The Downfall (La Débâcle): A Story of the Horrors of War

by Émile Zola

Then the month of November went by amid feverish impatience. Some trifling engagements were fought, in which Maurice took no part. He was now camping in the direction of St. Ouen, and at each opportunity he applied for leave, to satisfy his incessant craving for news. Like him, Paris was waiting anxiously. Political passions seemed to have been somewhat appeased by the election of the district mayors, though it was noticeable that most of the successful candidates belonged to the extreme parties, an ominous symptom for the future. And that for which Paris was so anxiously waiting during this long lull, was the great sortie so incessantly called for, the sortie which was to bring victory and deliverance. Of this, again, there was not the slightest doubt; they would hurl back the Prussians and pass over them. Preparations were being made on the peninsula of Gennevilliers, the point which was considered most favourable for the projected effort. But one morning there came a fit of mad delight at the good news of Coulmiers—Orleans retaken, the Army of the Loire marching upon Paris, and already camping, it was said, at Etampes. Then everything was changed; the Gennevilliers scheme, Trochu's long meditated plan, was abruptly set aside since it would merely be necessary to join hands with the army of succour across the Marne. The military forces had by this time been reorganised, and three armies had been created—one composed of the battalions of the National Guard under the orders of General Clément Thomas; the second, which General Ducrot was to conduct to the great attack, formed of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Army Corps, reinforced by the best men that could be picked out of the other forces; and finally the third, the reserve army, composed almost entirely of Mobile Guards, and confided to General Vinoy. And when on November 28 Maurice came to bivouac with his regiment—the 115th of the Line—in the wood of Vincennes, he entertained no doubt of the success of the effort. The three corps of the second army were all encamped there, and the men told one another that their appointment with the Army of the Loire was for the morrow at Fontainebleau. Then, immediately afterwards, came the customary ill-luck, the usual blunders, a sudden rising of the Marne which prevented the pontoon-bridges from being thrown across it, and regrettable orders which delayed the movements of the troops. On the following night the 115th of the Line was one of the first regiments to cross the river, and as early as ten o'clock, under a terrible fusillade, Maurice entered the village of Champigny. He was wild with excitement, and his chassepot burnt his fingers despite the bitter cold. Ever since he had been on the march he had had but one desire, to continue going onward like that, onward, ever onward until he met his comrades of the provinces over yonder. But, beyond Champigny and Bry, the army had come upon the park-walls of Cœuilly and Villiers, walls more than five hundred yards in length, which the enemy had transformed into impregnable fortresses. They proved the limit, the obstacle that bravery was powerless to surmount. From that moment all was hesitation and retreat; the third corps' movements having been delayed, the first and second, whose advance was already arrested, continued defending Champigny during a couple of days, but eventually had to abandon it during the night of December 2, having merely achieved a barren victory. That night the whole army returned to encamp under the trees of the wood of Vincennes, which were white with rime; and Maurice, who could no longer even feel his feet, so numbed they were by the cold, lay with his face upon the frozen ground, and wept.

Ah! the sad dreary days which followed after the collapse of that great effort! The great sortie, so long in preparation, the irresistible onslaught which was to have delivered Paris, had failed; and three days later a letter from General von Moltke announced that the Army of the Loire had again been defeated and compelled to abandon Orleans. The fetters encompassing the city were being drawn tighter and tighter, as it were, and henceforth there was no possibility of breaking through them. Yet Paris, in the delirium of despair, seemed to acquire a fresh resistive strength. Famine was beginning to threaten the inhabitants. Since the middle of October meat had been rationed. In December not a beast remained of the great droves of oxen and flocks of sheep which had been turned into the Bois de Boulogne amid the clouds of dust raised by their continuous tramping; and now the horses were being slaughtered. The Government supplies, and the private stores of flour and grain which had been requisitioned, had been calculated to yield sufficient bread for four months. When the flour was all consumed it became necessary to erect mills in the railway stations. There was also a dearth of fuel, and such little as remained was reserved for grinding the grain, baking the bread, and manufacturing weapons. And yet Paris, without gas, with her streets lighted merely by petroleum lamps, few and far between, Paris shivering under her icy mantle, Paris, whose black bread and horseflesh were doled out to her in infinitesimal quantities, continued hoping—hoping despite everything, talking of Faidherbe in the north, of Chanzy on the Loire, and of Bourbaki in the east, as though some prodigy were about to bring these commanders victorious under the ramparts. The crowds which waited in the snow outside the bakers' and butchers' shops still chatted gaily at times over the news of some great imaginary victory. Indeed, after the short fit of despondency which followed upon each defeat, the same tenacious illusions would spring to life again, and flare yet higher and higher among that mass of people whom suffering and hunger filled with hallucinations. One day, a soldier who had spoken of surrender, was almost massacred by the bystanders on the Place du Château d'Eau. The troops, whose courage was exhausted and who felt the end approaching, asked for peace, but the inhabitants still clamoured for the sortie en masse, the torrential sortie, when the entire population, men, women, and even children, were to rush upon the Prussians, like a vast overflowing stream which throws everything down and sweeps it away.

