The Memoirs of Victor Hugo

I listen and I weep. On, valiant ones! I will go where you go.

Receive a visit from the United States Consul-General and Mr. Wickham Hoffman.

Julie[19 - Victor Hugo’s sister-in-law.] writes me from Guernsey that the acorn I planted on July 14 has sprouted. The oak of the United States of Europe issued from the ground on September 5, the day of my return to Paris.

September 14. – I received a visit from the committee of the Société des Gens de Lettres, which wants me to be its president; from M. Jules Simon, Minister of Public Instruction; from Colonel Piré, who commands a corps of volunteers, etc.

September 16. – One year ago to-day I opened the Peace Congress at Lausanne. This morning I wrote the “Appeal to Frenchmen” for a war to the bitter end against the invasion.

On going out I perceived hovering over Montmartre the captive balloon from which a watch is to be kept upon the besiegers.

September 17. – All the forests around Paris are burning. Charles made a trip to the fortifications and is perfectly satisfied with them. I deposited at the office of the Rappel 2,088 francs 30 centimes, subscribed in Guernsey for the wounded and sent by M. H. Tupper, the French Consul.

At the same time I deposited at the “Rappel” office a bracelet and earrings of gold, sent anonymously for the wounded by a woman. Accompanying the trinkets was a little golden neck medal for Jeanne.[20 - Victor Hugo’s little granddaughter.]

September 20. – Charles and his little family left the Hotel Navarin yesterday and installed themselves at 174, Rue de Rivoli. Charles and his wife, as well as Victor, will continue to dine with me every day.

The attack upon Paris began yesterday.

Louis Blanc, Gambetta and Jules Ferry came to see me this morning.

I went to the Institute to sign the Declaration that it proposes to issue encouraging the capital to resist to the last.

I will not accept any limited candidacy. I would accept with devotedness the candidacy of the city of Paris. I want the voting to be not by districts, with local candidates, but by the whole city with one list to select from.

I went to the Ministry of Public Instruction to see Mme. Jules Simon, who is in mourning for her old friend Victor Bois. Georges and Jeanne were in the garden. I played with them.

Nadar came to see me this evening to ask me for some letters to put in a balloon which he will send up the day after tomorrow. It will carry with it my three addresses: “To the Germans,” “To Frenchmen,” “To Parisians.”

October 6. – Nadar’s balloon, which has been named the “Barbes,” and which is taking my letters, etc., started this morning, but had to come down again, as there was not enough wind. It will leave to-morrow. It is said that Jules Favre and Gambetta will go in it.

Last night General John Meredith Read, United States Consul-General, called upon me. He had seen the American General Burnside, who is in the Prussian camp. The Prussians, it appears, have respected Versailles. They are afraid to attack Paris. This we are aware of, for we can see it for ourselves.

October 7. – This morning, while strolling on the Boulevard de Clichy, I perceived a balloon at the end of a street leading to Montmartre. I went up to it. A small crowd bordered a large square space that was walled in by the perpendicular bluffs of Montmartre. In this space three balloons were being inflated, a large one, a medium-sized one, and a small one. The large one was yellow, the medium one white, and the small one striped yellow and red.

In the crowd it was whispered that Gambetta was going. Sure enough I saw him in a group near the yellow balloon, wearing a heavy overcoat and a sealskin cap. He seated himself upon a paving-stone and put on a pair of high fur-lined boots. A leather bag was slung over his shoulder. He took it off, entered the balloon, and a young man, the aeronaut, tied the bag to the cordage above Gambetta’s head.

It was half past 10. The weather was fine and sunshiny, with a light southerly breeze. All at once the yellow balloon rose, with three men in it, one of whom was Gambetta. Then the white balloon went up with three men, one of whom waved a tricolour flag. Beneath Gambetta’s balloon hung a long tricolour streamer. “Long live the Republic!” shouted the crowd.

The two balloons went up for some distance, the white one going higher than the yellow one, then they began to descend. Ballast was thrown out, but they continued their downward flight. They disappeared behind Montmartre hill. They must have landed on the Saint Denis plain. They were too heavily weighted, or else the wind was not strong enough.

The departure took place after all, for the balloons went up again.

