THE DOWNFALL OF LOUIS PHILIPPE.
As I said in the last chapter, everything in the year 1847 and during
the opening weeks of 1848 seemed unfavorable to Louis Philippe.
Besides the causes of dissatisfaction I have mentioned, there was
a scarcity of grain, there were drains on the finances, there was
disaffection among the National Guard, and hostility among the
peers to the measures of the Ministry. Then came the conviction
of M. Teste, a member of the Cabinet, for misappropriating public
funds. Even private affairs seemed turned against the royal family.
Madame Lafarge murdered her husband, and it was said that the court
had attempted to procure her acquittal because she was connected
with the house of Orleans by a bar-sinister. A quarrel about an
actress led to a duel. The man wounded was a journalist who was
actively opposed to the king's Government. It was hinted that the
duel was a device of the court to get him put out of the way. But
the greatest of the king's misfortunes was the death of his admirable
sister, Madame Adélaïde, in January, 1848. She had been all his life
his bosom friend and his chief counsellor. She died of a severe
attack of influenza.
In a letter from the Prince de Joinville to the Duc de Nemours,
found in the garden of the Tuileries in February, 1848, among many
valuable documents that had been flung from the windows of the
palace by the mob, the situation of things at the close of 1847
and the beginning of 1848 is thus summed up by one brother writing
in confidence to another:--
"The king will listen to no advice. His own will must be paramount
over everything. It seems to me impossible that in the Chamber of
Deputies at the next session the anomalous state of the government
should fail to attract attention. It has effaced all traces of
constitutional government, and has put forward the king as the
primary, and indeed sole, mover upon all occasions. There is no
longer any respect for ministers; their responsibility is null,
everything rests with the king. He has arrived at an age when he
declines to listen to suggestions. He is accustomed to govern,
and he loves to show that he does so. His immense experience, his
courage, and his great qualities lead him to face danger; but it
is not on that account the less real or imminent."
Then, after further summing up the state of France,--the finances
embarrassed, the _entente cordiale_ with England at an end, and the
provinces in confusion,--the prince adds: "Those unhappy Spanish
marriages!--we have not yet drained the cup of bitterness they
have mixed for us to drink."
In this state of things the opposition party was divided into liberals
who wished for reform, and liberals who aimed at revolution. For
a while the two parties worked together, and their war-cry was
Reform! There was little or no parliamentary opposition, for the
Chamber of Peers and the Chamber of Deputies were alike virtually
chosen by the Crown. The population of France in 1848 was thirty-five
millions; but those entitled to vote were only two hundred and
forty thousand, or one to every one hundred and forty-six of the
population, and of these a large part were in Government employ.
It was said that the number of places in the gift of the Ministry
was sixty-three thousand, every place, from that of a guard upon
a railroad to that of a judge upon the bench, being disposed of
by ministerial favor.
The plan adopted to give expression to the public discontent was
the inauguration of reform banquets. To these large crowds were
attracted, both from political motives and from a desire in the
rural districts to hear the great speakers, Lamartine and others,
who had a national renown. Many of the speeches were inflammatory.
The health of the king was never drunk on these occasions, but
the "Marseillaise" was invariably played.
Seventy-four of these banquets had been given in the provinces,
when it was decided to give one in Paris; and a large inclosed piece
of ground on the Rue Chaillot, not far from the Arch of Triumph,
was fixed upon for the purpose. This banquet was to take place on
Tuesday, Feb. 22, 1848. Until Monday afternoon opinions seemed
divided as to whether it would be suffered to go on. But meantime the
city had been crammed with troops, and the sleep of its inhabitants
had been broken night after night by the tramp of regiments and the
rumble of artillery. Monday, February 21, was a beautiful day,
the air was soft and genial, the streets and the Champs Elysées
were very gay. Scarcely any one was aware at that time that it
was the intention of the Government to forbid the banquet; but
that night the preparations made for it were carted away by order
of the liberal leaders, who had been warned of the decision of the
authorities, while at the same time every loose paving-stone that
might help to erect a barricade was, by orders from the police,
removed out of the way.
