Produced by Al Haines
[Frontispiece: AS THEY CLIMBED UP THEY WERE CLUBBED WITH MUSKETS]
HISTORICAL ROMANCES OF FRANCE
THE INVASION OF
FRANCE IN 1814
TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF
ERCKMANN-CHATRIAN
ILLUSTRATED
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
NEW YORK::::::::::::::::::::::1911
COPYRIGHT, 1889, 1898
BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
ILLUSTRATIONS
_As they climbed up they were clubbed with muskets . . . Frontispiece_
_There was a general shout of_ "_Long live France!_"
_Big Dubreuil; the friend of the allies_
_Yegof saluted each phantom with sparkling eyes_
"_Let us overwhelm them, as at Blutfeld!_"
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
The invasion of France by the allied armies after the battle of Leipsic
had proved the German campaign even more disastrous than that of Russia
the year before, was not only essentially the death-blow to the power
of Napoleon, but was the first real taste France had had for many years
of an experience she had so often previously meted out to her
neighbors. In spite of all she had suffered from the conscription and
from exhaustion of men and treasure in offensive war--or at least war
waged outside her own territory--the great Invasion meant for her
something far more terrible than any reverses she had yet undergone.
Napoleon was not only not invincible, it appeared, he was not even able
to defend the frontiers he had found firmly established on his
accession to power. The allies had announced that they were warring
not against France but against the French Emperor--"against the
preponderance that Napoleon had too long exercised beyond the limits of
his empire." Everywhere in France except in the official world of
Paris, the once enchanted name of Napoleon had become recognized as a
synonym of national disaster.
Nevertheless nothing--except, perhaps, the similar circumstances of the
Prussian invasion in 1870--has ever so well attested the fundamental
and absorbing patriotism of the French people as their heroic
resistance to this invasion and their instinctive and universal refusal
to separate in this crisis the cause of their Emperor from their own.
The presence of a foreign foe on whatever pretext within their
boundaries sufficed to arouse them _en masse_. No such enthusiasm had
been known since the days of the Republic's and the Consulate's
victories as was awakened, in the thick of national disaster and amid
the ruin of all ambitious hopes, by the thought of an enemy within the
borders of _la patrie_. And in "The Invasion" of MM. Erckmann-Chatrian
this enthusiasm and devotion find a chronicle which is most
realistically impressive. So soon as the peasants of the outlying
villages of the eastern frontier learn of the impending descent of the
Cossacks and Germans, without thought of their own comfort and
safety--which it is, however, impartially pointed out they know would
hardly be better secured by submission--they organize for resistance.
They blockade the highways and defend the mountain passes. Women and
children aid in the work. While the siege of Phalsbourg goes on the
heights are occupied by sturdy peasants who oppose for a while an
effective obstacle to the passage of the invaders. The worst
hardships, the most perilous adventures, are accepted by them with the
heroic courage of regulars. Outlaws and smugglers work and fight hand
to hand with the respected worthies of the neighborhood. They watch
their farms burn from their outlook on the hill-tops, they suffer the
pangs of starvation when their supplies are intercepted by the enemy,
they fight to desperation when their position is finally turned by the
treachery of a crazy German they have long harbored--and whose vagaries
give, by the way, a most romantic color to the narrative--and they are
finally slain or captured just as Paris capitulates and peace is made.
None of the National Novels is more graphic or more significant
historically than "The Invasion."
THE INVASION OF FRANCE IN 1814
CHAPTER I
THE OLD SHOEMAKER AND HIS DAUGHTER
If you would wish to know the history of the great invasion of 1814,
such as it was related to me by the old hunter Frantz du Hengst, you
must transport yourself to the village of Charmes, in the Vosges.
About thirty small houses, covered with shingles and dark-green
houseleeks, stand in rows along the banks of the Sarre: you can see the
gables carpeted with ivy and withered honeysuckles, for winter is
approaching; the beehives closed with corks of straw, the small
gardens, the palings, the hedges which separate them one from the other.
