'Is not this charming? Really, when one remembers what the "wounds of the country" were in 1871, and how those "wounds" were got first through the collapse of the wretched Government of the National Defence, and then through the Commune of Paris, the Governments of May 21 and May 16 may be credited with having done a good piece of work by "healing those wounds" and by "reconquering liberty." Is not this plain?

'But the "wounds having been healed," and "liberty having been reconquered," the true Republic, still according to Brother Doumer, was set free in 1879, to occupy itself with the question of the organisation of labour. Very good.

'1879! that is ten years ago! And only in 1888 do we find the Republic really occupying itself, in the person of Brother Doumer, with this great question, this beautiful and generous idea! How very odd! And what a strange coincidence that Brother Doumer, elected a deputy by the grace of the freemasons in 1888, and wishing to be re-elected a deputy by their grace in 1889, should be the man of destiny called upon to solve this great question!

'He makes this perfectly plain!

'Two Ministers of Public Works, M. de Freycinet and M. Sadi Carnot,' he blandly observes, 'studied measures which might be taken in view of facilitating the concession to societies of working-men of certain public works!

'Ah! This is hard upon M. de Freycinet and M. Sadi Carnot, now President of the ideal Republic! They "studied," did they, "measures which might be taken"! But they never took any such measures! Oh, no! not they!'

'So the first year of the "true Republic" went by, and still co-operation languished under the Imperial law of 1867. Then in 1880 came M. de Lacretelle, who "presented to the Chambers a proposed law tending" to the same end which M. de Freycinet and M. Sadi Carnot had so unprofitably "studied"! Of course the Chamber eagerly adopted it? Not at all! It was never discussed!

'Two years thrown away by the true Republic!

'Then in 1881 M. Floquet (now the favourite candidate of Brother Doumer for the Presidency of the Chamber if the Republicans carry the elections of 1889), being made Prefect of the Seine, had a great impulse! "He wished to revive the decree of 1848 as to that department." Excellent man! But he did not in fact revive it! He did what he could. He "appointed a Committee to study the question!" And this studious Committee eventually evolved--what? "A new schedule of prices for the public works of the City of Paris, which favoured co-operative societies and contractors whose workmen were to partic.i.p.ate in their profits!"

'So the fourth year of the true Republic began, and found the "beautiful and generous idea" still prostrate under the Imperial law of 1867!

'In 1882, still according to Brother Doumer, two deputies, M. Ballue backed by several colleagues, and M. Laroche-Joubert heroically rushed before the Chamber, each with a proposed law "tending" (how all these laws "tend"!) to make it obligatory upon all contractors for public works to give their workmen a share in their profits! But the Chamber paid no heed, and the fourth year of the true Republic ended, leaving the "beautiful and generous idea" still under the iron heel of the Imperial law of 1867!

'Then came March 20, 1883, and the Minister of the Interior rose at last to the height of his mission. He took it upon himself to issue a decree--inst.i.tuting what? An extra-parliamentary committee to "study"

the question of working-men's a.s.sociations, and if, and how, they should be admitted to take part in the public works of the State!'

'Bravo!'

'And the committee was appointed. It consisted' (it is still Brother Doumer who speaks) "of directors and high functionaries of all the ministerial departments." It went to work. It heard "a great number of witnesses." It also showed conclusively "how complex was the question, _and how urgent the necessity of a solution_."'

'What then happened?'

'The committee immediately went to sleep!

'"_After an interruption_ of more than a year" (it is still Brother Doumer who speaks), "_the extra-parliamentary committee resumed its sittings, on January_ 16, 1885!"

'Six years of the true Republic having now been spent in these desperate efforts to deal with the "beautiful and generous idea," and the election of a new Chamber being imminent for the autumn of 1885, M.

Waldeck-Rousseau, Minister of the Interior, proceeded to lay before the re-awakened committee--what? A project of a law to relieve the co-operative idea from the crushing weight of the Imperial law of 1867?

Not a bit of it!

'He proceeded (it is still Brother Doumer who speaks!) to lay before the Committee "_a summary of the studies upon which it ought to enter_!"

