emperor, 
 fully expecting M. Richard to support him. The Empress 
 energetically opposed the plan, and when M. Ollivier turned, 
 as it were, to M. Richard, the latter kept ominously silent. 
 Not to mince matters, he had been tampered with. M. 
 Ollivier found himself absolutely powerless. 
 
 A day or so before that I will not be positive as to the
 
 402 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 date M. Ollivier telegraphed officially to the head-quarters 
 at Metz, to request the return of the Prince Imperial, in ac- 
 cordance with the generally expressed wish of the Paris pa- 
 pers. M. Pietri told me that same day that the minister's 
 telegram had been followed by one in the Empress's private 
 cipher, expressing her wish that the Prince Imperial should 
 remain in the army. She did not explain why. She merely 
 recommended the Emperor to make the promise required, 
 and then to pay no further heed to it. 
 
 The regent had no power to summon parliament, never- 
 theless she did so, mainly in order to overthrow the Ollivier 
 ministry. I am perfectly cerfain that the Emperor never 
 forgave her for it. If those who were at Chislehurst are 
 alive when these notes appear, they will probably bear me 
 out. 
 
 What, in fact, could a parliament summoned under such 
 circumstances be but a council of war, every one of whose 
 decisions was canvassed in public and made the enemy still 
 wiser than he was before? Of course, the Empress felt 
 certain that she would be able to dismiss it as easily as it had 
 been summoned ; she evidently did not remember the fable 
 of the horse which had invited the man to get on his back in 
 order to fight the stag. There is not the slightest doubt 
 that, as I have already remarked, the Empress's main pur- 
 pose was the overthrow of the Ollivier administration ; if 
 proof were wanted, the evidence of the men who overthrew 
 the Empire would be sufficient to establish the fact, and not 
 one, but half a dozen, have openly stated that the defeat of 
 the Ollivier ministry was accomplished with the tacit ap- 
 proval of the court party : read, " the party of the Empress," 
 to which I have referred before. 
 
 The list of the Empress's blunders, involuntary or the 
 reverse, is too long to be transcribed in detail here ; I return 
 to my impressions of men and things after my meeting with 
 General Beaufort d'Hautpoul in the Eue de Rivoli. 
 
 I do not suppose that in the whole of Paris there were a 
 dozen sensible men who still cherished any illusions with 
 regard to the possibility of retrieving the disasters by a dash 
 into the enemy's country. The cry of " A Berlin ! " had 
 been finally abandoned even by the most chauvinistic. But 
 the hope still remained that the Prussians would be thrust 
 back from the " sacred soil of France ". by some brilliant 
 coup de main, although I am positive that the Empire
 
 THE EMPRESS'S BLUNDERS. 4Q3 
 
 would have been doomed just the same if that hope had 
 been realized. Among those who had faith in the coup 
 de main were M. Paul de Cassagnac and, curiously enough, 
 General Beaufort d'Hautpoul. He had suddenly conceived 
 great hopes with regard to Bazaine. M. de Cassagnac 
 seriously contemplated enlisting in the Zouaves. Strange to 
 relate, M. Paul de Cassagnac, in spite of his well-known at- 
 tachment to the Imperialist cause, was looked upon, by the 
 most determined opponents of that cause among the masses, 
 as a man to be trusted and consulted in a non-official way. 
 I remember being on the Boulevard one evening after the 
 affair at Beaumont, when the rage of the population was 
 even stronger than after the defeats at Woerth and Forbach. 
 All of a sudden we perceived a dense group swaying towards 
 us we were between the Hues Laffite and Le Peletier and 
 in the centre towered the tall figure of M. de Cassagnac. 
 For a moment we were afraid that some mischief was being 
 contemplated, the more that we had noticed several leaders 
 of the revolutionary party or, to speak by the card, of the 
 Blanqui party hovering near the Cafe Biche. But the 
 demonstration was not a hostile one ; on the contrary, it had 
 a friendly tendency, and showed a tacit acknowledgment 
 that, whosoever else might hide the truth from them, M. de 
 Cassagnac would not do so. " What about rifles, M. Paul ? " 
 was the cry ; " are there sufficient for us all ? " It must be 
 remembered that the levee en masse had been decreed. M. 
 de Cassagnac could not tell the truth, and would not tell a 
 lie. He frankly said, " I don't know." We noticed also that 
 at his approach the Blanquists slunk away. The Empire 
 had been tottering on its base until then ; after Beaumont 
 it was virtually doomed.
 
 404 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 The 4th of September A comic, not a tragic revolution A burlesque Harold 
 and a burlesque Boadicea The news of Sedan only known publicly on 
 the 3rd of September Grief and consternation, but no rage ;-The latter 
 feeling iniported by the bands of Delescluze, Blanqui, and Felix Pyat 
 Blanqui, Pyat, & Co. versus Favre, Gambetta, & Co. The former want 
 their share of the spoil, and only get it some years afterwards Eamail goes 
 to the Palais-Bourbon His reports Paris spends the night outdoors 
 Thiers a second-rate Talleyrand His journey to the dilferent courts of 
 Europe His interview with" Lord Granville The 4th of September The 
 Imperial eagles disappear Thejoyousness of the crowd The Place de la 
 Concorde The gardens of the Tuileries The crowds in the Rue de Kivoli 
 scarcely pay attention to the Tuileries The soldiers fraternizing with the 
 people, and proclaiming the republic from the barracks' windows A seri- 
 ous procession Sampierro Gavini gives his opinion The " heroic strug- 
 gles " of an Empress, and the crownless coronation of " le Eoi Pe"taud " 
 Ramail at the Tuileries How M. Sardou saved the palace from being 
 burned and sacked The republic proclaimed Illuminations as after a 
 victory. 
 
 ONLY those who were at a distance from Paris on the 4th 
 of September, 1870, can be deluded into the belief that the 
 scenes enacted there on that day partook of a dramatic char- 
 acter. Carefully and scrupulously dovetailed, they constitute 
 one vast burlesque of a revolution. It is not because the 
 overthrow of the Second Empire was accomplished without 
 bloodshed that I say this. Bloodshed would have only made 
 the burlesque more gruesome, but it could have never con- 
 verted it into a tragedy, the recollection of which would have 
 made men think and shudder even after the lapse of many 
 years. As it is, the recollection of the 4th of September can 
 only make the independent witness smile. On the one hand, 
 a burlesque Harold driven off to Wilhelmshohe in a landau, 
 surrounded by a troop of Uhlans ; and a burlesque Boadicea 
 slinking off in a hackney cab, minus the necessary handker- 
 chiefs for the cold in her head, " fleeing when no one pur- 
 sueth," instead of poisoning herself : on the other, " ceux 
 qui prennen tla parol epour autrui," i.e. the lawyers, prenant 
 le pouvoir pour eux-me'ines. Really, the only chronicler ca-
 
 THE 4TH OP SEPTEMBER. 495 
 
 pable of dealing with the situation in the right spirit is our 
 old and valued friend, Mr. Punch. Personally, from the 
 Saturday afternoon until the early hours on Monday, I saw 
 scarcely one incident worthy of being treated seriously ; nor 
 did the accounts supplied to me by others tend to modify my 
 impressions. 
 
 Though the defeat at Sedan was virtually complete on 
 Thursday the 1st at nine p.m., not the faintest rumour of it 
 reached Paris before Friday evening at an advanced hour, 
 and the real truth was not known generally until the Satur- 
 day at the hour just named. There was grief and conster- 
 nation on many faces, but no expression of fury or anger. 
 That sentiment, at any rate in its outward manifestations, 
 had to be supplied from the heights of Belleville and Mont- 
 martre, Montrouge and Montparnasse, when, later on, a good 
 many of the inhabitants of those delightful regions came 
 down like an avalanche on the heart of the city. They were 
 the lambs of Blanqui, Delescluze, Felix Pyat, and Milliere. 
 They were dispersed on reaching the Boulevard Montmartre, 
 and we saw nothing of them from where we were seated, at 
 the Cafe de la Paix. By the time they rallied in the side 
 streets and had marched to the Palais-Bourbon, they found 
 their competitors, Favre, Gambetta, & Co., trying to oust the 
 ministers of the Empire. But for that unfortunate delay we 
 might have had the Commune on the 4th of September in- 
 stead of on the 18th of March following. Blanqui, Pyat, & 
 Co. never forgave Favre, Gambetta, & Co. for having fore- 
 stalled them, and, above all, for not having shared the pro- 
 ceeds of the spoil. This is so true that, even after many 
 years of lording it, the successors of, and co-founders with, 
 the firm of Favre, Gambetta, & Co. have been obliged, not 
 only to grant an amnesty to those whom they cheated at the 
 beginning, but to admit them to some of the benefits of the 
 undertaking; Meline, Tirard, Eanc, Alphonse Humbert, 
 Camille Barrere, and a hundred others more or less impli- 
 cated in the Commune, are all occupying fat posts at the 
 hour I write. 
 
 A friend of ours, whose impartiality was beyond suspicion, 
 and who had more strength and inclination to battle with 
 crowds than any of us, offered to go and see how the land 
 lay at the Palais-Bourbon. He returned in about an hour, 
 and told us that Gambetta, perched on a chair, had been 
 addressing the crowd from behind the railings, exhorting
 
 406 AN- ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 them to patience and moderation. " Clever trick that," said 
 our informant ; " it's the confidence-trick of housebreakers 
 when two separate gangs have designs upon the same * crib ; ' 
 while the first arrivals ' crack ' it, they send one endowed 
 with the ' gift of the gab ' to pacify the others." 
 
 One thing is certain Gambetta and his crew did not 
 want to pursue the war, they wanted a Constituent Assembly 
 which would have left them to enjoy in peace the fruits of 
 their usurpation ; for theirs was as much usurpation as was 
 the Coup d'Etat. Their subsequent " Not an inch of our 
 territory, not a stone of our fortresses," was an afterthought, 
 when they found that Bismarck would not grant them as 
 good a peace as he would have granted Napoleon at Donchery 
 the morning after Sedan. 
 
 At about ten on Saturday night everybody knew that there 
 would be a night sitting, and I doubt whether one-fourth of 
 the adult male population of Paris went to bed at all, even if 
 they retired to their own homes. 
 
 Our friend returned to the Palais-Bourbon, but failed to 
 get a trustworthy account of what had happened during the 
 twenty-five minutes the deputies had been assembled. All 
 he knew was that nominally the Empire was still standing, 
 though virtually it had ceased to exist ; a bill for its deposi- 
 tion having been laid on the table. On his way back to the 
 Boulevards he saw the carriage of Thiers surrounded, and an 
 attempt to take out the horses. He called Thiers " le receleur 
 des vols commis au prejudice des monarchies." * 
 
 Let me look for a moment at that second-rate Talleyrand, 
 who has been grandiloquently termed the " liberator of the 
 soil " because he happened to do what any intelligent bank 
 manager could have done as well ; let me endeavour to estab- 
 lish his share in the 4th of September. I am speaking on 
 the authority of men who were behind the political scenes for 
 many years, and whose contempt for nearly all the actors was 
 equally great. Thiers refused his aid and counsel to the 
 Empress, who solicited it through the intermediary of Prince 
 Metternich and M. Prosper Merimee, but he also refused to 
 accept the power offered to him by Gambetta, Favre, Jules 
 Simon, etc., in the afternoon of the 4th of September. 
 Nevertheless, he was here, there, and everywhere ; offering 
 advice, but careful not to take any responsibility. Afterwards 
 
 * " The receiver of the goods stolen from monarchies." EDITOB.
 
 M. TRIERS. 407 
 
 he took a journey to the various courts of Europe. I only 
 know the particulars of one interview that with Lord Gran- 
 ville but I can vouch for their truth. After having held 
 forth for two hours without giving his lordship a chance of 
 edging in a word sideways, he stopped ; and five minutes 
 later, while Lord Granville was enumerating the reasons why 
 the cabinet of St. James's could not interfere, he (Thiers) was 
 fast asleep. When the conditions of peace were being dis- 
 cussed, Thiers was in favour of giving up Belfort rather than 
 pay another milliard of francs. "A city you may recover, a 
 milliard of francs you never get back," he said. Neverthe- 
 less, historians will tell one that Thiers made superhuman 
 efforts to save Belfort. I did not like M. Thiers, and, being 
 conscious of my dislike, I have throughout these notes en- 
 deavoured to say as little as possible of him. 
 
 The sun rose radiantly over Paris on the 4th of Sep- 
 tember, and I was up betimes, though I had not gone to bed 
 until 3 a.m. There was a dense crowd all along the Hue 
 Eoyale and the Place de la Concorde, and several hours be- 
 fore the Chamber had begun to discuss the deposition of the 
 Bonapartes (which was never formally voted), volunteer- 
 workmen were destroying or hauling down the Imperial 
 eagles. The mob cheered them vociferously, and when one 
 of these workmen hurt himself severely, they carried him 
 away in triumph. Nevertheless, there was a good deal of 
 hooting as several well-known members of the Chamber el- 
 bowed their way through the serried masses. Though they 
 were well known, I argued myself unknown in not knowing 
 them. I was under the impresssion that they were Imperial- 
 ists ; they turned out to be Republicans. The marks of dis- 
 approval proceeded from compact groups of what were ap- 
 parently workmen. As I knew that no workmen devoted to 
 the Empire would have dared to gather in that way, even if 
 their numbers had been sufficient, and as I felt reluctant to 
 inquire, I came to the natural conclusion that the hooters 
 were the supporters of Blanqui, Pyat, & Co. The Commune 
 was foreshadowed on the Place de la Concorde on that day. 
 
 My experience of the 24th of February, 1848, told me 
 that the Chamber would be invaded before long. In 1848 
 there was no more danger for a foreigner to mix with the 
 rabble than for a Frenchman. I felt not quite so sure about 
 my safety on the 4th of September. My adventure in the 
 Avenue de Clichy, which I will relate anon, had not hap-
 
 408 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 pened then, and I was not as careful as I became afterwards, 
 still I remembered in time the advice of the prudent French- 
 man " When in doubt, abstain ; " and I prepared to retrace 
 my steps to the Boulevards, where, I knew, there would be 
 no mistake about my identity. At the same time, I am 
 bound to say that no such accident as I dreaded, occurred 
 during that day, as far as I am aware. There may or may 
 not have been at that hour half a hundred spies of Bismarck 
 in the city, but no one was molested. The Parisians were so 
 evidently overjoyed at getting rid of the Empire, that for 
 four and twenty hours, at any rate, they forgot all about the 
 hated Germans and their march upon the capital. They 
 were shaking hands with, and congratulating one another, as 
 if some great piece of good fortune had befallen them. 
 Years before that, I had seen my wife behave in a similarly 
 joyous manner after having dismissed at a moment's notice 
 a cook who had shamefully robbed us : the wife knew very 
 well that, on the morrow, the tradesmen, the amount of 
 whose bills the dishonest servant had pocketed for months, 
 would be sending in their claims upon ns. " Perhaps they 
 will take into consideration that we dismissed her," she said, 
 " and not hold us responsible." The Latin race, and espe- 
 cially the French, are the females of the human race. 
 
 I noticed that the gates of the Tuileries gardens on the 
 Place de la Concorde were still open, and that the gardens 
 themselves were black with people. It must have been about 
 half -past ten or eleven. I did not go back by the Rue Royale, 
 but by the Rue de Rivoli. The people were absolutely stream- 
 ing down the street. There was not a single threatening 
 gesture on their part ; they merely looked at the flag still 
 floating over the Tuileries, and passed on. When I got back 
 to the Boulevards, I sat down outside the Cafe de la Paix de- 
 termined not to stir if possible. I knew that whatever hap- 
 pened the news of it would soon be brought thither. I was 
 not mistaken. 
 
 The first news we had was that the National Guards had 
 replaced the regulars inside and around the Palais- Bourbon, 
 which was either a sign that the latter could be no longer 
 depended upon, or that the Republicans in the Chamber had 
 carried that measure in their own interest. I am bound to 
 admit that I would always sooner take the word of a French 
 officer than that of a deputy, of no matter what shade ; and 
 I heard afterwards that the troops at the Napoleon barracks
 
 IN THE TUILEEIES GARDENS. 409 
 
 and elsewhere had begun to fraternize with the people as 
 early as eight in the morning, by shouting, from the windows 
 of their rooms, " Vive la Republique ! " The Chamber was 
 invaded, nevertheless ; it is as well to state that this invasion 
 gave Jules Favre & Co. a chance of repairing in hot haste to 
 the Hotel de Ville, where the Government of the National 
 Defence was proclaimed. 
 
 To return to my vantage-post at the Cafe de la Paix. 
 The crowds on the Place de la Concorde, apparently sta- 
 tioned there since early morning, did not seem to me to have 
 been brought thither at the instance of a leader or in obedi- 
 ence to a watchword. I except, of course, the groups of 
 which I have already spoken, and which jeered at the repub- 
 lican deputies. The streams of people I met on my return 
 in the Rue de Rivoli seemed impelled by their own curiosity 
 to the Chamber of Deputies. Not so the procession which 
 hove in sight almost the moment I had sat down at the Cafe. 
 It wheeled to the left when reaching the Rue de la Paix. It 
 was composed of National Guards with and without their 
 muskets, each company preceded by its own officers, the 
 armed ones infinitely more numerous than the unarmed, but 
 all marching in good order and in utter silence ; in fact, so 
 silently as to bode mischief. Behind and before there strode 
 large contingents of ordinary citizens, and I noticed two 
 things : that few of them wore blouses, and that a good many 
 wore kepis, apparently quite new. The wearers, though 
 equally undemonstrative, gave one the impression of being 
 the leaders. Most of those around me shook their heads 
 ominously as they passed; their silence did not impose upon 
 them. I am free to confess that I did not share their opin- 
 ion. To me, the whole looked like stern determined mani- 
 festors ; not like turbulent revolutionaries. I had seen noth- 
 ing like them in '48. Nevertheless, it was I who was 
 mistaken, for, according to M. Sampierro Gavini, who, un- 
 like his brother Denis, belonged to the opposition during the 
 Empire, it was they who invaded the Chamber. I may add 
 that M. Sampierro Gavini, though in the opposition, had lit- 
 tle or no sympathy with those who overthrew the Empire or 
 established the Commune. He had an almost idealistic faith 
 in constitutional means, and a somewhat exaggerated rever- 
 ence for the name of Bonaparte. He was a Corsican. 
 
 For several hours nothing occurred worthy of record. 
 The accounts brought to us by eye-witnesses of events going 
 18
 
 410 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 
 
 on simultaneously at the Tuileriea and the Palais-Bourbon 
 showed plainly that there was no intention on the mob's part 
 to exalt the Empress into a Marie-Antoinette. Our friend 
 who had given us the news of the Chamber on the previous 
 night, and who was a relative of the celebrated Dr. Yvan, an 
 habitue 1 of the Cafe de la Paix, had made up his mind in the 
 morning that " it would be more interesting to watch the " 
 last heroic struggles of an Empress against iron fortune than 
 the " crownless coronation of a half-score of ' rois Petauds.' " * 
 As such, he had taken up his station in the gardens of the 
 Tuileries, close to the gate dividing the private from the 
 public gardens. It was he who gave us the particulars of 
 the scenes preceding and succeeding the Empress's flight, 
 the exact moment of which no one seemed to know. The 
 account of these scenes was so exceedingly graphic, that I 
 have no difficulty whatsoever in remembering them. More- 
 over, I put down at the time several of his own expressions. 
 I do not know what has become of him. He went to New- 
 Zealand on account of some unhappy love-affair, and was 
 never heard of any more. Though scarcely thirty then, he 
 was a promising young doctor. His name was Eamail, but I 
 do not know in what relation he stood to Dr. Yvan ; who, 
 however, always called him cousin. 
 
 Young Eamail had been in the Tuileries gardens since 
 noon. The crowd was already very large at that hour, but it 
 seemed altogether engrossed in the doings of an individual 
 who was knocking down a gilded eagle on the top of the 
 gate. " Mind," said Eamail, " that was at twelve o'clock, or 
 somewhere thereabouts ; and I do not think that the sitting 
 at the Chamber began until at least an hour later. If the 
 Ecpublicans say, in days to come, that the Empire was 
 virtually condemned before they voted its overthrow, they 
 will, at any rate, have the semblance of truth on their side, 
 
 * In olden times, every community, corporation, and guild in France elected 
 annually a king even the mendicants, whose ruler took the title of King Pe- 
 taud, from the Latin peto, I ask. The latter's court, as a matter of course, was 
 a perfect bear-garden, in which every one did as he liked, in which every one 
 was as much sovereign as the titular one. The expression, " the Court of King 
 Petaud," became a synonym for everything that was disorderly, ridiculous, and 
 disgusting. 
 
 " Oui, je sors de chez vous fort mal e'difie'e ; 
 Dans toutes mes logons j'y suis contrari6e ; 
 On n'y respecte rien, ch'acun y parle haut, 
 Et c'est tout justement la cour ctuToi Petaud." 
 
 " Tartufle," Act i. Sc. 1.) EDITOR.
 
 IN THE TUILERIES-GARDENS. 41 1 
 
 because there were at least two thousand persons looking on 
 without trying to prevent the destruction of the eagles by 
 word or deed ; and two thousand persons, if they happen to 
 agree with them, are to the Republicans the whole of France ; 
 while two millions, if they happen to differ from them, are 
 only a corrupt and unintelligent majority. 
 
 " But I was wondering," he went on, " at the utter in- 
 gratitude of the lower and lower-middle classes. I feel cer- 
 tain that among those who stood staring there, half owned 
 their prosperous condition to the eighteen years of Imperial- 
 ism; yet I heard not a single expression of regret at the 
 brutal sweeping away of it. 
 
