“Well, Michaud, what’s the news?” asked the general as soon as his wife
had left the room.
“General, if you will permit me to say so, it would be better not to
talk over matters in this room. Walls have ears, and I should like to be
certain that what we say reaches none but our own.”
“Very good,” said the general, “then let us walk towards the steward’s
lodge by the path through the fields; no one can overhear us there.”
A few moments later the general, with Michaud and Sibilet, was crossing
the meadows, while Madame de Montcornet, with the abbe and Blondet, was
on her way to the gate of the Avonne.
Michaud related the scene that had just taken place at the Grand-I-Vert.
“Vatel did wrong,” said Sibilet.
“They made that plain to him at once,” replied Michaud, “by blinding
him; but that’s nothing. General, you remember the plan we agreed
upon,--to seize the cattle of those depredators against whom judgment
was given? Well, we can’t do it. Brunet, like his colleague Plissoud, is
not loyal in his support. They both warn the delinquents when they are
about to make a seizure. Vermichel, Brunet’s assistant, went to the
Grand-I-Vert this morning, ostensibly after Pere Fourchon; and Marie
Tonsard, who is intimate with Bonnebault, ran off at once to give the
alarm at Conches. The depredations have begun again.”
“A strong show of authority is becoming daily more and more necessary,”
said Sibilet.
“What did I tell you?” cried the general. “We must demand the
enforcement of the judgment of the court, which carried with it
imprisonment; we must arrest for debt all those who do not pay the
damages I have won and the costs of the suits.”
“These fellows imagine the law is powerless, and tell each other that
you dare not arrest them,” said Sibilet. “They think they frighten you!
They have confederates at Ville-aux-Fayes; for even the prosecuting
attorney seems to have ignored the verdicts against them.”
“I think,” said Michaud, seeing that the general looked thoughtful,
“that if you are willing to spend a good deal of money you can still
protect the property.”
“It is better to spend money than to act harshly,” remarked Sibilet.
“What is your plan?” asked the general of his bailiff.
“It is very simple,” said Michaud. “Inclose the whole forest with walls,
like those of the park, and you will be safe; the slightest depredation
then becomes a criminal offence and is taken to the assizes.”
“At a franc and a half the square foot for the material only, Monsieur
le comte would find his wall would cost him a third of the whole value
of Les Aigues,” said Sibilet, with a laugh.
“Well, well,” said Montcornet, “I shall go and see the attorney-general
at once.”
“The attorney-general,” remarked Sibilet, gently, “may perhaps share the
opinion of his subordinate; for the negligence shown by the latter is
probably the result of an agreement between them.”
“Then I wish to know it!” cried Montcornet. “If I have to get the whole
of them turned out, judges, civil authorities, and the attorney-general
to boot, I’ll do it; I’ll go the Keeper of the Seals, or to the king
himself.”
At a vehement sign made by Michaud the general stopped short and said
to Sibilet, as he turned to retrace his steps, “Good day, my dear
fellow,”--words which the steward understood.
“Does Monsieur le comte intend, as mayor, to enforce the necessary
measures to repress the abuse of gleaning?” he said, respectfully.
“The harvest is coming on, and if we are to publish the statutes about
certificates of pauperism and the prevention of paupers from other
districts gleaning our land, there is no time to be lost.”
“Do it at once, and arrange with Groison,” said the count. “With such a
class of people,” he added, “we must follow out the law.”
So, without a moment’s reflection, Montcornet gave in to a measure that
Sibilet had been proposing to him for more than a fortnight, to which
he had hitherto refused to consent; but now, in the violence of anger
caused by Vatel’s mishap, he instantly adopted it as the right thing to
do.
When Sibilet was at some distance the general said in a low voice to his
bailiff:--
“Well, my dear Michaud, what is it; why did you make me that sign?”
“You have an enemy within the walls, general, yet you tell him plans
which you ought not to confide even to the secret police.”
