Canon excerpts: Five Less, One More
In which Combeferre speechifies on the barricade.
AFTER the man of the people, who decreed "the protest of corpses," had spoken and given the formula of the common soul, from all lips arose a strangely satisfied and terrible cry, funereal in meaning and triumphant in tone:
"Long live death! Let us all stay!"
"Why all?" said Enjolras.
"All! all!" Enjolras resumed:
"The position is good, the barricade is fine. Thirty men are enough. Why sacrifice forty?"
They replied: "Because nobody wants to go away."
"Citizens," cried Enjolras, and there was in his voice almost an angry tremor, "the republic is not rich enough in men to incur useless expenditures. Vainglory is a squandering. If it is the duty of some to go away, that duty should be performed as well as any other."
Enjolras, the man of principle, had over his co-religionists that sort of omnipotence which emanates from the absolute. Still, notwithstanding this omnipotence, there was a murmur.
Chief to his finger-ends, Enjolras, seeing that they murmured, insisted. He resumed haughtily:
"Let those who fear to be one of but thirty, say so." The murmurs redoubled.
"Besides," observed a voice from one of the groups, "to go away is easily said. The barricade is hemmed in."
"Not towards the markets," said Enjolras. "The Rue Mondetour is open, and by the Rue des Precheurs one can reach the Marche des Innocents."
"And there," put in another voice from the group, "he will be taken. He will fall upon some grand guard of the line or the banlieue. They will see a man going by in cap and blouse. 'Where do you come from, fellow? you belong to the barricade, don't you?' And they look at your hands. You smell of powder. Shot."
Enjolras, without answering, touched Combeferre's shoulder, and they both went into the basement room.
They came back a moment afterwards. Enjolras held out in his hands the four uniforms which he had reserved. Combeferre followed him, bringing the cross belts and shakos.
"With this uniform," said Enjolras, "you can mingle with the ranks and escape. Here are enough for four." And he threw the four uniforms upon the unpaved ground.
No wavering in the stoical auditory. Combeferre spoke:
"Come," said he, "we must have a little pity. Do you know what the question is now? It is a question of women. Let us see. Are there any wives, yes or no? are there any children, yes or no? Are there, yes or no, any mothers, who rock the cradle with their foot and who have heaps of little ones about them? Let him among you who have never seen the breast of a nursing-woman hold up his hand. Ah! you wish to die, I wish it also, I, who am speaking to you, but I do not wish to feel the ghosts of women wringing their hands about me. Die so be it, but do not make others die. Suicides like those which will be accomplished here are sublime; but suicide is strict, and can have no extension; and as soon as it touches those next you, the name of suicide is murder. Think of the little flaxen heads, and think of the white hairs. Listen, but a moment ago, Enjolras, he just told me of it, saw at the corner of the Rue du Cygne a lighted casement, a candle in a poor window, in the fifth story, and on the glass the quivering shadow of the head of an old woman who appeared to have passed the night in watching and to be still waiting. She is perhaps the mother of one of you. Well, let that man go away, and let him hasten to say to his mother: 'Mother, here I am!' Let him feel at ease, the work here will be done just as well. When a man supports his relatives by his labour, he has no right to sacrifice himself. That is deserting his family. And those who have daughters, and those who have sisters! Do you think of it? You get killed, here you are dead, very well, and to-morrow? Young girls who have no bread, that is terrible. Man begs, woman sells. Ah! those charming beings, so graceful and so sweet, who have bonnets of flowers, who fill the house with chastity, who sing, who prattle, who are like a living perfume, who prove the existence of angels in heaven by the purity of maidens on the earth, that Jeanne, that Lise, that Mimi, those adorable and noble creatures who are your benediction and your pride, oh, God, they will be hungry! What would you have me say to you? There is a market for human flesh; and it is not with your shadowy hands, fluttering about them, that you can prevent them from entering it! Think of the street, think of the pavement covered with passers, think of the shops before which women walk to and fro with bare shoulders, through the mud. Those women also have been pure. Think of your sisters, those who have them. Misery, prostitution, the sergents de ville, Saint Lazare, such will be the fall of those delicate beautiful girls, those fragile wonders of modesty, grace, and beauty, fresher than the lilacs of the month of May. Ah! you are killed! ah! you are no longer with them! Very well you desired to deliver the people from monarchy, you give your maidens to the police. Friends, beware, have compassion. Women, hapless women, are not in the habit of reflecting much. We boast that women have not received the education of men, we prevent them from reading, we prevent them from thinking, we prevent them from interesting themselves in politics; will you prevent them from going tonight to the Morgue and identifying your corpses? Come, those who have families must be good fellows and give us a grasp of the hand and go away, and leave us to the business here all alone. I know well that it requires courage to go, it is difficult; but the more difficult it is, the more praiseworthy. You say: I have a musket, I am at the barricade, come the worst, I stay. Come the worst, that is very soon said. My friends, there is a morrow; you will not be here on that morrow, but your families will. And what suffering! See, a pretty, healthy child that has cheeks like an apple, that babbles, that prattles, that jabbers, that laughs, that smells sweet under the kiss, do you know what becomes of him when he is abandoned? I saw one, very small, no taller than that. His father was dead. Some poor people had taken him in from charity, but they had no bread for themselves. The child was always hungry. It was winter. He did not cry. They saw him go up to the stove where there was never any fire, and the pipe of which, you know, was plastered with yellow clay. The child picked off some of that clay with his little fingers and ate it. His breathing was hard, his face livid, his legs soft, his belly big.
