Paris under the Commune Part 16

Then another car of the same sort appears, another, and again another; in each of them there are thirty-two corpses. Behind the cars march the members of the Commune bare-headed, and wearing red scarfs. Alas! always that sanguinary colour! Last of all, between a double row of National Guards, follows a vast mult.i.tude of men, women, and children, all sorrowful and dejected, many in tears.

The procession proceeds along the boulevards; it started from the Beaujon hospital, and is going to the Pere Lachaise: as it pa.s.ses all heads are bared. One man alone up at a window remains covered; the crowd hiss him. Shame on him who will not bow before those who died for a cause, whether it may be a worthy one or not! On looking on those corpses, do not remember the evil they caused when they were alive. They are dead now, and have become sacred. But remember, oh! remember, that it is to the crimes of a few that are due the deaths of so many, and let us help to hasten the hour when the criminals, whoever they be, and to whatever party they belong; will feel the weight of the inexorable Nemesis of human destiny.

x.x.xVI.

We are to have no more letters! As in the time of the siege, if you desire to obtain news of your mother or your wife, you have no other alternative than to consult a somnambulist or a fortune-teller. This is not at all a complicated operation; of course you possess a ribbon or a look of hair, something appertaining to the absent person. This suffices to keep you informed, hour by hour, of what she says, does, and thinks.

Perhaps you would prefer the ordinary course of things, and that you would rather receive a letter than consult a charlatan. But if so, I would advise you not to say so. They would accuse you of being, what you are doubtless, a reactionist, and you might get into trouble.

Yesterday a young man was walking in the Champs Elysees, a Guard National stalked up to him and asked him for a light for his cigar.--"I am really very sorry," said he, "but my cigar has gone out."--"Oh! your cigar is out, is it? Oh! so you blush to render a service to a patriot!

Reactionist that you are!" Thereupon a torrent of invectives was poured on the poor young man, who was quickly surrounded by a crowd of eager faces: One charming young person exclaimed, "Why, he is a disguised sergent-de-ville!"--"Yes, yes; he is a gendarme!" is echoed on all sides.--"I think he looks like Ernest Picard," says one.--"Throw him into the Seine," says another.--"To the Seine, to the Seine, the spy!"

and the unfortunate victim is pushed, jostled, and hurried off. A dense crowd of National Guards, women, and children had by this time collected, all crying out at the top of their voices, and without any idea of what was the matter, "Shoot him! throw him the water! hang him!"

Superst.i.tious individuals leaned towards hanging for the sake of the cords. As to the original cause of the commotion, no one seemed to remember anything about it. I overheard one man say,--"It appears that they arrested him just as he was setting fire to the ambulance at the Palais de l'Industrie!" As to what became of the young man I do not know; I trust he was neither hanged, shot, nor drowned. At any rate, let it be a lesson to others not to get embroiled in dangerous adventures of that kind; and whatever your anxiety may be concerning your family or affairs, you would do well to hide it carefully under a smiling exterior. Suppose you meet one of your friends, who says to you, "My dear fellow, how anxious you must be?" You must answer, "Anxious! oh, not at all. On the contrary, I never felt more free of care in my life."--"Oh! I thought your aunt was ill, and as you do not receive any letters ..."--"Not receive any letters!" you continue in the same strain, "who told you that? Not receive any letters! why, I have more than I want! what an idea!"--"Then you must be strangely favoured," says your mystified companion; "for since Citizen Theiz[45] has taken possession of the Post-office, the communications are stopped."--"Don't believe it. It is a rumour set on float by the reactionists. Why, those terrible reactionists go so far as to pretend that the Commune has imprisoned the priests, arrested journalists, and stopped the newspapers!"--"Well, you may say what you please, but a proclamation of Citizen Theiz announces that communication with the departments will not be re-established for some days."--"Nothing but modesty on his part; he has only to show himself at the Post-office, and the service, which has been put out of order by those wretched reactionists, will be immediately reorganised."--"So I am to understand that you have news every day of your aunt."--"Of course."--"Well, I am delighted to hear it; for one of my friends, who arrived from Ma.r.s.eilles this morning, told me that your aunt was dead."--"Dead, good heavens! what do you mean? Now I think of it, I did not get a letter this morning."--"There you see!"

