Tales from Blackwood Volume V Part 11

"It _was_," answered Anthony. "Thank Heaven, there's an end of him!"

I shuddered. "But where is Bob?"

"Bob?" cried Anthony. "Bob!"

I glanced at the grave. The mound of earth seemed larger and higher than when I had last seen it. Doubtless the murderer lay beside his victim.

"Shall we not render the last service to this wretch, Anthony?" asked I.

"The scoundrel!" answered the huntsman. "I won't dirty my hands with him. Let him poison the kites and the crows!"

We rode on.

HOW WE GOT POSSESSION OF THE TUILERIES.

A ROMANCE AFTER THE MANNER OF ALEXANDER DUMAS.

BY PROFESSOR AYTOUN.

[_MAGA._ APRIL 1848.]

CHAPTER I.

HEADS OR TAILS?

I like political ovations. It is a very pleasant thing to perambulate Europe in the guise of a regenerator, sowing the good seed of political economy in places which have hitherto been barren, and enlightening the heathen upon the texture of calico, and the blessings of unreciprocal free-trade. I rather flatter myself that I have excited considerable sensation in certain quarters of Europe, previously plunged in darkness, and unillumined by the argand lamp of Manchester philosophy. Since September last, I have not been idle, but have borne the banner of regeneration from the Baltic to the sh.o.r.es of the Bosphorus.

As the apostle of peace and plenty, I have everywhere been rapturously greeted. Never, I believe, was there a sincerer, a more earnest wish prevalent throughout the nations for the maintenance of universal tranquillity than now; never a better security for that fraternisation which we all so earnestly desire; never a more peaceful or unrevolutionary epoch. Such, at least, were my ideas a short time ago, when, after having fulfilled a secret mission of some delicacy in a very distant part of the Continent, I turned my face homewards, and retraced my steps in the direction of my own Glaswegian Mecca. In pa.s.sing through Italy, I found that country deeply engaged in plans of social organisation, and much cheered by the sympathising presence of a member of her Britannic Majesty's Cabinet. It was delightful to witness the good feeling which seemed to prevail between the British unaccredited minister and the sc.u.m of the Ausonian population,--the mutual politeness and sympathy exhibited by each of the high contracting parties,--and the perfect understanding on the part of the Lazzaroni, of the motives which had induced the northern peer to absent himself from felicity awhile, and devote the whole of his vast talents and genius to the cause of foreign insurrection. I had just time to congratulate Pope Pius upon the charming prospect which was before him, and to say a few hurried words regarding the superiority of cotton to Christianity as a universal tranquillising medium, when certain unpleasant rumours from the frontier forced their way to the Eternal City, and convinced me of the propriety of continuing my retreat towards the land of my nativity. Not that I fear steel, or have any abstract repugnance to grape, but my mission was emphatically one of peace; I had a great duty to discharge to my country, and that might have been lamentably curtailed by the bullet of some blundering Austrian.

Behold me, then, at Paris--that Aspasian capital of the world. I had often visited it before in the character of a tourist and literateur, but never until now as a politician. True, I was not accredited: I enjoyed neither diplomatic rank, nor the more soothing salary which is its accompaniment. But, in these times, such distinctions are rapidly fading away. I had seen with my own eyes a good deal of spontaneous diplomacy, which certainly did not seem to flow in the regular channel; and, furthermore, I could personally testify to the weight attached abroad to private commercial crusades. I needed no official costume; I was the representative of a popular movement; I was the champion of a cla.s.s; and my name and my principles were alike familiar to the ears of the illuminati of Europe. Formerly I had been proud of a.s.sociating with Eugene Sue, Charles Nodier, Paul de k.o.c.k, and other characters of ephemeral literary celebrity; I had wasted my time in orgies at the Cafe de Londres, or the Rocher de Cancale, and was but too happy to be admitted to those little parties of pleasure in which the majority of the cavaliers are feuilletonists, and the dames, terrestrial stars from the constellation of the Theatre des Varietes. Now I looked back on this former phase of my existence with a consciousness of having wasted my energies. I had shot into another sphere--was ent.i.tled to take rank with Thiers, Odillon Barrot, Cremieux, and other champions of the people; and I resolved to comport myself accordingly. I do not feel at liberty to enter into the exact details of the public business which detained me for some time in Paris. It is enough to say, that I was warmly and cordially received, and on the best possible terms with the members of the _extreme gauche_.

