Chapter IX: Part 9

'He can feed himself,' said M. Roussell, 'for that, but I cannot, or for double that money.'

The day labourer is generally hired only for one day. A new bargain is made every day.

The house was not uncomfortable, but very untidy. There are no ricks, everything is stored in large barns, where it is safe from weather, but terribly exposed to vermin.

A bright-complexioned servant-girl was in the kitchen preparing an enormous bowl of soup, of which bread, potatoes, and onions were the chief solid ingredients.

'Roussell,' said Beaumont, 'is superior to his class. In general they are bad politicians. It is seldom difficult to get their votes for the nominee of the prefect. They dislike to vote for anyone whom they know, especially if he be a gentleman, or be supported by the gentry. Such a candidate excites their democratic envy and suspicion. But the prefect is an abstraction. They have never seen him, they have seldom heard of his name or of that of his candidate, and therefore they vote for him.

'Lately, however, in some of my communes, the peasants have adapted a new practice, that of electing peasants. I suspect that the Government is not displeased.

'The presence of such members will throw discredit on the _Conseils généraux_, and, if they get there, on the _Corps législatif,_ much to the pleasure of our democratic master, and they will be easily bribed or frightened. Besides which the fifteen francs a day will be a fortune to them, and they will be terrified by the threat of a dissolution. I do not think that even yet we have seen the worst of universal suffrage.'

'What influence,' I asked, 'have the priests?'

'In some parts of France,' said Beaumont, 'where the people are religious, as is the case here, much. Not much in the north-east, where there is little religion; and in the towns, where there is generally no religion, their patronage of a candidate would ruin him. I believe that nothing has so much contributed to Louis Napoleon's popularity with the _ouvriers_ as his quarrel with the Pope. You may infer the feelings of the lower classes in Paris from his cousin's conduct.'

'I study Prince Napoleon,' said Ampère, 'with interest, for I believe that he will be the successor.'

'If Louis Napoleon,' I said, 'were to be shot tomorrow, would not the little prince be proclaimed?'

'Probably,' said Ampere, 'but with Jérôme for regent, and I doubt whether the regency would end by the little Napoleon IV. assuming the sceptre.

'Louis Napoleon himself does not expect it. He often says that, in France, it is more than two hundred years since a sovereign has been succeeded by his son.

'On the whole,' continued Ampère, 'I had rather have Jérôme than Louis Napoleon. He has more talent and less prudence. He would bring on the crisis sooner.

'On the 31st of October, 1849,' said Madame de Tocqueville, 'I was in Louis Napoleon's company, and he mentioned some matter on which he wished to know my husband's opinion. I could not give it. "It does not much signify," he answered, "for as I see M. de Tocqueville every day, I will talk to him about it myself." At that very time, the _ordonnance_ dismissing M. de Tocqueville had been signed, and Louis Napoleon knew that he would probably never see him again.'

'I do not,' said Ampere, 'give up the chance of a republic. I do not wish for one. It must be a very bad constitutional monarchy which I should not prefer to the best republic. My democratic illusions are gone. France and America have dispelled them: but it must be a very bad republic which I should not prefer to the best despotism. A republic is like a fever, violent and frightful, but not necessarily productive of organic mischief. A despotism is a consumption: it degrades and weakens, and perverts all the vital functions.

'What is there now in France worth living for? I find people proud of our Italian campaign. Why should the French be proud that their master's soldiers have been successful in a war as to which they were not consulted; which, in fact, they disapproved, which was not made for their benefit, which was the most glaring proof of their servility and degradation? We knew before that our troops were better than the Austrians. What have we gained by the additional example of their superiority?

'I fear,' I said, 'that a republic, at least such a republic as you are likely to have, would begin by some gross economical enormities--by the _droit au travail_, by the _impôt progressif sur la fortune présumtée_, by a paper currency made a legal tender without limitation of its amount.'

