THE BESIEGED RESIDENT
(Sept., 1870-Feb., 1871)
Mr. Labouchere was a famous raconteur and of the reminiscences he
loved to recount there was no more riveting a series than the one
relating his experiences as a journalist during the siege of Paris.
According to the _Times_[1] nothing that he ever achieved in
journalism or literature excelled or perhaps equalled the letters of
a "Besieged Resident," which he sent from Paris to the _Daily News_,
in the autumn and winter of 1870 and 1871. The correspondent of the
_Daily News_ in Paris at that period was the late Mr. George Morland
Crawford, who had occupied the position since 1851. Mr. Crawford had
already made Mr. Labouchere's acquaintance in the early sixties, when
the latter was an attaché at Frankfort, and they had met again later
on at Homburg. It had been the intention of Mr. Crawford to remain
at his post in Paris, when an unexpected offer from Henry Labouchere
to replace him temporarily caused him to alter his plans.
Mrs. Crawford has given a graphic account[2] of how Labouchere took
her husband's place as correspondent. He had been in Paris with the
exception of some excursions into the country for several weeks, and
had invited {120} Mr. Crawford to dine with him at Durand's on the
night of September 17. The party was to have included Aurélien
Scholl, celebrated then as a wit, Got of the Comédie Française, Dr.
Alan Herbert, and Mr. Frank Lawley. However, the uncertainty of
immediate events and the general rush of departure from the capital
obliged Labouchere to put off his party. He went at about six
o'clock to the Café du Vaudeville to find Mr. Crawford--first to tell
him that the dinner was countermanded, and then to propose to take
his place as correspondent in Paris, whilst he, Mr. Crawford, should
go to Tours. Mrs. Crawford happened to be with her husband at the
café, and she thus describes the impression Labouchere made upon her:
"Labby looked a young man on this, to me, memorable evening, but, at
the close of the siege, frightened Odo Russell by looking almost an
old one. Before my husband, who was writing, introduced us he began
to talk to me and I could not make him out, but at once enjoyed his
company. He had a very pleasing and intelligent face, I thought
spoke a little like an American (he had been escorting a party of
American young ladies to Rouen), had high caste manners, but with
naturalness, and much that was the reverse of that affectation of
owlish wisdom or cordial dodgery then rife in the diplomatic world.
I saw that he was somebody, both on his own account, and from
education, and thought that he might be some Don brought up in
England, who had made himself the president of a South American
Republic."
As soon as Mr. Crawford had finished his writing, Labouchere broached
the subject of the _Daily News_. He said: "A fancy seized me, as
Sheffield (of the British Embassy) told me you had sent your little
children to England, and your wife had resolved to stay through the
siege and give you what help she can. It is to take your place as
correspondent of the _Daily News_, and to send you into the
provinces. As I am a proprietor of the paper, Robinson won't object
to this arrangement. It would be an excellent thing {121} for my
heirs were I to stop a bullet or die of starvation, but were anything
of the sort to befall you it would be calamitous for you and yours.
You need not leave me the six weeks' provisions which Sheffield told
me you laid in, but can give them to poor neighbours. I can always
get as much fresh mutton as I want from the porter of the British
Embassy, who has orders to this effect. There is a flock of ewes and
wethers on the grounds there, to browse on the grass and eat the hay
laid in for the horses of Lord Lyons, before he had directions from
Granville to go to Tours to watch events there. The only person at
the Embassy is the porter. We two will have more mutton than we can
eat even if the siege lasts long. The porter knows how to grow
potatoes and mushrooms in an empty cellar, so that we two shall have
not only meat but dainties to vary the dishes. I have arranged to
have rooms at the Grand Hotel, so you see I shall be in clover."
Mrs. Crawford, who did not the least believe he was in earnest,
protested that she was not at all afraid of remaining in Paris, but
Labouchere persisted in his persuasions.
"If you were at all affected," he replied, "I should say, 'Don't be
theatrical.' Instead of that I shall say, 'Don't be like Lot's
wife.'" Then he took out his watch and explained that the last train
to leave Paris between then and the end of the siege would start from
the Gare St. Lazare that night at 9.40. "I advise you to go home at
once," he went on, "and pack up what clothes you can for your
temporary residence at the seat of the delegate government at Tours.
Lyons will be glad to have you near him, for, as you can understand,
he knows nothing personally of those friends of yours whom the
Revolution has brought to the top."
Mrs. Crawford lost no more time in discussion, and hurried off to
make her preparations in order to catch the last train by which she
and her husband could get out of Paris. The 9.40 train did not leave
St. Lazare that day before {122} midnight, and such was its weight of
passengers and baggage that no fewer than three engines had to be
coupled on.
The next day Mr. Labouchere sent his first letter to London, in his
capacity of Paris correspondent to the _Daily News_. The mails
continued to leave Paris regularly for another three days, but the
chaos that prevailed in the post-office did not inspire the citizens
who entrusted their correspondence to its tender care with overmuch
confidence.
