France and the Republic | Page 3

in Ireland and France--'Land-grabbing' in Picardy a hundred years ago--The corvée abolished before the Revolution, but it still exists under the Republic, as a prestation en nature--Public education in Picardy two centuries ago--Small tenants as numerous under Edward II. in Picardy as small proprietors now are--Home rule needed in France--'The opinion of a man's legs' 95-124
CHAPTER VII
IN THE AISNE
St.-Gobain--Paris and the Ile-de-France--Reclamation of the commons--Mischievous haste in the Revolutionary transfer of lands--The evolution of property and order in France and England--The flower gardens of France--The home counties around London compared with the departments around Paris--Superiority of the French fruit and vegetable markets--The military city of La Fère--A local cabbage-leaf--French farmers and the Treaties of Commerce--Arthur Young at St.-Gobain--The largest mirror in the world--The great French glassworks--'An industrial flower on a seignorial stalk, springing from a feudal root'--Evolution without Revolution--Two centuries and a half of industrial progress--Labour in the Middle Ages--The Irish apostle of North-eastern France--The forests of France--A factory in a chateau--A centenarian royal porter--The Duchesse de Berri and the Empress Eugénie--A co-operative association of consumers--A great manufacturing company working on lines laid down under Louis XIV.--Glass-working, Venetian and French--A jointstock company of the 18th century--The old and new school of factory discipline--French industry and the Terror--'Two aristocrats' called in to save a confiscated property--St.-Gobain and the Eiffel Tower--Royal luxuries in 1673, popular necessaries of life in 1889--How great mirrors are cast--Beauty of the processes--The coming age of glass--Glass pavements and roofs--The hereditary principle among the working classes--Practical co-operation of capital and labour--Schools, asylums, workmen's houses and gardens, social clubs, and savings-banks--Co-operative pension funds--A great economic family--Of 2,650 workpeople more than 50 per cent. employed for more than ten years--A subterranean lake--The crypts of St.-Gobain and the Cisterns of Constantinople--A spectral gondolier--A Venetian promenade with coloured lanterns underground 125-161
CHAPTER VIII
IN THE AISNE--(continued)
Laon, Chauny, and St.-Gobain--The French Revolution and Spanish soda--The most extensive chemical works in France--A miniature Rotterdam--A Cité Ouvrière--The religious war in Chauny--Local and immigrant labour--M. Allain-Targé on Boulanger, the High Court of Justice, common sense and common honesty---French elections, matters of bargain and sale--'The blackguardocracy'--Sketches by a Republican minister--French freemasonry a persecuting sect--Their power in the Government--Utterly unlike the freemasonry of England, Germany, or America--The war against Christianity in France and Spanish America--1867 and the industrial progress of France--Extent of the chemical works of France--Retiring pensions for workmen--Chauny in the olden time--How the honest burghers freed their city in 1432--A contrast with the rioters of the Bastille in 1789--Henri IV. and La Belle Gabrielle--Chauny and the Revolution--The murder of d'Estaing--Chauny acclaims the Restoration, and gives a gold medal to the Prussian commandant--Public charity and public education in the 12th century--Benevolent foundations pillaged in 1793--Law and order under the ancien régime--A canal in the law courts--An enterprising American turns rubbish into indiarubber at Chauny 162-185
CHAPTER IX
IN THE AISNE--(continued)
Laon--A feudal fortress home--Chauny and the green monkeys of Rabelais--The festival of the jongleurs and the learned dogs--A damsel of Chauny on English good sense and Queen Victoria--A region of parks and chateaux--The cradle of the French Monarchy--How the Revolution robbed France--The rural reign of pillage and murder--Horrors committed in the provinces during 1789--Arthur Young and Gouverneur Morris on the general depravation and lawlessness--The National Assembly a mere noisy 'mob'--The outbreak of crime which preceded the Terror--The truth about Madame Roland--Her hatred of Marie Antoinette and her thirst for blood--The legend of the Gironde--Brissot de Warville on robbery as a virtuous action--The relations of the French Revolution to property--France more free before 1789 than after it--The laws against emigrants--Girls of fourteen condemned to death--Emigration made a crime, that property might be pillaged--How Irène de Tencin defended the family estate--The story of the Saporta family--The Laonnais in the 18th century--Wide-spread ruin of its churches, convents, and chateaux--Destruction of accumulated capital--How syndicates of rogues stole bronzes, brasswork, and monuments--The story of two chateaux--The bishop's chateau at Anizy--The burghers and the seigneurs in the 16th century--The local 'directory' in 1790--Wreck, ruin, and robbery--The Chateau of Pinon--Once the property of a granddaughter of Edward III. of England--A domain of the Duc d'Orléans--A tragedy of love and murder--Death of the Marquis d'Albret--How Pinon passed to the family of De Courvals--The present owner an American lady--The finest chateau in the Laonnais--What has the Laonnais gained from the ruin of the Anizy? 186-225
CHAPTER X.
IN THE AISNE--(continued)
Laon--The ruins of Coucy-le-Chateau--A rural inn in France--The sugar crisis--The birthplace of César de Vendóme--The bell which tolls and is heard by the dying alone--The hanging of boys for killing rabbits--Game laws, French and English--The true story of Enguerrand de Coucy--A little feudal city--The finest donjon in France--An official guardian--A dinner with four councillors-general--'What France really wants is a man'--Agricultural philosophers--How a councillor-general tested chemicals--Peasantry on the highway--A land of gardens--A city set on a hill--Simple good-natured people--A raging Boulangist at Laon--What a barber