ROYAL VISITORS
One night the future King of Siam came to dine with us. I took him into
the nursery to see the children. Mimi sat bolt upright in her crib. She
eyed the young stranger and frowned.
"Hello, king," she said, "where's your crown?"
I confessed to a similar feeling when from the balcony of a friend's
home in the Avenue du Bois de Bologne I saw the King of England riding
into Paris for the first of the welcomes we were giving Allied
sovereigns. It was natural that Great Britain should come ahead of other
nations. England had been the comrade-in-arms from the first days and
aided powerfully in preventing the Germans from reaching Paris in the
fierce onslaught of 1914. But it is a pity that the King was not
accompanied by Marshal French or Sir Douglas Haig. Parisians are
peculiarly sensitive to personality. George V has none. There was
nothing in the rôle he had played during the war to make the crowd feel
that he personified the valiant armies of the greatest and most faithful
ally. If only Beatty or Jellicoe had ridden with him through the Avenue
du Bois and down the Champs-Elysées. The war had not deepened the
enthusiasm of the French for a monarch simply because he was a monarch.
A crown and a royal robe might have helped George with the Paris crowd.
I am not sure even then. As my concierge put it when I told her that I
was going to cheer the royal visitor,
"_Voyons_, what has that king done in the war besides falling off his
horse?"
And then the weather was against our British guest. I do not care what
the occasion is, rain and enthusiasm do not go together in a Paris
crowd.
The King of the Belgians had good weather and received cheers that came
from the heart. We thought of him not as a royal personage but as the
man who had saved Paris at the beginning of the war because he put honor
and his country ahead of personal interest and blood. The French saw in
him also a soldier who had lived the life of the camp sharing the
hardships and dangers of his little army in the corner of Belgium the
Germans were never able to conquer. From the first day of the war to the
signing of the armistice, Albert I did not doff his uniform. He never
asked of his soldiers what he himself was not ready to do. And he came
to Paris with his queen, who had been idolized by the French. No woman
in the world was so popular in France as Elizabeth despite her German
origin.
The protocol for the royal visits was as elaborate as the ceremony
proved to be simple. The guests were received by President and Madame
Poincaré at the little Ceinture station at the Porte Dauphine. Headed
and followed by a single row of _gardes républicaines_ on horse, they
rode in open carriages down the Avenue du Bois de Bologne and the
Champs-Elysées and across the Pont de la Concorde to the Palais d'Orsay
where they were lodged. Infantry regiments, lining the route, aided the
police in keeping order. There was no parade and no music. The attention
and the acclamation of the crowd were concentrated on the visitors. As
state carriages are swung high, every one was able to see the king. The
Avenue du Bois is ideal for a procession. The park slopes up on either
side, affording a clear view for hundreds of thousands. And there are
innumerable trees for boys.
Those who were unable to get to the Avenue du Bois or the Champs-Elysées
at the time the visitors came had a chance to see them in the streets
afterward. For visits were exchanged between the royal visitors and
President Poincaré, and on the second day of the visit they rode in
state down the Rue de Rivoli to receive the freedom of Paris at the
Hôtel de Ville. The return from the Hôtel de Ville was made by the
Grands Boulevards and the Rue Royale. Then on the first evening was the
state dinner at the Elysée and on the second evening the gala
performance at the Opéra. If any one in Paris did not see the
sovereigns, it was not because of lack of opportunity.
The evening before we were to receive President Wilson, Rosalie burst
into my room in great excitement.
"Hush, hush!" I whispered. "I have just put the baby to bed."
But my pretty little cook did not hear me. She hurried to the window and
bounced out on the balcony. I followed.
"What is the matter?" I asked.
"Madame has only to listen: every church bell in Paris is ringing. What
is it, Madame? In my Brittany village the bells rang that way only when
they posted the mobilization order at the _mairie_. Is it the tocsin? Is
the war going to begin again?"