When morning dawned, a proclamation, forbidding the banquet, was
posted on every street-corner. The soldiers were everywhere confined
to their quarters, the windows of which were stuffed with mattresses;
but to residents in Paris the day seemed to pass quietly, though
about noon the Place de la Madeleine was full of men surrounding
the house of Odillon Barrot, the chief leader of the opposition,
demanding what, under the circumstances, they had better do. In the
Place de la Concorde, troops were endeavoring to prevent the crowd
from crossing the Seine and assembling in front of the Chamber of
Deputies. In order to break up the throng upon the bridge, a heavy
wagon was driven over it at a rapid pace, escorted by soldiers, who
slashed about them with their sheathed swords. At the residence
of M. Guizot, then both Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign
Affairs, a large crowd had assembled and had broken his windows;
but the rioters were dispersed the Municipal Guard and the Police.
In the afternoon, on the Place de la Concorde, a party of men and
boys, apparently without leaders, contrived to break through the
troops guarding the bridge, and began to ascend the steps of the
Chamber of Deputies. Being refused admission to the hall, they
proceeded to break windows and do other damage. Then a party of
dragoons began to clear the bridge, but good-humoredly, and the
people were retiring as fast as they might, when a detachment of the
Municipal Guard arrived. The Municipal Guard was a handsome corps
of mounted police, the men being all stalwart and fine-looking. They
wore brazen helmets and horse-tails and glittering breastplates,
but they were very unpopular, while the National Guards were looked
on by the rioters as their supporters. The Municipal Guards, when
they came upon the bridge, began treating the crowd roughly, a
good many persons were hurt, and an old woman was trodden down. At
this the crowd grew furious, stones were thrown, and the soldiers
drew their swords. Before nightfall there was riot and disorder all
over Paris. Towards dusk the _rappel_--the signal for the National
Guard to muster--had been beaten in the streets, and soon many
soldiers of that body might be seen, escorted by men in blouses
carrying their guns, while the National Guards, unarmed, were shouting
and singing.
All Tuesday, February 22, the affair was a mere riot. But during
the night the secret societies met, and decided on more formidable
action.
The next morning was chilly and rainy, very dispiriting to the
troops, who had bivouacked all night in the public squares, where
they had been ill-provided with food and forage. The coats and
swords of the students at the Polytechnic had been removed during
the night, to prevent their joining the bands who were singing the
"Marseillaise" and the "Dernier Chant des Girondins" under their
windows.
Meantime barricades had been raised in the thickly populated parts of
Paris, and successful efforts had been made to enlist the sympathies
of the soldiers and the National Guard.
During the early hours of Wednesday, the 23d, reports of these
disaffections succeeded each other rapidly at the Tuileries, and
a council was held in the king's cabinet, to which the queen and
the princes were invited. The king spoke of resigning his crown,
adding that he was "fortunate in being able to resign it." "But
you cannot abdicate, _mon ami_," said the queen. "You owe yourself
to France. The demand made is for the resignation of the Ministry.
M. Guizot should resign, and I feel sure that being the man of
honor that he is, he will do so in this emergency."
M. Guizot and his colleagues at once gave in their resignations.
The king wept as he embraced them, bidding them farewell. Count
Molé was then called in and requested to form a ministry. Before
he could do so, however, things had grown worse, and M. Thiers,
instead of Count Molé, was made head of the Cabinet. He insisted
that Odillon Barrot, the day before very popular with the insurgents,
must be his colleague. The king declined to assent to this. To put
Odillon Barrot into power, he said, was virtually to abandon the
policy of his reign.
But before this matter was decided, there had occurred a lamentable
massacre at the gates of the residence of M. Guizot, the Minister for
Foreign Affairs. The building had been surrounded by a fierce crowd,
composed mainly of working-men from the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Some
confusion was occasioned by the restlessness of a horse belonging
to an officer in command of a squad of cavalry detailed to defend
the building. The leader of the mob fired a pistol. The soldiers
responded with a volley from their carbines. Fifty of the crowd were
killed. The bodies were piled by the mob upon a cart and paraded
through Paris, the corpse of a half-naked woman lying conspicuously
among them. The sight everywhere woke threats of vengeance.