He said nothing. They spoke to him, he did not answer. He died. He was brought to the Necker Hospital to die, where I saw him. I was surgeon at that hospital. Now, if there are any fathers among you, fathers whose delight it is to take a walk on Sunday holding in their great strong hand the little hand of their child, let each of those fathers imagine that that child is his own. That poor bird, I remember him well, it seems to me that I see him now, when he lay naked upon the dissecting table, his ribs projecting under his skin like graves under the grass of a churchyard. We found a kind of mud in his stomach. There were ashes in his teeth.
Come, let us search our conscience and take counsel with our hearts. Statistics show that the mortality of abandoned children is fifty-five per cent. I repeat it, it is a question of wives, it is a question of mothers, it is a question of young girls, it is a question of babes. Do I speak to you for yourselves? We know very well what you are; we know very well that you are all brave, good heavens! we know very well that your souls are filled with joy and glory at giving your life for the great cause; we know very well that you feel that you are elected to die usefully and magnificently, and that each of you clings to his share of the triumph. Well and good. But you are not alone in this world. There are other beings of whom we must think. We must not be selfish."
All bowed their heads with a gloomy air.
Strange contradictions of the human heart in its most sublime moments! Combeferre, who spoke thus, was not an orphan. He remembered the mothers of others, and he forgot his own. He was going to be killed. He was "selfish."
AFTER the man of the people, who decreed "the protest of corpses," had spoken and given the formula of the common soul, from all lips arose a strangely satisfied and terrible cry, funereal in meaning and triumphant in tone:
"Long live death! Let us all stay!"
"Why all?" said Enjolras.
"All! all!" Enjolras resumed:
"The position is good, the barricade is fine. Thirty men are enough. Why sacrifice forty?"
They replied: "Because nobody wants to go away."
"Citizens," cried Enjolras, and there was in his voice almost an angry tremor, "the republic is not rich enough in men to incur useless expenditures. Vainglory is a squandering. If it is the duty of some to go away, that duty should be performed as well as any other."
Enjolras, the man of principle, had over his co-religionists that sort of omnipotence which emanates from the absolute. Still, notwithstanding this omnipotence, there was a murmur.
Chief to his finger-ends, Enjolras, seeing that they murmured, insisted. He resumed haughtily:
"Let those who fear to be one of but thirty, say so." The murmurs redoubled.
"Besides," observed a voice from one of the groups, "to go away is easily said. The barricade is hemmed in."
"Not towards the markets," said Enjolras. "The Rue Mondetour is open, and by the Rue des Precheurs one can reach the Marche des Innocents."
"And there," put in another voice from the group, "he will be taken. He will fall upon some grand guard of the line or the banlieue. They will see a man going by in cap and blouse. 'Where do you come from, fellow? you belong to the barricade, don't you?' And they look at your hands. You smell of powder. Shot."
Enjolras, without answering, touched Combeferre's shoulder, and they both went into the basement room.
They came back a moment afterwards. Enjolras held out in his hands the four uniforms which he had reserved. Combeferre followed him, bringing the cross belts and shakos.
"With this uniform," said Enjolras, "you can mingle with the ranks and escape. Here are enough for four." And he threw the four uniforms upon the unpaved ground.