'The last republic,' said Ampere, 'did some of these things, but very timidly and moderately. It gave to its paper a forced currency, but was so cautious in its issue, that it was not depreciated. It created the _ateliers nationaux,_ but it soon dissolved them, though at the expense of a civil war. Its worst fault was more political than economical: it was the 45 centimes, that is to say, the sudden increase by 45 per cent, of the direct taxes. It never recovered that blow. Of all its acts it is the one which is best recollected. The Provisional Government is known in the provinces as "ces gredins des quarante-cinq centimes." The business of a revolutionary government is to be popular. It ought to reduce taxation, meet its expenditure by loans, abolish octrois and prohibitions, and defer taxation until it has lasted long enough to be submitted to as a _fait accompli_.'

'I fear,' said Madame de Tocqueville, 'that our working classes are in a much worse frame of mind than they were in 1848. Socialist opinions--the doctrine that the profits of capitalists are so much taken fraudulently or oppressively from the wages of labourers, and that it is unjust that one man should have more of the means of happiness than another--are extending every day. The workpeople believe that the rich are their enemies and that the Emperor is their friend, and that he will join them in an attempt to get their fair share, that is, an equal share, of the property of the country--and I am not sure that they are mistaken.'

'Nor am I,' said Beaumont '_Celui-ci_ fully sympathises with their feelings, and I do not think that he has intelligence enough to see the absurdity of their theories.'

'You do not deny him,' I said, 'intelligence?'

'Not,' said Beaumont, 'for some purposes, and to some extent, practical intelligence. His ends are bad, but he is often skilful in inventing and pertinacious in employing means for effecting those bad ends. But I deny him theoretic intelligence. I do not think that he has comprehension or patience to work out, or even to follow, a long train of reasoning; such a train as that by which economical errors and fallacies are detected.'

'Are there strikes,' I asked, 'among your workmen?'

'They are beginning,' said Beaumont. 'We have had one near us, and the authorities were afraid to interfere.'

'I suppose,' I said, that they are illegal?'

'They are illegal,' he answered, 'and I think that they ought to be so. They are always oppressive and tyrannical. The workman who does not join in a strike is made miserable. They are generally mischievous to the combined workmen themselves, and always to those of other trades. Your toleration of them appears to me one of the worst symptoms of your political state of health. It shows among your public men an ignorance or a cowardice, or a desire of ill-earned popularity, which is generally a precursor of a democratic revolution.'

'It is certain,' said Ampère, 'that the masters are becoming afraid of their workmen. Péreire brings his from their residences to the Barrière Malesherbes in carriages. You are not actually insulted in the streets of Paris, but you are treated with rude neglect. A _fiacre_ likes to splash you, a _paveur_ to scatter you with mud. Louis Napoleon began with Chauvinism. He excited all the bad international passions of the multitude. He has now taken up Sansculotteism. Repulsed with scorn and disgust by the rich and the educated, he has thrown himself on the poor and ignorant The passions with which he likes to work are envy, malignity, and rapacity.

'I do not believe that he feels them. He is what is called a good-natured man. That is to say, he likes to please everyone that he sees. But his selfishness is indescribable.

'No public interest stands in the way of his slightest caprice. He often puts me in mind of Nero. With the same indifference to the welfare of others with which Nero amused himself by burning down Rome, he is amusing himself by pulling down Paris.'

N.W. SENIOR.

* * * * * *

[We left Tocqueville on the following day with great regret The same party was never to meet again--the only survivors are Madame de Beaumont and myself and the Beaumonts' son, then a very intelligent boy of ten years old.

One day my father and I visited the little green churchyard on a cliff near the sea where Tocqueville is buried. The tomb is a plain grey stone slab--on it a cross is cut in bas-relief, with these words only:--

ICI REPOSE

ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE.

NÉ 24 FEVRIER 1805. MORT 16 AVRIL 1859.

My father laid a wreath of _immortelles_ on the tomb.--ED.]

APPENDIX.

MONTALEMBERT'S speech was afterwards published in the _Moniteur_ but with considerable alterations. In Mr. Senior's journal in 1854 (which has not been published), he says, under the date of April 26, I called on Montalembert and took him my report of his speech. He has promised to add to it any notes that it may require. "The printed report," he said, "is intentionally falsified. Before it was struck off I asked to see the proofs. I was told that, as such an application was new, the President of the Bureau would meet and decide on its admissibility. They decided that it could not be granted."'