'According to Brother Doumer this "summary" was truly grand and even "vast." But alas! "the general elections," says Brother Doumer, sadly, "and afterwards successive ministerial crises, _suspended the inquiry during more than two years_! It was only in 1888 that the extra-parliamentary committee resumed its labours!"

'The Universal Exposition of 1889 was then organising and organising--let me ask you not for a moment to forget--with a specific eye, not so much to the "principles of 1789," about which our worthy ministers care as much as they do about the Edict of Nantes or the philosophy of Pascal, as to the Legislative elections of 1889!

'So what did the extra-parliamentary committee do in this _ninth year_ of the one "true Republic" for the "beautiful and generous idea" of co-operation?

'They adopted a decree--"a firm and practical decree"--promulgated June 6, 1888, "permitting several co-operative societies to contract for public works, especially in connection with the Exposition"! and they also adopted "two projects of laws"!

'"The first of these projects" (it is still Brother Doumer who speaks), "aimed at the creation of a general provident fund, industrial, commercial, and agricultural, to be managed by the 'Caisse des Depots et Consignations.'"

'"This very interesting project," says Brother Doumer, "_has not yet been submitted to the Chamber_. Sent up to be examined by the Ministry of the Interior to the Ministry of Commerce, it is there undergoing _a prolonged and inexplicable delay_!"

'No! no! Brother Doumer! "prolonged" if you like, but not "inexplicable!"

'And so, after now _ten years_, we have the true Republic which got complete possession in 1879 of all the machinery for giving force and effect to the "beautiful and generous" idea of co-operation, and for giving wings to that idea, leaving it still under the blighting curse of the Imperial law of 1867.

'And Doumer alone! Brother Doumer, whom Providence and the freemasons of Laon sent to the Chamber in 1888, has met the questions which have been "urgent" ever since 1848 with the grand practical solution of a "report"

fifteen pages long, and of a "project of law" consisting of six t.i.tles and about a hundred clauses!

'Take this pamphlet with you,' said my friend, after going over it with me; 'take it, look into it minutely, and tell me if anything you have ever heard or read in the way of our Conservative attacks upon the flatulence, the fatuity, and the hypocrisy of these pretended friends of labour and of the working-man is to be compared, for cold-blooded cruelty, with this exposition made by Brother Doumer of the methods of his party.

'I don't know,' he added, 'what portfolio Brother Doumer expects to get if the Government carry these elections of 1889. He has kicked M. de Freycinet, as you see, into one corner, and President Carnot into another, for the benefit of his friend and ally, M. Floquet, so I suppose he expects to secure some commanding position, neither M. de Freycinet nor President Carnot being strong enough to resent the impertinences of an eminent freemason. But wherever they put him, this wonderful Report of his ought to be printed and circulated freely all over France by the Conservative committees. It is the most concise and eloquent history, that I know, of ten years of the true Republic in its relation to the working cla.s.ses of France. You have seen at St.-Gobain the results of a co-operative a.s.sociation of working-men organized under statutes drawn up by a practical and liberal friend of labour, M.

Cochin, in 1866, a year before the Imperial law of 1867 was pa.s.sed.

'Wherever elsewhere in France you find the principle of co-operation adopted and bearing fruit for the benefit of working-men, pray remember that the "true Republic" has for ten years persistently evaded and dodged the problems with which the Empire grappled, and to which the Emperor gave a practical answer nearly a quarter of a century ago!'

After following my friend carefully through his amusing and instructive vivisection of the Report presented to the late Chamber by the masonic member for Laon upon the project of law touching co-operation proposed by M. Floquet, I was not surprised, of course, to learn that the 'project' still remains a 'project.' It was adopted in what is called a 'Friday session' by the Chamber, and then sent up to die a natural death in the Senate--the Senate, be it remembered, being the absolute stronghold of the existing Republican Government.

So that still, after ten years of power, the Republicans of M. Doumer's 'true Republic' leave the working-men of France, so far as co-operation can affect their interests, under the control of a law pa.s.sed under the Empire more than twenty years ago.

