It was always said that, backed by the Radicals, and supported by the President, the Minister of the Interior, M. Constans, a most resolute and unscrupulous man, who was himself in the crowd outside the restaurant, was the main cause of this miserable fiasco. Strong precautions had been taken against any attempt at violence. Powerful forces whose loyalty to the Republic was beyond question had been substituted for brigades of known Boulangist tendencies. That M. Constans would not, under the conditions, have stuck at trifles was well known. He was kept at a distance from France for years afterwards, on account of his ugly character, in the capacity of French Ambassador at Constantinople, a city where at that time such a trifling peccadillo as murder was scarcely noticed. So Boulanger knew what to expect. Moreover, Clemenceau and the Radical Republicans, as well as Jaurès and Socialists of every shade of opinion, had become thoroughly alarmed by what they had heard and seen during the election, and would not have given way without a fight to the death. The jubilant group at Durand’s, intimidated by these assumed facts, and Boulanger with his lack of determination and easy self-indulgence, let the opportunity slip.
All sorts of excuses and explanations were made for the hesitation of the General to provoke civil war. But on that one night he should have made his position secure or have died in the attempt. Success was, so far as a foreigner on the spot could judge, quite possible. It might even have been achieved without any forcible action. There was no certainty that, when the move decided upon was actually made, either troops or the people would have sided against the hero of the day. But that hero failed to rise to the level of the occasion, and the result was fatal to the immediate prospects of himself and his followers. A warrant was issued for his arrest and he ran away from Paris. He now became an object of pity rather than of alarm. He was condemned in his absence, and not long afterwards his suicide on the grave of his mistress, in Brussels, ended his career. Thus the estimate which Clemenceau had formed of his permanent influence was justified. But it was a narrow escape. The three pretenders who had come to France to watch the final development soon found their way across the frontier. Nevertheless, General Boulanger, with all his weakness and hesitation, was for many months the most dangerous enemy the Republic ever faced. His downfall helped also to add to the number of Clemenceau’s bitter enemies, and was partly instrumental in bringing about the political disaster which befell him later. For the Radicals who had been deceived by Boulanger cherished animosity against the Radical leader for reasons which, though quite incompatible, were decisive for them.
[CHAPTER IX]
PANAMA AND DRAGUIGNAN
The great Panama Canal Affair was only one of many financial scandals which seriously damaged the good fame of the French Republic founded upon the fall of the Empire, and consecrated by the collapse of the Commune of Paris. But this Panama scandal was by far the most important and most nefarious, alike in respect to the amount of money involved, the position and character of the people mixed up in it, and the wide ramifications of wholesale corruption throughout the political world that were in the end revealed.
M. Ferdinand de Lesseps, the originator and organiser of the Suez Canal, was a man of quite exceptional ability, energy and force of character. He carried through his great project in the face of obstacles, political and financial, that would certainly have broken the heart and frustrated the purpose of a weaker personality. At no period did he show any disposition to keep the canal under harmful restrictions, and the Khedive Ismail Pasha, though a Turk of no scruples, who backed him throughout, also took a very wide view of the services which the canal would render to the world at large. It was to be neutral and open under the same conditions to the ships of all nations. Unfortunately, England, whose commerce has chiefly benefited by the canal, bitterly opposed its construction, going so far at one time as actually to prohibit the Khedive from carrying on the canal works in his own territory, thus occasioning considerable delay. As it happened, however, this delay itself was turned by de Lesseps to the advantage of the Canal Company, as he used the time to create new engines for excavation which in the end expedited the completion of the waterway.
The result of this ignorant British opposition was that the finance of the great enterprise was chiefly provided in France, and, when the canal was first opened in 1869, it was considered, as in fact it was, a triumph of French sagacity and foresight over the obstructionist jealousy of England. This view was accompanied also by natural jubilation at the consequent increase of French influence in Egypt itself. Count Ferdinand de Lesseps, therefore, became a great French hero who, by his capacity, persistence and diplomacy, had not only gained glory for France and extended her power, but had also furnished his countrymen with an excellent investment for their savings, on which British commerce was paying the interest. His popularity in France was well earned and unbounded. The work of de Lesseps was, in fact, regarded as the one great and indisputable success of the French Empire. Anything which he took in hand thereafter was certain to prove of great value to the country and an assured benefit to those who followed his financial lead. He was also a lucky man. He and his set had won against heavy odds.
It is true the cost of the Suez Canal had been more than double his original estimate, even up to the time when it was first opened, and many millions sterling had been expended since; it was likewise the fact that his great idea had taken fully ten years to realise in the shape of a completed enterprise. But this was the larger tribute to his foresight and power of overcoming obstacles due either to natural causes or to the malignity of enemies. Thus Ferdinand de Lesseps, ten years after the Suez Canal had been made available for shipping between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, held an unequalled position in the eyes of French engineers, French bankers and, what was more important, French investors.