Monsieur, we hope for the day when the Divine Disposer of events will strike into the hearts of our fickle and erring countrymen the conviction that there will be no settled repose for France save under the sceptre of her rightful kings. But meanwhile we are,I see it more clearly since I have quitted Bretagne,we are a hopeless minority.
Does not history tell us that the great changes of the world have been wrought by minorities,but on the one condition that the minorities shall not be hopeless? It is almost the other day that the Bonapartists were in a minority that their adversaries called hopeless, and the majority for the Emperor is now so preponderant that I tremble for his safety. When a majority becomes so vast that intellect disappears in the crowd, the date of its destruction commences; for by the law of reaction the minority is installed against it. It is the nature of things that minorities are always more intellectual than multitudes, and intellect is ever at work in sapping numerical force. What your party want is hope; because without hope there is no energy. I remember hearing my father say that when he met the Count de Chambord at Ems, that illustrious personage delivered himself of a belle phrase much admired by his partisans. The Emperor was then President of the Republic, in a very doubtful and dangerous position. France seemed on the verge of another convulsion. A certain distinguished politician recommended the Count de Chambord to hold himself ready to enter at once as a candidate for the throne. And the Count, with a benignant smile on his handsome face, answered, All wrecks come to the shore: the shore does not go to the wrecks.
Beautifully said! exclaimed the Marquis.
Not if Le beau est toujours le vrai. My father, no inexperienced nor unwise politician, in repeating the royal words, remarked: The fallacy of the Counts argument is in its metaphor. A man is not a shore. Do you not think that the seamen on board the wrecks would be more grateful to him who did not complacently compare himself to a shore, but considered himself a human being like themselves, and risked his own life in a boat, even though it were a cockleshell, in the chance of saving theirs?
Alain de Rochebriant was a brave man, with that intense sentiment of patriotism which characterizes Frenchmen of every rank and persuasion, unless they belong to the Internationalists; and, without pausing to consider, he cried, Your father was right.
The Englishman resumed: Need I say, my dear Marquis, that I am not a Legitimist? I am not an Imperialist, neither am I an Orleanist nor a Republican. Between all those political divisions it is for Frenchmen to make their choice, and for Englishmen to accept for France that government which France has established. I view things here as a simple observer. But it strikes me that if I were a Frenchman in your position, I should think myself unworthy my ancestors if I consented to be an insignificant looker-on.
You are not in my position, said the Marquis, half mournfully, half haughtily, and you can scarcely judge of it even in imagination.
I need not much task my imagination; I judge of it by analogy. I was very much in your position when I entered upon what I venture to call my career; and it is the curious similarity between us in circumstances, that made me wish for your friendship when that similarity was made known to me by Lemercier, who is not less garrulous than the true Parisian usually is. Permit me to say that, like you, I was reared in some pride of no inglorious ancestry. I was reared also in the expectation of great wealth. Those expectations were not realized: my father had the fault of noble natures,generosity pushed to imprudence: he died poor and in debt. You retain the home of your ancestors; I had to resign mine.
The Marquis had felt deeply interested in this narrative, and as Graham now paused, took his hand and pressed it. One of our most eminent personages said to me about that time, Whatever a clever man of your age determines to do or to be, the odds are twenty to one that he has only to live on in order to do or to be it. Dont you think he spoke truly? I think so.
I scarcely know what to think, said Rochebriant; I feel as if you had given me so rough a shake when I was in the midst of a dull dream, that I am not yet quite sure whether I am asleep or awake.
Just as he said this, and towards the Paris end of the Champs Elysees, there was a halt, a sensation among the loungers round them; many of them uncovered in salute.
A man on the younger side of middle age, somewhat inclined to corpulence, with a very striking countenance, was riding slowly by. He returned the salutations he received with the careless dignity of a Personage accustomed to respect, and then reined in his horse by the side of a barouche, and exchanged some words with a portly gentleman who was its sole occupant. The loungers, still halting, seemed to contemplate this parleybetween him on horseback and him in the carriagewith very eager interest. Some put their hands behind their ears and pressed forward, as if trying to overhear what was said.
I wonder, quoth Graham, whether, with all his cleverness, the Prince has in any way decided what he means to do or to be.
The Prince! said Rochebriant, rousing himself from revery; what Prince?
Do you not recognize him by his wonderful likeness to the first Napoleon,him on horseback talking to Louvier, the great financier.
Is that stout bourgeois in the carriage Louvier,my mortgagee, Louvier?
Your mortgagee, my dear Marquis? Well, he is rich enough to be a very lenient one upon pay-day.
Hein!I doubt his leniency, said Alain. I have promised my avoue to meet him at dinner. Do you think I did wrong?
Wrong! of course not; he is likely to overwhelm you with civilities. Pray dont refuse if he gives you an invitation to his soiree next Saturday; I am going to it. One meets there the notabilities most interesting to study,artists, authors, politicians, especially those who call themselves Republicans. He and the Prince agree in one thing; namely, the cordial reception they give to the men who would destroy the state of things upon which Prince and financier both thrive. Hillo! here comes Lemercier on return from the Bois.
Lemerciers coupe stopped beside the footpath. What tidings of the Belle Inconnue? asked the Englishman. None; she was not there. But I am rewarded: such an adventure! a dame of the haute volee; I believe she is a duchess. She was walking with a lap-dog, a pure Pomeranian. A strange poodle flew at the Pomeranian, I drove off the poodle, rescued the Pomeranian, received the most gracious thanks, the sweetest smile: femme superbe, middle aged. I prefer women of forty. Au revoir, I am due at the club.
Alain felt a sensation of relief that Lemercier had not seen the lady in the pearl-coloured dress, and quitted the Englishman with a lightened heart.
CHAPTER IV
Piccola, piccola! com e cortese! another invitation from M. Louvier for next Saturday,conversazione. This was said in Italian by an elderly lady bursting noisily into the room,elderly, yet with a youthful expression of face, owing perhaps to a pair of very vivacious black eyes. She was dressed, after a somewhat slatternly fashion, in a wrapper of crimson merino much the worse for wear, a blue handkerchief twisted turban-like round her head, and her feet encased in list slippers. The person to whom she addressed herself was a young lady with dark hair, which, despite its evident repugnance, was restrained into smooth glossy braids over the forehead, and at the crown of the small graceful head into the simple knot which Horace has described as Spartan. Her dress contrasted the speakers by an exquisite neatness.