Society during the Empire — The series of guests at Compiègne — The amusements — the absence of musical taste in the Bonapartes — The programme on the first, second, third, and fourth days — An anecdote of Lafontaine, the actor — Theatrical performances and balls — The expenses of the same — The theatre at Compiègne — The guests, male and female — "Neck or nothing" for the latter, uniform for the former — The rest have to take "back seats" — The selection of guests among the notabilities of Compiègne — A mayor's troubles — The Empress's and the Emperor's conflicting opinions with regard to female charms — Bassano in "hot water" — Tactics of the demi-mondaines — Improvement from the heraldic point of view in the Empress's entourage — The cocodettes — Their dress — Worth — When every pretext for a change of toilette is exhausted, the court ladies turn themselves into ballerinas — "Le Diable à Quatre" at Compiègne — The ladies appear at the ball afterwards in their gauze skirts — The Emperor's dictum with regard to ballet-dancers and men's infatuation for them — The Emperor did not like stupid women — The Emperor's "eye" for a handsome woman — The Empress does not admire the instinct — William I. of Prussia acts as comforter — The hunt — Actors, "supers," and spectators — "La Comtesse d'Escarbagnas" — The Imperial procession — The Empress's and Emperor's unpunctuality — Louis-Napoléon not a "well-dressed man" — The Empress wished to get back before dark — The reason of this wish — Though unpunctual, punctual on hunt-days — The police measures at those gatherings — M. Hyrvoix and M. Boitelle — The Empress did not like the truth, the Emperor did — Her anxiety to go to St. Lazare [304]
CHAPTER XVI.
The story of a celebrated sculptor and his model — David d'Angers at the funeral of Cortot, the sculptor — How I became acquainted with him — The sculptor leaves the funeral procession to speak to a woman — He tells me the story — David d'Angers' sympathy with Greece in her struggle for independence — When Botzaris falls at Missolonghi, he makes up his mind to carve his monument — Wishes to do something original — He finds his idea in the cemetery of Père-la-Chaise — In search of a model — Comes unexpectedly upon her in the Rue du Montparnasse, while in company of Victor Hugo — The model and her mother — The bronze Christ on the studio wall — David gives it to his model — The latter dismissed — A plot against the sculptor's life — His model saves him — He tries to find her and fails — Only meets with her when walking behind the hearse of Cortot — She appears utterly destitute — Loses sight of her again — Meets her on the outer boulevards with a nondescript of the worst character — He endeavours to rescue her, but fails — Canler, of the Paris police, reveals the tactics pursued with regard to "unfortunates" — David's exile and death — The Botzaris Monument is brought back to Paris to be restored — The model at the door of the exhibition — Her death [323]
CHAPTER XVII.
Queen Victoria in Paris — The beginning of the era of middle-class excursions — English visitors before that — The British tourist of 1855 — The real revenge of Waterloo — The Englishman's French and the Frenchman's English — The opening of the Exhibition — The lord mayor and aldermen in Paris — The King of Portugal — All these considered so much "small fry" — Napoléon III. goes to Boulogne to welcome the Queen — The royal yacht is delayed — The French hotel proprietor the greatest artist in fleecing — The Italian, the Swiss, the German, mere bunglers in comparison — Napoléon III. before the arrival of the Queen — Pondering the past — Arrival of the Queen — The Queen lands, followed by Prince Albert and the royal children — The Emperor rides by the side of her carriage — Comments on the population — An old salt on the situation — An old soldier's retort — The general feeling — Arrival in Paris — The Parisians' reception of the Queen — A description of the route — The apartments of the Queen at St. Cloud — How the Queen spent Sunday — Visits the art section of the Exhibition on Monday — Ingres and Horace Vernet presented to her — Frenchmen's ignorance of English art in those days — English and French art critics — The Queen takes a carriage drive through Paris — Not a single cry of "Vive l'Angleterre!" a great many of "Vive la Reine" — England making a cats-paw of France — Reception at the Élysée-Bourbon — "Les Demoiselles de Saint-Cyr" at St. Cloud — Alexandre Dumas would have liked to see the Queen — Visit to Versailles — State-performances at the Opéra — Ball at the Hôtel de Ville — The Queen's dancing — Canrobert on "the Queen's dancing and her soldiers' fighting" — Another visit to the Exhibition — Béranger misses seeing the Queen — "I am not going to see the Queen, but the woman" — A review in the Champ-de-Mars — A visit to Napoléon's tomb — Jérôme's absence on the plea of illness — Marshal Vaillant's reply to the Emperor when the latter invites him to take Jérôme's place — His comments on the receptions given by the Emperor to foreign sovereigns — Fêtes at Versailles — Homeward [336]
CHAPTER XVIII.
