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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/32408-8.txt b/32408-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..35d5bd9 --- /dev/null +++ b/32408-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10209 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of Royalty, by +Imbert de Saint-Amand + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of Royalty + +Author: Imbert de Saint-Amand + +Translator: Elizabeth Gilbert Martin + +Release Date: May 18, 2010 [EBook #32408] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIE ANTOINETTE--DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: Marie Antoinette] + + + + + + +MARIE ANTOINETTE + +AND + +THE DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY + + + +BY + +IMBERT DE SAINT-AMAND + + + + +_TRANSLATED BY_ + +ELIZABETH GILBERT MARTIN + + + +_WITH PORTRAIT_ + + + +NEW YORK + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +1899 + + + + +COPYRIGHT, 1891, BY + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. + + + + +{v} + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I. PARIS AT THE BEGINNING OF 1792 . . . . . . . . . 1 + II. COUNT DE FERSON'S LAST JOURNEY TO PARIS . . . . 14 + III. THE DEATH OF THE EMPEROR LEOPOLD . . . . . . . . 23 + IV. THE DEATH OF GUSTAVUS III . . . . . . . . . . . 32 + V. THE BEGINNINGS OF MADAME ROLAND . . . . . . . . 46 + VI. MADAME ROLAND'S ENTRANCE ON THE SCENE . . . . . 60 + VII. MARIE ANTOINETTE AND MADAME ROLAND . . . . . . . 73 + VIII. MADAME ROLAND AT THE MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR . 85 + IX. DUMOURIEZ, MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS . . . . . 94 + X. THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 + XI. THE FÊTE OF THE SWISS OF CHATEAUVIEUX . . . . . 110 + XII. THE DECLARATION OF WAR . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 + XIII. THE DISBANDING OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL GUARD . . . 137 + XIV. THE SUFFERINGS OF LOUIS XVI . . . . . . . . . . 148 + XV. ROLAND'S DISMISSAL FROM OFFICE . . . . . . . . . 158 + XVI. A THREE DAYS' MINISTRY . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166 + XVII. THE PROLOGUE TO JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . . . 176 + XVIII. THE MORNING OF JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . . . 186 + +{vi} + + XIX. THE INVASION OF THE TUILERIES . . . . . . . . . 198 + XX. MARIE ANTOINETTE ON JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . 210 + XXI. THE MORROW OF JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . . . . 219 + XXII. LAFAYETTE IN PARIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229 + XXIII. THE LAMOURETTE KISS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239 + XXIV. THE FÊTE OF THE FEDERATION IN 1792 . . . . . . . 248 + XXV. THE LAST DAYS AT THE TUILERIES . . . . . . . . . 259 + XXVI. THE PROLOGUE TO THE TENTH OF AUGUST . . . . . . 267 + XXVII. THE NIGHT OF AUGUST NINTH TO TENTH . . . . . . . 275 + XXVIII. THE MORNING OF AUGUST TENTH . . . . . . . . . . 284 + XXIX. THE BOX OF THE LOGOGRAPH . . . . . . . . . . . . 299 + XXX. THE COMBAT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306 + XXXI. THE RESULTS OF THE COMBAT . . . . . . . . . . . 316 + XXXII. THE ROYAL FAMILY IN THE CONVENT OF THE FEUILLANTS 329 + XXXIII. THE TEMPLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337 + XXXIV. THE PRINCESS DE LAMBALLE'S MURDER . . . . . . . 350 + XXXV. THE SEPTEMBER MASSACRES . . . . . . . . . . . . 359 + XXXVI. MADAME ROLAND DURING THE MASSACRES . . . . . . . 372 + XXXVII. THE PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC . . . . . . . . 384 + INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395 + + + + +{1} + +MARIE ANTOINETTE + +AND + +THE DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY. + + +I. + +PARIS AT THE BEGINNING OF 1792. + +Paris in 1792 is no longer what it was in 1789. In 1789, the old +French society was still brilliant. The past endured beside the +present. Neither names nor escutcheons, neither liveries nor places at +court, had been suppressed. The aristocracy and the Revolution lived +face to face. In 1792, the scene has changed. The Paris of the +nobility is no longer in Paris, but at Coblentz. The Faubourg +Saint-Germain is like a desert. Since June, 1790, armorial bearings +have been taken down. The blazons of ancient houses have been broken +and thrown into the gutters. No more display, no more liveries, no +more carriages with coats-of-arms on their panels. Titles and manorial +names are done away with. The Duke de Brissac is called M. Cossé; the +Duke de Caraman, M. Riquet; the Duke d'Aiguillon, M. Vignerot. The +_Almanach royal_ of 1792 mentions not a single court appointment. + +{2} + +In 1789, it was still an exceptional thing for the nobility to +emigrate. In 1792, it is the rule. Those among the nobles who have +had the courage to remain at Paris in the midst of the furnace, so as +to make a rampart for the King of their bodies, seem half ashamed of +their generous conduct. The illusions of worldliness have been +dispelled. Nearly every salon was open in 1789. In 1792, they are +nearly all closed; those of the magistrates and the great capitalists +as well as those of the aristocracy. Etiquette is still observed at +the Tuileries, but there is no question of fêtes; no balls, no +concerts, none of that elegance and animation which once made the court +a rendezvous of pleasures. In 1789, illusions, dreams, a naïve +expectation of the age of gold, were to be found everywhere. In 1792, +eclogues and pastoral poetry are beginning to go out of fashion. The +diapason of hatred is pitched higher. Already there is powder and a +smell of blood in the air. A general instinct forebodes that France +and Europe are on the verge of a terrible duel. On both sides passions +have touched their culminating point. Distrust and uneasiness are +universal. Every day the despotism of the clubs becomes more +threatening. The Jacobins do not reign yet, but they govern. Deputies +who, if left to their own impulses, would vote on the conservative +side, pronounce for the Revolution solely through fear of the +demagogues. In 1789, the religious sentiment still retained power +among the {3} masses. In 1792, irreligion and atheism have wrought +their havoc. In 1789, the most ardent revolutionists, Marat, Danton, +Robespierre, were all royalists. At the beginning of 1792, the +republic begins to show its face beneath the monarchical mask. + +The Tuileries, menaced by the neighboring lanes of the Carrousel and +the Palais Royal, resembles a besieged fortress. The Revolution daily +augments its trenches and parallels around the sanctuary of the +monarchy. Its barracks are the faubourgs; its soldiers, red-bonneted +pikemen. Louis XVI. in his palace is like a general-in-chief in a +stronghold, who should have voluntarily dampened his powder, spiked his +cannon, and torn his flags. He no longer inspires his troops with +confidence. A capitulation seems imminent. The unfortunate monarch +still hopes vaguely for assistance from abroad, for the arrival of some +liberating army. Vain hope! He is blockaded in his castle, and the +moment is at hand when he will be compelled to play the buffoon in a +red bonnet. + +Glance at the palace and see how closely it is hemmed in by the +earthworks of the Revolution. The abode of luxury and display, +intended for fêtes rather than for war, Philibert Delorme's +_chef-d'oeuvre_ has in its architecture none of those means of defence +by which the military and feudal sovereignties of old times fortified +their dwellings. On the side of the courtyards a multitude of little +{4} streets contain a hostile population ready to swell every riot. +Near the Pavilion of Marsan is the Palais Royal, that headquarters of +insurrection, with its cafés, its gambling-dens, its houses of +ill-fame, its wooden galleries which are known as the camp of the +Tartars. It is the Duke of Orleans who has democratized the Palais +Royal. In spite of the sarcasms of the aristocracy and the lawsuits of +neighboring proprietors, he has destroyed the fine gardens bounded by +the rue de Richelieu, the rue des Petit-Champs, and the rue des +Bons-Enfants. In the place it occupied he has caused the rue de +Valois, the rue de Beaujolais, and the rue de Montpensier to be opened, +all of them inhabited by a revolutionary population. The remaining +space he has surrounded on three sides with constructions pierced by +galleries, where he has built the shops that form the finest bazaar in +Europe. The fourth side of these new constructions was originally +intended to form part of the Prince's palace, and to be composed of an +open colonnade supporting suites of apartments. But this side has not +been erected. In place of it the Duke of Orleans has run up some +temporary wooden sheds, containing three rows of shops separated by two +large passage-ways, the ground of which has not even been made level. + +The privileges pertaining to the Orleans family prevent the police from +entering the enclosure of the Palais Royal. Hence it becomes the +rendezvous of all conspirators. The taking of the Bastille was {5} +plotted there, and there the 20th of June and the 10th of August will +yet be organized. + +A little further off is the National Assembly. Its sessions are held +in the riding-school built when the little Louis XV. was to be taught +horsemanship. It adjoins the terrace of the Feuillants. One of its +courtyards which looks towards the front of the edifice, is at the +upper end of the rue de Dauphin. The other extremity occupies the site +where the rue Castiglione will be opened later on. There, close beside +the Tuileries, sits the National Assembly, the rival and victorious +power that will overcome the monarchy. + +The Assembly terrorizes the Tuileries. The Jacobin Club terrorizes the +Assembly. Close beside the Hall of the Manège, on the site to be +occupied afterward by the market of Saint-Honoré, the revolutionary +club holds its tumultuous sessions in the former convent founded in +1611 by the Jacobin, or Dominican, friars. The club meets three times +a week, at seven in the evening. The hall is a long rectangle with a +vaulted roof. Four rows of stalls occupy the longer sides, while the +two ends serve as public galleries. Nearly in the middle of the hall, +the speaker's platform and the president's writing-table stand opposite +each other. Hither come all ambitious revolutionists who desire to +talk, to agitate, to make themselves conspicuous. Here Robespierre +lords it, not being a deputy in consequence of the law forbidding +members of the {6} Constituent Assembly to belong to the legislative +body. Those who love disorder come here to seek emotions. Some find +lucrative employment, applause being paid for, and the different +parties having each its _claque_ in the galleries. Since April, 1791, +the Jacobin Club has affiliations in two thousand French towns and +villages. At its orders and in its pay is an army of agents whose +business it is to make stump speeches, to sing in the streets, to make +propositions in cafés, to applaud or to hiss in the galleries of the +National Assembly. These hirelings usually receive about five francs a +day, but as the number of the chevaliers of the revolutionary lustrum +increases, the pay diminishes, until it is finally reduced to forty +sous. Deserters and soldiers dismissed from their regiments for +misconduct are admitted by preference. + +For some days past, the Club of Moderate Revolutionists, friends of +Lafayette, who might have closed the old clubs after the sanguinary +repression of the riot in the Champ-de-Mars, and who contented +themselves with opening a new one, have been meeting in the convent of +the Feuillants, rue Saint-Honoré. But this new club has not been a +great success; moderation is not the order of the day; the Jacobins +have regained their empire, and on December 26, 1791, seals are placed +on the door of the Club of the Feuillants. + +At the other extremity of Paris there is a club still more inflammatory +than that of the Jacobins: {7} that of the Cordeliers. "The Jacobins," +said Barbaroux, "have no common aim, although they act in concert. The +Cordeliers are bent on blood, gold, and offices." Speaking as a rule, +the Cordeliers belong to the Jacobin Club, while hardly a single +Jacobin is a Cordelier. The Cordeliers are the advance-guard of the +Revolution. They are, as Camille Desmoulins has said, Jacobins of the +Jacobins. The chiefs are Danton, Marat, Hébert, Chaumette. They take +their names from those religious democrats, the Minorite friars of +Saint Francis, who wear a girdle of rope over their coarse gray habit. +They meet in the Place of the School of Medicine, in a monastery whose +church was built in the reign of Saint Louis, in 1259, with the fine +paid as indemnity for a murder. In 1590, it became the resort of the +most famous Leaguers. Chateaubriand says: "There are places which seem +to be the laboratory of seditions." How well this expression of the +author of the _Mémoires d'Outre-tombe_ describes the club-room of the +Cordeliers! The pictures, the sculptured or painted images, the veils +and curtains of the convent, have been torn down. The basilica +displays nothing but its bare bones to the eyes of the spectator. At +the apse, where wind and rain enter through the unglazed rose-window, +joiners' work-benches serve as a desk for the president and as places +on which to deposit the red caps. Do you see the fallen beams, the +wooden benches, the dismantled stalls, the relics of saints pushed or +rolled against the walls {8} to serve as benches for "dirty, dusty, +drunken, sweaty spectators in torn jackets, pikes on their shoulders, +or with their bare arms crossed"? Do you hear the orators who "call +each other beggars, pickpockets, robbers, assassins, to the discordant +noise of hisses and those proper to their different groups of devils? +They find the material of their metaphors in murder, they borrow them +from the filthiest of sewers and dungheaps, and from places set apart +for the prostitution of men and women. Gestures render their figures +of speech more comprehensible; with the cynicism of dogs, they call +everything by its own name, in an impious and obscene parade of oaths +and curses. To destroy and to produce, death and generation, nothing +else can be disentangled from the savage jargon which deafens one's +ear." And what is it that interrupts the speakers? "The little black +owls of the cloister without monks and the steeple without bells, +making themselves merry in the broken windows in expectation of their +prey. At first they are called to order by the tinkling of an +ineffectual bell; but as their cries do not cease, they are shot at to +make them keep silence. They fall, palpitating, bleeding, and ominous, +into the midst of the pandemonium." + +So, then, clubs take the place of convents. Since the Constituent +Assembly had decreed the abolition of monastic vows by its vote of +February 13, 1790, many persons, rudely detached from their usual way +of life and its duties, had abandoned their vocation. {9} The nun +became a working-woman; the shaved Capuchin read his journal in +suburban taverns; and grinning crowds visited the profaned and open +convents "as, in Grenada, travellers pass through the abandoned halls +of the Alhambra, or as they pause, at Tivoli, under the columns of the +Sibyl's temple." + +The Jacobin Club and the Club of the Cordeliers will destroy the +monarchy. In the Memoirs of Lafayette it is remarked that "it is hard +to understand how the Jacobin minority and a handful of pretended +Marseillais made themselves masters of Paris when nearly all the forty +thousand citizens composing the National Guard desired the +Constitution; but the clubs had succeeded in scattering the true +patriots and in creating a dread of vigorous measures. Experience had +not yet taught what this feebleness and disorganization must needs +cost." + +The dark side of the picture is plainly far more evident than it was in +1789. But how vivid it is still! Those who hunger after sensations +are in their element. When has there been more noise, more tumult, +more movement, more unexpected or more varied scenes? Listen once more +to Chateaubriand who, on his return from America, passed through Paris +at this epoch: "When I read the _Histoire des troubles publics ches +divers peuples_ before the Revolution, I could not conceive how it was +possible to live in those times. I was surprised that Montaigne wrote +so cheerfully in a castle which he could not walk around without risk +of being abducted by bands {10} of Leaguers or Protestants. The +Revolution has enabled me to comprehend this possibility of existence. +With us men, critical moments produce an increase of life. In a +society which is dissolving and forming itself anew, the strife between +the two tendencies, the collision of the past and the future, the +medley of ancient and modern manners, form a transitory combination +which does not admit a moment of ennui. Passions and characters, freed +from restraint, display themselves with an energy they do not possess +in well-regulated cities. The infraction of laws, the emancipation +from duties, usages, and the rules of decorum, even perils themselves, +increase the interest of this disorder." + +Yes, people complain, grow angry, suffer, but they are not bored. How +many incidents, episodes, emotions, there are in this strange +tragi-comedy! Everywhere there is something to be seen; in the +Assembly, the clubs, the public places, the promenades, streets, cafés, +and theatres. Brawls and discussions are heard on every side. If by +chance a salon is still open, disputes go on there as they would at a +club. What quarrels take place in the cafés! Men stand on chairs and +tables to spout. And what dissensions in the theatres! The actors +meddle with politics as well as the spectators. In the greenroom of +the _Comédie-Française_ there is a right side, whose chief is the +royalist Naudet, and a left side led by the republican Talma. Neither +actor goes out except well armed. There are pistols {11} underneath +their togas. The kings of tragedy, threatened by their political +adversaries, have real poniards wherewith to defend themselves. _Les +Horaces, Brutus, La Mort de César, Barnevelt, Guillaume Tell, Charles +IX._, are plays containing in each tirade allusions which inflame the +boxes and the pit. The theatre is a tilting-ground. If the royalists +are there in force, they cause the orchestra to play their favorite +airs: _Charmante Gabrielle, Vive Henri Quatre! O! Richard, O! mon +roi!_ The revolutionists protest, and sing their own chosen melody, +the _Ça ira_. Sometimes they come to blows, swords are drawn, and, the +play over, elegant women are dragged through the gutters. There is a +general outbreak of insults and violence. The journals play the chief +part in this universal madness. Sometimes the press is eloquent, but +it is oftener ribald or atrocious. To borrow an expression from +Montaigne, "it lowers itself even to the worthless esteem of extreme +inferiority." The beautiful French tongue, once so correct and pure, +is no longer recognizable. Vulgar words fall thick as hail. To the +language of the Academy has succeeded the jargon of the markets. + +What a swarm! what a swirl! How noisy, how restless, is this +revolutionary Paris! What excited crowds fill the clubs, the Assembly, +the Palais Royal, the gambling-houses, and the tumultuous faubourgs! +Riotous gatherings, popular deputations, detachments of cavalry, +companies of {12} foot-soldiers; gentlemen in French coats, powdered +hair, swords at their sides, hats under their arms, silk stockings and +low shoes; democrats close-cropped and unpowdered, with English frock +coats and American cravats; ragged _sans-culottes_ in red caps, weave +in and out in ceaseless motion. + +Do you know what was the chief distraction of this crowd in April, +1792? The debut of that new and fashionable machine, the guillotine. +It was used for the first time on the 25th, for a criminal guilty of +rape. Sensitive people congratulated each other on the mitigated +torment, which they were pleased to consider a humanitarian +improvement. The excellent philanthropist, Doctor Guillotin, was +lauded to the skies. His machine was named guillotine in his honor, +just as the stage-coaches established by Turgot had been called +turgotines. + +What enthusiasm, what infatuation, for this guillotine, already so +famous and destined to be so much more so! The editors of the +_Moniteur_ declare in a lyric outburst that it is worthy of the +approaching century. The truth is that it accelerates and makes less +difficult the executioner's task. In the end the crowd would become +disgusted with massacres. The delays of the gibbet would weary their +patience. The _sans-culottes_, who doubtless have a presentiment of +all that is going to happen, welcome the guillotine, then, with +acclamations. At the _Ambigu_ theatre a ballet-pantomime, called _Les +Quatre Fils Aymon_, is given, and all Paris runs to {13} see the heads +of all four fall at once, in the midst of loud applause, under the +blade of the good doctor's machine. People amuse themselves with their +future instrument of torture as if it were a toy. In a Girondin salon +they play at guillotine with a moveable screen that is lifted and let +fall again. At elegant dinners a little guillotine is brought in with +the dessert and takes the place of a sweet dish. A pretty woman places +a doll representing some political adversary under the knife; it is +decapitated in the neatest possible style, and out of it runs something +red that smells good, a liqueur perfumed with ambergris, into which +every lady hastens to dip her lace handkerchief. French gaiety would +make a vaudeville out of the day of judgment. Poor society, which +passes so quick from gay to grave, from lively to severe, and which, +like the Figaro of Beaumarchais, laughs at everything so that it may +not weep! + + + + +{14} + +II. + +COUNT DE FERSEN'S LAST JOURNEY TO PARIS. + +It has been supposed until lately that after the day when he bade +farewell to the royal family at the beginning of the Varennes journey, +Count de Fersen never again saw Marie Antoinette. A new publication of +very great importance proves that this is an error, and that the +Swedish nobleman came to Paris for the last time in 1792, and had +several interviews with the King and Queen. This publication is +entitled: _Extraits des papiers du grand maréchal de Suède, Comte Jean +Axel de Fersen_, and is published by his great-nephew, Baron de +Kinckowstrom, a Swedish colonel. There is something romantic in this +episode of the mysterious journey made by Marie Antoinette's loyal +chevalier, which merits to leave a trace in history. + +Fersen was one of those men whose sentiments are all the more profound +because they know how to veil them under an apparently imperturbable +calm. A soul of fire under an exterior of ice, as the Baroness de +Korff describes him, courageous to temerity, devoted to heroism, he had +conceived for Marie Antoinette one of those disinterested and ardent +{15} friendships which lie midway between love and religion. Almost as +much a Frenchman as he was a Swede, he did not forget that he had +fought in America under the standard of the Most Christian King, and +had been colonel of a regiment in the service of France. Having been +the courtier of the happy and brilliant Queen, he remained the courtier +of the Queen overcome by anguish. He had enkindled in the soul of his +sovereign, Gustavus III., the same chivalrous sentiment which animated +his own, and was impatiently awaiting the time when he could hasten to +the aid of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette under the Swedish flag. His +dearest ambition was to draw his sword in the Queen's defence. From +the Varennes journey up to the day of Marie Antoinette's execution, he +had but one thought: to rescue the woman for whom he would willingly +have shed the last drop of his blood. This fixed idea has left its +trace on every line of his journal. The sad and melancholy countenance +of Fersen, the courtier of misfortune, the friend of unhappy days, is +assuredly one of the celebrated types in the drama of Versailles and +the Tuileries. This man, who would have made no mark in history but +for the martyr Queen, is certain, thanks to her, not to be forgotten by +posterity. Marie Antoinette was to return him in glory what he gave +her in devotion. + +On her return to the Tuileries after the disastrous journey to +Varennes, the Queen wrote to {16} Fersen, June 27, 1791: "Be at ease +about us; we are living," and Fersen replied: "I am well, and live only +to serve you." June 29, she wrote him another letter in which she +said: "Do not write to me; it would endanger us; and, above all, do not +return here under any pretext; all would be lost if you should make +your appearance. They never lose sight of us by night or day; which is +a matter of indifference to me. Be tranquil; nothing will happen to +me. The Assembly desires to treat us with gentleness. Adieu. I shall +not be able to write to you again." + +Marie Antoinette was in error when she supposed she would not write +again. She was in error, likewise, when she imagined that Fersen, in +spite of all dangers and difficulties, would not find means to see her +again. Their correspondence was not interrupted. After the acceptance +of the Constitution, Marie Antoinette wrote to him: "Can you understand +my position and the part I am continually obliged to play? Sometimes I +do not understand myself, and am obliged to consider whether it is +really I who am speaking; but what is to be done? It is all necessary, +and be sure our position would be still worse than it is if I had not +at once assumed this attitude; we at least gain time by it, and that is +all that is required. I keep up better than could be expected, seeing +that I go out so little and endure constantly such immense fatigue of +mind. What with the persons whom I must see, my {17} writing, and the +time I spend with my children, I have not a moment to myself. The last +occupation, which is not the least, gives me my sole happiness. When I +am very sad, I take my little boy in my arms, embrace him with my whole +heart, and for a moment am consoled." + +Fersen, touched and pitying, was constantly thinking of that fatal +palace of the Tuileries where the Queen was so much to be +compassionated. An invincible attraction drew him thither. There, he +thought, was the post of devotion and of honor. November 26, he wrote: +"Tell me whether there is any possibility of going to see you entirely +alone, without a servant, in case I receive the order to do so from the +King (Gustavus III.); he has already spoken to me of his desire to +bring this about." Of all the sovereigns who interested themselves in +the fate of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, Gustavus was the most +active, brave, and resolute; he was also the only one in whom Marie +Antoinette placed absolute confidence. She expected less from her own +brother, the Emperor Leopold, and it was to Stockholm above all that +she turned her eyes. Gustavus ordered Fersen to go secretly to Paris, +and on December 22, 1791, he sent him a memoir and certain letters, +commissioning him to deliver them to Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. +He recommended, as forcibly as he could, a new attempt at flight, but +with precautions suggested by the lesson of Varennes. He thought the +members of the royal {18} family should depart separately and in +disguise, and that, once outside of his kingdom, Louis XVI. should call +for the intervention of a congress. The following passage occurs in +the letter of the Swedish King to Marie Antoinette: "I beg Your Majesty +to consider seriously that violent disorders can only be cured by +violent remedies, and that if moderation is a virtue in the course of +ordinary life, it often becomes a vice when there is question of public +matters. The King of France can re-establish his dominion only by +resuming his former rights; every other remedy is illusory; anything +except this would merely open the way to endless discussions which +would augment the confusion instead of ending it. The King's rights +were torn from him by the sword; it is by the sword that they must be +reconquered. But I refrain; I should remember that I am addressing a +princess who, in the most terrible moments of her life, has shown the +most intrepid courage." + +Fersen obtained permission from Louis XVI. to accomplish the mission +confided to him by Gustavus III. He left Stockholm under an assumed +name and with the passport of a Swedish courier, and reached Paris +without accident, February 13, 1792. He was so adroit and prudent that +no one suspected his presence. On the very evening of his arrival he +wrote in his journal: "Went to the Queen by my usual road; very few +National Guards; did not see the King." Fersen, therefore, only +reappeared at the Tuileries in the darkness, like a fugitive or {19} an +outlaw. He found the Queen pale with grief and with hair whitened by +sorrow and emotion. It was a solemn moment. The storm was raging +within France and beyond it. Terrible omens, snares, and dangers lay +on every side. One might have said that the Tuileries were about to be +swallowed up in a gulf of fire and blood. + +The next day Fersen saw the King. He wrote in his journal: "Tuesday, +14. Saw the King at six in the evening. He will not go and can not, +on account of the extreme vigilance. In fact, he scruples at it, +having so often promised to remain, for he is an honest man.... He +sees that force is the only resource; but, being weak, he thinks it +impossible to resume all his authority.... Unless he were constantly +encouraged, I am not sure he would not be tempted to negotiate with the +rebels. He said to me afterwards: 'That's all very well! We are by +ourselves and we can talk; but nobody ever found himself in my +position. I know I missed the right moment; it was the 14th of July; +we ought to have gone then, and I wanted to, but how could I when +Monsieur himself begged me to stay, and Marshal de Broglie, who was in +command, said to me: "Yes, we can go to Metz. But what shall we do +when we get there?" I lost the opportunity and never found it again. +I have been abandoned by everybody.'" Louis XVI. desired Fersen to +warn the Powers that they must not be surprised at anything he might be +forced to do; that he was {20} obliged, that it was the effect of +constraint. "They must put me out of the question," he added, "and let +me do what I can." + +Fersen had a long talk with Marie Antoinette the same day. She entered +into full details about the present and especially about the past. She +explained why the flight to Varennes, in which Fersen had taken such a +prominent part, and which had succeeded so well so long as he directed +it, had ended in failure. The Queen described the anguish of the +arrest and the return. To the project of a new effort to escape, she +replied by pointing out the implacable surveillance of which she was +the object, and the effervescence of popular passions, which this time +would overleap all restraint if the fugitives were taken. It would be +better for the royal family to suffer together than to expose +themselves to die separately. It would be better to die like princes, +who abdicate majesty only with life, than as vagabonds, under a vulgar +disguise. "The Queen," adds Fersen, "told me that she saw Alexander +Lameth and Duport; that they always tell her that there is no remedy +but foreign troops; failing that, all is lost, that this cannot last, +that they have gone farther than they wished to. In spite of all this, +she thinks them malicious, does not trust them, but uses them as best +she can. All the ministers are traitors who betray the King." Fersen +had a final interview with Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette on February +21, 1792. By February 24, {21} he had returned to Brussels. He was +profoundly moved on quitting the Tuileries, but, dismal and lugubrious +as his forebodings may have been, how much more sombre was the reality +to prove! + +What a terrible fate was reserved for the chief actors in this drama! +Yet a few days, and the chivalrous Gustavus was to be assassinated. +The hour of execution was approaching for Louis XVI. and Marie +Antoinette. Fersen, likewise, was to have a most tragic end. From the +moment when he bade his last adieu to the unhappy Queen, his life was +but one long torment. His disposition, already inclined to melancholy, +became incurably sad. His loyal and devoted soul could not accustom +itself to the thought of the calamities weighing so cruelly upon that +good and beautiful sovereign of whom he said in 1778: "The Queen is the +prettiest and most amiable princess that I know." On October 14, 1793, +he will still be endeavoring, with the aid of Baron de Breteuil, to +bring to completion a thousandth plot to extricate the august captive +from her fate. He will learn the fatal tidings on the 20th. "I can +think of nothing but my loss," he will write in his journal. "It is +frightful to have no positive details. It is horrible that she should +have been alone in her last moments, with no one to speak to, or to +receive her last wishes. No; without vengeance, my heart will never be +content." Covered with honors under the reign of Gustavus IV., +senator, chancellor of the Academy of {22} Upsal, member of the +Seraphim Order, grand marshal of the kingdom of Sweden, there will +remain in the depths of his heart a wound which nothing can heal. An +inveterate fatality will pursue him as it had done the unfortunate +sovereign of whom he had been the chevalier. He will perish in a riot +at Stockholm, June 20, 1810, at the time of the obsequies of the Prince +Royal. Struck down by fists and walking-sticks, his hair pulled out, +his clothes torn to rags, he will be dragged about half-naked, rolled +underfoot, assassinated by a maddened populace. Before rendering his +last sigh, he will succeed in rising to his knees, and, joining his +hands, he will utter these words from the stoning of Saint Stephen: "O +my God, who callest me to Thee, I implore Thee for my tormentors, whom +I pardon." If not the same words, they are at least the same thoughts +as those of Marie Antoinette on the platform of the scaffold. + + + + +{23} + +III. + +THE DEATH OF THE EMPEROR LEOPOLD. + +One after another, Marie Antoinette lost her last chances of safety; +blows as unforeseen as terrible beat down the combinations on which she +had built her hopes. Within a fortnight she was to see the two +sovereigns disappear from whom she had expected succor: her brother, +the Emperor Leopold, and Gustavus III., the King of Sweden. Leopold +had not been equal to all the illusions which his sister had cherished +with regard to him, but, nevertheless, he showed great interest in +French affairs, and a lively desire to be useful to Louis XVI. Pacific +by disposition, he had temporized at first, and adopted a conciliatory +policy. He desired a reconciliation with the new principles, and, +moreover, he was not blind to the inexperience and levity of the +_émigrés_. But the obligation, to which he was bound by treaties, to +defend the rights of princes holding property in Alsace, his fear of +the propaganda of sedition, the aggressive language of the National +Assembly and the Parisian press, had ended by determining him to take a +more resolute attitude, and it was at the moment when he was {24} +seriously intending to come to his sister's aid that he was carried off +by sudden death. Though she did not desire a war between Austria and +France, the Queen had persisted in wishing for an armed congress, which +would have been a compromise between peace and war, but which the +National Assembly would have regarded as an intolerable humiliation. +It must not be denied, the situation was a false one. Between the true +sentiments of Louis XVI. and his new rôle as a constitutional +sovereign, there was a real incompatibility. As to the Queen, she was +on good terms neither with the _émigrés_ nor with the Assembly. + +In order to get a just idea of the sentiments shown by the _émigrés_, +it is necessary to read a letter written from Trèves, October 16, 1791, +by Madame de Raigecourt, the friend of Madame Elisabeth, to another +friend of the Princess, the Marquise de Bombelles: "I see with pain +that Paris and Coblentz are not on good terms. The Emperor treats the +Princes like children.... The Princes cannot avoid suspecting that it +is the influence of the Queen and her agents which thwarts their plans +and causes the Emperor to behave so strangely.... Some trickery on the +part of the Tuileries is still suspected in this country. They ought +to explain themselves to each other once for all. Is the Queen afraid +lest the Count d'Artois should arrogate an authority in the realm which +would diminish her own? Let her be at ease on that score; she will +{25} always be the King's wife and always dominant. What is she afraid +of, then? She complains that she is not sufficiently respected. But +you know the good heart and the uprightness of our Prince; he is +incapable of the remarks attributed to him, and which have certainly +been reported to the Queen with the intention of estranging them +entirely." Madame de Raigecourt ends her letter with this complaint +against Louis XVI.: "Our wretched King lowers himself more and more +every day; for he is doing too much, even if he still intends to +escape.... The emigration, meanwhile, increases daily, and presently +there will be more Frenchmen than Germans in this region." At this +very time, the Queen was having recourse to her brother Leopold as to a +saviour. She wrote to him, October 4, 1791: "My only consolation is in +writing to you, my dear brother; I am surrounded by so many atrocities +that I need all your friendship to tranquillize my mind.... A point of +primary importance is to regulate the conduct of the _émigrés_. If +they re-enter France in arms, all is lost, and it will be impossible to +make it believed that we are not in connivance with them. Even the +existence of an army of _émigrés_ on the frontier would be enough to +keep up the irritation and afford ground for accusations against us; it +appears to me that a congress would make the task of restraining them +less difficult.... This idea of a congress pleases me greatly; it +would second the efforts we are {26} making to maintain confidence. In +the first place, I repeat, it would put a check on the _émigrés_, and, +moreover, it would make an impression here from which I hope much. I +submit that to your better judgment.... Adieu, my dear brother; we +love you, and my daughter has particularly charged me to embrace her +good uncle." + +While Marie Antoinette was thus turning towards Austria for assistance, +the National Assembly at Paris repelled with energy all thought of any +intervention whatsoever on the part of foreign powers. January 1, +1792, it issued a decree of impeachment against the King's brothers, +the Prince de Conde, and Calonne. The confiscation of the property of +the _émigrés_ and the taxation of their revenues for the benefit of the +State had been prescribed by another decree to which Louis XVI. had +offered no opposition. January 14, Guadet said in the tribune, while +speaking of the congress: "If it is true that by delays and +discouragement they wish to bring us to accept this shameful mediation, +ought the National Assembly to close its eyes to such a danger? Let us +all swear to die here rather than--" He was not allowed to finish. +The whole assembly rose to their feet, crying: "Yes, yes; we swear it!" +And in a burst of enthusiasm, every Frenchman who would take part in a +congress having for its object the modification of the Constitution, +was declared an infamous traitor. January 17, it was decreed that the +King should require the {27} Emperor Leopold to explain himself +definitely before March 1. + +By a curious coincidence, this date of March 1 was precisely that on +which the Emperor Leopold was to die of a dreadful malady. He was in +perfect health on February 27, when he gave audience to the Turkish +envoy; he was in his agony, February 28, and on March 1, he died. His +usual physician asserted that he had been poisoned. The idea that a +crime had been committed spread among the people. Vague rumors got +about concerning a woman who had caused remark at the last masked ball +at court. This unknown person, under shelter of her disguise, might +have presented the sovereign with poisoned bonbons. The Jacobins, who +might have desired to get rid of the armed chief of the empire, and the +_émigrés_, who might have reproached him as too luke-warm in his +opposition to the principles of the French Revolution, were alternately +suspected. The last hypothesis was hardly probable, nor does anything +prove that the Jacobins had any hand in the possibly natural death of +the Emperor Leopold. But minds were so overexcited at the time that +the parties mutually accused each other, on all occasions, of the most +execrable crimes. For that matter, there were Jacobins who, out of +mere bravado, would willingly have gloried in crimes of which they were +not guilty, provided that these crimes had been committed against kings. + +What is certain is, that Marie Antoinette believed {28} in poison. +"The death of the Emperor Leopold," says Madame Campan, "occurred on +March 1, 1792. The Queen was out when the news arrived at the +Tuileries. On her return, I gave her the letter announcing it. She +cried out that the Emperor had been poisoned; that she had remarked and +preserved a gazette in which, in an article on the session of the +Jacobin Club at the time when Leopold had declared for the Coalition, +it was said, in speaking of him, that a bit of piecrust could settle +that affair. From that moment the Queen had regarded this phrase as an +inadvertence of the propagandists." + +On the very day when Marie Antoinette's brother died, Louis XVI.'s +Minister of Foreign Affairs, De Lessart, had enraged the National +Assembly by reading them extracts from his diplomatic correspondence, +which they found not sufficiently firm. They were indignant at a +despatch in which Prince de Kaunitz said: "The latest events give us +hopes; it appears that the majority of the French nation, impressed +with the evils they have prepared, are returning to more moderate +principles, and incline to render to the throne the dignity and +authority which are the essence of monarchical government." When De +Lessart came down from the tribune, the whispering changed into cries +of rage and threats against the minister and the court, which, it was +said, was planning a counter-revolution at the Tuileries, and dictating +to the cabinet of Vienna the language by which it hoped to intimidate +France. {29} At the evening session of the same day, Rouyer, a deputy, +proposed to impeach the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "Is it possible," +cried he, "that a perfidious minister should come here to make a parade +of his work and lay the responsibility of it on a foreign power? Will +the time never arrive when ministers shall cease to betray us? Were my +head to be the price of the denunciation I am making, I would none the +less go on with it." At the session of March 6, Guadet said: "It is +time to know whether the ministers wish to make Louis XVI. King of the +French, or the King of Coblentz." + +On the 10th the storm broke. The day before, Narbonne had received his +dismission. Brissot accused De Lessart of having compromised the +safety of France, withheld from the Assembly the documents establishing +the alliance between the Emperor and the King of Prussia, discredited +the assignats, depreciated the credit, lowered the rate of exchange, +and encouraged interior disorder. Vergniaud followed him, exclaiming: +"From the tribune where I am speaking may be seen the palace where +perverse counsellors lead astray and deceive the King given to you by +the Constitution; where they forge chains for the nation, and arrange +the manoeuvres which are to deliver us up to Austria, after having +caused us to pass through the horrors of civil war. Terror and dismay +have often issued from that famous palace. Let them re-enter it to-day +in the name of the law, let them penetrate all hearts, and {30} teach +all who dwell there, that our Constitution accords inviolability to the +King alone. Let them know that the law will overtake all the guilty +without exception, and that there will not be a single head convicted +of crime which can escape its sword." The decree of impeachment +against the ministers was voted by a very large majority. De Lessart +was advised to take flight, but he refused. "I owe it to my country," +said he, "I owe it to my King and to myself to make my innocence and +the regularity of my conduct plain before the tribunal of the high +court, and I have decided to give myself up at Orleans." He was +conducted by gendarmes to that city, where he was imprisoned. Louis +XVI. dared not do anything to save his favorite minister. On March 11, +Pétion, the mayor of Paris, came to the bar of the Assembly, and read, +in the name of the Commune, an address in which it was said: "When the +atmosphere surrounding us is heavy with noisome vapors, Nature can +relieve herself only by a thunder-storm. So, too, society can purge +itself from the abuses which disturb it only by a formidable +explosion.... It is true, then, that responsibility is not an idle +word; that all men, whatever may be their stations, are equal before +the law; that the sword of justice is poised over all heads without +distinction." Was not this language like a prognostic of the 21st of +January and the 16th of October? Encompassed by a thousand snares, +hated by each of the extreme parties, by the {31} _émigrés_ as well as +by the Jacobins, Marie Antoinette no longer beheld anything but aspects +of sorrow. Abroad, as in France, her gaze fell on dismal spectacles +only. Her imagination was affected. She hardly dared taste the dishes +served at her table. All had conspired to betray her. She had +experienced so many deceptions and so much anguish; fate had pursued +her with so much bitterness, that her heart, exhausted with emotions, +and overwhelmed with sadness, was weary of all things, even of hope. + + + + +{32} + +IV. + +THE DEATH OF GUSTAVUS III. + +The drama of the Revolution is not French alone; it is European. It +has its afterclap in every empire, in every kingdom, even to the most +distant lands. It excites minds in Stockholm almost as much as in +Paris. Among the Swedes there are people whose greatest desire would +be to parody the October Days, and to carry about on pikes the bleeding +heads of their adversaries. The new ideas take fire and spread like a +train of gunpowder. It is the fashion to go to extremes; a nameless +frenzy and fatality seem let loose upon this epoch of agitations and +catastrophes. All those who, at one time or another, have been guests +at the palace of Versailles, are condemned, as by a mysterious +sentence, either to exile or to death. + +How will terminate the career of that brilliant King of Sweden, who had +received from Versailles and from Paris, from the court and from the +city, such an enthusiastic reception? Gustavus, the idol of the great +lords, the philosophers, and the fashionable beauties, who, after being +the hero of the encyclopædists, came to hold his court at {33} +Aix-la-Chapelle amid the French _émigrés_, and who, on his return to +Stockholm, prepared there the great crusade for authority, announcing +himself as the avenger of divine right, the saviour of all thrones? +The last days of his life, his presentiments, which recall those of +Cæsar, his superstitions, his belief in prophecies, his magic +incantations, that warning which he scorns, as the Duke de Guise did at +the castle of Blois, that masked ball where the costumes, the music, +the flowers, the lights, offer a painfully strange contrast to the +horror of the attack; all is sinister, lugubrious, in these fantastic +and fatal scenes which have already tempted more than one dramatist, +more than one musician, and whose phases a Shakespeare only could +retrace. The crime of Stockholm is linked closely to the +death-struggle of French royalty. The funeral knell which tolled at +this extremity of the North had echoes in Paris. The Swedish regicides +set the example to the regicides of France. + +M. Geffroy has remarked very justly in his work, _Gustave III. et la +cour de France_, that the bloody deed which put an end to the reign and +the life of Gustavus is not an isolated fact: "The faults committed by +this Prince would not have sufficed to arm his assassins. The true +source whence Ankarstroem and his accomplices drew their first +inspiration was that vertigo caused during the last years of the +century by the annihilation of all religious and even all philosophical +faith.... No moment of {34} modern history has presented an +intellectual and moral anarchy comparable to that which accompanied the +revolutionary period in Europe." + +The eighteenth century was punished for incredulity by superstition. +Having refused to believe the most holy truths, it lent credence to the +most fantastic chimeras. For priests it substituted sorcerers; for +Christian ceremonies, the rites of freemasonry. The time was coming +when, because it had rejected the Sacred Heart of Jesus, it was going +to bow before the sacred heart of Marat. The adepts of Mesmer and of +De Puysegur, the seekers after the philosopher's stone, the Nicolaites +of Berlin, the illuminati of Bavaria, enlarged the boundaries of human +credulity, and the men who succumbed in the most naïve and foolish +manner to these wretched weaknesses of mind, were precisely the +haughtiest philosophers, those who had prided themselves the most on +their distinction as free-thinkers. Such a one was Gustavus III. + +This Voltairean Prince, who had held the Christian verities so cheap, +was superstitious even to puerility. He did not believe in the +Gospels, but he believed in books of magic. In a corner of his palace +he had arranged a cupboard with a censer and a pair of candlesticks, +before which he performed cabalistic operations in nothing but his +shirt. Throughout his entire reign he consulted a fortune-teller named +Madame Arfwedsson, who read the future for him in coffee-grounds. +Around his neck {35} he wore a gold box containing a sachet in which +there was a powder that, according to his belief, would drive away evil +spirits. All this apparatus of incantation and sorcery was one of the +causes of Gustavus's fall. It multiplied the snares around the +unfortunate monarch, and served to mask his enemies. Prophecies +announced his approaching end, and conspirators took care to fulfil the +prophecies. + +The Duke of Sudermania, the King's brother, without being an accomplice +in the project of crime, encouraged underhand practices. Sectarians +approached Gustavus to reproach him for his luxury, his prodigalities, +his entertainments, or addressed him anonymous warnings which, in +Biblical language, declared him accursed and rejected by the Lord. +Their insolence knew no bounds. Madame Arfwedsson had counselled the +King to beware if he should meet a man dressed in red. Count de +Ribbing, one of the future conspirators, having heard of this, ordered +a red costume out of bravado, and presented himself in it before his +sovereign, whom such an apparition caused to reflect if not to tremble. + +Gustavus, like Cæsar, was to see his Ides of March. It had been +predicted to him that the month of March would be fatal to him. This +month approached, and the monarch diverted himself by fêtes and +boisterous entertainments in order to banish the presentiments which +never ceased to assail {36} him. He said to himself that all this +phantasmagoria would probably soon vanish; that the funereal images +would of themselves depart; and that the spectres would disappear at +the sound of arms. The monarchical crusade of which he proposed to be +the leader grew upon him as the best means by which to escape the +incessant obsessions haunting his spirit. In vain was he reminded that +Sweden was in need of money, and that a war of intervention in the +affairs of France was not popular. His resolution remained unshaken. +He counted the days and hours which still separated him from the moment +of action: his sole idea was to chastise the Jacobins and avenge the +majesty of thrones. + +Returned to Stockholm from Aix-la-Chapelle, at the beginning of August, +1791, the impetuous monarch began to be very active in his warlike +preparations. The Marquis de Bouillé, who had been obliged to quit +France at the time of the unsuccessful journey to Varennes, had entered +his service and was to counsel him and fight at his side under the +Swedish flag. At the same time Gustavus officially renewed his +promises of aid to the King of France. Louis XVI. replied:-- + +"MONSIEUR MY BROTHER AND COUSIN: I have just received the lines with +which you have honored me on the occasion of your return. It is always +a great consolation to have such proofs of a friendly sentiment as are +given me by this letter. The concern, Sire, which you take in all that +relates to {37} my interest touches me more and more, and I recognize +in each word the august soul of a king whom the world admires as much +for his magnanimous heart as for his wisdom." + +Meanwhile the conspirators, animated either by personal rancor or the +passions common to nobles hostile to their king, were secretly +preparing for an attack. The five leaders were Captain Ankarstroem, +Count de Ribbing, Count de Horn, Count de Lilienhorn, major of the Blue +Guards, and Baron Pechlin, an old man of seventy-two, who had been +distinguished in the civil wars, and was the soul of the plot. The +conspirators had doubts before committing the crime. During the Diet, +which met at Gefle, January 25, 1792, they refrained at the very moment +when they were about to strike. + +Gustavus was in his castle of Haga, about a league from Stockholm, +without guards or attendants. Three of the conspirators approached the +castle at five in the evening. They were armed with carbines, and, +having placed themselves in ambush near the King's apartment on the +ground-floor, were awaiting an opportunity to kill their sovereign. +Gustavus coming in from a long walk, went in his dressing-gown to sit +in the library, the windows of which opened like doors into the garden. +He fell asleep in his armchair. Whether they were alarmed by the sound +of footsteps, or whether the contrast between the slumber of the +unsuspicious King and the death poising above his head awakened {38} +some remorse, the assassins once more abandoned their meditated crime. + +Weary of the attempts they had been planning for six months, and which +never came to anything, the conspirators might possibly have given them +up altogether if a circumstance which they considered providential had +not come to rekindle their regicidal zeal. The last masked ball of the +season was to be given in the Opera-house on the night of March 16-17, +and it was known that Gustavus would be present. To strike the monarch +in the midst of the festival, in order to chastise him for his love of +pleasure, was an idea which charmed the assassins. Moreover, the mask +alone could embolden them; they thought that if the august victim were +enveloped in a domino they need no longer dread that royal prestige +which had more than once caused them to recoil. + +Gustavus was counselled to be on his guard. The young Count Louis de +Bouillé, who was then at Stockholm, and who had been informed by a +letter from Germany that the King was about to be assassinated, begged +him to profit by the warnings reaching him from every quarter. +Gustavus replied that he would rather go blindly to meet his fate than +torment himself with the numberless precautions which such suspicions +would demand. "If I listened," added he, "to all the advice I receive, +I could not even drink a glass of water; besides, I am far from +believing in the execution of such a plot. {39} My subjects, although +very brave in war, are extremely timid in politics. The successes I +expect to gain in France, the trophies of which I shall bring back to +Stockholm, will speedily augment my power by the confidence and general +respect which will be their result." + +Meantime the fatal hour was approaching. The masked ball of March 16 +was about to open. Before going there, Gustavus took supper with a few +of the persons belonging to his household. While he was at table he +received a note, written in French and unsigned, in which he was +entreated not to enter the playhouse, where he was about to be stricken +to death. The author of the note urgently recommended the King not to +make his appearance at the ball, and, if he persisted in going, to +suspect the crowd which would press around him, because this gathering +was to be the prelude and signal of the blow aimed at him. The really +bizarre thing about this was that the man who wrote these lines was +himself one of the conspirators, Count de Lilienhorn. + +"It is impossible to tell," says the Marquis de Bouillé in his Memoirs, +"whether his conscience wished to acquit itself in this manner towards +the King, to whom he owed everything, without forfeiting his word to +his party, or whether, knowing the fearless character of this prince, +he did not offer his anonymous advice as a bait to his courage. It +certainly produced the latter effect." Gustavus made no {40} +reflections on reading this note, and went fearlessly to the ball. + +The orchestra is playing wildly. The dances are animated. The hall, +adorned with flowers, sparkles under the glow of the chandeliers. +Gustavus appears for a moment in his box. It is only then that he +shows to Baron d'Essen, his first equerry, the anonymous note he had +received while at supper. That faithful servant begs him not to go +down into the hall. Gustavus disregards the prudent counsel. He says +that hereafter he will wear a coat of mail, but that, for this time, he +is perfectly determined to be reckless about danger. The King and his +equerry go into the saloon in front of the royal box, where each puts +on a domino. Then they enter the hall by way of the stage. There are +men essentially courageous, who love danger for its own sake. Gustavus +is one of them. Hence he takes pleasure in braving all his assassins. +As he is crossing the greenroom with Baron d'Essen on his arm, "Let us +see," says he, "whether they will really dare to kill me." Yes, they +will dare it. The moment that the King enters he is recognized in +spite of his mask and his domino. He walks slowly around the hall, and +then goes into the pit, where he strolls about during several minutes. +He is about to retrace his steps, when he finds himself surrounded, as +had been predicted, by a group of maskers who get between him and the +officers of his suite. Several black dominos approach. They are the +assassins. One of them, {41} Count de Horn, lays a hand on his +shoulder: "Good day, fine masker!" he says. This Judas salute, this +ironical welcome given by the murderers to their victim, is the signal +for the attack. On the instant, Ankarstroem fires on the King with a +pistol loaded with old iron. + +Gustavus, struck in the left hip, cries, "I am wounded!" The pistol, +which had been wrapped in wool, made only a muffled report, and the +smoke spreading throughout the room, the crowd does not think of a +murder, but a fire. Cries of "Fire! fire!" augment the confusion. +Baron d'Essen, all covered with his master's blood, helps him to gain a +little box called the OEil-de-Boeuf, and from there a salon, where he +is laid upon a sofa. Baron d'Armfelt orders the doors of the theatre +to be closed, and every one to unmask. A man, brazening it out, lifts +his mask before the officer of police, and says to him with assurance, +"As for me, sir, I hope that you will not suspect me." It is +Ankarstroem, the assassin. He goes out quietly. But, after the crime +was committed, his weapons, a pistol and a knife like that of +Ravaillac, had fallen on the floor. A gunsmith of Stockholm will +recognize the pistol and declare that he had sold it a few days before +to a former officer of the guards, Captain Ankarstroem. It is the +token which will cause the arrest of the assassin, and his punishment +by the penalty of parricides,--decapitation and the cutting off of his +right hand. + +{42} + +The King showed admirable calm and resignation during the thirteen days +he had still to live. He asked with anxiety if the murderer had been +arrested, and being answered that his name was not yet known: "Ah! God +grant," said he, "that he may not be discovered!" As soon as the first +bandages were put on, the wounded man was taken to his apartments at +the castle. There he received his courtiers and the foreign ministers. +When he saw the Duke d'Escars, who represented the brothers of Louis +XVI. at Stockholm: "This is a blow," said he, "which is going to +rejoice your Parisian Jacobins; but write to the Princes that if I +recover from it, it will change neither my sentiments nor my zeal for +their just cause." In the midst of his sufferings he preserved a +dignity above all praise. Neither recriminations nor murmurs issued +from his lips. He summoned to his death-bed both his friends and those +who had been among the number of his enemies, but would have been +horrified to have been accomplices in a crime. When the old Count de +Brahé, leader of the nobles of the opposition, presented himself, +Gustavus said, as he pressed him in his arms: "I bless my wound, since +it has brought back an old friend who had withdrawn from me. Embrace +me, my dear count, and let all be forgotten between us." + +The fate of his son, who was about to ascend the throne at the age of +thirteen, was the chief preoccupation of the King. "Let them put me on +a litter," cried he; "I will go to the public square and speak to {43} +the people." And he said to Baron d'Armfelt: "Go, and like another +Antony, show the bloody vestments of Cæsar." It was also to D'Armfelt +that he said as he was signing with his dying hand his commission as +Governor of Stockholm: "Give me your knightly word that you will serve +my son as faithfully as you have served me." He made his confession to +his grand-almoner: "I fear," he said to him, "that I have no great +merit before God, but at least I am sure that I have never done harm to +any one intentionally." He meant to receive the sacraments according +to the Lutheran form, and to have the Queen brought to him, as he had +not seen her since his illness. But while seeking sleep in order to +tranquillize his mind before this emotion, he found the slumber of +death, March 29, 1792, at eleven in the morning. He was forty-six +years old. + +Thus terminated the brilliant and stormy career of the prince on whom +the Marquis de Bouillé has pronounced the following judgment: "His +manners and his politeness rendered him the most amiable and attractive +man in his country, although the Swedes are naturally intelligent. He +had a vivid imagination, a mind enlightened and adorned by a taste for +letters, a masculine and persuasive eloquence, and an easy elocution +even when speaking French; useful and agreeable acquirements, a +prodigious memory, polite and affable manners, accompanied by a certain +oddity which did not displease. His strong and ardent soul was +enkindled with an inordinate love of glory; but a {44} chivalrous +spirit and loyalty dominated there. His sensitive heart rendered him +clement, when he ought, perhaps, to have been severe; he was even +susceptible of friendship, and this prince has had and has preserved +friends whom I have known, and who were worthy to be such. He had a +firm and decided character, and, above all, that resolution so +necessary to statesmen, without which wit, prudence, talents, +experience, are not only useless, but often injurious." + +According to the Marquis de Bouillé, Gustavus should have been the King +of France, and Louis XVI. King of Sweden. "As the sovereign of France, +Gustavus would have been, beyond all doubt, one of its greatest kings. +He would have preserved that beautiful realm from a revolution; he +would have governed with glory and with splendor.... Louis XVI., on +the other hand, placed on the throne of Sweden, would have obtained the +respect and esteem of that simple people by his moral and religious +virtues, his economy, his spirit of justice, and his good and +benevolent sentiments. He would have contributed to the happiness of +the Swedes, who would have wept above his tomb; whereas both these +monarchs perished at the hands of their subjects. But the designs of +Providence are impenetrable, and we ought, in respect and silence, to +obey its unalterable decrees." + +The Jacobins of Paris, who affected to despise the projects of Gustavus +III., showed how much they had feared him by the mad joy they displayed +on {45} learning of his death. They lavished praises on "Brutus +Ankarstroem." Although it had been committed by the nobles, there was +a certain reminiscence of the French Revolution about the assault. In +their secret meetings the conspirators had agreed to carry around on +pikes the heads of Gustavus's principal friends, "in the French style," +as was said in those days. Count de Lilienhorn, brought up, nourished, +and drawn from poverty and obscurity by Gustavus, and overwhelmed to +the last moment by the benefits of the generous monarch, explained his +monstrous ingratitude and the part he had taken in the attack, by +saying he had been led astray by the idea of commanding the National +Guards of Stockholm after the Revolution, and playing the same part as +Lafayette. The Girondin ministry attained to power in France a few +days after Gustavus had been struck down in Sweden. There was no +connecting link between the two facts; but at Paris, as at Stockholm, +the cause of kings sustained a terrible repulse. The tragic death of +their faithful friend must have caused Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette +some painful forebodings concerning their own fate. The murder of +Gustavus was the first of a series of great catastrophes. The pistol +of the Swedish regicide heralded the blade of the Parisian guillotine. +The 16th of March was the prelude of the 21st of January. + + + + +{46} + +V. + +THE BEGINNINGS OF MADAME ROLAND. + +The moment is at hand when a woman of the middle class, born in humble +circumstances, is about to make her appearance on the scene of +politics; a woman who, after living in obscurity during thirty-eight +years, was to become famous in a few days, and attract the attention of +all France first and afterwards that of Europe entire. No figure is +more curious to study than hers, and it is not surprising that of late +years it has tempted men of great merit, such as MM. Daubant and +Faugère, whose publications have shed great light on the Egeria of the +Girondins. + +At every epoch of history there are certain women who become as it were +living symbols, and sum up in their own persons the passions, +prejudices, and illusions of their time. They reflect at once its +vices and its virtues, its qualities and its defects. Such was Madame +Roland. All the distinctive characteristics of the close of the +eighteenth century are resumed in her: ardent enthusiasm, generous +ideals, aspiration towards progress, passion for liberty, heroic +courage in view of persecution, captivity, and death; an absence of +religious faith, an implacable vanity, a {47} thirst for emotions, +plagiarism of antiquity, declamatory language and sentiments, and +childish imitation of Greece and Rome. Nothing is more interesting +than to analyze the conceptions of this mind, count the pulsations of +this heart, and surprise the inmost secrets of a woman whose +psychological importance is as considerable as her place in history. +Intellectually as well as morally, Madame Roland is the daughter of +Jean-Jacques Rousseau; socially she is the personification of that +third estate which, having been nothing, wished at first to be +something and afterwards to be all; politically, she is by turns the +heroine and the victim of the Revolution, which, under pretext of +liberty, engendered tyranny, which used the guillotine and perished by +the guillotine, and which after dreaming of light expired in mire and +blood. + +How was it that this little _bourgeoise_, the daughter of Philipon the +engraver, a man midway between an artisan and an artist, whose very +origin seemed to remove her so far from any political rôle, attained to +high renown? What influences formed this woman whose qualities were +masculine? Whence was drawn the inspiration of this siren, destined to +be taken in her own snares and die the victim of her own incantations? +A rapid glance at the earliest years of Marie-Jeanne Philipon, the +future Madame Roland, is enough to explain her passions and her hopes, +her errors and her talents, her rages and her enthusiasms. + +She was born in Paris, March 18, 1754, of an intelligent but frivolous +father, and a simple, devoted, {48} honestly commonplace mother. From +infancy she felt herself superior to those by whom she was surrounded. +Thence sprang an unmeasured pride and a continual hunger to produce an +impression. The infant prodigy preluded the female politician. +Speaking of herself in her Memoirs, she becomes ecstatic over the child +who "read serious works, explained very well the circles of the +celestial globe, used crayons and the burin, found at eight years that +she was the best dancer in an assembly of young persons older than +herself," and who, nevertheless, "was often summoned to the kitchen to +make an omelette, clean the vegetables, or skim the pot." She admires +her own willingness to descend to domestic cares: "I was never out of +my element," she says; "I could make soup as skilfully as Philopoemen +could chop wood; but no one, observing me, could imagine that this was +suitable employment." Still speaking of herself, she celebrates "the +little person who on Sundays went to church or out walking in a +spick-and-span costume whose appearance was fully sustained by her +demeanor and her language." She calls attention to the contrast by +which, on week-days, the same child went out alone, in a little cloth +frock, to buy parsley and salad at a short distance from home. "It +must be owned," she adds, "that I did not like this very well; but I +did not show it, and I had the art of doing my errands in such a way as +to find some pleasure in it. I united such great politeness to a +certain dignity, that the fruit-seller or other person {49} of the +sort, took pleasure in serving me first, and even those who came before +me thought this proper." + +So the little Philipon wanted to take the chief place in the +fruiterer's shop, just as, later on, she desired it on the political +stage or the Ministry of the Interior. This enemy of privileges will +admit them only for herself. In everything she made pretentions: +pretentions to elegance, beauty, distinction, talent, knowledge, +eloquence, genius, and, when she wanted to be simple, to simplicity. +In her style as in her conversation, in her public as in her private +life, what she sought before all things was effect. It was absolutely +essential that people should talk about her, that she should be playing +a part, or standing on a pedestal. Assuredly, if she had a fault, it +was not excess of modesty. She regarded herself as the flower of her +sex, a superior woman, made to be loved, flattered, and adored. She +speaks of her charms with the precision of a doctor and the enthusiasm +of a poet. Not one of her perfections escapes her. It is through a +magnifying-glass and before a mirror that she studies and admires +herself. She discovers that a society in which a woman so remarkable +and so attractive is not thoroughly well known, must be badly +organized. Middle-class by birth, and aristocratic by instinct, she +represents what one might then have called the new social strata. A +secret voice told her that the day was to come when she would make +herself feared by the powerful of the earth, those giants with feet of +clay who, at the beginning of her {50} career, were still looked at +kneeling. Banished by fate from the theatre where the human +tragi-comedy is played, she said to herself: "I too will have a part +one of these days." In the earliest stage of her existence there was +in her a confused medley of uneasiness and ambition, of spite and +anger. She had a horror of the slightly disdainful protection of +people of quality. She conceived an aversion for persons like that +Demoiselle d'Hannaches, "big, awkward, dry, and yellow," infatuated +with her nobility, annoying everybody with her titles, and yet, in +spite of her ignorance, her stiff manners, her old-fashioned dress and +her follies, well received everywhere on account of her birth. + +Slowly, but steadily, the future amazon of the Revolution prepared +herself for the combat. The books which she read and re-read +incessantly were the arsenal whence she drew her weapons. One of those +presentiments which do not deceive, promised her a stormy but +illustrious destiny. More Roman than French, more pagan than +Christian, she longed for glory like that of the heroines of Plutarch, +her favorite author. In the humble dwelling of her father, situated at +the corner of the Pont-Neuf and the Quai des Orfévres, she caught a +glimpse of horizons as wide as her thoughts. "From the upper part of +our house," she says, "a great expanse offered itself to my dreamy and +romantic imagination. How often from my north window have I +contemplated with emotion the deserts of the sky, its superb azure {51} +vault splendidly outlined from the bluish dawn far behind the Pont du +Change, to the sunset gilded with a faint purplish lustre behind the +trees of the Champs Elysées and the houses of Chaillot." + +Irritated with the obscurity to which she was condemned by fate, there +was but one resource which could have consoled her for the social +inequalities which bruised her vanity and her pride. That resource +would have been religion. Nothing but an ideal of humility could have +appeased the interior revolts of this soul of fire. To such a woman, +what is lacking is heaven. Earth, no matter what happens, can give her +nothing but deceptions. The only moment of her life when she felt +herself really happy was that when she enjoyed the supreme good, peace +of heart. Of all parts of her Memoirs, the most pure and touching are +those she devotes to her recollections of the convent. One might think +that the author of _Rolla_ had remembered them when he described in +such penetrating terms the mystic poetry of the cloister, and the +regrets often engendered by the loss of faith in the minds and hearts +of people who have become unbelievers. + +The little Philipon, being in her twelfth year, asked to be sent to a +convent, in order to prepare better for her first communion. She was +placed with the Ladies of the Congregation, rue Neuve-Saint-Étienne, in +the Faubourg Saint-Marcel, near Sainte-Pélagie, her future prison: "How +I pressed my dear mamma in my arms at the moment of parting {52} from +her for the first time! I was stifled, overwhelmed; but I obeyed the +voice of God, and crossed the threshold of the cloister, offering Him +with tears the greatest sacrifice that I could make. The first night I +spent at the convent was agitated: I was no longer under the paternal +roof. I felt that I was far from that good mother who was surely +thinking of me with tenderness. There was a feeble light in the room +where I had been put to bed, with four other children of my own age; I +rose quietly and went to the window. The moonlight permitted me to see +the garden upon which it looked. The most profound silence reigned; I +listened to it, so to say, with a sort of respect; great trees cast +their gigantic shadows here and there, and promised a safe refuge for +tranquil meditation. I lifted my eyes to the pure and serene sky, and +thought I felt the presence of the Divinity, who smiled at my sacrifice +and already offered me its recompense in the peace of a celestial +abode. Delicious tears flowed slowly down my cheeks; I reiterated my +vows with a holy transport, and I enjoyed the slumber of the elect." + +As if in these silent cloisters, which she crossed slowly so as to +enjoy their solitude more fully, she had a presentiment of the storms +in her destiny and her heart, she sometimes stopped beside a tomb on +which was engraven the eulogy of a holy maiden. "She is happy!" she +said to herself with a sigh. While she was in prison she remembered +with emotion a novice's taking the veil: "I experience yet the {53} +thrill caused by her faintly tremulous voice when she chanted +melodiously the customary versicle: '_Elegi_: Here I have chosen my +abode, and I will not depart from it forever.' I have not forgotten +the notes of this little air; I can repeat them as exactly as if I had +heard them yesterday." + +Unhappily, religious ideas were soon to undergo a change in the mind of +the future Madame Roland. Returning to the paternal dwelling, she was +badly brought up there; her mother let her read everything, even +_Candide_. Voltaire, Helvétius, Diderot, had no secrets for this young +girl. Extreme disorder and confusion in mind and heart were the +result. When she had the misfortune to lose her mother at the age of +twenty-one, the book in which she sought consolation was the _Nouvelle +Héloise_. Jean-Jacques became her god. "It seems," she says, "as if +he were my natural aliment and the interpreter of the sentiment I had +already, and which he alone knew how to explain to me.... To have the +whole of Jean-Jacques," she says again, "to be able to consult him +incessantly, to enlighten and elevate one's self with him at all times +of life, is a felicity which can only be tasted by adoring him as I +did." Such reading robbed her of faith. It made her a free-thinker +and a bluestocking. It inspired her with an unhealthy ambition, +sullied her imagination, and troubled the peace of her heart. It +deprived her of that moral delicacy, lacking which, even virtue itself +loses its charms. She was no longer anything but a young {54} girl, +well-conducted but not pure, honest but shameless. + +Was not a day coming when, a prisoner and on the point of getting into +the fatal cart, she would throw off the terrible anxieties of her +situation in order to imitate the impurities of the _Confessions_ of +Jean-Jacques, and retrace indecent details with complacency? Do not +seek in her that flower of innocence which is the young girl's grace. +The charming puritan does not commit great faults, but she has +astonishing licenses of thought and speech. For her, Louvet's +_Faublas_ is "one of those charming romances known to persons of taste, +in which the graces of imagination ally themselves to the tone of +philosophy." Is not this woman, who begins her life like a saint and +ends it as a pupil of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the symbol of +that troubled eighteenth century which opened in fidelity to religious +faith and closed in the depths of the abyss of incredulity? The +ravages caused by bad reading in the soul of this young girl explain +the catastrophes of the entire century. + +From the time when she replaced the Gospels by the _Contrat Social_ and +the _Imitation of Jesus Christ_ by the _Nouvelle Héloise_, there was no +longer anything simple or natural remaining in the young philosopher. +All her thoughts and actions became declamatory. There was something +theatrical in her attitudes and gestures, and even in the sound of her +voice. Her speech was rhythmical, cadenced, marked {55} by a special +accent. Even her private letters often resemble the amplifications of +rhetoric rather than the effusions of friendship. One might say that +their author had a presentiment that they would be printed. She wrote +to Mademoiselle Sophie Cannet, January 3, 1776: "In any case, burn +nothing. Though my letters were one day to be read by all the world, I +would not hide the only monuments of my weakness, and my sentiments." +Monuments of weakness--is not the expression worthy of the bombast of +the time? + +Not finding love, Mademoiselle Philipon married philosophically. Her +union bears a striking imitation to that of Héloise with M. de Volmar. +"Looking her destiny peacefully and tenderly in the face, greatly moved +but not infatuated," she united herself to a man whom she esteemed but +did not love. This was Roland de la Platière, who was descended from +an ancient and very honorable middle class family. Though not rich, he +was at least comfortably well off. "Well educated, honest, simple in +his tastes and manners, he fulfilled his duties as inspector of +manufactures in a notable way. The marriage was celebrated on February +4, 1780. Roland was forty-six years old, while his wife was not yet +twenty-six. Thin, bald, careless in his dress, the husband was not at +all an ideal person. It had taken him five years to declare his +passion, and this hesitation, as his wife was to write thirteen years +later, "left not a vestige of illusion in his sentiments." "I have +often felt," {56} says she, "that there was no similarity between us. +If we lived in retirement, I spent many painful hours; if we mingled in +society, I was loved by persons among whom I perceived there were some +who might affect me too much; I plunged into labor with my husband.... +It was a long time before I gained courage to contradict him." + +M. Roland was sent to Amiens, where his wife presented him with a +daughter, whom she nursed, and afterwards brought up with the utmost +tenderness and devotion. In 1784, he was summoned to Lyons, where he +found himself once more in his native region. Thenceforward he spent +two of the winter months in Lyons, and the remainder of the year on his +paternal domain, the Close of Platière, two leagues from Villefranche, +surrounded by woods and vineyards, and opposite the mountains of +Beaujolais. While her husband went to take possession of his new post, +Madame Roland, not yet a republican, remained a few weeks in Paris in +order to obtain, if possible, the patent of nobility so ardently +desired by the family. Her solicitations proved unsuccessful, and the +married pair, despairing of becoming nobles, consoled themselves by a +frank avowal of democracy. + +Up to the time of the Revolution, Madame Roland's life glided +peacefully away without any remarkable incidents. In the Close of +Platière, which she calls her dovecot, she appears as a good +housekeeper who looks after everything, from the cellar to the garret; +{57} who plays the doctor among the poor villagers; who is delighted to +find in nature a savor of frank and free rusticity. The life she leads +is not merely honest, but edifying. She is very careful at this period +to hide her philosophy. She writes to Bosc, one of her friends, +February 9, 1785: "My brother-in-law, whose disposition is extremely +gentle and sensitive, is also very religious; I leave him the +satisfaction of thinking that the dogmas are as evident to me as they +appear to him, and my exterior actions are such as become the mother of +a family out in the country, who is bound to edify everybody. As I was +very devout in my early youth, I know my prayers as well as my +philosophy, and I prefer to make use of my first erudition." She wrote +again to Bosc, October 12, 1785: "I have hardly touched a pen for a +month, and I think I am acquiring some of the inclinations of the beast +whose milk refreshes me; I am extremely _asinine_, and I busy myself +with all the petty cares of the _hoggish_ country life. I make +preserved pears that are delicious; we dry grapes and plums; we wash +and make up linen; we have white wine for breakfast, and we lie down on +the grass to rest; we follow the vintagers; we repose in the woods and +fields." + +Before looking at the female politician, let us glance once more at the +woman in private life, the charitable, devoted, honorable mother of a +family, such as she paints herself in a letter of November 10, 1786: +"From the corner of my fire, at eleven {58} o'clock, after a quiet +night and the various morning cares, my husband at his desk, my little +girl knitting, and I chatting with one and superintending the other's +work, enjoying the happiness of being snugly in the bosom of my dear +little family, writing to a friend, while the snow is falling on so +many wretches weighed down by poverty and sorrow, I am touched with +compassion for their fate; I turn back sweetly to my own, and at this +moment I count as nothing the annoyances of relations or circumstances +which seem occasionally to mar its felicity." + +Alas, why did not Madame Roland stay in her modest country-house to dry +her grapes and plums, to superintend her washing, mend her linen, and +spread out in her garret the fruits for winter use? Were not +obscurity, repose, peace of heart, better for her than that fictitious +glory which was to pass so quickly and end upon the scaffold? One +might say that before quitting nature, that great consoler which calms +and does not betray, in order to plunge herself into the odious world +of politics, which spoils and embitters the most beautiful souls, she +experiences a certain vague regret for the sweet and tranquil joys +which her folly was about to cause her to renounce forever. + +"The weather is delightful," wrote Madame Roland, May 17, 1790; "the +country has changed almost beyond recognition in only six days; the +vines and walnuts were as black as they are in winter, but a stroke of +the magic wand does not alter the aspect of {59} things more quickly +than the heat of a few fine days has done; everything turns green and +leafs out; a soft verdure is visible where there was nothing but the +dull and faded tint of torpor and inaction. I could easily forget +public affairs and men's controversies here; content to arrange the +manor, to see my fowls brood, and take care of my rabbits, I would care +nothing more about the revolutions of empires. But, as soon as I am in +the city, the poverty of the people and the insolence of the rich rouse +my hatred of injustice and oppression: I have no longer any soul or +desire except for the triumph of great truths and the success of our +regeneration." + +The die is cast. The daughter of Philipon the engraver is about to +become a political woman. The hour is come when this great actress, +who has long known her part, is at last going on the stage. She has a +presentiment of the risk she is running in assuming a task which is +beyond her sex. But, like soldiers who love danger for danger's sake, +and prefer the emotions of the battle-field to garrison life, she will +joyfully quit her province and throw herself into the seething furnace +of Paris. Even though she is to meet persecution and death at the end +of her new career, she will not recoil. A short but agitated life will +seem better to her than a long and fortunate existence without violent +emotions. A clear sky pleases her no longer. She is homesick for +storms and lightning flashes. + + + + +{60} + +VI. + +MADAME ROLAND'S ENTRANCE ON THE SCENE. + +The hour of the Revolution had struck, and, ambitious, unbelieving, +full of disdain for the leading classes, full of confidence in her own +superiority, active, eloquent, impassioned, uniting the language of an +orator to the seductions of a charming woman, Madame Roland was ripe +for the Revolution. Her epoch suited her, and she suited her epoch. +This pagan who, according to her own expression, roamed mentally in +Greece, attended the Olympic games, and despised herself for being +French; this fanatical admirer of antiquity who, at eight years of age, +carried Plutarch to church with her instead of a missal, who styled +Roland _the virtuous_ as the Athenians called Aristides the _just_, who +will die like her heroes, Socrates and Phocion; this student who, at +another period, would have been rated as an under-bred woman of the +middle class, a more or less ridiculous bluestocking, suddenly found +herself, in consequence of a general panic and circumstances as strange +as they were unforeseen, the very ideal of the society in which she +lived. For several months she was to be its fashionable type, its +favorite heroine. {61} But the Revolution was a Saturn who devoured +his children, male and female, and the Egeria of the Girondins expiated +bitterly the intoxication caused by her brief popularity. + +In 1777, at the age of twenty-three, she had written: "Gay and jesting +speeches fall from this mouth which sobs at night upon its pillow; a +laugh dwells on my lips, while my tears, shut up within my heart, at +length make on it, in spite of its hardness, the effect produced by +water on a stone: falling drop by drop, they insensibly wear it away." +In 1791, when she was thirty-eight, she wrote: "The phenomena of +nature, which make the vulgar grow pale, and which are imposing even to +the philosophical eye, offer nothing to a sensitive person preoccupied +with great concerns, but scenes inferior to those of which her own +heart is the theatre." The flame consuming the eloquent and ardent +disciple of Rousseau was in need of fuel, and, finding this in +politics, she threw herself upon it with a sort of ravenous fury, just +as she had once abandoned herself to study. At twenty-two she had +written to one of her young friends: "You scold me for studying too +hard. Bear in mind, then, that unless I did so, love might perhaps +excite my imagination to frenzy. It is a necessary distraction. I am +not trying to become a learned woman; I study because I need to study, +as I do to eat." It was thus that Madame Roland plunged into politics. +All her unappeased instincts and repressed forces found their outlet in +that direction. + +{62} + +Woman being formed by nature to be dominated, nothing is more agreeable +to her than to invert the parts, and in her turn to domineer. To exert +influence in public affairs, to designate or support the candidates for +great offices of State, to organize or direct a ministry, to make +themselves listened to by serious men, to inspire opinions or systems, +is to ambitious women a kind of revenge for their sex. Those who have +acquired a habit of exercising this sort of power cannot relinquish it +without extreme reluctance. If they have once persuaded themselves of +their superiority to men, nothing can ever root the conviction from +their minds. To be protected humiliates them; what they long for most +of all is to be acknowledged as protectresses. Self-deluded, they +attribute to their passion for the public welfare what is, especially +in their case, the need of petty glory, the thirst for emotions, or the +amusement of pride and vanity. + +The Revolutionary bluestocking, Madame Roland, was from the very start +delighted to see that her works were printed, and that they produced as +much effect as if they had been written by some great statesman. These +first successes seemed to her to justify the excellent opinion she had +always entertained of herself. She got into a habit of playing the +oracle. No sooner had her lips touched the cup containing this +poisonous but intoxicating beverage than she would have no other. That +alone could refresh, even while it killed her. + +{63} + +Politics has the immense defect of exasperating, troubling, and +disfiguring souls. Madame Roland was born good, sensible, and +generous. Politics made her at times wicked, vindictive, and cruel. +July 26, 1789, she wrote this odious letter: "You are nothing but +children; your enthusiasm is a fire of straw, and if the National +Assembly does not order the trial of two illustrious heads, or some +generous Decius does not strike them down, you are all ... lost" +(Madame Roland employed a more trivial expression). "If this letter +does not reach you, may the cowards who read it redden to learn that it +is from a woman, and tremble in reflecting that she can create a +hundred enthusiasts from whom will proceed a million others." Roland +had been employed by the Agricultural Society of Lyons to draw up its +reports for the States-General. Madame Roland wrote much more of them +than her husband did. She sent article on article to a journal founded +by Champagneux to forward the revolutionary propaganda. Sixty thousand +copies were printed of one of them in which she described the festival +of the Federation at Lyons. Imagine the joy felt by the +_femme-auteur_, the pupil of Jean-Jacques, the model of George Sand! +Soon afterwards, the municipality deputed Roland to the Constituent +Assembly to advocate the interests of the city, which was involved to +the extent of forty millions, and which asked to have this debt assumed +by the State. Roland and his wife arrived in Paris, February 20, 1791. + +{64} + +The married pair installed themselves on the third floor of the hotel +Britannique, in rue Guénégaud. There a sort of political reunion was +formed, of which Brissot was the first link. Four times a week a few +friends, and certain deputies and journalists, met around this still +unknown woman, whose wit, charm, and beauty were not long in making a +sensation. It was at this period that she made Buzot's acquaintance. +The day of her first interview with the young and brilliant deputy was +an epoch in her sentimental life. Thenceforward, two passions, love +and ambition, the one as fierce and devouring as the other, were to +occupy her ardent soul. Comparing the young orator, whom she perhaps +transformed in her imagination into the president of a more or less +Athenian republic, with the austere and prosaic companion of her +existence, she perceived that, according to her own expression, there +was no equality between her and her husband, and that "the ascendency +of a domineering character, joined to twenty years' seniority, rendered +one of these superiorities too great"--that of age. She was herself +six years older than Buzot. Even though her love for him may have +remained Platonic, she gave him all her heart and soul. + +For the majority of women, still beautiful, who mingle in public +affairs, love is the principal thing; politics but the accessory, the +pretext. They imagine they are attaching themselves to ideas, and it +is to men. In this respect the heroines of the Revolution resemble +those of the Fronde. The stateswoman in {65} Madame Roland plays +second to the lover of Buzot. In her mind the Republic and the +handsome republican blend into one. Believing herself a patriot when +she is above all a woman in love, she carries the emotions, the +infatuations, the ardors and exaggerations of her private life into her +public one. With her, angers and enthusiasms rise to paroxysm. She is +extreme in all things. + +She detests Louis XVI. as much as she loves Buzot. After the flight to +Varennes, she wrote: "To replace the King on the throne is a folly, an +absurdity, if it is not a horror; to declare him demented is to make +obligatory the appointment of a regent. To impeach Louis XVI. would +be, beyond all contradiction, the greatest and most righteous step, but +you are incapable of taking it. Well then, put him not exactly under +interdict, but suspend him." Here begins the influence of Madame +Roland. The suspension of the royal authority is one of her ideas. +"So long as peace lasted," she says, "I adhered to the peaceful rôle +and to that kind of influence which I thought fitting to my sex; when +war was declared by the King's departure, it appeared to me that every +one should devote himself unreservedly. I joined the fraternal +societies, being persuaded that zeal and good intentions might be very +useful in critical moments. I was unable to stay at home any longer, +and I went to the houses of worthy people of my acquaintance that we +might excite each other to great measures." One knows what the {66} +Revolution meant by that expression: great measures. Madame Roland +became furious. She wanted a freedom of the press without check or +limit. She was angry because Marat's newspapers were destroyed by the +satellites of Lafayette. "It is a cruel thing to think of," she +exclaims, "but it becomes every day more evident that peace means +retrogression, and that we can only be regenerated by blood." + +Her hatred includes both Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. June 25, +1791, she writes: "It appears to me that the King ought to be +sequestered and his wife impeached." And on July 1: "The King has sunk +to the lowest depths of degradation; his trick has exposed him +completely, and he inspires nothing but contempt. His name, his +portrait, and his arms have been effaced everywhere. Notaries have +been obliged to take down the escutcheons marked with a flower-de-luce +which served to designate their houses. He is called nothing but Louis +the False, or the great hog. Caricatures of every sort represent him +under emblems which, though not the most odious, are the most suitable +to nourish and augment popular disdain. The people tend of their own +accord to all that can express this sentiment, and it is impossible +that they should ever again be willing to see seated on the throne a +being they despise so completely." + +Things did not go fast enough to suit Madame Roland's furious hatred. +The popular gathering in the Champ-de-Mars, whose aim was to bring +about {67} the deposition of the King, was forcibly dispersed on July +17. With six exceptions, all the deputies who had belonged either to +the Jacobin Club or that of the Cordeliers, left them on account of +their demand that Louis XVI. should be brought to trial. The time for +great measures, to use Madame Roland's expression, had not yet arrived. +The ardent democrat laments it. "I cannot describe our situation to +you," she writes at this moment of the revolutionary recoil; "I feel +environed by a silent horror; my heart grows steadfast in a mournful +and solemn silence, ready to sacrifice all rather than cease to defend +principles, but not knowing the moment when they can triumph, and +forming no resolution but that of giving a great example." + +The mission which had kept Roland in Paris for seven months being +ended, the discouraged pair returned to their province in September. +After stopping a few days in Lyons, in order to found a popular society +affiliated to the Jacobins of the capital, they went to spend the +remainder of the autumn at their country place, the Close of Platière. +But calm and silence no longer suited Madame Roland. Repose +exasperated her. She missed the struggle and the emotions of +revolutionary Paris, of which she had said: "One lives ten years here +in twenty-four hours; events and affections blend with and succeed each +other with singular rapidity; no such great events ever occupied minds." + +The pleasure of seeing her daughter again was not {68} enough to +compensate her for the chagrin of having parted from Buzot. Just as +she was despairing at the thought of sinking back into all the nullity +of the province, as she expresses it, the news came that the inspectors +of agriculture had been suppressed. Roland, no longer an official, +deliberated with his wife as to their next step. His own inclination +was to settle permanently in the country and devote himself to +agricultural labors which would surely and safely augment his fortune. +But his wife was by no means of the same mind. She must see her dear +Buzot again at any cost. She flattered the self-love of her +unsuspecting spouse, and persuaded him that Paris was the sole theatre +worthy of the virtuous Roland. Roland allowed himself to be convinced. +His wife, no longer mistress of herself, was drawn into the Parisian +abyss as by an irresistible force. And yet was it not she who had +proposed to herself this ideal, so easily to have been realized? "I +have never imagined anything more desirable than a life divided between +domestic cares and those of agriculture, spent on a healthy and fertile +farm, with a little family where the example of its heads and common +labor maintain attachment, peace, and freedom." Was it not she who had +uttered this profoundly true thought: "I see neither pleasure nor +happiness except in the reunion of that which charms the heart as well +as the senses, and costs no regrets"? In the most beautiful days of +her youth had she not written: "There was a time when I was never +content {69} except when I had a book or a pen in my hand; at present I +am as well satisfied when I have made a shirt for my father or added up +an account of expenses as if I had read something profound. I do not +care at all to be learned; I want to be good and happy; that is my +chief business. What is necessary but good, honest common sense?" Is +it not she, too, who will write at the beginning of her Memoirs: "I +have observed that in all classes, ambition is generally fatal; for the +few happy ones whom it exalts, it makes a multitude of victims." Why +did she not more frequently remind herself of the sentiment so just and +well expressed in a letter dated in 1790: "Women are not made to share +in all the occupations of men: they are altogether bound to domestic +cares and virtues, and they cannot turn away from them without +destroying their happiness." But, alas! passion does not reason. +Farewell common sense, wisdom, and experience, when ambition and love +have taken possession of a woman's heart. Returning to Paris, December +15, 1791, the Rolands established themselves in the rue de la Harpe, +and plunged head-long into politics. The wife redoubled her activity, +eloquence, and passion. The husband, instead of attending quietly to +the management of his retiring pension, was named a member of the +Jacobin corresponding committee at the beginning of 1792, a +revolutionary centre of which Brissot was the leader. At this period, +we are informed by Madame Roland, the intimidated court imagined that +the nomination of a {70} minister chosen from among the patriots of the +Assembly would cause it to regain a little popularity. Brissot +proposed Roland, who, on March 24, 1792, accepted the portfolio of the +Interior. + +Madame, behold yourself, then, the wife of a minister, and in fact more +of a minister than your husband. Your ambitious projects, which have +been treated as chimerical, are now realized. You have a cortège like +Marie Antoinette. Men seek the favor of a smile, a word, from you. +They court, they solicit, they fear you. The monarchy, which you +detest, is at last obliged to reckon with you and your friends. Your +beauty, your talent, and your eloquence are boasted of. Your name is +in every mouth. You are powerful, you are celebrated. Well! you will +find out for yourself what bitterness there is at the bottom of this +cup of pride which has tempted your lips so long. You will learn at +your own expense that renown does not produce happiness, and that, for +a woman, twilight is better than the full glare of day. Yes, you will +long for the obscurity which weighed upon you. You will long for the +house of your father, the engraver, on the Quai des Orfèvres. You will +dream of the sunsets which affected you, and of the monotonous but +peaceful succession of your days. You, the deist, the female +philosopher, will recall with regret the cloisters where in your +adolescence you tasted the peace of the elect. In the time of your +supreme trial Buzot's miniature will not console you; it is not his +image you should cover with your {71} kisses. No; that miniature is +not the viaticum for eternity. What you will need is the crucifix, and +you respect the crucifix no longer. And yet your imagination will +evoke the mystic cloister, with its altars decked with flowers, its +painted windows, its penetrating and ineffable poesy. And in thought, +also, you will see the country once more, the harvest time, the month +of the vintage, the poor who come to the door asking for bread and who +go away with blessings on their lips and gratitude in their hearts. +Why have you quitted these honest people? What have you come to do in +the midst of these ferocious Jacobins, who flatter you to-day and will +assassinate you to-morrow? Do you fancy that Marie Antoinette is the +only woman who will be insulted, calumniated, and betrayed? Why do you +seat at your hospitable table this livid-faced Robespierre, who to-day, +perhaps, will address you a madrigal, and to-morrow send you to the +scaffold? You will pay very dear for these false and artificial joys, +these gusts of commonplace vanity, this pride of a parvenu, and the +pleasure of presiding for a few evenings at the dinners given to the +Minister of the Interior in Calonne's dining-room. The Legislative +Assembly, the Jacobin Club, the journals and the ministry, the +souvenirs of Plutarch and the parodies of Jean-Jacques, the noisy crowd +of flatterers who are the courtiers of demagogues as they would have +been the courtiers of kings, these adulators who are going to change +into executioners,--all are vanity! Poor {72} woman, whose power will +be so ephemeral, why do you make yourself a persecutor? You will so +soon be persecuted. Why labor so relentlessly to shake the foundations +of a throne that will bury you beneath its ruins? + + + + +{73} + +VII. + +MARIE ANTOINETTE AND MADAME ROLAND. + +Two women find themselves confronted across the chessboard and about to +move the pieces in a terrible game in which each stakes her head, and +each is foredoomed to lose. One is the woman who represents the old +régime--the daughter of the German Cæsars, the Queen of France and +Navarre; the other stands for the new régime, the Parisian middle +classes--the daughter of the engraver of the Quai des Orfèvres. They +are nearly the same age. Madame Roland was born March 18, 1754; and +Marie Antoinette, November 2, 1755. Both are beautiful, and both are +conscious of their charm. Each exercises a sort of domination over all +who approach her. + +In 1792, when Roland enters the ministry, Marie Antoinette is no longer +thinking of coquetry, luxury, or dress. The heroine of the Gallery of +the Mirrors, the crowned shepherdess of the Trianon, the queen of +elegance, pleasure, and fashion is not recognizable in her. The time +for splendors is over, like the time for pastorals. No more festivals, +no more distractions, no more theatres. Incessant anxieties and +unremitting labor; writing throughout the day and reading, {74} +meditating, and praying throughout the night, are now the unfortunate +sovereign's whole existence. She hardly sleeps. Her eyes are reddened +by tears. A single night, that of the arrest on the journey to +Varennes, had sufficed to whiten her hair. She wears mourning for her +brother, the Emperor Leopold, and for her ally, the King of Sweden, +Gustavus III., and one might say that she is also wearing it for the +French monarchy. All trace of frivolity has disappeared. The severe +and majestic countenance of the woman who suffers so cruelly as queen, +spouse, and mother, is sanctified by the double poetry of religion and +sorrow. + +Madame Roland, on the other hand, is more coquettish than she has ever +been. The actress who has at last found her theatre and is very proud +to play her part, wishes to allure, desires to reign. She delights in +presiding at these political dinners where all the guests are men, and +of which her grace and eloquence constitute the charm. She has just +completed her thirty-eighth year. Her husband is nearly fifty-eight; +Buzot is only thirty-two. Possibly she is still more preoccupied with +love than with ambition. To use one of her own expressions, "her heart +swells with the desire to please," to please Buzot above all; she takes +pains to celebrate her own beauty, which, in spite of showing symptoms +of decline, has the brilliance of sunset. In her Memoirs she describes +her "large and superbly modelled bust, her light, quick step, her frank +and open glance, at once keen and {75} soft, which sometimes amazes, +but which caresses still more, and always quickens." She writes: "My +mouth is rather large; there are a thousand prettier, but none that has +a softer and more seductive smile." In prison, when she is nearly +forty, she states that if she has lost some of her attractions, yet she +needs no help from art to make her look five or six years younger. +"Even those who see me every day," she adds, "require to be told my +age, in order to believe me more than thirty-two or thirty-three." +Madame Roland had at first written thirty-three or thirty-four. But +after reflection, finding herself too modest, she made an erasure and +retrenched another year. She adds that she made very little use of her +charms; avowing at the same time, and with the most absolute frankness, +that if she could reconcile her duty with her inclination to utilize +them more fully, she would not be sorry. + +Both Marie Antoinette and Madame Roland were political women. But the +one became so in her own despite, in the hope of saving the life of her +husband and the heritage of her son; the other, through ambition and +the desire to play a part for which her origin had not destined her. +In the one, everything is at once noble and simple, natural and +majestic; in the other there is always something affected and +theatrical; one scents the _parvenue_ who will never be a _grande +dame_, even in the Ministry of the Interior or at the house of Calonne. +All is unstudied in Marie Antoinette; Madame Roland, on the contrary, +is an artist in coquetry. + +{76} + +Bizarre caprice of fate which makes political rivals and adversaries +treating with each other on equal terms of these two women, of whom one +was so much above the other by rank and birth. The Tuileries and the +house of the Minister of the Interior are like two hostile citadels at +a stone's throw from each other. On both sides there is watchfulness +and fear. An impassable abyss, hollowed out by the vanity of the +commoner still more than by the pride of the Queen, forever separates +these two courageous women who, had they united instead of antagonizing +each other, might have saved both their country and themselves. + +It is necessary to go back a few years in order to comprehend the +motive of Madame Roland's hatred for Marie Antoinette. It was inspired +in the vain commoner by envy, the worst and vilest of all counsellors. +Madame Roland's special characteristic was the passion for making an +effect. Now the effect produced by Marie Antoinette under the old +régime was immense; that produced by the future Egeria of the Girondin +group was almost null. A simple mortal, regarding Olympus from below, +she said to herself with vexation, that in spite of her talents and her +charms there was no place for her among the gods and goddesses. +Versailles was like a superior world from which it maddened her to be +excluded. She was twenty years old when, in 1774, she visited it with +her mother, her uncle, the Abbé Bimont, and an aged gentlewoman, +Mademoiselle d'Hannaches. They all lodged at the palace. One of Marie +Antoinette's {77} women, who was acquainted with the Abbé, and who was +not then on duty, lent them her apartment. The only object of the +excursion was to give the young girl a near view of the court. + +In recalling this souvenir in her Memoirs, Madame Roland displays her +aversion for the old society. She is annoyed even with the companion +of her visit, because she was, according to the expression then in use, +a person of quality. "Mademoiselle d'Hannaches," she says, "went +boldly wherever she chose, ready to fling her name in the face of any +one who tried to stop her, thinking they ought to be able to read on +her grotesque visage her six hundred years of established nobility. +The fine figure of a pedantic little cleric like the Abbé Bimont, and +the imbecile pride of the ugly d'Hannaches were not out of keeping in +those scenes; but the unpainted face of my worthy mamma, and the +modesty of my dress, announced that we were commoners; if my eyes or my +youth provoked remark, it was almost patronizing, and caused me nearly +as much displeasure as Madame de Boismorel's compliments." It was this +Madame de Boismorel who, although she found the little Philipon very +pleasing, had said to the grandmother of the future Madame Roland: +"Take care that she does not become a learned woman; it would be a +great pity." + +The splendors of Versailles did not dazzle the daughter of the engraver +of the Quai des Orfèvres. The apartment she occupied was at the top of +the {78} palace, in the same corridor as that of the Archbishop of +Paris, and so near it that it was necessary for the prelate to take +precautions lest she should overhear him talk. "Two poorly furnished +rooms," she says, "in the upper end of one of which space had been +contrived for a valet's bed, was the habitation which a duke and peer +of France esteemed himself honored in possessing, in order to be closer +at hand to cringe every morning at the levée of Their Majesties: and +yet he was the rigorist Beaumont.... The ordinary and the ceremonial +table-service of the entire family, eating separately or all together, +the masses, the promenades, the gaming, the presentations, had us for +spectators during a week." What impression was made on her by this +excursion to the royal palace? She herself will tell us nineteen years +later, in her prison. "I was not insensible," she says, "to the effect +of so much pomp and ceremony, but I was indignant that its object +should be to exalt certain individuals already too powerful and of very +slight personal importance: I liked much better to look at the statues +in the gardens than at the persons in the palace; and when my mother +asked if I was satisfied with my visit, 'Yes,' I replied, 'provided it +will soon be over; if I stay here many days longer, I shall detest the +people so much that I shall be unable to hide my hatred.' 'What harm +are they doing you, then?' 'Making me feel injustice, and constantly +behold absurdity.'" + +How this impression is emphasized in the really {79} prophetic letter +written by the future heroine of the Revolution to her friend, +Mademoiselle Sophie Cannet, October 4, 1774: "To return to Versailles. +I cannot tell you how greatly all I have examined has made me value my +own situation, and thank Heaven that I was born in an obscure +condition. You think, perhaps, that this sentiment is based on the +slight esteem I attach to the worth of opinion, and my sense of the +reality of the penalties attached to greatness. Not at all. It is +based on the knowledge I have of my own character, which would be very +detrimental both to me and to the State if I were placed at a little +distance from the throne; because I would be keenly shocked by the +extreme inequality which sets so many thousands of men below a single +individual of the same species!" What a prediction! The most +unforeseen events were one day to bring this young plebeian near that +royalty formerly so far above her. The engraver's daughter will be the +wife of a minister of State. And then what will happen? According to +her own expression, her rôle will be very detrimental to herself and to +the State. + +In the same letter she had written: "A beneficent king seems to me an +almost adorable being; but if, before coming into the world, the choice +of a government had been given me, my character would have made me +decide for a republic." She will end by hating the beneficent King, +and probably no one will contribute more than she towards establishing +the republican régime in France. + +{80} + +Supposing that, instead of being merely an insignificant commoner, +Madame Roland had been born in the ranks of aristocracy, had enjoyed +the right of sitting down in the presence of Their Majesties at +Versailles, and had shone at the familiar entertainments of the +Trianon, she would doubtless have shared the sentiments and ideas of +the women of the old régime, and, like the Princess de Lamballe or the +Duchess de Polignac, have shed tears of compassion over the Queen's +misfortunes. Fate, in placing her in a subordinate position, made her +an enemy and a rebel. She anathematized the society in which her rank +bore no relation to her lofty intelligence and her need of domination. +When, from the upper window of her father's house on the Quai des +Orfèvres, beside the Pont-Neuf, she saw the brilliant retinue of Marie +Antoinette pass by on their way to Notre Dame to return thanks to God +for some happy event, she grew angry at all this pomp and glitter, so +much in contrast with her own obscure condition. What crimes have been +engendered by the sentiment of envy! The furies of the guillotine were +above all things envious. They were delighted to see in the fatal cart +the woman whom they had formerly beheld in gala carriages resplendent +with gold. Madame Roland certainly ought not to have carried her +hatred to such a pitch; but had she not demanded in 1789, when speaking +of Louis XVI. and the Queen, that "two illustrious heads" should be +brought to trial? Who knows? If, in 1784, she had obtained the {81} +patent of nobility for her husband which at that period she solicited +so ardently, she might have become sincerely royalist! But having +remained, despite herself, in the citizen class, she retained and +personified, to her latest hour, its rancor, pettiness, and wrath. +What figure could she have made at Versailles, or even at the +Tuileries? In the midst of great lords and noble ladies the haughty +commoner would have been out of place; she would have stifled. It was +chiefly on that account that she attached herself to the new ideas. +She told herself that so long as royalty lasted, she would always be of +small importance; while, if the republic were established, she might +aspire to anything. Though her husband was one of the King's +ministers, she became daily more adverse to the monarchy, and Roland, +following her counsels, was like a pilot whose whole intent is to make +the vessel founder, even though he were to perish with its crew. + +It is a sad thing to say, but even their community in suffering did not +disarm Madame Roland's hate for Marie Antoinette. It was in prison, on +the eve of ascending the scaffold herself, that she wrote concerning +Louis XVI. and the Queen: "He was led away by a giddy creature who +united the presumption of youth and grandeur to Austrian insolence, the +intoxication of the senses, and the heedlessness of levity, and was +herself seduced by all the vices of an Asiatic court, for which she had +been too well prepared by the example of her mother." Ah! why {82} +were not these cruel lines effaced by the tears Madame Roland shed in +floods over the pages she was writing, and of which the traces still +remain on the manuscript of her Memoirs? Why did she not sympathize in +the grief of Marie Antoinette, separated from her children, when in +speaking of her daughter Eudora, she wrote: "Good God! I am a +prisoner, and she is living far from me! I dare not even send for her +to receive my embraces; hatred pursues even the children of those whom +tyranny persecutes, and mine, with her eleven years, her virginal +figure, and her beautiful fair hair, could hardly appear in the streets +without creatures suborned or deluded by falsehood pointing her out as +the offspring of a conspirator. Cruel wretches! how well they know how +to tear a mother's heart!" + +Why were these two women political adversaries? Both sensitive, both +artistic, with inexhaustible sources of poetry and tenderness at heart, +they were born for gentle emotions and not for horrible catastrophes. +Who, at their dawning, could have predicted for them such an appalling +night? Like Marie Antoinette, Madame Roland loved nature and the arts. +She felt the profound and penetrating charm of the fields. She drew, +she played on the harp, guitar, and violin, and she sang. "No one +knows," she wrote a few moments before her death, "what an alleviation +music is in solitude and anguish, nor from how many temptations it can +save one in prosperity." She had sung the same romances {83} as the +Queen. The same poets had inspired and affected each. + +Does not this most feminine passage in Madame Roland's Memoirs recall +the character of the mistress of the Little Trianon? "I always +remember the singular effect produced on me by a bunch of violets at +Christmas; when I received them I was in that condition of soul often +induced by a season favorable to serious thought. My imagination +slumbered, I reflected coldly, and I hardly felt at all; suddenly the +color of these violets and their delicate perfume struck my senses; it +was an awakening to life.... A rosy tinge suffused the horizon of the +day." Would not this cry of Madame Roland in her captivity suit Marie +Antoinette as well? "Ah! when shall I breathe pure air and those soft +exhalations so agreeable to my heart?" And might not the daughter of +the great Maria Theresa have cried, like the daughter of Philipon the +engraver? "Adieu! my child, my husband, my friends. Adieu! sun whose +brilliant rays brought serenity to my soul, as if they were recalling +it to the skies. Adieu! ye solitary fields which have so often moved +me." + +What must not these two keenly sensitive women have had to suffer at +the epoch when France became a hell? They have each believed in the +amelioration of the human species and the return of the golden age to +earth, and what will their awakening be, after such alluring dreams? +Men will be as unjust, as wicked, as cruel to the republican as to the +queen. {84} She, too, will be drenched with calumnies and outrages. +They will insult her also in the most cowardly and ferocious manner. +Under the very windows of her dungeon she will hear the hawkers crying: +"Great visit of Père Duchesne to Citizeness Roland, in the Abbey +prison, for the purpose of pumping her." The ignoble journalist will +call her "old sack of the counter-revolution." He will say to her with +his habitual oaths: "Weep for your crimes, old fright, before you +expiate them on the scaffold!" The wife of Louis XVI. and the wife of +Roland will die within twenty-three days of each other: one on October +16, the other on November 8, 1793. They will start from the same +prison of the Conciergerie, to be led to the same Place Louis XV., to +have their heads cut off by the blade of the same guillotine. The +commoner who had been so jealous of the Queen, can no longer complain. +If the lives of the two women have been different, they will at least +have the same death; and the doer of the noble deeds of the régime of +equality, the headsman, will make no distinction between the two +victims, between the veritable sovereign, the Queen of France and +Navarre, and the sovereign of a day, whom Père Duchesne, as insolent to +one as to the other, will no longer speak of except under the sobriquet +of Queen Coco. + + + + +{85} + +VIII. + +MADAME ROLAND AT THE MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR. + +Roland took the portfolio of the Interior, March 24, 1792, and +installed himself and his wife in the ministerial residence, then +occupying the site afterwards built on by the _Théâtre Italien_. This +very beautiful and luxurious mansion had formerly been the controller's +office, and both Calonne and Necker had lived in it. Madame Roland +found no small pleasure in queening it under the gilded canopies of the +old régime. It was not at all disagreeable to her to give dinners in +the sumptuous banqueting hall erected by the elegant Calonne, nor did +the austere admirer of the ancients set the black broth of Sparta +before her guests. + +Once arrived at power, was this great enemy of nobility and +prescription simple, and easy of approach? Not in the least. There is +often more arrogance displayed by parvenus of both sexes than by those +who are aristocrats by birth. Madame Roland was extremely proud of her +new dignity, and at once resolved, as she tells us in her Memoirs, +neither to make nor receive visits. Her attitude and {86} manners +while at the ministry were those of an Asiatic sovereign. She secluded +herself, permitting only a small number of privileged courtiers to +enter her presence. Under the old régime, the wives of ministers and +ambassadors, dukes and peers, had never felicitated themselves on +"cultivating their private tastes" to the detriment of the proprieties +and obligations of good breeding. But the Revolution had changed all +that. French politeness was now mere old-fashioned rubbish. At the +Ministry of the Interior, the etiquette whose "severity" is vaunted by +Madame Roland was more rigorous than that of the court of Versailles, +and it was easier to see the wife of the King than the wife of the +minister. With what hauteur the latter expresses herself concerning +"the self-seeking crowds who throng about those who hold great places"! +Assuredly, the Queen had never spoken of her subjects in this tone of +disdainful patronage. + +[Illustration: MADAME ROLAND] + +Madame Roland, who "was tired of fools," incommoded herself for nobody. +The agreeable side of power was all she wanted. Suppressing the +receptions which annoyed her, she gave none but men's dinners, where +she perorated and paraded, and where, being the only woman present, she +had no rivals to fear. Self-sufficiency and insufficiency are, for the +most part, what fall to the share of parvenus. What would have been +said in the old days of a noble dame who did the honors of a ministry +so strangely, who never invited another woman to {87} dinner, and +admitted no one to her presence but a little clique of flatterers? +Everybody would have accused such a lady as lacking in good breeding. +But to Madame Roland all that she did was right in her own eyes. How +could a woman so superior be expected to submit to the tyranny of +polite usages? Was not the first of all despotisms the very one to be +shaken off? and ought not a person so proud of the originality of her +genius feel bound before all things, as she said herself, "to preserve +her own mode of being"? Madame Roland did at the ministry just what +she did from her cradle to her grave: she posed. + +"To listen to Madame Roland," said Count Beugnot in his witty and +curious Memoirs, "you would have thought she had imbibed the passion +for liberty from reading the great writers of antiquity.... Cato the +Elder was her hero, and it was probably out of respect for this hero +that she showed a lack of courtesy towards her husband. She was +unwilling to see that there was as much difference between Roland's +wife and the Roman minister as there was between the Brutus of the +Revolutionary Tribunal and him of the Capitol. Self-love was the means +by which this woman had been elevated to the point where we have seen +her; she was incessantly actuated by it, and does not dissimulate the +fact." It was she, and not her husband, who was Minister of the +Interior. If the aristocrats treated Roland as a minister +_sans-culottes_, it might have been added that the {88} breeches which +he lacked were worn by his spouse. Out of all the rooms composing a +vast apartment, she had chosen for her own daily use the smallest that +could be converted into a study, and kept her books and writing-table +in it. It was from this boudoir, half literary, half political, that +she conducted the ministry according to her own whims. "It often +happened," says she, "that friends or colleagues desiring to speak +confidentially with the minister, instead of going to his own room, +where he was surrounded by his clerks and the public, came to mine and +begged me to have him called thither. Thus I found myself in the +stream of affairs without either intrigue or idle curiosity. Roland +took pleasure in talking these subjects over with me afterwards with +that confidence which has always reigned between us, and which has +brought our knowledge and our opinions into community." + +On this head, M. Dauban makes the very just remark: "A community in +which there is no equilibrium of forces, becomes a sort of omnipotence +for the strongest." The omnipotence in this case was not on the side +of the beard, but of Madame Roland. The wife wrote, thought, and acted +for her husband. It was she who drew up his circulars and reports to +the National Assembly. "My husband," she tells us, "had nothing to +lose in passing through my hands. Roland, without me, would have been +none the less a good administrator; with me, he has made more +sensation, because I imparted to my writings {89} that mixture of force +and sweetness, that authority of reason and charm of sentiment, which +perhaps belongs only to a sensitive woman, endowed with sound +understanding." And the "virtuous" Roland took pride in the +magnificent phrases which he naïvely believed to be the expression of +his own genius, when his wife had saved him not merely the trouble of +writing, but even of thinking. "He often ended," she says, "by +persuading himself that he had really been in a good vein when he had +written such or such a passage which proceeded from my pen." + +Madame Roland had at her orders a man of letters, salaried by the +Ministry of the Interior, who was the official defender of the minister +and his policy. "It had been felt," she tells us, "that it was needful +to counteract the influence of the court, the aristocracy, the civil +list and their journals, by popular instructions to which great +publicity should be given. A journal posted up in public places seemed +to be the proper thing, and a wise and enlightened man had to be found +for its editor." This wise and enlightened man was Louvet, the author +of the _Amours de Faublas_. He was the writer whom Madame Roland +esteemed most capable of instructing and of moralizing the masses. +"Men of letters and persons of taste," she says, "know his charming +romances, in which the graces of imagination are allied to lightness of +style, a philosophical tone, and the salt of criticism. He has proved +that his skilful hand could alternately shake the bells of folly, hold +the burin of history, and {90} launch the thunderbolts of eloquence. +Courageous as a lion, simple as a child, a sensible man, a good +citizen, a vigorous writer, he could make Catiline tremble from the +tribune, dine with the Graces, and sup with Bachaumont." + +Madame Roland admired the author of _Faublas_, now become the +editor-in-chief of the _Sentinelle_; but among her intimates there was +a man whom she admired much more. This was Buzot. With what +complacency she draws in her Memoirs the portrait of this man "of an +elevated character, a haughty spirit, and a vehement courage, +sensitive, ardent, melancholy; an impassioned lover of nature, +nourishing his imagination with all the charms she has to offer, and +his soul with the principles of the most touching philosophy; he seems +formed to enjoy and to procure domestic happiness; he could forget the +universe in the sweetness of private virtues practised with a heart +worthy of his own." Needless to say that in Madame Roland's thought, +this heart worthy of the heart of Buzot was her own. "He is +susceptible," says she, "of the tenderest affections" (always for +Madame Roland), "capable of sublime flights and the most generous +resolutions." Into what ecstasies she falls over the noble face and +elegant figure of this handsome man, in whose costume "reigns that +care, cleanliness, and decency which manifest the spirit of order, +taste, the sentiment of decorum, and the respect of an honest man for +the public and himself"! How she contrasts with {91} men who think +patriotism consists in "swearing, drinking, and dressing like porters, +in order to fraternize with their equals," this attractive, this +irresistible Buzot, who "professes the morality of Socrates and the +politeness of Scipio"! + +Clearly, the veritable idol of the Egeria of the Girondins is not the +republic, but Buzot. He is so elegant, so distinguished! His mind and +his person have so many charms! Poor Roland! You think that your +better half is solely occupied with your ministry. Alas! this learned +woman has other thoughts in her head. Your position as a minister has +not augmented your prestige in the region of sentiment. Though you +lord it in the Hotel Calonne, yet, in spite of the throng of +petitioners and flatterers who surround you, you will never be a +Lovelace, and your romantic spouse will not allow herself to be +affected by your appearance, like that of a Quaker in Sunday clothes. +You thought you were doing wonders in presenting yourself at the +council of ministers with lanky, unpowdered locks, a round hat, and +shoes minus buckles. This peasant costume, which so greatly +scandalized the master of ceremonies, doubtless made the best +impression at the Jacobin Club, but your wife prefers the careful dress +of her too dear Buzot. + +Madame Roland, who had just completed her thirty-eighth year, was still +very charming. Lémontey thus paints her portrait as she appeared at +this epoch: "Her eyes and hair were remarkably {92} beautiful; her +delicate complexion had a freshness and color which made her look +singularly young. At the beginning of her husband's ministry she had +lost nothing of her air of youth and simplicity; her husband resembled +a Quaker whose daughter she might have been, and her child hovered +round her with hair floating to her waist; one might have thought them +natives of Pennsylvania transported to the drawing-room of M. de +Calonne." + +Count Beugnot, who was the companion of her captivity in the +Conciergerie, is severe on the female politician, but he admires the +pretty woman. "Her figure was graceful," he says, "and her hands +perfectly modelled. Her glance was expressive, and even in repose her +face had something noble and subtly attractive in it. One surmised her +wit without needing to hear her speak, but no woman whom I have ever +listened to, spoke with more purity and elegance. She must have owed +her faculty of giving to French a rhythm and cadence veritably new, to +her familiar knowledge of Italian. The harmony of her voice was still +further heightened by graceful and appropriate gestures and the +expression of her eyes, which grew animated in conversation. I daily +experienced new charm in listening to her, less on account of what she +said than because of the magic of her delivery." + +If Madame Roland, a prisoner, crushed by misfortune, on the very +threshold of the scaffold, after so many sleepless nights and so many +tears, had {93} preserved such attractions, what a charm must she not +have exercised at the Ministry of the Interior, when hope and pride +illumined her beautiful face, and when, after appearing to her +electrified adorers as the Muse of the new régime, the magician, the +Circe of the Revolution, she touched so profoundly their minds and +hearts! She who knew so well how to love and how to hate, who felt so +keenly, who had so much energy, so much vigor, what fascination must +she not have exerted with her glance of fire, her long black tresses, +her more than ornate eloquence, her inspired, lyric, enthusiastic +bearing, and that consummate art which, according to the remark of +Fontanes, made one believe that in her everything was the work of +nature! + + + + +{94} + +IX. + +DUMOURIEZ, MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS. + +Madam Roland had wished to reign alone. She saw an influential rival +in Dumouriez, and at once conceived for him an instinctive repugnance +and suspicion. She met him first on March 23, 1792, at the time when, +as Minister of Foreign Affairs, he came to salute Roland, just named +Minister of the Interior, as his colleague. As soon as he departed: +"There," said she to her husband, "is a man with a crafty mind and a +false glance, against whom it is probably more necessary to be on one's +guard than any other person; he expressed great satisfaction at the +patriotic choice he was deputed to announce; but I should not be at all +surprised if he were to have you dismissed some day." She thought she +recognized in Dumouriez at first sight, "a witty roué, an insolent +chevalier who makes sport of everything except his own interests and +glory." + +Later on she drew the following portrait of him: "Among all his +colleagues, he had most of what is called wit, and less than any of +morality. Diligent and brave, a good general, a skilful courtier, +writing well and expressing himself with ease, capable of {95} great +enterprises, all he lacked was character enough to balance his mind, or +a cooler brain to carry out the plans he had conceived. Agreeable to +his friends, and ready to betray them, gallant to women, but not at all +suited to succeed with those among them who are susceptible to +affectionate relations, he was made for the ministerial intrigues of a +corrupt court." + +The nomination of Dumouriez as Minister of Foreign Affairs is one of +the most curious and unforeseen events of this strange epoch. Few men +have had a career so adventurous and agitated as his. A complex and +mobile nature, where the intriguer and the great man were blended into +one, he never commanded esteem, but at certain moments he secured +admiration. Napoleon I. seems to have been too severe when he said of +him that he was "only a miserable intriguer." The man who opened the +series of great French victories, and who saved his country from +invasion by his admirable defence of the defiles of Argonne, merited +more than this disdainful mention. It is none the less certain, +however, that one scents, as it were, an air of Beaumarchais in the +Memoirs of Dumouriez, and that there is more than one link of character +and existence between the author of the _Mariage de Figaro_ and the +victor of Jemmapes. Both were men without principles, but full of +resource, wit, and fascination. Both were lovable in spite of their +great defects, because of their humanity and kindness. Both belonged +at the same time to the {96} old régime and the Revolution. Before +arriving at celebrity, each had a stormy youth, tormented by the love +of pleasure, the need of money, and a sort of perpetual restlessness: +they flattered every power of the time, sought fortune by the most +circuitous ways, were diplomatic couriers, and secret agents; before +coming out into open daylight, they made trial of their marvellous +address in obscurity, and signalized themselves among those men of +action and initiative whom governments, which make use of them in +occult ways, first launch, then compromise, disavow, and sometimes +imprison. + +Born at Cambrai, January 25, 1739, Dumouriez belonged to a family of +the upper middle class. Entering the army early, he distinguished +himself by his high spirits and courage. As a cornet of the Penthièvre +cavalry, he served in the German campaigns from 1758 to 1761, and was +invalided in 1763. He spent twenty-four years at the wars and brought +back nothing but twenty-two wounds, the rank of captain, a decoration, +and some debts. Seeking then a new career, he entered, thanks to his +connection with Favier, the secret diplomacy of Louis XV., and was sent +to Corsica, Italy, and Portugal. He returned to the army in 1768, and +made a brilliant record in the Corsican campaign, obtaining +successively the grades of adjutant-major general, +adjutant-quartermaster, and colonel of cavalry. It was he who seized +the castle of Corte, Paoli's last asylum. In 1771, he again became a +secret agent. Louis {97} XV. wished to befriend Poland in its +death-struggle, but without betraying his hand. Dumouriez was sent to +the Polish confederates. He was reputed to be merely acting on his own +impulses. He organized troops and fought successfully against +Souvaroff, the future adversary of the French Republic, but could not +save Poland--that Asiatic nation of Europe, as he called it. He came +back to Paris in 1772, and the government, complying with the demands +of Russia, shut him up for a year in the Bastille, where he had leisure +to meditate on the ingratitude of courts. This captivity strengthened +his taste for study, and, far from allaying his ambition, gave it +renewed force. + +Louis XVI. put him in command at Cherbourg, and it was he who conceived +the plan of making that town a station for the French marine. He was +fifty years old when the Revolution of 1789 broke out. At once he saw +in it an opportunity for success and glory. Full of confidence in his +own superiority, he merely awaited the hour when events should second +his ambition. He said to himself that the emigration, by making a void +in the upper ranks of the army, was going to leave him free scope, and +that he would be commander-in-chief of the French troops under the new +régime. To attain this end he decided to serve the King, the Assembly, +and the factions; to assume all parts and all masks, and to be in turn, +and simultaneously if need were, the courtier of Louis XVI. and the +favorite of the Jacobins. + +As has been very well said by M. Frédéric Masson {98} in an excellent +book, as novel as it is interesting, _Le Département des affaires +étrangères sous la Revolution_, Dumouriez had been accustomed to make +his way everywhere, to eat at all tables, and listen at all doors. One +of the agents of Count d'Artois brought him into relations with +Mirabeau. He was protected by the minister Montmorin. He drew up +plans of campaign for Narbonne. He used the intimate "thou" to +Laporte, the King's confidant and intendant of the civil list. He made +use of women also. Separated from his lawful wife, he lived in marital +relations with a sister of Rivarol, the Baroness de Beauvert, a +charming person who had much intercourse with aristocratic society, who +speculated in arms, and who was pensioned by the Duke of Orleans, as +appears from a letter of Latouche de Tréville, the prince's chancellor, +dated April 17, 1789. Dumouriez, who had expensive tastes, sought at +the same time for gold and honors. Either by means of the court or the +Revolution, he desired to gain a great fortune and much glory, to +become a statesman, a minister, commander-in-chief, and realize his +great military plan, the conquest of the natural frontiers of France. +He said to himself: He who wills the end wills the means, and managed +as adroitly with parties as with soldiers. At Niort, where he was in +command at the beginning of the Revolution, he made himself remarkable +by his enthusiasm for the new ideas, and became president of the club +and honorary citizen of the town. He contracted an intimacy with +Gensonné, {99} whom the Assembly had sent into the departments of the +west to observe their spirit. In January, 1792, the emigration of +general officers had become so considerable that he rose by seniority +to the rank of lieutenant-general. Thereafter, he believed his hour +had come, and threw himself boldly into the political arena. The +Gironde and the Jacobins were the two powers then in vogue; he +flattered both the Jacobins and the Gironde. Brissot was the corypheus +of the diplomatic committee and the chief of the war party. He became +the familiar of Brissot. Already, in 1791, he had prepared a memoir on +the subject of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs which he dedicated and +read to the Jacobins. In it he announced (singular prediction for the +future minister of a king!) that before fifty years had passed, Europe +would be republican. He demanded an immediate and radical change in +the diplomatic personnel. "It is of small importance," said he in the +same memoir, "that our representatives would lack experience. In the +first place, our interests are greatly simplified; moreover, our former +representatives were young men belonging to the court who had had no +political education. In a word, it is the majesty of the nation which +gives our negotiations weight. The minister," he added, "should be a +man of approved patriotism, above all suspicion, like the wife of +Cæsar. Absolute integrity, great knowledge of men, great firmness, a +broad and upright mind, should complete his character." Dumouriez +perhaps imagined that all these qualities {100} of an ideal minister +were reunited in his person. However that may be, he accepted, without +any mistrust of his own abilities, the portfolio of Foreign Affairs, +confided to him March 15, 1792, on account of his relations with the +Gironde and his popularity with the Jacobins. He had a high opinion of +himself, and, even after his cruel disappointments, he was to write in +his Memoirs, in 1794: "Dumouriez sometimes laughs sardonically in his +retreat over the judgments passed upon him. When he arrived at the +ministry, the courtiers said and published that he was only a soldier +of fortune, incapable of conducting political affairs, in which he +would make nothing but blunders. When he commanded an army, they told +the Prussians and the German Emperor's troops that he was a mere +writer, who had never made war and understood nothing about it. Since +he retired with reputation from public employments, they have published +that up to the date of the Revolution he had been an intriguing +adventurer, a ministerial spy, an office-sweeper. Would to God, they +had employed the adventures of their youth in similar espionages! They +would not have begun the Revolution like factionists, they would have +conducted it with wisdom, they would have preserved the esteem of the +nation, they would not have been the prime authors of the King's death, +either by betraying or abandoning him." + +The new Minister of Foreign Affairs began to play his rôle of leader of +French diplomacy in a {101} singular fashion. Repairing to the Jacobin +Club, he described himself as their liegeman, assumed the red bonnet in +their presence, and, with it on his head, announced that as soon as war +should be declared, he would throw away his pen in order to resume his +sword. Let us add that he was simultaneously trying to conciliate the +good graces of Louis XVI. and to persuade him that if he leaned upon +the Jacobins, it was solely in the hope of serving the King and +consolidating the throne. At the same time he appointed as director of +foreign affairs that Bonne-Carrère whose portrait has been traced in +this wise by Brissot: "Falling with all his vices and perverse habits +into the midst of a revolution whereby the people had recovered +sovereignty, he merely changed his idol without changing his idolatry. +He caressed the people instead of caressing the great, made the hall of +the Jacobins his OEil-de-Boeuf, played valet to the successful parties +one after another, the Lameths and the Mirabeaus, and succeeded in +raising himself from the secretaryship of the Jacobins to the embassy +of Liège, by the aid of that very Montmorin who detested the Jacobins, +and could but advance a man who betrayed them." + +Dumouriez then, following the example of Mirabeau, was about to play a +double game; to be revolutionary with the Revolution and a courtier +with the court. As to Madame Roland, he never placed himself at her +feet. The despotism of this female minister, the pretentious of this +demagogic bluestocking, {102} her affectation of puritan rigor, her +mania for directing everything, shocked the good sense of a man who +believed that woman is made to please, not to reign. It was repugnant +to this soldier to take his orders from the Egeria of the Girondins. +On the other hand, Dumouriez was displeasing to Madame Roland. She +found him too dissolute and not sentimental enough. She could not +pardon his having Madame de Beauvert for mistress and Bonne-Carrère for +confidant. She admitted neither his free-and-easy tone, his Gallic +humor, nor his natural gaiety, so unlike the declamatory tone and +pretentious jargon of the disciples of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. +Moreover, she found him too much of a royalist, too accustomed to the +old régime. The ministry, apparently so homogeneous, was soon to be +divided against itself. + + + + +{103} + +X. + +THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS. + +Louis XVI. had been persuaded that the only means of regaining public +confidence would be to name a ministry chosen by the Gironde and +accepted by the Jacobins. The six ministers--Dumouriez of Foreign +Affairs, Roland of the Interior, De Grave of War, Claviére of Finances, +Duranton of Justice, Lacoste of Marine--formed what was called the +Girondin ministry; the reactionists named it the _sans-culottes_ +ministry. The revolutionists rejoiced in its advent, while the +royalists sought to cover it with ridicule. + +On the day when the Council met for the first time at the Tuileries (in +the great royal cabinet on the first floor, afterwards called the Salon +of Louis XIV.), Roland created a scandal by his plebeian dress. The +simplicity of his costume, his round hat, his shoes fastened with +ribbons instead of buckles, caused, as his wife disdainfully remarks, +"astonishment to all the valets, those creatures who, existing only for +the sake of etiquette, thought the safety of the empire depended on its +preservation." The master of ceremonies, approaching Dumouriez with an +{104} uneasy frown, glanced at Roland, and said in an undertone, "Eh! +sir, no buckles on his shoes!" "Ah! sir, all is lost!" replied +Dumouriez so coolly that it raised a laugh. + +Louis XVI., who wished, as one might say, to enlarge the borders of +gentleness and resignation, displayed more than good-will towards the +ministers; he showed them deference. This was the more meritorious +because to him this ministry was like a reunion of the seditious, like +the Revolution in arms against his crown; his pretended advisers seemed +much more like enemies than auxiliaries. He tried, however, to attach +them to him by kindness, and made a sincere trial of his rights and +duties as a constitutional sovereign. Madame Roland herself, bitter +and violent as she is, renders him a certain justice. "Louis XVI.," +says she, "showed the greatest good nature towards his new ministers; +this man was not precisely such as he has been painted by those who +seek to degrade him." As to Dumouriez, he says in his Memoirs: +"Dumouriez had been greatly deceived concerning the character of Louis +XVI., who had been represented to him as a violent and wrathful man, +who swore a great deal and maltreated his ministers. He must, on the +contrary, do him the justice to say that during three' months when he +observed him closely and in very delicate circumstances, he always +found him polite, gentle, affable, and even very patient. This prince +had a great timidity arising from his education and his distrust {105} +of himself, some difficulty in speaking, a just and dispassionate mind, +upright sentiments, great knowledge of history, geography, and the +arts, and an astonishing memory." Madame Roland also owns that he had +an excellent memory and much activity; that he was never idle; that he +read often, and had a distinct knowledge of all the different treaties +concluded by France with neighboring powers; that he knew history well, +and was the best geographer in the kingdom. "His knowledge of the +names and faces of those belonging to his court," she adds, "and the +anecdotes peculiar to each, extended to all persons who had come into +prominence during the Revolution; no subject could be mentioned to him +on which he had not some opinion founded on certain facts." + +At first, the sessions of the ministry went off very tranquilly. The +King, with an accent of candor, protested his attachment to the +Constitution and his desire to see it solidly established. Often he +left his ministers to chat among themselves without taking any part in +their conversation. During such times he read his French and English +journals, or wrote letters. If a decree was presented for his +sanction, he deferred his decision until the next meeting, to which he +came with a settled opinion, concealing it carefully, none the less, +and appearing to decide only in accordance with the will of the +majority. He frequently evaded irritating questions by turning the +conversation to other subjects. If war were the {106} topic, he spoke +of travels; apropos of diplomacy, he described the manners of the +country in question; to Roland he spoke of his works, to Dumouriez of +his adventures. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, who was a first-class +story-teller, and whose freedom of speech was welcomed by the King, to +use Madame Roland's expression, amused both his colleagues and his +sovereign by his jests and anecdotes. + +But all this was far from agreeable to the spiteful companion of the +Minister of the Interior. Indignant at the accord which seemed to +exist between Louis XVI. and his counsellors, she dreamed of nothing +but discussions and conflicts. All that wore the appearance of +reconciliation was repugnant to her. She made her obedient spouse +recount to her the smallest details of the sessions of the Council, +meddling with and criticising all. During the first three weeks, +Roland and Clavière, enchanted with the King's dispositions, flattered +themselves that the Revolution was at an end. Madame Roland scoffed at +their confidence. "_Bon Dieu_," she said to them, "every time I see +you start for the Council with this charming confidence, it seems to me +you are ready to commit some folly."--"I assure you," replied Clavière, +"that the King is perfectly aware that his interests are bound up with +the observance of the laws just established; he reasons too pertinently +not to be convinced of this truth."--"Well," added Roland, "if he is +not an honest man, he is the greatest rascal in the kingdom; nobody can +dissimulate {107} like that." Madame Roland rejoined that she could +not believe in love for the Constitution on the part of a man nourished +in the prejudices and accustomed to the use of despotic power. She, +who doubtless thought herself the only person capable of presiding well +at the council of ministers, treated it as a "café where they amused +themselves with idle gossip." "There was no record of their +deliberations," says she, "nor a secretary to take them down; after +sitting three or four hours, they went away without having accomplished +anything but a few signatures; it was like this three times a +week."--"This is pitiable!" she would exclaim impatiently when, on his +return, she asked her husband what had passed. "You are all in very +good humor because there have been no disputes or vexations, and you +have even been treated with civility; each of you seems to be doing +pretty much as he pleases in his own department. I am afraid you are +being made game of."--"Nevertheless, business is getting on."--"Yes, +and time is wasted, for in the torrent that is carrying you away, I +should be much better pleased to have you employ three hours in solid +meditation on great combinations than to see you spend them in useless +chatter." + +It must needs be said that no person contributed more to the downfall +of royalty than Madame Roland. At the moment when the good temper and +gentleness of Louis XVI. began to gain upon his ministers, when +Dumouriez was softened by the {108} royal kindness, when minds +experienced a relaxation, and honest people, worn out by so many +political shocks, were sincerely desirous of repose, it was she who +nourished discord, made the Gironde irreconcilable, inspired the +subversive pamphlets of Louvet, embittered her husband's heart, and +invented the provocations against which the conscience of the +unfortunate monarch rebelled. This part, which would have been a sorry +one for a man to play, seems still worse in a woman. Count Beugnot has +said very justly: "I have seen that a woman can preserve only the +faults of her sex in the midst of such a frightful catastrophe, not its +virtues. The gentle, amiable, sensitive qualities grow and develop in +the shelter of peaceful domestic joys; they are lost and obliterated in +the heat of debates, the bitterness of parties, and the shock of +passions. The soft and tender foot of woman cannot tread unharmed in +paths bristling with steel and red with blood. To do so with safety +she must become a man; but to me, a man-woman seems a monster. Ah! let +them leave to us, whom nature has granted the pitiful advantage of +strength, the field of contention and the fate of war; we are adequate +to this cruel destiny; but let them keep to the easier and sweeter part +of pouring balm into wounds and staunching tears." + +Roland's character was tranquil; it was his wife who made him +ambitious, haughty, and inflexible. She should have pacified her +husband, but instead of that she excited him. Never was he malevolent +and {109} spiteful enough to suit her. She would not pardon him a +single movement of compassion or respect towards the august +unfortunates. Led by her, Roland no longer dared entertain a generous +thought. He returned shamefaced to the Ministry of the Interior if he +had felt a humane sentiment while at the Tuileries. It is sad to find +tenderness and pity in the heart of a man, Dumouriez, and in the heart +of a woman, Madame Roland, nothing but malevolence and hatred. +Dumouriez wanted to put out the fire; Madame Roland, to stir it up. +Dumouriez sincerely desired the King's safety; Madame Roland swore that +he should perish. If a germ of pity woke to life in the hearts of the +ministers, Madame Roland hastened to stifle it. Her hostility towards +the royal family was more than deliberate; there was something like +ferocity in it. Her Memoirs and those of Dumouriez display two very +different minds. Sadness dominates in his; anger in hers. Even on the +steps of the scaffold, Madame Roland will not feel her hatred lessen. +Dumouriez, on the contrary, will cast a glance of melancholy respect +upon the unfortunate sovereign whose sorrows and whose resignation, +whose gentleness and uprightness, had touched him so profoundly. + + + + +{110} + +XI. + +THE FÊTE OF THE SWISS OF CHATEAUVIEUX. + +Dumouriez, at the beginning of his ministry, was still the slave of the +Jacobins, his allies and protectors. His elevation to the ministry was +in great part due to them, and even while despising them, he felt +unable to shake off their yoke. Little by little, they inspired him +with horror, and before many weeks were over, his only idea was to free +himself from their control. But at first he treated them like a power +with which he was obliged to reckon. What proves this is his passive +attitude at the time of the celebrated fête of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux. The prologue of the bloody tragedies that were in course +of preparation, this fête shows what headway the revolutionary ideas +had made. The sinister days of the Convention were approaching, the +Terror existed in germ, and already many representatives who, on a +secret ballot, would have voted in accordance with right and honor, +were cowardly enough to do so against their conscience when they had to +answer to their names. + +Things had travelled fast since the close of the Constituent Assembly. +In 1790, that Assembly, as {111} the faithful guardian of discipline, +had congratulated the Marquis de Bouillé on the energy with which he +repressed the military rebellion that broke out at Nancy, August 31. +The soldiers garrisoned at this town were guilty of the greatest +crimes. They pillaged the military chests, arrested the officers, and +fired on the troops who remained faithful. M. Desilles, an officer of +the King's regiment, conducted himself at the time in a heroic manner. +When the insurgents were about to discharge the cannon opposite the +Stainville gate, he sprang towards it, and covering it with his body, +cried: "It is your friends, your brothers, who are coming! The +National Assembly sends them. Do you mean to fire on them? Will you +disgrace your flags?" It was useless to try to hold Desilles back. He +broke away from his friends and threw himself again in front of the +rebels, falling under four wounds at the moment when the fight began. + +The Constituent Assembly passed a decree by which it thanked the +Marquis de Bouillé and his troops "for having gloriously fulfilled +their duty" in repressing the military insurrection of Nancy. Its +president wrote an official letter to Desilles, soon to die in +consequence of his wounds: "The National Assembly has learned with just +admiration, mingled with profound sorrow, the danger to which your +heroic devotion has exposed you; in trying to describe it, I should +weaken the emotion by which the Assembly was penetrated. So sublime an +example of courage {112} and civic virtue is above all praise. It has +secured you a sweeter recompense and one more worthy of you; you will +find it in your own heart, and the eternal memory of the French people." + +The Swiss regiment of Chateauvieux had taken part in the rebellion at +Nancy. Switzerland had reserved, by treaty, its federal jurisdiction +over such of its troops as had taken service under the King of France. +By virtue of this special jurisdiction the soldiers of the regiment of +Chateauvieux, taken arms in hand, were tried before a council of war +composed of Swiss officers. Twenty-two were condemned to death and +shot. Fifty were condemned to the galleys and sent to the convict +prison at Brest. It was in vain that Louis XVI. attempted to negotiate +their pardon with the Swiss Confederacy. It remained inflexible, and +the guilty were still undergoing their penalty when the Jacobins +resolved to release them from prison in defiance of the treaties +uniting Switzerland and France. "To deliver these condemned +prisoners," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "was to insult the Cantons, +attack their treaty rights, and judge their criminals. We had enemies +enough already without seeking new ones among an allied people who were +behaving wisely towards us, especially a free and republican people." +But revolutionary passions do not reason. Collot d'Herbois, a wretched +actor who had passed from the theatrical stage to that of politics, and +who, not content with having bored people, wished to terrorize them +also, {113} made himself the champion of the galley-slaves of the +regiment of Chateauvieux. He was the principal impresario of the +lugubrious fête which disgraced Paris on April 15, 1792. + +The programme was not arranged without some opposition. Public opinion +was not yet ripe for saturnalia. There were still a few honest and +courageous publicists who, like André Chénier, boldly lifted their +voices to stigmatize certain infamies. In the tribune of the Assembly +some orators were to be found who expressed their minds freely and held +their own against the tempests of demagogy. There were generals and +soldiers in the army for whom discipline was not an idle word; and if +the fête of the Swiss of Chateauvieux made the future Septembrists and +furies of the guillotine utter shouts of joy, it drew from honest men a +long cry of grief and indignation. + +Intimidated by the menaces of the Jacobins, the Assembly voted the +release of the Swiss incarcerated in the prison of Brest. But merely +to deliver them was not enough: the Jacobins wanted to give them an +ovation. Their march from Brest to Paris was a triumph, and Collot +d'Herbois organized a gigantic fête in their honor. + +André Chénier was at this time writing weekly letters for the _Journal +de Paris_, in which he eloquently supported the principles of order and +liberty. As M. de Lamartine has said, he was the Tyrtæus of good sense +and moderation. He was indignant at {114} the threatened scandal, and, +in concert with his collaborator on the _Journal de Paris_, Roucher, +the poet of _Les Mois_, he criticised in most energetic terms the +revolutionary manifestation then organizing. At the Jacobin Club, on +April 4, Collot d'Herbois freed his mind against him. "This is not +Chénier-Gracchus," said the comedian; "it is another person, quite +another." He spoke of André as a "sterile prose writer," and pointed +him out to popular vengeance. The two brothers were in opposing camps. +While André Chénier stigmatized the fête of anarchy, his brother Joseph +was diligently manufacturing scraps of poetry, inscriptions, and +devices which were to figure in the programme. "What!" cried André, +"must we invent extravagances capable of destroying any form of +government, recompense rebellion against the laws, and crown foreign +satellites for having shot French citizens in a riot? People say that +the statues will be veiled in every place through which this procession +is to pass. Oh! if this odious orgy takes place, it will be well to +veil the whole city; but it is not the images of despots that should be +wrapt in funeral crape, but the faces of honest men. How is it that +you do not blush when a turbulent handful, who seem numerous because +they are united and make a noise, oblige you to do their will, telling +you that it is your own, and amusing your childish curiosity meanwhile +with unworthy spectacles? In a city which respected itself such a fête +would meet nothing but solitude and silence." The controversy {115} +waxed furious. The walls were covered with posters for and against the +fête. Roucher thus flagellated Collot d'Herbois: "This character out +of a comic novel, who skipped from Polichinello's booth to the platform +of the Jacobins, has sprung at me as if he were going to strike me with +the oar the Swiss brought back from the galleys!" + +Pétion, then mayor of Paris, far from opposing the fête, approved and +encouraged it. "I think it my duty," he wrote, April 6, 1792, "to +explain myself briefly concerning the fête which is being arranged to +celebrate the arrival of the soldiers of Chateauvieux. Minds are +heated, passions are in ferment, and citizens hold different opinions; +everything seems to betoken disorder. It is sought to change a day of +rejoicing into a day of mourning.... What is it all about? Some +soldiers, leaders with the French guards, who have broken our chains +and afterwards been overloaded with them, are about to enter within our +walls; some citizens propose to meet and offer them a fraternal +welcome; these citizens are obeying a natural impulse and using a right +which belongs to all. The magistrates see nothing but what is simple +and innocent in all this; they see certain citizens abandoning +themselves to joy and mirth; every one is at liberty to participate or +not to participate in the fête. Public spirit rises and assumes a new +degree of energy amidst civic amusements." The municipality ordered +this letter of Pétion's to be printed, posted on the walls, and {116} +sent to the forty-eight sectional committees and the sixty battalions +of the National Guard. + +Not all the members of the National Assembly shared the optimism of the +mayor of Paris. The preparations for the fête, which was announced for +April 15, occasioned, on the 9th, a session as affecting as it was +stormy. The whole debate should be read in the _Moniteur_. The +question was put whether the Swiss of Chateauvieux, then waiting +outside the doors, should be introduced and admitted to the honors of +the session. M. de Gouvion, who had been major-general of the National +Guard under Lafayette, gravely ascended the tribune. "Gentlemen," said +he, "I had a brother, a good patriot, who, through the favorable +opinion of your fellow-citizens, had been successively a commander of +the National Guard and a member from the Department. Always ready to +sacrifice himself for the Revolution and the law, it was in the name of +the Revolution and the law that he was required to march to Nancy with +the brave National Guards. There he fell, pierced by fifty bayonets in +the hands of those who.... I ask if I am condemned to look on +tranquilly while the assassins of my brother enter here?" A voice +rising from the midst of the Assembly cried: "Very well, sir, go out!" +The galleries applauded. Gouvion attempted to continue. The murmurs +redoubled. Several persons in the galleries cried: "Down! down!" + +The Assembly, revolutionary though it was, felt {117} indignant at the +scandal, and called the galleries to order. The president reiterated +the injunction to keep silence. Gouvion began anew: "I treat with all +the contempt he merits, and with ... I would say the word if I did not +respect the Assembly--the coward who has been base enough to outrage a +brother's grief." The question was then put whether the Swiss of +Chateauvieux should be admitted to the honors of the session. Out of +546 votes, 288 were in the affirmative, and 265 in the negative. +Consequently, the president announced that the soldiers of +Chateauvieux, who had asked to present themselves to the Assembly, +should be admitted to the honors of the session. Gouvion went out by +one door, indignant, and swearing that he would never re-enter an +Assembly which received his brother's assassins as conquerors. By +another door, Collot d'Herbois made his entry with his protêgês, the +ex-galley slaves. + +The party of the left and the spectators in the galleries burst into +transports of joy, and gave three rounds of applause. The soldiers +entered the hall to the beating of drums and cries of "Long live the +nation!" They were followed by a large procession of men and women +carrying pikes and banners. Collot d'Herbois, the showman of the +Swiss, pronounced an emphatic address in praise of the pretended +martyrs of liberty, which the Assembly ordered to be printed. One +Goachon, speaking for the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, and holding a pike +ornamented with a {118} red liberty cap, exclaimed: "The citizens of +the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, the victors of the Bastille, the men of +July 14, have charged me to warn you that they are going to make ten +thousand more pikes after the model which you see." + +The fête took place on Sunday, April 15. It was the triumph of +anarchy, the glorification of indiscipline and revolt. On that day the +galley slaves were treated like heroes. The emblems adopted were a +colossal galley, ornamented with flowers, and the convicts' head gear, +that hideous red bonnet in which Dumouriez had already played the +buffoon, and which was presently to be set on the august head of Louis +XVI. The soldier galley slaves, whose chains were kissed with +transports by a swarm of harlots, came forward wearing civic crowns. +What a difference between the Constituent Assembly and the Legislative +Assembly! Under the one, a grand expiatory ceremony on the +Champ-de-Mars had honored the soldiers slain at Nancy, and the National +Guards had worn mourning for these martyrs of duty. Under the other, +it was not the victims who were lauded, but their assassins. A goddess +of Liberty in a Phrygian cap was borne in a state chariot. The +procession halted at the Bastille, the Hôtel de Ville, and the +Champ-de-Mars. The mayor and municipality of Paris were present in +their official capacity. The _Ça ira_ was sung in a frenzy of +enthusiasm. Soldiers and public women embraced each other. It was +David who had {119} designed the costumes, planned the chariot, and +organized the whole performance,--David, the revolutionary artist who +was destined by a change of fortune to paint the portrait of a Pope and +the coronation of an Emperor. + +In 1791, André Chénier and David, then friends, and saluting together +the dawn of the Revolution, had celebrated with lyre and pencil the +"_Serment du Jeu de Paumé_"[1] Consecrating an ode to the painter's +magnificent tableau, the poet exclaimed:-- + + Resume thy golden robe, bind on thy chaplet rich, + Divine and youthful Poesy! + To David's lips, King of the skilful brush, + Bear the ambrosial cup. + +How he repented his enthusiasm now! What ill-will he bore the artist +who placed his art, that sacred gift, at the service of anarchical +passions! With what irony the same pen passed from dithyramb to satire! + + Arts worthy of our eyes, pomp and magnificence + Worthy of our liberty, + Worthy of the vile tyrants who are devouring France, + Worthy of the atrocious dementia + Of that stupid David whom in other days I sang! + + +On the very day of the fête the young poet had the courage to publish +in the _Journal de Paris_ an avenging satire, which branded the +shoulders of the ex-galley slaves as with a new hot iron. The sweet +{120} and pathetic elegiast, the Catullus, the Tibullus of France, +added a bronze chord to his lyre:-- + + Hail, divine triumph! Enter within our walls! + Bring us these warriors so famed + For Desilles' blood, and for the obsequies + Of many Frenchmen massacred... + One day alone could win so much renown, + And this fair day will shine upon us soon! + When thou shalt lead Jourdan to our army, + And Lafayette to the scaffold! + + +Jourdan was the slaughterer, the headsman, the torturer of the Glacier +of Avignon, who, coming under the provisions of the amnesty, had +arrived to take part in the triumph of the Swiss of Chateauvieux. The +acclamations were lugubrious. The lanterns and torches shed a funereal +glare. Nothing is more doleful than enthusiasm for ignominy. The +applause accorded to disgrace and crime sounds like sinister derision. +Outraged public conscience extinguishes the fires of apotheoses such as +these. Madame Elisabeth, in a letter of April 18, speaks with a sort +of pity of this odious but ridiculous fête: "The people have been to +see Dame Liberty waggling about on her triumphal car, but they shrugged +their shoulders. Three or four hundred _sans-culottes_ followed, +crying 'Long live the nation! Long live liberty! Long live the +_sans-culottes_! to the devil with Lafayette!' All this was noisy but +sad. The National Guards took no part in it; on the contrary, they +were indignant, and Pétion, they say, is ashamed of his conduct. {121} +The next day a pike surmounted by a red bonnet was carried noiselessly +through the garden, and did not remain there long." The Princess de +Lamballe, who was living at the Tuileries in the Pavilion of Flora, +could see the pike thus carried by a passer. It may, perhaps, have +been that belonging to one of the Septembrists,--that on which her own +head was to be placed. + +The _Moniteur_, however, grew ecstatic over the fête. "There are +plenty of others," it said, "who will describe the march of the +triumphal cortège, the groups composing it, the car of Liberty, +conducted by Fame, drawn by twenty superb horses, preceded by ravishing +music which was sometimes listened to in religious silence and +sometimes interrupted by wild, irregular dances whose very disorder was +rendered more piquant by the fraternal union reigning in all hearts.... +The people were there in all their might, and did not abuse it. There +was not a weapon to repress excesses, and not an excess to be +repressed." It concluded thus: "We say to the administration: Give +such festivals as these often. Repeat this one every year on April 15; +let the feast of Liberty be our spring festival; and let other civic +solemnities signalize the return of the other seasons. In former days +the people had none but those of their masters, and all that was +accomplished by them was their depravity and abasement. Give them some +that shall be their own, and that will elevate their souls, develop +their sensibilities, and fortify their courage. They {122} will +create, or, better, they have already created, a new people. Popular +festivals are the best education for the people." + +Optimists, how will your illusions terminate? You who see nothing but +an idyl in all this, can not you perceive that such ceremonies are the +prelude to massacres, and that an odor of blood mingles with their +perfumes? All who took part on either side of the heated controversy +which preceded the ovation to the Swiss of Chateauvieux, will be +pursued by fate. Gouvion, who had sworn never again to set foot within +the precincts of the Assembly where the murderers of his brother +triumphed, kept his word. On the very day of that shameful session he +asked to be sent to the Army of the North, and three months later was +to be carried off by a cannon-ball. Still more melancholy was to be +the fate of Pétion, who showed such complaisance toward the Swiss on +this occasion. He, once so popular that in 1791 he was asked to allow +the ninth child, which a citizeness had just presented to her country, +"to be baptized in his name, revered almost as much as that of the +Divinity"; he of whom some one said at that time, "For the same reason +which would have made Jesus a suitable mayor of Jerusalem, Pétion is a +suitable mayor of Paris; there is too striking a resemblance between +them to be overlooked," was sadly to exclaim some months later: "I am +one of the most notable examples of popular inconsistency.... For a +long time I have said to myself and to my {123} friends: The people +will hate me still more than they have loved me. I can no longer +either enter or depart from the place where we hold our sessions +without being exposed to the grossest insults and the most seditious +threats. How often have I not heard them say as I was passing: +'Scoundrel! we will have your head!'" + +Proscribed with the Girondins, May 31, 1793, he fled at first to +Normandy, and afterwards into the Gironde, wandering from town to town, +from field to field, and hiding for several months thirty feet under +ground, in a sort of well; the poor people who showed him hospitality +paid for it with their heads. Ah! how disenchanted he must have been +with that revolutionary policy of which he had been the enthusiastic +promoter! How sad was the farewell to life signed by him and Buzot: +"Now that it has been demonstrated that liberty is hopelessly lost; +that the principles of morality and justice are trodden under foot; +that there is nothing to choose between two despotisms,--that of the +brigands who are tearing the vitals of France and that of foreign +powers; that the nation has lost all its energy; that it lies at the +feet of the tyrants by whom it is oppressed; that we can render no +further service to our country; that, far from being able to give +happiness to the beings we hold most dear, we shall bring down hatred, +vengeance, and misfortune upon them, so long as we live,--we have +resolved to quit life and be no longer witnesses of the slavery which +is about to desolate our unhappy country." + +{124} + +After ending with this cry of grief and indignation: "We devote the +vile scoundrels who have destroyed liberty and plunged France into an +abyss of evils to the scorn and indignation of all time," the two +proscripts were found dead in a wheat-field about a league from +Saint-Emilion. Their bodies were half devoured by wolves. + +And how will André Chénier end? On the day of the Swiss fête, the city +where such a scandal took place seemed to him insupportable. For +several days he sought refuge in the country where he could breathe a +purer air beneath the blossoming trees. But contemplation of nature +did not soothe him. Running to meet danger, he returned and threw +himself into the furnace, more ardent and indignant than before. With +manly enthusiasm he exclaimed: "It is above all when the sacrifices +which must be made to truth, liberty, and country are dangerous and +difficult, that they are accompanied by inexpressible delights. It is +in the midst of spying accusations, outrages, and proscriptions, it is +in dungeons and on scaffolds, that virtue, probity, and constancy taste +the pleasures of a proud and pure conscience." André had a +presentiment of his fate. + +He was to die on the same day and the same scaffold as his friend +Roucher, a few hours earlier than the moment when Robespierre's +condemnation would have saved them. It is thus that he was to pay with +his life for his opposition to the fête of the Swiss of Chateauvieux, +and Collot d'Herbois was avenged. {125} But after the turn of the +victims came that of the headsmen. The unlucky comedian who, pursuing +even his comrades with his hatred, asked that "the head of the _Comédie +Française_ should be guillotined and the rest transported," the +impresario of the fête of the Swiss galley slaves, the organizer of the +Lyons massacres, Collot d'Herbois, cursed by friends and enemies, was +transported to Guiana and died there in 1796, just as he had lived, in +an access of burning fever. + + + +[1] The oath taken by the deputies of the third estate in the +tennis-court of Versailles, in 1789. + + + + +{126} + +XII. + +THE DECLARATION OF WAR. + +The wave of anarchy constantly rose higher, but the optimists, +sheltering themselves, like Pétion, in a beatific calm, obstinately +closed their eyes and would not see it. Abroad and at home there was +such a series of shocks and agitations, of struggles and emotions, +perils and troubles; things hurried on so fast, and the scenes of the +drama were so varied and so violent, that what happened to-day was +forgotten by the morrow. The noise of the fête of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux had hardly ceased when the shouts of the multitude were +heard saluting Louis XVI., who had just declared war on Austria. + +In reality, the King did not desire war, but the bellicose current had +become irresistible. The court of Vienna had shown itself intractable. +It forbade the princes who owned possessions in Lorraine and Alsace to +receive the indemnities offered by France in exchange for their feudal +rights, and threatened to have the Diet of Ratisbonne annul any private +treaties they might conclude concerning them. The electors of Trèves, +Cologne, and Mayence undisguisedly favored the levying of troops by the +emigrant {127} princes, and even paid subsidies toward their support. +They refused to recognize the official ambassadors of Louis XVI., while +recognizing the plenipotentiaries of these princes. There was talk of +holding a Congress at Aix-la-Chapelle for the purpose of intimidating +the National Assembly. The successor of the Emperor Leopold, Francis +II., who, before his election to the Empire, had assumed the title of +King of Hungary and Bohemia, displayed extremely martial sentiments. +Austria, which had sent forty thousand men to the Low Countries and +twenty thousand to the Rhine, had just signed a treaty of alliance with +Prussia, "to put an end to the troubles in France." Dumouriez urgently +demanded the court of Vienna to explain itself. It finally sent the +French Ambassador, Marquis de Noailles, a dry, curt, and formal note, +naming the only conditions on which peace could be preserved. These +were: the re-establishment of the French monarchy on the bases of the +royal declaration of June 23, 1789, and, consequently, the restoration +of the nobility and clergy as orders; the restitution of Church +property; the return of Alsace to the German princes, with all their +sovereign and feudal rights; and, finally, the surrender of Avignon and +the county of Venaisson to the Holy See. + +"In truth," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "if the Viennese minister +had slept through the entire thirty-three months that had elapsed since +the royal séance, and had dictated this note on awaking {128} without +knowledge of what had happened, he could not have proposed conditions +more incongruous with the progress of the Revolution.... The new +social compact was founded on the abolition of the orders and the +equality of all citizens. The financial system, which alone could +prevent bankruptcy, was founded on the creation of assignats. The +assignats were hypothecated on the property of the clergy, now become +the property of the nation, and the greater part of which had been +already sold. The nation, therefore, could not accept these conditions +except by violating its Constitution, destroying property, ruining its +purchasers, annulling its assignats, and declaring bankruptcy. Could +so humiliating an obedience be expected from a great nation, proud of +having conquered its liberty? and that for the sake of placing itself +once more under the yoke of nobles who, having abandoned their King +himself, now threatened to re-enter their country with sword and flame +and every scourge of vengeance?" + +The entire National Assembly reasoned in the same way as Dumouriez. A +cry for war arose on all sides. The Girondins saw in it the +indispensable consecration of the Revolution. The Feuillants hoped +that besides proving creditable to the government, it would accomplish +the additional end of drawing away from Paris and other great cities a +multitude of turbulent men who, for lack of anything else to do, were +disturbing public order. Certain reactionists, stifling the sentiment +of patriotism in their hearts, {129} were equally anxious for war, in +the secret hope that it would prove disastrous for the French army, and +result in the re-establishment of the old régime. On the other hand, +there were good citizens, inclined to optimism and judging others by +themselves, who thought that when confronted with an enemy, all +intestine dissensions would vanish as by enchantment, and that the new +Constitution, hallowed by victory and glory, would ensure the country a +most brilliant destiny. Ministers were unanimous, and enthusiasm +universal. Even if he had so desired, Louis XVI. could no longer +resist it. On April 20, 1792, he went to the Assembly. The hall was +filled with a crowd which comprehended the importance and solemnity of +the act about to be accomplished. + +According to Dumouriez, the King was very majestic: "I come," he said, +"in accordance with the terms of the Constitution, formally to propose +war against the King of Hungary and Bohemia." He afterwards paid the +greatest attention to the report of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, +and seemed, by the motions of his head and hands, to approve it in +every respect. He returned to the Tuileries amidst general +acclamations. War was unanimously decided on, and Dumouriez went to +the diplomatic committee in order to draw up the declaration. At ten +in the evening the decree was brought in and carried to the King, who +sanctioned it at once. + +Thus commenced that gigantic war which France was to wage against all +Europe, and which ended, {130} twenty-three years later, in the +disaster of Waterloo. How many battles, what suffering, and what a +prodigious shedding of blood! And to attain what end? Simply the +point of departure; that is to say, in the political order, to +constitutional monarchy, and in territory, to the boundaries of 1792. +What! to have filled Europe with noise and renown; to have carried the +standards of France from east to west, from north to south; to have +camped victoriously in Brussels, Milan, Venice, Rome, Naples, Cairo, +Berlin, Madrid, Vienna, Moscow; to have enlarged the borders of valor, +heroism, and self-sacrifice in order to arrive, after so many efforts, +just at the spot where the strife began? Ah! how short-sighted is +human wisdom, how deceitful the previsions of mortal man, how sterile +the agitations of republics and monarchs! "Assuredly!" says Dumouriez, +"if the Emperor and the King of Prussia could have foreseen that France +was able to withstand all Europe, they would not have meddled with her +domestic quarrels; they would have treated the _émigrés_ not with +confidence, but compassion; they would have responded frankly and +without trickery to the minister's negotiation; the Revolution would +have been accomplished without cruelties; Europe would have remained at +peace, and France would be happy." What sadness underlies all history, +and what disproportion there is between man's sacrifices and their +results! The Revolution was achieved. All necessary liberties had +been conquered. Privileges {131} existed no longer. Animated by +excellent intentions, Louis XVI. would have been the best of +constitutional sovereigns, had his subjects possessed wisdom. Why this +long misunderstanding between him and his people? Why, on one side, +the insensate attitude of the _émigrés_, whose task seemed to be to +justify the revolutionists; and why, on the other, those savage +passions which seemed trying to justify the wrathful recriminations of +Coblentz? Why that untimely intervention of Austria which irritated +French national sentiment and gave a political pretext to inexcusable +violence, cruelty, and crime? Inextricable confusion of false +situations! Multitudes asked themselves in what direction right and +duty lay. A large contingent of the French nobility heartily desired +the success of foreign armies. At Coblentz a gathering of twenty-two +thousand gentlemen hastened to the side of the seven Bourbon princes: +the Comte de Provence, the Comte d'Artois, the Duc de Berry, the Duc +d'Angoulême, the Prince de Conde, the Duc de Bourbon, and the Duc +d'Enghien. + +As M. de Lamartine has said: "Infidelity to the country called itself +fidelity to the King. Desertion called itself honor. Fealty to the +throne was the religion of the French nobility. To them the +sovereignty of the people seemed an insolent dogma against which it was +necessary to draw the sword under penalty of sharing the crime. There +was real devotion in the act by which these men, young and {132} old, +abandoned their rank in the army, and the ties of country and family, +and rushed into a foreign land to defend the white flag as common +soldiers.... Their country symbolized duty for the patriots; to the +_émigrés_, duty meant the throne. One of these parties deceived itself +concerning its duty, but both of them believed they were performing it." + +As to the unfortunate Louis XVI., he suffered cruelly. It was like +death to him to declare war against his nephew, and at certain moments +he felt that this Austrian army against which his troops contended +might yet be his last resource. He could not even flatter himself that +the sacrifice he had made of his sympathies and family feelings would +be repaid by the love and confidence of his people. + +"We have no difficulty nowadays in comprehending," says M. Geffroy very +justly, "what pure patriotism there was in that young army of 1792, +which represented new France. But this army, formed in independence of +the old regiments, was none the less, in the eyes of the Queen, a +veritable army of sedition. She thought of it as composed of the +victors of the Bastille, those whom Mirabeau styled the greatest +scoundrels of Paris; the very rabble who came to Versailles on the 6th +of October. She believed they could be crushed by the first attack at +the frontier, and that France and Paris would be rid of them." The +following reflection by M. Geffroy is very judicious: "Marie Antoinette +committed a double error, but honest men who had not the same {133} +overpowering motives as she, have committed it likewise. I do not +allude merely to those Frenchmen who, after April 20, remained in the +ranks of the Emigration, and who, apparently, did not suppose +themselves to be betraying the true interests of their country. But +look at M. de Bouillé. He even accepted a command in the foreign army +under Gustavus III. And yet M. de Bouillé is an honest man who knows +France and loves her ardently. Observe, in his Memoirs, his +involuntary pride in our success, and how he shrugs his shoulders at +the bluster of the Prussian officers." + +It is not yet well understood what vigor, enthusiasm, and martial ardor +animated that brave national army, which, according to the foreigners, +was but a band of rioters, but which was suddenly to appear on the +battle-field as a people of heroes. Honor took refuge in the camps. +It was there that men whom the Jacobin Club enraged, and who had no +consolation for their patriotic grief but the virile emotions of +combat, went to fight and die. Why did not Louis XVI. call to mind +that he was the commander-in-chief of the army? Ah! had he been a +soldier, had he been accustomed to wear a uniform, to command, and, +above all, to speak to his troops, how quickly he would have come to +the end of his difficulties! Count de Vaublanc had good reason to say: +"Anything can be done with Frenchmen if one knows how to animate and +impress them with vehement ardor; otherwise, nothing need be +expected.... Never did {134} a prince merit better the eternal rewards +promised by religion to the true Christian; and yet his example should +forever teach kings that their conduct must be totally different from +his. Lacking the courage which acts, the most virtuous king cannot +achieve his own safety." Why did not Louis XVI. go amongst his +soldiers? Victory would have given him a sceptre and a crown. While +he still retained his sword, why did he leave it in the scabbard? Why +did he not remember that it might launch thunderbolts? + +On the contrary, Louis XVI. hesitates, fumbles, temporizes. Count de +Vaublanc says again: "This wretched time proves thoroughly that finesse +is the most detestable means of conducting great affairs. Nothing but +finesse was opposed to the impetuous attacks of the Jacobins. All was +dissimulation; conversations, writings, measures; authority acted only +by crooked ways. With a thousand means of safety, people were lost +because they pushed prudence to excess, and extreme prudence always +degenerates into despicable means. I was in every great crisis of the +Revolution, and I have always seen the same faults produce the same +misfortunes. It is the same thing in revolution as in war; no matter +how prudent a general may be, he must take some risk. Otherwise it +would be impossible to gain a single battle." + +Ah! how true and how striking is that great saying of Bossuet: "When +God wills to overthrow empires, all is feeble and irregular in their +designs." {135} Undecided and fickle, Louis XVI. does not even know +whether to desire the success or the failure of the Austrian army. He +has no plan, no steadiness of purpose. The secret mission he gives to +Mallet du Pan is a fresh proof of the irresolution of his character and +his policy. What is it he asks? To have the Powers declare that they +are making war against an anti-social faction, and not the French +nation; that they are undertaking the defence of legitimate governments +and of peoples against anarchy; that they will treat only with the +King; that they shall demand perfect liberty for him; that they convoke +a congress to which the _émigrés_ may be admitted as complainants, and +where the general scheme of claims and reclamations shall be negotiated +under the auspices and the guarantee of the great courts of Europe. +Hesitating between Austria and his own kingdom, the unhappy monarch +attempts to continue that equivocal system, that see-saw policy in +which he has succeeded so ill, and which constrains him to +dissimulation, that last resource of the feeble. Sent to Germany with +instructions written by Louis XVI., with his own hand, Mallet du Pan +recommends the sovereigns to be cautious in advancing into France, to +observe the greatest prudence in dealing with the inhabitants of the +invaded provinces, and to precede their arrival by a manifesto in which +they declare conciliatory and pacific intentions. It follows that +official ministers of the King did not possess his confidence and were +not the interpreters of his mind. A {136} sort of occult and +mysterious government existed, with a diplomacy, secret funds, and +agents abroad and at home. Such a system, lacking all grandeur and +sincerity, could accomplish nothing but catastrophes. + +Meanwhile, the war had begun under the most painful conditions. The +invasion of Belgium, arranged for the end of April, failed miserably. +Near Mons, Biron's troops took to flight, threatening to fire on their +officers, and crying: "We are betrayed!" At Lille, General Theobald +Dillon was massacred by his own soldiers. Such news caused +indescribable emotion in Paris. Popular mistrust and irritation +reached their height. The different parties hurled reproaches and +accusations in each other's face. The Girondins, finding the National +Guard too conservative, demanded pikes for the men of the faubourgs who +had no guns. The _sans-culottes_ enlisted. The army of assassins was +organized. The only thing left to do before giving the signal for a +riot was to obtain from the King a last concession,--the disbanding of +his guard. + + + + +{137} + +XIII. + +THE DISBANDING OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL GUARD. + +Louis XVI. had still some defenders, some heroes resolved to shed the +last drop of their blood for their King. Hence it was necessary to +remove them from his person. What means of doing so could be found? +Calumny. Fable on fable was spread among an always credulous public, +imaginary conspiracies invented, and the wretched monarch constrained +to deprive himself of his last resource, in order to deliver him, weak +and disarmed, into the hands of his enemies. + +The Constitution provided a guard for Louis XVI. One third of it was +composed of soldiers of the line, and the remainder of National Guards, +chosen by the Departments themselves from among their best-formed, +richest, and best-bred citizens. It was commanded by one of the +greatest lords of the old régime, the Duke de Cossé-Brissac. Born in +1734, the son of a marshal of France, the Duke had been governor of +Paris, grand steward of France, and colonel of the Hundred-Switzers. +He had never been willing to leave the King since the beginning of the +Revolution. When his regiment was {138} disbanded he might have fled, +and Louis XVI. begged him to do so; but the heart of a subject so +faithful had been deaf to the entreaties of the unfortunate sovereign. +"Sire," he had answered, "if I fly, they will say that I am guilty, and +you will be considered my accomplice: my flight would be your +accusation; I would rather die." And, in fact, he did die. He had a +real devotion to the former mistress of Louis XV., the Countess du +Barry, and this latest conquest is not the least important of the +favorite's adventures. Probably Count d'Allonville exaggerates when, +in his Memoirs, he extols in Madame du Barry "that decency of tone, +that nobility of manners, that bearing equally removed from pride and +humility, from license and from prudery, that countenance which was +enough to refute all the pamphlets." Nevertheless, it is certain that +the society of the Duke de Brissac inspired the former favorite with +generous sentiments. After the October Days, she took the wounded +body-guards into her own house, and when the Queen sent to thank her +for it, she replied: "These wounded young men regret nothing except not +having died for a princess so worthy of all homage as Your Majesty.... +Luciennes[1] is yours, Madame; did not your benevolence give it back to +me? ... The late King, by a sort of presentiment, forced me to accept a +thousand precious objects {139} before sending me away from his person. +I already had the honor of offering you this treasure in the time of +the Notables; I offer it again, Madame, with eagerness. You have so +many expenses to provide for, and so many favors to confer. Permit me, +I entreat you, to render to Cæsar that which belongs to Cæsar." + +An enthusiastic royalist, a gentleman of the old nobility, chivalrous +and full of courtesy, bred in notions of romantic susceptibility like +those of _Clélie_ and _Astrée_, the Duke de Brissac, like a +knight-errant of former times, represented at the court of Louis XVI. a +whole past which was crumbling to decay. If the unhappy monarch had +been a man of action, he would have turned to good advantage a guard +commanded by such a champion. He could have made it the nucleus of +resistance by grouping the Swiss regiments and the well-inclined +battalions of the National Guard around it. Unfortunately, there was +nothing warlike in Louis XVI. "Among the deplorable causes which +ruined him," says the Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "must be +counted the wretched education which kept him apart from every sort of +military action. I remember that in the early days of the Consulate, +after a review held on the Place of the Tuileries by Bonaparte, when +talking about this to M. Suard, of the French Academy, I said that +Bonaparte walked as if he were always ready to defend himself sword in +hand. 'Ah, well!' responded M. Suard, naïvely, {140} 'we used to think +differently; we wanted the King to have nothing military about him, and +never to wear a uniform.'" + +To this anecdote, M. de Vaublanc adds another. "We had in 1792," he +says, "a forcible proof of the despondency under which a royal soul, +spoiled by a detestable education, can labor. M. de Narbonne, the +Minister of War, with great difficulty induced the King to review three +excellent battalions of the Paris National Guard. He was on foot, in +silk breeches and white silk stockings, and wearing his hair in a black +bag. After the review a notary, named Chandon, I think, left the ranks +and said to the King: 'Sire, the National Guard would be greatly +honored to see Your Majesty in its uniform.' 'Sire,' said M. de +Narbonne, at once, 'have the goodness to promise to do so. At the head +of these three battalions of heroes you could destroy the Jacobins' +den.' After a minute's reflection, the King replied: 'I will inquire +of my Council whether the Constitution permits me to wear the uniform +of the National Guard.'" Louis XVI. allowed the last resources +accorded by fortune to slip away, and elements which in other hands +would have produced notable results, remained sterile in his. + +The Constitutional Guard, which according to regulation should have +numbered eighteen hundred men, really amounted, says Dumouriez, to six +thousand fit for duty. The royalist element predominated in it. But a +certain number of "false {141} brethren" had found their way into the +ranks, who managed by the aid of bribery to spy upon their officers, +and made reports to the committee of public safety. Undoubtedly the +King's guards did not approve of all that was going on. But how could +devoted royalists and men accustomed to discipline be expected to +approve the fête of the Swiss of Chateauvieux, for example? How could +they help being indignant when, while on duty at the Tuileries, they +heard the populace insult the royal family under the very windows of +the palace? + +When they returned to their barracks at the Military School, they +expressed this indignation too forcibly, and their words, hawked about +in all quarters by ill-will, were represented as the preliminary +symptoms of a reactionary plot. A guard commanded by a Duke de Brissac +was intolerable to the Jacobins. Their sole idea was to drive it from +the Tuileries, where its presence appeared to insure order,--a thing +they held in utmost horror. A 20th of June would not have been +possible with a constitutional guard, and ever since May, the 20th of +June had been in course of preparation. Its organizers had their plan +completely laid already. An adroit rumor was started of a so-called +plot, some Saint-Bartholomew or other, which they pretended was on foot +against the patriots, and of which the École Militaire was the centre. +The white flag, which was to be the signal for the assassins to +assemble, was said to be hidden there. Pétion, the mayor of Paris, +{142} under pretext of preventing troubles, sent municipal officers to +make a search. They could not lay their hands on the white flag which +was the pretended object of their visit, but they did find monarchical +hymns and ballads, and counter-revolutionary writings. + +An unlucky incident still further increased suspicion. The famous +Countess de La Motte had just published in London some new particulars +concerning the affair of the necklace. In order to avert scandal, the +Queen had caused Laporte, intendant of the civil list, to buy up the +whole edition, and he had burned every copy of it at the manufactory of +Sèvres. That very evening the committee of surveillance were in +possession of the fact that Laporte had gone to Sèvres with three +unknown persons, and that thirty bales of paper had been put into the +fire in his presence. There was at this time a great deal of talk +concerning a pretended Austrian committee, in which a complete plan of +restoration by foreign aid was being elaborated. It was claimed that +the papers burned at the manufactory were the archives of this +committee, with which popular imagination was extremely busy. +Denunciations fell in showers. Laporte and several others were +summoned before the committee of surveillance. Pétion declared that +the people were surrounded by conspiracies. Bazire demanded the +disbanding of the King's guard, which, according to him, was made up of +servants of the _émigrés_, and refractory priests. It was claimed +{143} that the soldiers, to whom the Duke de Brissac had given sabres +with hilts representing a cock surmounted by a royal crown, used +insulting language concerning the Assembly and the nation in their +barracks. They were said to rejoice in the reverses which the French +troops had just sustained on the northern frontier, and it was added +that they meant to march twenty leagues under a white flag to meet the +Austrians. The masses, always so easily deceived, were convinced that +the conspiracy was on the brink of discovery. + +The National Assembly took up the question, and a stormy debate on it +occupied the evening session of May 29. "What will become of the +individual liberty of citizens," cried M. Daverhouté, "if the dominant +party, merely by alleging suspicions, can decree the impeachment of all +who displease it, and if the different parties, coming successively +into power, overthrow, by means of this unchecked right of impeachment, +both ministers and all functionaries by the torrent of their intrigues? +In that case you would see proscriptions like those of Marius and +Sylla." In fact, this was what the near future was about to show. +Vergniaud responded by evoking a souvenir of the prætorian guards of +Caligula and Nero. At the close of his speech the Assembly passed the +following decree:-- + +"ARTICLE 1. The existing hired guard of the King is disbanded, and +will be replaced immediately in conformity with the laws. + +{144} + +"ART. 2. Until the formation of the new guard, the National Guard of +Paris will be on duty near the King's person, in the same manner as +before the establishment of the King's guard." + +A discussion ensued on the subject of Brissac's impeachment. The +struggle between the two opposing parties was of unheard-of vivacity. +One of the most courageous members of the right, M. Calvet, gave free +vent to his indignation. "The informer," said he, "is a scoundrel who +makes a thrust with a poniard and hides himself; he was unknown at Rome +until the times of Sejanus and Tiberius; times, gentlemen, of which you +remind me often." "To the Abbey! to the Abbey!" retorted the left, +with fury. Said Guadet: "I demand that M. Calvet should be sent to the +Abbey for three days, for having dared to say that the representatives +of the French people remind him of the Roman Tiberius and Sejanus." +The motion was adopted, and the Assembly decided that M. Calvet should +pass three days in prison. M. de Jaucourt threatened to cudgel Chabot, +and the ex-friar, ascending the tribune, said: "I think it was very +cowardly on the part of a colonel to offer to cane a Capuchin." The +Assembly, having passed an order of the day concerning this incident, +decreed that "there was reason for an accusation against M. Cossé, +styled Brissac, and that his papers should be sealed up at once." + +The King and Queen, awakened in the middle of the night by these +tidings, besought Brissac to make {145} his escape, and provided him +with the means. The Duke refused, and instead of trying to assure his +safety, sat down to write a long letter to Madame du Barry. At first +Louis XVI. wished to veto this decree, as was his duty, but his +ministers dissuaded him. They reminded him of the October Days, and +the weak monarch, alarmed on account of his family, if not on his own, +sacrificed his Constitutional Guard and also the brave servitor who +commanded it. Speaking to M. d'Aubier, one of the ordinary gentlemen +of the King's bedchamber, the Queen said: "I tremble lest the King's +guard should think the honor of the corps compromised by their +disarmament."--"Doubtless, Madame, that corps would have preferred to +die at the feet of Your Majesties."--"Yes," replied the Queen, "but the +few partisans who still adhere to the King in the Assembly counsel him +to sanction the decree disbanding them, and to disregard their advice +is to run the risk of losing them." While the Queen was yet speaking, +a man approached under pretence of asking alms. "You see," said she to +M. d'Aubier, "there is no place and no time when I am free from spies." + +The Constitutional Guard were sent as prisoners to the École Militaire +between a double file of National Guards, and forced to surrender their +weapons. By a sort of fatality Louis XVI. was led to disarm himself, +to spike his cannons, tear down his flags, and dismantle his +fortresses. By dint of approaching too near the fatal declivity of +concessions, {146} he ended by losing even his dignity as man and King. +He was paralyzed, annihilated by the Assembly, which treated him like a +hostage, a conquered man, and which struck down, one after another, the +last defenders of the monarchy and of public order. The fate of the +Constitutional Guard might well discourage honest men who only sought +to devote themselves. How was it possible to remain faithful to a +chief who was false to himself, who was more like a victim than a king? +Finding themselves unsupported by the Tuileries, the royalists began to +look across the frontier, and many men who would have flocked around an +energetic monarch, fled from a feeble king and sorrowfully went to +swell the ranks of the emigration. + +In spite of the advice of Dumouriez, Louis XVI. would not make use of +his right to form another guard. He preferred to put himself in the +hands of the National Guard, who were his jailors rather than his +servants. As to the Duke de Brissac, even the formality of an +interrogatory was dispensed with, and he was sent before the Superior +Court of Orleans. When he bade adieu to Louis XVI., the King said to +him: "You are going to prison; I should be much more afflicted if you +were not leaving me there myself." What was to be the fate of the +loyal and devoted servant, thus sacrificed to his master's inexcusable +weakness? He left the dungeons of Orleans only to be transferred to +Versailles by the Marseillais, and there, on September 9, 1792, was +assaulted by a {147} furious throng surrounding the carriages +containing the prisoners. The brave old man struggled long against the +assassins, but, after losing two fingers and receiving several other +wounds, he was killed by a sabre-thrust which broke his jaw, and his +head was set on one of the spikes of the palace gate. + + + +[1] The magnificent mansion built for Madame du Barry by Louis XV., and +restored to her after her banishment to Meaux by Marie Antoinette. + + + + +{148} + +XIV. + +THE SUFFERINGS OF LOUIS XVI. + +Dissatisfied with men and things, dissatisfied with others and himself, +the mind and heart of Louis XVI. were the prey of moral tortures which +left him no repose. He began to be ashamed of his concessions, and to +repent of having accepted pusillanimous advice. Why had he not +succeeded in being a king? Why had he garrisoned Paris insufficiently +ever since the outbreak of the Revolution? Why had he suffered the +Bastille to be taken, encouraged the emigration, and disbanded his +bodyguards? Why had he not opposed the first persecutions aimed at the +Church? Why had he pretended to approve acts and ideas which horrified +him? Why, by resorting to deplorable equivocations which cast a shadow +over his policy and his character, had he reduced his most devoted +followers to doubt and despair? Such thoughts as these assailed him +like so many stings of conscience. The sentiments of monarchy and of +military honor awoke in him once more, and he sounded with bitterness +the whole depth of the abyss into which his irresolution had plunged +him. In seeing what he was, he recalled sorrowfully {149} what he had +been, and comprehended by cruel experience what feebleness could make +of a Most Christian King and eldest son of the Church, an heir of Louis +XIV. He thought of the many brave men, victims of his political +errors, who on his account had suffered exile and ruin; of the faithful +royalists menaced, because of him, with prison and death. He thought +of the incessantly repeated crimes, the massacres of the Glacière, the +impunity of the brigands of "headsman" Jourdan, of Brissac's +incarceration. This is what it is, he said within himself, to have +suffered religion to be persecuted and to have believed that, were the +altar once overthrown, the throne might rest secure. He reproached +himself bitterly for having sanctioned the civil organization of the +clergy at the close of 1790, and thus drawn upon himself the censure of +the Sovereign Pontiff. He wanted to be done with concessions, but he +understood perfectly that it was too late now to resist, and that he +was irrevocably lost in consequence of events undesired and unforeseen. + +What was to be done? How could he sail against the stream? Where find +a point of vantage? Ought he to take violent measures? If the unhappy +King had been alone, perhaps he might have tried to do so. But he +feared to endanger his wife and children by thus acting. + +As if to push the wretched monarch to extremities, the National +Assembly passed two decrees which struck him to the heart. According +to the first of {150} these, voted May 19, any ecclesiastic having +refused the oath to the civil constitution of the clergy, could be +transported at the simple request of twenty citizens of the canton in +which he resided. According to the second, voted June 8, a camp of +twenty thousand federates, recruited from every canton of the realm, +were to be assembled before Paris, in order, as was said in one of the +preambles, "to take every hope from the enemies of the common weal who +are scheming in the interior." + +They had counted too much on the King's patience. He could not resolve +to sanction the two decrees, and banish the ecclesiastics whose +behavior he honored. Dumouriez afflicted him still further, when, in +entreating him to yield, he asked why he had sanctioned, at the close +of 1790, the decree obliging the clergy to take oath to the civil +constitution of the clergy. "Sire," said he, "you sanctioned the +decree for the priests' oath, and it is to that your veto must be +applied. If I had been one of your counsellors at the time, I would, +at the risk of my life, have advised you to refuse your sanction. Now +my opinion is that having, as I dare to say, committed the fault of +approving this decree, which has produced enormous evils, your veto, if +you apply it to the second decree, which may arrest the deluge of blood +ready to flow, will burden your conscience with all the crimes to which +the people are tending." Never had a sovereign's conscience been a +prey to similar perplexities. Louis XVI. seemed crushed beneath an +irresistible {151} fatality. The Tuileries, haunted night and day by +the spectre of Charles I., assumed a dismal air. At this period a sort +of stupor characterized the countenance, the gait, and even the silence +of the future victim of January 21. He no longer spoke; one might say +he no longer thought. He seemed prostrated, petrified. + +A rumor got about that he had become almost imbecile through care and +trouble, so much so that he did not recognize his son, but on seeing +him approach, had asked: "What child is that?" It was added that while +out walking he caught sight of the steeple of Saint Denis from the top +of the hill, and cried out: "That is where I shall be on my birthday." +He had been so calumniated, so misunderstood, so outraged, that not +merely his crown but his existence had become an intolerable burden to +him. His throne and his life alike disgusted him. He was no longer a +King, but only the ghost of one. + +Madame Campan thus describes him: "At this period the King fell into a +discouragement amounting to physical prostration. For ten days +together he never uttered a word, even in the bosom of his family, +except when the game of backgammon, which he played with Madame +Elisabeth after dinner, obliged him to pronounce some indispensable +words. The Queen drew him out of this condition, so fatal at a +critical time when every minute may necessitate action, by throwing +herself at his feet and addressing him sometimes in words intended only +to frighten him, {152} and at others expressing her affection for him. +She demanded, also, what he owed to his family, and went so far as to +say that if they must perish, it ought to be with honor, and without +waiting to be strangled one after another on the floor of their +apartment." + +While Louis XVI. assisted unmoved, not merely like Charles V. at his +own obsequies, but at those of royalty, the blood of Maria Theresa was +boiling in the veins of Marie Antoinette. The scenes she had witnessed +sometimes extorted sobs and cries of anguish from her. Her pride +revolted at seeing the royal mantle, crown, and sceptre dragged through +the mire. She wanted to struggle to the last, to hope against all +hope, to cling to the last chances of safety like a shipwrecked sailor +to the fragments of his ship. Who could say? She might find defenders +where she least expected them. It was for this reason that she wished +to meet Dumouriez, as she had met Mirabeau and Barnave. Dumouriez has +preserved the details of this interview in his Memoirs. + +How times had changed! Secrecy was almost necessary if one sought the +honor of speaking with the Queen of France. Even to salute her was to +expose one's self to the suspicion of belonging to the pretended +Austrian committee which was the perpetual object of popular invective. +When Louis XVI. told Dumouriez that the Queen desired a private +interview with him, the minister was not at all well pleased. He +thought it a useless step which might be misinterpreted by all parties. +However, {153} he must needs obey. He had received an order to go down +to the Queen an hour before the meeting of the Council. That it might +be the sooner over, he took the precaution of going half an hour late +to this perilous rendezvous. He had been presented to Marie Antoinette +on the day of his nomination as minister. She had then addressed him +several words, asking him to serve the King well, and he had replied +with a respectful phrase. Since then he had not seen her. When he +entered her room, he found the Queen alone, very much flushed, and +pacing to and fro in an agitation which promised a lively interview. +She approached him with an air of majestic irritation: "Sir!" she +exclaimed, "you are all-powerful at this moment, but it is by the favor +of the people, who soon break their idols. Your existence depends upon +your conduct." Dumouriez insisted on the necessity of scrupulously +respecting the Constitution, which Marie Antoinette was unwilling to +do. "It will not last," she said, raising her voice; "take care of +yourself!"--"Madame," replied the minister, "I am past fifty; I have +encountered many perils during my life, and in entering the ministry, I +thoroughly understood that responsibility was not the greatest of my +dangers."--"Nothing was wanting but to calumniate me," cried the Queen, +tears flowing from her eyes; "you seem to think me capable of having +you assassinated." Agitated as greatly as the sovereign, "God preserve +me," said Dumouriez, "from offering you so {154} grievous an offence! +Your Majesty's character is great and noble. You have given proofs of +it which I admire and which have attached me to you." Marie Antoinette +grew calmer. "Believe me, Madame," went on the minister; "I have no +interest in deceiving you, and I abhor anarchy and crime as much as you +do.... This is not, as you seem to think, a popular and transitory +movement. It is the almost unanimous insurrection of a great nation +against inveterate abuses. The conflagration is stirred up by great +parties, and there are scoundrels and fools in all of them. I behold +nothing in the Revolution but the King and the nation as a whole; all +that tends to separate them leads to their mutual ruin; I am doing all +I can to reunite them, and it is your part to aid me. If I am an +obstacle to your designs, say so, and I will at once offer my +resignation to the King, and go into a corner to bewail the fate of my +country and your own." The interview ended amicably. The Queen and +the minister talked over the different factions. Dumouriez spoke to +Marie Antoinette of the faults and crimes of each; he tried to convince +her that she was misled by those who surrounded her, and the Queen +appeared to be convinced. When he was obliged to call her attention to +the clock, as the hour for the Council had arrived, she dismissed him +most affably. + +If we may credit Madame Campan, who has also given an account of this +interview, the impression Marie Antoinette received from it was +scarcely a {155} good one. "One day," says Madame Campan, "I found the +Queen extremely troubled. She said she no longer knew where she stood; +whether the Jacobin chiefs were making overtures to her through +Dumouriez, or Dumouriez, abandoning the Jacobins, was acting on his own +account; that she had given him an audience; that, when alone with her, +he had fallen at her feet and said that although he had pulled the red +bonnet down to his ears, yet he was not and could not be a Jacobin; +that the Revolution had been allowed to fall into the hands of a rabble +of disorganizers who, seeking only for pillage, were capable of +everything, and could furnish the Assembly with a formidable army, +ready to undermine the support of a throne already too much shaken. +While speaking with extreme warmth, he had seized the Queen's hand, +and, kissing it with transport, cried, 'Permit yourself to be saved!' +The Queen said to me that the protestations of a traitor could not be +believed, and that his entire conduct was so well known that +undoubtedly the wisest thing would be not to trust him." + +Meantime, the danger constantly increased. Even the gates of the +Tuileries were no longer fastened. Hawkers of vile pamphlets and +sanguinary satires on the Queen cried their infamous wares under the +very windows of the palace; and the National Assembly, sitting close +beside, and hearing them--the National Assembly, terrorized by Jacobins +and pikemen--dared not even censure such baseness. On June 4, {156} a +deputy named Ribes, till then unknown, cited from the tribune the +titles of the following articles in Fréron's journal, _l'Orateur du +Peuple_: "The crowned porcupine, a constitutional animal who behaves +unconstitutionally."--"Crimes of M. Capet since the +Revolution."--"Decree to be passed forbidding the Queen to sleep with +the King."