 " I may have stood there for about an hour, a score of 
 steps away from the gate before the swingbridge, when, all at 
 once, I felt myself carried forward with the crowd ; and be- 
 fore I had time to look round, I found myself inside that 
 other gate. There were about five hundred persons who had 
 entered with me, but in what manner the gate gave way or 
 was opened I have not the vaguest idea. We went no further ; 
 we stopped as suddenly as we had advanced. I turned 
 round with difficulty, and looked over the heads of those 
 behind me ; sure enough, the gates were wide open and the 
 crowd at the rear was much denser than it had been ten min- 
 utes before. Still they stood perfectly still, without bringing 
 any pressure to bear upon us. Then I turned round again, 
 and saw the cause of their reluctance to move. The Imperial 
 Guard was being massed in front of the principal door lead- 
 ing from the private gardens into the palace. 'My dear 
 Eamail,' I said to myself, ' you stand a very good chance of 
 having a bullet through your head before you are ten minutes 
 older; because, at the slightest move of the crowd among 
 which you now stand, the guard will fire.' I own that I was 
 scarcely prepared to face death for such a trivial cause as 
 this; and I was quietly edging my way out of the crowd, 
 which was beginning to utter low ominous growls, when a 
 voice, ringing clear upon the air, shouted, ' Citoyens ! ' I 
 stopped, turned round once more, and stood on tiptoe. 
 
 " The speaker was a tall, handsome fellow, young to all 
 appearance, and with a voice like a bell. He looked a gentle- 
 man, but I have never seen him before to my knowledge. 
 His companion I knew at once; it was Victorien Sardou. 
 There is no mistaking that face. I have heard some people 
 say that it is not a bit like that of the great Napoleon, while
 
 412 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 others maintain that, placing the living man and the portrait 
 of the dead one side by side, one could not tell the difference. 
 I'll undertake to say this, that if M. Sardou had donned a 
 uniform, such as the lieutenant of artillery wore at Arcola, 
 for instance, he might have taken the Empress by the hand 
 and led her out safely among the people, who would have 
 believed in some miraculous resurrection. 
 
 " To come back to my story. ' Citoyens,' repeated M. 
 Sardou's companion, ' I do not wonder at your surprise that 
 the garden should not be open to you and its ingress forbid- 
 den by soldiers. The Tuileries belong to the people, now 
 that the Empire is gone ; for gone it is by this time, in spite 
 of the Imperial Guard massed before yonder door. Conse- 
 quently, my friend and I propose to go and ask for the with- 
 drawal of these soldiers. But, in order to do this, you must 
 give us your promise not to budge ; for the slightest attempt 
 on your part to do so before our return may lead to blood- 
 shed, and I am convinced that you are as anxious as we are 
 to avoid such a calamity.' 
 
 "If that young fellow is not an actor, he ought to be. 
 Every word he said could be heard distinctly and produced 
 its effect. The crowd cheered him and promised unani- 
 mously to wait. Then we saw him and M. Sardou take out 
 their handkerchiefs and tie them to the end of their sticks. 
 Perhaps it was well they did, for as I saw them boldly walk 
 up the central avenue, I was not at all convinced that their 
 lives were not in danger. My sight is excellent, and I no- 
 ticed a decidedly hostile movement on the part of the troops 
 ranged in front of the principal door, and an officer of Mo- 
 biles was evidently of my opinion, for, though he followed 
 them at a distance, he kept prudently behind the trees, shel- 
 tering himself as much as possible. I do not pretend to be 
 wiser than most of my fellow-men, but I doubt whether 
 many among those who watched M. Sardou and his com- 
 panion suspected the true drift of their self-imposed mission. 
 They merely wished to save the Tuileries from being pil- 
 laged and burnt down. I do not wish to libel the Imperial 
 Guard or their officers, but I should feel much surprised if 
 that noble idea ever entered their heads. "What was the mag- 
 nificent pile to them, now that one of their idols had left it, 
 probably for ever, and the other was about to do the same ? 
 At any rate, the suspicious movement was there. I have 
 forgotten to tell you that the inner gate was closed and I saw
 
 M. VICTORIEN SARDOU. 413 
 
 M. Sardou parley through its bars with one of the guardians. 
 Then a superior officer, accompanied by a civilian, came out ; 
 but by this time, the crowd, which had kept back, was be- 
 ginning to move also, I among them. All of a sudden, the 
 general, who turned out to be General Mellinet, gets on a 
 chair, while his companion, who turns out to be M. de Les- 
 seps, stands by him. The Imperial Guard disappears, seeing 
 which, the crowd, no longer apprehensive of being shot down, 
 advances rapidly to within a few steps of the gate. Then 
 there is a cheer, for the Imperial flag is hauled down from 
 the roof. ' Gentlemen,' says the general, ' the Tuileries are 
 empty, the Empress is gone. But it is my duty to guard the 
 palace, and I count upon you to help me.' He says a great 
 deal more, but the crowd are pressing forward all the same. 
 I feel that the crucial moment has arrived, and that the 
 palace will be invaded, in spite of the general's speechifying, 
 when lo, the Gardes Mobiles issue from the front door, and 
 range themselves in two rows. The gates are opened, the 
 crowd rushes in, but the Mobiles are there to prevent them 
 making any excursions, either upstairs or into the apart- 
 ments, and in a few minutes we find ourselves in the Place 
 du Carrousel. The palace has been virtually saved by M. 
 Sardou." 
 
 Half an hour later, we receive the news that the Govern- 
 ment of the National Defence has been proclaimed at the 
 Hotel de Ville, and that night Paris is illuminated as after a 
 victory.
 
 414: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTEK XXII. 
 
 The siege The Parisians convinced that the Germans will not invest Paris- 
 Paris becomes a vast drill-ground, nevertheless The Parisians leave off 
 singing, but listen to itinerant performers, though the latter no longer sing 
 the " Marseillaise " The theatres closed The ComeMie-Frangaise and th 
 Opera Influx of the Gardes Mobiles The Parisian no longer chaffs the 
 provincial, but does the honours of the city to him The stolid, gaunt 
 Breton and the astute and cynical Normand The gardens of the Tuileries 
 an artillery park The mitrailleuse still commands confidence The papers 
 try to be comic Food may fail, drink will not My visit to the wine d6pot 
 at Bercy An official's information Cattle in the public squares and on 
 the outer Boulevards Fear with regard to them Every man carries a rifle 
 The woods in the suburbs are set on fire The statue of Strasburg on the 
 Place de la Concorde M. Prudhomme to his sons The men who do not 
 spout The French shopkeeper and bourgeois A story of his greed He 
 reveals the whereabouts of the cable laid on the bed of the Seine Obscure 
 heroes Would-be Kavaillacs and Balthazar Gerards Inventors of schemes 
 for the instant annihilation of all the Germans A musical mitrailleuse 
 An exhibition and lecture at the Alcazar The last train Trains converted 
 into dwellings for the suburban poor Interior of a railway station The 
 spy maniaWhere the Parisians ought to have looked for spies I am 
 arrested as a spy A chat with the officer in charge A terrible-looking 
 knife. 
 
 IN" spite of the frequent reports from the provinces that 
 the Germans were marching on Paris, there were thousands 
 of people in the capital who seriously maintained that they, 
 the Germans, would not dare to invest, let alone, shell it. 
 But it must not be inferred, as many English writers have 
 done, that this confidence was due to a mistaken view of the 
 Germans' pluck, or their reluctance to beard the " lion " in 
 his den. Not at all. The Parisians simply credited their 
 foes with the superstitious love and reverence for " the cen- 
 tre of light and civilization" which they themselves felt. 
 They did not take their cue from Victor Hugo's "high- 
 falutin' " remonstrance to King William ; on the contrary, it 
 was the poet who translated their sentiments. It was not a 
 case of " one fool making many ; " but of many mute inglori- 
 ous visionaries inspiring a still greater one, who had the gift 
 of eloquence, which eloquence, in this instance, bordered 
 very closely on sublimated drivel.
 
 THE SIEGE. 415 
 
 Nevertheless, the whole of Paris became suddenly trans- 
 formed into one vast drill-ground, and the clang of arms re- 
 sounded through the city day and night. For the time being, 
 the crowds left off singing, albeit that they listened now and 
 then devoutly and reverently to itinerant performers, male 
 and female, who had paraphrased the patriotic airs of certain 
 operas for the occasion. The " Pars beau mousquetaire," 
 etc., of Halevy, became " Pars beau volontaire ; " the " Guerre 
 aux tyrans," of the same composer, " Guerre aux all'mands," * 
 and so forth. 
 
 All the theatres had closed their doors by this time, the 
 Comedie-Franc.aise being last, I believe ; though, almost im- 
 mediately afterward, it threw open its portals once more for 
 at least two performances a week, and often a third time, in 
 aid of the victims of the siege. Meanwhile, several rooms 
 were being got ready for the reception of the wounded ; the 
 new opera-house, still unfinished, was made into a commissa- 
 riat and partly into a barracks, for the provincial Gardes 
 Mobiles were flocking by thousands to the capital, and the 
 camps could not hold them all. For once in a way the Pari- 
 sian forgot to chaff the provincial who came to pay him a 
 visit ; and considering that, even under such circumstances, 
 all drill and no play would make Jacques a dull boy, he not 
 only received him very cordially, but showed him some of 
 the lions of the capital, at which the long-haired gaunt and 
 stolid Breton stared without moving a muscle, only mutter- 
 ing an unintelligible gibberish, which might be an invocation 
 to his ancient pagan gods, or a tribute of admiration ; while 
 the more astute and cynical, though scarcely more impres- 
 sionable Normand, ten thousand of which had come from 
 the banks of the Marne, showed the thought underlying all 
 his daily actions, in one sentence : " C'est ben beau, mais c,a 
 a coute beaucoup d'argent ; fallait mieux le garder en poche." 
 Even at this supreme moment, he remembered, with a kind 
 of bitterness, that he had been made to pay for part of all 
 this glorious architecture. 
 
 The Cirques Napoleon and de 1'Imperatrice the Repub- 
 lic had not had time to change their names had become a 
 kind of left-luggage office for these human cargoes, taken 
 thither at their arrival, which happened generally during the 
 
 * The first from " Les Mousquetaires de la Eeine ; " the second from " Charles 
 VI." EDITOE.
 
 416 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 night. In the morning they were transferred to their per- 
 manent encampments, and their military education was pro- 
 ceeded with at once. I am afraid I am not competent to 
 judge of the merits of the method adopted, but I was by no 
 means powerfully impressed with the knowledge displayed 
 by the instructors. 
 
 The gardens of the Tuileries had been closed to the pub- 
 lic, who had to be satisfied with admiring the ordnance and 
 long rows of horses parked there from a distance. Did the 
 latter lend enchantment to the view ? Apparently, for they 
 were never tired of gazing with ecstasy on the mitrailleuses. 
 The gunners in charge treated the foremost of the gazers 
 now and then to a lecture on artillery practice, through the 
 railings of the gates. In whatsoever else they had lost faith, 
 those murderous engines of war evidently still commanded 
 their confidence. 
 
 The frightful din that marked the first weeks of the war 
 had ceased, but Paris did by no means look crestfallen. The 
 gas burned brightly still, the cafes were full of people, the 
 restaurants had all their tables occupied ; for we were not " in- 
 vested " yet, and the idea of scarcity, let alone of famine, 
 though a much-discussed contingency, was not a staring, 
 stubborn fact. " It will never become one," said and thought 
 many, " and all that talk about doling out rations already is 
 so much nonsense." The papers waxed positively comic on 
 the subject. They also waxed comic over the telegrams of 
 the King of Prussia to his Consort ; but they left off harping 
 on that string, for very shame' sake. 
 
 One thing was certain from the beginning of the siege 
 whatever else might fail, there was enough wine and to spare 
 to cheer the hearts of men who professed to do and dare more 
 than men. Though the best part of my life had been spent 
 in Paris, I had, curiously enough, never seen the wine and 
 spirit depots at Bercy ; in fact, I was profoundly ignorant of 
 that, as well as of other matters connected with the food- 
 supply of Paris. So I wrote to a member of the firm which 
 had supplied me for many years with wine and spirits, and 
 he took me thither. 
 
 I should think that the " entrepot-general," as it is called, 
 occupied, at that time, not less than sixty acres of ground, 
 which meant more than treble that area as far as storage 
 was concerned; for there was not only the cellarage, but 
 the buildings above ground, rising, in many instances, to
 
 THE WINE DEPOT AT BERCY. 
 
 three and four stories. The entrep6t consisted, and consists 
 still, I believe, of three distinct parts : one for wines ; an- 
 other for what the French call " alcohols," and we " spirits ; " 
 a third, much smaller, for potable, or, rather, edible oils. 
 The latter wing contains the cellarage of the general admin- 
 istration of the hospitals. The spirit-cellars were absolutely 
 empty at the time of my visit ; their contents had been re- 
 moved to a bomb and shell proof cellarage hard by. 
 
 Though I had come to see, I felt very little wiser after 
 leaving the cellars than before ; for, truth to tell, I was ab- 
 solutely bewildered. I had no more idea of the quantity of 
 wine stored there than a child. My guide laughed. 
 
 " We'll soon make the matter clear to you," he said, shak- 
 ing hands with a gentleman who turned out to be one of the 
 principal employes. " This gentleman will tell you almost to 
 a hectolitre the quantity of ordinary wine in store. You 
 know pretty well the number of inhabitants of the capital, 
 and though it has considerably increased during the last few 
 days, and is not unlikely to decrease during the siege, if siege 
 there be, the influx does not amount to a hundred thousand. 
 Now, monsieur, will you tell this gentleman what you have 
 in stock?" 
 
 " We have got at the present moment 1,600,000 hecto- 
 litres of ordinary wine in our cellars. Ten days ago we had 
 nearly one hundred thousand more, but the wine-shops and 
 others have laid in large provisions since then. The more 
 expensive wines I need not mention, because the quantity is 
 very considerably less, and, moreover, they are not likely to 
 be wanted ; though, if they were wanted, they would keep us 
 going for many, many weeks. At a rough guess, the number 
 of ' souls ' within the fortifications is about 1,700,000, with 
 the recent increase 1,800,000 ; consequently, with what the 
 'liquoristes' have recently bought, one hundred litres for 
 every man, woman, and child. I do not reckon the contents 
 of private cellars, nor those of the wine-merchants, apart 
 from their recent purchases. Nor is ordinary wine much 
 dearer than it was in years of great plenty ; it is, in fact, less 
 by twenty-five francs or thirty francs than in the middle of 
 the fifties. I am comparing prices for quarter pipes, contain- 
 ing from two hundred and ten to two hundred and thirty 
 litres. There is no fear of regrating here, nor the likelihood 
 of our having to drink water for some time." 
 
 On our homeward journey, we noticed bullocks, pigs, and
 
 418 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 sheep littered down in some of the public squares and on the 
 outer boulevards. The stinted grass in the former had al- 
 ready entirely disappeared, and it was evident that, with the 
 utmost care, the cattle would deteriorate under the existing 
 circumstances ; for fodder would probably be the first com- 
 modity to fail ; as it was, it had already risen to more than 
 twice its former price. Moreover, the competent judges 
 feared that, in the event of a rainy autumn, the cattle penned 
 in such small spaces would be more subject to epidemic dis- 
 eases, which would absolutely render them unfit for human 
 food. In view of such a contingency, the learned members 
 of the Academie des Sciences were beginning to put their 
 heads together, but the results of their deliberations were not 
 known as yet. 
 
 We returned on foot as we had come ; private carriages 
 had entirely disappeared, and though the omnibuses and 
 cabs were plying as usual, their progress was seriously im- 
 peded by long lines of vans, heavily laden with neat deal 
 boxes, evidently containing tinned provisions. Very few fe- 
 male passengers in the public conveyances, and scarcely a man 
 without a rifle. They were the future defenders of the capi- 
 tal, who had been to Vincennes, where the distribution of 
 arms was going on from early morn till late at night. In 
 fact, the sight of a working-man not provided with a rifle, a 
 mattock, a spade, or a pickaxe was becoming a rarity, for a 
 great many had been engaged to aid the engineers in digging 
 trenches, spiking the ground, etc. 
 
 I did not, and do not, feel competent to judge of the 
 utility of all these means of defense ; one of them, however, 
 seemed to be conceived in the wrong spirit : I allude to the 
 firing of the woods around Paris. With the results of For- 
 bach and Woerth to guide them, the generals entrusted with 
 the defence of Paris could not leave the woods to stand ; but 
 was there any necessity to destroy them in the way they did ? 
 In spite of the activity displayed, there were still thousands 
 of idle hands anxious to be employed. Why were not the 
 trees cut down and transported to Paris, for fuel for the com- 
 ing winter ? At that moment there were lots of horses avail- 
 able, and such a measure would have given us the double ad- 
 vantage of saving coals for the manufacture of gas, and of 
 protecting from the rigours of the coming winter hundreds 
 whose sufferings would have been mitigated by light and heat. 
 Personally, I did not suffer much. From what I have seen
 
 FRENCHMEN'S GREED. 419 
 
 during the siege, I have come to the conclusion that short- 
 comings in the way of food are far less hard to bear, nay, are 
 almost cheerfully borne, in a warm room and with a lamp 
 brightly burning. I leave out of the question the quantities 
 of mineral oil wasted in the attempt to set fire to the woods, 
 because in many instances the attempt failed utterly. 
 
 Meanwhile, patriotism was kept at the boiling point, by 
 glowing reports of the heroic defence of General Uhrich at 
 Strasburg. The statue, representing the capital of Alsace on 
 tho Place de la Concorde, became the goal of a reverent pil- 
 grimage on the part of the Parisians, though the effect of it 
 was spoiled too frequently by M. Prudhomme holding forth 
 sententiousiy, to his sons apparently, to the crowd in reality. 
 These discourses reminded one too much of Heine's sneer, 
 that " all Frenchmen are actors, and the worse are generally 
 on the stage." In this instance, however, the amateurs ran 
 the professional very hard. The crowds were not hypercriti- 
 cal, though, and they applauded the speaker, who departed, 
 accompanied by his offspring, with the proud consciousness 
 that he was a born orator, and that he had done his duty to 
 his country by spouting platitudes. It is not difficult to give 
 the general sequel to that amateur performance. Next morn- 
 ing there is a line in some obscure paper, and M. Prudhomme, 
 beside himself with joy, leaves his card on the journalist who 
 wrote it ; the journalist leaves his in return, and for the next 
 six months the latter has his knife and fork laid at M. Prud- 
 homme's table. The acquaintance generally terminates on 
 M. Prudhomme's discovery that Madame Prudhomme carried 
 her friendship too far by looking after the domestic concerns 
 of the scribe, at the scribe's bachelor quarters. 
 
 The men who did not spout were the Duruys, the Meis- 
 soniers, and a hundred others I could mention. The eminent 
 historian and grand-master of the University, though sixty, 
 donned, the simple uniform of a National Guard, and per- 
 formed his garrison duties like the humblest artisan, only dis- 
 tinguished from the latter by his star of grand-officer of the Le- 
 gion d'Honneur ; the great painter did the same. The French 
 shopkeeping bourgeois is, as a rule, a silly, pompous creature ; 
 very frequently, he is mean and contemptible besides. 
 
 Here is a story for the truth of which I can vouch, and 
 which shows him in his true light. In the skirmish in which 
 Lieutenant Winslow was killed, some damage had been done 
 to the inn at Schirlenhoff, where the Baden officers were at
 
 420 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 breakfast when they were surprised by General de Bernis and 
 his men. The general had his foot already in the stirrup, 
 and was about to remove his prisoners, when Boniface made 
 his appearance, coolly asking to whom he was to present the 
 bill for the breakage. The general burst out laughing : 
 " The losing party pays the damage as a rule," he said, " but 
 France is sufficiently rich to reverse the rule. Here is double 
 the amount of your bill." 
 
 A second story, equally authentic. A cable had been 
 secretly laid on the bed of the Seine between Paris and Havre, 
 shortly before the siege. Two small shopkeepers of St. Ger- 
 main revealed the fact for a consideration to the Germans, 
 who had but very vague suspicions of it, and who certainly 
 did not know the land-bearings ; one of the scoundrels was 
 caught after the siege, the other escaped. The one who was 
 tried pleaded poverty, and received a ridiculously small sen- 
 tence. It transpired afterwards that he was exceedingly well 
 paid for his treachery, and that he cheated his fellow- informer 
 out of his share. 
 
 The contrast is more pleasant to dwell upon. There were 
 hundreds of obscure heroes, by which I do not mean those 
 prepared to shed their blood on the battle-field, but men with 
 a sublime indifference to life, courting the fate of a Ravaillac 
 and a Balthazar Gerard. History would have called them 
 regicides, and perhaps ranked them with paid assassins had 
 they accomplished their purpose, would have held them up 
 to the scorn of posterity as bloodthirsty fanatics, and his- 
 tory, for once in a way, would have been wrong. In their 
 reprehensible folly, they were more estimable than the Jules 
 Favres, the Gambettas who played at being the saviours of the 
 country, and who were only the saviours of their needy, fel- 
 low political adventurers. 
 
 Apart from the former, there were the inventors of im- 
 possible schemes for the instantaneous annihilation of the 
 three hundred thousand Germans around Paris, inventors 
 who supply the comic note in the otherwise terrible drama, 
 inventors, who day by day besiege the Ministry for War, and 
 to whom, after all, the minister's collaborateurs are compelled 
 to listen " on the chance of there being something in their 
 schemes." 
 
 " I am asking myself, every now and then, whether I am 
 a staff-officer or one of the doctors at Charenton," said Prince 
 Bibesca, one evening.
 
 INVENTORS AND SAVIOURS. 
 
 " Since yesterday morning," he went on, " I have been in- 
 terviewed by a dozen inventors, every one of whom wanted 
 to see General Trochu or General Schmitz, and would scarcely 
 be persuaded that I would do as well. The first one simply 
 took the breath out of me. I had no energy left to resist the 
 others, or to bow them out politely ; if they had chosen to 
 keep on talking for four and twenty hours, I should have 
 been compelled to listen. He was a little man, about the 
 height of M. Thiers. His opening speech was in proportion 
 to his height ; it consisted of one line. ' Monsieur, I annihi- 
 late the Germans with one blow,' he said. I was thrown off 
 my guard in spite of myself, for etiquette demands that I 
 should keep serious in spite of myself ; and I replied, ' Let 
 me fill my pipe before you do it.' 
 