"Everybody was in military uniform," writes Labouchere, "everybody
was shrugging his shoulders, and everybody was in the condition of a
London policeman, were he to see himself marched off to prison by a
street sweeper. That the Prussians should have taken the Emperor
prisoner and have vanquished the French armies, had of course
astonished these French bureaucrats, but that they should have
ventured to interfere with postmen had perfectly dumbfounded them."
Having disposed of his letter as best he might, Labouchere passed
through the courtyard to try his luck with a telegram. There he saw
postmen seated on the boxes of carts, with no horses before them. It
was their hour to carry out the letters, and thus mechanically they
fulfilled their duty. It is in touches such as these that the writer
makes the scenes of the winter months of '70 and '71 live before the
eyes of his readers. Were the ridiculous episodes he relates visible
to others besides himself, or were his journalistic abilities so
acutely developed that nothing significant, however minute, could
escape his eager scrutiny? It is not easy to say, but the fact
remains that he gave the world at that time, in astonishingly amusing
letters, vivid pictures of bureaucracy startled into ludicrous
attitudes of unaccustomed enterprise, of gilt and tinsel patriotism
ineffectually trying to replace the paper courage[3] of Imperial
{123} France--of an irresponsible populace brought face to face with
a catastrophe which they imagined to be impossible up till within the
last ten days of the siege.
The Parisians had undoubtedly a good excuse for the poor figure they
were obliged to cut before Europe in the January of 1871. Events,
which every one, except their ex-Emperor and his government, had
predicted as inevitable, had followed one another with a disastrous
rapidity, leaving them, after each one, _bouches béantes_, incapable
of deciding whether the most appropriate gesture to express their
attitude would be one of applause, of hisses, or of weeping.
Only six months had elapsed since the afternoon of the Emperor's
reception, at St. Cloud, of the members of the Senate, when M. Rouher
had said, during the course of his address, in words that, to-day,
sound as if they must have been meant to be ironical: "Your Majesty
has occupied the last four years in perfecting the armament and
organisation of the army," and since the King of Prussia and the
Sovereigns of South Germany had ordered the mobilisation of their
armies. Six months! But what a six months of bloodshed and fury, of
humiliation and defeat.
The Emperor left St. Cloud for the seat of war on July 28th, and went
straight to Metz, where a Council of War was held on August 4, with
Marshals Macmahon and Bazaine in attendance. That very day the Crown
Prince of Prussia fell upon a portion of Macmahon's army corps at
Weissenburg, and all but destroyed it, killing its general, Abel
Douay, and taking 800 prisoners. The next day a similar fate
overtook another corps, commanded by {124} Macmahon himself on the
hills above Wörth, when 6000 men were killed or taken prisoner, and
no less than thirty pieces of artillery with six mitrailleuses were
captured. Whilst the latter engagement was actually in progress
General Froissard's army corps, which was holding the heights above
Saarbrück, was driven back in confusion and with great loss upon Metz.
The news of these events fell upon the ears of startled Europe on
August 8. A fiasco, so hurried and hopeless, had not been
contemplated. At first a false report had reached Paris of a grand
victory won by Macmahon, who was supposed to have captured the Crown
Prince of Prussia with all his army. The enthusiastic excitement had
been unbounded. Gradually the truth was borne in upon the unhappy
people, and a hopeless reaction was the natural result. Napoleon's
apologetic telegrams from Metz did not cheer his subjects; even the
fourth of a series of five containing these words, _Tout pent se
rétablir_, brought little hope to their hearts, for it was impossible
not to be aware of the fact that, although the war was but three
weeks old, the Prussian invasion of France was going successfully and
steadily forward.
But France was still an Empire, and, on the morning of August 7, the
Empress-Regent presided over a ministerial council at 5 o'clock in
the morning, and convoked the chambers, who met on the 9th, when the
Ollivier Ministry resigned. The department of the Seine was declared
in a state of siege, and a permanent council of the Ministry was
established at the Tuileries. The Ollivier Ministry was replaced, by
one under Count Palikao.
It was still possible for news of the French defeats at the seat of
war to reach the capital. Bazaine's unsuccessful movement of retreat
from Metz to Verdun on August 15, followed by the bloody battle of
Gravelotte, resulting in his enforced retirement into the entrenched
camp of Metz, spread further consternation among the Imperial
Ministers {125} at home, and preparations for a siege began in
earnest. General Trochu was appointed Commander-in-Chief of all the
forces in Paris on August 17.
Sedan was fought on the first of September, and on the second, the
Emperor of the French sent his sword to the King of Prussia, who
thereupon appointed him a residence as a prisoner of war. Two days
later the advance guard of the Prussian army at Sedan set out for
Paris.
It is to the columns of the _Daily News_,[4] that we must turn for
the most authentic account of the way in which Paris took the news of
Sedan. Although Labouchere was not yet the official correspondent
from Paris, he nevertheless sent letters to Fleet Street dealing with
matters connected with the crisis, which were published above the
signature of a "Parisian Resident."