And Maurice now kept apart from his comrades, avoiding them, and experiencing a growing hatred of his soldier's calling which penned him up idle and useless under the shelter of Mont Valérien. And thus he availed himself of every opportunity that presented itself, invented all possible pretexts to obtain leave, and hurried with more haste than ever into that Paris where his heart had fixed its abode. He only found peace of mind when he was in the midst of the thronging masses; he tried to force himself to hope as the mob hoped. He often went to witness the ascent of the balloons which every few days were sent up from the Northern and Orleans railway stations, with a freight of carrier pigeons, despatches, and letters. The balloons ascended and were lost to sight in the cheerless wintry sky; and the hearts of the onlookers became heavy with anguish whenever the wind wafted them in the direction of Germany. Many of them must have been lost. Maurice had written twice to his sister Henriette, but he did not know if she had received his letters. His recollections of her and of Jean were now so far away from him, in the depths of that vast world whence nothing came, that he now thought of those dear ones but seldom, and then as of affections which he had left behind him in some other life. There was no room for them in his being now, it was filled to overflowing with the ceaseless tempest of despondency and excitement amid which he lived. Then, in the early days of January, he found fresh food for his exasperation in the bombardment of the districts on the left bank of the Seine. He had ended by ascribing the dilatoriness of the Germans in this respect to humanitarian reasons, though it was simply due to the difficulties they encountered in conveying their siege-guns through France and getting them into position. And now that a shell had killed two little girls at the Val-de-Grâce hospital, Maurice felt unbounded scorn and hatred for those barbarians who murdered children and threatened to burn down the public museums and libraries. However, after the first few days of fright, Paris had resumed, under the bombs, its life of unfaltering heroism.

Since the reverse of Champigny, there had only been one more abortive attempt at a sortie, made in the direction of Le Bourget, and on the evening when the plateau of Avron had to be evacuated, under the fire of the heavy guns pounding away at the forts, Maurice shared the violent fit of exasperation which spread throughout the city. At this juncture the growing discontent which threatened to sweep away General Trochu and the Government of National Defence acquired such intensity that the rulers of the city were compelled to attempt a supreme and hopeless effort. Why indeed did they refuse to lead the three hundred thousand National Guards into the field, the National Guards who did not cease offering themselves and claiming their share of peril? It was the torrential sortie clamoured for since the very outset, Paris opening her flood-gates and drowning the Prussians beneath the colossal torrent of her people. Despite the certainty of a fresh defeat, it became necessary to accede to this gallant prayer; but in order to limit the slaughter, the commanders contented themselves with adjoining to the regular troops the fifty-nine marching battalions of the National Guard. And the eve of January 19 was like a fête: an enormous crowd thronged the Boulevards and the Champs-Elysées, watching the regiments as they marched along headed by their bands, and singing patriotic refrains. Children and women accompanied them, and men sprang upon the benches to shout their ardent prayers for victory. Then, on the morrow, the entire population betook itself to the neighbourhood of the Arc-de-Triomphe, and a wild hope inflamed it when in the course of the morning the tidings arrived of the occupation of Montretout. Epic-like narratives circulated concerning the irresistible dash of the National Guards; the Prussians were overcome, Versailles itself would be captured before the evening. And then, what a collapse there was when the inevitable repulse became known at nightfall! Whilst the left wing of the army was occupying Montretout, the central column, after making its way beyond the outer wall of Buzenval Park, was shattered in its efforts to carry a second inner wall which it encountered. There had been a thaw, moreover, a persistent fine rain had drenched the roads, and the guns, those guns cast by public subscription, the pride and the hope of Paris, were unable to come up. On the right, too, General Ducrot's column, brought into action much too late, was still lagging into the rear. The effort could be carried no further, and General Trochu had to give orders for a general retreat. Montretout was abandoned, St. Cloud was abandoned and set on fire by the Prussians. And when black night had fallen the whole horizon was illumined by the glow of that immense conflagration.

