jealously closed with mouldering shutters. The door stood ajar; Lebeau pushed it open, and the action set in movement a bell within a porter's lodge. The house, then, was not uninhabited; it retained the dignity of a concierge. A man with a large grizzled beard cut square, and holding a journal in his hand, emerged from the lodge, and moved his cap with a certain bluff and surly reverence on recognizing Lebeau. "What! so early, citizen?" "Is it too early?" said Lebeau, glancing at his watch. "So it is. I was not aware of the time; but I am tired with waiting. Let me into the salon. I will wait for the rest; I shall not be sorry for a little repose." "Bon," said the porter, sententiously; "while man reposes men advance." "A profound truth, citizen Le Roux; though, if they advance on a reposing foe, they have blundering leaders unless they march through unguarded by-paths and with noiseless tread." Following the porter up a dingy broad staircase, Lebeau was admitted into a large room, void of all other furniture than a table, two benches at its sides, and a fauteuil at its head. On the mantelpiece there was a huge clock, and some iron sconces were fixed on the panelled walls. Lebeau flung himself, with a wearied air into the fauteuil. The porter looked at him with a kindly expression. He had a liking to Lebeau, whom he had served in his proper profession of messenger or commissionnaire before being placed by that courteous employer in the easy post he now held. Lebeau, indeed, had the art, when he pleased, of charming inferiors; his knowledge of mankind allowed him to distinguish peculiarities in each individual, and flatter the amour propre by deference to such eccentricities. Marc le Roux, the roughest of "red caps," had a wife of whom he was very proud. He would have called the Empress Citoyenne Eugénie, but he always spoke of his wife as Madame. Lebeau won his heart by always asking after Madame. "You look tired, citizen," said the porter; "let me bring you a glass of wine." "Thank you, mon ami, no. Perhaps later, if I have time, after we break up, to pay my respects to Madame." The porter smiled, bowed, and retired, muttering, "Nom d'un petit bonhomme – il n'y a rien de tel que les belles manières." -a Left alone, Lebeau leaned his elbow on the table, resting his chin on his hand, and gazing into the dim space-for it was now, indeed, night, and little light came through the grim panes of the one window left unclosed by shutters. He was musing deeply. This man was, in much, an enigma to himself. Was he seeking to unriddle it? A strange compound of contradictory elements. In his stormy youth there had been lightninglike flashes of good instincts, of irregular honour, of inconsistent generosity puissant wild nature - with strong passions of love and of hate, without fear, but not without shame. In other forms of society that love of applause which had made him seek and exult in the notoriety which he mistook for fame, might have settled down into some solid and useful ambition. He might have become great in the world's eye, for at the service of his desires there were no ordinary talents. Though too true a Parisian to be a severe student, still, on the whole, he had acquired much general information, partly from books, partly from varied commerce with mankind. He had the gift, both by tongue and by pen, of expressing himself with force and warmth time and necessity had improved that gift. Coveting, during his brief career of fashion, the distinctions which necessitate lavish expenditure, he had been the most reckless of spendthrifts, but the neediness which follows waste had never destroyed his original sense of personal honour. Certainly Victor de Mauléon was not, at the date of his fall, a man to whom the thought of accepting, much less of stealing the jewels of a woman who loved him, could have occurred as a possible question of casuistry between honour and temptation. Nor could that sort of question have, throughout the sternest trials, or the humblest callings to which his after life had been subjected, forced admission into his brain. He was one of those men, perhaps the most terrible though unconscious criminals, who are the offsprings produced by intellectual power and egotistical ambition. If you had offered to Victor de Mauléon the crown of the Cæsars, on condition of his doing one of those base things which "a gentleman" cannot do- pick a pocket, cheat at cards - Victor de Mauléon would have refused the crown. He would not have refused on account of any laws of morality affecting the foundations of the social system, but from the pride of his own personality. "I, Victor de Mauléon! CHAPTER VI. I pick a pocket! I cheat at cards! I!" (and conditions of established political But when something incalculably worse order. Perforce, the aristocrat must for the interests of society than picking a make himself democrat if he would bepocket or cheating at cards was con- come a political chief. Could he assist in cerned; when, for the sake either of turning upside down the actual state of private ambition, or political experiment things, he trusted to his individual force hitherto untested, and therefore very of character to find himself among the doubtful, the peace and order and happi- uppermost in the general bouleversement. ness of millions might be exposed to the And in the first stage of popular revolurelease of the most savage passions tion the mob has no greater darling than rushing on revolutionary madness or civil the noble who deserts his order, though massacre then this French dare-devil in the second stage it may guillotine would have been just as unscrupulous as him at the denunciation of his cobbler. any English philosopher whom a metro- A mind so sanguine and so audacious as politan borough might elect as its repre- that