After all eyes had looked in vain for the German flag, which was nowhere to be found, M. E. de Girardin arose to his full height and cried in a solemn nasal tone, “Monsieur, vous êtes le drapeau vivant de l’Allemagne ici!”[[27]]

During the storm of applause that followed these words, I remembered that at breakfast I had seen in the Charivari a cartoon of Girardin, with these words for a legend: “Mr. de Girardin commence à flotter avec le vent.”[[28]] So I got up, as soon as the hall was quiet again, and said, “Merci du compliment, bien que je ne puisse pas l’accepter dans toute la force du terme, attendu que je ne flotte pas avec le vent, moi!”[[29]]

Indescribable effect. Hundreds of Americans and Englishmen cried, “The translation! The translation!”

M. de Coquerel, curé de Ste. Madelaine, translateur officiel, gets up and begins:

“The learned gentleman has said—”

I interrupt him, politely begging permission to translate my words into English myself; in doing so I make an allusion to our Anglo-Saxon relationship, and arouse great enthusiasm.

Now arose M. de Cormenin (Timon) to protest against Germany’s being la nation la plus civilisée du globe: only France, said he, could be so designated.

“Let us put it to the test,” I cried.... “How is the greatness of a nation known? By its great men. Name me six of your great living men and I will wager that every German schoolboy knows their names; then I will mention six Germans who are their peers, and I will acknowledge myself beaten if you yourself can give me any tolerably satisfactory account of their importance.”

So the matter was thrashed back and forth without its being possible to speak of it as a speech; I myself was farthest of all from having the idea that I had made one. But Fate often plays strange tricks with us. Szarvady, Wilhelmine Claus’s husband, was my guide through Paris, and we had agreed to dine at the Hotel Rougemont at six o’clock with some of his acquaintances. He had not been at the meeting, but had taken me to Victor Hugo’s the day before and had there learned that I was not going to make a speech. Great was his astonishment at reading in all the evening papers the most contradictory reports of the speech I did not make. John Lemoine in the Journal des Débats was praising my fine English, and Galignani’s Messenger remarked as follows about my French:

“The learned gentleman delivered himself in a most exquisite French.”