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John Swinton's Travels. 
 
 CURRENT VIEWS AND NOTES 
 
 Forty Days 
 
 France and England, 
 
 By JOHN SWINTON. 
 
 :rSN OF 
 
 
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 NEW. YORK: 
 
 Copyright, :S80,by 
 
 G. IV. Carleton & Co., Ptib lis hers, 
 
 LONDON : S. LOW, SON & CO, 
 MDCCCLXXX. 
 
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TO MY WIFE, 
 
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PREFACE. 
 
 These brief sketches, made in haste, within 
 four days after my return from Europe to New 
 York, are here published for reasons which will 
 be found by those who properly read them, 
 
 J. S. 
 
 New York, October i, 1880. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I.— FRANCE. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Republic Flowering 9 
 
 The Propitious Year 10 
 
 The Strong Republic . 10 
 
 On the Way to the Millennium 12 
 
 Not the Fruits of Frivolity 13 
 
 The Model City of the World 14 
 
 The Shadow of the Sword 15 
 
 The Three Ominous Words 15 
 
 Three Political Meetings 16 
 
 The Arts of the Stage 16 
 
 The Pomp of Democracy 17 
 
 Paradise and the Peri 17 
 
 The Elysian Fields 18 
 
 Victor Hugo's Charming Fute 18 
 
 The Challenge to the Shows and Shams 21 
 
 The Man of Wit and War 21 
 
 Two Tombs in Pere la Chaise 24 
 
 Yet France Stands 25 
 
 Peaceful Ratification of Powerful Laws 25 
 
 Beautiful Fontainebleau 27 
 
 vii 
 
viii CONTENTS. . 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Resounding Crash of Rifles. .............. , 27 
 
 The Body of Wage-Workers. ........,..,......»...'...... 28 
 
 A Significant Appropriation , . 29 
 
 The Revelries of the Latins. 30 
 
 The Flying Parisian 30 
 
 The Horse Leech. 30 
 
 Statesmanship in the Press 31 
 
 The Deity of Paris ... .... 31 
 
 The Subtle Spirit of CofTee. .......................... . . 32 
 
 The Venus of Milo. ........ ........................ 33 
 
 Royal Palaces for the People . , 33 
 
 These were Scavengers. 33 
 
 Things Well Worth Study. 34 
 
 PART II.— ENGLAND. 
 
 The Glory and Shame of London. 35 
 
 The Variety Show 36 
 
 The Only Hope 38 
 
 Romance and Pathos — Thomas Carlyle 38 
 
 The Man of Earthquakes — Karl Marx 41 
 
 Ireland 45 
 
 Here Again. ..,.....,.,. . 45 
 
John Swinton's Travels. 
 
 PART I.— FRANCE. 
 
 THE REPUBLIC FLOURISHING AND FLOWERING IN 
 THESE PROPITIOUS YEARS. 
 
 NEW YORK, October i, 1880.— The forty days 
 of travel and observation which I enjoyed in 
 France and England, and which ended w^hen I took 
 the Inman steamship at Liverpool that reached here 
 a few days ago, were full of novelty, surprise, inter- 
 est, suggestion and benefit. One who sees these 
 countries, as I then saw them, for the first time, finds 
 that he has many preconceived notions to correct, 
 and that neither the books he has read nor the narra- 
 tives he has heard have ena^bled him to apprehend 
 their features or their life. 
 
 In France, the French Republic, the French peo- 
 ple, and the city of Paris had a special and peculiar 
 interest for me ; and from the hour in which I landed 
 at Calais to that at which I left it for Dover, the 
 scenes and experiences were of ever-varying zest, 
 while some of them, especially those at Fontaine- 
 
 [ix] 
 
I o JOHN S WIN TON'S TEA VELS. 
 
 bleau, were of enchantment beyond anything I had 
 ever fancied. 
 
 In Paris, of course, I made it my business to see 
 the things of ordinary and extraordinary interest — ■ 
 the palaces, temples, monuments, galleries, libraries, 
 parks, museums, trophies, ancient spoils and modern 
 works. The days of a month w^ere all too few to 
 allow more than a hasty glance at them ; and one 
 might spend profitable years of study in many a 
 place to which I could give but a few hours. Of 
 all these familiar things I shall have nothing to say 
 in the few current notes here to be made. 
 
 THE PROPITIOUS YEAR. 
 
 Nothing that I had heard or read about France 
 before my visit tliere had given me any proper idea 
 of her prosperity or of the practical welfare and 
 well-being of the body of lier people. I cannot, of 
 course, make any comparison of the present times 
 with other years, from my own observation ; but 
 the public figures agree with what I saw and heard 
 on all hands of the flourishing and flowering of the 
 popular life in these propitious days. 
 
 THE STRONG REPUBLIC. 
 
 The Republic appeared to me strong in all the 
 elements of durable strength. I am often asked here 
 if it will last. Ay, ay. It is an established, accepted, 
 overpowering fact. The intellect, the industry, the 
 interests, and the hopes of France are on its side. The 
 genius of France is with it. The elections of the last 
 three years, year after year, up to the present time, 
 have strikingly shown what a hold it has upon the 
 
THE STRONG REPUBLIC. ii 
 
 minds of the French people. Its roots are striking 
 deeper and spreading farther every day. The opposi- 
 tion to it in the Chambers and in the press is moribund. 
 Its power in the press is far more formidable than 
 that of any other French Government has ever been. 
 I was told by two or three political speculators 
 that the Orleans restoration might be possible in 
 certain contingencies, but that it is inconceivable. I 
 met Bonapartists and monarchists in Paris and else- 
 wliere, but they were hopeless. 
 
 I was in Paris during that most extraordinary 
 manifestation of republican power and enthusiasm, 
 the fete of the 14th of July, the new national holi- 
 day, the commemoration of the fall of the Bastile. 
 Not one of the fetes of the First Revolution, so 
 far as they are described by historians, approached 
 it in universal fervor ; and old imperialists told 
 me that not one of the fetes of the Third Empire 
 approached it in grandeur. I have seen some fasci- 
 nating sketches of it in the American papers, but 
 not Thomas Caiiyle himself could give an account 
 that would convey any idea of its pomp, its pictur- 
 esqueness, its gayety, its glow, or its spirit. One 
 thing of peculiar significance I noticed as I made 
 m^ way through the rejoicing millions — the frater- 
 nization of the troops with other citizens. In the 
 Rue de Rivoli, one of the most notable streets, for 
 that night, of the illuminated and bedizened city, as 
 well as in many other streets and avenues, you could 
 see thousands of young soldiers marching arm-in- 
 arm, to and fro, with the serried and multitudi- 
 nous young men and women of the locality, Phry- 
 gian-capped and many-spangled, dancing, singing 
 the " Marseillaise," and exuberant with festivity. 
 
12 JOHN SWINTON'S^ TRAVELS. 
 
 Again, at the presentation of the new republican 
 flags to the troops during the day at Longchamps, I 
 saw and heard the volume of republican jubilation 
 in the army„ The army is republicanized. The 
 army is the people; and I do not believe that even 
 Gambetta's Gallifet can Gallifetize it. Here let me 
 say, in leaving this point, that, though twice as many 
 people as inhabit our city of New York took part in 
 the fete, not a policeman was to be anywhere seen; 
 and if there was any drunkenness it was not visible 
 to one who saw as much of Paris that day and night 
 as any man in it. 
 
