In an instant a dozen heads were bent over the paper, each eager to scan the paragraph so long and ardently desired.
“Come, Burke, I hope you have not forgotten your English,” said the major. “We shall want you soon to interpret for us in London; if, pardieu, we can ever find our way through the fogs of that ill-starred island.”
I hung my head without speaking; the miserable isolation of him who has no country is a sad and sickening sense of want no momentary enthusiasm, no impulse of high daring can make up for. Happily for me, all were too deeply interested in the important news to remark me, or pay any attention to my feelings.
CHAPTER XXVII. THE MARCH TO VERSAILLES
They who remember the excited state of England on the rupture of the peace of Amiens; the spirit of military ardor that animated every class and condition of life; the national hatred, carried to the highest pitch by the instigations and attack of a violent press,—can yet form but an imperfect notion of the mad enthusiasm that prevailed in France on the same occasion. The very fact that there was no determinate and precise cause of quarrel added to the exasperation on both sides. It was less like the warfare of two great nations, than the personal animosity of two high-spirited and passionate individuals, who, having interchanged words of insult, resolve on the sword as the only arbiter between them. All that the long rivalry of centuries, national dislike, jealousy in every form, and ridicule in a thousand shapes could suggest, were added to the already existing hate, and gave to the coming contest a character of blackest venom.
In England, the tyrannic rule of Bonaparte gave deep offence to all true lovers of liberty, and gave rise to fears of what the condition of their own country would become should he continue to increase his power by conquest. In France, the rapid rise to honor and wealth the career of arms so singularly favored, made partisans of war in every quarter of the kingdom. The peaceful arts were but mean pursuits compared with that royal road to rank and riches,—the field of battle; and their self-interest lent its share in forming the spirit of hostility, which wanted no element of hatred to make it perfect.
Paris,—where so lately nothing was heard save the roll of splendid equipages, the din of that gay world whose business is amusement; where amid gilded salons the voluptuous habits of the Consulate mixed with the less courtly but scarce less costly display of military splendor,—became now like a vast camp. Regiments poured in daily, to resume their march the next morning; the dull rumble of ammunition wagons and caissons, the warlike clank of mounted cavalry, awoke the citizens at daybreak; the pickets of hussar corps and the dusty and travel-stained infantry soldiers filled the streets at nightfall. Yet through all, the mad gayety of this excited nation prevailed. The cafés were Crowded with eager and delighted faces; the tables spread in the open air were occupied by groups whose merry voices and ready laughter attested that war was the pastime of the people, and the very note of preparation a tocsin of joy and festivity. The walls were placarded with inflammatory addresses to the patriotism and spirit of France. The papers teemed with artful and cleverly written explanations of the rupture with England; in which every complaint against that country was magnified, and every argument put forward to prove the peaceful desires of that nation whose present enthusiasm for war was an unhappy commentary on the assertion. The good faith of France was extolled; the moderation of the First Consul dwelt upon; and the treachery of that “perfidious Albion, that respected not the faith of treaties,” was displayed in such irrefragable clearness, that the humblest citizen thought the cause his own, and felt the coming contest the ordeal of his own honor.
All the souvenirs of the former wars were invoked to give spirit to the approaching struggle, and they were sufficiently numerous to let no week pass over without at least one eventful victory to commemorate. Now it was Kellerman's cuirassiers, whose laurel-wreathed helmets reminded the passing stranger that on that day eight years they tore through the dense ranks of the Austrians, and sabred the gunners at the very guns. Now it was the Polish regiments, the steel-clad lancers, who paraded before the Tuileries in memory of the proud day they marched through Montebello with that awful sentence on their banners, “Venice exists no longer!” Here were corps of infantry, intermingled with dragoons, pledging each other as they passed along; while the names of Castiglione, Bassano, and Roveredo rang througl the motley crowd. The very children, “les enfants de troupe,” seemed filled with the warlike enthusiasm of their fathers; and each battalion, as it moved past, stepped to the encouraging shouts of thousands who gazed with envious admiration on the heroes of their country.
Never did the pent-up feelings of a nation find vent in such a universal torrent of warlike fervor as now filled the land. The clank of the sabre was the music that charmed the popular ear; and the “coquette vivandiére,” as she tripped along the gravel avenued of the Tuileries gardens, was as much an object of admiration as the most splendidly attired beauty of the Faubourg St. Germain. The whole tone of society assumed the feature of the political emergency. The theatres only represented such pieces as bore upon the ancient renown of the nation in arms,—its victories and conquests; the artists painted no other subjects; and the literature of the period appealed to few other sympathies than are found in the rude manners of the guardroom or around the watchfires of the bivouac. Pegault Lebrun was the popular author of the day; and his works are even now no mean indication of the current tastes and opinions of the period.