diff options
| author | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-07 00:45:23 -0800 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-07 00:45:23 -0800 |
| commit | 51da8fd0f333284e433276194a945476885a7b97 (patch) | |
| tree | 52c424d9eec5fe980b0bcbcfa0ea8dff13d73e75 | |
| parent | 532031d32917a8fcd3eca95d0284d0373da1e0a3 (diff) | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 4 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-0.txt | 8074 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-0.zip | bin | 178001 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h.zip | bin | 1922808 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/54493-h.htm | 10235 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/cover.jpg | bin | 39160 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/f01.jpg | bin | 46399 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p001.jpg | bin | 17128 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p006.jpg | bin | 13386 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p007.jpg | bin | 21909 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p008a.jpg | bin | 87844 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p032a.jpg | bin | 86467 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p033.jpg | bin | 31462 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p034.jpg | bin | 17234 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p036a.jpg | bin | 47678 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p062a.jpg | bin | 47771 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p074.jpg | bin | 25504 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p075.jpg | bin | 33349 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p080a.jpg | bin | 56697 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p091.jpg | bin | 39938 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p092.jpg | bin | 83092 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p096a.jpg | bin | 61034 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p106.jpg | bin | 32096 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p107.jpg | bin | 32590 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p130.jpg | bin | 81439 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p131.jpg | bin | 37079 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p138a.jpg | bin | 55374 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p154.jpg | bin | 33770 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p155.jpg | bin | 40350 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p164a.jpg | bin | 70171 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p172a.jpg | bin | 62459 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p174.jpg | bin | 87743 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p175.jpg | bin | 43756 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p194.jpg | bin | 66176 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p195.jpg | bin | 32526 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p196a.jpg | bin | 46408 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p216a.jpg | bin | 82318 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p219.jpg | bin | 75308 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p220.jpg | bin | 32528 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p250.jpg | bin | 29036 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p251.jpg | bin | 32542 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54493-h/images/i_p265.jpg | bin | 19720 -> 0 bytes |
44 files changed, 17 insertions, 18309 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9f7e75a --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #54493 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54493) diff --git a/old/54493-0.txt b/old/54493-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 3b828b0..0000000 --- a/old/54493-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8074 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Dungeons of Old Paris, by Tighe Hopkins - -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/license - - -Title: The Dungeons of Old Paris - Being the Story and Romance of the most Celebrated Prisons - of the Monarchy and the Revolution - -Author: Tighe Hopkins - -Release Date: April 6, 2017 [EBook #54493] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DUNGEONS OF OLD PARIS *** - - - - -Produced by deaurider, Barry Abrahamsen and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - -[Illustration: IN THE GRIP OF THE BASTILLE.] - - The Dungeons of Old Paris - - - - - Being the Story and Romance - of the most Celebrated Prisons - of the Monarchy and - the Revolution - - - - - By - - Tighe Hopkins - - Author of "Lady Bonnie's Experiment," "Nell Haffenden," "The - Nugents of Carriconna," "The Incomplete Adventurer," - "Kilmainham Memories," etc. - - ------- - - Illustrated - - ------- - - - - - G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS - - NEW YORK AND LONDON - - The Knickerbocker Press - - 1897 - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - COPYRIGHT, 1897, BY - G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS - Entered at Stationers' Hall, London - By WARD & DOWNEY - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CONTENTS. - - --------- - - - CHAPTER - - I. INTRODUCTION - - II. THE CONCIERGERIE - - III. THE DUNGEON OF VINCENNES - - IV. THE GREAT AND LITTLE CHÂTELET AND THE FORT-L'ÉVÊQUE - - V. THE TEMPLE - - VI. BICÊTRE - - VII. SAINTE-PÉLAGIE - - VIII. THE ABBAYE - - IX. THE LUXEMBOURG IN '93 - - X. THE BASTILLE - - XI. THE PRISONS OF ASPASIA - - XII. LA ROQUETTE - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - ILLUSTRATIONS. - - - IN THE GRIP OF THE BASTILLE - - MADAME DUBARRY - - CELL OF MARIE ANTOINETTE IN THE CONCIERGERIE - - THE KEEP OR DUNGEON OF VINCENNES - - MIRABEAU ON THE TERRACE OF VINCENNES - - THE GREAT CHÂTELET - - THE TEMPLE PRISON - - A TURNKEY - - A STREET SCENE DURING THE MASSACRES - - THE GALLANT SWISS - - THE BASTILLE - - PLAN OF THE BASTILLE - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - THE DUNGEONS OF OLD PARIS. - - - CHAPTER I. - - INTRODUCTORY. - - -_Triste comme les portes d'une prison—Sad as the gates of Prison_, is an -old French proverb which must once have had an aching significance. To -the citizen of Paris it must have been familiar above most other popular -sayings, since he had the menace of a prison door at almost every turn! -For the "Dungeons of Old Paris" were well-nigh as thick as its churches -or its taverns. Up to the period, or very close upon the period, of the -Revolution of 1789, everyone who exercised what was called with quite -unconscious irony the "right of justice" (_droit de justice_), possessed -his prison. The King was the great gaoler-in-chief of the State, but -there were countless other gaolers. The terrible prisons of State—two of -the most renowned of which, the Dungeon of Vincennes and the Bastille, -have been partially restored in these pages—are almost hustled out of -sight by the towers and ramparts of the host of lesser prisons. To every -town in France there was its dungeon, to every puissant noble his -dungeon, to every lord of the manor his dungeon, to every bishop and -Abbé his dungeon. The dreaded cry of "_Laissez passer la justice du -Roi!_" "Way for the King's justice!" was not oftener heard, nor more -unwillingly, than "Way for the Duke's justice!" or "Way for the justice -of my lord Bishop!" For indeed the mouldy records of those hidden -dungeons and torture rooms of château and monastery, the _carceres duri_ -and the _vade in pace_, into which the hooded victim was lowered by -torchlight, and out of which his bones were never raked, might shew us -scenes yet more forbidding than the darkest which these chapters unfold. -But they have crumbled and passed, and history itself no longer cares to -trouble their infected dust. - -Scenes harsh enough, though not wholly unrelieved (for romance is of the -essence of their story), are at hand within the walls of certain prisons -whose names and memories have survived. I have undone the bolts of -nearly all the more celebrated prisons of historic Paris, few of which -are standing at this day. One or two have been passed by, or but very -briefly surveyed, for the reason that to include them would have been to -commit myself to a certain amount of not very necessary repetition. I -fear that even as the book stands I must have repeated myself more than -once, but this has been for the most part in the attempt to enforce -points which seemed not to have been brought out or emphasised with -sufficient clearness elsewhere. Dealing with prisons which were in -existence for centuries, and some of which were associated with almost -every great and stirring epoch of French history, selection of periods -and events was a paramount necessity. The endeavour has been to give -back to each of these cruel old dungeons, Prison d'État, Conciergerie, -or Maison de Justice, its special and distinctive character; to shew -just what each was like at the most interesting or important dates in -its career; and, as far as might be, to find the reason of that dreary -proverb, "Sad as the gates of Prison." Light chequers the shades in some -of these dim vaults, and the echoes of the dour days they witnessed are -not all tears and lamentations. Something is shewn, it is hoped, of -every kind of "justice" that was recognised in Paris until the days of -'89, when everything that had been, fell with the terrific fall of the -monarchy:—feudal justice, the justice of absolute kings and of ministers -who were but less absolute, provosts' and bishops' justice, and the -justice of prison governors and lieutenants of police. Often it is no -more than a glimpse that is afforded; but the picture as a whole is, -perhaps, not altogether lacking in completeness. Once inside a prison, -the prisoner is the first study; and there are no more moving or pitiful -objects in the annals of France than the victims of its criminal justice -in every age. Slit the curtain of cobweb that has formed over the narrow -_grille_ of the dungeon, put back on their shrill hinges the double and -triple doors of the cell, peer into the hole that ventilates the conical -_oubliette_, and one may see once more under what conditions life was -possible, and amid what surroundings death was a blessing, in the days -when Paris was studded with prisons, when every abbot was free to -wall-up his monks alive, and every seigneur to erect his gallows in his -own courtyard. - -For during all these days, dragging slowly into ages, justice has seldom -more than one face to shew us: a face of cruelty and vengeance. The -thing which we call the "theory of punishment" had really no existence. -Punishment was not to chasten and reform; it was scarcely even to deter; -it was mainly and almost solely to revenge. What the notion of prison -was, I have tried briefly to explain in the chapters on "The -Conciergerie," "The Dungeon of Vincennes," and, I think, elsewhere. We -are strictly to remember, however, that the vindictive idea of -punishment, and the idea of prison as a place in which (1) to hold and -(2) to torment anyone who might be unfortunate enough to get in there, -were not at all peculiar to France. The history of punishment in our own -country leaves no room for boasting; and France has not more to reproach -herself with in the memory of the Bastille, than we have in the actual -and visible existence of Newgate. France has _Archives de la Bastille_; -we have Howard's _State of Prisons_ and Griffiths's _Chronicles of -Newgate_. We are not to forget that, in the "age of chivalry" in -England, it was unsafe for visitors in London to stroll a hundred yards -from their inn after sunset; and that, in the reign of Elizabeth, -Shakespeare might have penned his lines on "the quality of mercy" within -earshot of the rabble on their way to gloat over the disembowelling of a -"traitor," or flocking to surround the stake at which a woman was to die -by fire. In a word, the sense of vengeance, and the thirst for -vengeance, which underlay the old criminal law of France, and of all -Europe, were not less the basis of our own criminal law until well on -into the second quarter of this century. But the French, it would seem, -have paid the cost of their quick dramatic sense. They have handed down -to us, in history, drama, and romance, the picture of Louis XI. arm in -arm with his torturer and hangman, Tristan; the spectacle of the noble -whose sword was convertible into a headsman's axe; and of the abbot -whose girdle was ever ready for use as a halter. Histories akin to these -(and, at the root, there is more of history than of legend in all of -them) are to be delved out of our own records; but the French have been -more candid in the matter, and a good deal more skilled with the pen in -chronicles of the sort. - -On the other hand, England never had quite such bitter memories of her -prisons as France had of hers. The struggle for freedom in England was -never a struggle against the prisons; and it was not consciously a -struggle against the prisons in France. But the destruction of a prison -was the beginning of the French Revolution; and when the Revolution was -over, its first historians took the prisons of France as the type and -example of the immemorial tyranny of their kings. In one important -respect, therefore, the dungeons of old Paris stand apart from the -prisons of the rest of Europe. - -I had proposed to myself, in beginning this introductory chapter, to -attempt a comparison, more or less detailed, between these ruined and -obliterated prisons of historic Paris and the French or English prisons -of to-day. But a final glance at the chapters as they were going to -press counselled me to abstain. There is no point to start from. The old -and the new prisons have a space between them wider than divides the -poles. The key that turned a lock of the Châtelet, Bicêtre, or the -Bastille will open no cell of any modern prison, French or English. -Punishment is systematised, and has its basis in two ideas,—the safety -of peoples living in communities, and the cure of certain moral -obliquities; or, it is quite without system, and means only the -vengeance of the strong upon the weak. Between the prison which was -intended either as a living tomb, or as a starting-place for the -pillory, the whipping-post, or the scaffold; and the prison which -proposes to punish, to deter, or to reform the bad, the diseased, the -weak, or the luckless members of society, there is not a point at which -comparison is possible. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER II. - - THE CONCIERGERIE. - - -If walls had tongues, those of the Conciergerie might rehearse a -wretched story. This is, I believe, the oldest prison in Europe; it -would speak with the twofold authority of age and black experience. Give -these walls a voice, and they might say: - -"Look at the buildings we enclose. There is a little of every style in -our architecture, reflecting the many ages we have witnessed. Paris and -France, in all the reigns of all the Kings, have been locked in here, -starved here, tortured here, and sent from here to die by hanging, by -beheading, by dismembering by horses, by fire, and by the guillotine. We -have found chains and a bitter portion for the victims of all the -tyrannies of France,—those of the Feudal Ages, those of the Absolute -Monarchy, those of the Revolution, and those of the Restoration. There -is no discord, trouble, passion, or revolution in France which is not -recorded in our annals. Politics, religion, feuds of parties and of -houses, private rancours and the enmities of queens, the vengeance of -kings and the jealousies of their ministers, have filled in turn the -vaults of this little city of the dead-in-life. We have seen the killing -of the innocent; the torment of a Queen; the tears of a Dubarry and the -stoicism of a hideous Cartouche; the collapse of a Marquise de -Brinvilliers under torture and the silent heroism of a Charlotte Corday -on her way to the guillotine; the bold immodesty of a La Voisin on the -rack and the solemn abandon of the 'last supper' of the Girondins. We -have seen the worst that France could shew of wickedness and the best -that it could shew of patriotism; we have seen the beginning and the end -of everything that makes the history of a prison." - -Most French writers who have touched upon the Conciergerie seem to have -felt the oppression of the place; their recollections or impressions are -recorded in a spirit of melancholy or indignation. - - "Ah, that Conciergerie!" exclaims Philarète Chasles; "there is a - sense of suffocation in its buildings; one thinks of the prisoner, - innocent or guilty, crushed beneath the weight of society. Here are - the oldest dungeons of France; Paris has scarcely begun to be when - those dungeons are opened." - -The strain of Dulaure, the historian of Paris, is not less depressing: - - "The Conciergerie, the most ancient and the most formidable of all - our prisons, which forms a part of the buildings of the Palais de - Justice, one time palace of the kings, has preserved to this day the - hideous character of the feudal ages. Its towers, its courtyard, and - the dim passage by which the prisoners are admitted, have tears in - their very aspect. Pity on the wight who, condemned to sojourn - there, has not the wherewithal to pay for the hire of a bed! For him - a lodging on the straw in some dark and mouldy chamber, cheek by - jowl with wretches penniless like himself."[1] - -Footnote 1: - - _Histoire de Paris._ - -[Illustration: MADAME DUBARRY.] - -In the days when Paris had not so much as a gate to shut in the face of -the invader, the citizen raftsmen of the Seine thought it well to have a -prison, and "dug a hole in the middle of their isle." This, it seems, -was the sorry beginning of the Conciergerie; but the details of that -vanished epoch are scant. Palace and prison are thought to have been -constructed at about the same date: the palace, which was principally a -fortress, was the residence of the kings; the Conciergerie was their -dungeon. Rebuilt by Saint Louis, the Conciergerie became in part—as its -name implies—the dwelling of the Concierge of the palace. According to -Larousse, the Concierge "was in some sort the governor of the royal -house, and had the keeping of the King's prisoners, with the right of -_low_ and _middle_ justice" (_basse et moyenne justice_). In 1348, the -Concierge took the official title of _bailli_; the functions and -privileges of the office were enlarged, and it was held by many persons -of distinction, amongst whom was Jacques Coictier, the famous doctor of -Louis XI. As the practice was, in an age when every gaoler "exploited" -his prisoners, the concierge-bailli taxed the victuals he supplied them -with, and charged what he pleased for the hire of beds and other -cell-equipments; while it happened more than once, says Larousse, "that -prisoners who were entitled to be released on a judge's order, were -detained until they had paid all prison fees." On such a system were the -old French gaols administered. The office of concierge-bailli, with its -voluminous powers, and its manifold abuses, was in existence until the -era of the Revolution. - -Justice under the old régime counted sex as nothing. The physical -weakness and finer nervous organisation of woman were allowed no claim -upon its mercy. Primary or capital punishment, as to burning and -beheading, was the same for women as for men, and the shocking apparatus -of the torture chamber served for both sexes. The elaborate rules for -the application of the Question published in Louis XIV.'s reign (and -abolished only in the reign of Louis XVI.) specified the costume which -women _and girls_ should wear in the hands of the torturer.[2] - -Footnote 2: - - "Si c'est une femme ou fille, lui sera laissé une jupe avec sa chemise - et sera sa jupe liée aux genoux." - -The black walls of the torture chamber in the Conciergerie, with their -ring-bolts and benches of stone, gave back the groans of many thousands -of mutilated sufferers. There were the "Question ordinary" and the -"Question extraordinary"; and if the first failed to extract a -confession, the second seems almost always to have been applied. The -extravagant cruelty of the age frequently added sentence of torture to -the death sentence; and this was probably done in every case in which -the condemned was thought to be withholding the name of an accomplice. -Far on into the history of France these sentences were dealt out to, and -executed upon, women as well as men; and with as artistic a disregard of -human pain or shame in the one sex as in the other. - -We are in the presence of a high civilisation, or at least a highly -boasted one, in the days of Louis XIV.; but public sentiment is not -offended by the knowledge that a woman is being tortured by the -_questionnaire_ and his assistants in the Conciergerie; nor are many -persons shocked by seeing a woman on the scaffold semi-nude in the -coarse hands of the headsman, or struggling amid blazing faggots in a -Paris square. Nowadays, whether in France or in England, the _mauvais -quart d'heure_ (which, at the guillotine or on the gallows, is usually a -half-minute at the utmost) pays the score of the worst of criminals; but -in the advanced and cultured France of the seventeenth and eighteenth -centuries a Marquise de Brinvilliers must pass through the torture -chamber on her way to the block, and a Ravaillac and a Damiens (after a -like ordeal) are put to death in a manner which sends a thrill of horror -through Europe, and which is not afterwards outdone in any camp of -American Red Indians. - -The extraordinary criminal drama of the Marquise de Brinvilliers has -been vulgarised not a little by legend, by romance, and by the stage; -but is there cause for wonder that a series of crimes which made Paris -quake from its royal boudoirs to the extremities of its darkest alleys -should have inspired writers to the fourth and fifth generations? - -In the hands of De Brinvilliers and her lover and accomplice, the Gascon -officer Sainte-Croix, poison became a polite art; and the accident of -marriage associated the Marchioness with an industrial art which was of -great renown in Paris,—I mean, the Gobelin Manufacture, or Royal -Manufacture of Crown Tapestries. From the fourteenth century, in the -Faubourg Saint-Marcel and on the Bièvre River—the water of which was -considered specially good for dyeing purposes,—there were established -certain drapers and wool-dyers; and amongst them, in 1450, was a wealthy -dyer named Jean Gobelin, who had acquired large possessions on the banks -of the river. His business, after his death, was continued by his son -Philibert, who made it more than ever profitable, and who on his -death-bed bequeathed handsome portions to his sons. The family divided -between them, in 1510, ten mansions, gardens, orchards, and lands. Not -less fruitful were the labours of their successors, and when the name of -Gobelin had grown into celebrity, the popular voice bestowed it, says -Dulaure, upon the district in which their establishment was situated. - -Immensely enriched, the Gobelins ceased to occupy themselves with -business, and took over various employments in the magistracy, army, and -finance. Some of them succeeded in obtaining the rank and title of -Marquis. From the middle of the sixteenth to the middle of the -seventeenth century, the Gobelins held high offices, or married into -office; and were notable amongst the merchant princes whose illustrious -coffers and power to assert themselves won places for them amid the -hereditary aristocracy of France. Into this family entered by marriage, -in 1651, Marie Marguerite d'Aubrai, daughter of the _Lieutenant Civil_, -or Civil Magistrate of Paris. Her husband, Antoine Gobelin, was the -Marquis de Brinvilliers; a title which she was to cover with an infamy -as great and enduring as the fame of the Gobelin Tapestries. - -The Marquise's gallantries (a term which in the seventeenth century -embraced a greater variety of moral eccentricities than the Decalogue -has provided for) were quite eclipsed by her celebrity as a poisoner. -With her performances in this art—in which she seems to have been -trained by Sainte-Croix—began that incredible series of murders, and -attempted murders, known as _L'Affaire des Poisons_, which both -characterised and lent a _special_ character to the morals of the age of -the Grand Monarque. - -It was the accidental death of her lover, in 1675, which exposed and -brought the vengeance of the law on La Brinvilliers. Sainte-Croix was -conducting some experiment with poisons in his laboratory, when the -glass mask with which he had covered his face suddenly broke, and he -fell dead on the spot. Letters of Mme. de Brinvilliers were amongst the -suspicious objects found in the laboratory by the police, and she fled -to London. One of Sainte-Croix' servants was put to the Question, and -his confession did not improve the situation of the Marquise. Leaving -London, she hid by turns in Brussels and Liège; and in a convent in the -latter town she was discovered by the detective Desgrais, who got her -out by a ruse, and brought her back to Paris. Her appearance in the -torture chamber of the Conciergerie was not long delayed. All her -fascinations failed her with those bloodless cross-examiners, and as she -persisted in denying one charge after another, she saw the executioner -and his attendants make ready the apparatus for the torture by water. -She summoned a little shew of raillery: "Surely, gentlemen, you don't -think that with a figure like mine I can swallow those three buckets of -water! Do you mean to drown me? I simply cannot drink it." "Madame," -replied the examiner-in-chief, "we shall see"; and the Marchioness was -bound upon the trestle. - -For a time her courage sustained her, but, as the torture grew sharper, -avowals came slowly, which must have amazed the hardened ears that -received them. - -"Who was your first victim?" - -"M. d'Aubrai—my father." - -"You were very devout at this time, attending church and visiting -hospitals?" - -"I was testing the powers of our science on the patients. I gave -poisoned biscuits to the sick." - -"You had two brothers?" - -"Yes ... we were two too many in my family. Lachaussée, Sainte-Croix' -valet, had instructions to poison my brothers; they died in the country, -with some of their friends, after eating a pigeon-pie which Lachaussée -used to make to perfection." - -"You poisoned one of your children?" - -"Sainte-Croix hated it!" - -"You wanted to poison your husband?" - -"Sainte-Croix for some reason prevented it. After I had administered the -poison, he would give my husband an antidote." - -Before she was released from the trestle, Madame's confession was -complete. Sainte-Croix, imprisoned in the Bastille, on a -_lettre-de-cachet_ obtained by M. de Brinvilliers, had there made the -acquaintance of an Italian chemist, named Exili, who had taught him the -whole art and mystery of poison. Exili's cell in the Bastille was the -first laboratory of Sainte-Croix, who proved afterwards so apt a pupil -that, as his mistress and accomplice avowed, he could conceal a deadly -poison in a flower, an orange, a letter, a glove, "or in nothing at -all." - -After sentence of death had been passed on this most miserable woman, -she was denied the consolations of the Church, but a priest found -courage to give her absolution as she was carried to the scaffold. The -Marchioness was followed to her death by the husband whom she had tried -in vain to send to _his_ death, and who, it is said, wept beside her the -whole way from the Conciergerie to the Place de Grève. Conspicuous in -the enormous crowd assembled in the square were women of fashion and -rank, whom the noble murderess rallied on the spectacle she had provided -for them. One of the ladies was that distinguished gossip, Madame de -Sévigné, who wrote the whole scene down for her daughter on the -following day. De Brinvilliers was beheaded, and her body burnt to -ashes. - -This signal example—the torture, beheading, and burning of a peeress of -France—was signally void of effect. - -The secrets of Sainte-Croix and La Brinvilliers had not been buried with -the one, nor scattered with the ashes of the other. Four years later, -Paris talked of nothing but poison and the revival of the "black art" -which was associated with it; and, in 1680, the King established at the -Arsenal a court specially charged to try cases of poisoning and magic. -The notoriety of the widow Montvoisin, more commonly known as La Voisin, -who dealt extensively in both arts, was inferior only to that of the -Brinvilliers. Duchesses, marchionesses, countesses, and other high dames -of the Court were concerned in this scandal, and Louis himself was -active in seeking to bring the culprits of title to justice,—or to get -them out of the way. He sent a private message to the Comtesse de -Soissons, advising her that if she were innocent she should go to the -Bastille for a time, in which case he would stand by her, and that if -she were guilty, it would be well for her to quit Paris without delay. -The Comtesse, who was "famous at the Court of Louis XIV. for her -dissolute habits," fled and was exiled to Brussels; the Marquise -d'Alluye or d'Allaye was banished to Amboise, Mme. de Bouillon to -Nevers, and M. de Luxembourg was imprisoned for two years in the -Bastille. A far more terrible expiation was prepared for La Voisin. - -Outwardly, this was a woman of a grosser type than the Marchioness -Brinvilliers. The Marchioness, is described as "_gracieuse, élégante, -spirituelle et polie_." La Voisin was a repellent fat creature, as -coarse in speech as in appearance. Yet she lived as a woman of society -(_en femme de qualitè_); and composed and sold to the beauties and -gallants of the Court, poisons, charms, philters, and secrets to procure -lovers or to outwit rivals; she called up spirits for a fee, and would -shew the Devil if one paid the tariff for a glimpse of that -celebrity.[3] - -Footnote 3: - - Dulaure. - -Her attitude in the Salle de la Question of the Conciergerie became her -well. She cursed, flouted the examiners, and "swore that she would keep -on swearing" if they racked her to pieces. "Here's your health!" she -cried, when the first vessel of water was forced down her throat; and, -as they fastened her on the rack,—"That's right! One should always be -growing. I have complained all my life of being too short." It is said -that, having been made to drink fourteen pots of water during the water -torture, she drank fourteen bottles of wine with the turnkeys in her -cell at night. Her sentence was death at the stake, and on her way to -the place of execution she jeered at the priest who accompanied her, -refused to make the _amende honorable_ at Notre-Dame, and fought like a -tigress with the executioners on descending from the cart. Tied and -fettered on the pile, she threw off five or six times the straw which -was heaped on her. Sévigné, who looked on, detailed the scene with -animation, and without a touch of feeling, in a letter to her daughter. - -Confounding the real crimes with chimerical ones, the new court -continued to prosecute poisoners and "sorcerers" together; and even at -that credulous and superstitious date, when judges listened gravely to -the most baseless and fantastic accusations, there were persons -interrogated on charges of sorcery who had the spirit to laugh both -judges and accusers in the face. Mme. de Bouillon said aloud, on the -conclusion of her examination, that she had never in her life heard so -much nonsense so solemnly spoken (_n'avait jamais tant ouïdire de -sottises d'un ton si grave_); whereat, it is chronicled, his Majesty -"was very angry." It was not until the bench itself began to treat as -mere charlatans the wizards of both sexes who appeared before it, that -trials for sorcery and "black magic" fell away and gradually ceased. - -It was the Conciergerie which presided over the examination, torture, -and atrocious punishment of Ravaillac, the assassin of Henri IV., and -Damiens, who attempted the life of Louis XV. Ravaillac, the first to -occupy it, left his name to a tower of the prison. - - "You shiver even now in the Tower of Ravaillac," say MM. Alhoy and - Lurine in _Les Prisons de Paris_,—"that cold and dreadful place. - Thought conjures up a multitude of fearful images, and is aghast at - all the tragedies and all the dramas which have culminated in the - old Conciergerie, between the judge, the victim, and the - executioner. What tears and lamentations, what cries and - maledictions, what blasphemies and vain threats has it not heard, - that pitiless _doyenne_ of the prisons of Paris!" - -Ravaillac, most fearless of fanatics and devotees, said, when -interrogated before Parliament as to his estate and calling, "I teach -children to read, write, and pray to God." At his third examination, he -wrote beneath the signature which he had affixed to his testimony the -following distich: - - "Que toujours, dans mon cœur, - Jésus soit le vainqueur!" - -and a member of Parliament exclaimed on reading it, "Where the devil -will religion lodge next!" - -He was condemned by Parliament on the 2d of May, 1610, to a death so -appalling that one wonders how the mere words of the sentence can have -been pronounced. Our own ancient penalty for high treason was a mild -infliction in comparison with this. Before being led to execution, -Ravaillac did penance in the streets of Paris, wearing a shirt only and -carrying a lighted torch or candle, two pounds in weight. Taken next to -the Place de Grève, he was stripped for execution, and the dagger with -which he had twice struck the King was placed in his right hand. He was -then put to death in the following manner. His flesh was torn in eight -places with red-hot pincers, and molten lead, pitch, brimstone, wax, and -boiling oil were poured upon the wounds. This done, his body was torn -asunder by four horses; the trunk and limbs were burned to ashes, and -the ashes were scattered to the winds. - -Eight assassins had preceded Ravaillac in attempts on the life of Henri -IV., and six of them had paid this outrageous forfeit. The torments of -the Conciergerie and the Place de Grève were bequeathed by these to the -regicide of 1610, and Ravaillac left them a legacy to Robert François -Damiens. - -The _Tower of Ravaillac_ was equally the _Tower of Damiens_. François -Damiens, a bilious and pious creature of the Jesuits, not unfamiliar -with crime, pricked Louis, as his Majesty was starting for a drive, with -a weapon scarcely more formidable than a penknife. He was seized on the -spot, and there were found on him another and a larger knife, -thirty-seven louis d'or, some silver, and a book of devotions,—the -assassins of the Kings of France were always pious men. "Horribly -tortured," he confessed nothing at first, and it is by no means certain -what was the nature or importance of his subsequent avowals. But, -although there is little question that Damiens was merely the instrument -of a conspiracy more or less redoubtable, no effort was made to arraign, -arrest, or discover his supposed accomplices. The examination and trial, -conducted with none of the publicity which such a crime demanded, were -in the hands of persons chosen by the court, "persons suspected of -partiality," says Dulaure, "and bidden to condemn the assassin without -concerning themselves about those who had set him on—which gives colour -to the belief, that they were too high to be touched" (_que ces derniers -étaient puissans_). - -One hundred and forty-seven years had passed since the Paris -Parliament's inhuman sentence on Ravaillac, but not a detail of it was -spared to Damiens on the 28th of March, 1757. Enough of such atrocities. - -In the days of the Regency there was in one of the suburbs of Paris a -tea-garden which was at once popular and fashionable under the name of -La Courtille. In the groves of La Courtille, on summer evenings, amid -lights and music, russet-coated burghers might almost touch elbows with -"high-rouged dames of the palace"; and here one night Mesdames de -Parabère and de Prie brought a party of elegant revellers. As one of the -guests strolled apart, humming an air, he was approached softly from -behind, and a hand was laid upon his shoulder. - -"My gallant mask, I know you! So you have left Normandy, eh? Well, you -have made us suffer much, but I fancy it will be our turn now. One of -our cells has long been ready for you, and you shall sleep at the -Conciergerie to-night. Cartouche!" - -Yes, it was indeed the great Cartouche whom a deft detective had trapped -on the sward of La Courtille. The capture was a notable one, and the -next day and for many days to come Paris could not make enough of -it,—Paris which had suffered beatings, plunderings, and assassinations -at the hands of Cartouche and his band for ten years past. He lay three -months at the Conciergerie, and every day his fame increased. The -Regent's finances and the "ministerial rigours" of Dubois were -disregarded; Cartouche was a godsend to rhymesters, journalists, wits, -and diners-out; pretty lips repeated the dubious history of his amours, -and a theatrical gentleman announced a "comedy" named after the -distinguished cut-throat. Cartouche awaited stoically enough death by -breaking on the wheel. It required a severe application of the Question -to bring him to a betrayal of his band, but "his tongue once loosed, he -passed an entire night in naming the companions of his crimes." The -villain even denounced "three pretty women who had been his mistresses." - -He consented one day to the visit of a person whose indiscreet candour -was passing cruel. This was the dramatist Legrand who, with his -_Cartouche_ comedy in preparation, sought the "local colour" of the -condemned cell. Cartouche had the vanity which characterises the great -criminal, and willingly allowed himself to be "interviewed"; he answered -all Legrand's questions, and then asked one himself: "When is your piece -to be represented?" "On the day of your execution, my dear Monsieur -Cartouche." "Ah, indeed! Then you had better interview the executioner -also; he will come in at the climax, you see." - -Having entertained the playwright with his wit, the murderer next -essayed the part of patriot, and said to his Jesuit confessor, Guignard, -in speaking of the assassination of Henri IV.: - - "All the crimes that I have ever committed were the merest - peccadilloes (_de légères peccadilles_) in comparison with those - which your Order is stained with. Is there any crime more enormous - than to take the life of your King, and such a King as that was? The - noblest prince in the universe, the glory of France, the father of - his country! I tell you that if a man whom I were pursuing had taken - refuge at the foot of the statue of Henri IV., I should not have - dared to kill him." - -The condition of the Conciergerie at this date was at all events better -than it had been two or three centuries earlier. No Mediæval prisons -were fit to live in. Sanitation was a science as yet undreamed of in -Europe, and even had there been such a science, it is improbable that -the inmates of prisons would have tasted its advantages. In the Middle -Ages, nothing was more remote from the official mind, from the minds of -all judges, magistrates, governors, gaolers, and concierges, than the -notion that prisoners should live in wholesome and decent surroundings. -Two very definite ideas the Middle Ages had about prisons, and only two: -the first was, that they should be impregnable, and the second was, that -they should be "gey ill" to live in; and their one idea regarding the -lot of all prisoners and captives was, that it should be beyond every -other lot wretched and unendurable. - -In the age we live in, civilised governments setting about the building -of a new prison do not say to their architects, "You must build a -fortress which prisoners cannot break, and you must put into it a -certain quantity of conical cells below the level of the ground, in -which prisoners may be suffocated within a given number of days," but, -"You must build a prison of sufficient strength; and in planning your -cells you must secure for every prisoner an ample provision of space, -air, and light." Those are the supreme differences between ancient and -modern gaols. Prison in the old days was of all places the least healthy -to live in; nowadays, it is often the most healthy. Good control and -strict surveillance confer security upon prisons which are not built as -fortresses; but nothing gives such immense distinction to the new -system, by contrast with all the earlier ones, as the elaborate and -minute regard of everything which may make for the physical well-being -of the prisoners. - -Then comes the moral question; and from the standpoint of morals the -situation tells even more in favour of the modern system. Imprisonment -should never be cruel; but, when the prisoner is fairly tried and justly -sentenced, it should always be both irksome and disgraceful. The -disgrace of prison, however, depends upon the absolute impartiality of -the tribunal and the soundness of public sentiment. Nobody is disgraced -by being sent into prison in a society in which arrest is arbitrary, and -in which arraignment at the bar is not followed by an honest examination -of the facts. Princes of the blood, nobles, ministers, and judges and -magistrates themselves were equally liable with the commonest offenders -against the common law to be spirited into prison, and left there, -without accusation and without trial, during many centuries of French -history. Most tribunals were corrupt, and during many ages all were at -the mercy of the Crown. A Daniel on the bench was rare, and in great -danger of being hanged; and public sentiment was not yet articulate. - -In such insecurity of justice, imprisonment could carry with it no -social stigma, as it carries inevitably in these days. But, where there -is no shame in imprisonment, there is no question of the reform of the -prisoner, and this—one of the main endeavours of modern penal -systems—was not only quite ignored by the old régime, but was an aspect -of the matter to which it was entirely indifferent, and which had -evidently no place whatever in its conceptions. In the progress of -civilisation, no institution has been so completely transformed as the -prison. It was an instrument of vengeance; it is seeking, not at present -too successfully, to be an instrument of grace. - -Prisons neglected or encumbered with filth are natural hotbeds of -disease, and epidemic sicknesses were frequent. In 1548, the plague -broke out in the Conciergerie, and then for the first time an infirmary -was established in the prison, though I cannot find that it made greatly -for the comfort of the sick. Doctor's work was grudgingly and carelessly -done in the prisons of those days, and there was no great disposition to -hinder the sick from yielding up the ghost; the bed or the share of a -bed allotted to the patient was always wanted. The Conciergerie was -devastated by fire in 1776, and this visitation resulted in a royal -command to rehabilitate the whole interior of the prison. In this -attempt to realise the generous thought of his minister Turgot, Louis -XVI. did not imagine, we may be sure, that he was preparing a last -lodging for Marie Antoinette! - -Here then we stand on the threshold of the Conciergerie of the -Revolution—the ante-chamber of the scaffold, in the fit words of -Fouquier-Tinville. - -It was at four o'clock on the morning of the 14th of October, 1793, at -the close of the sitting of the revolutionary tribunal, that the -dethroned and widowed Queen was brought to the Conciergerie. Poor, -abandoned, outraged Queen, they thrust her into one of their common -cells, and gave her for attendant a galley-slave named Barasin. This -must have been a brave, good fellow, with a loyal heart under his -galley-slave's vest, for at the risk of his life he waited devoutly and -devotedly on the queenly woman, a queen no longer, who could in nothing -reward his devotion. One should name also the concierge Richard, who -shewed himself not less a man in his care of the "beautiful high-born," -and who for his humanity to her was stripped of all his goods. - -The gendarmes guarded her last hours, sat there in the cell with her, -though republican modesty allowed the intervention of a screen. - -It is known what a sublime dignity sustained her to the end; and indeed -almost the worst was over when she had quitted Fouquier-Tinville's bar, -after the "hideous indictment" and the condemnation. She withdrew to -die, and she could die as became a Queen. Louis had gone before her, and -all the mother's dying thoughts and prayers must have been for the -children who were to live after her—how long, she knew not. She sat in -the dingy cell, clasping her crucifix, waiting her call to the tumbril; -"dim, dim, as if in disastrous eclipse; like the pale kingdoms of Dis!" - -From this time on to the end of the Reign of Terror, the Conciergerie -offered such a spectacle as was never seen before within the walls of -any prison. The guillotine - - "smoked with bloody execution." - -The Revolution was eating not her enemies only but her children, and -those victims and prospective victims, men and women, old and young, -filled the cells of the Conciergerie, the chambers, the corridors, and -the yards. They swarmed there in disorder, dirt, and disease, guarded -and bullied by drunken turnkeys, who had a pack of savage dogs to assist -them. They went out by batches in the tumbrils, to leave their heads in -Samson's basket, and ever fresh parties of proscribed ones took the -places of the dead. "I remained six months in the Conciergerie," says -Nougaret, one of the historians of the period, "and saw there nobles, -priests, merchants, bankers, men of letters, artisans, agriculturists, -and honest _sans-culottes_." Often as this population was decimated, -Fouquier-Tinville filled up the gap; and throughout the whole of the -Terror the condemned and the untried proscribed ones, herded together, -seldom had space enough for the common decencies of life. - -Then some sort of classification was attempted, and three orders were -established in the prison. The _Pistoliers_ were those who could afford -to pay for the privilege of sleeping two in a bed. The _Pailleux_ lay -huddled in parties, in dens or lairs, on piles of stale straw, "at the -risk of being devoured by rats and vermin." Nougaret remarks that in -some cells the prisoners on the floor at night had to protect their -faces with their hands, and leave the rest of their persons to the rats. -The _Secrets_ were the third class of prisoners, who made what shift -they could in black and reeking cells beneath the level of the Seine. - -And the sick in the infirmary? Listen once more to Nougaret in his -_Histoire des Prisons de Paris et des Départemens_: - - "There were frightful fevers there, and you took your chance of - catching them. The patients, lying in pairs in filthy beds, were in - as wretched a plight as ever mortals found themselves in. The - doctors hardly condescended to examine them. They had one or two - potions which, as they said, were 'saddles for all horses,' and - which they administered quite indiscriminately. It was curious to - see with what an air of contempt they made their rounds. One day, - the head doctor approached a bed and felt the patient's pulse. 