 The Republic, I repeat, is very strong, and not in 
 Paris alone, but among the population of France 
 at large, in so far as I had the opportunity of sound- 
 ing it. The Republic will advance in its republican- 
 ism ; it will not fall back into the old slough of 
 despotism. 
 
 ON THE WAY TO THE MILLENNIUM. 
 
 I spoke a moment ago of the prosperous show of 
 France. It needs but a brief period of observation 
 in Paris to see that the shop-keeping, hotel-keeping, 
 mercantile classes in the hundred business streets 
 of the city are carrying on a trade that they find 
 desirable and advantageous, though, of course, there 
 is not, except in a few huge establishments, the crowd 
 and rush of customers that some New York dealers 
 hold to be necessary to their financial salvation. I 
 took occasion to see something of many branches of 
 business in many quarters of the city, and the 
 reports were everywhere favorable to a surprising 
 extent. The Parisian shopkeepers are less anxious, 
 
NOT THE FRUITS OF FRIVOLITY, 13 
 
 hankering, and vaulting than those of New York, 
 less careworn and fagged oat ; they do a safer busi- 
 ness ; they are more provident ; they are less in 
 haste to be rich ; they take more comfort as they go 
 along ; they have a better relish for life. 
 
 Turning to the working classes, I was surprised 
 and gratified beyond measure at what I saw of tiieir 
 life and advancement. I took pains to look into 
 the work, the means, and the ways of life of those 
 yet called the masses, the proletariat, visiting by day 
 and by night, with open eyes, not only the crowded 
 parts east of the Place of the Bastile, toward Pere 
 la Chaise, all over the St. Antoine Quarter, up 
 among the Buttes of Chaumont and toward Lake 
 St. Fargeau, down beyond the abattoirs and about 
 the Place d'ltalie, but through a hundred other 
 streets of the swarming myriads of labor. I found 
 these working myriads enjoying a measure of daily 
 welfare far beyond, as I believe, those of any other 
 city in the world, and so far beyond those of Lon= 
 don, Birmingham, and Liverpool, whom I subse- 
 quently saw^, or those of New York, whom I have 
 seen since boyhood, that any comparison is out of 
 the question. 
 
 But on this point I shall again touch in the 
 course of these current notes. 
 
 NOT THE FRUITS OF FRIVOLITY. 
 
 AVhen you behold tlie solid splendors of archi- 
 tecture, old and new, that are to be found every- 
 where in France ; when you think of the force, 
 grandeur, and durability of French achievements 
 in every line of mental and manual activity ; when 
 
14 JOHN SWIN TON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 you consider the substantiality, comfort, and accept- 
 ability of the city of Paris ; when you observe the 
 depth of French life and the sweep of French 
 genius — how unworthy appears the remark so often 
 heard in the United States as the summing-up of 
 French character, that "the French are a frivolous 
 people ! " 
 
 THE MODEL CITY OF THE WORLD. 
 
 You can't help seeing in Paris how greatly the 
 well-being of the population at large is promoted 
 by the thoroughly-efficient, highly-intelligent, and 
 genuinely-democratic administration of the affairs 
 of the city by the Municipal Council and by the 
 Mayoralties. The watchfulness over the interests 
 of the community, the attention to every feature of 
 the public life, are extraordinary to a New Yorker, 
 Twenty years more of such service as Paris now 
 has, impelled by the public spirit which animates 
 the population, will place her far higher than she 
 now stands. 
 
 I would that the managers of our great American 
 cities might study the management of the greater 
 city of Paris. When I am told by our plutocracy 
 that the universal suffrage of New York is incom- 
 patible with the proper administration of the city 
 business, let me ask them what are the limits of 
 suffrage among the Parisians ? 
 
 The consequence of the watchfulness over the 
 public welfare that prevails in Paris is seen in the 
 mortality statistics— the truest test of the value of 
 any government — which show how largely the 
 death-rate of the citv is below that of New York. 
 
THREE OMINOUS WORDS, 15 
 
 THE SHADOW OF THE SWORD. 
 
 The army of France is never out of your sight— 
 whether you are in Paris or in the lesser places, or in 
 the rural regions. Soldiers everywhere — cavalry, 
 infantry, artillery. At the town of Fontainebleau 
 there were thousands of them forever in view. The 
 manhood and mind and strenortli and resources of 
 France are wasted on this gigantic establishment. 
 Surely, some better way than that now in vogue 
 ought to be found for guarding the country, 
 
 THE THREE OMINOUS WORDS. 
 
 Over the entrance of every cathedral and church 
 in France, as well as over the palaces of kings and 
 emperors, you will find in very large characters the 
 three conjuring words of French democracy — ''''Lib- 
 erty, Equality, Fraternity'' — inscribed by order of 
 the Government, They are over the portals of the 
 beautiful Madelaine ; they are over the great door 
 of the venerable Notre Dame, and even when I went 
 to St. Denis, to the cathedral which contains the 
 relics or the effigies of the Kings of France for 
 many a generation, I found the three words of dread 
 to monarchs high over the ancient porch. Of course 
 they are obnoxious to the hierarchy and the priests, 
 and to many of the laity who pass under them on 
 the way to the service ; but the State, which pen- 
 sions religion, insists that the Church shall recog- 
 nize the basis of its authority. 
 
1 6 JOHN SWIN TON'S TRAVELS, 
 
 THREE POLITICAL MEETINGS. 
 
 The three political meetings at which I was pres- 
 ent in Paris — two of them on Sunday — edified me in 
 many ways. 
 
 I was struck by the genuine interest which citi- 
 zens of all sorts take in political questions and 
 action, 
 
 I was struck, also, by the elevated character of 
 the arguments and language that were addressed to 
 the audiences — those of workingmen as well as of 
 students and of the general body of citizens. 
 
 Great principles, current policies, and special 
 measures were discussed in a way that showed the 
 speakers' confidence in the intelligence of their 
 hearers ; and the hearers justified this confidence by 
 the way in which they appreciated the speeches. 
 
 It was evident to me that the political education 
 and mental growth of the Parisian masses were very 
 far advanced. 
 
 THE ARTS OF THE STAGE. 
 
 The magnificent interior of the new opera house 
 and its decorations are the wonder of every visitor, 
 and the grand foyer is more splendid than that of any 
 palace I have seen ; the ten million dollars that were 
 lavished upon it brought forth something different 
 from Mr. Tweed's New York court-house, which 
 cost more. The opera of the night was the " Hugue- 
 nots"; and what a spectacle a,nd an artistic triumph it 
 was ! Salomon, Montalban, and the others were in 
 their glory. In one of the boxes was the ex-Queen 
 of Spain ; in another was the Prince of Wales; and 
 
PARADISE AND THE PERL 17 
 
 the brilliant swell of auditors in the amphitheatre, 
 stalls, and galleries were not less picturesque than 
 the array of performers upon the ample stage. 
 Another night, at the Theatre Frangais, which, with 
 nearly three centuries of growth and good fortune, 
 is the finest flower of dramatic art in the world, I 
 enjoyed a performance of that charming comedy, 
 " Le Gendre de M. Poirier," in which the inimitable 
 Got and Delaunay appeared. Such playing and 
 such places for, play as may be found in Paris are 
 attraction and novelty enough for any American in 
 these summer nights. 
 
 THE POMP OF DEMOCRACY. 
 
