Part 14 (1/2)

PARIS, _March 17, 1871_.

At last, to-morrow, March 18th, at four o'clock, I am to be received by M. Jules Favre at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

PARIS, _March 18, 1871_.

We dressed ourselves, I and my two secretaries, in our official costumes, and departed at three o'clock, accompanied by an interpreter.

We arrived. The court of the house was filled with people who appeared busy and hurried, and who came and went, carrying cases and packages.

The interpreter, after having exchanged several words with an employee of the ministry, said to me:

”Something serious has happened--an insurrection. The Government is again obliged to change its capital!”

At that moment a door opened, and M. Jules Favre himself appeared with a large portfolio under his arm. He explained to the interpreter that I should have my audience at Versailles in several days, and having made me a profound bow, which I returned him, he ran away with his large portfolio.

VERSAILLES, _March 19, 1871_.

I had to leave Paris at twelve o'clock in a great hurry. There really is a new Government at Paris. This Government is not one of the three monarchies, nor one of the three republics. It is a seventh arrangement, which is called the _Commune_. This morning an armed troop of men surrounded the house where I live. It seems that the new Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Paris of the Commune would have been charmed to receive a Chinese amba.s.sador. They had come to carry me off. I had time to escape. It is not the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Paris that I ought to see, it is the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Versailles.

Good heavens, how complicated it all is! And when shall I be able to put my hand on this intangible person, who is now blockaded in Paris and now chased out of Paris?

VERSAILLES, _April 6, 1871_.

At last, yesterday, I had the honor of being received by his Excellency, and we discussed the events that had occurred in Paris.

”This insurrection,” M. Jules Favre said to me, ”is the most formidable and the most extraordinary that has ever broken out.”

I could not allow such a great historical error to pa.s.s. I answered M.

Jules Favre that we had had in China for millions of years socialists and socialistic uprisings; that the French Communists were but rough imitators of our Chinese Taipings; that we had had in 1230 a siege at Nankin which had lasted seven years, etc. In short, these Europeans are only beginning again our history with less grandeur and more barbarity.

VERSAILLES, _May 15, 1871_.

My mission is ended; I could return to China; but all that I see here interests me extremely. This civil war immediately succeeding a foreign war is a very curious occurrence. There is here, for a Chinaman, an excellent opportunity of study, on the spot and from life, of European civilization.

VERSAILLES, _May 24, 1871_.

Paris is burning, and on the terrace of the palace of Saint-Cloud, in the midst of the ruins of that palace, I pa.s.sed my day looking at Paris burn. It is a dead, destroyed, and annihilated city.

PARIS, _June 10, 1871_.

Not at all. It is still the most beautiful city in Europe, and the most brilliant, and the most gay. I shall spend some time in Paris.

PARIS, _June 29, 1871_.

Yesterday M. Thiers, in the Bois de Boulogne, held a review of a hundred thousand men. Will there always be a France?

IN THE EXPRESS