English Pharisees and French Crocodiles Part 13

You never run the risk of offending an Englishman by offering him money.

Everyone must remember the lamentations of the Madagascar missionary, Mr. Shaw. The reverend gentleman had been parted from his flock, and obliged to take pot-luck on board the late Admiral Pierre's vessel. What meant those jeremiads? Was it apologies he wanted? Not a bit of it! This apostle wanted cash. From the day that he received $5000 from the French Government not a word more was heard from him. He was quiet and happy.

$5000 for having eaten a few bad dinners! It does not fall to everyone's share to dine so satisfactorily as that.

Although the labor of preparing the posthumous works of Victor Hugo for publication will be enormous, his literary executors have refused to accept the profits, sure to be immense, which the poet meant should be the reward of their arduous task. But the thought of receiving money for such a labor of love is odious to them. English people may look upon this as sentimentality, but it compares very favorably with the highly practical proceedings of Thomas Carlyle's literary executor.

M. H----, the French _depute_, who obtained 10,000 francs damages the other day, in Paris, from an individual who had insulted his wife, gave the money to the poor the very same day. It is a fact that, in France, no man, jealous of his honor, would pocket such gains.

"But," you will say, "surely the Reverend Mr. Shaw gave his $5000 to the poor, or to some good cause----?"

You little know the type.

In England, it is only too much the fas.h.i.+on to carry everything to the bank--an insult, a kick, the loss of a lover, the faithlessness of a wife, all possible inconveniences; the almighty guinea consoles for every wrong, and may be offered to anyone.

On his wedding day (January 28, 1885), the Rev. Stephen Gladstone, Vicar of Hawarden, and son of the Prime Minister of England, received, among his numerous wedding presents, a check for a hundred pounds from Dr. Sir Andrew Clark, and another for the same sum from the Duke of Westminster.

The thing was so natural that not a single English paper commented on the fact.

In France, such a wedding present could only be offered to a domestic who had served us faithfully for some time.

I was in France, spending a few days with a farmer in the heart of the country.

Dressed in a blouse and a large straw hat, I was one day taking a walk on the main road, when an Englishman, accompanied by a young lad of fifteen, accosted me, and asked which was the shortest way to the village of M----.

Delighted to see an Englishman, I volunteered all the information that was at my command. I even offered to accompany him as far as the lane which led to M----, and he willingly accepted.

After racking my brains to give my Englishman every detail I could think of, concerning the interesting village he was about to visit, I proposed to turn back.

He, after having uttered a formidable "Aoh" for all thanks, went on his way.

I had spoken in French. I always like to make Englishmen speak French when I meet them in France. It is my little revenge.

I will admit that, in my rustic attire, I could not have looked much of a dandy; but, in France, we have still preserved that good old habit of saying "Thank you," even to our inferiors.

The Briton had simply treated me as he would have a City policeman who had told him his way.

I called him back.

"_Excusez-moi_," I said.

"_Aoh! mon ami, oui ... je save ce que vo--vole ... je demande pardonne._"

And, without another word, he drew from his pocket a fifty-centime piece, which he slipped into my hand.

As you must always keep what an Englishman gives you a chance of pocketing, I did not hesitate to put the fifty-centimes in a safe place.

This done, I said to him in decent English:

"My dear sir, let me give you a piece of advice. When you have got a Frenchman to talk himself hoa.r.s.e to explain to you your way, just thank him."

"Why, sir, you speak English----"

He was immediately all apologies.

"Above all," I continued, "never offer money in this country before you are quite sure it will be acceptable. You might have it thrown in your face," I added laughing.

My Englishman held out his hand, as if to receive back his fifty centimes.

"Oh! with me," I said to him, "there is no danger. I have lived a long while in England, and I am pretty businesslike by this time. I never throw money out of windows or in people's faces ... I put it in my pocket."

My practical ideas won me his esteem. We laughed heartily over the adventure, and parted the best of friends.

After having beaten the Ashantees, in 1874, brought home the umbrella of their king, and burnt their capital, a feat not requiring much talent, the dwellings being built of wood and straw, General Wolseley, on his return to England, had a grant of 25,000 made to him. Eight years later, on his return from Egypt, this same general received a peerage and 28,000. Lord Alcester, his companion in arms, who had operated on the walls of Alexandria, while he was operating on the backs of the Egyptians, also obtained a peerage and 30,000. When I consider that, during the siege of Alexandria, the English had only three men put _hors de combat_, it occurs to me that doubtless these rewards were granted to Lord Alcester at the suggestion of the British Royal Humane Society.

And yet General Roberts, the history of whose celebrated march to Candahar will remain written in letters of gold among the records of the great military feats of the present century, had to content himself with the Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath.

General Wolseley, now Baron of Cairo, a name so grotesque that he has never yet cared to a.s.sume it in public, was one day sent back to the Soudan to deliver Gordon, that modern _chevalier sans peur et sans reproche_. The perspective was tempting; there was every prospect of an ample harvest of honors and banknotes. Unfortunately, the Mahdi cut the gra.s.s under the general's feet, and he arrived too late. Poor Gordon had to die, not to save his country, but to become, and forever remain, a specter at England's feast, the victim of her vacillations, a standing reproach to her indifference.

Gordon and Wolseley! to think that, by the irony of fate, these two names should have been a.s.sociated in the same campaign! The soldier saint, and the n.o.ble millionaire, whose victories are sounded with the clink of guineas.

"Look, here, upon this picture, and on this."

And you, O heroes of antiquity, arise from your long sleep, and see the progress that military art has made! Veil your faces, O Fabricius, Cincinnatus, and all you Romans, who, after you had subdued your country's foes, and drawn fettered kings behind your triumphal chariots, returned to cultivate your fields, and died so poor that you had to be buried at the public expense.

It has long been England's practice to reward with money those who had rendered services to the country.

After the battle of Waterloo, the Duke of Wellington received, as a present from the nation, 400,000 and a palace at the entrance of Hyde Park.

With reference to the grants to the famous Duke of Marlborough, that great general, who filled the hearts of his enemies with terror, and the pockets of his family with the money of his countrymen, and whose descendants still receive from the state the sum of 4000 a year, Swift compares, in the _Examiner_, the generosity of the Romans with the generosity of the English:

_A Bill of Roman Grat.i.tude._

For frankincense, and earthen pots to burn it in, $22.50 A bull for sacrifice, 40.00 An embroidered garment, 250.00 A crown of laurel, .05 A statue, 500.00 A trophy, 400.00 A thousand copper medals, value half-penny apiece, 10.20 A triumphal arch, 2500.00 A triumphal car, 500.00 Casual charges at the triumph, 750.00 -------- Total, $4972.75

_A Bill of British Grat.i.tude._

Woodstock, $200,000.00 Blenheim, 1,000,000.00 Post-office grant, 500,000.00 Mildenheim, 150,000.00 Pictures, jewels, etc., 300,000.00 Pall Mall grant, 50,000.00 Employments, 500,000.00 ------------- Total, $2,700,000.00

John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, was pocketing these $2,700,000 about the time when Flechier, comparing Turenne to Maccabaeus, was able to say of him, "that he would never accept any other reward, for the services he rendered to his country, than the honor of having served her."

It is not at the Abbey of Westminster, it is on the facade of the Bank of England that there ought to be written:

HERE ENGLAND SHOWS HER GRAt.i.tUDE TO HER GREAT MEN.