Clearly one of two things must be true: either this law, pa.s.sed under the Empire more than twenty years ago, is a good and sufficient law, a.s.suring to the working-men of France all the advantages, and protecting them against all the disadvantages, incident to the principle of co-operation, so far as this influence and this protection can be given by laws; or the Republicans of M. Doumer's 'true Republic' have been humbugging and trifling with the working-men of France on the subject ever since they contrived, ten years ago, to get the control of power at Paris. Upon one horn or the other of this dilemma, the 'true Republicans' clearly must elect to take their seats.

The voters of Laon would appear to be of the mind that the 'true Republicans' of M. Doumer have been humbugging and trifling with them.

For at the election of this year, M. Doumer lost his seat, and the candidate favoured by my Boulangist Figaro at Laon, M. Castelin, was elected. What followed is worth noting, to complete this picture of the working of representative inst.i.tutions in one of the great French provinces under the Third Republic.

M. Doumer, in his address to the electors of the Aisne, issued at Laon on August 15, 1889, was at great pains to explain what his own relations had been with Boulangism and with General Boulanger in 1888, before he became a deputy from Laon in the place of M. Ringuier.

'I frankly admit,' he observes in this very curious doc.u.ment, 'that I felt a lively sympathy with General Boulanger _while he was Minister of War_!... In the journal which I conducted I insisted on his being put back into the Cabinet, on the fall of the Goblet Ministry.'

When, by the death of M. Ringuier in the early spring of 1888, a seat from the Aisne was suddenly vacated, the freemasons of Laon, as I have stated, selected M. Doumer as the Republican candidate to fill it. M.

Doumer's friend, M. Floquet, was not then at the head of the Government, and General Boulanger was still in command of his army-corps at Clermont, coming up to Paris, as the Government affirmed, disguised and wearing blue spectacles, to organise political mischief, and generally making himself a terror and a trouble to the 'true Republicans,' who had made a great man of him for their own purposes.

'Eight days before the election, which was fixed for March 25, 1888,'

says M. Doumer, in his address of this year to the voters, "I had no compet.i.tor, and my election seemed to be certain."'

No doubt. The 'Brethren' had arranged everything.

But suddenly the skies darkened! The Government of M. Tirard plucked up courage to make head against the 'brav' General.' General Boulanger was relieved of his command at Clermont.

Thereupon the Boulangists resolved to avail themselves of the impending election at Laon as an opportunity of responding to the attack of the Government by a demonstration of their strength in the provinces; and M. Doumer was suddenly served with a notice that the seat of which he had felt so sure would be wanted for General Boulanger!

It was a cruel and a critical moment. What was to be done? To withdraw from the contest was to take sides virtually with General Boulanger against the Tirard Government, and much as M. Floquet and the friends of M. Doumer disliked M. Tirard, they were not ready to throw in their lot at that moment against him. So the Brethren, as my friend believes, were called upon to bring about an arrangement. What General Boulanger wanted was not to fill the seat for Laon; it was only to be elected to fill the seat for Laon. Plainly, therefore, the course of practical wisdom, for M. Doumer was to come to an understanding with the friends of General Boulanger. So this was done.

The Parisian Committee of the General came into the Aisne, and at a conference, which M. Doumer admits that he held with them at Tergnier, it was agreed that after the first balloting, on March 31, 'the voters who then voted for General Boulanger as a protest, should vote for M.

Doumer at the second balloting, and so elect him.'

The first balloting came off in due course of time. Both M. Doumer, the Republican candidate, and M. Jacquemont, the Conservative candidate, were left in the rear by General Boulanger, who received some forty thousand votes--the election being held in 1888 under the _scrutin de liste_ adopted, before the elections of 1885, by the Republicans, in order to remedy what they had denounced as the 'intolerable' evils of the _scrutin d'arrondiss.e.m.e.nt_. Under the stress of the Boulangist panic, these same Republicans suddenly threw the _scrutin de liste_ over again in 1889, to readopt and reimpose upon their beloved country the 'intolerable' evils of the _scrutin d'arrondiss.e.m.e.nt_!