A CLERGYMAN IN PARIS.
[Facia a CORRESPONDINT.] tE AM told that the British public pretty generally believes that Paris has been under a reign of terror ; that the Commune and their supporters are godless anarchists ; that they make war on property ; that their "requisitions" simply mean pillage; that they thrust into prison anyone who has an opinion of his own ; that 'they go round seizing men of all ages, forcing them into the ranks, hurrying them outside the enceinte, and then ostentatiously locking the gates against them, to show that all return is cut off. 1 am taught, too, that drunkenness is the order of the day, the Ver- sailles papers go further, and add that the guard-houses have become mere brothels ; that every corporal has gold lace enough about him to rig out a General's staff ; that the women (except the maenads and the cantinieres) are all against the movement, and help their husbands and sons and sweethearts to hide or to escape ; that the poverty and distress are dreadful, and that while the Commune lives luxuriously and has its banquets a la re'gence, the houseless refugees from Netiilly are left to starve about the streets ; that all the churches are shut up and all the priests and sisters in prison ; that Paris is dirty, and that the public buildings are all closed or seized for purposes of defence ; that the barricades are just strong enough to be a nuisance and an impediment to traffic, and that the moment the Versailles troops get inside the fortifications, the immense majority will turn on the little knot of desperadoes (mostly foreigners) who have been terrifying Paris into concealing her true wishes.
Now each of these allegations, so far as I have seen, is simply un- true. So far from Paris being under a reign of terror, the great fault found with the Commune, not by "the knot of desperadoes," but by the rank and file of the National Guard, and also by the most intelligent on-lookers, has been that they are not strict enough. Paris has reason enough to dread a military dictator, and
the Commune have hitherto managed most remarkably to keep their Generals from attempting anything like a coup ; but everybody says they have done it at the expense of promptitude and decision. The other day, one Captain Gentil refused to obey orders ; he was wounded by the men sent to arrest him ; but, instead of shooting him on the spot, the authorities packed him off on sick leave to his home at Nevers. This is why Rossel resigned, following therein the advice of Pere Duchene, who (with great good sense under his coating of blackguardism) argued that it was cruel to make a man responsible for the conduct of the war, and then to let him be trammelled at every turn by three or four conceited prigs such as are to be found in almost every regiment.
The phrase " godless anarchists " conveys two distinct charges. As to the first, it is not probable that the Sorbonne, or even our Privy Council, would " pass " any of the members of the Commune ; but a man is not godless because, brought up in a country where the shrine of St. Martin at Tours and the black virgins at Chartres and Clermont draw yearly thousands of worshippers, he throws Christianity over altogether. When the Bishop of Angers publishes a self-complacent allocution, telling his people how at the outset of the war he put the diocese under the special protec- tion of the Virgin, letting no one know it except two priests in whom he could confide, and how he now feels that to this act of his is due their immunity from invasion ; and when even at Havre the "Christian mothers" are working to get up another colossal statue to Notre Dame de Grace because the Prussians only came within a few leagues of the town, one can well understand people thinking they have had enough of priests and priestcraft. As to anarchy, never was Paris more quiet and orderly, never were persons or property so safe ; you may walk at all hours in any quarter without fear of insult, nay, with the certainty of being unmolested ; and this is much more than could be said of the place when, besides the city police and the army of spies, it had 12,000 sergens specially employed in the Emperor's service.
