LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

back growling to their mysterious dens, wherever such may exist. Prevention was considered better than cure, in spite of the misinterpretations and misapprehensions to which it might be exposed, and by which it was subsequently assailed by the disappointed faction. Arrest then followed upon arrest; upwards of two hundred of the suspected chiefs of the conspiracy were hurried off to prison. Among them were former delegates to the once famous committee of the Luxembourg, whose conduct gave evidence of the results produced by the dangerous utopian theories set forth under the lectureship of M. Louis Blanc, and his noble friend the soi-disant ouvrier Albert. Chiefs of the clubs bore them company in their incarceration; and the ex-Count D'Alton Shee, the ex-élégant of the fashionable salons of Paris, but now the socialist-atheist and anarchist, suffered the same penalty of his actions as leading member of the club "De la Solidarité Républicaine." Turbulent officers of the Garde Mobile underwent a similar fate. Even the national guard was not spared in the person of one of its superior officers, whose agitation and over-zealous movements excited suspicion; and, by the way, in the general summing up, arrest, imprisonment, restriction of liberty, may also take their place in the row as another little figure in the total.

      The conspiracy, however, was suppressed; the insurrection failed entirely for the time; and Paris was told that it might be perfectly reassured, and doze quietly again upon its pillow, without any fear that Red-republicanism should again "murder sleep." But Paris, which has not learned yet to recover its old quiet habit of sleeping calmly, and has got too much fever in its system to close its eyes at will, is not to be lulled by such mere sedatives of ministerial assurance. Once roused in startled hurry from its bed again, and seeing the opiate of confidence which was beginning to work its effect in very small doses snatched from its grasp, it cannot calm its nerves at once. It will not be persuaded that the crisis is over, and has passed away for ever; like a child awakened by a nightmare, it looks into all sorts of dark holes and corners, thinking to see the spectre lurking there. It knows what it had to expect from the tender mercies of its pitiless enemies, had they succeeded in their will; what was the programme of a new Red-republican rule – a comité du salut public, the régime of the guillotine, the épuration of suspected aristocrats, the confiscation of the property of emigrants, a tax of three milliards upon the rich, a spoliation of all who "possess," the dissolution of the national guard, the exclusive possession of all arms by the soi-disant people, and – but the list of such new-old measures of ultra-republican government would be too long; it is an old tale often told, and, after all, only a free translation from the measures of other times. Paris, then, knows all this; it knows the fanatic and inexpressible rage of its antagonist, to which the fever of madness lends strength; it allows itself to be told all sorts of fearful tales – how Socialists, in imitation of their London brethren, have hired some thousand apartments in different quarters of the capital, in order to light a thousand fires at once upon a given signal. It goes about repeating the old vague cry – "Nous allons avoir quelque chose;" and, however foolishly exaggerated its alarm, the results it experiences are the same – again want of confidence arising from anxiety, again suspension of trade, again a renewal of misery. The fresh want of confidence, then, with all the attendant evils in its train, may again, as the year of republicanism approaches to its close, be taken as another figure in the sum-total that is sought.

      In the midst of this sudden ferment, which has appeared towards the end of the republican year like a tableau final at the conclusion of an act of a drama – hastily thrust forward when the interest of the piece began to languish, – how stands the state of parties in that Assembly which, although it is said – and very correctly, it would appear – no longer to represent the spirit of the country at large, must still be considered as the great axis of the republic, around which all else moves? Always tumultuous, disorderly, and disdainful of those parliamentary forms which could alone insure it the aspect of a dignified deliberative body, the National Assembly, as it sees its last days inevitably approaching – although it retards its dissolution by every quack-doctoring means within its grasp – seems to have plunged, in its throes, into a worse slough of triple confusion, disorder, and uncertainty than ever. Jealous of its dignity, unwilling to quit its power, unwilling – say malicious tongues – to quit its profit, and yet pressed upon by that public opinion which it would vainly attempt to deny, to misinterpret, or to despise, it has shown itself more vacillating, capricious, and childish than ever. It wavers, votes hither and thither, backwards and forwards – now almost inclined to fall into the nets spread for it by the ultra-democratic party, that supports its resistance against all attempts to dissolve it, and upon the point of throwing itself into that party's arms; and now, again, alarmed at the allies to whom it would unite itself, starting back from their embrace, turning round in its majority, and declaring itself against the sense of its former decisions. Now, it offers an active and seemingly spiteful opposition to the government; and now, again, it accepts the first outlet to enable it to turn back upon its course. Now it is sulky, now alarmed at its own sulkiness; now angry, now begging its own pardon for its hastiness. It is like a child that does not know its own mind or temper, and gives way to all the first vagaries that spring into its childish brain: it neglects the more real interests of the country, and loses the country's time in its service, in its eternal interpellations, accusations, recriminations, jealousies, suspicions, and offended susceptibilities; it quarrels, scratches, fights, and breaks its own toys – and all this in the midst of the most inextricable confusion. To do it justice, the Assembly, as represented by its wavering majority, is placed between two stools of apprehension, between which it is continually coming to the ground, and making wofully wry faces: and, between the two, it is not very easy to see how it should preserve a decent equilibrium. On the one hand, it suspects the reactionary, and perhaps counter-revolutionary designs of the moderate party on the right, whose chiefs and leaders have chosen to hold themselves back from any participation in the governmental posts, which they have otherwise coveted and fatally intrigued for, as if they had an arrière-pensée of better and more congenial opportunities in store, and whose reliance in this respect seems equivocal; and it looks upon them as monarchists biding their time. On the other hand, it dreads the Montagnards on the extreme left, with their frantic excesses and violent measures, however much it has looked for their support in the momentous question of the dissolution of the Assembly. It bears no good-will to the president, whose immense majority in the elections has been mainly due to the hopes of the anti-republicans that his advent might lead to a total change of government: it bears still less good-will to the ministers of that president's choice. Between its two fears, then, no wonder that it oscillates like a pendulum. The approach of its final dissolution, which it has at last indefinitely voted, and yet endeavours to retard by fresh obligations for remaining, gives it that character of bitterness which an old coquette may feel when she finds her last hope of conquest slipping indubitably away from her. Without accusing the majority of that desperate clinging to place from interested motives – which the country, however, is continually casting in its teeth – it may be owned that it is not willing to see power wrested from it, when it fears, upon its return to its constituents, it may never find that power placed in its hands again, and seeks every means of prolonging the fatal hour under the pretence of serving the best interests of that country to which it fears to appeal: and to this state of temper, its waspishness, uncertainty, and increasing disorder, may be in some degree attributed.

      Of the hopes and designs of the extreme moderate and supposed reactionary party, little can be said, inasmuch as it has kept its thoughts to itself, and not permitted itself to give any open evidences whatever upon the point. But the ardent and impetuous Montagnards are by no means so cautious: their designs, and hopes, and fears, have been clearly enough expressed; and they flash forth continually, as lightnings in the midst of the thunder of their incessant tumult. The allies and representatives, and, if all tales be true, the chiefs of the Red-republican party out of the Assembly – they still cherish the hope of establishing an ultra-democratic republican government, by some means or other – "by foul if fair should fail" – a government of despotic rule by violence – of propagandism by constraint – of systematic anarchy. They still form visions of some future Convention of which they may be the heroes – of a parliamentary tyrannical oligarchy, by which they may enforce their extravagant opinions. Driven to the most flagrant inconsistencies by their false position, they declare themselves also the true and supreme organ – not only of those they call "the people,"

Скачать книгу