We paid a visit to Notre Dame, which has been admirably restored.

We also went to see the Tour Saint Jacques. While our carriage was standing there one of the delegates of the other day (from the Eleventh Arrondissement) came up and told me that the Eleventh Arrondissement had come round to my views, concluded that I was right in insisting upon a vote of the whole city upon a single list of candidates, begged me to accept the nomination upon the conditions I had imposed, and wanted to know what ought to be done should the Government refuse to permit an election. Ought force be resorted to? I replied that a civil war would help the foreign war that was being waged against us and deliver Paris to the Prussians.

On the way home I bought some toys for my little ones – a zouave in a sentry-box for Georges, and for Jeanne a doll that opens and shuts its eyes.

October 8. – I have received a letter from M. L. Colet, of Vienna (Austria), by way of Normandy. It is the first letter that has reached me from the outside since Paris has been invested.

There has been no sugar in Paris for six days. The rationing of meat began to-day. We shall get three quarters of a pound per person and per day.

Incidents of the postponed Commune. Feverish unrest in Paris. Nothing to cause uneasiness, however. The deep-toned Prussian cannon thunder continuously. They recommend unity among us.

The Minister of Finance, M. Ernest Picard, through his secretary, asks me to “grant him an audience;” these are the terms he uses. I answer that I will see him on Monday morning, October 10.

October 9. – Five delegates from the Ninth Arrondissement came in the name of the arrondissement to *forbid me to get myself killed*.

October 10. – M. Ernest Picard came to see me. I asked him to issue immediately a decree liberating all articles pawned at the Mont de Piété for less than 15 francs (the present decree making absurd exceptions, linen, for instance). I told him that the poor could not wait. He promised to issue the decree to-morrow.

There is no news of Gambetta. We are beginning to get uneasy. The wind carried him to the north-east, which is occupied by the Prussians.

October 11. – Good news of Gambetta. He descended at Epineuse, near Amiens.

Last night, after the demonstrations in Paris, while passing a group that had assembled under a street lamp, I heard these words: “It appears that Victor Hugo and the others – .” I continued on my way, and did not listen to the rest, as I did not wish to be recognised.

After dinner I read to my friends the verses with which the French edition of Les Châtiments begins (“When about to return to France,” Brussels, August 31, 1870).

October 12. – It is beginning to get cold. Barbieux, who commands a battalion, brought us the helmet of a Prussian soldier who was killed by his men. This helmet greatly astonished little Jeanne. These angels do not yet know anything about earth.

The decree I demanded for the indigent was published this morning in the “Journal Officiel.”

M. Pallain, the Minister’s secretary, whom I met as I came out of the Carrousel, told me that the decree would cost 800,000 francs.

I replied: “Eight hundred thousand francs, all right. Take from the rich. Give to the poor.”

October 13. – I met to-day Théophile Gautier, whom I I had not seen for many years. I embraced him. He was rather nervous. I told him to come and dine with me.

October 14. – The Château of Saint Cloud was burned yesterday!

I went to Claye’s to correct last proofs of the French edition of Les Chatiments which will appear on Tuesday. Dr. Emile Allix brought me a Prussian cannon-ball which he had picked up behind a barricade, near Montrouge, where it had just killed two horses. The cannon-ball weighs 25 pounds. Georges, in playing with it, pinched his fingers under it, which made him cry a good deal.

To-day is the anniversary of Jena!

October 16. – There is no more butter. There is no more cheese. Very little milk is left, and eggs are nearly all gone.

The report that my name has been given to the Boulevard Haussmann is confirmed. I have not been to see it for myself.

October 17. – To-morrow a postal balloon named the “Victor Hugo” is to be sent up in the Place de la Concorde. I am sending a letter to London by this balloon.

October 18. – I have paid a visit to Les Feuillantines. The house and garden of my boyhood have disappeared.

A street now passes over the site.

October 19. – Louis Blanc came to dine with me. He brought a declaration by ex-Representatives for me to sign. I said that I would not sign it unless it were drawn up in a different manner.

October 20. – Visit from the Gens de Lettres committee. To-day the first postage stamps of the Republic of 1870 were put in circulation.