--"The royal tigress, separated from her worthy spouse, to +serve as a hostage." "Rouse up!" cried the indignant deputy. "There +is still time. Join with me in proclaiming war on traitors and justice +for the seditious, and the country is safe!" Ribes preached in the +desert. The Assembly shrugged their shoulders and treated him as a +fool. + +June 11, another deputy, M. Delsaux, said from the tribune: "Last +evening, at half-past seven, passing through the Tuileries, I saw an +orator standing on a chair and speaking with great vehemence. Mixing +with the crowd, I heard him read a libel strongly inciting to the +King's assassination. This libel is called, 'The Fall of the Idol of +the French,' and these sentences occur in it: 'This monster employs his +power and his treasures to hinder our regeneration. A new Charles IX., +he wishes to bring desolation and death to France. Go, cruel wretch; +thy crimes shall have an end. Damiens was less guilty. He was +punished by most horrible tortures for having desired to deliver France +from a monster. And thou, whose offences are twenty-five million times +greater, art left unpunished! But tremble, tyrant; there is a Scævola +amongst us.'" + +{157} + +The Assembly listened, but took no measures. No further restraint was +placed either on moral or material disorder. Anarchy showed a nameless +epileptic ferocity. Never had the press been more furious or +licentious. It was a torrent of mud and gall and blood. The limits of +invective and insult were driven further back. "You see that I am +annoyed," said the Queen to Dumouriez in Louis XVI.'s presence; "I dare +not go to the window looking into the garden. Last evening, needing a +breath of air, I showed myself at the window facing the courtyard. A +gunner belonging to the guard apostrophized me in an insulting way, and +added: 'What pleasure it would give me to have your head on the end of +my bayonet!' In that frightful garden a man standing on a chair reads +out horrors against us on one side, and on the other may be seen a +soldier or a priest whom they are dragging through a pond, and crushing +with blows and insults. Meantime, others are flying balloons or +quietly strolling about. Ah! what a place! what a people!" + + + + +{158} + +XV. + +ROLAND'S DISMISSAL FROM OFFICE. + +In the ministry, as elsewhere, discord reigned. At first, the +ministers had seemed to be of one mind. They dined at each other's +houses four times a week, on the days when there was a meeting of the +Council. Friday was Roland's day for receiving his colleagues at his +table, where his wife presided and perorated. "These dinners," says +Etienne Dumont, "were often remarkable for their gaiety, of which no +situation can deprive Frenchmen when they meet in society, and which +was natural to men contented with themselves and flattered by their +elevation. The future was hidden from them by the present. The cares +of the ministry were forgotten. They seated themselves in their +dwellings as if they were to abide there forever." This sort of +political honeymoon could not last very long. Things presently began +to change for the worse. Dumouriez tired very soon of Madame Roland's +pretensions; she wanted to know, see, and direct everything, and he +persisted in refusing to transform himself into a puppet whose strings +were to be pulled by this woman and the Girondins. Madame Roland, who +{159} posed as a puritan, caused remonstrances to be addressed to +Dumouriez on the subject of some more or less suspicious affairs, said +to have been negotiated by Bonne-Carrère, the director at the Ministry +of Foreign Affairs, by which Madame de Beauvert was supposed to have +gained large sums. The wife of the Minister of the Interior had a +grudge against the favorite of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "She +is Dumouriez's mistress," said she; "she lives in his house and does +the honors at his table, to the great scandal of sensible men, who are +friendly to good morals and liberty. For this license on the part of a +public man charged with State affairs marks too plainly his contempt +for decorum; and Madame de Beauvert, Rivarol's sister, very well and +very unfavorably known, is surrounded by the tools of aristocracy, +unworthy in all respects." One evening, after dinner, Roland, "with +the gravity belonging to his age and character," as his wife says, gave +a lecture on morality to the Minister of Foreign Affairs apropos of +this matter. At first Dumouriez made jesting replies, but afterwards +showed temper and appeared displeased with his entertainers. +Thereafter he seldom visited the Ministry of the Interior. Reflecting +on this, Madame Roland said to her husband: "Though not a good judge of +intrigue, I think worldly wisdom would dictate that the hour has come +for getting rid of Dumouriez, if we wish to avoid being ruined by him. +I know very well that you would be unwilling to lower yourself to such +an {160} action; and yet it is plain that Dumouriez must be seeking to +disembarrass himself of those whose censure has offended him. When one +undertakes to preach, and does so in vain, he must either punish or +expect to be molested." + +Thenceforward, Madame Roland formed a distinct group within the +ministry, composed of her husband, Clavière, and Servan, who had just +replaced De Grave as Minister of War. While Dumouriez, Lacoste, and +Duranton (whom Louis XVI. called "the good Duranton") allowed +themselves to be affected by the King's goodness, and sincerely wished +to save him, their three colleagues, inspired by the spiteful Madame +Roland, had but one idea: to destroy him. "Roland, Clavière, and +Servan," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "no longer observed any +moderation, not merely with their colleagues, but with the King +himself. At every meeting of the Council they abused the mildness of +this prince, in order to mortify and kill him with pin-pricks." + +It was Servan who proposed forming a camp of twenty thousand federates +around Paris. He thought it would be a sort of central revolutionary +army, analogous to that English parliamentary army under command of +Cromwell, which had brought Charles I. to the scaffold. "Servan, a +very wicked man and most inimical to the King," says Dumouriez again, +"took the notion to write to the President of the Assembly, without +consulting his colleagues, and propose a decree for assembling an army +of twenty {161} thousand men around Paris. This was at the time when +the Girondin faction was at the height of its power, having the +Jacobins at their command, and governing Paris through Pétion. They +wanted to destroy the Feuillants, perhaps at the sword's point, to put +down the court, and probably to begin putting their republican projects +into execution. Thus it was this faction which brought to Paris the +federates who ended by causing every one of them to perish on the +scaffold after making Louis XVI. ascend it." Dumouriez was indignant +that the Minister of War should have taken it on himself to propose +such a decree without even mentioning it to the sovereign. The dispute +on this matter was so violent that, but for the presence of the King, +the meeting of the Council might have come to a bloody close. Louis +XVI., deeply grieved by such scandals, resolved to dismiss the three +ministers, who, instead of supporting him, were merely conspirators who +had sworn his ruin. + +The anguish of the unhappy monarch had reached its height. Four +councils were held without his returning the decrees submitted to him +for consideration. The National Assembly grew impatient. The Jacobins +were in a rage. At last the King concluded to take up in the Council +the decree relative to the camp of twenty thousand federates. "I +think," said Dumouriez, "that the decree is dangerous to the nation, +the King, the National Assembly, and above all to its authors, whose +chastisement it {162} will turn out to be; and yet, Sire, it is my +opinion that you cannot refuse it. It was proposed by profound malice, +debated with fury, and decreed with enthusiasm; everybody is blinded. +If you veto it, it will none the less be passed." The hesitation of +Louis XVI. redoubled. As to the decree concerning the clergy, he +declared that he would never sanction it. This was the only time that +Dumouriez ever saw "the character of this gentle soul somewhat changed +for the worse." + +Meanwhile, Madame Roland, more impatient and vindictive than ever, +wrote the famous letter supposed to issue from her husband, which was +to echo in the ears of royalty like a funeral knell. She says of it:-- + +"The letter was written at one stroke, like nearly all matters of the +sort which I have done; for, to feel the necessity, the fitness of a +thing, to apprehend its good effect, to desire to produce it, and to +give form to the object from which this effect should result, was to me +but a single operation." + +This letter, a veritable arraignment of the King, was much more like a +club speech or a newspaper article than a letter from a minister of +state to his sovereign. Such sentences as these occur in it: "Sire, +the existing state of things in France cannot long continue; it is a +crisis whose violence is attaining its highest point; it must end by an +outbreak which should interest Your Majesty as seriously as it affects +the entire kingdom.... It is no longer possible to draw back. The +Revolution is {163} accomplished in men's minds; it will end in blood +and be cemented by blood if wisdom does not avert the evils which it is +still possible to prevent.... Yet a little more delay, and the +afflicted people will behold in their King the friend and accomplice of +conspirators. Just Heaven! hast Thou stricken with blindness the +powerful of this earth, and will they never heed other counsels than +those which drag them to destruction! I know that the austere language +of truth is rarely welcomed near the throne; I know, also, that it is +because it so rarely obtains a hearing there that revolutions become +necessary; I know, above all, that I am bound to employ it to Your +Majesty, not merely as a citizen submissive to the law, but as a +minister honored with your confidence, or vested with functions which +imply this." + +The letter also contained a defence of the two decrees, and plainly +threatened Louis XVI., should he veto them, with the horrors of a civil +war which would develop "that sombre energy, mother of virtues and of +crimes, which is always fatal to those who have evoked it!" Was not +Madame Roland here announcing the September massacres, and the heinous +crimes of which she herself was speedily to become one of the most +celebrated victims? + +At first Roland sent this letter to the King, with a promise that it +should always remain a secret between them. But, incited by the vanity +of his wife, who was incessantly urging him on to notoriety and +display, Roland did not keep this promise. He read {164} the letter at +the next meeting of the Council, June 11. "The King," says Dumouriez, +"listened to this impudent diatribe with admirable patience, and said +with the greatest coolness: 'M. Roland, you had already sent me your +letter; it was unnecessary to read it to the Council, as it was to +remain a secret between ourselves.'" Dumouriez was summoned to the +palace the following morning, June 12. He found the King in his own +room, accompanied by the Queen. "Do you think, Monsieur," said Marie +Antoinette, "that the King ought to submit any longer to the threats +and insolence of Roland and the knavery of Servan and Clavière?"--"No, +Madame," he replied; "I am indignant at them; I admire the King's +patience, and I venture to ask him to make an entire change in his +ministry. Let him dismiss us on the spot, and appoint men belonging to +neither party."--"That is not my intention," said Louis XVI. "I wish +you to remain, as well as Lacoste and that good man, Duranton. Do me +the service of ridding me of these three factious and insolent persons, +for my patience is exhausted."--"It is a dangerous matter, Sire, but I +will do it." As a condition of remaining in the ministry, Dumouriez +exacted the sanction of the two decrees. There was another ministerial +council the same evening. Roland, Servan, and Clavière were more +insolent and acrimonious than usual. Louis XVI. closed the session +with mingled dissatisfaction and dignity. + +At eight o'clock that evening (June 12), Servan, {165} the Minister of +War, went to Madame Roland and said: "Congratulate me! I have been +turned out."--"I am much piqued," replied she, "that you should be the +first to receive that honor, but I hope it will not be long before it +will be decreed to my husband also." Madame Roland's prayer was +granted. The virtuous Minister of the Interior received his letters of +dismissal the next morning. As Duranton, who delivered it at the +Ministry of Justice, was slowly drawing it from his pocket,-- + +"You make us wait for our liberty," said Roland; and, taking the +letter, he added, "In reality that is what it is." Then he went home +to his wife to announce to her that he was no longer minister. + +Madame Roland, with the instinct of hatred, saw at once how to obtain +revenge. "One thing remains to be done," she cried; "we must be the +first to communicate the news to the Assembly, sending them at the same +time a copy of the letter to the King which must have caused it." This +idea pleased the ex-minister highly, and he put it instantly into +execution. "I was conscious," says the irascible Egeria of the +Girondins in her Memoirs, "of all the effects this might produce, and I +was not deceived; my double object was attained, and both utility and +glory attended the retirement of my husband. I had not been proud of +his entering the ministry, but I was of his leaving it." Thenceforward +Madame Roland was to be the most indefatigable cause of the Revolution, +and Louis XVI. was to learn by experience what the vengeance of a woman +can accomplish. + + + + +{166} + +XVI. + +A THREE DAYS' MINISTRY. + +Dumouriez had taken the portfolio of war. He kept it three days only. +But during those three days what activity! what excitement! More than +fifteen hundred signatures affixed, instructions sent to all the +generals, a most tumultuous session of the National Assembly, a last +effort to induce Louis XVI. to make further concessions, a resignation +which was to be the signal for catastrophes. How the scenes of the +drama multiply! How the dénouement is accelerated! + +The session at which Dumouriez was to appear for the first time as +Minister of War could not fail to be singular. It took place June 13, +1792, and from ten o'clock in the morning all the galleries had been +crowded. The Jacobins had filled them with their satellites. The +Girondins had prepared a dramatic surprise. The three ex-ministers +were to be brought into the chamber under pretext of explaining the +causes of their dismissal. It was agreed that they should be received +as victims of the aristocracy and martyrs of the Revolution. Roland's +letter--say, rather, his wife's letter--to Louis XVI. was read to {167} +the Assembly and frequently interrupted by loud bursts of applause. +Just as it was finished, and some one was demanding that it should be +sent to all the eighty-three departments, Dumouriez entered the hall. +Murmurs and hisses arose on all sides. The Assembly voted the despatch +of the letter to the departments. A deputy exclaimed: "It will be a +famous document in the history of the Revolution and of the ministers." +The Assembly went on to declare that Roland was followed by the regrets +of the nation. Then Dumouriez ascended the tribune and read a message +in which M. Lafayette announced the death of M. de Gouvion. He had +been major-general of the National Guard, and, having quitted the +Assembly rather than be present at the triumph of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux, had met his death bravely in the Army of the North. "A +cannon-ball," said the message, "has terminated a virtuous life." The +Assembly was affected, and voted complimentary condolences to the +father of the heroic officer. + +Afterwards, Dumouriez read his report on military affairs. It was a +long criticism on the legislators who had ordered a new levy of troops +before providing the existing corps with their full complements; on the +muster-masters, the standing committees, and the market-contractors, +who were piling up abuses. Dumouriez complained of everything; he +reproached the factions, and insisted on the consideration due to +ministers. Guadet thundered out: "Do you hear him? He already thinks +himself so {168} sure of power that he takes it on him to give us +advice."--"And why not?" resumed the minister, turning toward the side +of the Mountain.[1] This bold response astonished the most furious. +Some one said: "The document is not signed. Let him sign it! Let him +sign it!" Dumouriez called for pen and ink, signed his memoir, and +went to lay it on the desk. Then he slowly crossed the hall and went +quietly out by the door beneath the Mountain, with a haughty glance at +his adversaries. His martial attitude disconcerted them. The shouts +and hootings ceased, and complete silence ensued. On leaving the +Assembly, Dumouriez was surrounded by a group of persons before the +door of the Feuillants, but their faces displayed no signs of anger +toward him. As soon as he quitted the Assembly, his enemies, no longer +intimidated by his presence, redoubled their attacks. Three or four +deputies left the Chamber, and making their way to him through the +crowd, said: "They are raising the devil inside; they would like to +send you to Orleans." (It was there the Duke de Brissac was imprisoned +and the Superior Court held its sessions.) "So much the better," +replied Dumouriez; "I would take the baths, drink butter-milk, and rest +myself." This sally amused the crowd, and the minister as he entered +the Tuileries garden, said to the deputies who followed him: "It will +be a mistake for my enemies to have {169} my memoir printed, for it +will bring all good citizens back to me. At present, being drunk and +crazy, you have just extolled Roland's infamous perfidy to the skies." +Then he went to the palace. Louis XVI. complimented him on his +firmness, but absolutely refused to sanction the decree against the +priests. + +Far from ameliorating, the situation continued to grow worse. Pétion's +emissaries stirred up the inhabitants of the faubourgs. That evening +Dumouriez sent a letter to the King announcing that a riot was +apprehended. Louis XVI. suspected that the minister was lying, and +wrote to him: "Do not believe, Monsieur, that any one can succeed in +frightening me by threats; my resolution is taken." Dumouriez had +based his entire scheme on the hypothesis that the decree concerning +the priests would be accepted by the King. From the moment that Louis +XVI. rejected it, Dumouriez no longer hoped to remain in the ministry. +He wrote again, imploring the sovereign to give it his sanction, and +announcing that, in case of his refusal, the ministers would all feel +obliged to retire. The next day, June 15, the King received them in +his chamber. "Are you still," said he to Dumouriez, "in the same +sentiments expressed in your letter last evening?"--"Yes, Sire, if Your +Majesty will not permit yourself to be moved by our fidelity and +attachment."--"Very well," replied Louis XVI., with a gloomy air, +"since your decision is made, I accept your resignation and will +provide for it." Dumouriez was no {170} longer a minister. In his +Memoirs he describes himself as much affected, "not on account of +quitting a dangerous post, which simply made his existence disturbed +and painful, but because he saw all his trouble thrown away, and the +King handed over to the fury of cruel enemies and the criminal +indiscretion of false friends." + +At bottom, Dumouriez inspired nobody with confidence. He belonged to +no party, and no one knew his opinions. He had leaned on both Jacobins +and Girondins, while at the same time he was inspiring certain hopes in +the Feuillants, and flattering the King, to whom he promised signs and +wonders. Too revolutionary for the conservatives and too conservative +for the revolutionists, he had tried a see-saw policy which would no +longer answer. It became indispensable to make a choice. It was +impossible to please both the Jacobins and the court. + +And yet Dumouriez was a man of resources, and it is much to be +regretted, on the King's account, that no better understanding could be +arrived at between them. More successfully than any one else, +Dumouriez might have resorted to bold measures and called in at this +time the intervention of the army, as he did several years later. He +loved money and rank; royalty still excited a great prestige over him, +and he had used the Revolution as a means, not as an end. + +Could Louis XVI. have pretended patience for a few days longer, perhaps +he might have extricated {171} himself from difficulties which, though +grave, were still not insoluble. He did not choose his hour for +resistance wisely. It was either too late or too soon. The dismission +of Dumouriez was a blunder. At what moment did Louis XVI. elect to +deprive himself of his minister's aid? That very one when, attacked by +the Girondins, exasperated by Roland's conduct, and disgusted with the +progress of anarchy, the force of circumstances was about to toss +Dumouriez back to the side of the reactionists. The camp of twenty +thousand men, if confided to safe hands, and secret service money +judiciously employed, might have become the nucleus of a monarchical +resistance. Lafayette and his partisans were becoming conservative, +and between him and Dumouriez agreement was not impossible. Louis XVI. +was in too great a hurry. His conscience revolted at an unfortunate +moment. Why, if he was bent on this veto, so just, so honest, but so +ill-timed, had he freely made so many concessions which thus became +inexplicable? In rejecting the offers of Dumouriez, the Queen possibly +deprived herself of her only remaining support. He who saved France in +the Passes of Argonne might, had he gained the entire confidence of +Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, have saved the King and royalty. + +Dumouriez had a final interview with Louis XVI., June 18. The King +received him in his chamber. He had resumed his kindly air, and when +the ex-minister had shown him the accounts of the last {172} fortnight, +he complimented him on their clearness. Afterwards, the following +conversation took place: "Then you are going to join Luckner's +army?"--"Yes, Sire, I leave this frightful city with delight; I have +but one regret; you are in danger here."--"Yes, that is +certain."--"Well, Sire, you can no longer fancy that I have any +personal interest to consult in talking with you; once having left your +Council, I shall never again approach you; it is through fidelity and +the purest attachment that I dare once more entreat you, by your love +for your country, your safety and that of your crown, by your august +spouse and your interesting children, not to persist in the fatal +resolution of vetoing the two decrees. This persistence will do no +good, and you will ruin yourself by it."--"Don't say any more about it; +my decision is made."--"Ah! Sire, you said the same thing when, in +this very room, and in presence of the Queen, you gave me your word to +sanction them."--"I was wrong, and I repent of it."--"Sire, I shall +never see you again; pardon my frankness; I am fifty-three, and I have +some experience. It was not then that you were wrong, but now. Your +conscience is abused concerning this decree against the priests; you +are being forced into civil war; you are helpless, and you will be +overthrown, and history, though it may pity you, will reproach you with +having caused all the misfortunes of France. On your account, I fear +your friends still more than your enemies."--"God is my witness {173} +that I wish for nothing but the welfare of France."--"I do not doubt +it, Sire; but you will have to account to God, not solely for the +purity but also for the enlightened execution of your intentions. You +expect to save religion, and you destroy it. The priests will be +massacred and your crown torn from you. Perhaps even your wife, your +children..." Emotion prevented Dumouriez from going on. Tears stood +in his eyes. He kissed the hand of Louis XVI. respectfully. The King +wept also, and for a moment both were silent. "Sire," resumed +Dumouriez, "if all Frenchmen knew you as well as I do, our woes would +soon be ended. Do you desire the welfare of France? Very well! That +demands the sacrifice of your scruples ... You are still master of +your fate. Your soul is guiltless; believe a man exempt from passion +and prejudice, and who has always told you the truth."--"I expect my +death," replied Louis XVI. sadly, "and I forgive them for it in +advance. I thank you for your sensibility. You have served me well; I +esteem you, and if a happier time shall ever come, I will prove it to +you." With these words the King rose sadly, and went to a window at +the end of the apartment. Dumouriez gathered up his papers slowly, in +order to gain time to compose his features; he was unwilling to let his +emotion become evident to the persons at the door as he went out. +"Adieu," said the King kindly, "and be happy!" + +As he was leaving, he met his friend Laporte, intendant of the civil +list. The two, who were meeting {174} for the last time, went into +another room and closed the door. "You advised me to resign," said +Laporte, "and I meant to do so, but I have changed my mind. My master +is in danger, and I will share his fate."--"If I were in the personal +service of the King, as you are," replied Dumouriez, "I would think and +act the same; I esteem your devotion, and love you the more for it; +each of us is faithful in his own way; you, to Louis; I, to the King of +the French. May both of us felicitate him some day on his happiness!" +Then the two friends separated, after embracing each other with tears. + +The sole thought of Dumouriez now was to escape from the city where he +had witnessed so many intrigues and been so often deceived. He was +very sorrowful at heart. Ordinarily so gay, so brilliant, so full of +Gallic and _Rabelaisian_ wit, power had made him melancholy. His +ministerial life left on him an abiding impression of bitterness and +repugnance. "One needs," he has said, "either a patriotism equal to +any test, or else an insatiable ambition, to aspire in any way whatever +after those difficult positions where one is surrounded with snares and +calumnies. One learns only too soon that men are not worth the trouble +one takes to govern them." June 19, he wrote to the Assembly, asking +an authorization to repair to the Army of the North. "I have spent +thirty-six years in military and diplomatic service, and have +twenty-two wounds," said he in this letter; "I envy the fate of the +virtuous Gouvion, and should {175} esteem myself happy if a cannon-ball +could put an end to all differences concerning me." He never again +returned either to the palace, the Assembly, or any other place where +he might encounter either ministers, deputies, or persons belonging to +the court. He started for the army, June 26, regarding it as "the only +asylum where an honest man might still be safe. At least, death +presents itself there under the attractive aspect of glory." He left +in the capital "consternation, suspicion, hatred, which pierced through +the frivolity of the wretched Parisians." With an intuition worthy of +a man of genius, he foresaw the vicious circle about to be described by +French history, and divined that by plunging into license men return +inevitably to servitude, because "it is impossible to sustain liberty +with an absurd government, founded on barbarity, terror, and the +subversion of every principle necessary to the maintenance of human +society." Two years later, in 1794, he wrote in his Memoirs: "The +serpent will recoil upon itself. His tail, which is anarchy, will +re-enter his throat, which is despotism." + + + +[1] The advanced republican party in the Assembly. + + + + +{176} + +XVII. + +THE PROLOGUE TO JUNE TWENTIETH. + +On retiring from the ministry, Dumouriez left his successors a burden +far too heavy for their shoulders, and under which they were to +succumb. The new ministers, Lajard, Terrier de Montciel, and +Chambonas, were almost unknown men who had no definite, decided +opinions, and offered no resistance to disorder: for that matter, they +had no means of doing so. The political system then in power had left +Paris a helpless prey to sedition. By the new laws, the executive +power could take no direct action looking to the preservation of public +order in any French commune. Any minister or departmental +administration that should adopt a police regulation or give a +commander to armed forces, would be guilty of betraying a trust. The +power to prevent or repress disorder belonged exclusively to the +municipal authority, which, in Paris, was composed of a mayor, sixteen +administrators, thirty-two municipal councillors, a council-general of +ninety-six notables, an attorney-general and his two substitutes. This +body of 148 members was the redoubtable power known as the Commune of +Paris. It was not {177} composed entirely of seditious persons, and in +the National Guard, also, there were still battalions fervently devoted +to the constitutional monarchy. But Pétion was mayor of Paris; Manuel, +the attorney-general, and Danton his substitute. Seditious movements +were sure to find instigators and accomplices in these three men. + +Moreover, the insurrection was regularly organized. It had its +muster-rolls, its officers, sergeants, soldiers; its strategy and plans +of battle. It utilized wineshops as guard-houses, the faubourgs as +barracks, the red bonnet and the _carmagnole_, or revolutionary jacket, +as a uniform. Its agitators distributed wine, beer, and brandy +gratuitously. The Jacobins or the Cordeliers had but to give the +signal for a riot, and a riot sprang out of the ground. The mine was +loaded; the only question was when to fire the train. The Girondins +were of one mind with the Jacobins. Exasperated by the dismissal of +three ministers who shared their opinions, they wanted to intimidate +the court by means of a popular tumult, and thus force the unhappy +sovereign to sanction the two decrees, concerning the deportation of +priests and the camp of twenty thousand men. The populace already +manifested their restlessness by threats and strange rumors. At the +Jacobin Club the most violent propositions were mooted. Some wanted to +establish a minority, on the ground of the King's mental alienation; +some, to send the Queen back to Austria; the more moderate talked of +suppressing the army, {178} dismissing the staff-officers of the +National Guard, depriving the King of the right of veto, and electing a +Constituent Assembly. Revolutionary conventicles multiplied beyond all +measure. The division of Paris into forty-eight sections became an +exhaustless source of confusion. The assembly of each section +transformed itself into a club. + +Meanwhile, the moderate party rested all its hopes on Lafayette, who +was friendly not only to liberty, but to order. He considered himself +the founder of the new monarchy, of constitutional royalty; but, for +that very reason, he felt that he had duties toward the King. +Despising the reactionists, whose hopes were more or less enlisted on +behalf of the foreign armies, he also detested the Jacobins who were +dishonoring and compromising the new order of things. He expresses +both sentiments in a letter addressed to the National Assembly, and +written from the intrenched camp of Maubeuge, June 16, 1792, the Fourth +Year of Liberty: "Can you conceal from yourselves," he says in it, +"that a faction, and to use plain terms, the Jacobin faction, has +caused all these disorders? I make the accusation boldly. Organized +like a separate empire, with its capital and its affiliations blindly +directed by certain ambitious chiefs, this sect forms a distinct body +in the midst of the French people, whose powers it usurps by +subjugating its representatives and agents. In its public meetings, +attachment to the laws is named aristocracy, and disobedience to them +patriotism; there the {179} assassins of Desilles are received in +triumph, and Jourdan's insensate clamor finds panegyrists; there the +story of the assassinations which defiled the city of Metz is still +greeted with infernal applause." + +Lafayette puts himself courageously forward in his letter: "As to me, +gentlemen, who espoused the American cause at the very time when the +ambassadors assured me it was lost; who, from that period, devoted +myself to a persistent defence of the liberty and sovereignty of +peoples; who, on June 11, 1789, in presenting a declaration of rights +to my country, dared to say, 'For a nation to be free, all that is +necessary is that it shall will to be so,' I come to-day, full of +confidence in the justice of our cause, of scorn for the cowards who +desert it, and of indignation against the traitors who would sully it; +I come to declare that the French nation, if it be not the vilest in +the universe, can and ought to resist the conspiracy of kings which has +been leagued against it." At the same time, the general +enthusiastically praised his soldiers: "Doubtless it is not within the +bosom of my brave army that sentiments of timidity are permissible. +Patriotism, energy, discipline, patience, mutual confidence, all civic +and military virtues, I find here. Here the principles of liberty and +equality are cherished, the laws respected, and property held sacred; +here, neither calumnies nor seditions are known." + +Including both revolutionists and reactionists in the same accusation, +Lafayette makes this reflection: {180} "What a remarkable conformity of +language exists, gentlemen, between those seditious persons +acknowledged by the aristocracy, and those who usurp the name of +patriots! All are alike ready to repeal our laws, to rejoice in +disorders, to rebel against the authorities granted by the people, to +detest the National Guard, to preach indiscipline to the army, and +almost to disseminate distrust and discouragement." Lafayette +concludes in these words: "Let the royal power be intact, for it is +guaranteed by the Constitution; let it be independent, for this +independence is one of the forces of our liberty; let the King be +revered, for he is invested with the national majesty; let him choose a +ministry unhampered by the yoke of any faction; if conspirators exist, +let them perish only by the sword of law; finally, let the reign of +clubs, brought to nothing by you, give place to the reign of law; their +disorganizing maxims to the true principles of liberty; their delirious +fury to the calm courage of a nation which knows its rights and which +defends them!" + +Lafayette's letter was read to the Assembly at the session of June 18. +The noble thoughts it expresses produced at first a favorable +impression, and it was greeted with much applause. For an instant the +Girondins were disconcerted; but, feeling themselves supported by the +Jacobins who lined the galleries, they soon resumed the offensive. +"What does the advice of the general of the army amount to," said +Vergniaud, "if it is not law?" Guadet maintained {181} that the letter +must be apocryphal. "When Cromwell used such language," said he, +"liberty was at an end in England, and I cannot persuade myself that +the emulator of Washington desires to imitate the conduct of the +Protector. We no longer have a constitution if a general can give us +laws." The allusion to Cromwell produced its effect. The letter, +instead of being published and copies sent to the eighty-three +departments, was merely referred to a committee. + +Nevertheless, public opinion was aroused. A reactionary sentiment +against the Jacobins began to show itself. The King might have +profited by it, and found his account in relying upon Lafayette, the +army, and the National Guard. But Louis XVI. was in too much haste. +His resistance, like his concessions, was maladroit and inopportune. +Without having combined his means of defence, consulted with Lafayette, +or having any troops at his disposal, he vetoed the two famous decrees, +June 19, and thus threw himself headlong into the snare. The +Revolution, which had lain in wait for him, would not let its prey +escape. It gave Lafayette no time to arrive, but, without losing a +minute, organized an insurrection for the next day. The royal tree had +been so violently shaken, that it needed, or so they thought, but one +more shock to lay it low and root it out. + +On June 16, a request had been presented to the Council-General of the +Commune, asking them to authorize the citizens of the Faubourg +Saint-Antoine {182} to assemble in arms on June 20, the anniversary of +the oath of the Jeu de Paume, and present a petition to the Assembly +and the King. The Council had passed to the order of the day, but the +petitioners declared that they would assemble notwithstanding. On the +19th, the Directory of the department, which on all occasions had shown +itself inimical to agitators, and which was presided over by the Duke +de La Rochefoucauld, issued an order forbidding all armed gatherings, +and enjoining the commandant-general and the mayor to take all +necessary measures for dispersing them. This order was communicated to +the National Assembly by the Minister of the Interior at the evening +session. + +"It is important," said a deputy, "that the Assembly should know the +decrees of the administrative bodies when they tend to assure public +tranquillity. Nobody is ignorant that at this moment the people are +greatly agitated. Nobody is ignorant that to-morrow threatens to be a +day of violence." Vergniaud replied: "I do not know whether or not +to-morrow is to be a day of troubles, but I cannot understand how M. +Becquet, who is always so constitutional" (here there was laughter and +applause), "how M. Becquet, by an inversion of law and order, desires +the National Assembly to occupy itself with police regulations." The +decree of the Directory was read, nevertheless. But the Assembly, far +from supporting it, passed to the order of the day. The rioters had +nothing to fear. + +{183} + +During the same session, a deputation of citizens from Marseilles had +been presented at the bar of the Assembly. The orator of this +deputation thus expressed himself: "French liberty is in danger. The +free men of the South are ready to march in its defence. The day of +the people's wrath has come at last. The people, whom they have always +sought to ruin or enslave, are tired of parrying blows. They want to +inflict them, and to annihilate conspiracies. It is time for the +people to rise. This lion, generous but enraged, is about to quit his +repose, and spring upon the pack of conspirators." Here the galleries +applauded furiously. The orator continued: "The popular force is your +force; employ it. No quarter, since you can expect none." The +applause and enthusiastic cries of the galleries redoubled. Somebody +demanded that the speech should be sent to the eighty-three departments +of France. A deputy, M. Rouher, was courageous enough to exclaim: "It +is not by the harangues of seditious persons that the departments +should be instructed!" Another deputy, M. Lecointre-Puyravaux, +responded: "Is it surprising that men born under a burning sun should +have a more ardent imagination and a patriotism more energetic than +ours?" The question whether the discourse should be sent to the +departments was put to vote, and the president and secretaries declared +that the Assembly had decided against it. This did not suit the public +in the galleries. They howled, they vociferated. They claimed that +the result was {184} doubtful. They demanded a viva voce count. This +demand alarmed those deputies who never dared to look the Revolution in +the face. A new vote was taken, and this time, the sending of the +address to the eighty-three departments was decreed. With such an +Assembly, why should the insurrectionists have hesitated? + +The rioters of the next day did not hesitate a moment. The order of +the Directory had somewhat intimidated them. But Chabot, the deputy so +celebrated for his violence at the Jacobin Club, hastened to reassure +them. "To-morrow," said he, "you will be received with open arms by +the National Assembly. People count on you." The Faubourg +Saint-Antoine was in commotion. Condorcet said, in speaking of the +anxieties expressed by the ministers: "Is it not fine to see the +Executive asking legislators to provide means of action! Let them save +themselves; that is their business!" + +The Most Christian King is treated like the Divine Master. Pétion, +mayor of Paris, is to play the rôle of Pontius Pilate. He washes his +hands of all that is to happen. He orders the battalions of National +Guards under arms for the following day, not in order to oppose the +march of the columns of the people, but to fraternize with the +petitioners, and act as escort to the insurrection. This equivocal +measure, he thinks, will set him right with both the Directory and the +populace. To one he says: "I am watching," and to the other, "I am +with you." {185} The rioters count on Pétion as anarchy counts on +weakness. He is precisely the magistrate that suits the faubourgs when +they resort to violent measures. A last conventicle was held at the +house of Santerre the brewer, chief of battalion of the National Guard +of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, on the night of June 19-20. It broke up +at midnight. All was ready. The leaders of the insurrection repaired +each to his post. They summoned their loyal adherents, and sent them +about in small detachments to assemble and mass together the working +classes, as soon as they should leave their houses in the morning. +Santerre had declared that the National Guard could offer no opposition +to the rioters. "Rest easy," said he to the conspirators; "Pétion will +be there." Louis XVI. no longer feigned not to notice the danger. +"Who knows," said he during the night to M. de Malesherbes, with a +melancholy smile, "who knows if I shall see the sun set to-morrow?" + + + + +{186} + +XVIII. + +THE MORNING OF JUNE TWENTIETH. + +It is Wednesday, June 20, 1792, the anniversary of the oath of the Jeu +de Paume. The signal is given. The faubourgs assemble. It is five in +the morning. Santerre, on horseback, is at the Place de la Bastille, +at the head of a popular staff. The army of rioters forms slowly. +Some anxiety is shown at first. The departmental decree forbidding +armed gatherings had been posted, and occasioned some reflection in the +timid. But Santerre reassures them. He tells them that the National +Guard will not be ordered to oppose their march, and that they may +count on Pétion's complicity. + +When the march toward the National Assembly begins, hardly more than +fifteen hundred are in line. But the little band increases as it goes. +The route lies through rues Saint-Antoine, de la Verrerie, des +Lombards, de la Ferronnerie, and Saint-Honoré. The procession is +headed by soldiers, after whom comes a great poplar stretched upon a +wagon. It is the Liberty tree. According to some, it is to be planted +in the courtyard of the Riding School, opposite the Assembly chamber; +according to others, on the {187} terrace of the Tuileries, before the +principal door of the palace. A military band plays the _Ça ira_, +which is chanted in chorus by the insurrectionary troop. No obstacle +impedes their march. The torrent swells incessantly. The inquisitive +mingle with the bandits. Some are in uniform, some in rags; there are +soldiers, active and disabled, National Guards, workmen, and beggars. +Harlots in dirty silk gowns join the contingent from studios, garrets, +and robbers' dens, and gangs of ragpickers unite with butchers from the +slaughter-houses. Pikes, lances, spits, masons' hammers, paviors' +crowbars, kitchen utensils,--their equipment is oddity itself. + +It is noon. The session of the Assembly has just been opened. At this +hour the throng, now numbering some twenty thousand persons, enters the +rue Saint-Honoré. The Directory of the Department of Paris demands +admission to the bar on pressing business, and the municipal +attorney-general, Roederer, begins to speak. Heeding neither the +murmurs of the galleries, the disapprobation of part of the Assembly, +nor the clamor sure to be raised against him that evening in the +Jacobin and Cordelier clubs, he boldly announces what is going on. He +reminds them of the law, and the decrees forbidding armed gatherings +which have been issued by the Commune and the Department. He adds +that, without such prohibitions, neither the authorities nor private +individuals have any security for their lives. "We demand," cried he, +"to be invested with {188} complete responsibility; we demand that our +obligation to die for the maintenance of public tranquillity shall in +nowise be diminished." + +Vergniaud ascends the platform. He owns that, in principle, the +Assembly is wrong in admitting armed gatherings within its precincts, +but he declares that he thinks it impossible to refuse a permission +accorded to so many others to that which now presents itself. He +believes, moreover, that it could not be dispersed without a resort to +martial law and a renewal of the massacre of the Champ-de-Mars. "It +would be insulting to the citizens who are now asking to pay their +respects to you," said he, "to suspect them of bad intentions... The +assemblage doubtless does not claim to accompany the citizens who +desire to present a petition to the King. Nevertheless, as a +precaution, I propose that sixty members of the Assembly shall be +commissioned to go to the King and remain near him until this gathering +shall have been dispersed." + +The discussion continues. M. Ramond follows Vergniaud. What is going +to happen? What will the insurrectionary column do? Glance for an +instant at the topography of the Assembly and its environs. The +session-chamber is the Hall of the Riding School, which extends to the +terrace of the Feuillants, and occupies the site where the rue de +Rivoli was opened later on, almost at the corner of the future rue de +Castiglione. It is a building about one hundred and fifty feet long. +In front of it is a long and {189} narrow courtyard beginning very near +the rue de Dauphin. It is entered through this courtyard, which a +wall, afterwards replaced by a grating, separates from the terrace of +the Feuillants. It may be entered at the other extremity, also, at the +spot where the flight of steps facing the Place Vendôme was afterwards +built. From the side of the courtyard it can be approached by +carriages, but from the other, only by pedestrians who cross the narrow +passage of the Feuillants, which starts from the rue Saint-Honoré, +opposite the Place Vendôme, and leads to the garden of the Tuileries. +This passage is bordered on the right by the convent of the Capuchins; +on the left is the Riding School, almost at the spot where the passage +opens into the Tuileries Garden by a door which had just been closed, +and before which had been placed a cannon and a battalion of National +Guards. + +On reaching the rue Saint-Honoré, the crowd had taken good care not to +enter the court of the Riding School, where they might have been +arrested and disarmed. They preferred to follow the rue Saint-Honoré +and take the passage conducting thence to the Assembly and the terrace +of the Feuillants. Three municipal officers who had gone to the +Tuileries Garden, passed through this passage before the crowd, and met +the advancing column at the door of the Assembly, just as M. Ramond was +in the tribune discussing Vergniaud's proposition. While the head of +the column was awaiting the issue of this discussion, the rank and file +were constantly advancing. The {190} passage became so thronged that +people were in danger of stifling. Part of them withdrew from the +crowd and went into the garden of the Capuchin convent, where they +amused themselves by planting the Liberty tree in the classic ground of +monkish ignorance and idleness, as was said in those days. The +remainder, which was in front of the door and the grating of the +terrace of the Feuillants, became exasperated. The sight of the +glittering bayonets, and the cannon placed in front of this grating, +roused them to fury. + +Meanwhile, a letter from Santerre reached the president of the National +Assembly: "Gentlemen," said he, "I have received a letter from the +commandant of the National Guard, which announces that the gathering +amounts to eight thousand men, and that they demand admission to the +bar of the chamber."--"Since there are eight thousand of them," cried a +deputy, "and since we are only seven hundred and forty-five, I move +that we adjourn the session and go away." + +Santerre's letter is thus expressed: "Mr. President, the inhabitants of +the Faubourg Saint-Antoine are celebrating to-day the anniversary of +the oath of the _Jeu de Paume_. They have been calumniated before you; +they ask to be admitted to the bar; they will confound their cowardly +detractors for the second time, and prove that they are still the men +of July 14." It was applauded by a large number of the Assembly. On +the other side murmurs rose against it. M. Ramond {191} went on with +his speech: "Eight thousand men, they say, are awaiting your decision. +You owe it to twenty-five millions of other men who await it with no +less interest.... Certainly, I shall never fear to see the citizens of +Paris in our midst, nor the entire French people around us. No one +could behold with greater pleasure than I the weapons which are a +terror to the enemies of liberty; but the law and the authorities have +spoken. Let the petitioners, therefore, lay down at the entrance of +the sanctuary the arms they are forbidden to bear within it. You ought +to insist on this. They ought to obey." + +M. Ramond's courage did not last long. Passing to Vergniaud's proposal +to send sixty members of the Assembly to the Tuileries, he said: "I +applaud the motive which prompted this proposition. But, convinced +that there is nothing to be feared by any person from the citizens of +Paris, I regard the motion as insulting to them." + +Meanwhile, the noise at the door redoubles; the petitioners are growing +impatient. Guadet rises to demand that they shall come in with their +arms. It is plain that the Gironde has taken the riot under its +patronage. After some disorderly and violent debate, it is resolved +that the president shall put the question: Are the petitioners to be +admitted to the bar? They do not yet decide this other: Shall the +armed citizens defile before the Assembly after they have been heard? +The first question is answered in the affirmative. The delegates of +the crowd are {192} admitted to the bar. They make their entry into +the Assembly between one and two in the afternoon. + +Their orator is a person named Huguenin, who will preside a few weeks +later at the Council of the Commune during the September massacres. In +his declamatory harangue he includes every tirade, threat, and insult +current in the streets. "We demand," said he, "that you should find +out why our armies are inactive. If the executive power is the cause, +let it be abolished. The blood of patriots must not flow to satisfy +the pride and ambition of the perfidious palace of the Tuileries." +Here the galleries burst into enthusiastic applause. The orator goes +on: "We complain of the delays of the Superior National Court. Why is +it so slow in bringing down the sword of the law upon the heads of the +guilty? ... Do the enemies of the country imagine that the men of July +14 are sleeping? If they appear to be so, their awakening will be +terrible.... There is no time to dissimulate; the hour is come, blood +will flow, and the tree of Liberty we are about to plant will flourish +in peace." The applause from the galleries redoubles. Huguenin +excites himself to fury: "The image of the country," he shouts, "is the +sole divinity which it shall be permitted to adore. Ought this +divinity, so dear to Frenchmen, to find in its own temple those who +rebel against its worship? Are there any such? Let them show +themselves, these friends of arbitrary power; let them make themselves +known! This is not their {193} place! Let them depart from the land +of liberty! Let them go to Coblentz and rejoin the _émigrés_. There, +their hearts will expand, they will distil their venom, they will +machinate, they will conspire against their country." The orator +concludes by demanding that the armed citizens shall be passed in +review by the Assembly. It was in vain that Stanislas de Girardin +cries, "Do the laws exist no longer, then?" The Assembly capitulates. +Armed citizens are introduced. Twenty thousand men are about to pass +through the session hall. The march is opened by a dozen musicians, +who stop in front of the president's armchair. Then the two leaders of +the manifestation make their appearance: Santerre, king of the fish +markets, idol of the faubourgs, and Saint-Huruge, the deserter from the +aristocracy, the marquis demagogue; Saint-Huruge, cast into the +Bastille for his debts and scandalous behavior, and liberated by the +Revolution; Saint-Huruge, the man of gigantic stature and the strength +of a Hercules, who is the rioter _par excellence_, and whose stentorian +voice rises above the bellowing of the crowd. + +The spectators in the galleries tremble with joy; they stamp on +perceiving both Santerre and Saint-Huruge, sabre in hand and pistols at +the belt. The band plays the _Ça ira_, the national hymn of the red +caps. Is this an orgy, a masquerade? Look at these rags, these +bizarre costumes, these butcher-boys brandishing their knives, these +tattered women, these drunken harlots who dance and shout; inhale this +{194} odor of wine and eau-de-vie; behold the ensigns, the banners of +insurrection, the ambulating trophies, the stone table on which are +inscribed the Rights of Man; the placards wherein one reads: "Down with +the veto!" "The people are tired of suffering!" "Liberty or Death!" +"Tremble, tyrant!"; the gibbet from which hangs a doll representing +Marie Antoinette; the ragged breeches surmounting the fashionable +motto: "Live the Sans-Culottes!"; the bleeding heart set upon a pike, +with the inscription, "Heart of an aristocrat!" The procession, which +began about two in the afternoon, is not over until nearly four +o'clock. At this time Santerre repairs to the bar, where he says: "The +citizens of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine came here to express to you +their ardent wishes for the welfare of the country. They beg you to +accept this flag in gratitude for the good will you have shown towards +them." The president responds: "The National Assembly receives your +offering; it invites you to continue to march under the protection of +the law, the safeguard of the country." And then, heedless of the +dangers the King was about to incur, he adjourns the session at +half-past four in the afternoon. + +What is going to happen? Will the armed citizens return peaceably to +their homes? Or, not content with their promenade to the Assembly, +will they make another to the palace of the Tuileries? What +preparations have been made for its defence? Ten battalions line the +terrace facing the palace. Two {195} others are on the terrace at the +water side, four on the side of the Carrousel. There are two companies +of gendarmes before the door of the Royal Court; four on the Place +Louis XVI., to guard the passage of the Orangery, opposite rue +Saint-Florentin. Here, there might have been serious means of defence. +But Louis XVI. is a sovereign who does not defend himself. Two +municipal officers, MM. Boucher-Saint-Sauveur and Mouchet, had just +approached him: "My colleagues and myself," said M. Mouchet to him, +"have observed with pain that the Tuileries were closed the very +instant the cortège made its appearance. The people, crowded into the +passage of the Feuillants, were all the more dissatisfied because they +could see through the wicket that there were persons in the garden. We +ourselves, Sire, were very much affected at seeing cannon pointed at +the people. It is urgent that Your Majesty should order the gates of +the Tuileries to be opened." + +After hesitating slightly, Louis XVI. ended by replying: "I consent +that the door of the Feuillants shall be opened; but on condition that +you make the procession march across the length of the terrace and go +out by the courtyard gate of the Riding School, without descending into +the garden." + +This was one of the King's illusions. While he was parleying with the +two municipal officers the armed citizens had passed in review before +the Assembly. They had just left the session hall by a door leading +into the courtyard. Once in this {196} courtyard, the intervention of +some municipal officers caused the entrance known as the Dauphin's +door, opposite the street of the same name, to be opened for them. It +was by this that they entered the Tuileries Garden, while it was the +wish of Louis XVI. that they should pass out through it from the +terrace of the Feuillants. There they are, then, in the garden, having +made an irruption there instead of continuing their route through rue +Saint-Honoré. Here they come along the terrace in front of the palace, +on which several battalions of the National Guard are stationed. The +crowd passes quickly before these battalions. Some of the guards unfix +their bayonets; others present arms, as if to do honor to the riot. +Having passed through the garden, the columns of the people go out +through the gate before the Pont-Royal. They pass up the quay, and +through the Louvre wickets, and so into the Place Carrousel, which is +cut up by a multitude of streets, a sort of covered ways very suitable +to facilitate the attack. + +Certain municipal officers make some slight efforts to quiet the +assailants; others, on the contrary, do what they can to embolden and +excite them. The four battalions at the entrance of the Carrousel, and +the two companies of gendarmes posted before the door of the Royal +Court, make no resistance. The rioters, who have invaded the +Carrousel, find their march obstructed by the closing of this door. +Santerre and Saint-Huruge, who had been the last to leave the National +Assembly, make their appearance, {197} raging with anger. They rail at +the people for not having penetrated into the palace. "That is all we +came for," say they. Santerre, before the door of the Royal Court--one +of the three courtyards in front of the palace, opposite the +Carrousel--summons his cannoneers. "I am going," he cries, "to open +the doors with cannon-balls." + +Some royalist officers of the National Guard seek vainly to defend the +palace. No one heeds them. The door of the Royal Court opens its two +leaves. The crowd presses through. No more dike to the torrent; the +gendarmes set their caps on the ends of their sabres, and cry: "Live +the nation!" The thing is done; the palace is invaded. + + + + +{198} + +XIX. + +THE INVASION OF THE TUILERIES. + +It is nearly four o'clock in the afternoon. The invasion of the +Tuileries is beginning. Let us glance at the palace and get a notion +of the apartments through which the crowd are about to rush. On +approaching it by way of the Carrousel, one comes first to three +courtyards: that of the Princes, in front of the Pavilion of Flora; the +Royal Court, before the Pavilion of the Horloge; and the Swiss Court, +before the Pavilion of Marsan. The assailants enter by the Royal +Court, pass into the palace through the vestibule of the Horloge +Pavilion, and climb the great staircase. On the left of this are the +large apartments of the first story:-- + +1. The Hall of the Hundred Swiss (the future Hall of the Marshals); + +2. The Hall of the Guards (the future Hall of the First Consul); + +3. The King's Antechamber (the future Salon d'Apollon); + +4. The State Bedchamber (the future Throne-room); + +{199} + +5. The King's Grand Cabinet (called later the Salon of Louis XIV.); + +6. The Gallery of Diana. + + +There are a battalion and two companies of gendarmes in the palace, as +well as the guards then on duty and those they had relieved. But as no +orders are given to these troops, they either break their ranks or +fraternize with the enemy. No obstacle, no resistance, is offered, and +nobody defends the apartments. The assailants, who have taken a cannon +as far as the first story, enter the Hall of the Hundred Swiss, whose +doors are neither locked nor barricaded. They penetrate into the Hall +of the Guards with the same ease. But when they try to make their way +into the OEil-de-Boeuf, or King's Antechamber, the locked door of this +apartment arrests their progress. This exasperates them, and one of +the panels is soon broken. + +Where is Louis XVI. when the invasion begins? In his bedroom with his +family. It communicates with the Grand Cabinet, and has windows +commanding a view of the garden. M. Acloque, chief of the second +legion of the National Guard, and a faithful royalist, hastens to the +King by way of the little staircase leading from the Princes' Court to +the royal chamber, in order to tell him what has happened. He finds +the door locked; he knocks, gives his name, urgently demands +admittance, and obtains it. He advises Louis XVI. to show himself to +the people. {200} The King, whom no peril has ever frightened, does +not hesitate to follow this advice. The Queen wishes to accompany her +husband; but she is opposed in this and forcibly drawn into the +Dauphin's chamber, which is near that of Louis XVI. Happier than the +Queen,--these are her own words,--Madame Elisabeth finds nobody to tear +her from the King. She takes hold of the skirts of her brother's coat. +Nothing could separate them. + +Louis XVI. passes into the Great Cabinet, thence into the State +Bedchamber, and through it into the OEil-de-Boeuf, where he will +presently receive the crowd. He is surrounded at this moment by Madame +Elisabeth, three of his ministers (MM. de Beaulieu, de Lajard, and +Terrier de Montciel), the old Marshal de Mouchy, Chevalier de Canolle, +M. d'Hervilly, M. Guinguerlet, lieutenant-colonel of the unmounted +gendarmes, and M. de Vainfrais, also an officer of gendarmes. Some +grenadiers of the National Guard afterwards arrive through the Great +Cabinet and the State Bedchamber. "Come here! four grenadiers of the +National Guard!" cries the King. One of them says, "Sire, do not be +afraid."--"I am not afraid," replies the King; "put your hand on my +heart; it is pure and tranquil." And taking the grenadier's hand he +presses it forcibly against his breast. The grenadier is a tailor +named Jean Lalanne. Later, under the Terror, by a decree of the 12th +Messidor, Year II., he will be condemned to death for having--so runs +the sentence--"displayed the character of a {201} cringing valet of the +tyrant, in boasting before several citizens that Capet, taking his hand +and laying it on his heart, had said to him, 'Feel, my friend, whether +it palpitates.'" + +"Gentlemen, save the King!" cries Madame Elisabeth. Meanwhile, the +crowd is still in the next apartment, the Hall of the Guards. They are +battering away with hatchets and gun-stocks at the door which opens +into the King's Antechamber. Nothing but a partition separates Louis +XVI. from the assailants. He orders the door to be opened. The crowd +rush in. "Here I am," says Louis XVI. calmly; "I have never deviated +from the Constitution." + +"Citizens," says Acloque, "recognize your King and respect him; the law +commands you to do so. We will all perish rather than suffer him to +receive the slightest harm." M. de Canolle cries: "Long live the +nation! Long live the King!" This cry is not repeated. Some one begs +Madame Elisabeth to retire. "I will not leave the King," she replies, +"I will not leave him." Those who surround Louis XVI. make a rampart +for him of their bodies. The crowd becomes immense. It is proposed to +the King that he stand on a bench in the embrasure of the central +window, from which there is a view of the courtyard. Other benches and +a table are placed in front of him. Madame Elisabeth takes a bench in +the next window with M. de Marsilly. The hall is full. Groans, +atrocious threats, and gross insults resound on every side. Some one +shouts: "Down with the {202} veto! To the devil with the veto! Recall +the patriot ministers! Let him sign, or we will not go out of here!" +The butcher Legendre comes forward. He asks permission to speak. +Silence is obtained, and, addressing the King, he says: "Monsieur." At +this unusual title, Louis XVI. make a gesture of surprise. "Yes, +Monsieur," goes on Legendre, "listen to us; it is your duty to listen +to us.... You are a traitor. You have always deceived us, and you +deceive us still; the measure is full, and the people are tired of +being made your laughing-stock." The insolent butcher, who calls +himself the agent of the people, then reads a pretended petition which +is a mere tissue of recriminations and threats. Louis XVI. listens +with imperturbable sang-froid. He answers simply: "I will do what the +Constitution and the decrees ordain that I shall do." The noise begins +anew. It is a rain, a hail of insults. + +Some individuals mistake Madame Elisabeth for Marie Antoinette. Her +equerry, M. de Saint-Pardoux, throws himself between her and the +furious wretches, who cry: "Ah! there is the Austrian woman; we must +have the Austrian!" and undeceives them by naming her.--"Why did you +not allow them to believe I am the Queen?" says the courageous +Princess; "perhaps you might have averted a greater crime." And, +putting aside a bayonet which almost touches her breast, "Take care, +Monsieur," she says gently, "you might hurt somebody, and I am sure you +would be sorry to do that." {203} The shouts redouble. The confusion +becomes terrible. It is with great difficulty that some grenadiers of +the National Guard defend the embrasure of the window where Louis XVI. +still stands immovable on his bench. Mingled with the crowd there are +inoffensive persons, who have come merely out of curiosity, and even +honest men who sincerely pity the King. But there are tigers and +assassins as well. One of them, armed with a club ending in a +sword-blade, tries to thrust it into the King's heart. The grenadiers +parry the blow with their bayonets. A market porter struggles long to +reach Louis XVI., against whom he brandishes a sabre. Several times +the wretched monarch seeks to address the crowd. His voice is lost in +the uproar. A municipal official, M. Mouchet, hoisting himself on the +shoulders of two persons, demands by voice and gesture a moment's +silence for the King and for himself. Vain efforts. The vociferations +of the crowd only increase. Here comes a long pole on the end of which +is a Phrygian cap, a _bonnet rouge_. The pole is inclined towards M. +Mouchet. M. Mouchet takes the cap and presents it to the King, who, to +please the crowd, puts it on his head. + +Is it possible? That man on a bench, with the ignoble cap of a +galley-slave on his head, surrounded by a drunken and tattered rabble +who vomit filthy language, that man the King of France and Navarre, the +most Christian King, Louis XVI.? Go back to the day of the coronation, +June 11, 1775. It is {204} just seventeen years and nine days ago! Do +you remember the Cathedral of Rheims, luminous, glittering; the +cardinals, ministers, and marshals of France, the red ribbons, the blue +ribbons, the lay peers with their vests of cloth-of-gold, their violet +ducal mantles lined with ermine; the clerical peers with cope and +cross? Do you remember the King taking Charlemagne's sword in his +hand, and then prostrating himself before the altar on a great +kneeling-cushion of velvet sown with golden lilies? Do you see him +vested by the grand-chamberlain with the tunic, the dalmatica, and the +ermine-lined mantle which represent the vestments of a sub-deacon, +deacon, and priest, because the King is not merely a sovereign, but a +pontiff? Do you see him seizing the royal sceptre, that golden sceptre +set with oriental pearls, and carvings representing the great +Carlovingian Emperor on a throne adorned with lions and eagles? Do you +remember the pealing of the bells, the chords of the organ, the blare +of trumpets, the clouds of incense, the birds flying in the nave? + +And now, instead of the coronation the pillory; instead of the crown +the hideous red cap; instead of hymns and murmurs of admiration and +respect,--insults, the buffoonery of the fish-market, shouts of +contempt and hatred, threats of murder. Ah! the time is not far +distant when a Conventionist will break the vial containing the sacred +oil on the pavement of the Abbey of Saint Remi. How slippery is the +swift descent, the fatal descent by which a {205} sovereign who disarms +himself glides down from the heights of power and glory to the depths +of opprobrium and sorrow! There he is! Not content with putting the +red bonnet on his head, he keeps it there, and mumming in the Jacobin +coiffure, he cries: "Long live the nation!" The crowd find the +spectacle amusing. A National Guard, to whom some one has passed a +bottle of wine, offers the complaisant King a drink. Perhaps the wine +is poisoned. No matter; Louis XVI. takes a glass of it. + +While all this is going on, two deputies, Isnard and Vergniaud, present +themselves. "Citizens," says the first, "I am Isnard, a deputy. If +what you demand were at once granted, it might be thought you extorted +it by force. In the name of the law and the National Assembly, I ask +you to respect the constituted authorities and retire. The National +Assembly will do justice; I will aid thereto with all my power. You +shall obtain satisfaction; I answer for it with my head; but go away." +Vergniaud follows him with similar remarks. Neither is listened to. +Nobody departs. + +It is six in the evening. For two hours, one man, exposed to every +insult, has held his own against a multitude. At last Pétion arrives +wearing his mayor's scarf. The crowd draws back. "Sire," says he, "I +have just this instant learned the situation you were in."--"That is +very astonishing," returns Louis XVI.; "for it has lasted two +hours."--"Sire, truly, I was ignorant that there was trouble at the +palace. {206} As soon as I was informed, I hastened to your side. But +you have nothing to fear; I answer for it that the people will respect +you."--"I fear nothing," replies the King. "Moreover, I have not been +in any danger, since I was surrounded by the National Guard." + +Pétion, like Pontius Pilate, pretends indifference. A municipal +officer, M. Champion, reminds him of his duties, and says with +firmness: "Order the people to retire; order them in the name of the +law; we are threatened with great danger, and you must speak." At last +Pétion decides to intervene. "Citizens," he says, "all you who are +listening to me, came to present legally your petition to the +hereditary representative of the nation, and you have done so with the +dignity and majesty of a free people; return now to your homes, for you +can desire nothing further. Your demand will doubtless be reiterated +by all the eighty-three departments, and the King will grant your +prayer. Retire, and do not, by remaining longer, give occasion to the +public enemies to impugn your worthy intentions." + +At first this discourse of the mayor of Paris produces but slight +effect. The cries and threats continue. But, after a while, the +crowd, worn out with shouting, and hungry and thirsty as well, begin to +quiet down a little. The most excited cry: "We are waiting for an +answer from the King. Nothing has been asked of him yet." Others say: +"Listen to the mayor, he is going to speak again; we will {207} hear +him." Pétion repeats what he said before: "If you do not wish your +magistrates to be unjustly accused, withdraw." + +M. Sergent, administrator of police, who had come with the mayor, asked +if any one has ordered the doors leading from the Grand Cabinet to the +Gallery of Diana to be opened, so as to allow the crowd to pass out by +the small staircase into the Court of the Princes. Louis XVI. +overheard this question. "I have had the apartments opened," said he; +"the people, marching out on the gallery side, will like to see them." +A sentiment of curiosity hastened the movements of the crowd. In order +to go out, they had to pass through the State Bedchamber, the Grand +Cabinet, and the Gallery of Diana. Sergent, standing in front of the +door, leading from the OEil-de-Boeuf to the State Bedchamber, unfastens +his scarf and waving it over his head, cries: "Citizens, this is the +badge of the law; in its name we invite you to retire and follow us." +Pétion says: "The people have done what they ought to do. You have +acted with the pride and dignity of freemen. But there has been enough +of it; let all retire." A double row of National Guards is formed, and +the people pass between them. The return march begins. A few +recalcitrants want to remain, and keep up a cry of "Down with the veto! +Recall the ministers!" But they are swept on by the stream, and follow +the march like all the rest. While they are going out through the door +between the OEil-de-Boeuf and the State {208} Bed-chamber, the National +Guard prevents any one from entering on the other side, through the +door connecting the OEil-de-Boeuf with the Hall of the Guards. + +At this moment, a deputation of twenty-four members of the Assembly +present themselves. Roused by the public clamor announcing that the +King's life is in danger, the National Assembly has called an +extraordinary evening session. The president of the deputation, M. +Brunk, says to the King: "Sire, the National Assembly sends us to +assure ourselves of your situation, to protect the constitutional +liberty you should enjoy, and to share your danger." Louis XVI. +replies: "I am grateful for the solicitude of the Assembly; I am +undisturbed in the midst of Frenchmen." At the same time, Pétion goes +to turn back the crowd, who are constantly ascending the great +staircase, and who threaten another invasion. The sentry at the +doorway of the OEil-de-Boeuf is replaced, and the crowd ceases to flock +thither. The circle of National Guards about the sovereign is +increased. A space is formed, and he is surrounded by the deputation +from the Assembly. Acloque, seeing that the tumult is lessening and +the room no longer encumbered by the crowd, proposes to the King that +he should retire, and Louis XVI. decides to do so. Surrounded by +deputies and National Guards, he passes into the State Bedchamber, and +notwithstanding the throng, he manages to reach a secret door at the +right of the bed, near the chimney, which communicates with his +bedroom. He goes through this little door, and some one closes it +behind him. + +{209} + +It is not far from eight o'clock in the evening. The peril and +humiliation of Louis XVI. have lasted nearly four hours, and the +unhappy King is not yet at the end of his sufferings, for he does not +know what has become of his wife and children. While these sad scenes +had been enacting in the palace, a furious populace had been in +incessant commotion beneath the windows, in the garden and the +courtyards. People desiring to establish communication between those +down stairs and those above, had been heard to cry: "Have they been +struck down? Are they dead? Throw us down their heads!" + +A slender young man, with the profile of a Roman medal, a pale +complexion, and flashing eyes, was looking at all this from the upper +part of the terrace beside the water. Unable to comprehend the +long-suffering of Louis XVI., he said in an indignant tone: "How could +they have allowed this rabble to enter? They should have swept out +four or five hundred of them with cannon, and the rest would have run." +The man who spoke thus, obscure and hidden in the crowd, opposite that +palace where he was to play so great a part, was the "straight-haired +Corsican," the future Emperor Napoleon. + + + + +{210} + +XX. + +MARIE ANTOINETTE ON JUNE TWENTIETH. + +Louis XVI. had just entered his bedchamber. The crowd, after leaving +the hall of the OEil-de-Boeuf, had departed through the State +Bedchamber, and the King's Great Cabinet, called also the Council Hall. +On entering this last apartment, an unexpected scene had surprised +them. Behind the large table they saw the Queen, Madame Elisabeth, the +Dauphin, and Madame Royale. + +How came the Queen to be there? What had happened? At a quarter of +four, when Louis XVI. had left his room to go into the hall of the +Bull's-Eye and meet the rioters, Marie Antoinette, as we have already +said, made desperate efforts to follow him. M. Aubier, placing himself +before the door of the King's chamber, prevented the Queen from going +out. In vain she cried: "Let me pass; my place is beside the King; I +will join him and perish with him if it must be." M. Aubier, through +devotion, disobeyed her. Nevertheless, the Queen, whose courage +redoubled her strength, would have borne down this faithful servant if +M. Rougeville, a chevalier of Saint-Louis, had not aided him to block +up the passage. {211} Imploring Marie Antoinette in the name of her +own safety and that of the King, not to expose herself needlessly to +poniards, and aided by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, they drew her +almost by force into the chamber of the Dauphin, which was near the +King's. MM. de Choiseul, d'Haussonville, and de Saint-Priest, assisted +by several grenadiers of the National Guard, afterwards induced her to +go with her children into the Grand Cabinet of the King, called also +the Council Hall, because the ministers were accustomed to assemble +there. + +The Princess de Lamballe, the Princess of Tarento, the Marchioness de +Tourzel, the Duchesses de Luynes, de Duras, de Maillé, the Marchioness +de Laroche-Aymon, Madame de Soucy, the Baroness de Mackau, the Countess +de Ginestous, remained with the Queen. So also did the Minister +Chambonas, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts d'Haussonville and de +Montmorin, Viscount de Saint-Priest, Marquis de Champcenetz, and +General de Wittenghoff, commander of the 17th military division. The +Queen and her children occupied the embrasure of a window, and the +large and heavy table used by the ministerial council was placed in +front of them as a sort of barricade. + +Meanwhile, Marie Antoinette's apartments and her bedroom on the +ground-floor were invaded. Some National Guards tried vainly to defend +them. "You are cutting your own throats!" shouted the people. +Overwhelmed by numbers, they saw the door of the first apartment broken +down by hatchets. It {212} contained the beds of the Queen's servants, +ranged behind screens. Afterwards they saw the invaders go into Marie +Antoinette's sleeping-room, tear the clothes off her bed, and loll upon +it, crying as they did so, "We will have the Austrian woman, dead or +alive!" + +The Queen, however, remained in the Council Hall, where she could hear +the echo of the cries resounding in that of the OEil-de-Boeuf, where +Louis XVI. was, and from which she was separated only by the State +Bedchamber. Toward seven in the evening she beheld Madame Elisabeth, +who, after heroically sharing the dangers of the King, had now found +means to rejoin her. "The deputies who came to us," she wrote to +Madame de Raigecourt, July 3, "had come out of good will. A veritable +deputation arrived and persuaded the King to go back to his own +apartments. As I was told this, and as I was unwilling to be left in +the crowd, I went away about an hour before he did, and rejoined the +Queen: you can imagine with what pleasure I embraced her." In their +perils, therefore, Madame Elisabeth was near both Louis XVI. and Marie +Antoinette. + +After having voluntarily exposed herself to all the anguish of the +invasion of the OEil-de-Boeuf, the courageous Princess was with the +Queen in the Council Hall, when the crowd, coming through the State +Bed-chamber, arrived there. The horde marched through it, carrying +their barbarous inscriptions like so many ferocious standards. "One of +these," says Madame {213} Campan in her Memoirs, "represented a gibbet +from which an ugly doll was hanging; below it was written: 'Marie +Antoinette to the lamp-post!' Another was a plank to which a bullock's +heart had been fastened, surrounded by the words: 'Heart of Louis XVI.' +Finally, a third presented a pair of bullock's horns with an indecent +motto." Some royalist grenadiers belonging to the battalion called the +_Filles-Saint-Thomas_, were near the council-table and protected the +Queen. Marie Antoinette was standing, and held her daughter's hand. +The Dauphin sat on the table in front of her. At the moment when the +march began, a woman threw a red cap on this table and cried out that +it must be placed on the Queen's head. M. de Wittenghoff, his hand +trembling with indignation, took the cap and after holding it for a +moment over Marie Antoinette's head, put it back on the table. Then a +cry was raised: "The red cap for the Prince Royal! Tri-colored ribbons +for little Veto!" Ribbons were thrown down beside the Phrygian cap. +Some one shouted: "If you love the nation, set the red cap on your +son's head." The Queen made an affirmative sign, and the revolutionary +coiffure was set on the child's fair head. + +What humiliations were these for the unhappy mother! What anguish for +so haughty, so magnanimous a queen! The galley-slave's cap has touched +the head of the daughter of Cæsars, and now soils the forehead of her +son! The slang of the {214} fish-markets resounds beneath the +venerable arches of the palace. How bitterly the unfortunate sovereign +expiates her former triumphs! Where are the ovations and the +apotheoses, the carriages of gold and crystal, the solemn entries into +the city in its gala dress, to the sound of bells and trumpets? What +trace remains of those brilliant days when, more goddess than woman, +the Queen of France and Navarre appeared through a cloud of incense, in +the midst of flowers and light? This good and beautiful sovereign, +whose least smile, or glance, or nod, had been regarded as a precious +recompense, a supreme favor by the noble lords and ladies who bent +respectfully before her, behold how she is treated now! Consider the +costumes and the language of her new courtiers! And yet, Marie +Antoinette is majestic still. Even in this horrible scene, in presence +of these drunken women and ragged suburbans, she does not lose that +gift of pleasing which is her special dower. At a distance they curse +her; but when they come near they are subjugated by her spell. Her +most ferocious enemies are touched in their own despite. A young girl +had just called her "_Autrichienné_." "You call me an Austrian woman," +replied she, "but I am the wife of the King of France, I am the mother +of the Dauphin; I am a Frenchwoman by my sentiments as wife and mother. +I shall never again see the land where I was born. I can be happy or +unhappy nowhere but in France. I was happy when you loved me." +Confused by this gentle {215} reproach, the young girl softened. +"Pardon me," she said; "it was because I did not know you; I see very +well now that you are not wicked." A woman, passing, stopped before +the Queen and began to sob. "What is the matter with her?" asked +Santerre; "what is she crying about?" And he shook her by the arm, +saying: "Make her pass on, she is drunk." Even Santerre himself felt +Marie Antoinette's influence. "Madame," he said to her, "the people +wish you no harm. Your friends deceive you; you have nothing to fear, +and I am going to prove it by serving as your shield." It was he who +took pity on the Dauphin whom the heat was stifling, and said: "Take +the red cap off the child; he is too hot." He too, it was, that +hastened the march of the procession and pointed out to the people the +different members of the royal family by name, saying: "This is the +Queen, this is her son, this her daughter, this Madame Elisabeth." + +At last the crowd is gone. The hall is empty. It is eight o'clock. +The Queen and her children enter the King's chamber. Louis XVI., who +finds them once more after so many perils and emotions, covers them +with kisses. In the midst of this pathetic scene some deputies arrive. +Marie Antoinette shows them the traces of violence which the people +have left behind them,--locks broken, hinges forced off, wainscoting +burst through, furniture ruined. She speaks of the dangers that have +threatened the King and the insults offered to herself. Perceiving +that Merlin de {216} Thionville, an ardent Jacobin, has tears in his +eyes, she says: "You are weeping to see the King and his family so +cruelly treated by people whom he has always desired to render happy." +The republican answered: "Yes, Madame, I weep, but it is for the +misfortunes of the mother of a family, not for the King and Queen; I +hate kings and queens." A deputy accosted Marie Antoinette, saying in +a familiar tone: "You were very much afraid, Madame, you must admit." +"No, Monsieur," she replied, "I was not at all afraid; but I suffered +much in being separated from the King at a moment when his life was in +danger. At least, I had the consolation of being with my children and +performing one of my duties." "Without pretending to excuse +everything, agree, Madame, that the people showed themselves very +good-natured." "The King and I, Monsieur, are convinced of the natural +goodness of the people; it is only when they are misled that they are +wicked."--"How old is Mademoiselle?" went on the deputy, pointing to +Madame Royale.--"She is at that age, Monsieur, when one feels only too +great a horror of such scenes." + +Other deputies surround the Dauphin. They question him on different +subjects, especially concerning the geography of France and its new +territorial division into departments and districts, and are enchanted +by the correctness of his replies. + +An officer of Chasseurs of the National Guard enters the King's +chamber. This officer had shown {217} the utmost zeal in protecting +his sovereign and had had the honor of being wounded at his side. He +is congratulated. The Dauphin perceives him. "What is the name of +that guard who defended my father so bravely?" he asks.--"Monseigneur," +replies M. Hue, "I do not know; he will be flattered if you ask him." +The Prince runs to put his question to the officer, but the latter, in +respectful terms, declines to answer. Then M. Hue insists. "I beg +you," he cries, "tell us your name."--"I ought to conceal my name," +replies the officer; "unfortunately for me, it is the same as that of +an execrable man." The faithful royalist bore the same name as the man +who had caused the arrest of the royal family at Varennes the previous +year. He was called Drouot. + +The hour for repose has come at last. It is ten o'clock. Certain +individuals still complain: "They took us there for nothing; but we +will go back and have what we want." Still, the storm is over. The +crowd has evacuated the palace, the courtyards, and the garden. The +Assembly closes its sessions at half-past ten. Pétion said there: "The +King has no cause of complaint against the citizens who marched before +him. He has said as much to the deputies and magistrates." Finally, +as the deputies were about to separate after this exciting day, one of +them, M. Guyton-Morveau, remarked: "The deputation which preceded us, +has doubtless announced to you that all is now tranquil. We remained +with the King for some time, and saw nothing which could {218} inspire +the least alarm. We invited the King to seek some repose. He sent an +officer of the National Guard to visit the posts, and the officer +reported that there was nobody in the palace. His Majesty assured us +that he desired to remain alone; we left him; and we can certify to you +that all is quiet." + + + + +{219} + +XXI. + +THE MORROW OF JUNE TWENTIETH. + +In the morning of June 21 there were still some disorderly gatherings +in front of the Tuileries. On awaking, the Dauphin put this artless +question to the Queen: "Mamma, is it yesterday still?" Alas! yes, it +was still yesterday, it was always to be yesterday until the +catastrophes at the end of the drama. It was just a year to a day +since the royal family had furtively quitted Paris to begin the fatal +journey which terminated at Varennes. This souvenir occurred to Marie +Antoinette, and, recalling the first stations of her Calvary, the +unfortunate sovereign told herself that her humiliations had but just +begun. Her lips had touched only the brim of the chalice, and it must +be drained to the dregs. + +Meanwhile, visitors were arriving at the Tuileries one after another to +condole with and protest their fidelity to the King and his family. +When Marshal de Mouchy made his appearance, the worthy old man was +received with the honors due to his noble conduct on the previous day. +When the invasion began, Louis XVI., in order not to irritate the +rabble, had given his gentlemen a formal order to withdraw, but {220} +the old marshal, hoping that his great age (he was seventy-seven) would +excuse his presence in the palace, had refused to leave his master. +More than once, with a strength rejuvenated by devotion, he had +succeeded in repulsing persons whose violence made him tremble for the +King's life. As soon as she saw the marshal, Marie Antoinette made +haste to say: "I have learned from the King how courageously you +defended him yesterday. I share his gratitude."--"Madame," he replied, +alluding to those of his relatives who had figured among the promoters +of the Revolution, "I did very little in comparison with the injuries I +should like to repair. They were not mine, but they touch me very +nearly."--"My son," said the Queen, calling the Dauphin, "repeat before +the marshal, the prayer you addressed to God this morning for the +King." The child, kneeling down, put his hands together, and looking +up to heaven, began to sing this refrain from the opera of _Pierre le +Grand_:-- + + _Ciel, entends la prière + Qu'ici je fais: + Conserve un si bon père + A ses sujets._[1] + + +After the Marshal de Mouchy came M. de Malesherbes. Contrary to his +usual custom, the ex-first {221} president wore his sword. "It is a +long time," some one said to him, "since you have worn a +sword."--"True," replied the old man, "but who would not arm when the +King's life is in danger?" Then, looking with emotion at the little +Prince, he said to Marie Antoinette: "I hope, Madame, that at least our +children will see better days!" + +And yet, even for the present there still remained a glimmer of hope. +Hardly had the invaders left the palace than invectives against them +rose from all classes of society. The calmness and courage of the King +and his family found admirers on every side. The departments sent +addresses demanding the punishment of those who had been guilty. +Royalist sentiments woke to life anew. One might almost believe that +the indignation caused by the recent scandals would produce an +immediate reaction in favor of Louis XVI. Possibly, with an energetic +sovereign, something might have been attempted. On the whole, the +insurrection had obtained nothing. Even the Girondins perceived the +dangerous character of revolutionary passions. Honest men stigmatized +the criminal tendencies which had just displayed themselves. It was +the moment for the King to show himself and strike a great blow. But +Louis XVI. had neither will nor energy. Letting the last chance of +safety which fortune offered him escape, he was unable to profit by the +turn in public opinion. Nothing could shake him out of that easy +patience which was the chief cause of his ruin. + +{222} + +Marie Antoinette herself was opposed to vigorous measures. She still +desired to try the effects of kindness. Learning that a legal inquiry +was proposed into the events of June 20, and foreseeing that M. Hue +would be called as a witness, she said to this loyal servant: "Say as +little in your deposition as truth will permit. I recommend you, on +the King's part and my own, to forget that we were the objects of these +popular movements. Every suspicion that either the King or myself feel +the least resentment for what happened must be avoided; it is not the +people who are guilty, and even if it were, they would always obtain +pardon and forgetfulness of their errors from us." + +During this time the Assembly maintained an attitude more than +equivocal. It contained a great number of honest men. But, terrorized +already, it no longer possessed the courage of indignation. It grew +pale before the menaces of the public. By cringing to the rabble it +had attained that hypocritical optimism which is the distinctive mark +of moderate revolutionists, and which makes them in turn the dupes and +the victims of those who are more zealous. + +If the majority of the deputies had said openly what they silently +thought, they would not have hesitated to stigmatize the invasion of +the Tuileries as it deserved. But in that case, what would have become +of their popularity with the pikemen? And then, must they not take +into account the ambitions of the Girondins, the hatreds of the +Mountain party, {223} and the rancor of Madame Roland and her friends? +Was it not, moreover, a real satisfaction to the bourgeoisie to give +power a lesson and humiliate a sovereign? Ah! how cruelly this +pleasure will be expiated by those who take delight in it, and how they +will repent some day for having permitted justice, law, and authority +to be trampled under foot! + +When the session of June 21 opened, Deputy Daverhoult denounced in +energetic terms the violence of the previous day. Thuriot exclaimed: +"Are we expected to press an inquiry against forty thousand men?" +Duranton, the Minister of Justice, then read a letter from the King, +dated that day, and worded thus: "Gentlemen, the National Assembly is +already acquainted with the events of yesterday. Paris is doubtless in +consternation; France will hear the news with astonishment and grief. +I was much affected by the zeal shown for me by the National Assembly +on this occasion. I leave to its prudence the task of investigating +the causes of this event, weighing its circumstances, and taking the +necessary measures to maintain the Constitution and assure the +inviolability and constitutional liberty of the hereditary +representative of the nation. For my part, nothing can prevent me, at +all times and under all circumstances, from performing the duties +imposed on me by the Constitution, which I have accepted in the true +interests of the French nation." + +A few moments after this letter had been read, the session was +disturbed by a warning from the {224} municipal agent of the +department, to the effect that an armed crowd were marching towards the +palace. This was soon followed by tidings that Pétion had hindered +their further advance, and the mayor himself came to the Assembly to +receive the laudations of his friends. "Order reigns everywhere," said +he; "all precautions have been taken. The magistrates have done their +duty; they will always do so, and the hour approaches when justice will +be rendered them." + +Pétion then went to the Tuileries, where he addressed the King nearly +in these terms:-- + +"Sire, we learn that you have been warned of the arrival of a crowd at +the palace. We come to announce that this crowd is composed of unarmed +citizens who wish to set up a may-pole. I know, Sire, that the +municipality has been calumniated; but its conduct will be understood +by you."--"It ought to be by all France," responded Louis XVI.; "I +accuse no one in particular, I saw everything."--"It will be," returned +the mayor; "and but for the prudent measures taken by the municipality, +much more disagreeable events might have occurred." The King attempted +to reply, but Pétion, without listening to him, went on: "Not to your +own person; you may well understand that it will always be respected." +The King, unaccustomed to interruption when speaking, said in a loud +voice: "Be silent!" There was silence for an instant, and then Louis +XVI. added: "Is it what you call respecting {225} my person to enter my +house in arms, break down my doors and use force to my +guards?"--"Sire," answered Pétion, "I know the extent of my duties and +of my responsibility."--"Do your duty!" replied Louis XVI.; "You are +answerable for the tranquillity of Paris. Adieu!" And the King turned +his back on the mayor. + +Pétion revenged himself that very evening, by circulating a rumor that +the royal family were preparing to escape; in consequence, he requested +the commanders of the National Guard to re-enforce the sentries and +redouble their vigilance. The revolutionists, who had been +disconcerted for a moment by popular indignation, raised their heads +again. Prudhomme wrote in the _Révolutions de Paris_: "The Parisian +people--yes, the people, not the aristocratic class of citizens--have +just set a grand example to France. The King, at the instigation of +Lafayette, discharged his patriotic ministers; he paralyzed by his veto +the decree relative to the camp of twenty thousand men, and that on the +banishment of priests. Very well! the people rose and signified to him +their sovereign will that the ministers should be reinstated and these +two murderous vetoes recalled.... Doubtless it will not be long before +Europe will be full of a caricature representing Louis XVI. of the big +paunch, covered with orders, crowned with a red cap, and drinking out +of the same bottle with the _sans-culottes_, who are crying: 'The King +is drinking, the King has drunk. He has the liberty {226} cap on his +head.' Would he might have it in his heart!" + +Apropos of this red bonnet which remained for three hours on the +sovereign's head, Bertrand de Molleville ventured to put some questions +to Louis XVI. on the evening of June 21. According to the Memoirs of +the former Minister of Marine, this is what the King replied: "The +cries of 'Long live the Nation' increasing in violence and seeming to +be addressed to me, I answered that the nation had no better friend +than I. Then an ill-looking man, thrusting himself through the crowd, +came close to me and said in a rude tone: 'Very well! if you are +telling the truth, prove it to us by putting on this red cap.' 'I +consent,' said I. Instantly one or two of these people advanced and +placed the cap on my hair, for it was too small for my head to enter +it. I was convinced, I don't know why, that their intention was simply +to place this cap on my head and then retire, and I was so preoccupied +with what was going on before my eyes, that I did not notice whether it +was there or not. So little did I feel it that after I had returned to +my chamber I did not observe that I still wore it until I was told. I +was greatly astonished to find it on my head, and was all the more +displeased because I could have taken it off at once without the least +difficulty. But I am convinced that if I had hesitated to receive it, +the drunken man by whom it was presented would have thrust his pike +into my stomach." + +{227} + +During the same interview Bertrand de Molleville congratulated the King +upon his almost miraculous escape from the dangers of the previous day. +Louis XVI. replied: "All my anxieties were for the Queen, my children +and my sister; because I feared nothing for myself."--"But it seems to +me," rejoined his interlocutor, "that this insurrection was aimed +chiefly against Your Majesty."--"I know it very well," returned Louis +XVI.; "I saw clearly that they wanted to assassinate me, and I don't +know why they did not do it; but I shall not escape them another day. +So I have gained nothing; it is all the same whether I am assassinated +now or two months from now!"--"Great God!" cried Bertrand de +Molleville, "does Your Majesty believe that you will be +assassinated?"--"I am convinced of it," replied the King; "I have +expected it for a long time and have accustomed myself to the thought. +Do you think I am afraid of death?"--"Certainly not, but I would desire +Your Majesty to take vigorous measures to protect yourself from +danger."--"It is possible," went on the King after a moment of +reflection, "that I may escape. There are many odds against me, and I +am not lucky. If I were alone I would risk one more attempt. Ah! if +my wife and children were not with me, people should see that I am not +so weak as they fancy. What would be their fate if the measures you +propose to me did not succeed?"--"But if they assassinate Your Majesty, +do you think that the Queen and her children would be in less +danger?"--"Yes, I think {228} so, and even were it otherwise, I should +not have to reproach myself with being the cause." + +A sort of Christian fanaticism had taken possession of the King's soul. +Resigned to his fate, he ceased to struggle, and wrote to his +confessor: "Come to see me to-day; I have done with men; I want nothing +now but heaven." + + + +[1] Listen, heaven, to the prayer + That here I make: + Preserve so good a father + To his subjects. + + + + +{229} + +XXII. + +LAFAYETTE IN PARIS. + +One of the greatest griefs of a political career is disenchantment. To +pass from devout optimism to profound discouragement; to have treated +as alarmists or cowards whoever perceived the least cloud on the +horizon, and then to see the most formidable tempests unchained; to be +obliged to recognize at one's proper cost that one has carried illusion +to the verge of simplicity and has judged neither men nor things +aright; to have heard distressed passengers saying that a pilot without +experience or prudence is responsible for the shipwreck; to have +promised the age of gold and suddenly found one's self in the age of +iron, is a veritable torture for the pride and the conscience of a +statesman. And this torture is still more cruel when to disappointment +is added the loss of a popularity laboriously acquired; when, having +been accustomed to excite nothing but enthusiasm and applause, one is +all at once greeted with criticism, howls, and curses, and when, having +long strutted about triumphantly on the summits of the Capitol, one +sees yawning before him the gulf at the foot of the Tarpeian rock. + +{230} + +Such was the fate of Lafayette. A few months had sufficed to throw +down the popular idol from his pedestal, and the same persons who had +once almost burned incense before him, now thought of nothing but +flinging him into the gutter. Stunned by his fall, Lafayette could not +believe it. To familiarize himself with the fickleness, the caprices, +and the inconsequence of the multitude was impossible. For him the +Constitution was the sacred ark, and he did not believe that the very +men who had constructed this edifice at such a cost had now nothing so +much at heart as to destroy it. He would not admit that the +predictions of the royalists were about to be accomplished in every +point, and still desired to hold aloof from the complicities into which +revolutions drag the most upright minds and the most honest characters. +He who, in July, 1789, had not been able to prevent the assassination +of Foulon and Berthier; who, on October 5, had marched, despite +himself, against Versailles; who, on April 18, 1791, had been unable to +protect the departure of the royal family to Saint Cloud; who, on the +following June 21, had thought himself obliged to say to the Jacobins +in their club: "I have come to rejoin you, because I think the true +patriots are here," nevertheless imagined that just a year later, all +that was necessary to vanquish the same Jacobins was for him to show +himself and say like Cæsar: "_Veni, vidi, vici_." + +It was only a later illusion of the generous but imprudent man who had +already dreamed many {231} dreams. He thought the popular tiger could +be muzzled by persuasion. He was going to make a _coup d'état_, not in +deeds, but in words, forgetting that the Revolution neither esteems nor +fears anything but force. As M. de Larmartime has said: "One gets from +factions only what one snatches." Instead of striking, Lafayette was +going to speak and write. The Jacobins might have feared his sword; +they despised his words and pen. But though it was not very wise, the +noble audacity with which the hero of America came spontaneously to +throw himself into the heat of the struggle and utter his protest in +the name of right and honor, was none the less an act of courage. +While with the army, that asylum of generous ideas, the sentiments on +which his ancestors had prided themselves rekindled in his heart. +Memories of his early youth revived anew. Doubtless he also recalled +his personal obligations to Louis XVI. On his return from the United +States, had he not been created major-general over the heads of a +multitude of older officers? Had not the Queen accorded him at that +epoch the most flattering eulogies? Had he not been received at the +great receptions of May 29, 1785, when any other officer unless highly +born would have remained in the OEil-de-Boeuf or paid his court in the +passage of the chapel? Had he not accepted the rank of +lieutenant-general from the King, on June 30, 1791? The gentleman +reappeared beneath the revolutionist. The humiliation of a throne for +which his ancestors had so often shed their blood {232} caused him a +real grief, and it is perhaps regrettable that Louis XVI. should have +refused the hand which his recent adversary extended loyally though +late. + +Lafayette was encamped near Bavay with the Army of the North when the +first tidings of June 20 reached him. His soul was roused to +indignation, and he wanted to start at once for Paris to lift his voice +against the Jacobins. Old Marshal Luckner tried in vain to restrain +him by saying that the _sans-culottes_ would have his head. Nothing +could stop him. Placing his army in safety under the cannon of +Maubeuge, he started with no companion but an aide-de-camp. At +Soissons some persons tried to dissuade him from going further by +painting a doleful picture of the dangers to which he would expose +himself. He listened to nobody and went on his way. Reaching Paris in +the night of June 27-28, he alighted at the house of his intimate +friend, the Duke de La Rochefoucauld, who was about to play so +honorable a part. As soon as morning came, Lafayette was at the door +of the National Assembly, asking permission to offer the homage of his +respect. This authorization having been granted, he entered the hall. +The right applauded; the left kept silence. Being allowed to speak, he +declared that he was the author of the letter to the Assembly of June +16, whose authenticity had been denied, and that he openly avowed +responsibility for it. He then expressed himself in the sincerest +terms concerning the outrages committed in {233} the palace of the +Tuileries on June 20. He said he had received from the officers, +subalterns, and soldiers of his army a great number of addresses +expressive of their love for the Constitution, their respect for the +authorities, and their patriotic hatred against seditious men of all +parties. He ended by imploring the Assembly to punish the authors or +instigators of the violences committed on June 20, as guilty of treason +against the nation, and to destroy a sect which encroached upon +National Sovereignty, and terrorized citizens, and by their public +debates removed all doubts concerning the atrocity of their projects. +"In my own name and that of all honest men in the kingdom," said he in +conclusion, "I entreat you to take efficacious measures to make all +constitutional authorities respected, particularly your own and that of +the King, and to assure the army that the Constitution will receive no +injury from within, while so many brave Frenchmen are lavishing their +blood to defend it on the frontiers." + +Applause from the right and from some of those in the galleries began +anew. The president said: "The National Assembly has sworn to maintain +the Constitution. Faithful to its oath, it will be able to guarantee +it against all attacks. It accords to you the honors of the session." +The general went to take his seat on the right. Deputy Kersaint +observed that his place was on the petitioners' bench. The general +obeyed this hint and sat down modestly on the bench assigned him. +Renewed applause {234} ensued. Thereupon Guadet ascended the tribune +and said in an ironic tone: "At the moment when M. Lafayette's presence +in Paris was announced to me, a most consoling idea presented itself. +So we have no more external enemies, thought I; the Austrians are +conquered. This illusion did not last long. Our enemies remain the +same. Our exterior situation is not altered, and yet M. Lafayette is +in Paris! What powerful motives have brought him hither? Our internal +troubles? Does he fear, then, that the National Assembly is not strong +enough to repress them? He constitutes himself the organ of his army +and of honest men. Where are these honest men? How has the army been +able to deliberate?" Guadet concluded thus: "I demand that the +Minister of War be asked whether he gave leave of absence to M. +Lafayette, and that the extraordinary Committee of Twelve make a report +to-morrow on the danger of granting the right of petition to generals." +Ramond, one of the most courageous members of the right, was the next +speaker: "Four days ago," said he, "an armed multitude asked to appear +before you. Positive laws forbade such a thing, and a proclamation +made by the department on the previous day recalled this law and +demanded that it should be put into execution. You paid no attention, +but admitted armed men into your midst. To-day M. Lafayette presents +himself; he is known only by reason of his love of liberty; his life is +a series of combats against despotisms of every sort; he has {235} +sacrificed his life and fortune to the Revolution. It is against this +man that pretended suspicions are directed and every passion unchained. +Has the National Assembly two weights and measures, then? Certainly, +if respect is to be had to persons, it should be shown to this eldest +son of French liberty." This eulogy exasperated the left. Deputy +Saladin exclaimed: "I ask M. Ramond if he is making M. Lafayette's +funeral oration?" However, the right was still in the majority. After +a long tumult Guadet's motion against Lafayette was rejected by 339 +votes against 234. The general left the Assembly surrounded by a +numerous cortège of deputies and National Guards, and went directly to +the palace of the Tuileries. + +It is the decisive moment. The vote just taken may serve as the +starting-point of a conservative reaction if the King will trust +himself to Lafayette. But how will he receive him? The sovereign's +greeting will be polite, but not cordial. The King and Queen say they +are persuaded that there is no safety but in the Constitution. Louis +XVI. adds that he would consider it a very fortunate thing if the +Austrians were beaten without delay. Lafayette is treated with a +courtesy through which suspicion pierces. When he leaves the palace, a +large crowd accompany him to his house and plant a may-pole before the +door. On the next day Louis XVI. was to review four thousand men of +the National Guard. Lafayette had proposed to appear at this review +{236} beside the King and make a speech in favor of order. But the +court does not desire the general's aid, and takes what measures it can +to defeat this project. Pétion, whom it had preferred to Lafayette as +mayor of Paris, countermands the review an hour before daybreak. + +Perhaps Louis XVI. might have succeeded in overcoming his repugnance to +Lafayette and submitted to be rescued by him. But the Queen absolutely +refused to trust the man whom she considered her evil genius. She had +seen him rise like a spectre at every hapless hour. He had brought her +back to Paris a prisoner on the 6th of October. He had been her +jailer. His apparition amid the glare of torches in the Court of the +Carrousel had frozen her with terror when she was flying from her +prison, the Tuileries, to begin the fatal journey to Varennes. His +aides-de-camp had pursued her. He was responsible for her arrest; he +was present at her humiliating and sorrowful return; the sight of his +face, the sound of his voice, made her tremble; she could not hear his +name without a shudder. In vain Madame Elisabeth exclaimed: "Let us +forget the past and throw ourselves into the arms of the only man who +can save the King and his family!" Marie Antoinette's pride revolted +at the thought of owing anything to her former persecutor. Moreover, +in his latest confidential communications with her, Mirabeau had said: +"Madame, be on your guard against Lafayette; if ever he commands the +army, he would like to keep {237} the King in his tent." In the +Queen's opinion, to rely on Lafayette would be to accept him as regent +of the palace under a sluggard King. Protector for protector, she +preferred Danton. Danton, who, subsidized from the civil list, accepts +money without knowing whether he will fairly earn it; Danton, who, +while awaiting events, had made the cynical remark that he would "save +the King or kill him." Strange that the orator of the faubourgs +inspired the daughter of Cæsars with less repugnance than the +gentleman, the marquis. "They propose M. de Lafayette as a resource," +she said to Madame Campan; "but it would be better to perish than owe +our safety to the man who has done us most harm." + +However, Lafayette was not yet discouraged. He wished to save the +royal family in spite of themselves. He assembled several officers of +the National Guard at his house. He represented to them the dangers +into which the apathy of each plunged the affairs of all; he showed the +urgent necessity of combining against the avowed enterprises of the +anarchists, of inspiring the National Assembly with the firmness +required to repress the intended attacks, and foretold the inevitable +calamities which would result from the weakness and disunion of honest +men. He wanted to march against the Jacobin Club and close it. But, +in consequence of the instructions issued by the court, the royalists +of the National Guard were indisposed to second him in this measure. +Lafayette, having no one on his side but the constitutionals, an {238} +honest but scanty group who were suspected by both of the extreme +parties, gave up the struggle. The next day, June 30, he beat a hasty +retreat to the army, after writing to the Assembly another letter which +was merely an echo of the first one. A moment since, the Jacobins were +trembling. Now, they are reassured, they triumph. In his _Chronique +des Cinquante Jours_, Roederer says: "If M. de Lafayette had had the +will and ability to make a bold stroke and seize the dictatorship, +reserving the power to relinquish it after the re-establishment of +order, one could comprehend his coming to the Assembly with the sword +of a dictator at his side; but, to show it only, without resolving to +draw it from the scabbard, was a fatal imprudence. In civil commotions +it will not answer to dare by halves." + + + + +{239} + +XXIII. + +THE LAMOURETTE KISS. + +France had still its moments of enthusiasm and illusion before plunging +into the abyss of woes. It seemed under an hallucination, or suffering +from a sort of vertigo. A nameless frenzy, both in good and evil, +agitated and disturbed it beyond measure in 1792, that year so fertile +in surprises and dramas of every kind. Strange and bizarre epoch, full +of love and hatred, launching itself from one extreme to the other with +frightful inconstancy, now weeping with tenderness, and now howling +with rage! Society resembled a drunken man who is sometimes amiable in +his cups, and sometimes cruel. There were sudden halts on the road of +fury, oases in the midst of scorching sands, beneath a sun whose fire +consumed. But the caravan does not rest long beneath the shady trees. +Quickly it resumes its course as if urged by a mysterious force, and +soon the terrible simoom overwhelms and destroys it. + +Madame Elisabeth wrote to Madame de Raigecourt, July 8, 1792: "It would +need all Madame de Sévigné's eloquence to describe properly what {240} +happened yesterday; for it was certainly the most surprising thing, the +most extraordinary, the greatest, the smallest, etc., etc. But, +fortunately, experience may aid comprehension. In a word, here were +Jacobins, Feuillants, republicans, and monarchists, abjuring all their +discords and assembling near the tree of the Constitution and of +liberty, to promise sincerely that they will act in accordance with law +and not depart from it. Luckily, August is coming, the time when, the +leaves being well grown, the tree of liberty will afford a more secure +shelter." + +What had happened on the day before Madame Elisabeth wrote this letter? +There had been a very singular session of the Legislative Assembly. In +the morning, a woman named Olympe de Gouges, whose mother was a dealer +in second-hand clothing at Montauban, being consumed with a desire to +be talked about, had caused an emphatic placard to be posted up, in +which she preached concord between all parties. This placard was like +a prologue to the day's session. + +Among the deputies there was a certain Abbé Lamourette, the +constitutional bishop of Lyons, who played at religious democracy. He +was an ex-Lazarist who had been professor of theology at the Seminary +at Toul. Weary of the conventual yoke, he had left his order, and at +the beginning of the Revolution was the vicar-general of the diocese of +Arras. He had published several works in which he sought to reconcile +philosophy and religion. Mirabeau was {241} one of his acolytes and +adopted him as his theologian in ordinary. Finding him fit to +"bishopize" (_à evêquailler_), to use his own expression, the great +tribune recommended him to the electors of the Rhone department. It +was thus that the Abbé Lamourette became the constitutional bishop of +Lyons. After his consecration, he issued a pastoral instruction in +such agreement with current ideas that Mirabeau, his protector, induced +the Constituent Assembly to have it sent as a model to every department +in France. In 1792, the Abbé Lamourette was fifty years old. Affable, +unctuous, his mouth always full of pacific and gentle words, he naïvely +preached moderation, concord, and fraternity in conversations which +were like so many sermons. + +For several days the discussions in the Assembly had been of +unparalleled violence. Suspicion, hatred, rancor, wrath, were +unchained in a fury that bordered on delirium. Right and left emulated +each other in outrages and invectives. Lafayette's appearance and the +fear of a foreign invasion had disturbed all minds. The National +Assembly, sitting both day and night, was like an arena of gladiators +fighting without truce or pity. It was this moment which the good Abbé +Lamourette chose for delivering his most touching sermon from the +tribune. + +During the session of July 7, Brissot was about to ascend the tribune +and propose new measures of public safety. Lamourette, getting before +him, asked to be heard on a motion of order. He said {242} that of all +the means proposed for arresting the divisions which were destroying +France, but one had been forgotten, and that the only one which could +be efficacious. It was the union of all Frenchmen in one mind, the +reconciliation of all the deputies, without exception. What was to +prevent this? The only irreconcilable things are crime and virtue. +What do all our mistrust and suspicions amount to? One party in the +Assembly attributes to the other a seditious desire to destroy the +monarchy. The others attribute to their colleagues a desire to destroy +constitutional equality and to establish the aristocratic government +known as that of the Two Chambers. These are the disastrous suspicions +which divide the empire. "Very well!" cried the abbé, "let us crush +both the republic and the Two Chambers." The hall rang with unanimous +applause from the Assembly and the galleries. From all sides came +shouts of "Yes, yes, we want nothing but the Constitution." Lamourette +went on: "Let us swear to have but one mind, one sentiment. Let us +swear to sink all our differences and become a homogeneous mass of +freemen formidable both to the spirit of anarchy and that of feudalism. +The moment when foreigners see that we desire one settled thing, and +that we all desire it, will be the moment when liberty will triumph and +France be saved. I ask the president to put to vote this simple +proposition: That those who equally abjure and execrate the republic +and the Two Chambers shall rise." At {243} once, as if moved by the +same impulse, the members of the Assembly rose as one man, and swore +enthusiastically never to permit, either by the introduction of the +republican system or by that of the Two Chambers, any alteration +whatsoever in the Constitution. + +By a spontaneous movement, the members of the extreme left went towards +the deputies of the right. They were received with open arms, and, in +their turn, the right advanced toward the ranks of the left. All +parties blended. Jaucourt and Merlin, Albite and Ramond, Gensonné and +Calvet, Chabot and Genty, men who ordinarily opposed each other +relentlessly, could be seen sitting on the same bench. As if by +miracle, the Assembly chamber became the temple of Concord. The moved +spectators mingled their acclamations with the oaths of the deputies. +According to the expressions of the _Moniteur_, serenity and joy were +on all faces, and unction in every heart. + +M. Emmery was the next speaker. "When the Assembly is reunited," said +he, "all the powers ought to be so. I ask, therefore, that the +Assembly at once send the King the minutes of its proceedings by a +deputation of twenty-four members." The motion was adopted. + +A few minutes later, Louis XVI., followed by the deputation and +surrounded by his ministers, entered the hall. Cries of "Long live the +nation! Long live the King!" resounded from every side. The sovereign +{244} placed himself near the president, and in a voice that betrayed +emotion, made the following address: "Gentlemen, the spectacle most +affecting to my heart is that of the reunion of all wills for the sake +of the country's safety. I have long desired this salutary moment; my +desire is accomplished. The nation and the King are one. Each of them +has the same end in view. Their reunion will save France. The +Constitution should be the rallying-point for all Frenchmen. We all +ought to defend it. The King will always set the example of so doing." +The president replied: "Sire, this memorable moment, when all +constituted authorities unite, is a signal of joy to the friends of +liberty, and of terror to its enemies. From this union will issue the +force necessary to combat the tyrants combined against us. It is a +sure warrant of liberty." + +After prolonged applause a great silence followed. "I own to you, M. +the President," presently said the complaisant Louis XVI., "that I was +longing for the deputation to finish, so that I might hasten to the +Assembly." Applause and cries of "Long live the nation! Long live the +King!" redoubled. What! this monarch now acclaimed is the same prince +against whom Vergniaud hurled invectives a few days ago with the +enthusiastic approbation of the same Assembly! He is the sovereign +whom the Girondin thus addressed: "O King, who doubtless have believed +with Lysander the tyrant that truth is no better than a lie, and that +men must be amused {245} with oaths like children with rattles; who +have pretended to love the laws only to preserve the power that will +enable you to defy them; the Constitution only that it may not cast you +from the throne where you must remain in order to destroy it; the +nation only to assure the success of your perfidy by inspiring it with +confidence,--do you think you can impose upon us to-day by hypocritical +protestations?" What has occurred since the day when Vergniaud, +uttering such words as these, was frantically cheered? Nothing. That +day, the weather-cock pointed to anger; to-day to concord. Why? No +one knows. Tired of hating, the Assembly doubtless needed an instant +of relaxation. Violent sentiments end by wearying the souls that +experience them. They must rest and renew their energies in order to +hate better to-morrow. And why say to-morrow? This very evening the +quarrelling, anger, and fury will begin anew. + +At half-past three Louis XVI. left the Hall of the Manège, in the midst +of joyful applause from the Assembly and the galleries. During the +evening session discord reappeared. The following letter from the King +was read: "I have just been handed the departmental decree which +provisionally suspends the mayor and the procureur of the Commune of +Paris. As this decree is based on facts which personally concern me, +the first impulse of my heart is to beg the Assembly to decide upon +it." Does any one believe that the Assembly will have the courage to +condemn Pétion and the 20th of June? Not a bit {246} of it. It makes +no decision, but passes unanimously from the King's letter to the order +of the day. And what occurs at the clubs? Listen to Billaud-Varennes +at the Jacobins: "They embrace each other at the Assembly," he +exclaims; "it is the kiss of Judas, it is the kiss of Charles IX., +extending his hand to Coligny. They were embracing like this while the +King was preparing for flight on October 6. They were embracing like +this before the massacres of the Champ-de-Mars. They embrace, but are +the court conspiracies coming to an end? Have our enemies ceased their +advance against our frontiers? Is Lafayette the less a traitor?" And +thereupon the cry broke out: "Pétion or death!" The next day, June 8, +at the Assembly, loud applause greeted the orator from a section who +said, concerning the department: "It openly serves the sinister +projects and disastrous conspiracies of a perfidious court. It is the +first link in the immense chain of plots formed against the people. It +is an accomplice in the extravagant projects of this general, who, not +being able to become the hero of liberty, has preferred to make himself +the Don Quixote of the court." A deputy exclaimed: "The acclamations +with which the Assembly has listened to this petition authorize me to +ask its publication: I make an express motion to that effect." And the +publication was decreed. + +O poor Lamourette! humanitarian abbé, rose-water revolutionist, of what +avail is your democratic holy water? What have you gained by your +sentimental {247} jargon? what do your dreams of evangelical philosophy +and universal brotherhood amount to? Poor constitutional abbé, people +are scoffing already at your sacerdotal unction, your soothing homily! +The very men who, to please you, have sworn to destroy the republic, +will proclaim it two and a half months later. Your famous reunion of +parties, people are already shrugging their shoulders at and calling it +the "_baiser d'Amourette, la réconciliation normande_": the calf-love +kiss, the pretended reconciliation. They accuse you of having sold +yourself to the court. They ridicule, they flout, and they will kill +you. January 11, 1794, Fouquier-Tinville's prosecuting speech will +punish you for your moderatism. You will carry your head to the +scaffold, and, optimist to the end, you will say: "What is the +guillotine? only a rap on the neck." + + + + +{248} + +XXIV. + +THE FÉTE OF THE FEDERATION IN 1792. + +The fête of the Federation, which was to be celebrated July 14, was +awaited with anxiety. The federates came into Paris full of the most +revolutionary projects. Anxiety and anguish reigned at the Tuileries. +Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, who were to be present in the +Champ-de-Mars, feared to be assassinated there. The Queen's +importunities decided the King to have a plastron made, to ward off a +poniard thrust. Composed of fifteen thicknesses of Italian taffeta, +this plastron consisted of a vest and a large belt. Madame Campan +secretly tried it on the King in the chamber where Marie Antoinette was +lying. Pulling Madame Campan by the dress as far as possible from the +Queen's bed, Louis XVI. whispered: "It is to satisfy her that I yield; +they will not assassinate me; their plan is changed; they will put me +to death in another way." When the King had gone out, the Queen forced +Madame Campan to tell her what he had just said. "I had divined it!" +she exclaimed. "He has said this long time that all that is going on +in France is an imitation of the revolution in England under Charles I. +I begin to dread {249} an impeachment for him. As for me, I am a +foreigner, and they will assassinate me. What will become of my poor +children?" And she fell to weeping. Madame Campan tried to administer +a nervine, but the Queen refused it. "Nervous maladies," said she. +"are the ailments of happy women; I no longer have them." Without her +knowledge a sort of corset, in the style of her husband's plastron, had +been made for her. Nothing could induce her to wear it. To those who +implored her with tears to put it on, she replied: "If seditious +persons assassinate me, so much the better; they will deliver me from a +most sorrowful life." + +The fête of the Federation was celebrated in 1792 amidst extremely +tragical preoccupations. Things had changed very greatly since the +fête which had excited such enthusiasm two years earlier. On July 14, +1790, the Champ-de-Mars was filled at four o'clock in the morning by a +crowd delirious with joy. At eight o'clock in the morning of July 14, +1792, it was still empty. The people were said to be at the Bastille +witnessing the laying of the first stone of the column to be erected on +the ruins of the famous fortress. On the Champ-de-Mars there was no +magnificent altar served by three hundred priests, no side benches +covered by an innumerable crowd, none of that sincere and ardent joy +which throbbed in every heart two years before. For the fête of 1792, +eighty-three little tents, representing the departments of the kingdom, +had been erected on hillocks of sand. {250} Before each tent stood a +poplar, so frail that it seemed as if a breath might blow away the tree +and its tri-colored pendant. In the middle of the Champ-de-Mars were +four stretchers covered with canvas painted gray which would have made +a miserable decoration for a boulevard theatre. It was a so-called +tomb, an honorary monument to those who had died or were about to die +on the frontiers. On one side of it was the inscription: "Tremble, +tyrants; we will avenge them!" The Altar of the Country could hardly +be seen. It was formed of a truncated column placed on the top of the +altar steps raised in 1790. Perfumes were burned on the four small +corner altars. Two hundred yards farther off, near the Seine, a large +tree had been set up and named the Tree of Feudalism. From its +branches depended escutcheons, helmets, and blue ribbons interwoven +with chains. This tree rose out of a wood-pile on which lay a heap of +crowns, tiaras, cardinals' hats, Saint Peter's keys, ermine mantles, +doctors' caps, and titles of nobility. A royal crown was among them, +and beside it the escutcheons of the Count de Provence, the Count +d'Artois, and the Prince de Condé. The organizers of the fête hoped to +induce the King himself to set fire to this pile, covered with feudal +emblems. A figure representing Liberty, and another representing Law, +were placed on casters by the aid of which the two divinities were to +be rolled about. Fifty-four pieces of cannon bordered the +Champ-de-Mars on the side next the Seine, and the Phrygian cap crowned +every tree. + +{251} + +At eleven in the morning the King and his cortège arrived at the +Military School. A detachment of cavalry opened the march. There were +three carriages. In the first were the Prince de Poix, the Marquis de +Brézé, and the Count de Saint-Priest; in the second, the Queen's +ladies, Mesdames de Tarente, de la Roche-Aymon, de Maillé, and de +Mackau; in the third, the King, the Queen, their two children, and +Madame Elisabeth. The trumpets sounded and the drums beat a salute. A +salvo of artillery announced the arrival of the royal family. The +sovereign's countenance was mild and benevolent. Marie Antoinette +appeared still more majestic than usual. The dignity of her demeanor, +the grace of her children, and the angelic charm of Madame Elisabeth +inspired a tender respect. The little Dauphin wore the uniform of a +National Guard. "He has not deserved the cap yet," said the Queen to +the grenadiers. + +The royal family took their places on the balcony of the Military +School, which was covered with a red velvet carpet embroidered with +gold, and watched the popular procession, entering the Champ-de-Mars by +the gate of the rue de Grenelle, and marching towards the Altar of the +Country. What a strange procession! Men, women, children, armed with +pikes, sticks, and hatchets; bands singing the _Ça ira_; drunken +harlots, adorned with flowers; people from the faubourgs with the +inscription, "Long live Pétion!" chalked on their head-gear; six +legions of National Guards marching pell-mell with the _sans-culottes_; +red {252} caps; placards with devices either ferocious or stupid, like +this one: "Long live the heroes who died in the siege of the Bastille!" +a plan in relief of the celebrated fortress; a travelling +printing-press throwing off copies of the revolutionary manifesto, +which the crowd at first mistook for a little guillotine; a great deal +of noise and shouting,--and there you have the popular cortège. By way +of compensation, the troops of the line and the grenadiers of the +National Guard displayed extremely royalist sentiments. The 104th +regiment of infantry having halted under the balcony, its band played +the air: _Où peut-on être mieux qu'au sein de sa famille?_ (Where is +one better off than in the bosom of his family?) + +The moment when Louis XVI. left the Military School to walk to the +Altar of the Country with the National Assembly was not without +solemnity. A certain anxiety was felt by all as to what might happen. +Would Louis XVI. be struck by a ball or by a poniard? What might not +be feared from so many demoniacs, howling like cannibals? The King, +the deputies, the soldiers, the crowd, all pressed against each other +in a solid mass that left no vacant spaces; all was in continual +undulation. Louis XVI. could only advance slowly and with difficulty. +The intervention of the troops was necessary to enable him to reach the +Altar of the Country, where he was to swear allegiance for the second +time to the Constitution whose fragments were to overwhelm his throne. +"It needed the character of Louis XVI.," Madame de {253} Staël has +said, "it needed that martyr character which he never belied, to +support such a situation as he did. His gait, his countenance, had +something peculiar to himself; on other occasions one might have wished +he had more grandeur; but at this moment it was enough for him to +remain what he was in order to appear sublime. From a distance I +watched his powdered head in the midst of all those black ones; his +coat, still embroidered as it had been in former days, stood out +against the costumes of the common people who pressed around him. When +he ascended the steps of the altar, one seemed to behold the sacred +victim offering himself in voluntary sacrifice." + +The Queen had remained on the balcony of the Military School. From +there she watched through a lorgnette the dangerous progress of the +King. A prey to inexpressible emotion, she remained motionless during +an entire hour, hardly able to breathe on account of excessive anguish. +She used the lorgnette steadily, but at one moment she cried out: "He +has come down two steps!" This cry made all those about her shudder. +The King could not, in fact, reach the summit of the altar, because a +throng of suspicious-looking persons had already taken possession of it. + +Deputy Dumas had the presence of mind to cry out: "Attention, +Grenadiers! present arms!" The intimidated _sans-culottes_ remained +quiet, and Louis XVI. took the oath amid the thundering of the cannon +ranged beside the Seine. + +{254} + +It was then proposed to the King that he should set fire to the Tree of +Feudalism; it was close to the river and the arms of France were hung +upon it. Louis XVI. spared himself that shame, exclaiming, "There is +no more feudalism!" He returned to the Military School by the way he +came. The 6th legion of the National Guard had not yet marched past +when the cavalry announced the King's approach. This legion, +quickening its pace, was intercepted by the royal escort, and invaded, +not to say routed, by the populace, which from all sides pressed into +its ranks. + +Meanwhile the anguish of Marie Antoinette redoubled. "The expression +of the Queen's face," Madame de Staël says again, "will never be +effaced from my memory. Her eyes were drowned in tears; the splendor +of her toilette, the dignity of her demeanor, contrasted with the +throng that surrounded her. Nothing separated her from the populace +but a few National Guards; the armed men assembled in the Champ-de-Mars +seemed more as if they had come together for a riot than for a +festival." Pétion, who had been reinstated in his functions as mayor +of Paris on the previous day, was the hero of the occasion. They +called him King Pétion, and the cheers which resounded in honor of this +revolutionist were like a funeral knell in the ears of Marie Antoinette. + +At last Louis XVI. appeared in front of the Military School. The Queen +experienced a momentary joy in seeing him approach. Rising hastily, +she ran {255} down the stairs to meet him. Always calm, the King +tenderly clasped his wife's hand. At once royalist sentiment took +fire. All who were present--National Guards, troops of the line, +Switzers, people in the courts, at the windows, on balconies and +gates--all cried: "Long live the King! Long live the Queen!" The +royal family regained the Tuileries in the midst of acclamations. At +the entrance of the palace enthusiasm deepened. From the Royal Court +to the great stairway of the Horloge Pavilion, the grenadiers of the +National Guard, who had escorted and saved the King, formed into line +with shouts of joy. + +"All former souvenirs," says the Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "all +former habits of respect then awoke.... Yes, I saw and observed this +multitude; it was animated with the best sentiments; at heart it was +faithful to its King and crowned him with sincere benedictions. But do +popular love and fidelity afford any support to a tottering throne? He +is mad who can think so. The people will be spectators of the latest +combat and will applaud the victor. And let no one blame them! What +can they do if they are not united, encouraged, and led? The people +behold a few seditious individuals attack a throne, and a few +courageous men defend it; they fear one party and desire the success of +the other. When the struggle is over, they submit and obey. The most +honest of them weep in silence, the timid force themselves to display a +guilty joy in order to escape the hatred of the victors whom they see +{256} bathing themselves in blood. They think about their families, +their affairs, their means of support. They were not expected to lead +themselves; that duty was imposed on others; have they fulfilled it?" + +It is said that during the fête those who were friendly to the King, +amongst the crowd, were awaiting a signal they expected from him. They +hoped that, by the assistance of the Swiss, they could force their way +to the royal family during the confusion of a hand-to-hand affray, and +get them safely out of Paris. But Louis XVI. neither spoke nor acted. +He returned to his palace without having dared anything. And, +nevertheless, there were still many chances of safety open. Imagine +the effect of a haughty bearing, a commanding gesture in place of the +inert attitude habitual to the unfortunate sovereign. Fancy the Most +Christian King, the heir of Louis XIV., on horseback, haranguing the +people in the style of his witty and valiant ancestor, Henry IV.! He +is still King. The troops of the line are faithful. The great +majority of the National Guard are well-disposed towards him. Luckner, +Lafayette, Dumouriez himself, would ask nothing better than to defend +him if he would show a little energy. + +The day after the ceremony of July 14, Lafayette was still anxious that +Louis XVI. should leave Paris openly and go to Compiègne, so as to show +France and Europe that he was free. In case of resistance, the general +demanded only fifty loyal cavaliers to take the royal family away. +From Compiègne, picked {257} squadrons would conduct them to the midst +of the French army, the asylum of devotion and honor. But Louis XVI. +refused. The last resources remaining to him were to evaporate between +his hands. He will profit neither by the sympathies of all European +courts, which ardently desire his safety; by his civil list, which +might be such an efficacious means of action; nor by the loyalty of his +brave soldiers, who are ready to shed their last drop of blood in his +defence. A large party in the Legislative Assembly would ask nothing +but a signal, providing it were seriously given, to rally with vigor to +the royal cause. He had intrepid champions there whom no menace could +affright, and who on every occasion, no matter how violent or +tumultuous the galleries might be, had braved the storm with heroic +constancy. Public opinion was changing for the better. The schemes +and language of the Jacobins exasperated the mass of honest people. +The provinces were sending addresses of fidelity to the King. + +What was lacking to the monarch to enable him to combine so many +scattered elements into a solid group? A little will, a little of that +essential quality, audacity, which, according to Danton, is the last +word of politics. But Louis XVI. has a timorous soul. If he makes one +step forward, he is in haste to make another back. He is scrupulous, +hesitating; he has no confidence in himself or any one else. This +prince, so incontestably courageous, acts as if he were a coward. He +has made so many concessions already that {258} the idea of any manner +of resistance seems to him chimerical. Does the fate of Charles I. +make him dread the beginning of civil war as the supreme danger? Does +he fear to imperil the lives of his wife and children by an energetic +deed? Is he expecting foreign aid? Does he think to prove his wisdom +by his patience, and that success will crown delay? Is he so +benevolent, so gentle, that the least thought of repression is +repugnant to him? Does he wish to carry to extremes that pardon of +injuries which is recommended by the Gospel? What is plain is, that he +rejects every firm resolution. + +Palliatives, expedients, half-measures, were what suited this honest +but feeble nature. Disturbed by contradictory councils, and no longer +knowing what to desire or what to hope, he looked on at his own +destruction like an unmoved spectator. He was no longer a sovereign +full of the sentiment of his power and his rights, but an almost +unconscious victim of fatality. Example full of startling lessons for +all leaders of state who adopt weakness as a system, and who, under +pretext of benevolence or moderation, no longer know how to foresee, to +will, or to strike! + + + + +{259} + +XXV. + +THE LAST DAYS AT THE TUILERIES. + +During one of the last nights of July, at one o'clock, Madame Campan +was alone near the Queen's bed, when she heard some one walking softly +in the adjoining corridor, which was ordinarily locked at both ends. +Madame Campan summoned the valet-de-chambre, who went into the +corridor; presently the noise of two men fighting reached the ears of +Marie Antoinette. "What a position!" cried the unfortunate Queen. +"Insults by day and assassins by night!" The valet cried: "Madame, it +is a scoundrel whom I know; I am holding him."--"Let him go," said the +Queen. "Open the door for him; he came to assassinate me; he will be +carried in triumph by the Jacobins to-morrow." + +People were constantly saying that the Faubourg Saint-Antoine was +getting ready to march against the palace. Marie Antoinette was so +badly guarded, and it was so easy to force an entrance to her apartment +on the ground-floor, opposite the garden, that Madame de Tourzel, her +children's governess, begged her to sleep in the Dauphin's room on the +first floor. The Queen was averse to this step, as she was {260} +unwilling to have any one suspect her uneasiness. But Madame de +Tourzel having shown her that it would be easy to keep the secret of +this change by using the Dauphin's private staircase, she ended by +accepting the proposal so long as the trouble should last. She was so +thoughtful of all those in her service that it cost her much to +incommode them in the least. Finally, she consented to use the bed of +the governess, and a pallet was laid for the latter every evening. +Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel slept on a sofa in an adjoining closet. +As no one in the house suspected that the Queen might have changed her +apartment for the night, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter took +precautionary measures. When the Queen had gone to bed, they rose, and +after making sure that the doors were locked, they shot the inside +bolts. "The closet I occupied served as a passage for the royal family +when they went to supper," says Mademoiselle de Tourzel, afterwards +Madame de Béarn, in her _Souvenirs de Quarante Ans_; "I went to bed +early; sometimes I pretended to be asleep when the Princes were passing +through, and I saw them approach my sofa, one after another; I heard +their expressions of kindness and good will toward me, and noticed what +care they took not to disturb my slumber." + +Poor Marie Antoinette! Could one believe that a Queen of France would +be reduced to keeping a little dog in her bedroom to warn her of the +least noise in her apartment? The Dauphin, delighted to {261} have his +mother sleep so near him, used to run to her as soon as he awoke, and +clasping her in his little arms would say the most affectionate things. +This was the only moment of the day that brought her any consolation. + +By the end of July, both the Queen and her children were obliged to +give up walking in the garden. She had gone out to take the air with +her daughter in the Dauphin's small parterre at the extreme end of the +Tuileries, close to the Place Louis XV. Some federates grossly +insulted her. Four Swiss officers made their way through the crowd, +and placing the Queen and the young Princess between them, brought them +back to the palace. When she reached her apartments, Marie Antoinette +thanked her defenders in the most affecting terms, but she never went +out again. + +After June 20, the garden, excepting the terrace of the Feuillants, +which, by a decree of the Assembly, had become a part of its precincts, +had been forbidden to the populace. Posters warned the people to +remain on the terrace and not go down into the garden. The terrace was +called National Ground, and the garden the Land of Coblentz. +Inscriptions apprised passers-by of this novel topography. Tri-colored +ribbons had been tied to the banisters of the staircases by way of +barriers. Placards were fastened at intervals to the trees bordering +the terrace, whereon could be read: "Citizens, respect yourselves; give +the force of bayonets to this feeble barrier. Citizens, do {262} not +go into this foreign land, this Coblentz, abode of corruption." The +leaders had such an empire over the crowd that no one disobeyed. And +yet it was the height of summer, the trees offered their verdant shade, +and the King had withdrawn all his guards and opened every gate. +Nobody dared infringe the revolutionary mandate. One young man, paying +no attention, went down into the garden. Furious clamors broke out on +all sides. "To the lamp-post with him!" cried some one on the terrace. +Thereupon the young man, taking off his shoes, drew out his +handkerchief and began to wipe the dust from their soles. People cried +bravo, and he was carried in triumph. + +Marie Antoinette could not become resigned to this hatred. Often she +frightened her women by wishing to go out of the palace and address the +people. "Yes," she would cry, her voice trembling, as she walked +quickly to and fro in her chamber, "yes, I will say to them: Frenchmen, +they have had the cruelty to persuade you that I do not love France, I, +the wife of its King and the mother of a Dauphin!" Then, this brief +moment of generous exaltation over, the illusion of being able to move +a nation of insulters quickly vanished. Her life was a daily, hourly +struggle. The wife, the mother, the queen, never ceased to contend +against destiny. She hardly slept or ate; but from the very excess of +danger she drew additional energy, and moral and material force. As +she awoke at daybreak, she required that the {263} shutters should not +be closed, so that her sleepless nights might be sooner consoled by the +light of morning. The most widely diverse sentiments occupied her +soul. A captive in her palace, she sometimes believed herself +irrevocably condemned by fate, and sometimes hoped for deliverance. + +Toward the middle of one of the last nights preceding the 10th of +August, the moon shone into her bedchamber. "In a month," she said to +Madame Campan, "I shall not see that moon unless I am freed from my +chains." But she was not free from anxiety concerning all that might +happen before that. "The King is not a poltroon," she added; "he has +very great passive courage, but he is crushed by a false shame, a doubt +of himself, which arises from his education quite as much as from his +character. He is afraid of commanding; he dreads above everything to +speak to assemblages of men. He lived uneasily and like a child, under +the eyes of Louis XV. until he was twenty, and this constraint has had +an effect on his timidity. In our circumstances, a few clearly spoken +words addressed to the Parisians who are devoted to us would immensely +strengthen our party, but he will not say them." Then Marie Antoinette +explained why she did not put herself forward more: "For my part," said +she, "I could act, and mount a horse if need were; but, if I acted, it +would put weapons into the hands of King's enemies; a general outcry +would be raised in France against the Austrian woman, against female +domination; moreover, {264} I should reduce the King to nothingness by +showing myself. A queen who is not regent must in such circumstances +remain inactive and prepare to die." + +The danger constantly increased. At four in the morning of one of the +last days of July, warning was given at the palace that the faubourgs +were threatening, and would doubtless march against the Tuileries. +Madame Campan went very softly into the Queen's room. For a wonder, +Marie Antoinette was sleeping peacefully and profoundly. Madame Campan +did not rouse her. "You were right," said Louis XVI.; "it is good to +see her take a little rest. Oh! her griefs redouble mine!" At her +waking the Queen, on being informed of what had passed, began to weep, +and said: "Why was I not called?" Madame Campan excused herself by +saying: "It was only a false alarm. Your Majesty needed to repair your +prostrate strength."--"It is not prostrate," quickly replied the +courageous sovereign; "misfortune makes it all the greater. Elisabeth +was with the King, and I was sleeping! I, who wish to perish beside +him! I am his wife; I am not willing that he should incur the least +danger without me!" + +On Sunday, August 5,--the last Sunday the royal family were to spend at +the Tuileries,--as they were going to the chapel to hear Mass, half the +National Guards on duty cried: "Long live the King!" The others said: +"No, no; no King, down with the veto!" The same day, at Vespers, the +chanters had agreed to swell their tones greatly, and in a {265} +menacing way, when reciting this versicle of the _Magnificat: Deposuit +potentes de sede_--"He hath put down the mighty from their seat." In +their turn the royalists, after the _Dominum salvum fac regem_, cried +thrice, turning as they did so toward the Queen: _Et reginam_. There +was a continual murmuring all through the divine office. Five days +later, the same chapel was to be a pool of blood. + +And yet Madame Elisabeth, always calm and always angelic, still had +illusions. One morning of this terrible month of August, while in her +room in the Pavilion of Flora, she thought she heard some one humming +her favorite air, _Pauvre Jacques_, beneath her windows. Attracted by +this refrain, which in the midst of sorrow renewed the souvenir of +happier times, she half opened her window and listened attentively. +The words sung were not those of the ballad she loved, yet they were +royalist in sentiment and adapted to the same air. The poor people had +been substituted for poor Jack--the poor people who were pitied for +having a king no longer and for knowing nothing but wretchedness. Such +marks of attachment consoled the virtuous Princess, and made her hope +against all hope. She wrote, August 8, to her friend Madame de +Raigecourt: "They say that the King is going to be turned out of here +somewhat forcibly, and made to lodge in the Hôtel-de-Ville. They say +that there will be a very strong movement to that effect in Paris. Do +you believe it? For my part, I do not. I believe in rumors, but not +in their {266} resulting in anything. That is my profession of faith. +For the rest, everything is perfectly quiet to-day. Yesterday passed +in the same way, and I think this one will be like it." On August 9, +the eve of the fatal day, Madame Elisabeth again addressed a reassuring +letter to one of her friends, Madame de Bombelles. Curiously enough +she dated this letter August 10, no doubt by accident, and when Madame +de Bombelles received it, she read these lines, which seem like the +irony of fate: "This day of the 10th, which was to have been so +exciting, so terrible, is as calm as possible; the Assembly has decreed +neither deposition nor suspension." + + + + +{267} + +XXVI. + +THE PROLOGUE TO THE TENTH OF AUGUST. + +The first rumblings of the storm began. People quarrelled and fought +in the Palais Royal, the cafés, and the theatres. Half of the National +Guard sided with the court, and the other half with the people. To +seditious speeches were added songs full of insults to the King and +Queen. These songs, sold on every corner, applauded in every tavern, +and repeated by the wives and children of the people, propagated +revolutionary fury. There was a constant succession of gatherings, +brawls, and riots. The Assembly had declared the country in danger. +Rumors of every sort excited popular imagination. It was said that +priests who refused the oath were in hiding at the Tuileries, which +was, moreover, full of arms and munitions. The Duke of Brunswick's +manifesto exasperated national sentiment. It was read aloud in every +street. The leaders neglected nothing likely to excite the populace, +and prepared their last attack on the throne, their afterpiece of June +20, with as much audacity as skill. + +In order to subdue the court, it was necessary to destroy its only +remaining means of defence. To {268} leave plenty of elbow-room for +the riot, the Assembly, on July 15, ordered the troops of the line to +be sent some thirty-five miles beyond Paris and kept there. A singular +means was devised for breaking up the choice troops of the National +Guard, who were royalists. They were told that it was contrary to +equality for certain citizens to be more brilliantly equipped than +others; that a bearskin cap humiliated those who were entitled only to +a felt one; and that there was a something aristocratic about the name +of grenadier which was really intolerable to a simple foot-soldier. +The choice troops were dissolved in consequence, and the grenadiers +came to the Assembly like good patriots to lay down their epaulettes +and bearskin caps and assume the red cap. On July 30, the National +Guard was reconstructed, by taking in all the vagabonds and bandits +that the clubs could muster. + +The famous federates of Marseilles, who were to take such an active +part in the coming insurrection, arrived in Paris the same day. The +Girondins, having failed to obtain their camp of twenty thousand men +before Paris, had devised instead of it a reunion of federate +volunteers, summoned from every part of France. The roads were at once +thronged by future rioters whom the Assembly allowed thirty cents a day. + +The Jacobins of Brest and Marseilles distinguished themselves. Instead +of a handful of volunteers they sent two battalions. That of +Marseilles, recruited by {269} Barbaroux, comprised five hundred men +and two pieces of artillery. Starting July 5, it entered Paris July +30. Excited to fanaticism by the sun and the declamations of the +southern clubs, it had run over France, been received under triumphal +arches, and chanted in a sort of frenzy the terrible stanzas of Rouget +de l'Isle's new hymn, the _Marseillaise_. It was at this time that +Blanc Gilli, deputy from the Bouches du Rhone department to the +Legislative Assembly, wrote: "These pretended Marseillais are the scum +of the jails of Genoa, Piedmont, Sicily, and of all Italy, Spain, the +Archipelago, and Barbary. I run across them every day." Rouget de +l'Isle received from his old mother, a royalist and Catholic at heart, +a letter in which she said: "What is this revolutionary hymn which a +horde of brigands are singing as they pass through France, and in which +your name is mixed up?" At Paris the accents of that terrible melody +sounded like strokes of the tocsin. The men who sang it filled the +conservatives with terror. They wore woollen cockades and insulted as +aristocrats those who wore silk ones. + +There was no longer any dike to the torrent. August 1, Louis XVI. +nominated a cabinet composed of loyal men: Joly was Minister of +Justice; Champion de Villeneuve, of the Interior; Bigot de +Sainte-Croix, of Foreign Affairs; Du Bouchage, of the Marine; Leroux de +la Ville, of Public Taxes; and D'Abancourt, of War. But this ministry +was to last only ten days. Certain petitioners at the bar of the {270} +Assembly asked for the deposition of the King in most violent language. +"This measure," says Barbaroux in his Memoirs, "would have carried +Philippe of Orléans to the regency, and therefore his party violently +clamored for it. His creditors, his hirelings, and boon-companions, +Marat and his Cordeliers, all manner of swindlers and insolvent +debtors, thronged public places and incited to this deposition because +they were hungry for money and positions under a regent who was their +tool and their accomplice." + +In vain did Louis XVI. display those sentiments of paternal kindness +which had hitherto availed him so little. August 3, he sent a message +to the Assembly, in which he said: "I will uphold national independence +to my latest breath. Personal dangers are nothing compared to public +ones. Oh! what are personal dangers to a King whom men are seeking to +deprive of his people's love? This is the real plague-spot in my +heart. Perhaps the people will some day know how dear their welfare is +to me. How many of my sorrows could be obliterated by the least +evidence of a return to right feeling!" + +How did they respond to this conciliatory language? After it had been +read, Pétion, the mayor of Paris, presented himself at the bar, and +read an address from the Council General of the Commune, in which these +words occur: "The chief of the executive power is the first link of the +counter-revolutionary chain.... Through a lingering forbearance, we +would have desired the power to ask you for the {271} suspension of +Louis XVI., but to this the Constitution is opposed. Louis XVI. +incessantly invokes the Constitution; we invoke it in our turn, and ask +you for his deposition." The next day the municipality distributed +five thousand ball cartridges to the Marseillais, while refusing any to +the National Guards. + +Nevertheless, the Girondins still hesitated. Guadet, Vergniaud, and +Gensonné would have declared themselves satisfied if the three +ministers belonging to their party had been reinstated, and on July 29 +they secretly despatched a letter to the sovereign, by Thierry, his +valet-de-chambre, in which they said that, "attached to the interests +of the nation, they would never separate them from those of the King +except in so far as he separated them himself." As to Barbaroux, like +a true visionary, he dreamed of I know not what rose-water +insurrection. "They should not have entered the apartments of the +palace," he has said, "but merely blockaded them. Had this plan been +followed, the blood of Frenchmen and Swiss, ignorant victims of court +perfidy, would not have been shed on the 10th of August, the republic +would have been founded without convulsions or massacres, and we, +corroded by popular gangrene, should not have become the horror of all +nations." The demagogues were not at all certain of success. +Robespierre was to spend the 10th of August in the discreet darkness of +a cellar. Danton was prudently to await the end of the combat before +arming himself with a big sabre and marching at the head of the +Marseilles {272} battalion as the hero of the day. Barbaroux says in +his Memoirs that on the 1st, 3d, and 7th of August, Marat implored him +to take him to Marseilles, and that on the evening of the 9th he +renewed this prayer more urgently than ever, adding that he would +disguise himself as a jockey in order to get away. + +In spite of their many weaknesses, the majority of the Assembly were +royalists and constitutionalists still. The proof is that on August 8, +in spite of the violent menaces of the galleries, they decided by 406 +against 244 votes, that there was no occasion to impeach Lafayette, so +abhorred by the Jacobins. This vote excited the wrath of the +revolutionists to fury. The conservative deputies were insulted, +pursued, and struck. Several of them barely escaped assassination. +The sessions became stormier from day to day. Not only were the large +galleries of the Assembly overthronged by violent crowds, but the +courtyards, the approaches, and the corridors were obstructed. Many +sat or stood on the exterior entablatures of the high windows. The +upper part of the hall, where the Jacobins sat, received many +strangers, in spite of the often-reiterated opposition of the right. +Below this Mountain sat the members of the centre, the _Ventrus_. +There were not seats enough for them, and they were crowded up in a +ridiculous manner. At the bottom of the hall, almost entirely +deserted, were the forty-four members of the right. They were easily +marked and counted by their future executioners, who threatened them by +voice and gesture. Every {273} day the petitioners who were admitted +to the honors of the session avoided the empty benches of the right and +seated themselves with the Mountain or the centre, where they crowded +still more the already overcrowded deputies. The discussions were like +formidable tempests. "The effect produced by such a spectacle," says +Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "was still greater on those who +entered the hall during one of those terrible moments. I received this +impression several times myself, and it will never be effaced from my +mind; I seek vainly for expressions by which to describe it. Long +afterwards, M. de Caux, then Minister of War, said to me: 'You made the +profoundest impression on me which I ever received in my life. I was +young at the time. I entered the galleries just as you were standing +out against the furious shouts of a part of the deputies and the people +in the galleries.'" + +Meanwhile the end was approaching. Faithful royalists still proposed +schemes of flight to Louis XVI. Bertrand de Molleville, who is so ill +disposed toward Madame de Staël, says concerning this: "There was +nobody, even to Madame de Staël, who, either in the hope of being +pardoned the injury her intrigues had done the King, or else through +her continual need of intrigue, had not invented some plan of escape +for His Majesty." Louis XVI. declined them all. He would owe nothing +to Lafayette. He relied on the money he had given to Danton and other +demagogues, and hoped that the {274} insurrectionary bands would be +repulsed by the royalists of the National Guard and the Swiss regiment. +August 8th, in the evening, this fine regiment left its Courbevoie +barracks and arrived at the Tuileries at daybreak next morning. Under +various idle pretexts it had been deprived of its twelve pieces of +artillery, and also of three hundred men who had been given the +commission, true or false as may be, to watch over the transportation +of corn in Normandy. Only seven hundred and fifty, officers and +soldiers, remained; but all of them had said: "We will let ourselves be +killed to the last man rather than fail in honor or betray the sanctity +of our oaths." In company with a handful of noblemen, these were to be +the last defenders of the throne. The fatal hour was approaching. The +section of the Cordeliers had decided that if the Assembly had not +pronounced the King's deposition by the evening of August 9th, the +drums should beat the general alarm at the stroke of midnight, and the +insurrection march against the Tuileries. The revolutionists were to +carry out their plan, and the Swiss to keep their word. + + + + +{275} + +XXVII. + +THE NIGHT OF AUGUST NINTH TO TENTH. + +The night was serene, the sky clear and sown with stars. The calmness +of nature contrasted with the revolutionary passions that had been +unchained. On account of the heat, all the windows of the Tuileries +had been left open, and from a distance the palace could be seen +illuminated as if for a fête. It had just struck midnight. The +Revolution was executing the programme of the Cordeliers' section. The +tocsin was sounding all over the city. Everybody named the church +whose bell he thought he recognized. The people of the faubourgs were +out of bed in their houses. The drums mingled with the tocsin. The +revolutionists beat the general alarm, and the royalists the call to +arms. + +No one was asleep at the Tuileries. There was no further question of +etiquette. The night reception in the royal bedchamber was omitted for +the first time. Certain old servitors, faithful guardians of +tradition, in vain recalled that it was not permissible to sit down in +the sovereign's apartments. The courtiers of the last hour seated +themselves in armchairs, on tables and consoles. Louis XVI. stayed +sometimes {276} in his chamber and sometimes in his Great Cabinet, also +called the Council Hall, where the assembled ministers received +constant tidings of what was happening without. The pious monarch had +summoned his confessor, Abbé Hébert, and shutting himself up with this +venerable priest, he besought from Heaven the resignation and courage +he needed to pass through the final crisis. Madame Elisabeth showed +the faithful Madame Campan the carnelian pin which fastened her fichu. +These words, surrounding the stalk of a lily, were engraved on it: +"Forget offences, pardon injuries."--"I fear much," said the virtuous +Princess, "that this maxim has little influence over our enemies, but +it must be none the less dear to us." Louis XVI. did not wear his +padded vest. "I consented to do so on the 14th of July," said he, +"because on that day I was merely going to a ceremony where an +assassin's dagger might be apprehended. But on a day when my party may +be forced to fight with the revolutionists, I should think it cowardly +to preserve my life by such means." + +Marie Antoinette was grave and tranquil in her heroism. There was +nothing affected about her, nothing theatrical, neither passion, +despair, nor the spirit of revenge. According to the expressions of +Roederer, who never left her, "she was a woman, a mother, a wife in +peril; she feared, she hoped, she grieved, and she took heart again." +She was also a queen, and the daughter of Maria Theresa. Her anxiety +and grief were restrained or concealed by {277} her respect for her +rank, her dignity, and her name. When she reappeared amidst the +courtiers in the Council Hall, after having dissolved in tears in +Thierry's room, the redness of her cheeks and eyes had disappeared. +The courtiers said to each other: "What serenity! what courage!" + +The struggle might still seem doubtful. Something like two hundred +noblemen who had spontaneously repaired to the King, seven hundred and +fifty Swiss, and nine hundred mounted gendarmes posted at the +approaches of the Tuileries were the last resources of the +commander-in-chief of the French army. The Swiss, who through some +one's extreme imprudence had not cartridges enough, were posted in the +apartments, the chapel, and at the entry of the Royal Court. Baron de +Salis, as the oldest captain of the regiment, commanded at the +stairways. A reserve of three hundred men, under Captain Durler, was +stationed in the Swiss Court, before the Pavilion of Marsan. The +National Guards belonging to the sections _Petits-Pères_ and the +_Filles-Saint-Thomas_ showed themselves well disposed toward the King; +but it was different with the other companies. As to the mounted +gendarmes, Louis XVI. could not count on them, and before the riot +ended they were to join the insurgents in spite of all the efforts made +by their royalist officers. The artillerists of the National Guard, +charged with serving the cannons placed in the courts and before the +palace doors to defend the entry, were to act in the same manner. + +{278} + +Like the Swiss, the two hundred noblemen, martyrs to the old French +ideas of honor, had resolved to be loyal unto death. With their silk +coats and drawing-room swords, they seemed as if they had come to a +fête instead of a combat. The servants of the chateau joined them. +Some of them had pistols and blunderbusses. Some, for lack of other +weapons, had taken the tongs from the chimneys. They jested with each +other over their accoutrements. No, no; there was nothing laughable in +these champions of misfortune. They represented the past, with its +ancient fidelity to the altar and the throne. A great poet who had the +spirit of divination, Heinrich Heine, wrote on November 12, 1840, as if +he foresaw February 24, 1848: "The middle classes will possibly make +less resistance than the aristocracy would do in a similar case. Even +in its most pitiable weakness, its enervation by immorality and its +degeneration through flattery, the old nobility was still alive to a +certain point of honor unknown to our middle classes, who have become +prosperous by industry, but who will perish by it also. Another 10th +of August is predicted for these middle classes; but I doubt whether +the industrial Knights of the throne of July will prove themselves as +heroic as the powdered marquises of the old régime who, in silk coats +and flimsy dress swords, opposed the people who invaded the Tuileries." +The greater part of these noblemen, volunteers for the last conflict, +were old men with white hair. There were also children among them. +{279} M. Mortimer-Ternaux, author of the _Histoire de la Terreur_, has +remarked: "Was not this a time to exclaim with Racine:-- + + "'See what avengers arm themselves for the quarrel?' + + +"Who could have told Louis XIV., when in the midst of the splendors of +his court he was present at the performance of _Athalie_, that the poet +was predicting, through the mouth of Joad, the fate reserved for his +great-grandson?" The royalist National Guards who were in the +apartments considered the volunteer noblemen as companions in arms. +They shook hands with each other amid cries of "Long live the King! +Long live the National Guard!" But the troops outside did not share +these sentiments. Jealous of the royalists assembled in the palace, +they wanted to have them sent out. A regimental commander having come +to make known this desire to Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette exclaimed: +"Nothing can separate us from these gentlemen; they are our most +faithful friends. They will share the dangers of the National Guard. +They will obey us. Put them at the cannon's mouth, and they will show +you how men die for their King." + +Meantime what had become of Pétion, whose business it was, as mayor, to +defend the palace? Summoned to the Tuileries, he arrived there at +eleven in the evening. As Louis XVI. said to him: "It seems there is a +great deal of commotion?"--"Yes, sire," he replied, "the excitement is +great." And he {280} enlarged upon the measures he claimed that he had +taken, and his pretended haste to wait upon the King. In going out, he +came face to face with M. de Mandat, who, as general-in-chief of the +National Guard, was in command of all military forces. "Why," +exclaimed he, "have the police refused cartridges to the National Guard +when they have wasted them on the Marseillais? My men have only four +charges apiece; some of them have not one. No matter; I answer for +everything; my measures are taken, providing I am authorized, by an +order signed by you, to repel force by force." Not daring to avow his +complicity with the riot, Pétion signed the order demanded. Then he +made his escape under pretext of inspecting the gardens, and fell +amongst some royalist National Guards, who reprimanded him severely. +He began to fear being kept at the Tuileries as a hostage, to guarantee +the palace against the attempts of the populace, and went to the +Assembly. It had adjourned at ten o'clock the evening before, but on +account of the crisis had met again at two in the morning. The +Assembly knew the gravity of the danger as well as the King did; but +through a ridiculous and culpable point of honor, it affected not to +recognize it, and devoted to the reading of a colonial report the +moments it should have employed in saving that Constitution it had +sworn to maintain. Pétion merely put in an appearance in the Hall of +the Manège. But he took good care not to return to the Tuileries. At +half-past three in the morning the {281} rolling of a carriage was +heard from the palace. It was that of the mayor, going back empty. He +had not dared to get into it, and had only sent his coachman an order +to return when he found himself in safety at the mayoralty, whither he +had made his way on foot. + +Meanwhile, some hundred unknown individuals, who gathered at the +Hôtel-de-Ville, and surreptitiously made their way into one of the +halls, had formed an insurrectionary Commune. On their own authority +they appointed commissaries of sections, and dismissed the staff of the +National Guard, who were very much in their way; but retained in office +Manuel as procurator and Pétion as mayor. This new municipality, whose +very existence was unknown at the palace, had just learned that Mandat, +general-in-chief of the National Guard, had a document in his pocket by +which Pétion authorized him to oppose force to force. It was necessary +to get rid of this document at any cost. The municipality sent Mandat +an order to come to the Hôtel-de-Ville. He knew nothing about the +revolution that had just taken place there. And yet he hesitated to +obey. A secret presentiment took possession of his soul. Finally, at +the instance of Roederer, he decided, towards five in the morning, to +leave the Tuileries and go to that Hôtel-de-Ville, which was to be so +fatal to him. When he came before the municipality he was surprised to +see new faces. + +He was accused of having intended to disperse "the {282} innocent and +patriotic column of the people," and sentenced to be taken to the Abbey +prison. It was a sentence of death. Mandat was massacred on the steps +of the Hôtel-de-Ville. A pistol-shot brought him down. Pikes and +sabres finished him. His body was thrown into the Seine. Such was the +first exploit of the new Commune. It preluded thus the massacres of +September. "Mandat's death," says Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, +"was, beyond any doubt, the chief cause of the calamities of the day. +If he had attacked the rebels as soon as they came near the palace, he +could have dispersed them with ease. They took a long time to form and +set off; and, being undecided and uneasy, they often halted. No troop +marching from a given point in this immense city knew whether it was +seconded by the rebels from other quarters, and lost much time in +making sure." The second exploit of the Commune was to confine Pétion +at the mayoralty under the guard of six men. A voluntary captive, this +accomplice of the insurrection rejoiced at a measure which sheltered +him from every danger. As M. Mortimer-Ternaux has observed: "On this +fatal night, when the passion of the royalty was fulfilled, Pétion +doubled the parts of Judas and Pontius Pilate. Like Judas, he went at +nightfall to give the kiss of peace to Louis XVI. by assuring him of +his loyalty; like the Roman governor, he proclaimed at daybreak the +impotence with which he had stricken himself, and washed his hands of +all that was to happen." + +{283} + +When the first fires of this fatal day were kindling in the sky, Marie +Antoinette experienced a profound emotion. Looking with melancholy at +the horizon which began to lighten: "Sister," said she to Madame +Elisabeth, "come and see the sun rise." It was the sun that was to +illumine the death-struggle of royalty. Sinister omen! the sun was red +as blood. + + + +{284} + +XXVIII. + +THE MORNING OF AUGUST TENTH. + +The fatal day began. It was five o'clock in the morning. The Queen +made her children rise, lest the swords of the insurgents should +surprise them in their beds. The Dauphin, unaccustomed to being called +so early, stared with surprise at the spectacle presented by the court +and garden. "Mamma," said he, "why should any one harm papa? He is so +good!" Then, turning to a little girl who was his usual companion in +his games, he addressed her these words, which prove how well, in spite +of his age, he knew the peril he was in: "Here, Josephine, take this +lock of my hair, and promise to wear it as long as I am in danger." + +Led by their chief, Marshal de Mailly, an old man of eighty-six, the +two hundred noblemen, who had assembled in the Gallery of Diana, passed +in review before the royal family with those of the National Guards who +were royalists. "Sire," exclaimed the old marshal, bending his knee, +"here are your faithful nobles who have hastened to re-establish Your +Majesty on the throne of your ancestors."--"For this once," responded +Louis XVI., "I consent that {285} my friends should defend me; we will +perish or save ourselves together." The last defenders of the throne +shed tears of fidelity and tenderness. They kneeled before Marie +Antoinette, and entreated the honor of kissing her hand. Never had the +Queen appeared more gracious and majestic. The National Guards, +enchanted, loaded their arms with transport. The Queen seized the +Dauphin in her arms and held him above their heads like a living +standard. The young men shouted: "Long live the Kings of our fathers!" +And the old men cried: "Long live the King of our children!" + +At the gates of the Tuileries the tide was rising. Vanguards of the +insurrection, the Marseillais arrived unhindered. The municipality had +succeeded in removing the cannons which were to have prevented approach +by way of the Pont-Neuf and the Pont-Royal. Mandat was no longer there +to issue orders. Nothing impeded the march of the faubourgs. + +And yet resistance might still have been possible. It is Barbaroux, +the fierce revolutionist himself, who says so. "All the faults +committed by the insurrection, the wretched arrangement of the +attacking party, the terror of some and the ignorance of others, the +forces at the palace, all made the victory of the court certain, if the +King had not left his post. If he had shown himself on horseback, a +large majority of the people of Paris would have pronounced for him." +Napoleon, who was an eye-witness, had said the night before to Pozzo di +Borgo, that with two {286} battalions of Swiss and some cavalry he +would undertake to give the rioters a lesson they would remember. In +the evening of August 10, he wrote to his brother Joseph: "According to +what I saw of the temper of the crowd in the morning, if Louis XVI. had +mounted a horse, he would have gained the victory." Very few of the +insurgents were seriously determined on a revolt. Most of them marched +blindly, not knowing, and not even asking, whither they went. + +Westermann had been obliged to threaten Santerre, and even to put his +sword against his breast, in order to induce him to march. A great +number of the people of the faubourgs, uneasy as to the result of the +enterprise, said that, considering the preparations made by the palace, +it would be better to defer the matter to another day. The unarmed +crowd followed through mere curiosity, and were ready to take flight at +the first discharge of musketry. According to Count de Vaublanc, the +Swiss, if they had been commanded by a good officer from four o'clock +in the morning, would have sufficed to disperse the multitude as they +came up, and possibly might have won the day for the King without +bloodshed. "Thus, the best of princes rendered useless the courage of +his defenders, and to spare the blood of his enemies accomplished the +ruin of his friends. All his virtues turned against him and brought +him to his ruin." M. de Vaublanc says again in his Memoirs: "At six in +the morning those who were in revolt had not yet assembled. How much +time had been lost, how {287} much was still to be lost! It was too +evident that no military judgment had presided over that strange +disposition of troops, so placed within and without the palace as to be +unable to give each other mutual support; a military man knows too well +the value of the briefest moments, he knows too well how quickly +victory can be decided by attacking the flank of a multitude with a +small number of brave men. If the King had appointed one of the +generals near him absolute master of operations, no doubt this general +would have given the rebels no time to unite.... Alas! Louis XVI. had +three times more courage than was necessary to conquer, but he knew not +how to avail himself of it." Such also was the opinion of M. Thiers, +who, in his _Histoire de la Révolution française_, says: "It must be +repeated, the unfortunate Prince feared nothing for himself. He had, +in fact, refused to wear a wadded vest, as he had done on July 14, +saying that on a day of combat he ought to be as much exposed as the +least of his servants. Courage did not fail him then, and afterwards +he displayed a bravery that was noble and elevated enough; but he +lacked boldness to take the offensive.... It is certain, as has been +frequently said, that if he had mounted a horse and charged at the head +of his troops, the insurrection would have been put down." + +Toward six o'clock the King went out on the balcony. He was saluted +with acclamations. Then he went down the great staircase with the +Queen to {288} inspect the troops stationed in the courtyards. As one +of his gentlemen-of-the-chamber, Emmanuel Aubier, has remarked: "He had +never made war himself during his reign; there had never been a war on +the continent; he was so unfortunate as to be wanting in grace, even +awkward, and to look thoughtful rather than energetic,--a thing +displeasing to French soldiers." Instead of putting on a uniform and +mounting a horse, he wore a purple coat, of the shade used as mourning +for kings, on this fatal day when he was to wear mourning for the +monarchy. Unspurred, unbooted, shod as if for a drawing-room, with +white silk stockings, his hat under his arm, his hair out of curl and +badly powdered, there was nothing martial, nothing royal about him. At +this hour, when what was needed was the attitude and the fire of a +Henry IV., he looked like an honest country gentleman talking with his +farmers. The first condition of inspiring confidence is to possess it. +Louis XVI.'s aspect was much more that of a victim than a sovereign. +The cries of "Long live the King!" which would have been enthusiastic +for a prince ready to battle for his rights and reconquer his realm at +the sword's point, were few and sad. After having inspected the troops +in the courts, Louis XVI. decided to inspect those in the garden also. +The Queen returned to the palace, and he continued his rounds. + +The loyal National Guards, comprising the companies of the +_Petits-Pères_ and the _Filles-Saint-Thomas_, were drawn up on the +terrace between the palace and {289} the garden. They received the +King sympathetically and advised him to continue his inspection as far +as the Place Louis XV. At this moment a battalion of the National +Guards from the Saint-Marceau section defiled before him, uttering +shouts of hatred and fury. Louis XVI. was undisturbed by this. He +remained calm, and when this battalion had got into position, he +tranquilly reviewed it. Then he walked on again and crossed the entire +garden. The battalion of the _Croix-Rouge_, which was on the terrace +beside the water, cried from a distance: "Down with the veto! Down +with the traitor!" On the terrace of the Feuillants, at the other +side, there was an equally violent crowd. The King, calm as ever, went +on to the swing-bridge by which the Tuileries was entered from Place +Louis XV. He was well enough received by the troops stationed there. +But his return to the palace could not but be difficult. The National +Guards of the _Croix-Rouge_ had broken rank and come down from the +terrace beside the river to the garden, and pressed around the King +with menacing shouts. The unfortunate monarch could only re-enter the +palace where he had but a few moments more to stay, by calling to his +aid a double row of faithful grenadiers. The ministers who were at the +windows became alarmed. One of them, M. de Bouchage, cried: "Great +God! it is the King they are hooting! What the devil are they doing +down there? Quick; we must go after him!" And he hastened to descend +into the garden with his colleague, {290} Bigot de Sainte-Croix, to +meet his master. The Queen, who beheld the sight, shed tears. The two +ministers brought back Louis XVI. He came in out of breath, and +fatigued by the heat and the exercise he had taken, but otherwise +seeming very little moved. "All is lost," said the Queen. "This +review has done more harm than good." + +From this moment bad tidings succeeded each other without interruption. +They were apprised of the formation of the new Commune, Mandat's +murder, the march of the faubourgs, and the arrival of the first +detachments of rioters. The Marseillais debouched into the Carrousel, +and sent an envoy to demand that the gate of the Royal Court should be +opened. As it remained closed, they knocked on it with repeated blows, +while the National Guards said: "We will not fire on our brothers." + +Would resistance have been possible even at this moment; that is to +say, between seven and eight in the morning? M. de Vaublanc thought +so. "I do not know," he writes, "to what section the first band that +arrived on the Carrousel belonged; it was in disorder and badly armed. +If the King had marched towards this troop at the head of a battalion +of the National Guard, if he had pronounced these words: 'I am your +King; I order you to lay down your arms,' the success would have been +decided. The flight of a single battalion of rebels would have +sufficed to frighten and disperse the others, even before they were +formed into line." + +{291} + +It was at this time that Roederer, instead of counselling resistance, +implored Louis XVI. to seek shelter in the Assembly for the royal +family. "Sire," he said in an urgent tone, "Your Majesty has not five +minutes to lose; there is no safety for you except in the National +Assembly. In the opinion of the department, it is necessary to go +there without delay. There are not men enough in the courtyards to +defend the palace; nor are they perfectly well-disposed. On the mere +recommendation to be on the defensive, the cannoneers have already +unloaded their cannons."--"But," said the King, "I did not see many +persons on the Carrousel."--"Sire," returned Roederer, "there are a +dozen pieces of artillery, and an immense crowd is arriving from the +faubourgs." The idea of a flight before the insurrection revolted the +Queen's pride. "What are you saying, Sir?" cried she; "you are +proposing that we should seek shelter with our most cruel persecutors! +Never! never! I will be nailed to these walls before I consent to +leave them. Sir, we have troops."--"Madame, all Paris is on the march. +Resistance is impossible. Will you cause the massacre of the King, +your children, and your servants?" + +Louis XVI. still hesitating, Roederer vehemently insisted. "Sire," +said he, "time presses; this is no longer an entreaty nor even a +counsel we take the liberty of offering you; there is only one thing +left for us to do now, and we ask your permission to take you away." +The King looked fixedly at his {292} interlocutor for several seconds; +then, turning to the Queen, he said: "Let us go," and rose to his feet. +Madame Elisabeth said: "Monsieur Roederer, do you answer for the King's +life?"--"Yes, Madame, with my own," responded the communal attorney. +Then, turning to the King: "Sire," said he, "I ask Your Majesty not to +take any of your court with you, but to have no cortège but the +department and no escort except the National Guard."--"Yes," replied +the King, "there is nothing but that to say." The Minister of Justice +exclaimed: "The ministers will follow the King."--"Yes, they have a +place in the Assembly."--"And Madame de Tourzel, my children's +governess?" said the Queen.--"Yes, Madame; she will accompany you." + +Roederer then left the King's chamber, where this conversation had +taken place, and said in a loud voice to the persons crowding together +in the Council Hall: "The King and his family are going to the Assembly +without other attendants than the department, the ministers, and a +guard." Then he asked: "Is the officer who commands the guard here?" +This officer presenting himself, he said to him: "You must bring +forward a double file of National Guards to accompany the King. The +King desires it." The officer replied: "It shall be done." Louis XVI. +came out of his chamber with his family. He waited several minutes in +the hall until the guard should arrive, and, going around the circle +composed of some forty or fifty persons belonging to his court: "Come, +{293} gentlemen," said he, "there is nothing more to do here." The +Queen, turning to Madame Campan, said: "Wait in my apartment; I will +rejoin you or else send word to go I don't know where." Marie +Antoinette took no one with her except the Princess de Lamballe and +Madame de Tourzel. The Princess de Tarente and Madame de la +Roche-Aymon, afflicted at the thought of being left at the Tuileries, +went down with all the other ladies to the Queen's apartments on the +ground-floor. + +La Chesnaye, who had succeeded to the command of the National Guard in +consequence of Mandat's death, put himself at the head of the escort. +This was formed of detachments from the most loyal battalions, the +_Petits-Pères_, the _Suite des Moulins_, and the _Filles-Saint-Thomas_, +re-enforced by about two hundred Swiss, commanded by the colonel of the +regiment, Marquis de Maillardoz, and the major, Baron de Bachmann. The +cortège reached the great staircase by way of the Council Hall, the +Royal Bedchamber, the OEil-de-Boeuf, the Hall of the Guards, and the +Hall of the Hundred Swiss. As he was passing through the +OEil-de-Boeuf, Louis XVI. took the hat of the National Guard on his +right, and replaced it by his own, which was adorned with white +feathers. The guard, surprised, removed the King's hat from his head +and carried it under his arm. + +When Louis XVI. arrived at the foot of the stairs in the Pavilion of +the Horloge, his thoughts recurred {294} to the faithful adherents who +had so uselessly devoted themselves to his defence, and whom he was +leaving at the Tuileries without watchword or direction. "What is +going to become of all those who have stayed up stairs?" said +he.--"Sire," replied Roederer, "it seemed to me that they were all in +colored coats. Those who have swords need only lay them off, follow +you, and go out through the garden."--"That is true," returned Louis +XVI. In the vestibule, a little further on, as he was about to quit +the fatal palace which fate had condemned him never to re-enter, he had +a last moment of scruple and hesitation. He said again: "But after +all, there are not many people on the Carrousel." + +"True, Sire," replied Roederer; "but the faubourgs will soon arrive, +and all the sections are armed, and have assembled at the municipality; +besides, there are neither men enough here, nor are they determined +enough to resist the actual gathering on the Carrousel, which has +twelve pieces of artillery." + +The die is cast; Louis XVI. abandons the Tuileries. Respect alone +restrains the grief and indignation that move the Swiss soldiers and +the noblemen whose weapons and whose blood have been refused. They +looked down from the windows at the cortège, or better, the funeral +procession of royalty. It was about seven o'clock in the morning. The +escort was drawn up in two lines. The members of the department formed +a circle around the royal family. Roederer walked first. Then came +the King, with {295} Bigot de Sainte-Croix, Minister of Foreign +Affairs, at his side; the Queen followed, giving her left arm to M. du +Bouchage, Minister of Marine, and her right hand to the Dauphin, who +held Madame de Tourzel with the other; then Madame Royale and Madame +Elisabeth, with De Joly, Minister of Justice; the Minister of War, +D'Abancourt, leading the Princess de Lamballe. The Ministers of the +Interior and of Taxes, Champion de Villeneuve and Le Roux de la Ville, +closed the procession. The air was pure and the morning radiant. The +sun lighted up the garden, the marble sculpture, and the sheets of +water. Birds sang under the trees, and nature smiled on this day of +mourning as if it were a festival. + +Looking at the populace, Madame Elisabeth said: "All those people have +gone astray; I should like them to be converted; I should not like them +to be punished." Tears stood in the eyes of the little Madame Royale. +The Princess de Lamballe said mournfully: "We shall never return to the +Tuileries!" The Prince de Poix, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts +d'Haussonville, de Vioménil, de Hervilly, and de Pont-l'Abbé, the +Marquis de Briges, Chevalier de Fleurieu, Viscount de Saint-Priest, the +Marquis de Nantouillet, MM. de Fresnes and de Salaignac, the King's +equerries, and Saint-Pardoux, the equerry of Madame Elisabeth, followed +the sad procession. They passed through the grand alley unobstructed +as far as the parterres, then turned to the right, {296} toward the +alley of the chestnut trees. There a halt of some minutes occurred, in +order to give time for warning the Assembly. Louis XVI. looked down at +a heap of dead leaves which had been swept up by the gardeners after a +storm the night before. "There are a good many leaves," said the King; +"they are falling early this year." It was only a few days before that +Manuel had written in a journal that the King would not last until the +falling of the leaves. Perhaps Louis XVI. remembered the prophecy of +the revolutionist; the Dauphin, with the carelessness belonging to his +age, amused himself by kicking about the dead leaves, the leaves that +had fallen as his father's crown was falling at this moment. + +Before the royal family could enter the Assembly chamber, it was +necessary that the step the King had taken should be announced to the +deputies. The president of the department undertook this commission. +A deputation of twenty-four members was at once sent to meet Louis XVI. +They found him in the large alley at the foot of the terrace of the +Feuillants, a few steps from the staircase leading up to it, and which +goes as far as the lobby through which one enters the hall occupied by +the National Assembly. "Sire," said the leader of the deputation, "the +Assembly, eager to contribute to your safety, offers to you and your +family an asylum in its midst." + +During this time, the terrace and the staircase had become thronged by +a furious crowd. A man {297} carrying a long pole cried out in rage: +"No, no; they shall not enter the Assembly. They are the cause of all +our troubles. This must be ended. Down with them!" Roederer, +standing on the fourth step of the staircase, cried: "Citizens, I +demand silence in the name of the law. You seem disposed to prevent +the King and his family from entering the National Assembly; you are +not justified in opposing it. The King has a place there in virtue of +the Constitution; and though his family has none legally, they have +just been authorized by a decree to go there. Here are the deputies +sent to meet the King; they will attest the existence of this decree." +The deputies confirmed his words. Nevertheless, the crowd still +hesitated to leave the way clear. The man with the pole kept on +brandishing it, and crying: "Down with them! down with them!" +Roederer, going on to the terrace, snatched the pole and flung it into +the garden. The crowd was so compact that in the midst of the squabble +some one stole the Queen's watch and her purse. A man with a sinister +face approached the Dauphin, took him from Marie Antoinette, and lifted +him in his arms. The Queen uttered a cry. "Do not be frightened," +said the man; "I will do him no harm." Another person said to Louis +XVI.: "Sire, we are honest men; but we are not willing to be betrayed +any longer. Be a good citizen, and don't forget to drive away your +shavelings and your wife." Insults and threats resounded from all +sides. Finally, after an actual struggle, the royal family succeeded +{298} in opening a passage. They made their way with difficulty +through the narrow lobby, choked with people, penetrated the crowd, and +entered the session chamber. It was there that royalty, humiliated and +overcome, was to lie at the point of death under the eyes of its +implacable enemies. + + + + +{299} + +XXIX. + +THE BOX OF THE LOGOGRAPH. + +The royal family has just entered the session chamber. It will find +there not an asylum, but the vestibule of the prison and the scaffold. +The man who had taken the Dauphin from the Queen's arms at the door of +the Assembly set him down on the secretary's desk with an air of +triumph, and the young Prince was greeted with applause. Marie +Antoinette advanced with dignity. According to Vaublanc's expression, +she would not have had a different bearing or a more august serenity on +a day of royal pomp. Louis XVI. took a place near the president. The +Queen, her daughter, Madame Elisabeth, and Madame de Tourzel sat down +on the ministerial benches. As soon as the Dauphin was left to +himself, he sprang towards his mother. A voice cried: "Take him to the +King! The Austrian woman is unworthy of the people's confidence." An +usher attempted to obey this injunction. However, the child began to +cry, people were affected, and he was allowed to remain with the Queen. +At this moment some armed noblemen made their appearance at the +extremity of the hall. "You {300} compromise the King's safety!" +exclaimed some one, and the nobles retired. + +Order was restored. Louis XVI. began to speak. "I came here," said +he, "to prevent a great crime, and I think that I could be nowhere more +secure than amidst the representatives of the nation." Alas! the crime +will not be prevented, but only adjourned. Vergniaud occupied the +president's chair. "Sire," he replied, "you may count on the firmness +of the National Assembly. It knows its duties; its members have sworn +to die in defending the rights of the people and the constituted +authorities." + +So they still called Louis XVI. Sire; presently they will call him +nothing but Louis Capet. They allow him to take an armchair near the +president; but in a few minutes they will find this place too good for +him. And it is the voice of this very Vergniaud who, a few hours from +now, will pronounce his deposition, and five months later his sentence +of death. + +Hardly had the unhappy King sat down when Chabot, the unfrocked +Capuchin, claimed that a clause of the Constitution forbade the +Assembly to deliberate in presence of the sovereign. Under this +pretext his place was changed, and Louis XVI. with all his family was +shut up in the reporters' gallery, sometimes called the box of the +Logograph. This miserable hole, about six feet high by twelve wide, +was on a level with the last ranks of the Assembly, behind the +president's chair and the seats of the {301} secretaries. It was +ordinarily set apart for the editors, or rather for the stenographers +of a great newspaper which reported the proceedings, and which was +called the _Journal logographique_, or the _Logotachygraphe_, usually +abbreviated into the _Logographe_. Louis XVI. seated himself in the +front of the box, Marie Antoinette half-concealed herself in a corner, +where she sought a little shelter against so many humiliations. Her +children and their governess took places on a bench with Madame +Elisabeth and the Princess de Lamballe. Several noblemen, the latest +courtiers of misfortune, stood up behind them. + +Roederer, who was at the bar, then made a report in the name of the +municipal department, in which he explained all that had taken place. +He declared that he had said to the soldiers and National Guard +detailed for the defence of the Tuileries: "We do not ask you to shed +the blood of your brethren nor to attack your fellow-citizens; your +cannons are there for your defence, not for an attack; but I require +this defence in the name of the law, in the name of the Constitution. +The law authorizes you, when violence is used against you, to repress +it vigorously.... Once more, you are not to be assailants, but to act +on the defensive only." + +Roederer added that the cannoneers, instead of complying with his +urgent exhortations, gave no response save that of unloading their +pieces before him. After having explained how greatly the {302} +defence was disorganized, he thus ended his report: "We felt ourselves +no longer in a position to protect the charge confided to us; this +charge was the King; the King is a man; this man is a father. The +children ask us to assure the existence of the father; the law asks us +to assure the existence of the King of France; humanity asks of us the +existence of the man. No longer able to defend this charge, no other +idea presented itself than that of entreating the King to come with his +family to the National Assembly.... We have nothing to add to what I +have just said, except that, our force being paralyzed, and no longer +in existence, we can have none but that which it shall please the +National Assembly to communicate. We are ready to die in the execution +of the orders it may give us. We ask, while awaiting them, to remain +near it, being useless everywhere else." The Assembly, not then +suspecting that it would so soon depose Louis XVI., applauded without +contradiction from the galleries. The president said to Roederer: "The +Assembly has listened to your account with the greatest interest; it +invites you to be present at the session." + +The advice given by Roederer to the King has been greatly blamed. The +event has seriously influenced the judgment since passed upon it. If +Louis XVI. had received the support he had a right to count on from the +representatives, things would have appeared in quite another light. +Count de Vaublanc, in his Memoirs, has rendered full justice {303} to +the loyal intentions of the municipal attorney. "The advice he gave +has been accounted a crime," says M. de Vaublanc; "I think it is an +unjust reproach. Until then he had done all that lay in his power to +contribute to the defence of the palace. He must have seen clearly +that as the King would not defend himself, he could no longer be +defended. If the rebels had been attacked, neither M. Roederer nor any +one else would have proposed going to the Assembly; but since they were +on the defensive, and without any recognized leader, the magistrate +might doubtless have been struck with a single thought: The King and +his family are about to be massacred. The King put an end to all +irresolution in saying these words: 'There is nothing more to do here.'" + +At first, Louis XVI. seemed not to repent of the step he had been +obliged to take. Even in that wretched hole, the Logograph box, his +face at first was calm and even confident. As the shouting had +increased outside, Vergniaud ordered the removal of the iron grating +separating this box from the hall, so that in case the populace made an +irruption into the lobbies, the King could take refuge in the midst of +the deputies. In default of workmen and tools, the deputies nearest at +hand, the Duke de Choiseul, Prince de Poix, and the ministers, +undertook to tear away the grating, and Louis XVI. himself, accustomed +to the rough work of a locksmith, joined his efforts to theirs. The +fastenings having been broken in this manner, the unfortunate sovereign +seemed not {304} to doubt the sentiments of the National Assembly. He +pointed out the most remarkable deputies to the Dauphin, chatted with +several among them, and looked on at the session like a mere spectator +in a box at the theatre. + +The royal family had been nearly two hours at the Assembly when all of +a sudden a frightful discharge of musketry and artillery was heard. +The deputies of the left grew pale with fear and anger, thinking +themselves betrayed. Casting glances of uneasiness and wrath at the +feeble monarch, they accused him of having ordered a massacre, and said +that all was lost. An officer of the National Guard rushed in, crying: +"We are pursued, we are overpowered!" The galleries, affrighted, +imagined that the Swiss would arrive at any moment. Excitement was at +its height. Sinister, imposing, dreadful moment! Solemn hour, when +the monarchy, amidst a frightful tempest, was like a venerable oak +which lightning has just stricken; when terror, wrath, and pity +disputed the possession of men's souls, and when the King, already +captive, was present like Charles V. at his own funeral. Marie +Antoinette had started. At the sound of the cannon her cheeks kindled +and her eyes blazed. A vague hope animated her. Perhaps, she said +within herself, the monarchy is at last to be avenged; perhaps the +Swiss are about to give the insurrection a lesson it will remember; +perhaps Louis XVI. will re-enter in triumph the palace of his +forefathers. The daughter of Cæsars prayed God in silence, and +supplicated {305} Him to grant victory to the defenders of the throne. + +Chimeras! vain hopes! Louis XVI. has no longer but one idea: to cast +off all responsibility for events. He mustered up, so to say, the +little authority he had yet remaining, to write hastily, in pencil, the +last order he was to sign: the order to stop firing. He flattered +himself that the prohibition to shoot would justify him completely in +the sight of the National Assembly, and induce them to treat him with +more consideration. But he asked himself anxiously who would be bold +enough to carry his order as far as the palace. Would not so perilous +a mission intimidate even the most heroic? M. d'Hervilly, who was at +this moment in the box of the Logograph, offered himself. As the King +and Queen at first refused his offer, and pointed out all the dangers +of such an errand: "I beg Their Majesties," cried he, "not to think of +my danger; my duty is to brave everything in their service; my place is +in the midst of the firing, and if I were afraid of it I should be +unworthy of my uniform." These words determined Louis XVI. to give M. +d'Hervilly the order signed by his own hand; the valiant nobleman, +bearing this order which was to have such disastrous consequences for +the defenders of the palace, went hastily out of the Assembly hall and +made his way to the Tuileries through a rain of balls and canister. + + + + +{306} + +XXX. + +THE COMBAT. + +What had taken place at the Tuileries after the departure of the royal +family for the Assembly? At the very moment when they abandoned this +palace which they were never to see again, the Marseillais, the +vanguard of the insurrection, were pounding at the gate of the +principal courtyard, furious because it was not opened. A few minutes +later, the column of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, after passing through +the rue Saint-Honoré, debouched on the Carrousel. It was under command +of the Pole, Lazouski, and Westermann, who directed it toward the gate +of the Royal Court. As the Marseillais had not yet succeeded in +forcing this, Westermann had it broken open. The cannoneers, whose +business it was to defend the palace, at once declared on the side of +the riot and turned their pieces against the Tuileries. With the +exception of the domestics there were now in the palace only the seven +hundred and fifty Swiss, about a hundred National Guards, and a few +nobles. The sole instructions the Swiss received came from old Marshal +de Mailly: "Do not let yourselves be taken." Louis XVI. had said +absolutely nothing on going {307} away, and his departure discouraged +his most faithful adherents. Add to this that the Swiss had not enough +cartridges. What was to be the fate of this fine regiment, this _corps +d'élite_, which everywhere and always had set the example of discipline +and military honor; which ever since the Revolution began had haughtily +repulsed every attempt to tamper with it; and whose red uniforms alone +struck terror into the populace? These brave soldiers guarded +respectfully the traditions of their ancestors who, at the famous +retreat of Meaux, had saved Charles IX. "But for my good friends the +Swiss," said that prince, "my life and liberty would have been in a bad +way." What the Swiss of the sixteenth century had done for one King of +France, the Swiss of the eighteenth century would have done for his +successor. They would have saved Louis XVI. if he would have let +himself be saved. + +A major-general who had remained at the Tuileries, judging that it was +impossible to defend the courts with so few soldiers, cried: +"Gentlemen, retire to the palace!" "They had to leave six cannon in +the power of the enemy and to abandon the courts. It should have been +foreseen that it would be necessary to retake these under penalty of +being burned in the palace; the common soldiers said so loudly. +Meanwhile they obeyed, and were disposed as well as time and the +localities permitted. The stairs and windows were lined with +soldiers." (Account of Colonel Pfyffer d'Altishoffen, published at +Lucerne in 1819.) + +{308} + +One post occupied the chapel, and another the vestibule and grand +staircase. There were Swiss also at the windows looking into the +courts. "Down with the Swiss!" cried the Marseillais. "Down! down! +Surrender!" However, the struggle had not yet begun. Nearly fifteen +minutes elapsed between the invasion of the Royal Court and the first +shot. The Marseillais brandished their pikes and guns, but they were +not confident, for at first they dared not cross the court more than +half-way. The Swiss and National Guards who were at the windows made +gestures to induce the populace to quiet down and go away. The throng +of insurgents grew greater every minute. They had just got their +cannon into battery against the Tuileries. What the Swiss specially +intended was to defend the grand staircase, so as to prevent the +apartments on the first floor from being invaded. This staircase, +afterwards destroyed, was in the middle of the vestibule of the Horloge +Pavilion. The chapel, whose site was afterwards changed, was on the +level of the first landing; and from this landing, two symmetrical +flights, at right angles with the first, led to the Hall of the Hundred +Swiss (the future Hall of the Marshals). Westermann, bolder than the +other insurgents, had advanced as far as the vestibule with several +Marseillais. He began to parley with the soldiers, trying to set them +against their officers and induce them to lay down their arms. +Sergeant Blazer answered Westermann: "We are Swiss, and the Swiss only +lay down their weapons with their lives." + +{309} + +The officers caused a barricade of pieces of wood to be raised on the +first landing at the head of the stairs, to prevent new deputations +from coming to demoralize their men. The Marseillais attempted to take +it by main force. Some of them were armed with halberds terminating in +hooks. These they thrust below the barricade, trying to catch the men +defending it. They seized an adjutant in this way and disarmed him. +At the foot of the stairs "they seized the first Swiss sentry and +afterwards five others. They laid hold of them with hooked pikes which +they thrust into their coats and drew them forwards, disarming them at +once of their sabres, guns, and cartridge-boxes, amidst shouts of +laughter. Encouraged by the success of this forlorn hope, the whole +crowd pressed towards the foot of the stairs and there massacred the +five Swiss already taken and disarmed." (M. Peltier's Relation.) Then +a pistol-shot was heard. From which side did it come? Was it the +Marseillais who provoked the combat? Was it the Swiss who sought to +avenge their comrades, the sentries? Whoever it was, this pistol-shot +was the signal for the fight, which began about half-past ten in the +morning. + +At first the Swiss had the advantage. Every shot they fired from the +windows told. Among the people crowding the courtyards were many who +had not come to fight, but through mere curiosity. Pale with fright, +they fled toward the Carrousel through the gate of the Royal Court, +which was strewn in an {310} instant with guns, pikes, and +cartridge-boxes. Some of the insurgents fell flat on their faces and +counterfeited death, rising occasionally and gliding along the walls to +gain the sentry-boxes of the mounted sentinels as best they could. +Even the majority of the cannoneers deserted their pieces and ran like +the rest. The courts were cleared in an instant. Two Swiss officers, +MM. de Durler and de Pfyffer, instantly made a sortie at the head of +one hundred and twenty soldiers, took four cannon, and found themselves +once more masters of the door of the Royal Court. A detachment of +sixty soldiers formed themselves into a hollow square before this door +and kept up a rolling fire on the rioters remaining on the Carrousel +until the place was completely swept. At the same time, on the side of +the garden, another detachment of Swiss, under Count de Salis, seized +three cannon and brought them to the palace gate. Napoleon, who +witnessed the combat from a distance, says: "The Swiss handled their +artillery with vigor; in ten minutes the Marseillais were chased as far +as the rue de l'Echelle, and never came back until the Swiss were +withdrawn by the King's order." + +It was now, in fact, that M. d'Hervilly arrived, hatless and unarmed, +through the fusillade of grape. They wanted to show him the +dispositions they had just made on the garden side. "There is no +question of that," said he; "you must go to the Assembly; it is the +King's order." The unfortunate soldiers flattered themselves that they +might still {311} be of use. "Yes, brave Swiss," cried Baron de +Viomesnil, "go and find the King. Your ancestors did so more than +once." In spite of their chagrin at abandoning the field of which they +they had just become masters, they obeyed. Their only thought was to +repair to that Assembly where a last humiliation awaited them. The +officers had the drums beat the call to arms, and, in spite of the rain +of balls from every side, they succeeded in marshalling the soldiers as +if for a dress parade in front of the palace, opposite the garden. The +signal for departure was given. An unforeseen peril was reserved for +these heroes. The battalions of the National Guard, stationed at the +door of the Pont Royal, at that of the Manège court, and the beginning +of the terrace of the Feuillants, had stood still, with their weapons +grounded, since the affray began. But hardly had the Swiss entered the +grand alley than these battalions, neutral until now, detailed a number +of individuals who hid behind the trees, and fired, with their muzzles +almost touching the troops. On reaching the middle of the alley, the +Swiss, who hardly deigned to return this fire, divided into two +columns. The first, turning to the right under the trees, went towards +the staircase leading to the Assembly from the terrace of the +Feuillants. The second, which followed at a short distance and acted +as a rearguard, went on as far as the Place Louis XV., where it found +the mounted gendarmes. If this body of cavalry had done its duty, it +would have united with the {312} Swiss. But, far from that, it +declared for the insurrection, and sabred them. It is said that the +officers and soldiers killed in this retreat across the garden were +interred at the foot of the famous chestnut whose exceptional +forwardness has earned the surname of the tree of March 20. Thus the +Bonapartist tree of popular tradition owes its astonishing strength of +vegetation solely to the human compost furnished by the corpses of the +last defenders of royalty. + +The first column, that which was on its way to the Assembly, presented +itself resolutely in front of the terrace of the Feuillants, which was +full of people. These took flight, and the Swiss entered the corridors +of the Assembly. Carried away by his zeal, one of their officers, +Baron de Salis, entered the hall with his naked sword in his hand. The +left uttered a cry of affright. A deputy went out to order the +commander, Baron de Durler, to make his troop lay down their arms. M. +de Durler, having refused, he was conducted to the King. "Sire," said +he, with sorrowful indignation, "they want me to lay down arms." Louis +XVI. responded: "Put them in the hands of the National Guard; I am not +willing that brave men like you should perish." To surrender arms! +Did Louis XVI. fully comprehend that for soldiers like these such an +outrage was a hundred times worse than death? The King's words were +like a thunderbolt to them. They wept with rage. "But," said they, +"even if we have no more cartridges, we can still defend ourselves with +our {313} bayonets!" Such devotion, such courage, such discipline, +such heroism to end like this! And yet the unfortunate Swiss, though +grieved to the heart, resigned themselves to the last sacrifice their +master required from their fidelity, laid down their arms, and were +imprisoned in the ancient church of the Feuillants, to the number of +about two hundred and fifty. It was all that remained of this +magnificent regiment. The others had been killed in the garden or had +their throats cut in the palace, and the greater part of the survivors +were to be assassinated in the massacres of September. + +"Thus ended the French King's regiment of Swiss Guards, like one of +those sturdy oaks whose prolonged existence has affronted so many +storms, and which nothing but an earthquake can uproot. It fell the +very day on which the ancient French monarchy also fell. It counted +more than a century and a half of faithful services rendered to France. +To destroy this worthy corps a combination of unfortunate events had +been required; it had been necessary to deprive the Swiss of their +artillery, their ammunition, their staff, and the presence of the King; +to enfeeble them five days before the combat by sending away a +detachment of three hundred men; to forbid the two hundred men who +accompanied the King to the Assembly to fire a shot; to render useless +the wise dispositions of MM. de Maillardoz and de Bachmann by an +ill-advised order at the moment of the attack; and to have M. +d'Hervilly come at {314} the moment of victory to divide and enfeeble +the defence." (Relation of Colonel Pfyffer d'Altishoffen.) + +The Swiss republic has honored the memory of these sons who died for a +king. At the entrance of Lucerne, in the side of a rock, a grotto has +been hollowed out, in which may be seen a colossal stone lion, the work +of Thorwaldsen, the famous Danish sculptor. This lion, struck by a +lance, and lying down to die, holds tight within his claws the royal +escutcheon upon a shield adorned with fleurs-de-lis. Underneath the +lion are engraved the names of the Swiss officers and soldiers who died +between August 10 and September 2, 1792. Above it may be read this +inscription cut in the rock:-- + + HELVETIORUM FIDEI AC VIRTUTI. + _To the fidelity and courage of the Swiss._ + + +Louis XVI. had to repent his weakness bitterly. The wretched monarch +had at last reached the bottom of the abyss where the slippery descent +of concessions ends, and for having been willing to spare the blood of +a few criminals, he was to see that of his most loyal and faithful +adherents shed in torrents. It is said that Napoleon, who witnessed +the combat from a distance, cried several times, in speaking of Louis +XVI.: "What, then, wretched man! Have you no cannon to sweep out this +rabble?" Behind the people of the 10th of August, the man of Brumaire +already appeared as a conqueror. + +{315} + +Work away, then, insurgents! This unknown young man, this +"straight-haired Corsican," hidden in the crowd, will be the master of +you all! He will crush the Revolution, he will made himself +all-powerful in that palace of the Tuileries where the riot is lording +it at this moment! And after him, the brother of the King whom you +insult to-day and will kill to-morrow, the Count de Provence, that +_émigré_ who is the object of your hatred, will triumphantly enter the +palace of his forefathers. And each of them in his turn, the Corsican +gentleman and the brother of Louis XVI., will be received with the same +transports in that fatal palace which is now red with the blood of the +Swiss! How surprised these people would be if they could foresee what +the future has in store for them! Among these frenzied demagogues, +these ultra-revolutionists, these dishevelled Marseillais with lips +blackened by powder, and jackets all blood, how many will be the +fanatical admirers and soldiers of a Cæsar! + + + + +{316} + +XXXI. + +THE RESULTS OF THE COMBAT. + +The results of the combat were, at the Assembly, the decree of +suspension, or, rather, the decree of deposition; at the Tuileries, +devastation, massacre, and conflagration. From the moment when he +ordered his last defenders to lay down their arms, Louis XVI. was but +the phantom of a king. + +While the fight was going on, Robespierre had remained in hiding; Marat +had not quitted the bottom of a cellar. Even Danton, the man of +"audacity," did not show himself until after the last shot had been +fired. But now that fate had declared for the Revolution, those who +were trembling and hesitating a moment since, were those who talked the +loudest. Louis XVI., who had been dreaded a few minutes ago, was +insulted and jeered at. The National Assembly, royalist in the +morning, became the accomplice of the republicans during the day. It +perceived, moreover, that the 10th of August was aimed at it not less +than at the throne, and that its own downfall would be contemporaneous +with that of royalty. + +Huguenin, the president of the new Commune, came boldly to the bar, and +said to the deputies: {317} "The people is your sovereign as well as +ours!" Another individual, likewise at the bar, exclaimed in a +menacing tone: "For a long time the people has asked you to pronounce +the deposition, and you have not even yet pronounced the suspension! +Know that the Tuileries is on fire, and that we shall not extinguish it +until the vengeance of the people has been satisfied!" Vergniaud, who +in the morning had promised the King the support of the Assembly, no +longer even attempted to stem the revolutionary tide. He came down +from the president's chair, and went to a desk to write the decree +which should give a legislative form to the will of the insurrection. +In virtue of this decree, which Vergniaud read from the tribune, and +which was unanimously adopted, the royal power was suspended and a +National Convention convoked. In reality this was a veritable +deposition, and yet the Assembly still hesitated to give the last shock +which should uproot the royal tree that had sheltered beneath its +branches so many faithful generations. It declared that in default of +a civil list, a salary should be granted to the King during his +suspension; that Louis XVI. and his family should have a palace, the +Luxembourg, for a residence, and that he should be appointed governor +of the Prince-royal. + +Concerning this, Madame de Staël has remarked in her _Considerations +sur les principaux événements de la Révolution française_: "Ambition +for power mingled with the enthusiasm of principles in the republicans +{318} of 1792, and several among them offered to maintain royalty if +all the ministerial places were given to their friends.... The throne +they attacked served to shelter them, and it was not until after they +had triumphed that they found themselves exposed before the people." +What the Girondins wanted was merely a change in the ministry; it was +not a revolution. Vergniaud felt that he had been distanced. When he +read the act of deposition, his voice was sad, his attitude dejected, +and his action feeble. Did he foresee that the King and himself would +die at the same place, on the same scaffold, and only nine months apart? + +Louis XVI. listened to the invectives launched against him, and to the +decree depriving him of royal power, without a change of color. At the +very moment when the vote was taken, he bent towards Deputy Coustard, +who sat beside the box of the _Logographe_, and said with the greatest +tranquillity: "What you are doing there is not very constitutional." +Impassive, and speaking of himself as of a king who had lived a +thousand years before, he leaned his elbows on the front of the box, +and looked on, like a disinterested spectator, at the lugubrious +spectacle that was unrolled before him. + +Marie Antoinette, on the contrary, was shuddering. So long as the +combat lasted, a secret hope had thrilled her. But when she saw them +bringing to the Assembly and laying on the table the jewel-cases, +trinkets, and portfolios which the insurgents had just {319} taken from +her bedroom at the Tuileries; when she heard the victorious cries of +the rioters; when Vergniaud's voice sounded in her ears like a funeral +knell--she could hardly contain her grief and indignation. For one +instant she closed her eyes. But presently she haughtily raised her +head. + +The tide was rising, rising incessantly. Petitioners demanded +sometimes the deposition, and sometimes the death, of the King. This +dialogue was overheard between the painter David and Merlin de +Thionville, who were talking together about Louis XVI.: "Would you +believe it? Just now he asked me, as I was passing his box, if I would +soon have his portrait finished."