Paris in the Twentieth Century (10 page)

At
this moment the doorbell rang. Quinsonnas opened the door and announced his
friend Jacques Aubanet, an employee of the General Corporation of Maritime
Mines. Michel and Jacques were introduced to each other in the simplest manner
possible.

Jacques
Aubanet, a handsome young man of twenty-five, was a close friend of Quinsonnas,
and like him reduced in circumstances. Michel had no idea what kind of work the
employees of the Corporation of Maritime Mines might do; certainly Jacques
brought with him a remarkable appetite.

Fortunately
dinner was ready; the three young men
devoured:
after
the initial moments of this struggle with comestibles, a few words managed to
make their way through the less expeditive mouthfuls. "My dear Jacques,
" Quinsonnas observed, "by introducing you to Michel Dufrénoy I
allowed you to make the acquaintance of a young friend who is one of us— one of
those poor devils Society refuses to employ according to their talents, one of
those drones whose useless mouths Society padlocks in order not to have to
feed!"

"Ah!
Monsieur Dufrénoy is a dreamer, " Jacques replied.

"A
poet, my friend! and I wonder what in the world he can be doing here in Paris,
where a man's first duty is to make money!"

"Obviously
enough, " Jacques replied, "he's landed on the wrong planet. "

"My
friends, " said Michel, "you're anything but encouraging, but I shall
take your exaggerations into account. "

"This
dear child, " Quinsonnas replied, "he hopes, he works, he loves good
books, and when Hugo, Musset, and Lamartine are no longer read, he hopes someone
will still read
him!
But what have you done, wretch that
you are—have you invented a utilitarian poetry, a literature to replace
compressed air or power brakes? No? Well then! Gnaw your own vitals, my son! If
you don't have something sensational to tell, who will listen to you? Art is no
longer possible unless it produces a tour de force! These days, Hugo would have
to recite his
Orientates
straddling two
circus horses, and Lamartine would perform his
Harmonies
upside
down from a trapeze!"

"Nonsense,
" exclaimed Michel, leaping up in indignation.

"Calm
down, child, " the pianist replied. "Just ask Jacques whether I'm
right or not. "

"A
hundred times over, " Jacques opined. "This world is nothing more
than a market, an immense fairground, and you must entertain your clients with
the talents of a mountebank. "

"Poor
Michel, " Quinsonnas continued with a sigh, "his Latin verse prize
will turn his head!"

"What
will you prove by that?" demanded the young man.

"Nothing,
my son! After all, you're following your destiny. You're a great poet! I've
seen some of your works; only you'll allow me to remark that they're hardly
suited to the taste of the age. "

"Which
means?"

"Which
means that you deal with poetical subjects, and nowadays that's a poetical
fault! You sing of mountains and valleys, fields and clouds, love and the
stars—all those worn-out things no one wants anymore!"

"Then
what should I sing?"

"Your
verses must celebrate the wonders of industry!"

"Never!"
Michel exclaimed.

"Well
put, " Jacques observed.

"For
instance, " Quinsonnas continued, "have you heard the ode that was
given first prize by the forty de Broglies cluttering up the Acad
é
mie-Française?"
"No!"

"Well
then, listen and learn. Here are the two last stanzas:

And
coal was shoveled into blazing fires:

Through
glowing tubes the pressure it requires

Is
driven to the monster's heart; it pumps

In
pulsing fury and in frenzy thumps

Till,
bellowing, it emulates the forces

of
eighty horses!

Now
with his heavy bars, the engineer

Opens
the valves! Within the cylinder

The
double piston runs! The wheel has slipped

Its
cog! The roaring engine's speed is up!

The
whistle blows!... Hail to the Crampton System:

the
locomotive runs!

"Dreadful!"
Michel exclaimed.

"Some
nice rhymes, " Jacques observed.

"There
you are, my boy, " continued the pitiless Quinsonnas. "May heaven
keep you from being forced to live by your talent! Better follow the example of
those of us who recognize the present state of affairs for what it is, at least
until better days. "

"Is
Monsieur Jacques, " inquired Michel, "similarly obliged to ply some
rebarbative trade?"

"Jacques
is a shipping clerk in an industrial company, " Quinsonnas explained,
"which does not mean, to his great regret, that he has ever seen the
inside of a ship. "

"What
does it mean?" asked Michel.

"It
means, " Jacques replied, "that I'd have liked to be a soldier.
"

"A
soldier!" Michel betrayed his astonishment.

"Yes,
a soldier. A noble profession in which, barely fifty years ago, you could earn
an honest living!"

