GEORGES CLEMENCEAU.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12065, 21 July 1917, Page 6

GEORGES CLEMENCEAU.

REBEL AHTO STATESMAN. A VETERAN WHO IS A LIVI\TI FORGE IN THE FRANCE OF TO-DAY. In the Passv district of Paris., across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower, there is a quiet street, Ruo Franklin, where a little old man sits at his desk in a groat, (Inn study, alone but lor the two sphinx heads that guard his door. The man at tho desk :s Georges Gemenceau, a living sphinx, with the heart of a rebel and the brain of a statesman; a Vonclean conservative by blood, a revolutionary by instinct.. Hi*;, has boon a lonely, studious life, interrupted only by a. prodigal's venture into tho fashionable clubdom and opera circles of Paris, where he formed a close friendship with Caron. . The son of a poor country physician, his thirst for iirsi-hand information took him far afield, oven to New York, where lie paid his way with lessons in French. With Irs savings lie returned to Franco, studied medicine, and established himself as a practitioner in the Paris of the dying Second Empire. Came the war of 18T0-IS7I. The Commune carried him to the. city hall of Montmartre, where, though the in him hold sway over the statesman, ho is saul to have wept over his obligation to countersign the death sentence of Mgr. Darboy, Archbishop of far is. He left the mairie to become a, political journalist., and married an American girl. Jlis marriage proved a mistake, bub never did that personal experience. lessen Cleraencoau's regard for the United States or for Angio-iSaxoi, ideas and institutions. One of the outstanding accomplishments during hi;later premiership was the consolidation of the entente cordialo with England, Money has never interested Clemenceau. He has long supported liimscll entirely with his pen, except for a lecture Lour through South America in liMliJ, Mhich lie undertook because hi.savings had vanished during his two official years at tie Place fjcauvcan—the Ministry of the Interior. It. is a fair estimate to guess that now, as for many years past, except during his ministry,' lie maintains' himself and his grizzled old man servant on less than Iwo hundred dollars a month. Nor has Clemen'ceau ever sought official power.

" T can do my work for France baiter from this newspaper dc.sk/' lie said when ho was editor ot a daily, •• L'Aurorc." Yet, when ho. was invited, on the eve of the Moroccan trouble, to join Sarrien's Cabinet, and later 1o form our of hie own. ho answered tlie call in a j spirit, of solf-iimnolation.—the spirit ot (•patriotism. Soon after his resignation from the, Premiership, when one of hi.; few friends addressed him as " your cncelleney," i]inervous little man snapped "behind his drooping wlrumoustache: " Shall I never again be Georges Chunonceau?" Yet, in discussing the Franco-G> rmaii crisis over Morocco, lie confided; '• No one knows how near it brought "Franco to wai —and defeat. No one knows what sort of direct messages 1 received from the Kaiser at. the I'l.vv Boauvcau. nor what a- task it was for me. sinclc-handcd, to maintain pen™ with honour. It I never a service to France, 1 shall ciie knowing that I have done my human share." "" Ilis place in the hiftorv of France must bo left to the. perspective of time, i " Cabinet-Wrecker " they called _ him when his editorials torpedoed without warning French Ministries that are. a|readv .forgotten. "Traitor to Franco, said the Nationalists when he saw good in Britain; "Political Clown!" criet l the Socialists, when his rapier-like logic reduced them to abuse. Few love hiiu ■, iiKuiv bate him; uone are indifferent, anrl all admit the purity of his devotion to the welfare of franco. Perhaps Georges Clemenceau would have written his name in taller letters into the chronicles of his tmie had h<> not retained so much of Ins youth in his rebel heart. But ho conld. not have served 7' ranee better than by showing up a lid clearing out the- demagogues and time-servers who so long made light of the. destinies of their country. To-dav, at seventy-bye, lie goads the slugrtaxds of Franco in the pages of "17 Homme Enchaine, 1 ' and the Government finds valuable advice in what the censor suppresses. ft is not aI- j ways good that the crowd F.houl/l hca 1 , the wisdom of the Sphinx. j