"The news of the Emperor's capture," he writes on September 4,
"reached the foreign embassies here at ten yesterday morning. At
about 8 o'clock it began to be rumoured that the Emperor and
Macmahon's army had surrendered. I saw a crowd of about 2000 men
going down the Boulevard, and shouting '_La déchéance_.' I took the
arm of a patriot, and we all went together to the Louvre to interview
General Trochu. He came out after we had shouted for him about
half-an-hour, and a deputation had gone in to him. There was a dead
silence as soon as he appeared, so what he said could be distinctly
heard. He told us that the news of the capture of the Emperor was
true, and that as for arms he could not give more than he had, and he
regretted to say that the millions on paper were not forthcoming."
In the course of the next twenty-four hours a bloodless revolution
was accomplished in Paris. On Sunday afternoon Labouchere got into a
carriage and drove about the city, noting everything he saw. "The
weather was {126} beautiful," he wrote; "it was one of the most
glorious early September days ever seen. I drove slowly along the
quay parallel with the Orangerie of the Tuileries before the Palace.
The Tuileries gardens were full of people. I learned that, in the
morning, orders had been given to close the gates, but that,
half-an-hour before I passed, the people had forced them open, and
that neither the troops nor the people made any resistance. My
coachman, who, I dare say, was an Imperialist yesterday, but was a
very strong Republican to-day, pointed out to me several groups of
people bearing red flags. I told him that the tricolour, betokening
the presence of the Empress, still floated from the central tower of
the Tuileries. While I was speaking, and at exactly twenty minutes
past three, I saw that flag taken down. That is an event in a man's
life not to be forgotten. Crossing over the Pont de Solferino to the
Quai d'Orsay, I witnessed an extraordinary sight indeed. From the
windows of those great barracks, formerly peopled with troops, every
man of whom was supposed to be ready to die for his Emperor, I saw
soldiers smiling, waving handkerchiefs, and responding to the cries
of '_Vive la République_.' Nay, strangers fell on each other's necks
and kissed each other with 'effusion.' In the neighbourhood of the
Pont Neuf, I saw people on the tops of ladders busily pulling down
the Emperor's bust, which the late loyalty of the people had induced
them to stick about in all possible and impossible places. I saw the
busts carried in mock procession to the parapets of the Pont Neuf and
thrown into the Seine, clapping of hands and hearty laughter greeting
the splash which the graven image of the mighty monarch made in the
water. I went as far as the Hôtel de Ville, and found it in
possession of his Majesty the Sovereign People. Blouses were in
every one of M. Haussmann's balconies. How they got there I do not
know. I presume that M. Chevreau did not invite them. But they got
in somehow without violence. The great square in front of the Hôtel
de Ville was full of the National Guards, {127} most of them without
uniform. They carried the butts of their muskets in the air, in
token that they were fraternising with the people. The most perfect
good humour prevailed. Portraits of the Emperor and Empress, which
many of your readers must have seen in the Hôtel de Ville ballrooms,
were thrown out of the window and the people trod and danced on the
canvas. On leaving the Hôtel de Ville I saw, in the Avenue Victoria,
M. Henri Rochefort,[5] let out of prison as a logical sequence of
events but half-an-hour before. He was on a triumphal car, and wore
a scarlet scarf. He was escorted by an immense mob, crying, '_Vive
Rochefort_!' He looked in far better health than I expected to see
him after his long imprisonment, and his countenance beamed with
delight. He had seen his desire on his enemy."
[Illustration: Facsimile of a "Pigeon-post" letter sent by Henry
Labouchere to his mother during the siege of Paris.]
At four o'clock on the same day the Republic was proclaimed at the
Hôtel de Ville, with a provisional Government composed of the
following members: MM. Gambetta, Jules Favre, Pelletan, Rochefort,
Jules Ferry, Jules Simon, and Ernest Picard. Kératry was appointed
Prefect of the Police and Arago the Mayor of Paris.
Meanwhile the Prussians came nearer and nearer. On the 10th, they
entered Laon, and General Hame, who was in command, surrendered the
citadel in order to save the city. On that day the Republican
Government issued an order to all owners of provisions and forage in
the neighbourhood to move their goods into the capital. On the 18th
the Crown Prince and the third army were at Chaumes, and two days
later the long march of the Prussians was ended. The Crown Prince
took up his headquarters at Versailles. The _Daily News_
correspondent, Archibald Forbes, who had accompanied the third army
from Wörth to Sedan, and from Sedan to Paris, informed Fleet Street
that: "The fortune of war has brought the Prussians to the Hampton
Court of the French capital--has placed them at the very gates of
{128} Paris. I need say no further word to make the situation more
striking. Here are the dark blue uniforms and the spiked helmets in
the stately avenues of Versailles. The barracks of the Imperial
Guard give ample quarters to King William's soldiery, and there have
been found immense stores of hay and oats which will make the
Prussian horses fat, if only rest enough be given them for feeding."
From that day until the end of the siege no regular mail went out of
Paris. Balloons and pigeons carried the news of the imprisoned
inhabitants into the provinces and beyond the seas. Sometimes a
letter would be successfully fixed between the double soles of a
crafty man's boots,[6] who would, on some pretext or another, succeed
in making his way through the Prussian lines, or a note would be
rolled up into a ball and be concealed in a pot of pomade and so
proceed in unctuous quiet on its way out of the prison into the open.
