Anyone whose way led him daily past the fortifications could see,
however technically ignorant he might be, that they were exceedingly
insignificant. Constantly, too, one heard quoted Trochu's words: "I
don't delude myself into supposing that I can stop the Prussians with
the matchsticks that are being planted on the ramparts." Strangely
enough, Paris shut herself in with such a wall of masonry that in
driving through it in the Bois de Boulogne, there was barely room for a
carriage with two horses. They bored loop-holes in these walls and
ramparts, but few doubted that the German artillery would be able to
destroy all their defences with the greatest ease.
Distribute arms to the civil population, as the papers unanimously
demanded, from readily comprehensible reasons, no one dared to do. The
Empress' Government had to hold out for the existing state of things;
nevertheless, in Paris,--certainly from about the 8th August,--people
were under the impression that what had been lost was lost irrevocably.
I considered it would be incumbent upon my honour to return to Denmark,
if we were drawn into the war, and I lived with this thought before my
eyes. I contemplated with certainty an approaching revolution in
France; I was vexed to think that there was not one conspicuously great
and energetic man among the leaders of the Opposition, and that such a
poor wretch as Rochefort was once more daily mentioned and dragged to
the front. Of Gambetta no one as yet thought, although his name was
respected, since he had made himself felt the last season as the most
vehement speaker in the Chamber. But it was not speakers who were
wanted, and people did not know that he was a man of action.
The Ministry that followed Ollivier's inspired me with no confidence.
Palikao, the Prime Minister, was termed in the papers an _iron man_
(the usual set phrase). It was said that he "would not scruple to clear
the boulevards with grape"; but the genius needed for such a
performance was not overwhelming. What he had to do was to clear France
of the Germans, and that was more difficult.
Renan had had to interrupt the journey to Spitzbergen which he had
undertaken in Prince Napoleon's company; the Prince and his party had
only reached Tromsöe, when they were called back on account of the war,
and Renan was in a state of the most violent excitement. He said: "No
punishment could be too great for that brainless scoundrel Ollivier,
and the Ministry that has followed his is worse. Every thinking man
could see for himself that the declaration of this war was madness.
(_A-t-on jamais vu pareille folie, mon Dieu, mon Dieu, c'est navrant.
Nous sommes un peuple désarçonné._)" In his eyes, Palikao was no better
than a robber, Jérôme David than a murderer. He considered the fall of
Strasburg imminent. He was less surprised than I at the unbounded
incapacity shown by the French fleet under the difficult conditions;
all plans for a descent on Northern Germany had already been given up,
and the French fleet was unable to set about even so much as a blockade
of the ports, such as the Danes had successfully carried out six years
before.
Taine was as depressed as Renan. He had returned from Germany, where he
had gone to prepare a treatise on Schiller, on account of the sudden
death of Madame Taine's mother. As early as August 2d, when no battle
had as yet been fought, he felt exceedingly anxious, and he was the
first Frenchman whom I heard take into consideration the possibility of
the defeat of France; he expressed great sorrow that two nations such
as France and Germany should wage national war against each other as
they were doing. "I have just come from Germany," he remarked, "where I
have talked with many brave working-men. When I think of what it means
for a man to be born into the world, nursed, brought up, instructed,
and equipped; when I think what struggling and difficulties he must go
through himself to be fit for the battle of life, and then reflect how
all that is to be flung into the grave as a lump of bleeding flesh, how
can I do other than grieve! With two such statesmen as Louis Philippe,
war could certainly have been averted, but with two quarrelsome men
like Bismarck and Napoleon at the head of affairs, it was, of course,
inevitable."
Philarète Chasles saw in the defeats a confirmation of the theory that
he proclaimed, day in, day out, namely: that the Latin races were on
the rapid down-grade; Spain and Portugal, Italy, Roumania, the South
American republics, were, in his opinion, in a state of moral
putrefaction, France a sheer Byzantium. It had been a piece of
foolhardiness without parallel to try to make this war a decisive
racial struggle between the nation that, as Protestant, brought free
research in its train and one which had not yet been able to get rid of
the Pope and political despotism. Now France was paying the penalty.
Out in the country at Meudon, where he was, there had--probably from
carelessness--occurred repeated explosions, the last time on August
20th. Twenty cases of cartridges had just been sent to Bazaine; a
hundred still remained, which were to start the day that they were
urgently required. They blew up, and no one in the town doubted that
the explosion was the work of Prussian spies. For things had come to
such a pass that people saw Prussian spies everywhere. (During the
first month of the war all Germans were called Prussians.) Importance
was attached to the fact that General Frossard's nephew, a young
lieutenant who lay wounded in Chasles' tower-house, from a sword-thrust
in the chest, and was usually delirious, at the crash had jumped up and
come to his senses, crying out: "It is treachery! It is Chamber No. 6
blowing up!" As a matter of fact, that was where the cartridges were.
It was said that at Meudon traces had been found of the same explosive
as had been used in bombs against the Emperor during the first days of
May (a plot that had probably been hatched by the police). The
perpetrator, however,--doubtless for good reasons--was not discovered.
Whatever vanity there was about old Philarète Chasles left him
altogether during this critical time, which seemed to make good men
better still. His niece, too, who used to be loud-voiced and conceited,
was quite a different person. One day that I was at their house at
Meudon, she sat in a corner for a long time crying quietly. Out there,
they were all feverishly anxious, could not rest, craved, partly to
hear the latest news, partly to feel the pulse of Paris. One day after
dinner, Chasles invited me to go into town with him, and when we
arrived he took a carriage and drove about with me for two hours
observing the prevailing mood. We heard countless anecdotes, most of
them apocryphal, but reflecting the beliefs of the moment: The Empress
had sent three milliards (!) in French gold to the Bank of England. The
Emperor, who was jealous of Macmahon since the latter had rescued him
at Magenta, had taken the command of the Turcos from the Marshal,
although the latter had said in the Council of War: "The Turcos must be
given to me, they will not obey anyone else." And true it was that no
one else had any control over them. If one had committed theft, or
misbehaved himself in any other way, and Macmahon. whom they called
only "Our Marshal," rode down the front of their lines and scolded
them, they began to cry, rushed up and kissed his feet, and hung to his
horse, like children asking for forgiveness. And now someone had made
the great mistake of giving them to another general. And, the commander
being anxious to dazzle the Germans with them, they and the Zouaves had
been sent first into the fire, in spite of Bazaine's very sensible
observation: "When you drive, you do not begin at a galop." And so
these picked troops were broken up in their first engagement. It was
said that of 2,500 Turcos, only 29 were left.
An anecdote like the following, which was told to us, will serve to
show how popular legends grow up, in virtue of the tendency there is to
reduce a whole battle to a collision between two generals, just as in
the Homeric age, or in Shakespeare: The Crown Prince of Prussia was
fighting very bravely at Wörth, in the front ranks. That he threw the
Turcos into confusion was the result of a ray of sunlight falling on
the silver eagle on his helmet. The Arabs thought it a sign from
Heaven. Macmahon, who was shooting in the ranks, was so near the Crown
Prince that the latter shouted to him in French: "_Voilà un homme!_"
but the Frenchman surpassed him in chivalrous politeness, for he
saluted, and replied: "_Voilà un héros!_"