An Englishman in Paris: Notes and Recollections

by Albert D. Vandam

"I told him that I'd feel much obliged to him if he could induce Sardou or Dumas to write me a good part, like the latter had done before, because I wanted to be something more than a comic actor. But I saw that he was getting angry.

"'Do you mean to tell me,' he almost hissed, 'that you do not want to belong to the Commune?'

"'I haven't the slightest ambition that way,' I replied. 'People would only make fun of me, and they would be perfectly right.'

"'Why should people make fun of you?'

"'Because, because——' I stammered.

"He left me no time to finish. 'Because you are a small man,' he said. 'Well, I am a small man, too, and an ugly one into the bargain. I can assure you that the world will hear as much of me before long as if I had been an Adonis and a Hercules.' With this he disappeared, and I have not seen him since."

My purpose in reporting this conversation is to show that the Commune, with all its evils, might have been prevented by the so-called government of Versailles, if its members had been a little less eager to get their snug berths comfortably settled.

To return for a moment to Ferré and his companions, who, without exception, were sober to a degree, though many were probably fond of good cheer. The English writers, often very insufficiently informed, have generally maintained the contrary, but I know for a fact that, among the leaders of the movement, drunkenness was unknown. Ferré himself was among the soberest of the lot: the few evenings I saw him he drank either cold coffee or some cordial diluted with water. Nevertheless, it was he who was directly responsible for the death of Archbishop Darboy, whom he could and might have saved.

In every modern tragedy there is a comic element, and in that of the Commune the comic parts were, to a certain extent, sustained by Gambon, Jourde, and a few others whom it is not necessary to mention. Gambon was one of the mildest of creatures, and somewhat of a "communard malgré lui." He would have willingly "left the settlement of all these vexed questions to moral force," and he proposed once or twice a mission to Versailles to that effect. He was about fifty, and a fine specimen of a robust, healthy farmer. His love of "peaceful settlement" arose from an experiment he had made in that way during the Empire, though it is very doubtful whether strictly logical reasoners would have looked upon it as "peaceful." Gambon had been a magistrate and a member of the National Assembly during the Second Republic, and voted with the conservative side. The advent of the Empire made an end of his parliamentary career, and, in order to mark his disapproval of the Coup-d'État and its sequel, Gambon refused to pay his taxes. The authorities seized one of his cows, and were proceeding to sell it by auction, when Gambon, accompanied by a good many of his former constituents, appeared on the scene. "This cow," he shouts, "has been stolen from me by the Imperial fisc, and whosoever buys it is nothing more than a thief himself." Result: not a single bid for the cow, and the auctioneer was compelled to adjourn the sale for a week. The auctioneer deemed it prudent to transport the cow to a neighbouring commune, but Gambon had got wind of the affair, and adopted the same expedient of moral persuasion. For nearly three months the auctioneer transported the cow from one commune to another, and Gambon followed him everywhere, until they reached the limits of the department. Gambon apprehended that moral persuasion would have no effect among strangers, and he let things take their course. The cost of selling the cow amounted to about ten times its worth. As a matter of course, the whole affair was revived by "les journaux bien pensants" at the advent of the Commune, and Gambon was elected a member by the 10th Arrondissement. Gambon managed to escape into Switzerland; but when the amnesty was proclaimed, he returned, and solicited once more the suffrages of his former constituents. At the Brasserie Saint-Séverin, Gambon was generally to be found at the ladies' table, about the occupants of which I cannot speak, seeing that I was not introduced to them.

Jourde was one of two "financial delegates" of the Commune. He had been a superior employé at the Bank of France, and was considered an authority on financial affairs. It was he to whom the Marquis de Ploeuc, the governor of the Bank, had handed the first million for the use of the Commune. My friend, the doctor, had known him in his former capacity, and often invited him to our table, to which invitation the "paymaster-general" always eagerly responded. One evening, the conversation turned upon the events which had preceded the request for funds. "On the second day of the Commune," he said, "the want of money began to be horribly felt. Eudes proposed that I should go and fetch some from the Bank of France. To be perfectly candid, I did not care about it. Had I been a soldier, I might have invaded the Bank at the head of a regiment; but, to go and ask my former chief for a million or so as a matter of course, was a different thing, and I had not the moral courage. The director of the Bank of France is very little short of a god to his subordinates, and, in spite of our boasted 'Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality,' there is no nation so ready to bow down before its governors as the French. Seeing that I hung back, Eudes proposed to go himself, and did, refusing to take a single soldier with him. But he did not want the responsibility of handling the million of francs the governor placed at our disposal, so I was, after all, obliged to beard my former chief in his own den. He was very polite, and called me 'Monsieur le délégué aux finances,' but I would have preferred his calling me all the names in the world, for I caught sight of a very ironical smile at the corners of his mouth when, on taking leave of him, he said, 'You may be my successor one day, Monsieur le délégué, and I hope you will profit by the lessons I have always endeavoured to teach my subordinates: obedience to the powers that be.'"