 " Meanwhile, my visitor spread out a large roll of paper 
 on the table. ' I am not an inventor,' he said ; ' I merely 
 adapt the lessons of ancient history to the present circum- 
 stances. I merely modify the trick of the horse of Troy. 
 Here is Paris with its ninety-six bastions, its forts, etc. I 
 draw three lines : along the first I send twenty-five thousand 
 men pretending to attack the northern positions of the 
 enemy ; along the second line I send a similar number, ap- 
 parently bent on a similar attempt to the south; my fifty 
 thousand troops are perfectly visible to the Germans, for they 
 commence their march an hour or so before dusk. Mean- 
 while darkness sets in, and that is the moment I choose to 
 despatch a hundred and fifty thousand troops, screened and 
 entirely concealed by a movable wall of sheet iron, blackened 
 by smoke. My inventive powers have gone no further than 
 this. My hundred and fifty thousand men behind their wall 
 penetrate unhindered as far as the Prussian lines, where a 
 hundred thousand fall on their backs, taking aim over the 
 wall, while fifty thousand keep moving it forward slowly. 
 Twelve shots for every man make twelve hundred thousand 
 shots more than sufficient to cause a panic among the Ger- 
 mans, who do not know whence the firing proceeds, because 
 my wall is as dark as night itself. Supposing, however, that 
 those who have been left in the camp defend themselves, their 
 projectiles will glance off against the sheet iron of the wall, 
 which, if necessary, can be thrown down finally by our own 
 men, who will finish their business with the bayonet and the 
 sword.' 
 
 " My second visitor had something not less formidable to
 
 422 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 propose ; namely, a sledge-hammer, fifteen miles in circum- 
 ference, and weighing ten millions of tons. It was to be 
 lifted up to a certain altitude by means of balloons. A 
 favourable wind had to be waited for, which would send the 
 balloons in the direction of Versailles, where the ropes con- 
 fining the hammer would be cut. In its fall it would crush 
 and bury the head-quarters and the bulk of the German army. 
 
 " The third showed me the plan of a musical mitrailleuse, 
 which would deal death and destruction while playing Wag- 
 ner, Schubert, and Mendelssohn, the former by preference. 
 1 The Germans,' he remarked, ' are too fond of music to be 
 able to resist the temptation of listening. They are sure to 
 draw near in thousands when my mitrailleuses are set playing. 
 We have got them at our mercy.' I asked him to send me a 
 small one as a sample : he promised to do so." 
 
 Another evening I was induced to go to the Alcazar. I 
 had been there once before, to hear Theresa. This time it 
 was to see an " Exhibition of Engines of War," and to listen 
 to a practical lecture thereon. The audience was as jolly as 
 if the Germans were a thousand miles away jollier, per- 
 haps, than when they listened to " Kien n'est sacre pour un 
 sapeur ; " because they were virtually taking part in the per- 
 formance. The lecturer began by an exhibition of bullet- 
 proof pads, by means of which the soldier might fearlessly 
 advance towards the enemy ; " because they render that part 
 of the body on which they are worn invulnerable." A wag 
 among the spectators made a remark about " retreating sol- 
 diers," which I cannot transcribe; but the exhibitor, an 
 Italian or Spanish major, to judge by his accent, was in no 
 way disconcerted. He placed his pad against an upright 
 board in the shape of a target and began firing at it with a 
 revolver at a distance of four or five paces. The material, 
 though singed, was not pierced, but the spectators seemed by 
 no means convinced. " You wear the pad, and let me have 
 a shot at you," exclaimed one; at which offer the major 
 made a long face. " Have you ever tried the experiment on 
 a living animal ? " asks another. " Perfectly," replied the 
 major ; " I tried it on my clerk," which admission was hailed 
 with shouts of laughter. There were cries for the clerk, who 
 did not appear. A corporal of the National Guards proposed 
 to try an experiment on the major and the pad with the 
 bayonet fastened to a chassepot ; thereupon major and pad 
 suddenly disappeared behind the wings.
 
 AN EVENING AT THE ALCAZAR. 428 
 
 The next inventor exhibits a fire-extinguisher ; the audi- 
 ence require more than a verbal explanation ; some of them 
 propose to set the Alcazar on fire. A small panic, checked 
 in time ; and the various demonstrations are proceeded with 
 amidst shouts, and laughter, and jokes. They yield no prac- 
 tical results, but they kill time. They are voted the next 
 best thing to the theatre. 
 
 By this time we were shut off from the outer world. On 
 the 17th of September, at night, the last train of the Orleans 
 IJailway Company had left Paris. The others had ceased 
 working a day or so before, and placed their rolling stock in 
 safety. JSTot the whole of it, though. A great many of the 
 third-class carriages have had their seats taken out, the lug- 
 gage and goods vans have been washed, the cattle trucks 
 boarded in, and all these transformed into temporary dwell- 
 ings for the suburban poor who have been obliged to seek 
 shelter within the walls of the capital. The interiors of the 
 principal railway stations present scenes that would rejoice 
 the hearts of genre-painters on a large scale. The washing 
 and cooking of all these squatters is done on the various 
 platforms, the carriages have become parlor and bedroom in 
 one, and there has even been some ingenuity displayed in 
 their decoration. The womankind rarely stir from their im- 
 provised homes ; the men are on the fortifications or roaming 
 the streets of Paris. Part of the household gods has been 
 stowed inside the trucks, the rest is piled up in front. The 
 domestic pets, such as cats and dogs, have, as yet, not been 
 killed for food, and the former have a particularly good time 
 of it, for mice and rats abound, especially in the goods- 
 sheds. Here and there a goat gravely stalking along, hap- 
 pily unconscious of its impending doom ; and chanticleer 
 surrounded by a small harem trying to make the best of 
 things. 
 
 Of course, the sudden and enormous influx of human 
 beings could not be housed altogether in that way, but care 
 has been taken that none of them shall be shelterless. All 
 the tenantless apartments, from the most palatial in the 
 Faubourg St. Honore and Champs-Elysees to the humblest 
 in the popular quarters, have been utilized, and the pot-au- 
 feu simmers in marble fireplaces, while Gallic Hodge sees his 
 face reflected in gigantic mirrors the like of which he never 
 saw before. The dwellings that have been merely vacated 
 by their tenants who have flitted to Homburg and Baden-
 
 424: AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Baden, to Nice and elsewhere, are as yet not called into 
 requisition by the authorities. 
 
 From the moment we were cut off from the outer world, 
 the spy mania, which had been raging fiercely enough before, 
 became positively contagious. There is not the slightest 
 doubt that there were spies in Paris, but I feel perfectly cer- 
 tain that they were not prowling about the streets, and that 
 to have caught them one would have had to look among the 
 personnel of the ministries. For a foreigner, unless he spoke 
 French without the slightest accent, to have accepted such 
 a mission, would have been akin to madness ; and there were 
 and are still few foreigners, however well they may know 
 French, who do not betray their origin now and then by im- 
 perfect pronunciation. Besides, there was nothing to spy in 
 the streets ; nevertheless, the spy mania, as I have already 
 said, had reached an acute crisis. The majority of the Na- 
 tional Guard seemed to have no other occupation than to 
 look for spies. A poor Spanish priest was arrested because 
 he had been three times in the same afternoon to the cobbler 
 for the only serviceable pair of shoes he possessed. Woe to 
 the man or woman who was ill-advised enough to take out 
 his pocket-book in the streets. If you happened to be of 
 studious habits, or merely inclined to sit up late, the lights 
 peeping through the carelessly drawn curtains exposed you 
 to a sudden visit from half a dozen ill-mannered, swaggering 
 National Guards, your concierge was called out of his bed, 
 while you were taken to the nearest commissary of police to 
 explain ; or, what was worse still, to the nearest military post, 
 where the lieutenant in command made it a point to be alto- 
 gether soldier-like according to his ideas, i.e. brutal, rude, 
 disgustingly familiar. You might get an apology from the 
 police-official for having been disturbed and dragged through 
 the streets for no earthly reason; the quasi-military man 
 would have considered it beneath his dignity to offer one. 
 
 Of course, every now and then, one happened to meet 
 with a gentleman who was only too anxious to atone for the 
 imbecile "goings-on" of his men, and I was fortunate 
 enough to do so one night. It was on the 20th of Septem- 
 ber, when the feelings of the Parisians had already been em- 
 bittered by their first and not very creditable defeat under 
 their own walls. I dp not suppose there were more than a 
 score of Englishmen in Paris, besides the Irishmen engaged 
 m salting beef at the slaughter-house of La Villette, when,
 
 THE SPY MANIA. 
 
 425 
 
 but for that gentleman, I should have been in a sore strait. 
 Among the English, there was a groom who, at the time of 
 the general exodus, was so dangerously ill that the doctor 
 absolutely forbade his removal, even to a hospital. The case 
 had been brought under my notice, and as the poor fellow 
 was very respectable and had been hard-working, as he had 
 a wife and a young family besides, we not only did all we 
 could for him, but I went to see him personally two or three 
 times to cheer him up a bit. He was on the mend, but 
 slowly, very slowly. He lived in one of the side streets of 
 the Avenue de Clichy, and had lived there a good while, and 
 the concierge of the house had her mind perfectly at rest 
 with regard to his nationality, albeit that the fact of being 
 an Englishman was not always a sufficient guarantee against 
 the suspicion of being a spy on the part of the lower classes. 
 Moreover, they would not always take the fact for granted ; 
 they were unable to distinguish an English from a German 
 or any other accent, and, with them, to be a foreigner was 
 necessarily to be a German, and a German could not be any- 
 thing but a spy. However, in this instance, I felt no anxiety 
 for my protege. 
 
 Unfortunately, a few days before the closing of Paris, the 
 concierge herself fell ill, and another one took her place. 
 The successor was a man, and not by any means a pleasant 
 man. There was a scowl on his face, as, in answer to his 
 summons, I told him whither I was going ; and he cast a 
 suspicious look at a box I was carrying under my arm, which 
 happened to contain nothing more formidable than a surgical 
 appliance. I took no notice, however, and mounted the 
 stairs. 
 
 My visit may have lasted between twenty minutes and 
 half an hour. When I came out, a considerable crowd had 
 assembled on the footway and in the road, and a dozen Na- 
 tional Guards were ranged in a semicircle in front of the 
 door. 
 
 The first cry that greeted me was " Le voila," and then a 
 corporal advanced. " Your name, citizen," he said, in a hec- 
 toring tone, " and what brings you to this house ? " I kept 
 very cool, and told him that I* would neither give him my 
 name nor an explanation of my visit, but that if he would 
 take me to his lieutenant or captain, I should be pleased to 
 give both to the latter. But he would not be satisfied. 
 " Where is the box you had in your hand ? what did it con-
 
 426 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 tain? and what have you done with it?" he insisted. I 
 knew that it would be useless to try and enlighten him, so I 
 stuck to my text. Meanwhile the crowd had become very 
 excited, so I simply repeated my request to be taken to tLe 
 post. 
 
 The crowd would have willingly judged me there and 
 then; that is, strung me up to the nearest lamp-post. If 
 they had, not a single one among them would have been 
 prosecuted for murder, and by the end of the siege the Brit- 
 ish Government would have considered it too late to move 
 in the matter; besides, a great many of my countrymen 
 would have opined that " it served me right " for remaining 
 in Paris, when I might have made myself so comfortable in 
 London or elsewhere. So I felt very thankful when the cor- 
 poral, though very ungraciously, ordered his men to close 
 around me and " to march." I have, since then, been twice 
 to the Avenue de Clichy on pleasure bent ; that is, to break- 
 fast at the celebrated establishment of " le pere Lathuille," 
 and the sight of the lamp-posts there sent a cold shudder 
 down my back. 
 
 The journey to the military post did not take long. It 
 had been established in a former ball-room or music-hall, for 
 at the far end of the room there was a stage, representing, as 
 far as I can remember, an antique palace. The floor of it 
 was littered with straw, on which a score or so of civic warri- 
 ors were lazily stretched out ; while others were sitting at the 
 small wooden tables, that had, not long ago, borne the festive 
 " saladier de petit bleu." Some of the ladles with which that 
 decoction had been stirred were still hanging from the walls ; 
 for in those neighbourhoods the love of portable property on 
 the part of the patrons is quite Wemmickian, and the pro- 
 prietors made and make it a rule to throw as little temptation 
 as possible in the way of the former. The place looked quite 
 sombre, though the gas was alight. There was an intolerable 
 smell of damp straw and stale tobacco smoke. 
 
 Part of the crowd succeeded in making their way inside, 
 notwithstanding the efforts of the National Guards. My ap- 
 pearance caused a certain stir among the occupants of the 
 room ; but in a few moments the captain, summoned from 
 an apartment at the back, came upon the scene, and my pre- 
 liminary trial was proceeded with at once. 
 
 The indictment of the corporal who had arrested me waa 
 brief and to the point. " This man is a foreigner who pays
 
 THE INTERIOR OF A GUARD-ROOM. 427 
 
 constant visits to another foreigner, supposed to be sick. 
 This evening he arrived with a box under his arm which he 
 left with his friend. The concierge has reason to suppose 
 that there is something wrong, for he does not believe in the 
 man's illness. He is supposed to be poor, and still he and his 
 family are living on the fat of the land. My prisoner refused 
 to give me his name and address, or an explanation of his 
 visit." 
 
 " What have you to say, monsieur ? " asked the captain, a 
 man of about thirty-five, evidently belonging to the better 
 classes. I found out afterwards that his name was Garnier 
 or G-armier, and that he was a cashier in one of the large 
 commercial establishments in the Eue St. Martin. He was 
 killed in the last sortie of the Parisians. 
 
 It was the first time I had been addressed that evening as 
 " monsieur." I simply took a card from my pocket-book and 
 gave it to him. " If that is not sufficient, some of your men 
 can accompany me home and ascertain for themselves that I 
 have not given a false name or address," I said. 
 
 He looked at it for a moment. " It is quite unnecessary. 
 I know your name very well, though I have not the honour 
 of knowing you personally. I have seen your portrait at my 
 relatives' establishment" he named a celebrated picture- 
 dealer in the Kue de la Paix, " and I ought to have recog- 
 nized you at once, for it is a very striking likeness, but it is 
 so dark here." Then he turned to his men and to the crowd : 
 " I will answer for this gentleman. I wish we had a thou- 
 sand or so of foreign spies like him in Paris. France has no 
 better friend than he." 
 
 I was almost as much afraid of the captain's praise as I 
 had been of the corporal's blame, because the crowd wanted 
 to give me an ovation ; seeing which, M. Garmier invited me 
 to stay with him a little while, until the latter should have 
 dispersed. It was while sitting in his own room that he told 
 me the following story. 
 
 " My principal duty, monsieur, seems to consist, not in 
 killing Germans, but in preventing perfectly honest French- 
 men and foreigners from being killed or maimed. Not later 
 than the night before last, three men were brought in. They 
 were all very powerful fellows; there was no doubt about 
 their being Frenchmen. They did not take their arrest as a 
 matter of course at all, but to every question I put they sim- 
 ply sent me to the devil. It was not the behaviour of the
 
 28 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 presumed spy, who, as a rule, is very soft spoken and concili- 
 ating until he sees that the game is up, when he becomes in- 
 sulting. Still, I reflected that the violence of the three men 
 might be a clever bit of acting also, the more that I could see 
 for myself that they were abominably, though not speechless- 
 ly, drunk. Their offence was that they had been seen loiter- 
 ing in a field very close to the fortifications, with their noses 
 almost to the ground. Do what I would, an explanation I 
 could not get, and at last the most powerful of the trio made 
 a movement as if to draw a knife. With great difficulty a 
 dozen of my men succeeded in getting his coat off ; and there, 
 between his waistcoat and his shirt, was a murderously look- 
 ing blade, a formidable weapon indeed. 
 
 " 'He is a Prussian spy, sure enough ! ' exclaimed the 
 roomful of guards. 
 
 " I examined the knife carefully, tried to find the name of 
 the maker, and all at once put it to my nose. Then I took 
 up a candle and looked more carefully still at the prisoners. 
 ' They are simply drunk,' I said, ' and the best thing you can 
 do is to take them home.' 
 
 '"But the knife ? ' insisted the sergeant. 
 
 " ' The knife is all right,' I answered. 
 
 " ' I should think it is all right,' said the owner, ' seeing 
 that I am cutting provisions all day with it for those con- 
 founded Parisians.' 
 
 " But the guards were not satisfied with the explanation. 
 They began to surround me. ' That was surely a sign you 
 made to the fellow when you lifted the blade to your face, 
 captain,' said the sergeant. 
 
 " ' Not at all, friend ; I was simply smelling it. And it 
 smelt abominably of onions.' That will give you an idea, 
 monsieur, of the life they lead me also. Still, I would ask 
 you, as a particular favour, monsieur, not to mention your 
 mishap to any one. As you are aware, I am not to blame ; 
 but we are in bad odour enough as it is at the Ministry of 
 War, and we do not wish to increase our somewhat justified 
 reputation for irresponsible rowdyism and lack of discipline." 
 
 I gave him my promise to that effect, and have not men- 
 tioned the matter until this day.
 
 LEX VENTRIS. 
 
 429 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 The siege The food-supply of Paris How and what the Parisians eat and 
 drink Bread, meat, and wine Alcoholism The waste among the Lon- 
 don poor The French take a lesson from the alien The Irish at La Vil- 
 lette A whisper of the horses being doomed M. Gagne The various at- 
 tempts to introduce horseflesh The journals deliver their opinions The 
 supply of horseflesh as it stood in '70 The Academic des Sciences Gela- 
 tine Kitchen gardens on the balcony M. Lockroy's experiment M. 
 Pierre Joigueux and the Englishman If cabbages, why not mushrooms ? 
 There is still a kitchen garden left Cream cheese from the moon, to be 
 fetched by Gambetta His departure in a balloon Nadar and Napoleon 
 HI- Carrier-pigeons An aerial telegraph Otters to cross the Prussian 
 lines The theatres A performance at the Cirque National "Le Koi 
 s'amuse," at the Theatre de Montmartre A dejeuner at Durand's Weber 
 and Beethoven Long winter nights without fuel or gas The price of pro- 
 visions The Parisian's good-humour His wit The greed of the shop- 
 keeperCulinary literature Here's " Dtopia" An ex-lieutenant of the 
 Foreign Legion He gives us a breakfast He delivers a lecture on food 
 Joseph, his servant Milk The slender resources of the poor I interview 
 an employe of the State Pawnshop Statistics Hidden provisions Bread 
 Prices of provisions New Year's Day, and New Year's dinners The 
 bombardment No more bread The end of the siege. 
 
 I AM not a soldier, nor in the least like one ; hence, I 
 have, almost naturally, neglected to note any of the strategic 
 and military problems involved in the campaign and the 
 siege. But, ignorant as I am in these matters, and notwith- 
 standing the repeated failures of General Trochu's troops to 
 break through the lines of investment, I feel certain, on the 
 other hand, that the Germans would have never taken Paris 
 by storming it. Years before, Von Moltke had expressed his 
 opinion to that effect in his correspondence, not exactly with 
 regard to the French capital, but with regard to any fortified 
 centre of more than a hundred thousand inhabitants. Such 
 an agglomeration, even if severely left alone, and only shut 
 off from the rest of the world, falls by itself. I am giving 
 the spirit and not the substance of his words. 
 
 Consequently, there is no need to say, that, to the mere 
 social observer, the problems raised by the food-supply were 
 perhaps the most interesting. Even under normal condi-
 
 430 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 tions, the average Parisian in his method of feeding is worth 
 studying ; he is supposed to be one of the most abstemious 
 creatures on the civilized globe. And yet, I do not think 
 that he consumes less alcohol than the average Englishman 
 or German. The Frenchman's alcohol is more diluted ; that 
 is all. A drunken woman is a very rare sight, either in Paris 
 or in the provinces ; nevertheless, there is, probably, not one 
 in a thousand women among the lower classes who drinks 
 less than her half a bottle of wine per day ; while ladies of 
 high degree generally partake of one if not two glasses of 
 chartreuse with their coffee, after each of the two principal 
 meals. Un grog Americain is as often ordered for the lady 
 as for the gentleman, during the evening visits to the cafe. 
 I am speaking of gentlewomen by birth and education, and 
 of the spouses of the well-to-do men, not of the members of 
 the demi-monde and of those below them. 
 
 So far, the question of drink, which, after my visit to 
 the wine-depots at Bercy, assumed an altogether different 
 aspect to my mind. I began to wonder whether the plethora 
 of wine would not do as much harm as the expected scarcity 
 of food. My fears were not groundless. 
 
 Frenchmen, especially Parisians, not only eat a great 
 quantity of bread, but they are very particular as to its qual- 
 ity. I have a note showing that, during the years 1868-69, 
 the consumption per head for every man, woman, and child 
 amounted to a little more than an English pound per day, 
 and that very little of this was of " second quality," though 
 the latter was as good as that sold at many a London baker's 
 as first. I tasted it myself, because the municipality had 
 made a great point of introducing it to the lower classes at 
 twopence per quartern less than the first quality. Neverthe- 
 less, the French workman would have none of it.* 
 
 Even in the humblest restaurants, the bread supplied to 
 customers is of a superior quality ; the ordinary household 
 bread (pain de menage) is only to be had by specially asking 
 for it ; the roll with the caf e-au-lait in the morning is an 
 institution except with the very poor. 
 
 As for meat, I have an idea, in spite of all the doubts 
 thrown upon the question by English writers, that the Pa- 
 
 * Goethe, in his journey through France, noticed that the peasants who 
 drove his carriage invariably refused to eat the soldiers' "bread, which he found 
 to his taste. EDITOR.
 
 ENGLISH AND FRENCH COOKING. 431 
 
 risian workman in 18TO consumed as much as his London 
 fellow. The fact of the former having two square meals a 
 day instead of one, is not sufficiently taken into account by 
 the casual observer. There arc few English artisans whose 
 supper, except on Sundays, consists of anything more sub- 
 stantial than bread and cheese. The Frenchman eats meat 
 at twelve a.m. and at six p.m. The nourishment contained 
 in the scraps, the bones, etc., is generally lost to the English- 
 man : not a particle of it is wasted in France. Be that as 
 it may, the statistics for 1858 show a consumption of close 
 upon eight ounces (English) of fresh meat per day for every 
 head of the population. Be it remembered that these sta- 
 tistics are absolutely correct, because a town-due of over a 
 halfpenny per English pound is paid on the meat leaving 
 the public slaughter-houses, and killed meat is taxed simi- 
 larly at the city gates. Private slaughter-houses there are 
 virtually none. 
 
