MARCEL PROUSTto acquit Dreyfus would be to condemn their own superiors,
were divided. On 9 September, by five votes to two, they pro-
nounced the absurd and disgraceful verdict: "Guilty of high
treason with extenuating circumstances." Dreyfus was sentenced
to ten years' imprisonment and to the hideous ordeal of a second
degradation. There was an outcry of savage delight from the
nationalists, of grief and anger from the Dreyfusists. The Govern-
ment were embarrassed: they had hoped for an end to the Affair,
and now it could only go on for ever, in an interminable sequence
of new appeals and new condemnations. They offered Dreyfus a
free pardon, which he accepted under pressure from his brother
Mathieu, who realised he would not survive another trial; but he
made the proviso that he would not abandon the struggle to
establish his innocence. The sensible Reinach concurred;
Clemenceau, to whom Dreyfus was only a means to political
ends, was furious; and the more idealistic of the young Dreyfus-
ists, for whom Dreyfus was not so much a wronged and suffering
human being as a symbol, felt themselves entitled to be bitterly
disi\lusioned. 'We were ready to die for Dreyfus,' wrote Peguy,
'but Dreyfus isn't.'
Meanwhile Proust was at Evian on the Lake of Geneva with his
father and mother, staying in the luxurious Splendide Hotel. His
passionate day-to-day interest in the Rennes trial, which was
shared by Mme Proust but had to be tactfully kept from his anti-
Dreyfusist father, did not prevent him from enjoying the social
delights of the Lake. The Villa Bassaraba at Amphion was
crammed with Brancovans, Noailles's, Chimays and Polignacs,
all rabid Dreyfusards, except the poor Prince de Chimay, who did
his best to keep out of the way. With them were the society
novelist Abel Hermant, and, of all people, Leon Delafosse, now
looking a somewhat ravaged angel. Princesse Rachel lived in the
main villa, and the guests were scattered over the park in various
annexes and chalets, so that on wet days a carriage was sent round
to bring them to meals. After lunch the young people met in
Mme de Noailles's room, where she usually received them
reclining on a chaise-longue, or even in bed, with an extraordinary
mingling of languor and effervescence-"I never knew a girl to
toss about in bed so!" said Abel Hermant-and proceeded to read
the poem she had invariably written the night before. Sometimes
Proust would come to dine, and burn his anti-asthma powders