The king, when he heard of this, yielded. Odillon Barrot was associated
with M. Thiers, and Marshal Bugeaud was placed in command of the
military.
M. Thiers' foible was omniscience; and to Bugeaud's amazement,
amusement, and indignation he insisted on inspecting his military
plans and giving his advice concerning them. Happily the marshal's
plans met with the approval of the minister, and the commander-in-chief
went to his post; while Odillon Barrot, accompanied by Horace Vernet,
the painter, went forth into the streets to inform the insurgents
that their demand for reform had been granted, that the obnoxious
ministers had been dismissed, and that all power was made over
to himself and to his colleagues.
Marshal Bugeaud found everything in wild confusion at the War Office;
but was restoring order, and had marched four columns of troops
through Paris without serious opposition, when he received orders
from M. Thiers that not another shot was to be fired by the soldiers.
The marshal replied that he would not obey such orders unless he
received them from the king. The Duc de Nemours therefore signed
the paper in the name of his father, and soon afterwards a new
proclamation was posted on the walls:--
Citizens! An order has been given to suspend all firing. We are
charged by the king to form a ministry. The Chamber is about to be
dissolved. General Lamoricière has been appointed Commander-in-Chief
of the National Guard. Messieurs Odillon Barrot, Thiers, Lamoricière,
and Duvergier de Haurannes are ministers. Our watchwords are,--Order,
Union, Reform!
(Signed) ODILLON BARROT.
THIERS.
This proclamation may be said to have been the beginning of the
end. The soldiers were disgusted; supporters of the monarchy lost
heart; the secret societies now felt that the game was in their
hands. By that time barricades without number, it was said, had
been thrown up in the streets. The suburbs of Paris were cut off
from the capital. During the previous night, arms had been everywhere
demanded from private houses; but in obtaining them the insurgents
endeavored to inspire no unnecessary terror. One lady in the English
quarter was found kneeling by the bedside of her dying child. When
a party of armed men entered the chamber they knelt down, joined
their prayers to hers for the soul that was departing, and then
quitted the room in silence, placing a guard and writing over the
door in chalk: "Respect this house, for death is here."
By nine o'clock on Wednesday morning the troops, disgusted by the
order which forbade them to defend themselves, reversed their arms
and fraternized with the people, the officers sheathing their swords.
A little later, Odillon Barrot, who supposed himself to be the
people's favorite, rode along the Boulevard to proclaim to the
rioters that he was now their minister, and that the cause of reform
was assured. He was met with cries of "Never mind him! We have no
time to hear him! Too late, too late! We know all he has to say!"
About the same time the École Militaire was taken; but a guard
_en blouse_ was posted to protect the apartments of the ladies
of the governor. The fight before the Palais Royal occurred about
noon. The palace, which was the private property of Louis Philippe,
was sacked, and many valuable works of art were destroyed.
The royal family were sitting down to breakfast about midday when
a party of gentlemen, among them M. Émile de Girardin, made their
way into the Tuileries, imploring the king to abdicate at once
and spare further bloodshed. Without a word, Louis Philippe drew
pen and paper towards him and wrote his abdication. Embracing his
grandson, the little Comte de Paris, he went out, saying to the
gentlemen about him: "This child is your king."
Through the Pavillon de l'Horloge, the main entrance to the Tuileries,
came a party of dragoons, leading their horses down the marble
steps into the gardens. The victorious blouses already filled the
inner court, the Place du Carrousel. The royal family, slenderly
attended, followed the king. The crowd poured into the Tuileries
on the side of the Carrousel as the royal family quitted it through
the gardens.