 Allowing for all this, it will be seen that Paris was not 
 much better off than other capitals would have been if 
 threatened with a siege, except, perhaps, for the ingenuity of 
 even the humblest French housewife in making much out of 
 little by means of vegetables, fruit, and cunningly prepared 
 sauces, for which, nevertheless, butter, milk, lard, etc., were 
 wanted, which commodities were as likely to fail as all other 
 things. Xor must one forget to mention the ingenuity dis- 
 played in the public slaughter-houses themselves, in utilizing 
 every possible scrap of the slaughtered animals for human 
 food"! I had occasion, not very long ago (1883), to go fre- 
 quently, and for several weeks running, to one of the poorest 
 quarters in London. I often made the journey on foot, for 
 I am ashamed to say that, until then, the East End was far 
 more unknown to me than many an obscure town in France, 
 Italy, Germany, and Spain. The clever remark of a French 
 sociologist that " the battle of life is fought below the belt," 
 holds especially good with regard to the lower classes. Well, 
 I may unhesitatingly say that in no country are the poor left 
 in greater ignorance with regard to cheap and nourishing 
 food than in England, if I am to judge by London. The 
 French, the German, the Italian, the Spanish poor, have a 
 dozen inexpensive and succulent dishes of which the Eng- 
 lish poor know absolutely nothing ; and still those very 
 dishes figure on the tables of the well-to-do, and of fashion- 
 able restaurants, as entrees under more or less fantastic names.
 
 432 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 Is the English working man so utterly devoid of thrift and 
 of common sense, is his contempt for the foreigner so great 
 as to make him refuse to take a lesson from the latter ? I 
 think not. I fancy it will depend much on the manner in 
 which the lesson is conveyed. A little less board-school work 
 and Sunday-school teaching, fewer Bible classes, and a good 
 many practical cooking-classes would probably meet the case. 
 The French, though aware of their incontestable supe- 
 riority in the way of preparing food, did not disdain to take 
 a lesson from the alien. They clearly foresaw the fate in 
 store for the cattle penned in the squares and public gardens, 
 if compelled to remain there under existing conditions, and 
 with the inclement season close at hand ; consequently, the 
 authorities enlisted the services of Mr. Wilson, an Irish gen- 
 tleman who had been residing in Paris for a number of years, 
 and whose experience in the salted-provision trade seemed to 
 them very likely to yield most satisfactory results. Up till 
 then, only thirty head of cattle had been submitted to his 
 process, from that moment the number is considerably in- 
 creased, and it becomes apparent that, in a short while, there 
 will be few live oxen, sheep, or pigs left in Paris, though, as 
 yet we are only in the beginning of October. Under Mr. Wil- 
 son's able management, half a hundred Irishmen are at work 
 for many, many hours a day at the slaughter-house in La 
 Villete, whither flock the Parisians, at any rate the privi- 
 leged ones, to watch the preliminaries to the regime of salt- 
 junk which is staring them in the face. The fodder thus 
 economized will go to the horses, although there is a whisper 
 in the air that one eminent savant has recommended their 
 immediate slaughter and salting also. Of course, such as are 
 wanted for military purposes will be exempted from this 
 holocaust on the altar of patriotism. M. Gagne, who has 
 already provided the Parisians with amusement for years, in 
 his capacity as a perpetual candidate for parliamentary hon- 
 ours, does not stop at hippophagy ; he seriously proposes an- 
 thropophagy. " A human being over sixty is neither useful 
 nor ornamental," he exclaimed at a public meeting ; " and 
 to prove that I mean what I say, I am willing to give myself 
 as food to my sublime and suffering townsmen." Poor fel- 
 low ! as mad as a March hare, but a man of education and 
 with an infinite fund of sympathy for humanity. He was 
 but moderately provided for at the best of times ; his income 
 was derived from some property in the provinces, and, as a
 
 HORSEFLESH. 433 
 
 matter of course, the investment of Paris stopped his sup- 
 plies of funds from that quarter. He was of no earthly use 
 in the besieged city, but he refused to go. He had a small 
 but very valuable collection of family plate, which went bit 
 by bit to the Mint, not to feed himself but to feed others, for 
 he was never weary of well-doing. He reminded one irre- 
 sistibly of Balzac's hero, " le Pere Goriot," parting with his 
 treasures to supply his ungrateful daughters, for the Parisians 
 were ungrateful to him. Mad as he was, no man in posses- 
 sion of all his mental faculties could have been more sub- 
 lime. 
 
 Whatever the question of human flesh as food may have 
 been to the Parisians, that of horseflesh was by no means 
 new to them. Since '66, various attempts had been made to 
 introduce it on a large scale, but, for once in a way, they were 
 logical in their objections to it. " It is all very well," wrote 
 a paper, devoted to the improvement of the humbler classes, 
 " it is all very well for a few savants to sit round a well- 
 appointed table to feast upon the succulent parts of a young, 
 tender, and perfectly healthy horse, especially if the steaks are 
 
 * aux truSes,' and the kidneys stewed in * Madeira ; ' but that 
 young, tender, and perfectly healthy horse would cost more 
 than an equally tender, young, and perfectly healthy bullock 
 or cow. So, where is the advantage? In order to obtain 
 that advantage, horses only fit for the knacker's yard, not fit 
 for human food, would have to be killed, and the hard-work- 
 ing artisan with his non-vitiated taste, who does not even 
 care for venison or game when it happens to be ' high,' 
 would certainly not care for a superannuated charger to be 
 set before him. You might just as well ask an unsophisti- 
 cated cannibal to feast upon an invalid. The best part of 
 
 * the warrior on the shelf ' is his wooden leg or his wooden 
 arm ; the best part of the superannuated charger is his skin 
 or his hoof, with or without the shoe ; and no human being, 
 whether cannibal or not, can be expected to make a timber- 
 yard, a tanner's yard, or an old-iron and rag store of his 
 stomach, even to please faddists." 
 
 As a consequence, only two millions of pounds of horse- 
 flesh were " produced " during the first three years succeed- 
 ing the publication of that article (1866-69) ; but it is more 
 than doubtful whether a sixteenth part of it was consumed 
 as human food with a knowledge on the part of the con- 
 sumers. And during those three years, as if to prove the 
 
 19
 
 434 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 writer's words, the public were being constantly fortified in 
 their dislike with official reports of the seizure of diseased 
 horses on their way to the four specially appointed slaughter- 
 houses. I remember, that in one week, twenty-four ani- 
 mals were thus confiscated by the sanitary inspectors, " the 
 flesh of which," added the Moniteur, " would have probably 
 found its way to the tables of the better class Parisians, in 
 the shape of Aries, Lorraine, or German sausages. These 
 commodities," it went on, " are never offered by the manu- 
 facturer to the experienced proprietors of the ham and beef 
 shops (charcutiers), but to fruiterers, grocers, vendors of so- 
 called dainties, and dealers in preserved provisions." The 
 article had the effect of arousing the suspicion of the better 
 classes as well as of the poorer. 
 
 The number of " horse-butchers '' had decreased by four 
 during the four years that had elapsed since their first estab- 
 lishment with the Government's sanction, and the remaining 
 eighteen were not very prosperous when the siege brought 
 the question to the fore once more. The public could not 
 afford to be positively hostile to the scheme, but the assertion 
 of the rare advocates of the system, that they were enthu- 
 siastic, is altogether beside the truth. They had to make the 
 best of a bad game, that was all. It is a very curious, but 
 positive fact, nevertheless, that I have heard Parisians speak 
 favourably afterwards of dog's and cat's flesh, even of rats 
 baked in a pie ; I have heard them say that, for once in a 
 way, even under ordinary circumstances, they would not mind 
 partaking of those dishes : I have never heard them express 
 the same good will toward horseflesh. Of course, I am allud- 
 ing to those who affected no partisanship, either one way or the 
 other. One thing is very certain, though : at the end of the 
 siege the sight of a cat or dog was a rarity in Paris, while 
 by the official reports there were thirty thousand horses 
 left. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Academie de Sciences is attracting notice 
 by the reports of its sittings, in which the question of food 
 is the only subject discussed. Professor Dorderone reads a 
 paper on the utilization of beef and mutton fat; and he 
 communicates a new process with regard to kidney fat, 
 which, up till then, had withstood the attempts of the most 
 celebrated chefs for culinary purposes. He professes to have 
 discovered the means of doing away with the unpleasant 
 taste and smell which have hitherto militated against its
 
 FAT VERSUS BUTTER. 435 
 
 use, he undertakes to give it the flavour and aroma of the 
 best butter from Brittany and Normandy. M. Richard, the 
 maire of La Villette, attempts similar experiments with ani- 
 mal offal, which M. Dumas, the great savant, declares highly 
 satisfactory. M. Siche, one of the superior officials of the 
 Mint, transforms bullock's blood into black puddings, which 
 are voted superior to those hitherto made with pig's blood. 
 The nourishing properties of gelatine are demonstrated in 
 an equally scientific manner, and the Academic des Sciences 
 gradually becomes the rendezvous of the fair ones of Paris, 
 who come to take lessons in the culinary art. 
 
 " Mais, monsieur," says one, " maintenant que nous 
 avons du beurre, veuillez nous dire d'oii viendront nos 
 epinards ? " * 
 
 "Don't let that trouble you, madame," is the answer; 
 " if you will honour us with your presence next week, one 
 of our learned friends from the Jardin des Plantes will tell 
 you how to grow salads, and perhaps asparagus, on your 
 balcony and in front of your windows, in less than a fort- 
 night." 
 
 The learned professor is not trying to mystify his charm- 
 ing interlocutor ; he honestly believes in what he says : and, 
 a week later, when " the friend from the Jardin des Plantes " 
 has spoken, there is a wonderful run on all the seed-shops 
 near the Chatelet, every one tries to borrow flower-pots from 
 his neighbours, and barrow-loads of mould are being trun- 
 dled in long lines into Paris. Wherever one goes, the eye 
 meets careful housewives bending over wooden boxes on the 
 balconies; M. Philippe Lockroy, the eminent actor and 
 dramatist, the father of M. Edouard Lockroy, the future 
 minister of the Third Republic, asks seriously why we 
 should not revive the hanging gardens of Semiramis, and 
 sets the example by converting his fifth floor balcony into a 
 market garden, to the discomfiture of his son, who finds his 
 erstwhile bedroom converted into a storehouse for tools and 
 less agreeable matter. I may mention that M. Lockroy did 
 not abandon his project after a mere fleeting attempt, nor 
 when the necessity for it had disappeared, but that at the 
 hour I write (1883) he has taken a prize for pears grown on 
 that same balcony. 
 
 * " Mettre du beurre dans ses e"pinards," means, figuratively, to increase one's 
 comforts. EDITOR.
 
 436 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 The mania spreads, and every one becomes, for the time 
 being, a market-gardener in chambers- Even M. Pierre 
 Joigneux, the well-known horticulturist, and equally clever 
 writer, is bitten with it. That the thing was perfectly feasi- 
 ble, was proved subsequently by M. Lockroy, but the latter 
 did not imitate the nigger who dug up the potatoes an hour 
 after he had planted them, to see if they were growing. 
 That thoroughly inexperienced persons should have indulged 
 in such wild fancies is perhaps not to be wondered at ; but 
 M. Joigneux was not one of these, yet he provided an Eng- 
 lishman, who had come to propose the experiment to him, 
 with all the necessary funds. " I was perfectly certain that 
 I should never see him again," he said afterwards ; but, with 
 all due deference, we may take this as a shamefaced denial 
 of his credulity. " Contrary to my expectations," M. Joig- 
 neux went on, when he told us the tale a few nights after- 
 wards at the Cafe de la Paix he lived in the Kue du 4 Sep- 
 tembre, " my Englishman did come back, accompanied by 
 a porter who carried the requisite material. I did not inter- 
 fere with him in the least, but merely watched him. I knew 
 that in England they did produce ' greenstuff ' in that way ; 
 though I was also aware of the difference between a few 
 blades and a serious crop." 
 
 Others, more ingenious still, began to argue that if it was 
 possible to produce vegetables in a fortnight by means of 
 light and a few handfuls of mould, it could not be difficult 
 to produce mushrooms with a much thicker layer of mould 
 and in the darkness of a cellar. 
 
 Fortunately there is, as yet, a very decent kitchen-garden 
 to fall back upon. It lies between the fortifications and the 
 forts ; it has been somewhat pillaged at first, but the authori- 
 ties have organized several companies of labourers from among 
 those whom they have not been able to provide with arms, 
 and those who do not dig or delve keep watch against depre- 
 dation. They have a very simple uniform a black kepi with 
 crimson piping, and a crimson belt round their waists. They 
 are exposed to a certain danger, for every now and then a 
 stray German bullet lays one of them low, but, upon the 
 whole, their lot is not a hard one. 
 
 " We have still nearly everything we want," writes a face- 
 tious journalist ; " and now that good and obliging fellow, 
 Gambetta, is going to fetch us some cream cheese from the 
 moon for our dessert."
 
 DEPARTURE OF GAMBETTA. 437- 
 
 In fact, during the last few days, we have been informed 
 of the Minister of the Interior's impending departure for 
 Tours by balloon on the 7th of October, and by twelve 
 o'clock on that day the little Place St. Pierre, right on the 
 heights of Montmartre, is simply black with people. " The 
 great statesman," the " hero who is to rouse the provinces to 
 unheard-of efforts for the deliverance of the sacred soil of 
 France from the polluting presence of the Teutonic barba- 
 rian," has not arrived yet when I edge my way through the 
 crowd, accompanied by an officer on General Vinoy's staff, 
 who is a near relative of mine. With the recollection of my 
 adventure in the Avenue de Clichy fresh upon me, I would 
 not have ventured to come by myself. There is a military 
 post on the Place St. Pierre, and I am wondering whether it 
 will turn out to pay honours to " the great statesman ; " and 
 whether Nadar, the famous Nadar, whom I can see towering 
 above the crowd, and giving instructions, will treat Gam- 
 betta with the same scant courtesy he once treated Louis- 
 Napoleon, when the latter went to see the ascent of his bal- 
 loon, " Le Geant," from the Champ-de-Mars. Nadar's be- 
 haviour on that occasion reminds one of Elizabeth's with the 
 wife of Bishop Parker. " ' Madam,' " said the queen, " I 
 may not call you, and ' mistress ' I am loth to call you." 
 Nadar was too fervent a republican to call Louis-Napoleon 
 " Majesty ; " he was too well-bred to insult his guest by ad- 
 dressing him as " Monsieur : " so, when he saw the sovereign 
 advancing, he backed towards his car, and, before he could 
 come up with him, gave orders to " let go." 
 
 I do not know whether Gambetta came in a carriage. It 
 did not make its appearance on the Place St. Pierre ; he 
 probably left it, like meaner mortals, at the foot of the very 
 steep hill. The cheering was immense, and he took it as if 
 to the manner born. He was accompanied by M. Spuller, 
 who was to take the journey with him, and who, even at that 
 time, bore a curious likeness to Mr. Spurgeon. M. Spuller did 
 not appear to claim any of the cheers for himself, for he kept 
 perfectly stolid. Gambetta, on the other hand, bowed re- 
 peatedly, at which Nadar grinned. Nadar was always honest, 
 if outspoken. He did not seem particularly pleased with 
 the business in hand, and was evidently determined to get 
 it over as soon as possible. Gambetta was still standing up, 
 bowing and waving his hands, when Nadar gave the order 
 to " let go " the ropes, and the dictator fell back into the lap
 
 438 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 of his companion. The balloon rose rather quickly, and 
 about nine that same night we had the news that the balloon 
 had safely landed in the Department of the Oise, about twelve 
 miles from Clermont. 
 
 From that moment, the ascent of a balloon with its car 
 containing one or two, sometimes three, wicker cages of car- 
 rier-pigeons, becomes a favourite spectacle with the Parisians, 
 who would willingly see the departure of a dozen per day. 
 For each departure means not only the conveyance of a 
 budget of news from the besieged city to the provinces, it 
 means the return of the winged messengers with perhaps 
 hopeful tidings that the provinces are marching to the rescue. 
 I am bound to say, at the same time, that the terrible anxiety 
 for such rescue did not arise solely from a wish to escape fur- 
 ther physical sufferings and privations. Three-fourths of 
 the Parisians would have been willing to put up with worse 
 for the sake of one terrible defeat inflicted upon the Germans 
 by their levies or by those in the provinces. 
 
 But though the gas companies did wonders, fifty-two 
 balloons having been inflated by them during the siege, they 
 could do no more. Nevertheless, the experiments continue : 
 the brothers Goddard have established their head-quarters 
 at the Orleans Railway ; MM. Dartois and Yon at the North- 
 ern ; Admiral Labrousse, who has already invented an ingen- 
 ious gun-carriage, is now busy upon a navigable balloon ; the 
 Government grants a subsidy of forty thousand francs to M. 
 Dupuy de Lome to assist him in his research ; and at the 
 Grande H6tel there is a permanent exhibition of appliances 
 for navigating the air under the direction of MM. Horeau 
 and Saint-Felix. The public flock to them, and for a mo- 
 ment there is the hope that if we ourselves cannot come and 
 go as free as birds, there will be at least a means of perma- 
 nent communication with the outer world that way. M. 
 Granier has proposed to make an aerial telegraph without the 
 support of poles. The wire is to be enclosed in a gutta- 
 percha tube filled with hydrogen gas, which will enable it to 
 keep its altitude a thousand or fifteen hundred meters above 
 the earth. The cable is to be paid out by balloons. M. Gaston 
 Tissandier, a well-known authority in such matters, looks fav- 
 ourably upon the experiment ; but, alas, it comes to nothing, 
 and we have to fall back upon less ingenious, more common- 
 place means. 
 
 In other words, we are offering tempting fees to plucky
 
 POSTAL EXPERIMENTS. 439 
 
 individuals who will attempt to cross the Prussian lines. 
 Several do make the attempt, and for a week or so the news- 
 papers and the walls swarm with advertisements of a pri- 
 vate firm who will forward and receive despatches at the 
 rate of ten francs per letter. A good many messengers de- 
 part ; a good many return almost at once, finding the task 
 impossible ; those that do not return have presumably been 
 shot by the Prussians, for not a single one reached his des- 
 tination. 
 
 Then we begin to turn our thoughts to the sheep-dog as 
 a carrier of messengers, or rather to the smuggler's dog, 
 thousands of which are known to exist on the Belgian and 
 Swiss frontiers. The postal authorities go even so far as to 
 promise two hundred francs for every batch of despatches 
 if delivered within twenty-four hours of the animal's de- 
 parture from his starting-place, and fifty francs less for 
 every twenty-four hours' delay ; but the animals fall a prey 
 to the Prussian sentries, not one of them succeeds in reach- 
 ing the French outposts. The carrier-pigeon is all we have 
 left. 
 
 Still, we are not discouraged ; and in less than a month 
 after the investment, the Parisians begin to clamour for their 
 favourite amusement the theatre. There are, of course, 
 many divergencies of opinion with regard to the fitness of 
 the measure, and we get some capital articles on the subject, 
 studded with witty sentences and relieved by historical anec- 
 dotes, showing that, whatever they may not know, French 
 journalists have an inexhaustible fund of parallels when it 
 becomes a question of the playhouse. " In '92 the Lillois 
 went peacefully to the theatre while the shells were pouring 
 into the devoted city. Why should we be less courageous 
 and less cheerful than they?" writes one. "Nero was fid- 
 dling while Home was burning," writes another, " but Paris* 
 is not on fire yet ; and, if it were, the Nero who might be 
 blamed for the catastrophe is at Wilhelmshohe, where, we 
 may be sure, he will not eat a mouthful less for our pangs of 
 hunger. If he does not fiddle, it is because, like his famous 
 uncle, he has no ear for music." 
 
 " Whatever may happen," writes M. Francisque Sarcey in 
 the Gaulois, " art should be considered superior to all things ; 
 the theatre is not a more unseemly pleasure under the cir- 
 cumstances than the perusal of a good book ; and it is just 
 in the darkest and saddest hours of his life that a man needs
 
 440 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 a diversion which will, for a little while, at least, prevent him 
 from brooding upon his sufferings." 
 
 To which " Thomas Grimm," of Le Petit Journal, who 
 is on the opposite side, replies : " If I may be allowed to in- 
 tervene in so grave a question, I have no hesitation in say- 
 ing that the time for singing and amusing ourselves has 
 not arrived. It seems to me very doubtful whether the spec- 
 tators would not be constantly thinking of scenes enacted in 
 other spots than behind the footlights. And in such moments, 
 when they might concentrate the whole of their attention on 
 the pleasant fiction enacted before them, the sound of the 
 cannon thundering in the distance would more than once re- 
 call them to the reality." 
 
 The ice was virtually broken, and on Sunday, the 23rd 
 of October, the Cirque National opened its doors for a con- 
 cert. During the last five years, as my readers will perceive 
 by the almost involuntary break in these notes, I had not 
 been so assiduous a frequenter of the theatre and the concert 
 hall as I used to be, and though I was during the siege over- 
 burdened with business, on the nature of which I need not 
 dwell here, I felt that I wanted some amusement. The even- 
 ings were becoming chilly, one of my cherished companions 
 was doing his duty with General Vinoy, and, though I had 
 practically unlimited means at my command for my necessi- 
 ties, and am by no means sparing of money at any time, I 
 grudged the price of fuel. As yet, wood only cost six francs 
 the hundredweight, but it was such wood ! If the ancient 
 proverb-coiner had been seated in front of the hearth in 
 which it was trying to burn, he might have hesitated to 
 write that " there is no smoke without a fire." The friendly 
 chats by the fireside, which I had enjoyed for many years, 
 had almost entirely ceased. Nearly all my familiars were 
 " on duty," and the few hours they could snatch were either 
 spent in bed, to rest from the fatigue and discomforts of the 
 night, or else at the cafes and restaurants, where the news, 
 mostly of an anecdotal kind, was circulating freely. In fact, 
 the cafes and- restaurants, as long as there was fuel and light, 
 were more amusing during the siege than I had known them 
 to be at any time. Perhaps the most amusing feature of 
 these nightly gatherings was the presentation of the bill 
 after dinner. The prices charged at the Cafe de Paris in its 
 palmiest days were child's play compared to the actual ones. 
 I have preserved the note of a breakfast for two at Durand's,
 
 AMUSEMENTS. 
 
 i 
 
 Hors d'CEuvres (Radishes and Sausage) . 19 
 
 Entree (Navarin aux Ponimes) ... 13 
 
 Filet de Boeuf aux Champignons ... ! 24 
 
 Omelette Sucree (3 ceufs) ... 13 
 
 Cafe 
 
 1 Bouteille de Macon .... Q 
 
 Total frs. 71 
 
 The bread and butter were included in the hors-d'oeuvres, 
 and I may remark that the entree and the filet de bceuf were 
 only for one. Durand's was the cheapest of the five restau- 
 rants which still retained their ordinary clientele. Bignon, 
 Voisin, the Cafes de la Paix and Anglais were much dearer! 
 The latter gave its patrons white bread as late as the 16th of 
 December. 
 