“I share your suspicions, my dear friend,” replied Montcornet, “but I
don’t intend to commit the same fault twice over. I shall not part with
another steward till I’m sure of a better. I am waiting to get rid of
Sibilet, till you understand the business of steward well enough to
take his place, and till Vatel is fit to succeed you. And yet, I have
no ground of complaint against Sibilet. He is honest and punctual in
all his dealings; he hasn’t kept back a hundred francs in all these five
years. He has a perfectly detestable nature, and that’s all one can say
against him. If it were otherwise, what would be his plan in acting as
he does?”
“General,” said Michaud, gravely, “I will find out, for undoubtedly
he has one; and if you would only allow it, a good bribe to that old
scoundrel Fourchon will enable me to get at the truth; though after what
he said just now I suspect the old fellow of having more secrets than
one in his pouch. That swindling old cordwainer told me himself they
want to drive you from Les Aigues. And let me tell you, for you ought to
know it, that from Conches to Ville-aux-Fayes there is not a peasant, a
petty tradesman, a farmer, a tavern-keeper who isn’t laying by his money
to buy a bit of the estate. Fourchon confided to me that Tonsard has
already put in his claim. The idea that you can be forced to sell Les
Aigues has gone from end to end of the valley like an infection in the
air. It may be that the steward’s present house, with some adjoining
land, will be the price paid for Sibilet’s spying. Nothing is ever said
among us that is not immediately known at Ville-aux-Fayes. Sibilet is
a relative of your enemy Gaubertin. What you have just said about the
attorney-general and the others will probably be reported before you
have reached the Prefecture. You don’t know what the inhabitants of this
district are.”
“Don’t I know them? I know they are the scum of the earth! Do you
suppose I am going to yield to such blackguards?” cried the general.
“Good heavens, I’d rather burn Les Aigues myself!”
“No need to burn it; let us adopt a line of conduct which will baffle
the schemes of these Lilliputians. Judging by threats, general, they
are resolved on war to the knife against you; and therefore since you
mention incendiarism, let me beg of you to insure all your buildings,
and all your farmhouses.”
“Michaud, do you know whom they mean by ‘Shopman’? Yesterday, as I was
riding along by the Thune, I heard some little rascals cry out, ‘The
Shopman! here’s the Shopman!’ and then they ran away.”
“Ask Sibilet; the answer is in his line, he likes to make you
angry,” said Michaud, with a pained look. “But--if you will have an
answer--well, that’s a nickname these brigands have given you, general.”
“What does it mean?”
“It means, general--well, it refers to your father.”
“Ha! the curs!” cried the count, turning livid. “Yes, Michaud, my father
was a shopkeeper, an upholsterer; the countess doesn’t know it. Oh!
that I should ever--well! after all, I have waltzed with queens and
empresses. I’ll tell her this very night,” he cried, after a pause.
“They also call you a coward,” continued Michaud.
“Ha!”
“They ask how you managed to save yourself at Essling when nearly all
your comrades perished.”
The accusation brought a smile to the general’s lips. “Michaud, I shall
go at once to the Prefecture!” he cried, with a sort of fury, “if it
is only to get the policies of insurance you ask for. Let Madame la
comtesse know that I have gone. Ha, ha! they want war, do they? Well,
they shall have it; I’ll take my pleasure in thwarting them,--every one
of them, those bourgeois of Soulanges, and their peasantry! We are in
the enemy’s country, therefore prudence! Tell the foresters to keep
within the limits of the law. Poor Vatel, take care of him. The countess
is inclined to be timid; she must know nothing of all this; otherwise I
could never get her to come back here.”
Neither the general nor Michaud understood their real peril. Michaud had
been too short a time in this Burgundian valley to realize the enemy’s
power, though he saw its action. The general, for his part, believed in
the supremacy of the law.
The law, such as the legislature of these days manufactures it, has not
the virtue we attribute to it. It strikes unequally; it is so modified
in many of its modes of application that it virtually refutes its own
principles. This fact may be noted more or less distinctly throughout
all ages. Is there any historian ignorant enough to assert that the
decrees of the most vigilant of powers were ever enforced throughout
France?--for instance, that the requisitions of the Convention for
men, commodities, and money were obeyed in Provence, in the depths of
Normandy, on the borders of Brittany, as they were at the great centres
of social life? What philosopher dares deny that a head falls to-day in
such or such department, while in a neighboring department another head
stays on its shoulders though guilty of a crime identically the same,
and often more horrible? We ask for equality in life, and inequality
reigns in law and in the death penalty!
