Three dissolving elements have greatly hastened the degenerate condition of Paris workmen, and, in general, of the lower classes in this capital. They are the wine-shop, the club, and the journal.
The enormous rate at which wine was taxed under the Empire forced the heads of small families to give up keeping a provision of ordinaire in their cellars; and, as wine could not be kept at home, it had to be fetched from the nearest wine-shop. There was also an additional reason why the usual barrel could not be kept. Houses no longer afford the luxury of a cellar to each flat, and those who could have afforded to pay the duties had no room for a cask of wine from the provinces. But there was the wine-shop; and alcoholic mixtures, colored with dyeing tinctures or logwood, were resorted to instead of the wholesome draught of thin but unadulterated wine which every Frenchman, a few years ago, was so accustomed to. When once the habit is acquired of turning in at a wine-shop, many are the baneful results which ensue; first drunkenness, then extravagance, bad associates, low talk and discussions round the counter, broils—all of which soon get the better of an originally upright conscience unsupported by firm principle.
The evil effects of drink were never known to breed in France such a cankerous wound as that which has spread among us since the siege and the Commune. Prior to these melancholy events, alcoholic patients were only now and then brought to our hospitals, but they have increased out of all proportion within the last few years. There can be no mistaking such cases with the following symptoms: delirium, inflammation of the lungs, extraordinary irritability, then languor and that sudden debility which is the forerunner of death. No sooner did a Communist suffer amputation than he expired; for it is almost impossible to operate on men who are in a continual state of intoxication.
Paris clubs were first heard of towards the end of the Empire. M. Emile Ollivier thought a good deal of these gatherings; but they have, in reality, proved to be a most disastrous institution. The only good they accomplished was to propagate a correct idea of the intellectual and moral degeneracy of our people. The lower classes met for no other purpose than that of uniting all their ignorance and hates. What errors, what curses, fell from those short-lived tribunes! What frantic applause welcomed false theories! No European nation could have resisted this trial, much less than any other the French, who are so credulous, so fickle, so sensitive to all outward impressions. The seeds which bore such noxious fruit under the Commune were first sown within Paris clubs.
As to the public press, it would be loss of time and space to demonstrate how that has contributed to general demoralization. The Siècle, the Opinion Nationale, etc., are read at all wine-shops. The smallest fault or misdemeanor committed by any one connected with the clergy is exposed by these journals to general scandal, aggravated by spiteful comment, exaggerated, then thrown as a rare morsel to open-mouthed multitudes. Such manœuvres are very hurtful with an unenlightened populace, who never discriminate between religion and those who profess it. To them the priest and the faith are synonymous. If the former is immoral, the latter can be good for nothing. A certain amount of logic is wanting by which the contrary could be demonstrated; but the larger proportion are incapacitated for so intellectual an effort. It would lead too far were I to analyze more closely the workings of the three causes which have destroyed our religious and moral convictions. Suffice it that the wine-shop, the club, and the journal have exercised a pernicious influence, and that our working-classes have not the means in their power wherewith to avert it so long as their education is considered complete at the age of twelve. From the day a mechanic commences an apprenticeship, he never hears the name of God, unless it is coupled with some curse on the lips of his elders. The church, Jesus Christ, the sacraments, soon become objects of derision.
In short, the end of such an educational system and of such a life is that the poor man who is carried to a Paris hospital, there to die, knows that he will no sooner have breathed his last than his body will belong to medical students; and as to his soul, that better part which, had it been cultured, would have been a glorious harvest for eternity, he cannot comprehend any discourse concerning it; if compelled to listen because he cannot help himself, he falls back on his pillow in morose indifference.
When a nation, once so devout, has come to this, some anxiety is felt for its future; and the words addressed to Ezechiel the prophet rise to our lips: "Lord, can a new life ever animate these scattered bones?"
THE POOR MAN'S BURIAL.
The deeper we dive into the subject of Paris hospitals, the more are we impressed by the melancholy spectacle of extreme misery presented. It is as if we stepped into Dante's circles, and saw nothing before us but horror; only here we look stern facts in the face, and have nothing to do with grand poetic conceptions. It is life, it is reality, it is anguish in a most poignant form; for I have now to speak of the mortal remains of Christians, of brothers, of men like ourselves. When a death occurs in the Paris hospitals, the corpse of the departed remains for one or two hours in the ward, after which space of time it is enveloped in a sheet and carried out on a litter by two infirmiers.
None who have ever seen this abandoned cortége will forget it. The corpse is instantly conveyed to an amphitheatre, where it is left, after being stripped of every thread of linen which covered it. Here it lies for forty-eight hours or more, according to the arrangements made by relatives, or to orders received from the authorities. When no objections are made by relatives, indoor and outdoor students proceed to the autopsy of the body.