'Ah,' - said he to the hospital warder, 'the man's better than he was - yesterday.' 'Yes, doctor, he's a good deal better,—but it's not the - same man. Yesterday's patient is dead; this one has taken his - place.' 'Really?' said the doctor, 'that makes the difference! Well, - mix this fellow his draught.'" - -When the prisoners were to be locked in for the night, there was always -a great to-do in getting the roll called. Three or four tipsy turnkeys, -with half-a-dozen dogs at their heels, passed from hand to hand an -incorrect list, which none of them could read. A wrong name was spelled -out, which no one answered to; the turnkeys swore in chorus, and spelled -out another name. In the end, the prisoners had to come to the -assistance of the guards and call their own roll. Then the numbers had -to be told over and over again, and the prisoners to be marched in and -marched out three or four times, before their muddled keepers could -satisfy themselves that the count was correct. - -One seeks to know what the feeding was like in the "ante-chamber of the -guillotine." When, in the midst of the Terror, Paris was pinched with -hunger, the pinch was felt severely in the Conciergerie. Rations ran -desperately short, and a common table was instituted. The aristocrats -had to pay scot for the penniless, and came in these strange -circumstances to "estimate their fortunes by the number of -_sans-culottes_ whom they fed, as formerly they had done by the numbers -of their horses, mistresses, dogs, and lackeys." - -All histories, memoirs, chronicles, and legends are agreed that the -Conciergerie of the Revolution was a frightful place. The political -prisoners endured all the horrors, physical and mental, of an -unparalleled régime. Sick and unattended, hungry and barely fed, cold -and left to shiver in dark and naked cells—these were amongst the ills -of the body. But greater by far than these must have been the pangs of -the mind. - -Nearly all of these prisoners, men and women both, regarded death as a -certainty; before ever they were tried, from the moment that the outer -door of the prison had closed behind them, the guillotine was as good as -promised to them. They had no help to count on from without, they had -not even the animating hope of a fair hearing by an upright judge. The -judgment bar of Fouquier-Tinville did not pretend to be impartial. - -Nevertheless, though the blade of the guillotine was suspended over all -heads, and fell daily upon many, an air of mingled serenity and -exaltation reigned throughout the gaol. There were few tears, and there -was no weak repining. Morning and evening, the political prisoners -chanted in chorus the hymns of the Revolution, and these were varied by -witty verses on the guillotine, composed in some instances by prisoners -on the eve of passing beneath the knife. Some had brought in with them -their favourite books, and reading led to long discussions, of which -literature, science, religion, and politics were alternately the themes. -Devoted priests like the Abbé Emory went about making converts, and -opposing their efforts to those of the militant atheist, Anacharsis -Clootz, who styled himself the "personal enemy of Jesus Christ." For -recreation, old games were played and new ones invented. Imagine a crowd -of prisoners of both sexes, living in daily expectation of the scaffold, -who played for hours together at the _guillotine_! A hall of the prison -was transformed into Tinville's tribunal, a Tinville was placed on the -bench who could parody the voice and manner of the terrible original, -the prisoner was arraigned, there were eloquent counsel on both sides, -and witnesses; and when the trial was finished, and the inevitable -sentence had been pronounced, the guillotine of chairs and laths was set -up, and amid a tumult of applause the wooden blade was loosed and the -victim rolled into the basket. Sometimes the game was interrupted, and -there was a general rush to the window to catch the voice of the crier -in the street,—"Here's the list of the brigands who have won to-day at -the lottery of the blessed guillotine!" - -Famous figures, and a few sublime ones, detach themselves from the -groups: a Duc d'Orléans, a Duc de Lauzun, a General Beauharnais (who -writes to his wife Josephine that letter of farewell which she shewed to -Bonaparte at her first interview with him), Charlotte Corday, the great -chemist Lavoisier (on whose death Lagrange exclaimed, "It took but a -moment to sever that head, and a hundred years will not produce one like -it"), Danton the Titan of the Revolution, Camille Desmoulins, and -Robespierre himself. - -One evening, a few days after the death of Marie Antoinette, the -twenty-two Girondins, condemned to die in twenty-four hours, passed into -the keeping of Concierge Richard. These were some of the most heroic men -of the Revolution, "the once flower of French patriotism," Carlyle calls -them; tribunes, prelates, men of war, men of ancient and noble stock, -poets, lawyers. One of their number had killed himself in court on -receiving sentence, and the dead body was carried to the prison, and lay -in a corner of the room in which the twenty-two spent their last night. -They gathered at a long deal table for a farewell supper, at which, says -Thiers, they were by turns, "gay, serious, and eloquent." They drank to -the glory of France, and the happiness of all friends. They sang -solemnly the great songs of the Revolution, and at five in the morning, -when the turnkey came to call the last roll, one of them arose and -declaimed the _Marseillaise_. A few hours later, the twenty-two went -chanting to their death; and the chant was sustained until the last head -had fallen. - -These are amongst the loftier memories of those bloody days. It is -impossible within the limits of a chapter to give a tithe even of the -names that were written in the registers of the _maison de justice_ of -the Revolution. Well, indeed, might Fouquier-Tinville have named it the -ante-chamber of the guillotine, for two thousand prisoners, drawn from -all the other gaols of Paris, went to the scaffold from the -Conciergerie. And they died, most of them, as children of a Revolution -should die; virgin girls were no longer timid, women were weak no -longer, when their turn came to mount the steps of the scaffold. A sense -of patriotism so high and pure and penetrating as to resemble the -spiritual exaltation and abandonment of the Christian martyrs seemed to -extinguish in the frailest breasts the natural fear of death. "_On meurt -en riant, on meurt en chantant, on meurt en criant: Vive la France!_" - -The fierce political interests of the revolutionary period absorb all -others; those who are not Fouquier-Tinville's victims languish obscurely -in their cells, or travel towards the guillotine almost unnoticed. But -who is this in a condemned cell of the Conciergerie in the year '94, not -sent there by sentence of Tinville? It is honest, unfortunate Joseph -Lesurques, unjustly convicted of the murder of a courier of Lyons,—one -of the saddest miscarriages of justice. English play-goers are familiar -with the dramatic version of the story, which gave Sir Henry Irving the -material of one of his most remarkable creations. In the drama, -playwright's justice snatches Lesurques from the tumbril within sight of -the guillotine, but the Lesurques of real life fared otherwise. He died, -innocent and ignorant of the crime, but the shade of the murdered -courier had a double vengeance, for the actual assassin, Dubosc, was -taken later, and duly stretched on the _bascule_. - -In the Napoleonic era, the Conciergerie lost two-thirds of its -lugubrious importance. It continued to receive prisoners of note, but -their sojourn was brief; the prison of the Terror passed them on to -Sainte-Pélagie, Bicêtre, the Temple, or the Bastille. With the return to -France of the dynasty of Louis XVI., the old gaol went suddenly into -mourning, as one may say, for Marie Antoinette. When Louis XVIII. -commanded the erection of an "expiatory monument" in the Rue d'Anjou, -the authorities of the Conciergerie made haste to blot out within its -walls all traces of the Queen's captivity. They broke up the mean and -meagre furniture of her cell, the wooden table, the two straw chairs, -the shabby stump bedstead, the screen behind which her gaolers had -gossiped in whispers; and the cell itself ceased its existence in that -form, and was converted into a little chapel or sacristy. Some poor -prisoner with a thought above his own distresses may be praying there -to-day for the soul of Marie Antoinette. - -[Illustration: CELL OF MARIE ANTOINETTE IN THE CONCIERGERIE.] - -A ghostly souvenir of 1815 may give us pause for a moment. There is no -need to rehearse the story of Marshal Ney, bravest of the sons of -France, Napoleon's _le brave des braves_, whose surpassing services in -the field might have spared him a traitor's end. A few days after he had -"gathered into his bosom" the bullets of a file of soldiers in the -Avenue de l'Observatoire, behind the Luxembourg, the public prosecutor, -M. Bellart, was entertaining at dinner the great men of the bar, the -army, and society. At midnight, the door of the inner salon was suddenly -thrown open, and a footman announced: _Le Maréchal Ney!_ - -M. Bellart and his guests, smitten to stone, looked dumbly towards the -door. The talk stopped in every corner, the music stopped, the play at -the card-tables stopped. In a moment, the tension passed. It was not the -great Marshal, nor his astral. It was a blunder of the footman, who had -confounded the name with that of a friend of the family, M. Maréchal -Aîné. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER III. - - THE DUNGEON OF VINCENNES. - - I. - - -Louis XI. strolled one day in the precincts of Vincennes, wrapped in his -threadbare surtout edged with rusty fur, and plucking at the queer -little peaked cap with the leaden image of the Virgin stuck in the band. -There was a smile on the sallow and saturnine face. - -At his Majesty's right walked a thick-set, squab man of scurvy -countenance, wearing a close-fitting doublet, and armed like a hangman. -On the King's left went a showy person, vulgar and mean of face, whose -gait was a ridiculous strut. - -Louis stopped against the dungeon and tapped the great wall with his -finger. - -"What's just the thickness of this?" he asked. - -"Six feet in places, sire, eight in others," answered the squab man, -Tristan, the executioner. - -"Good!" said Louis. "But the place looks to me as if it were tumbling." - -"It might, no doubt, be in better repair, sire," observed the showy -person, Oliver, the barber; "but as it is no longer used——" - -"Ah! but suppose I thought of using it, gossip?" - -"Then, sire, your Majesty would have it repaired." - -"To be sure!" chuckled the King—"If I were to shut you up in there, -Oliver, you could get out, eh?" - -"I think so, sire." - -"But you, gossip," to his hangman, "you'd catch him and have him back to -me, _hein?_" - -"Trust me, sire!" said Tristan. - -"Then I'll have my dungeon mended," said Louis. "I'm going to have -company here, gossips." - -"Sire!" exclaimed Oliver. "Prisoners so close to your Majesty's own -apartments! But you might hear their groans." - -"Ha! They groan, Oliver? The prisoners groan, do they? But there's no -need why I should live in the château here. Hark you both, gossips, I'd -like my guests to groan and cry at their pleasure, without the fear of -inconveniencing their King." - -And the King, and his hangman, and his barber fell a-laughing. - - ------- - -From that day, in a word, Louis ceased to inhabit the château of -Vincennes, and the dungeon which appertained to it was made a terrible -fastness for his Majesty's prisoners of State. It was already a place of -some antiquity. The date of the original buildings is quite obscure. The -immense foundations of the dungeon itself were laid by Philippe de -Valois; his son, Jean le Bon, carried the fortress to its third story; -and Charles V. finished the work which his fathers had begun. - -All prisons are not alike in their origin. In the beginnings of states, -force counts for more than legal prescripts, and ideas of vengeance go -above the worthier idea of the repression of crime. Such-and-such a -prison, renowned in history, is the expression in stone and mortar of -the power or the hatred of its builders. Thus and thus did they plan and -construct against their enemies. There was no mistaking, for example, -the purpose of the architect of the Bastille,—it must be a fortress -stout enough to resist the enemy outside, and a place fit and suitable -to hold and to torture him when he had been carried a prisoner within -its walls. - -But Vincennes, in its origin, at all events, may be viewed under other -and softer aspects. Those prodigious towers, for all the frightful -menace of their frown, were not first reared to be a place of torment. -The name of Vincennes came indeed, in the end, to be not less dreadful -and only less abhorrent than that of the Bastille. A few revolutions of -the vicious wheel of despotism, and the King's château was transformed -into the King's prison, for the pain of the King's enemies, or of the -King's too valiant subjects. But the infancy and youth of Vincennes were -innocent enough, a reason, perhaps, why it was always less hated of the -people than the Bastille. Vincennes lived and passed scathless through -the terrors and hurtlings of the Revolution; and presently, from its -cincture of flowers and verdant forest, looked down upon that high -column of Liberty, which occupied the blood-stained site of the -vanquished and obliterated Bastille. - -[Illustration: THE KEEP OR DUNGEON OF VINCENNES.] - -King Louis lived no more in the château, and his masons made good the -breaches in the dungeon which neglect, rather than age, had occasioned. -When it stood again a solid mass of stone,— - -"Gossip," said Louis to his executioner and torturer-in-chief, "if there -were some little executions to be done here quietly and secretly—as you -like to do them, Tristan—what place would you choose, _hein_?" - -"I've chosen one, sire; a beautiful chamber on the first floor. The -walls are thick enough to stifle the cries of an army; and if you lift -the stones of the floor here and there, you find underneath the most -exquisite _oubliettes_! Ah! sire, they understood high politics before -your Majesty's time." - -King Louis caressed his pointed chin, and laughed: - -"I think it was Charles _the Wise_ who built that chamber." - -"No, sire; it was John _the Good_!" - -"Ah, so! Go on, gossip. My dungeon is quite ready, eh?" - -"Quite ready, sire." - -"To-morrow, then, good Tristan, you will go to Montlhéry. In the château -there you will find four guests of mine, masked, and very snug in one of -our cosy iron cages. You will bring them here." - -"Very good, sire." - -"You will take care that no one sees you—or them." - -"Yes, sire." - -"And you will be tender of them, gossip. You are not to kill them on the -way. When we have them here—we shall see. Start early to-morrow, -Tristan. As for friend Oliver here, he shall be my governor of the -dungeon of Vincennes, and devote himself to my prisoners. If a man of -them escapes, my Oliver, Tristan will hang you; because you are not a -nobleman, you know." - -"Sire," murmured the barber, "you overwhelm me." - -"Your Majesty owed that place to me, I think," said Tristan. - -"Are you not my matchless hangman, gossip? No, no! Besides, I'm keeping -you to hang Oliver. Go to Montlhéry." - -Thus was Vincennes advanced to be a State prison, in 1473, when Louis -XI. held the destinies of France. From that date to the beginning of the -century we live in, those black jaws had neither sleep nor rest. As fast -as they closed on one victim, they opened to receive another. At a -certain stage of all despotic governments, the small few in power live -mainly for two reasons—to amuse themselves and to revenge themselves. -One amuses oneself at Court, and a State prison-controlled from the -Court—is an ideal means of revenging oneself. The tedious machinery of -the law is dispensed with. There is no trouble of prosecuting, beating -up witnesses, or waiting in suspense for a verdict which may be given -for the other side. The _lettre de cachet_, which a Court historian -described as an ideal means of government, and which Mirabeau (in an -essay penned in Vincennes itself) tore once for all into shreds, saved a -world of tiresome procedure to the King, the King's favourites, and the -King's ministers. For generations and for centuries, absolutism, -persecution, party spirit, public and private hate used the _lettre de -cachet_ to fill and keep full the cells and dungeons of the Bastille and -Vincennes. It was, to be sure, a two-edged weapon, cutting either way. -He who used it one day might find it turned against him on another day. -But, by whomsoever employed, it was the great weapon of its time; the -most effective weapon ever forged by irresponsible authority, and the -most unscrupulously availed of. It was this instrument which, during -hundreds of years, consigned to captivity without a limit, in the -_oubliettes_ of all the State prisons of France, that "_immense et -déplorable contingent de prisonniers célèbres, de misères illustres_." - -Vincennes and the Bastille have been contrasted. They were worthy the -one of the other; and at several points their histories touch. In both -prisons the discipline (which was much an affair of the governor's whim) -followed pretty nearly the same lines, and owed nothing in either place -to any central, preconceived and ordered scheme of management. Prisoners -might be transferred from Vincennes to the Bastille, and from the -Bastille again to Vincennes. For the governor, Vincennes was generally -the stepping-stone to the Bastille. At Vincennes he served his -apprenticeship in the three branches of his calling—turnkey, torturer, -and hangman. Like the callow barber-surgeon of the age, he bled at -random, and used the knife at will; and his savage novitiate counted as -so much zealous service to the State. - -But Vincennes wears a greater colour than the Bastille. It stood to the -larger and more famous fortress as the _noblesse_ to the _bourgeoisie_. -Vincennes was the great prison, and the prison of the great. Talent or -genius might lodge itself in the Bastille, and often so did, very -easily; nobility, with courage enough to face its sovereign on a -grievance, or with power enough to be reckoned a thought too near the -throne, tasted the honours of Vincennes. To be a wit, and polish an -epigram against a minister or a madam of the Court; to be a rhymester, -and turn a couplet against the Government; to be a philosopher, and -hazard a new social theory, was to knock for admission at the wicket of -the Bastille. But to be a stalwart noble, and look royalty in the eye, -sword in hand; to be brother to the King, and chafe under the royal -behest; to be a cardinal of the Church, and dare to jingle your breviary -in the ranks of the Fronde; to be leader of a sect or party, or the head -of some school of enterprise, this was to give with your own hand the -signal to lower the drawbridge of Vincennes. - -At seasons prisoners of all degrees jostled one another in both prisons; -but in general the unwritten rule obtained that philosophy and unguarded -wit went to the Bastille; whilst for strength of will that might prove -troublesome to the Crown ... _voilà le donjon de Vincennes!_ - -Yes, Vincennes was the _State_ prison, the prison for audacity in high -places, for genius that could lead the general mind into paths of danger -to the throne. The fetters fashioned there were for a Prince de Condé to -wear, a Henri de Navarre, a Maréchal de Montmorency, a Bassompierre or a -Cardinal de Retz, a Duc de Longueville or a Prince Charles Edward, a La -Môle and a Coconas, a Rantzau or a Prince Casimir, a Fouquet or a Duc de -Lauzun, a Louis-Joseph de Vendôme, a Diderot or a Mirabeau, a d'Enghien. - -History, says a French historian, shews itself never at the Bastille but -with manacles in one hand and headsman's axe in the other. At Vincennes, -ever and anon, it appears in the rustling silks of a king's favourite, -who finds within the circle of those cruel walls soft bosky nooks and -bowers, for feasting and for love. Sometimes from the bosom of those -perfumed solitudes, a death-cry escapes, and the flowers are spotted -with blood: Messalina has dispensed with a _lettre de cachet_. At one -epoch it is Isabeau de Bavière, it is Catherine de Médicis at another; -what need to exhaust or to extend the list? Catherine made no sparing -use of the towers of Vincennes. It was a spectacle of royal splendours -on this side and of royal tyrannies on that; banquets and executions; -the songs of her troubadours mingling with the sighs of her captives. -Often some enemy of Catherine, quitting the dance at her pavilion of -Vincennes, fell straightway into a cell of the dungeon, to die that -night by stiletto, or twenty years later as nature willed. Yes, indeed, -Vincennes and the Bastille were worthy of each other. - - ------- - -Two mysterious echoes of history still reach the ear from what were once -the vaulted dungeons of Vincennes. The note of the first is gay and -mocking, a cry with more of victory in it than of defeat, and one -remembers the captivity of the Prince de Condé. The other is like the -sudden detonation of musketry, and one recalls the bloody death of the -young Duc d'Enghien, the last notable representative of the house of -Condé. - -The Prince de Condé's affair is of the seventeenth century. It was Anne -of Austria, inspired by Mazarin, who had him arrested, along with his -brother the Prince de Conti and their brother-in-law the Duc de -Longueville. A lighter-hearted gallant than Condé never set foot on the -drawbridge of Vincennes. On the night of his arrival with De Conti and -the duke, no room had been prepared for his reception. He called for -new-laid eggs for supper, and slept on a bundle of straw. De Conti -cried, and De Longueville asked for a work on theology. The next day, -and every day, Condé played tennis and shuttle-cock with his keepers; -sang and began to learn music. He quizzed the governor perpetually, and -laid out a garden in the grounds of the prison which became the talk of -Paris. "He fasted three times a week and planted pinks," says a -chronicler. "He studied strategy and sang the psalms," says another. -When the governor threatened him for breaches of the rules, the Prince -offered to strangle him. But not even Vincennes could hold a Condé for -long, and he was liberated. - -Briefer still was the sojourn of the Duc d'Enghien—one of the strangest, -darkest, and most tragical events of history. In 1790, at the age of -nineteen, he had quitted France with the chiefs of the royalist party. -Twelve years later, in 1802, he was living quietly at the little town of -Ettenheim, not far from Strasbourg; in touch with the forces of Condé, -but not, as it seems, taking active part in the movement which was -preparing against Napoleon. A mere police report lost him with the First -Consul. He was denounced as having an understanding with the officers of -Condé's army, and as holding himself in readiness to unite with them on -the receipt of instructions from England. Napoleon issued orders for his -arrest, and he was seized in his little German retreat on March 15, -1804. Five days later he was lodged in the dungeon of Vincennes. - -Here the prison drama, one of the saddest enacted on the stage of -history, commences. "_Tout est mystérieux dans cette tragédie, dont le -prologue même commence par un secret._" (Everything is mysterious in -this tragedy, the very prologue of which begins with a secret.) - -The Duke had married secretly the Princess Charlotte de Rohan, who, by -her husband's wish, continued to occupy her own house. The daily visits -of the constant husband were a cause of suspicion to the agents of -Napoleon. They said that he was framing plots; he was simply enjoying -the society of his wife. He was engaged, they said, in a conspiracy with -Georges and others against the life of Napoleon; he was but turning love -phrases in the boudoir of the Princess. - -The mystery accompanied the unfortunate prisoner from Ettenheim to -Strasbourg, from Strasbourg to Paris, and went before him to Vincennes. -Governor Harel was instructed to receive "an individual whose name is on -no account to be disclosed. The orders of the Government are that the -strictest secrecy is to be preserved respecting him. He is not to be -questioned either as to his name or as to the cause of his detention. -You yourself will remain ignorant of his identity." - -As he was driven into Paris at five o'clock on the evening of March -20th, the Duke said with a fine assurance: - -"If I may be permitted to see the First Consul, it will be settled in a -moment." - -That request never reached Napoleon, and the prisoner was hurried to -Vincennes. His only thought on reaching the château was to ask that he -might have leave to hunt next day in the forest. But the next day was -not yet come. - -The mystery does not cease. The military commission sent hot-foot from -Paris to try the case were "_dans l'ignorance la plus complète_" both as -to the name and the quality of the accused. An aide-de-camp of Murat -gave the Duke's name to them as they gathered at the table in an -ante-chamber of the prison to inquire what cause had summoned them. -D'Enghien was abed and asleep. - -"Bring in the prisoner," and Governor Harel fetched d'Enghien from his -bed. He stood before his judges with a grave composure, and not a -question shook him. - -"Interrogated as to plots against the Emperor's life, taxed with -projects of assassination, he answered quietly that insinuations such as -these were insults to his birth, his character, and his rank."[4] - -Footnote 4: - - _Histoire du Donjon de Vincennes._ - -The inquiry finished, the Duke demanded with insistence to see the First -Consul. Savary, Napoleon's aide-de-camp, whispered the council that the -Emperor wished no delay in the affair,[5] and the prisoner was -withdrawn. - -Footnote 5: - - It is moderately certain at this day that everyone representing - Napoleon in this miserable affair of d'Enghien _mis_-represented him - from first to last. - -Some twenty minutes later a gardener of the château, Bontemps by name, -was turned out of bed in a hurry to dig a grave in the trenches against -the Pavilion de la Reine; and the officer commanding the guard had -orders to furnish a file of soldiers. - -D'Enghien sat composedly in his room against the council-chamber, -writing up his diary for his wife, and wondering whether leave would be -given him to hunt on the morrow. Enters, once more, Governor Harel, a -lantern in his hand. It was on the stroke of midnight. - -"Would monsieur le duc have the kindness to follow?" It is still on -record that the governor was pale, looked troubled, and spoke with much -concern. - -He led the way that conducted to the Devil's Tower. The stairs from that -tower descended straight into the trenches. At the head of the -staircase, looking into the blackness beyond, the Duke turned and said -to his conductor: "Are you taking me to an _oubliette_? I should prefer, -_mon ami_, to be shot." - -"Monsieur," said Harel, "you must follow me,—and God grant you courage!" - -"It is a prayer I never yet needed to put up," responded d'Enghien -calmly, and he followed to the foot of the stairs. - -"Shoulder arms!" - -A lantern glimmering at either end of the file of soldiers shewed -d'Enghien his fate. As the sentence of death was read, he wrote in -pencil a message to his wife, folded and gave it to the officer in -command of the file, and asked for a priest. There was no priest in -residence at the château, he was told. - -"And time presses!" said the Duke. He prayed a moment, covering his face -with his hands. As he raised his head, the officer gave the word to -fire. - -Volumes have been written upon this tragedy, but to this day no one -knows by whose precise word the blood of the last Condé was spilled in -the trenches of Vincennes. That d'Enghien was assassinated seems beyond -question—but by whom? Years after the event, General Hullin, president -of the commission, asserted in writing that no order of death was ever -signed; and that the members of the commission, still sitting at the -council-table, heard with amazement the volley that made an end of the -debate. Napoleon bore and still bears the opprobrium, but the proof -lacks. Yet who, under the Consulate, dared shoot a d'Enghien, failing -the Consul's word? The stones of Vincennes, wherein the mystery is -locked, have kept their counsel. - - ------- - -Let the curtain be drawn for a moment on the last scene in the tragedy -of La Môle and Coconas. It is a lurid picture of the manners of the -time—the last quarter of the sixteenth century, Charles IX. on the -throne. The tale, which space forbids to tell at length, is one of love -and jealousy, with the wiles of a _soi-disant_ magician in the -background. The prime plotter in the affair was the Queen-Mother, -Catherine de Médicis. La Môle was the lover of Marguerite de Navarre; -Coconas, the lover of the Queen's friend, the Duchesse de Nevers. -Arrested on a dull and senseless charge of conspiring by witchcraft -against the life of the King, the two courtiers were thrown into -Vincennes. The first stage of the trial yielding nothing, the accused -were carried to the torture chamber, and there underwent all the -torments of the Question. After that, being innocent of the charge, they -were declared guilty, and sentenced to the axe. - -"Justice" was done upon them in the presence of all Paris, wondering -dumbly at the iniquity of the punishment. - -Night had fallen, and the executioner was at supper with his family in -his house in the tower of the pillory. All good citizens shunned that -accursed dwelling, and those who had to pass the headsman's door after -dark crossed themselves as they did so. All at once there was a knocking -at the door. - -On his dreadful days of office the "Red Man" sometimes received the -stealthy visit of a friend, brother, wife, or sister, come to beg or -purchase a lock of hair, a garment, or a jewel. - -"There's money coming to us," said the headsman to his wife. He opened -the door, and on the threshold stood a man, armed, and two women. - -"These ladies would speak with you," said the man; and as the headsman -stood aside, the two ladies, enveloped in enormous hoods, entered the -house, their companion remaining without. - -"You are the executioner?" said an imperious voice from behind an -impenetrable veil. - -"Yes, madame." - -"You have here ... the bodies of two gentlemen." - -The headsman hesitated. The lady drew out a purse, which she laid upon -the table. "It is full of gold," she said. - -"Madame," exclaimed the "Red Man," "what do you wish? I am at your -service." - -"Shew me the bodies," said the lady. - -"Ah! madame, but consider. It is terrible!" said the headsman, not -altogether unmoved. "You would scarcely support the sight." - -"Shew them to me," said the lady. - -Taking a lighted torch, the headsman pointed to a door in a corner of -the room, dark and humid. - -"In there!" he said. - -The lady who had not yet spoken broke into an hysterical sob. "I dare -not! I dare not! I am terrified!" she cried. - -"Who loves should love unto death ... and in death," said she of the -imperious voice. - -The headsman pushed open the door of a cellar-like apartment, held the -torch above his head, and from the black doorway the two ladies gazed in -silent horror upon the mutilated spoils of the scaffold. In the red ooze -upon the bare stone floor the bodies of La Môle and Coconas lay side by -side. The severed heads were almost in their places, a circular black -line dividing them from the white shoulders. The first of the two -ladies, with heaving bosom, stooped over La Môle, and raised the pale -right hand to her lips. - -"Poor La Môle! Poor La Môle! I will avenge you!" she murmured. - -Then to the executioner: "Give me the head! Here is the double of your -gold." - -"Ah! madame, I cannot. I dare not! Suppose the Provost——" - -"If the Provost demands this head of you, tell him to whom you gave it!" -and the lady swept the veil from her face. - -The headsman bent to the earth: "Madame the Queen of Navarre!" - -"And the head of Coconas to me, maître," said the Duchesse de Nevers.[6] - -Footnote 6: - - In effect, Margaret of Navarre bore away the head of La Môle, and the - Duchesse de Nevers that of Coconas. It is said that La Môle on the - scaffold bequeathed his head to the Queen. - - ------- - -Amongst Louis XV.'s State prisoners, a long and picturesque array, may -be singled out for the present Prince Charles Edward, son of the -Pretender. Under the wind of adversity, after Culloden, Prince Charles -was blown at length upon French soil. Louis was gracious in his offer of -an asylum, and courtly France was enthusiastic over the exploits and -fantastic wanderings of the young hero. All went gaily with him in Paris -until the signatures had been placed to the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. -Then the wind began to blow from the east again. - -One morning the visit was announced of MM. de Maurepas and the Duc de -Gèvres. - -"Gentlemen," said Prince Charles to his friends, "I know what this visit -bodes. His Majesty proposes to withdraw his hospitality. We are to be -driven out of France." - -His handful of followers were stupefied, but the Prince was right. M. de -Maurepas announced himself as commanded by the King to request Prince -Charles Edward's immediate departure from France. - -"Sir," returned the Prince, "your King has given me shelter, and the -title of brother." - -"Monseigneur," said M. de Maurepas, "circumstances have changed——" - -"To my advantage, sir! For over and above the rights which Louis XV. has -acknowledged in me, I have those more sacred ones of misfortune and -persecution." - -"His Majesty, monseigneur, is beyond doubt deeply touched by your -misfortunes, but the treaty he has just signed for the welfare of his -people compels him now to deny you his succour." - -"Does your King indeed break his word and oath so lightly?" said Prince -Charles. "Is the blood of a proscribed and exiled prince, to whom he has -but just given his hand, so trifling a matter to him?" - -"Monseigneur," said de Maurepas, "I am not here to sustain an argument -with you. I am only the bearer of his Majesty's commands." - -"Then tell the King from me that I shall yield only to his force." - -This was on December 10, 1748. - -When Louis's emissaries had retired, Prince Charles announced his -intention of going to the Opera in the evening. His followers feared -some public scandal, and did their utmost to dissuade him. - -"The more public the better!" cried the Prince in a passion. - -In effect, he drove to the Opera after dinner. De Maurepas had -surrounded the building with twelve hundred soldiers, and as the -Prince's carriage drew up at the steps, a troop of horse encircled it, -and he himself was met with a brusque request for his sword. - -"Come and take it!" said young Hotspur, flourishing the weapon. - -In a moment he was seized from behind, his hands and arms bound, and the -soldiers lifted him into another carriage, which was forthwith driven -off at a gallop. - -"Where are you taking me?" asked the Prince. - -"Monseigneur, to the dungeon of Vincennes." - -"Ah, indeed! Pray thank your King for having chosen for me the prison -which was honoured by the great Condé. You may add that, whilst Condé -was the subject of Louis XIV., I am only the guest of Louis XV." - -M. du Châtelet, governor of Vincennes at that epoch, had received orders -to make the Prince's imprisonment a rigorous one, and fifty men were -specially appointed to watch him. But du Châtelet, a friend and admirer -of the young hero, took his part, and counselled him to abandon a -resistance which must be worse than futile, "You have had triumph -enough," said the prudent du Châtelet, "in exposing the feebleness and -cowardice of the King." - -Prince Charlie's detention lasted but six days. He was liberated on -December 16th, and left Paris in the keeping of an officer of musketeers -to join his father in Rome. - - ------- - -Absolutism, _l'arbitraire_, all through this period was making hay while -the sun shone, and playing rare tricks with the liberties of the -subject. Vincennes was a witness of strange things done in the name of -the King's justice. Take the curious case of the Abbé Prieur. The Abbé -had invented a kind of shorthand, which he thought should be of some use -to the ministry. But the ministry would none of it, and the Abbé made -known his little invention to the King of Prussia, a patron of such -profitable things. But one of his letters was opened at the post-office -by the _Cabinet Noir_, and the next morning Monsieur l'Abbé Prieur awoke -in the dungeon of Vincennes. He inquired the reason, and in the course -of months his letter to the King of Prussia was shewn to him. - -"But I can explain that in a moment," said the Abbé. "Look, here is the -translation." - -The hieroglyphs, in short, were as innocent as a verse of the Psalms, -but the Abbé Prieur never quitted his dungeon. - -A venerable and worthy nobleman, M. Pompignan de Mirabelle, was -imprudent enough to repeat at a supper party some satirical verses he -had heard touching Madame de Pompadour and De Sartines, the chief of -police. Warned that De Sartines had filled in his name on a _lettre de -cachet_, M. de Mirabelle called at the police office, and asked to what -prison he should betake himself. "To Vincennes," said De Sartines. - -"To Vincennes," repeated M. de Mirabelle to his coachman, and he arrived -at the dungeon before the order for his detention. - -Once a year, De Sartines made a formal visit to Vincennes, and once a -year punctually he demanded of M. de Mirabelle the name of the author of -the verses. "If I knew it I should not tell you," was the invariable -reply; "but as a matter of fact I never heard it in my life." M. de -Mirabelle died in Vincennes, a very old man. - -A Swiss, by name Thoring, in the service of Madame de Foncemargue, told -a dream in which his mistress had appeared to him with this message: -"You must assassinate the King, and I will save you. You will be deaf -and dumb until the deed is accomplished." - -The man was clearly of unsound mind, but weak intellects were not -allowed to murder kings in their sleep, and he was cast into Vincennes. -Twenty years later he was seen chained by the middle to the wall of his -cell, half naked and wholly mad. - -But we may leave the prisoners for a while, and throw a glance upon the -great castellany itself. It is best viewed, perhaps, as it stood at the -commencement of the eighteenth century. Nine gigantic towers composed -the fortress. A tenth out-topped them—the tower of the dungeon, -distinguished as the royal manor. Two drawbridges gave access to the -prison proper, the one small and very narrow, the other of an imposing -size, to admit vehicles. Once beneath the wicket, the prisoner saw -himself surrounded on every side by walls of prodigious elevation and -thickness. He stood now immediately at the foot of the dungeon, which -reared its vast height above him. Before beginning the ascent, three -heavy doors must be opened for him, and that which communicated directly -with the dungeon could be unfastened only by the joint action of the -turnkey from within and the sergeant of the guard from without. Straight -from this inner door rose the steep staircase which led to the dungeon -towers. There were four of these towers, one at each angle, and -communication between them was by means of immense halls or chambers, -each defended by its own iron-ribbed doors. - -To each of the four towers, four stories; and at each story a hall -thirty feet long, and from fifteen to eighteen feet wide. At the four -corners of the hall, four dismal chambers—the prisoners' cells. These -cells were like miniature fortresses. A solid outer door being opened, a -second one presented itself. Beyond the second was a third; and the -third, iron-plated on both sides, and armed with two locks and three -bolts, was the door of the cell. The three doors acted upon one another -in such a manner that, unless their secret were known, the second barred -the first, and the third barred the second. Light entered the cells -through four loopholes, of which the inner orifices were a foot and a -half in width, and the outer only six inches. - -In the great halls on which the cells opened, prisoners were exercised -for a limited time (never more than an hour) on rainy days, or when the -orders of the governor forbade them to descend to the walled garden of -the dungeon. - -The hall of the first floor, celebrated in the annals of barbarism, was -called the _Salle de la Question_, or torture chamber. It had its stone -benches, on which, the miserable creatures were placed to wait and watch -the preparations for their torment; and great iron hoops or rings -attached to the walls, to compress their limbs when the Question was to -be put. Hard by this frightful chamber—which was fitted with every -contrivance for the infliction of bodily suffering—were certain -diminutive cells, deprived of light and air, and furnished with plank -beds, on which prisoners were chained for a moment of repose between the -first and second applications of the torture.[7] - -Footnote 7: - - Up to the reign of Louis XVI., every prison in Paris and the principal - courts of justice had a torture chamber, and precise rules existed as - to the various kinds of torture that might be resorted to, the mode in - which each was to be applied, the persons who were to be present - during the Question, the preliminary examination of the prisoner by a - surgeon, the manner of binding, stretching, etc., together with the - minutest details respecting the several forms of the Question, and the - means to be employed to restore the sufferer for a second application. - -On the ground floor of the dungeon were the dark cells. These were in no -way connected with the _Salle de la Question_, but served as the abodes -for months, or even for years, of those unhappy prisoners against whom -absolutism had a special grudge, or whom the governor took a pleasure in -reducing to the last extremity of misery. Here was a bed hollowed in the -stone wall, and littered with mouldy straw; and rings in the wall and -floor for waist-chains and leg-irons. Such a dwelling as this might -receive the unfortunate whose _lettre de cachet_ bore the appalling -legend: _Pour être oublié!_—(_To be forgotten!_). - -But there were darker profundities yet in this Tartarus of the Kings of -France. Almost as far as its towers rose above the ground, the dungeon -plunged downwards in subterranean abysses, deep below deep. How many -victims sank in those secure abysses, and were silently extinguished! - -In a place which witnessed so many last earthly moments, a chapel was a -necessity. Hasty absolution was often given for the crimes real or -imaginary which were so rudely expiated within the royal manor; and -sometimes prisoners were carried in a dying state from the _Salle de la -Question_ to receive the last rites of the Church in one of the three -small chapel cells with double doors. Here, on the very threshold of -death, one lay in semi-darkness to hear the mass which was pronounced on -the other side of the wall. Over the chaplain's apartment was the -singular inscription, _Carcer sacerdotis_ (_Prison of the Priest_), -which allows the inference that the chaplain, whilst in the exercise of -his functions, was not allowed to communicate with the outer world. - -A narrow stone staircase of two hundred and sixty-five high steps, -obstructed at frequent intervals by sealed doors, conducted to a small -and well made terrace at the very top of the dungeon. It is probable -that this terrace is still in existence.