But Adam shrugged his shoulders and replied: “Alas! I only wish it were so. But it is very far from being the case now, or likely to be in the future.”
Indeed, Thiers, throughout the difficult months which were to follow, was to regard as a serious obstacle in his path Gambetta’s eloquent advocacy of la Revanche, which so delighted Mme. Adam. For at that time Thiers was engaged in those delicate negotiations with Bismarck which culminated in March 1873, in the paying off of the five milliards war indemnity, and in the consequent liberation of France from the Prussian occupation almost two years before the time stipulated by the Treaty of Frankfort.
This magnificent consummation, far surpassing the wildest hopes of the most sanguine, Thiers beheld constantly endangered by Gambetta’s revanchard fervour. The President trembled when he heard that to a deputation from Alsace Gambetta had declared that if ever France descended to such a depth of impiety as to put away from her the image of bleeding, mutilated Alsace, then and then alone might Alsatians give way to despair.[266] “This is not the moment for such a declaration,” exclaimed Thiers. “Let him wait. Let him wait.” The President was constantly entreating Adam to implore his friend to be moderate. His ideas, his speeches in the provinces, were impressing the Germans in a manner most unfavourable to the negotiations which were proceeding.[267] Never did the Great Tribune appear to Thiers more of a fou furieux than during the autumn and winter of 1872 and ’73, when the commis voyageux de la politique (the political commercial traveller), as he liked to call himself, was going up and down France delivering that famous series of speeches, intended to rouse the provinces to a great burst of republican ardour, which should dissolve the reactionary National Assembly, get rid of the temporising Thiers, and bring in Gambetta and his friends.
Mme. Adam, despite her respect for Thiers, deeply sympathised with Gambetta’s aims as he declared them in those celebrated orations. Merely to read Gambetta’s speeches was to lose their finest flavour. Unlike the speeches of our own Edmund Burke and John Bright, they will never be classics. His eloquence, for its full appreciation, so I have heard Mme. Adam say, required the magic of his presence, the thrill of his sonorous voice, the dramatic emphasis of his gestures, and the inspiration of his whole presence.
On returning from Venice to Bruyères in the autumn of 1872, she and Adam read the first reports of these speeches in the newspapers. Vigilance and patience were the two qualities Gambetta most fervently enjoined on his compatriots. And vigilance for him involved two all-important reforms: the reorganisation of the army on the lines of universal military service, and compulsory education. Chaque citoyen soldat et instruit was his device.[268] Indeed, it is largely to the Great Tribune that we owe that systematic teaching of patriotism in French schools which in the present war is bearing such rich fruit. “Every child in our elementary schools,” said Gambetta, “must be taught that a cause exists to which it must give everything, sacrifice everything, its life, its future, its family, and that this cause is France.”
These words Mme. Adam and her husband read over and over again. “Yes,” exclaims Juliette, “we must sacrifice ourselves for France; we must keep nothing back, and we must also serve him who utters these patriotic words,[269] and who has never despaired of his country.”
With Gambetta’s requirement that national education must be as secular as the state itself the Adams were also in agreement. While every religion should be assured of absolute liberty, Gambetta declared at Havre, “the state must not identify itself with any dogma or philosophy. If such questions are admitted to be within its competency, then it becomes at once arbitrary, persecuting, intolerant.”
With the importance Gambetta attached to the army the Adams were in perfect sympathy. All three they shared the President’s emotion when, at the close of the Longchamps review in the summer of 1871, le petit bourgeois, descending from his seat, grasped the hands of Marshal MacMahon as he marched past at the head of the army he had reformed, and in a voice choked by a sob murmured “Thank you.” “Gambetta,” wrote Juliette, “rejoices at the success of the review. He adores the army.”[270]
During their first talk with Gambetta after his return to political life the Adams had advised their friend to found a republican newspaper. “Il vous faut un grand journal,” said Adam.[271] “Would it not be possible,” asked Gambetta, “to revive L’Avenir National?” Founded in the middle sixties, largely financed by Adam, with his wife for one of its regular contributors, and her friend Peyrat as editor, the paper had at first been a brilliant success. Then it fell on evil days, and in order to keep it going at all, Adam had to subscribe large sums. Having been hard hit by this earlier journalistic adventure, Adam did not feel himself in a position to provide funds for a second. He suggested, however, that Gambetta might apply to other ardent republicans, to Dorian and to that fervent Alsatian, Scheurer-Kestner, for example. While for collaborators, he could not do better than appeal to Challemel-Lacour, Spuller, Ranc, Paul Bert, etc.
The outcome of this conversation was the foundation of La République Française. “Grandissime évènement,” writes Mme. Adam, “La République Française a paru.” Gambetta, assisted by Spuller, was its editor-in-chief, Challemel-Lacour its literary editor, Proust was to contribute articles on foreign politics. The new paper’s office was, of course, in the Rue Croissant.[272] Where else but in that most famous journalist street in Paris could an influential newspaper appear! And close at hand, only round the corner, in the Boulevard Poissonnière was the Adams’ flat. So, equally of course, when the editors’ work was done and they required some relaxation after their literary labours, they were always welcome to talk and dominoes in the hospitable Maison Sallandrouze. “The workshops of the République Française will be in the Rue Croissant, the Salon in the Maison Sallandrouze,” writes Mme. Adam.[273] The paper’s success justified all the hopes inspired by the eminence of its editors and contributors.