In the Place de la Concorde, beneath the old Egyptian obelisk which
had witnessed so many changes in this troubled world, they found
two cabs in waiting. The king and queen entered one, with several
of the children. Into the second stepped the Duchesse de Nemours,
the Princess Clémentine, and an attendant. Some persons in the
crowd who recognized them, cried out: "Respect old age! Respect
misfortune!" And when an officer in attendance called out to the
crowd not to hurt the king, he was answered: "Do you take us for
assassins? Let him get away!"
This, indeed, was the general feeling. Only a few persons ventured
to insult the royal family. The coachmen, however, drove off in such
haste that the Spanish princess, Luisa, Duchesse de Montpensier,
was left alone upon the sidewalk, weeping bitterly. A Portuguese
gentleman gave her his arm, and took her in search of her husband's
aide-de-camp, General Thierry. With several other gentlemen, who
formed a guard about her, they passed back into the garden of the
Tuileries, where M. Jules de Lasteyrie, the grandson of Lafayette,
took possession of the duchess and escorted her to his own house.
From thence, a few days later, he forwarded her to the coast, where
she rejoined her husband.
When the king quitted the Tuileries he was urged to leave behind
him a paper conferring the regency on the Duchess of Orleans. He
refused positively. "It would be contrary to law," he said; "and I
have never yet done anything, thank God! contrary to law." "But what
must I do," asked the duchess, "without friends, without relations,
without counsel?" "_Ma chère Hélène_," the king replied, "the dynasty
and the crown of your son are intrusted to you. Remain here and
protect them."
As the mob began to pour into the palace after the king's departure,
the duchess, by the advice of M. Dupin, the President (or Speaker)
of the Chamber, set out on foot to cross the bridge nearest to
the palace, and to reach the Palais Bourbon. She held her eldest
son, the Comte de Paris, by the hand; her youngest, who was too
small to walk, was carried by an aide-de-camp. Beside them walked
M. Dupin, the Duc de Nemours, and a faithful servant. They left
the Tuileries in such haste that they failed to give orders to
the faithful Garde Municipale, who would have suffered the fate
of the Swiss Guard in 1792, had not National Guards in the crowd
assisted them to change their conspicuous uniforms and to escape
out of the windows.
During the first half hour after the invasion of the palace a great
deal of money and many other valuables disappeared; but after that
time it was death to appropriate anything, even if it were of little
value.
Soon the gardens of the Tuileries were white with papers flung
from the windows of the palace, many of them of great historical
value. A piece of pink gauze, the property, probably, of some
maid-of-honor, streamed from one of the windows in the roof and
fluttered across the whole building. The crowd, in high good humor,
tossed forth livery coats, fragments of state furniture, and papers.
The beds still stood unmade, and all the apparatus of the ladies'
toilet-tables remained in disorder. In one royal bed-chamber a
man was rubbing pomade with both hands into his hair, another was
drenching himself with perfume, a third was scrubbing his teeth
furiously with a brush that had that morning parted the lips of
royalty. In another room a man _en blouse_ was seated at a piano
playing the "Marseillaise" to an admiring audience (the "Marseillaise"
had been forbidden in Paris for many years). Elsewhere a party of
_gamins_ were turning over a magnificent scrapbook. In the next
room was a grand piano, on which four men were thumping at once.
In another, a party of working-men were dancing a quadrille, while
a gentleman played for them upon a piano. At every chimney-piece
and before every work of art stood a guard, generally ragged and
powder-stained, bearing a placard, "Death to Robbers!" while at the
head of the Grand Staircase others stood, crying, "Enter, messieurs!
Enter! We don't have cards of admission to this house every day!"
While the cry that passed through the crowd was: "Look as much as
you like, but take nothing!" "Are not we magnificent in our own
house, Monsieur?" said a _gamin_ to an Englishman; while another
was to be seen walking about in one of poor Queen Amélie's state
head-dresses, surmounted by a bird-of-paradise with a long tail.
At first the crowd injured nothing, even the king's portraits being
respected; but after a while the destruction of state furniture
began. Three men were seen smoking in the state bed; some ate up
the royal breakfast; and the cigars of the princes were freely
handed to rough men in the crowd.
