"I do not say 'No.'"

"I will not go."

"You will go, nevertheless."

"I tell you I will not go," exclaimed Cournet.

And with a movement, unexpected as a flash of lightning, he seized the

police spy by the throat.

The police agent could not utter a cry, he struggled: a hand of bronze

clutched him.

His tongue protruded from his mouth, his eyes became hideous, and

started from their sockets. Suddenly his head sank down, and reddish

froth rose from his throat to his lips. He was dead.

Huy and Lorrain, motionless, and as though themselves thunderstruck,

gazed at this gloomy deed.

They did not utter a word. They did not move a limb. The _fiacre_ was

still driving on.

"Open the door!" Cournet cried to them.

They did not stir, they seemed to have become stone.

Cournet, whose thumb was closely pressed in the neck of the wretched

police spy, tried to open the door with his left hand, but he did not

succeed, he felt that he could only do it with his right hand, and he

was obliged to loose his hold of the man. The man fell face forwards,

and sank down on his knees.

Cournet opened the door.

"Off with you!" he said to them.

Huy and Lorrain jumped into the street and fled at the top of their

speed.

The coachman had noticed nothing.

Cournet let them get away, and then, pulling the check string, stopped

the _fiacre_, got down leisurely, reclosed the door, quietly took forty

sous from his purse, gave them to the coachman, who had not left his

seat, and said to him, "Drive on."

He plunged into Paris. In the Place des Victoires he met the

ex-Constituent Isidore Buvignier, his friend, who about six weeks

previously had come out of the Madelonnettes, where he had been confined

for the matter of the _Solidarité Républicaine_. Buvignier was one of

the noteworthy figures on the high benches of the Left; fair,

close-shaven, with a stern glance, he made one think of the English

Roundheads, and he had the bearing rather of a Cromwellian Puritan than

of a Dantonist Man of the Mountain. Cournet told his adventure, the

extremity had been terrible.

Buvignier shook his head.

"You have killed a man," he said.

In "Marie Tudor," I have made Fabiani answer under similar

circumstances,--

"No, a Jew."

Cournet, who probably had not read "Marie Tudor," answered,--

"No, a police spy."

Then he resumed,--

"I have killed a police spy to save three men, one of whom was myself."

Cournet was right. They were in the midst of the combat, they were

taking him to be shot; the spy who had arrested him was, properly

speaking, an assassin, and assuredly it was a case of legitimate

defence. I add that this wretch, a democrat for the people, a spy for

the police, was a twofold traitor. Moreover, the police spy was the

jackal of the _coup d'état_, while Cournet was the combatant for the

Law.

"You must conceal yourself," said Buvignier; "come to Juvisy."

Buvignier had a little refuge at Juvisy, which is on the road to

Corbeil. He was known and loved there; Cournet and he reached there that

evening.

But they had hardly arrived when some peasants said to Buvignier, "The

police have already been here to arrest you, and are coming again

to-night."

It was necessary to go back.

Cournet, more in danger than ever, hunted, wandering, pursued, hid

himself in Paris with considerable difficulty. He remained there till

the 16th. He had no means of procuring himself a passport. At length, on

the 16th, some friends of his on the Northern Railway obtained for him a

special passport, worded as follows:--

"Allow M. ----, an Inspector on the service of the Company, to pass."

He decided to leave the next day, and take the day train, thinking,

perhaps rightly, that the night train would be more closely watched.

On the 17th, at daybreak, favored by the dim dawn, he glided from street

to street, to the Northern Railway Station. His tall stature was a

special source of danger. He, however, reached the station in safety.

The stokers placed him with them on the tender of the engine of the

train, which was about to start. He only had the clothes which he had

worn since the 2d; no clean linen, no trunk, a little money.

In December, the day breaks late and the night closes in early, which is

favorable to proscribed persons.

He reached the frontier at night without hindrance. At Neuvéglise he was

in Belgium; he believed himself in safety. When asked for his papers he

caused himself to be taken before the Burgomaster, and said to him, "I

am a political refugee."

The Burgomaster, a Belgian but a Bonapartist--this breed is to be

found--had him at once reconducted to the frontier by the gendarmes, who

were ordered to hand him over to the French authorities.

Cournet gave himself up for lost.

The Belgian gendarmes took him to Armentières. If they had asked for the

Mayor it would have been all at an end with Cournet, but they asked for

the Inspector of Customs.

A glimmer of hope dawned upon Cournet.

He accosted the Inspector of Customs with his head erect, and shook

hands with him.

The Belgian gendarmes had not yet released him.

"Now, sir," said Cournet to the Custom House officer, "you are an

Inspector of Customs, I am an Inspector of Railways. Inspectors do not

eat inspectors. The deuce take it! Some worthy Belgians have taken

fright and sent me to you between four gendarmes. Why, I know not. I am

sent by the Northern Company to relay the ballast of a bridge somewhere

about here which is not firm. I come to ask you to allow me to continue

my road. Here is my pass."

He presented the pass to the Custom House officer, the Custom House

officer read it, found it according to due form, and said to Cournet,--

"Mr. Inspector, you are free."

Cournet, delivered from the Belgian gendarmes by French authority,

hastened to the railway station. He had friends there.

"Quick," he said, "it is dark, but it does not matter, it is even all

the better. Find me some one who has been a smuggler, and who will help

me to pass the frontier."

They brought him a small lad of eighteen; fair-haired, ruddy, hardy, a

Walloon[35] and who spoke French.

"What is your name?" said Cournet.

"Henry."

"You look like a girl."

"Nevertheless I am a man."

"Is it you who undertake to guide me?"

"Yes."

"You have been a smuggler?"

"I am one still."

"Do you know the roads?"

"No. I have nothing to do with the roads."

"What do you know then?"

"I know the passes."

"There are two Custom House lines."

"I know that well."

"Will you pass me across them?"

"Without doubt."

"Then you are not afraid of the Custom House officers?"

"I'm afraid of the dogs."

"In that case," said Cournet, "we will take sticks."

They accordingly armed themselves with big sticks. Cournet gave fifty

francs to Henry, and promised him fifty more when they should have

crossed the second Custom House line.

"That is to say, at four o'clock in the morning," said Henry.

It was midnight.

They set out on their way.

What Henry called the "passes" another would have called the

"hindrances." They were a succession of pitfalls and quagmires. It had

been raining, and all the holes were pools of water.

An indescribable footpath wound through an inextricable labyrinth,

sometimes as thorny as a heath, sometimes as miry as a marsh.

The night was very dark.

From time to time, far away in the darkness, they could hear a dog bark.

The smuggler then made bends or zigzags, turned sharply to the right or

to the left, and sometimes retraced his steps.

Cournet, jumping hedges, striding over ditches, stumbling at every

moment, slipping into sloughs, laying hold of briers, with his clothes

in rags, his hands bleeding, dying with hunger, battered about, wearied,

worn out, almost exhausted, followed his guide gaily.

At every minute he made a false step; he fell into every bog, and got up

covered with mud. At length he fell into a pond. It was several feet

deep. This washed him.

"Bravo!" he said. "I am very clean, but I am very cold."

At four o'clock in the morning, as Henry had promised him, they reached

Messine, a Belgian village. The two Custom House lines had been cleared.

Cournet had nothing more to fear, either from the Custom House nor from

the _coup d'état_, neither from men nor from dogs.

He gave Henry the second fifty francs, and continued his journey on

foot, trusting somewhat to chance.

It was not until towards evening that he reached a railway station. He

got into a train, and at nightfall he arrived at the Southern Railway

Station at Brussels.

He had left Paris on the preceding morning, had not slept an hour, had

been walking all night, and had eaten nothing. On searching in his

pocket he missed his pocket book, but found a crust of bread. He was

more delighted at the discovery of the crust than grieved at the loss of

his pocket-book. He carried his money in a waistband; the pocket-book,

which had probably disappeared in the pond, contained his letters, and

amongst others an exceedingly useful letter of introduction from his

friend M. Ernest Koechlin, to the Representatives Guilgot and Carlos

Forel, who at that moment were refugees at Brussels, and lodged at the

Hôtel de Brabant.

On leaving the railway station he threw himself into a cab, and said to

the coachman,--

"Hôtel de Brabant."

He heard a voice repeat, "Hôtel de Brabant." He put out his head and saw

a man writing something in a notebook with a pencil by the light of a

street-lamp.

It was probably some police agent.

Without a passport, without letters, without papers, he was afraid of

being arrested in the night, and he was longing for a good sleep. A good

bed to-night, he thought, and to-morrow the Deluge! At the Hôtel de

Brabant he paid the coachman, but did not go into the hotel. Moreover,

he would have asked in vain for the Representatives Forel and Guilgot;

both were there under false names.

He took to wandering about the streets. It was eleven o'clock at night,

and for a long time he had begun to feel utterly worn out.

At length he saw a lighted lamp with the inscription "Hôtel de la

Monnaie."

He walked in.

The landlord came up, and looked at him somewhat askance.

He then thought of looking at himself.

His unshaven beard, his disordered hair, his cap soiled with mud, his

blood-stained hands, his clothes in rags, he looked horrible.

He took a double louis out of his waistband, and put it on the table of

the parlor, which he had entered and said to the landlord,--

"In truth, sir, I am not a thief, I am a proscript; money is now my only

passport. I have just come from Paris, I wish to eat first and sleep

afterwards."

The landlord was touched, took the double louis, and gave him bed and

supper.

Next day, while he was still sleeping, the landlord came into his room,

woke him gently, and said to him,--

"Now, sir, if I were you, I should go and see Baron Hody."

"Who and what is Baron Hody?" asked Cournet, half asleep.

The landlord explained to him who Baron Hody was. When I had occasion to

ask the same question as Cournet, I received from three inhabitants of

Brussels the three answers as follows:--

"He is a dog."

"He is a polecat."

"He is a hyena."

There is probably some exaggeration in these three answers.

A fourth Belgian whom I need not specify confined himself to saying to

me,--

"He is a beast."

As to his public functions, Baron Hody was what they call at Brussels

"The Administrator of Public Safety;" that is to say, a counterfeit of

the Prefect of Police, half Carlier, half Maupas.

Thanks to Baron Hody, who has since left the place, and who, moreover,

like M. de Montalembert, was a "mere Jesuit," the Belgian police at that

moment was a compound of the Russian and Austrian police. I have read

strange confidential letters of this Baron Hody. In action and in style

there is nothing more cynical and more repulsive than the Jesuit police,

when they unveil their secret treasures. These are the contents of the

unbuttoned cassock.

At the time of which we are speaking (December, 1851), the Clerical

party had joined itself to all the forms of Monarchy; and this Baron

Hody confused Orleanism with Legitimate right. I simply tell the tale.

Nothing more.

"Baron Hody. Very well, I will go to him," said Cournet.

He got up, dressed himself, brushed his clothes as well as he could, and

asked the landlord, "Where is the Police office?"

"At the Ministry of Justice."

In fact this is the case in Brussels; the police administration forms

part of the Ministry of Justice, an arrangement which does not greatly

raise the police and somewhat lowers justice.

Cournet went there, and was shown into the presence of this personage.

Baron Hody did him the honor to ask him sharply,--

"Who are you?"

"A refugee," answered Cournet; "I am one of those whom the _coup d'état_

has driven from Paris.

"Your profession?"

"Ex-naval officer."

"Ex-naval officer!" exclaimed Baron Hody in a much gentler tone, "did

you know His Royal Highness the Prince de Joinville?"

"I have served under him."

It was the truth. Cournet had served under M. de Joinville, and prided

himself on it.

At this statement the administrator of Belgian safety completely unbent,

and said to Cournet, with the most gracious smile that the police can

find, "That's all right, sir; stay here as long as you please; we close

Belgium to the Men of the Mountain, but we throw it widely open to men

like you."

When Cournet told me this answer of Hody's, I thought that my fourth

Belgian was right.

A certain comic gloom was mingled at times with these tragedies.

Barthelémy Terrier was a Representative of the people, and a proscript.

They gave him a special passport for a compulsory route as far as

Belgium for himself and his wife. Furnished with this passport he left

with a woman. This woman was a man. Préveraud, a landed proprietor at

Donjon, one of the most prominent men in the Department of Allier, was

Terrier's brother-in-law. When the _coup d'état_ broke out at Donjon,

Préveraud had taken up arms and fulfilled his duty, had combated the

outrage and defended the law. For this he had been condemned to death.

