The Defeat at Sedan, Part 1

 

 by Brett Rutherford

     Translated and adapted from Victor Hugo, l’Année Terrible.

PART I

“Toulon[1] was no big deal — Sedan is everything!”

O, the man of tragic airs —
how did he think it would end?

     (As logic dictates!)
His own crime’s captive, he yielded up
     to fate, blindfolded,
to dark outcomes that played him like dice.
Look at him now, the stranded,
     deluded dreamer,
object of unfathomable blame!

Who looks on high, formidable,
too distant to see, yet always there,
the one who never looks away at crime,
has seized upon him. God pushed
this arrant tapeworm, this specter
on two legs, to where he is today,
this gutter-shadow where History shudders.

This depth of shame was saved for him alone,
To the dry well’s bottom, sinister,
he is cast, abandoned.  The Judge of all
surpassed all expectations of his fall.

To think that he dared to dream at all.
Such jumbled thoughts he had. “I reign,
yet all despise me. How is this so?
Must I make them fear me, too?”

“It is my turn to rule the world.
Earth, I am my uncle’s equal, am I not?
Why do none tremble when my name is said?
Lacking an Austerlitz, I have my Brumaire.

“For Uncle, both Machiavelli and Homer served.
I’ll settle for Machiavelli, for scheming alone
must substitute for Achaean valor.
I have my triumphs. Galifet I have,
Morny was mine — oh, well! —
     Rouher and Devienne remain.
So much to do remains! I’ll have Madrid,
and Lisbon and Vienna, all in good time.
My hand extends across the map to Dresden,
Munich and Naples I’ll swallow up.

“At sea I will humiliate the Union Jack,
and ancient Albion will kneel to me.
What use to steal unless one seizes
everything? Take all, or vegetate!
They will call me ‘the Great.’
I will have as valets the mitered Pope
and the turbaned Pasha, the Tsar
bowed down beneath his bearskin and sable.
I have sent men to fire upon
the rabble at Boulevard Montmartre.
Why should I blink at invading Berlin?
I am perfectly capable of defeating Prussia.
Besieging Berlin is no more difficult for me
    than taking an ice at Tortoni’s café.
Presiding over La Banque de France,
its conversations and coffee
is just as much work as ruling Mainz.
I’ll topple St. Petersburg and Istanbul:
what’s left of them will resemble
a junk-heap of broken porcelain dogs.

 “Pius and the gentleman king[2]
     are at a stand-off
Two he-goats in a meadow,
England and Ireland butt heads
and make a great commotion.
From Spain to Cuba it’s one great cloud
of war and rebellion.
Austrian Joseph who pretends to be Caesar,
and Wilhelm on his throne, a pathetic Attila,
     pull out each other’s
          nearly non-existent hair.

“I’ll put a stop to them,
and I, not past my prime
no matter what they say, I,
the former clown, shall stand
above all scepters, the arbiter.
Like everything else I have done,
I shall do it suddenly.
There shall be no discussions,
debates or plebiscites.
All Powerful, Most High,
above all classes, titles and stations,
that is the place for me.

“From false Napoleon I pass
to a truer Charlemagne. Is that
too much to ask? My vision!
What will it take to make it happen?

“Money, of course. If Magne will please
to advance the funds to LeBoeuf,
much can be accomplished by stealth.
Like Haroun in midnight Baghdad
     escorted by his grand vizier,
I shall be everywhere all at once, unseen,
and seeing everything. The empty streets
shall be full of my eyes and ears.
Then suddenly I shall strike.
The Rubicon is far behind me:
my toe-tip waits to test the Rhine.

“The Prefect of Police[3] will throw flowers
upon me from his balcony to celebrate.
Magnan[4] is dead; master of coups,
he cannot help me now.
Frossard[5] is out there fighting.
And Saint-Arnaud,[6] ruthless,
reliable, has disappeared.

“I am left with Bazaine, my general.
He’s good enough, I think.
Bismarck is such a buffoon, anyway,
twisting this way and that like an acrobat.
I am just as good at sleight-of-hand,
and I will catch him sleeping, no doubt.

“Chance is my ally. Look how he
has served me thus far, throne and all.
I have made him my right-hand-man
and Fraud is my consort.

“I may seem timid in person, but I conquer.
I may be infamous, but how I shine! Onward!
He who has Paris in his hands can win anything.
I’d might as well win the lottery, too!
Everything smiles at me, so why settle? Take it all!
Luck is fickle, I know, but this is my universe.
What I want, comes. What I like, lands in my lap.
This tiny, black, starry globe, lost in the cosmos,
     fits under my goblet.
I have stolen away France; let’s make off with Europe.

“December is my cloak. To the eye,
I am no more than a shadow.
Even if eagles have fled my service,
     I have plenty of falcons.
No matter. The shade and quiet
     are to our advantage. Attack!”

But what he did,
     was done in the light of day.
All known in London, in Rome,
and in Vienna. Everyone saw
what a disaster was happening,
all open-eyed except this man.

And Berlin smiled,
    and like the patient snake,
observed him silently.
Each move he made already drawn
     in their smoke-filled war-rooms.

His furtive motions fooled no one.
He blundered on, and small details
like time, and place, and number
eluded him. He trusted the cloud
in which he groped about. He had no plan.

This suicide took our proud soldiers,
the army of France whom Fame preceded,
troops without cannons, breadless
and leaderless. Where were the generals?

He led his heroes to the bottom of the abyss.
Calmly, he walked about, pretending to brave
the German fire. The trap he fell into,
all followed in shame and surrender.

Did he hear the grave’s voice asking,
“What is your destination, Emperor?”
All he could do was shrug and say, “Who knows?”

---

[1] Toulon. Site of Napoleon I’s first great military victory in 1793.

[2] Victor Emanuele II was known as “Il Re Galantuomo” (the gentleman king).

[3] Prefect of Police. The notorious Joseph Marie Piétri (1820-1902).

[4] Magnan. Bernard Pierre Magnan (1791-1865). Commander of the army in Paris who helped Napoleon III in his 1851 coup.

[5] Frossard. Charles Auguste Frossard (1807-1875) helped Napoleon III plan for war with Germany, and chose to serve at the front in key battles of the Franco-Prussian War.

[6] Jacques Leroy de Saint-Arnaud (1798-1854), another 1851 coup plotter, successor to Magnan as minister of war, was a perpetrator of genocidal massacres in Algeria. He died on shipboard on the way to the Crimean War.