 The other night, between acts of the '^ Hugue- 
 nots," I stood on tlie lofty balcony of the splendif- 
 erous opera house, fronting the superb and sweep- 
 ing Avenue de 1' Opera, glittering with a myriad 
 gas lamps, high over which rose the serried line of 
 great Jablockhoff candles, with their lambent flow- 
 ing flame, throwing into relief the solid, spacious 
 and ornate architecture of the avenue, the host of 
 promenaders, the festive parties regaling themselves 
 at the coffee tables on the sidewalks, the whirl of 
 open carriages and the trundling omnibuses with 
 their passengers aloft. The scene was fascinating ; 
 and where else in the world was there ever a demo- 
 cratic spectacle like this? 
 
 PARADISE AND THE PERL 
 
 I spent the other August evening from sunset 
 till midnight at one of the out-door tables of a cafe 
 on the Rue Royale. To the right was that superb 
 
1 8 JOHN S WIN TON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 Greelc temple, the Madelaine, with its massive Cor- 
 intliian colonnade ; to the left was the hoary obe- 
 lisk of Luxor and the fountains between the Elysian 
 Fields and the gardens of the Tuileries ; all was 
 gayety, variety and charm ; the sky and the foliage, 
 the lights and the life, the fashions and the manners, 
 the language and the laughter, the beverages and 
 the fragrant cigars, how they rejoice the wits ; and 
 none the less when I think that here in Paris there 
 are ten thousand such places in the open air, at 
 which perhaps half a million people may enjoy 
 themselves to-night, though few can be so happy as 
 I am over such philosophy as that with which my 
 literary companion beguiles the passing hours. 
 
 THE ELYSIAN FIELDS. 
 
 What pleasant scenes, including the open-air 
 dining-scenes, you have in the Champs ElyseeSj 
 from 5 to lo o'clock in these August evenings ! 
 
 VICTOR HUGO'S CHARMING FETE, 
 
 Victor Hugo's fete day was announced, and it 
 was my fortune to take part in its celebration at his 
 new house, during my stay in Paris, It was in the 
 garden behind his house that the aged poet, philos- 
 opher and politician, beloved by France and honored 
 by the world, welcomed his friends in the evening 
 after the family dinner, in which those two grand- 
 children, whose names shine in the lustre of his lit- 
 erary genius, took part. The garden, lined with 
 trees of heavy foliage, and enriched with shrubbery 
 and tropical plants and flowers, was transformed 
 into a fairy scene by variegated lanterns, lights, 
 flags, and other decorations among the branches and 
 
VICTOR HUGO'S FETE. 19 
 
 leaves ; and you might see at one spot a small sup- 
 ply of fireworks which the two dainty youngsters, 
 who were frolicking about after their flight from 
 the dinner table, had procured and were to setoff as 
 a surprise in honor of their grandfather. 
 
 Victor Hugo made his appearance on the balcony 
 fronting the garden in which his friends were enjo}?-- 
 ing themselves. Among the foliage near his left 
 was his marble bust, taken in his youthful prime of 
 about 28 or 30; on his right, in a leafy bower, hung 
 an oil painting representing him in the full matur- 
 ity of perhaps 50; and between these two he himself 
 stood, 78 years of age, solid, white-bearded, severe- 
 faced, serene-faced, not altogether unlike a Jupiter 
 upon whom time had told. It was an interesting 
 spectacle — interesting indeed. His friends of both 
 sexes, among whom were many authors and artists 
 of celebrity, pressed forward and around him; there 
 were salutation and embracing and kissing of hands, 
 and gifts of llow^ers, and words of enthusiasm and 
 affection, and he whom they called "the master" ac- 
 cepted their homage w^ith dignity, courtesy, and cor- 
 diality. An enchanting young American lady, who 
 had accompanied her mother with myself to the fete, 
 presented him with a conflux of flowers, and the 
 beaming joy w^ith which he seized them and, like a 
 courtier, kissed her hand, was the reward. Sudden- 
 ly he broke from his friends; he saw among the 
 shrubbery of the garden the two grandchildren on 
 whom he dotes, just as they set off one of their little 
 fire-rockets; and as he stood alone on the illuminated 
 gravel w^alk at tlie point to which he had hast- 
 ened, they set off other baby fireworks among the 
 decorated bushes till he clapped his hands with glee 
 
20 JOHN SWINTON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 and shouted "Bravo" in slender voice. Till the 
 last little star was sent up into the air he g.azed with 
 patriarchal joy at the grandchildren, leaving behind 
 the older intellectual lights, and then the boy and 
 girl found in his fervor how proud he had been of 
 their display. He chatted gayly with his friends as 
 he passed around among them, but he never lost 
 sight of his favorites; and it was evident that, in life 
 as in literature, he well knew " the art of being a 
 grandfather." 
 
 Victor Hugo was in sound frame and health; all 
 his faculties were on the alert and in order. He con- 
 verses fluently and philosophically ; he takes a deep 
 interest in French politics, and labors ceaselessly to 
 strengthen the Republic and promote the growth of 
 democratic ideas. His books of the last few years 
 show that his mind is as brave and impassioned and 
 rich in imagery as ever it was ; and he delivered a 
 discourse on education while I was in Paris which 
 was a masterpiece of diction as well as of comprehen- 
 sive thought. It is sixty-three years since his first 
 poem appeared ; fifty years since the battle of ro- 
 manticism raged around his name, and the triumph 
 of " Hernani " brought about a literary revolution ; 
 thirty-five years since he was created a Peer of 
 France by King Louis Philippe ; twenty-nine years 
 since he was proscribed by the Bonaparte usurper 
 and sent into exile, and nearly ten years since he re- 
 turned to France upon the proclamation of the Re- 
 public which he had done so much to establish. 
 These ten years have been among the most impor- 
 tant years of his life,'which was still fertile and full 
 of hope when I saw him at his fete about forty 
 days ago. 
 
MAN OF WI2' AND WAR, 21 
 
 THE CHALLENGE TO THE SHOWS AND SHAMS. 
 
 The mobility of republican politics in France is 
 in striking contrast witli the political stagnation of 
 inan)^ other countries. The gravest questions are 
 kept open ; and the whole world is put under in- 
 quiry. The State, as it stands, is challenged ; the 
 church is challenged ; so are property and capital ; 
 so are forms and laws and institutions. They must, 
 at their peril, demonstrate by their fruits that they 
 have the riglit to exist. 
 
 This perpetual challenge of the fundamental 
 shows, shadows, and sliams of the world, is con- 
 ducive to freshness and freedom of thought, and has 
 much to do with that marvelous intellectual activ- 
 ity which appears especially in Paris, but also in 
 other parts of France. The spirit of which it is the ex- 
 pression belongs to all mankind ; but it obtained a 
 peculiar momentum in France at the time of the 
 First Republic, when all things were in solution. 
 
 THE MAN OF WIT AND WAR. 
 
 The most interesting of all the descendants of 
 the kings of Burgundy is the Count de Lucay, who 
 returned to Paris the night of my arrival there, 
 after nine years of banishment and exile from 
 France. The career of the Count de Lugay, better 
 known as Henri Rochefort, is familiar to every 
 reader of newspapers. His politics, his Lanterney 
 his war upon the empire, his wit, his duels, his par- 
 ticipation in the Commune, his barricades, his de- 
 portation to New Caledonia, his flight from there, 
 his passage through the United States, his six years 
 
2 2 JOHN S WIN TON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 of busy exile in Geneva, and his dramatic appear- 
 ance in Paris immediately after the passage of the 
 Amnesty Act of July last, have kept him in the 
 public eye ever since he emerged from the clerk- 
 ship which he held when a young man. 
 