 I made up my mind, then, to go to that concert at the 
 Cirque National, and to as many of the entertainments as 
 might be offered. I have rarely seen such a crowd outside a 
 theatre ; and I doubt whether the fact of the performance 
 being for a charitable purpose had much to do with it, be- 
 cause, if so, those who were denied admission might have 
 handed their money at the box-office, but they did not, they 
 only gave the reverse of their blessing. If charity it was, it 
 did not want to end at home that afternoon. 
 
 The entertainment began with a charity sermon by the 
 Abbe Duquesnay, a hardworking priest in one of the thickly 
 populated quarters of Paris. I would willingly give another 
 ten francs to hear a similar sermon. I am positive that the 
 Abbe had taken Laurence Sterne for his model. I have 
 never heard anything so brilliant in my life. Not the 
 slightest attempt at thrusting religion down one's throat. 
 A good many quotations on the advantages of well-doing, 
 notably that of Shakespeare, admirably translated, probably 
 by the speaker himself. Then the following to wind up 
 with : " I do not know of a single curmudgeon who has ever 
 been converted into what I should call 'a genuine alms- 
 giver,' by myself, or by my fellow-priests. When he did 
 give, he looked upon the gift as a loan to the Lord in virtue 
 of that gospel precept which you all know. Now, my good 
 friends, allow me to give you my view of that sentence : God 
 is just, and no doubt He will repay the loan with interest, 
 but after He has settled the account, He will indict the lender 
 before the Highest tribunal for usury. Consequently, if you
 
 442 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS V 
 
 have an idea of placing your money in that way with God as 
 a security, you had bettor keep it in your purses." 
 
 After this, the orchestra, nine-tenths of whose members 
 are in uniform, performs the overture to "La Muette de 
 Portici " (Masaniello) ; Pasdeloup conducting. Pasdeloup 
 is a naturalized German, whose real name is AVolfgang, but, 
 in this instance, the public do not seem to mind it ; nor is 
 there any protest against the names of two other Germans 
 on the programme, Weber's and Beethoven's. On the con- 
 trary, the latter's composition is frantically encored. I be- 
 lieve it is the symphony in C Minor, for it has been wedded 
 to Victor Hugo's words, and it is Madame Ugalde who sings 
 the stirring hymn " Patria." 
 
 There is a story connected with this hymn, which is not 
 generally known. I give it as it was told to me a day or so 
 afterwards by Auber, who had it from the lips of Joseph 
 Dartigues, who, at the time of its occurrence, was the musical 
 critic of the Journal des Debats. 
 
 Hugo was very young then, and one night he went to the 
 Theatre de Madame, which has since become the Gymnase. 
 The piece was one of Scribe's " La Chatte metamorphosee 
 en Femme ; " and Jenny Vertpre, whom our grandfathers 
 applauded at the St. James Theatre in the thirties, was to 
 play the principal part. Still, our poet was not particularly 
 struck with the plot, dialogue, or lyrics ; but, all at once, he 
 sat upright in his seat, at the strains of a " Hindoo invoca- 
 tion." When the music ceased, Hugo left the house, hum- 
 ming the notes to himself He was very fond of music, 
 though he could never reconcile himself to have his dramas 
 appropriated by the librettists, and gave his consent but very 
 reluctantly. Next morning, he met Dartigues on the Boule- 
 vard des Italiens, then the Boulevard de Gand. He told him 
 what he had heard, and recommended the critic to go and 
 judge for himself. " It is so utterly different from the idiotic 
 stuff one generally hears." Dartigues acted upon the recom- 
 mendation, A few days later, they met once more. " Did 
 you go and hear that music, at the Theatre de Madame ? " 
 asked Hugo. 
 
 " Yes," was the reply. " I am not surprised at your lik- 
 ing it ; it is Beethoven's." 
 
 Curious to relate, Hugo had not as much as heard the 
 name of the great German composer. The acquaintance with 
 classical music was very limited in the France of those days.
 
 THE THEATRES. 
 
 443 
 
 But Hugo never forgot the symphony, and, later on, in his 
 exile, he wrote the words I had just heard. 
 
 The impulse has been given, and from that moment the 
 walls of Paris display as many bills of theatrical and musical 
 entertainments as if the Germans were not at the gates. I 
 go to nearly all, and, to my great regret, hear a great many 
 actors and actresses who have received favours and honours 
 at the hand of Louis-Napoleon vie with one another in cast- 
 ing obloquy upon him and his reign. One of the few honour- 
 able exceptions is M. Got, who, being invited to recite Hugo's 
 " Chatiments," emphatically refuses " to kick a man when he 
 is down." 
 
 At the Theatre-Fran9ais, there is a special box the 
 erstwhile Imperial box for the convalescents, who are being 
 tended in the theatre itself. 
 
 But though I went to hear Melchisedec and Taillade, 
 Caron and Berthelier, there is one performance that stands 
 out vividly from the rest in my memory. It was a representa- 
 tion of Hugo's " Le Roi s'amuse " (" The Fool's Revenge "), 
 at the theatre at Montmartre. Under ordinary circumstances, 
 I should probably not have gone so far afield to see any piece, 
 not even that which was reputed to be the masterpiece of 
 Victor Hugo, but, in this instance, the temptation was too 
 great. The play had only been performed in Paris once on 
 the 22nd of November, 1832 ; next day it was suspended by 
 order of the Government. Alexandre Dumas the elder, 
 Theophile Gautier, Nestor Roqueplan, all of whom wera 
 present on that memorable night, had spoken to me of its 
 beauties. I had often promised myself to read it, and had 
 never done so. If I had, I should probably not have gone to 
 Montmartre that night, lest my illusions should be disturbed. 
 The performance was intended as a tribute to the genius of 
 the poet, but also as an act of defiance on the part of the 
 young Republic to the preceding regimes ; though why it was 
 not revived during the Second Republic I have never been 
 able to make out clearly. 
 
 My companion and I toiled up the steep Rue des Martyrs, 
 and it was evident to us, when we got to the Place du Theatre, 
 that something unusual was going on, for the little square 
 was absolutely black with people. We managed, however, to 
 elbow pur way through, and to get two stalls. The house 
 was dimly lighted by gas, the deficiency made up, as far I 
 could see, by lamps in the auditorium, by candles on the
 
 444 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 stage. There was not an empty seat anywhere. The over- 
 ture, consisting of snatches from " Rigoletto," was received 
 with deafening applause, and then the curtain rose upon the 
 magnificent hall in the Louvre of Fran9ois I., with the king 
 surrounded by his courtiers and his favourites. By his side 
 hobbled Triboulet, his evil genius, as Hugo has represented 
 him. 
 
 My disappointment was great. I had come to admire, 
 not expecting magnificent scenery, gorgeous costumes, or 
 transcendent acting, but a spirit of reverence for the im- 
 mortal creation of a great poet. At that time I was not 
 sufficiently familiar with provincial art in England to be able 
 to picture a performance of Shakespeare except under con- 
 ditions such as prevail in the best of London theatres. I had 
 read accounts, however, of strolling companies and their 
 doings, but I doubt whether the humblest would have been 
 guilty of such utter iconoclasm in the spirit as well as in the 
 letter as I witnessed that night. It was not comic, it was 
 absolutely painful. It was not the glazed calico doing duty 
 for brocade, that made me wince ; it was not the anti-macassar 
 replacing lace that made me gasp for breath : it was the 
 miserable failure of those behind the footlights, as well as of 
 those in front, to grasp the meaning of the simplest line. 
 They had been told that this play was an indictment, not 
 against a libertine king, but against generations and genera- 
 tions of rulers to whom debauch was as the air they breathed. 
 And, in order to make the lesson more striking, Saint- Vallier 
 was represented as an old dotard, Triboulet as a pander, the 
 king as an amorous Bill Sykes, and Triboulet's daughter as 
 an hysterical young woman who virtually gloried in her dis- 
 honour. I had seen " Orphee aux Enf ers," " La Belle Helene," 
 and " La Grande Duchesse ; " I had heard Schneider at her 
 best and at her worst ; I had heard women of birth and breed- 
 ing titter, and gentlemen roar, at allusions which would make 
 a London coalheaver blush ; I had never seen anything so 
 downright degrading as this performance. And when, at 
 last, the dramatis personce gathered round a bust of Hippoc- 
 rates the best substitute for one of Victor Hugo they could 
 find, and one of them recited " Les Chatiments," I left, hop- 
 ing that I should never see such an exhibition again. It was 
 one of the first deliberately planned lessons in " king-hatred " 
 I had heard. The disciples looked to me very promising, and 
 the Commune, when it came, was not such a surprise to me,
 
 "L'ESPRIT XE PERD JAMAIS SES DROITS." 445 
 
 after all. Before then, I had come to the conclusion that 
 the barbarians outside the gates of Paris were less to be 
 feared than those inside the former, at any rate, believed in 
 a chief ; the motto of the others was, " Ni Dieu, ni maitre." 
 
 Meanwhile, the long winter nights have come. The stock 
 of gas is pretty well exhausted, or tantamount to it ; wood, 
 similar to that I have described already, has risen to seven 
 francs fifty centimes the hundredweight. Beef and mutton 
 have entirely disappeared from the butchers' stalls. Eats 
 are beginning to be sold at one franc apiece, and eggs cost 
 thirty francs a dozen. Butter has risen to fifty francs the 
 half-kilogramme (about seventeen ozs., English). Carrots 
 and potatoes fetch, the first, forty francs, the second, twenty 
 francs, the peck (English). I am being told that milk is still 
 to be had, but I have neither tasted nor seen any for ten days. 
 Personally, I do not feel the want of it ; but in my visits to 
 some of the poor in my neighbourhood I am confronted by 
 the fact of little ones, between two and three years of age, 
 being fed on bread soaked in wine, and suffering from vari- 
 ous ailments in consequence. 
 
 I am pursuing some inquiries at the various mairies, and 
 find that the death-rate for October has reached nearly three 
 thousand above the corresponding month of the previous 
 year. I am furthermore told that not a third of this increase 
 is due to the direct results of the siege that is, to death on 
 the battle-field, -or resulting from wounds received there ; 
 typhus and low fever, anaemia, etc., are beginning to ravage 
 the inhabitants. Worse than all, the authorities have made 
 a mistake with regard to the influx of strangers. The seventy- 
 five thousand aliens and Parisians who have left at the be- 
 ginning of the siege have been replaced by three times that 
 number, so that Paris has virtually one hundred and fifty 
 thousand more mouths to feed than it counted upon. " All 
 the women, children, and old men," says one of my inform- 
 ants, " ought to have been removed to some provincial centre ; 
 it would have cost no more, and would have left those who 
 remained free for a more energetic defence. And you will 
 scarcely believe it, monsieur, but here is the register to prove 
 it ; there have been nearly four hundred marriages celebrated 
 during the past month. It looks to me like tying the Gordian 
 knot with a vengeance." 
 
 One thing I cannot help remarking amidst all this suffer- 
 ing ; the Parisian never ceases to be witty. Among my pen-
 
 44:0 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 sioners there was the wife of a hard-working, frugal uphol- 
 sterer, whose trade was absolutely at a standstill. He was 
 doing his duty on the fortifications ; she was keeping the 
 home together on the meagre pittance allowed to her hus- 
 band by the Government, and the rations doled out to her 
 every morning. The youngest of her three children was 
 barely four weeks old. One morning, to my great surprise, I 
 found two infants in her lap. " C'est comme 9a, monsieur," 
 she said, with a wan smile. " Andre found it on a doorstep 
 in the Eue Mogador, and he brought it home, saying, ' It 
 won't make much difference ; Nature laid the table for two 
 infants.' " 
 
 The Parisian is a born lounger. Balzac had said, " Flaner 
 est une science, c'est la gastronomie de 1'ceil." Seeing that it is 
 the only gastronomy they can enjoy under the circumstances, 
 the Parisians take to it with a vengeance during those months 
 of October and November, and their favourite halting-places 
 are the rare provision-shops that have still a fowl, or a goose, 
 or a pigeon in their windows. The sight of a turkey causes 
 an obstruction, and the would-be purchaser of a rabbit is 
 mobbed like the winner of a great prize in the lottery. Nine 
 times out of ten the negotiations do not go beyond the pre- 
 liminary stage of inquiring the price, because vendors are 
 obstinate, though polite. 
 
 " How much for the rabbit ? " says the supposed Nabob, 
 for the very fact of inquiring implies wealth: 
 
 " Forty-five francs, monsieur." 
 
 " You are joking. Forty-five francs ! It's simply ridicu- 
 lous," protests the other one. 
 
 " I am not joking, monsieur ; and I cannot take a far- 
 thing less." 
 
 The would-be diner goes away ; but he has scarcely gone 
 a few steps, when the dealer calls him back. " Listen, mon- 
 sieur," he cries. 
 
 Hope revives in the other's breast. His fancy conjures 
 up a savoury rabbit-stew, and he leaps rather than walks the 
 distance that separates him from the stall. 
 
 " Ventre affame a des oreilles pour sur," says a bystander.* 
 
 " "Well, how much are you going to take off ? " 
 
 " I am not going to take off a penny, but I thought I 
 might tell you that this rabbit plays the drum." 
 
 * The proverb is, " Ventre affame n'a pas d'oreilles." EDITOR.
 
 THE PRAISE OF GELATINE. 447 
 
 Some of the jokes, though, were not equally innocent, and 
 revealed a callousness on the part of the perpetrators which 
 it is not pleasant to have to record. True, they did not affect 
 the very poor, whose poverty was, as it were, a guarantee 
 against them ; but it is a moot point whether the well-to-do 
 should be shamelessly robbed by the Avell-to-do tradesmen for 
 no other reason than to increase the latter 's hoard. Greed, 
 that abominable feature in the character of the French mid- 
 dle-classes, showed itself again and again under circumstances 
 which ought to have suspended its manifestations for the time 
 being. 
 
 I have already noted that one member of the Academie 
 des Sciences had insisted upon the benefits to be derived from 
 the extraction of gelatine from bones. A great number of 
 equally learned men simply scouted the idea as preposterous, 
 notably Dr. Gannal, the well-known authority on embalm- 
 ing. His opposition went so far as to prompt him to submit 
 his family and himself to the " ordeal," as he called it. At 
 the end of a week, all of them were reduced to mere skele- 
 tons ; and then, but then only, Dr. Gannal sent for his learned 
 colleagues to attest the effects. The drowning man will pro- 
 verbially cling to a straw ; consequently, some Parisians took 
 to gelatine, undeterred by the clever lampoons, one of which 
 
 I quote : 
 
 " L'inventeur de la gelatine, 
 A la chair preferant les os, 
 Vent desormais que chacun dine 
 Avec un jeu of dominos." 
 
 They, however, did so with their eyes open, and as a last re- 
 source : not so those who were imposed upon, and induced 
 to part with their money for cleverly imitated calves' heads, 
 which, as a matter of course, merely left a gluish substance 
 at the bottom of the saucepan, to the indignation of anxious 
 housewives and irate cooks, one of whom took her revenge 
 one day by clapping the saucepan and its contents on the 
 head of the fraudulent dealer, and, while the latter was in an 
 utterly defenceless state, triumphantly stalking away with 
 two very respectable fowls. The shopkeeper had the impu- 
 dence to seek redress in a court of law. The judge would 
 not so much as listen to him. 
 
 Another curious feature of the siege was the >sudden pas- 
 sion developed by cooks for what I must be permitted to call 
 culinary literature. As a rule, the French cordon-bleu, an<
 
 418 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 even her less accomplished sisters, do not go for their recipes 
 to cookery-books; theirs is knowledge gained from actual 
 experience: but at that period such works as, "Le Livre 
 de Cuisine de Mademoiselle Marguerite," "La <?uisiniere 
 Pratique," etc., were to be found on every kitchen table. 
 The cooks had simply taken to them in despair, not believing 
 a single word of their contents, but on the chance of finding 
 a hint that might lend itself to the provisions placed at their 
 disposal. I refrain from giving their criticisms on the au- 
 thors : the forcibleness of their language could only be done 
 justice to by such masters of realism as M. Zola. I have 
 spoken before now of the uniform good temper of the Paris- 
 ians under the most trying circumstances ; I beg to append 
 a rider, excluding cooks, but especially female ones. " C'est 
 comme si on essayait d'enseigner le patinage a la femme aux 
 jambes de bois du boulevard," said the ministering angel to 
 one of my bachelor friends. One day, to my great surprise, 
 on calling on him I found him reading. He was not much 
 given to poring over books, though his education had been a 
 very good one. 
 
 " What are you doing ? " I asked. 
 
 " I am reading More's ' Utopia,' " he said, puting down 
 the volume. 
 
 " What do you mean ? " I remarked, pointing to the cover, 
 displaying a young woman bending over stew-pans. 
 
 " This is More's ' Utopia,' to me at present. It speaks of 
 things which will never be realized; supreme de volaille, 
 tournedos a la poivrade, and so forth. The book wants an- 
 other chapter," he went one, " a chapter treating of the food 
 of besieged cities. The Dutch might have written it cent- 
 uries ago : at Leyden they were "on the point of eating their 
 left arms, while defending themselves with their right ; they 
 could have told us how to stew the former. If one could add 
 a chapter to that effect, the book might go through a hun- 
 dred new editions, and the writer might make a fortune. It 
 would not do him much good, for he would be expected to 
 live up to his precepts, and not touch a morsel of that beauti- 
 ful kangaroo or elephant I saw yesterday' on the Boulevard 
 Haussmann." 
 
 At that moment a mutual acquaintance came in. He had 
 been a lieutenant in the Foreign Legion, and lost his right 
 foot before Constantine. Noticing our host's doleful looks, 
 he inquired the cause, and we got another spoken essay on
 
 A CURIOUS DINNER. 449 
 
 the difficulties of the situation as connected with the food 
 supply. I may add that, wherever a few men were gathered 
 together, this became invariably the absorbing topic of con- 
 versation. 
 
 The ex-lieutenant laughed outright. " You are altogether 
 labouring under a mistake ; there is plenty of food of a kind 
 left, though I admit with you that the Parisian does not know 
 how to prepare it." 
 
 " Will you teach them ? " was the query. 
 
 " I will not, because they would simply sneer at me. Feed- 
 ing is simply a matter of prejudice ; and, to prove it to you, 
 I will give you a breakfast to-morrow morning which you 
 will appreciate. But I am not going to tell you of what it 
 consists, nor will I do so until two days after the entertain- 
 ment." 
 
 "We accepted the invitation, though I must confess that I 
 was not eager about it. Nevertheless, next day, about one, 
 we were seated at the hospitable board of our ex-lieutenant, 
 who, three weeks before, had dismissed his female servant 
 and was waited upon by an old trooper, with one arm. 
 Though perfectly respectful, Joseph received us with a broad 
 grin, which, as the repast progressed, was contracted into a 
 proud smile. He had evidently co-operated with his master 
 in the concoction of the dishes, all of which, I am bound to 
 say, were very savoury. In fact, I was like that new tenant 
 of the house haunted by a laughing ghost. But for the 
 knowledge that there was something uncanny about it, I 
 would have been intensely gratified and amused. Our host 
 told us, with great glee, that Joseph had been up since a 
 quarter-past four that morning ; and that before five he was 
 at the Halles. As we could distinctly taste the onions in the 
 stew that served as an entree, and as the potatoes round the 
 next dish were visible to the naked eye, we concluded that 
 the old trooper had got up so early to buy vegetables, and 
 were correspondingly grateful. There was no mystery what- 
 soever about the fish, and about the entremets. The first 
 was dry cod but with a sauce such as I had never tasted be- 
 fore or have since. The latter was a delicious dish of sweet 
 macaroni, fit to set before a prince. I repeat, but for my 
 knowledge that there was something uncanny about that 
 meal, I would have asked permission to come every day. Yet 
 I felt almost equally convinced that, with regard to one dish, 
 we had been doubly mystified that they were larks, which
 
 450 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 our host had managed to procure somehow, though I missed 
 the bones. 
 
 True to his word, our Amphitryon revealed the real in- 
 gredients of the menu forty-eight hours after. The entree 
 had been composed of very small mice field-mice, I think 
 we call them in England ;^the second dish was rat. Not a 
 single ounce of butter or lard had been used in the sauces or 
 for the macaroni. The dried cod was still plentiful enough 
 to be had at any grocer's or salted provision shop. Instead 
 of butter, Joseph used horse-marrow. The horse-butchers 
 sold the bones ridiculously cheap, not having the slightest 
 idea what to do with them. The mice, Joseph caught round 
 about the fortifications, whither he went almost every day. 
 The rats he caught in the cellarage of the Halles. He had a 
 cousin there in a large way of business, and access to the un- 
 derground part of the market was never refused to him. 
 
