VIII

When Marcas had finished the story of his life, intermingled with

reflections, maxims, and observations, revealing him as a great

politician, a few questions and answers on both sides as to the

progress of affairs in France and in Europe were enough to prove to us

that he was a real statesman; for a man may be quickly and easily

judged when he can be brought on to the ground of immediate

difficulties: there is a certain Shibboleth for men of superior

talents, and we were of the tribe of modern Levites without belonging

as yet to the Temple. As I have said, our frivolity covered certain

purposes which Juste has carried out, and which I am about to execute.

When we had done talking, we all three went out, cold as it was, to

walk in the Luxembourg gardens till the dinner hour. In the course of

that walk our conversation, grave throughout, turned on the painful

aspects of the political situation. Each of us contributed his

remarks, his comment, or his jest, a pleasantry or a proverb. This was

no longer exclusively a discussion of life on the colossal scale just

described by Marcas, the soldier of political warfare. Nor was it the

distressful monologue of the wrecked navigator, stranded in a garret

in the Hotel Corneille; it was a dialogue in which two well-informed

young men, having gauged the times they lived in, were endeavoring,

under the guidance of a man of talent, to gain some light on their own

future prospects.

"Why," asked Juste, "did you not wait patiently for an opportunity,

and imitate the only man who has been able to keep the lead since the

Revolution of July by holding his head above water?"

"Have I not said that we never know where the roots of chance lie?

Carrell was in identically the same position as the orator you speak

of. That gloomy young man, of a bitter spirit, had a whole government

in his head; the man of whom you speak had no idea beyond mounting on

the crupper of every event. Of the two, Carrel was the better man.

Well, one becomes a minister, Carrel remained a journalist; the

incomplete but craftier man is living; Carrel is dead.

"I may point out that your man has for fifteen years been making his

way, and is but making it still. He may yet be caught and crushed

between two cars full of intrigues on the highroad to power. He has no

house; he has not the favor of the palace like Metternich; nor, like

Villele, the protection of a compact majority.

"I do not believe that the present state of things will last ten

years longer. Hence, supposing I should have such poor good luck,

I am already too late to avoid being swept away by the commotion

I foresee. I should need to be established in a superior

position."

"What commotion?" asked Juste.

"AUGUST, 1830," said Marcas in solemn tones, holding out his hand

towards Paris; "AUGUST, the offspring of Youth which bound the

sheaves, and of Intellect which had ripened the harvest, forgot to

provide for Youth and Intellect.

"Youth will explode like the boiler of a steam-engine. Youth has no

outlet in France; it is gathering an avalanche of underrated

capabilities, of legitimate and restless ambitions; young men are not

marrying now; families cannot tell what to do with their children.

What will the thunderclap be that will shake down these masses? I know

not, but they will crash down into the midst of things, and overthrow

everything. These are laws of hydrostatics which act on the human

race; the Roman Empire had failed to understand them, and the Barbaric

hordes came down.

"The Barbaric hordes now are the intelligent class. The laws of

overpressure are at this moment acting slowly and silently in our

midst. The Government is the great criminal; it does not appreciate

the two powers to which it owes everything; it has allowed its hands

to be tied by the absurdities of the Contract; it is bound, ready to

be the victim.

"Louis XIV., Napoleon, England, all were or are eager for intelligent

youth. In France the young are condemned by the new legislation, by

the blundering principles of elective rights, by the unsoundness of

the ministerial constitution.

"Look at the elective Chamber; you will find no deputies of thirty;

the youth of Richelieu and of Mazarin, of Turenne and of Colbert, of

Pitt and of Saint-Just, of Napoleon and of Prince Metternich, would

find no admission there; Burke, Sheridan, or Fox could not win seats.

Even if political majority had been fixed at one-and-twenty, and

eligibility had been relieved of every disabling qualification, the

Departments would have returned the very same members, men devoid of

political talent, unable to speak without murdering French grammar,

and among whom, in ten years, scarcely one statesman has been found.

"The causes of an impending event may be seen, but the event itself

cannot be foretold. At this moment the youth of France is being driven

into Republicanism, because it believes that the Republic would bring

it emancipation. It will always remember the young representatives of

the people and the young army leaders! The imprudence of the

Government is only comparable to its avarice."

That day left its echoes in our lives. Marcas confirmed us in our

resolution to leave France, where young men of talent and energy are

crushed under the weight of successful commonplace, envious, and

insatiable middle age.