When the population of a town falls below a certain figure the
administrative system is no longer the same. There are perhaps a hundred
cities in France where the laws are vigorously enforced, and there the
intelligence of the citizens rises to the conception of the problem of
public welfare and future security which the law seeks to solve; but
throughout the rest of France nothing is comprehended beyond immediate
gratification; people rebel against all that lessens it. Therefore in
nearly one half of France we find a power of inertia which defeats all
legal action, both municipal and governmental. This resistance, be it
understood, does not affect the essential things of public polity.
The collection of taxes, recruiting, punishment of great crimes, as a
general thing do systematically go on; but outside of such recognized
necessities, all legislative decrees which affect customs, morals,
private interests, and certain abuses, are a dead letter, owing to the
sullen opposition of the people. At the very moment when this book
is going to press, this dumb resistance, which opposed Louis XIV. in
Brittany, may still be seen and felt. See the unfortunate results of
the game-laws, to which we are now sacrificing yearly the lives of some
twenty or thirty men for the sake of preserving a few animals.
In France the law is, to at least twenty million of inhabitants, nothing
more than a bit of white paper posted on the doors of the church and the
town-hall. That gives rise to the term “papers,” which Mouche used to
express legality. Many mayors of cantons (not to speak of the district
mayors) put up their bundles of seeds and herbs with the printed
statutes. As for the district mayors, the number of those who do not
know how to read and write is really alarming, and the manner in which
the civil records are kept is even more so. The danger of this state of
things, well-known to the governing powers, is doubtless diminishing;
but what centralization (against which every one declaims, as it is
the fashion in France to declaim against all things good and useful and
strong),--what centralization cannot touch, the Power against which it
will forever fling itself in vain, is that which the general was now
about to attack, and which we shall take leave to call the Mediocracy.
A great outcry was made against the tyranny of the nobles; in these days
the cry is against that of capitalists, against abuses of power, which
may be merely the inevitable galling of the social yoke, called Compact
by Rousseau, Constitution by some, Charter by others; Czar here,
King there, Parliament in Great Britain; while in France the general
levelling begun in 1789 and continued in 1830 has paved the way for the
juggling dominion of the middle classes, and delivered the nation
into their hands without escape. The portrayal of one fact alone,
unfortunately only too common in these days, namely, the subjection of
a canton, a little town, a sub-prefecture, to the will of a family
clique,--in short, the power acquired by Gaubertin,--will show this
social danger better than all dogmatic statements put together. Many
oppressed communities will recognize the truth of this picture; many
persons secretly and silently crushed by this tyranny will find in these
words an obituary, as it were, which may half console them for their
hidden woes.
At the very moment when the general imagined himself to be renewing a
warfare in which there had really been no truce, his former steward had
just completed the last meshes of the net-work in which he now held the
whole arrondissement of Ville-aux-Fayes. To avoid too many explanations
it is necessary to state, once for all, succinctly, the genealogical
ramifications by means of which Gaubertin wound himself about the
country, as a boa-constrictor winds around a tree,--with such art that a
passing traveller thinks he beholds some natural effect of the tropical
vegetation.
In 1793 there were three brothers of the name of Mouchon in the valley
of the Avonne. After 1793 they changed the name of the valley to that of
the Valley des Aigues, out of hatred to the old nobility.
The eldest brother, steward of the property of the Ronquerolles family,
was elected deputy of the department to the Convention. Like his
friend, Gaubertin’s father, the prosecutor of those days, who saved
the Soulanges family, he saved the property and the lives of the
Ronquerolles. He had two daughters; one married to Gendrin, the lawyer,
the other to Gaubertin. He died in 1804.
The second, through the influence of his elder brother, was made
postmaster at Conches. His only child was a daughter, married to a rich
farmer named Guerbet. He died in 1817.