[8] It was little used—perhaps -because it was the pleasantest place in the prison,—but tradition has -represented Mirabeau as taking an occasional airing on that superb -summit. The little lantern-shaped tower placed here contained the chapel -which was once the oratory of the Kings of France. Some nerve must have -been needed for Majesty to pray at ease, whilst crushing with its knees -that mass of human wretchedness! - -Footnote 8: - - Vincennes is now a fort and artillery barracks, and may neither be - sketched nor photographed. - -The great court below was parcelled into little close gardens, where, -under rigid surveillance, favoured prisoners took their dreary exercise. - -Few prisons the like of Vincennes have been erected. Those tremendous -towers, those almost impenetrable walls, those double and triple doors -garnished with iron, the trenches forty feet in depth, those wide outer -galleries to give the sentries command at every point—what more could -genius and industry invent to combat the prisoner's passion for liberty? -There were, indeed, few escapes from Vincennes. The prisoner who broke -prison from the Bastille, and won his way into the trenches, nearly -always made good his flight; but in the trenches of Vincennes, if he -ever reached them, he was more helpless than a rat in a bucket. The -architect of Vincennes was up some half-hour earlier than the architect -of the Bastille. - -Twice every hour of the twenty-four the patrol made a complete tour of -the dungeon; and night and morning, before the closing and opening of -the doors, the trenches (which were forbidden to the turnkeys except by -express order) were surveyed from end to end, that no letters might be -thrown there by prisoners upon whom the State had set a seal like that -of the _Masque de Fer_. - -Over and above all these _précautions barbares_, the sentries had orders -to turn the eyes of every passerby from the dungeon towers. No one might -stand or draw bridle in the shadow of Vincennes. It might be a relative -or friend seeking to learn in what exact cell the captive was lodged! -From light to dusk, the sentry reiterated his changeless formula: -_Passez votre chemin!_ - -We have yet to see what life the prisoners led. - - - II. - -The hour, the manner, and the circumstances of his reception at -Vincennes were little adapted to lessen the apprehensions of a prisoner -regarding the fate that awaited him. It was generally at night that the -arrest was effected, and the dismal ceremony of admission lost nothing -amid the general gloom of the scene, streaked here and there by the thin -light of the warders' lanterns. It would have been distressing enough to -pass into that black keep as the King's prisoner, after a fair trial in -open court, and with full knowledge of the term of one's captivity; how -much more so to find oneself thrust in there on some vague or fabulous -charge, a victim not of offended laws but of some cold caprice of -vengeance, to stay the pleasure of an enemy who might forget his -prisoner before he forgot his wrath. At Vincennes as in the Bastille, -prisoners lived on, hopelessly forgotten, years after the death of their -accusers. - -On arrival at the dungeon the prisoner was searched from head to foot, -and all papers, money, or other valuables were taken from him. This was -done under the eyes of the governor, who then, preceded by two turnkeys, -led his charge up that steep, narrow and winding staircase which has -been described. One vast hall after another was slowly traversed, with -frequent halts for the unbarring of doors which creaked on their rusty -hinges. The flicker of the lanterns amid that sea of shadows brought -into dim evidence huge locks and padlocks, loopholes and casements, -garnished with twisted iron bars; and every footfall found an echo in -the vaulted ceilings. - -At the end of this oppressive journey, the prisoner came to his den, a -miserable place containing a wooden stump bedstead, a couple of rush -chairs, and a table stained with the dishes of every previous occupant. -If it were past the hour at which prisoners were served with supper, he -would probably be denied a morsel of food; and the governor left him, -after bestowing his first injunction: "I would have you remember, -monsieur, that this is the house of silence." - -The prisoner had now to keep himself in patience until the governor -decided on his lot—that is to say, on the life that he should lead. -There was no ordered system such as regulates the existence of an army -of convicts undergoing sentence of penal servitude in these days. The -power of the governor was all but autocratic, and though he made -constant reference to "the rules," he interpreted those shadowy -prescriptions entirely as it pleased him. "It is the rule," said the -governor, when enforcing some petty tyranny. "It is not the rule," he -said, when denying some petty favour. Sometimes the prisoner was -forbidden by superior order the use of books and writing materials, but -more frequently such an order issued from the lips of the governor -himself. If permission to read and write were accorded, new difficulties -arose. There was no special library attached to the dungeon, and as the -governor's tastes were seldom literary, his store of books was scanty, -and the volumes were usually in the keeping of those few prisoners whom -he favoured. As for writing materials, little books of note-paper were -sparsely doled, each sheet numbered and to be accounted for; and no -letter could leave the prison without the governor's scrutiny. - -As the prisoner read and wrote, so also did he eat and drink, by favour -of the governor. An allowance sufficient for each prisoner's maintenance -was authorised and paid by the State, but most of the King's bounty -contributed to swell the governor's private fortune. The tariff allowed -and paid out of the royal treasury was: - - For a prince of the blood, about £2 _per diem_. - - For a marshal of France, about £1 10_s._ - - For a lieutenant-general, about £1. - - For a member of Parliament, about 15_s._ - - For an ordinary judge, a priest, a captain in the army, or an official - of good standing, about 7_s._ 6_d._ - - For a barrister or a citizen of means, about 2_s._ 6_d._ - - For a small tradesman, about 1_s._ 6_d._ - -At such rates as these, all prisoners should have been well cared for in -those days; but the truth is that the governors who entered Vincennes -with small means left it rich men. Not only the moneys allotted for -food, but the allowances of wood, lights, etc., were shamelessly -pilfered; and prisoners who were unable or forbidden to supplement the -royal bounty from their own purses were often half-starved and -half-frozen in their cells. As for the quality of the food, warders and -kitchen-assistants sometimes tried to sell in Vincennes meat taken from -the prison kitchen, but it had an ill name amongst the peasants: "That -comes from the dungeon; it's rotten." On the other hand, wealthy -prisoners who enjoyed the governor's favour, or who could bring -influence to bear on him from without, were allowed to beguile the -tedium of captivity by unlimited feasting and drinking. The inmate of -one cell, lying in chains, dirt, and darkness, might be kept awake at -night by the tipsy strains of his neighbour in the cell adjoining. -Governors avaricious above the common generally had their dark cells -full, so as to be able to feed on bread and water the prisoners for whom -they received the regular daily tariff. Ordinarily, there were but two -meals a day, dinner at eleven in the morning and supper at five in the -evening; hence, if your second ration were insufficient, you must go -hungry for eighteen hours. A privileged few were allowed a valet at -their own charge, but the majority of the prisoners of both sexes were -served by the turnkeys. - -The turnkeys visited the cells three times a day, rather as spies, it -seems, than as ministers to the needs of the prisoners. "They came like -heralds of misfortune," says one. "A face hard, expressionless, or -insolent; an imperturbable silence; a heart proof against the sufferings -of others. Useless to address a question to them; a curt negative was -the sole response. 'I know nothing about it,' was the turnkey's eternal -formula." - -Some prisoners, but by no means all, were allowed to walk for an hour a -day in one of the confined gardens at the base of the tower; always in -company with a warder, who might neither speak nor be spoken to. As the -hour struck, the exercise ceased. - -Such seems to have been the external routine of life at Vincennes. -Beneath the surface was the perpetual tyrannous oppression of the -governor and his subordinates on the one side, and on the other a weight -of suffering, extended to almost every detail of existence, endured by -the great majority of the prisoners; silently even unto death in some -instances, but in others not without desperate resistance, long -sustained against overwhelming odds. - -The recital of Mirabeau's captivity throws into curious relief the inner -life of the dungeon. The governor was a certain De Rougemont, of most -unrighteous memory, whom Latude describes as having written his name in -blood on the walls of every cell. Elsewhere the same narrator says that -prisoners occasionally strangled themselves to escape the rage of De -Rougemont, who was seventeen years in charge of Vincennes. - -The fiery, impetuous Mirabeau was ceaselessly at variance with this -"despotic ape," who delighted in trying to repress by the most -contemptible annoyances that irrepressible spirit. Complaint was a fault -in the eyes of De Rougemont, impatience a crime. - -The future tribune,[9] whose head was always in the clouds, complained -incessantly and was impatience incarnate. Night or day he gave his -gaoler no peace. Mirabeau's lodging in the fortress was a small -tower-chamber between the second and third story, rarely visited by the -sun; it was in existence fifty years ago, and bore the number 28. De -Rougemont began by submitting him to all the rigours of "the rules." -Mirabeau demanded leave to write, it was refused; to read, it was -refused; to take a daily airing, it was refused. He could not get -scissors to cut his hair, nor a barber to dress it for him. He was four -months in altercation with De Rougemont before he could obtain the use -of a blunt table-knife. He could not get at his trunk to procure himself -a change of linen. - -Footnote 9: - - He was imprisoned mainly on the order of the Marquis de Mirabeau, his - father, whose lifelong jealousy of that brilliant son is matter of - history; a finished example of the domestic bully, and a matchless - humbug and hypocrite, whose every action gave the lie to his by-name - _Friend of Man_. In the course of his life, the Marquis procured no - fewer than fifty _lettres de cachet_ against members of his own - family. - -[Illustration: MIRABEAU ON THE TERRACE OF VINCENNES.] - -"Is it by 'the rules' that my trunk is kept from me?" he demanded of the -governor. - -"What need have you of your trunk?" - -"Need! I want clothes and linen. I am still wearing what I brought into -this rat-hole!" - -"What does it matter? You see no company here." - -"I am to go foul, then, because I see no company! Is that your rule? -Once more, let me have my trunk." - -"We have not the key of it." - -"Send for a locksmith,—an affair of an hour." - -"Where am I to find the hour? Have I no one and nothing else to attend -to? Are you the only prisoner here?" - -"That is no answer. You are here to take care of your prisoners. Give me -my trunk, I tell you!" - -"_It is against the rules._ We shall see by-and-bye." - -"As usual! 'We shall see.' In the meantime perhaps you will have the -goodness to send a barber to shave me and cut my hair." - -"Ah! I must speak about that to the minister." - -"What! The minister's permission to——" - -"Yes. _It is the rule._" - -"Indeed! The doctor said as much, but I refused to credit him." - -"You were wrong, you see!" - -"Now that I remember, he told me something else, that in the present -state of my health a bath, with as little delay as possible, was -indispensable. Perhaps he did not mention that to you?" - -"I fancy he did say something about it." - -"Oh, he did! But the King and the Government have not debated it yet, I -suppose? Well, sir, I want a bath and I'm going to have one." - -"You have no right to give orders here, sir." - -"Nor have you the right to withhold what the doctor prescribes for me." - -"M. de Mirabeau, you are insolent. Do you forget that I represent the -King?" - -"He could not be more grotesquely represented. The distance between you -and his Majesty is short, sir." - -The governor (to make the joke more apparent) was short and of a full -habit. He went out speechless, and Mirabeau would doubtless have felt -the effects of his rage had it not been for the interest of Lenoir, -Lieutenant-General of Police, who was always ready to stand between the -prisoner and the vengeful gaoler. Through Lenoir, who won for him the -intercession of the Princesse de Lamballe, Mirabeau got the use of books -and pen, and some other small indulgences. He wrote to his father: "Will -you not ease me of my chains? Let me have friends to see me; let me have -leave to walk. Let me exchange the dungeon for the château. There as -here I should be under the King's hand, and close enough to the prison, -if I should abuse that measure of liberty." The implacable _Friend of -Man_ vouchsafed no response to this entreaty. The prisoner buried -himself in the books that were given him, but they were for the most -part "_de mauvais auteurs_," who had nothing to teach him. He flung them -from him one by one, and as he paced his cell he began those brilliant -improvisations which were soon to electrify France, and which struck -absolutism at its root. In this way he worked out the scheme of the -_lettres de cachet_, that work of flaming eloquence in which the genius -of liberty approaches, seizes, and strangles the dragon of despotism. -Deprived of all but his pen, Mirabeau let fall from the height of his -dungeon on the head of royalty that thunderbolt of a treatise. Since De -Rougemont would never, for a hundred chiefs of police, have aided him -with materials for this purpose, he tore out of all the books he could -lay hands on the fly-leaves and blank spaces, and covered them with his -fine close writing. Each completed slip he concealed in the lining of -his coat, and in this manner did the tribune compose and preserve his -work, every page of which was a prophecy of the coming Revolution. When -inspiration lacked for a time, he prostrated himself on the flags of his -cell and wept for his absent mistress, or he renewed hostilities with De -Rougemont. The battle of the trunk was followed by the battle of the -looking-glass. - -He could not go through his toilet without a looking-glass, he insisted; -and in a letter to the governor which must have filled several -manuscript pages he exhausted his logic and his sarcasm in enforcing -this modest request. He got his mirror in the end, and then renewed his -fruitless correspondence with his father, and made an eloquent attempt -to move the clemency of the King. "Deign, sire, to save me from my -persecutors," he wrote to Louis. "Look with pity on a man twenty-eight -years of age, who, buried in full life, sees and feels the slow approach -of brutish inertia, despair, and madness, darkening and paralysing the -noblest of his years." M. Lenoir himself placed this letter in the -King's hands, but nothing came of it for Mirabeau, who continued in the -pauses of astonishing literary labours his fight for liberty from behind -his prison bars. By clamours and entreaties he succeeded at length in -forcing his way through them. - - ------- - -Amongst the prisoners of renown of the eighteenth century Latude must -not pass unnoticed. His sojourn in and escape from the Bastille have -been much more widely bruited than his captivity at Vincennes, where -also he did things wonderful and suffered pains and indignities -incredible. Needless to say that he gave his guards the slip, and -equally needless to add that he was recovered and brought back. His -second incarceration was in one of De Rougemont's _cachots_ (De -Rougemont always had a _cachot_ available), from, which, on the -surgeon's declaration that his life was in danger, he was removed to a -more habitable chamber. On his way thither he found and secreted one of -those handy tools which fortune seemed always to leave in the path of -Latude, and used it to establish a most ingenious means of communication -with his fellow-prisoners. No one ever yet performed such wonders in -prison as Masers de Latude. No one accomplished such unheard-of escapes. -No one, when retaken, paid with such cruel interest the penalty of his -daring. Was the man only a splendid fable, as some latter-day sceptics -have suggested? The question has been put, but no one will ever affirm -it with authority, and the weight of the evidence seems to lie with -Latude the man and not with Latude the legend. - -No great distance separated the chamber of Latude from the _cachot_ of -the Prévôt de Beaumont. The Prévôt was a great criminal: he had had the -courage to denounce and expose that gigantic State fraud, the _pacte de -famine_, in which the De Sartines before named and other persons of -consequence were involved. Those were not the days for Prévôts de -Beaumont to meddle as critics with criminal ventures of this sort, and -the Prévôt had his name written on the customary form. He spent -twenty-two years in five of the State prisons of France, and fifteen of -them in the dungeon of Vincennes. - - "There is not in the _Saints' Martyrology_," he wrote (in the record - which he gave to the people of the Revolution of his experiences in - the dungeon of the Monarchy), "such a tale of tribulations and - torments as were suffered by me on twelve separate occasions in the - fifteen years of my captivity at Vincennes. On one occasion I was - confined four months in the _cachot_, nine months on another - occasion, eighteen months on a third; of my fifteen years in the - dungeon, _seven years and eight months_ were passed in the black - hole. The cruel De Sartines never ceased to harry me; the monster De - Rougemont surpassed the orders of De Sartines. Yes, I have lain - almost naked and with fettered ankles for eighteen months together. - For eighteen months at a time, I have lived on a daily allowance of - two ounces of bread and a mug of water. I have more than once been - deprived of both for three successive days and nights."[10] - -Footnote 10: - - I have summarised here the extracts in the original from the pamphlet - of the Prévôt de Beaumont quoted at great length by the authors of the - _Histoire du Donjon de Vincennes_. As a curiosity of prison - literature, the Prévôt's pamphlet, if correctly cited, goes above the - little eighteenth-century work on Newgate by "B. L. of Twickenham." - -The dramatic interest of the Prévôt's imprisonment culminates in an -assault upon him in his cell, renewed at four several ventures by the -whole strength of the prison staff "and the biggest dog that I have ever -seen." The Prévôt had devoted five years to the stealthy composition of -an essay on the _Art of True Government_, which was actually a history -of the _pacte de famine_. His attempts to get it printed were discovered -by the police, and the attack on his cell was designed to wrest from him -the manuscript. He sets out the affair in detail with the liveliest -touches—"First Round," "Second Round," etc.—shews himself levelling De -Rougemont with a brick in the stomach, the dog with a blow on the nose, -and blinding a brace of warders with the contents of his slop-bucket. At -last, faced by an order in the King's writing, he allowed himself to be -transferred from Vincennes to Charenton, on the express understanding -that his precious manuscript should be transferred with him. The Prévôt -himself arrived duly at Charenton, but he never again set eyes on the -essay on the _Art of True Government_. De Rougemont had arranged that it -should be stolen on the journey, and the manuscript was last seen in the -archives of the Bastille. - - ------- - -Mirabeau was not the only polemic of genius who helped to sharpen -against the gratings of Vincennes the weapons of the dawning Revolution. -Was not Diderot of the _Encyclopedia_ there also? He paid by a month's -rigorous imprisonment in the dungeon, and a longer period of mild -captivity in the château, the publication of his _Letter on the Blind -for the Use of those who See_. This, at least, was the ostensible reason -of his detention; the true reason was never quite apparent. At the -château he was allowed the visits of his wife and friends, and amongst -the latter Jean Jacques Rousseau was frequently admitted. Literary -legend is more responsible than history for the statement that the first -idea of the _Social Contract_ was the outcome of Rousseau's talks with -Diderot and Grimm in the park of Vincennes. - - ------- - -Year after year, reign after reign, the picture rarely changes within -the four walls of the dungeon. Vincennes was perhaps fuller under Louis -XV. than in the reigns of preceding or succeeding sovereigns, but the -difference could not have been great. During the twenty years of -Cardinal Fleury's ministry under Louis XV., 40,000 _lettres de cachet_ -were issued by him, mostly against the Jansenists. Madame de Pompadour -made a lavish use of the _lettres_ in favour of Vincennes; Madame -Dubarry bestowed her patronage chiefly on the Bastille. Richelieu at one -epoch, Mazarin at another, found occupants in plenty for the cells of -Vincennes. It was Richelieu who passed a dry word one day apropos of -certain mysterious deaths in the dungeon. - -"It must be grief," said one. - -"Or the purple fever," said the King. - -"It is the air of Vincennes," observed Richelieu, "that marvellous air -which seems fatal to all who do not love his Majesty." - - ------- - -Ministers themselves were apt to fall by the weapon of their own -employment. A minister of Louis XIV., who had chosen for his proud -device the motto, _Quò non ascendam?_—_What place too high for me?_—and -whom chroniclers have suspected of pretensions to the gallant crown of -Mademoiselle de la Vallière, fell one day from a too giddy pinnacle -plump into the dungeon of Vincennes. It was Fouquet the magnificent. - -Up to a point, Fouquet was the best courtier in France. The King's -passion was for pomp and glitter; the minister cultivated a taste for -the dazzling. Louis was prodigal to extravagance; Fouquet became lavish -_jusqu'à la folie_. The King dipped both hands into the public moneys; -the minister plunged elbow-deep into the coffers of the State. The King -offered to his servitors fêtes the most sumptuous; the minister regaled -his friends with spectacles beyond compare. Then Louis wearied of this -too splendid emulation, and Fouquet the magnificent was attached. He all -but sacrificed his head to his lust of rivalry; but Louis relented, and -took from him only his goods and his freedom. Despoiled and dishonoured, -the ex-minister fared from prison to prison,—Vincennes, Angers, Amboise, -Moret, the Bastille, and Pignerol. _Quò non ascendam?_—_Whither may I -not mount?_ The unfortunate minister, who had thought to climb to the -sun of Louis XIV., sank to his death in a _cachot_. - - ------- - -The contrasts presented by the diverse fates of certain prisoners are -sufficiently striking. Fouquet was preceded at Vincennes by Cardinal de -Retz, the last prisoner of distinction whom Anne of Austria sent to the -dungeon. The Cardinal's was a gilt-edged captivity. He lived _en prince_ -at Vincennes; he had valets, money, and a good table; great ladies came -to distract him, friends to flatter him, and players to divert him. -Literature, politics, gallantry, and the theatre—the Cardinal found all -of these at Vincennes. When he chanced to remember his priestly quality, -he obtained leave to say mass in the chapel of the château, "carefully -concealing the end of his chain under the richest of vestments." But the -chain was there, and the lightest of fetters grows heavy in prison;—the -Cardinal resolved on flight. - -It was a clever and most original plan. On a certain day, a party of the -Cardinal's friends, mounted as for a desperate ride, were to assemble -under the walls of the keep, and at a given signal were to whirl away in -their midst a man attired at all points like the Cardinal himself. A -rope hanging from a severed bar in the window of the cell was to give -his guards to suppose that the prisoner had escaped that way; but all -this while the Cardinal was to lie _perdu_ in a hole which he had -discovered on the upper terrace of the prison. When the excitement over -the imaginary flight had subsided, and the vigilance of the sentries was -relaxed, the Cardinal was to issue from his hiding-place, disguised as a -kitchen-man, and walk out of the dungeon. It might have succeeded, but -the elements played into the hands of Anne d'Autriche. A storm blew up -on the night that the Cardinal was to have quitted his chamber, and the -wind closed a heavy door on the staircase that led to the terrace. All -the Cardinal's efforts to wrest it open were unavailing, and he was -forced to return to his cell. He was removed to the château of Nantes, -and the imaginative daring of his flight from that place has ranked it -high in the annals of prison-breaking. - - ------- - -One echo more shall reach us from these lugubrious caverns. Towards the -beginning of the eighteenth century, a young man, Du Puits by name -(victimised by an Italian Abbé into forging orders on the King's -treasury), received as cell-companion the Marquis de la Baldonnière, a -reputed or suspected alchemist. Du Puits, a laughing philosopher now on -the verge of tears, recovered his spirits when he learned the -new-comer's name. - -"I heard all about you, sir, before I came here," he said. "I was -secretary to M. Chamillart, the minister, and you were often talked of -at the bureau. I told M. Chamillart that if you could turn iron into -gold, it was a pity you were not appointed manager of the iron mines. -But it is never too late to turn one's talents to account, monsieur le -marquis, and as a magician of the first water you shall effect our -escape." - -The achievements of the noble wizard came short of this end, but they -were far from contemptible. He took surreptitious impressions in wax of -the keys dangling from the very belt of the warder who visited them, and -manufactured a choice set of false ones, which gave the two prisoners -the range of the dungeon. There was no night watch within the tower, and -when the warders had withdrawn after the prisoners' supper-hour, Du -Puits and the Marquis ran up and down the stairs, and from hall to hall, -called on the other prisoners in their cells, and made some agreeable -acquaintances, including that of a pretty and charming young sorceress. -Trying a new lock one night, they found themselves in the governor's -pantry—after this, some rollicking supper parties. The feasts were -organised nightly in one cell or another, Du Puits and the Marquis -furnishing the table from the ample larder of the governor. Healths were -being drunk one night, when the door was rudely opened, and the guests -found themselves covered by the muskets of the guard. An unamiable -prisoner whose company they had declined had exposed the gay conspiracy, -and there were no more supper parties. - - ------- - -The last years of Vincennes as a State prison have little of the -interest either of romance or of tragedy. Its fate in this respect was -settled by Mirabeau's _lettres de cachet_. Vincennes was the only prison -of which he had directly exposed the callous and cruel régime, and the -ministry thought well to close it, as a small concession to the rising -wrath of the populace. In 1784, accordingly, Vincennes was struck off -the list of the State prisons of France. A singular and oddly ludicrous -fate came upon it in the following year, when it was transformed into a -sort of charitable bakery under the patronage of Louis XVI.! The -_cachot_ in which the Prévôt de Beaumont had lain hungry for eighteen -months, and for three days without food, was stored with cheap loaves -for the working people of Paris. A little later, the dungeon was a -manufactory of arms for the King's troops. After the destruction of the -Bastille, Vincennes was attacked by the mob, but Lafayette and his -troops saved it from their hands. Under the Republic it was used for a -time as a prison for women. The wretched fate of the Duc d'Enghien, -Napoleon's chief captive in this fortress, has been told; and there is -only to add that the last prisoners who passed within the walls of -Vincennes were MM. de Peyronnet, de Guernon Ranville, de Polignac, and -Chantelauze, the four ministers of Charles X. whose part in the -"Revolution of July" belongs to the history of our own times. Brave old -General Daumesnil, "Old Wooden-Leg," who died August 17, 1832, was the -last governor of the Dungeon of Vincennes. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER IV. - - THE GREAT AND LITTLE CHÂTELET, AND THE FORT-L'ÉVÊQUE. - - -Louis VI., called le Gros, whose reign was from 1108 to 1137, did much -to enlarge and to embellish the mean and narrow Paris of his day. He -built churches and schools both in the Cité and beyond the river, and -thanks to the lectures of Abelard his schools were famous. He built a -wall around the suburbs, and for the further defence of the Cité he set -up the two fortresses called Le Grand and Le Petit Châtelet, "at the -extremities of the bridge which united the Cité with the opposite bank." - -Here was established the court of municipal justice, and here the -Provost of Paris had his residence. The prison of the Châtelet became -one of the most celebrated in Paris, and prison and fortress were not -completely demolished until 1802. - -The functions of the Châtelet—_cette justice royale ordinaire à -Paris_—were great and various. It was charged in effect, says -Desmaze,[11] with the maintenance of public safety in the capital, with -the settlement of divers causes, with the repression of popular -agitations, with the ordering of corporations and trades, with the -verification of weights and measures. It punished commercial frauds, -defended "minors and married women," and kept in check the turbulent -scholars of the University. Its magistrates were fifty-six in number; it -had its four King's Counsel and its King's Procurator; its -clerk-in-chief and his host of subordinates; its receivers, bailiffs, -and ushers; its gaolers and its sworn tormentor; its "sixty special -experts"; its surgeon and his assistants, including a _sage-femme_ or -mid-wife; and its two hundred and twenty _sergents à cheval_. - -Footnote 11: - - _Le Châtelet de Paris._ - -All in all, the Châtelet was one of the most formidable powers in Paris. -The court of the Châtelet comprised four divisions, administered by -councillors who sat in rotation. The four sections were distinguished as -the _parc civil_, the _présidial_, the _chambre du conseil_, and the -_chambre criminelle_. - -But the Prison of the Châtelet is our principal concern. Although, says -Desmaze, the prison was instituted for the safe-keeping and not for the -maltreatment of the accused, the law's design was too often eluded or -ignored. Much the same might be said in respect of any other prison in -Europe at that epoch. Antique papers cited by Desmaze show, -nevertheless, that Parliaments of Paris sought by successive decrees to -modify the rigour of the prisoner's lot, to restrain the cupidity of his -gaolers, and to maintain decent order within the prison. There were -provisions against gambling with dice, rules for the distribution of -alms amongst the prisoners, and penalties for those who absented -themselves from chapel. In 1425, a new _ordonnance_ fixed the scale of -fees (_geôlage_) which prisoners were to pay to the governor or head -gaoler on reception. (This ironic jest of compelling persons to pay for -the privilege of going to prison obtained for centuries in Newgate.) A -count or countess was charged ten livres, a knight banneret (_chevalier -banneret_) passed in for ten sols, a Jew or a Jewess for half that sum; -and so on to the end of the scale. There were particular injunctions as -to the registering of prisoners, and as to the mode of keeping the -prison books. The bread served out was ordered to be _de bonne qualitè_, -and not less than a pound and a half a day for each prisoner: in 1739, -the baker who supplied the Châtelet was condemned to a fine of 2000 -livres for adulterating the prisoners' bread. A special ration of bread -and meat was distributed at the Châtelet on the day of the annual feast -of the confraternity of drapers, and the goldsmiths of Paris gave a -dinner on Easter Day to such of the prisoners as would accept their -bounty. - -The deputies of the _Procureur Général_ were instructed to visit the -prison once a week, to examine and receive in private the requests and -complaints of the prisoners, and to see that the doctors did their duty -by the sick. The first Presidents of the Paris Parliament seem to have -visited the Châtelet frequently from the end of the fourteenth to the -middle of the sixteenth century. - - ------- - -But there was one circumstance which, in Mediæval Paris and in the Paris -of a much later date, must have gone far to nullify all good intentions -and humane precautions of kings and parliaments alike. Under an -_ordonnance_ of July, 1319, Philippe le Long decreed that the -governorships of gaols should be sold at auction. The purchasers were, -of course, to be "respectable persons" (_bonnes gens_), who should -pledge their word to deal humanely by (_de bien traiter_) the prisoners; -but of what use were such provisos? In no circumstances, indeed, could a -saving clause of any description ensure the proper administration of a -prison the governor of which had bought the right to make private gain -out of his prisoners. For this was what the selling of gaolerships came -to. Having paid for his office (having bought it, moreover, over the -heads of other bidders), the governor recouped himself by fleecing his -wealthy prisoners and by stinting or starving his poorer ones. It was no -worse in France than elsewhere; until Howard demanded reform, prisoners -in Newgate were plundered right and left under a similar system, and -those who could not pay the illegal fees of the governor and his -subordinates were lodged in stinking holds, and fed themselves as they -could. - -We shall see what the prisons of the Châtelet and the Fort-l'Évêque were -like amid the luxuries and refinements which surrounded them in the -eighteenth century. An _ordonnance_ of 1670 had enjoined that the -prisons should be kept in a wholesome state, and so administered that -the prisoners should suffer nothing in their health. Never, says -Desmaze, was a decree so miserably neglected. - -What are the facts? He quotes from an "anonymous eighteenth-century -manuscript" ("by a magistrate") entitled: _Projet concernant -l'établissement_ _de nouvelles Prisons dans la Capitale_. The -Fort-l'Évêque and the Châtelet are turned inside out for such an -inspection as Howard would have made with a gust. - -In the court or principal yard of Fort-l'Évêque, thirty feet long by -eighteen wide, from four to five hundred prisoners were confined. The -prison walls were so high that no air could circulate in the yard; the -prisoners were "choked by their own miasma." The cells "were more like -holes than lodgings"; and there were some under the steps of the -staircase, six feet square, into which five prisoners were thrust. Other -cells, in which it was barely possible to stand upright, received no -light but from the general yard. The cells in which certain prisoners -were kept at their private charge were scarcely better. Worst of all -were the dens belowground. These were on a level with the river, water -filtered in through the arches the whole year round, and even in the -height of summer the sole means of ventilation was a slit above the door -three inches in width. Passing before one of the subterranean cells, it -was as though one were smitten by fire (_on est frappé comme d'un coup -de feu_). They gave only on to the dark and narrow galleries which -surrounded them. The whole prison was in a state of dilapidation, -threatening an immediate ruin. - -The Châtelet was "even more horrible and pestilential." The prison -buildings, having no external opening, received air only from above; -there was thus "no current, but only, as it were, a stationary column of -air, which barely allowed the prisoners to breathe." This is far from a -realisation of the _ordonnance_ of 1670! Like the Fort-l'Évêque, the -Châtelet had its horrors of the pit. Dulaure[12] has a curious passage -on the subject. It appears, says one of the best of the historians of -Paris, that prisoners were let down into a dungeon called _la fosse_, as -a bucket is lowered into a well; here they sat with their feet in water, -unable to stand or to lie, "and seldom lived beyond fifteen days." -Another of these pits, known as _fin d'aise_ (a name more bodeful than -the Little Ease of old Newgate), was "full of filth and reptiles"; and -Dulaure adds that the mere names of most of the Châtelet cells were -"frightfully significant." - -Footnote 12: - - _Histoire de Paris._ - - ------- - -The Provost of Paris, rendering justice in the King's name, took -cognisance of all ordinary causes, of capital crimes, and of petty -offences. His officers arrested and imprisoned "all manner of criminals, -vagabonds, and disturbers of the public peace." In the reign of -Philippe-Auguste, he was charged with the duty of "bringing to justice -the Jews" who at that epoch were "accused of seeking to convert -Christians to Judaism, of taking usurious interest, and of profaning the -sacred vessels which the churches gave them in pledge." After the King, -said Pasquier, the Provost of Paris was the most powerful man in the -kingdom. - -The headsman of Paris depended on the jurisdiction of the Châtelet. -There was a small chamber in the prison called the _réduit aux -gehennes_, where, when an execution was to take place, Monsieur de Paris -received the Provost's warrant. In 1418, the headsman Capeluche was -himself sentenced to be beheaded, and in the _réduit aux gehennes_ he -put the new Monsieur de Paris through his facings with the axe. - -[Illustration: THE GREAT CHÂTELET.] - - ------- - -An account of the sentences decreed by the Châtelet would be little less -than a history of punishment in France. The Châtelet gave reasons for -its sentences, a practice not followed by the superior courts. Terrible -were the pains and penalties decreed sometimes from beneath the -Provost's dais. Torture wrung some avowal from the frothy lips of the -accused, and then he was shrived and carried to the place of execution. -The fierce canonical law lent its ingenuity in punishment to the judges -of the Châtelet; but many of the penalties, such as hanging, beheading, -burning, whipping, mutilation, and the pillory, are found on our own -criminal registers of the same period. Coiners and forgers were boiled -alive; there is an entry of twelve livres for the purchase of a cauldron -in which to boil to death a _faux monnoyeur_. In 1390, a young female -servant, convicted of stealing silver spoons from her master, was -exposed in the pillory, suffered the loss of an ear, and was banished -from Paris and its environs, "not to return under penalty of being -buried alive." For the crime of marrying two wives, one Robert Bonneau -was sentenced to be "hanged and strangled." Geoffroy Vallée was burned, -in 1573, for the publication of a pamphlet entitled _The Heavenly -Felicity of the Christians, or the Scourge of the Faith_; and, in 1645, -a bookseller was sent to the galleys "for having printed a libel against -the Government." - -Some of the old registers of the Châtelet examined by Desmaze showed -entries of charges of pocket-picking and card-sharping at public -processions, fairs, and spectacles. Little thieves defended themselves -before the magistrates in the style familiar at Bow Street to-day,—a lad -of fifteen charged with stealing handkerchiefs from pedestrians said he -had "picked up one in the street." - - ------- - -The Châtelet, or rather the Little Châtelet, was the Provost's residence -until the end of the sixteenth century. In 1564, the Provost was Hugues -de Bourgueil, "distinguished for the possession of a terrific hump and a -beautiful wife." One day Parliament consigned to the cells of the Little -Châtelet a young Italian, accused of having set up in Paris a -"gambling-house and fencing-saloon," where he corrupted the morals of -the young nobility, "teaching them a thousand things unworthy of -Christians and Frenchmen." - -In his quality of Italian, the prisoner, Gonsalvi by name, invoked the -protection of Catherine de Médicis. The Queen-Mother, while respecting -the decree of Parliament, recommended the young compatriot to the -Provost's particular care. De Bourgueil accordingly lodged him in his -own house, where Gonsalvi was soon on intimate terms with the family. -One night he eloped with the Provost's wife. Madame had contrived to -possess herself of the keys of the prison, thinking that if she let -loose the whole three hundred prisoners, M. le Prévôt would have a good -night's work on hand, and the course would be clear for her lover and -herself. And so it resulted; for the Provost, faithful to his duty, -despatched horse and foot after his three hundred fugitives, and let -Madame and Gonsalvi take their way. - -The next day, an errant wife was missing from the Little Châtelet, but -at night the keys were turned as usual on the full contingent of three -hundred prisoners. It was the scandal of this affair, say MM. Alhoy and -Lurine, which decided the King to shift the Provost's residence from the -Châtelet to the Hôtel d'Hercule, wherein was presently installed -Nantouillet, "successeur de ce pauvre diable de Bourgueil." - -Nantouillet was not too well off, it would seem, in the Hôtel d'Hercule. -No sooner was he established there than he was bidden to prepare for the -visit of three Kings,—France, Poland, and Navarre,—who would do -themselves the pleasure of lunching with him. Nantouillet, who had just -declined to marry a cast-off mistress of the King of Poland, suspected -some scheme of vengeance on their Majesties' part; he could not, -however, refuse to spread his board for them. He spread it, and the -Kings came down and swept it bare. They swooped upon Nantouillet's -silver plate and sacked his coffers of fifty thousand francs. There was -a fierce fight in the Hôtel, but the Kings got away with the plunder. On -the following day, the First President of Parliament waited upon Charles -IX. and said that all Paris was shocked; and his Majesty in reply bade -him "not trouble himself about that." This _tableau moral_ of the period -is presented by several historians. - -With such examples in the seats of Royalty, one can feel little surprise -at the charges of venality, and worse, which were brought from time to -time against the Provosts. In the reign of Philippe le Long, a certain -wealthy citizen lay under sentence of death in the Châtelet. The Provost -Henri Caperel made him a private proposal of ransom, a bargain was -struck. Dives was set free, and the Provost hanged some obscure prisoner -in his stead. Provost Hugues de Cruzy is said to have trafficked openly -at the Châtelet in much the same way, Royalty itself sharing the booty -with him. Now and again, justice took her revenge; and both Henri -Caperel and Hugues de Cruzy finished on the gallows. The noble brigand, -highwayman, and cut-throat, Jourdain de Lisle, who led a numerous band -in the fourteenth century, bought the interest of the Provost of Paris; -and the Châtelet "refused to take cognisance of his eighteen crimes, the -least of which would have brought to an ignominious death any other -criminal." A new Provost had to be appointed before Jourdain de Lisle, -tied to the tail of a horse, could be dragged through the streets of -Paris to the public gallows. He had married a niece of Pope Jean XXII., -and when justice had been done, the curé of the church of Saint-Merri -wrote to Rome: "Scarcely had your Holiness's nephew been hanged, when, -with much pomp, we fetched him from the gibbet to our church, and there -buried him _honorablement et gratis_." - - ------- - -Ordinarily, the Châtelet relied for its defence upon the archers of the -Provost's guard, a reedy support when the mob turned out in force. It -was seized in 1320 by the _Pastoureaux_, a swarm of peasants who had -united themselves under two apostate priests, and who said they were -"going across the sea to combat the enemies of the faith and conquer the -Holy Land." To rescue some of their number who had been arrested and -thrown into the Châtelet, they marched on that place, broke open the -gaol, and effected a general delivery of the prisoners, as Madame de -Bourgueil was to do some two centuries later. - -Between the conflicting powers of the Châtelet, as represented by the -Provost of Paris, and the University, which was accountable only to the -ecclesiastical tribunals, and intensely jealous of any interference by -the secular arm, a long and bitter struggle was sustained. In 1308, -Provost Pierre Jumel hanged a young man for theft on the highway. -Unfortunately for Jumel, this was a scholar of the University, and the -clergy of Paris went in procession to the Châtelet and briefly harangued -the Provost: "Come out of that, Satan, accursed one! Acknowledge thy -sin, and seek pardon at the holy altar, or expect the fate of Dathan and -Abiram, whom the earth swallowed." While they were thus engaged, a -messenger came from the Louvre with the announcement that the King had -sacrificed his chief magistrate to the wrathful demands of the clergy -and University. For a like encroachment on the sacred privileges of the -University, Guillaume de Thignonville was degraded from his office of -Provost, led to the gallows, and there compelled to take down and kiss -the corpses of two students whom he had hanged for robbery. - -In 1330, Hugues Aubriot, in his capacity of Provost, lent the shelter of -the Châtelet to a party of Jews flying for their lives before the mob. -This service to the causes of humanity