Gerald Fitzgerald, the Chevalier: A Novel

by Charles James Lever

‘I am a foreigner, with whose sentiments you have no concern. I do not obtrude my opinions upon you.’

‘What do we care for that?’ shouted a deep voice. ‘You have dared to offend the most sacred sentiments of a nation, and to riot in a festive orgie while we weep over the deathbed of a patriot.’

‘A la Grue! à la Grue!’ screamed the wild mass in a yell of passion.

Now the Grue was an immense crane—used in some repairs of the Pont Neuf—which still held its place at the approach to the bridge. It was here that a sort of public tribunal held its nightly sittings by the light of a gigantic lantern, suspended from the crane; and which, report alleged, had more than once given way to a very different pendant. It is certain that two men, taken in the act of robbery, had been hanged by the sentence of this self-constituted tribunal, which, in open defiance of the authorities, continued to assemble there. The cry, ‘A la Grue! à la Grue!’ had, therefore, a dreadful significance; and there was a terrible import in the savage roar of the mob as they ratified the proposal.

‘We will try him fairly. He shall be judged deliberately, and be allowed to speak in his own defence,’ said several, who believed that their words were those of moderation and equity:

Powerless against the overwhelming mass, and too indignant to proffer one single word of palliation, Gerald was hurried along towards the quay.

There was something singularly solemn in the measured tread of that vast multitude, as, in a mockery of justice, they marched along. At first not a word was spoken; but suddenly a deep voice in the front rank began one of the popular chants of the day, the whole dense mass joining in the refrain. Nothing could be ruder than the verses, save the accents that intoned them; but there was in the very roar and resonance a depth that imparted a sense of force and power.

We offer a rough version of the unpolished chant—

‘The Cour Royale has a princely hall,
And many come there to sue;
But I love the sight of a stilly night,
And the crowd beneath the Grue.
No lawyer clown, with his cap and gown,
Has complex work to do;
For the horny hand and the face that’s tanned
Are the judges beneath the Grue.
At best, this life is a fleeting strife,
For me as well as for you;
But our work is brief with a rogue or thief
When he stands beneath the Grue.
No bribes resort to our humble court,
All is open and plain to view;
And the people’s voice and the people’s choice
Are the law beneath the Grue.
The Grue! the Grue! the Grue!
I ween there are but few
Who have hearts for hope as they see the rope
That dangles beneath the Grue.’

As they sang a number of voices in front of them took up the strain, till the crowd seemed to make the very air ring with their hoarse chant. In this way they reached the Seine, over whose dark and rapid flood the fatal crane seemed to droop sadly. Several hundred people were assembled here, a confused murmur showing that they were engaged in conversing rather than in that judicial function it was their pride to discharge.