Sometimes, however, you are bold enough to act; but it almost creates a scandal: as when the ex-Rue de l’Impératrice, now the Rue Jeanne-Darc, and the Square Solferino were opened in Rouen. Still: “Public parks are the style now, and Rouen must have one!”[I]
[I] M. Decorde’s poetry. (Letter of condolence to Saint-Ouen Park, already cited.)
But the most important, though the most neglected, of all your projects is the distribution of water throughout the city. Take Saint-Sever, for example, where there is great need of it. What we proposed was, to erect, at any street corner, a small fountain adorned with a statue. Several of you had formally promised that our fountain should be erected; we were therefore greatly surprised at your decision, inasmuch as you are sometimes generous in these matters. The statue to Napoleon I. on the Place Saint-Ouen is an instance. You gave, for the erection of this masterpiece, which had cost 160,000 francs or thereabouts, the small sum of 30,000 francs! The council had appropriated the first time 10,000 francs; the second time, 8,000; and the third time, 5,000, as indemnity to the sculptor, because his maquette had casually been overthrown by the committee—always the committee! What aptitude for art! For the statue of Pierre Corneille, proposed in 1805 and erected twenty-nine years later, 1834, you spent 7,037.38 francs—not a cent more. True, he was a great poet, and you are so considerate that you prefer to deprive yourselves of a necessity, rather than honour a second-rate poet!
Permit me to ask two questions: If this fountain, this useful public monument which we offered, had represented anything but Louis Bouilhet’s bust, would you have refused it? If it had been intended for one of the capitalists of our district, whose fortune runs into the millions, would you have refused it? I doubt it.
Be careful, or you will be accused of despising those who cannot boast of a fortune! For such cautious men, who consider success the main object, you have sadly erred, gentlemen! The Moniteur Universel, l’Ordre, the Paris-Journal, the Bien Public, the XIXème Siècle, l’Opinion Nationale, the Constitutionnel, the Gaulois, the Figaro, in fact, nearly all the papers, were against you. To convince you, we will simply quote a few lines from the dean of modern critics, Jules Janin:
“When the time came for definitive compensation, the last hope of Louis Bouilhet’s friends was dashed to the ground; they encountered all sorts of obstacles. His statue was refused a place in a city that his fame had made illustrious! His friends proposed in vain to erect a much needed fountain, so that the statue ornamenting it might not be thought the main object of this good deed. But how can unjust men understand the cruelty of such a refusal? They might erect a statue to war, but to a poet, never!”
Of the twenty-four composing the committee, eleven sided with us; and Messrs. Vaucquier du Traversin, F. Deschamps and Raoul Duval spoke eloquently in our favour. This affair is trifling in itself, but it may be noted as a characteristic feature of the century—of your class.
“I address myself to you no longer, gentlemen, but to all the bourgeoisie. Therefore I say: Conservators who conserve nothing, it is time to follow a different path. You speak of decentralizing, regenerating,—if so, rouse yourselves. Be active! Originate! French nobles lost their prestige for having had, during two centuries, the feelings of menials. The end of the bourgeois is at hand, because their feelings are those of the rabble. I do not see that they read different papers, or hear different music, or that their pleasures are more refined. In one as in the other, it is the same love of money; the same wish to destroy idols; the same hatred of superior minds; the same meanness; the same crass ignorance.”
Of the seven hundred members of l’Assemblée Nationale, how many are there who could name six kings of France, who know the first rudiments of political economy, who have even read Bastiat? The whole municipality of Rouen, who disowned a poet’s talent, no doubt are ignorant of the rules of versification. They do not need to know them, so long as they do not meddle with poetry.