Glorious news! I have seen Lullier again. We had lost Cluseret, lost
Rossel; Delescluze does not suffice, and except for Dombrowski and La
Cécilia with his prima-donna-like name, the company of the Commune
would be sadly wanting in stars. Happily! Lullier has been restored to
us. What had become of him? he only wrote seven or eight letters a day
to Rochefort and Maroteau, that I can find out. How did he manage to
employ that indomitable activity of his, and that of his two hundred
friends, who with their red Garibaldis and blue sailor trousers made
him the most picturesque escort you can imagine? Was he meditating some
gigantic enterprises the dictatorship that Cluseret had dreamed of and
Rossel disdained, was he about to assume it for the good of the
Republic? I have no idea; but whatever he has been doing, I have seen
him again at the club held in the church of Saint Jacques.
[Illustration: General La Cécilia.[89]]
Ha! ha! Worthless hypocrites and inquisitors, who for the last eighteen
hundred years have crushed, degraded, and tortured the poor; you
thought our turn was never to come, you monks, priests, and
archbishops! Thanks to the Commune you now preach in the prisons of the
Republic; you may confess, if you like, the spiders of your dungeons,
and give the holy viaticum to the rats which play around your legs! You
can no longer do any harm to patriots. No more churches, no more
convents! Those who have not houses in the Champs Elysées shall lodge
in your convents; in your churches shall be held honest assemblies,
which will give the people their rights; as to their duties, that is an
invention of reactionists. No more of your sermons or speeches: after
Bossuet, Napoléon Gaillard!
[Illustration: The Church of Saint Eustache. Used As a Red Club. Partly
destroyed by fire.]
On entering the church of Saint Eustache yesterday, I was agreeably
surprised to find the font full of tobacco instead of holy-water, and
to see the altar in the distance covered with bottles and glasses. Some
one informed me that was the counter. In one of the lateral chapels, a
statue of the Virgin had been dressed out in the uniform of a
vivandière, with a pipe in her mouth. I was, however, particularly
charmed with the amiable faces of the people I saw collected there. The
sex to which we owe the _tricoteuses_ was decidedly in the majority. It
was quite delightful not to see any of those elegant dresses and
frivolous manners, which have for so long disgraced the better half of
the human race. Thank heaven! my eyes fell with rapture on the heroic
rags of those ladies who do us the honour of sweeping our streets for
us. Many of these female patriots were proud to bear in the centre of
their faces a rubicund nose, that rivalled in colour the Communal flag
on the Hôtel de Ville. Oh, glorious red nose, the distinguished sign of
Republicanism! As to the men, they seemed to have been chosen among the
first ranks of the new aristocracy. It was charming to note the
military elegance with which their caps were slightly inclined over one
ear; their faces, naturally hideous, were illuminated with the joy of
freedom, and certainly the thick smoke which emanated from their pipes,
must have been more agreeable as an offering, than the faint vapours of
incense that used to arise from the gilded censers. “Marriage,
citoyennes, is the greatest error of ancient humanity. To be married is
to be a slave. Will you be slaves?”—“No, no!” cried all the female part
of the audience, and the orator, a tall gaunt woman with a nose like
the beak of a hawk, and a jaundice-coloured complexion, flattered by
such universal applause, continued, “Marriage, therefore, cannot be
tolerated any longer in a free city. It ought to be considered a crime,
and suppressed by the most severe measures. Nobody has the right to
sell his liberty, and thereby to set a bad example to his fellow
citizens. The matrimonial state is a perpetual crime against morality.
Don’t tell me that marriage may be tolerated, if you institute divorce.
Divorce is only an expedient, and if I may be allowed to use the word,
an Orleanist expedient!” (Thunders of applause.) “Therefore, I propose
to this assembly, that it should get the Commune of Paris to modify the
decree, which assures pensions to the legitimate or illegitimate
companions of the National Guards, killed in the defence of our
municipal rights. No half measures. We, the illegitimate companions,
will no longer suffer the legitimate wives to usurp rights they no
longer possess, and which they ought never to have had at all. Let the
decree be modified. All for the free women, none for the slaves!”
[Illustration: Interior of the Church Of St. Eustache—communist Club.]
The orator descends from the pulpit amidst the most lively
congratulations. I am told by some one standing near me, that the
orator is a monthly nurse, who used to be a somnambulist in her youth.
But the crowd opens now to give place to a male orator, who mounts the
spiral staircase, passes his hand through his hair, and darts a
piercing glance on the multitude beneath. It is Citizen Lullier.
This young man has really a very agreeable physiognomy; his forehead is
intelligent, his eyes pleasant. Looking on M. Lullier’s sympathetic
face, one is sorry to remember his eccentricities. But what is all this
noise about? What has he said? what has he done? I only heard the words
“Dombrowski,” and “La Cécilia.” Every one starts to his feet,
exasperated, shouting. Several chairs are about to be flung at the
orator. He is surrounded, hooted. “Down with Lullier! Long live
Dombrowski!” The tumult increases. Citizen Lullier seems perfectly calm
in the midst of it all, but refuses to leave the pulpit; he tries in
vain to speak and explain. Two women, two amiable hags, throw
themselves upon him; several men rush up also; he is taken up bodily
and carried away, resisting to the utmost and shouting to the last. The
people jump up on the chairs, Lullier has disappeared, and I hear him
no more; what have they done with him!
What do you think of all this, gentlemen and Catholics! Do you still
regret the priests and choristers who used awhile ago to preach and
chant in the Parisian churches? Where is the man, who at the very sight
of this new congregation, so tolerant, so intelligent, listening with
such gratitude to these noble lessons of politics and morality; where
is the man, who could any longer blind himself to the admirable
influence of the present revolution? Innumerable are the benefits that
the Paris Commune showers upon us! As I leave the church, a little
vagabond walks up to the font, and taking a pinch of tobacco,—“In the
name of the...!” says he, then fills his pipe; “In the name of the
...!” proceeding to strike a lucifer, adds, “In the name of the
...!”—“Confound the blasphemous rascal!” say I, giving him a good box
on the ears. After having written these lines I felt inclined to erase
them; on second thoughts I let them remain—they belong to history!