"Unless
you lost it even more honestly, " Quinsonnas added. "Well, it's over
and done with as a career, since there's no more army—unless you become a policeman.
In other times, Jacques would have entered some military academy, or joined up,
and there, after a life of battle, he would have become a general like a
Turenne, or an emperor like a Bonaparte! But nowadays, my handsome officer,
you'll have to give that all up. "

"Oh,
you never know!" said Jacques. "It's true that France, England,
Russia, and Italy have dismissed their soldiers; during the last century the
engines of warfare were perfected to such a degree that the whole thing had
become ridiculous—France couldn't help laughing—"

"And
having laughed, " Quinsonnas put in, "she disarmed. "

"Yes,
you joker! I grant you that with the exception of old Austria, the European
peoples have done away with the military state. But for all that, have they
done away with the spirit of battle natural to human beings, and the spirit of
conquest natural to governments?"

"Probably,
" remarked the musician.

"And
why?"

"Because
the best reason those instincts had for existing was the possibility of
satisfying them! Because nothing suggests battle so much as an armed peace, according
to the old expression! Because if you do away with painters there's no more
painting, sculptors, no more sculpture, musicians, no more music, and if you do
away with warriors—no more wars! Soldiers are artists. "

"Yes,
of course!" Michel exclaimed, "and rather than do the awful work I
do, I ought to join up. "

"Ah,
you fell for it, baby!" Quinsonnas crowed. "Is there any possibility
that you'd like to fight?"

"Fighting
ennobles the soul, " Michel replied, "at least according to Stendhal,
one of the great thinkers of the last century."

"Yes,
it does, " the pianist agreed, but added, "How much brains does it
take to give a good thrust with a saber?"

"A
lot, if you're going to do it right, " Jacques answered.

"And
even more, if you're going to receive the thrust, " Quinsonnas retorted.
"My word, my friends, it's likely you're right, from a certain point of
view. Perhaps I'd be inclined to make you a soldier, if there was still an
army; with a little philosophy, it's a fine career. But nowadays, since the
Champs-de-Mars has been turned into a school, we must give up fighting. "

"We'll
go back to it, " said Jacques; "one fine day, some unexpected
complication will arise..."

"I
don't think so, my brave friend, for our bellicose notions are fading away,
and with them our honorable ideas.... In France in the old days, men were
afraid of ridicule, but do you think such a thing as a point of honor still
exists? There are no duels fought nowadays; the fashion is past; we either
compromise or we sue; now, if we no longer fight for honor's sake, why should
we do it for politics? If individuals no longer take sword in hand, why should
governments pull them from the scabbards? Battles were never more numerous than
in the days of duels, and if there are no more duelists, then there are no more
soldiers. "

"Oh,
new ones will be born, " Jacques declared.

"I
doubt it, since the links of commerce are drawing nations ever closer
together! The British, the Russians, the Americans all have their banknotes,
their rubles, their dollars invested in our commercial enterprises. Isn't
money the enemy of the bullet? Hasn't the cotton bale replaced the cannonball?
Just think, Jacques! Aren't the British enjoying a privilege they deny us, and
gradually becoming the great landowners of France? They possess enormous
territories, almost
d
é
partements
now,
not conquered but bought, which is a lot more permanent! No one realized what
was happening, we just let it happen, and soon these foreigners will own our
entire country, and that's when they'll take their revenge on William the
Conqueror!"

"My
dear fellow, " Jacques replied, "remember this, and you too, young
man, listen to what I say, for it's the century's profession of faith: With
Montaigne and maybe Rabelais it was What Do I Know? In the nineteenth century
it was What Does It Matter to Me? And nowadays we say: How Much Does It Earn?
Well, the day a war earns as much as an industrial investment, then there'll
be wars. "

"Good!
War has never earned anything, especially for France. "

"Because
we fought for honor and not for money, " Jacques replied.

"So
you believe in an army of intrepid businessmen?"

"Of
course. Look at the Americans in their dreadful War of Secession. "

"Well,
my friend, an army that fights for a financial motive will no longer be
composed of soldiers, but of looters and thieves!"

"All
the same, such an army will accomplish wonders. "

"Thieving
wonders, " Quinsonnas put in. And the three young men burst out laughing.
"To conclude, " resumed the pianist, "here we have Michel, a
poet, and Jacques, a soldier, and Quinsonnas, a musician, and this at a moment
when our country no longer has music, or poetry, or an army! We are, quite
obviously, stupid, all three of us. But at least the meal is over—it was quite
substantial, at least in conversation. Let's proceed with other exercises.
" The table, once cleared, returned to its slots and grooves, and the
piano resumed the place of honor.