The justice of that time, as we know. Justice executed justice. For this

crime of being an honest man they had guillotined Charlet, guillotined

Cuisinier, guillotined Cirasse. The guillotine was an instrument of the

reign. Assassination by the guillotine was one of the means of order of

that time. It was necessary to save Préveraud. He was little and slim:

they dressed him as a woman. He was not sufficiently pretty for them not

to cover his face with a thick veil. They put the brave and sturdy hands

of the combatant in a muff. Thus veiled and a little filled out with

padding, Préveraud made a charming woman. He became Madame Terrier, and

his brother-in-law took him away. They crossed Paris peaceably, and

without any other adventure than an imprudence committed by Préveraud,

who, seeing that the shaft-horse of a wagon had fallen down, threw aside

his muff, lifted his veil and his petticoat, and if Terrier, in dire

alarm, had not stopped him, he would have helped the carter to raise his

horse. Had a _sergent de ville_ been there, Préveraud would have been

captured. Terrier hastened to thrust Préveraud into a carriage, and at

nightfall they left for Brussels. They were alone in the carriage, each

in a corner and face to face. All went well as far as Amiens. At Amiens

station the door was opened, and a gendarme entered and seated himself

by the side of Préveraud. The gendarme asked for his passport, Terrier

showed it him; the little woman in her corner, veiled and silent, did

not stir, and the gendarme found all in due form. He contented himself

with saying, "We shall travel together, I am on duty as far as the

frontier."

The train, after the ordinary delay of a few minutes, again started. The

night was dark. Terrier had fallen asleep. Suddenly Préveraud felt a

knee press against his, it was the knee of the policeman. A boot placed

itself softly on his foot, it was a horse-soldier's boot. An idyll had

just germinated in the gendarme's soul. He first tenderly pressed

Préveraud's knee, and then emboldened by the darkness of the hour and by

the slumbering husband, he ventured his hand as far as her dress, a

circumstance foreseen by Molière, but the fair veiled one was virtuous.

Préveraud, full of surprise and rage, gently pushed back the gendarme's

hand. The danger was extreme. Too much love on the part of the gendarme,

one audacious step further, would bring about the unexpected, would

abruptly change the eclogue into an official indictment, would reconvert

the amorous satyr into a stony-hearted policeman, would transform Tircis

into Vidocq; and then this strange thing would be seen, a passenger

guillotined because a gendarme had committed an outrage. The danger

increased every moment. Terrier was sleeping. Suddenly the train

stopped. A voice cried, "Quièvrain!" and the door was opened. They were

in Belgium. The gendarme, obliged to stop here, and to re-enter France,

rose to get out, and at the moment when he stepped on to the ground he

heard behind him these expressive words coming from beneath the lace

veil, "Be off, or I'll break your jaw!"

[34] See "Les Hommes de l'Exile."

[35] The name given to a population belonging to the Romanic family, and

more particularly to those of French descent, who occupy the region

along the frontiers of the German-speaking territory in the South

Netherlands from Dunkirk to Malmedy in Rhenish Prussia.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE MILITARY COMMISSIONS AND THE MIXED COMMISSIONS

Justice sometime meets with strange adventures.

This old phrase assumed a new sense.

The code ceased to be a safeguard. The law became something which had

sworn fealty to a crime. Louis Bonaparte appointed judges by whom one

felt oneself stopped as in the corner of a wood. In the same manner as

the forest is an accomplice through its density, so the legislation was

an accomplice by its obscurity. What it lacked at certain points in

order to make it perfectly dark they added. How? By force. Purely and

simply. By decree. _Sic jubeo_. The decree of the 17th of February was a

masterpiece. This decree completed the proscription of the person, by

the proscription of the name. Domitian could not have done better. Human

conscience was bewildered; Right, Equity, Reason felt that the master

had over them the authority that a thief has over a purse. No reply.

Obey. Nothing resembles those infamous times.

Every iniquity was possible. Legislative bodies supervened and instilled

so much gloom into legislation that it was easy to achieve a baseness in

this darkness.

A successful _coup d'état_ does not stand upon ceremony. This kind of

success permits itself everything.

Facts abound. But we must abridge, we will only present them briefly.

There were two species of Justice; the Military Commissions and the

Mixed Commissions.

The Military Commissions sat in judgment with closed doors. A colonel

presided.

In Paris alone there were three Military Commissions: each received a

thousand bills of indictment. The Judge of Instruction sent these

accusations to the Procureur of the Republic, Lascoux, who transmitted

them to the Colonel President. The Commission summoned the accused to

appear. The accused himself was his own bill of indictment. They

searched him, that is to say, they "thumbed" him. The accusing document

was short. Two or three lines. Such as this, for example,--

Name. Christian name. Profession. A sharp fellow. Goes to the Café.

Reads the papers. Speaks. Dangerous.

The accusation was laconic. The judgment was still less prolix. It was a

simple sign.

The bill of indictment having been examined, the judges having been

consulted, the colonel took a pen, and put at the end of the accusing

line one of three signs:--

- + o

- signified consignment to Lambessa.

+ signified transportation to Cayenne. (The dry guillotine. Death.)

o signified acquittal.

While this justice was at work, the man on whose case they were working

was sometimes still at liberty, he was going and coming at his ease;

suddenly they arrested him, and without knowing what they wanted with

him, he left for Lambessa or for Cayenne.

His family was often ignorant of what had become of him.

People asked of a wife, of a sister, of a daughter, of a mother,--

"Where is your husband?"

"Where is your brother?"

"Where is your father?"

"Where is your son?"

The wife, the sister, the daughter, the mother answered,--"I do not

know."

In the Allier eleven members of one family alone, the Préveraud family

of Donjon, were struck down, one by the penalty of death, the others by

banishment and transportation.

A wine-seller of the Batignolles, named Brisadoux, was transported to

Cayenne for this line in his deed of accusation: _his shop is frequented

by Socialists_.

Here is a dialogue, word for word, and taken from life, between a

colonel and his convicted prisoner:--

"You are condemned."

"Indeed! Why?"

"In truth I do not exactly know myself. Examine your conscience. Think

what you have done."

"I?"

"Yes, you."

"How I?"

"You must have done something."

"No. I have done nothing. I have not even done my duty. I ought to have

taken my gun, gone down into the street, harangued the people, raised

barricades; I remained at home stupidly like a sluggard" (the accused

laughs); "that is the offence of which I accuse myself."

"You have not been condemned for that offence. Think carefully."

"I can think of nothing."

"What! You have not been to the _café_?"

"Yes, I have breakfasted there."

"Have you not chatted there?"

"Yes, perhaps."

"Have you not laughed?"

"Perhaps I have laughed."

"At whom? At what?"

"At what is going on. It is true I was wrong to laugh."

"At the same time you talked?"

"Yes."

"Of whom?"

"Of the President."

"What did you say?"

"Indeed, what may be said with justice, that he had broken his oath."

"And then?"

"That he had not the right to arrest the Representatives."

"You said that?"

"Yes. And I added that he had not the right to kill people on the

boulevard...."

Here the condemned man interrupted himself and exclaimed,--

"And thereupon they send me to Cayenne!"

The judge looks fixedly at the prisoner, and answers,--"Well, then?"

Another form of justice:--

Three miscellaneous personages, three removable functionaries, a

Prefect, a soldier, a public prosecutor, whose only conscience is the

sound of Louis Bonaparte's bell, seated themselves at a table and

judged. Whom? You, me, us, everybody. For what crimes? They invented

crimes. In the name of what laws? They invented laws. What penalties did

they inflict? They invented penalties. Did they know the accused? No.

Did they listen to him? No. What advocates did they listen to? None.

What witnesses did they question? None. What deliberation did they enter

upon? None. What public did they call in? None. Thus, no public, no

deliberation, no counsellors, no witnesses, judges who are not

magistrates, a jury where none are sworn in, a tribunal which is not a

tribunal, imaginary offences, invented penalties, the accused absent,

the law absent; from all these things which resembled a dream there came

forth a reality: the condemnation of the innocent.

Exile, banishment, transportation, ruin, home-sickness, death, and

despair for 40,000 families.

That is what History calls the Mixed Commissions.

Ordinarily the great crimes of State strike the great heads, and content

themselves with this destruction; they roll like blocks of stone, all in

one piece, and break the great resistances; illustrious victims suffice

for them. But the Second of December had its refinements of cruelty; it

required in addition petty victims. Its appetite for extermination

extended to the poor and to the obscure, its anger and animosity

penetrated as far as the lowest class; it created fissures in the social

subsoil in order to diffuse the proscription there; the local

triumvirates, nicknamed "mixed mixtures," served it for that. Not one

head escaped, however humble and puny. They found means to impoverish

the indigent, to ruin those dying of hunger, to spoil the disinherited;

the _coup d'état_ achieved this wonderful feat of adding misfortune to

misery. Bonaparte, it seems, took the trouble to hate a mere peasant;

the vine-dresser was torn from his vine, the laborer from his furrow,

the mason from his scaffold, the weaver from his loom. Men accepted this

mission of causing the immense public calamity to fall, morsel by

morsel, upon the humblest walks of life. Detestable task! To crumble a

catastrophe upon the little and on the weak.

CHAPTER XIV.

A RELIGIOUS INCIDENT

A little religion can be mingled with this justice. Here is an example.

Frederick Morin, like Arnauld de l'Ariège, was a Catholic Republican. He

thought that the souls of the victims of the 4th of December, suddenly

cast by the volleys of the _coup d'état_ into the infinite and the

unknown, might need some assistance, and he undertook the laborious task

of having a mass said for the repose of these souls. But the priests

wished to keep the masses for their friends. The group of Catholic

Republicans which Frederick Morin headed applied successively to all the

priests of Paris; but met with a refusal. They applied to the

Archbishop: again a refusal. As many masses for the assassin as they

liked, but far the assassinated not one. To pray for dead men of this

sort would be a scandal. The refusal was determined. How should it be

overcome? To do without a mass would have appeared easy to others, but

not to these staunch believers. The worthy Catholic Democrats with great

difficulty at length unearthed in a tiny suburban parish a poor old

vicar, who consented to mumble in a whisper this mass in the ear of the

Almighty, while begging Him to say nothing about it.

CHAPTER XV.

HOW THEY CAME OUT OF HAM

On the night of the 7th and 8th of January, Charras was sleeping. The

noise of his bolts being drawn awoke him.

"So then!" said he, "they are going to put us in close confinement." And

he went to sleep again.

An hour afterwards the door was opened. The commandant of the fort

entered in full uniform, accompanied by a police agent carrying a torch.

It was about four o'clock in the morning.

"Colonel," said the Commandant, "dress yourself at once."

"What for?"

"You are about to leave."

"Some more rascality, I suppose!"

The Commandant was silent. Charras dressed himself.

As he finished dressing, a short young man, dressed in black, came in.

This young man spoke to Charras.

"Colonel, you are about to leave the fortress, you are about to quit

France. I am instructed to have you conducted to the frontier."

Charras exclaimed,--

"If I am to quit France I will not leave the fortress. This is yet

another outrage. They have no more the right to exile me than they had

the right to imprison me. I have on my side the Law, Right, my old

services, my commission. I protest. Who are you, sir?"

"I am the Private Secretary of the Minister of the Interior."

"Ah! it is you who are named Léopold Lehon."

The young man cast down his eyes.

Charras continued,--

"You come on the part of some one whom they call 'Minister of the

Interior,' M. de Morny, I believe. I know M. de Morny. A bald young man;

he has played the game where people lose their hair; and now he is

playing the game where people risk their heads."

The conversation was painful. The young man was deeply interested in the

toe of his boot.

After a pause, however, he ventured to speak,--

"M. Charras, I am instructed to say that if you want money--"

Charras interrupted him impetuously.

"Hold your tongue, sir! not another word. I have served my country

five-and-twenty years as an officer, under fire, at the peril of my

life, always for honor, never for gain. Keep your money for your own

set!"

"But, sir--"

"Silence! Money which passes through your hands would soil mine."

Another pause ensued, which the private secretary again broke,--

"Colonel, you will be accompanied by two police agents who have special

instructions, and I should inform you that you are ordered to travel

with a false passport, and under the name of Vincent."

"Good heavens!" said Charras; "this is really too much. Who is it

imagines that they will make me travel by order with a false passport,

and under a false name?" And looking steadily at M. Léopold Lehon,

"Know, sir, that my name is Charras and not Vincent, and that I belong

to a family whose members have always borne the name of their father."

They set out.

They journeyed by carriage as far as Creil, which is on the railway.

At Creil station the first person whom Charras saw was General

Changarnier.

"Ah! it is you, General."

The two proscripts embraced each other. Such is exile.

"What the deuce are they doing with you?" asked the General.

"What they are probably doing with you. These vagabonds are making me

travel under the name of Vincent."

"And me," said Changarnier, "under the name of Leblanc."