 " From what you have tasted at my rooms," concluded 
 the ex-lieutenant, " you will easily see that our vaunted su- 
 periority as cooks is so much humbug. The dish of cod I 
 gave you, and which you liked so much, may be seen on the 
 table of the poorest household in Holland and Flanders at 
 least once, sometimes twice, a week, especially in North-Bra- 
 bant, where the good Catholics scarcely ever eat anything else 
 on Fridays. The sauce, which they call a mustard-sauce, 
 would naturally be better if made with butter, but you could 
 not taste the difference if the cook takes care to sprinkle a 
 little saffron in her fat or marrow. Saffron is a great thing 
 in cooking, and still our best chefs know little or nothing 
 about it. But for the saffron, you would have detected a 
 slight odour of musk in the entree you took to be larks. You 
 may almost disguise anything with saffron, except dog's-flesh. 
 Listen to what I tell you, and in a month or so, perhaps be- 
 fore, you'll admit the truth of my words. The moment 
 horseflesh fails, the Parisians will fall back upon dogs, turn- 
 ing up their noses at cats and rats, though both are a thou- 
 sand times superior to the latter. In saying this, I am virtu- 
 ally libelling the cat and the rat ; for ' the friend of man,' be 
 he cooked in ever so grand a way, is always a detestable dish. 
 His flesh is oily and flabby ; stew him, fry him, do what you 
 will, there is always a flavour of castor oil about him. The 
 only way to minimize that flavour, to make him palatable, is 
 to salt, or rather to pepper him ; that is, to cut him up in 
 slices, and leave them for a fortnight, bestrewing them very
 
 THE POOR. 
 
 liberally with pepper-corns. Then, before ' accommodating ' 
 them finally, put them into boiling water for a while, and 
 throw the water away. 
 
 " Xo such compromises are necessary with ' the fauna of 
 the tiles,' who, with his larger-sized victim, therat, has been 
 the most misprized and misjudged of all animals, from the 
 culinary point of view. Stewed puss is by far more delicious 
 than stewed rabbit. The flesh of the former tastes less pun- 
 gent than that of the latter, and is more tender. As for the 
 prejudice against cat, well, the Germans have the same pre- 
 judice against rabbit, and while I was in the. Foreign Legion 
 there was a AVurtemberger, a lieutenant, who would not 
 touch bunny, but who would devour grimalkin. Those who 
 have not tasted couscoussou of cat, prepared according to the 
 Arabian recipe though the Arabs won't touch it have 
 never tasted anything." * 
 
 Our friend said much more, notably with regard to rat 
 and horseflesh ; and then he wound up : " But what is the 
 good ? Those who might benefit by my advice are not here, 
 and, if they were, they would probably scorn it ; I mean the 
 very poor. The only item of animal food which cannot be 
 adequately replaced by something else yielding as much or 
 nearly as much nourishment is milk. But, unless an adult 
 be in delicate health or suffering from ailments to the allevi- 
 ation and cure of which milk is absolutely necessary, he may 
 very well go without it for six months. Not so children. I 
 am only showing you that the poor, with their slender re- 
 sources and Heaven knows they are slender enough might 
 do better than they are doing, for cats and rats must still be 
 very plentiful, only they won't touch them." 
 
 The reference to the very poor and their slender resources 
 recurred more than once that evening, but I knew that the 
 authorities were trying to do all they could in the way of 
 relieving general and individual distress, and that they were 
 admirably seconded by private charity, which not only placed 
 comparatively large sums at their disposal, but bestirred itself 
 by means of specially appointed committees and visitors. 
 The rations of meat (horsemeat) and bread distributed were 
 not sufficient. The first had already fallen to forty-five 
 
 * The Arab kwlcus generally consists of a piece of mutton baked in a paste 
 with the vegetables of the season, flavoured with herbs ; and the addition of 
 half a dozen hard-boiled eggs. The whole of the flesh is boned. EDITOR.
 
 452 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 grammes per day per head, the second to three hundred and 
 fifty grammes ; * they were to fall much lower. Tickets 
 were also distributed for set meals, with and without meat. 
 There was, furthermore, a distribution of fuel, albeit that 
 there was reaHy no more fuel to distribute. All the wooden 
 seats in the public thoroughfares, the scaffoldings before the 
 half-finished buildings had disappeared. At one of my 
 friend's apartments there was none but the outer door left, 
 all the others had been replaced by curtains. They had been 
 chopped up to keep his family warm. The fear of the 
 terrible landlord may have prevented the poor from imi- 
 tating this proceeding. At any rate, I noticed no absent 
 doors in my visits to any of them. A further supply of meat 
 or bread, even if they had the money, was out of the question 
 for them ; because, though some shops remained open and 
 their owners were compelled to sell according to the tariff set 
 forth by the municipality, they had nothing to sell. I re- 
 member being in the Rue Lafayette one morning, near one of 
 those shops, when I saw the whole of the crowd, that had 
 been waiting there for hours probably, turn away disap- 
 pointed. The assistant had just told them that " this morn- 
 ing we have nothing to sell but preserved truffles." 
 
 At the same time, I am bound to note the fact that, 
 at the slightest rumours of peace, the usually empty win- 
 dows became filled with artistically arranged pyramids of 
 "canned" provisions, at prices considerably below those 
 charged twenty-four hours before, and even below those 
 mentioned in the municipal tariff. Frequent attempts were 
 made by the police to discover the hiding-places for this 
 stock, but they failed in every instance. Those hiding-places 
 were far away from the shops, and the shopkeepers them- 
 selves were too wary to be caught napping. A stranger 
 might have safely gone in and offered a hundred francs for 
 half a dozen tins of their wares. They would have looked 
 a perfect blank, and told him they had none to sell: and 
 no wonder ; their detection would have meant certain death ; 
 no earthly power could have saved them from the legitimate 
 fury of the populace. And even those who bought the 
 hidden food at abnormal prices were compelled to preserve 
 silence, at the risk of seeing their supplies cut off. One 
 
 * Five hundred French grammes make seventeen ounces English, and a 
 fraction. EDITOK.
 
 A SHOPKEEPER. 453 
 
 thing is certain, and I can unhesitatingly vouch for it. My 
 name had become known in connection with several com- 
 mittees for the relief of the poor. On the 25th of Janu- 
 ary, at 11 a.m., when the negotiations between Bismarck 
 and M. Jules Favre could have been but in the preliminary 
 stage, I received a note, brought by hand, from a grocer in 
 the Faubourg Montmartre, asking me to call personally, as 
 he had something to communicate which might be to the 
 advantage of my proteges. An hour later, I was at his 
 establishment, and he oifered to sell me five hundred tins 
 of various provisions and two hundred and fifty boxes of 
 sardines at two francs each. It was something like double 
 the ordinary price. A little more than three weeks before 
 that date, I had sent a letter to the same man, asking him 
 for a similar quantity of goods, which I intended to dis- 
 tribute as Xew Year's gifts. The reply was, that he had 
 none, but that he might possibly procure them at the rate of 
 five francs a tin and box. I found out afterwards, that the 
 excellent grocer had a son at the Ministry for Foreign 
 Affairs. I need not point out the logical deduction. 
 
 I am equally certain that there were large quantities of 
 horseflesh, salted or fresh, hidden somewhere ; for, as I have 
 already noted, it was officially, or at any rate semi-officially 
 stated, that, on the day of the conclusion of the armistice, 
 there were thirty thousand live horses in Paris, and the 
 greater part of these would have been slaughtered by order 
 of the Government, if the measure had been thought expe- 
 dient, for there is scarcely any need to say that the pretext 
 of their being wanted for military purposes would not hold 
 water. A sixth part of them, or less, would have been amply 
 sufficient for that. In reality, M. Favre and his colleagues 
 were, by this time, fully convinced that all further resistance 
 was useless, but they had not the courage to say so frankly, 
 and they wished to convert the advocates of " resistance to 
 death " to their side by aggravating the scarcity of the food 
 supply, as if it were not bad enough already. The horses 
 confiscated by the Government for food were paid for by 
 them at the rate of between one and two francs per pound, 
 yet there was no possibility of buying a single pound of 
 horseflesh, beyond what was distributed at the municipal 
 canteens, for less than seven or eight francs. Whence this 
 difference? 
 
 Butter could be bought for thirty to thirty-five francs per
 
 454 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 pound, but such butter! Anything worth eating com- 
 manded sixty francs. There was a kind of grease that 
 fetched two francs per pound, but even the poorest shrank 
 from it, and preferred to eat dry bread, which was composed 
 as follows : 
 
 (FOR A LOAF OF 300 GRAMMES.) 
 
 75 grammes of wheat. 
 
 15 
 60 
 90 
 30 
 30 
 
 rye, barley, or peas. 
 
 rice, 
 oats. 
 
 chopped straw mixed with starch. 
 
 bran. 
 
 As for the rest, here are some of the prices at which, 
 however, things were not always to be had : 
 
 frs. 
 
 A dog or a cat 20 
 
 A rat, crow, or sparrow 3 or 4 
 
 1 Ib. of bear's flesh 13 
 
 1 Ib. of venison 
 
 1 Ib. of wolf's flesh, or porcupine's .... 
 
 A rabbit 40 
 
 A fowl 4 9 
 
 A pigeon . . 2o 
 
 A goose < 
 
 A turkey * 
 
 1 Ib. of ham (very rare) 10 
 
 1 Ib. of bacon (not so rare) 6 
 
 Eggs (each) 5 
 
 Haricot beans (per litre) 8 
 
 Cabbages (each) 16 
 
 Leeks (each) 1 
 
 Bushel of carrots (2| gallons) 75 
 
 Bushel of potatoes 35 
 
 Bushel of onions 80 
 
 Still, until the very last, there occurred, as far as I know, 
 no case of actual starvation, and I was pretty well posted up 
 in that respect. The very young and very old suffered most : 
 for the milk that was sold at two francs per litre was simply 
 disgraceful, three-fourths of it was water; and beef -tea, or 
 that worthy of the name, was not to be had at any price. 
 Both commodities were distributed to the poor at the mu- 
 nicipal canteens, on the certificate of a doctor ; but the latter, 
 though by no means hard-hearted, and thoroughly sympa- 
 thetic with the ills he was scarcely able to alleviate, had to 
 draw the line somewhere. Of bedding, bed-linen, and warm
 
 THE STATE PAWNSHOP. 455 
 
 underclothing there was little or no lack ; but the cold, for 
 several days, at frequent intervals was severe to a degree. 
 
 Our ex-lieutenant's reference to the poor and their slender 
 resources recurred frequently to my mind for several days 
 after the scene described above, and set me wondering how 
 far the poor had parted, finally or temporarily, with their 
 household gods and small valuables in order to obtain some 
 of the quasi-luxuries I have just enumerated. In order to 
 get at the truth of the matter, I determined to pay a visit to 
 the central pawnbroking office in the Rue des Blancs Man- 
 teaux. I provided myself with a letter of introduction to 
 the director, who placed an official at my disposal. This was 
 towards the latter end of December. 
 
 I transcribe my informant's statement in brief and from 
 memory, but I am positive as to main facts. Up till the end 
 of August the transactions at the central office, which vir- 
 tually include those of the whole of the capital, presented 
 nothing abnormal, but the moment the investment became 
 an almost foregone conclusion, there was a positive run on 
 the Mont-de-Piete. The applicants for loans, however, were 
 by no means of the poorest or even of the lower-middle class, 
 but the well-to-do people, whose chief aim was to place their 
 valuables in safety, and who looked upon the 9 per cent, 
 interest they had to pay on the advances received as a pre- 
 mium for warehousing and insurance. They knew that 
 nothing could be more secure than the fire and burglar proof 
 receptacles of the Mont-de-Piete, and that, come what might, 
 the State would be responsible for the value of the articles 
 deposited. 
 
 This run ceased when the investment was an accomplished 
 fact, but, as a matter of course, the financial resources had 
 been put to a severe test, and, at the time my informant 
 spoke to me, they had dwindled from nearly eight millions 
 of francs, at which they were computed in the beginning of 
 August, to about three-quarters of a million. The order of 
 the mayor of Paris, intended to prevent this, had come too 
 late. The decree of 1863, limiting the maximum of a loan 
 to ten thousand francs at the chief office, and to five hundred 
 francs at any of the auxiliary ones, had been suspended in 
 favour of a decision that, during the investment, no loan 
 should exceed fifty francs.* From the 19th of September to 
 
 * A similar measure had been decided upon in 1814, under analogous circum- 
 stances, but the maximum was twenty francs instead of fifty francs. EUITOK.
 
 456 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 the end of October, the cessation from all labour, and, conse- 
 quently, the non-receipt of wages throughout the capital, had 
 to be faced in the acceptance of thousands of pledges, con- 
 sisting of household goods, apparel, etc. ; but, curiously 
 enough, workmen's tools and implements formed but a small 
 proportion of these. At present, the whole of the business 
 was at a standstill ; there was no redemption of pledges, and 
 few were offered.* 
 
 Meanwhile, Christmas and the New Year were at hand, 
 and not a single sortie had led to any practical modifica- 
 tion of the situation. The cold was intense. Coal and 
 coke could be obtained for neither money nor love. The 
 street lamps had not been lighted for nearly a month ; up 
 till the end of October, one had been lighted here and there ; 
 then there had been an attempt to supply the absence of gas 
 by paraffin in the public thoroughfares, but the stock of 
 mineral oil was also getting lower. Most of the shops were 
 closed, but, at the advent of the festive season, a few took 
 down their shutters and made a feeble display of bonbons in 
 sugar and chocolate, and even of marrons glaces. I doubt 
 whether these articles found many purchasers. The toy- 
 shops never took the trouble of exhibiting at all. They were 
 wise in their abstention, for even the most ignorant Parisian 
 was aware that nine-tenths of the wares in these establish- 
 ments hailed from Germany, and he would assuredly have 
 smashed the windows if they had been offered for sale. Kay, 
 the booths that make their appearance on the Boulevards at 
 that time of the year displayed few toys, except of a military 
 kind. It was very touching, in after years, to hear the lads 
 and lassies refer to the 1st of January, 1871, as the New 
 Year's Day without the New Year's gifts. 
 
 Nevertheless, it must not be thought that Paris was given 
 over to melancholy on these two days. Crowds perambulated 
 the streets and sat in the cafes. In spite of all that has been 
 said by ultra-patriotic writers, I am inclined to think that 
 
 * A curious feature in connection with the pledging of tools and implements 
 may be recorded here. At the termination of the siege, a committee in London 
 transmitted 20,000 francs (800) for the express purpose of redeeming these. 
 The Paris committee entrusted with the task, while grateful for the solicitude 
 shown, rightly considered that it would not go very far, considering that, at 
 the time, the Mont-de-Piete" held a total of 1,708,549 articles, representing loans 
 to the amount of 37,502,743 francs. The authorities took particular pains to 
 publish the receipt of the 20,000 francs, and the purposes thereof. Within a 
 given time, they returned 6,430 francs to the committee Only 2,383 tools (or 
 Buts of tools) had been redeemed, representing a lent value of 13,570 francs.
 
 NEW YEAR'S DAY. 
 
 457 
 
 the Parisians no longer cherished any illusions about the 
 possibility of retrieving their disasters, though many may 
 have thought that the besiegers would abstain, at the last 
 moment, from shelling the city. The Government whether 
 with the intention of cheering the besieged or for the pur- 
 pose of exhausting their stock of provisions as quickly as 
 possible, in order to capitulate with better grace had made 
 the city a magnificent New Year's gift of 
 
 104,000 kilogrammes of preserved beef, 
 52,000 " " dried haricot beans. 
 
 52,000 " " olive oil, 
 
 52,000 " " coffee (not roasted), 
 
 52,000 chocolate; 
 
 which gift elicited the reply of a group of artists and littera- 
 teurs that, though thankful for their more epicurean brethren 
 and sisters, they, the litterateurs and artists, had fared very 
 well on Christmas Day and would meet again on New Year's 
 Day to discuss the following menu : 
 
 " Consomme de Cheval au millet. 
 Brochettes de Foie de Chien a la Maitre d'Hotel. 
 
 Emince de Rable de Chat, Sauce Mayonnaise. 
 Epaules et Filets de Chien braises a la Sauce Tomate. 
 
 Civet de Chat aux Champignons. 
 
 Cotelettes de Chien aux Champignons. 
 
 Gigots de Chien flanques de Ratons. 
 
 Sauce Poivrade. 
 
 Begonias au Jus. 
 
 Plum-pudding au Rhum et a la Moelle de Cheval." 
 
 Simultaneously with the publication of the menu, a dealer 
 in the St. Germain Market put up a new signboard : 
 
 "RESISTANCE 1 OUTRANGE. 
 " GRANDE BOUCHERIE CANINE ET FELINE. 
 
 " L'heroique Paris brave les Prussiens ; 
 II ne sera jamais vaincu par la famine ! 
 Qtiand il aura mange la race chevaline 
 11 mangera ses rats, et ses chats, et ses chiens." 
 
 The proprietor of a cookshop in the Hue de Rome had 
 confined himself to prose, but prose which, to those who 
 could read it aright, was much cleverer than the poetry of 
 his transpontine fellow-tradesman. 
 20
 
 458 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 VIN A DIX-HUIT SOUS 
 ET EAU-DESSUS, 
 
 EOSSE BEEF. 
 RAT GOUT DE Mourox."* 
 
 Personally, I have eaten the flesh of elephants, wolves, 
 cassowaries, porcupines, bears, kangaroos, rats, cats, and 
 horses. I did not touch dog's-flesh knowingly after I had 
 been warned by our ex-lieutenant. The proprietor of the 
 English butcher-shop, M. Debos, who was not an Englishman 
 at all, supplied most of these strange dishes ; for he bought 
 nearly all the animals from the Zoological Gardens at tremen- 
 dous prices. These were only the animals from the Jardin 
 d'Acclimation in the Bois, which had been sent as guests to 
 the Jardin des Plantes. The elephants belonged to the latter 
 establishment, and were sold to M. Debos for twenty-seven 
 thousand francs. In January I was elected a member of the 
 Jockey Club, but I had dined there once before by special in- 
 vitation. I give the menu as far as I remember : 
 
 " Soupe au Poireau. 
 Aloyau de Boeuf. 
 
 Poule au Riz. 
 
 Flageolets aux Jus. 
 
 Biscuits de Reims glaces. 
 
 Charlotte aux Pommes." 
 
 In spite of the hope that Paris would escape being shelled, 
 minute instructions how to act, in the event of such a 
 calamity, had been posted on the walls. In fact, if speechi- 
 fying and the promulgation of decrees could have saved the 
 
 * Here are the two English readings, as far as I am able to give them : 
 
 "WINE AT EIGHTEEN SOUS THE LITKE 
 AND UPWARDS. 
 
 ROAST BEEF. 
 RAGOUT OF MUTTON." 
 
 "WINE AT EIGHTEEN SOUS THE LITRE 
 AND WATER ATOP. 
 
 OLD CROCK'S FLESH. . 
 RAT TASTING OF MUTTON." EDITOR.
 
 THE FIRST SHELLS. 
 
 459 
 
 city, Trochu first, and the rest afterwards, would have so 
 saved it. But I have solemnly promised myself at the outset 
 of these notes not to be betrayed into any criticism of the 
 military operations, and I will endeavour to keep my promise 
 to myself. 
 
 The first and foremost result of those directions on the 
 part of the Government was a display of water-butts, filled to 
 the brim, in the passage, and of sand-heaps in the yard of 
 every building. As the months went by, and there was no 
 sign of a bombardment, the contents of the casks became so 
 much solid ice, and the sand-heaps disappeared beneath the 
 accumulated snow, to be converted into slush and mire at the 
 first thaw, which gave us, at the same time, a kind of minia- 
 ture deluge, because, as a matter of course, the barrels had 
 sprung leaks which were not attended to at the time. 
 
 And when, early on the 5th of January, the first projectiles 
 crashed down upon some houses in the south of Paris, the 
 people were simply astonished, but still deluded themselves 
 into the belief that it was a mistake, that the " trajectory " 
 had been miscalculated, and the shells had carried farther 
 than was intended. To a certain extent they had good 
 grounds for their supposition. They had heard the big 
 cannon boom and roar at frequent intervals ever since the 
 morning of the 27th of December, and been given to 
 understand that it was merely a big artillery duel for the 
 possession of the plateau d'Avron, between the positions of 
 Noisy-le- Grand and Gournay on the enemy's side, and the 
 forts of Nogent, Eosny, and Noisy; on that of the French. 
 They were, furthermore, under the impression that the shell- 
 ing of the city would be preceded by a final summons to sur- 
 render : they had got that notion mostly from their military 
 dramas and popular histories. But there were men, better 
 informed than the majority of the masses, who made sure 
 that, if not the Parisians themselves, the foreign consuls and 
 the aliens under their charge would receive a sufficiently 
 timely notice, in order to leave the city if they felt so 
 minded. 
 
 The 5th of January was a bitterly cold day ; it had been 
 freezing hard during the whole of the night, and, as I wended 
 my way across the Seine, about noon, the mist, which had 
 been hanging over the river, was slowly rising in banked and 
 jagged masses, with only a rift here and there for the piti- 
 lessly glacial sun to peer through and mock at our shivering
 
 460 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 condition. When I got to the Boulevard Montparnasse, I 
 met several stretchers, bearing sentries who had been abso- 
 lutely frozen to within an ace of death. 
 
