The Parisians — Complete by Baron Edward Bulwer Lytton Lytton (beautiful books to read TXT) 📖

nod to his brother, and a polite, if not cordial salutation to Victor, entered the porte cochere.

“Your brother seems out of spirits,—a pleasing contrast to the uproarious mirth with which Parisians welcome the advance of calamity.”

“Raoul, as you know, is deeply religious. He regards the defeat we have sustained, and the peril that threatens us, as the beginning of a divine chastisement, justly incurred by our sins—I mean, the sins of Paris. In vain my father reminds him of Voltaire’s story, in which the ship goes down with a fripon on board. In order to punish the fripon, the honest folks are drowned.”

“Is your father going to remain on board the ship, and share the fate of the other honest folks?”

“Pas si bete. He is off to Dieppe for sea-bathing. He says that Paris has grown so dirty since the 4th September, that it is only fit for the feet of the Unwashed. He wished my mother to accompany him; but she replies, ‘No; there are already too many wounded not to need plenty of nurses.’ She is assisting to inaugurate a society of ladies in aid of the Soeurs de Charite. Like Raoul, she is devout, but she has not his superstitions. Still his superstitions are the natural reaction of a singularly earnest and pure nature from the frivolity and corruption which, when kneaded well up together with a slice of sarcasm, Paris calls philosophy.”

“And what, my dear Enguerrand, do you propose to do?”

“That depends on whether we are really besieged. If so, of course I become a soldier.”

“I hope not a National Guard?”

“I care not in what name I fight, so that I fight for France.”

As Enguerrand said these simple words, his whole countenance, seemed changed. The crest rose; his eyes sparkled; the fair and delicate beauty which had made him the darling of women—the joyous sweetness of expression and dainty grace of high breeding which made him the most popular companion to men,—were exalted in a masculine nobleness of aspect, from which a painter might have taken hints for a study of the young Achilles separated for ever from effeminate companionship at the sight of the weapons of war. De Mauleon gazed on him admiringly. We have seen that he shared the sentiments uttered—had resolved on the same course of action. But it was with the tempered warmth of a man who seeks to divest his thoughts and his purpose of the ardour of romance, and who, in serving his country, calculates on the gains to his own ambition. Nevertheless he admired in Enguerrand the image of his own impulsive and fiery youth.

“And you, I presume,” resumed Enguerrand, “will fight too, but rather with pen than with sword.”

“Pens will now only be dipped in red ink, and commonsense never writes in that colour; as for the sword, I have passed the age of forty-five, at which military service halts. But if some experience in active service, some knowledge of the art by which soldiers are disciplined and led, will be deemed sufficient title to a post of command, however modest the grade be, I shall not be wanting among the defenders of Paris.”

“My brave dear Vicomte, if you are past the age to serve, you are in the ripest age to command; and with the testimonials and the cross you won in Algeria, your application for employment will be received with gratitude by any general so able as Trochu.”

“I don’t know whether I shall apply to Trochu. I would rather be elected to command even by the Mobiles or the National Guard, of whom I have just spoken disparagingly; and no doubt both corps will soon claim and win the right to choose their officers. But if elected, no matter by whom, I shall make a preliminary condition; the men under me shall train, and drill, and obey,—soldiers of a very different kind from the youthful Pekins nourished on absinthe and self-conceit, and applauding that Bombastes Furioso, M. Hugo, when he assures the enemy that Paris will draw an idea from its scabbard. But here comes Savarin. Bon jour, my dear poet.”

“Don’t say good day. An evil day for journalists and writers who do not out-Herod Blanqui and Pyat. I know not how I shall get bread and cheese. My poor suburban villa is to be pulled down by way of securing Paris; my journal will be suppressed by way of establishing the liberty of the press. I ventured to suggest that the people of France should have some choice in the form of their government.”

“That was very indiscreet, my poor Savarin,” said Victor; “I wonder your printing-office has not been pulled down. We are now at the moment when wise men hold their tongues.”

“Perhaps so, M. de Mauleon. It might have been wiser for all of us, you as well as myself, if we had not allowed our tongues to be so free before this moment arrived. We live to learn; and if we ever have what may be called a passable government again, in which we may say pretty much what we like, there is one thing I will not do, I will not undermine that government without seeing a very clear way to the government that is to follow it. What say you, Pierre Firmin?”

“Frankly, I say that I deserve your rebuke,” answered De Mauleon thoughtfully. “But, of course, you are going to take or send Madame Savarin out of Paris.”

“Certainly. We have made a very pleasant party for our hegira this evening-among others the Morleys. Morley is terribly disgusted. A Red Republican slapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘American, we have a republic as well as you.’ ‘Pretty much you know about republics,’ growled Morley; ‘a French republic is as much like ours as a baboon is like a man.’ On which the Red roused the mob, who dragged the American off to the nearest station of the National Guard, where he was accused of being a Prussian spy. With some difficulty, and lots of brag about the sanctity of the stars and stripes, he escaped with a reprimand, and caution how to behave himself in future. So he quits a city in which there no longer exists freedom of speech. My wife hoped to induce Mademoiselle Cicogna to accompany us; I grieve to say she refuses. You know she is engaged in marriage to Gustave Rameau; and his mother dreads the effect that these Red Clubs and his own vanity may have upon his excitable temperament if the influence of Mademoiselle Cicogna be withdrawn.”

“How could a creature so exquisite as Isaura Cicogna ever find fascination in Gustave Rameau!” exclaimed Enguerrand.

“A woman like her,” answered De Mauleon, “always finds a fascination in self-sacrifice.”

“I think you divine the truth,” said Savarin, rather mournfully. “But I must bid you good-bye. May we live to shake hands reunis sons des meilleurs auspices.”

Here Savarin hurried off, and the other two men strolled into the Champs Elysees, which were crowded with loungers, gay and careless, as if there had been no disaster at Sedan, no overthrow of an Empire, no enemy on its road to Paris.

In fact the Parisians, at once the most incredulous and the most credulous of all populations, believed that the Prussians would never be so impertinent as to come in sight of the gates. Something would occur to