The last of the Mouchons, who was a priest, and the curate of
Ville-aux-Fayes before the Revolution, was again a priest after the
re-establishment of Catholic worship, and again the curate of the same
little town. He was not willing to take the oath, and was hidden for a
long time in the hermitage of Les Aigues, under the protection of the
Gaubertins, father and son. Now about sixty-seven years of age, he was
treated with universal respect and affection, owing to the harmony of
his nature with that of the inhabitants. Parsimonious to the verge of
avarice, he was thought to be rich, and the credit of being so increased
the respect that was shown to him. Monseigneur the bishop paid the
greatest attention to the Abbe Mouchon, who was always spoken of as the
venerable curate of Ville-aux-Fayes; and the fact that he had several
times refused to go and live in a splendid parsonage attached to the
Prefecture, where Monseigneur wished to settle him, made him dearer
still to his people.
Gaubertin, now mayor of Ville-aux-Fayes, received steady support from
his brother-in-law Gendrin, who was judge of the municipal court.
Gaubertin the younger, the solicitor who had the most practice before
this court and much repute in the arrondissement, was already thinking
of selling his practice after five years’ exercise of it. He wanted
to succeed his Uncle Gendrin as counsellor whenever the latter should
retire from the profession. Gendrin’s only son was commissioner of
mortgages.
Soudry’s son, who for the last two years had been prosecuting-attorney
at the prefecture, was Gaubertin’s henchman. The clever Madame Soudry
had secured the future of her husband’s son by marrying him to Rigou’s
only daughter. The united fortunes of the Soudrys and the ex-monk, which
would come eventually to the attorney, made that young man one of the
most important personages of the department.
The sub-prefect of Ville-aux-Fayes, Monsieur des Lupeaulx, nephew of the
general-secretary of one of the most important ministries in Paris, was
the prospective husband of Mademoiselle Elise Gaubertin, the mayor’s
youngest daughter, whose dowry, like that of her elder sister, was
two hundred thousand francs, not to speak of “expectations.” This
functionary showed much sense, though not aware of it, in falling in
love with Mademoiselle Elise when he first arrived at Ville-aux-Fayes,
in 1819. If it had not been for his social position, which made him
“eligible,” he would long ago have been forced to ask for his exchange.
But Gaubertin in marrying him to his daughter thought much more of the
uncle, the general-secretary, than of the nephew; and in return, the
uncle, for the sake of his nephew, gave all his influence to Gaubertin.
Thus the Church, the magistracy both removable and irremovable, the
municipality, and the prefecture, the four feet of power, walked as the
mayor pleased. Let us now see how that functionary strengthened himself
in the spheres above and below that in which he worked.
The department to which Ville-aux-Fayes belongs is one the number of
whose population gives it the right to elect six deputies. Ever since
the creation of the Left Centre of the Chamber, the arrondissement of
Ville-aux-Fayes had sent a deputy named Leclercq, formerly banking agent
of the wine department of the custom-house, a son-in-law of Gaubertin,
and now a governor of the Bank of France. The number of electors which
this rich valley sent to the electoral college was sufficient to insure,
if only through private dealing, the constant appointment of Monsieur
de Ronquerolles, the patron of the Mouchon family. The voters of
Ville-aux-Fayes lent their support to the prefect, on condition that the
Marquis de Ronquerolles was maintained in the college. Thus Gaubertin,
who was the first to broach the idea of this arrangement, was favorably
received at the Prefecture, which he often, in return, saved from petty
annoyances. The prefect always selected three firm ministerialists,
and two deputies of the Left Centre. The latter, one of them being the
Marquis de Ronquerolles, brother-in-law of the Comte de Serisy, and the
other a governor of the Bank of France, gave little or no alarm to the
cabinet, and the elections in this department were rated excellent at
the ministry of the interior.
The Comte de Soulanges, peer of France, selected to be the next marshal,
and faithful to the Bourbons, knew that his forests and other property
were all well-managed by the notary Lupin, and well-watched by Soudry.
He was a patron of Gendrin’s, having obtained his appointment as judge
partly by the help of Monsieur de Ronquerolles.
Messieurs Leclercq and de Ronquerolles sat in the Left Centre, but
nearer to the left than to the centre,--a political position which
offers great advantages to those who regard their political conscience
as a garment.
The brother of Monsieur Leclercq had obtained the situation of collector
at Ville-aux-Fayes, and Leclercq himself, Gaubertin’s son-in-law, had
lately bought a fine estate beyond the valley of the Avonne, which
brought him in a rental of thirty thousand francs, with park and chateau
and a controlling influence in its own canton.