"In that case they ought at least to have called me Lerouge," said

Charras, with a burst of laughter.

In the meantime a group, kept at a distance by the police agents, had

formed round them. People had recognized them and saluted them. A little

child, whose mother could not hold him back, ran quickly to Charras and

took his hand.

They got into the train apparently as free as other travellers. Only

they isolated them in empty compartments, and each was accompanied by

two men, who sat one at the side and the other facing him, and who never

took their eyes off him. The keepers of General Changarnier were of

ordinary strength and stature. Those of Charras were almost giants.

Charras is exceedingly tall; they topped him by an entire head. These

men who were galley sergeants, had been carabineers; these spies had

been heroes.

Charras questioned them. They had served when quite young, from 1813.

Thus they had shared the bivouac of Napoleon; now they ate the same

bread as Vidocq. The soldier brought to such a sorry pass as this is a

sad sight.

The pocket of one of them was bulged out with something which he was

hiding there.

When this man crossed the station in company with Charras, a lady

traveller said,--

"Has he got M. Thiers in his pocket?"

What the police agent was hiding was a pair of pistols. Under their

long, buttoned-up and doubled-breasted frock coats these men were armed.

They were ordered to treat "those gentlemen" with the most profound

respect, but in certain circumstances to blow out their brains.

The prisoners had each been informed that in the eyes of the different

authorities whom they would meet on the road they would pass for

foreigners, Swiss or Belgians, expelled on account of their political

opinions, and that the police agents would keep their title of police

agents, and would represent themselves as charged with reconducting

these foreigners to the frontier.

Two-thirds of the journey were accomplished without any hindrance. At

Valenciennes an incident occurred.

The _coup d'état_ having succeeded, zeal reigned paramount. No task was

any longer considered despicable. To denounce was to please; zeal is one

of the forms of servitude towards which people lean the most willingly.

The general became a common soldier, the prefect became a commissary of

police, the commissary of police became a police spy.

The commissary of police at Valenciennes himself superintended the

inspection of passports. For nothing in the world would he have deputed

this important office to a subordinate inspector. When they presented

him the passport of the so-called Leblanc, he looked the so-called

Leblanc full in the face, started, and exclaimed,--

"You are General Changarnier!"

"That is no affair of mine," said the General.

Upon this the two keepers of the General protested and exhibited their

papers, perfectly drawn up in due form.

"Mr. Commissary, we are Government agents. Here are our proper

passports."

"Improper ones," said the General.

The Commissary shook his head. He had been employed in Paris, and had

been frequently sent to the headquarters of the staff at the Tuileries,

to General Changarnier. He knew him very well.

"This is too much!" exclaimed the police agents. They blustered,

declared that they were police functionaries on a special service, that

they had instructions to conduct to the frontier this Leblanc, expelled

for political reasons, swore by all the gods, and gave their word of

honor that the so-called Leblanc was really named Leblanc.

"I do not much believe in words of honor," said the Commissary.

"Honest Commissary," muttered Changarnier, "you are right. Since the 2d

of December words of honor and oaths are no more than worthless paper

money."

And then he began to smile.

The Commissary became more and more perplexed. The police agents ended

by invoking the testimony of the prisoner himself.

"Now, sir, tell him your name yourself."

"Get out of the difficulty yourselves," answered Changarnier.

All this appeared most irregular to the mind of a provincial alguazil.

It seemed evident to the Commissary of Valenciennes that General

Changarnier was escaping from Ham under a false name with a false

passport, and with false agents of police, in order to mislead the

authorities, and that it was a plot to escape which was on the point of

succeeding.

"Come down, all three of you!" exclaimed the Commissary.

The General gets down, and on putting foot to the ground notices Charras

in the depths of his compartment between his two bullies.

"Oho! Charras, you are there!" he cries.

"Charras!" exclaimed the Commissary. "Charras there! Quick! the

passports of these gentlemen!" And looking Charras in the face,--

"Are you Colonel Charras?"

"Egad!" said Charras.

Yet another complication. It was now the turn of Charras's bullies to

bluster. They declared that Charras was the man called Vincent,

displayed passports and papers, swore and protested. The Commissary's

suspicions were fully confirmed.

"Very well," said he, "I arrest everybody."

And he handed over Changarnier, Charras, and the four police agents to

the gendarmes. The Commissary saw the Cross of Honor shining in the

distance. He was radiant.

The police arrested the police. It happens sometimes that the wolf

thinks he has seized a victim and bites his own tail.

The six prisoners--for now there were six prisoners--were taken into a

parlor at the railway station. The Commissary informed the town

authorities. The town authorities hastened hither, headed by the

sub-prefect.

The sub-prefect, who was named Censier, comes in, and does not know

whether he ought to salute or to question, to grovel in the dust or to

keep his hat on his head. These poor devils of magistrates and local

officials were very much exercised in their minds. General Changarnier

had been too near the Dictatorship not to make them thoughtful. Who can

foresee the course of events? Everything is possible. Yesterday called

itself Cavaignac, to-day calls itself Bonaparte, to-morrow may call

itself Changarnier. Providence is really cruel not to let sub-prefects

have a peep at the future.

It is sad for a respectable functionary, who would ask for nothing

better than to be servile or arrogant according to circumstances, to be

in danger of lavishing his platitudes on a person who is perhaps going

to rot forever in exile, and who is nothing more than a rascal, or to

risk being insolent to a vagabond of a postscript who is capable of

coming back a conqueror in six months' time, and of becoming the

Government in his turn. What was to be done? And then they were spied

upon. This takes place between officials. The slightest word would be

maliciously interpreted, the slightest gesture would be laid to their

discredit. How should he keep on good terms at the same time this

Cabbage, which is called To-day, and that Goat, which is called

To-morrow? To ask too many questions would offend the General, to render

to many salutations would annoy the President. How could he be at the

same time very much a sub-prefect, and in some degree a lacquey? How

could he combine the appearance of obsequiousness, which would please

Changarnier, with the appearance of authority, which would please

Bonaparte?

The sub-prefect thought to get out of the difficulty by saying,

"General, you are my prisoner," and by adding, with a smile, "Do me the

honor of breakfasting with me?" He addressed the same words to Charras.

The General refused curtly.

Charras looked at him fixedly, and did not answer him.

Doubts regarding the identity of the prisoners came to the mind of the

sub-prefect. He whispered to the Commissary "Are you quite sure?"

"Certainly," said the Commissary.

The sub-prefect decided to address himself to Charras, and dissatisfied

with the manner in which his advances had been received, asked him

somewhat sharply, "But, in short, who are you?"

Charras answered, "We are packages."

And turning to his keepers who were now in their turn in keeping:--

"Apply to our exporters. Ask our Custom House officers. It is a mere

matter of goods traffic."

They set the electric telegraph to work. Valenciennes, alarmed,

questioned Paris. The sub-prefect informed the Minister of the Interior

that, thanks to a strict supervision, which he had trusted to no one but

himself, he had just effected an important capture, that he had just

discovered a plot, had saved the President, had saved society, had saved

religion, etc., that in one word he had just arrested General

Changarnier and Colonel Charras, who had escaped that morning from the

fort of Ham with false passports, doubtless for the purpose of heading a

rising, etc., and that, in short, he asked the Government what was to be

done with the two prisoners.

At the end of an hour the answer arrived:--"Let them go on their way."

The police perceived that in a burst of zeal they had pushed profundity

to the point of stupidity. That sometimes happens.

The next train carried away the prisoners, restored, not to liberty, but

to their keepers.

They passed Quiévrain.

They got down from the carriage, and got in again.

When the train again started Charras heaved the deep, joyous sigh of a

freed man, and said, "At last!"

He raised his eyes, and perceived his two jailers by his side.

They had got up behind him into the carriage.

"Ah, indeed!" he said to them; "you there!"

Of these two men there was only one who spoke, that one answered,--

"Yes, Colonel."

"What are you doing here?"

"We are keeping watch over you."

"But we are in Belgium."

"Possibly."

"Belgium is not France."

"Ah, that may be."

"But suppose I put my head out of the carriage? Suppose I call out?

Suppose I had you arrested? Suppose I reclaimed my liberty?"

"You will not do all that, Colonel."

"How will you prevent me?"

The police agent showed the butt-end of his pistol and said "Thus."

Charras burst out laughing, and asked them, "Where then are you going to

leave me?"

"At Brussels."

"That is to say, that at Brussels you will salute me with your cap; but

that at Mons you will salute me with your pistol."

"As you say, Colonel."

"In truth," said Charras, "it does not matter to me. It is King

Leopold's business. The Bonaparte treats countries as he has treated the

Representatives. He has violated the Assembly, he violates Belgium. But

all the same, you are a medley of strange rascals. He who is at the top

is a madman, those who are beneath are blockheads. Very well, my

friends, let me go to sleep."

And he went to sleep.

Almost the same incident happened nearly at the same moment to Generals

Changarnier and Lamoricière and to M. Baze.

The police agents did not leave General Changarnier until they had

reached Mons. There they made him get down from the train, and said to

him, "General, this is your place of residence. We leave you free."

"Ah!" said he, "this is my place of residence, and I am free? Well,

then, good-night."

And he sprang lightly back into the carriage just as the train was

starting, leaving behind him two galley sergeants dumfounded.

The police released Charras at Brussels, but did not release General

Lamoricière. The two police agents wished to compel him to leave

immediately for Cologne. The General, who was suffering from rheumatism

which he had caught at Ham, declared that he would sleep at Brussels.

"Be it so," said the police agents.

They followed him to the Hôtel de Bellevue. They spent the night there

with him. He had considerable difficulty to prevent them from sleeping

in his room. Next day they carried him off, and took him to

Cologne-violating Prussian territory after having violated Belgian

territory.

The _coup d'état_ was still more impudent with M. Baze.

They made M. Baze journey with his wife and his children under the name

of Lassalle. He passed for the servant of the police agent who

accompanied him.

They took him thus to Aix-la-Chapelle.

There, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the street, the

police agents deposited him and the whole of his family, without a

passport, without papers, without money. M. Baze, indignant, was obliged

to have recourse to threats to induce them to take him and identify him

before a magistrate. It was, perhaps, part of the petty joys of

Bonaparte to cause a Questor of the Assembly to be treated as a vagrant.

On the night of the 7th of January, General Bedeau, although he was not

to leave till the next day, was awakened like the others by the noise of

bolts. He did not understand that they were shutting him in, but on the

contrary, believed that they were releasing M. Baze, his neighbor in the

adjoining cell. He cried through the door, "Bravo, Baze!"

In fact, every day the Generals said to the Questor, "You have no

business here, this is a military fortress. One of these fine mornings

you will be thrust outside like Roger du Nord."

Nevertheless General Bedeau heard an unusual noise in the fortress. He

got up and "knocked" for General Leflô, his neighbor in the cell on the

other side, with whom he exchanged frequent military dialogues, little

flattering to the _coup d'état_. General Leflô answered the knocking,

but he did not know any more than General Bedeau.

General Bedeau's window looked out on the inner courtyard of the prison.

He went to this window and saw lanterns flashing hither and thither,

species of covered carts, horsed, and a company of the 48th under arms.

A moment afterwards he saw General Changarnier come into the courtyard,

get into a carriage, and drive off. Some moments elapsed, then he saw

Charras pass. Charras noticed him at the window, and cried out to him,

"Mons!"

In fact he believed he was going to Mons, and this made General Bedeau,

on the next day, choose Mons as his residence, expecting to meet Charras

there.

Charras having left, M. Léopold Lehon came in accompanied by the

Commandant of the fort. He saluted Bedeau, explained his business, and

gave his name. General Bedeau confined himself to saying, "They banish

us; it is an illegality, and one more indignity added to the others.

However, with the people who send you one is no longer surprised at

anything."

They did not send him away till the next day. Louis Bonaparte had said,

"We must 'space out' the Generals."

The police agent charged with escorting General Bedeau to Belgium was

one of those who, on the 2d of December, had arrested General Cavaignac.

He told General Bedeau that they had had a moment of uneasiness when

arresting General Cavaignae: the picket of fifty men, which had been

told off to assist the police having failed them.

In the compartment of the railway carriage which was taking General

Bedeau into Belgium there was a lady, manifestly belonging to good

society, of very distinguished appearance, and who was accompanied by

three little children. A servant in livery, who appeared to be a German,

had two of the children on his knees, and lavished a thousand little

attentions on them. However, the General, hidden by the darkness, and

muffled up, like the police agents, in the collar of his mantle, paid

little attention to this group. When they reached Quièvrain, the lady

turned to him and said, "General, I congratulate you, you are now in

safety."

The General thanked her, and asked her name.