To the left, on a high mountain, arise the ruins of the ancient chateau
of Falkenstein, destroyed two hundred years ago by the Swedes. It is
now only a mass of stones and brambles; an old "timber-way," with its
worn-out steps, ascends to it through the pine-trees. To the right, on
the side of the hill, one can perceive the farm of Bois-de-Chenes--a
large building, with granaries, stables, and sheds, the flat roof
loaded with great stones, in order to resist the north wind. A few
cows are grazing in the heather, a few goats on the rocks.
Everything is calm and silent.
Some children, in gray stuff trousers, their heads and feet bare, are
warming themselves around their little fires on the outskirts of the
woods; the spiral lines of blue smoke fade away in the air, great white
clouds remain immovable above the valley; behind these clouds arise the
arid peaks of the Grosmann and Donon.
You must know that the end house of the village, whose square roof is
pierced by two loophole windows, and whose low door opens on the muddy
street, belonged, in 1813, to Jean-Claude Hullin, one of the old
volunteers of '92, but now a shoemaker in the village of Charmes, and
who was held in much consideration by the mountaineers. Hullin was a
short stout man, with gray eyes, large lips, a short nose, and thick
eyebrows. He was of a jovial, kind disposition, and did not know how
to refuse anything to his daughter Louise, a child whom he had picked
up among some miserable gypsies--farriers and tin-sellers--without
house or dwelling-place, who go from village to village mending pots
and pans, melting the ladles, and patching up cracked utensils. He
considered her as his own daughter, and never seemed to remember she
came of a strange race.
Besides this natural affection, the good old fellow possessed others
still: he loved above all his cousin, the old mistress of the farm of
Bois-de-Chenes, Catherine Lefevre, and her son Gaspard, who had been
carried off that year by the conscription--a handsome young fellow, the
"fiance" of Louise, and whose return was expected by all the family at
the end of the campaign.
Hullin recalled always with enthusiasm his campaigns of the
Sambre-et-Meuse, of Italy and of Egypt. He often thought of them, and
sometimes in the evening, when the work was over, he would go to the
sawmills of Valtin, that dark manufactory formed of trunks of trees
still bearing their bark, and which you can perceive down there at the
end of the valley. He sat down among the wood-cutters and
charcoal-gatherers, and sledges, in front of the great fire; and while
the heavy wheel turned, the dam thundered and the saws grinded, he, his
elbow on his knee, and his pipe in his mouth, would speak to them of
Hoche, of Kleber, and finally of General Bonaparte, whom he had seen
hundreds of times, and whose thin face, piercing eyes, and eagle
profile, he would depict as though he were present.
Such was Jean-Claude Hullin.
He was one of the old Gallic stock, fond of extraordinary adventures
and heroic enterprises, but constant to his work, out of a sentiment of
duty, from New Year's day until Saint Sylvester's.
As for Louise, the child of the tramp, she was a slender creature, with
long delicate hands, eyes of such a soft deep blue that they seemed to
penetrate to the depths of your soul, skin of a snowy whiteness, hair
of a pale straw-color, like silk in texture, and drooping shoulders
like those of a virgin praying. Her ingenuous smile, pensive
forehead--in fact, her whole appearance--recalled the old _Lied_ of the
Minnesinger Erhart, when he said: "I have seen a ray of light pass by:
my eyes are still dazzled by it. Was it a moonbeam piercing the
foliage? Was it a smile from the dawn in the forests? No, it was the
beautiful Edith, my love, who passed by. I have seen her, and my eyes
are still dazzled."
Louise only cared for fields, gardens, and flowers. In spring-time,
the first notes of the skylark made her shed tears of delight. She
went to see the budding hawthorn and blue cornflowers behind the hedges
on the hill-sides; she watched for the return of the swallows, from the
little windows of the garret. She was always the true child of the
homeless vagrants, only less wild. Hullin forgave her everything; he
understood her nature, and would sometimes say, laughingly:--"My poor
Louise, with the booty that thou bringest us,--thy fine sheaves of
flowers and golden wheat-ears--we should die of hunger in three days!"
Then she would smile so tenderly at him and embrace him so willingly,
that he would go on with his work, saying:--"Bah! why need I grumble?
