Part 4 (1/2)
The Tuileries correspondence, of which I gave a short summary yesterday, reveals the fact that both M. de Ca.s.sagnac and Baron Jerome David were regular pensioners on the Civil List. The cost of the Prince Imperial's baptism amounted to 898,000fr. The cousins, male and female, of the Emperor, received 1,310,975fr. per annum; the Duc de Persigny received in two months, 60,000fr.; Prince Jablonowyski, Countess Gajan, Madame Claude Vignon, Le General Morris, and many other ladies and gentlemen who never did the State any service, are down for various sums. Among other items is one of 1,200fr. to General de Failly for sugar plums. The d.u.c.h.ess of Mouchy, whose name continually appears, received 2,000,000fr.
as a marriage portion. The son of the American Bonaparte had a pension of 30,000fr.; Madame Ratazzi of 24,000fr.; her sister, Madame Turr, the same; Marquis Pepoli, 25,000fr. But the poor relations do not appear to have been contented with their pensions, for on some pretext or other they were always getting extra allowances out of their rich cousin. As for Prince Achille Murat, the Emperor paid his debts a dozen times.
Whatever he may have been to the outer world, poor old Badinguet seems to have been a Providence to his forty-two cousins and to his personal friends. He carried out Sidney Smith's notion of charity--put his hand into someone else's pocket, and gave away what he stole liberally.
_Figaro_, with its usual good taste, recommends the battalions of the National Guard to choose celebrities of the _demi-monde_ for their vivandieres. From what I hear every day, I imagine that the battalions will be far more likely to hang the editor of this facetious paper than to take his advice. I am told by the kiosque women that its sale is falling off daily.
The clubs and their organs have announced that the munic.i.p.al elections are to take place, with or without the consent of the Government, on October 2, and that not only the inhabitants of Paris, but the Gardes Mobiles and the peasants who have taken refuge within the walls of the city are to vote. In the working men's quarters there is undoubtedly a strong feeling in favour of these elections being held at once. But the working men do not attend the clubs. I have dropped into several of them, and the audience appeared to me princ.i.p.ally to be composed of strongminded women and demagogues, who never did an honest day's work in their lives. The Government has, however, been ”interviewed” on the subject of the munic.i.p.al elections by the chiefs of the battalions of the National Guards of the Faubourgs, and, if only some men of position can be found to put themselves at the head of the movement, it will cause trouble. As yet, Ledru-Rollin is the only known politician who avowedly favours it. The Government is, I believe, divided upon the expediency of holding the elections at once, or rather I should say, upon the possibility of putting them off without provoking disturbances.
I am inclined to think that, as is usually the case, the Moderates will yield on this point to their Ultra colleagues. Very possibly they may think that, if ever a capitulation becomes necessary, it will be as well to make the nominees of the Faubourgs share in the responsibility. As Jules Favre said of Rochefort, they are perhaps safer in the Government than outside of it.
The column of the Place Vendome is daily bombarded by indignant patriots, who demand that it should be razed to the ground, and the metal of which it is composed be melted down into cannon. The statue of Napoleon I., in the c.o.c.ked hat and great-coat, which used to be on its summit, was removed a few years ago to a pedestal at the end of the Avenue de la Grande Armee. It has been concealed to preserve it from the iconoclasts. There has been a lull of late in M. Gambetta's proclamations. Within the last twenty-four hours, not above two fresh ones have appeared. The newspapers are beginning to clamour for a sortie. Why, they ask, are we to allow ourselves to be besieged by an army which does not equal in numbers our own? Why are we to allow them quietly to establish their batteries? There is a certain amount of sense in these complaints, though the vital question of how regiments, which have never had an opportunity of being brigaded together, will be able to vanquish in the open field the disciplined troops of Germany, is the unknown [Greek: x] in the problem which has yet to be solved. It is evident, however, that the question must be tested, unless we are to remain within the fortifications until we have digested our last omnibus horse. If the enemy attacks, there is fair ground to suppose that he will be repelled; but then, perhaps he will leave us to make the first move. Without entering into details, I may say that considerable engineering skill has been shown of late in strengthening the defences, that the Mobiles and the National Guard, if their words mean anything, which has yet to be proved, are full of fighting, and that the armed force at our disposal has at length been knocked into some sort of shape. Every day that the Prussian attack is delayed diminishes its chance of success. ”If they do carry the town by a.s.sault,” said a general to me yesterday, ”it will be our fault, for, from a military point of view, it is now impregnable.” What the effect of a bombardment may be upon the morale of the inhabitants we have yet to see. In any case, however, until several of those hard nuts, the forts, have been cracked, a bombardment can only be partial.