and public order renewed against -the Provost an ancient enmity of the clerics and University, by whom, in -the words of MM. Alhoy and Lurine, "it was determined that Aubriot -should be ruined." Condemned by the ecclesiastical tribunal "for the -crime of impiety and heresy," he was ordered to be "preached against and -publicly mitred in front of Notre-Dame." On his knees, he demanded -absolution of the bishop, and promised an offering of candles for his -iniquity in befriending the Jews. "His crimes were read aloud by the -Inquisitor of the Faith, and the bishop consigned him to perpetual -imprisonment, with the bread of sorrow and the water of affliction, as -an abettor of the Jewish infidelity, and a contemner of the Christian -faith." From that, the Provost descended to an _oubliette_ of the -Fort-l'Évêque. - - ------- - -The Fort-l'Évêque, in the Rue Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois, was one of the -two prisons of the Bishop of Paris. Its _oubliettes_ were subterranean -dungeons, separated from one another by stout timbers. The prisoners, -attached to a common chain, were fastened to the wall by iron rings, in -such a manner that they could not approach one another. They never saw -their gaolers, and their meagre rations were handed in through a narrow -wicket in the door. Hugues Aubriot occupied his _oubliette_ for many -years. In the insurrection of the _Maillotins_ he was discovered by the -rioters and set free. In 1674, the Bishop's jurisdiction was reunited -with that of the Châtelet, but the prison of the Fort-l'Évêque was in -existence until 1780. - -Dulaure says that the penalties imposed by the episcopal court were -inflicted in various places, according to the gravity of the offence. -Sentences of hanging or burning were carried out beyond the precincts of -Paris; but if it were "a mere bagatelle of cutting off the culprit's -ears," justice was done at the Place du Trahoir. - - ------- - -In the middle of the seventeenth century, the Fort-l'Évêque was the -prison for "debtors and refractory comedians"; and about a hundred years -later, in 1765, it received the entire company of the Comédie-Française. -The episode is one of the oddest in the history of the House of Molière. -A second-rate member of the famous troupe, named Dubois, who had been -under medical treatment for some malady, refused to pay the doctor's -bill. Mademoiselle Clairon, the tragic actress, delicate on the point of -honour, summoned the rest of the company, and it was resolved to appeal -to M. de Richelieu, _gentilhomme de la chambre_. This functionary -treated it as "an affair of vagabonds," and told the company to settle -it amongst themselves. Dubois, accordingly, was put out of the troupe. -His daughter carried her father's grievance and her own charms (_elle -met en œuvre tous ses charmes_) to the Duc de Fronsac, through whose -intervention she succeeded in forcing for Dubois the doors of the -Comédie-Française. But the company were resolved not to act with him -again, and put a sudden stop to the performances of that very successful -piece, the _Siège de Calais_. De Sartines, of the police, now came -forward in the pretended interests of the public, and ordered the arrest -of Dauberval, Lekain, Molé, Brisard, Mademoiselle Clairon, and others of -the company. The public, however, were on the side of the players, and -Mademoiselle Clairon and her fellows had a semi-royal progress to the -Fort-l'Évêque; roses and rhetoric were showered on them, and _les plus -nobles dames de Paris_ disputed the honour of attending the tragédienne -to the threshold of the prison. Their captivity lasted, nevertheless, -for five and twenty days; but the final victory was with the players, -for Dubois was dismissed with a pension, and appeared no more on the -stage of the Théâtre Français. - - ------- - -Fêted every day in her chamber in the ecclesiastical prison—for there -was scarcely question of an _oubliette_ in her case,—receiving the -visits of noblemen and dames of fashion, artists, wits, and poets, -Mademoiselle Clairon had small leisure to bethink her that, under the -litter of flowers pressed by her dainty feet, lay the bones of whole -generations of victims of the church's tyranny; victims of those too -familiar charges of magic, heresy, and sacrilege. - -Yet (I quote again from MM. Alhoy and Lurine) had she in the still night -lent a listening ear to those grey walls, the wailing murmurs of the -phantoms of Fort-l'Évêque might have chilled her heart:— - - "We expiated in the _oubliettes_ of the Fort-l'Évêque, under the - reign of Francis I., the wrong of believing in God without believing - also in the infallibility of the Pope. Look ... there is blood on - our shrouds!" - - "We are two poor Augustine monks. They accused us, in Charles VI.'s - time, of being idolaters, invokers of evil spirits, utterers of - profane words. They accused us of making a pact with the powers - below; our only crime was believing that our science might heal the - madness of the King. Look ... there is blood on our shrouds!" - - "I am the sorcerer of the château of Landon. I promised an Abbé of - Citeaux to find, by magic, a sum of money that had been stolen from - him. Alas! it was a dear jest for me; torture, and death on the - Place de Grève. Look ... there is blood upon my shroud!" - - "I am a poor madman. I thought that heaven had given me the glorious - mission of sustaining on earth the servants of Jesus Christ. I went - humbly to the bishop and said: The envoy of God salutes you! They - brought me here to an _oubliette_, and I left it only with the - headsman. Look ... there is blood on my shroud!" - - ------- - -The factions of the Armagnacs and the Bourguignons cost Paris a river of -blood in the early years of the fifteenth century, and the massacre of -the Armagnacs in May-August, 1418, was a terrible affair. On the first -day, five hundred and twenty-two were put to the sword by the -Bourguignons in the streets of the capital. Every Armagnac, or suspected -Armagnac, was laid hold of, and the prisons overflowed with the -captives. The Bourguignons assailed the Châtelet, "and the threshold of -the prison became the scaffold of fifteen hundred unfortunates." The -attack upon the Châtelet was renewed by the Bourguignons in August; and -the Provost of Paris, powerless to check or even to stem their fury, -bade them at length "Do what they would": _Mes amis, faites_ _ce qu'il -vous plaira_. This time the prisoners organised a defence, and a regular -siege began. On the north side of the fortress was a lofty terrace, -crowning the wall, so to say, and running the length of the prison. Here -the imprisoned Armagnacs threw up barricades, but the Bourguignons -reared scaling-ladders, and made light of climbing the walls, sixty feet -in height. The attack on the one side and the defence on the other were -long, bloody, and desperate; but the advantage was with the assailants. -Foiled at this point and that, they fired the prison; and where the -flames did not penetrate, they hacked their way in, and drove their game -to take refuge on the heights. As the fire soared upwards, the Armagnacs -flung themselves over the walls, and were caught upon the pikes of the -Burgundians, "who finished them with axe and sword." - - ------- - -The name of Louis XI., which is writ large in the histories of the -Bastille and the Dungeon of Vincennes, attaches to one curious episode -in the history of the Châtelet. In 1477, on the day of the festival of -Saint Denis, Louis "took the singular fancy of giving their liberty" to -the prisoners of the Great and Little Châtelet. A chronicler of this -fact, evidently puzzled, "hastens to add" that at that epoch the two -Châtelets "held merely robbers, assassins, and vagabonds. Not even to -honour the memory of Saint Denis could Louis bring himself to liberate -his political prisoners in Vincennes and the Bastille." It was in Louis -XI.'s reign that one Chariot Tonnelier, a hosier turned brigand, lying -in the Châtelet on a score of charges, and dreading lest the Question -should weaken him into betrayal of his companions, snatched a knife from -a guard at the door of the torture chamber, and deliberately cut his -tongue out. - - ------- - -The Fort-l'Évêque and the Little Châtelet were suppressed in 1780, in -virtue of an _ordonnance_ of Louis XVI., countersigned by Necker; and -the prisoners were transferred to La Force. The buildings, which were -even then in a state of ruin, were thrown down two years later. The -Great Châtelet existed as a prison for another decade, and the fortress -itself was not demolished until 1802-4. A triumphal column replaced the -ancient dungeon of the Provosts of Paris. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER V. - - THE TEMPLE. - - -When they came to Paris in the twelfth century, the Templars obtained -leave to settle in the Marshes, whose baleful exhalations cost the town -a plague or two every year. In no long time they had completely -transformed that dismal and pestilential swamp. Herculean labours -witnessed as their outcome oaks, elms, and beeches growing where the -rotten ooze had bred but reeds and osiers. Vast buildings, too, arose as -if by magic, with towers and turrets protecting them, drawbridges, -battlemented walls, and trenches. The principal tower of the pile -enclosed the treasure and arsenal of the Order, and four smaller towers -or turrets served as a prison for those who had transgressed the stark -monastic rules. On the broad terrace of the Temple three hundred men had -space for exercise at cross-bow and halberd. - -Philip III. bestowed a royal recompense on the laborious monks who had -reclaimed those miasmatic marshes and given new means of defence to the -capital; and towards the close of the thirteenth century the Templars -had become an extraordinary power in France. In Paris they exercised -large justiciary rights, and had their gallows standing without the -Temple walls. They were concerned in all enterprises, civil, political, -and military; their sovereignty was such that princes had to reckon with -them, on pain of contact with the monkish steel. They had great -monopolies of grain, and owned some of the richest lands in the kingdom; -they touched the revenues of from eight to ten thousand manors. The -Templars guarded at need the towns, treasures, and archives of royalty; -and kings, popes, and nobles were their visitors and guests. - -The fortress dwelling of the Temple which had sprung fairy-like from the -foul marshes of Paris shone with a splendour above that of the royal -residence. Twenty-four columns of silver, carved and chased, sustained -the audience-chamber of the grand master; and the chapter-hall, paved in -mosaic, and enriched with woodwork in cedar of Lebanon, contained sixty -huge vases of solid gold and a veritable armoury of Arabian, Moorish, -and Turkish weapons, chiselled, damascened, and crusted with precious -stones. The private chamber of every knight of the Order was -distinguished by some particular object of beauty; whilst the chambers -of the officers and commanders were stored with riches "so that they -were a wonder to behold." - -How great a gulf separated the wealthy and powerful Templars of Paris -from those "poor brothers of the Temple who rode two on one horse, lived -frugally, without wives or children, had no goods of their own, and who, -when they were not taking the field against the infidels, were employed -in mending their weapons and the harness of their horses, or in pious -exercises prescribed for them by their chief." - -The first institution of the Order of the Temple dates from the year -1118, when "certain brave and devout gentlemen" obtained from King -Baudouin III. "the noble favour of guarding the approaches to -Jerusalem." The Council of Troyes, in 1128, confirmed the religious and -military Order of the Templars. The knights clothed themselves in long -white robes adorned with a red cross; and the standard of the Order, -called the _Beaucèant_, was white and black, for an emblem of life and -death,—death for the infidels and life for the Christians of the Holy -Land. Bravery in battle was almost an article of their faith; no Templar -would fly from three opponents. - -In the day of their military and political power, the Templars of France -acknowledged none but the authority of the grand master of the Order, -and treated with royalty as between power and power. Up to the reign of -Philippe le Bel, the Kings of France were little more than courtiers of -the Temple, Royalty knocked humbly at those august, defiant portals, for -leave to deposit within them its treasures and its charters, or to -solicit a loan from the golden coffers of the knights. Not so, however, -Philippe le Bel. - -This was the sovereign who, in 1307, broke the power of the Knights -Templars of France. The act of accusation which he flung at the Order -proscribed its members as "ravening wolves," "a perfidious and -idolatrous society, whose works, nay, whose very words soil the earth -and infect the air." The last grand master, Jacques de Molay, seized by -the King's Inquisitor, passed through the torments of the torture -chamber, and thence to the torments of the stake. The Knights of the -Temple in their turn, loaded with chains, were led before the -Inquisitor, Guillaume de Paris, to answer his charges of heresy and -idolatry. The Templars were pursued through all the States of Europe, -the Pope encouraging the hue and cry. Jacques de Molay, and his -companion in misfortunes, Gui, Dauphin of Auvergne, were burned alive in -Paris; and the persecution of the Templars lasted for six years. Their -Order was abolished, and most of their wealth was bestowed by Philippe -upon the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. - -The prison of the Temple became a prison of the State; and the Temple -and the Louvre were the forerunners of the Bastille. The Dukes of -Aquitaine and Brabant were confined in the Temple under Philippe V. and -Philippe de Valois, the Counts of Dammartin and Flanders under King -John. Four sovereigns, indeed, Charles VII., Louis XI., Charles VIII., -and Louis XII., seemed to have forgotten the dungeon which the Templars -had bequeathed them (they might well have done so, since Mediæval Paris -had its prisons at every turn); and the cells and chambers in the great -tower of the Temple remained closed,—to be opened no more until after -the 10th of August, 1792. - -But there were social passages of interest in the history of this famous -fastness, and it was not unfitting that Francis I., the magnificent -monarch of the Renaissance, should repair the palace of the Templars, -restore those historic ruins, re-establish the spreading gardens, gild -afresh those illustrious halls,—re-create, in a word, the once brilliant -dwelling of the Chevaliers of the Cross: in 1540, the Temple became the -sumptuous abode of the Grand Priors of France. - -In the last years of the seventeenth century, Philippe de Vendôme, -prince of the blood and knight of Malta, was named Grand Prior of the -Temple. He would have his priory worthy of the gallant and graceful -Court of the Palais-Royal; and the handsomest and most amiable of -ladies, and the finest and gayest of wits were bidden to his historic -suppers. The oaks that had shadowed the cross of Jacques de Molay lent -their shelter now to "all the gods of Olympus," summoned within the -green enclosure of the Temple by the lively invocations of La Fare and -de Chaulieu. - -In the eighteenth century, this same enclosure had a population of four -thousand souls, divided into three distinct classes. There was first the -house of the Grand Prior, the dignitaries of the Order, and certain -nobles; then, a numerous body of workers of all grades; and lastly, a -rather heterogeneous collection of debtors who were able to elude their -creditors within these precincts, in virtue of a Mediæval -prescript—which justice ceased to respect in 1779. - -At this epoch, the Government of Louis XVI.—as if with a presentiment of -what the Temple was shortly to become for the King of France—ordered the -demolition of the old fortress of the Templars. But the destroyers of -1779 overthrew only a portion of the tower; the dungeon itself remained, -to be witness of a royal agony. - -[Illustration: THE TEMPLE PRISON.] - -See, then, at length, after the revolution of the 10th of August, Louis -XVI. and Marie Antoinette prisoners in the prison of the Temple! Marie -Antoinette, most imprudent and most amiable, most unfortunate and most -calumniated of women; Louis XVI., poor honest gentleman, whose passive -intelligence drew from Turgot this prophetic word: "Sire, a weak prince -can make choice only between the musket of Charles IX. and the scaffold -of Charles I." The King was without force and without prestige; the -Queen was incapable either of giving or of receiving a lesson in -royalty. - -Taciturn, and subject to sudden fits of temper; as much embarrassed by -his wife as by his crown, Louis divided his time between hunting and -those little harmless hobbies which showed that, had the fates desired, -he might have made an excellent artisan. As for Marie Antoinette, what -rôle was there for her, the victim of perpetual suspicion, in the midst -of a tremendous political reaction? It was reproached against her, not -without reason, that she could never fashion for herself the conscience -of a queen. She felt herself a woman, young and beautiful; she forgot -that she was also the partner of a throne. Full of personal charm, -liking to toy with elegant pleasures, wedded to a man so little made for -her, surrounded by gallant courtiers whom her beauty and graces -intoxicated, Marie Antoinette had her share of ardent emotions, and more -than once she was at last forgetful of her pride, _cette pudeur des -reines_; but her position at the Court of France was so false and so -complicated that, let her have done what she would, she might not have -escaped the abyss towards which her own feet impelled her. - -To the Temple, then, they were hurried, Louis and his family, on the -14th of August, 1792. The tower of the fortress was allotted to them, -and a portion of the palace and all the adjacent buildings were -levelled, so that the dungeon proper was completely isolated. The space -of garden reserved for their daily exercise was enclosed between lofty -walls. Louis occupied the first floor of the prison and his family the -second. Every casement was protected by thick iron bars, and the outer -windows were masked in such a manner that the prisoners obtained -scarcely a glimpse of the world beyond their cage. Six wickets defended -the staircase which led to the King's apartment; so low and narrow that -it was necessary to squeeze through them in a stooping posture. Each -door was of iron, heavily barred, and was kept locked at all hours. -After Louis' imprisonment, a seventh wicket with a door of iron was -constructed at the top of the stairs, which no one could open -unassisted. The first door of Louis' chamber was also of iron; so here -were eight solid barriers betwixt the King and his friends in -freedom,—not counting the dungeon walls. A guard of some three hundred -men watched night and day around the Temple. - -These costly preparations on his Majesty's account (great sums, it is -said, were spent on them) were not completed in a day, and in the -meantime the Royal family inhabited that portion of the palace of the -Temple which had been left standing. In his daily walks in the garden, -King Louis looked on at the building of his last earthly mansion, and -must have noticed the desperate haste with which the builders worked! In -the middle of September, he passed into the shades of the dungeon. - -Once locked in there, he was forbidden the use of pens, ink, and paper; -no writing materials were allowed him until the national convention had -commanded his appearance at the bar. - -The large chamber assigned to the King was partitioned into four -compartments; the first served as a dining-room, the second was Louis' -bed-chamber, and his valet slept in the third; the fourth was a little -cabinet contrived in a turret, to which the royal prisoner was fond of -retiring. His bed-chamber was hung in yellow and decently furnished. A -little clock on the chimney-piece bore on its pedestal the words -"Lepante, Clockmaker for the King." When the convention had decreed -France a republic, Louis' gaolers scratched out the last three words of -the inscription. They hung in his dining-room the declaration of the -rights of the Constitution of 1792, at the foot of which ran the legend: -"First year of the Republic." This was their announcement to Louis that -he had fallen from his king's estate. - -Like a murderer of these days in the condemned hold, Louis had two -guards with him night and day. They passed the day in his bed-chamber, -following him to the dining-room when he took his meals; and in the -dining-room they slept at night, after locking the doors of the -apartments. - -Their captivity was full of indignity for the illustrious unfortunates, -whose guards were incessantly suspicious. If Louis addressed a question -during the night to the valet who slept close to him, the answer must be -spoken loudly. The members of the family were not allowed to whisper in -their conversations, and if at dinner Louis, or his wife, or his sister -chanced to speak low in asking anything of the servant who waited on -them, one of the guards at the door cried, "_Parlez plus haut!_" - -Apart from suspense as to the future, a terrible dreariness must have -marked those days in the Temple. The early morning was given by the King -to his private devotions, after which he read the office which the -Chevaliers of the Order of the Saint-Esprit were accustomed to recite -daily. His piety was not without its inconveniences to himself. The -table was furnished with meat on Fridays, but Louis dipped a slice of -bread in his wine glass with the remark: "_voilà mon diner!_" To the -gentle suggestion that such extreme abstinence might be dispensed with, -he replied: "I do not trouble your conscience; why trouble mine? You -have your practices, and I have my own; let each hold to those which he -believes the best." - -His devotions engaged the King until nine o'clock, at which hour his -family joined him in the dining-room,—that is to say, during the period -in which it was still permitted him to communicate with them. He sat -with them at breakfast, eating nothing himself; he had made it a rule in -prison to fast until the dinner-hour. After breakfast the King took his -son for lessons in Latin and geography, and whilst Marie Antoinette -taught their daughter, sister Elizabeth plied her needle. The children -had an hour's play at mid-day, and at one o'clock the family assembled -for dinner. The table was always well supplied, but Louis ate little and -drank less, and the Queen took nothing but water with her food. - -After dinner the parents amused their children again as best they could, -round games at the table being the favourite recreation. To these poor -little pleasures succeeded reading and conversation, and at nine the -prisoners supped. After supper, Louis took the boy to his bed-chamber, -where a little bed was placed for him beside his own. He heard him -recite his prayers, and saw him to bed. Then he returned to reading, and -fell to his own prayers at eleven. When the doomed King, husband, and -father was denied the solace of his family, the time that he had devoted -to them was given almost wholly to his books. The Latins were his -favourite authors, and a day seldom passed on which he had not conned -afresh some pages of Tacitus, Livy, Seneca, Horace, Virgil, or Terence. -In French he was especially fond of books of travel. He read the news of -the day as long as he was supplied with it, but his not unnatural -interest in the affairs of revolutionary France seemed to trouble his -gaolers, and the newspapers were withdrawn from him. Thrown back upon -his books, he studied more than ever, and on the eve of his death he -summed up the volumes he had read through during the five months and -seven days of his captivity in the Temple: the number was two hundred -and fifty-seven. - -Towards the end he suffered some brusque interruptions of his -ignominious solitude. Three times he awoke to find a new valet in his -bedroom. Chamilly's place in this capacity was taken by Hue, and Hue was -succeeded by Cléry, who was all but a stranger to the King. Chamilly and -Hue barely came off with their lives in the prisons to which they were -removed from the Temple. The abandoned King took shock upon shock with -not a little fortitude. He was skimming his Tacitus one day when the -cannibals of September stopped under his window to brandish on a pike -the bleeding and disfigured head of the Princess Lamballe. - -Severely as they had guarded him, his gaolers began to double their -precautions. The concierge of the dungeon, the chief warder,—all, in a -word, who were specially charged with the keeping of the King, were -themselves constituted prisoners of the Temple. Did you wait on Louis, -or were you suffered to approach him, your person was searched minutely -at the governor's discretion. Not the commonest instrument of steel or -iron was allowed to be carried by anyone who went near the King: Cléry -was deprived of his penknife. Every article of food passed into the -prison for Louis' table was rigorously examined; and the prison cook had -to taste every dish, under the eyes of the guard, before it was -permitted to leave the kitchen. Never was suicide more strenuously -denied to a man who had no thought of it. - -The prisoners themselves were not spared the indignity of the search. -Louis, his wife, and his sister had their cupboards, drawers, and -closets ransacked; they were spoiled of knives, scissors, and -curling-irons. Louis' pains were prolonged to the end. The courage he -had mustered for death, and it was a very commendable portion, failed -him a moment at the last. In his confessor's hands, on the morning of -his death, whilst the carriage was waiting for him in the courtyard, he -halted in his prayers. He had, as he thought, caught a note of tears on -the other side of the partition, and he dreaded a second last embrace. -His ear strained at the wall, whilst the priest's hand was on his head. -But there was no weeping there, for Marie Antoinette was on her knees -under her crucifix; and Louis went down to his carriage. There is no -need to tell again the last scene of all.... - -Marie Antoinette was removed to the Conciergerie, which she quitted only -for the scaffold. After the parents had passed under the knife, the -young dauphin and his sister Marie Thérèse continued in the prison of -the Temple "the sorrowful Odyssey of the Royalty of France." The -daughter of Marie Antoinette must quit the Temple to go into exile, the -son of Louis XVI. must die wretchedly in the prison of his father. The -"education" of the poor little dauphin was entrusted to Simon the -shoemaker, whose wife, it is said, used to teach him ribald songs. He -had a charming face and a crooked back, "as if life were already too -heavy for him." In the hands of those singular preceptors he came to -lose nearly all his moral faculties, and the sole sentiment which he -cherished was that of gratitude, "not so much for the good that was done -him—which was small—as for the ills that were spared him. Without -uttering a word, he would precipitate himself before his guards, press -their hands, and kiss the hems of their coats."[13] After the retreat of -Simon, who had not used his gentle captive over-tenderly, the dauphin's -imprisonment was somewhat kinder, though he continued to be watched as -closely as before. His gaoler one day asked him: "What would you do to -Simon, little master, if you were to become king?" "I would have him -punished as an example," answered the young Capet. He had had no news of -Simon for two years, and did not know that the ungentle shoemaker had -perished on the scaffold.[14] - -Footnote 13: - - Nougaret. - -Footnote 14: - - Idem. - -The little dauphin's own untimely death, while still a prisoner in the -Temple, induced more than one audacious adventurer to seek to assume the -mask of Louis XVI's son. Hervagaut, Mathurin Bruneau, and more recently -the Duc de Normandie essayed in turn the rôle of pretender, "draped in -the shroud of Louis XVII." The first-named, condemned in 1802 to four -years' imprisonment, died ten years later in Bicêtre. The second, tried -at Rouen in 1818, received a sentence of seven years; and the Duc de -Normandie ended his days in Holland. - -The Convention seems to have given no political prisoners to the tower -of the Temple, which was again a prison of State under the Directory, -the Consulate, and the Empire. - -It was the Directory which consigned to the Temple the celebrated -English Admiral, Sir Sidney Smith, M.P. for Rochester, who had defended -Acre against Napoleon, and who was arrested at Havre "on the point of -setting fire to the port." He was transferred to the Temple from the -Abbey, the order of transfer bearing the signature of Barras. - -On the 10th of May, 1798, certain friends of the Admiral, disguised in -French uniform, presented to the concierge of the Temple a document -purporting to be an order of the Minister of War for the removal of Sir -Sidney to another prison. The concierge fell into the trap, and bade -adieu to his prisoner, who, a few days later, found himself safe in -London. - -The mysterious conspiracy of the Camp de Grenelle furnished the Temple -with a batch of one hundred and thirty-five prisoners; and the _coup -d'État_ which swept them in proscribed also the editors of twenty-two -French journals. During the next eight years the most distinguished of -the "enemies of the Republic" whose names were entered on the Temple -register were Lavalette; Caraccioli, the Ambassador of the King of -Naples to the Court of Louis XVI.; Hottinguer, the banker of the Rue de -Provence; Hyde de Neuville; the journalist Bertin; Toussaint-Louverture, -the hero of Saint-Domingue, who had written to Buonaparte: "_Le premier -homme des noirs au premier homme des blancs_"; the two Polignacs, the -Duc de Rivière, George Cadoudal, Moreau, and Pichegru. - -General Pichegru, arrested on the 28th of February, 1804, "for having -forgotten in the interests of the English and the Royalists what he owed -to the French Republic," was found dead in his cell on the 6th of April -following, having strangled himself with a black silk cravat. Moreau, -liberated by the First Consul, took service in the ranks of the enemy, -and was slain by a French bullet before Dresden, in 1813. - -Toussaint-Louverture's detention in the Temple is an episode which -reflects little credit upon the military and political history of the -Consulate. Certainly the expedition of Saint-Domingue, under the command -of General Leclerc, Napoleon's brother-in-law, makes a poor page in the -annals of that period. After having received Toussaint-Louverture's -submission, Leclerc, afraid of the great negro's influence, made him a -prisoner by the merest trick, and despatched him to France. Confined at -first in the Temple, he was afterwards removed to the fort of Joux, -where he died in April, 1803. - -Five years after this, in June, 1808, the prisoners of the Temple were -transferred by Fouché's order to the Dungeon of Vincennes. Amongst them -was General Malet, that bold conspirator who, in 1812, "_devait porter -la main sur la couronne de l'Empereur_." - -The tower of the Temple was demolished in 1811, and, four years later, -Louis XVIII. instituted, on the ruins of the ancient dwelling of the -Templars and the prison of Louis XVI., a congregation of nuns, who had -for their Superior a daughter of Prince de Condé. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER VI. - - BICÊTRE. - - -"Where there are monks," exclaimed brusquely the authors of _Les Prisons -de Paris_, "there are prisoners." The folds of the priestly garb -concealed a place of torment which monastic justice, with a grisly -humour, named a _Vade in Pace_; the last bead of the rosary grazed the -first rings of a chain which bore the bloody impress of the sworn -tormentor. At Bicêtre, as at the Luxembourg, ages ago, big-bellied -cenobites sang and tippled in the cosy cells piled above the dungeons of -the church. - -Bicêtre—more anciently Bissestre—is a corrupt form of Vincestre, or -Winchester, after John, Bishop of Winchester, who is thought to have -built the original château, and who certainly held it in the first -years of the thirteenth century. It was famous amongst the -pleasure-houses of the Duc de Berri, who embellished it with windows -of glass, which at that epoch were only beginning to be an ornament of -architecture—"objects of luxury," says Villaret, "reserved exclusively -for the mansions of the wealthiest seigneurs." In one of the rather -frequent "popular demonstrations" in the Paris of the early fifteenth -century, these "objects of luxury" were smashed, and little of the -château remained except the bare walls. It was rebuilt by the Duc de -Berri, a noted amateur of books, and was by him presented to an order -of monks in 1416. - -A colony of Carthusians under St. Louis; John of Winchester under -Philippe-Auguste; Amédée le Rouge, Count of Savoy, under Charles VI.; -the Bourguignons and the Armagnacs in the fifteenth century; the canons -of Notre-Dame de Paris under Louis XI.; the robbers and _bohèmiens_ in -the sixteenth century; the Invalides under Cardinal Richelieu, and the -foundlings of St. Vincent de Paul,—all these preceded at Bicêtre the -vagabonds, the _bons-pauvres_, the epileptics and other diseased, the -lunatics, and "all prisoners and captives." In becoming an asylum and -hospital, in a word, Bicêtre became also one of the most horrible of the -countless prisons of Paris; it grew into dreadful fame as "the Bastille -of the canaille and the bourgeoisie." - -The enormous numbers of the poor, the hordes of sturdy mendicants who -"demanded alms sword in hand," and the soldiers who took the road when -they could get no pay, became one of the chief scourges of Paris. Early -in the seventeenth century it was sought to confine them in the various -hospitals or houses of detention in the Faubourg Saint-Victor, but under -the disorders and weaknesses of the Government these establishments soon -collapsed. Parliament issued decree after decree; all strollers and -beggars were to be locked up in a prison or asylum specially -appropriated to them; the buildings were commenced and large sums of -money were spent on them, but they were never carried to completion. In -course of time the magistrates took the matter in hand, dived into old -records, but drew no counsel thence, for the evil, albeit not new, was -of extraordinary proportions; went to the King for a special edict, and -procured one "which ordered the setting up of a general hospital and -prescribed the rules for its governance." The château of Bicêtre and the -Maison de la Salpêtrière were ceded for the purpose. - -Children and women went to the Salpêtrière; at Bicêtre were placed men -with no visible means of subsistence, "widowers," beggars, feeble or -sturdy, and "young men worn out by debauchery." Before taking these last -in hand, the doctors "were accustomed to order them a whipping." - -This destiny of Bicêtre is pretty clear, and as hospital and asylum -combined it should, under decent conduct, have played a useful part in -the social economy of Paris. But the absolutism of that age had its own -notions as to the proper functions of "hospitals," and the too familiar -_ordres du roi_, and the not less familiar _lettres de cachet_ (which -Mirabeau had not yet come forward to denounce), were presently in hot -competition with the charitable _ordonnances_ of the doctors. Madness -was a capital new excuse for vengeance in high places, and the cells set -apart for cases of mental disease were quickly tenanted by "luckless -prisoners whose wrong most usually consisted in being strictly right." -Bicêtre, it must be admitted, did the thing conscientiously, and with -the best grace in the world. Rational individuals were despatched there -whom, according to the authors of _Les Prisons de Paris_, Bicêtre -promptly transformed into imbeciles and raging maniacs. - -Indeed the "philanthropists" and the criminologists of the early part of -this century need not have taxed their imaginations for any scheme of -cellular imprisonment. The system existed in diabolical perfection at -Bicêtre. That much-abused "depôt" of indigent males, "widowers," and -young rakes had an assortment of dark cells which realised _à merveille_ -the conditions of the vaunted programme of the penitentiary—isolation -and the silence of the tomb. Buried in a _cabanon_ or black hole of -Bicêtre, the prisoner endured a fate of life in death; he was as one -dead, who lived long, _tête-à-tête with God and his conscience_. If a -human sound penetrated to him, it was the sobbing moan of some companion -in woe. - -There was a subterranean Bicêtre, of which at this day only the dark -memory survives. For a dim idea of this, one has to stoop and peer in -fancy into a far-reaching abyss or pit, partitioned into little tunnels: -in each little tunnel a chain riven to the wall; at the end of the chain -a man. Now there were men in these hellish tunnels who had been guilty -of crimes, but far oftener they stifled slowly the lives or the -intelligences, or both, of men who had done no crimes at all. Innocent -or guilty, Bicêtre in the long run had one way with all its guests; and -when the prisoners and their wits had definitely parted company, the -governor of the prison effected a transfer with his colleague the -administrator of the asylum. It was expeditious and simple, and no one -asked questions or called for a report. - -It is on record, nevertheless, that existence in underground Bicêtre was -a degree less insupportable than a sojourn in the _cabanons_. Hear the -strenuous greet of Latude, with its wonted vividness of detail: - - "When the wet weather began, or when it thawed in the winter, water - streamed from all parts of my cell. I was crippled with rheumatism, - and the pains I had from it were such that I was sometimes whole - weeks without getting up.... In cold weather it was even worse. The - 'window' of the cell, protected by an iron grating, gave on the - corridor, the wall of which was pierced exactly opposite at the - height of ten feet. Through this aperture (garnished, like my own - window, with iron bars), I received a little air and a glimmer of - light, but the same aperture let in both snow and rain. I had - neither fire nor artificial light, and the rags of the prison were - my only clothing. I had to break with my wooden shoe the ice in my - pail, and then to suck morsels of ice to quench my thirst. I stopped - up the window, but the stench from the sewers and the tunnels came - nigh to choke me; I was stung in the eyes, and had a loathsome - savour in the mouth, and was horribly oppressed in the lungs. The - eight and thirty months they kept me in that noisome cell, I endured - the miseries of hunger, cold, and damp.... The scurvy that had - attacked me showed itself in a lassitude which spread through all my - members; I was presently unable either to sit or to rise. In ten - days my legs and thighs were twice their proper size; my body was - black; my teeth, loosened in their sockets, were no longer able to - masticate. Three full days I fasted; they saw me dying, and cared - not a jot. Neighbours in the prison did this and that to have me - speak to them; I could not utter a word. At length they thought me - dead, and called out that I should be removed. I was in sooth at - death's gate when the surgeon looked in on me and had me fetched to - the infirmary."[15] - -Footnote 15: - - _Mémoires._ - -Whether Masers de Latude existed, or was but a creature projected on -paper by some able enemy of La Pompadour, those famous and titillating -_Mémoires_ are excellent documents—all but unique of their kind—of the -prisons of bygone France. If the question be of the Bastille, of the -Dungeon of Vincennes, of Charenton, or of Bicêtre, these pungent pages, -with a luxuriance and colour of realistic detail not so well nor so -plausibly sustained by any other pen, are always pat and complete to the -purpose. To compare great things with small, it is as unimportant to -inquire who wrote _Shakespeare_ as to seek to know who was the author of -the _Mémoires_ of Latude. It is necessary only to feel certain that the -writer of this extraordinary volume was as intimately acquainted with -the prisons he describes as Mirabeau was with the Dungeon of Vincennes, -or Cardinal de Retz with the château de Nantes. His book (an epitome of -what men might and could and did endure under the absolute monarchy, -when his rights as an individual were the least secure of a citizen's -possessions) is the main thing, and the sole thing; the name and -identity of the author are not now, if they ever were, of the most -infinitesimal consequence. - - ------- - -A fine sample of the work of Bicêtre, considered as a machine for the -manufacture of lunatics, is offered in the person of that interesting, -unhappy genius, Salomon de Caus. A Protestant Frenchman, he lived much -in England and Germany, and at the age of twenty he was already a -skilled architect, a painter of distinction, and an engineer with ideas -in advance of his time. He was in the service of the Prince of Wales in -1612, and of the Elector Palatine, at Heidelberg, 1614-20. In 1623 he -returned to live and work in France, _dans sa patrie et pour sa patrie_. -He became engineer and architect to the King. - -Eight years before his return to France, De Caus had published at -Frankfort his _Raison des Forces Mouvantes_, a treatise in which he -described "an apparatus for forcing up water by a steam fountain," which -differs only in one particular from that of Della Porta. The apparatus -seems never to have been constructed, but Arago, relying on the -description, has named De Caus the inventor of the steam engine. - -It is not, however, with the inventive genius that we are concerned, but -with the ill-starred lover of Marion Delorme. The minister Particelli -took De Caus one day to the _petit lever_ of the brilliant and beautiful -Aspasia of the Place Royale. Particelli, one of the most prodigal of her -adorers, wanted De Caus to surpass, in the palace of Mademoiselle -Delorme, the splendours he had achieved in the palace of the Prince of -Wales. "At my charge, look you, Monsieur Salomon, and spare nothing! -Scatter with both hands gold, silver, colours, marble, bronze, and -precious stuffs—what you please. Imagine, seek, invent,—and count on -me!" - -But Monsieur Salomon had no sooner seen the goddess of Particelli than -he too was lifted from the earth and borne straight into the empyrean. -At the moment of leaving her, when she suffered him to kiss her hand, -and let him feel the darts of desire which shot from those not too -prudish eyes, Salomon de Caus "_devint amoureux à en perdre la tête_." -Thenceforth, in brief, - - "His chief good and market of his time" - -was to obey and anticipate every wild and frivolous fantasy of Marion -Delorme. Michel Particelli's hyperbolical commission should be fulfilled -for him beyond his own imaginings! He threw down the palace of Marion -and built another in its place. The new palace was to cede in nothing to -the Louvre or Saint-Germain. With his own hands Salomon de Caus -decorated it; and then, at the bidding of his protector, Particelli, he -consented, _bon grè, mal grè_, to paint the picture of the divinity -herself. - -"Alone one morning with his delicious model," the distracted artist -flung brushes and palette from him, and cast himself at her feet. "_Mon -cœur se déchire, ma tête se perd.... Je deviens fou, je vous aime, et je -me meurs!