Los Angeles herald., 1891-10-05
AN OPERA BoUFFE HsRo-A CONTRAST

There are some features OF the Bou-
hanger episode that public journal is
obliged to note in the interest OF genu-
inc public morality. 1t is, on reflection,
extraordinary that this man should
have gained hold on anybody. He
was neither the type of q soldier nor OF
an ideologist, to employ one OF Napo-
Icons favorite words. He lacked the
essential masculinity of revolutionist.
His exit from the world was absolute ly
disgraceful, but it was not more pusil-
luminous than many other incidents of
his career. Bred a soldier, in the me
lee of battle he received wounds which
the coward and the brave are alike LA
BILE to encounter. He seems to have
Entertained the absurd ambition OF
counterfeiting the career of the First
Napoleon, with none of the lion-like
courage which made that phenomenal
character hero as we'll as man OF al
fairs, law giver, an administrator and
political and social portent. Victor
Hugo, in one of his impassioned apos-
the Augustulus to the Augustus OF Ma
poleon the First. 1t will be difficult,
however learned, for writer OF history
to find any place for Boulanger in the
annals OF the world. At no stage has
his personal initiative achieved any
potency in any line whatsoever.
As a hero he could scarcely hope to
figure in opera bouffe, even with the ex-
aggerations of Offenbach, to more dis
advantage than has characterized his
public, life in openings which were
| ',opportunist" in many senses, all of
which he failed to grasp. The only sig
nal talent he displayed in his whole
career was his remarkable facility in
dominating women, and in sense
which the French have a habit of char
acterizing by very vulgar word, which
signifies the surcease of all manliness.
When he had provoked Monsie III
Floquet, venerable journalist and ad-
vocate, to duel-Floquet man seventy
years of age-he was disabled by
his opponent, and only escaped
death through the magnanimity
of the aged statesman. When his at
fairs reached crisis in France instead
of facing his enemies like man, he fled
with his mistress to Brussels. But, be-
fore he fed, he actually tainted in the
moving events that led to his flight.
This is the hero Of patchwork imbe-
cility and unmanliness that surrendered
his life because the woman who sup
ported him happened, in the Providence
of God, to die. This is the individual
who assumed to be sort of second Ma.
poleon The great Corsican, in the in
itial crisis Of his life, rushed on to the
bridge OF Arcola and bore the tri-colol
into the very mouths of the
Austrian cannon. At the climacteriC
OF his career, at Waterloo, he
drew his sword, dismounted from his
horse and started to seek death with
Cambronne and the sold guard" when
his friends threw him bodily into his
carriage and whipped the horses from
the field of carnage.
There is one parallel to Boulanger in
the great French marshals which honort
the sham herowho died at Brussels. OF
all Napoleon's marshals Berthier was
par excellence, the sentimental man
When the great Corsican was IN Egypt
Bourrienne tells us, Berthier was incon-
solable at his absence from his mistress.
When the first consul had occasion
for the services OF his lieutenant
he always knew where to find him.
This man, who was real warrior, would
always be found in his tent, with his
sword erected on high, with picture Of
his beloved on the hilt. in an attitude Of
most intense devotion, on his knees.
The foundation of this story may pos
sibly be referable to the lively imagina-
ton of the Parisians, who delight in
drolleries. But one thing is certain, and
that is that Berthier, like all the mar
shals of the first empire, knew how to
be a man. There was no question OF
fainting at any stage with any of those
whiskerandos. They knew how to
direct the whirlwind and to ride the
storm. When they died, they died like
men and heroes, without single suicide
amongst them.