Chapter V: In the Somme

Amiens--Picardy Old and New--Arthur Young and Charles James
Fox in Amiens--'The look of a capital'--The floating gardens
of Amiens--A stronghold of Boulangism--Protest of Amiens
against the Terror of 1792--The French nation and the Commune
of Paris--Vergniaud denounces the Parisians as the 'slaves of the
vilest scoundrels alive'--Gambetta and his balloon--Amiens and
the Revolution of September 1870--The rise of M. Goblet--The
'great blank credit opened to the Republic in 1870'--What has
become of it--The Prussians in Amiens--Warlike spirit of the
Picards--A political portrait of M. Goblet by a fellow citizen--A
Roman son and his father's funeral--A typical Republican senator
and mayor--How M. Petit demolished the crosses in the cemetery--M.
Spuller as Prefect of the Somme--The Christian Brothers and
their schools--M. Jules Ferry withholds the salaries earned by
teachers--The Emperor Julian of Amiens--How the Sisters were
turned out of their schools--The mayor, the locksmith, and the
curate--Mdlle. de Colombel--A senatorial epistle--Ulysses
deserted by Calypso--Why Boulangism flourishes at Amiens--The
First Republic invoked to justify the destruction of crosses
on graves--The Cathedral of Amiens and Mr. Ruskin. 73-94