I do? I am a steward, not a keeper. You want three for-
esters and a mounted patrol to look after the Aigues."
THE PEASANTRY 129
"We will defend ourselves. If war it is to be, we will fight.
That does not frighten me," said Montcornet, rubbing his
hands.
"It is a money war/' said Sibilet, "and that will seem
harder to you than the other kind. You can kill men, but
there is no killing men's interests. You will fight it out on
a battlefield where all landowners' must fight called realiza-
tion. It is nothing to grow this and that ; you must sell your
produce; and if you mean to sell it, you must keep on good
terms with everybody."
"I shall have the country people on my side."
"How so ?" queried Sibilet.
"By treating them kindly."
"Treat the peasants kindly and the townspeople at Sou-
langes !" cried Sibilet, squinting hideously, for one eye seemed
to gleam more than the other with the irony in his words.
"You do not know, sir, what you are setting about. Our Lord
Jesus Christ would be crucified there a second time. If you
want a quiet life, M. le Comte, do as the late Mile. Laguerre
did and let them rob you, or else strike terror into them.
The people, women and children, are all governed in the same
way by terror. That was the grand secret of the Convention
and of the Emperor."
"Oh, come now ! have we fallen among thieves here ?" cried
Montcornet.
Adeline came out to them.
"Your breakfast is waiting, dear," she said to Sibilet. "I
beg your pardon, M. le Comte, but he has had nothing this
morning, and he has been as far as Eonquerolles with some
corn."
"Go, by all means, Sibilet."
Montcornet was up and out before day next morning. He
chose to return by the Avonne gate to have a chat with his
one forester, and to sound the man's disposition.
Some seven or eight acres of forest lay beside the Avonne;
a fringe of tall forest trees had been left along the bank on
130 THE PEASANTRY
either side, that a river which flowed almost in a straight line
foi three leagues might preserve its stately character.
The Aigues had once belonged to a mistress of Henri IV.,
who loved the chase as passionately as the Bearnais. It was
she who built, in 1793, the steep, single-span bridge over the
Avonne to cross over to the much larger forest purchased for
her on the other side of the* river. The Avonne gate had been
built at the same time as a rendezvous for the hunt, and every
one knows that architects in those times lavished all magnifi-
cence upon edifices reared for this greatest pleasure of kings
and princes. Six avenues met before it in a semicircular
space, and in the centre of the crescent rose an obelisk sur-
mounted by a sun once gilded, with the arms of Navarre on
the one side, and those of the Comtesse de Moret on the
other.
A corresponding crescent-shaped space by the Avonne com-
municated with the first by a broad, straight walk, whence
you saw the angular crown of the Venetian-looking bridge.
Between two handsome iron railings (resembling the mag-
nificent ironwork which used to surround the Jardin de la
Place Koyale in Paris, now, alas! destroyed) stood a hunting-
lodge built of brick, with stone string courses of the same
depressed-pyramid pattern as at the chateau, stone facings
likewise ornamented, and a high-pitched roof.
This bygone style, that gave the house the look of a royal
hunting-lodge, is only suitable in towns for prisons, but here
the background of forest trees set off its peculiarly grandiose
character. The kennels, pheasant-houses, and the old quar-
ters of falconers and prickers were screened by a blind wall.
The place had once been the pride of Burgundy; row it lay
almost in ruins.
In 1595 a royal train set out from that princely hunting-
lodge, preceded by the great hounds beloved of Eubens and
Paul Veronese; the horses that pawed the ground are now
only seen in Wouvermans' wonderful pictures mighty white
beasts with a bluish shade on the heavy plo^y hindquarters.
After these followed footmen in gorgeous array, and the fore-
THE PEASANTRY 131
ground was enlivened by the huntsmen in yellow breeches
and high topboots who fill Van de Meulen's great canvases.
The stone obelisk was reared to commemorate that day when
the Bearnais went hunting with the beautiful Comtesse de
Moret, and bore the date beneath the arms of Navarre.
Navarre, not France ; for the jealous mistress, whose son was
declared to be a prince of the blood, could not endure that the
arms of France should meet her eyes to reproach her.
But in 1823, when the General saw the splendid monument,
the roof was green with moss on every side. The octagonal
glass panes were dropping out of the loosened leads, the win-
dows looked half-blind. The stones of the weather-worn
string-courses seemed to cry out, with countless gaping
mouths, against such desecration. Yellow wallflowers blos-
somed among the balusters; the ivy stems slipped pale down-
covered claws into every cranny.
