“The name of Odilon Barrot is a guarantee that the widest and most
open appeal will be made to the nation; and that you will have in all
sincerity a representative government.”
My declaration is responded to with applause from several points, but it
appears evident that the great bulk of the crowd is uncertain as to what
view of the situation they ought to take, and are not satisfied.
We re-enter the hall of the Mairie.
“Now,” I say to M. Ernest Moreau, “I must go and proclaim the news in
the Place de la Bastille.”
But the Mayor is discouraged.
“You can very well see that it is useless,” he says sadly. “The Regency
is not accepted. And you have spoken here in a quarter where you are
known and loved. At the Bastille your audience will be the revolutionary
people of the faubourg, who will perhaps harm you.”
“I will go,” I say, “I promised Odilon Barrot that I would.”
“I have changed my hat,” the Mayor goes on, “but remember my hat of this
morning.”
“This morning the army and the people were face to face, and there was
danger of a conflict; now, however, the people are alone, the people are
the masters.”
“Masters--and hostile; have a care!”
“No matter, I have promised, and I will keep my promise.”
I tell the Mayor that his place is at the Mairie and that he ought
to stay there. But several National Guard officers present themselves
spontaneously and offer to accompany me, among them the excellent M.
Launaye, my former captain. I accept their friendly offer, and we form
a little procession and proceed by the Rue du Pas de la Mule and the
Boulevard Beaumarchais towards the Place de la Bastille.
Here are a restless, eager crowd in which workingmen predominate, many
of them armed with rifles taken from the barracks or given up to them
by the soldiers; shouts and the song of the Girondins: “Die for the
fatherland!” numerous groups debating and disputing passionately. They
turn round, they look at us, they interrogate us:
“What’s the news? What is going on?” And they follow us. I hear my name
mentioned coupled with various sentiments: “Victor Hugo! It’s Victor
Hugo!” A few salute me. When we reach the Column of July we are
surrounded by a considerable gathering. In order that I may be heard I
mount upon the base of the column.
I will only repeat the words which it was possible for me to make my
turbulent audience hear. It was much less a speech than a dialogue, but
the dialogue of one voice with ten, twenty, a hundred voices more or
less hostile.
I began by announcing at once the abdication of Louis Philippe, and, as
in the Place Royale, applause that was practically unanimous greeted the
news. There were also, however, cries of “No! no abdication, deposition!
deposition!” Decidedly, I was going to have my hands full.
When I announced the Regency violent protests arose:
“No! no! No Regency! Down with the Bourbons! Neither King nor Queen! No
masters!”
I repeated: “No masters! I don’t want them any more than you do. I have
defended liberty all my life.”
“Then why do you proclaim the Regency?”
“Because a Queen-Regent is not a master. Besides, I have no right
whatever to proclaim the Regency; I merely announce it.”
“No! no! No Regency!”
A man in a blouse shouted: “Let the peer of France be silent. Down with
the peer of France!” And he levelled his rifle at me. I gazed at him
steadily, and raised my voice so loudly that the crowd became silent:
“Yes, I am a peer of France, and I speak as a peer of France. I swore
fidelity, not to a royal personage, but to the Constitutional Monarchy.
As long as no other government is established it is my duty to be
faithful to this one. And I have always thought that the people approved
of a man who did his duty, whatever that duty might be.”
There was a murmur of approbation and here and there a few bravos.
But when I endeavoured to continue: “If the Regency--” the protests
redoubled. I was permitted to take up only one of these protests. A
workman had shouted: “We will not be governed by a woman.” I retorted
quickly:
“Well, neither will I be governed by a woman, nor even by a man. It was
because Louis Philippe wanted to govern that his abdication is to-day
necessary and just. But a woman who reigns in the name of a child! Is
that not a guarantee against all thought of personal government? Look at
Queen Victoria in England--”
“We are French, we are!” shouted several voices. “No Regency!”
“No Regency? Then, what? Nothing is ready, nothing! It means a total
upheaval, ruin, distress, civil war, perhaps; in any case, it is the
unknown.”
One voice, a single voice, cried: “Long live the Republic!”