--"Bah! and what did you say?"--"That +I would never paint the portrait of a tyrant again until I should have +his head in my hat."--"Admirable! I don't know a more sublime answer, +even in antiquity." + +The demands of the Revolution grew greater from minute to minute. In +the decree of deposition which had been voted on Vergniaud's +proposition, it was stipulated that the ministers should continue to +exercise their functions. A few instants later, Brissot caused it to +be decreed that they had lost the nation's confidence. A new ministry +was nominated during the session. The three ministers dismissed before +June 20--Roland, Clavière, and Servan--were reinstalled by acclamation +in the ministries of the Interior, of Finances, and of War. The other +ministers were chosen by ballot: Danton was nominated to that {320} of +Justice by 282 votes, Monge to the Marine by 150, and Lebrun-Tondu to +Foreign Affairs by 100. This ballot established the fact that out of +the 749 members composing the Assembly, but 284 were present. Two days +before, 680 had voted on the question concerning Lafayette, and now, at +the moment of the final crisis, not more than 284 could be found! All +the others had disappeared, through fear or through disgust. The +Revolution was accomplished by an Assembly thus reduced, and a Commune +whose members had appointed themselves. Marie Antoinette, in her pride +as Queen, was unable to conceive that there could be anything serious +in such a government. When Lebrun-Tondu's appointment was announced, +she leaned towards Bigot de Sainte-Croix, and said in his ear: "I hope +you will none the less believe yourself Minister of Foreign Affairs." + +The unfortunate royal family were still prisoners in the narrow box of +the _Logographe_. The heat there was horrible: the sun scorched the +white walls of this furnace where the captives listened, as in a place +of torture, to the most ignoble insults and the most sanguinary threats. + +At seven o'clock in the evening, Count François de la Rochefoucauld +succeeded in approaching the box of the _Logographe_. He thus +describes its aspect at this hour: "I approached the King's box; it was +unguarded except by some wretches who were drunk and paid no attention +to me, so that I half-opened the door. I saw the King with a fatigued +and {321} downcast face; he was sitting on the front of the box, coldly +observing through his lorgnette the scoundrels who were talking, +sometimes one after another, and sometimes all together. Near him was +the Queen, whose tears and perspiration had completely drenched her +fichu and her handkerchief. The Dauphin was asleep on her lap, and +resting partly also on that of Madame de Tourzel. Mesdames Elisabeth, +de Lamballe, and Madame the King's daughter were at the back of the +box. I offered my services to the King, who replied that it would be +too dangerous to try to see him again, and added that he was going to +the Luxembourg that evening. The Queen asked me for a handkerchief; I +had none; mine had served to bind up the wounds of the Viscount de +Maillé, whom I had rescued from some pikemen. I went out to look for a +handkerchief, and borrowed one from the keeper of the refreshment-room; +but as I was taking it to the Queen, the sentinels were relieved, and I +found it impossible to approach the box." + +We have just seen what occurred at the Assembly after the close of the +combat. Cast now a glance at the Tuileries. What horrible scenes, +what cries of grief, how many wounded, dead, and dying, what streams of +blood! What had become of those Swiss who, either in consequence of +their wounds, or through some other motive, had been obliged to remain +at the palace? Eighty of them had defended the grand staircase like +heroes, against an immense crowd, and died after prodigies of valor. +Seventeen {322} Swiss who were posted in the chapel, and who had not +fired a shot since the fight began, hoped to save their lives by laying +down their arms. It was a mistake. They had their throats cut like +the others. Two ushers of the King's chamber, MM. Pallas and de +Marchais, sword in hand, and hats pulled down over their eyes, said: +"We don't want to live any longer; this is our post; we ought to die +here!" and they were killed at the door of their master's chamber. + +M. Dieu died in the same way on the threshold of the Queen's bedroom. +A certain number of nobles who had not followed the King to the +Assembly succeeded in escaping the blows of the assassins. Passing +through the suite of large apartments towards the Louvre Gallery, they +rejoined there some soldiers detailed to guard an opening contrived in +the flooring, so as to prevent the assailants from entering by that +way. They crossed this opening on boards, and reached the extremity of +the gallery unhindered; then, going down the staircase of Catharine de +Medici, they managed to gain the streets near the Louvre. These may +have been saved. But woe to all men, no matter what their conditions, +who remained in the Tuileries! Domestic servants, ushers, laborers, +every soul was put to death. They killed even the dying, even the +surgeons who were caring for the wounded. It is Barbaroux himself who +describes the murderers as "cowardly fugitives during the action, +assassins after the victory, butchers {323} of dead bodies which they +stabbed with their swords so as to give themselves the honors of the +combat. In the apartments, on roofs, and in cellars, they massacred +the Swiss, armed or disarmed, the chevaliers, soldiers, and all who +peopled the chateau.... Our devotion was of no avail," says Barbaroux +again; "we were speaking to men who no longer recognized us." + +And the women, what was their fate? When the firing began, the Queen's +ladies and the Princesses descended to Marie Antoinette's apartments on +the ground-floor. They closed the shutters, hoping to incur less +danger, and lighted a candle so as not to be in total darkness. Then +Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel exclaimed: "Let us light all the +candles in the chandelier, the sconces, and the torches; if the +brigands force open the door, the astonishment so many lights will +cause them may delay the first blow and give us time to speak." The +ladies set to work. When the invaders broke in, sabre in hand, the +numberless lights, which were repeated also in the mirrors, made such a +contrast with the daylight they had just left, that for a moment they +remained stupefied. And yet, the Princess de Tarente, Madame de La +Roche-Aymon, Mademoiselle de Tourzel, Madame de Ginestons, and all the +other ladies were about to perish when a man with a long beard made his +appearance, crying to the assassins in Pétion's name: "Spare the women; +do not dishonor the nation." + +{324} + +Madame Campan had attempted to go up a stairway in pursuit of her +sister. The murderers followed her. She already felt a terrible hand +against her back, trying to seize her by her clothes, when some one +cried from the foot of the stairs: "What are you doing up +there?"--"Hey!" said the murderer, in a tone that did not soon leave +the trembling woman's ears. The other voice replied: "We don't kill +women." The Revolution goes fast; it will kill them next year. Madame +Campan was on her knees. Her executioner let go his hold. "Get up, +hussy," he said to her, "the nation spares you!" In going back she +walked over corpses; she recognized that of the old Viscount de Broves. +The Queen had sent word to him and to another old man as the last night +began, that she desired them to go home. He had replied: "We have been +only too obedient to the King's orders in all circumstances when it was +necessary to expose our lives to save him; this time we will not obey, +and will simply preserve the memory of the Queen's kindness." + +What a sight the Tuileries presented! People walked on nothing but +dead bodies. A comic actor drank a glass of blood, the blood of a +Swiss; one might have thought himself at a feast of Atreus. The +furniture was broken, the secretaries forced open, the mirrors smashed +to pieces. Prudhomme, the journalist of the _Révolutions de Paris_, +thinks that "Medicis-Antoinette has too long studied in them {325} the +hypocritical look she wears in public." What a sinister carnival! +Drunken women and prostitutes put on the Queen's dresses and sprawl on +her bed. Through the cellar gratings one can see a thousand hands +groping in the sand, and drawing forth bottles of wine. Everywhere +people are laughing, drinking, killing. The royal wine runs in +streams. Torrents of wine, torrents of blood. The apartments, the +staircase, the vestibule, are crimson pools. Disfigured corpses, +pictures thrust through with pikes, musicians' stands thrown on the +altar, the organ dismounted, broken,--that is how the chapel looks. +But to rob and murder is not enough: they will kindle a conflagration. +It devours the stables of the mounted guards, all the buildings in the +courts, the house of the governor of the palace: eighteen hundred yards +of barracks, huts, and houses. Already the fire is gaining on the +Pavilion of Marsan and the Pavilion of Flora. The flames are perceived +at the Assembly. A deputy asks to have the firemen sent to fight this +fire which threatens the whole quarter Saint-Honoré. Somebody remarks +that this is the Commune's business. But the Commune, to use a phrase +then in vogue, thinks it has something else to do besides preventing +the destruction of the tyrant's palace. It turns a deaf ear. The +messenger returns to the Assembly. It is remarked that the flames are +doing terrible damage. The president decides to send orders to the +firemen. But the firemen return, saying: "We can do nothing. They +{326} are firing on us. They want to throw us into the fire." What is +to be done? The president bethinks himself of a "patriot" architect, +Citizen Palloy, who generally makes his appearance whenever there are +"patriotic" demolitions to be accomplished. It is he whom they send to +the palace, and who succeeds in getting the flames extinguished. The +Tuileries are not burned up this time. The work of the incendiaries of +1792 was only to be finished by the petroleurs of 1871. + +Night was come. A great number of the Parisian population were +groaning, but the revolutionists triumphed with joy. Curiosity to see +the morning battle-field, urged the indolent, who had stayed at home +all day, towards the quays, the Champs-Elysées, and the Tuileries. +They looked at the trees under which the Swiss had fallen, at the +windows of the apartments where the massacres had taken place, at the +ravages made by the hardly extinguished fire. The buildings in the +three courts: Court of the Princes, Court Royal, Court of the Swiss, +had been completely consumed. Thenceforward these three courts formed +only one, separated from the Carrousel by a board partition which +remained until 1800, and was replaced by a grating finished on the very +day when the First Consul came to install himself at the Tuileries. +The inscription which was placed above the wooden partition: "On August +10 royalty was abolished; it will never rise again," disappeared even +before the proclamation of the Empire. + +{327} + +Squads of laborers gathered up the dead bodies and threw them into +tumbrels. At midnight an immense pile was erected on the Carrousel +with timbers and furniture from the palace. There the corpses of the +victims that had strewed the courts, the vestibule, and the apartments +were heaped up, and set on fire. + +The National Guard had disappeared; it figured with the King and the +Assembly itself, among the vanquished of the day. Instead of its +bayonets and uniforms one saw nothing in the stations and patrols that +divided Paris but pikes and tatters. "Some one came to tell me," +relates Madame de Staël, "that all of my friends who had been on guard +outside the palace, had been seized and massacred. I went out at once +to learn the news; the coachman who drove me was stopped at the bridge +by men who silently made signs that they were murdering on the other +side. After two hours of useless efforts to pass I learned that all +those in whom I was interested were still living, but that most of them +had been obliged to hide in order to escape the proscription with which +they were threatened. When I went to see them in the evening, on foot, +and in the mean houses where they had been able to find shelter, I +found armed men lying before the doors, stupid with drink, and only +half waking to utter execrable curses. Several women of the people +were in the same state, and their vociferations were more odious still. +Whenever a patrol intended to maintain order made its appearance, {328} +honest people fled out of its way; for what they called maintaining +order was to contribute to the triumph of assassins and rid them of all +hindrances." + +At last the city was going to rest a while after so much emotion! It +was three o'clock in the morning. The Assembly, which had been in +session for twenty-four hours, adjourned. Only a few members remained +in the hall to maintain the permanence proclaimed at the beginning of +the crisis. The inspectors of the hall came for Louis XVI. and his +family, to conduct them, not to the Luxembourg, but to the upper story +of the convent of the Feuillants, above the corridor where the offices +and committees of the Assembly had been established. It was there, in +the cells of the monks, that the royal family were to pass the night. +Then all was silent once more. Royalty was dying! + + + + +{329} + +XXXII. + +THE ROYAL-FAMILY IN THE CONVENT OF THE FEUILLANTS. + +What a strange prison was this dilapidated old monastery, these little +cells, not lived in for two years, with their flooring half-destroyed, +and their narrow windows looking down into courts full of men drunken +with wine and blood! By the light of candles stuck into gun-barrels +the royal family entered this gloomy lodging. Trembling for her son, +who was frightened, the Queen took him from M. Aubier's arms and +whispered to him. The child grew calmer. "Mamma," said he, "has +promised to let me sleep in her room because I was very good before all +those wicked men." Four cells, all opening by similar small doors upon +the same corridor, comprised the quarters of the royal family. What a +night! The souvenirs of the previous day came back like dismal dreams. +Their ears were still deafened with furious cries. They seemed to see +the blood of the Swiss flowing like a torrent, the pyramids of corpses +in red uniforms, the flames of the terrible conflagration sweeping the +approaches to the Tuileries. Marie Antoinette seems under an {330} +hallucination; her emotions break her down. Is this woman, confided to +the care of an unknown servant, in this deserted old convent, really +she? Is this the Queen of France and Navarre? This the daughter of +the great Empress Maria Theresa? What uncertainty rests over the fate +of her most faithful servitors! What news will she yet learn? Who has +fallen? Who has survived the carnage? The hours of the night wear on; +Marie Antoinette has not been able to sleep a moment. + +The Marquis de Tourzel and M. d'Aubier remained near the King's +bedside. Before sleeping, he talked to them with the utmost calmness +of all that had taken place. "People regret," said he, "that I did not +have the rebels attacked before they could have forced the Assembly; +but besides the fact that in accordance with the terms of the +Constitution, the National Guards might have refused to be the +aggressors, what would have been the result of this attack? The +measures of the insurrection were too well taken for my party to have +been victorious, even if I had not left the Tuileries. Do they forget +that when the seditious Commune massacred M. Mandat, it rendered his +projected defence of no avail?" While Louis XVI. was saying this, the +men placed under the windows were shouting loudly for the Queen's head. +"What has she done to them?" cried the unfortunate sovereign. + +The next morning, August 11, several persons were authorized to enter +the cells of the convent. {331} Among them was one of the officers of +the King's bedchamber, François Hue, who had incurred the greatest +dangers on the previous day. Cards of admission were distributed by +the inspector of the Assembly hall. A large guard was stationed at all +the issues of the corridor. No one could pass without being stopped +and questioned. After surmounting all obstacles, M. Hue reached the +cell of Louis XVI. The King was still in bed, with his head covered by +a coarse cloth. He looked tenderly at his faithful servant. M. Hue, +who could scarcely speak for sobbing, apprised his unhappy master of +the tragic death of several persons whom His Majesty was especially +fond of, among others, the Chevalier d'Allonville, who had been +under-governor to the first Dauphin, and several officers of the +bedchamber: MM. Le Tellier, Pallas, and de Marchais. "I have, at +least," said Louis XVI., "the consolation of seeing you saved from this +massacre!" + +All night long, Madame Elisabeth, the Princess de Lamballe, and Madame +de Tourzel had prayed and wept in silence at the door of the chamber +where Marie Antoinette watched beside her sleeping children. It was +not until morning, after cruel insomnia, that the wretched Queen was at +last able to close her eyes. And when, after a few minutes, she opened +them again, what an awakening! + +At eight o'clock in the morning Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel arrived +at the Feuillants. "I cannot say enough," she writes in her _Souvenirs +de Quarante {332} Ans_, "about the goodness of the King and Queen; they +asked me many questions about the persons concerning whom I could give +them any tidings. Madame and the Dauphin received me with touching +signs of affection; they embraced me, and Madame said: 'My dear +Pauline, do not leave us any more!'" The courtiers of misfortune came +one after another. Madame Campan and her sister, Madame Auguié, saw +the Prince de Poix, M. d'Aubier, M. de Saint-Pardou, Madame Elisabeth's +equerry, MM. de Goguelat, Hue, and de Chamilly in the first cell; in +the second they found the King. They wanted to kiss his hand, but he +prevented it, and embraced them without speaking. In the third cell +they saw the Queen, waited on by an unknown woman. Marie Antoinette +held out her arms. "Come!" she cried; "come, unhappy women! come and +see one who is still more unhappy than you, since it is she who has +been the cause of all your sorrow!" She added: "We are ruined. We +have reached the place at last to which they have been leading us for +three years by every possible outrage; we shall succumb in this +horrible revolution, and many others will perish after us. Everybody +has contributed to our ruin: the innovators like fools, others like the +ambitious, in order to aid their own fortunes; for the most furious of +the Jacobins wanted gold and places, and the crowd expected pillage. +There is not a patriot in the whole infamous horde; the emigrants had +their schemes and manoeuvres; {333} the foreigners wanted to profit by +the dissensions of France; everybody has had a part in our +misfortunes." Here the Dauphin entered with his sister and Madame de +Tourzel. "Poor children!" cried the Queen. "How cruel it is not to +transmit to them so noble a heritage, and to say: All is over for us!" +And as the little Dauphin, seeing his mother and those around her +weeping, began to shed tears also: "My child," the Queen said, +embracing him, "you see I have consolations too; the friends whom +misfortune deprived me of were not worth as much as those it gave me." +Then Marie Antoinette asked for news of the Princess de Tarente, Madame +de la Roche-Aymon, and others whom she had left at the Tuileries. She +compassionated the fate of the victims of the previous day. + +Madame Campan expressed a desire to know what the foreign ambassadors +had done in this catastrophe. The Queen replied that they had done +nothing, but that the English ambassadress, Lady Sutherland, had just +displayed some interest by sending linen for the Dauphin, who was in +need of it. + +What memories must not that little cell in the Feuillants convent have +left in the souls of those who were privileged to present there the +homage of their devotion to the Queen! "I think I still see," Madame +Campan has said in her Memoirs, "I shall always see, that little cell, +hung with green paper, that wretched couch from which the dethroned +sovereign stretched out her arms to us, saying that our {334} woes, of +which she was the cause, aggravated her own. There, for the last time, +I saw the tears flowing and heard the sobs of her whose birth and +natural gifts, and above all the goodness of whose heart had destined +her to be the ornament of all thrones and the happiness of all peoples." + +During the 11th and 12th of August the tortures of the 10th were +renewed for the royal family. They were obliged to occupy the odious +box of the _Logographe_ during the sessions of the Assembly, and from +there witness, as at a show, the slow and painful death-struggle of +royalty. As she was on her way to this wretched hole, Marie Antoinette +perceived in the garden some curious spectators on whose faces a +certain compassion was depicted. She saluted them. Then a voice +cried: "Don't put on so many airs with that graceful head; it is not +worth while. You'll not have it much longer." From the box of the +_Logographe_ the royal family listened to the most offensive motions; +to decrees according the Marseillais a payment of thirty sous a day, +ordering all statues of kings to be overthrown, and petitions demanding +the heads of all the Swiss who had escaped the massacre. At last the +Assembly grew tired of the long humiliation of the august captives. On +Monday, August 13, they were not present at the session, and during the +day they were notified that in the evening they were to be +incarcerated, not in the Luxembourg,--that palace being too good for +them,--but in the tower of the Temple. When Marie {335} Antoinette was +informed of this decision, she turned toward Madame de Tourzel, and +putting her hands over her eyes, said: "I always asked the Count +d'Artois to have that villanous tower of the Temple torn down; it +always filled me with horror!" Pétion told Louis XVI. that the +Communal Council had decreed that none of the persons proposed for the +service of the royal family should follow them to their new abode. By +force of remonstrance the King finally obtained permission that the +Princess de Lamballe, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter should be +excepted from this interdiction, and also MM. Hue and de Chamilly, and +Mesdames Thibaud, Basire, Navarre, and Saint-Brice. The departure for +the Temple took place at five in the evening. The royal family went in +a large carriage with Manuel and Pétion, who kept their hats on. The +coachman and footmen, dressed in gray, served their masters for the +last time. National Guards escorted the carriage on foot and with +reversed arms. The passage through a hostile multitude occupied not +less than two hours. The vehicle, which moved very slowly, stopped for +several moments in the Place Vendôme. There Manuel pointed out the +statue of Louis XIV., which had been thrown down from its pedestal. At +first the descendant of the great King reddened with indignation, then, +tranquillizing himself instantly, he calmly replied: "It is fortunate, +Sir, that the rage of the people spends itself on inanimate objects." +Manuel might have gone on to say that {336} on this very Place Vendôme +"Queen Violet," one of the most furious vixens of the October Days, had +just been crushed by the fall of this equestrian statue of Louis XIV. +to which she was hanging in order to help bring it down. The statue of +Henry IV. in the Place Royale, that of Louis XIII. in the Place des +Victoires, and that of Louis XV. in the place that bears his name, had +fallen at the same time. + +The royal family arrived at the Temple at seven in the evening. The +lanterns placed on the projecting portions of the walls and the +battlements of the great tower made it resemble a catafalque surrounded +by funeral lights. The Queen wore a shoe with a hole in it, through +which her foot could be seen. "You would not believe," said she, +smiling, "that a Queen of France was in need of shoes." The doors +closed upon the captives, and a sanguinary crowd complained of the +thickness of the walls separating them from their prey. + + + + +{337} + +XXXIII. + +THE TEMPLE. + +There are places which, by the very souvenirs they evoke, seem fatal +and accursed. Such was the dungeon that was to serve as a prison for +Louis XVI. and his family. The great tower for which Marie Antoinette +had felt a nameless instinctive repugnance in the happiest days of her +reign, arose at the extremity of Paris like a gigantic phantom, and +recalled in a sinister fashion the tragedies of the Middle Ages and the +sombre legends of the Templars. It was formerly the manor, the +fortress, of that religious and military Order of the Temple, founded +in the Holy Land at the beginning of the twelfth century, to protect +the pilgrims, and which, after the fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, +had spread all over Europe. The great tower was built by Frère Hubert, +in the early years of the thirteenth century, in the midst of an +enclosure surrounded by turreted walls. There ruled, by cross and +sword, those men of iron, in white habits, who took the triple vows of +poverty, chastity, and obedience, and who excited royal jealousy by the +increase of their power. It was there that Philippe le Bel went on +October 13, {338} 1307, with his lawyers and his archers, to lay his +hand on the grand-master, seize the treasures of the order, and on the +same day, at the same hour, cause all Templars to be arrested +throughout the realm. Then began that mysterious trial which has +remained an insoluble problem to posterity, and after which these +monastic knights, whose bravery and whose exploits have made so +prolonged an echo, perished in prisons or on scaffolds. Pursued by +horrible accusations, they had confessed under torture, but they denied +at execution. When the grand-master, Jacques de Molay, and the +commander of Normandy were burned alive before the garden of Philippe +le Bel, March 11, 1314, even in the midst of flames, they did not cease +to attest the innocence of the Order of the Temple. The people, +astonished by their heroism, believed that they had summoned the Pope +and the King to appear in the presence of God before the end of the +year. Clement V., on April 20, and Philippe IV., on November 29, +obeyed the summons. + +The possessions of the order were given to the Hospitallers of Saint +John of Jerusalem, who transformed themselves into Knights of Malta +toward the middle of the sixteenth century. The Temple became the +provincial house of the grand-prior of the Order of Malta for the +_nation_ or _language_ of France, and the great tower contained +successively the treasure, the arsenal, and the archives. In 1607, the +grand-prior, Jacques de Souvré, had a house built in {339} front of the +old manor, between the court and the garden, which was called the +palace of the grand-prior. His successor, Philippe de Vendôme, made +his palace a rendezvous of elegance and pleasure. There shone that +Anacreon in a cassock, the gay and sprightly Abbé de Chaulieu, who died +a fervent Christian in the voluptuous abode where he had dwelt a +careless Epicurean. There young Voltaire went to complete the lessons +he had begun in the sceptical circle of Ninon de l'Enclos. The office +of grand-prior, which was worth sixty thousand livres a year, passed +afterwards to Prince de Conti, who in 1765 sheltered Jean-Jacques +Rousseau there, as _lettres de cachet_ could not penetrate within its +privileged precinct. Under Louis XVI. the palace of the grand-prior +had served as a passing hostelry to the young and brilliant Count +d'Artois when he came from Versailles to Paris. The flowers of the +entertainments given there by the Prince were hardly faded when Louis +XVI. suddenly entered it as a prisoner. + +It was seven o'clock in the evening when the wretched King and his +family, coming from the convent of the Feuillants, arrived at the +Temple. Situated near the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, not far from the +former site of the Bastille, the Temple enclosure at this period was +not more than two hundred yards long by nearly as many wide. The rest +of the ancient precinct had disappeared under the pavements or the +houses of the great city. Nevertheless, the enclosure still formed a +sort of little {340} private city, sometimes called the +Ville-Neuve-du-Temple, the gates of which were closed every night. In +one of its angles stood the house called the grand-prior's palace. + +This was the first stopping-place of the royal family, which had been +entrusted by Pétion to the surveillance of the municipality and the +guard of Santerre. The municipal officers stayed close to the King, +kept their hats on, and gave him no title except "Monsieur." Louis +XVI., not doubting that the palace of the grand-prior was the residence +assigned him by the nation until the close of his career, began to +visit its apartments. While the municipal officers took a cruel +pleasure in this error, thinking of the still keener one they would +enjoy when they disabused him of it, he pleased himself by allotting +the different rooms in advance. The word palace had an unpleasant +sound to the persecutors of royalty. The Temple tower looked more like +a prison. Toward eleven o'clock, one of the commissioners ordered the +august captives to collect such linen and other clothing as they had +been able to procure, and follow him. They silently obeyed, and left +the palace. The night was very dark. They passed through a double row +of soldiers holding naked sabres. The municipal officers carried +lanterns. One of them broke the dismal silence he had observed +throughout the march. "Thy master," said he to M. Hue, "has been +accustomed to gilded canopies. Very well! he is going to find out how +we lodge the assassins of the people." + +{341} + +The lamps in the windows of the old quadrangular dungeon lighted up its +high pinnacles and turrets, its gigantic profile and gloomy bulk. The +immense tower, one hundred and fifty feet high, and with walls nine +feet thick, rose, menacing and fatal, amidst the darkness. Beside it +was another tower, narrower and not so high, but which was also flanked +by turrets. Thus the whole dungeon was composed of two distinct yet +united towers. The second of these, called the little tower, to +distinguish it from the great one, was selected as the prison of the +former hosts of Versailles, Fontainebleau, and the Tuileries. + +The little tower of the Temple, which had no interior communication +with the great one against which it stood, was a long quadrangle +flanked by two turrets. Four steps led to the door, which was low and +narrow, and opened on a landing at the end of which began a winding +staircase shaped like a snail-shell. Wide from its base as far as the +first story, it grew narrower as it climbed up into the second. The +door, which was considered too weak, was to be strengthened on the +following day by heavy bars, and supplied with an enormous lock brought +from the prisons of the Châtelet. The Queen was put on the second +floor, and the King on the third. On entering his chamber, Louis XVI. +found a miserable bed in an alcove without tapestry or curtains. He +showed neither ill humor nor surprise. Engravings, indecent for the +most part, covered the walls. He {342} took them down himself. "I +will not leave such objects before my children's eyes," said he. Then +he lay down and slept tranquilly. + +The first days of captivity were relatively calm. The prisoners +consoled themselves by their family life, reading, and, above all, +prayer. Forgetting that he had been a king, and remembering that he +was a father, Louis XVI. gave lessons to the Dauphin. "It would have +been worth while for the whole nation to be present at these lessons; +they would have been both surprised and touched at all the sensible, +cordial, and kindly things the good King found to say when the map of +France lay spread out before him, or concerning the chronology of his +predecessors. Everything in his remarks showed the love he bore his +subjects and how greatly his paternal heart desired their happiness. +What great and useful lessons one could learn in listening to this +captive king instructing a child born to the throne and condemned to +share the captivity of his parents." (_Souvenirs de Quarante Ans_, by +Madame de Béarn, _née_ de Tourzel.) + +All those who had been authorized to follow the royal family to the +Temple--the Princess de Lamballe, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter, +Mesdames Thibaud, Basire, Navarre, MM. de Chamilly and François +Hue--surrounded the captives with the most respectful and devoted +attentions. But these noble courtiers of misfortune, these voluntary +prisoners who were so glad to be associated in their {343} master's +trials, were not long to enjoy an honor they had so keenly desired. In +the night of August 18-19, two municipal officers presented themselves, +who were commissioned to fetch away "all persons not belonging to the +Capet family." The Queen pointed out in vain that the Princess de +Lamballe was her relative. The Princess must go with the others. "In +our position," has said Madame de Tourzel, the governess of the +children of France, "there was nothing to do but obey. We dressed +ourselves and then went to the Queen, to whom I resigned that dear +little Prince, whose bed had been carried into her room without awaking +him." It was an indescribable torture for Madame de Tourzel to abandon +the Dauphin, whom she cherished so tenderly, and whom she had educated +since 1789. "I abstained from looking at him," she adds, "not only to +avoid weakening the courage we had so much need of, but in order to +give no room for censure, and so come back, if possible, to a place we +left with so much regret. The Queen went instantly into the chamber of +the Princess de Lamballe, from whom she parted with the utmost grief. +To Pauline and me she showed a touching sensibility, and said to me in +an undertone: 'If we are not so happy as to see you again, take good +care of Madame de Lamballe. Do the talking on all important occasions, +and spare her as much as possible from having to answer captious and +embarrassing questions.'" The two municipal officers said to Hue and +Chamilly: "Are you {344} the valets-de-chambre?" On their affirmative +response, the two faithful servants were ordered to get up and prepare +for departure. They shook hands with each other, both of them +convinced that they had reached the end of their existence. One of the +municipal officers had said that very day in their presence: "The +guillotine is permanent, and strikes with death the pretended servants +of Louis." When they descended to the Queen's antechamber, a very +small room in which the Princess de Lamballe slept, they found that +Princess and Madame de Tourzel all ready to start, and clasped in one +embrace with the Queen, the children, and Madame Elisabeth. Tender and +heart-breaking farewells, presages of separations more cruel still! + +All these exiles from the prison left at the same time. Only one of +them, M. François Hue, was to return. He was examined at the +Hôtel-de-Ville, and at the close of this interrogation an order was +signed permitting him to be taken back to the tower. "How happy I +was," he writes, "to return to the Temple! I ran to the King's +chamber. He was already up and dressed, and was reading as usual in +the little tower. The moment he saw me, his anxiety to know what had +occurred made him advance toward me; but the presence of the municipal +officers and the guards who were near him made all conversation +impossible. I indicated by a glance that, for the moment, prudence +forbade me to explain myself. Feeling the necessity of silence as well +as myself, the King resumed his {345} reading and waited for a more +opportune moment. Some hours later, I hastily informed him what +questions had been asked me and what I had replied." (_Dernières Années +de Louis XVI., par François Hue_.) + +The unfortunate sovereign doubtless believed that the others were also +about to return. Vain hope! During the day Manuel announced to the +King that none of them would come back to the Temple. "What has become +of them?" asked Louis XVI. anxiously.--"They are prisoners at the +Force," returned Manuel.--"What are they going to do with the only +servant I have left?" asked the King, glancing at M. Hue.--"The Commune +leaves him with you," said Manuel; "but as he cannot do everything, men +will be sent to assist him."--"I do not want them," replied Louis XVI.; +"what he cannot do, we will do ourselves. Please God, we will not +voluntarily give those who have been taken from us the chagrin of +seeing their places taken by others!" In Manuel's presence, the Queen +and Madame Elisabeth aided M. Hue to prepare the things most necessary +for the new prisoners of the Force. The two Princesses arranged the +packets of linen and other matters with the skill and activity of +chambermaids. + +Behold the heir of Louis XIV., the King of France and Navarre, with but +a single servant left him! He has but one coat, and at night his +sister mends it. Behold the daughter of the German Cæsars, with not +even one woman to wait upon her, and who waits on herself, incessantly +watched, meanwhile, by the {346} inquisitors of the Commune; who cannot +speak a word or make a gesture unwitnessed by a squad of informers who +pursue her even into the chamber where she goes to change her dress, +and who spy on her even when she is sleeping! And yet neither the +calmness nor the dignity of the prisoners suffers any loss. + +There was but one thing that keenly annoyed Louis XVI. It was when, on +August 24, they deprived him, the chief of gentlemen, of his sword, as +if taking away his sceptre were not enough. He consoled himself by +prayer, meditation, and reading. He spent hours in the room containing +the library of the keeper of archives of the Order of Malta, who had +previously occupied the little tower. One day when he was looking for +books, he pointed out to M. Hue the works of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques +Rousseau. "Those two men have ruined France," said he in an undertone. +On another day he was pained by overhearing the insults heaped on this +faithful servant by one of the Municipal Guards. "You have had a great +deal to suffer to-day," he said to him. "Well! for the love of me, +continue to endure everything; make no answer." At another time he +slipped into his hand a folded paper. "This is some of my hair," said +he; "it is the only present I can give you at this moment." M. Hue +exclaims in his pathetic book: "O shade forever cherished! I will +preserve this precious gift to my latest day! The inheritance of my +son, it will pass on to my descendants, and all of them will see in +this testimonial of Louis XVI.'s {347} goodness, that they had a father +who merited the affection of his King by his fidelity." + +In the evenings the Queen made the Dauphin recite this prayer: +"Almighty God, who created and redeemed me, I adore Thee. Spare the +lives of the King, my father, and those of my family! Defend us +against our enemies! Grant Madame de Tourzel the strength she needs to +support the evils she endures on our account." And the angel of the +Temple, Madame Elisabeth, recited every day this sublime prayer of her +own composition: "What will happen to me to-day, O my God! I do not +know. All I know is, that nothing will happen that has not been +foreseen by Thee from all eternity. It is enough, my God, to keep me +tranquil. I adore Thy eternal designs, I submit to them with my whole +heart; I will all, I accept all; I sacrifice all to Thee; I unite this +sacrifice to that of Thy dear Son, my Saviour, asking Thee by His +sacred heart and His infinite merits, the patience in our afflictions +and the perfect submission which is due to Thee for all that Thou +wiliest and permittest." One day when she had finished her prayer, the +saintly Princess said to M. Hue: "It is less for the unhappy King than +for his misguided people that I pray. May the Lord deign to be moved, +and to look mercifully upon France!" Then she added, with her +admirable resignation: "Come, let us take courage. God will never send +us more troubles than we are able to bear." + +{348} + +The prisoners were permitted to walk a few steps in the garden every +day to get a breath of fresh air. But even there they were insulted. +As they passed by, the guards stationed at the base of the tower took +pains to put on their hats and sit down. The sentries scrawled insults +on the walls. Colporteurs maliciously cried out bad tidings, which +were sometimes false. One day, one of them announced a pretended +decree separating the King from his family. The Queen, who was near +enough to hear distinctly the voice which told this news, not exact as +yet, was struck with a terror from which she did not recover. + +And yet there were still souls that gave way to compassion. From the +upper stories of houses near the Temple enclosure there were eyes +looking down into the garden when the prisoners took their walk. The +common people and the workmen living in these poor abodes were +affected. Sometimes, to show her gratitude for the sympathy of those +unknown friends, Marie Antoinette would remove her veil, and smile. +When the little Dauphin was playing, there would be hands at the +windows, joined as if to applaud. Flowers would sometimes fall, as if +by chance, from a garret roof to the Queen's feet, and occasionally it +happened that when the captives had gone back to their prison, they +would hear in the darkness the echo of some royalist refrain, hummed by +a passer-by in the silence of the night. + +The Temple tower is no longer in existence. Bonaparte visited it when +he was Consul. "There are {349} too many souvenirs in that prison," he +exclaimed. "I will tear it down." In 1811 he kept his promise. The +palace of the grand-prior was destroyed in 1853. No trace remains of +that famous enclosure of the Templars whose legend has so sombre a +poetry. But it has left an impress on the imagination of peoples which +will never be effaced. It seems to rise again gigantic, that tower +where the son of Saint Louis realized not alone the type of the antique +sage of whom Horace said: _Impavidum ferient ruinae_, but also the +purest ideal of the true Christian. Does not the name Temple seem +predestinated for a spot which was to be sanctified by so many virtues, +and where the martyr King put in practice these verses of the +_Imitation of Jesus Christ_, his favorite book: "It needs no great +virtue to live peaceably with those who are upright and amiable; one is +naturally pleased in such society; we always love those whose +sentiments agree with ours. But it is very praiseworthy, and the +effect of a special grace and great courage to live in peace with +severe and wicked men, who are disorderly, or who contradict us.... He +who knows best how to suffer, will enjoy the greatest peace; such a one +is the conqueror of himself, master of the world, the friend of Jesus +Christ, and the inheritor of heaven." + + + + +{350} + +XXXIV. + +THE PRINCESS DE LAMBALLE'S MURDER. + +The Princess de Lamballe, after being taken from the Temple in the +night of August 18-19, had been examined by Billaud-Varennes at the +Hôtel-de-Ville, and then sent, at noon, August 19, to the Force. This +prison, divided into two distinct parts, the great and the little +Force, was situated between the rues Roi-de-Sicile, Culture, and Pavée. +In 1792 it supplemented the Abbey and Châtelet prisons, which were +overcrowded. The little Force had a separate entry on the rue Pavée to +the Marais, while the door of the large one opened on the rue des +Ballets, a few steps from the rue Saint-Antoine. The register of the +little Force, which is preserved in the archives of the prefecture of +police, records that, at the time of the September massacres, this +prison in which the Princess de Lamballe was immured, contained one +hundred and ten women, most of them not concerned with political +affairs, and in great part women of the town. Here, from August 19 to +September 3, the Princess suffered inexpressible anguish. She never +heard a turnkey open the door of her cell without thinking that her +last hour had come. + +{351} + +The massacres began on September 2. On that day the Princess de +Lamballe was spared. In the evening she threw herself on her bed, a +prey to the most cruel anxiety. Toward six o'clock the next morning, +the turnkey entered with a frightened air: "They are coming here," he +said to the prisoners. Six men, armed with sabres, guns, and pistols, +followed him, approached the beds, asked the names of the women, and +went out again. Madame de Tourzel, who shared the Princess de +Lamballe's captivity, said to her: "This threatens to be a terrible +day, dear Princess; we know not what Heaven intends for us; we must ask +God to forgive our faults. Let us say the _Miserere_ and the +_Confiteor_ as acts of contrition, and recommend ourselves to His +goodness." The two women said their prayers aloud, and incited each +other to resignation and courage. + +There was a window which opened on the street, and from which, although +it was very high, one could see what was passing by mounting on Madame +de Lamballe's bed, and thence to the window ledge. The Princess +climbed up, and as soon as her head was noticed on the street, a +pretence of firing on her was made. She saw a considerable crowd at +the prison door. + +Very little doubt remained concerning her fate. Neither she nor Madame +de Tourzel had eaten since the previous day. But they were too greatly +moved to take any breakfast. They dared not speak to each other. They +took their work, and sat down to await the result of the fatal day in +silence. + +{352} + +Toward eleven o'clock the door opened. Armed men filled the room and +demanded Madame de Lamballe. The Princess put on a gown, bade adieu to +Madame de Tourzel, and was led to the great Force, where some municipal +officers, wearing their insignia, subjected the prisoners to a +pretended trial. In front of this tribunal stood executioners with +ferocious faces, who brandished bloody weapons. The atmosphere was +sickening: full of the steam of carnage, and the odors of wine and +blood. Madame de Lamballe fainted. When she recovered consciousness +she was interrogated: "Who are you?"--"Marie Louise, Princess of +Savoy."--"What is your rank?"--"Superintendent of the Queen's +household."--"Were you acquainted with the conspiracies of the court on +August 10?"--"I do not know that there were any conspiracies on August +10, but I know I had no knowledge of them."--"Swear liberty, equality, +hatred to the King, the Queen, and royalty."--"I will swear the first +two without difficulty; I cannot swear the last; it is not in my +heart." Here an assistant said in a whisper to Madame de Lamballe: +"Swear it! if you do not swear, you are a dead woman." The Princess +made no answer; she put her hands up to her eyes, covered her face with +them and made a step toward the wicket. The judge exclaimed: "Let some +one release Madame!" This phrase was the death signal. Two men took +the victim roughly by the arms, and made her walk over corpses. Hardly +had she crossed the threshold when she received a {353} blow from a +sabre on the back of her head, which made her blood flow in streams. +In the narrow passage leading from the rue Saint-Antoine to the Force, +and called the Priests' cul-de-sac, she was despatched with pikes on a +heap of dead bodies. Then they stripped off her clothes and exposed +her body to the insults of a horde of cannibals. When the blood that +flowed from her wounds, or that of the neighboring corpses, had soiled +the body too much, they washed it with a sponge, so that the crowd +might notice its whiteness better. They cut off her head and her +breasts. They tore out her heart, and of this head and this heart they +made horrible trophies. The pikes which bore them were lifted high in +air, and they went to carry around these excellent spoils of the +Revolution. + +At the very moment when the hideous procession began its march, Madame +de Lebel, the wife of a painter, who owed many benefits to Madame de +Lamballe, was trying to get near the prison, hoping to hear news of +her. Seeing the great commotion in the crowd, she inquired the cause. +When some one replied: "It is Lamballe's head that they are going to +carry through Paris," she was seized with horror, and, turning back, +took refuge in a hairdresser's shop on the Place Bastille. Hardly had +she done so when the crowd entered the Place. The murderers came into +the shop and required the hairdresser to arrange the head of the +Princess. They washed it, and powdered the fair hair, all soiled with +{354} blood. Then one of the assassins cried joyfully: "Now, at any +rate, Antoinette can recognize her!" The procession resumed its march. +From time to time they called a halt before a wine-shop. Wishing to +empty his glass, the scoundrel who had the Princess's head in his hand, +set it flat down on the lead counter. Then it was put back on the end +of a pike. The heart was on another pike, and other individuals +dragged along the headless corpse. In this manner they arrived in +front of the Temple. It was three o'clock in the afternoon. + +On that day the royal family had been refused permission to go into the +garden. They were in the little tower when the cries of the multitude +became audible. The workmen who were then employed in tearing down the +walls and buildings contiguous to the Temple dungeon, mingled with the +crowd, increased also by innumerable curious spectators, and uttered +furious shouts. One of the Municipal Guards at the Temple closed doors +and windows, and pulled down curtains so that the captives could see +nothing. + +On the street in front of the enclosure a tricolored ribbon had been +fastened across, with this inscription: "Citizens, you who know how to +ally the love of order with a just vengeance, respect this barrier; it +is necessary to our surveillance and our responsibility." This was the +sole dike they meant to oppose to the torrent. At the side of this +ribbon stood a municipal officer named Danjou, formerly a priest, who +was called Abbé Six-feet, on account of his {355} height. He mounted +on a chair and harangued the crowd. He felt his face touched by Madame +de Lamballe's head, still on the end of a pike which the bearer shook +about and gesticulated with, and also by a rag of her chemise, soaked +with blood and mire, which another individual also carried on a pike. +The naked body was there likewise, with its back to the ground and the +front cut open to the very breast. Danjou tried to make the crowd of +assassins who wanted to invade the Temple understand that at a moment +when the enemy was master of the frontiers, it would be impolitic to +deprive themselves of hostages so precious as Louis XVI. and his +family. "Moreover," he added, "would it not demonstrate their +innocence if you dare not try them? How much worthier it is of a great +people to execute a king guilty of treason on the scaffold!" Thus, +while preventing an immediate massacre, he held the scaffold in +reserve. Danjou said that the Communal Council, in order to show its +confidence in the citizens composing the mob, had decided that six of +them should be admitted to make the rounds of the Temple garden, with +the commissioners at their head. The ribbon was then raised and +several persons entered the enclosure. They were those who carried the +remains of Madame de Lamballe. With these were the laborers who had +been at work on the demolitions. Voices were heard demanding furiously +that Marie Antoinette should show herself at a window, so that some one +might climb up and make her {356} kiss her friend's head. As Danjou +opposed this infernal scheme, he was accused of being on the side of +the tyrant. Was the dungeon of the Temple to be forced? Were the +assassins about to seize the Queen, tear her in pieces, and drag her, +like her friend, through streets and squares to the rolling of drums +and the chanting of the _Marseillaise_ and the _Ça ira_? + +A municipal officer entered the tower and began a mysterious parley +with his colleagues. As Louis XVI. asked what was going on, some one +replied: "Well, sir, since you desire to know, they want to show you +Madame de Lamballe's head." Meanwhile the cries outside were growing +louder. Another municipal came in, followed by four delegates from the +mob. One of them, who carried a heavy sabre in his hand, insisted that +the prisoners should present themselves at the window, but this was +opposed by the municipal officers, who were less cruel. This man said +to the Queen in an insulting tone: "They want us to hide the Princess +de Lamballe's head from you when we brought it to let you see how the +people avenge themselves on their tyrants. I advise you to show +yourself if you don't want the people to come up." Marie Antoinette +fainted on learning her friend's death in this manner. Her children +burst into tears and tried by their caresses to bring her back to +consciousness. The man did not go away. "Sir," the King said to him, +"we are prepared for the worst, but you might have dispensed yourself +from informing the Queen of this frightful calamity." {357} Cléry, the +King's valet, was looking through a corner of the window blinds, and +saw Madame de Lamballe's head. The person carrying it had climbed up +on a heap of rubbish from the buildings in process of demolition. +Another, who stood beside him, held her bleeding heart. Cléry heard +Danjou expostulating the crowd in words like these: "Antoinette's head +does not belong to you; the departments have their rights in it also. +France has confided these great criminals to the care of Paris; and it +is your business to assist us in guarding them until national justice +shall avenge the people." Then, addressing himself to these cannibals +as if they were heroes whose courage and exploits he praised, he added, +in speaking of the profaned corpse of the Princess de Lamballe: "The +remains you have there are the property of all. Do they not belong to +all Paris? Have you the right to deprive others of the pleasure of +sharing your triumph? Night will soon be here. Make haste, then, to +quit this precinct, which is too narrow for your glory. You ought to +place this trophy in the Palais Royal or the Tuileries garden, where +the sovereignty of the people has been so often trampled under foot, as +an eternal monument of the victory you have just won." Remarks like +these were all that could prevent these tigers from entering the Temple +and destroying the prisoners. Shouts of "To the Palais Royal!" proved +to Danjou that his harangue had been appreciated. The assassins at +last departed, after having covered his face with {358} kisses that +smelt of wine and blood. They wanted to show their victim's head at +the Hôtel Toulouse, the mansion of the venerable Duke de Penthièvre, +her father-in-law, but were deterred by the assurance that she did not +ordinarily live there, but at the Tuileries. Then they turned toward +the Palais Royal. The Duke of Orleans was at a window with his +mistress, Madame de Buffon. He left it, but he may have seen the head +of his sister-in-law. + +Some of the cannibals had remained in the neighborhood of the Temple. +Sitting down at table in a wine-shop, they had the heart of the +Princess de Lamballe cooked, and ate it with avidity. "Thus," says M. +de Beauchesne in his excellent work on Louis XVII., "this civilization +which had departed from God, surpassed at a single bound the fury of +savages, and the eighteenth century, so proud of its learning and +humanity, ended by anthropophagy." In the evening, when some one was +giving Collot d'Herbois an account of the day's performances, he +expressed but one regret,--that they had not succeeded in showing Marie +Antoinette the remains of the Princess de Lamballe. "What!" he +spitefully exclaimed, "did they spare the Queen that impression? They +ought to have served up her best friend's head in a covered dish at her +table." + + + + +{359} + +XXXV. + +THE SEPTEMBER MASSACRES. + +Lovers of paradoxes have tried to represent the September massacres as +something spontaneous, a passing delirium of opinion, a sort of great +national convulsion. This myth was a lie against history and humanity. +It exists no longer, Heaven be thanked. The mists with which it was +sought to shroud these execrable crimes are now dissipated. Light has +been shed upon that series of infernal spectacles which would have made +cannibals blush. No; these odious massacres were not the result of a +popular movement, an unforeseen fanaticism, a paroxysm of rage or +vengeance. They present an ensemble of murders committed in cool +blood, a planned and premeditated thing. M. Mortimer-Ternaux, in his +_Histoire de la Terreur_, M. Granier de Cassagnac, in his _Histoire des +Girondins et des Massacres de Septembre_, have proved this abundantly. +They have exhumed from the archives and the record offices such a mass +of uncontested and incontestable documents, that not the slightest +doubt is now permissible. Edgar Quinet has not hesitated to recognize +this in his book, _La Révolution_. He says: "The {360} massacres were +executed administratively; the same discipline was everywhere displayed +throughout the carnage.... This was not a piece of blind, spontaneous +barbarism; it was a barbarity slowly meditated, minutely elaborated by +a sanguinary mind. Hence it bears no resemblance to anything +previously known in history. Marat harvested in September what he had +been sowing for three years." The Parisian populace, eight hundred +thousand souls, was inert; it was cowardly, it trembled; but it did not +approve, it was not an accomplice. It was a monstrous thing that a +handful of cut-throats should be enough to transform Paris into a +slaughter-house. One shudders in thinking what a few criminals can +accomplish in the midst of an immense population. "The people, the +real people--that composed of laborious and honest workmen, ardent and +patriotic at heart, and of young _bourgeois_ with generous aspirations +and indomitable courage--never united for an instant with the +scoundrels recruited by Maillard from every kennel in the capital. +While the hired assassins of the Committee of Surveillance established +in the prisons what Vergniaud called a butcher's shop for human flesh, +the true populace was assembled on the Champ-de-Mars, and before the +enlistment booths; it was offering its purest blood for the country; it +would have blushed to shed that of helpless unfortunates."[1] In 1871, +the murder of hostages and {361} the burning of monuments was no more +approved by the population than the massacres in the prisons were in +1792. The crimes were committed at both epochs by a mere handful of +individuals. The great majority of the people were guilty merely of +apathy and fear. + +The hideous tableau surpasses the most lugubrious conceptions of +Dante's sombre imagination. Paris is a hell. From August 29, it is +like a torpid Oriental town. The whole city is in custody, like a +criminal whose limbs are held while he is being searched and put in +irons. Every house is inspected by the agents of the Commune. A knock +at the door makes the inmates tremble. The denunciation of an enemy, a +servant, a neighbor, is a death sentence. People scarcely dare to +breathe. Neither running water nor solid earth is free. The parapets +of quays, the arches of bridges, the bathing and washing boats are +bristling with sentries. Everything is surrounded. There is no +refuge. Three thousand suspected persons are taken out of houses, and +crowded into prisons. The hunt begins anew the following day. The +programme of massacres is arranged. The Communal Council of +Surveillance has minutely regulated everything. The price of the +actual work is settled. The personnel of cut-throats is at its post. +Danton has furnished the executioners; Manuel, the victims. All is +ready. The bloody drama can begin. + +On September 2, Danton said to the Assembly: "The tocsin about to sound +is not an alarm signal; it {362} is a charge upon the enemies of the +country. To vanquish them, gentlemen, all that is needed is boldness, +and again boldness, and always boldness." Two days before, he had been +still more explicit. "The 10th of August," said he, "divided us into +republicans and royalists; the first few in number, the second many...; +we must make the royalists afraid." A frightful gesture, a horizontal +gesture, sufficed to express his meaning. + +Robbery preceded murder. It was a veritable raid. The Commune caused +the palaces, national property, the Garde-Meuble, the houses and +mansions of the _émigrés_ to be pillaged. One saw nothing but carts +and wagons transporting stolen goods to the Hôtel-de-Ville. All the +plate was stolen from the churches likewise. "Millions," says Madame +Roland in her Memoirs, "passed into the hands of people who used it to +perpetuate the anarchy which was the source of their domination." When +will the men of the Commune render their accounts? Never. Who are the +accomplices of Danton and Marat in organizing the massacres? A band of +defaulting accountants, faithless violators of public trusts, breakers +of locks, swindlers, spies, and men overwhelmed with debts. What +interest have they in planning the murders? That of perpetuating the +dictatorship they had assumed on the eve of August 10, and, above all, +of having no accounts to render. A few weeks later on, Collot +d'Herbois will say at the Jacobin Club: "The 2d of September is the +chief article in the creed of our liberty." + +{363} + +The jailors were forewarned. They served the prisoners' dinner +earlier, and took away their knives. There was a disturbed and uneasy +look in their faces which made the victims suspect their end was near. +Toward noon the general alarm was beaten in every street. The citizens +were ordered to return at once to their dwellings. An order was issued +to illuminate every house when night fell. The shops were closed. +Terror overspread the entire city. + +It was agreed that at the third discharge of cannon the cut-throats +should set to work. The first blood shed was that of prisoners taken +from the mayoralty to the Abbey prison. The carriages containing them +passed along the Quai des Orfèvres, the Pont-Neuf and rue Dauphine, +until it reached the Bussy square. Here there was a crowd assembled +around a platform where enlistments were going on. The throng impeded +the progress of the carriages. Thereupon one of the escort opened the +door of one of them, and standing on the step, plunged his sabre into +the breast of an aged priest. The multitude shuddered and fled in +affright. "That makes you afraid," said the assassin; "you will see +plenty more like it." + +The rest of the escort followed the example set them. The carriages go +on again, and so do the massacres. They kill along the route, and they +kill on arriving at the Abbey. Towards five o'clock, Billaud-Varennes +presents himself there, wearing his municipal scarf. "People," says +he--what he calls {364} people is a band of salaried +assassins--"people, thou immolatest thine enemies, thou art doing thy +duty." Then he walks into the midst of the dead bodies, dipping his +feet in blood, and fraternizes with the murderers. "There is nothing +more to do here," exclaims Maillard; "let us go to the Carmelites." + +At the Carmelites, one hundred and eighty priests, crowded into the +church and convent, were awaiting their fate with pious resignation. +Two days before, Manuel had said to them ironically: "In forty-eight +hours you will all be free. Get ready to go into a foreign country and +enjoy the repose you cannot find here." And on the previous day a +gendarme had said to the Archbishop of Arles, blowing the smoke from +his pipe into his face as he did so: "It is to-morrow, then, that they +are going to kill Your Grandeur." A short time before the massacre +began, the victims were sent into the garden. At the bottom of it was +an orangery which has since become a chapel. Mgr. Dulau, Archbishop of +Arles, and the Bishops of Beauvais and de Saintes, both of whom were +named de la Rochefoucauld, kneeled down with the other priests and +recited the last prayers. The murderers approached. The Archbishop of +Arles, who was upwards of eighty, advanced to meet them. "I am he whom +you seek," he said; "my sacrifice is made; but spare these worthy +priests; they will pray for you on earth, and I in heaven." They +insulted him before they struck him. "I have never done harm to any +one," said he. An assassin {365} responded: "Very well; I'll do some +to you," and killed him. The other priests were chased around the +garden from one tree to another, and shot down. During this infernal +hunt the murderers were shouting with laughter and singing their +favorite song: _Dansez la Carmagnole_! + +The massacre of the Carmelites is over. "Let us go back to the Abbey!" +cries Maillard; "we shall find more game there." This time there is a +pretence of justice made. The tribunal is the vestibule of the Abbey; +Maillard, the chief cut-throat, is president; the assassins are the +judges, and the public, the Marseillais, the sans-culottes, the female +furies, and men to whom murder was a delightful spectacle. The +prisoners are summoned one after another. They enter the vestibule, +which has a wicket as a door of exit. They are questioned simply as a +matter of form. Their answers are not even listened to. "Conduct this +gentleman to the Force!" says the president. The prisoner thinks he is +safe; he does not know that this phrase has been agreed upon as the +signal of death. On reaching the wicket, hatchet and sabre strokes cut +him down in the midst of his dream. The Swiss officers and soldiers +who had survived August 10 were murdered thus. Their torture lasted a +longer or shorter time, and was accomplished with more or less cruel +refinements, according to the caprice of the assassins, who were nearly +all drunk. + +Night came, and torches were lighted. No {366} shadows; a grand +illumination. They must see clearly in the slaughter house. Lanterns +were placed near the lakes of blood and heaps of dead bodies, so as +plainly to distinguish the work from the workmen. There were some who +were bent on losing no details of the carnage. The spectators wanted +to take things easy. They were tired of standing too long. Benches +for men and others for dames were got ready for them. The death-rattle +of the agonizing, the vociferations of the assassins, the emulation +between the executioners who kill slowly and the victims who are in +haste to die, give joy to the spectators. There is no interruption to +the human butchery. There has been so much blood spilled that the feet +of the murderers slip on the pavement. A litter is made of straw and +the clothes of the victims, and thereafter none are killed except upon +this mattress. In this way the work is more commodiously accomplished. +The assassins have plenty of assurance. Morning dawns on the +continuation of the murders, and the wives of the murderers bring them +something to eat. + +On September 2, the only persons handed over to the cut-throats, were +at the Abbey, the Carmelites, and Saint-Firmin. On September 3, the +massacre became more general. The assassins had said: "If there is no +more work, we shall have to find some." Their desire realizes itself. +Work will not be lacking. There is still some at the Force, where the +Princess de Lamballe, the preferred victim, is {367} murdered. The +assassins, who at the Abbey had been paid at the rate of eight francs a +day, get only fifty sous at the Force. They work with undiminished +zeal, even at this reduction. If necessary, they would work for +nothing. To drink wine and shed blood is the essential thing. The +negro Delorme, servant to Fournier "the American," distinguishes +himself among them all. His black skin, reddened with blood, his white +teeth and ferocious eyes, his bestial laugh, his ravenous fury, make +him a choice assassin. There is work too at the Conciergerie, at the +great and little Châtelet, the Salpêtrière, and the Bicêtre. A great +number of those detained are people condemned or accused of private +crimes which had absolutely nothing in common with politics. No +matter; blood is wanted; they kill there as elsewhere. At the Grand +Châtelet, work is so plenty, and the assassins so few, that they +release several individuals imprisoned for theft, and impress them into +their service. One of these unfortunate accidental executioners begins +in a hesitating way, strikes a few undecided blows, and then throws +down the hatchet placed in his hands. "No, no," he cries, "I cannot. +No, no! Rather a victim than a murderer! I would rather receive death +from scoundrels like you, then give it to innocent, disarmed people. +Strike me!" And at once the veteran murderers kill the inexperienced +cut-throat. There was a woman, known on account of her charms as the +Beautiful Flower Girl, who was accused of having wounded {368} her +lover, a French guard, in a fit of jealousy. Théroigne de Mericourt, +an amazon of the gutters, was her rival. She pointed her out to the +assassins. They fastened her naked to a post, her legs apart and her +feet nailed to the ground. They burned her alive. They cut off her +breasts with sabre strokes. They impaled her on a hot iron. Her +shrieks carried dismay as far as the outer banks of the Seine. +Théroigne was at the height of felicity. + +At the Salpêtrière there was still another spectacle. This prison for +fallen women is a place of correction for the old, of amendment for the +young, and an asylum for those who are still children. More than forty +children of the lower classes were slain during these horrible days. +The delirium of murder reached its height. Gorged with wine mingled +with gunpowder, intoxicated with the fumes and reek of carnage, the +assassins experienced a devouring, inextinguishable thirst for blood +which nothing could quench. More blood, and yet more blood! And where +can it now be found? The prisons are empty. There are no more nobles, +no more priests, to put to death. Very well! for lack of anything +better, they will go to an asylum for the poor, the sick, and the +insane; to the Bicêtre. Vagabonds, paupers, fools, thieves, steward, +chaplains, janitor, all is fish that comes to their net. The butchery +lasts five days and nights without stopping. Massacre takes every +form; some are drowned in the cellars, others shot in the courts. +Water, fire, and sword, every sort of torture. + +{369} + +The cut-throats can at last take some repose. They have worked all the +week. There are still some, however, who have not yet had enough, and +who are going to continue the massacres of Paris in the provinces. The +Communal Council of Surveillance has taken care to send to every +commune in France a circular bearing the seal of the Minister of +Justice, inviting them to follow the example of the capital. + +September 9, the prisoners who had been detained at Orleans to be tried +there by the Superior Court, entered Versailles on carts. At the +moment when they approached the grating of the Orangery, assassins sent +from Paris under the lead of Fournier "the American" sprang upon them +and immolated every one. Thus perished the former Minister of Foreign +Affairs, de Lessart, and the Duke de Brissac, former commander of the +Constitutional Guard. Fournier "the American"[2] returned on horseback +to Paris and began to caracole on the Place Vendôme; Danton loudly +felicitated him on the success of the expedition, from the balcony of +the Ministry of Justice. + +During all this time, what efforts had the Assembly made to put a stop +to the murders? None, absolutely none. Never has any deliberative +body shown a like cowardice. Neither Vergniaud's voice nor that of any +other Girondin was heard in protest. Indignation, pity, found not a +single word to say. Speeches, {370} discussions, votes on different +questions, went on as usual. Concerning the massacres, not a syllable. +During that infamous week, neither the ministers, the virtuous Roland +not more than the others, neither Pétion, the mayor of Paris, nor the +commander of the National Guard sent a picket guard of fifty men to any +quarter to prevent the murders. A population of eight hundred thousand +souls and a National Guard of fifty thousand men bent their necks under +the yoke of a handful of bandits, of two hundred and thirty-five +assassins (the exact number is known). People trembled. At the +Assembly the old moderate party had disappeared. There were not more +than two hundred odd deputies present at the shameful and powerless +sessions. Terrorized Paris was in a state of stupor and prostration. + +The murderers ended by execrating themselves. Tormented by remorse, +they could see nothing before them but vivid faces, reeking entrails, +bleeding limbs. "Among the cut-throats," M. Louis Blanc has said, +"some gave signs of insanity that led to the supposition that some +mysterious and terrible drug had been mingled with the wine they +drank." Some of them became furious madmen. Others sought refuge in +suicide, killing themselves the moment they had no one else to kill. +Others enlisted. They were chased out of the army. Among these was +the man who had carried the head of the Princess de Lamballe on a pike. +One day when he was boasting of his murders, the soldiers became +indignant and {371} put him to death. Others still were tried as +Septembrists and sent to the scaffold. The guilty received their +punishment, even on this earth. Well! there are people nowadays who +would like to rehabilitate them! In vain has Lamartine, the founder of +the Second Republic, exclaimed in a burst of noble wrath: "Has human +speech an execration, an anathema, which is equal to the horror these +crimes of cannibals inspire in me, as in all civilized men?" In vain +have the most celebrated historians of democracy, Edgar Quinet and +Michelet, expressed in eloquent terms their indignation against these +crimes. In vain has M. Louis Blanc said: "Every murder is a suicide. +In the victim the body alone is killed; but what is killed in the +murderer is the soul." There are men who would not alone excuse, but +glorify the assassinations and the assassins! + + + +[1] M. Mortimer-Ternaux, _Histoire de la Terreur_. + +[2] Claude Fournier-Lhéritier, was born in Auvergne, 1745, and served +as a volunteer in Santo Domingo, 1772-85, with Toussaint l'Ouverture, +whence his sobriquet "the American." + + + + +{372} + +XXXVI. + +MADAME ROLAND DURING THE MASSACRES. + +Madame Roland's hatred was appeased. The ambitious _bourgeoise_ +throned it for the second time at the Ministry of the Interior, and the +Queen groaned in captivity in the Temple tower. The Egeria of the +Girondins had not felt her heart swell with a single movement of pity +for Marie Antoinette. The fatal 10th of August had seemed to her a +personal triumph in which her pride delighted. The parvenue enjoyed +the humiliations of the daughter of the German Cæsars. Her jealous +instincts feasted on the afflictions of the Queen of France and Navarre. + +Lamartine, indignant at this cruelty on Madame Roland's part, has +repented of the eulogies he gave her in his _Histoire des Girondins_. +In his _Cours de Littérature_ (Volume XIII. Conversation XXIII.), he +says: "I glided over that medley of intrigue and pomposity which +composed the genius, both feminine and Roman, of this woman. In so +doing, I conceded more to popularity than to truth. I wanted to give a +Cornelia to the Republic. As a matter of fact, I do not know what +Cornelia was, that mother of the {373} Gracchi who brought up +conspirators against the Roman Senate, and trained them to sedition, +that virtue of ambitious commoners. As to Madame Roland, who inflated +a vulgar husband by the breath of her feminine anger against a court +she found odious because it did not open to her upstart vanity, there +was nothing really fine in her except her death. Her rôle had been a +mere parade of true greatness of soul." What Lamartine finds fault +with most of all is her hostility to the martyr Queen. He adds: "She +inspired the Girondins, her intimate friends, with an implacable hatred +against the Queen, already so humiliated and so menaced; she had +neither respect nor pity for this victim; she points her out to the +rebellious multitude. She is no longer a wife, a mother, or a +Frenchwoman. She poses as Nemesis at the door of the Temple, when the +Queen is groaning there over her husband, her children, and herself, +between the throne and the scaffold. This ostentatious stoicism of +implacability is what, in my view, kills the woman in this female +demagogue." + +Alas! if Madame Roland was guilty, she was to be punished cruelly. The +colleague of the _virtuous_ Roland was the organizer of the September +massacres. The republican sheepfold dreamed of by the admirer of +Jean-Jacques Rousseau was invaded by ferocious beasts. Human nature +had never appeared under a more execrable aspect than since its +so-called regeneration. Madame Roland was filled with a naïve +astonishment. After having sown the wind she was {374} utterly +surprised to reap the whirlwind. What! she said to herself, my husband +is minister, or, to speak with great exactness, I am the minister +myself, and yet there are people in France who are dissatisfied! +Ungrateful nation, why dost thou not appreciate thy happiness? Madame +Roland resembled certain politicians, who, having attained to power, +would willingly disembarrass themselves of those by whose aid they +reached it. For the second time she had just arrived at the goal of +her ambition. Who dared, then, to pollute her joy? Why did that +marplot, Danton, come with his untimely massacres to destroy such +brilliant projects and banish such delightful dreams? The man who, as +if in derision and antithesis, allowed himself to be called the +Minister of Justice, produced the effect of a monster on Madame Roland. +The republic as conceived by him had not the head of a goddess, but of +a Gorgon. Its eyes glittered with a sinister lustre. The sword it +held was that of an assassin or a headsman. + +Madame Roland was greatly astonished when, on Sunday, September 2, +1792, toward five in the evening, when the massacres had already begun, +she saw two hundred men of forbidding appearance arrive at the Ministry +of the Interior and ask for her husband, who was absent. Lucky for him +he was; for albeit a minister, they had come to arrest him in virtue of +a mandate of the Communal Council of Surveillance. Not finding Roland, +the two hundred men retired. One of them, with his shirt-sleeves +rolled up to his {375} elbows, and a sabre in his hand, declaimed +furiously against the treachery of ministers. A few minutes later, +Danton said to Pétion: "Do you know what they have taken into their +heads? If they haven't issued a decree to arrest Roland!"--"Who did +that?" demanded the mayor.--"Eh! those devils of committeemen. I have +taken the mandate; hold! here it is!" + +What was Madame Roland doing the next day, when the worst of the +massacres were going on? She gave a dinner, and allowed the Prussian, +Anacharsis Clootz, who came, moreover, uninvited, to make a regular +defence of these horrible murders. "The events of the day," she says +in her Memoirs, "formed the subject of conversation. Clootz pretended +to prove that it was an indispensable and salutary measure; he uttered +a good many commonplaces about the people's rights, the justice of +their vengeance, and of its utility to the welfare of the species; he +talked a long while and very loudly, ate still more, and fatigued more +than one listener." + +And yet, revolutionary passions had not extinguished every notion of +humanity and justice in Madame Roland's soul. On that very day she +induced her husband to write a letter to the National Assembly +concerning the massacres. But how weak and undecided is this letter, +and how public opinion must have been lowered and debased when it could +regard Roland as a courageous minister! In place of scathing the +murderers with the energy of an {376} honest man, he pleads extenuating +circumstances in their favor. "It is in the nature of things and +according to the human heart," he said in his pale missive, "that +victory should lead to some excesses. The sea, agitated by a violent +storm, continues to roar long after the tempest; but everything has its +limits and must finally see them determined. Yesterday was a day over +whose events we ought, perhaps, to draw a veil. I know that the +terrible vengeance of the people carries with it a sort of justice; but +how easy it is for scoundrels and traitors to abuse this effervescence, +and how necessary it is to arrest it!" This language produced not the +least effect. The massacres went on, and Roland remained minister; +although in his letter of September 3 he had written: "I ask the +privilege of resigning if the silence of the laws does not permit me to +act." The _virtuous_ Roland sat in the Council beside his colleague, +the organizer of this human butchery. September 13, he addressed a +letter to the Parisians in which he burnt incense to himself, bragged +about his character, his actions, and his firmness, and carried his +infatuation so far as to write: "I have twice accepted a burden which I +felt myself able to bear." Ah! how difficult it is to renounce even a +shadow of power, and of what compromises with their consciences are not +ministers capable in order to retain for a few days longer the +portfolios that are slipping from their hands! In the depths of his +soul Roland, like his wife, had the profoundest horror of the murders +and {377} the murderers. And yet notice how he extenuates them in his +letter to the Parisians: "I admired August 10; I trembled over the +results of September 2; I carefully considered what the betrayed +patience of the people and their justice had produced, and I did not +blame a first impulse too inconsiderately; I believe that its further +progress should have been prevented, and that those who were seeking to +perpetuate it were deceived by their imagination or by cruel and +evil-minded men. If the erring brethren recognize that they have been +deceived, let them come; my arms are open to them." That was a very +prompt amnesty. Already the assassins are but erring brethren, and the +minister welcomes them to his arms! + +The Gironde kept silence, or, if it spoke, it was to attribute, like +Vergniaud, the massacres "to the _émigrés_ and the satellites of +Coblentz." Later on, they were horrified by the crimes, but it was +when others were to profit by them. Each taken by himself, the +Girondins did not hesitate to condemn the murders; but taken as a +whole, they considered merely the interests of their party. Were not +three of them still in the Ministerial Council? What had they to +complain of, then? The September massacres are the most striking +expression of what abominations the ambitious may commit or allow to be +committed in order to maintain themselves a few weeks longer in power. + +But there is a voice in the depths of conscience {378} which neither +interest nor ambition can succeed in stifling. Madame Roland could not +blind herself. The odious reality appeared to her. At last she saw +the yawning gulf beneath her feet, and she uttered a cry of terror. A +secret voice warned her that her fate would be like that of the +September victims. After the 9th of that fatal month her imagination +was vividly impressed. Bloody phantoms rose before her. She wrote on +that day to Bancal des Issarts: "If you knew the frightful details of +these expeditions.... You know my enthusiasm for the Revolution; well, +I am ashamed of it; it has become hideous. In a week ... how do I know +what may happen? It is degrading to remain in office, and we are not +permitted to leave Paris. We are detained so that we may be destroyed +at the propitious moment." + +From that time a rising anger and indignation took possession of the +mind and heart of the Egeria of the Girondins, and constantly increased +until the hour when she ascended the steps of the scaffold. She writes +in her Memoirs, apropos of the September massacres: "All Paris +witnessed these horrible scenes executed by a small number of wretches +(there were but fifteen at the Abbey, at the door of which only two +National Guards were stationed, in spite of the applications made to +the Commune and the commandant). All Paris permitted it to go on. All +Paris was accursed in my eyes, and I no longer hoped that liberty might +be established among cowards, insensible to the worst outrages that +could be perpetrated {379} against nature and humanity, cold spectators +of attempts which the courage of fifty armed men could have prevented +with ease.... It is not the first night that astonishes me; but four +days!--and inquisitive people going to see this spectacle! No, I know +nothing in the annals of the most barbarous peoples which can compare +with these atrocities." + +What a striking lesson for those who play with anarchical passions and +end by falling themselves into the snares they have laid for others! +Nothing is more deserving of study than this retaliatory punishment +which is found, one may say, on every page of revolutionary histories. +The hour was coming when the Girondins and their heroine would repent +of the means they had employed to overset the throne. This was when +the same means were employed against them, when they recognized their +own weapons in the wounds they received. Then, when they had no more +interest in keeping silence, they sought to escape a complicity that +gained them nothing. Instead of the luminous heights which in their +golden dreams they had aspired to gain, they fell, crushed and +overwhelmed, into a dismal gulf, full of tears and blood. How bitter +then were their recriminations against men and things! It was only to +virtue that the dying Brutus said: "Thou art but a name." The +Girondins said it also to glory, to country, and to liberty. Those +among them who did not succeed in fleeing, disavowed, denounced, and +insulted each other before the revolutionary tribunal. At the {380} +Conciergerie they intoned the Marseillaise, but parodying the demagogic +chant in this wise:-- + + Contre nous de la tyrannie[1] + Le _couteau_ sanglant est levé. + + +Read the Memoirs of Louvet, Buzot, Barbaroux, Pétion, and Madame +Roland, and you will see to what extremes of bitterness the language of +deceived ambition can go. They are paroxysms of rage, howls of anger, +shrieks of despair. Consider the difference between philosophy and +religion! The philosophers curse, and the Christian pardons. Yes, as +Edgar Quinet has said, "Louis XVI. alone speaks of forgiveness on that +scaffold to which the others were to bring thoughts of vengeance and +despair. And by that he seems still to reign over those who were to +follow him in death with the passions and the furies of earth." Louis +XVI. will be magnanimous and calm. A celestial sweetness will +overspread his royal countenance. An infernal rage will distort the +heart and the features of the Girondins. What pains, what tortures, in +their death-struggle! Earth fails them, and they do not look to +heaven. What accents of disgust and hatred when they speak of their +former accomplices, now become their executioners! + +"Great God!" Buzot will say, "if it is only by such men and such +infamous means that republics {381} can arise and be consolidated, +there is no government more frightful on this earth nor more fatal to +human happiness." He will address these insults, worthy of the +imprecations of Camillus, to the city of Paris: "I say truly, that +France can expect neither liberty nor happiness except from the +irreparable destruction of that capital." + +Barbaroux will be still more severe. His anathemas are launched not +only at Paris, but at all France. "The people," he says, "do not +deserve that one should become attached to them, for they are +essentially ungrateful. It is the absurdest folly to try to conduct to +liberty people without morals, who blaspheme God and adore Marat. +These people are no more fit for a philosophic government than the +lazzaroni of Naples or the cannibals of America.... Liberty, virtue, +sacred rights of men, to-day you are nothing but empty names." Pétion, +before dying, will write to his son this letter, which is like the +testament of the Gironde: "My greatest torment will be to think that so +many crimes went unpunished; vengeance is here the most sacred of +duties.... My son, either the murderers of thy father and thy country +will be delivered to the severities of the law and expiate their crimes +upon the scaffold, or thou art under obligation to free thy country +from them. They have broken all the ties of society; their crimes are +of such a nature that they do not fall under ordinary rules. From such +monsters every one is authorized to purge the earth." + +{382} + +Madame Roland will be not less vehement than Buzot, Barbaroux, and +Pétion. She will address these severe but just reproaches to her +friends who had not been valiant enough in their own defence: "They +temporized with crime, the cowards! They were to fall in their turn, +but they succumb shamefully, pitied by nobody, and with nothing to +expect from posterity but utter contempt.... Rather than obey their +tyrants, than descend from the bar and go out of the Assembly like a +timid flock about to be branded by the butcher, why did they not do +justice to themselves by falling on the monsters to annihilate them +rather than be sentenced by them?" It is not her friends alone whom +her anger will lash, but the sovereign people, the people once so +flattered, whom she will pursue with her anathemas. "The people," she +will say, "can feel nothing but the cannibal joy of seeing blood flow, +in order that they may run no risk of shedding their own. That +predicted time has come when, if they ask for bread, dead bodies will +be given them; but their degraded nature takes pleasure in the +spectacle, and the satisfied instinct of cruelty makes the dearth +supportable until it becomes absolute." The Egeria of the Girondins +will comprehend that all is lost, that even her blood will be sterile, +and that France is condemned either to anarchy or a dictatorship. +"Liberty," she will exclaim, "was not made for this corrupt nation, +which leaves the bed of debauchery or the dunghill of poverty only to +brutalize itself in license, and howl as it {383} wallows in the blood +streaming from scaffolds." Like the damned souls in Dante, Madame +Roland will leave all hope behind, and when, a few days after Marie +Antoinette, she ascends the steps of the guillotine, instead of +thinking of heaven, like the Queen, she will address this sarcastic +speech to the plaster statue which has replaced that of Louis XV.: "O +Liberty! how they have betrayed thee!" + +But let us not anticipate. The Girondins are still to have a glimmer +of joy. The Republic is about to be proclaimed. + + + +[1] The bloody _knife_ of tyranny is lifted against us. + + + + +{384} + +XXXVII. + +THE PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC. + +"One of the astonishing things in the French Revolution," says one of +the most eminent writers of the democratic school, Edgar Quinet, "is +the unexpectedness with which the great changes occur. The most +important events, the destruction of the monarchy and the advent of the +Republic, came about without any previous warning." The most ardent +republicans were royalists, not merely under the old régime, but after +1789, and even up to August 10, 1792. Marat wrote, in No. 374 of the +_Ami du Peuple_, February 17, 1791: "I have often been represented as a +mortal enemy of royalty, but I claim that the King has no better friend +than myself." And he added: "As to Louis XVI. personally, I know very +well that his defects are chargeable solely to his education, and that +by nature he is an excellent sort of man, whom one would have cited as +a worthy citizen if he had not had the misfortune to be born on the +throne; but, such as he is, he is at all events the King we want. We +ought to thank Heaven for having given him to us. We ought to pray +that he may be spared to us." Marat praying, {385} Marat thanking +Heaven! and for whom? For the King. Does not that prove what deep +root royalty had taken in France? April 20, 1792, the same Marat +bitterly reproached Condorcet with "shamelessly calumniating the +Jacobin Club, and perfidiously accusing it of wishing to destroy the +monarchy" (_L' Ami du Peuple_, No. 434). June 13, he attacked those +who violated the oath taken at the time of the Federation, and said: +"To defend the Constitution is the same thing as to be faithful to the +nation, the law, and the King" (_L' Ami du Peuple_, No. 448). + +During the entire continuance of the Legislative Assembly, when +Robespierre, having left the tribune, was pretending to educate the +people by means of his journal, what he defended to the utmost was the +royal Constitution. Madame Roland relates that after the flight to +Varennes, when the prospect of a republic loomed up, possibly for the +first time, at a secret meeting, Robespierre, grinning as usual, and +biting his nails, asked ironically what a republic might be. In June, +1792, the entire Jacobin Club was royalist still. It proposed to drop +Billaud-Varennes, because Billaud-Varennes had dared to put the +monarchical principle in question. On the 7th of July following, two +months and a half, that is, before the opening of the Convention, at +the time of the famous Lamourette Kiss, all the members of the Assembly +swore to execrate the Republic forever. Three weeks after September 2, +Danton alleged the paucity and the weakness of the republicans, +compared with the royalists, as {386} motives for the massacres. +Pétion has said: "When the insurrection of August 10 was undertaken, +there were but five men in France who desired a republic." + +Buzot, Madame Roland's idol, has written: "A wretched mob, +unintelligent and unenlightened, vomited forth insults against royalty; +the rest neither desired nor willed anything but the Constitution of +1791, and spoke of the republicans just as one speaks of extremely +honest fools. This people is republican only through force of the +guillotine." And yet, September 21, 1792, the Convention, holding its +first sitting in the Hall of the Manège, began by proclaiming the +Republic. + +Buzot, in his Memoirs, has thus described the deputations that were +sent to the bar, and the public that occupied the galleries: "It seemed +as if the outlet of every sewer in Paris and other great cities had +been searched for whatever was most filthy, hideous, and infected. +Villainously dirty faces, surmounted by shocks of greasy hair, and with +eyes half sunk into their heads, they spat out, with their nauseating +breath, the grossest insults mingled with the sharp snarls of +carnivorous beasts. The galleries were worthy of such legislators: men +whose frightful aspect betokened crime and poverty, and women whose +shameless faces expressed the filthiest debauchery. When all these +with hands and feet and voice made their horrible racket, one seemed to +be in an assembly of devils." + +When the session opened, Collot d'Herbois was {387} the first speaker. +He said: "There is a matter which you cannot put off until to-morrow, +which you cannot put off until this evening, which you cannot defer for +a single instant without being unfaithful to the wishes of the nation; +it is the abolition of royalty." Quinet having objected that it would +be better to present this question when the Constitution was to be +discussed, Grégoire, constitutional Bishop of Blois, exclaimed: +"Certainly, no one will ever propose to us to preserve the deadly race +of kings in France. All the dynasties have been breeds of ravenous +beasts, living on nothing but human flesh; still it is necessary to +reassure plainly the friends of liberty; this magic talisman, which +still has power to stupefy so many men, must be destroyed." Bazire +remarked that it would be a frightful example to the people to see an +Assembly which they had entrusted with their dearest interests, resolve +upon anything in a moment of enthusiasm and without thorough +discussion. Grégoire replied with vehemence: "Eh! what need is there +of discussion when everybody is of the same mind? Kings, in the moral +order, are what monsters are in the physical order. Courts are the +workshop of crime and the lair of tyrants. The history of kings is the +martyrology of nations; we are all equally penetrated by this truth. +What is the use of discussing it?" Then the question, put to vote in +these terms: "The National Convention declares that royalty is +abolished in France," was adopted amidst applause. + +{388} + +At four in the afternoon of the same day, a municipal officer named +Lubin, surrounded by mounted gendarmes and a large crowd of people, +came to read a proclamation before the Temple tower. The trumpets were +sounded. A great silence ensued, and Lubin, who had a stentorian +voice, read loud enough to be heard by the royal family confined in the +dungeon, this proclamation, the death knell of monarchy: "Royalty is +abolished in France. All public acts will be dated from the first year +of the Republic. The seal of State will be inscribed with this motto: +_Republique française_. The National Seal will represent a woman +seated on a sheaf of arms, holding in one hand a pike surmounted by a +liberty-cap." Hébert (the famous Père Duchesne) was at this moment on +guard near the royal family. Sitting on the threshold of their +chamber, he sought to discover a movement of vexation or anger, or any +other emotion on their faces. He was unsuccessful. While listening to +the revolutionary decree which snatched away his throne, the descendant +of Saint Louis, Henry IV., and Louis XIV. experienced not the slightest +trouble. He had a book in his hand, and he quietly went on reading it. +As impassive as her spouse, the Queen neither made a movement nor +uttered a word. When the proclamation was finished, the trumpets +sounded again. Cléry then went to the window, and the eyes of the +crowd turned instantly towards him. As they mistook him for Louis +XVI., they overwhelmed him with insults. The gendarmes made +threatening {389} gestures, and he was obliged to withdraw so as to +quiet the tumult. While the populace was unchained around the Temple +prison, one man alone was calm, one man alone seemed a stranger to all +anxiety: it was the prisoner. + +A new era begins. The death-struggle of royalty is over. Royalty is +dead, and the King is soon to die. Grégoire, who had stolen the vote +(there were but 371 conventionists present; 374 were absent; that is to +say, more than half), is both surprised and enthusiastic about what he +has done. He confesses that for several days his excessive joy +deprived him of appetite and sleep. Such joy will not last very long. +M. Taine compares revolutionary France to a badly nourished workman, +poor, and overdriven with toil, and yet who drinks strong liquors. At +first, in his intoxication, he thinks he is a millionnaire, loved and +admired; he thinks himself a king. "But soon the radiant visions give +place to black and monstrous phantoms.... At present, France has +passed through the period of joyous delirium, and is about to enter on +another that is sombre; behold it, capable of daring, suffering, and +doing all things, whenever its guides, as widely astray as itself, +shall point out an enemy or an obstacle to its fury." + +How quickly the disenchantments come! Already Lafayette, the man of +generous illusions, has had to imitate the conduct of those _émigrés_ +on whom he has been so severe. He has fled to a foreign land, and +found there not a refuge, but a prison. He will {390} remain more than +five years in the gloomy fortress of Olmutz. The victor of Valmy, +Dumouriez, will hardly be more fortunate. He will go over to the +enemy, and live in exile on a pension from foreign powers. How close +together deceptions and recantations come! Marat, who had already said +to the inhabitants of the capital: "Eternal cockneys, with what +epithets would I not assail you in the transports of my despair, if I +knew any more humiliating than that of Parisians?"[1] Marat, who had +said to all Frenchmen: "No, no; liberty is not made for an ignorant, +light, and frivolous nation, for cits brought up in fear, +dissimulation, knavery, and lying, nourished in cunning, intrigue, +sycophancy, avarice, and swindling, subsisting only by theft and +rapine, aspiring after nothing but pleasures, titles, and decorations, +and always ready to sell themselves for gold!"[2] Marat will write, +May 7th, 1793, that is to say, at the apogee of his favorite political +system: "All measures taken up to the present day by the assemblies, +constituent, legislative, and conventional, to establish and +consolidate liberty, have been thoughtless, vain, and illusory, even +supposing them to have been taken in good faith. The greater part seem +to have had for their object to perpetuate oppression, bring on +anarchy, death, poverty, and famine; to make the people weary of their +independence, to make liberty a burden, to cause them to {391} detest +the Revolution, through its excessive disorders, to exhaust them by +watching, fatigue, want, and inanition, to reduce them to despair by +hunger, and to bring them back to despotism by civil war."[3] + +There were six ministers appointed on August 10. Two of them, Claviére +and Roland, will kill themselves; two others, Lebrun-Tondu and Danton, +will be guillotined; the remaining two, Servan and Monge, are destined +to become, one a general of division under Napoleon, and the other a +senator of the Empire and Count of Péluse; and when, at the beginning +of his reign, the Emperor complains to the latter because there are +still partisans of the Republic to be found: "Sire," the former +minister of August 10 will answer, "we had so much trouble to make them +republicans! may it please Your Majesty kindly to allow them at least a +few days to become imperialists!" Of the two men who had so +enthusiastically brought about the proclamation of the Republic, one, +Collot d'Herbois, will be transported to Guiana by the republicans, and +die there in a paroxysm of burning fever; the other, Grégoire, will be +a senator of the Empire, which will not, however, prevent him from +promoting the deposition of Napoleon as he had promoted that of Louis +XVI. There are men who will exchange the jacket of the _sans-culotte_ +for the gilded livery of an imperial functionary. The conventionists +and regicides are {392} transformed into dukes and counts and barons. +David, the official painter of the Empire, Napoleon's favorite, will +paint with joy the picture of a pope, and be very proud of his great +picture of the new Charlemagne's coronation. But listen to Edgar +Quinet: "When I see the orators of deputations taking things with such +a high hand at the bar, and lording it so proudly over mute and +complaisant assemblies, I should like to know what became of them a few +years later." And thereupon he sets out to discover their traces. But +after considerable investigation he stops. "If I searched any +further," he exclaims, "I should be afraid of encountering them among +the petty employés of the Empire. It was quite enough to see Huguenin, +the indomitable president of the insurrectionary Commune, so quickly +tamed, soliciting and obtaining a post as clerk of town gates as soon +as absolute power made its reappearance after the 18th Brumaire. The +terrible Santerre becomes the gentlest of men as soon as he is +pensioned by the First Consul. Hardly had Bourdon de l'Oise and +Albitte, those men of iron, felt the rod than you see them the supplest +functionaries of the Empire. The great king-taker, Drouet, thrones it +in the sub-prefecture of Sainte-Menehould. Napoleon has related that, +on August 10, he was in a shop in the Carrousel, whence he witnessed +the taking of the palace. If he had a presentiment then, he must have +smiled at the chaos which he was to reduce so easily to its former +limits. How many furies, and all to terminate so soon in the +accustomed obedience!" + +{393} + +Is not history, with its perpetual alternatives of license and +despotism, like a vicious circle? And do not the nations pass their +time in producing webs of Penelope, whose bloody threads they weave and +unweave again with tears? All governments, royalties, empires, +republics, ought to be more modest. But all, profoundly forgetful of +the lessons of the past, believe themselves immortal. All declare +haughtily that they have closed forever the era of revolutions. + +With the advent of the Republic a new calendar had been put in force. +The equality of days and nights at the autumnal equinox opened the era +of civil equality on September 22. "Who would have believed that this +human geometry, so profoundly calculated, was written in the sand, and +that in a few years no traces of it would remain? ... The heavens have +continued to gravitate, and have brought back the equality of days and +nights; but they have allowed the promised liberty and equality to +perish, like meteors that vanish in empty space.... The +_sans-culottes_ have not been able to make themselves popular among the +starry peoples.... An ancient belief which the men of the Revolution +had neglected through fear or through contempt was again met with; a +spectre had appeared; a chilly breath, like that of Samuel, had made +itself felt; and lo, the edifice so sagely constructed, and leaning on +the worlds, has vanished away."[4] + +{394} + +There lies at the foundation of history a supreme sadness and +melancholy. This never-ending series of illusions and deceptions, +errors and afflictions, faults and crimes; this rage, and passion, and +folly; so many efforts and fatigues, so many dangers, tortures, and +tears, so much blood, such revolutions, catastrophies, cataclysms of +every sort,--and all for what? Wretched humanity, rolling its stone of +Sisyphus from age to age, inspires far more compassion than contempt. +The painful reflections caused by the annals of all peoples are perhaps +more sombre for the French Revolution than for any other period. Edgar +Quinet justly laments over the inequality between the sacrifices of the +victims and the results obtained by posterity. He affirms that in +other histories one thing reconciles us to the fury of men, and that is +the speedy fecundity of the blood they shed; for example, when one sees +that of the martyrs flow, one also sees Christianity spread over the +earth from the depth of the catacombs; while amongst us, the blood +which streamed most abundantly and from such lofty sources, did not +find soil equally well prepared. And the illustrious historian +exclaims sadly: "The supreme consolation has been refused to our +greatest dead; their blood has not been a seed of virtue and +independence for their posterity. If they should reappear once more, +they would feel themselves tortured again, and on a worse scaffold, by +the denial of their descendants; they would hurl at us again the same +adieu: 'O Liberty! how they have betrayed thee!'" + + + +[1] _Ami du Peuple_, No. 429. + +[2] _Ami du Peuple_, No. 539. + +[3] _La Publiciste de la République_, No. 211. + +[4] Edgar Quinet, _La Révolution_, t. 11. + + + + +{395} + +INDEX. + + +Abbey prison, the, massacre of the prisoners of, 363. + +Ankarstroem, Captain, the assassin of Gustavus III., 37, 41. + +Arles, Archbishop of, massacre of, 364. + +Assassins, the, of the September massacres, 362 _et seq._; their fate, +370. + +Assignats created, 128. + +Aubier, M. d', on the King's unwar-like disposition, 288; with the King +in the Convent of the Feuillants, 330. + + +Barbaroux, visionary schemes of, 271; declares the King might have +maintained himself, 285; anathemas of, on the Septembrists, 381. + +Barry, Madame du, her letter to Marie Antoinette, 138. + +Beaumarchais compared with Dumouriez, 95. + +Belgium, the invasion of, a failure, 136. + +Beugnot, Count, his description of Madame Roland, 87, 92; philosophic +remarks of, on woman, 108. + +Billaud-Varennes, 246; at the Abbey, 363. + +Blanc, M. Louis, quoted, 370. + +Bonne-Carrère, director of foreign affairs, portrait of, 101. + +Bossuet quoted, 134. + +Bouillé, Count de, warns Gustavus III. of the conspiracy against him, +38; his judgment on Gustavus III., 43. + +Bouillé, Marquis de, suppresses the insurrection at Nancy, 111, 133. + +Brissac, Duke of, his devotion to royalty, 137 _et seq._; intolerable +to the Jacobins, 141; accused in the Assembly, 144; assassinated, 147, +369. + +Brunswick, Duke of, his manifesto, 267. + +Buzot, Madame Roland's affection for, 64; quoted, 386. + + +Calvet, M., sent to the Abbey, 144. + +Campan, Madame, describes the Queen's emotion on hearing of her +brother's death, 28; her account of Dumouriez' interview with the +Queen, 155; in peril in the Tuileries, 324. + +Carmelite church, massacre at, 364. + +Chateaubriand, quotation from, 9. + +Chateauvieux, the fête of, 110 _et seq._, mutinous soldiers of, +punished, 112; fêted by the Jacobins, 113, 118; admitted to the +Assembly, 117. + +Chénier, André, patriotic conduct of, 113, 124; his ode to David, 119; +his fate, 124. + +Clavière made Minister of the Finances, 103, 160. + +Clootz, Anacharsis, defends the September massacres, 375. + +_Comédie-Française_, the, in the Revolution, 10. + +Commune, insurrectionary, formed in the Hôtel-de-Ville, 281; refuse to +extinguish the fire at the Tuileries, 325, 335, 345, 355; invites every +commune in France to follow the example of massacre in Paris, 369; +terrorize the Assembly, 370; order the arrest of Roland, 374, 378. + +Constitutional Guard, the composition of, 140; disarmed, 145. + +Cordeliers, club of the, 7; chiefs of, 7; decide to attack the +Tuileries, 274. + + +Danjou turns the mob bearing the Princess de Lamballe's head away from +the Temple, 355. + +Danton, cowardice of, 271, 316; his bloodthirsty speech to the +Assembly, 361, 374; fate of, 391. + +Dauphin, the, the red cap set on his head, 213; his interest in the +guard, Drouet, 217, 219; his prayer for the King, 220; on the morning +of August 10, 284; taken from his mother's arms by an insurrectionist, +297; in the Assembly, 299; in the Convent of the Feuillants, 329, 333; +prayer taught him by his mother, 347. + +David, his part in the fête of Chateauvieux, 119; conversation of, 319; +under the Empire, 392. + +Delorme, the negro assassin, 367. + +Desilles, killed in the insurrection at Nancy, 111. + +Drouet, the royalist guard, 217. + +Dumouriez, portrait of, by Madame Roland, 94; Minister of Foreign +Affairs, 95; "a miserable intriguer," 95; his career, 96; Masson's +description of him, 98; plays a double part, 101; his description of +Louis XVI., 104; made Minister of Foreign Affairs, 103; Memoirs of, +quoted, 127, 129, 130; urges the King to sign the decree for the +transportation of the clergy, 150; has an interview with the Queen, +153; refuses to be Madame Roland's puppet, 158; aids the King to be rid +of Roland and his faction, 164; takes the portfolio of War, 166; before +the Assembly, 167; resigns, 169; final interview of, with the King, +171; entreats him not to veto the decrees, 172 _et seq._; goes to the +army, 174. + +Duranton, made Minister of Justice, 103, 160. + + +Elisabeth, Madame, letter of, concerning the fête of Chateauvieux, 120; +remains with the King during the invasion of the Tuileries, 200; +mistaken by the mob for Marie Antoinette, 202; rejoins the Queen, 212; +letter of, to Madame de Raigecourt, 239; cherishes false illusions, +265; pious maxim of, 276; her gentleness, 295; prayer of, in the +Temple, 347. + +Emigration of the nobility the rule in 1792, 2. + + +Federation, fête of the, 249 _et seq._ + +Fersen, Count de, new information concerning, 14; his chivalric +devotion to Marie Antoinette, 15; their correspondence, 16; secret +mission of, 18; sees the King and Queen, 19; his melancholy end, 21, 22. + +Feuillants, Convent of the, royal family imprisoned in, 328 _et seq._ + +Feuillants, club of, 6. + +Force, the, prison of, 350. + +Fournier, "the American," 369. + +Francis II., warlike acts of, 127. + + +Geoffrey, M., remarks of, on Gustavus III., 33; quoted, 132. + +Girondins, the, 177; hesitate to depose the King, 271; tacitly approve +the massacres, 377. + +Gouges, Olympe de, 240. + +Gouvion, M. de, protests against admitting the Swiss to the Assembly, +116; death of, 167. + +Grand Châtelet, massacres at, 367. + +Grave, de, made Minister of War, 103; replaced by Servan, 160. + +Grégoire urges the abolition of royalty, 387; career of, after the +Revolution, 391. + +Guadet, hostility of, to Lafayette, 234. + +Guillotine, Doctor, and his invention, 12. + +Guillotine, the, 12; diversion of society over, 13. + +Gustavus III., his interest in Marie Antoinette, 17; trusted by her, +17; letter of, to her, 18; at Aix-la-Chapelle, 32; his superstition, +34; his promises to Louis XVI., 36; conspiracy against, 37 _et seq._; +assassination of, 40 _et seq._; scenes at his death, 42; character of, +43. + + +Hannaches, Mademoiselle d', 30, 77. + +Hébert, Abbé, confesses the King, 276. + +Hébert (Père Duchesne) on guard at the Temple, 388. + +Heine, Heinrich, quoted, 278. + +Herbois, Collot d', his part in the affair of the regiment of +Chateauvieux, 112 _et seq._; attacks Andre Chénier, 114; fate of, 125; +boasts of the 2d of September, 362; urges the abolition of royalty, +387; fate of, 391. + +Hervelly, M. d', brings the order to the Swiss to cease firing, 310. + +Hue, François, with the King in his captivity, 331; receives from the +King a lock of his hair, 346. + +Huguenin, the orator of the insurrectionists of June 20, 192; chief of +the Commune, 316. + + +Insurrectionists of June 20, organization of, 182; enter the hall of +the Assembly, 193; break into the Tuileries, 198. + +Isle, Rouget de l', author of the _Marseillaise_, 269. + + +Jacobin Club, place of its meeting, 5; its affiliations, 6; Lafayette's +remarks on, 9; joy of at, the death of Gustavus III., 44; the +insurrectionary power of, 177; of Brest and Marseilles, send two +battalions to Paris, 268; royalist, in June, 1792, 385. + +Jourdan, the headsman, 120. + +June 20, insurrection of, 186 _et seq._ + + +La Chesnaye commands the force in the Tuileries, 293. + +Lacoste, made Minister of the Marine, 103. + +Lafayette, letter of, to the Assembly, 178 _et seq._; his letter not +published, but referred to a committee, 181; his relations to the +Jacobins, 230; before the National Assembly, 232; distrusted by the +King and Queen, 236; anxious that the King should leave Paris, 256. + +Lalanne, the grenadier, and Louis XVI., 200. + +Lamartine, quoted, 131; his observations on Lafayette, 231; on Madame +Roland, 372. + +Lamballe, Princess of, 121, 321, 331; not allowed to go to the Temple +with the Queen, 343; sent to the Force, 350 _et seq._; examination and +execution of, 352 _et seq._; her body mutilated and her head carried on +a pike to the Temple, 355; her heart eaten, 358. + +Lamourette, Abbé, his career, 241; his speech to the Assembly and his +proposition for harmony, 242. + +Laporte burns the Countess de la Motte's book at the Queen's order, 142. + +Lebel, Madame de, 353. + +Legendre, addresses the King insolently, 202. + +Leopold II., his interest in French affairs, 23; death of, 27. + +Lessart, de, report of, disapproved by the Assembly, 28; impeached, 30; +massacre of, 369. + +Lilienhorn, Count de, one of the assassins of Gustavus III., 37, 45. + +_Logographe_, box of the, 299 _et seq._ + +Louis XVI., despised by the _émigrés_, 25; letter of, to Gustavus III., +36; appoints a ministry chosen by the Gironde, 103; his deference to +his ministers, 104 _et seq._; declares war on Austria, 126, 129; +sufferings of, 132; not a soldier, 133, 139; has no plan, 135; +anecdotes of, by M. de Vaublanc, 139, 140; sacrifices his guard, 145; +repents his concessions, 148; for several days in a sort of stupor, +151; insulted by Roland and his faction, 160; Madame Roland's letter to +him read in the Council, 164; asks Dumouriez to help rid him of +Roland's faction, 164; refuses to sign the decree against the priests, +169; accepts the resignation of Dumouriez, 169; resists Dumouriez' +entreaties not to veto the decrees, 172; vetoes the decrees, 181; +permits the gate of the Tuileries to be opened to the mob, 195; his +conduct at the invasion of the Tuileries, 199 _et seq._; his reception +of the mob in the Tuileries, 201; addressed by the butcher Legendre, +202; in bodily peril, 203; returns to the bedchamber, 208; letter of, +to the Assembly relative to the invasion of the Tuileries, 223; +interview of, with Pétion, 224; incident of the red bonnet, 226; +conversation of, with Bertrand de Molleville, 227; repugnance of, to +Lafayette, 236; address of, to the Assembly, 243; letter of, to the +Assembly, 245; his plastron, 248; takes part in the fête of the +Federation, 249 _et seq._; too timorous and hesitating to act, 257; +nominates a new cabinet, 269; conciliatory message of, to the Assembly, +270; declines to entertain any plan of escape, 273; consents that the +royalist noblemen should defend him, 284; unwarlike character of, 288; +reviews the troops in the Tuileries garden and narrowly escapes from +them, 289; urged by Roederer, goes with his family to the Assembly, 292 +_et seq._; his escort, 295; addresses the Assembly, 300; compelled to +remain in the reporters' gallery, 300; orders the defenders of the +Tuileries to cease firing, 305; deposition of, proposed in the +Assembly, 317; acts like a disinterested spectator, 318; taken to the +Convent of the Feuillants, 328; transferred to the Temple, 334, 339; +his quarters, 341; gives lessons to the Dauphin in the Temple, 342: +deprived of his sword, 346; hears the proclamation abolishing royalty +without emotion, 388. + +Louvet, the author of _Faublas_, 54; editor of the _Sentinelle_, and +Madame Roland's confidant, 89 _et seq._ + + +Maillard, president of the tribunal at the Abbey, 365. + +Mailly, Marshal de, the chief of the two hundred noblemen in the +Tuileries, 284. + +Malta, Knights of, 338. + +Mandat, M. de, receives from Pétion an order to repel force, 280; goes +to the Hôtel-de-Ville and is massacred, 281. + +Marat incites to the deposition of the king, 270; on Louis XVI., 384. + +Marie Antoinette, chivalric devotion of Count de Fersen for, 15; her +correspondence with him, 16; places absolute confidence in Gustavus +III., 17; letter of, to her brother Leopold, 25; condition of, in 1792, +73; has an interview with Dumouriez, 153; annoyed and insulted by the +populace, 156, 157; during the invasion of the Tuileries, 210 _et +seq._; opposed to vigorous measures, 222; her distrust of Lafayette and +preference for Danton, 237; present at the fête of the Federation, 251 +_et seq._; her alarm at the King's peril, 253; midnight alarms of, 259; +insulted by federates and forced to keep to her apartments, 261; her +estimate of the King's character, 263; on the night of August 9, 276; +takes refuge in the Assembly, 299; her hopes excited by the sound of +artillery, 304; in the box of the _Logographe_, 321; in the Convent of +the Feuillante, 332; in the Temple, 343; faints when she hears of the +Princesse de Lamballe's death, 356. + +_Marseillaise_, the, Rouget de l'Isle's new hymn, 269. + +Marseilles, federates of, arrive in Paris, 268; the scum of the jails, +269; at the Tuileries, 290, 306 _et seq._, 309. + +Masson, M. Frédéric, his description of Dumouriez, 98. + +Ministry appointed by the King resign; new, appointed, 176. + +Mirabeau cautions the Queen against Lafayette, 236; and Abbé +Lamourette, 241. + +Molleville, Bertrand de, conversation of, with the King, 227; quoted, +273. + +Monge, senator of the Empire, reply of, to Napoleon, 391. + +_Moniteur_, the, on the fête of Chateauvieux, 121. + +Mortimer-Ternaux, M., quoted, 279, 282; his _Histoire de la Terreur_, +359. + +Mouchy, Marshal de, his devotion to the King and Queen, 220. + + +Napoleon, a witness of the invasion of the Tuileries, 209; asserts the +King could have gained the victory, 286; a witness of the attack of the +Marseillais on the Tuileries, 310, 314; visits the Temple, and has it +destroyed, 348. + +National Assembly, place of meeting of, 5; impeach the King's brothers +and confiscate the _émigrés'_ property, 26; impeach De Lessart, 30; +order the King's guard disbanded, 143; decrees of as to the clergy and +an army before Paris, 150; Madame Roland's letter to the King, read to, +167; letter of Lafayette read in the, 178; receive a deputation from +Marseilles, 183; consider the admission of the resurrectionists to the +chamber, 187; the place of meeting of, 188; deputation from, to the +King during the invasion of the Tuileries, 208; question the Queen, +216; maintain an equivocal attitude, 222; the majority of, royalists +and constitutionalists, 272; affect not to recognize the King's danger, +280; send a deputation to receive the King and his family, 296; number +of members present when the decree of deposition was voted, 320; +terrorized by the Commune, 370; royalty abolished and the republic +proclaimed by, 387. + +National Guard, at the Tuileries, 196; the choice troops of, broken up, +268; royalist, in the Tuileries, 279, 288. + +Noblemen, royalist, fidelity of, to the King, 278, 284; fate of, 322. + + +Orleans, Duke of, and the Palais Royal, 4; and his party clamor for the +deposition of the King, 270. + + +Palais Royal, the, in 1792, 4. + +Pan, Mallet du, sent to Germany by Louis XVI., 135. + +Paris, in 1792, 1; the Archbishop of, at Versailles, in 1774, 78; +Commune of, how organized, 176; a hell during the September massacres, +361. + +Pétion, address of, to the Assembly, 30; promotes the fête of +Chateauvieux, 115; fate of, 122 _et seq._; favors the insurrectionists, +184; his insolent address to the King, 224; the hero of the fête of the +Federation, 254; presents an address to the Assembly praying for the +King's deposition, 270; signs an order giving M. de Mandat the right to +repel force, 280; his treachery and hypocrisy, 282. + +Philipon, the father of Madame Roland, 47. + +Prisons of Paris, the September massacres at, 363 _et seq._ + +Prudhomme's _Révolutions de Paris_ quoted, 225. + + +Quinet, Edgar, quoted, 360, 371; on Louis XVI.'s magnanimity, 380, 384; +quoted, 392, 394. + + +Raigecourt, Madame de, letter of, 24. + +Ramond defends Lafayette in the Assembly, 235. + +Republic proclaimed, 388. + +Revolution, beginning of the organization of, 181. + +Revolutionists, the, in the Tuileries, 199; insolence of, to the King, +200; refuse to leave the Assembly, 205; their barbarity and indecency, +213. + +Robespierre in the Jacobin Club, 5; cowardice of, 271, 316; his defence +of the Constitution, 385. + +Rochefoucauld, Count de la, describes the appearance of the royal +family in the box of the _Logographe_, 321. + +Roederer, remarks of, on Lafayette, 238; urges the King to seek shelter +with the Assembly, 291, 294; addresses the mob, 297; explains to the +Assembly the cause of King's taking refuge with them, 301; blamed for +his advice, 302. + +Roland de la Platière, M., marries Mademoiselle Philipon, 55; deputed +to the Assembly, 63; takes the portfolio of the Interior, 70; dominated +by his wife, 88; his plebeian dress at the Council, 103; driven by his +wife to hostility against the King, 108; his faction desire to destroy +the King, 160; dismissed from the Council, 165; reinstated, 319; arrest +of, determined, 374; writes a letter to the Assembly concerning the +massacres, 375; continues minister, 376; fate of, 391. + +Roland, Madame, the distinctive characteristics of the century resumed +in her, 46; early years of, 47 _et seq._; married to Roland de la +Platière, 55; strives to obtain a patent of nobility for her husband, +56; letters of, to Bosc, 57; her description of herself, 61, 74; draws +up her husband's reports, 63; her infatuation for Buzot, 64; her hatred +of royalty, 65; established in Paris, 70; and Marie Antoinette, 74; the +motive of her hatred of Marie Antoinette, 76, 80; describes her visit +to Versailles, 77, 79; her part in establishing the republican régime +in France, 79, 107; her judgment of Louis XVI., 81; her character +contrasted with that of Marie Antoinette, 82; her arrogant demeanor, +86; acts for her husband in public affairs, 88; her intimacy with +Louvet, 89 _et seq._; Lemontey's picture of her, 91; and Dumouriez, 94, +102; creates discord in the Council, 106; decides to get rid of +Dumouriez, 159; her letter to the King, 162; her advice on the +dismissal of the ministers, 165; on the September massacres, 362; feels +no pity for the Queen, 372, 375; her horror at the murders, 376; her +apprehensions, 378; reproaches her friends with temporizing, 382; her +last speech, 383. + +Rousseau, imprisoned in the Temple, 339. + + +Saint-Antoine, Faubourg, citizens of, ask permission to assemble in +arms, 182; in commotion, 184. + +Saint-Huruge, the rioter, 193. + +Salpêtrière, the, butchery at, 368. + +Santerre, at the head of the insurrectionists on June 20, 186; demands +admission for the insurrectionists to the Assembly, 190; violence of, +at the Tuileries, 197; offers to protect the Queen, 215; forced by +Westermann to march to the Tuileries, 286. + +September massacres, the, 359 _et seq._ + +Sergent, M., 207. + +Servan, made Minister of War, 160; proposes the formation of an army +around Paris, 160; dismissed from the Council, 165; his career after +the Revolution, 391. + +Staël, Madame de, views the fête of the Federation, her observations, +253; invents a plan of escape for the King, 273; quoted, 317, 327. + +Sudermania, Duke of, brother of Gustavus III., practices of, 35. + +Sutherland, Lady, sends linen for the Dauphin to the Convent of the +Feuillants, 333. + +Swiss regiment, the, go to the Tuileries, 274; ill provided with +ammunition, 277; defend the Tuileries, but are commanded to retire, +307; sweep the Carrousel of rioters, 310; ordered to go to the King, +311; surrender their arms, 313; imprisoned in the church of the +Feuillants, 313; fate of the, 321. + + +Taine, on revolutionary France, 389. + +Temple, the, the royal family taken to, 336; description of, 337; the +Order of the, 337; destroyed by Napoleon, 349. + +Thiers, quoted, 287. + +Thorwaldsen's lion at Lucerne, 314. + +Tourzel, Pauline de, in peril in the Tuileries, 323. + +Tuileries, the, guard of, 195; the invasion of, 198 _et seq._; the, on +the night of August 9, 275 _et seq._; attacked by the Marseillais, 306 +_et seq._; rioters in, 325; on fire, 325. + + +Vaublanc, Count de, quoted, 133; anecdotes of, concerning Louis XVI., +139, 140, 255, 273, 282, 286, 290, 303. + +Vergniaud, 180, 182; speech of, with regard to the admission of the +insurrectionists to the Assembly, 188; violent attack of, on the King, +244; as president of the Assembly, receives Louis XVI., 300; presents +the decree suspending the royal power, 317. + +"Violet, Queen," 336. + +Voltaire, imprisoned in the Temple, 339. + + +Westermann forces Santerre to march, 286; leader of the Marseillais, +who attacked the Tuileries, 306, 308. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of +Royalty, by Imbert de Saint-Amand + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIE ANTOINETTE--DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY *** + +***** This file should be named 32408-8.txt or 32408-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/0/32408/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of Royalty + +Author: Imbert de Saint-Amand + +Translator: Elizabeth Gilbert Martin + +Release Date: May 18, 2010 [EBook #32408] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIE ANTOINETTE--DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="img-front"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-front.jpg" ALT="Marie Antoinette" BORDER="2" WIDTH="409" HEIGHT="665"> +<H4 CLASS="h4center" STYLE="width: 409px"> +Marie Antoinette +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +MARIE ANTOINETTE +</H1> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +AND +</H4> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +THE DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY +</H2> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +BY +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IMBERT DE SAINT-AMAND +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>TRANSLATED BY</I> +<BR> +ELIZABETH GILBERT MARTIN +</H4> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>WITH PORTRAIT</I> +</H4> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +NEW YORK +<BR> +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +<BR> +1899 +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +COPYRIGHT, 1891, BY +<BR> +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="Pv"></A>v}</SPAN> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS. +</H2> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="90%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%">CHAPTER</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="80%"> </TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%">PAGE</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">PARIS AT THE BEGINNING OF 1792 </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 1</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">COUNT DE FERSON'S LAST JOURNEY TO PARIS </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 14</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">THE DEATH OF THE EMPEROR LEOPOLD </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 23</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">THE DEATH OF GUSTAVUS III </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 32</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">THE BEGINNINGS OF MADAME ROLAND </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 46</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">MADAME ROLAND'S ENTRANCE ON THE SCENE </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 60</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">MARIE ANTOINETTE AND MADAME ROLAND </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 73</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">MADAME ROLAND AT THE MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 85</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">DUMOURIEZ, MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 94</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 103</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">THE FÊTE OF THE SWISS OF CHATEAUVIEUX </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 110</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">THE DECLARATION OF WAR </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 126</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">THE DISBANDING OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL GUARD </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 137</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">THE SUFFERINGS OF LOUIS XVI </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 148</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap15">ROLAND'S DISMISSAL FROM OFFICE </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 158</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap16">A THREE DAYS' MINISTRY </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 166</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap17">THE PROLOGUE TO JUNE TWENTIETH </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 176</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap18">THE MORNING OF JUNE TWENTIETH </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 186</TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="Pvi"></A>vi}</SPAN> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="90%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%">XIX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="80%"> +<A HREF="#chap19">THE INVASION OF THE TUILERIES </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%"> + 198</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap20">MARIE ANTOINETTE ON JUNE TWENTIETH </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 210</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap21">THE MORROW OF JUNE TWENTIETH </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 219</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap22">LAFAYETTE IN PARIS </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 229</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap23">THE LAMOURETTE KISS </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 239</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap24">THE FÊTE OF THE FEDERATION IN 1792 </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 248</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap25">THE LAST DAYS AT THE TUILERIES </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 259</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap26">THE PROLOGUE TO THE TENTH OF AUGUST </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 267</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap27">THE NIGHT OF AUGUST NINTH TO TENTH </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 275</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap28">THE MORNING OF AUGUST TENTH </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 284</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap29">THE BOX OF THE LOGOGRAPH </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 299</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap30">THE COMBAT </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 306</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap31">THE RESULTS OF THE COMBAT </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 316</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap32">THE ROYAL FAMILY IN THE CONVENT OF THE FEUILLANTS </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 329</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap33">THE TEMPLE </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 337</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap34">THE PRINCESS DE LAMBALLE'S MURDER </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 350</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap35">THE SEPTEMBER MASSACRES </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 359</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap36">MADAME ROLAND DURING THE MASSACRES </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 372</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXVII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap37">THE PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 384</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#index">INDEX </A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> + 395</TD> +</TR> + + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P1"></A>1}</SPAN> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +MARIE ANTOINETTE +</H2> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +AND +</H4> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +THE DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY. +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +PARIS AT THE BEGINNING OF 1792. +</H4> + +<P> +Paris in 1792 is no longer what it was in 1789. In 1789, the old +French society was still brilliant. The past endured beside the +present. Neither names nor escutcheons, neither liveries nor places at +court, had been suppressed. The aristocracy and the Revolution lived +face to face. In 1792, the scene has changed. The Paris of the +nobility is no longer in Paris, but at Coblentz. The Faubourg +Saint-Germain is like a desert. Since June, 1790, armorial bearings +have been taken down. The blazons of ancient houses have been broken +and thrown into the gutters. No more display, no more liveries, no +more carriages with coats-of-arms on their panels. Titles and manorial +names are done away with. The Duke de Brissac is called M. Cossé; the +Duke de Caraman, M. Riquet; the Duke d'Aiguillon, M. Vignerot. The +<I>Almanach royal</I> of 1792 mentions not a single court appointment. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P2"></A>2}</SPAN> + +<P> +In 1789, it was still an exceptional thing for the nobility to +emigrate. In 1792, it is the rule. Those among the nobles who have +had the courage to remain at Paris in the midst of the furnace, so as +to make a rampart for the King of their bodies, seem half ashamed of +their generous conduct. The illusions of worldliness have been +dispelled. Nearly every salon was open in 1789. In 1792, they are +nearly all closed; those of the magistrates and the great capitalists +as well as those of the aristocracy. Etiquette is still observed at +the Tuileries, but there is no question of fêtes; no balls, no +concerts, none of that elegance and animation which once made the court +a rendezvous of pleasures. In 1789, illusions, dreams, a naïve +expectation of the age of gold, were to be found everywhere. In 1792, +eclogues and pastoral poetry are beginning to go out of fashion. The +diapason of hatred is pitched higher. Already there is powder and a +smell of blood in the air. A general instinct forebodes that France +and Europe are on the verge of a terrible duel. On both sides passions +have touched their culminating point. Distrust and uneasiness are +universal. Every day the despotism of the clubs becomes more +threatening. The Jacobins do not reign yet, but they govern. Deputies +who, if left to their own impulses, would vote on the conservative +side, pronounce for the Revolution solely through fear of the +demagogues. In 1789, the religious sentiment still retained power +among the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P3"></A>3}</SPAN> +masses. In 1792, irreligion and atheism have wrought +their havoc. In 1789, the most ardent revolutionists, Marat, Danton, +Robespierre, were all royalists. At the beginning of 1792, the +republic begins to show its face beneath the monarchical mask. +</P> + +<P> +The Tuileries, menaced by the neighboring lanes of the Carrousel and +the Palais Royal, resembles a besieged fortress. The Revolution daily +augments its trenches and parallels around the sanctuary of the +monarchy. Its barracks are the faubourgs; its soldiers, red-bonneted +pikemen. Louis XVI. in his palace is like a general-in-chief in a +stronghold, who should have voluntarily dampened his powder, spiked his +cannon, and torn his flags. He no longer inspires his troops with +confidence. A capitulation seems imminent. The unfortunate monarch +still hopes vaguely for assistance from abroad, for the arrival of some +liberating army. Vain hope! He is blockaded in his castle, and the +moment is at hand when he will be compelled to play the buffoon in a +red bonnet. +</P> + +<P> +Glance at the palace and see how closely it is hemmed in by the +earthworks of the Revolution. The abode of luxury and display, +intended for fêtes rather than for war, Philibert Delorme's +<I>chef-d'oeuvre</I> has in its architecture none of those means of defence +by which the military and feudal sovereignties of old times fortified +their dwellings. On the side of the courtyards a multitude of little +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P4"></A>4}</SPAN> +streets contain a hostile population ready to swell every riot. +Near the Pavilion of Marsan is the Palais Royal, that headquarters of +insurrection, with its cafés, its gambling-dens, its houses of +ill-fame, its wooden galleries which are known as the camp of the +Tartars. It is the Duke of Orleans who has democratized the Palais +Royal. In spite of the sarcasms of the aristocracy and the lawsuits of +neighboring proprietors, he has destroyed the fine gardens bounded by +the rue de Richelieu, the rue des Petit-Champs, and the rue des +Bons-Enfants. In the place it occupied he has caused the rue de +Valois, the rue de Beaujolais, and the rue de Montpensier to be opened, +all of them inhabited by a revolutionary population. The remaining +space he has surrounded on three sides with constructions pierced by +galleries, where he has built the shops that form the finest bazaar in +Europe. The fourth side of these new constructions was originally +intended to form part of the Prince's palace, and to be composed of an +open colonnade supporting suites of apartments. But this side has not +been erected. In place of it the Duke of Orleans has run up some +temporary wooden sheds, containing three rows of shops separated by two +large passage-ways, the ground of which has not even been made level. +</P> + +<P> +The privileges pertaining to the Orleans family prevent the police from +entering the enclosure of the Palais Royal. Hence it becomes the +rendezvous of all conspirators. The taking of the Bastille was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P5"></A>5}</SPAN> +plotted there, and there the 20th of June and the 10th of August will +yet be organized. +</P> + +<P> +A little further off is the National Assembly. Its sessions are held +in the riding-school built when the little Louis XV. was to be taught +horsemanship. It adjoins the terrace of the Feuillants. One of its +courtyards which looks towards the front of the edifice, is at the +upper end of the rue de Dauphin. The other extremity occupies the site +where the rue Castiglione will be opened later on. There, close beside +the Tuileries, sits the National Assembly, the rival and victorious +power that will overcome the monarchy. +</P> + +<P> +The Assembly terrorizes the Tuileries. The Jacobin Club terrorizes the +Assembly. Close beside the Hall of the Manège, on the site to be +occupied afterward by the market of Saint-Honoré, the revolutionary +club holds its tumultuous sessions in the former convent founded in +1611 by the Jacobin, or Dominican, friars. The club meets three times +a week, at seven in the evening. The hall is a long rectangle with a +vaulted roof. Four rows of stalls occupy the longer sides, while the +two ends serve as public galleries. Nearly in the middle of the hall, +the speaker's platform and the president's writing-table stand opposite +each other. Hither come all ambitious revolutionists who desire to +talk, to agitate, to make themselves conspicuous. Here Robespierre +lords it, not being a deputy in consequence of the law forbidding +members of the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P6"></A>6}</SPAN> +Constituent Assembly to belong to the legislative +body. Those who love disorder come here to seek emotions. Some find +lucrative employment, applause being paid for, and the different +parties having each its <I>claque</I> in the galleries. Since April, 1791, +the Jacobin Club has affiliations in two thousand French towns and +villages. At its orders and in its pay is an army of agents whose +business it is to make stump speeches, to sing in the streets, to make +propositions in cafés, to applaud or to hiss in the galleries of the +National Assembly. These hirelings usually receive about five francs a +day, but as the number of the chevaliers of the revolutionary lustrum +increases, the pay diminishes, until it is finally reduced to forty +sous. Deserters and soldiers dismissed from their regiments for +misconduct are admitted by preference. +</P> + +<P> +For some days past, the Club of Moderate Revolutionists, friends of +Lafayette, who might have closed the old clubs after the sanguinary +repression of the riot in the Champ-de-Mars, and who contented +themselves with opening a new one, have been meeting in the convent of +the Feuillants, rue Saint-Honoré. But this new club has not been a +great success; moderation is not the order of the day; the Jacobins +have regained their empire, and on December 26, 1791, seals are placed +on the door of the Club of the Feuillants. +</P> + +<P> +At the other extremity of Paris there is a club still more inflammatory +than that of the Jacobins: +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P7"></A>7}</SPAN> +that of the Cordeliers. "The Jacobins," +said Barbaroux, "have no common aim, although they act in concert. The +Cordeliers are bent on blood, gold, and offices." Speaking as a rule, +the Cordeliers belong to the Jacobin Club, while hardly a single +Jacobin is a Cordelier. The Cordeliers are the advance-guard of the +Revolution. They are, as Camille Desmoulins has said, Jacobins of the +Jacobins. The chiefs are Danton, Marat, Hébert, Chaumette. They take +their names from those religious democrats, the Minorite friars of +Saint Francis, who wear a girdle of rope over their coarse gray habit. +They meet in the Place of the School of Medicine, in a monastery whose +church was built in the reign of Saint Louis, in 1259, with the fine +paid as indemnity for a murder. In 1590, it became the resort of the +most famous Leaguers. Chateaubriand says: "There are places which seem +to be the laboratory of seditions." How well this expression of the +author of the <I>Mémoires d'Outre-tombe</I> describes the club-room of the +Cordeliers! The pictures, the sculptured or painted images, the veils +and curtains of the convent, have been torn down. The basilica +displays nothing but its bare bones to the eyes of the spectator. At +the apse, where wind and rain enter through the unglazed rose-window, +joiners' work-benches serve as a desk for the president and as places +on which to deposit the red caps. Do you see the fallen beams, the +wooden benches, the dismantled stalls, the relics of saints pushed or +rolled against the walls +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P8"></A>8}</SPAN> +to serve as benches for "dirty, dusty, +drunken, sweaty spectators in torn jackets, pikes on their shoulders, +or with their bare arms crossed"? Do you hear the orators who "call +each other beggars, pickpockets, robbers, assassins, to the discordant +noise of hisses and those proper to their different groups of devils? +They find the material of their metaphors in murder, they borrow them +from the filthiest of sewers and dungheaps, and from places set apart +for the prostitution of men and women. Gestures render their figures +of speech more comprehensible; with the cynicism of dogs, they call +everything by its own name, in an impious and obscene parade of oaths +and curses. To destroy and to produce, death and generation, nothing +else can be disentangled from the savage jargon which deafens one's +ear." And what is it that interrupts the speakers? "The little black +owls of the cloister without monks and the steeple without bells, +making themselves merry in the broken windows in expectation of their +prey. At first they are called to order by the tinkling of an +ineffectual bell; but as their cries do not cease, they are shot at to +make them keep silence. They fall, palpitating, bleeding, and ominous, +into the midst of the pandemonium." +</P> + +<P> +So, then, clubs take the place of convents. Since the Constituent +Assembly had decreed the abolition of monastic vows by its vote of +February 13, 1790, many persons, rudely detached from their usual way +of life and its duties, had abandoned their vocation. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P9"></A>9}</SPAN> +The nun +became a working-woman; the shaved Capuchin read his journal in +suburban taverns; and grinning crowds visited the profaned and open +convents "as, in Grenada, travellers pass through the abandoned halls +of the Alhambra, or as they pause, at Tivoli, under the columns of the +Sibyl's temple." +</P> + +<P> +The Jacobin Club and the Club of the Cordeliers will destroy the +monarchy. In the Memoirs of Lafayette it is remarked that "it is hard +to understand how the Jacobin minority and a handful of pretended +Marseillais made themselves masters of Paris when nearly all the forty +thousand citizens composing the National Guard desired the +Constitution; but the clubs had succeeded in scattering the true +patriots and in creating a dread of vigorous measures. Experience had +not yet taught what this feebleness and disorganization must needs +cost." +</P> + +<P> +The dark side of the picture is plainly far more evident than it was in +1789. But how vivid it is still! Those who hunger after sensations +are in their element. When has there been more noise, more tumult, +more movement, more unexpected or more varied scenes? Listen once more +to Chateaubriand who, on his return from America, passed through Paris +at this epoch: "When I read the <I>Histoire des troubles publics ches +divers peuples</I> before the Revolution, I could not conceive how it was +possible to live in those times. I was surprised that Montaigne wrote +so cheerfully in a castle which he could not walk around without risk +of being abducted by bands +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P10"></A>10}</SPAN> +of Leaguers or Protestants. The +Revolution has enabled me to comprehend this possibility of existence. +With us men, critical moments produce an increase of life. In a +society which is dissolving and forming itself anew, the strife between +the two tendencies, the collision of the past and the future, the +medley of ancient and modern manners, form a transitory combination +which does not admit a moment of ennui. Passions and characters, freed +from restraint, display themselves with an energy they do not possess +in well-regulated cities. The infraction of laws, the emancipation +from duties, usages, and the rules of decorum, even perils themselves, +increase the interest of this disorder." +</P> + +<P> +Yes, people complain, grow angry, suffer, but they are not bored. How +many incidents, episodes, emotions, there are in this strange +tragi-comedy! Everywhere there is something to be seen; in the +Assembly, the clubs, the public places, the promenades, streets, cafés, +and theatres. Brawls and discussions are heard on every side. If by +chance a salon is still open, disputes go on there as they would at a +club. What quarrels take place in the cafés! Men stand on chairs and +tables to spout. And what dissensions in the theatres! The actors +meddle with politics as well as the spectators. In the greenroom of +the <I>Comédie-Française</I> there is a right side, whose chief is the +royalist Naudet, and a left side led by the republican Talma. Neither +actor goes out except well armed. There are pistols +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P11"></A>11}</SPAN> +underneath +their togas. The kings of tragedy, threatened by their political +adversaries, have real poniards wherewith to defend themselves. <I>Les +Horaces, Brutus, La Mort de César, Barnevelt, Guillaume Tell, Charles +IX.</I>, are plays containing in each tirade allusions which inflame the +boxes and the pit. The theatre is a tilting-ground. If the royalists +are there in force, they cause the orchestra to play their favorite +airs: <I>Charmante Gabrielle, Vive Henri Quatre! O! Richard, O! mon +roi!</I> The revolutionists protest, and sing their own chosen melody, +the <I>Ça ira</I>. Sometimes they come to blows, swords are drawn, and, the +play over, elegant women are dragged through the gutters. There is a +general outbreak of insults and violence. The journals play the chief +part in this universal madness. Sometimes the press is eloquent, but +it is oftener ribald or atrocious. To borrow an expression from +Montaigne, "it lowers itself even to the worthless esteem of extreme +inferiority." The beautiful French tongue, once so correct and pure, +is no longer recognizable. Vulgar words fall thick as hail. To the +language of the Academy has succeeded the jargon of the markets. +</P> + +<P> +What a swarm! what a swirl! How noisy, how restless, is this +revolutionary Paris! What excited crowds fill the clubs, the Assembly, +the Palais Royal, the gambling-houses, and the tumultuous faubourgs! +Riotous gatherings, popular deputations, detachments of cavalry, +companies of +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P12"></A>12}</SPAN> +foot-soldiers; gentlemen in French coats, powdered +hair, swords at their sides, hats under their arms, silk stockings and +low shoes; democrats close-cropped and unpowdered, with English frock +coats and American cravats; ragged <I>sans-culottes</I> in red caps, weave +in and out in ceaseless motion. +</P> + +<P> +Do you know what was the chief distraction of this crowd in April, +1792? The debut of that new and fashionable machine, the guillotine. +It was used for the first time on the 25th, for a criminal guilty of +rape. Sensitive people congratulated each other on the mitigated +torment, which they were pleased to consider a humanitarian +improvement. The excellent philanthropist, Doctor Guillotin, was +lauded to the skies. His machine was named guillotine in his honor, +just as the stage-coaches established by Turgot had been called +turgotines. +</P> + +<P> +What enthusiasm, what infatuation, for this guillotine, already so +famous and destined to be so much more so! The editors of the +<I>Moniteur</I> declare in a lyric outburst that it is worthy of the +approaching century. The truth is that it accelerates and makes less +difficult the executioner's task. In the end the crowd would become +disgusted with massacres. The delays of the gibbet would weary their +patience. The <I>sans-culottes</I>, who doubtless have a presentiment of +all that is going to happen, welcome the guillotine, then, with +acclamations. At the <I>Ambigu</I> theatre a ballet-pantomime, called <I>Les +Quatre Fils Aymon</I>, is given, and all Paris runs to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P13"></A>13}</SPAN> +see the heads +of all four fall at once, in the midst of loud applause, under the +blade of the good doctor's machine. People amuse themselves with their +future instrument of torture as if it were a toy. In a Girondin salon +they play at guillotine with a moveable screen that is lifted and let +fall again. At elegant dinners a little guillotine is brought in with +the dessert and takes the place of a sweet dish. A pretty woman places +a doll representing some political adversary under the knife; it is +decapitated in the neatest possible style, and out of it runs something +red that smells good, a liqueur perfumed with ambergris, into which +every lady hastens to dip her lace handkerchief. French gaiety would +make a vaudeville out of the day of judgment. Poor society, which +passes so quick from gay to grave, from lively to severe, and which, +like the Figaro of Beaumarchais, laughs at everything so that it may +not weep! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P14"></A>14}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +COUNT DE FERSEN'S LAST JOURNEY TO PARIS. +</H4> + +<P> +It has been supposed until lately that after the day when he bade +farewell to the royal family at the beginning of the Varennes journey, +Count de Fersen never again saw Marie Antoinette. A new publication of +very great importance proves that this is an error, and that the +Swedish nobleman came to Paris for the last time in 1792, and had +several interviews with the King and Queen. This publication is +entitled: <I>Extraits des papiers du grand maréchal de Suède, Comte Jean +Axel de Fersen</I>, and is published by his great-nephew, Baron de +Kinckowstrom, a Swedish colonel. There is something romantic in this +episode of the mysterious journey made by Marie Antoinette's loyal +chevalier, which merits to leave a trace in history. +</P> + +<P> +Fersen was one of those men whose sentiments are all the more profound +because they know how to veil them under an apparently imperturbable +calm. A soul of fire under an exterior of ice, as the Baroness de +Korff describes him, courageous to temerity, devoted to heroism, he had +conceived for Marie Antoinette one of those disinterested and ardent +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P15"></A>15}</SPAN> +friendships which lie midway between love and religion. Almost as +much a Frenchman as he was a Swede, he did not forget that he had +fought in America under the standard of the Most Christian King, and +had been colonel of a regiment in the service of France. Having been +the courtier of the happy and brilliant Queen, he remained the courtier +of the Queen overcome by anguish. He had enkindled in the soul of his +sovereign, Gustavus III., the same chivalrous sentiment which animated +his own, and was impatiently awaiting the time when he could hasten to +the aid of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette under the Swedish flag. His +dearest ambition was to draw his sword in the Queen's defence. From +the Varennes journey up to the day of Marie Antoinette's execution, he +had but one thought: to rescue the woman for whom he would willingly +have shed the last drop of his blood. This fixed idea has left its +trace on every line of his journal. The sad and melancholy countenance +of Fersen, the courtier of misfortune, the friend of unhappy days, is +assuredly one of the celebrated types in the drama of Versailles and +the Tuileries. This man, who would have made no mark in history but +for the martyr Queen, is certain, thanks to her, not to be forgotten by +posterity. Marie Antoinette was to return him in glory what he gave +her in devotion. +</P> + +<P> +On her return to the Tuileries after the disastrous journey to +Varennes, the Queen wrote to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P16"></A>16}</SPAN> +Fersen, June 27, 1791: "Be at ease +about us; we are living," and Fersen replied: "I am well, and live only +to serve you." June 29, she wrote him another letter in which she +said: "Do not write to me; it would endanger us; and, above all, do not +return here under any pretext; all would be lost if you should make +your appearance. They never lose sight of us by night or day; which is +a matter of indifference to me. Be tranquil; nothing will happen to +me. The Assembly desires to treat us with gentleness. Adieu. I shall +not be able to write to you again." +</P> + +<P> +Marie Antoinette was in error when she supposed she would not write +again. She was in error, likewise, when she imagined that Fersen, in +spite of all dangers and difficulties, would not find means to see her +again. Their correspondence was not interrupted. After the acceptance +of the Constitution, Marie Antoinette wrote to him: "Can you understand +my position and the part I am continually obliged to play? Sometimes I +do not understand myself, and am obliged to consider whether it is +really I who am speaking; but what is to be done? It is all necessary, +and be sure our position would be still worse than it is if I had not +at once assumed this attitude; we at least gain time by it, and that is +all that is required. I keep up better than could be expected, seeing +that I go out so little and endure constantly such immense fatigue of +mind. What with the persons whom I must see, my +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P17"></A>17}</SPAN> +writing, and the +time I spend with my children, I have not a moment to myself. The last +occupation, which is not the least, gives me my sole happiness. When I +am very sad, I take my little boy in my arms, embrace him with my whole +heart, and for a moment am consoled." +</P> + +<P> +Fersen, touched and pitying, was constantly thinking of that fatal +palace of the Tuileries where the Queen was so much to be +compassionated. An invincible attraction drew him thither. There, he +thought, was the post of devotion and of honor. November 26, he wrote: +"Tell me whether there is any possibility of going to see you entirely +alone, without a servant, in case I receive the order to do so from the +King (Gustavus III.); he has already spoken to me of his desire to +bring this about." Of all the sovereigns who interested themselves in +the fate of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, Gustavus was the most +active, brave, and resolute; he was also the only one in whom Marie +Antoinette placed absolute confidence. She expected less from her own +brother, the Emperor Leopold, and it was to Stockholm above all that +she turned her eyes. Gustavus ordered Fersen to go secretly to Paris, +and on December 22, 1791, he sent him a memoir and certain letters, +commissioning him to deliver them to Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. +He recommended, as forcibly as he could, a new attempt at flight, but +with precautions suggested by the lesson of Varennes. He thought the +members of the royal +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P18"></A>18}</SPAN> +family should depart separately and in +disguise, and that, once outside of his kingdom, Louis XVI. should call +for the intervention of a congress. The following passage occurs in +the letter of the Swedish King to Marie Antoinette: "I beg Your Majesty +to consider seriously that violent disorders can only be cured by +violent remedies, and that if moderation is a virtue in the course of +ordinary life, it often becomes a vice when there is question of public +matters. The King of France can re-establish his dominion only by +resuming his former rights; every other remedy is illusory; anything +except this would merely open the way to endless discussions which +would augment the confusion instead of ending it. The King's rights +were torn from him by the sword; it is by the sword that they must be +reconquered. But I refrain; I should remember that I am addressing a +princess who, in the most terrible moments of her life, has shown the +most intrepid courage." +</P> + +<P> +Fersen obtained permission from Louis XVI. to accomplish the mission +confided to him by Gustavus III. He left Stockholm under an assumed +name and with the passport of a Swedish courier, and reached Paris +without accident, February 13, 1792. He was so adroit and prudent that +no one suspected his presence. On the very evening of his arrival he +wrote in his journal: "Went to the Queen by my usual road; very few +National Guards; did not see the King." Fersen, therefore, only +reappeared at the Tuileries in the darkness, like a fugitive or +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P19"></A>19}</SPAN> +an +outlaw. He found the Queen pale with grief and with hair whitened by +sorrow and emotion. It was a solemn moment. The storm was raging +within France and beyond it. Terrible omens, snares, and dangers lay +on every side. One might have said that the Tuileries were about to be +swallowed up in a gulf of fire and blood. +</P> + +<P> +The next day Fersen saw the King. He wrote in his journal: "Tuesday, +14. Saw the King at six in the evening. He will not go and can not, +on account of the extreme vigilance. In fact, he scruples at it, +having so often promised to remain, for he is an honest man.... He +sees that force is the only resource; but, being weak, he thinks it +impossible to resume all his authority.... Unless he were constantly +encouraged, I am not sure he would not be tempted to negotiate with the +rebels. He said to me afterwards: 'That's all very well! We are by +ourselves and we can talk; but nobody ever found himself in my +position. I know I missed the right moment; it was the 14th of July; +we ought to have gone then, and I wanted to, but how could I when +Monsieur himself begged me to stay, and Marshal de Broglie, who was in +command, said to me: "Yes, we can go to Metz. But what shall we do +when we get there?" I lost the opportunity and never found it again. +I have been abandoned by everybody.'" Louis XVI. desired Fersen to +warn the Powers that they must not be surprised at anything he might be +forced to do; that he was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P20"></A>20}</SPAN> +obliged, that it was the effect of +constraint. "They must put me out of the question," he added, "and let +me do what I can." +</P> + +<P> +Fersen had a long talk with Marie Antoinette the same day. She entered +into full details about the present and especially about the past. She +explained why the flight to Varennes, in which Fersen had taken such a +prominent part, and which had succeeded so well so long as he directed +it, had ended in failure. The Queen described the anguish of the +arrest and the return. To the project of a new effort to escape, she +replied by pointing out the implacable surveillance of which she was +the object, and the effervescence of popular passions, which this time +would overleap all restraint if the fugitives were taken. It would be +better for the royal family to suffer together than to expose +themselves to die separately. It would be better to die like princes, +who abdicate majesty only with life, than as vagabonds, under a vulgar +disguise. "The Queen," adds Fersen, "told me that she saw Alexander +Lameth and Duport; that they always tell her that there is no remedy +but foreign troops; failing that, all is lost, that this cannot last, +that they have gone farther than they wished to. In spite of all this, +she thinks them malicious, does not trust them, but uses them as best +she can. All the ministers are traitors who betray the King." Fersen +had a final interview with Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette on February +21, 1792. By February 24, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P21"></A>21}</SPAN> +he had returned to Brussels. He was +profoundly moved on quitting the Tuileries, but, dismal and lugubrious +as his forebodings may have been, how much more sombre was the reality +to prove! +</P> + +<P> +What a terrible fate was reserved for the chief actors in this drama! +Yet a few days, and the chivalrous Gustavus was to be assassinated. +The hour of execution was approaching for Louis XVI. and Marie +Antoinette. Fersen, likewise, was to have a most tragic end. From the +moment when he bade his last adieu to the unhappy Queen, his life was +but one long torment. His disposition, already inclined to melancholy, +became incurably sad. His loyal and devoted soul could not accustom +itself to the thought of the calamities weighing so cruelly upon that +good and beautiful sovereign of whom he said in 1778: "The Queen is the +prettiest and most amiable princess that I know." On October 14, 1793, +he will still be endeavoring, with the aid of Baron de Breteuil, to +bring to completion a thousandth plot to extricate the august captive +from her fate. He will learn the fatal tidings on the 20th. "I can +think of nothing but my loss," he will write in his journal. "It is +frightful to have no positive details. It is horrible that she should +have been alone in her last moments, with no one to speak to, or to +receive her last wishes. No; without vengeance, my heart will never be +content." Covered with honors under the reign of Gustavus IV., +senator, chancellor of the Academy of +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P22"></A>22}</SPAN> +Upsal, member of the +Seraphim Order, grand marshal of the kingdom of Sweden, there will +remain in the depths of his heart a wound which nothing can heal. An +inveterate fatality will pursue him as it had done the unfortunate +sovereign of whom he had been the chevalier. He will perish in a riot +at Stockholm, June 20, 1810, at the time of the obsequies of the Prince +Royal. Struck down by fists and walking-sticks, his hair pulled out, +his clothes torn to rags, he will be dragged about half-naked, rolled +underfoot, assassinated by a maddened populace. Before rendering his +last sigh, he will succeed in rising to his knees, and, joining his +hands, he will utter these words from the stoning of Saint Stephen: "O +my God, who callest me to Thee, I implore Thee for my tormentors, whom +I pardon." If not the same words, they are at least the same thoughts +as those of Marie Antoinette on the platform of the scaffold. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P23"></A>23}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE DEATH OF THE EMPEROR LEOPOLD. +</H4> + +<P> +One after another, Marie Antoinette lost her last chances of safety; +blows as unforeseen as terrible beat down the combinations on which she +had built her hopes. Within a fortnight she was to see the two +sovereigns disappear from whom she had expected succor: her brother, +the Emperor Leopold, and Gustavus III., the King of Sweden. Leopold +had not been equal to all the illusions which his sister had cherished +with regard to him, but, nevertheless, he showed great interest in +French affairs, and a lively desire to be useful to Louis XVI. Pacific +by disposition, he had temporized at first, and adopted a conciliatory +policy. He desired a reconciliation with the new principles, and, +moreover, he was not blind to the inexperience and levity of the +<I>émigrés</I>. But the obligation, to which he was bound by treaties, to +defend the rights of princes holding property in Alsace, his fear of +the propaganda of sedition, the aggressive language of the National +Assembly and the Parisian press, had ended by determining him to take a +more resolute attitude, and it was at the moment when he was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P24"></A>24}</SPAN> +seriously intending to come to his sister's aid that he was carried off +by sudden death. Though she did not desire a war between Austria and +France, the Queen had persisted in wishing for an armed congress, which +would have been a compromise between peace and war, but which the +National Assembly would have regarded as an intolerable humiliation. +It must not be denied, the situation was a false one. Between the true +sentiments of Louis XVI. and his new rôle as a constitutional +sovereign, there was a real incompatibility. As to the Queen, she was +on good terms neither with the <I>émigrés</I> nor with the Assembly. +</P> + +<P> +In order to get a just idea of the sentiments shown by the <I>émigrés</I>, +it is necessary to read a letter written from Trèves, October 16, 1791, +by Madame de Raigecourt, the friend of Madame Elisabeth, to another +friend of the Princess, the Marquise de Bombelles: "I see with pain +that Paris and Coblentz are not on good terms. The Emperor treats the +Princes like children.... The Princes cannot avoid suspecting that it +is the influence of the Queen and her agents which thwarts their plans +and causes the Emperor to behave so strangely.... Some trickery on the +part of the Tuileries is still suspected in this country. They ought +to explain themselves to each other once for all. Is the Queen afraid +lest the Count d'Artois should arrogate an authority in the realm which +would diminish her own? Let her be at ease on that score; she will +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P25"></A>25}</SPAN> +always be the King's wife and always dominant. What is she afraid +of, then? She complains that she is not sufficiently respected. But +you know the good heart and the uprightness of our Prince; he is +incapable of the remarks attributed to him, and which have certainly +been reported to the Queen with the intention of estranging them +entirely." Madame de Raigecourt ends her letter with this complaint +against Louis XVI.: "Our wretched King lowers himself more and more +every day; for he is doing too much, even if he still intends to +escape.... The emigration, meanwhile, increases daily, and presently +there will be more Frenchmen than Germans in this region." At this +very time, the Queen was having recourse to her brother Leopold as to a +saviour. She wrote to him, October 4, 1791: "My only consolation is in +writing to you, my dear brother; I am surrounded by so many atrocities +that I need all your friendship to tranquillize my mind.... A point of +primary importance is to regulate the conduct of the <I>émigrés</I>. If +they re-enter France in arms, all is lost, and it will be impossible to +make it believed that we are not in connivance with them. Even the +existence of an army of <I>émigrés</I> on the frontier would be enough to +keep up the irritation and afford ground for accusations against us; it +appears to me that a congress would make the task of restraining them +less difficult.... This idea of a congress pleases me greatly; it +would second the efforts we are +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P26"></A>26}</SPAN> +making to maintain confidence. In +the first place, I repeat, it would put a check on the <I>émigrés</I>, and, +moreover, it would make an impression here from which I hope much. I +submit that to your better judgment.... Adieu, my dear brother; we +love you, and my daughter has particularly charged me to embrace her +good uncle." +</P> + +<P> +While Marie Antoinette was thus turning towards Austria for assistance, +the National Assembly at Paris repelled with energy all thought of any +intervention whatsoever on the part of foreign powers. January 1, +1792, it issued a decree of impeachment against the King's brothers, +the Prince de Conde, and Calonne. The confiscation of the property of +the <I>émigrés</I> and the taxation of their revenues for the benefit of the +State had been prescribed by another decree to which Louis XVI. had +offered no opposition. January 14, Guadet said in the tribune, while +speaking of the congress: "If it is true that by delays and +discouragement they wish to bring us to accept this shameful mediation, +ought the National Assembly to close its eyes to such a danger? Let us +all swear to die here rather than—" He was not allowed to finish. +The whole assembly rose to their feet, crying: "Yes, yes; we swear it!" +And in a burst of enthusiasm, every Frenchman who would take part in a +congress having for its object the modification of the Constitution, +was declared an infamous traitor. January 17, it was decreed that the +King should require the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P27"></A>27}</SPAN> +Emperor Leopold to explain himself +definitely before March 1. +</P> + +<P> +By a curious coincidence, this date of March 1 was precisely that on +which the Emperor Leopold was to die of a dreadful malady. He was in +perfect health on February 27, when he gave audience to the Turkish +envoy; he was in his agony, February 28, and on March 1, he died. His +usual physician asserted that he had been poisoned. The idea that a +crime had been committed spread among the people. Vague rumors got +about concerning a woman who had caused remark at the last masked ball +at court. This unknown person, under shelter of her disguise, might +have presented the sovereign with poisoned bonbons. The Jacobins, who +might have desired to get rid of the armed chief of the empire, and the +<I>émigrés</I>, who might have reproached him as too luke-warm in his +opposition to the principles of the French Revolution, were alternately +suspected. The last hypothesis was hardly probable, nor does anything +prove that the Jacobins had any hand in the possibly natural death of +the Emperor Leopold. But minds were so overexcited at the time that +the parties mutually accused each other, on all occasions, of the most +execrable crimes. For that matter, there were Jacobins who, out of +mere bravado, would willingly have gloried in crimes of which they were +not guilty, provided that these crimes had been committed against kings. +</P> + +<P> +What is certain is, that Marie Antoinette believed +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P28"></A>28}</SPAN> +in poison. +"The death of the Emperor Leopold," says Madame Campan, "occurred on +March 1, 1792. The Queen was out when the news arrived at the +Tuileries. On her return, I gave her the letter announcing it. She +cried out that the Emperor had been poisoned; that she had remarked and +preserved a gazette in which, in an article on the session of the +Jacobin Club at the time when Leopold had declared for the Coalition, +it was said, in speaking of him, that a bit of piecrust could settle +that affair. From that moment the Queen had regarded this phrase as an +inadvertence of the propagandists." +</P> + +<P> +On the very day when Marie Antoinette's brother died, Louis XVI.'s +Minister of Foreign Affairs, De Lessart, had enraged the National +Assembly by reading them extracts from his diplomatic correspondence, +which they found not sufficiently firm. They were indignant at a +despatch in which Prince de Kaunitz said: "The latest events give us +hopes; it appears that the majority of the French nation, impressed +with the evils they have prepared, are returning to more moderate +principles, and incline to render to the throne the dignity and +authority which are the essence of monarchical government." When De +Lessart came down from the tribune, the whispering changed into cries +of rage and threats against the minister and the court, which, it was +said, was planning a counter-revolution at the Tuileries, and dictating +to the cabinet of Vienna the language by which it hoped to intimidate +France. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P29"></A>29}</SPAN> +At the evening session of the same day, Rouyer, a deputy, +proposed to impeach the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "Is it possible," +cried he, "that a perfidious minister should come here to make a parade +of his work and lay the responsibility of it on a foreign power? Will +the time never arrive when ministers shall cease to betray us? Were my +head to be the price of the denunciation I am making, I would none the +less go on with it." At the session of March 6, Guadet said: "It is +time to know whether the ministers wish to make Louis XVI. King of the +French, or the King of Coblentz." +</P> + +<P> +On the 10th the storm broke. The day before, Narbonne had received his +dismission. Brissot accused De Lessart of having compromised the +safety of France, withheld from the Assembly the documents establishing +the alliance between the Emperor and the King of Prussia, discredited +the assignats, depreciated the credit, lowered the rate of exchange, +and encouraged interior disorder. Vergniaud followed him, exclaiming: +"From the tribune where I am speaking may be seen the palace where +perverse counsellors lead astray and deceive the King given to you by +the Constitution; where they forge chains for the nation, and arrange +the manoeuvres which are to deliver us up to Austria, after having +caused us to pass through the horrors of civil war. Terror and dismay +have often issued from that famous palace. Let them re-enter it to-day +in the name of the law, let them penetrate all hearts, and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P30"></A>30}</SPAN> +teach +all who dwell there, that our Constitution accords inviolability to the +King alone. Let them know that the law will overtake all the guilty +without exception, and that there will not be a single head convicted +of crime which can escape its sword." The decree of impeachment +against the ministers was voted by a very large majority. De Lessart +was advised to take flight, but he refused. "I owe it to my country," +said he, "I owe it to my King and to myself to make my innocence and +the regularity of my conduct plain before the tribunal of the high +court, and I have decided to give myself up at Orleans." He was +conducted by gendarmes to that city, where he was imprisoned. Louis +XVI. dared not do anything to save his favorite minister. On March 11, +Pétion, the mayor of Paris, came to the bar of the Assembly, and read, +in the name of the Commune, an address in which it was said: "When the +atmosphere surrounding us is heavy with noisome vapors, Nature can +relieve herself only by a thunder-storm. So, too, society can purge +itself from the abuses which disturb it only by a formidable +explosion.... It is true, then, that responsibility is not an idle +word; that all men, whatever may be their stations, are equal before +the law; that the sword of justice is poised over all heads without +distinction." Was not this language like a prognostic of the 21st of +January and the 16th of October? Encompassed by a thousand snares, +hated by each of the extreme parties, by the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P31"></A>31}</SPAN> +<I>émigrés</I> as well as +by the Jacobins, Marie Antoinette no longer beheld anything but aspects +of sorrow. Abroad, as in France, her gaze fell on dismal spectacles +only. Her imagination was affected. She hardly dared taste the dishes +served at her table. All had conspired to betray her. She had +experienced so many deceptions and so much anguish; fate had pursued +her with so much bitterness, that her heart, exhausted with emotions, +and overwhelmed with sadness, was weary of all things, even of hope. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P32"></A>32}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE DEATH OF GUSTAVUS III. +</H4> + +<P> +The drama of the Revolution is not French alone; it is European. It +has its afterclap in every empire, in every kingdom, even to the most +distant lands. It excites minds in Stockholm almost as much as in +Paris. Among the Swedes there are people whose greatest desire would +be to parody the October Days, and to carry about on pikes the bleeding +heads of their adversaries. The new ideas take fire and spread like a +train of gunpowder. It is the fashion to go to extremes; a nameless +frenzy and fatality seem let loose upon this epoch of agitations and +catastrophes. All those who, at one time or another, have been guests +at the palace of Versailles, are condemned, as by a mysterious +sentence, either to exile or to death. +</P> + +<P> +How will terminate the career of that brilliant King of Sweden, who had +received from Versailles and from Paris, from the court and from the +city, such an enthusiastic reception? Gustavus, the idol of the great +lords, the philosophers, and the fashionable beauties, who, after being +the hero of the encyclopædists, came to hold his court at +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P33"></A>33}</SPAN> +Aix-la-Chapelle amid the French <I>émigrés</I>, and who, on his return to +Stockholm, prepared there the great crusade for authority, announcing +himself as the avenger of divine right, the saviour of all thrones? +The last days of his life, his presentiments, which recall those of +Cæsar, his superstitions, his belief in prophecies, his magic +incantations, that warning which he scorns, as the Duke de Guise did at +the castle of Blois, that masked ball where the costumes, the music, +the flowers, the lights, offer a painfully strange contrast to the +horror of the attack; all is sinister, lugubrious, in these fantastic +and fatal scenes which have already tempted more than one dramatist, +more than one musician, and whose phases a Shakespeare only could +retrace. The crime of Stockholm is linked closely to the +death-struggle of French royalty. The funeral knell which tolled at +this extremity of the North had echoes in Paris. The Swedish regicides +set the example to the regicides of France. +</P> + +<P> +M. Geffroy has remarked very justly in his work, <I>Gustave III. et la +cour de France</I>, that the bloody deed which put an end to the reign and +the life of Gustavus is not an isolated fact: "The faults committed by +this Prince would not have sufficed to arm his assassins. The true +source whence Ankarstroem and his accomplices drew their first +inspiration was that vertigo caused during the last years of the +century by the annihilation of all religious and even all philosophical +faith.... No moment of +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P34"></A>34}</SPAN> +modern history has presented an +intellectual and moral anarchy comparable to that which accompanied the +revolutionary period in Europe." +</P> + +<P> +The eighteenth century was punished for incredulity by superstition. +Having refused to believe the most holy truths, it lent credence to the +most fantastic chimeras. For priests it substituted sorcerers; for +Christian ceremonies, the rites of freemasonry. The time was coming +when, because it had rejected the Sacred Heart of Jesus, it was going +to bow before the sacred heart of Marat. The adepts of Mesmer and of +De Puysegur, the seekers after the philosopher's stone, the Nicolaites +of Berlin, the illuminati of Bavaria, enlarged the boundaries of human +credulity, and the men who succumbed in the most naïve and foolish +manner to these wretched weaknesses of mind, were precisely the +haughtiest philosophers, those who had prided themselves the most on +their distinction as free-thinkers. Such a one was Gustavus III. +</P> + +<P> +This Voltairean Prince, who had held the Christian verities so cheap, +was superstitious even to puerility. He did not believe in the +Gospels, but he believed in books of magic. In a corner of his palace +he had arranged a cupboard with a censer and a pair of candlesticks, +before which he performed cabalistic operations in nothing but his +shirt. Throughout his entire reign he consulted a fortune-teller named +Madame Arfwedsson, who read the future for him in coffee-grounds. +Around his neck +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P35"></A>35}</SPAN> +he wore a gold box containing a sachet in which +there was a powder that, according to his belief, would drive away evil +spirits. All this apparatus of incantation and sorcery was one of the +causes of Gustavus's fall. It multiplied the snares around the +unfortunate monarch, and served to mask his enemies. Prophecies +announced his approaching end, and conspirators took care to fulfil the +prophecies. +</P> + +<P> +The Duke of Sudermania, the King's brother, without being an accomplice +in the project of crime, encouraged underhand practices. Sectarians +approached Gustavus to reproach him for his luxury, his prodigalities, +his entertainments, or addressed him anonymous warnings which, in +Biblical language, declared him accursed and rejected by the Lord. +Their insolence knew no bounds. Madame Arfwedsson had counselled the +King to beware if he should meet a man dressed in red. Count de +Ribbing, one of the future conspirators, having heard of this, ordered +a red costume out of bravado, and presented himself in it before his +sovereign, whom such an apparition caused to reflect if not to tremble. +</P> + +<P> +Gustavus, like Cæsar, was to see his Ides of March. It had been +predicted to him that the month of March would be fatal to him. This +month approached, and the monarch diverted himself by fêtes and +boisterous entertainments in order to banish the presentiments which +never ceased to assail +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P36"></A>36}</SPAN> +him. He said to himself that all this +phantasmagoria would probably soon vanish; that the funereal images +would of themselves depart; and that the spectres would disappear at +the sound of arms. The monarchical crusade of which he proposed to be +the leader grew upon him as the best means by which to escape the +incessant obsessions haunting his spirit. In vain was he reminded that +Sweden was in need of money, and that a war of intervention in the +affairs of France was not popular. His resolution remained unshaken. +He counted the days and hours which still separated him from the moment +of action: his sole idea was to chastise the Jacobins and avenge the +majesty of thrones. +</P> + +<P> +Returned to Stockholm from Aix-la-Chapelle, at the beginning of August, +1791, the impetuous monarch began to be very active in his warlike +preparations. The Marquis de Bouillé, who had been obliged to quit +France at the time of the unsuccessful journey to Varennes, had entered +his service and was to counsel him and fight at his side under the +Swedish flag. At the same time Gustavus officially renewed his +promises of aid to the King of France. Louis XVI. replied:— +</P> + +<P> +"MONSIEUR MY BROTHER AND COUSIN: I have just received the lines with +which you have honored me on the occasion of your return. It is always +a great consolation to have such proofs of a friendly sentiment as are +given me by this letter. The concern, Sire, which you take in all that +relates to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P37"></A>37}</SPAN> +my interest touches me more and more, and I recognize +in each word the august soul of a king whom the world admires as much +for his magnanimous heart as for his wisdom." +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile the conspirators, animated either by personal rancor or the +passions common to nobles hostile to their king, were secretly +preparing for an attack. The five leaders were Captain Ankarstroem, +Count de Ribbing, Count de Horn, Count de Lilienhorn, major of the Blue +Guards, and Baron Pechlin, an old man of seventy-two, who had been +distinguished in the civil wars, and was the soul of the plot. The +conspirators had doubts before committing the crime. During the Diet, +which met at Gefle, January 25, 1792, they refrained at the very moment +when they were about to strike. +</P> + +<P> +Gustavus was in his castle of Haga, about a league from Stockholm, +without guards or attendants. Three of the conspirators approached the +castle at five in the evening. They were armed with carbines, and, +having placed themselves in ambush near the King's apartment on the +ground-floor, were awaiting an opportunity to kill their sovereign. +Gustavus coming in from a long walk, went in his dressing-gown to sit +in the library, the windows of which opened like doors into the garden. +He fell asleep in his armchair. Whether they were alarmed by the sound +of footsteps, or whether the contrast between the slumber of the +unsuspicious King and the death poising above his head awakened +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P38"></A>38}</SPAN> +some remorse, the assassins once more abandoned their meditated crime. +</P> + +<P> +Weary of the attempts they had been planning for six months, and which +never came to anything, the conspirators might possibly have given them +up altogether if a circumstance which they considered providential had +not come to rekindle their regicidal zeal. The last masked ball of the +season was to be given in the Opera-house on the night of March 16-17, +and it was known that Gustavus would be present. To strike the monarch +in the midst of the festival, in order to chastise him for his love of +pleasure, was an idea which charmed the assassins. Moreover, the mask +alone could embolden them; they thought that if the august victim were +enveloped in a domino they need no longer dread that royal prestige +which had more than once caused them to recoil. +</P> + +<P> +Gustavus was counselled to be on his guard. The young Count Louis de +Bouillé, who was then at Stockholm, and who had been informed by a +letter from Germany that the King was about to be assassinated, begged +him to profit by the warnings reaching him from every quarter. +Gustavus replied that he would rather go blindly to meet his fate than +torment himself with the numberless precautions which such suspicions +would demand. "If I listened," added he, "to all the advice I receive, +I could not even drink a glass of water; besides, I am far from +believing in the execution of such a plot. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P39"></A>39}</SPAN> +My subjects, although +very brave in war, are extremely timid in politics. The successes I +expect to gain in France, the trophies of which I shall bring back to +Stockholm, will speedily augment my power by the confidence and general +respect which will be their result." +</P> + +<P> +Meantime the fatal hour was approaching. The masked ball of March 16 +was about to open. Before going there, Gustavus took supper with a few +of the persons belonging to his household. While he was at table he +received a note, written in French and unsigned, in which he was +entreated not to enter the playhouse, where he was about to be stricken +to death. The author of the note urgently recommended the King not to +make his appearance at the ball, and, if he persisted in going, to +suspect the crowd which would press around him, because this gathering +was to be the prelude and signal of the blow aimed at him. The really +bizarre thing about this was that the man who wrote these lines was +himself one of the conspirators, Count de Lilienhorn. +</P> + +<P> +"It is impossible to tell," says the Marquis de Bouillé in his Memoirs, +"whether his conscience wished to acquit itself in this manner towards +the King, to whom he owed everything, without forfeiting his word to +his party, or whether, knowing the fearless character of this prince, +he did not offer his anonymous advice as a bait to his courage. It +certainly produced the latter effect." Gustavus made no +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P40"></A>40}</SPAN> +reflections on reading this note, and went fearlessly to the ball. +</P> + +<P> +The orchestra is playing wildly. The dances are animated. The hall, +adorned with flowers, sparkles under the glow of the chandeliers. +Gustavus appears for a moment in his box. It is only then that he +shows to Baron d'Essen, his first equerry, the anonymous note he had +received while at supper. That faithful servant begs him not to go +down into the hall. Gustavus disregards the prudent counsel. He says +that hereafter he will wear a coat of mail, but that, for this time, he +is perfectly determined to be reckless about danger. The King and his +equerry go into the saloon in front of the royal box, where each puts +on a domino. Then they enter the hall by way of the stage. There are +men essentially courageous, who love danger for its own sake. Gustavus +is one of them. Hence he takes pleasure in braving all his assassins. +As he is crossing the greenroom with Baron d'Essen on his arm, "Let us +see," says he, "whether they will really dare to kill me." Yes, they +will dare it. The moment that the King enters he is recognized in +spite of his mask and his domino. He walks slowly around the hall, and +then goes into the pit, where he strolls about during several minutes. +He is about to retrace his steps, when he finds himself surrounded, as +had been predicted, by a group of maskers who get between him and the +officers of his suite. Several black dominos approach. They are the +assassins. One of them, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P41"></A>41}</SPAN> +Count de Horn, lays a hand on his +shoulder: "Good day, fine masker!" he says. This Judas salute, this +ironical welcome given by the murderers to their victim, is the signal +for the attack. On the instant, Ankarstroem fires on the King with a +pistol loaded with old iron. +</P> + +<P> +Gustavus, struck in the left hip, cries, "I am wounded!" The pistol, +which had been wrapped in wool, made only a muffled report, and the +smoke spreading throughout the room, the crowd does not think of a +murder, but a fire. Cries of "Fire! fire!" augment the confusion. +Baron d'Essen, all covered with his master's blood, helps him to gain a +little box called the OEil-de-Boeuf, and from there a salon, where he +is laid upon a sofa. Baron d'Armfelt orders the doors of the theatre +to be closed, and every one to unmask. A man, brazening it out, lifts +his mask before the officer of police, and says to him with assurance, +"As for me, sir, I hope that you will not suspect me." It is +Ankarstroem, the assassin. He goes out quietly. But, after the crime +was committed, his weapons, a pistol and a knife like that of +Ravaillac, had fallen on the floor. A gunsmith of Stockholm will +recognize the pistol and declare that he had sold it a few days before +to a former officer of the guards, Captain Ankarstroem. It is the +token which will cause the arrest of the assassin, and his punishment +by the penalty of parricides,—decapitation and the cutting off of his +right hand. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P42"></A>42}</SPAN> + +<P> +The King showed admirable calm and resignation during the thirteen days +he had still to live. He asked with anxiety if the murderer had been +arrested, and being answered that his name was not yet known: "Ah! God +grant," said he, "that he may not be discovered!" As soon as the first +bandages were put on, the wounded man was taken to his apartments at +the castle. There he received his courtiers and the foreign ministers. +When he saw the Duke d'Escars, who represented the brothers of Louis +XVI. at Stockholm: "This is a blow," said he, "which is going to +rejoice your Parisian Jacobins; but write to the Princes that if I +recover from it, it will change neither my sentiments nor my zeal for +their just cause." In the midst of his sufferings he preserved a +dignity above all praise. Neither recriminations nor murmurs issued +from his lips. He summoned to his death-bed both his friends and those +who had been among the number of his enemies, but would have been +horrified to have been accomplices in a crime. When the old Count de +Brahé, leader of the nobles of the opposition, presented himself, +Gustavus said, as he pressed him in his arms: "I bless my wound, since +it has brought back an old friend who had withdrawn from me. Embrace +me, my dear count, and let all be forgotten between us." +</P> + +<P> +The fate of his son, who was about to ascend the throne at the age of +thirteen, was the chief preoccupation of the King. "Let them put me on +a litter," cried he; "I will go to the public square and speak to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P43"></A>43}</SPAN> +the people." And he said to Baron d'Armfelt: "Go, and like another +Antony, show the bloody vestments of Cæsar." It was also to D'Armfelt +that he said as he was signing with his dying hand his commission as +Governor of Stockholm: "Give me your knightly word that you will serve +my son as faithfully as you have served me." He made his confession to +his grand-almoner: "I fear," he said to him, "that I have no great +merit before God, but at least I am sure that I have never done harm to +any one intentionally." He meant to receive the sacraments according +to the Lutheran form, and to have the Queen brought to him, as he had +not seen her since his illness. But while seeking sleep in order to +tranquillize his mind before this emotion, he found the slumber of +death, March 29, 1792, at eleven in the morning. He was forty-six +years old. +</P> + +<P> +Thus terminated the brilliant and stormy career of the prince on whom +the Marquis de Bouillé has pronounced the following judgment: "His +manners and his politeness rendered him the most amiable and attractive +man in his country, although the Swedes are naturally intelligent. He +had a vivid imagination, a mind enlightened and adorned by a taste for +letters, a masculine and persuasive eloquence, and an easy elocution +even when speaking French; useful and agreeable acquirements, a +prodigious memory, polite and affable manners, accompanied by a certain +oddity which did not displease. His strong and ardent soul was +enkindled with an inordinate love of glory; but a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P44"></A>44}</SPAN> +chivalrous +spirit and loyalty dominated there. His sensitive heart rendered him +clement, when he ought, perhaps, to have been severe; he was even +susceptible of friendship, and this prince has had and has preserved +friends whom I have known, and who were worthy to be such. He had a +firm and decided character, and, above all, that resolution so +necessary to statesmen, without which wit, prudence, talents, +experience, are not only useless, but often injurious." +</P> + +<P> +According to the Marquis de Bouillé, Gustavus should have been the King +of France, and Louis XVI. King of Sweden. "As the sovereign of France, +Gustavus would have been, beyond all doubt, one of its greatest kings. +He would have preserved that beautiful realm from a revolution; he +would have governed with glory and with splendor.... Louis XVI., on +the other hand, placed on the throne of Sweden, would have obtained the +respect and esteem of that simple people by his moral and religious +virtues, his economy, his spirit of justice, and his good and +benevolent sentiments. He would have contributed to the happiness of +the Swedes, who would have wept above his tomb; whereas both these +monarchs perished at the hands of their subjects. But the designs of +Providence are impenetrable, and we ought, in respect and silence, to +obey its unalterable decrees." +</P> + +<P> +The Jacobins of Paris, who affected to despise the projects of Gustavus +III., showed how much they had feared him by the mad joy they displayed +on +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P45"></A>45}</SPAN> +learning of his death. They lavished praises on "Brutus +Ankarstroem." Although it had been committed by the nobles, there was +a certain reminiscence of the French Revolution about the assault. In +their secret meetings the conspirators had agreed to carry around on +pikes the heads of Gustavus's principal friends, "in the French style," +as was said in those days. Count de Lilienhorn, brought up, nourished, +and drawn from poverty and obscurity by Gustavus, and overwhelmed to +the last moment by the benefits of the generous monarch, explained his +monstrous ingratitude and the part he had taken in the attack, by +saying he had been led astray by the idea of commanding the National +Guards of Stockholm after the Revolution, and playing the same part as +Lafayette. The Girondin ministry attained to power in France a few +days after Gustavus had been struck down in Sweden. There was no +connecting link between the two facts; but at Paris, as at Stockholm, +the cause of kings sustained a terrible repulse. The tragic death of +their faithful friend must have caused Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette +some painful forebodings concerning their own fate. The murder of +Gustavus was the first of a series of great catastrophes. The pistol +of the Swedish regicide heralded the blade of the Parisian guillotine. +The 16th of March was the prelude of the 21st of January. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P46"></A>46}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE BEGINNINGS OF MADAME ROLAND. +</H4> + +<P> +The moment is at hand when a woman of the middle class, born in humble +circumstances, is about to make her appearance on the scene of +politics; a woman who, after living in obscurity during thirty-eight +years, was to become famous in a few days, and attract the attention of +all France first and afterwards that of Europe entire. No figure is +more curious to study than hers, and it is not surprising that of late +years it has tempted men of great merit, such as MM. Daubant and +Faugère, whose publications have shed great light on the Egeria of the +Girondins. +</P> + +<P> +At every epoch of history there are certain women who become as it were +living symbols, and sum up in their own persons the passions, +prejudices, and illusions of their time. They reflect at once its +vices and its virtues, its qualities and its defects. Such was Madame +Roland. All the distinctive characteristics of the close of the +eighteenth century are resumed in her: ardent enthusiasm, generous +ideals, aspiration towards progress, passion for liberty, heroic +courage in view of persecution, captivity, and death; an absence of +religious faith, an implacable vanity, a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P47"></A>47}</SPAN> +thirst for emotions, +plagiarism of antiquity, declamatory language and sentiments, and +childish imitation of Greece and Rome. Nothing is more interesting +than to analyze the conceptions of this mind, count the pulsations of +this heart, and surprise the inmost secrets of a woman whose +psychological importance is as considerable as her place in history. +Intellectually as well as morally, Madame Roland is the daughter of +Jean-Jacques Rousseau; socially she is the personification of that +third estate which, having been nothing, wished at first to be +something and afterwards to be all; politically, she is by turns the +heroine and the victim of the Revolution, which, under pretext of +liberty, engendered tyranny, which used the guillotine and perished by +the guillotine, and which after dreaming of light expired in mire and +blood. +</P> + +<P> +How was it that this little <I>bourgeoise</I>, the daughter of Philipon the +engraver, a man midway between an artisan and an artist, whose very +origin seemed to remove her so far from any political rôle, attained to +high renown? What influences formed this woman whose qualities were +masculine? Whence was drawn the inspiration of this siren, destined to +be taken in her own snares and die the victim of her own incantations? +A rapid glance at the earliest years of Marie-Jeanne Philipon, the +future Madame Roland, is enough to explain her passions and her hopes, +her errors and her talents, her rages and her enthusiasms. +</P> + +<P> +She was born in Paris, March 18, 1754, of an intelligent but frivolous +father, and a simple, devoted, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P48"></A>48}</SPAN> +honestly commonplace mother. From +infancy she felt herself superior to those by whom she was surrounded. +Thence sprang an unmeasured pride and a continual hunger to produce an +impression. The infant prodigy preluded the female politician. +Speaking of herself in her Memoirs, she becomes ecstatic over the child +who "read serious works, explained very well the circles of the +celestial globe, used crayons and the burin, found at eight years that +she was the best dancer in an assembly of young persons older than +herself," and who, nevertheless, "was often summoned to the kitchen to +make an omelette, clean the vegetables, or skim the pot." She admires +her own willingness to descend to domestic cares: "I was never out of +my element," she says; "I could make soup as skilfully as Philopoemen +could chop wood; but no one, observing me, could imagine that this was +suitable employment." Still speaking of herself, she celebrates "the +little person who on Sundays went to church or out walking in a +spick-and-span costume whose appearance was fully sustained by her +demeanor and her language." She calls attention to the contrast by +which, on week-days, the same child went out alone, in a little cloth +frock, to buy parsley and salad at a short distance from home. "It +must be owned," she adds, "that I did not like this very well; but I +did not show it, and I had the art of doing my errands in such a way as +to find some pleasure in it. I united such great politeness to a +certain dignity, that the fruit-seller or other person +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P49"></A>49}</SPAN> +of the +sort, took pleasure in serving me first, and even those who came before +me thought this proper." +</P> + +<P> +So the little Philipon wanted to take the chief place in the +fruiterer's shop, just as, later on, she desired it on the political +stage or the Ministry of the Interior. This enemy of privileges will +admit them only for herself. In everything she made pretentions: +pretentions to elegance, beauty, distinction, talent, knowledge, +eloquence, genius, and, when she wanted to be simple, to simplicity. +In her style as in her conversation, in her public as in her private +life, what she sought before all things was effect. It was absolutely +essential that people should talk about her, that she should be playing +a part, or standing on a pedestal. Assuredly, if she had a fault, it +was not excess of modesty. She regarded herself as the flower of her +sex, a superior woman, made to be loved, flattered, and adored. She +speaks of her charms with the precision of a doctor and the enthusiasm +of a poet. Not one of her perfections escapes her. It is through a +magnifying-glass and before a mirror that she studies and admires +herself. She discovers that a society in which a woman so remarkable +and so attractive is not thoroughly well known, must be badly +organized. Middle-class by birth, and aristocratic by instinct, she +represents what one might then have called the new social strata. A +secret voice told her that the day was to come when she would make +herself feared by the powerful of the earth, those giants with feet of +clay who, at the beginning of her +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P50"></A>50}</SPAN> +career, were still looked at +kneeling. Banished by fate from the theatre where the human +tragi-comedy is played, she said to herself: "I too will have a part +one of these days." In the earliest stage of her existence there was +in her a confused medley of uneasiness and ambition, of spite and +anger. She had a horror of the slightly disdainful protection of +people of quality. She conceived an aversion for persons like that +Demoiselle d'Hannaches, "big, awkward, dry, and yellow," infatuated +with her nobility, annoying everybody with her titles, and yet, in +spite of her ignorance, her stiff manners, her old-fashioned dress and +her follies, well received everywhere on account of her birth. +</P> + +<P> +Slowly, but steadily, the future amazon of the Revolution prepared +herself for the combat. The books which she read and re-read +incessantly were the arsenal whence she drew her weapons. One of those +presentiments which do not deceive, promised her a stormy but +illustrious destiny. More Roman than French, more pagan than +Christian, she longed for glory like that of the heroines of Plutarch, +her favorite author. In the humble dwelling of her father, situated at +the corner of the Pont-Neuf and the Quai des Orfévres, she caught a +glimpse of horizons as wide as her thoughts. "From the upper part of +our house," she says, "a great expanse offered itself to my dreamy and +romantic imagination. How often from my north window have I +contemplated with emotion the deserts of the sky, its superb azure +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P51"></A>51}</SPAN> +vault splendidly outlined from the bluish dawn far behind the Pont du +Change, to the sunset gilded with a faint purplish lustre behind the +trees of the Champs Elysées and the houses of Chaillot." +</P> + +<P> +Irritated with the obscurity to which she was condemned by fate, there +was but one resource which could have consoled her for the social +inequalities which bruised her vanity and her pride. That resource +would have been religion. Nothing but an ideal of humility could have +appeased the interior revolts of this soul of fire. To such a woman, +what is lacking is heaven. Earth, no matter what happens, can give her +nothing but deceptions. The only moment of her life when she felt +herself really happy was that when she enjoyed the supreme good, peace +of heart. Of all parts of her Memoirs, the most pure and touching are +those she devotes to her recollections of the convent. One might think +that the author of <I>Rolla</I> had remembered them when he described in +such penetrating terms the mystic poetry of the cloister, and the +regrets often engendered by the loss of faith in the minds and hearts +of people who have become unbelievers. +</P> + +<P> +The little Philipon, being in her twelfth year, asked to be sent to a +convent, in order to prepare better for her first communion. She was +placed with the Ladies of the Congregation, rue Neuve-Saint-Étienne, in +the Faubourg Saint-Marcel, near Sainte-Pélagie, her future prison: "How +I pressed my dear mamma in my arms at the moment of parting +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P52"></A>52}</SPAN> +from +her for the first time! I was stifled, overwhelmed; but I obeyed the +voice of God, and crossed the threshold of the cloister, offering Him +with tears the greatest sacrifice that I could make. The first night I +spent at the convent was agitated: I was no longer under the paternal +roof. I felt that I was far from that good mother who was surely +thinking of me with tenderness. There was a feeble light in the room +where I had been put to bed, with four other children of my own age; I +rose quietly and went to the window. The moonlight permitted me to see +the garden upon which it looked. The most profound silence reigned; I +listened to it, so to say, with a sort of respect; great trees cast +their gigantic shadows here and there, and promised a safe refuge for +tranquil meditation. I lifted my eyes to the pure and serene sky, and +thought I felt the presence of the Divinity, who smiled at my sacrifice +and already offered me its recompense in the peace of a celestial +abode. Delicious tears flowed slowly down my cheeks; I reiterated my +vows with a holy transport, and I enjoyed the slumber of the elect." +</P> + +<P> +As if in these silent cloisters, which she crossed slowly so as to +enjoy their solitude more fully, she had a presentiment of the storms +in her destiny and her heart, she sometimes stopped beside a tomb on +which was engraven the eulogy of a holy maiden. "She is happy!" she +said to herself with a sigh. While she was in prison she remembered +with emotion a novice's taking the veil: "I experience yet the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P53"></A>53}</SPAN> +thrill caused by her faintly tremulous voice when she chanted +melodiously the customary versicle: '<I>Elegi</I>: Here I have chosen my +abode, and I will not depart from it forever.' I have not forgotten +the notes of this little air; I can repeat them as exactly as if I had +heard them yesterday." +</P> + +<P> +Unhappily, religious ideas were soon to undergo a change in the mind of +the future Madame Roland. Returning to the paternal dwelling, she was +badly brought up there; her mother let her read everything, even +<I>Candide</I>. Voltaire, Helvétius, Diderot, had no secrets for this young +girl. Extreme disorder and confusion in mind and heart were the +result. When she had the misfortune to lose her mother at the age of +twenty-one, the book in which she sought consolation was the <I>Nouvelle +Héloise</I>. Jean-Jacques became her god. "It seems," she says, "as if +he were my natural aliment and the interpreter of the sentiment I had +already, and which he alone knew how to explain to me.... To have the +whole of Jean-Jacques," she says again, "to be able to consult him +incessantly, to enlighten and elevate one's self with him at all times +of life, is a felicity which can only be tasted by adoring him as I +did." Such reading robbed her of faith. It made her a free-thinker +and a bluestocking. It inspired her with an unhealthy ambition, +sullied her imagination, and troubled the peace of her heart. It +deprived her of that moral delicacy, lacking which, even virtue itself +loses its charms. She was no longer anything but a young +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P54"></A>54}</SPAN> +girl, +well-conducted but not pure, honest but shameless. +</P> + +<P> +Was not a day coming when, a prisoner and on the point of getting into +the fatal cart, she would throw off the terrible anxieties of her +situation in order to imitate the impurities of the <I>Confessions</I> of +Jean-Jacques, and retrace indecent details with complacency? Do not +seek in her that flower of innocence which is the young girl's grace. +The charming puritan does not commit great faults, but she has +astonishing licenses of thought and speech. For her, Louvet's +<I>Faublas</I> is "one of those charming romances known to persons of taste, +in which the graces of imagination ally themselves to the tone of +philosophy." Is not this woman, who begins her life like a saint and +ends it as a pupil of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the symbol of +that troubled eighteenth century which opened in fidelity to religious +faith and closed in the depths of the abyss of incredulity? The +ravages caused by bad reading in the soul of this young girl explain +the catastrophes of the entire century. +</P> + +<P> +From the time when she replaced the Gospels by the <I>Contrat Social</I> and +the <I>Imitation of Jesus Christ</I> by the <I>Nouvelle Héloise</I>, there was no +longer anything simple or natural remaining in the young philosopher. +All her thoughts and actions became declamatory. There was something +theatrical in her attitudes and gestures, and even in the sound of her +voice. Her speech was rhythmical, cadenced, marked +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P55"></A>55}</SPAN> +by a special +accent. Even her private letters often resemble the amplifications of +rhetoric rather than the effusions of friendship. One might say that +their author had a presentiment that they would be printed. She wrote +to Mademoiselle Sophie Cannet, January 3, 1776: "In any case, burn +nothing. Though my letters were one day to be read by all the world, I +would not hide the only monuments of my weakness, and my sentiments." +Monuments of weakness—is not the expression worthy of the bombast of +the time? +</P> + +<P> +Not finding love, Mademoiselle Philipon married philosophically. Her +union bears a striking imitation to that of Héloise with M. de Volmar. +"Looking her destiny peacefully and tenderly in the face, greatly moved +but not infatuated," she united herself to a man whom she esteemed but +did not love. This was Roland de la Platière, who was descended from +an ancient and very honorable middle class family. Though not rich, he +was at least comfortably well off. "Well educated, honest, simple in +his tastes and manners, he fulfilled his duties as inspector of +manufactures in a notable way. The marriage was celebrated on February +4, 1780. Roland was forty-six years old, while his wife was not yet +twenty-six. Thin, bald, careless in his dress, the husband was not at +all an ideal person. It had taken him five years to declare his +passion, and this hesitation, as his wife was to write thirteen years +later, "left not a vestige of illusion in his sentiments." "I have +often felt," +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P56"></A>56}</SPAN> +says she, "that there was no similarity between us. +If we lived in retirement, I spent many painful hours; if we mingled in +society, I was loved by persons among whom I perceived there were some +who might affect me too much; I plunged into labor with my husband.... +It was a long time before I gained courage to contradict him." +</P> + +<P> +M. Roland was sent to Amiens, where his wife presented him with a +daughter, whom she nursed, and afterwards brought up with the utmost +tenderness and devotion. In 1784, he was summoned to Lyons, where he +found himself once more in his native region. Thenceforward he spent +two of the winter months in Lyons, and the remainder of the year on his +paternal domain, the Close of Platière, two leagues from Villefranche, +surrounded by woods and vineyards, and opposite the mountains of +Beaujolais. While her husband went to take possession of his new post, +Madame Roland, not yet a republican, remained a few weeks in Paris in +order to obtain, if possible, the patent of nobility so ardently +desired by the family. Her solicitations proved unsuccessful, and the +married pair, despairing of becoming nobles, consoled themselves by a +frank avowal of democracy. +</P> + +<P> +Up to the time of the Revolution, Madame Roland's life glided +peacefully away without any remarkable incidents. In the Close of +Platière, which she calls her dovecot, she appears as a good +housekeeper who looks after everything, from the cellar to the garret; +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P57"></A>57}</SPAN> +who plays the doctor among the poor villagers; who is delighted to +find in nature a savor of frank and free rusticity. The life she leads +is not merely honest, but edifying. She is very careful at this period +to hide her philosophy. She writes to Bosc, one of her friends, +February 9, 1785: "My brother-in-law, whose disposition is extremely +gentle and sensitive, is also very religious; I leave him the +satisfaction of thinking that the dogmas are as evident to me as they +appear to him, and my exterior actions are such as become the mother of +a family out in the country, who is bound to edify everybody. As I was +very devout in my early youth, I know my prayers as well as my +philosophy, and I prefer to make use of my first erudition." She wrote +again to Bosc, October 12, 1785: "I have hardly touched a pen for a +month, and I think I am acquiring some of the inclinations of the beast +whose milk refreshes me; I am extremely <I>asinine</I>, and I busy myself +with all the petty cares of the <I>hoggish</I> country life. I make +preserved pears that are delicious; we dry grapes and plums; we wash +and make up linen; we have white wine for breakfast, and we lie down on +the grass to rest; we follow the vintagers; we repose in the woods and +fields." +</P> + +<P> +Before looking at the female politician, let us glance once more at the +woman in private life, the charitable, devoted, honorable mother of a +family, such as she paints herself in a letter of November 10, 1786: +"From the corner of my fire, at eleven +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P58"></A>58}</SPAN> +o'clock, after a quiet +night and the various morning cares, my husband at his desk, my little +girl knitting, and I chatting with one and superintending the other's +work, enjoying the happiness of being snugly in the bosom of my dear +little family, writing to a friend, while the snow is falling on so +many wretches weighed down by poverty and sorrow, I am touched with +compassion for their fate; I turn back sweetly to my own, and at this +moment I count as nothing the annoyances of relations or circumstances +which seem occasionally to mar its felicity." +</P> + +<P> +Alas, why did not Madame Roland stay in her modest country-house to dry +her grapes and plums, to superintend her washing, mend her linen, and +spread out in her garret the fruits for winter use? Were not +obscurity, repose, peace of heart, better for her than that fictitious +glory which was to pass so quickly and end upon the scaffold? One +might say that before quitting nature, that great consoler which calms +and does not betray, in order to plunge herself into the odious world +of politics, which spoils and embitters the most beautiful souls, she +experiences a certain vague regret for the sweet and tranquil joys +which her folly was about to cause her to renounce forever. +</P> + +<P> +"The weather is delightful," wrote Madame Roland, May 17, 1790; "the +country has changed almost beyond recognition in only six days; the +vines and walnuts were as black as they are in winter, but a stroke of +the magic wand does not alter the aspect of +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P59"></A>59}</SPAN> +things more quickly +than the heat of a few fine days has done; everything turns green and +leafs out; a soft verdure is visible where there was nothing but the +dull and faded tint of torpor and inaction. I could easily forget +public affairs and men's controversies here; content to arrange the +manor, to see my fowls brood, and take care of my rabbits, I would care +nothing more about the revolutions of empires. But, as soon as I am in +the city, the poverty of the people and the insolence of the rich rouse +my hatred of injustice and oppression: I have no longer any soul or +desire except for the triumph of great truths and the success of our +regeneration." +</P> + +<P> +The die is cast. The daughter of Philipon the engraver is about to +become a political woman. The hour is come when this great actress, +who has long known her part, is at last going on the stage. She has a +presentiment of the risk she is running in assuming a task which is +beyond her sex. But, like soldiers who love danger for danger's sake, +and prefer the emotions of the battle-field to garrison life, she will +joyfully quit her province and throw herself into the seething furnace +of Paris. Even though she is to meet persecution and death at the end +of her new career, she will not recoil. A short but agitated life will +seem better to her than a long and fortunate existence without violent +emotions. A clear sky pleases her no longer. She is homesick for +storms and lightning flashes. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P60"></A>60}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +MADAME ROLAND'S ENTRANCE ON THE SCENE. +</H4> + +<P> +The hour of the Revolution had struck, and, ambitious, unbelieving, +full of disdain for the leading classes, full of confidence in her own +superiority, active, eloquent, impassioned, uniting the language of an +orator to the seductions of a charming woman, Madame Roland was ripe +for the Revolution. Her epoch suited her, and she suited her epoch. +This pagan who, according to her own expression, roamed mentally in +Greece, attended the Olympic games, and despised herself for being +French; this fanatical admirer of antiquity who, at eight years of age, +carried Plutarch to church with her instead of a missal, who styled +Roland <I>the virtuous</I> as the Athenians called Aristides the <I>just</I>, who +will die like her heroes, Socrates and Phocion; this student who, at +another period, would have been rated as an under-bred woman of the +middle class, a more or less ridiculous bluestocking, suddenly found +herself, in consequence of a general panic and circumstances as strange +as they were unforeseen, the very ideal of the society in which she +lived. For several months she was to be its fashionable type, its +favorite heroine. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P61"></A>61}</SPAN> +But the Revolution was a Saturn who devoured +his children, male and female, and the Egeria of the Girondins expiated +bitterly the intoxication caused by her brief popularity. +</P> + +<P> +In 1777, at the age of twenty-three, she had written: "Gay and jesting +speeches fall from this mouth which sobs at night upon its pillow; a +laugh dwells on my lips, while my tears, shut up within my heart, at +length make on it, in spite of its hardness, the effect produced by +water on a stone: falling drop by drop, they insensibly wear it away." +In 1791, when she was thirty-eight, she wrote: "The phenomena of +nature, which make the vulgar grow pale, and which are imposing even to +the philosophical eye, offer nothing to a sensitive person preoccupied +with great concerns, but scenes inferior to those of which her own +heart is the theatre." The flame consuming the eloquent and ardent +disciple of Rousseau was in need of fuel, and, finding this in +politics, she threw herself upon it with a sort of ravenous fury, just +as she had once abandoned herself to study. At twenty-two she had +written to one of her young friends: "You scold me for studying too +hard. Bear in mind, then, that unless I did so, love might perhaps +excite my imagination to frenzy. It is a necessary distraction. I am +not trying to become a learned woman; I study because I need to study, +as I do to eat." It was thus that Madame Roland plunged into politics. +All her unappeased instincts and repressed forces found their outlet in +that direction. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P62"></A>62}</SPAN> + +<P> +Woman being formed by nature to be dominated, nothing is more agreeable +to her than to invert the parts, and in her turn to domineer. To exert +influence in public affairs, to designate or support the candidates for +great offices of State, to organize or direct a ministry, to make +themselves listened to by serious men, to inspire opinions or systems, +is to ambitious women a kind of revenge for their sex. Those who have +acquired a habit of exercising this sort of power cannot relinquish it +without extreme reluctance. If they have once persuaded themselves of +their superiority to men, nothing can ever root the conviction from +their minds. To be protected humiliates them; what they long for most +of all is to be acknowledged as protectresses. Self-deluded, they +attribute to their passion for the public welfare what is, especially +in their case, the need of petty glory, the thirst for emotions, or the +amusement of pride and vanity. +</P> + +<P> +The Revolutionary bluestocking, Madame Roland, was from the very start +delighted to see that her works were printed, and that they produced as +much effect as if they had been written by some great statesman. These +first successes seemed to her to justify the excellent opinion she had +always entertained of herself. She got into a habit of playing the +oracle. No sooner had her lips touched the cup containing this +poisonous but intoxicating beverage than she would have no other. That +alone could refresh, even while it killed her. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P63"></A>63}</SPAN> + +<P> +Politics has the immense defect of exasperating, troubling, and +disfiguring souls. Madame Roland was born good, sensible, and +generous. Politics made her at times wicked, vindictive, and cruel. +July 26, 1789, she wrote this odious letter: "You are nothing but +children; your enthusiasm is a fire of straw, and if the National +Assembly does not order the trial of two illustrious heads, or some +generous Decius does not strike them down, you are all ... lost" +(Madame Roland employed a more trivial expression). "If this letter +does not reach you, may the cowards who read it redden to learn that it +is from a woman, and tremble in reflecting that she can create a +hundred enthusiasts from whom will proceed a million others." Roland +had been employed by the Agricultural Society of Lyons to draw up its +reports for the States-General. Madame Roland wrote much more of them +than her husband did. She sent article on article to a journal founded +by Champagneux to forward the revolutionary propaganda. Sixty thousand +copies were printed of one of them in which she described the festival +of the Federation at Lyons. Imagine the joy felt by the +<I>femme-auteur</I>, the pupil of Jean-Jacques, the model of George Sand! +Soon afterwards, the municipality deputed Roland to the Constituent +Assembly to advocate the interests of the city, which was involved to +the extent of forty millions, and which asked to have this debt assumed +by the State. Roland and his wife arrived in Paris, February 20, 1791. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P64"></A>64}</SPAN> + +<P> +The married pair installed themselves on the third floor of the hotel +Britannique, in rue Guénégaud. There a sort of political reunion was +formed, of which Brissot was the first link. Four times a week a few +friends, and certain deputies and journalists, met around this still +unknown woman, whose wit, charm, and beauty were not long in making a +sensation. It was at this period that she made Buzot's acquaintance. +The day of her first interview with the young and brilliant deputy was +an epoch in her sentimental life. Thenceforward, two passions, love +and ambition, the one as fierce and devouring as the other, were to +occupy her ardent soul. Comparing the young orator, whom she perhaps +transformed in her imagination into the president of a more or less +Athenian republic, with the austere and prosaic companion of her +existence, she perceived that, according to her own expression, there +was no equality between her and her husband, and that "the ascendency +of a domineering character, joined to twenty years' seniority, rendered +one of these superiorities too great"—that of age. She was herself +six years older than Buzot. Even though her love for him may have +remained Platonic, she gave him all her heart and soul. +</P> + +<P> +For the majority of women, still beautiful, who mingle in public +affairs, love is the principal thing; politics but the accessory, the +pretext. They imagine they are attaching themselves to ideas, and it +is to men. In this respect the heroines of the Revolution resemble +those of the Fronde. The stateswoman in +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P65"></A>65}</SPAN> +Madame Roland plays +second to the lover of Buzot. In her mind the Republic and the +handsome republican blend into one. Believing herself a patriot when +she is above all a woman in love, she carries the emotions, the +infatuations, the ardors and exaggerations of her private life into her +public one. With her, angers and enthusiasms rise to paroxysm. She is +extreme in all things. +</P> + +<P> +She detests Louis XVI. as much as she loves Buzot. After the flight to +Varennes, she wrote: "To replace the King on the throne is a folly, an +absurdity, if it is not a horror; to declare him demented is to make +obligatory the appointment of a regent. To impeach Louis XVI. would +be, beyond all contradiction, the greatest and most righteous step, but +you are incapable of taking it. Well then, put him not exactly under +interdict, but suspend him." Here begins the influence of Madame +Roland. The suspension of the royal authority is one of her ideas. +"So long as peace lasted," she says, "I adhered to the peaceful rôle +and to that kind of influence which I thought fitting to my sex; when +war was declared by the King's departure, it appeared to me that every +one should devote himself unreservedly. I joined the fraternal +societies, being persuaded that zeal and good intentions might be very +useful in critical moments. I was unable to stay at home any longer, +and I went to the houses of worthy people of my acquaintance that we +might excite each other to great measures." One knows what the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P66"></A>66}</SPAN> +Revolution meant by that expression: great measures. Madame Roland +became furious. She wanted a freedom of the press without check or +limit. She was angry because Marat's newspapers were destroyed by the +satellites of Lafayette. "It is a cruel thing to think of," she +exclaims, "but it becomes every day more evident that peace means +retrogression, and that we can only be regenerated by blood." +</P> + +<P> +Her hatred includes both Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. June 25, +1791, she writes: "It appears to me that the King ought to be +sequestered and his wife impeached." And on July 1: "The King has sunk +to the lowest depths of degradation; his trick has exposed him +completely, and he inspires nothing but contempt. His name, his +portrait, and his arms have been effaced everywhere. Notaries have +been obliged to take down the escutcheons marked with a flower-de-luce +which served to designate their houses. He is called nothing but Louis +the False, or the great hog. Caricatures of every sort represent him +under emblems which, though not the most odious, are the most suitable +to nourish and augment popular disdain. The people tend of their own +accord to all that can express this sentiment, and it is impossible +that they should ever again be willing to see seated on the throne a +being they despise so completely." +</P> + +<P> +Things did not go fast enough to suit Madame Roland's furious hatred. +The popular gathering in the Champ-de-Mars, whose aim was to bring +about +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P67"></A>67}</SPAN> +the deposition of the King, was forcibly dispersed on July +17. With six exceptions, all the deputies who had belonged either to +the Jacobin Club or that of the Cordeliers, left them on account of +their demand that Louis XVI. should be brought to trial. The time for +great measures, to use Madame Roland's expression, had not yet arrived. +The ardent democrat laments it. "I cannot describe our situation to +you," she writes at this moment of the revolutionary recoil; "I feel +environed by a silent horror; my heart grows steadfast in a mournful +and solemn silence, ready to sacrifice all rather than cease to defend +principles, but not knowing the moment when they can triumph, and +forming no resolution but that of giving a great example." +</P> + +<P> +The mission which had kept Roland in Paris for seven months being +ended, the discouraged pair returned to their province in September. +After stopping a few days in Lyons, in order to found a popular society +affiliated to the Jacobins of the capital, they went to spend the +remainder of the autumn at their country place, the Close of Platière. +But calm and silence no longer suited Madame Roland. Repose +exasperated her. She missed the struggle and the emotions of +revolutionary Paris, of which she had said: "One lives ten years here +in twenty-four hours; events and affections blend with and succeed each +other with singular rapidity; no such great events ever occupied minds." +</P> + +<P> +The pleasure of seeing her daughter again was not +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P68"></A>68}</SPAN> +enough to +compensate her for the chagrin of having parted from Buzot. Just as +she was despairing at the thought of sinking back into all the nullity +of the province, as she expresses it, the news came that the inspectors +of agriculture had been suppressed. Roland, no longer an official, +deliberated with his wife as to their next step. His own inclination +was to settle permanently in the country and devote himself to +agricultural labors which would surely and safely augment his fortune. +But his wife was by no means of the same mind. She must see her dear +Buzot again at any cost. She flattered the self-love of her +unsuspecting spouse, and persuaded him that Paris was the sole theatre +worthy of the virtuous Roland. Roland allowed himself to be convinced. +His wife, no longer mistress of herself, was drawn into the Parisian +abyss as by an irresistible force. And yet was it not she who had +proposed to herself this ideal, so easily to have been realized? "I +have never imagined anything more desirable than a life divided between +domestic cares and those of agriculture, spent on a healthy and fertile +farm, with a little family where the example of its heads and common +labor maintain attachment, peace, and freedom." Was it not she who had +uttered this profoundly true thought: "I see neither pleasure nor +happiness except in the reunion of that which charms the heart as well +as the senses, and costs no regrets"? In the most beautiful days of +her youth had she not written: "There was a time when I was never +content +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P69"></A>69}</SPAN> +except when I had a book or a pen in my hand; at present I +am as well satisfied when I have made a shirt for my father or added up +an account of expenses as if I had read something profound. I do not +care at all to be learned; I want to be good and happy; that is my +chief business. What is necessary but good, honest common sense?" Is +it not she, too, who will write at the beginning of her Memoirs: "I +have observed that in all classes, ambition is generally fatal; for the +few happy ones whom it exalts, it makes a multitude of victims." Why +did she not more frequently remind herself of the sentiment so just and +well expressed in a letter dated in 1790: "Women are not made to share +in all the occupations of men: they are altogether bound to domestic +cares and virtues, and they cannot turn away from them without +destroying their happiness." But, alas! passion does not reason. +Farewell common sense, wisdom, and experience, when ambition and love +have taken possession of a woman's heart. Returning to Paris, December +15, 1791, the Rolands established themselves in the rue de la Harpe, +and plunged head-long into politics. The wife redoubled her activity, +eloquence, and passion. The husband, instead of attending quietly to +the management of his retiring pension, was named a member of the +Jacobin corresponding committee at the beginning of 1792, a +revolutionary centre of which Brissot was the leader. At this period, +we are informed by Madame Roland, the intimidated court imagined that +the nomination of a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P70"></A>70}</SPAN> +minister chosen from among the patriots of the +Assembly would cause it to regain a little popularity. Brissot +proposed Roland, who, on March 24, 1792, accepted the portfolio of the +Interior. +</P> + +<P> +Madame, behold yourself, then, the wife of a minister, and in fact more +of a minister than your husband. Your ambitious projects, which have +been treated as chimerical, are now realized. You have a cortège like +Marie Antoinette. Men seek the favor of a smile, a word, from you. +They court, they solicit, they fear you. The monarchy, which you +detest, is at last obliged to reckon with you and your friends. Your +beauty, your talent, and your eloquence are boasted of. Your name is +in every mouth. You are powerful, you are celebrated. Well! you will +find out for yourself what bitterness there is at the bottom of this +cup of pride which has tempted your lips so long. You will learn at +your own expense that renown does not produce happiness, and that, for +a woman, twilight is better than the full glare of day. Yes, you will +long for the obscurity which weighed upon you. You will long for the +house of your father, the engraver, on the Quai des Orfèvres. You will +dream of the sunsets which affected you, and of the monotonous but +peaceful succession of your days. You, the deist, the female +philosopher, will recall with regret the cloisters where in your +adolescence you tasted the peace of the elect. In the time of your +supreme trial Buzot's miniature will not console you; it is not his +image you should cover with your +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P71"></A>71}</SPAN> +kisses. No; that miniature is +not the viaticum for eternity. What you will need is the crucifix, and +you respect the crucifix no longer. And yet your imagination will +evoke the mystic cloister, with its altars decked with flowers, its +painted windows, its penetrating and ineffable poesy. And in thought, +also, you will see the country once more, the harvest time, the month +of the vintage, the poor who come to the door asking for bread and who +go away with blessings on their lips and gratitude in their hearts. +Why have you quitted these honest people? What have you come to do in +the midst of these ferocious Jacobins, who flatter you to-day and will +assassinate you to-morrow? Do you fancy that Marie Antoinette is the +only woman who will be insulted, calumniated, and betrayed? Why do you +seat at your hospitable table this livid-faced Robespierre, who to-day, +perhaps, will address you a madrigal, and to-morrow send you to the +scaffold? You will pay very dear for these false and artificial joys, +these gusts of commonplace vanity, this pride of a parvenu, and the +pleasure of presiding for a few evenings at the dinners given to the +Minister of the Interior in Calonne's dining-room. The Legislative +Assembly, the Jacobin Club, the journals and the ministry, the +souvenirs of Plutarch and the parodies of Jean-Jacques, the noisy crowd +of flatterers who are the courtiers of demagogues as they would have +been the courtiers of kings, these adulators who are going to change +into executioners,—all are vanity! Poor +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P72"></A>72}</SPAN> +woman, whose power will +be so ephemeral, why do you make yourself a persecutor? You will so +soon be persecuted. Why labor so relentlessly to shake the foundations +of a throne that will bury you beneath its ruins? +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P73"></A>73}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +MARIE ANTOINETTE AND MADAME ROLAND. +</H4> + +<P> +Two women find themselves confronted across the chessboard and about to +move the pieces in a terrible game in which each stakes her head, and +each is foredoomed to lose. One is the woman who represents the old +régime—the daughter of the German Cæsars, the Queen of France and +Navarre; the other stands for the new régime, the Parisian middle +classes—the daughter of the engraver of the Quai des Orfèvres. They +are nearly the same age. Madame Roland was born March 18, 1754; and +Marie Antoinette, November 2, 1755. Both are beautiful, and both are +conscious of their charm. Each exercises a sort of domination over all +who approach her. +</P> + +<P> +In 1792, when Roland enters the ministry, Marie Antoinette is no longer +thinking of coquetry, luxury, or dress. The heroine of the Gallery of +the Mirrors, the crowned shepherdess of the Trianon, the queen of +elegance, pleasure, and fashion is not recognizable in her. The time +for splendors is over, like the time for pastorals. No more festivals, +no more distractions, no more theatres. Incessant anxieties and +unremitting labor; writing throughout the day and reading, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P74"></A>74}</SPAN> +meditating, and praying throughout the night, are now the unfortunate +sovereign's whole existence. She hardly sleeps. Her eyes are reddened +by tears. A single night, that of the arrest on the journey to +Varennes, had sufficed to whiten her hair. She wears mourning for her +brother, the Emperor Leopold, and for her ally, the King of Sweden, +Gustavus III., and one might say that she is also wearing it for the +French monarchy. All trace of frivolity has disappeared. The severe +and majestic countenance of the woman who suffers so cruelly as queen, +spouse, and mother, is sanctified by the double poetry of religion and +sorrow. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Roland, on the other hand, is more coquettish than she has ever +been. The actress who has at last found her theatre and is very proud +to play her part, wishes to allure, desires to reign. She delights in +presiding at these political dinners where all the guests are men, and +of which her grace and eloquence constitute the charm. She has just +completed her thirty-eighth year. Her husband is nearly fifty-eight; +Buzot is only thirty-two. Possibly she is still more preoccupied with +love than with ambition. To use one of her own expressions, "her heart +swells with the desire to please," to please Buzot above all; she takes +pains to celebrate her own beauty, which, in spite of showing symptoms +of decline, has the brilliance of sunset. In her Memoirs she describes +her "large and superbly modelled bust, her light, quick step, her frank +and open glance, at once keen and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P75"></A>75}</SPAN> +soft, which sometimes amazes, +but which caresses still more, and always quickens." She writes: "My +mouth is rather large; there are a thousand prettier, but none that has +a softer and more seductive smile." In prison, when she is nearly +forty, she states that if she has lost some of her attractions, yet she +needs no help from art to make her look five or six years younger. +"Even those who see me every day," she adds, "require to be told my +age, in order to believe me more than thirty-two or thirty-three." +Madame Roland had at first written thirty-three or thirty-four. But +after reflection, finding herself too modest, she made an erasure and +retrenched another year. She adds that she made very little use of her +charms; avowing at the same time, and with the most absolute frankness, +that if she could reconcile her duty with her inclination to utilize +them more fully, she would not be sorry. +</P> + +<P> +Both Marie Antoinette and Madame Roland were political women. But the +one became so in her own despite, in the hope of saving the life of her +husband and the heritage of her son; the other, through ambition and +the desire to play a part for which her origin had not destined her. +In the one, everything is at once noble and simple, natural and +majestic; in the other there is always something affected and +theatrical; one scents the <I>parvenue</I> who will never be a <I>grande +dame</I>, even in the Ministry of the Interior or at the house of Calonne. +All is unstudied in Marie Antoinette; Madame Roland, on the contrary, +is an artist in coquetry. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P76"></A>76}</SPAN> + +<P> +Bizarre caprice of fate which makes political rivals and adversaries +treating with each other on equal terms of these two women, of whom one +was so much above the other by rank and birth. The Tuileries and the +house of the Minister of the Interior are like two hostile citadels at +a stone's throw from each other. On both sides there is watchfulness +and fear. An impassable abyss, hollowed out by the vanity of the +commoner still more than by the pride of the Queen, forever separates +these two courageous women who, had they united instead of antagonizing +each other, might have saved both their country and themselves. +</P> + +<P> +It is necessary to go back a few years in order to comprehend the +motive of Madame Roland's hatred for Marie Antoinette. It was inspired +in the vain commoner by envy, the worst and vilest of all counsellors. +Madame Roland's special characteristic was the passion for making an +effect. Now the effect produced by Marie Antoinette under the old +régime was immense; that produced by the future Egeria of the Girondin +group was almost null. A simple mortal, regarding Olympus from below, +she said to herself with vexation, that in spite of her talents and her +charms there was no place for her among the gods and goddesses. +Versailles was like a superior world from which it maddened her to be +excluded. She was twenty years old when, in 1774, she visited it with +her mother, her uncle, the Abbé Bimont, and an aged gentlewoman, +Mademoiselle d'Hannaches. They all lodged at the palace. One of Marie +Antoinette's +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P77"></A>77}</SPAN> +women, who was acquainted with the Abbé, and who was +not then on duty, lent them her apartment. The only object of the +excursion was to give the young girl a near view of the court. +</P> + +<P> +In recalling this souvenir in her Memoirs, Madame Roland displays her +aversion for the old society. She is annoyed even with the companion +of her visit, because she was, according to the expression then in use, +a person of quality. "Mademoiselle d'Hannaches," she says, "went +boldly wherever she chose, ready to fling her name in the face of any +one who tried to stop her, thinking they ought to be able to read on +her grotesque visage her six hundred years of established nobility. +The fine figure of a pedantic little cleric like the Abbé Bimont, and +the imbecile pride of the ugly d'Hannaches were not out of keeping in +those scenes; but the unpainted face of my worthy mamma, and the +modesty of my dress, announced that we were commoners; if my eyes or my +youth provoked remark, it was almost patronizing, and caused me nearly +as much displeasure as Madame de Boismorel's compliments." It was this +Madame de Boismorel who, although she found the little Philipon very +pleasing, had said to the grandmother of the future Madame Roland: +"Take care that she does not become a learned woman; it would be a +great pity." +</P> + +<P> +The splendors of Versailles did not dazzle the daughter of the engraver +of the Quai des Orfèvres. The apartment she occupied was at the top of +the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P78"></A>78}</SPAN> +palace, in the same corridor as that of the Archbishop of +Paris, and so near it that it was necessary for the prelate to take +precautions lest she should overhear him talk. "Two poorly furnished +rooms," she says, "in the upper end of one of which space had been +contrived for a valet's bed, was the habitation which a duke and peer +of France esteemed himself honored in possessing, in order to be closer +at hand to cringe every morning at the levée of Their Majesties: and +yet he was the rigorist Beaumont.... The ordinary and the ceremonial +table-service of the entire family, eating separately or all together, +the masses, the promenades, the gaming, the presentations, had us for +spectators during a week." What impression was made on her by this +excursion to the royal palace? She herself will tell us nineteen years +later, in her prison. "I was not insensible," she says, "to the effect +of so much pomp and ceremony, but I was indignant that its object +should be to exalt certain individuals already too powerful and of very +slight personal importance: I liked much better to look at the statues +in the gardens than at the persons in the palace; and when my mother +asked if I was satisfied with my visit, 'Yes,' I replied, 'provided it +will soon be over; if I stay here many days longer, I shall detest the +people so much that I shall be unable to hide my hatred.' 'What harm +are they doing you, then?' 'Making me feel injustice, and constantly +behold absurdity.'" +</P> + +<P> +How this impression is emphasized in the really +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P79"></A>79}</SPAN> +prophetic letter +written by the future heroine of the Revolution to her friend, +Mademoiselle Sophie Cannet, October 4, 1774: "To return to Versailles. +I cannot tell you how greatly all I have examined has made me value my +own situation, and thank Heaven that I was born in an obscure +condition. You think, perhaps, that this sentiment is based on the +slight esteem I attach to the worth of opinion, and my sense of the +reality of the penalties attached to greatness. Not at all. It is +based on the knowledge I have of my own character, which would be very +detrimental both to me and to the State if I were placed at a little +distance from the throne; because I would be keenly shocked by the +extreme inequality which sets so many thousands of men below a single +individual of the same species!" What a prediction! The most +unforeseen events were one day to bring this young plebeian near that +royalty formerly so far above her. The engraver's daughter will be the +wife of a minister of State. And then what will happen? According to +her own expression, her rôle will be very detrimental to herself and to +the State. +</P> + +<P> +In the same letter she had written: "A beneficent king seems to me an +almost adorable being; but if, before coming into the world, the choice +of a government had been given me, my character would have made me +decide for a republic." She will end by hating the beneficent King, +and probably no one will contribute more than she towards establishing +the republican régime in France. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P80"></A>80}</SPAN> + +<P> +Supposing that, instead of being merely an insignificant commoner, +Madame Roland had been born in the ranks of aristocracy, had enjoyed +the right of sitting down in the presence of Their Majesties at +Versailles, and had shone at the familiar entertainments of the +Trianon, she would doubtless have shared the sentiments and ideas of +the women of the old régime, and, like the Princess de Lamballe or the +Duchess de Polignac, have shed tears of compassion over the Queen's +misfortunes. Fate, in placing her in a subordinate position, made her +an enemy and a rebel. She anathematized the society in which her rank +bore no relation to her lofty intelligence and her need of domination. +When, from the upper window of her father's house on the Quai des +Orfèvres, beside the Pont-Neuf, she saw the brilliant retinue of Marie +Antoinette pass by on their way to Notre Dame to return thanks to God +for some happy event, she grew angry at all this pomp and glitter, so +much in contrast with her own obscure condition. What crimes have been +engendered by the sentiment of envy! The furies of the guillotine were +above all things envious. They were delighted to see in the fatal cart +the woman whom they had formerly beheld in gala carriages resplendent +with gold. Madame Roland certainly ought not to have carried her +hatred to such a pitch; but had she not demanded in 1789, when speaking +of Louis XVI. and the Queen, that "two illustrious heads" should be +brought to trial? Who knows? If, in 1784, she had obtained the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P81"></A>81}</SPAN> +patent of nobility for her husband which at that period she solicited +so ardently, she might have become sincerely royalist! But having +remained, despite herself, in the citizen class, she retained and +personified, to her latest hour, its rancor, pettiness, and wrath. +What figure could she have made at Versailles, or even at the +Tuileries? In the midst of great lords and noble ladies the haughty +commoner would have been out of place; she would have stifled. It was +chiefly on that account that she attached herself to the new ideas. +She told herself that so long as royalty lasted, she would always be of +small importance; while, if the republic were established, she might +aspire to anything. Though her husband was one of the King's +ministers, she became daily more adverse to the monarchy, and Roland, +following her counsels, was like a pilot whose whole intent is to make +the vessel founder, even though he were to perish with its crew. +</P> + +<P> +It is a sad thing to say, but even their community in suffering did not +disarm Madame Roland's hate for Marie Antoinette. It was in prison, on +the eve of ascending the scaffold herself, that she wrote concerning +Louis XVI. and the Queen: "He was led away by a giddy creature who +united the presumption of youth and grandeur to Austrian insolence, the +intoxication of the senses, and the heedlessness of levity, and was +herself seduced by all the vices of an Asiatic court, for which she had +been too well prepared by the example of her mother." Ah! why +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P82"></A>82}</SPAN> +were not these cruel lines effaced by the tears Madame Roland shed in +floods over the pages she was writing, and of which the traces still +remain on the manuscript of her Memoirs? Why did she not sympathize in +the grief of Marie Antoinette, separated from her children, when in +speaking of her daughter Eudora, she wrote: "Good God! I am a +prisoner, and she is living far from me! I dare not even send for her +to receive my embraces; hatred pursues even the children of those whom +tyranny persecutes, and mine, with her eleven years, her virginal +figure, and her beautiful fair hair, could hardly appear in the streets +without creatures suborned or deluded by falsehood pointing her out as +the offspring of a conspirator. Cruel wretches! how well they know how +to tear a mother's heart!" +</P> + +<P> +Why were these two women political adversaries? Both sensitive, both +artistic, with inexhaustible sources of poetry and tenderness at heart, +they were born for gentle emotions and not for horrible catastrophes. +Who, at their dawning, could have predicted for them such an appalling +night? Like Marie Antoinette, Madame Roland loved nature and the arts. +She felt the profound and penetrating charm of the fields. She drew, +she played on the harp, guitar, and violin, and she sang. "No one +knows," she wrote a few moments before her death, "what an alleviation +music is in solitude and anguish, nor from how many temptations it can +save one in prosperity." She had sung the same romances +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P83"></A>83}</SPAN> +as the +Queen. The same poets had inspired and affected each. +</P> + +<P> +Does not this most feminine passage in Madame Roland's Memoirs recall +the character of the mistress of the Little Trianon? "I always +remember the singular effect produced on me by a bunch of violets at +Christmas; when I received them I was in that condition of soul often +induced by a season favorable to serious thought. My imagination +slumbered, I reflected coldly, and I hardly felt at all; suddenly the +color of these violets and their delicate perfume struck my senses; it +was an awakening to life.... A rosy tinge suffused the horizon of the +day." Would not this cry of Madame Roland in her captivity suit Marie +Antoinette as well? "Ah! when shall I breathe pure air and those soft +exhalations so agreeable to my heart?" And might not the daughter of +the great Maria Theresa have cried, like the daughter of Philipon the +engraver? "Adieu! my child, my husband, my friends. Adieu! sun whose +brilliant rays brought serenity to my soul, as if they were recalling +it to the skies. Adieu! ye solitary fields which have so often moved +me." +</P> + +<P> +What must not these two keenly sensitive women have had to suffer at +the epoch when France became a hell? They have each believed in the +amelioration of the human species and the return of the golden age to +earth, and what will their awakening be, after such alluring dreams? +Men will be as unjust, as wicked, as cruel to the republican as to the +queen. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P84"></A>84}</SPAN> +She, too, will be drenched with calumnies and outrages. +They will insult her also in the most cowardly and ferocious manner. +Under the very windows of her dungeon she will hear the hawkers crying: +"Great visit of Père Duchesne to Citizeness Roland, in the Abbey +prison, for the purpose of pumping her." The ignoble journalist will +call her "old sack of the counter-revolution." He will say to her with +his habitual oaths: "Weep for your crimes, old fright, before you +expiate them on the scaffold!" The wife of Louis XVI. and the wife of +Roland will die within twenty-three days of each other: one on October +16, the other on November 8, 1793. They will start from the same +prison of the Conciergerie, to be led to the same Place Louis XV., to +have their heads cut off by the blade of the same guillotine. The +commoner who had been so jealous of the Queen, can no longer complain. +If the lives of the two women have been different, they will at least +have the same death; and the doer of the noble deeds of the régime of +equality, the headsman, will make no distinction between the two +victims, between the veritable sovereign, the Queen of France and +Navarre, and the sovereign of a day, whom Père Duchesne, as insolent to +one as to the other, will no longer speak of except under the sobriquet +of Queen Coco. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P85"></A>85}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +MADAME ROLAND AT THE MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR. +</H4> + +<P> +Roland took the portfolio of the Interior, March 24, 1792, and +installed himself and his wife in the ministerial residence, then +occupying the site afterwards built on by the <I>Théâtre Italien</I>. This +very beautiful and luxurious mansion had formerly been the controller's +office, and both Calonne and Necker had lived in it. Madame Roland +found no small pleasure in queening it under the gilded canopies of the +old régime. It was not at all disagreeable to her to give dinners in +the sumptuous banqueting hall erected by the elegant Calonne, nor did +the austere admirer of the ancients set the black broth of Sparta +before her guests. +</P> + +<P> +Once arrived at power, was this great enemy of nobility and +prescription simple, and easy of approach? Not in the least. There is +often more arrogance displayed by parvenus of both sexes than by those +who are aristocrats by birth. Madame Roland was extremely proud of her +new dignity, and at once resolved, as she tells us in her Memoirs, +neither to make nor receive visits. Her attitude and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P86"></A>86}</SPAN> +manners +while at the ministry were those of an Asiatic sovereign. She secluded +herself, permitting only a small number of privileged courtiers to +enter her presence. Under the old régime, the wives of ministers and +ambassadors, dukes and peers, had never felicitated themselves on +"cultivating their private tastes" to the detriment of the proprieties +and obligations of good breeding. But the Revolution had changed all +that. French politeness was now mere old-fashioned rubbish. At the +Ministry of the Interior, the etiquette whose "severity" is vaunted by +Madame Roland was more rigorous than that of the court of Versailles, +and it was easier to see the wife of the King than the wife of the +minister. With what hauteur the latter expresses herself concerning +"the self-seeking crowds who throng about those who hold great places"! +Assuredly, the Queen had never spoken of her subjects in this tone of +disdainful patronage. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-086"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-086.jpg" ALT="MADAME ROLAND" BORDER="2" WIDTH="466" HEIGHT="779"> +<H4 CLASS="h4center" STYLE="width: 466px"> +MADAME ROLAND +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Madame Roland, who "was tired of fools," incommoded herself for nobody. +The agreeable side of power was all she wanted. Suppressing the +receptions which annoyed her, she gave none but men's dinners, where +she perorated and paraded, and where, being the only woman present, she +had no rivals to fear. Self-sufficiency and insufficiency are, for the +most part, what fall to the share of parvenus. What would have been +said in the old days of a noble dame who did the honors of a ministry +so strangely, who never invited another woman to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P87"></A>87}</SPAN> +dinner, and +admitted no one to her presence but a little clique of flatterers? +Everybody would have accused such a lady as lacking in good breeding. +But to Madame Roland all that she did was right in her own eyes. How +could a woman so superior be expected to submit to the tyranny of +polite usages? Was not the first of all despotisms the very one to be +shaken off? and ought not a person so proud of the originality of her +genius feel bound before all things, as she said herself, "to preserve +her own mode of being"? Madame Roland did at the ministry just what +she did from her cradle to her grave: she posed. +</P> + +<P> +"To listen to Madame Roland," said Count Beugnot in his witty and +curious Memoirs, "you would have thought she had imbibed the passion +for liberty from reading the great writers of antiquity.... Cato the +Elder was her hero, and it was probably out of respect for this hero +that she showed a lack of courtesy towards her husband. She was +unwilling to see that there was as much difference between Roland's +wife and the Roman minister as there was between the Brutus of the +Revolutionary Tribunal and him of the Capitol. Self-love was the means +by which this woman had been elevated to the point where we have seen +her; she was incessantly actuated by it, and does not dissimulate the +fact." It was she, and not her husband, who was Minister of the +Interior. If the aristocrats treated Roland as a minister +<I>sans-culottes</I>, it might have been added that the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P88"></A>88}</SPAN> +breeches which +he lacked were worn by his spouse. Out of all the rooms composing a +vast apartment, she had chosen for her own daily use the smallest that +could be converted into a study, and kept her books and writing-table +in it. It was from this boudoir, half literary, half political, that +she conducted the ministry according to her own whims. "It often +happened," says she, "that friends or colleagues desiring to speak +confidentially with the minister, instead of going to his own room, +where he was surrounded by his clerks and the public, came to mine and +begged me to have him called thither. Thus I found myself in the +stream of affairs without either intrigue or idle curiosity. Roland +took pleasure in talking these subjects over with me afterwards with +that confidence which has always reigned between us, and which has +brought our knowledge and our opinions into community." +</P> + +<P> +On this head, M. Dauban makes the very just remark: "A community in +which there is no equilibrium of forces, becomes a sort of omnipotence +for the strongest." The omnipotence in this case was not on the side +of the beard, but of Madame Roland. The wife wrote, thought, and acted +for her husband. It was she who drew up his circulars and reports to +the National Assembly. "My husband," she tells us, "had nothing to +lose in passing through my hands. Roland, without me, would have been +none the less a good administrator; with me, he has made more +sensation, because I imparted to my writings +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P89"></A>89}</SPAN> +that mixture of force +and sweetness, that authority of reason and charm of sentiment, which +perhaps belongs only to a sensitive woman, endowed with sound +understanding." And the "virtuous" Roland took pride in the +magnificent phrases which he naïvely believed to be the expression of +his own genius, when his wife had saved him not merely the trouble of +writing, but even of thinking. "He often ended," she says, "by +persuading himself that he had really been in a good vein when he had +written such or such a passage which proceeded from my pen." +</P> + +<P> +Madame Roland had at her orders a man of letters, salaried by the +Ministry of the Interior, who was the official defender of the minister +and his policy. "It had been felt," she tells us, "that it was needful +to counteract the influence of the court, the aristocracy, the civil +list and their journals, by popular instructions to which great +publicity should be given. A journal posted up in public places seemed +to be the proper thing, and a wise and enlightened man had to be found +for its editor." This wise and enlightened man was Louvet, the author +of the <I>Amours de Faublas</I>. He was the writer whom Madame Roland +esteemed most capable of instructing and of moralizing the masses. +"Men of letters and persons of taste," she says, "know his charming +romances, in which the graces of imagination are allied to lightness of +style, a philosophical tone, and the salt of criticism. He has proved +that his skilful hand could alternately shake the bells of folly, hold +the burin of history, and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P90"></A>90}</SPAN> +launch the thunderbolts of eloquence. +Courageous as a lion, simple as a child, a sensible man, a good +citizen, a vigorous writer, he could make Catiline tremble from the +tribune, dine with the Graces, and sup with Bachaumont." +</P> + +<P> +Madame Roland admired the author of <I>Faublas</I>, now become the +editor-in-chief of the <I>Sentinelle</I>; but among her intimates there was +a man whom she admired much more. This was Buzot. With what +complacency she draws in her Memoirs the portrait of this man "of an +elevated character, a haughty spirit, and a vehement courage, +sensitive, ardent, melancholy; an impassioned lover of nature, +nourishing his imagination with all the charms she has to offer, and +his soul with the principles of the most touching philosophy; he seems +formed to enjoy and to procure domestic happiness; he could forget the +universe in the sweetness of private virtues practised with a heart +worthy of his own." Needless to say that in Madame Roland's thought, +this heart worthy of the heart of Buzot was her own. "He is +susceptible," says she, "of the tenderest affections" (always for +Madame Roland), "capable of sublime flights and the most generous +resolutions." Into what ecstasies she falls over the noble face and +elegant figure of this handsome man, in whose costume "reigns that +care, cleanliness, and decency which manifest the spirit of order, +taste, the sentiment of decorum, and the respect of an honest man for +the public and himself"! How she contrasts with +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P91"></A>91}</SPAN> +men who think +patriotism consists in "swearing, drinking, and dressing like porters, +in order to fraternize with their equals," this attractive, this +irresistible Buzot, who "professes the morality of Socrates and the +politeness of Scipio"! +</P> + +<P> +Clearly, the veritable idol of the Egeria of the Girondins is not the +republic, but Buzot. He is so elegant, so distinguished! His mind and +his person have so many charms! Poor Roland! You think that your +better half is solely occupied with your ministry. Alas! this learned +woman has other thoughts in her head. Your position as a minister has +not augmented your prestige in the region of sentiment. Though you +lord it in the Hotel Calonne, yet, in spite of the throng of +petitioners and flatterers who surround you, you will never be a +Lovelace, and your romantic spouse will not allow herself to be +affected by your appearance, like that of a Quaker in Sunday clothes. +You thought you were doing wonders in presenting yourself at the +council of ministers with lanky, unpowdered locks, a round hat, and +shoes minus buckles. This peasant costume, which so greatly +scandalized the master of ceremonies, doubtless made the best +impression at the Jacobin Club, but your wife prefers the careful dress +of her too dear Buzot. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Roland, who had just completed her thirty-eighth year, was still +very charming. Lémontey thus paints her portrait as she appeared at +this epoch: "Her eyes and hair were remarkably +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P92"></A>92}</SPAN> +beautiful; her +delicate complexion had a freshness and color which made her look +singularly young. At the beginning of her husband's ministry she had +lost nothing of her air of youth and simplicity; her husband resembled +a Quaker whose daughter she might have been, and her child hovered +round her with hair floating to her waist; one might have thought them +natives of Pennsylvania transported to the drawing-room of M. de +Calonne." +</P> + +<P> +Count Beugnot, who was the companion of her captivity in the +Conciergerie, is severe on the female politician, but he admires the +pretty woman. "Her figure was graceful," he says, "and her hands +perfectly modelled. Her glance was expressive, and even in repose her +face had something noble and subtly attractive in it. One surmised her +wit without needing to hear her speak, but no woman whom I have ever +listened to, spoke with more purity and elegance. She must have owed +her faculty of giving to French a rhythm and cadence veritably new, to +her familiar knowledge of Italian. The harmony of her voice was still +further heightened by graceful and appropriate gestures and the +expression of her eyes, which grew animated in conversation. I daily +experienced new charm in listening to her, less on account of what she +said than because of the magic of her delivery." +</P> + +<P> +If Madame Roland, a prisoner, crushed by misfortune, on the very +threshold of the scaffold, after so many sleepless nights and so many +tears, had +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P93"></A>93}</SPAN> +preserved such attractions, what a charm must she not +have exercised at the Ministry of the Interior, when hope and pride +illumined her beautiful face, and when, after appearing to her +electrified adorers as the Muse of the new régime, the magician, the +Circe of the Revolution, she touched so profoundly their minds and +hearts! She who knew so well how to love and how to hate, who felt so +keenly, who had so much energy, so much vigor, what fascination must +she not have exerted with her glance of fire, her long black tresses, +her more than ornate eloquence, her inspired, lyric, enthusiastic +bearing, and that consummate art which, according to the remark of +Fontanes, made one believe that in her everything was the work of +nature! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P94"></A>94}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +DUMOURIEZ, MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS. +</H4> + +<P> +Madam Roland had wished to reign alone. She saw an influential rival +in Dumouriez, and at once conceived for him an instinctive repugnance +and suspicion. She met him first on March 23, 1792, at the time when, +as Minister of Foreign Affairs, he came to salute Roland, just named +Minister of the Interior, as his colleague. As soon as he departed: +"There," said she to her husband, "is a man with a crafty mind and a +false glance, against whom it is probably more necessary to be on one's +guard than any other person; he expressed great satisfaction at the +patriotic choice he was deputed to announce; but I should not be at all +surprised if he were to have you dismissed some day." She thought she +recognized in Dumouriez at first sight, "a witty roué, an insolent +chevalier who makes sport of everything except his own interests and +glory." +</P> + +<P> +Later on she drew the following portrait of him: "Among all his +colleagues, he had most of what is called wit, and less than any of +morality. Diligent and brave, a good general, a skilful courtier, +writing well and expressing himself with ease, capable of +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P95"></A>95}</SPAN> +great +enterprises, all he lacked was character enough to balance his mind, or +a cooler brain to carry out the plans he had conceived. Agreeable to +his friends, and ready to betray them, gallant to women, but not at all +suited to succeed with those among them who are susceptible to +affectionate relations, he was made for the ministerial intrigues of a +corrupt court." +</P> + +<P> +The nomination of Dumouriez as Minister of Foreign Affairs is one of +the most curious and unforeseen events of this strange epoch. Few men +have had a career so adventurous and agitated as his. A complex and +mobile nature, where the intriguer and the great man were blended into +one, he never commanded esteem, but at certain moments he secured +admiration. Napoleon I. seems to have been too severe when he said of +him that he was "only a miserable intriguer." The man who opened the +series of great French victories, and who saved his country from +invasion by his admirable defence of the defiles of Argonne, merited +more than this disdainful mention. It is none the less certain, +however, that one scents, as it were, an air of Beaumarchais in the +Memoirs of Dumouriez, and that there is more than one link of character +and existence between the author of the <I>Mariage de Figaro</I> and the +victor of Jemmapes. Both were men without principles, but full of +resource, wit, and fascination. Both were lovable in spite of their +great defects, because of their humanity and kindness. Both belonged +at the same time to the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P96"></A>96}</SPAN> +old régime and the Revolution. Before +arriving at celebrity, each had a stormy youth, tormented by the love +of pleasure, the need of money, and a sort of perpetual restlessness: +they flattered every power of the time, sought fortune by the most +circuitous ways, were diplomatic couriers, and secret agents; before +coming out into open daylight, they made trial of their marvellous +address in obscurity, and signalized themselves among those men of +action and initiative whom governments, which make use of them in +occult ways, first launch, then compromise, disavow, and sometimes +imprison. +</P> + +<P> +Born at Cambrai, January 25, 1739, Dumouriez belonged to a family of +the upper middle class. Entering the army early, he distinguished +himself by his high spirits and courage. As a cornet of the Penthièvre +cavalry, he served in the German campaigns from 1758 to 1761, and was +invalided in 1763. He spent twenty-four years at the wars and brought +back nothing but twenty-two wounds, the rank of captain, a decoration, +and some debts. Seeking then a new career, he entered, thanks to his +connection with Favier, the secret diplomacy of Louis XV., and was sent +to Corsica, Italy, and Portugal. He returned to the army in 1768, and +made a brilliant record in the Corsican campaign, obtaining +successively the grades of adjutant-major general, +adjutant-quartermaster, and colonel of cavalry. It was he who seized +the castle of Corte, Paoli's last asylum. In 1771, he again became a +secret agent. Louis +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P97"></A>97}</SPAN> +XV. wished to befriend Poland in its +death-struggle, but without betraying his hand. Dumouriez was sent to +the Polish confederates. He was reputed to be merely acting on his own +impulses. He organized troops and fought successfully against +Souvaroff, the future adversary of the French Republic, but could not +save Poland—that Asiatic nation of Europe, as he called it. He came +back to Paris in 1772, and the government, complying with the demands +of Russia, shut him up for a year in the Bastille, where he had leisure +to meditate on the ingratitude of courts. This captivity strengthened +his taste for study, and, far from allaying his ambition, gave it +renewed force. +</P> + +<P> +Louis XVI. put him in command at Cherbourg, and it was he who conceived +the plan of making that town a station for the French marine. He was +fifty years old when the Revolution of 1789 broke out. At once he saw +in it an opportunity for success and glory. Full of confidence in his +own superiority, he merely awaited the hour when events should second +his ambition. He said to himself that the emigration, by making a void +in the upper ranks of the army, was going to leave him free scope, and +that he would be commander-in-chief of the French troops under the new +régime. To attain this end he decided to serve the King, the Assembly, +and the factions; to assume all parts and all masks, and to be in turn, +and simultaneously if need were, the courtier of Louis XVI. and the +favorite of the Jacobins. +</P> + +<P> +As has been very well said by M. Frédéric Masson +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P98"></A>98}</SPAN> +in an excellent +book, as novel as it is interesting, <I>Le Département des affaires +étrangères sous la Revolution</I>, Dumouriez had been accustomed to make +his way everywhere, to eat at all tables, and listen at all doors. One +of the agents of Count d'Artois brought him into relations with +Mirabeau. He was protected by the minister Montmorin. He drew up +plans of campaign for Narbonne. He used the intimate "thou" to +Laporte, the King's confidant and intendant of the civil list. He made +use of women also. Separated from his lawful wife, he lived in marital +relations with a sister of Rivarol, the Baroness de Beauvert, a +charming person who had much intercourse with aristocratic society, who +speculated in arms, and who was pensioned by the Duke of Orleans, as +appears from a letter of Latouche de Tréville, the prince's chancellor, +dated April 17, 1789. Dumouriez, who had expensive tastes, sought at +the same time for gold and honors. Either by means of the court or the +Revolution, he desired to gain a great fortune and much glory, to +become a statesman, a minister, commander-in-chief, and realize his +great military plan, the conquest of the natural frontiers of France. +He said to himself: He who wills the end wills the means, and managed +as adroitly with parties as with soldiers. At Niort, where he was in +command at the beginning of the Revolution, he made himself remarkable +by his enthusiasm for the new ideas, and became president of the club +and honorary citizen of the town. He contracted an intimacy with +Gensonné, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P99"></A>99}</SPAN> +whom the Assembly had sent into the departments of the +west to observe their spirit. In January, 1792, the emigration of +general officers had become so considerable that he rose by seniority +to the rank of lieutenant-general. Thereafter, he believed his hour +had come, and threw himself boldly into the political arena. The +Gironde and the Jacobins were the two powers then in vogue; he +flattered both the Jacobins and the Gironde. Brissot was the corypheus +of the diplomatic committee and the chief of the war party. He became +the familiar of Brissot. Already, in 1791, he had prepared a memoir on +the subject of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs which he dedicated and +read to the Jacobins. In it he announced (singular prediction for the +future minister of a king!) that before fifty years had passed, Europe +would be republican. He demanded an immediate and radical change in +the diplomatic personnel. "It is of small importance," said he in the +same memoir, "that our representatives would lack experience. In the +first place, our interests are greatly simplified; moreover, our former +representatives were young men belonging to the court who had had no +political education. In a word, it is the majesty of the nation which +gives our negotiations weight. The minister," he added, "should be a +man of approved patriotism, above all suspicion, like the wife of +Cæsar. Absolute integrity, great knowledge of men, great firmness, a +broad and upright mind, should complete his character." Dumouriez +perhaps imagined that all these qualities +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P100"></A>100}</SPAN> +of an ideal minister +were reunited in his person. However that may be, he accepted, without +any mistrust of his own abilities, the portfolio of Foreign Affairs, +confided to him March 15, 1792, on account of his relations with the +Gironde and his popularity with the Jacobins. He had a high opinion of +himself, and, even after his cruel disappointments, he was to write in +his Memoirs, in 1794: "Dumouriez sometimes laughs sardonically in his +retreat over the judgments passed upon him. When he arrived at the +ministry, the courtiers said and published that he was only a soldier +of fortune, incapable of conducting political affairs, in which he +would make nothing but blunders. When he commanded an army, they told +the Prussians and the German Emperor's troops that he was a mere +writer, who had never made war and understood nothing about it. Since +he retired with reputation from public employments, they have published +that up to the date of the Revolution he had been an intriguing +adventurer, a ministerial spy, an office-sweeper. Would to God, they +had employed the adventures of their youth in similar espionages! They +would not have begun the Revolution like factionists, they would have +conducted it with wisdom, they would have preserved the esteem of the +nation, they would not have been the prime authors of the King's death, +either by betraying or abandoning him." +</P> + +<P> +The new Minister of Foreign Affairs began to play his rôle of leader of +French diplomacy in a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P101"></A>101}</SPAN> +singular fashion. Repairing to the Jacobin +Club, he described himself as their liegeman, assumed the red bonnet in +their presence, and, with it on his head, announced that as soon as war +should be declared, he would throw away his pen in order to resume his +sword. Let us add that he was simultaneously trying to conciliate the +good graces of Louis XVI. and to persuade him that if he leaned upon +the Jacobins, it was solely in the hope of serving the King and +consolidating the throne. At the same time he appointed as director of +foreign affairs that Bonne-Carrère whose portrait has been traced in +this wise by Brissot: "Falling with all his vices and perverse habits +into the midst of a revolution whereby the people had recovered +sovereignty, he merely changed his idol without changing his idolatry. +He caressed the people instead of caressing the great, made the hall of +the Jacobins his OEil-de-Boeuf, played valet to the successful parties +one after another, the Lameths and the Mirabeaus, and succeeded in +raising himself from the secretaryship of the Jacobins to the embassy +of Liège, by the aid of that very Montmorin who detested the Jacobins, +and could but advance a man who betrayed them." +</P> + +<P> +Dumouriez then, following the example of Mirabeau, was about to play a +double game; to be revolutionary with the Revolution and a courtier +with the court. As to Madame Roland, he never placed himself at her +feet. The despotism of this female minister, the pretentious of this +demagogic bluestocking, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P102"></A>102}</SPAN> +her affectation of puritan rigor, her +mania for directing everything, shocked the good sense of a man who +believed that woman is made to please, not to reign. It was repugnant +to this soldier to take his orders from the Egeria of the Girondins. +On the other hand, Dumouriez was displeasing to Madame Roland. She +found him too dissolute and not sentimental enough. She could not +pardon his having Madame de Beauvert for mistress and Bonne-Carrère for +confidant. She admitted neither his free-and-easy tone, his Gallic +humor, nor his natural gaiety, so unlike the declamatory tone and +pretentious jargon of the disciples of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. +Moreover, she found him too much of a royalist, too accustomed to the +old régime. The ministry, apparently so homogeneous, was soon to be +divided against itself. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P103"></A>103}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +X. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS. +</H4> + +<P> +Louis XVI. had been persuaded that the only means of regaining public +confidence would be to name a ministry chosen by the Gironde and +accepted by the Jacobins. The six ministers—Dumouriez of Foreign +Affairs, Roland of the Interior, De Grave of War, Claviére of Finances, +Duranton of Justice, Lacoste of Marine—formed what was called the +Girondin ministry; the reactionists named it the <I>sans-culottes</I> +ministry. The revolutionists rejoiced in its advent, while the +royalists sought to cover it with ridicule. +</P> + +<P> +On the day when the Council met for the first time at the Tuileries (in +the great royal cabinet on the first floor, afterwards called the Salon +of Louis XIV.), Roland created a scandal by his plebeian dress. The +simplicity of his costume, his round hat, his shoes fastened with +ribbons instead of buckles, caused, as his wife disdainfully remarks, +"astonishment to all the valets, those creatures who, existing only for +the sake of etiquette, thought the safety of the empire depended on its +preservation." The master of ceremonies, approaching Dumouriez with an +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P104"></A>104}</SPAN> +uneasy frown, glanced at Roland, and said in an undertone, "Eh! +sir, no buckles on his shoes!" "Ah! sir, all is lost!" replied +Dumouriez so coolly that it raised a laugh. +</P> + +<P> +Louis XVI., who wished, as one might say, to enlarge the borders of +gentleness and resignation, displayed more than good-will towards the +ministers; he showed them deference. This was the more meritorious +because to him this ministry was like a reunion of the seditious, like +the Revolution in arms against his crown; his pretended advisers seemed +much more like enemies than auxiliaries. He tried, however, to attach +them to him by kindness, and made a sincere trial of his rights and +duties as a constitutional sovereign. Madame Roland herself, bitter +and violent as she is, renders him a certain justice. "Louis XVI.," +says she, "showed the greatest good nature towards his new ministers; +this man was not precisely such as he has been painted by those who +seek to degrade him." As to Dumouriez, he says in his Memoirs: +"Dumouriez had been greatly deceived concerning the character of Louis +XVI., who had been represented to him as a violent and wrathful man, +who swore a great deal and maltreated his ministers. He must, on the +contrary, do him the justice to say that during three' months when he +observed him closely and in very delicate circumstances, he always +found him polite, gentle, affable, and even very patient. This prince +had a great timidity arising from his education and his distrust +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P105"></A>105}</SPAN> +of himself, some difficulty in speaking, a just and dispassionate mind, +upright sentiments, great knowledge of history, geography, and the +arts, and an astonishing memory." Madame Roland also owns that he had +an excellent memory and much activity; that he was never idle; that he +read often, and had a distinct knowledge of all the different treaties +concluded by France with neighboring powers; that he knew history well, +and was the best geographer in the kingdom. "His knowledge of the +names and faces of those belonging to his court," she adds, "and the +anecdotes peculiar to each, extended to all persons who had come into +prominence during the Revolution; no subject could be mentioned to him +on which he had not some opinion founded on certain facts." +</P> + +<P> +At first, the sessions of the ministry went off very tranquilly. The +King, with an accent of candor, protested his attachment to the +Constitution and his desire to see it solidly established. Often he +left his ministers to chat among themselves without taking any part in +their conversation. During such times he read his French and English +journals, or wrote letters. If a decree was presented for his +sanction, he deferred his decision until the next meeting, to which he +came with a settled opinion, concealing it carefully, none the less, +and appearing to decide only in accordance with the will of the +majority. He frequently evaded irritating questions by turning the +conversation to other subjects. If war were the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P106"></A>106}</SPAN> +topic, he spoke +of travels; apropos of diplomacy, he described the manners of the +country in question; to Roland he spoke of his works, to Dumouriez of +his adventures. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, who was a first-class +story-teller, and whose freedom of speech was welcomed by the King, to +use Madame Roland's expression, amused both his colleagues and his +sovereign by his jests and anecdotes. +</P> + +<P> +But all this was far from agreeable to the spiteful companion of the +Minister of the Interior. Indignant at the accord which seemed to +exist between Louis XVI. and his counsellors, she dreamed of nothing +but discussions and conflicts. All that wore the appearance of +reconciliation was repugnant to her. She made her obedient spouse +recount to her the smallest details of the sessions of the Council, +meddling with and criticising all. During the first three weeks, +Roland and Clavière, enchanted with the King's dispositions, flattered +themselves that the Revolution was at an end. Madame Roland scoffed at +their confidence. "<I>Bon Dieu</I>," she said to them, "every time I see +you start for the Council with this charming confidence, it seems to me +you are ready to commit some folly."—"I assure you," replied Clavière, +"that the King is perfectly aware that his interests are bound up with +the observance of the laws just established; he reasons too pertinently +not to be convinced of this truth."—"Well," added Roland, "if he is +not an honest man, he is the greatest rascal in the kingdom; nobody can +dissimulate +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P107"></A>107}</SPAN> +like that." Madame Roland rejoined that she could +not believe in love for the Constitution on the part of a man nourished +in the prejudices and accustomed to the use of despotic power. She, +who doubtless thought herself the only person capable of presiding well +at the council of ministers, treated it as a "café where they amused +themselves with idle gossip." "There was no record of their +deliberations," says she, "nor a secretary to take them down; after +sitting three or four hours, they went away without having accomplished +anything but a few signatures; it was like this three times a +week."—"This is pitiable!" she would exclaim impatiently when, on his +return, she asked her husband what had passed. "You are all in very +good humor because there have been no disputes or vexations, and you +have even been treated with civility; each of you seems to be doing +pretty much as he pleases in his own department. I am afraid you are +being made game of."—"Nevertheless, business is getting on."—"Yes, +and time is wasted, for in the torrent that is carrying you away, I +should be much better pleased to have you employ three hours in solid +meditation on great combinations than to see you spend them in useless +chatter." +</P> + +<P> +It must needs be said that no person contributed more to the downfall +of royalty than Madame Roland. At the moment when the good temper and +gentleness of Louis XVI. began to gain upon his ministers, when +Dumouriez was softened by the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P108"></A>108}</SPAN> +royal kindness, when minds +experienced a relaxation, and honest people, worn out by so many +political shocks, were sincerely desirous of repose, it was she who +nourished discord, made the Gironde irreconcilable, inspired the +subversive pamphlets of Louvet, embittered her husband's heart, and +invented the provocations against which the conscience of the +unfortunate monarch rebelled. This part, which would have been a sorry +one for a man to play, seems still worse in a woman. Count Beugnot has +said very justly: "I have seen that a woman can preserve only the +faults of her sex in the midst of such a frightful catastrophe, not its +virtues. The gentle, amiable, sensitive qualities grow and develop in +the shelter of peaceful domestic joys; they are lost and obliterated in +the heat of debates, the bitterness of parties, and the shock of +passions. The soft and tender foot of woman cannot tread unharmed in +paths bristling with steel and red with blood. To do so with safety +she must become a man; but to me, a man-woman seems a monster. Ah! let +them leave to us, whom nature has granted the pitiful advantage of +strength, the field of contention and the fate of war; we are adequate +to this cruel destiny; but let them keep to the easier and sweeter part +of pouring balm into wounds and staunching tears." +</P> + +<P> +Roland's character was tranquil; it was his wife who made him +ambitious, haughty, and inflexible. She should have pacified her +husband, but instead of that she excited him. Never was he malevolent +and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P109"></A>109}</SPAN> +spiteful enough to suit her. She would not pardon him a +single movement of compassion or respect towards the august +unfortunates. Led by her, Roland no longer dared entertain a generous +thought. He returned shamefaced to the Ministry of the Interior if he +had felt a humane sentiment while at the Tuileries. It is sad to find +tenderness and pity in the heart of a man, Dumouriez, and in the heart +of a woman, Madame Roland, nothing but malevolence and hatred. +Dumouriez wanted to put out the fire; Madame Roland, to stir it up. +Dumouriez sincerely desired the King's safety; Madame Roland swore that +he should perish. If a germ of pity woke to life in the hearts of the +ministers, Madame Roland hastened to stifle it. Her hostility towards +the royal family was more than deliberate; there was something like +ferocity in it. Her Memoirs and those of Dumouriez display two very +different minds. Sadness dominates in his; anger in hers. Even on the +steps of the scaffold, Madame Roland will not feel her hatred lessen. +Dumouriez, on the contrary, will cast a glance of melancholy respect +upon the unfortunate sovereign whose sorrows and whose resignation, +whose gentleness and uprightness, had touched him so profoundly. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P110"></A>110}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE FÊTE OF THE SWISS OF CHATEAUVIEUX. +</H4> + +<P> +Dumouriez, at the beginning of his ministry, was still the slave of the +Jacobins, his allies and protectors. His elevation to the ministry was +in great part due to them, and even while despising them, he felt +unable to shake off their yoke. Little by little, they inspired him +with horror, and before many weeks were over, his only idea was to free +himself from their control. But at first he treated them like a power +with which he was obliged to reckon. What proves this is his passive +attitude at the time of the celebrated fête of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux. The prologue of the bloody tragedies that were in course +of preparation, this fête shows what headway the revolutionary ideas +had made. The sinister days of the Convention were approaching, the +Terror existed in germ, and already many representatives who, on a +secret ballot, would have voted in accordance with right and honor, +were cowardly enough to do so against their conscience when they had to +answer to their names. +</P> + +<P> +Things had travelled fast since the close of the Constituent Assembly. +In 1790, that Assembly, as +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P111"></A>111}</SPAN> +the faithful guardian of discipline, +had congratulated the Marquis de Bouillé on the energy with which he +repressed the military rebellion that broke out at Nancy, August 31. +The soldiers garrisoned at this town were guilty of the greatest +crimes. They pillaged the military chests, arrested the officers, and +fired on the troops who remained faithful. M. Desilles, an officer of +the King's regiment, conducted himself at the time in a heroic manner. +When the insurgents were about to discharge the cannon opposite the +Stainville gate, he sprang towards it, and covering it with his body, +cried: "It is your friends, your brothers, who are coming! The +National Assembly sends them. Do you mean to fire on them? Will you +disgrace your flags?" It was useless to try to hold Desilles back. He +broke away from his friends and threw himself again in front of the +rebels, falling under four wounds at the moment when the fight began. +</P> + +<P> +The Constituent Assembly passed a decree by which it thanked the +Marquis de Bouillé and his troops "for having gloriously fulfilled +their duty" in repressing the military insurrection of Nancy. Its +president wrote an official letter to Desilles, soon to die in +consequence of his wounds: "The National Assembly has learned with just +admiration, mingled with profound sorrow, the danger to which your +heroic devotion has exposed you; in trying to describe it, I should +weaken the emotion by which the Assembly was penetrated. So sublime an +example of courage +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P112"></A>112}</SPAN> +and civic virtue is above all praise. It has +secured you a sweeter recompense and one more worthy of you; you will +find it in your own heart, and the eternal memory of the French people." +</P> + +<P> +The Swiss regiment of Chateauvieux had taken part in the rebellion at +Nancy. Switzerland had reserved, by treaty, its federal jurisdiction +over such of its troops as had taken service under the King of France. +By virtue of this special jurisdiction the soldiers of the regiment of +Chateauvieux, taken arms in hand, were tried before a council of war +composed of Swiss officers. Twenty-two were condemned to death and +shot. Fifty were condemned to the galleys and sent to the convict +prison at Brest. It was in vain that Louis XVI. attempted to negotiate +their pardon with the Swiss Confederacy. It remained inflexible, and +the guilty were still undergoing their penalty when the Jacobins +resolved to release them from prison in defiance of the treaties +uniting Switzerland and France. "To deliver these condemned +prisoners," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "was to insult the Cantons, +attack their treaty rights, and judge their criminals. We had enemies +enough already without seeking new ones among an allied people who were +behaving wisely towards us, especially a free and republican people." +But revolutionary passions do not reason. Collot d'Herbois, a wretched +actor who had passed from the theatrical stage to that of politics, and +who, not content with having bored people, wished to terrorize them +also, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P113"></A>113}</SPAN> +made himself the champion of the galley-slaves of the +regiment of Chateauvieux. He was the principal impresario of the +lugubrious fête which disgraced Paris on April 15, 1792. +</P> + +<P> +The programme was not arranged without some opposition. Public opinion +was not yet ripe for saturnalia. There were still a few honest and +courageous publicists who, like André Chénier, boldly lifted their +voices to stigmatize certain infamies. In the tribune of the Assembly +some orators were to be found who expressed their minds freely and held +their own against the tempests of demagogy. There were generals and +soldiers in the army for whom discipline was not an idle word; and if +the fête of the Swiss of Chateauvieux made the future Septembrists and +furies of the guillotine utter shouts of joy, it drew from honest men a +long cry of grief and indignation. +</P> + +<P> +Intimidated by the menaces of the Jacobins, the Assembly voted the +release of the Swiss incarcerated in the prison of Brest. But merely +to deliver them was not enough: the Jacobins wanted to give them an +ovation. Their march from Brest to Paris was a triumph, and Collot +d'Herbois organized a gigantic fête in their honor. +</P> + +<P> +André Chénier was at this time writing weekly letters for the <I>Journal +de Paris</I>, in which he eloquently supported the principles of order and +liberty. As M. de Lamartine has said, he was the Tyrtæus of good sense +and moderation. He was indignant at +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P114"></A>114}</SPAN> +the threatened scandal, and, +in concert with his collaborator on the <I>Journal de Paris</I>, Roucher, +the poet of <I>Les Mois</I>, he criticised in most energetic terms the +revolutionary manifestation then organizing. At the Jacobin Club, on +April 4, Collot d'Herbois freed his mind against him. "This is not +Chénier-Gracchus," said the comedian; "it is another person, quite +another." He spoke of André as a "sterile prose writer," and pointed +him out to popular vengeance. The two brothers were in opposing camps. +While André Chénier stigmatized the fête of anarchy, his brother Joseph +was diligently manufacturing scraps of poetry, inscriptions, and +devices which were to figure in the programme. "What!" cried André, +"must we invent extravagances capable of destroying any form of +government, recompense rebellion against the laws, and crown foreign +satellites for having shot French citizens in a riot? People say that +the statues will be veiled in every place through which this procession +is to pass. Oh! if this odious orgy takes place, it will be well to +veil the whole city; but it is not the images of despots that should be +wrapt in funeral crape, but the faces of honest men. How is it that +you do not blush when a turbulent handful, who seem numerous because +they are united and make a noise, oblige you to do their will, telling +you that it is your own, and amusing your childish curiosity meanwhile +with unworthy spectacles? In a city which respected itself such a fête +would meet nothing but solitude and silence." The controversy +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P115"></A>115}</SPAN> +waxed furious. The walls were covered with posters for and against the +fête. Roucher thus flagellated Collot d'Herbois: "This character out +of a comic novel, who skipped from Polichinello's booth to the platform +of the Jacobins, has sprung at me as if he were going to strike me with +the oar the Swiss brought back from the galleys!" +</P> + +<P> +Pétion, then mayor of Paris, far from opposing the fête, approved and +encouraged it. "I think it my duty," he wrote, April 6, 1792, "to +explain myself briefly concerning the fête which is being arranged to +celebrate the arrival of the soldiers of Chateauvieux. Minds are +heated, passions are in ferment, and citizens hold different opinions; +everything seems to betoken disorder. It is sought to change a day of +rejoicing into a day of mourning.... What is it all about? Some +soldiers, leaders with the French guards, who have broken our chains +and afterwards been overloaded with them, are about to enter within our +walls; some citizens propose to meet and offer them a fraternal +welcome; these citizens are obeying a natural impulse and using a right +which belongs to all. The magistrates see nothing but what is simple +and innocent in all this; they see certain citizens abandoning +themselves to joy and mirth; every one is at liberty to participate or +not to participate in the fête. Public spirit rises and assumes a new +degree of energy amidst civic amusements." The municipality ordered +this letter of Pétion's to be printed, posted on the walls, and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P116"></A>116}</SPAN> +sent to the forty-eight sectional committees and the sixty battalions +of the National Guard. +</P> + +<P> +Not all the members of the National Assembly shared the optimism of the +mayor of Paris. The preparations for the fête, which was announced for +April 15, occasioned, on the 9th, a session as affecting as it was +stormy. The whole debate should be read in the <I>Moniteur</I>. The +question was put whether the Swiss of Chateauvieux, then waiting +outside the doors, should be introduced and admitted to the honors of +the session. M. de Gouvion, who had been major-general of the National +Guard under Lafayette, gravely ascended the tribune. "Gentlemen," said +he, "I had a brother, a good patriot, who, through the favorable +opinion of your fellow-citizens, had been successively a commander of +the National Guard and a member from the Department. Always ready to +sacrifice himself for the Revolution and the law, it was in the name of +the Revolution and the law that he was required to march to Nancy with +the brave National Guards. There he fell, pierced by fifty bayonets in +the hands of those who.... I ask if I am condemned to look on +tranquilly while the assassins of my brother enter here?" A voice +rising from the midst of the Assembly cried: "Very well, sir, go out!" +The galleries applauded. Gouvion attempted to continue. The murmurs +redoubled. Several persons in the galleries cried: "Down! down!" +</P> + +<P> +The Assembly, revolutionary though it was, felt +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P117"></A>117}</SPAN> +indignant at the +scandal, and called the galleries to order. The president reiterated +the injunction to keep silence. Gouvion began anew: "I treat with all +the contempt he merits, and with ... I would say the word if I did not +respect the Assembly—the coward who has been base enough to outrage a +brother's grief." The question was then put whether the Swiss of +Chateauvieux should be admitted to the honors of the session. Out of +546 votes, 288 were in the affirmative, and 265 in the negative. +Consequently, the president announced that the soldiers of +Chateauvieux, who had asked to present themselves to the Assembly, +should be admitted to the honors of the session. Gouvion went out by +one door, indignant, and swearing that he would never re-enter an +Assembly which received his brother's assassins as conquerors. By +another door, Collot d'Herbois made his entry with his protêgês, the +ex-galley slaves. +</P> + +<P> +The party of the left and the spectators in the galleries burst into +transports of joy, and gave three rounds of applause. The soldiers +entered the hall to the beating of drums and cries of "Long live the +nation!" They were followed by a large procession of men and women +carrying pikes and banners. Collot d'Herbois, the showman of the +Swiss, pronounced an emphatic address in praise of the pretended +martyrs of liberty, which the Assembly ordered to be printed. One +Goachon, speaking for the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, and holding a pike +ornamented with a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P118"></A>118}</SPAN> +red liberty cap, exclaimed: "The citizens of +the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, the victors of the Bastille, the men of +July 14, have charged me to warn you that they are going to make ten +thousand more pikes after the model which you see." +</P> + +<P> +The fête took place on Sunday, April 15. It was the triumph of +anarchy, the glorification of indiscipline and revolt. On that day the +galley slaves were treated like heroes. The emblems adopted were a +colossal galley, ornamented with flowers, and the convicts' head gear, +that hideous red bonnet in which Dumouriez had already played the +buffoon, and which was presently to be set on the august head of Louis +XVI. The soldier galley slaves, whose chains were kissed with +transports by a swarm of harlots, came forward wearing civic crowns. +What a difference between the Constituent Assembly and the Legislative +Assembly! Under the one, a grand expiatory ceremony on the +Champ-de-Mars had honored the soldiers slain at Nancy, and the National +Guards had worn mourning for these martyrs of duty. Under the other, +it was not the victims who were lauded, but their assassins. A goddess +of Liberty in a Phrygian cap was borne in a state chariot. The +procession halted at the Bastille, the Hôtel de Ville, and the +Champ-de-Mars. The mayor and municipality of Paris were present in +their official capacity. The <I>Ça ira</I> was sung in a frenzy of +enthusiasm. Soldiers and public women embraced each other. It was +David who had +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P119"></A>119}</SPAN> +designed the costumes, planned the chariot, and +organized the whole performance,—David, the revolutionary artist who +was destined by a change of fortune to paint the portrait of a Pope and +the coronation of an Emperor. +</P> + +<P> +In 1791, André Chénier and David, then friends, and saluting together +the dawn of the Revolution, had celebrated with lyre and pencil the +"<I>Serment du Jeu de Paumé</I>"[<A NAME="chap11fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap11fn1">1</A>] Consecrating an ode to the painter's +magnificent tableau, the poet exclaimed:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Resume thy golden robe, bind on thy chaplet rich,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Divine and youthful Poesy!</SPAN><BR> +To David's lips, King of the skilful brush,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Bear the ambrosial cup.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +How he repented his enthusiasm now! What ill-will he bore the artist +who placed his art, that sacred gift, at the service of anarchical +passions! With what irony the same pen passed from dithyramb to satire! +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Arts worthy of our eyes, pomp and magnificence<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Worthy of our liberty,</SPAN><BR> +Worthy of the vile tyrants who are devouring France,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Worthy of the atrocious dementia</SPAN><BR> +Of that stupid David whom in other days I sang!<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +On the very day of the fête the young poet had the courage to publish +in the <I>Journal de Paris</I> an avenging satire, which branded the +shoulders of the ex-galley slaves as with a new hot iron. The sweet +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P120"></A>120}</SPAN> +and pathetic elegiast, the Catullus, the Tibullus of France, +added a bronze chord to his lyre:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Hail, divine triumph! Enter within our walls!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Bring us these warriors so famed</SPAN><BR> +For Desilles' blood, and for the obsequies<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of many Frenchmen massacred...</SPAN><BR> +One day alone could win so much renown,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And this fair day will shine upon us soon!</SPAN><BR> +When thou shalt lead Jourdan to our army,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And Lafayette to the scaffold!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Jourdan was the slaughterer, the headsman, the torturer of the Glacier +of Avignon, who, coming under the provisions of the amnesty, had +arrived to take part in the triumph of the Swiss of Chateauvieux. The +acclamations were lugubrious. The lanterns and torches shed a funereal +glare. Nothing is more doleful than enthusiasm for ignominy. The +applause accorded to disgrace and crime sounds like sinister derision. +Outraged public conscience extinguishes the fires of apotheoses such as +these. Madame Elisabeth, in a letter of April 18, speaks with a sort +of pity of this odious but ridiculous fête: "The people have been to +see Dame Liberty waggling about on her triumphal car, but they shrugged +their shoulders. Three or four hundred <I>sans-culottes</I> followed, +crying 'Long live the nation! Long live liberty! Long live the +<I>sans-culottes</I>! to the devil with Lafayette!' All this was noisy but +sad. The National Guards took no part in it; on the contrary, they +were indignant, and Pétion, they say, is ashamed of his conduct. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P121"></A>121}</SPAN> +The next day a pike surmounted by a red bonnet was carried noiselessly +through the garden, and did not remain there long." The Princess de +Lamballe, who was living at the Tuileries in the Pavilion of Flora, +could see the pike thus carried by a passer. It may, perhaps, have +been that belonging to one of the Septembrists,—that on which her own +head was to be placed. +</P> + +<P> +The <I>Moniteur</I>, however, grew ecstatic over the fête. "There are +plenty of others," it said, "who will describe the march of the +triumphal cortège, the groups composing it, the car of Liberty, +conducted by Fame, drawn by twenty superb horses, preceded by ravishing +music which was sometimes listened to in religious silence and +sometimes interrupted by wild, irregular dances whose very disorder was +rendered more piquant by the fraternal union reigning in all hearts.... +The people were there in all their might, and did not abuse it. There +was not a weapon to repress excesses, and not an excess to be +repressed." It concluded thus: "We say to the administration: Give +such festivals as these often. Repeat this one every year on April 15; +let the feast of Liberty be our spring festival; and let other civic +solemnities signalize the return of the other seasons. In former days +the people had none but those of their masters, and all that was +accomplished by them was their depravity and abasement. Give them some +that shall be their own, and that will elevate their souls, develop +their sensibilities, and fortify their courage. They +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P122"></A>122}</SPAN> +will +create, or, better, they have already created, a new people. Popular +festivals are the best education for the people." +</P> + +<P> +Optimists, how will your illusions terminate? You who see nothing but +an idyl in all this, can not you perceive that such ceremonies are the +prelude to massacres, and that an odor of blood mingles with their +perfumes? All who took part on either side of the heated controversy +which preceded the ovation to the Swiss of Chateauvieux, will be +pursued by fate. Gouvion, who had sworn never again to set foot within +the precincts of the Assembly where the murderers of his brother +triumphed, kept his word. On the very day of that shameful session he +asked to be sent to the Army of the North, and three months later was +to be carried off by a cannon-ball. Still more melancholy was to be +the fate of Pétion, who showed such complaisance toward the Swiss on +this occasion. He, once so popular that in 1791 he was asked to allow +the ninth child, which a citizeness had just presented to her country, +"to be baptized in his name, revered almost as much as that of the +Divinity"; he of whom some one said at that time, "For the same reason +which would have made Jesus a suitable mayor of Jerusalem, Pétion is a +suitable mayor of Paris; there is too striking a resemblance between +them to be overlooked," was sadly to exclaim some months later: "I am +one of the most notable examples of popular inconsistency.... For a +long time I have said to myself and to my +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P123"></A>123}</SPAN> +friends: The people +will hate me still more than they have loved me. I can no longer +either enter or depart from the place where we hold our sessions +without being exposed to the grossest insults and the most seditious +threats. How often have I not heard them say as I was passing: +'Scoundrel! we will have your head!'" +</P> + +<P> +Proscribed with the Girondins, May 31, 1793, he fled at first to +Normandy, and afterwards into the Gironde, wandering from town to town, +from field to field, and hiding for several months thirty feet under +ground, in a sort of well; the poor people who showed him hospitality +paid for it with their heads. Ah! how disenchanted he must have been +with that revolutionary policy of which he had been the enthusiastic +promoter! How sad was the farewell to life signed by him and Buzot: +"Now that it has been demonstrated that liberty is hopelessly lost; +that the principles of morality and justice are trodden under foot; +that there is nothing to choose between two despotisms,—that of the +brigands who are tearing the vitals of France and that of foreign +powers; that the nation has lost all its energy; that it lies at the +feet of the tyrants by whom it is oppressed; that we can render no +further service to our country; that, far from being able to give +happiness to the beings we hold most dear, we shall bring down hatred, +vengeance, and misfortune upon them, so long as we live,—we have +resolved to quit life and be no longer witnesses of the slavery which +is about to desolate our unhappy country." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P124"></A>124}</SPAN> + +<P> +After ending with this cry of grief and indignation: "We devote the +vile scoundrels who have destroyed liberty and plunged France into an +abyss of evils to the scorn and indignation of all time," the two +proscripts were found dead in a wheat-field about a league from +Saint-Emilion. Their bodies were half devoured by wolves. +</P> + +<P> +And how will André Chénier end? On the day of the Swiss fête, the city +where such a scandal took place seemed to him insupportable. For +several days he sought refuge in the country where he could breathe a +purer air beneath the blossoming trees. But contemplation of nature +did not soothe him. Running to meet danger, he returned and threw +himself into the furnace, more ardent and indignant than before. With +manly enthusiasm he exclaimed: "It is above all when the sacrifices +which must be made to truth, liberty, and country are dangerous and +difficult, that they are accompanied by inexpressible delights. It is +in the midst of spying accusations, outrages, and proscriptions, it is +in dungeons and on scaffolds, that virtue, probity, and constancy taste +the pleasures of a proud and pure conscience." André had a +presentiment of his fate. +</P> + +<P> +He was to die on the same day and the same scaffold as his friend +Roucher, a few hours earlier than the moment when Robespierre's +condemnation would have saved them. It is thus that he was to pay with +his life for his opposition to the fête of the Swiss of Chateauvieux, +and Collot d'Herbois was avenged. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P125"></A>125}</SPAN> +But after the turn of the +victims came that of the headsmen. The unlucky comedian who, pursuing +even his comrades with his hatred, asked that "the head of the <I>Comédie +Française</I> should be guillotined and the rest transported," the +impresario of the fête of the Swiss galley slaves, the organizer of the +Lyons massacres, Collot d'Herbois, cursed by friends and enemies, was +transported to Guiana and died there in 1796, just as he had lived, in +an access of burning fever. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap11fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap11fn1text">1</A>] The oath taken by the deputies of the third estate in the +tennis-court of Versailles, in 1789. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P126"></A>126}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE DECLARATION OF WAR. +</H4> + +<P> +The wave of anarchy constantly rose higher, but the optimists, +sheltering themselves, like Pétion, in a beatific calm, obstinately +closed their eyes and would not see it. Abroad and at home there was +such a series of shocks and agitations, of struggles and emotions, +perils and troubles; things hurried on so fast, and the scenes of the +drama were so varied and so violent, that what happened to-day was +forgotten by the morrow. The noise of the fête of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux had hardly ceased when the shouts of the multitude were +heard saluting Louis XVI., who had just declared war on Austria. +</P> + +<P> +In reality, the King did not desire war, but the bellicose current had +become irresistible. The court of Vienna had shown itself intractable. +It forbade the princes who owned possessions in Lorraine and Alsace to +receive the indemnities offered by France in exchange for their feudal +rights, and threatened to have the Diet of Ratisbonne annul any private +treaties they might conclude concerning them. The electors of Trèves, +Cologne, and Mayence undisguisedly favored the levying of troops by the +emigrant +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P127"></A>127}</SPAN> +princes, and even paid subsidies toward their support. +They refused to recognize the official ambassadors of Louis XVI., while +recognizing the plenipotentiaries of these princes. There was talk of +holding a Congress at Aix-la-Chapelle for the purpose of intimidating +the National Assembly. The successor of the Emperor Leopold, Francis +II., who, before his election to the Empire, had assumed the title of +King of Hungary and Bohemia, displayed extremely martial sentiments. +Austria, which had sent forty thousand men to the Low Countries and +twenty thousand to the Rhine, had just signed a treaty of alliance with +Prussia, "to put an end to the troubles in France." Dumouriez urgently +demanded the court of Vienna to explain itself. It finally sent the +French Ambassador, Marquis de Noailles, a dry, curt, and formal note, +naming the only conditions on which peace could be preserved. These +were: the re-establishment of the French monarchy on the bases of the +royal declaration of June 23, 1789, and, consequently, the restoration +of the nobility and clergy as orders; the restitution of Church +property; the return of Alsace to the German princes, with all their +sovereign and feudal rights; and, finally, the surrender of Avignon and +the county of Venaisson to the Holy See. +</P> + +<P> +"In truth," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "if the Viennese minister +had slept through the entire thirty-three months that had elapsed since +the royal séance, and had dictated this note on awaking +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P128"></A>128}</SPAN> +without +knowledge of what had happened, he could not have proposed conditions +more incongruous with the progress of the Revolution.... The new +social compact was founded on the abolition of the orders and the +equality of all citizens. The financial system, which alone could +prevent bankruptcy, was founded on the creation of assignats. The +assignats were hypothecated on the property of the clergy, now become +the property of the nation, and the greater part of which had been +already sold. The nation, therefore, could not accept these conditions +except by violating its Constitution, destroying property, ruining its +purchasers, annulling its assignats, and declaring bankruptcy. Could +so humiliating an obedience be expected from a great nation, proud of +having conquered its liberty? and that for the sake of placing itself +once more under the yoke of nobles who, having abandoned their King +himself, now threatened to re-enter their country with sword and flame +and every scourge of vengeance?" +</P> + +<P> +The entire National Assembly reasoned in the same way as Dumouriez. A +cry for war arose on all sides. The Girondins saw in it the +indispensable consecration of the Revolution. The Feuillants hoped +that besides proving creditable to the government, it would accomplish +the additional end of drawing away from Paris and other great cities a +multitude of turbulent men who, for lack of anything else to do, were +disturbing public order. Certain reactionists, stifling the sentiment +of patriotism in their hearts, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P129"></A>129}</SPAN> +were equally anxious for war, in +the secret hope that it would prove disastrous for the French army, and +result in the re-establishment of the old régime. On the other hand, +there were good citizens, inclined to optimism and judging others by +themselves, who thought that when confronted with an enemy, all +intestine dissensions would vanish as by enchantment, and that the new +Constitution, hallowed by victory and glory, would ensure the country a +most brilliant destiny. Ministers were unanimous, and enthusiasm +universal. Even if he had so desired, Louis XVI. could no longer +resist it. On April 20, 1792, he went to the Assembly. The hall was +filled with a crowd which comprehended the importance and solemnity of +the act about to be accomplished. +</P> + +<P> +According to Dumouriez, the King was very majestic: "I come," he said, +"in accordance with the terms of the Constitution, formally to propose +war against the King of Hungary and Bohemia." He afterwards paid the +greatest attention to the report of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, +and seemed, by the motions of his head and hands, to approve it in +every respect. He returned to the Tuileries amidst general +acclamations. War was unanimously decided on, and Dumouriez went to +the diplomatic committee in order to draw up the declaration. At ten +in the evening the decree was brought in and carried to the King, who +sanctioned it at once. +</P> + +<P> +Thus commenced that gigantic war which France was to wage against all +Europe, and which ended, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P130"></A>130}</SPAN> +twenty-three years later, in the +disaster of Waterloo. How many battles, what suffering, and what a +prodigious shedding of blood! And to attain what end? Simply the +point of departure; that is to say, in the political order, to +constitutional monarchy, and in territory, to the boundaries of 1792. +What! to have filled Europe with noise and renown; to have carried the +standards of France from east to west, from north to south; to have +camped victoriously in Brussels, Milan, Venice, Rome, Naples, Cairo, +Berlin, Madrid, Vienna, Moscow; to have enlarged the borders of valor, +heroism, and self-sacrifice in order to arrive, after so many efforts, +just at the spot where the strife began? Ah! how short-sighted is +human wisdom, how deceitful the previsions of mortal man, how sterile +the agitations of republics and monarchs! "Assuredly!" says Dumouriez, +"if the Emperor and the King of Prussia could have foreseen that France +was able to withstand all Europe, they would not have meddled with her +domestic quarrels; they would have treated the <I>émigrés</I> not with +confidence, but compassion; they would have responded frankly and +without trickery to the minister's negotiation; the Revolution would +have been accomplished without cruelties; Europe would have remained at +peace, and France would be happy." What sadness underlies all history, +and what disproportion there is between man's sacrifices and their +results! The Revolution was achieved. All necessary liberties had +been conquered. Privileges +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P131"></A>131}</SPAN> +existed no longer. Animated by +excellent intentions, Louis XVI. would have been the best of +constitutional sovereigns, had his subjects possessed wisdom. Why this +long misunderstanding between him and his people? Why, on one side, +the insensate attitude of the <I>émigrés</I>, whose task seemed to be to +justify the revolutionists; and why, on the other, those savage +passions which seemed trying to justify the wrathful recriminations of +Coblentz? Why that untimely intervention of Austria which irritated +French national sentiment and gave a political pretext to inexcusable +violence, cruelty, and crime? Inextricable confusion of false +situations! Multitudes asked themselves in what direction right and +duty lay. A large contingent of the French nobility heartily desired +the success of foreign armies. At Coblentz a gathering of twenty-two +thousand gentlemen hastened to the side of the seven Bourbon princes: +the Comte de Provence, the Comte d'Artois, the Duc de Berry, the Duc +d'Angoulême, the Prince de Conde, the Duc de Bourbon, and the Duc +d'Enghien. +</P> + +<P> +As M. de Lamartine has said: "Infidelity to the country called itself +fidelity to the King. Desertion called itself honor. Fealty to the +throne was the religion of the French nobility. To them the +sovereignty of the people seemed an insolent dogma against which it was +necessary to draw the sword under penalty of sharing the crime. There +was real devotion in the act by which these men, young and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P132"></A>132}</SPAN> +old, +abandoned their rank in the army, and the ties of country and family, +and rushed into a foreign land to defend the white flag as common +soldiers.... Their country symbolized duty for the patriots; to the +<I>émigrés</I>, duty meant the throne. One of these parties deceived itself +concerning its duty, but both of them believed they were performing it." +</P> + +<P> +As to the unfortunate Louis XVI., he suffered cruelly. It was like +death to him to declare war against his nephew, and at certain moments +he felt that this Austrian army against which his troops contended +might yet be his last resource. He could not even flatter himself that +the sacrifice he had made of his sympathies and family feelings would +be repaid by the love and confidence of his people. +</P> + +<P> +"We have no difficulty nowadays in comprehending," says M. Geffroy very +justly, "what pure patriotism there was in that young army of 1792, +which represented new France. But this army, formed in independence of +the old regiments, was none the less, in the eyes of the Queen, a +veritable army of sedition. She thought of it as composed of the +victors of the Bastille, those whom Mirabeau styled the greatest +scoundrels of Paris; the very rabble who came to Versailles on the 6th +of October. She believed they could be crushed by the first attack at +the frontier, and that France and Paris would be rid of them." The +following reflection by M. Geffroy is very judicious: "Marie Antoinette +committed a double error, but honest men who had not the same +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P133"></A>133}</SPAN> +overpowering motives as she, have committed it likewise. I do not +allude merely to those Frenchmen who, after April 20, remained in the +ranks of the Emigration, and who, apparently, did not suppose +themselves to be betraying the true interests of their country. But +look at M. de Bouillé. He even accepted a command in the foreign army +under Gustavus III. And yet M. de Bouillé is an honest man who knows +France and loves her ardently. Observe, in his Memoirs, his +involuntary pride in our success, and how he shrugs his shoulders at +the bluster of the Prussian officers." +</P> + +<P> +It is not yet well understood what vigor, enthusiasm, and martial ardor +animated that brave national army, which, according to the foreigners, +was but a band of rioters, but which was suddenly to appear on the +battle-field as a people of heroes. Honor took refuge in the camps. +It was there that men whom the Jacobin Club enraged, and who had no +consolation for their patriotic grief but the virile emotions of +combat, went to fight and die. Why did not Louis XVI. call to mind +that he was the commander-in-chief of the army? Ah! had he been a +soldier, had he been accustomed to wear a uniform, to command, and, +above all, to speak to his troops, how quickly he would have come to +the end of his difficulties! Count de Vaublanc had good reason to say: +"Anything can be done with Frenchmen if one knows how to animate and +impress them with vehement ardor; otherwise, nothing need be +expected.... Never did +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P134"></A>134}</SPAN> +a prince merit better the eternal rewards +promised by religion to the true Christian; and yet his example should +forever teach kings that their conduct must be totally different from +his. Lacking the courage which acts, the most virtuous king cannot +achieve his own safety." Why did not Louis XVI. go amongst his +soldiers? Victory would have given him a sceptre and a crown. While +he still retained his sword, why did he leave it in the scabbard? Why +did he not remember that it might launch thunderbolts? +</P> + +<P> +On the contrary, Louis XVI. hesitates, fumbles, temporizes. Count de +Vaublanc says again: "This wretched time proves thoroughly that finesse +is the most detestable means of conducting great affairs. Nothing but +finesse was opposed to the impetuous attacks of the Jacobins. All was +dissimulation; conversations, writings, measures; authority acted only +by crooked ways. With a thousand means of safety, people were lost +because they pushed prudence to excess, and extreme prudence always +degenerates into despicable means. I was in every great crisis of the +Revolution, and I have always seen the same faults produce the same +misfortunes. It is the same thing in revolution as in war; no matter +how prudent a general may be, he must take some risk. Otherwise it +would be impossible to gain a single battle." +</P> + +<P> +Ah! how true and how striking is that great saying of Bossuet: "When +God wills to overthrow empires, all is feeble and irregular in their +designs." +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P135"></A>135}</SPAN> +Undecided and fickle, Louis XVI. does not even know +whether to desire the success or the failure of the Austrian army. He +has no plan, no steadiness of purpose. The secret mission he gives to +Mallet du Pan is a fresh proof of the irresolution of his character and +his policy. What is it he asks? To have the Powers declare that they +are making war against an anti-social faction, and not the French +nation; that they are undertaking the defence of legitimate governments +and of peoples against anarchy; that they will treat only with the +King; that they shall demand perfect liberty for him; that they convoke +a congress to which the <I>émigrés</I> may be admitted as complainants, and +where the general scheme of claims and reclamations shall be negotiated +under the auspices and the guarantee of the great courts of Europe. +Hesitating between Austria and his own kingdom, the unhappy monarch +attempts to continue that equivocal system, that see-saw policy in +which he has succeeded so ill, and which constrains him to +dissimulation, that last resource of the feeble. Sent to Germany with +instructions written by Louis XVI., with his own hand, Mallet du Pan +recommends the sovereigns to be cautious in advancing into France, to +observe the greatest prudence in dealing with the inhabitants of the +invaded provinces, and to precede their arrival by a manifesto in which +they declare conciliatory and pacific intentions. It follows that +official ministers of the King did not possess his confidence and were +not the interpreters of his mind. A +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P136"></A>136}</SPAN> +sort of occult and +mysterious government existed, with a diplomacy, secret funds, and +agents abroad and at home. Such a system, lacking all grandeur and +sincerity, could accomplish nothing but catastrophes. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, the war had begun under the most painful conditions. The +invasion of Belgium, arranged for the end of April, failed miserably. +Near Mons, Biron's troops took to flight, threatening to fire on their +officers, and crying: "We are betrayed!" At Lille, General Theobald +Dillon was massacred by his own soldiers. Such news caused +indescribable emotion in Paris. Popular mistrust and irritation +reached their height. The different parties hurled reproaches and +accusations in each other's face. The Girondins, finding the National +Guard too conservative, demanded pikes for the men of the faubourgs who +had no guns. The <I>sans-culottes</I> enlisted. The army of assassins was +organized. The only thing left to do before giving the signal for a +riot was to obtain from the King a last concession,—the disbanding of +his guard. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P137"></A>137}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE DISBANDING OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL GUARD. +</H4> + +<P> +Louis XVI. had still some defenders, some heroes resolved to shed the +last drop of their blood for their King. Hence it was necessary to +remove them from his person. What means of doing so could be found? +Calumny. Fable on fable was spread among an always credulous public, +imaginary conspiracies invented, and the wretched monarch constrained +to deprive himself of his last resource, in order to deliver him, weak +and disarmed, into the hands of his enemies. +</P> + +<P> +The Constitution provided a guard for Louis XVI. One third of it was +composed of soldiers of the line, and the remainder of National Guards, +chosen by the Departments themselves from among their best-formed, +richest, and best-bred citizens. It was commanded by one of the +greatest lords of the old régime, the Duke de Cossé-Brissac. Born in +1734, the son of a marshal of France, the Duke had been governor of +Paris, grand steward of France, and colonel of the Hundred-Switzers. +He had never been willing to leave the King since the beginning of the +Revolution. When his regiment was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P138"></A>138}</SPAN> +disbanded he might have fled, +and Louis XVI. begged him to do so; but the heart of a subject so +faithful had been deaf to the entreaties of the unfortunate sovereign. +"Sire," he had answered, "if I fly, they will say that I am guilty, and +you will be considered my accomplice: my flight would be your +accusation; I would rather die." And, in fact, he did die. He had a +real devotion to the former mistress of Louis XV., the Countess du +Barry, and this latest conquest is not the least important of the +favorite's adventures. Probably Count d'Allonville exaggerates when, +in his Memoirs, he extols in Madame du Barry "that decency of tone, +that nobility of manners, that bearing equally removed from pride and +humility, from license and from prudery, that countenance which was +enough to refute all the pamphlets." Nevertheless, it is certain that +the society of the Duke de Brissac inspired the former favorite with +generous sentiments. After the October Days, she took the wounded +body-guards into her own house, and when the Queen sent to thank her +for it, she replied: "These wounded young men regret nothing except not +having died for a princess so worthy of all homage as Your Majesty.... +Luciennes[<A NAME="chap13fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap13fn1">1</A>] is yours, Madame; did not your benevolence give it back to +me? ... The late King, by a sort of presentiment, forced me to accept a +thousand precious objects +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P139"></A>139}</SPAN> +before sending me away from his person. +I already had the honor of offering you this treasure in the time of +the Notables; I offer it again, Madame, with eagerness. You have so +many expenses to provide for, and so many favors to confer. Permit me, +I entreat you, to render to Cæsar that which belongs to Cæsar." +</P> + +<P> +An enthusiastic royalist, a gentleman of the old nobility, chivalrous +and full of courtesy, bred in notions of romantic susceptibility like +those of <I>Clélie</I> and <I>Astrée</I>, the Duke de Brissac, like a +knight-errant of former times, represented at the court of Louis XVI. a +whole past which was crumbling to decay. If the unhappy monarch had +been a man of action, he would have turned to good advantage a guard +commanded by such a champion. He could have made it the nucleus of +resistance by grouping the Swiss regiments and the well-inclined +battalions of the National Guard around it. Unfortunately, there was +nothing warlike in Louis XVI. "Among the deplorable causes which +ruined him," says the Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "must be +counted the wretched education which kept him apart from every sort of +military action. I remember that in the early days of the Consulate, +after a review held on the Place of the Tuileries by Bonaparte, when +talking about this to M. Suard, of the French Academy, I said that +Bonaparte walked as if he were always ready to defend himself sword in +hand. 'Ah, well!' responded M. Suard, naïvely, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P140"></A>140}</SPAN> +'we used to think +differently; we wanted the King to have nothing military about him, and +never to wear a uniform.'" +</P> + +<P> +To this anecdote, M. de Vaublanc adds another. "We had in 1792," he +says, "a forcible proof of the despondency under which a royal soul, +spoiled by a detestable education, can labor. M. de Narbonne, the +Minister of War, with great difficulty induced the King to review three +excellent battalions of the Paris National Guard. He was on foot, in +silk breeches and white silk stockings, and wearing his hair in a black +bag. After the review a notary, named Chandon, I think, left the ranks +and said to the King: 'Sire, the National Guard would be greatly +honored to see Your Majesty in its uniform.' 'Sire,' said M. de +Narbonne, at once, 'have the goodness to promise to do so. At the head +of these three battalions of heroes you could destroy the Jacobins' +den.' After a minute's reflection, the King replied: 'I will inquire +of my Council whether the Constitution permits me to wear the uniform +of the National Guard.'" Louis XVI. allowed the last resources +accorded by fortune to slip away, and elements which in other hands +would have produced notable results, remained sterile in his. +</P> + +<P> +The Constitutional Guard, which according to regulation should have +numbered eighteen hundred men, really amounted, says Dumouriez, to six +thousand fit for duty. The royalist element predominated in it. But a +certain number of "false +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P141"></A>141}</SPAN> +brethren" had found their way into the +ranks, who managed by the aid of bribery to spy upon their officers, +and made reports to the committee of public safety. Undoubtedly the +King's guards did not approve of all that was going on. But how could +devoted royalists and men accustomed to discipline be expected to +approve the fête of the Swiss of Chateauvieux, for example? How could +they help being indignant when, while on duty at the Tuileries, they +heard the populace insult the royal family under the very windows of +the palace? +</P> + +<P> +When they returned to their barracks at the Military School, they +expressed this indignation too forcibly, and their words, hawked about +in all quarters by ill-will, were represented as the preliminary +symptoms of a reactionary plot. A guard commanded by a Duke de Brissac +was intolerable to the Jacobins. Their sole idea was to drive it from +the Tuileries, where its presence appeared to insure order,—a thing +they held in utmost horror. A 20th of June would not have been +possible with a constitutional guard, and ever since May, the 20th of +June had been in course of preparation. Its organizers had their plan +completely laid already. An adroit rumor was started of a so-called +plot, some Saint-Bartholomew or other, which they pretended was on foot +against the patriots, and of which the École Militaire was the centre. +The white flag, which was to be the signal for the assassins to +assemble, was said to be hidden there. Pétion, the mayor of Paris, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P142"></A>142}</SPAN> +under pretext of preventing troubles, sent municipal officers to +make a search. They could not lay their hands on the white flag which +was the pretended object of their visit, but they did find monarchical +hymns and ballads, and counter-revolutionary writings. +</P> + +<P> +An unlucky incident still further increased suspicion. The famous +Countess de La Motte had just published in London some new particulars +concerning the affair of the necklace. In order to avert scandal, the +Queen had caused Laporte, intendant of the civil list, to buy up the +whole edition, and he had burned every copy of it at the manufactory of +Sèvres. That very evening the committee of surveillance were in +possession of the fact that Laporte had gone to Sèvres with three +unknown persons, and that thirty bales of paper had been put into the +fire in his presence. There was at this time a great deal of talk +concerning a pretended Austrian committee, in which a complete plan of +restoration by foreign aid was being elaborated. It was claimed that +the papers burned at the manufactory were the archives of this +committee, with which popular imagination was extremely busy. +Denunciations fell in showers. Laporte and several others were +summoned before the committee of surveillance. Pétion declared that +the people were surrounded by conspiracies. Bazire demanded the +disbanding of the King's guard, which, according to him, was made up of +servants of the <I>émigrés</I>, and refractory priests. It was claimed +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P143"></A>143}</SPAN> +that the soldiers, to whom the Duke de Brissac had given sabres +with hilts representing a cock surmounted by a royal crown, used +insulting language concerning the Assembly and the nation in their +barracks. They were said to rejoice in the reverses which the French +troops had just sustained on the northern frontier, and it was added +that they meant to march twenty leagues under a white flag to meet the +Austrians. The masses, always so easily deceived, were convinced that +the conspiracy was on the brink of discovery. +</P> + +<P> +The National Assembly took up the question, and a stormy debate on it +occupied the evening session of May 29. "What will become of the +individual liberty of citizens," cried M. Daverhouté, "if the dominant +party, merely by alleging suspicions, can decree the impeachment of all +who displease it, and if the different parties, coming successively +into power, overthrow, by means of this unchecked right of impeachment, +both ministers and all functionaries by the torrent of their intrigues? +In that case you would see proscriptions like those of Marius and +Sylla." In fact, this was what the near future was about to show. +Vergniaud responded by evoking a souvenir of the prætorian guards of +Caligula and Nero. At the close of his speech the Assembly passed the +following decree:— +</P> + +<P> +"ARTICLE 1. The existing hired guard of the King is disbanded, and +will be replaced immediately in conformity with the laws. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P144"></A>144}</SPAN> + +<P> +"ART. 2. Until the formation of the new guard, the National Guard of +Paris will be on duty near the King's person, in the same manner as +before the establishment of the King's guard." +</P> + +<P> +A discussion ensued on the subject of Brissac's impeachment. The +struggle between the two opposing parties was of unheard-of vivacity. +One of the most courageous members of the right, M. Calvet, gave free +vent to his indignation. "The informer," said he, "is a scoundrel who +makes a thrust with a poniard and hides himself; he was unknown at Rome +until the times of Sejanus and Tiberius; times, gentlemen, of which you +remind me often." "To the Abbey! to the Abbey!" retorted the left, +with fury. Said Guadet: "I demand that M. Calvet should be sent to the +Abbey for three days, for having dared to say that the representatives +of the French people remind him of the Roman Tiberius and Sejanus." +The motion was adopted, and the Assembly decided that M. Calvet should +pass three days in prison. M. de Jaucourt threatened to cudgel Chabot, +and the ex-friar, ascending the tribune, said: "I think it was very +cowardly on the part of a colonel to offer to cane a Capuchin." The +Assembly, having passed an order of the day concerning this incident, +decreed that "there was reason for an accusation against M. Cossé, +styled Brissac, and that his papers should be sealed up at once." +</P> + +<P> +The King and Queen, awakened in the middle of the night by these +tidings, besought Brissac to make +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P145"></A>145}</SPAN> +his escape, and provided him +with the means. The Duke refused, and instead of trying to assure his +safety, sat down to write a long letter to Madame du Barry. At first +Louis XVI. wished to veto this decree, as was his duty, but his +ministers dissuaded him. They reminded him of the October Days, and +the weak monarch, alarmed on account of his family, if not on his own, +sacrificed his Constitutional Guard and also the brave servitor who +commanded it. Speaking to M. d'Aubier, one of the ordinary gentlemen +of the King's bedchamber, the Queen said: "I tremble lest the King's +guard should think the honor of the corps compromised by their +disarmament."—"Doubtless, Madame, that corps would have preferred to +die at the feet of Your Majesties."—"Yes," replied the Queen, "but the +few partisans who still adhere to the King in the Assembly counsel him +to sanction the decree disbanding them, and to disregard their advice +is to run the risk of losing them." While the Queen was yet speaking, +a man approached under pretence of asking alms. "You see," said she to +M. d'Aubier, "there is no place and no time when I am free from spies." +</P> + +<P> +The Constitutional Guard were sent as prisoners to the École Militaire +between a double file of National Guards, and forced to surrender their +weapons. By a sort of fatality Louis XVI. was led to disarm himself, +to spike his cannons, tear down his flags, and dismantle his +fortresses. By dint of approaching too near the fatal declivity of +concessions, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P146"></A>146}</SPAN> +he ended by losing even his dignity as man and King. +He was paralyzed, annihilated by the Assembly, which treated him like a +hostage, a conquered man, and which struck down, one after another, the +last defenders of the monarchy and of public order. The fate of the +Constitutional Guard might well discourage honest men who only sought +to devote themselves. How was it possible to remain faithful to a +chief who was false to himself, who was more like a victim than a king? +Finding themselves unsupported by the Tuileries, the royalists began to +look across the frontier, and many men who would have flocked around an +energetic monarch, fled from a feeble king and sorrowfully went to +swell the ranks of the emigration. +</P> + +<P> +In spite of the advice of Dumouriez, Louis XVI. would not make use of +his right to form another guard. He preferred to put himself in the +hands of the National Guard, who were his jailors rather than his +servants. As to the Duke de Brissac, even the formality of an +interrogatory was dispensed with, and he was sent before the Superior +Court of Orleans. When he bade adieu to Louis XVI., the King said to +him: "You are going to prison; I should be much more afflicted if you +were not leaving me there myself." What was to be the fate of the +loyal and devoted servant, thus sacrificed to his master's inexcusable +weakness? He left the dungeons of Orleans only to be transferred to +Versailles by the Marseillais, and there, on September 9, 1792, was +assaulted by a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P147"></A>147}</SPAN> +furious throng surrounding the carriages +containing the prisoners. The brave old man struggled long against the +assassins, but, after losing two fingers and receiving several other +wounds, he was killed by a sabre-thrust which broke his jaw, and his +head was set on one of the spikes of the palace gate. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap13fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap13fn1text">1</A>] The magnificent mansion built for Madame du Barry by Louis XV., and +restored to her after her banishment to Meaux by Marie Antoinette. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P148"></A>148}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE SUFFERINGS OF LOUIS XVI. +</H4> + +<P> +Dissatisfied with men and things, dissatisfied with others and himself, +the mind and heart of Louis XVI. were the prey of moral tortures which +left him no repose. He began to be ashamed of his concessions, and to +repent of having accepted pusillanimous advice. Why had he not +succeeded in being a king? Why had he garrisoned Paris insufficiently +ever since the outbreak of the Revolution? Why had he suffered the +Bastille to be taken, encouraged the emigration, and disbanded his +bodyguards? Why had he not opposed the first persecutions aimed at the +Church? Why had he pretended to approve acts and ideas which horrified +him? Why, by resorting to deplorable equivocations which cast a shadow +over his policy and his character, had he reduced his most devoted +followers to doubt and despair? Such thoughts as these assailed him +like so many stings of conscience. The sentiments of monarchy and of +military honor awoke in him once more, and he sounded with bitterness +the whole depth of the abyss into which his irresolution had plunged +him. In seeing what he was, he recalled sorrowfully +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P149"></A>149}</SPAN> +what he had +been, and comprehended by cruel experience what feebleness could make +of a Most Christian King and eldest son of the Church, an heir of Louis +XIV. He thought of the many brave men, victims of his political +errors, who on his account had suffered exile and ruin; of the faithful +royalists menaced, because of him, with prison and death. He thought +of the incessantly repeated crimes, the massacres of the Glacière, the +impunity of the brigands of "headsman" Jourdan, of Brissac's +incarceration. This is what it is, he said within himself, to have +suffered religion to be persecuted and to have believed that, were the +altar once overthrown, the throne might rest secure. He reproached +himself bitterly for having sanctioned the civil organization of the +clergy at the close of 1790, and thus drawn upon himself the censure of +the Sovereign Pontiff. He wanted to be done with concessions, but he +understood perfectly that it was too late now to resist, and that he +was irrevocably lost in consequence of events undesired and unforeseen. +</P> + +<P> +What was to be done? How could he sail against the stream? Where find +a point of vantage? Ought he to take violent measures? If the unhappy +King had been alone, perhaps he might have tried to do so. But he +feared to endanger his wife and children by thus acting. +</P> + +<P> +As if to push the wretched monarch to extremities, the National +Assembly passed two decrees which struck him to the heart. According +to the first of +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P150"></A>150}</SPAN> +these, voted May 19, any ecclesiastic having +refused the oath to the civil constitution of the clergy, could be +transported at the simple request of twenty citizens of the canton in +which he resided. According to the second, voted June 8, a camp of +twenty thousand federates, recruited from every canton of the realm, +were to be assembled before Paris, in order, as was said in one of the +preambles, "to take every hope from the enemies of the common weal who +are scheming in the interior." +</P> + +<P> +They had counted too much on the King's patience. He could not resolve +to sanction the two decrees, and banish the ecclesiastics whose +behavior he honored. Dumouriez afflicted him still further, when, in +entreating him to yield, he asked why he had sanctioned, at the close +of 1790, the decree obliging the clergy to take oath to the civil +constitution of the clergy. "Sire," said he, "you sanctioned the +decree for the priests' oath, and it is to that your veto must be +applied. If I had been one of your counsellors at the time, I would, +at the risk of my life, have advised you to refuse your sanction. Now +my opinion is that having, as I dare to say, committed the fault of +approving this decree, which has produced enormous evils, your veto, if +you apply it to the second decree, which may arrest the deluge of blood +ready to flow, will burden your conscience with all the crimes to which +the people are tending." Never had a sovereign's conscience been a +prey to similar perplexities. Louis XVI. seemed crushed beneath an +irresistible +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P151"></A>151}</SPAN> +fatality. The Tuileries, haunted night and day by +the spectre of Charles I., assumed a dismal air. At this period a sort +of stupor characterized the countenance, the gait, and even the silence +of the future victim of January 21. He no longer spoke; one might say +he no longer thought. He seemed prostrated, petrified. +</P> + +<P> +A rumor got about that he had become almost imbecile through care and +trouble, so much so that he did not recognize his son, but on seeing +him approach, had asked: "What child is that?" It was added that while +out walking he caught sight of the steeple of Saint Denis from the top +of the hill, and cried out: "That is where I shall be on my birthday." +He had been so calumniated, so misunderstood, so outraged, that not +merely his crown but his existence had become an intolerable burden to +him. His throne and his life alike disgusted him. He was no longer a +King, but only the ghost of one. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Campan thus describes him: "At this period the King fell into a +discouragement amounting to physical prostration. For ten days +together he never uttered a word, even in the bosom of his family, +except when the game of backgammon, which he played with Madame +Elisabeth after dinner, obliged him to pronounce some indispensable +words. The Queen drew him out of this condition, so fatal at a +critical time when every minute may necessitate action, by throwing +herself at his feet and addressing him sometimes in words intended only +to frighten him, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P152"></A>152}</SPAN> +and at others expressing her affection for him. +She demanded, also, what he owed to his family, and went so far as to +say that if they must perish, it ought to be with honor, and without +waiting to be strangled one after another on the floor of their +apartment." +</P> + +<P> +While Louis XVI. assisted unmoved, not merely like Charles V. at his +own obsequies, but at those of royalty, the blood of Maria Theresa was +boiling in the veins of Marie Antoinette. The scenes she had witnessed +sometimes extorted sobs and cries of anguish from her. Her pride +revolted at seeing the royal mantle, crown, and sceptre dragged through +the mire. She wanted to struggle to the last, to hope against all +hope, to cling to the last chances of safety like a shipwrecked sailor +to the fragments of his ship. Who could say? She might find defenders +where she least expected them. It was for this reason that she wished +to meet Dumouriez, as she had met Mirabeau and Barnave. Dumouriez has +preserved the details of this interview in his Memoirs. +</P> + +<P> +How times had changed! Secrecy was almost necessary if one sought the +honor of speaking with the Queen of France. Even to salute her was to +expose one's self to the suspicion of belonging to the pretended +Austrian committee which was the perpetual object of popular invective. +When Louis XVI. told Dumouriez that the Queen desired a private +interview with him, the minister was not at all well pleased. He +thought it a useless step which might be misinterpreted by all parties. +However, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P153"></A>153}</SPAN> +he must needs obey. He had received an order to go down +to the Queen an hour before the meeting of the Council. That it might +be the sooner over, he took the precaution of going half an hour late +to this perilous rendezvous. He had been presented to Marie Antoinette +on the day of his nomination as minister. She had then addressed him +several words, asking him to serve the King well, and he had replied +with a respectful phrase. Since then he had not seen her. When he +entered her room, he found the Queen alone, very much flushed, and +pacing to and fro in an agitation which promised a lively interview. +She approached him with an air of majestic irritation: "Sir!" she +exclaimed, "you are all-powerful at this moment, but it is by the favor +of the people, who soon break their idols. Your existence depends upon +your conduct." Dumouriez insisted on the necessity of scrupulously +respecting the Constitution, which Marie Antoinette was unwilling to +do. "It will not last," she said, raising her voice; "take care of +yourself!"—"Madame," replied the minister, "I am past fifty; I have +encountered many perils during my life, and in entering the ministry, I +thoroughly understood that responsibility was not the greatest of my +dangers."—"Nothing was wanting but to calumniate me," cried the Queen, +tears flowing from her eyes; "you seem to think me capable of having +you assassinated." Agitated as greatly as the sovereign, "God preserve +me," said Dumouriez, "from offering you so +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P154"></A>154}</SPAN> +grievous an offence! +Your Majesty's character is great and noble. You have given proofs of +it which I admire and which have attached me to you." Marie Antoinette +grew calmer. "Believe me, Madame," went on the minister; "I have no +interest in deceiving you, and I abhor anarchy and crime as much as you +do.... This is not, as you seem to think, a popular and transitory +movement. It is the almost unanimous insurrection of a great nation +against inveterate abuses. The conflagration is stirred up by great +parties, and there are scoundrels and fools in all of them. I behold +nothing in the Revolution but the King and the nation as a whole; all +that tends to separate them leads to their mutual ruin; I am doing all +I can to reunite them, and it is your part to aid me. If I am an +obstacle to your designs, say so, and I will at once offer my +resignation to the King, and go into a corner to bewail the fate of my +country and your own." The interview ended amicably. The Queen and +the minister talked over the different factions. Dumouriez spoke to +Marie Antoinette of the faults and crimes of each; he tried to convince +her that she was misled by those who surrounded her, and the Queen +appeared to be convinced. When he was obliged to call her attention to +the clock, as the hour for the Council had arrived, she dismissed him +most affably. +</P> + +<P> +If we may credit Madame Campan, who has also given an account of this +interview, the impression Marie Antoinette received from it was +scarcely a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P155"></A>155}</SPAN> +good one. "One day," says Madame Campan, "I found the +Queen extremely troubled. She said she no longer knew where she stood; +whether the Jacobin chiefs were making overtures to her through +Dumouriez, or Dumouriez, abandoning the Jacobins, was acting on his own +account; that she had given him an audience; that, when alone with her, +he had fallen at her feet and said that although he had pulled the red +bonnet down to his ears, yet he was not and could not be a Jacobin; +that the Revolution had been allowed to fall into the hands of a rabble +of disorganizers who, seeking only for pillage, were capable of +everything, and could furnish the Assembly with a formidable army, +ready to undermine the support of a throne already too much shaken. +While speaking with extreme warmth, he had seized the Queen's hand, +and, kissing it with transport, cried, 'Permit yourself to be saved!' +The Queen said to me that the protestations of a traitor could not be +believed, and that his entire conduct was so well known that +undoubtedly the wisest thing would be not to trust him." +</P> + +<P> +Meantime, the danger constantly increased. Even the gates of the +Tuileries were no longer fastened. Hawkers of vile pamphlets and +sanguinary satires on the Queen cried their infamous wares under the +very windows of the palace; and the National Assembly, sitting close +beside, and hearing them—the National Assembly, terrorized by Jacobins +and pikemen—dared not even censure such baseness. On June 4, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P156"></A>156}</SPAN> +a +deputy named Ribes, till then unknown, cited from the tribune the +titles of the following articles in Fréron's journal, <I>l'Orateur du +Peuple</I>: "The crowned porcupine, a constitutional animal who behaves +unconstitutionally."—"Crimes of M. Capet since the +Revolution."—"Decree to be passed forbidding the Queen to sleep with +the King."—"The royal tigress, separated from her worthy spouse, to +serve as a hostage." "Rouse up!" cried the indignant deputy. "There +is still time. Join with me in proclaiming war on traitors and justice +for the seditious, and the country is safe!" Ribes preached in the +desert. The Assembly shrugged their shoulders and treated him as a +fool. +</P> + +<P> +June 11, another deputy, M. Delsaux, said from the tribune: "Last +evening, at half-past seven, passing through the Tuileries, I saw an +orator standing on a chair and speaking with great vehemence. Mixing +with the crowd, I heard him read a libel strongly inciting to the +King's assassination. This libel is called, 'The Fall of the Idol of +the French,' and these sentences occur in it: 'This monster employs his +power and his treasures to hinder our regeneration. A new Charles IX., +he wishes to bring desolation and death to France. Go, cruel wretch; +thy crimes shall have an end. Damiens was less guilty. He was +punished by most horrible tortures for having desired to deliver France +from a monster. And thou, whose offences are twenty-five million times +greater, art left unpunished! But tremble, tyrant; there is a Scævola +amongst us.'" +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P157"></A>157}</SPAN> + +<P> +The Assembly listened, but took no measures. No further restraint was +placed either on moral or material disorder. Anarchy showed a nameless +epileptic ferocity. Never had the press been more furious or +licentious. It was a torrent of mud and gall and blood. The limits of +invective and insult were driven further back. "You see that I am +annoyed," said the Queen to Dumouriez in Louis XVI.'s presence; "I dare +not go to the window looking into the garden. Last evening, needing a +breath of air, I showed myself at the window facing the courtyard. A +gunner belonging to the guard apostrophized me in an insulting way, and +added: 'What pleasure it would give me to have your head on the end of +my bayonet!' In that frightful garden a man standing on a chair reads +out horrors against us on one side, and on the other may be seen a +soldier or a priest whom they are dragging through a pond, and crushing +with blows and insults. Meantime, others are flying balloons or +quietly strolling about. Ah! what a place! what a people!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap15"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P158"></A>158}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ROLAND'S DISMISSAL FROM OFFICE. +</H4> + +<P> +In the ministry, as elsewhere, discord reigned. At first, the +ministers had seemed to be of one mind. They dined at each other's +houses four times a week, on the days when there was a meeting of the +Council. Friday was Roland's day for receiving his colleagues at his +table, where his wife presided and perorated. "These dinners," says +Etienne Dumont, "were often remarkable for their gaiety, of which no +situation can deprive Frenchmen when they meet in society, and which +was natural to men contented with themselves and flattered by their +elevation. The future was hidden from them by the present. The cares +of the ministry were forgotten. They seated themselves in their +dwellings as if they were to abide there forever." This sort of +political honeymoon could not last very long. Things presently began +to change for the worse. Dumouriez tired very soon of Madame Roland's +pretensions; she wanted to know, see, and direct everything, and he +persisted in refusing to transform himself into a puppet whose strings +were to be pulled by this woman and the Girondins. Madame Roland, who +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P159"></A>159}</SPAN> +posed as a puritan, caused remonstrances to be addressed to +Dumouriez on the subject of some more or less suspicious affairs, said +to have been negotiated by Bonne-Carrère, the director at the Ministry +of Foreign Affairs, by which Madame de Beauvert was supposed to have +gained large sums. The wife of the Minister of the Interior had a +grudge against the favorite of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "She +is Dumouriez's mistress," said she; "she lives in his house and does +the honors at his table, to the great scandal of sensible men, who are +friendly to good morals and liberty. For this license on the part of a +public man charged with State affairs marks too plainly his contempt +for decorum; and Madame de Beauvert, Rivarol's sister, very well and +very unfavorably known, is surrounded by the tools of aristocracy, +unworthy in all respects." One evening, after dinner, Roland, "with +the gravity belonging to his age and character," as his wife says, gave +a lecture on morality to the Minister of Foreign Affairs apropos of +this matter. At first Dumouriez made jesting replies, but afterwards +showed temper and appeared displeased with his entertainers. +Thereafter he seldom visited the Ministry of the Interior. Reflecting +on this, Madame Roland said to her husband: "Though not a good judge of +intrigue, I think worldly wisdom would dictate that the hour has come +for getting rid of Dumouriez, if we wish to avoid being ruined by him. +I know very well that you would be unwilling to lower yourself to such +an +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P160"></A>160}</SPAN> +action; and yet it is plain that Dumouriez must be seeking to +disembarrass himself of those whose censure has offended him. When one +undertakes to preach, and does so in vain, he must either punish or +expect to be molested." +</P> + +<P> +Thenceforward, Madame Roland formed a distinct group within the +ministry, composed of her husband, Clavière, and Servan, who had just +replaced De Grave as Minister of War. While Dumouriez, Lacoste, and +Duranton (whom Louis XVI. called "the good Duranton") allowed +themselves to be affected by the King's goodness, and sincerely wished +to save him, their three colleagues, inspired by the spiteful Madame +Roland, had but one idea: to destroy him. "Roland, Clavière, and +Servan," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "no longer observed any +moderation, not merely with their colleagues, but with the King +himself. At every meeting of the Council they abused the mildness of +this prince, in order to mortify and kill him with pin-pricks." +</P> + +<P> +It was Servan who proposed forming a camp of twenty thousand federates +around Paris. He thought it would be a sort of central revolutionary +army, analogous to that English parliamentary army under command of +Cromwell, which had brought Charles I. to the scaffold. "Servan, a +very wicked man and most inimical to the King," says Dumouriez again, +"took the notion to write to the President of the Assembly, without +consulting his colleagues, and propose a decree for assembling an army +of twenty +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P161"></A>161}</SPAN> +thousand men around Paris. This was at the time when +the Girondin faction was at the height of its power, having the +Jacobins at their command, and governing Paris through Pétion. They +wanted to destroy the Feuillants, perhaps at the sword's point, to put +down the court, and probably to begin putting their republican projects +into execution. Thus it was this faction which brought to Paris the +federates who ended by causing every one of them to perish on the +scaffold after making Louis XVI. ascend it." Dumouriez was indignant +that the Minister of War should have taken it on himself to propose +such a decree without even mentioning it to the sovereign. The dispute +on this matter was so violent that, but for the presence of the King, +the meeting of the Council might have come to a bloody close. Louis +XVI., deeply grieved by such scandals, resolved to dismiss the three +ministers, who, instead of supporting him, were merely conspirators who +had sworn his ruin. +</P> + +<P> +The anguish of the unhappy monarch had reached its height. Four +councils were held without his returning the decrees submitted to him +for consideration. The National Assembly grew impatient. The Jacobins +were in a rage. At last the King concluded to take up in the Council +the decree relative to the camp of twenty thousand federates. "I +think," said Dumouriez, "that the decree is dangerous to the nation, +the King, the National Assembly, and above all to its authors, whose +chastisement it +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P162"></A>162}</SPAN> +will turn out to be; and yet, Sire, it is my +opinion that you cannot refuse it. It was proposed by profound malice, +debated with fury, and decreed with enthusiasm; everybody is blinded. +If you veto it, it will none the less be passed." The hesitation of +Louis XVI. redoubled. As to the decree concerning the clergy, he +declared that he would never sanction it. This was the only time that +Dumouriez ever saw "the character of this gentle soul somewhat changed +for the worse." +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, Madame Roland, more impatient and vindictive than ever, +wrote the famous letter supposed to issue from her husband, which was +to echo in the ears of royalty like a funeral knell. She says of it:— +</P> + +<P> +"The letter was written at one stroke, like nearly all matters of the +sort which I have done; for, to feel the necessity, the fitness of a +thing, to apprehend its good effect, to desire to produce it, and to +give form to the object from which this effect should result, was to me +but a single operation." +</P> + +<P> +This letter, a veritable arraignment of the King, was much more like a +club speech or a newspaper article than a letter from a minister of +state to his sovereign. Such sentences as these occur in it: "Sire, +the existing state of things in France cannot long continue; it is a +crisis whose violence is attaining its highest point; it must end by an +outbreak which should interest Your Majesty as seriously as it affects +the entire kingdom.... It is no longer possible to draw back. The +Revolution is +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P163"></A>163}</SPAN> +accomplished in men's minds; it will end in blood +and be cemented by blood if wisdom does not avert the evils which it is +still possible to prevent.... Yet a little more delay, and the +afflicted people will behold in their King the friend and accomplice of +conspirators. Just Heaven! hast Thou stricken with blindness the +powerful of this earth, and will they never heed other counsels than +those which drag them to destruction! I know that the austere language +of truth is rarely welcomed near the throne; I know, also, that it is +because it so rarely obtains a hearing there that revolutions become +necessary; I know, above all, that I am bound to employ it to Your +Majesty, not merely as a citizen submissive to the law, but as a +minister honored with your confidence, or vested with functions which +imply this." +</P> + +<P> +The letter also contained a defence of the two decrees, and plainly +threatened Louis XVI., should he veto them, with the horrors of a civil +war which would develop "that sombre energy, mother of virtues and of +crimes, which is always fatal to those who have evoked it!" Was not +Madame Roland here announcing the September massacres, and the heinous +crimes of which she herself was speedily to become one of the most +celebrated victims? +</P> + +<P> +At first Roland sent this letter to the King, with a promise that it +should always remain a secret between them. But, incited by the vanity +of his wife, who was incessantly urging him on to notoriety and +display, Roland did not keep this promise. He read +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P164"></A>164}</SPAN> +the letter at +the next meeting of the Council, June 11. "The King," says Dumouriez, +"listened to this impudent diatribe with admirable patience, and said +with the greatest coolness: 'M. Roland, you had already sent me your +letter; it was unnecessary to read it to the Council, as it was to +remain a secret between ourselves.'" Dumouriez was summoned to the +palace the following morning, June 12. He found the King in his own +room, accompanied by the Queen. "Do you think, Monsieur," said Marie +Antoinette, "that the King ought to submit any longer to the threats +and insolence of Roland and the knavery of Servan and Clavière?"—"No, +Madame," he replied; "I am indignant at them; I admire the King's +patience, and I venture to ask him to make an entire change in his +ministry. Let him dismiss us on the spot, and appoint men belonging to +neither party."—"That is not my intention," said Louis XVI. "I wish +you to remain, as well as Lacoste and that good man, Duranton. Do me +the service of ridding me of these three factious and insolent persons, +for my patience is exhausted."—"It is a dangerous matter, Sire, but I +will do it." As a condition of remaining in the ministry, Dumouriez +exacted the sanction of the two decrees. There was another ministerial +council the same evening. Roland, Servan, and Clavière were more +insolent and acrimonious than usual. Louis XVI. closed the session +with mingled dissatisfaction and dignity. +</P> + +<P> +At eight o'clock that evening (June 12), Servan, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P165"></A>165}</SPAN> +the Minister of +War, went to Madame Roland and said: "Congratulate me! I have been +turned out."—"I am much piqued," replied she, "that you should be the +first to receive that honor, but I hope it will not be long before it +will be decreed to my husband also." Madame Roland's prayer was +granted. The virtuous Minister of the Interior received his letters of +dismissal the next morning. As Duranton, who delivered it at the +Ministry of Justice, was slowly drawing it from his pocket,— +</P> + +<P> +"You make us wait for our liberty," said Roland; and, taking the +letter, he added, "In reality that is what it is." Then he went home +to his wife to announce to her that he was no longer minister. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Roland, with the instinct of hatred, saw at once how to obtain +revenge. "One thing remains to be done," she cried; "we must be the +first to communicate the news to the Assembly, sending them at the same +time a copy of the letter to the King which must have caused it." This +idea pleased the ex-minister highly, and he put it instantly into +execution. "I was conscious," says the irascible Egeria of the +Girondins in her Memoirs, "of all the effects this might produce, and I +was not deceived; my double object was attained, and both utility and +glory attended the retirement of my husband. I had not been proud of +his entering the ministry, but I was of his leaving it." Thenceforward +Madame Roland was to be the most indefatigable cause of the Revolution, +and Louis XVI. was to learn by experience what the vengeance of a woman +can accomplish. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap16"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P166"></A>166}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XVI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +A THREE DAYS' MINISTRY. +</H4> + +<P> +Dumouriez had taken the portfolio of war. He kept it three days only. +But during those three days what activity! what excitement! More than +fifteen hundred signatures affixed, instructions sent to all the +generals, a most tumultuous session of the National Assembly, a last +effort to induce Louis XVI. to make further concessions, a resignation +which was to be the signal for catastrophes. How the scenes of the +drama multiply! How the dénouement is accelerated! +</P> + +<P> +The session at which Dumouriez was to appear for the first time as +Minister of War could not fail to be singular. It took place June 13, +1792, and from ten o'clock in the morning all the galleries had been +crowded. The Jacobins had filled them with their satellites. The +Girondins had prepared a dramatic surprise. The three ex-ministers +were to be brought into the chamber under pretext of explaining the +causes of their dismissal. It was agreed that they should be received +as victims of the aristocracy and martyrs of the Revolution. Roland's +letter—say, rather, his wife's letter—to Louis XVI. was read to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P167"></A>167}</SPAN> +the Assembly and frequently interrupted by loud bursts of applause. +Just as it was finished, and some one was demanding that it should be +sent to all the eighty-three departments, Dumouriez entered the hall. +Murmurs and hisses arose on all sides. The Assembly voted the despatch +of the letter to the departments. A deputy exclaimed: "It will be a +famous document in the history of the Revolution and of the ministers." +The Assembly went on to declare that Roland was followed by the regrets +of the nation. Then Dumouriez ascended the tribune and read a message +in which M. Lafayette announced the death of M. de Gouvion. He had +been major-general of the National Guard, and, having quitted the +Assembly rather than be present at the triumph of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux, had met his death bravely in the Army of the North. "A +cannon-ball," said the message, "has terminated a virtuous life." The +Assembly was affected, and voted complimentary condolences to the +father of the heroic officer. +</P> + +<P> +Afterwards, Dumouriez read his report on military affairs. It was a +long criticism on the legislators who had ordered a new levy of troops +before providing the existing corps with their full complements; on the +muster-masters, the standing committees, and the market-contractors, +who were piling up abuses. Dumouriez complained of everything; he +reproached the factions, and insisted on the consideration due to +ministers. Guadet thundered out: "Do you hear him? He already thinks +himself so +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P168"></A>168}</SPAN> +sure of power that he takes it on him to give us +advice."—"And why not?" resumed the minister, turning toward the side +of the Mountain.[<A NAME="chap16fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap16fn1">1</A>] This bold response astonished the most furious. +Some one said: "The document is not signed. Let him sign it! Let him +sign it!" Dumouriez called for pen and ink, signed his memoir, and +went to lay it on the desk. Then he slowly crossed the hall and went +quietly out by the door beneath the Mountain, with a haughty glance at +his adversaries. His martial attitude disconcerted them. The shouts +and hootings ceased, and complete silence ensued. On leaving the +Assembly, Dumouriez was surrounded by a group of persons before the +door of the Feuillants, but their faces displayed no signs of anger +toward him. As soon as he quitted the Assembly, his enemies, no longer +intimidated by his presence, redoubled their attacks. Three or four +deputies left the Chamber, and making their way to him through the +crowd, said: "They are raising the devil inside; they would like to +send you to Orleans." (It was there the Duke de Brissac was imprisoned +and the Superior Court held its sessions.) "So much the better," +replied Dumouriez; "I would take the baths, drink butter-milk, and rest +myself." This sally amused the crowd, and the minister as he entered +the Tuileries garden, said to the deputies who followed him: "It will +be a mistake for my enemies to have +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P169"></A>169}</SPAN> +my memoir printed, for it +will bring all good citizens back to me. At present, being drunk and +crazy, you have just extolled Roland's infamous perfidy to the skies." +Then he went to the palace. Louis XVI. complimented him on his +firmness, but absolutely refused to sanction the decree against the +priests. +</P> + +<P> +Far from ameliorating, the situation continued to grow worse. Pétion's +emissaries stirred up the inhabitants of the faubourgs. That evening +Dumouriez sent a letter to the King announcing that a riot was +apprehended. Louis XVI. suspected that the minister was lying, and +wrote to him: "Do not believe, Monsieur, that any one can succeed in +frightening me by threats; my resolution is taken." Dumouriez had +based his entire scheme on the hypothesis that the decree concerning +the priests would be accepted by the King. From the moment that Louis +XVI. rejected it, Dumouriez no longer hoped to remain in the ministry. +He wrote again, imploring the sovereign to give it his sanction, and +announcing that, in case of his refusal, the ministers would all feel +obliged to retire. The next day, June 15, the King received them in +his chamber. "Are you still," said he to Dumouriez, "in the same +sentiments expressed in your letter last evening?"—"Yes, Sire, if Your +Majesty will not permit yourself to be moved by our fidelity and +attachment."—"Very well," replied Louis XVI., with a gloomy air, +"since your decision is made, I accept your resignation and will +provide for it." Dumouriez was no +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P170"></A>170}</SPAN> +longer a minister. In his +Memoirs he describes himself as much affected, "not on account of +quitting a dangerous post, which simply made his existence disturbed +and painful, but because he saw all his trouble thrown away, and the +King handed over to the fury of cruel enemies and the criminal +indiscretion of false friends." +</P> + +<P> +At bottom, Dumouriez inspired nobody with confidence. He belonged to +no party, and no one knew his opinions. He had leaned on both Jacobins +and Girondins, while at the same time he was inspiring certain hopes in +the Feuillants, and flattering the King, to whom he promised signs and +wonders. Too revolutionary for the conservatives and too conservative +for the revolutionists, he had tried a see-saw policy which would no +longer answer. It became indispensable to make a choice. It was +impossible to please both the Jacobins and the court. +</P> + +<P> +And yet Dumouriez was a man of resources, and it is much to be +regretted, on the King's account, that no better understanding could be +arrived at between them. More successfully than any one else, +Dumouriez might have resorted to bold measures and called in at this +time the intervention of the army, as he did several years later. He +loved money and rank; royalty still excited a great prestige over him, +and he had used the Revolution as a means, not as an end. +</P> + +<P> +Could Louis XVI. have pretended patience for a few days longer, perhaps +he might have extricated +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P171"></A>171}</SPAN> +himself from difficulties which, though +grave, were still not insoluble. He did not choose his hour for +resistance wisely. It was either too late or too soon. The dismission +of Dumouriez was a blunder. At what moment did Louis XVI. elect to +deprive himself of his minister's aid? That very one when, attacked by +the Girondins, exasperated by Roland's conduct, and disgusted with the +progress of anarchy, the force of circumstances was about to toss +Dumouriez back to the side of the reactionists. The camp of twenty +thousand men, if confided to safe hands, and secret service money +judiciously employed, might have become the nucleus of a monarchical +resistance. Lafayette and his partisans were becoming conservative, +and between him and Dumouriez agreement was not impossible. Louis XVI. +was in too great a hurry. His conscience revolted at an unfortunate +moment. Why, if he was bent on this veto, so just, so honest, but so +ill-timed, had he freely made so many concessions which thus became +inexplicable? In rejecting the offers of Dumouriez, the Queen possibly +deprived herself of her only remaining support. He who saved France in +the Passes of Argonne might, had he gained the entire confidence of +Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, have saved the King and royalty. +</P> + +<P> +Dumouriez had a final interview with Louis XVI., June 18. The King +received him in his chamber. He had resumed his kindly air, and when +the ex-minister had shown him the accounts of the last +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P172"></A>172}</SPAN> +fortnight, +he complimented him on their clearness. Afterwards, the following +conversation took place: "Then you are going to join Luckner's +army?"—"Yes, Sire, I leave this frightful city with delight; I have +but one regret; you are in danger here."—"Yes, that is +certain."—"Well, Sire, you can no longer fancy that I have any +personal interest to consult in talking with you; once having left your +Council, I shall never again approach you; it is through fidelity and +the purest attachment that I dare once more entreat you, by your love +for your country, your safety and that of your crown, by your august +spouse and your interesting children, not to persist in the fatal +resolution of vetoing the two decrees. This persistence will do no +good, and you will ruin yourself by it."—"Don't say any more about it; +my decision is made."—"Ah! Sire, you said the same thing when, in +this very room, and in presence of the Queen, you gave me your word to +sanction them."—"I was wrong, and I repent of it."—"Sire, I shall +never see you again; pardon my frankness; I am fifty-three, and I have +some experience. It was not then that you were wrong, but now. Your +conscience is abused concerning this decree against the priests; you +are being forced into civil war; you are helpless, and you will be +overthrown, and history, though it may pity you, will reproach you with +having caused all the misfortunes of France. On your account, I fear +your friends still more than your enemies."—"God is my witness +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P173"></A>173}</SPAN> + +that I wish for nothing but the welfare of France."—"I do not doubt +it, Sire; but you will have to account to God, not solely for the +purity but also for the enlightened execution of your intentions. You +expect to save religion, and you destroy it. The priests will be +massacred and your crown torn from you. Perhaps even your wife, your +children..." Emotion prevented Dumouriez from going on. Tears stood +in his eyes. He kissed the hand of Louis XVI. respectfully. The King +wept also, and for a moment both were silent. "Sire," resumed +Dumouriez, "if all Frenchmen knew you as well as I do, our woes would +soon be ended. Do you desire the welfare of France? Very well! That +demands the sacrifice of your scruples ... You are still master of +your fate. Your soul is guiltless; believe a man exempt from passion +and prejudice, and who has always told you the truth."—"I expect my +death," replied Louis XVI. sadly, "and I forgive them for it in +advance. I thank you for your sensibility. You have served me well; I +esteem you, and if a happier time shall ever come, I will prove it to +you." With these words the King rose sadly, and went to a window at +the end of the apartment. Dumouriez gathered up his papers slowly, in +order to gain time to compose his features; he was unwilling to let his +emotion become evident to the persons at the door as he went out. +"Adieu," said the King kindly, "and be happy!" +</P> + +<P> +As he was leaving, he met his friend Laporte, intendant of the civil +list. The two, who were meeting +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P174"></A>174}</SPAN> +for the last time, went into +another room and closed the door. "You advised me to resign," said +Laporte, "and I meant to do so, but I have changed my mind. My master +is in danger, and I will share his fate."—"If I were in the personal +service of the King, as you are," replied Dumouriez, "I would think and +act the same; I esteem your devotion, and love you the more for it; +each of us is faithful in his own way; you, to Louis; I, to the King of +the French. May both of us felicitate him some day on his happiness!" +Then the two friends separated, after embracing each other with tears. +</P> + +<P> +The sole thought of Dumouriez now was to escape from the city where he +had witnessed so many intrigues and been so often deceived. He was +very sorrowful at heart. Ordinarily so gay, so brilliant, so full of +Gallic and <I>Rabelaisian</I> wit, power had made him melancholy. His +ministerial life left on him an abiding impression of bitterness and +repugnance. "One needs," he has said, "either a patriotism equal to +any test, or else an insatiable ambition, to aspire in any way whatever +after those difficult positions where one is surrounded with snares and +calumnies. One learns only too soon that men are not worth the trouble +one takes to govern them." June 19, he wrote to the Assembly, asking +an authorization to repair to the Army of the North. "I have spent +thirty-six years in military and diplomatic service, and have +twenty-two wounds," said he in this letter; "I envy the fate of the +virtuous Gouvion, and should +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P175"></A>175}</SPAN> +esteem myself happy if a cannon-ball +could put an end to all differences concerning me." He never again +returned either to the palace, the Assembly, or any other place where +he might encounter either ministers, deputies, or persons belonging to +the court. He started for the army, June 26, regarding it as "the only +asylum where an honest man might still be safe. At least, death +presents itself there under the attractive aspect of glory." He left +in the capital "consternation, suspicion, hatred, which pierced through +the frivolity of the wretched Parisians." With an intuition worthy of +a man of genius, he foresaw the vicious circle about to be described by +French history, and divined that by plunging into license men return +inevitably to servitude, because "it is impossible to sustain liberty +with an absurd government, founded on barbarity, terror, and the +subversion of every principle necessary to the maintenance of human +society." Two years later, in 1794, he wrote in his Memoirs: "The +serpent will recoil upon itself. His tail, which is anarchy, will +re-enter his throat, which is despotism." +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap16fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap16fn1text">1</A>] The advanced republican party in the Assembly. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap17"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P176"></A>176}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XVII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE PROLOGUE TO JUNE TWENTIETH. +</H4> + +<P> +On retiring from the ministry, Dumouriez left his successors a burden +far too heavy for their shoulders, and under which they were to +succumb. The new ministers, Lajard, Terrier de Montciel, and +Chambonas, were almost unknown men who had no definite, decided +opinions, and offered no resistance to disorder: for that matter, they +had no means of doing so. The political system then in power had left +Paris a helpless prey to sedition. By the new laws, the executive +power could take no direct action looking to the preservation of public +order in any French commune. Any minister or departmental +administration that should adopt a police regulation or give a +commander to armed forces, would be guilty of betraying a trust. The +power to prevent or repress disorder belonged exclusively to the +municipal authority, which, in Paris, was composed of a mayor, sixteen +administrators, thirty-two municipal councillors, a council-general of +ninety-six notables, an attorney-general and his two substitutes. This +body of 148 members was the redoubtable power known as the Commune of +Paris. It was not +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P177"></A>177}</SPAN> +composed entirely of seditious persons, and in +the National Guard, also, there were still battalions fervently devoted +to the constitutional monarchy. But Pétion was mayor of Paris; Manuel, +the attorney-general, and Danton his substitute. Seditious movements +were sure to find instigators and accomplices in these three men. +</P> + +<P> +Moreover, the insurrection was regularly organized. It had its +muster-rolls, its officers, sergeants, soldiers; its strategy and plans +of battle. It utilized wineshops as guard-houses, the faubourgs as +barracks, the red bonnet and the <I>carmagnole</I>, or revolutionary jacket, +as a uniform. Its agitators distributed wine, beer, and brandy +gratuitously. The Jacobins or the Cordeliers had but to give the +signal for a riot, and a riot sprang out of the ground. The mine was +loaded; the only question was when to fire the train. The Girondins +were of one mind with the Jacobins. Exasperated by the dismissal of +three ministers who shared their opinions, they wanted to intimidate +the court by means of a popular tumult, and thus force the unhappy +sovereign to sanction the two decrees, concerning the deportation of +priests and the camp of twenty thousand men. The populace already +manifested their restlessness by threats and strange rumors. At the +Jacobin Club the most violent propositions were mooted. Some wanted to +establish a minority, on the ground of the King's mental alienation; +some, to send the Queen back to Austria; the more moderate talked of +suppressing the army, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P178"></A>178}</SPAN> +dismissing the staff-officers of the +National Guard, depriving the King of the right of veto, and electing a +Constituent Assembly. Revolutionary conventicles multiplied beyond all +measure. The division of Paris into forty-eight sections became an +exhaustless source of confusion. The assembly of each section +transformed itself into a club. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, the moderate party rested all its hopes on Lafayette, who +was friendly not only to liberty, but to order. He considered himself +the founder of the new monarchy, of constitutional royalty; but, for +that very reason, he felt that he had duties toward the King. +Despising the reactionists, whose hopes were more or less enlisted on +behalf of the foreign armies, he also detested the Jacobins who were +dishonoring and compromising the new order of things. He expresses +both sentiments in a letter addressed to the National Assembly, and +written from the intrenched camp of Maubeuge, June 16, 1792, the Fourth +Year of Liberty: "Can you conceal from yourselves," he says in it, +"that a faction, and to use plain terms, the Jacobin faction, has +caused all these disorders? I make the accusation boldly. Organized +like a separate empire, with its capital and its affiliations blindly +directed by certain ambitious chiefs, this sect forms a distinct body +in the midst of the French people, whose powers it usurps by +subjugating its representatives and agents. In its public meetings, +attachment to the laws is named aristocracy, and disobedience to them +patriotism; there the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P179"></A>179}</SPAN> +assassins of Desilles are received in +triumph, and Jourdan's insensate clamor finds panegyrists; there the +story of the assassinations which defiled the city of Metz is still +greeted with infernal applause." +</P> + +<P> +Lafayette puts himself courageously forward in his letter: "As to me, +gentlemen, who espoused the American cause at the very time when the +ambassadors assured me it was lost; who, from that period, devoted +myself to a persistent defence of the liberty and sovereignty of +peoples; who, on June 11, 1789, in presenting a declaration of rights +to my country, dared to say, 'For a nation to be free, all that is +necessary is that it shall will to be so,' I come to-day, full of +confidence in the justice of our cause, of scorn for the cowards who +desert it, and of indignation against the traitors who would sully it; +I come to declare that the French nation, if it be not the vilest in +the universe, can and ought to resist the conspiracy of kings which has +been leagued against it." At the same time, the general +enthusiastically praised his soldiers: "Doubtless it is not within the +bosom of my brave army that sentiments of timidity are permissible. +Patriotism, energy, discipline, patience, mutual confidence, all civic +and military virtues, I find here. Here the principles of liberty and +equality are cherished, the laws respected, and property held sacred; +here, neither calumnies nor seditions are known." +</P> + +<P> +Including both revolutionists and reactionists in the same accusation, +Lafayette makes this reflection: +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P180"></A>180}</SPAN> +"What a remarkable conformity of +language exists, gentlemen, between those seditious persons +acknowledged by the aristocracy, and those who usurp the name of +patriots! All are alike ready to repeal our laws, to rejoice in +disorders, to rebel against the authorities granted by the people, to +detest the National Guard, to preach indiscipline to the army, and +almost to disseminate distrust and discouragement." Lafayette +concludes in these words: "Let the royal power be intact, for it is +guaranteed by the Constitution; let it be independent, for this +independence is one of the forces of our liberty; let the King be +revered, for he is invested with the national majesty; let him choose a +ministry unhampered by the yoke of any faction; if conspirators exist, +let them perish only by the sword of law; finally, let the reign of +clubs, brought to nothing by you, give place to the reign of law; their +disorganizing maxims to the true principles of liberty; their delirious +fury to the calm courage of a nation which knows its rights and which +defends them!" +</P> + +<P> +Lafayette's letter was read to the Assembly at the session of June 18. +The noble thoughts it expresses produced at first a favorable +impression, and it was greeted with much applause. For an instant the +Girondins were disconcerted; but, feeling themselves supported by the +Jacobins who lined the galleries, they soon resumed the offensive. +"What does the advice of the general of the army amount to," said +Vergniaud, "if it is not law?" Guadet maintained +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P181"></A>181}</SPAN> +that the letter +must be apocryphal. "When Cromwell used such language," said he, +"liberty was at an end in England, and I cannot persuade myself that +the emulator of Washington desires to imitate the conduct of the +Protector. We no longer have a constitution if a general can give us +laws." The allusion to Cromwell produced its effect. The letter, +instead of being published and copies sent to the eighty-three +departments, was merely referred to a committee. +</P> + +<P> +Nevertheless, public opinion was aroused. A reactionary sentiment +against the Jacobins began to show itself. The King might have +profited by it, and found his account in relying upon Lafayette, the +army, and the National Guard. But Louis XVI. was in too much haste. +His resistance, like his concessions, was maladroit and inopportune. +Without having combined his means of defence, consulted with Lafayette, +or having any troops at his disposal, he vetoed the two famous decrees, +June 19, and thus threw himself headlong into the snare. The +Revolution, which had lain in wait for him, would not let its prey +escape. It gave Lafayette no time to arrive, but, without losing a +minute, organized an insurrection for the next day. The royal tree had +been so violently shaken, that it needed, or so they thought, but one +more shock to lay it low and root it out. +</P> + +<P> +On June 16, a request had been presented to the Council-General of the +Commune, asking them to authorize the citizens of the Faubourg +Saint-Antoine +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P182"></A>182}</SPAN> +to assemble in arms on June 20, the anniversary of +the oath of the Jeu de Paume, and present a petition to the Assembly +and the King. The Council had passed to the order of the day, but the +petitioners declared that they would assemble notwithstanding. On the +19th, the Directory of the department, which on all occasions had shown +itself inimical to agitators, and which was presided over by the Duke +de La Rochefoucauld, issued an order forbidding all armed gatherings, +and enjoining the commandant-general and the mayor to take all +necessary measures for dispersing them. This order was communicated to +the National Assembly by the Minister of the Interior at the evening +session. +</P> + +<P> +"It is important," said a deputy, "that the Assembly should know the +decrees of the administrative bodies when they tend to assure public +tranquillity. Nobody is ignorant that at this moment the people are +greatly agitated. Nobody is ignorant that to-morrow threatens to be a +day of violence." Vergniaud replied: "I do not know whether or not +to-morrow is to be a day of troubles, but I cannot understand how M. +Becquet, who is always so constitutional" (here there was laughter and +applause), "how M. Becquet, by an inversion of law and order, desires +the National Assembly to occupy itself with police regulations." The +decree of the Directory was read, nevertheless. But the Assembly, far +from supporting it, passed to the order of the day. The rioters had +nothing to fear. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P183"></A>183}</SPAN> + +<P> +During the same session, a deputation of citizens from Marseilles had +been presented at the bar of the Assembly. The orator of this +deputation thus expressed himself: "French liberty is in danger. The +free men of the South are ready to march in its defence. The day of +the people's wrath has come at last. The people, whom they have always +sought to ruin or enslave, are tired of parrying blows. They want to +inflict them, and to annihilate conspiracies. It is time for the +people to rise. This lion, generous but enraged, is about to quit his +repose, and spring upon the pack of conspirators." Here the galleries +applauded furiously. The orator continued: "The popular force is your +force; employ it. No quarter, since you can expect none." The +applause and enthusiastic cries of the galleries redoubled. Somebody +demanded that the speech should be sent to the eighty-three departments +of France. A deputy, M. Rouher, was courageous enough to exclaim: "It +is not by the harangues of seditious persons that the departments +should be instructed!" Another deputy, M. Lecointre-Puyravaux, +responded: "Is it surprising that men born under a burning sun should +have a more ardent imagination and a patriotism more energetic than +ours?" The question whether the discourse should be sent to the +departments was put to vote, and the president and secretaries declared +that the Assembly had decided against it. This did not suit the public +in the galleries. They howled, they vociferated. They claimed that +the result was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P184"></A>184}</SPAN> +doubtful. They demanded a viva voce count. This +demand alarmed those deputies who never dared to look the Revolution in +the face. A new vote was taken, and this time, the sending of the +address to the eighty-three departments was decreed. With such an +Assembly, why should the insurrectionists have hesitated? +</P> + +<P> +The rioters of the next day did not hesitate a moment. The order of +the Directory had somewhat intimidated them. But Chabot, the deputy so +celebrated for his violence at the Jacobin Club, hastened to reassure +them. "To-morrow," said he, "you will be received with open arms by +the National Assembly. People count on you." The Faubourg +Saint-Antoine was in commotion. Condorcet said, in speaking of the +anxieties expressed by the ministers: "Is it not fine to see the +Executive asking legislators to provide means of action! Let them save +themselves; that is their business!" +</P> + +<P> +The Most Christian King is treated like the Divine Master. Pétion, +mayor of Paris, is to play the rôle of Pontius Pilate. He washes his +hands of all that is to happen. He orders the battalions of National +Guards under arms for the following day, not in order to oppose the +march of the columns of the people, but to fraternize with the +petitioners, and act as escort to the insurrection. This equivocal +measure, he thinks, will set him right with both the Directory and the +populace. To one he says: "I am watching," and to the other, "I am +with you." +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P185"></A>185}</SPAN> +The rioters count on Pétion as anarchy counts on +weakness. He is precisely the magistrate that suits the faubourgs when +they resort to violent measures. A last conventicle was held at the +house of Santerre the brewer, chief of battalion of the National Guard +of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, on the night of June 19-20. It broke up +at midnight. All was ready. The leaders of the insurrection repaired +each to his post. They summoned their loyal adherents, and sent them +about in small detachments to assemble and mass together the working +classes, as soon as they should leave their houses in the morning. +Santerre had declared that the National Guard could offer no opposition +to the rioters. "Rest easy," said he to the conspirators; "Pétion will +be there." Louis XVI. no longer feigned not to notice the danger. +"Who knows," said he during the night to M. de Malesherbes, with a +melancholy smile, "who knows if I shall see the sun set to-morrow?" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap18"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P186"></A>186}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XVIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE MORNING OF JUNE TWENTIETH. +</H4> + +<P> +It is Wednesday, June 20, 1792, the anniversary of the oath of the Jeu +de Paume. The signal is given. The faubourgs assemble. It is five in +the morning. Santerre, on horseback, is at the Place de la Bastille, +at the head of a popular staff. The army of rioters forms slowly. +Some anxiety is shown at first. The departmental decree forbidding +armed gatherings had been posted, and occasioned some reflection in the +timid. But Santerre reassures them. He tells them that the National +Guard will not be ordered to oppose their march, and that they may +count on Pétion's complicity. +</P> + +<P> +When the march toward the National Assembly begins, hardly more than +fifteen hundred are in line. But the little band increases as it goes. +The route lies through rues Saint-Antoine, de la Verrerie, des +Lombards, de la Ferronnerie, and Saint-Honoré. The procession is +headed by soldiers, after whom comes a great poplar stretched upon a +wagon. It is the Liberty tree. According to some, it is to be planted +in the courtyard of the Riding School, opposite the Assembly chamber; +according to others, on the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P187"></A>187}</SPAN> +terrace of the Tuileries, before the +principal door of the palace. A military band plays the <I>Ça ira</I>, +which is chanted in chorus by the insurrectionary troop. No obstacle +impedes their march. The torrent swells incessantly. The inquisitive +mingle with the bandits. Some are in uniform, some in rags; there are +soldiers, active and disabled, National Guards, workmen, and beggars. +Harlots in dirty silk gowns join the contingent from studios, garrets, +and robbers' dens, and gangs of ragpickers unite with butchers from the +slaughter-houses. Pikes, lances, spits, masons' hammers, paviors' +crowbars, kitchen utensils,—their equipment is oddity itself. +</P> + +<P> +It is noon. The session of the Assembly has just been opened. At this +hour the throng, now numbering some twenty thousand persons, enters the +rue Saint-Honoré. The Directory of the Department of Paris demands +admission to the bar on pressing business, and the municipal +attorney-general, Roederer, begins to speak. Heeding neither the +murmurs of the galleries, the disapprobation of part of the Assembly, +nor the clamor sure to be raised against him that evening in the +Jacobin and Cordelier clubs, he boldly announces what is going on. He +reminds them of the law, and the decrees forbidding armed gatherings +which have been issued by the Commune and the Department. He adds +that, without such prohibitions, neither the authorities nor private +individuals have any security for their lives. "We demand," cried he, +"to be invested with +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P188"></A>188}</SPAN> +complete responsibility; we demand that our +obligation to die for the maintenance of public tranquillity shall in +nowise be diminished." +</P> + +<P> +Vergniaud ascends the platform. He owns that, in principle, the +Assembly is wrong in admitting armed gatherings within its precincts, +but he declares that he thinks it impossible to refuse a permission +accorded to so many others to that which now presents itself. He +believes, moreover, that it could not be dispersed without a resort to +martial law and a renewal of the massacre of the Champ-de-Mars. "It +would be insulting to the citizens who are now asking to pay their +respects to you," said he, "to suspect them of bad intentions... The +assemblage doubtless does not claim to accompany the citizens who +desire to present a petition to the King. Nevertheless, as a +precaution, I propose that sixty members of the Assembly shall be +commissioned to go to the King and remain near him until this gathering +shall have been dispersed." +</P> + +<P> +The discussion continues. M. Ramond follows Vergniaud. What is going +to happen? What will the insurrectionary column do? Glance for an +instant at the topography of the Assembly and its environs. The +session-chamber is the Hall of the Riding School, which extends to the +terrace of the Feuillants, and occupies the site where the rue de +Rivoli was opened later on, almost at the corner of the future rue de +Castiglione. It is a building about one hundred and fifty feet long. +In front of it is a long and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P189"></A>189}</SPAN> +narrow courtyard beginning very near +the rue de Dauphin. It is entered through this courtyard, which a +wall, afterwards replaced by a grating, separates from the terrace of +the Feuillants. It may be entered at the other extremity, also, at the +spot where the flight of steps facing the Place Vendôme was afterwards +built. From the side of the courtyard it can be approached by +carriages, but from the other, only by pedestrians who cross the narrow +passage of the Feuillants, which starts from the rue Saint-Honoré, +opposite the Place Vendôme, and leads to the garden of the Tuileries. +This passage is bordered on the right by the convent of the Capuchins; +on the left is the Riding School, almost at the spot where the passage +opens into the Tuileries Garden by a door which had just been closed, +and before which had been placed a cannon and a battalion of National +Guards. +</P> + +<P> +On reaching the rue Saint-Honoré, the crowd had taken good care not to +enter the court of the Riding School, where they might have been +arrested and disarmed. They preferred to follow the rue Saint-Honoré +and take the passage conducting thence to the Assembly and the terrace +of the Feuillants. Three municipal officers who had gone to the +Tuileries Garden, passed through this passage before the crowd, and met +the advancing column at the door of the Assembly, just as M. Ramond was +in the tribune discussing Vergniaud's proposition. While the head of +the column was awaiting the issue of this discussion, the rank and file +were constantly advancing. The +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P190"></A>190}</SPAN> +passage became so thronged that +people were in danger of stifling. Part of them withdrew from the +crowd and went into the garden of the Capuchin convent, where they +amused themselves by planting the Liberty tree in the classic ground of +monkish ignorance and idleness, as was said in those days. The +remainder, which was in front of the door and the grating of the +terrace of the Feuillants, became exasperated. The sight of the +glittering bayonets, and the cannon placed in front of this grating, +roused them to fury. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, a letter from Santerre reached the president of the National +Assembly: "Gentlemen," said he, "I have received a letter from the +commandant of the National Guard, which announces that the gathering +amounts to eight thousand men, and that they demand admission to the +bar of the chamber."—"Since there are eight thousand of them," cried a +deputy, "and since we are only seven hundred and forty-five, I move +that we adjourn the session and go away." +</P> + +<P> +Santerre's letter is thus expressed: "Mr. President, the inhabitants of +the Faubourg Saint-Antoine are celebrating to-day the anniversary of +the oath of the <I>Jeu de Paume</I>. They have been calumniated before you; +they ask to be admitted to the bar; they will confound their cowardly +detractors for the second time, and prove that they are still the men +of July 14." It was applauded by a large number of the Assembly. On +the other side murmurs rose against it. M. Ramond +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P191"></A>191}</SPAN> +went on with +his speech: "Eight thousand men, they say, are awaiting your decision. +You owe it to twenty-five millions of other men who await it with no +less interest.... Certainly, I shall never fear to see the citizens of +Paris in our midst, nor the entire French people around us. No one +could behold with greater pleasure than I the weapons which are a +terror to the enemies of liberty; but the law and the authorities have +spoken. Let the petitioners, therefore, lay down at the entrance of +the sanctuary the arms they are forbidden to bear within it. You ought +to insist on this. They ought to obey." +</P> + +<P> +M. Ramond's courage did not last long. Passing to Vergniaud's proposal +to send sixty members of the Assembly to the Tuileries, he said: "I +applaud the motive which prompted this proposition. But, convinced +that there is nothing to be feared by any person from the citizens of +Paris, I regard the motion as insulting to them." +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, the noise at the door redoubles; the petitioners are growing +impatient. Guadet rises to demand that they shall come in with their +arms. It is plain that the Gironde has taken the riot under its +patronage. After some disorderly and violent debate, it is resolved +that the president shall put the question: Are the petitioners to be +admitted to the bar? They do not yet decide this other: Shall the +armed citizens defile before the Assembly after they have been heard? +The first question is answered in the affirmative. The delegates of +the crowd are +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P192"></A>192}</SPAN> +admitted to the bar. They make their entry into +the Assembly between one and two in the afternoon. +</P> + +<P> +Their orator is a person named Huguenin, who will preside a few weeks +later at the Council of the Commune during the September massacres. In +his declamatory harangue he includes every tirade, threat, and insult +current in the streets. "We demand," said he, "that you should find +out why our armies are inactive. If the executive power is the cause, +let it be abolished. The blood of patriots must not flow to satisfy +the pride and ambition of the perfidious palace of the Tuileries." +Here the galleries burst into enthusiastic applause. The orator goes +on: "We complain of the delays of the Superior National Court. Why is +it so slow in bringing down the sword of the law upon the heads of the +guilty? ... Do the enemies of the country imagine that the men of July +14 are sleeping? If they appear to be so, their awakening will be +terrible.... There is no time to dissimulate; the hour is come, blood +will flow, and the tree of Liberty we are about to plant will flourish +in peace." The applause from the galleries redoubles. Huguenin +excites himself to fury: "The image of the country," he shouts, "is the +sole divinity which it shall be permitted to adore. Ought this +divinity, so dear to Frenchmen, to find in its own temple those who +rebel against its worship? Are there any such? Let them show +themselves, these friends of arbitrary power; let them make themselves +known! This is not their +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P193"></A>193}</SPAN> +place! Let them depart from the land +of liberty! Let them go to Coblentz and rejoin the <I>émigrés</I>. There, +their hearts will expand, they will distil their venom, they will +machinate, they will conspire against their country." The orator +concludes by demanding that the armed citizens shall be passed in +review by the Assembly. It was in vain that Stanislas de Girardin +cries, "Do the laws exist no longer, then?" The Assembly capitulates. +Armed citizens are introduced. Twenty thousand men are about to pass +through the session hall. The march is opened by a dozen musicians, +who stop in front of the president's armchair. Then the two leaders of +the manifestation make their appearance: Santerre, king of the fish +markets, idol of the faubourgs, and Saint-Huruge, the deserter from the +aristocracy, the marquis demagogue; Saint-Huruge, cast into the +Bastille for his debts and scandalous behavior, and liberated by the +Revolution; Saint-Huruge, the man of gigantic stature and the strength +of a Hercules, who is the rioter <I>par excellence</I>, and whose stentorian +voice rises above the bellowing of the crowd. +</P> + +<P> +The spectators in the galleries tremble with joy; they stamp on +perceiving both Santerre and Saint-Huruge, sabre in hand and pistols at +the belt. The band plays the <I>Ça ira</I>, the national hymn of the red +caps. Is this an orgy, a masquerade? Look at these rags, these +bizarre costumes, these butcher-boys brandishing their knives, these +tattered women, these drunken harlots who dance and shout; inhale this +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P194"></A>194}</SPAN> +odor of wine and eau-de-vie; behold the ensigns, the banners of +insurrection, the ambulating trophies, the stone table on which are +inscribed the Rights of Man; the placards wherein one reads: "Down with +the veto!" "The people are tired of suffering!" "Liberty or Death!" +"Tremble, tyrant!"; the gibbet from which hangs a doll representing +Marie Antoinette; the ragged breeches surmounting the fashionable +motto: "Live the Sans-Culottes!"; the bleeding heart set upon a pike, +with the inscription, "Heart of an aristocrat!" The procession, which +began about two in the afternoon, is not over until nearly four +o'clock. At this time Santerre repairs to the bar, where he says: "The +citizens of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine came here to express to you +their ardent wishes for the welfare of the country. They beg you to +accept this flag in gratitude for the good will you have shown towards +them." The president responds: "The National Assembly receives your +offering; it invites you to continue to march under the protection of +the law, the safeguard of the country." And then, heedless of the +dangers the King was about to incur, he adjourns the session at +half-past four in the afternoon. +</P> + +<P> +What is going to happen? Will the armed citizens return peaceably to +their homes? Or, not content with their promenade to the Assembly, +will they make another to the palace of the Tuileries? What +preparations have been made for its defence? Ten battalions line the +terrace facing the palace. Two +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P195"></A>195}</SPAN> +others are on the terrace at the +water side, four on the side of the Carrousel. There are two companies +of gendarmes before the door of the Royal Court; four on the Place +Louis XVI., to guard the passage of the Orangery, opposite rue +Saint-Florentin. Here, there might have been serious means of defence. +But Louis XVI. is a sovereign who does not defend himself. Two +municipal officers, MM. Boucher-Saint-Sauveur and Mouchet, had just +approached him: "My colleagues and myself," said M. Mouchet to him, +"have observed with pain that the Tuileries were closed the very +instant the cortège made its appearance. The people, crowded into the +passage of the Feuillants, were all the more dissatisfied because they +could see through the wicket that there were persons in the garden. We +ourselves, Sire, were very much affected at seeing cannon pointed at +the people. It is urgent that Your Majesty should order the gates of +the Tuileries to be opened." +</P> + +<P> +After hesitating slightly, Louis XVI. ended by replying: "I consent +that the door of the Feuillants shall be opened; but on condition that +you make the procession march across the length of the terrace and go +out by the courtyard gate of the Riding School, without descending into +the garden." +</P> + +<P> +This was one of the King's illusions. While he was parleying with the +two municipal officers the armed citizens had passed in review before +the Assembly. They had just left the session hall by a door leading +into the courtyard. Once in this +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P196"></A>196}</SPAN> +courtyard, the intervention of +some municipal officers caused the entrance known as the Dauphin's +door, opposite the street of the same name, to be opened for them. It +was by this that they entered the Tuileries Garden, while it was the +wish of Louis XVI. that they should pass out through it from the +terrace of the Feuillants. There they are, then, in the garden, having +made an irruption there instead of continuing their route through rue +Saint-Honoré. Here they come along the terrace in front of the palace, +on which several battalions of the National Guard are stationed. The +crowd passes quickly before these battalions. Some of the guards unfix +their bayonets; others present arms, as if to do honor to the riot. +Having passed through the garden, the columns of the people go out +through the gate before the Pont-Royal. They pass up the quay, and +through the Louvre wickets, and so into the Place Carrousel, which is +cut up by a multitude of streets, a sort of covered ways very suitable +to facilitate the attack. +</P> + +<P> +Certain municipal officers make some slight efforts to quiet the +assailants; others, on the contrary, do what they can to embolden and +excite them. The four battalions at the entrance of the Carrousel, and +the two companies of gendarmes posted before the door of the Royal +Court, make no resistance. The rioters, who have invaded the +Carrousel, find their march obstructed by the closing of this door. +Santerre and Saint-Huruge, who had been the last to leave the National +Assembly, make their appearance, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P197"></A>197}</SPAN> +raging with anger. They rail at +the people for not having penetrated into the palace. "That is all we +came for," say they. Santerre, before the door of the Royal Court—one +of the three courtyards in front of the palace, opposite the +Carrousel—summons his cannoneers. "I am going," he cries, "to open +the doors with cannon-balls." +</P> + +<P> +Some royalist officers of the National Guard seek vainly to defend the +palace. No one heeds them. The door of the Royal Court opens its two +leaves. The crowd presses through. No more dike to the torrent; the +gendarmes set their caps on the ends of their sabres, and cry: "Live +the nation!" The thing is done; the palace is invaded. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap19"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P198"></A>198}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE INVASION OF THE TUILERIES. +</H4> + +<P> +It is nearly four o'clock in the afternoon. The invasion of the +Tuileries is beginning. Let us glance at the palace and get a notion +of the apartments through which the crowd are about to rush. On +approaching it by way of the Carrousel, one comes first to three +courtyards: that of the Princes, in front of the Pavilion of Flora; the +Royal Court, before the Pavilion of the Horloge; and the Swiss Court, +before the Pavilion of Marsan. The assailants enter by the Royal +Court, pass into the palace through the vestibule of the Horloge +Pavilion, and climb the great staircase. On the left of this are the +large apartments of the first story:— +</P> + +<P> +1. The Hall of the Hundred Swiss (the future Hall of the Marshals); +</P> + +<P> +2. The Hall of the Guards (the future Hall of the First Consul); +</P> + +<P> +3. The King's Antechamber (the future Salon d'Apollon); +</P> + +<P> +4. The State Bedchamber (the future Throne-room); +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P199"></A>199}</SPAN> + +<P> +5. The King's Grand Cabinet (called later the Salon of Louis XIV.); +</P> + +<P> +6. The Gallery of Diana. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +There are a battalion and two companies of gendarmes in the palace, as +well as the guards then on duty and those they had relieved. But as no +orders are given to these troops, they either break their ranks or +fraternize with the enemy. No obstacle, no resistance, is offered, and +nobody defends the apartments. The assailants, who have taken a cannon +as far as the first story, enter the Hall of the Hundred Swiss, whose +doors are neither locked nor barricaded. They penetrate into the Hall +of the Guards with the same ease. But when they try to make their way +into the OEil-de-Boeuf, or King's Antechamber, the locked door of this +apartment arrests their progress. This exasperates them, and one of +the panels is soon broken. +</P> + +<P> +Where is Louis XVI. when the invasion begins? In his bedroom with his +family. It communicates with the Grand Cabinet, and has windows +commanding a view of the garden. M. Acloque, chief of the second +legion of the National Guard, and a faithful royalist, hastens to the +King by way of the little staircase leading from the Princes' Court to +the royal chamber, in order to tell him what has happened. He finds +the door locked; he knocks, gives his name, urgently demands +admittance, and obtains it. He advises Louis XVI. to show himself to +the people. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P200"></A>200}</SPAN> +The King, whom no peril has ever frightened, does +not hesitate to follow this advice. The Queen wishes to accompany her +husband; but she is opposed in this and forcibly drawn into the +Dauphin's chamber, which is near that of Louis XVI. Happier than the +Queen,—these are her own words,—Madame Elisabeth finds nobody to tear +her from the King. She takes hold of the skirts of her brother's coat. +Nothing could separate them. +</P> + +<P> +Louis XVI. passes into the Great Cabinet, thence into the State +Bedchamber, and through it into the OEil-de-Boeuf, where he will +presently receive the crowd. He is surrounded at this moment by Madame +Elisabeth, three of his ministers (MM. de Beaulieu, de Lajard, and +Terrier de Montciel), the old Marshal de Mouchy, Chevalier de Canolle, +M. d'Hervilly, M. Guinguerlet, lieutenant-colonel of the unmounted +gendarmes, and M. de Vainfrais, also an officer of gendarmes. Some +grenadiers of the National Guard afterwards arrive through the Great +Cabinet and the State Bedchamber. "Come here! four grenadiers of the +National Guard!" cries the King. One of them says, "Sire, do not be +afraid."—"I am not afraid," replies the King; "put your hand on my +heart; it is pure and tranquil." And taking the grenadier's hand he +presses it forcibly against his breast. The grenadier is a tailor +named Jean Lalanne. Later, under the Terror, by a decree of the 12th +Messidor, Year II., he will be condemned to death for having—so runs +the sentence—"displayed the character of a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P201"></A>201}</SPAN> +cringing valet of the +tyrant, in boasting before several citizens that Capet, taking his hand +and laying it on his heart, had said to him, 'Feel, my friend, whether +it palpitates.'" +</P> + +<P> +"Gentlemen, save the King!" cries Madame Elisabeth. Meanwhile, the +crowd is still in the next apartment, the Hall of the Guards. They are +battering away with hatchets and gun-stocks at the door which opens +into the King's Antechamber. Nothing but a partition separates Louis +XVI. from the assailants. He orders the door to be opened. The crowd +rush in. "Here I am," says Louis XVI. calmly; "I have never deviated +from the Constitution." +</P> + +<P> +"Citizens," says Acloque, "recognize your King and respect him; the law +commands you to do so. We will all perish rather than suffer him to +receive the slightest harm." M. de Canolle cries: "Long live the +nation! Long live the King!" This cry is not repeated. Some one begs +Madame Elisabeth to retire. "I will not leave the King," she replies, +"I will not leave him." Those who surround Louis XVI. make a rampart +for him of their bodies. The crowd becomes immense. It is proposed to +the King that he stand on a bench in the embrasure of the central +window, from which there is a view of the courtyard. Other benches and +a table are placed in front of him. Madame Elisabeth takes a bench in +the next window with M. de Marsilly. The hall is full. Groans, +atrocious threats, and gross insults resound on every side. Some one +shouts: "Down with the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P202"></A>202}</SPAN> +veto! To the devil with the veto! Recall +the patriot ministers! Let him sign, or we will not go out of here!" +The butcher Legendre comes forward. He asks permission to speak. +Silence is obtained, and, addressing the King, he says: "Monsieur." At +this unusual title, Louis XVI. make a gesture of surprise. "Yes, +Monsieur," goes on Legendre, "listen to us; it is your duty to listen +to us.... You are a traitor. You have always deceived us, and you +deceive us still; the measure is full, and the people are tired of +being made your laughing-stock." The insolent butcher, who calls +himself the agent of the people, then reads a pretended petition which +is a mere tissue of recriminations and threats. Louis XVI. listens +with imperturbable sang-froid. He answers simply: "I will do what the +Constitution and the decrees ordain that I shall do." The noise begins +anew. It is a rain, a hail of insults. +</P> + +<P> +Some individuals mistake Madame Elisabeth for Marie Antoinette. Her +equerry, M. de Saint-Pardoux, throws himself between her and the +furious wretches, who cry: "Ah! there is the Austrian woman; we must +have the Austrian!" and undeceives them by naming her.—"Why did you +not allow them to believe I am the Queen?" says the courageous +Princess; "perhaps you might have averted a greater crime." And, +putting aside a bayonet which almost touches her breast, "Take care, +Monsieur," she says gently, "you might hurt somebody, and I am sure you +would be sorry to do that." +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P203"></A>203}</SPAN> +The shouts redouble. The confusion +becomes terrible. It is with great difficulty that some grenadiers of +the National Guard defend the embrasure of the window where Louis XVI. +still stands immovable on his bench. Mingled with the crowd there are +inoffensive persons, who have come merely out of curiosity, and even +honest men who sincerely pity the King. But there are tigers and +assassins as well. One of them, armed with a club ending in a +sword-blade, tries to thrust it into the King's heart. The grenadiers +parry the blow with their bayonets. A market porter struggles long to +reach Louis XVI., against whom he brandishes a sabre. Several times +the wretched monarch seeks to address the crowd. His voice is lost in +the uproar. A municipal official, M. Mouchet, hoisting himself on the +shoulders of two persons, demands by voice and gesture a moment's +silence for the King and for himself. Vain efforts. The vociferations +of the crowd only increase. Here comes a long pole on the end of which +is a Phrygian cap, a <I>bonnet rouge</I>. The pole is inclined towards M. +Mouchet. M. Mouchet takes the cap and presents it to the King, who, to +please the crowd, puts it on his head. +</P> + +<P> +Is it possible? That man on a bench, with the ignoble cap of a +galley-slave on his head, surrounded by a drunken and tattered rabble +who vomit filthy language, that man the King of France and Navarre, the +most Christian King, Louis XVI.? Go back to the day of the coronation, +June 11, 1775. It is +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P204"></A>204}</SPAN> +just seventeen years and nine days ago! Do +you remember the Cathedral of Rheims, luminous, glittering; the +cardinals, ministers, and marshals of France, the red ribbons, the blue +ribbons, the lay peers with their vests of cloth-of-gold, their violet +ducal mantles lined with ermine; the clerical peers with cope and +cross? Do you remember the King taking Charlemagne's sword in his +hand, and then prostrating himself before the altar on a great +kneeling-cushion of velvet sown with golden lilies? Do you see him +vested by the grand-chamberlain with the tunic, the dalmatica, and the +ermine-lined mantle which represent the vestments of a sub-deacon, +deacon, and priest, because the King is not merely a sovereign, but a +pontiff? Do you see him seizing the royal sceptre, that golden sceptre +set with oriental pearls, and carvings representing the great +Carlovingian Emperor on a throne adorned with lions and eagles? Do you +remember the pealing of the bells, the chords of the organ, the blare +of trumpets, the clouds of incense, the birds flying in the nave? +</P> + +<P> +And now, instead of the coronation the pillory; instead of the crown +the hideous red cap; instead of hymns and murmurs of admiration and +respect,—insults, the buffoonery of the fish-market, shouts of +contempt and hatred, threats of murder. Ah! the time is not far +distant when a Conventionist will break the vial containing the sacred +oil on the pavement of the Abbey of Saint Remi. How slippery is the +swift descent, the fatal descent by which a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P205"></A>205}</SPAN> +sovereign who disarms +himself glides down from the heights of power and glory to the depths +of opprobrium and sorrow! There he is! Not content with putting the +red bonnet on his head, he keeps it there, and mumming in the Jacobin +coiffure, he cries: "Long live the nation!" The crowd find the +spectacle amusing. A National Guard, to whom some one has passed a +bottle of wine, offers the complaisant King a drink. Perhaps the wine +is poisoned. No matter; Louis XVI. takes a glass of it. +</P> + +<P> +While all this is going on, two deputies, Isnard and Vergniaud, present +themselves. "Citizens," says the first, "I am Isnard, a deputy. If +what you demand were at once granted, it might be thought you extorted +it by force. In the name of the law and the National Assembly, I ask +you to respect the constituted authorities and retire. The National +Assembly will do justice; I will aid thereto with all my power. You +shall obtain satisfaction; I answer for it with my head; but go away." +Vergniaud follows him with similar remarks. Neither is listened to. +Nobody departs. +</P> + +<P> +It is six in the evening. For two hours, one man, exposed to every +insult, has held his own against a multitude. At last Pétion arrives +wearing his mayor's scarf. The crowd draws back. "Sire," says he, "I +have just this instant learned the situation you were in."—"That is +very astonishing," returns Louis XVI.; "for it has lasted two +hours."—"Sire, truly, I was ignorant that there was trouble at the +palace. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P206"></A>206}</SPAN> +As soon as I was informed, I hastened to your side. But +you have nothing to fear; I answer for it that the people will respect +you."—"I fear nothing," replies the King. "Moreover, I have not been +in any danger, since I was surrounded by the National Guard." +</P> + +<P> +Pétion, like Pontius Pilate, pretends indifference. A municipal +officer, M. Champion, reminds him of his duties, and says with +firmness: "Order the people to retire; order them in the name of the +law; we are threatened with great danger, and you must speak." At last +Pétion decides to intervene. "Citizens," he says, "all you who are +listening to me, came to present legally your petition to the +hereditary representative of the nation, and you have done so with the +dignity and majesty of a free people; return now to your homes, for you +can desire nothing further. Your demand will doubtless be reiterated +by all the eighty-three departments, and the King will grant your +prayer. Retire, and do not, by remaining longer, give occasion to the +public enemies to impugn your worthy intentions." +</P> + +<P> +At first this discourse of the mayor of Paris produces but slight +effect. The cries and threats continue. But, after a while, the +crowd, worn out with shouting, and hungry and thirsty as well, begin to +quiet down a little. The most excited cry: "We are waiting for an +answer from the King. Nothing has been asked of him yet." Others say: +"Listen to the mayor, he is going to speak again; we will +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P207"></A>207}</SPAN> +hear +him." Pétion repeats what he said before: "If you do not wish your +magistrates to be unjustly accused, withdraw." +</P> + +<P> +M. Sergent, administrator of police, who had come with the mayor, asked +if any one has ordered the doors leading from the Grand Cabinet to the +Gallery of Diana to be opened, so as to allow the crowd to pass out by +the small staircase into the Court of the Princes. Louis XVI. +overheard this question. "I have had the apartments opened," said he; +"the people, marching out on the gallery side, will like to see them." +A sentiment of curiosity hastened the movements of the crowd. In order +to go out, they had to pass through the State Bedchamber, the Grand +Cabinet, and the Gallery of Diana. Sergent, standing in front of the +door, leading from the OEil-de-Boeuf to the State Bedchamber, unfastens +his scarf and waving it over his head, cries: "Citizens, this is the +badge of the law; in its name we invite you to retire and follow us." +Pétion says: "The people have done what they ought to do. You have +acted with the pride and dignity of freemen. But there has been enough +of it; let all retire." A double row of National Guards is formed, and +the people pass between them. The return march begins. A few +recalcitrants want to remain, and keep up a cry of "Down with the veto! +Recall the ministers!" But they are swept on by the stream, and follow +the march like all the rest. While they are going out through the door +between the OEil-de-Boeuf and the State +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P208"></A>208}</SPAN> +Bed-chamber, the National +Guard prevents any one from entering on the other side, through the +door connecting the OEil-de-Boeuf with the Hall of the Guards. +</P> + +<P> +At this moment, a deputation of twenty-four members of the Assembly +present themselves. Roused by the public clamor announcing that the +King's life is in danger, the National Assembly has called an +extraordinary evening session. The president of the deputation, M. +Brunk, says to the King: "Sire, the National Assembly sends us to +assure ourselves of your situation, to protect the constitutional +liberty you should enjoy, and to share your danger." Louis XVI. +replies: "I am grateful for the solicitude of the Assembly; I am +undisturbed in the midst of Frenchmen." At the same time, Pétion goes +to turn back the crowd, who are constantly ascending the great +staircase, and who threaten another invasion. The sentry at the +doorway of the OEil-de-Boeuf is replaced, and the crowd ceases to flock +thither. The circle of National Guards about the sovereign is +increased. A space is formed, and he is surrounded by the deputation +from the Assembly. Acloque, seeing that the tumult is lessening and +the room no longer encumbered by the crowd, proposes to the King that +he should retire, and Louis XVI. decides to do so. Surrounded by +deputies and National Guards, he passes into the State Bedchamber, and +notwithstanding the throng, he manages to reach a secret door at the +right of the bed, near the chimney, which communicates with his +bedroom. He goes through this little door, and some one closes it +behind him. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P209"></A>209}</SPAN> + +<P> +It is not far from eight o'clock in the evening. The peril and +humiliation of Louis XVI. have lasted nearly four hours, and the +unhappy King is not yet at the end of his sufferings, for he does not +know what has become of his wife and children. While these sad scenes +had been enacting in the palace, a furious populace had been in +incessant commotion beneath the windows, in the garden and the +courtyards. People desiring to establish communication between those +down stairs and those above, had been heard to cry: "Have they been +struck down? Are they dead? Throw us down their heads!" +</P> + +<P> +A slender young man, with the profile of a Roman medal, a pale +complexion, and flashing eyes, was looking at all this from the upper +part of the terrace beside the water. Unable to comprehend the +long-suffering of Louis XVI., he said in an indignant tone: "How could +they have allowed this rabble to enter? They should have swept out +four or five hundred of them with cannon, and the rest would have run." +The man who spoke thus, obscure and hidden in the crowd, opposite that +palace where he was to play so great a part, was the "straight-haired +Corsican," the future Emperor Napoleon. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap20"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P210"></A>210}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +MARIE ANTOINETTE ON JUNE TWENTIETH. +</H4> + +<P> +Louis XVI. had just entered his bedchamber. The crowd, after leaving +the hall of the OEil-de-Boeuf, had departed through the State +Bedchamber, and the King's Great Cabinet, called also the Council Hall. +On entering this last apartment, an unexpected scene had surprised +them. Behind the large table they saw the Queen, Madame Elisabeth, the +Dauphin, and Madame Royale. +</P> + +<P> +How came the Queen to be there? What had happened? At a quarter of +four, when Louis XVI. had left his room to go into the hall of the +Bull's-Eye and meet the rioters, Marie Antoinette, as we have already +said, made desperate efforts to follow him. M. Aubier, placing himself +before the door of the King's chamber, prevented the Queen from going +out. In vain she cried: "Let me pass; my place is beside the King; I +will join him and perish with him if it must be." M. Aubier, through +devotion, disobeyed her. Nevertheless, the Queen, whose courage +redoubled her strength, would have borne down this faithful servant if +M. Rougeville, a chevalier of Saint-Louis, had not aided him to block +up the passage. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P211"></A>211}</SPAN> +Imploring Marie Antoinette in the name of her +own safety and that of the King, not to expose herself needlessly to +poniards, and aided by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, they drew her +almost by force into the chamber of the Dauphin, which was near the +King's. MM. de Choiseul, d'Haussonville, and de Saint-Priest, assisted +by several grenadiers of the National Guard, afterwards induced her to +go with her children into the Grand Cabinet of the King, called also +the Council Hall, because the ministers were accustomed to assemble +there. +</P> + +<P> +The Princess de Lamballe, the Princess of Tarento, the Marchioness de +Tourzel, the Duchesses de Luynes, de Duras, de Maillé, the Marchioness +de Laroche-Aymon, Madame de Soucy, the Baroness de Mackau, the Countess +de Ginestous, remained with the Queen. So also did the Minister +Chambonas, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts d'Haussonville and de +Montmorin, Viscount de Saint-Priest, Marquis de Champcenetz, and +General de Wittenghoff, commander of the 17th military division. The +Queen and her children occupied the embrasure of a window, and the +large and heavy table used by the ministerial council was placed in +front of them as a sort of barricade. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, Marie Antoinette's apartments and her bedroom on the +ground-floor were invaded. Some National Guards tried vainly to defend +them. "You are cutting your own throats!" shouted the people. +Overwhelmed by numbers, they saw the door of the first apartment broken +down by hatchets. It +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P212"></A>212}</SPAN> +contained the beds of the Queen's servants, +ranged behind screens. Afterwards they saw the invaders go into Marie +Antoinette's sleeping-room, tear the clothes off her bed, and loll upon +it, crying as they did so, "We will have the Austrian woman, dead or +alive!" +</P> + +<P> +The Queen, however, remained in the Council Hall, where she could hear +the echo of the cries resounding in that of the OEil-de-Boeuf, where +Louis XVI. was, and from which she was separated only by the State +Bedchamber. Toward seven in the evening she beheld Madame Elisabeth, +who, after heroically sharing the dangers of the King, had now found +means to rejoin her. "The deputies who came to us," she wrote to +Madame de Raigecourt, July 3, "had come out of good will. A veritable +deputation arrived and persuaded the King to go back to his own +apartments. As I was told this, and as I was unwilling to be left in +the crowd, I went away about an hour before he did, and rejoined the +Queen: you can imagine with what pleasure I embraced her." In their +perils, therefore, Madame Elisabeth was near both Louis XVI. and Marie +Antoinette. +</P> + +<P> +After having voluntarily exposed herself to all the anguish of the +invasion of the OEil-de-Boeuf, the courageous Princess was with the +Queen in the Council Hall, when the crowd, coming through the State +Bed-chamber, arrived there. The horde marched through it, carrying +their barbarous inscriptions like so many ferocious standards. "One of +these," says Madame +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P213"></A>213}</SPAN> +Campan in her Memoirs, "represented a gibbet +from which an ugly doll was hanging; below it was written: 'Marie +Antoinette to the lamp-post!' Another was a plank to which a bullock's +heart had been fastened, surrounded by the words: 'Heart of Louis XVI.' +Finally, a third presented a pair of bullock's horns with an indecent +motto." Some royalist grenadiers belonging to the battalion called the +<I>Filles-Saint-Thomas</I>, were near the council-table and protected the +Queen. Marie Antoinette was standing, and held her daughter's hand. +The Dauphin sat on the table in front of her. At the moment when the +march began, a woman threw a red cap on this table and cried out that +it must be placed on the Queen's head. M. de Wittenghoff, his hand +trembling with indignation, took the cap and after holding it for a +moment over Marie Antoinette's head, put it back on the table. Then a +cry was raised: "The red cap for the Prince Royal! Tri-colored ribbons +for little Veto!" Ribbons were thrown down beside the Phrygian cap. +Some one shouted: "If you love the nation, set the red cap on your +son's head." The Queen made an affirmative sign, and the revolutionary +coiffure was set on the child's fair head. +</P> + +<P> +What humiliations were these for the unhappy mother! What anguish for +so haughty, so magnanimous a queen! The galley-slave's cap has touched +the head of the daughter of Cæsars, and now soils the forehead of her +son! The slang of the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P214"></A>214}</SPAN> +fish-markets resounds beneath the +venerable arches of the palace. How bitterly the unfortunate sovereign +expiates her former triumphs! Where are the ovations and the +apotheoses, the carriages of gold and crystal, the solemn entries into +the city in its gala dress, to the sound of bells and trumpets? What +trace remains of those brilliant days when, more goddess than woman, +the Queen of France and Navarre appeared through a cloud of incense, in +the midst of flowers and light? This good and beautiful sovereign, +whose least smile, or glance, or nod, had been regarded as a precious +recompense, a supreme favor by the noble lords and ladies who bent +respectfully before her, behold how she is treated now! Consider the +costumes and the language of her new courtiers! And yet, Marie +Antoinette is majestic still. Even in this horrible scene, in presence +of these drunken women and ragged suburbans, she does not lose that +gift of pleasing which is her special dower. At a distance they curse +her; but when they come near they are subjugated by her spell. Her +most ferocious enemies are touched in their own despite. A young girl +had just called her "<I>Autrichienné</I>." "You call me an Austrian woman," +replied she, "but I am the wife of the King of France, I am the mother +of the Dauphin; I am a Frenchwoman by my sentiments as wife and mother. +I shall never again see the land where I was born. I can be happy or +unhappy nowhere but in France. I was happy when you loved me." +Confused by this gentle +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P215"></A>215}</SPAN> +reproach, the young girl softened. +"Pardon me," she said; "it was because I did not know you; I see very +well now that you are not wicked." A woman, passing, stopped before +the Queen and began to sob. "What is the matter with her?" asked +Santerre; "what is she crying about?" And he shook her by the arm, +saying: "Make her pass on, she is drunk." Even Santerre himself felt +Marie Antoinette's influence. "Madame," he said to her, "the people +wish you no harm. Your friends deceive you; you have nothing to fear, +and I am going to prove it by serving as your shield." It was he who +took pity on the Dauphin whom the heat was stifling, and said: "Take +the red cap off the child; he is too hot." He too, it was, that +hastened the march of the procession and pointed out to the people the +different members of the royal family by name, saying: "This is the +Queen, this is her son, this her daughter, this Madame Elisabeth." +</P> + +<P> +At last the crowd is gone. The hall is empty. It is eight o'clock. +The Queen and her children enter the King's chamber. Louis XVI., who +finds them once more after so many perils and emotions, covers them +with kisses. In the midst of this pathetic scene some deputies arrive. +Marie Antoinette shows them the traces of violence which the people +have left behind them,—locks broken, hinges forced off, wainscoting +burst through, furniture ruined. She speaks of the dangers that have +threatened the King and the insults offered to herself. Perceiving +that Merlin de +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P216"></A>216}</SPAN> +Thionville, an ardent Jacobin, has tears in his +eyes, she says: "You are weeping to see the King and his family so +cruelly treated by people whom he has always desired to render happy." +The republican answered: "Yes, Madame, I weep, but it is for the +misfortunes of the mother of a family, not for the King and Queen; I +hate kings and queens." A deputy accosted Marie Antoinette, saying in +a familiar tone: "You were very much afraid, Madame, you must admit." +"No, Monsieur," she replied, "I was not at all afraid; but I suffered +much in being separated from the King at a moment when his life was in +danger. At least, I had the consolation of being with my children and +performing one of my duties." "Without pretending to excuse +everything, agree, Madame, that the people showed themselves very +good-natured." "The King and I, Monsieur, are convinced of the natural +goodness of the people; it is only when they are misled that they are +wicked."—"How old is Mademoiselle?" went on the deputy, pointing to +Madame Royale.—"She is at that age, Monsieur, when one feels only too +great a horror of such scenes." +</P> + +<P> +Other deputies surround the Dauphin. They question him on different +subjects, especially concerning the geography of France and its new +territorial division into departments and districts, and are enchanted +by the correctness of his replies. +</P> + +<P> +An officer of Chasseurs of the National Guard enters the King's +chamber. This officer had shown +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P217"></A>217}</SPAN> +the utmost zeal in protecting +his sovereign and had had the honor of being wounded at his side. He +is congratulated. The Dauphin perceives him. "What is the name of +that guard who defended my father so bravely?" he asks.—"Monseigneur," +replies M. Hue, "I do not know; he will be flattered if you ask him." +The Prince runs to put his question to the officer, but the latter, in +respectful terms, declines to answer. Then M. Hue insists. "I beg +you," he cries, "tell us your name."—"I ought to conceal my name," +replies the officer; "unfortunately for me, it is the same as that of +an execrable man." The faithful royalist bore the same name as the man +who had caused the arrest of the royal family at Varennes the previous +year. He was called Drouot. +</P> + +<P> +The hour for repose has come at last. It is ten o'clock. Certain +individuals still complain: "They took us there for nothing; but we +will go back and have what we want." Still, the storm is over. The +crowd has evacuated the palace, the courtyards, and the garden. The +Assembly closes its sessions at half-past ten. Pétion said there: "The +King has no cause of complaint against the citizens who marched before +him. He has said as much to the deputies and magistrates." Finally, +as the deputies were about to separate after this exciting day, one of +them, M. Guyton-Morveau, remarked: "The deputation which preceded us, +has doubtless announced to you that all is now tranquil. We remained +with the King for some time, and saw nothing which could +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P218"></A>218}</SPAN> +inspire +the least alarm. We invited the King to seek some repose. He sent an +officer of the National Guard to visit the posts, and the officer +reported that there was nobody in the palace. His Majesty assured us +that he desired to remain alone; we left him; and we can certify to you +that all is quiet." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap21"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P219"></A>219}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE MORROW OF JUNE TWENTIETH. +</H4> + +<P> +In the morning of June 21 there were still some disorderly gatherings +in front of the Tuileries. On awaking, the Dauphin put this artless +question to the Queen: "Mamma, is it yesterday still?" Alas! yes, it +was still yesterday, it was always to be yesterday until the +catastrophes at the end of the drama. It was just a year to a day +since the royal family had furtively quitted Paris to begin the fatal +journey which terminated at Varennes. This souvenir occurred to Marie +Antoinette, and, recalling the first stations of her Calvary, the +unfortunate sovereign told herself that her humiliations had but just +begun. Her lips had touched only the brim of the chalice, and it must +be drained to the dregs. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, visitors were arriving at the Tuileries one after another to +condole with and protest their fidelity to the King and his family. +When Marshal de Mouchy made his appearance, the worthy old man was +received with the honors due to his noble conduct on the previous day. +When the invasion began, Louis XVI., in order not to irritate the +rabble, had given his gentlemen a formal order to withdraw, but +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P220"></A>220}</SPAN> +the old marshal, hoping that his great age (he was seventy-seven) would +excuse his presence in the palace, had refused to leave his master. +More than once, with a strength rejuvenated by devotion, he had +succeeded in repulsing persons whose violence made him tremble for the +King's life. As soon as she saw the marshal, Marie Antoinette made +haste to say: "I have learned from the King how courageously you +defended him yesterday. I share his gratitude."—"Madame," he replied, +alluding to those of his relatives who had figured among the promoters +of the Revolution, "I did very little in comparison with the injuries I +should like to repair. They were not mine, but they touch me very +nearly."—"My son," said the Queen, calling the Dauphin, "repeat before +the marshal, the prayer you addressed to God this morning for the +King." The child, kneeling down, put his hands together, and looking +up to heaven, began to sing this refrain from the opera of <I>Pierre le +Grand</I>:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<I> +Ciel, entends la prière<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Qu'ici je fais:</SPAN><BR> +Conserve un si bon père<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">A ses sujets.[<A NAME="chap21fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap21fn1">1</A>]</SPAN><BR> +</I> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +After the Marshal de Mouchy came M. de Malesherbes. Contrary to his +usual custom, the ex-first +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P221"></A>221}</SPAN> +president wore his sword. "It is a +long time," some one said to him, "since you have worn a +sword."—"True," replied the old man, "but who would not arm when the +King's life is in danger?" Then, looking with emotion at the little +Prince, he said to Marie Antoinette: "I hope, Madame, that at least our +children will see better days!" +</P> + +<P> +And yet, even for the present there still remained a glimmer of hope. +Hardly had the invaders left the palace than invectives against them +rose from all classes of society. The calmness and courage of the King +and his family found admirers on every side. The departments sent +addresses demanding the punishment of those who had been guilty. +Royalist sentiments woke to life anew. One might almost believe that +the indignation caused by the recent scandals would produce an +immediate reaction in favor of Louis XVI. Possibly, with an energetic +sovereign, something might have been attempted. On the whole, the +insurrection had obtained nothing. Even the Girondins perceived the +dangerous character of revolutionary passions. Honest men stigmatized +the criminal tendencies which had just displayed themselves. It was +the moment for the King to show himself and strike a great blow. But +Louis XVI. had neither will nor energy. Letting the last chance of +safety which fortune offered him escape, he was unable to profit by the +turn in public opinion. Nothing could shake him out of that easy +patience which was the chief cause of his ruin. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P222"></A>222}</SPAN> + +<P> +Marie Antoinette herself was opposed to vigorous measures. She still +desired to try the effects of kindness. Learning that a legal inquiry +was proposed into the events of June 20, and foreseeing that M. Hue +would be called as a witness, she said to this loyal servant: "Say as +little in your deposition as truth will permit. I recommend you, on +the King's part and my own, to forget that we were the objects of these +popular movements. Every suspicion that either the King or myself feel +the least resentment for what happened must be avoided; it is not the +people who are guilty, and even if it were, they would always obtain +pardon and forgetfulness of their errors from us." +</P> + +<P> +During this time the Assembly maintained an attitude more than +equivocal. It contained a great number of honest men. But, terrorized +already, it no longer possessed the courage of indignation. It grew +pale before the menaces of the public. By cringing to the rabble it +had attained that hypocritical optimism which is the distinctive mark +of moderate revolutionists, and which makes them in turn the dupes and +the victims of those who are more zealous. +</P> + +<P> +If the majority of the deputies had said openly what they silently +thought, they would not have hesitated to stigmatize the invasion of +the Tuileries as it deserved. But in that case, what would have become +of their popularity with the pikemen? And then, must they not take +into account the ambitions of the Girondins, the hatreds of the +Mountain party, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P223"></A>223}</SPAN> +and the rancor of Madame Roland and her friends? +Was it not, moreover, a real satisfaction to the bourgeoisie to give +power a lesson and humiliate a sovereign? Ah! how cruelly this +pleasure will be expiated by those who take delight in it, and how they +will repent some day for having permitted justice, law, and authority +to be trampled under foot! +</P> + +<P> +When the session of June 21 opened, Deputy Daverhoult denounced in +energetic terms the violence of the previous day. Thuriot exclaimed: +"Are we expected to press an inquiry against forty thousand men?" +Duranton, the Minister of Justice, then read a letter from the King, +dated that day, and worded thus: "Gentlemen, the National Assembly is +already acquainted with the events of yesterday. Paris is doubtless in +consternation; France will hear the news with astonishment and grief. +I was much affected by the zeal shown for me by the National Assembly +on this occasion. I leave to its prudence the task of investigating +the causes of this event, weighing its circumstances, and taking the +necessary measures to maintain the Constitution and assure the +inviolability and constitutional liberty of the hereditary +representative of the nation. For my part, nothing can prevent me, at +all times and under all circumstances, from performing the duties +imposed on me by the Constitution, which I have accepted in the true +interests of the French nation." +</P> + +<P> +A few moments after this letter had been read, the session was +disturbed by a warning from the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P224"></A>224}</SPAN> +municipal agent of the +department, to the effect that an armed crowd were marching towards the +palace. This was soon followed by tidings that Pétion had hindered +their further advance, and the mayor himself came to the Assembly to +receive the laudations of his friends. "Order reigns everywhere," said +he; "all precautions have been taken. The magistrates have done their +duty; they will always do so, and the hour approaches when justice will +be rendered them." +</P> + +<P> +Pétion then went to the Tuileries, where he addressed the King nearly +in these terms:— +</P> + +<P> +"Sire, we learn that you have been warned of the arrival of a crowd at +the palace. We come to announce that this crowd is composed of unarmed +citizens who wish to set up a may-pole. I know, Sire, that the +municipality has been calumniated; but its conduct will be understood +by you."—"It ought to be by all France," responded Louis XVI.; "I +accuse no one in particular, I saw everything."—"It will be," returned +the mayor; "and but for the prudent measures taken by the municipality, +much more disagreeable events might have occurred." The King attempted +to reply, but Pétion, without listening to him, went on: "Not to your +own person; you may well understand that it will always be respected." +The King, unaccustomed to interruption when speaking, said in a loud +voice: "Be silent!" There was silence for an instant, and then Louis +XVI. added: "Is it what you call respecting +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P225"></A>225}</SPAN> +my person to enter my +house in arms, break down my doors and use force to my +guards?"—"Sire," answered Pétion, "I know the extent of my duties and +of my responsibility."—"Do your duty!" replied Louis XVI.; "You are +answerable for the tranquillity of Paris. Adieu!" And the King turned +his back on the mayor. +</P> + +<P> +Pétion revenged himself that very evening, by circulating a rumor that +the royal family were preparing to escape; in consequence, he requested +the commanders of the National Guard to re-enforce the sentries and +redouble their vigilance. The revolutionists, who had been +disconcerted for a moment by popular indignation, raised their heads +again. Prudhomme wrote in the <I>Révolutions de Paris</I>: "The Parisian +people—yes, the people, not the aristocratic class of citizens—have +just set a grand example to France. The King, at the instigation of +Lafayette, discharged his patriotic ministers; he paralyzed by his veto +the decree relative to the camp of twenty thousand men, and that on the +banishment of priests. Very well! the people rose and signified to him +their sovereign will that the ministers should be reinstated and these +two murderous vetoes recalled.... Doubtless it will not be long before +Europe will be full of a caricature representing Louis XVI. of the big +paunch, covered with orders, crowned with a red cap, and drinking out +of the same bottle with the <I>sans-culottes</I>, who are crying: 'The King +is drinking, the King has drunk. He has the liberty +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P226"></A>226}</SPAN> +cap on his +head.' Would he might have it in his heart!" +</P> + +<P> +Apropos of this red bonnet which remained for three hours on the +sovereign's head, Bertrand de Molleville ventured to put some questions +to Louis XVI. on the evening of June 21. According to the Memoirs of +the former Minister of Marine, this is what the King replied: "The +cries of 'Long live the Nation' increasing in violence and seeming to +be addressed to me, I answered that the nation had no better friend +than I. Then an ill-looking man, thrusting himself through the crowd, +came close to me and said in a rude tone: 'Very well! if you are +telling the truth, prove it to us by putting on this red cap.' 'I +consent,' said I. Instantly one or two of these people advanced and +placed the cap on my hair, for it was too small for my head to enter +it. I was convinced, I don't know why, that their intention was simply +to place this cap on my head and then retire, and I was so preoccupied +with what was going on before my eyes, that I did not notice whether it +was there or not. So little did I feel it that after I had returned to +my chamber I did not observe that I still wore it until I was told. I +was greatly astonished to find it on my head, and was all the more +displeased because I could have taken it off at once without the least +difficulty. But I am convinced that if I had hesitated to receive it, +the drunken man by whom it was presented would have thrust his pike +into my stomach." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P227"></A>227}</SPAN> + +<P> +During the same interview Bertrand de Molleville congratulated the King +upon his almost miraculous escape from the dangers of the previous day. +Louis XVI. replied: "All my anxieties were for the Queen, my children +and my sister; because I feared nothing for myself."—"But it seems to +me," rejoined his interlocutor, "that this insurrection was aimed +chiefly against Your Majesty."—"I know it very well," returned Louis +XVI.; "I saw clearly that they wanted to assassinate me, and I don't +know why they did not do it; but I shall not escape them another day. +So I have gained nothing; it is all the same whether I am assassinated +now or two months from now!"—"Great God!" cried Bertrand de +Molleville, "does Your Majesty believe that you will be +assassinated?"—"I am convinced of it," replied the King; "I have +expected it for a long time and have accustomed myself to the thought. +Do you think I am afraid of death?"—"Certainly not, but I would desire +Your Majesty to take vigorous measures to protect yourself from +danger."—"It is possible," went on the King after a moment of +reflection, "that I may escape. There are many odds against me, and I +am not lucky. If I were alone I would risk one more attempt. Ah! if +my wife and children were not with me, people should see that I am not +so weak as they fancy. What would be their fate if the measures you +propose to me did not succeed?"—"But if they assassinate Your Majesty, +do you think that the Queen and her children would be in less +danger?"—"Yes, I think +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P228"></A>228}</SPAN> +so, and even were it otherwise, I should +not have to reproach myself with being the cause." +</P> + +<P> +A sort of Christian fanaticism had taken possession of the King's soul. +Resigned to his fate, he ceased to struggle, and wrote to his +confessor: "Come to see me to-day; I have done with men; I want nothing +now but heaven." +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap21fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap21fn1text">1</A>] Listen, heaven, to the prayer<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">That here I make:</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Preserve so good a father</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">To his subjects.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap22"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P229"></A>229}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +LAFAYETTE IN PARIS. +</H4> + +<P> +One of the greatest griefs of a political career is disenchantment. To +pass from devout optimism to profound discouragement; to have treated +as alarmists or cowards whoever perceived the least cloud on the +horizon, and then to see the most formidable tempests unchained; to be +obliged to recognize at one's proper cost that one has carried illusion +to the verge of simplicity and has judged neither men nor things +aright; to have heard distressed passengers saying that a pilot without +experience or prudence is responsible for the shipwreck; to have +promised the age of gold and suddenly found one's self in the age of +iron, is a veritable torture for the pride and the conscience of a +statesman. And this torture is still more cruel when to disappointment +is added the loss of a popularity laboriously acquired; when, having +been accustomed to excite nothing but enthusiasm and applause, one is +all at once greeted with criticism, howls, and curses, and when, having +long strutted about triumphantly on the summits of the Capitol, one +sees yawning before him the gulf at the foot of the Tarpeian rock. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P230"></A>230}</SPAN> + +<P> +Such was the fate of Lafayette. A few months had sufficed to throw +down the popular idol from his pedestal, and the same persons who had +once almost burned incense before him, now thought of nothing but +flinging him into the gutter. Stunned by his fall, Lafayette could not +believe it. To familiarize himself with the fickleness, the caprices, +and the inconsequence of the multitude was impossible. For him the +Constitution was the sacred ark, and he did not believe that the very +men who had constructed this edifice at such a cost had now nothing so +much at heart as to destroy it. He would not admit that the +predictions of the royalists were about to be accomplished in every +point, and still desired to hold aloof from the complicities into which +revolutions drag the most upright minds and the most honest characters. +He who, in July, 1789, had not been able to prevent the assassination +of Foulon and Berthier; who, on October 5, had marched, despite +himself, against Versailles; who, on April 18, 1791, had been unable to +protect the departure of the royal family to Saint Cloud; who, on the +following June 21, had thought himself obliged to say to the Jacobins +in their club: "I have come to rejoin you, because I think the true +patriots are here," nevertheless imagined that just a year later, all +that was necessary to vanquish the same Jacobins was for him to show +himself and say like Cæsar: "<I>Veni, vidi, vici</I>." +</P> + +<P> +It was only a later illusion of the generous but imprudent man who had +already dreamed many +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P231"></A>231}</SPAN> +dreams. He thought the popular tiger could +be muzzled by persuasion. He was going to make a <I>coup d'état</I>, not in +deeds, but in words, forgetting that the Revolution neither esteems nor +fears anything but force. As M. de Larmartime has said: "One gets from +factions only what one snatches." Instead of striking, Lafayette was +going to speak and write. The Jacobins might have feared his sword; +they despised his words and pen. But though it was not very wise, the +noble audacity with which the hero of America came spontaneously to +throw himself into the heat of the struggle and utter his protest in +the name of right and honor, was none the less an act of courage. +While with the army, that asylum of generous ideas, the sentiments on +which his ancestors had prided themselves rekindled in his heart. +Memories of his early youth revived anew. Doubtless he also recalled +his personal obligations to Louis XVI. On his return from the United +States, had he not been created major-general over the heads of a +multitude of older officers? Had not the Queen accorded him at that +epoch the most flattering eulogies? Had he not been received at the +great receptions of May 29, 1785, when any other officer unless highly +born would have remained in the OEil-de-Boeuf or paid his court in the +passage of the chapel? Had he not accepted the rank of +lieutenant-general from the King, on June 30, 1791? The gentleman +reappeared beneath the revolutionist. The humiliation of a throne for +which his ancestors had so often shed their blood +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P232"></A>232}</SPAN> +caused him a +real grief, and it is perhaps regrettable that Louis XVI. should have +refused the hand which his recent adversary extended loyally though +late. +</P> + +<P> +Lafayette was encamped near Bavay with the Army of the North when the +first tidings of June 20 reached him. His soul was roused to +indignation, and he wanted to start at once for Paris to lift his voice +against the Jacobins. Old Marshal Luckner tried in vain to restrain +him by saying that the <I>sans-culottes</I> would have his head. Nothing +could stop him. Placing his army in safety under the cannon of +Maubeuge, he started with no companion but an aide-de-camp. At +Soissons some persons tried to dissuade him from going further by +painting a doleful picture of the dangers to which he would expose +himself. He listened to nobody and went on his way. Reaching Paris in +the night of June 27-28, he alighted at the house of his intimate +friend, the Duke de La Rochefoucauld, who was about to play so +honorable a part. As soon as morning came, Lafayette was at the door +of the National Assembly, asking permission to offer the homage of his +respect. This authorization having been granted, he entered the hall. +The right applauded; the left kept silence. Being allowed to speak, he +declared that he was the author of the letter to the Assembly of June +16, whose authenticity had been denied, and that he openly avowed +responsibility for it. He then expressed himself in the sincerest +terms concerning the outrages committed in +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P233"></A>233}</SPAN> +the palace of the +Tuileries on June 20. He said he had received from the officers, +subalterns, and soldiers of his army a great number of addresses +expressive of their love for the Constitution, their respect for the +authorities, and their patriotic hatred against seditious men of all +parties. He ended by imploring the Assembly to punish the authors or +instigators of the violences committed on June 20, as guilty of treason +against the nation, and to destroy a sect which encroached upon +National Sovereignty, and terrorized citizens, and by their public +debates removed all doubts concerning the atrocity of their projects. +"In my own name and that of all honest men in the kingdom," said he in +conclusion, "I entreat you to take efficacious measures to make all +constitutional authorities respected, particularly your own and that of +the King, and to assure the army that the Constitution will receive no +injury from within, while so many brave Frenchmen are lavishing their +blood to defend it on the frontiers." +</P> + +<P> +Applause from the right and from some of those in the galleries began +anew. The president said: "The National Assembly has sworn to maintain +the Constitution. Faithful to its oath, it will be able to guarantee +it against all attacks. It accords to you the honors of the session." +The general went to take his seat on the right. Deputy Kersaint +observed that his place was on the petitioners' bench. The general +obeyed this hint and sat down modestly on the bench assigned him. +Renewed applause +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P234"></A>234}</SPAN> +ensued. Thereupon Guadet ascended the tribune +and said in an ironic tone: "At the moment when M. Lafayette's presence +in Paris was announced to me, a most consoling idea presented itself. +So we have no more external enemies, thought I; the Austrians are +conquered. This illusion did not last long. Our enemies remain the +same. Our exterior situation is not altered, and yet M. Lafayette is +in Paris! What powerful motives have brought him hither? Our internal +troubles? Does he fear, then, that the National Assembly is not strong +enough to repress them? He constitutes himself the organ of his army +and of honest men. Where are these honest men? How has the army been +able to deliberate?" Guadet concluded thus: "I demand that the +Minister of War be asked whether he gave leave of absence to M. +Lafayette, and that the extraordinary Committee of Twelve make a report +to-morrow on the danger of granting the right of petition to generals." +Ramond, one of the most courageous members of the right, was the next +speaker: "Four days ago," said he, "an armed multitude asked to appear +before you. Positive laws forbade such a thing, and a proclamation +made by the department on the previous day recalled this law and +demanded that it should be put into execution. You paid no attention, +but admitted armed men into your midst. To-day M. Lafayette presents +himself; he is known only by reason of his love of liberty; his life is +a series of combats against despotisms of every sort; he has +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P235"></A>235}</SPAN> +sacrificed his life and fortune to the Revolution. It is against this +man that pretended suspicions are directed and every passion unchained. +Has the National Assembly two weights and measures, then? Certainly, +if respect is to be had to persons, it should be shown to this eldest +son of French liberty." This eulogy exasperated the left. Deputy +Saladin exclaimed: "I ask M. Ramond if he is making M. Lafayette's +funeral oration?" However, the right was still in the majority. After +a long tumult Guadet's motion against Lafayette was rejected by 339 +votes against 234. The general left the Assembly surrounded by a +numerous cortège of deputies and National Guards, and went directly to +the palace of the Tuileries. +</P> + +<P> +It is the decisive moment. The vote just taken may serve as the +starting-point of a conservative reaction if the King will trust +himself to Lafayette. But how will he receive him? The sovereign's +greeting will be polite, but not cordial. The King and Queen say they +are persuaded that there is no safety but in the Constitution. Louis +XVI. adds that he would consider it a very fortunate thing if the +Austrians were beaten without delay. Lafayette is treated with a +courtesy through which suspicion pierces. When he leaves the palace, a +large crowd accompany him to his house and plant a may-pole before the +door. On the next day Louis XVI. was to review four thousand men of +the National Guard. Lafayette had proposed to appear at this review +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P236"></A>236}</SPAN> +beside the King and make a speech in favor of order. But the +court does not desire the general's aid, and takes what measures it can +to defeat this project. Pétion, whom it had preferred to Lafayette as +mayor of Paris, countermands the review an hour before daybreak. +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps Louis XVI. might have succeeded in overcoming his repugnance to +Lafayette and submitted to be rescued by him. But the Queen absolutely +refused to trust the man whom she considered her evil genius. She had +seen him rise like a spectre at every hapless hour. He had brought her +back to Paris a prisoner on the 6th of October. He had been her +jailer. His apparition amid the glare of torches in the Court of the +Carrousel had frozen her with terror when she was flying from her +prison, the Tuileries, to begin the fatal journey to Varennes. His +aides-de-camp had pursued her. He was responsible for her arrest; he +was present at her humiliating and sorrowful return; the sight of his +face, the sound of his voice, made her tremble; she could not hear his +name without a shudder. In vain Madame Elisabeth exclaimed: "Let us +forget the past and throw ourselves into the arms of the only man who +can save the King and his family!" Marie Antoinette's pride revolted +at the thought of owing anything to her former persecutor. Moreover, +in his latest confidential communications with her, Mirabeau had said: +"Madame, be on your guard against Lafayette; if ever he commands the +army, he would like to keep +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P237"></A>237}</SPAN> +the King in his tent." In the +Queen's opinion, to rely on Lafayette would be to accept him as regent +of the palace under a sluggard King. Protector for protector, she +preferred Danton. Danton, who, subsidized from the civil list, accepts +money without knowing whether he will fairly earn it; Danton, who, +while awaiting events, had made the cynical remark that he would "save +the King or kill him." Strange that the orator of the faubourgs +inspired the daughter of Cæsars with less repugnance than the +gentleman, the marquis. "They propose M. de Lafayette as a resource," +she said to Madame Campan; "but it would be better to perish than owe +our safety to the man who has done us most harm." +</P> + +<P> +However, Lafayette was not yet discouraged. He wished to save the +royal family in spite of themselves. He assembled several officers of +the National Guard at his house. He represented to them the dangers +into which the apathy of each plunged the affairs of all; he showed the +urgent necessity of combining against the avowed enterprises of the +anarchists, of inspiring the National Assembly with the firmness +required to repress the intended attacks, and foretold the inevitable +calamities which would result from the weakness and disunion of honest +men. He wanted to march against the Jacobin Club and close it. But, +in consequence of the instructions issued by the court, the royalists +of the National Guard were indisposed to second him in this measure. +Lafayette, having no one on his side but the constitutionals, an +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P238"></A>238}</SPAN> +honest but scanty group who were suspected by both of the extreme +parties, gave up the struggle. The next day, June 30, he beat a hasty +retreat to the army, after writing to the Assembly another letter which +was merely an echo of the first one. A moment since, the Jacobins were +trembling. Now, they are reassured, they triumph. In his <I>Chronique +des Cinquante Jours</I>, Roederer says: "If M. de Lafayette had had the +will and ability to make a bold stroke and seize the dictatorship, +reserving the power to relinquish it after the re-establishment of +order, one could comprehend his coming to the Assembly with the sword +of a dictator at his side; but, to show it only, without resolving to +draw it from the scabbard, was a fatal imprudence. In civil commotions +it will not answer to dare by halves." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap23"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P239"></A>239}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE LAMOURETTE KISS. +</H4> + +<P> +France had still its moments of enthusiasm and illusion before plunging +into the abyss of woes. It seemed under an hallucination, or suffering +from a sort of vertigo. A nameless frenzy, both in good and evil, +agitated and disturbed it beyond measure in 1792, that year so fertile +in surprises and dramas of every kind. Strange and bizarre epoch, full +of love and hatred, launching itself from one extreme to the other with +frightful inconstancy, now weeping with tenderness, and now howling +with rage! Society resembled a drunken man who is sometimes amiable in +his cups, and sometimes cruel. There were sudden halts on the road of +fury, oases in the midst of scorching sands, beneath a sun whose fire +consumed. But the caravan does not rest long beneath the shady trees. +Quickly it resumes its course as if urged by a mysterious force, and +soon the terrible simoom overwhelms and destroys it. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Elisabeth wrote to Madame de Raigecourt, July 8, 1792: "It would +need all Madame de Sévigné's eloquence to describe properly what +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P240"></A>240}</SPAN> +happened yesterday; for it was certainly the most surprising thing, the +most extraordinary, the greatest, the smallest, etc., etc. But, +fortunately, experience may aid comprehension. In a word, here were +Jacobins, Feuillants, republicans, and monarchists, abjuring all their +discords and assembling near the tree of the Constitution and of +liberty, to promise sincerely that they will act in accordance with law +and not depart from it. Luckily, August is coming, the time when, the +leaves being well grown, the tree of liberty will afford a more secure +shelter." +</P> + +<P> +What had happened on the day before Madame Elisabeth wrote this letter? +There had been a very singular session of the Legislative Assembly. In +the morning, a woman named Olympe de Gouges, whose mother was a dealer +in second-hand clothing at Montauban, being consumed with a desire to +be talked about, had caused an emphatic placard to be posted up, in +which she preached concord between all parties. This placard was like +a prologue to the day's session. +</P> + +<P> +Among the deputies there was a certain Abbé Lamourette, the +constitutional bishop of Lyons, who played at religious democracy. He +was an ex-Lazarist who had been professor of theology at the Seminary +at Toul. Weary of the conventual yoke, he had left his order, and at +the beginning of the Revolution was the vicar-general of the diocese of +Arras. He had published several works in which he sought to reconcile +philosophy and religion. Mirabeau was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P241"></A>241}</SPAN> +one of his acolytes and +adopted him as his theologian in ordinary. Finding him fit to +"bishopize" (<I>à evêquailler</I>), to use his own expression, the great +tribune recommended him to the electors of the Rhone department. It +was thus that the Abbé Lamourette became the constitutional bishop of +Lyons. After his consecration, he issued a pastoral instruction in +such agreement with current ideas that Mirabeau, his protector, induced +the Constituent Assembly to have it sent as a model to every department +in France. In 1792, the Abbé Lamourette was fifty years old. Affable, +unctuous, his mouth always full of pacific and gentle words, he naïvely +preached moderation, concord, and fraternity in conversations which +were like so many sermons. +</P> + +<P> +For several days the discussions in the Assembly had been of +unparalleled violence. Suspicion, hatred, rancor, wrath, were +unchained in a fury that bordered on delirium. Right and left emulated +each other in outrages and invectives. Lafayette's appearance and the +fear of a foreign invasion had disturbed all minds. The National +Assembly, sitting both day and night, was like an arena of gladiators +fighting without truce or pity. It was this moment which the good Abbé +Lamourette chose for delivering his most touching sermon from the +tribune. +</P> + +<P> +During the session of July 7, Brissot was about to ascend the tribune +and propose new measures of public safety. Lamourette, getting before +him, asked to be heard on a motion of order. He said +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P242"></A>242}</SPAN> +that of all +the means proposed for arresting the divisions which were destroying +France, but one had been forgotten, and that the only one which could +be efficacious. It was the union of all Frenchmen in one mind, the +reconciliation of all the deputies, without exception. What was to +prevent this? The only irreconcilable things are crime and virtue. +What do all our mistrust and suspicions amount to? One party in the +Assembly attributes to the other a seditious desire to destroy the +monarchy. The others attribute to their colleagues a desire to destroy +constitutional equality and to establish the aristocratic government +known as that of the Two Chambers. These are the disastrous suspicions +which divide the empire. "Very well!" cried the abbé, "let us crush +both the republic and the Two Chambers." The hall rang with unanimous +applause from the Assembly and the galleries. From all sides came +shouts of "Yes, yes, we want nothing but the Constitution." Lamourette +went on: "Let us swear to have but one mind, one sentiment. Let us +swear to sink all our differences and become a homogeneous mass of +freemen formidable both to the spirit of anarchy and that of feudalism. +The moment when foreigners see that we desire one settled thing, and +that we all desire it, will be the moment when liberty will triumph and +France be saved. I ask the president to put to vote this simple +proposition: That those who equally abjure and execrate the republic +and the Two Chambers shall rise." At +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P243"></A>243}</SPAN> +once, as if moved by the +same impulse, the members of the Assembly rose as one man, and swore +enthusiastically never to permit, either by the introduction of the +republican system or by that of the Two Chambers, any alteration +whatsoever in the Constitution. +</P> + +<P> +By a spontaneous movement, the members of the extreme left went towards +the deputies of the right. They were received with open arms, and, in +their turn, the right advanced toward the ranks of the left. All +parties blended. Jaucourt and Merlin, Albite and Ramond, Gensonné and +Calvet, Chabot and Genty, men who ordinarily opposed each other +relentlessly, could be seen sitting on the same bench. As if by +miracle, the Assembly chamber became the temple of Concord. The moved +spectators mingled their acclamations with the oaths of the deputies. +According to the expressions of the <I>Moniteur</I>, serenity and joy were +on all faces, and unction in every heart. +</P> + +<P> +M. Emmery was the next speaker. "When the Assembly is reunited," said +he, "all the powers ought to be so. I ask, therefore, that the +Assembly at once send the King the minutes of its proceedings by a +deputation of twenty-four members." The motion was adopted. +</P> + +<P> +A few minutes later, Louis XVI., followed by the deputation and +surrounded by his ministers, entered the hall. Cries of "Long live the +nation! Long live the King!" resounded from every side. The sovereign +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P244"></A>244}</SPAN> +placed himself near the president, and in a voice that betrayed +emotion, made the following address: "Gentlemen, the spectacle most +affecting to my heart is that of the reunion of all wills for the sake +of the country's safety. I have long desired this salutary moment; my +desire is accomplished. The nation and the King are one. Each of them +has the same end in view. Their reunion will save France. The +Constitution should be the rallying-point for all Frenchmen. We all +ought to defend it. The King will always set the example of so doing." +The president replied: "Sire, this memorable moment, when all +constituted authorities unite, is a signal of joy to the friends of +liberty, and of terror to its enemies. From this union will issue the +force necessary to combat the tyrants combined against us. It is a +sure warrant of liberty." +</P> + +<P> +After prolonged applause a great silence followed. "I own to you, M. +the President," presently said the complaisant Louis XVI., "that I was +longing for the deputation to finish, so that I might hasten to the +Assembly." Applause and cries of "Long live the nation! Long live the +King!" redoubled. What! this monarch now acclaimed is the same prince +against whom Vergniaud hurled invectives a few days ago with the +enthusiastic approbation of the same Assembly! He is the sovereign +whom the Girondin thus addressed: "O King, who doubtless have believed +with Lysander the tyrant that truth is no better than a lie, and that +men must be amused +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P245"></A>245}</SPAN> +with oaths like children with rattles; who +have pretended to love the laws only to preserve the power that will +enable you to defy them; the Constitution only that it may not cast you +from the throne where you must remain in order to destroy it; the +nation only to assure the success of your perfidy by inspiring it with +confidence,—do you think you can impose upon us to-day by hypocritical +protestations?" What has occurred since the day when Vergniaud, +uttering such words as these, was frantically cheered? Nothing. That +day, the weather-cock pointed to anger; to-day to concord. Why? No +one knows. Tired of hating, the Assembly doubtless needed an instant +of relaxation. Violent sentiments end by wearying the souls that +experience them. They must rest and renew their energies in order to +hate better to-morrow. And why say to-morrow? This very evening the +quarrelling, anger, and fury will begin anew. +</P> + +<P> +At half-past three Louis XVI. left the Hall of the Manège, in the midst +of joyful applause from the Assembly and the galleries. During the +evening session discord reappeared. The following letter from the King +was read: "I have just been handed the departmental decree which +provisionally suspends the mayor and the procureur of the Commune of +Paris. As this decree is based on facts which personally concern me, +the first impulse of my heart is to beg the Assembly to decide upon +it." Does any one believe that the Assembly will have the courage to +condemn Pétion and the 20th of June? Not a bit +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P246"></A>246}</SPAN> +of it. It makes +no decision, but passes unanimously from the King's letter to the order +of the day. And what occurs at the clubs? Listen to Billaud-Varennes +at the Jacobins: "They embrace each other at the Assembly," he +exclaims; "it is the kiss of Judas, it is the kiss of Charles IX., +extending his hand to Coligny. They were embracing like this while the +King was preparing for flight on October 6. They were embracing like +this before the massacres of the Champ-de-Mars. They embrace, but are +the court conspiracies coming to an end? Have our enemies ceased their +advance against our frontiers? Is Lafayette the less a traitor?" And +thereupon the cry broke out: "Pétion or death!" The next day, June 8, +at the Assembly, loud applause greeted the orator from a section who +said, concerning the department: "It openly serves the sinister +projects and disastrous conspiracies of a perfidious court. It is the +first link in the immense chain of plots formed against the people. It +is an accomplice in the extravagant projects of this general, who, not +being able to become the hero of liberty, has preferred to make himself +the Don Quixote of the court." A deputy exclaimed: "The acclamations +with which the Assembly has listened to this petition authorize me to +ask its publication: I make an express motion to that effect." And the +publication was decreed. +</P> + +<P> +O poor Lamourette! humanitarian abbé, rose-water revolutionist, of what +avail is your democratic holy water? What have you gained by your +sentimental +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P247"></A>247}</SPAN> +jargon? what do your dreams of evangelical philosophy +and universal brotherhood amount to? Poor constitutional abbé, people +are scoffing already at your sacerdotal unction, your soothing homily! +The very men who, to please you, have sworn to destroy the republic, +will proclaim it two and a half months later. Your famous reunion of +parties, people are already shrugging their shoulders at and calling it +the "<I>baiser d'Amourette, la réconciliation normande</I>": the calf-love +kiss, the pretended reconciliation. They accuse you of having sold +yourself to the court. They ridicule, they flout, and they will kill +you. January 11, 1794, Fouquier-Tinville's prosecuting speech will +punish you for your moderatism. You will carry your head to the +scaffold, and, optimist to the end, you will say: "What is the +guillotine? only a rap on the neck." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap24"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P248"></A>248}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXIV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE FÉTE OF THE FEDERATION IN 1792. +</H4> + +<P> +The fête of the Federation, which was to be celebrated July 14, was +awaited with anxiety. The federates came into Paris full of the most +revolutionary projects. Anxiety and anguish reigned at the Tuileries. +Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, who were to be present in the +Champ-de-Mars, feared to be assassinated there. The Queen's +importunities decided the King to have a plastron made, to ward off a +poniard thrust. Composed of fifteen thicknesses of Italian taffeta, +this plastron consisted of a vest and a large belt. Madame Campan +secretly tried it on the King in the chamber where Marie Antoinette was +lying. Pulling Madame Campan by the dress as far as possible from the +Queen's bed, Louis XVI. whispered: "It is to satisfy her that I yield; +they will not assassinate me; their plan is changed; they will put me +to death in another way." When the King had gone out, the Queen forced +Madame Campan to tell her what he had just said. "I had divined it!" +she exclaimed. "He has said this long time that all that is going on +in France is an imitation of the revolution in England under Charles I. +I begin to dread +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P249"></A>249}</SPAN> +an impeachment for him. As for me, I am a +foreigner, and they will assassinate me. What will become of my poor +children?" And she fell to weeping. Madame Campan tried to administer +a nervine, but the Queen refused it. "Nervous maladies," said she. +"are the ailments of happy women; I no longer have them." Without her +knowledge a sort of corset, in the style of her husband's plastron, had +been made for her. Nothing could induce her to wear it. To those who +implored her with tears to put it on, she replied: "If seditious +persons assassinate me, so much the better; they will deliver me from a +most sorrowful life." +</P> + +<P> +The fête of the Federation was celebrated in 1792 amidst extremely +tragical preoccupations. Things had changed very greatly since the +fête which had excited such enthusiasm two years earlier. On July 14, +1790, the Champ-de-Mars was filled at four o'clock in the morning by a +crowd delirious with joy. At eight o'clock in the morning of July 14, +1792, it was still empty. The people were said to be at the Bastille +witnessing the laying of the first stone of the column to be erected on +the ruins of the famous fortress. On the Champ-de-Mars there was no +magnificent altar served by three hundred priests, no side benches +covered by an innumerable crowd, none of that sincere and ardent joy +which throbbed in every heart two years before. For the fête of 1792, +eighty-three little tents, representing the departments of the kingdom, +had been erected on hillocks of sand. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P250"></A>250}</SPAN> +Before each tent stood a +poplar, so frail that it seemed as if a breath might blow away the tree +and its tri-colored pendant. In the middle of the Champ-de-Mars were +four stretchers covered with canvas painted gray which would have made +a miserable decoration for a boulevard theatre. It was a so-called +tomb, an honorary monument to those who had died or were about to die +on the frontiers. On one side of it was the inscription: "Tremble, +tyrants; we will avenge them!" The Altar of the Country could hardly +be seen. It was formed of a truncated column placed on the top of the +altar steps raised in 1790. Perfumes were burned on the four small +corner altars. Two hundred yards farther off, near the Seine, a large +tree had been set up and named the Tree of Feudalism. From its +branches depended escutcheons, helmets, and blue ribbons interwoven +with chains. This tree rose out of a wood-pile on which lay a heap of +crowns, tiaras, cardinals' hats, Saint Peter's keys, ermine mantles, +doctors' caps, and titles of nobility. A royal crown was among them, +and beside it the escutcheons of the Count de Provence, the Count +d'Artois, and the Prince de Condé. The organizers of the fête hoped to +induce the King himself to set fire to this pile, covered with feudal +emblems. A figure representing Liberty, and another representing Law, +were placed on casters by the aid of which the two divinities were to +be rolled about. Fifty-four pieces of cannon bordered the +Champ-de-Mars on the side next the Seine, and the Phrygian cap crowned +every tree. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P251"></A>251}</SPAN> + +<P> +At eleven in the morning the King and his cortège arrived at the +Military School. A detachment of cavalry opened the march. There were +three carriages. In the first were the Prince de Poix, the Marquis de +Brézé, and the Count de Saint-Priest; in the second, the Queen's +ladies, Mesdames de Tarente, de la Roche-Aymon, de Maillé, and de +Mackau; in the third, the King, the Queen, their two children, and +Madame Elisabeth. The trumpets sounded and the drums beat a salute. A +salvo of artillery announced the arrival of the royal family. The +sovereign's countenance was mild and benevolent. Marie Antoinette +appeared still more majestic than usual. The dignity of her demeanor, +the grace of her children, and the angelic charm of Madame Elisabeth +inspired a tender respect. The little Dauphin wore the uniform of a +National Guard. "He has not deserved the cap yet," said the Queen to +the grenadiers. +</P> + +<P> +The royal family took their places on the balcony of the Military +School, which was covered with a red velvet carpet embroidered with +gold, and watched the popular procession, entering the Champ-de-Mars by +the gate of the rue de Grenelle, and marching towards the Altar of the +Country. What a strange procession! Men, women, children, armed with +pikes, sticks, and hatchets; bands singing the <I>Ça ira</I>; drunken +harlots, adorned with flowers; people from the faubourgs with the +inscription, "Long live Pétion!" chalked on their head-gear; six +legions of National Guards marching pell-mell with the <I>sans-culottes</I>; +red +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P252"></A>252}</SPAN> +caps; placards with devices either ferocious or stupid, like +this one: "Long live the heroes who died in the siege of the Bastille!" +a plan in relief of the celebrated fortress; a travelling +printing-press throwing off copies of the revolutionary manifesto, +which the crowd at first mistook for a little guillotine; a great deal +of noise and shouting,—and there you have the popular cortège. By way +of compensation, the troops of the line and the grenadiers of the +National Guard displayed extremely royalist sentiments. The 104th +regiment of infantry having halted under the balcony, its band played +the air: <I>Où peut-on être mieux qu'au sein de sa famille?</I> (Where is +one better off than in the bosom of his family?) +</P> + +<P> +The moment when Louis XVI. left the Military School to walk to the +Altar of the Country with the National Assembly was not without +solemnity. A certain anxiety was felt by all as to what might happen. +Would Louis XVI. be struck by a ball or by a poniard? What might not +be feared from so many demoniacs, howling like cannibals? The King, +the deputies, the soldiers, the crowd, all pressed against each other +in a solid mass that left no vacant spaces; all was in continual +undulation. Louis XVI. could only advance slowly and with difficulty. +The intervention of the troops was necessary to enable him to reach the +Altar of the Country, where he was to swear allegiance for the second +time to the Constitution whose fragments were to overwhelm his throne. +"It needed the character of Louis XVI.," Madame de +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P253"></A>253}</SPAN> +Staël has +said, "it needed that martyr character which he never belied, to +support such a situation as he did. His gait, his countenance, had +something peculiar to himself; on other occasions one might have wished +he had more grandeur; but at this moment it was enough for him to +remain what he was in order to appear sublime. From a distance I +watched his powdered head in the midst of all those black ones; his +coat, still embroidered as it had been in former days, stood out +against the costumes of the common people who pressed around him. When +he ascended the steps of the altar, one seemed to behold the sacred +victim offering himself in voluntary sacrifice." +</P> + +<P> +The Queen had remained on the balcony of the Military School. From +there she watched through a lorgnette the dangerous progress of the +King. A prey to inexpressible emotion, she remained motionless during +an entire hour, hardly able to breathe on account of excessive anguish. +She used the lorgnette steadily, but at one moment she cried out: "He +has come down two steps!" This cry made all those about her shudder. +The King could not, in fact, reach the summit of the altar, because a +throng of suspicious-looking persons had already taken possession of it. +</P> + +<P> +Deputy Dumas had the presence of mind to cry out: "Attention, +Grenadiers! present arms!" The intimidated <I>sans-culottes</I> remained +quiet, and Louis XVI. took the oath amid the thundering of the cannon +ranged beside the Seine. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P254"></A>254}</SPAN> + +<P> +It was then proposed to the King that he should set fire to the Tree of +Feudalism; it was close to the river and the arms of France were hung +upon it. Louis XVI. spared himself that shame, exclaiming, "There is +no more feudalism!" He returned to the Military School by the way he +came. The 6th legion of the National Guard had not yet marched past +when the cavalry announced the King's approach. This legion, +quickening its pace, was intercepted by the royal escort, and invaded, +not to say routed, by the populace, which from all sides pressed into +its ranks. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile the anguish of Marie Antoinette redoubled. "The expression +of the Queen's face," Madame de Staël says again, "will never be +effaced from my memory. Her eyes were drowned in tears; the splendor +of her toilette, the dignity of her demeanor, contrasted with the +throng that surrounded her. Nothing separated her from the populace +but a few National Guards; the armed men assembled in the Champ-de-Mars +seemed more as if they had come together for a riot than for a +festival." Pétion, who had been reinstated in his functions as mayor +of Paris on the previous day, was the hero of the occasion. They +called him King Pétion, and the cheers which resounded in honor of this +revolutionist were like a funeral knell in the ears of Marie Antoinette. +</P> + +<P> +At last Louis XVI. appeared in front of the Military School. The Queen +experienced a momentary joy in seeing him approach. Rising hastily, +she ran +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P255"></A>255}</SPAN> +down the stairs to meet him. Always calm, the King +tenderly clasped his wife's hand. At once royalist sentiment took +fire. All who were present—National Guards, troops of the line, +Switzers, people in the courts, at the windows, on balconies and +gates—all cried: "Long live the King! Long live the Queen!" The +royal family regained the Tuileries in the midst of acclamations. At +the entrance of the palace enthusiasm deepened. From the Royal Court +to the great stairway of the Horloge Pavilion, the grenadiers of the +National Guard, who had escorted and saved the King, formed into line +with shouts of joy. +</P> + +<P> +"All former souvenirs," says the Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "all +former habits of respect then awoke.... Yes, I saw and observed this +multitude; it was animated with the best sentiments; at heart it was +faithful to its King and crowned him with sincere benedictions. But do +popular love and fidelity afford any support to a tottering throne? He +is mad who can think so. The people will be spectators of the latest +combat and will applaud the victor. And let no one blame them! What +can they do if they are not united, encouraged, and led? The people +behold a few seditious individuals attack a throne, and a few +courageous men defend it; they fear one party and desire the success of +the other. When the struggle is over, they submit and obey. The most +honest of them weep in silence, the timid force themselves to display a +guilty joy in order to escape the hatred of the victors whom they see +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P256"></A>256}</SPAN> +bathing themselves in blood. They think about their families, +their affairs, their means of support. They were not expected to lead +themselves; that duty was imposed on others; have they fulfilled it?" +</P> + +<P> +It is said that during the fête those who were friendly to the King, +amongst the crowd, were awaiting a signal they expected from him. They +hoped that, by the assistance of the Swiss, they could force their way +to the royal family during the confusion of a hand-to-hand affray, and +get them safely out of Paris. But Louis XVI. neither spoke nor acted. +He returned to his palace without having dared anything. And, +nevertheless, there were still many chances of safety open. Imagine +the effect of a haughty bearing, a commanding gesture in place of the +inert attitude habitual to the unfortunate sovereign. Fancy the Most +Christian King, the heir of Louis XIV., on horseback, haranguing the +people in the style of his witty and valiant ancestor, Henry IV.! He +is still King. The troops of the line are faithful. The great +majority of the National Guard are well-disposed towards him. Luckner, +Lafayette, Dumouriez himself, would ask nothing better than to defend +him if he would show a little energy. +</P> + +<P> +The day after the ceremony of July 14, Lafayette was still anxious that +Louis XVI. should leave Paris openly and go to Compiègne, so as to show +France and Europe that he was free. In case of resistance, the general +demanded only fifty loyal cavaliers to take the royal family away. +From Compiègne, picked +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P257"></A>257}</SPAN> +squadrons would conduct them to the midst +of the French army, the asylum of devotion and honor. But Louis XVI. +refused. The last resources remaining to him were to evaporate between +his hands. He will profit neither by the sympathies of all European +courts, which ardently desire his safety; by his civil list, which +might be such an efficacious means of action; nor by the loyalty of his +brave soldiers, who are ready to shed their last drop of blood in his +defence. A large party in the Legislative Assembly would ask nothing +but a signal, providing it were seriously given, to rally with vigor to +the royal cause. He had intrepid champions there whom no menace could +affright, and who on every occasion, no matter how violent or +tumultuous the galleries might be, had braved the storm with heroic +constancy. Public opinion was changing for the better. The schemes +and language of the Jacobins exasperated the mass of honest people. +The provinces were sending addresses of fidelity to the King. +</P> + +<P> +What was lacking to the monarch to enable him to combine so many +scattered elements into a solid group? A little will, a little of that +essential quality, audacity, which, according to Danton, is the last +word of politics. But Louis XVI. has a timorous soul. If he makes one +step forward, he is in haste to make another back. He is scrupulous, +hesitating; he has no confidence in himself or any one else. This +prince, so incontestably courageous, acts as if he were a coward. He +has made so many concessions already that +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P258"></A>258}</SPAN> +the idea of any manner +of resistance seems to him chimerical. Does the fate of Charles I. +make him dread the beginning of civil war as the supreme danger? Does +he fear to imperil the lives of his wife and children by an energetic +deed? Is he expecting foreign aid? Does he think to prove his wisdom +by his patience, and that success will crown delay? Is he so +benevolent, so gentle, that the least thought of repression is +repugnant to him? Does he wish to carry to extremes that pardon of +injuries which is recommended by the Gospel? What is plain is, that he +rejects every firm resolution. +</P> + +<P> +Palliatives, expedients, half-measures, were what suited this honest +but feeble nature. Disturbed by contradictory councils, and no longer +knowing what to desire or what to hope, he looked on at his own +destruction like an unmoved spectator. He was no longer a sovereign +full of the sentiment of his power and his rights, but an almost +unconscious victim of fatality. Example full of startling lessons for +all leaders of state who adopt weakness as a system, and who, under +pretext of benevolence or moderation, no longer know how to foresee, to +will, or to strike! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap25"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P259"></A>259}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE LAST DAYS AT THE TUILERIES. +</H4> + +<P> +During one of the last nights of July, at one o'clock, Madame Campan +was alone near the Queen's bed, when she heard some one walking softly +in the adjoining corridor, which was ordinarily locked at both ends. +Madame Campan summoned the valet-de-chambre, who went into the +corridor; presently the noise of two men fighting reached the ears of +Marie Antoinette. "What a position!" cried the unfortunate Queen. +"Insults by day and assassins by night!" The valet cried: "Madame, it +is a scoundrel whom I know; I am holding him."—"Let him go," said the +Queen. "Open the door for him; he came to assassinate me; he will be +carried in triumph by the Jacobins to-morrow." +</P> + +<P> +People were constantly saying that the Faubourg Saint-Antoine was +getting ready to march against the palace. Marie Antoinette was so +badly guarded, and it was so easy to force an entrance to her apartment +on the ground-floor, opposite the garden, that Madame de Tourzel, her +children's governess, begged her to sleep in the Dauphin's room on the +first floor. The Queen was averse to this step, as she was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P260"></A>260}</SPAN> +unwilling to have any one suspect her uneasiness. But Madame de +Tourzel having shown her that it would be easy to keep the secret of +this change by using the Dauphin's private staircase, she ended by +accepting the proposal so long as the trouble should last. She was so +thoughtful of all those in her service that it cost her much to +incommode them in the least. Finally, she consented to use the bed of +the governess, and a pallet was laid for the latter every evening. +Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel slept on a sofa in an adjoining closet. +As no one in the house suspected that the Queen might have changed her +apartment for the night, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter took +precautionary measures. When the Queen had gone to bed, they rose, and +after making sure that the doors were locked, they shot the inside +bolts. "The closet I occupied served as a passage for the royal family +when they went to supper," says Mademoiselle de Tourzel, afterwards +Madame de Béarn, in her <I>Souvenirs de Quarante Ans</I>; "I went to bed +early; sometimes I pretended to be asleep when the Princes were passing +through, and I saw them approach my sofa, one after another; I heard +their expressions of kindness and good will toward me, and noticed what +care they took not to disturb my slumber." +</P> + +<P> +Poor Marie Antoinette! Could one believe that a Queen of France would +be reduced to keeping a little dog in her bedroom to warn her of the +least noise in her apartment? The Dauphin, delighted to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P261"></A>261}</SPAN> +have his +mother sleep so near him, used to run to her as soon as he awoke, and +clasping her in his little arms would say the most affectionate things. +This was the only moment of the day that brought her any consolation. +</P> + +<P> +By the end of July, both the Queen and her children were obliged to +give up walking in the garden. She had gone out to take the air with +her daughter in the Dauphin's small parterre at the extreme end of the +Tuileries, close to the Place Louis XV. Some federates grossly +insulted her. Four Swiss officers made their way through the crowd, +and placing the Queen and the young Princess between them, brought them +back to the palace. When she reached her apartments, Marie Antoinette +thanked her defenders in the most affecting terms, but she never went +out again. +</P> + +<P> +After June 20, the garden, excepting the terrace of the Feuillants, +which, by a decree of the Assembly, had become a part of its precincts, +had been forbidden to the populace. Posters warned the people to +remain on the terrace and not go down into the garden. The terrace was +called National Ground, and the garden the Land of Coblentz. +Inscriptions apprised passers-by of this novel topography. Tri-colored +ribbons had been tied to the banisters of the staircases by way of +barriers. Placards were fastened at intervals to the trees bordering +the terrace, whereon could be read: "Citizens, respect yourselves; give +the force of bayonets to this feeble barrier. Citizens, do +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P262"></A>262}</SPAN> +not +go into this foreign land, this Coblentz, abode of corruption." The +leaders had such an empire over the crowd that no one disobeyed. And +yet it was the height of summer, the trees offered their verdant shade, +and the King had withdrawn all his guards and opened every gate. +Nobody dared infringe the revolutionary mandate. One young man, paying +no attention, went down into the garden. Furious clamors broke out on +all sides. "To the lamp-post with him!" cried some one on the terrace. +Thereupon the young man, taking off his shoes, drew out his +handkerchief and began to wipe the dust from their soles. People cried +bravo, and he was carried in triumph. +</P> + +<P> +Marie Antoinette could not become resigned to this hatred. Often she +frightened her women by wishing to go out of the palace and address the +people. "Yes," she would cry, her voice trembling, as she walked +quickly to and fro in her chamber, "yes, I will say to them: Frenchmen, +they have had the cruelty to persuade you that I do not love France, I, +the wife of its King and the mother of a Dauphin!" Then, this brief +moment of generous exaltation over, the illusion of being able to move +a nation of insulters quickly vanished. Her life was a daily, hourly +struggle. The wife, the mother, the queen, never ceased to contend +against destiny. She hardly slept or ate; but from the very excess of +danger she drew additional energy, and moral and material force. As +she awoke at daybreak, she required that the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P263"></A>263}</SPAN> +shutters should not +be closed, so that her sleepless nights might be sooner consoled by the +light of morning. The most widely diverse sentiments occupied her +soul. A captive in her palace, she sometimes believed herself +irrevocably condemned by fate, and sometimes hoped for deliverance. +</P> + +<P> +Toward the middle of one of the last nights preceding the 10th of +August, the moon shone into her bedchamber. "In a month," she said to +Madame Campan, "I shall not see that moon unless I am freed from my +chains." But she was not free from anxiety concerning all that might +happen before that. "The King is not a poltroon," she added; "he has +very great passive courage, but he is crushed by a false shame, a doubt +of himself, which arises from his education quite as much as from his +character. He is afraid of commanding; he dreads above everything to +speak to assemblages of men. He lived uneasily and like a child, under +the eyes of Louis XV. until he was twenty, and this constraint has had +an effect on his timidity. In our circumstances, a few clearly spoken +words addressed to the Parisians who are devoted to us would immensely +strengthen our party, but he will not say them." Then Marie Antoinette +explained why she did not put herself forward more: "For my part," said +she, "I could act, and mount a horse if need were; but, if I acted, it +would put weapons into the hands of King's enemies; a general outcry +would be raised in France against the Austrian woman, against female +domination; moreover, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P264"></A>264}</SPAN> +I should reduce the King to nothingness by +showing myself. A queen who is not regent must in such circumstances +remain inactive and prepare to die." +</P> + +<P> +The danger constantly increased. At four in the morning of one of the +last days of July, warning was given at the palace that the faubourgs +were threatening, and would doubtless march against the Tuileries. +Madame Campan went very softly into the Queen's room. For a wonder, +Marie Antoinette was sleeping peacefully and profoundly. Madame Campan +did not rouse her. "You were right," said Louis XVI.; "it is good to +see her take a little rest. Oh! her griefs redouble mine!" At her +waking the Queen, on being informed of what had passed, began to weep, +and said: "Why was I not called?" Madame Campan excused herself by +saying: "It was only a false alarm. Your Majesty needed to repair your +prostrate strength."—"It is not prostrate," quickly replied the +courageous sovereign; "misfortune makes it all the greater. Elisabeth +was with the King, and I was sleeping! I, who wish to perish beside +him! I am his wife; I am not willing that he should incur the least +danger without me!" +</P> + +<P> +On Sunday, August 5,—the last Sunday the royal family were to spend at +the Tuileries,—as they were going to the chapel to hear Mass, half the +National Guards on duty cried: "Long live the King!" The others said: +"No, no; no King, down with the veto!" The same day, at Vespers, the +chanters had agreed to swell their tones greatly, and in a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P265"></A>265}</SPAN> +menacing way, when reciting this versicle of the <I>Magnificat: Deposuit +potentes de sede</I>—"He hath put down the mighty from their seat." In +their turn the royalists, after the <I>Dominum salvum fac regem</I>, cried +thrice, turning as they did so toward the Queen: <I>Et reginam</I>. There +was a continual murmuring all through the divine office. Five days +later, the same chapel was to be a pool of blood. +</P> + +<P> +And yet Madame Elisabeth, always calm and always angelic, still had +illusions. One morning of this terrible month of August, while in her +room in the Pavilion of Flora, she thought she heard some one humming +her favorite air, <I>Pauvre Jacques</I>, beneath her windows. Attracted by +this refrain, which in the midst of sorrow renewed the souvenir of +happier times, she half opened her window and listened attentively. +The words sung were not those of the ballad she loved, yet they were +royalist in sentiment and adapted to the same air. The poor people had +been substituted for poor Jack—the poor people who were pitied for +having a king no longer and for knowing nothing but wretchedness. Such +marks of attachment consoled the virtuous Princess, and made her hope +against all hope. She wrote, August 8, to her friend Madame de +Raigecourt: "They say that the King is going to be turned out of here +somewhat forcibly, and made to lodge in the Hôtel-de-Ville. They say +that there will be a very strong movement to that effect in Paris. Do +you believe it? For my part, I do not. I believe in rumors, but not +in their +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P266"></A>266}</SPAN> +resulting in anything. That is my profession of faith. +For the rest, everything is perfectly quiet to-day. Yesterday passed +in the same way, and I think this one will be like it." On August 9, +the eve of the fatal day, Madame Elisabeth again addressed a reassuring +letter to one of her friends, Madame de Bombelles. Curiously enough +she dated this letter August 10, no doubt by accident, and when Madame +de Bombelles received it, she read these lines, which seem like the +irony of fate: "This day of the 10th, which was to have been so +exciting, so terrible, is as calm as possible; the Assembly has decreed +neither deposition nor suspension." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap26"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P267"></A>267}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXVI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE PROLOGUE TO THE TENTH OF AUGUST. +</H4> + +<P> +The first rumblings of the storm began. People quarrelled and fought +in the Palais Royal, the cafés, and the theatres. Half of the National +Guard sided with the court, and the other half with the people. To +seditious speeches were added songs full of insults to the King and +Queen. These songs, sold on every corner, applauded in every tavern, +and repeated by the wives and children of the people, propagated +revolutionary fury. There was a constant succession of gatherings, +brawls, and riots. The Assembly had declared the country in danger. +Rumors of every sort excited popular imagination. It was said that +priests who refused the oath were in hiding at the Tuileries, which +was, moreover, full of arms and munitions. The Duke of Brunswick's +manifesto exasperated national sentiment. It was read aloud in every +street. The leaders neglected nothing likely to excite the populace, +and prepared their last attack on the throne, their afterpiece of June +20, with as much audacity as skill. +</P> + +<P> +In order to subdue the court, it was necessary to destroy its only +remaining means of defence. To +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P268"></A>268}</SPAN> +leave plenty of elbow-room for +the riot, the Assembly, on July 15, ordered the troops of the line to +be sent some thirty-five miles beyond Paris and kept there. A singular +means was devised for breaking up the choice troops of the National +Guard, who were royalists. They were told that it was contrary to +equality for certain citizens to be more brilliantly equipped than +others; that a bearskin cap humiliated those who were entitled only to +a felt one; and that there was a something aristocratic about the name +of grenadier which was really intolerable to a simple foot-soldier. +The choice troops were dissolved in consequence, and the grenadiers +came to the Assembly like good patriots to lay down their epaulettes +and bearskin caps and assume the red cap. On July 30, the National +Guard was reconstructed, by taking in all the vagabonds and bandits +that the clubs could muster. +</P> + +<P> +The famous federates of Marseilles, who were to take such an active +part in the coming insurrection, arrived in Paris the same day. The +Girondins, having failed to obtain their camp of twenty thousand men +before Paris, had devised instead of it a reunion of federate +volunteers, summoned from every part of France. The roads were at once +thronged by future rioters whom the Assembly allowed thirty cents a day. +</P> + +<P> +The Jacobins of Brest and Marseilles distinguished themselves. Instead +of a handful of volunteers they sent two battalions. That of +Marseilles, recruited by +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P269"></A>269}</SPAN> +Barbaroux, comprised five hundred men +and two pieces of artillery. Starting July 5, it entered Paris July +30. Excited to fanaticism by the sun and the declamations of the +southern clubs, it had run over France, been received under triumphal +arches, and chanted in a sort of frenzy the terrible stanzas of Rouget +de l'Isle's new hymn, the <I>Marseillaise</I>. It was at this time that +Blanc Gilli, deputy from the Bouches du Rhone department to the +Legislative Assembly, wrote: "These pretended Marseillais are the scum +of the jails of Genoa, Piedmont, Sicily, and of all Italy, Spain, the +Archipelago, and Barbary. I run across them every day." Rouget de +l'Isle received from his old mother, a royalist and Catholic at heart, +a letter in which she said: "What is this revolutionary hymn which a +horde of brigands are singing as they pass through France, and in which +your name is mixed up?" At Paris the accents of that terrible melody +sounded like strokes of the tocsin. The men who sang it filled the +conservatives with terror. They wore woollen cockades and insulted as +aristocrats those who wore silk ones. +</P> + +<P> +There was no longer any dike to the torrent. August 1, Louis XVI. +nominated a cabinet composed of loyal men: Joly was Minister of +Justice; Champion de Villeneuve, of the Interior; Bigot de +Sainte-Croix, of Foreign Affairs; Du Bouchage, of the Marine; Leroux de +la Ville, of Public Taxes; and D'Abancourt, of War. But this ministry +was to last only ten days. Certain petitioners at the bar of the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P270"></A>270}</SPAN> +Assembly asked for the deposition of the King in most violent language. +"This measure," says Barbaroux in his Memoirs, "would have carried +Philippe of Orléans to the regency, and therefore his party violently +clamored for it. His creditors, his hirelings, and boon-companions, +Marat and his Cordeliers, all manner of swindlers and insolvent +debtors, thronged public places and incited to this deposition because +they were hungry for money and positions under a regent who was their +tool and their accomplice." +</P> + +<P> +In vain did Louis XVI. display those sentiments of paternal kindness +which had hitherto availed him so little. August 3, he sent a message +to the Assembly, in which he said: "I will uphold national independence +to my latest breath. Personal dangers are nothing compared to public +ones. Oh! what are personal dangers to a King whom men are seeking to +deprive of his people's love? This is the real plague-spot in my +heart. Perhaps the people will some day know how dear their welfare is +to me. How many of my sorrows could be obliterated by the least +evidence of a return to right feeling!" +</P> + +<P> +How did they respond to this conciliatory language? After it had been +read, Pétion, the mayor of Paris, presented himself at the bar, and +read an address from the Council General of the Commune, in which these +words occur: "The chief of the executive power is the first link of the +counter-revolutionary chain.... Through a lingering forbearance, we +would have desired the power to ask you for the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P271"></A>271}</SPAN> +suspension of +Louis XVI., but to this the Constitution is opposed. Louis XVI. +incessantly invokes the Constitution; we invoke it in our turn, and ask +you for his deposition." The next day the municipality distributed +five thousand ball cartridges to the Marseillais, while refusing any to +the National Guards. +</P> + +<P> +Nevertheless, the Girondins still hesitated. Guadet, Vergniaud, and +Gensonné would have declared themselves satisfied if the three +ministers belonging to their party had been reinstated, and on July 29 +they secretly despatched a letter to the sovereign, by Thierry, his +valet-de-chambre, in which they said that, "attached to the interests +of the nation, they would never separate them from those of the King +except in so far as he separated them himself." As to Barbaroux, like +a true visionary, he dreamed of I know not what rose-water +insurrection. "They should not have entered the apartments of the +palace," he has said, "but merely blockaded them. Had this plan been +followed, the blood of Frenchmen and Swiss, ignorant victims of court +perfidy, would not have been shed on the 10th of August, the republic +would have been founded without convulsions or massacres, and we, +corroded by popular gangrene, should not have become the horror of all +nations." The demagogues were not at all certain of success. +Robespierre was to spend the 10th of August in the discreet darkness of +a cellar. Danton was prudently to await the end of the combat before +arming himself with a big sabre and marching at the head of the +Marseilles +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P272"></A>272}</SPAN> +battalion as the hero of the day. Barbaroux says in +his Memoirs that on the 1st, 3d, and 7th of August, Marat implored him +to take him to Marseilles, and that on the evening of the 9th he +renewed this prayer more urgently than ever, adding that he would +disguise himself as a jockey in order to get away. +</P> + +<P> +In spite of their many weaknesses, the majority of the Assembly were +royalists and constitutionalists still. The proof is that on August 8, +in spite of the violent menaces of the galleries, they decided by 406 +against 244 votes, that there was no occasion to impeach Lafayette, so +abhorred by the Jacobins. This vote excited the wrath of the +revolutionists to fury. The conservative deputies were insulted, +pursued, and struck. Several of them barely escaped assassination. +The sessions became stormier from day to day. Not only were the large +galleries of the Assembly overthronged by violent crowds, but the +courtyards, the approaches, and the corridors were obstructed. Many +sat or stood on the exterior entablatures of the high windows. The +upper part of the hall, where the Jacobins sat, received many +strangers, in spite of the often-reiterated opposition of the right. +Below this Mountain sat the members of the centre, the <I>Ventrus</I>. +There were not seats enough for them, and they were crowded up in a +ridiculous manner. At the bottom of the hall, almost entirely +deserted, were the forty-four members of the right. They were easily +marked and counted by their future executioners, who threatened them by +voice and gesture. Every +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P273"></A>273}</SPAN> +day the petitioners who were admitted +to the honors of the session avoided the empty benches of the right and +seated themselves with the Mountain or the centre, where they crowded +still more the already overcrowded deputies. The discussions were like +formidable tempests. "The effect produced by such a spectacle," says +Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "was still greater on those who +entered the hall during one of those terrible moments. I received this +impression several times myself, and it will never be effaced from my +mind; I seek vainly for expressions by which to describe it. Long +afterwards, M. de Caux, then Minister of War, said to me: 'You made the +profoundest impression on me which I ever received in my life. I was +young at the time. I entered the galleries just as you were standing +out against the furious shouts of a part of the deputies and the people +in the galleries.'" +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile the end was approaching. Faithful royalists still proposed +schemes of flight to Louis XVI. Bertrand de Molleville, who is so ill +disposed toward Madame de Staël, says concerning this: "There was +nobody, even to Madame de Staël, who, either in the hope of being +pardoned the injury her intrigues had done the King, or else through +her continual need of intrigue, had not invented some plan of escape +for His Majesty." Louis XVI. declined them all. He would owe nothing +to Lafayette. He relied on the money he had given to Danton and other +demagogues, and hoped that the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P274"></A>274}</SPAN> +insurrectionary bands would be +repulsed by the royalists of the National Guard and the Swiss regiment. +August 8th, in the evening, this fine regiment left its Courbevoie +barracks and arrived at the Tuileries at daybreak next morning. Under +various idle pretexts it had been deprived of its twelve pieces of +artillery, and also of three hundred men who had been given the +commission, true or false as may be, to watch over the transportation +of corn in Normandy. Only seven hundred and fifty, officers and +soldiers, remained; but all of them had said: "We will let ourselves be +killed to the last man rather than fail in honor or betray the sanctity +of our oaths." In company with a handful of noblemen, these were to be +the last defenders of the throne. The fatal hour was approaching. The +section of the Cordeliers had decided that if the Assembly had not +pronounced the King's deposition by the evening of August 9th, the +drums should beat the general alarm at the stroke of midnight, and the +insurrection march against the Tuileries. The revolutionists were to +carry out their plan, and the Swiss to keep their word. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap27"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P275"></A>275}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXVII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE NIGHT OF AUGUST NINTH TO TENTH. +</H4> + +<P> +The night was serene, the sky clear and sown with stars. The calmness +of nature contrasted with the revolutionary passions that had been +unchained. On account of the heat, all the windows of the Tuileries +had been left open, and from a distance the palace could be seen +illuminated as if for a fête. It had just struck midnight. The +Revolution was executing the programme of the Cordeliers' section. The +tocsin was sounding all over the city. Everybody named the church +whose bell he thought he recognized. The people of the faubourgs were +out of bed in their houses. The drums mingled with the tocsin. The +revolutionists beat the general alarm, and the royalists the call to +arms. +</P> + +<P> +No one was asleep at the Tuileries. There was no further question of +etiquette. The night reception in the royal bedchamber was omitted for +the first time. Certain old servitors, faithful guardians of +tradition, in vain recalled that it was not permissible to sit down in +the sovereign's apartments. The courtiers of the last hour seated +themselves in armchairs, on tables and consoles. Louis XVI. stayed +sometimes +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P276"></A>276}</SPAN> +in his chamber and sometimes in his Great Cabinet, also +called the Council Hall, where the assembled ministers received +constant tidings of what was happening without. The pious monarch had +summoned his confessor, Abbé Hébert, and shutting himself up with this +venerable priest, he besought from Heaven the resignation and courage +he needed to pass through the final crisis. Madame Elisabeth showed +the faithful Madame Campan the carnelian pin which fastened her fichu. +These words, surrounding the stalk of a lily, were engraved on it: +"Forget offences, pardon injuries."—"I fear much," said the virtuous +Princess, "that this maxim has little influence over our enemies, but +it must be none the less dear to us." Louis XVI. did not wear his +padded vest. "I consented to do so on the 14th of July," said he, +"because on that day I was merely going to a ceremony where an +assassin's dagger might be apprehended. But on a day when my party may +be forced to fight with the revolutionists, I should think it cowardly +to preserve my life by such means." +</P> + +<P> +Marie Antoinette was grave and tranquil in her heroism. There was +nothing affected about her, nothing theatrical, neither passion, +despair, nor the spirit of revenge. According to the expressions of +Roederer, who never left her, "she was a woman, a mother, a wife in +peril; she feared, she hoped, she grieved, and she took heart again." +She was also a queen, and the daughter of Maria Theresa. Her anxiety +and grief were restrained or concealed by +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P277"></A>277}</SPAN> +her respect for her +rank, her dignity, and her name. When she reappeared amidst the +courtiers in the Council Hall, after having dissolved in tears in +Thierry's room, the redness of her cheeks and eyes had disappeared. +The courtiers said to each other: "What serenity! what courage!" +</P> + +<P> +The struggle might still seem doubtful. Something like two hundred +noblemen who had spontaneously repaired to the King, seven hundred and +fifty Swiss, and nine hundred mounted gendarmes posted at the +approaches of the Tuileries were the last resources of the +commander-in-chief of the French army. The Swiss, who through some +one's extreme imprudence had not cartridges enough, were posted in the +apartments, the chapel, and at the entry of the Royal Court. Baron de +Salis, as the oldest captain of the regiment, commanded at the +stairways. A reserve of three hundred men, under Captain Durler, was +stationed in the Swiss Court, before the Pavilion of Marsan. The +National Guards belonging to the sections <I>Petits-Pères</I> and the +<I>Filles-Saint-Thomas</I> showed themselves well disposed toward the King; +but it was different with the other companies. As to the mounted +gendarmes, Louis XVI. could not count on them, and before the riot +ended they were to join the insurgents in spite of all the efforts made +by their royalist officers. The artillerists of the National Guard, +charged with serving the cannons placed in the courts and before the +palace doors to defend the entry, were to act in the same manner. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P278"></A>278}</SPAN> + +<P> +Like the Swiss, the two hundred noblemen, martyrs to the old French +ideas of honor, had resolved to be loyal unto death. With their silk +coats and drawing-room swords, they seemed as if they had come to a +fête instead of a combat. The servants of the chateau joined them. +Some of them had pistols and blunderbusses. Some, for lack of other +weapons, had taken the tongs from the chimneys. They jested with each +other over their accoutrements. No, no; there was nothing laughable in +these champions of misfortune. They represented the past, with its +ancient fidelity to the altar and the throne. A great poet who had the +spirit of divination, Heinrich Heine, wrote on November 12, 1840, as if +he foresaw February 24, 1848: "The middle classes will possibly make +less resistance than the aristocracy would do in a similar case. Even +in its most pitiable weakness, its enervation by immorality and its +degeneration through flattery, the old nobility was still alive to a +certain point of honor unknown to our middle classes, who have become +prosperous by industry, but who will perish by it also. Another 10th +of August is predicted for these middle classes; but I doubt whether +the industrial Knights of the throne of July will prove themselves as +heroic as the powdered marquises of the old régime who, in silk coats +and flimsy dress swords, opposed the people who invaded the Tuileries." +The greater part of these noblemen, volunteers for the last conflict, +were old men with white hair. There were also children among them. + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P279"></A>279}</SPAN> +M. Mortimer-Ternaux, author of the <I>Histoire de la Terreur</I>, has +remarked: "Was not this a time to exclaim with Racine:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'See what avengers arm themselves for the quarrel?'<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Who could have told Louis XIV., when in the midst of the splendors of +his court he was present at the performance of <I>Athalie</I>, that the poet +was predicting, through the mouth of Joad, the fate reserved for his +great-grandson?" The royalist National Guards who were in the +apartments considered the volunteer noblemen as companions in arms. +They shook hands with each other amid cries of "Long live the King! +Long live the National Guard!" But the troops outside did not share +these sentiments. Jealous of the royalists assembled in the palace, +they wanted to have them sent out. A regimental commander having come +to make known this desire to Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette exclaimed: +"Nothing can separate us from these gentlemen; they are our most +faithful friends. They will share the dangers of the National Guard. +They will obey us. Put them at the cannon's mouth, and they will show +you how men die for their King." +</P> + +<P> +Meantime what had become of Pétion, whose business it was, as mayor, to +defend the palace? Summoned to the Tuileries, he arrived there at +eleven in the evening. As Louis XVI. said to him: "It seems there is a +great deal of commotion?"—"Yes, sire," he replied, "the excitement is +great." And he +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P280"></A>280}</SPAN> +enlarged upon the measures he claimed that he had +taken, and his pretended haste to wait upon the King. In going out, he +came face to face with M. de Mandat, who, as general-in-chief of the +National Guard, was in command of all military forces. "Why," +exclaimed he, "have the police refused cartridges to the National Guard +when they have wasted them on the Marseillais? My men have only four +charges apiece; some of them have not one. No matter; I answer for +everything; my measures are taken, providing I am authorized, by an +order signed by you, to repel force by force." Not daring to avow his +complicity with the riot, Pétion signed the order demanded. Then he +made his escape under pretext of inspecting the gardens, and fell +amongst some royalist National Guards, who reprimanded him severely. +He began to fear being kept at the Tuileries as a hostage, to guarantee +the palace against the attempts of the populace, and went to the +Assembly. It had adjourned at ten o'clock the evening before, but on +account of the crisis had met again at two in the morning. The +Assembly knew the gravity of the danger as well as the King did; but +through a ridiculous and culpable point of honor, it affected not to +recognize it, and devoted to the reading of a colonial report the +moments it should have employed in saving that Constitution it had +sworn to maintain. Pétion merely put in an appearance in the Hall of +the Manège. But he took good care not to return to the Tuileries. At +half-past three in the morning the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P281"></A>281}</SPAN> +rolling of a carriage was +heard from the palace. It was that of the mayor, going back empty. He +had not dared to get into it, and had only sent his coachman an order +to return when he found himself in safety at the mayoralty, whither he +had made his way on foot. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile, some hundred unknown individuals, who gathered at the +Hôtel-de-Ville, and surreptitiously made their way into one of the +halls, had formed an insurrectionary Commune. On their own authority +they appointed commissaries of sections, and dismissed the staff of the +National Guard, who were very much in their way; but retained in office +Manuel as procurator and Pétion as mayor. This new municipality, whose +very existence was unknown at the palace, had just learned that Mandat, +general-in-chief of the National Guard, had a document in his pocket by +which Pétion authorized him to oppose force to force. It was necessary +to get rid of this document at any cost. The municipality sent Mandat +an order to come to the Hôtel-de-Ville. He knew nothing about the +revolution that had just taken place there. And yet he hesitated to +obey. A secret presentiment took possession of his soul. Finally, at +the instance of Roederer, he decided, towards five in the morning, to +leave the Tuileries and go to that Hôtel-de-Ville, which was to be so +fatal to him. When he came before the municipality he was surprised to +see new faces. +</P> + +<P> +He was accused of having intended to disperse "the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P282"></A>282}</SPAN> +innocent and +patriotic column of the people," and sentenced to be taken to the Abbey +prison. It was a sentence of death. Mandat was massacred on the steps +of the Hôtel-de-Ville. A pistol-shot brought him down. Pikes and +sabres finished him. His body was thrown into the Seine. Such was the +first exploit of the new Commune. It preluded thus the massacres of +September. "Mandat's death," says Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, +"was, beyond any doubt, the chief cause of the calamities of the day. +If he had attacked the rebels as soon as they came near the palace, he +could have dispersed them with ease. They took a long time to form and +set off; and, being undecided and uneasy, they often halted. No troop +marching from a given point in this immense city knew whether it was +seconded by the rebels from other quarters, and lost much time in +making sure." The second exploit of the Commune was to confine Pétion +at the mayoralty under the guard of six men. A voluntary captive, this +accomplice of the insurrection rejoiced at a measure which sheltered +him from every danger. As M. Mortimer-Ternaux has observed: "On this +fatal night, when the passion of the royalty was fulfilled, Pétion +doubled the parts of Judas and Pontius Pilate. Like Judas, he went at +nightfall to give the kiss of peace to Louis XVI. by assuring him of +his loyalty; like the Roman governor, he proclaimed at daybreak the +impotence with which he had stricken himself, and washed his hands of +all that was to happen." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P283"></A>283}</SPAN> + +<P> +When the first fires of this fatal day were kindling in the sky, Marie +Antoinette experienced a profound emotion. Looking with melancholy at +the horizon which began to lighten: "Sister," said she to Madame +Elisabeth, "come and see the sun rise." It was the sun that was to +illumine the death-struggle of royalty. Sinister omen! the sun was red +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap28"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P284"></A>284}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXVIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE MORNING OF AUGUST TENTH. +</H4> + +<P> +The fatal day began. It was five o'clock in the morning. The Queen +made her children rise, lest the swords of the insurgents should +surprise them in their beds. The Dauphin, unaccustomed to being called +so early, stared with surprise at the spectacle presented by the court +and garden. "Mamma," said he, "why should any one harm papa? He is so +good!" Then, turning to a little girl who was his usual companion in +his games, he addressed her these words, which prove how well, in spite +of his age, he knew the peril he was in: "Here, Josephine, take this +lock of my hair, and promise to wear it as long as I am in danger." +</P> + +<P> +Led by their chief, Marshal de Mailly, an old man of eighty-six, the +two hundred noblemen, who had assembled in the Gallery of Diana, passed +in review before the royal family with those of the National Guards who +were royalists. "Sire," exclaimed the old marshal, bending his knee, +"here are your faithful nobles who have hastened to re-establish Your +Majesty on the throne of your ancestors."—"For this once," responded +Louis XVI., "I consent that +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P285"></A>285}</SPAN> +my friends should defend me; we will +perish or save ourselves together." The last defenders of the throne +shed tears of fidelity and tenderness. They kneeled before Marie +Antoinette, and entreated the honor of kissing her hand. Never had the +Queen appeared more gracious and majestic. The National Guards, +enchanted, loaded their arms with transport. The Queen seized the +Dauphin in her arms and held him above their heads like a living +standard. The young men shouted: "Long live the Kings of our fathers!" +And the old men cried: "Long live the King of our children!" +</P> + +<P> +At the gates of the Tuileries the tide was rising. Vanguards of the +insurrection, the Marseillais arrived unhindered. The municipality had +succeeded in removing the cannons which were to have prevented approach +by way of the Pont-Neuf and the Pont-Royal. Mandat was no longer there +to issue orders. Nothing impeded the march of the faubourgs. +</P> + +<P> +And yet resistance might still have been possible. It is Barbaroux, +the fierce revolutionist himself, who says so. "All the faults +committed by the insurrection, the wretched arrangement of the +attacking party, the terror of some and the ignorance of others, the +forces at the palace, all made the victory of the court certain, if the +King had not left his post. If he had shown himself on horseback, a +large majority of the people of Paris would have pronounced for him." +Napoleon, who was an eye-witness, had said the night before to Pozzo di +Borgo, that with two +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P286"></A>286}</SPAN> +battalions of Swiss and some cavalry he +would undertake to give the rioters a lesson they would remember. In +the evening of August 10, he wrote to his brother Joseph: "According to +what I saw of the temper of the crowd in the morning, if Louis XVI. had +mounted a horse, he would have gained the victory." Very few of the +insurgents were seriously determined on a revolt. Most of them marched +blindly, not knowing, and not even asking, whither they went. +</P> + +<P> +Westermann had been obliged to threaten Santerre, and even to put his +sword against his breast, in order to induce him to march. A great +number of the people of the faubourgs, uneasy as to the result of the +enterprise, said that, considering the preparations made by the palace, +it would be better to defer the matter to another day. The unarmed +crowd followed through mere curiosity, and were ready to take flight at +the first discharge of musketry. According to Count de Vaublanc, the +Swiss, if they had been commanded by a good officer from four o'clock +in the morning, would have sufficed to disperse the multitude as they +came up, and possibly might have won the day for the King without +bloodshed. "Thus, the best of princes rendered useless the courage of +his defenders, and to spare the blood of his enemies accomplished the +ruin of his friends. All his virtues turned against him and brought +him to his ruin." M. de Vaublanc says again in his Memoirs: "At six in +the morning those who were in revolt had not yet assembled. How much +time had been lost, how +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P287"></A>287}</SPAN> +much was still to be lost! It was too +evident that no military judgment had presided over that strange +disposition of troops, so placed within and without the palace as to be +unable to give each other mutual support; a military man knows too well +the value of the briefest moments, he knows too well how quickly +victory can be decided by attacking the flank of a multitude with a +small number of brave men. If the King had appointed one of the +generals near him absolute master of operations, no doubt this general +would have given the rebels no time to unite.... Alas! Louis XVI. had +three times more courage than was necessary to conquer, but he knew not +how to avail himself of it." Such also was the opinion of M. Thiers, +who, in his <I>Histoire de la Révolution française</I>, says: "It must be +repeated, the unfortunate Prince feared nothing for himself. He had, +in fact, refused to wear a wadded vest, as he had done on July 14, +saying that on a day of combat he ought to be as much exposed as the +least of his servants. Courage did not fail him then, and afterwards +he displayed a bravery that was noble and elevated enough; but he +lacked boldness to take the offensive.... It is certain, as has been +frequently said, that if he had mounted a horse and charged at the head +of his troops, the insurrection would have been put down." +</P> + +<P> +Toward six o'clock the King went out on the balcony. He was saluted +with acclamations. Then he went down the great staircase with the +Queen to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P288"></A>288}</SPAN> +inspect the troops stationed in the courtyards. As one +of his gentlemen-of-the-chamber, Emmanuel Aubier, has remarked: "He had +never made war himself during his reign; there had never been a war on +the continent; he was so unfortunate as to be wanting in grace, even +awkward, and to look thoughtful rather than energetic,—a thing +displeasing to French soldiers." Instead of putting on a uniform and +mounting a horse, he wore a purple coat, of the shade used as mourning +for kings, on this fatal day when he was to wear mourning for the +monarchy. Unspurred, unbooted, shod as if for a drawing-room, with +white silk stockings, his hat under his arm, his hair out of curl and +badly powdered, there was nothing martial, nothing royal about him. At +this hour, when what was needed was the attitude and the fire of a +Henry IV., he looked like an honest country gentleman talking with his +farmers. The first condition of inspiring confidence is to possess it. +Louis XVI.'s aspect was much more that of a victim than a sovereign. +The cries of "Long live the King!" which would have been enthusiastic +for a prince ready to battle for his rights and reconquer his realm at +the sword's point, were few and sad. After having inspected the troops +in the courts, Louis XVI. decided to inspect those in the garden also. +The Queen returned to the palace, and he continued his rounds. +</P> + +<P> +The loyal National Guards, comprising the companies of the +<I>Petits-Pères</I> and the <I>Filles-Saint-Thomas</I>, were drawn up on the +terrace between the palace and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P289"></A>289}</SPAN> +the garden. They received the +King sympathetically and advised him to continue his inspection as far +as the Place Louis XV. At this moment a battalion of the National +Guards from the Saint-Marceau section defiled before him, uttering +shouts of hatred and fury. Louis XVI. was undisturbed by this. He +remained calm, and when this battalion had got into position, he +tranquilly reviewed it. Then he walked on again and crossed the entire +garden. The battalion of the <I>Croix-Rouge</I>, which was on the terrace +beside the water, cried from a distance: "Down with the veto! Down +with the traitor!" On the terrace of the Feuillants, at the other +side, there was an equally violent crowd. The King, calm as ever, went +on to the swing-bridge by which the Tuileries was entered from Place +Louis XV. He was well enough received by the troops stationed there. +But his return to the palace could not but be difficult. The National +Guards of the <I>Croix-Rouge</I> had broken rank and come down from the +terrace beside the river to the garden, and pressed around the King +with menacing shouts. The unfortunate monarch could only re-enter the +palace where he had but a few moments more to stay, by calling to his +aid a double row of faithful grenadiers. The ministers who were at the +windows became alarmed. One of them, M. de Bouchage, cried: "Great +God! it is the King they are hooting! What the devil are they doing +down there? Quick; we must go after him!" And he hastened to descend +into the garden with his colleague, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P290"></A>290}</SPAN> +Bigot de Sainte-Croix, to +meet his master. The Queen, who beheld the sight, shed tears. The two +ministers brought back Louis XVI. He came in out of breath, and +fatigued by the heat and the exercise he had taken, but otherwise +seeming very little moved. "All is lost," said the Queen. "This +review has done more harm than good." +</P> + +<P> +From this moment bad tidings succeeded each other without interruption. +They were apprised of the formation of the new Commune, Mandat's +murder, the march of the faubourgs, and the arrival of the first +detachments of rioters. The Marseillais debouched into the Carrousel, +and sent an envoy to demand that the gate of the Royal Court should be +opened. As it remained closed, they knocked on it with repeated blows, +while the National Guards said: "We will not fire on our brothers." +</P> + +<P> +Would resistance have been possible even at this moment; that is to +say, between seven and eight in the morning? M. de Vaublanc thought +so. "I do not know," he writes, "to what section the first band that +arrived on the Carrousel belonged; it was in disorder and badly armed. +If the King had marched towards this troop at the head of a battalion +of the National Guard, if he had pronounced these words: 'I am your +King; I order you to lay down your arms,' the success would have been +decided. The flight of a single battalion of rebels would have +sufficed to frighten and disperse the others, even before they were +formed into line." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P291"></A>291}</SPAN> + +<P> +It was at this time that Roederer, instead of counselling resistance, +implored Louis XVI. to seek shelter in the Assembly for the royal +family. "Sire," he said in an urgent tone, "Your Majesty has not five +minutes to lose; there is no safety for you except in the National +Assembly. In the opinion of the department, it is necessary to go +there without delay. There are not men enough in the courtyards to +defend the palace; nor are they perfectly well-disposed. On the mere +recommendation to be on the defensive, the cannoneers have already +unloaded their cannons."—"But," said the King, "I did not see many +persons on the Carrousel."—"Sire," returned Roederer, "there are a +dozen pieces of artillery, and an immense crowd is arriving from the +faubourgs." The idea of a flight before the insurrection revolted the +Queen's pride. "What are you saying, Sir?" cried she; "you are +proposing that we should seek shelter with our most cruel persecutors! +Never! never! I will be nailed to these walls before I consent to +leave them. Sir, we have troops."—"Madame, all Paris is on the march. +Resistance is impossible. Will you cause the massacre of the King, +your children, and your servants?" +</P> + +<P> +Louis XVI. still hesitating, Roederer vehemently insisted. "Sire," +said he, "time presses; this is no longer an entreaty nor even a +counsel we take the liberty of offering you; there is only one thing +left for us to do now, and we ask your permission to take you away." +The King looked fixedly at his +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P292"></A>292}</SPAN> +interlocutor for several seconds; +then, turning to the Queen, he said: "Let us go," and rose to his feet. +Madame Elisabeth said: "Monsieur Roederer, do you answer for the King's +life?"—"Yes, Madame, with my own," responded the communal attorney. +Then, turning to the King: "Sire," said he, "I ask Your Majesty not to +take any of your court with you, but to have no cortège but the +department and no escort except the National Guard."—"Yes," replied +the King, "there is nothing but that to say." The Minister of Justice +exclaimed: "The ministers will follow the King."—"Yes, they have a +place in the Assembly."—"And Madame de Tourzel, my children's +governess?" said the Queen.—"Yes, Madame; she will accompany you." +</P> + +<P> +Roederer then left the King's chamber, where this conversation had +taken place, and said in a loud voice to the persons crowding together +in the Council Hall: "The King and his family are going to the Assembly +without other attendants than the department, the ministers, and a +guard." Then he asked: "Is the officer who commands the guard here?" +This officer presenting himself, he said to him: "You must bring +forward a double file of National Guards to accompany the King. The +King desires it." The officer replied: "It shall be done." Louis XVI. +came out of his chamber with his family. He waited several minutes in +the hall until the guard should arrive, and, going around the circle +composed of some forty or fifty persons belonging to his court: "Come, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P293"></A>293}</SPAN> +gentlemen," said he, "there is nothing more to do here." The +Queen, turning to Madame Campan, said: "Wait in my apartment; I will +rejoin you or else send word to go I don't know where." Marie +Antoinette took no one with her except the Princess de Lamballe and +Madame de Tourzel. The Princess de Tarente and Madame de la +Roche-Aymon, afflicted at the thought of being left at the Tuileries, +went down with all the other ladies to the Queen's apartments on the +ground-floor. +</P> + +<P> +La Chesnaye, who had succeeded to the command of the National Guard in +consequence of Mandat's death, put himself at the head of the escort. +This was formed of detachments from the most loyal battalions, the +<I>Petits-Pères</I>, the <I>Suite des Moulins</I>, and the <I>Filles-Saint-Thomas</I>, +re-enforced by about two hundred Swiss, commanded by the colonel of the +regiment, Marquis de Maillardoz, and the major, Baron de Bachmann. The +cortège reached the great staircase by way of the Council Hall, the +Royal Bedchamber, the OEil-de-Boeuf, the Hall of the Guards, and the +Hall of the Hundred Swiss. As he was passing through the +OEil-de-Boeuf, Louis XVI. took the hat of the National Guard on his +right, and replaced it by his own, which was adorned with white +feathers. The guard, surprised, removed the King's hat from his head +and carried it under his arm. +</P> + +<P> +When Louis XVI. arrived at the foot of the stairs in the Pavilion of +the Horloge, his thoughts recurred +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P294"></A>294}</SPAN> +to the faithful adherents who +had so uselessly devoted themselves to his defence, and whom he was +leaving at the Tuileries without watchword or direction. "What is +going to become of all those who have stayed up stairs?" said +he.—"Sire," replied Roederer, "it seemed to me that they were all in +colored coats. Those who have swords need only lay them off, follow +you, and go out through the garden."—"That is true," returned Louis +XVI. In the vestibule, a little further on, as he was about to quit +the fatal palace which fate had condemned him never to re-enter, he had +a last moment of scruple and hesitation. He said again: "But after +all, there are not many people on the Carrousel." +</P> + +<P> +"True, Sire," replied Roederer; "but the faubourgs will soon arrive, +and all the sections are armed, and have assembled at the municipality; +besides, there are neither men enough here, nor are they determined +enough to resist the actual gathering on the Carrousel, which has +twelve pieces of artillery." +</P> + +<P> +The die is cast; Louis XVI. abandons the Tuileries. Respect alone +restrains the grief and indignation that move the Swiss soldiers and +the noblemen whose weapons and whose blood have been refused. They +looked down from the windows at the cortège, or better, the funeral +procession of royalty. It was about seven o'clock in the morning. The +escort was drawn up in two lines. The members of the department formed +a circle around the royal family. Roederer walked first. Then came +the King, with +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P295"></A>295}</SPAN> +Bigot de Sainte-Croix, Minister of Foreign +Affairs, at his side; the Queen followed, giving her left arm to M. du +Bouchage, Minister of Marine, and her right hand to the Dauphin, who +held Madame de Tourzel with the other; then Madame Royale and Madame +Elisabeth, with De Joly, Minister of Justice; the Minister of War, +D'Abancourt, leading the Princess de Lamballe. The Ministers of the +Interior and of Taxes, Champion de Villeneuve and Le Roux de la Ville, +closed the procession. The air was pure and the morning radiant. The +sun lighted up the garden, the marble sculpture, and the sheets of +water. Birds sang under the trees, and nature smiled on this day of +mourning as if it were a festival. +</P> + +<P> +Looking at the populace, Madame Elisabeth said: "All those people have +gone astray; I should like them to be converted; I should not like them +to be punished." Tears stood in the eyes of the little Madame Royale. +The Princess de Lamballe said mournfully: "We shall never return to the +Tuileries!" The Prince de Poix, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts +d'Haussonville, de Vioménil, de Hervilly, and de Pont-l'Abbé, the +Marquis de Briges, Chevalier de Fleurieu, Viscount de Saint-Priest, the +Marquis de Nantouillet, MM. de Fresnes and de Salaignac, the King's +equerries, and Saint-Pardoux, the equerry of Madame Elisabeth, followed +the sad procession. They passed through the grand alley unobstructed +as far as the parterres, then turned to the right, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P296"></A>296}</SPAN> +toward the +alley of the chestnut trees. There a halt of some minutes occurred, in +order to give time for warning the Assembly. Louis XVI. looked down at +a heap of dead leaves which had been swept up by the gardeners after a +storm the night before. "There are a good many leaves," said the King; +"they are falling early this year." It was only a few days before that +Manuel had written in a journal that the King would not last until the +falling of the leaves. Perhaps Louis XVI. remembered the prophecy of +the revolutionist; the Dauphin, with the carelessness belonging to his +age, amused himself by kicking about the dead leaves, the leaves that +had fallen as his father's crown was falling at this moment. +</P> + +<P> +Before the royal family could enter the Assembly chamber, it was +necessary that the step the King had taken should be announced to the +deputies. The president of the department undertook this commission. +A deputation of twenty-four members was at once sent to meet Louis XVI. +They found him in the large alley at the foot of the terrace of the +Feuillants, a few steps from the staircase leading up to it, and which +goes as far as the lobby through which one enters the hall occupied by +the National Assembly. "Sire," said the leader of the deputation, "the +Assembly, eager to contribute to your safety, offers to you and your +family an asylum in its midst." +</P> + +<P> +During this time, the terrace and the staircase had become thronged by +a furious crowd. A man +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P297"></A>297}</SPAN> +carrying a long pole cried out in rage: +"No, no; they shall not enter the Assembly. They are the cause of all +our troubles. This must be ended. Down with them!" Roederer, +standing on the fourth step of the staircase, cried: "Citizens, I +demand silence in the name of the law. You seem disposed to prevent +the King and his family from entering the National Assembly; you are +not justified in opposing it. The King has a place there in virtue of +the Constitution; and though his family has none legally, they have +just been authorized by a decree to go there. Here are the deputies +sent to meet the King; they will attest the existence of this decree." +The deputies confirmed his words. Nevertheless, the crowd still +hesitated to leave the way clear. The man with the pole kept on +brandishing it, and crying: "Down with them! down with them!" +Roederer, going on to the terrace, snatched the pole and flung it into +the garden. The crowd was so compact that in the midst of the squabble +some one stole the Queen's watch and her purse. A man with a sinister +face approached the Dauphin, took him from Marie Antoinette, and lifted +him in his arms. The Queen uttered a cry. "Do not be frightened," +said the man; "I will do him no harm." Another person said to Louis +XVI.: "Sire, we are honest men; but we are not willing to be betrayed +any longer. Be a good citizen, and don't forget to drive away your +shavelings and your wife." Insults and threats resounded from all +sides. Finally, after an actual struggle, the royal family succeeded +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P298"></A>298}</SPAN> +in opening a passage. They made their way with difficulty +through the narrow lobby, choked with people, penetrated the crowd, and +entered the session chamber. It was there that royalty, humiliated and +overcome, was to lie at the point of death under the eyes of its +implacable enemies. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap29"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P299"></A>299}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXIX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE BOX OF THE LOGOGRAPH. +</H4> + +<P> +The royal family has just entered the session chamber. It will find +there not an asylum, but the vestibule of the prison and the scaffold. +The man who had taken the Dauphin from the Queen's arms at the door of +the Assembly set him down on the secretary's desk with an air of +triumph, and the young Prince was greeted with applause. Marie +Antoinette advanced with dignity. According to Vaublanc's expression, +she would not have had a different bearing or a more august serenity on +a day of royal pomp. Louis XVI. took a place near the president. The +Queen, her daughter, Madame Elisabeth, and Madame de Tourzel sat down +on the ministerial benches. As soon as the Dauphin was left to +himself, he sprang towards his mother. A voice cried: "Take him to the +King! The Austrian woman is unworthy of the people's confidence." An +usher attempted to obey this injunction. However, the child began to +cry, people were affected, and he was allowed to remain with the Queen. +At this moment some armed noblemen made their appearance at the +extremity of the hall. "You +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P300"></A>300}</SPAN> +compromise the King's safety!" +exclaimed some one, and the nobles retired. +</P> + +<P> +Order was restored. Louis XVI. began to speak. "I came here," said +he, "to prevent a great crime, and I think that I could be nowhere more +secure than amidst the representatives of the nation." Alas! the crime +will not be prevented, but only adjourned. Vergniaud occupied the +president's chair. "Sire," he replied, "you may count on the firmness +of the National Assembly. It knows its duties; its members have sworn +to die in defending the rights of the people and the constituted +authorities." +</P> + +<P> +So they still called Louis XVI. Sire; presently they will call him +nothing but Louis Capet. They allow him to take an armchair near the +president; but in a few minutes they will find this place too good for +him. And it is the voice of this very Vergniaud who, a few hours from +now, will pronounce his deposition, and five months later his sentence +of death. +</P> + +<P> +Hardly had the unhappy King sat down when Chabot, the unfrocked +Capuchin, claimed that a clause of the Constitution forbade the +Assembly to deliberate in presence of the sovereign. Under this +pretext his place was changed, and Louis XVI. with all his family was +shut up in the reporters' gallery, sometimes called the box of the +Logograph. This miserable hole, about six feet high by twelve wide, +was on a level with the last ranks of the Assembly, behind the +president's chair and the seats of the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P301"></A>301}</SPAN> +secretaries. It was +ordinarily set apart for the editors, or rather for the stenographers +of a great newspaper which reported the proceedings, and which was +called the <I>Journal logographique</I>, or the <I>Logotachygraphe</I>, usually +abbreviated into the <I>Logographe</I>. Louis XVI. seated himself in the +front of the box, Marie Antoinette half-concealed herself in a corner, +where she sought a little shelter against so many humiliations. Her +children and their governess took places on a bench with Madame +Elisabeth and the Princess de Lamballe. Several noblemen, the latest +courtiers of misfortune, stood up behind them. +</P> + +<P> +Roederer, who was at the bar, then made a report in the name of the +municipal department, in which he explained all that had taken place. +He declared that he had said to the soldiers and National Guard +detailed for the defence of the Tuileries: "We do not ask you to shed +the blood of your brethren nor to attack your fellow-citizens; your +cannons are there for your defence, not for an attack; but I require +this defence in the name of the law, in the name of the Constitution. +The law authorizes you, when violence is used against you, to repress +it vigorously.... Once more, you are not to be assailants, but to act +on the defensive only." +</P> + +<P> +Roederer added that the cannoneers, instead of complying with his +urgent exhortations, gave no response save that of unloading their +pieces before him. After having explained how greatly the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P302"></A>302}</SPAN> +defence was disorganized, he thus ended his report: "We felt ourselves +no longer in a position to protect the charge confided to us; this +charge was the King; the King is a man; this man is a father. The +children ask us to assure the existence of the father; the law asks us +to assure the existence of the King of France; humanity asks of us the +existence of the man. No longer able to defend this charge, no other +idea presented itself than that of entreating the King to come with his +family to the National Assembly.... We have nothing to add to what I +have just said, except that, our force being paralyzed, and no longer +in existence, we can have none but that which it shall please the +National Assembly to communicate. We are ready to die in the execution +of the orders it may give us. We ask, while awaiting them, to remain +near it, being useless everywhere else." The Assembly, not then +suspecting that it would so soon depose Louis XVI., applauded without +contradiction from the galleries. The president said to Roederer: "The +Assembly has listened to your account with the greatest interest; it +invites you to be present at the session." +</P> + +<P> +The advice given by Roederer to the King has been greatly blamed. The +event has seriously influenced the judgment since passed upon it. If +Louis XVI. had received the support he had a right to count on from the +representatives, things would have appeared in quite another light. +Count de Vaublanc, in his Memoirs, has rendered full justice +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P303"></A>303}</SPAN> +to +the loyal intentions of the municipal attorney. "The advice he gave +has been accounted a crime," says M. de Vaublanc; "I think it is an +unjust reproach. Until then he had done all that lay in his power to +contribute to the defence of the palace. He must have seen clearly +that as the King would not defend himself, he could no longer be +defended. If the rebels had been attacked, neither M. Roederer nor any +one else would have proposed going to the Assembly; but since they were +on the defensive, and without any recognized leader, the magistrate +might doubtless have been struck with a single thought: The King and +his family are about to be massacred. The King put an end to all +irresolution in saying these words: 'There is nothing more to do here.'" +</P> + +<P> +At first, Louis XVI. seemed not to repent of the step he had been +obliged to take. Even in that wretched hole, the Logograph box, his +face at first was calm and even confident. As the shouting had +increased outside, Vergniaud ordered the removal of the iron grating +separating this box from the hall, so that in case the populace made an +irruption into the lobbies, the King could take refuge in the midst of +the deputies. In default of workmen and tools, the deputies nearest at +hand, the Duke de Choiseul, Prince de Poix, and the ministers, +undertook to tear away the grating, and Louis XVI. himself, accustomed +to the rough work of a locksmith, joined his efforts to theirs. The +fastenings having been broken in this manner, the unfortunate sovereign +seemed not +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P304"></A>304}</SPAN> +to doubt the sentiments of the National Assembly. He +pointed out the most remarkable deputies to the Dauphin, chatted with +several among them, and looked on at the session like a mere spectator +in a box at the theatre. +</P> + +<P> +The royal family had been nearly two hours at the Assembly when all of +a sudden a frightful discharge of musketry and artillery was heard. +The deputies of the left grew pale with fear and anger, thinking +themselves betrayed. Casting glances of uneasiness and wrath at the +feeble monarch, they accused him of having ordered a massacre, and said +that all was lost. An officer of the National Guard rushed in, crying: +"We are pursued, we are overpowered!" The galleries, affrighted, +imagined that the Swiss would arrive at any moment. Excitement was at +its height. Sinister, imposing, dreadful moment! Solemn hour, when +the monarchy, amidst a frightful tempest, was like a venerable oak +which lightning has just stricken; when terror, wrath, and pity +disputed the possession of men's souls, and when the King, already +captive, was present like Charles V. at his own funeral. Marie +Antoinette had started. At the sound of the cannon her cheeks kindled +and her eyes blazed. A vague hope animated her. Perhaps, she said +within herself, the monarchy is at last to be avenged; perhaps the +Swiss are about to give the insurrection a lesson it will remember; +perhaps Louis XVI. will re-enter in triumph the palace of his +forefathers. The daughter of Cæsars prayed God in silence, and +supplicated +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P305"></A>305}</SPAN> +Him to grant victory to the defenders of the throne. +</P> + +<P> +Chimeras! vain hopes! Louis XVI. has no longer but one idea: to cast +off all responsibility for events. He mustered up, so to say, the +little authority he had yet remaining, to write hastily, in pencil, the +last order he was to sign: the order to stop firing. He flattered +himself that the prohibition to shoot would justify him completely in +the sight of the National Assembly, and induce them to treat him with +more consideration. But he asked himself anxiously who would be bold +enough to carry his order as far as the palace. Would not so perilous +a mission intimidate even the most heroic? M. d'Hervilly, who was at +this moment in the box of the Logograph, offered himself. As the King +and Queen at first refused his offer, and pointed out all the dangers +of such an errand: "I beg Their Majesties," cried he, "not to think of +my danger; my duty is to brave everything in their service; my place is +in the midst of the firing, and if I were afraid of it I should be +unworthy of my uniform." These words determined Louis XVI. to give M. +d'Hervilly the order signed by his own hand; the valiant nobleman, +bearing this order which was to have such disastrous consequences for +the defenders of the palace, went hastily out of the Assembly hall and +made his way to the Tuileries through a rain of balls and canister. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap30"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P306"></A>306}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE COMBAT. +</H4> + +<P> +What had taken place at the Tuileries after the departure of the royal +family for the Assembly? At the very moment when they abandoned this +palace which they were never to see again, the Marseillais, the +vanguard of the insurrection, were pounding at the gate of the +principal courtyard, furious because it was not opened. A few minutes +later, the column of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, after passing through +the rue Saint-Honoré, debouched on the Carrousel. It was under command +of the Pole, Lazouski, and Westermann, who directed it toward the gate +of the Royal Court. As the Marseillais had not yet succeeded in +forcing this, Westermann had it broken open. The cannoneers, whose +business it was to defend the palace, at once declared on the side of +the riot and turned their pieces against the Tuileries. With the +exception of the domestics there were now in the palace only the seven +hundred and fifty Swiss, about a hundred National Guards, and a few +nobles. The sole instructions the Swiss received came from old Marshal +de Mailly: "Do not let yourselves be taken." Louis XVI. had said +absolutely nothing on going +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P307"></A>307}</SPAN> +away, and his departure discouraged +his most faithful adherents. Add to this that the Swiss had not enough +cartridges. What was to be the fate of this fine regiment, this <I>corps +d'élite</I>, which everywhere and always had set the example of discipline +and military honor; which ever since the Revolution began had haughtily +repulsed every attempt to tamper with it; and whose red uniforms alone +struck terror into the populace? These brave soldiers guarded +respectfully the traditions of their ancestors who, at the famous +retreat of Meaux, had saved Charles IX. "But for my good friends the +Swiss," said that prince, "my life and liberty would have been in a bad +way." What the Swiss of the sixteenth century had done for one King of +France, the Swiss of the eighteenth century would have done for his +successor. They would have saved Louis XVI. if he would have let +himself be saved. +</P> + +<P> +A major-general who had remained at the Tuileries, judging that it was +impossible to defend the courts with so few soldiers, cried: +"Gentlemen, retire to the palace!" "They had to leave six cannon in +the power of the enemy and to abandon the courts. It should have been +foreseen that it would be necessary to retake these under penalty of +being burned in the palace; the common soldiers said so loudly. +Meanwhile they obeyed, and were disposed as well as time and the +localities permitted. The stairs and windows were lined with +soldiers." (Account of Colonel Pfyffer d'Altishoffen, published at +Lucerne in 1819.) +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P308"></A>308}</SPAN> + +<P> +One post occupied the chapel, and another the vestibule and grand +staircase. There were Swiss also at the windows looking into the +courts. "Down with the Swiss!" cried the Marseillais. "Down! down! +Surrender!" However, the struggle had not yet begun. Nearly fifteen +minutes elapsed between the invasion of the Royal Court and the first +shot. The Marseillais brandished their pikes and guns, but they were +not confident, for at first they dared not cross the court more than +half-way. The Swiss and National Guards who were at the windows made +gestures to induce the populace to quiet down and go away. The throng +of insurgents grew greater every minute. They had just got their +cannon into battery against the Tuileries. What the Swiss specially +intended was to defend the grand staircase, so as to prevent the +apartments on the first floor from being invaded. This staircase, +afterwards destroyed, was in the middle of the vestibule of the Horloge +Pavilion. The chapel, whose site was afterwards changed, was on the +level of the first landing; and from this landing, two symmetrical +flights, at right angles with the first, led to the Hall of the Hundred +Swiss (the future Hall of the Marshals). Westermann, bolder than the +other insurgents, had advanced as far as the vestibule with several +Marseillais. He began to parley with the soldiers, trying to set them +against their officers and induce them to lay down their arms. +Sergeant Blazer answered Westermann: "We are Swiss, and the Swiss only +lay down their weapons with their lives." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P309"></A>309}</SPAN> + +<P> +The officers caused a barricade of pieces of wood to be raised on the +first landing at the head of the stairs, to prevent new deputations +from coming to demoralize their men. The Marseillais attempted to take +it by main force. Some of them were armed with halberds terminating in +hooks. These they thrust below the barricade, trying to catch the men +defending it. They seized an adjutant in this way and disarmed him. +At the foot of the stairs "they seized the first Swiss sentry and +afterwards five others. They laid hold of them with hooked pikes which +they thrust into their coats and drew them forwards, disarming them at +once of their sabres, guns, and cartridge-boxes, amidst shouts of +laughter. Encouraged by the success of this forlorn hope, the whole +crowd pressed towards the foot of the stairs and there massacred the +five Swiss already taken and disarmed." (M. Peltier's Relation.) Then +a pistol-shot was heard. From which side did it come? Was it the +Marseillais who provoked the combat? Was it the Swiss who sought to +avenge their comrades, the sentries? Whoever it was, this pistol-shot +was the signal for the fight, which began about half-past ten in the +morning. +</P> + +<P> +At first the Swiss had the advantage. Every shot they fired from the +windows told. Among the people crowding the courtyards were many who +had not come to fight, but through mere curiosity. Pale with fright, +they fled toward the Carrousel through the gate of the Royal Court, +which was strewn in an +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P310"></A>310}</SPAN> +instant with guns, pikes, and +cartridge-boxes. Some of the insurgents fell flat on their faces and +counterfeited death, rising occasionally and gliding along the walls to +gain the sentry-boxes of the mounted sentinels as best they could. +Even the majority of the cannoneers deserted their pieces and ran like +the rest. The courts were cleared in an instant. Two Swiss officers, +MM. de Durler and de Pfyffer, instantly made a sortie at the head of +one hundred and twenty soldiers, took four cannon, and found themselves +once more masters of the door of the Royal Court. A detachment of +sixty soldiers formed themselves into a hollow square before this door +and kept up a rolling fire on the rioters remaining on the Carrousel +until the place was completely swept. At the same time, on the side of +the garden, another detachment of Swiss, under Count de Salis, seized +three cannon and brought them to the palace gate. Napoleon, who +witnessed the combat from a distance, says: "The Swiss handled their +artillery with vigor; in ten minutes the Marseillais were chased as far +as the rue de l'Echelle, and never came back until the Swiss were +withdrawn by the King's order." +</P> + +<P> +It was now, in fact, that M. d'Hervilly arrived, hatless and unarmed, +through the fusillade of grape. They wanted to show him the +dispositions they had just made on the garden side. "There is no +question of that," said he; "you must go to the Assembly; it is the +King's order." The unfortunate soldiers flattered themselves that they +might still +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P311"></A>311}</SPAN> +be of use. "Yes, brave Swiss," cried Baron de +Viomesnil, "go and find the King. Your ancestors did so more than +once." In spite of their chagrin at abandoning the field of which they +they had just become masters, they obeyed. Their only thought was to +repair to that Assembly where a last humiliation awaited them. The +officers had the drums beat the call to arms, and, in spite of the rain +of balls from every side, they succeeded in marshalling the soldiers as +if for a dress parade in front of the palace, opposite the garden. The +signal for departure was given. An unforeseen peril was reserved for +these heroes. The battalions of the National Guard, stationed at the +door of the Pont Royal, at that of the Manège court, and the beginning +of the terrace of the Feuillants, had stood still, with their weapons +grounded, since the affray began. But hardly had the Swiss entered the +grand alley than these battalions, neutral until now, detailed a number +of individuals who hid behind the trees, and fired, with their muzzles +almost touching the troops. On reaching the middle of the alley, the +Swiss, who hardly deigned to return this fire, divided into two +columns. The first, turning to the right under the trees, went towards +the staircase leading to the Assembly from the terrace of the +Feuillants. The second, which followed at a short distance and acted +as a rearguard, went on as far as the Place Louis XV., where it found +the mounted gendarmes. If this body of cavalry had done its duty, it +would have united with the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P312"></A>312}</SPAN> +Swiss. But, far from that, it +declared for the insurrection, and sabred them. It is said that the +officers and soldiers killed in this retreat across the garden were +interred at the foot of the famous chestnut whose exceptional +forwardness has earned the surname of the tree of March 20. Thus the +Bonapartist tree of popular tradition owes its astonishing strength of +vegetation solely to the human compost furnished by the corpses of the +last defenders of royalty. +</P> + +<P> +The first column, that which was on its way to the Assembly, presented +itself resolutely in front of the terrace of the Feuillants, which was +full of people. These took flight, and the Swiss entered the corridors +of the Assembly. Carried away by his zeal, one of their officers, +Baron de Salis, entered the hall with his naked sword in his hand. The +left uttered a cry of affright. A deputy went out to order the +commander, Baron de Durler, to make his troop lay down their arms. M. +de Durler, having refused, he was conducted to the King. "Sire," said +he, with sorrowful indignation, "they want me to lay down arms." Louis +XVI. responded: "Put them in the hands of the National Guard; I am not +willing that brave men like you should perish." To surrender arms! +Did Louis XVI. fully comprehend that for soldiers like these such an +outrage was a hundred times worse than death? The King's words were +like a thunderbolt to them. They wept with rage. "But," said they, +"even if we have no more cartridges, we can still defend ourselves with +our +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P313"></A>313}</SPAN> +bayonets!" Such devotion, such courage, such discipline, +such heroism to end like this! And yet the unfortunate Swiss, though +grieved to the heart, resigned themselves to the last sacrifice their +master required from their fidelity, laid down their arms, and were +imprisoned in the ancient church of the Feuillants, to the number of +about two hundred and fifty. It was all that remained of this +magnificent regiment. The others had been killed in the garden or had +their throats cut in the palace, and the greater part of the survivors +were to be assassinated in the massacres of September. +</P> + +<P> +"Thus ended the French King's regiment of Swiss Guards, like one of +those sturdy oaks whose prolonged existence has affronted so many +storms, and which nothing but an earthquake can uproot. It fell the +very day on which the ancient French monarchy also fell. It counted +more than a century and a half of faithful services rendered to France. +To destroy this worthy corps a combination of unfortunate events had +been required; it had been necessary to deprive the Swiss of their +artillery, their ammunition, their staff, and the presence of the King; +to enfeeble them five days before the combat by sending away a +detachment of three hundred men; to forbid the two hundred men who +accompanied the King to the Assembly to fire a shot; to render useless +the wise dispositions of MM. de Maillardoz and de Bachmann by an +ill-advised order at the moment of the attack; and to have M. +d'Hervilly come at +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P314"></A>314}</SPAN> +the moment of victory to divide and enfeeble +the defence." (Relation of Colonel Pfyffer d'Altishoffen.) +</P> + +<P> +The Swiss republic has honored the memory of these sons who died for a +king. At the entrance of Lucerne, in the side of a rock, a grotto has +been hollowed out, in which may be seen a colossal stone lion, the work +of Thorwaldsen, the famous Danish sculptor. This lion, struck by a +lance, and lying down to die, holds tight within his claws the royal +escutcheon upon a shield adorned with fleurs-de-lis. Underneath the +lion are engraved the names of the Swiss officers and soldiers who died +between August 10 and September 2, 1792. Above it may be read this +inscription cut in the rock:— +</P> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +HELVETIORUM FIDEI AC VIRTUTI.<BR> +<I>To the fidelity and courage of the Swiss.</I><BR> +</H4> + +<BR> + +<P> +Louis XVI. had to repent his weakness bitterly. The wretched monarch +had at last reached the bottom of the abyss where the slippery descent +of concessions ends, and for having been willing to spare the blood of +a few criminals, he was to see that of his most loyal and faithful +adherents shed in torrents. It is said that Napoleon, who witnessed +the combat from a distance, cried several times, in speaking of Louis +XVI.: "What, then, wretched man! Have you no cannon to sweep out this +rabble?" Behind the people of the 10th of August, the man of Brumaire +already appeared as a conqueror. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P315"></A>315}</SPAN> + +<P> +Work away, then, insurgents! This unknown young man, this +"straight-haired Corsican," hidden in the crowd, will be the master of +you all! He will crush the Revolution, he will made himself +all-powerful in that palace of the Tuileries where the riot is lording +it at this moment! And after him, the brother of the King whom you +insult to-day and will kill to-morrow, the Count de Provence, that +<I>émigré</I> who is the object of your hatred, will triumphantly enter the +palace of his forefathers. And each of them in his turn, the Corsican +gentleman and the brother of Louis XVI., will be received with the same +transports in that fatal palace which is now red with the blood of the +Swiss! How surprised these people would be if they could foresee what +the future has in store for them! Among these frenzied demagogues, +these ultra-revolutionists, these dishevelled Marseillais with lips +blackened by powder, and jackets all blood, how many will be the +fanatical admirers and soldiers of a Cæsar! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap31"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P316"></A>316}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE RESULTS OF THE COMBAT. +</H4> + +<P> +The results of the combat were, at the Assembly, the decree of +suspension, or, rather, the decree of deposition; at the Tuileries, +devastation, massacre, and conflagration. From the moment when he +ordered his last defenders to lay down their arms, Louis XVI. was but +the phantom of a king. +</P> + +<P> +While the fight was going on, Robespierre had remained in hiding; Marat +had not quitted the bottom of a cellar. Even Danton, the man of +"audacity," did not show himself until after the last shot had been +fired. But now that fate had declared for the Revolution, those who +were trembling and hesitating a moment since, were those who talked the +loudest. Louis XVI., who had been dreaded a few minutes ago, was +insulted and jeered at. The National Assembly, royalist in the +morning, became the accomplice of the republicans during the day. It +perceived, moreover, that the 10th of August was aimed at it not less +than at the throne, and that its own downfall would be contemporaneous +with that of royalty. +</P> + +<P> +Huguenin, the president of the new Commune, came boldly to the bar, and +said to the deputies: +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P317"></A>317}</SPAN> +"The people is your sovereign as well as +ours!" Another individual, likewise at the bar, exclaimed in a +menacing tone: "For a long time the people has asked you to pronounce +the deposition, and you have not even yet pronounced the suspension! +Know that the Tuileries is on fire, and that we shall not extinguish it +until the vengeance of the people has been satisfied!" Vergniaud, who +in the morning had promised the King the support of the Assembly, no +longer even attempted to stem the revolutionary tide. He came down +from the president's chair, and went to a desk to write the decree +which should give a legislative form to the will of the insurrection. +In virtue of this decree, which Vergniaud read from the tribune, and +which was unanimously adopted, the royal power was suspended and a +National Convention convoked. In reality this was a veritable +deposition, and yet the Assembly still hesitated to give the last shock +which should uproot the royal tree that had sheltered beneath its +branches so many faithful generations. It declared that in default of +a civil list, a salary should be granted to the King during his +suspension; that Louis XVI. and his family should have a palace, the +Luxembourg, for a residence, and that he should be appointed governor +of the Prince-royal. +</P> + +<P> +Concerning this, Madame de Staël has remarked in her <I>Considerations +sur les principaux événements de la Révolution française</I>: "Ambition +for power mingled with the enthusiasm of principles in the republicans +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P318"></A>318}</SPAN> +of 1792, and several among them offered to maintain royalty if +all the ministerial places were given to their friends.... The throne +they attacked served to shelter them, and it was not until after they +had triumphed that they found themselves exposed before the people." +What the Girondins wanted was merely a change in the ministry; it was +not a revolution. Vergniaud felt that he had been distanced. When he +read the act of deposition, his voice was sad, his attitude dejected, +and his action feeble. Did he foresee that the King and himself would +die at the same place, on the same scaffold, and only nine months apart? +</P> + +<P> +Louis XVI. listened to the invectives launched against him, and to the +decree depriving him of royal power, without a change of color. At the +very moment when the vote was taken, he bent towards Deputy Coustard, +who sat beside the box of the <I>Logographe</I>, and said with the greatest +tranquillity: "What you are doing there is not very constitutional." +Impassive, and speaking of himself as of a king who had lived a +thousand years before, he leaned his elbows on the front of the box, +and looked on, like a disinterested spectator, at the lugubrious +spectacle that was unrolled before him. +</P> + +<P> +Marie Antoinette, on the contrary, was shuddering. So long as the +combat lasted, a secret hope had thrilled her. But when she saw them +bringing to the Assembly and laying on the table the jewel-cases, +trinkets, and portfolios which the insurgents had just +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P319"></A>319}</SPAN> +taken from +her bedroom at the Tuileries; when she heard the victorious cries of +the rioters; when Vergniaud's voice sounded in her ears like a funeral +knell—she could hardly contain her grief and indignation. For one +instant she closed her eyes. But presently she haughtily raised her +head. +</P> + +<P> +The tide was rising, rising incessantly. Petitioners demanded +sometimes the deposition, and sometimes the death, of the King. This +dialogue was overheard between the painter David and Merlin de +Thionville, who were talking together about Louis XVI.: "Would you +believe it? Just now he asked me, as I was passing his box, if I would +soon have his portrait finished."—"Bah! and what did you say?"—"That +I would never paint the portrait of a tyrant again until I should have +his head in my hat."—"Admirable! I don't know a more sublime answer, +even in antiquity." +</P> + +<P> +The demands of the Revolution grew greater from minute to minute. In +the decree of deposition which had been voted on Vergniaud's +proposition, it was stipulated that the ministers should continue to +exercise their functions. A few instants later, Brissot caused it to +be decreed that they had lost the nation's confidence. A new ministry +was nominated during the session. The three ministers dismissed before +June 20—Roland, Clavière, and Servan—were reinstalled by acclamation +in the ministries of the Interior, of Finances, and of War. The other +ministers were chosen by ballot: Danton was nominated to that +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P320"></A>320}</SPAN> +of +Justice by 282 votes, Monge to the Marine by 150, and Lebrun-Tondu to +Foreign Affairs by 100. This ballot established the fact that out of +the 749 members composing the Assembly, but 284 were present. Two days +before, 680 had voted on the question concerning Lafayette, and now, at +the moment of the final crisis, not more than 284 could be found! All +the others had disappeared, through fear or through disgust. The +Revolution was accomplished by an Assembly thus reduced, and a Commune +whose members had appointed themselves. Marie Antoinette, in her pride +as Queen, was unable to conceive that there could be anything serious +in such a government. When Lebrun-Tondu's appointment was announced, +she leaned towards Bigot de Sainte-Croix, and said in his ear: "I hope +you will none the less believe yourself Minister of Foreign Affairs." +</P> + +<P> +The unfortunate royal family were still prisoners in the narrow box of +the <I>Logographe</I>. The heat there was horrible: the sun scorched the +white walls of this furnace where the captives listened, as in a place +of torture, to the most ignoble insults and the most sanguinary threats. +</P> + +<P> +At seven o'clock in the evening, Count François de la Rochefoucauld +succeeded in approaching the box of the <I>Logographe</I>. He thus +describes its aspect at this hour: "I approached the King's box; it was +unguarded except by some wretches who were drunk and paid no attention +to me, so that I half-opened the door. I saw the King with a fatigued +and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P321"></A>321}</SPAN> +downcast face; he was sitting on the front of the box, coldly +observing through his lorgnette the scoundrels who were talking, +sometimes one after another, and sometimes all together. Near him was +the Queen, whose tears and perspiration had completely drenched her +fichu and her handkerchief. The Dauphin was asleep on her lap, and +resting partly also on that of Madame de Tourzel. Mesdames Elisabeth, +de Lamballe, and Madame the King's daughter were at the back of the +box. I offered my services to the King, who replied that it would be +too dangerous to try to see him again, and added that he was going to +the Luxembourg that evening. The Queen asked me for a handkerchief; I +had none; mine had served to bind up the wounds of the Viscount de +Maillé, whom I had rescued from some pikemen. I went out to look for a +handkerchief, and borrowed one from the keeper of the refreshment-room; +but as I was taking it to the Queen, the sentinels were relieved, and I +found it impossible to approach the box." +</P> + +<P> +We have just seen what occurred at the Assembly after the close of the +combat. Cast now a glance at the Tuileries. What horrible scenes, +what cries of grief, how many wounded, dead, and dying, what streams of +blood! What had become of those Swiss who, either in consequence of +their wounds, or through some other motive, had been obliged to remain +at the palace? Eighty of them had defended the grand staircase like +heroes, against an immense crowd, and died after prodigies of valor. +Seventeen +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P322"></A>322}</SPAN> +Swiss who were posted in the chapel, and who had not +fired a shot since the fight began, hoped to save their lives by laying +down their arms. It was a mistake. They had their throats cut like +the others. Two ushers of the King's chamber, MM. Pallas and de +Marchais, sword in hand, and hats pulled down over their eyes, said: +"We don't want to live any longer; this is our post; we ought to die +here!" and they were killed at the door of their master's chamber. +</P> + +<P> +M. Dieu died in the same way on the threshold of the Queen's bedroom. +A certain number of nobles who had not followed the King to the +Assembly succeeded in escaping the blows of the assassins. Passing +through the suite of large apartments towards the Louvre Gallery, they +rejoined there some soldiers detailed to guard an opening contrived in +the flooring, so as to prevent the assailants from entering by that +way. They crossed this opening on boards, and reached the extremity of +the gallery unhindered; then, going down the staircase of Catharine de +Medici, they managed to gain the streets near the Louvre. These may +have been saved. But woe to all men, no matter what their conditions, +who remained in the Tuileries! Domestic servants, ushers, laborers, +every soul was put to death. They killed even the dying, even the +surgeons who were caring for the wounded. It is Barbaroux himself who +describes the murderers as "cowardly fugitives during the action, +assassins after the victory, butchers +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P323"></A>323}</SPAN> +of dead bodies which they +stabbed with their swords so as to give themselves the honors of the +combat. In the apartments, on roofs, and in cellars, they massacred +the Swiss, armed or disarmed, the chevaliers, soldiers, and all who +peopled the chateau.... Our devotion was of no avail," says Barbaroux +again; "we were speaking to men who no longer recognized us." +</P> + +<P> +And the women, what was their fate? When the firing began, the Queen's +ladies and the Princesses descended to Marie Antoinette's apartments on +the ground-floor. They closed the shutters, hoping to incur less +danger, and lighted a candle so as not to be in total darkness. Then +Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel exclaimed: "Let us light all the +candles in the chandelier, the sconces, and the torches; if the +brigands force open the door, the astonishment so many lights will +cause them may delay the first blow and give us time to speak." The +ladies set to work. When the invaders broke in, sabre in hand, the +numberless lights, which were repeated also in the mirrors, made such a +contrast with the daylight they had just left, that for a moment they +remained stupefied. And yet, the Princess de Tarente, Madame de La +Roche-Aymon, Mademoiselle de Tourzel, Madame de Ginestons, and all the +other ladies were about to perish when a man with a long beard made his +appearance, crying to the assassins in Pétion's name: "Spare the women; +do not dishonor the nation." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P324"></A>324}</SPAN> + +<P> +Madame Campan had attempted to go up a stairway in pursuit of her +sister. The murderers followed her. She already felt a terrible hand +against her back, trying to seize her by her clothes, when some one +cried from the foot of the stairs: "What are you doing up +there?"—"Hey!" said the murderer, in a tone that did not soon leave +the trembling woman's ears. The other voice replied: "We don't kill +women." The Revolution goes fast; it will kill them next year. Madame +Campan was on her knees. Her executioner let go his hold. "Get up, +hussy," he said to her, "the nation spares you!" In going back she +walked over corpses; she recognized that of the old Viscount de Broves. +The Queen had sent word to him and to another old man as the last night +began, that she desired them to go home. He had replied: "We have been +only too obedient to the King's orders in all circumstances when it was +necessary to expose our lives to save him; this time we will not obey, +and will simply preserve the memory of the Queen's kindness." +</P> + +<P> +What a sight the Tuileries presented! People walked on nothing but +dead bodies. A comic actor drank a glass of blood, the blood of a +Swiss; one might have thought himself at a feast of Atreus. The +furniture was broken, the secretaries forced open, the mirrors smashed +to pieces. Prudhomme, the journalist of the <I>Révolutions de Paris</I>, +thinks that "Medicis-Antoinette has too long studied in them +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P325"></A>325}</SPAN> +the +hypocritical look she wears in public." What a sinister carnival! +Drunken women and prostitutes put on the Queen's dresses and sprawl on +her bed. Through the cellar gratings one can see a thousand hands +groping in the sand, and drawing forth bottles of wine. Everywhere +people are laughing, drinking, killing. The royal wine runs in +streams. Torrents of wine, torrents of blood. The apartments, the +staircase, the vestibule, are crimson pools. Disfigured corpses, +pictures thrust through with pikes, musicians' stands thrown on the +altar, the organ dismounted, broken,—that is how the chapel looks. +But to rob and murder is not enough: they will kindle a conflagration. +It devours the stables of the mounted guards, all the buildings in the +courts, the house of the governor of the palace: eighteen hundred yards +of barracks, huts, and houses. Already the fire is gaining on the +Pavilion of Marsan and the Pavilion of Flora. The flames are perceived +at the Assembly. A deputy asks to have the firemen sent to fight this +fire which threatens the whole quarter Saint-Honoré. Somebody remarks +that this is the Commune's business. But the Commune, to use a phrase +then in vogue, thinks it has something else to do besides preventing +the destruction of the tyrant's palace. It turns a deaf ear. The +messenger returns to the Assembly. It is remarked that the flames are +doing terrible damage. The president decides to send orders to the +firemen. But the firemen return, saying: "We can do nothing. They +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P326"></A>326}</SPAN> +are firing on us. They want to throw us into the fire." What is +to be done? The president bethinks himself of a "patriot" architect, +Citizen Palloy, who generally makes his appearance whenever there are +"patriotic" demolitions to be accomplished. It is he whom they send to +the palace, and who succeeds in getting the flames extinguished. The +Tuileries are not burned up this time. The work of the incendiaries of +1792 was only to be finished by the petroleurs of 1871. +</P> + +<P> +Night was come. A great number of the Parisian population were +groaning, but the revolutionists triumphed with joy. Curiosity to see +the morning battle-field, urged the indolent, who had stayed at home +all day, towards the quays, the Champs-Elysées, and the Tuileries. +They looked at the trees under which the Swiss had fallen, at the +windows of the apartments where the massacres had taken place, at the +ravages made by the hardly extinguished fire. The buildings in the +three courts: Court of the Princes, Court Royal, Court of the Swiss, +had been completely consumed. Thenceforward these three courts formed +only one, separated from the Carrousel by a board partition which +remained until 1800, and was replaced by a grating finished on the very +day when the First Consul came to install himself at the Tuileries. +The inscription which was placed above the wooden partition: "On August +10 royalty was abolished; it will never rise again," disappeared even +before the proclamation of the Empire. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P327"></A>327}</SPAN> + +<P> +Squads of laborers gathered up the dead bodies and threw them into +tumbrels. At midnight an immense pile was erected on the Carrousel +with timbers and furniture from the palace. There the corpses of the +victims that had strewed the courts, the vestibule, and the apartments +were heaped up, and set on fire. +</P> + +<P> +The National Guard had disappeared; it figured with the King and the +Assembly itself, among the vanquished of the day. Instead of its +bayonets and uniforms one saw nothing in the stations and patrols that +divided Paris but pikes and tatters. "Some one came to tell me," +relates Madame de Staël, "that all of my friends who had been on guard +outside the palace, had been seized and massacred. I went out at once +to learn the news; the coachman who drove me was stopped at the bridge +by men who silently made signs that they were murdering on the other +side. After two hours of useless efforts to pass I learned that all +those in whom I was interested were still living, but that most of them +had been obliged to hide in order to escape the proscription with which +they were threatened. When I went to see them in the evening, on foot, +and in the mean houses where they had been able to find shelter, I +found armed men lying before the doors, stupid with drink, and only +half waking to utter execrable curses. Several women of the people +were in the same state, and their vociferations were more odious still. +Whenever a patrol intended to maintain order made its appearance, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P328"></A>328}</SPAN> +honest people fled out of its way; for what they called maintaining +order was to contribute to the triumph of assassins and rid them of all +hindrances." +</P> + +<P> +At last the city was going to rest a while after so much emotion! It +was three o'clock in the morning. The Assembly, which had been in +session for twenty-four hours, adjourned. Only a few members remained +in the hall to maintain the permanence proclaimed at the beginning of +the crisis. The inspectors of the hall came for Louis XVI. and his +family, to conduct them, not to the Luxembourg, but to the upper story +of the convent of the Feuillants, above the corridor where the offices +and committees of the Assembly had been established. It was there, in +the cells of the monks, that the royal family were to pass the night. +Then all was silent once more. Royalty was dying! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap32"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P329"></A>329}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE ROYAL-FAMILY IN THE CONVENT OF THE FEUILLANTS. +</H4> + +<P> +What a strange prison was this dilapidated old monastery, these little +cells, not lived in for two years, with their flooring half-destroyed, +and their narrow windows looking down into courts full of men drunken +with wine and blood! By the light of candles stuck into gun-barrels +the royal family entered this gloomy lodging. Trembling for her son, +who was frightened, the Queen took him from M. Aubier's arms and +whispered to him. The child grew calmer. "Mamma," said he, "has +promised to let me sleep in her room because I was very good before all +those wicked men." Four cells, all opening by similar small doors upon +the same corridor, comprised the quarters of the royal family. What a +night! The souvenirs of the previous day came back like dismal dreams. +Their ears were still deafened with furious cries. They seemed to see +the blood of the Swiss flowing like a torrent, the pyramids of corpses +in red uniforms, the flames of the terrible conflagration sweeping the +approaches to the Tuileries. Marie Antoinette seems under an +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P330"></A>330}</SPAN> +hallucination; her emotions break her down. Is this woman, confided to +the care of an unknown servant, in this deserted old convent, really +she? Is this the Queen of France and Navarre? This the daughter of +the great Empress Maria Theresa? What uncertainty rests over the fate +of her most faithful servitors! What news will she yet learn? Who has +fallen? Who has survived the carnage? The hours of the night wear on; +Marie Antoinette has not been able to sleep a moment. +</P> + +<P> +The Marquis de Tourzel and M. d'Aubier remained near the King's +bedside. Before sleeping, he talked to them with the utmost calmness +of all that had taken place. "People regret," said he, "that I did not +have the rebels attacked before they could have forced the Assembly; +but besides the fact that in accordance with the terms of the +Constitution, the National Guards might have refused to be the +aggressors, what would have been the result of this attack? The +measures of the insurrection were too well taken for my party to have +been victorious, even if I had not left the Tuileries. Do they forget +that when the seditious Commune massacred M. Mandat, it rendered his +projected defence of no avail?" While Louis XVI. was saying this, the +men placed under the windows were shouting loudly for the Queen's head. +"What has she done to them?" cried the unfortunate sovereign. +</P> + +<P> +The next morning, August 11, several persons were authorized to enter +the cells of the convent. +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P331"></A>331}</SPAN> +Among them was one of the officers of +the King's bedchamber, François Hue, who had incurred the greatest +dangers on the previous day. Cards of admission were distributed by +the inspector of the Assembly hall. A large guard was stationed at all +the issues of the corridor. No one could pass without being stopped +and questioned. After surmounting all obstacles, M. Hue reached the +cell of Louis XVI. The King was still in bed, with his head covered by +a coarse cloth. He looked tenderly at his faithful servant. M. Hue, +who could scarcely speak for sobbing, apprised his unhappy master of +the tragic death of several persons whom His Majesty was especially +fond of, among others, the Chevalier d'Allonville, who had been +under-governor to the first Dauphin, and several officers of the +bedchamber: MM. Le Tellier, Pallas, and de Marchais. "I have, at +least," said Louis XVI., "the consolation of seeing you saved from this +massacre!" +</P> + +<P> +All night long, Madame Elisabeth, the Princess de Lamballe, and Madame +de Tourzel had prayed and wept in silence at the door of the chamber +where Marie Antoinette watched beside her sleeping children. It was +not until morning, after cruel insomnia, that the wretched Queen was at +last able to close her eyes. And when, after a few minutes, she opened +them again, what an awakening! +</P> + +<P> +At eight o'clock in the morning Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel arrived +at the Feuillants. "I cannot say enough," she writes in her <I>Souvenirs +de Quarante +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P332"></A>332}</SPAN> +Ans</I>, "about the goodness of the King and Queen; they +asked me many questions about the persons concerning whom I could give +them any tidings. Madame and the Dauphin received me with touching +signs of affection; they embraced me, and Madame said: 'My dear +Pauline, do not leave us any more!'" The courtiers of misfortune came +one after another. Madame Campan and her sister, Madame Auguié, saw +the Prince de Poix, M. d'Aubier, M. de Saint-Pardou, Madame Elisabeth's +equerry, MM. de Goguelat, Hue, and de Chamilly in the first cell; in +the second they found the King. They wanted to kiss his hand, but he +prevented it, and embraced them without speaking. In the third cell +they saw the Queen, waited on by an unknown woman. Marie Antoinette +held out her arms. "Come!" she cried; "come, unhappy women! come and +see one who is still more unhappy than you, since it is she who has +been the cause of all your sorrow!" She added: "We are ruined. We +have reached the place at last to which they have been leading us for +three years by every possible outrage; we shall succumb in this +horrible revolution, and many others will perish after us. Everybody +has contributed to our ruin: the innovators like fools, others like the +ambitious, in order to aid their own fortunes; for the most furious of +the Jacobins wanted gold and places, and the crowd expected pillage. +There is not a patriot in the whole infamous horde; the emigrants had +their schemes and manoeuvres; +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P333"></A>333}</SPAN> +the foreigners wanted to profit by +the dissensions of France; everybody has had a part in our +misfortunes." Here the Dauphin entered with his sister and Madame de +Tourzel. "Poor children!" cried the Queen. "How cruel it is not to +transmit to them so noble a heritage, and to say: All is over for us!" +And as the little Dauphin, seeing his mother and those around her +weeping, began to shed tears also: "My child," the Queen said, +embracing him, "you see I have consolations too; the friends whom +misfortune deprived me of were not worth as much as those it gave me." +Then Marie Antoinette asked for news of the Princess de Tarente, Madame +de la Roche-Aymon, and others whom she had left at the Tuileries. She +compassionated the fate of the victims of the previous day. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Campan expressed a desire to know what the foreign ambassadors +had done in this catastrophe. The Queen replied that they had done +nothing, but that the English ambassadress, Lady Sutherland, had just +displayed some interest by sending linen for the Dauphin, who was in +need of it. +</P> + +<P> +What memories must not that little cell in the Feuillants convent have +left in the souls of those who were privileged to present there the +homage of their devotion to the Queen! "I think I still see," Madame +Campan has said in her Memoirs, "I shall always see, that little cell, +hung with green paper, that wretched couch from which the dethroned +sovereign stretched out her arms to us, saying that our +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P334"></A>334}</SPAN> +woes, of +which she was the cause, aggravated her own. There, for the last time, +I saw the tears flowing and heard the sobs of her whose birth and +natural gifts, and above all the goodness of whose heart had destined +her to be the ornament of all thrones and the happiness of all peoples." +</P> + +<P> +During the 11th and 12th of August the tortures of the 10th were +renewed for the royal family. They were obliged to occupy the odious +box of the <I>Logographe</I> during the sessions of the Assembly, and from +there witness, as at a show, the slow and painful death-struggle of +royalty. As she was on her way to this wretched hole, Marie Antoinette +perceived in the garden some curious spectators on whose faces a +certain compassion was depicted. She saluted them. Then a voice +cried: "Don't put on so many airs with that graceful head; it is not +worth while. You'll not have it much longer." From the box of the +<I>Logographe</I> the royal family listened to the most offensive motions; +to decrees according the Marseillais a payment of thirty sous a day, +ordering all statues of kings to be overthrown, and petitions demanding +the heads of all the Swiss who had escaped the massacre. At last the +Assembly grew tired of the long humiliation of the august captives. On +Monday, August 13, they were not present at the session, and during the +day they were notified that in the evening they were to be +incarcerated, not in the Luxembourg,—that palace being too good for +them,—but in the tower of the Temple. When Marie +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P335"></A>335}</SPAN> +Antoinette was +informed of this decision, she turned toward Madame de Tourzel, and +putting her hands over her eyes, said: "I always asked the Count +d'Artois to have that villanous tower of the Temple torn down; it +always filled me with horror!" Pétion told Louis XVI. that the +Communal Council had decreed that none of the persons proposed for the +service of the royal family should follow them to their new abode. By +force of remonstrance the King finally obtained permission that the +Princess de Lamballe, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter should be +excepted from this interdiction, and also MM. Hue and de Chamilly, and +Mesdames Thibaud, Basire, Navarre, and Saint-Brice. The departure for +the Temple took place at five in the evening. The royal family went in +a large carriage with Manuel and Pétion, who kept their hats on. The +coachman and footmen, dressed in gray, served their masters for the +last time. National Guards escorted the carriage on foot and with +reversed arms. The passage through a hostile multitude occupied not +less than two hours. The vehicle, which moved very slowly, stopped for +several moments in the Place Vendôme. There Manuel pointed out the +statue of Louis XIV., which had been thrown down from its pedestal. At +first the descendant of the great King reddened with indignation, then, +tranquillizing himself instantly, he calmly replied: "It is fortunate, +Sir, that the rage of the people spends itself on inanimate objects." +Manuel might have gone on to say that +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P336"></A>336}</SPAN> +on this very Place Vendôme +"Queen Violet," one of the most furious vixens of the October Days, had +just been crushed by the fall of this equestrian statue of Louis XIV. +to which she was hanging in order to help bring it down. The statue of +Henry IV. in the Place Royale, that of Louis XIII. in the Place des +Victoires, and that of Louis XV. in the place that bears his name, had +fallen at the same time. +</P> + +<P> +The royal family arrived at the Temple at seven in the evening. The +lanterns placed on the projecting portions of the walls and the +battlements of the great tower made it resemble a catafalque surrounded +by funeral lights. The Queen wore a shoe with a hole in it, through +which her foot could be seen. "You would not believe," said she, +smiling, "that a Queen of France was in need of shoes." The doors +closed upon the captives, and a sanguinary crowd complained of the +thickness of the walls separating them from their prey. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap33"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P337"></A>337}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE TEMPLE. +</H4> + +<P> +There are places which, by the very souvenirs they evoke, seem fatal +and accursed. Such was the dungeon that was to serve as a prison for +Louis XVI. and his family. The great tower for which Marie Antoinette +had felt a nameless instinctive repugnance in the happiest days of her +reign, arose at the extremity of Paris like a gigantic phantom, and +recalled in a sinister fashion the tragedies of the Middle Ages and the +sombre legends of the Templars. It was formerly the manor, the +fortress, of that religious and military Order of the Temple, founded +in the Holy Land at the beginning of the twelfth century, to protect +the pilgrims, and which, after the fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, +had spread all over Europe. The great tower was built by Frère Hubert, +in the early years of the thirteenth century, in the midst of an +enclosure surrounded by turreted walls. There ruled, by cross and +sword, those men of iron, in white habits, who took the triple vows of +poverty, chastity, and obedience, and who excited royal jealousy by the +increase of their power. It was there that Philippe le Bel went on +October 13, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P338"></A>338}</SPAN> +1307, with his lawyers and his archers, to lay his +hand on the grand-master, seize the treasures of the order, and on the +same day, at the same hour, cause all Templars to be arrested +throughout the realm. Then began that mysterious trial which has +remained an insoluble problem to posterity, and after which these +monastic knights, whose bravery and whose exploits have made so +prolonged an echo, perished in prisons or on scaffolds. Pursued by +horrible accusations, they had confessed under torture, but they denied +at execution. When the grand-master, Jacques de Molay, and the +commander of Normandy were burned alive before the garden of Philippe +le Bel, March 11, 1314, even in the midst of flames, they did not cease +to attest the innocence of the Order of the Temple. The people, +astonished by their heroism, believed that they had summoned the Pope +and the King to appear in the presence of God before the end of the +year. Clement V., on April 20, and Philippe IV., on November 29, +obeyed the summons. +</P> + +<P> +The possessions of the order were given to the Hospitallers of Saint +John of Jerusalem, who transformed themselves into Knights of Malta +toward the middle of the sixteenth century. The Temple became the +provincial house of the grand-prior of the Order of Malta for the +<I>nation</I> or <I>language</I> of France, and the great tower contained +successively the treasure, the arsenal, and the archives. In 1607, the +grand-prior, Jacques de Souvré, had a house built in +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P339"></A>339}</SPAN> +front of the +old manor, between the court and the garden, which was called the +palace of the grand-prior. His successor, Philippe de Vendôme, made +his palace a rendezvous of elegance and pleasure. There shone that +Anacreon in a cassock, the gay and sprightly Abbé de Chaulieu, who died +a fervent Christian in the voluptuous abode where he had dwelt a +careless Epicurean. There young Voltaire went to complete the lessons +he had begun in the sceptical circle of Ninon de l'Enclos. The office +of grand-prior, which was worth sixty thousand livres a year, passed +afterwards to Prince de Conti, who in 1765 sheltered Jean-Jacques +Rousseau there, as <I>lettres de cachet</I> could not penetrate within its +privileged precinct. Under Louis XVI. the palace of the grand-prior +had served as a passing hostelry to the young and brilliant Count +d'Artois when he came from Versailles to Paris. The flowers of the +entertainments given there by the Prince were hardly faded when Louis +XVI. suddenly entered it as a prisoner. +</P> + +<P> +It was seven o'clock in the evening when the wretched King and his +family, coming from the convent of the Feuillants, arrived at the +Temple. Situated near the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, not far from the +former site of the Bastille, the Temple enclosure at this period was +not more than two hundred yards long by nearly as many wide. The rest +of the ancient precinct had disappeared under the pavements or the +houses of the great city. Nevertheless, the enclosure still formed a +sort of little +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P340"></A>340}</SPAN> +private city, sometimes called the +Ville-Neuve-du-Temple, the gates of which were closed every night. In +one of its angles stood the house called the grand-prior's palace. +</P> + +<P> +This was the first stopping-place of the royal family, which had been +entrusted by Pétion to the surveillance of the municipality and the +guard of Santerre. The municipal officers stayed close to the King, +kept their hats on, and gave him no title except "Monsieur." Louis +XVI., not doubting that the palace of the grand-prior was the residence +assigned him by the nation until the close of his career, began to +visit its apartments. While the municipal officers took a cruel +pleasure in this error, thinking of the still keener one they would +enjoy when they disabused him of it, he pleased himself by allotting +the different rooms in advance. The word palace had an unpleasant +sound to the persecutors of royalty. The Temple tower looked more like +a prison. Toward eleven o'clock, one of the commissioners ordered the +august captives to collect such linen and other clothing as they had +been able to procure, and follow him. They silently obeyed, and left +the palace. The night was very dark. They passed through a double row +of soldiers holding naked sabres. The municipal officers carried +lanterns. One of them broke the dismal silence he had observed +throughout the march. "Thy master," said he to M. Hue, "has been +accustomed to gilded canopies. Very well! he is going to find out how +we lodge the assassins of the people." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P341"></A>341}</SPAN> + +<P> +The lamps in the windows of the old quadrangular dungeon lighted up its +high pinnacles and turrets, its gigantic profile and gloomy bulk. The +immense tower, one hundred and fifty feet high, and with walls nine +feet thick, rose, menacing and fatal, amidst the darkness. Beside it +was another tower, narrower and not so high, but which was also flanked +by turrets. Thus the whole dungeon was composed of two distinct yet +united towers. The second of these, called the little tower, to +distinguish it from the great one, was selected as the prison of the +former hosts of Versailles, Fontainebleau, and the Tuileries. +</P> + +<P> +The little tower of the Temple, which had no interior communication +with the great one against which it stood, was a long quadrangle +flanked by two turrets. Four steps led to the door, which was low and +narrow, and opened on a landing at the end of which began a winding +staircase shaped like a snail-shell. Wide from its base as far as the +first story, it grew narrower as it climbed up into the second. The +door, which was considered too weak, was to be strengthened on the +following day by heavy bars, and supplied with an enormous lock brought +from the prisons of the Châtelet. The Queen was put on the second +floor, and the King on the third. On entering his chamber, Louis XVI. +found a miserable bed in an alcove without tapestry or curtains. He +showed neither ill humor nor surprise. Engravings, indecent for the +most part, covered the walls. He +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P342"></A>342}</SPAN> +took them down himself. "I +will not leave such objects before my children's eyes," said he. Then +he lay down and slept tranquilly. +</P> + +<P> +The first days of captivity were relatively calm. The prisoners +consoled themselves by their family life, reading, and, above all, +prayer. Forgetting that he had been a king, and remembering that he +was a father, Louis XVI. gave lessons to the Dauphin. "It would have +been worth while for the whole nation to be present at these lessons; +they would have been both surprised and touched at all the sensible, +cordial, and kindly things the good King found to say when the map of +France lay spread out before him, or concerning the chronology of his +predecessors. Everything in his remarks showed the love he bore his +subjects and how greatly his paternal heart desired their happiness. +What great and useful lessons one could learn in listening to this +captive king instructing a child born to the throne and condemned to +share the captivity of his parents." (<I>Souvenirs de Quarante Ans</I>, by +Madame de Béarn, <I>née</I> de Tourzel.) +</P> + +<P> +All those who had been authorized to follow the royal family to the +Temple—the Princess de Lamballe, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter, +Mesdames Thibaud, Basire, Navarre, MM. de Chamilly and François +Hue—surrounded the captives with the most respectful and devoted +attentions. But these noble courtiers of misfortune, these voluntary +prisoners who were so glad to be associated in their +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P343"></A>343}</SPAN> +master's +trials, were not long to enjoy an honor they had so keenly desired. In +the night of August 18-19, two municipal officers presented themselves, +who were commissioned to fetch away "all persons not belonging to the +Capet family." The Queen pointed out in vain that the Princess de +Lamballe was her relative. The Princess must go with the others. "In +our position," has said Madame de Tourzel, the governess of the +children of France, "there was nothing to do but obey. We dressed +ourselves and then went to the Queen, to whom I resigned that dear +little Prince, whose bed had been carried into her room without awaking +him." It was an indescribable torture for Madame de Tourzel to abandon +the Dauphin, whom she cherished so tenderly, and whom she had educated +since 1789. "I abstained from looking at him," she adds, "not only to +avoid weakening the courage we had so much need of, but in order to +give no room for censure, and so come back, if possible, to a place we +left with so much regret. The Queen went instantly into the chamber of +the Princess de Lamballe, from whom she parted with the utmost grief. +To Pauline and me she showed a touching sensibility, and said to me in +an undertone: 'If we are not so happy as to see you again, take good +care of Madame de Lamballe. Do the talking on all important occasions, +and spare her as much as possible from having to answer captious and +embarrassing questions.'" The two municipal officers said to Hue and +Chamilly: "Are you +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P344"></A>344}</SPAN> +the valets-de-chambre?" On their affirmative +response, the two faithful servants were ordered to get up and prepare +for departure. They shook hands with each other, both of them +convinced that they had reached the end of their existence. One of the +municipal officers had said that very day in their presence: "The +guillotine is permanent, and strikes with death the pretended servants +of Louis." When they descended to the Queen's antechamber, a very +small room in which the Princess de Lamballe slept, they found that +Princess and Madame de Tourzel all ready to start, and clasped in one +embrace with the Queen, the children, and Madame Elisabeth. Tender and +heart-breaking farewells, presages of separations more cruel still! +</P> + +<P> +All these exiles from the prison left at the same time. Only one of +them, M. François Hue, was to return. He was examined at the +Hôtel-de-Ville, and at the close of this interrogation an order was +signed permitting him to be taken back to the tower. "How happy I +was," he writes, "to return to the Temple! I ran to the King's +chamber. He was already up and dressed, and was reading as usual in +the little tower. The moment he saw me, his anxiety to know what had +occurred made him advance toward me; but the presence of the municipal +officers and the guards who were near him made all conversation +impossible. I indicated by a glance that, for the moment, prudence +forbade me to explain myself. Feeling the necessity of silence as well +as myself, the King resumed his +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P345"></A>345}</SPAN> +reading and waited for a more +opportune moment. Some hours later, I hastily informed him what +questions had been asked me and what I had replied." (<I>Dernières Années +de Louis XVI., par François Hue</I>.) +</P> + +<P> +The unfortunate sovereign doubtless believed that the others were also +about to return. Vain hope! During the day Manuel announced to the +King that none of them would come back to the Temple. "What has become +of them?" asked Louis XVI. anxiously.—"They are prisoners at the +Force," returned Manuel.—"What are they going to do with the only +servant I have left?" asked the King, glancing at M. Hue.—"The Commune +leaves him with you," said Manuel; "but as he cannot do everything, men +will be sent to assist him."—"I do not want them," replied Louis XVI.; +"what he cannot do, we will do ourselves. Please God, we will not +voluntarily give those who have been taken from us the chagrin of +seeing their places taken by others!" In Manuel's presence, the Queen +and Madame Elisabeth aided M. Hue to prepare the things most necessary +for the new prisoners of the Force. The two Princesses arranged the +packets of linen and other matters with the skill and activity of +chambermaids. +</P> + +<P> +Behold the heir of Louis XIV., the King of France and Navarre, with but +a single servant left him! He has but one coat, and at night his +sister mends it. Behold the daughter of the German Cæsars, with not +even one woman to wait upon her, and who waits on herself, incessantly +watched, meanwhile, by the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P346"></A>346}</SPAN> +inquisitors of the Commune; who cannot +speak a word or make a gesture unwitnessed by a squad of informers who +pursue her even into the chamber where she goes to change her dress, +and who spy on her even when she is sleeping! And yet neither the +calmness nor the dignity of the prisoners suffers any loss. +</P> + +<P> +There was but one thing that keenly annoyed Louis XVI. It was when, on +August 24, they deprived him, the chief of gentlemen, of his sword, as +if taking away his sceptre were not enough. He consoled himself by +prayer, meditation, and reading. He spent hours in the room containing +the library of the keeper of archives of the Order of Malta, who had +previously occupied the little tower. One day when he was looking for +books, he pointed out to M. Hue the works of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques +Rousseau. "Those two men have ruined France," said he in an undertone. +On another day he was pained by overhearing the insults heaped on this +faithful servant by one of the Municipal Guards. "You have had a great +deal to suffer to-day," he said to him. "Well! for the love of me, +continue to endure everything; make no answer." At another time he +slipped into his hand a folded paper. "This is some of my hair," said +he; "it is the only present I can give you at this moment." M. Hue +exclaims in his pathetic book: "O shade forever cherished! I will +preserve this precious gift to my latest day! The inheritance of my +son, it will pass on to my descendants, and all of them will see in +this testimonial of Louis XVI.'s +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P347"></A>347}</SPAN> +goodness, that they had a father +who merited the affection of his King by his fidelity." +</P> + +<P> +In the evenings the Queen made the Dauphin recite this prayer: +"Almighty God, who created and redeemed me, I adore Thee. Spare the +lives of the King, my father, and those of my family! Defend us +against our enemies! Grant Madame de Tourzel the strength she needs to +support the evils she endures on our account." And the angel of the +Temple, Madame Elisabeth, recited every day this sublime prayer of her +own composition: "What will happen to me to-day, O my God! I do not +know. All I know is, that nothing will happen that has not been +foreseen by Thee from all eternity. It is enough, my God, to keep me +tranquil. I adore Thy eternal designs, I submit to them with my whole +heart; I will all, I accept all; I sacrifice all to Thee; I unite this +sacrifice to that of Thy dear Son, my Saviour, asking Thee by His +sacred heart and His infinite merits, the patience in our afflictions +and the perfect submission which is due to Thee for all that Thou +wiliest and permittest." One day when she had finished her prayer, the +saintly Princess said to M. Hue: "It is less for the unhappy King than +for his misguided people that I pray. May the Lord deign to be moved, +and to look mercifully upon France!" Then she added, with her +admirable resignation: "Come, let us take courage. God will never send +us more troubles than we are able to bear." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P348"></A>348}</SPAN> + +<P> +The prisoners were permitted to walk a few steps in the garden every +day to get a breath of fresh air. But even there they were insulted. +As they passed by, the guards stationed at the base of the tower took +pains to put on their hats and sit down. The sentries scrawled insults +on the walls. Colporteurs maliciously cried out bad tidings, which +were sometimes false. One day, one of them announced a pretended +decree separating the King from his family. The Queen, who was near +enough to hear distinctly the voice which told this news, not exact as +yet, was struck with a terror from which she did not recover. +</P> + +<P> +And yet there were still souls that gave way to compassion. From the +upper stories of houses near the Temple enclosure there were eyes +looking down into the garden when the prisoners took their walk. The +common people and the workmen living in these poor abodes were +affected. Sometimes, to show her gratitude for the sympathy of those +unknown friends, Marie Antoinette would remove her veil, and smile. +When the little Dauphin was playing, there would be hands at the +windows, joined as if to applaud. Flowers would sometimes fall, as if +by chance, from a garret roof to the Queen's feet, and occasionally it +happened that when the captives had gone back to their prison, they +would hear in the darkness the echo of some royalist refrain, hummed by +a passer-by in the silence of the night. +</P> + +<P> +The Temple tower is no longer in existence. Bonaparte visited it when +he was Consul. "There are +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P349"></A>349}</SPAN> +too many souvenirs in that prison," he +exclaimed. "I will tear it down." In 1811 he kept his promise. The +palace of the grand-prior was destroyed in 1853. No trace remains of +that famous enclosure of the Templars whose legend has so sombre a +poetry. But it has left an impress on the imagination of peoples which +will never be effaced. It seems to rise again gigantic, that tower +where the son of Saint Louis realized not alone the type of the antique +sage of whom Horace said: <I>Impavidum ferient ruinae</I>, but also the +purest ideal of the true Christian. Does not the name Temple seem +predestinated for a spot which was to be sanctified by so many virtues, +and where the martyr King put in practice these verses of the +<I>Imitation of Jesus Christ</I>, his favorite book: "It needs no great +virtue to live peaceably with those who are upright and amiable; one is +naturally pleased in such society; we always love those whose +sentiments agree with ours. But it is very praiseworthy, and the +effect of a special grace and great courage to live in peace with +severe and wicked men, who are disorderly, or who contradict us.... He +who knows best how to suffer, will enjoy the greatest peace; such a one +is the conqueror of himself, master of the world, the friend of Jesus +Christ, and the inheritor of heaven." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap34"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P350"></A>350}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXIV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE PRINCESS DE LAMBALLE'S MURDER. +</H4> + +<P> +The Princess de Lamballe, after being taken from the Temple in the +night of August 18-19, had been examined by Billaud-Varennes at the +Hôtel-de-Ville, and then sent, at noon, August 19, to the Force. This +prison, divided into two distinct parts, the great and the little +Force, was situated between the rues Roi-de-Sicile, Culture, and Pavée. +In 1792 it supplemented the Abbey and Châtelet prisons, which were +overcrowded. The little Force had a separate entry on the rue Pavée to +the Marais, while the door of the large one opened on the rue des +Ballets, a few steps from the rue Saint-Antoine. The register of the +little Force, which is preserved in the archives of the prefecture of +police, records that, at the time of the September massacres, this +prison in which the Princess de Lamballe was immured, contained one +hundred and ten women, most of them not concerned with political +affairs, and in great part women of the town. Here, from August 19 to +September 3, the Princess suffered inexpressible anguish. She never +heard a turnkey open the door of her cell without thinking that her +last hour had come. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P351"></A>351}</SPAN> + +<P> +The massacres began on September 2. On that day the Princess de +Lamballe was spared. In the evening she threw herself on her bed, a +prey to the most cruel anxiety. Toward six o'clock the next morning, +the turnkey entered with a frightened air: "They are coming here," he +said to the prisoners. Six men, armed with sabres, guns, and pistols, +followed him, approached the beds, asked the names of the women, and +went out again. Madame de Tourzel, who shared the Princess de +Lamballe's captivity, said to her: "This threatens to be a terrible +day, dear Princess; we know not what Heaven intends for us; we must ask +God to forgive our faults. Let us say the <I>Miserere</I> and the +<I>Confiteor</I> as acts of contrition, and recommend ourselves to His +goodness." The two women said their prayers aloud, and incited each +other to resignation and courage. +</P> + +<P> +There was a window which opened on the street, and from which, although +it was very high, one could see what was passing by mounting on Madame +de Lamballe's bed, and thence to the window ledge. The Princess +climbed up, and as soon as her head was noticed on the street, a +pretence of firing on her was made. She saw a considerable crowd at +the prison door. +</P> + +<P> +Very little doubt remained concerning her fate. Neither she nor Madame +de Tourzel had eaten since the previous day. But they were too greatly +moved to take any breakfast. They dared not speak to each other. They +took their work, and sat down to await the result of the fatal day in +silence. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P352"></A>352}</SPAN> + +<P> +Toward eleven o'clock the door opened. Armed men filled the room and +demanded Madame de Lamballe. The Princess put on a gown, bade adieu to +Madame de Tourzel, and was led to the great Force, where some municipal +officers, wearing their insignia, subjected the prisoners to a +pretended trial. In front of this tribunal stood executioners with +ferocious faces, who brandished bloody weapons. The atmosphere was +sickening: full of the steam of carnage, and the odors of wine and +blood. Madame de Lamballe fainted. When she recovered consciousness +she was interrogated: "Who are you?"—"Marie Louise, Princess of +Savoy."—"What is your rank?"—"Superintendent of the Queen's +household."—"Were you acquainted with the conspiracies of the court on +August 10?"—"I do not know that there were any conspiracies on August +10, but I know I had no knowledge of them."—"Swear liberty, equality, +hatred to the King, the Queen, and royalty."—"I will swear the first +two without difficulty; I cannot swear the last; it is not in my +heart." Here an assistant said in a whisper to Madame de Lamballe: +"Swear it! if you do not swear, you are a dead woman." The Princess +made no answer; she put her hands up to her eyes, covered her face with +them and made a step toward the wicket. The judge exclaimed: "Let some +one release Madame!" This phrase was the death signal. Two men took +the victim roughly by the arms, and made her walk over corpses. Hardly +had she crossed the threshold when she received a +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P353"></A>353}</SPAN> +blow from a +sabre on the back of her head, which made her blood flow in streams. +In the narrow passage leading from the rue Saint-Antoine to the Force, +and called the Priests' cul-de-sac, she was despatched with pikes on a +heap of dead bodies. Then they stripped off her clothes and exposed +her body to the insults of a horde of cannibals. When the blood that +flowed from her wounds, or that of the neighboring corpses, had soiled +the body too much, they washed it with a sponge, so that the crowd +might notice its whiteness better. They cut off her head and her +breasts. They tore out her heart, and of this head and this heart they +made horrible trophies. The pikes which bore them were lifted high in +air, and they went to carry around these excellent spoils of the +Revolution. +</P> + +<P> +At the very moment when the hideous procession began its march, Madame +de Lebel, the wife of a painter, who owed many benefits to Madame de +Lamballe, was trying to get near the prison, hoping to hear news of +her. Seeing the great commotion in the crowd, she inquired the cause. +When some one replied: "It is Lamballe's head that they are going to +carry through Paris," she was seized with horror, and, turning back, +took refuge in a hairdresser's shop on the Place Bastille. Hardly had +she done so when the crowd entered the Place. The murderers came into +the shop and required the hairdresser to arrange the head of the +Princess. They washed it, and powdered the fair hair, all soiled with +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P354"></A>354}</SPAN> +blood. Then one of the assassins cried joyfully: "Now, at any +rate, Antoinette can recognize her!" The procession resumed its march. +From time to time they called a halt before a wine-shop. Wishing to +empty his glass, the scoundrel who had the Princess's head in his hand, +set it flat down on the lead counter. Then it was put back on the end +of a pike. The heart was on another pike, and other individuals +dragged along the headless corpse. In this manner they arrived in +front of the Temple. It was three o'clock in the afternoon. +</P> + +<P> +On that day the royal family had been refused permission to go into the +garden. They were in the little tower when the cries of the multitude +became audible. The workmen who were then employed in tearing down the +walls and buildings contiguous to the Temple dungeon, mingled with the +crowd, increased also by innumerable curious spectators, and uttered +furious shouts. One of the Municipal Guards at the Temple closed doors +and windows, and pulled down curtains so that the captives could see +nothing. +</P> + +<P> +On the street in front of the enclosure a tricolored ribbon had been +fastened across, with this inscription: "Citizens, you who know how to +ally the love of order with a just vengeance, respect this barrier; it +is necessary to our surveillance and our responsibility." This was the +sole dike they meant to oppose to the torrent. At the side of this +ribbon stood a municipal officer named Danjou, formerly a priest, who +was called Abbé Six-feet, on account of his +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P355"></A>355}</SPAN> +height. He mounted +on a chair and harangued the crowd. He felt his face touched by Madame +de Lamballe's head, still on the end of a pike which the bearer shook +about and gesticulated with, and also by a rag of her chemise, soaked +with blood and mire, which another individual also carried on a pike. +The naked body was there likewise, with its back to the ground and the +front cut open to the very breast. Danjou tried to make the crowd of +assassins who wanted to invade the Temple understand that at a moment +when the enemy was master of the frontiers, it would be impolitic to +deprive themselves of hostages so precious as Louis XVI. and his +family. "Moreover," he added, "would it not demonstrate their +innocence if you dare not try them? How much worthier it is of a great +people to execute a king guilty of treason on the scaffold!" Thus, +while preventing an immediate massacre, he held the scaffold in +reserve. Danjou said that the Communal Council, in order to show its +confidence in the citizens composing the mob, had decided that six of +them should be admitted to make the rounds of the Temple garden, with +the commissioners at their head. The ribbon was then raised and +several persons entered the enclosure. They were those who carried the +remains of Madame de Lamballe. With these were the laborers who had +been at work on the demolitions. Voices were heard demanding furiously +that Marie Antoinette should show herself at a window, so that some one +might climb up and make her +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P356"></A>356}</SPAN> +kiss her friend's head. As Danjou +opposed this infernal scheme, he was accused of being on the side of +the tyrant. Was the dungeon of the Temple to be forced? Were the +assassins about to seize the Queen, tear her in pieces, and drag her, +like her friend, through streets and squares to the rolling of drums +and the chanting of the <I>Marseillaise</I> and the <I>Ça ira</I>? +</P> + +<P> +A municipal officer entered the tower and began a mysterious parley +with his colleagues. As Louis XVI. asked what was going on, some one +replied: "Well, sir, since you desire to know, they want to show you +Madame de Lamballe's head." Meanwhile the cries outside were growing +louder. Another municipal came in, followed by four delegates from the +mob. One of them, who carried a heavy sabre in his hand, insisted that +the prisoners should present themselves at the window, but this was +opposed by the municipal officers, who were less cruel. This man said +to the Queen in an insulting tone: "They want us to hide the Princess +de Lamballe's head from you when we brought it to let you see how the +people avenge themselves on their tyrants. I advise you to show +yourself if you don't want the people to come up." Marie Antoinette +fainted on learning her friend's death in this manner. Her children +burst into tears and tried by their caresses to bring her back to +consciousness. The man did not go away. "Sir," the King said to him, +"we are prepared for the worst, but you might have dispensed yourself +from informing the Queen of this frightful calamity." +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P357"></A>357}</SPAN> +Cléry, the +King's valet, was looking through a corner of the window blinds, and +saw Madame de Lamballe's head. The person carrying it had climbed up +on a heap of rubbish from the buildings in process of demolition. +Another, who stood beside him, held her bleeding heart. Cléry heard +Danjou expostulating the crowd in words like these: "Antoinette's head +does not belong to you; the departments have their rights in it also. +France has confided these great criminals to the care of Paris; and it +is your business to assist us in guarding them until national justice +shall avenge the people." Then, addressing himself to these cannibals +as if they were heroes whose courage and exploits he praised, he added, +in speaking of the profaned corpse of the Princess de Lamballe: "The +remains you have there are the property of all. Do they not belong to +all Paris? Have you the right to deprive others of the pleasure of +sharing your triumph? Night will soon be here. Make haste, then, to +quit this precinct, which is too narrow for your glory. You ought to +place this trophy in the Palais Royal or the Tuileries garden, where +the sovereignty of the people has been so often trampled under foot, as +an eternal monument of the victory you have just won." Remarks like +these were all that could prevent these tigers from entering the Temple +and destroying the prisoners. Shouts of "To the Palais Royal!" proved +to Danjou that his harangue had been appreciated. The assassins at +last departed, after having covered his face with +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P358"></A>358}</SPAN> +kisses that +smelt of wine and blood. They wanted to show their victim's head at +the Hôtel Toulouse, the mansion of the venerable Duke de Penthièvre, +her father-in-law, but were deterred by the assurance that she did not +ordinarily live there, but at the Tuileries. Then they turned toward +the Palais Royal. The Duke of Orleans was at a window with his +mistress, Madame de Buffon. He left it, but he may have seen the head +of his sister-in-law. +</P> + +<P> +Some of the cannibals had remained in the neighborhood of the Temple. +Sitting down at table in a wine-shop, they had the heart of the +Princess de Lamballe cooked, and ate it with avidity. "Thus," says M. +de Beauchesne in his excellent work on Louis XVII., "this civilization +which had departed from God, surpassed at a single bound the fury of +savages, and the eighteenth century, so proud of its learning and +humanity, ended by anthropophagy." In the evening, when some one was +giving Collot d'Herbois an account of the day's performances, he +expressed but one regret,—that they had not succeeded in showing Marie +Antoinette the remains of the Princess de Lamballe. "What!" he +spitefully exclaimed, "did they spare the Queen that impression? They +ought to have served up her best friend's head in a covered dish at her +table." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap35"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P359"></A>359}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE SEPTEMBER MASSACRES. +</H4> + +<P> +Lovers of paradoxes have tried to represent the September massacres as +something spontaneous, a passing delirium of opinion, a sort of great +national convulsion. This myth was a lie against history and humanity. +It exists no longer, Heaven be thanked. The mists with which it was +sought to shroud these execrable crimes are now dissipated. Light has +been shed upon that series of infernal spectacles which would have made +cannibals blush. No; these odious massacres were not the result of a +popular movement, an unforeseen fanaticism, a paroxysm of rage or +vengeance. They present an ensemble of murders committed in cool +blood, a planned and premeditated thing. M. Mortimer-Ternaux, in his +<I>Histoire de la Terreur</I>, M. Granier de Cassagnac, in his <I>Histoire des +Girondins et des Massacres de Septembre</I>, have proved this abundantly. +They have exhumed from the archives and the record offices such a mass +of uncontested and incontestable documents, that not the slightest +doubt is now permissible. Edgar Quinet has not hesitated to recognize +this in his book, <I>La Révolution</I>. He says: "The +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P360"></A>360}</SPAN> +massacres were +executed administratively; the same discipline was everywhere displayed +throughout the carnage.... This was not a piece of blind, spontaneous +barbarism; it was a barbarity slowly meditated, minutely elaborated by +a sanguinary mind. Hence it bears no resemblance to anything +previously known in history. Marat harvested in September what he had +been sowing for three years." The Parisian populace, eight hundred +thousand souls, was inert; it was cowardly, it trembled; but it did not +approve, it was not an accomplice. It was a monstrous thing that a +handful of cut-throats should be enough to transform Paris into a +slaughter-house. One shudders in thinking what a few criminals can +accomplish in the midst of an immense population. "The people, the +real people—that composed of laborious and honest workmen, ardent and +patriotic at heart, and of young <I>bourgeois</I> with generous aspirations +and indomitable courage—never united for an instant with the +scoundrels recruited by Maillard from every kennel in the capital. +While the hired assassins of the Committee of Surveillance established +in the prisons what Vergniaud called a butcher's shop for human flesh, +the true populace was assembled on the Champ-de-Mars, and before the +enlistment booths; it was offering its purest blood for the country; it +would have blushed to shed that of helpless unfortunates."[<A NAME="chap35fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap35fn1">1</A>] In 1871, +the murder of hostages and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P361"></A>361}</SPAN> +the burning of monuments was no more +approved by the population than the massacres in the prisons were in +1792. The crimes were committed at both epochs by a mere handful of +individuals. The great majority of the people were guilty merely of +apathy and fear. +</P> + +<P> +The hideous tableau surpasses the most lugubrious conceptions of +Dante's sombre imagination. Paris is a hell. From August 29, it is +like a torpid Oriental town. The whole city is in custody, like a +criminal whose limbs are held while he is being searched and put in +irons. Every house is inspected by the agents of the Commune. A knock +at the door makes the inmates tremble. The denunciation of an enemy, a +servant, a neighbor, is a death sentence. People scarcely dare to +breathe. Neither running water nor solid earth is free. The parapets +of quays, the arches of bridges, the bathing and washing boats are +bristling with sentries. Everything is surrounded. There is no +refuge. Three thousand suspected persons are taken out of houses, and +crowded into prisons. The hunt begins anew the following day. The +programme of massacres is arranged. The Communal Council of +Surveillance has minutely regulated everything. The price of the +actual work is settled. The personnel of cut-throats is at its post. +Danton has furnished the executioners; Manuel, the victims. All is +ready. The bloody drama can begin. +</P> + +<P> +On September 2, Danton said to the Assembly: "The tocsin about to sound +is not an alarm signal; it +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P362"></A>362}</SPAN> +is a charge upon the enemies of the +country. To vanquish them, gentlemen, all that is needed is boldness, +and again boldness, and always boldness." Two days before, he had been +still more explicit. "The 10th of August," said he, "divided us into +republicans and royalists; the first few in number, the second many...; +we must make the royalists afraid." A frightful gesture, a horizontal +gesture, sufficed to express his meaning. +</P> + +<P> +Robbery preceded murder. It was a veritable raid. The Commune caused +the palaces, national property, the Garde-Meuble, the houses and +mansions of the <I>émigrés</I> to be pillaged. One saw nothing but carts +and wagons transporting stolen goods to the Hôtel-de-Ville. All the +plate was stolen from the churches likewise. "Millions," says Madame +Roland in her Memoirs, "passed into the hands of people who used it to +perpetuate the anarchy which was the source of their domination." When +will the men of the Commune render their accounts? Never. Who are the +accomplices of Danton and Marat in organizing the massacres? A band of +defaulting accountants, faithless violators of public trusts, breakers +of locks, swindlers, spies, and men overwhelmed with debts. What +interest have they in planning the murders? That of perpetuating the +dictatorship they had assumed on the eve of August 10, and, above all, +of having no accounts to render. A few weeks later on, Collot +d'Herbois will say at the Jacobin Club: "The 2d of September is the +chief article in the creed of our liberty." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P363"></A>363}</SPAN> + +<P> +The jailors were forewarned. They served the prisoners' dinner +earlier, and took away their knives. There was a disturbed and uneasy +look in their faces which made the victims suspect their end was near. +Toward noon the general alarm was beaten in every street. The citizens +were ordered to return at once to their dwellings. An order was issued +to illuminate every house when night fell. The shops were closed. +Terror overspread the entire city. +</P> + +<P> +It was agreed that at the third discharge of cannon the cut-throats +should set to work. The first blood shed was that of prisoners taken +from the mayoralty to the Abbey prison. The carriages containing them +passed along the Quai des Orfèvres, the Pont-Neuf and rue Dauphine, +until it reached the Bussy square. Here there was a crowd assembled +around a platform where enlistments were going on. The throng impeded +the progress of the carriages. Thereupon one of the escort opened the +door of one of them, and standing on the step, plunged his sabre into +the breast of an aged priest. The multitude shuddered and fled in +affright. "That makes you afraid," said the assassin; "you will see +plenty more like it." +</P> + +<P> +The rest of the escort followed the example set them. The carriages go +on again, and so do the massacres. They kill along the route, and they +kill on arriving at the Abbey. Towards five o'clock, Billaud-Varennes +presents himself there, wearing his municipal scarf. "People," says +he—what he calls +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P364"></A>364}</SPAN> +people is a band of salaried +assassins—"people, thou immolatest thine enemies, thou art doing thy +duty." Then he walks into the midst of the dead bodies, dipping his +feet in blood, and fraternizes with the murderers. "There is nothing +more to do here," exclaims Maillard; "let us go to the Carmelites." +</P> + +<P> +At the Carmelites, one hundred and eighty priests, crowded into the +church and convent, were awaiting their fate with pious resignation. +Two days before, Manuel had said to them ironically: "In forty-eight +hours you will all be free. Get ready to go into a foreign country and +enjoy the repose you cannot find here." And on the previous day a +gendarme had said to the Archbishop of Arles, blowing the smoke from +his pipe into his face as he did so: "It is to-morrow, then, that they +are going to kill Your Grandeur." A short time before the massacre +began, the victims were sent into the garden. At the bottom of it was +an orangery which has since become a chapel. Mgr. Dulau, Archbishop of +Arles, and the Bishops of Beauvais and de Saintes, both of whom were +named de la Rochefoucauld, kneeled down with the other priests and +recited the last prayers. The murderers approached. The Archbishop of +Arles, who was upwards of eighty, advanced to meet them. "I am he whom +you seek," he said; "my sacrifice is made; but spare these worthy +priests; they will pray for you on earth, and I in heaven." They +insulted him before they struck him. "I have never done harm to any +one," said he. An assassin +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P365"></A>365}</SPAN> +responded: "Very well; I'll do some +to you," and killed him. The other priests were chased around the +garden from one tree to another, and shot down. During this infernal +hunt the murderers were shouting with laughter and singing their +favorite song: <I>Dansez la Carmagnole</I>! +</P> + +<P> +The massacre of the Carmelites is over. "Let us go back to the Abbey!" +cries Maillard; "we shall find more game there." This time there is a +pretence of justice made. The tribunal is the vestibule of the Abbey; +Maillard, the chief cut-throat, is president; the assassins are the +judges, and the public, the Marseillais, the sans-culottes, the female +furies, and men to whom murder was a delightful spectacle. The +prisoners are summoned one after another. They enter the vestibule, +which has a wicket as a door of exit. They are questioned simply as a +matter of form. Their answers are not even listened to. "Conduct this +gentleman to the Force!" says the president. The prisoner thinks he is +safe; he does not know that this phrase has been agreed upon as the +signal of death. On reaching the wicket, hatchet and sabre strokes cut +him down in the midst of his dream. The Swiss officers and soldiers +who had survived August 10 were murdered thus. Their torture lasted a +longer or shorter time, and was accomplished with more or less cruel +refinements, according to the caprice of the assassins, who were nearly +all drunk. +</P> + +<P> +Night came, and torches were lighted. No +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P366"></A>366}</SPAN> +shadows; a grand +illumination. They must see clearly in the slaughter house. Lanterns +were placed near the lakes of blood and heaps of dead bodies, so as +plainly to distinguish the work from the workmen. There were some who +were bent on losing no details of the carnage. The spectators wanted +to take things easy. They were tired of standing too long. Benches +for men and others for dames were got ready for them. The death-rattle +of the agonizing, the vociferations of the assassins, the emulation +between the executioners who kill slowly and the victims who are in +haste to die, give joy to the spectators. There is no interruption to +the human butchery. There has been so much blood spilled that the feet +of the murderers slip on the pavement. A litter is made of straw and +the clothes of the victims, and thereafter none are killed except upon +this mattress. In this way the work is more commodiously accomplished. +The assassins have plenty of assurance. Morning dawns on the +continuation of the murders, and the wives of the murderers bring them +something to eat. +</P> + +<P> +On September 2, the only persons handed over to the cut-throats, were +at the Abbey, the Carmelites, and Saint-Firmin. On September 3, the +massacre became more general. The assassins had said: "If there is no +more work, we shall have to find some." Their desire realizes itself. +Work will not be lacking. There is still some at the Force, where the +Princess de Lamballe, the preferred victim, is +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P367"></A>367}</SPAN> +murdered. The +assassins, who at the Abbey had been paid at the rate of eight francs a +day, get only fifty sous at the Force. They work with undiminished +zeal, even at this reduction. If necessary, they would work for +nothing. To drink wine and shed blood is the essential thing. The +negro Delorme, servant to Fournier "the American," distinguishes +himself among them all. His black skin, reddened with blood, his white +teeth and ferocious eyes, his bestial laugh, his ravenous fury, make +him a choice assassin. There is work too at the Conciergerie, at the +great and little Châtelet, the Salpêtrière, and the Bicêtre. A great +number of those detained are people condemned or accused of private +crimes which had absolutely nothing in common with politics. No +matter; blood is wanted; they kill there as elsewhere. At the Grand +Châtelet, work is so plenty, and the assassins so few, that they +release several individuals imprisoned for theft, and impress them into +their service. One of these unfortunate accidental executioners begins +in a hesitating way, strikes a few undecided blows, and then throws +down the hatchet placed in his hands. "No, no," he cries, "I cannot. +No, no! Rather a victim than a murderer! I would rather receive death +from scoundrels like you, then give it to innocent, disarmed people. +Strike me!" And at once the veteran murderers kill the inexperienced +cut-throat. There was a woman, known on account of her charms as the +Beautiful Flower Girl, who was accused of having wounded +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P368"></A>368}</SPAN> +her +lover, a French guard, in a fit of jealousy. Théroigne de Mericourt, +an amazon of the gutters, was her rival. She pointed her out to the +assassins. They fastened her naked to a post, her legs apart and her +feet nailed to the ground. They burned her alive. They cut off her +breasts with sabre strokes. They impaled her on a hot iron. Her +shrieks carried dismay as far as the outer banks of the Seine. +Théroigne was at the height of felicity. +</P> + +<P> +At the Salpêtrière there was still another spectacle. This prison for +fallen women is a place of correction for the old, of amendment for the +young, and an asylum for those who are still children. More than forty +children of the lower classes were slain during these horrible days. +The delirium of murder reached its height. Gorged with wine mingled +with gunpowder, intoxicated with the fumes and reek of carnage, the +assassins experienced a devouring, inextinguishable thirst for blood +which nothing could quench. More blood, and yet more blood! And where +can it now be found? The prisons are empty. There are no more nobles, +no more priests, to put to death. Very well! for lack of anything +better, they will go to an asylum for the poor, the sick, and the +insane; to the Bicêtre. Vagabonds, paupers, fools, thieves, steward, +chaplains, janitor, all is fish that comes to their net. The butchery +lasts five days and nights without stopping. Massacre takes every +form; some are drowned in the cellars, others shot in the courts. +Water, fire, and sword, every sort of torture. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P369"></A>369}</SPAN> + +<P> +The cut-throats can at last take some repose. They have worked all the +week. There are still some, however, who have not yet had enough, and +who are going to continue the massacres of Paris in the provinces. The +Communal Council of Surveillance has taken care to send to every +commune in France a circular bearing the seal of the Minister of +Justice, inviting them to follow the example of the capital. +</P> + +<P> +September 9, the prisoners who had been detained at Orleans to be tried +there by the Superior Court, entered Versailles on carts. At the +moment when they approached the grating of the Orangery, assassins sent +from Paris under the lead of Fournier "the American" sprang upon them +and immolated every one. Thus perished the former Minister of Foreign +Affairs, de Lessart, and the Duke de Brissac, former commander of the +Constitutional Guard. Fournier "the American"[<A NAME="chap35fn2text"></A><A HREF="#chap35fn2">2</A>] returned on horseback +to Paris and began to caracole on the Place Vendôme; Danton loudly +felicitated him on the success of the expedition, from the balcony of +the Ministry of Justice. +</P> + +<P> +During all this time, what efforts had the Assembly made to put a stop +to the murders? None, absolutely none. Never has any deliberative +body shown a like cowardice. Neither Vergniaud's voice nor that of any +other Girondin was heard in protest. Indignation, pity, found not a +single word to say. Speeches, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P370"></A>370}</SPAN> +discussions, votes on different +questions, went on as usual. Concerning the massacres, not a syllable. +During that infamous week, neither the ministers, the virtuous Roland +not more than the others, neither Pétion, the mayor of Paris, nor the +commander of the National Guard sent a picket guard of fifty men to any +quarter to prevent the murders. A population of eight hundred thousand +souls and a National Guard of fifty thousand men bent their necks under +the yoke of a handful of bandits, of two hundred and thirty-five +assassins (the exact number is known). People trembled. At the +Assembly the old moderate party had disappeared. There were not more +than two hundred odd deputies present at the shameful and powerless +sessions. Terrorized Paris was in a state of stupor and prostration. +</P> + +<P> +The murderers ended by execrating themselves. Tormented by remorse, +they could see nothing before them but vivid faces, reeking entrails, +bleeding limbs. "Among the cut-throats," M. Louis Blanc has said, +"some gave signs of insanity that led to the supposition that some +mysterious and terrible drug had been mingled with the wine they +drank." Some of them became furious madmen. Others sought refuge in +suicide, killing themselves the moment they had no one else to kill. +Others enlisted. They were chased out of the army. Among these was +the man who had carried the head of the Princess de Lamballe on a pike. +One day when he was boasting of his murders, the soldiers became +indignant and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P371"></A>371}</SPAN> +put him to death. Others still were tried as +Septembrists and sent to the scaffold. The guilty received their +punishment, even on this earth. Well! there are people nowadays who +would like to rehabilitate them! In vain has Lamartine, the founder of +the Second Republic, exclaimed in a burst of noble wrath: "Has human +speech an execration, an anathema, which is equal to the horror these +crimes of cannibals inspire in me, as in all civilized men?" In vain +have the most celebrated historians of democracy, Edgar Quinet and +Michelet, expressed in eloquent terms their indignation against these +crimes. In vain has M. Louis Blanc said: "Every murder is a suicide. +In the victim the body alone is killed; but what is killed in the +murderer is the soul." There are men who would not alone excuse, but +glorify the assassinations and the assassins! +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap35fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap35fn1text">1</A>] M. Mortimer-Ternaux, <I>Histoire de la Terreur</I>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap35fn2"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap35fn2text">2</A>] Claude Fournier-Lhéritier, was born in Auvergne, 1745, and served +as a volunteer in Santo Domingo, 1772-85, with Toussaint l'Ouverture, +whence his sobriquet "the American." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap36"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P372"></A>372}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXVI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +MADAME ROLAND DURING THE MASSACRES. +</H4> + +<P> +Madame Roland's hatred was appeased. The ambitious <I>bourgeoise</I> +throned it for the second time at the Ministry of the Interior, and the +Queen groaned in captivity in the Temple tower. The Egeria of the +Girondins had not felt her heart swell with a single movement of pity +for Marie Antoinette. The fatal 10th of August had seemed to her a +personal triumph in which her pride delighted. The parvenue enjoyed +the humiliations of the daughter of the German Cæsars. Her jealous +instincts feasted on the afflictions of the Queen of France and Navarre. +</P> + +<P> +Lamartine, indignant at this cruelty on Madame Roland's part, has +repented of the eulogies he gave her in his <I>Histoire des Girondins</I>. +In his <I>Cours de Littérature</I> (Volume XIII. Conversation XXIII.), he +says: "I glided over that medley of intrigue and pomposity which +composed the genius, both feminine and Roman, of this woman. In so +doing, I conceded more to popularity than to truth. I wanted to give a +Cornelia to the Republic. As a matter of fact, I do not know what +Cornelia was, that mother of the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P373"></A>373}</SPAN> +Gracchi who brought up +conspirators against the Roman Senate, and trained them to sedition, +that virtue of ambitious commoners. As to Madame Roland, who inflated +a vulgar husband by the breath of her feminine anger against a court +she found odious because it did not open to her upstart vanity, there +was nothing really fine in her except her death. Her rôle had been a +mere parade of true greatness of soul." What Lamartine finds fault +with most of all is her hostility to the martyr Queen. He adds: "She +inspired the Girondins, her intimate friends, with an implacable hatred +against the Queen, already so humiliated and so menaced; she had +neither respect nor pity for this victim; she points her out to the +rebellious multitude. She is no longer a wife, a mother, or a +Frenchwoman. She poses as Nemesis at the door of the Temple, when the +Queen is groaning there over her husband, her children, and herself, +between the throne and the scaffold. This ostentatious stoicism of +implacability is what, in my view, kills the woman in this female +demagogue." +</P> + +<P> +Alas! if Madame Roland was guilty, she was to be punished cruelly. The +colleague of the <I>virtuous</I> Roland was the organizer of the September +massacres. The republican sheepfold dreamed of by the admirer of +Jean-Jacques Rousseau was invaded by ferocious beasts. Human nature +had never appeared under a more execrable aspect than since its +so-called regeneration. Madame Roland was filled with a naïve +astonishment. After having sown the wind she was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P374"></A>374}</SPAN> +utterly +surprised to reap the whirlwind. What! she said to herself, my husband +is minister, or, to speak with great exactness, I am the minister +myself, and yet there are people in France who are dissatisfied! +Ungrateful nation, why dost thou not appreciate thy happiness? Madame +Roland resembled certain politicians, who, having attained to power, +would willingly disembarrass themselves of those by whose aid they +reached it. For the second time she had just arrived at the goal of +her ambition. Who dared, then, to pollute her joy? Why did that +marplot, Danton, come with his untimely massacres to destroy such +brilliant projects and banish such delightful dreams? The man who, as +if in derision and antithesis, allowed himself to be called the +Minister of Justice, produced the effect of a monster on Madame Roland. +The republic as conceived by him had not the head of a goddess, but of +a Gorgon. Its eyes glittered with a sinister lustre. The sword it +held was that of an assassin or a headsman. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Roland was greatly astonished when, on Sunday, September 2, +1792, toward five in the evening, when the massacres had already begun, +she saw two hundred men of forbidding appearance arrive at the Ministry +of the Interior and ask for her husband, who was absent. Lucky for him +he was; for albeit a minister, they had come to arrest him in virtue of +a mandate of the Communal Council of Surveillance. Not finding Roland, +the two hundred men retired. One of them, with his shirt-sleeves +rolled up to his +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P375"></A>375}</SPAN> +elbows, and a sabre in his hand, declaimed +furiously against the treachery of ministers. A few minutes later, +Danton said to Pétion: "Do you know what they have taken into their +heads? If they haven't issued a decree to arrest Roland!"—"Who did +that?" demanded the mayor.—"Eh! those devils of committeemen. I have +taken the mandate; hold! here it is!" +</P> + +<P> +What was Madame Roland doing the next day, when the worst of the +massacres were going on? She gave a dinner, and allowed the Prussian, +Anacharsis Clootz, who came, moreover, uninvited, to make a regular +defence of these horrible murders. "The events of the day," she says +in her Memoirs, "formed the subject of conversation. Clootz pretended +to prove that it was an indispensable and salutary measure; he uttered +a good many commonplaces about the people's rights, the justice of +their vengeance, and of its utility to the welfare of the species; he +talked a long while and very loudly, ate still more, and fatigued more +than one listener." +</P> + +<P> +And yet, revolutionary passions had not extinguished every notion of +humanity and justice in Madame Roland's soul. On that very day she +induced her husband to write a letter to the National Assembly +concerning the massacres. But how weak and undecided is this letter, +and how public opinion must have been lowered and debased when it could +regard Roland as a courageous minister! In place of scathing the +murderers with the energy of an +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P376"></A>376}</SPAN> +honest man, he pleads extenuating +circumstances in their favor. "It is in the nature of things and +according to the human heart," he said in his pale missive, "that +victory should lead to some excesses. The sea, agitated by a violent +storm, continues to roar long after the tempest; but everything has its +limits and must finally see them determined. Yesterday was a day over +whose events we ought, perhaps, to draw a veil. I know that the +terrible vengeance of the people carries with it a sort of justice; but +how easy it is for scoundrels and traitors to abuse this effervescence, +and how necessary it is to arrest it!" This language produced not the +least effect. The massacres went on, and Roland remained minister; +although in his letter of September 3 he had written: "I ask the +privilege of resigning if the silence of the laws does not permit me to +act." The <I>virtuous</I> Roland sat in the Council beside his colleague, +the organizer of this human butchery. September 13, he addressed a +letter to the Parisians in which he burnt incense to himself, bragged +about his character, his actions, and his firmness, and carried his +infatuation so far as to write: "I have twice accepted a burden which I +felt myself able to bear." Ah! how difficult it is to renounce even a +shadow of power, and of what compromises with their consciences are not +ministers capable in order to retain for a few days longer the +portfolios that are slipping from their hands! In the depths of his +soul Roland, like his wife, had the profoundest horror of the murders +and +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P377"></A>377}</SPAN> +the murderers. And yet notice how he extenuates them in his +letter to the Parisians: "I admired August 10; I trembled over the +results of September 2; I carefully considered what the betrayed +patience of the people and their justice had produced, and I did not +blame a first impulse too inconsiderately; I believe that its further +progress should have been prevented, and that those who were seeking to +perpetuate it were deceived by their imagination or by cruel and +evil-minded men. If the erring brethren recognize that they have been +deceived, let them come; my arms are open to them." That was a very +prompt amnesty. Already the assassins are but erring brethren, and the +minister welcomes them to his arms! +</P> + +<P> +The Gironde kept silence, or, if it spoke, it was to attribute, like +Vergniaud, the massacres "to the <I>émigrés</I> and the satellites of +Coblentz." Later on, they were horrified by the crimes, but it was +when others were to profit by them. Each taken by himself, the +Girondins did not hesitate to condemn the murders; but taken as a +whole, they considered merely the interests of their party. Were not +three of them still in the Ministerial Council? What had they to +complain of, then? The September massacres are the most striking +expression of what abominations the ambitious may commit or allow to be +committed in order to maintain themselves a few weeks longer in power. +</P> + +<P> +But there is a voice in the depths of conscience +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P378"></A>378}</SPAN> +which neither +interest nor ambition can succeed in stifling. Madame Roland could not +blind herself. The odious reality appeared to her. At last she saw +the yawning gulf beneath her feet, and she uttered a cry of terror. A +secret voice warned her that her fate would be like that of the +September victims. After the 9th of that fatal month her imagination +was vividly impressed. Bloody phantoms rose before her. She wrote on +that day to Bancal des Issarts: "If you knew the frightful details of +these expeditions.... You know my enthusiasm for the Revolution; well, +I am ashamed of it; it has become hideous. In a week ... how do I know +what may happen? It is degrading to remain in office, and we are not +permitted to leave Paris. We are detained so that we may be destroyed +at the propitious moment." +</P> + +<P> +From that time a rising anger and indignation took possession of the +mind and heart of the Egeria of the Girondins, and constantly increased +until the hour when she ascended the steps of the scaffold. She writes +in her Memoirs, apropos of the September massacres: "All Paris +witnessed these horrible scenes executed by a small number of wretches +(there were but fifteen at the Abbey, at the door of which only two +National Guards were stationed, in spite of the applications made to +the Commune and the commandant). All Paris permitted it to go on. All +Paris was accursed in my eyes, and I no longer hoped that liberty might +be established among cowards, insensible to the worst outrages that +could be perpetrated +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P379"></A>379}</SPAN> +against nature and humanity, cold spectators +of attempts which the courage of fifty armed men could have prevented +with ease.... It is not the first night that astonishes me; but four +days!—and inquisitive people going to see this spectacle! No, I know +nothing in the annals of the most barbarous peoples which can compare +with these atrocities." +</P> + +<P> +What a striking lesson for those who play with anarchical passions and +end by falling themselves into the snares they have laid for others! +Nothing is more deserving of study than this retaliatory punishment +which is found, one may say, on every page of revolutionary histories. +The hour was coming when the Girondins and their heroine would repent +of the means they had employed to overset the throne. This was when +the same means were employed against them, when they recognized their +own weapons in the wounds they received. Then, when they had no more +interest in keeping silence, they sought to escape a complicity that +gained them nothing. Instead of the luminous heights which in their +golden dreams they had aspired to gain, they fell, crushed and +overwhelmed, into a dismal gulf, full of tears and blood. How bitter +then were their recriminations against men and things! It was only to +virtue that the dying Brutus said: "Thou art but a name." The +Girondins said it also to glory, to country, and to liberty. Those +among them who did not succeed in fleeing, disavowed, denounced, and +insulted each other before the revolutionary tribunal. At the +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P380"></A>380}</SPAN> +Conciergerie they intoned the Marseillaise, but parodying the demagogic +chant in this wise:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Contre nous de la tyrannie[<A NAME="chap36fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap36fn1">1</A>]<BR> +Le <I>couteau</I> sanglant est levé.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Read the Memoirs of Louvet, Buzot, Barbaroux, Pétion, and Madame +Roland, and you will see to what extremes of bitterness the language of +deceived ambition can go. They are paroxysms of rage, howls of anger, +shrieks of despair. Consider the difference between philosophy and +religion! The philosophers curse, and the Christian pardons. Yes, as +Edgar Quinet has said, "Louis XVI. alone speaks of forgiveness on that +scaffold to which the others were to bring thoughts of vengeance and +despair. And by that he seems still to reign over those who were to +follow him in death with the passions and the furies of earth." Louis +XVI. will be magnanimous and calm. A celestial sweetness will +overspread his royal countenance. An infernal rage will distort the +heart and the features of the Girondins. What pains, what tortures, in +their death-struggle! Earth fails them, and they do not look to +heaven. What accents of disgust and hatred when they speak of their +former accomplices, now become their executioners! +</P> + +<P> +"Great God!" Buzot will say, "if it is only by such men and such +infamous means that republics +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P381"></A>381}</SPAN> +can arise and be consolidated, +there is no government more frightful on this earth nor more fatal to +human happiness." He will address these insults, worthy of the +imprecations of Camillus, to the city of Paris: "I say truly, that +France can expect neither liberty nor happiness except from the +irreparable destruction of that capital." +</P> + +<P> +Barbaroux will be still more severe. His anathemas are launched not +only at Paris, but at all France. "The people," he says, "do not +deserve that one should become attached to them, for they are +essentially ungrateful. It is the absurdest folly to try to conduct to +liberty people without morals, who blaspheme God and adore Marat. +These people are no more fit for a philosophic government than the +lazzaroni of Naples or the cannibals of America.... Liberty, virtue, +sacred rights of men, to-day you are nothing but empty names." Pétion, +before dying, will write to his son this letter, which is like the +testament of the Gironde: "My greatest torment will be to think that so +many crimes went unpunished; vengeance is here the most sacred of +duties.... My son, either the murderers of thy father and thy country +will be delivered to the severities of the law and expiate their crimes +upon the scaffold, or thou art under obligation to free thy country +from them. They have broken all the ties of society; their crimes are +of such a nature that they do not fall under ordinary rules. From such +monsters every one is authorized to purge the earth." +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P382"></A>382}</SPAN> + +<P> +Madame Roland will be not less vehement than Buzot, Barbaroux, and +Pétion. She will address these severe but just reproaches to her +friends who had not been valiant enough in their own defence: "They +temporized with crime, the cowards! They were to fall in their turn, +but they succumb shamefully, pitied by nobody, and with nothing to +expect from posterity but utter contempt.... Rather than obey their +tyrants, than descend from the bar and go out of the Assembly like a +timid flock about to be branded by the butcher, why did they not do +justice to themselves by falling on the monsters to annihilate them +rather than be sentenced by them?" It is not her friends alone whom +her anger will lash, but the sovereign people, the people once so +flattered, whom she will pursue with her anathemas. "The people," she +will say, "can feel nothing but the cannibal joy of seeing blood flow, +in order that they may run no risk of shedding their own. That +predicted time has come when, if they ask for bread, dead bodies will +be given them; but their degraded nature takes pleasure in the +spectacle, and the satisfied instinct of cruelty makes the dearth +supportable until it becomes absolute." The Egeria of the Girondins +will comprehend that all is lost, that even her blood will be sterile, +and that France is condemned either to anarchy or a dictatorship. +"Liberty," she will exclaim, "was not made for this corrupt nation, +which leaves the bed of debauchery or the dunghill of poverty only to +brutalize itself in license, and howl as it +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P383"></A>383}</SPAN> +wallows in the blood +streaming from scaffolds." Like the damned souls in Dante, Madame +Roland will leave all hope behind, and when, a few days after Marie +Antoinette, she ascends the steps of the guillotine, instead of +thinking of heaven, like the Queen, she will address this sarcastic +speech to the plaster statue which has replaced that of Louis XV.: "O +Liberty! how they have betrayed thee!" +</P> + +<P> +But let us not anticipate. The Girondins are still to have a glimmer +of joy. The Republic is about to be proclaimed. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap36fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap36fn1text">1</A>] The bloody <I>knife</I> of tyranny is lifted against us. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap37"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P384"></A>384}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXVII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC. +</H4> + +<P> +"One of the astonishing things in the French Revolution," says one of +the most eminent writers of the democratic school, Edgar Quinet, "is +the unexpectedness with which the great changes occur. The most +important events, the destruction of the monarchy and the advent of the +Republic, came about without any previous warning." The most ardent +republicans were royalists, not merely under the old régime, but after +1789, and even up to August 10, 1792. Marat wrote, in No. 374 of the +<I>Ami du Peuple</I>, February 17, 1791: "I have often been represented as a +mortal enemy of royalty, but I claim that the King has no better friend +than myself." And he added: "As to Louis XVI. personally, I know very +well that his defects are chargeable solely to his education, and that +by nature he is an excellent sort of man, whom one would have cited as +a worthy citizen if he had not had the misfortune to be born on the +throne; but, such as he is, he is at all events the King we want. We +ought to thank Heaven for having given him to us. We ought to pray +that he may be spared to us." Marat praying, +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P385"></A>385}</SPAN> +Marat thanking +Heaven! and for whom? For the King. Does not that prove what deep +root royalty had taken in France? April 20, 1792, the same Marat +bitterly reproached Condorcet with "shamelessly calumniating the +Jacobin Club, and perfidiously accusing it of wishing to destroy the +monarchy" (<I>L' Ami du Peuple</I>, No. 434). June 13, he attacked those +who violated the oath taken at the time of the Federation, and said: +"To defend the Constitution is the same thing as to be faithful to the +nation, the law, and the King" (<I>L' Ami du Peuple</I>, No. 448). +</P> + +<P> +During the entire continuance of the Legislative Assembly, when +Robespierre, having left the tribune, was pretending to educate the +people by means of his journal, what he defended to the utmost was the +royal Constitution. Madame Roland relates that after the flight to +Varennes, when the prospect of a republic loomed up, possibly for the +first time, at a secret meeting, Robespierre, grinning as usual, and +biting his nails, asked ironically what a republic might be. In June, +1792, the entire Jacobin Club was royalist still. It proposed to drop +Billaud-Varennes, because Billaud-Varennes had dared to put the +monarchical principle in question. On the 7th of July following, two +months and a half, that is, before the opening of the Convention, at +the time of the famous Lamourette Kiss, all the members of the Assembly +swore to execrate the Republic forever. Three weeks after September 2, +Danton alleged the paucity and the weakness of the republicans, +compared with the royalists, as +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P386"></A>386}</SPAN> +motives for the massacres. +Pétion has said: "When the insurrection of August 10 was undertaken, +there were but five men in France who desired a republic." +</P> + +<P> +Buzot, Madame Roland's idol, has written: "A wretched mob, +unintelligent and unenlightened, vomited forth insults against royalty; +the rest neither desired nor willed anything but the Constitution of +1791, and spoke of the republicans just as one speaks of extremely +honest fools. This people is republican only through force of the +guillotine." And yet, September 21, 1792, the Convention, holding its +first sitting in the Hall of the Manège, began by proclaiming the +Republic. +</P> + +<P> +Buzot, in his Memoirs, has thus described the deputations that were +sent to the bar, and the public that occupied the galleries: "It seemed +as if the outlet of every sewer in Paris and other great cities had +been searched for whatever was most filthy, hideous, and infected. +Villainously dirty faces, surmounted by shocks of greasy hair, and with +eyes half sunk into their heads, they spat out, with their nauseating +breath, the grossest insults mingled with the sharp snarls of +carnivorous beasts. The galleries were worthy of such legislators: men +whose frightful aspect betokened crime and poverty, and women whose +shameless faces expressed the filthiest debauchery. When all these +with hands and feet and voice made their horrible racket, one seemed to +be in an assembly of devils." +</P> + +<P> +When the session opened, Collot d'Herbois was +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P387"></A>387}</SPAN> +the first speaker. +He said: "There is a matter which you cannot put off until to-morrow, +which you cannot put off until this evening, which you cannot defer for +a single instant without being unfaithful to the wishes of the nation; +it is the abolition of royalty." Quinet having objected that it would +be better to present this question when the Constitution was to be +discussed, Grégoire, constitutional Bishop of Blois, exclaimed: +"Certainly, no one will ever propose to us to preserve the deadly race +of kings in France. All the dynasties have been breeds of ravenous +beasts, living on nothing but human flesh; still it is necessary to +reassure plainly the friends of liberty; this magic talisman, which +still has power to stupefy so many men, must be destroyed." Bazire +remarked that it would be a frightful example to the people to see an +Assembly which they had entrusted with their dearest interests, resolve +upon anything in a moment of enthusiasm and without thorough +discussion. Grégoire replied with vehemence: "Eh! what need is there +of discussion when everybody is of the same mind? Kings, in the moral +order, are what monsters are in the physical order. Courts are the +workshop of crime and the lair of tyrants. The history of kings is the +martyrology of nations; we are all equally penetrated by this truth. +What is the use of discussing it?" Then the question, put to vote in +these terms: "The National Convention declares that royalty is +abolished in France," was adopted amidst applause. +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P388"></A>388}</SPAN> + +<P> +At four in the afternoon of the same day, a municipal officer named +Lubin, surrounded by mounted gendarmes and a large crowd of people, +came to read a proclamation before the Temple tower. The trumpets were +sounded. A great silence ensued, and Lubin, who had a stentorian +voice, read loud enough to be heard by the royal family confined in the +dungeon, this proclamation, the death knell of monarchy: "Royalty is +abolished in France. All public acts will be dated from the first year +of the Republic. The seal of State will be inscribed with this motto: +<I>Republique française</I>. The National Seal will represent a woman +seated on a sheaf of arms, holding in one hand a pike surmounted by a +liberty-cap." Hébert (the famous Père Duchesne) was at this moment on +guard near the royal family. Sitting on the threshold of their +chamber, he sought to discover a movement of vexation or anger, or any +other emotion on their faces. He was unsuccessful. While listening to +the revolutionary decree which snatched away his throne, the descendant +of Saint Louis, Henry IV., and Louis XIV. experienced not the slightest +trouble. He had a book in his hand, and he quietly went on reading it. +As impassive as her spouse, the Queen neither made a movement nor +uttered a word. When the proclamation was finished, the trumpets +sounded again. Cléry then went to the window, and the eyes of the +crowd turned instantly towards him. As they mistook him for Louis +XVI., they overwhelmed him with insults. The gendarmes made +threatening +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P389"></A>389}</SPAN> +gestures, and he was obliged to withdraw so as to +quiet the tumult. While the populace was unchained around the Temple +prison, one man alone was calm, one man alone seemed a stranger to all +anxiety: it was the prisoner. +</P> + +<P> +A new era begins. The death-struggle of royalty is over. Royalty is +dead, and the King is soon to die. Grégoire, who had stolen the vote +(there were but 371 conventionists present; 374 were absent; that is to +say, more than half), is both surprised and enthusiastic about what he +has done. He confesses that for several days his excessive joy +deprived him of appetite and sleep. Such joy will not last very long. +M. Taine compares revolutionary France to a badly nourished workman, +poor, and overdriven with toil, and yet who drinks strong liquors. At +first, in his intoxication, he thinks he is a millionnaire, loved and +admired; he thinks himself a king. "But soon the radiant visions give +place to black and monstrous phantoms.... At present, France has +passed through the period of joyous delirium, and is about to enter on +another that is sombre; behold it, capable of daring, suffering, and +doing all things, whenever its guides, as widely astray as itself, +shall point out an enemy or an obstacle to its fury." +</P> + +<P> +How quickly the disenchantments come! Already Lafayette, the man of +generous illusions, has had to imitate the conduct of those <I>émigrés</I> +on whom he has been so severe. He has fled to a foreign land, and +found there not a refuge, but a prison. He will +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P390"></A>390}</SPAN> +remain more than +five years in the gloomy fortress of Olmutz. The victor of Valmy, +Dumouriez, will hardly be more fortunate. He will go over to the +enemy, and live in exile on a pension from foreign powers. How close +together deceptions and recantations come! Marat, who had already said +to the inhabitants of the capital: "Eternal cockneys, with what +epithets would I not assail you in the transports of my despair, if I +knew any more humiliating than that of Parisians?"[<A NAME="chap37fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap37fn1">1</A>] Marat, who had +said to all Frenchmen: "No, no; liberty is not made for an ignorant, +light, and frivolous nation, for cits brought up in fear, +dissimulation, knavery, and lying, nourished in cunning, intrigue, +sycophancy, avarice, and swindling, subsisting only by theft and +rapine, aspiring after nothing but pleasures, titles, and decorations, +and always ready to sell themselves for gold!"[<A NAME="chap37fn2text"></A><A HREF="#chap37fn2">2</A>] Marat will write, +May 7th, 1793, that is to say, at the apogee of his favorite political +system: "All measures taken up to the present day by the assemblies, +constituent, legislative, and conventional, to establish and +consolidate liberty, have been thoughtless, vain, and illusory, even +supposing them to have been taken in good faith. The greater part seem +to have had for their object to perpetuate oppression, bring on +anarchy, death, poverty, and famine; to make the people weary of their +independence, to make liberty a burden, to cause them to +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P391"></A>391}</SPAN> +detest +the Revolution, through its excessive disorders, to exhaust them by +watching, fatigue, want, and inanition, to reduce them to despair by +hunger, and to bring them back to despotism by civil war."[<A NAME="chap37fn3text"></A><A HREF="#chap37fn3">3</A>] +</P> + +<P> +There were six ministers appointed on August 10. Two of them, Claviére +and Roland, will kill themselves; two others, Lebrun-Tondu and Danton, +will be guillotined; the remaining two, Servan and Monge, are destined +to become, one a general of division under Napoleon, and the other a +senator of the Empire and Count of Péluse; and when, at the beginning +of his reign, the Emperor complains to the latter because there are +still partisans of the Republic to be found: "Sire," the former +minister of August 10 will answer, "we had so much trouble to make them +republicans! may it please Your Majesty kindly to allow them at least a +few days to become imperialists!" Of the two men who had so +enthusiastically brought about the proclamation of the Republic, one, +Collot d'Herbois, will be transported to Guiana by the republicans, and +die there in a paroxysm of burning fever; the other, Grégoire, will be +a senator of the Empire, which will not, however, prevent him from +promoting the deposition of Napoleon as he had promoted that of Louis +XVI. There are men who will exchange the jacket of the <I>sans-culotte</I> +for the gilded livery of an imperial functionary. The conventionists +and regicides are +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P392"></A>392}</SPAN> +transformed into dukes and counts and barons. +David, the official painter of the Empire, Napoleon's favorite, will +paint with joy the picture of a pope, and be very proud of his great +picture of the new Charlemagne's coronation. But listen to Edgar +Quinet: "When I see the orators of deputations taking things with such +a high hand at the bar, and lording it so proudly over mute and +complaisant assemblies, I should like to know what became of them a few +years later." And thereupon he sets out to discover their traces. But +after considerable investigation he stops. "If I searched any +further," he exclaims, "I should be afraid of encountering them among +the petty employés of the Empire. It was quite enough to see Huguenin, +the indomitable president of the insurrectionary Commune, so quickly +tamed, soliciting and obtaining a post as clerk of town gates as soon +as absolute power made its reappearance after the 18th Brumaire. The +terrible Santerre becomes the gentlest of men as soon as he is +pensioned by the First Consul. Hardly had Bourdon de l'Oise and +Albitte, those men of iron, felt the rod than you see them the supplest +functionaries of the Empire. The great king-taker, Drouet, thrones it +in the sub-prefecture of Sainte-Menehould. Napoleon has related that, +on August 10, he was in a shop in the Carrousel, whence he witnessed +the taking of the palace. If he had a presentiment then, he must have +smiled at the chaos which he was to reduce so easily to its former +limits. How many furies, and all to terminate so soon in the +accustomed obedience!" +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P393"></A>393}</SPAN> + +<P> +Is not history, with its perpetual alternatives of license and +despotism, like a vicious circle? And do not the nations pass their +time in producing webs of Penelope, whose bloody threads they weave and +unweave again with tears? All governments, royalties, empires, +republics, ought to be more modest. But all, profoundly forgetful of +the lessons of the past, believe themselves immortal. All declare +haughtily that they have closed forever the era of revolutions. +</P> + +<P> +With the advent of the Republic a new calendar had been put in force. +The equality of days and nights at the autumnal equinox opened the era +of civil equality on September 22. "Who would have believed that this +human geometry, so profoundly calculated, was written in the sand, and +that in a few years no traces of it would remain? ... The heavens have +continued to gravitate, and have brought back the equality of days and +nights; but they have allowed the promised liberty and equality to +perish, like meteors that vanish in empty space.... The +<I>sans-culottes</I> have not been able to make themselves popular among the +starry peoples.... An ancient belief which the men of the Revolution +had neglected through fear or through contempt was again met with; a +spectre had appeared; a chilly breath, like that of Samuel, had made +itself felt; and lo, the edifice so sagely constructed, and leaning on +the worlds, has vanished away."[<A NAME="chap37fn4text"></A><A HREF="#chap37fn4">4</A>] +</P> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P394"></A>394}</SPAN> + +<P> +There lies at the foundation of history a supreme sadness and +melancholy. This never-ending series of illusions and deceptions, +errors and afflictions, faults and crimes; this rage, and passion, and +folly; so many efforts and fatigues, so many dangers, tortures, and +tears, so much blood, such revolutions, catastrophies, cataclysms of +every sort,—and all for what? Wretched humanity, rolling its stone of +Sisyphus from age to age, inspires far more compassion than contempt. +The painful reflections caused by the annals of all peoples are perhaps +more sombre for the French Revolution than for any other period. Edgar +Quinet justly laments over the inequality between the sacrifices of the +victims and the results obtained by posterity. He affirms that in +other histories one thing reconciles us to the fury of men, and that is +the speedy fecundity of the blood they shed; for example, when one sees +that of the martyrs flow, one also sees Christianity spread over the +earth from the depth of the catacombs; while amongst us, the blood +which streamed most abundantly and from such lofty sources, did not +find soil equally well prepared. And the illustrious historian +exclaims sadly: "The supreme consolation has been refused to our +greatest dead; their blood has not been a seed of virtue and +independence for their posterity. If they should reappear once more, +they would feel themselves tortured again, and on a worse scaffold, by +the denial of their descendants; they would hurl at us again the same +adieu: 'O Liberty! how they have betrayed thee!'" +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap37fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap37fn1text">1</A>] <I>Ami du Peuple</I>, No. 429. +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap37fn2"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap37fn2text">2</A>] <I>Ami du Peuple</I>, No. 539. +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap37fn3"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap37fn3text">3</A>] <I>La Publiciste de la République</I>, No. 211. +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap37fn4"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap37fn4text">4</A>] Edgar Quinet, <I>La Révolution</I>, t. 11. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="index"></A> + +<SPAN CLASS="pagenum">{<A NAME="P395"></A>395}</SPAN> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +INDEX. +</H3> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Abbey prison, the, massacre of the prisoners of, <A HREF="#P363">363</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Ankarstroem, Captain, the assassin of Gustavus III., <A HREF="#P37">37</A>, <A HREF="#P41">41</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Arles, Archbishop of, massacre of, <A HREF="#P364">364</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Assassins, the, of the September massacres, <A HREF="#P362">362</A> <I>et seq.</I>; their fate, +<A HREF="#P370">370</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Assignats created, <A HREF="#P128">128</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Aubier, M. d', on the King's unwar-like disposition, <A HREF="#P288">288</A>; with the King +in the Convent of the Feuillants, <A HREF="#P330">330</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Barbaroux, visionary schemes of, <A HREF="#P271">271</A>; declares the King might have +maintained himself, <A HREF="#P285">285</A>; anathemas of, on the Septembrists, <A HREF="#P381">381</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Barry, Madame du, her letter to Marie Antoinette, <A HREF="#P138">138</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Beaumarchais compared with Dumouriez, <A HREF="#P95">95</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Belgium, the invasion of, a failure, <A HREF="#P136">136</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Beugnot, Count, his description of Madame Roland, <A HREF="#P87">87</A>, <A HREF="#P92">92</A>; philosophic +remarks of, on woman, <A HREF="#P108">108</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Billaud-Varennes, <A HREF="#P246">246</A>; at the Abbey, <A HREF="#P363">363</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Blanc, M. Louis, quoted, <A HREF="#P370">370</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Bonne-Carrère, director of foreign affairs, portrait of, <A HREF="#P101">101</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Bossuet quoted, <A HREF="#P134">134</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Bouillé, Count de, warns Gustavus III. of the conspiracy against him, +<A HREF="#P38">38</A>; his judgment on Gustavus III., <A HREF="#P43">43</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Bouillé, Marquis de, suppresses the insurrection at Nancy, <A HREF="#P111">111</A>, <A HREF="#P133">133</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Brissac, Duke of, his devotion to royalty, <A HREF="#P137">137</A> <I>et seq.</I>; intolerable +to the Jacobins, <A HREF="#P141">141</A>; accused in the Assembly, <A HREF="#P144">144</A>; assassinated, <A HREF="#P147">147</A>, +<A HREF="#P369">369</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Brunswick, Duke of, his manifesto, <A HREF="#P267">267</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Buzot, Madame Roland's affection for, <A HREF="#P64">64</A>; quoted, <A HREF="#P386">386</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Calvet, M., sent to the Abbey, <A HREF="#P144">144</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Campan, Madame, describes the Queen's emotion on hearing of her +brother's death, <A HREF="#P28">28</A>; her account of Dumouriez' interview with the +Queen, <A HREF="#P155">155</A>; in peril in the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P324">324</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Carmelite church, massacre at, <A HREF="#P364">364</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Chateaubriand, quotation from, <A HREF="#P9">9</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Chateauvieux, the fête of, <A HREF="#P110">110</A> <I>et seq.</I>, mutinous soldiers of, +punished, <A HREF="#P112">112</A>; fêted by the Jacobins, <A HREF="#P113">113</A>, <A HREF="#P118">118</A>; admitted to the +Assembly, <A HREF="#P117">117</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Chénier, André, patriotic conduct of, <A HREF="#P113">113</A>, <A HREF="#P124">124</A>; his ode to David, <A HREF="#P119">119</A>; +his fate, <A HREF="#P124">124</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Clavière made Minister of the Finances, <A HREF="#P103">103</A>, <A HREF="#P160">160</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Clootz, Anacharsis, defends the September massacres, <A HREF="#P375">375</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +<I>Comédie-Française</I>, the, in the Revolution, <A HREF="#P10">10</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Commune, insurrectionary, formed in the Hôtel-de-Ville, <A HREF="#P281">281</A>; refuse to +extinguish the fire at the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P325">325</A>, <A HREF="#P335">335</A>, <A HREF="#P345">345</A>, <A HREF="#P355">355</A>; invites every +commune in France to follow the example of massacre in Paris, <A HREF="#P369">369</A>; +terrorize the Assembly, <A HREF="#P370">370</A>; order the arrest of Roland, <A HREF="#P374">374</A>, <A HREF="#P378">378</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Constitutional Guard, the composition of, <A HREF="#P140">140</A>; disarmed, <A HREF="#P145">145</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Cordeliers, club of the, <A HREF="#P7">7</A>; chiefs of, <A HREF="#P7">7</A>; decide to attack the +Tuileries, <A HREF="#P274">274</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Danjou turns the mob bearing the Princess de Lamballe's head away from +the Temple, <A HREF="#P355">355</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Danton, cowardice of, <A HREF="#P271">271</A>, <A HREF="#P316">316</A>; his bloodthirsty speech to the +Assembly, <A HREF="#P361">361</A>, <A HREF="#P374">374</A>; fate of, <A HREF="#P391">391</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Dauphin, the, the red cap set on his head, <A HREF="#P213">213</A>; his interest in the +guard, Drouet, <A HREF="#P217">217</A>, <A HREF="#P219">219</A>; his prayer for the King, <A HREF="#P220">220</A>; on the morning +of August 10, <A HREF="#P284">284</A>; taken from his mother's arms by an insurrectionist, +<A HREF="#P297">297</A>; in the Assembly, <A HREF="#P299">299</A>; in the Convent of the Feuillants, <A HREF="#P329">329</A>, <A HREF="#P333">333</A>; +prayer taught him by his mother, <A HREF="#P347">347</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +David, his part in the fête of Chateauvieux, <A HREF="#P119">119</A>; conversation of, <A HREF="#P319">319</A>; +under the Empire, <A HREF="#P392">392</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Delorme, the negro assassin, <A HREF="#P367">367</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Desilles, killed in the insurrection at Nancy, <A HREF="#P111">111</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Drouet, the royalist guard, <A HREF="#P217">217</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Dumouriez, portrait of, by Madame Roland, <A HREF="#P94">94</A>; Minister of Foreign +Affairs, <A HREF="#P95">95</A>; "a miserable intriguer," <A HREF="#P95">95</A>; his career, <A HREF="#P96">96</A>; Masson's +description of him, <A HREF="#P98">98</A>; plays a double part, <A HREF="#P101">101</A>; his description of +Louis XVI., <A HREF="#P104">104</A>; made Minister of Foreign Affairs, <A HREF="#P103">103</A>; Memoirs of, +quoted, <A HREF="#P127">127</A>, <A HREF="#P129">129</A>, <A HREF="#P130">130</A>; urges the King to sign the decree for the +transportation of the clergy, <A HREF="#P150">150</A>; has an interview with the Queen, +<A HREF="#P153">153</A>; refuses to be Madame Roland's puppet, <A HREF="#P158">158</A>; aids the King to be rid +of Roland and his faction, <A HREF="#P164">164</A>; takes the portfolio of War, <A HREF="#P166">166</A>; before +the Assembly, <A HREF="#P167">167</A>; resigns, <A HREF="#P169">169</A>; final interview of, with the King, +<A HREF="#P171">171</A>; entreats him not to veto the decrees, <A HREF="#P172">172</A> <I>et seq.</I>; goes to the +army, <A HREF="#P174">174</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Duranton, made Minister of Justice, <A HREF="#P103">103</A>, <A HREF="#P160">160</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Elisabeth, Madame, letter of, concerning the fête of Chateauvieux, <A HREF="#P120">120</A>; +remains with the King during the invasion of the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P200">200</A>; +mistaken by the mob for Marie Antoinette, <A HREF="#P202">202</A>; rejoins the Queen, <A HREF="#P212">212</A>; +letter of, to Madame de Raigecourt, <A HREF="#P239">239</A>; cherishes false illusions, +<A HREF="#P265">265</A>; pious maxim of, <A HREF="#P276">276</A>; her gentleness, <A HREF="#P295">295</A>; prayer of, in the +Temple, <A HREF="#P347">347</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Emigration of the nobility the rule in 1792, <A HREF="#P2">2</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Federation, fête of the, <A HREF="#P249">249</A> <I>et seq.</I> +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Fersen, Count de, new information concerning, <A HREF="#P14">14</A>; his chivalric +devotion to Marie Antoinette, <A HREF="#P15">15</A>; their correspondence, <A HREF="#P16">16</A>; secret +mission of, <A HREF="#P18">18</A>; sees the King and Queen, <A HREF="#P19">19</A>; his melancholy end, <A HREF="#P21">21</A>, <A HREF="#P22">22</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Feuillants, Convent of the, royal family imprisoned in, <A HREF="#P328">328</A> <I>et seq.</I> +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Feuillants, club of, <A HREF="#P6">6</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Force, the, prison of, <A HREF="#P350">350</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Fournier, "the American," <A HREF="#P369">369</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Francis II., warlike acts of, <A HREF="#P127">127</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Geoffrey, M., remarks of, on Gustavus III., <A HREF="#P33">33</A>; quoted, <A HREF="#P132">132</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Girondins, the, <A HREF="#P177">177</A>; hesitate to depose the King, <A HREF="#P271">271</A>; tacitly approve +the massacres, <A HREF="#P377">377</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Gouges, Olympe de, <A HREF="#P240">240</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Gouvion, M. de, protests against admitting the Swiss to the Assembly, +<A HREF="#P116">116</A>; death of, <A HREF="#P167">167</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Grand Châtelet, massacres at, <A HREF="#P367">367</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Grave, de, made Minister of War, <A HREF="#P103">103</A>; replaced by Servan, <A HREF="#P160">160</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Grégoire urges the abolition of royalty, <A HREF="#P387">387</A>; career of, after the +Revolution, <A HREF="#P391">391</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Guadet, hostility of, to Lafayette, <A HREF="#P234">234</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Guillotine, Doctor, and his invention, <A HREF="#P12">12</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Guillotine, the, <A HREF="#P12">12</A>; diversion of society over, <A HREF="#P13">13</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Gustavus III., his interest in Marie Antoinette, <A HREF="#P17">17</A>; trusted by her, +<A HREF="#P17">17</A>; letter of, to her, <A HREF="#P18">18</A>; at Aix-la-Chapelle, <A HREF="#P32">32</A>; his superstition, +<A HREF="#P34">34</A>; his promises to Louis XVI., <A HREF="#P36">36</A>; conspiracy against, <A HREF="#P37">37</A> <I>et seq.</I>; +assassination of, <A HREF="#P40">40</A> <I>et seq.</I>; scenes at his death, <A HREF="#P42">42</A>; character of, +<A HREF="#P43">43</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Hannaches, Mademoiselle d', <A HREF="#P30">30</A>, <A HREF="#P77">77</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Hébert, Abbé, confesses the King, <A HREF="#P276">276</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Hébert (Père Duchesne) on guard at the Temple, <A HREF="#P388">388</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Heine, Heinrich, quoted, <A HREF="#P278">278</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Herbois, Collot d', his part in the affair of the regiment of +Chateauvieux, <A HREF="#P112">112</A> <I>et seq.</I>; attacks Andre Chénier, <A HREF="#P114">114</A>; fate of, <A HREF="#P125">125</A>; +boasts of the 2d of September, <A HREF="#P362">362</A>; urges the abolition of royalty, +<A HREF="#P387">387</A>; fate of, <A HREF="#P391">391</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Hervelly, M. d', brings the order to the Swiss to cease firing, <A HREF="#P310">310</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Hue, François, with the King in his captivity, <A HREF="#P331">331</A>; receives from the +King a lock of his hair, <A HREF="#P346">346</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Huguenin, the orator of the insurrectionists of June 20, <A HREF="#P192">192</A>; chief of +the Commune, <A HREF="#P316">316</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Insurrectionists of June 20, organization of, <A HREF="#P182">182</A>; enter the hall of +the Assembly, <A HREF="#P193">193</A>; break into the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P198">198</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Isle, Rouget de l', author of the <I>Marseillaise</I>, <A HREF="#P269">269</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Jacobin Club, place of its meeting, <A HREF="#P5">5</A>; its affiliations, <A HREF="#P6">6</A>; Lafayette's +remarks on, <A HREF="#P9">9</A>; joy of at, the death of Gustavus III., <A HREF="#P44">44</A>; the +insurrectionary power of, <A HREF="#P177">177</A>; of Brest and Marseilles, send two +battalions to Paris, <A HREF="#P268">268</A>; royalist, in June, 1792, <A HREF="#P385">385</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Jourdan, the headsman, <A HREF="#P120">120</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +June <A HREF="#P20">20</A>, insurrection of, <A HREF="#P186">186</A> <I>et seq.</I> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +La Chesnaye commands the force in the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P293">293</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lacoste, made Minister of the Marine, <A HREF="#P103">103</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lafayette, letter of, to the Assembly, <A HREF="#P178">178</A> <I>et seq.</I>; his letter not +published, but referred to a committee, <A HREF="#P181">181</A>; his relations to the +Jacobins, <A HREF="#P230">230</A>; before the National Assembly, <A HREF="#P232">232</A>; distrusted by the +King and Queen, <A HREF="#P236">236</A>; anxious that the King should leave Paris, <A HREF="#P256">256</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lalanne, the grenadier, and Louis XVI., <A HREF="#P200">200</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lamartine, quoted, <A HREF="#P131">131</A>; his observations on Lafayette, <A HREF="#P231">231</A>; on Madame +Roland, <A HREF="#P372">372</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lamballe, Princess of, <A HREF="#P121">121</A>, <A HREF="#P321">321</A>, <A HREF="#P331">331</A>; not allowed to go to the Temple +with the Queen, <A HREF="#P343">343</A>; sent to the Force, <A HREF="#P350">350</A> <I>et seq.</I>; examination and +execution of, <A HREF="#P352">352</A> <I>et seq.</I>; her body mutilated and her head carried on +a pike to the Temple, <A HREF="#P355">355</A>; her heart eaten, <A HREF="#P358">358</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lamourette, Abbé, his career, <A HREF="#P241">241</A>; his speech to the Assembly and his +proposition for harmony, <A HREF="#P242">242</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Laporte burns the Countess de la Motte's book at the Queen's order, <A HREF="#P142">142</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lebel, Madame de, <A HREF="#P353">353</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Legendre, addresses the King insolently, <A HREF="#P202">202</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Leopold II., his interest in French affairs, <A HREF="#P23">23</A>; death of, <A HREF="#P27">27</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lessart, de, report of, disapproved by the Assembly, <A HREF="#P28">28</A>; impeached, <A HREF="#P30">30</A>; +massacre of, <A HREF="#P369">369</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Lilienhorn, Count de, one of the assassins of Gustavus III., <A HREF="#P37">37</A>, <A HREF="#P45">45</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +<I>Logographe</I>, box of the, <A HREF="#P299">299</A> <I>et seq.</I> +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Louis XVI., despised by the <I>émigrés</I>, <A HREF="#P25">25</A>; letter of, to Gustavus III., +<A HREF="#P36">36</A>; appoints a ministry chosen by the Gironde, <A HREF="#P103">103</A>; his deference to +his ministers, <A HREF="#P104">104</A> <I>et seq.</I>; declares war on Austria, <A HREF="#P126">126</A>, <A HREF="#P129">129</A>; +sufferings of, <A HREF="#P132">132</A>; not a soldier, <A HREF="#P133">133</A>, <A HREF="#P139">139</A>; has no plan, <A HREF="#P135">135</A>; +anecdotes of, by M. de Vaublanc, <A HREF="#P139">139</A>, <A HREF="#P140">140</A>; sacrifices his guard, <A HREF="#P145">145</A>; +repents his concessions, <A HREF="#P148">148</A>; for several days in a sort of stupor, +<A HREF="#P151">151</A>; insulted by Roland and his faction, <A HREF="#P160">160</A>; Madame Roland's letter to +him read in the Council, <A HREF="#P164">164</A>; asks Dumouriez to help rid him of +Roland's faction, <A HREF="#P164">164</A>; refuses to sign the decree against the priests, +<A HREF="#P169">169</A>; accepts the resignation of Dumouriez, <A HREF="#P169">169</A>; resists Dumouriez' +entreaties not to veto the decrees, <A HREF="#P172">172</A>; vetoes the decrees, <A HREF="#P181">181</A>; +permits the gate of the Tuileries to be opened to the mob, <A HREF="#P195">195</A>; his +conduct at the invasion of the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P199">199</A> <I>et seq.</I>; his reception +of the mob in the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P201">201</A>; addressed by the butcher Legendre, +<A HREF="#P202">202</A>; in bodily peril, <A HREF="#P203">203</A>; returns to the bedchamber, <A HREF="#P208">208</A>; letter of, +to the Assembly relative to the invasion of the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P223">223</A>; +interview of, with Pétion, <A HREF="#P224">224</A>; incident of the red bonnet, <A HREF="#P226">226</A>; +conversation of, with Bertrand de Molleville, <A HREF="#P227">227</A>; repugnance of, to +Lafayette, <A HREF="#P236">236</A>; address of, to the Assembly, <A HREF="#P243">243</A>; letter of, to the +Assembly, <A HREF="#P245">245</A>; his plastron, <A HREF="#P248">248</A>; takes part in the fête of the +Federation, <A HREF="#P249">249</A> <I>et seq.</I>; too timorous and hesitating to act, <A HREF="#P257">257</A>; +nominates a new cabinet, <A HREF="#P269">269</A>; conciliatory message of, to the Assembly, +<A HREF="#P270">270</A>; declines to entertain any plan of escape, <A HREF="#P273">273</A>; consents that the +royalist noblemen should defend him, <A HREF="#P284">284</A>; unwarlike character of, <A HREF="#P288">288</A>; +reviews the troops in the Tuileries garden and narrowly escapes from +them, <A HREF="#P289">289</A>; urged by Roederer, goes with his family to the Assembly, <A HREF="#P292">292</A> +<I>et seq.</I>; his escort, <A HREF="#P295">295</A>; addresses the Assembly, <A HREF="#P300">300</A>; compelled to +remain in the reporters' gallery, <A HREF="#P300">300</A>; orders the defenders of the +Tuileries to cease firing, <A HREF="#P305">305</A>; deposition of, proposed in the +Assembly, <A HREF="#P317">317</A>; acts like a disinterested spectator, <A HREF="#P318">318</A>; taken to the +Convent of the Feuillants, <A HREF="#P328">328</A>; transferred to the Temple, <A HREF="#P334">334</A>, <A HREF="#P339">339</A>; +his quarters, <A HREF="#P341">341</A>; gives lessons to the Dauphin in the Temple, 342: +deprived of his sword, <A HREF="#P346">346</A>; hears the proclamation abolishing royalty +without emotion, <A HREF="#P388">388</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Louvet, the author of <I>Faublas</I>, <A HREF="#P54">54</A>; editor of the <I>Sentinelle</I>, and +Madame Roland's confidant, <A HREF="#P89">89</A> <I>et seq.</I> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Maillard, president of the tribunal at the Abbey, <A HREF="#P365">365</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Mailly, Marshal de, the chief of the two hundred noblemen in the +Tuileries, <A HREF="#P284">284</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Malta, Knights of, <A HREF="#P338">338</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Mandat, M. de, receives from Pétion an order to repel force, <A HREF="#P280">280</A>; goes +to the Hôtel-de-Ville and is massacred, <A HREF="#P281">281</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Marat incites to the deposition of the king, <A HREF="#P270">270</A>; on Louis XVI., <A HREF="#P384">384</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Marie Antoinette, chivalric devotion of Count de Fersen for, <A HREF="#P15">15</A>; her +correspondence with him, <A HREF="#P16">16</A>; places absolute confidence in Gustavus +III., <A HREF="#P17">17</A>; letter of, to her brother Leopold, <A HREF="#P25">25</A>; condition of, in 1792, +<A HREF="#P73">73</A>; has an interview with Dumouriez, <A HREF="#P153">153</A>; annoyed and insulted by the +populace, <A HREF="#P156">156</A>, <A HREF="#P157">157</A>; during the invasion of the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P210">210</A> <I>et +seq.</I>; opposed to vigorous measures, <A HREF="#P222">222</A>; her distrust of Lafayette and +preference for Danton, <A HREF="#P237">237</A>; present at the fête of the Federation, <A HREF="#P251">251</A> +<I>et seq.</I>; her alarm at the King's peril, <A HREF="#P253">253</A>; midnight alarms of, <A HREF="#P259">259</A>; +insulted by federates and forced to keep to her apartments, <A HREF="#P261">261</A>; her +estimate of the King's character, <A HREF="#P263">263</A>; on the night of August 9, <A HREF="#P276">276</A>; +takes refuge in the Assembly, <A HREF="#P299">299</A>; her hopes excited by the sound of +artillery, <A HREF="#P304">304</A>; in the box of the <I>Logographe</I>, <A HREF="#P321">321</A>; in the Convent of +the Feuillante, <A HREF="#P332">332</A>; in the Temple, <A HREF="#P343">343</A>; faints when she hears of the +Princesse de Lamballe's death, <A HREF="#P356">356</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +<I>Marseillaise</I>, the, Rouget de l'Isle's new hymn, <A HREF="#P269">269</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Marseilles, federates of, arrive in Paris, <A HREF="#P268">268</A>; the scum of the jails, +<A HREF="#P269">269</A>; at the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P290">290</A>, <A HREF="#P306">306</A> <I>et seq.</I>, <A HREF="#P309">309</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Masson, M. Frédéric, his description of Dumouriez, <A HREF="#P98">98</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Ministry appointed by the King resign; new, appointed, <A HREF="#P176">176</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Mirabeau cautions the Queen against Lafayette, <A HREF="#P236">236</A>; and Abbé +Lamourette, <A HREF="#P241">241</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Molleville, Bertrand de, conversation of, with the King, <A HREF="#P227">227</A>; quoted, +<A HREF="#P273">273</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Monge, senator of the Empire, reply of, to Napoleon, <A HREF="#P391">391</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +<I>Moniteur</I>, the, on the fête of Chateauvieux, <A HREF="#P121">121</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Mortimer-Ternaux, M., quoted, <A HREF="#P279">279</A>, <A HREF="#P282">282</A>; his <I>Histoire de la Terreur</I>, +<A HREF="#P359">359</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Mouchy, Marshal de, his devotion to the King and Queen, <A HREF="#P220">220</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Napoleon, a witness of the invasion of the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P209">209</A>; asserts the +King could have gained the victory, <A HREF="#P286">286</A>; a witness of the attack of the +Marseillais on the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P310">310</A>, <A HREF="#P314">314</A>; visits the Temple, and has it +destroyed, <A HREF="#P348">348</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +National Assembly, place of meeting of, <A HREF="#P5">5</A>; impeach the King's brothers +and confiscate the <I>émigrés'</I> property, <A HREF="#P26">26</A>; impeach De Lessart, <A HREF="#P30">30</A>; +order the King's guard disbanded, <A HREF="#P143">143</A>; decrees of as to the clergy and +an army before Paris, <A HREF="#P150">150</A>; Madame Roland's letter to the King, read to, +<A HREF="#P167">167</A>; letter of Lafayette read in the, <A HREF="#P178">178</A>; receive a deputation from +Marseilles, <A HREF="#P183">183</A>; consider the admission of the resurrectionists to the +chamber, <A HREF="#P187">187</A>; the place of meeting of, <A HREF="#P188">188</A>; deputation from, to the +King during the invasion of the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P208">208</A>; question the Queen, +<A HREF="#P216">216</A>; maintain an equivocal attitude, <A HREF="#P222">222</A>; the majority of, royalists +and constitutionalists, <A HREF="#P272">272</A>; affect not to recognize the King's danger, +<A HREF="#P280">280</A>; send a deputation to receive the King and his family, <A HREF="#P296">296</A>; number +of members present when the decree of deposition was voted, <A HREF="#P320">320</A>; +terrorized by the Commune, <A HREF="#P370">370</A>; royalty abolished and the republic +proclaimed by, <A HREF="#P387">387</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +National Guard, at the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P196">196</A>; the choice troops of, broken up, +<A HREF="#P268">268</A>; royalist, in the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P279">279</A>, <A HREF="#P288">288</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Noblemen, royalist, fidelity of, to the King, <A HREF="#P278">278</A>, <A HREF="#P284">284</A>; fate of, <A HREF="#P322">322</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Orleans, Duke of, and the Palais Royal, <A HREF="#P4">4</A>; and his party clamor for the +deposition of the King, <A HREF="#P270">270</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Palais Royal, the, in 1792, <A HREF="#P4">4</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Pan, Mallet du, sent to Germany by Louis XVI., <A HREF="#P135">135</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Paris, in 1792, <A HREF="#P1">1</A>; the Archbishop of, at Versailles, in 1774, <A HREF="#P78">78</A>; +Commune of, how organized, <A HREF="#P176">176</A>; a hell during the September massacres, +<A HREF="#P361">361</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Pétion, address of, to the Assembly, <A HREF="#P30">30</A>; promotes the fête of +Chateauvieux, <A HREF="#P115">115</A>; fate of, <A HREF="#P122">122</A> <I>et seq.</I>; favors the insurrectionists, +<A HREF="#P184">184</A>; his insolent address to the King, <A HREF="#P224">224</A>; the hero of the fête of the +Federation, <A HREF="#P254">254</A>; presents an address to the Assembly praying for the +King's deposition, <A HREF="#P270">270</A>; signs an order giving M. de Mandat the right to +repel force, <A HREF="#P280">280</A>; his treachery and hypocrisy, <A HREF="#P282">282</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Philipon, the father of Madame Roland, <A HREF="#P47">47</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Prisons of Paris, the September massacres at, <A HREF="#P363">363</A> <I>et seq.</I> +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Prudhomme's <I>Révolutions de Paris</I> quoted, <A HREF="#P225">225</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Quinet, Edgar, quoted, <A HREF="#P360">360</A>, <A HREF="#P371">371</A>; on Louis XVI.'s magnanimity, <A HREF="#P380">380</A>, <A HREF="#P384">384</A>; +quoted, <A HREF="#P392">392</A>, <A HREF="#P394">394</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Raigecourt, Madame de, letter of, <A HREF="#P24">24</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Ramond defends Lafayette in the Assembly, <A HREF="#P235">235</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Republic proclaimed, <A HREF="#P388">388</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Revolution, beginning of the organization of, <A HREF="#P181">181</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Revolutionists, the, in the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P199">199</A>; insolence of, to the King, +<A HREF="#P200">200</A>; refuse to leave the Assembly, <A HREF="#P205">205</A>; their barbarity and indecency, +<A HREF="#P213">213</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Robespierre in the Jacobin Club, <A HREF="#P5">5</A>; cowardice of, <A HREF="#P271">271</A>, <A HREF="#P316">316</A>; his defence +of the Constitution, <A HREF="#P385">385</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Rochefoucauld, Count de la, describes the appearance of the royal +family in the box of the <I>Logographe</I>, <A HREF="#P321">321</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Roederer, remarks of, on Lafayette, <A HREF="#P238">238</A>; urges the King to seek shelter +with the Assembly, <A HREF="#P291">291</A>, <A HREF="#P294">294</A>; addresses the mob, <A HREF="#P297">297</A>; explains to the +Assembly the cause of King's taking refuge with them, <A HREF="#P301">301</A>; blamed for +his advice, <A HREF="#P302">302</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Roland de la Platière, M., marries Mademoiselle Philipon, <A HREF="#P55">55</A>; deputed +to the Assembly, <A HREF="#P63">63</A>; takes the portfolio of the Interior, <A HREF="#P70">70</A>; dominated +by his wife, <A HREF="#P88">88</A>; his plebeian dress at the Council, <A HREF="#P103">103</A>; driven by his +wife to hostility against the King, <A HREF="#P108">108</A>; his faction desire to destroy +the King, <A HREF="#P160">160</A>; dismissed from the Council, <A HREF="#P165">165</A>; reinstated, <A HREF="#P319">319</A>; arrest +of, determined, <A HREF="#P374">374</A>; writes a letter to the Assembly concerning the +massacres, <A HREF="#P375">375</A>; continues minister, <A HREF="#P376">376</A>; fate of, <A HREF="#P391">391</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Roland, Madame, the distinctive characteristics of the century resumed +in her, <A HREF="#P46">46</A>; early years of, <A HREF="#P47">47</A> <I>et seq.</I>; married to Roland de la +Platière, <A HREF="#P55">55</A>; strives to obtain a patent of nobility for her husband, +<A HREF="#P56">56</A>; letters of, to Bosc, <A HREF="#P57">57</A>; her description of herself, <A HREF="#P61">61</A>, <A HREF="#P74">74</A>; draws +up her husband's reports, <A HREF="#P63">63</A>; her infatuation for Buzot, <A HREF="#P64">64</A>; her hatred +of royalty, <A HREF="#P65">65</A>; established in Paris, <A HREF="#P70">70</A>; and Marie Antoinette, <A HREF="#P74">74</A>; the +motive of her hatred of Marie Antoinette, <A HREF="#P76">76</A>, <A HREF="#P80">80</A>; describes her visit +to Versailles, <A HREF="#P77">77</A>, <A HREF="#P79">79</A>; her part in establishing the republican régime +in France, <A HREF="#P79">79</A>, <A HREF="#P107">107</A>; her judgment of Louis XVI., <A HREF="#P81">81</A>; her character +contrasted with that of Marie Antoinette, <A HREF="#P82">82</A>; her arrogant demeanor, +<A HREF="#P86">86</A>; acts for her husband in public affairs, <A HREF="#P88">88</A>; her intimacy with +Louvet, <A HREF="#P89">89</A> <I>et seq.</I>; Lemontey's picture of her, <A HREF="#P91">91</A>; and Dumouriez, <A HREF="#P94">94</A>, +<A HREF="#P102">102</A>; creates discord in the Council, <A HREF="#P106">106</A>; decides to get rid of +Dumouriez, <A HREF="#P159">159</A>; her letter to the King, <A HREF="#P162">162</A>; her advice on the +dismissal of the ministers, <A HREF="#P165">165</A>; on the September massacres, <A HREF="#P362">362</A>; feels +no pity for the Queen, <A HREF="#P372">372</A>, <A HREF="#P375">375</A>; her horror at the murders, <A HREF="#P376">376</A>; her +apprehensions, <A HREF="#P378">378</A>; reproaches her friends with temporizing, <A HREF="#P382">382</A>; her +last speech, <A HREF="#P383">383</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Rousseau, imprisoned in the Temple, <A HREF="#P339">339</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Saint-Antoine, Faubourg, citizens of, ask permission to assemble in +arms, <A HREF="#P182">182</A>; in commotion, <A HREF="#P184">184</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Saint-Huruge, the rioter, <A HREF="#P193">193</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Salpêtrière, the, butchery at, <A HREF="#P368">368</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Santerre, at the head of the insurrectionists on June 20, <A HREF="#P186">186</A>; demands +admission for the insurrectionists to the Assembly, <A HREF="#P190">190</A>; violence of, +at the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P197">197</A>; offers to protect the Queen, <A HREF="#P215">215</A>; forced by +Westermann to march to the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P286">286</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +September massacres, the, <A HREF="#P359">359</A> <I>et seq.</I> +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Sergent, M., <A HREF="#P207">207</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Servan, made Minister of War, <A HREF="#P160">160</A>; proposes the formation of an army +around Paris, <A HREF="#P160">160</A>; dismissed from the Council, <A HREF="#P165">165</A>; his career after +the Revolution, <A HREF="#P391">391</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Staël, Madame de, views the fête of the Federation, her observations, +<A HREF="#P253">253</A>; invents a plan of escape for the King, <A HREF="#P273">273</A>; quoted, <A HREF="#P317">317</A>, <A HREF="#P327">327</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Sudermania, Duke of, brother of Gustavus III., practices of, <A HREF="#P35">35</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Sutherland, Lady, sends linen for the Dauphin to the Convent of the +Feuillants, <A HREF="#P333">333</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Swiss regiment, the, go to the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P274">274</A>; ill provided with +ammunition, <A HREF="#P277">277</A>; defend the Tuileries, but are commanded to retire, +<A HREF="#P307">307</A>; sweep the Carrousel of rioters, <A HREF="#P310">310</A>; ordered to go to the King, +<A HREF="#P311">311</A>; surrender their arms, <A HREF="#P313">313</A>; imprisoned in the church of the +Feuillants, <A HREF="#P313">313</A>; fate of the, <A HREF="#P321">321</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Taine, on revolutionary France, <A HREF="#P389">389</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Temple, the, the royal family taken to, <A HREF="#P336">336</A>; description of, <A HREF="#P337">337</A>; the +Order of the, <A HREF="#P337">337</A>; destroyed by Napoleon, <A HREF="#P349">349</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Thiers, quoted, <A HREF="#P287">287</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Thorwaldsen's lion at Lucerne, <A HREF="#P314">314</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Tourzel, Pauline de, in peril in the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P323">323</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Tuileries, the, guard of, <A HREF="#P195">195</A>; the invasion of, <A HREF="#P198">198</A> <I>et seq.</I>; the, on +the night of August 9, <A HREF="#P275">275</A> <I>et seq.</I>; attacked by the Marseillais, <A HREF="#P306">306</A> +<I>et seq.</I>; rioters in, <A HREF="#P325">325</A>; on fire, <A HREF="#P325">325</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Vaublanc, Count de, quoted, <A HREF="#P133">133</A>; anecdotes of, concerning Louis XVI., +<A HREF="#P139">139</A>, <A HREF="#P140">140</A>, <A HREF="#P255">255</A>, <A HREF="#P273">273</A>, <A HREF="#P282">282</A>, <A HREF="#P286">286</A>, <A HREF="#P290">290</A>, <A HREF="#P303">303</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Vergniaud, <A HREF="#P180">180</A>, <A HREF="#P182">182</A>; speech of, with regard to the admission of the +insurrectionists to the Assembly, <A HREF="#P188">188</A>; violent attack of, on the King, +<A HREF="#P244">244</A>; as president of the Assembly, receives Louis XVI., <A HREF="#P300">300</A>; presents +the decree suspending the royal power, <A HREF="#P317">317</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +"Violet, Queen," <A HREF="#P336">336</A>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Voltaire, imprisoned in the Temple, <A HREF="#P339">339</A>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="index"> +Westermann forces Santerre to march, <A HREF="#P286">286</A>; leader of the Marseillais, +who attacked the Tuileries, <A HREF="#P306">306</A>, <A HREF="#P308">308</A>. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of +Royalty, by Imbert de Saint-Amand + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIE ANTOINETTE--DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY *** + +***** This file should be named 32408-h.htm or 32408-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/0/32408/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of Royalty + +Author: Imbert de Saint-Amand + +Translator: Elizabeth Gilbert Martin + +Release Date: May 18, 2010 [EBook #32408] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIE ANTOINETTE--DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: Marie Antoinette] + + + + + + +MARIE ANTOINETTE + +AND + +THE DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY + + + +BY + +IMBERT DE SAINT-AMAND + + + + +_TRANSLATED BY_ + +ELIZABETH GILBERT MARTIN + + + +_WITH PORTRAIT_ + + + +NEW YORK + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +1899 + + + + +COPYRIGHT, 1891, BY + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. + + + + +{v} + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I. PARIS AT THE BEGINNING OF 1792 . . . . . . . . . 1 + II. COUNT DE FERSON'S LAST JOURNEY TO PARIS . . . . 14 + III. THE DEATH OF THE EMPEROR LEOPOLD . . . . . . . . 23 + IV. THE DEATH OF GUSTAVUS III . . . . . . . . . . . 32 + V. THE BEGINNINGS OF MADAME ROLAND . . . . . . . . 46 + VI. MADAME ROLAND'S ENTRANCE ON THE SCENE . . . . . 60 + VII. MARIE ANTOINETTE AND MADAME ROLAND . . . . . . . 73 + VIII. MADAME ROLAND AT THE MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR . 85 + IX. DUMOURIEZ, MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS . . . . . 94 + X. THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 + XI. THE FETE OF THE SWISS OF CHATEAUVIEUX . . . . . 110 + XII. THE DECLARATION OF WAR . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 + XIII. THE DISBANDING OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL GUARD . . . 137 + XIV. THE SUFFERINGS OF LOUIS XVI . . . . . . . . . . 148 + XV. ROLAND'S DISMISSAL FROM OFFICE . . . . . . . . . 158 + XVI. A THREE DAYS' MINISTRY . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166 + XVII. THE PROLOGUE TO JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . . . 176 + XVIII. THE MORNING OF JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . . . 186 + +{vi} + + XIX. THE INVASION OF THE TUILERIES . . . . . . . . . 198 + XX. MARIE ANTOINETTE ON JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . 210 + XXI. THE MORROW OF JUNE TWENTIETH . . . . . . . . . . 219 + XXII. LAFAYETTE IN PARIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229 + XXIII. THE LAMOURETTE KISS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239 + XXIV. THE FETE OF THE FEDERATION IN 1792 . . . . . . . 248 + XXV. THE LAST DAYS AT THE TUILERIES . . . . . . . . . 259 + XXVI. THE PROLOGUE TO THE TENTH OF AUGUST . . . . . . 267 + XXVII. THE NIGHT OF AUGUST NINTH TO TENTH . . . . . . . 275 + XXVIII. THE MORNING OF AUGUST TENTH . . . . . . . . . . 284 + XXIX. THE BOX OF THE LOGOGRAPH . . . . . . . . . . . . 299 + XXX. THE COMBAT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306 + XXXI. THE RESULTS OF THE COMBAT . . . . . . . . . . . 316 + XXXII. THE ROYAL FAMILY IN THE CONVENT OF THE FEUILLANTS 329 + XXXIII. THE TEMPLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337 + XXXIV. THE PRINCESS DE LAMBALLE'S MURDER . . . . . . . 350 + XXXV. THE SEPTEMBER MASSACRES . . . . . . . . . . . . 359 + XXXVI. MADAME ROLAND DURING THE MASSACRES . . . . . . . 372 + XXXVII. THE PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC . . . . . . . . 384 + INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395 + + + + +{1} + +MARIE ANTOINETTE + +AND + +THE DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY. + + +I. + +PARIS AT THE BEGINNING OF 1792. + +Paris in 1792 is no longer what it was in 1789. In 1789, the old +French society was still brilliant. The past endured beside the +present. Neither names nor escutcheons, neither liveries nor places at +court, had been suppressed. The aristocracy and the Revolution lived +face to face. In 1792, the scene has changed. The Paris of the +nobility is no longer in Paris, but at Coblentz. The Faubourg +Saint-Germain is like a desert. Since June, 1790, armorial bearings +have been taken down. The blazons of ancient houses have been broken +and thrown into the gutters. No more display, no more liveries, no +more carriages with coats-of-arms on their panels. Titles and manorial +names are done away with. The Duke de Brissac is called M. Cosse; the +Duke de Caraman, M. Riquet; the Duke d'Aiguillon, M. Vignerot. The +_Almanach royal_ of 1792 mentions not a single court appointment. + +{2} + +In 1789, it was still an exceptional thing for the nobility to +emigrate. In 1792, it is the rule. Those among the nobles who have +had the courage to remain at Paris in the midst of the furnace, so as +to make a rampart for the King of their bodies, seem half ashamed of +their generous conduct. The illusions of worldliness have been +dispelled. Nearly every salon was open in 1789. In 1792, they are +nearly all closed; those of the magistrates and the great capitalists +as well as those of the aristocracy. Etiquette is still observed at +the Tuileries, but there is no question of fetes; no balls, no +concerts, none of that elegance and animation which once made the court +a rendezvous of pleasures. In 1789, illusions, dreams, a naive +expectation of the age of gold, were to be found everywhere. In 1792, +eclogues and pastoral poetry are beginning to go out of fashion. The +diapason of hatred is pitched higher. Already there is powder and a +smell of blood in the air. A general instinct forebodes that France +and Europe are on the verge of a terrible duel. On both sides passions +have touched their culminating point. Distrust and uneasiness are +universal. Every day the despotism of the clubs becomes more +threatening. The Jacobins do not reign yet, but they govern. Deputies +who, if left to their own impulses, would vote on the conservative +side, pronounce for the Revolution solely through fear of the +demagogues. In 1789, the religious sentiment still retained power +among the {3} masses. In 1792, irreligion and atheism have wrought +their havoc. In 1789, the most ardent revolutionists, Marat, Danton, +Robespierre, were all royalists. At the beginning of 1792, the +republic begins to show its face beneath the monarchical mask. + +The Tuileries, menaced by the neighboring lanes of the Carrousel and +the Palais Royal, resembles a besieged fortress. The Revolution daily +augments its trenches and parallels around the sanctuary of the +monarchy. Its barracks are the faubourgs; its soldiers, red-bonneted +pikemen. Louis XVI. in his palace is like a general-in-chief in a +stronghold, who should have voluntarily dampened his powder, spiked his +cannon, and torn his flags. He no longer inspires his troops with +confidence. A capitulation seems imminent. The unfortunate monarch +still hopes vaguely for assistance from abroad, for the arrival of some +liberating army. Vain hope! He is blockaded in his castle, and the +moment is at hand when he will be compelled to play the buffoon in a +red bonnet. + +Glance at the palace and see how closely it is hemmed in by the +earthworks of the Revolution. The abode of luxury and display, +intended for fetes rather than for war, Philibert Delorme's +_chef-d'oeuvre_ has in its architecture none of those means of defence +by which the military and feudal sovereignties of old times fortified +their dwellings. On the side of the courtyards a multitude of little +{4} streets contain a hostile population ready to swell every riot. +Near the Pavilion of Marsan is the Palais Royal, that headquarters of +insurrection, with its cafes, its gambling-dens, its houses of +ill-fame, its wooden galleries which are known as the camp of the +Tartars. It is the Duke of Orleans who has democratized the Palais +Royal. In spite of the sarcasms of the aristocracy and the lawsuits of +neighboring proprietors, he has destroyed the fine gardens bounded by +the rue de Richelieu, the rue des Petit-Champs, and the rue des +Bons-Enfants. In the place it occupied he has caused the rue de +Valois, the rue de Beaujolais, and the rue de Montpensier to be opened, +all of them inhabited by a revolutionary population. The remaining +space he has surrounded on three sides with constructions pierced by +galleries, where he has built the shops that form the finest bazaar in +Europe. The fourth side of these new constructions was originally +intended to form part of the Prince's palace, and to be composed of an +open colonnade supporting suites of apartments. But this side has not +been erected. In place of it the Duke of Orleans has run up some +temporary wooden sheds, containing three rows of shops separated by two +large passage-ways, the ground of which has not even been made level. + +The privileges pertaining to the Orleans family prevent the police from +entering the enclosure of the Palais Royal. Hence it becomes the +rendezvous of all conspirators. The taking of the Bastille was {5} +plotted there, and there the 20th of June and the 10th of August will +yet be organized. + +A little further off is the National Assembly. Its sessions are held +in the riding-school built when the little Louis XV. was to be taught +horsemanship. It adjoins the terrace of the Feuillants. One of its +courtyards which looks towards the front of the edifice, is at the +upper end of the rue de Dauphin. The other extremity occupies the site +where the rue Castiglione will be opened later on. There, close beside +the Tuileries, sits the National Assembly, the rival and victorious +power that will overcome the monarchy. + +The Assembly terrorizes the Tuileries. The Jacobin Club terrorizes the +Assembly. Close beside the Hall of the Manege, on the site to be +occupied afterward by the market of Saint-Honore, the revolutionary +club holds its tumultuous sessions in the former convent founded in +1611 by the Jacobin, or Dominican, friars. The club meets three times +a week, at seven in the evening. The hall is a long rectangle with a +vaulted roof. Four rows of stalls occupy the longer sides, while the +two ends serve as public galleries. Nearly in the middle of the hall, +the speaker's platform and the president's writing-table stand opposite +each other. Hither come all ambitious revolutionists who desire to +talk, to agitate, to make themselves conspicuous. Here Robespierre +lords it, not being a deputy in consequence of the law forbidding +members of the {6} Constituent Assembly to belong to the legislative +body. Those who love disorder come here to seek emotions. Some find +lucrative employment, applause being paid for, and the different +parties having each its _claque_ in the galleries. Since April, 1791, +the Jacobin Club has affiliations in two thousand French towns and +villages. At its orders and in its pay is an army of agents whose +business it is to make stump speeches, to sing in the streets, to make +propositions in cafes, to applaud or to hiss in the galleries of the +National Assembly. These hirelings usually receive about five francs a +day, but as the number of the chevaliers of the revolutionary lustrum +increases, the pay diminishes, until it is finally reduced to forty +sous. Deserters and soldiers dismissed from their regiments for +misconduct are admitted by preference. + +For some days past, the Club of Moderate Revolutionists, friends of +Lafayette, who might have closed the old clubs after the sanguinary +repression of the riot in the Champ-de-Mars, and who contented +themselves with opening a new one, have been meeting in the convent of +the Feuillants, rue Saint-Honore. But this new club has not been a +great success; moderation is not the order of the day; the Jacobins +have regained their empire, and on December 26, 1791, seals are placed +on the door of the Club of the Feuillants. + +At the other extremity of Paris there is a club still more inflammatory +than that of the Jacobins: {7} that of the Cordeliers. "The Jacobins," +said Barbaroux, "have no common aim, although they act in concert. The +Cordeliers are bent on blood, gold, and offices." Speaking as a rule, +the Cordeliers belong to the Jacobin Club, while hardly a single +Jacobin is a Cordelier. The Cordeliers are the advance-guard of the +Revolution. They are, as Camille Desmoulins has said, Jacobins of the +Jacobins. The chiefs are Danton, Marat, Hebert, Chaumette. They take +their names from those religious democrats, the Minorite friars of +Saint Francis, who wear a girdle of rope over their coarse gray habit. +They meet in the Place of the School of Medicine, in a monastery whose +church was built in the reign of Saint Louis, in 1259, with the fine +paid as indemnity for a murder. In 1590, it became the resort of the +most famous Leaguers. Chateaubriand says: "There are places which seem +to be the laboratory of seditions." How well this expression of the +author of the _Memoires d'Outre-tombe_ describes the club-room of the +Cordeliers! The pictures, the sculptured or painted images, the veils +and curtains of the convent, have been torn down. The basilica +displays nothing but its bare bones to the eyes of the spectator. At +the apse, where wind and rain enter through the unglazed rose-window, +joiners' work-benches serve as a desk for the president and as places +on which to deposit the red caps. Do you see the fallen beams, the +wooden benches, the dismantled stalls, the relics of saints pushed or +rolled against the walls {8} to serve as benches for "dirty, dusty, +drunken, sweaty spectators in torn jackets, pikes on their shoulders, +or with their bare arms crossed"? Do you hear the orators who "call +each other beggars, pickpockets, robbers, assassins, to the discordant +noise of hisses and those proper to their different groups of devils? +They find the material of their metaphors in murder, they borrow them +from the filthiest of sewers and dungheaps, and from places set apart +for the prostitution of men and women. Gestures render their figures +of speech more comprehensible; with the cynicism of dogs, they call +everything by its own name, in an impious and obscene parade of oaths +and curses. To destroy and to produce, death and generation, nothing +else can be disentangled from the savage jargon which deafens one's +ear." And what is it that interrupts the speakers? "The little black +owls of the cloister without monks and the steeple without bells, +making themselves merry in the broken windows in expectation of their +prey. At first they are called to order by the tinkling of an +ineffectual bell; but as their cries do not cease, they are shot at to +make them keep silence. They fall, palpitating, bleeding, and ominous, +into the midst of the pandemonium." + +So, then, clubs take the place of convents. Since the Constituent +Assembly had decreed the abolition of monastic vows by its vote of +February 13, 1790, many persons, rudely detached from their usual way +of life and its duties, had abandoned their vocation. {9} The nun +became a working-woman; the shaved Capuchin read his journal in +suburban taverns; and grinning crowds visited the profaned and open +convents "as, in Grenada, travellers pass through the abandoned halls +of the Alhambra, or as they pause, at Tivoli, under the columns of the +Sibyl's temple." + +The Jacobin Club and the Club of the Cordeliers will destroy the +monarchy. In the Memoirs of Lafayette it is remarked that "it is hard +to understand how the Jacobin minority and a handful of pretended +Marseillais made themselves masters of Paris when nearly all the forty +thousand citizens composing the National Guard desired the +Constitution; but the clubs had succeeded in scattering the true +patriots and in creating a dread of vigorous measures. Experience had +not yet taught what this feebleness and disorganization must needs +cost." + +The dark side of the picture is plainly far more evident than it was in +1789. But how vivid it is still! Those who hunger after sensations +are in their element. When has there been more noise, more tumult, +more movement, more unexpected or more varied scenes? Listen once more +to Chateaubriand who, on his return from America, passed through Paris +at this epoch: "When I read the _Histoire des troubles publics ches +divers peuples_ before the Revolution, I could not conceive how it was +possible to live in those times. I was surprised that Montaigne wrote +so cheerfully in a castle which he could not walk around without risk +of being abducted by bands {10} of Leaguers or Protestants. The +Revolution has enabled me to comprehend this possibility of existence. +With us men, critical moments produce an increase of life. In a +society which is dissolving and forming itself anew, the strife between +the two tendencies, the collision of the past and the future, the +medley of ancient and modern manners, form a transitory combination +which does not admit a moment of ennui. Passions and characters, freed +from restraint, display themselves with an energy they do not possess +in well-regulated cities. The infraction of laws, the emancipation +from duties, usages, and the rules of decorum, even perils themselves, +increase the interest of this disorder." + +Yes, people complain, grow angry, suffer, but they are not bored. How +many incidents, episodes, emotions, there are in this strange +tragi-comedy! Everywhere there is something to be seen; in the +Assembly, the clubs, the public places, the promenades, streets, cafes, +and theatres. Brawls and discussions are heard on every side. If by +chance a salon is still open, disputes go on there as they would at a +club. What quarrels take place in the cafes! Men stand on chairs and +tables to spout. And what dissensions in the theatres! The actors +meddle with politics as well as the spectators. In the greenroom of +the _Comedie-Francaise_ there is a right side, whose chief is the +royalist Naudet, and a left side led by the republican Talma. Neither +actor goes out except well armed. There are pistols {11} underneath +their togas. The kings of tragedy, threatened by their political +adversaries, have real poniards wherewith to defend themselves. _Les +Horaces, Brutus, La Mort de Cesar, Barnevelt, Guillaume Tell, Charles +IX._, are plays containing in each tirade allusions which inflame the +boxes and the pit. The theatre is a tilting-ground. If the royalists +are there in force, they cause the orchestra to play their favorite +airs: _Charmante Gabrielle, Vive Henri Quatre! O! Richard, O! mon +roi!_ The revolutionists protest, and sing their own chosen melody, +the _Ca ira_. Sometimes they come to blows, swords are drawn, and, the +play over, elegant women are dragged through the gutters. There is a +general outbreak of insults and violence. The journals play the chief +part in this universal madness. Sometimes the press is eloquent, but +it is oftener ribald or atrocious. To borrow an expression from +Montaigne, "it lowers itself even to the worthless esteem of extreme +inferiority." The beautiful French tongue, once so correct and pure, +is no longer recognizable. Vulgar words fall thick as hail. To the +language of the Academy has succeeded the jargon of the markets. + +What a swarm! what a swirl! How noisy, how restless, is this +revolutionary Paris! What excited crowds fill the clubs, the Assembly, +the Palais Royal, the gambling-houses, and the tumultuous faubourgs! +Riotous gatherings, popular deputations, detachments of cavalry, +companies of {12} foot-soldiers; gentlemen in French coats, powdered +hair, swords at their sides, hats under their arms, silk stockings and +low shoes; democrats close-cropped and unpowdered, with English frock +coats and American cravats; ragged _sans-culottes_ in red caps, weave +in and out in ceaseless motion. + +Do you know what was the chief distraction of this crowd in April, +1792? The debut of that new and fashionable machine, the guillotine. +It was used for the first time on the 25th, for a criminal guilty of +rape. Sensitive people congratulated each other on the mitigated +torment, which they were pleased to consider a humanitarian +improvement. The excellent philanthropist, Doctor Guillotin, was +lauded to the skies. His machine was named guillotine in his honor, +just as the stage-coaches established by Turgot had been called +turgotines. + +What enthusiasm, what infatuation, for this guillotine, already so +famous and destined to be so much more so! The editors of the +_Moniteur_ declare in a lyric outburst that it is worthy of the +approaching century. The truth is that it accelerates and makes less +difficult the executioner's task. In the end the crowd would become +disgusted with massacres. The delays of the gibbet would weary their +patience. The _sans-culottes_, who doubtless have a presentiment of +all that is going to happen, welcome the guillotine, then, with +acclamations. At the _Ambigu_ theatre a ballet-pantomime, called _Les +Quatre Fils Aymon_, is given, and all Paris runs to {13} see the heads +of all four fall at once, in the midst of loud applause, under the +blade of the good doctor's machine. People amuse themselves with their +future instrument of torture as if it were a toy. In a Girondin salon +they play at guillotine with a moveable screen that is lifted and let +fall again. At elegant dinners a little guillotine is brought in with +the dessert and takes the place of a sweet dish. A pretty woman places +a doll representing some political adversary under the knife; it is +decapitated in the neatest possible style, and out of it runs something +red that smells good, a liqueur perfumed with ambergris, into which +every lady hastens to dip her lace handkerchief. French gaiety would +make a vaudeville out of the day of judgment. Poor society, which +passes so quick from gay to grave, from lively to severe, and which, +like the Figaro of Beaumarchais, laughs at everything so that it may +not weep! + + + + +{14} + +II. + +COUNT DE FERSEN'S LAST JOURNEY TO PARIS. + +It has been supposed until lately that after the day when he bade +farewell to the royal family at the beginning of the Varennes journey, +Count de Fersen never again saw Marie Antoinette. A new publication of +very great importance proves that this is an error, and that the +Swedish nobleman came to Paris for the last time in 1792, and had +several interviews with the King and Queen. This publication is +entitled: _Extraits des papiers du grand marechal de Suede, Comte Jean +Axel de Fersen_, and is published by his great-nephew, Baron de +Kinckowstrom, a Swedish colonel. There is something romantic in this +episode of the mysterious journey made by Marie Antoinette's loyal +chevalier, which merits to leave a trace in history. + +Fersen was one of those men whose sentiments are all the more profound +because they know how to veil them under an apparently imperturbable +calm. A soul of fire under an exterior of ice, as the Baroness de +Korff describes him, courageous to temerity, devoted to heroism, he had +conceived for Marie Antoinette one of those disinterested and ardent +{15} friendships which lie midway between love and religion. Almost as +much a Frenchman as he was a Swede, he did not forget that he had +fought in America under the standard of the Most Christian King, and +had been colonel of a regiment in the service of France. Having been +the courtier of the happy and brilliant Queen, he remained the courtier +of the Queen overcome by anguish. He had enkindled in the soul of his +sovereign, Gustavus III., the same chivalrous sentiment which animated +his own, and was impatiently awaiting the time when he could hasten to +the aid of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette under the Swedish flag. His +dearest ambition was to draw his sword in the Queen's defence. From +the Varennes journey up to the day of Marie Antoinette's execution, he +had but one thought: to rescue the woman for whom he would willingly +have shed the last drop of his blood. This fixed idea has left its +trace on every line of his journal. The sad and melancholy countenance +of Fersen, the courtier of misfortune, the friend of unhappy days, is +assuredly one of the celebrated types in the drama of Versailles and +the Tuileries. This man, who would have made no mark in history but +for the martyr Queen, is certain, thanks to her, not to be forgotten by +posterity. Marie Antoinette was to return him in glory what he gave +her in devotion. + +On her return to the Tuileries after the disastrous journey to +Varennes, the Queen wrote to {16} Fersen, June 27, 1791: "Be at ease +about us; we are living," and Fersen replied: "I am well, and live only +to serve you." June 29, she wrote him another letter in which she +said: "Do not write to me; it would endanger us; and, above all, do not +return here under any pretext; all would be lost if you should make +your appearance. They never lose sight of us by night or day; which is +a matter of indifference to me. Be tranquil; nothing will happen to +me. The Assembly desires to treat us with gentleness. Adieu. I shall +not be able to write to you again." + +Marie Antoinette was in error when she supposed she would not write +again. She was in error, likewise, when she imagined that Fersen, in +spite of all dangers and difficulties, would not find means to see her +again. Their correspondence was not interrupted. After the acceptance +of the Constitution, Marie Antoinette wrote to him: "Can you understand +my position and the part I am continually obliged to play? Sometimes I +do not understand myself, and am obliged to consider whether it is +really I who am speaking; but what is to be done? It is all necessary, +and be sure our position would be still worse than it is if I had not +at once assumed this attitude; we at least gain time by it, and that is +all that is required. I keep up better than could be expected, seeing +that I go out so little and endure constantly such immense fatigue of +mind. What with the persons whom I must see, my {17} writing, and the +time I spend with my children, I have not a moment to myself. The last +occupation, which is not the least, gives me my sole happiness. When I +am very sad, I take my little boy in my arms, embrace him with my whole +heart, and for a moment am consoled." + +Fersen, touched and pitying, was constantly thinking of that fatal +palace of the Tuileries where the Queen was so much to be +compassionated. An invincible attraction drew him thither. There, he +thought, was the post of devotion and of honor. November 26, he wrote: +"Tell me whether there is any possibility of going to see you entirely +alone, without a servant, in case I receive the order to do so from the +King (Gustavus III.); he has already spoken to me of his desire to +bring this about." Of all the sovereigns who interested themselves in +the fate of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, Gustavus was the most +active, brave, and resolute; he was also the only one in whom Marie +Antoinette placed absolute confidence. She expected less from her own +brother, the Emperor Leopold, and it was to Stockholm above all that +she turned her eyes. Gustavus ordered Fersen to go secretly to Paris, +and on December 22, 1791, he sent him a memoir and certain letters, +commissioning him to deliver them to Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. +He recommended, as forcibly as he could, a new attempt at flight, but +with precautions suggested by the lesson of Varennes. He thought the +members of the royal {18} family should depart separately and in +disguise, and that, once outside of his kingdom, Louis XVI. should call +for the intervention of a congress. The following passage occurs in +the letter of the Swedish King to Marie Antoinette: "I beg Your Majesty +to consider seriously that violent disorders can only be cured by +violent remedies, and that if moderation is a virtue in the course of +ordinary life, it often becomes a vice when there is question of public +matters. The King of France can re-establish his dominion only by +resuming his former rights; every other remedy is illusory; anything +except this would merely open the way to endless discussions which +would augment the confusion instead of ending it. The King's rights +were torn from him by the sword; it is by the sword that they must be +reconquered. But I refrain; I should remember that I am addressing a +princess who, in the most terrible moments of her life, has shown the +most intrepid courage." + +Fersen obtained permission from Louis XVI. to accomplish the mission +confided to him by Gustavus III. He left Stockholm under an assumed +name and with the passport of a Swedish courier, and reached Paris +without accident, February 13, 1792. He was so adroit and prudent that +no one suspected his presence. On the very evening of his arrival he +wrote in his journal: "Went to the Queen by my usual road; very few +National Guards; did not see the King." Fersen, therefore, only +reappeared at the Tuileries in the darkness, like a fugitive or {19} an +outlaw. He found the Queen pale with grief and with hair whitened by +sorrow and emotion. It was a solemn moment. The storm was raging +within France and beyond it. Terrible omens, snares, and dangers lay +on every side. One might have said that the Tuileries were about to be +swallowed up in a gulf of fire and blood. + +The next day Fersen saw the King. He wrote in his journal: "Tuesday, +14. Saw the King at six in the evening. He will not go and can not, +on account of the extreme vigilance. In fact, he scruples at it, +having so often promised to remain, for he is an honest man.... He +sees that force is the only resource; but, being weak, he thinks it +impossible to resume all his authority.... Unless he were constantly +encouraged, I am not sure he would not be tempted to negotiate with the +rebels. He said to me afterwards: 'That's all very well! We are by +ourselves and we can talk; but nobody ever found himself in my +position. I know I missed the right moment; it was the 14th of July; +we ought to have gone then, and I wanted to, but how could I when +Monsieur himself begged me to stay, and Marshal de Broglie, who was in +command, said to me: "Yes, we can go to Metz. But what shall we do +when we get there?" I lost the opportunity and never found it again. +I have been abandoned by everybody.'" Louis XVI. desired Fersen to +warn the Powers that they must not be surprised at anything he might be +forced to do; that he was {20} obliged, that it was the effect of +constraint. "They must put me out of the question," he added, "and let +me do what I can." + +Fersen had a long talk with Marie Antoinette the same day. She entered +into full details about the present and especially about the past. She +explained why the flight to Varennes, in which Fersen had taken such a +prominent part, and which had succeeded so well so long as he directed +it, had ended in failure. The Queen described the anguish of the +arrest and the return. To the project of a new effort to escape, she +replied by pointing out the implacable surveillance of which she was +the object, and the effervescence of popular passions, which this time +would overleap all restraint if the fugitives were taken. It would be +better for the royal family to suffer together than to expose +themselves to die separately. It would be better to die like princes, +who abdicate majesty only with life, than as vagabonds, under a vulgar +disguise. "The Queen," adds Fersen, "told me that she saw Alexander +Lameth and Duport; that they always tell her that there is no remedy +but foreign troops; failing that, all is lost, that this cannot last, +that they have gone farther than they wished to. In spite of all this, +she thinks them malicious, does not trust them, but uses them as best +she can. All the ministers are traitors who betray the King." Fersen +had a final interview with Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette on February +21, 1792. By February 24, {21} he had returned to Brussels. He was +profoundly moved on quitting the Tuileries, but, dismal and lugubrious +as his forebodings may have been, how much more sombre was the reality +to prove! + +What a terrible fate was reserved for the chief actors in this drama! +Yet a few days, and the chivalrous Gustavus was to be assassinated. +The hour of execution was approaching for Louis XVI. and Marie +Antoinette. Fersen, likewise, was to have a most tragic end. From the +moment when he bade his last adieu to the unhappy Queen, his life was +but one long torment. His disposition, already inclined to melancholy, +became incurably sad. His loyal and devoted soul could not accustom +itself to the thought of the calamities weighing so cruelly upon that +good and beautiful sovereign of whom he said in 1778: "The Queen is the +prettiest and most amiable princess that I know." On October 14, 1793, +he will still be endeavoring, with the aid of Baron de Breteuil, to +bring to completion a thousandth plot to extricate the august captive +from her fate. He will learn the fatal tidings on the 20th. "I can +think of nothing but my loss," he will write in his journal. "It is +frightful to have no positive details. It is horrible that she should +have been alone in her last moments, with no one to speak to, or to +receive her last wishes. No; without vengeance, my heart will never be +content." Covered with honors under the reign of Gustavus IV., +senator, chancellor of the Academy of {22} Upsal, member of the +Seraphim Order, grand marshal of the kingdom of Sweden, there will +remain in the depths of his heart a wound which nothing can heal. An +inveterate fatality will pursue him as it had done the unfortunate +sovereign of whom he had been the chevalier. He will perish in a riot +at Stockholm, June 20, 1810, at the time of the obsequies of the Prince +Royal. Struck down by fists and walking-sticks, his hair pulled out, +his clothes torn to rags, he will be dragged about half-naked, rolled +underfoot, assassinated by a maddened populace. Before rendering his +last sigh, he will succeed in rising to his knees, and, joining his +hands, he will utter these words from the stoning of Saint Stephen: "O +my God, who callest me to Thee, I implore Thee for my tormentors, whom +I pardon." If not the same words, they are at least the same thoughts +as those of Marie Antoinette on the platform of the scaffold. + + + + +{23} + +III. + +THE DEATH OF THE EMPEROR LEOPOLD. + +One after another, Marie Antoinette lost her last chances of safety; +blows as unforeseen as terrible beat down the combinations on which she +had built her hopes. Within a fortnight she was to see the two +sovereigns disappear from whom she had expected succor: her brother, +the Emperor Leopold, and Gustavus III., the King of Sweden. Leopold +had not been equal to all the illusions which his sister had cherished +with regard to him, but, nevertheless, he showed great interest in +French affairs, and a lively desire to be useful to Louis XVI. Pacific +by disposition, he had temporized at first, and adopted a conciliatory +policy. He desired a reconciliation with the new principles, and, +moreover, he was not blind to the inexperience and levity of the +_emigres_. But the obligation, to which he was bound by treaties, to +defend the rights of princes holding property in Alsace, his fear of +the propaganda of sedition, the aggressive language of the National +Assembly and the Parisian press, had ended by determining him to take a +more resolute attitude, and it was at the moment when he was {24} +seriously intending to come to his sister's aid that he was carried off +by sudden death. Though she did not desire a war between Austria and +France, the Queen had persisted in wishing for an armed congress, which +would have been a compromise between peace and war, but which the +National Assembly would have regarded as an intolerable humiliation. +It must not be denied, the situation was a false one. Between the true +sentiments of Louis XVI. and his new role as a constitutional +sovereign, there was a real incompatibility. As to the Queen, she was +on good terms neither with the _emigres_ nor with the Assembly. + +In order to get a just idea of the sentiments shown by the _emigres_, +it is necessary to read a letter written from Treves, October 16, 1791, +by Madame de Raigecourt, the friend of Madame Elisabeth, to another +friend of the Princess, the Marquise de Bombelles: "I see with pain +that Paris and Coblentz are not on good terms. The Emperor treats the +Princes like children.... The Princes cannot avoid suspecting that it +is the influence of the Queen and her agents which thwarts their plans +and causes the Emperor to behave so strangely.... Some trickery on the +part of the Tuileries is still suspected in this country. They ought +to explain themselves to each other once for all. Is the Queen afraid +lest the Count d'Artois should arrogate an authority in the realm which +would diminish her own? Let her be at ease on that score; she will +{25} always be the King's wife and always dominant. What is she afraid +of, then? She complains that she is not sufficiently respected. But +you know the good heart and the uprightness of our Prince; he is +incapable of the remarks attributed to him, and which have certainly +been reported to the Queen with the intention of estranging them +entirely." Madame de Raigecourt ends her letter with this complaint +against Louis XVI.: "Our wretched King lowers himself more and more +every day; for he is doing too much, even if he still intends to +escape.... The emigration, meanwhile, increases daily, and presently +there will be more Frenchmen than Germans in this region." At this +very time, the Queen was having recourse to her brother Leopold as to a +saviour. She wrote to him, October 4, 1791: "My only consolation is in +writing to you, my dear brother; I am surrounded by so many atrocities +that I need all your friendship to tranquillize my mind.... A point of +primary importance is to regulate the conduct of the _emigres_. If +they re-enter France in arms, all is lost, and it will be impossible to +make it believed that we are not in connivance with them. Even the +existence of an army of _emigres_ on the frontier would be enough to +keep up the irritation and afford ground for accusations against us; it +appears to me that a congress would make the task of restraining them +less difficult.... This idea of a congress pleases me greatly; it +would second the efforts we are {26} making to maintain confidence. In +the first place, I repeat, it would put a check on the _emigres_, and, +moreover, it would make an impression here from which I hope much. I +submit that to your better judgment.... Adieu, my dear brother; we +love you, and my daughter has particularly charged me to embrace her +good uncle." + +While Marie Antoinette was thus turning towards Austria for assistance, +the National Assembly at Paris repelled with energy all thought of any +intervention whatsoever on the part of foreign powers. January 1, +1792, it issued a decree of impeachment against the King's brothers, +the Prince de Conde, and Calonne. The confiscation of the property of +the _emigres_ and the taxation of their revenues for the benefit of the +State had been prescribed by another decree to which Louis XVI. had +offered no opposition. January 14, Guadet said in the tribune, while +speaking of the congress: "If it is true that by delays and +discouragement they wish to bring us to accept this shameful mediation, +ought the National Assembly to close its eyes to such a danger? Let us +all swear to die here rather than--" He was not allowed to finish. +The whole assembly rose to their feet, crying: "Yes, yes; we swear it!" +And in a burst of enthusiasm, every Frenchman who would take part in a +congress having for its object the modification of the Constitution, +was declared an infamous traitor. January 17, it was decreed that the +King should require the {27} Emperor Leopold to explain himself +definitely before March 1. + +By a curious coincidence, this date of March 1 was precisely that on +which the Emperor Leopold was to die of a dreadful malady. He was in +perfect health on February 27, when he gave audience to the Turkish +envoy; he was in his agony, February 28, and on March 1, he died. His +usual physician asserted that he had been poisoned. The idea that a +crime had been committed spread among the people. Vague rumors got +about concerning a woman who had caused remark at the last masked ball +at court. This unknown person, under shelter of her disguise, might +have presented the sovereign with poisoned bonbons. The Jacobins, who +might have desired to get rid of the armed chief of the empire, and the +_emigres_, who might have reproached him as too luke-warm in his +opposition to the principles of the French Revolution, were alternately +suspected. The last hypothesis was hardly probable, nor does anything +prove that the Jacobins had any hand in the possibly natural death of +the Emperor Leopold. But minds were so overexcited at the time that +the parties mutually accused each other, on all occasions, of the most +execrable crimes. For that matter, there were Jacobins who, out of +mere bravado, would willingly have gloried in crimes of which they were +not guilty, provided that these crimes had been committed against kings. + +What is certain is, that Marie Antoinette believed {28} in poison. +"The death of the Emperor Leopold," says Madame Campan, "occurred on +March 1, 1792. The Queen was out when the news arrived at the +Tuileries. On her return, I gave her the letter announcing it. She +cried out that the Emperor had been poisoned; that she had remarked and +preserved a gazette in which, in an article on the session of the +Jacobin Club at the time when Leopold had declared for the Coalition, +it was said, in speaking of him, that a bit of piecrust could settle +that affair. From that moment the Queen had regarded this phrase as an +inadvertence of the propagandists." + +On the very day when Marie Antoinette's brother died, Louis XVI.'s +Minister of Foreign Affairs, De Lessart, had enraged the National +Assembly by reading them extracts from his diplomatic correspondence, +which they found not sufficiently firm. They were indignant at a +despatch in which Prince de Kaunitz said: "The latest events give us +hopes; it appears that the majority of the French nation, impressed +with the evils they have prepared, are returning to more moderate +principles, and incline to render to the throne the dignity and +authority which are the essence of monarchical government." When De +Lessart came down from the tribune, the whispering changed into cries +of rage and threats against the minister and the court, which, it was +said, was planning a counter-revolution at the Tuileries, and dictating +to the cabinet of Vienna the language by which it hoped to intimidate +France. {29} At the evening session of the same day, Rouyer, a deputy, +proposed to impeach the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "Is it possible," +cried he, "that a perfidious minister should come here to make a parade +of his work and lay the responsibility of it on a foreign power? Will +the time never arrive when ministers shall cease to betray us? Were my +head to be the price of the denunciation I am making, I would none the +less go on with it." At the session of March 6, Guadet said: "It is +time to know whether the ministers wish to make Louis XVI. King of the +French, or the King of Coblentz." + +On the 10th the storm broke. The day before, Narbonne had received his +dismission. Brissot accused De Lessart of having compromised the +safety of France, withheld from the Assembly the documents establishing +the alliance between the Emperor and the King of Prussia, discredited +the assignats, depreciated the credit, lowered the rate of exchange, +and encouraged interior disorder. Vergniaud followed him, exclaiming: +"From the tribune where I am speaking may be seen the palace where +perverse counsellors lead astray and deceive the King given to you by +the Constitution; where they forge chains for the nation, and arrange +the manoeuvres which are to deliver us up to Austria, after having +caused us to pass through the horrors of civil war. Terror and dismay +have often issued from that famous palace. Let them re-enter it to-day +in the name of the law, let them penetrate all hearts, and {30} teach +all who dwell there, that our Constitution accords inviolability to the +King alone. Let them know that the law will overtake all the guilty +without exception, and that there will not be a single head convicted +of crime which can escape its sword." The decree of impeachment +against the ministers was voted by a very large majority. De Lessart +was advised to take flight, but he refused. "I owe it to my country," +said he, "I owe it to my King and to myself to make my innocence and +the regularity of my conduct plain before the tribunal of the high +court, and I have decided to give myself up at Orleans." He was +conducted by gendarmes to that city, where he was imprisoned. Louis +XVI. dared not do anything to save his favorite minister. On March 11, +Petion, the mayor of Paris, came to the bar of the Assembly, and read, +in the name of the Commune, an address in which it was said: "When the +atmosphere surrounding us is heavy with noisome vapors, Nature can +relieve herself only by a thunder-storm. So, too, society can purge +itself from the abuses which disturb it only by a formidable +explosion.... It is true, then, that responsibility is not an idle +word; that all men, whatever may be their stations, are equal before +the law; that the sword of justice is poised over all heads without +distinction." Was not this language like a prognostic of the 21st of +January and the 16th of October? Encompassed by a thousand snares, +hated by each of the extreme parties, by the {31} _emigres_ as well as +by the Jacobins, Marie Antoinette no longer beheld anything but aspects +of sorrow. Abroad, as in France, her gaze fell on dismal spectacles +only. Her imagination was affected. She hardly dared taste the dishes +served at her table. All had conspired to betray her. She had +experienced so many deceptions and so much anguish; fate had pursued +her with so much bitterness, that her heart, exhausted with emotions, +and overwhelmed with sadness, was weary of all things, even of hope. + + + + +{32} + +IV. + +THE DEATH OF GUSTAVUS III. + +The drama of the Revolution is not French alone; it is European. It +has its afterclap in every empire, in every kingdom, even to the most +distant lands. It excites minds in Stockholm almost as much as in +Paris. Among the Swedes there are people whose greatest desire would +be to parody the October Days, and to carry about on pikes the bleeding +heads of their adversaries. The new ideas take fire and spread like a +train of gunpowder. It is the fashion to go to extremes; a nameless +frenzy and fatality seem let loose upon this epoch of agitations and +catastrophes. All those who, at one time or another, have been guests +at the palace of Versailles, are condemned, as by a mysterious +sentence, either to exile or to death. + +How will terminate the career of that brilliant King of Sweden, who had +received from Versailles and from Paris, from the court and from the +city, such an enthusiastic reception? Gustavus, the idol of the great +lords, the philosophers, and the fashionable beauties, who, after being +the hero of the encyclopaedists, came to hold his court at {33} +Aix-la-Chapelle amid the French _emigres_, and who, on his return to +Stockholm, prepared there the great crusade for authority, announcing +himself as the avenger of divine right, the saviour of all thrones? +The last days of his life, his presentiments, which recall those of +Caesar, his superstitions, his belief in prophecies, his magic +incantations, that warning which he scorns, as the Duke de Guise did at +the castle of Blois, that masked ball where the costumes, the music, +the flowers, the lights, offer a painfully strange contrast to the +horror of the attack; all is sinister, lugubrious, in these fantastic +and fatal scenes which have already tempted more than one dramatist, +more than one musician, and whose phases a Shakespeare only could +retrace. The crime of Stockholm is linked closely to the +death-struggle of French royalty. The funeral knell which tolled at +this extremity of the North had echoes in Paris. The Swedish regicides +set the example to the regicides of France. + +M. Geffroy has remarked very justly in his work, _Gustave III. et la +cour de France_, that the bloody deed which put an end to the reign and +the life of Gustavus is not an isolated fact: "The faults committed by +this Prince would not have sufficed to arm his assassins. The true +source whence Ankarstroem and his accomplices drew their first +inspiration was that vertigo caused during the last years of the +century by the annihilation of all religious and even all philosophical +faith.... No moment of {34} modern history has presented an +intellectual and moral anarchy comparable to that which accompanied the +revolutionary period in Europe." + +The eighteenth century was punished for incredulity by superstition. +Having refused to believe the most holy truths, it lent credence to the +most fantastic chimeras. For priests it substituted sorcerers; for +Christian ceremonies, the rites of freemasonry. The time was coming +when, because it had rejected the Sacred Heart of Jesus, it was going +to bow before the sacred heart of Marat. The adepts of Mesmer and of +De Puysegur, the seekers after the philosopher's stone, the Nicolaites +of Berlin, the illuminati of Bavaria, enlarged the boundaries of human +credulity, and the men who succumbed in the most naive and foolish +manner to these wretched weaknesses of mind, were precisely the +haughtiest philosophers, those who had prided themselves the most on +their distinction as free-thinkers. Such a one was Gustavus III. + +This Voltairean Prince, who had held the Christian verities so cheap, +was superstitious even to puerility. He did not believe in the +Gospels, but he believed in books of magic. In a corner of his palace +he had arranged a cupboard with a censer and a pair of candlesticks, +before which he performed cabalistic operations in nothing but his +shirt. Throughout his entire reign he consulted a fortune-teller named +Madame Arfwedsson, who read the future for him in coffee-grounds. +Around his neck {35} he wore a gold box containing a sachet in which +there was a powder that, according to his belief, would drive away evil +spirits. All this apparatus of incantation and sorcery was one of the +causes of Gustavus's fall. It multiplied the snares around the +unfortunate monarch, and served to mask his enemies. Prophecies +announced his approaching end, and conspirators took care to fulfil the +prophecies. + +The Duke of Sudermania, the King's brother, without being an accomplice +in the project of crime, encouraged underhand practices. Sectarians +approached Gustavus to reproach him for his luxury, his prodigalities, +his entertainments, or addressed him anonymous warnings which, in +Biblical language, declared him accursed and rejected by the Lord. +Their insolence knew no bounds. Madame Arfwedsson had counselled the +King to beware if he should meet a man dressed in red. Count de +Ribbing, one of the future conspirators, having heard of this, ordered +a red costume out of bravado, and presented himself in it before his +sovereign, whom such an apparition caused to reflect if not to tremble. + +Gustavus, like Caesar, was to see his Ides of March. It had been +predicted to him that the month of March would be fatal to him. This +month approached, and the monarch diverted himself by fetes and +boisterous entertainments in order to banish the presentiments which +never ceased to assail {36} him. He said to himself that all this +phantasmagoria would probably soon vanish; that the funereal images +would of themselves depart; and that the spectres would disappear at +the sound of arms. The monarchical crusade of which he proposed to be +the leader grew upon him as the best means by which to escape the +incessant obsessions haunting his spirit. In vain was he reminded that +Sweden was in need of money, and that a war of intervention in the +affairs of France was not popular. His resolution remained unshaken. +He counted the days and hours which still separated him from the moment +of action: his sole idea was to chastise the Jacobins and avenge the +majesty of thrones. + +Returned to Stockholm from Aix-la-Chapelle, at the beginning of August, +1791, the impetuous monarch began to be very active in his warlike +preparations. The Marquis de Bouille, who had been obliged to quit +France at the time of the unsuccessful journey to Varennes, had entered +his service and was to counsel him and fight at his side under the +Swedish flag. At the same time Gustavus officially renewed his +promises of aid to the King of France. Louis XVI. replied:-- + +"MONSIEUR MY BROTHER AND COUSIN: I have just received the lines with +which you have honored me on the occasion of your return. It is always +a great consolation to have such proofs of a friendly sentiment as are +given me by this letter. The concern, Sire, which you take in all that +relates to {37} my interest touches me more and more, and I recognize +in each word the august soul of a king whom the world admires as much +for his magnanimous heart as for his wisdom." + +Meanwhile the conspirators, animated either by personal rancor or the +passions common to nobles hostile to their king, were secretly +preparing for an attack. The five leaders were Captain Ankarstroem, +Count de Ribbing, Count de Horn, Count de Lilienhorn, major of the Blue +Guards, and Baron Pechlin, an old man of seventy-two, who had been +distinguished in the civil wars, and was the soul of the plot. The +conspirators had doubts before committing the crime. During the Diet, +which met at Gefle, January 25, 1792, they refrained at the very moment +when they were about to strike. + +Gustavus was in his castle of Haga, about a league from Stockholm, +without guards or attendants. Three of the conspirators approached the +castle at five in the evening. They were armed with carbines, and, +having placed themselves in ambush near the King's apartment on the +ground-floor, were awaiting an opportunity to kill their sovereign. +Gustavus coming in from a long walk, went in his dressing-gown to sit +in the library, the windows of which opened like doors into the garden. +He fell asleep in his armchair. Whether they were alarmed by the sound +of footsteps, or whether the contrast between the slumber of the +unsuspicious King and the death poising above his head awakened {38} +some remorse, the assassins once more abandoned their meditated crime. + +Weary of the attempts they had been planning for six months, and which +never came to anything, the conspirators might possibly have given them +up altogether if a circumstance which they considered providential had +not come to rekindle their regicidal zeal. The last masked ball of the +season was to be given in the Opera-house on the night of March 16-17, +and it was known that Gustavus would be present. To strike the monarch +in the midst of the festival, in order to chastise him for his love of +pleasure, was an idea which charmed the assassins. Moreover, the mask +alone could embolden them; they thought that if the august victim were +enveloped in a domino they need no longer dread that royal prestige +which had more than once caused them to recoil. + +Gustavus was counselled to be on his guard. The young Count Louis de +Bouille, who was then at Stockholm, and who had been informed by a +letter from Germany that the King was about to be assassinated, begged +him to profit by the warnings reaching him from every quarter. +Gustavus replied that he would rather go blindly to meet his fate than +torment himself with the numberless precautions which such suspicions +would demand. "If I listened," added he, "to all the advice I receive, +I could not even drink a glass of water; besides, I am far from +believing in the execution of such a plot. {39} My subjects, although +very brave in war, are extremely timid in politics. The successes I +expect to gain in France, the trophies of which I shall bring back to +Stockholm, will speedily augment my power by the confidence and general +respect which will be their result." + +Meantime the fatal hour was approaching. The masked ball of March 16 +was about to open. Before going there, Gustavus took supper with a few +of the persons belonging to his household. While he was at table he +received a note, written in French and unsigned, in which he was +entreated not to enter the playhouse, where he was about to be stricken +to death. The author of the note urgently recommended the King not to +make his appearance at the ball, and, if he persisted in going, to +suspect the crowd which would press around him, because this gathering +was to be the prelude and signal of the blow aimed at him. The really +bizarre thing about this was that the man who wrote these lines was +himself one of the conspirators, Count de Lilienhorn. + +"It is impossible to tell," says the Marquis de Bouille in his Memoirs, +"whether his conscience wished to acquit itself in this manner towards +the King, to whom he owed everything, without forfeiting his word to +his party, or whether, knowing the fearless character of this prince, +he did not offer his anonymous advice as a bait to his courage. It +certainly produced the latter effect." Gustavus made no {40} +reflections on reading this note, and went fearlessly to the ball. + +The orchestra is playing wildly. The dances are animated. The hall, +adorned with flowers, sparkles under the glow of the chandeliers. +Gustavus appears for a moment in his box. It is only then that he +shows to Baron d'Essen, his first equerry, the anonymous note he had +received while at supper. That faithful servant begs him not to go +down into the hall. Gustavus disregards the prudent counsel. He says +that hereafter he will wear a coat of mail, but that, for this time, he +is perfectly determined to be reckless about danger. The King and his +equerry go into the saloon in front of the royal box, where each puts +on a domino. Then they enter the hall by way of the stage. There are +men essentially courageous, who love danger for its own sake. Gustavus +is one of them. Hence he takes pleasure in braving all his assassins. +As he is crossing the greenroom with Baron d'Essen on his arm, "Let us +see," says he, "whether they will really dare to kill me." Yes, they +will dare it. The moment that the King enters he is recognized in +spite of his mask and his domino. He walks slowly around the hall, and +then goes into the pit, where he strolls about during several minutes. +He is about to retrace his steps, when he finds himself surrounded, as +had been predicted, by a group of maskers who get between him and the +officers of his suite. Several black dominos approach. They are the +assassins. One of them, {41} Count de Horn, lays a hand on his +shoulder: "Good day, fine masker!" he says. This Judas salute, this +ironical welcome given by the murderers to their victim, is the signal +for the attack. On the instant, Ankarstroem fires on the King with a +pistol loaded with old iron. + +Gustavus, struck in the left hip, cries, "I am wounded!" The pistol, +which had been wrapped in wool, made only a muffled report, and the +smoke spreading throughout the room, the crowd does not think of a +murder, but a fire. Cries of "Fire! fire!" augment the confusion. +Baron d'Essen, all covered with his master's blood, helps him to gain a +little box called the OEil-de-Boeuf, and from there a salon, where he +is laid upon a sofa. Baron d'Armfelt orders the doors of the theatre +to be closed, and every one to unmask. A man, brazening it out, lifts +his mask before the officer of police, and says to him with assurance, +"As for me, sir, I hope that you will not suspect me." It is +Ankarstroem, the assassin. He goes out quietly. But, after the crime +was committed, his weapons, a pistol and a knife like that of +Ravaillac, had fallen on the floor. A gunsmith of Stockholm will +recognize the pistol and declare that he had sold it a few days before +to a former officer of the guards, Captain Ankarstroem. It is the +token which will cause the arrest of the assassin, and his punishment +by the penalty of parricides,--decapitation and the cutting off of his +right hand. + +{42} + +The King showed admirable calm and resignation during the thirteen days +he had still to live. He asked with anxiety if the murderer had been +arrested, and being answered that his name was not yet known: "Ah! God +grant," said he, "that he may not be discovered!" As soon as the first +bandages were put on, the wounded man was taken to his apartments at +the castle. There he received his courtiers and the foreign ministers. +When he saw the Duke d'Escars, who represented the brothers of Louis +XVI. at Stockholm: "This is a blow," said he, "which is going to +rejoice your Parisian Jacobins; but write to the Princes that if I +recover from it, it will change neither my sentiments nor my zeal for +their just cause." In the midst of his sufferings he preserved a +dignity above all praise. Neither recriminations nor murmurs issued +from his lips. He summoned to his death-bed both his friends and those +who had been among the number of his enemies, but would have been +horrified to have been accomplices in a crime. When the old Count de +Brahe, leader of the nobles of the opposition, presented himself, +Gustavus said, as he pressed him in his arms: "I bless my wound, since +it has brought back an old friend who had withdrawn from me. Embrace +me, my dear count, and let all be forgotten between us." + +The fate of his son, who was about to ascend the throne at the age of +thirteen, was the chief preoccupation of the King. "Let them put me on +a litter," cried he; "I will go to the public square and speak to {43} +the people." And he said to Baron d'Armfelt: "Go, and like another +Antony, show the bloody vestments of Caesar." It was also to D'Armfelt +that he said as he was signing with his dying hand his commission as +Governor of Stockholm: "Give me your knightly word that you will serve +my son as faithfully as you have served me." He made his confession to +his grand-almoner: "I fear," he said to him, "that I have no great +merit before God, but at least I am sure that I have never done harm to +any one intentionally." He meant to receive the sacraments according +to the Lutheran form, and to have the Queen brought to him, as he had +not seen her since his illness. But while seeking sleep in order to +tranquillize his mind before this emotion, he found the slumber of +death, March 29, 1792, at eleven in the morning. He was forty-six +years old. + +Thus terminated the brilliant and stormy career of the prince on whom +the Marquis de Bouille has pronounced the following judgment: "His +manners and his politeness rendered him the most amiable and attractive +man in his country, although the Swedes are naturally intelligent. He +had a vivid imagination, a mind enlightened and adorned by a taste for +letters, a masculine and persuasive eloquence, and an easy elocution +even when speaking French; useful and agreeable acquirements, a +prodigious memory, polite and affable manners, accompanied by a certain +oddity which did not displease. His strong and ardent soul was +enkindled with an inordinate love of glory; but a {44} chivalrous +spirit and loyalty dominated there. His sensitive heart rendered him +clement, when he ought, perhaps, to have been severe; he was even +susceptible of friendship, and this prince has had and has preserved +friends whom I have known, and who were worthy to be such. He had a +firm and decided character, and, above all, that resolution so +necessary to statesmen, without which wit, prudence, talents, +experience, are not only useless, but often injurious." + +According to the Marquis de Bouille, Gustavus should have been the King +of France, and Louis XVI. King of Sweden. "As the sovereign of France, +Gustavus would have been, beyond all doubt, one of its greatest kings. +He would have preserved that beautiful realm from a revolution; he +would have governed with glory and with splendor.... Louis XVI., on +the other hand, placed on the throne of Sweden, would have obtained the +respect and esteem of that simple people by his moral and religious +virtues, his economy, his spirit of justice, and his good and +benevolent sentiments. He would have contributed to the happiness of +the Swedes, who would have wept above his tomb; whereas both these +monarchs perished at the hands of their subjects. But the designs of +Providence are impenetrable, and we ought, in respect and silence, to +obey its unalterable decrees." + +The Jacobins of Paris, who affected to despise the projects of Gustavus +III., showed how much they had feared him by the mad joy they displayed +on {45} learning of his death. They lavished praises on "Brutus +Ankarstroem." Although it had been committed by the nobles, there was +a certain reminiscence of the French Revolution about the assault. In +their secret meetings the conspirators had agreed to carry around on +pikes the heads of Gustavus's principal friends, "in the French style," +as was said in those days. Count de Lilienhorn, brought up, nourished, +and drawn from poverty and obscurity by Gustavus, and overwhelmed to +the last moment by the benefits of the generous monarch, explained his +monstrous ingratitude and the part he had taken in the attack, by +saying he had been led astray by the idea of commanding the National +Guards of Stockholm after the Revolution, and playing the same part as +Lafayette. The Girondin ministry attained to power in France a few +days after Gustavus had been struck down in Sweden. There was no +connecting link between the two facts; but at Paris, as at Stockholm, +the cause of kings sustained a terrible repulse. The tragic death of +their faithful friend must have caused Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette +some painful forebodings concerning their own fate. The murder of +Gustavus was the first of a series of great catastrophes. The pistol +of the Swedish regicide heralded the blade of the Parisian guillotine. +The 16th of March was the prelude of the 21st of January. + + + + +{46} + +V. + +THE BEGINNINGS OF MADAME ROLAND. + +The moment is at hand when a woman of the middle class, born in humble +circumstances, is about to make her appearance on the scene of +politics; a woman who, after living in obscurity during thirty-eight +years, was to become famous in a few days, and attract the attention of +all France first and afterwards that of Europe entire. No figure is +more curious to study than hers, and it is not surprising that of late +years it has tempted men of great merit, such as MM. Daubant and +Faugere, whose publications have shed great light on the Egeria of the +Girondins. + +At every epoch of history there are certain women who become as it were +living symbols, and sum up in their own persons the passions, +prejudices, and illusions of their time. They reflect at once its +vices and its virtues, its qualities and its defects. Such was Madame +Roland. All the distinctive characteristics of the close of the +eighteenth century are resumed in her: ardent enthusiasm, generous +ideals, aspiration towards progress, passion for liberty, heroic +courage in view of persecution, captivity, and death; an absence of +religious faith, an implacable vanity, a {47} thirst for emotions, +plagiarism of antiquity, declamatory language and sentiments, and +childish imitation of Greece and Rome. Nothing is more interesting +than to analyze the conceptions of this mind, count the pulsations of +this heart, and surprise the inmost secrets of a woman whose +psychological importance is as considerable as her place in history. +Intellectually as well as morally, Madame Roland is the daughter of +Jean-Jacques Rousseau; socially she is the personification of that +third estate which, having been nothing, wished at first to be +something and afterwards to be all; politically, she is by turns the +heroine and the victim of the Revolution, which, under pretext of +liberty, engendered tyranny, which used the guillotine and perished by +the guillotine, and which after dreaming of light expired in mire and +blood. + +How was it that this little _bourgeoise_, the daughter of Philipon the +engraver, a man midway between an artisan and an artist, whose very +origin seemed to remove her so far from any political role, attained to +high renown? What influences formed this woman whose qualities were +masculine? Whence was drawn the inspiration of this siren, destined to +be taken in her own snares and die the victim of her own incantations? +A rapid glance at the earliest years of Marie-Jeanne Philipon, the +future Madame Roland, is enough to explain her passions and her hopes, +her errors and her talents, her rages and her enthusiasms. + +She was born in Paris, March 18, 1754, of an intelligent but frivolous +father, and a simple, devoted, {48} honestly commonplace mother. From +infancy she felt herself superior to those by whom she was surrounded. +Thence sprang an unmeasured pride and a continual hunger to produce an +impression. The infant prodigy preluded the female politician. +Speaking of herself in her Memoirs, she becomes ecstatic over the child +who "read serious works, explained very well the circles of the +celestial globe, used crayons and the burin, found at eight years that +she was the best dancer in an assembly of young persons older than +herself," and who, nevertheless, "was often summoned to the kitchen to +make an omelette, clean the vegetables, or skim the pot." She admires +her own willingness to descend to domestic cares: "I was never out of +my element," she says; "I could make soup as skilfully as Philopoemen +could chop wood; but no one, observing me, could imagine that this was +suitable employment." Still speaking of herself, she celebrates "the +little person who on Sundays went to church or out walking in a +spick-and-span costume whose appearance was fully sustained by her +demeanor and her language." She calls attention to the contrast by +which, on week-days, the same child went out alone, in a little cloth +frock, to buy parsley and salad at a short distance from home. "It +must be owned," she adds, "that I did not like this very well; but I +did not show it, and I had the art of doing my errands in such a way as +to find some pleasure in it. I united such great politeness to a +certain dignity, that the fruit-seller or other person {49} of the +sort, took pleasure in serving me first, and even those who came before +me thought this proper." + +So the little Philipon wanted to take the chief place in the +fruiterer's shop, just as, later on, she desired it on the political +stage or the Ministry of the Interior. This enemy of privileges will +admit them only for herself. In everything she made pretentions: +pretentions to elegance, beauty, distinction, talent, knowledge, +eloquence, genius, and, when she wanted to be simple, to simplicity. +In her style as in her conversation, in her public as in her private +life, what she sought before all things was effect. It was absolutely +essential that people should talk about her, that she should be playing +a part, or standing on a pedestal. Assuredly, if she had a fault, it +was not excess of modesty. She regarded herself as the flower of her +sex, a superior woman, made to be loved, flattered, and adored. She +speaks of her charms with the precision of a doctor and the enthusiasm +of a poet. Not one of her perfections escapes her. It is through a +magnifying-glass and before a mirror that she studies and admires +herself. She discovers that a society in which a woman so remarkable +and so attractive is not thoroughly well known, must be badly +organized. Middle-class by birth, and aristocratic by instinct, she +represents what one might then have called the new social strata. A +secret voice told her that the day was to come when she would make +herself feared by the powerful of the earth, those giants with feet of +clay who, at the beginning of her {50} career, were still looked at +kneeling. Banished by fate from the theatre where the human +tragi-comedy is played, she said to herself: "I too will have a part +one of these days." In the earliest stage of her existence there was +in her a confused medley of uneasiness and ambition, of spite and +anger. She had a horror of the slightly disdainful protection of +people of quality. She conceived an aversion for persons like that +Demoiselle d'Hannaches, "big, awkward, dry, and yellow," infatuated +with her nobility, annoying everybody with her titles, and yet, in +spite of her ignorance, her stiff manners, her old-fashioned dress and +her follies, well received everywhere on account of her birth. + +Slowly, but steadily, the future amazon of the Revolution prepared +herself for the combat. The books which she read and re-read +incessantly were the arsenal whence she drew her weapons. One of those +presentiments which do not deceive, promised her a stormy but +illustrious destiny. More Roman than French, more pagan than +Christian, she longed for glory like that of the heroines of Plutarch, +her favorite author. In the humble dwelling of her father, situated at +the corner of the Pont-Neuf and the Quai des Orfevres, she caught a +glimpse of horizons as wide as her thoughts. "From the upper part of +our house," she says, "a great expanse offered itself to my dreamy and +romantic imagination. How often from my north window have I +contemplated with emotion the deserts of the sky, its superb azure {51} +vault splendidly outlined from the bluish dawn far behind the Pont du +Change, to the sunset gilded with a faint purplish lustre behind the +trees of the Champs Elysees and the houses of Chaillot." + +Irritated with the obscurity to which she was condemned by fate, there +was but one resource which could have consoled her for the social +inequalities which bruised her vanity and her pride. That resource +would have been religion. Nothing but an ideal of humility could have +appeased the interior revolts of this soul of fire. To such a woman, +what is lacking is heaven. Earth, no matter what happens, can give her +nothing but deceptions. The only moment of her life when she felt +herself really happy was that when she enjoyed the supreme good, peace +of heart. Of all parts of her Memoirs, the most pure and touching are +those she devotes to her recollections of the convent. One might think +that the author of _Rolla_ had remembered them when he described in +such penetrating terms the mystic poetry of the cloister, and the +regrets often engendered by the loss of faith in the minds and hearts +of people who have become unbelievers. + +The little Philipon, being in her twelfth year, asked to be sent to a +convent, in order to prepare better for her first communion. She was +placed with the Ladies of the Congregation, rue Neuve-Saint-Etienne, in +the Faubourg Saint-Marcel, near Sainte-Pelagie, her future prison: "How +I pressed my dear mamma in my arms at the moment of parting {52} from +her for the first time! I was stifled, overwhelmed; but I obeyed the +voice of God, and crossed the threshold of the cloister, offering Him +with tears the greatest sacrifice that I could make. The first night I +spent at the convent was agitated: I was no longer under the paternal +roof. I felt that I was far from that good mother who was surely +thinking of me with tenderness. There was a feeble light in the room +where I had been put to bed, with four other children of my own age; I +rose quietly and went to the window. The moonlight permitted me to see +the garden upon which it looked. The most profound silence reigned; I +listened to it, so to say, with a sort of respect; great trees cast +their gigantic shadows here and there, and promised a safe refuge for +tranquil meditation. I lifted my eyes to the pure and serene sky, and +thought I felt the presence of the Divinity, who smiled at my sacrifice +and already offered me its recompense in the peace of a celestial +abode. Delicious tears flowed slowly down my cheeks; I reiterated my +vows with a holy transport, and I enjoyed the slumber of the elect." + +As if in these silent cloisters, which she crossed slowly so as to +enjoy their solitude more fully, she had a presentiment of the storms +in her destiny and her heart, she sometimes stopped beside a tomb on +which was engraven the eulogy of a holy maiden. "She is happy!" she +said to herself with a sigh. While she was in prison she remembered +with emotion a novice's taking the veil: "I experience yet the {53} +thrill caused by her faintly tremulous voice when she chanted +melodiously the customary versicle: '_Elegi_: Here I have chosen my +abode, and I will not depart from it forever.' I have not forgotten +the notes of this little air; I can repeat them as exactly as if I had +heard them yesterday." + +Unhappily, religious ideas were soon to undergo a change in the mind of +the future Madame Roland. Returning to the paternal dwelling, she was +badly brought up there; her mother let her read everything, even +_Candide_. Voltaire, Helvetius, Diderot, had no secrets for this young +girl. Extreme disorder and confusion in mind and heart were the +result. When she had the misfortune to lose her mother at the age of +twenty-one, the book in which she sought consolation was the _Nouvelle +Heloise_. Jean-Jacques became her god. "It seems," she says, "as if +he were my natural aliment and the interpreter of the sentiment I had +already, and which he alone knew how to explain to me.... To have the +whole of Jean-Jacques," she says again, "to be able to consult him +incessantly, to enlighten and elevate one's self with him at all times +of life, is a felicity which can only be tasted by adoring him as I +did." Such reading robbed her of faith. It made her a free-thinker +and a bluestocking. It inspired her with an unhealthy ambition, +sullied her imagination, and troubled the peace of her heart. It +deprived her of that moral delicacy, lacking which, even virtue itself +loses its charms. She was no longer anything but a young {54} girl, +well-conducted but not pure, honest but shameless. + +Was not a day coming when, a prisoner and on the point of getting into +the fatal cart, she would throw off the terrible anxieties of her +situation in order to imitate the impurities of the _Confessions_ of +Jean-Jacques, and retrace indecent details with complacency? Do not +seek in her that flower of innocence which is the young girl's grace. +The charming puritan does not commit great faults, but she has +astonishing licenses of thought and speech. For her, Louvet's +_Faublas_ is "one of those charming romances known to persons of taste, +in which the graces of imagination ally themselves to the tone of +philosophy." Is not this woman, who begins her life like a saint and +ends it as a pupil of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the symbol of +that troubled eighteenth century which opened in fidelity to religious +faith and closed in the depths of the abyss of incredulity? The +ravages caused by bad reading in the soul of this young girl explain +the catastrophes of the entire century. + +From the time when she replaced the Gospels by the _Contrat Social_ and +the _Imitation of Jesus Christ_ by the _Nouvelle Heloise_, there was no +longer anything simple or natural remaining in the young philosopher. +All her thoughts and actions became declamatory. There was something +theatrical in her attitudes and gestures, and even in the sound of her +voice. Her speech was rhythmical, cadenced, marked {55} by a special +accent. Even her private letters often resemble the amplifications of +rhetoric rather than the effusions of friendship. One might say that +their author had a presentiment that they would be printed. She wrote +to Mademoiselle Sophie Cannet, January 3, 1776: "In any case, burn +nothing. Though my letters were one day to be read by all the world, I +would not hide the only monuments of my weakness, and my sentiments." +Monuments of weakness--is not the expression worthy of the bombast of +the time? + +Not finding love, Mademoiselle Philipon married philosophically. Her +union bears a striking imitation to that of Heloise with M. de Volmar. +"Looking her destiny peacefully and tenderly in the face, greatly moved +but not infatuated," she united herself to a man whom she esteemed but +did not love. This was Roland de la Platiere, who was descended from +an ancient and very honorable middle class family. Though not rich, he +was at least comfortably well off. "Well educated, honest, simple in +his tastes and manners, he fulfilled his duties as inspector of +manufactures in a notable way. The marriage was celebrated on February +4, 1780. Roland was forty-six years old, while his wife was not yet +twenty-six. Thin, bald, careless in his dress, the husband was not at +all an ideal person. It had taken him five years to declare his +passion, and this hesitation, as his wife was to write thirteen years +later, "left not a vestige of illusion in his sentiments." "I have +often felt," {56} says she, "that there was no similarity between us. +If we lived in retirement, I spent many painful hours; if we mingled in +society, I was loved by persons among whom I perceived there were some +who might affect me too much; I plunged into labor with my husband.... +It was a long time before I gained courage to contradict him." + +M. Roland was sent to Amiens, where his wife presented him with a +daughter, whom she nursed, and afterwards brought up with the utmost +tenderness and devotion. In 1784, he was summoned to Lyons, where he +found himself once more in his native region. Thenceforward he spent +two of the winter months in Lyons, and the remainder of the year on his +paternal domain, the Close of Platiere, two leagues from Villefranche, +surrounded by woods and vineyards, and opposite the mountains of +Beaujolais. While her husband went to take possession of his new post, +Madame Roland, not yet a republican, remained a few weeks in Paris in +order to obtain, if possible, the patent of nobility so ardently +desired by the family. Her solicitations proved unsuccessful, and the +married pair, despairing of becoming nobles, consoled themselves by a +frank avowal of democracy. + +Up to the time of the Revolution, Madame Roland's life glided +peacefully away without any remarkable incidents. In the Close of +Platiere, which she calls her dovecot, she appears as a good +housekeeper who looks after everything, from the cellar to the garret; +{57} who plays the doctor among the poor villagers; who is delighted to +find in nature a savor of frank and free rusticity. The life she leads +is not merely honest, but edifying. She is very careful at this period +to hide her philosophy. She writes to Bosc, one of her friends, +February 9, 1785: "My brother-in-law, whose disposition is extremely +gentle and sensitive, is also very religious; I leave him the +satisfaction of thinking that the dogmas are as evident to me as they +appear to him, and my exterior actions are such as become the mother of +a family out in the country, who is bound to edify everybody. As I was +very devout in my early youth, I know my prayers as well as my +philosophy, and I prefer to make use of my first erudition." She wrote +again to Bosc, October 12, 1785: "I have hardly touched a pen for a +month, and I think I am acquiring some of the inclinations of the beast +whose milk refreshes me; I am extremely _asinine_, and I busy myself +with all the petty cares of the _hoggish_ country life. I make +preserved pears that are delicious; we dry grapes and plums; we wash +and make up linen; we have white wine for breakfast, and we lie down on +the grass to rest; we follow the vintagers; we repose in the woods and +fields." + +Before looking at the female politician, let us glance once more at the +woman in private life, the charitable, devoted, honorable mother of a +family, such as she paints herself in a letter of November 10, 1786: +"From the corner of my fire, at eleven {58} o'clock, after a quiet +night and the various morning cares, my husband at his desk, my little +girl knitting, and I chatting with one and superintending the other's +work, enjoying the happiness of being snugly in the bosom of my dear +little family, writing to a friend, while the snow is falling on so +many wretches weighed down by poverty and sorrow, I am touched with +compassion for their fate; I turn back sweetly to my own, and at this +moment I count as nothing the annoyances of relations or circumstances +which seem occasionally to mar its felicity." + +Alas, why did not Madame Roland stay in her modest country-house to dry +her grapes and plums, to superintend her washing, mend her linen, and +spread out in her garret the fruits for winter use? Were not +obscurity, repose, peace of heart, better for her than that fictitious +glory which was to pass so quickly and end upon the scaffold? One +might say that before quitting nature, that great consoler which calms +and does not betray, in order to plunge herself into the odious world +of politics, which spoils and embitters the most beautiful souls, she +experiences a certain vague regret for the sweet and tranquil joys +which her folly was about to cause her to renounce forever. + +"The weather is delightful," wrote Madame Roland, May 17, 1790; "the +country has changed almost beyond recognition in only six days; the +vines and walnuts were as black as they are in winter, but a stroke of +the magic wand does not alter the aspect of {59} things more quickly +than the heat of a few fine days has done; everything turns green and +leafs out; a soft verdure is visible where there was nothing but the +dull and faded tint of torpor and inaction. I could easily forget +public affairs and men's controversies here; content to arrange the +manor, to see my fowls brood, and take care of my rabbits, I would care +nothing more about the revolutions of empires. But, as soon as I am in +the city, the poverty of the people and the insolence of the rich rouse +my hatred of injustice and oppression: I have no longer any soul or +desire except for the triumph of great truths and the success of our +regeneration." + +The die is cast. The daughter of Philipon the engraver is about to +become a political woman. The hour is come when this great actress, +who has long known her part, is at last going on the stage. She has a +presentiment of the risk she is running in assuming a task which is +beyond her sex. But, like soldiers who love danger for danger's sake, +and prefer the emotions of the battle-field to garrison life, she will +joyfully quit her province and throw herself into the seething furnace +of Paris. Even though she is to meet persecution and death at the end +of her new career, she will not recoil. A short but agitated life will +seem better to her than a long and fortunate existence without violent +emotions. A clear sky pleases her no longer. She is homesick for +storms and lightning flashes. + + + + +{60} + +VI. + +MADAME ROLAND'S ENTRANCE ON THE SCENE. + +The hour of the Revolution had struck, and, ambitious, unbelieving, +full of disdain for the leading classes, full of confidence in her own +superiority, active, eloquent, impassioned, uniting the language of an +orator to the seductions of a charming woman, Madame Roland was ripe +for the Revolution. Her epoch suited her, and she suited her epoch. +This pagan who, according to her own expression, roamed mentally in +Greece, attended the Olympic games, and despised herself for being +French; this fanatical admirer of antiquity who, at eight years of age, +carried Plutarch to church with her instead of a missal, who styled +Roland _the virtuous_ as the Athenians called Aristides the _just_, who +will die like her heroes, Socrates and Phocion; this student who, at +another period, would have been rated as an under-bred woman of the +middle class, a more or less ridiculous bluestocking, suddenly found +herself, in consequence of a general panic and circumstances as strange +as they were unforeseen, the very ideal of the society in which she +lived. For several months she was to be its fashionable type, its +favorite heroine. {61} But the Revolution was a Saturn who devoured +his children, male and female, and the Egeria of the Girondins expiated +bitterly the intoxication caused by her brief popularity. + +In 1777, at the age of twenty-three, she had written: "Gay and jesting +speeches fall from this mouth which sobs at night upon its pillow; a +laugh dwells on my lips, while my tears, shut up within my heart, at +length make on it, in spite of its hardness, the effect produced by +water on a stone: falling drop by drop, they insensibly wear it away." +In 1791, when she was thirty-eight, she wrote: "The phenomena of +nature, which make the vulgar grow pale, and which are imposing even to +the philosophical eye, offer nothing to a sensitive person preoccupied +with great concerns, but scenes inferior to those of which her own +heart is the theatre." The flame consuming the eloquent and ardent +disciple of Rousseau was in need of fuel, and, finding this in +politics, she threw herself upon it with a sort of ravenous fury, just +as she had once abandoned herself to study. At twenty-two she had +written to one of her young friends: "You scold me for studying too +hard. Bear in mind, then, that unless I did so, love might perhaps +excite my imagination to frenzy. It is a necessary distraction. I am +not trying to become a learned woman; I study because I need to study, +as I do to eat." It was thus that Madame Roland plunged into politics. +All her unappeased instincts and repressed forces found their outlet in +that direction. + +{62} + +Woman being formed by nature to be dominated, nothing is more agreeable +to her than to invert the parts, and in her turn to domineer. To exert +influence in public affairs, to designate or support the candidates for +great offices of State, to organize or direct a ministry, to make +themselves listened to by serious men, to inspire opinions or systems, +is to ambitious women a kind of revenge for their sex. Those who have +acquired a habit of exercising this sort of power cannot relinquish it +without extreme reluctance. If they have once persuaded themselves of +their superiority to men, nothing can ever root the conviction from +their minds. To be protected humiliates them; what they long for most +of all is to be acknowledged as protectresses. Self-deluded, they +attribute to their passion for the public welfare what is, especially +in their case, the need of petty glory, the thirst for emotions, or the +amusement of pride and vanity. + +The Revolutionary bluestocking, Madame Roland, was from the very start +delighted to see that her works were printed, and that they produced as +much effect as if they had been written by some great statesman. These +first successes seemed to her to justify the excellent opinion she had +always entertained of herself. She got into a habit of playing the +oracle. No sooner had her lips touched the cup containing this +poisonous but intoxicating beverage than she would have no other. That +alone could refresh, even while it killed her. + +{63} + +Politics has the immense defect of exasperating, troubling, and +disfiguring souls. Madame Roland was born good, sensible, and +generous. Politics made her at times wicked, vindictive, and cruel. +July 26, 1789, she wrote this odious letter: "You are nothing but +children; your enthusiasm is a fire of straw, and if the National +Assembly does not order the trial of two illustrious heads, or some +generous Decius does not strike them down, you are all ... lost" +(Madame Roland employed a more trivial expression). "If this letter +does not reach you, may the cowards who read it redden to learn that it +is from a woman, and tremble in reflecting that she can create a +hundred enthusiasts from whom will proceed a million others." Roland +had been employed by the Agricultural Society of Lyons to draw up its +reports for the States-General. Madame Roland wrote much more of them +than her husband did. She sent article on article to a journal founded +by Champagneux to forward the revolutionary propaganda. Sixty thousand +copies were printed of one of them in which she described the festival +of the Federation at Lyons. Imagine the joy felt by the +_femme-auteur_, the pupil of Jean-Jacques, the model of George Sand! +Soon afterwards, the municipality deputed Roland to the Constituent +Assembly to advocate the interests of the city, which was involved to +the extent of forty millions, and which asked to have this debt assumed +by the State. Roland and his wife arrived in Paris, February 20, 1791. + +{64} + +The married pair installed themselves on the third floor of the hotel +Britannique, in rue Guenegaud. There a sort of political reunion was +formed, of which Brissot was the first link. Four times a week a few +friends, and certain deputies and journalists, met around this still +unknown woman, whose wit, charm, and beauty were not long in making a +sensation. It was at this period that she made Buzot's acquaintance. +The day of her first interview with the young and brilliant deputy was +an epoch in her sentimental life. Thenceforward, two passions, love +and ambition, the one as fierce and devouring as the other, were to +occupy her ardent soul. Comparing the young orator, whom she perhaps +transformed in her imagination into the president of a more or less +Athenian republic, with the austere and prosaic companion of her +existence, she perceived that, according to her own expression, there +was no equality between her and her husband, and that "the ascendency +of a domineering character, joined to twenty years' seniority, rendered +one of these superiorities too great"--that of age. She was herself +six years older than Buzot. Even though her love for him may have +remained Platonic, she gave him all her heart and soul. + +For the majority of women, still beautiful, who mingle in public +affairs, love is the principal thing; politics but the accessory, the +pretext. They imagine they are attaching themselves to ideas, and it +is to men. In this respect the heroines of the Revolution resemble +those of the Fronde. The stateswoman in {65} Madame Roland plays +second to the lover of Buzot. In her mind the Republic and the +handsome republican blend into one. Believing herself a patriot when +she is above all a woman in love, she carries the emotions, the +infatuations, the ardors and exaggerations of her private life into her +public one. With her, angers and enthusiasms rise to paroxysm. She is +extreme in all things. + +She detests Louis XVI. as much as she loves Buzot. After the flight to +Varennes, she wrote: "To replace the King on the throne is a folly, an +absurdity, if it is not a horror; to declare him demented is to make +obligatory the appointment of a regent. To impeach Louis XVI. would +be, beyond all contradiction, the greatest and most righteous step, but +you are incapable of taking it. Well then, put him not exactly under +interdict, but suspend him." Here begins the influence of Madame +Roland. The suspension of the royal authority is one of her ideas. +"So long as peace lasted," she says, "I adhered to the peaceful role +and to that kind of influence which I thought fitting to my sex; when +war was declared by the King's departure, it appeared to me that every +one should devote himself unreservedly. I joined the fraternal +societies, being persuaded that zeal and good intentions might be very +useful in critical moments. I was unable to stay at home any longer, +and I went to the houses of worthy people of my acquaintance that we +might excite each other to great measures." One knows what the {66} +Revolution meant by that expression: great measures. Madame Roland +became furious. She wanted a freedom of the press without check or +limit. She was angry because Marat's newspapers were destroyed by the +satellites of Lafayette. "It is a cruel thing to think of," she +exclaims, "but it becomes every day more evident that peace means +retrogression, and that we can only be regenerated by blood." + +Her hatred includes both Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. June 25, +1791, she writes: "It appears to me that the King ought to be +sequestered and his wife impeached." And on July 1: "The King has sunk +to the lowest depths of degradation; his trick has exposed him +completely, and he inspires nothing but contempt. His name, his +portrait, and his arms have been effaced everywhere. Notaries have +been obliged to take down the escutcheons marked with a flower-de-luce +which served to designate their houses. He is called nothing but Louis +the False, or the great hog. Caricatures of every sort represent him +under emblems which, though not the most odious, are the most suitable +to nourish and augment popular disdain. The people tend of their own +accord to all that can express this sentiment, and it is impossible +that they should ever again be willing to see seated on the throne a +being they despise so completely." + +Things did not go fast enough to suit Madame Roland's furious hatred. +The popular gathering in the Champ-de-Mars, whose aim was to bring +about {67} the deposition of the King, was forcibly dispersed on July +17. With six exceptions, all the deputies who had belonged either to +the Jacobin Club or that of the Cordeliers, left them on account of +their demand that Louis XVI. should be brought to trial. The time for +great measures, to use Madame Roland's expression, had not yet arrived. +The ardent democrat laments it. "I cannot describe our situation to +you," she writes at this moment of the revolutionary recoil; "I feel +environed by a silent horror; my heart grows steadfast in a mournful +and solemn silence, ready to sacrifice all rather than cease to defend +principles, but not knowing the moment when they can triumph, and +forming no resolution but that of giving a great example." + +The mission which had kept Roland in Paris for seven months being +ended, the discouraged pair returned to their province in September. +After stopping a few days in Lyons, in order to found a popular society +affiliated to the Jacobins of the capital, they went to spend the +remainder of the autumn at their country place, the Close of Platiere. +But calm and silence no longer suited Madame Roland. Repose +exasperated her. She missed the struggle and the emotions of +revolutionary Paris, of which she had said: "One lives ten years here +in twenty-four hours; events and affections blend with and succeed each +other with singular rapidity; no such great events ever occupied minds." + +The pleasure of seeing her daughter again was not {68} enough to +compensate her for the chagrin of having parted from Buzot. Just as +she was despairing at the thought of sinking back into all the nullity +of the province, as she expresses it, the news came that the inspectors +of agriculture had been suppressed. Roland, no longer an official, +deliberated with his wife as to their next step. His own inclination +was to settle permanently in the country and devote himself to +agricultural labors which would surely and safely augment his fortune. +But his wife was by no means of the same mind. She must see her dear +Buzot again at any cost. She flattered the self-love of her +unsuspecting spouse, and persuaded him that Paris was the sole theatre +worthy of the virtuous Roland. Roland allowed himself to be convinced. +His wife, no longer mistress of herself, was drawn into the Parisian +abyss as by an irresistible force. And yet was it not she who had +proposed to herself this ideal, so easily to have been realized? "I +have never imagined anything more desirable than a life divided between +domestic cares and those of agriculture, spent on a healthy and fertile +farm, with a little family where the example of its heads and common +labor maintain attachment, peace, and freedom." Was it not she who had +uttered this profoundly true thought: "I see neither pleasure nor +happiness except in the reunion of that which charms the heart as well +as the senses, and costs no regrets"? In the most beautiful days of +her youth had she not written: "There was a time when I was never +content {69} except when I had a book or a pen in my hand; at present I +am as well satisfied when I have made a shirt for my father or added up +an account of expenses as if I had read something profound. I do not +care at all to be learned; I want to be good and happy; that is my +chief business. What is necessary but good, honest common sense?" Is +it not she, too, who will write at the beginning of her Memoirs: "I +have observed that in all classes, ambition is generally fatal; for the +few happy ones whom it exalts, it makes a multitude of victims." Why +did she not more frequently remind herself of the sentiment so just and +well expressed in a letter dated in 1790: "Women are not made to share +in all the occupations of men: they are altogether bound to domestic +cares and virtues, and they cannot turn away from them without +destroying their happiness." But, alas! passion does not reason. +Farewell common sense, wisdom, and experience, when ambition and love +have taken possession of a woman's heart. Returning to Paris, December +15, 1791, the Rolands established themselves in the rue de la Harpe, +and plunged head-long into politics. The wife redoubled her activity, +eloquence, and passion. The husband, instead of attending quietly to +the management of his retiring pension, was named a member of the +Jacobin corresponding committee at the beginning of 1792, a +revolutionary centre of which Brissot was the leader. At this period, +we are informed by Madame Roland, the intimidated court imagined that +the nomination of a {70} minister chosen from among the patriots of the +Assembly would cause it to regain a little popularity. Brissot +proposed Roland, who, on March 24, 1792, accepted the portfolio of the +Interior. + +Madame, behold yourself, then, the wife of a minister, and in fact more +of a minister than your husband. Your ambitious projects, which have +been treated as chimerical, are now realized. You have a cortege like +Marie Antoinette. Men seek the favor of a smile, a word, from you. +They court, they solicit, they fear you. The monarchy, which you +detest, is at last obliged to reckon with you and your friends. Your +beauty, your talent, and your eloquence are boasted of. Your name is +in every mouth. You are powerful, you are celebrated. Well! you will +find out for yourself what bitterness there is at the bottom of this +cup of pride which has tempted your lips so long. You will learn at +your own expense that renown does not produce happiness, and that, for +a woman, twilight is better than the full glare of day. Yes, you will +long for the obscurity which weighed upon you. You will long for the +house of your father, the engraver, on the Quai des Orfevres. You will +dream of the sunsets which affected you, and of the monotonous but +peaceful succession of your days. You, the deist, the female +philosopher, will recall with regret the cloisters where in your +adolescence you tasted the peace of the elect. In the time of your +supreme trial Buzot's miniature will not console you; it is not his +image you should cover with your {71} kisses. No; that miniature is +not the viaticum for eternity. What you will need is the crucifix, and +you respect the crucifix no longer. And yet your imagination will +evoke the mystic cloister, with its altars decked with flowers, its +painted windows, its penetrating and ineffable poesy. And in thought, +also, you will see the country once more, the harvest time, the month +of the vintage, the poor who come to the door asking for bread and who +go away with blessings on their lips and gratitude in their hearts. +Why have you quitted these honest people? What have you come to do in +the midst of these ferocious Jacobins, who flatter you to-day and will +assassinate you to-morrow? Do you fancy that Marie Antoinette is the +only woman who will be insulted, calumniated, and betrayed? Why do you +seat at your hospitable table this livid-faced Robespierre, who to-day, +perhaps, will address you a madrigal, and to-morrow send you to the +scaffold? You will pay very dear for these false and artificial joys, +these gusts of commonplace vanity, this pride of a parvenu, and the +pleasure of presiding for a few evenings at the dinners given to the +Minister of the Interior in Calonne's dining-room. The Legislative +Assembly, the Jacobin Club, the journals and the ministry, the +souvenirs of Plutarch and the parodies of Jean-Jacques, the noisy crowd +of flatterers who are the courtiers of demagogues as they would have +been the courtiers of kings, these adulators who are going to change +into executioners,--all are vanity! Poor {72} woman, whose power will +be so ephemeral, why do you make yourself a persecutor? You will so +soon be persecuted. Why labor so relentlessly to shake the foundations +of a throne that will bury you beneath its ruins? + + + + +{73} + +VII. + +MARIE ANTOINETTE AND MADAME ROLAND. + +Two women find themselves confronted across the chessboard and about to +move the pieces in a terrible game in which each stakes her head, and +each is foredoomed to lose. One is the woman who represents the old +regime--the daughter of the German Caesars, the Queen of France and +Navarre; the other stands for the new regime, the Parisian middle +classes--the daughter of the engraver of the Quai des Orfevres. They +are nearly the same age. Madame Roland was born March 18, 1754; and +Marie Antoinette, November 2, 1755. Both are beautiful, and both are +conscious of their charm. Each exercises a sort of domination over all +who approach her. + +In 1792, when Roland enters the ministry, Marie Antoinette is no longer +thinking of coquetry, luxury, or dress. The heroine of the Gallery of +the Mirrors, the crowned shepherdess of the Trianon, the queen of +elegance, pleasure, and fashion is not recognizable in her. The time +for splendors is over, like the time for pastorals. No more festivals, +no more distractions, no more theatres. Incessant anxieties and +unremitting labor; writing throughout the day and reading, {74} +meditating, and praying throughout the night, are now the unfortunate +sovereign's whole existence. She hardly sleeps. Her eyes are reddened +by tears. A single night, that of the arrest on the journey to +Varennes, had sufficed to whiten her hair. She wears mourning for her +brother, the Emperor Leopold, and for her ally, the King of Sweden, +Gustavus III., and one might say that she is also wearing it for the +French monarchy. All trace of frivolity has disappeared. The severe +and majestic countenance of the woman who suffers so cruelly as queen, +spouse, and mother, is sanctified by the double poetry of religion and +sorrow. + +Madame Roland, on the other hand, is more coquettish than she has ever +been. The actress who has at last found her theatre and is very proud +to play her part, wishes to allure, desires to reign. She delights in +presiding at these political dinners where all the guests are men, and +of which her grace and eloquence constitute the charm. She has just +completed her thirty-eighth year. Her husband is nearly fifty-eight; +Buzot is only thirty-two. Possibly she is still more preoccupied with +love than with ambition. To use one of her own expressions, "her heart +swells with the desire to please," to please Buzot above all; she takes +pains to celebrate her own beauty, which, in spite of showing symptoms +of decline, has the brilliance of sunset. In her Memoirs she describes +her "large and superbly modelled bust, her light, quick step, her frank +and open glance, at once keen and {75} soft, which sometimes amazes, +but which caresses still more, and always quickens." She writes: "My +mouth is rather large; there are a thousand prettier, but none that has +a softer and more seductive smile." In prison, when she is nearly +forty, she states that if she has lost some of her attractions, yet she +needs no help from art to make her look five or six years younger. +"Even those who see me every day," she adds, "require to be told my +age, in order to believe me more than thirty-two or thirty-three." +Madame Roland had at first written thirty-three or thirty-four. But +after reflection, finding herself too modest, she made an erasure and +retrenched another year. She adds that she made very little use of her +charms; avowing at the same time, and with the most absolute frankness, +that if she could reconcile her duty with her inclination to utilize +them more fully, she would not be sorry. + +Both Marie Antoinette and Madame Roland were political women. But the +one became so in her own despite, in the hope of saving the life of her +husband and the heritage of her son; the other, through ambition and +the desire to play a part for which her origin had not destined her. +In the one, everything is at once noble and simple, natural and +majestic; in the other there is always something affected and +theatrical; one scents the _parvenue_ who will never be a _grande +dame_, even in the Ministry of the Interior or at the house of Calonne. +All is unstudied in Marie Antoinette; Madame Roland, on the contrary, +is an artist in coquetry. + +{76} + +Bizarre caprice of fate which makes political rivals and adversaries +treating with each other on equal terms of these two women, of whom one +was so much above the other by rank and birth. The Tuileries and the +house of the Minister of the Interior are like two hostile citadels at +a stone's throw from each other. On both sides there is watchfulness +and fear. An impassable abyss, hollowed out by the vanity of the +commoner still more than by the pride of the Queen, forever separates +these two courageous women who, had they united instead of antagonizing +each other, might have saved both their country and themselves. + +It is necessary to go back a few years in order to comprehend the +motive of Madame Roland's hatred for Marie Antoinette. It was inspired +in the vain commoner by envy, the worst and vilest of all counsellors. +Madame Roland's special characteristic was the passion for making an +effect. Now the effect produced by Marie Antoinette under the old +regime was immense; that produced by the future Egeria of the Girondin +group was almost null. A simple mortal, regarding Olympus from below, +she said to herself with vexation, that in spite of her talents and her +charms there was no place for her among the gods and goddesses. +Versailles was like a superior world from which it maddened her to be +excluded. She was twenty years old when, in 1774, she visited it with +her mother, her uncle, the Abbe Bimont, and an aged gentlewoman, +Mademoiselle d'Hannaches. They all lodged at the palace. One of Marie +Antoinette's {77} women, who was acquainted with the Abbe, and who was +not then on duty, lent them her apartment. The only object of the +excursion was to give the young girl a near view of the court. + +In recalling this souvenir in her Memoirs, Madame Roland displays her +aversion for the old society. She is annoyed even with the companion +of her visit, because she was, according to the expression then in use, +a person of quality. "Mademoiselle d'Hannaches," she says, "went +boldly wherever she chose, ready to fling her name in the face of any +one who tried to stop her, thinking they ought to be able to read on +her grotesque visage her six hundred years of established nobility. +The fine figure of a pedantic little cleric like the Abbe Bimont, and +the imbecile pride of the ugly d'Hannaches were not out of keeping in +those scenes; but the unpainted face of my worthy mamma, and the +modesty of my dress, announced that we were commoners; if my eyes or my +youth provoked remark, it was almost patronizing, and caused me nearly +as much displeasure as Madame de Boismorel's compliments." It was this +Madame de Boismorel who, although she found the little Philipon very +pleasing, had said to the grandmother of the future Madame Roland: +"Take care that she does not become a learned woman; it would be a +great pity." + +The splendors of Versailles did not dazzle the daughter of the engraver +of the Quai des Orfevres. The apartment she occupied was at the top of +the {78} palace, in the same corridor as that of the Archbishop of +Paris, and so near it that it was necessary for the prelate to take +precautions lest she should overhear him talk. "Two poorly furnished +rooms," she says, "in the upper end of one of which space had been +contrived for a valet's bed, was the habitation which a duke and peer +of France esteemed himself honored in possessing, in order to be closer +at hand to cringe every morning at the levee of Their Majesties: and +yet he was the rigorist Beaumont.... The ordinary and the ceremonial +table-service of the entire family, eating separately or all together, +the masses, the promenades, the gaming, the presentations, had us for +spectators during a week." What impression was made on her by this +excursion to the royal palace? She herself will tell us nineteen years +later, in her prison. "I was not insensible," she says, "to the effect +of so much pomp and ceremony, but I was indignant that its object +should be to exalt certain individuals already too powerful and of very +slight personal importance: I liked much better to look at the statues +in the gardens than at the persons in the palace; and when my mother +asked if I was satisfied with my visit, 'Yes,' I replied, 'provided it +will soon be over; if I stay here many days longer, I shall detest the +people so much that I shall be unable to hide my hatred.' 'What harm +are they doing you, then?' 