You must not, however, allow your sorrow to carry you away, at the risk of your personal safety, but answer readily. "I see it all, for a wonder I did not get a letter this morning; Citizen Theiz is a kind-hearted man, and did not want to make me unhappy."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 45: A working chaser, and one of the most active and influential members of the International Society. He was among the accused who were tried in July, 1870, and was condemned to two years'

imprisonment. On the formation of the Central Committee, he was appointed Vice-President. It was Theiz who saved the General Post Office, Rue J.J. Rousseau, from the total destruction decreed by other members of the Commune. His fate is not well known. Director of the General Post-office in the Rue J.J. Rousseau, he is said to have saved that important establishment, doomed to destruction by the Commune.

Theiz escaped from Paris to London on the 29th of July; he took an active part in the struggle to the last, and was close to Vermorel when wounded at the barricade of the Chateau d'Eau.]

x.x.xVII.

The queen of the age is the Press. Lately dethroned and somewhat shorn of her majesty, but still a queen. It is in vain that the press has sometimes degraded itself in the eyes of honest men by stooping to applaud and approve of crimes and excesses, that journalists have done what they can to lower it; still the august offspring of the human mind, the press, has really lost neither its power nor its fascination.

Misunderstood, misapplied, it may have done some harm, but no one can question the signal service which it has been able to render, or the n.o.bility of its mission. If it has sometimes been the organ of false prophets, its voice has also been often raised to instruct and encourage.

When last night you went secretly, in a manner worthy of the act, to seize on the printing presses of the _Journal des Debats_, the _Paris Journal_, and the _Const.i.tutionnel_, were you aware of what you were doing? You imagined, perhaps, this act would have no other result than that of suppressing violently a private concern--which is one kind of robbery--and of reducing to a state of beggary--which is a crime--the numerous individuals, journalists, printers, compositors, and others who are employed on the journal, and who live by its means. You have done worse than this. You have stopped, as far as it was in your power, the current of human progress. You have suppressed man's n.o.blest.

right--the right of expressing his opinions to the world; you are no better than the pickpocket who appropriates your handkerchief. You have taken our freedom of thought by the throat, and said, "It is in my way, I will strangle it." Wherefore have you acted thus? To shut the mouths of those who contradict you, is to admit that you are not so very sure of being in the right. To suppress the journals is to confess your fear of them; to avoid the light is to excite our suspicion concerning the deeds you are perpetrating in the darkness. We shut our windows when we do not desire to be seen. Little confidence is inspired by closed doors.

Your councils at the Hotel de Ville are secret as the proceedings of certain legal cases, the details of which might be hurtful to public morality. Again I say, wherefore this mystery? What strange projects have you on foot? Do you discuss among you, propositions of a nature which your modesty declines to make known to the world? This fear of publicity, of opposition, you have proved afresh, by the nocturnal visits of your National Guards to the printing offices, wherein they forced an entrance like housebreakers. Shall we be reduced to judge of your acts, and of the b.l.o.o.d.y incidents of the civil war, only by your own a.s.severations and those of your accomplices? You must be very determined to act guiltily and to be obliged to tell lies, as you take so much trouble to get rid of those, who might pa.s.s sentence on you, and who might convict you of falsehood. Therefore you have not only committed a crime in so doing, but made a great mistake as well. No one can meddle with the liberty of the press with impunity. The persecution of the press always brings with it its own punishment. Look back to the many years of the Imperial Government, to the few months of the Government of the 4th of September; of all the crimes perpetrated by the former, of all the errors committed by the latter, those crimes and errors which most particularly hastened the end were those that were levelled against the freedom of the press. The most valable excuse in favour of the revolt of the 18th of March was certainly the suppression of several journals by General Vinoy, with the consent of M. Thiers. How can you be so rash as to make the very same mistakes which have been the destruction of former governments, and also so unmindful of your own honour as to commit the very crime which reduces you to the same level as your enemies?

