The Amazing City

The month of May, 1899—how long ago it seems!

At that time, up at Montmartre, in a large house, overlooking a garden, resided M. Jules Guérin, most savage of Anti-Dreyfusards, and chief of the Anti-Semitic party.

A fine house, but an unlovely garden. A gaunt tree or two; four or five gritty, stony flower-beds; in a corner, a dried-up, dilapidated old well. But this waste of a garden suited M. Guérin’s purposes,—which were sinister.

“If my enemies attack me here, I shall shoot them dead and bury them beneath this very window—by that tree, in that flower-bed.”

“Oh!” I expostulated.

“Or I shall throw their infamous bodies into that well,” continued M. Guérin, again pointing out of the window. “I am prepared; I am ready. You see this gun? Then look at those revolvers. All are loaded.”

A long, highly polished gun rested in a corner at M. Guérin’s elbow. Curiously then I glanced at a collection of revolvers that bristled murderously on the wall, and next at Jules Guérin, a powerfully built man, with massive shoulders, a square chin, lurid green eyes, a fierce moustache, and a formidable block of a head on which a soft grey hat of enormous dimensions was tilted jauntily on one side. Thus, although he sat in his study before a vast, business-like writing-table, Jules Guérin wore his hat, or rather his sombrero, and also an overcoat; but then (as he explained) he might be called out at any moment to take part in a political brawl, or to chastise a journalist, or to arrange a duel—even to dig the grave of an enemy; and so was dressed ready to sally forth anywhere, and with ferocious designs upon anyone, at the shortest notice. Vehemently, he puffed at a cigarette. Now and again he pulled at his fierce moustache. As he spoke he gesticulated, thumped the writing-table savagely, and, when he thumped, the ink-bottles and penholders leapt and danced, and the gun in the corner trembled.

“Downstairs I have twenty clerks and assistants. All are armed with revolvers; all are devoted; and thus my enemies are their enemies. And so if the brigands attack us, into the earth with them, or into the well, or into——”

“But who are these enemies?” I interrupted. “These brigands?”

“The Government—Lépine, Chief of the Police—Loubet, President of the Republic—a hundred other traitors and assassins,” cried M. Guérin. “But the garden is waiting for them. I desire that this garden shall be their cemetery.”

Of course, an impossible ambition. But so incoherent, so chaotic was the state of mind of the Anti-Semites fourteen years ago, that I refrained from suggesting that it was highly improbable President Loubet or his Ministers would invade M. Guérin’s bit of waste ground up there in the rue Condorcet. Nor was my host a man to stand ridicule. A flippant word from me, and he would have shown me the door. So I listened patiently to his wild, savage denunciations of the Jews—of Captain Dreyfus in particular, who was lying (burnt up with fever, broken and battered in everything except determination) in his cell on the Devil’s Island; whilst here, in Paris, the Cour de Cassation was deliberating whether there was sufficient “new” evidence to justify the prisoner being brought back to France and given a new trial. Rumours were flying about to the effect that the Court had already made up its mind to order the revision. Thus, fury of the Anti-Dreyfusards; frenzy of the Anti-Semites, and, in their newspapers, the statements that the Cour de Cassation had been “bought” by the Jews; that the Jews, being the masters of France, had “sold” the country to Germany; and that, therefore, the only thing to do with the Jews was to hang them on the lamp-posts of Paris. Particularly bloodthirsty and barbarous was M. Guérin’s weekly journal, L’Anti-Juif, which stood on the floor, in three or four stacks, of this extraordinary study. In it were published the name and address of every Jewish tradesman in Paris. Each column was headed with exhortation: “Français, N’achetez Rien Aux Juifs.” Then, hideous cartoons depicting the flight of the Jews along the boulevards and their panic and agony—and their massacre.

