第17章 THE FETES OF JULY(4)
The fete, then, is over; the pompous black pyramid at the Louvre is only a skeleton now; all the flags have been miraculously whisked away during the night, and the fine chandeliers which glittered down the Champs Elysees for full half a mile, have been consigned to their dens and darkness.Will they ever be reproduced for other celebrations of the glorious 29th of July?--I think not; the Government which vowed that there should be no more persecutions of the press, was, on that very 29th, seizing a Legitimist paper, for some real or fancied offence against it: it had seized, and was seizing daily, numbers of persons merely suspected of being disaffected (and you may fancy how liberty is understood, when some of these prisoners, the other day, on coming to trial, were found guilty and sentenced to ONE day's imprisonment, after THIRTY-SIXDAYS' DETENTION ON SUSPICION).I think the Government which follows such a system, cannot be very anxious about any farther revolutionary fetes, and that the Chamber may reasonably refuse to vote more money for them.Why should men be so mighty proud of having, on a certain day, cut a certain number of their fellow-countrymen's throats? The Guards and the Line employed this time nine years did no more than those who cannonaded the starving Lyonnese, or bayoneted the luckless inhabitants of the Rue Transnounain:--they did but fulfil the soldier's honorable duty:--his superiors bid him kill and he killeth:--perhaps, had he gone to his work with a little more heart, the result would have been different, and then--would the conquering party have been justified in annually rejoicing over the conquered? Would we have thought Charles X.justified in causing fireworks to be blazed, and concerts to be sung, and speeches to be spouted, in commemoration of his victory over his slaughtered countrymen?--I wish for my part they would allow the people to go about their business as on the other 362 days of the year, and leave the Champs Elysees free for the omnibuses to run, and the Tuileries' in quiet, so that the nurse-maids might come as usual, and the newspapers be read for a halfpenny apiece.
Shall I trouble you with an account of the speculations of these latter, and the state of the parties which they represent? The complication is not a little curious, and may form, perhaps, a subject of graver disquisition.The July fetes occupy, as you may imagine, a considerable part of their columns just now, and it is amusing to follow them one by one; to read Tweedledum's praise, and Tweedledee's indignation--to read, in the Debats how the King was received with shouts and loyal vivats--in the Nation, how not a tongue was wagged in his praise, but, on the instant of his departure, how the people called for the "Marseillaise" and applauded THAT.--But best say no more about the fete.The Legitimists were always indignant at it.The high Philippist party sneers at and despises it; the Republicans hate it: it seems a joke against THEM.Why continue it?--If there be anything sacred in the name and idea of loyalty, why renew this fete? It only shows how a rightful monarch was hurled from his throne, and a dexterous usurper stole his precious diadem.If there be anything noble in the memory of a day, when citizens, unused to war, rose against practised veterans, and, armed with the strength of their cause, overthrew them, why speak of it now? or renew the bitter recollections of the bootless struggle and victory? O Lafayette!
O hero of two worlds! O accomplished Cromwell Grandison! you have to answer for more than any mortal man who has played a part in history: two republics and one monarchy does the world owe to you;and especially grateful should your country be to you.Did you not, in '90, make clear the path for honest Robespierre, and in '30, prepare the way for--......
[The Editor of the Bungay Beacon would insert no more of this letter, which is, therefore, for ever lost to the public.]