Ah I truly those who were ready to judge you with patience and impartiality, those who at first were perhaps, on the whole, favourable to you, because it seemed to them that you represented some of the legitimate aspirations of Paris, even those, seeing you act like thoughtless tyrants, will feel it quite impossible to blind themselves any longer to your faults; those who having wished to esteem you for the sake of liberty, will for the sake of liberty, be obliged to despise you!

x.x.xVIII.

It cannot be true. I will not believe it. It cannot be possible that Paris is to be again bombarded: and by whom? By Frenchmen! In spite of the danger I was told there was to be apprehended near Neuilly, I wished to see with my own eyes what was going on. So this morning, the 8th April, I went to the Champs Elysees.

Until I reached the Rond Point there was nothing unusual, only perhaps fewer people to be seen about. The omnibus does not go any farther than the corner of the Avenue Marigny. An Englishwoman, whom the conductor had just helped down, came up to me and asked me the way; she wanted to go to the Rue Galilee, but did not like to walk up the wide avenue. I pointed out to her a side-street, and continued my way. A little higher up a line of National Guards, standing about ten feet distant from each other, had orders to stop pa.s.sengers from going any farther. "You can't pa.s.s."--"But ...," and I stopped to think of some plausible motive to justify my curiosity. However, I was saved the trouble. Although I had only uttered a hesitating "but," the sentinel seemed to consider that sufficient, and replied, "Oh, very well, you can pa.s.s."

The avenue seemed more and more deserted as I advanced. The shutters of all the houses were closed. Here and there a pa.s.senger slipped along close to the walls of the houses, ready to take refuge within the street-doors, which had been left open by order, directly they heard the whizzing of a sh.e.l.l. In front of the shop of a carriage-builder, securely closed, were piled heaps of rifles; most of the National Guards were stretched on the pavement fast asleep, while some few were walking up and down smoking their pipes, and others playing at the plebeian game of "bouchon."[46] I was told that a sh.e.l.l had burst a quarter of an hour before at the corner of the Rue de Morny. A captain was seated there on the ground beside his wife, who had just brought him his breakfast; the poor fellow was literally cut in two, and the woman had been carried away to a neighbouring chemist's shop dangerously wounded. I was told she was still there, so I turned my steps in that direction. A small group of people were a.s.sembled before the door. I managed to get near, but saw nothing, as the poor thing had been carried into the surgery.

They told me that she had been wounded in the neck by a bit of the sh.e.l.l, and that she was now under the care of one of the surgeons of the Press Ambulance. I then continued my walk up the avenue. The cannonading, which had seemed to cease for some little time, now began again with greater intensity than ever. Clouds of white smoke arose in the direction of the Porte Maillot, while bombs from Mont Valerien burst over the Arc de Triomphe. On the right and left of me were companies of Federals. A little further on a battalion, fully equipped, with blankets and saucepans strapped to their knapsacks, and loaves of bread stuck aloft on their bayonets, moved in the direction of Porte Maillot. By the side of the captain in command of the first company marched a woman in a strange costume, the skirt of a vivandiere and the jacket of a National Guard, a Phrygian cap on her head, a cha.s.sepot in her hand, and a revolver stuck in her belt. From the distance at which I was standing she looked both young and pretty. I asked some Federals who she was; one told me she was the wife of Citizen Eudes,[47] a member of the Commune, and another that she was a newspaper seller in the Avenue des Ternes, whose child had been killed in the Rue des Acacias the night before by a fragment of a sh.e.l.l, and that she had sworn to revenge him. It appeared the battalion was on its way to support the combatants at Neuilly, who were in want of help. From what I hear the gendarmes and sergents de ville had fought their way as far as the Rue des Huissiers. Now I had no doubt the Versailles generals had made use of the gendarmes and sergents de ville, who were most of them old and tried soldiers, but if in very truth they were wherever the imagination of the Federals persisted in placing them, they must either have been as numerous as the grains of sand on the sea-sh.o.r.e, or else their leaders must have found out a way of making them serve in several places at once. Having followed the battalion, I found myself a few yards in front of the Arc de Triomphe.

Suddenly a hissing, whizzing sound is heard in the distance, and rapidly approaches us; it sounds very much like the noise of a sky-rocket. "A sh.e.l.l!" cried the sergeant, and the whole battalion to a man, threw itself on the ground with a load jingling of saucepans and bayonets.