 The amnesty took effect on the 14th of July, and 
 hours before the dawn of the morning of that day 
 he was in Paris, and simultaneously with his advent 
 on the boulevards the first number of his new paper, 
 the Intransigeant^ made its appearance at all the 
 kiosks of the city. It appeared opportunely on the 
 day of the great fete, when all the city and half a 
 million of strangers were in the streets, and the 
 extraordinary sale of 200,000 copies showed that it 
 was at once in th%3 hands of the greater part of the 
 population. The news girls, who sat behind piles 
 of them, did not like the name, wiiich was a strange 
 and hard one, but their receipts from it soon recon- 
 ciled them even to that, and in an hour or two they 
 uttered it as though it had been an ancient familiar 
 of their speech. '''■ L' Intransigeant^ grand journal," 
 said my dainty and solicitous news vender of the 
 Avenue de I'Opera, in a tone and with a smile that 
 would have made even Paul de Cassagnac himself 
 purchase a copy. Rt3chefort resumed at once with 
 all his energy the work of agitation which had been 
 stopped by the flames of the Commune. He turned 
 the artillery of his new paper against his old friend 
 Gambetta, as he had turned that of the Lanterne 
 against his old enemy, the third Napoleon. You 
 not only saw his leaders every day, you not only 
 heard his speeches in various parts of the city, 
 knew of his presiding at this conference or that 
 banquet, learned of his organizing one movement 
 
MAN OF WIT AND WAR, 23 
 
 or another, defending M. Cadole or bringing Mar- 
 cerou to punishment ; but you saw by the publica- 
 tions that, at the same time, he was sending out two 
 serial romances and preparing ncAv editions of his 
 various works. He had not yet found time to fight 
 a duel, but he was engaged in several newspaper 
 combats which will very surely be settled at the 
 point of the sword. Caricatures of liim appeared 
 daily ; the poFice were on the alert when he held a 
 meeting, and even his rivals of the press assisted in 
 the business he took hold of. 
 
 I first saw Rochefort a few days after his arrival, 
 at the "'punch of honor" given him by the young 
 students of the Latin quarter ; the next day I met 
 liim at a great Sunday meeting of working men and 
 women, at the Chayne Hall, and I passed an hour 
 with him the same evening at the banquet of a 
 thousand friends of both sexes, by the side of Lake 
 St. Fargeau. He looked like a different man from 
 the lean, severe refugee who appeared at the New 
 York Academy of Music on the 5th of June, 1874. 
 He is now robust, partially gray, of energetic voice, 
 and it is evident that his years in Geneva have 
 added to his power as well as his maturity. His 
 salutation was such as only a Frenchman can give, 
 and his paper of next day showed that the memory 
 of his reception in New York was yet vivid in his 
 mind. His speech at the banquet was the pro- 
 gramme of action for his party, and it was no less 
 remarkable for its comprehensiveness than for its 
 temperance. The audience were responsive and 
 enthusiastic, and when he ended they sprang to 
 their feet, raised their wine-glasses in the air, and 
 gave him a salvo that swept over Lake St. Fargeau 
 
24 JOHN SWINTON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 to the walls of Paris. Among those beside him 
 were M. Cattiaux, the Municipal Counselor, Beau- 
 quier, the Deputy, Clovis Hugues, the editor, and 
 others, but Rochefort was easily the master, as he 
 was the figurehead, of the occasion. 
 
 What may be the result of his anti-Gam betta 
 war time w^ill tell ; but that he is sustained by a 
 very large part of the population of Paris, no one 
 will doubt who has watched his career since the 
 14th of July. 
 
 TWO TOMBS IN PERE LA CHAISE. 
 
 Pere la Chaise, of course. And what a city of 
 the dead it is, so utterly unlike any cemetery in the 
 United States. Renowned names everywhere — men 
 of letters, men of affairs, men of history. Many of 
 the tombs are of noble and impressive architecture, 
 and the family tributes, the mementoes of affection, 
 the immortelles, crowns, chaplets, crosses, pictures, 
 epitaphs, and artistic decorations to be seen on 
 almost every tomb show that the people of the gay 
 city do not fail to honor the graves that arc dear to 
 them. At one tomb you will see a family party, at 
 another a mourning friend, at another a group of 
 old admirers, and this poor, aged, weeping widow 
 is carrying that cheap crown of artificial flowers to 
 the humble burial-place of the husband whom she 
 lost in her youth. Ay, here are Abelard and He- 
 loise, and there is the monument, vast and absurd, 
 upon which Beaujoir lavished his fortune. 
 
 Here are two tombs but a step from each other — 
 one of them surmounted by a monument which, 
 with its base, is perhaps thirty feet in height ; but 
 both base and monument are almost hidden from 
 
RATIFICATION OF LAWS. 25 
 
 sight by floral offerings, decorations, crowns, in- 
 scriptions of praise, and streamers witli words of 
 affection sent from cities of France, from political, 
 benevolent, and workingmen's societies, and from 
 individual friends, on the 14th of July ; the floor of 
 the open vault is strewn with cards and other me- 
 mentoes left by the visitors to this tomb, which is 
 the tomb of Raspail. Not because he was a natural- 
 ist and chemist, not because of his camphor and 
 his liqueur, isall this glorification of his memory, 
 but because, as it appears, he was the friend of the 
 people — ramidupeuph — and showed his friendship 
 in ways that keep his memory green. The other 
 tomb to which I have referred is that of M. 
 Thiers, President of the French Republic a few 
 years ago; — but tell me why the contrast and the 
 neglect ; why there is not a crown, a flower, or a 
 word of praise for the old politician of Versailles ? 
 
 YET FRANCE STANDS. 
 
 It would be interesting to inquire how many of 
 the demands of the men of the March revolt have 
 beea complied vv-ith, or in how far any of them was 
 conceded, from the suppression of the Paris Com- 
 mune to the amnesty of last July, The primary 
 and supreme demand of their programme was The 
 Republic ; and that is now well established ; but 
 this is not by any means the only article of the 
 programme that has been won, or is in the way of 
 being won. And yet France stands ! 
 
 PEACEFUL RATIFICATION OF POWERFUL LAWS. 
 
 I w^as down at Fontainebleau on the day (Sun- 
 day) of the elections of the ist of August, which 
 2 
 
26 JOHN SWINTON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 were held throughout France. In the preliminary 
 management of the elections I had seen nothing of 
 some of the features with which we of New York 
 are familiar on such occasions — the torchlight pro- 
 cessions, with music and flags, the great turn-outs, 
 with their speeches and appeals, the newspaper 
 agony, and so on. On the day of voting you had 
 hardly any evidence that an election was going on 
 in Fontainebleau, though the whole population of 
 the place voted, and the triumph of one of the par- 
 ties was complete. 
 
 The Government and the political leaders watched 
 with interest for the result ; but I heard of no offi- 
 cial pressure of any kind. Gambetta had just se- 
 cured the execution of two of the chief features of 
 his opportunist policy — the expulsion of the Jesuits 
 and the amnesty of the exiled Communists ; and 
 the judgment of France upon these grave measures 
 was to be taken at this election. 
 
