CABET, ETIENNE, a notable French communist, was b. at Dijon, Jan. 2, 1788, and educated for the bar, but turned his attention to literature and politics. Under the res toration, he was one of the leaders of the Carbonari (q.v.), and in 1831 was elected deputy for the departmeat of Cote d'Or. Soon afterwards, he published a History of the July Revolution (1832), started a radical Sunday paper, Le Populaire (1833), and, on account of an article in this paper, was sentenced to two years' imprisonment, but escaped to London. Here he wrote brochures against the July government, and began his communistic studies. After the amnesty, 1839, he returned to Paris, and published a History/ of the French, Revolution (4 vols., 1840), bestowing great praise on the old Jac bins. Ile attracted far more notice by his Voyage en Icarie (1840), a " philosophical and social romance," describing a communistic Utopia. The work obtained great popularity among the working-classes of Paris. C. next proceeded to turn " his philosophical romance" into a reality, and published (1847) in his journal, Le Populaire, the statutes for the formation of an " Icarian colony" on the Red river in Texas; inviting his fol lowers to emigrate. The first division sailed on the 2d Feb., 1848, but a short experi
ence convinced them that Texas was anythLg but a Utopia. Their complaints reached Europe, but did not deter C. from embarking at the head of a second band of colonists. On his arrival, he learned that the Mormons had just been expelled from Nauvoo, in Illinois, and that their city was left deserted. The Icarians established themselves there in May, 1850. C. now returned France, to repel the accusations against his probity which had been circulated during his absence, and to obtain a reversal of the judgment which had been formally pronounced against him, 30th Sept., 1849. Having succeeded in this, he went back to Nauvoo, where he governed, as a sort of dictator, his petty colony, until 1856. when he was deprived of his office, and obliged to flee to St. Louis, where he died 9th Dec. of the same year. C. was a shallow thinker, a weak ruler, and a poor writer; but his success, such as it was, is a proof of what can be accomplished by what has been termed, with more vigor than elegance, "pig-headed perseverance."