This time Maurice himself felt that it was all over. During four hours, under the galling fire from the Prussian entrenchments, he had remained in the park of Buzenval with some of the National Guards, whose courage he greatly praised when he returned into the city a few days afterwards. They had indeed conducted themselves bravely. That being so, was not the defeat necessarily due to the imbecility and treachery of the commanders? In the Rue de Rivoli he met bands of men shouting 'Down with Trochu!' and 'Vive la Commune!' Another awakening of the revolutionary passions had come, a fresh propulsion of public opinion of such a disquieting character that, to avoid being swept away, the Government of National Defence thought it necessary to compel General Trochu to resign his command and set General Vinoy in his place. That same day, at a public meeting at Belleville, Maurice again heard a demand for an attack en masse. It was a mad idea, and he knew it, yet his heart again began beating more rapidly, in presence of this obstinate resolve to fight and conquer. When all is ended, should not the impossible be attempted? Throughout the night he dreamt of prodigies.

Then another long week went by. Paris was suffering uncomplainingly. The shops were no longer opened, the few foot passengers no longer met a single vehicle in the deserted streets. Forty thousand horses had been eaten; dogs, cats, and rats were fetching high prices. Since the dearth of wheat had set in, the bread, partially compounded of rice and oats, was black, viscous, and difficult of digestion; and the interminable 'waits' outside the bakers' shops to obtain the three hundred grammes of bread[50] to which each person's daily ration was limited, were becoming mortal. Ah! those grievous 'waits' of the siege days, those poor women shivering under the downpour, with their feet in the icy slush—all the heroic wretchedness of the great city still bent upon not surrendering. The death-rate had increased threefold,[51] the theatres had been turned into ambulances. At nightfall the once luxurious fashionable quarters fell into a dreary quietness, into dense obscurity, like districts of some accursed city smitten by pestilence. And amid the silence and obscurity, you heard but the far-off, continuous crash of the bombardment, and saw but the flashes of the guns setting the wintry sky aglow.

All at once, on January 26, Paris became aware that for a couple of days past Jules Favre had been negotiating with Count von Bismarck for an armistice; and at the same time it learnt that there only remained sufficient bread for another ten days, barely the period requisite for the revictualling of the city. Capitulation had become a brutal necessity. In its stupor at thus at last learning the truth, Paris mournfully allowed the Government to act as it listed. That same day, at midnight, the last cannon shot was fired. And, on the 29th, when the Germans had occupied the forts, Maurice came inside the ramparts with the 115th and encamped in the neighbourhood of Montrouge. Then began an aimless kind of life, made up of idleness and feverish unrest. Discipline was greatly relaxed, the soldiers disbanded and roamed about, waiting to be sent home again. He, however, remained in a wild excited state, prompt to taking offence at the slightest provocation, his disquietude ever ready to turn into exasperation. He devoured the revolutionary newspapers, and that three weeks' armistice, concluded for the sole purpose of allowing France to elect an Assembly which was to pronounce upon the conclusion of peace or the continuance of war, seemed to him a delusion and a snare, a final, supreme act of treachery. Even if Paris were forced to capitulate, he, like Gambetta, was in favour of continuing the war on the Loire and in the North. The disasters which overtook the Army of the East, forgotten, compelled to take refuge in Switzerland, enraged him. And then the result of the elections brought his fury to a climax; it was just as he had foreseen, the cowardly provinces, irritated by the resistance of Paris, hankered for peace at any price, so that they might bring back the monarchy, even under the Prussian guns. After the first sittings of the Assembly at Bordeaux, Thiers, elected in six-and-twenty departments, chosen chief of the executive by acclamation, became in his eyes a monster, the man of every lie and every crime. And nothing could now calm him—the peace which was concluded by the monarchical Assembly seemed to him a climax of shame; he became delirious at the mere thought of those harsh conditions, the indemnity of five milliards of francs, Metz given up, Alsace abandoned, the gold and the blood of France pouring forth from that wound opened in her flank, and never to be healed!

