Читать книгу The Paris Sketch Book of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh; and the Irish Sketch Book - William Makepeace Thackeray - Страница 7

‘ “Par votre ange envolé, ainsi qu’une colombe,

Par le royal enfant, doux et frêle roseau,

Grâce, encore une fois! Grâce, au nom de la tombe!

Grâce, au nom du berçeau!”[1]

‘M. Victor Hugo wrote the lines out instantly on a sheet of paper, which he folded, and simply despatched them to the King of the French by the penny-post.

‘That truly is a noble voice which can at all hours thus speak to the throne. Poetry, in old days, was called the language of the gods—it is better named now—it is the language of the kings.

‘But the clemency of the King had anticipated the letter of the poet. The pen of his Majesty had signed the commutation of Barbès, while that of the poet was still writing.

‘Louis Philippe replied to the author of Ruy Blas most graciously, that he had already subscribed to a wish so noble, and that the verses had only confirmed his previous disposition to mercy.’

Now in countries where fools most abound, did one ever read of more monstrous palpable folly? In any country; save this, would a poet who chose to write four crack-brained verses comparing an angel to a dove, and a little boy to a reed, and calling upon the chief magistrate, in the name of the angel, or dove (the Princess Mary), in her tomb, and the little infant in his cradle, to spare a criminal, have received a ‘gracious answer’ to his nonsense? Would he have ever despatched the nonsense? and would any journalist have been silly enough to talk of ‘the noble voice that could thus speak to the throne,’ and the noble throne that could return such a noble answer to the noble voice? You get nothing done here gravely and decently. Tawdry stage-tricks are played, and braggadocio claptraps uttered, on every occasion, however sacred or solemn; in the face of death, as by Barbès with his hideous Indian metaphor; in the teeth of reason, as by M. Victor Hugo with his twopenny-post poetry; and of justice, as by the King’s absurd reply to this absurd demand! Suppose the Count of Paris to be twenty times a reed, and the Princess Mary a host of angels, is that any reason why the law should not have its course? Justice is the God of our lower world, our great omnipresent guardian: as such it moves, or should move on, majestic, awful, irresistible, having no passions—like a God: but, in the very midst of the path across which it is to pass, lo! M. Victor Hugo trips forward, smirking, and says, O divine Justice! I will trouble you to listen to the following trifling effusion of mine:

‘Par votre ange envolé, ainsi qu’une,’ etc.

Awful Justice stops, and, bowing gravely, listens to M. Hugo’s verses, and, with true French politeness, says, ‘Mon cher Monsieur, these verses are charming, ravissants, délicieux, and, coming from such a célébrité littéraire as yourself, shall meet with every possible attention—in fact, had I required anything to confirm my own previous opinions, this charming poem would have done so. Bon jour, mon cher Monsieur Hugo, au revoir!’—and they part:—Justice taking off his hat and bowing, and the Author of Ruy Blas quite convinced that he has been treating with him d’égal à égal. I can hardly bring my mind to fancy that anything is serious in France—it seems to be all rant, tinsel, and stage-play. Sham liberty, sham monarchy, sham glory, sham justice—où, diable, donc la vérité va-t-elle se nicher?

. … .

The last rocket of the fête of July has just mounted, exploded, made a portentous bang, and emitted a gorgeous show of blue-lights, and then (like many reputations) disappeared totally: the hundredth gun on the Invalid Terrace has uttered its last roar—and a great comfort it is for eyes and ears that the festival is over. We shall be able to go about our every-day business again, and not be hustled by the gendarmes or the crowd.