of Victor de Mauléon never thinks sentative. The system of the Empire of the second step if it sees a way to the was in the way of Victor de Mauléon first. in the way of his private ambition, in the way of his political dogmas - and therefore it must be destroyed, no matter what nor whom it crushed beneath its ruins. He was one of those plotters of revolutions not uncommon in democracies, ancient and modern, who invoke popular agencies with the less scruple because they have a supreme contempt for the populace. A man with mental powers equal to De Mauléon's, and who sincerely loves the people and respects the grandeur of aspiration with which, in the great upheaving of their masses, they so often contrast the irrational credulities of their ignorance and the blind fury of their wrath, is always exceedingly loath to pass the terrible gulf that divides reform from revolution. He knows how rarely it happens that genuine liberty is not disarmed in the passage, and what sufferings must be undergone by those who live by their labour during the dismal intervals between the sudden destruction of one.form of society and the gradual settlement of another. Such a man, however, has no type in a Victor de Mauléon. The circumstances of his life had placed this strong nature at war with society, and corrupted into misanthropy affections that had once been ardent. That misanthropy made his ambition more intense, because it increased his scorn for the human instruments it employed. THE room was in complete darkness, save where a ray from a gas-lamp at the mouth of the court came aslant_through the window, when citizen Le Roux reentered, closed the window, lighted two of the sconces, and drew forth from a drawer in the table implements of writing, which he placed thereon noiselessly, as if he feared to disturb M. Lebeau, whose head, buried in his hands, rested on the table. He seemed in a profound sleep. At last the porter gently touched the arm of the slumberer, and whispered in his ear, "It is on the stroke of ten, citizen; they will be here in a minute or so." Lebeau lifted his head drowsily. "Eh," said he "what?" "I suppose so, for I have been dreaming. Ha! I hear the doorbell. I am wide awake now." The porter left him, and in a few minutes conducted into the salon two men wrapped in cloaks, despite the warmth of the summer night. Lebeau shook hands with them silently, not less silently they laid aside their cloaks and seated themselves. Both these men appeared to belong to the upper section of the middle class. One, strongly built, with a keen expression of countenance, was a surgeon considered able in his profession, but Victor de Mauléon knew that, however with limited practice, owing to a current innocent of the charges that had so long suspicion against his honour in connecdarkened his name, and however thanks tion with a forged will. The other, tall, to his rank, his manners, his savoir vivre meagre, with long grizzled hair and a wild -the aid of Louvier's countenance, and unsettled look about the eyes, was a man the support of his own high-born connec- of science; had written works well estions he might restore himself to his teemed upon mathematics and electricity, rightful grade in private life, the higher also against the existence of any other prizes in public life would scarcely be creative power than that which he called within reach, to a man of his antecedents" nebulosity," and defined to be the comand stinted means, in the existent form'bination of heat and moisture. The sur geon was about the age of forty, the atheist a few years older. In another minute or so, a knock was heard against the wall. One of the men rose and touched a spring in the panel, which then flew back, and showed an opening upon a narrow stair, by which, one after the other, entered three other members of the society. Evidently there was more than one mode of ingress and exit. the face was stern, but not mean -- an expression which might have become an ancient baron as well as a modern workman — in it plenty of haughtiness and of will, and still more of self-esteem. "Confrères," said Lebeau, rising, and every eye turned to him, "our number for the present séance is complete. To business. Since we last met, our cause has advanced with rapid and not with noiseless stride. I need not tell you that Louis Bonaparte has virtually abnegated Les idées Napoléoniennes — a fatal mistake for him, a glorious advance for us. liberty of the press must very shortly be achieved, and with it personal government must end. When the autocrat once The The three new-comers were not Frenchmen-one might see that at a glance; probably they had reasons for greater precaution than those who entered by the front door. One, a tall, powerfully-built man, with fair hair and beard, dressed with a certain pretension to elegancefaded threadbare elegance-exhibiting is compelled to go by the advice of his no appearance of linen, was a Pole. One a slight bald man, very dark and sallow was an Italian. The third, who seemed like an ouvrier in his holiday clothes, was a Belgian. Lebeau greeted them all with an equal courtesy, and each with an equal silence took his seat at the table. Lebeau glanced at the clock. "Confrères," he said, "our number, as fixed for this séance, still needs two to be complete, and doubtless they will arrive in a few minutes. Till they come, we can but talk upon trifles. Permit me to offer you my cigar-case." And so saying, he who professed to be no smoker, handed his next neighbour, who was the Pole, a large cigar-case amply furnished; and the Pole, helping himself to two cigars, handed the case to the man next him-two only declining the luxury, the Italian and the Belgian. But the Pole was the only man who took two cigars. Ministers, look for sudden changes. His Ministers