“That is all that I want to say to you.”
Adrien Rezon came down from the podium as simply as he had gone up to it. Polite applause accompanied him to his bench.
After him, there was the flood of those who no longer had the ear of the Chambre for having exceeded those, albeit robust, of the deputes: those who took the podium for a gymnastic apparatus designed to develop the torso and fortify the vocal cords. For them, an orator is a man who emits sounds. They talk for the sake of hygiene, in the manner of an exercise in physical culture, which, for the most part, they neglected in their youth in parallel with their education. They seem happy and satisfied to feel their lungs dilate, their vocal cords vibrate and their temples stream with sweat. The victims of that eloquence do not appear to worry about it, just as, in a declamation class, no one pays any attention to the sonorous efforts of the pupils, or, in a Turkish bath, no one is astonished to see the sweat glands of his companions in the steam working hard.
As in a pot-pourri of celebrated works, speeches succeeded one another without any thematic linkage or consequence. The greater number treated the material conditions of the animals, relative to which Adrien Rezon had had confidence in the Government. The central heating of natural and artificial caves was envisaged, as well as the creation of vast refrigeration establishments, with the aim of giving equal satisfaction to tropical beasts and polar bears.
One député declared that it was necessary to be prudent and that from now on it was necessary to take the future under consideration. He therefore proposed to fix an age-limit and a number of years of service, after which every animal having met the required conditions would be gratuitously repatriated.
Another, a dyed-in-the-wool realist, criticized dreamy and sentimental animals, in particular the nostalgic giraffe. He favored their absolute proscription from the Republican Jungle.
A former magistrate, who was reputed to be a devotee of the wings of the Opéra, embarked on the reading of a study of the amorous season among animals. It seemed to him to be appropriate to keep it open every year, while leaving the usage of it to the free appreciation of interested parties. He recalled that in that matter, only humans knew no unemployment, and without withdrawing their crown as the monarchs of creation, he proclaimed them the emperors of amour. He celebrated his own erotic glory, of which he gallantly left a part to woman. He quoted Latin verses exhumed from licentious texts.
A chorus to the right translated them in its own manner by singing a well-known verse: “Blonde hair, silky thread/that grows in the head/in a mat that teaches vice/to climb to paradise.”
After that interlude, the discussion entered the domain of application, and it was then that particular interests collided with one another and came into conflict. One representative of a honey-producing region opposed the importation of bears, sworn enemies of hives because of their fondness for the work of bees. Another undertook the defense of his electoral rabbits. The exotic Noah’s ark was searched in every corner of its holds. Every one of its guests had its detractors, all armed with plausible and legitimate local reasons.
Philémon Singeoreille looked in amazement at his neighbor, the Minister of Agriculture, who smiled at the host of amendments that submerged his proposal, and remained speechless when he heard the pronunciation “The Government proposes the appointment of a committee.”
That was what the assembly decided, with a unanimity inclusive of the vote of Philémon Singeoreille, who learned with a keen satisfaction of his designation as a committee-member.
For three-quarters of a century the creation of the Republican Jungle served as a trampoline in every election. Not one candidate failed to make it the capital item in his program. Not one profession of faith omitted a formal engagement on its subject.
At the debut of every new legislature, every four years, in synchronicity with the bissextile years, Philémon Singeoreille renewed his proposal. The Chambre appointed a committee, which undertook its task so conscientiously that the mandate of its members expired before the report necessary for the plenary discussion could be completed.
Finally, Philémon Singeoreille did, on the very eve of the day when his faithful electors were about to celebrate his centenary. No one after him thought themselves cut out to continue his unfinished work, and the project of the Republican Jungle joined in oblivion numerous parliamentary initiatives that likewise might have merited a better fate.
Notes
1 The literal meaning of petitpaon is “little peacock,” and that might be the author’s intended implication in attributing it to his dubious hero; it is, however, worth noting that the term is most familiar in French with reference to the “petit paon de nuit”: the heathland moth Saturnia pavonia, known in England as the Emperor Moth, or sometimes as the Small Emperor.