 I know nothing of the military import of a bombardment, 
 but have been told that even the greatest strategists only 
 count upon the moral effect it produces upon the besieged 
 inhabitants. I can only say this: if Marshal von Moltke 
 took the " moral effect " of his projectiles into his calcula- 
 tions to accelerate the surrender of Paris, he might have gone 
 on shelling Paris for a twelvemonth without being one whit 
 nearer his aim ; that is, if I am to judge by the scene I wit- 
 nessed on that January morning, before familiarity with the 
 destruction-dealing shells could have produced the proverbial 
 contempt. At the risk of offending all the sensation-mongers, 
 foreign and native, with pen or with pencil, I can honestly say 
 that a broken-down omnibus and a couple of prostrate horses 
 would have excited as much curiosity as did the sight of the 
 battered tenements at Vaugirard, Montrouge, and Vanves. 
 On the Chaussee du Maine, the roadway had been ploughed 
 up for a distance of about half a dozen yards by a shell ; in 
 another spot, a shell had gone clean through the roof and 
 killed a women by the side of her husband ; in a third, a 
 shell had carried away part of the wall of a one-storied 
 cottage, and the whole of the opposite wall : in short, there 
 was more than sufficient evidence that life was no longer safe 
 within the fortifications, and yet there was no wailing, no 
 wringing of hands, no heartrending frenzied look of despair, 
 either pent up or endeavouring to find vent in shrieks and 
 yells, nay, not even on the part of the women. There was 
 merely a kind of undemonstrative contempt very unlike the 
 usual French way of manifesting it blended with a con- 
 siderable dash of badauderie, for which word I cannot find 
 an English equivalent, because the Parisian loafer or idler is 
 unlike any of his European congeners. To grasp the differ- 
 ence between the former and the latter, one must have had 
 the good fortune to see the same incident in the streets of 
 Paris, London, Madrid, Florence, and Eome, Vienna, Berlin, 
 and St. Petersburg, not to mention Brussels, the Hague, 
 Amsterdam, Munich, and Dresden. The " Monsieur Prud- 
 homme" of Charles Monnier shows but one facet of the 
 Paris badaud's character. The nearest approach to him is 
 the middle-class English tourist on the Continent, who en- 
 deavours to explain to his wife and companions things he
 
 NO MORE BREAD. 461 
 
 does not know himself, and blesses his stars aloud for having 
 made him an Englishman. 
 
 But even the Paris badaud, who is not unlike his Roman 
 predecessor in his craving for circuses, must have bread ; and 
 when the cry arises, a fortnight later, that " there is no more 
 bread," the siege is virtually at an end.
 
 462 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 Some men of the Commune Cluseret His opinion of Eossel His opinion of 
 Bergeret What Cluseret was fighting for Thiers and Abraham Lincoln 
 Kaoul Eigault on horseback Theophile Ferre Ferre and Gil-Peres, the 
 actor The comic men of the Commune Gambon Jourde, one of the 
 most valuable of the lot His financial abilities His endeavours to save 
 Jourde at Godillot's Colonel Maxime Lisbonne The Editor's recollections 
 of him General Dombrowski and General la Cecilia A soiree at the 
 Tuileries A gala-performance at the Opera Comique The death-knell of 
 the Commune. 
 
 I HAVE before now spoken of a young medical student in 
 whose company I spent several evenings at a cafe on the 
 Boulevard St. Michel, during the Empire. He, like myself, 
 remained in Paris during the siege, and refused to stir at the 
 advent of the Commune. As a matter of course, whenever 
 we met, while the latter lasted, we rarely spoke of anything 
 else. He sympathized, to a certain extent, with the principle, 
 though not with the would-he expounders of it. I knew few, 
 if any, of the leaders even hy sight, though I had heard of 
 some, such as, for instance, Jules Valles, in connection with 
 their literary work. My admiration was strictly confined to 
 those performances, and I often said so to my friend. " You 
 are mistaken in your estimate of them," he invariably replied. 
 " There are men of undoubted talent among them, for in- 
 stance, Cluseret ; but most of them are like square pegs in 
 round holes. Come with me to-night, and you will be able 
 to judge for yourself ; for he is sure to be at the Brasserie 
 Saint-Severin." 
 
 I had never been to the Brasserie Saint-Severin, though I 
 had paid two or three visits several years before to the cafe de 
 la Renaissance opposite the Fontaine Saint-Michel, at which 
 establishment the Commune may be said to have been 
 hatched. It was there that, in 1866, Raoul Rigault, Longuet, 
 the brothers Levraud, Dacosta, Genton, Protot, and a dozen 
 more were arrested by the Commissary of Police, M. Cle- 
 ment.
 
 CLUSERET. 
 
 463 
 
 That night, about eight o'clock, we crossed the Pont 
 Saint-Michel, and, in a minute or so, found ourselves amidst 
 some of the shining lights of the Commune. 
 
 Save on review days I had never seen so many brilliant 
 uniforms gathered together. As far as I can recollect, there 
 was only one civilian in the group pointed out to me. He 
 looked a mere skeleton, was misshapen, and one of the 
 ugliest men I have ever met. I asked his name, and was 
 told it was Tridon. The name was perfectly familiar to me 
 as belonging to one of the most remarkable polemists during 
 the late regime. A little while afterwards, Cluseret came in. 
 
 My friend introduced me, and we sat talking for more 
 than two hours ; and I have rarely been more interested than 
 I was that night. Cluseret spoke English very well, for he 
 had been in America several years, and our conversation was 
 carried on in that language. I have already remarked that I 
 had no intention, at that time, to jot down my recollections, 
 still I was so impressed with what I had heard that I made 
 some rough memoranda when I got home. They are among 
 the papers I have preserved. 
 
 Cluseret fostered no illusions as to the final upshot of the 
 Commune. " If every man were as devoted to the cause as 
 Kossuth and Garibaldi were to theirs, we should not be able 
 to establish a permanent Commune ; but this is by no means 
 the case. Most of the leaders, even those who are not self- 
 seekers, are too visionary in their aims ; they will not abate 
 one jot of their ideal. The others think of nothing but their 
 own aggrandisement, and though many are no doubt capable 
 to a degree, they are absolutely useless for the posts they have 
 chosen for themselves. There are certainly exceptions ; such 
 as, for instance, Kossel. His technical knowledge is very 
 considerable. If I had to describe him in two words, I 
 should call him Lothario-Cromwell. For, notwithstanding 
 his military aptitudes and his Puritan stiffness in many 
 things, he has too many petticoats about him. In addition 
 to this, he is overbearing and absolutely eaten up with ambi- 
 tion; he is a republican who despises the proletariat; he 
 would fain imitate the axiom of Napoleon I., ' The tools to 
 those who can use them ; ' but he forgets that it will not do 
 for a socialistic regime such as we would establish, because it 
 is exactly those that cannot use the tools who wish to be 
 treated as if they could. If they had intelligence enough to 
 use the tools, they would have lifted themselves out of their
 
 464 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 humble, unsatisfactory positions without any aid. Eossel is 
 no doubt a better strategist than I am, and I do not in the 
 least mind his letting me know it, but if Dombrowski or 
 Bergeret was ' Delegate for War,' Eossel would have been in 
 prison or shot a fortnight ago.'' 
 
 "For," continued Cluseret, "Bergeret especially thinks 
 himself a heaven-born general. He shows well on horseback, 
 because, I believe, he began life as a stable-lad : so did Michel 
 Ney; but then, Michel Ney served his apprenticeship at 
 fighting, while Bergeret became a compositor, a chef-de- 
 claque, a proof-reader, and, finally, a traveller for a publishing 
 firm. All these are, no doubt, very honourable occupations, 
 but they are scarcely calculated to make a good general. 
 Still, you should see him : he wears his sash as your officers 
 wear theirs when on duty ; he would like the people to mis- 
 take it for the grand-cordon of the Legion d'Honneur ; and 
 his staff is more numerous than that of the late Emperor. 
 You should go and dine at the head-quarters of the military 
 governor of Paris ; I am sure you would be very welcome. 
 Marast at the Palais-Bourbon in '48 was nothing to it. If 
 the Commune lasts another three months there will be serv- 
 ants in livery, gold lace, and powder, like in your country. 
 At present, Bergeret has to put up with attendants in fault- 
 less black. 
 
 " Personally," he went on, " I am not fighting for Com- 
 munism, but for Communalism, which, I need not tell you, is 
 quite a different thing. I fail to see why Paris and Lyons 
 should be judged incapable of managing their own municipal 
 affairs without the interference of the State, while other great 
 provincial centres are considered capable of doing so. The 
 English Government does not interfere with the municipal 
 affairs of London on the plea that it is the capital, with those 
 of Manchester on the plea that it has inaugurated a policy of 
 its own, any more than it interferes with those of Liverpool, 
 Leeds, or Bristol, Your lord-lieutenants of counties are vir- 
 tually decorative officials, something different from our pre- 
 fects and our sub-prefects, and your Home Secretary has not 
 a hundredth part of the power of our Minister of the Inte- 
 rior. We wish to go a step further than you, without, how- 
 ever, shirking the financial obligations imposed by a federa- 
 tion. What you would call imperial taxes, we are willing to 
 pay in kind as well as money. This is one of the things we 
 do want; what we do not want is the resuscitation of the
 
 BELLIGERENTS, NOT INSURGENTS. 
 
 Empire. I am not speaking at random when I tell you that 
 there are rumours about traitors in our camp, and that, ac- 
 cording to these rumours, the struggle against the Versaillese 
 troops would be a mere pretext to sweep the deck for the un- 
 opposed entry of an imperial army into Paris. Whence would 
 that army be recruited ? From among the prisoners going to 
 leave Germany, who have been worked all the while in the 
 interest of the Napoleonic dynasty. After all, we have as 
 much right to overthrow the Government of Versailles as the 
 Government of Versailles had the right to upset the Empire. 
 Their powers are by no means more valid by virtue of the 
 recent elections, than was the power of Louis-Napoleon by 
 virtue of the plebiscite of 1870. Does M. Thiers really think 
 that he is a better or greater man than Abraham Lincoln, 
 who treated the Southerns as belligerents, not as insurgents ? " 
 
 So far Cluseret. I am not prepared to say that he was a 
 strictly honourable man, but he was a very intelligent one, 
 probably the most intelligent among the leaders of the Com- 
 mune. At any rate, his conversation made me anxious to get 
 a nearer sight of some of the latter, and, as they had evident- 
 ly made the Brasserie Saint-Severin their principal resort of 
 an evening, I returned thither several times. 
 
 A few nights afterwards, I was just in time to witness the 
 arrival of Raoul Rigault, on horseback, accompanied by a 
 staff running by the side of his animal. The whole reminded 
 me irresistibly of Decamp's picture, "La Patrouille Turque." 
 The Prefect of Police was scarcely less magnificently attired 
 than the rest of his fellow-dignitaries. His uniform, if I re- 
 member rightly, was blue with red facings, but it is impossible 
 to say, because it was covered everywhere with gold lace. 
 His myrmidons hustled the crowd in order to make room for 
 their chief, and some one laughed : Mais il n'y a rixm de 
 change; c'est absolument comnie sous I'Empire. 
 moment Rigault sat quite still, surveying the crowd and 
 ogling the women through his double eye-glasses, 
 alighted, and caught sight of my friend and myself standing 
 on the threshold. " Quels sont ces citoyens?" he inquired, 
 taking us in from top to toe, and stroking his long beard all 
 the while. Some one told him our names, at which he made 
 a wry face, the more that mine must have been familiar to 
 him, seeing that a very near relative of mine bearing the 
 same, had been a special favourite with General Vmoy. He 
 did not think fit to molest us ; had he done so, it might have
 
 46G AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 fared badly with us, for by the time Lord Lyons could have 
 interfered, we might have been shot. 
 
 Ever since, my friend and I have been under the impres- 
 sion that we owed our lives to a dark, ugly little man who, at 
 that moment, whispered something to him, and who, my 
 friend told me, immediately afterwards, was the right hand 
 of Raoul Eigault, Theophile Ferre. That name was also 
 familiar to me, as it was to most Parisians, previous to the 
 outbreak of the war, because Ferre was implicated in the plot 
 against Louis- Napoleon's life, and was tried in the early part 
 of '70 at Blois. Every one knew how he insulted the Presi- 
 dent, how he refused to answer, and finally exclaimed, " Yes, 
 I am an anarchist, a socialist, an atheist, and woe to you 
 when our turn comes." He kept his word ; he was a fiend, 
 and looked one. "Whenever there was anything cruel and 
 bloodthirsty going on, he made it a point to be present. He 
 was, though ugly, not half so ugly as Tridon, but one invol- 
 untarily recoiled from him. 
 
 Curiously enough, this very Theophile Ferre, whom I 
 then saw for the first time, had been the subject of a conversa- 
 tion I had with Gil-Perds, the actor of the Palais-Royal, on 
 the 25th or 26th of March. I had known Gil-Peres from 
 the moment he made his mark in " La Dame aux Camelias " 
 as Gaudens. To my great surprise, a day or two after the 
 proclamation of the Commune, I heard that he had been 
 cruelly maltreated in the Eue Drouot, that he had narrowly 
 escaped being killed. Two days later, I paid him a visit in 
 his lodgings at Montmartre ; for he had been severely, though 
 not dangerously hurt, and was unable to leave his bed. 
 
 " I am very sorry for your mishap," I said ; " but what, in 
 Heaven's name, induced you to meddle with politics ? " 
 
 He burst out laughing, in that peculiar laugh of his which 
 I have never heard before or since, on or off the stage. The 
 nearest approach to it was that of Grassot, but the latter's 
 was like a discharge of artillery, while Gil-Peres was like 
 that of a musketry volley. 
 
 " I did not meddle with politics," he replied ; " but you 
 know how fond I am of going among crowds to study char- 
 acter. This day last week, I was passing along the Rue 
 Drouot, when I saw a large group in front of the Mairie. I 
 had left home early in the morning, I knew nothing of what 
 was going on in my neighbourhood, so you may imagine my 
 surprise when I heard them calmly discussing the death of
 
 THfiOPHILE PERR& 
 
 Clement Thomas and Lecomte. My hair stood positively on 
 end, and I must have pushed a bit in order to get nearer the 
 speakers. I had a long black coat on, and they mistook me 
 for a cure. I did all I could to tell them my name, but, be- 
 fore I could utter a word, I was down, and they began tramp- 
 ling on me. Some one, God alone knows who, saved me, by 
 telling them my name. I knew nothing more, for I was 
 brought home unconscious. And to think," he added, " that 
 I might have been a member of the Commune myself, if I 
 had liked." 
 
 " What do you mean ? " I said, for I began to think that 
 he was out of his mind. 
 
 " Well, you know that during the siege I tried to do my 
 duty as a' National Guard, and in my battalion was this 
 Theophile Ferre of whom you have already heard. A most 
 intelligent creature, but poor as Job and ferocious to a de- 
 gree. He was a study to me, and, of late, he frequently came 
 to see me in the morning. I generally asked him to stay to 
 breakfast, for I liked to hear him talk of the future Com- 
 mune, though I had not the slightest faith in his visions. I 
 considered him a downright lunatic. About two or three 
 days before this outbreak, he came, one morning, looking as 
 pale as a ghost, but evidently very much excited. Before I 
 had time to ask him the cause of his emotion, he exclaimed, 
 
 * This time there is no mistake about it ; we are the masters.' 
 I suppose my face must have looked a perfect blank, for he 
 proceeded to explain. ' In two days we'll hold our sittings at 
 the H6tel-de-Ville, and the Commune will be proclaimed. 
 And now, he added, 'what can I do for you, citoyen Gil- 
 Peres ? You have always been very kind to me, and I am 
 not likely to forget it when I am at the top of the tree.' 
 
 " I told him that I'd feel much obliged to him if he could 
 induce Sardou or Dumas to Avrite me a good part, like the lat- 
 ter had done before, because I wanted to be something more 
 than a comic actor. But I saw that he was getting angry. 
 
 " ' Do you mean to tell me,' he almost hissed, ' that you 
 do not want to belong to the Commune ? ' 
 
 " ' I haven't the slightest ambition that way,' I replied. 
 
 * People would only make fun of me, and they would be per- 
 fectly right.' 
 
 " ' Why should people make fun of you ? 
 
 " ' Because, because ' I stammered. 
 
 "He left me no time to finish. ' Because you are a small
 
 468 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 man,' he said. ' Well, I am a small man, too, and an ugly 
 one into the bargain. I can assure you that the world will 
 hear as much of me before long as if I had been an Adonis 
 and a Hercules.' With this he disappeared, and I have not 
 seen him since." 
 
 My purpose in reporting this conversation is to show that 
 the Commune, with all its evils, might have been prevented 
 by the so-called government of Versailles, if its members had 
 been a little less eager to get their snug berths comfortably 
 settled. 
 
 To return for a moment to Ferre and his companions, 
 who, without exception, were sober to a degree, though many 
 were probably fond of good cheer. The English' writers, 
 often very insufficiently informed, have generally maintained 
 the contrary, but I know for a fact that, among the leaders 
 of the movement, drunkenness was unknown. Ferre him- 
 self was among the soberest of the lot : the few evenings I 
 saw him he drank either cold coffee or some cordial diluted 
 with water. Nevertheless, it was he who was directly re- 
 sponsible for the death of Archbishop Darboy, whom he 
 could and might have saved. 
 
 In every modern tragedy there is a comic element, and in 
 that of the Commune the comic parts were, to a certain ex- 
 tent, sustained by Gambon, Jourde, and a few others whom 
 it is not necessary to mention. Gambon was one of the mild- 
 est of creatures, and somewhat of a " communard malgre 
 lui." He would have willingly "left the settlement of all 
 these vexed questions to moral force," and he proposed once 
 or twice a mission to Versailles to that effect. He was about 
 fifty, and a fine specimen of a robust, healthy farmer. His 
 love of " peaceful settlement " arose from an experiment he 
 had made in that way during the Empire, though it is very 
 doubtful whether strictly logical reasoners would have looked 
 upon it as " peaceful." Gambon had been a magistrate and 
 a member of the National Assembly during the Second Re- 
 public, and voted with the conservative side. The advent of 
 the Empire made an end of his parliamentary career, and, in 
 order to mark his disapproval of the Coup-d'Etat and its 
 sequel, Gambon refused to pay his taxes. The authorities 
 seized one of his cows, and were proceeding to sell it by 
 auction, when Gambon, accompanied by a good many of his 
 former constituents, appeared on the scene. " This cow," he 
 shouts, " has been stolen from me by the Imperial fisc, and
 
 A MAN AND A COW. 459 
 
 whosoever buys it is nothing more than a thief himself." 
 Eesult : not a single bid for the cow, and the auctioneer was 
 compelled to adjourn the sale for a week. The auctioneer 
 deemed it prudent to transport the cow to a neighbouring 
 commune, but Gambon had got wind of the affair, and 
 adopted the same expedient of moral persuasion. For nearly 
 three months the auctioneer transported the cow from one 
 commune to another, and Gambon followed him everywhere, 
 until they reached the limits of the department. Gambon 
 apprehended that moral persuasion would have no effect 
 among strangers, and he let things take their course. The 
 cost of selling the cow amounted to about ten times its 
 worth. As a matter of course, the whole affair was revived 
 by " les journaux bien pensants " at the advent of the Com- 
 mune, and Gambon was elected a member by the 10th Arron- 
 dissement. Gambon managed to escape into Switzerland; 
 but when the amnesty was proclaimed, he returned, and 
 solicited once more the suffrages of his former constituents. 
 At the Brasserie Samt-Severin, Gambon was generally to be 
 found at the ladies' table, about the occupants of which I 
 cannot speak, seeing that I was not introduced to them. 
 
 Jourde was one of two " financial delegates " of the Com- 
 mune. He had been a superior employe at the Bank of 
 France, and was considered an authority on financial affairs. 
 It was he to whom the Marquis de Ploeuc, the governor of 
 the Bank, had handed the first million for the use of the 
 Commune. My friend, the doctor, had known him in his 
 former capacity, and often invited him to our table, to which 
 invitation the " paymaster-general " always eagerly responded. 
 One evening, the conversation turned upon the events which 
 had preceded the request for funds. " On the second day of 
 the Commune," he said, " the want of money began to be 
 horribly felt. Eudes proposed that I should go and fetch 
 some from the Bank of France. To be perfectly candid, I 
 did not care about it. Had I been a soldier, I might have 
 invaded the Bank at the head of a regiment ; but, to go and 
 ask my former chief for a million or so as a matter of course, 
 was a different thing, and I had not the moral courage. The 
 director of the Bank of France is very little short of a god to 
 his subordinates, and, in spite of our boasted ' Liberty, Fra- 
 ternity, and Equality,' there is no nation so ready to bow 
 down before its governors as the French. Seeing that I hung 
 back, Eudes proposed to go himself, and did, refusing to take
 
 470 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 a single soldier with him. But he did not want the respon- 
 sibility of handling the million of francs the governor placed 
 at our disposal, so I was, after all, obliged to beard my former 
 chief in his own den. He was very polite, and called me 
 * Monsieur le delegue aux finances,' but I would have pre- 
 ferred his calling me all the names in the world, for I caught 
 sight of a very ironical smile at the corners of his mouth 
 when, on taking leave of him, he said, ' You may be my suc- 
 cessor one day, Monsieur le delegue, and I hope you will 
 profit by the lessons I have always endeavoured to teach my 
 subordinates : obedience to the powers that be.' " 
 
 Jourde was by no means a fool or a braggart ; he was a 
 very good administrator, and exceedingly conscientious. Like 
 most men who have had the constant handling of important 
 sums of money, he was absolutely indifferent to it ; and I feel 
 certain that he did not feather his own nest during the two 
 months he had the chance. But he vainly endeavoured to 
 impress upon the others the necessity for economy. Every 
 now and then he tore his red hair and beard at the waste 
 going on at the H6tel-de-Ville, where, in the beginning, Assi 
 was keeping open table. Not that they were feasting, but 
 . every one who had a mind could sit down, and, though the 
 sum charged by the steward was moderate, two francs for 
 breakfast and two francs fifty centimes for dinner, the num- 
 ber of self-invited guests increased day by day, and the pay- 
 master-general was at his wits' end to keep pace with the ex- 
 penses. The Central-Committee put a stop to this indiscrimi- 
 nate hospitality by simply arresting Assi, whom I never saw. 
 
 When the Commune decreed the demolition of the Ven- 
 dome column, Jourde was still more angry and in despair. 
 He was, first of all, opposed to its destruction, from a patri- 
 otic and common-sense point of view : secondly, he objected 
 to the waste of money that destruction entailed ; he endeav- 
 oured to cut the Gordian knot by stopping the workmen's 
 pay. Though three or four of his fellow " delegates " were 
 absolutely of the same opinion, the rest sent him a polite in- 
 timation that if the necessary funds were not disbursed vol- 
 untarily they would send for them, and take the opportunity, 
 at the same time, to " put him against the wall," and make 
 an end of him. That night, Courbet, the painter, who had 
 been the prime mover in this work of destruction, came to 
 the Brasserie Saint-Severin from the Brasserie Andler, hard 
 by, to taste the sweets of his victory. His friend, Chaudey,
 
 THE GLORY OF SOLOMON. 
 
 of the Siecle, was no longer with him. Like Mgr. Darbov 
 the Abbes Lagarde, Crozes, and Deguerry, he had been 
 arrested by Raoul Rigault as a hostage, in virtue of a decree 
 by the Commune, setting forth that every execution of a 
 prisoner of war, taken by the Versailles, would be followed 
 by the execution of three hostages to be drawn by lot. 
 
