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multitudes of Parisians stationed themselves along the route that the Czar was to follow, three to four
hours in advance, and remained immobile, pressed together, with no sign of discontent. From time to
time some carriage was taken for the beginning of the cortege, but once the error was recognized,
people returned to their waiting without the occurrence of those repeated illusions and
disappointments that usually create exasperation. Well-known too is the indefinite amount of time
spent in the rain, even at night, by curious crowds awaiting a big military review. Inversely, it often
happens at the theater that the same public which calmly resigned to an excessive delay suddenly
becomes exasperated and will not suffer another minute’s delay. Why is a crowd thus always more
patient or more impatient than an individual? The same psychological cause explains both cases: the
mutual contagion of sentiments among the assembled individuals. So long as no manifestation of
impatience, foot stamping, catcalling, sound of canes or of feet is produced in a group (and they never
occur when it would do no good, such as before an execution or a review), each individual is
impressed by the sight of his neighbors’ resigned or cheerful attitude, and unconsciously reflects their
gaiety or resignation. But if someone (when, as at the theater, it can help reduce the delay) takes the
initiative and becomes impatient, he is soon imitated by degrees, and the impatience of each
individual is redoubled by that of the others. Individuals in a crowd have achieved both the highest
degree of mutual moral attraction and mutual physical repulsion (an antithesis which does not exist
for publics). They elbow each other aside, but at the same time they visibly wish to to express only
those sentiments which are in agreement with those of their neighbors, and in the conversations which
sometimes occur between them they seek to please each other without distinction for rank or class.
Attentive crowds are those who crowd around the pulpit of a preacher or lecturer, a lectern, a
platform, or in front of the stage where a moving drama is being performed. Their attention—and also
their inattention—is always stronger and more constant than would be that of each individual in the
group if he were alone. On the subject of the crowds in question, a professor made a remark to me
that seemed accurate. He said that “an audience of young people at the Law Faculty or in any other
faculty is always attentive and respectful when it is not large; but if instead of being 20 or 30, there
are 100, 200, 300, they often cease to respect and listen to the professor, whereupon foot-tapping is
frequent. Divide them into four groups of 25, and from these 100 rebellious and turbulent students you
will get four audiences full of attention and respect.” The arrogant sensation of their numbers
intoxicates men when they are assembled and makes them scorn the isolated man who is speaking to
them, unless he manages to dazzle or “charm” them. But it must be added that when a large audience
is captured by a speaker, size makes it all the more respectful and attentive.
In a crowd of people fascinated by a spectacle or a speech, only a small number of spectators or
listeners can hear very well, many only see or hear partially or almost not at all, and nonetheless,
however poorly seated they may be, no matter how expensive their seat, they are satisfied and regret
neither their time nor their money. Those people waited two hours for the Czar, who did finally pass
by, but, crowded together behind several rows of people, they saw nothing; at most they could have
heard the noise of the carriages—or sometimes only a deceptive noise. Yet when they went home they
recounted the spectacle in all good faith as if they had been witnesses, for, in truth, they had seen it
through the eyes of others. They would have been astonished had they been told that the man in the
provinces, 200 leagues from Paris, looking at a picture of the imperial procession in his illustrated
paper, was more truly a spectator than they. Why are they convinced of the contrary? Because the
crowd itself on such occasions serves as its own spectacle. The crowd draws and admires the crowd.
Halfway between the more or less passive crowds of which we have just spoken and the active
ones lie the demonstrating crowds. Whether they demonstrate with love or with hate, with joy or with