Henry Labouchere, some twenty-five years later, described how he
managed to get his letters to the _Daily News_.[7]
"More of my letters reached their destination, I believe, than those
of other correspondents. The reason was this. The correspondents
waited on Jules Favre, and asked him to afford them facilities for
sending their letters. He kindly said that he would, and told us
that whenever a balloon started we might give them, made up in a
parcel, to the man in charge, who would make it his business to
transmit them {129} to their destination so soon as the balloon
touched land outside. There was a complacent smile on his
countenance when we gratefully accepted this offer that led me to
suspect that, whatever might happen to the letters, they were not
likely to reach the newspaper offices to which they were addressed,
unless they lauded everything. So, instead of falling a victim to
this confidence trick, I placed my letters under cover to a friend in
London, and put them into a post-box, calculating that, as each
balloon took out about twenty thousand letters, those posted in the
ordinary way would not be opened."
The letters, posted as Labouchere described above, were written on
tissue paper and addressed to Miss Henrietta Hodson. She,
immediately on receipt of the manuscript, carried it to Fleet Street,
where it was rightly considered copy of the very first order.
Labouchere, as soon as the siege had really begun, tried in vain to
induce General Trochu to allow him to accompany him on his rides to
the ramparts of the city, pointing out that the newspaper
correspondents were always allowed to accompany the Prussian staffs.
Trochu would not hear of the scheme, and explained that he himself
had been within an inch of being shot because he had had the
impudence to say that he was the Governor of Paris.
"From Trochu," writes Labouchere, on September 25, "I went to pay a
few calls. I found every one engaged in measuring the distance from
the Prussian batteries to his particular house. One friend I found
seated in a cellar with a quantity of mattresses over it, to make it
bomb-proof. He emerged from his subterraneous Patmos to talk to me,
ordered his servant to pile on a few more mattresses, and then
retreated. Anything so dull as existence here it is difficult to
imagine. Before the day is out one gets sick and tired of the one
single topic of conversation. We are like the people at Cremorne
waiting for the fireworks to begin; and I really do believe that if
this continues much longer, the {130} most cowardly will welcome the
bombs as a relief from the oppressive _ennui_."
A letter to his mother,[8] dated September 26, gives the following
account of his life in Paris: "I wrote a day or two ago by balloon,
but probably my letter is in the moon. A man is going to try and get
through the lines with this, and a letter to the _Daily News_. We
are all right here. The Prussians fire at the forts, but as yet they
have not bombarded the town. Provisions are already very dear. It
is rather dull--in fact a little bombarding would be a relief to our
_ennui_. Everybody is swaggering about in uniform. I went round the
inner barricades a day or two ago with the citizen Rochefort."
A few days later he wrote to the _Daily News_: "The presence of the
Prussians at the gates, and the sound of the cannon, have at last
sobered this frivolous people. Frenchmen indeed cannot live without
exaggeration, and for the last twenty-four hours they have taken to
walking about as if they were guests at their own funerals. It is
hardly in their line to play the _justum et tenacem_ of Horace.
Always acting, they are now acting the part of Spartans. It is
somewhat amusing to see the stern gloom on the face of patriots one
meets, who were singing and shouting a few days ago--more
particularly as it is by no means difficult to distinguish beneath
this outward gloom a certain keen relish, founded upon the feeling
that the part is being well played."
On the evening of the same day Labouchere took his strolls abroad,
and came to the Avenue de L'Impératrice, where he found a large crowd
gazing upon the Fort of Mont Valérien. This fort, from being the
strongest for defence, was particularly beloved by the Parisians.
"They love it as a sailor loves his ship," writes Labouchere. He
witnessed the following incident: "If I were near enough," said a
young {131} girl, "I would kiss it." "Let me carry your kiss to it,"
responded a Mobile, and the pair embraced, amid the cheers of the
people around them.
The question of domestic economy had not yet become a pressing one,
as far as the "besieged resident" was concerned. He was lodged _au
quatrième_ at the Grand Hotel, and wrote during the first week of the
siege: "I presume if the siege lasts long enough, dogs, rats, and
cats will be tariffed. I have got a thousand francs with me. It is
impossible to draw upon England; consequently, I see a moment coming
when, unless rats are reasonable, I shall not be able to afford
myself the luxury of one oftener than once a week." And a fortnight
later he writes: "My landlord presents me every week with my bill.
The ceremony seems to please him, and does me no harm. I have pasted
upon my mantelpiece the decree of the Government adjourning payment
of rent, and the right to read and re-read this document is all that
he will get from me until the end of the siege. Yesterday I ordered
myself a warm suit of clothes; I chose a tailor with a German name,
so I feel convinced he will not venture to ask for payment under the
present circumstances, and if he does he will not get it. If my
funds run out before the siege is over, I shall have at least the
pleasure to think that this has not been caused by improvidence."