“Now,” said M. Guérin, “you have seen the official organ of the Anti-Semitic League, and I could show you pamphlets and posters that are equally powerful. No League in Paris is so resolute, so strong, so efficiently organised. Such is our success that I am shortly removing to more spacious quarters. There we shall deliver Anti-Semitic lectures, and give Anti-Semitic plays—open to all, not a centime will be charged. Then, boxing and fencing classes, pistol practice, a library, a doctor and a solicitor on the premises—always, no charge. The Parisians, being thrifty, will flock to us. They will cry: ‘Here we get entertainment, medical and legal advice for nothing; it is admirable. Vive Guérin! Vive la France! À bas les Juifs!’ The Government will be furious. Loubet in the Élysée will shake in his shoes. And Lépine will shout: ‘We must arrest that canaille Guérin!’ But let him come. I shall be armed more strongly than ever in my new quarters in the rue de Chabrol.”

“A garden?” I ventured.

“There are no gardens in the rue de Chabrol: but there are cellars,” grimly replied M. Guérin. “Come and see me there. You will be astonished. Au revoir.”

Out in the passage, and on the staircase, I encountered four or five of Jules Guérin’s clerks and assistants; coarse, powerful young men, with bull-dog faces, who had been recruited by the chief of the Anti-Semites from the ghastly slaughter-house of Villette. In the garden I paused to inspect the stony flower-beds and the dilapidated well.

“The future cemetery of my enemies. Ah, the traitors, the brigands, the assassins! Let them come.”

At an open window, in his sombrero and smoking his eternal cigarette, stood fierce Jules Guérin.

“Lépine in that flower-bed,” he shouted, and then closed the window. But reopened it, when I reached the gateway, to cry:

“And Loubet, in the well.”

A month later, Paris in uproar. On the afternoon of the 3rd June the Cour de Cassation ordered the revision of the Dreyfus Affair; the same night official arrangements were made for the return to France of the shattered prisoner of the Devil’s Island; next day, during the race-meeting at Auteuil, President Loubet’s hat was smashed over his head by the stick of a certain Baron Christiani, a Royalist Anti-Dreyfusard. Then, the fall of the Dupuy Ministry, and M. Loubet in a dilemma. M. Poincaré, astutest of statesmen, was summoned to the Élysée; but, with characteristic shrewdness, declined the task of forming a Cabinet in such unfavourable circumstances. M. Léon Bourgeois (absent on a Peace mission at The Hague) was telegraphed for, but could not be persuaded to exercise a pacific influence in his own country. M. Waldeck-Rousseau was next requisitioned; and left the Élysée with the assurance: “Monsieur le Président, I will do my best to succeed.” Nothing could have been more admirable than his subsequent exertions, for, in making them, M. Waldeck-Rousseau, the most distinguished and most prosperous lawyer at the Paris Bar, had nothing to gain and everything to lose; and he must have been dismayed at the refusal, or the reluctance, of highly esteemed politicians to serve their country by fighting a just if an unpopular cause. Well, for a whole week the most painstaking, the most level-headed and truly patriotic Prime Minister who has yet worked for the Third Republic, visited prominent statesmen with the earnest desire to form a ministère d’apaisement, founded on the principles of disinterestedness and justice. Throughout that week, he was hooted in the streets, and ridiculed and insulted by MM. Rochefort, Millevoye, Drumont and Jules Guérin, who triumphantly predicted in their newspapers that “Panama Loubet”—like “Père Grévy” before him—would be compelled to resign for want of a ministry. And biting was the satire, and more savage became the contumely, when at last the Waldeck-Rousseau Ministry was completed, by the inclusion of such opposite, hostile personages as the “citizen Millerand” and fierce, aristocratic and despotic old General the Marquis de Galliffet. “After this,” wrote Henri Rochefort, “the deluge.” “At last,” declared M. Drumont, “Paris will rebel; and the next events will prove fatal to this unspeakable Republic.” The next important event was the landing in France, in the middle of the night, of a bent, prematurely aged figure: Captain Dreyfus. How the musty old carriage in which he sat, dazed, exhausted, shivering, rattled over the cobble-stones to the Rennes prison! How the prison gates clanged to when the shabby vehicle had entered the dark, grim courtyard! And how split and how cracked was the voice of the prisoner from the Devil’s Island when, at the court-martial a few days afterwards, he protested his innocence and refuted the new monstrous accusations of highly respected and brilliantly uniformed Generals Gonse, de Boisdeffre and Mercier! Solitary confinement had left him almost inarticulate. But he defended himself heroically: and, with an effort, straightened his bent back when questioned by his judges. Then how the trial dragged on; and what scenes took place in the streets, hotels and cafés of Rennes, which were crowded with le Tout Paris and echoed with Parisian exclamations and disputes! Brawls, duels, Henri Rochefort’s white “Imperial” pulled; Maître Labori, Captain Dreyfus’s brilliant counsel, shot between the shoulders; a famous demi-mondaine expelled the town; arrests, startling canards, alarms; hysteria, chaos, and delirium enough for Paris itself; and in Paris—whilst these exhibitions were occurring in the Rennes streets, and Captain Dreyfus (in the severe court-room) was stiffening his back and straining his split voice until it rose to an uncanny scream—what of Jules Guérin in Paris? and of his guns and revolvers, his well and his flower-bed? and of his assistants and clerks, the young men with the bull-dog faces, whom he had recruited from the ghastly slaughter-house of La Villette?