2 The phrase “Or de Perpignan” [Perpignan gold] is nowadays used more generally in a metaphorical sense, but its original use seems to have been closely connected with the famous Masonic lodge once possessed by the town, which was reputed to be a significant hotbed of Enlightenment thought in the twilight years of the ancien régime.
3 Cincinnatus was a Roman military leader and statesman who was recalled in a time of crisis to serve as dictator after retiring to work on his farm, having fallen from favor. He created a startling precedent by resigning his dictatorship once the crisis was over, and thus became an emblem of civic virtue. The opera and its supposed composer are fictitious.
4 The three fundamental acts establishing the Third Republic in France, which became known as the Constitutional Laws, although they did not constitute a formal Constitution, were passed by the National Assembly in 1875. They were eventually replaced by the Constitution of 1946.
5 The Roman god Mercury was, among other ministerial functions, the god of the marketplace.
6 I have translated “vertes” and “bleues” literally to conserve the wordplay although both are intended metaphorically and both meanings would be gathered under the metaphorical means of “green” in English—the General means it in the sense of unripe or sour, the Abbé in the distinctively French sense of a new or raw recruit.
7 Coffre’s forename is given here as Anacharsis in the original, but is given as Hermann everywhere else, so I have altered it is the interests of consistency.
8 The decree in question is that of 24 Messidor, an XII (13 July 1804), instituted by Napoléon I, which defined the roles of civil, military and ecclesiastic authorities is state ceremonies. This passage was written before the modification of the relevant decree in 1907 by Georges Clemenceau.
9 Venetian ceruse, or “Spirits of Saturn,” based on white lead, was widely used in the 16th century as a skin-whitener, but it had virtually fallen out of use by 1906 because it was known by then to cause hair loss and other nasty symptoms because of the toxicity of the lead. (If lead piping in their baths played a part in causing of the decadence of the Roman aristocracy, imagine what ceruse did to the English nobility in the days when the trend-setting Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots, were enthusiastic users.) In the present instance, the poor black casualties really have been condemned to death, albeit slowly—a fact of which the author eventually reveals his awareness.
10 The rhyme-scheme of the pithy French saying [Everything passes, everything wearies, everything breaks] does not translate, alas. Paris is frequently compared to a ship, and has a ship for its emblem, because the shape of the Île de la Cité makes easy to imagine it as a vessel floating on the Seine; the Latin quotation is a deliberate distortion of the ancient inscription Fluctuat nec mergitur [It floats and doesn’t sink], removing the negative element.
11 In fact, the quotation comes from a Jesuit rule-book, Du Gouvernement des Communautés Religieuses [On the Government of Religious Communities], but it would not be surprising had some contemporary parliamentarian borrowed it.
12 The “battle” of the Caudine Forks in 321 B.C. the story of which was recounted by Livy—probably as an item of didactic fict
ion rather than an account of actual events—went down in history as the first in which there was no fighting and no casualties. A Roman army trapped by Samnites in a narrow mountain pass in Campania had no alternative but to surrender, and the ensuing conflict was conducted by magistrates negotiating the terms, which obliged them to take into account long-term consequences normally ignored in the heat of conflict. As a former advocate, Austruy would have been familiar with the example and its relevance to his own parable.
13 Prior to the institution of the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe in 1920 the Grand Prix de Paris, run at Longchamp in July, was the most important flat race in the French calendar.
14 Togo Heihachiro was the Japanese admiral whose forces destroyed the Russian fleet at the Battle of Tsushima in 1905.
15 Sadi Carnot, the fourth President of the Third Republic, assassinated in 1894, had earlier been charged with organizing French resistance in the north of the country during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870. Given the outcome of the war in question, the comparison is not as flattering as its predecessors.