 The sweeping victories of the Government ended 
 all debate as to the popular attitude toward the 
 measures in question, terminated both the fears and 
 the hopes which prevailed in certain quarters, gave 
 the Gambettists an accession of power which at 
 once immeasurably strengthened their hands, and 
 prepared the way for other serious projects which 
 will undoubtedly make their appearance before a half 
 year passes by. Many of the monarchists and im- 
 perialists surrendered to the Republic after the ist 
 of August ; and one of the curious incidents of the 
 moment was the change of posture one morning of 
 the great Imperialist organ, the Figaro. It had been 
 the Figaro's boast that, though a man might possibly 
 be as much of an imperialist as the Figaro^ no man 
 
THE CRASH OF RIFLES. 27 
 
 could possibly be more of an imperialist than the 
 Figaro ; and when it unexpectedly took an oppor- 
 tunist squint, it was evident that Gambetta had en- 
 tered the very citadel of the enemy. I have not seen 
 the Figaro since that day, and know not w^here it is 
 now pointing ; but many other Bonapartists and Or- 
 leanists took new ground at that time, from which it 
 will not be easy for them to turn. 
 
 BEAUTIFUL FONTAINEBLEAU. 
 
 I spent the greater part of a week at the ancient 
 city of Fontainebleau. These days, those gardens 
 and woods, palaces and domains, the delightful city 
 itself, and this altogether charming hotel of the 
 Black Eagle, "founded in 1720" — is there in all the 
 world elsewhere such poetry of nature and art? 
 
 THE RESOUNDING CRASH OF RIFLES. 
 
 Visiting Versailles one day, to see the place and 
 the palace, I took the short cut up the hill and 
 through the woods to the barracks of Satory, in 
 which I found troops enjoying the afternoon on the 
 greensward and in the well-kept huts of the plain. 
 
 It was on this plain of Satory, during the days 
 of M. Thiers, that the military executions following 
 the suppression of the Commune took place in 187 1. 
 There is w^here the firing parties performed their 
 hideous work. Here is where the squad poured 
 their bullets intothe heart of the high-souled young 
 artillery officer. Gen. Rossel, whose memoirs show 
 him possessed of a genius that might have honored 
 France — ^aye, that did well honor France. 
 
 The field is very serene and peaceful as it is 
 gilded by the setting sun ; but I hear the crash of 
 
28 JOHN S WIN TON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 those rifles resounding over the world through the 
 
 ages. 
 
 THE BODY OF WAGE WORKERS. 
 
 In a previous page of these notes I alluded to 
 the remarkable measure of welfare enjoyed by the 
 working masses of Paris, and to my exploration of 
 those quarters and streets of the city in which you 
 find the heaviest clusters of ihQ proletariat. 
 
 It was strengthening to see how much has been 
 done in Paris to make life tolerable for those who 
 make the world wealthy. 
 
 I found them in their homes ; mingled with them 
 in their resorts ; visited their meetings ; and saw 
 them at hundreds or thousands of the out-door cafes 
 with which all parts of Paris are dotted. They did 
 not seem to be nearly as much overworked as those 
 of the English cities ; you did not feel that they 
 were unmanned by underfeeding ; they were always 
 lively and chatty, often gay and never discourteous. 
 I saw nothing of drunkenness, but much drinking 
 of light wines and too much of absinthe ; they were 
 prudent, economical, and cleanly ; family morality 
 had a strong hold upon them ; there was a very 
 high grade of intelligence among them ; they were 
 remarkably well versed in political questions, and. 
 interested in the administration of public affairs ; 
 and they were looking toward many improvements 
 that promise to relieve the evils of their lot under 
 the anarchy of modern life. These evils are yet 
 many and grievous, and I do not say that their con- 
 dition is by any means, in any way, what it ought 
 properly to be. But if so much advancement has 
 been made, there is every hope of far greater ad- 
 vancement under a Republic that comprehends its 
 
A SIGNIFICANT APPROPRIATION. 29 
 
 duties. The frugality that you nolice on all hands 
 is striking. A man will make a fine and satisfactory 
 meal on a bowl of soup, radishes and salt, a half 
 loaf of bread, with half a bottle of wine ; then he 
 will roll his cigarette and talk politics like a Deputy 
 — strong politics very often. The extent and inten- 
 sity of the opposition to the Church among the 
 Parisian masses can hardly be overstated. At a 
 Sunday meeting of many thousands, which I took 
 a look at, the dogmas of modern religion were 
 assaulted and ridiculed out and out ; and of this 
 sort of thing you can find any amount. 
 
 A SIGxNIFICANT APPROPRIATION. 
 
 Workingmen's societies, assemblies, and meet- 
 ings are often encouraged, in very practical ways, 
 by the authorities of the city. The condition of the 
 people is observed, their complaints are listened to, 
 and even the vagaries that may be put out in their 
 name are not disregarded. One thing that occurred 
 while I stayed in Paris was very striking to me as a 
 New Yorker, who had seen poor workingmen's 
 meetings prohibited by the city authorities, crushed 
 by the clubs of the police, ridiculed by the press, 
 and feared by the wealthy. A series of local par- 
 liaments (regional congresses) of the workers in 
 various trades had been held during the summer 
 throughout France, and it was agreed that they 
 should hold a general congress of delegates from all 
 parts of the Republic at Havre, in October (1880). 
 What did that most enlightened body, the Municipal 
 Council of Paris, do in the premises? Why, they 
 did the finest thing in the world — the 5th of August 
 was the date — a thin.Q^ which I commend to the notice 
 
30 JOHN SWINTON'S TRAVELS, 
 
 of the Common Council of New York ; they made 
 an appropriation of 3,000 francs to pay the expenses 
 of the delegates selected by the workingmen's socie- 
 ties of Paris ! This will seem a startling and ridicu- 
 lous thing to the New York press ; but it is signifi- 
 cant of the way in which the best practical minds of 
 France regard the great questions of the times. 
 
 THE REVELRIES OF THE LATINS. 
 
 I looked at one of those wild students' balls in 
 the Latin quarter, so much spoken of. Two or three 
 thousands of the students from the score of colleges 
 in that quarter danced and flirted with a host of 
 young women in the hall and garden during the 
 two hours before midnight. 
 
 There was high revelry in the evil place, but 
 there was affability and perfect freedom from drunk- 
 enness, the little glasses of beer now and then 
 brought to the tables appearing to be the only bev- 
 erage quaffed that night. 
 
 THE FLYING PARISIAN. 
 
 The pleasant open cabs or voitures of Paris are 
 a perpetual relief ; they are seen everywhere ; they 
 are always ready ; the fare is cheap, and it is fixed ; 
 the drivers are polite and helpful ; the horses are 
 good ; they save your time and strength ; they are 
 one of the chief conveniences of a city which has all 
 the means and appliances of life in an amazing state 
 of convenience. 
 
 THE HORSE LEECH. 
 
 An offensive and degrading custom of Paris is 
 that of gratuities or pourboirese At a hotel your 
 
THE DEITY OF PARIS, 31 
 
 attendants and servants must have their pourboire. 
 If you take a lemonade at an out-door table, there 
 is the pourboire ; if you take a cab, the driver must 
 have it ; if you are shaved, you must give it to the 
 barber ; at the theatre some trifling convenience 
 will make it necessary ; for every petty service you 
 are required to pay it. 
 
 The custom ought to be done away with. The 
 receiver of the fee demeans himself, and the giver is 
 annoyed. 
 
 STATESMANSHIP IN THE PRESS. 
 
 There are many radical daily papers of more or 
 less influence in Paris. One morning, at a kiosk 
 near my hotel, I procured ten of them, all of strong 
 Democratic color, and displaying remarkable vivac- 
 ity in their columns. 
 