will be but weathercocks, turned hither and thither according as the wind chops at Paris; and Paris is the temple of the winds. The new revolution is almost at hand." (Murmurs of applause.) "It would move the laughter of the Tuileries and its Ministers, of the Bourse and of its gamblers, of every dainty salon of this silken city of wouldbe philosophers and wits, if they were told that here within this mouldering baraque, eight men, so little blest by fortune, so little known to fame as ourselves, met to concert the fall of an empire. The Government would not deem us important enough to notice our existence." "I know not that," interrupted the Pole. "Ah, pardon," resumed the orator; "I should have confined my remark to the five of us who are French. I did injustice to the illustrious antecedents of our Steps were now heard on the stairs, the foreign allies. I know that you, Thaddoor opened, and citizen Le Roux ushered deus Loubisky- that you, Leonardo Rain, one after the other, two men, this time selli - have been too eminent for hands unmistakably French to an experienced hostile to tyrants not to be marked with eye unmistakably Parisians: the one a a black cross in the books of the police. young beardless man, who seemed almost I know that you, Jan Vanderstegen, if boyish, with a beautiful face, and a stint- hitherto unscarred by those wounds in ed, meagre frame; the other, a stalwart defence of freedom which despots and man of about eight-and-twenty, dressed cowards would fain miscall the brands of partly as an ouvrier, not in his Sunday the felon, still owe it to your special fraclothes, rather affecting the blouse,-not ternity to keep your movements rigidly that he wore that antique garment, but concealed. The tyrant would suppress that he was in rough costume unbrushed the International Society, and forbids and stained, with thick shoes and coarse it the liberty of congress. To you three stockings, and a workman's cap. But of is granted the secret entrance to our all who gathered round the table at which council-hall. But we Frenchmen are as M. Lebeau presided, he had the most dis- yet safe in our supposed insignificance. tinguished exterior. A virile honest ex- Confrères, permit me to impress on you terior, a massive open forehead, intelli- the causes why, insignificant as we seem, gent eyes, a handsome clear-cut incisive we are really formidable. In the first profile, and solid jaw. The expression of place, we are few: the great mistake in VOL. II. 79 LIVING AGE. most secret associations has been to ad- less bands when the trumpet sounds for mit many councillors; and disunion en- battle. Young publicist and poet, Gusters wherever many tongues can wrangle. tave Rameau - I care not which you are In the next place, though so few in coun- at present, I know what you will be soon cil, we are legion when the time comes you need nothing for the development for action; because we are representative of your powers over the many but an ormen, each of his own section, and each gan for their manifestation. Of that section is capable of an indefinite expansion. "You, valiant Pole-you, politic Italian enjoy the confidence of thousands now latent in unwatched homes and harmless callings, but who, when you lift a finger, will, like the buried dragon's teeth, spring up into armed men. You, Jan Vanderstegen, the trusted delegate from Verviers, that swarming camp of wronged labour in its revolt from the iniquities of capital-you, when the hour arrives, can touch the wire that flashes the telegram 'Arise' through all the lands in which workmen combine against their oppressors. "Of us five Frenchmen, let me speak more modestly. You-sage and scholar -Felix Ruvigny, honoured alike for the profundity of your science and the probity of your manners, induced to join us by your abhorrence of priestcraft and superstition you have a wide connection among all the enlightened reasoners who would emancipate the mind of man from the trammels of Church-born fable-and when the hour arrives in which it is safe to say, 'Delenda est Roma,' you know where to find the pens that are more victorious than swords against a Church and a Creed. You" (turning to the surgeon) "you, Gaspard le Noy, whom a vile calumny has robbed of the throne in your profession, so justly due to your skill you, nobly scorning the rich and great, have devoted yourself to tend and heal the humble and the penniless, so that you have won the popular title of the 'Médecin des Pauvres,. when the time comes wherein soldiers shall fly before the sansculottes, and the mob shall begin the work which they who move mobs will complete, the clients of Gaspard le Noy will be the avengers of his wrongs. anon. I now descend into the bathos of egotism. I am compelled lastly to speak of myself. It was at Marseilles and Lyons, as you already know, that I first conceived the plan of this representative association. For years before I had been in familiar intercourse with the friends of freedom - that is, with the foes of the Empire. They are not all poor. Some few are rich and generous. I do not say these rich and few concur in the ultimate objects of the poor and many. But they concur in the first object, the demolition of that which exists the Empire. In the course of my special calling of negotiator or agent in the towns of the Midi, I formed friendships with some of these prosperous malcontents. And out of these friendships I conceived the idea which is embodied in this council. "According to that conception, while the council may communicate as it will with all societies, secret or open, having revolution for their object, the council refuses to merge itself in any other confederation: it stands aloof and independent; it declines to admit into its code any special articles of faith in a future beyond the bounds