"M. de Bismarck, I have never heard a German speak French as you do," said Napoléon.
"Will you allow me to return the compliment, sire?"
"Certainly."
"I have never heard a Frenchman speak French as you do."[47]
When Prince Louis-Napoléon held out his hand and I looked into his face, I felt almost tempted to put him down as an opium-eater. Ten minutes afterwards, I felt convinced that, to use a metaphor, he himself was the drug, and that every one with whom he came in contact was bound to yield to its influence. When I came away that evening, I could have given Cavaignac, Thiers, Lamartine, Hugo, and the rest, who wanted to make a cat's-paw of him, a timely warning, if they would have condescended to listen to, and profit by it, which I am certain they would not have done. Strange as it may seem, every one of these men, and, with the exception of one, all undoubtedly clever, thought Louis-Napoléon either an imbecile or a secret drunkard. And, what is more, they endeavoured to propagate their opinion throughout the length and breadth, not only of France, but of Europe.
As usual, the one who was really the greatest nonentity among the latter was most lavish in his contempt. I am alluding to General Cavaignac. The nobodies who have governed or misgoverned France since the Fall of Sedan were, from an intellectual point of view, eagles compared to that surly and bumptious drill-sergeant, who had nothing, absolutely nothing, to recommend him for the elevated position he coveted. He was the least among all those brilliant African soldiers whose names and prowess were on every one's lips; he had really been made a hero of, at so much per line, by the staff of the National, where his brother Godefroy wielded unlimited power. He was all buckram; and, in the very heart of Paris, and in the midst of that republic whose fiercest watchword, whose loudest cry, was "equality," he treated partisans and opponents alike, as he would have treated a batch of refractory Arabs in a distant province of that newly-conquered African soil. He disliked every one who did not wear a uniform, and assumed a critical attitude towards every one who did. His republicanism was probably as sincere as that of Thiers—it meant "La République c'est moi:" with this difference, that Thiers was amiable, witty, and charming, though treacherous, and that Cavaignac was the very reverse. His honesty was beyond suspicion; that is, he felt convinced that he was the only possible saviour of France: but it was impaired by his equally sincere conviction that bribery and coercion—of cajoling he would have none—were admissible, nay, incumbent to attain that end. "Thiers, c'est la république en écureuil, Cavaignac c'est la république en ours mal léché," said a witty journalist. He and Louis-Napoléon were virtually the two men who were contending for the presidential chair, and the chances of Cavaignac may be judged by the conclusion of the verbal report of one of Lamoricière's emissaries, who canvassed one of the departments.
"'The thing might be feasible,' said an elector, 'if your general's name was Geneviève de Brabant, or that of one of the four sons of Aymon.[48] But his name is simply Cavaignac—Cavaignac, and that's all. I prefer Napoléon; at any rate, there is a ring about that name.' And I am afraid that eleven-twelfths of the electors are of the same opinion."
As for Ledru Rollin, Raspail, Changarnier, and even Lamartine and the Prince de Joinville, some of whom were candidates against their will, they were out of the running from the very start, though, curiously enough, the son of the monarch whom the republic had driven from the throne obtained more votes than the man who had proclaimed that republic. These votes were altogether discarded as unconstitutional, though one really fails to see why one member of a preceding dynasty should have been held to be more eligible than another. Be this as it may, the votes polled by the sailor prince amounted to over twenty-three thousand, showing that he enjoyed a certain measure of popularity. It is doubtful whether the Duc d'Aumale or the Duc de Nemours would have obtained a fifth of that number. As I have already said, the latter was disliked by his father's opponents for his suspected legitimist tendencies, and tacitly blamed by some of the partisans of the Orleanist régime for his lack of resistance on the 24th of February; the former's submission "to the will of the nation," as embodied in a manifesto "to the inhabitants of Algeria," provoked no enthusiasm either among friends or foes.[49] Perhaps public rumour was not altogether wrong, when it averred that the D'Orléans were too tight-fisted to spend their money in electioneering literature. The expense involved in that item was a terrible obstacle to Louis-Napoléon and his few faithful henchmen; for, though the Napoleonic idea was pervading all classes of society, there was, correctly speaking, no Bonapartist party to shape it for the practical purposes of the moment. The Napoleonic idea was a fond remembrance of France's glorious past, rather than a hope of its renewal in the future. Even the greatest number of the most ardent worshippers of that marvellous soldier of fortune, doubted whether his nephew was sufficiently popular to obtain an appreciable following, and those who did not doubt were mostly poor. While Dufaure and Lamoricière were scattering money broadcast, and using pressure of the most arbitrary kind, in order to insure Cavaignac's success, Louis-Napoléon and his knot of partisans were absolutely reduced to their own personal resources. Miss Howard—afterwards Comtesse de Beauregard—and Princesse Mathilde had given all they could; a small loan was obtained from M. Fould; and some comparatively scanty supplies had been forthcoming from England—it was said at the time, with how much truth I know not, that Lords Palmerston and Malmesbury had contributed: but the exchequer was virtually empty. A stray remittance of a few thousand francs, from an altogether unexpected quarter, and most frequently from an anonymous sender, arrived now and then; but it was what the Germans call "a drop of water in a very hot frying-pan;" it barely sufficed to stop a hole. Money was imperatively wanted for the printing of millions upon millions of handbills, thousands and thousands of posters, and their distribution; for the expenses of canvassers, electioneering agents, and so forth. The money went to the latter, the rest was obtained on credit. Prince Louis, confident of success, emptied his pockets of the last five-franc pieces; when he had no more, he promised to pay. He was as badly off as his famous uncle before the turn of fortune came.
In connection with this dire impecuniosity, I remember a story for the truth of which I can vouch as if I had had it from Louis-Napoléon's own lips. In front of Siraudin's confectioner's shop at the angle of the Boulevard des Capucines and the Rue de la Paix, there sits an old woman with two wooden legs. About '48, when she was very pretty and dressed with a certain coquettishness, she was already there, though sitting a little higher up, in front of the wall of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, which has since made room for the handsome establishment of Giroux. Behind her, on the wall, were suspended for sale some cheap and not very artistically executed reproductions of Fragonard, "Le Coucher de la Mariée," etc., all of which would fetch high prices now; also songs, the tunes of which she played with great taste on her violin. It was reported that she had been killed during the attack on the ministry, but to people's great surprise she reappeared a few days afterwards. Prince Louis, who was staying at the Place Vendôme, then used to take a short cut by the Rue Neuve des Capucines to the Boulevards, and it seems that he never passed her without giving her something. In a few weeks she came to look upon his contributions as a certain part of her income. She knew who he was, and, curiously enough, seemed to be aware not only of his political preoccupations, but of his pecuniary embarrassments. I am unable to say whether she was in sympathy with the former, but she was evidently concerned about the latter; for, one evening, after thanking Louis-Napoléon, she added, "Monseigneur, je voudrais vous dire un mot."
"Parlez, madame."