Indeed there was some danger. The terrible projectile lowered as it approached, and then fell with a terrific noise a little way from us, in front of the last house on the left-hand side of the avenue. I had never seen a sh.e.l.l burst so near me before; a good idea of what it is like may be had from those sinister looking paintings, that one sees sometimes suspended round the necks of certain blind beggars, supposed to represent an explosion in a mine. I think no one was hurt, and the mischief done seemed to consist in a Wide hole in the asphalte and a door reduced to splinters. The National Guards got up from the ground, and several of them proceeded to pick up fragments of the sh.e.l.l. They had, however, not gone many yards when another cry of alarm was given, and again we heard the ominous Whizzing sound; in an instant we were all on our faces. The second sh.e.l.l burst, but we did not see it; we only saw at the top of the house that had already been struck, a window open suddenly and broken panes fall to the ground. The sh.e.l.l had most likely gone through the roof and burst in the attic. Was there anyone in those upper stories? However, we were on our legs again and had doubled the Arc de Triomphe. I had succeeded in ingratiating myself with the men of the rear-guard, and I hoped to be able to go as far with them as I pleased. Strange enough, and I confess it with _naif_ delight, I did not feel at all afraid. Although half an inch difference in the inclination of the cannon might have cost me my life, still I felt inclined to proceed on my way. I begin to think that it is not difficult to be brave when one is not naturally a coward! Beneath the great arch were a.s.sembled a hundred or so of persons who seemed to consider themselves in safety, and who from time to time ventured a few steps forward, for the purpose of examining the damage done to Etex's sculptured group by three successive sh.e.l.ls. But in the Avenue de la Grande Armee only three Federals were to be seen, and I think I was the only man in plain clothes they had allowed to go so far. I could distinctly perceive a small barricade erected in front of the Porte Maillot on this side of the ramparts. The bastion to the right was hard at work cannonading the heights of Courbevoie; great columns of smoke, succeeded by terrific explosions, testified to the zeal of the Communist artillerymen. Beyond the ramparts the Avenue de Neuilly extended, dusty and deserted.

Unfortunately the sun blinded me, and I could not distinguish well what was going on in the distance. By this time the sound of musketry was heard distinctly. I was told they were fighting princ.i.p.ally at Saint James and in the park of Neuilly. I tried to pa.s.s out of the gates with the battalion, but an officer caught sight of me, and in no measured tones ordered me back. I ought not to complain, however, he rendered me good service; for although the fire of the Versaillais had somewhat diminished, I do not think the place could have been much longer tenable, to judge from the quant.i.ties of bits of sh.e.l.l that strewed the road; from the numerous litters that were being borne away with their b.l.o.o.d.y burthens; from the railway-station in ruins, and the condition of the neighbouring houses, which had nearly all of them great black holes in their fronts. The Federals did not seem at all impressed by their critical position; sounds of laughter reached me from the interior of a casemate, from the chimney of which smoke was arising, and guards running hither and thither were whistling merrily the _Chant du Depart_, with a look of complete satisfaction.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ARC DE TRIOMPHE, EAST SIDE (THE FINEST), UNINJURED.

Damaged on the other side. During the Prussian siege it was defended from injury, though no sh.e.l.ls reached it. Uncovered before the civil war.]

I managed to reach the Rue du Debarcadere, which is situated close to the ramparts. An acquaintance of mine lives there. I knew he was away, but I thought the porter would recognise and allow me to take up a position at one of the windows. Next door, the corner house, I found a sh.e.l.l had gone into a wine-merchant's shop there, who could very well have dispensed with such a visitor, and had behaved in the most unruly fas.h.i.+on, breaking the gla.s.s, smas.h.i.+ng the tables and counter, but neither killing nor wounding anybody. The porter knew me quite well, and invited me to walk upstairs to the apartments of my friend, situated on the third floor. From the windows I could not see the bastion, which was hidden by the station; but to the left, in the distance, beyond the Bois de Boulogne, wherein I fancied I perceived troops moving between the branches, but whether Versaillais or Parisians I could not tell, arose the tremendous Mont Valerien bathed in sunlight. The flashes from the cannon, which in daylight have a pale silver tint, succeeded each other rapidly; the explosions were formidable, and the fort was crowned with a wreath of smoke. They appeared to be firing in the direction of Levallois, rather than on the Porte Maillot. The Federals did not seem to attempt to reply. Turning myself towards the right I could scan nearly the whole length of the Avenue de Neuilly. The bare piece of ground which const.i.tutes the military zone was completely deserted; several sh.e.l.ls fell there that had been aimed doubtless at the Porte Maillot or the bastion. The position I had taken up at the window was rather a perilous one. I was just behind the bastion. Beyond the military zone most of the houses seemed uninhabited, but I saw distinctly the National Guards in front of the Restaurant Gilet, making their soup on the side-walk. I was too far away to judge of the extent of the mischief done by the cannonading, but I was told that several roofs had fallen in and many walls had been thrown down in that quarter.