Everything spoke of a mean neglect. Selfishness, regard-
less of those who come after it, leaves its stamp on all its
present possessions. Two -windows above were stopped up
with hay; one window on the ground floor gave a glimpse of
a room full of tools and firewood, and a cow's muzzle thrust
from another informed the beholder that, to save himself
the trouble of going to and fro between the pheasant-house
and the lodge, Courtecuisse had made a cowhouse of the great
hall, where the armorial bearings of every owner of the Aigues
were painted on the paneled ceiling.
The whole approach to the house was disfigured by a col-
lection of dirty black palings marking the limits of pig-sties
roofed with planks, and little square pens for poultry and
ducks. Every six months the accumulated filth was cleared
away. Sundry rags were drying on the brambles, which had
thrust themselves up here and there.
As the General came up the avenue from the bridge, he
saw Courtecuisse's wife scouring the earthen pipkin in which
she had just made coffee. The keeper himself was sitting on
a chair in the sun looking on, much as a savage might watch
132 THE PEASANTRY
his squaw. He turned his head at the sound of footsteps,
saw the Count his master, and looked fooli-sli.
"Well, Courtecuisse, my boy, I don't wonder that some one
else cuts down my wood before the Messrs. Gravelot can get
it. Do you take your place for a sinecure ?"
"Upon my word, M. le Comte, I have been out in your
woods for so many nights that I have got a chill. I was feel-
ing so bad this morning that my wife has been warming a
poultice for me ; she is cleaning the pipkin now/'
"My good fellow," remarked the General, "I only know of
one complaint which needs poulticing with hot coffee, and
that is hunger. Listen, you rogue ! Yesterday I went
through the woods belonging to Messrs, de Ronquerolles and
de Soulanges, and then through my own. Theirs are properly
looked after, and mine is in a pitiable state/'
"Ah ! M. le Comte, they have been here this ever so long,
they have; people let them alone. Would you have me fight
with half-a-dozen communes? I value my life even more
than your woods. Any man who tried to look after your
woods properly would get a bullet .through his head by way of
wages in some corner of the forest/'
"Coward!" cried the General, choking down the wrath
kindled by Courtecuisse's insolence. "It has been a splendid
night, but it has cost me three hundred francs at this mo-
ment, and a thousand francs in claims for damages to come.
Things must be done differently, or you shall go out of this.
All past offences should be forgiven. Here are my condition- :
you shall have all the fines and three francs for each convic-
tion. If I do not find that this plan pays me better, you shall
go about your business ; while if you serve me well, and man-
age to put down the pilfering, you shall have a hundred
crowns a year. Think it over. Here are six ways," he went
on, pointing to the alleys, "like me, you must take one; I
am not afraid of bullets. Try to find the right one."
Courtecuisse, forty-six years of age, a short man with a
full-moon countenance, dearly loved to do nothing. He rerk-
oned upon spending the rest of his days in the hunting lodge
THE PEASANTEY 133
his lodge. His two cows grazed in the forest, he had fuel
for his needs; he worked in his garden instead of running
about after delinquents. His neglect of his duties suited
Gaubertin, and Courtecuisse and Gaubertin understood each
other. So he never harassed the wood-stealers except to
gratify his own petty hatreds. He persecuted girls who would
not accede to his wishes, and people whom he disliked; but
it was a long while now since he had borne any one a grudge,
his easy ways had won popularity for him.
At the Grand-I-Vert a knife and fork was always set for
Courtecuisse, the faggot-stealers were no longer recalcitrant.
Both he and his wife received tribute in kind from the ma-
rauders. This wood was stacked for him, his vines were lay-
ered and pruned. He had vassals and tributaries in all the
delinquents, in fact.
Almost reassured as he had been as to his future by the
words that Gaubertin let fall about those two acres to be his
when the Aigues should be sold, he was rudely awakened from
his dream by the General's dry remarks. After four years he
stood revealed at last; the nature of the bourgeois had come
out ; he was determined to be cheated no longer. Courtecuisse
took up his cap, his game-bag and gun, put on his gaiters,
his belt stamped with the brand-new arms of Montcornet, and
went forth to Yille-aux-Fayes, with the careless gait which
hides the countryman's deepest thoughts. He looked along
the woods as he went and whistled to his dogs.