She is right: she loves the sunshine. Gaspard will work for two--he
will have the happiness of four. I do not pity him: on the contrary.
One can find plenty of women who work, and that does not improve their
beauty; but loving woman! what luck to have found one--what luck!"
Thus reasoned the good old fellow; and days, weeks, and months wore
away in the expectation of Gaspard's return.
Madame Lefevre, an extremely energetic woman, partook of Hullin's ideas
on the subject of Louise.
"As for me," she said, "I only want a daughter who loves us; I do not
wish her to have anything to do with my household affairs. So long as
she is contented! Thou wilt not bother me--is it not so, Louise?"
And then they would embrace each other. But Gaspard did not return,
and for two months they had had no tidings of him.
On that same day, toward the middle of December, 1813, between three
and four o'clock in the afternoon, Hullin, bending over his bench, was
finishing a pair of nailed shoes for the wood-cutter Rochart. Louise
had just put an earthenware porringer down on the little iron stove,
which sang and crackled in a plaintive manner, while the old clock
counted the seconds in its monotonous tic-tac. Outside, all along the
street, could be perceived small pools of water, covered with a coating
of thin white ice, announcing the approach of intense cold. At times
the sound of great wooden shoes, running along the hardened road, could
be heard, and a felt hat, a cape, or a woollen cap would pass by: then
the noise would cease, and the plaintive hissing of the green wood in
the flames, the humming of Louise's spinning-wheel, and the boiling of
the porridge-pot again prevailed. This had gone on for about two
hours, when Hullin, glancing accidentally through the little
window-panes, stopped his work, and remained with his eyes wide open,
staring, as though absorbed by some unusual spectacle.
In fact, at the corner of the street, in front of the "Trois Pigeons,"
there advanced, in the midst of a crowd of whistling, jumping, and
shouting boys, who called out "The King of Diamonds! The King of
Diamonds!"--There advanced, I say, one of the strangest personages
imaginable. Picture to yourself a red-headed, red-bearded man, with a
grave face, gloomy expression, straight nose, the eyebrows meeting on
the forehead, a circle of tin on the head, a gray dogskin floating over
the back, its forepaws tied around the neck; the chest covered with
little copper crosses, the legs clothed with a sort of gray cloth
trousers fastened above the ankle, and the feet bare. A great raven,
with black wings glossed over with white, was perched on his shoulder.
From his imposing gait one would have taken him for one of the ancient
Merovingian kings, such as are represented by the images of
Montbeliard; he held in the left hand a short thick stick in the shape
of a sceptre, and with the right he made ostentatious gestures, raising
his finger toward heaven, and apostrophizing his retinue.
All the doors opened on his passage; behind every pane appeared
inquisitive faces. Some few old women on the outer stairs of their
houses, called out to the madman, who would not deign to turn his head;
others went down into the streets and tried to prevent him passing; but
he, lifting his head and raising his eyebrows, with one word and a
sign, forced them to make way.
"Hullo!" said Hullin, "here is Yegof. I did not expect to have seen
him again this winter. It is not one of his customs. What on earth
can bring him back in such weather?"
And Louise, laying down her distaff, hurried away to contemplate "The
King of Diamonds." It was a great event, the arrival of Yegof the
madman at the commencement of winter: some rejoiced over it, hoping to
keep him and make him relate his glory and fortunes in the inns;
others, and especially the women, were filled with a sort of vague
uneasiness, for madmen, as all know, have ideas from another world:
they know the past and the future--they are inspired by God: the only
thing is to know how to understand them--their words bearing always two
meanings: one for the ordinary run of people, the other for more
refined and delicate souls, and the wise. This madman besides, more
than another, had truly some sublime and extraordinary thoughts. None
knew from whence he came, nor where he went, nor what he wanted; for
Yegof wandered about the country like some troubled spirit. He spoke
of extinct races, and pretended that he was Emperor of Australasia, of
Polynesia, and of other lands besides. Great books could have been
written on his palaces, castles, and strongholds--of which he knew the
number, the situation, the architecture--and whose beauty, riches, and
grandeur, he would celebrate in a simple and modest manner. He spoke
of his stables, of his hunts, of his crown-officers, ministers,
counsellors, of the heads of his provinces; he never made any mistakes
as to their names or different merits; but he bitterly bewailed having
been dethroned by the accursed race: and the old midwife, Sapience
Coquelin, every time that she heard him groan over this subject, would
cry bitterly, and others also did the same. Then he would raise his
arms to heaven and cry out,--"O women, women! remember, remember! The
hour approaches--the spirits of darkness flee! the old race--the
masters of your masters--advance like the waves of the sea!"