[The following is Mr. Senior's report, with M. de Montalembert's own corrections and additions in French.--ED.]

At length Montalembert rose. He stood near the extreme right, with his side towards the tribune, and his face towards the centre gallery, in which I sat. His voice and delivery are so good, and the house was so silent, that I did not lose a word. I believe that the following report is a tolerably accurate abridgment of his speech.

'Gentlemen, I must begin by expressing to you my deep gratitude for the attention which you have paid to this unhappy business. I am grieved at having occasioned the waste of so much public time. I am still more grieved at having been the occasion of division among my colleagues.'

[_Note by Montalember_.--'J'aurais voulu faire plus qu'exprimer le regret: j'aurais voulu me prêter à tous les arrangements qui m'ont été suggérés par des voix amies pour mettre un terme à cette discussion. Je n'aurais reculé devant aucun sacrifice qui eût été compatible avec l'honneur. Mais vous comprenez tous que sous le coup d'une poursuite, d'un danger, je ne puis rien désavouer, rien rétracter, rien retirer de ce que j'ai écrit, de ce que j'ai pensé. Si j'agissais autrement il vous resterait un collègue absous, mais déshonoré et dont vous ne sauriez que faire.']

'More than all I am grieved when I think of the time at which this has occurred. A time when we are engaged in an honourable and serious war--a war in which, with the great and faithful ally whom I have always desired, and the sympathy of all Europe, we are defending civilisation against an enemy, barbarous indeed, but so formidable as to require our undivided energy and our undivided attention.

But you must recollect _when_ that letter was written. It was in last September, in profound peace, when our whole thoughts were employed, and were properly employed, on our internal affairs.

'Aujourd'hui il en est autrement; l'état de guerre impose à tous les citoyens des devoirs spéciaux: il doit aussi imposer un certain frein à l'esprit de critique. Aucun Français, quel que soit sa foi politique, ne peut vouloir discréditer le pouvoir des dissidents, des mécontents, mais il n'y a plus d'émigrés, ni à l'intérieur, ni à l'extérieur.'

[_Note by N.W. Senior._--This seems to be an allusion to a passage in Thiers's celebrated speech of the 17th of February, 1851. 'I1 ne faut émigrer, ni au dehors, ni au dedans.']

['J'aurais su contenir les sentiments les plus passionés de mon âme, plutôt que de paraître affaiblir en quoi que ce soit la main qui porte l'épée et le drapeau de la France. Ce n'est pas toutefois que j'admette que toute liberté de parole ou de presse soit incompatible avec l'état de guerre. L'Angleterre a conservé toutes ses libertés en faisant la guerre aux plus redoutables ennemis: aujourd'hui encore l'opposition, d'accord avec le gouvernement sur la question extérieure, maintient les résistances et les critiques à l'intérieur. Et certes personne ne dira que l'Angleterre, pour avoir conservé la liberté de discussion la plus entière, n'ait pas déployé pour le moins autant de prévoyance et d'énergie que nous dans la conduite de la guerre où nous entrons. Il n'y a que les nations où la vie publique circule dans toutes les veines du corps social, qui sachent résister aux épreuves et aux chances d'une guerre prolongée. La liberté de la contradiction centuple le prix d'une libre adhésion; et à force de mettre une sourdine à toutes les émotions du pays, il faut prendre garde qu'on ne se trouve un jour dans l'impossibilité de faire vibrer les cordes les plus essentielles quand le moment des dangers et des sacrifices sera arrivé.']

'I deeply regret the publication of that letter. But with that publication I repeat that I am utterly unconnected. I never sanctioned it, I never wished for it, I never even thought it possible. There are passages in the letter itself which I might modify if I were to re-write it, but it would rather be by adding to them than by taking from them. Two accusations have been directed against its substance. One that it is hostile to the Emperor; the other that it is hostile to this assembly. No one who knows my character, and knows my history, will believe that I can have intended to injure the Emperor. Our relations have been such as to make it impossible.

