The Amazing City

by John Frederick Macdonald

Thus, a new régime had dawned. Poincaré was “going to wake things up”; Poincaré was also “going to do things”; what precisely Poincaré was going to do nobody could explain; but “Vive Poincaré,” was the cry of the hour; and not only in luxurious, radiant Paris, but in grim, industrial centres, dull, provincial towns, and remote, obscure hamlets. Such a popularity that into the shop windows came Poincaré Pipes, Poincaré Braces, Poincaré Walking Sticks, the Poincaré Safety Razor. Then, on restaurant menus: Consommé Poincaré—Poulet Poincaré—Omelette Poincaré. More Poincaré, smiling and bowing, on dizzy kinematograph films and in the music hall revues; and imagine, if you can, the sale of Poincaré photographs in the flashy arcade of the rue de Rivoli! “Poincaré and Gaby Deslys—that’s what we are selling,” the shopkeepers stated. “But Poincaré is surpassing the blonde, elegant Gaby.”

In a word, nothing but Poincaré, only Poincaré, until the announcement that M. Lépine, Chief of the Paris Police, had tendered his resignation, that his decision to retire was “irrevocable.” Then M. Lépine leading in the photographic commerce of the rue de Rivoli: and M. Poincaré a poor second, and the blonde Mademoiselle Deslys a remote third. Elsewhere and everywhere, M. Lépine and his resignation superseded M. Poincaré and the New Régime, as the one and only topic of conversation. For twenty years the Chief of the Police had governed his own departments of Paris with extraordinary skill. Throughout that period he had practically lived in the streets: repressing riots, scattering criminals, dispersing Royalist conspirators, controlling fires, directing all manner of grim or poignant or delirious operations—a short, slender, insignificant-looking figure, in ill-fitting clothes, a dusty “bowler” hat, and square, creaking boots. With him, a shabby umbrella or a stout, common walking-stick, the latter the only weapon he ever carried. Never more than four or five hours’ sleep: even then the telephone placed at his bedside.

It was all work with M. Lépine—all energy, all courage. The most familiar figure in the streets, he soon became the most famous and most popular of State servants. Cried M. le Bourgeois, whilst out walking with his small son: “Voilà—regarde bien—voilà Lépine!”

Everyone “saluted” him, all political parties (except the United Socialists, who admire no one) applauded him. There was (with the same solitary exception) general rejoicing when the dusty, intrepid little Chief of the Police received the supreme distinction of the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour.

Yes; a popularity even vaster than M. Poincaré’s. Gossips remarked that it was curious that the Presidency of the one should synchronise with the resignation of the other. Critics agreed that if France had gained a strong Chief of the State she had lost an incomparable Chief of the Police. Alarm of M. le Bourgeois, who had got to regard M. Lépine as his special protector. Once again, and for the hundredth time, M. Lépine became the hero of the hour. And, as I have already recorded, there was a rush for Lépine photographs—Lépine side and full face, Lépine gay or severe, Lépine with Grand Cross or shabby umbrella, and a decided “slump” in Poincarés and blonde, bejewelled Gaby Deslys’ in the rue de Rivoli arcade.

Impossible, in the space at my disposal, to give more than an idea of M. Lépine’s amazing record. Born at Lyons in 1846, he is now sixty-seven years of age—a mere nothing for a Frenchman of genius. At thirty he was already Under-Prefect of the Department of the Indre. Successively he was Prefect of the Seine-et-Oise, General Secretary of the Préfecture de Police, Governor-General of Algeria, and Chief of the Police. From a biographical dictionary that devotes pages and pages to Louis Lépine, I take the following passages:—“Actif et ferme, il parvint à rétablir les relations rompues entre le Conseil Municipal de Paris et la Préfecture de Police, et opéra d’importantes réformes.... Nommé Gouverneur-Général de l’Algérie, il apporta en plan de grands travaux publics et de réformes.... Nommé Conseiller d’État, il prit de nouveau la direction de la Préfecture de Police. Il s’est occupé de refondre tous les règlements administratifs relatifs au service de la navigation et de la circulation dans Paris, et un vaste Répertoire de Police a paru sous sa direction.” Thus it will be seen that M. Lépine was always “reforming,” for ever reorganising, unfailingly “active” and “firm.” He it was who “reformed” the nervous, excitable Paris police in the delirious Dreyfus days of 1899. To their astonishment he preached calm.

“Mais oui, mais oui, mais oui, du calme, nom d’un nom,” he expostulated. “You charge the crowd for no reason. You thump the innocent bourgeois on the back and tear off his collar. You exasperate the Latin Quarter. You are making an inferno of the boulevards. You are bringing ridicule and discredit on the force. In future, I myself shall direct operations.”

Dreyfus riots every day and every night, and M. Lépine in the thick of them. Short and slender, he was swept about and almost submerged by the Anti-Dreyfus mob. He lost his hat, his umbrella, but never his temper. He was to be seen swarming up lamp-posts, that he might discover the extent of the crowd and whether reinforcements of agitators were coming up side streets, and from which particular windows stones, bottles and lighted fusées were being hurled. His orders he issued by prearranged gesticulations. Not only the police, but the Municipal and Republican Guards, had been taught to understand the significance of his signals. A wave of the arm, and it meant “charge.” But it was only in desperate extremities that M. Lépine sent the crowd flying, battered and wounded. Pressure was his policy; six or seven rows of policemen advancing slowly yet heavily upon the manifestants, truncheon in hand and the formidable horses and shining helmets of the Republican Guard in the rear. When, upon a particularly tumultuous occasion, the “pressure” was resisted, and a number of boulevard kiosks were blazing and heads, too, were on fire, M. Lépine implored assistance—from Above.

“Send me rain,” he begged audibly of the heavens, “send me torrents of rain.” And the heavens responded, so people affirmed. A few minutes later the heavens sent M. Lépine thunder, lightning and a deluge that reduced the blazing kiosks to hissing, sodden ruins; cleared the frantic boulevards; allowed police, soldiers and even M. Lépine to go to bed. But, on the other hand, caused Jules Guérin and his fellow outlaws and conspirators against the Republic to exult wildly and grotesquely on the roof of Fort Chabrol. For Guérin was short of water. The supply had been cut off and Guérin’s only salvation was surrender or rain. And it rained, and it poured and it thundered. The heavens were equally kind to Rebel, and Chief of the Police. Up there on the roof of conspiring Fort Chabrol assembled Guérin and his companions with baths, buckets and basins; with jugs, glasses and mugs; all of which speedily overflowed with the rain. Down there in the street, the soldiers in occupation of the besieged thoroughfare stared upwards, open-mouthed, at the amazing spectacle on the roof—Guérin and Company joining hands and dancing with glee amidst their multitudinous rain-catching vessels; Guérin bending perilously over the parapet and roaring forth between the explosions of thunder and the flashes of lightning: “We have got enough water for months. Tell Lépine we defy him.” Another jig from Guérin et Cie. Guérin once again at the edge of the parapet, mockingly drinking the health of the soldiers below, and then emptying baths full of water into the street and bellowing: “Voilà de l’eau,” and performing such delirious, dangerous antics that it was deemed necessary to telephone an account of the scene to the Chief of the Police. “Let him dance his jigs all night in the rain; it will cool him,” replied M. Lépine. “Je le connais: he is too clever to fall over the parapet.”