Madame Adam (Juliette Lambert), la grande Française

by Winifred Stephens Whale

And Gambetta goes on to express his profound admiration of Holland, which he has just visited, and of the marvellous energy of the Dutch.

When the crisis of 1875 was past, when the elections of 1876 had resulted in a Republican majority in the Chamber, although MacMahon still remained President, Gambetta became more hopeful. At length the Republic had been placed upon a definite footing. The four years’ provisional government was now over. The constitution had been established. On the eve of the election, towards the end of the debates on the constitution, Gambetta had written to Mme. Adam:[296] “At last we are nearing the end of our difficulties. And despite the malcontents and the mere office-seekers, we (i.e. the republican party) shall appear before the country in great force, offering it the two things we had promised—the dissolution of the Assembly[297] and the Republic. Thus we shall place the country in a position to send us a new political generation worthy to complete the work and capable of successfully accomplishing the regeneration of la patrie.”

Throughout the debates on the constitution, as we have seen, Mme. Adam’s salon continued to serve as a lobby to the chamber. Every new stage in the progress of that republican constitution she had so long desired, filled her with rejoicing. “On the 24th of February,” she writes,[298] “was passed the law establishing the Senate. Imagine our joy. Imagine the meetings in our salon.... Of course, as yet our Republic is but in its infancy; but it will grow. And we are certain that in a few days’ time the law defining the various parties of the constitution will be passed. All our gratitude as old republicans is due to Gambetta, who has conducted the negotiations with marvellous tact and diplomacy.”

Encouraged by the success of his labours, Gambetta began to take a more hopeful view of the European situation. The crisis of 1875 having been tided over, the French army having attained to a high degree of excellent organisation, something approaching universal service for five years having been instituted, he began to see his country in a position to hold her own against Germany. Alas! how very far this was from being the case was born in upon Gambetta when, in 1877, he visited that country. On his return Gambetta sent Mme. Adam an account of his journey. “This idea (the idea of the German visit), chère amie,” he wrote,[299] “originated with you in a friendly conversation.... We said to one another: ‘How useful it would be ... to go to Germany, and to take the opportunity afforded by the manœuvres of studying on the spot, and with one’s own eyes, the results of that vast military organisation of which we have been the victims, and of which we remain the objective.’

“My only difficulty was how to carry out such an idea, how to observe closely, how to penetrate everywhere without exciting attention and suspicion, without being recognised.”

The simplest plan Gambetta found was to shave off his beard, thus rendering himself—as he puts it—uglier than ever, and quite unrecognisable even by his most intimate friends.

The result of that tour was to fill Gambetta with admiration of the work accomplished by M. de Bismarck. But he was quick to see also that Germany’s prosperity depended on the Prussian sword. Once that was allowed to rust, then the whole mechanism of the German State would fall out of gear. “The men of this nation,” he writes, “were well advised to concentrate their attention on the army. Their efforts have met with the most complete success. Unhappily,” he continues, “we possess no force which is worthy to be compared with the troops I have just seen.”

There is little doubt of the profound effect produced upon Gambetta by this and other visits to Germany. They convinced him that France was far from ready for la Revanche, at any rate for a revanche by force of arms. He did not, however, abandon altogether the hope of regaining the lost provinces by some diplomatic arrangement with Bismarck. He could not believe that Germany would long be able to endure the enormous burden of such vast military expenditure. To a deputation of Alsatians who visited him he held out this hope, adding,[300] “that the time would come when Germany would be willing to enter into some friendly agreement with France, and that for such an agreement there could only be one basis.”

Meanwhile, until that happy day should dawn, Gambetta advocated the strengthening of the French army. And henceforth, with renewed vigour, he never ceased to urge on the Government the necessity of perfecting every means of defence. No doubt it was partly due to this impulsion given by Gambetta that seven years after his death the German military attaché in Paris was compelled to admit to Prince von Hohenlohe that the French army was superior to the German.[301]

But while France was improving and strengthening her defences, Gambetta was inclined to seek elsewhere compensation for the lost provinces. He advocated colonial expansion. He also advocated powerful alliances, notably with England; and with this object he more than once met the Prince of Wales (afterwards Edward VII) in Paris.