"Of course not," I answered. "It's a whole month since the armistice.
Cheer up, Rosalie, perhaps the Kaiser is dead."
The older children and Elisa and Alice were now with us. The bells
continued ringing, and we heard cannon, one boom after another. It was
the salute that had been given for the royal visitors by the guns of
Mont Valérian. Now we realized that the special train from Brest had
arrived.
"It is the _Président-Vilsonne_!" said Alice in the reverent tone, that
she had been taught to use in speaking of "l'Eternel." If you have heard
a French Protestant reciting a psalm, and pronouncing the beautiful
French word for Jehovah, you will understand what I mean.
My young governess struck the note of the Wilsonian greeting. All that
has happened since that memorable December day has dispelled little by
little the legend of the Wilson who was to deliver the world from the
bondage of war. The French quickly discovered that their idol had feet
of clay. Whether they expected too much from what President Wilson had
said in his speeches or whether his failure to make good his promises
was due to circumstances beyond his power to control is not for us to
judge. We do not know the facts and we have no perspective. But at the
moment we did not foresee the disappointment in store for us. A merciful
providence, veiling the future, allows us the joy of entertaining hopes
without realizing that they are illusions. Legends are beautiful and
touching. But they are most precious when you think they are true, and
nothing can rob one of the memory of moments on the mountain top.
Fearing that the Métro to the Place de l'Etoile would be crowded, we got
up very early that Saturday morning. The day of President Wilson's
coming--whatever day the great event would happen--had been declared
beforehand a holiday. So we could take the children with us. We were
none too soon. All Paris of our quarter was going in the same direction.
Without a grown person for each child, the Métro would have been
difficult. When we came up at Kléber station the aspect of the streets
around the Etoile assured us that the Wilson welcome would break all
records. We passed through side streets to the Avenue du Bois--by the
corner of the Etoile it was already impossible, and thanked our stars
that the friends who invited us to see the royal visits from their
apartment lived on the near side of the street. To cross the Avenue du
Bois would have been a problem.
Lloyd struck against going up to the wonderful vantage point on a fourth
floor. The good things Aunt Eleanor and Aunt Caroline would certainly
have for him to eat meant nothing when he saw boys in trees. Having no
good reason to deny him, his father yielded. My son climbed a tree near
the side-walk with Herbert standing guardian below while the rest of us
were high above.
I shall not attempt to describe the welcome given to President Wilson.
After the carriages passed and the crowd broke, the children went home.
Herbert and I followed the current of enthusiastic, delirious Parisians
down the Champs-Elysées, up the Rue Royale and the Avenue Malesherbes.
Wilson beamed and responded to the greeting of Paris. He did not grasp
what that greeting meant. Clemenceau, Parisian himself, knew that the
power to change the world was in the hands of the man riding ahead of
him. But this is retrospect! I did not realize then that one of the
greatest tragedies of history was being enacted under my eyes. Perhaps I
am wrong in thinking so now. Who knows?
More significant in its potentiality than the initial greeting to
President Wilson was the acclamation that greeted him when he went to
the Hôtel de Ville. Belleville turned out. From the heart of the common
people came the cry, "_Vive la paix Wilsonienne!_" It was taken up and
re-echoed with frenzy when the guest of Paris appeared on the balcony of
the Hôtel de Ville.
The coming of the King of Italy was an anti-climax. Paris, of course,
responded with her customary politeness to the duty of welcoming the
sovereign of France's Latin ally. But heart was lacking in the reception
to Victor Emanuel III. The comparative coolness was not intentional. I
am sure of that. It was simply that we were coming down from the
mountain top to earth.
And when the Peace Conference assembled, Paris very quickly realized
that the hope of a new world was an illusion. Our royal visitors came at
the right moment. Paris will give enthusiastic welcome to other rulers
in future days. But not in our generation! A famous saying of Abraham
Lincoln's comes into my mind. There is no need to quote it.