CHAPTER X

Republican banquet at the _Vendanges de Bourgogne_--The toasts--_To Louis-Philippe!_--Gathering of those who were decorated in July--Formation of the board--Protests--Fifty yards of ribbon--A dissentient--Contradiction in the _Moniteur_---Trial of Évariste Gallois--His examination--His acquittal

Let us skip over the reception of M. Viennet into the Académie Française, which fact M. Viennet doubtless learnt from his porter, as he learned later, from the same porter, that he was made a peer of France, and let us return to our friends, acquitted amidst storms of applause and enthusiastically escorted to their homes on the night of 16 April. It was decided that we should give them a banquet by subscription. This was fixed for 9 May and took place at the _Vendanges de Bourgogne._ There were two hundred subscribers. It would have been difficult to find throughout the whole of Paris two hundred guests more hostile to the Government than were these who gathered together at five o'clock in the afternoon, in a long dining-room on the ground-floor looking out on the garden. I was placed between Raspail, who had just declined the cross, and an actor from the Théâtre-Français, who had come with me far less from political conviction than from curiosity. Marrast was the depositary of the official toasts which were to be offered, and it had been decided that none should be drunk but such as had been approved by the president.

Things went smoothly enough throughout two-thirds of the dinner; but, at the popping of the bottles of champagne, which began to simulate a well-sustained discharge of musketry, spirits rose; the conversation, naturally of a purely political character, resolved itself into a most dangerous dialogue, and, in the midst of official toasts, there gradually slipped private toasts.

The first illicit toast was offered to Raspail, because he had declined the Cross of the Légion d'Honneur. Fontan, who had just obtained it, took the matter personally, and began to entangle himself in a speech, the greater part of which never reached the ears of the audience. Poor Fontan had not the gift of speech and, luckily, the applause of his friends drowned the halting of his tongue.

I had no intention of offering any toast: I do not like speaking in public unless I am carried away by some passion or other. However, shouts of "Dumas! Dumas! Dumas!" compelled me to raise my glass. I proposed a toast which would have seemed very mild, if, instead of coming before the others, it had come after. I had completely forgotten what the toast was, but the actor whom I mentioned just now came to dine with me a week ago and recalled it to me. It was: "To Art! inasmuch as the pen and the paint-brush contribute as efficaciously as the rifle and sword to that social regeneration to which we have dedicated our lives and for which cause we are ready to die!"

There are times when people will applaud everything: they applauded my toast. Why not? They had just applauded Fontan's speech. It was now Étienne Arago's turn. He rose.

"_To the sun of_ 1831!" he said; "may it be as warm as that of 1830 and not dazzle us as that did!"

