| 4 Febr. 1871.
Dear Paul,
Il
faut créer des nouveaux défenseurs à la France. You and
Laura
seem seriously and successfully
engaged in that
patriotic
business. The whole
family was delighted to hear
that our dear Laura has
passed victoriously through the critical juncture
and we hope the progress will prove no less
favourable.
Embrace little
Schnappy
on my part and tell him that Old Nick
feels highly elated at the two photogramms of his successor. In the “serious”
copy the stern qualities of the little man protrude, while in his attitude as
franc-fileur there is a charming expression of humor and
espièglerie.
You know my low opinion of
middleclass heroes. Still,
Jules Favre
et Co
have contrived to surpass my worst anticipations. When
Trochu
had carried out his mysterious “plan”, that is to say,
when
that
“sabre
orthodoxe”, that “crétin
militäire”
had
pushed the
passive
resistance of Paris to that point
where there remained only the alternative of starvation or capitulation—Jules
Favre and Co. might have followed the precedent of
the
Governor of Toul
. When
his power of resistance had altogether broken down, he did not
capitulate
. He simply informed the Prussians of the real
state of things, declared that he could not any longer go on with the defence,
being deprived of provisions, and that they might now do as they liked. He made
them no consession at all. He simply recogni
s
(?)
ed
a fait 
| ac
c
ompli
. Favre et Co., on the contrary,
not only sign a formal capitulation. They have impudence to act on behalf
of all France,
although
xx
in
complete ignorance of the state of affairs
en-dehors
de Paris
, in regard to which they were strictly confined to the
dishinterested information
Bismarck
condescended to vouchsave them.
Moreover, having capitulated, having become Messieurs les prisonniers du
roi de Prusse
, they go further and
declare that the Bordelais delegation has lost its power and must only act in
union with “Messieurs les prisonniers du roi de Prusse”. Why, even
Louis Bonaparte
, after his capitulation and
surrender at Sedan, declared to Bismarck he could enter into no
negociations
with him, because he had ceased to be a
free agent, and because, by the very fact of his being a
Prussian prisoner
, he had ceased to hold any authority over France!
Thus even L. Bonaparte was
less shameless than Favre et Co! The only condition which Favre could have
accepted
conditionally,
that is to say under the reserve
of his act being assented to by the Bordelais delegation, was the
armistice
. Yet to settle the
terms of
that armistice
he must have left to the men who were not prisoners of
le roi de Prusse
. They would certainly
not
have
allowed the Prussians to exclude from
that armistice the
Eastern theatre of war
, and would not
have allowed the Prussians to improve, on the plea of the armistice, the whole
outlines of their military occupation, rounding it off in the way most
profitable to themselves.
| Embolded by the
dastardly
servilism of the Paris delegation who presume to participate in the government
of France, after having become Messieurs les capitulards et les prisonniers du
roi de Prusse
,
Bismarck
considers himself and acts
already
as the
de facto
g
xxxxxx
(?)
supreme authority in France. He
protests
against
Gambetta
’s decree
relating to the general elections as interfering with their “liberty”. He
dictates the terms on which the general assembly ought to be chosen. Why!
Gambetta
might reply by
protesting
against the conditions under which at this
very moment the
general elections for the Reichstag
are
carried on
in Germany
. He might insist that to render
these elections
free
. Bismarck ought above all things to
abolish or at least to suspend
the state of siege
maintained through great part of Prussia. To give you one instance of the
liberty
of election in Germany. At
Frankfurt
(on the
Maine
Mein
)
a workman’s candidate
(not residing in
Frankfort
) is proposed and opens his electoral
campaign in that town. What do the Prussian authorities resort to? To the
expulsion of that candidate from Frankfort by the police force!
I hope that the Prussians
will insist on their modest demand of 400 millions of £. sterl. war contribution
by France! This
will
may
rouse
even the French middleclass
wh
o
will
(?)
whose
manoeuvres
,
together with the intrigues of
the
local
administration (which
Gambetta
has allowed to a great part to rest in
the hands of Bonapartists, Orleanists etc) are the true
xxx
(?)
key to the
till now
reverses
of the
present
war. Even the middleclass may at last
become aware that they will lose more by giving in than by fighting!
| At the same time, if
France holds still out for same time, the Foreign relations will become much
more favourable to her cause.
In England the
Gladstone
ministry is seriously endangered. It may
have
soon be kicked out. The public opinion here
is now again
warlike
to the highest degree. This change
has been worked by Prussia’s demands, mainly by her asking
Pondichery
(?)
and the 20
firstrate
French men-of-war.
John Bull
sees in this a
menace against England and a Russian intrigue (and these demands have indeed
been
suggested
to Prussia by the St. Petersburgh cabinet).
In Russia itself a great
change seems imminent. Since the assumption of the Imperial title by the
king of Prussia
, the anti-German party,
the so-called Muscovite party, led by the
prince
successor
, has again got the upperhand. It is very probable that
the
present emperor
will either have to
accept its dictates and a consequent change of his foreign policy, or that he
will share the fate of his predeccessors and by some means or other released of
his “mortal body”. If such a convulsion in Russia takes place, Prussia, whose
frontiers on the Russian and Austrian
be
(?)
sides, are quite
denuded of troops, guite exposed and defenceless, will prove unable to keep up
her present forces in France. She will at once lower her tone and become quite
traitable.
Hence, if France holds out,
if she improves the armistice to repair her forces, if she understands at last
that inorder to carry on a revolutionary war, revolutionary measures and
revolutionary energy are wanted, she may still be saved.
Bismarck
knows perfectly that he is in a
fix. He hopes to get out of it by “bullying”. He confides in the cooperation of
all reactionary elements of France.
Yours
Old Nick.
P. S. The master who now employs
Dupont
,
has received a letter from a house at Bordeaux which wants an agent at
Manchester. Behind the back of his master—a most infamous and brutal
parvenu—Dupont would like to ascertain whether
he
could get that agency. He therefore requests you to obtain
the
(?)
information about this point. The address of the
house in question is:
Labadie et Co.
(Vins
et esprits) Rue des terres de Bordes. Bordeaux.
What is
Prudhomme
doing? Has his health improved?