No other voice echoed it. Poor, great people, irresponsible and blind!
They know what they do not want, but they do not know what they do want.
From this moment the noise, the shouts, the menaces became such that
I gave up the attempt to get myself heard. My brave Launaye said: “You
have done what you wanted to, what you promised to do; the only thing
that remains for us to do is to withdraw.”
The crowd opened before us, curious and inoffensive. But twenty paces
from the column the man who had threatened me with his rifle came up
with us and again levelled his weapon at me, shouting: “Down with the
peer of France!” “No, respect the great man!” cried a young workman,
who, with a quick movement, pushed the rifle downward. I thanked this
unknown friend with a wave of the hand and passed on.
At the Mairie, M. Ernest Moreau, who it appears had been very anxious
about us, received us with joy and cordially congratulated me. But I
knew that even when their passions are aroused the people are just; and
not the slightest credit was due to me, for I had not been uneasy in the
least.
While these things were happening in the Place de la Bastille, this is
what was taking place at the Palais Bourbon:
There is at this moment a man whose name is in everybody’s mouth and
the thought of whom is in everybody’s mind; that man is Lamartine. His
eloquent and vivid _History of the Girondins_ has for the first time
taught the Revolution to France. Hitherto he had only been illustrious;
he has become popular and may be said to hold Paris in his hand.
In the universal confusion his influence could be decisive. This is
what they said to themselves in the offices of the National, where the
possible chances of the Republic had been weighed, and where a scheme
for a provisional government had been sketched, from which Lamartine had
been left out. In 1842, at the time of the debate over the Regency which
resulted in the choice of the Duke de Nemours, Lamartine had pleaded
warmly for the Duchess d’Orleans. Was he imbued with the same ideas
to-day? What did he want? What would he do? It was necessary that this
should be ascertained. M. Armand Marrast, the editor-in-chief of the
National, took with him three notorious Republicans, M. Bastide, M.
Hetzel, the publisher, and M. Bocage, the eminent comedian who created
the role of Didier in “Marion de Lorme.” All four went to the Chamber of
Deputies. They found Lamartine there and held a conference with him in
one of the offices.
They all spoke in turn, and expressed their convictions and hopes. They
would be happy to think that Lamartine was with them for the immediate
realization of the Republic. If, however, he judged that the transition
of the Regency was necessary they asked him to at least aid them in
obtaining serious guarantees against any retrogression. They awaited
with emotion his decision in this great matter.
Lamartine listened to their reasons in silence, then requested them
to allow him a few minutes for reflection. He sat apart from them at a
table, leaned his head upon his hands, and thought. His four visitors,
standing and silent, gazed at him respectfully. It was a solemn moment.
“We listened to history passing,” said Bocage to me.
Lamartine raised his head and said: “I will oppose the Regency.”
A quarter of an hour later the Duchess d’Orleans arrived at the Chamber
holding by the hand her two sons, the Count de Paris and the Duke
de Chartres. M. Odilon. Barrot was not with her. The Duke de Nemours
accompanied her.
She was acclaimed by the deputies. But, the Chamber having been
dissolved, were there any deputies?
M. Crémieux ascended the tribune and flatly proposed a provisional
government. M. Odilon Barrot, who had been fetched from the Ministry of
the Interior, made his appearance at last and pleaded for the Regency,
but without éclat and without energy. Suddenly a mob of people and
National Guards with arms and flags invaded the chamber. The Duchess
d’Orleans, persuaded by her friends, withdrew with her children.
The Chamber of Deputies then vanished, submerged by a sort of
revolutionary assembly. Ledru-Rollin harangued this crowd. Next came
Lamartine, who was awaited and acclaimed. He opposed the Regency, as he
had promised.
That settled it. The names for a provisional government were proposed
to the people. And by shouts of “yes” or “no” the people elected
successively: Lamartine, Dupont de l’Eure, Arago, and Ledru-Rollin
unanimously, Crémieux, Gamier-Pages, and Marie by a majority.
The new ministers at once set out for the Hotel de Ville.
At the Chamber of Deputies not once was the word “Republic” uttered in
any of the speeches of the orators, not even in that of Ledru-Rollin.