The sight which I have just come away from is as brilliant, happy, and beautiful as can be conceived; and if you want to see French people to the greatest advantage, you should go to a festival like this, where their manners and innocent gaiety show a very pleasing contrast to the coarse and vulgar hilarity which the same class would exhibit in our own country—at Epsom racecourse, for instance, or Greenwich Fair. The greatest noise that I heard was that of a company of jolly villagers from a place in the neighbourhood of Paris, who, as soon as the fireworks were over, formed themselves into a line, three or four abreast, and so marched singing home. As for the fireworks, squibs and crackers are very hard to describe, and very little was to be seen of them: to me, the prettiest sight was the vast, orderly, happy crowd, the number of children, and the extraordinary care and kindness of the parents towards these little creatures. It does one good to see honest, heavy épiciers, fathers of families, playing with them in the Tuileries, or, as to-night, bearing them stoutly on their shoulders, through many long hours, in order that the little ones, too, may have their share of the fun. John Bull, I fear, is more selfish: he does not take Mrs. Bull to the public-house; but leaves her, for the most part, to take care of the children at home.

The fête, then, is over; the pompous black pyramid at the Louvre is only a skeleton now; all the flags have been miraculously whisked away during the night, and the fine chandeliers which glittered down the Champs Élysées for full half a mile have been consigned to their dens and darkness. Will they ever be reproduced for other celebrations of the glorious 29th of July?—I think not; the Government which vowed that there should be no more persecutions of the press, was, on that very 29th, seizing a legitimist paper, for some real or fancied offence against it: it had seized, and was seizing daily, numbers of persons merely suspected of being disaffected (and you may fancy how liberty is understood, when some of these prisoners, the other day, on coming to trial, were found guilty and sentenced to one day’s imprisonment, after thirty-six days’ detention on suspicion). I think the Government which follows such a system cannot be very anxious about any further revolutionary fêtes, and that the Chamber may reasonably refuse to vote more money for them. Why should men be so mighty proud of having, on a certain day, cut a certain numbre of their fellow-countrymen’s throats? The Guards and the Line employed, this time nine years, did no more than those who cannonaded the starving Lyonnese, or bayoneted the luckless inhabitants of the Rue Transnounain; they did but fulfil the soldier’s honourable duty—his superiors bid him kill and he killeth; perhaps, had he gone to his work with a little more heart, the result would have been different, and then—would the conquering party have been justified in annually rejoicing over the conquered? Would we have thought Charles X. justified in causing fireworks to be blazed, and concerts to be sung, and speeches to be spouted, in commemoration of his victory over his slaughtered countrymen? I wish, for my part, they would allow the people to go about their business as on the other 362 days of the year, and leave the Champs Élysées free for the omnibuses to run, and the Tuileries in quiet, so that the nursemaids might come as usual, and the newspapers be read for a halfpenny apiece.

Shall I trouble you with an account of the speculations of these latter, and the state of the parties which they represent? The complication is not a little curious, and may form, perhaps, a subject of graver disquisition. The July fêtes occupy, as you may imagine, a considerable part of their columns just now, and it is amusing to follow them, one by one; to read Tweedledum’s praise, and Tweedledee’s indignation—to read, in the Débats, how the King was received with shouts and loyal vivats—in the National, how not a tongue was wagged in his praise, but, on the instant of his departure, how the people called for the ‘Marseillaise’ and applauded that. But best say no more about the fête. The legitimists were always indignant at it. The high Philippist party sneers at and despises it; the Republicans hate it; it seems a joke against them. Why continue it! If there be anything sacred in the name and idea of royalty, why renew this fête? It only shows how a rightful monarch was hurled from his throne, and a dexterous usurper stole his precious diadem. If there be anything noble in the memory of a day, when citizens, unused to war, rose against practised veterans, and, armed with the strength of their cause, overthrew them, why speak of it now? or renew the bitter recollections of the bootless struggle and victory? O Lafayette! O hero of two worlds! O accomplished Cromwell Grandison! you have to answer for more than any mortal man who has played a part in history: two republics and one monarchy does the world owe to you; and especially grateful should your country be to you. Did you not, in ’90, make clear the path for honest Robespierre, and, in ’30, prepare the way for——

. … .

[The editor of the Bungay Beacon would insert no more of this letter, which is, therefore, for ever lost to the public.]/