['J'ai eu l'occasion de défendre le chef actuel de l'État dans des circonstances infiniment difficiles, et où rien n'était plus douteux que le succès. Je ne prétends pas l'avoir constitué par cela mon débiteur, car en le défendant, je ne voulais servir, comme toujours, que la justice, l'intérêt du pays, la liberté modérée qui se personnifiaient en lui à mes yeux, mais enfin, aux yeux du public il est mon obligé, et je ne suis pas le sien. Si j'avais eu la pensée d'offenser publiquement l'Empereur, et si j'y avais cédé, nous serions _quittes_. Or, je tiens beaucoup à ce que nous ne le soyons pas. Il n'y aurait pour moi ni honneur ni avantage à ce changement de position. Tous les hommes de bon goût, tous les coeurs délicats, me comprendront.']

'It is equally impossible that I should have wished to offend this assembly. It contains men by whose sides I have fought the great battles of property and law. I love many of its members. I respect almost all. If I have offended any, it was done unconsciously. Again, it is said that the tone of my letter is violent. Expressions may be called violent by some which would be only called _passionnés_ by others. Now I admit that I am _passionné_. It is in my nature. I owe to that quality much of my merit, whatever that merit may be. Were I not _passionné_, I should not have been, during all my life, _la sentinelle perdue de la liberté_. I should not have thrown myself into every breach: sometimes braving the attacks of anarchy, sometimes heading the assault on tyranny, and sometimes fighting against the worst of all despotisms, the despotism that is based on democracy.'

['Allons plus au fond, et vous reconnaîtrez que les opinions énoncées dans la lettre ne sont autres que celles toujours professées par moi. Elles peuvent toutes se ramener à une seule, à mon éloignement pour le pouvoir absolu. Je ne l'aime pas: je ne l'ai jamais aimé. Si j'ai tant combattu l'anarchie avant et après 1848, si j'ai suscité contre moi dans le parti démagogique ces haines virulentes qui durent encore et qui ne perdent jamais une occasion d'éclater contre moi, c'est parce que j'ai compris de bonne heure les affinités naturelles du despotisme et de la démocratie; c'est parce que j'ai prévu et prédit que la démocratie nous conduirait au pouvoir absolu. Oui, je crois, comme je l'ai dit, que le despotisme abaisse les caractères, les intelligences, les consciences. Oui, je déplore le système qui rend un seul homme tout-puissant et seul responsable des destinées d'une nation de 36 millions d'hommes; et trouve que cela ressemble trop au gouvernement russe, contre lequel nous allons en guerre, et trop peu au gouvernement anglais, dont nous prisons si haut l'alliance.']

'I am told again, and the accusation is sanctioned by the _réquisitoire_ of the Procureur-Général, that my letter is inconsistent with the fidelity which I have sworn to the Emperor and to the constitution. When a man swears fidelity to a sovereign and to a constitution, his oath engages him only as to matters within his own power. He swears not to conspire against them. He swears not to attempt to subvert them. He cannot swear to approve the acts of the sovereign, or the working of the constitution, for he cannot foresee what either of them will be. I have kept, and I shall keep, my oath to the Emperor and my oath to the constitution. I have not attempted, and I shall not attempt, to overthrow either of them. But my approbation of either of them does not depend on me. I accepted the _coup d'état_, comme vous l'avez tous fait, comme notre seule chance de salut dans les circonstances d'alors. I expected a Government _honnête et modéré_. I have been disappointed.'

Here a violent exclamation ran through the assembly. Baroche rose and cried out, 'You hear him, gentlemen. He says that he expected honesty and moderation from the Government, and that he has been disappointed. I appeal to you, Mr. President, to decide whether we are to sit and listen to such infamies.'

[Voix diverses:--'Expliquez vos paroles.' 'Retirez vos paroles.' M. de Montalembert.--'Je les maintiens et je les explique.']

'I expected _un gouvernement honnête et modéré_. I have been disappointed. Its _honnêté_ may be judged by the confiscation of the Orleans property.'

Here was another hubbub, and another protest of Baroche's.