Well, first of all, came the dishevelled, dusty confusion of a déménagement in the rue Condorcet. The study walls were stripped of their revolvers; the basement was cleared of the printing-press that produced the murderous Anti-Juif; huge packing-cases were passed into a number of furniture vans; and so, farewell to the stony garden—in which not an “enemy” lay buried; and en route to No. 12 rue de Chabrol, a commodious, massive building with large windows and a solid oak door. The arrival of Jules Guérin and his assistants caused consternation amongst the peaceful, bourgeois inhabitants of the street. Lurid Anti-Semitic posters were stuck to the walls of No. 12; the din of the printing-machines disturbed the neighbours—and Guérin’s voice of thunder (execrating the Jews and demanding the lives of his enemies) was to be heard through the open windows, while his enormous sombrero was another disquieting element in the orderly, dull thoroughfare. The Anti-Semitic lectures and plays were announced; a solicitor and a doctor were engaged—and Paris was invited to visit No. 12 rue de Chabrol and partake of its pleasures and advantages. Then came the suggestion in the Anti-Juif that Paris should fix a day and an hour when the Jews should be hanged on the boulevard lamp-posts. And then followed the resolution of the Government—to have done with Jules Guérin! A warrant was issued for his arrest on the charge of “incitement to rebellion.” Somehow or other the news reached No. 12; and when the Commissary of Police (armed with his warrant) rang at the oak door, the massive form of Guérin appeared at a window. “Bandit,” he shouted. “There are twenty of us in here: and not one of us will be taken alive. Tell the Government of Traitors we shall fight to the death.” And he flourished a revolver, and his assistants, assembled behind him in the window, cheered wildly. Away went the Commissary of Police for further orders. Up came MM. Drumont, Millevoye and other leading Anti-Semites with exhortations to surrender. But Guérin, from his window, reiterated his determination to die heroically at his post: and again the young men with the bull-dog faces cheered enthusiastically. And there were cries of “Mon Dieu, quelle affaire!” and angry protests, lamentations and tears amongst the shopkeepers and peaceful old rentiers of the street. Many of them put up their shutters and fled, when policemen and Municipal Guards marched up and stationed themselves outside No. 12. Jules Guérin greeted them with cries of “Assassins!”; shook his great fist threateningly; rushed from window to window, shouting forth abuse. More cheering from his assistants, who pointed guns at the authorities.

“It is a revolution,” cried the householders. “Let us save ourselves quickly.”

