WHAT FRANCE HAS DONE TO MERIT THE RESPECT OF THE WORLD.
France, ruined by the wars and extravagances of Louis XIV., exasperated
by the turpitudes of Louis XV., encouraged by the weakness of Louis
XVI., revolts. Thrones tremble, and the whole world is awe-struck at the
terrible Revolution. Kings league themselves together against her; but
such is her might that, with soldiers half armed, half clothed, half
fed, she puts to flight the allied armies of the enemies, who had sworn
to crush her.
Up rises a man and wrests from her all the liberty she had just bought
at the price of so much bloodshed. To steady himself upon an unsteady
throne, Napoleon engages in dynastic wars for ten years, marching his
victorious army from capital to capital, while Europe wonders and
trembles. At length the eagle falls, and France, sick of military glory,
beaten, but not humiliated, takes breath and submits to the Restoration
imposed upon her by the allied invaders. To console herself for the loss
of the Republic, a form of government least calculated to foster
literature and the fine arts, she profits by the return of monarchical
rule to inaugurate the Golden Age of 1830. I say _the Age of 1830_, for
such is the name this epoch, one of the most glorious in the history of
France, will be known by in the next century. Now appear, in poetry,
Victor Hugo, Lamartine, Alfred de Musset, Beranger; in fiction, Balzac,
Chateaubriand, Alexandre Dumas, George Sand; in history, Thiers, Guizot;
in political oratory, Manuel, Foy, Berryer; in criticism, Sainte-Beuve,
Jules Janin; in painting, Horace Vernet, Ingres, Delacroix, Gudin; in
music, Boieldieu, Herold, Halevy, Auber; in tragedy, Talma, Rachel; in
comedy, Mars, Duvernoy; in opera, Nourrit, Duprez, Lablache, Baroilhet,
Malibran.
I have mentioned but a few of the princes of talent.
To keep her hand in practice, she makes the conquest of Algeria, and,
later on, having nothing else particular in hand, she takes it into her
head to make the Suez Canal, a gigantic undertaking, which of itself
would be enough to save the nineteenth century from oblivion. Ever
enamored of great names, she re-establishes the Empire, because there is
a man in the world who bears the name of the victor of Austerlitz.
Smitten once more with that strange malady, the love of glory, she
fights Russia in 1855 to prevent her from going to Constantinople, and
Austria in 1859 to create Italian unity. Then comes that terrible year,
the year 1870. With an army of 350,000 men, she sanctions a war, like
the child that she is, with a nation, which for sixteen years had been
silently preparing to avenge her defeat at Jena, and which had
1,200,0000 men ready to take the field. She is conquered, and, alas!
humiliated. She pays her conquerors $1,000,000,000, but this she has
almost forgotten, and sees wrenched from her two provinces that she
loved and was beloved by; this she will never forget. The following
year, she holds up her head, the richest and most esteemed of European
nations. To-day, if she only had a leader, republican or monarch, she
would be the strongest.
Ah, dear Foreigners all over the world, respect her, that beautiful
France! I have often heard the sincerest and most intelligent of you say
that no country in the world would probably have been able to do as
much.
THE END.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] If my memory serves me, it was one of our wittiest
vaudevillists who once laid a wager that he would get an
encore, at one of our popular theaters on the Boulevard,
for the following patriotic quatrain:
"La lachete ne vaut pas la vaillance,
Mille revers ne font pas un succes;
La France, amis, sera toujours la France,
Les Francais seront toujours les Francais."
He won the bet.
The London _badauds_ are at present nightly applauding, at
the Empire Theater, a patriotic song which begins by the
following words:
"What though the powers the world doth hold
Were all against us met,
We have the might they felt of old,
And England's England yet."
Is it not strange that music-hall jingoism and _chauvinisme_
should not only be expressed in the same manner, but by the
very same words?
[2] I take the word "admiration" in the Latin sense of "wonder."
[3] The Germanic hordes, which overran Gaul in the fifth century,
did not succeed in changing our language or character. On the
contrary, the barbarians were civilized by contact with us,
and adopted our language, instead of imposing theirs upon
us. In Great Britain, the case was different: the absorption
was complete: from the fifth to the ninth century, the island
was perfectly Germanic.
[4] In our National Schools (_Ecoles Communales_), the prizes
often take the form of sums of money, which are deposited in
the Savings Bank in the child's name.
[5] England makes colonies for the exportation of her goods
and for her surplus population; France makes colonies for
the wholesale exportation of her officials. In Annam, there
are 1000 French Colonists, 4500 French soldiers, and 2000
French officials.
[6] "La Reforme Intellectuelle et Morale."
[7] Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of
heaven.
[8] Everybody knows that, at Guernsey, Victor Hugo had an Irish
Catholic cook, and that the illustrious poet abstained from
meat on Fridays, not to offend his faithful servant.
[9] Some two hundred years ago, a king was taken to Whitehall
to be beheaded for wishing to govern without his people; but
here was a future king who had come there to see the people
try to overthrow the House of Lords.--_Tempora mutantur._
[10] The society in question is described in the English
newspapers of the 19th of December, 1884.
[11] A member of Mr. Gladstone's Cabinet said to me one day that,
in England, a statesman of M. Ollivier's ability would be
sure to return to power.
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