Meantime in the Chamber of Deputies the scene was terrible. M.
Dupin, its president, lost his head. Had he, when he knew of the
king's abdication, declared the sitting closed, and directed the
Deputies to disperse, he might possibly have saved the monarchy.
But the mob got possession of the _tribune_ (the pulpit from which
alone speeches can be made in the Chamber); they pointed their guns
at the Deputies, who cowered under their benches, and the last
chance for Louis Philippe's dynasty was over. Odillon Barrot, who
had come down to the house full of self-importance, notwithstanding
his reception on the Boulevards, found that his hour was over and
his power gone.
M. de Lamartine was the idol of the mob, though he was very nearly
shot in the confusion. Armed insurgents crowded round him, clinging
to his skirts, his hands, his knees. Throughout the tumult the
reporters for the "Moniteur" kept their seats, taking notes of what
was passing.
The Duchess of Orleans found the Chamber occupied by armed men. She
was jostled and pressed upon. A feeble effort was made to proclaim
her son king, and to appoint her regent during his minority. She
endeavored several times to speak, and behaved with an intrepidity
which did her honor. But when Lamartine, mounting the tribune,
cast aside her claims, and announced that the moment had arrived
for proclaiming a provisional government and a republic, she was
hustled and pushed aside by the crowd.
She was dressed in deep mourning. Her long black veil, partly raised,
showed her fair face marred with sorrow and anxiety. Her children
were dressed in little black velvet skirts and jackets, with large
white turned-down collars. Soon the crowd around the tribune, beneath
which the duchess had her seat, grew so furious that her attendants,
fearing for her life, hurried her away.
In the press and the confusion the Duc de Nemours and her two children
were parted from her. The Comte de Paris was seized by a gigantic
man _en blouse_, who said afterwards that he had been only anxious
to protect the child; but a National Guard forced the boy from his
grasp, and restored him to his mother. The Duc de Chartres was
for some time lost, and was in great danger, having been knocked
down on the staircase by an ascending crowd.
At last, however, the little party, under the escort of the Duc
de Nemours, who had disguised himself, escaped on foot into the
streets, then growing dark; and finding a hackney-coach, persuaded
the coachman to drive them to a place of safety. The Duc de Chartres
was not to be found, and his mother passed many hours of terrible
anxiety before he was restored to her arms.
Very strange that night was the scene in the Champs Elysées. They
were filled with a joyous and triumphant crowd in every variety of
military costume, and armed with every sort of weapon. Soldiers alone
were unarmed. They marched arm-in-arm with their new friends, singing,
like them, the "Marseillaise" and "Mourir pour la Patrie." In the
quarter of the Champs Elysées, where well-to-do foreigners formed a
considerable part of the population, there was no ferocity exhibited
by the mob. The insurgents were like children at play,--children on
their good behavior. They had achieved a wonderful and unexpected
victory. The throne had fallen, as if built on sand. Those who
had overturned it were in high good-humor.
A French mob at the present day is very different. It has the modern
grudge of laborer against employer, it has memories of the license
of the Commune, and above all it has learned the use of _absinthe_.
There is a hatred and a contempt for all things that should command
men's reverence, which did not display itself in 1848.
May I here be permitted to relate a little story connected with
this day's events? I was with my family in Paris during those days
of revolution. Our nurse,--an Englishwoman who had then been with us
twenty-five years, and who died recently, at the age of ninety-eight,
still a member of our family,--when we returned home from viewing
the devastation at the Tuileries, expressed strongly her regret
at not having accompanied us. She was consoled, however, by an
offer from our man-servant to escort her down the Champs Elysées.