Thus, in the upper regions of the State, in both Chambers, and in the
chief ministerial department, Gaubertin could rely on an influence that
was powerful and also active, and which he was careful not to weary with
unimportant requests.
The counsellor Gendrin, appointed judge by the Chamber, was the leading
spirit of the Supreme Court; for the chief justice, one of the three
ministerial deputies, left the management of it to Gendrin during half
the year. The counsel for the Prefecture, a cousin of Sarcus, called
“Sarcus the rich,” was the right-hand man of the prefect, himself a
deputy. Even without the family reasons which allied Gaubertin and young
des Lupeaulx, a brother of Madame Sarcus would still have been desirable
as sub-prefect to the arrondissement of Ville-aux-Fayes. Madame Sarcus,
the counsellor’s wife, was a Vallat of Soulanges, a family connected
with the Gaubertins, and she was said to have “distinguished” the notary
Lupin in her youth. Though she was now forty-five years old, with a son
in the school of engineers, Lupin never went to the Prefecture without
paying his respects and dining with her.
The nephew of Guerbet, the postmaster, whose father was, as we have
seen, collector of Soulanges, held the important situation of examining
judge in the municipal court of Ville-aux-Fayes. The third judge, son of
Corbinet, the notary, belonged body and soul to the all-powerful mayor;
and, finally, young Vigor, son of the lieutenant of the gendarmerie, was
the substitute judge.
Sibilet’s father, sheriff of the court, had married his sister to
Monsieur Vigor the lieutenant, and that individual, father of six
children, was cousin of the father of Gaubertin through his wife, a
Gaubertin-Vallat. Eighteen months previously the united efforts of the
two deputies, Monsieur de Soulanges and Gaubertin, had created the place
of commissary of police for the sheriff’s second son.
Sibilet’s eldest daughter married Monsieur Herve, a school-master, whose
school was transformed into a college as a result of this marriage,
so that for the past year Soulanges had rejoiced in the presence of a
professor.
The sheriff’s youngest son was employed on the government domains, with
the promise of succeeding the clerk of registrations so soon as that
officer had completed the term of service which enabled him to retire on
a pension.
The youngest Sibilet girl, now sixteen years old, was betrothed
to Corbinet, brother of the notary. And an old maid, Mademoiselle
Gaubertin-Vallat, sister of Madame Sibilet, the sheriff’s wife, held the
office for the sale of stamped paper.
Thus, wherever we turn in Ville-aux-Fayes we meet some member of the
invisible coalition, whose avowed chief, recognized as such by every
one, great and small, was the mayor of the town, the general agent for
the entire timber business, Gaubertin!
If we turn to the other end of the valley of the Avonne we shall see
that Gaubertin ruled at Soulanges through the Soudrys, through Lupin the
assistant mayor and steward of the Soulanges estate, who was necessarily
in constant communication with the Comte de Soulanges, through Sarcus,
justice of the peace, through Guerbet, the collector, through Gourdon,
the doctor, who had married a Gendrin-Vatebled. He governed Blangy
through Rigou, Conches through the post-master, the despotic ruler of
his own district.
Gaubertin’s influence was so great and powerful that even the
investments and the savings of Rigou, Soudry, Gendrin, Guerbet, Lupin,
even Sarcus the rich himself, were managed by his advice. The town of
Ville-aux-Fayes believed implicitly in its mayor. Gaubertin’s ability
was not less extolled than his honesty and his kindness; he was the
servant of his relatives and constituents (always with an eye to a
return of benefits), and the whole municipality adored him. The town
never ceased to blame Monsieur Mariotte, of Auxerre, for having opposed
and thwarted that worthy Monsieur Gaubertin.
Not aware of their strength, no occasion for displaying it having
arisen, the bourgeoisie of Ville-aux-Fayes contented themselves with
boasting that no strangers intermeddled in their affairs and they
believed themselves excellent citizens and faithful public servants.
Nothing, however, escaped their despotic rule, which in itself was not
perceived, the result being considered a triumph of the locality.