All that I could see of the market-place was empty; but the sound of musketry, and the smoke which issued from the houses on one side of it, told me that the Federals were there in sufficient numbers. A little further on I saw the barrels of the rifles sticking out of the windows, with little wreaths of smoke curling out of them; small knots of armed men every now and then marched hurriedly across the avenue, and disappeared into the opposite houses. Partly on account of the distance, and partly on account of the blinding sun, and partly, perhaps, on account of the emotion I experienced, which made me desire and yet fear to see, I could distinguish the bridge but indistinctly, with the dark line of a barricade in front of it. What surprised me most in the battle which I was busily observing, was the extraordinarily small number of combatants that were visible, when suddenly--it was about two o'clock in the afternoon--the Versailles batteries at Courbevoie, which had been silent for some time, began firing furiously. The horrid screech of the mitrailleuse drowned the hissing of the sh.e.l.ls; the whole breadth of the long avenue was covered by a kind of white mist. The bastion in front of me replied energetically. It seemed to me as if the interior part of my ear was being rent asunder, when suddenly I heard a dull heavy sound, such as I had not heard before, and I felt the house tremble beneath me.

Loud cries arose from the National Guards on the ramparts. I fancied that a rain of shot and sh.e.l.l had destroyed the drawbridge of the Porte Maillot; but it was not so; in the distance I saw that the clouds of smoke were rolling nearer and nearer, and that the roar of the musketry, which had greatly increased, sounded close by. I felt sure that a rush was being made from Courbevoie--that the Versaillais were advancing. The sh.e.l.ls were flying over our heads in the direction of the Champs Elysees. I began to distinguish that a tumultuous ma.s.s of human beings were marching on in the smoke, in the dust, in the sun. The guns on the bastion now thundered forth incessantly. There was no mistaking by this time, there were the Versaillais; I could see the red trowsers of the men of the line. The Federals were shooting them down from the windows.

Then I saw the advanced guard stop, hesitate beneath the b.a.l.l.s which seemed to rain on them from the Place du Marche, and presently retire.

Whereupon a large number of Federals poured forth from the houses, and, walking close to the walls, to be as much as possible out of the way of the projectiles, hurried after the retreating enemy. But suddenly, when they had arrived a little too far for me to distinguish anything very clearly, they in their turn came to a standstill, and then retraced their steps, and returned to their positions within the houses. The fire from the Versaillais then sensibly diminished, but that of the bastions continued its furious attack. It was thus that I witnessed one of those _cha.s.se-croises_ under fire, which have become so frequent since this dreadful civil war was concentrated at Neuilly.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HORSE CHa.s.sEUR ACTING AS A COMMUNIST ARTILLERY MAN, ATTENDED BY A GAMIN SPONGER.]