_" It was a declaration of much in little, and Marion, a -_connaisseuse_ of such speeches, absolved and accepted him with a kiss. - -Installed by right of conquest in that Circean boudoir, which drew as a -magnet the wit and gallantry of Paris, Salomon stood sentinel at the -door "like a eunuch or a Cerberus." Brissac and Saint-Evremont received -the most Lenten entertainment, and the proposals of Cinq-Mars were -rejected. Marion was even persuaded to be not at home to Richelieu -himself. But the happy Salomon grew unhappy, and more unhappy. Every -moment he came with a sigh upon some souvenir, delicately equivocal, of -the _vie galante_ of his mistress; and when love began to feed upon the -venom of jealousy, his complacent goddess grew capricious, vexed, -irritated, and at length incensed. After that, she resolved coldly on -Salomon's betrayal. It was the fashion of the age to be cruel in one's -vengeance. Marion penned a note to Richelieu: - - "I want so much to see you again. I send with this the little key - which opens the little door.... You must forgive everything, and you - are not to be angry at finding here a most learned young man whom - the love of science and the science of love have combined to reduce - to a condition of midsummer madness. Does your friendship for me, to - say nothing of your respect for yourself, suggest any means of - ridding me instantly of this embarrassing lunatic? The poor devil - loves me to distraction. He is astonishingly clever, and has - discovered wonders—mountains that nobody else has seen, and worlds - that nobody else has imagined. He has all the talents of the Bible, - and another, the talent of making me the most miserable of women. - This genius from the moon, whom I commend to your Eminence's most - particular attention, is called Salomon de Caus." - -A missive of that colour, from a Marion Delorme to a Richelieu, was the -request polite for a _lettre de cachet_. Salomon de Caus was invited to -call upon the Cardinal. Behind his jealous passion for his mistress, -Salomon still cherished his passion for science, and he went hot-foot to -Richelieu with his hundred schemes for changing the face of the world, -with steam as the motive power. It must have been a curious interview. -At the end, Richelieu summoned the captain of his guard. - -"Take this man away." - -"Where, your Eminence?" - -"To what place are we sending our lunatics just now?" - -"To Bicêtre, your Eminence." - -"Just so! Ask admission for Monsieur at Bicêtre." So, from the meridian -of his glory, Salomon de Caus hastened to his setting, and at this point -he vanishes from history. Legend, not altogether legendary, shows him -once again. - -Some eighteen months or two years after he had been carried, "gagged and -handcuffed," to Bicêtre, it fell to Marion Delorme (in the absence of -her new lover Cinq-Mars) to do the honours of Paris for the Marquis of -Worcester. The marquis took a fancy to visit Bicêtre, which had even -then an unrighteous celebrity from one end of Europe to the other. As -they strolled through the _quartier des fous_ a creature made a spring -at the bars of his cell. - -"Marion—look, Marion! It is I! It is Salomon! I love you! Listen: I have -made a discovery which will bring millions and millions to France! Let -me out for God's sake! I will give you the moon and all the stars to set -me free, Marion!" - -"Do you know this man?" said Lord Worcester. - -"I am not at home in bedlam," said Marion, who on principle allowed no -corner to her conscience. - -"What is the discovery he talks of?" asked Lord Worcester of a warder. - -"He calls it steam, milord. They've all discovered something, milord." - -Lord Worcester went back to Bicêtre the next morning and was closeted -for an hour with the madman. At Marion Delorme's in the afternoon he -said: - -"In England we should not have put that man into a madhouse. Your -Bicêtre is not the most useful place. Who invented those cells? They -have wasted to madness as fine a genius as the age has known." - -Salamon de Caus died in Bicêtre in 1626. - - ------- - -Earlier than this, Bicêtre the asylum shared the evil renown of Bicêtre -the prison. To prisoners and patients alike popular rumour assigned an -equal fate. The first, it was said, were assassinated, the second were -"disposed of." Now and again the warders and attendants amused -themselves by organising a pitched battle between the "mad side" and the -"prison side"; the wounded were easily transferred to the infirmary, the -dead were as easily packed into the trench beneath the walls. - -The very name of Bicêtre—dungeon, madhouse, and _cloaca_ of obscene -infamies—became of dreadful import; not the Conciergerie, the Châtelet, -Fort-l'Évêque, Vincennes, nor the Bastille itself inspired the common -people and the bourgeoisie with such detestation and panic fear. The -general imagination, out-vieing rumour, peopled it with imps, evil -genii, sorcerers, and shapeless monsters compounded of men and beasts. -Mediæval Paris, at a loss for the origins of things, ascribed them to -the Fairies, the Devil, or Julius Cæsar. It was said that the Devil -alighted in Paris one night, and brought in chains to the "plateau de -Bicêtre" a pauper, a madman, and a prisoner, with which three -unfortunates he set agoing the prison on the one side and the asylum on -the other, to minister to the _menus plaisirs_ of the denizens of hell. -Such grim renown as this was not easily surpassed; but at the end of -Louis XIV.'s reign the common legend went a step farther, and said that -the Devil had now disowned Bicêtre! Rhymes sincere or satirical gave -utterance to the terror and abhorrence of the vulgar mind. - - ------- - -Throughout the whole of the eighteenth century, up to the time of the -Revolution, say MM. Alhoy and Lurine,[16] Bicêtre continued a treatment -which in all respects is not easily paralleled: the helot's lot and -labour for pauperism; the rod and worse for sickness of body and of -mind; the dagger or the ditch, upon occasion, for mere human misfortune. -Till the first grey glimmer of the dawn of prison reform, in the days of -Louis XVI, Bicêtre offered to "mere prisoners" the "sanctuary of a -lion's den," and lent boldly to king, minister, nobles, clergy, police, -and all the powers that were, the cells set apart for the mad as -convenient places for stifling the wits and consciences of the sane. - -Footnote 16: - - _Les Prisons de Paris._ - - ------- - -In 1789, Paris had thirty-two State prisons. Four years later, the -Terror itself was content with twenty-eight. One of the earliest acts of -that vexed body, the National Assembly, was to appoint a commission of -four of its members to the decent duty of visiting the prisons. The -commissioners chosen were Fréteau, Barrière, De Castellane, and -Mirabeau. Count Mirabeau at least—whose hot vagaries and the undying -spite of his father had passed him through the hands of nearly every -gaoler in France—had qualifications enough for the task! - -The commissioners found within the black walls of _ce hideux Bicêtre_ a -population of close upon three thousand creatures, including "paupers, -children, paralytics, imbeciles and lunatics." The administrative staff -of all degrees numbered just three hundred. The governor, knowing his -inferno, was not too willing to accord a free pass to the explorers, and -Mirabeau and his colleagues had to give him a taste of their authority -before he could be induced to slip the bolts of subterranean cells, -whose inmates "had been expiating twenty years the double crime of -poverty and courage," against whom no decree had been pronounced but -that of a _lettre de cachet_, or who had been involved, like the Prévôt -de Beaumont, in the crime of exposing some plot against the people's -welfare. Children were found in these cells chained to criminals and -idiots. - - ------- - -In April, 1792, Bicêtre gave admission to another set of commissioners. -This second was a visit of some mystery, not greatly noised, and under -cover of the night. It was not now a question of diving into moist and -sunless caverns for living proofs (in fetters and stinking rags) of the -hidden abuses of regal justice. The new commissioners came, quietly and -almost by stealth, to make the first official trial of the Guillotine. - -The invention of Dr. Guillotin (touching which he had first addressed -the Constituent Assembly in December, 1789: "With this machine of mine, -gentlemen, I shall shave off your heads in a twinkling, and you will not -feel the slightest pain") does not date in France as an instrument of -capital punishment until 1792; but under other names, and with other -accessories, Scotland, Germany, and Italy had known a similar -contrivance in the sixteenth century. In Paris, where sooner or later -everything finishes with a couplet, the newspapers and broadsheets, not -long after that midnight _essai_ at Bicêtre, began to overflow gaily -enough with topical songs (_couplets de circonstance_) in praise of the -Doctor and his "razor." Two fragmentary samples will serve:— - - Air—"Quand la Mer Rouge apparut." - - "C'est un coup que l'on reçoit - Avant qu'on s'en doute; - A peine on s'en aperçoit, - Car on n'y voit goutte. - Un certain ressort caché, - Tout à coup étant laché, - Fait tomber, ber, ber, - Fait sauter, ter, ter, - Fait tomber, - Fait sauter, - Fait voler la tête ... - C'est bien plus honnête." - - II. - - "Sur l'inimitable machine du Mèdecin Guillotin, propere à couper les - têtes, et dite de son nom Guillotine." - - Air—"Du Menuet d'Exaudet." - - "Guillotin, - Médecin - Politique, - Imagine un beau matin - Que pendre est inhumain - Et peu patriotique; - Aussitôt, - Il lui faut - Un supplice - Que, sans corde ni poteau, - Supprime du bourreau - L'office," etc. - -It was on the 17th of April, 1792, that proof was made of the first -guillotine—not yet famed through France as the nation's razor. Three -corpses, it is said (commodities easily procured at Bicêtre), were -furnished for the experiment, which Doctors Guillotine and Louis -directed. Mirabeau's physician and friend Cabanis was of the party, -and—a not unimportant assistant—Samson the headsman, with his two -brothers and his son. "The mere weight of the axe," said Cabanis, -"sheared the heads with the swiftness of a glance, and the bones were -clean severed (_coupés net_)" Dr. Louis recommended that the knife -should be given an oblique direction, so that it might cut saw-fashion -in its fall. The guillotine was definitely adopted; and eight days -later, the 25th of April, it settled accounts with an assassin named -Pelletier, who was the first to "look through the little window," and -"sneeze into the sack (_éternuer dans le sac_)." - - ------- - -Four months after the first trial of the "inimitable machine" Bicêtre -paid its tribute of blood to the red days of September. In Bicêtre, as -elsewhere in Paris, that Sunday, 2d of September, 1792, and the three -days that followed were long remembered. "All France leaps distracted," -says Carlyle, "like the winnowed Sahara waltzing in sand colonnades!" In -Paris, "huge placards" going up on the walls, "all steeples clangouring, -the alarm-gun booming from minute to minute, and lone Marat, the man -forbid," seeing salvation in one thing only—in the fall of "two hundred -and sixty thousand aristocrat heads." It was the beginning or presage of -the Terror. - -The hundred hours' massacre in the prisons of Paris, beginning on the -Sunday afternoon, may be reckoned with the hours of St. Bartholomew. -"The tocsin is pealing its loudest, the clocks inaudibly striking -three." The massacre of priests was just over at the Abbaye prison; and -there, and at La Force, and at the Châtelet, and the Conciergerie, in -each of these prisons the strangest court—which could not be called of -justice but of revenge—was hurriedly got together, and prisoner after -prisoner, fetched from his cell and swiftly denounced as a "royalist -plotter," was thrust out into a "howling sea" of _sans-culottes_ and -hewn to pieces under an arch of pikes and sabres. "Man after man is cut -down," says Carlyle; "the sabres need sharpening, the killers refresh -themselves from wine-jugs." Dr. Moore, author of the _Journal during a -Residence in France_, came upon one of the scenes of butchery, grew sick -at the sight, and "turned into another street." Not fewer than a -thousand and eighty-nine were slaughtered in the prisons. - -The carnage at Bicêtre, on the Paris outskirts, was on the Monday, and -here it seems to have been of longer duration and more terrible than -elsewhere. Narratives of this butchery are not all in harmony. -Prud'homme, author of the _Journal des Révolutions de Paris_, says that -the mob started for Bicêtre towards three o'clock, taking with them -seven pieces of cannon; that a manufactory of false paper-money -(_assignats_) was discovered in full swing in the prison, and that all -who were concerned in it were killed without mercy; that Lamotte, -husband of the "Necklace Countess," was amongst the prisoners, and that -the people "at once took him under their protection"; that the debtors -and "the more wretched class of prisoners," were enlarged; and that the -rest fell under pike, sabre, and club. - -Barthélemi Maurice contradicts Prud'homme wholesale. The attack was at -ten in the morning, he says, and not at three; there were no cannon; the -paper-notes manufactory existed only in M. Prud'homme's imagination; -prisoners for debt were not lodged in Bicêtre; the sick and the lunatics -suffered no harm; and the famous Lamotte "never figured in any register -of Bicêtre." - -Thiers[17] insists upon the cannon, says the killing was done madly for -mere lust of blood, and that the massacre continued until Wednesday, the -5th of September. - -Footnote 17: - - _Histoire de la Révolution._ - -Peltier in his turn, royalist pamphleteer, gives his version of the -tragedy. This Bicêtre, says Peltier, was "the den of all the vices," the -sewer, so to speak, of Paris. "All were slain; impossible to figure up -the number of the victims. I have heard it placed at as many as six -thousand!" Peltier is not easily satisfied. "Eight days and eight -nights, without one instant's pause, the work of death went forward." -Pikes, sabres, and muskets "were not enough for the ferocious assassins, -they had to bring cannon into play." It was not until a mere handful of -the prisoners remained "that they had recourse again to their -small-arms" (_que l'on en revenait aux petites armes_). - -Doubtless the most accurate account of this merciless affair is -contained in the statement made to Barthélemi Maurice by Père Richard, -_doyen_ of the warders of Bicêtre, and an eyewitness. It may be -summarised from the pages of MM. Alhoy and Lurine: - - "Master Richard traced on paper the three numbers, 166, 55, and - 22,—What are those? I asked him.—166, that is the number of the - dead.—And 55 and 22, what are they?—55 was the number of children in - the prison, and only 22 were left us. The scoundrels killed 33 - children, besides the 166 adults.—Tell me how it began.—They came - bellowing up at ten that Monday morning, all in the prison so still - that you might have heard a fly buzzing, though we had three - thousand men in that morning.—But you had cannon they say; you - defended yourselves.—Where did you get that tale, sir? We had no - cannon, and we didn't attempt to defend ourselves.—What was the - strength of the attacking party?—A good three thousand, I should - say; but of those not more than about two hundred were active, so to - speak. —Did they bring cannon?—It was said they did, but I saw none, - though I looked out of the main gate more than once.—What were their - arms, then?—Well, a few of them had second-hand muskets (_de - méchants fusils_), others had swords, axes, bludgeons (_bûches_), - and bills (_crochets_), but there were more pikes than anything - else.—Were there any well-dressed people amongst them?—Oh, yes; the - 'judges' especially; though the bulk of them were not much to look - at.—How many 'judges' were there?—A dozen; but they relieved one - another.—If there were judges, there was some sort of formality, I - suppose. What was the procedure? How did they judge, acquit, and - execute?—They sat in the clerk's office, a room down below, near the - chapel. They made us fetch out the register; looked down the column - of 'cause of imprisonment,' and then sent for the prisoner. If you - were too frightened to feel your legs under you, or couldn't get a - word out quick, it was 'guilty' on the spot.—And then?—Then the - 'president' said: 'Let the citizen be taken to the Abbaye.' They - knew outside what that meant. Two men seized him by the arm and led - him out of the room. At the door he was face to face with a double - row of cut-throats, a prod in the rear with a pike tossed him - amongst them, and then ... well, there were some that took a good - deal of finishing off.—They did not shoot them then?—No, there was - no shooting.—And the acquittals?—Well, if it was simply, 'take the - citizen to the Abbaye,' they killed him. If it was 'take him to the - Abbaye,' with _Vive la nation_! he was acquitted. It wasn't over at - nightfall. We passed the night of the 3d with the butchers inside - the prison; they were just worn out. It began again on the morning - of the 4th, but not quite with the same spirit. It was mostly the - children who suffered on the Tuesday.—And the lunatics, and the - patients, and the old creatures—did they get their throats cut - too?—No, they were all herded in the dormitories, with the doors - locked on them, and sentinels inside to keep them from looking out - of window. All the killing was done in the prison.—And when did they - leave you? At about three on Tuesday afternoon; and then we called - the roll of the survivors.—And the dead?—We buried them in quicklime - in our own cemetery." - -The hideous _mise-en-scène_ of Père Richard is, at the worst, a degree -less reproachful than that of Prud'homme, Peltier, or M. Thiers. - - ------- - -There was one worthy man at Bicêtre, Dr. Pinel, whose devotion to -humanitarian science (a form of devotion not over-common in such places -at that day) very nearly cost him his life at the hands of the -revolutionary judges. Dr. Pinel, who had the notion that disease of the -mind was not best cured by whipping, was accused by the Committee of -Public Safety (under whose rule, it may be observed, no public ever went -in greater terror) of plotting with medical science for the restoration -of the monarchy! It was a charge quite worthy of the wisdom and the -tenderness for "public safety" of the _Comité de Salut Public_. Pinel, -disdaining oratory, vouchsafed the simplest explanation of his treatment -at Bicêtre,—and was permitted to continue it. - -Not so charitable were the gods to Théroigne de Mericourt, a woman -singular amongst the women of the Revolution. Readers of Carlyle will -remember his almost gallant salutations of her (a handsome young woman -of the streets, who took a passion for the popular cause, and rode on a -gun-carriage in the famous outing to Versailles) as often as she starts -upon the scene. When he misses her from the procession, in the fourth -book of the first volume, it is: - - "But where is the brown-locked, light-behaved, fire-hearted - Demoiselle Théroigne? Brown eloquent beauty, who, with thy winged - words and glances, shalt thrill rough bosoms—whole steel - battalions—and persuade an Austrian Kaiser, pike and helm lie - provided for thee in due season, and alas! also strait waistcoat and - long lodging in the Salpêtrière." - -Théroigne was some beautiful village girl when the echo first reached -her of the tocsin of the Revolution. She thought a woman was wanted -there, and trudged hot-foot to Paris, perhaps through the self-same -quiet lanes that saw the pilgrimage of Charlotte Corday. In Paris she -took (for reasons of her own, one must suppose) the calling of -"unfortunate female"—the euphemism will be remembered as Carlyle's—and -dubbed herself the people's Aspasia—"l'Aspasie du peuple." In "tunic -blue," over a "red petticoat," crossed with a tricolour scarf and -crowned with the Phrygian cap, she roamed the streets, "_criant_, -_jurant_, _blasphémant_," to the tune of the drum of rebellion. One day -the women of the town, in a rage of fear or jealousy, fell upon her, -stripped her, and beat her through the streets. She went mad, and in the -first years of this century she was still an inmate of Bicêtre. When the -"women's side" of Bicêtre was closed, in 1803, Théroigne was transferred -to the Salpêtrière, where she died. - - ------- - -During the hundred years (1748-1852) of the prisons of the Bagnes—those -convict establishments at Toulon, Brest, and Rochefort, which took the -place of the galleys, and which in their turn gave way to the modern -system of transportation,—it was from Bicêtre that the chained cohorts -of the _forçats_ were despatched on their weary march through France. -The ceremony of the _ferrement_, or putting in irons for the journey, -was one of the sights of Paris for those who could gain admission to the -great courtyard of the prison. At daybreak of the morning appointed for -the start, the long chains and collars of steel were laid out in the -yard, and the prison smiths attended with their mallets and portable -anvils; the convicts, for whom these preparations were afoot, keeping up -a terrific din behind their grated windows. When all was ready for them, -they were tumbled out by batches and placed in rows along the wall. -Every man had to strip to the skin, let the weather be what it might, -and a sort of smock of coarse calico was tossed to him from a pile in -the middle of the yard; he did not dress until the toilet of the collar -was finished. This, at the rough hands of the smith and his aids, was a -sufficiently painful process. The convicts were called up in -alphabetical order, and to the neck of each man a heavy collar was -adjusted, the triangular bolt of which was hammered to by blows of a -wooden mallet. To the padlock was attached a chain which, descending to -the prisoner's waistbelt, was taken up thence and riveted to the next -man's collar, and in this way some two hundred _forçats_ were tethered -like cattle in what was called the _chaine volante_. The satyr-like -humours of the gang, singing and capering on the cobbles, shouting to -the echo the name of some criminal hero as he stepped out to receive his -collar, and sometimes joining hands in a frenzied dance, which was -broken only by the savage use of the warder's bâtons—all this was the -sport of the well-dressed crowd of spectators. - -As far as the outskirts of Paris, the convicts were carried in -_chars-à-bancs_, an armed escort on either side; and when the prison -doors were thrown open to let them out, the whole canaille of the town -was waiting to receive them with yells of derision, to which the -_forçats_ responded with all the oaths they had. This was one of the -most popular spectacles of Paris until the middle of the present -century. - -An essential sordidness is the character most persistent in the history -of Bicêtre—a dull squalor, with perpetual crises of unromantic agony. -There is no glamour upon Bicêtre; no silken gown with a domino above it -rustles softly by lantern-light through those grimy wickets. It is not -here that any gallant prisoner of state comes, bribing the governor to -keep his table furnished with the best, receiving his love-letters in -baskets of fruit, giving his wine-parties of an evening. In the records -of Vincennes and the Bastille the novelist will always feel himself at -home, but Bicêtre has daunted him. It is poor Jean Valjean, of _Les -Misérables_, squatting "in the north corner of the courtyard," choked -with tears, "while the bolt of his iron collar was being riveted with -heavy hammer-blows." This is the solitary figure of interest which -Bicêtre has given to fiction. - -If a shadowy figure may be added, it is from the same phantasmagoric -gallery of Victor Hugo. Bicêtre was the prison of the nameless -faint-heart who weeps and moans through the incredible pages of _Le -Dernier Jour d'un Condamné_. Then, and until 1836, Bicêtre was the last -stage but one (_l'avant-dernière étape_) on the road to the guillotine. -The last was the Conciergerie, close to the Place de Grève. The -shadow-murderer of _Le Dernier Jour d'un Condamné_—for there is no real -stuff of murder in him, and he is the feeblest and least sympathetic -puppet of fiction—is useful only as bringing into relief the old, -disused, and forgotten _cachot du Condamné_, or condemned cell, of -Bicêtre. It was a den eight feet square; rough stone walls, moist and -sweating, like the flags which made the flooring; the only "window" a -grating in the iron door; a truss of straw on a stone couch in a recess; -and an arched and blackened ceiling, wreathed with cobwebs. - -Starting out of sleep one night, Hugo's condemned man lifts his lamp and -sees spectral writings, figures and arabesques in crayons, blood and -charcoal dancing over the walls of the cell—the "visitors' book" of -generations of _Condamnés à mort_ who have preceded him. Some had -blazoned their names in full, with grotesque embellishments of the -capital letter and a motto underneath breathing their last defiance to -the world; and in one corner, "traced in white outline, a frightful -image, the figure of the scaffold, which, at the moment that I write, -may be rearing its timbers for me! The lamp all but fell from my hands." - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER VII. - - SAINTE-PÉLAGIE. - - -The prison of Sainte-Pélagie owed its name to a frail beauty whom -play-goers in Antioch knew in the fifth century of this era. Embracing -Christianity, she forsook the stage, and built herself a cell on the -Mount of Olives. The Church bestowed on her the honours of the Calendar. - -Twelve centuries later, in the reign of Louis XIV., a Madame de -Miramion, inspired by the memory, not of Pélagie the _comédienne_, but -of Sainte-Pélagie the recluse, built in Paris a substantial Refuge for -young women whose virtue seemed in need of protection. Letters-patent -were obtained from the King, and Madame de Miramion sought her recruits -here and there in the capital; gathering within the fold, it was said, a -considerable number "who had no longer anything to fear for their -virtue." But the rule of the house was strait, and one by one Madame's -young persons absconded, or were withdrawn from her keeping by their -parents. Nothing daunted, and sustained by her fixed idea of making -penitents at any price, Madame de Miramion descended boldly upon the -haunts of Aspasia herself, and there laid hands on all those votaries of -Venus who were either weary of their calling or whose calling was -wearying of them. The crown of the _joyeuse vie_ fits loosely, and the -lightest shock unfixes it. Madame's campaign in this quarter was -successful, and she was soon at the head of a battalion of more or less -repentant graces. New letters-patent were granted by a Majesty so -desirous of the moral well-being of his female subjects, the -establishment of Sainte-Pélagie was confirmed, and, thanks to the -invaluable assistance of the police, the complement of Magdalens was -maintained. Sainte-Pélagie continued its pious destiny until the days of -the Revolution, when the cloister of the Magdalens became a prison. - - ------- - -As a prison, Sainte-Pélagie (which is in existence to-day as a _maison -de correction_, or penitentiary) has known many and strange guests. From -1792 to 1795, it held a mixed population of both sexes, political -prisoners and others. Between the years 1797 and 1834, debtors of all -degrees were confined there, and at one period the debtors shared the -gaol with a motley crew of juvenile delinquents. Under the Restoration -and under the two Empires Sainte-Pélagie served the uses of a State -prison. The first Napoleon had the cells in constant occupation. The -Restoration sent there, within the space of a few days, one hundred and -thirty-five individuals, arrested by the police of Louis XVIII. for -their connection, as officers, with the old Imperial Guard. Innumerable -indeed, from 1790 onwards, were the victims who found a lodging, not of -their choosing, behind the ample walls which the widow Miramion had -consecrated a shelter for tottering virtue or gallantry in mourning for -its past. The men of the Revolution found Sainte-Pélagie excellently -suited to their needs; Madame de Miramion had housed her Magdalens -strongly. In form a vast quadrilateral, the buildings were easily -converted to the uses of a prison; and at a later date the prison was -arranged in three divisions. On the west side were confined petty -offenders under sentences ranging between six months and one year. The -debtors' was the second division; and here also were imprisoned young -rogues, thieves, and vagabonds, and (up to 1867) "certain men of letters -and journalists." The east side seems to have been reserved principally -for political offenders. But the divisions were never very strictly -observed; and a political prisoner relegated by mischance or for lack of -space to the west side of the prison was treated in all respects as a -common criminal. Ordinary prisoners were kept at work, and received a -small percentage on the profits of their industry. Political prisoners, -journalists, and "men of letters" were exempted from labour; and a third -class called _pistoliers_, purchased this exemption at a cost of from -six to seven francs a fortnight. - -It was by order of the Convention that Sainte-Pélagie was transformed -from a convent-refuge into a prison, and during the revolutionary period -a crowd of unknown or little-known suspects passed within its keeping -before being summoned to the bar. Not a few quitted it only for the -scaffold. - -Madame Roland was cast there on the 25th of June, 1793. Three years -earlier, Carlyle notes her at Lyons, "that queen-like burgher woman; -beautiful, Amazonian-graceful to the eye" with "that strong -Minerva-face." We shall return to Madame Roland, wife of the "King's -Inspector of Manufactures." - -In the same month, if not on the same day, were sent to Sainte-Pélagie -the Comte de Laval-Montmorency, and the Marquis de Pons. In August of -the same year went to join them (not now with popular acclamation, as -when, in 1765, Mademoiselle Clairon and her fellow players were haled to -the Châtelet) nine ladies of the Théâtre-Français. After the 9th -Thermidor (July 27, 1794), which saw the sudden downfall and death of -Robespierre, Sainte-Pélagie received most of the victims of the -reaction,—the _Tail_ of Robespierre,—including the Duplaix family. - - ------- - -Madame Roland had known the indignities of a revolutionary prison before -her sojourn at Sainte-Pélagie. Imprisoned first in the Abbaye, it was -from there that she wrote: - - "I find a certain pleasure in enforcing privations on myself, in - seeing how far the human will can be employed in reducing the - 'necessaries' of existence. I substituted bread and water for - chocolate, at breakfast; a plate of meat with vegetables was my - dinner; and I supped on vegetables, without desert." - -But having "as much aversion from as contempt for a merely useless -economy" (_autant d'aversion que de mépris pour une économie inutile_), -Madame Roland goes on to say that what she saved by the retrenchments of -her own cuisine she spent in procuring extra rations for the pauper -prisoners of the Abbaye; and adds: "If I stay here six months I mean to -go out plump and hearty [_je veux en sortir grasse et fraîche_] wanting -nothing more than soup and bread, and with the satisfaction of having -earned certain _bénédictions incognito_." - -Transferred to Sainte-Pélagie, this heroic woman of the people saw -herself confounded with women of the town (the descendants of the widow -Miramion's Magdalens), thieves, forgers, and assassins. She made the -best of the situation, cultivated flowers in a box in the window of her -cell, and wrote incessantly. When told that her name had been included -in the process against the Girondins, she said: "I am not afraid to go -to the scaffold in such good company; I am ashamed only to live among -scoundrels." Her friends had contrived a plan for her escape, but could -not induce her to profit by it: "Spare me!" she cried. "I love my -husband, I love my daughter; you know it; but I will not save myself by -flight." When the axe fell on the heads of the twenty-two Girondins, -October 31, 1793 (10th Brumaire of the Republican calendar), Madame -Roland was removed to the Conciergerie. Knowing well the fate that -awaited her, she lost neither her courage nor her beautiful -tranquillity; and used to go down to the men's wicket of the prison, -exhorting them to be brave and worthy of the cause. In the tumbril, on -her way to the guillotine, she was robed in white, her superb black hair -floating behind her; and at the place of execution, bending her head to -the statue of Liberty, she murmured: "O Liberty! what crimes are done in -thy name!"—_O Liberté! que de crimes on commet en ton nom!_ - -It was not Madame Dubarry's to show this sublime fortitude in death; but -after all one dies as one must. Sainte-Pélagie will tell us that poor -Dame Dubarry was the feeblest and most faint-hearted of its recluses of -the Revolution. She wept, and called on heaven to save her, and shuffled -and cut her cards, and consulted the lines in her hand; and when her -name was called at the wicket on the fatal morning, she swooned on the -flags of the prison, and was carried scarcely animate to the tumbril. - - ------- - -The story of governor Bouchotte, who had charge of Sainte-Pélagie at -this terrible epoch, is a noble one. The September massacres had begun, -and the red-bonnets in detachments were sharing the butchery at the -prisons. The Abbaye, the Carmes, the Force, and the Conciergerie had -given them prompt entrance; the turnkeys saluting the self-styled -judges, say MM. Alhoy and Lurine, as the grave-digger salutes the -hangman. Not so governor Bouchotte of Sainte-Pélagie. The mob swarmed at -the doors, but to their clattering on the panels no answer was -vouchsafed. Pikes, hammers, and axes resounded on the solid portals, but -silence the most complete reigned behind them. - -"Can citizen Bouchotte have been beforehand with us?—_Le citoyen -Bouchotte, nous aurait-il devancés?_" cried one. "Not an aristocrat -voice to be heard! Bouchotte has perhaps finished them off himself." - -The neighbouring houses were ransacked for tools proper to effect an -entrance, and the doors were burst open. The mob poured in; and there, -bound hand and foot on the flags in the courtyard of the prison, they -found the governor and his wife. - -"Citizens," cried Bouchotte, "you arrive too late! My prisoners are -gone. They got warning of your coming, and after binding my wife and -myself as you see us, they made their escape." - -Bouchotte was taken at his word, he and his wife were released from -their cords, and the red-bonnets went off to wreak a double vengeance at -Bicêtre. At the risk of his own and of his wife's life, the admirable -Bouchotte had tricked the cut-throats. He had uncaged his birds and -given them their liberty through a private postern, and had then ordered -his warders to tie up his wife and himself. Honour to the brave memory -of Bouchotte! The history of the French Revolution has few brighter -passages than this. - -Nougaret gives us a curious picture of the interior of Sainte-Pélagie -under the bloody rule of Robespierre.[18] The prison itself he describes -as "damp and unwholesome" (_humide et malsaine_). There were about three -hundred and fifty prisoners, detained they knew not why, for they were -not allowed to read the charges entered on the registers. - -Footnote 18: - - _Histoire des Prisons de Paris et des Départements._ - -To each prisoner was allotted a cell six feet square, "with a dirty bed -and a mattress as hard as marble." The turnkey's first question to a -new-comer was: "Have you any money?" If the answer was, Yes, he was -supplied with "a basin and a water-jug and a few cracked plates, for -which he paid triple their worth." If the prisoner entered with empty -pockets, it was: "So much the worse for you; for the rule here is that -nothing buys nothing" (_on n'a rien pour rien_). In this plight, says -Nougaret, the prisoner was obliged to sell some poor personal effect in -order to obtain the strictest necessaries of life. "A citizen who -occupied, in the month of Floréal, cell number 10 in the corridor of the -second story, sacrificed for twenty-five francs a gold ring worth about -£20, to procure for himself those same necessities." The rations at this -date consisted of "a pound and a half of bad bread and a plate of flinty -beans [_haricots très-durs_], larded with stale grease or tallow." -Prisoners who could afford it paid an exorbitant price for a few -supplementary dishes. Later, the diet was rather more generous. - -Although communication between the prisoners was forbidden, they had -invented a sort of club; perhaps the most singular in the annals of -clubdom. The "meetings" were at eight in the evening, but no member left -his cell. Despite the thickness of the doors, it was found that, by -raising his voice, a prisoner could be heard from one end of the -corridor to the other; and by this means the members of the club -exchanged such news as they had gleaned during the day from the warders -on duty. In order that no one might be betrayed or compromised (in the -event of the conversation being overheard by the gendarmes posted under -the windows), instead of saying "I heard such-and-such a thing to-day," -the formula was, "I dreamt last night." - -[Illustration: A TURNKEY.] - -When a candidate presented himself (that is to say, when a new prisoner -arrived), the president inquired, in behalf of the club, his name, -quality, residence, and the reason of his imprisonment; and if the -answers were satisfactory he was proclaimed a member of the society in -these terms: "Citizen, the patriots imprisoned in this corridor deem you -worthy to be their brother and friend. Permit me to send you the -_accolade fraternelle_!" - -Two circumstances excluded from membership of the club,—to have borne -false witness at Fouquier-Tinville's bar, and to have been concerned in -the fabrication of false _assignats_. The club held its "meetings" -regularly, until the date at which the prisoners were allowed to -exercise together in the corridors. - -We saw Madame Roland, "brave, fair Roland," at the men's wicket of -Sainte-Pélagie, passionately exhorting them; and Comtesse Dubarry -answering her summons to the guillotine by a swoon. - -Another woman, not famous yet, but destined to fame, was on the women's -side of Sainte-Pélagie in 1793: Joséphine de Beauharnais, who was to -stand one day with Napoleon on the throne. A tradition of the prison -affirmed that Joséphine left her initials carved or traced on a wall of -her cell. - - ------- - -The Terror seems almost to have emptied Sainte-Pélagie, and it is not -until the days of the Empire that we find its cells once more in the -occupation of political prisoners. Prisoners of that quality were not -lacking there in Buonaparte's despotic era; but (and this may have been -of design) the registers were not too well kept, and prisoners' names -and the motives of their imprisonment are hard to arrive at. Had we the -lists in full, however, they would excite small interest at this day. -Between 1811 and March, 1814, when the records were more precise, two -hundred and thirty-four persons were confined in this prison for causes -more or less political. In April, 1814, we have the Russian Emperor -giving their freedom to some seventy of the prisoners of Napoleon. The -Restoration sends the officers of the old Imperial Guard to -Sainte-Pélagie. The record of the Hundred Days, so far as this prison is -concerned, is a clean one; but Charles X. continues the use of -Sainte-Pélagie as a prison of State, and Béranger, Cauchois-Lemaire, -Colonel Duvergier, Bonnaire, Dubois, Achille Roche, and Barthélemy are -amongst the names on the gaoler's books. The Constitutional Monarchy -from 1830 to 1848, the Republic succeeding it, and the reign of Napoleon -III. (who swept into it five hundred citizens in the space of a few -days) kept alive the political tradition of Sainte-Pélagie. M. -Rochefort, who had his turn there from 1869-1870, was one of the last of -Napoleon III.'s prisoners, to whom the revolution of the 4th of -September gave back their liberty. From that date, the "political -boarders" of Sainte-Pélagie were few, the governments of MM. Thiers and -De Broglie preferring rather to suppress newspapers than to pursue their -editors. - -Under the Empire and the Restoration the organisation and administration -of Sainte-Pélagie evidently left much to be desired. It was not rare, -says one chronicler, for accused persons to remain six or seven months -without being interrogated. - -A certain M. Poulain d'Angers lay there a quarter of a year quite -ignorant as to the cause of his arrest. Another accused, a certain M. -Guillon, who had been attached to the Emperor's Council, weary of the -perpetual shufflings of the police of the succeeding reign, constituted -himself a prisoner _de facto_ without having received judgment; and -remained six months a captive, although there was no entry against his -name: one morning, they showed him the door, _malgré lui_. An adventure -which befell this gentleman attests sufficiently the disorder which -reigned in the prison service. - -Being to some extent indisposed, the doctor had given M. Guillon an -order for the baths. Not knowing in what part of the prison the -infirmary was situated, he presented his order to a tipsy turnkey, who -promptly opened the door which gave on the Rue du Puits-de-l'Ermite. M. -Guillon, a free man without being aware of it, took the narrow street to -be a sentry's walk, and went a few paces without finding any one to -direct him. Returning to the sentry at the door, he inquired where were -the baths. "What baths?" said the sentinel.—"The prison baths." "The -prison baths," said the sentinel, "are probably in the prison; but you -can't get in there."—"What? I can't get into the prison! Am I outside -it, then?"—"Why, yes; you're in the street; you ought to know that, I -should think." "I did not know it, I assure you," said M. Guillon; "and -this won't suit me at all." He rang the prison bell, and was readmitted; -and the recital of his adventure restored to sobriety the turnkey who -had given him his freedom. - -It was related that under the Directory a criminal condemned to -transportation managed to conceal himself in Sainte-Pélagie, persuaded -that there at all events he was safe, nor were his hopes deceived. - - ------- - -It appears to have been after the Revolution of 1830—that brief week of -July which "paragons description"—that some kind of method was attained -or attempted in the management of Sainte-Pélagie. A new wing had been -built, which was reserved for the politicals,—but the builder had -reckoned without his guests, and without the King's Attorney. It was -considered that thirty-six beds in ten chambers, to say nothing of a -small spare dormitory, would be accommodation enough for prisoners of -this class. At the same epoch, a droll idea took possession of the -administration. It was, that if the _gamins_ and 'prentice-thieves raked -into the police-courts were mixed pell-mell with the political -prisoners, the former might get a polish on their morals, and the latter -an agreeable distraction! As a scheme of reform for the artful dodger it -was perhaps elementary, but it shewed at least a kindly anxiety on the -part of the administration to prepare diversions for political -offenders. Alas! it was a dream; for there were presently so many -political delinquents to be accommodated, that the question was no -longer how to distract their captivity, but how to lodge the new-comers. -The artful dodger was exiled. - -More buildings were called for, and another court; and the -political wing of Sainte-Pélagie became a colony by itself. A -colonist of the early thirties bestowed on it the following -appreciation:—"Sainte-Pélagie is death by wasting (_le supplice par la -langueur_), torture by ennui, homicide by process of decline. It is a -sort of pneumatic machine applied to the brain, which saps and exhausts -it by inches. It is not an active irritation, and it is nothing -resembling repose. It is not Paris, and it is not a desert solitude. It -is a _mélange_ of everything: air, a modicum; elbow-room, rather less; -friends, one or two; bores, any number. It is a prison with a mirage of -the world; a world not made for a prison. It is not severe, and it is -infinitely wearisome. It is a kind of civilised police; it is a -prodigious and perpetual paradox.... Sainte-Pélagie is insupportable!" - -Here is another appreciation of about the same date:—"Sainte-Pélagie is -a hurly-burly (_pêle-mêle_) of all imaginable ideas and opinions; a -species of political Pandemonium. The _Caricature_ runs foul of the -_Quotidienne_, the _Courrier de l'Europe_ elbows the _Revolution_, the -_Gazette_ pirouettes between the _Tribune_ and the _Courrier -Français_.... All colours and all races, all ages and all tongues are -confounded. It is a Babel; it is a common camp in which friends and foes -are flung together after a general rout. As a huge anomaly it is curious -to see, but it has the depressing effect of a monster!" - -Let us turn to the debtors' side. Dulaure quotes in this connection a -description given by De la Borde in his _Memoirs_, which is worth -translating: - -"The debtors' wing of Sainte-Pélagie, which is intended to accommodate a -hundred, has one hundred and twenty and sometimes one hundred and fifty -tenants. The building is in three stories, each story consisting of one -narrow corridor, the rooms in which receive no light except from -loopholes beneath the roof. There are no fire-places in the rooms, some -of which are cruelly cold, whilst in others the heat is unbearable. With -proper space for three persons at the most, they are generally made to -hold from five to six; and the dirt everywhere is revolting. The -wretched occupants can only take exercise in a corridor four feet wide, -and a courtyard thirty feet square. For years they have asked in vain -for some contrivance which would give them a proper current of air; -there is not a decent ventilator in the place. In winter they are locked -in from eight P.M. until seven A.M.; and, whatever his necessities, not -one of the five or six cell-mates can possibly quit his cell between -those hours. The dirtiest and worst-kept part of the whole prison is the -infirmary. Two or three patients are put into one bed,—an excellent -means of spreading the itch, and other maladies." - -The reproach of this unseemly state M. de la Borde laid upon the chiefs -of the prison service for their indifference, and the subordinates for -their wholesale negligence. - - ------- - -To obtain leave to visit a friend on the debtors' side, you climbed the -dingy staircase of the Préfecture de Police, to the office marked -_Bureau des Prisons_, where orders were issued for the principal gaols; -and you took your place in the waiting-room amongst a very motley crowd -whose relatives or acquaintances had been "put away" for murder, arson, -forgery, house-breaking, or a simple difficulty with a creditor. - -Furnished with the necessary passport, a literary Frenchman made the -pilgrimage to Sainte-Pélagie seventy years ago, and wrote a most -interesting account of his visit. The authors of _Les Prisons de Paris_ -transferred it to their entertaining pages, and I cannot do better than -translate from them. It chanced to be pay-day in the prison, that is to -say, the day on which the debtors received the stingy pittance which -their creditors were compelled to pay them once a month,—an excellent -opportunity of observing the stranded victims of the most nonsensical -law in the universe. To clap into prison a man who could not satisfy his -creditors, and thereby to encourage the indolent debtor in his indolence -and to dry up for the industrious debtor all possible sources of -industry, was perhaps, in this country as in France, the summit of folly -ever attained by legal enactment. - - "I found myself in a world of which those who have described it only - from the other side of the wall have given us an entirely false - notion. Where were all the gaieties which the novelists and the - rhymesters have depicted for us? Where were the bevies of fair women - who, as we have been assured, flock here by day to scatter the cares - of the forlorn imprisoned debtor? I strained my ear in vain for any - note of those bacchic concert-parties and mad festivities (_ces - bruyants éclats de l'orgie_) which are to be met with in the novels. - I threw a glance into the courtyard, and calculated the amount of - space which each man could claim in the only spot in the whole - prison where there is any circulation of air; I came to the - conclusion that, when the prisoners were assembled here of an - evening, after their friends had left, each might possess for - himself a fraction of a fraction of a square yard of mother earth." - -The debtors trooped down to the office to finger their doles. - - "I watched a procession of artisans and labourers, whose speech and - costume contrasted oddly with the title of 'merchants' - (_négociants_), under which their creditors had filched them from - the workshops and yards to which they belonged; next, some - physiognomies of men of the world, some representatives of the - middle classes, and a crowd of young bloods (_étourneaux_). - - "One of the first comers was an officer, decorated and seamed with - wounds, who had been four times in Sainte-Pélagie to purge the same - debt. After five months' captivity he came to an arrangement with - his creditor, to whom he owed a couple of thousand francs, agreeing - to pay him in ninety days five hundred more. He was let out, failed - to redeem the debt, and returned to take up his old quarters in - Sainte-Pélagie. At the end of a year, he acknowledged a debt of - three thousand francs to the same creditor, and obtained six months' - grace. He paid a thousand on account, could not furnish a penny - more, and went back to prison for the third time. Thus, after nearly - three years in prison, the captain owes one-third more than he did - on first coming in, and has paid a thousand francs to boot,—to - encourage his creditor. - - "The old fellow who followed him was a monument of the speculative - spirit of a certain class of creditors. He was half-blind, and had - lost his left arm; his whole debt amounted to £20. Eight days before - the King's birthday his creditor cast him into Sainte-Pélagie, in - the hope that one of the civil-list bonuses would fall to the old - man. Unhappily, the hope was not realised, and the creditor is now - looking forward to next year's list. - - "Amongst the swarm of debtors, I recognised my old water-carrier, - who needed little coaxing to tell me the story of his imprisonment. - - "Léonard was a native of Auvergne. After hawking water in buckets - for several years, his ambition rose to a water-cart; and behold him - now with his sphere of operations extended from the Rue du - Faubourg-Poissonnière to the Marais. Unluckily for Léonard the - water-cart was not yet his own property, and he began to fall into - arrears with his monthly payments. When the arrears had become what - the bailiffs call an 'exploitable' sum, Léonard was haled to the - bar. Here he suddenly ceased to be a water-carrier; they promoted - him to the rank of 'merchant,' and under that style and dignity they - condemned poor Léonard for debt. In this strait Léonard thought, - "Why not become bankrupt at once?" but when he went to deposit his - balance-sheet they told him he was not a 'merchant' at all, but a - mere water-carrier. Fifteen days later, Léonard had joined the ranks - of the impecunious in Sainte-Pélagie. - - "His next idea was to lodge an appeal, and his brother was willing - to bear the costs; but Léonard's debt was a bagatelle of £12, and - the lawyer whom he consulted said that the blessings of appeal were - reserved for persons owing £20 and upwards. The code of the Osages, - if they have one, probably does not contain such exquisite burlesque - as this. - - "I asked Léonard what had become of his wife. 