But the " requisitions "? Well, fighting needs money, and it has not yet been proved that war can be carried on by voluntary contributions. A man who locked up his house and furniture and went out of town to avoid paying his income-tax, would pro. bably find that Mr. Lowe would manage to get the money out of him somehow. One could not fairly blame the Commune if, in their want of funds, they had seized and sold the furniture of the absentees to meet the extra taxes. That they have not done so universally is the completest answer to the charges of idle detractors. Here are "a knot of desperadoes ;" or, at best, a mob of roughs, who have certainly suffered much during the Prussian siege, and who are now called on to pay up arrears of rent by the house.owners who have been living out of harm's way in Jersey, or London, or Brussels. Could we wonder if these men said, " No : before you talk of our paying you your rent, do you pay up your taxes ; and, as you shirk the tax of blood you must pay in money pretty smartly. If you decline, we shall break open your doors and sell your goods by public auction "? Instead of this, the Com- mune has simply made calls on the Bank, the railways, and other large companies, for sums to be loaned to the State, and it has "requisitioned " hardware, saltpetre, and such-like from those who had large stocks of it, giving in every case a bond to pay, which bond whatever French Government may finally come into power will in honour be bound to meet. " How is it you Se'dentaires are armed with old-fashioned muskets, and of such different makes ?" you ask of a little squad of men preparing to relieve guards, by the Pantheon. "Why, we haven't Chassepota to spare for patrol work ; and we got these out of the house they accuse us of robbing. We did break in, it's quite true, but not to rob ; we took what
arms we could find, lest we should get shot in the back while we were out.there defending the enceinte."
You cannot meet half a dozen people in Paris without feeling that there is plenty of freedom of opinion ; whereas at Versailles no one dares breathe a word except in favour of the Govern- ment. As to personal liberty, you can walk in by the Gare du Nord just as you would into Belgrave Square out of Victoria Station. You are never questioned while there, nor are you stopped anywhere except where a barricade is being built, or near one of the public buildings, which are carefully protected against the possible frolics of street boys. You walk out again without a word ; whereas at Versailles, if you go into the Gardens by the front gate and return by the grille de l'octroi, out rushes on you a detective, who calla for papers. Detectives, lost sight of along the Prussian line, meet you again at Havre ; and not content with stopping you at the station, actually come to look after you on board the steamer.
Now for the question of enforced military service. Even if the National Guard were hunted up, as we are told they are, it would be just what must be done with men who undertake a certain duty. Militiamen are not allowed to shirk. Conscripts must march. There need not be much sympathy for men who, having drawn their pay, say for three weeks, skulk off when their week of ser- vice comes round. But such men (always found in all services) are very rare in Paris. You need only look at a detachment marching out to Vanvres,—men of all ages (too many mere boys), calm, not noisy as French soldiers generally are, but cheerful, singing in a low tone a rather plaintive song, and cheering the Commune, kepis on bayonets, as they pass a guard-house or a mairie, to be certain that these men are not being dragged out to battle. The women who are with them, mothers, sisters, sweet- hearts, are as resolute as the men. Whatever one may think of the Commune, one thinks better of human nature after seeing that its defenders are not, after all, what M. Thiers has so often called them, "forests, assassins, itres chetifs avec des figures ignobks,— more like wild beasts than men." They are men, and untrained as most of them are, will do their best.
As for compulsion, in our sense of the word it does not exist. The Cri du Peuple is daily calling out for it, and saying that Paris has had enough of those volunteers who mean to march when they are 500 strong, and that it is a war, and not a masquerade, which the people have taken in hand. The same with the orators at St. Eustache ; and their hearers (more than half women) seem to go along with them. It is a strange sight that mass-meeting in the big church by the Halles. By the light of a score of dim petroleum lamps you- see that the place is chokeful. At a table on a platform sit a dozen . men, taking notes. An orator gets into the pulpit opposite them. Whenever he denounces Thiers as a robber of the people, or Trochu as a traitor, or gives out any other popular sentiment, there is a roar of applause. Then he gets serious and talks of duty, and the crowd grows as still as death ; and then in a strange whisper he says, " But there is one debt we all owe, and that is the debt of blood," and then a moment's pause, and it seems as if almost every one says, " Oui, oui ; it faut la payer." And these are not all Communists ; close at your elbow are two Bordelaises,—mother and daughter, ladies in speech, though evidently in the depth of genteel poverty. The husband came to Paris to set up business last autumn, and died during the siege ; and widow and daughter tell you they have not suffered all that just to give up Paris now to those who sold them to the Prussians. It may be a delusion, but it has strong hold of many who despise the Commune, this belief that the 4th of September people did not really wish the Republic to succeed. Trochu is especially distrusted " it eat h moitie pretre, cet animal," said a wholesale shopkeeper, " it ne voulait que Henri V." Even some of the Versailles officers are disgusted at the constant reports about the cowardice of the National Guard. " Cowards ? Why Troche would never use them. Look at them now, when we have Mont Valerien to bear upon them."