He wrote to his mother on October 10, as follows: "I send this by
balloon. The smaller the letter, the more chance it has to go. We
are all thriving in here, though we have heard absolutely nothing
from the outside world for a fortnight. I don't know if my letters
to the _Daily News_ arrive. Yesterday, I could only get sheeps'
trotters and pickled cauliflower for dinner. We boast awfully of
what we are going to do, but, as yet, all our sorties have been
driven back, and our forts stun our ears by firing upon stray rabbits
and Uhlans. If ever my letters to the _Daily News_ do not arrive and
come back here, I shall be shot, but I don't think that they will. I
am convinced that the {132} provisions will soon give out. We go
about saying that we cannot be beaten, because we have made a 'pact
with death.'"
And again on the 21st: "We are getting on very well here. Nothing
has come in since the commencement of the siege, and no one can get
out. They say there are provisions to last until February, so we
shall have a dose of our own society. About one sixth of the town is
now commanded by the Prussian batteries, but we don't know whether
they will fire or not. I am living very well on horse and cat--the
latter excellent--like rabbit, only better. Our people brag very
much, but do little more. The Ultras are going ahead--they have
taken now to denouncing crucifixes, which they call ridiculous
nudities--a mayor has had them all removed--he then announced that no
marriages were to take place in his _arrondissement_--marriage being
an insult upon honourable citizens who did not approve of this relic
of superstition. This was a little too much, so he was removed, and
we are now free to marry or not according to our tastes. I am the
intimate friend of Louis Blanc, so no one touches me."
One of the most curious things about these letters by balloon was the
irregularity in their delivery. It was not merely that one balloon
reached friendly or neutral territory in safety, while another did
not. Of half a dozen letters coming by the same balloon, two would
be delivered, say, on the 6th of the month, one on the 10th, two on
the 15th, and the last on the 20th. This greatly puzzled the
recipients at the time. The explanation turned out to be that the
bag containing the first letter had been sent off immediately the
aeronaut descended, whereas the others underwent a variety of
adventures. Frequently a balloon fell at or near a place of German
occupation. The aeronaut would come down at a run, hurry off with
one bag, and give the others to friendly peasants, who secreted them
until an opportunity occurred for getting them safely to the nearest
post-town. Usually the letters came in beautiful order, {133}
without a speck upon them to show an unusual mode of transit. One
batch, however, had to be fished out of the sea, off the Cornish
coast. In one case a letter was delivered in wonderfully quick time.
Dispatched from Paris on a Monday night, it was delivered in London
on the following evening.[9]
Apparently his "made in Germany" suit did not wear as well as might
have been expected, for it was only December when he described his
wardrobe as follows:
"My pea-jacket is torn and threadbare, my trousers are frayed at the
bottom, and of many colours--like Joseph's coat. As for my linen, I
will only say that the washer-women have struck work, as they have no
fuel. I believe my shirt was once white, but I am not sure. I
invested a few weeks ago in a pair of cheap boots. They are my
torment. They have split in various places, and I wear a pair of
gaiters--purple, like those of a respectable ecclesiastic--to cover
the rents. I bought them on the Boulevard, and at the same stall I
bought a bright blue handkerchief which was going cheap; this I wear
round my neck. My upper man resembles that of a dog-stealer, my
lower man that of a bishop. My buttons are turning my hair grey.
When I had more than one change of raiment these appendages remained
in their places, now they drop off as though I were a moulting fowl.
I have to pin myself together elaborately, and whenever I want to get
anything out of my pocket, I have cautiously to unpin myself, with
the dread of falling to pieces before my eyes."
In another place Labouchere describes his head-dress, which was quite
eccentric enough to fit in with the rest of his travesty: "I have
bought myself a sugar-loaf hat of the first Republic, and am
consequently regarded with deference. 'The style is the man,' said
Buffon; had he lived here now he would rather have said, 'The hat is
the man.' An English doctor who goes about in a regulation
chimney-pot has {134} already been arrested twenty-seven times. I,
thanks to my revolutionary hat, have not been arrested once. I have
only to glance from under its brim at any one for him to quail."
The extracts which Labouchere copied from the newspapers for the
benefit of his London readers are extremely amusing, and give, as no
other method of narration could have done, a good idea of the spirit
which the leaders of the people thought fit to try and promulgate
amongst the Parisians. One morning, for instance, he learned that
"Moltke is dead, that the Crown Prince is dying of a fever, that
Bismarck is anxious to negotiate but is prevented by the obstinacy of
the King, that three hundred Prussians from the Polish provinces have
come over to our side, that the Bavarian and Würtemberg troops are in
a state of incipient rebellion. From the fact that the Prussian
outposts have withdrawn to a greater distance from the forts, it is
probable that they despair of success, and in a few days will raise
the siege. Most of the newspapers make merry over the faults in
grammar in a letter which has been discovered from the Empress to the
Emperor, although I doubt whether there is one Frenchman in the world
who could write Spanish as well as the Empress does French."