This deserved and obtained a triple salvo of cheers. Then came the toasts of Godefroy and Eugène Cavaignac. I blame myself for having forgotten them; especially do I regret forgetting Eugène's, which was most characteristic. Suddenly, in the midst of a private conversation with my left-hand neighbour, the name of Louis-Philippe, followed by five or six hisses, caught my ear. I turned round. A most animated scene was going on fifteen or twenty places from me. A young fellow was holding his raised glass and an open dagger-knife in the same hand and trying to make himself heard. It was Évariste Gallois, who was afterwards killed in a duel by Pescheux d'Herbinville, that delightful young man who wrapped his cartridges in tissue-paper, tied with rose-coloured favours. Évariste Gallois was scarcely twenty-three or twenty-four years of age at that time; he was one of the fiercest of Republicans. The noise was so great, that the cause of it could not be discovered because of the tumult. But I could gather there was danger threatening; the name of Louis-Philippe had been uttered--and the open knife plainly showed with what motive. This far exceeded the limits of my Republican opinions: I yielded to the persuasion of the neighbour on my left, who, in his capacity as king's comedian, could not dare to be compromised, and we leapt through the window into the garden. I returned home very uneasy: it was evident that this affair would have consequences, and, as a matter of fact, Évariste Gallois was arrested two or three days later. We shall meet him again at the end of the chapter before the Court of Assizes. This event happened at the same time as another event which was of some gravity to us. I have related that the decree concerning the Cross of July instituted the phrase, _Given by the King of the French_, and imposed the substitution of the blue ribbon edged with red, for the red edged with black. The king had signed this order in a fit of ill-temper. At one of the meetings at which I was present as a member of the committee, one of the king's aide-de-camps,--M. de Rumigny, so far as I can remember, although I cannot say for certain,--presented himself, asking, in the king's name and on behalf of the king, for the decoration of the Three Days, which had been accorded with much enthusiasm to La Fayette, Laffitte, Dupont (de l'Eure) and Béranger. This proceeding had surprised us, but not disconcerted us; we launched into discussion and decided, unanimously, that, the decoration being specially reserved for the combatants of the Three Days, or for citizens, who, without fighting, had during those three days taken an active part in the Revolution, the king, who had not entered Paris until the night of the 30th, had, therefore, no sort of right either to the decoration or to the medal. This decision was immediately transmitted to the messenger, who transmitted it instantly to his august principal. Now, we never doubted that our refusal was the cause of the decree of 30 April. I believe I have also mentioned that a protest was made by us against the colour of the ribbon, the subscription and the oath.

Two days before the banquet at the _Vendanges de Bourgogne_, a general assembly had taken place in the hall of the _Grande-Chaumière_ in the _passage du Saumon._ The total number of the decorated amounted to fifteen hundred and twenty-eight. Four hundred belonged to the _départements_, the remainder to Paris. Notices having been sent to each at his own house, all those decorated were prompt in answering the appeal; there were nearly a thousand of us gathered together. We proceeded to form a board. The president was elected by acclamation. He was one of the old conquerors of the Bastille, aged between seventy and seventy-five,---who wore next the decoration of 14 July 1789 the Cross of 29 July 1830. M. de Talleyrand was right in his dictum that nothing is more dangerous than enthusiasm; we learnt afterwards that the man we made president by acclamation was an old blackguard who had been before the assizes for violating a young girl.

Then we proceeded to the voting. The board was to be composed of fourteen members, one for each arrondissement; the thirteenth and fourteenth arrondissements represented the outlying dependencies. By a most wonderful chance, I have discovered the list of members of that board close to my hand; here it is--

"_First arrondissement_, Lamoure; _second_, Étienne Arago; _third_, Trélat; _fourth_, Moussette; _fifth_, Higonnet; _sixth_, Bastide; _seventh_, Garnier--Pagès; _eighth_, Villeret; _ninth_, Gréau; _tenth_, Godefroy Cavaignac; _eleventh_, Raspail; _twelfth_, Bavoux; _thirteenth_, Geibel; _fourteenth_, Alexandre Dumas."

The names of the fourteen members were given out and applauded; then we proceeded with the discussion. The meeting was first informed of the situation; next, different questions were put upon which the meeting was asked to deliberate. All these queries were put to the vote, for and against, and decided accordingly. The following minutes of the meeting were immediately dispatched to the three papers, the _Temps_, the _Courrier_ and the _National._

"No oath, inasmuch as the law respecting national awards had not prescribed any such oath.

"No superscription of _Donnée par le roi_; the Cross of July is a national award, not a royal.

"All those decorated for the events of July pledge themselves to wear that cross, holding themselves authorised to do so by the insertion of their names upon the list of national awards issued by the committee.

"The king cannot be head of an order of which he is not even chevalier.

"Even were the king a chevalier of July, and he is not, his son, when he comes to the throne, would not inherit that decoration.

"Further, there is no identity whatever between his position with regard to the decoration of July and his position with regard to the Légion d'Honneur and other orders which are inherited with the kingdom.

"The right won at the place de Grève, at the Louvre and at the Caserne de Babylon is anterior to all other rights: it is not possible, without falling into absurdity, to imagine a decoration to have been given by a king who did not exist at that time, and for whose person, we publicly confess we should not have fought for then.