Then, during the last days of February, Maurice made up his mind to desert. One clause of the treaty specified that the soldiers encamped in Paris should be disarmed and sent home. He did not wait for this, however; it seemed to him that it would rend his heart asunder if he were compelled to quit that glorious Paris, which hunger alone had been able to subdue. So he took himself off, and rented, in a six-storeyed house in the Rue des Orties, atop of the Butte des Moulins,[52] a little furnished room, akin to a belvedere, whence he could gaze over the sea of roofs and chimneys, from the Tuileries to the Bastille. An old fellow-student of the Law School had lent him a hundred francs. Moreover, as soon as he had secured a lodging, he entered himself in one of the battalions of the National Guard, resolved to content himself with the pay of a franc and a half per day allowed to the citizen soldiery. The idea of leading a quiet, egotistical life in the provinces horrified him. Even the letters which he received from his sister Henriette, to whom he had written directly the armistice was concluded, angered him with their pressing entreaties, the ardent desire they expressed that he would come and rest at Remilly. He refused to do so—he would only go there later on, when no Prussians were left there.

And Maurice now led a vagabond, lazy life, in a state of increasing feverishness. He no longer suffered from hunger; he had devoured the first white bread he could procure with delight. Paris, where there had never been any dearth either of wine or brandy, was now living in plenty, sinking, too, into incorrigible dipsomania. Still, it was always a prison, with its gates guarded by the Germans, and so many complicated formalities in force that people were unable to leave. There had as yet been no resumption of social life; there was still no work, no business transactions were engaged in, and cooped within the ramparts there was a whole people waiting in suspense and doing nothing, losing its last habits of regular, orderly life, whilst it vegetated in the bright sunshine of that budding springtime. During the siege there had at least been the military service to tire men's limbs and occupy their minds, whereas now the population, in the isolation in which it still found itself, had all at once slipped into a life of absolute idleness. Maurice, like most others, lounged about from morn to eve, breathing the vitiated atmosphere, now thoroughly impregnated with all the germs of madness which for months past had been ascending from the mob. The unlimited liberty which prevailed completed the universal destruction. Maurice read the papers, attended the public meetings, shrugged his shoulders at the more preposterous speeches, but, nevertheless, returned home with his brain full of violent ideas, ready to engage in any desperate deed for the defence of what he believed to be truth and justice. And in his little room, whence he overlooked the city, he still indulged in dreams of victory, telling himself that France, the Republic, might yet be saved, so long as the treaty of peace was not finally signed.

The Prussians were to enter Paris on March 1, and when this became known a long howl of execration and wrath went up from every heart. Maurice never attended a public meeting now without hearing the Assembly, Thiers, and the Men of the Fourth of September charged with the responsibility of this crowning affront, from which, it was asserted, they had not tried to spare the heroic city.[53] He himself became so frenzied one evening that he made a speech and shouted that all Paris ought to go and die upon the ramparts, rather than allow a single Prussian to enter the capital. Amid this population, maddened by long months of misery and hunger, reduced to absolute idleness, unable to shake off its painful thoughts, consumed by suspicion, and fearful of phantoms of its own creation, the insurrectionary movement grew and spread, made all its preparations in the full light of day. It was one of those moral crises which have followed upon all great sieges, when excessive patriotism, deceived in its hopes and expectations, after vainly inflaming men's minds, becomes changed into a blind longing for violence and destruction. The Central Committee, elected by the delegates of the National Guard, had just protested against any attempt at disarming the citizen soldiery. A great demonstration had followed on the Place de la Bastille, with red flags, incendiary speeches, an immense concourse of people, and, as a climax, the murder of a wretched detective, who was flung into the canal and stoned until he drowned. And forty-eight hours later, on the night of February 26, Maurice, aroused by the beating of the 'assembly' and the ringing of the tocsin, met bands of men and women dragging cannon along the Boulevard des Batignolles. And he too, with a score of other men, harnessed himself to one of the guns, on hearing that the people had been to fetch this artillery from the Place Wagram, so that the Assembly might not hand it over to the Prussians. There were altogether a hundred and seventy pieces, and for lack of horses the people dragged them along with ropes, pushed them with their fists till they brought them to the summit of Montmartre, with the fierce impetuosity of some barbarian horde saving its idols from destruction. When on March 1 the Prussians had to content themselves with occupying the district of the Champs-Elysées, penned up there within barriers like a herd of anxious conquerors, Paris put on a lugubrious aspect and did not stir; its streets were deserted, its houses closed—the whole city remained lifeless, shrouded, as it were, in a huge veil of mourning.