They made their way to the Place du Carrousel, at the back of the
palace, where a dense crowd was assembled, and the good lady became
separated from her protector. The National Guard and the servants
in the palace had just succeeded in getting the crowd out of the
rooms and in closing the doors. This greatly disappointed our good
nurse. She had counted on seeing the interior of the king's abode,
and above all, the king's throne. She could speak very little French,
but she must in some way have communicated her regrets to the crowd
around her. "Does Madame desire so much to pass in?" said a big
man in a blouse, girt with a red sash, and carrying a naked sword;
"then Madame _shall_ pass in!" Thereupon he and his followers in
the front rank of the crowd so bepummelled the door with the hilts
of their swords and the stocks of their muskets that those within
were forced to throw it open. In marched our dear nurse beside her
protector. They passed through room after room until they reached
the throne-room; there she indicated her wish to obtain a relic of
departed royalty. Instantly her friend with the bare sword sliced
off from the throne a piece of red velvet with gold embroidery.
She kept it ever after, together with a delicate china cup marked
L. P.; but the cup was much broken. "You see, dears," she would
say to us, "there was lots of things like these lying about, but
there were men standing round with naked swords ready to cut your
head off if you stole anything. So I took this cup and broke it.
It was not stealing to carry off a broken cup, you know." And she
would add, when winding up her narrative: "Those Frenchmen was
so polite to me that they did n't even tread on my corns."
That night there was a brilliant conflagration in the Carrousel. It
was a bonfire of those very carriages which eighteen years before
the mob had brought in triumph to Louis Philippe from the stables
of Charles X. at Rambouillet.
All the next day not a newspaper was to be had. The "Presse," indeed,
brought out a half sheet, mainly taken up in returning thanks to two
compositors "who, between two fires," had been "so considerate" as
to set up the type. But their consideration could not have lasted
long, for the news broke off abruptly in the middle of a sentence
on the first page. Events worked faster than compositors.
By noon on Friday, February 25, the entire population of Paris
was in the streets. From the flags on public offices, the blue
and white strips had been tom away. On that day--but on that day
only--every man wore a red ribbon in his button-hole. Many did so
very unwillingly, for red was understood to be the badge of Red
Republicanism.
On the Boulevards the iron railings had been tom up, and most of
the trees had been cut down. They were replanted, however, not
long after, to the singing of the "Marseillaise" and the firing of
cannon. For more than a week there was a strange quiet in Paris:
no vehicles were in the streets, for the paving-stones had been
torn up for barricades; no shops were open; on the closed shutters
of most of them appeared the words "Armes données," Everywhere a
paintbrush had been passed over the royal arms. Even the words
"roi," "reine," "royal," were effaced. The patriots were very zealous
in exacting these removals. Two _gamins_ with swords hacked patiently
for two hours at a cast-iron double-headed Austrian eagle.
Change (small money, I mean) was hardly to be had in Paris. For
a month it was necessary, in order to obtain it, to apply at the
Mairie of the Arrondissement, and to stand for hours in a _queue_.
Other money could be had only from the bankers in thousand-franc
notes. Shopping was of course at an end, and half Paris was thrown
out of employment. Gold and silver were hidden away.
Louis Philippe and his family drove in their two cabriolets to
Versailles. There they found great difficulty in getting post-horses.
Indeed, they would have procured none, had there not been some
cavalry horses in the place, which were harnessed to one of the
royal carriages. About midnight of their second day's journey they
reached Dreux. There Louis Philippe found himself without money,
and had to borrow from one of his tenants. He had left behind him
in his haste three hundred and fifty thousand francs on a table
in the Tuileries.
The Provisional Government, which was kept well informed as to
his movements, forwarded to him a supply of money. At Dreux the
king's party was joined by the Duke of Montpensier with news that
the king's attempt to save the monarchy by abdication had failed.
The old man seemed stupefied by his sudden fall. Over and over
again he was heard to repeat: "Comme Charles X.! Comme Charles X.!"
The next day, travelling under feigned names, the royal party pushed
on to Evreux, where they were hospitably received by a farmer in
the forest, who harnessed his work-horses to their carriage. Thence
they went on to their own Château d'Eu. The danger to which during
this journey they were exposed arose, not from the new Government
at Paris, but from the excited state of the peasantry.