Marshal Vaillant — The beginning of our acquaintance — His stories of the swashbucklers of the First Empire, and the beaux of the Restauration — Rabelaisian, but clever — Marshal Vaillant neither a swashbuckler nor a beau; hated both — Never cherished the slightest illusions about the efficiency of the French army — Acknowledged himself unable to effect the desired and necessary reforms — To do that, a minister of war must become a fixture — Why he stayed — Careful of the public moneys, and of the Emperor's also — Napoléon III.'s lavishness — An instance of it — Vaillant never dazzled by the grandeur of court entertainments — Not dazzled by anything — His hatred of wind-bags — Prince de Canino — Matutinal interviews — Prince de Canino sends his seconds — Vaillant declines the meeting, and gives his reason — Vaillant abrupt at the best of times — A freezing reception — A comic interview — Attempts to shirk military duty — Tricks — Mistakes — A story in point — More tricks — Sham ailments: how the marshal dealt with them — When the marshal was not in an amiable mood — Another interview — Vaillant's tactics — "D——d annoying to be wrong" — The marshal fond of science — A very interesting scientific phenomenon himself — Science under the later Bourbons — Suspicion of the soldiers of the Empire — The priesthood and the police — The most godless republic preferable to a continuance of their régime — The marshal's dog, Brusca — Her dislike to civilians — Brusca's chastity — Vaillant's objection to insufficiently prepaid letters — His habit of missing the train, notwithstanding his precautions — His objection to fuss and public honours [351]
CHAPTER XIX.
The Franco-German War — Friday, July 15, 1870, 6 p.m. — My friends "confident of France being able to chastise the insolence of the King of Prussia" — I do not share their confidence; but do not expect a crushing defeat — Napoléon III.'s presence aggravated the disasters; his absence would not have averted them — He himself had no illusions about the efficiency of the army, did not suspect the rottenness of it — His previous endeavours at reorganization — The real drift of his proposed inquiries — His plan meant also compulsory service for every one — Why the legislature opposed it — The makeshift proposed by it — Napoléon weary, body and soul — His physical condition — A great consultation and the upshot of it — Dr. Ricord and what he told me — I am determined to see and hear, though not to speak — I sally forth — The streets on the evening of Friday, the 15th of July — The illuminations — Patriotism or Chauvinism — The announcement of a bookseller — What Moltke thought of it — The opinion of a dramatist on the war — The people; no horse-play — No work done on Saturday and Sunday — Cabmen — "A man does not pay for his own funeral, monsieur" — The northern station on Sunday — The departing Germans — The Emperor's particular instructions with regard to them — Alfred de Musset's "Rhin Allemand" — Prévost-Paradol and the news of his suicide — The probable cause of it — A chat with a superior officer — The Emperor's Sunday receptions at the Tuileries — Promotions in the army, upon what basis — Good and bad officers — The officers' mess does not exist — Another general officer gives his opinion — Marshal Niel and Lebœuf — The plan of campaign suddenly altered — The reason — The Emperor leaves St. Cloud — His confidence shaken before then — Some telegrams from the commanders of divisions — Thiers is appealed to, to stem the tide of retrenchment; afterwards to take the portfolio of war — The Emperor's opinion persistently disregarded at the Tuileries — Trochu — The dancing colonels at the Tuileries [367]
CHAPTER XX.