IV. THE FIRST PARLIAMENTARY TEMPEST

"Messieurs," said Simon Giguet, "I ask permission to thank Monsieur Achille Pigoult, who, although our meeting is altogether friendly--"

"It is a meeting preparatory to the great primary meeting," said the solicitor Marcelin.

"That is what I was about to explain," resumed Simon, "I thank Monsieur Achille Pigoult for having insisted on the strictness of parliamentary forms. This is the first time that the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt of Arcis has been at liberty to use--"

"At liberty!" said Pigoult, interrupting the orator.

"At liberty!" cried the a.s.sembly.

"At liberty," continued Simon Giguet, "to use its rights in the great battle of a general election to the Chamber of Deputies; and as, in a few days, we shall have a meeting, at which all electors will be present, to judge of the merits of the candidates, we ought to feel ourselves most fortunate in becoming accustomed here, in this limited meeting, to the usages of great a.s.semblies. We shall be all the more able to decide the political future of the town of Arcis; for the question now is to subst.i.tute a town's interests for family interests, a whole region for a man."

Simon then reviewed the history of the Arcis elections for the last twenty years. While approving the constant election of Francois Keller, he said the moment had now come to shake off the yoke of the house of Gondreville. Arcis ought to be no more a fief of the liberals than a fief of the Cinq-Cygnes. Advanced opinions were arising in France of which the Kellers were not the exponents. Charles Keller, having become a viscount, belonged to the court; he could have no independence, because, in presenting him as candidate, his family thought much more of making him succeed to his father's peerage than of benefiting his const.i.tuency as deputy, etc., etc. And, finally, Simon presented himself to the choice of his fellow-citizens, pledging his word to sit on the same bench with the ill.u.s.trious Odilon Barrot, and never to desert the glorious flag of Progress.

_Progress_! one of those words behind which more flimsy ambitions than ideas were trying to group themselves; for, after 1830, it represented only the pretensions of a few hungry democrats. Nevertheless, this word had still a great effect upon Arcis, and gave stability to whosoever might inscribe it on his banner. To call himself a man of progress was to declare himself a philosopher in all things and a puritan in politics; it declared him in favor of railroads, mackintoshes, penitentiaries, wooden pavements, Negro freedom, savings-banks, seamless shoes, lighting by gas, asphalt pavements, universal suffrage, and reduction of the civil list. In short, it meant p.r.o.nouncing himself against the treaties of 1815, against the Eldest Branch, against the colossus of the North, perfidious Albion, against all enterprises, good or bad, of the government. Thus we see that the word _progress_ might signify "No," as well as "Yes." It was gilding put upon the word _liberalism_, a new pa.s.s-word for new ambitions.

"If I have rightly understood what this meeting is for," said Jean Violette, a stocking-maker, who had recently bought the Beauvisage house, "it is to pledge ourselves to support, by employing every means in our power, Monsieur Simon Giguet at the elections as deputy in place of Comte Francois Keller. If each of us intends to coalesce in this manner we have only to say plainly Yes or No on that point."

"That is going too quickly to the point! Political affairs do not advance in that way, or there would be no politics at all!" cried Pigoult, whose old grandfather, eighty-six years old, had just entered the room. "The last speaker undertakes to decide what seems to me, according to my feeble lights, the very object we are met to discuss. I demand permission to speak."

"Monsieur Achille Pigoult has the floor," said Beauvisage, at last able to p.r.o.nounce that phrase with all his munic.i.p.al and const.i.tutional dignity.

"Messieurs," said the notary, "if there is a house in Arcis in which no voice should be raised against the influence of the Comte de Gondreville, it is surely the one we are now in. The worthy Colonel Giguet is the only person in it who has not sought the benefits of the senatorial power; he, at least, has never asked anything of the Comte de Gondreville, who took his name off the list of exiles in 1815 and caused him to receive the pension which the colonel now enjoys without lifting a finger to obtain it."

A murmur, flattering to the old soldier, greeted this observation.

"But," continued the orator, "the Marions are covered with the count's benefits. Without that influence, the late Colonel Giguet would not have commanded the gendarmerie of the Aube. The late Monsieur Marion would not have been chief-justice of the Imperial court without the protection of the count, to whom I myself have every reason to be thankful. You will therefore think it natural that I should be his advocate within these walls. There are, indeed, few persons in this arrondiss.e.m.e.nt who have not received benefits from that family."

[Murmurs.]

"A candidate puts himself in the stocks," continued Achille Pigoult, warming up. "I have the right to scrutinize his life before I invest him with my powers. I do not desire ingrat.i.tude in the delegate I may help to send to the Chamber, for ingrat.i.tude is like misfortune--one ingrat.i.tude leads to others. We have been, he tells us, the stepping-stone of the Kellers; well, from what I have heard here, I am afraid we may become the stepping-stone of the Giguets. We live in a practical age, do we not? Well, then, let us examine into what will be the results to the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt of Arcis if Simon Giguet is elected.