One afternoon about the middle of February, I was returning from the Chamber of Deputies, meditating very seriously upon the nature of a debate which I had just heard, regarding the opposition of ministers to the holding of a Reform banquet in Paris, and in which my friend Barrot had borne a very conspicuous share. At the corner of the Place de la Concorde, I observed a tall swarthy man in the uniform of the National Guard, engaged in cheapening a poodle. I thought I recognised the face--hesitated, stopped, and in a moment was in the arms of my ill.u.s.trious friend, the Count of Monte-Christo, and Marquis Davy de la Pailleterie!

"_Capdibious!_" cried the author of Trois Mousquetaires--"Who would have thought to see you here? Welcome, my dear Dunshunner, a thousand times to Paris. Where have you been these hundred years?"

"Voyaging, like yourself, to the East, my dear Marquis," replied I.

"Ah, bah! That is an old joke. I never was nearer Egypt than the Bois de Boulogne; however, I did manage to mystify the good public about the baths of Alexandria. But how came you here just now? _Dix mille tonnerres!_ They told me you had been made _pair d'Angleterre_."

"Why, no; not exactly. There was some talk of it, I believe. But jealousy--jealousy, you know--"

"Ah, yes,--I comprehend! _Ce vilain Palmerston, n'est-ce pas?_ But that is always the way; ministers are always the same. You will hardly credit it, my dear friend, but I--I with my ancient t.i.tle--and the most popular author of France, am not even a member of the Chamber of Deputies!"

"You amaze me!"

"Yes--after all, you manage better in England. There is that little D'Israeli--very clever man--Monceton Milles, Bourring, and Wakeley, all in the legislature; while here the literary interest is altogether unrepresented."

"Surely, my dear Marquis, you forget--there's Lamartine."

"Lamartine! a mere sentimentalist--a n.o.body! No, my dear friend; France must be regenerated. The daughter of glory, she cannot live without progression."

"How, Marquis? I thought that you and Montpensier--"

"Were friends? True enough. It was I who settled the Spanish marriages.

There, I rather flatter myself, I had your perfidious Albion on the hip.

But, to say the truth, I am tired of family alliances. We want something more to keep us alive--something startling, in short--something like the Pyramids and Moscow, to give us an impulse forward into the dark gulf of futurity. The limits of Algeria are too contracted for the fluttering of our national banner. We want freedom, less taxation, and a more extended frontier."

"And cannot all these," said I, unwilling to lose the opportunity of converting so remarkable a man as the Count of Monte-Christo to the grand principles of Manchester--"cannot these be attained by more peaceful methods than the subversion of general tranquillity? What is freedom, my dear Marquis, but an unlimited exportation of cotton abroad, with double task hours of wholesome labour at home? How will you diminish your taxation better, than by reducing all duties on imports, until the deficit is laid directly upon the shoulders of a single uncomplaining cla.s.s? Why seek to extend your frontier, whilst we in England, out of sheer love to the world at large, are rapidly demolis.h.i.+ng our colonies? Did you ever happen," continued I, pulling from my pocket a bundle of the Manchester manifestos, "to peruse any of these glorious epitomes of reason and of political science? Are you familiar with the soul-stirring tracts of Thompson and of Bright? Did you ever read the Socialist's scheme for universal philanthropy, which Cobden--"

"_Peste!_" replied the ill.u.s.trious n.o.bleman, "what the deuce do we care for the opinions of Monsieur Tonson, or any of your low manufacturers?

By my honour, Dunshunner, I am afraid you are losing your head. Don't you know, my dear fellow, that all great revolutions spring from us, the men of genius? It is we who are the true rousers of the people; we, the poets and romancers, who are the source of all legitimate power. Witness Voltaire, Rousseau, De Beranger, and--I may say it without any imputation of vanity--the Marquis Davy de la Pailleterie!"

"Yours is a new theory!" said I, musingly.

"New! Pray pardon me--it is as old as literature itself! No revolution can be effectual unless it has the fine arts for its basis. Simple as I stand here, I demand no more time than a month to wrap Europe in universal war."

"You don't say so seriously?"

"On my honour."

"Give me leave to doubt it."

"Should you like a proof?"

"Not on so great a scale, certainly. I am afraid the results would be too serious to justify the experiment."

"Ah, bah! You are a philanthropist. What are a few thousand lives compared with the triumph of mind?"

"Not much to you, perhaps, but certainly something to the owners. But come, my dear friend, you are jesting. You don't mean to insinuate that you possess any such power?"

"I do indeed."

"But the means? Granting that you have the power--and all Europe acknowledges the extraordinary faculties of the author of Monte-Christo--some time would be required for their development.

You cannot hope to inoculate the mind of a nation in a moment."

"I did not say a moment--I said a month."

"And dare I ask your recipe?"

"A very simple one. Two romances, each in ten volumes, and a couple of melodramas."

"What! of your own?"

"Of mine," replied the Marquis de la Pailleterie.