"With regard to the ribbon, as its change of colour does not change any principle, the ribbon suggested by the Government may be adopted."

This last clause roused a long and heated discussion. In my opinion, the colour of the ribbon was a matter of indifference; moreover, to cede one point showed that we had not previously made up our minds to reject everything. I gained a hearing, and won the majority of the meeting over to my opinion. As soon as this point had been settled by vote. I drew from my pocket three or four yards of blue ribbon edged with red, with which I had provided myself in advance, and I decorated the board and those members of the order who were nearest me. Among them was Charras. I did not see him again after that for twenty-two years--and then he was in exile. Hardly was it noticed that a score of members were decorated, before everybody wished to be in the same case. We sent out for fifty yards of ribbon, and the thousand spectators left the _passage du Saumon_ wearing the ribbon of July in their buttonholes. This meeting of 7 May made a great stir in Paris. The _Moniteur_ busied itself with lying as usual. It announced that the resolutions had not been unanimously passed, and that many of those decorated had protested there and then. On the contrary, no protests of any kind had been raised. This was the only note which reached the board--

"I ask that all protests against all or part of the decree relative to the distribution of the Cross of July shall be decided by those who are interested in the matter, and that no general measure shall be adopted and imposed on everyone; each of us ought to rest perfectly free to protest or not as he likes. HUET"

This note was read aloud and stopped with hootings. We sent the following contradiction to the _Moniteur_ signed by our fourteen names--

"_To the Editor of the Moniteur Universal_

"SIR,--You state that the account of the meeting of those wearing the July decoration is false, although you were not present thereat and took no part whatever in the acts of the combatants of the Three Days. We affirm that it contained nothing but the exact truth. We will not discuss the illegality of the decree of 30 April: it has been sufficiently dwelt upon by the newspapers.

"We will only say that it is a lie that any combatant of 1789 and of 1830 was brought to that meeting by means of a prearranged surprise. Citizen Decombis came of his own accord to relate how the decoration of 1789 had been distributed, and at the equally spontaneous desire of the meeting he was called to the board. It was not, as you state, a small number of men who protested against the decree; the gathering was composed of over a thousand decorated people. The illegality of the oath and of the superscription _Donnée par le roi_, was recognised _unanimously._ None of the members present raised a hand to vote against it; all rose with enthusiasm to refuse to subscribe to that twofold illegality; this we can absolutely prove; for, in case any of the questions had not been thoroughly understood, each vote for and against the motions was repeated.

"Furthermore: all those decorated remained in the hall for an hour after the meeting, waiting for ribbons, and during that time no objections were raised against the conclusions arrived at during the deliberations.

"And this we affirm, we who have never dishonoured our pens or our oaths.

"_Signed_: LAMOURE, ST. ARAGO, TRÉLAT, MOUSSETTE, HIGONNET, BASTIDE, GARNIER-PAGÈS, VILLERET, GRÉAU, G. CAVAIGNAC, RASPAIL, BAVOUX, GEIBEL, ALEX. DUMAS."

The affair, as I have said, made a great noise; and had somewhat important consequences: an order of Republican knighthood was instituted, outside the pale of the protection and oversight of the Government. A thousand knights of this order rose up solely of their own accord, pledged only to their own conscience, able to recognise one another at a sign, always on the alert with their July guns ready to hand. The Government recoiled.