"Baroness Coppens," she answered.

It may be remembered that it was at M. Coppens's house, 70, Rue Blanche,

that the first meeting of the Left had taken place on December 2d.

"You have charming children there, madam," said the General, "and," he

added, "an exceedingly good servant."

"It is my husband," said Madame Coppens.

M. Coppens, in fact, had remained five weeks buried in a hiding-place

contrived in his own house. He had escaped from France that very night

under the cover of his own livery. They had carefully taught their

children their lesson. Chance had made them get into the same carriage

as General Bedeau and the two bullies who were keeping guard over him,

and throughout the night Madame Coppens had been in terror lest, in the

presence of the policeman, one of the little ones awakening, should

throw its arms around the neck of the servant and cry "Papa!"

CHAPTER XVI.

A RETROSPECT

Louis Bonaparte had tested the majority as engineers test a bridge; he

had loaded it with iniquities, encroachments, enormities, slaughters on

the Place du Havre, cries of "Long live the Emperor," distributions of

money to the troops, sales of Bonapartist journals in the streets,

prohibition of Republican and parliamentary journals, reviews at Satory,

speeches at Dijon; the majority bore everything.

"Good," said he, "It will carry the weight of the _coup d'état_."

Let us recall the facts. Before the 2d of December the _coup d'état_ was

being constructed in detail, here and there, a little everywhere, with

exceeding impudence, and yet the majority smiled. The Representative

Pascal Duprat had been violently treated by police agents. "That is very

funny," said the Right. The Representative Dain was seized. "Charming."

The Representative Sartin was arrested. "Bravo." One fine morning when

all the hinges had been well tested and oiled, and when all the wires

were well fixed, the _coup d'état_ was carried out all at once,

abruptly. The majority ceased to laugh, but the trick, was done. It had

not perceived that for a long time past, while it was laughing at the

strangling of others, the cord was round its own neck.

Let us maintain this, not to punish the past, but to illuminate the

future. Many months before being carried out, the _coup d'état_ had been

accomplished. The day having come, the hour having struck, the mechanism

being completely wound up, it had only to be set going. It was bound not

to fail, and nothing did fail. What would have been an abyss if the

majority had done its duty, and had understood its joint responsibility

with the Left, was not even a ditch. The inviolability had been

demolished by those who were inviolable. The hand of gendarmes had

become as accustomed to the collar of the Representatives as to the

collar of thieves: the white tie of the statesman was not even rumpled

in the grasp of the galley sergeants, and one can admire the Vicomte de

Falloux--oh, candor!--for being dumfounded at being treated like Citizen

Sartin.

The majority, going backwards, and ever applauding Bonaparte, fell into

the hole which Bonaparte had dug for it.

CHAPTER XVII.

CONDUCT OF THE LEFT

The conduct of the Republican Left in this grave crisis of the 2d of

December was memorable.

The flag of the Law was on the ground, in the mire of universal treason,

under the feet of Louis Bonaparte; the Left raised this flag, washed

away the mire with its blood, unfurled it, waved it before the eyes of

the people, and from the 2d to the 5th of December held Bonaparte at

bay.

A few men, a mere handful, 120 Representatives of the people escaped by

chance from arrest, plunged in darkness and in silence, without even

possessing that cry of the free press which sounds the tocsin to human

intellects, and which encourages the combatants, without generals under

their orders, without soldiers, without ammunition, went down into the

streets, resolutely barred the way against the _coup d'état_, and gave

battle to this monstrous crime, which had taken all its precautions,

which was mail-clad in every part, armed to the teeth, crowding round it

forests of bayonets, and making a pack of mortars and cannons give

tongue in its favor.

They had that presence of mind, which is the most practical kind of

courage; they had, while lacking everything else, the formidable

improvisation of duty, which never loses heart. They had no

printing-offices, they obtained them; they had no guns, they found them;

they had no balls, they cast them; they had no powder, they manufactured

it; they had nothing but paving-stones, and from thence they evolved

combatants.

It is true that these paving-stones were the paving-stones of Paris,

stones which change themselves into men.

Such is the power of Right, that, during four days these hundred and

twenty men, who had nothing in their favor but the goodness of their

cause, counterbalanced an army of 100,000 soldiers. At one moment the

scale turned on their side. Thanks to them, thanks to their resistance,

seconded by the indignation of honest hearts, there came an hour when

the victory of the law seemed possible, and even certain. On Thursday,

the 4th, the _coup d'état_ tottered, and was obliged to support itself

by assassination. We seen that without the butchery of the boulevards,

if he had not saved his perjury by a massacre, if he had not sheltered

his crime by another crime, Louis Bonaparte was lost.

During the long hours of this struggle, a struggle without a truce, a

struggle against the army during the day and against the police during

the night,--an unequal struggle, where all the strength and all the rage

was on one side, and, as we have just said, nothing but Right on the

other, not one of these hundred and twenty Representatives, not a single

one failed at the call of duty, not one shunned the danger, not one drew

back, not one wearied,--all these heads placed themselves resolutely

under the axe, and for four days waited for it to fall.

To-day captivity, transportation, expatriation, exile, the axe has

fallen on nearly all these heads.

I am one of those who have had no other merit in this struggle than to

rally into one unique thought the courage of all; but let me here

heartily render justice to those men amongst whom I pride myself with

having for three years served the holy cause of human progress, to this

Left, insulted, calumniated, unappreciated, and dauntless, which was

always in the breach, and which did not repose for a single day, which

recoiled none the more before the military conspiracy than before the

parliamentary conspiracy, and which, entrusted by the people with the

task of defending them, defended them even when abandoned by themselves;

defended them in the tribune with speech, and in the street with the

sword.

When the Committee of Resistance in the sitting at which the decree of

deposition and of outlawry was drawn up and voted, making use of the

discretionary power which the Left had confided to it, decided that all

the signatures of the Republican Representatives remaining at liberty

should be placed at the foot of the decree, it was a bold stroke; the

Committee did not conceal from itself that it was a list of proscription

offered to the victorious _coup d'état_ ready drawn up, and perhaps in

its inner conscience it feared that some would disavow it, and protest

against it. As a matter of fact, the next day we received two letters,

two complaints. They were from two Representatives who had been omitted

from the list, and who claimed the honor of being reinstated there. I

reinstate these two Representatives here, in their right of being

proscripts. Here are their names--Anglade and Pradié.

From Tuesday, the 2d, to Friday, the 5th of December, the

Representatives of the Left and the Committee, dogged, worried, hunted

down, always on the point of being discovered and taken, that is to

say--massacred; repaired for the purpose of deliberating, to

twenty-seven different houses, shifted twenty-seven times their place of

meeting, from their first gathering in the Rue Blanche to their last

conference at Raymond's. They refused the shelters which were offered

them on the left bank of the river, wishing always to remain in the

centre of the combat. During these changes they more than once traversed

the right bank of Paris from one end to the other, most of the time on

foot, and making long circuits in order not to be followed. Everything

threatened them with danger; their number, their well-known faces, even

their precautions. In the populous streets there was danger, the police

were permanently posted there; in the lonely streets there was danger,

because the goings and comings were more noticed there.

They did not sleep, they did not eat, they took what they could find, a

glass of water from time to time, a morsel of bread here and there.

Madame Landrin gave us a basin of soup, Madame Grévy the remainder of a

cold pie. We dined one evening on a little chocolate which a chemist had

distributed in a barricade. At Jeunesse's, in the Rue de Grammont,

during the night of the 3rd, Michel de Bourges took a chair, and said,

"This is my bed." Were they tired? They did not feel it. The old men,

like Ronjat, the sick, like Boysset, all went forward. The public peril,

like a fever, sustained them.

Our venerable colleague, Lamennais, did not come, but he remained three

days without going to bed, buttoned up in his old frock coat, his thick

boots on his feet, ready to march. He wrote to the author these three

lines, which it is impossible not to quote:--"You are heroes without me.

This pains me greatly. I await your orders. Try, then, to find me

something to do, be it but to die."

In these meetings each man preserved his usual demeanor. At times one

might have thought it an ordinary sitting in one of the bureaux of the

Assembly. There was the calm of every day, mingled with the firmness of

decisive crises. Edgar Quinet retained all his lofty judgment, Noël

Parfait all his mental vivacity, Yvan all his vigorous and intelligent

penetration, Labrousse all his animation. In a corner Pierre Lefranc,

pamphleteer and ballad-writer, but a pamphleteer like Courier, and a

ballad-writer like Béranger smiled at the grave and stern words of

Dupont de Bussac. All that brilliant group of young orators of the Left,

Baneel with his powerful ardor, Versigny and Victor Chauffour with their

youthful daring. Sain with his coolheadedness which reveals strength,

Farconnet with his gentle voice and his energetic inspiration, lavishing

his efforts in resisting the _coup d'état_, sometimes taking part in the

deliberations, at others amongst the people, proving that to be an

orator one must possess all the qualifications of a combatant. De

Flotte, indefatigable, was ever ready to traverse all Paris. Xavier

Durrieu was courageous, Dulac dauntless, Charamaule fool-hardy. Citizens

and Paladins. Courage! who would have dared to exhibit none amongst all

these men, of whom not one trembled? Untrimmed beards, torn coats,

disordered hair, pale faces, pride glistening in every eye. In the

houses where they were received they installed themselves as best they

could. If there were no sofas or chairs, some, exhausted in strength,

but not in heart, seated themselves on the floor. All became copyists of

the decrees and proclamations; one dictated, ten wrote. They wrote on

tables, on the corners of furniture, on their knees. Frequently paper

was lacking, pens were wanting. These wretched trifles created obstacles

at the most critical times. At certain moments in the history of peoples

an inkstand where the ink is dried up may prove a public calamity.

Moreover, cordiality prevailed among all, all shades of difference were

effaced. In the secret sittings of the Committee Madier de Montjau, that

firm and generous heart, De Flotte, brave and thoughtful, a fighting

philosopher of the Devolution, Carnot, accurate, cold, tranquil,

immovable, Jules Favre, eloquent, courageous, admirable through his

simplicity and his strength, inexhaustible in resources as in sarcasms,

doubled, by combining them, the diverse powers of their minds.

Michel de Bourges, seated in a corner of the fireplace, or leaning on a

table enveloped in his great coat, his black silk cap on his head, had

an answer for every suggestion, gave back to occurrences blow for blow,

was on his guard for danger, difficulty, opportunity, necessity, for his

is one of those wealthy natures which have always something ready either

in their intellect or in their imagination. Words of advice crossed

without jostling each other. These men entertained no illusion. They

knew that they had entered into a life-and-death struggle. They had no

quarter to expect. They had to do with the Man who had said, "Crush

everything." They knew the bloody words of the self-styled Minister,

Merny. These words the placards of Saint-Arnaud interpreted by decrees,

the Praetorians let loose in the street interpreted them by murder. The

members of the Insurrectionary Committee and the Representatives

assisting at the meetings were not ignorant that wherever they might be

taken they would be killed on the spot by bayonet-thrusts. It was the

fortune of this war. Yet the prevailing expression on every face was

serenity; that profound serenity which comes from a happy conscience. At

times this serenity rose to gaiety. They laughed willingly and at

everything. At the torn trousers of one, at the hat which another had

brought back from the barricade instead of his own, at the comforter of

a third. "Hide your big body," they said to him. They were children, and

everything amused them. On the morning of the 4th Mathien de la Drôme

came in. He had organized for his part a committee which communicated

with the Central Committee, he came to tell us of it. He had shaved off

his fringe of beard so as not to be recognized in the streets. "You look

like an Archbishop," said Michel de Bourges to him, and there was a

general laugh. And all this, with this thought which every moment

brought back; the noise which is heard at the door, the key which turns

in the lock is perhaps Death coming in.

The Representatives and the Committee were at the mercy of chance. More

than once they could have been captured, and they were not; either owing

to the scruples of certain police agents (where the deuce will scruples

next take up their abode?) or that these agents doubted the final

result, and feared to lay their hand heedlessly upon possible victors.

If Vassal, the Commissary of Police, who met us on the morning of the

4th, on the pavement of the Rue des Moulins, had wished, we might have

been taken that day. He did not betray us. But these were exceptions.

The pursuit of the police was none the less ardent and implacable. At

Marie's, it may be remembered that the _sergents de ville_ and the

gendarmes arrived ten minutes after we had left the house, and that they

even ransacked under the beds with their bayonets.

Amongst the Representatives there were several Constituents, and at

their head Bastide. Bastide, in 1848, had been Minister for Foreign

Affairs. During the second night, meeting in the Rue Popincourt, they

reproached him with several of his actions. "Let me first get myself

killed," he answered, "and then you can reproach me with what you like."