'Making me feel injustice, and constantly +behold absurdity.'" + +How this impression is emphasized in the really {79} prophetic letter +written by the future heroine of the Revolution to her friend, +Mademoiselle Sophie Cannet, October 4, 1774: "To return to Versailles. +I cannot tell you how greatly all I have examined has made me value my +own situation, and thank Heaven that I was born in an obscure +condition. You think, perhaps, that this sentiment is based on the +slight esteem I attach to the worth of opinion, and my sense of the +reality of the penalties attached to greatness. Not at all. It is +based on the knowledge I have of my own character, which would be very +detrimental both to me and to the State if I were placed at a little +distance from the throne; because I would be keenly shocked by the +extreme inequality which sets so many thousands of men below a single +individual of the same species!" What a prediction! The most +unforeseen events were one day to bring this young plebeian near that +royalty formerly so far above her. The engraver's daughter will be the +wife of a minister of State. And then what will happen? According to +her own expression, her role will be very detrimental to herself and to +the State. + +In the same letter she had written: "A beneficent king seems to me an +almost adorable being; but if, before coming into the world, the choice +of a government had been given me, my character would have made me +decide for a republic." She will end by hating the beneficent King, +and probably no one will contribute more than she towards establishing +the republican regime in France. + +{80} + +Supposing that, instead of being merely an insignificant commoner, +Madame Roland had been born in the ranks of aristocracy, had enjoyed +the right of sitting down in the presence of Their Majesties at +Versailles, and had shone at the familiar entertainments of the +Trianon, she would doubtless have shared the sentiments and ideas of +the women of the old regime, and, like the Princess de Lamballe or the +Duchess de Polignac, have shed tears of compassion over the Queen's +misfortunes. Fate, in placing her in a subordinate position, made her +an enemy and a rebel. She anathematized the society in which her rank +bore no relation to her lofty intelligence and her need of domination. +When, from the upper window of her father's house on the Quai des +Orfevres, beside the Pont-Neuf, she saw the brilliant retinue of Marie +Antoinette pass by on their way to Notre Dame to return thanks to God +for some happy event, she grew angry at all this pomp and glitter, so +much in contrast with her own obscure condition. What crimes have been +engendered by the sentiment of envy! The furies of the guillotine were +above all things envious. They were delighted to see in the fatal cart +the woman whom they had formerly beheld in gala carriages resplendent +with gold. Madame Roland certainly ought not to have carried her +hatred to such a pitch; but had she not demanded in 1789, when speaking +of Louis XVI. and the Queen, that "two illustrious heads" should be +brought to trial? Who knows? If, in 1784, she had obtained the {81} +patent of nobility for her husband which at that period she solicited +so ardently, she might have become sincerely royalist! But having +remained, despite herself, in the citizen class, she retained and +personified, to her latest hour, its rancor, pettiness, and wrath. +What figure could she have made at Versailles, or even at the +Tuileries? In the midst of great lords and noble ladies the haughty +commoner would have been out of place; she would have stifled. It was +chiefly on that account that she attached herself to the new ideas. +She told herself that so long as royalty lasted, she would always be of +small importance; while, if the republic were established, she might +aspire to anything. Though her husband was one of the King's +ministers, she became daily more adverse to the monarchy, and Roland, +following her counsels, was like a pilot whose whole intent is to make +the vessel founder, even though he were to perish with its crew. + +It is a sad thing to say, but even their community in suffering did not +disarm Madame Roland's hate for Marie Antoinette. It was in prison, on +the eve of ascending the scaffold herself, that she wrote concerning +Louis XVI. and the Queen: "He was led away by a giddy creature who +united the presumption of youth and grandeur to Austrian insolence, the +intoxication of the senses, and the heedlessness of levity, and was +herself seduced by all the vices of an Asiatic court, for which she had +been too well prepared by the example of her mother." Ah! why {82} +were not these cruel lines effaced by the tears Madame Roland shed in +floods over the pages she was writing, and of which the traces still +remain on the manuscript of her Memoirs? Why did she not sympathize in +the grief of Marie Antoinette, separated from her children, when in +speaking of her daughter Eudora, she wrote: "Good God! I am a +prisoner, and she is living far from me! I dare not even send for her +to receive my embraces; hatred pursues even the children of those whom +tyranny persecutes, and mine, with her eleven years, her virginal +figure, and her beautiful fair hair, could hardly appear in the streets +without creatures suborned or deluded by falsehood pointing her out as +the offspring of a conspirator. Cruel wretches! how well they know how +to tear a mother's heart!" + +Why were these two women political adversaries? Both sensitive, both +artistic, with inexhaustible sources of poetry and tenderness at heart, +they were born for gentle emotions and not for horrible catastrophes. +Who, at their dawning, could have predicted for them such an appalling +night? Like Marie Antoinette, Madame Roland loved nature and the arts. +She felt the profound and penetrating charm of the fields. She drew, +she played on the harp, guitar, and violin, and she sang. "No one +knows," she wrote a few moments before her death, "what an alleviation +music is in solitude and anguish, nor from how many temptations it can +save one in prosperity." She had sung the same romances {83} as the +Queen. The same poets had inspired and affected each. + +Does not this most feminine passage in Madame Roland's Memoirs recall +the character of the mistress of the Little Trianon? "I always +remember the singular effect produced on me by a bunch of violets at +Christmas; when I received them I was in that condition of soul often +induced by a season favorable to serious thought. My imagination +slumbered, I reflected coldly, and I hardly felt at all; suddenly the +color of these violets and their delicate perfume struck my senses; it +was an awakening to life.... A rosy tinge suffused the horizon of the +day." Would not this cry of Madame Roland in her captivity suit Marie +Antoinette as well? "Ah! when shall I breathe pure air and those soft +exhalations so agreeable to my heart?" And might not the daughter of +the great Maria Theresa have cried, like the daughter of Philipon the +engraver? "Adieu! my child, my husband, my friends. Adieu! sun whose +brilliant rays brought serenity to my soul, as if they were recalling +it to the skies. Adieu! ye solitary fields which have so often moved +me." + +What must not these two keenly sensitive women have had to suffer at +the epoch when France became a hell? They have each believed in the +amelioration of the human species and the return of the golden age to +earth, and what will their awakening be, after such alluring dreams? +Men will be as unjust, as wicked, as cruel to the republican as to the +queen. {84} She, too, will be drenched with calumnies and outrages. +They will insult her also in the most cowardly and ferocious manner. +Under the very windows of her dungeon she will hear the hawkers crying: +"Great visit of Pere Duchesne to Citizeness Roland, in the Abbey +prison, for the purpose of pumping her." The ignoble journalist will +call her "old sack of the counter-revolution." He will say to her with +his habitual oaths: "Weep for your crimes, old fright, before you +expiate them on the scaffold!" The wife of Louis XVI. and the wife of +Roland will die within twenty-three days of each other: one on October +16, the other on November 8, 1793. They will start from the same +prison of the Conciergerie, to be led to the same Place Louis XV., to +have their heads cut off by the blade of the same guillotine. The +commoner who had been so jealous of the Queen, can no longer complain. +If the lives of the two women have been different, they will at least +have the same death; and the doer of the noble deeds of the regime of +equality, the headsman, will make no distinction between the two +victims, between the veritable sovereign, the Queen of France and +Navarre, and the sovereign of a day, whom Pere Duchesne, as insolent to +one as to the other, will no longer speak of except under the sobriquet +of Queen Coco. + + + + +{85} + +VIII. + +MADAME ROLAND AT THE MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR. + +Roland took the portfolio of the Interior, March 24, 1792, and +installed himself and his wife in the ministerial residence, then +occupying the site afterwards built on by the _Theatre Italien_. This +very beautiful and luxurious mansion had formerly been the controller's +office, and both Calonne and Necker had lived in it. Madame Roland +found no small pleasure in queening it under the gilded canopies of the +old regime. It was not at all disagreeable to her to give dinners in +the sumptuous banqueting hall erected by the elegant Calonne, nor did +the austere admirer of the ancients set the black broth of Sparta +before her guests. + +Once arrived at power, was this great enemy of nobility and +prescription simple, and easy of approach? Not in the least. There is +often more arrogance displayed by parvenus of both sexes than by those +who are aristocrats by birth. Madame Roland was extremely proud of her +new dignity, and at once resolved, as she tells us in her Memoirs, +neither to make nor receive visits. Her attitude and {86} manners +while at the ministry were those of an Asiatic sovereign. She secluded +herself, permitting only a small number of privileged courtiers to +enter her presence. Under the old regime, the wives of ministers and +ambassadors, dukes and peers, had never felicitated themselves on +"cultivating their private tastes" to the detriment of the proprieties +and obligations of good breeding. But the Revolution had changed all +that. French politeness was now mere old-fashioned rubbish. At the +Ministry of the Interior, the etiquette whose "severity" is vaunted by +Madame Roland was more rigorous than that of the court of Versailles, +and it was easier to see the wife of the King than the wife of the +minister. With what hauteur the latter expresses herself concerning +"the self-seeking crowds who throng about those who hold great places"! +Assuredly, the Queen had never spoken of her subjects in this tone of +disdainful patronage. + +[Illustration: MADAME ROLAND] + +Madame Roland, who "was tired of fools," incommoded herself for nobody. +The agreeable side of power was all she wanted. Suppressing the +receptions which annoyed her, she gave none but men's dinners, where +she perorated and paraded, and where, being the only woman present, she +had no rivals to fear. Self-sufficiency and insufficiency are, for the +most part, what fall to the share of parvenus. What would have been +said in the old days of a noble dame who did the honors of a ministry +so strangely, who never invited another woman to {87} dinner, and +admitted no one to her presence but a little clique of flatterers? +Everybody would have accused such a lady as lacking in good breeding. +But to Madame Roland all that she did was right in her own eyes. How +could a woman so superior be expected to submit to the tyranny of +polite usages? Was not the first of all despotisms the very one to be +shaken off? and ought not a person so proud of the originality of her +genius feel bound before all things, as she said herself, "to preserve +her own mode of being"? Madame Roland did at the ministry just what +she did from her cradle to her grave: she posed. + +"To listen to Madame Roland," said Count Beugnot in his witty and +curious Memoirs, "you would have thought she had imbibed the passion +for liberty from reading the great writers of antiquity.... Cato the +Elder was her hero, and it was probably out of respect for this hero +that she showed a lack of courtesy towards her husband. She was +unwilling to see that there was as much difference between Roland's +wife and the Roman minister as there was between the Brutus of the +Revolutionary Tribunal and him of the Capitol. Self-love was the means +by which this woman had been elevated to the point where we have seen +her; she was incessantly actuated by it, and does not dissimulate the +fact." It was she, and not her husband, who was Minister of the +Interior. If the aristocrats treated Roland as a minister +_sans-culottes_, it might have been added that the {88} breeches which +he lacked were worn by his spouse. Out of all the rooms composing a +vast apartment, she had chosen for her own daily use the smallest that +could be converted into a study, and kept her books and writing-table +in it. It was from this boudoir, half literary, half political, that +she conducted the ministry according to her own whims. "It often +happened," says she, "that friends or colleagues desiring to speak +confidentially with the minister, instead of going to his own room, +where he was surrounded by his clerks and the public, came to mine and +begged me to have him called thither. Thus I found myself in the +stream of affairs without either intrigue or idle curiosity. Roland +took pleasure in talking these subjects over with me afterwards with +that confidence which has always reigned between us, and which has +brought our knowledge and our opinions into community." + +On this head, M. Dauban makes the very just remark: "A community in +which there is no equilibrium of forces, becomes a sort of omnipotence +for the strongest." The omnipotence in this case was not on the side +of the beard, but of Madame Roland. The wife wrote, thought, and acted +for her husband. It was she who drew up his circulars and reports to +the National Assembly. "My husband," she tells us, "had nothing to +lose in passing through my hands. Roland, without me, would have been +none the less a good administrator; with me, he has made more +sensation, because I imparted to my writings {89} that mixture of force +and sweetness, that authority of reason and charm of sentiment, which +perhaps belongs only to a sensitive woman, endowed with sound +understanding." And the "virtuous" Roland took pride in the +magnificent phrases which he naively believed to be the expression of +his own genius, when his wife had saved him not merely the trouble of +writing, but even of thinking. "He often ended," she says, "by +persuading himself that he had really been in a good vein when he had +written such or such a passage which proceeded from my pen." + +Madame Roland had at her orders a man of letters, salaried by the +Ministry of the Interior, who was the official defender of the minister +and his policy. "It had been felt," she tells us, "that it was needful +to counteract the influence of the court, the aristocracy, the civil +list and their journals, by popular instructions to which great +publicity should be given. A journal posted up in public places seemed +to be the proper thing, and a wise and enlightened man had to be found +for its editor." This wise and enlightened man was Louvet, the author +of the _Amours de Faublas_. He was the writer whom Madame Roland +esteemed most capable of instructing and of moralizing the masses. +"Men of letters and persons of taste," she says, "know his charming +romances, in which the graces of imagination are allied to lightness of +style, a philosophical tone, and the salt of criticism. He has proved +that his skilful hand could alternately shake the bells of folly, hold +the burin of history, and {90} launch the thunderbolts of eloquence. +Courageous as a lion, simple as a child, a sensible man, a good +citizen, a vigorous writer, he could make Catiline tremble from the +tribune, dine with the Graces, and sup with Bachaumont." + +Madame Roland admired the author of _Faublas_, now become the +editor-in-chief of the _Sentinelle_; but among her intimates there was +a man whom she admired much more. This was Buzot. With what +complacency she draws in her Memoirs the portrait of this man "of an +elevated character, a haughty spirit, and a vehement courage, +sensitive, ardent, melancholy; an impassioned lover of nature, +nourishing his imagination with all the charms she has to offer, and +his soul with the principles of the most touching philosophy; he seems +formed to enjoy and to procure domestic happiness; he could forget the +universe in the sweetness of private virtues practised with a heart +worthy of his own." Needless to say that in Madame Roland's thought, +this heart worthy of the heart of Buzot was her own. "He is +susceptible," says she, "of the tenderest affections" (always for +Madame Roland), "capable of sublime flights and the most generous +resolutions." Into what ecstasies she falls over the noble face and +elegant figure of this handsome man, in whose costume "reigns that +care, cleanliness, and decency which manifest the spirit of order, +taste, the sentiment of decorum, and the respect of an honest man for +the public and himself"! How she contrasts with {91} men who think +patriotism consists in "swearing, drinking, and dressing like porters, +in order to fraternize with their equals," this attractive, this +irresistible Buzot, who "professes the morality of Socrates and the +politeness of Scipio"! + +Clearly, the veritable idol of the Egeria of the Girondins is not the +republic, but Buzot. He is so elegant, so distinguished! His mind and +his person have so many charms! Poor Roland! You think that your +better half is solely occupied with your ministry. Alas! this learned +woman has other thoughts in her head. Your position as a minister has +not augmented your prestige in the region of sentiment. Though you +lord it in the Hotel Calonne, yet, in spite of the throng of +petitioners and flatterers who surround you, you will never be a +Lovelace, and your romantic spouse will not allow herself to be +affected by your appearance, like that of a Quaker in Sunday clothes. +You thought you were doing wonders in presenting yourself at the +council of ministers with lanky, unpowdered locks, a round hat, and +shoes minus buckles. This peasant costume, which so greatly +scandalized the master of ceremonies, doubtless made the best +impression at the Jacobin Club, but your wife prefers the careful dress +of her too dear Buzot. + +Madame Roland, who had just completed her thirty-eighth year, was still +very charming. Lemontey thus paints her portrait as she appeared at +this epoch: "Her eyes and hair were remarkably {92} beautiful; her +delicate complexion had a freshness and color which made her look +singularly young. At the beginning of her husband's ministry she had +lost nothing of her air of youth and simplicity; her husband resembled +a Quaker whose daughter she might have been, and her child hovered +round her with hair floating to her waist; one might have thought them +natives of Pennsylvania transported to the drawing-room of M. de +Calonne." + +Count Beugnot, who was the companion of her captivity in the +Conciergerie, is severe on the female politician, but he admires the +pretty woman. "Her figure was graceful," he says, "and her hands +perfectly modelled. Her glance was expressive, and even in repose her +face had something noble and subtly attractive in it. One surmised her +wit without needing to hear her speak, but no woman whom I have ever +listened to, spoke with more purity and elegance. She must have owed +her faculty of giving to French a rhythm and cadence veritably new, to +her familiar knowledge of Italian. The harmony of her voice was still +further heightened by graceful and appropriate gestures and the +expression of her eyes, which grew animated in conversation. I daily +experienced new charm in listening to her, less on account of what she +said than because of the magic of her delivery." + +If Madame Roland, a prisoner, crushed by misfortune, on the very +threshold of the scaffold, after so many sleepless nights and so many +tears, had {93} preserved such attractions, what a charm must she not +have exercised at the Ministry of the Interior, when hope and pride +illumined her beautiful face, and when, after appearing to her +electrified adorers as the Muse of the new regime, the magician, the +Circe of the Revolution, she touched so profoundly their minds and +hearts! She who knew so well how to love and how to hate, who felt so +keenly, who had so much energy, so much vigor, what fascination must +she not have exerted with her glance of fire, her long black tresses, +her more than ornate eloquence, her inspired, lyric, enthusiastic +bearing, and that consummate art which, according to the remark of +Fontanes, made one believe that in her everything was the work of +nature! + + + + +{94} + +IX. + +DUMOURIEZ, MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS. + +Madam Roland had wished to reign alone. She saw an influential rival +in Dumouriez, and at once conceived for him an instinctive repugnance +and suspicion. She met him first on March 23, 1792, at the time when, +as Minister of Foreign Affairs, he came to salute Roland, just named +Minister of the Interior, as his colleague. As soon as he departed: +"There," said she to her husband, "is a man with a crafty mind and a +false glance, against whom it is probably more necessary to be on one's +guard than any other person; he expressed great satisfaction at the +patriotic choice he was deputed to announce; but I should not be at all +surprised if he were to have you dismissed some day." She thought she +recognized in Dumouriez at first sight, "a witty roue, an insolent +chevalier who makes sport of everything except his own interests and +glory." + +Later on she drew the following portrait of him: "Among all his +colleagues, he had most of what is called wit, and less than any of +morality. Diligent and brave, a good general, a skilful courtier, +writing well and expressing himself with ease, capable of {95} great +enterprises, all he lacked was character enough to balance his mind, or +a cooler brain to carry out the plans he had conceived. Agreeable to +his friends, and ready to betray them, gallant to women, but not at all +suited to succeed with those among them who are susceptible to +affectionate relations, he was made for the ministerial intrigues of a +corrupt court." + +The nomination of Dumouriez as Minister of Foreign Affairs is one of +the most curious and unforeseen events of this strange epoch. Few men +have had a career so adventurous and agitated as his. A complex and +mobile nature, where the intriguer and the great man were blended into +one, he never commanded esteem, but at certain moments he secured +admiration. Napoleon I. seems to have been too severe when he said of +him that he was "only a miserable intriguer." The man who opened the +series of great French victories, and who saved his country from +invasion by his admirable defence of the defiles of Argonne, merited +more than this disdainful mention. It is none the less certain, +however, that one scents, as it were, an air of Beaumarchais in the +Memoirs of Dumouriez, and that there is more than one link of character +and existence between the author of the _Mariage de Figaro_ and the +victor of Jemmapes. Both were men without principles, but full of +resource, wit, and fascination. Both were lovable in spite of their +great defects, because of their humanity and kindness. Both belonged +at the same time to the {96} old regime and the Revolution. Before +arriving at celebrity, each had a stormy youth, tormented by the love +of pleasure, the need of money, and a sort of perpetual restlessness: +they flattered every power of the time, sought fortune by the most +circuitous ways, were diplomatic couriers, and secret agents; before +coming out into open daylight, they made trial of their marvellous +address in obscurity, and signalized themselves among those men of +action and initiative whom governments, which make use of them in +occult ways, first launch, then compromise, disavow, and sometimes +imprison. + +Born at Cambrai, January 25, 1739, Dumouriez belonged to a family of +the upper middle class. Entering the army early, he distinguished +himself by his high spirits and courage. As a cornet of the Penthievre +cavalry, he served in the German campaigns from 1758 to 1761, and was +invalided in 1763. He spent twenty-four years at the wars and brought +back nothing but twenty-two wounds, the rank of captain, a decoration, +and some debts. Seeking then a new career, he entered, thanks to his +connection with Favier, the secret diplomacy of Louis XV., and was sent +to Corsica, Italy, and Portugal. He returned to the army in 1768, and +made a brilliant record in the Corsican campaign, obtaining +successively the grades of adjutant-major general, +adjutant-quartermaster, and colonel of cavalry. It was he who seized +the castle of Corte, Paoli's last asylum. In 1771, he again became a +secret agent. Louis {97} XV. wished to befriend Poland in its +death-struggle, but without betraying his hand. Dumouriez was sent to +the Polish confederates. He was reputed to be merely acting on his own +impulses. He organized troops and fought successfully against +Souvaroff, the future adversary of the French Republic, but could not +save Poland--that Asiatic nation of Europe, as he called it. He came +back to Paris in 1772, and the government, complying with the demands +of Russia, shut him up for a year in the Bastille, where he had leisure +to meditate on the ingratitude of courts. This captivity strengthened +his taste for study, and, far from allaying his ambition, gave it +renewed force. + +Louis XVI. put him in command at Cherbourg, and it was he who conceived +the plan of making that town a station for the French marine. He was +fifty years old when the Revolution of 1789 broke out. At once he saw +in it an opportunity for success and glory. Full of confidence in his +own superiority, he merely awaited the hour when events should second +his ambition. He said to himself that the emigration, by making a void +in the upper ranks of the army, was going to leave him free scope, and +that he would be commander-in-chief of the French troops under the new +regime. To attain this end he decided to serve the King, the Assembly, +and the factions; to assume all parts and all masks, and to be in turn, +and simultaneously if need were, the courtier of Louis XVI. and the +favorite of the Jacobins. + +As has been very well said by M. Frederic Masson {98} in an excellent +book, as novel as it is interesting, _Le Departement des affaires +etrangeres sous la Revolution_, Dumouriez had been accustomed to make +his way everywhere, to eat at all tables, and listen at all doors. One +of the agents of Count d'Artois brought him into relations with +Mirabeau. He was protected by the minister Montmorin. He drew up +plans of campaign for Narbonne. He used the intimate "thou" to +Laporte, the King's confidant and intendant of the civil list. He made +use of women also. Separated from his lawful wife, he lived in marital +relations with a sister of Rivarol, the Baroness de Beauvert, a +charming person who had much intercourse with aristocratic society, who +speculated in arms, and who was pensioned by the Duke of Orleans, as +appears from a letter of Latouche de Treville, the prince's chancellor, +dated April 17, 1789. Dumouriez, who had expensive tastes, sought at +the same time for gold and honors. Either by means of the court or the +Revolution, he desired to gain a great fortune and much glory, to +become a statesman, a minister, commander-in-chief, and realize his +great military plan, the conquest of the natural frontiers of France. +He said to himself: He who wills the end wills the means, and managed +as adroitly with parties as with soldiers. At Niort, where he was in +command at the beginning of the Revolution, he made himself remarkable +by his enthusiasm for the new ideas, and became president of the club +and honorary citizen of the town. He contracted an intimacy with +Gensonne, {99} whom the Assembly had sent into the departments of the +west to observe their spirit. In January, 1792, the emigration of +general officers had become so considerable that he rose by seniority +to the rank of lieutenant-general. Thereafter, he believed his hour +had come, and threw himself boldly into the political arena. The +Gironde and the Jacobins were the two powers then in vogue; he +flattered both the Jacobins and the Gironde. Brissot was the corypheus +of the diplomatic committee and the chief of the war party. He became +the familiar of Brissot. Already, in 1791, he had prepared a memoir on +the subject of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs which he dedicated and +read to the Jacobins. In it he announced (singular prediction for the +future minister of a king!) that before fifty years had passed, Europe +would be republican. He demanded an immediate and radical change in +the diplomatic personnel. "It is of small importance," said he in the +same memoir, "that our representatives would lack experience. In the +first place, our interests are greatly simplified; moreover, our former +representatives were young men belonging to the court who had had no +political education. In a word, it is the majesty of the nation which +gives our negotiations weight. The minister," he added, "should be a +man of approved patriotism, above all suspicion, like the wife of +Caesar. Absolute integrity, great knowledge of men, great firmness, a +broad and upright mind, should complete his character." Dumouriez +perhaps imagined that all these qualities {100} of an ideal minister +were reunited in his person. However that may be, he accepted, without +any mistrust of his own abilities, the portfolio of Foreign Affairs, +confided to him March 15, 1792, on account of his relations with the +Gironde and his popularity with the Jacobins. He had a high opinion of +himself, and, even after his cruel disappointments, he was to write in +his Memoirs, in 1794: "Dumouriez sometimes laughs sardonically in his +retreat over the judgments passed upon him. When he arrived at the +ministry, the courtiers said and published that he was only a soldier +of fortune, incapable of conducting political affairs, in which he +would make nothing but blunders. When he commanded an army, they told +the Prussians and the German Emperor's troops that he was a mere +writer, who had never made war and understood nothing about it. Since +he retired with reputation from public employments, they have published +that up to the date of the Revolution he had been an intriguing +adventurer, a ministerial spy, an office-sweeper. Would to God, they +had employed the adventures of their youth in similar espionages! They +would not have begun the Revolution like factionists, they would have +conducted it with wisdom, they would have preserved the esteem of the +nation, they would not have been the prime authors of the King's death, +either by betraying or abandoning him." + +The new Minister of Foreign Affairs began to play his role of leader of +French diplomacy in a {101} singular fashion. Repairing to the Jacobin +Club, he described himself as their liegeman, assumed the red bonnet in +their presence, and, with it on his head, announced that as soon as war +should be declared, he would throw away his pen in order to resume his +sword. Let us add that he was simultaneously trying to conciliate the +good graces of Louis XVI. and to persuade him that if he leaned upon +the Jacobins, it was solely in the hope of serving the King and +consolidating the throne. At the same time he appointed as director of +foreign affairs that Bonne-Carrere whose portrait has been traced in +this wise by Brissot: "Falling with all his vices and perverse habits +into the midst of a revolution whereby the people had recovered +sovereignty, he merely changed his idol without changing his idolatry. +He caressed the people instead of caressing the great, made the hall of +the Jacobins his OEil-de-Boeuf, played valet to the successful parties +one after another, the Lameths and the Mirabeaus, and succeeded in +raising himself from the secretaryship of the Jacobins to the embassy +of Liege, by the aid of that very Montmorin who detested the Jacobins, +and could but advance a man who betrayed them." + +Dumouriez then, following the example of Mirabeau, was about to play a +double game; to be revolutionary with the Revolution and a courtier +with the court. As to Madame Roland, he never placed himself at her +feet. The despotism of this female minister, the pretentious of this +demagogic bluestocking, {102} her affectation of puritan rigor, her +mania for directing everything, shocked the good sense of a man who +believed that woman is made to please, not to reign. It was repugnant +to this soldier to take his orders from the Egeria of the Girondins. +On the other hand, Dumouriez was displeasing to Madame Roland. She +found him too dissolute and not sentimental enough. She could not +pardon his having Madame de Beauvert for mistress and Bonne-Carrere for +confidant. She admitted neither his free-and-easy tone, his Gallic +humor, nor his natural gaiety, so unlike the declamatory tone and +pretentious jargon of the disciples of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. +Moreover, she found him too much of a royalist, too accustomed to the +old regime. The ministry, apparently so homogeneous, was soon to be +divided against itself. + + + + +{103} + +X. + +THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS. + +Louis XVI. had been persuaded that the only means of regaining public +confidence would be to name a ministry chosen by the Gironde and +accepted by the Jacobins. The six ministers--Dumouriez of Foreign +Affairs, Roland of the Interior, De Grave of War, Claviere of Finances, +Duranton of Justice, Lacoste of Marine--formed what was called the +Girondin ministry; the reactionists named it the _sans-culottes_ +ministry. The revolutionists rejoiced in its advent, while the +royalists sought to cover it with ridicule. + +On the day when the Council met for the first time at the Tuileries (in +the great royal cabinet on the first floor, afterwards called the Salon +of Louis XIV.), Roland created a scandal by his plebeian dress. The +simplicity of his costume, his round hat, his shoes fastened with +ribbons instead of buckles, caused, as his wife disdainfully remarks, +"astonishment to all the valets, those creatures who, existing only for +the sake of etiquette, thought the safety of the empire depended on its +preservation." The master of ceremonies, approaching Dumouriez with an +{104} uneasy frown, glanced at Roland, and said in an undertone, "Eh! +sir, no buckles on his shoes!" "Ah! sir, all is lost!" replied +Dumouriez so coolly that it raised a laugh. + +Louis XVI., who wished, as one might say, to enlarge the borders of +gentleness and resignation, displayed more than good-will towards the +ministers; he showed them deference. This was the more meritorious +because to him this ministry was like a reunion of the seditious, like +the Revolution in arms against his crown; his pretended advisers seemed +much more like enemies than auxiliaries. He tried, however, to attach +them to him by kindness, and made a sincere trial of his rights and +duties as a constitutional sovereign. Madame Roland herself, bitter +and violent as she is, renders him a certain justice. "Louis XVI.," +says she, "showed the greatest good nature towards his new ministers; +this man was not precisely such as he has been painted by those who +seek to degrade him." As to Dumouriez, he says in his Memoirs: +"Dumouriez had been greatly deceived concerning the character of Louis +XVI., who had been represented to him as a violent and wrathful man, +who swore a great deal and maltreated his ministers. He must, on the +contrary, do him the justice to say that during three' months when he +observed him closely and in very delicate circumstances, he always +found him polite, gentle, affable, and even very patient. This prince +had a great timidity arising from his education and his distrust {105} +of himself, some difficulty in speaking, a just and dispassionate mind, +upright sentiments, great knowledge of history, geography, and the +arts, and an astonishing memory." Madame Roland also owns that he had +an excellent memory and much activity; that he was never idle; that he +read often, and had a distinct knowledge of all the different treaties +concluded by France with neighboring powers; that he knew history well, +and was the best geographer in the kingdom. "His knowledge of the +names and faces of those belonging to his court," she adds, "and the +anecdotes peculiar to each, extended to all persons who had come into +prominence during the Revolution; no subject could be mentioned to him +on which he had not some opinion founded on certain facts." + +At first, the sessions of the ministry went off very tranquilly. The +King, with an accent of candor, protested his attachment to the +Constitution and his desire to see it solidly established. Often he +left his ministers to chat among themselves without taking any part in +their conversation. During such times he read his French and English +journals, or wrote letters. If a decree was presented for his +sanction, he deferred his decision until the next meeting, to which he +came with a settled opinion, concealing it carefully, none the less, +and appearing to decide only in accordance with the will of the +majority. He frequently evaded irritating questions by turning the +conversation to other subjects. If war were the {106} topic, he spoke +of travels; apropos of diplomacy, he described the manners of the +country in question; to Roland he spoke of his works, to Dumouriez of +his adventures. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, who was a first-class +story-teller, and whose freedom of speech was welcomed by the King, to +use Madame Roland's expression, amused both his colleagues and his +sovereign by his jests and anecdotes. + +But all this was far from agreeable to the spiteful companion of the +Minister of the Interior. Indignant at the accord which seemed to +exist between Louis XVI. and his counsellors, she dreamed of nothing +but discussions and conflicts. All that wore the appearance of +reconciliation was repugnant to her. She made her obedient spouse +recount to her the smallest details of the sessions of the Council, +meddling with and criticising all. During the first three weeks, +Roland and Claviere, enchanted with the King's dispositions, flattered +themselves that the Revolution was at an end. Madame Roland scoffed at +their confidence. "_Bon Dieu_," she said to them, "every time I see +you start for the Council with this charming confidence, it seems to me +you are ready to commit some folly."--"I assure you," replied Claviere, +"that the King is perfectly aware that his interests are bound up with +the observance of the laws just established; he reasons too pertinently +not to be convinced of this truth."--"Well," added Roland, "if he is +not an honest man, he is the greatest rascal in the kingdom; nobody can +dissimulate {107} like that." Madame Roland rejoined that she could +not believe in love for the Constitution on the part of a man nourished +in the prejudices and accustomed to the use of despotic power. She, +who doubtless thought herself the only person capable of presiding well +at the council of ministers, treated it as a "cafe where they amused +themselves with idle gossip." "There was no record of their +deliberations," says she, "nor a secretary to take them down; after +sitting three or four hours, they went away without having accomplished +anything but a few signatures; it was like this three times a +week."--"This is pitiable!" she would exclaim impatiently when, on his +return, she asked her husband what had passed. "You are all in very +good humor because there have been no disputes or vexations, and you +have even been treated with civility; each of you seems to be doing +pretty much as he pleases in his own department. I am afraid you are +being made game of."--"Nevertheless, business is getting on."--"Yes, +and time is wasted, for in the torrent that is carrying you away, I +should be much better pleased to have you employ three hours in solid +meditation on great combinations than to see you spend them in useless +chatter." + +It must needs be said that no person contributed more to the downfall +of royalty than Madame Roland. At the moment when the good temper and +gentleness of Louis XVI. began to gain upon his ministers, when +Dumouriez was softened by the {108} royal kindness, when minds +experienced a relaxation, and honest people, worn out by so many +political shocks, were sincerely desirous of repose, it was she who +nourished discord, made the Gironde irreconcilable, inspired the +subversive pamphlets of Louvet, embittered her husband's heart, and +invented the provocations against which the conscience of the +unfortunate monarch rebelled. This part, which would have been a sorry +one for a man to play, seems still worse in a woman. Count Beugnot has +said very justly: "I have seen that a woman can preserve only the +faults of her sex in the midst of such a frightful catastrophe, not its +virtues. The gentle, amiable, sensitive qualities grow and develop in +the shelter of peaceful domestic joys; they are lost and obliterated in +the heat of debates, the bitterness of parties, and the shock of +passions. The soft and tender foot of woman cannot tread unharmed in +paths bristling with steel and red with blood. To do so with safety +she must become a man; but to me, a man-woman seems a monster. Ah! let +them leave to us, whom nature has granted the pitiful advantage of +strength, the field of contention and the fate of war; we are adequate +to this cruel destiny; but let them keep to the easier and sweeter part +of pouring balm into wounds and staunching tears." + +Roland's character was tranquil; it was his wife who made him +ambitious, haughty, and inflexible. She should have pacified her +husband, but instead of that she excited him. Never was he malevolent +and {109} spiteful enough to suit her. She would not pardon him a +single movement of compassion or respect towards the august +unfortunates. Led by her, Roland no longer dared entertain a generous +thought. He returned shamefaced to the Ministry of the Interior if he +had felt a humane sentiment while at the Tuileries. It is sad to find +tenderness and pity in the heart of a man, Dumouriez, and in the heart +of a woman, Madame Roland, nothing but malevolence and hatred. +Dumouriez wanted to put out the fire; Madame Roland, to stir it up. +Dumouriez sincerely desired the King's safety; Madame Roland swore that +he should perish. If a germ of pity woke to life in the hearts of the +ministers, Madame Roland hastened to stifle it. Her hostility towards +the royal family was more than deliberate; there was something like +ferocity in it. Her Memoirs and those of Dumouriez display two very +different minds. Sadness dominates in his; anger in hers. Even on the +steps of the scaffold, Madame Roland will not feel her hatred lessen. +Dumouriez, on the contrary, will cast a glance of melancholy respect +upon the unfortunate sovereign whose sorrows and whose resignation, +whose gentleness and uprightness, had touched him so profoundly. + + + + +{110} + +XI. + +THE FETE OF THE SWISS OF CHATEAUVIEUX. + +Dumouriez, at the beginning of his ministry, was still the slave of the +Jacobins, his allies and protectors. His elevation to the ministry was +in great part due to them, and even while despising them, he felt +unable to shake off their yoke. Little by little, they inspired him +with horror, and before many weeks were over, his only idea was to free +himself from their control. But at first he treated them like a power +with which he was obliged to reckon. What proves this is his passive +attitude at the time of the celebrated fete of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux. The prologue of the bloody tragedies that were in course +of preparation, this fete shows what headway the revolutionary ideas +had made. The sinister days of the Convention were approaching, the +Terror existed in germ, and already many representatives who, on a +secret ballot, would have voted in accordance with right and honor, +were cowardly enough to do so against their conscience when they had to +answer to their names. + +Things had travelled fast since the close of the Constituent Assembly. +In 1790, that Assembly, as {111} the faithful guardian of discipline, +had congratulated the Marquis de Bouille on the energy with which he +repressed the military rebellion that broke out at Nancy, August 31. +The soldiers garrisoned at this town were guilty of the greatest +crimes. They pillaged the military chests, arrested the officers, and +fired on the troops who remained faithful. M. Desilles, an officer of +the King's regiment, conducted himself at the time in a heroic manner. +When the insurgents were about to discharge the cannon opposite the +Stainville gate, he sprang towards it, and covering it with his body, +cried: "It is your friends, your brothers, who are coming! The +National Assembly sends them. Do you mean to fire on them? Will you +disgrace your flags?" It was useless to try to hold Desilles back. He +broke away from his friends and threw himself again in front of the +rebels, falling under four wounds at the moment when the fight began. + +The Constituent Assembly passed a decree by which it thanked the +Marquis de Bouille and his troops "for having gloriously fulfilled +their duty" in repressing the military insurrection of Nancy. Its +president wrote an official letter to Desilles, soon to die in +consequence of his wounds: "The National Assembly has learned with just +admiration, mingled with profound sorrow, the danger to which your +heroic devotion has exposed you; in trying to describe it, I should +weaken the emotion by which the Assembly was penetrated. So sublime an +example of courage {112} and civic virtue is above all praise. It has +secured you a sweeter recompense and one more worthy of you; you will +find it in your own heart, and the eternal memory of the French people." + +The Swiss regiment of Chateauvieux had taken part in the rebellion at +Nancy. Switzerland had reserved, by treaty, its federal jurisdiction +over such of its troops as had taken service under the King of France. +By virtue of this special jurisdiction the soldiers of the regiment of +Chateauvieux, taken arms in hand, were tried before a council of war +composed of Swiss officers. Twenty-two were condemned to death and +shot. Fifty were condemned to the galleys and sent to the convict +prison at Brest. It was in vain that Louis XVI. attempted to negotiate +their pardon with the Swiss Confederacy. It remained inflexible, and +the guilty were still undergoing their penalty when the Jacobins +resolved to release them from prison in defiance of the treaties +uniting Switzerland and France. "To deliver these condemned +prisoners," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "was to insult the Cantons, +attack their treaty rights, and judge their criminals. We had enemies +enough already without seeking new ones among an allied people who were +behaving wisely towards us, especially a free and republican people." +But revolutionary passions do not reason. Collot d'Herbois, a wretched +actor who had passed from the theatrical stage to that of politics, and +who, not content with having bored people, wished to terrorize them +also, {113} made himself the champion of the galley-slaves of the +regiment of Chateauvieux. He was the principal impresario of the +lugubrious fete which disgraced Paris on April 15, 1792. + +The programme was not arranged without some opposition. Public opinion +was not yet ripe for saturnalia. There were still a few honest and +courageous publicists who, like Andre Chenier, boldly lifted their +voices to stigmatize certain infamies. In the tribune of the Assembly +some orators were to be found who expressed their minds freely and held +their own against the tempests of demagogy. There were generals and +soldiers in the army for whom discipline was not an idle word; and if +the fete of the Swiss of Chateauvieux made the future Septembrists and +furies of the guillotine utter shouts of joy, it drew from honest men a +long cry of grief and indignation. + +Intimidated by the menaces of the Jacobins, the Assembly voted the +release of the Swiss incarcerated in the prison of Brest. But merely +to deliver them was not enough: the Jacobins wanted to give them an +ovation. Their march from Brest to Paris was a triumph, and Collot +d'Herbois organized a gigantic fete in their honor. + +Andre Chenier was at this time writing weekly letters for the _Journal +de Paris_, in which he eloquently supported the principles of order and +liberty. As M. de Lamartine has said, he was the Tyrtaeus of good sense +and moderation. He was indignant at {114} the threatened scandal, and, +in concert with his collaborator on the _Journal de Paris_, Roucher, +the poet of _Les Mois_, he criticised in most energetic terms the +revolutionary manifestation then organizing. At the Jacobin Club, on +April 4, Collot d'Herbois freed his mind against him. "This is not +Chenier-Gracchus," said the comedian; "it is another person, quite +another." He spoke of Andre as a "sterile prose writer," and pointed +him out to popular vengeance. The two brothers were in opposing camps. +While Andre Chenier stigmatized the fete of anarchy, his brother Joseph +was diligently manufacturing scraps of poetry, inscriptions, and +devices which were to figure in the programme. "What!" cried Andre, +"must we invent extravagances capable of destroying any form of +government, recompense rebellion against the laws, and crown foreign +satellites for having shot French citizens in a riot? People say that +the statues will be veiled in every place through which this procession +is to pass. Oh! if this odious orgy takes place, it will be well to +veil the whole city; but it is not the images of despots that should be +wrapt in funeral crape, but the faces of honest men. How is it that +you do not blush when a turbulent handful, who seem numerous because +they are united and make a noise, oblige you to do their will, telling +you that it is your own, and amusing your childish curiosity meanwhile +with unworthy spectacles? In a city which respected itself such a fete +would meet nothing but solitude and silence." The controversy {115} +waxed furious. The walls were covered with posters for and against the +fete. Roucher thus flagellated Collot d'Herbois: "This character out +of a comic novel, who skipped from Polichinello's booth to the platform +of the Jacobins, has sprung at me as if he were going to strike me with +the oar the Swiss brought back from the galleys!" + +Petion, then mayor of Paris, far from opposing the fete, approved and +encouraged it. "I think it my duty," he wrote, April 6, 1792, "to +explain myself briefly concerning the fete which is being arranged to +celebrate the arrival of the soldiers of Chateauvieux. Minds are +heated, passions are in ferment, and citizens hold different opinions; +everything seems to betoken disorder. It is sought to change a day of +rejoicing into a day of mourning.... What is it all about? Some +soldiers, leaders with the French guards, who have broken our chains +and afterwards been overloaded with them, are about to enter within our +walls; some citizens propose to meet and offer them a fraternal +welcome; these citizens are obeying a natural impulse and using a right +which belongs to all. The magistrates see nothing but what is simple +and innocent in all this; they see certain citizens abandoning +themselves to joy and mirth; every one is at liberty to participate or +not to participate in the fete. Public spirit rises and assumes a new +degree of energy amidst civic amusements." The municipality ordered +this letter of Petion's to be printed, posted on the walls, and {116} +sent to the forty-eight sectional committees and the sixty battalions +of the National Guard. + +Not all the members of the National Assembly shared the optimism of the +mayor of Paris. The preparations for the fete, which was announced for +April 15, occasioned, on the 9th, a session as affecting as it was +stormy. The whole debate should be read in the _Moniteur_. The +question was put whether the Swiss of Chateauvieux, then waiting +outside the doors, should be introduced and admitted to the honors of +the session. M. de Gouvion, who had been major-general of the National +Guard under Lafayette, gravely ascended the tribune. "Gentlemen," said +he, "I had a brother, a good patriot, who, through the favorable +opinion of your fellow-citizens, had been successively a commander of +the National Guard and a member from the Department. Always ready to +sacrifice himself for the Revolution and the law, it was in the name of +the Revolution and the law that he was required to march to Nancy with +the brave National Guards. There he fell, pierced by fifty bayonets in +the hands of those who.... I ask if I am condemned to look on +tranquilly while the assassins of my brother enter here?" A voice +rising from the midst of the Assembly cried: "Very well, sir, go out!" +The galleries applauded. Gouvion attempted to continue. The murmurs +redoubled. Several persons in the galleries cried: "Down! down!" + +The Assembly, revolutionary though it was, felt {117} indignant at the +scandal, and called the galleries to order. The president reiterated +the injunction to keep silence. Gouvion began anew: "I treat with all +the contempt he merits, and with ... I would say the word if I did not +respect the Assembly--the coward who has been base enough to outrage a +brother's grief." The question was then put whether the Swiss of +Chateauvieux should be admitted to the honors of the session. Out of +546 votes, 288 were in the affirmative, and 265 in the negative. +Consequently, the president announced that the soldiers of +Chateauvieux, who had asked to present themselves to the Assembly, +should be admitted to the honors of the session. Gouvion went out by +one door, indignant, and swearing that he would never re-enter an +Assembly which received his brother's assassins as conquerors. By +another door, Collot d'Herbois made his entry with his proteges, the +ex-galley slaves. + +The party of the left and the spectators in the galleries burst into +transports of joy, and gave three rounds of applause. The soldiers +entered the hall to the beating of drums and cries of "Long live the +nation!" They were followed by a large procession of men and women +carrying pikes and banners. Collot d'Herbois, the showman of the +Swiss, pronounced an emphatic address in praise of the pretended +martyrs of liberty, which the Assembly ordered to be printed. One +Goachon, speaking for the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, and holding a pike +ornamented with a {118} red liberty cap, exclaimed: "The citizens of +the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, the victors of the Bastille, the men of +July 14, have charged me to warn you that they are going to make ten +thousand more pikes after the model which you see." + +The fete took place on Sunday, April 15. It was the triumph of +anarchy, the glorification of indiscipline and revolt. On that day the +galley slaves were treated like heroes. The emblems adopted were a +colossal galley, ornamented with flowers, and the convicts' head gear, +that hideous red bonnet in which Dumouriez had already played the +buffoon, and which was presently to be set on the august head of Louis +XVI. The soldier galley slaves, whose chains were kissed with +transports by a swarm of harlots, came forward wearing civic crowns. +What a difference between the Constituent Assembly and the Legislative +Assembly! Under the one, a grand expiatory ceremony on the +Champ-de-Mars had honored the soldiers slain at Nancy, and the National +Guards had worn mourning for these martyrs of duty. Under the other, +it was not the victims who were lauded, but their assassins. A goddess +of Liberty in a Phrygian cap was borne in a state chariot. The +procession halted at the Bastille, the Hotel de Ville, and the +Champ-de-Mars. The mayor and municipality of Paris were present in +their official capacity. The _Ca ira_ was sung in a frenzy of +enthusiasm. Soldiers and public women embraced each other. It was +David who had {119} designed the costumes, planned the chariot, and +organized the whole performance,--David, the revolutionary artist who +was destined by a change of fortune to paint the portrait of a Pope and +the coronation of an Emperor. + +In 1791, Andre Chenier and David, then friends, and saluting together +the dawn of the Revolution, had celebrated with lyre and pencil the +"_Serment du Jeu de Paume_"[1] Consecrating an ode to the painter's +magnificent tableau, the poet exclaimed:-- + + Resume thy golden robe, bind on thy chaplet rich, + Divine and youthful Poesy! + To David's lips, King of the skilful brush, + Bear the ambrosial cup. + +How he repented his enthusiasm now! What ill-will he bore the artist +who placed his art, that sacred gift, at the service of anarchical +passions! With what irony the same pen passed from dithyramb to satire! + + Arts worthy of our eyes, pomp and magnificence + Worthy of our liberty, + Worthy of the vile tyrants who are devouring France, + Worthy of the atrocious dementia + Of that stupid David whom in other days I sang! + + +On the very day of the fete the young poet had the courage to publish +in the _Journal de Paris_ an avenging satire, which branded the +shoulders of the ex-galley slaves as with a new hot iron. The sweet +{120} and pathetic elegiast, the Catullus, the Tibullus of France, +added a bronze chord to his lyre:-- + + Hail, divine triumph! Enter within our walls! + Bring us these warriors so famed + For Desilles' blood, and for the obsequies + Of many Frenchmen massacred... + One day alone could win so much renown, + And this fair day will shine upon us soon! + When thou shalt lead Jourdan to our army, + And Lafayette to the scaffold! + + +Jourdan was the slaughterer, the headsman, the torturer of the Glacier +of Avignon, who, coming under the provisions of the amnesty, had +arrived to take part in the triumph of the Swiss of Chateauvieux. The +acclamations were lugubrious. The lanterns and torches shed a funereal +glare. Nothing is more doleful than enthusiasm for ignominy. The +applause accorded to disgrace and crime sounds like sinister derision. +Outraged public conscience extinguishes the fires of apotheoses such as +these. Madame Elisabeth, in a letter of April 18, speaks with a sort +of pity of this odious but ridiculous fete: "The people have been to +see Dame Liberty waggling about on her triumphal car, but they shrugged +their shoulders. Three or four hundred _sans-culottes_ followed, +crying 'Long live the nation! Long live liberty! Long live the +_sans-culottes_! to the devil with Lafayette!' All this was noisy but +sad. The National Guards took no part in it; on the contrary, they +were indignant, and Petion, they say, is ashamed of his conduct. {121} +The next day a pike surmounted by a red bonnet was carried noiselessly +through the garden, and did not remain there long." The Princess de +Lamballe, who was living at the Tuileries in the Pavilion of Flora, +could see the pike thus carried by a passer. It may, perhaps, have +been that belonging to one of the Septembrists,--that on which her own +head was to be placed. + +The _Moniteur_, however, grew ecstatic over the fete. "There are +plenty of others," it said, "who will describe the march of the +triumphal cortege, the groups composing it, the car of Liberty, +conducted by Fame, drawn by twenty superb horses, preceded by ravishing +music which was sometimes listened to in religious silence and +sometimes interrupted by wild, irregular dances whose very disorder was +rendered more piquant by the fraternal union reigning in all hearts.... +The people were there in all their might, and did not abuse it. There +was not a weapon to repress excesses, and not an excess to be +repressed." It concluded thus: "We say to the administration: Give +such festivals as these often. Repeat this one every year on April 15; +let the feast of Liberty be our spring festival; and let other civic +solemnities signalize the return of the other seasons. In former days +the people had none but those of their masters, and all that was +accomplished by them was their depravity and abasement. Give them some +that shall be their own, and that will elevate their souls, develop +their sensibilities, and fortify their courage. They {122} will +create, or, better, they have already created, a new people. Popular +festivals are the best education for the people." + +Optimists, how will your illusions terminate? You who see nothing but +an idyl in all this, can not you perceive that such ceremonies are the +prelude to massacres, and that an odor of blood mingles with their +perfumes? All who took part on either side of the heated controversy +which preceded the ovation to the Swiss of Chateauvieux, will be +pursued by fate. Gouvion, who had sworn never again to set foot within +the precincts of the Assembly where the murderers of his brother +triumphed, kept his word. On the very day of that shameful session he +asked to be sent to the Army of the North, and three months later was +to be carried off by a cannon-ball. Still more melancholy was to be +the fate of Petion, who showed such complaisance toward the Swiss on +this occasion. He, once so popular that in 1791 he was asked to allow +the ninth child, which a citizeness had just presented to her country, +"to be baptized in his name, revered almost as much as that of the +Divinity"; he of whom some one said at that time, "For the same reason +which would have made Jesus a suitable mayor of Jerusalem, Petion is a +suitable mayor of Paris; there is too striking a resemblance between +them to be overlooked," was sadly to exclaim some months later: "I am +one of the most notable examples of popular inconsistency.... For a +long time I have said to myself and to my {123} friends: The people +will hate me still more than they have loved me. I can no longer +either enter or depart from the place where we hold our sessions +without being exposed to the grossest insults and the most seditious +threats. How often have I not heard them say as I was passing: +'Scoundrel! we will have your head!'" + +Proscribed with the Girondins, May 31, 1793, he fled at first to +Normandy, and afterwards into the Gironde, wandering from town to town, +from field to field, and hiding for several months thirty feet under +ground, in a sort of well; the poor people who showed him hospitality +paid for it with their heads. Ah! how disenchanted he must have been +with that revolutionary policy of which he had been the enthusiastic +promoter! How sad was the farewell to life signed by him and Buzot: +"Now that it has been demonstrated that liberty is hopelessly lost; +that the principles of morality and justice are trodden under foot; +that there is nothing to choose between two despotisms,--that of the +brigands who are tearing the vitals of France and that of foreign +powers; that the nation has lost all its energy; that it lies at the +feet of the tyrants by whom it is oppressed; that we can render no +further service to our country; that, far from being able to give +happiness to the beings we hold most dear, we shall bring down hatred, +vengeance, and misfortune upon them, so long as we live,--we have +resolved to quit life and be no longer witnesses of the slavery which +is about to desolate our unhappy country." + +{124} + +After ending with this cry of grief and indignation: "We devote the +vile scoundrels who have destroyed liberty and plunged France into an +abyss of evils to the scorn and indignation of all time," the two +proscripts were found dead in a wheat-field about a league from +Saint-Emilion. Their bodies were half devoured by wolves. + +And how will Andre Chenier end? On the day of the Swiss fete, the city +where such a scandal took place seemed to him insupportable. For +several days he sought refuge in the country where he could breathe a +purer air beneath the blossoming trees. But contemplation of nature +did not soothe him. Running to meet danger, he returned and threw +himself into the furnace, more ardent and indignant than before. With +manly enthusiasm he exclaimed: "It is above all when the sacrifices +which must be made to truth, liberty, and country are dangerous and +difficult, that they are accompanied by inexpressible delights. It is +in the midst of spying accusations, outrages, and proscriptions, it is +in dungeons and on scaffolds, that virtue, probity, and constancy taste +the pleasures of a proud and pure conscience." Andre had a +presentiment of his fate. + +He was to die on the same day and the same scaffold as his friend +Roucher, a few hours earlier than the moment when Robespierre's +condemnation would have saved them. It is thus that he was to pay with +his life for his opposition to the fete of the Swiss of Chateauvieux, +and Collot d'Herbois was avenged. {125} But after the turn of the +victims came that of the headsmen. The unlucky comedian who, pursuing +even his comrades with his hatred, asked that "the head of the _Comedie +Francaise_ should be guillotined and the rest transported," the +impresario of the fete of the Swiss galley slaves, the organizer of the +Lyons massacres, Collot d'Herbois, cursed by friends and enemies, was +transported to Guiana and died there in 1796, just as he had lived, in +an access of burning fever. + + + +[1] The oath taken by the deputies of the third estate in the +tennis-court of Versailles, in 1789. + + + + +{126} + +XII. + +THE DECLARATION OF WAR. + +The wave of anarchy constantly rose higher, but the optimists, +sheltering themselves, like Petion, in a beatific calm, obstinately +closed their eyes and would not see it. Abroad and at home there was +such a series of shocks and agitations, of struggles and emotions, +perils and troubles; things hurried on so fast, and the scenes of the +drama were so varied and so violent, that what happened to-day was +forgotten by the morrow. The noise of the fete of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux had hardly ceased when the shouts of the multitude were +heard saluting Louis XVI., who had just declared war on Austria. + +In reality, the King did not desire war, but the bellicose current had +become irresistible. The court of Vienna had shown itself intractable. +It forbade the princes who owned possessions in Lorraine and Alsace to +receive the indemnities offered by France in exchange for their feudal +rights, and threatened to have the Diet of Ratisbonne annul any private +treaties they might conclude concerning them. The electors of Treves, +Cologne, and Mayence undisguisedly favored the levying of troops by the +emigrant {127} princes, and even paid subsidies toward their support. +They refused to recognize the official ambassadors of Louis XVI., while +recognizing the plenipotentiaries of these princes. There was talk of +holding a Congress at Aix-la-Chapelle for the purpose of intimidating +the National Assembly. The successor of the Emperor Leopold, Francis +II., who, before his election to the Empire, had assumed the title of +King of Hungary and Bohemia, displayed extremely martial sentiments. +Austria, which had sent forty thousand men to the Low Countries and +twenty thousand to the Rhine, had just signed a treaty of alliance with +Prussia, "to put an end to the troubles in France." Dumouriez urgently +demanded the court of Vienna to explain itself. It finally sent the +French Ambassador, Marquis de Noailles, a dry, curt, and formal note, +naming the only conditions on which peace could be preserved. These +were: the re-establishment of the French monarchy on the bases of the +royal declaration of June 23, 1789, and, consequently, the restoration +of the nobility and clergy as orders; the restitution of Church +property; the return of Alsace to the German princes, with all their +sovereign and feudal rights; and, finally, the surrender of Avignon and +the county of Venaisson to the Holy See. + +"In truth," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "if the Viennese minister +had slept through the entire thirty-three months that had elapsed since +the royal seance, and had dictated this note on awaking {128} without +knowledge of what had happened, he could not have proposed conditions +more incongruous with the progress of the Revolution.... The new +social compact was founded on the abolition of the orders and the +equality of all citizens. The financial system, which alone could +prevent bankruptcy, was founded on the creation of assignats. The +assignats were hypothecated on the property of the clergy, now become +the property of the nation, and the greater part of which had been +already sold. The nation, therefore, could not accept these conditions +except by violating its Constitution, destroying property, ruining its +purchasers, annulling its assignats, and declaring bankruptcy. Could +so humiliating an obedience be expected from a great nation, proud of +having conquered its liberty? and that for the sake of placing itself +once more under the yoke of nobles who, having abandoned their King +himself, now threatened to re-enter their country with sword and flame +and every scourge of vengeance?" + +The entire National Assembly reasoned in the same way as Dumouriez. A +cry for war arose on all sides. The Girondins saw in it the +indispensable consecration of the Revolution. The Feuillants hoped +that besides proving creditable to the government, it would accomplish +the additional end of drawing away from Paris and other great cities a +multitude of turbulent men who, for lack of anything else to do, were +disturbing public order. Certain reactionists, stifling the sentiment +of patriotism in their hearts, {129} were equally anxious for war, in +the secret hope that it would prove disastrous for the French army, and +result in the re-establishment of the old regime. On the other hand, +there were good citizens, inclined to optimism and judging others by +themselves, who thought that when confronted with an enemy, all +intestine dissensions would vanish as by enchantment, and that the new +Constitution, hallowed by victory and glory, would ensure the country a +most brilliant destiny. Ministers were unanimous, and enthusiasm +universal. Even if he had so desired, Louis XVI. could no longer +resist it. On April 20, 1792, he went to the Assembly. The hall was +filled with a crowd which comprehended the importance and solemnity of +the act about to be accomplished. + +According to Dumouriez, the King was very majestic: "I come," he said, +"in accordance with the terms of the Constitution, formally to propose +war against the King of Hungary and Bohemia." He afterwards paid the +greatest attention to the report of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, +and seemed, by the motions of his head and hands, to approve it in +every respect. He returned to the Tuileries amidst general +acclamations. War was unanimously decided on, and Dumouriez went to +the diplomatic committee in order to draw up the declaration. At ten +in the evening the decree was brought in and carried to the King, who +sanctioned it at once. + +Thus commenced that gigantic war which France was to wage against all +Europe, and which ended, {130} twenty-three years later, in the +disaster of Waterloo. How many battles, what suffering, and what a +prodigious shedding of blood! And to attain what end? Simply the +point of departure; that is to say, in the political order, to +constitutional monarchy, and in territory, to the boundaries of 1792. +What! to have filled Europe with noise and renown; to have carried the +standards of France from east to west, from north to south; to have +camped victoriously in Brussels, Milan, Venice, Rome, Naples, Cairo, +Berlin, Madrid, Vienna, Moscow; to have enlarged the borders of valor, +heroism, and self-sacrifice in order to arrive, after so many efforts, +just at the spot where the strife began? Ah! how short-sighted is +human wisdom, how deceitful the previsions of mortal man, how sterile +the agitations of republics and monarchs! "Assuredly!" says Dumouriez, +"if the Emperor and the King of Prussia could have foreseen that France +was able to withstand all Europe, they would not have meddled with her +domestic quarrels; they would have treated the _emigres_ not with +confidence, but compassion; they would have responded frankly and +without trickery to the minister's negotiation; the Revolution would +have been accomplished without cruelties; Europe would have remained at +peace, and France would be happy." What sadness underlies all history, +and what disproportion there is between man's sacrifices and their +results! The Revolution was achieved. All necessary liberties had +been conquered. Privileges {131} existed no longer. Animated by +excellent intentions, Louis XVI. would have been the best of +constitutional sovereigns, had his subjects possessed wisdom. Why this +long misunderstanding between him and his people? Why, on one side, +the insensate attitude of the _emigres_, whose task seemed to be to +justify the revolutionists; and why, on the other, those savage +passions which seemed trying to justify the wrathful recriminations of +Coblentz? Why that untimely intervention of Austria which irritated +French national sentiment and gave a political pretext to inexcusable +violence, cruelty, and crime? Inextricable confusion of false +situations! Multitudes asked themselves in what direction right and +duty lay. A large contingent of the French nobility heartily desired +the success of foreign armies. At Coblentz a gathering of twenty-two +thousand gentlemen hastened to the side of the seven Bourbon princes: +the Comte de Provence, the Comte d'Artois, the Duc de Berry, the Duc +d'Angouleme, the Prince de Conde, the Duc de Bourbon, and the Duc +d'Enghien. + +As M. de Lamartine has said: "Infidelity to the country called itself +fidelity to the King. Desertion called itself honor. Fealty to the +throne was the religion of the French nobility. To them the +sovereignty of the people seemed an insolent dogma against which it was +necessary to draw the sword under penalty of sharing the crime. There +was real devotion in the act by which these men, young and {132} old, +abandoned their rank in the army, and the ties of country and family, +and rushed into a foreign land to defend the white flag as common +soldiers.... Their country symbolized duty for the patriots; to the +_emigres_, duty meant the throne. One of these parties deceived itself +concerning its duty, but both of them believed they were performing it." + +As to the unfortunate Louis XVI., he suffered cruelly. It was like +death to him to declare war against his nephew, and at certain moments +he felt that this Austrian army against which his troops contended +might yet be his last resource. He could not even flatter himself that +the sacrifice he had made of his sympathies and family feelings would +be repaid by the love and confidence of his people. + +"We have no difficulty nowadays in comprehending," says M. Geffroy very +justly, "what pure patriotism there was in that young army of 1792, +which represented new France. But this army, formed in independence of +the old regiments, was none the less, in the eyes of the Queen, a +veritable army of sedition. She thought of it as composed of the +victors of the Bastille, those whom Mirabeau styled the greatest +scoundrels of Paris; the very rabble who came to Versailles on the 6th +of October. She believed they could be crushed by the first attack at +the frontier, and that France and Paris would be rid of them." The +following reflection by M. Geffroy is very judicious: "Marie Antoinette +committed a double error, but honest men who had not the same {133} +overpowering motives as she, have committed it likewise. I do not +allude merely to those Frenchmen who, after April 20, remained in the +ranks of the Emigration, and who, apparently, did not suppose +themselves to be betraying the true interests of their country. But +look at M. de Bouille. He even accepted a command in the foreign army +under Gustavus III. And yet M. de Bouille is an honest man who knows +France and loves her ardently. Observe, in his Memoirs, his +involuntary pride in our success, and how he shrugs his shoulders at +the bluster of the Prussian officers." + +It is not yet well understood what vigor, enthusiasm, and martial ardor +animated that brave national army, which, according to the foreigners, +was but a band of rioters, but which was suddenly to appear on the +battle-field as a people of heroes. Honor took refuge in the camps. +It was there that men whom the Jacobin Club enraged, and who had no +consolation for their patriotic grief but the virile emotions of +combat, went to fight and die. Why did not Louis XVI. call to mind +that he was the commander-in-chief of the army? Ah! had he been a +soldier, had he been accustomed to wear a uniform, to command, and, +above all, to speak to his troops, how quickly he would have come to +the end of his difficulties! Count de Vaublanc had good reason to say: +"Anything can be done with Frenchmen if one knows how to animate and +impress them with vehement ardor; otherwise, nothing need be +expected.... Never did {134} a prince merit better the eternal rewards +promised by religion to the true Christian; and yet his example should +forever teach kings that their conduct must be totally different from +his. Lacking the courage which acts, the most virtuous king cannot +achieve his own safety." Why did not Louis XVI. go amongst his +soldiers? Victory would have given him a sceptre and a crown. While +he still retained his sword, why did he leave it in the scabbard? Why +did he not remember that it might launch thunderbolts? + +On the contrary, Louis XVI. hesitates, fumbles, temporizes. Count de +Vaublanc says again: "This wretched time proves thoroughly that finesse +is the most detestable means of conducting great affairs. Nothing but +finesse was opposed to the impetuous attacks of the Jacobins. All was +dissimulation; conversations, writings, measures; authority acted only +by crooked ways. With a thousand means of safety, people were lost +because they pushed prudence to excess, and extreme prudence always +degenerates into despicable means. I was in every great crisis of the +Revolution, and I have always seen the same faults produce the same +misfortunes. It is the same thing in revolution as in war; no matter +how prudent a general may be, he must take some risk. Otherwise it +would be impossible to gain a single battle." + +Ah! how true and how striking is that great saying of Bossuet: "When +God wills to overthrow empires, all is feeble and irregular in their +designs." {135} Undecided and fickle, Louis XVI. does not even know +whether to desire the success or the failure of the Austrian army. He +has no plan, no steadiness of purpose. The secret mission he gives to +Mallet du Pan is a fresh proof of the irresolution of his character and +his policy. What is it he asks? To have the Powers declare that they +are making war against an anti-social faction, and not the French +nation; that they are undertaking the defence of legitimate governments +and of peoples against anarchy; that they will treat only with the +King; that they shall demand perfect liberty for him; that they convoke +a congress to which the _emigres_ may be admitted as complainants, and +where the general scheme of claims and reclamations shall be negotiated +under the auspices and the guarantee of the great courts of Europe. +Hesitating between Austria and his own kingdom, the unhappy monarch +attempts to continue that equivocal system, that see-saw policy in +which he has succeeded so ill, and which constrains him to +dissimulation, that last resource of the feeble. Sent to Germany with +instructions written by Louis XVI., with his own hand, Mallet du Pan +recommends the sovereigns to be cautious in advancing into France, to +observe the greatest prudence in dealing with the inhabitants of the +invaded provinces, and to precede their arrival by a manifesto in which +they declare conciliatory and pacific intentions. It follows that +official ministers of the King did not possess his confidence and were +not the interpreters of his mind. A {136} sort of occult and +mysterious government existed, with a diplomacy, secret funds, and +agents abroad and at home. Such a system, lacking all grandeur and +sincerity, could accomplish nothing but catastrophes. + +Meanwhile, the war had begun under the most painful conditions. The +invasion of Belgium, arranged for the end of April, failed miserably. +Near Mons, Biron's troops took to flight, threatening to fire on their +officers, and crying: "We are betrayed!" At Lille, General Theobald +Dillon was massacred by his own soldiers. Such news caused +indescribable emotion in Paris. Popular mistrust and irritation +reached their height. The different parties hurled reproaches and +accusations in each other's face. The Girondins, finding the National +Guard too conservative, demanded pikes for the men of the faubourgs who +had no guns. The _sans-culottes_ enlisted. The army of assassins was +organized. The only thing left to do before giving the signal for a +riot was to obtain from the King a last concession,--the disbanding of +his guard. + + + + +{137} + +XIII. + +THE DISBANDING OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL GUARD. + +Louis XVI. had still some defenders, some heroes resolved to shed the +last drop of their blood for their King. Hence it was necessary to +remove them from his person. What means of doing so could be found? +Calumny. Fable on fable was spread among an always credulous public, +imaginary conspiracies invented, and the wretched monarch constrained +to deprive himself of his last resource, in order to deliver him, weak +and disarmed, into the hands of his enemies. + +The Constitution provided a guard for Louis XVI. One third of it was +composed of soldiers of the line, and the remainder of National Guards, +chosen by the Departments themselves from among their best-formed, +richest, and best-bred citizens. It was commanded by one of the +greatest lords of the old regime, the Duke de Cosse-Brissac. Born in +1734, the son of a marshal of France, the Duke had been governor of +Paris, grand steward of France, and colonel of the Hundred-Switzers. +He had never been willing to leave the King since the beginning of the +Revolution. When his regiment was {138} disbanded he might have fled, +and Louis XVI. begged him to do so; but the heart of a subject so +faithful had been deaf to the entreaties of the unfortunate sovereign. +"Sire," he had answered, "if I fly, they will say that I am guilty, and +you will be considered my accomplice: my flight would be your +accusation; I would rather die." And, in fact, he did die. He had a +real devotion to the former mistress of Louis XV., the Countess du +Barry, and this latest conquest is not the least important of the +favorite's adventures. Probably Count d'Allonville exaggerates when, +in his Memoirs, he extols in Madame du Barry "that decency of tone, +that nobility of manners, that bearing equally removed from pride and +humility, from license and from prudery, that countenance which was +enough to refute all the pamphlets." Nevertheless, it is certain that +the society of the Duke de Brissac inspired the former favorite with +generous sentiments. After the October Days, she took the wounded +body-guards into her own house, and when the Queen sent to thank her +for it, she replied: "These wounded young men regret nothing except not +having died for a princess so worthy of all homage as Your Majesty.... +Luciennes[1] is yours, Madame; did not your benevolence give it back to +me? ... The late King, by a sort of presentiment, forced me to accept a +thousand precious objects {139} before sending me away from his person. +I already had the honor of offering you this treasure in the time of +the Notables; I offer it again, Madame, with eagerness. You have so +many expenses to provide for, and so many favors to confer. Permit me, +I entreat you, to render to Caesar that which belongs to Caesar." + +An enthusiastic royalist, a gentleman of the old nobility, chivalrous +and full of courtesy, bred in notions of romantic susceptibility like +those of _Clelie_ and _Astree_, the Duke de Brissac, like a +knight-errant of former times, represented at the court of Louis XVI. a +whole past which was crumbling to decay. If the unhappy monarch had +been a man of action, he would have turned to good advantage a guard +commanded by such a champion. He could have made it the nucleus of +resistance by grouping the Swiss regiments and the well-inclined +battalions of the National Guard around it. Unfortunately, there was +nothing warlike in Louis XVI. "Among the deplorable causes which +ruined him," says the Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "must be +counted the wretched education which kept him apart from every sort of +military action. I remember that in the early days of the Consulate, +after a review held on the Place of the Tuileries by Bonaparte, when +talking about this to M. Suard, of the French Academy, I said that +Bonaparte walked as if he were always ready to defend himself sword in +hand. 'Ah, well!' responded M. Suard, naively, {140} 'we used to think +differently; we wanted the King to have nothing military about him, and +never to wear a uniform.'" + +To this anecdote, M. de Vaublanc adds another. "We had in 1792," he +says, "a forcible proof of the despondency under which a royal soul, +spoiled by a detestable education, can labor. M. de Narbonne, the +Minister of War, with great difficulty induced the King to review three +excellent battalions of the Paris National Guard. He was on foot, in +silk breeches and white silk stockings, and wearing his hair in a black +bag. After the review a notary, named Chandon, I think, left the ranks +and said to the King: 'Sire, the National Guard would be greatly +honored to see Your Majesty in its uniform.' 'Sire,' said M. de +Narbonne, at once, 'have the goodness to promise to do so. At the head +of these three battalions of heroes you could destroy the Jacobins' +den.' After a minute's reflection, the King replied: 'I will inquire +of my Council whether the Constitution permits me to wear the uniform +of the National Guard.'" Louis XVI. allowed the last resources +accorded by fortune to slip away, and elements which in other hands +would have produced notable results, remained sterile in his. + +The Constitutional Guard, which according to regulation should have +numbered eighteen hundred men, really amounted, says Dumouriez, to six +thousand fit for duty. The royalist element predominated in it. But a +certain number of "false {141} brethren" had found their way into the +ranks, who managed by the aid of bribery to spy upon their officers, +and made reports to the committee of public safety. Undoubtedly the +King's guards did not approve of all that was going on. But how could +devoted royalists and men accustomed to discipline be expected to +approve the fete of the Swiss of Chateauvieux, for example? How could +they help being indignant when, while on duty at the Tuileries, they +heard the populace insult the royal family under the very windows of +the palace? + +When they returned to their barracks at the Military School, they +expressed this indignation too forcibly, and their words, hawked about +in all quarters by ill-will, were represented as the preliminary +symptoms of a reactionary plot. A guard commanded by a Duke de Brissac +was intolerable to the Jacobins. Their sole idea was to drive it from +the Tuileries, where its presence appeared to insure order,--a thing +they held in utmost horror. A 20th of June would not have been +possible with a constitutional guard, and ever since May, the 20th of +June had been in course of preparation. Its organizers had their plan +completely laid already. An adroit rumor was started of a so-called +plot, some Saint-Bartholomew or other, which they pretended was on foot +against the patriots, and of which the Ecole Militaire was the centre. +The white flag, which was to be the signal for the assassins to +assemble, was said to be hidden there. Petion, the mayor of Paris, +{142} under pretext of preventing troubles, sent municipal officers to +make a search. They could not lay their hands on the white flag which +was the pretended object of their visit, but they did find monarchical +hymns and ballads, and counter-revolutionary writings. + +An unlucky incident still further increased suspicion. The famous +Countess de La Motte had just published in London some new particulars +concerning the affair of the necklace. In order to avert scandal, the +Queen had caused Laporte, intendant of the civil list, to buy up the +whole edition, and he had burned every copy of it at the manufactory of +Sevres. That very evening the committee of surveillance were in +possession of the fact that Laporte had gone to Sevres with three +unknown persons, and that thirty bales of paper had been put into the +fire in his presence. There was at this time a great deal of talk +concerning a pretended Austrian committee, in which a complete plan of +restoration by foreign aid was being elaborated. It was claimed that +the papers burned at the manufactory were the archives of this +committee, with which popular imagination was extremely busy. +Denunciations fell in showers. Laporte and several others were +summoned before the committee of surveillance. Petion declared that +the people were surrounded by conspiracies. Bazire demanded the +disbanding of the King's guard, which, according to him, was made up of +servants of the _emigres_, and refractory priests. It was claimed +{143} that the soldiers, to whom the Duke de Brissac had given sabres +with hilts representing a cock surmounted by a royal crown, used +insulting language concerning the Assembly and the nation in their +barracks. They were said to rejoice in the reverses which the French +troops had just sustained on the northern frontier, and it was added +that they meant to march twenty leagues under a white flag to meet the +Austrians. The masses, always so easily deceived, were convinced that +the conspiracy was on the brink of discovery. + +The National Assembly took up the question, and a stormy debate on it +occupied the evening session of May 29. "What will become of the +individual liberty of citizens," cried M. Daverhoute, "if the dominant +party, merely by alleging suspicions, can decree the impeachment of all +who displease it, and if the different parties, coming successively +into power, overthrow, by means of this unchecked right of impeachment, +both ministers and all functionaries by the torrent of their intrigues? +In that case you would see proscriptions like those of Marius and +Sylla." In fact, this was what the near future was about to show. +Vergniaud responded by evoking a souvenir of the praetorian guards of +Caligula and Nero. At the close of his speech the Assembly passed the +following decree:-- + +"ARTICLE 1. The existing hired guard of the King is disbanded, and +will be replaced immediately in conformity with the laws. + +{144} + +"ART. 2. Until the formation of the new guard, the National Guard of +Paris will be on duty near the King's person, in the same manner as +before the establishment of the King's guard." + +A discussion ensued on the subject of Brissac's impeachment. The +struggle between the two opposing parties was of unheard-of vivacity. +One of the most courageous members of the right, M. Calvet, gave free +vent to his indignation. "The informer," said he, "is a scoundrel who +makes a thrust with a poniard and hides himself; he was unknown at Rome +until the times of Sejanus and Tiberius; times, gentlemen, of which you +remind me often." "To the Abbey! to the Abbey!" retorted the left, +with fury. Said Guadet: "I demand that M. Calvet should be sent to the +Abbey for three days, for having dared to say that the representatives +of the French people remind him of the Roman Tiberius and Sejanus." +The motion was adopted, and the Assembly decided that M. Calvet should +pass three days in prison. M. de Jaucourt threatened to cudgel Chabot, +and the ex-friar, ascending the tribune, said: "I think it was very +cowardly on the part of a colonel to offer to cane a Capuchin." The +Assembly, having passed an order of the day concerning this incident, +decreed that "there was reason for an accusation against M. Cosse, +styled Brissac, and that his papers should be sealed up at once." + +The King and Queen, awakened in the middle of the night by these +tidings, besought Brissac to make {145} his escape, and provided him +with the means. The Duke refused, and instead of trying to assure his +safety, sat down to write a long letter to Madame du Barry. At first +Louis XVI. wished to veto this decree, as was his duty, but his +ministers dissuaded him. They reminded him of the October Days, and +the weak monarch, alarmed on account of his family, if not on his own, +sacrificed his Constitutional Guard and also the brave servitor who +commanded it. Speaking to M. d'Aubier, one of the ordinary gentlemen +of the King's bedchamber, the Queen said: "I tremble lest the King's +guard should think the honor of the corps compromised by their +disarmament."--"Doubtless, Madame, that corps would have preferred to +die at the feet of Your Majesties."--"Yes," replied the Queen, "but the +few partisans who still adhere to the King in the Assembly counsel him +to sanction the decree disbanding them, and to disregard their advice +is to run the risk of losing them." While the Queen was yet speaking, +a man approached under pretence of asking alms. "You see," said she to +M. d'Aubier, "there is no place and no time when I am free from spies." + +The Constitutional Guard were sent as prisoners to the Ecole Militaire +between a double file of National Guards, and forced to surrender their +weapons. By a sort of fatality Louis XVI. was led to disarm himself, +to spike his cannons, tear down his flags, and dismantle his +fortresses. By dint of approaching too near the fatal declivity of +concessions, {146} he ended by losing even his dignity as man and King. +He was paralyzed, annihilated by the Assembly, which treated him like a +hostage, a conquered man, and which struck down, one after another, the +last defenders of the monarchy and of public order. The fate of the +Constitutional Guard might well discourage honest men who only sought +to devote themselves. How was it possible to remain faithful to a +chief who was false to himself, who was more like a victim than a king? +Finding themselves unsupported by the Tuileries, the royalists began to +look across the frontier, and many men who would have flocked around an +energetic monarch, fled from a feeble king and sorrowfully went to +swell the ranks of the emigration. + +In spite of the advice of Dumouriez, Louis XVI. would not make use of +his right to form another guard. He preferred to put himself in the +hands of the National Guard, who were his jailors rather than his +servants. As to the Duke de Brissac, even the formality of an +interrogatory was dispensed with, and he was sent before the Superior +Court of Orleans. When he bade adieu to Louis XVI., the King said to +him: "You are going to prison; I should be much more afflicted if you +were not leaving me there myself." What was to be the fate of the +loyal and devoted servant, thus sacrificed to his master's inexcusable +weakness? He left the dungeons of Orleans only to be transferred to +Versailles by the Marseillais, and there, on September 9, 1792, was +assaulted by a {147} furious throng surrounding the carriages +containing the prisoners. The brave old man struggled long against the +assassins, but, after losing two fingers and receiving several other +wounds, he was killed by a sabre-thrust which broke his jaw, and his +head was set on one of the spikes of the palace gate. + + + +[1] The magnificent mansion built for Madame du Barry by Louis XV., and +restored to her after her banishment to Meaux by Marie Antoinette. + + + + +{148} + +XIV. + +THE SUFFERINGS OF LOUIS XVI. + +Dissatisfied with men and things, dissatisfied with others and himself, +the mind and heart of Louis XVI. were the prey of moral tortures which +left him no repose. He began to be ashamed of his concessions, and to +repent of having accepted pusillanimous advice. Why had he not +succeeded in being a king? Why had he garrisoned Paris insufficiently +ever since the outbreak of the Revolution? Why had he suffered the +Bastille to be taken, encouraged the emigration, and disbanded his +bodyguards? Why had he not opposed the first persecutions aimed at the +Church? Why had he pretended to approve acts and ideas which horrified +him? Why, by resorting to deplorable equivocations which cast a shadow +over his policy and his character, had he reduced his most devoted +followers to doubt and despair? Such thoughts as these assailed him +like so many stings of conscience. The sentiments of monarchy and of +military honor awoke in him once more, and he sounded with bitterness +the whole depth of the abyss into which his irresolution had plunged +him. In seeing what he was, he recalled sorrowfully {149} what he had +been, and comprehended by cruel experience what feebleness could make +of a Most Christian King and eldest son of the Church, an heir of Louis +XIV. He thought of the many brave men, victims of his political +errors, who on his account had suffered exile and ruin; of the faithful +royalists menaced, because of him, with prison and death. He thought +of the incessantly repeated crimes, the massacres of the Glaciere, the +impunity of the brigands of "headsman" Jourdan, of Brissac's +incarceration. This is what it is, he said within himself, to have +suffered religion to be persecuted and to have believed that, were the +altar once overthrown, the throne might rest secure. He reproached +himself bitterly for having sanctioned the civil organization of the +clergy at the close of 1790, and thus drawn upon himself the censure of +the Sovereign Pontiff. He wanted to be done with concessions, but he +understood perfectly that it was too late now to resist, and that he +was irrevocably lost in consequence of events undesired and unforeseen. + +What was to be done? How could he sail against the stream? Where find +a point of vantage? Ought he to take violent measures? If the unhappy +King had been alone, perhaps he might have tried to do so. But he +feared to endanger his wife and children by thus acting. + +As if to push the wretched monarch to extremities, the National +Assembly passed two decrees which struck him to the heart. According +to the first of {150} these, voted May 19, any ecclesiastic having +refused the oath to the civil constitution of the clergy, could be +transported at the simple request of twenty citizens of the canton in +which he resided. According to the second, voted June 8, a camp of +twenty thousand federates, recruited from every canton of the realm, +were to be assembled before Paris, in order, as was said in one of the +preambles, "to take every hope from the enemies of the common weal who +are scheming in the interior." + +They had counted too much on the King's patience. He could not resolve +to sanction the two decrees, and banish the ecclesiastics whose +behavior he honored. Dumouriez afflicted him still further, when, in +entreating him to yield, he asked why he had sanctioned, at the close +of 1790, the decree obliging the clergy to take oath to the civil +constitution of the clergy. "Sire," said he, "you sanctioned the +decree for the priests' oath, and it is to that your veto must be +applied. If I had been one of your counsellors at the time, I would, +at the risk of my life, have advised you to refuse your sanction. Now +my opinion is that having, as I dare to say, committed the fault of +approving this decree, which has produced enormous evils, your veto, if +you apply it to the second decree, which may arrest the deluge of blood +ready to flow, will burden your conscience with all the crimes to which +the people are tending." Never had a sovereign's conscience been a +prey to similar perplexities. Louis XVI. seemed crushed beneath an +irresistible {151} fatality. The Tuileries, haunted night and day by +the spectre of Charles I., assumed a dismal air. At this period a sort +of stupor characterized the countenance, the gait, and even the silence +of the future victim of January 21. He no longer spoke; one might say +he no longer thought. He seemed prostrated, petrified. + +A rumor got about that he had become almost imbecile through care and +trouble, so much so that he did not recognize his son, but on seeing +him approach, had asked: "What child is that?" It was added that while +out walking he caught sight of the steeple of Saint Denis from the top +of the hill, and cried out: "That is where I shall be on my birthday." +He had been so calumniated, so misunderstood, so outraged, that not +merely his crown but his existence had become an intolerable burden to +him. His throne and his life alike disgusted him. He was no longer a +King, but only the ghost of one. + +Madame Campan thus describes him: "At this period the King fell into a +discouragement amounting to physical prostration. For ten days +together he never uttered a word, even in the bosom of his family, +except when the game of backgammon, which he played with Madame +Elisabeth after dinner, obliged him to pronounce some indispensable +words. The Queen drew him out of this condition, so fatal at a +critical time when every minute may necessitate action, by throwing +herself at his feet and addressing him sometimes in words intended only +to frighten him, {152} and at others expressing her affection for him. +She demanded, also, what he owed to his family, and went so far as to +say that if they must perish, it ought to be with honor, and without +waiting to be strangled one after another on the floor of their +apartment." + +While Louis XVI. assisted unmoved, not merely like Charles V. at his +own obsequies, but at those of royalty, the blood of Maria Theresa was +boiling in the veins of Marie Antoinette. The scenes she had witnessed +sometimes extorted sobs and cries of anguish from her. Her pride +revolted at seeing the royal mantle, crown, and sceptre dragged through +the mire. She wanted to struggle to the last, to hope against all +hope, to cling to the last chances of safety like a shipwrecked sailor +to the fragments of his ship. Who could say? She might find defenders +where she least expected them. It was for this reason that she wished +to meet Dumouriez, as she had met Mirabeau and Barnave. Dumouriez has +preserved the details of this interview in his Memoirs. + +How times had changed! Secrecy was almost necessary if one sought the +honor of speaking with the Queen of France. Even to salute her was to +expose one's self to the suspicion of belonging to the pretended +Austrian committee which was the perpetual object of popular invective. +When Louis XVI. told Dumouriez that the Queen desired a private +interview with him, the minister was not at all well pleased. He +thought it a useless step which might be misinterpreted by all parties. +However, {153} he must needs obey. He had received an order to go down +to the Queen an hour before the meeting of the Council. That it might +be the sooner over, he took the precaution of going half an hour late +to this perilous rendezvous. He had been presented to Marie Antoinette +on the day of his nomination as minister. She had then addressed him +several words, asking him to serve the King well, and he had replied +with a respectful phrase. Since then he had not seen her. When he +entered her room, he found the Queen alone, very much flushed, and +pacing to and fro in an agitation which promised a lively interview. +She approached him with an air of majestic irritation: "Sir!" she +exclaimed, "you are all-powerful at this moment, but it is by the favor +of the people, who soon break their idols. Your existence depends upon +your conduct." Dumouriez insisted on the necessity of scrupulously +respecting the Constitution, which Marie Antoinette was unwilling to +do. "It will not last," she said, raising her voice; "take care of +yourself!"--"Madame," replied the minister, "I am past fifty; I have +encountered many perils during my life, and in entering the ministry, I +thoroughly understood that responsibility was not the greatest of my +dangers."--"Nothing was wanting but to calumniate me," cried the Queen, +tears flowing from her eyes; "you seem to think me capable of having +you assassinated." Agitated as greatly as the sovereign, "God preserve +me," said Dumouriez, "from offering you so {154} grievous an offence! +Your Majesty's character is great and noble. You have given proofs of +it which I admire and which have attached me to you." Marie Antoinette +grew calmer. "Believe me, Madame," went on the minister; "I have no +interest in deceiving you, and I abhor anarchy and crime as much as you +do.... This is not, as you seem to think, a popular and transitory +movement. It is the almost unanimous insurrection of a great nation +against inveterate abuses. The conflagration is stirred up by great +parties, and there are scoundrels and fools in all of them. I behold +nothing in the Revolution but the King and the nation as a whole; all +that tends to separate them leads to their mutual ruin; I am doing all +I can to reunite them, and it is your part to aid me. If I am an +obstacle to your designs, say so, and I will at once offer my +resignation to the King, and go into a corner to bewail the fate of my +country and your own." The interview ended amicably. The Queen and +the minister talked over the different factions. Dumouriez spoke to +Marie Antoinette of the faults and crimes of each; he tried to convince +her that she was misled by those who surrounded her, and the Queen +appeared to be convinced. When he was obliged to call her attention to +the clock, as the hour for the Council had arrived, she dismissed him +most affably. + +If we may credit Madame Campan, who has also given an account of this +interview, the impression Marie Antoinette received from it was +scarcely a {155} good one. "One day," says Madame Campan, "I found the +Queen extremely troubled. She said she no longer knew where she stood; +whether the Jacobin chiefs were making overtures to her through +Dumouriez, or Dumouriez, abandoning the Jacobins, was acting on his own +account; that she had given him an audience; that, when alone with her, +he had fallen at her feet and said that although he had pulled the red +bonnet down to his ears, yet he was not and could not be a Jacobin; +that the Revolution had been allowed to fall into the hands of a rabble +of disorganizers who, seeking only for pillage, were capable of +everything, and could furnish the Assembly with a formidable army, +ready to undermine the support of a throne already too much shaken. +While speaking with extreme warmth, he had seized the Queen's hand, +and, kissing it with transport, cried, 'Permit yourself to be saved!' +The Queen said to me that the protestations of a traitor could not be +believed, and that his entire conduct was so well known that +undoubtedly the wisest thing would be not to trust him." + +Meantime, the danger constantly increased. Even the gates of the +Tuileries were no longer fastened. Hawkers of vile pamphlets and +sanguinary satires on the Queen cried their infamous wares under the +very windows of the palace; and the National Assembly, sitting close +beside, and hearing them--the National Assembly, terrorized by Jacobins +and pikemen--dared not even censure such baseness. On June 4, {156} a +deputy named Ribes, till then unknown, cited from the tribune the +titles of the following articles in Freron's journal, _l'Orateur du +Peuple_: "The crowned porcupine, a constitutional animal who behaves +unconstitutionally."--"Crimes of M. Capet since the +Revolution."--"Decree to be passed forbidding the Queen to sleep with +the King."--"The royal tigress, separated from her worthy spouse, to +serve as a hostage." "Rouse up!" cried the indignant deputy. "There +is still time. Join with me in proclaiming war on traitors and justice +for the seditious, and the country is safe!" Ribes preached in the +desert. The Assembly shrugged their shoulders and treated him as a +fool. + +June 11, another deputy, M. Delsaux, said from the tribune: "Last +evening, at half-past seven, passing through the Tuileries, I saw an +orator standing on a chair and speaking with great vehemence. Mixing +with the crowd, I heard him read a libel strongly inciting to the +King's assassination. This libel is called, 'The Fall of the Idol of +the French,' and these sentences occur in it: 'This monster employs his +power and his treasures to hinder our regeneration. A new Charles IX., +he wishes to bring desolation and death to France. Go, cruel wretch; +thy crimes shall have an end. Damiens was less guilty. He was +punished by most horrible tortures for having desired to deliver France +from a monster. And thou, whose offences are twenty-five million times +greater, art left unpunished! But tremble, tyrant; there is a Scaevola +amongst us.'" + +{157} + +The Assembly listened, but took no measures. No further restraint was +placed either on moral or material disorder. Anarchy showed a nameless +epileptic ferocity. Never had the press been more furious or +licentious. It was a torrent of mud and gall and blood. The limits of +invective and insult were driven further back. "You see that I am +annoyed," said the Queen to Dumouriez in Louis XVI.'s presence; "I dare +not go to the window looking into the garden. Last evening, needing a +breath of air, I showed myself at the window facing the courtyard. A +gunner belonging to the guard apostrophized me in an insulting way, and +added: 'What pleasure it would give me to have your head on the end of +my bayonet!' In that frightful garden a man standing on a chair reads +out horrors against us on one side, and on the other may be seen a +soldier or a priest whom they are dragging through a pond, and crushing +with blows and insults. Meantime, others are flying balloons or +quietly strolling about. Ah! what a place! what a people!" + + + + +{158} + +XV. + +ROLAND'S DISMISSAL FROM OFFICE. + +In the ministry, as elsewhere, discord reigned. At first, the +ministers had seemed to be of one mind. They dined at each other's +houses four times a week, on the days when there was a meeting of the +Council. Friday was Roland's day for receiving his colleagues at his +table, where his wife presided and perorated. "These dinners," says +Etienne Dumont, "were often remarkable for their gaiety, of which no +situation can deprive Frenchmen when they meet in society, and which +was natural to men contented with themselves and flattered by their +elevation. The future was hidden from them by the present. The cares +of the ministry were forgotten. They seated themselves in their +dwellings as if they were to abide there forever." This sort of +political honeymoon could not last very long. Things presently began +to change for the worse. Dumouriez tired very soon of Madame Roland's +pretensions; she wanted to know, see, and direct everything, and he +persisted in refusing to transform himself into a puppet whose strings +were to be pulled by this woman and the Girondins. Madame Roland, who +{159} posed as a puritan, caused remonstrances to be addressed to +Dumouriez on the subject of some more or less suspicious affairs, said +to have been negotiated by Bonne-Carrere, the director at the Ministry +of Foreign Affairs, by which Madame de Beauvert was supposed to have +gained large sums. The wife of the Minister of the Interior had a +grudge against the favorite of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "She +is Dumouriez's mistress," said she; "she lives in his house and does +the honors at his table, to the great scandal of sensible men, who are +friendly to good morals and liberty. For this license on the part of a +public man charged with State affairs marks too plainly his contempt +for decorum; and Madame de Beauvert, Rivarol's sister, very well and +very unfavorably known, is surrounded by the tools of aristocracy, +unworthy in all respects." One evening, after dinner, Roland, "with +the gravity belonging to his age and character," as his wife says, gave +a lecture on morality to the Minister of Foreign Affairs apropos of +this matter. At first Dumouriez made jesting replies, but afterwards +showed temper and appeared displeased with his entertainers. +Thereafter he seldom visited the Ministry of the Interior. Reflecting +on this, Madame Roland said to her husband: "Though not a good judge of +intrigue, I think worldly wisdom would dictate that the hour has come +for getting rid of Dumouriez, if we wish to avoid being ruined by him. +I know very well that you would be unwilling to lower yourself to such +an {160} action; and yet it is plain that Dumouriez must be seeking to +disembarrass himself of those whose censure has offended him. When one +undertakes to preach, and does so in vain, he must either punish or +expect to be molested." + +Thenceforward, Madame Roland formed a distinct group within the +ministry, composed of her husband, Claviere, and Servan, who had just +replaced De Grave as Minister of War. While Dumouriez, Lacoste, and +Duranton (whom Louis XVI. called "the good Duranton") allowed +themselves to be affected by the King's goodness, and sincerely wished +to save him, their three colleagues, inspired by the spiteful Madame +Roland, had but one idea: to destroy him. "Roland, Claviere, and +Servan," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "no longer observed any +moderation, not merely with their colleagues, but with the King +himself. At every meeting of the Council they abused the mildness of +this prince, in order to mortify and kill him with pin-pricks." + +It was Servan who proposed forming a camp of twenty thousand federates +around Paris. He thought it would be a sort of central revolutionary +army, analogous to that English parliamentary army under command of +Cromwell, which had brought Charles I. to the scaffold. "Servan, a +very wicked man and most inimical to the King," says Dumouriez again, +"took the notion to write to the President of the Assembly, without +consulting his colleagues, and propose a decree for assembling an army +of twenty {161} thousand men around Paris. This was at the time when +the Girondin faction was at the height of its power, having the +Jacobins at their command, and governing Paris through Petion. They +wanted to destroy the Feuillants, perhaps at the sword's point, to put +down the court, and probably to begin putting their republican projects +into execution. Thus it was this faction which brought to Paris the +federates who ended by causing every one of them to perish on the +scaffold after making Louis XVI. ascend it." Dumouriez was indignant +that the Minister of War should have taken it on himself to propose +such a decree without even mentioning it to the sovereign. The dispute +on this matter was so violent that, but for the presence of the King, +the meeting of the Council might have come to a bloody close. Louis +XVI., deeply grieved by such scandals, resolved to dismiss the three +ministers, who, instead of supporting him, were merely conspirators who +had sworn his ruin. + +The anguish of the unhappy monarch had reached its height. Four +councils were held without his returning the decrees submitted to him +for consideration. The National Assembly grew impatient. The Jacobins +were in a rage. At last the King concluded to take up in the Council +the decree relative to the camp of twenty thousand federates. "I +think," said Dumouriez, "that the decree is dangerous to the nation, +the King, the National Assembly, and above all to its authors, whose +chastisement it {162} will turn out to be; and yet, Sire, it is my +opinion that you cannot refuse it. It was proposed by profound malice, +debated with fury, and decreed with enthusiasm; everybody is blinded. +If you veto it, it will none the less be passed." The hesitation of +Louis XVI. redoubled. As to the decree concerning the clergy, he +declared that he would never sanction it. This was the only time that +Dumouriez ever saw "the character of this gentle soul somewhat changed +for the worse." + +Meanwhile, Madame Roland, more impatient and vindictive than ever, +wrote the famous letter supposed to issue from her husband, which was +to echo in the ears of royalty like a funeral knell. She says of it:-- + +"The letter was written at one stroke, like nearly all matters of the +sort which I have done; for, to feel the necessity, the fitness of a +thing, to apprehend its good effect, to desire to produce it, and to +give form to the object from which this effect should result, was to me +but a single operation." + +This letter, a veritable arraignment of the King, was much more like a +club speech or a newspaper article than a letter from a minister of +state to his sovereign. Such sentences as these occur in it: "Sire, +the existing state of things in France cannot long continue; it is a +crisis whose violence is attaining its highest point; it must end by an +outbreak which should interest Your Majesty as seriously as it affects +the entire kingdom.... It is no longer possible to draw back. The +Revolution is {163} accomplished in men's minds; it will end in blood +and be cemented by blood if wisdom does not avert the evils which it is +still possible to prevent.... Yet a little more delay, and the +afflicted people will behold in their King the friend and accomplice of +conspirators. Just Heaven! hast Thou stricken with blindness the +powerful of this earth, and will they never heed other counsels than +those which drag them to destruction! I know that the austere language +of truth is rarely welcomed near the throne; I know, also, that it is +because it so rarely obtains a hearing there that revolutions become +necessary; I know, above all, that I am bound to employ it to Your +Majesty, not merely as a citizen submissive to the law, but as a +minister honored with your confidence, or vested with functions which +imply this." + +The letter also contained a defence of the two decrees, and plainly +threatened Louis XVI., should he veto them, with the horrors of a civil +war which would develop "that sombre energy, mother of virtues and of +crimes, which is always fatal to those who have evoked it!" Was not +Madame Roland here announcing the September massacres, and the heinous +crimes of which she herself was speedily to become one of the most +celebrated victims? + +At first Roland sent this letter to the King, with a promise that it +should always remain a secret between them. But, incited by the vanity +of his wife, who was incessantly urging him on to notoriety and +display, Roland did not keep this promise. He read {164} the letter at +the next meeting of the Council, June 11. "The King," says Dumouriez, +"listened to this impudent diatribe with admirable patience, and said +with the greatest coolness: 'M. Roland, you had already sent me your +letter; it was unnecessary to read it to the Council, as it was to +remain a secret between ourselves.'" Dumouriez was summoned to the +palace the following morning, June 12. He found the King in his own +room, accompanied by the Queen. "Do you think, Monsieur," said Marie +Antoinette, "that the King ought to submit any longer to the threats +and insolence of Roland and the knavery of Servan and Claviere?"--"No, +Madame," he replied; "I am indignant at them; I admire the King's +patience, and I venture to ask him to make an entire change in his +ministry. Let him dismiss us on the spot, and appoint men belonging to +neither party."--"That is not my intention," said Louis XVI. "I wish +you to remain, as well as Lacoste and that good man, Duranton. Do me +the service of ridding me of these three factious and insolent persons, +for my patience is exhausted."--"It is a dangerous matter, Sire, but I +will do it." As a condition of remaining in the ministry, Dumouriez +exacted the sanction of the two decrees. There was another ministerial +council the same evening. Roland, Servan, and Claviere were more +insolent and acrimonious than usual. Louis XVI. closed the session +with mingled dissatisfaction and dignity. + +At eight o'clock that evening (June 12), Servan, {165} the Minister of +War, went to Madame Roland and said: "Congratulate me! I have been +turned out."--"I am much piqued," replied she, "that you should be the +first to receive that honor, but I hope it will not be long before it +will be decreed to my husband also." Madame Roland's prayer was +granted. The virtuous Minister of the Interior received his letters of +dismissal the next morning. As Duranton, who delivered it at the +Ministry of Justice, was slowly drawing it from his pocket,-- + +"You make us wait for our liberty," said Roland; and, taking the +letter, he added, "In reality that is what it is." Then he went home +to his wife to announce to her that he was no longer minister. + +Madame Roland, with the instinct of hatred, saw at once how to obtain +revenge. "One thing remains to be done," she cried; "we must be the +first to communicate the news to the Assembly, sending them at the same +time a copy of the letter to the King which must have caused it." This +idea pleased the ex-minister highly, and he put it instantly into +execution. "I was conscious," says the irascible Egeria of the +Girondins in her Memoirs, "of all the effects this might produce, and I +was not deceived; my double object was attained, and both utility and +glory attended the retirement of my husband. I had not been proud of +his entering the ministry, but I was of his leaving it." Thenceforward +Madame Roland was to be the most indefatigable cause of the Revolution, +and Louis XVI. was to learn by experience what the vengeance of a woman +can accomplish. + + + + +{166} + +XVI. + +A THREE DAYS' MINISTRY. + +Dumouriez had taken the portfolio of war. He kept it three days only. +But during those three days what activity! what excitement! More than +fifteen hundred signatures affixed, instructions sent to all the +generals, a most tumultuous session of the National Assembly, a last +effort to induce Louis XVI. to make further concessions, a resignation +which was to be the signal for catastrophes. How the scenes of the +drama multiply! How the denouement is accelerated! + +The session at which Dumouriez was to appear for the first time as +Minister of War could not fail to be singular. It took place June 13, +1792, and from ten o'clock in the morning all the galleries had been +crowded. The Jacobins had filled them with their satellites. The +Girondins had prepared a dramatic surprise. The three ex-ministers +were to be brought into the chamber under pretext of explaining the +causes of their dismissal. It was agreed that they should be received +as victims of the aristocracy and martyrs of the Revolution. Roland's +letter--say, rather, his wife's letter--to Louis XVI. was read to {167} +the Assembly and frequently interrupted by loud bursts of applause. +Just as it was finished, and some one was demanding that it should be +sent to all the eighty-three departments, Dumouriez entered the hall. +Murmurs and hisses arose on all sides. The Assembly voted the despatch +of the letter to the departments. A deputy exclaimed: "It will be a +famous document in the history of the Revolution and of the ministers." +The Assembly went on to declare that Roland was followed by the regrets +of the nation. Then Dumouriez ascended the tribune and read a message +in which M. Lafayette announced the death of M. de Gouvion. He had +been major-general of the National Guard, and, having quitted the +Assembly rather than be present at the triumph of the Swiss of +Chateauvieux, had met his death bravely in the Army of the North. "A +cannon-ball," said the message, "has terminated a virtuous life." The +Assembly was affected, and voted complimentary condolences to the +father of the heroic officer. + +Afterwards, Dumouriez read his report on military affairs. It was a +long criticism on the legislators who had ordered a new levy of troops +before providing the existing corps with their full complements; on the +muster-masters, the standing committees, and the market-contractors, +who were piling up abuses. Dumouriez complained of everything; he +reproached the factions, and insisted on the consideration due to +ministers. Guadet thundered out: "Do you hear him? He already thinks +himself so {168} sure of power that he takes it on him to give us +advice."--"And why not?" resumed the minister, turning toward the side +of the Mountain.[1] This bold response astonished the most furious. +Some one said: "The document is not signed. Let him sign it! Let him +sign it!" Dumouriez called for pen and ink, signed his memoir, and +went to lay it on the desk. Then he slowly crossed the hall and went +quietly out by the door beneath the Mountain, with a haughty glance at +his adversaries. His martial attitude disconcerted them. The shouts +and hootings ceased, and complete silence ensued. On leaving the +Assembly, Dumouriez was surrounded by a group of persons before the +door of the Feuillants, but their faces displayed no signs of anger +toward him. As soon as he quitted the Assembly, his enemies, no longer +intimidated by his presence, redoubled their attacks. Three or four +deputies left the Chamber, and making their way to him through the +crowd, said: "They are raising the devil inside; they would like to +send you to Orleans." (It was there the Duke de Brissac was imprisoned +and the Superior Court held its sessions.) "So much the better," +replied Dumouriez; "I would take the baths, drink butter-milk, and rest +myself." This sally amused the crowd, and the minister as he entered +the Tuileries garden, said to the deputies who followed him: "It will +be a mistake for my enemies to have {169} my memoir printed, for it +will bring all good citizens back to me. At present, being drunk and +crazy, you have just extolled Roland's infamous perfidy to the skies." +Then he went to the palace. Louis XVI. complimented him on his +firmness, but absolutely refused to sanction the decree against the +priests. + +Far from ameliorating, the situation continued to grow worse. Petion's +emissaries stirred up the inhabitants of the faubourgs. That evening +Dumouriez sent a letter to the King announcing that a riot was +apprehended. Louis XVI. suspected that the minister was lying, and +wrote to him: "Do not believe, Monsieur, that any one can succeed in +frightening me by threats; my resolution is taken." Dumouriez had +based his entire scheme on the hypothesis that the decree concerning +the priests would be accepted by the King. From the moment that Louis +XVI. rejected it, Dumouriez no longer hoped to remain in the ministry. +He wrote again, imploring the sovereign to give it his sanction, and +announcing that, in case of his refusal, the ministers would all feel +obliged to retire. The next day, June 15, the King received them in +his chamber. "Are you still," said he to Dumouriez, "in the same +sentiments expressed in your letter last evening?"--"Yes, Sire, if Your +Majesty will not permit yourself to be moved by our fidelity and +attachment."--"Very well," replied Louis XVI., with a gloomy air, +"since your decision is made, I accept your resignation and will +provide for it." Dumouriez was no {170} longer a minister. In his +Memoirs he describes himself as much affected, "not on account of +quitting a dangerous post, which simply made his existence disturbed +and painful, but because he saw all his trouble thrown away, and the +King handed over to the fury of cruel enemies and the criminal +indiscretion of false friends." + +At bottom, Dumouriez inspired nobody with confidence. He belonged to +no party, and no one knew his opinions. He had leaned on both Jacobins +and Girondins, while at the same time he was inspiring certain hopes in +the Feuillants, and flattering the King, to whom he promised signs and +wonders. Too revolutionary for the conservatives and too conservative +for the revolutionists, he had tried a see-saw policy which would no +longer answer. It became indispensable to make a choice. It was +impossible to please both the Jacobins and the court. + +And yet Dumouriez was a man of resources, and it is much to be +regretted, on the King's account, that no better understanding could be +arrived at between them. More successfully than any one else, +Dumouriez might have resorted to bold measures and called in at this +time the intervention of the army, as he did several years later. He +loved money and rank; royalty still excited a great prestige over him, +and he had used the Revolution as a means, not as an end. + +Could Louis XVI. have pretended patience for a few days longer, perhaps +he might have extricated {171} himself from difficulties which, though +grave, were still not insoluble. He did not choose his hour for +resistance wisely. It was either too late or too soon. The dismission +of Dumouriez was a blunder. At what moment did Louis XVI. elect to +deprive himself of his minister's aid? That very one when, attacked by +the Girondins, exasperated by Roland's conduct, and disgusted with the +progress of anarchy, the force of circumstances was about to toss +Dumouriez back to the side of the reactionists. The camp of twenty +thousand men, if confided to safe hands, and secret service money +judiciously employed, might have become the nucleus of a monarchical +resistance. Lafayette and his partisans were becoming conservative, +and between him and Dumouriez agreement was not impossible. Louis XVI. +was in too great a hurry. His conscience revolted at an unfortunate +moment. Why, if he was bent on this veto, so just, so honest, but so +ill-timed, had he freely made so many concessions which thus became +inexplicable? In rejecting the offers of Dumouriez, the Queen possibly +deprived herself of her only remaining support. He who saved France in +the Passes of Argonne might, had he gained the entire confidence of +Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, have saved the King and royalty. + +Dumouriez had a final interview with Louis XVI., June 18. The King +received him in his chamber. He had resumed his kindly air, and when +the ex-minister had shown him the accounts of the last {172} fortnight, +he complimented him on their clearness. Afterwards, the following +conversation took place: "Then you are going to join Luckner's +army?"--"Yes, Sire, I leave this frightful city with delight; I have +but one regret; you are in danger here."--"Yes, that is +certain."--"Well, Sire, you can no longer fancy that I have any +personal interest to consult in talking with you; once having left your +Council, I shall never again approach you; it is through fidelity and +the purest attachment that I dare once more entreat you, by your love +for your country, your safety and that of your crown, by your august +spouse and your interesting children, not to persist in the fatal +resolution of vetoing the two decrees. This persistence will do no +good, and you will ruin yourself by it."--"Don't say any more about it; +my decision is made."--"Ah! Sire, you said the same thing when, in +this very room, and in presence of the Queen, you gave me your word to +sanction them."--"I was wrong, and I repent of it."--"Sire, I shall +never see you again; pardon my frankness; I am fifty-three, and I have +some experience. It was not then that you were wrong, but now. Your +conscience is abused concerning this decree against the priests; you +are being forced into civil war; you are helpless, and you will be +overthrown, and history, though it may pity you, will reproach you with +having caused all the misfortunes of France. On your account, I fear +your friends still more than your enemies."--"God is my witness {173} +that I wish for nothing but the welfare of France."--"I do not doubt +it, Sire; but you will have to account to God, not solely for the +purity but also for the enlightened execution of your intentions. You +expect to save religion, and you destroy it. The priests will be +massacred and your crown torn from you. Perhaps even your wife, your +children..." Emotion prevented Dumouriez from going on. Tears stood +in his eyes. He kissed the hand of Louis XVI. respectfully. The King +wept also, and for a moment both were silent. "Sire," resumed +Dumouriez, "if all Frenchmen knew you as well as I do, our woes would +soon be ended. Do you desire the welfare of France? Very well! That +demands the sacrifice of your scruples ... You are still master of +your fate. Your soul is guiltless; believe a man exempt from passion +and prejudice, and who has always told you the truth."--"I expect my +death," replied Louis XVI. sadly, "and I forgive them for it in +advance. I thank you for your sensibility. You have served me well; I +esteem you, and if a happier time shall ever come, I will prove it to +you." With these words the King rose sadly, and went to a window at +the end of the apartment. Dumouriez gathered up his papers slowly, in +order to gain time to compose his features; he was unwilling to let his +emotion become evident to the persons at the door as he went out. +"Adieu," said the King kindly, "and be happy!" + +As he was leaving, he met his friend Laporte, intendant of the civil +list. The two, who were meeting {174} for the last time, went into +another room and closed the door. "You advised me to resign," said +Laporte, "and I meant to do so, but I have changed my mind. My master +is in danger, and I will share his fate."--"If I were in the personal +service of the King, as you are," replied Dumouriez, "I would think and +act the same; I esteem your devotion, and love you the more for it; +each of us is faithful in his own way; you, to Louis; I, to the King of +the French. May both of us felicitate him some day on his happiness!" +Then the two friends separated, after embracing each other with tears. + +The sole thought of Dumouriez now was to escape from the city where he +had witnessed so many intrigues and been so often deceived. He was +very sorrowful at heart. Ordinarily so gay, so brilliant, so full of +Gallic and _Rabelaisian_ wit, power had made him melancholy. His +ministerial life left on him an abiding impression of bitterness and +repugnance. "One needs," he has said, "either a patriotism equal to +any test, or else an insatiable ambition, to aspire in any way whatever +after those difficult positions where one is surrounded with snares and +calumnies. One learns only too soon that men are not worth the trouble +one takes to govern them." June 19, he wrote to the Assembly, asking +an authorization to repair to the Army of the North. "I have spent +thirty-six years in military and diplomatic service, and have +twenty-two wounds," said he in this letter; "I envy the fate of the +virtuous Gouvion, and should {175} esteem myself happy if a cannon-ball +could put an end to all differences concerning me." He never again +returned either to the palace, the Assembly, or any other place where +he might encounter either ministers, deputies, or persons belonging to +the court. He started for the army, June 26, regarding it as "the only +asylum where an honest man might still be safe. At least, death +presents itself there under the attractive aspect of glory." He left +in the capital "consternation, suspicion, hatred, which pierced through +the frivolity of the wretched Parisians." With an intuition worthy of +a man of genius, he foresaw the vicious circle about to be described by +French history, and divined that by plunging into license men return +inevitably to servitude, because "it is impossible to sustain liberty +with an absurd government, founded on barbarity, terror, and the +subversion of every principle necessary to the maintenance of human +society." Two years later, in 1794, he wrote in his Memoirs: "The +serpent will recoil upon itself. His tail, which is anarchy, will +re-enter his throat, which is despotism." + + + +[1] The advanced republican party in the Assembly. + + + + +{176} + +XVII. + +THE PROLOGUE TO JUNE TWENTIETH. + +On retiring from the ministry, Dumouriez left his successors a burden +far too heavy for their shoulders, and under which they were to +succumb. The new ministers, Lajard, Terrier de Montciel, and +Chambonas, were almost unknown men who had no definite, decided +opinions, and offered no resistance to disorder: for that matter, they +had no means of doing so. The political system then in power had left +Paris a helpless prey to sedition. By the new laws, the executive +power could take no direct action looking to the preservation of public +order in any French commune. Any minister or departmental +administration that should adopt a police regulation or give a +commander to armed forces, would be guilty of betraying a trust. The +power to prevent or repress disorder belonged exclusively to the +municipal authority, which, in Paris, was composed of a mayor, sixteen +administrators, thirty-two municipal councillors, a council-general of +ninety-six notables, an attorney-general and his two substitutes. This +body of 148 members was the redoubtable power known as the Commune of +Paris. It was not {177} composed entirely of seditious persons, and in +the National Guard, also, there were still battalions fervently devoted +to the constitutional monarchy. But Petion was mayor of Paris; Manuel, +the attorney-general, and Danton his substitute. Seditious movements +were sure to find instigators and accomplices in these three men. + +Moreover, the insurrection was regularly organized. It had its +muster-rolls, its officers, sergeants, soldiers; its strategy and plans +of battle. It utilized wineshops as guard-houses, the faubourgs as +barracks, the red bonnet and the _carmagnole_, or revolutionary jacket, +as a uniform. Its agitators distributed wine, beer, and brandy +gratuitously. The Jacobins or the Cordeliers had but to give the +signal for a riot, and a riot sprang out of the ground. The mine was +loaded; the only question was when to fire the train. The Girondins +were of one mind with the Jacobins. Exasperated by the dismissal of +three ministers who shared their opinions, they wanted to intimidate +the court by means of a popular tumult, and thus force the unhappy +sovereign to sanction the two decrees, concerning the deportation of +priests and the camp of twenty thousand men. The populace already +manifested their restlessness by threats and strange rumors. At the +Jacobin Club the most violent propositions were mooted. Some wanted to +establish a minority, on the ground of the King's mental alienation; +some, to send the Queen back to Austria; the more moderate talked of +suppressing the army, {178} dismissing the staff-officers of the +National Guard, depriving the King of the right of veto, and electing a +Constituent Assembly. Revolutionary conventicles multiplied beyond all +measure. The division of Paris into forty-eight sections became an +exhaustless source of confusion. The assembly of each section +transformed itself into a club. + +Meanwhile, the moderate party rested all its hopes on Lafayette, who +was friendly not only to liberty, but to order. He considered himself +the founder of the new monarchy, of constitutional royalty; but, for +that very reason, he felt that he had duties toward the King. +Despising the reactionists, whose hopes were more or less enlisted on +behalf of the foreign armies, he also detested the Jacobins who were +dishonoring and compromising the new order of things. He expresses +both sentiments in a letter addressed to the National Assembly, and +written from the intrenched camp of Maubeuge, June 16, 1792, the Fourth +Year of Liberty: "Can you conceal from yourselves," he says in it, +"that a faction, and to use plain terms, the Jacobin faction, has +caused all these disorders? I make the accusation boldly. Organized +like a separate empire, with its capital and its affiliations blindly +directed by certain ambitious chiefs, this sect forms a distinct body +in the midst of the French people, whose powers it usurps by +subjugating its representatives and agents. In its public meetings, +attachment to the laws is named aristocracy, and disobedience to them +patriotism; there the {179} assassins of Desilles are received in +triumph, and Jourdan's insensate clamor finds panegyrists; there the +story of the assassinations which defiled the city of Metz is still +greeted with infernal applause." + +Lafayette puts himself courageously forward in his letter: "As to me, +gentlemen, who espoused the American cause at the very time when the +ambassadors assured me it was lost; who, from that period, devoted +myself to a persistent defence of the liberty and sovereignty of +peoples; who, on June 11, 1789, in presenting a declaration of rights +to my country, dared to say, 'For a nation to be free, all that is +necessary is that it shall will to be so,' I come to-day, full of +confidence in the justice of our cause, of scorn for the cowards who +desert it, and of indignation against the traitors who would sully it; +I come to declare that the French nation, if it be not the vilest in +the universe, can and ought to resist the conspiracy of kings which has +been leagued against it." At the same time, the general +enthusiastically praised his soldiers: "Doubtless it is not within the +bosom of my brave army that sentiments of timidity are permissible. +Patriotism, energy, discipline, patience, mutual confidence, all civic +and military virtues, I find here. Here the principles of liberty and +equality are cherished, the laws respected, and property held sacred; +here, neither calumnies nor seditions are known." + +Including both revolutionists and reactionists in the same accusation, +Lafayette makes this reflection: {180} "What a remarkable conformity of +language exists, gentlemen, between those seditious persons +acknowledged by the aristocracy, and those who usurp the name of +patriots! All are alike ready to repeal our laws, to rejoice in +disorders, to rebel against the authorities granted by the people, to +detest the National Guard, to preach indiscipline to the army, and +almost to disseminate distrust and discouragement." Lafayette +concludes in these words: "Let the royal power be intact, for it is +guaranteed by the Constitution; let it be independent, for this +independence is one of the forces of our liberty; let the King be +revered, for he is invested with the national majesty; let him choose a +ministry unhampered by the yoke of any faction; if conspirators exist, +let them perish only by the sword of law; finally, let the reign of +clubs, brought to nothing by you, give place to the reign of law; their +disorganizing maxims to the true principles of liberty; their delirious +fury to the calm courage of a nation which knows its rights and which +defends them!" + +Lafayette's letter was read to the Assembly at the session of June 18. +The noble thoughts it expresses produced at first a favorable +impression, and it was greeted with much applause. For an instant the +Girondins were disconcerted; but, feeling themselves supported by the +Jacobins who lined the galleries, they soon resumed the offensive. +"What does the advice of the general of the army amount to," said +Vergniaud, "if it is not law?" Guadet maintained {181} that the letter +must be apocryphal. "When Cromwell used such language," said he, +"liberty was at an end in England, and I cannot persuade myself that +the emulator of Washington desires to imitate the conduct of the +Protector. We no longer have a constitution if a general can give us +laws." The allusion to Cromwell produced its effect. The letter, +instead of being published and copies sent to the eighty-three +departments, was merely referred to a committee. + +Nevertheless, public opinion was aroused. A reactionary sentiment +against the Jacobins began to show itself. The King might have +profited by it, and found his account in relying upon Lafayette, the +army, and the National Guard. But Louis XVI. was in too much haste. +His resistance, like his concessions, was maladroit and inopportune. +Without having combined his means of defence, consulted with Lafayette, +or having any troops at his disposal, he vetoed the two famous decrees, +June 19, and thus threw himself headlong into the snare. The +Revolution, which had lain in wait for him, would not let its prey +escape. It gave Lafayette no time to arrive, but, without losing a +minute, organized an insurrection for the next day. The royal tree had +been so violently shaken, that it needed, or so they thought, but one +more shock to lay it low and root it out. + +On June 16, a request had been presented to the Council-General of the +Commune, asking them to authorize the citizens of the Faubourg +Saint-Antoine {182} to assemble in arms on June 20, the anniversary of +the oath of the Jeu de Paume, and present a petition to the Assembly +and the King. The Council had passed to the order of the day, but the +petitioners declared that they would assemble notwithstanding. On the +19th, the Directory of the department, which on all occasions had shown +itself inimical to agitators, and which was presided over by the Duke +de La Rochefoucauld, issued an order forbidding all armed gatherings, +and enjoining the commandant-general and the mayor to take all +necessary measures for dispersing them. This order was communicated to +the National Assembly by the Minister of the Interior at the evening +session. + +"It is important," said a deputy, "that the Assembly should know the +decrees of the administrative bodies when they tend to assure public +tranquillity. Nobody is ignorant that at this moment the people are +greatly agitated. Nobody is ignorant that to-morrow threatens to be a +day of violence." Vergniaud replied: "I do not know whether or not +to-morrow is to be a day of troubles, but I cannot understand how M. +Becquet, who is always so constitutional" (here there was laughter and +applause), "how M. Becquet, by an inversion of law and order, desires +the National Assembly to occupy itself with police regulations." The +decree of the Directory was read, nevertheless. But the Assembly, far +from supporting it, passed to the order of the day. The rioters had +nothing to fear. + +{183} + +During the same session, a deputation of citizens from Marseilles had +been presented at the bar of the Assembly. The orator of this +deputation thus expressed himself: "French liberty is in danger. The +free men of the South are ready to march in its defence. The day of +the people's wrath has come at last. The people, whom they have always +sought to ruin or enslave, are tired of parrying blows. They want to +inflict them, and to annihilate conspiracies. It is time for the +people to rise. This lion, generous but enraged, is about to quit his +repose, and spring upon the pack of conspirators." Here the galleries +applauded furiously. The orator continued: "The popular force is your +force; employ it. No quarter, since you can expect none." The +applause and enthusiastic cries of the galleries redoubled. Somebody +demanded that the speech should be sent to the eighty-three departments +of France. A deputy, M. Rouher, was courageous enough to exclaim: "It +is not by the harangues of seditious persons that the departments +should be instructed!" Another deputy, M. Lecointre-Puyravaux, +responded: "Is it surprising that men born under a burning sun should +have a more ardent imagination and a patriotism more energetic than +ours?" The question whether the discourse should be sent to the +departments was put to vote, and the president and secretaries declared +that the Assembly had decided against it. This did not suit the public +in the galleries. They howled, they vociferated. They claimed that +the result was {184} doubtful. They demanded a viva voce count. This +demand alarmed those deputies who never dared to look the Revolution in +the face. A new vote was taken, and this time, the sending of the +address to the eighty-three departments was decreed. With such an +Assembly, why should the insurrectionists have hesitated? + +The rioters of the next day did not hesitate a moment. The order of +the Directory had somewhat intimidated them. But Chabot, the deputy so +celebrated for his violence at the Jacobin Club, hastened to reassure +them. "To-morrow," said he, "you will be received with open arms by +the National Assembly. People count on you." The Faubourg +Saint-Antoine was in commotion. Condorcet said, in speaking of the +anxieties expressed by the ministers: "Is it not fine to see the +Executive asking legislators to provide means of action! Let them save +themselves; that is their business!" + +The Most Christian King is treated like the Divine Master. Petion, +mayor of Paris, is to play the role of Pontius Pilate. He washes his +hands of all that is to happen. He orders the battalions of National +Guards under arms for the following day, not in order to oppose the +march of the columns of the people, but to fraternize with the +petitioners, and act as escort to the insurrection. This equivocal +measure, he thinks, will set him right with both the Directory and the +populace. To one he says: "I am watching," and to the other, "I am +with you." {185} The rioters count on Petion as anarchy counts on +weakness. He is precisely the magistrate that suits the faubourgs when +they resort to violent measures. A last conventicle was held at the +house of Santerre the brewer, chief of battalion of the National Guard +of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, on the night of June 19-20. It broke up +at midnight. All was ready. The leaders of the insurrection repaired +each to his post. They summoned their loyal adherents, and sent them +about in small detachments to assemble and mass together the working +classes, as soon as they should leave their houses in the morning. +Santerre had declared that the National Guard could offer no opposition +to the rioters. "Rest easy," said he to the conspirators; "Petion will +be there." Louis XVI. no longer feigned not to notice the danger. +"Who knows," said he during the night to M. de Malesherbes, with a +melancholy smile, "who knows if I shall see the sun set to-morrow?" + + + + +{186} + +XVIII. + +THE MORNING OF JUNE TWENTIETH. + +It is Wednesday, June 20, 1792, the anniversary of the oath of the Jeu +de Paume. The signal is given. The faubourgs assemble. It is five in +the morning. Santerre, on horseback, is at the Place de la Bastille, +at the head of a popular staff. The army of rioters forms slowly. +Some anxiety is shown at first. The departmental decree forbidding +armed gatherings had been posted, and occasioned some reflection in the +timid. But Santerre reassures them. He tells them that the National +Guard will not be ordered to oppose their march, and that they may +count on Petion's complicity. + +When the march toward the National Assembly begins, hardly more than +fifteen hundred are in line. But the little band increases as it goes. +The route lies through rues Saint-Antoine, de la Verrerie, des +Lombards, de la Ferronnerie, and Saint-Honore. The procession is +headed by soldiers, after whom comes a great poplar stretched upon a +wagon. It is the Liberty tree. According to some, it is to be planted +in the courtyard of the Riding School, opposite the Assembly chamber; +according to others, on the {187} terrace of the Tuileries, before the +principal door of the palace. A military band plays the _Ca ira_, +which is chanted in chorus by the insurrectionary troop. No obstacle +impedes their march. The torrent swells incessantly. The inquisitive +mingle with the bandits. Some are in uniform, some in rags; there are +soldiers, active and disabled, National Guards, workmen, and beggars. +Harlots in dirty silk gowns join the contingent from studios, garrets, +and robbers' dens, and gangs of ragpickers unite with butchers from the +slaughter-houses. Pikes, lances, spits, masons' hammers, paviors' +crowbars, kitchen utensils,--their equipment is oddity itself. + +It is noon. The session of the Assembly has just been opened. At this +hour the throng, now numbering some twenty thousand persons, enters the +rue Saint-Honore. The Directory of the Department of Paris demands +admission to the bar on pressing business, and the municipal +attorney-general, Roederer, begins to speak. Heeding neither the +murmurs of the galleries, the disapprobation of part of the Assembly, +nor the clamor sure to be raised against him that evening in the +Jacobin and Cordelier clubs, he boldly announces what is going on. He +reminds them of the law, and the decrees forbidding armed gatherings +which have been issued by the Commune and the Department. He adds +that, without such prohibitions, neither the authorities nor private +individuals have any security for their lives. "We demand," cried he, +"to be invested with {188} complete responsibility; we demand that our +obligation to die for the maintenance of public tranquillity shall in +nowise be diminished." + +Vergniaud ascends the platform. He owns that, in principle, the +Assembly is wrong in admitting armed gatherings within its precincts, +but he declares that he thinks it impossible to refuse a permission +accorded to so many others to that which now presents itself. He +believes, moreover, that it could not be dispersed without a resort to +martial law and a renewal of the massacre of the Champ-de-Mars. "It +would be insulting to the citizens who are now asking to pay their +respects to you," said he, "to suspect them of bad intentions... The +assemblage doubtless does not claim to accompany the citizens who +desire to present a petition to the King. Nevertheless, as a +precaution, I propose that sixty members of the Assembly shall be +commissioned to go to the King and remain near him until this gathering +shall have been dispersed." + +The discussion continues. M. Ramond follows Vergniaud. What is going +to happen? What will the insurrectionary column do? Glance for an +instant at the topography of the Assembly and its environs. The +session-chamber is the Hall of the Riding School, which extends to the +terrace of the Feuillants, and occupies the site where the rue de +Rivoli was opened later on, almost at the corner of the future rue de +Castiglione. It is a building about one hundred and fifty feet long. +In front of it is a long and {189} narrow courtyard beginning very near +the rue de Dauphin. It is entered through this courtyard, which a +wall, afterwards replaced by a grating, separates from the terrace of +the Feuillants. It may be entered at the other extremity, also, at the +spot where the flight of steps facing the Place Vendome was afterwards +built. From the side of the courtyard it can be approached by +carriages, but from the other, only by pedestrians who cross the narrow +passage of the Feuillants, which starts from the rue Saint-Honore, +opposite the Place Vendome, and leads to the garden of the Tuileries. +This passage is bordered on the right by the convent of the Capuchins; +on the left is the Riding School, almost at the spot where the passage +opens into the Tuileries Garden by a door which had just been closed, +and before which had been placed a cannon and a battalion of National +Guards. + +On reaching the rue Saint-Honore, the crowd had taken good care not to +enter the court of the Riding School, where they might have been +arrested and disarmed. They preferred to follow the rue Saint-Honore +and take the passage conducting thence to the Assembly and the terrace +of the Feuillants. Three municipal officers who had gone to the +Tuileries Garden, passed through this passage before the crowd, and met +the advancing column at the door of the Assembly, just as M. Ramond was +in the tribune discussing Vergniaud's proposition. While the head of +the column was awaiting the issue of this discussion, the rank and file +were constantly advancing. The {190} passage became so thronged that +people were in danger of stifling. Part of them withdrew from the +crowd and went into the garden of the Capuchin convent, where they +amused themselves by planting the Liberty tree in the classic ground of +monkish ignorance and idleness, as was said in those days. The +remainder, which was in front of the door and the grating of the +terrace of the Feuillants, became exasperated. The sight of the +glittering bayonets, and the cannon placed in front of this grating, +roused them to fury. + +Meanwhile, a letter from Santerre reached the president of the National +Assembly: "Gentlemen," said he, "I have received a letter from the +commandant of the National Guard, which announces that the gathering +amounts to eight thousand men, and that they demand admission to the +bar of the chamber."--"Since there are eight thousand of them," cried a +deputy, "and since we are only seven hundred and forty-five, I move +that we adjourn the session and go away." + +Santerre's letter is thus expressed: "Mr. President, the inhabitants of +the Faubourg Saint-Antoine are celebrating to-day the anniversary of +the oath of the _Jeu de Paume_. They have been calumniated before you; +they ask to be admitted to the bar; they will confound their cowardly +detractors for the second time, and prove that they are still the men +of July 14." It was applauded by a large number of the Assembly. On +the other side murmurs rose against it. M. Ramond {191} went on with +his speech: "Eight thousand men, they say, are awaiting your decision. +You owe it to twenty-five millions of other men who await it with no +less interest.... Certainly, I shall never fear to see the citizens of +Paris in our midst, nor the entire French people around us. No one +could behold with greater pleasure than I the weapons which are a +terror to the enemies of liberty; but the law and the authorities have +spoken. Let the petitioners, therefore, lay down at the entrance of +the sanctuary the arms they are forbidden to bear within it. You ought +to insist on this. They ought to obey." + +M. Ramond's courage did not last long. Passing to Vergniaud's proposal +to send sixty members of the Assembly to the Tuileries, he said: "I +applaud the motive which prompted this proposition. But, convinced +that there is nothing to be feared by any person from the citizens of +Paris, I regard the motion as insulting to them." + +Meanwhile, the noise at the door redoubles; the petitioners are growing +impatient. Guadet rises to demand that they shall come in with their +arms. It is plain that the Gironde has taken the riot under its +patronage. After some disorderly and violent debate, it is resolved +that the president shall put the question: Are the petitioners to be +admitted to the bar? They do not yet decide this other: Shall the +armed citizens defile before the Assembly after they have been heard? +The first question is answered in the affirmative. The delegates of +the crowd are {192} admitted to the bar. They make their entry into +the Assembly between one and two in the afternoon. + +Their orator is a person named Huguenin, who will preside a few weeks +later at the Council of the Commune during the September massacres. In +his declamatory harangue he includes every tirade, threat, and insult +current in the streets. "We demand," said he, "that you should find +out why our armies are inactive. If the executive power is the cause, +let it be abolished. The blood of patriots must not flow to satisfy +the pride and ambition of the perfidious palace of the Tuileries." +Here the galleries burst into enthusiastic applause. The orator goes +on: "We complain of the delays of the Superior National Court. Why is +it so slow in bringing down the sword of the law upon the heads of the +guilty? ... Do the enemies of the country imagine that the men of July +14 are sleeping? If they appear to be so, their awakening will be +terrible.... There is no time to dissimulate; the hour is come, blood +will flow, and the tree of Liberty we are about to plant will flourish +in peace." The applause from the galleries redoubles. Huguenin +excites himself to fury: "The image of the country," he shouts, "is the +sole divinity which it shall be permitted to adore. Ought this +divinity, so dear to Frenchmen, to find in its own temple those who +rebel against its worship? Are there any such? Let them show +themselves, these friends of arbitrary power; let them make themselves +known! This is not their {193} place! Let them depart from the land +of liberty! Let them go to Coblentz and rejoin the _emigres_. There, +their hearts will expand, they will distil their venom, they will +machinate, they will conspire against their country." The orator +concludes by demanding that the armed citizens shall be passed in +review by the Assembly. It was in vain that Stanislas de Girardin +cries, "Do the laws exist no longer, then?" The Assembly capitulates. +Armed citizens are introduced. Twenty thousand men are about to pass +through the session hall. The march is opened by a dozen musicians, +who stop in front of the president's armchair. Then the two leaders of +the manifestation make their appearance: Santerre, king of the fish +markets, idol of the faubourgs, and Saint-Huruge, the deserter from the +aristocracy, the marquis demagogue; Saint-Huruge, cast into the +Bastille for his debts and scandalous behavior, and liberated by the +Revolution; Saint-Huruge, the man of gigantic stature and the strength +of a Hercules, who is the rioter _par excellence_, and whose stentorian +voice rises above the bellowing of the crowd. + +The spectators in the galleries tremble with joy; they stamp on +perceiving both Santerre and Saint-Huruge, sabre in hand and pistols at +the belt. The band plays the _Ca ira_, the national hymn of the red +caps. Is this an orgy, a masquerade? Look at these rags, these +bizarre costumes, these butcher-boys brandishing their knives, these +tattered women, these drunken harlots who dance and shout; inhale this +{194} odor of wine and eau-de-vie; behold the ensigns, the banners of +insurrection, the ambulating trophies, the stone table on which are +inscribed the Rights of Man; the placards wherein one reads: "Down with +the veto!" "The people are tired of suffering!" "Liberty or Death!" +"Tremble, tyrant!"; the gibbet from which hangs a doll representing +Marie Antoinette; the ragged breeches surmounting the fashionable +motto: "Live the Sans-Culottes!"; the bleeding heart set upon a pike, +with the inscription, "Heart of an aristocrat!" The procession, which +began about two in the afternoon, is not over until nearly four +o'clock. At this time Santerre repairs to the bar, where he says: "The +citizens of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine came here to express to you +their ardent wishes for the welfare of the country. They beg you to +accept this flag in gratitude for the good will you have shown towards +them." The president responds: "The National Assembly receives your +offering; it invites you to continue to march under the protection of +the law, the safeguard of the country." And then, heedless of the +dangers the King was about to incur, he adjourns the session at +half-past four in the afternoon. + +What is going to happen? Will the armed citizens return peaceably to +their homes? Or, not content with their promenade to the Assembly, +will they make another to the palace of the Tuileries? What +preparations have been made for its defence? Ten battalions line the +terrace facing the palace. Two {195} others are on the terrace at the +water side, four on the side of the Carrousel. There are two companies +of gendarmes before the door of the Royal Court; four on the Place +Louis XVI., to guard the passage of the Orangery, opposite rue +Saint-Florentin. Here, there might have been serious means of defence. +But Louis XVI. is a sovereign who does not defend himself. Two +municipal officers, MM. Boucher-Saint-Sauveur and Mouchet, had just +approached him: "My colleagues and myself," said M. Mouchet to him, +"have observed with pain that the Tuileries were closed the very +instant the cortege made its appearance. The people, crowded into the +passage of the Feuillants, were all the more dissatisfied because they +could see through the wicket that there were persons in the garden. We +ourselves, Sire, were very much affected at seeing cannon pointed at +the people. It is urgent that Your Majesty should order the gates of +the Tuileries to be opened." + +After hesitating slightly, Louis XVI. ended by replying: "I consent +that the door of the Feuillants shall be opened; but on condition that +you make the procession march across the length of the terrace and go +out by the courtyard gate of the Riding School, without descending into +the garden." + +This was one of the King's illusions. While he was parleying with the +two municipal officers the armed citizens had passed in review before +the Assembly. They had just left the session hall by a door leading +into the courtyard. Once in this {196} courtyard, the intervention of +some municipal officers caused the entrance known as the Dauphin's +door, opposite the street of the same name, to be opened for them. It +was by this that they entered the Tuileries Garden, while it was the +wish of Louis XVI. that they should pass out through it from the +terrace of the Feuillants. There they are, then, in the garden, having +made an irruption there instead of continuing their route through rue +Saint-Honore. Here they come along the terrace in front of the palace, +on which several battalions of the National Guard are stationed. The +crowd passes quickly before these battalions. Some of the guards unfix +their bayonets; others present arms, as if to do honor to the riot. +Having passed through the garden, the columns of the people go out +through the gate before the Pont-Royal. They pass up the quay, and +through the Louvre wickets, and so into the Place Carrousel, which is +cut up by a multitude of streets, a sort of covered ways very suitable +to facilitate the attack. + +Certain municipal officers make some slight efforts to quiet the +assailants; others, on the contrary, do what they can to embolden and +excite them. The four battalions at the entrance of the Carrousel, and +the two companies of gendarmes posted before the door of the Royal +Court, make no resistance. The rioters, who have invaded the +Carrousel, find their march obstructed by the closing of this door. +Santerre and Saint-Huruge, who had been the last to leave the National +Assembly, make their appearance, {197} raging with anger. They rail at +the people for not having penetrated into the palace. "That is all we +came for," say they. Santerre, before the door of the Royal Court--one +of the three courtyards in front of the palace, opposite the +Carrousel--summons his cannoneers. "I am going," he cries, "to open +the doors with cannon-balls." + +Some royalist officers of the National Guard seek vainly to defend the +palace. No one heeds them. The door of the Royal Court opens its two +leaves. The crowd presses through. No more dike to the torrent; the +gendarmes set their caps on the ends of their sabres, and cry: "Live +the nation!" The thing is done; the palace is invaded. + + + + +{198} + +XIX. + +THE INVASION OF THE TUILERIES. + +It is nearly four o'clock in the afternoon. The invasion of the +Tuileries is beginning. Let us glance at the palace and get a notion +of the apartments through which the crowd are about to rush. On +approaching it by way of the Carrousel, one comes first to three +courtyards: that of the Princes, in front of the Pavilion of Flora; the +Royal Court, before the Pavilion of the Horloge; and the Swiss Court, +before the Pavilion of Marsan. The assailants enter by the Royal +Court, pass into the palace through the vestibule of the Horloge +Pavilion, and climb the great staircase. On the left of this are the +large apartments of the first story:-- + +1. The Hall of the Hundred Swiss (the future Hall of the Marshals); + +2. The Hall of the Guards (the future Hall of the First Consul); + +3. The King's Antechamber (the future Salon d'Apollon); + +4. The State Bedchamber (the future Throne-room); + +{199} + +5. The King's Grand Cabinet (called later the Salon of Louis XIV.); + +6. The Gallery of Diana. + + +There are a battalion and two companies of gendarmes in the palace, as +well as the guards then on duty and those they had relieved. But as no +orders are given to these troops, they either break their ranks or +fraternize with the enemy. No obstacle, no resistance, is offered, and +nobody defends the apartments. The assailants, who have taken a cannon +as far as the first story, enter the Hall of the Hundred Swiss, whose +doors are neither locked nor barricaded. They penetrate into the Hall +of the Guards with the same ease. But when they try to make their way +into the OEil-de-Boeuf, or King's Antechamber, the locked door of this +apartment arrests their progress. This exasperates them, and one of +the panels is soon broken. + +Where is Louis XVI. when the invasion begins? In his bedroom with his +family. It communicates with the Grand Cabinet, and has windows +commanding a view of the garden. M. Acloque, chief of the second +legion of the National Guard, and a faithful royalist, hastens to the +King by way of the little staircase leading from the Princes' Court to +the royal chamber, in order to tell him what has happened. He finds +the door locked; he knocks, gives his name, urgently demands +admittance, and obtains it. He advises Louis XVI. to show himself to +the people. {200} The King, whom no peril has ever frightened, does +not hesitate to follow this advice. The Queen wishes to accompany her +husband; but she is opposed in this and forcibly drawn into the +Dauphin's chamber, which is near that of Louis XVI. Happier than the +Queen,--these are her own words,--Madame Elisabeth finds nobody to tear +her from the King. She takes hold of the skirts of her brother's coat. +Nothing could separate them. + +Louis XVI. passes into the Great Cabinet, thence into the State +Bedchamber, and through it into the OEil-de-Boeuf, where he will +presently receive the crowd. He is surrounded at this moment by Madame +Elisabeth, three of his ministers (MM. de Beaulieu, de Lajard, and +Terrier de Montciel), the old Marshal de Mouchy, Chevalier de Canolle, +M. d'Hervilly, M. Guinguerlet, lieutenant-colonel of the unmounted +gendarmes, and M. de Vainfrais, also an officer of gendarmes. Some +grenadiers of the National Guard afterwards arrive through the Great +Cabinet and the State Bedchamber. "Come here! four grenadiers of the +National Guard!" cries the King. One of them says, "Sire, do not be +afraid."--"I am not afraid," replies the King; "put your hand on my +heart; it is pure and tranquil." And taking the grenadier's hand he +presses it forcibly against his breast. The grenadier is a tailor +named Jean Lalanne. Later, under the Terror, by a decree of the 12th +Messidor, Year II., he will be condemned to death for having--so runs +the sentence--"displayed the character of a {201} cringing valet of the +tyrant, in boasting before several citizens that Capet, taking his hand +and laying it on his heart, had said to him, 'Feel, my friend, whether +it palpitates.'" + +"Gentlemen, save the King!" cries Madame Elisabeth. Meanwhile, the +crowd is still in the next apartment, the Hall of the Guards. They are +battering away with hatchets and gun-stocks at the door which opens +into the King's Antechamber. Nothing but a partition separates Louis +XVI. from the assailants. He orders the door to be opened. The crowd +rush in. "Here I am," says Louis XVI. calmly; "I have never deviated +from the Constitution." + +"Citizens," says Acloque, "recognize your King and respect him; the law +commands you to do so. We will all perish rather than suffer him to +receive the slightest harm." M. de Canolle cries: "Long live the +nation! Long live the King!" This cry is not repeated. Some one begs +Madame Elisabeth to retire. "I will not leave the King," she replies, +"I will not leave him." Those who surround Louis XVI. make a rampart +for him of their bodies. The crowd becomes immense. It is proposed to +the King that he stand on a bench in the embrasure of the central +window, from which there is a view of the courtyard. Other benches and +a table are placed in front of him. Madame Elisabeth takes a bench in +the next window with M. de Marsilly. The hall is full. Groans, +atrocious threats, and gross insults resound on every side. Some one +shouts: "Down with the {202} veto! To the devil with the veto! Recall +the patriot ministers! Let him sign, or we will not go out of here!" +The butcher Legendre comes forward. He asks permission to speak. +Silence is obtained, and, addressing the King, he says: "Monsieur." At +this unusual title, Louis XVI. make a gesture of surprise. "Yes, +Monsieur," goes on Legendre, "listen to us; it is your duty to listen +to us.... You are a traitor. You have always deceived us, and you +deceive us still; the measure is full, and the people are tired of +being made your laughing-stock." The insolent butcher, who calls +himself the agent of the people, then reads a pretended petition which +is a mere tissue of recriminations and threats. Louis XVI. listens +with imperturbable sang-froid. He answers simply: "I will do what the +Constitution and the decrees ordain that I shall do." The noise begins +anew. It is a rain, a hail of insults. + +Some individuals mistake Madame Elisabeth for Marie Antoinette. Her +equerry, M. de Saint-Pardoux, throws himself between her and the +furious wretches, who cry: "Ah! there is the Austrian woman; we must +have the Austrian!" and undeceives them by naming her.--"Why did you +not allow them to believe I am the Queen?" says the courageous +Princess; "perhaps you might have averted a greater crime." And, +putting aside a bayonet which almost touches her breast, "Take care, +Monsieur," she says gently, "you might hurt somebody, and I am sure you +would be sorry to do that." {203} The shouts redouble. The confusion +becomes terrible. It is with great difficulty that some grenadiers of +the National Guard defend the embrasure of the window where Louis XVI. +still stands immovable on his bench. Mingled with the crowd there are +inoffensive persons, who have come merely out of curiosity, and even +honest men who sincerely pity the King. But there are tigers and +assassins as well. One of them, armed with a club ending in a +sword-blade, tries to thrust it into the King's heart. The grenadiers +parry the blow with their bayonets. A market porter struggles long to +reach Louis XVI., against whom he brandishes a sabre. Several times +the wretched monarch seeks to address the crowd. His voice is lost in +the uproar. A municipal official, M. Mouchet, hoisting himself on the +shoulders of two persons, demands by voice and gesture a moment's +silence for the King and for himself. Vain efforts. The vociferations +of the crowd only increase. Here comes a long pole on the end of which +is a Phrygian cap, a _bonnet rouge_. The pole is inclined towards M. +Mouchet. M. Mouchet takes the cap and presents it to the King, who, to +please the crowd, puts it on his head. + +Is it possible? That man on a bench, with the ignoble cap of a +galley-slave on his head, surrounded by a drunken and tattered rabble +who vomit filthy language, that man the King of France and Navarre, the +most Christian King, Louis XVI.? Go back to the day of the coronation, +June 11, 1775. It is {204} just seventeen years and nine days ago! Do +you remember the Cathedral of Rheims, luminous, glittering; the +cardinals, ministers, and marshals of France, the red ribbons, the blue +ribbons, the lay peers with their vests of cloth-of-gold, their violet +ducal mantles lined with ermine; the clerical peers with cope and +cross? Do you remember the King taking Charlemagne's sword in his +hand, and then prostrating himself before the altar on a great +kneeling-cushion of velvet sown with golden lilies? Do you see him +vested by the grand-chamberlain with the tunic, the dalmatica, and the +ermine-lined mantle which represent the vestments of a sub-deacon, +deacon, and priest, because the King is not merely a sovereign, but a +pontiff? Do you see him seizing the royal sceptre, that golden sceptre +set with oriental pearls, and carvings representing the great +Carlovingian Emperor on a throne adorned with lions and eagles? Do you +remember the pealing of the bells, the chords of the organ, the blare +of trumpets, the clouds of incense, the birds flying in the nave? + +And now, instead of the coronation the pillory; instead of the crown +the hideous red cap; instead of hymns and murmurs of admiration and +respect,--insults, the buffoonery of the fish-market, shouts of +contempt and hatred, threats of murder. Ah! the time is not far +distant when a Conventionist will break the vial containing the sacred +oil on the pavement of the Abbey of Saint Remi. How slippery is the +swift descent, the fatal descent by which a {205} sovereign who disarms +himself glides down from the heights of power and glory to the depths +of opprobrium and sorrow! There he is! Not content with putting the +red bonnet on his head, he keeps it there, and mumming in the Jacobin +coiffure, he cries: "Long live the nation!" The crowd find the +spectacle amusing. A National Guard, to whom some one has passed a +bottle of wine, offers the complaisant King a drink. Perhaps the wine +is poisoned. No matter; Louis XVI. takes a glass of it. + +While all this is going on, two deputies, Isnard and Vergniaud, present +themselves. "Citizens," says the first, "I am Isnard, a deputy. If +what you demand were at once granted, it might be thought you extorted +it by force. In the name of the law and the National Assembly, I ask +you to respect the constituted authorities and retire. The National +Assembly will do justice; I will aid thereto with all my power. You +shall obtain satisfaction; I answer for it with my head; but go away." +Vergniaud follows him with similar remarks. Neither is listened to. +Nobody departs. + +It is six in the evening. For two hours, one man, exposed to every +insult, has held his own against a multitude. At last Petion arrives +wearing his mayor's scarf. The crowd draws back. "Sire," says he, "I +have just this instant learned the situation you were in."--"That is +very astonishing," returns Louis XVI.; "for it has lasted two +hours."--"Sire, truly, I was ignorant that there was trouble at the +palace. {206} As soon as I was informed, I hastened to your side. But +you have nothing to fear; I answer for it that the people will respect +you."--"I fear nothing," replies the King. "Moreover, I have not been +in any danger, since I was surrounded by the National Guard." + +Petion, like Pontius Pilate, pretends indifference. A municipal +officer, M. Champion, reminds him of his duties, and says with +firmness: "Order the people to retire; order them in the name of the +law; we are threatened with great danger, and you must speak." At last +Petion decides to intervene. "Citizens," he says, "all you who are +listening to me, came to present legally your petition to the +hereditary representative of the nation, and you have done so with the +dignity and majesty of a free people; return now to your homes, for you +can desire nothing further. Your demand will doubtless be reiterated +by all the eighty-three departments, and the King will grant your +prayer. Retire, and do not, by remaining longer, give occasion to the +public enemies to impugn your worthy intentions." + +At first this discourse of the mayor of Paris produces but slight +effect. The cries and threats continue. But, after a while, the +crowd, worn out with shouting, and hungry and thirsty as well, begin to +quiet down a little. The most excited cry: "We are waiting for an +answer from the King. Nothing has been asked of him yet." Others say: +"Listen to the mayor, he is going to speak again; we will {207} hear +him." Petion repeats what he said before: "If you do not wish your +magistrates to be unjustly accused, withdraw." + +M. Sergent, administrator of police, who had come with the mayor, asked +if any one has ordered the doors leading from the Grand Cabinet to the +Gallery of Diana to be opened, so as to allow the crowd to pass out by +the small staircase into the Court of the Princes. Louis XVI. +overheard this question. "I have had the apartments opened," said he; +"the people, marching out on the gallery side, will like to see them." +A sentiment of curiosity hastened the movements of the crowd. In order +to go out, they had to pass through the State Bedchamber, the Grand +Cabinet, and the Gallery of Diana. Sergent, standing in front of the +door, leading from the OEil-de-Boeuf to the State Bedchamber, unfastens +his scarf and waving it over his head, cries: "Citizens, this is the +badge of the law; in its name we invite you to retire and follow us." +Petion says: "The people have done what they ought to do. You have +acted with the pride and dignity of freemen. But there has been enough +of it; let all retire." A double row of National Guards is formed, and +the people pass between them. The return march begins. A few +recalcitrants want to remain, and keep up a cry of "Down with the veto! +Recall the ministers!" But they are swept on by the stream, and follow +the march like all the rest. While they are going out through the door +between the OEil-de-Boeuf and the State {208} Bed-chamber, the National +Guard prevents any one from entering on the other side, through the +door connecting the OEil-de-Boeuf with the Hall of the Guards. + +At this moment, a deputation of twenty-four members of the Assembly +present themselves. Roused by the public clamor announcing that the +King's life is in danger, the National Assembly has called an +extraordinary evening session. The president of the deputation, M. +Brunk, says to the King: "Sire, the National Assembly sends us to +assure ourselves of your situation, to protect the constitutional +liberty you should enjoy, and to share your danger." Louis XVI. +replies: "I am grateful for the solicitude of the Assembly; I am +undisturbed in the midst of Frenchmen." At the same time, Petion goes +to turn back the crowd, who are constantly ascending the great +staircase, and who threaten another invasion. The sentry at the +doorway of the OEil-de-Boeuf is replaced, and the crowd ceases to flock +thither. The circle of National Guards about the sovereign is +increased. A space is formed, and he is surrounded by the deputation +from the Assembly. Acloque, seeing that the tumult is lessening and +the room no longer encumbered by the crowd, proposes to the King that +he should retire, and Louis XVI. decides to do so. Surrounded by +deputies and National Guards, he passes into the State Bedchamber, and +notwithstanding the throng, he manages to reach a secret door at the +right of the bed, near the chimney, which communicates with his +bedroom. He goes through this little door, and some one closes it +behind him. + +{209} + +It is not far from eight o'clock in the evening. The peril and +humiliation of Louis XVI. have lasted nearly four hours, and the +unhappy King is not yet at the end of his sufferings, for he does not +know what has become of his wife and children. While these sad scenes +had been enacting in the palace, a furious populace had been in +incessant commotion beneath the windows, in the garden and the +courtyards. People desiring to establish communication between those +down stairs and those above, had been heard to cry: "Have they been +struck down? Are they dead? Throw us down their heads!" + +A slender young man, with the profile of a Roman medal, a pale +complexion, and flashing eyes, was looking at all this from the upper +part of the terrace beside the water. Unable to comprehend the +long-suffering of Louis XVI., he said in an indignant tone: "How could +they have allowed this rabble to enter? They should have swept out +four or five hundred of them with cannon, and the rest would have run." +The man who spoke thus, obscure and hidden in the crowd, opposite that +palace where he was to play so great a part, was the "straight-haired +Corsican," the future Emperor Napoleon. + + + + +{210} + +XX. + +MARIE ANTOINETTE ON JUNE TWENTIETH. + +Louis XVI. had just entered his bedchamber. The crowd, after leaving +the hall of the OEil-de-Boeuf, had departed through the State +Bedchamber, and the King's Great Cabinet, called also the Council Hall. +On entering this last apartment, an unexpected scene had surprised +them. Behind the large table they saw the Queen, Madame Elisabeth, the +Dauphin, and Madame Royale. + +How came the Queen to be there? What had happened? At a quarter of +four, when Louis XVI. had left his room to go into the hall of the +Bull's-Eye and meet the rioters, Marie Antoinette, as we have already +said, made desperate efforts to follow him. M. Aubier, placing himself +before the door of the King's chamber, prevented the Queen from going +out. In vain she cried: "Let me pass; my place is beside the King; I +will join him and perish with him if it must be." M. Aubier, through +devotion, disobeyed her. Nevertheless, the Queen, whose courage +redoubled her strength, would have borne down this faithful servant if +M. Rougeville, a chevalier of Saint-Louis, had not aided him to block +up the passage. {211} Imploring Marie Antoinette in the name of her +own safety and that of the King, not to expose herself needlessly to +poniards, and aided by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, they drew her +almost by force into the chamber of the Dauphin, which was near the +King's. MM. de Choiseul, d'Haussonville, and de Saint-Priest, assisted +by several grenadiers of the National Guard, afterwards induced her to +go with her children into the Grand Cabinet of the King, called also +the Council Hall, because the ministers were accustomed to assemble +there. + +The Princess de Lamballe, the Princess of Tarento, the Marchioness de +Tourzel, the Duchesses de Luynes, de Duras, de Maille, the Marchioness +de Laroche-Aymon, Madame de Soucy, the Baroness de Mackau, the Countess +de Ginestous, remained with the Queen. So also did the Minister +Chambonas, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts d'Haussonville and de +Montmorin, Viscount de Saint-Priest, Marquis de Champcenetz, and +General de Wittenghoff, commander of the 17th military division. The +Queen and her children occupied the embrasure of a window, and the +large and heavy table used by the ministerial council was placed in +front of them as a sort of barricade. + +Meanwhile, Marie Antoinette's apartments and her bedroom on the +ground-floor were invaded. Some National Guards tried vainly to defend +them. "You are cutting your own throats!" shouted the people. +Overwhelmed by numbers, they saw the door of the first apartment broken +down by hatchets. It {212} contained the beds of the Queen's servants, +ranged behind screens. Afterwards they saw the invaders go into Marie +Antoinette's sleeping-room, tear the clothes off her bed, and loll upon +it, crying as they did so, "We will have the Austrian woman, dead or +alive!" + +The Queen, however, remained in the Council Hall, where she could hear +the echo of the cries resounding in that of the OEil-de-Boeuf, where +Louis XVI. was, and from which she was separated only by the State +Bedchamber. Toward seven in the evening she beheld Madame Elisabeth, +who, after heroically sharing the dangers of the King, had now found +means to rejoin her. "The deputies who came to us," she wrote to +Madame de Raigecourt, July 3, "had come out of good will. A veritable +deputation arrived and persuaded the King to go back to his own +apartments. As I was told this, and as I was unwilling to be left in +the crowd, I went away about an hour before he did, and rejoined the +Queen: you can imagine with what pleasure I embraced her." In their +perils, therefore, Madame Elisabeth was near both Louis XVI. and Marie +Antoinette. + +After having voluntarily exposed herself to all the anguish of the +invasion of the OEil-de-Boeuf, the courageous Princess was with the +Queen in the Council Hall, when the crowd, coming through the State +Bed-chamber, arrived there. The horde marched through it, carrying +their barbarous inscriptions like so many ferocious standards. "One of +these," says Madame {213} Campan in her Memoirs, "represented a gibbet +from which an ugly doll was hanging; below it was written: 'Marie +Antoinette to the lamp-post!' Another was a plank to which a bullock's +heart had been fastened, surrounded by the words: 'Heart of Louis XVI.' +Finally, a third presented a pair of bullock's horns with an indecent +motto." Some royalist grenadiers belonging to the battalion called the +_Filles-Saint-Thomas_, were near the council-table and protected the +Queen. Marie Antoinette was standing, and held her daughter's hand. +The Dauphin sat on the table in front of her. At the moment when the +march began, a woman threw a red cap on this table and cried out that +it must be placed on the Queen's head. M. de Wittenghoff, his hand +trembling with indignation, took the cap and after holding it for a +moment over Marie Antoinette's head, put it back on the table. Then a +cry was raised: "The red cap for the Prince Royal! Tri-colored ribbons +for little Veto!" Ribbons were thrown down beside the Phrygian cap. +Some one shouted: "If you love the nation, set the red cap on your +son's head." The Queen made an affirmative sign, and the revolutionary +coiffure was set on the child's fair head. + +What humiliations were these for the unhappy mother! What anguish for +so haughty, so magnanimous a queen! The galley-slave's cap has touched +the head of the daughter of Caesars, and now soils the forehead of her +son! The slang of the {214} fish-markets resounds beneath the +venerable arches of the palace. How bitterly the unfortunate sovereign +expiates her former triumphs! Where are the ovations and the +apotheoses, the carriages of gold and crystal, the solemn entries into +the city in its gala dress, to the sound of bells and trumpets? What +trace remains of those brilliant days when, more goddess than woman, +the Queen of France and Navarre appeared through a cloud of incense, in +the midst of flowers and light? This good and beautiful sovereign, +whose least smile, or glance, or nod, had been regarded as a precious +recompense, a supreme favor by the noble lords and ladies who bent +respectfully before her, behold how she is treated now! Consider the +costumes and the language of her new courtiers! And yet, Marie +Antoinette is majestic still. Even in this horrible scene, in presence +of these drunken women and ragged suburbans, she does not lose that +gift of pleasing which is her special dower. At a distance they curse +her; but when they come near they are subjugated by her spell. Her +most ferocious enemies are touched in their own despite. A young girl +had just called her "_Autrichienne_." "You call me an Austrian woman," +replied she, "but I am the wife of the King of France, I am the mother +of the Dauphin; I am a Frenchwoman by my sentiments as wife and mother. +I shall never again see the land where I was born. I can be happy or +unhappy nowhere but in France. I was happy when you loved me." +Confused by this gentle {215} reproach, the young girl softened. +"Pardon me," she said; "it was because I did not know you; I see very +well now that you are not wicked." A woman, passing, stopped before +the Queen and began to sob. "What is the matter with her?" asked +Santerre; "what is she crying about?" And he shook her by the arm, +saying: "Make her pass on, she is drunk." Even Santerre himself felt +Marie Antoinette's influence. "Madame," he said to her, "the people +wish you no harm. Your friends deceive you; you have nothing to fear, +and I am going to prove it by serving as your shield." It was he who +took pity on the Dauphin whom the heat was stifling, and said: "Take +the red cap off the child; he is too hot." He too, it was, that +hastened the march of the procession and pointed out to the people the +different members of the royal family by name, saying: "This is the +Queen, this is her son, this her daughter, this Madame Elisabeth." + +At last the crowd is gone. The hall is empty. It is eight o'clock. +The Queen and her children enter the King's chamber. Louis XVI., who +finds them once more after so many perils and emotions, covers them +with kisses. In the midst of this pathetic scene some deputies arrive. +Marie Antoinette shows them the traces of violence which the people +have left behind them,--locks broken, hinges forced off, wainscoting +burst through, furniture ruined. She speaks of the dangers that have +threatened the King and the insults offered to herself. Perceiving +that Merlin de {216} Thionville, an ardent Jacobin, has tears in his +eyes, she says: "You are weeping to see the King and his family so +cruelly treated by people whom he has always desired to render happy." +The republican answered: "Yes, Madame, I weep, but it is for the +misfortunes of the mother of a family, not for the King and Queen; I +hate kings and queens." A deputy accosted Marie Antoinette, saying in +a familiar tone: "You were very much afraid, Madame, you must admit." +"No, Monsieur," she replied, "I was not at all afraid; but I suffered +much in being separated from the King at a moment when his life was in +danger. At least, I had the consolation of being with my children and +performing one of my duties." "Without pretending to excuse +everything, agree, Madame, that the people showed themselves very +good-natured." "The King and I, Monsieur, are convinced of the natural +goodness of the people; it is only when they are misled that they are +wicked."--"How old is Mademoiselle?" went on the deputy, pointing to +Madame Royale.--"She is at that age, Monsieur, when one feels only too +great a horror of such scenes." + +Other deputies surround the Dauphin. They question him on different +subjects, especially concerning the geography of France and its new +territorial division into departments and districts, and are enchanted +by the correctness of his replies. + +An officer of Chasseurs of the National Guard enters the King's +chamber. This officer had shown {217} the utmost zeal in protecting +his sovereign and had had the honor of being wounded at his side. He +is congratulated. The Dauphin perceives him. "What is the name of +that guard who defended my father so bravely?" he asks.--"Monseigneur," +replies M. Hue, "I do not know; he will be flattered if you ask him." +The Prince runs to put his question to the officer, but the latter, in +respectful terms, declines to answer. Then M. Hue insists. "I beg +you," he cries, "tell us your name."--"I ought to conceal my name," +replies the officer; "unfortunately for me, it is the same as that of +an execrable man." The faithful royalist bore the same name as the man +who had caused the arrest of the royal family at Varennes the previous +year. He was called Drouot. + +The hour for repose has come at last. It is ten o'clock. Certain +individuals still complain: "They took us there for nothing; but we +will go back and have what we want." Still, the storm is over. The +crowd has evacuated the palace, the courtyards, and the garden. The +Assembly closes its sessions at half-past ten. Petion said there: "The +King has no cause of complaint against the citizens who marched before +him. He has said as much to the deputies and magistrates." Finally, +as the deputies were about to separate after this exciting day, one of +them, M. Guyton-Morveau, remarked: "The deputation which preceded us, +has doubtless announced to you that all is now tranquil. We remained +with the King for some time, and saw nothing which could {218} inspire +the least alarm. We invited the King to seek some repose. He sent an +officer of the National Guard to visit the posts, and the officer +reported that there was nobody in the palace. His Majesty assured us +that he desired to remain alone; we left him; and we can certify to you +that all is quiet." + + + + +{219} + +XXI. + +THE MORROW OF JUNE TWENTIETH. + +In the morning of June 21 there were still some disorderly gatherings +in front of the Tuileries. On awaking, the Dauphin put this artless +question to the Queen: "Mamma, is it yesterday still?" Alas! yes, it +was still yesterday, it was always to be yesterday until the +catastrophes at the end of the drama. It was just a year to a day +since the royal family had furtively quitted Paris to begin the fatal +journey which terminated at Varennes. This souvenir occurred to Marie +Antoinette, and, recalling the first stations of her Calvary, the +unfortunate sovereign told herself that her humiliations had but just +begun. Her lips had touched only the brim of the chalice, and it must +be drained to the dregs. + +Meanwhile, visitors were arriving at the Tuileries one after another to +condole with and protest their fidelity to the King and his family. +When Marshal de Mouchy made his appearance, the worthy old man was +received with the honors due to his noble conduct on the previous day. +When the invasion began, Louis XVI., in order not to irritate the +rabble, had given his gentlemen a formal order to withdraw, but {220} +the old marshal, hoping that his great age (he was seventy-seven) would +excuse his presence in the palace, had refused to leave his master. +More than once, with a strength rejuvenated by devotion, he had +succeeded in repulsing persons whose violence made him tremble for the +King's life. As soon as she saw the marshal, Marie Antoinette made +haste to say: "I have learned from the King how courageously you +defended him yesterday. I share his gratitude."--"Madame," he replied, +alluding to those of his relatives who had figured among the promoters +of the Revolution, "I did very little in comparison with the injuries I +should like to repair. They were not mine, but they touch me very +nearly."--"My son," said the Queen, calling the Dauphin, "repeat before +the marshal, the prayer you addressed to God this morning for the +King." The child, kneeling down, put his hands together, and looking +up to heaven, began to sing this refrain from the opera of _Pierre le +Grand_:-- + + _Ciel, entends la priere + Qu'ici je fais: + Conserve un si bon pere + A ses sujets._[1] + + +After the Marshal de Mouchy came M. de Malesherbes. Contrary to his +usual custom, the ex-first {221} president wore his sword. "It is a +long time," some one said to him, "since you have worn a +sword."--"True," replied the old man, "but who would not arm when the +King's life is in danger?" Then, looking with emotion at the little +Prince, he said to Marie Antoinette: "I hope, Madame, that at least our +children will see better days!" + +And yet, even for the present there still remained a glimmer of hope. +Hardly had the invaders left the palace than invectives against them +rose from all classes of society. The calmness and courage of the King +and his family found admirers on every side. The departments sent +addresses demanding the punishment of those who had been guilty. +Royalist sentiments woke to life anew. One might almost believe that +the indignation caused by the recent scandals would produce an +immediate reaction in favor of Louis XVI. Possibly, with an energetic +sovereign, something might have been attempted. On the whole, the +insurrection had obtained nothing. Even the Girondins perceived the +dangerous character of revolutionary passions. Honest men stigmatized +the criminal tendencies which had just displayed themselves. It was +the moment for the King to show himself and strike a great blow. But +Louis XVI. had neither will nor energy. Letting the last chance of +safety which fortune offered him escape, he was unable to profit by the +turn in public opinion. Nothing could shake him out of that easy +patience which was the chief cause of his ruin. + +{222} + +Marie Antoinette herself was opposed to vigorous measures. She still +desired to try the effects of kindness. Learning that a legal inquiry +was proposed into the events of June 20, and foreseeing that M. Hue +would be called as a witness, she said to this loyal servant: "Say as +little in your deposition as truth will permit. I recommend you, on +the King's part and my own, to forget that we were the objects of these +popular movements. Every suspicion that either the King or myself feel +the least resentment for what happened must be avoided; it is not the +people who are guilty, and even if it were, they would always obtain +pardon and forgetfulness of their errors from us." + +During this time the Assembly maintained an attitude more than +equivocal. It contained a great number of honest men. But, terrorized +already, it no longer possessed the courage of indignation. It grew +pale before the menaces of the public. By cringing to the rabble it +had attained that hypocritical optimism which is the distinctive mark +of moderate revolutionists, and which makes them in turn the dupes and +the victims of those who are more zealous. + +If the majority of the deputies had said openly what they silently +thought, they would not have hesitated to stigmatize the invasion of +the Tuileries as it deserved. But in that case, what would have become +of their popularity with the pikemen? And then, must they not take +into account the ambitions of the Girondins, the hatreds of the +Mountain party, {223} and the rancor of Madame Roland and her friends? +Was it not, moreover, a real satisfaction to the bourgeoisie to give +power a lesson and humiliate a sovereign? Ah! how cruelly this +pleasure will be expiated by those who take delight in it, and how they +will repent some day for having permitted justice, law, and authority +to be trampled under foot! + +When the session of June 21 opened, Deputy Daverhoult denounced in +energetic terms the violence of the previous day. Thuriot exclaimed: +"Are we expected to press an inquiry against forty thousand men?" +Duranton, the Minister of Justice, then read a letter from the King, +dated that day, and worded thus: "Gentlemen, the National Assembly is +already acquainted with the events of yesterday. Paris is doubtless in +consternation; France will hear the news with astonishment and grief. +I was much affected by the zeal shown for me by the National Assembly +on this occasion. I leave to its prudence the task of investigating +the causes of this event, weighing its circumstances, and taking the +necessary measures to maintain the Constitution and assure the +inviolability and constitutional liberty of the hereditary +representative of the nation. For my part, nothing can prevent me, at +all times and under all circumstances, from performing the duties +imposed on me by the Constitution, which I have accepted in the true +interests of the French nation." + +A few moments after this letter had been read, the session was +disturbed by a warning from the {224} municipal agent of the +department, to the effect that an armed crowd were marching towards the +palace. This was soon followed by tidings that Petion had hindered +their further advance, and the mayor himself came to the Assembly to +receive the laudations of his friends. "Order reigns everywhere," said +he; "all precautions have been taken. The magistrates have done their +duty; they will always do so, and the hour approaches when justice will +be rendered them." + +Petion then went to the Tuileries, where he addressed the King nearly +in these terms:-- + +"Sire, we learn that you have been warned of the arrival of a crowd at +the palace. We come to announce that this crowd is composed of unarmed +citizens who wish to set up a may-pole. I know, Sire, that the +municipality has been calumniated; but its conduct will be understood +by you."--"It ought to be by all France," responded Louis XVI.; "I +accuse no one in particular, I saw everything."--"It will be," returned +the mayor; "and but for the prudent measures taken by the municipality, +much more disagreeable events might have occurred." The King attempted +to reply, but Petion, without listening to him, went on: "Not to your +own person; you may well understand that it will always be respected." +The King, unaccustomed to interruption when speaking, said in a loud +voice: "Be silent!" There was silence for an instant, and then Louis +XVI. added: "Is it what you call respecting {225} my person to enter my +house in arms, break down my doors and use force to my +guards?"--"Sire," answered Petion, "I know the extent of my duties and +of my responsibility."--"Do your duty!" replied Louis XVI.; "You are +answerable for the tranquillity of Paris. Adieu!" And the King turned +his back on the mayor. + +Petion revenged himself that very evening, by circulating a rumor that +the royal family were preparing to escape; in consequence, he requested +the commanders of the National Guard to re-enforce the sentries and +redouble their vigilance. The revolutionists, who had been +disconcerted for a moment by popular indignation, raised their heads +again. Prudhomme wrote in the _Revolutions de Paris_: "The Parisian +people--yes, the people, not the aristocratic class of citizens--have +just set a grand example to France. The King, at the instigation of +Lafayette, discharged his patriotic ministers; he paralyzed by his veto +the decree relative to the camp of twenty thousand men, and that on the +banishment of priests. Very well! the people rose and signified to him +their sovereign will that the ministers should be reinstated and these +two murderous vetoes recalled.... Doubtless it will not be long before +Europe will be full of a caricature representing Louis XVI. of the big +paunch, covered with orders, crowned with a red cap, and drinking out +of the same bottle with the _sans-culottes_, who are crying: 'The King +is drinking, the King has drunk. He has the liberty {226} cap on his +head.' Would he might have it in his heart!" + +Apropos of this red bonnet which remained for three hours on the +sovereign's head, Bertrand de Molleville ventured to put some questions +to Louis XVI. on the evening of June 21. According to the Memoirs of +the former Minister of Marine, this is what the King replied: "The +cries of 'Long live the Nation' increasing in violence and seeming to +be addressed to me, I answered that the nation had no better friend +than I. Then an ill-looking man, thrusting himself through the crowd, +came close to me and said in a rude tone: 'Very well! if you are +telling the truth, prove it to us by putting on this red cap.' 'I +consent,' said I. Instantly one or two of these people advanced and +placed the cap on my hair, for it was too small for my head to enter +it. I was convinced, I don't know why, that their intention was simply +to place this cap on my head and then retire, and I was so preoccupied +with what was going on before my eyes, that I did not notice whether it +was there or not. So little did I feel it that after I had returned to +my chamber I did not observe that I still wore it until I was told. I +was greatly astonished to find it on my head, and was all the more +displeased because I could have taken it off at once without the least +difficulty. But I am convinced that if I had hesitated to receive it, +the drunken man by whom it was presented would have thrust his pike +into my stomach." + +{227} + +During the same interview Bertrand de Molleville congratulated the King +upon his almost miraculous escape from the dangers of the previous day. +Louis XVI. replied: "All my anxieties were for the Queen, my children +and my sister; because I feared nothing for myself."--"But it seems to +me," rejoined his interlocutor, "that this insurrection was aimed +chiefly against Your Majesty."--"I know it very well," returned Louis +XVI.; "I saw clearly that they wanted to assassinate me, and I don't +know why they did not do it; but I shall not escape them another day. +So I have gained nothing; it is all the same whether I am assassinated +now or two months from now!"--"Great God!" cried Bertrand de +Molleville, "does Your Majesty believe that you will be +assassinated?"--"I am convinced of it," replied the King; "I have +expected it for a long time and have accustomed myself to the thought. +Do you think I am afraid of death?"--"Certainly not, but I would desire +Your Majesty to take vigorous measures to protect yourself from +danger."--"It is possible," went on the King after a moment of +reflection, "that I may escape. There are many odds against me, and I +am not lucky. If I were alone I would risk one more attempt. Ah! if +my wife and children were not with me, people should see that I am not +so weak as they fancy. What would be their fate if the measures you +propose to me did not succeed?"--"But if they assassinate Your Majesty, +do you think that the Queen and her children would be in less +danger?"--"Yes, I think {228} so, and even were it otherwise, I should +not have to reproach myself with being the cause." + +A sort of Christian fanaticism had taken possession of the King's soul. +Resigned to his fate, he ceased to struggle, and wrote to his +confessor: "Come to see me to-day; I have done with men; I want nothing +now but heaven." + + + +[1] Listen, heaven, to the prayer + That here I make: + Preserve so good a father + To his subjects. + + + + +{229} + +XXII. + +LAFAYETTE IN PARIS. + +One of the greatest griefs of a political career is disenchantment. To +pass from devout optimism to profound discouragement; to have treated +as alarmists or cowards whoever perceived the least cloud on the +horizon, and then to see the most formidable tempests unchained; to be +obliged to recognize at one's proper cost that one has carried illusion +to the verge of simplicity and has judged neither men nor things +aright; to have heard distressed passengers saying that a pilot without +experience or prudence is responsible for the shipwreck; to have +promised the age of gold and suddenly found one's self in the age of +iron, is a veritable torture for the pride and the conscience of a +statesman. And this torture is still more cruel when to disappointment +is added the loss of a popularity laboriously acquired; when, having +been accustomed to excite nothing but enthusiasm and applause, one is +all at once greeted with criticism, howls, and curses, and when, having +long strutted about triumphantly on the summits of the Capitol, one +sees yawning before him the gulf at the foot of the Tarpeian rock. + +{230} + +Such was the fate of Lafayette. A few months had sufficed to throw +down the popular idol from his pedestal, and the same persons who had +once almost burned incense before him, now thought of nothing but +flinging him into the gutter. Stunned by his fall, Lafayette could not +believe it. To familiarize himself with the fickleness, the caprices, +and the inconsequence of the multitude was impossible. For him the +Constitution was the sacred ark, and he did not believe that the very +men who had constructed this edifice at such a cost had now nothing so +much at heart as to destroy it. He would not admit that the +predictions of the royalists were about to be accomplished in every +point, and still desired to hold aloof from the complicities into which +revolutions drag the most upright minds and the most honest characters. +He who, in July, 1789, had not been able to prevent the assassination +of Foulon and Berthier; who, on October 5, had marched, despite +himself, against Versailles; who, on April 18, 1791, had been unable to +protect the departure of the royal family to Saint Cloud; who, on the +following June 21, had thought himself obliged to say to the Jacobins +in their club: "I have come to rejoin you, because I think the true +patriots are here," nevertheless imagined that just a year later, all +that was necessary to vanquish the same Jacobins was for him to show +himself and say like Caesar: "_Veni, vidi, vici_." + +It was only a later illusion of the generous but imprudent man who had +already dreamed many {231} dreams. He thought the popular tiger could +be muzzled by persuasion. He was going to make a _coup d'etat_, not in +deeds, but in words, forgetting that the Revolution neither esteems nor +fears anything but force. As M. de Larmartime has said: "One gets from +factions only what one snatches." Instead of striking, Lafayette was +going to speak and write. The Jacobins might have feared his sword; +they despised his words and pen. But though it was not very wise, the +noble audacity with which the hero of America came spontaneously to +throw himself into the heat of the struggle and utter his protest in +the name of right and honor, was none the less an act of courage. +While with the army, that asylum of generous ideas, the sentiments on +which his ancestors had prided themselves rekindled in his heart. +Memories of his early youth revived anew. Doubtless he also recalled +his personal obligations to Louis XVI. On his return from the United +States, had he not been created major-general over the heads of a +multitude of older officers? Had not the Queen accorded him at that +epoch the most flattering eulogies? Had he not been received at the +great receptions of May 29, 1785, when any other officer unless highly +born would have remained in the OEil-de-Boeuf or paid his court in the +passage of the chapel? Had he not accepted the rank of +lieutenant-general from the King, on June 30, 1791? The gentleman +reappeared beneath the revolutionist. The humiliation of a throne for +which his ancestors had so often shed their blood {232} caused him a +real grief, and it is perhaps regrettable that Louis XVI. should have +refused the hand which his recent adversary extended loyally though +late. + +Lafayette was encamped near Bavay with the Army of the North when the +first tidings of June 20 reached him. His soul was roused to +indignation, and he wanted to start at once for Paris to lift his voice +against the Jacobins. Old Marshal Luckner tried in vain to restrain +him by saying that the _sans-culottes_ would have his head. Nothing +could stop him. Placing his army in safety under the cannon of +Maubeuge, he started with no companion but an aide-de-camp. At +Soissons some persons tried to dissuade him from going further by +painting a doleful picture of the dangers to which he would expose +himself. He listened to nobody and went on his way. Reaching Paris in +the night of June 27-28, he alighted at the house of his intimate +friend, the Duke de La Rochefoucauld, who was about to play so +honorable a part. As soon as morning came, Lafayette was at the door +of the National Assembly, asking permission to offer the homage of his +respect. This authorization having been granted, he entered the hall. +The right applauded; the left kept silence. Being allowed to speak, he +declared that he was the author of the letter to the Assembly of June +16, whose authenticity had been denied, and that he openly avowed +responsibility for it. He then expressed himself in the sincerest +terms concerning the outrages committed in {233} the palace of the +Tuileries on June 20. He said he had received from the officers, +subalterns, and soldiers of his army a great number of addresses +expressive of their love for the Constitution, their respect for the +authorities, and their patriotic hatred against seditious men of all +parties. He ended by imploring the Assembly to punish the authors or +instigators of the violences committed on June 20, as guilty of treason +against the nation, and to destroy a sect which encroached upon +National Sovereignty, and terrorized citizens, and by their public +debates removed all doubts concerning the atrocity of their projects. +"In my own name and that of all honest men in the kingdom," said he in +conclusion, "I entreat you to take efficacious measures to make all +constitutional authorities respected, particularly your own and that of +the King, and to assure the army that the Constitution will receive no +injury from within, while so many brave Frenchmen are lavishing their +blood to defend it on the frontiers." + +Applause from the right and from some of those in the galleries began +anew. The president said: "The National Assembly has sworn to maintain +the Constitution. Faithful to its oath, it will be able to guarantee +it against all attacks. It accords to you the honors of the session." +The general went to take his seat on the right. Deputy Kersaint +observed that his place was on the petitioners' bench. The general +obeyed this hint and sat down modestly on the bench assigned him. +Renewed applause {234} ensued. Thereupon Guadet ascended the tribune +and said in an ironic tone: "At the moment when M. Lafayette's presence +in Paris was announced to me, a most consoling idea presented itself. +So we have no more external enemies, thought I; the Austrians are +conquered. This illusion did not last long. Our enemies remain the +same. Our exterior situation is not altered, and yet M. Lafayette is +in Paris! What powerful motives have brought him hither? Our internal +troubles? Does he fear, then, that the National Assembly is not strong +enough to repress them? He constitutes himself the organ of his army +and of honest men. Where are these honest men? How has the army been +able to deliberate?" Guadet concluded thus: "I demand that the +Minister of War be asked whether he gave leave of absence to M. +Lafayette, and that the extraordinary Committee of Twelve make a report +to-morrow on the danger of granting the right of petition to generals." +Ramond, one of the most courageous members of the right, was the next +speaker: "Four days ago," said he, "an armed multitude asked to appear +before you. Positive laws forbade such a thing, and a proclamation +made by the department on the previous day recalled this law and +demanded that it should be put into execution. You paid no attention, +but admitted armed men into your midst. To-day M. Lafayette presents +himself; he is known only by reason of his love of liberty; his life is +a series of combats against despotisms of every sort; he has {235} +sacrificed his life and fortune to the Revolution. It is against this +man that pretended suspicions are directed and every passion unchained. +Has the National Assembly two weights and measures, then? Certainly, +if respect is to be had to persons, it should be shown to this eldest +son of French liberty." This eulogy exasperated the left. Deputy +Saladin exclaimed: "I ask M. Ramond if he is making M. Lafayette's +funeral oration?" However, the right was still in the majority. After +a long tumult Guadet's motion against Lafayette was rejected by 339 +votes against 234. The general left the Assembly surrounded by a +numerous cortege of deputies and National Guards, and went directly to +the palace of the Tuileries. + +It is the decisive moment. The vote just taken may serve as the +starting-point of a conservative reaction if the King will trust +himself to Lafayette. But how will he receive him? The sovereign's +greeting will be polite, but not cordial. The King and Queen say they +are persuaded that there is no safety but in the Constitution. Louis +XVI. adds that he would consider it a very fortunate thing if the +Austrians were beaten without delay. Lafayette is treated with a +courtesy through which suspicion pierces. When he leaves the palace, a +large crowd accompany him to his house and plant a may-pole before the +door. On the next day Louis XVI. was to review four thousand men of +the National Guard. Lafayette had proposed to appear at this review +{236} beside the King and make a speech in favor of order. But the +court does not desire the general's aid, and takes what measures it can +to defeat this project. Petion, whom it had preferred to Lafayette as +mayor of Paris, countermands the review an hour before daybreak. + +Perhaps Louis XVI. might have succeeded in overcoming his repugnance to +Lafayette and submitted to be rescued by him. But the Queen absolutely +refused to trust the man whom she considered her evil genius. She had +seen him rise like a spectre at every hapless hour. He had brought her +back to Paris a prisoner on the 6th of October. He had been her +jailer. His apparition amid the glare of torches in the Court of the +Carrousel had frozen her with terror when she was flying from her +prison, the Tuileries, to begin the fatal journey to Varennes. His +aides-de-camp had pursued her. He was responsible for her arrest; he +was present at her humiliating and sorrowful return; the sight of his +face, the sound of his voice, made her tremble; she could not hear his +name without a shudder. In vain Madame Elisabeth exclaimed: "Let us +forget the past and throw ourselves into the arms of the only man who +can save the King and his family!" Marie Antoinette's pride revolted +at the thought of owing anything to her former persecutor. Moreover, +in his latest confidential communications with her, Mirabeau had said: +"Madame, be on your guard against Lafayette; if ever he commands the +army, he would like to keep {237} the King in his tent." In the +Queen's opinion, to rely on Lafayette would be to accept him as regent +of the palace under a sluggard King. Protector for protector, she +preferred Danton. Danton, who, subsidized from the civil list, accepts +money without knowing whether he will fairly earn it; Danton, who, +while awaiting events, had made the cynical remark that he would "save +the King or kill him." Strange that the orator of the faubourgs +inspired the daughter of Caesars with less repugnance than the +gentleman, the marquis. "They propose M. de Lafayette as a resource," +she said to Madame Campan; "but it would be better to perish than owe +our safety to the man who has done us most harm." + +However, Lafayette was not yet discouraged. He wished to save the +royal family in spite of themselves. He assembled several officers of +the National Guard at his house. He represented to them the dangers +into which the apathy of each plunged the affairs of all; he showed the +urgent necessity of combining against the avowed enterprises of the +anarchists, of inspiring the National Assembly with the firmness +required to repress the intended attacks, and foretold the inevitable +calamities which would result from the weakness and disunion of honest +men. He wanted to march against the Jacobin Club and close it. But, +in consequence of the instructions issued by the court, the royalists +of the National Guard were indisposed to second him in this measure. +Lafayette, having no one on his side but the constitutionals, an {238} +honest but scanty group who were suspected by both of the extreme +parties, gave up the struggle. The next day, June 30, he beat a hasty +retreat to the army, after writing to the Assembly another letter which +was merely an echo of the first one. A moment since, the Jacobins were +trembling. Now, they are reassured, they triumph. In his _Chronique +des Cinquante Jours_, Roederer says: "If M. de Lafayette had had the +will and ability to make a bold stroke and seize the dictatorship, +reserving the power to relinquish it after the re-establishment of +order, one could comprehend his coming to the Assembly with the sword +of a dictator at his side; but, to show it only, without resolving to +draw it from the scabbard, was a fatal imprudence. In civil commotions +it will not answer to dare by halves." + + + + +{239} + +XXIII. + +THE LAMOURETTE KISS. + +France had still its moments of enthusiasm and illusion before plunging +into the abyss of woes. It seemed under an hallucination, or suffering +from a sort of vertigo. A nameless frenzy, both in good and evil, +agitated and disturbed it beyond measure in 1792, that year so fertile +in surprises and dramas of every kind. Strange and bizarre epoch, full +of love and hatred, launching itself from one extreme to the other with +frightful inconstancy, now weeping with tenderness, and now howling +with rage! Society resembled a drunken man who is sometimes amiable in +his cups, and sometimes cruel. There were sudden halts on the road of +fury, oases in the midst of scorching sands, beneath a sun whose fire +consumed. But the caravan does not rest long beneath the shady trees. +Quickly it resumes its course as if urged by a mysterious force, and +soon the terrible simoom overwhelms and destroys it. + +Madame Elisabeth wrote to Madame de Raigecourt, July 8, 1792: "It would +need all Madame de Sevigne's eloquence to describe properly what {240} +happened yesterday; for it was certainly the most surprising thing, the +most extraordinary, the greatest, the smallest, etc., etc. But, +fortunately, experience may aid comprehension. In a word, here were +Jacobins, Feuillants, republicans, and monarchists, abjuring all their +discords and assembling near the tree of the Constitution and of +liberty, to promise sincerely that they will act in accordance with law +and not depart from it. Luckily, August is coming, the time when, the +leaves being well grown, the tree of liberty will afford a more secure +shelter." + +What had happened on the day before Madame Elisabeth wrote this letter? +There had been a very singular session of the Legislative Assembly. In +the morning, a woman named Olympe de Gouges, whose mother was a dealer +in second-hand clothing at Montauban, being consumed with a desire to +be talked about, had caused an emphatic placard to be posted up, in +which she preached concord between all parties. This placard was like +a prologue to the day's session. + +Among the deputies there was a certain Abbe Lamourette, the +constitutional bishop of Lyons, who played at religious democracy. He +was an ex-Lazarist who had been professor of theology at the Seminary +at Toul. Weary of the conventual yoke, he had left his order, and at +the beginning of the Revolution was the vicar-general of the diocese of +Arras. He had published several works in which he sought to reconcile +philosophy and religion. Mirabeau was {241} one of his acolytes and +adopted him as his theologian in ordinary. Finding him fit to +"bishopize" (_a evequailler_), to use his own expression, the great +tribune recommended him to the electors of the Rhone department. It +was thus that the Abbe Lamourette became the constitutional bishop of +Lyons. After his consecration, he issued a pastoral instruction in +such agreement with current ideas that Mirabeau, his protector, induced +the Constituent Assembly to have it sent as a model to every department +in France. In 1792, the Abbe Lamourette was fifty years old. Affable, +unctuous, his mouth always full of pacific and gentle words, he naively +preached moderation, concord, and fraternity in conversations which +were like so many sermons. + +For several days the discussions in the Assembly had been of +unparalleled violence. Suspicion, hatred, rancor, wrath, were +unchained in a fury that bordered on delirium. Right and left emulated +each other in outrages and invectives. Lafayette's appearance and the +fear of a foreign invasion had disturbed all minds. The National +Assembly, sitting both day and night, was like an arena of gladiators +fighting without truce or pity. It was this moment which the good Abbe +Lamourette chose for delivering his most touching sermon from the +tribune. + +During the session of July 7, Brissot was about to ascend the tribune +and propose new measures of public safety. Lamourette, getting before +him, asked to be heard on a motion of order. He said {242} that of all +the means proposed for arresting the divisions which were destroying +France, but one had been forgotten, and that the only one which could +be efficacious. It was the union of all Frenchmen in one mind, the +reconciliation of all the deputies, without exception. What was to +prevent this? The only irreconcilable things are crime and virtue. +What do all our mistrust and suspicions amount to? One party in the +Assembly attributes to the other a seditious desire to destroy the +monarchy. The others attribute to their colleagues a desire to destroy +constitutional equality and to establish the aristocratic government +known as that of the Two Chambers. These are the disastrous suspicions +which divide the empire. "Very well!" cried the abbe, "let us crush +both the republic and the Two Chambers." The hall rang with unanimous +applause from the Assembly and the galleries. From all sides came +shouts of "Yes, yes, we want nothing but the Constitution." Lamourette +went on: "Let us swear to have but one mind, one sentiment. Let us +swear to sink all our differences and become a homogeneous mass of +freemen formidable both to the spirit of anarchy and that of feudalism. +The moment when foreigners see that we desire one settled thing, and +that we all desire it, will be the moment when liberty will triumph and +France be saved. I ask the president to put to vote this simple +proposition: That those who equally abjure and execrate the republic +and the Two Chambers shall rise." At {243} once, as if moved by the +same impulse, the members of the Assembly rose as one man, and swore +enthusiastically never to permit, either by the introduction of the +republican system or by that of the Two Chambers, any alteration +whatsoever in the Constitution. + +By a spontaneous movement, the members of the extreme left went towards +the deputies of the right. They were received with open arms, and, in +their turn, the right advanced toward the ranks of the left. All +parties blended. Jaucourt and Merlin, Albite and Ramond, Gensonne and +Calvet, Chabot and Genty, men who ordinarily opposed each other +relentlessly, could be seen sitting on the same bench. As if by +miracle, the Assembly chamber became the temple of Concord. The moved +spectators mingled their acclamations with the oaths of the deputies. +According to the expressions of the _Moniteur_, serenity and joy were +on all faces, and unction in every heart. + +M. Emmery was the next speaker. "When the Assembly is reunited," said +he, "all the powers ought to be so. I ask, therefore, that the +Assembly at once send the King the minutes of its proceedings by a +deputation of twenty-four members." The motion was adopted. + +A few minutes later, Louis XVI., followed by the deputation and +surrounded by his ministers, entered the hall. Cries of "Long live the +nation! Long live the King!" resounded from every side. The sovereign +{244} placed himself near the president, and in a voice that betrayed +emotion, made the following address: "Gentlemen, the spectacle most +affecting to my heart is that of the reunion of all wills for the sake +of the country's safety. I have long desired this salutary moment; my +desire is accomplished. The nation and the King are one. Each of them +has the same end in view. Their reunion will save France. The +Constitution should be the rallying-point for all Frenchmen. We all +ought to defend it. The King will always set the example of so doing." +The president replied: "Sire, this memorable moment, when all +constituted authorities unite, is a signal of joy to the friends of +liberty, and of terror to its enemies. From this union will issue the +force necessary to combat the tyrants combined against us. It is a +sure warrant of liberty." + +After prolonged applause a great silence followed. "I own to you, M. +the President," presently said the complaisant Louis XVI., "that I was +longing for the deputation to finish, so that I might hasten to the +Assembly." Applause and cries of "Long live the nation! Long live the +King!" redoubled. What! this monarch now acclaimed is the same prince +against whom Vergniaud hurled invectives a few days ago with the +enthusiastic approbation of the same Assembly! He is the sovereign +whom the Girondin thus addressed: "O King, who doubtless have believed +with Lysander the tyrant that truth is no better than a lie, and that +men must be amused {245} with oaths like children with rattles; who +have pretended to love the laws only to preserve the power that will +enable you to defy them; the Constitution only that it may not cast you +from the throne where you must remain in order to destroy it; the +nation only to assure the success of your perfidy by inspiring it with +confidence,--do you think you can impose upon us to-day by hypocritical +protestations?" What has occurred since the day when Vergniaud, +uttering such words as these, was frantically cheered? Nothing. That +day, the weather-cock pointed to anger; to-day to concord. Why? No +one knows. Tired of hating, the Assembly doubtless needed an instant +of relaxation. Violent sentiments end by wearying the souls that +experience them. They must rest and renew their energies in order to +hate better to-morrow. And why say to-morrow? This very evening the +quarrelling, anger, and fury will begin anew. + +At half-past three Louis XVI. left the Hall of the Manege, in the midst +of joyful applause from the Assembly and the galleries. During the +evening session discord reappeared. The following letter from the King +was read: "I have just been handed the departmental decree which +provisionally suspends the mayor and the procureur of the Commune of +Paris. As this decree is based on facts which personally concern me, +the first impulse of my heart is to beg the Assembly to decide upon +it." Does any one believe that the Assembly will have the courage to +condemn Petion and the 20th of June? Not a bit {246} of it. It makes +no decision, but passes unanimously from the King's letter to the order +of the day. And what occurs at the clubs? Listen to Billaud-Varennes +at the Jacobins: "They embrace each other at the Assembly," he +exclaims; "it is the kiss of Judas, it is the kiss of Charles IX., +extending his hand to Coligny. They were embracing like this while the +King was preparing for flight on October 6. They were embracing like +this before the massacres of the Champ-de-Mars. They embrace, but are +the court conspiracies coming to an end? Have our enemies ceased their +advance against our frontiers? Is Lafayette the less a traitor?" And +thereupon the cry broke out: "Petion or death!" The next day, June 8, +at the Assembly, loud applause greeted the orator from a section who +said, concerning the department: "It openly serves the sinister +projects and disastrous conspiracies of a perfidious court. It is the +first link in the immense chain of plots formed against the people. It +is an accomplice in the extravagant projects of this general, who, not +being able to become the hero of liberty, has preferred to make himself +the Don Quixote of the court." A deputy exclaimed: "The acclamations +with which the Assembly has listened to this petition authorize me to +ask its publication: I make an express motion to that effect." And the +publication was decreed. + +O poor Lamourette! humanitarian abbe, rose-water revolutionist, of what +avail is your democratic holy water? What have you gained by your +sentimental {247} jargon? what do your dreams of evangelical philosophy +and universal brotherhood amount to? Poor constitutional abbe, people +are scoffing already at your sacerdotal unction, your soothing homily! +The very men who, to please you, have sworn to destroy the republic, +will proclaim it two and a half months later. Your famous reunion of +parties, people are already shrugging their shoulders at and calling it +the "_baiser d'Amourette, la reconciliation normande_": the calf-love +kiss, the pretended reconciliation. They accuse you of having sold +yourself to the court. They ridicule, they flout, and they will kill +you. January 11, 1794, Fouquier-Tinville's prosecuting speech will +punish you for your moderatism. You will carry your head to the +scaffold, and, optimist to the end, you will say: "What is the +guillotine? only a rap on the neck." + + + + +{248} + +XXIV. + +THE FETE OF THE FEDERATION IN 1792. + +The fete of the Federation, which was to be celebrated July 14, was +awaited with anxiety. The federates came into Paris full of the most +revolutionary projects. Anxiety and anguish reigned at the Tuileries. +Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, who were to be present in the +Champ-de-Mars, feared to be assassinated there. The Queen's +importunities decided the King to have a plastron made, to ward off a +poniard thrust. Composed of fifteen thicknesses of Italian taffeta, +this plastron consisted of a vest and a large belt. Madame Campan +secretly tried it on the King in the chamber where Marie Antoinette was +lying. Pulling Madame Campan by the dress as far as possible from the +Queen's bed, Louis XVI. whispered: "It is to satisfy her that I yield; +they will not assassinate me; their plan is changed; they will put me +to death in another way." When the King had gone out, the Queen forced +Madame Campan to tell her what he had just said. "I had divined it!" +she exclaimed. "He has said this long time that all that is going on +in France is an imitation of the revolution in England under Charles I. +I begin to dread {249} an impeachment for him. As for me, I am a +foreigner, and they will assassinate me. What will become of my poor +children?" And she fell to weeping. Madame Campan tried to administer +a nervine, but the Queen refused it. "Nervous maladies," said she. +"are the ailments of happy women; I no longer have them." Without her +knowledge a sort of corset, in the style of her husband's plastron, had +been made for her. Nothing could induce her to wear it. To those who +implored her with tears to put it on, she replied: "If seditious +persons assassinate me, so much the better; they will deliver me from a +most sorrowful life." + +The fete of the Federation was celebrated in 1792 amidst extremely +tragical preoccupations. Things had changed very greatly since the +fete which had excited such enthusiasm two years earlier. On July 14, +1790, the Champ-de-Mars was filled at four o'clock in the morning by a +crowd delirious with joy. At eight o'clock in the morning of July 14, +1792, it was still empty. The people were said to be at the Bastille +witnessing the laying of the first stone of the column to be erected on +the ruins of the famous fortress. On the Champ-de-Mars there was no +magnificent altar served by three hundred priests, no side benches +covered by an innumerable crowd, none of that sincere and ardent joy +which throbbed in every heart two years before. For the fete of 1792, +eighty-three little tents, representing the departments of the kingdom, +had been erected on hillocks of sand. {250} Before each tent stood a +poplar, so frail that it seemed as if a breath might blow away the tree +and its tri-colored pendant. In the middle of the Champ-de-Mars were +four stretchers covered with canvas painted gray which would have made +a miserable decoration for a boulevard theatre. It was a so-called +tomb, an honorary monument to those who had died or were about to die +on the frontiers. On one side of it was the inscription: "Tremble, +tyrants; we will avenge them!" The Altar of the Country could hardly +be seen. It was formed of a truncated column placed on the top of the +altar steps raised in 1790. Perfumes were burned on the four small +corner altars. Two hundred yards farther off, near the Seine, a large +tree had been set up and named the Tree of Feudalism. From its +branches depended escutcheons, helmets, and blue ribbons interwoven +with chains. This tree rose out of a wood-pile on which lay a heap of +crowns, tiaras, cardinals' hats, Saint Peter's keys, ermine mantles, +doctors' caps, and titles of nobility. A royal crown was among them, +and beside it the escutcheons of the Count de Provence, the Count +d'Artois, and the Prince de Conde. The organizers of the fete hoped to +induce the King himself to set fire to this pile, covered with feudal +emblems. A figure representing Liberty, and another representing Law, +were placed on casters by the aid of which the two divinities were to +be rolled about. Fifty-four pieces of cannon bordered the +Champ-de-Mars on the side next the Seine, and the Phrygian cap crowned +every tree. + +{251} + +At eleven in the morning the King and his cortege arrived at the +Military School. A detachment of cavalry opened the march. There were +three carriages. In the first were the Prince de Poix, the Marquis de +Breze, and the Count de Saint-Priest; in the second, the Queen's +ladies, Mesdames de Tarente, de la Roche-Aymon, de Maille, and de +Mackau; in the third, the King, the Queen, their two children, and +Madame Elisabeth. The trumpets sounded and the drums beat a salute. A +salvo of artillery announced the arrival of the royal family. The +sovereign's countenance was mild and benevolent. Marie Antoinette +appeared still more majestic than usual. The dignity of her demeanor, +the grace of her children, and the angelic charm of Madame Elisabeth +inspired a tender respect. The little Dauphin wore the uniform of a +National Guard. "He has not deserved the cap yet," said the Queen to +the grenadiers. + +The royal family took their places on the balcony of the Military +School, which was covered with a red velvet carpet embroidered with +gold, and watched the popular procession, entering the Champ-de-Mars by +the gate of the rue de Grenelle, and marching towards the Altar of the +Country. What a strange procession! Men, women, children, armed with +pikes, sticks, and hatchets; bands singing the _Ca ira_; drunken +harlots, adorned with flowers; people from the faubourgs with the +inscription, "Long live Petion!" chalked on their head-gear; six +legions of National Guards marching pell-mell with the _sans-culottes_; +red {252} caps; placards with devices either ferocious or stupid, like +this one: "Long live the heroes who died in the siege of the Bastille!" +a plan in relief of the celebrated fortress; a travelling +printing-press throwing off copies of the revolutionary manifesto, +which the crowd at first mistook for a little guillotine; a great deal +of noise and shouting,--and there you have the popular cortege. By way +of compensation, the troops of the line and the grenadiers of the +National Guard displayed extremely royalist sentiments. The 104th +regiment of infantry having halted under the balcony, its band played +the air: _Ou peut-on etre mieux qu'au sein de sa famille?