On 13 May the king issued an order decreeing that the Cross of July should be remitted by the mayors to the citizens of Paris and of the outskirts included in the _état nominatif_ and in the supplementary list which the commission on national awards had drawn up. To that end, a register was opened at all municipal offices to receive the oaths of the decorated. The mayors did not have much business to do and the registers remained almost immaculate. Each one of us paid for his own decoration, and people clubbed together to buy crosses for those who could not afford that expense. The Government left us all in undisturbed peace. I have said that Gallois was arrested. His trial was rapidly hurried on: on 15 June, he appeared before the Court of Assizes. I never saw anything simpler or more straightforward than that trial, in which the prisoner seemed to make a point of furnishing the judges with the evidence of which they might be in need. Here is the writ of indictment--it furnishes me with facts of which I, at any rate, did not yet know. Carried away in other directions by the rapidity of events, I had not troubled myself about that stormy evening. People lived fast and in an exceedingly varied way at that period. But let us listen to the king's procurator--

"On 9 May last, a reunion of two hundred persons assembled at the restaurant _Vendanges de Bourgogne_, in the faubourg du Temple to celebrate the acquittal of MM. Trélat, Cavaignac and Guinard. The repast took place in a dining-room on the ground-floor which opened out on the garden. Divers toasts were drunk, at which the most hostile opinions against the present Government were expressed. In the middle of this gathering Évariste Gallois rose and said in a loud voice, on his own responsibility: '_To Louis-Philippe!_' holding a dagger in his hand meantime. He repeated it twice. Several persons imitated his example by raising their hands and shouting similarly: '_To Louis-Philippe!_' Then hootings were heard, although the guests wish to disclaim the wretched affair, suggesting, _as Gallois declares_, that they thought he was proposing the health of the king of the French; it is, however, a well-established fact that several of the diners loudly condemn what happened. The dagger-knife had been ordered by Gallois on 6 May, from Henry, the cutler. He had seemed in a great hurry for it, giving the false excuse of going a journey."

We will now give the examination of the prisoner in its naked simplicity--

"THE PRESIDENT.--Prisoner Gallois, were you present at the meeting which was held on 9 May last, at the _Vendanges de Bourgogne_?

"THE PRISONER.--Yes, Monsieur le Président, and if you will allow me to instruct you as to the truth of what took place at it, I will save you the trouble of questioning me.

"THE PRESIDENT.--We will listen.

"THE PRISONER.--This is the exact truth of the incident to which I owe _the honour_ of appearing before you. I had a knife which had been used to carve with throughout the banquet; at dessert, I raised this knife and said: '_For Louis-Philippe ... if he turns traitor_.' These last words were only heard by my immediate neighbours, because of the fierce hootings that were raised by the first part of my speech and the notion that I intended to propose a toast to that man.

"D.[1]--Then, in your opinion, a toast proposed to the king's health was proscribed at that gathering?

"R.--To be sure!

"D.--A toast offered purely and simply to Louis-Philippe, king of the French, would have excited the animosity of that assembly?

"R.--Assuredly.

"D.--Your intention, therefore, was to put King Louis-Philippe to the dagger?

"R.--In case he turned traitor, yes, monsieur.

"D.--Was it, on your part, the expression of your own personal sentiment to set forth the king of the French as deserving a dagger-stroke, or was your real intention to provoke the others to a like action?

"R.--I wished to incite them to such a deed if Louis-Philippe proved a traitor, that is to say, in case he ventured to depart from legal action.

"D.--Why do you suppose the king is likely to act illegally?

"R.--Everybody unites in thinking that it will not be long before he makes himself guilty of that crime, if he has not already done so.

"D.--Explain yourself.

"R.--I should have thought it clear enough.

"D.--No matter! Explain it.

"R.--Well, I say then, that the trend of Government action leads one to suppose that Louis-Philippe will some day be treacherous if he has not already been so."

It will be understood that with such lucid questions and answers the proceedings would be brief. The jury retired to a room to deliberate and brought in a verdict of not guilty. Did they consider Gallois mad, or were they of his opinion? Gallois was instantly set at liberty. He went straight to the desk on which his knife lay open as damning evidence, picked it up, shut it, put it in his pocket, bowed to the bench and went out. I repeat, those were rough times! A little mad, maybe; but you will recollect Béranger's song about _Les Fous._

[1] TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.--D = _Demande_ (Question). R = _Réponse_ (Answer).