Edmond Dantès

by Edmund Flagg

Albert bowed and gave his peculiar smile.

"Our friend Albert smiles, and well he may. He has had a sad experience in this error of premature outbreaks. In April, 1834, he exerted every energy to restrain the revolt in Lyons, as chief of the Société des Droits de l'Homme, and as the undoubted friend of the operatives. But his efforts were futile. Exasperated, urged on by less experienced leaders, they were in full tide of revolution, and could no more be restrained in their unwise rising than could the mountain cataract in mad career be dammed. The result was, of course, defeat—most disastrous defeat. Hundreds of the people perished, and our friend was imprisoned and fined for taking part in a movement, which he had in vain attempted to quell, and then, with the certainty of defeat, had joined, rather than desert the people who trusted and relied on him."

"A noble act!" cried Marrast, as he paced the room.

Albert quietly smiled, but otherwise his countenance remained unmoved.

"And was it not a most noble and a most wise act," continued the author of "The Ten Years," "when our friend Flocon, by an energetic and eloquent harangue, restrained the indignant people from razing to the ground the office of the 'Gazette de France,' the organ of the Duchess of Berri, and his bitter foe? Terribly would that rash act have recoiled on us, and yet, at the same time, with this most patriotic and prudent deed before us, a wilder measure than even that was adopted, and it was quelled only by force. You all remember the events. In February, '33, Eugène Brifault, in his 'Corsair,' alluded jestingly to the mysterious pregnancy of the mother of Henry V., Duke of Bordeaux, as did every one, she then being imprisoned at Baye because of her prior conspiracy to place her son on the throne, and her secret marriage in Italy being unrevealed. The Legitimists of 'Le Revenant' challenged; the allusion was repeated, and a second trial and a death ensued. 'Le National' and 'La Tribune,' regarding these repeated challenges as a menace to the Republicans, hurled defiance at the Legitimists, and demanded twelve distinct rencontres in behalf of as many names of our friends posted at their offices, among which those of Armand Carrel, Godefroi Cavaignac and Armand Marrast were conspicuous. The challenge is accepted—the names of twelve Legitimists are furnished—Armand Carrel selects Roux Laborie—they fight, and Carrel is dangerously wounded—the police then interfere—the affair ends with Flocon's terrific and audacious defiance flung down at the whole Legitimist and Orléans parties in the columns of 'La Réforme.' Now, what to Republicans were the quarrels of Legitimists and Orléanists? If we were to be ruled by a king, what cared we whether that king were Henry V. or Louis Philippe? How would the sacrifice of Carrel, Marrast, Cavaignac, or of any of those twelve brave men have been repaid, or made up? And afterwards, alas! in July of '36, when Armand Carrel, causelessly assuming a quarrel not his own, because of a fancied attempt to degrade the press, by rendering its issues accessible, by cheapness, to the masses, was slain in the Bois de Vincennes by the vulgar bullet of Émile de Girardin, of 'La Presse.' What reparation to our cause was it that our champion had died like a hero, and Châteaubriand, Arago, Cormenin and Béranger wept around his grave? Alas! that inestimable life belonged to his country and his race, and not to himself, to fling away in an obscure quarrel."

"But we are not all of us Armand Carrels," said Rollin.

"And yet, to the great cause of human liberty, and the amelioration of man's condition, to which each of us stands sworn, are pledged our lives. To hazard that cause, by the sacrifice of those lives, or by rashly and unwisely attempting its advancement, makes us violators of our vows, quite as much in reality as if we had become traitors."

"But the instances you cite are those only of individual rashness, Louis, and not of the people, or of their leaders acting in concert," remarked Marrast.

"True, concert of action has been chiefly needed, but I have only to recall the dates and places of our repeated attempts and defeats, for the past ten years, to convince you all that those attempts were premature, and had they not been so, they might have been successful—that they have frittered away energies which, properly concentrated and directed, might have achieved a revolution; and that while they have betrayed our designs and depressed our friends, have enabled our foes insultingly to triumph and caused them to be on the constant qui vive to anticipate our movements. What but premature and undigested uprisings were the conspiracy of the bell-tower of Nôtre Dame, in January of '32, when 'Le National' was seized—or the disturbances in La Vendée—or those in Grenoble—or those in Marseilles—or those in the Rue des Prouvaires—or those in April, during the cholera, when Casimir Perier died—or those of the 5th and 6th of June, on the occasion of General Lamarque's funeral, on pretence of avenging upon the Government the affront offered during the obsequies of Casimir Perier, the victim-Premier of the cholera? For the part taken by 'La Tribune,' then conducted by Marrast, in this revolt, its press was seized and sealed. The same was the fate of 'La Quotidienne,' and the same would have been the fate of 'Le National,' but for its barricades. Well do I remember the meeting of our friends in this very apartment on the night after General Lamarque's funeral. The great shade of the venerable warrior seemed among us, repeating for our counsel and imitation his last impressive words, 'I die but the cause lives!' But, alas! we observed it not. Doubt, dissension, dismay and despair were in our midst. All was dark—all was defiance and denunciation, crimination and recrimination—brother's hand raised against brother. Armand Carrel that night sat in this chair, but he was not the man to command his own will or opinions; how could he then bring to obedience and concert the conflicting impulses of others? Armand Carrel was a wonderful man. His motto, like that of Danton, was this: 'Audacity, audacity, always audacity!' Yet with all the audacity of Danton, he had little of his firmness. An officer under the Restoration, a conspirator at Bifort, in arms in Spain against the white flag, three times a prisoner before a council of war—in 1830 he was with Thiers, the founder of this journal; but everywhere he carried the exactitude of the camp; even in dress, manner and bearing he was a soldier—lofty, haughty, seemingly overbearing, yet, at heart, noble and generous, and to his friends accessible in the extreme. To his military notions, nothing could be accomplished without soldiers, and for the people to carry a revolution against soldiers seemed to him absurd."