As it would have been most imprudent to follow the railway cutting, or to have gone back by the Avenue de la Grande Armee, where the Versailles sh.e.l.ls were still falling, I walked up the Rue du Debarcadere, and then turned into the Rue Saint-Ferdinand, and soon found myself in the Place des Ternes, in front of the church. There was a most dismal aspect about the whole of this quarter. Situated close to the ramparts, it is very much exposed, and had suffered greatly. Nearly all the shops were shut; some of the doors, however, of those where wine or provisions, are sold, were standing open, while on the shutters of others were inscribed in chalk, "The entrance is beneath the gateway." I was astonished to see that the church was open, a rare sight in these days. Why, is it possible that the Commune has committed the unqualifiable imprudence of not arresting the cure of Saint-Ferdinand, and that she is weak enough--may she not have to regret it!--to permit the inhabitants of Ternes to be baptised, married, and buried according to the deplorable rites and ceremonies of Catholicism, which has happily fallen into disuse in the other quarters of Paris? I can now understand why the sh.e.l.ls fall so persistently in this poor arrondiss.e.m.e.nt: the anger of the G.o.ddess of Reason (shall we not soon have a G.o.ddess of Reason?) lies heavily on this quarter, the shame of the capital, where the inhabitants still try to look as if they believed in heaven! In spite of everything, however, I entered the church; there were a great many women on their knees, and several men too. The prayers of the dead were being said over the coffin of a woman who, I was told, was killed yesterday by a ball in the chest, whilst crossing the Avenue des Ternes, just a little above the railway bridge. A ball, how strange! yet I was a.s.sured such was the case. It is pretty evident, then, that the Versaillais were considerably nearer to Paris, on this side at least, than the official despatches lead us to suppose.

On returning to the street I directed my steps in the direction of the Place d'Eylau. Two National Guards pa.s.sed me, bearing a litter between them.--"Oh, you can look if you like," said one. So I drew back the checked curtain. On the mattress was stretched a woman, decently dressed, with a child of two or three years lying on her breast. They both looked very pale; one of the woman's arms was hanging down; her sleeve was stained with blood; the hand had been carried away.--"Where were they wounded?" I asked.--"Wounded! they are dead. It is the wife and child of the velocipede-maker in the Avenue de Wagram; if you will go and break the news to him you will do us a good service."

It was therefore quite true, certain, incontestable. The b.a.l.l.s and sh.e.l.ls of the Versaillais were not content with killing the combatants and knocking down the forts and ramparts. They were also killing women and children, ordinary pa.s.sers-by; not only those who were attracted by an imprudent curiosity to go where they had no business, but unfortunates who were necessarily obliged to venture into the neighbouring streets, for the purpose of buying bread. Not only do the sh.e.l.ls of the National a.s.sembly reach the buildings situated close to the city walls, but they often fall considerably farther in, crus.h.i.+ng inoffensive houses, and breaking the sculpture on the public monuments.

No one can deny this. I have seen it with my own eyes. Anyhow, the projectiles fall nearer and nearer the centre. Yesterday they fell in the Avenue de la Grande Armee; to-day they fly over the Arc de Triomphe, and fall in the Place d'Eylau and the Avenue d'Uhrich. Who knows but what to-morrow they will have reached the Place de la Concorde, and the next day perhaps I may be killed by one on the Boulevard Montmartre?

Paris bombarded! Take care, gentlemen of the National a.s.sembly! What the Prussians did, and what gave rise to such a clamour of indignation on the part of the Government of the 4th September, it will be both infamous and imprudent for you to attempt. You kill Frenchmen who are in arms against their countrymen,--alas! that is a horrible necessity in civil war,--but spare the lives and the dwellings of those who are not arrayed against you, and who are perhaps your allies. It is all very well to argue that guns are not endowed with the gifts of intelligence and mercy, and that one cannot make them do exactly what one likes; but what have you done with those marvellous marksmen who, during the siege, continually threw down the enemy's batteries and interrupted his works with such extraordinary precision, and who pretended that at a distance of seven thousand metres they could hit the gilded spike of a Prussian helmet? Wherefore have they become so clumsy since they changed places with their adversaries? Joking apart, in a word, you are doing yourself the greatest injury in being so uselessly cruel; every sh.e.l.l overleaping the fortifications is not only a crime, but a great mistake. Remember, that in this horrible duel which is going on, victory will not really remain with that party which shall have triumphed over the other, by the force of arms (yours undoubtedly), but to the one who, by his conduct, shall have succeeded in proving to the neutral population, which observes and judges, that right was on his side. I do not say but what your cause is the best; for although we may have to reproach you with an imprudent resistance, unnecessary attacks, and a wilful obstinacy not to see what was legitimate and honourable in the wishes of the Parisians, still we must consider that you represent, legally, the whole of France.

