As a modern innovation Pierno’s “Creation” was given, beautifully executed, but received only with toleration.

Just to go up the familiar worn staircase brought the old scenes vividly before me.  Then it was a great piece of luck to obtain a seat within its sacred walls, and such an event to go to a concert that I can still remember my sensations.

PARIS, 1899.

My dear Sister,—­You ask me to tell you about the “Dreyfus affair.”

It is a lengthy tale, and such a tissue of lies and intrigue that common sense wonders if the impossible cannot be possible, if wrong cannot be right.  You probably know more of the details of the case than I do, if you have followed it from the beginning, as I am just beginning to follow.

I assure you it is as much as your life is worth to speak about it; and, as for bringing people together or inviting them to dinner, you must first find out if they are Dreyfusards or anti-Dreyfusards, otherwise you risk your crockery.  The other day I was talking to an old gentleman who seemed very level-headed on the start.  Perhaps I might learn something!  I ventured to say, “Do tell me the real facts about the Dreyfus affair.”  Had I told him that he was sitting on a lighted bomb the effect on him could not have been more startling.

“Do you know that he is the greatest traitor that has ever lived?  He gave the bordereau to the German government.”

“What is a bordereau?” I asked.

He seemed astonished that I did not know what a bordereau was.  “It is a list of secret documents.  He gave this three years ago.”

“Who discovered it?” I inquired.

“It was found in the paper-basket of the German Embassy, and Monsieur Paty du Clam knew about it.”

“And then?”

“Well, then he was arrested and brought before the conseil de guerre, found guilty, and degraded before the army.”

“Did he confess that he wrote the bordereau?”

“No!  On the contrary, he swore he had not, but the generals decided that he had.  So he must have!”

“The generals may have been mistaken,” I said.  “Such things have happened.”

“Oh no.  It is impossible that these officers could have been mistaken.”

“What did he say when he was accused?” I continued.

“I hardly think that he was told of what he was accused.”

“Do you mean to say,” I cried, “that he did not know that he was suspected of high treason?”

“He must have known that he wrote the bordereau,” he replied.

“If he wrote it,” I interrupted.  “Was he not condemned only on his handwriting?”

“Yes,” replied my elderly friend, whose head I had thought level.  “But to discover the truth one had to resort to all sort of ruses in order to convict him and convince the public.”