 The press is a colossal power in France ; and 
 the number of editors or newspaper writers who 
 have played prominent parts on the stage of France 
 in the business of statesmanship, especially dur- 
 ing the great crises of French history, is almost 
 equal to the number of statesmen who are known 
 to fame. At this moment the most powerful 
 politician in France, Gambetta, is a journalist ; so 
 is his most formidable adversary, Rochefort ; and 
 it were easy to give a list of editors' names in all 
 fields of administrative activity. The method 
 adopted by newspaper writers, of putting their sig- 
 natures to their articles, helps to bring them into 
 notice and to promote their public fortune. 
 
 THE DEITY OF PARIS. 
 Driving through a narrow old street, I alighted 
 on seeing the sign Cafe Procope, recalling the fact 
 
35 JOHN S WIN TON'S TRAVELS, 
 
 that it used to be a rendezvous of the encyclope- 
 dists of last century, and there T found Voltaire's 
 chair and table, with other relics of those days ; but 
 the polite old lady who keeps it w^as not well versed 
 in such matters, and knew more about that quarter 
 of the cafe in which Gambetta, some years ago, 
 used to air his politics over his plain fare. 
 
 You are made aware, in many ways, that Vol- 
 taire is the intellectual deity of Paris. You find the 
 sculptured features of the author of Mariamne in the 
 new Opera ; you find Houdon's statue of the author 
 <jf L't/idiscret in the Theatre Frangais ; you find the 
 figure of the famous Encyclopedist in the grounds 
 of the Polytechnic School ; you see that a boule- 
 vard and a quay have been called after him ; you 
 notice tliat a daily paper has taken his name ; and 
 you learn by a hundred other signs how deeply this 
 man has affected the mind of Paris. 
 
 THE SUBTLE SPIRIT OF COFFEE. 
 
 How hard \i is to get even tolerable coffee at 
 one's breakfast in any of the hotels, restaurants or 
 cafes of Paris ! Not only did I fail to find it at any 
 of the three pompous liotels in which I stayed, but 
 it was not found at such places as the new Big- 
 non's. The Grand Vefour, and Ledoyen, or at sun- 
 dry cafes of the Rue Royale and the Boulevards. 
 In all these places, a poor bean, badly roasted, 
 sparingly used, crossed with chicory, and unskillfully 
 decocted, was the substitute for the inspiring bever- 
 age that one may enjoy if he know^s its creative 
 spell. 
 
THESE WERE SCAVENGERS. 33 
 
 THE VENUS OF MILO. 
 
 An editor who is not unknown to the readers of 
 The Smito\<\ me before I left New Yorl< to go to 
 the Louvre while in Paris, and " take a long look " 
 at the Venus of Milo. I did so. She fascinated 
 me — her perfect ligure and her perfect grace. This 
 Aphrodite is not dominated by the active passion 
 of love. The face and head are those of a full, 
 free, superb w^oman, with all the qualities of mind 
 and life in the finest harmony. You could gaze at 
 her for hours, for days, forever. 
 
 ROYAL PALACES FOR THE PEOPLE. 
 
 The old royal palaces in Paris and other parts of 
 France are largely used for the Government service 
 or devoted to public museums and galleries. The 
 I.ouvre and the Luxembourg, as well as Versailles 
 and Fontainebleau, are put to good account. The 
 ruins of the Tuileries are not yet removed. 
 
 THESE WERE SCAVENGERS. 
 
 Opening the shutters of my apartment on the 
 ground floor of a hotel on the Rue Caumartin, at 
 an early hour one August morning, I noticed a gen- 
 tleman and lady, with a boy, contiguous to a cart in 
 the street, the pavement of which w^as as smooth as 
 a marble table, and about as clean. The young 
 lady, who was dressed in a nice figured calico and a 
 clean apron, with a white cap on her head, had a 
 broom in her hand, which she plied quietly in her 
 daily business as a street sweeper ; the gentleman 
 whom she assisted used his shovel by her side, and 
 
34 JOHN SWINTON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 their boy drove the cart, into which the sweepings 
 were thrown. It was one of the ordinary sights 
 whicli you may see in many parts of Paris of a 
 morning. In about an hour an inspector on horse- 
 back rode through the street to see that the work 
 had been properly done. And it was. 
 
 THINGS WELL WORTH STUDY. 
 
 I have not in these current notes of Paris 
 alluded to the abattoirs, in which meats are scienti- 
 fically and economically prepared for the use of the 
 people ; or to the gigantic hall of wines, with stor- 
 age of twenty million gallons ; or to the huge gov- 
 ernment tobacco factory ; or to the water and gas 
 works ; or to the cheap telegraphy ; or to many 
 other branches of the popular service, of deep in- 
 terest to all who study the public economies. 
 
PART II ""ENGLAND. 
 
 THE GLORY AND SHAME OF LONDON. 
 
 In London and other English cities, as in Paris 
 and other French cities, I made it my business to see 
 the great works of architecture, art, royalty, and 
 history. 
 
 In the people and the life of London, however, I 
 took a surpassing interest. Of the aristocracy, an 
 ordinary stranger sees little beyond their London 
 residences ; and beside these you can view the 
 sumptuous establishments of the wealthy people of 
 the West End. The business places and the count- 
 less shops of the myriad streets of trade give you a 
 dazed notion of the tremendous volume of activity 
 in I^ondon. 
 
 I was overwhelmed by the spectacle of the hid- 
 eous squalor, the sunken, hopeless degradation of 
 the swarming masses in the poorer quarters of Lon- 
 don. It is indescribable, and I am amazed that the 
 owners and managers of England do not look at it, 
 or try to deal with it. I do not refer only to Little 
 Earl street and the streets contiguous to the Seven 
 Dials, which I visited on a Saturday night, but to 
 hundreds of other localities in the central and east- 
 
 [35] 
 
S6 JOHN SW IN TON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 ern quarters, the horrors of which would obscure 
 even those of Dante's "place in hell called Male- 
 bolge." At the time of my stay in London I had 
 not yet seen the analogous quarters of Birmingham, 
 though I had seen the Canongate of Edinburgh, but 
 the sight was enough. 
 
 Then how could I speak of the Babylonian 
 abominations, the swirl of putridity, that confronted 
 me one night in the Strand, when, on arriving at the 
 Charing Cross station, near midnight, I walked as 
 far as Ludgate Circus ? 
 
 The London correspondent of The Sun, who 
 knows what he is writing about in describing 
 English aristocratic and high life society, has re- 
 cently given some pictures of its moral decay 
 that are appalling ; but that high society did not 
 fall under my observation. In other classes of the 
 community of London, it seemed to me that the 
 processes of organic disintegration were being 
 hastened in a way that will nqvj soon terminate — 
 somewhere. 
 
 I know of the strength of England. I see the 
 towers of Windsor Castle, the Horse Guards, the 
 Bank of England, Westminster Abbey, and the 
 Parliament Houses. But, alas ! what else do we 
 see, at the same time, in these vast cities of industry 
 and struggle ? 
 
 THE VARIETY SHOW. 
 
 In my tours in and around London the variety 
 of objects to be thought over grew with every day 
 — many of them pleasant and beautiful in the high- 
 est degree. 
 