But now, outside, in the street, the elect of the people heard this
words this shout, everywhere. It flew from mouth to mouth and filled the
air of Paris.
The seven men who, in these supreme and extreme days, held the destiny
of France in their hands were themselves at once tools and playthings in
the hands of the mob, which is not the people, and of chance, which is
not providence. Under the pressure of the multitude; in the bewilderment
and terror of their triumph, which overwhelmed them, they decreed the
Republic without having time to think that they were doing such a great
thing.
When, having been separated and dispersed by the violent pushing of the
crowd, they were able to find each other again and reassemble, or rather
hide, in one of the rooms of the Hotel de Ville, they took half a sheet
of paper, at the head of which were printed the words: “Prefecture of
the Seine. Office of the Prefect.” M. de Rambuteau may that very morning
have used the other half of the sheet to write a love-letter to one of
his “little bourgeoises,” as he called them.
Under the dictation of terrible shouts outside Lamartine traced this
phrase:
“The Provisional Government declares that the Provisional Government
of France is the Republican Government, and that the nation shall be
immediately called upon to ratify the resolution of the Provisional
Government and of the people of Paris.”
I had this paper, this sheet smeared and blotted with ink, in my hands.
It was still stamped, still palpitating, so to speak, with the fever
of the moment. The words hurriedly scribbled were scarcely formed.
_Appelée_ was written _appellée_.
When these half dozen lines had been written Lamartine handed the sheet
to Ledru-Rollin.
Ledru-Rollin read aloud the phrase: “The Provisional Government
declares that the Provisional Government of France is the Republican
Government--”
“The word ‘provisional’ occurs twice,” he commented.
“That is so,” said the others.
“One of them at least must be effaced,” added Ledru-Rollin.
Lamartine understood the significance of this grammatical observation,
which was simply a political revolution.
“But we must await the sanction of France,” he said. “I can do without
the sanction of France,” cried Ledru-Rollin, “when I have the sanction of
the people.”
“Of the people of Paris. But who knows at present what is the will of
the people of France?” observed Lamartine.
There was an interval of silence. The noise of the multitude without
sounded like the murmuring of the ocean. Ledru-Rollin went on:
“What the people want is the Republic at once, the Republic without
waiting.”
“The Republic without any delay?” said Lamartine, covering an objection
in this interpretation of Ledru-Rollin’s words.
“We are provisional,” returned Ledru-Rollin, “but the Republic is not!”
M. Crémieux took the pen from Lamartine’s hands, scratched out the
word “provisional” at the end of the third line and wrote beside it:
“actual.”
“The actual government? Very well!” said Ledru-Rollin, with a slight
shrug of the shoulder.
The seal of the City of Paris was on the table. Since 1830 the vessel
sailing beneath a sky starred with fleurs-de-lys and with the device,
_Proelucent clarius astris_, had disappeared from the seal of the City.
The seal was merely a circle with the words “Ville de Paris” in the
centre. Crémieux took the seal and stamped the paper so hastily with it
that the words appeared upside down.
But they did not sign this rough draught. Their whereabouts had been
discovered; an impetuous stream was surging against the door of
the office in which they had taken refuge. The people were calling,
ordering, them to go to the meeting-hall of the Municipal Council.
There they were greeted by this clamour: “The Republic! Long live
the Republic! Proclaim the Republic!” Lamartine, who was at first
interrupted by the cries, succeeded at length with his grand voice in
calming this feverish impatience.
The members of the Provisional Government were thus enabled to return
and resume their session and lively discussion. The more ardent ones
wanted the document to read: “The Provisional Government proclaims the
Republic.” The moderates proposed: “The Provisional Government desires
the Republic.” A compromise was reached on the proposition of M.
Crémieux, and the sentence was made to read: “The Provisional Government
‘is for’ the Republic.” To this was added: “subject to the ratification
of the people, who will be immediately consulted.”
The news was at once announced to the crowds in the meeting-hall and in
the square outside, who would listen to nothing but the word “republic,”
and saluted it with tremendous cheering.
The Republic was established. _Alea jacta_, as Lamartine observed later.