And he added, "How can you distrust me, who am a Republican up to the

hilt?" Bastide would not consent to call our resistance the

"insurrection," he called it the "counter-insurrection." he said,

"Victor Hugo is right. The insurgent is at the Elysée." It was my

opinion, as we have seen, that we ought to bring the battle at once to

an issue, to defer nothing, to reserve nothing; I said, "We must strike

the _coup d'état_ while it is hot." Bastide supported me. In the combat

he was impassive, cold, gay beneath his coldness. At the Saint Antoine

barricade, at the moment when the guns of the _coup d'état_ were leveled

at the Representatives of the people, he said smilingly to Madier de

Montjau, "Ask Schoelcher what he thinks of the abolition of the penalty

of death." (Schoelcher, like myself, at this supreme moment, would have

answered, "that it ought to be abolished") In another barricade Bastide,

compelled to absent himself for a moment, placed his pipe on a

paving-stone. They found Bastide's pipe, and they thought him dead. He

came back, and it was hailing musket-balls; he said, "My pipe?" he

relighted it and resumed the fight. Two balls pierced his coat.

When the barricades were constructed, the Republican Representatives

spread themselves abroad; and distributed themselves amongst them.

Nearly all the Representatives of the Left repaired to the barricades,

assisting either to build them or to defend them. Besides the great

exploit at Saint Antoine barricade, where Schoelcher was so admirable,

Esquiros went to the barricade of the Rue de Charonne, De Flotte to

those of the Pantheon and of the Chapelle Saint Denis, Madier de

Montjau to those of Belleville and the Rue Aumaire, Doutre and Pelletier

to that of the Mairie of the Fifth Arrondissement, Brives to that of Rue

Beaubourg, Arnauld de l'Ariège to that of Rue de Petit-Repîsoir, Viguier

to that of the Rue Pagevin, Versigny to that of the Rue Joigneaux;

Dupont de Bussac to that of the Carré Saint Martin; Carlos Forel and

Boysset to that of the Rue Rambuteau. Doutre received a sword-cut on his

head, which cleft his hat; Bourzat had four balls in his overcoat;

Baudin was killed; Gaston Dussoubs was ill and could not come; his

brother, Denis Dussoubs, replaced him. Where? In the tomb.

Baudin fell on the first barricade, Denis Dussoubs on the last.

I was less favored than Bourzat; I only had three balls in my overcoat,

and it is impossible for me to say whence they came. Probably from the

boulevard.

After the battle was lost there was no general helter-skelter, no rout,

no flight. All remained hidden in Paris ready to reappear, Michel in the

Rue d'Alger, myself in the Rue de Navarin. The Committee held yet

another sitting on Saturday, the 6th, at eleven o'clock at night. Jules

Favre, Michel de Bourges, and myself, we came during the night to the

house of a generous and brave woman, Madame Didier. Bastide came there

and said to me, "If you are not killed here, you are going to enter upon

exile. For myself, I am going to remain in Paris. Take me for your

lieutenant." I have related this incident.

They hoped for the 9th (Tuesday) a resumption of arms, which did not

take place. Malarmet had announced it to Dupont de Bussac, but the blow

of the 4th had prostrated Paris. The populace no longer stirred. The

Representatives did not resolve to think of their safety, and to quit

France through a thousand additional dangers until several days

afterwards, when the last spark of resistance was extinguished in the

heart of the people, and the last glimmer of hope in heaven.

Several Republican Representatives were workmen; they have again become

workmen in exile. Nadaud has resumed his trowel, and is a mason in

London. Faure (du Rhône), a cutler, and Bansept, a shoemaker, felt that

their trade had become their duty, and practise it in England. Faure

makes knives, Bansept makes boots. Greppo is a weaver, it was he who

when a proscript made the coronation robe of Queen Victoria. Gloomy

smile of Destiny. Noël Parfait is a proof-reader at Brussels; Agricol

Perdiguier, called Avignonnais-la-Vertu, has girded on his leathern

apron, and is a cabinet-maker at Antwerp. Yesterday these men sat in the

Sovereign Assembly. Such things as these are seen in Plutarch.

The eloquent and courageous proscript, Emile Deschanel, has created at

Brussels, with a rare talent of speech, a new form of public

instruction, the Conferences. To him is due the honor of this

foundation, so fruitful and so useful.

Let us say in conclusion that the National Legislative Assembly lived

badly but died well.

At this moment of the fall, irreparable for the cowards, the Right was

worthy, the Left was great.

Never before has History seen a Parliament fall in this manner.

February had blown upon the Deputies of the legal country, and the

Deputies had vanished. M. Sauzet had sunk down behind the tribune, and

had gone away without even taking his hat.

Bonaparte, the other, the first, the true Bonaparte, had made the "Five

Hundred" step out of the windows of the Orangery of Saint Cloud,

somewhat embarrassed with their large mantles.

Cromwell, the oldest of the Bonapartes, when he achieved his Eighteenth

Brumaire, encountered scarcely any other resistance than a few

imprecations from Milton and from Ludlaw, and was able to say in his

boorishly gigantic language, "I have put the King in my knapsack and the

Parliament in my pocket."

We must go back to the Roman Senate in order to find true Curule chairs.

The Legislative Assembly, let us repeat, to its honor, did not lose

countenance when facing the abyss. History will keep an account of it.

After having betrayed so many things, it might have been feared that

this Assembly would end by betraying itself. It did nothing of the kind.

The Legislature, one is obliged to remember, had committed faults upon

faults; the Royalist majority had, in the most odious manner, persecuted

the Republican minority, which was bravely doing its duty in denouncing

it to the people; this Assembly had had a very long cohabitation and a

most fatal complicity with the Man of Crime, who had ended by strangling

it as a robber strangles his concubine in his bed; but whatever may be

said of this fateful Assembly, it did not exhibit that wretched

vanishing away which Louis Bonaparte hoped for; it was not a coward.

This is due to its having originated from universal suffrage. Let us

mention this, for it is an instructive lesson. The virtue of this

universal suffrage, which had begotten the Assembly and which the

Assembly had wished to slay, it felt in itself to its last hour.

The sap of a whole people does not spread in vain throughout an

Assembly, even throughout the most decrepit. On the decisive day this

sap asserts itself.

The Legislative Assembly, laden as it may be with formidable

responsibilities, will, perhaps, be less overwhelmed than it deserves by

the reprobation of posterity.

Thanks to universal suffrage, which it had deceived, and which

constituted its faith and its strength at the last moment, thanks to the

Left, which it had oppressed, scoffed at, calumniated, and decimated,

and which cast on it the glorious reflection of its heroism, this

pitiful Assembly died a grand death.

CHAPTER XVIII.

PAGE WRITTEN AT BRUSSELS

Well then, yes, I will kick open the door of this Palace, and I will

enter with you, History! I will seize by the collar all the

perpetrators, continually caught red-handed in the commission of all

these outrages! I will suddenly illuminate this cavern of night with the

broad daylight of truth!

Yes, I will bring in the daylight! I will tear down the curtain, I will

open the window, I will show to every eye such as it really is,

infamous, horrible, wealthy, triumphant, joyous, gilded,

besmirched--this Elysée! this Court! this group! this heap! call it what

you will! this galley-crew! where writhe and crawl, and pair and breed

every baseness, every indignity, every abomination: filibusters,

buccaneers, swearers of oaths, Signers of the Cross, spies, swindlers,

butchers, executioners, from the brigand who vends his sword, to the

Jesuit who sells his God second-hand! This sink where Baroche elbows

Teste! where each brings his own nastiness! Magnan his epaulets;

Montalembert his religion, Dupin his person!

And above all the innermost circle, the Holy of Holies, the private

Council, the smug den where they drink--where they eat--where they

laugh--where they sleep--where they play--where they cheat--where they

call Highnesses "Thou,"--where they wallow! Oh! what ignominies! It is

them! It is there! Dishonor, baseness, shame, and opprobrium are there!

Oh History! A hot iron for all these faces.

It is there that they amuse themselves, and that they jest, and that

they banter, and that they make sport of France! It is there that they

pocket hap-hazard, amid great shouts of laughter, the millions of louis

and the millions of votes! See them, look at them! They have treated the

Law like a girl, they are content! Right is slaughtered, Liberty is

gagged, the flag is dishonored, the people are under their feet. They

are happy! And who are they? What are these men? Europe knows not. One

fine morning it saw them come out of a crime. Nothing more. A parcel of

rascals who vainly tried to become celebrated, and who have remained

anonymous. Look! they are all there! See them, I tell you! Look at them,

I tell you! Recognize them if you can. Of what sex are they? To what

species do they belong? Who is this one? Is he a writer? No; he is a

dog. He gobbles human flesh. And that one? Is he a dog? No, he is a

courtier--he has blood on his paw.

New men, that is what they term them. New, in truth! Unlooked-for,

strange, unprecedented, monstrous! Perjury, iniquity, robbery,

assassination, erected into ministerial departments, swindling applied

to universal suffrage, government under false pretences, duty called

crime, crime called duty, cynicism laughing in the midst of

atrocity,--it is of all this that their newness is compounded.

Now, all is well, they have succeeded, they have a fair wind, they enjoy

themselves to the full. They have cheated France, they are dividing the

spoil. France is a bag, and they put their hand in it. Rummage, for

Heaven's sake! Take, while you are there; help yourselves, draw out,

plunder, steal! One wants money, another wants situations, another wants

a decorative collar round his neck, another a plume in his hat, another

embroidery on his sleeve, another women, another power; another news for

the Bourse, another a railway, another wine. I should think, indeed,

that they are well satisfied. Picture to yourself a poor devil who,

three years ago, borrowed ten sous of his porter, and who to-day,

leaning voluptuously on the _Moniteur_, has only to sign a decree to

take a million. To make themselves perfectly happy, to be able to devour

the finances of the State, to live at the expense of the Treasury like a

son of the family, this is what is called their policy. Their ambition

has a true name, it is gluttony.

They ambitious? Nonsense! They are gluttons. To govern is to gamble.

This does not prevent betrayal. On the contrary, they spy upon each

other, they betray each other. The little traitors betray the great

traitors. Pietri looks askance at Maupas, and Maupas at Carlier. They

all lie in the same reeking sewer! They have achieved the _coup d'état_

in common. That is all. Moreover they feel sure of nothing, neither of

glances, nor of smiles, nor of hidden thoughts, nor of men, nor of

women, nor of the lacquey, nor of the prince, nor of words of honor, nor

of birth certificates. Each feels himself fraudulent, and knows himself

suspected. Each has his secret aims. Each alone knows why he has done

this. Not one utters a word about his crime, and no one bears the name

of his father. Ah! may God grant me life, and may Jesus pardon me, I

will raise a gibbet a hundred yards high, I will take hammer and nails,

and I will crucify this Beauharnais called Bonaparte, between this Leroy

called Saint-Arnoud, and this Fialin called Persigny!

And I would drag you there also, all of you accomplices! This Morny,

this Romieu, this Fould, the Jew senator, this Delangle, who bears on

his back this placard: JUSTICE! and this Troplong, this judicial

glorifier of the violation of the laws, this lawyer apologist of the

_coup d'état_, this magistrate flatterer of perjury, this judge

panegyrist of murder, who will go down to posterity with a sponge filled

with mud and with blood in his hand.

I begin the battle therefore. With whom? With the present ruler of

Europe. It is right that this spectacle should be given to the world.

Louis Bonaparte is the success, is the intoxicated triumph, is the gay

and ferocious despotism, opening out under the victory, he is the mad

fulness of power, seeking limits and finding none, neither in things nor

in men; Louis Bonaparte holds France, _Urbem Roman habit_; and whoever

holds France holds the world; he is master of the votes, master of the

consciences, master of the people; he nominates his successor, reigns

forever over future electoral scrutinies, disposes of eternity, and

places futurity in an envelope; his Senate, his Legislative Body, his

Council of State, with heads lowered and mingled confusedly behind him,

lick his feet; he drags along in a leash the bishops and cardinals; he

tramples on the justice which curses him, and on the judges who adore

him, thirty correspondents inform the Continent that he has frowned, and

every electric telegraph vibrates if he raises his little finger; around

him is heard the rustling of sabres, and the drums beat the salute; he

sits under the shadow of the eagle in the midst of bayonets and of

citadels, the free nations tremble and hide their liberties for fear

that he should steal them, the great American Republic herself falters

in his presence, and dares not withdraw her Ambassador from him; the

kings, surrounded by their armies, look at him smilingly, with their

hearts full of fear. Where will he begin? With Belgium? With

Switzerland? With Piedmont? Europe expects to be overrun. He is capable

of all, and he dreams of all.