The New Year's address to the Prussians, published in the _Gaulois_,
is a masterpiece of journalistic invective, and the relish with which
the besieged resident copied it for the benefit of his London readers
may well be imagined:
"You Prussian beggars, you Prussian scoundrels, you bandits and you
Vandals, you have taken everything from us; you have ruined us; you
are starving us; you are bombarding us; and we have a right to hate
you with a royal hatred. Well, perhaps one day we might have
forgiven you your rapine and your murders; our towns that you have
sacked; your heavy yokes; your infamous treasons. The French race is
so light of heart, so kindly, that we might perhaps in time have
forgotten our resentments. What we {135} never shall forget will be
this New Year's Day, which we have been forced to pass without news
from our families. You, at least, have had letters from your
Gretchers, astounding letters, very likely, in which the melancholy
blondes with blue eyes make a wonderful literary salad, composed of
sour kraut, berlin wool, forget-me-nots, pillage, bombardment, pure
love, and transcendental philosophy. But you like all this just as
you like jam with your mutton. You have what pleases you. Your ugly
faces receive kisses by the post. But you kill our pigeons, you
intercept our letters, you shoot at our balloons with your absurd
_fusils de rempart_, and you burst out into a heavy German grin when
you get hold of one of our bags, which are carrying to those we love
our vows, our hopes, our remembrances, our regrets, our hearts." And
so on.
Labouchere had not a high opinion of French journalism during the
investment. "A French journalist," he says, "even when he is not
obliged to do so, generally invents his facts, and then reasons upon
them with wonderful ingenuity. One would think that just at present
a Parisian would do well to keep his breath to cool his own porridge.
Such, however, is not his opinion. He thinks that he has a mission
to guide and instruct the world, and this mission he manfully fulfils
in defiance of Prussians and Prussian cannons. It is true, that he
knows rather less of foreign countries than an intelligent Japanese
Daimio may be supposed to know of Tipperary, but, by some curious law
of nature, the less he knows of a subject, the more strongly does he
feel impelled to write about it. I read a very clever article this
morning pointing out that if we are not on our guard, our Empire in
India will come to an end by a Russian fleet attacking it from the
Caspian Sea. When one thinks how very easy it would have been for
the author not to have written about the Caspian Sea, one is at once
surprised and grateful to him for having called our attention to the
danger which menaces us in that quarter of the globe."
{136}
His estimate of General Trochu was, on the whole, the fairest that
was made at the period. During the earliest days of the siege it was
supposed that Trochu had a plan, and, on being questioned about it,
he admitted that he had. He went on to say that he guaranteed its
success, but that he should reveal it to no one, until the right
moment--in fact, he had deposited it for safety with his notary,
Maître Duclos, who, in the event of his being killed, would produce
it. As time wore on and no plan was forthcoming from the General, it
became very evident that it could have been nothing more elaborate
than a determination to capitulate as soon as Paris was starved out.
When the siege was nearly five weeks old Labouchere wrote:
"Every day this siege lasts, convinces me that Gen. Trochu is not the
right man in the right place. He writes long-winded letters, utters
Spartan aphorisms, and complains of his colleagues, his generals, and
his troops. The confidence which is felt in him is rapidly
diminishing. He is a good, respectable man, without a grain of
genius, or of that fierce, indomitable energy which sometimes
replaces it. He would make a good minister of war in quiet times,
but he is about as fit to command in the present emergency as Mr.
Cardwell[10] would be. His two principal military subordinates,
Vinoy and Ducrot, are excellent Generals of division, but nothing
more. As for his civilian colleagues they are one and all hardly
more practical than Professor Fawcett. Each has some crotchet of his
own, each likes to dogmatise and to speechify, and each considers the
others to be idiots, and has a small following of his own, which
regards him as a species of divinity. They are philosophers,
orators, and legists, but they are neither practical men nor
statesmen." And when the siege was over he summed up the case for
Trochu thus: "What will be the verdict of history on the defence?
Who knows! On the one hand, the Parisians have kept a powerful army
at bay for longer than was expected; on the {137} other hand, every
sortie that they have made has been unsuccessful--every attempt to
arrest the approach of the besiegers has failed. Passively and
inertly they have allowed their store of provisions to grow less and
less, until they have been forced to capitulate, without their
defences having been stormed, or the cannon silenced. The General
complains of his soldiers, the soldiers complain of their General;
and on both sides there is cause of complaint. Trochu is not a
Todleben. His best friends describe him as a weak sort of military
Hamlet, wise of speech, but weak and hesitating in action--making
plans and then criticising them, instead of accomplishing them. As a
commander his task was a difficult one; when the siege commenced he
had no army; when the army was formed it was encompassed by
earthworks and redoubts so strong that even better soldiers would
have failed to carry them. As a statesman, he never was master of
the situation. He followed rather than led public opinion. Success
is the criterion of ability in this country, and poor Trochu is as
politically dead as though he never had lived."
As time wore on the question of meals in the besieged city naturally
became one of absorbing moment. "I went," says Labouchere, on
December 21, "to see what was going on in the house of a friend of
mine, in the Avenue de L'Impératrice, who has left Paris. The
servant who was in charge told me that up there they had not been
able to obtain bread for three days, and that the last time he had
presented his ticket, he had been given about half an inch of cheese.
