d de l'Ariege was a Representative after his own heart. Arnauld de
l'Ariege was a noble character. He was a Catholic Democrat like the
workman. At the Assembly he raised aloft, but he bore nearly alone, that
banner so little followed which aspires to ally the Democracy with the
Church. Arnauld de l'Ariege, young, handsome, eloquent, enthusiastic,
gentle, and firm, combined the attributes of the Tribune with the faith
of the knight. His open nature, without wishing to detach itself from
Rome, worshipped Liberty. He had two principles, but he had not two
faces. On the whole the democratic spirit preponderated in him. He said
to me one day, "I give my hand to Victor Hugo. I do not give it to
Montalembert."
The workman knew him. He had often written to him, and had sometimes
seen him.
Arnauld de l'Ariege lived in a district which had remained almost free.
The workman went there without delay.
Like the rest of us, as has been seen, Arnauld de l'Ariege had taken
part in the conflict. Like most of the Representatives of the Left, he
had not returned home since the morning of the 2d. Nevertheless, on the
second day, he thought of his young wife whom he had left without
knowing if he should see her again, of his baby of six months old which
she was suckling, and which he had not kissed for so many hours, of that
beloved hearth, of which at certain moments one feels an absolute need
to obtain a fleeting glimpse, he could no longer resist; arrest, Mazas,
the cell, the hulks, the firing party, all vanished, the idea of danger
was obliterated, he went home.
It was precisely at that moment that the workman arrived there.
Arnauld de l'Ariege received him, read his letter, and approved of it.
Arnauld de l'Ariege knew the Archbishop of Paris personally.
M. Sibour, a Republican priest appointed Archbishop of Paris by General
Cavaignac, was the true chief of the Church dreamed of by the liberal
Catholicism of Arnauld de l'Ariege. On behalf of the Archbishop, Arnauld
de l'Ariege represented in the Assembly that Catholicism which M. de
Montalembert perverted. The democratic Representative and the Republic
Archbishop had at times frequent conferences, in which acted as
intermediatory the Abbe Maret, an intelligent priest, a friend of the
people and of progress, Vicar-General of Paris, who has since been Bishop
_in partibus_ of Surat. Some days previously Arnauld had seen the
Archbishop, and had received his complaints of the
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