Up to this point Bobinet’s triumphant progress had not been attended by bloodshed. He met with his first opposition from ardent Catholics beyond the Loire, and sanguinary engagements took place. Fortunately for Bobinet, many Frenchmen had remained sceptics, even in communities completely saturated with the Absolute, and indeed showed themselves wildly fanatical in their unbelief and rationalism. After cruel massacres and new St. Bartholomew’s Eves “les Bobinets” were welcomed everywhere as liberators, and everywhere they went they succeeded in pacifying the populace after destroying all the Karburators.
And so it befell that as early as July, Parliament proclaimed that Toni Bobinet had deserved well of his country, and raised him to the dignity of First Consul with the title of Marshal. France was consolidated. Bobinet introduced State atheism; any sort of religious demonstration was punishable by court-martial with death.
We cannot refrain from mentioning a few episodes in the great man’s career.
Bobinet and his Mother.—One day Bobinet was holding council at Versailles with his General Staff. As the day was hot, he had taken his place by an open window. Suddenly he noticed an aged woman in the park, warming herself in the sun. Bobinet at once interrupted Marshal Jollivet with a cry of “Look, gentlemen … my mother!” All present, even the most hardened generals, were moved to tears by this demonstration of filial affection.
Bobinet and Love of Country.—On one occasion Bobinet was holding a military review on the Champ de Mars in a downpour of rain. While the heavy howitzers were passing before him, an army motor ran into a large puddle of water which spurted up and bespattered Bobinet’s cloak. Marshal Jollivet wished to punish the commander of the unfortunate battery by reducing him in rank on the spot. But Bobinet restrained him, saying, “Let him alone, Marshal. After all, this is the mud of France!”
Bobinet and the Old Pensioner.—Bobinet was once driving out incognito to Chartres. On the way a tyre burst, and while the chauffeur was putting on a new one, a one-legged pensioner came up and asked for alms.
“Where did this man lose his leg?” asked Bobinet.
The old pensioner related that he had lost it while serving in Indo-China. He had a poor old mother, and there were often days when neither of them had a bite to eat.
“Marshal, take this man’s name,” said Bobinet, deeply affected. And sure enough a week later there came a knock at the door of the old pensioner’s hut; it was Bobinet’s personal courier, who handed the hapless cripple a packet “from the First Consul.” Who can describe the surprise and delight of the old soldier when upon opening the packet he found inside it the Bronze Medal!
Thanks to a character of such striking qualities, it is not surprising that Bobinet finally consented to gratify the fervent desire of the whole nation, and on the 14th of August proclaimed himself, amid universal enthusiasm, Emperor of the French.
The whole world thus entered upon a period which, though anything but peaceful, was to be glorious in history. Every quarter of the globe literally blazed with heroic feats of arms. Seen from Mars, our earth must certainly have shone like a star of the first magnitude, from which the Martian astronomers doubtless concluded that we were still in a condition of glowing heat. You can well believe that chivalrous France and her representative, the Emperor Toni Bobinet, did not play a minor role. Perhaps, too, such remnants of the Absolute as had not yet escaped into space were at work here, awakening