Of drunkenness you see none in Paris, though with wine excep- tionally cheap and bread very dear (5d. the kilo.) it would not be surprising if ill-fed men were often "overtaken." About de- bauchery it is harder to judge ; Paris now seems infinitely more moral than any capital of Europe. The women have joined the Commune in the perhaps Utopian effort to put down prostitution. Those who follow the march are certainly modest. As for dress, no one under the rank of colonel can even wear silver lace, and gold lace is strictly confined to staff officers ; there is no pomp of war about the Commune troops,—not their only contrast this with the country lads who lie half drunk about the stations of the western lines, and whose officers are as dandified as their men are dirty and ragged. As for churches, St. Eustache is a "club," St. Roch is to be used for the same purpose,. and Notre Dame is shut up. The excuse (a poor one) is there are no meeting-halls in Paris. The priests seized were simply taken as hostages against the killing of prisoners ; the act nearly stopped that monstrous piece of barbarism. Priests go- freely about the streets, there is service at nearly all the churches, and sisters (against Pere Duchene's wish) minister in prison and ambulances, though an American doctor says he knew a case in which wine was withheld from a wounded man because he would not " confess."
The city, of course, is not in holiday dress. The fountains in the Place of Concord are empty ; but still all essentials are well• done. The scavenging is over by 7 a.m. (let our vestries think of that), and the hose-watering of the roads goes on all day. It only needs a word to the concierge to visit any public building. The. Louvre, half-arranged, is as free as ever ; and the Tuileries are open at 5d. a head, the money being put into the sick fund. In• the Tuileries every room is labelled, and every one guarded by a sidentaire; no breakage, no scribbling on the walls, nothing of whah we might expect from a Paris mob let loose in its late master's palace. In fact, there is no scribbling anywhere, except the text, repeated over *lid over again, " Mort aux voleurs : respect a la proprilte I" The'shops in the English quarter are mostly shut ; all shops shut early,—even cafes are deserted at ten o'clock ; gas is very sparingly used ; the early-closing movement and economy in gas will both, if they can be made permanent, be good thinge for Paris. The great " Vienna brewery" cafe by the Madeleine is &tett ;. another great café brewery is turned into an ambulance ; and the milliners, of course, have followed their customers. The books and prints are mostly decent and serious ; it is at Saint-Denis you. see stalls loaded with vile photographs and books about L'Empereu'- s'amuse, ou Les Amours de Cesar, and Les Nuits de Ste. Cloud'. Caricatures of Thiers are the order of the day ; one represents him holding on with his left hand at the edge of the grave into• which Death is pushing him, while, with a lighted match in his right, he struggles to fire a big gun, crying, " One minute, Death ; just one shot more." Meat, of course, is scarce; but happily vegetables are in abundance, and are much eheaper than at Versailles. Eggs, are ld. each, cheese from 1s. to 1s. 2d. per kilo., bacon in the• shops the same price,—at the public stores it is only 9d. Potatoes 4d. a bushel, 4s. 2d. a quintal. Fish and shrimps daily on the stalls along the streets. With St. Denis open, of coarse Paris could not be starved.
As to the barricades, they are in several places absolute for- tresses ; and if M. Thiers' troops come in by the Bois and along the St. Honore quarter, they will so disgust those who are supposed' to be " the men of order," that probably more than half of them• will turn out and fight as desperately as any one. How this will be, no one can tell ; weeks ago several Versailles officers said that the three forts could be taken at any moment, but that it was no- use taking them till time/ were ready to go in and storm the place, and every one rather dreaded doing that.
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