"You complain of the Upholsterer," said Gaubertin, when
Courtecuisse had told his tale ; "why, your fortune is made !
What ! the ninny is giving you three francs for each prose-
cution and all the fines into the bargain, is he? If you can
come to an understanding with your friends, he can have
them, and as many as he likes. Prosecutions ! let them have
them by the hundred. When you have a thousand francs,
you will be able to buy the Bachelerie, Rigoii's farm; you
can be your own master and work on your own land, or rather,
you can live at ease and set others to work. Only, mind this,
you must arrange to prosecute nobody but those who are as
134 , THE PEASANTRY
poor as Job. You cannot shear those that have no wool. Take
the Upholsterer's offer; let him pile up costs for himself if
lie has a liking for them. Tastes differ, and it takes all sorts
to make a world. There was old Mariotte, in spite of all I
could say, he liked losses better than profits."
Courtecuisse went home again, profoundly impressed by
Gaubertin's wisdom and consumed with a desire to have a bit
of land for himself and to be a master like the rest at last.
General Montcornet likewise returned, and on his way gave
Sibilet on account of his expedition.
"Quite right, quite right, M. le Comte," said the steward,
rubbing his hands, "but there must be no stopping short now
you are on the right track. The rural policeman who allowed
the spoliation to go on in our fields ought to be changed. It
would be easy for M. le Comte to obtain the appointment of
mayor of the commune, and to put some one else in Vau-
doyer's place some old soldier who would not be afraid to
carry out orders. A great landowner should be master on his
own property; and see what trouble we have with the present
mayor !"
The mayor of the commune of Blangy, one Eigou, had been
a Benedictine monk, but in the year 1 of the Kepublic he
had married the servant-maid of the late cure of Blangy. A
married monk was not likely to find much favor at the pre-
fecture after the Eestoration, but there was no one else to
fill his post, and in 1815 Eigou was still mayor of Blangy.
In 1817, however, the bishop had sent the Abbe Brossette to
act as officiating priest of the parish. Blangy had done with-
out a priest for twenty-five years, and, not unnaturally, a vio-
lent feud broke out between the apostate and the young
churchman whose character has been previously sketched.
People had looked down upon Eigou, but the war between
the mayor and the parson brought the former popularity.
Eigou had Been hated by the peasants for his usurious
schemes, but now he was suddenly identified with their inter-
ests, political and financial, which were threatened (as they
imagined) by the Eestoration and the clergy.
THE PEASANTRY 135
Socquard of the Cafe de la Paix was the nominal subscriber
to the Constitutlonnel, the principal Liberal paper, but all the
local functionaries joined in the subscription, and the journal
circulated through a score of hands after it left the Cafe till,
at the end of the week, it came to Eigou, who passed it on to
Langlume, the miller, who gave the tattered fragments to
any one who could read. The leading articles, written for
Paris, and the anti-religious canards, were seriously read and
considered in the valley of the Aigues. Kigou became a hero
after the pattern of the "venerable" Abbe Gregoire; and as
in the case of certain Parisian bankers, the purple oloak of
popularity served to hide a multitude of sins.
At this particular moment, indeed, Eigou, the perjured
monk, was looked upon as a local Frangois Keller and a
champion of the people, though at no very remote period he
would not have dared to walk in the fields after dark lest he
should be trapped and die an accidental death. Persecution
for political opinion has such virtue that not merely does it
increase a man's present importance, but it restores innocence
to his past. Liberalism worked many miracles of this kind.
But the unlucky paper, which had the wit to find the level of
its readers in those days, and to be as dull, scandalous, gulli-
ble and besottedly disloyal as the ordinary public, of which
the ordinary rank and file of mankind is composed, did, it
may be, as much damage to private property as to the Church
which it attacked.
Eigou flattered himself that a son of the people, reared by
the Eevolution, a Bonapartist general, in disgrace to boot,
would be a sworn enemy of Bourbons and clericals. But the
General had his own ideas, and had managed to avoid a visit
from M. and Mme. Eigou when he first came to the Aigues.
The enormity of the General's blunder, afterwards made
worse by a piece of insolence on the part of the Countess (the
story will be related in its place) can only be recognized
after a better acquaintance with the terrible figure of Eigou
the vampire of the valley.