Shutters were hurried up everywhere; cabs carried off distracted rentiers and their smaller belongings; policemen and Municipal Guards barred either end of the rue de Chabrol, and permitted only people who had business in the street to pass them; and with the cutting off of water and gas supplies, the siege of Fort Chabrol began in earnest.

The Holder of the Fort—though the Parisian, interested in “affaires,” studied him attentively—could only be observed from a distance. The curious, with the aid of opera-glasses, discovered him sitting at an open window with rifles resting on either side of him; or beheld him walking about the roof amidst the chimney-pots—an extraordinary figure in his sombrero. Now and again he discharged revolvers at the heavens: a proceeding that never failed to arouse the enthusiasm of his fellow-prisoners. Then leaning perilously over the parapet or out of a window, Guérin would apostrophise the soldiers and policemen below as “brigands” and “assassins”; and throw down pencilled messages (addressed to the “Ministry of Traitors” and the “Government of Forgers”) inviting all State officials to come to the rue de Chabrol and be shot through their “infamous heads” or their “abominable hearts.” When particularly indignant, Guérin would hurl forth a cup, a bottle, a saucepan—but the missiles invariably fell wide of the mark; and the Guards and police (whilst smoking cigarettes) snapped their fingers and laughed back mockingly and sardonically at the rebel. It was weary work for the besiegers; the air was stale and sickly with disinfectants; and often it rained.

Guérin blessed the downpours. He was short of water. When the skies were generous, he brought up buckets and basins and a great bath on to the roof—and shook his fist exultingly at the watchers beneath as the rain pattered into and filled those receptacles; and next, coming to the edge of the parapet with a glass in hand, drank to the death of the “Government of Assassins.” Indeed, quite an orgy of water-drinking on the roof of the Fort; for the ex-butchers, with the bull-dog faces, uproariously proposed the health of their chief, and then emptied their glasses into the street to show that they had no fear of suffering from thirst.

But what of provisions? The twenty-fifth night of the siege—a dark, wet night—the police fancied they discerned mysterious objects flying far over their heads on to the roof of Fort Chabrol. Much speculation, infinite straining of eyes and stretching of ears, and suddenly a paper parcel, falling from above, struck a Municipal Guard. Shock of the Guard. The cry: “It is a bomb!” But it was only a ham—a fine, excellent ham. And a few minutes later the Guards and police were searching the house from which it had been thrown and examining numbers of other paper parcels (carefully tied up) that contained joints of meat, “groceries,” sugared cakes, fruit and fresh salads; all of which luxuries were obviously intended for the rebels over the way. But where were Guérin’s friends and accomplices? Not a soul in the house; so said a policeman: “Try the roof.” And there, on the roof, more paper parcels ready to be thrown across to the Fort; and hiding behind the chimney-pots, four or five men.

“Arrest them,” cried an officer. And then, amidst the chimney-pots, much dodging and slipping and catching as in the games of “hide-and-seek” and “touch wood”; whilst over the way on his roof, Jules Guérin raced about amidst his chimney-pots, swinging a lantern and furiously shouting: “Assassins. Assassins.” Thus, no sleep for the few remaining householders that night. When his friends had been removed from the roof, and the police reappeared in the street with their captives and laden with parcels, Jules Guérin and his assistants discharged revolvers at the heavy, dark clouds; and, next morning, hurled fenders, fire-irons and a bedstead into the street. No one was struck: the prisoners were too excited to take aim.