 I might tell how I heard an intellectual and at- 
 
THE VARIETY SHOW. 37 
 
 tractive debate on a petty subject in the House of 
 Commons ; how I was impressed on the Sunday and 
 Monday I spent in magnificent Westminster Abbey, 
 crowded with effigies and monuments, so many of 
 which are in honor of official butchers and Bagitious 
 women ; Irow I enjoyed those great popuhir palaces 
 of art, the Kensington and British Museums; how 
 the old times were brought back by Jerusalem 
 Chamber and the Temple Church ; how beneficent 
 are the free parks ; how I saw Canterbury Cathe- 
 dral and York Minster, strolled through Ramsgate, 
 gazed upon the scene of Gray's Elegy at the hour of 
 parting day, spent some time in Stratford-on-Avon, 
 and discovered Falstaff with sweet Mistress Anne 
 Page keeping the Red Hart Inn near Windsor, the 
 very spot at which Shakespeare carried on his dra- 
 matic revelries with the old knight. I might tell of 
 the joyance with which one views the farms and 
 fields, the cottages and villages, of England. Ex- 
 periences like these you may find over England, 
 and it were easy to sketch them in free hand from 
 the memory. 
 
 One sketch, and a dolorous one, might be of my 
 visit to Edinburgh, when, leaving my hotel and wan- 
 dering out toward evening, I struck a street which 
 liad an old castle at one end, an old palace at the 
 other, and several old churches between them, but 
 which, under the name of the Canongaie, Avas filled 
 with a horde of de-humanized human beings, the 
 most abject I liad ever seen — even more abject, in 
 some respects, than the hordes I subsequently saw 
 in London and Birmingham. 
 
 But let the ghosts of these various sketches pass 
 from my mind into limbo. 
 
38 JOHN SWINTON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 THE ONLY HOPE. 
 
 We have all heard very often of the charitable 
 institutions, the co-operative concerns, the popular 
 improvement societies, the trade unions, the moral 
 movements, the sanitary projects, and the countless 
 reformers of England ; but how slight, after all, is 
 the impression that all of them, with their enormous 
 expenditures and labor, have made upon the misera- 
 ble millions. I apprehend that only when the gov- 
 ernment undertakes the primary duties of a govern- 
 ment, will there be any serious show^ of betterment. 
 
 ROMANCE AND PATHOS— THOMAS CARLYLE, 
 
 Driving through the lovely, fertile, finely-cultured 
 farming lands of the Lothians, in the south of Scot- 
 land, and talking with the farmers, who are all 
 apprehensive of the impending ruin from the glut 
 of American grain and beef, and who are struggling 
 under a rent of $20 to $25 an acre against the prod- 
 ucts of the free soil of our Western plains, we 
 reach the ancient town of Haddington, the birth- 
 place of John Knox, on the outskirts of which 
 stands the massive monument to his memory, in the 
 shape of an academy built a few years ago by the 
 contributions of the whole Presbyterian world. 
 
 Wandering around the quiet environs of the 
 place, I am surprised at suddenly finding myself 
 gazing upon the majestic, venerable, picturesque, 
 ivy-clad ruins of a Gothic cathedral of the twelfth 
 century, built by that remorseful monarch David I., 
 whose splendid architectural achievements are yet to 
 be found in so many parts of the land. The scene 
 
ROMANCE AND PATHOS. 
 
 39 
 
 is impressive and inviting in the sunshine of this 
 soft summer day, and the peaceful graveyard around 
 the ruins is rich with the mortal relics of many gen- 
 erations. The rustic grave-digger is at work with 
 his spade in a secluded quarter of the grounds, and 
 glad enough, in his broad Scotch dialect, to wel- 
 come a stranger in his lonesome toil. The walls of 
 the cathedral, with their grand Gothic window 
 spaces, and the columns of the interior, stand as 
 they were built seven centuries ago, but nearly all 
 the roof is gone, and the sky is above you as you 
 stand within the consecrated precincts. " Here," 
 says the grim sexton, '' is the grave of such-an-one, 
 and there is the tombstone of such-another-one, and 
 yonder is the monument of that great man " — about 
 whom he tells us a tale of weal or woe as we pass 
 hither and thither among the mounds. 
 
 Inside the cathedral walls the grassy sod is dotted 
 with tombstones, bearing names almost obliterated 
 by time and tempest, and in an alcove of the wall 
 itself is the vault with the recumbent marble mailed 
 effigies of two knights or earls who were lionored 
 with a rhyming and drooling inscription from the 
 royal hand of King James I. With pride the sexton 
 showed the effigies, showing also other titled names 
 that decorate the spot. ''And there," said he, 
 while mooling along, as he pointed out a flagstone 
 bearing two names, one of which was but a few 
 years old, "there is Mrs. Carlyle's grave." "The 
 wife of Thomas Carlyle?" I inquired. "Ay," said 
 he, " ay, ay." 
 
 And I saw that it was, and that this was the 
 tombstone glorified by that immortal epitaph, the 
 
40 JOHN SWIN TON'S TRAVELS. 
 
 finest tribute ever paid to wife or woman, in which 
 the illustrious literary giant — 
 
 Mightiest Titan of ruggedest mind 
 Frowning majestic on feeble mankind- 
 after referring to her long years of wise and helpful 
 companionship, says that, by her death, "the light 
 of his life is clean gone out." 
 
 "And Mr. Carlyle." said the sexton, " comes here 
 from London now and then to see this grave. He 
 is a gaunt, shaggy, weird kind of old man, looking 
 very old the last time he was here." " He is eighty- 
 six now," said L "Ay," he repeated, "eighty-six, 
 and comes here to this grave all the way from Lon- 
 don." And I told the sexton that Carlyle was a 
 great man, the greatest man of the age in books, and 
 that his name was known all over the world ; but 
 the sexton thouglit there were other great men lying 
 near at hand, though I told him their fame did not 
 reach beyond the graveyard, and brought him back 
 to talk of Carlyle. "Mr. Carlyle himself," said the 
 grave-digger softly, " is to be brought here to be 
 buried with his wife, ay." "He comes here lone- 
 some and alone," continued the grave-digger, " when 
 he visits the wife's grave. His niece keeps him 
 company to the gate, but he leaves her there, and 
 she stays there for him. The last time he was here 
 I got a sight of him, and he was bowed down under 
 his white hairs, and he took his way up by that 
 ruined wall of the old cathedral, and round there 
 and in here by the gateway, and he tottered up here 
 to this spot." 
 
 Softly spake the grave-digger, and paused. Softer 
 
THE MAN OF EARTHQUAKES. 41 
 
 still, in the broad dialect of the Lothians, he pro- 
 ceeded : "And he stood here a while in the grass, 
 and then he kneeled down and stayed on his knees 
 at the grave ; then he bent over, and I saw him kiss 
 the ground — ay, he kissed it again and again, and 
 he kept kneeling, and it was a long time before he 
 rose and tottered out of the cathedral, and wandered 
 through the graveyard to the gate, where his niece 
 stood waiting for him." 
 
 I almost shrink from putting on paper these 
 words of the rustic grave-digger that day ; but is 
 not the scene one for art and poetry ? And does 
 it not show the rugged sham-destroyer of other days, 
 he of the sanguinary blade and the loud artillery, in 
 a finer light than that of any page of his hundred 
 books ? 
 