If Montcornet had set out to win the mayor's goodwill,
136 THE PEASANTRY
and courted his friendship, Kigou's influence might have neu-
tralized Gaubertin's power. But far from making the over-
tures, Montcornet had brought three several actions against
the ex-monk in the court at Ville-aux-Fa)'es ; Rigou had al-
ready gained one case, but the other two were still in suspense.
Then Montcornet's mind had been so busy over schemes for
the gratification of his vanity, so full of his marriage, that he
had forgotten Rigou; but now when Sibilet advised him to
take Rigou's place himself, he called for post-horses and went
straight to the prefect.
The General and the prefect, Count Martial de la Roche-
Hugon, had been friends since the year 1804. The purchase
of the Aigues had been determined by a hint let fall in Paris
by the Councillor of State. La Roche-Hugon had been a pre-
fect under Napoleon, and remained a prefect under the Bour-
bons, paying court to the Bishop so as to keep his place. Xow
his lordship had asked for Rigou's removal not once but many
times, and Martial, who knew perfectly well how matters
stood in the commune, was only too delighted by the General's
request. In a month's time, Montcornet was mayor of Blangy.
While Montcornet was staying with his friend at the pre-
fecture, it happened naturally enough that one Groison, a
subaltern officer of the old Imperial Guard, came thither
about his pension, which had been stopped on some pretext.
The General had once already done the man a service, and,
recollecting this, the gallant cavalry officer poured out the
story of his woes. He had nothing whatever. Montcornet
undertook to obtain the pension, and offered Groison the post
of rural policeman at Blangy, and a way at the same time of
repaying the obligation by devotion to his patron's interests.
So the new mayor and the new rural policeman came into
office together, and, as may be imagined, the General gave
weighty counsel to his lieutenant.
Vaudoyer, whose bread was thus taken out of his mouth,
vas a peasant born on the Ronquerolles estate. He was the
ordinary rural policeman, fit for nothing but to dawdle about
and to make use of his position, so that he was made much of
THE PEASANTRY 131
and cajoled by the peasants, who ask no better than to bribe
subaltern authority and outpost sentinels of property. Vau-
doyer knew Soudry ; for a police-sergeant in the gendarmerie
fulfils quasi-judicial functions, and the rural police naturally
act as detectives if required. Soudry sent his man to Gau-
bertin, who gave a warm welcome to an old acquaintance, and
the pair discussed Vaudoyer's wrongs over a friendly glass.
"My dear fellow," said the mayor of Ville-aux-Fayes, who
could suit himself to his company, ''the thing that has hap-
pened to you is in store for us ail. The nobles have come
back again, and the Emperor's nobles are making common
cause with them. They mean to grind the people down, to
establish the old customs and to take away our property; but
we are Burgundians, we must defend ourselves and send those
Arminacs back to Paris. You go back to Blangy; you can
be watchman there for M. Polissard. who has taken the lease
of the Eonquerolles woods. Never mind, ray lad, I will find
you plenty of work all the year round. But there is to be
no trespassing there, mind you; the woods belong to us, and
that would spoil it all. Send on all 'wood-cutters' to the
Aigues. And lastly, if there is any sale for faggots, te)] the
people to buy of us and not of the Aigues. You will be rural
policeman again; this won't last long. The General will
soon be sick of living among thieves. Did you know that
yonder Upholsterer called me a thief ? And I the son of one
of the most honest Republicans ! and the son-in-law of
Mouchon, the famous representative of the people, who died
without leaving a penny to pay for his funeral !"
The General raised his rural policeman's salafy to three
hundred francs a year. He had a mairie built in Blangy, and
installed Groison in the premises. Then he found a wife foi
that functionary in the orphan daughter of one of his own
little tenants who owned three acres of vineyard. Groison
felt a doglike affection for his master. His fidelity was ad-
mitted on all sides, and Groison was feared and respected,
but much as an unpopular captain is respected and feared
138 THE PEASANTRY
by his crew. The peasantry shunned him as if he had been
a leper. They were silent when he came among them, or
they disguised their dislike under an appearance of banter.
Against such numbers he was powerless.
The delinquents amused themselves by inventing misde-
meanors of which no cognizance could be taken, and the old
warrior chafed at his impotence. For Groison his functions
united the attractions of guerilla warfare with the pleasures
of the chase. He hunted down offenders. But war had in-
stilled into him the sportsmanlike instinct of acting openly
and above-board, as it were, and he loathed the underhand
schemings and thievish dexterity which caused him continual
mortification. He very soon found out that the property of
other landlords was respected, that it was only at the
Aigues that this pilfering went on, and he felt sincere con-
tempt for a peasantry ungrateful enough to rob a general of
the Empire, a man so essentially kind-hearted and generous.