The only stranger in this family community was the government engineer
in the highway department; and his dismissal in favor of the son of
Sarcus the rich was now being pressed, with a fair chance that this one
weak thread in the net would soon be strengthened. And yet this powerful
league, which monopolized all duties both public and private, sucked the
resources of the region, and fastened on power like limpets to a
ship, escaped all notice so completely that General Montcornet had
no suspicion of it. The prefect boasted of the prosperity of
Ville-aux-Fayes and its arrondissement; even the minister of the
interior was heard to remark: “There’s a model sub-prefecture, which
runs on wheels; we should be lucky indeed if all were like it.” Family
designs were so involved with local interests that here, as in many
other little towns and even prefectures, a functionary who did not
belong to the place would have been forced to resign within a year.
When this despotic middle-class cousinry seizes a victim, he is so
carefully gagged and bound that complaint is impossible; he is
smeared with slime and wax like a snail in a beehive. This invisible,
imperceptible tyranny is upheld by powerful reasons,--such as the wish
to be surrounded by their own family, to keep property in their own
hands, the mutual help they ought to lend each other, the guarantees
given to the administration by the fact that their agent is under the
eyes of his fellow-citizens and neighbors. What does all this lead
to? To the fact that local interests supersede all questions of public
interest; the centralized will of Paris is frequently overthrown in the
provinces, the truth of things is disguised, and country communities
snap their fingers at government. In short, after the main public
necessities have been attended to, it will be seen that the laws,
instead of acting upon the masses, receive their impulse from them; the
populations adapt the law to themselves and not themselves to the law.
Whoever has travelled in the south or west of France, or in Alsace, in
any other way than from inn to inn to see buildings and landscapes, will
surely admit the truth of these remarks. The results of middle-class
nepotism may be, at present, merely isolated evils; but the tendency of
existing laws is to increase them. This low-level despotism can and will
cause great disasters, and the events of the drama about to be played in
the valley of Les Aigues will prove it.
The monarchical and imperial systems, more rashly overthrown than people
realize, remedied these abuses by means of certain consecrated lives,
by classifications and categories and by those particular counterpoises
since so absurdly defined as “privileges.” There are no privileges now,
when every human being is free to climb the greased pole of power. But
surely it would be safer to allow open and avowed privileges than those
which are underhand, based on trickery, subversive of what should be
public spirit, and continuing the work of despotism to a lower and baser
level than heretofore. May we not have overthrown noble tyrants devoted
to their country’s good, to create the tyranny of selfish interests?
Shall power lurk in secret places, instead of radiating from its natural
source? This is worth thinking about. The spirit of local sectionalism,
such as we have now depicted, will soon be seen to invade the Chamber.
Montcornet’s friend, the late prefect, Comte de la Roche-Hugon, had lost
his position just before the last arrival of the general at Les Aigues.
This dismissal drove him into the ranks of the Liberal opposition,
where he became one of the chorus of the Left, a position he soon after
abandoned for an embassy. His successor, luckily for Montcornet, was
a son-in-law of the Marquis de Troisville, uncle of the countess, the
Comte de Casteran. He welcomed Montcornet as a relation and begged
him to continue his intimacy at the Prefecture. After listening to
the general’s complaints the Comte de Casteran invited the bishop, the
attorney-general, the colonel of the gendarmerie, counsellor Sarcus,
and the general commanding the division to meet him the next day at
breakfast.
The attorney-general, Baron Bourlac (so famous in the Chanterie and
Rifael suits), was one of those men well-known to all governments, who
attach themselves to power, no matter in whose hands it is, and who make
themselves invaluable by such devotion. Having owed his elevation in the
first place to his fanaticism for the Emperor, he now owed the
retention of his official rank to his inflexible character and the
conscientiousness with which he fulfilled his duties. He who once
implacably prosecuted the remnant of the Chouans now prosecuted the
Bonapartists as implacably. But years and turmoils had somewhat subdued
his energy and he had now become, like other old devils incarnate,
perfectly charming in manner and ways.
The general explained his position and the fears of his bailiff, and
spoke of the necessity of making an example and enforcing the rights of
property.
