Excerpt from Gambetta: And the Foundation of the Third Republic

The lad's mother, whose influence on her son's whole life was as powerful as it was unobtrusive, is alleged to have taught him his letters but she did not Charge herself with the whole burden of his early education, for he was only four when he was sent to a school kept by the Peres du Sacré Coeur de Picpus, one of whom was eventually murdered in the Commune. The choice indicates no specific religious attitude on the part of the parents. It seems to have been the only infant school avail able, and the fact that his father supplied it with groceries secured the boy's admission at a reduced fee. After five years' attendance he was withdrawn and sent to the seminary of Mont faucon. Here again no religious motive was at work. This school, too, was among the father's customers, and fear of losing its patronage, combined with satisfactory terms and the fact that a larger establishment was better suited to a growing lad, induced him to make the transfer. Legend, however, which at once gets busy with a man of Gambetta's origin and character, has it that the boy threatened to destroy the sight of his remaining eye unless he was withdrawn from priestly control. It is a pretty story, but the accident occurred almost midway through the boy's term at the seminary.

Besides, the good fathers were doing their work well. Gambetta's earliest letters, which belong to the Montfaucon period, are full of Scriptural references. With a child's quick ness in imitation he has exactly caught the parsonic tone, though a hint of his mature temperament is given by the zest with which he tells a story. To this time belong his first political opinions - all expressed with characteristic emphasis. He followed the moving events of 1848 with intense interest. Cavaignac was his hero, and he was unrestrained in his abuse of Louis Napoleon, who was as stupid as an ostrich, and had a foreign accent. All this was much to his father's taste, but the lad went too far when he burnt the hated Bonaparte in effigy, a piece of daring for which he narrowly escaped expulsion.

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