Hate was soon added to contempt. But in vain did he try to
be omnipresent ; he could not be everywhere at once ; and the
delinquencies went on all over the woods at the same time.
Groison made it plain to the General that he must organize
a complete system of defence; his utmost zeal, he said, was
insufficient to cope with the ill-will of the population of the
valley, and he revealed its extent.
"There is something behind this, General," he said ; "these
people are too bold, they are afraid of nothing; it is as if they
reckoned on Providence."
"We shall see," said the Count.
Unlucky words ! A great statesman does not conjugate the
verb "to see" in the future tense.
At that time Montcornet had something else on his mind,
a difficulty more pressing, as it seemed to him. He must find
an alter ego to take his place as mayor while he was absent
in Paris, and a mayor must of necessity be able to read and
write. Looking over the whole commune, he found but one
man to answer this description this was Langlume, the
miller. He could not well have made a worse choice.
THE PEASANTRY 139
In the first place, the interests of the General-mayor and
ihe miller-deputy-mayor were diametrically opposed; and in
the second, Langlume was mixed up in several shady transac-
tions with Eigou, who lent him money in the way of busi-
ness. The miller used to buy the right of pasture for his
horses in the fields ; thanks to his machinations indeed he had
a monopoly, for Sibilet could not find another purchaser. All
the grazing land in the valley commanded good prices, but
the fields at the Aigues, the best land of all, was left to the
last and fetched the least.
So Langlume was appointed deputy-mayor for the time
being, but in France "for the time being" practically means
"once for all," though Frenchmen are credited with a love of
change. Langlume, counseled by Bigou, feigned devotion to
the General's interests, and became deputy-mayor about the
time selected by the omnipotent chronicler for the beginning
of the drama.
As soon as the new mayor had turned his back, Eigou, who
of course was on the Council, had it all his own way at the
Board, and the resolutions which he passed there were by
no means in the General's interest. He voted money for
schemes purely for the benefit of the peasants, though the
Aigues must pay most of the rates, and indeed paid two-thirds
of the taxes, or he refused grants of money which were really
needed for supplementing the Abbe's stipend, for rebuilding
the parsonage, or wages (sic) for a schoolmaster.
"If the peasants knew how to read and write, what would
become of us?" said Langlume, with ingenuous frankness.
The Abbe Brossette had tried to induce a brother of the Order
of the Doctrine chretienne to come to Blangy, and the miller
was endeavoring to justify to the General the anti-Liberal
course taken by the Council.
The General returned from Paris, and so delighted was he
with Groison's behavior that he began to look up old soldiers
of the Imperial Guard. He meant to organize his defence
of the Aigues and put it on a formidable footing. By dint
of looking about him, and making inquiries among his frienda
VOL. 10 jj
140 THE PEASANTRY
and officers on half-pay, he unearthed Michaud, an old quar-
termaster in the cuirassiers of the Guard, "a tough morsel,"
in soldier's language, a simile suggested by camp cookery,
when a bean here and there resists the softening influences
of the boiling pot. Michaud picked out three of his acquaint-
ances to be foresters, without fear or blame.
The first of these, Steingel by name, was a thorough Alsa-
tian, an illegitimate son of the General. Steingel who fell dur-
ing the time of Bonaparte's early successes in Italy. Steingel
the younger was tall and strong, a soldier of a type accus-
tomed, like the Eussians, to complete and passive obedience.
Nothing stopped him in his duty. If he had had his orders,
he would have laid hands coolly on Emperor or Pope. He
did not know what danger meant. He had served in the
ranks with undaunted courage for sixteen years, and had
never received a scratch. He slept out of doors or in his
bed with stoical indifference; and at any aggravation of dis-
comfort merely remarked, "That is how things are to-day, it
seems !"
Vatel, the second, was the child of his regiment ; a corporal
of light infantry, gay as a lark, a trifle light with the fair sex,
utterly devoid of religious principle, and brave to the verge
of rashness, the man who would laugh as he shot down a com-
rade. He had no future before him, no idea of a calling, he
saw a very amusing little war in the functions proposed to