The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-03-04
PIETY VERSUS POMPIERS.
Details OF One Of the Recent Battles in
Paris Churches.


The Paris correspondent OF London
Truth gives a lively account OF, one OF the
recent religious riots In that tumultuous
city. 1t took place in the church OF Les
Gros-Caillou, and was referred to In The
Sun dispatches at the time.
On one side Of the church low wine shops
and licensed lodging houses for the use OF
soldiers beauties abound. On the other
side, shady b~oulevards and not less shady
gardens afford retreats to the nightingale,
thrush and blaokbird. The members Of
the vestry could call in rough manifestants
on the one side and ultra-fashionable on
the other.
The cure filed the church, his own garden,
and manse with the latter. They came
dressed for the S O'clock teas which they
expected to attend after the row. l dare
say they did not look forward to its being
the terrible affair it turned out, though
many OF the young men were armed with
bludgeons just like the roughs, and not a
few with sword canes and knives.
They had overlooked the fact that the
military service to which the aristooratio
youth OF France has been for some years
subjected has hardened the grain, moral
and muscular, and induced the idea OF
resorting to brute force In party quarrels;
while motoring and cycling have unsexed
the ladies Of the generation which has not
yet reached middle age.
The cure, OF course, was glad to Gee the
steam rise. None the less, he professed
himself ready to obey the Arohbishop's
pacific orders. This attitude rather dis
gusted M. Edouard Drumont, who had
come as a parish oner with NJ. Odelin, the
capitalist behind La Libre Parole. M.
Drumont had the ear Of the assembled
parishioners. and his declaration that Christ
is above any archprelate or cure fetched
enthusiastic applause and cries of 'Vive le
Christi" "Vive Drumont!" "yive Ld Libre
Pdrolei"
The manifestants. adopting his view, at
once turned the church into a Fort Chabrol,
and as many almost as it could hold looked
themselves in with the cure and his vicar s.
When the agent Of the domain. with a
police and fire brigade force. came, he
sought vainly for admittanoe.
There was no course for them-seeing
the orders they had received-but to force
their way In. Then only, however, used
one kind of projeotile. Climbing to the
windows, the firemen applied their hose TO
broken panes, drenching the ladies' who had
| taken UP positions behind barricades of
chairs. Their cavaliers retorted with mis-
siles.
Some Of them, anticipating the drench-
ing strategy, had come armed with pack
ages Of PEPPER. They climbed on the roof
and cast the pepper on the upturned faces Of
the besiegers, who were at once hors du
combat and were led of to a pharmacy
adjacent.
When cocoaine ointment had soothed the
burning eyes, they returned in q raging
mood to aid in bursting in the doors, and
they met with furious resistance on enter
ing from those be hind the barricades. The
ladies were more savage than their cava-
liers.
Law-that is to say, the police and the
pompiers-triumphed. The last entrench-
ment was In the chanoel, where about
a hundred persons, grouped on the steps
of the high altar, had been singing canticles.
They were allowed, on Offering to submit,
to leave the church. The cure then ex-
pressed willingness to submit to an iniqui-
tous law, but under protest.
Drumont protested, M. 0delin protested,
the Comtesse Fleury, in the name of her
wounded son, who lay bleeding on the
flooded floor, protested. The beadle pro-
tested against the proclamation Of the vaults,
which he had been visiting. There were
eighteen inches Of water in most of them.
That Of the Duchesse de Talleyrand was the
most deeply inundated. The flood reached
to the very co ffin lid and the pail was
drenched. The stairs leading to the vault
were a cascade.
When the agent Of the domain had left
the cure and the Wears knelt and sang the
TdntuHn ergo and the Are Nara, then helped
the wounded who still lay on the 70 oded
floors.