After many perils and adventures, sometimes indeed travelling on
foot to avoid dangerous places, they reached Harfleur on March
3. An English steamer, the "Express," lay at the wharf, on which
the king and queen embarked as Mr. and Mrs. William Smith. The
following morning they were off the English coast, at Newbern.
They landed, and proceeded at once to Claremont, the palace given
to their son-in-law, Leopold of Belgium, for his lifetime by the
English Parliament.
The government set up in Paris was a provisional one. The members
of the Provisional Government were many of them well known to the
public, and of approved character. No men ever had a more difficult
task before them, and none ever tried with more self-sacrifice to
do their duty.
The measures they proposed were eighteen in number:
1. The retention of the tricolor.
2. The retention of the Gallic cock.
3. The sovereignty of the people.
4. The dissolution of the Chamber of Deputies.
5. The suppression of the Chamber of Peers.
6. The convocation of a National Assembly.
7. Work to be guaranteed to all working-men.
8. The unity of the army and the populace.
9. The formation of a Garde Mobile.
10. The arrest and punishment of all deserters.
11. The release of all political prisoners.
12. The trial of M. Guizot and his colleagues.
13. The reduction of Vincennes and Fort Valérien, still held by the
troops for the king.
14. All officials under Louis Philippe to be released from their oaths.
15. All objects at the Mont de Piété (the Government pawn-broking
establishment) valued under ten francs, to be restored.
16. All National Guards dismissed under preceding Governments to be
reinstated.
17. The million of francs expended on the court to be given to disabled
workmen.
18. A paternal commission to be nominated, to look after the interests
of the working-classes.
The institution of the Garde Mobile was a device for finding employment
for those boys and young men who formed one of the most dangerous
of the dangerous classes.
It is easy to see how tempting these promises were to working-men;
and yet the better class among them mourned their loss of steady
employment. The Revolution of 1848, though it was not originated
by the working-classes, was made to appear as if it were intended
for their profit; and that indeed was its ruin, for it was found
impossible to keep the promises of work, support, parental protection,
etc., made to the Parisian masses. The _bourgeoisie_, when they
recovered from their astonishment and found that the stone they
had set rolling under the name of reform had dislodged their own
Revolution of 1830, and the peasants of the provinces, when they
found that all the praise and all the profits were solely for the
working-men of the capital, were very far from satisfied.
As to the upper classes, their terror and dismay were overwhelming.
Everything seemed sliding away under their feet. Many women of rank
and fashion, distrusting the stability of the king's government, had
for some time past been yearly adding diamonds to their necklaces,
because, as one of them exclaimed to us during this month of February:
"We knew not what might happen to stocks or to securities, but
diamonds we can put into our pockets. No other property in France
can be called secure!"
And yet Paris soon resumed its wonted appearance. Commerce and
shopping might be impossible in a city where nobody could make
change for two hundred dollars, yet the Champs Elysées were again
gay with pedestrians and carriages. All favorite amusements were
resumed, but almost all men being idle, their great resource was
to assemble round the Hôtel-de-Ville and force Lamartine to make
a speech to them.
On Saturday, March 4, all Paris crowded to the Boulevards to witness
the funeral _cortège_ of the victims. There were neither military
nor police to keep order; yet the crowd was on its good behavior,
and strict decorum was maintained. There were about three hundred
thousand persons in the procession, and as many more on the sidewalks.
As they marched, mourners and spectators all sang the Chant of the
Girondins ("Mourir pour la Patrie") and the "Marseillaise."
Two things distinguished this revolution of February from all other
French revolutions before or after it,--the high character and
self-devotion of the men placed at the head of affairs, and the
absence of prejudice against religion. The revolution, so far from
putting itself in antagonism with religious feeling, everywhere
appealed to it. The men who invaded the Tuileries bowed before
the crucifix in the queen's chamber. Priests who were known to be
zealous workers among the poor were treated as fathers. _Curés_
blessed the trees of liberty planted in their parishes. Prayers for
the Republic were offered at the altars, and in country villages
priests headed the men of their congregations who marched up to
the polls.
[Illustration: _ALPHONSE DE LAMARTINE._]