They talk to you of independence! Simon, whom I thus maltreat as candidate, is my personal friend, as he is that of all who hear me, and I should myself be charmed to see him the orator of the Left, seated between Garnier-Pages and Lafitte; but how would that benefit the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt? The arrondiss.e.m.e.nt would lose the support of the Comte de Gondreville and the Kellers. We all, in the course of five years, have had and shall have need of the one and of the others. Some have gone to the Marechale de Carigliano to obtain the release of a young fellow who had drawn a bad number. Others have had recourse to the influence of the Kellers in many matters which are decided according to their recommendation. We have always found the old Comte de Gondreville ready to do us service. It is enough to belong to Arcis to obtain admission to him without being forced to kick our heels in his antechamber. Those two families know every one in Arcis. Where is the financial influence of the Giguets, and what power have they with the ministry? Have they any standing at the Bourse? When we want to replace our wretched wooden bridge with one of stone can they obtain from the department and the State the necessary funds? By electing Charles Keller we shall cement a bond of friendship which has never, to this day, failed to do us service. By electing my good, my excellent schoolmate, my worthy friend Simon Giguet, we shall realize nothing but losses until the far-distant time when he becomes a minister. I know his modesty well enough to be certain he will not contradict me when I say that I doubt his election to the post of deputy." [Laughter.] "I have come to this meeting to oppose a course which I regard as fatal to our arrondiss.e.m.e.nt. Charles Keller belongs to the court, they say to me.

Well, so much the better! we shall not have to pay the costs of his political apprenticeship; he knows the affairs of the country; he knows parliamentary necessities; he is much nearer being a statesman than my friend Simon, who will not pretend to have made himself a Pitt or a Talleyrand in a little town like Arcis--"

"Danton went from it!" cried Colonel Giguet, furious at Achille's speech and the justice of it.

"Bravo!"

This was an acclamation, and sixty persons clapped their hands.

"My father has a ready wit," whispered Simon Giguet to Beauvisage.

"I do not understand why, apropos of an election," continued the old colonel, rising suddenly, with the blood boiling in his face, "we should be hauled up for the ties which connect us with the Comte de Gondreville. My son's fortune comes from his mother; he has asked nothing of the Comte de Gondreville. The comte might never have existed and Simon would have been what he now is,--the son of a colonel of artillery who owes his rank to his services; a man whose opinions have never varied. I should say openly to the Comte de Gondreville if he were present: 'We have elected your son-in-law for twenty years; to-day we wish to prove that in so doing we acted of our own free-will, and we now elect a man of Arcis, in order to show that the old spirit of 1789, to which you owe your fortune, still lives in the land of Danton, Malin, Grevin, Pigoult, Marion--That is all!"

And the old man sat down. Whereupon a great hubbub arose. Achille opened his mouth to reply. Beauvisage, who would not have thought himself chairman unless he had rung his bell, increased the racket, and called for silence. It was then two o'clock.

"I shall take the liberty to observe to the honorable Colonel Giguet, whose feelings are easily understood, that he took upon himself to speak, which is against parliamentary usage," said Achille Pigoult.

"I think it is not necessary to call the colonel to order," said the chairman. "He is a father--"

Silence was re-established.

"We did not come here," cried Fromaget, "to say Amen to everything the Messieurs Giguet, father and son, may wish--"

"No! no!" cried the a.s.sembly.

"Things are going badly," said Madame Marion to her cook in the garden.

"Messieurs," resumed Achille, "I confine myself to asking my friend Simon Giguet, categorically, what he expects to do for our interests."

"Yes! yes!" cried the a.s.sembly.

"Since when," demanded Simon Giguet, "have good citizens like those of Arcis made trade and barter of the sacred mission of deputy?"

It is impossible to represent the effect produced by n.o.ble sentiments on a body of men. They will applaud fine maxims, while they none the less vote for the degradation of their country, like the galley-slave who shouted for the punishment of Robert Macaire when he saw the thing played, and then went off and killed his own Monsieur Germeuil.

"Bravo!" cried several true-blood Giguet electors.

"You will send me to the Chamber," went on Simon, "if you do send me, to represent principles, the principles of 1789; to be one of the ciphers, if you choose, of the Opposition, but a cipher that votes with it to enlighten the government, make war against abuses, and promote progress in all things--"

"What do you call progress?" asked Fromaget. "For us, progress means getting the waste lands of la Champagne under cultivation."

"Progress! I will explain to you what I mean by that," cried Giguet, exasperated by the interruption.

"It is the frontier of the Rhine for France," put in the colonel, "and the destruction of the treaties of 1815."

"It is selling wheat dear and keeping bread cheap," cried Achille Pigoult sarcastically, thinking that he made a joke, but actually expressing one of the delusions that reign in France.

"It is the happiness of all, obtained by the triumph of humanitarian doctrines," continued Simon.

"What did I tell you?" said Achille to his neighbors.

"Hush! silence! let us listen!" said various voices.

"Messieurs," said the stout Mollot, smiling, "the debate is beginning; give your attention to the orator; and let him explain himself."

"In all transitional epochs, Messieurs," continued Simon, gravely, "and we are now in such an epoch--"

"Ba-a-a! ba-a-a!" bleated a friend of Achille Pigoult, who possessed the faculty (precious at elections) of ventriloquism.

A roar of laughter came from the whole a.s.sembly, who were Champagnards before all else. Simon Giguet folded his arms and waited till the tumult subsided.

"If it was intended to give me a lesson," he resumed, "and to tell me that I belong to the flock of the glorious defenders of the rights of humanity, the flock of the immortal priest who pleads for dying Poland, the daring pamphleteers, the scrutinizers of the civil test, the philosophers who demand sincerity in the working of our inst.i.tutions, if that was the intention of my nameless interrupter, I thank him. To me, progress is the realization of all that was promised to us by the revolution of July; it is electoral reform, it is--"

"What! are you a democrat?" said Achille Pigoult.