And every spring he was in the habit of making a survey of all the old
owls' nests, the ancient castles, and all the ruins which crown the
Vosges in the depths of their forests, at Nideck, Geroldseck,
Lutzelbourg, and Turkestein, saying that he was going to visit his
territories, talking of re-establishing the past splendor of his
states, and of putting all mutinous people into slavery, with the aid
of his cousin the "Grand Golo."
Jean-Claude Hullin made light of these things, from not having a soul
elevated enough to enter into the invisible spheres; but Louise was
much troubled by them--above all, when the raven flapped its wings and
gave its hoarse cry.
Yegof, then, descended the street, without stopping anywhere; and
Louise, all excitement, seeing that he looked toward their little
house, said aloud,--"Papa Jean-Claude, I believe he is coming our way."
"It is quite possible," replied Hullin. "The poor devil must be in
need of a pair of good lined shoes for the great cold, and if he were
to ask me, I should hardly be able to refuse them to him."
"Oh, how kind you are!" said the young girl, embracing him
affectionately.
"Yes, yes! thou art flattering me," said he, laughing, "because I do
what thou wishest. Who will pay me for my wood and work? It will not
be Yegof!"
Louise kissed him again, and Hullin, looking lovingly at her,
murmured,--"This payment is worth the other."
Yegof was then about fifteen yards from their door: the tumult still
kept increasing; the boys hung on to the tatters of his coat, crying
out, "Diamond! Club! Spade!" Suddenly he turned, raised his sceptre,
and called out in a dignified though furious manner,--"Go back,
accursed race! Go back, deafen me no longer, or I will loose my
bloodhounds against you!"
This menace only made the shouts of laughter and hisses redouble; but
as at that moment Hullin appeared on the threshold with a long strap in
his hand, and distinguishing five or six of the most obstinate among
them, he warned them that that evening he would go and pull their ears
during their supper--a feat which he had already performed several
times with the consent of the parents, the whole band dispersed in
great consternation. Then, going toward the madman,--"Enter, Yegof,"
said the shoemaker, "come and warm thyself by the fire."
"I do not call myself Yegof," replied the unhappy man, looking
offended. "I call myself Luitprandt, King of Australasia and
Polynesia."
"Yes, yes, I know," said Jean-Claude--"I know! Thou hast already told
me all that. But what does it matter that thou callest thyself Yegof,
or Luitprandt? come in all the same. It is cold; try to warm thyself."
"I come in," replied the madman; "but it is for a much more serious
affair: it is for a state affair--to form an indissoluble alliance
between the Germans and the Triboques."
"Well, we will talk of that."
Yegof, stooping under the door, entered as though in a reverie, and
saluted Louise by bowing and lowering his sceptre; but the raven would
not come in. Opening his great wings, he made a circuit around the
house, and came and fastened himself onto the window-panes to break
them.
"Hans," shouted the madman, "take care! I am coming!"
But the bird did not detach its sharp claws from the casement, and
never ceased fluttering its great wings so long as its master remained
in the cottage. Louise did not take her eyes off it: she was afraid.
As for Yegof, he sat down in the old leathern armchair behind the
stove, his legs stretched out as though on a throne; and gazing around
him in a triumphant manner, he cried out,--"I come direct from Jerome,
to conclude an alliance with thee, Hullin. Thou art not ignorant that
I have deigned to cast my eyes on thy daughter, and I come to ask her
of thee in marriage."
At this proposition Louise blushed to the roots of her hair, and Hullin
burst into a loud laugh.