 Jpurde did not wear a uniform ; at any rate, I never saw 
 him in one. I happened to remark upon it one evening, and 
 he then gave me a partial explanation why the others did 
 wear them in so ostentatious a manner. 
 
 _ "It is really done to please the National Guards; they 
 mistrust those who remain ' in mufti ; ' they attribute their 
 reluctance to don the uniform to the fear of being compro- 
 mised, to the wish to escape unnoticed if things should go 
 wrong. I grant you that all this does not warrant the uni- 
 forms most of my colleagues do wear, but to the Latin races 
 the wisdom of Solomon lies in his magnificence, and they 
 trace the elevation of Joseph to its primary cause his coat 
 of many colours. I am not only ' delegate of finances ' and 
 paymaster-general, but head cook and bottle-washer in all 
 that concerns monetary matters to the Central-Committee. I 
 have very few clerks to assist me in my work, and fewer still, 
 upon whose honesty I can depend ; consequently, I am com- 
 pelled to do a good deal of drudgery myself. Yesterday I 
 received the fortnightly accounts of Godillot,* the military 
 tailors and accoutrement manufacturers. They seemed to me 
 simply monstrous, not so much in respect of the prices charged 
 for each uniform, as in respect of the number of uniforms 
 supplied. To have sent one of my clerks would have been of 
 no earthly use ; there is an old Normand saying about send- 
 ing the cat to Rome and his coming back mewing ; the clerk 
 would have simply come back mewing, saying that there was 
 no mistake, so I went myself. I saw the chief manager. 
 
 " ' I am positive there is no mistake, monsieur,' he said, 
 * though I may tell you at once that I made the same remark 
 when I passed the accounts ; the number of uniforms seemed 
 to me inordinately large ; mais il faut se rendre d Pevidence, 
 and I ticketed off every item by its corresponding voucher. 
 Still I felt that there is a terrible waste somewhere, and said 
 so to the head of the retail department. " If you will remain 
 
 * The word " Godillot " has passed into the French language, and, at pres- 
 ent, means the soldier's shoes. EDITOB.
 
 472 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 downstairs for one hour," was the answer, " you will have 
 the explanation." I can only say the same to you, Monsieur 
 le delegue.' 
 
 " I did remain on that ground-floor for one hour," Jourde 
 went on, " and, during that time, no fewer than eight young 
 fellows came in with vouchers for complete uniforms of lieu- 
 tenants or captains of the staff. Most of them looked to me 
 as if they had never handled a sword or rifle in their lives 
 yardsticks seemed more in their line ; and the airs they gave 
 themselves positively disgusted me ; but I do not want an- 
 other reminder of the Central-Committee about my cheese- 
 paring, so I'll let things take their course. Look, here is a 
 sample of how we deck ourselves out quand nous allons en 
 guerre." 
 
 I looked in the direction pointed out to me, and beheld a 
 somewhat dark individual with lank, black hair, of ordinary 
 height, or a little below perhaps, dressed in a most extraor- 
 dinary costume. He wore a blue Zouave jacket, large baggy 
 crimson breeches tucked into a pair of quasi- hessian boots, a 
 crimson sash, and a black sombrero hat with a red feather. 
 A long cavalry sabre completed the costume. Upon the 
 % whole, he carried himself well, though there was a kind of 
 swashbuckler air about him which smacked of the stage. I 
 was not mistaken ; the scent or the smell of the footlights 
 was over it all. 
 
 " This is Colonel Maxime Lisbonne, an actor by profes- 
 sion, who has taken to soldiering with a vengeance," said 
 Jourde. " There is no doubt about his bravery, but he is as 
 fit to be a colonel as I am to be a general. It does not seem 
 to strike my colleagues that, in no matter what profession, 
 one has to serve an apprenticeship, and, most of all, in the 
 science of soldiering ; Maxime Lisbonne said he would be a 
 colonel, so they, without more ado, made him one.* He 
 never moves without that Turco at his heels." 
 
 * During my stay in Paris, 1881-86, as the correspondent of a London even- 
 ing paper, 1 had occasion to see a great deal of M. Maxime Lisbonne, who is a 
 prominent figure at nearly every social function, such as premieres, the unveil- 
 ing of monuments, the opening of public buildings, etc. The reason of this 
 prominence has never been very clear to me, unless it be on the assumption 
 that the Paris journalists, even the foremost of whom he treats on a footing of 
 equality, consider him " good copy." Only as late as a few years ago, he made 
 a considerable sensation in the Paris press by appearing at one of M. Carnot's 
 receptions in evening dress, redolent of benzine, " because the dress had been 
 lying perdu for so many years." It was he who started the famous " taverne 
 du bagne," on the Boulevard Rochechouart, to which " all Paris " flocked.
 
 ANOTHER GENERAL. 
 
 473 
 
 On another occasion I saw the famous General Dombrow- 
 ski, and the no less famous Colonel or General la Cecilia I 
 only exchanged a few words with the former, but I sat talk- 
 ing for a whole evening to the latter. He was a short, spare, 
 fidgety man, strongly pitted with small-pox, with a few 
 straggling hairs on the upper lip and chin. He was terribly 
 near-sighted, and wore a pair of thick spectacles. Nervous 
 and restless to a degree, but a voice of remarkable sweetness. 
 His English was faultless, with scarcely any accent, and I 
 was told that he spoke every European language and several 
 Oriental ones with the same accuracy. He was the only 
 Frenchman who could converse with Dombrowski and the 
 other Poles in their native language. He was a clever mathe- 
 matician, and, that evening, he endeavoured to prove mathe- 
 matically that Von Moltke had committed several blunders, 
 both at Sadowa and Sedan. "That kind of thing," said 
 Jourde, after he was gone, " was sure to ' fetch ' the Central- 
 Committee ; he always reminds me of the doctors in Moliere 
 trying to prove that one of their confreres had cured a pa- 
 tient contrary to the principles of medicine. Mind, do not 
 imagine that La Cecilia is not a good soldier. He got all his 
 grades in the Italian army, on the battle-fields of '59-'60, 
 and, during the late war, he directed the brilliant defence of 
 Aleii9on. But between a good soldier and a great general 
 there is a vast difference." 
 
 Physically, Dombrowski was almost the counterpart of 
 La Cecilia, with the exception of the glasses and the small- 
 pox. But while the Frenchman for Cecilia was a French- 
 man notwithstanding his Italian name was modest though 
 critical, the Pole was a braggart, though by no means devoid 
 of courage. Up to the very end, he sent in reports of his 
 victories, all of which were purely imaginary. Even as late 
 
 Previous to this, he had been the lessee of the Bouffes du Nord, at which 
 theatre he brought out Louise Michel's " Nadine." Though by no means an 
 educated man, he can, on occasions, behave himself very_ well, and truth com- 
 pels me to state that he is very good-natured and obliging. One day, on the 
 occasion of an important murder trial, I failed to see Commandant Lunel at the 
 Palais de Justice, and was turning away disconsolately, when, at a sign from 
 M. Lisbonne, the sergeant of the Gardes' de Paris, who nad refused to admit mo 
 on the presentation of my card, relented. That same afternoon, at the mere 
 expression of his wish, the manager of the Jardin de Paris, which had just 
 been opened, presented me with a season ticket, or, to speak correctly, placed 
 my name on tiie permanent free list. In short, I could mention a score of in- 
 stances of a similar nature ; all tending to show that M. Maxime Lisbonne 
 "participation in the events of the Commune " has had the effect of investing 
 bun with a kind of social halo. EDITOR.
 
 4Y4 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 as the 21st of May, when the Versailles troops were carrying 
 everything before them, the newspaper-boys were shouting, 
 " Brilliant victory of General Dombrowski." Dombrowski 
 had been invested with his high command under the pretext 
 that he had fought under Garibaldi and in the Polish strug- 
 gle against Russia. It transpired afterwards that he had 
 never seen Garibaldi nor Garibaldi him, and that, so far 
 from having aided his own countrymen, he had been a sim- 
 ple private in the Russian army. Still, he was a better man 
 than his countryman Wrobleski, who showed his courage by 
 going to bed while the Versaillais were shelling Vanves. 
 
 ******* 
 
 Among my papers I find a torn programme of a concert at 
 the Tuileries during the Commune. It reads as follows : 
 
 COMMUNE DE PARIS, 
 PALAIS DES TUILERIES 
 
 Servant pour LA PREMIERE FOIS a une oeuvre patriotique 
 
 GRAND CONCERT 
 
 Au Profit des Veuves et Orphelins de la Republique. 
 
 Sous le Patronage de la Commune et du Citoyen Dr. Rousselle. 
 
 Tout porteur de billet pris a 1'avance pourra sans retribution, visiter le 
 Palais des Tuileries. 
 
 The rest is missing, but I remember that among the art- 
 ists who gave their services were Mesdames Agar and Bordas ; 
 MM. Coquelin cadet, and Francis Thome, the pianist. 
 
 I did not take my ticket beforehand, consequently was 
 not entitled to a stroll through the Palace previous to the 
 concert. When I entered the Salle des Marechaux, where 
 the concert was to take place, I felt thankful that the trial 
 had been spared to me, and I mentally ejaculated a wish that 
 I might never see that glorious apartment under similar cir- 
 cumstances. The traces of neglect were too painful to be- 
 hold, though I am bound to say that I could detect no proofs 
 of wilful damage. My wish was gratified with a vengeance. 
 A little more than a month afterwards, the building was in
 
 A SOIREE AT THE TUILERIES. 475 
 
 flames, and, at the hour I write, it is being razed to the 
 ground. 
 
 I did not stay long ; I heard Madame Agar, dressed in 
 deep mourning, declaim " the Marseillaise," and M. Thome 
 execute a fantasia on well-known operatic airs. Some of the 
 reserved seats were occupied by the minor dignitaries of the 
 Commune, but the greater part of the place was filled by 
 working men and their spouses and the very petite bour- 
 geoisie. The latter seemed to be in doubt whether to enjoy 
 themselves or not ; but the former were very vociferous, and 
 had evidently made up their minds that the Commune was 
 the best of all possible regimes, seeing that it enabled them 
 to listen to a concert in a palace for a mere trifle. " That's 
 equality, as I understand it, monsieur," said a workman in a 
 very clean blouse to me, at the same time making room for 
 me on the seat next to him. He and his companion beguiled 
 the time between the first and second number on the pro- 
 gramme by sucking barley-sugar. 
 
 About a month later on Wednesday, May 17th, but I 
 will not be certain I was present at the first gala-perform- 
 ance organized by the Commune, although the Versailles 
 troops were within gunshot of the fortifications. This time 
 I had taken a ticket beforehand. The performance was to 
 take place at the Opera-Comique, and long before the ap- 
 pointed hour the Boulevards and the streets adjoining the 
 theatre were crowded with idlers, anxious to watch the ar- 
 rival of the bigwigs under whose immediate patronage the 
 entertainment was to be given. The papers had been full of 
 it for days and days beforehand ; the posters on the walls had 
 set forth its many attractions. In accordance with tradi- 
 tional usage on such occasions, the programme was a miscel- 
 laneous one, and the wags did not fail to remark that the 
 Commune ought to have struck out something original in- 
 stead of blindly following the precedents of tyrants ; but in 
 reality the Commune had no choice. Few of the principal 
 artists of the subsidized theatres were available, and there 
 was an evident reluctance to co-operate among some of those 
 who were ; hence it was decided to give fragments of such 
 operas or comedies, calculated to stimulate still further the 
 patriotic and republican sentiments with which the majority 
 of the spectators were credited. There had been less dif 
 culty in recruiting the orchestra, and a very fair band was 
 got together. A great many invitations had been issued;
 
 478 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 few of the seats, especially in the better parts, were paid 
 for. 
 
 All the entrances had been thrown open, and around every 
 one there was a considerable gathering, almost exclusively 
 composed of National Guards in uniform, and women of 
 the working classes, who enthusiastically cheered each 
 known personage on his arrival. The latter were too mag- 
 nificent for words, the clanking sabres, resplendent uni- 
 forms, and waving plumes only paled in contrast with the 
 toilettes of their female companions who hung proudly on 
 their arms. For them, at any rate, " le jour de gloire etait 
 arrive." 
 
 The crowd, especially the fairer portion of it, was de- 
 cidedly enthusiastic, perhaps somewhat too enthusiastic, in 
 their ultra-cordial greetings and recognition of the ladies, so 
 suddenly promoted in the social scale. Melanie and Clarisse 
 would have been satisfied with a less literal interpretation 
 of "Auld Lang Syne," as they stepped out of the car- 
 riages, the horses of which belied the boast that at the end 
 of the siege there were 30,000 serviceable animals of that 
 kind left. 
 
 The performance had been timed for half-past seven ; at 
 half-past eight, the principal box set apart for the chiefs of 
 the new regime was still empty. As I have already said, dis- 
 quieting rumours had been afloat for the last few days with 
 regard to the approach of the Versailles troops, the guns had 
 been thundering all day long, and, what was worse, for the 
 last forty-eight hours no " startling victory " had been an- 
 nounced either on the walls of Paris or in the papers. Some 
 of the " great men," among the audience in the stalls and 
 dress-circle, and easily to be distinguished from the ruck of 
 ordinary mortals, professed themselves unable to supply au- 
 thentic information, but as the performance had not been 
 countermanded, they suggested that things were not so bad 
 as they looked. 
 
 The theatre was crammed from floor to ceiling, and the 
 din was something terrible. The heat was oppressive ; luckily 
 the gas was burning low because the companies were as yet 
 unable to provide a full supply. There were few people out 
 of uniform in either stalls or dress-circle, but the upper parts 
 were occupied by blouses with a fair sprinkling of cloth coats. 
 The women seemed to me to make the most infernal noise. 
 The two stage-boxes were still empty ; in the others there
 
 A GALA PERFORMANCE. 477 
 
 were a good many journalists and ladies who had come to 
 criticize the appearance and demeanour of the " dames de 
 nos nouveaux gouvernants." There was one box which at- 
 tracted particular attention ; one of its occupants, evidently 
 a "dame du monde," was in evening dress, wearing some 
 magnificent diamonds, while it was very patent that those 
 of her own social status had made it a point to dress as 
 simply as possible. I have never been able to find out the 
 name of the lady ; I had not seen her before, I have not seen 
 her since. 
 
 At about a quarter to nine the doors of the stage-boxes 
 were flung back, and the guests of the evening appeared. 
 But alas, they were not the chief members of the Commune, 
 only the secondary characters. It is doubtful, though, whether 
 the former could have been more magnificently attired than 
 were the latter. Their uniforms were positively hidden be- 
 neath the gold lace. 
 
 Immediately, the band struck up the inevitable "Mar- 
 seillaise ; " the spectators in the upper galleries joined in the 
 chorus ; the building shook to its foundations, and, amidst 
 the terrible din, one could distinctly hear the crowds on the 
 Boulevards re-echoing the strains. The occupants of the 
 state boxes gave the signal for the applause, then the curtain 
 rose, and Mdlle. Agar, in peplos and cothurnus, recited the 
 strophes once more. When the curtain fell, the audience 
 rushed to the foyer or out into the open air ; at any rate, the 
 former was not inconveniently crowded. Among those stroll- 
 ing up and down I noticed the lady of the diamonds, on the 
 arm of a rather common-looking individual in a gorgeous 
 uniform. I believe I caught sight of the American Minister, 
 but I will not be certain. 
 
 This time the curtain rose upon an act of a comedy ; t 
 spectators, however, did not seem to be vastly interested ; they 
 were evidently waiting for the duo to be sung by Madame 
 Ugalde and a tenor whose name I do not remember, 
 was, I heard, an amateur of great promise. 
 
 Scarcelv had Madame Ugalde uttered her first notes, when 
 a bugler of "the franc-tireurs of the Commune stepped in froi 
 of an empty box and sounded the charge. The effect was 
 startling. The audience rose to a man, and rushed to the 
 exits. In less than five minutes the building was empty. 1 
 had let the human avalanche pass by. When I came outside 
 I was told that it was a false alarm, or, rather, a practical
 
 478 AN ENGLISHMAN IN PARIS. 
 
 joke ; but no one re-entered the theatre. Thus ended the 
 gala-performance of the Commune, and a careful observer 
 would have had no difficulty in foreseeing the end of the 
 latter. The bugler had, unconsciously perhaps, sounded its 
 death-knell. 
 
 THE END.
 
 D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 
 
 STORY OF COLUMBUS. 
 
 By ELIZABETH EGGLESTON SEELYE ; ed- 
 ited by Dr. EDWARD EGGLESTON. "With 
 IOO Illustrations by Allegra Eggleston. 
 I2mo. Cloth, $1.75. 
 
 This book is the result of most extensive 
 investigations, which have been carefully veri- 
 fied by the eminent historian and novelist, 
 Dr. Eggleston. It is not too much to say that 
 the whole world has been drawn upon for ma- 
 terial by the author and the artist. The fruits 
 of these investigations are presented in a popular, readable, always entertain- 
 ing form. While the book contains all the results ol 
 modern inquiry offered in the bulkiest biographies, 
 the story is here condensed and the material selected 
 with a view to an always interesting narrative. To 
 a considerable extent the plan of both text and illus- 
 trations is like that of Eggleston's " Household His- 
 tory of the United States." It is hardly necessary to 
 say more regarding the fitness of this volume for a 
 place in every American private, public, and school 
 
 library. / ^JL M " The purpose of the writer of this book 
 
 has been to relate the life of the greatest 
 of discoverers in a manner interesting and 
 delightful to the general reader, while pro- 
 ducing a narrative strictly conformed to 
 the facts as given by the best ancient au- 
 thorities and developed by the latest re- 
 searches of scholars. There is here no 
 attempt to discuss the pros and cons of 
 debated points in Columbian history. 
 Such investigators as Navarrete, Mr. Har- 
 risse, Signor Staglieno, and our own 
 learned Mr. Justin Winsor, have wrought 
 CATAPULT. abundantly and with 
 
 large results upon 
 
 these problems. It is the purpose of the present work to tell the 
 story as understood through the labors of these scholars, leaving 
 aside ponderous discussions which in a book intended for general 
 reading would tire without enlightening. 
 
 " Though disclaiming original investigation beyond the care- 
 ful use of the leading authorities, Mrs, Seelye has been at much 
 pains not to give the reader the discredited myths used by the 
 old school of biographers. It is a poor service to relate as history 
 an interesting story that is not true, or to lift an historical figure 
 into a heroism far from his real character. To give the facts as 
 we know them, and to show Columbus as he really was, has been 
 the sincere endeavor of the writer of this book. The story is 
 wonderful enough without the embellishment of fiction; the man 
 is interesting enough when painted in his real colors." From tht 
 Introduction, by Edward Eggleston. IMAGR 
 
 New York : D. APPLETON & CO., i, 3, & 5 Bond St. SANTO DOMINGO.
 
 BRER RABBIT PREACHES. 
 
 D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 r\N THE PLANT A TION. 
 vX By JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS, au- 
 thor of " Uncle Remus." With 
 23 Illustrations by E. W. KEM- 
 BLE, and Portrait of the Author. 
 I2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 The most personal and in some re- 
 spects the most important work which 
 Mr. Harris has published since "Uncle 
 Remus." Many will read between the 
 lines and see the autobiography of the 
 author. In addition to the stirring inci- 
 dents which appear in the story, the au- 
 thor presents a graphic picture of certain 
 phases of Southern life which have not 
 appeared in his books before. There are also new examples of the folk-lore 
 of the negroes, which became classic when presented to the public in the 
 pages of " Uncle Remus.'' 
 
 "The book is in the characteristic vein which has made the author so famous and 
 popular as an interpreter of plantation character." Rochester Union and Advertiser. 
 
 "Those who never tire of Uncle Remus and his stories with whom we would be 
 accounted will delight in Joe Maxwell and his exploits." London Saturday Review. 
 
 " Altogether a most charming book.*' Chicago Times. 
 
 " Really a valuable, if modest, contribution to the history of the civil war within the 
 Confederate lines, particularly on the eve of the catastrophe. While Mr. Harris, in his 
 preface, professes to have lost the power to distinguish between what is true and what 
 is imaginative in his episodical narrative, the reader readily finds the clew. Two or 
 three new animal fables are introduced with effect; but the history of the plantation, the 
 printing-office, the black runaways, and white deserters, of whom the impending break- 
 up made the community tolerant, the coon and fox hunting, forms the serious purpose 
 of the book, and holds the reader's interest from beginning to end. Like ' Daddy Jake,' 
 this is a good anti-slavery tract in disguise, and does credit to Mr. Harris's humanity. 
 There are amusing illustrations by E. W. Kemble." New York Evening Post. 
 
 "A charming little book, tastefully gotten up. . . . Its simplicity, humor, and indi- 
 viduality would be very welcome to any one who was weary of the pretentiousness and 
 the dull obviousness of the average three-vclume novel." London Chron'^le. 
 
 " The mirage of war vanishes and reappears like an ominous shadow on the horizon, 
 but the stay-at-home whites of the Southern Confederacy were likewise thieatened by 
 fears of a servile insurrection. This dark dread exerts its influence on a narration which 
 is otherwise cheery with boyhood's fortunate freedom from anxiety, and sublime disre- 
 gard for what the morrow may bring forth. The simple chronicle of old times ' on the 
 plantation ' concludes all too soon ; the fire bums low and the tale is ended just as the 
 reader becomes acclimated to the mid-Georgian village, and feels thoroughly at home 
 with Joe and Mink. The ' Owl and the Birds,' ' Old Zip Cooii,' the 'Big Injun and 
 the Buzzard,' are joyous echoes of the plantation-lore that first delighted us in ' Uncle 
 Remus.' Kemble's illustrations, evidently studied from life, are interspersed in these 
 pages of a book of consummate charm." Philadelphia. Ledger. 
 
 New York : D. APPLETON & CO., i, 3, & 5 Bond Street. 
 
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