The high functionaries listened gravely, making, however, no reply
beyond mere platitudes, such as, “Undoubtedly, the laws must be upheld”;
“Your cause is that of all land-owners”; “We will consider it; but,
situated as we are, prudence is very necessary”; “A monarchy could
certainly do more for the people than the people would do for itself,
even if it were, as in 1793, the sovereign people”; “The masses suffer,
and we are bound to do as much for them as for ourselves.”
The relentless attorney-general expressed such kindly and benevolent
views respecting the condition of the lower classes that our future
Utopians, had they heard him, might have thought that the higher grade
of government officials were already aware of the difficulties of that
problem which modern society will be forced to solve.
It may be well to say here that at this period of the Restoration,
various bloody encounters had taken place in remote parts of the
kingdom, caused by this very question of the pillage of woods, and
the marauding rights which the peasants were everywhere arrogating to
themselves. Neither the government nor the court liked these outbreaks,
nor the shedding of blood which resulted from repression. Though they
felt the necessity of rigorous measures, they nevertheless treated
as blunderers the officials who were compelled to employ them, and
dismissed them on the first pretence. The prefects were therefore
anxious to shuffle out of such difficulties whenever possible.
At the very beginning of the conversation Sarcus (the rich) had made a
sign to the prefect and the attorney-general which Montcornet did not
see, but which set the tone of the discussion. The attorney-general was
well aware of the state of mind of the inhabitants of the valley des
Aigues through his subordinate, Soudry the young attorney.
“I foresee a terrible struggle,” the latter had said to him. “They mean
to kill the gendarmes; my spies tell me so. It will be very hard to
convict them for it. The instant the jury feel they are incurring the
hatred of the friends of the twenty or thirty prisoners, they will not
sustain us,--we could not get them to convict for death, nor even for
the galleys. Possibly by prosecuting in person you might get a few
years’ imprisonment for the actual murderers. Better shut our eyes
than open them, if by opening them we bring on a collision which costs
bloodshed and several thousand francs to the State,--not to speak of the
cost of keeping the guilty in prison. It is too high a price to pay for
a victory which will only reveal our judicial weakness to the eyes of
all.”
Montcornet, who was wholly without suspicion of the strength and
influence of the Mediocracy in his happy valley, did not even mention
Gaubertin, whose hand kept these embers of opposition always alive,
though smouldering. After breakfast the attorney-general took Montcornet
by the arm and led him to the Prefect’s study. When the general left
that room after their conference, he wrote to his wife that he was
starting for Paris and should be absent a week. We shall see, after
the execution of certain measures suggested by Baron Bourlac, the
attorney-general, whether the secret advice he gave to Montcornet was
wise, and whether in conforming to it the count and Les Aigues were
enabled to escape the “Evil grudge.”
Some minds, eager for mere amusement, will complain that these various
explanations are far too long; but we once more call attention to the
fact that the historian of the manners, customs, and morals of his time
must obey a law far more stringent than that imposed on the historian of
mere facts. He must show the probability of everything, even the truth;
whereas, in the domain of history, properly so-called, the impossible
must be accepted for the sole reason that it did happen. The
vicissitudes of social or private life are brought about by a crowd of
little causes derived from a thousand conditions. The man of science
is forced to clear away the avalanche under which whole villages lie
buried, to show you the pebbles brought down from the summit which alone
can determine the formation of the mountain. If the historian of human
life were simply telling you of a suicide, five hundred of which occur
yearly in Paris, the melodrama is so commonplace that brief reasons and
explanations are all that need be given; but how shall he make you see
that the self-destruction of an estate could happen in these days when
property is reckoned of more value than life? “De re vestra agitur,”
said a maker of fables; this tale concerns the affairs and interests of
all those, no matter who they be, who possess anything.
Remember that this coalition of a whole canton and of a little town
against a general, who, in spite of his rash courage, had escaped the
dangers of actual war, is going on in other districts against other men
who seek only to do what is right by those districts. It is a coalition
which to-day threatens every man, the man of genius, the statesman, the
modern agriculturalist,--in short, all innovators.
This last explanation not only gives a true presentation of the
personages of this drama, and a serious meaning even to its petty
details, but it also throws a vivid light upon the scene where so many
social interests are now marshalling.