16 The edifice in question, constructed for the Exposition Universelle of 1900 and inspired by London’s Crystal Palace, was still new when the story was written; Austruy had no way of knowing that it would be employed as a military hospital during the Great War, or that the Nazis would put on propaganda exhibitions therein during World War II, although modern readers might think that those developments add a little extra irony to the story. Nowadays, Chanel holds annual fashion shows there.
17 The London Association for the Prevention of Premature Burial was founded in 1896 by William Tebb and Walter Hawden; the movement remained active until the 1930s, when the practice of embalming became sufficiently widespread to make sure that anyone scheduled for burial or cremation was well and truly dead. It is not obvious why it was not replaced by an Association for the Prevention of Premature Embalming.
18 The reference is to Voltaire’s (fictitious) account of the battle of Fontenoy in May 1745, when the Comte d’Anterroche of the Garde Française was said to have invited the English to shoot first after being taunted by Sir Charles Hay.
19 Although the responsibility of tsetse flies in spreading the animal disease nagana had been recognized by David Livingston in the 1850s, it was not until 1895 that the trypanosomes causing the disease were identified, and not until1901 that similar trypanosomes were first observed in human blood; Aldo Castellani was the first to suggest their responsibility for sleeping sickness in 1902, when he observed them in cerebrospinal fluid. When Austruy wrote this story the transmission was still thought to be purely mechanical; the complex life-cycle of the parasite was not elucidated until 1909.
20 General Pierre Cambronne’s Guards were cut off at Waterloo and left in a hopeless position. The rumor was put around that when he was invited to surrender he replied; “The Guards do not surrender—they die!” In fact, the remaining Guards did surrender, and the counter-rumor went around was what he had actually said was “Merde!” which can be loosely translated as either “Oh shit!” or “Fuck off!” He always maintained—very plausibly, in view of the fact that he was seriously wounded at the time—that he did not say anything at all, but the latter anecdote was widely adapted by litterateurs, who followed the example of Victor Hugo in signaling obscenities too indecent to print as “le mot de Cambronne” [Cambronne’s word].
21 Wavre was the location of a battle fought simultaneously with Waterloo, in which Maréchal Grouchy engaged retreating Prussian troops. Afterthought suggested that if he had disobeyed the order he had received to do that and taken his troops to Waterloo instead (the gunfire of which was audible) Napoléon would probably have won.
22 In France, Tuesday is mardi.
23 A walled farmhouse that became a crucial position during the battle of Waterloo, over which Napoléon and Wellington fought ferociously. Troops led by Maréchal Ney eventually took it, but too late; the final attack launched therefrom was beaten back and the battle lost.
24 The inn that was Napoléon’s headquarters during the battle, where he and Blücher met to signify its end. Blücher wanted to call the battle the Battle of the Belle Alliance, but Wellington, who had spent the last night of the battle in the village of Waterloo, insisted that it should be the winner’s command post, not the loser’s, that had the honor in question.
25 Nowadays, when used as a common noun, miellune signifies “honeymoon.” In 1908, however, that term had not yet been imported into French with a meaning equivalent to its English significance, so its use here as the name of a town was an improvisation.
26 Singeoreille translates as “monkey ear.” Austruy must have been fond of the name because he reattributed it, in full, to a different character in “Un Samsâra” (1932; tr. in the third volume of the present set as “A Samsara”).
27 I have translated poisson rouge [goldfish] literally, although the elimination of the word “red” spoils this item of weak repartee. Translating it as “red herring” would have preserved the wordplay, but at the expense of accuracy. It is not obvious why the French deem goldfish to be red, but nor is it obvious why we deem them to be gold.
28 I have not translated Tantale as Tantalus out of respect for the rhyming echo.
29 I have left maison [house] untranslated, in order to preserve the rhyme with the non-existent word encornaison, which obviously refers to fitting with [cuckold’s] horns.