No wavering in the stoical auditory. Combeferre spoke:
"Come," said he, "we must have a little pity. Do you know what the question is now? It is a question of women. Let us see. Are there any wives, yes or no? are there any children, yes or no? Are there, yes or no, any mothers, who rock the cradle with their foot and who have heaps of little ones about them? Let him among you who have never seen the breast of a nursing-woman hold up his hand. Ah! you wish to die, I wish it also, I, who am speaking to you, but I do not wish to feel the ghosts of women wringing their hands about me. Die so be it, but do not make others die. Suicides like those which will be accomplished here are sublime; but suicide is strict, and can have no extension; and as soon as it touches those next you, the name of suicide is murder. Think of the little flaxen heads, and think of the white hairs. Listen, but a moment ago, Enjolras, he just told me of it, saw at the corner of the Rue du Cygne a lighted casement, a candle in a poor window, in the fifth story, and on the glass the quivering shadow of the head of an old woman who appeared to have passed the night in watching and to be still waiting. She is perhaps the mother of one of you. Well, let that man go away, and let him hasten to say to his mother: 'Mother, here I am!' Let him feel at ease, the work here will be done just as well. When a man supports his relatives by his labour, he has no right to sacrifice himself. That is deserting his family. And those who have daughters, and those who have sisters! Do you think of it? You get killed, here you are dead, very well, and to-morrow? Young girls who have no bread, that is terrible. Man begs, woman sells. Ah! those charming beings, so graceful and so sweet, who have bonnets of flowers, who fill the house with chastity, who sing, who prattle, who are like a living perfume, who prove the existence of angels in heaven by the purity of maidens on the earth, that Jeanne, that Lise, that Mimi, those adorable and noble creatures who are your benediction and your pride, oh, God, they will be hungry! What would you have me say to you? There is a market for human flesh; and it is not with your shadowy hands, fluttering about them, that you can prevent them from entering it! Think of the street, think of the pavement covered with passers, think of the shops before which women walk to and fro with bare shoulders, through the mud. Those women also have been pure. Think of your sisters, those who have them. Misery, prostitution, the sergents de ville, Saint Lazare, such will be the fall of those delicate beautiful girls, those fragile wonders of modesty, grace, and beauty, fresher than the lilacs of the month of May. Ah! you are killed! ah! you are no longer with them! Very well you desired to deliver the people from monarchy, you give your maidens to the police. Friends, beware, have compassion. Women, hapless women, are not in the habit of reflecting much. We boast that women have not received the education of men, we prevent them from reading, we prevent them from thinking, we prevent them from interesting themselves in politics; will you prevent them from going tonight to the Morgue and identifying your corpses? Come, those who have families must be good fellows and give us a grasp of the hand and go away, and leave us to the business here all alone. I know well that it requires courage to go, it is difficult; but the more difficult it is, the more praiseworthy. You say: I have a musket, I am at the barricade, come the worst, I stay. Come the worst, that is very soon said. My friends, there is a morrow; you will not be here on that morrow, but your families will. And what suffering! See, a pretty, healthy child that has cheeks like an apple, that babbles, that prattles, that jabbers, that laughs, that smells sweet under the kiss, do you know what becomes of him when he is abandoned? I saw one, very small, no taller than that. His father was dead. Some poor people had taken him in from charity, but they had no bread for themselves. The child was always hungry. It was winter. He did not cry. They saw him go up to the stove where there was never any fire, and the pipe of which, you know, was plastered with yellow clay. The child picked off some of that clay with his little fingers and ate it. His breathing was hard, his face livid, his legs soft, his belly big.
He said nothing. They spoke to him, he did not answer. He died. He was brought to the Necker Hospital to die, where I saw him. I was surgeon at that hospital. Now, if there are any fathers among you, fathers whose delight it is to take a walk on Sunday holding in their great strong hand the little hand of their child, let each of those fathers imagine that that child is his own. That poor bird, I remember him well, it seems to me that I see him now, when he lay naked upon the dissecting table, his ribs projecting under his skin like graves under the grass of a churchyard. We found a kind of mud in his stomach. There were ashes in his teeth.
Come, let us search our conscience and take counsel with our hearts. Statistics show that the mortality of abandoned children is fifty-five per cent. I repeat it, it is a question of wives, it is a question of mothers, it is a question of young girls, it is a question of babes. Do I speak to you for yourselves? We know very well what you are; we know very well that you are all brave, good heavens! we know very well that your souls are filled with joy and glory at giving your life for the great cause; we know very well that you feel that you are elected to die usefully and magnificently, and that each of you clings to his share of the triumph. Well and good. But you are not alone in this world. There are other beings of whom we must think. We must not be selfish."
All bowed their heads with a gloomy air.
Strange contradictions of the human heart in its most sublime moments! Combeferre, who spoke thus, was not an orphan. He remembered the mothers of others, and he forgot his own. He was going to be killed. He was "selfish."