"Thou laughest!" cried the madman, in a hollow voice. "Well! thou art
wrong to laugh. This alliance may alone save thee from the impending
ruin of thyself, thy house, and all thy belongings. At this moment my
armies are advancing. They are countless--they cover the earth. What
can you do against me? You will be vanquished, annihilated, or reduced
to slavery, as you have already been for centuries: for I, Luitprandt,
King of Australasia and of Polynesia--I have decided that everything
shall be as it once was. Remember!"--here the madman raised his finger
solemnly--"remember what has passed! You have been beaten! And we,
the old northern races--we have put our yokes upon you. We have
burdened you with the largest stones for building our strong castles
and our subterraneous prisons; we have harnessed you to our ploughs;
you have been before us as the straw before the hurricane. Remember,
remember, Triboque, and tremble!"
"I remember very well," said Hullin, still laughing; "but we had our
revenge. Thou knowest?"
"Yes, yes," interrupted Yegof, frowning; "but that time has gone by.
My warriors are more numerous than the leaves in the forests; and your
blood flows like the water of the brooks. Thou, I know thee--I knew
thee a thousand years ago!"
"Bah!" said Hullin.
"Yes, it was this hand--dost thou hear?--this hand that has vanquished
thee, when, for the first time, we entered your forests. It has made
thy head bow beneath the yoke--it will make it bend again! Because you
are brave, you believe yourselves masters of this country and of all
France forever. Well, you are wrong! We have spoiled you, and we will
spoil you again. We will restore Alsace and Lorraine to Germany,
Brittany and Normandy to the men from the North, with Flanders and the
South to Spain. We will make France into a little kingdom around
Paris--a very little kingdom--with a descendant of the ancient race at
your head. And you will no longer agitate yourselves--you will be very
tranquil. Ha, ha, ha!" Yegof began to laugh.
Hullin, who had no knowledge of history, was astonished that he should
know so many names.
"Bah! stop that, Yegof," said he; "and come, take a little soup to warm
thy inside."
"I do not ask thee for soup; I ask thee for this girl in marriage--the
most beautiful on my estates. Give her to me willingly, and I raise
thee to the steps of my throne: else my armies shall take her by force,
and thou shalt not have the merit of giving her to me."
While thus speaking, the unhappy creature regarded Louise with an air
of profound admiration.
"How beautiful she is! I destine her to the greatest honors. Rejoice,
young girl, rejoice! Thou shalt be queen of Australasia."
"Listen, Yegof," said Hullin. "I am very much flattered by thy demand:
it shows that thou canst appreciate beauty. It is well. But my
daughter is already affianced to Gaspard Lefevre."
"And I," said the madman, greatly irritated--"I will not hear of such a
thing!" Then rising up,--"Hullin," said he, in solemn tones, "it is my
first demand. I will renew it yet twice again--dost thou hear--twice!
And if thou wilt persist in thy obstinacy--misfortune, misfortune on
thee and thy race!"
"What! thou wilt not take any soup?"
"No, no! I will accept nothing from thee so long as thou hast not
consented. Nothing, nothing!" And then marching toward the door, much
to the satisfaction of Louise, who was intent on the raven, fluttering
its wings against the window-panes, he said, raising his
sceptre,--"Twice again!" and departed.
Hullin went off into a shout of laughter. "Poor devil!" he exclaimed.
"In spite of himself, his nose turned toward the porringer. He has
nothing in his inside--his teeth chatter with hunger. Well! his
madness is stronger than either cold or hunger."
"Oh, how he frightened me!" said Louise.
"Come, come, my child, calm thyself. He is gone. He thinks thou art
pretty, fool though he is; do not let that terrify thee."
But although the madman had left, Louise still trembled, and felt
herself blushing when she thought of how he had looked at her.
Yegof had taken the road to Valtin. He could still be seen, his raven
on his shoulder, walking slowly along and making curious gestures,
although no one was near him. The night was drawing on, and soon the
tall figure of "The King of Diamonds" disappeared in the gray shadows
of the winter twilight.