'What is going on before you,' continued Montalembert, 'is a sample of its moderation. It is now attempting in my person to introduce into our criminal law a new _délit_, "communication." Until now it was supposed that nothing was criminal until it was published. It was believed that a man might write his opinions and his reflections, and might exchange them with his friends; that nothing was libellous that was confidential. _Now_ this Government holds a man responsible for every thought that an indiscreet or an incautious friend, or a concealed enemy, or a tool of power reveals. If it succeeds in this attempt, it will not rest satisfied with this victory over the remnant of our freedom. It is not in the nature of things that it should. A Government that will not tolerate censure must forbid discussion. You are now asked to put down writing. When that has been done, conversation will be attacked. Paris will resemble Rome under the successors of Augustus. Already this prosecution has produced a _malaise_ which I never felt or observed before. What will be the feelings of the nation when all that is around it is concealed, when every avenue by which light could penetrate is stopped; when we are exposed to all the undefined terrors and exaggerated dangers that accompany utter darkness? The misfortune of France, a national defect which makes the happiness enjoyed by England unattainable by us, is, that she is always oscillating between extremes; that she is constantly swinging from universal conquest to _la paix à tout prix_, from the desire of nothing but glory to the desire of nothing but wealth, from the wildest democracy to the most abject servility. Every new Government starts with a new principle. Every Government in a few years perishes by carrying that principle to an extreme. The First Republic was destroyed by the intemperance with which it trampled on every sort of tradition and authority, the First Empire by its abuse of victory and war, the Restoration by its exaggerated belief in divine right and legitimacy, the Royalty of July by its exaggerated reliance on purchased voters and Parliamentary majorities, the Second Republic by the conduct of its own Republicans. The danger to the Second Empire--its only internal danger, but I fear a fatal one--is its abuse of authority. With every phase of our sixty years' long revolution, we have a new superstition, a new _culte_. We are now required to become the worshippers of authority. I lament that with the new religion we have not new priests. Our public men would not be discredited by instantaneous apostasy from one political faith to another. I am grieved, gentlemen, if I offend you; though many of you are older in years than I am, not one probably is so old in public life. I may be addressing you for the last time, and I feel that my last words ought to contain all the warnings that I think will be useful to you. This assembly will soon end, as all its predecessors have ended. Its acts, its legislation, may perish with it, but its reputation, its fame, for good or for evil, will survive. Within a few minutes you will do an act by which that reputation will be seriously affected; by which it may be raised, by which it may be deeply, perhaps irrevocably, sunk. Your vote to-night will show whether you possess freedom, and whether you deserve it. As for myself, I care but little. A few months, or even years, of imprisonment are among the risks which every public man who does his duty in revolutionary times must encounter, and which the first men of the country have incurred, _soit en sortant des affaires, soit avant d'y entrer_. But whatever may be the effect of your vote on _my_ person, whatever it may be on _your_ reputation, I trust that it is not in your power to inflict permanent injury on my country. Among you are some who lived through the Empire. They must remember that the soldiers of our glorious army cherished as fondly the recollection of its defeats as of its victories. They must see that the lessons which those defeats taught, and the feelings which they inspired, are now among the sources of our military strength. Your Emperor himself, in one of his earlier addresses, talked hopefully of the period when France would be capable of more liberty than he now thinks good for her, "Un jour," he exclaimed, "mon oeuvre sera couronnée par la liberté." I join in that hope. I look sanguinely towards the time when she will be worthy of the English constitution, and she will obtain it. Vous tenez le corps de la France, mais vous ne tenez pas son âme. Cette âme, aujourd'hui effrayée, engourdie, endormie, cette âme c'est la liberté. Elle se réveillera un jour et vous échappera. La certitude de ce réveil suffit pour consoler et fortifier ses vieux et fidèles soldats à traverser la nuit de l'épreuve. Cette liberté honnête et modérée, sage et sainte, j'y ai toujours cru, et j'y crois encore. Je l'ai toujours servie, toujours aimée, toujours invoquée, tantôt pour la religion, tantôt pour le pays; hier contre le socialisme, aujourd'hui contre un commencement de despotisme; et, quelle que soit votre décision, je me féliciterai toujours d'avoir eu cette occasion solennelle de la confesser encore une fois devant vous, et, s'il le faut, de souffrir un peu pour elle.'

These concluding words were drowned in universal murmurs.

N.W. SENIOR.