'Oh,' he said, 'poor - Jeanne has gone back to Auvergne; otherwise they'd have had her too, - for they made Jeanne a "merchant" also' (_elle était aussi - négociante_). - - "I gave Léonard a trifle, and he went off to drink it. It is the - commonest recreation, when it can be indulged; and the majority of - the debtors, when their day of liberation comes, return to their - homes with the two incurable habits of idleness and liquor." - -Another who came to touch his allowance was a tradesman whose clerk had -robbed him of one thousand crowns. "The tradesman being unable in -consequence to meet his engagements is condemned to spend five years in -Sainte-Pélagie, and from the grating of his cell he can see in the penal -wing the scoundrelly clerk, who gets off with six months' imprisonment!" - -Another comes - - "tripping cheerfully through the crowd; he is receiving his last - payment; in a few days he will be a free man. An anonymous letter - has loosed his bonds with the happy tidings that his creditor has - been dead a year, and that a speculative bailiff has been prolonging - his captivity on the chance of the debt being paid into his own - pocket." - -To this victim of a negligent law succeeded two who had made the law -their dupe. One was an officer who had had himself arrested for debt to -escape joining an expedition to Morea. The other was a tradesman "who -was nobody's prisoner but his own, and who had arranged with a friend to -deposit the monthly allowance for food. He was speculating on the -article of the code which gave a general exemption from arrest for debt -to all who had passed five consecutive years in the gaol." - -A new-comer, "with his face all slashed," was - - "recounting the details of the siege he had sustained in his house - against the bailiff's men. He had wanted to give himself up without - fuss, but was told when he presented himself at the office that a - person condemned for debt must be forcibly arrested (_doit être - appréhendé au corps avec brutalité_), and pitched into a cab under - the eyes of all the loungers on the foot-way,—who no doubt often - imagine that they are assisting at the capture of some eminent - criminal. This enterprise on the part of the bailiff and his men is - charged to the unfortunate debtor, and the field of battle is as - often as not some public thoroughfare." - -But by far the most interesting and sympathetic personality on the -debtor's side of Sainte-Pélagie at this date was the American Colonel -Swan. The nature and amount of the colonel's debt are not set out, but -the interest seems to have been the main cause of offence, and he had -made it a matter of conscience to refuse payment. - - "The French law had ordered his temporary arrest, and, twenty years - after his incarceration, he was still 'temporarily' in confinement. - Compatriot and friend of Washington, Colonel Swan had fought in the - War of Independence with Lafayette, and the grand old French - republican often bent his white head beneath the wicket of the gaol, - on a visit to his brother-in-arms." - -His own private means, the aid of wealthier friends, or even a -successful project of escape, might have restored him to the free world; -but so greatly had he used himself to his captivity, that no thought of -liberty seems ever to have crossed his mind. - - "It was not altogether without emotion that one saw this comely - veteran—whose features were almost a copy of Benjamin - Franklin's—pacing the narrow and sombre passages of the prison, - drawing a breath of air at the loop-hole above the little garden. - His long robe of swanskin or white dimity announced his coming, and - it was both curious and touching to see how the groups of prisoners - made way for him in the corridors, and how some hastened to carry - into their cells the little stoves on which they did their cooking, - lest the fumes of the charcoal should offend him." - -This respect and love of the whole prison the old colonel had justly -won; not a day of his long confinement there but he had marked by some -service of kindness, for the most part mysterious and anonymous. No -hungry debtor went in vain to the door of the colonel's little cell; and -often, seeking a supper, the petitioner went away with the full price of -his liberty. - -There were two classes in the debtors' wing; those with certain -resources of their own to supplement the miserable allowance of their -creditors, and those who were dependent for their daily rations on the -handful of centimes allowed them by law. - -These last used to hire their services to the others for a gratuity, and -were among the regular suitors of Colonel Swan's inexhaustible bounty. -They were known in the prison as "cotton-caps" (_bonnets de coton_). One -of these, hearing that the American had lost his "cotton-cap," went to -beg the place. The colonel knew all about the man, a poor devil with a -large family, stranded there for a few hundred francs. He asked a salary -of six francs a month. - -"That will suit me very well," said the colonel; and, opening a little -chest, "here is five years' pay in advance." It was the amount precisely -of the man's debt,—and a fair instance of the colonel's benefactions. - -Towards the year 1829, prisoners taking their airing in the garden saw -an old man strolling an hour or two in the day on the high terrace or -gallery at the top of the prison. It was Colonel Swan, for whom, in -failing health, the doctor had demanded that privilege. He had accepted -it gratefully, but—as if admonished from within—he said to the doctor: -"My proper air is the air of the prison; this breath of liberty will -kill me." - -A few months later, the cannon of the 27th of July was belching in the -streets of Paris. On the 28th, the doors of the "commercial Bastille" -were thrown open, and the prisoners went out. - -Colonel Swan, who went out with them, died on the 29th. - - ------- - -There were a few clever escapes, _evasions_ as the French call them, -from Sainte-Pélagie. What was known as the _procès d'Avril_, 1835, -resulted in the condemnation of Guinard, Imbert, Cavaignac, Marrast, and -others, who were lodged in the political wing. Forty of them joined in a -scheme of evasion, and a subterranean passage was dug from the -north-east angle of the prison into the garden of No. 9, Rue Copeau. The -tunnel, nearly twenty yards in length, was completed on the 12th of -July, and of the forty prisoners twenty-eight made good their escape -from Sainte-Pélagie the "insupportable." - -The excitement of a well-conducted escape is contagious, and in -September of the same year the Comte de Richmond, who gave himself out -as the son of Louis XVI., with his two friends in durance, Duclerc and -Rossignol, broke prison ingeniously enough. By bribery or some other -means, Richmond procured a pass-key which gave admission to the -sentry-walk; and, head erect and a file of papers under his arm, he -walked boldly out, followed by Rossignol and Duclerc. To the sentinel -who challenged them, the Count with perfect _sang-froid_ introduced -himself as the director of the prison; "and these gentlemen," he added, -"whom you ought to know, are my chief clerk, and my architect." The -sentry saluted and let them pass, and M. de Richmond and his friends -opened the door and walked out. - -In 1865, an Englishman named Jackson, condemned to five years' hard -labour, managed to get himself transferred to Sainte-Pélagie. On a wet -wild night in the last week of January, he squeezed out of his cell, -crawled over the roof to a convenient wall, and by the aid of a cord and -grappling iron let himself down into the street. The night was pitchy -black, rain was falling in torrents, the sentry was in his box, and -Jackson footed it leisurely home. - -Better than these, however, was the escape of Colonel Duvergier, one of -the State prisoners of Charles X. Colonel Duvergier had been condemned -to five years' "reclusion" for no apparent reason except that he was one -of the most distinguished soldiers of his day. The story of his escape -is one of the happiest in the romantic annals of prison-breaking, but -the credit of the affair rests principally with a young littérateur, a -certain Eugène de P——. - -Colonel Duvergier was on the political, and Eugène de P—— on the -debtors' side of Sainte-Pélagie, but they had succeeded in establishing -a correspondence by letter; and Eugène, not over-eager for his own -liberty, seems to have taken upon himself to procure the colonel's. With -Colonel Duvergier was one Captain Laverderie, and the colonel refused to -go out unless the captain could share his escape. Eugène de P—— said the -captain should go also, and the plot went forward. - -The first step was to get the colonel and his friend from the political -to the debtors' side of the prison, and this was contrived at the -exercise hour. When the political prisoners were being marched in, to -give place to the debtors—there being but one exercise yard for the two -classes—Duvergier and Laverderie escaped the warder's eye, and hid in -the garden, until the debtors came out for their constitutional. -Nowadays, the warder would have counted his flock, both on coming out -and on going in; but the colonel and the captain seem to have had no -difficulty, either in attaching themselves to the debtors or in taking -refuge, after the exercise hour, in the cell of a debtor who was a party -to the scheme. - -So far, however, the fugitives had succeeded only in changing their -quarters in the prison; and the next step was to procure for them two -visitors' passes. These passes, deposited with the gate-warder when -visitors entered, were returned to them as they left the prison. How to -place in the warder's hands passes bearing the names of two "visitors" -who had not entered the prison? The adroit Eugène thought it not too -difficult. - -He had a friendly warder at the gate who was much interested in some -sketches which Eugène was making in the prison, and went down to him one -day with his portfolio in his hand. "A few fresh sketches you might like -to look at." While the Argus of the gate was amusing himself with -Eugène's drawings, Eugène himself feigned astonishment at the number of -visitors to the prison, as evidenced by the quantity of passes lying -loose on the table. He expressed no less surprise that the warder should -have so little care of them; why not keep the passes in a handy case, -such, for example, as Eugène used for his drawings? - -The warder thought he would ask the governor for one. "You needn't -trouble the governor," said Eugène; "take mine. Look, what could be -better!" and in filling the portfolio with the visitors' passes, he -slipped in two others. - -At that psychological instant, Duvergier and Laverderie presented -themselves at the gate. - -"Your names, messieurs?" and they gave the names which were entered on -Eugène's passes. - -The passes were turned up, the warder handed them over, and—still -thanking Eugène for his present—bowed the fugitives out of the prison. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER VIII. - - THE ABBAYE. - - -It was the monks, as tradition wills it, who hollowed out the cruel -cells of the Abbaye de Saint-Germain-des-Près. The architect Gomard, -insisting that cells were not included in the bond, withdrew when he had -put his last touches to the cloisters. But in 1630, or thereabouts, no -monastery was complete without its _oubliettes_, and the prior commanded -his brethren to finish the work of the too-scrupulous Gomard. Thus was -the Abbaye equipped as an abbaye should be. - -What power indeed, spiritual or temporal, had not the privilege in those -days of setting up its pillory, its gallows, its pile of faggots built -around a stake! In Paris alone at this date some twenty separate -jurisdictions possessed the right to fatten victims for the scaffold, -and it might almost be said that the municipal divisions of the capital -had gibbets for their boundaries. - -In 1674, however, the situation changed somewhat. The authority of the -Châtelet was enlarged by royal edict, which gathered to it the rights -and privileges of all the lesser corporations, and confiscated the -halters and the faggots of private justice. This was a general blow, -which none took more to heart than the prior of the Abbaye of -Saint-Germain-of-the-Meadows. He had enjoyed the rights of "high," -"middle," and "low" justice; he had imprisoned, tortured, and despatched -at his holy pleasure. Forthwith, he composed and addressed to Louis XIV. -_un mémoire éloquent_, which touched that pious heart. The Royal will -consented to restore to the prior a considerable portion of his ancient -jurisdiction. Within the extensive bounds of the monastery and its -appanages, the holy father might still consider himself gaoler, -tormentor, and executioner. - -But his prison was now large beyond his pious needs, and little by -little the Abbaye took a more secular character. The cells which the -restricted powers of the prior could no longer charge to the full, were -set apart for young noblemen and others whose parents or guardians had -an interest in narrowing their borders. It was an age when parents and -guardians had an almost unlimited authority over sons, daughters, and -wards; and when fathers and uncles seldom thought twice about applying -for a _lettre de cachet_. Sometimes young rakes were put into temporary -seclusion for quite satisfactory reasons; but very often the legal -powers of parents and guardians were used with abominable cruelty; and -young men were imprisoned for years, suffering the treatment of -criminals, merely to gratify the rancour of a near relative; or were -even, where there was a fortune in question, confined expressly with the -design that they should be secretly got rid of. A father could or did -authorise a gaoler to treat his innocent son with a rigour that goes -almost beyond belief; to forbid him to petition anyone for release; to -keep him in solitary confinement; to feed him on the most meagre -rations. The nephew of a General Wurmser, who had designs upon the young -man's fortune, had him imprisoned in the Abbaye on some vague charge of -dissipation. The young man was only twenty years of age, but he entered -the Abbaye with the fixed conviction that his uncle did not intend ever -to release him, and this conviction was confirmed by the hint conveyed -to him by a turnkey, that he was to be sent to the fortress of -Pierre-Encise, or Ham. Within a week, he had committed suicide in his -cell. - -Occasionally, young bloods of the period did penance in the Abbaye for -practical jokes of a rather questionable morality. A certain D——, a -spend-thrift of the first rank (who, however, rose afterwards to great -honour in the army), was at the last pinch to settle his gaming debts. -An uncle from whom he expected a goodly legacy lay sick unto death in -his Hôtel, and D—— gave out that the patient desired the attendance of a -notary. The notary arrived, and the uncle dictated a will entirely in -his nephew's favour. This being published, loans were forthcoming. But -the sequel was less satisfactory; for D—— presently found himself a -prisoner in the Abbaye, and his friend, the Chevalier de C——, in a cell -of the Bastille; the former for having personated a moribund uncle, and -the latter for having aided and abetted him in the swindle. - -When Howard was making his memorable progress through the "Lazzarettos -of Europe," the Abbaye was amongst the prisons which he visited. He -notes that there were "five little cells in which as many as fifty men -were sometimes massed together." The Abbaye had undergone yet another -transformation, and was now the principal military prison of Paris. It -was reserved chiefly for the soldiers, both officers and privates, of -the _Gardes Françaises_; but delinquents of other regiments were sent -there also; and a turbulent place the Abbaye seems to have been in the -days before the Revolution. For, up to '89, the French army recruited -itself as best it could, and principally from amongst the masses of the -unemployed and the vagabond classes. They were bought by recruiting -sergeants, or swept into the ranks by the press-gangs, and it may be -supposed that the stuff out of which the rank-and-file was manufactured -was sometimes of the rottenest. Moreover, there was little spirit -amongst the officers to induce them to train up into good fighting-men -and self-respecting citizens the peasants, beggars, and outcasts of whom -they found themselves in command. The swaggering, aristocrat captain, -lording it over the colonel, who was perhaps a mere soldier of fortune, -scorned the men beneath him. His military rank, added to the colossal -difference in social rank between the nobility and the people, gave him -a double sense of superiority; there was no _esprit de corps_, no -feeling of comradeship in arms; but, on the one side, a perpetual and -galling assertion of authority, and, on the other, a continuous struggle -to secure some amount of recognition and freedom. - -Insubordinate soldiers were continually being thrust into the Abbaye, -and there were strange scenes within those walls. - -In the year 1784, say the authors of _Les Prisons de l'Europe_, two -military prisoners were finishing their scanty meal. - -"Our last day together, Desforges," said one. "You go to château -Trompette, I to Valenciennes. "We're in for twenty years of it!" - -"Yes, and for what, Dessaignes?" said the other. "For a quarrel with a -clod of an officer risen from the ranks. Twenty years!" - -"My dear Desforges," said the young aristocrat. "It is not a cheerful -prospect.—Warm here, isn't it? Trees in leaf, and flowers smelling -sweet—out there. Out there, where liberty lies, Desforges. Come, shall -we be free?" - -"Free! There are four bolts to the door, and another door at the end of -the corridor." - -"Who talks of forcing bolts?" said Dessaignes. "At what hour do they -exercise us?" - -"At six, as usual, I suppose." - -"Yes; and once in the courtyard there is but one door to open." - -"True; but the means of opening it?" - -Dessaignes whipped up his mattrass, and displayed a pair of cavalry -pistols (_pistolets d'arcon_) and a long dagger. - -"Where—" began his friend. - -"The barrister who came to see me yesterday conveyed the arsenal under -his robe. Now, are these the keys to open a cage like ours?" - -"None better! But I make one condition," said Desforges,—"that we are -not to kill anyone." - -"There will be no necessity. We shall go down armed to the courtyard; -one of us will entice the concierge near the door, and the other will -cover him with a pistol. A little determination is all we shall need." - -Six o'clock struck, and the gaoler came to conduct the prisoners to the -courtyard. They descended with their weapons in their pockets, and once -in the yard Dessaignes was for losing not a moment. Their guard was the -only attendant within sight, and as Desforges held him in talk, -Dessaignes suddenly stepped behind and seized him by his coat-collar. -The startled gaoler prepared to summon help, but before he could get out -a word Dessaignes clapped a pistol to his forehead. - -"Speak but one syllable," said he in a whisper, "and you will never -utter another. Come, your keys!" - -"Never!" replied the gaoler. - -"Your soul to God, then, for your hour has come!" - -The gaoler felt the muzzle at his forehead, and saw the glitter in the -eyes of his captor. He hesitated. - -"A second more, and I fire. Reflect!" said Dessaignes, quietly. - -The gaoler's hand was already moving towards his keys when, all at once, -his collar burst in the grip of Dessaignes, and he fell backwards. At -the same instant, and by accident, Dessaignes' pistol exploded. The -crack brought a dozen warders on the scene. - -"Quick!" cried Dessaignes to his fellow-prisoner; "up-stairs again!" - -They gained their cell, Dessaignes shut and bolted the door, and -together they barricaded it with all the furniture they could lay hands -on. - -"How much powder have we?" asked Desforges, under his breath. - -"About four charges, but we shall not need it," replied Dessaignes. -"Wait; I'll give them their answer." - -The warders hammered vainly at the door. - -"Gentlemen," called Dessaignes, "we may be induced to capitulate, but we -shall not yield to force. You had better desist. We have powder enough -here to blow the Abbaye to the gate of heaven." - -A murmur of alarm arose on the other side of the door, and silence -followed. - -"You see!" observed Dessaignes, "these pious chaps will not mount -unprepared into the presence of their Maker!" - -The posse of warders was, in fact, withdrawn. - -"But what shall we do next?" asked Desforges. - -"For the present," said Dessaignes, "we shall wait. They will be wanting -to make terms with us." - -But the night passed, and no offer of capitulation was received. Two -other things lacking were, supper in the evening and breakfast in the -morning. The enemy had apparently changed their tactics; the blockade of -the prisoners was complete, and so was the famine. The day wore on, and -night came again; but not the paltriest offer of terms, nor a bowl of -thin soup. The next day broke with a prospect as barren. - -Towards noon a deputation was heard approaching. - -"If you don't give us something to eat," cried Dessaignes, "sooner than -die of hunger we will blow up the prison." - -"To the gate of heaven. You have already said so," replied the voice of -the governor. - -"Then you mean to sacrifice all the innocent persons in the place?" - -"Not at all! We have made our dispositions. The other prisoners have -been removed. You two can ascend heavenwards as soon as you please." - -Dessaignes glanced at his friend, and the expressions on both faces must -have been interesting. - -"To be candid," said Desforges, "my stomach sounds a parley." - -"My own offers the same advice," said Dessaignes. - -"Let us follow it," said Desforges. - -"Gentlemen," called Dessaignes through the key-hole, "the war is over. -Some bread, if you please, a bottle of wine, and a plate of meat. Those -are our simple conditions of capitulation." - -Agreed to; and the door was opened. A legal gentleman came from the King -to hold an enquiry; but as Dessaignes' pistol had done no harm to -anyone, and as the two prisoners had conducted their little campaign in -a modest and inoffensive manner, no addition was made to their -sentence,—which indeed was the equivalent of a "life" sentence at the -present day. They were transferred to the Conciergerie, where their -bonds were not too tight; their families kept them in money, and they -received and dined their friends. - -Desforges, the younger of the pair, seemed willing to accept his fate; -but Dessaignes, whose blood was always tingling, ached for liberty. He -watched his visitors out of the prison with hungry eyes. After all, the -least cruel of prisons is a cage, and the wings will beat against the -bars. Who knows what freedom means but the man who hears his lock turned -nightly by some other man's hand? - -One night, the two young prisoners had been allowed (an affair of a -bribe) to give a dinner to some friends. The looseness of the rules -permitted the presence also of the principal warders, whom the hosts -took care to fill with wine. The table was surrounded by men in the -sleep of liquor, and Dessaignes and Desforges slipped out, and presented -themselves at the inner door of the prison. It was past midnight, and -the turnkey was asleep in his chair. Dessaignes took a key from his belt -at a venture, and tried the lock. It creaked, and the turnkey awoke. -Dessaignes turned and stabbed him, and he slept in death. The first door -was passed. - -At the second door the turnkey was awake. So much the worse for him. -Dessaignes' dagger was out and in again, and the turnkey dropped. -Another key, another lock; the second door was passed. - -At the third and outer door, the warder stood beyond the grille, safe, -and shouted the alarm. The prisoners turned to retreat, but the third -warder's cry had summoned another, who, quick to see the situation, -slammed the first door to; and between the first door and the third -Dessaignes and Desforges were trapped. - -One warder murdered outright, a second on the point of death,—the fate -of the assassin and his comrade could not be long in doubt. A prisoner -gave evidence that he had been bribed to drug the first gate-warder; and -both Dessaignes and Desforges were sentenced to be "broken alive." The -decree was passed on the 1st of October, 1784, signed by Louis XVI., at -the express request of two of his ministers, and carried out publicly in -every terrible detail. - -But darker scenes than this are preparing at the Abbaye. It was here -that the Revolution may be said to have begun, and here that some of its -worst crimes were perpetrated. - -[Illustration: A STREET SCENE DURING THE MASSACRES.] - -In June of 1789, there lay in the Abbaye certain soldiers of the _Gardes -Françaises_, charged with refusing to obey their orders, out of sympathy -with the National Assembly. Their situation in the prison became known, -and a clamour arose for their release. "À l'Abbaye! à l'Abbaye!" was the -cry; two hundred men set out from the Palais-Royal, and four thousand -arrived at the prison gates. Every door of defence was staved in, and in -less than an hour from the commencement of the attack, the democratic -_Gardes_ were released, and borne in triumph through Paris. This was one -of the first demonstrations of the popular will. How quickly that will -felt and appreciated its strength, and in what abandonment of cruel -passion it was to find expression, most readers have learned. There is -nothing in the annals of the world to be compared with the series of -events in the Paris prisons in '92, to which history has given the name -of the September Massacres. In that deliberate slaughter, over one -thousand men and women perished, hewn in pieces in the prisons or at the -prison doors. The revolutionary committees had packed the gaols with -"suspected" persons, mostly innocent of anything that could be laid to -their charge; and there they awaited such death as might be decreed for -them: salvation was all but hopeless. There was talk at first of burning -them _en masse_ in the prisons; then of thrusting all the prisoners into -the subterranean cells, and drowning them slowly by pouring or pumping -water on them. Assassination pure and simple seems to have been resolved -upon "as a measure of indulgence." A mock form of trial was held at all -the prisons, that the butcheries might be given an appearance of -legality. - -On Sunday, the 2d of September, '92, the barriers of the city were -closed, and early in the afternoon the tocsin clanging from every -steeple in Paris called up the butchers to their work. Some thirty -priests were faring in five hackney carriages to the Abbaye prison, and -with them the slaughter was begun. One coach reached the prison with a -load of corpses; the occupants of the other four—Abbé Sicard -excepted—were killed as they alighted. Prisoners in the Abbaye watched -the carnage from behind their bars, and said: "It will be our turn -next." - -To one of these prisoners, Journiac Saint-Méard, one time captain in the -King's light infantry, we shall for the present attach ourselves. His -_Agony of Thirty-eight Hours_ (_Mon agonie de trente-huit heures_), much -read at the beginning of the century, is amongst the best of the -contemporary records, and from that I shall translate at some length. - -This slow deliberate killing of the priests was done, he says, amid a -silence inexpressibly horrible; and as each fell, a savage murmur went -up, and a single shout of _Vive la nation_! Women were there encouraging -the men, and fetching jugs of wine for them. Someone in the crowd -pointed to the windows of the prison and said: "There are plenty of -conspirators behind there; and not a single one must escape!" - -Towards seven in the evening, two men with sabres, their hands steeped -in blood, entered the prison, and began to carry out the prisoners for -slaughter. - - "The unfortunate Reding lay sick on his bed, and begged to be killed - there. One of the men hesitated, but his companion said, '_Allons - donc!_' and he slung him across his shoulder to carry him out, and - he was killed in the street." - - "We looked at one another in silence, but presently the cries of - fresh victims renewed our agitation, and we recalled the words of M. - Chantereine as he plunged a knife into his heart: 'We are all - destined to be massacred.'" - - "At midnight, ten men armed with sabres, and preceded by two - turnkeys with torches, came into our dungeon, and ordered us to - range ourselves along the foot of our beds. They counted us, and - told us that we were responsible for one another, swearing that if - one of us escaped, the rest should be massacred, without being heard - by the President. The last words gave us a little hope, for until - then we had had no idea that we might be heard before being killed." - - "At two o'clock on Monday morning, we heard them breaking in one of - the prison doors, and thought at first that we were about to be - slaughtered in our beds, but were a little reassured when we heard - someone outside say that it was the door of a cell which some - prisoners had tried to barricade. We learned afterwards that all who - were found there had their throats cut." - - "At ten, Abbé Lenfant, confessor of the King, and the Abbé de - Chapt-Rastignac appeared in the pulpit of the chapel which served - for our prison, and informing us that our last hour was approaching, - invited us all to receive their blessing. An indefinable electric - movement sent us all to our knees, and, with clasped hands, we - received it. Those two white-haired old men with hands outstretched - in prayer, death hovering above us, and on every side environing us: - what a situation, what a moment, never to be forgotten!" - -Saint-Méard goes on to say how, during that morning, they discussed -among themselves what was the easiest way in which to receive death. The -slaughter in the streets never stopped, and some of them went from time -to time to the window to observe and make reports. - - "They reported that those certainly suffered the most and were the - longest in dying who tried in any way to protect their heads, - inasmuch as by so doing they warded off the sabre-cuts for a time, - and sometimes lost both hands and arms before their heads were - struck. Those who stood up with their hands behind their backs - seemed to suffer least, and certainly died soonest.... On such - horrible details did we deliberate." - -Towards afternoon, overwhelmed by fatigue and anxiety, Saint-Méard threw -himself on his bed and slept. He awoke after a comforting dream, which -he felt certain was an omen of good fortune. But he and the others were -now consumed by thirst; it was twenty-six hours since they had had -anything to drink. A gaoler fetched them a jug of water, but could tell -them nothing as to their fate. - -The long agony of waiting drew to an end. - - "At eleven at night, several persons armed with swords and pistols - ordered us to place ourselves in single file, and led us out to the - second wicket, next to the place where the trials were being held. I - got as near as I could to one of our guards, and managed little by - little to engage him in conversation." - -This man was an old soldier and a Provençal, and when he found that -Saint-Méard could talk the rude patois of that district—scarcely -intelligible in Paris—he grew quite friendly, fetched him a tumbler of -wine to hearten him, and counselled him as to what he should tell the -judges. The Provençal let him stand where he had a glimpse of the court, -and he saw two prisoners thrust to the bar and condemned almost unheard; -a moment later, their death-cries reached his ears. - -Two hours passed thus; it was one o'clock in the morning, but still the -judges heard, condemned, and sent their victims out to die by sword and -hatchet in the street, where in places the blood was ankle deep, and the -dead lay in piles. - -All at once Saint-Méard heard his name called. "After having suffered an -agony of thirty-seven hours, an agony as of death itself, the door -opened and I was called. Three men laid hold of me, and haled me in." - -By the glare of torches, - - "I saw that dreadful judgment bar, where liberty or death lay for - me. The President, in grey coat, sword at his side, stood leaning - against a table, on which were papers, an ink-stand, pipes, and - bottles. Around the table were ten persons, sitting or standing, two - of whom were in sleeveless jackets and aprons; others were asleep, - stretched on benches. Two men in shirts all smeared with blood kept - the door; an old turnkey had his hand on the bolt.... - - "Here then stood I at this swift and bloody bar, where the best help - was to be without all help, and where no resources of the mind were - of avail that had not truth to rest upon. - - "'Your name, your calling?' said the President, and one of the - judges added: 'The smallest lie undoes you.' - - "'My name,' I answered, 'is Journiac Saint-Méard; I served - twenty-five years as an officer in the army. I stand before you with - the confidence of a man who has nothing to reproach himself with, - and who is therefore not likely to utter falsehoods.' - - "'It will be for us to judge of that,' responded the man in grey." - -The trial proceeded. Saint-Méard was accused of having edited the -anti-revolutionary journal, _De la cour et de la ville_, but showed -satisfactorily that he had not done so. Accused next of recruiting for -the emigrants, at which there was an ominous murmur, "Gentlemen, -gentlemen," pleaded the prisoner, "the word is with me at present, and I -beg the President to maintain it for me,—I never needed it so sorely!" -"That's true enough!" laughed the judges, and the court began to shew -itself more sympathetic. Saint-Méard, though, was not yet off the -gridiron. "You tell us continually," said one impatient judge, "that you -are not this and you are not that! Be good enough then to tell us what -you are."—"I was once frankly a Royalist." Another and louder murmur; -but the President put in: "We are not here to sit in judgment on -opinions, but on their results"; words of precious augury for the -prisoner, who went on to say that he was well aware the old régime was -done with, that there was no longer a Royalist cause, and that never had -he been concerned in plots or Royalist conspiracies, for he had never in -his life been concerned in public affairs of any kind. He was a -Frenchman who loved his country above all things. - -The questioning and cross-questioning came to an end, and the President -removed his hat. "I can find nothing to suspect in Monsieur. What do you -say; shall I release him?" and the voice of the judges was for liberty. -Thus finished, at two o'clock in the morning, the "thirty-eight hours' -agony" of Journiac Saint-Méard. He survived it some twenty years. - -Alas for the hundreds upon hundreds whose agony of yet longer duration -finished under the arch of pikes! - -The escapes were not many. Abbé Sicard, the benevolent founder of the -Deaf-and-Dumb Institute, was set free on the earnest petition in writing -of one of his pupils. Beaumarchais, author of the _Mariage de Figaro_, -evaded the clutches of the judges after a terrible period of suspense in -the Abbaye. The old Marquis de Sombreuil was saved by his daughter. She -clung to his neck, imploring the cut-throats to spare him to her. "Say, -then," said one of them, dipping a cup into the blood at his feet: "Wilt -thou drink _this_?" The brave girl gulped it down; the mob threw up -their weapons with a roar of applause, and opened out a way for both -through their dripping ranks. - -But few fared as these did. President Maillard, of the grey coat, who -was so well satisfied with Saint-Méard, did not release, perhaps, one in -fifty amongst the accused at the Abbaye. He is accused of "carrying -about heads, and cutting up dead bodies." Billaud-Varennes went about -from group to group of the assassins who were massed in parties, -encouraged them in the name of the tribunal, and promised that each man -should be paid a louis for his "labour." - -A contemporary sketch depicts him delivering a speech on "a table of -corpses" against the door of the Abbaye: "Citizens, you are slaughtering -the enemies of France. You are doing your duty." Indiscriminate killing -had been the legal order of the day. There was no question of the -guillotine during the September massacres. Every citizen who could arm -himself was a Samson by privilege of the prison judges; and popular -justice, called "severe justice of the people," made the butcheries of -September a people's fête. It was not so much an act of patriotism to -assist in them as a dereliction of duty to hold aloof. The -"Septemberers" have been condemned as cannibals; but they were common -ratepayers of Paris to whom the government of the day offered money to -kill as many "enemies of the republic" as should be delivered to them. -Most of these "enemies of the republic" were persons to whom the -republic was scarcely known by name, and who asked only to be ignored by -it. They were killed in batches during the September of '92, merely -because they happened to be thrust out at one particular door of their -prison. You came out at this door, and were received with cheers; you -came out at the next door, and were hacked in pieces. Which door it was, -depended upon the vote of the judges; and this, as a rule, was the -determination of a moment. Saint-Méard's trial of an hour was one of the -longest. - -The mere business of killing went forward until numbers had lost their -significance, and the lists of the dead were but approximately reckoned. -They are all set down in black and white, and may still be read—so many -killed "in the heap" (_en masse_), so many "after judgment" (_après -jugement_)—but the figures have never been proved; and one seeks in vain -to reckon the total, after the "three hundred families belonging to the -Faubourg St. Germain," who were "thrown into the Abbaye in a night"; and -the "cartload of young girls, of whom the oldest was not eighteen," and -who, "dressed all in white in the tumbril, looked like a basket of -lilies." After this batch, were guillotined all the nuns of the convent -of Montmartre. - -Then there were the Swiss Guards, "remnants of the 10th of August," to -whom Maillard said; "Gentlemen, you may find mercy outside, but I am -afraid we cannot grant it to you here." The youngest of them, "in a blue -frock-coat," elected to go first. "Since we must die," he said, "let me -show the way"; then, dashing on his hat, he presented himself at the -door where the butchers stood ready to receive him; a double row of -them,—sabre, bayonet, hatchet, or pike in hand. For a moment he looked -at them, quite coolly; then, seeing that all was prepared, he threw -himself between their ranks, and "fell beneath a thousand blows." - -[Illustration: THE GALLANT SWISS.] - -When the killers began to flag, brandy mixed with gunpowder was served -to them. A woman passes, carrying a basket of hot rolls; they beg them -of her, and the bread, before being eaten, is "soaked in the wounds of -the still breathing victims."[19] The brigands of the Abbaye were not -more than from thirty to forty in number. Amongst them, says Nougaret, -"one youth, mounted on a post, distinguished himself by his ferocity in -killing. He said that he had lost his two brothers on the 10th of -August, and meant to avenge them. He boasted of having cut down fifty to -his own weapon. Another brigand prided himself on a total of two -hundred!" - -Footnote 19: - - Nougaret. - -Women looked on, adds the same authority, "sitting in carts on piles of -dead bodies, like washerwomen on dirty linen. Others flung themselves -upon the corpses, and tore them with their teeth, danced round them, and -kicked them. Some of these Furies cut off the ears of the dead, and -pinned them on their bosoms." - -Some ten months after this carnage, tranquil amid the din of the Terror, -lies beautiful Charlotte Corday, in her cell within the Abbaye walls. -Her hour has not yet come; she bides it in perfect peace. By-and-bye she -will go to the Conciergerie, and thence the next morning to the -guillotine. Samson will lift the fair head when he has struck it off, -and smite the cheek with his crimson paw, amid universal plaudits. "I -have found the sweetest rest here these two days," she writes from -prison; "I could not be better off, and my gaolers are the best people -in the world." A memory of her lives as she tripped smiling up the steps -of the scaffold, her hair cropped under a little close-fitting cap, and -wearing, by order of her judges, a hideous red shirt, which descended to -her feet. "She blushed and frowned on the executioner when he plucked -the tippet from her bosom. Two moments after, the knife fell on her." - -After the Revolution, the Abbaye was again a military prison, and its -subterranean dungeons were in existence in 1814. "The principal of -these," wrote one who had inspected it, "is as horrible as any in -Bicêtre; sunk thirty feet below the level of the ground, and so -fashioned that a man of average height could not stand up in it. One -could scarcely remain here, says the doctor himself, more than four and -twenty hours without being in danger of one's life." - -The Abbaye was demolished in 1854. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER IX. - - THE LUXEMBOURG IN '93. - - -This was, above all others, the aristocratic prison of the Revolution. -It was fitly chosen for the reception of that brilliant contingent of -nobles, just ready to fly the country, whom the famous Law of the -Suspects had routed from their hôtels in Paris. To confine them in the -Luxembourg, converting that ancient and renowned palace into a dungeon -of aristocrats, was in itself an apt stroke of vengeance on the part of -the people. Few indeed of the historic dwellings of Paris could have put -them more forcibly in mind of the tyrannies of kings and regents, of the -splendid and licentious fêtes and orgies of princes and princesses of -the blood, the cost of which was wrung from the lean pockets of those -who were told to eat cake when there was no bread in the cupboard! Had -not Marie de Médicis passed here, and Gaston de France, and Duchesse de -Montpensier, and Elizabeth d'Orléans, who gave it to Louis XIV., and -Louis XVI., who gave it, in 1779, to Monsieur his brother, who after the -days of storm and terror was to reign, not too satisfactorily, as Louis -XVIII.? Was it not here that Duchesse de Berri, in the early years of -the eighteenth century, held those surprising revels the details of -which may be read only in secret and unpublished memoirs? Sedate -historians merely hint at them.[20] And, palace though it was, the -revolutionary judges might have found ready to their hands at the -Luxembourg, bars, bolts, fetters and dungeons enow. For that "symbolic -hierarchy" of palace, cloister, and prison, proper to all princely and -noble dwellings of the old régime, had existed at the Luxembourg; and -during long years the penal justice of priest and monk had passed that -way. - -Footnote 20: - - "Dans son Palais-Royal, au Palais de Luxembourg où demeurait la - duchesse de B——, se célébraient le plus ordinairement ces parties de - débauche. L'on y voyait les acteurs figurer quelquefois avec un - costume qui consistait à n'en point avoir; et les princes, les - princesses, se livrer sans pudeur aux désordres les plus - dégoûtans."—Dulaure, vol. viii., p. 187. - -This was the place to which the noble and courtly suspects were conveyed -by hundreds in August, 1793. One can imagine, though but very faintly, -with what feelings they resigned themselves into the hands of concierge -Benoît. Their King had been decapitated; their Queen, a prisoner -elsewhere, was expecting her husband's fate. They knew how little their -sovereign's life had weighed in the people's balance; was it likely that -theirs would be of greater weight? Judgment and death disquieted them. - -"A diverting spectacle in its way," wrote one sarcastic prisoner, "to -see arriving in a miserable hackney-coach two marquises, a duchess, a -marchioness, and a count; all ready to faint on alighting, and all -seized with the megrims on entering." Dames of great rank came with -their brisk femmes de chambre, old noblemen with their valets, youths -separated from their governors and tutors,—children even; whole -battalions of the most distinguished suspects, the very flower of the -aristocracy of France. The dungeons were not requisitioned, but hasty -preparations had been made for them. Under concierge Benoît's polite and -sympathetic conduct, they mounted the splendid staircase—up which had -flitted in a costume of no weight at all the unblushing guests of De -Berri—to the splendid chambers, picture-gallery, ball-room, salon, -dining-room, and the whole sumptuous suite, which rude partitions of -naked lath and timber had converted into some semblance of prison -lodgings. The wide windows had been armed with iron bars, and guards -were posted at every story. - -The gallant company of French suspects found some of the chambers in the -occupation of a party of English suspects, who had been placed under -arrest some weeks earlier, "as a response to the insults offered by the -English government to the Republic" (_pour répondre aux insultes -dirigées par le gouvernement anglais contre la République_). Amongst -them were Miss Maria Williams, who had gone to France, pen in hand, to -see what liberty, equality, and fraternity were like in practice (and -who returned to write one of the dullest books on record); and Thomas -Paine, who was studying "The Rights of Man" under alarming aspects. - -This was the first Battue; the royalist suspects of Republican France -were the second. - -The salons of the palace, made into prison chambers, were named afresh. -Miss Williams and her sister occupied the chamber of _Cincinnatus_; hard -by were the chambers of _Brutus_, _Socrates_, and _Solon_; and the -derisive name of _Liberty_ was given to the room in which nobles under -special guard were confined in the strictest privacy. High personages, -whose titles but a little while before might have made their gaolers -tremble, were lodged in every quarter of the palace. In this cabinet -were Marshal de Mouchy and his wife, "rigorous observers of courtly -etiquette"; a little way off, in chambers no bigger than prison cells, -the Comte de Mirepoix, the Marquis de Fleury, President Nicolai, M. de -Noailles, and the Duc de Lévi. - -Parlous in a high degree as the situation was for all of them, they did -not at this date suffer any special discomfort, the deprivation of -liberty excepted. Their captors were satisfied at having them under lock -and key, and did not insult their captivity. A gossiping history, which -may be history or fable, describes a visit of Latude to one of the -political prisoners, a certain M. Roger. The great prison-breaker -laughed the Luxembourg to scorn: "A prison? You call this a prison, _mon -cher_? I call it a _bonbonnière_, a _boudoir_!" - -Indeed, to be precise, the Luxembourg was not exactly a Bastille. There -were sad and evil days in store for these suspects, but they were days -as yet distant. For the present, heart-questionings apart, it was not -too dismal a confinement; and rumour went so far as to hint that there -were relaxations of an evening which would not have discredited the -character of the Luxembourg of history. - -The palace-prison might be compared to an unseaworthy vessel in which -one shipped for a compulsory voyage, in dangerous waters, with a -doubtful chart. One might reach port, or founder in mid-ocean. -Meanwhile, there was no choice but to sail; and the rotten ship had good -berths and was well-provisioned. - -The Luxembourg was not as yet governed as a prison, the suspects of the -Revolution were under no extraordinary restraint, there was no -surveillance, and the sentries allowed the prisoners to come and go as -they pleased within the wide walls of the palace and its gardens. Their -friends called upon them, and they wrote and received letters. One of -them had a dog in his chamber which used to fetch and carry messages and -packets between the "prison" and free Paris. A confectioner outside was -allowed to furnish whatever was ordered for the tables, and the rich -paid ungrudgingly for the poor. Plain _sans-culottes_ came in as -suspects with the nobles, and were regularly fed by them. - -"How many are you feeding?" asked one marquis of another. - -"Twelve; and pretty hungry ones." - -"Well, what do you give them?" - -"Meat at dinner always, and dessert." - -"That's not so bad. My fellows want meat twice a day, and coffee once a -week." - -A strained position made matters easier. The nobles kept apart from the -plebs, and took their share of snubs from the "common patriots" whom -their purses kept in food; but a sense of general danger minimised the -hostilities of class. Succour, whenever needed, was never lacking. The -regulation mattress for the beds is described as "of about the thickness -of an omelette" and the bolster "of the leanest"; but bolsters and -mattresses ran short in a month or two, and the men stripped themselves -of coats and waistcoats to make beds for the women. It was a camp or -caravanserai, with the style of a court. - -The aristocrats assembled of an evening in a common room which was -always called the salon, powdered and dressed in the fashion, saluted -one another by the titles which they had ceased to own, and disputed -precedence as at Versailles. Visits were paid and returned, and never -was a fool's paradise so scrupulously ordered. It was admirable in its -way; the old order would die by rule. - -The prisoners were fortunate in their concierge, Benoît. A veteran of -seventy, gentle and genial, with a heart as fine as the manners of his -royalist prisoners, he smoothed all paths, and ushered in a new-comer to -a lodging of four bare walls and a naked floor with an apology that -transformed it into a royal boudoir. He seemed to know all his guests as -they arrived, and placed them where he thought they would find the -easiest entertainment and the most congenial company. He played the part -of master of ceremonies, and put each guest into his proper niche. In -Benoît's hands, the marquis who had arrived without his valet found -himself handling the broom, fetching water, and taking his turn at the -spit, as if the custom of a lifetime had used him to those offices. It -was Benoît who learned at once what money a prisoner had brought in with -him, and who saved the needy suspect the humiliation of begging his -meals, by a whisper in the ear of a good-natured noble. - -By-and-bye, the suspects had the gratification of knowing that their -perils, present and to come, were shared by the enemy himself. There -arrived as a prisoner one evening a president of the revolutionary -tribunal. It was one Kalmer, a German Jew, and reputed millionaire (he -had an income of about £8000), who had been active in filling the -chamber-cells of the Luxembourg. He presented himself in sabots and a -costume of the shabbiest simplicity, and his reception was of the -coolest. He displayed from the first a voracious appetite, and every day -an ass laden with provisions was brought for him to the palace door. The -ex-president seemed well disposed to end his days eating and drinking in -the Luxembourg, and was not a little shocked on receiving the news that -he had been sentenced to death, "for conspiring secretly with the enemy -abroad." He went to the guillotine without a benediction. - -Came next the much more notable Chaumette, ex-sailor, ex-priest, and -recently Procureur of the Commune, in which capacity he had been -foremost in demanding and promoting the Law of the Suspects. He was as -chapfallen as a wolf in a snare, but he did not escape the mordant jests -of the company. It was Chaumette who had declared in the Chamber that -"you might almost recognise a suspect by the look of him." He himself -was recognised on the instant. - -"Sublime Procureur!" exclaimed one, "thanks to that famous requisition -of yours, I am suspect, thou art suspect, he is suspect; we are suspect, -you are suspect, they are all suspect"—which indeed was the case, for at -that date, as Carlyle says, "if suspect of nothing else, you may grow," -as came to be a saying, "Suspect of being Suspect." - -One night, the wildest rumour circulated in the prison. It was said that -Danton, Camille Desmoulins, Hérault de Séchelle, Lacroix, Philippeaux, -and others, the head and front of the party of the Moderates, had been -arrested by Robespierre's order, and were to be sent forthwith to the -Luxembourg. It was even so; and the next night the news sped through -every corridor of the palace that Danton and his fellows had arrived, -and were with the concierge. The prisoners swarmed to the reception -room, and gratified their eyes with that unlooked-for spectacle. The -brilliant Camille, whose young wife was a prisoner with him, was -denouncing the tribunal in a storm of passion; Danton bade him be calm: -"When men act with folly," he said, "one should know how to laugh at -them." Then, recognising Thomas Paine, he said: "What you have done for -the liberty of your country, I have tried to do for mine. I have been -less fortunate than you! They will send me to the scaffold; well, I -shall go there cheerfully enough!" Camille Desmoulins had brought with -him some rather melancholy reading—Hervey's _Meditations_ and Young's -_Night Thoughts_. The merry Réal, who had arrived a day or two earlier, -exclaimed against these works: "Do you want to die before your time? -Here, take my book, _La Pucelle d'Orléans_; that will keep your spirits -up!" - -General Dillon, who was of the earliest batch of suspects, was amongst -the first to visit the imprisoned Moderates in the chamber which had -been set apart for them.[21] Camille was still fuming, and Danton -playing the part of moderator. Lacroix was debating with himself whether -he should cut his hair, or wait till Samson dressed it for him. Another -of the party, Fabre d'Eglantine, lay sick in bed, tenderly nursed by his -comrades. He was saved for the scaffold, for the turn of the Moderates -was not long delayed. At the brief trial of the party, Danton and -Camille showed a characteristic front to their judges. "You ask my -name!" thundered the Titan of the Revolution. "You should know it! It is -Danton, a name tolerably familiar in the Revolution. As for my abode, it -will soon be the Unknown, but I shall live in the Pantheon of history!" -"My age," answered Camille, "is the age of the good _sans-culotte_ Jesus -Christ; an age fatal to Revolutionists!" Returning to the Luxembourg -after condemnation, he said to Benoît: "I am condemned for having shed a -tear or two over the fate of other unfortunates. My only regret is that -I was not able to be of better service to them." Camille wrote with one -of the wittiest pens of his day, and busied himself in the Luxembourg -with a comedy called _The Orange_, the model of which was Sheridan's -_School for Scandal_. He had evoked in a greater degree than any other -of the Moderates the sympathies of the suspects in the Luxembourg, and -up to the last there was a general belief in the prison that both he and -Danton would be saved by the intervention of Robespierre. But -Robespierre could not, if he would. Executioner Samson received in due -course his order to proceed with them—a document drawn up in the style -and almost in the terms of a commercial invoice—and made his own note in -pencil at the foot: "One cart will be enough." Even at the steps of the -guillotine, Camille turned to denounce the crowd. "Leave that canaille!" -said Danton, quietly; "we are done with it." To the headsman Danton -said, as he stood on the scaffold: "You must show my head to the people. -It is a head worth looking at." - -Footnote 21: - - "This general," says Nougaret, in his dry way, "drank a great deal. In - his sober moments, he played at trictrac."—Vol. ii., p. 61. - -This hecatomb of the Moderates sent a thrill of fear through the -Luxembourg. Whose turn next? - -Up to this date, the principal political prisoners had enjoyed -unrestrained communication with their friends outside, and General -Dillon had private news twice a day from the tribunal. Two days after -the bloody despatch of the Moderates, the prisoners of the Luxembourg -were confined to their chambers. Evening receptions and parties of -trictrac (in one's sober intervals) were suppressed; communication of -every kind was forbidden; and the journals of the day, which had been -freely circulated in the prison, were no longer admitted. The prisoners -awaited "in silence and fear" the explanation of this rigorous -_consigne_. - -It was the outcome of the first of those rumours of a "plot in the -prison." A certain Lafflotte, a suspect of low origin, denounced General -Dillon and one Simon (nicknamed in the prison Simon-Limon) as the author -of a secret conspiracy. The revolutionary journals were full of the -affair, but it was never very clearly explained, nor, for that matter, -was any precise explanation ever offered of other prison plots -so-called. There were pretended discoveries and expositions of plots in -the Luxembourg, Saint-Lazare, Bicêtre, and the Carmes. That the -prisoners of the Revolution in all these goals were eager to recover -their liberty, is a statement which may pass without dispute; and it is -no less natural to suppose that they would have seized upon any means -that offered a reasonable hope of escape. But the truth seems to have -been, and it is rather curious in the circumstances (though the presence -of so many women and children would have multiplied the difficulties) -that no concerted efforts to break prison were ever made by the -suspects. Statements or rumours to the effect that they were planning a -forcible release for themselves, and that, once out of prison, they -intended to put Paris to the sword, should have been regarded as quite -too silly for credence. Surely those poor aristocrats had given proof -enough of their weakness! Of all the enemies of the Republic, they were -the least capable of harming it. - -Dillon and Simon, nevertheless, were delivered over to Samson. The -terror had begun for the prisoners of the Luxembourg. - -An unexpected calamity succeeded. Benoît, most humane and benevolent of -concierges, was arrested. It was as if the father had been snatched from -his family, and the suspects were inconsolable; they had lost their best -friend within the prison. The tribunal acquitted him, but he did not -return to his post. Benoît had two successors at the Luxembourg within a -space of weeks, the second of whom was a man who would have been -regarded with terror in any French prison at that epoch. This was -Guiard, who had been fetched expressly from Lyons, where he had acquired -a hideous celebrity as gaoler of the "Cellar of the Dead," the name -bestowed upon the dungeon or black hole in which the victims of the -_commission populaire_ passed their last hours between condemnation and -execution. - -A few days after the removal of Benoît, the prisoners awoke one morning -to find that sentinels had been posted at every door. A stolid police -officer named Wilcheritz, a Pole by birth, who had been nominated to a -principal post in the prison, came round with the order that there was -to be no communication between the suspects. They, believing that they -were on the eve of another September massacre, prepared to bid each -other farewell. On this occasion, however, it was merely a question of -stripping them of their belongings. Money, paper notes, rings, studs, -pins, shoebuckles, penknives, razors, scissors, keys, were gathered in -cell after cell, and deposited in a heap in one of the larger rooms; no -notes or inventory being taken. Wilcheritz and his inquisitors were the -objects of some pleasantries which, it is said, "annoyed them greatly." -One prisoner, after handing over his writing-case was asked for his -ring. "What!" said he, "isn't the stationery enough? Are you setting up -in the jewellery line too?" Another, when it was pointed out to him that -he had retained the gold buckles of his garters, replied: "I think, -citizens, you had better undress me at once." They entered the cell of -the playwright Parisau. "Citizens," said the author, "I am really -distressed; you have come too late. I had three hundred livres here, but -another citizen has just relieved me of them. I hope that you will have -better luck elsewhere. They tell me, however, that you are leaving us -fifty livres apiece, and as I have only just five and twenty, no doubt -you will make up the sum to me." "Oh no, citizen," returned the stolid -Pole.—"Ah! I see. You are merely 'on the make,' citizen. It is -unfortunate in that case that there are gentry in the prison more active -than you. However, if you follow the other citizen, I dare say you will -catch him up, and then you can settle accounts with him. You are the -ocean, citizen, and all the little tributaries will join themselves to -you." - -In another apartment it was proposed to carry off his silver coffee-pot -from a prisoner, who, to preserve it, explained that it was "not exactly -silver," but "some sort of English metal." That was possible, observed -Wilcheritz, for he had one just like it himself. "Ah!" returned the -prisoner, "now that you mention it, I remember there was another like -mine in the prison!" - -Suspects belonging to the working-classes,—tailors shoemakers, -engravers, and the like—were allowed to retain the tools of their -crafts; and the barbers received their razors in the morning, returning -them to the gaolers at night. - -To all requests addressed to him by the prisoners, imploring information -as to their fate, the phlegmatic Pole made answer: "Patience! Justice is -just. This durance will not endure for ever. Patience!" - -Patriots and nobles were now massed in hundreds within the same walls, -shared the same chambers, and were fed from the same kitchen; and all -alike were now in the same state of siege. What news penetrated within -the palace-prison was not the most inspiriting; the tumbrils were moving -steadily to the guillotine, and in the copies of the _Courrier -Republicain_ which were smuggled into the Luxembourg, the principal -intelligence was the "Judgment of the Revolutionary Tribunal, which has -condemned to death" thirty, forty, fifty, or sixty "conspirators." - -Word was passed that the _commissions populaires_ were to take in hand -the cases of the suspects, which was more comforting to the patriots -than to the nobles; but the days crept on, and nothing happened. - -The prisoners amused themselves by teasing Wilcheritz, a fair butt for -raillery, who carried out his orders imperturbably, but was never a -bully. The day came of the "Feast of the Supreme Being," and citizen -Wilcheritz honoured it with a radiant suit. His big feet were cramped in -a pair of new shoes with the finest of silver buckles. One of the -despoiled suspects fancied or pretended that he recognised the buckles, -and a whisper went round. The prisoner whose coffee-pot had been -appropriated came to the rescue. "Citizens," he said, "those buckles -don't look to me like silver. They are _a sort of English metal_." "They -have been in my family for three generations, citizens, I assure you. I -had them long before the visitation," stammered Wilcheritz. "The -visitation" had grown to be the polite mode of reference to the act of -spoliation. "Citizen," said the defender of Wilcheritz, "your answer is -complete. You told us the other day that no good Republican should stoop -to wear jewellery, but no citizen here would have the heart to claim -your shoebuckles." - -The coming of Guiard as concierge (_cet homme féroce_ is Nougaret's -dismissal of him) quenched all pleasantries, and made the palace-prison -a prison complete. Two suspects hopeless of being brought to the bar, -had committed suicide by throwing themselves from their windows; Guiard -ordered that no prisoner should approach within a yard of his window. -The sentries had orders to enter every cell and chamber, with drawn -sabres, at midnight, rouse the occupants from their beds, and count -them. At intervals, all through the night, they were to hail one another -loudly in every corridor: "_Sentinelles, prenez-garde à nous!_" so that -there should be no sleep for the prisoners. No letters were allowed to -pass out from or into the prison; and no visitors were admitted. - -Meals could no longer be sent in from the confectioner's, and a common -table was established. At noon precisely, the bell was struck for -dinner, and the nine hundred prisoners were ranged in the corridors, -each with his _couvert_ under his arm, a wooden fork, knife, and spoon. -They descended by batches to the dining-room, marching two and two, and -this singular procession was half an hour on its journey. Arriving at -the dining-room, three hundred took their places at the table, three -hundred waited with their backs to the wall, and three hundred cooled -their heels in the passage. - -At this time, all money and paper notes, having been taken from them, -the suspects were receiving an allowance of about two shillings a day, -though it is not quite clear what they were to spend it on. - -At the distribution one morning, Guiard said significantly: "There won't -be quite so many to receive it to-morrow!" That same night, a long row -of tumbrils stopped under the walls of the Luxembourg, and one hundred -and sixty-nine prisoners were dragged from bed to fill them. - -It was the first seizure on the grand scale, and in a few minutes the -whole prison was in confusion and panic terror. The warders were heard -going from door to door, and calling the names of the victims; one from -one chamber, two, three, or four from another. Here were sobbings and -loud wails, and clinging embraces; husbands and fathers trying to -animate the weeping women whom they were leaving; priests called for in -the dark to bless together for the last time two who were to be -separated. No one dared descend to the great gallery, but elsewhere -there were frightened rushings to and fro; meetings and partings in -darkened doorways and half-illumined corridors; friend seeking friend, -and women and girls imploring with streaming eyes for leave to say -good-bye again to the lost ones who were already seated in the tumbrils. -Happy were the friends and whole families who were despatched together. -In one moving instance, weeping was turned into joy. A family of father, -mother, and two daughters were divided; the younger daughter was left -behind, almost distracted; her name was not upon the list. Presently -came another warder with another list. The girl started from the empty -bed on which she had thrown herself, snatched the list from the gaoler, -and read her own name there. Carrying the sheet, and with a face beaming -as if a free pardon had been handed to her, she ran down the corridor, -crying: "Mamma, I have found my name! See, it is here! Now we shall die -together!" So by minutes, of which each minute was an æon, that night of -horror was exhausted, and at daybreak the long file of tumbrils dragged -scaffold-wards. - -Not less wretched was the situation of the hundreds who remained. -Racking fears were their portion day and night; death was in their -hearts. Every evening a new list came in. The "ferocious" Guiard had a -very suitable assistant in a turnkey called Verney, whose duty is was to -read out the roll of the proscribed, and who did it with a terrible art, -dallying with the syllables of a name, and pausing to watch the strained -faces around him. Sometimes instead of reading the list, he would pass -it round, when the struggle to reach it prolonged the agony. An -eyewitness of the scene has left a description: - - "In the evening, those prisoners who were allowed to do so assembled - in one of the large rooms and played, or made a pretence at playing, - vingt-et-un, chess, and other games. While these were in progress, - the terrible Verney, head turnkey, appeared, bringing what was - called the lottery list. This little paper contained the names of - those who were to go the same night to the Conciergerie, and the - next morning to the guillotine. The fatal list went round amid the - most pitiful silence. Those who found their names on it rose pale - and trembling from the table, embraced and bade farewell to their - friends, and left us. Verney would then produce the evening paper, - where we read the list of the day's dead,—the dead who had been at - the table with us the night before! I was playing chess one evening - with General Appremont, General Flers looking on. I had just put him - in check when the summons came for him, and Verney carried him off. - Flers took the vacant seat, with a pretence of finishing the game, - when he too was called. This officer had proved his courage in - battle a score of times, but I have never seen terror so horribly - painted on any human countenance. His whole visage seemed undone, - and when he struggled to his feet, he could scarcely support - himself. He gave me his hand, speechless, and staggered from the - room."[22] - -Footnote 22: - - _Les Prisons de l'Europe._ - -In the Luxembourg as in the other prisons at this epoch there were -miserable creatures, also under lock and key, who made a kind of trade -of denouncing their fellows. The Luxembourg had seven of these spies, -who assisted in preparing the lists, "embellishing" them, as they said, -with details which they had scraped together or invented in the prison. -These wretches enjoyed and boasted of the terror which they inspired; -and the chief of them, Boyaval (a tailor by trade, who had served in and -deserted from the Austrian army), used to say that anyone who looked -askance at him in the Luxembourg might count on spending the next night -in the Conciergerie! Scarcely a suspect whom Boyaval denounced escaped -the guillotine, and one night he scandalised the prison by offering love -to a young widow of a day, whose husband he had sacrificed. The husband -was an artist, who had painted portraits in the Luxembourg of nobles who -had reason to suppose that they would leave their families no other -legacy. He was accused of assembling the nobles in his room, and -plotting with them against the Republic. As lightly as this, during the -Terror, were lives devoted to Samson, in every prison in Paris. The -"plots" were not credible, and it is impossible at this date to suppose -that they were ever credited; but Paris was still obedient to the word -of the Danton whom it had guillotined, that "one must strike terror into -the aristocrats"; and these "prison plots" served to fill the tumbrils -to the last. - -An epidemic of sickness came to crown the sufferings of the dwindling -population of the Luxembourg. They were reduced almost to the last -extremity of despair. They had no news from without, except the nightly -list of the proscribed, and the nightly journal, with its monotonous -tale of executions. Between morning and evening, there was no other -event, except the swift good-bye at night to the friends or relatives -whose names were mumbled out by Verney. A silence almost unbroken had -settled on the prison; parties of ghosts assembled at dinner, and -whispered together in the common-room until bedtime. Their misery -culminated in the epidemic of sickness. The rations had been cut down to -one meal a day, and Guiard was the caterer. The wasted prisoners sent -back their rotten meat to the kitchen, and lived on bread and thin soup. -Half the prison fell ill; poisoned or underfed. Doctor's aid could be -had only on a warrant from the police, and applications remained a week -or a fortnight at the bureau. Samson had a rival in diseased or -exhausted nature; and Guiard's requiem for the dead was an unvarying -formula: "Peste! there's another lost to the guillotine!" - -This agony of a season was dissolved in an hour. The "walking corpses" -(_les cadavres ambulans_) of the Luxembourg were recalled to life by the -revolution of the 9th of Thermidor. It came with the din of the tocsin, -and the beat to arms which, until that day had gathered the rabble to -follow the tumbrils to the guillotine. The tocsin continued, and the -rattle of the drums increased, and the trampling of feet towards the -Luxembourg grew louder. The remnant of the suspects gathered in the -gallery: the last massacre was to come. No! The doors were burst open; a -shout went up. Robespierre had fallen. The Reign of Terror was finished. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER X. - - THE BASTILLE. - - "... if once it were left in the power of any, the highest, - magistrate to imprison arbitrarily whomever he or his officers - thought proper (as in France is daily practised by the - Crown), there would soon be an end of all other rights and - immunities."—BLACKSTONE. - - -After enduring for centuries an oppression as rigorous and as cruel as -any nation had ever been subjected to, this idea dawned, almost in an -hour, upon the mind of France. It did not matter that the King who -occupied the throne at this time was, if not at all a wise one, at least -one of the most humane, and distinctly the best intentioned, and the -only French sovereign who had ever really cared to soften the lot of his -prisoners. He did not soften their lot in the least, because he was weak -and indolent, and in the hands of the least honest of his ministers; but -his predecessors, almost without exception, had lent their efforts or -their sanction to the support of that old malignant policy, descended -from the feudal times, that prison was properly a place of torment. The -quick aspiration of liberty, born at last of a wretchedness that was -past enduring, inflamed the heart of the whole nation. It took Paris, as -it were, by the throat. What thing in Paris opposed itself most visibly -to the "natural rights" and liberty of man? Paris said: The Bastille! Up -then, and let the Bastille go down. They went there, a very ordinary -crowd of rioters, and overturned it. The Bastille, which the -superstitious fears of ages had thought impregnable, fell like an old -ruined house (which it was) in a midsummer gust. But the fall of it -shook Europe to its foundations, and before the dust had vanished, it -was seen that the Bastille had carried with it the throne of France, and -every shred and vestige of the system which that throne represented. - -This then must have been the most terrible prison in Europe? Not at all. -It was the most renowned; and, as a prison, no other name is ever likely -to be greater than, or as great as, the Bastille; but at the time of its -destruction it was no more than the shadow of its ancient self, and at -no period of its existence was it a worse place than any other of the -old State prisons of France. Vincennes was quite as cruel a hold as the -Bastille had ever been; there were, I think, uglier dens in the Châtelet -and in Bicêtre; and the torture chamber of the Conciergerie had perhaps -witnessed more inhuman spectacles than any other prison in Paris. - -[Illustration: THE BASTILLE.] - -But when, in July, 1789, a prison was to be destroyed, as the chief -symbol of the tyranny of kings, it was upon the Bastille that Paris -marched, as by instinct. Why was this prison abhorred above all the -rest? Mainly because what had once been a fact had survived as a -tradition,—that the master of the Bastille was the master of France; and -the master of the Bastille was, of course, the King. In its beginnings, -the Bastille was merely a gate of Paris, as Newgate was originally -nothing more than the New Gate of London. It came next to be a very -common little fort, for the defence of the Seine against the English and -other pirates. But it grew by-and-bye to be a stout castle and prison, -over against the royal residence of Vincennes; and when, on the approach -of an insurgent force, the King could signal from his window at -Vincennes to his commandant in the Bastille, just opposite, and the guns -of both places could be primed in time, the plain between them was -secure. The Bastille came thus to hold a place quite distinct from that -of any other prison in Paris, and one which threatened in a much higher -degree the liberties of the citizens. It was considered impossible of -capture; and while the King's standard shook over the great towers of -the Bastille, Paris and France were secure to him; and, in the popular -imagination, his principal stronghold was also his principal prison. In -this point of view, and it was the popular point of view, the Bastille -was a double menace to Paris. It was the King's best means of keeping -importunate subjects at arm's length, and it was also the most -redoubtable of the prisons he could shut them in. Both ideas were to -some extent erroneous. The Bastille, considered as a fort, was never as -formidable as its name; and, as a prison, the Kings of France seldom -favoured it above the Dungeon of Vincennes. - -But let us seek now to put the Bastille in its proper and exact place -amongst the historic gaols of France. In recent years, one or two French -writers of distinction, and others of no distinction whatever, have come -forward as the apologists of this too famous keep, who would persuade us -that it was not only a very tolerable sort of prison, but even, in -cases, a rather desirable place of retirement, for meditation, and -philosophical pursuits. M. Viollet-le-Duc has assured us, quite gravely, -that the famed _oubliettes_ (the bottoms of which were shaped like sugar -loaves, so that prisoners might have no resting-place for their feet) -were merely ice-houses! It is not denied that these cells existed, and -those who care to believe that a Mediæval architect built them under the -towers of the Bastille as store-chambers for ice to cool the governor's -or the prisoners' wine, are entirely welcome to do so. These were -amongst the places of torment in which Louis XI. kept the Armagnac -princes, who were taken out twice a week to be scourged in the presence -of Governor l'Huillier, and "every three months to have a tooth pulled -out." The author of _The Bastille Unveiled_ has attempted to explain -away the iron cage in which the same King confined Cardinal Balue for -eleven years, and which, I believe, is still in existence. An English -apologist (whose work extends to two bulky volumes) says that "prisoners -were less harshly treated in the Bastille than in other French and -English prisons"; that "the accusations of prisoners having been -tortured in the Bastille have no serious foundation"; that the majority -of the chambers "were comfortable enough"; that one of the courtyards -"resembled a college playground, in which prisoners received their -friends, and indulged in all kinds of games." We hear of tables which -were so sumptuously furnished (three bottles of wine a day, amongst -other comforts) that the prisoners complained to the governor that he -was feeding them too well. We are presented with printed rules to show -how carefully the sick were to be attended to, and what were to be their -ghostly ministrations in their final hours. We are told, without a -smile, that it was really not so easy for people to get into the -Bastille as the world in general has supposed; and that, once there, -their situation was not too helpless, inasmuch as the governor must -present to the minister every day a written report upon the conditions -of the prison. Under the pen of this or the other indulgent writer, the -horrors of the Bastille have vanished as by process of magic. -Unfortunately, the horrors are, with quite unimportant exceptions, facts -of history. - -The government of the Bastille was precisely similar to the government -of the other State prisons of France. Edicts notwithstanding, these -prisons were practically the _property_ of their successive governors. -To this unwritten rule the Bastille was not an exception. The governor -in possession at this or that epoch might or might not be the creature -of the minister through whose interest he had bought his office at a -sometimes exorbitant price; it was, at all events, understood that, -whatever limits were set to his authority, he was fully entitled to get -back his purchase money; and this, as had been shown, he could seldom do -except by villainously ill-using his prisoners. There were governors who -did not do this, and then indeed came a blessed period for the -prisoners. Then food was good and plentiful, the faggots were not -stinted in the fire-place, the beds were not rotten and lousy, the foul -linen went to the wash, and the threadbare clothes were replaced, the -cells were made proof against wind and rain, the governor was prompt in -looking into grievances, and all went as well for the prisoner as it was -possible that it should go in a gaol of old Paris. But when a new -Pharaoh arose, who was avaricious, and a tyrant, and a bully, and who -had bought his prison as a speculative investment, then the clouds -gathered again, and the wind blew again from the east, and the old -tribulations began afresh. Now, as the records of all the French prisons -of history leave no doubt as to the fact the bad governors were many, -and the good governors were few, and that within his prison walls the -governor was only less than omnipotent, readers of these pages will not -expect often to find prisoners of the Bastille regaling themselves with -three bottles of wine a day, or asking to have their tables ordered more -plainly, or receiving the free visits of their friends, or playing at -"all kinds of games" in courtyards resembling college playgrounds. -Sprigs of the nobility and young men of family, shut up for a time for -making too free with their money, or for running away with a -ballet-dancer, had perhaps not too much to complain of in the Bastille; -there were certain prisoners of rank, too, who came off lightly; and now -and again there were other prisoners who enjoyed what were called the -"liberties of the Bastille," and who were allowed a restricted -intercourse. But the general rules for the keeping and conduct of -prisoners in the Bastille were of the severest description, and they -were carried out for the most part with inflexible rigour. Privations -and humiliations of all kinds were inflicted on them; and redress for -injuries, or for insults, or for mean and illegal annoyances, the -outcome of the governor's spleen, was not more easy to obtain in the -Bastille than in the Dungeon of Vincennes. - -The statement that "it was not so easy to enter into the Bastille" is -from Ravaisson, the compiler of the _Archives de la Bastille_. He gives -his reasons, which are sufficiently curious. Incarcerations, says -Ravaisson, were accomplished with the utmost care, and the Government -insisted upon the most stringent precautions, inasmuch as, "acting with -absolute authority, it felt the danger of an uncontrolled -responsibility." Sore indeed would be the task of proving by example -that the absolute monarchy had many compunctions on this score, when -tampering with the liberties of its subjects. "Extreme care was taken to -avoid errors and abuses" in effecting incarcerations in the Bastille; -and the great safeguard was that "each _lettre de cachet_ was signed by -the King himself, and countersigned by one of his ministers!" One need -go no further than this. M. Ravaisson spent from fifteen to twenty years -in studying and arranging the archives of the Bastille, and his -knowledge of his subject must have been immense. Was this the writer -from whom one would have expected the suggestion that the King and his -minister, in signing a _lettre de cachet_, took care to assure -themselves that no injustice was being done, and made themselves -immediately and personally responsible for the guilt of the victim whom -it was to consign to captivity in the Bastille? Leave aside the cases in -which the document was used to imprison a person in order that charges -or suspicions might afterwards be inquired into,—though there are -countless instances to show, (1) that no proper investigation was held, -and (2), that the clearest proofs of innocence were not always -sufficient to procure the prisoner's liberation. But what shall be said -of the cases, infinitely more numerous than these, in which no charge -was ever formulated, and in which none could have been formulated, save -some fictitious one inspired by private greed, hatred, or vengeance? -Where in these cases was that "greatest care" which "was taken to -prevent errors and abuses"? Kings and their ministers sent to the -Bastille and other prisons many thousands of prisoners who had no -justice, and who never expected justice. But these same "closed -letters," duly signed and sealed, were the instruments of imprisoning -hundreds of thousands of other persons—to whom life was sweet and -liberty was dear—in whose affairs neither King nor minister had the most -shadowy interest, and whose very names most probably they had never -heard of. During the reign of one King, Louis XV., one hundred and fifty -thousand _lettres de cachet_ were issued. For how many of those was -Louis himself responsible? They carried his signature, but is it -necessary at this day to say that the King wrote his name upon the blank -forms, which the minister distributed amongst his friends? The -lieutenant-general of police also had his blank forms at hand, in which -it was necessary only to insert the names of the victims. Wives obtained -these forms against their husbands, husbands against their wives, -fathers against their children, men-about-town against their rivals in -love, debtors against their creditors, opera-dancers against the lovers -who had slighted them. If one but had the ear of the King, or the King's -mistress, or the King's minister, or the King's chief of police, or of a -friend or a friend's friend of any of these potentates, there was no -grudge, jealousy, or enmity which one might not satisfy by means of a -_lettre de cachet_,—that instrument which was so sure a safegard against -the "errors and abuses" of imprisonment, because it carried the -signature of the King and his minister! And the cases in which these -scraps of paper were used merely for the ruin, the torment, or the -temporary defeat of a private enemy, often had the cruelest results. The -enemy and the enmity were forgotten, but the _lettre de cachet_ had not -been cancelled, and the prisoner still bided his day. Persons who had -never been convicted of crimes, and other persons who had never been -guilty of crimes, lay for years in the Bastille, forgotten and uncared -for. "There are prisoners who remain in the Bastille," said Linguet (who -spent two years there), "not because anybody is particularly anxious -that they should remain, but because they happen to be there and have -been forgotten, and there is nobody to ask for their release." Captain -Bingham, the English apologist of the Bastille, discussing the cases of -certain criminals who were arbitrarily dealt with by _lettres de -cachet_, says that in England at the present day they "would be -prosecuted according to law, and most probably committed to prison." -Very good! But is there no difference between the situation of the -criminal who, after conviction in open court, is sent to prison for a -fixed term of weeks, months, or years, and that of the "criminal" who -goes to prison uncondemned and untried, and who cannot gauge the length -of his imprisonment? Far enough from being "not so easy" to get into the -Bastille, the passage across those two drawbridges and through those -five massy gates was only too dreadfully simple for all who were -furnished against their wills with the "open sesame" of the _lettre de -cachet_. - -The interior of the Bastille had nothing worse to show than has been -discovered in the chapters on Vincennes, the Châtelet, and Bicêtre. -There were, perhaps, uglier corners in the two last-named prisons than -in either of the two more famous ones. The Bastille, however, has stood -as the type, and the almost plutonic fame which it owes to romance seems -likely to endure. Romance has not been guilty of much exaggeration, but -this saving clause may be put in, that what has been written of the -Bastille might have been written with equal truth of most other -contemporary prisons. Its eight dark towers, its walls of a hundred -feet, its drawbridges, its outer and its four great inner gates, its -ditches, its high wooden gallery for the watch, and its ramparts -bristling with cannon,—these external features have been of infinite -service to romance, and romantic history. But within the walls of the -Bastille there was nothing extraordinary. Lodging was provided for about -fifty prisoners, and it was possible to accommodate twice that number. - -The fifth and last gate opened into the Great Court, some hundred feet -in length and seventy in breadth, with three towers on either side. The -Well Court, about eighty feet by five and forty, lay beyond, with a -tower in the right and a tower in the left angle. Each tower had its -name; those in the Great Court were _de la Comté_, _du Trésor_, _de la -Chapelle_, _de la Bazanière_, _de la Bertaudière_, and _de la Liberté_; -those in the Well Court were the _du Coin_ and the _du Puits_. The -comely garden on the suburban side of the château was closed to all -prisoners by order of De Launay, the last governor of the Bastille, who -also forbade them the use of the fine airy platforms on the summit of -the towers. The main court was then the only exercise ground, a dreary -enclosure which Linguet describes as insufferably cold in winter ("the -north-east wind rushes through it") and a veritable oven in summer. - -The _oubliettes_ have been mentioned. Besides these there were the -dungeons, below the level of the soil; dens in which there was no -protection from wind or rain, and where rats and toads abounded. The -ordinary chambers of the prisoners were situated in the towers. The -upper stories were the _calottes_ (skull-caps), residence in which seems -to have been regarded as only better than that belowground. "One can -only walk upright in the middle." The windows, barred within and -without, gave little light; there was a wretched stove in one corner -(which had six pieces of wood for its daily allowance during the winter -months), and one has no reason to doubt the statements of prisoners, -that only an iron constitution could support the extremities of heat and -cold in the _calottes_. In contrast to these, there were rooms which had -fair views of Paris and the open country. The lower chambers looked only -on the ditches; all the chambers (and the stairs) were shut in by double -doors with double bolts; and all, with the exceptions of those which a -few privileged persons were allowed to upholster at their own cost, were -furnished in the most beggarly style. But in all of these respects, -nothing was worse in the Bastille than elsewhere. - -In principle, the dietary system here was the same as in other State -prisons. The King paid a liberal sum for the board of every prisoner, -but the governor contracted for the supplies, and might put into his -pocket half or three-fourths of the amount which he drew from the royal -treasury. In the Bastille, as in other prisons, there were periods when -the prisoners were fed extremely well; and in all these prisons there -were persons who, by favour of the Government or the governor, kept a -much more luxurious table than was allowed to the rest. But one must -take the scale of diet which was customary. Two meals a day were the -rule. On flesh days, the dinner consisted of soup and the meat of which -it had been made; and for supper there were "a slice of roast meat, a -ragout, and a salad." Sunday's dinner was "some bad soup, a slice of a -cow which they call beef, and four little pâtés"; supper, "a slice of -roast veal or mutton, or a little plate of haricot, in which bones and -turnips are most conspicuous, and a salad with rancid oil." On three -holidays in the year, "every prisoner had an addition made to his -rations of half a roast chicken, or a pigeon." Holy Monday was -celebrated by "a tart extraordinary." There was always or usually -dessert at dinner, which "consists of an apple, a biscuit, a few almonds -and raisins, cherries, gooseberries, or plums." Each prisoner received a -pound of bread a day, and a bottle of wine. De Launay's method of -supplying his prisoners with wine was no doubt the usual one. He had the -right of taking into his cellars about a hundred hogsheads, free of -duty. "Well," says Linguet, "what does he do? He sells his privilege to -one Joli, a Paris publican, who pays him £250 for it; and from Joli he -receives in exchange, for the prisoners' use, the commonest wine that is -sold,—mere vinegar, in fact."