Well, then! Before this master, this triumpher, this conqueror, this

dictator, this Emperor, this all-powerful, there rises a solitary man, a

wanderer, despoiled, ruined, prostrate, proscribed, and attacks him.

Louis Napoleon has ten thousand cannons, and five hundred thousand

soldiers; the writer has his pen and his ink-stand. The writer is

nothing, he is a grain of dust, he is a shadow, he is an exile without a

refuge, he is a vagrant without a passport, but he has by his side and

fighting with him two powers, Right, which is invincible, and Truth,

which is immortal.

Assuredly, for this struggle to the death, for this formidable duel,

Providence could have chosen a more illustrious champion, a grander

athlete. But what matter men, there, where it is the idea with combats!

Such as it is, it is good, let us repeat, that this spectacle should be

given to the world. What is this in truth? It is intellect, an atom

which resists strength--a colossus.

I have only one stone in my sling, but that stone is a good one; that

stone is justice.

I attack Louis Bonaparte at this hour, when he is erect; at this hour,

when he is master. He is in his zenith. So much the better; it is that

which suits me.

Yes, I attack Louis Bonaparte. I attack him before the world; I attack

him in the presence of God and men; I attack him resolutely,

desperately; for the love of the people and of France. He is about to be

Emperor, let it be so. Let there be at least one brow which resists. Let

Louis Bonaparte know that an Empire may be taken, but that a Conscience

cannot be taken.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE INFALLIBLE BENEDICTION

The Pope approved.

When the mails brought to Rome intelligence of the event of the 2d of

December, the Pope went to a review held by General Gémeau, and begged

him to congratulate Prince Louis Napoléon for him.

There was a precedent for this.

On the 12th December, 1572, Saint-Goard, Ambassador of Charles the

Ninth, King of France, to Philip the Second, King of Spain, wrote from

Madrid to his master, Charles the Ninth, "The news of the events of the

day of Saint Bartholomew have reached the Catholic King. Contrary to his

wont and custom, he has shown so much joy, that he has manifested it

more openly than he has ever done for all the happy events and good

fortune which have previously befallen him. So that I went to him on

Sunday morning at Saint Hieronimus, and having approached him, he burst

out laughing, and with every demonstration of extreme pleasure and

contentment, began to praise your Majesty."[36]

The hand of Pius IX. remained extended over France, when it had become

the Empire.

Then, under the shadow of this benediction, began an era of prosperity.

[36] "Archives of the house of Orange," page 125, Supplement.

CONCLUSION--THE FALL.

CHAPTER I.

I was coming back from my fourth exile--an exile in Belgium, a small

matter. It was one of the last days of September, 1871. I was

re-entering France by the Luxembourg frontier. I had fallen asleep in

the carriage. Suddenly the jolt of the train coming to a standstill

awoke me. I opened my eyes.

The train had stopped in the middle of a charming landscape.

I was in the half-consciousness of an interrupted sleep; and ideas, as

yet half-dreams, hazy and diffuse, hovered between myself and reality. I

experienced the undefinable and confused sensation of awakening.

A river flowed by the side of the railway, clear, around a bright and

verdant island. This vegetation was so thick that the moor-hens, on

reaching it, plunged beneath it and disappeared. The river wound through

a valley, which appeared like a huge garden. Apple-trees were there,

which reminded one of Eve, and willows, which made one think of Galatea.

It was, as I have said, in one of those equinoctial months when may be

felt the peculiar charm of a season drawing to a close. If it be winter

which is passing away, you hear the song of approaching spring; if it be

summer which is vanishing, you see glimmering on the horizon the

undefinable smile of autumn. The wind lulled and harmonized all those

pleasant sounds which compose the murmur of the fields; the tinkling of

the sheep-bells seemed to soothe the humming of the bees; the last

butterflies met together with the first grapes; this hour of the year

mingles the joy of being still alive with the unconscious melancholy of

fast approaching death; the sweetness of the sun was indescribable.

Fertile fields streaked with furrows, honest peasants' cottages; under

the trees a turf covered with shade, the lowing of cattle as in Virgil,

and the smoke of hamlets penetrated by rays of sunshine; such was the

complete picture. The clanging of anvils rang in the distance, the

rhythm of work amidst the harmony of nature. I listened, I mused

vaguely. The valley was beautiful and quiet, the blue heavens seemed as

though resting upon a lovely circle of hills; in the distance were the

voices of birds, and close to me the voices of children, like two songs

of angels mingled together; the universal purity enshrouded me: all this

grace and all this grandeur shed a golden dawn into my soul....

Suddenly a fellow-traveller asked,--

"What place is this?"

Another answered,--

"Sedan."

I shuddered.

This paradise was a tomb.

I looked around. The valley was circular and hollow, like the bottom of

a crater; the winding river resembled a serpent; the high hills, ranged

one behind the other, surrounded this mysterious spot like a triple line

of inexorable walls; once there, there is no means of exit. It reminded

me of the amphitheatres. An indescribable disquieting vegetation which

seemed to be an extension of the Black Forest, overran all the heights,

and lost itself in the horizon like a huge impenetrable snare; the sun

shone, the birds sang, carters passed by whistling; sheep, lambs, and

pigeons were scattered about, leaves quivered and rustled; the grass, a

densely thick grass, was full of flowers. It was appalling.

I seemed to see waving over this valley the flashing of the avenging

angel's sword.

This word "Sedan" had been like a veil abruptly torn aside. The

landscape had become suddenly filled with tragedy. Those shapeless eyes

which the bark of trees delineates on the trunks were gazing--at what?

At something terrible and lost to view.

In truth, that was the place! And at the moment when I was passing by

thirteen months all but a few days had elapsed. That was the place where

the monstrous enterprise of the 2d of December had burst asunder. A

fearful shipwreck.

The gloomy pathways of Fate cannot be studied without profound anguish

of the heart.

CHAPTER II.

On the 31st of August, 1870, an army was reassembled, and was, as it

were, massed together under the walls of Sedan, in a place called the

Givonne Valley. This army was a French army--twenty-nine brigades,

fifteen divisions, four army corps--90,000 men. This army was in this

place without any one being able to divine the reason; without order,

without an object, scattered about--a species of heap of men thrown down

there as though with the view of being seized by some huge hand.

This army either did not entertain, or appeared not to entertain, for

the moment any immediate uneasiness. They knew, or at least they thought

they knew, that the enemy was a long way off. On calculating the stages

at four leagues daily, it was three days' march distant. Nevertheless,

towards evening the leaders took some wise strategic precautions; they

protected the army, which rested in the rear on Sedan and the Meuse, by

two battle fronts, one composed of the 7th Corps, and extending from

Floing to Givonne, the other composed of the 12th Corps, extending from

Givonne to Bazeilles; a triangle of which the Meuse formed the

hypothenuse. The 12th Corps, formed of the three divisions of

Lacretelle, Lartigue, and Wolf, ranged on the right, with the artillery,

between the brigades formed a veritable barrier, having Bazeilles and

Givonne at each end, and Daigny in its centre; the two divisions of

Petit and Lhéritier massed in the rear upon two lines supported this

barrier. General Lebrun commanded the 12th Corps. The 7th Corps,

commanded by General Douay, only possessed two divisions--Dumont's

division and Gilbert's division--and formed the other battle front,

covering the army of Givonne to Floing on the side of Illy; this battle

front was comparatively weak, too open on the side of Givonne, and only

protected on the side of the Meuse by the two cavalry divisions of

Margueritte and Bonnemains, and by Guyomar's brigade, resting in squares

upon Floing. Within this triangle were encamped the 5th Corps, commanded

by General Wimpfen, and the 1st Corps, commanded by General Ducrot.

Michel's cavalry division covered the 1st Corps on the side of Daigny;

the 5th supported itself upon Sedan. Four divisions, each disposed upon

two lines--the divisions of Lhéritier, Grandchamp, Goze, and

Conseil-Duménil--formed a sort of horseshoe, turned towards Sedan, and

uniting the first battle front with the second. The cavalry division of

Ameil and the brigade of Fontanges served as a reserve for these four

divisions. The whole of the artillery was upon the two battle fronts.

Two portions of the army were in confusion, one to the right of Sedan

beyond Balan, the other to the left of Sedan, on this side of Iges.

Beyond Balan were the divisions of Vassoigne and the brigade of Reboul,

on this side of Iges were the two cavalry divisions of Margueritte and

Bonnemains.

These arrangements indicated a profound feeling of security. In the

first place the Emperor Napoleon III. would not have come there if he

had not been perfectly tranquil. This Givonne Valley is what Napoleon I.

called a "washhand basin." There could not be a more complete enclosure.

An army is so much at home there that it is too much so; it runs the

risk of no longer being able to get out. This disquieted some brave and

prudent leaders such as Wimpfen, but they were not listened to. If

absolutely necessary, said the people of the Imperial circle, they could

always be sure of being able to reach Mézières, and at the worst the

Belgian frontier. Was it, however, needful to provide for such extreme

eventualities? In certain cases foresight is almost an offence. They

were all of one mind, therefore, to be at their ease.

If they had been uneasy they would have cut the bridges of the Meuse;

but they did not even think of it. To what purpose? The enemy was a long

way off. The Emperor, who evidently was well informed, affirmed it.

The army bivouacked somewhat in confusion, as we have said, and slept

peaceably throughout this night of August 31, having, whatever might

happen, or believing that they had, the retreat upon Mézières open

behind it. They disdained to take the most ordinary precautions, they

made no cavalry reconnaissances, they did not even place outposts. A

German military writer has stated this.[37] Fourteen leagues at least

separated them from the German army, three days' march; they did not

exactly know where it was; they believed it scattered, possessing little

unity, badly informed, led somewhat at random upon several points at

once, incapable of a movement converging upon one single point, like

Sedan; they believed that the Crown Prince of Saxony was marching on

Chalons, and that the Crown Prince of Prussia was marching on Metz; they

were ignorant of everything appertaining to this army, its leaders, its

plan, its armament, its effective force. Was it still following the

strategy of Gustavus Adolphus? Was it still following the tactics of

Frederick II.? No one knew. They felt sure of being at Berlin in a few

weeks. What nonsense! The Prussian army! They talked of this war as of a

dream, and of this army as of a phantom.

During this very night, while the French army was sleeping, this is what

was taking place.

[37] M. Harwik.

CHAPTER III.

At a quarter to two in the morning, at his headquarters at Mouzon,

Albert, Crown Prince of Saxony, set the Army of the Meuse in motion; the

Royal Guard were beat to arms, and two divisions marched, one upon

Villers-Cernay, by Escambre and Fouru-aux-Bois, the other upon

Francheval by Suchy and Fouru-Saint-Remy. The Artillery of the Guard

followed.

At the same moment the 12th Saxon Corps was beaten to arms, and by the

high road to the south of Douzy reached Lamécourt, and marched upon La

Moncelle; the 1st Bavarian Corps marched upon Bazeilles, supported at

Reuilly-sur-Meuse by an Artillery Division of the 4th Corps. The other

division of the 4th Corps crossed the Meuse at Mouzon, and massed itself

in reserve at Mairy, upon the right bank. These three columns maintained

close communication with each other. The order was given to the advanced

guards to begin no offensive movement before five o'clock, and silently

to occupy Fouru-aux-Bois, Fouru-Saint-Remy, and Douay. They had left

their knapsacks behind them. The baggage-wagons did not stir. The Crown

Prince of Saxony was on horseback on the heights of Amblimont.

At the same time, at his headquarters at Chémery, Blumenthal was having

a bridge built over the Meuse by the Wurtemburg division. The 11th

Corps, astir before daylight, crossed the Meuse at Dom-le-Mesnil and at

Donchery, and reached Vrigne-sur-Bois. The artillery followed, and held

the road from Vrigne to Sedan. The Wurtemburg division kept the bridge

which it had built, and held the road from Sedan to Mézières. At five

o'clock, the 2d Bavarian Corps, with the artillery at its head, detached

one of its divisions, and sent it by Bulson upon Frénois; the other

division passed by Noyers, and drew up before Sedan, between Frénois and

Wadelincourt. The artillery of the Reserve was drawn up on the heights

of the left bank, opposite Donchery.

At the same time the 6th Cavalry Division was sent from Mazeray, and

passing by Boutancourt and Bolzicourt, reached the Meuse at Flize; the

2d Cavalry Division quitted its encampment, and took up its position to

the south of Boutancourt; the 4th Cavalry Division took up its position

to the south of Frénois; the 1st Bavarian Corps installed itself at

Remilly; the 5th Cavalry Division and the 6th Corps were posted to

observe, and all in line, and order, massed upon the heights waited for

the dawn to appear. The Crown Prince of Prussia was on horseback on the

hill of Frénois.