Guérin’s harangues were still bloodthirsty, but it was noticed that he looked pale and drawn when he appeared at the windows, as though suffering from want of nourishment and exercise.... Now he was more subdued as he took air amidst the chimney-pots; and he would sit up on the roof in the moonlight, with a gun across his knees, for a whole hour without moving. How the air reeked with disinfectants, and how sombre was the Fort! Apparently oil and candles were scarce, for only a single candle was used at a time. One saw its dim light passing from room to room—now on the first floor, then on the second, the third; then there was darkness. Upon two occasions Guérin spent the entire night on the roof. A dishevelled shivering object he was at daybreak, with his coat-collar turned up and the sombrero dragged down over his ears. Nor did his young assistants with the bull-dog faces fare better. Their cheers became faint: and they themselves were to be discerned leaning moodily against the chimney-pots or yawning with all their mouths behind the windows. Moreover, it was suspected by the police that there was illness in the Fort. One night a candle burned steadily in the same room. Not a soul on the roof, silence in the citadel. At daybreak Jules Guérin hoisted a black flag; one of the young prisoners with the bull-dog face was dying. In answer to Jules Guérin’s call, an officer stepped forward, and parleying ensued. An ambulance was brought up. When the solid oak door of Fort Chabrol opened and Jules Guérin appeared with the dying man in his arms, the policemen and Guards stood gravely at salute. Away, slowly, went the ambulance. And no sooner had it vanished than Jules Guérin—livid and trembling—banged to and bolted the door: rushed back to his window, and there, pointing dramatically to the black flag, hoarsely shouted: “Assassins. Assassins. Assassins.”

On the 9th September, at five o’clock in the afternoon, Paris heard from Rennes that Captain Dreyfus had—O astounding judgment!—been found guilty of high treason, “with extenuating circumstances.” On the following Tuesday it was announced—O amazing clemency—that the “traitor” had been pardoned. And throughout France there arose a cry of “N’en Parlons Plus.”

Up and down the boulevards on that Tuesday rushed scores of hoarse, unshaven camelots with their latest song. “N’en Parlons Plus,” they shouted. Then (in some cases) the chorus was chanted:

But there remained Fort Chabrol. Neither “sanity” nor “order” could prevail in Paris whilst Jules Guérin was defying the Government from his window, and hurling missiles at its public servants, and discharging revolvers at the heavens. As the camelots were selling their song on the boulevards, as Paris was rejoicing in cafés that the “Affaire” was now “buried,” Jules Guérin still walked his roof, and his assistants leant dejectedly against the chimney-pots: and M. Lépine, Chief of the Police, was on his side preparing an attack on the stronghold. A few journalists were let into the secret. At ten o’clock on the night of Tuesday, the 12th September—the thirty-seventh and last night of the siege—MM. les journalistes were permitted to penetrate through the lines of policemen and of Municipal and Republican Guards that guarded the dark, gloomy rue de Chabrol. Not a light in the citadel. But shadowy forms were to be distinguished on the roof. And at a window, smoking a cigarette, stood Jules Guérin, in his sombrero.

“Mon vieux Jules, it is for to-night. Be reasonable and come out,” shouted a journalist; and he was promptly pulled backwards and called to order by a policeman. But M. Millevoye, the Anti-Semite deputy and editor of La Patrie, was permitted to converse with the rebel on the condition that he urged him to surrender.

“He swears he will fight to the death,” stated M. Millevoye to an officer. Very pale and agitated was the deputy. Very excited were the journalists, who had provided themselves with sandwiches, flasks and strong oil of eucalyptus with which to ward off contamination. Calm was the Chief of the Police, when he appeared on the scene with various officials and announced that the pompiers and their engines were on the way.

It was a cold, disagreeable night. The clatter of horses’ hoofs—up came a detachment of the mounted Republican Guard. The hissing of fire-engines; here were the pompiers. A distant babel of voices, for now, at one o’clock in the morning, all kinds and conditions of Parisians had heard of the impending attack on the citadel, and had hastened to the barriers—only to find themselves refused admittance to the grim, besieged thoroughfare. From my side of the barrier I beheld—beyond it—stalwart market-people from the Halles, Apaches in caps and scarlet waistbands, ragged old loafers, revellers from Maxim’s and the stifling, frenzied night-restaurants of Montmartre.