to which it limits its design and its force. That design unites us; to go beyond would divide. We all agree to destroy the Napoleonic dynasty; none of us might agree as to what we should place in its stead. All of us here present might say, 'A republic.' Ay, but of what kind? Vanderstegen would have it socialistic; Monnier goes further, and would have it communistic, on the principles of Fourier; Le Noy adheres to the policy of Danton, and would commence the republic by a reign of terror; our Italian ally abhors the notion of general massacre, and advocates individual assassination. Ruvigny would annihilate the "You, Armand Monnier, simple ou- worship of a Deity; Monnier holds, with vrier, but of illustrious parentage, for Voltaire and Robespierre, that 'if there your grandsire was the beloved friend of were no Deity, it would be necessary to the virtuous Robespierre, your father per- Man to create one.' Bref, we could not ished a hero and a martyr in the massa- agree upon any plan for the new edifice, cre of the coup d'état; you, cultured in and therefore we refuse to discuss one the eloquence of Robespierre himself, till the ploughshare has gone over the and in the persuasive philosophy of ruins of the old. But I have another and Robespierre's teacher, Rousseau-you, more practical reason for keeping our the idolized orator of the Red Republi- council distinct from all societies with procans-you will be indeed a chief of daunt-fessed objects beyond that of demolition. 66 We need a certain command of money. be startling and terrific. Of this I will It is I who bring to you that, and-how? say more to Citizen Rameau in private. Not from my own resources; they but To you I need not enlarge upon the fact suffice to support myself. Not by contri- that, at Paris, a combination of men, butions from ouvriers, who, as you well though immeasurably superior to us in know, will subscribe only for their own status or influence, without a journal at ends in the victory of workmen over mas- command, is nowhere; with such a jourters. I bring money to you from the cof-nal, written not to alarm but to seduce fers of the rich malcontents. Their pol- fluctuating opinions, a combination of itics are not those of most present; their men immeasurably inferior to us may be politics are what they term moderate. anywhere. Some are indeed for a republic, but for a| Confrères, this affair settled, I proceed republic strong in defence of order, in to distribute amongst you sums of which support of property; others-and they are each who receives will render me an acthe more numerous and the more rich-for count, except our valued Confrère the a constitutional monarchy, and, if possi- Pole. All that we can subscribe to the ble, for the abridgement of universal suf- cause of humanity, a representative of frage, which, in their eyes, tends only to Poland requires for himself." (A supanarchy in the towns and arbitrary rule pressed laugh among all but the Pole, under priestly influence in the rural dis- who looked round with a grave, imposing tricts. They would not subscribe a sou air, as much as to say, "What is there if they thought it went to further the de- to laugh at ?—a simple truth.") signs whether of Ruvigny the atheist, or of Monnier, who would enlist the Deity of Rousseau on the side of the drapeau rouge—not a sou if they knew I had the honour to boast such confrères as I see around me. They subscribe, as we concert, for the fall of Bonaparte. The policy I adopt I borrow from the policy of the English Liberals. In England, potent millionnaires, high-born dukes, devoted Churchmen, belonging to the Liberal party, accept the services of men who look forward to measures which would ruin capital, eradicate aristocracry, and destroy the Church, provided these men combine with them in some immediate step onward against the Tories. They have a proverb which I thus adapt to Whatever rules with regard to the disFrench localities: If a train passes Fon-tribution of money M. Lebeau laid down tainebleau on its way to Marseilles, why were acquiesced in without demur, for should I not take it to Fontainebleau be- the money was found exclusively by himcause other passengers are going on to self, and furnished without the pale of Marseilles? the Secret Council, of which he had made himself founder and dictator. Some other business was then discussed, sealed reports from each member were handed to the president, who placed them unopened in his pocket, and resumed "Confrères, it seems to me the moment has come when we may venture some of the fund placed at my disposal to other purposes than those to which it has been hitherto devoted. I propose, therefore, to set up a journal under the auspices of Gustave Rameau as editor-in-chief-a journal which, if he listen to my advice, will create no small sensation. It will begin with a tone of impartiality: it will refrain from all violence of invective; it will have wit, it will have sentiment, and éloquence; it will win its way into the salons and cafés of educated men; and then, and then, when it does change from polished satire into fierce denunciation and sides with the blouses, its effect will M. Lebeau then presented to each of his confrères a sealed envelope, containing no doubt a bank-note, and perhaps also private instructions as to its disposal. It was one of his rules to make the amount of any sum granted to an individual member of the society from the fund at his disposal a confidential secret between himself and the recipient. Thus jealousy was avoided if the sums were unequal; and unequal they generally were. In the present instance the two largest sums were given to the Médecin des Pauvres and to the delegate from Verviers. Both were no doubt to be distributed among "the poor," at the discretion of the trustee appointed. |