There was heavy firing last night, and it increased in intensity this morning. At about one o'clock I saw above 100 wounded being brought to the Palais de l'Industrie, and on going to Montrouge I found the church near the fortifications full of them. The following is the official account of what has happened:
Our troops in a vigorous sortie, successively occupied Chevilly and l'Hay, and advanced as far as Thiais and Choisy-le-Roi. All these positions were solidly occupied, the latter with cannon. After a sharp artillery and musketry engagement our troops fell back on their positions with a remarkable order and _aplomb_. The Garde Mobile were very firm. _En somme journee tres honorable_. Our losses have been considerable. Those of the enemy probably as considerable. TROCHU.
I need not add that as usual we have had rumours all day of a great victory and a junction with the Army of the Loire. General Trochu's despatch, dated 10-30, Bicetre, reduces matters to their real dimensions.
_October 1st._
Although the Government statistics respecting the amount of food in Paris have been published, and are consequently, in all probability, in the hands of the Prussians, I do not like to give them myself. It can, however, do no harm to explain the system which is being adopted by the authorities to make our stores hold out as long as possible. Every butcher receives each morning a certain amount of meat, calculated upon his average sales. Against this meat he issues tickets in the evening to his customers, who, upon presentation of the ticket the next morning, receive the amount for which they have inscribed themselves at the price fixed by the tariff of the week. When tickets have been issued by the butcher equivalent to the meat which he is to receive, he issues no more. Yesterday a decree was promulgated, ordering all persons having flour on sale to give it up to the Government at the current price. It will, I presume, be distributed to the bakers, like the meat to the butchers. As regards meat, the supply does not equal the demand--many persons are unable to obtain tickets, and consequently have to go without it. Restaurants cannot get enough for their customers. This evening, for instance, at seven o'clock, on going into a restaurant, I found almost everything already eaten up. I was obliged to ”vanquish the prejudices of my stomach,” and make a dinner on sheeps' trotters, pickled cauliflower, and peaches. My stomach is still engaged in ”vanquis.h.i.+ng its prejudice” to this repast, and I am yet in the agonies of indigestion. In connection, however, with this question of food, there is another important consideration. Work is at a standstill.
Mobiles and Nationaux who apply _forma pauperis_ receive one franc and a half per diem. Now, at present prices, it is materially impossible for a single man to buy sufficient food to stave off hunger for this sum, how then those who depend upon it for their sustenance, and have wives and families to support out of it, are able to live, it is difficult to understand. Sooner or later the population will have to be rationed like soldiers, and, if the siege goes on, useless mouths will have to be turned out. It was supposed that the peasants in the neighbourhood of Paris, who were invited to take refuge within its walls, would bring more than enough food with them for themselves and their families, but they preferred to bring their old beds and their furniture. Besides our stores of flour, of sheep, and of oxen, we have twenty-two million pounds of horse-flesh to fall back upon, so that I do not think that we shall be starved out for some time; still the misery among those who have no money to buy food will, unless Government boldly faces the question, be very great. Everything, except beef, mutton, and bread, is already at a fancy price. Ham costs 7fr. the kilo.; cauliflowers, 1.50fr. a head; salt b.u.t.ter 9fr. the kilo, (a kilo, is about two pounds); a fat chicken 10fr.; a thin one, 5fr.; a rabbit, 11fr.; a duck, 9fr.; a fat goose, 20fr.