At the same moment, upon every point of the horizon, other and similar

movements were taking place from every side. The high hills were

suddenly overrun by an immense black army. Not one shout of command. Two

hundred and fifty thousand men came silently to encircle the Givonne

Valley.

This is what the circle consisted of,--

The Bavarians, the right wing, at Bazeilles on the Meuse; next to the

Bavarians the Saxons, at La Moncelle and Daigny; opposite Givonne, the

Royal Guard; the 5th Corps at Saint Menges; the 2d at Flaigneux; the

Wurtemburgers at the bend of the Meuse, between Saint Menges and

Donchery; Count Stolberg and his cavalry at Donchery; in front, towards

Sedan, the 2d Bavarian Army.

All this was carried out in a ghostly manner, in order, without a

whisper, without a sound, through forests, ravines, and valleys. A

tortuous and ill-omened march. A stealthy gliding onwards of reptiles.

Scarcely could a murmur be heard beneath the thick foliage. The silent

battle swarmed in the darkness awaiting the day.

The French army was sleeping.

Suddenly it awoke.

It was a prisoner.

The sun rose, brilliant on the side of God--terrible on the side of man.

CHAPTER IV.

Let us review the situation.

The Germans have numbers on their side; they are three against one,

perhaps four; they own to 250,000 men, and it is certain that their

attacking front extended for 30 kilomètres; they have on their side the

positions, they crown the heights, they fill the forests, they are

covered by all these escarpments, they are masked by all this shade;

they possess an incomparable artillery. The French army is in a valley,

almost without artillery and without supplies, utterly naked beneath

their hail of lead. The Germans have on their side the ambuscade, and

the French have only on their side heroism. Death is glorious, but

surprise is profitable.

A surprise, that is the true description of this brilliant exploit.

Is it fair warfare? Yes. But if this is fair, what is unfair warfare? It

is the same thing.

This said, the story of the Battle of Sedan has been told.

I should have wished to stop there. But I cannot. Whatever horror the

historian may feel, History is a duty, and this duty must be fulfilled.

There is no incline more inexorable than this: to tell the truth; he who

ventures on it rolls to the very bottom. It must be so. The guardian of

Justice is doomed to justice.

The Battle of Sedan is more than a battle which has been fought; it is a

syllogism which is completed; a formidable premeditation of destiny.

Destiny never hurries, but it always comes. At its hour, there it is. It

allows years to pass by, and at the moment when men are least thinking

of it, it appears. Of this character is the fatal, the unexpected

catastrophe named Sedan. From time to time in History, Divine logic

makes an onslaught. Sedan is one of those onslaughts.

Thus on the 1st of September, at five o'clock in the morning the world

awoke under the sun, and the French army under the thunderbolt.

CHAPTER V.

Bazeilles takes fire, Givonne takes fire, Floing takes fire; the battle

begins with a furnace. The whole horizon is aflame. The French camp is

in this crater, stupefied, affrighted, starting up from sleeping,--a

funereal swarming. A circle of thunder surrounds the army. They are

encircled by annihilation. This mighty slaughter is carried on on all

sides simultaneously. The French resist, and they are terrible, having

nothing left but despair. Our cannon, almost all old-fashioned and of

short range, are at once dismounted by the fearful and exact aim of the

Prussians. The density of the rain of shells upon the valley is so

great, that "the earth is completely furrowed," says an eye-witness, "as

though by a rake." How many cannon? Eleven hundred at least. Twelve

German batteries upon La Moncelle alone; the 3d and 4th _Abtheilung_, an

awe-striking artillery, upon the crests of Givonne, with the 2d horse

battery in reserve; opposite Doigny ten Saxon and two Wurtemburg

batteries; the curtain of trees of the wood to the north of

Villers-Cernay masks the mounted _Abtheilung_, which is there with the

3d Heavy Artillery in reserve, and from this gloomy copse issues a

formidable fire; the twenty-four pieces of the 1st Heavy Artillery are

ranged in the glade skirting the road from La Moncelle to La Chapelle;

the battery of the Royal Guard sets fire to the Garenne Wood; the shells

and the balls riddle Suchy, Francheval, Fouru-Saint-Remy, and the valley

between Heibes and Givonne; and the third and fourth rank of cannon

extend without break of continuity as far as the Calvary of Illy, the

extreme point of the horizon. The German soldiers, seated or lying

before the batteries, watch the artillery at work. The French soldiers

fall and die. Amongst the bodies which cover the plain there is one, the

body of an officers on which they will find, after the battle, a sealed

note, containing this order, signed NAPOLEON: "To-day, September 1st,

rest for the whole army."

The gallant 35th of the Line almost completely disappears under the

overwhelming shower of shells; the brave Marine Infantry holds at bay

for a moment the Saxons, joined by the Bavarians, but outflanked on

every side, draws back; all the admirable cavalry of the Targueritte

Division hurled against the German infantry, halts and sinks down

midway, "annihilated," says the Prussian Report, "by well-aimed and cool

firing."[38] This field of carnage has three outlets; all three barred:

the Bouillon road by the Prussian Guard, the Carignan road by the

Bavarians, the Mézières road by the Wurtemburgers. The French have not

thought of barricading the railway viaduct; three German battalions have

occupied it during the night. Two isolated houses on the Balan road

could be made the pivot of a long resistance; but the Germans are there.

The wood from Monvilliers to Bazeilles, bushy and dense, might prevent

the junction of the Saxons, masters of La Moncelle, and the Bavarians,

masters of Bazeilles; but the French have been forestalled: they find

the Bavarians cutting the underwood with their bill-hooks. The German

army moves in one piece, in one absolute unity; the Crown Prince of

Saxony is on the height of Mairy, whence he surveys the whole action;

the command oscillates in the French army; at the beginning of the

battle, at a quarter to six, MacMahon is wounded by the bursting of a

shell; at seven o'clock Ducrot replaces him; at ten o'clock Wimpfen

replaces Ducrot. Every instant the wall of fire is drawing closer in,

the roll of the thunder is continuous, a dismal pulverization of 90,000

men! Never before has anything equal to this been seen; never before has

an army been overwhelmed beneath such a downpour of lead and iron! At

one o'clock all is lost. The regiments fly helter-skelter into Sedan.

But Sedan begins to burn; Dijonval burns, the ambulances burn, there is

nothing now possible but to cut their way out. Wimpfen, brave and

resolute, proposes this to the Emperor. The 3d Zouaves, desperate, have

set the example. Cut off from the rest of the army, they have forced a

passage, and have reached Belgium. A flight of lions!

Suddenly, above the disaster, above the huge pile of dead and dying,

above all this unfortunate heroism, appears disgrace. The white flag is

hoisted.

Turenne and Vauban were both present, one in his statue, the other in

his citadel.

The statue and the citadel witnessed the awe-striking capitulation.

These two virgins, one of bronze, the other of granite, felt themselves

prostituted. O noble face of our country! Oh, eternal blushes!

[38] The Franco-German War of 1870-71. Report of the Prussian Staff,

page 1087.

CHAPTER VI.

This disaster of Sedan was easy of avoidance by any other man, but

impossible of avoidance for Louis Bonaparte. He avoided it so little

that he sought it. _Lex fati_.

Our army seemed expressly arranged for the catastrophe. The soldier was

uneasy, ignorant of his whereabouts, famished. On the 31st of August, in

the streets of Sedan, soldiers were seeking their regiments, and going

from door to door asking for bread. We have seen the Emperor's order

announcing the next day, September 1st, as a day of rest. In truth the

army was worn out with fatigue. And yet it had only marched by short

stages. The soldier was almost losing the habit of marching. One corps,

the 1st, for example, only accomplished two leagues per day (on the 29th

of August from Stonne to Raucourt).

During that time the German army, inexorably commanded and driven at the

stick's end like the army of the Xerxes, achieved marches of fourteen

leagues in fifteen hours, which enabled it to arrive unexpectedly, and

to surround the French army while asleep. It was customary to allow

oneself to be surprised. General Failly allowed himself to be surprised

at Beaumont; during the day the soldiers took their guns to pieces to

clean them, at night they slept, without even cutting the bridges which

delivered them to the enemy; thus they neglected to blow up the bridges

of Mouzon and Bazeilles. On September 1st, daylight had not yet

appeared, when an advance guard of seven battalions, commanded by

General Schultz, captured La Rulle, and insured the junction of the army

of the Meuse with the Royal Guard. Almost at the same minute, with

German precision, the Wurtemburgers seized the bridge of La Platinerie,

and hidden by the Chevalier Wood, the Saxon battalions, spread out into

company columns, occupied the whole of the road from La Moncelle to

Villers-Cernay.

Thus, as we have seen, the awakening of the French Army was horrible. At

Bazeilles a fog was added to the smoke. Our soldiers, attacked in this

gloom, knew not what death required of them; they fought from room to

room and from house to house.[39]

It was in vain that the Reboul brigade came to support the Martin des

Pallières brigade; they were obliged to yield. At the same time Ducrot

was compelled to concentrate his forces in the Garenne Wood, before the

Calvary of Illy; Douay, shattered, fell back; Lebrun alone stood firm on

the plateau of Stenay. Our troops occupied a line of five kilomètres;

the front of the French army faced the east, the left faced the north,

the extreme left (the Guyomar brigade) faced the west; but they did not

know whether they faced the enemy, they did not see him; annihilation

struck without showing itself; they had to deal with a masked Medusa.

Our cavalry was excellent, but useless. The field of battle, obstructed

by a large wood, cut up by clumps of trees, by houses and by farms and

by enclosure walls, was excellent for artillery and infantry, but bad

for cavalry. The rivulet of Givonne, which flows at the bottom of the

valley and crosses it, for three days ran with more blood than water.

Among other places of carnage, Saint-Menges was appalling. For a moment

it appeared possible to cut a way out by Carignan towards Montmédy, and

then this outlet reclosed. This refuge only remained, Sedan; Sedan

encumbered with carts, with wagons, with carriages, with hospital huts;

a heap of combustible matter. This dying agony of heroes lasted ten

hours. They refused to surrender, they grew indignant, they wished to

complete their death, so bravely begun. They were delivered up to it.

As we have said, three men, three dauntless soldiers, had succeeded each

other in the command, MacMahon, Ducrot, Wimpfen; MacMahon had only time

to be wounded, Ducrot had only time to commit a blunder, Wimpfen had

only time to conceive an heroic idea, and he conceived it; but MacMahon

is not responsible for his wound, Ducrot is not responsible for his

blunder, and Wimpfen is not responsible for the impossibility of his

suggestion to cut their way out. The shell which struck MacMahon

withdrew him from the catastrophe; Ducrot's blunder, the inopportune

order to retreat given to General Lebrun, is explained by the confused

horror of the situation, and is rather an error than a fault. Wimpfen,

desperate, needed 20,000 soldiers to cut his way out, and could only get

together 2000. History exculpates these three men; in this disaster of

Sedan there was but one sole and fatal general, the Emperor. That which

was knitted together on the 2d December, 1851, came apart on the 2d

September, 1870; the carnage on the Boulevard Montmartre, and the

capitulation of Sedan are, we maintain, the two parts of a syllogism;

logic and justice have the same balance; it was Louis Bonaparte's dismal

destiny to begin with the black flag of massacres and to end with the

white flag of disgrace.

[39] "The French were literally awakened from sleep by our attack."

--Helvic.

CHAPTER VII.

There was no alternative between death and opprobrium; either soul or

sword must be surrendered. Louis Bonaparte surrendered his sword.

He wrote to William:

"SIRE, MY BROTHER,

"Not having been able to die in the midst of my troops, it only

remains for me to place my sword in your Majesty's hands.

"I am, your Majesty,

"Your good Brother,

"NAPOLEON.

"Sedan, 1st September, 1870."

William answered, "Sire, my Brother, I accept your sword."

And on the 2d of September, at six o'clock in the morning, this plain,

streaming with blood, and covered with dead, saw pass by a gilded open

carriage and four, the horses harnessed after Daumont fashion, and in

this carriage a man, cigarette in mouth. It was the Emperor of the

French going to surrender his sword to the King of Prussia.

The King kept the Emperor waiting. It was too early. He sent M. de

Bismarck to Louis Bonaparte to say that he "would not" receive him yet

awhile. Louis Bonaparte entered into a hovel by the side of the road. A

table and two chairs were there. Bismarck and he leant their arms on the

table and conversed. A mournful conversation. At the hour which suited

the King, towards noon, the Emperor got back into his carriage, and went

to the castle of Bellevue, half way to the castle of Vandresse. There he

waited until the King came. At one o'clock William arrived from

Vandresse, and consented to receive Bonaparte. He received him badly.