'How do you live then?' I asked. After looking mysteriously round to
see that no one was watching us, he took me down into the cellar, and
pointed to some meat in a barrel. 'It is half a horse,' he said, in
the tone of a man who is showing some one the corpse of his murdered
victim. 'A neighbouring coachman killed him, and we salted him down,
and divided him.' Then he opened a closet in which sat a huge cat.
'I am fattening her up for Christmas day; {138} we mean to serve her
up, surrounded with mice like sausages,' he observed." On January 6
Labouchere notes: "Yesterday I had a slice of Pollux for dinner.
Pollux and his brother Castor are two elephants, which have been
killed. It was tough, coarse, and oily, and I do not recommend
English families to eat elephant as long as they can get beef or
mutton. Many of the restaurants are closed, owing to want of fuel.
They are recommended to use lamps; but although French cooks can do
wonders with very poor materials, when they are called upon to cook
an elephant with a spirit lamp the thing is almost beyond their
ingenuity. Castor and Pollux's trunks sold for forty-five francs a
pound; the other parts of the interesting twins fetched about ten
francs a pound."
He wrote to his mother on January 8[11]: "Here we still are. For the
last few days the Prussians have taken to throwing shells into the
town, which makes things more lively. I do not think it can last
much longer. It is awfully cold, for all the wood is freshly cut and
will not burn. The washerwomen have struck as they have no fuel, so
we all wear very dirty shirts. I am in a great fright of my money
giving out, as none is to be got here. My dress is seedy--in fact
falling to pieces. I think I have eaten now of every animal which
Noah had in his ark.[12] Since the bombardment the cannon makes a
great noise. All night it is as if doors were slamming. Outside the
walls it is rather pretty to see the batteries exchanging shots. We
have heard nothing from England since September, except from scraps
of paper picked out of dead Prussians' pockets." Labouchere was
always ready to recall to his memory for conversational purposes the
strange food he ate during the siege {139} of Paris. Donkey
apparently was his favourite dish. This is what he said on the
subject:
"A donkey is infinitely better eating than beef or mutton, indeed I
do not know any meat which is better. This was so soon discovered by
the French, during the siege of Paris, that donkey meat was about
five times the price of horse meat. At Voisin's there was almost
every day a joint of cold donkey for breakfast, and it was greatly
preferred to anything else. Let any one who doubts the excellence of
cold donkey slay one of these weak-minded animals, cook him, and eat
him." Rats he did not appreciate so much: "The objection to them is
that when cooked their flesh is gritty. This objection is, however,
somewhat Epicurean, for, except for this grittiness, they are a
wholesome and excellent article of food. I am surprised that there
is not a society for the promotion of eating rats. Why should not
prisoners be fed with these nourishing and prolific little animals?"
His account of how he got a leg of mutton into Paris after the
capitulation, when, in spite of the siege being raised, the
difficulties of procuring food were almost as insurmountable as
before, was one of his most amusing _contes_. He rode out to
Versailles,[13] where he procured the longed-for joint, but, when he
started on his return journey, a sentinel of Versailles refused to
allow the meat to leave the town, and actually took it away from him.
Desperately he decided to appeal to the better side of the Prussian's
nature, and explained to him that he was in love, indeed, that to
love was the fate of all mortals. The warrior sighed and pensively
assented: Labouchere judged that he was most likely thinking of his
distant Gretchen, and shamelessly followed up his advantage: "My lady
love is in Paris," {140} he proceeded pathetically, "long have I
sighed in vain. I am taking her now a leg of mutton--on this leg
hangs all my hope of bliss--if I present myself to her with this
token of my devotion she may yield to my suit. Oh, full of feeling,
beloved of beauteous women, German warrior, can you refuse me?" Of
course the sentinel yielded, and the correspondent, who, needless to
say, had no lady love in the capital, bore it off in triumph. He
enjoyed it for dinner that evening in company with Mr. Frank Lawley
and Mr. Denis Bingham, in whose journal for that day occurs the
following entry:
"On their return from Versailles together, Labouchere and Lawley
brought me a leg of mutton. And what a treat it was for our small
household and dear neighbours! And an Italian lady brought us a
large loaf of white bread, and we feasted and were merry, and
measured our girths, and promised ourselves that we would soon get
into condition again, for we were lamentably pulled down."[14]
On February 10, Labouchere took his departure from Paris, feeling, as
he said, much as Daniel must have done on emerging from the den of
lions. Baron Rothschild procured for him a pass which enabled him to
take the Amiens train at the goods station within the walls of the
city, instead of driving, as those who were less fortunate were
obliged to do, to Gonesse. The train was drawn up before a shed in
the midst of oceans of mud. It consisted of one passenger carriage,
and of a long series of empty bullock vans. He entered one of the
latter as the passenger van was already crowded. At Breteuil the
train waited for above an hour, and Labouchere, impatient of the
delay, perceiving a Prussian train puffing up, managed to induce an
official to allow him to get into the luggage van, by which means he
was able to proceed on his way to the destination. "Having started
from Paris as a bullock, I reached Amiens at twelve o'clock as a
carpet-bag," was the way he described his journey.
