The three great organs that have acquired front-rank importance are certainly the Matin, the Journal, its rival in everything, even in impudence, and the Petit Parisien. You will find many people in Paris who do not know the Temps, except that they have seen it in the newspaper kiosks, you will find a great many more who do not know even that much about the Débats, but you will never come across any man or woman, to begin with your concierge, and to end with the foremost politician in the Chamber, who does not know the Matin and its chief editor and proprietor, M. Alfred Edwards, of Lanthelme fame. In the opinion of many the Matin is not a credit to French journalism.
More popular even than the Matin are the Journal and the Petit Parisien, whose proprietor, M. Jean Dupuy, has already been several times entrusted with a ministerial portfolio, and is a member of the Senate, where his opinion is always listened to with attention. The Petit Parisien has many editions, and is extensively read in the provinces. It instils into millions of people the Radical opinions which it professes.
One of the reasons why everybody who can wield a pen in France turns to journalism nowadays lies in this knowledge that it leads to anything one likes—and principally to politics, after which every Frenchman craves. In olden times every young man wanted to become a member of the Bar, persuaded that the Bar alone could lead him to the Chamber and thence to become a member of the government. At present journalists have it all their own way. I won’t pretend to say that the change is by any means to advantage.
The general tone of the press lacks sadly of sympathy. Journalists like M. Hébrard become rarer and rarer every day. The press is no longer a tribune, it is something like the servants’ hall of political life, and though its successes are greater than they have ever been they are not lasting, and they are forgotten the very next hour after they have reached their culminating height.
Politics, thanks to this degeneration, have become a hurried, feverish occupation, are more talked about than discussed, more felt than acted upon. Ministries, too, change far too often for France to work out her regeneration with anything like stability, and at present she is obliged to lean upon Russia, because only in so doing can she have any hope of remaining a Great Power.
There are, however, a few great journalists left on the banks of the Seine, and I am sure that no one will contradict me when I say that one of the first places among the few is occupied by that remarkable man, Arthur Meyer, the son of a Jewish tailor and the grandson of a rabbi, who by a strange freak of destiny has become the most fervent supporter of both Monarchy and Catholicism. He was associated with Boulanger and also with that most ardent of anti-Semites, Edouard Drumont, and, after having become the friend, adviser, and counsellor of the Comte de Paris, who had replaced Napoleon III. in his affections, succeeded in being admitted into the intimacy of the Duchesse d’Uzès and the noblest great ladies of the noble Faubourg, where at last he found himself a wife in the person of the charming but dowerless daughter of the Comte and Comtesse de Turenne.
Such a career is one of the most curious products of our times, and stranger still than its success is the fact that no one, save a few bad tempered people whose opinions do not count and to whom no one listens, has ever expressed the least astonishment at its development. Paris has accepted M. Arthur Meyer just as it accepted the Republic and the institution of the Concours Hippique; and Parisian society has acquired the habit of turning to him not only for news but also for the manner in which it ought to be received. He has become an oracle among certain circles, and his whiskers, his ties, and the shape and cut of his clothes are copied not only by fashionable men but also by fashionable tailors. The morning coat of M. Meyer has replaced the frock coat of the Prince de Sagan, and the dinner-jacket of King Edward VII.
I quoted at the beginning the remark that every country has the press which it deserves. I can complete it by saying that every society has the leader that it merits. And Parisian fashionable circles can boast of having kept M. Arthur Meyer, though circumstances compelled it to lose Count Boni de Castellane.
I have mentioned the marriage of this favourite of the gods. People wondered at it excessively, but it would be extremely unfair to M. Meyer not to maintain that he decided to ask for the hand of Mademoiselle de Turenne under circumstances that were entirely to his honour. The young girl belonged to a family just as illustrious as it was poor, and though she had very rich relations, none of them attempted to do anything in her favour nor even to try to marry her in her own sphere. Arthur Meyer was a frequent visitor at the house of her parents, and had many opportunities of watching the revolts of a youthful mind disgusted at what it perceived of the injustices of the world. One day she told him that she did not know what she could do to escape the misery of her existence, adding that she knew that only two roads were open to her, either a convent or the free life of a woman who had put aside all prejudices and the principles in which she had been reared. “And,” she added, “I don’t want to become a nun, I have not got the courage to leave the society to which I belong, and I would never commit suicide. I have often wondered what I could do.”
Meyer was above all chivalrous, and the despair of that young and lovely woman touched him deeply. He did not love her, and he knew very well that she could feel no love for him, but he asked her to become his wife, and, after some hesitation, she accepted his offer. Of course society rose up in arms when it heard about it, but nevertheless neither her uncle, Count Louis de Turenne, nor her aunt, the Marquise de Nicolai, whose wealth could be counted by millions, ever tried by making her a small dowry to give her the chance of marrying within her own sphere.