BOOKS.

FRANCE OF TO-DAY.*

THERE is much that is attractive, interesting, and valuable in Miss Betham-Edwards's new book. It is intended to be a complete survey of France at the present time, a bird's-eye view, giving all the chief characteristics of each part of the country, as mapped out into convenient sections for a journey from Paris. Thus we are by turns carried east, west, north, and south, and are given all the results of the writer's careful personal observation, and of the information she has gained in the course of her various tours. The survey is also " re- trospective," the book being written to the glory of the Third Republic, with the object of pointing out all the astonishing progress of the present day, and of contrasting the state of France now with its state under former Governments, and of course before the great Revolution, "the pole-star of modern universal history."

Those who share, though from a different standpoint, in Miss Betham-Edwards's sincere love for France, will feel that it almost disarms criticism. But the book raises for them many questions, and a feeling of surprised disappointment, however well aware they may have been of the author's bias, both religious and political. It is really startling that a writer capable of such wide and deep study, such enthusiasm for beauty in all its forms, should commit herself to the narrow, one-sided views, the prejudices, the contradictions,

Edwards, Author of "The Roof of France," &c. 2 vote. Vol. L London :

which are to be found in her present work. To judge by her expressions, one would think that nothing good in France, no glory, no greatness, no pleasantness of life above all, existed before the days of the present Republic, flower-gardens at railway-stations, " museums, picture-galleries, and industrial exhibitions." We are given to understand, on the same page with the description of the town of Nevers, that all the beauty of French towns is owing to the Revolution. Then we hear of the "deep, rich bells of the Cathedral terraced city, ancient and modern, Cathedral tower, and vast many-buttressed nave surmounting both." We admit all the beauty and the charm, brilliancy of atmosphere, " combined majesty and graciousness of outline,"—but we do not feel in- clined to thank the Revolution for the beauty of Nevers, or of any other French town. The Revolution did not build the Cathedrals, and certainly her doctrines are not preached by the sound of their bells. The same inconsistent thought shows itself in ascribing joyfully to Angers "material pro- gress worthy of Chicago," and adding that of late years it has been " Haussmannised within an inch of its ruin." There is an old proverb which says that we cannot eat our cake and have it.• If we find it necessary to be enthusiastic about material progress of a modern, American sort, and to consider it the only thing worth a nation's living for, we must give up this lingering love of spiritual beauty, of that atmo- sphere, not yet quite lost to France, through which breathes the mysterious influence of old religion and of a civilisation which had something to say for itself, though it may have lacked Japanese cabinets, carpets and curtains, and bedrooms that "might have been fitted up by an upholsterer of Totten- ham Court Road."

Owing to all the variations of race, of soil, of climate, to be found in France, the well-being of the people of different departments is almost as unequal now as in the days of La Bruyere, whose terrible description, exaggerated for effect, of the peasants in one very poor neighbourhood, has been such a fine text for uncritical admirers of the Revolution. We know now that even in those days, and in spite of all their unfair burdens, the peasants in many parts were well fed, well clothed, and happy, though careful to hide their possessions from the eyes of the tax-gatherer. Rousseau, for instance, tells a curious story of that kind from his own experience. The prosperity of the peasants under the Third Republic, though it varies a good deal more, we think, than Miss Betham-Ed wards will allow, is no doubt comparatively on a very high level, and, as she many times points out, is the strong backbone of France. M. Zola's picture, as we might expect, fills her with indignation. Here she is probably right ; but on her side she goes considerably too far in the way of idealism. It is a relief to the reader to meet with the con- cession that " perhaps over-carefulness about money and a superabundance of wealth materialise the French character." This is so certain and so true, that it spoils most of one's plea- sure in studying the great material progress of France under the present regime. The rulers of France, if the peasants are to be called so, are people of a keen, narrow intelligence, of calcu- lating minds—still, however, capable of sordid suspiciousness and ignorant heathen superstition—and of a low moral ideal. The pleasant manners and respectable lives of many among them are not enough to disprove these statements. They are a generation of materialists, steadily, logically, and success- fully devoted to their religion, the worship of money. Their strong instinct of self-preservation can hardly be called patriotism. No one doubts the " unerring common-sense " of " the homely yet dignified figure in blue blouse ; " but be in his millions, with his undeniable virtues and attractions, is not an elevating subject for study, though the dead-weight of him may ensure the triumph of the Republic and the peace of France.

As was to be expected, the Catholic Church in France fares badly in Miss Betham-Edwards's hands ; in fact, she attempts to lay on it the blame of peasant materialism—the result of which, however, she admires, so that the Church's supposed sin ought not to seem to her so black ! One can only say that before the Revolution the peasants were Christiana, and that the influences which have reigned more lately have left most of them without any religion at all. A writer who knows France well, and has studied her society thoroughly, having left no class out of view, remarks that if French society " has not yet broken up, it is because France is still living on the remains of her old capital, on the Christian education of children, the Christian devotion of religious women, and the Christian resignation of the poor." However, in these matters of religion, Miss Betham-Edwards is not quite able to go the whole length with those minds—logical, as French minds generally are—which find no half-way house between the Catholic Church and materialism. She would, if she could, see a future for France in Protestantism. This, again, makes great demands on her idealising power, for she is obliged to confess, " as a rule, I have found the Reformed Church somewhat inadequate and lukewarm in country- places." But she rejoices over the department of the Gard,

which- " Offers an anomaly pleasing to English observers and Pro- gressists generally. Here and here alone through the length and breadth of France are found villages without a Catholic- church."