_ (Where is +one better off than in the bosom of his family?) + +The moment when Louis XVI. left the Military School to walk to the +Altar of the Country with the National Assembly was not without +solemnity. A certain anxiety was felt by all as to what might happen. +Would Louis XVI. be struck by a ball or by a poniard? What might not +be feared from so many demoniacs, howling like cannibals? The King, +the deputies, the soldiers, the crowd, all pressed against each other +in a solid mass that left no vacant spaces; all was in continual +undulation. Louis XVI. could only advance slowly and with difficulty. +The intervention of the troops was necessary to enable him to reach the +Altar of the Country, where he was to swear allegiance for the second +time to the Constitution whose fragments were to overwhelm his throne. +"It needed the character of Louis XVI.," Madame de {253} Stael has +said, "it needed that martyr character which he never belied, to +support such a situation as he did. His gait, his countenance, had +something peculiar to himself; on other occasions one might have wished +he had more grandeur; but at this moment it was enough for him to +remain what he was in order to appear sublime. From a distance I +watched his powdered head in the midst of all those black ones; his +coat, still embroidered as it had been in former days, stood out +against the costumes of the common people who pressed around him. When +he ascended the steps of the altar, one seemed to behold the sacred +victim offering himself in voluntary sacrifice." + +The Queen had remained on the balcony of the Military School. From +there she watched through a lorgnette the dangerous progress of the +King. A prey to inexpressible emotion, she remained motionless during +an entire hour, hardly able to breathe on account of excessive anguish. +She used the lorgnette steadily, but at one moment she cried out: "He +has come down two steps!" This cry made all those about her shudder. +The King could not, in fact, reach the summit of the altar, because a +throng of suspicious-looking persons had already taken possession of it. + +Deputy Dumas had the presence of mind to cry out: "Attention, +Grenadiers! present arms!" The intimidated _sans-culottes_ remained +quiet, and Louis XVI. took the oath amid the thundering of the cannon +ranged beside the Seine. + +{254} + +It was then proposed to the King that he should set fire to the Tree of +Feudalism; it was close to the river and the arms of France were hung +upon it. Louis XVI. spared himself that shame, exclaiming, "There is +no more feudalism!" He returned to the Military School by the way he +came. The 6th legion of the National Guard had not yet marched past +when the cavalry announced the King's approach. This legion, +quickening its pace, was intercepted by the royal escort, and invaded, +not to say routed, by the populace, which from all sides pressed into +its ranks. + +Meanwhile the anguish of Marie Antoinette redoubled. "The expression +of the Queen's face," Madame de Stael says again, "will never be +effaced from my memory. Her eyes were drowned in tears; the splendor +of her toilette, the dignity of her demeanor, contrasted with the +throng that surrounded her. Nothing separated her from the populace +but a few National Guards; the armed men assembled in the Champ-de-Mars +seemed more as if they had come together for a riot than for a +festival." Petion, who had been reinstated in his functions as mayor +of Paris on the previous day, was the hero of the occasion. They +called him King Petion, and the cheers which resounded in honor of this +revolutionist were like a funeral knell in the ears of Marie Antoinette. + +At last Louis XVI. appeared in front of the Military School. The Queen +experienced a momentary joy in seeing him approach. Rising hastily, +she ran {255} down the stairs to meet him. Always calm, the King +tenderly clasped his wife's hand. At once royalist sentiment took +fire. All who were present--National Guards, troops of the line, +Switzers, people in the courts, at the windows, on balconies and +gates--all cried: "Long live the King! Long live the Queen!" The +royal family regained the Tuileries in the midst of acclamations. At +the entrance of the palace enthusiasm deepened. From the Royal Court +to the great stairway of the Horloge Pavilion, the grenadiers of the +National Guard, who had escorted and saved the King, formed into line +with shouts of joy. + +"All former souvenirs," says the Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "all +former habits of respect then awoke.... Yes, I saw and observed this +multitude; it was animated with the best sentiments; at heart it was +faithful to its King and crowned him with sincere benedictions. But do +popular love and fidelity afford any support to a tottering throne? He +is mad who can think so. The people will be spectators of the latest +combat and will applaud the victor. And let no one blame them! What +can they do if they are not united, encouraged, and led? The people +behold a few seditious individuals attack a throne, and a few +courageous men defend it; they fear one party and desire the success of +the other. When the struggle is over, they submit and obey. The most +honest of them weep in silence, the timid force themselves to display a +guilty joy in order to escape the hatred of the victors whom they see +{256} bathing themselves in blood. They think about their families, +their affairs, their means of support. They were not expected to lead +themselves; that duty was imposed on others; have they fulfilled it?" + +It is said that during the fete those who were friendly to the King, +amongst the crowd, were awaiting a signal they expected from him. They +hoped that, by the assistance of the Swiss, they could force their way +to the royal family during the confusion of a hand-to-hand affray, and +get them safely out of Paris. But Louis XVI. neither spoke nor acted. +He returned to his palace without having dared anything. And, +nevertheless, there were still many chances of safety open. Imagine +the effect of a haughty bearing, a commanding gesture in place of the +inert attitude habitual to the unfortunate sovereign. Fancy the Most +Christian King, the heir of Louis XIV., on horseback, haranguing the +people in the style of his witty and valiant ancestor, Henry IV.! He +is still King. The troops of the line are faithful. The great +majority of the National Guard are well-disposed towards him. Luckner, +Lafayette, Dumouriez himself, would ask nothing better than to defend +him if he would show a little energy. + +The day after the ceremony of July 14, Lafayette was still anxious that +Louis XVI. should leave Paris openly and go to Compiegne, so as to show +France and Europe that he was free. In case of resistance, the general +demanded only fifty loyal cavaliers to take the royal family away. +From Compiegne, picked {257} squadrons would conduct them to the midst +of the French army, the asylum of devotion and honor. But Louis XVI. +refused. The last resources remaining to him were to evaporate between +his hands. He will profit neither by the sympathies of all European +courts, which ardently desire his safety; by his civil list, which +might be such an efficacious means of action; nor by the loyalty of his +brave soldiers, who are ready to shed their last drop of blood in his +defence. A large party in the Legislative Assembly would ask nothing +but a signal, providing it were seriously given, to rally with vigor to +the royal cause. He had intrepid champions there whom no menace could +affright, and who on every occasion, no matter how violent or +tumultuous the galleries might be, had braved the storm with heroic +constancy. Public opinion was changing for the better. The schemes +and language of the Jacobins exasperated the mass of honest people. +The provinces were sending addresses of fidelity to the King. + +What was lacking to the monarch to enable him to combine so many +scattered elements into a solid group? A little will, a little of that +essential quality, audacity, which, according to Danton, is the last +word of politics. But Louis XVI. has a timorous soul. If he makes one +step forward, he is in haste to make another back. He is scrupulous, +hesitating; he has no confidence in himself or any one else. This +prince, so incontestably courageous, acts as if he were a coward. He +has made so many concessions already that {258} the idea of any manner +of resistance seems to him chimerical. Does the fate of Charles I. +make him dread the beginning of civil war as the supreme danger? Does +he fear to imperil the lives of his wife and children by an energetic +deed? Is he expecting foreign aid? Does he think to prove his wisdom +by his patience, and that success will crown delay? Is he so +benevolent, so gentle, that the least thought of repression is +repugnant to him? Does he wish to carry to extremes that pardon of +injuries which is recommended by the Gospel? What is plain is, that he +rejects every firm resolution. + +Palliatives, expedients, half-measures, were what suited this honest +but feeble nature. Disturbed by contradictory councils, and no longer +knowing what to desire or what to hope, he looked on at his own +destruction like an unmoved spectator. He was no longer a sovereign +full of the sentiment of his power and his rights, but an almost +unconscious victim of fatality. Example full of startling lessons for +all leaders of state who adopt weakness as a system, and who, under +pretext of benevolence or moderation, no longer know how to foresee, to +will, or to strike! + + + + +{259} + +XXV. + +THE LAST DAYS AT THE TUILERIES. + +During one of the last nights of July, at one o'clock, Madame Campan +was alone near the Queen's bed, when she heard some one walking softly +in the adjoining corridor, which was ordinarily locked at both ends. +Madame Campan summoned the valet-de-chambre, who went into the +corridor; presently the noise of two men fighting reached the ears of +Marie Antoinette. "What a position!" cried the unfortunate Queen. +"Insults by day and assassins by night!" The valet cried: "Madame, it +is a scoundrel whom I know; I am holding him."--"Let him go," said the +Queen. "Open the door for him; he came to assassinate me; he will be +carried in triumph by the Jacobins to-morrow." + +People were constantly saying that the Faubourg Saint-Antoine was +getting ready to march against the palace. Marie Antoinette was so +badly guarded, and it was so easy to force an entrance to her apartment +on the ground-floor, opposite the garden, that Madame de Tourzel, her +children's governess, begged her to sleep in the Dauphin's room on the +first floor. The Queen was averse to this step, as she was {260} +unwilling to have any one suspect her uneasiness. But Madame de +Tourzel having shown her that it would be easy to keep the secret of +this change by using the Dauphin's private staircase, she ended by +accepting the proposal so long as the trouble should last. She was so +thoughtful of all those in her service that it cost her much to +incommode them in the least. Finally, she consented to use the bed of +the governess, and a pallet was laid for the latter every evening. +Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel slept on a sofa in an adjoining closet. +As no one in the house suspected that the Queen might have changed her +apartment for the night, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter took +precautionary measures. When the Queen had gone to bed, they rose, and +after making sure that the doors were locked, they shot the inside +bolts. "The closet I occupied served as a passage for the royal family +when they went to supper," says Mademoiselle de Tourzel, afterwards +Madame de Bearn, in her _Souvenirs de Quarante Ans_; "I went to bed +early; sometimes I pretended to be asleep when the Princes were passing +through, and I saw them approach my sofa, one after another; I heard +their expressions of kindness and good will toward me, and noticed what +care they took not to disturb my slumber." + +Poor Marie Antoinette! Could one believe that a Queen of France would +be reduced to keeping a little dog in her bedroom to warn her of the +least noise in her apartment? The Dauphin, delighted to {261} have his +mother sleep so near him, used to run to her as soon as he awoke, and +clasping her in his little arms would say the most affectionate things. +This was the only moment of the day that brought her any consolation. + +By the end of July, both the Queen and her children were obliged to +give up walking in the garden. She had gone out to take the air with +her daughter in the Dauphin's small parterre at the extreme end of the +Tuileries, close to the Place Louis XV. Some federates grossly +insulted her. Four Swiss officers made their way through the crowd, +and placing the Queen and the young Princess between them, brought them +back to the palace. When she reached her apartments, Marie Antoinette +thanked her defenders in the most affecting terms, but she never went +out again. + +After June 20, the garden, excepting the terrace of the Feuillants, +which, by a decree of the Assembly, had become a part of its precincts, +had been forbidden to the populace. Posters warned the people to +remain on the terrace and not go down into the garden. The terrace was +called National Ground, and the garden the Land of Coblentz. +Inscriptions apprised passers-by of this novel topography. Tri-colored +ribbons had been tied to the banisters of the staircases by way of +barriers. Placards were fastened at intervals to the trees bordering +the terrace, whereon could be read: "Citizens, respect yourselves; give +the force of bayonets to this feeble barrier. Citizens, do {262} not +go into this foreign land, this Coblentz, abode of corruption." The +leaders had such an empire over the crowd that no one disobeyed. And +yet it was the height of summer, the trees offered their verdant shade, +and the King had withdrawn all his guards and opened every gate. +Nobody dared infringe the revolutionary mandate. One young man, paying +no attention, went down into the garden. Furious clamors broke out on +all sides. "To the lamp-post with him!" cried some one on the terrace. +Thereupon the young man, taking off his shoes, drew out his +handkerchief and began to wipe the dust from their soles. People cried +bravo, and he was carried in triumph. + +Marie Antoinette could not become resigned to this hatred. Often she +frightened her women by wishing to go out of the palace and address the +people. "Yes," she would cry, her voice trembling, as she walked +quickly to and fro in her chamber, "yes, I will say to them: Frenchmen, +they have had the cruelty to persuade you that I do not love France, I, +the wife of its King and the mother of a Dauphin!" Then, this brief +moment of generous exaltation over, the illusion of being able to move +a nation of insulters quickly vanished. Her life was a daily, hourly +struggle. The wife, the mother, the queen, never ceased to contend +against destiny. She hardly slept or ate; but from the very excess of +danger she drew additional energy, and moral and material force. As +she awoke at daybreak, she required that the {263} shutters should not +be closed, so that her sleepless nights might be sooner consoled by the +light of morning. The most widely diverse sentiments occupied her +soul. A captive in her palace, she sometimes believed herself +irrevocably condemned by fate, and sometimes hoped for deliverance. + +Toward the middle of one of the last nights preceding the 10th of +August, the moon shone into her bedchamber. "In a month," she said to +Madame Campan, "I shall not see that moon unless I am freed from my +chains." But she was not free from anxiety concerning all that might +happen before that. "The King is not a poltroon," she added; "he has +very great passive courage, but he is crushed by a false shame, a doubt +of himself, which arises from his education quite as much as from his +character. He is afraid of commanding; he dreads above everything to +speak to assemblages of men. He lived uneasily and like a child, under +the eyes of Louis XV. until he was twenty, and this constraint has had +an effect on his timidity. In our circumstances, a few clearly spoken +words addressed to the Parisians who are devoted to us would immensely +strengthen our party, but he will not say them." Then Marie Antoinette +explained why she did not put herself forward more: "For my part," said +she, "I could act, and mount a horse if need were; but, if I acted, it +would put weapons into the hands of King's enemies; a general outcry +would be raised in France against the Austrian woman, against female +domination; moreover, {264} I should reduce the King to nothingness by +showing myself. A queen who is not regent must in such circumstances +remain inactive and prepare to die." + +The danger constantly increased. At four in the morning of one of the +last days of July, warning was given at the palace that the faubourgs +were threatening, and would doubtless march against the Tuileries. +Madame Campan went very softly into the Queen's room. For a wonder, +Marie Antoinette was sleeping peacefully and profoundly. Madame Campan +did not rouse her. "You were right," said Louis XVI.; "it is good to +see her take a little rest. Oh! her griefs redouble mine!" At her +waking the Queen, on being informed of what had passed, began to weep, +and said: "Why was I not called?" Madame Campan excused herself by +saying: "It was only a false alarm. Your Majesty needed to repair your +prostrate strength."--"It is not prostrate," quickly replied the +courageous sovereign; "misfortune makes it all the greater. Elisabeth +was with the King, and I was sleeping! I, who wish to perish beside +him! I am his wife; I am not willing that he should incur the least +danger without me!" + +On Sunday, August 5,--the last Sunday the royal family were to spend at +the Tuileries,--as they were going to the chapel to hear Mass, half the +National Guards on duty cried: "Long live the King!" The others said: +"No, no; no King, down with the veto!" The same day, at Vespers, the +chanters had agreed to swell their tones greatly, and in a {265} +menacing way, when reciting this versicle of the _Magnificat: Deposuit +potentes de sede_--"He hath put down the mighty from their seat." In +their turn the royalists, after the _Dominum salvum fac regem_, cried +thrice, turning as they did so toward the Queen: _Et reginam_. There +was a continual murmuring all through the divine office. Five days +later, the same chapel was to be a pool of blood. + +And yet Madame Elisabeth, always calm and always angelic, still had +illusions. One morning of this terrible month of August, while in her +room in the Pavilion of Flora, she thought she heard some one humming +her favorite air, _Pauvre Jacques_, beneath her windows. Attracted by +this refrain, which in the midst of sorrow renewed the souvenir of +happier times, she half opened her window and listened attentively. +The words sung were not those of the ballad she loved, yet they were +royalist in sentiment and adapted to the same air. The poor people had +been substituted for poor Jack--the poor people who were pitied for +having a king no longer and for knowing nothing but wretchedness. Such +marks of attachment consoled the virtuous Princess, and made her hope +against all hope. She wrote, August 8, to her friend Madame de +Raigecourt: "They say that the King is going to be turned out of here +somewhat forcibly, and made to lodge in the Hotel-de-Ville. They say +that there will be a very strong movement to that effect in Paris. Do +you believe it? For my part, I do not. I believe in rumors, but not +in their {266} resulting in anything. That is my profession of faith. +For the rest, everything is perfectly quiet to-day. Yesterday passed +in the same way, and I think this one will be like it." On August 9, +the eve of the fatal day, Madame Elisabeth again addressed a reassuring +letter to one of her friends, Madame de Bombelles. Curiously enough +she dated this letter August 10, no doubt by accident, and when Madame +de Bombelles received it, she read these lines, which seem like the +irony of fate: "This day of the 10th, which was to have been so +exciting, so terrible, is as calm as possible; the Assembly has decreed +neither deposition nor suspension." + + + + +{267} + +XXVI. + +THE PROLOGUE TO THE TENTH OF AUGUST. + +The first rumblings of the storm began. People quarrelled and fought +in the Palais Royal, the cafes, and the theatres. Half of the National +Guard sided with the court, and the other half with the people. To +seditious speeches were added songs full of insults to the King and +Queen. These songs, sold on every corner, applauded in every tavern, +and repeated by the wives and children of the people, propagated +revolutionary fury. There was a constant succession of gatherings, +brawls, and riots. The Assembly had declared the country in danger. +Rumors of every sort excited popular imagination. It was said that +priests who refused the oath were in hiding at the Tuileries, which +was, moreover, full of arms and munitions. The Duke of Brunswick's +manifesto exasperated national sentiment. It was read aloud in every +street. The leaders neglected nothing likely to excite the populace, +and prepared their last attack on the throne, their afterpiece of June +20, with as much audacity as skill. + +In order to subdue the court, it was necessary to destroy its only +remaining means of defence. To {268} leave plenty of elbow-room for +the riot, the Assembly, on July 15, ordered the troops of the line to +be sent some thirty-five miles beyond Paris and kept there. A singular +means was devised for breaking up the choice troops of the National +Guard, who were royalists. They were told that it was contrary to +equality for certain citizens to be more brilliantly equipped than +others; that a bearskin cap humiliated those who were entitled only to +a felt one; and that there was a something aristocratic about the name +of grenadier which was really intolerable to a simple foot-soldier. +The choice troops were dissolved in consequence, and the grenadiers +came to the Assembly like good patriots to lay down their epaulettes +and bearskin caps and assume the red cap. On July 30, the National +Guard was reconstructed, by taking in all the vagabonds and bandits +that the clubs could muster. + +The famous federates of Marseilles, who were to take such an active +part in the coming insurrection, arrived in Paris the same day. The +Girondins, having failed to obtain their camp of twenty thousand men +before Paris, had devised instead of it a reunion of federate +volunteers, summoned from every part of France. The roads were at once +thronged by future rioters whom the Assembly allowed thirty cents a day. + +The Jacobins of Brest and Marseilles distinguished themselves. Instead +of a handful of volunteers they sent two battalions. That of +Marseilles, recruited by {269} Barbaroux, comprised five hundred men +and two pieces of artillery. Starting July 5, it entered Paris July +30. Excited to fanaticism by the sun and the declamations of the +southern clubs, it had run over France, been received under triumphal +arches, and chanted in a sort of frenzy the terrible stanzas of Rouget +de l'Isle's new hymn, the _Marseillaise_. It was at this time that +Blanc Gilli, deputy from the Bouches du Rhone department to the +Legislative Assembly, wrote: "These pretended Marseillais are the scum +of the jails of Genoa, Piedmont, Sicily, and of all Italy, Spain, the +Archipelago, and Barbary. I run across them every day." Rouget de +l'Isle received from his old mother, a royalist and Catholic at heart, +a letter in which she said: "What is this revolutionary hymn which a +horde of brigands are singing as they pass through France, and in which +your name is mixed up?" At Paris the accents of that terrible melody +sounded like strokes of the tocsin. The men who sang it filled the +conservatives with terror. They wore woollen cockades and insulted as +aristocrats those who wore silk ones. + +There was no longer any dike to the torrent. August 1, Louis XVI. +nominated a cabinet composed of loyal men: Joly was Minister of +Justice; Champion de Villeneuve, of the Interior; Bigot de +Sainte-Croix, of Foreign Affairs; Du Bouchage, of the Marine; Leroux de +la Ville, of Public Taxes; and D'Abancourt, of War. But this ministry +was to last only ten days. Certain petitioners at the bar of the {270} +Assembly asked for the deposition of the King in most violent language. +"This measure," says Barbaroux in his Memoirs, "would have carried +Philippe of Orleans to the regency, and therefore his party violently +clamored for it. His creditors, his hirelings, and boon-companions, +Marat and his Cordeliers, all manner of swindlers and insolvent +debtors, thronged public places and incited to this deposition because +they were hungry for money and positions under a regent who was their +tool and their accomplice." + +In vain did Louis XVI. display those sentiments of paternal kindness +which had hitherto availed him so little. August 3, he sent a message +to the Assembly, in which he said: "I will uphold national independence +to my latest breath. Personal dangers are nothing compared to public +ones. Oh! what are personal dangers to a King whom men are seeking to +deprive of his people's love? This is the real plague-spot in my +heart. Perhaps the people will some day know how dear their welfare is +to me. How many of my sorrows could be obliterated by the least +evidence of a return to right feeling!" + +How did they respond to this conciliatory language? After it had been +read, Petion, the mayor of Paris, presented himself at the bar, and +read an address from the Council General of the Commune, in which these +words occur: "The chief of the executive power is the first link of the +counter-revolutionary chain.... Through a lingering forbearance, we +would have desired the power to ask you for the {271} suspension of +Louis XVI., but to this the Constitution is opposed. Louis XVI. +incessantly invokes the Constitution; we invoke it in our turn, and ask +you for his deposition." The next day the municipality distributed +five thousand ball cartridges to the Marseillais, while refusing any to +the National Guards. + +Nevertheless, the Girondins still hesitated. Guadet, Vergniaud, and +Gensonne would have declared themselves satisfied if the three +ministers belonging to their party had been reinstated, and on July 29 +they secretly despatched a letter to the sovereign, by Thierry, his +valet-de-chambre, in which they said that, "attached to the interests +of the nation, they would never separate them from those of the King +except in so far as he separated them himself." As to Barbaroux, like +a true visionary, he dreamed of I know not what rose-water +insurrection. "They should not have entered the apartments of the +palace," he has said, "but merely blockaded them. Had this plan been +followed, the blood of Frenchmen and Swiss, ignorant victims of court +perfidy, would not have been shed on the 10th of August, the republic +would have been founded without convulsions or massacres, and we, +corroded by popular gangrene, should not have become the horror of all +nations." The demagogues were not at all certain of success. +Robespierre was to spend the 10th of August in the discreet darkness of +a cellar. Danton was prudently to await the end of the combat before +arming himself with a big sabre and marching at the head of the +Marseilles {272} battalion as the hero of the day. Barbaroux says in +his Memoirs that on the 1st, 3d, and 7th of August, Marat implored him +to take him to Marseilles, and that on the evening of the 9th he +renewed this prayer more urgently than ever, adding that he would +disguise himself as a jockey in order to get away. + +In spite of their many weaknesses, the majority of the Assembly were +royalists and constitutionalists still. The proof is that on August 8, +in spite of the violent menaces of the galleries, they decided by 406 +against 244 votes, that there was no occasion to impeach Lafayette, so +abhorred by the Jacobins. This vote excited the wrath of the +revolutionists to fury. The conservative deputies were insulted, +pursued, and struck. Several of them barely escaped assassination. +The sessions became stormier from day to day. Not only were the large +galleries of the Assembly overthronged by violent crowds, but the +courtyards, the approaches, and the corridors were obstructed. Many +sat or stood on the exterior entablatures of the high windows. The +upper part of the hall, where the Jacobins sat, received many +strangers, in spite of the often-reiterated opposition of the right. +Below this Mountain sat the members of the centre, the _Ventrus_. +There were not seats enough for them, and they were crowded up in a +ridiculous manner. At the bottom of the hall, almost entirely +deserted, were the forty-four members of the right. They were easily +marked and counted by their future executioners, who threatened them by +voice and gesture. Every {273} day the petitioners who were admitted +to the honors of the session avoided the empty benches of the right and +seated themselves with the Mountain or the centre, where they crowded +still more the already overcrowded deputies. The discussions were like +formidable tempests. "The effect produced by such a spectacle," says +Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "was still greater on those who +entered the hall during one of those terrible moments. I received this +impression several times myself, and it will never be effaced from my +mind; I seek vainly for expressions by which to describe it. Long +afterwards, M. de Caux, then Minister of War, said to me: 'You made the +profoundest impression on me which I ever received in my life. I was +young at the time. I entered the galleries just as you were standing +out against the furious shouts of a part of the deputies and the people +in the galleries.'" + +Meanwhile the end was approaching. Faithful royalists still proposed +schemes of flight to Louis XVI. Bertrand de Molleville, who is so ill +disposed toward Madame de Stael, says concerning this: "There was +nobody, even to Madame de Stael, who, either in the hope of being +pardoned the injury her intrigues had done the King, or else through +her continual need of intrigue, had not invented some plan of escape +for His Majesty." Louis XVI. declined them all. He would owe nothing +to Lafayette. He relied on the money he had given to Danton and other +demagogues, and hoped that the {274} insurrectionary bands would be +repulsed by the royalists of the National Guard and the Swiss regiment. +August 8th, in the evening, this fine regiment left its Courbevoie +barracks and arrived at the Tuileries at daybreak next morning. Under +various idle pretexts it had been deprived of its twelve pieces of +artillery, and also of three hundred men who had been given the +commission, true or false as may be, to watch over the transportation +of corn in Normandy. Only seven hundred and fifty, officers and +soldiers, remained; but all of them had said: "We will let ourselves be +killed to the last man rather than fail in honor or betray the sanctity +of our oaths." In company with a handful of noblemen, these were to be +the last defenders of the throne. The fatal hour was approaching. The +section of the Cordeliers had decided that if the Assembly had not +pronounced the King's deposition by the evening of August 9th, the +drums should beat the general alarm at the stroke of midnight, and the +insurrection march against the Tuileries. The revolutionists were to +carry out their plan, and the Swiss to keep their word. + + + + +{275} + +XXVII. + +THE NIGHT OF AUGUST NINTH TO TENTH. + +The night was serene, the sky clear and sown with stars. The calmness +of nature contrasted with the revolutionary passions that had been +unchained. On account of the heat, all the windows of the Tuileries +had been left open, and from a distance the palace could be seen +illuminated as if for a fete. It had just struck midnight. The +Revolution was executing the programme of the Cordeliers' section. The +tocsin was sounding all over the city. Everybody named the church +whose bell he thought he recognized. The people of the faubourgs were +out of bed in their houses. The drums mingled with the tocsin. The +revolutionists beat the general alarm, and the royalists the call to +arms. + +No one was asleep at the Tuileries. There was no further question of +etiquette. The night reception in the royal bedchamber was omitted for +the first time. Certain old servitors, faithful guardians of +tradition, in vain recalled that it was not permissible to sit down in +the sovereign's apartments. The courtiers of the last hour seated +themselves in armchairs, on tables and consoles. Louis XVI. stayed +sometimes {276} in his chamber and sometimes in his Great Cabinet, also +called the Council Hall, where the assembled ministers received +constant tidings of what was happening without. The pious monarch had +summoned his confessor, Abbe Hebert, and shutting himself up with this +venerable priest, he besought from Heaven the resignation and courage +he needed to pass through the final crisis. Madame Elisabeth showed +the faithful Madame Campan the carnelian pin which fastened her fichu. +These words, surrounding the stalk of a lily, were engraved on it: +"Forget offences, pardon injuries."--"I fear much," said the virtuous +Princess, "that this maxim has little influence over our enemies, but +it must be none the less dear to us." Louis XVI. did not wear his +padded vest. "I consented to do so on the 14th of July," said he, +"because on that day I was merely going to a ceremony where an +assassin's dagger might be apprehended. But on a day when my party may +be forced to fight with the revolutionists, I should think it cowardly +to preserve my life by such means." + +Marie Antoinette was grave and tranquil in her heroism. There was +nothing affected about her, nothing theatrical, neither passion, +despair, nor the spirit of revenge. According to the expressions of +Roederer, who never left her, "she was a woman, a mother, a wife in +peril; she feared, she hoped, she grieved, and she took heart again." +She was also a queen, and the daughter of Maria Theresa. Her anxiety +and grief were restrained or concealed by {277} her respect for her +rank, her dignity, and her name. When she reappeared amidst the +courtiers in the Council Hall, after having dissolved in tears in +Thierry's room, the redness of her cheeks and eyes had disappeared. +The courtiers said to each other: "What serenity! what courage!" + +The struggle might still seem doubtful. Something like two hundred +noblemen who had spontaneously repaired to the King, seven hundred and +fifty Swiss, and nine hundred mounted gendarmes posted at the +approaches of the Tuileries were the last resources of the +commander-in-chief of the French army. The Swiss, who through some +one's extreme imprudence had not cartridges enough, were posted in the +apartments, the chapel, and at the entry of the Royal Court. Baron de +Salis, as the oldest captain of the regiment, commanded at the +stairways. A reserve of three hundred men, under Captain Durler, was +stationed in the Swiss Court, before the Pavilion of Marsan. The +National Guards belonging to the sections _Petits-Peres_ and the +_Filles-Saint-Thomas_ showed themselves well disposed toward the King; +but it was different with the other companies. As to the mounted +gendarmes, Louis XVI. could not count on them, and before the riot +ended they were to join the insurgents in spite of all the efforts made +by their royalist officers. The artillerists of the National Guard, +charged with serving the cannons placed in the courts and before the +palace doors to defend the entry, were to act in the same manner. + +{278} + +Like the Swiss, the two hundred noblemen, martyrs to the old French +ideas of honor, had resolved to be loyal unto death. With their silk +coats and drawing-room swords, they seemed as if they had come to a +fete instead of a combat. The servants of the chateau joined them. +Some of them had pistols and blunderbusses. Some, for lack of other +weapons, had taken the tongs from the chimneys. They jested with each +other over their accoutrements. No, no; there was nothing laughable in +these champions of misfortune. They represented the past, with its +ancient fidelity to the altar and the throne. A great poet who had the +spirit of divination, Heinrich Heine, wrote on November 12, 1840, as if +he foresaw February 24, 1848: "The middle classes will possibly make +less resistance than the aristocracy would do in a similar case. Even +in its most pitiable weakness, its enervation by immorality and its +degeneration through flattery, the old nobility was still alive to a +certain point of honor unknown to our middle classes, who have become +prosperous by industry, but who will perish by it also. Another 10th +of August is predicted for these middle classes; but I doubt whether +the industrial Knights of the throne of July will prove themselves as +heroic as the powdered marquises of the old regime who, in silk coats +and flimsy dress swords, opposed the people who invaded the Tuileries." +The greater part of these noblemen, volunteers for the last conflict, +were old men with white hair. There were also children among them. +{279} M. Mortimer-Ternaux, author of the _Histoire de la Terreur_, has +remarked: "Was not this a time to exclaim with Racine:-- + + "'See what avengers arm themselves for the quarrel?' + + +"Who could have told Louis XIV., when in the midst of the splendors of +his court he was present at the performance of _Athalie_, that the poet +was predicting, through the mouth of Joad, the fate reserved for his +great-grandson?" The royalist National Guards who were in the +apartments considered the volunteer noblemen as companions in arms. +They shook hands with each other amid cries of "Long live the King! +Long live the National Guard!" But the troops outside did not share +these sentiments. Jealous of the royalists assembled in the palace, +they wanted to have them sent out. A regimental commander having come +to make known this desire to Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette exclaimed: +"Nothing can separate us from these gentlemen; they are our most +faithful friends. They will share the dangers of the National Guard. +They will obey us. Put them at the cannon's mouth, and they will show +you how men die for their King." + +Meantime what had become of Petion, whose business it was, as mayor, to +defend the palace? Summoned to the Tuileries, he arrived there at +eleven in the evening. As Louis XVI. said to him: "It seems there is a +great deal of commotion?"--"Yes, sire," he replied, "the excitement is +great." And he {280} enlarged upon the measures he claimed that he had +taken, and his pretended haste to wait upon the King. In going out, he +came face to face with M. de Mandat, who, as general-in-chief of the +National Guard, was in command of all military forces. "Why," +exclaimed he, "have the police refused cartridges to the National Guard +when they have wasted them on the Marseillais? My men have only four +charges apiece; some of them have not one. No matter; I answer for +everything; my measures are taken, providing I am authorized, by an +order signed by you, to repel force by force." Not daring to avow his +complicity with the riot, Petion signed the order demanded. Then he +made his escape under pretext of inspecting the gardens, and fell +amongst some royalist National Guards, who reprimanded him severely. +He began to fear being kept at the Tuileries as a hostage, to guarantee +the palace against the attempts of the populace, and went to the +Assembly. It had adjourned at ten o'clock the evening before, but on +account of the crisis had met again at two in the morning. The +Assembly knew the gravity of the danger as well as the King did; but +through a ridiculous and culpable point of honor, it affected not to +recognize it, and devoted to the reading of a colonial report the +moments it should have employed in saving that Constitution it had +sworn to maintain. Petion merely put in an appearance in the Hall of +the Manege. But he took good care not to return to the Tuileries. At +half-past three in the morning the {281} rolling of a carriage was +heard from the palace. It was that of the mayor, going back empty. He +had not dared to get into it, and had only sent his coachman an order +to return when he found himself in safety at the mayoralty, whither he +had made his way on foot. + +Meanwhile, some hundred unknown individuals, who gathered at the +Hotel-de-Ville, and surreptitiously made their way into one of the +halls, had formed an insurrectionary Commune. On their own authority +they appointed commissaries of sections, and dismissed the staff of the +National Guard, who were very much in their way; but retained in office +Manuel as procurator and Petion as mayor. This new municipality, whose +very existence was unknown at the palace, had just learned that Mandat, +general-in-chief of the National Guard, had a document in his pocket by +which Petion authorized him to oppose force to force. It was necessary +to get rid of this document at any cost. The municipality sent Mandat +an order to come to the Hotel-de-Ville. He knew nothing about the +revolution that had just taken place there. And yet he hesitated to +obey. A secret presentiment took possession of his soul. Finally, at +the instance of Roederer, he decided, towards five in the morning, to +leave the Tuileries and go to that Hotel-de-Ville, which was to be so +fatal to him. When he came before the municipality he was surprised to +see new faces. + +He was accused of having intended to disperse "the {282} innocent and +patriotic column of the people," and sentenced to be taken to the Abbey +prison. It was a sentence of death. Mandat was massacred on the steps +of the Hotel-de-Ville. A pistol-shot brought him down. Pikes and +sabres finished him. His body was thrown into the Seine. Such was the +first exploit of the new Commune. It preluded thus the massacres of +September. "Mandat's death," says Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, +"was, beyond any doubt, the chief cause of the calamities of the day. +If he had attacked the rebels as soon as they came near the palace, he +could have dispersed them with ease. They took a long time to form and +set off; and, being undecided and uneasy, they often halted. No troop +marching from a given point in this immense city knew whether it was +seconded by the rebels from other quarters, and lost much time in +making sure." The second exploit of the Commune was to confine Petion +at the mayoralty under the guard of six men. A voluntary captive, this +accomplice of the insurrection rejoiced at a measure which sheltered +him from every danger. As M. Mortimer-Ternaux has observed: "On this +fatal night, when the passion of the royalty was fulfilled, Petion +doubled the parts of Judas and Pontius Pilate. Like Judas, he went at +nightfall to give the kiss of peace to Louis XVI. by assuring him of +his loyalty; like the Roman governor, he proclaimed at daybreak the +impotence with which he had stricken himself, and washed his hands of +all that was to happen." + +{283} + +When the first fires of this fatal day were kindling in the sky, Marie +Antoinette experienced a profound emotion. Looking with melancholy at +the horizon which began to lighten: "Sister," said she to Madame +Elisabeth, "come and see the sun rise." It was the sun that was to +illumine the death-struggle of royalty. Sinister omen! the sun was red +as blood. + + + +{284} + +XXVIII. + +THE MORNING OF AUGUST TENTH. + +The fatal day began. It was five o'clock in the morning. The Queen +made her children rise, lest the swords of the insurgents should +surprise them in their beds. The Dauphin, unaccustomed to being called +so early, stared with surprise at the spectacle presented by the court +and garden. "Mamma," said he, "why should any one harm papa? He is so +good!" Then, turning to a little girl who was his usual companion in +his games, he addressed her these words, which prove how well, in spite +of his age, he knew the peril he was in: "Here, Josephine, take this +lock of my hair, and promise to wear it as long as I am in danger." + +Led by their chief, Marshal de Mailly, an old man of eighty-six, the +two hundred noblemen, who had assembled in the Gallery of Diana, passed +in review before the royal family with those of the National Guards who +were royalists. "Sire," exclaimed the old marshal, bending his knee, +"here are your faithful nobles who have hastened to re-establish Your +Majesty on the throne of your ancestors."--"For this once," responded +Louis XVI., "I consent that {285} my friends should defend me; we will +perish or save ourselves together." The last defenders of the throne +shed tears of fidelity and tenderness. They kneeled before Marie +Antoinette, and entreated the honor of kissing her hand. Never had the +Queen appeared more gracious and majestic. The National Guards, +enchanted, loaded their arms with transport. The Queen seized the +Dauphin in her arms and held him above their heads like a living +standard. The young men shouted: "Long live the Kings of our fathers!" +And the old men cried: "Long live the King of our children!" + +At the gates of the Tuileries the tide was rising. Vanguards of the +insurrection, the Marseillais arrived unhindered. The municipality had +succeeded in removing the cannons which were to have prevented approach +by way of the Pont-Neuf and the Pont-Royal. Mandat was no longer there +to issue orders. Nothing impeded the march of the faubourgs. + +And yet resistance might still have been possible. It is Barbaroux, +the fierce revolutionist himself, who says so. "All the faults +committed by the insurrection, the wretched arrangement of the +attacking party, the terror of some and the ignorance of others, the +forces at the palace, all made the victory of the court certain, if the +King had not left his post. If he had shown himself on horseback, a +large majority of the people of Paris would have pronounced for him." +Napoleon, who was an eye-witness, had said the night before to Pozzo di +Borgo, that with two {286} battalions of Swiss and some cavalry he +would undertake to give the rioters a lesson they would remember. In +the evening of August 10, he wrote to his brother Joseph: "According to +what I saw of the temper of the crowd in the morning, if Louis XVI. had +mounted a horse, he would have gained the victory." Very few of the +insurgents were seriously determined on a revolt. Most of them marched +blindly, not knowing, and not even asking, whither they went. + +Westermann had been obliged to threaten Santerre, and even to put his +sword against his breast, in order to induce him to march. A great +number of the people of the faubourgs, uneasy as to the result of the +enterprise, said that, considering the preparations made by the palace, +it would be better to defer the matter to another day. The unarmed +crowd followed through mere curiosity, and were ready to take flight at +the first discharge of musketry. According to Count de Vaublanc, the +Swiss, if they had been commanded by a good officer from four o'clock +in the morning, would have sufficed to disperse the multitude as they +came up, and possibly might have won the day for the King without +bloodshed. "Thus, the best of princes rendered useless the courage of +his defenders, and to spare the blood of his enemies accomplished the +ruin of his friends. All his virtues turned against him and brought +him to his ruin." M. de Vaublanc says again in his Memoirs: "At six in +the morning those who were in revolt had not yet assembled. How much +time had been lost, how {287} much was still to be lost! It was too +evident that no military judgment had presided over that strange +disposition of troops, so placed within and without the palace as to be +unable to give each other mutual support; a military man knows too well +the value of the briefest moments, he knows too well how quickly +victory can be decided by attacking the flank of a multitude with a +small number of brave men. If the King had appointed one of the +generals near him absolute master of operations, no doubt this general +would have given the rebels no time to unite.... Alas! Louis XVI. had +three times more courage than was necessary to conquer, but he knew not +how to avail himself of it." Such also was the opinion of M. Thiers, +who, in his _Histoire de la Revolution francaise_, says: "It must be +repeated, the unfortunate Prince feared nothing for himself. He had, +in fact, refused to wear a wadded vest, as he had done on July 14, +saying that on a day of combat he ought to be as much exposed as the +least of his servants. Courage did not fail him then, and afterwards +he displayed a bravery that was noble and elevated enough; but he +lacked boldness to take the offensive.... It is certain, as has been +frequently said, that if he had mounted a horse and charged at the head +of his troops, the insurrection would have been put down." + +Toward six o'clock the King went out on the balcony. He was saluted +with acclamations. Then he went down the great staircase with the +Queen to {288} inspect the troops stationed in the courtyards. As one +of his gentlemen-of-the-chamber, Emmanuel Aubier, has remarked: "He had +never made war himself during his reign; there had never been a war on +the continent; he was so unfortunate as to be wanting in grace, even +awkward, and to look thoughtful rather than energetic,--a thing +displeasing to French soldiers." Instead of putting on a uniform and +mounting a horse, he wore a purple coat, of the shade used as mourning +for kings, on this fatal day when he was to wear mourning for the +monarchy. Unspurred, unbooted, shod as if for a drawing-room, with +white silk stockings, his hat under his arm, his hair out of curl and +badly powdered, there was nothing martial, nothing royal about him. At +this hour, when what was needed was the attitude and the fire of a +Henry IV., he looked like an honest country gentleman talking with his +farmers. The first condition of inspiring confidence is to possess it. +Louis XVI.'s aspect was much more that of a victim than a sovereign. +The cries of "Long live the King!" which would have been enthusiastic +for a prince ready to battle for his rights and reconquer his realm at +the sword's point, were few and sad. After having inspected the troops +in the courts, Louis XVI. decided to inspect those in the garden also. +The Queen returned to the palace, and he continued his rounds. + +The loyal National Guards, comprising the companies of the +_Petits-Peres_ and the _Filles-Saint-Thomas_, were drawn up on the +terrace between the palace and {289} the garden. They received the +King sympathetically and advised him to continue his inspection as far +as the Place Louis XV. At this moment a battalion of the National +Guards from the Saint-Marceau section defiled before him, uttering +shouts of hatred and fury. Louis XVI. was undisturbed by this. He +remained calm, and when this battalion had got into position, he +tranquilly reviewed it. Then he walked on again and crossed the entire +garden. The battalion of the _Croix-Rouge_, which was on the terrace +beside the water, cried from a distance: "Down with the veto! Down +with the traitor!" On the terrace of the Feuillants, at the other +side, there was an equally violent crowd. The King, calm as ever, went +on to the swing-bridge by which the Tuileries was entered from Place +Louis XV. He was well enough received by the troops stationed there. +But his return to the palace could not but be difficult. The National +Guards of the _Croix-Rouge_ had broken rank and come down from the +terrace beside the river to the garden, and pressed around the King +with menacing shouts. The unfortunate monarch could only re-enter the +palace where he had but a few moments more to stay, by calling to his +aid a double row of faithful grenadiers. The ministers who were at the +windows became alarmed. One of them, M. de Bouchage, cried: "Great +God! it is the King they are hooting! What the devil are they doing +down there? Quick; we must go after him!" And he hastened to descend +into the garden with his colleague, {290} Bigot de Sainte-Croix, to +meet his master. The Queen, who beheld the sight, shed tears. The two +ministers brought back Louis XVI. He came in out of breath, and +fatigued by the heat and the exercise he had taken, but otherwise +seeming very little moved. "All is lost," said the Queen. "This +review has done more harm than good." + +From this moment bad tidings succeeded each other without interruption. +They were apprised of the formation of the new Commune, Mandat's +murder, the march of the faubourgs, and the arrival of the first +detachments of rioters. The Marseillais debouched into the Carrousel, +and sent an envoy to demand that the gate of the Royal Court should be +opened. As it remained closed, they knocked on it with repeated blows, +while the National Guards said: "We will not fire on our brothers." + +Would resistance have been possible even at this moment; that is to +say, between seven and eight in the morning? M. de Vaublanc thought +so. "I do not know," he writes, "to what section the first band that +arrived on the Carrousel belonged; it was in disorder and badly armed. +If the King had marched towards this troop at the head of a battalion +of the National Guard, if he had pronounced these words: 'I am your +King; I order you to lay down your arms,' the success would have been +decided. The flight of a single battalion of rebels would have +sufficed to frighten and disperse the others, even before they were +formed into line." + +{291} + +It was at this time that Roederer, instead of counselling resistance, +implored Louis XVI. to seek shelter in the Assembly for the royal +family. "Sire," he said in an urgent tone, "Your Majesty has not five +minutes to lose; there is no safety for you except in the National +Assembly. In the opinion of the department, it is necessary to go +there without delay. There are not men enough in the courtyards to +defend the palace; nor are they perfectly well-disposed. On the mere +recommendation to be on the defensive, the cannoneers have already +unloaded their cannons."--"But," said the King, "I did not see many +persons on the Carrousel."--"Sire," returned Roederer, "there are a +dozen pieces of artillery, and an immense crowd is arriving from the +faubourgs." The idea of a flight before the insurrection revolted the +Queen's pride. "What are you saying, Sir?" cried she; "you are +proposing that we should seek shelter with our most cruel persecutors! +Never! never! I will be nailed to these walls before I consent to +leave them. Sir, we have troops."--"Madame, all Paris is on the march. +Resistance is impossible. Will you cause the massacre of the King, +your children, and your servants?" + +Louis XVI. still hesitating, Roederer vehemently insisted. "Sire," +said he, "time presses; this is no longer an entreaty nor even a +counsel we take the liberty of offering you; there is only one thing +left for us to do now, and we ask your permission to take you away." +The King looked fixedly at his {292} interlocutor for several seconds; +then, turning to the Queen, he said: "Let us go," and rose to his feet. +Madame Elisabeth said: "Monsieur Roederer, do you answer for the King's +life?"--"Yes, Madame, with my own," responded the communal attorney. +Then, turning to the King: "Sire," said he, "I ask Your Majesty not to +take any of your court with you, but to have no cortege but the +department and no escort except the National Guard."--"Yes," replied +the King, "there is nothing but that to say." The Minister of Justice +exclaimed: "The ministers will follow the King."--"Yes, they have a +place in the Assembly."--"And Madame de Tourzel, my children's +governess?" said the Queen.--"Yes, Madame; she will accompany you." + +Roederer then left the King's chamber, where this conversation had +taken place, and said in a loud voice to the persons crowding together +in the Council Hall: "The King and his family are going to the Assembly +without other attendants than the department, the ministers, and a +guard." Then he asked: "Is the officer who commands the guard here?" +This officer presenting himself, he said to him: "You must bring +forward a double file of National Guards to accompany the King. The +King desires it." The officer replied: "It shall be done." Louis XVI. +came out of his chamber with his family. He waited several minutes in +the hall until the guard should arrive, and, going around the circle +composed of some forty or fifty persons belonging to his court: "Come, +{293} gentlemen," said he, "there is nothing more to do here." The +Queen, turning to Madame Campan, said: "Wait in my apartment; I will +rejoin you or else send word to go I don't know where." Marie +Antoinette took no one with her except the Princess de Lamballe and +Madame de Tourzel. The Princess de Tarente and Madame de la +Roche-Aymon, afflicted at the thought of being left at the Tuileries, +went down with all the other ladies to the Queen's apartments on the +ground-floor. + +La Chesnaye, who had succeeded to the command of the National Guard in +consequence of Mandat's death, put himself at the head of the escort. +This was formed of detachments from the most loyal battalions, the +_Petits-Peres_, the _Suite des Moulins_, and the _Filles-Saint-Thomas_, +re-enforced by about two hundred Swiss, commanded by the colonel of the +regiment, Marquis de Maillardoz, and the major, Baron de Bachmann. The +cortege reached the great staircase by way of the Council Hall, the +Royal Bedchamber, the OEil-de-Boeuf, the Hall of the Guards, and the +Hall of the Hundred Swiss. As he was passing through the +OEil-de-Boeuf, Louis XVI. took the hat of the National Guard on his +right, and replaced it by his own, which was adorned with white +feathers. The guard, surprised, removed the King's hat from his head +and carried it under his arm. + +When Louis XVI. arrived at the foot of the stairs in the Pavilion of +the Horloge, his thoughts recurred {294} to the faithful adherents who +had so uselessly devoted themselves to his defence, and whom he was +leaving at the Tuileries without watchword or direction. "What is +going to become of all those who have stayed up stairs?" said +he.--"Sire," replied Roederer, "it seemed to me that they were all in +colored coats. Those who have swords need only lay them off, follow +you, and go out through the garden."--"That is true," returned Louis +XVI. In the vestibule, a little further on, as he was about to quit +the fatal palace which fate had condemned him never to re-enter, he had +a last moment of scruple and hesitation. He said again: "But after +all, there are not many people on the Carrousel." + +"True, Sire," replied Roederer; "but the faubourgs will soon arrive, +and all the sections are armed, and have assembled at the municipality; +besides, there are neither men enough here, nor are they determined +enough to resist the actual gathering on the Carrousel, which has +twelve pieces of artillery." + +The die is cast; Louis XVI. abandons the Tuileries. Respect alone +restrains the grief and indignation that move the Swiss soldiers and +the noblemen whose weapons and whose blood have been refused. They +looked down from the windows at the cortege, or better, the funeral +procession of royalty. It was about seven o'clock in the morning. The +escort was drawn up in two lines. The members of the department formed +a circle around the royal family. Roederer walked first. Then came +the King, with {295} Bigot de Sainte-Croix, Minister of Foreign +Affairs, at his side; the Queen followed, giving her left arm to M. du +Bouchage, Minister of Marine, and her right hand to the Dauphin, who +held Madame de Tourzel with the other; then Madame Royale and Madame +Elisabeth, with De Joly, Minister of Justice; the Minister of War, +D'Abancourt, leading the Princess de Lamballe. The Ministers of the +Interior and of Taxes, Champion de Villeneuve and Le Roux de la Ville, +closed the procession. The air was pure and the morning radiant. The +sun lighted up the garden, the marble sculpture, and the sheets of +water. Birds sang under the trees, and nature smiled on this day of +mourning as if it were a festival. + +Looking at the populace, Madame Elisabeth said: "All those people have +gone astray; I should like them to be converted; I should not like them +to be punished." Tears stood in the eyes of the little Madame Royale. +The Princess de Lamballe said mournfully: "We shall never return to the +Tuileries!" The Prince de Poix, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts +d'Haussonville, de Viomenil, de Hervilly, and de Pont-l'Abbe, the +Marquis de Briges, Chevalier de Fleurieu, Viscount de Saint-Priest, the +Marquis de Nantouillet, MM. de Fresnes and de Salaignac, the King's +equerries, and Saint-Pardoux, the equerry of Madame Elisabeth, followed +the sad procession. They passed through the grand alley unobstructed +as far as the parterres, then turned to the right, {296} toward the +alley of the chestnut trees. There a halt of some minutes occurred, in +order to give time for warning the Assembly. Louis XVI. looked down at +a heap of dead leaves which had been swept up by the gardeners after a +storm the night before. "There are a good many leaves," said the King; +"they are falling early this year." It was only a few days before that +Manuel had written in a journal that the King would not last until the +falling of the leaves. Perhaps Louis XVI. remembered the prophecy of +the revolutionist; the Dauphin, with the carelessness belonging to his +age, amused himself by kicking about the dead leaves, the leaves that +had fallen as his father's crown was falling at this moment. + +Before the royal family could enter the Assembly chamber, it was +necessary that the step the King had taken should be announced to the +deputies. The president of the department undertook this commission. +A deputation of twenty-four members was at once sent to meet Louis XVI. +They found him in the large alley at the foot of the terrace of the +Feuillants, a few steps from the staircase leading up to it, and which +goes as far as the lobby through which one enters the hall occupied by +the National Assembly. "Sire," said the leader of the deputation, "the +Assembly, eager to contribute to your safety, offers to you and your +family an asylum in its midst." + +During this time, the terrace and the staircase had become thronged by +a furious crowd. A man {297} carrying a long pole cried out in rage: +"No, no; they shall not enter the Assembly. They are the cause of all +our troubles. This must be ended. Down with them!" Roederer, +standing on the fourth step of the staircase, cried: "Citizens, I +demand silence in the name of the law. You seem disposed to prevent +the King and his family from entering the National Assembly; you are +not justified in opposing it. The King has a place there in virtue of +the Constitution; and though his family has none legally, they have +just been authorized by a decree to go there. Here are the deputies +sent to meet the King; they will attest the existence of this decree." +The deputies confirmed his words. Nevertheless, the crowd still +hesitated to leave the way clear. The man with the pole kept on +brandishing it, and crying: "Down with them! down with them!" +Roederer, going on to the terrace, snatched the pole and flung it into +the garden. The crowd was so compact that in the midst of the squabble +some one stole the Queen's watch and her purse. A man with a sinister +face approached the Dauphin, took him from Marie Antoinette, and lifted +him in his arms. The Queen uttered a cry. "Do not be frightened," +said the man; "I will do him no harm." Another person said to Louis +XVI.: "Sire, we are honest men; but we are not willing to be betrayed +any longer. Be a good citizen, and don't forget to drive away your +shavelings and your wife." Insults and threats resounded from all +sides. Finally, after an actual struggle, the royal family succeeded +{298} in opening a passage. They made their way with difficulty +through the narrow lobby, choked with people, penetrated the crowd, and +entered the session chamber. It was there that royalty, humiliated and +overcome, was to lie at the point of death under the eyes of its +implacable enemies. + + + + +{299} + +XXIX. + +THE BOX OF THE LOGOGRAPH. + +The royal family has just entered the session chamber. It will find +there not an asylum, but the vestibule of the prison and the scaffold. +The man who had taken the Dauphin from the Queen's arms at the door of +the Assembly set him down on the secretary's desk with an air of +triumph, and the young Prince was greeted with applause. Marie +Antoinette advanced with dignity. According to Vaublanc's expression, +she would not have had a different bearing or a more august serenity on +a day of royal pomp. Louis XVI. took a place near the president. The +Queen, her daughter, Madame Elisabeth, and Madame de Tourzel sat down +on the ministerial benches. As soon as the Dauphin was left to +himself, he sprang towards his mother. A voice cried: "Take him to the +King! The Austrian woman is unworthy of the people's confidence." An +usher attempted to obey this injunction. However, the child began to +cry, people were affected, and he was allowed to remain with the Queen. +At this moment some armed noblemen made their appearance at the +extremity of the hall. "You {300} compromise the King's safety!" +exclaimed some one, and the nobles retired. + +Order was restored. Louis XVI. began to speak. "I came here," said +he, "to prevent a great crime, and I think that I could be nowhere more +secure than amidst the representatives of the nation." Alas! the crime +will not be prevented, but only adjourned. Vergniaud occupied the +president's chair. "Sire," he replied, "you may count on the firmness +of the National Assembly. It knows its duties; its members have sworn +to die in defending the rights of the people and the constituted +authorities." + +So they still called Louis XVI. Sire; presently they will call him +nothing but Louis Capet. They allow him to take an armchair near the +president; but in a few minutes they will find this place too good for +him. And it is the voice of this very Vergniaud who, a few hours from +now, will pronounce his deposition, and five months later his sentence +of death. + +Hardly had the unhappy King sat down when Chabot, the unfrocked +Capuchin, claimed that a clause of the Constitution forbade the +Assembly to deliberate in presence of the sovereign. Under this +pretext his place was changed, and Louis XVI. with all his family was +shut up in the reporters' gallery, sometimes called the box of the +Logograph. This miserable hole, about six feet high by twelve wide, +was on a level with the last ranks of the Assembly, behind the +president's chair and the seats of the {301} secretaries. It was +ordinarily set apart for the editors, or rather for the stenographers +of a great newspaper which reported the proceedings, and which was +called the _Journal logographique_, or the _Logotachygraphe_, usually +abbreviated into the _Logographe_. Louis XVI. seated himself in the +front of the box, Marie Antoinette half-concealed herself in a corner, +where she sought a little shelter against so many humiliations. Her +children and their governess took places on a bench with Madame +Elisabeth and the Princess de Lamballe. Several noblemen, the latest +courtiers of misfortune, stood up behind them. + +Roederer, who was at the bar, then made a report in the name of the +municipal department, in which he explained all that had taken place. +He declared that he had said to the soldiers and National Guard +detailed for the defence of the Tuileries: "We do not ask you to shed +the blood of your brethren nor to attack your fellow-citizens; your +cannons are there for your defence, not for an attack; but I require +this defence in the name of the law, in the name of the Constitution. +The law authorizes you, when violence is used against you, to repress +it vigorously.... Once more, you are not to be assailants, but to act +on the defensive only." + +Roederer added that the cannoneers, instead of complying with his +urgent exhortations, gave no response save that of unloading their +pieces before him. After having explained how greatly the {302} +defence was disorganized, he thus ended his report: "We felt ourselves +no longer in a position to protect the charge confided to us; this +charge was the King; the King is a man; this man is a father. The +children ask us to assure the existence of the father; the law asks us +to assure the existence of the King of France; humanity asks of us the +existence of the man. No longer able to defend this charge, no other +idea presented itself than that of entreating the King to come with his +family to the National Assembly.... We have nothing to add to what I +have just said, except that, our force being paralyzed, and no longer +in existence, we can have none but that which it shall please the +National Assembly to communicate. We are ready to die in the execution +of the orders it may give us. We ask, while awaiting them, to remain +near it, being useless everywhere else." The Assembly, not then +suspecting that it would so soon depose Louis XVI., applauded without +contradiction from the galleries. The president said to Roederer: "The +Assembly has listened to your account with the greatest interest; it +invites you to be present at the session." + +The advice given by Roederer to the King has been greatly blamed. The +event has seriously influenced the judgment since passed upon it. If +Louis XVI. had received the support he had a right to count on from the +representatives, things would have appeared in quite another light. +Count de Vaublanc, in his Memoirs, has rendered full justice {303} to +the loyal intentions of the municipal attorney. "The advice he gave +has been accounted a crime," says M. de Vaublanc; "I think it is an +unjust reproach. Until then he had done all that lay in his power to +contribute to the defence of the palace. He must have seen clearly +that as the King would not defend himself, he could no longer be +defended. If the rebels had been attacked, neither M. Roederer nor any +one else would have proposed going to the Assembly; but since they were +on the defensive, and without any recognized leader, the magistrate +might doubtless have been struck with a single thought: The King and +his family are about to be massacred. The King put an end to all +irresolution in saying these words: 'There is nothing more to do here.'" + +At first, Louis XVI. seemed not to repent of the step he had been +obliged to take. Even in that wretched hole, the Logograph box, his +face at first was calm and even confident. As the shouting had +increased outside, Vergniaud ordered the removal of the iron grating +separating this box from the hall, so that in case the populace made an +irruption into the lobbies, the King could take refuge in the midst of +the deputies. In default of workmen and tools, the deputies nearest at +hand, the Duke de Choiseul, Prince de Poix, and the ministers, +undertook to tear away the grating, and Louis XVI. himself, accustomed +to the rough work of a locksmith, joined his efforts to theirs. The +fastenings having been broken in this manner, the unfortunate sovereign +seemed not {304} to doubt the sentiments of the National Assembly. He +pointed out the most remarkable deputies to the Dauphin, chatted with +several among them, and looked on at the session like a mere spectator +in a box at the theatre. + +The royal family had been nearly two hours at the Assembly when all of +a sudden a frightful discharge of musketry and artillery was heard. +The deputies of the left grew pale with fear and anger, thinking +themselves betrayed. Casting glances of uneasiness and wrath at the +feeble monarch, they accused him of having ordered a massacre, and said +that all was lost. An officer of the National Guard rushed in, crying: +"We are pursued, we are overpowered!" The galleries, affrighted, +imagined that the Swiss would arrive at any moment. Excitement was at +its height. Sinister, imposing, dreadful moment! Solemn hour, when +the monarchy, amidst a frightful tempest, was like a venerable oak +which lightning has just stricken; when terror, wrath, and pity +disputed the possession of men's souls, and when the King, already +captive, was present like Charles V. at his own funeral. Marie +Antoinette had started. At the sound of the cannon her cheeks kindled +and her eyes blazed. A vague hope animated her. Perhaps, she said +within herself, the monarchy is at last to be avenged; perhaps the +Swiss are about to give the insurrection a lesson it will remember; +perhaps Louis XVI. will re-enter in triumph the palace of his +forefathers. The daughter of Caesars prayed God in silence, and +supplicated {305} Him to grant victory to the defenders of the throne. + +Chimeras! vain hopes! Louis XVI. has no longer but one idea: to cast +off all responsibility for events. He mustered up, so to say, the +little authority he had yet remaining, to write hastily, in pencil, the +last order he was to sign: the order to stop firing. He flattered +himself that the prohibition to shoot would justify him completely in +the sight of the National Assembly, and induce them to treat him with +more consideration. But he asked himself anxiously who would be bold +enough to carry his order as far as the palace. Would not so perilous +a mission intimidate even the most heroic? M. d'Hervilly, who was at +this moment in the box of the Logograph, offered himself. As the King +and Queen at first refused his offer, and pointed out all the dangers +of such an errand: "I beg Their Majesties," cried he, "not to think of +my danger; my duty is to brave everything in their service; my place is +in the midst of the firing, and if I were afraid of it I should be +unworthy of my uniform." These words determined Louis XVI. to give M. +d'Hervilly the order signed by his own hand; the valiant nobleman, +bearing this order which was to have such disastrous consequences for +the defenders of the palace, went hastily out of the Assembly hall and +made his way to the Tuileries through a rain of balls and canister. + + + + +{306} + +XXX. + +THE COMBAT. + +What had taken place at the Tuileries after the departure of the royal +family for the Assembly? At the very moment when they abandoned this +palace which they were never to see again, the Marseillais, the +vanguard of the insurrection, were pounding at the gate of the +principal courtyard, furious because it was not opened. A few minutes +later, the column of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, after passing through +the rue Saint-Honore, debouched on the Carrousel. It was under command +of the Pole, Lazouski, and Westermann, who directed it toward the gate +of the Royal Court. As the Marseillais had not yet succeeded in +forcing this, Westermann had it broken open. The cannoneers, whose +business it was to defend the palace, at once declared on the side of +the riot and turned their pieces against the Tuileries. With the +exception of the domestics there were now in the palace only the seven +hundred and fifty Swiss, about a hundred National Guards, and a few +nobles. The sole instructions the Swiss received came from old Marshal +de Mailly: "Do not let yourselves be taken." Louis XVI. had said +absolutely nothing on going {307} away, and his departure discouraged +his most faithful adherents. Add to this that the Swiss had not enough +cartridges. What was to be the fate of this fine regiment, this _corps +d'elite_, which everywhere and always had set the example of discipline +and military honor; which ever since the Revolution began had haughtily +repulsed every attempt to tamper with it; and whose red uniforms alone +struck terror into the populace? These brave soldiers guarded +respectfully the traditions of their ancestors who, at the famous +retreat of Meaux, had saved Charles IX. "But for my good friends the +Swiss," said that prince, "my life and liberty would have been in a bad +way." What the Swiss of the sixteenth century had done for one King of +France, the Swiss of the eighteenth century would have done for his +successor. They would have saved Louis XVI. if he would have let +himself be saved. + +A major-general who had remained at the Tuileries, judging that it was +impossible to defend the courts with so few soldiers, cried: +"Gentlemen, retire to the palace!" "They had to leave six cannon in +the power of the enemy and to abandon the courts. It should have been +foreseen that it would be necessary to retake these under penalty of +being burned in the palace; the common soldiers said so loudly. +Meanwhile they obeyed, and were disposed as well as time and the +localities permitted. The stairs and windows were lined with +soldiers." (Account of Colonel Pfyffer d'Altishoffen, published at +Lucerne in 1819.) + +{308} + +One post occupied the chapel, and another the vestibule and grand +staircase. There were Swiss also at the windows looking into the +courts. "Down with the Swiss!" cried the Marseillais. "Down! down! +Surrender!" However, the struggle had not yet begun. Nearly fifteen +minutes elapsed between the invasion of the Royal Court and the first +shot. The Marseillais brandished their pikes and guns, but they were +not confident, for at first they dared not cross the court more than +half-way. The Swiss and National Guards who were at the windows made +gestures to induce the populace to quiet down and go away. The throng +of insurgents grew greater every minute. They had just got their +cannon into battery against the Tuileries. What the Swiss specially +intended was to defend the grand staircase, so as to prevent the +apartments on the first floor from being invaded. This staircase, +afterwards destroyed, was in the middle of the vestibule of the Horloge +Pavilion. The chapel, whose site was afterwards changed, was on the +level of the first landing; and from this landing, two symmetrical +flights, at right angles with the first, led to the Hall of the Hundred +Swiss (the future Hall of the Marshals). Westermann, bolder than the +other insurgents, had advanced as far as the vestibule with several +Marseillais. He began to parley with the soldiers, trying to set them +against their officers and induce them to lay down their arms. +Sergeant Blazer answered Westermann: "We are Swiss, and the Swiss only +lay down their weapons with their lives." + +{309} + +The officers caused a barricade of pieces of wood to be raised on the +first landing at the head of the stairs, to prevent new deputations +from coming to demoralize their men. The Marseillais attempted to take +it by main force. Some of them were armed with halberds terminating in +hooks. These they thrust below the barricade, trying to catch the men +defending it. They seized an adjutant in this way and disarmed him. +At the foot of the stairs "they seized the first Swiss sentry and +afterwards five others. They laid hold of them with hooked pikes which +they thrust into their coats and drew them forwards, disarming them at +once of their sabres, guns, and cartridge-boxes, amidst shouts of +laughter. Encouraged by the success of this forlorn hope, the whole +crowd pressed towards the foot of the stairs and there massacred the +five Swiss already taken and disarmed." (M. Peltier's Relation.) Then +a pistol-shot was heard. From which side did it come? Was it the +Marseillais who provoked the combat? Was it the Swiss who sought to +avenge their comrades, the sentries? Whoever it was, this pistol-shot +was the signal for the fight, which began about half-past ten in the +morning. + +At first the Swiss had the advantage. Every shot they fired from the +windows told. Among the people crowding the courtyards were many who +had not come to fight, but through mere curiosity. Pale with fright, +they fled toward the Carrousel through the gate of the Royal Court, +which was strewn in an {310} instant with guns, pikes, and +cartridge-boxes. Some of the insurgents fell flat on their faces and +counterfeited death, rising occasionally and gliding along the walls to +gain the sentry-boxes of the mounted sentinels as best they could. +Even the majority of the cannoneers deserted their pieces and ran like +the rest. The courts were cleared in an instant. Two Swiss officers, +MM. de Durler and de Pfyffer, instantly made a sortie at the head of +one hundred and twenty soldiers, took four cannon, and found themselves +once more masters of the door of the Royal Court. A detachment of +sixty soldiers formed themselves into a hollow square before this door +and kept up a rolling fire on the rioters remaining on the Carrousel +until the place was completely swept. At the same time, on the side of +the garden, another detachment of Swiss, under Count de Salis, seized +three cannon and brought them to the palace gate. Napoleon, who +witnessed the combat from a distance, says: "The Swiss handled their +artillery with vigor; in ten minutes the Marseillais were chased as far +as the rue de l'Echelle, and never came back until the Swiss were +withdrawn by the King's order." + +It was now, in fact, that M. d'Hervilly arrived, hatless and unarmed, +through the fusillade of grape. They wanted to show him the +dispositions they had just made on the garden side. "There is no +question of that," said he; "you must go to the Assembly; it is the +King's order." The unfortunate soldiers flattered themselves that they +might still {311} be of use. "Yes, brave Swiss," cried Baron de +Viomesnil, "go and find the King. Your ancestors did so more than +once." In spite of their chagrin at abandoning the field of which they +they had just become masters, they obeyed. Their only thought was to +repair to that Assembly where a last humiliation awaited them. The +officers had the drums beat the call to arms, and, in spite of the rain +of balls from every side, they succeeded in marshalling the soldiers as +if for a dress parade in front of the palace, opposite the garden. The +signal for departure was given. An unforeseen peril was reserved for +these heroes. The battalions of the National Guard, stationed at the +door of the Pont Royal, at that of the Manege court, and the beginning +of the terrace of the Feuillants, had stood still, with their weapons +grounded, since the affray began. But hardly had the Swiss entered the +grand alley than these battalions, neutral until now, detailed a number +of individuals who hid behind the trees, and fired, with their muzzles +almost touching the troops. On reaching the middle of the alley, the +Swiss, who hardly deigned to return this fire, divided into two +columns. The first, turning to the right under the trees, went towards +the staircase leading to the Assembly from the terrace of the +Feuillants. The second, which followed at a short distance and acted +as a rearguard, went on as far as the Place Louis XV., where it found +the mounted gendarmes. If this body of cavalry had done its duty, it +would have united with the {312} Swiss. But, far from that, it +declared for the insurrection, and sabred them. It is said that the +officers and soldiers killed in this retreat across the garden were +interred at the foot of the famous chestnut whose exceptional +forwardness has earned the surname of the tree of March 20. Thus the +Bonapartist tree of popular tradition owes its astonishing strength of +vegetation solely to the human compost furnished by the corpses of the +last defenders of royalty. + +The first column, that which was on its way to the Assembly, presented +itself resolutely in front of the terrace of the Feuillants, which was +full of people. These took flight, and the Swiss entered the corridors +of the Assembly. Carried away by his zeal, one of their officers, +Baron de Salis, entered the hall with his naked sword in his hand. The +left uttered a cry of affright. A deputy went out to order the +commander, Baron de Durler, to make his troop lay down their arms. M. +de Durler, having refused, he was conducted to the King. "Sire," said +he, with sorrowful indignation, "they want me to lay down arms." Louis +XVI. responded: "Put them in the hands of the National Guard; I am not +willing that brave men like you should perish." To surrender arms! +Did Louis XVI. fully comprehend that for soldiers like these such an +outrage was a hundred times worse than death? The King's words were +like a thunderbolt to them. They wept with rage. "But," said they, +"even if we have no more cartridges, we can still defend ourselves with +our {313} bayonets!" Such devotion, such courage, such discipline, +such heroism to end like this! And yet the unfortunate Swiss, though +grieved to the heart, resigned themselves to the last sacrifice their +master required from their fidelity, laid down their arms, and were +imprisoned in the ancient church of the Feuillants, to the number of +about two hundred and fifty. It was all that remained of this +magnificent regiment. The others had been killed in the garden or had +their throats cut in the palace, and the greater part of the survivors +were to be assassinated in the massacres of September. + +"Thus ended the French King's regiment of Swiss Guards, like one of +those sturdy oaks whose prolonged existence has affronted so many +storms, and which nothing but an earthquake can uproot. It fell the +very day on which the ancient French monarchy also fell. It counted +more than a century and a half of faithful services rendered to France. +To destroy this worthy corps a combination of unfortunate events had +been required; it had been necessary to deprive the Swiss of their +artillery, their ammunition, their staff, and the presence of the King; +to enfeeble them five days before the combat by sending away a +detachment of three hundred men; to forbid the two hundred men who +accompanied the King to the Assembly to fire a shot; to render useless +the wise dispositions of MM. de Maillardoz and de Bachmann by an +ill-advised order at the moment of the attack; and to have M. +d'Hervilly come at {314} the moment of victory to divide and enfeeble +the defence." (Relation of Colonel Pfyffer d'Altishoffen.) + +The Swiss republic has honored the memory of these sons who died for a +king. At the entrance of Lucerne, in the side of a rock, a grotto has +been hollowed out, in which may be seen a colossal stone lion, the work +of Thorwaldsen, the famous Danish sculptor. This lion, struck by a +lance, and lying down to die, holds tight within his claws the royal +escutcheon upon a shield adorned with fleurs-de-lis. Underneath the +lion are engraved the names of the Swiss officers and soldiers who died +between August 10 and September 2, 1792. Above it may be read this +inscription cut in the rock:-- + + HELVETIORUM FIDEI AC VIRTUTI. + _To the fidelity and courage of the Swiss._ + + +Louis XVI. had to repent his weakness bitterly. The wretched monarch +had at last reached the bottom of the abyss where the slippery descent +of concessions ends, and for having been willing to spare the blood of +a few criminals, he was to see that of his most loyal and faithful +adherents shed in torrents. It is said that Napoleon, who witnessed +the combat from a distance, cried several times, in speaking of Louis +XVI.: "What, then, wretched man! Have you no cannon to sweep out this +rabble?" Behind the people of the 10th of August, the man of Brumaire +already appeared as a conqueror. + +{315} + +Work away, then, insurgents! This unknown young man, this +"straight-haired Corsican," hidden in the crowd, will be the master of +you all! He will crush the Revolution, he will made himself +all-powerful in that palace of the Tuileries where the riot is lording +it at this moment! And after him, the brother of the King whom you +insult to-day and will kill to-morrow, the Count de Provence, that +_emigre_ who is the object of your hatred, will triumphantly enter the +palace of his forefathers. And each of them in his turn, the Corsican +gentleman and the brother of Louis XVI., will be received with the same +transports in that fatal palace which is now red with the blood of the +Swiss! How surprised these people would be if they could foresee what +the future has in store for them! Among these frenzied demagogues, +these ultra-revolutionists, these dishevelled Marseillais with lips +blackened by powder, and jackets all blood, how many will be the +fanatical admirers and soldiers of a Caesar! + + + + +{316} + +XXXI. + +THE RESULTS OF THE COMBAT. + +The results of the combat were, at the Assembly, the decree of +suspension, or, rather, the decree of deposition; at the Tuileries, +devastation, massacre, and conflagration. From the moment when he +ordered his last defenders to lay down their arms, Louis XVI. was but +the phantom of a king. + +While the fight was going on, Robespierre had remained in hiding; Marat +had not quitted the bottom of a cellar. Even Danton, the man of +"audacity," did not show himself until after the last shot had been +fired. But now that fate had declared for the Revolution, those who +were trembling and hesitating a moment since, were those who talked the +loudest. Louis XVI., who had been dreaded a few minutes ago, was +insulted and jeered at. The National Assembly, royalist in the +morning, became the accomplice of the republicans during the day. It +perceived, moreover, that the 10th of August was aimed at it not less +than at the throne, and that its own downfall would be contemporaneous +with that of royalty. + +Huguenin, the president of the new Commune, came boldly to the bar, and +said to the deputies: {317} "The people is your sovereign as well as +ours!" Another individual, likewise at the bar, exclaimed in a +menacing tone: "For a long time the people has asked you to pronounce +the deposition, and you have not even yet pronounced the suspension! +Know that the Tuileries is on fire, and that we shall not extinguish it +until the vengeance of the people has been satisfied!" Vergniaud, who +in the morning had promised the King the support of the Assembly, no +longer even attempted to stem the revolutionary tide. He came down +from the president's chair, and went to a desk to write the decree +which should give a legislative form to the will of the insurrection. +In virtue of this decree, which Vergniaud read from the tribune, and +which was unanimously adopted, the royal power was suspended and a +National Convention convoked. In reality this was a veritable +deposition, and yet the Assembly still hesitated to give the last shock +which should uproot the royal tree that had sheltered beneath its +branches so many faithful generations. It declared that in default of +a civil list, a salary should be granted to the King during his +suspension; that Louis XVI. and his family should have a palace, the +Luxembourg, for a residence, and that he should be appointed governor +of the Prince-royal. + +Concerning this, Madame de Stael has remarked in her _Considerations +sur les principaux evenements de la Revolution francaise_: "Ambition +for power mingled with the enthusiasm of principles in the republicans +{318} of 1792, and several among them offered to maintain royalty if +all the ministerial places were given to their friends.... The throne +they attacked served to shelter them, and it was not until after they +had triumphed that they found themselves exposed before the people." +What the Girondins wanted was merely a change in the ministry; it was +not a revolution. Vergniaud felt that he had been distanced. When he +read the act of deposition, his voice was sad, his attitude dejected, +and his action feeble. Did he foresee that the King and himself would +die at the same place, on the same scaffold, and only nine months apart? + +Louis XVI. listened to the invectives launched against him, and to the +decree depriving him of royal power, without a change of color. At the +very moment when the vote was taken, he bent towards Deputy Coustard, +who sat beside the box of the _Logographe_, and said with the greatest +tranquillity: "What you are doing there is not very constitutional." +Impassive, and speaking of himself as of a king who had lived a +thousand years before, he leaned his elbows on the front of the box, +and looked on, like a disinterested spectator, at the lugubrious +spectacle that was unrolled before him. + +Marie Antoinette, on the contrary, was shuddering. So long as the +combat lasted, a secret hope had thrilled her. But when she saw them +bringing to the Assembly and laying on the table the jewel-cases, +trinkets, and portfolios which the insurgents had just {319} taken from +her bedroom at the Tuileries; when she heard the victorious cries of +the rioters; when Vergniaud's voice sounded in her ears like a funeral +knell--she could hardly contain her grief and indignation. For one +instant she closed her eyes. But presently she haughtily raised her +head. + +The tide was rising, rising incessantly. Petitioners demanded +sometimes the deposition, and sometimes the death, of the King. This +dialogue was overheard between the painter David and Merlin de +Thionville, who were talking together about Louis XVI.: "Would you +believe it? Just now he asked me, as I was passing his box, if I would +soon have his portrait finished."--"Bah! and what did you say?"--"That +I would never paint the portrait of a tyrant again until I should have +his head in my hat."--"Admirable! I don't know a more sublime answer, +even in antiquity." + +The demands of the Revolution grew greater from minute to minute. In +the decree of deposition which had been voted on Vergniaud's +proposition, it was stipulated that the ministers should continue to +exercise their functions. A few instants later, Brissot caused it to +be decreed that they had lost the nation's confidence. A new ministry +was nominated during the session. The three ministers dismissed before +June 20--Roland, Claviere, and Servan--were reinstalled by acclamation +in the ministries of the Interior, of Finances, and of War. The other +ministers were chosen by ballot: Danton was nominated to that {320} of +Justice by 282 votes, Monge to the Marine by 150, and Lebrun-Tondu to +Foreign Affairs by 100. This ballot established the fact that out of +the 749 members composing the Assembly, but 284 were present. Two days +before, 680 had voted on the question concerning Lafayette, and now, at +the moment of the final crisis, not more than 284 could be found! All +the others had disappeared, through fear or through disgust. The +Revolution was accomplished by an Assembly thus reduced, and a Commune +whose members had appointed themselves. Marie Antoinette, in her pride +as Queen, was unable to conceive that there could be anything serious +in such a government. When Lebrun-Tondu's appointment was announced, +she leaned towards Bigot de Sainte-Croix, and said in his ear: "I hope +you will none the less believe yourself Minister of Foreign Affairs." + +The unfortunate royal family were still prisoners in the narrow box of +the _Logographe_. The heat there was horrible: the sun scorched the +white walls of this furnace where the captives listened, as in a place +of torture, to the most ignoble insults and the most sanguinary threats. + +At seven o'clock in the evening, Count Francois de la Rochefoucauld +succeeded in approaching the box of the _Logographe_. He thus +describes its aspect at this hour: "I approached the King's box; it was +unguarded except by some wretches who were drunk and paid no attention +to me, so that I half-opened the door. I saw the King with a fatigued +and {321} downcast face; he was sitting on the front of the box, coldly +observing through his lorgnette the scoundrels who were talking, +sometimes one after another, and sometimes all together. Near him was +the Queen, whose tears and perspiration had completely drenched her +fichu and her handkerchief. The Dauphin was asleep on her lap, and +resting partly also on that of Madame de Tourzel. Mesdames Elisabeth, +de Lamballe, and Madame the King's daughter were at the back of the +box. I offered my services to the King, who replied that it would be +too dangerous to try to see him again, and added that he was going to +the Luxembourg that evening. The Queen asked me for a handkerchief; I +had none; mine had served to bind up the wounds of the Viscount de +Maille, whom I had rescued from some pikemen. I went out to look for a +handkerchief, and borrowed one from the keeper of the refreshment-room; +but as I was taking it to the Queen, the sentinels were relieved, and I +found it impossible to approach the box." + +We have just seen what occurred at the Assembly after the close of the +combat. Cast now a glance at the Tuileries. What horrible scenes, +what cries of grief, how many wounded, dead, and dying, what streams of +blood! What had become of those Swiss who, either in consequence of +their wounds, or through some other motive, had been obliged to remain +at the palace? Eighty of them had defended the grand staircase like +heroes, against an immense crowd, and died after prodigies of valor. +Seventeen {322} Swiss who were posted in the chapel, and who had not +fired a shot since the fight began, hoped to save their lives by laying +down their arms. It was a mistake. They had their throats cut like +the others. Two ushers of the King's chamber, MM. Pallas and de +Marchais, sword in hand, and hats pulled down over their eyes, said: +"We don't want to live any longer; this is our post; we ought to die +here!" and they were killed at the door of their master's chamber. + +M. Dieu died in the same way on the threshold of the Queen's bedroom. +A certain number of nobles who had not followed the King to the +Assembly succeeded in escaping the blows of the assassins. Passing +through the suite of large apartments towards the Louvre Gallery, they +rejoined there some soldiers detailed to guard an opening contrived in +the flooring, so as to prevent the assailants from entering by that +way. They crossed this opening on boards, and reached the extremity of +the gallery unhindered; then, going down the staircase of Catharine de +Medici, they managed to gain the streets near the Louvre. These may +have been saved. But woe to all men, no matter what their conditions, +who remained in the Tuileries! Domestic servants, ushers, laborers, +every soul was put to death. They killed even the dying, even the +surgeons who were caring for the wounded. It is Barbaroux himself who +describes the murderers as "cowardly fugitives during the action, +assassins after the victory, butchers {323} of dead bodies which they +stabbed with their swords so as to give themselves the honors of the +combat. In the apartments, on roofs, and in cellars, they massacred +the Swiss, armed or disarmed, the chevaliers, soldiers, and all who +peopled the chateau.... Our devotion was of no avail," says Barbaroux +again; "we were speaking to men who no longer recognized us." + +And the women, what was their fate? When the firing began, the Queen's +ladies and the Princesses descended to Marie Antoinette's apartments on +the ground-floor. They closed the shutters, hoping to incur less +danger, and lighted a candle so as not to be in total darkness. Then +Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel exclaimed: "Let us light all the +candles in the chandelier, the sconces, and the torches; if the +brigands force open the door, the astonishment so many lights will +cause them may delay the first blow and give us time to speak." The +ladies set to work. When the invaders broke in, sabre in hand, the +numberless lights, which were repeated also in the mirrors, made such a +contrast with the daylight they had just left, that for a moment they +remained stupefied. And yet, the Princess de Tarente, Madame de La +Roche-Aymon, Mademoiselle de Tourzel, Madame de Ginestons, and all the +other ladies were about to perish when a man with a long beard made his +appearance, crying to the assassins in Petion's name: "Spare the women; +do not dishonor the nation." + +{324} + +Madame Campan had attempted to go up a stairway in pursuit of her +sister. The murderers followed her. She already felt a terrible hand +against her back, trying to seize her by her clothes, when some one +cried from the foot of the stairs: "What are you doing up +there?"--"Hey!" said the murderer, in a tone that did not soon leave +the trembling woman's ears. The other voice replied: "We don't kill +women." The Revolution goes fast; it will kill them next year. Madame +Campan was on her knees. Her executioner let go his hold. "Get up, +hussy," he said to her, "the nation spares you!" In going back she +walked over corpses; she recognized that of the old Viscount de Broves. +The Queen had sent word to him and to another old man as the last night +began, that she desired them to go home. He had replied: "We have been +only too obedient to the King's orders in all circumstances when it was +necessary to expose our lives to save him; this time we will not obey, +and will simply preserve the memory of the Queen's kindness." + +What a sight the Tuileries presented! People walked on nothing but +dead bodies. A comic actor drank a glass of blood, the blood of a +Swiss; one might have thought himself at a feast of Atreus. The +furniture was broken, the secretaries forced open, the mirrors smashed +to pieces. Prudhomme, the journalist of the _Revolutions de Paris_, +thinks that "Medicis-Antoinette has too long studied in them {325} the +hypocritical look she wears in public." What a sinister carnival! +Drunken women and prostitutes put on the Queen's dresses and sprawl on +her bed. Through the cellar gratings one can see a thousand hands +groping in the sand, and drawing forth bottles of wine. Everywhere +people are laughing, drinking, killing. The royal wine runs in +streams. Torrents of wine, torrents of blood. The apartments, the +staircase, the vestibule, are crimson pools. Disfigured corpses, +pictures thrust through with pikes, musicians' stands thrown on the +altar, the organ dismounted, broken,--that is how the chapel looks. +But to rob and murder is not enough: they will kindle a conflagration. +It devours the stables of the mounted guards, all the buildings in the +courts, the house of the governor of the palace: eighteen hundred yards +of barracks, huts, and houses. Already the fire is gaining on the +Pavilion of Marsan and the Pavilion of Flora. The flames are perceived +at the Assembly. A deputy asks to have the firemen sent to fight this +fire which threatens the whole quarter Saint-Honore. Somebody remarks +that this is the Commune's business. But the Commune, to use a phrase +then in vogue, thinks it has something else to do besides preventing +the destruction of the tyrant's palace. It turns a deaf ear. The +messenger returns to the Assembly. It is remarked that the flames are +doing terrible damage. The president decides to send orders to the +firemen. But the firemen return, saying: "We can do nothing. They +{326} are firing on us. They want to throw us into the fire." What is +to be done? The president bethinks himself of a "patriot" architect, +Citizen Palloy, who generally makes his appearance whenever there are +"patriotic" demolitions to be accomplished. It is he whom they send to +the palace, and who succeeds in getting the flames extinguished. The +Tuileries are not burned up this time. The work of the incendiaries of +1792 was only to be finished by the petroleurs of 1871. + +Night was come. A great number of the Parisian population were +groaning, but the revolutionists triumphed with joy. Curiosity to see +the morning battle-field, urged the indolent, who had stayed at home +all day, towards the quays, the Champs-Elysees, and the Tuileries. +They looked at the trees under which the Swiss had fallen, at the +windows of the apartments where the massacres had taken place, at the +ravages made by the hardly extinguished fire. The buildings in the +three courts: Court of the Princes, Court Royal, Court of the Swiss, +had been completely consumed. Thenceforward these three courts formed +only one, separated from the Carrousel by a board partition which +remained until 1800, and was replaced by a grating finished on the very +day when the First Consul came to install himself at the Tuileries. +The inscription which was placed above the wooden partition: "On August +10 royalty was abolished; it will never rise again," disappeared even +before the proclamation of the Empire. + +{327} + +Squads of laborers gathered up the dead bodies and threw them into +tumbrels. At midnight an immense pile was erected on the Carrousel +with timbers and furniture from the palace. There the corpses of the +victims that had strewed the courts, the vestibule, and the apartments +were heaped up, and set on fire. + +The National Guard had disappeared; it figured with the King and the +Assembly itself, among the vanquished of the day. Instead of its +bayonets and uniforms one saw nothing in the stations and patrols that +divided Paris but pikes and tatters. "Some one came to tell me," +relates Madame de Stael, "that all of my friends who had been on guard +outside the palace, had been seized and massacred. I went out at once +to learn the news; the coachman who drove me was stopped at the bridge +by men who silently made signs that they were murdering on the other +side. After two hours of useless efforts to pass I learned that all +those in whom I was interested were still living, but that most of them +had been obliged to hide in order to escape the proscription with which +they were threatened. When I went to see them in the evening, on foot, +and in the mean houses where they had been able to find shelter, I +found armed men lying before the doors, stupid with drink, and only +half waking to utter execrable curses. Several women of the people +were in the same state, and their vociferations were more odious still. +Whenever a patrol intended to maintain order made its appearance, {328} +honest people fled out of its way; for what they called maintaining +order was to contribute to the triumph of assassins and rid them of all +hindrances." + +At last the city was going to rest a while after so much emotion! It +was three o'clock in the morning. The Assembly, which had been in +session for twenty-four hours, adjourned. Only a few members remained +in the hall to maintain the permanence proclaimed at the beginning of +the crisis. The inspectors of the hall came for Louis XVI. and his +family, to conduct them, not to the Luxembourg, but to the upper story +of the convent of the Feuillants, above the corridor where the offices +and committees of the Assembly had been established. It was there, in +the cells of the monks, that the royal family were to pass the night. +Then all was silent once more. Royalty was dying! + + + + +{329} + +XXXII. + +THE ROYAL-FAMILY IN THE CONVENT OF THE FEUILLANTS. + +What a strange prison was this dilapidated old monastery, these little +cells, not lived in for two years, with their flooring half-destroyed, +and their narrow windows looking down into courts full of men drunken +with wine and blood! By the light of candles stuck into gun-barrels +the royal family entered this gloomy lodging. Trembling for her son, +who was frightened, the Queen took him from M. Aubier's arms and +whispered to him. The child grew calmer. "Mamma," said he, "has +promised to let me sleep in her room because I was very good before all +those wicked men." Four cells, all opening by similar small doors upon +the same corridor, comprised the quarters of the royal family. What a +night! The souvenirs of the previous day came back like dismal dreams. +Their ears were still deafened with furious cries. They seemed to see +the blood of the Swiss flowing like a torrent, the pyramids of corpses +in red uniforms, the flames of the terrible conflagration sweeping the +approaches to the Tuileries. Marie Antoinette seems under an {330} +hallucination; her emotions break her down. Is this woman, confided to +the care of an unknown servant, in this deserted old convent, really +she? Is this the Queen of France and Navarre? This the daughter of +the great Empress Maria Theresa? What uncertainty rests over the fate +of her most faithful servitors! What news will she yet learn? Who has +fallen? Who has survived the carnage? The hours of the night wear on; +Marie Antoinette has not been able to sleep a moment. + +The Marquis de Tourzel and M. d'Aubier remained near the King's +bedside. Before sleeping, he talked to them with the utmost calmness +of all that had taken place. "People regret," said he, "that I did not +have the rebels attacked before they could have forced the Assembly; +but besides the fact that in accordance with the terms of the +Constitution, the National Guards might have refused to be the +aggressors, what would have been the result of this attack? The +measures of the insurrection were too well taken for my party to have +been victorious, even if I had not left the Tuileries. Do they forget +that when the seditious Commune massacred M. Mandat, it rendered his +projected defence of no avail?" While Louis XVI. was saying this, the +men placed under the windows were shouting loudly for the Queen's head. +"What has she done to them?" cried the unfortunate sovereign. + +The next morning, August 11, several persons were authorized to enter +the cells of the convent. {331} Among them was one of the officers of +the King's bedchamber, Francois Hue, who had incurred the greatest +dangers on the previous day. Cards of admission were distributed by +the inspector of the Assembly hall. A large guard was stationed at all +the issues of the corridor. No one could pass without being stopped +and questioned. After surmounting all obstacles, M. Hue reached the +cell of Louis XVI. The King was still in bed, with his head covered by +a coarse cloth. He looked tenderly at his faithful servant. M. Hue, +who could scarcely speak for sobbing, apprised his unhappy master of +the tragic death of several persons whom His Majesty was especially +fond of, among others, the Chevalier d'Allonville, who had been +under-governor to the first Dauphin, and several officers of the +bedchamber: MM. Le Tellier, Pallas, and de Marchais. "I have, at +least," said Louis XVI., "the consolation of seeing you saved from this +massacre!" + +All night long, Madame Elisabeth, the Princess de Lamballe, and Madame +de Tourzel had prayed and wept in silence at the door of the chamber +where Marie Antoinette watched beside her sleeping children. It was +not until morning, after cruel insomnia, that the wretched Queen was at +last able to close her eyes. And when, after a few minutes, she opened +them again, what an awakening! + +At eight o'clock in the morning Mademoiselle Pauline de Tourzel arrived +at the Feuillants. "I cannot say enough," she writes in her _Souvenirs +de Quarante {332} Ans_, "about the goodness of the King and Queen; they +asked me many questions about the persons concerning whom I could give +them any tidings. Madame and the Dauphin received me with touching +signs of affection; they embraced me, and Madame said: 'My dear +Pauline, do not leave us any more!'" The courtiers of misfortune came +one after another. Madame Campan and her sister, Madame Auguie, saw +the Prince de Poix, M. d'Aubier, M. de Saint-Pardou, Madame Elisabeth's +equerry, MM. de Goguelat, Hue, and de Chamilly in the first cell; in +the second they found the King. They wanted to kiss his hand, but he +prevented it, and embraced them without speaking. In the third cell +they saw the Queen, waited on by an unknown woman. Marie Antoinette +held out her arms. "Come!" she cried; "come, unhappy women! come and +see one who is still more unhappy than you, since it is she who has +been the cause of all your sorrow!" She added: "We are ruined. We +have reached the place at last to which they have been leading us for +three years by every possible outrage; we shall succumb in this +horrible revolution, and many others will perish after us. Everybody +has contributed to our ruin: the innovators like fools, others like the +ambitious, in order to aid their own fortunes; for the most furious of +the Jacobins wanted gold and places, and the crowd expected pillage. +There is not a patriot in the whole infamous horde; the emigrants had +their schemes and manoeuvres; {333} the foreigners wanted to profit by +the dissensions of France; everybody has had a part in our +misfortunes." Here the Dauphin entered with his sister and Madame de +Tourzel. "Poor children!" cried the Queen. "How cruel it is not to +transmit to them so noble a heritage, and to say: All is over for us!" +And as the little Dauphin, seeing his mother and those around her +weeping, began to shed tears also: "My child," the Queen said, +embracing him, "you see I have consolations too; the friends whom +misfortune deprived me of were not worth as much as those it gave me." +Then Marie Antoinette asked for news of the Princess de Tarente, Madame +de la Roche-Aymon, and others whom she had left at the Tuileries. She +compassionated the fate of the victims of the previous day. + +Madame Campan expressed a desire to know what the foreign ambassadors +had done in this catastrophe. The Queen replied that they had done +nothing, but that the English ambassadress, Lady Sutherland, had just +displayed some interest by sending linen for the Dauphin, who was in +need of it. + +What memories must not that little cell in the Feuillants convent have +left in the souls of those who were privileged to present there the +homage of their devotion to the Queen! "I think I still see," Madame +Campan has said in her Memoirs, "I shall always see, that little cell, +hung with green paper, that wretched couch from which the dethroned +sovereign stretched out her arms to us, saying that our {334} woes, of +which she was the cause, aggravated her own. There, for the last time, +I saw the tears flowing and heard the sobs of her whose birth and +natural gifts, and above all the goodness of whose heart had destined +her to be the ornament of all thrones and the happiness of all peoples." + +During the 11th and 12th of August the tortures of the 10th were +renewed for the royal family. They were obliged to occupy the odious +box of the _Logographe_ during the sessions of the Assembly, and from +there witness, as at a show, the slow and painful death-struggle of +royalty. As she was on her way to this wretched hole, Marie Antoinette +perceived in the garden some curious spectators on whose faces a +certain compassion was depicted. She saluted them. Then a voice +cried: "Don't put on so many airs with that graceful head; it is not +worth while. You'll not have it much longer." From the box of the +_Logographe_ the royal family listened to the most offensive motions; +to decrees according the Marseillais a payment of thirty sous a day, +ordering all statues of kings to be overthrown, and petitions demanding +the heads of all the Swiss who had escaped the massacre. At last the +Assembly grew tired of the long humiliation of the august captives. On +Monday, August 13, they were not present at the session, and during the +day they were notified that in the evening they were to be +incarcerated, not in the Luxembourg,--that palace being too good for +them,--but in the tower of the Temple. When Marie {335} Antoinette was +informed of this decision, she turned toward Madame de Tourzel, and +putting her hands over her eyes, said: "I always asked the Count +d'Artois to have that villanous tower of the Temple torn down; it +always filled me with horror!" Petion told Louis XVI. that the +Communal Council had decreed that none of the persons proposed for the +service of the royal family should follow them to their new abode. By +force of remonstrance the King finally obtained permission that the +Princess de Lamballe, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter should be +excepted from this interdiction, and also MM. Hue and de Chamilly, and +Mesdames Thibaud, Basire, Navarre, and Saint-Brice. The departure for +the Temple took place at five in the evening. The royal family went in +a large carriage with Manuel and Petion, who kept their hats on. The +coachman and footmen, dressed in gray, served their masters for the +last time. National Guards escorted the carriage on foot and with +reversed arms. The passage through a hostile multitude occupied not +less than two hours. The vehicle, which moved very slowly, stopped for +several moments in the Place Vendome. There Manuel pointed out the +statue of Louis XIV., which had been thrown down from its pedestal. At +first the descendant of the great King reddened with indignation, then, +tranquillizing himself instantly, he calmly replied: "It is fortunate, +Sir, that the rage of the people spends itself on inanimate objects." +Manuel might have gone on to say that {336} on this very Place Vendome +"Queen Violet," one of the most furious vixens of the October Days, had +just been crushed by the fall of this equestrian statue of Louis XIV. +to which she was hanging in order to help bring it down. The statue of +Henry IV. in the Place Royale, that of Louis XIII. in the Place des +Victoires, and that of Louis XV. in the place that bears his name, had +fallen at the same time. + +The royal family arrived at the Temple at seven in the evening. The +lanterns placed on the projecting portions of the walls and the +battlements of the great tower made it resemble a catafalque surrounded +by funeral lights. The Queen wore a shoe with a hole in it, through +which her foot could be seen. "You would not believe," said she, +smiling, "that a Queen of France was in need of shoes." The doors +closed upon the captives, and a sanguinary crowd complained of the +thickness of the walls separating them from their prey. + + + + +{337} + +XXXIII. + +THE TEMPLE. + +There are places which, by the very souvenirs they evoke, seem fatal +and accursed. Such was the dungeon that was to serve as a prison for +Louis XVI. and his family. The great tower for which Marie Antoinette +had felt a nameless instinctive repugnance in the happiest days of her +reign, arose at the extremity of Paris like a gigantic phantom, and +recalled in a sinister fashion the tragedies of the Middle Ages and the +sombre legends of the Templars. It was formerly the manor, the +fortress, of that religious and military Order of the Temple, founded +in the Holy Land at the beginning of the twelfth century, to protect +the pilgrims, and which, after the fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, +had spread all over Europe. The great tower was built by Frere Hubert, +in the early years of the thirteenth century, in the midst of an +enclosure surrounded by turreted walls. There ruled, by cross and +sword, those men of iron, in white habits, who took the triple vows of +poverty, chastity, and obedience, and who excited royal jealousy by the +increase of their power. It was there that Philippe le Bel went on +October 13, {338} 1307, with his lawyers and his archers, to lay his +hand on the grand-master, seize the treasures of the order, and on the +same day, at the same hour, cause all Templars to be arrested +throughout the realm. Then began that mysterious trial which has +remained an insoluble problem to posterity, and after which these +monastic knights, whose bravery and whose exploits have made so +prolonged an echo, perished in prisons or on scaffolds. Pursued by +horrible accusations, they had confessed under torture, but they denied +at execution. When the grand-master, Jacques de Molay, and the +commander of Normandy were burned alive before the garden of Philippe +le Bel, March 11, 1314, even in the midst of flames, they did not cease +to attest the innocence of the Order of the Temple. The people, +astonished by their heroism, believed that they had summoned the Pope +and the King to appear in the presence of God before the end of the +year. Clement V., on April 20, and Philippe IV., on November 29, +obeyed the summons. + +The possessions of the order were given to the Hospitallers of Saint +John of Jerusalem, who transformed themselves into Knights of Malta +toward the middle of the sixteenth century. The Temple became the +provincial house of the grand-prior of the Order of Malta for the +_nation_ or _language_ of France, and the great tower contained +successively the treasure, the arsenal, and the archives. In 1607, the +grand-prior, Jacques de Souvre, had a house built in {339} front of the +old manor, between the court and the garden, which was called the +palace of the grand-prior. His successor, Philippe de Vendome, made +his palace a rendezvous of elegance and pleasure. There shone that +Anacreon in a cassock, the gay and sprightly Abbe de Chaulieu, who died +a fervent Christian in the voluptuous abode where he had dwelt a +careless Epicurean. There young Voltaire went to complete the lessons +he had begun in the sceptical circle of Ninon de l'Enclos. The office +of grand-prior, which was worth sixty thousand livres a year, passed +afterwards to Prince de Conti, who in 1765 sheltered Jean-Jacques +Rousseau there, as _lettres de cachet_ could not penetrate within its +privileged precinct. Under Louis XVI. the palace of the grand-prior +had served as a passing hostelry to the young and brilliant Count +d'Artois when he came from Versailles to Paris. The flowers of the +entertainments given there by the Prince were hardly faded when Louis +XVI. suddenly entered it as a prisoner. + +It was seven o'clock in the evening when the wretched King and his +family, coming from the convent of the Feuillants, arrived at the +Temple. Situated near the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, not far from the +former site of the Bastille, the Temple enclosure at this period was +not more than two hundred yards long by nearly as many wide. The rest +of the ancient precinct had disappeared under the pavements or the +houses of the great city. Nevertheless, the enclosure still formed a +sort of little {340} private city, sometimes called the +Ville-Neuve-du-Temple, the gates of which were closed every night. In +one of its angles stood the house called the grand-prior's palace. + +This was the first stopping-place of the royal family, which had been +entrusted by Petion to the surveillance of the municipality and the +guard of Santerre. The municipal officers stayed close to the King, +kept their hats on, and gave him no title except "Monsieur." Louis +XVI., not doubting that the palace of the grand-prior was the residence +assigned him by the nation until the close of his career, began to +visit its apartments. While the municipal officers took a cruel +pleasure in this error, thinking of the still keener one they would +enjoy when they disabused him of it, he pleased himself by allotting +the different rooms in advance. The word palace had an unpleasant +sound to the persecutors of royalty. The Temple tower looked more like +a prison. Toward eleven o'clock, one of the commissioners ordered the +august captives to collect such linen and other clothing as they had +been able to procure, and follow him. They silently obeyed, and left +the palace. The night was very dark. They passed through a double row +of soldiers holding naked sabres. The municipal officers carried +lanterns. One of them broke the dismal silence he had observed +throughout the march. "Thy master," said he to M. Hue, "has been +accustomed to gilded canopies. Very well! he is going to find out how +we lodge the assassins of the people." + +{341} + +The lamps in the windows of the old quadrangular dungeon lighted up its +high pinnacles and turrets, its gigantic profile and gloomy bulk. The +immense tower, one hundred and fifty feet high, and with walls nine +feet thick, rose, menacing and fatal, amidst the darkness. Beside it +was another tower, narrower and not so high, but which was also flanked +by turrets. Thus the whole dungeon was composed of two distinct yet +united towers. The second of these, called the little tower, to +distinguish it from the great one, was selected as the prison of the +former hosts of Versailles, Fontainebleau, and the Tuileries. + +The little tower of the Temple, which had no interior communication +with the great one against which it stood, was a long quadrangle +flanked by two turrets. Four steps led to the door, which was low and +narrow, and opened on a landing at the end of which began a winding +staircase shaped like a snail-shell. Wide from its base as far as the +first story, it grew narrower as it climbed up into the second. The +door, which was considered too weak, was to be strengthened on the +following day by heavy bars, and supplied with an enormous lock brought +from the prisons of the Chatelet. The Queen was put on the second +floor, and the King on the third. On entering his chamber, Louis XVI. +found a miserable bed in an alcove without tapestry or curtains. He +showed neither ill humor nor surprise. Engravings, indecent for the +most part, covered the walls. He {342} took them down himself. "I +will not leave such objects before my children's eyes," said he. Then +he lay down and slept tranquilly. + +The first days of captivity were relatively calm. The prisoners +consoled themselves by their family life, reading, and, above all, +prayer. Forgetting that he had been a king, and remembering that he +was a father, Louis XVI. gave lessons to the Dauphin. "It would have +been worth while for the whole nation to be present at these lessons; +they would have been both surprised and touched at all the sensible, +cordial, and kindly things the good King found to say when the map of +France lay spread out before him, or concerning the chronology of his +predecessors. Everything in his remarks showed the love he bore his +subjects and how greatly his paternal heart desired their happiness. +What great and useful lessons one could learn in listening to this +captive king instructing a child born to the throne and condemned to +share the captivity of his parents." (_Souvenirs de Quarante Ans_, by +Madame de Bearn, _nee_ de Tourzel.) + +All those who had been authorized to follow the royal family to the +Temple--the Princess de Lamballe, Madame de Tourzel and her daughter, +Mesdames Thibaud, Basire, Navarre, MM. de Chamilly and Francois +Hue--surrounded the captives with the most respectful and devoted +attentions. But these noble courtiers of misfortune, these voluntary +prisoners who were so glad to be associated in their {343} master's +trials, were not long to enjoy an honor they had so keenly desired. In +the night of August 18-19, two municipal officers presented themselves, +who were commissioned to fetch away "all persons not belonging to the +Capet family." The Queen pointed out in vain that the Princess de +Lamballe was her relative. The Princess must go with the others. "In +our position," has said Madame de Tourzel, the governess of the +children of France, "there was nothing to do but obey. We dressed +ourselves and then went to the Queen, to whom I resigned that dear +little Prince, whose bed had been carried into her room without awaking +him." It was an indescribable torture for Madame de Tourzel to abandon +the Dauphin, whom she cherished so tenderly, and whom she had educated +since 1789. "I abstained from looking at him," she adds, "not only to +avoid weakening the courage we had so much need of, but in order to +give no room for censure, and so come back, if possible, to a place we +left with so much regret. The Queen went instantly into the chamber of +the Princess de Lamballe, from whom she parted with the utmost grief. +To Pauline and me she showed a touching sensibility, and said to me in +an undertone: 'If we are not so happy as to see you again, take good +care of Madame de Lamballe. Do the talking on all important occasions, +and spare her as much as possible from having to answer captious and +embarrassing questions.'" The two municipal officers said to Hue and +Chamilly: "Are you {344} the valets-de-chambre?" On their affirmative +response, the two faithful servants were ordered to get up and prepare +for departure. They shook hands with each other, both of them +convinced that they had reached the end of their existence. One of the +municipal officers had said that very day in their presence: "The +guillotine is permanent, and strikes with death the pretended servants +of Louis." When they descended to the Queen's antechamber, a very +small room in which the Princess de Lamballe slept, they found that +Princess and Madame de Tourzel all ready to start, and clasped in one +embrace with the Queen, the children, and Madame Elisabeth. Tender and +heart-breaking farewells, presages of separations more cruel still! + +All these exiles from the prison left at the same time. Only one of +them, M. Francois Hue, was to return. He was examined at the +Hotel-de-Ville, and at the close of this interrogation an order was +signed permitting him to be taken back to the tower. "How happy I +was," he writes, "to return to the Temple! I ran to the King's +chamber. He was already up and dressed, and was reading as usual in +the little tower. The moment he saw me, his anxiety to know what had +occurred made him advance toward me; but the presence of the municipal +officers and the guards who were near him made all conversation +impossible. I indicated by a glance that, for the moment, prudence +forbade me to explain myself. Feeling the necessity of silence as well +as myself, the King resumed his {345} reading and waited for a more +opportune moment. Some hours later, I hastily informed him what +questions had been asked me and what I had replied." (_Dernieres Annees +de Louis XVI., par Francois Hue_.) + +The unfortunate sovereign doubtless believed that the others were also +about to return. Vain hope! During the day Manuel announced to the +King that none of them would come back to the Temple. "What has become +of them?" asked Louis XVI. anxiously.--"They are prisoners at the +Force," returned Manuel.--"What are they going to do with the only +servant I have left?" asked the King, glancing at M. Hue.--"The Commune +leaves him with you," said Manuel; "but as he cannot do everything, men +will be sent to assist him."--"I do not want them," replied Louis XVI.; +"what he cannot do, we will do ourselves. Please God, we will not +voluntarily give those who have been taken from us the chagrin of +seeing their places taken by others!" In Manuel's presence, the Queen +and Madame Elisabeth aided M. Hue to prepare the things most necessary +for the new prisoners of the Force. The two Princesses arranged the +packets of linen and other matters with the skill and activity of +chambermaids. + +Behold the heir of Louis XIV., the King of France and Navarre, with but +a single servant left him! He has but one coat, and at night his +sister mends it. Behold the daughter of the German Caesars, with not +even one woman to wait upon her, and who waits on herself, incessantly +watched, meanwhile, by the {346} inquisitors of the Commune; who cannot +speak a word or make a gesture unwitnessed by a squad of informers who +pursue her even into the chamber where she goes to change her dress, +and who spy on her even when she is sleeping! And yet neither the +calmness nor the dignity of the prisoners suffers any loss. + +There was but one thing that keenly annoyed Louis XVI. It was when, on +August 24, they deprived him, the chief of gentlemen, of his sword, as +if taking away his sceptre were not enough. He consoled himself by +prayer, meditation, and reading. He spent hours in the room containing +the library of the keeper of archives of the Order of Malta, who had +previously occupied the little tower. One day when he was looking for +books, he pointed out to M. Hue the works of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques +Rousseau. "Those two men have ruined France," said he in an undertone. +On another day he was pained by overhearing the insults heaped on this +faithful servant by one of the Municipal Guards. "You have had a great +deal to suffer to-day," he said to him. "Well! for the love of me, +continue to endure everything; make no answer." At another time he +slipped into his hand a folded paper. "This is some of my hair," said +he; "it is the only present I can give you at this moment." M. Hue +exclaims in his pathetic book: "O shade forever cherished! I will +preserve this precious gift to my latest day! The inheritance of my +son, it will pass on to my descendants, and all of them will see in +this testimonial of Louis XVI.'s {347} goodness, that they had a father +who merited the affection of his King by his fidelity." + +In the evenings the Queen made the Dauphin recite this prayer: +"Almighty God, who created and redeemed me, I adore Thee. Spare the +lives of the King, my father, and those of my family! Defend us +against our enemies! Grant Madame de Tourzel the strength she needs to +support the evils she endures on our account." And the angel of the +Temple, Madame Elisabeth, recited every day this sublime prayer of her +own composition: "What will happen to me to-day, O my God! I do not +know. All I know is, that nothing will happen that has not been +foreseen by Thee from all eternity. It is enough, my God, to keep me +tranquil. I adore Thy eternal designs, I submit to them with my whole +heart; I will all, I accept all; I sacrifice all to Thee; I unite this +sacrifice to that of Thy dear Son, my Saviour, asking Thee by His +sacred heart and His infinite merits, the patience in our afflictions +and the perfect submission which is due to Thee for all that Thou +wiliest and permittest." One day when she had finished her prayer, the +saintly Princess said to M. Hue: "It is less for the unhappy King than +for his misguided people that I pray. May the Lord deign to be moved, +and to look mercifully upon France!" Then she added, with her +admirable resignation: "Come, let us take courage. God will never send +us more troubles than we are able to bear." + +{348} + +The prisoners were permitted to walk a few steps in the garden every +day to get a breath of fresh air. But even there they were insulted. +As they passed by, the guards stationed at the base of the tower took +pains to put on their hats and sit down. The sentries scrawled insults +on the walls. Colporteurs maliciously cried out bad tidings, which +were sometimes false. One day, one of them announced a pretended +decree separating the King from his family. The Queen, who was near +enough to hear distinctly the voice which told this news, not exact as +yet, was struck with a terror from which she did not recover. + +And yet there were still souls that gave way to compassion. From the +upper stories of houses near the Temple enclosure there were eyes +looking down into the garden when the prisoners took their walk. The +common people and the workmen living in these poor abodes were +affected. Sometimes, to show her gratitude for the sympathy of those +unknown friends, Marie Antoinette would remove her veil, and smile. +When the little Dauphin was playing, there would be hands at the +windows, joined as if to applaud. Flowers would sometimes fall, as if +by chance, from a garret roof to the Queen's feet, and occasionally it +happened that when the captives had gone back to their prison, they +would hear in the darkness the echo of some royalist refrain, hummed by +a passer-by in the silence of the night. + +The Temple tower is no longer in existence. Bonaparte visited it when +he was Consul. "There are {349} too many souvenirs in that prison," he +exclaimed. "I will tear it down." In 1811 he kept his promise. The +palace of the grand-prior was destroyed in 1853. No trace remains of +that famous enclosure of the Templars whose legend has so sombre a +poetry. But it has left an impress on the imagination of peoples which +will never be effaced. It seems to rise again gigantic, that tower +where the son of Saint Louis realized not alone the type of the antique +sage of whom Horace said: _Impavidum ferient ruinae_, but also the +purest ideal of the true Christian. Does not the name Temple seem +predestinated for a spot which was to be sanctified by so many virtues, +and where the martyr King put in practice these verses of the +_Imitation of Jesus Christ_, his favorite book: "It needs no great +virtue to live peaceably with those who are upright and amiable; one is +naturally pleased in such society; we always love those whose +sentiments agree with ours. But it is very praiseworthy, and the +effect of a special grace and great courage to live in peace with +severe and wicked men, who are disorderly, or who contradict us.... He +who knows best how to suffer, will enjoy the greatest peace; such a one +is the conqueror of himself, master of the world, the friend of Jesus +Christ, and the inheritor of heaven." + + + + +{350} + +XXXIV. + +THE PRINCESS DE LAMBALLE'S MURDER. + +The Princess de Lamballe, after being taken from the Temple in the +night of August 18-19, had been examined by Billaud-Varennes at the +Hotel-de-Ville, and then sent, at noon, August 19, to the Force. This +prison, divided into two distinct parts, the great and the little +Force, was situated between the rues Roi-de-Sicile, Culture, and Pavee. +In 1792 it supplemented the Abbey and Chatelet prisons, which were +overcrowded. The little Force had a separate entry on the rue Pavee to +the Marais, while the door of the large one opened on the rue des +Ballets, a few steps from the rue Saint-Antoine. The register of the +little Force, which is preserved in the archives of the prefecture of +police, records that, at the time of the September massacres, this +prison in which the Princess de Lamballe was immured, contained one +hundred and ten women, most of them not concerned with political +affairs, and in great part women of the town. Here, from August 19 to +September 3, the Princess suffered inexpressible anguish. She never +heard a turnkey open the door of her cell without thinking that her +last hour had come. + +{351} + +The massacres began on September 2. On that day the Princess de +Lamballe was spared. In the evening she threw herself on her bed, a +prey to the most cruel anxiety. Toward six o'clock the next morning, +the turnkey entered with a frightened air: "They are coming here," he +said to the prisoners. Six men, armed with sabres, guns, and pistols, +followed him, approached the beds, asked the names of the women, and +went out again. Madame de Tourzel, who shared the Princess de +Lamballe's captivity, said to her: "This threatens to be a terrible +day, dear Princess; we know not what Heaven intends for us; we must ask +God to forgive our faults. Let us say the _Miserere_ and the +_Confiteor_ as acts of contrition, and recommend ourselves to His +goodness." The two women said their prayers aloud, and incited each +other to resignation and courage. + +There was a window which opened on the street, and from which, although +it was very high, one could see what was passing by mounting on Madame +de Lamballe's bed, and thence to the window ledge. The Princess +climbed up, and as soon as her head was noticed on the street, a +pretence of firing on her was made. She saw a considerable crowd at +the prison door. + +Very little doubt remained concerning her fate. Neither she nor Madame +de Tourzel had eaten since the previous day. But they were too greatly +moved to take any breakfast. They dared not speak to each other. They +took their work, and sat down to await the result of the fatal day in +silence. + +{352} + +Toward eleven o'clock the door opened. Armed men filled the room and +demanded Madame de Lamballe. The Princess put on a gown, bade adieu to +Madame de Tourzel, and was led to the great Force, where some municipal +officers, wearing their insignia, subjected the prisoners to a +pretended trial. In front of this tribunal stood executioners with +ferocious faces, who brandished bloody weapons. The atmosphere was +sickening: full of the steam of carnage, and the odors of wine and +blood. Madame de Lamballe fainted. When she recovered consciousness +she was interrogated: "Who are you?"--"Marie Louise, Princess of +Savoy."--"What is your rank?"--"Superintendent of the Queen's +household."--"Were you acquainted with the conspiracies of the court on +August 10?"--"I do not know that there were any conspiracies on August +10, but I know I had no knowledge of them."--"Swear liberty, equality, +hatred to the King, the Queen, and royalty."--"I will swear the first +two without difficulty; I cannot swear the last; it is not in my +heart." Here an assistant said in a whisper to Madame de Lamballe: +"Swear it! if you do not swear, you are a dead woman." The Princess +made no answer; she put her hands up to her eyes, covered her face with +them and made a step toward the wicket. The judge exclaimed: "Let some +one release Madame!" This phrase was the death signal. Two men took +the victim roughly by the arms, and made her walk over corpses. Hardly +had she crossed the threshold when she received a {353} blow from a +sabre on the back of her head, which made her blood flow in streams. +In the narrow passage leading from the rue Saint-Antoine to the Force, +and called the Priests' cul-de-sac, she was despatched with pikes on a +heap of dead bodies. Then they stripped off her clothes and exposed +her body to the insults of a horde of cannibals. When the blood that +flowed from her wounds, or that of the neighboring corpses, had soiled +the body too much, they washed it with a sponge, so that the crowd +might notice its whiteness better. They cut off her head and her +breasts. They tore out her heart, and of this head and this heart they +made horrible trophies. The pikes which bore them were lifted high in +air, and they went to carry around these excellent spoils of the +Revolution. + +At the very moment when the hideous procession began its march, Madame +de Lebel, the wife of a painter, who owed many benefits to Madame de +Lamballe, was trying to get near the prison, hoping to hear news of +her. Seeing the great commotion in the crowd, she inquired the cause. +When some one replied: "It is Lamballe's head that they are going to +carry through Paris," she was seized with horror, and, turning back, +took refuge in a hairdresser's shop on the Place Bastille. Hardly had +she done so when the crowd entered the Place. The murderers came into +the shop and required the hairdresser to arrange the head of the +Princess. They washed it, and powdered the fair hair, all soiled with +{354} blood. Then one of the assassins cried joyfully: "Now, at any +rate, Antoinette can recognize her!" The procession resumed its march. +From time to time they called a halt before a wine-shop. Wishing to +empty his glass, the scoundrel who had the Princess's head in his hand, +set it flat down on the lead counter. Then it was put back on the end +of a pike. The heart was on another pike, and other individuals +dragged along the headless corpse. In this manner they arrived in +front of the Temple. It was three o'clock in the afternoon. + +On that day the royal family had been refused permission to go into the +garden. They were in the little tower when the cries of the multitude +became audible. The workmen who were then employed in tearing down the +walls and buildings contiguous to the Temple dungeon, mingled with the +crowd, increased also by innumerable curious spectators, and uttered +furious shouts. One of the Municipal Guards at the Temple closed doors +and windows, and pulled down curtains so that the captives could see +nothing. + +On the street in front of the enclosure a tricolored ribbon had been +fastened across, with this inscription: "Citizens, you who know how to +ally the love of order with a just vengeance, respect this barrier; it +is necessary to our surveillance and our responsibility." This was the +sole dike they meant to oppose to the torrent. At the side of this +ribbon stood a municipal officer named Danjou, formerly a priest, who +was called Abbe Six-feet, on account of his {355} height. He mounted +on a chair and harangued the crowd. He felt his face touched by Madame +de Lamballe's head, still on the end of a pike which the bearer shook +about and gesticulated with, and also by a rag of her chemise, soaked +with blood and mire, which another individual also carried on a pike. +The naked body was there likewise, with its back to the ground and the +front cut open to the very breast. Danjou tried to make the crowd of +assassins who wanted to invade the Temple understand that at a moment +when the enemy was master of the frontiers, it would be impolitic to +deprive themselves of hostages so precious as Louis XVI. and his +family. "Moreover," he added, "would it not demonstrate their +innocence if you dare not try them? How much worthier it is of a great +people to execute a king guilty of treason on the scaffold!" Thus, +while preventing an immediate massacre, he held the scaffold in +reserve. Danjou said that the Communal Council, in order to show its +confidence in the citizens composing the mob, had decided that six of +them should be admitted to make the rounds of the Temple garden, with +the commissioners at their head. The ribbon was then raised and +several persons entered the enclosure. They were those who carried the +remains of Madame de Lamballe. With these were the laborers who had +been at work on the demolitions. Voices were heard demanding furiously +that Marie Antoinette should show herself at a window, so that some one +might climb up and make her {356} kiss her friend's head. As Danjou +opposed this infernal scheme, he was accused of being on the side of +the tyrant. Was the dungeon of the Temple to be forced? Were the +assassins about to seize the Queen, tear her in pieces, and drag her, +like her friend, through streets and squares to the rolling of drums +and the chanting of the _Marseillaise_ and the _Ca ira_? + +A municipal officer entered the tower and began a mysterious parley +with his colleagues. As Louis XVI. asked what was going on, some one +replied: "Well, sir, since you desire to know, they want to show you +Madame de Lamballe's head." Meanwhile the cries outside were growing +louder. Another municipal came in, followed by four delegates from the +mob. One of them, who carried a heavy sabre in his hand, insisted that +the prisoners should present themselves at the window, but this was +opposed by the municipal officers, who were less cruel. This man said +to the Queen in an insulting tone: "They want us to hide the Princess +de Lamballe's head from you when we brought it to let you see how the +people avenge themselves on their tyrants. I advise you to show +yourself if you don't want the people to come up." Marie Antoinette +fainted on learning her friend's death in this manner. Her children +burst into tears and tried by their caresses to bring her back to +consciousness. The man did not go away. "Sir," the King said to him, +"we are prepared for the worst, but you might have dispensed yourself +from informing the Queen of this frightful calamity." {357} Clery, the +King's valet, was looking through a corner of the window blinds, and +saw Madame de Lamballe's head. The person carrying it had climbed up +on a heap of rubbish from the buildings in process of demolition. +Another, who stood beside him, held her bleeding heart. Clery heard +Danjou expostulating the crowd in words like these: "Antoinette's head +does not belong to you; the departments have their rights in it also. +France has confided these great criminals to the care of Paris; and it +is your business to assist us in guarding them until national justice +shall avenge the people." Then, addressing himself to these cannibals +as if they were heroes whose courage and exploits he praised, he added, +in speaking of the profaned corpse of the Princess de Lamballe: "The +remains you have there are the property of all. Do they not belong to +all Paris? Have you the right to deprive others of the pleasure of +sharing your triumph? Night will soon be here. Make haste, then, to +quit this precinct, which is too narrow for your glory. You ought to +place this trophy in the Palais Royal or the Tuileries garden, where +the sovereignty of the people has been so often trampled under foot, as +an eternal monument of the victory you have just won." Remarks like +these were all that could prevent these tigers from entering the Temple +and destroying the prisoners. Shouts of "To the Palais Royal!" proved +to Danjou that his harangue had been appreciated. The assassins at +last departed, after having covered his face with {358} kisses that +smelt of wine and blood. They wanted to show their victim's head at +the Hotel Toulouse, the mansion of the venerable Duke de Penthievre, +her father-in-law, but were deterred by the assurance that she did not +ordinarily live there, but at the Tuileries. Then they turned toward +the Palais Royal. The Duke of Orleans was at a window with his +mistress, Madame de Buffon. He left it, but he may have seen the head +of his sister-in-law. + +Some of the cannibals had remained in the neighborhood of the Temple. +Sitting down at table in a wine-shop, they had the heart of the +Princess de Lamballe cooked, and ate it with avidity. "Thus," says M. +de Beauchesne in his excellent work on Louis XVII., "this civilization +which had departed from God, surpassed at a single bound the fury of +savages, and the eighteenth century, so proud of its learning and +humanity, ended by anthropophagy." In the evening, when some one was +giving Collot d'Herbois an account of the day's performances, he +expressed but one regret,--that they had not succeeded in showing Marie +Antoinette the remains of the Princess de Lamballe. "What!" he +spitefully exclaimed, "did they spare the Queen that impression? They +ought to have served up her best friend's head in a covered dish at her +table." + + + + +{359} + +XXXV. + +THE SEPTEMBER MASSACRES. + +Lovers of paradoxes have tried to represent the September massacres as +something spontaneous, a passing delirium of opinion, a sort of great +national convulsion. This myth was a lie against history and humanity. +It exists no longer, Heaven be thanked. The mists with which it was +sought to shroud these execrable crimes are now dissipated. Light has +been shed upon that series of infernal spectacles which would have made +cannibals blush. No; these odious massacres were not the result of a +popular movement, an unforeseen fanaticism, a paroxysm of rage or +vengeance. They present an ensemble of murders committed in cool +blood, a planned and premeditated thing. M. Mortimer-Ternaux, in his +_Histoire de la Terreur_, M. Granier de Cassagnac, in his _Histoire des +Girondins et des Massacres de Septembre_, have proved this abundantly. +They have exhumed from the archives and the record offices such a mass +of uncontested and incontestable documents, that not the slightest +doubt is now permissible. Edgar Quinet has not hesitated to recognize +this in his book, _La Revolution_. He says: "The {360} massacres were +executed administratively; the same discipline was everywhere displayed +throughout the carnage.... This was not a piece of blind, spontaneous +barbarism; it was a barbarity slowly meditated, minutely elaborated by +a sanguinary mind. Hence it bears no resemblance to anything +previously known in history. Marat harvested in September what he had +been sowing for three years." The Parisian populace, eight hundred +thousand souls, was inert; it was cowardly, it trembled; but it did not +approve, it was not an accomplice. It was a monstrous thing that a +handful of cut-throats should be enough to transform Paris into a +slaughter-house. One shudders in thinking what a few criminals can +accomplish in the midst of an immense population. "The people, the +real people--that composed of laborious and honest workmen, ardent and +patriotic at heart, and of young _bourgeois_ with generous aspirations +and indomitable courage--never united for an instant with the +scoundrels recruited by Maillard from every kennel in the capital. +While the hired assassins of the Committee of Surveillance established +in the prisons what Vergniaud called a butcher's shop for human flesh, +the true populace was assembled on the Champ-de-Mars, and before the +enlistment booths; it was offering its purest blood for the country; it +would have blushed to shed that of helpless unfortunates."[1] In 1871, +the murder of hostages and {361} the burning of monuments was no more +approved by the population than the massacres in the prisons were in +1792. The crimes were committed at both epochs by a mere handful of +individuals. The great majority of the people were guilty merely of +apathy and fear. + +The hideous tableau surpasses the most lugubrious conceptions of +Dante's sombre imagination. Paris is a hell. From August 29, it is +like a torpid Oriental town. The whole city is in custody, like a +criminal whose limbs are held while he is being searched and put in +irons. Every house is inspected by the agents of the Commune. A knock +at the door makes the inmates tremble. The denunciation of an enemy, a +servant, a neighbor, is a death sentence. People scarcely dare to +breathe. Neither running water nor solid earth is free. The parapets +of quays, the arches of bridges, the bathing and washing boats are +bristling with sentries. Everything is surrounded. There is no +refuge. Three thousand suspected persons are taken out of houses, and +crowded into prisons. The hunt begins anew the following day. The +programme of massacres is arranged. The Communal Council of +Surveillance has minutely regulated everything. The price of the +actual work is settled. The personnel of cut-throats is at its post. +Danton has furnished the executioners; Manuel, the victims. All is +ready. The bloody drama can begin. + +On September 2, Danton said to the Assembly: "The tocsin about to sound +is not an alarm signal; it {362} is a charge upon the enemies of the +country. To vanquish them, gentlemen, all that is needed is boldness, +and again boldness, and always boldness." Two days before, he had been +still more explicit. "The 10th of August," said he, "divided us into +republicans and royalists; the first few in number, the second many...; +we must make the royalists afraid." A frightful gesture, a horizontal +gesture, sufficed to express his meaning. + +Robbery preceded murder. It was a veritable raid. The Commune caused +the palaces, national property, the Garde-Meuble, the houses and +mansions of the _emigres_ to be pillaged. One saw nothing but carts +and wagons transporting stolen goods to the Hotel-de-Ville. All the +plate was stolen from the churches likewise. "Millions," says Madame +Roland in her Memoirs, "passed into the hands of people who used it to +perpetuate the anarchy which was the source of their domination." When +will the men of the Commune render their accounts? Never. Who are the +accomplices of Danton and Marat in organizing the massacres? A band of +defaulting accountants, faithless violators of public trusts, breakers +of locks, swindlers, spies, and men overwhelmed with debts. What +interest have they in planning the murders? That of perpetuating the +dictatorship they had assumed on the eve of August 10, and, above all, +of having no accounts to render. A few weeks later on, Collot +d'Herbois will say at the Jacobin Club: "The 2d of September is the +chief article in the creed of our liberty." + +{363} + +The jailors were forewarned. They served the prisoners' dinner +earlier, and took away their knives. There was a disturbed and uneasy +look in their faces which made the victims suspect their end was near. +Toward noon the general alarm was beaten in every street. The citizens +were ordered to return at once to their dwellings. An order was issued +to illuminate every house when night fell. The shops were closed. +Terror overspread the entire city. + +It was agreed that at the third discharge of cannon the cut-throats +should set to work. The first blood shed was that of prisoners taken +from the mayoralty to the Abbey prison. The carriages containing them +passed along the Quai des Orfevres, the Pont-Neuf and rue Dauphine, +until it reached the Bussy square. Here there was a crowd assembled +around a platform where enlistments were going on. The throng impeded +the progress of the carriages. Thereupon one of the escort opened the +door of one of them, and standing on the step, plunged his sabre into +the breast of an aged priest. The multitude shuddered and fled in +affright. "That makes you afraid," said the assassin; "you will see +plenty more like it." + +The rest of the escort followed the example set them. The carriages go +on again, and so do the massacres. They kill along the route, and they +kill on arriving at the Abbey. Towards five o'clock, Billaud-Varennes +presents himself there, wearing his municipal scarf. "People," says +he--what he calls {364} people is a band of salaried +assassins--"people, thou immolatest thine enemies, thou art doing thy +duty." Then he walks into the midst of the dead bodies, dipping his +feet in blood, and fraternizes with the murderers. "There is nothing +more to do here," exclaims Maillard; "let us go to the Carmelites." + +At the Carmelites, one hundred and eighty priests, crowded into the +church and convent, were awaiting their fate with pious resignation. +Two days before, Manuel had said to them ironically: "In forty-eight +hours you will all be free. Get ready to go into a foreign country and +enjoy the repose you cannot find here." And on the previous day a +gendarme had said to the Archbishop of Arles, blowing the smoke from +his pipe into his face as he did so: "It is to-morrow, then, that they +are going to kill Your Grandeur." A short time before the massacre +began, the victims were sent into the garden. At the bottom of it was +an orangery which has since become a chapel. Mgr. Dulau, Archbishop of +Arles, and the Bishops of Beauvais and de Saintes, both of whom were +named de la Rochefoucauld, kneeled down with the other priests and +recited the last prayers. The murderers approached. The Archbishop of +Arles, who was upwards of eighty, advanced to meet them. "I am he whom +you seek," he said; "my sacrifice is made; but spare these worthy +priests; they will pray for you on earth, and I in heaven." They +insulted him before they struck him. "I have never done harm to any +one," said he. An assassin {365} responded: "Very well; I'll do some +to you," and killed him. The other priests were chased around the +garden from one tree to another, and shot down. During this infernal +hunt the murderers were shouting with laughter and singing their +favorite song: _Dansez la Carmagnole_! + +The massacre of the Carmelites is over. "Let us go back to the Abbey!" +cries Maillard; "we shall find more game there." This time there is a +pretence of justice made. The tribunal is the vestibule of the Abbey; +Maillard, the chief cut-throat, is president; the assassins are the +judges, and the public, the Marseillais, the sans-culottes, the female +furies, and men to whom murder was a delightful spectacle. The +prisoners are summoned one after another. They enter the vestibule, +which has a wicket as a door of exit. They are questioned simply as a +matter of form. Their answers are not even listened to. "Conduct this +gentleman to the Force!" says the president. The prisoner thinks he is +safe; he does not know that this phrase has been agreed upon as the +signal of death. On reaching the wicket, hatchet and sabre strokes cut +him down in the midst of his dream. The Swiss officers and soldiers +who had survived August 10 were murdered thus. Their torture lasted a +longer or shorter time, and was accomplished with more or less cruel +refinements, according to the caprice of the assassins, who were nearly +all drunk. + +Night came, and torches were lighted. No {366} shadows; a grand +illumination. They must see clearly in the slaughter house. Lanterns +were placed near the lakes of blood and heaps of dead bodies, so as +plainly to distinguish the work from the workmen. There were some who +were bent on losing no details of the carnage. The spectators wanted +to take things easy. They were tired of standing too long. Benches +for men and others for dames were got ready for them. The death-rattle +of the agonizing, the vociferations of the assassins, the emulation +between the executioners who kill slowly and the victims who are in +haste to die, give joy to the spectators. There is no interruption to +the human butchery. There has been so much blood spilled that the feet +of the murderers slip on the pavement. A litter is made of straw and +the clothes of the victims, and thereafter none are killed except upon +this mattress. In this way the work is more commodiously accomplished. +The assassins have plenty of assurance. Morning dawns on the +continuation of the murders, and the wives of the murderers bring them +something to eat. + +On September 2, the only persons handed over to the cut-throats, were +at the Abbey, the Carmelites, and Saint-Firmin. On September 3, the +massacre became more general. The assassins had said: "If there is no +more work, we shall have to find some." Their desire realizes itself. +Work will not be lacking. There is still some at the Force, where the +Princess de Lamballe, the preferred victim, is {367} murdered. The +assassins, who at the Abbey had been paid at the rate of eight francs a +day, get only fifty sous at the Force. They work with undiminished +zeal, even at this reduction. If necessary, they would work for +nothing. To drink wine and shed blood is the essential thing. The +negro Delorme, servant to Fournier "the American," distinguishes +himself among them all. His black skin, reddened with blood, his white +teeth and ferocious eyes, his bestial laugh, his ravenous fury, make +him a choice assassin. There is work too at the Conciergerie, at the +great and little Chatelet, the Salpetriere, and the Bicetre. A great +number of those detained are people condemned or accused of private +crimes which had absolutely nothing in common with politics. No +matter; blood is wanted; they kill there as elsewhere. At the Grand +Chatelet, work is so plenty, and the assassins so few, that they +release several individuals imprisoned for theft, and impress them into +their service. One of these unfortunate accidental executioners begins +in a hesitating way, strikes a few undecided blows, and then throws +down the hatchet placed in his hands. "No, no," he cries, "I cannot. +No, no! Rather a victim than a murderer! I would rather receive death +from scoundrels like you, then give it to innocent, disarmed people. +Strike me!" And at once the veteran murderers kill the inexperienced +cut-throat. There was a woman, known on account of her charms as the +Beautiful Flower Girl, who was accused of having wounded {368} her +lover, a French guard, in a fit of jealousy. Theroigne de Mericourt, +an amazon of the gutters, was her rival. She pointed her out to the +assassins. They fastened her naked to a post, her legs apart and her +feet nailed to the ground. They burned her alive. They cut off her +breasts with sabre strokes. They impaled her on a hot iron. Her +shrieks carried dismay as far as the outer banks of the Seine. +Theroigne was at the height of felicity. + +At the Salpetriere there was still another spectacle. This prison for +fallen women is a place of correction for the old, of amendment for the +young, and an asylum for those who are still children. More than forty +children of the lower classes were slain during these horrible days. +The delirium of murder reached its height. Gorged with wine mingled +with gunpowder, intoxicated with the fumes and reek of carnage, the +assassins experienced a devouring, inextinguishable thirst for blood +which nothing could quench. More blood, and yet more blood! And where +can it now be found? The prisons are empty. There are no more nobles, +no more priests, to put to death. Very well! for lack of anything +better, they will go to an asylum for the poor, the sick, and the +insane; to the Bicetre. Vagabonds, paupers, fools, thieves, steward, +chaplains, janitor, all is fish that comes to their net. The butchery +lasts five days and nights without stopping. Massacre takes every +form; some are drowned in the cellars, others shot in the courts. +Water, fire, and sword, every sort of torture. + +{369} + +The cut-throats can at last take some repose. They have worked all the +week. There are still some, however, who have not yet had enough, and +who are going to continue the massacres of Paris in the provinces. The +Communal Council of Surveillance has taken care to send to every +commune in France a circular bearing the seal of the Minister of +Justice, inviting them to follow the example of the capital. + +September 9, the prisoners who had been detained at Orleans to be tried +there by the Superior Court, entered Versailles on carts. At the +moment when they approached the grating of the Orangery, assassins sent +from Paris under the lead of Fournier "the American" sprang upon them +and immolated every one. Thus perished the former Minister of Foreign +Affairs, de Lessart, and the Duke de Brissac, former commander of the +Constitutional Guard. Fournier "the American"[2] returned on horseback +to Paris and began to caracole on the Place Vendome; Danton loudly +felicitated him on the success of the expedition, from the balcony of +the Ministry of Justice. + +During all this time, what efforts had the Assembly made to put a stop +to the murders? None, absolutely none. Never has any deliberative +body shown a like cowardice. Neither Vergniaud's voice nor that of any +other Girondin was heard in protest. Indignation, pity, found not a +single word to say. Speeches, {370} discussions, votes on different +questions, went on as usual. Concerning the massacres, not a syllable. +During that infamous week, neither the ministers, the virtuous Roland +not more than the others, neither Petion, the mayor of Paris, nor the +commander of the National Guard sent a picket guard of fifty men to any +quarter to prevent the murders. A population of eight hundred thousand +souls and a National Guard of fifty thousand men bent their necks under +the yoke of a handful of bandits, of two hundred and thirty-five +assassins (the exact number is known). People trembled. At the +Assembly the old moderate party had disappeared. There were not more +than two hundred odd deputies present at the shameful and powerless +sessions. Terrorized Paris was in a state of stupor and prostration. + +The murderers ended by execrating themselves. Tormented by remorse, +they could see nothing before them but vivid faces, reeking entrails, +bleeding limbs. "Among the cut-throats," M. Louis Blanc has said, +"some gave signs of insanity that led to the supposition that some +mysterious and terrible drug had been mingled with the wine they +drank." Some of them became furious madmen. Others sought refuge in +suicide, killing themselves the moment they had no one else to kill. +Others enlisted. They were chased out of the army. Among these was +the man who had carried the head of the Princess de Lamballe on a pike. +One day when he was boasting of his murders, the soldiers became +indignant and {371} put him to death. Others still were tried as +Septembrists and sent to the scaffold. The guilty received their +punishment, even on this earth. Well! there are people nowadays who +would like to rehabilitate them! In vain has Lamartine, the founder of +the Second Republic, exclaimed in a burst of noble wrath: "Has human +speech an execration, an anathema, which is equal to the horror these +crimes of cannibals inspire in me, as in all civilized men?" In vain +have the most celebrated historians of democracy, Edgar Quinet and +Michelet, expressed in eloquent terms their indignation against these +crimes. In vain has M. Louis Blanc said: "Every murder is a suicide. +In the victim the body alone is killed; but what is killed in the +murderer is the soul." There are men who would not alone excuse, but +glorify the assassinations and the assassins! + + + +[1] M. Mortimer-Ternaux, _Histoire de la Terreur_. + +[2] Claude Fournier-Lheritier, was born in Auvergne, 1745, and served +as a volunteer in Santo Domingo, 1772-85, with Toussaint l'Ouverture, +whence his sobriquet "the American." + + + + +{372} + +XXXVI. + +MADAME ROLAND DURING THE MASSACRES. + +Madame Roland's hatred was appeased. The ambitious _bourgeoise_ +throned it for the second time at the Ministry of the Interior, and the +Queen groaned in captivity in the Temple tower. The Egeria of the +Girondins had not felt her heart swell with a single movement of pity +for Marie Antoinette. The fatal 10th of August had seemed to her a +personal triumph in which her pride delighted. The parvenue enjoyed +the humiliations of the daughter of the German Caesars. Her jealous +instincts feasted on the afflictions of the Queen of France and Navarre. + +Lamartine, indignant at this cruelty on Madame Roland's part, has +repented of the eulogies he gave her in his _Histoire des Girondins_. +In his _Cours de Litterature_ (Volume XIII. Conversation XXIII.), he +says: "I glided over that medley of intrigue and pomposity which +composed the genius, both feminine and Roman, of this woman. In so +doing, I conceded more to popularity than to truth. I wanted to give a +Cornelia to the Republic. As a matter of fact, I do not know what +Cornelia was, that mother of the {373} Gracchi who brought up +conspirators against the Roman Senate, and trained them to sedition, +that virtue of ambitious commoners. As to Madame Roland, who inflated +a vulgar husband by the breath of her feminine anger against a court +she found odious because it did not open to her upstart vanity, there +was nothing really fine in her except her death. Her role had been a +mere parade of true greatness of soul." What Lamartine finds fault +with most of all is her hostility to the martyr Queen. He adds: "She +inspired the Girondins, her intimate friends, with an implacable hatred +against the Queen, already so humiliated and so menaced; she had +neither respect nor pity for this victim; she points her out to the +rebellious multitude. She is no longer a wife, a mother, or a +Frenchwoman. She poses as Nemesis at the door of the Temple, when the +Queen is groaning there over her husband, her children, and herself, +between the throne and the scaffold. This ostentatious stoicism of +implacability is what, in my view, kills the woman in this female +demagogue." + +Alas! if Madame Roland was guilty, she was to be punished cruelly. The +colleague of the _virtuous_ Roland was the organizer of the September +massacres. The republican sheepfold dreamed of by the admirer of +Jean-Jacques Rousseau was invaded by ferocious beasts. Human nature +had never appeared under a more execrable aspect than since its +so-called regeneration. Madame Roland was filled with a naive +astonishment. After having sown the wind she was {374} utterly +surprised to reap the whirlwind. What! she said to herself, my husband +is minister, or, to speak with great exactness, I am the minister +myself, and yet there are people in France who are dissatisfied! +Ungrateful nation, why dost thou not appreciate thy happiness? Madame +Roland resembled certain politicians, who, having attained to power, +would willingly disembarrass themselves of those by whose aid they +reached it. For the second time she had just arrived at the goal of +her ambition. Who dared, then, to pollute her joy? Why did that +marplot, Danton, come with his untimely massacres to destroy such +brilliant projects and banish such delightful dreams? The man who, as +if in derision and antithesis, allowed himself to be called the +Minister of Justice, produced the effect of a monster on Madame Roland. +The republic as conceived by him had not the head of a goddess, but of +a Gorgon. Its eyes glittered with a sinister lustre. The sword it +held was that of an assassin or a headsman. + +Madame Roland was greatly astonished when, on Sunday, September 2, +1792, toward five in the evening, when the massacres had already begun, +she saw two hundred men of forbidding appearance arrive at the Ministry +of the Interior and ask for her husband, who was absent. Lucky for him +he was; for albeit a minister, they had come to arrest him in virtue of +a mandate of the Communal Council of Surveillance. Not finding Roland, +the two hundred men retired. One of them, with his shirt-sleeves +rolled up to his {375} elbows, and a sabre in his hand, declaimed +furiously against the treachery of ministers. A few minutes later, +Danton said to Petion: "Do you know what they have taken into their +heads? If they haven't issued a decree to arrest Roland!"--"Who did +that?" demanded the mayor.--"Eh! those devils of committeemen. I have +taken the mandate; hold! here it is!" + +What was Madame Roland doing the next day, when the worst of the +massacres were going on? She gave a dinner, and allowed the Prussian, +Anacharsis Clootz, who came, moreover, uninvited, to make a regular +defence of these horrible murders. "The events of the day," she says +in her Memoirs, "formed the subject of conversation. Clootz pretended +to prove that it was an indispensable and salutary measure; he uttered +a good many commonplaces about the people's rights, the justice of +their vengeance, and of its utility to the welfare of the species; he +talked a long while and very loudly, ate still more, and fatigued more +than one listener." + +And yet, revolutionary passions had not extinguished every notion of +humanity and justice in Madame Roland's soul. On that very day she +induced her husband to write a letter to the National Assembly +concerning the massacres. But how weak and undecided is this letter, +and how public opinion must have been lowered and debased when it could +regard Roland as a courageous minister! In place of scathing the +murderers with the energy of an {376} honest man, he pleads extenuating +circumstances in their favor. "It is in the nature of things and +according to the human heart," he said in his pale missive, "that +victory should lead to some excesses. The sea, agitated by a violent +storm, continues to roar long after the tempest; but everything has its +limits and must finally see them determined. Yesterday was a day over +whose events we ought, perhaps, to draw a veil. I know that the +terrible vengeance of the people carries with it a sort of justice; but +how easy it is for scoundrels and traitors to abuse this effervescence, +and how necessary it is to arrest it!" This language produced not the +least effect. The massacres went on, and Roland remained minister; +although in his letter of September 3 he had written: "I ask the +privilege of resigning if the silence of the laws does not permit me to +act." The _virtuous_ Roland sat in the Council beside his colleague, +the organizer of this human butchery. September 13, he addressed a +letter to the Parisians in which he burnt incense to himself, bragged +about his character, his actions, and his firmness, and carried his +infatuation so far as to write: "I have twice accepted a burden which I +felt myself able to bear." Ah! how difficult it is to renounce even a +shadow of power, and of what compromises with their consciences are not +ministers capable in order to retain for a few days longer the +portfolios that are slipping from their hands! In the depths of his +soul Roland, like his wife, had the profoundest horror of the murders +and {377} the murderers. And yet notice how he extenuates them in his +letter to the Parisians: "I admired August 10; I trembled over the +results of September 2; I carefully considered what the betrayed +patience of the people and their justice had produced, and I did not +blame a first impulse too inconsiderately; I believe that its further +progress should have been prevented, and that those who were seeking to +perpetuate it were deceived by their imagination or by cruel and +evil-minded men. If the erring brethren recognize that they have been +deceived, let them come; my arms are open to them." That was a very +prompt amnesty. Already the assassins are but erring brethren, and the +minister welcomes them to his arms! + +The Gironde kept silence, or, if it spoke, it was to attribute, like +Vergniaud, the massacres "to the _emigres_ and the satellites of +Coblentz." Later on, they were horrified by the crimes, but it was +when others were to profit by them. Each taken by himself, the +Girondins did not hesitate to condemn the murders; but taken as a +whole, they considered merely the interests of their party. Were not +three of them still in the Ministerial Council? What had they to +complain of, then? The September massacres are the most striking +expression of what abominations the ambitious may commit or allow to be +committed in order to maintain themselves a few weeks longer in power. + +But there is a voice in the depths of conscience {378} which neither +interest nor ambition can succeed in stifling. Madame Roland could not +blind herself. The odious reality appeared to her. At last she saw +the yawning gulf beneath her feet, and she uttered a cry of terror. A +secret voice warned her that her fate would be like that of the +September victims. After the 9th of that fatal month her imagination +was vividly impressed. Bloody phantoms rose before her. She wrote on +that day to Bancal des Issarts: "If you knew the frightful details of +these expeditions.... You know my enthusiasm for the Revolution; well, +I am ashamed of it; it has become hideous. In a week ... how do I know +what may happen? It is degrading to remain in office, and we are not +permitted to leave Paris. We are detained so that we may be destroyed +at the propitious moment." + +From that time a rising anger and indignation took possession of the +mind and heart of the Egeria of the Girondins, and constantly increased +until the hour when she ascended the steps of the scaffold. She writes +in her Memoirs, apropos of the September massacres: "All Paris +witnessed these horrible scenes executed by a small number of wretches +(there were but fifteen at the Abbey, at the door of which only two +National Guards were stationed, in spite of the applications made to +the Commune and the commandant). All Paris permitted it to go on. All +Paris was accursed in my eyes, and I no longer hoped that liberty might +be established among cowards, insensible to the worst outrages that +could be perpetrated {379} against nature and humanity, cold spectators +of attempts which the courage of fifty armed men could have prevented +with ease.... It is not the first night that astonishes me; but four +days!--and inquisitive people going to see this spectacle! No, I know +nothing in the annals of the most barbarous peoples which can compare +with these atrocities." + +What a striking lesson for those who play with anarchical passions and +end by falling themselves into the snares they have laid for others! +Nothing is more deserving of study than this retaliatory punishment +which is found, one may say, on every page of revolutionary histories. +The hour was coming when the Girondins and their heroine would repent +of the means they had employed to overset the throne. This was when +the same means were employed against them, when they recognized their +own weapons in the wounds they received. Then, when they had no more +interest in keeping silence, they sought to escape a complicity that +gained them nothing. Instead of the luminous heights which in their +golden dreams they had aspired to gain, they fell, crushed and +overwhelmed, into a dismal gulf, full of tears and blood. How bitter +then were their recriminations against men and things! It was only to +virtue that the dying Brutus said: "Thou art but a name." The +Girondins said it also to glory, to country, and to liberty. Those +among them who did not succeed in fleeing, disavowed, denounced, and +insulted each other before the revolutionary tribunal. At the {380} +Conciergerie they intoned the Marseillaise, but parodying the demagogic +chant in this wise:-- + + Contre nous de la tyrannie[1] + Le _couteau_ sanglant est leve. + + +Read the Memoirs of Louvet, Buzot, Barbaroux, Petion, and Madame +Roland, and you will see to what extremes of bitterness the language of +deceived ambition can go. They are paroxysms of rage, howls of anger, +shrieks of despair. Consider the difference between philosophy and +religion! The philosophers curse, and the Christian pardons. Yes, as +Edgar Quinet has said, "Louis XVI. alone speaks of forgiveness on that +scaffold to which the others were to bring thoughts of vengeance and +despair. And by that he seems still to reign over those who were to +follow him in death with the passions and the furies of earth." Louis +XVI. will be magnanimous and calm. A celestial sweetness will +overspread his royal countenance. An infernal rage will distort the +heart and the features of the Girondins. What pains, what tortures, in +their death-struggle! Earth fails them, and they do not look to +heaven. What accents of disgust and hatred when they speak of their +former accomplices, now become their executioners! + +"Great God!" Buzot will say, "if it is only by such men and such +infamous means that republics {381} can arise and be consolidated, +there is no government more frightful on this earth nor more fatal to +human happiness." He will address these insults, worthy of the +imprecations of Camillus, to the city of Paris: "I say truly, that +France can expect neither liberty nor happiness except from the +irreparable destruction of that capital." + +Barbaroux will be still more severe. His anathemas are launched not +only at Paris, but at all France. "The people," he says, "do not +deserve that one should become attached to them, for they are +essentially ungrateful. It is the absurdest folly to try to conduct to +liberty people without morals, who blaspheme God and adore Marat. +These people are no more fit for a philosophic government than the +lazzaroni of Naples or the cannibals of America.... Liberty, virtue, +sacred rights of men, to-day you are nothing but empty names." Petion, +before dying, will write to his son this letter, which is like the +testament of the Gironde: "My greatest torment will be to think that so +many crimes went unpunished; vengeance is here the most sacred of +duties.... My son, either the murderers of thy father and thy country +will be delivered to the severities of the law and expiate their crimes +upon the scaffold, or thou art under obligation to free thy country +from them. They have broken all the ties of society; their crimes are +of such a nature that they do not fall under ordinary rules. From such +monsters every one is authorized to purge the earth." + +{382} + +Madame Roland will be not less vehement than Buzot, Barbaroux, and +Petion. She will address these severe but just reproaches to her +friends who had not been valiant enough in their own defence: "They +temporized with crime, the cowards! They were to fall in their turn, +but they succumb shamefully, pitied by nobody, and with nothing to +expect from posterity but utter contempt.... Rather than obey their +tyrants, than descend from the bar and go out of the Assembly like a +timid flock about to be branded by the butcher, why did they not do +justice to themselves by falling on the monsters to annihilate them +rather than be sentenced by them?" It is not her friends alone whom +her anger will lash, but the sovereign people, the people once so +flattered, whom she will pursue with her anathemas. "The people," she +will say, "can feel nothing but the cannibal joy of seeing blood flow, +in order that they may run no risk of shedding their own. That +predicted time has come when, if they ask for bread, dead bodies will +be given them; but their degraded nature takes pleasure in the +spectacle, and the satisfied instinct of cruelty makes the dearth +supportable until it becomes absolute." The Egeria of the Girondins +will comprehend that all is lost, that even her blood will be sterile, +and that France is condemned either to anarchy or a dictatorship. +"Liberty," she will exclaim, "was not made for this corrupt nation, +which leaves the bed of debauchery or the dunghill of poverty only to +brutalize itself in license, and howl as it {383} wallows in the blood +streaming from scaffolds." Like the damned souls in Dante, Madame +Roland will leave all hope behind, and when, a few days after Marie +Antoinette, she ascends the steps of the guillotine, instead of +thinking of heaven, like the Queen, she will address this sarcastic +speech to the plaster statue which has replaced that of Louis XV.: "O +Liberty! how they have betrayed thee!" + +But let us not anticipate. The Girondins are still to have a glimmer +of joy. The Republic is about to be proclaimed. + + + +[1] The bloody _knife_ of tyranny is lifted against us. + + + + +{384} + +XXXVII. + +THE PROCLAMATION OF THE REPUBLIC. + +"One of the astonishing things in the French Revolution," says one of +the most eminent writers of the democratic school, Edgar Quinet, "is +the unexpectedness with which the great changes occur. The most +important events, the destruction of the monarchy and the advent of the +Republic, came about without any previous warning." The most ardent +republicans were royalists, not merely under the old regime, but after +1789, and even up to August 10, 1792. Marat wrote, in No. 374 of the +_Ami du Peuple_, February 17, 1791: "I have often been represented as a +mortal enemy of royalty, but I claim that the King has no better friend +than myself." And he added: "As to Louis XVI. personally, I know very +well that his defects are chargeable solely to his education, and that +by nature he is an excellent sort of man, whom one would have cited as +a worthy citizen if he had not had the misfortune to be born on the +throne; but, such as he is, he is at all events the King we want. We +ought to thank Heaven for having given him to us. We ought to pray +that he may be spared to us." Marat praying, {385} Marat thanking +Heaven! and for whom? For the King. Does not that prove what deep +root royalty had taken in France? April 20, 1792, the same Marat +bitterly reproached Condorcet with "shamelessly calumniating the +Jacobin Club, and perfidiously accusing it of wishing to destroy the +monarchy" (_L' Ami du Peuple_, No. 434). June 13, he attacked those +who violated the oath taken at the time of the Federation, and said: +"To defend the Constitution is the same thing as to be faithful to the +nation, the law, and the King" (_L' Ami du Peuple_, No. 448). + +During the entire continuance of the Legislative Assembly, when +Robespierre, having left the tribune, was pretending to educate the +people by means of his journal, what he defended to the utmost was the +royal Constitution. Madame Roland relates that after the flight to +Varennes, when the prospect of a republic loomed up, possibly for the +first time, at a secret meeting, Robespierre, grinning as usual, and +biting his nails, asked ironically what a republic might be. In June, +1792, the entire Jacobin Club was royalist still. It proposed to drop +Billaud-Varennes, because Billaud-Varennes had dared to put the +monarchical principle in question. On the 7th of July following, two +months and a half, that is, before the opening of the Convention, at +the time of the famous Lamourette Kiss, all the members of the Assembly +swore to execrate the Republic forever. Three weeks after September 2, +Danton alleged the paucity and the weakness of the republicans, +compared with the royalists, as {386} motives for the massacres. +Petion has said: "When the insurrection of August 10 was undertaken, +there were but five men in France who desired a republic." + +Buzot, Madame Roland's idol, has written: "A wretched mob, +unintelligent and unenlightened, vomited forth insults against royalty; +the rest neither desired nor willed anything but the Constitution of +1791, and spoke of the republicans just as one speaks of extremely +honest fools. This people is republican only through force of the +guillotine." And yet, September 21, 1792, the Convention, holding its +first sitting in the Hall of the Manege, began by proclaiming the +Republic. + +Buzot, in his Memoirs, has thus described the deputations that were +sent to the bar, and the public that occupied the galleries: "It seemed +as if the outlet of every sewer in Paris and other great cities had +been searched for whatever was most filthy, hideous, and infected. +Villainously dirty faces, surmounted by shocks of greasy hair, and with +eyes half sunk into their heads, they spat out, with their nauseating +breath, the grossest insults mingled with the sharp snarls of +carnivorous beasts. The galleries were worthy of such legislators: men +whose frightful aspect betokened crime and poverty, and women whose +shameless faces expressed the filthiest debauchery. When all these +with hands and feet and voice made their horrible racket, one seemed to +be in an assembly of devils." + +When the session opened, Collot d'Herbois was {387} the first speaker. +He said: "There is a matter which you cannot put off until to-morrow, +which you cannot put off until this evening, which you cannot defer for +a single instant without being unfaithful to the wishes of the nation; +it is the abolition of royalty." Quinet having objected that it would +be better to present this question when the Constitution was to be +discussed, Gregoire, constitutional Bishop of Blois, exclaimed: +"Certainly, no one will ever propose to us to preserve the deadly race +of kings in France. All the dynasties have been breeds of ravenous +beasts, living on nothing but human flesh; still it is necessary to +reassure plainly the friends of liberty; this magic talisman, which +still has power to stupefy so many men, must be destroyed." Bazire +remarked that it would be a frightful example to the people to see an +Assembly which they had entrusted with their dearest interests, resolve +upon anything in a moment of enthusiasm and without thorough +discussion. Gregoire replied with vehemence: "Eh! what need is there +of discussion when everybody is of the same mind? Kings, in the moral +order, are what monsters are in the physical order. Courts are the +workshop of crime and the lair of tyrants. The history of kings is the +martyrology of nations; we are all equally penetrated by this truth. +What is the use of discussing it?" Then the question, put to vote in +these terms: "The National Convention declares that royalty is +abolished in France," was adopted amidst applause. + +{388} + +At four in the afternoon of the same day, a municipal officer named +Lubin, surrounded by mounted gendarmes and a large crowd of people, +came to read a proclamation before the Temple tower. The trumpets were +sounded. A great silence ensued, and Lubin, who had a stentorian +voice, read loud enough to be heard by the royal family confined in the +dungeon, this proclamation, the death knell of monarchy: "Royalty is +abolished in France. All public acts will be dated from the first year +of the Republic. The seal of State will be inscribed with this motto: +_Republique francaise_. The National Seal will represent a woman +seated on a sheaf of arms, holding in one hand a pike surmounted by a +liberty-cap." Hebert (the famous Pere Duchesne) was at this moment on +guard near the royal family. Sitting on the threshold of their +chamber, he sought to discover a movement of vexation or anger, or any +other emotion on their faces. He was unsuccessful. While listening to +the revolutionary decree which snatched away his throne, the descendant +of Saint Louis, Henry IV., and Louis XIV. experienced not the slightest +trouble. He had a book in his hand, and he quietly went on reading it. +As impassive as her spouse, the Queen neither made a movement nor +uttered a word. When the proclamation was finished, the trumpets +sounded again. Clery then went to the window, and the eyes of the +crowd turned instantly towards him. As they mistook him for Louis +XVI., they overwhelmed him with insults. The gendarmes made +threatening {389} gestures, and he was obliged to withdraw so as to +quiet the tumult. While the populace was unchained around the Temple +prison, one man alone was calm, one man alone seemed a stranger to all +anxiety: it was the prisoner. + +A new era begins. The death-struggle of royalty is over. Royalty is +dead, and the King is soon to die. Gregoire, who had stolen the vote +(there were but 371 conventionists present; 374 were absent; that is to +say, more than half), is both surprised and enthusiastic about what he +has done. He confesses that for several days his excessive joy +deprived him of appetite and sleep. Such joy will not last very long. +M. Taine compares revolutionary France to a badly nourished workman, +poor, and overdriven with toil, and yet who drinks strong liquors. At +first, in his intoxication, he thinks he is a millionnaire, loved and +admired; he thinks himself a king. "But soon the radiant visions give +place to black and monstrous phantoms.... At present, France has +passed through the period of joyous delirium, and is about to enter on +another that is sombre; behold it, capable of daring, suffering, and +doing all things, whenever its guides, as widely astray as itself, +shall point out an enemy or an obstacle to its fury." + +How quickly the disenchantments come! Already Lafayette, the man of +generous illusions, has had to imitate the conduct of those _emigres_ +on whom he has been so severe. He has fled to a foreign land, and +found there not a refuge, but a prison. He will {390} remain more than +five years in the gloomy fortress of Olmutz. The victor of Valmy, +Dumouriez, will hardly be more fortunate. He will go over to the +enemy, and live in exile on a pension from foreign powers. How close +together deceptions and recantations come! Marat, who had already said +to the inhabitants of the capital: "Eternal cockneys, with what +epithets would I not assail you in the transports of my despair, if I +knew any more humiliating than that of Parisians?"[1] Marat, who had +said to all Frenchmen: "No, no; liberty is not made for an ignorant, +light, and frivolous nation, for cits brought up in fear, +dissimulation, knavery, and lying, nourished in cunning, intrigue, +sycophancy, avarice, and swindling, subsisting only by theft and +rapine, aspiring after nothing but pleasures, titles, and decorations, +and always ready to sell themselves for gold!"[2] Marat will write, +May 7th, 1793, that is to say, at the apogee of his favorite political +system: "All measures taken up to the present day by the assemblies, +constituent, legislative, and conventional, to establish and +consolidate liberty, have been thoughtless, vain, and illusory, even +supposing them to have been taken in good faith. The greater part seem +to have had for their object to perpetuate oppression, bring on +anarchy, death, poverty, and famine; to make the people weary of their +independence, to make liberty a burden, to cause them to {391} detest +the Revolution, through its excessive disorders, to exhaust them by +watching, fatigue, want, and inanition, to reduce them to despair by +hunger, and to bring them back to despotism by civil war."[3] + +There were six ministers appointed on August 10. Two of them, Claviere +and Roland, will kill themselves; two others, Lebrun-Tondu and Danton, +will be guillotined; the remaining two, Servan and Monge, are destined +to become, one a general of division under Napoleon, and the other a +senator of the Empire and Count of Peluse; and when, at the beginning +of his reign, the Emperor complains to the latter because there are +still partisans of the Republic to be found: "Sire," the former +minister of August 10 will answer, "we had so much trouble to make them +republicans! may it please Your Majesty kindly to allow them at least a +few days to become imperialists!" Of the two men who had so +enthusiastically brought about the proclamation of the Republic, one, +Collot d'Herbois, will be transported to Guiana by the republicans, and +die there in a paroxysm of burning fever; the other, Gregoire, will be +a senator of the Empire, which will not, however, prevent him from +promoting the deposition of Napoleon as he had promoted that of Louis +XVI. There are men who will exchange the jacket of the _sans-culotte_ +for the gilded livery of an imperial functionary. The conventionists +and regicides are {392} transformed into dukes and counts and barons. +David, the official painter of the Empire, Napoleon's favorite, will +paint with joy the picture of a pope, and be very proud of his great +picture of the new Charlemagne's coronation. But listen to Edgar +Quinet: "When I see the orators of deputations taking things with such +a high hand at the bar, and lording it so proudly over mute and +complaisant assemblies, I should like to know what became of them a few +years later." And thereupon he sets out to discover their traces. But +after considerable investigation he stops. "If I searched any +further," he exclaims, "I should be afraid of encountering them among +the petty employes of the Empire. It was quite enough to see Huguenin, +the indomitable president of the insurrectionary Commune, so quickly +tamed, soliciting and obtaining a post as clerk of town gates as soon +as absolute power made its reappearance after the 18th Brumaire. The +terrible Santerre becomes the gentlest of men as soon as he is +pensioned by the First Consul. Hardly had Bourdon de l'Oise and +Albitte, those men of iron, felt the rod than you see them the supplest +functionaries of the Empire. The great king-taker, Drouet, thrones it +in the sub-prefecture of Sainte-Menehould. Napoleon has related that, +on August 10, he was in a shop in the Carrousel, whence he witnessed +the taking of the palace. If he had a presentiment then, he must have +smiled at the chaos which he was to reduce so easily to its former +limits. How many furies, and all to terminate so soon in the +accustomed obedience!" + +{393} + +Is not history, with its perpetual alternatives of license and +despotism, like a vicious circle? And do not the nations pass their +time in producing webs of Penelope, whose bloody threads they weave and +unweave again with tears? All governments, royalties, empires, +republics, ought to be more modest. But all, profoundly forgetful of +the lessons of the past, believe themselves immortal. All declare +haughtily that they have closed forever the era of revolutions. + +With the advent of the Republic a new calendar had been put in force. +The equality of days and nights at the autumnal equinox opened the era +of civil equality on September 22. "Who would have believed that this +human geometry, so profoundly calculated, was written in the sand, and +that in a few years no traces of it would remain? ... The heavens have +continued to gravitate, and have brought back the equality of days and +nights; but they have allowed the promised liberty and equality to +perish, like meteors that vanish in empty space.... The +_sans-culottes_ have not been able to make themselves popular among the +starry peoples.... An ancient belief which the men of the Revolution +had neglected through fear or through contempt was again met with; a +spectre had appeared; a chilly breath, like that of Samuel, had made +itself felt; and lo, the edifice so sagely constructed, and leaning on +the worlds, has vanished away."[4] + +{394} + +There lies at the foundation of history a supreme sadness and +melancholy. This never-ending series of illusions and deceptions, +errors and afflictions, faults and crimes; this rage, and passion, and +folly; so many efforts and fatigues, so many dangers, tortures, and +tears, so much blood, such revolutions, catastrophies, cataclysms of +every sort,--and all for what? Wretched humanity, rolling its stone of +Sisyphus from age to age, inspires far more compassion than contempt. +The painful reflections caused by the annals of all peoples are perhaps +more sombre for the French Revolution than for any other period. Edgar +Quinet justly laments over the inequality between the sacrifices of the +victims and the results obtained by posterity. He affirms that in +other histories one thing reconciles us to the fury of men, and that is +the speedy fecundity of the blood they shed; for example, when one sees +that of the martyrs flow, one also sees Christianity spread over the +earth from the depth of the catacombs; while amongst us, the blood +which streamed most abundantly and from such lofty sources, did not +find soil equally well prepared. And the illustrious historian +exclaims sadly: "The supreme consolation has been refused to our +greatest dead; their blood has not been a seed of virtue and +independence for their posterity. If they should reappear once more, +they would feel themselves tortured again, and on a worse scaffold, by +the denial of their descendants; they would hurl at us again the same +adieu: 'O Liberty! how they have betrayed thee!'" + + + +[1] _Ami du Peuple_, No. 429. + +[2] _Ami du Peuple_, No. 539. + +[3] _La Publiciste de la Republique_, No. 211. + +[4] Edgar Quinet, _La Revolution_, t. 11. + + + + +{395} + +INDEX. + + +Abbey prison, the, massacre of the prisoners of, 363. + +Ankarstroem, Captain, the assassin of Gustavus III., 37, 41. + +Arles, Archbishop of, massacre of, 364. + +Assassins, the, of the September massacres, 362 _et seq._; their fate, +370. + +Assignats created, 128. + +Aubier, M. d', on the King's unwar-like disposition, 288; with the King +in the Convent of the Feuillants, 330. + + +Barbaroux, visionary schemes of, 271; declares the King might have +maintained himself, 285; anathemas of, on the Septembrists, 381. + +Barry, Madame du, her letter to Marie Antoinette, 138. + +Beaumarchais compared with Dumouriez, 95. + +Belgium, the invasion of, a failure, 136. + +Beugnot, Count, his description of Madame Roland, 87, 92; philosophic +remarks of, on woman, 108. + +Billaud-Varennes, 246; at the Abbey, 363. + +Blanc, M. Louis, quoted, 370. + +Bonne-Carrere, director of foreign affairs, portrait of, 101. + +Bossuet quoted, 134. + +Bouille, Count de, warns Gustavus III. of the conspiracy against him, +38; his judgment on Gustavus III., 43. + +Bouille, Marquis de, suppresses the insurrection at Nancy, 111, 133. + +Brissac, Duke of, his devotion to royalty, 137 _et seq._; intolerable +to the Jacobins, 141; accused in the Assembly, 144; assassinated, 147, +369. + +Brunswick, Duke of, his manifesto, 267. + +Buzot, Madame Roland's affection for, 64; quoted, 386. + + +Calvet, M., sent to the Abbey, 144. + +Campan, Madame, describes the Queen's emotion on hearing of her +brother's death, 28; her account of Dumouriez' interview with the +Queen, 155; in peril in the Tuileries, 324. + +Carmelite church, massacre at, 364. + +Chateaubriand, quotation from, 9. + +Chateauvieux, the fete of, 110 _et seq._, mutinous soldiers of, +punished, 112; feted by the Jacobins, 113, 118; admitted to the +Assembly, 117. + +Chenier, Andre, patriotic conduct of, 113, 124; his ode to David, 119; +his fate, 124. + +Claviere made Minister of the Finances, 103, 160. + +Clootz, Anacharsis, defends the September massacres, 375. + +_Comedie-Francaise_, the, in the Revolution, 10. + +Commune, insurrectionary, formed in the Hotel-de-Ville, 281; refuse to +extinguish the fire at the Tuileries, 325, 335, 345, 355; invites every +commune in France to follow the example of massacre in Paris, 369; +terrorize the Assembly, 370; order the arrest of Roland, 374, 378. + +Constitutional Guard, the composition of, 140; disarmed, 145. + +Cordeliers, club of the, 7; chiefs of, 7; decide to attack the +Tuileries, 274. + + +Danjou turns the mob bearing the Princess de Lamballe's head away from +the Temple, 355. + +Danton, cowardice of, 271, 316; his bloodthirsty speech to the +Assembly, 361, 374; fate of, 391. + +Dauphin, the, the red cap set on his head, 213; his interest in the +guard, Drouet, 217, 219; his prayer for the King, 220; on the morning +of August 10, 284; taken from his mother's arms by an insurrectionist, +297; in the Assembly, 299; in the Convent of the Feuillants, 329, 333; +prayer taught him by his mother, 347. + +David, his part in the fete of Chateauvieux, 119; conversation of, 319; +under the Empire, 392. + +Delorme, the negro assassin, 367. + +Desilles, killed in the insurrection at Nancy, 111. + +Drouet, the royalist guard, 217. + +Dumouriez, portrait of, by Madame Roland, 94; Minister of Foreign +Affairs, 95; "a miserable intriguer," 95; his career, 96; Masson's +description of him, 98; plays a double part, 101; his description of +Louis XVI., 104; made Minister of Foreign Affairs, 103; Memoirs of, +quoted, 127, 129, 130; urges the King to sign the decree for the +transportation of the clergy, 150; has an interview with the Queen, +153; refuses to be Madame Roland's puppet, 158; aids the King to be rid +of Roland and his faction, 164; takes the portfolio of War, 166; before +the Assembly, 167; resigns, 169; final interview of, with the King, +171; entreats him not to veto the decrees, 172 _et seq._; goes to the +army, 174. + +Duranton, made Minister of Justice, 103, 160. + + +Elisabeth, Madame, letter of, concerning the fete of Chateauvieux, 120; +remains with the King during the invasion of the Tuileries, 200; +mistaken by the mob for Marie Antoinette, 202; rejoins the Queen, 212; +letter of, to Madame de Raigecourt, 239; cherishes false illusions, +265; pious maxim of, 276; her gentleness, 295; prayer of, in the +Temple, 347. + +Emigration of the nobility the rule in 1792, 2. + + +Federation, fete of the, 249 _et seq._ + +Fersen, Count de, new information concerning, 14; his chivalric +devotion to Marie Antoinette, 15; their correspondence, 16; secret +mission of, 18; sees the King and Queen, 19; his melancholy end, 21, 22. + +Feuillants, Convent of the, royal family imprisoned in, 328 _et seq._ + +Feuillants, club of, 6. + +Force, the, prison of, 350. + +Fournier, "the American," 369. + +Francis II., warlike acts of, 127. + + +Geoffrey, M., remarks of, on Gustavus III., 33; quoted, 132. + +Girondins, the, 177; hesitate to depose the King, 271; tacitly approve +the massacres, 377. + +Gouges, Olympe de, 240. + +Gouvion, M. de, protests against admitting the Swiss to the Assembly, +116; death of, 167. + +Grand Chatelet, massacres at, 367. + +Grave, de, made Minister of War, 103; replaced by Servan, 160. + +Gregoire urges the abolition of royalty, 387; career of, after the +Revolution, 391. + +Guadet, hostility of, to Lafayette, 234. + +Guillotine, Doctor, and his invention, 12. + +Guillotine, the, 12; diversion of society over, 13. + +Gustavus III., his interest in Marie Antoinette, 17; trusted by her, +17; letter of, to her, 18; at Aix-la-Chapelle, 32; his superstition, +34; his promises to Louis XVI., 36; conspiracy against, 37 _et seq._; +assassination of, 40 _et seq._; scenes at his death, 42; character of, +43. + + +Hannaches, Mademoiselle d', 30, 77. + +Hebert, Abbe, confesses the King, 276. + +Hebert (Pere Duchesne) on guard at the Temple, 388. + +Heine, Heinrich, quoted, 278. + +Herbois, Collot d', his part in the affair of the regiment of +Chateauvieux, 112 _et seq._; attacks Andre Chenier, 114; fate of, 125; +boasts of the 2d of September, 362; urges the abolition of royalty, +387; fate of, 391. + +Hervelly, M. d', brings the order to the Swiss to cease firing, 310. + +Hue, Francois, with the King in his captivity, 331; receives from the +King a lock of his hair, 346. + +Huguenin, the orator of the insurrectionists of June 20, 192; chief of +the Commune, 316. + + +Insurrectionists of June 20, organization of, 182; enter the hall of +the Assembly, 193; break into the Tuileries, 198. + +Isle, Rouget de l', author of the _Marseillaise_, 269. + + +Jacobin Club, place of its meeting, 5; its affiliations, 6; Lafayette's +remarks on, 9; joy of at, the death of Gustavus III., 44; the +insurrectionary power of, 177; of Brest and Marseilles, send two +battalions to Paris, 268; royalist, in June, 1792, 385. + +Jourdan, the headsman, 120. + +June 20, insurrection of, 186 _et seq._ + + +La Chesnaye commands the force in the Tuileries, 293. + +Lacoste, made Minister of the Marine, 103. + +Lafayette, letter of, to the Assembly, 178 _et seq._; his letter not +published, but referred to a committee, 181; his relations to the +Jacobins, 230; before the National Assembly, 232; distrusted by the +King and Queen, 236; anxious that the King should leave Paris, 256. + +Lalanne, the grenadier, and Louis XVI., 200. + +Lamartine, quoted, 131; his observations on Lafayette, 231; on Madame +Roland, 372. + +Lamballe, Princess of, 121, 321, 331; not allowed to go to the Temple +with the Queen, 343; sent to the Force, 350 _et seq._; examination and +execution of, 352 _et seq._; her body mutilated and her head carried on +a pike to the Temple, 355; her heart eaten, 358. + +Lamourette, Abbe, his career, 241; his speech to the Assembly and his +proposition for harmony, 242. + +Laporte burns the Countess de la Motte's book at the Queen's order, 142. + +Lebel, Madame de, 353. + +Legendre, addresses the King insolently, 202. + +Leopold II., his interest in French affairs, 23; death of, 27. + +Lessart, de, report of, disapproved by the Assembly, 28; impeached, 30; +massacre of, 369. + +Lilienhorn, Count de, one of the assassins of Gustavus III., 37, 45. + +_Logographe_, box of the, 299 _et seq._ + +Louis XVI., despised by the _emigres_, 25; letter of, to Gustavus III., +36; appoints a ministry chosen by the Gironde, 103; his deference to +his ministers, 104 _et seq._; declares war on Austria, 126, 129; +sufferings of, 132; not a soldier, 133, 139; has no plan, 135; +anecdotes of, by M. de Vaublanc, 139, 140; sacrifices his guard, 145; +repents his concessions, 148; for several days in a sort of stupor, +151; insulted by Roland and his faction, 160; Madame Roland's letter to +him read in the Council, 164; asks Dumouriez to help rid him of +Roland's faction, 164; refuses to sign the decree against the priests, +169; accepts the resignation of Dumouriez, 169; resists Dumouriez' +entreaties not to veto the decrees, 172; vetoes the decrees, 181; +permits the gate of the Tuileries to be opened to the mob, 195; his +conduct at the invasion of the Tuileries, 199 _et seq._; his reception +of the mob in the Tuileries, 201; addressed by the butcher Legendre, +202; in bodily peril, 203; returns to the bedchamber, 208; letter of, +to the Assembly relative to the invasion of the Tuileries, 223; +interview of, with Petion, 224; incident of the red bonnet, 226; +conversation of, with Bertrand de Molleville, 227; repugnance of, to +Lafayette, 236; address of, to the Assembly, 243; letter of, to the +Assembly, 245; his plastron, 248; takes part in the fete of the +Federation, 249 _et seq._; too timorous and hesitating to act, 257; +nominates a new cabinet, 269; conciliatory message of, to the Assembly, +270; declines to entertain any plan of escape, 273; consents that the +royalist noblemen should defend him, 284; unwarlike character of, 288; +reviews the troops in the Tuileries garden and narrowly escapes from +them, 289; urged by Roederer, goes with his family to the Assembly, 292 +_et seq._; his escort, 295; addresses the Assembly, 300; compelled to +remain in the reporters' gallery, 300; orders the defenders of the +Tuileries to cease firing, 305; deposition of, proposed in the +Assembly, 317; acts like a disinterested spectator, 318; taken to the +Convent of the Feuillants, 328; transferred to the Temple, 334, 339; +his quarters, 341; gives lessons to the Dauphin in the Temple, 342: +deprived of his sword, 346; hears the proclamation abolishing royalty +without emotion, 388. + +Louvet, the author of _Faublas_, 54; editor of the _Sentinelle_, and +Madame Roland's confidant, 89 _et seq._ + + +Maillard, president of the tribunal at the Abbey, 365. + +Mailly, Marshal de, the chief of the two hundred noblemen in the +Tuileries, 284. + +Malta, Knights of, 338. + +Mandat, M. de, receives from Petion an order to repel force, 280; goes +to the Hotel-de-Ville and is massacred, 281. + +Marat incites to the deposition of the king, 270; on Louis XVI., 384. + +Marie Antoinette, chivalric devotion of Count de Fersen for, 15; her +correspondence with him, 16; places absolute confidence in Gustavus +III., 17; letter of, to her brother Leopold, 25; condition of, in 1792, +73; has an interview with Dumouriez, 153; annoyed and insulted by the +populace, 156, 157; during the invasion of the Tuileries, 210 _et +seq._; opposed to vigorous measures, 222; her distrust of Lafayette and +preference for Danton, 237; present at the fete of the Federation, 251 +_et seq._; her alarm at the King's peril, 253; midnight alarms of, 259; +insulted by federates and forced to keep to her apartments, 261; her +estimate of the King's character, 263; on the night of August 9, 276; +takes refuge in the Assembly, 299; her hopes excited by the sound of +artillery, 304; in the box of the _Logographe_, 321; in the Convent of +the Feuillante, 332; in the Temple, 343; faints when she hears of the +Princesse de Lamballe's death, 356. + +_Marseillaise_, the, Rouget de l'Isle's new hymn, 269. + +Marseilles, federates of, arrive in Paris, 268; the scum of the jails, +269; at the Tuileries, 290, 306 _et seq._, 309. + +Masson, M. Frederic, his description of Dumouriez, 98. + +Ministry appointed by the King resign; new, appointed, 176. + +Mirabeau cautions the Queen against Lafayette, 236; and Abbe +Lamourette, 241. + +Molleville, Bertrand de, conversation of, with the King, 227; quoted, +273. + +Monge, senator of the Empire, reply of, to Napoleon, 391. + +_Moniteur_, the, on the fete of Chateauvieux, 121. + +Mortimer-Ternaux, M., quoted, 279, 282; his _Histoire de la Terreur_, +359. + +Mouchy, Marshal de, his devotion to the King and Queen, 220. + + +Napoleon, a witness of the invasion of the Tuileries, 209; asserts the +King could have gained the victory, 286; a witness of the attack of the +Marseillais on the Tuileries, 310, 314; visits the Temple, and has it +destroyed, 348. + +National Assembly, place of meeting of, 5; impeach the King's brothers +and confiscate the _emigres'_ property, 26; impeach De Lessart, 30; +order the King's guard disbanded, 143; decrees of as to the clergy and +an army before Paris, 150; Madame Roland's letter to the King, read to, +167; letter of Lafayette read in the, 178; receive a deputation from +Marseilles, 183; consider the admission of the resurrectionists to the +chamber, 187; the place of meeting of, 188; deputation from, to the +King during the invasion of the Tuileries, 208; question the Queen, +216; maintain an equivocal attitude, 222; the majority of, royalists +and constitutionalists, 272; affect not to recognize the King's danger, +280; send a deputation to receive the King and his family, 296; number +of members present when the decree of deposition was voted, 320; +terrorized by the Commune, 370; royalty abolished and the republic +proclaimed by, 387. + +National Guard, at the Tuileries, 196; the choice troops of, broken up, +268; royalist, in the Tuileries, 279, 288. + +Noblemen, royalist, fidelity of, to the King, 278, 284; fate of, 322. + + +Orleans, Duke of, and the Palais Royal, 4; and his party clamor for the +deposition of the King, 270. + + +Palais Royal, the, in 1792, 4. + +Pan, Mallet du, sent to Germany by Louis XVI., 135. + +Paris, in 1792, 1; the Archbishop of, at Versailles, in 1774, 78; +Commune of, how organized, 176; a hell during the September massacres, +361. + +Petion, address of, to the Assembly, 30; promotes the fete of +Chateauvieux, 115; fate of, 122 _et seq._; favors the insurrectionists, +184; his insolent address to the King, 224; the hero of the fete of the +Federation, 254; presents an address to the Assembly praying for the +King's deposition, 270; signs an order giving M. de Mandat the right to +repel force, 280; his treachery and hypocrisy, 282. + +Philipon, the father of Madame Roland, 47. + +Prisons of Paris, the September massacres at, 363 _et seq._ + +Prudhomme's _Revolutions de Paris_ quoted, 225. + + +Quinet, Edgar, quoted, 360, 371; on Louis XVI.'s magnanimity, 380, 384; +quoted, 392, 394. + + +Raigecourt, Madame de, letter of, 24. + +Ramond defends Lafayette in the Assembly, 235. + +Republic proclaimed, 388. + +Revolution, beginning of the organization of, 181. + +Revolutionists, the, in the Tuileries, 199; insolence of, to the King, +200; refuse to leave the Assembly, 205; their barbarity and indecency, +213. + +Robespierre in the Jacobin Club, 5; cowardice of, 271, 316; his defence +of the Constitution, 385. + +Rochefoucauld, Count de la, describes the appearance of the royal +family in the box of the _Logographe_, 321. + +Roederer, remarks of, on Lafayette, 238; urges the King to seek shelter +with the Assembly, 291, 294; addresses the mob, 297; explains to the +Assembly the cause of King's taking refuge with them, 301; blamed for +his advice, 302. + +Roland de la Platiere, M., marries Mademoiselle Philipon, 55; deputed +to the Assembly, 63; takes the portfolio of the Interior, 70; dominated +by his wife, 88; his plebeian dress at the Council, 103; driven by his +wife to hostility against the King, 108; his faction desire to destroy +the King, 160; dismissed from the Council, 165; reinstated, 319; arrest +of, determined, 374; writes a letter to the Assembly concerning the +massacres, 375; continues minister, 376; fate of, 391. + +Roland, Madame, the distinctive characteristics of the century resumed +in her, 46; early years of, 47 _et seq._; married to Roland de la +Platiere, 55; strives to obtain a patent of nobility for her husband, +56; letters of, to Bosc, 57; her description of herself, 61, 74; draws +up her husband's reports, 63; her infatuation for Buzot, 64; her hatred +of royalty, 65; established in Paris, 70; and Marie Antoinette, 74; the +motive of her hatred of Marie Antoinette, 76, 80; describes her visit +to Versailles, 77, 79; her part in establishing the republican regime +in France, 79, 107; her judgment of Louis XVI., 81; her character +contrasted with that of Marie Antoinette, 82; her arrogant demeanor, +86; acts for her husband in public affairs, 88; her intimacy with +Louvet, 89 _et seq._; Lemontey's picture of her, 91; and Dumouriez, 94, +102; creates discord in the Council, 106; decides to get rid of +Dumouriez, 159; her letter to the King, 162; her advice on the +dismissal of the ministers, 165; on the September massacres, 362; feels +no pity for the Queen, 372, 375; her horror at the murders, 376; her +apprehensions, 378; reproaches her friends with temporizing, 382; her +last speech, 383. + +Rousseau, imprisoned in the Temple, 339. + + +Saint-Antoine, Faubourg, citizens of, ask permission to assemble in +arms, 182; in commotion, 184. + +Saint-Huruge, the rioter, 193. + +Salpetriere, the, butchery at, 368. + +Santerre, at the head of the insurrectionists on June 20, 186; demands +admission for the insurrectionists to the Assembly, 190; violence of, +at the Tuileries, 197; offers to protect the Queen, 215; forced by +Westermann to march to the Tuileries, 286. + +September massacres, the, 359 _et seq._ + +Sergent, M., 207. + +Servan, made Minister of War, 160; proposes the formation of an army +around Paris, 160; dismissed from the Council, 165; his career after +the Revolution, 391. + +Stael, Madame de, views the fete of the Federation, her observations, +253; invents a plan of escape for the King, 273; quoted, 317, 327. + +Sudermania, Duke of, brother of Gustavus III., practices of, 35. + +Sutherland, Lady, sends linen for the Dauphin to the Convent of the +Feuillants, 333. + +Swiss regiment, the, go to the Tuileries, 274; ill provided with +ammunition, 277; defend the Tuileries, but are commanded to retire, +307; sweep the Carrousel of rioters, 310; ordered to go to the King, +311; surrender their arms, 313; imprisoned in the church of the +Feuillants, 313; fate of the, 321. + + +Taine, on revolutionary France, 389. + +Temple, the, the royal family taken to, 336; description of, 337; the +Order of the, 337; destroyed by Napoleon, 349. + +Thiers, quoted, 287. + +Thorwaldsen's lion at Lucerne, 314. + +Tourzel, Pauline de, in peril in the Tuileries, 323. + +Tuileries, the, guard of, 195; the invasion of, 198 _et seq._; the, on +the night of August 9, 275 _et seq._; attacked by the Marseillais, 306 +_et seq._; rioters in, 325; on fire, 325. + + +Vaublanc, Count de, quoted, 133; anecdotes of, concerning Louis XVI., +139, 140, 255, 273, 282, 286, 290, 303. + +Vergniaud, 180, 182; speech of, with regard to the admission of the +insurrectionists to the Assembly, 188; violent attack of, on the King, +244; as president of the Assembly, receives Louis XVI., 300; presents +the decree suspending the royal power, 317. + +"Violet, Queen," 336. + +Voltaire, imprisoned in the Temple, 339. + + +Westermann forces Santerre to march, 286; leader of the Marseillais, +who attacked the Tuileries, 306, 308. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of +Royalty, by Imbert de Saint-Amand + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIE ANTOINETTE--DOWNFALL OF ROYALTY *** + +***** This file should be named 32408.txt or 32408.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/0/32408/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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