{141}
At Abbeville the train passed out of the Prussian lines into the
French, and Calais was reached at 7 P.M. "Right glad" was the Paris
correspondent, to use his own words, to "eat a Calais supper and to
sleep on a Calais bed."[15]
In his last letter to the _Daily News_ during the war, Mr. Labouchere
lodged one other Parthian shot in the city whose hospitality he had
been enjoying: "I took my departure from Paris," he wrote, "leaving
without any very poignant regret, its inhabitants wending their way
to the electoral 'urns,' the many revolving in their minds how France
and Paris are to manage to pay the little bill which their creditor
outside is making up against them; the few--the very few--determined
to die rather than yield, sitting in the cafés on the boulevard,
which is to be, I presume, their last ditch."
In one of his earliest numbers of _Truth_, Mr. Labouchere gave a
characteristic account of how he behaved under fire. It is worth
quoting as illustrative of the naïve frankness with which he always
described those instinctive little actions of human nature which more
sophisticated persons usually pretend never occur. "I was at some of
the engagements during the Franco-Prussian War. The first time that
I was under fire, I felt that every shell whizzing through the air
would infallibly blow me up. Being a non-combatant, in an
unconcerned sort of way, as if I had business to attend to elsewhere,
I effected a strategical movement to the rear. But, as no shell had
blown me up, I came to the conclusion that no shell would blow me up,
and accepted afterwards as a natural state of things which did not
concern me, the fact that these missiles occasionally blew up other
people."
[1] _Times_, January 17, 1912.
[2] _Truth_, January 24, 1912.
[3] The Emperor's plan of campaign was to mass 150,000 men at Metz;
100,000 at Strassburg, and 50,000 at the Camp at Châlons. It was
then his intention to unite the armies at Metz and Strassburg, and to
cross the Rhine at Maxau, to force the States of South Germany to
observe neutrality. He would then have pushed on to encounter the
Prussians. But the army at Metz, instead of 150,000 men, only
mustered 100,000; that of Strassburg only 40,000 instead of 100,000;
whilst the corps of Marshal Canrobert had still one division at
Paris, and another at Soissons; his artillery as well as his cavalry
were not ready. Further no army corps was even yet completely
furnished with the equipments necessary for taking the
field.--_Campagne de 1870; des Causes qui ont amené la Capitulation
de Sedan_. Par un Officier attaché à l'État Major-Général.
Bruxelles.
[4] Quotations in this chapter not otherwise specified have been
taken from the columns of the _Daily News_, August, 1870-January,
1871.
[5] He had been undergoing a term of imprisonment for certain
articles written in the _Marseillaise_.
[6] I quote a few lines--the only legible ones--from a letter,
addressed to his mother, which Labouchere sent out of Paris, fastened
between the double sole of a man's boot. It looks as if the bearer
must have waded through water, and the marks of the cobbler's nails
are visible all over it. "November 6, 1870. This goes out in a
citizen's boot. If he is caught, he will be shot, which is his
affair--only you will not get it. The position is utterly hopeless.
We shall be bombarded in a week. This hotel has two hundred wounded
in it. I got into the Hôtel de Ville on Monday with the mob. Such a
scene. I have got a pass from General Vinoy, so I get a good view of
all the military operations.... I do not know if my letters to the
D. N. arrive...."
[7] J. M'Carthy and Sir J. Robinson, The Daily News Jubilee. _A
Retrospect of Fifty Years of the Queen's Reign_.
[8] Mrs. Labouchere had been a widow since 1863, and was now living
at Oakdene, near Dorking.
[9] Robinson. _Fifty Years of Fleet Street_.
[10] Secretary of War in Mr. Gladstone's first Ministry.
[11] This letter did not reach London, E. C., from whence it was
posted to Dorking, until Jan. 19.
[12] Captain Bingham notes in his diary for Dec. 4 that Henry
Labouchere, Frank Lawley, Lewis Wingfield, and Quested Lynch dined
with him, and that they partook of moufflon, a kind of wild sheep
which inhabits Corsica.--_Recollections of Paris_, Capt. Hon. D.
Bingham.
[13] "As soon as the armistice was signed, several of the English
correspondents managed to get to Versailles. The first thing that
Labouchere did on arriving there was to plunge his head into a pail
of milk, and he was with difficulty weaned."--_Recollections of
Paris_, Capt. Hon. D. Bingham.
[14] Capt. Hon. D. Bingham. _Recollections of Paris_.
[15] The following gentlemen of the press were in Paris during the
siege: Charles Austen of the _Times_, Frank Lawley of the _Daily
Telegraph_, Henry Labouchere of the _Daily News_, Thomas Gibson
Bowles of the _Morning Post_, J. Augustus O'Shea of the _Standard_,
Capt. Bingham, who sent letters to the _Pall Mall Gazette_, and Mr.
Dallas, who wrote both for the _Times_ and the _Daily News_.
{142}