A few more departments so exceptional as the Gard, we are told, would be the saving of France. No intolerance, no superstition : Protestantism, intelligence, progress, go hand- in-hand. With regard to this, however, we come on more of those contradictions before noticed. A few pages later, we- read of these Protestant " progressists : "— " These worthy country-folks stick to their prejudices tena- ciously as their forefathers to Protestantism. As soon persuade FL nineteenth-century Huguenot of the Cevennes to worship the Virgin, as try a steam thrashing-machine ! For nearly a quarter of a century the peasant-farmers of Quissac and its environs have had before their eyes the most enlightened agricultural methods year after year, object-lessons by which one might suppose the least enterprising would alertly profit. But no such thing !"

No: Protestantism may have its advantages, but it has nothing in the world to do with intelligence. Also, if it was worth while to represent conversions to Protestantism as occurring frequently in France, it would have been worth while to give a more creditable instance than that, quoted from the Daily News in the note on p. 360, of the wholesale con- version of the commune of Murat. This appears to have taken place for no better reason than because the commune quarrelled with the Bishop of Cahore, and refused to get up early to go- to mass.

It will thus be seen that the value of the book is seriously affected by religious prejudice. And we are further justified in saying this by the language in which the writer allows herself to describe Lourdes, for instance, and almost every other development of the Roman Catholic religion, or institu- tion depending on it. In fact, her tone with regard to these subjects quite does away with the impartiality which one naturally wants and expects in a bird's-eye view such as this.

She takes no trouble to understand one great section of the French people. Treating them with scorn as " reactionaries," she can hardly bring herself to be barely civil to those who, after all, represent a France that has not yet ceased to exist, and who are themselves, we may venture to say, the salt of France as she is now, and her only defence against being swal- lowed up completely by a low, money-grubbing materialism. Mies Betham-Edwards is inclined to credit French Catholics,. most unjustly, with the souls of persecutors. One feels that in her mind these good and gentle women brought up in con- vents, these men who have kept their faith in spite of the times, almost deserve the same kind of language that she bestows on poor Madame de Maintenon. It can hardly be called parliamentary. For instance :-

" The prude whose virtue caused more mischief than the vices

of all the Montespans and Dubarrys put together veritable fury, carrying fire and sword wherever she went, her path marked by tears, bloodshed, and ruin."

One or two other points show that Miss Betham-Edwards is not very well acquainted with that side of society in France which she finds it so difficult to tolerate. There is something

naïf in such a remark as this :—

" I oncetook steps to place a young English Jewess as governess in France, but found that none excepting Protestants would receive her." (!) (Protestants, by-the-bye, who did not care much about the religious opinions of their children.) Miss Betham-Edwards found no friendly intercourse between the peasants and the rich Catholic bourgeois, " notaries, advocates, and others,

all landowners and country gentlemen in a certain sense ; " and she notes "the fact that when I did find the peasants living on sociable terms with their richer neighbours, those neighbours were Liberals in the fullest sense of the word." If she had looked a little further, a little deeper,

she would have found in old Catholic and Royalist families, scattered all over France in many a eliciteau, the kindest feeling, the readiest benevolence, towards peasant neighbours, only checked, and this too often, by the sordid, ungracious, envious spirit which " progress " has set so strongly growing among the peasants themselves. The mutual dislike of bour- geois and peasant is a very old story ; but even before the Revolution, as many witnesses have told us, noble and peasant were on friendly terms together.

We have one more criticism to make ; and that is on the astonishing statement that the village school in France "could not be said to exist" before the Revolution, and that if it did, "writing, reading, arithmetic; and the teaching of French were deemed unnecessary." We can only refer to M. Albert Babeau's book on the subject, which proves that village schools in France were both many and good before the Revo- lution, according to the ideas of the time. There was not so very much difference in the number of those who could read and write before the Revolution and in the year 1866, when Miss Betham-Edwards herself states that " 35 per cent. of the entire population of France could neither read nor write." In 1780, according to M. Babeau, 47 per cent. could read and write in the Aube, an average part of France, and in Paris there was hardly any one who could not read. The lowest depth of national ignorance was reached in the days of the Directoire. Of course the strides made in the last twenty years have been enormous, and the credit of them is due to the Republic. There is no lack of knowledge in France now. Miss Betham-Edwards, however, might have spared us sundry unkind remarks on the village voluntary schools which are still here and there taught by Sisters, and also the statement, which, if true in one instance, is far from being generally so, that in these schools the girls receive as prizes " dry theological treatises, lives of saints, expositions of the sacra- ments, and so on, the only attraction being a gaudy cover." In July last year, the present writer saw the prizes which were to be given in one of these schools. Their covers certainly were gaudy ; but their inside was equally cheerful, consisting of stories of all kinds. And after all, the life of a saint might be quite as appropriate a prize as Lord Lytton's Pelham, for instance, which was given in an English National school the other day.

We have pointed out our disagreements with Miss Betham- Edwards the more frankly, because below all the criticism lies sincere though disappointed admiration. If only, with all her great stores of information and descriptive power, she could take a higher and wider view, her books would gain tenfold in • interest and value. And as it is, we frequently follow her with great pleasure and real profit, enjoying her appreciation of one of the greatest and most charming countries in the world, sharing her sympathy in its troubles, and with certain variations, her hopes for its future. We look forward to the second volume of a very remarkable though sometimes irri- tating book.