FRENCH SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY COLLECTION
105 Adolphe Ahaiza. Cybele
102 Alphonse Allais. The Adventures of Captain Cap
02 Henri Allorge. The Great Cataclysm
14 G.-J. Arnaud. The Ice Company
61 Charles Asselineau. The Double Life
118 Henri Austruy. The Eupantophone
119 Henri Austry. The Petitpaon Era
120 Henri Austry. The Olotelepan
103 S. Henry Berthoud. Martyrs of Science
23 Richard Bessière. The Gardens of the Apocalypse
26 Albert Bleunard. Ever Smaller
06 Félix Bodin. The Novel of the Future
92 Louis Boussenard. Monsieur Synthesis
39 Alphonse Brown. City of Glass
89. Alphonse Brown. The Conquest of the Air
98. Emile Calvet. In A Thousand Years
40 Félicien Champsaur. The Human Arrow
81 Félicien Champsaur. Ouha, King of the Apes
91. Félicien Champsaur. The Pharaoh’s Wife
03 Didier de Chousy. Ignis
97 Michel Corday. The Eternal Flame
113 André Couvreur. The Necessary Evil
114 André Couvreur. Caresco, Superman
115 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 1)
116 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 2)
117 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 3)
67 Captain Danrit. Undersea Odyssey
17 C. I. Defontenay. Star (Psi Cassiopeia)
05 Charles Derennes. The People of the Pole
68 Georges T. Dodds. The Missing Link and Other Tales of Ape-Men
49 Alfred Driou. The Adventures of a Parisian Aeronaut
-- J.-C. Dunyach. The Night Orchid;
-- J.-C. Dunyach. The Thieves of Silence
10 Henri Duvernois. The Man Who Found Himself
08 Achille Eyraud. Voyage to Venus
01 Henri Falk. The Age of Lead
51 Charles de Fieux. Lamékis]
108 Louis Forest. Someone Is Stealing Children In Paris
31 Arnould Galopin. Doctor Omega
70 Arnould Galopin. Doctor Omega & The Shadowmen
112 H. Gayar. The Marvelous Adventures of Serge Myrandhal on Mars
88 Judith Gautier. Isoline and the Serpent-Flower
57 Edmond Haraucourt. Illusions of Immortality
24 Nathalie Henneberg. The Green Gods
107 Jules Janin. The Magnetized Corpse
29 Michel Jeury. Chronolysis
&
nbsp; 55 Gustave Kahn. The Tale of Gold and Silence
30 Gérard Klein. The Mote in Time’s Eye
90 Fernand Kolney. Love in 5000 Years
87 Louis-Guillaume de La Follie. The Unpretentious Philosopher
101 Jean de La Hire. The Fiery Wheel
50 André Laurie. Spiridon
52 Gabriel de Lautrec. The Vengeance of the Oval Portrait
82 Alain Le Drimeur. The Future City
27-28 Georges Le Faure & Henri de Graffigny. The Extraordinary Adventures of a Russian Scientist Across the Solar System (2 vols.)
07 Jules Lermina. Mysteryville
25 Jules Lermina. Panic in Paris
32 Jules Lermina. The Secret of Zippelius
66 Jules Lermina. To-Ho and the Gold Destroyers
15 Gustave Le Rouge. The Vampires of Mars
73 Gustave Le Rouge. The Plutocratic Plot
74 Gustave Le Rouge. The Transatlantic Threat
75 Gustave Le Rouge. The Psychic Spies
76 Gustave Le Rouge. The Victims Victorious
109-110-111 Gustave Le Rouge. The Mysterious Doctor Cornelius
96. André Lichtenberger. The Centaurs
99. André Lichtenberger. The Children of the Crab
72 Xavier Mauméjean. The League of Heroes
78 Joseph Méry. The Tower of Destiny
77 Hippolyte Mettais. The Year 5865
83 Louise Michel. The Human Microbes
84 Louise Michel. The New World
93. Tony Moilin. Paris in the Year 2000
11 José Moselli. Illa’s End
38 John-Antoine Nau. Enemy Force
04 Henri de Parville. An Inhabitant of the Planet Mars
The Petitpaon Era Page 29