“Impossible to pass,” declared the policeman. An officer of the Municipal Guards facetiously kept up the refrain: “Not President Loubet; not his Holiness the Pope; not even the bon Dieu, could I possibly allow to pass.” Songs from the Apaches. Naïve exclamations from the simple market-women.

“Please give this bouquet to Guérin. He is a real man; he is épatant—do please send him these flowers,” cried a brilliant demi-mondaine from Maxim’s, holding forth a bouquet of weird orchids. “Alas, madame,” replied the facetious officer; “alas, not even a bouquet from paradise could I possibly allow to pass.”

Ominous sounds in the rue de Chabrol. The thud and the clanking of the firemen’s hose as it was dragged towards No. 12; the increased hissing of the steam-engines; the impatient clatter of the horses’ hoofs; the bolting and barring of doors, and the putting up of shutters in those few houses where residents remained. Ominous, too, the consultations (carried on in a low voice) between M. Lépine and the various officials. Then the flash of lanterns, the smoke pouring forth from the funnels of the steam-engines, the stench of the disinfectants, those shadowy figures still on the roof of Fort Chabrol; and Jules Guérin still at his window in his sombrero, still smoking cigarettes unconcernedly, still calmly watching the preparations for the attack.

“It is sinister,” cried a journalist.

“So all is ready,” rang out the voice of the Chief of the Police. Briskly stepping forward, M. Lépine thus addressed Jules Guérin: “It is a quarter to four o’clock. If, at four o’clock, you do not surrender, we shall use force.”

Jules Guérin smoked on.

Still nearer to the Fort came the pompiers, dragging their hose. The plan was that they should deluge the massive building with water, while their colleagues with the shining hatchets should break down the door. A last consultation between M. Lépine and the officials. He held his watch in his hand. Five minutes to four o’clock. The neighing of a restive horse. Shouts and song from behind the barrier. Again, the clanking of the hose. Three... two... minutes to four. Jules Guérin, striking a match, lighted a new cigarette.

“He means to fight. It will be appalling,” exclaimed a journalist.

“Jules Guérin, it is four o’clock,” cried M. Lépine, again stepping forward. Without a word, the man in the sombrero banged down the window, and a few moments later the shadowy figures of his assistants disappeared from the roof.

“I thought so, but I wasn’t sure—no, I wasn’t sure,” said M. Lépine—when the heavy oak door swung open!

A third time he stepped forward—entered the doorway—vanished—reappeared to give an order—again vanished. Up with the hose, into the gutter with the fire-engines; way for half-a-dozen ordinary, shabby fiacres which came bumping and lurching down the street, pulled up before the oak door: and a few minutes later took Jules Guérin and the young men with the bull-dog faces ingloriously away to the Santé prison!

“N’en Parlons Plus,” said Paris, when the Senate, assembled as a High Court, sentenced Jules Guérin, Paul Déroulède, and other rebels and conspirators against the safety of the Republic to long terms of imprisonment and exile.

“N’en Parlons Plus,” reiterated Paris, when the Amnesty Bill permitted the exiles to return to their country.

Little more was heard of Jules Guérin. France, having been restored to order and sanity, and having made what reparation she could to Major Dreyfus, would have no more of Anti-Semitism; and on his return from exile, the rebel of Fort Chabrol retired into the obscurity of a damp, ugly little house in the valley of the Seine.

He still wore his sombrero; but his spirit was broken, and he pottered about in his garden and smoked cigarettes by the side of an evil-smelling stove. Then, a year ago, came the devastating floods. After saving his own scanty furniture, Jules Guérin went to the assistance of his neighbours. He was himself again, dashing hither and thither, issuing orders, directing operations. Many valiant feats he performed. He was rough, but he was kind. It was through standing waist-deep in the cold, murky water—whilst helping his neighbours—that he contracted pneumonia.

“The death, at the age of forty-nine, is announced of M. Jules Guérin: who had his hour of notoriety.”

So—and no more—said the Figaro.