Rents, too, are as vexed a question as they are in Ireland. In a few days the October term comes due. Few can pay it; it is proposed, therefore, to allow no landlord to levy it either before the close of the siege or before December.
General Trochu, in his Rapport Militaire of yesterday's proceedings, expands his despatch of yesterday evening. The object, he says, was, by a combined action on both banks of the Seine, to discover precisely in what force the enemy was in the villages of Choisy-le-Roi and Chevilly.
Whilst the brigade of General Giulham drove the enemy out of Chevilly, the head of the column of General Blaise entered the village of Thiais, and seized a battery of cannon, which, however, could not be moved for want of horses. At this moment the Prussians were reinforced, and a retreat took place in good order. General Giulham was killed. General d'Exea, while this combat was going on, marched with a brigade on Creteil, and inflicted a severe loss with his mitrailleuses on the enemy. This report contrasts favourably with the florid, exaggerated accounts of the engagement which are published in this morning's papers.
I am glad to find that France possesses at least one man who tells the truth, and who can address his fellow-citizens in plain language. The credulity of the Parisians, and their love of high-flown bombast, amount to a disease, which, if this city is not to sink into a species of Baden Baden, must be stamped out. Mr. O'Sullivan recently published an account of his expedition to the Prussian headquarters in the _Electeur Libre_. Because he said that the Prussians were conducting themselves well in the villages they occupied, the editor of the paper has been overwhelmed with letters reviling him for publis.h.i.+ng such audacious lies. Most Frenchmen consider anyone who differs from them to be either a knave or a fool, and they fabricate facts to prove their theories. An ”intelligent young man” published a letter this morning saying that he had escaped from Versailles, and that already 700 girls have been ravished there by the Prussians. This intelligent young man's tale will be credited, and Mr. O'Sullivan will be disbelieved by nine-tenths of this population. They believe only what they wish to believe.
M. Rochefort has issued a ”poster” begging citizens not to construct private barricades. There must, he justly observes, be ”unity in the system of interior defences.” The _Reveil_ announces that the Ultras do not intend to proceed to revolutionary elections of a munic.i.p.ality to-morrow, because they have hopes that the Government intend to yield on this question. The Prefect of the Police is actively engaged in an attempt to throw light upon Pietri's connection with the plots which periodically came to a head against the Empire. Doc.u.ments have been discovered which will show that most of these plots were got up by the Imperial police. Pietri, Lagrange, and Barnier, a _juge d'instruction_, were the prime movers. A certain Bablot received 20,000fr. for his services as a conspirator.
The complaints of the newspapers against the number of young men who avoid military duty by hooking themselves on in some capacity or other to an ambulance are becoming louder every day. For my part I confess that I look with contempt upon any young Frenchman I meet with the red cross on his arm, unless he be a surgeon. I had some thoughts of making myself useful as a neutral in joining one of these ambulances, but I was deterred by what happened to a fellow-countryman of mine who offered his services. He was told that thousands of applicants were turned away every day, and that there already were far more persons attached to every ambulance than were necessary.
Dr. Evans, the leading spirit of the American ambulance, the man whose speciality it was to have drawn more royal teeth, and to have received more royal decorations than any other human being, has left Paris. Mr.
Washburne informs me that there are still about 250 Americans here, of whom about forty are women. Some of them remain to look after their homes, others out of curiosity. ”I regard,” said an American lady to me to-day, who had been in a southern city (Vicksburg, if I remember rightly), when it was under fire, ”a bombardment as the finest and most interesting effort of pyrotechnical skill, and I want to see if you Europeans have developed this art as fully as we have, which I doubt.”
_October 2nd._
I wrote to General Trochu yesterday to ask him to allow me to accompany him outside the walls to witness military operations. His secretary has sent me a reply to-day regretting that the General cannot comply with my request. The correspondent of the _Morning Post_ interviewed the secretary yesterday on the same subject, but was informed that as no _laisser pa.s.ser_ was recognised by the Mobiles, and as General Trochu had himself been arrested, the Government would not take upon itself the responsibility of granting them. This is absurd, for I hear that neither the General nor any of his staff have been fired upon or arrested during the last week. The French military mind is unable to understand that the world will rather credit the testimony of impartial neutrals than official bulletins. As far as correspondents are concerned, they are worse off under the Republic than even under the Empire.