I do not say, therefore, but what your cause is the best; frankly though, can you hope to bring over to your side that large body of citizens, whose confidence you had shaken, by ma.s.sacring innocent people in the streets, and destroying their dwellings? If this bombardment continues, if it increases in violence as it seems likely to do, you will become odious, and then, were you a hundred times in the right, you will still be in the wrong. Therefore, it is most urgent that you give orders to the artillerymen of Courbevoie and Mont Valerien, to moderate their zeal, if you do not desire that Paris--neutral Paris--should make dangerous comparisons between the a.s.sembly which flings us its sh.e.l.ls, and the Commune which launches its decrees, and come to the conclusion that decrees are less dangerous missiles than cannon-b.a.l.l.s. As to the legality of the thing, we do not much care about that; we have seen so many governments, more or less legal, that we are somewhat _blases_ on that point; and a few millions of votes have scarcely power enough to put us in good humour with shot and sh.e.l.l.

Certainly the Commune, such as the men at the Hotel de Ville have const.i.tuted it, is not a brilliant prospect. It arrests priests, stops newspapers, wishes to incorporate us, in spite of ourselves, in the National Guard; robs us--so we are told; lies inveterately--that is incontestable, and altogether makes itself a great bore; but what does that matter?--human nature is full of weaknesses, and prefers to be bored than bombarded.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MARINE GUNNER AND STREET-BOY.

During the Prussian siege the sailors of the French navy played an important part, their bravery, activity, and ingenuity being much esteemed by the Parisians. Some, of them took the red side, and manned the gun-boats on the Seine. Knowing the prestige attached to the brave marines, the Communist generals made use of the naval clothes found in the marine stores, and dressed therein some of the valliant heroes of Belleville and Montmartre.]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 46: The game of pitch-halfpenny, in, which, in France, a cork (_bouchon_), with halfpence on the top of it, is placed on the ground.]

[Footnote 47: General Eudes was the Alcibiades, or rather the Saint Just, of the Commune. He had the face and manners of a fas.h.i.+onable _tenorino_, the luxurious taste of the Athenian, the cruel inflexibility of Robespierre's protege. He was born at Bonay, in the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt of Coutances. His father was a tradesman of the Boulevard des Italians. In his examination before the Council of War in August, 1870, Eudes called himself a shorthand writer and law student, though his real position was said to be that of a linendraper's clerk. His first notable exploit was the a.s.sa.s.sination of a fireman at La Villette. For this crime he was brought before the First Council of War at Paris. Here he informed the President, in somewhat unparliamentary terms, that "the betrayers of the country were not the Republicans, and that to destroy the Imperial Government was to annihilate the Prussians." In spite of the eloquent appeal of his counsel, he was condemned to death. The events of the fourth of September prevented the execution of this sentence, and he lived to take an active part in the agitation of the thirty-first of October. He was again tried for this conduct and acquitted, together with Vermorel, Ribaldi, Lefrancais and others. Eudes' name figures in the first decrees of the Commune, and on the last of those of the Committee of Public Safety. On the second of April he was appointed Delegate for War, and, conjointly with Cluseret, organised ten corps of the Enfants Perdus of Belleville. He promised to each of his volunteers an annuity of 300 francs and a decoration. Eudes was an atheist of the most violent type, and sayings are attributed to him which make one shudder.]

x.x.xIX.

Where is Bergeret? What have they done with Bergeret? We miss Bergeret.

They have no right to suppress Bergeret, who, according to the official doc.u.ment, was "himself" at Neuilly; Bergeret, who drove to battle in an open carriage; who enlivened our ennui with a little fun. They were perfectly at liberty to take away his command and give it to whomsoever they chose; I am quite agreeable to that, but they had no right to take him away and prevent him amusing us. Alas! we do not have the chance so often![48]

Rumours are afloat that he has been taken to the Conciergerie. Poor Bergeret! and why is he so treated? Because he got the Federals beaten in trying to lead them to Versailles?

[Ill.u.s.tration: CORPS LEGISLATIF.--THE HEAD-QUARTERS OF GENERAL BERGERET.]