 THE MAN OF EARTHQUAKES— KARL MARX, 
 
 One of the most remarkable men of the day, who 
 has played an inscrutable but puissant part in the 
 revolutionary politics of the past forty years, is 
 Karl Marx. A man without desire for show or 
 fame, caring nothing for the fanfaronade of life or 
 the pretense of power, without haste and without 
 rest, a man of strong, broad, elevated mind, full of 
 far-reaching projects, logical methods and practical 
 aims, he has stood and yet stands behind more of 
 the earthquakes which have convulsed nations and 
 destroyed thrones, and do now menace and appal 
 crowned heads and established frauds, than any 
 other man in Europe, not excepting Joseph Mazzini 
 himself. The student of Berlin, the critic of Hegel- 
 ianism, the editor of papers, and the old-time corre- 
 spondent of the Ne-iu York Tribune^ he showed his 
 
42 JOHN SWINTON'S - TRAVELS. 
 
 qualities and his spirit; tlie founder and master- 
 spirit of the once dreaded International, and the 
 author of Capital, he has been expelled from half 
 the countries of Europe, proscribed in nearly all of 
 them, and for thirty years past has found refuge in 
 London. 
 
 He was at Ramsgate, the great seashore resort of 
 the Londoners, while I was in London, and there I 
 found him in his cottage, with his family of two 
 generations. The saintly-faced, sweet-voiced, grace- 
 ful Avoman of suavity, who welcomed me at the 
 door, was evidently the mistress of the house and 
 the wife of Karl Marx. And is this massive-headed, 
 generous-featured, courtly, kindly man of 60, with 
 the bushy masses of long revelling gray hair, Karl 
 Marx ? His dialogue reminded me of that of Socra- 
 tes — so free, so sweeping, so creative, so incisive, so 
 genuine — with its sardonic touches, its gleams of 
 humor, and its sportive merriment. He spoke of 
 the political forces and popular movements of the 
 various countries of Europe — the vast current of the 
 spirit of .Russia, the motions of the German mind, 
 the action of France, the immobility of England. 
 He spoke hopefully of Russia, philosophically of 
 Germany, cheerfully of France, and sombrely of 
 England — referring contemptuously to the "atom- 
 istic reforms" over which the Liberals of the British 
 Parliament spend their time. Surveying the Euro- 
 pean world, country after country, indicating the 
 features and the developments and the personages 
 of the surface and under the surface, he showed that 
 things wero working towards ends which will assur- 
 edly be realized. 
 
 I was often surprised as he spoke. It was evident 
 
THE MAN OF EARTHQUAKES. 43 
 
 that this man, of whom so little is seen or heard, is 
 deep in the times, and that, from the Neva to the Seine, 
 from the Urals to the Pyrenees, his hand is at work 
 preparing the way for the new advent. Nor is his 
 work wasted now any more than it has been in 
 the past, during which so many desirable changes 
 have been brought about, so many heroic strug- 
 gles have been seen, and the French Republic has 
 been set up on the heights. As he spoke, the ques- 
 tion I had put, '''■ Why are you doing nothing now ?'' 
 w^as seen to be a question of the unlearned, and one 
 to which he could not make direct answer. Inquir- 
 ing why his great work, Capital^ the seed field of 
 so many crops, had not been put into English as it 
 has been put into Russian and French from the 
 original German, he seemed unable to tell, but said 
 that a proposition for an English translation had 
 come to him from New York. He said that that 
 book was but a fragment, a single part of a work in 
 three parts, two of the parts being yet unpublished, 
 the full trilogy being Land, Capital, Credit, the 
 last part, he said, being largely illustrated from 
 the United States, where credit has had such an 
 amazing development. Mr. Marx is an observer of 
 American action, and his remarks upon some of the 
 formative and substantive forces of American life 
 were full of suggestiveness. By the way, in refer- 
 ring to his Capital, he said that any one who might 
 desire to read it would find the French translation 
 much superior in many ways to the German orig- 
 inal. Mr. Marx referred to Henri Rochefort the 
 Frenchman, and in his talk of some of his dead 
 disciples, the stormy Bakunin, the brilliant Lasalle, 
 and others, I could see how deeply his genius had 
 
44 JOHN S WIN TON'S TRAVELS, 
 
 taken hold of men who, under other circumstances, 
 might have directed the course of history. 
 
 The afternoon is waning toward the long twi- 
 light of an English summer evening as Mr, Marx 
 discourses, and he proposes a walk through the sea- 
 side town and along the shore to the beach, upon 
 which we see many thousand people, largely chil- 
 dren, disporting themselves. Here we find on the 
 sands his family party — the wife, who had already 
 welcomed me, his two daughters with their children, 
 and his two sons-in-law, one of whom is a professor 
 in King's College, London, and the other, I believe, 
 a man of letters. It was a delightful party — about 
 ten in all — the father of the two young wives, who 
 were happy with their children, and the grand- 
 mother of the children, rich in the joysomeness 
 and serenity of her wifely nature. Not less finely 
 than Victor Hugo himself does Karl Marx under- 
 stand the art of being a grandfather ; but, more for- 
 tunate than Huq;o, the married children of Marx 
 live to make jocund his years. 
 
 Toward nightfall he and his sons-in-law part 
 from their families to pass an hour with their Amer- 
 ican guest. And the talk was of the world, and of 
 man, and of time, and of ideas, as our glasses tinkled 
 over the sea. 
 
 The railway train waits for no man, and night 
 is at hand. Over the thought of the babblement 
 and rack of the age and the ages, over the talk 
 of the day and the scenes of the evening, arose 
 in my mind one question touching upon the final 
 law of being, for which I would seek answer from 
 this sage. Going down to the depth of language, 
 and rising to the height of emphasis, during an 
 
HERE AGAIN. 45 
 
 interspace of silence, I interrogated the revolution- 
 ist and philosopher in these fateful words : 
 
 " What is r 
 
 And it seemed as though his mind were inverted 
 for a moment while he looked upon the roaring sea 
 in front and the restless multitude upon the beach. 
 *' What is .?" I had inquired, to which, in deep and 
 solemn tone, he replied : '' Struggle f 
 
 At first it seemed as though 1 had heard the echo 
 of despair ; but, perad venture, it was the law of life. 
 
 IRELAND. 
 
 After leaving Liverpool, I passed an Irish after- 
 noon in the County of Cork, while our steamship 
 was delayed at Queenstown, the city of beggars. 
 
 I had a flying ride in an Irish jaunting-car, bought 
 a shillelah, procured a bunch of shamrock, got hold 
 of an Irish bull, was taken into a shebeen kept by a 
 queer old crone, saw a Danish tower, ate cockles 
 sold by a widow with seven children, heard a queer 
 speech, visited the costly new cathedral at Queens- 
 town, met a fine old Irish gentleman in the person 
 of Richard O'Sullivan, questioned men and women 
 as to sundry things, saw some of the more palpable 
 evils of the Irish land system, and was grieved as I 
 saw the fruits of the wrongs of Ireland. 
 
 HERE AGAIN. 
 
 Ho, ho ! New York. 
 
 Ay, after the salt seas, and the stiff breezes, and 
 the ten days' voyage of life under the rigging, here 
 at last is my own unkempt city of New York. 
 
 Our huge steamship toils up to the wharf. Off 
 from her deck, down to the docks. Away in a time- 
 
46 JOHN S WIN TON'S TRAVELS, 
 
 worn hack, which w^hirls me through a filthy, 
 wretched quarter of the city. But here, in a few 
 minutes, is Washington Square, and now up and 
 onward for my old home. 
 
 Wei], this city of mine differs from Paris ; my 
 esteemed fellow-citizens are not Parisians ; these 
 streets and houses are not those of the diamond 
 city of the Seine. 
 
 Yet here we must toil, waiting for the things 
 that are to be. 
 
 The End. 
 
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