M. Louis Blanc's appeal to the people of England is declamatory and rhetorical in tone, and I am inclined to think that the people of England are but a Richard Doe, and that in reality it is addressed to the Parisians. M. Blanc asks the English in Paris to bear witness that the windows of the Louvre are being stuffed with sandbags to preserve the treasures within from the risks of a bombardment. I do so with pleasure. I cannot, however, bear him out in his a.s.sertions respecting the menacing calm of Paris, and the indomitable att.i.tude of its National Guards. M. Blanc, like most of his countrymen, mistakes the wish for the will, words for deeds, promises for performance. What has happened here, and what is happening? The forts are manned with sailors, who conscientiously fire off their cannon. A position has been lost. Two sorties consisting of troops and armed peasants have been driven back.
The National Guards do duty on the ramparts, drill in the streets, offer crowns to the statue of Strasburg, wear uniforms, and announce that they have made a pact with death. I sincerely trust that they may distinguish themselves, but they have not had an opportunity to do so. Not one of them has as yet honoured his draft on death. Behind their forts, their troops, their crowd of peasants, and their ramparts, they boast of what they will do. If they do really bury themselves beneath the ruins of their capital they will be ent.i.tled to the admiration of history, but as yet they are civilians of the present and heroes of the future. Noisy bl.u.s.terers may be brave men. I have no doubt there are many in Paris ready to die for their country. I can, however, only deal with facts, and I find that the Parisians appear to rely for safety upon everything except their own valour. One day it is the Army of the Loire; another day it is some mechanical machine; another day dissensions among the Prussian generals; another day the intervention of Russia or Austria. In the meantime, clubs denounce the Government; club orators make absurd and impracticable speeches, the Mayor changes the names of streets, and inscribes Liberte, Egalite, and Fraternite on the public buildings. The journals of all colours, with only one or two exceptions, are filled with lies and bombast, and the people believe the one and admire the other. The Minister of the Interior placards the walls with idle proclamations, and arrests Bonapartists. Innocent neutrals are mobbed as Prussian spies, and the only prisoners that we see are French soldiers on their way to be shot for cowardice. Nothing is really done to force the Prussians to raise the siege, although the defenders exceed in number the besiegers. How can all this end? In a given time provisions and ammunition will be exhausted, and a capitulation must ensue. I wish with all my heart that the hosts of Germany may meet with the same fate as befell the army of Sennacherib; but they are not likely to be killed or forced to retreat by speeches, pacts with death, sentimental appeals, and exaggerated abuse.
The _Temps_ calculates that our loss on Friday amounted to about 500 wounded and 400 killed. The object of the sortie was to blow up a bridge over the Seine, and to rouse the courage of the Parisians by obtaining a marked success at a point where the Prussians were not supposed to be in force. Neither end was attained, and consequently we are greatly depressed. Count Bismarck has not condescended to send a reply to the Corps Diplomatique, requesting to be allowed to establish postal communication with their Governments, much to the disgust of that estimable body.
The result of the pryings of the Government into the papers of their predecessors has as yet only disclosed the facts, that most of the conspiracies against the Empire were got up by the police, and that the Emperor bribed porters and postmen to open letters. His main object seems to have been to get hold of the letters of his Ministers to their mistresses. The fourth livraison of the Tuileries papers contains the report of a spy on the doings of the Russian Military Attache. This gentleman lost some doc.u.ment, and observes that it can only be his Prussian colleague who took it from him. Such is diplomacy. The weather is beautiful. Women and children are making holiday in the streets. The inner line of barricades is nearly finished.
_Evening._
The news of the fall of Strasburg and Toul was received by the Government here this morning, and has just been made public. ”In falling,” says M. Gambetta, ”they cast a glance towards Paris to affirm once more the unity and indivisibility of the Republic; and they leave us as a legacy the duty to deliver them, the honour to revenge them.”