Attila has not a light hand. The King, a blunt, straightforward man,

showed the Emperor a pity involuntarily cruel. There are pities which

overwhelm. The conqueror upbraided the conquered with the victory.

Bluntness handles an open wound badly. "Whatever was your reason for

declaring this war?" The conquered excused himself, accusing France. The

distant hurrahs of the victorious German army cut short this dialogue.

The King caused the Emperor to be reconducted by a detachment of the

Royal Guard. This excess of ignominy is called "an escort of honor."

After the sword the Army.

On the 3d of September, Louis Bonaparte handed over to Germany 88,000

French soldiers.

"In addition" (says the Prussian report):--

"One eagle and two flags.

"419 field-guns and mitrailleuses.

"139 heavy pieces.

"1079 vehicles of all kinds.

"60,000 muskets.

"6000 horses, still good for service."

These German figures are not wholly to be depended upon. According to

what seems useful at the moment, the Aulic chancellors swell or reduce

the disaster. There were about 13,000 wounded amongst the prisoners. The

numbers vary in the official documents. A Prussian report, reckoning up

the French soldiers killed and wounded in the battle of Sedan, publishes

this total: _Sixteen thousand four hundred_ men. This number causes a

shudder. For it is that very number, _Sixteen thousand four hundred_

men, which Saint Arnaud had set to work on the Boulevard Montmartre upon

the 4th of December, 1851.

Half a league to the north-west of Sedan, near Iges, the bend of the

Meuse almost forms an island. A canal crosses the isthmus, so that the

peninsula becomes an island. It was there that there were penned, under

the stick of the Prussian corporals, 83,000 French soldiers. A few

sentinels watched over this army.

They placed but few, insolently. These conquered men remained there ten

days, the wounded almost without care, the able-bodied almost without

nourishment. The German army sneered around them. The heavens took part

against them. The weather was fearful. Neither huts nor tents. Not a

fire, not a truss of straw. For ten days and ten nights these 83,000

prisoners bivouacked with their heads beneath the rain, their feet in

the mud. Many died of fever, regretting the hail of bullets.

At length ox-wagons came and took them away.

The King placed the Emperor in some place or other. Wilhelmshöhe.

What a thing of rags and tatters, an Emperor "drawn" like a fowl!

CHAPTER VIII.

I was there, thoughtful. I looked on these fields, these ravines, these

hills, shuddering. I would willingly have insulted this terrible place.

But sacred horror held me back.

The station-master of Sedan came to my carriage, and explained to me

what I had before my eyes. I seemed to see, through his words, the pale

lightnings of the battle. All these distant cottages, scattered about

and charming in the sun, had been burnt; they were rebuilt; Nature, so

quickly diverted, had repaired everything, had cleaned everything, had

swept everything, had replaced everything. The ferocious convulsion of

men had vanished, eternal order had resumed its sway. But, as I have

said, the sun was there in vain, all this valley was smoke and darkness.

In the distance, upon an eminence to my left, I saw a huge castle; it

was Vandresse. There lodged the King of Prussia. Halfway up this height,

along the road, I distinguished above the trees three pointed gables; it

was another castle, Bellevue; there Louis Bonaparte surrendered to

William; there he had given and delivered up our army; it was there

that, not being immediately admitted, and requested to exercise a little

patience, he had remained for nearly an hour silent and wan before the

door, bringing his disgrace, and waiting until it should please William

to open the door to him; it was there that before receiving it the King

of Prussia had made the sword of France dangle about in an ante-chamber.

Lower down, nearer, in the valley, at the beginning of a road leading to

Vandresse, they pointed out to me a species of hovel. There they told

me, while waiting for the King of Prussia, the Emperor Napoleon III. had

got down, livid; he had gone into a little courtyard, which they pointed

out to me, and where a dog growled on the chain; he had seated himself

on a stone close by a dunghill, and he had said, "I am thirsty." A

Prussian soldier had brought him a glass of water.

Terrible end of the _coup d'état_! Blood when it is drunk does not

quench the thirst. An hour was to come when the unhappy one should utter

the cry of fever and of agony. Disgrace reserved for him this thirst,

and Prussia this glass of water.

Fearful dregs of Destiny.

Beyond the road, at a few steps from me, five trembling and pale poplars

sheltered the front of the house, the single story of which was

surmounted by a sign. On this sign was written in great letters this

name: DROUET. I became haggard. _Drouet_ I read _Varennes_. Tragical

Chance, which mingled Varennes with Sedan, seemed to wish to bring the

two catastrophes face to face, and to couple in a manner with the same

chain the Emperor a prisoner of the foreigner, to the King a prisoner of

his people.

The mist of reverie veiled this plain from me. The Meuse appeared to me

to wear a ruddy reflection, the neighboring isle, whose verdure I had

admired, had for its subsoil a tomb: Fifteen hundred horses, and as many

men, were buried there: thence the thick grass. Here and there, as far

as could be seen, mounds, covered with ill-favored vegetation, dotted

the valley; each of these patches of vegetation marked the place of a

buried regiment. There Guyomar's Brigade had been annihilated; there,

the Lhéritier Division had been exterminated; here the 7th Corps had

perished; there, without having even reached the enemy's infantry, had

fallen "beneath the cool and well-aimed firing," as the Prussian report

states, the whole of General Margueritte's cavalry. From these two

heights, the most elevated of this circle of hills, Daigny, opposite

Givonne, which is 266 mètres high, Fleigneux, opposite Illy, 296 mètres

high, the batteries of the Prussian Royal Guard had crushed the French

Army. It was done from above, with the terrible authority of Destiny. It

seemed as though they had come there purposely, these to kill, the

others to die. A valley for a mortar, the German Army for a pestle, such

is the battle of Sedan. I gazed, powerless to avert my eyes, at this

field of disaster, at this undulating country which had proved no

protection to our regiments, at this ravine where all our cavalry were

demolished, at all this amphitheatre where the catastrophe was spread

out, at the gloomy escarpments of La Marphée, at these thickets, at

these declivities, at these precipices, at these forests filled with

ambushes, and in this terrible shadow, O Thou the Invisible! I saw Thee.

CHAPTER IX.

Never was there a more dismal fall.

No expiation can be compared with this. The unprecedented drama was in

five acts, so fierce that Aeschylus himself would not have dared to

dream of them. "The Ambush!" "The Struggle!" "The Massacre!" "The

Victory!" "The Fall!" What a tangle and what an unwinding! A poet who

would have predicted it would have seemed a traitor. God alone could

permit Himself Sedan.

Everything in proportion, such is His law. Far worse than Brumaire, it

needed a more crushing retribution than Waterloo.

The first Napoleon, as we have said elsewhere,[40] had faced his

destiny; he had not been dishonored by his punishment, he fell while

steadfastly regarding God. He came back to Paris, appraising the deserts

of those men who overthrew him, proudly distinguishing amongst them,

esteeming Lafayette and despising Dupin. He had at the last moment

wished to see clearly into his destiny, he had not allowed his eyes to

be bandaged; he had accepted the catastrophe while making his conditions

with it. Here there is nothing of the kind. One might almost say that

the traitor is struck treacherously. In this case there is a bad man who

feels himself in the grasp of Destiny, and who does not know what it is

doing to him. He was at the summit of his power, the blind master of an

idiot world. He had wished for a _plebiscitum_, he had had one. He had

at his feet this very William. It was at this moment that his crime

suddenly seized him. He did not struggle against it; he was the

condemned man who obeys his sentence. He submitted to everything which

terrible Fate exacted from him. Never was there a more docile patient.

He had no army, he made war; he had only Rouher, he provoked Bismarck;

he had only Leboeuf, he attacked Moltke. He confided Strasburg to

Uhrich; he gave Metz to Bazaine to guard. He had 120,000 men at Châlons;

he had it in his power to cover Paris. He felt that his crime rose up

there, threatening and erect; he fled, not daring to face Paris. He

himself led--purposely, and yet despite himself; willing and yet

unwilling, knowingly and yet unknowingly, a miserable mind, a prey to

the abyss--he led his army into a place of annihilation; he made that

terrible choice, a battle-field without an outlet; he was no longer

conscious of anything, no more of his blunder of to-day than of his

crime of former days; he must finish, but he could only finish as a

fugitive; this condemned one was not worthy to look his end in the face;

he lowered his head, he turned his back. God executed him in degrading

him. Napoleon III. as an Emperor had a right to thunder, but for this

man the thunder was ignominious--he was thunderstruck in the back.

[40] "L'Année Terrible."

CHAPTER X.

Let us forget this man, and let us look at Humanity.

The invasion of France by Germany, in 1870, was a night effect. The

world was astonished that so much gloom could come forth from a people.

Five black months--such was the siege of Paris. To create night may

prove Power, but Glory consists in the creation of daylight. France

creates daylight. Thence her immense human popularity. To her

Civilization owes the dawn. The human mind in order to see clearly turns

in the direction of France. Five months of darkness, that is what, in

1870, Germany succeeded in giving to the Nations; France has given to

them four centuries of light.

To-day the civilized world more than ever feels the need which it has of

France. France has proved this by her danger. The ungrateful apathy of

Governments only increased the anxiety of nations. At the sight of Paris

threatened, there arose among the peoples dread that their own heads

were in danger. Would they allow Germany to go on? But France saved

herself quite alone. She had only to rise. _Patuit dea_.

To-day she is greater than ever. What would have killed another nation

has hardly wounded her. The darkening of her horizon has rendered her

light more visible. What she has lost in territory she has gained in

radiancy. Moreover, she is fraternal without an effort. Above her

misfortune there is her smile. It is not on her that the Gothic Empire

weighs. She is a nation of citizens and not a flock of subjects.

Frontiers? Will there be any frontiers in twenty years? Victories?

France counts in her past victories of war, and in her future victories

of peace. The future belongs to Voltaire, and not to Krupp; the future

belongs to the book, and not to the sword. The future belongs to life,

and not to death. There is in the policy opposed to France a certain

amount of the tomb; to seek life in the old institutions is a vain task,

and to feed upon the past is to bite the dust. France has the faculty of

giving light; no catastrophe, political or military, will deprive her of

this mysterious supremacy. The cloud passes away, the star is seen once

more.

The star possesses no anger; the dawn bears no malice. Light is

satisfied in being light. Light is everything; the human race has no

other love. France knows herself beloved because she is good, and the

greatest of all powers is to be loved. The French revolution is for all

the world. It is a battle perpetually waged for Right, and perpetually

gained for Truth. Right is the innermost part of man; Truth is the

innermost part of God. What can be done against a revolution which has

so much right on its side? Nothing. To love it. That is what the nations

do. France offers herself, the world accepts her. The whole phenomenon

lies in these few words. An invasion of armies can be resisted; an

invasion of ideas cannot be resisted. The glory of barbarians is to be

conquered by humanity; the glory of savages is to be conquered by

civilization; the glory of darkness is to be conquered by the torch.

This is why France is desired and assented to by all. This is why,

having no hatred, she has no fear; this is why she is fraternal and

maternal; this is why it is impossible to lessen her, impossible to

humiliate her, impossible to irritate her; this is why, after so many

ordeals, after so many catastrophes, after so many disasters, after so

many calamities, after so many falls, incorruptible and invulnerable she

holds out her hand to all the peoples from above.

When our glance rests on this old continent, stirred to-day by a new

breath, certain phenomena appear, and we seem to gain a glimpse of that

august and mysterious problem, the formation of the future. It may be

said, that in the same manner as light is compounded of seven colors,

civilization is compounded of seven peoples. Of these peoples, three,

Greece, Italy, and Spain, represent the South; three, England, Germany,

and Russia, represent the north; the seventh, or the first, France, is

at the same time North and South, Celtic and Latin, Gothic and Greek.

This country owes to its heaven this sublime good fortune, the crossing

of two rays of light; the crossing of two rays of light is as though we

were to say the joining of two hands, that is to say Peace. Such is the

privilege of this France, she is at the same time solar and starry. In

her heaven she possesses as much dawn as the East, and as many stars as

the North. Sometimes her glimmer rises in the twilight, but it is in the

black night of revolutions and of wars that her resplendence blazes

forth, and her aurorean dawn becomes the Aurora Borealis.

One day, before long, the seven nations, which combine in themselves the

whole of humanity, will join together and amalgamate like the seven

colors of the prism, in a radiant celestial arch; the marvel of Peace

will appear eternal and visible above civilization, and the world,

dazzled, will contemplate the immense rainbow of the United Peoples of

Europe.

THE END.