[23] A prisoner of the same period sums up -the matter thus: "There is no eating-house in all France where they -would not give you for a shilling a better dinner than is served in the -Bastille." - -Footnote 23: - - _Mémoires sur la Bastille._ - -Apart from all exceptional hardships and privations, the oppression of -the first months of captivity in the Bastille must have been very -terrible. The prisoner who was not certain of his fate, and who did not -know to whom he owed his imprisonment, lay under a suspense which words -are inadequate to describe. Mystery and doubt environed him; his -day-long silence and utter isolation were relieved only by the regular -visits of his gaoler. He was not allowed to see anyone from without, and -could not get leave to write or receive a letter. Nothing could be done -for him, he was told, until his examination had been concluded; and this -was sometimes delayed for weeks or months. If he were a person of some -consequence in the State, powerful enough to have enemies at Court, his -examination in the council-chamber of the Bastille was conducted in a -manner quite similar to (and probably borrowed from) that adopted by the -Inquisition. He was asked his connection with plots or intrigues which -he had never heard of; he was coaxed or menaced to denounce or betray -persons with whom perhaps he had never associated; papers were held up -before him which he was assured contained clear proofs of his guilt; and -he might be told that the King had unfortunately been inflamed against -him, and would not hear his name. If, mystified by threats, hints, and -arguments which had no meaning for him, he asked to be confronted by an -accuser or witnesses, his request was not allowed. These were the exact -methods of the Inquisition. The lieutenant of police, or the -commissioner from the Châtelet, who presided over the interrogation, -would not hesitate to tell the accused that his life was at stake, and -that if his answers were not complete and satisfactory he would be -handed over forthwith to a _commission extraordinaire_. Every device was -resorted to (says the author of the _Remarques politiques sur le château -de la Bastille_) in order to draw from the prisoner some sort of -admission or avowal which might compromise either himself or some other -person or persons in whom the Government had a hostile interest. The -examiner might say that he was authorised to promise the prisoner his -freedom, but if he allowed himself to be taken by this ruse it was -generally the worse for him; for, on the strength of the confession thus -obtained, he was told that it would be impossible to release him at -present, but every effort would be made, etc. If the ministry had reason -to suspect that the prisoner was really a dangerous character, and -involved in political intrigue, there was little hesitation in resorting -to torture. - -Ravaisson says that only two kinds of torture were applied in the -Bastille; the "boot," and the torture by water. Well, these were -sufficient; but it is to be remembered that the archives of the Bastille -date only from about the middle of the seventeenth century, and it is -improbable that the _Salle de la Question_ of this prison was less -horribly equipped than that of any other. The ordeal of the "boot" needs -no description; for the torture by water, the victim was bound on a -trestle, and water was poured down his throat by the gallon, until his -sufferings became unendurable. Torture was practised in the Bastille as -long as it was practised in any other French prison; a man named Alexis -Danouilh underwent the Question there ("ordinary" and "extraordinary") -in 1783—after the date at which Louis XVI. had forbidden and abolished -it by royal edict. To so small an extent had the absolute sovereigns of -France control over the administration of their own prisons of State! - -At no point in the existence of an ordinary captive of the Bastille is -there any occasion to exaggerate his pains. Such as they were, they were -very real; and scant reason is there to wonder at the bitterness, the -vehemence, and even the violence of tone which characterises the memoirs -or narratives of those who had endured them. The apologists of the -Bastille will beg us to believe that the histories of Linguet and -certain others are mendacious, have been refuted, and so forth. The -gifted, caustic Linguet, who is one of their particular bugbears, was -not the most upright man, nor the most scrupulous writer, in the France -of his day; but the essential parts of his narrative are confirmed by -the statements of a host of others. It is not because Linguet has said -that the Bastille walls, which were from seven to twelve feet thick, -were from thirty to forty feet thick (which he might quite possibly have -supposed) that we are to discredit his account, highly wrought as it is, -of the general conditions of life within the prison. It is not more -highly wrought than the accounts of other prisoners of the Bastille, the -accuracy of which has not been questioned. These other histories are -plentiful, and we are under no necessity of resting upon the -better-known narratives which, for their qualities of style or their -greater picturesqueness, have been so often reproduced. Far on into the -eighteenth century—indeed until within a few years of our own—there lay -in the Bastille victims of public or private injustice, whose -complainings, stifled in its vaulted ceilings, have sent us down a faint -but faithful echo. What of Bertin de Frateaux, who was walled in there -from 1752 until his death in 1782? What of Tavernier, who, imprisoned in -1759 (after a previous ten years' sojourn in another gaol), was -liberated only by the wreckers of the Bastille, on the 14th of July, -1789? Here, too, in 1784, lies the Genoese, Pellissery, imprisoned, in -1777, for publishing a pamphlet on the finances of Necker. Dishonourable -terms of release are offered him which he will not accept, although -"rheumatic in every joint, scorbutic, and spitting blood for fifteen -months, owing to the atrocious treatment I have had here during seven -years." Here, two years later, is Brun de la Condamine, the inventor of -an explosive bomb, which he has importuned the ministry to make test of. -After a captivity of four years and a half, enraged at the indignities -he receives, he makes a wild attempt to escape. Here, at the same -period, is Guillaume Debure, the oldest and most respected bookseller in -France, lodged in the Bastille for refusing to stamp the pirated copies -of works issued by his brethren in the trade; treated apparently like a -common malefactor, and released only on the indignant representations of -the whole bookselling fraternity of Paris. Thus lightly was the liberty -of the subject held, even while the Revolution was fermenting. - -The prisoner who was released never knew until then the full bitterness -of the treatment he had endured. It was perhaps the acutest part of his -sufferings, that the letters he had written to family and friends, the -entreaties he had addressed to ministers, magistrates, and chiefs of -police, brought him never a word in answer. It was thus that was -produced in so many cases that sense of utter desolation and abandonment -by the whole world which resulted in the madness of very many prisoners. -Those who were restored to liberty with their reason unimpaired learned -that their letters and petitions had never been received. They had -never, in fact, passed out of the Bastille. It was well to have the -truth of this at any time; but we are to remember the prisoners who died -in the belief that their dearest ones had denied them one kind or -sympathetic word. When the Bastille was sacked, piles of letters were -found which had never passed beyond the governor's hands. Amongst them -was one which (considering the circumstances of the writer, and the fact -that no line was ever vouchsafed him in response) may be regarded as -perhaps the very saddest ever penned: "If for my consolation," wrote the -prisoner to the lieutenant of police, "Monseigneur would have the -goodness, in the name of the God above us both, to give me but one word -of my dear wife, her name only on a card, that I might know she still -lives, I would pray for Monseigneur to the last day of my life." This -letter was signed "Queret Démery," a name known to nobody, but which -will be remembered while the Bastille is remembered. One does not choose -to ask, were there even a chance of an answer, how many other letters -not less piteous than this were read and drily docketed by governors of -the Bastille. - -This inveterate and almost inviolable secrecy in which the government of -the Bastille enwrapped the majority of its prisoners seems on the whole -to have been the most cruel feature of its policy. After reading some -fifty volumes of cells with rats in them, and dungeons frozen or fiery, -and torture rooms, and filthy beds, and food not enough to keep life on, -one is shocked to find that the due and natural poignancy of sympathy -with human suffering begins insensibly to weaken. But this refinement of -pain, inflicted as a part of the routine, upon the common prisoners of -the Bastille, revives the sense of pity. It was the habit to pretend -that prisoners who were dungeoned there were not in there at all. Asked -as to the fate of this prisoner or the other, ministers would respond -with a blank look, assure the questioner that they had never heard the -prisoner's name, and that, wherever he might be, he was certainly not in -the Bastille. The governor and chief officers of the prison, who saw the -prisoner every day, would say that he was not in their keeping, and that -no such person was known to them. The common practice of imprisoning men -in the Bastille under names other than their own made these denials -easy. At other times, when it was desired to prejudice his friends or -society against a prisoner, the answer would be, that the less said -about him the better. The nominal cause of his imprisonment, his friends -were told, was not the real one; the Government had their information, -and if it could possibly be published the prisoner would be known in his -true character. The prisoner himself was often told that his friends had -ceased to believe in his innocence, or that they thought him dead, or -that they had given up all hope of procuring his release. The Bastille -and the Inquisition were singularly alike in their methods. - -Dreary beyond expression must have been the daily round for all but the -privileged few. "Every hour was struck on a bell which was heard all -through the Faubourg St. Antoine." The sentries on the rampart -challenged one another ceaselessly throughout the night. There were -prisoners in solitary confinement to whom no other sounds than these -ever penetrated, except the grating of the key in the lock which -announced the daily visits of the gaoler. This was the life of such -prisoners as the Iron Mask, and of Tavernier, who told his liberators -that, during the thirty years of his captivity, he had passed nineteen -consecutive ones without crossing the threshold of his cell. Exercise in -the yard, for those who enjoyed this favour, was limited to an hour a -day, and this period might be reduced to a few minutes if there were -many prisoners to be exercised in turn,—for, in general, the utmost care -was taken to prevent them from meeting one another. If a stranger were -shewn into the yard, the prisoner who was taking his mouthful of air had -to retreat to a cabinet in the wall. These walks were solitary, except -for the presence of a dumb sentinel; and, unless the prisoner were now -and then permitted or compelled to share his chamber with a -fellow-captive, not less solitary was his whole existence. The most -stringent rules were in force respecting the admission of friends or -relatives. "Strangers cannot enter the Bastille," ran the official -injunction, "without very precise orders from the governor"; and such -rare interviews as were permitted took place in the council-chamber, in -the presence of this officer or his deputy. The length of the interview -was always fixed in the letter which the visitor bore from the -lieutenant of police, and nothing might be said relative to the cause of -the prisoner's detention. - -A certain Mme. de Montazau, visiting her husband in the Bastille, took -with her a little dog, and, while pretending to caress it in her own -Portuguese tongue, was trying to tell Montazau what efforts she was -making for his release. "Madame," interrupted De Launay, his gaoler's -instinct aroused, "if your dog does not understand French you cannot -bring him here." Even such poor barren visits as these were of the -rarest possible occurrence. - -But, M. Ravaisson will tell us, prisoners were frequently visited by the -lieutenant of the King or some other high personage. It would be more to -the point to say that such visits were occasionally inflicted, for the -comfort that prisoners derived from them was slender. Abbé Duvernet -receives the visit of the minister Amelot, who tells him that he can -have nothing to complain of, since he has had access to the prison -library. The Bastille library, by the way, seems to have been founded -not by the Government, but by a prisoner who was confined there early in -the eighteenth century. Abbé Duvernet had made a catalogue of the -collection. "I have catalogued your library," he replied to the -minister, "and there are not ten volumes in it which a man of ordinary -education would trouble himself to read. Library, indeed! Listen, -monsieur: when a man has had the hardihood to expose one of the blunders -of you ministers, you will spend any quantity of money to be avenged on -him. You will hunt him to Holland, England, or the heart of Germany, if -it costs the State two thousand pounds. But to afford a little solace to -the poor devils in your Bastille, by buying a few books for them to -read—no! I dare be sworn that Government has not spent ten pounds on -books for this place since the Bastille was built!" - -"Well, monsieur l'Abbé," said Amelot, "may I ask why you are here?" - -"Why am I here! Because you yourself gave some one a _lettre de cachet_, -which had your own name and the King's attached to it. I am very sure -that his Majesty knows nothing of my detention, or the motive of it; but -_you_ can scarcely pretend to the same ignorance. Or, will you have me -believe that you set your signature to these _lettres_ without knowing -what it is that you are signing?" Then, turning to Lenoir, the -Lieutenant of Police, the Abbé asked: "Do _you_, sir, demand _lettres de -cachet_ of M. Amelot without giving him a reason? Come, as you are both -here together, perhaps one of you will be good enough to tell me what is -the excuse for my imprisonment." I have condensed this interview from -_Les Prisons de Paris_. It is not likely that ministers and chiefs of -police were often faced in this style by prisoners of the Bastille, but -it is probable enough that most interviews of the kind ended with the -same fruitless inquiry on the part of the prisoner. - -It may be inferred from this how much protection was afforded to -prisoners by the daily reports of the governor or the major to the -minister, who was nominally responsible for the Bastille. These reports, -in fact, seem to have been merely a part of the system of espionage -which was regularly practised there. The governor writes: - - "I have the honour to inform you that the sieur Billard was engaged - with the sieur Perrin yesterday, from six to nine in the evening. - - "This morning M. de la Monnoye saw and spoke with Abbé Grisel a good - half-hour. - - "M. Moncarré had an interview with his wife in the afternoon, in - accordance with your instructions. - - "In obedience to your instructions of the 28th of this month, I have - handed letters to Abbé Grisel and M. Ponce de Lèon.—I am, etc." - -[Illustration: - - 1. Tour du Puit. - 2. Tour de la Liberté. - 3. Tour de la Bertaudière. - 4. Tour de la Basinière. - 5. Tour de la Comté. - 6. Tour du Trésor. - 7. Tour de la Chapelle. - 8. Tour du Coin. - A. Entry from Street St. Antony. - B. First Enclosure, Called Passage Court. - C. Governor's House. - D. Court before Governor's House. - E. F. Drawbridge and Gate of Castle. - G. Guard Room. - H. Great Court of Castle. - K. Council-Chamber. - L. Well Court. - O. Bastion. - P. Woods and Grounds. - Q. Gate of the Cour de l'Orme. - - PLAN OF THE BASTILLE.] - - The library which Abbé Duvernet dismissed with contempt was not at the - disposal of every prisoner. Both books and writing materials were in - the nature of indulgences, and doled out sparingly. The rule was - terribly precise on the subject of relaxations of any kind. It stated, - in so many words, that: "As regards a prisoner, the governor and the - officers of the château cannot be too severe and firm in preventing - the least relaxation in the discipline of the Bastille; they cannot - pay too much attention to this, nor punish too severely any act of - insubordination." How often was that rule interpreted in favour of a - sojourn in the dungeon or the "ice-chamber"? - - Not only the governor and his immediate subordinates, but every - turnkey, sentinel, guard of the watch, and invalid soldier on the - staff was a gaoler and spy in himself. The inferior attendants of the - Bastille were encouraged and sometimes directly charged to feign - sympathy with a political prisoner, in order to lure him into some - indiscreet avowal; but in the discharge of their ordinary duties they - were enjoined to be watchful and mute. Amongst their orders were the - following: - - "The sentinels will arrest immediately anyone of whom they have the - slightest suspicion, and will send for a staff-officer to settle the - matter. - - "The sentinel will not let out of his sight, on any pretext, - prisoners who are exercising in the court. He will watch carefully - to see whether a prisoner drops any paper, note, or packet. He will - be careful to prevent prisoners from writing on the walls, and will - report upon everything he may have remarked whilst on duty. - - "When the corporal of the guard or any inferior officer is ordered - to accompany a prisoner who may have leave to walk in the garden or - on the towers, it is expressly forbidden him to hold any - conversation with the prisoner. The officer is there solely to guard - the prisoner, and to prevent him from signalling to anyone outside - the walls." - -Prisoners of a devout character must have been shocked by the studiously -cynical mode of worship in the Bastille. The chapel was a dingy den on -the ground floor of the prison, which Howard describes as containing - - "five niches or closets; three are hollowed out of the wall, the - others are only in the wainscot. In these, prisoners are put one by - one to hear mass. They can neither see nor be seen. The doors of - these niches are secured on the outside by a lock and two bolts; - within, they are iron-grated, and have glass windows towards the - chapel, with curtains, which are drawn at the _Sanctus_, and closed - again at the concluding prayer." - -As not more than five prisoners were present at each mass, only ten -could hear it each day. "If there is a greater number in the castle, -either they do not go to mass at all (which is generally the case with -the ecclesiastics, prisoners for life, and those who do not desire to -go) or they attend alternately: because there are almost always some who -have permission to go constantly." - -If a prisoner, sick and at the point of death, asked that masses might -be said for his soul, he was told that it was not customary for masses -to be said in the Bastille, either for the living or for the dead. "No -prayers are offered up in the Castle," ran the word, "except for the -King and the Royal Family." If it were promised him that he should be -prayed for in a church outside the prison, he was sent out of captivity -with a lie in his ear; for information of his death was withheld from -his family. He was buried by night and in secrecy in the graveyard of -St. Paul's, and the record of his name and rank in the parish register -"were fictitious, that all trace of him might be obliterated." The -register of the Bastille, in which his real name and station were -recorded, was a volume closed to the world. That false book of the dead, -which a turnkey edits by his lantern's glimmer in the sacristy of St. -Paul's, adds a mountain's weight to the sins of the keepers of the -Bastille. There is no reason why its memory should not increase in -detestation. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER XI. - - THE PRISONS OF ASPASIA. - - -It is not easy, in telling the story of the prisons of old Paris, to -avoid mention of the subject with which this chapter is concerned. That -subject is not, however, an attractive one, and readers whom it repels -are invited to let the chapter go. - -According to the authors of _Les Prisons de l'Europe_, Charlemagne was -the first monarch of France who "formally punished" the calling of the -_femme publique_. His edict swept the field, so to speak; the _femme -publique_ (known then, however, as the _femme du monde_) and all who -gave asylum to her were absolutely banned. The prison, the whip, and the -pillory were their portion; the keepers of houses of ill-fame had to -carry the pillory on their backs to the market-place, and the women whom -they lodged had to stand in it. This edict, completely prohibitive, was -in force during four centuries, and its principal result seems to have -been to augment the custom of Aspasia. She and her industry increased a -thousand-fold. - -The state of France in this respect struck Saint Louis with horror on -his return from the Holy Land. His _ordonnance_ of 1254 bade the women -of the town renounce their calling, on pain of being deprived of house -and clothing, "even of the clothes in which they stood up." If, after -being warned, these women continued as before, they were to be banished -the country. But, wiser and more humane than Charlemagne, Saint Louis -set apart for repentant Magdalens a shelter in the convent of the -Filles-Dieu, and drew from his private purse the moneys to lodge and -maintain two hundred of them. - -The new law, enforced with as much rigour as the old one, proved every -whit as impotent. Aspasia went her ways in secret, and devised many -arts. She borrowed the manners and the costume of her more respectable -sisters (_Les prostituées singèrent les manières et le costume des -femmes honnêtes_), glided into the churches, and went with sidelong -glances through the most frequented places of the town. This clandestine -pursuit of the calling, and the hypocrisy which of necessity it bred on -every side, were beyond measure distressing to Saint Louis. A good king, -and a pious one, he considered the matter deeply, and then, in the -interests, as he believed, of public and private morals, he resolved -upon a novel and hazardous measure. It was, to allow the _femmes -publiques_ a degree of liberty, and the exercise of their calling, under -certain strict conditions. Amongst other regulations, they were to live -in houses specially appointed to them, and these houses were to be -closed at six o'clock in the evening, no person being allowed to enter -them after that hour. - -Thus, strangely enough in one point of view, the King who won the name -of "Saint," and whose memory has been justly cherished, was the first to -give legality in France to the calling of Aspasia. Yet this was also the -King who, above all others on that throne, had sought to keep in check -the moral disorders of his kingdom. It was only when he had seen that -measures of repression were of worse than no avail, inasmuch as the -immorality of the town appeared always to increase in proportion to the -stringency of laws, whilst the secrecy of the traffic confounded the -_femme du monde_ with the "respectable" woman, that he resolved upon -giving to the former a domain and status of her own. In this manner, the -unrecognised _femme du monde_ was transformed into the _femme publique_, -a woman with a standing of her own, and with the King's authority to -prosecute her mournful industry. - -She entered under the special jurisdiction of the Provosts of Paris, who -from time to time made various enactments on her account. Thus, in 1360, -the chief magistrate forbade the _femmes publiques_ to wear certain -specified apparel in the streets; and, in 1367, a police order confined -them to particular streets in Paris, "a measure rendered necessary by -their unseemly behaviour in all places, to the great scandal of -everyone."[24] During the next two hundred years they were occasionally -transferred from one quarter of Paris to another, and Parliament more -than once took upon itself to "regulate their costume." - -In 1560, an edict given at Orleans formulated afresh the stern -prohibitions of Charlemagne. Once more, the calling of Aspasia was -forbidden throughout the whole of France. The difficulties of enforcing -this new-old _ordonnance_ were great everywhere, but nowhere so great as -in the capital; and the Provost, it is said, was five years in -concerting his measures. The statement is easily credited. Paris herself -was little in sympathy at that date with laws to restrict the liberty of -Aspasia; and it cannot be said that the average citizen had received -much encouragement to virtue from the examples of the Court, the -nobility, the clergy, or the magistracy itself. Dulaure asserts in his -_Histoire de Paris_ that "_La prostitution était considérée à l'égal des -autres professions de la société_." The _femmes publiques_, he adds, -formed a corporation by themselves, received their patents, as it were, -from the hands of Royalty, "_et même étaient protégées par les rois. -Charles VI. et Charles VII. ont laissé des témoignages authentiques de -cette protection._" The commerce to which was extended the august -protection of the throne "_était encore favorisé par le grand nombre de -célibataires, prêtres et moines, par le libertinage des magistrats, des -gens de guerre, etc. Les femmes publiques, richement vêtues, se -répandaient dans tous les quartiers de cette ville, et se trouvaient -confondues avec les bourgeoises, qui, elles-mêmes, menaient une vie fort -dissolue_." Provosts of Paris sometimes refused to put in force laws -which themselves had framed against the "daughters of joy"; and in so -refusing they seem usually to have had with them the sympathies of the -town. - -Footnote 24: - - _Les Prisons de l'Europe._ - -This being in general the attitude of society in Paris, it might be -thought that the attempt to revive the code of Charlemagne would be -received with small popular favour. It appears to have been received -with no favour whatever. Seven years, from 1560 to 1567, did the Provost -prepare his way, and then the edict was launched. It was read aloud at -either end of every street in which Aspasia had her dwelling, and in -several of these streets a violent resistance was offered, by the women -as well as by their friends and protectors, to the not too-willing -agents of the law. By main force at length the women were taken as by -press-gang, their streets were closed, the temple of Venus was -demolished, and there were once more no _femmes publiques_ in Paris. - -So, at least, did the Law assure itself; what then had become of them? -As may be supposed, the great majority were still in Paris. Not a few -were in prison (but for short periods only); the rest were scattered -throughout the town, or in the villages surrounding Paris. As in the -days of Charlemagne, and before the second decree of Saint Louis, -Aspasia had merely disguised herself. No Magdalen repented on the order -of the State. She sought a retreat until the passing of the storm, and -in a little while the history of the affair repeated itself: _la -prostitution clandestine inonda Paris_. - -Matters continued apparently without the slightest improvement until -1619, when the authorities could devise no better plan than a renewal of -the prohibitions of 1565. The _femmes publiques_ were commanded by -proclamation to betake themselves to some domestic or other occupation, -or to quit the town and suburbs within four and twenty hours. The utter -infeasibility of the injunction is not more striking than its stupendous -absurdity. Imagine the whole corporation of Aspasias, _richement -vêtues_, converting themselves at a day's notice into seamstresses, -cooks, or chambermaids. It would have been so easy for them to find -employers! Saint Louis had shewn himself more generous, more thoughtful, -and more sensible in opening his private purse to lodge and maintain the -would-be penitents of the order amongst the recluses of the Filles-Dieu. -Needless to say, the foolish and impossible decree was quite barren of -result. During the next sixty-five years, that is to say until 1684, no -definite legal action was taken with respect to the position of the -_femme publique_. Unlicenced and unacknowledged, she fared well or ill -according to the laxity or the vigilance of the bench and police, who -sometimes harried and sometimes tacitly or openly abetted her. The -secret or semi-open practice of her calling was often as profitable as -the pursuit of it by sanction of the Crown, but it was attended by the -risks of an illegal industry, and in seasons when provosts or -lieutenants of police shewed an unwonted activity, Aspasia went to -prison. Thus she fared, now sparkling in the finest company, now pinched -for a meal, and now doing penance on the prison flags, or perhaps sick -(eight to a bed) in Bicêtre hospital, until 1684. At that date, another -move was resolved upon, and for the second time Aspasia had the gracious -permission of the State to style herself _femme publique_, and to sell -her liberty to the police, to buy _une licence de débauche_,—for this -was what it came to. - -At the period arrived at, it was no longer merely a question of -irregularities to be repressed, but of the public health to be -preserved; and in the new regulations the hospital was named along with -the prison. From this time forward, a brief interval under the Consulate -excepted, it does not seem to have been questioned in France that women -who chose to do so, or who might be driven to do so, were entitled under -specified conditions to enter on the calling of _femme publique_. What -steps must be taken to secure the dubious privileges of the order, and -what dissuasions were employed by the magistrate who dispensed them, -will presently be shewn. - -Up to the reign of Louis XIV., the monarch responsible for the -provisions of 1684, there was no special prison for the women of this -class, who, when under lock and key, were herded with female offenders -of all degrees. The first special prison for the _femmes publiques_ was -the Salpêtrière, built by Louis XIV., under the designation of "Hospital -General." At this era, the women arrested were not put upon their trial, -nor was any formal judgment pronounced against them. They were under the -sole jurisdiction of the newly appointed lieutenant of police, who -dispatched them to prison on the King's warrant, which took the form of -a _lettre de cachet_. Curious, that the _fille de joie_ should be placed -in this respect on a footing of equality with the prince of the blood, -the nobleman, and the prelate! - -At about the end of the eighteenth century (say, towards 1770), the -police authorities distinguished two classes of women of the town, the -_femmes publiques_, or authorised women, and a numerous and unlicenced -class, of more dissolute habits, officially stigmatised as _débauchées_. -To strengthen the line of demarcation between the two classes, the -_femmes publiques_, or the majority of them, were inscribed on the -police registers (paying a fee of twenty sous), and being to a certain -extent _protégées_ of the State, the treatment accorded to them was -generally of a more lenient character. The terms of their imprisonment -(for soliciting in the streets or public places, for brawling and -rioting, for signalling from their windows, etc.,) were entirely at the -discretion of the lieutenant of police; but it would appear that they -were frequently released, at the request or on the bond of a parent, -sister, or other relative, after a brief confinement. The houses in -which the members of the unlicenced class lived together were -continually raided by the police, who descended upon them after dark, -"_parce que les femmes en étaient arrivées à ce degré de scandale, qu'on -ne pouvait plus les arrêter pendant le jour, à cause du désordre -qu'elles causaient, et des collisions qu'excitaient leurs amants et -autres adhérents_." - -Eighteenth-century documents concerning these houses are still to be -read, and some of them have a curiously modern flavour. There are -complaints of householders, and the reports of the police agents whom -these complaints set in motion. A certain, M. Ledure, writing under date -of the 23d of July, 1785, asks the attention of the police to an -unlicensed house of ill-fame adjoining his own, and details his -annoyances with a freedom of expression which debars translation. The -burden of his protest is, that being a gentleman with a family of -daughters, and the holder of a position which obliges him to entertain -"des personnes de distinction," his existence is rendered intolerable by -the worse than light behaviour of the "females over the way." He can -scarcely even get into his own house of an evening. - -"To satisfy M. Ledure," runs the police report, "we began by visiting, -in Beaubourg Street, the house in which the women complained of were -lodging. We arrested there, Marguerite Lefèbvre, the other women having -taken themselves off.... In response to the complaints of the residents -in Rohan Street, against the women living at No. 63, we forced an entry -there, and arrested the woman Rochelet, and the two _filles d'amour_ -kept by her. We fetched them out, to take them to Saint-Martin"—a house -of detention, from which the women were transferred to the -Salpêtrière,—"but, although our guard was composed of five men with -fixed bayonets, we were so set upon by the man Rochelet, a hairdresser, -and twenty blackguards with him, that we had to let the women go." - -The origin of the prison of Saint-Martin, abolished by Louis XVI., is -quite unknown. It was a small confined place with a villainous -reputation. Regarded by the authorities as a temporary lodging for both -classes of public women, a sort of fore-chamber of the Salpêtrière, no -attempt was ever made to render it decently habitable. The dark and -dirty cells were absolutely destitute of furniture; a truss of straw, -thrown from time to time on the stone floor, was both bed and bedding. -The food was strictly in keeping; all that the prison gave was a loaf of -black bread a day, and whilst prisoners who could afford it were allowed -to do a little catering for themselves, the rest soaked their black -bread in the soup provided by charitable societies. - -Every petition to improve Saint-Martin was answered by the formula that -no one stayed there above a few days, which was a callous misstatement -of the facts. It is true that the women arrested "by order of the King" -were not detained after their _lettres de cachet_ had been obtained; but -the women of the other class, who were arrested by simple act of police, -and tried at the bar as ordinary offenders, lay for weeks or months at -Saint-Martin, awaiting the pleasure of a judge of the Châtelet. When the -cases to be disposed of were numerous, a part only were heard, and the -women whose fate was still to be pronounced were remanded for a further -period of weeks or months to Saint-Martin. It was thus not less a prison -in the ordinary meaning of the word than what the French call a _dépôt_; -and when its inconveniences were no longer to be endured, Louis XVI. -abolished and demolished it, and constituted by letters-patent the Hôtel -de Brienne as a _prison des femmes publiques_, under the name of _La -Petite Force_. This continued to be the temporary prison until the -revolutionary era, and here at least the women had air to breathe and -beds to lie on. - -The first rules for the conduct of the Salpêtrière were issued from -Versailles in April, 1684, over the signatures of Louis XIV. and his -minister Colbert. - -The women were to hear mass on Sundays and Saints' days; to pray -together a quarter of an hour morning and evening, and to submit to -readings from "the catechism and pious books" whilst they were at work. - -They were to be soberly attired in dark stuff gowns, and shod with -sabots; bread and water with soup were to be their portion; and they -were to sleep on mattresses with sufficient bed-gear. - -The nature of their tasks was left to the discretion of the directors, -but the labour was to be "both long and severe." After a period of -probation, prisoners of approved behaviour might be employed at lighter -occupations, and receive a small percentage of the profits, which they -were to be at liberty to spend on the purchase of meat, fruit, "_et -autres rafraîchissements_." - -Swearing, idleness, and quarrelling with one another were to be punished -by a diminution of rations, the pillory, the dark cell, or such other -pains as the directors might think proper to inflict. - -These continued to be the rules for the prisons of the _femmes -publiques_; their spirit is modern, but we shall see later on to what -extent they were enforced. - -In no long time, indeed, after the decrees of 1684, the conditions of -life in the Salpêtrière seem to have been little if at all better than -those in Saint-Martin. Six women shared a cell by night; the one bed -which was supposed to hold them all accommodated four; two of whom slept -at the head and two at the foot, while the two latest comers made shift -on the bare floor. When one of the bed-fellows got her discharge, or -went sick to Bicêtre, the elder of the floor-companions took the vacant -place in the bed, resigning her share of the boards to a new _fille -d'amour_. Complaints evoked the cut-and-dried response that the bed was -intended to hold six. The cells were always damp, and "_il y régnait -absolument, et surtout le matin, une odeur infecte, capable de faire -reculer_." Despite the lack of sanitation, and the fact that the food -was always of an inferior quality, the death-rate was not abnormal in -the Salpêtrière. - -Such was the first regular prison of the _femmes publiques_, and its -régime. The sensible intentions of Louis XIV. were never realised, nor -does the character of the monarch himself permit it to be inferred that -he was very seriously concerned on the subject. The Salpêtrière -continued to receive, if not to chasten, the "daughters of joy" until -two days before the September massacres, when, as the beds for six were -wanted for political prisoners, they were restored to liberty. - -The year '91 saw the overthrow of everything, and the women of pleasure, -so-called, entered upon halcyon days. Aspasia, left to her own devices, -was "regarded as exercising an ordinary trade." Scandals and disorders -followed, and when the public health was again in danger, there being -neither control nor supervision of this traffic, a new census of the -women was ordered. This was in 1796, but the work was so badly done that -the opening days of the Directory found the situation more deplorable, -if possible, than ever. Strange to say, the dissolute Directory (which -admitted to its salons "gallant dames" who lacked nothing of the status -of _filles d'amour_ save inscription on the police registers) turned a -severe eye upon the morals of the public. The police were bidden to be -active in the haunts of Aspasia, but Aspasia had not forgotten the -Republican doctrine of liberty, and when haled before the bench she -gathered her lovers and friends about her in such numbers, that the -cloud of witnesses in her favour quite overawed the magistrates, who -were fain to let her go free. - -The Consulate renewed the attack. It was at this era that the Central -Bureau, which displaced the old office of Lieutenant of Police, was -created, with a special sub-department called the _Bureau des Mœurs_. -This department gave its attention principally to the sanitary aspects -of the matter. Then was established the _Préfecture de Police_; and the -new prefect, M. Dubois, ordered a fresh numbering of the women, which -was made in 1801. The police, however, continued to ask for larger -powers, which, to be brief, were conferred on them by article 484 of the -_Code Pénal_. There were here revived at a stroke the _ordonnances_ of -1713, 1778, and 1780, which gave to the heads of police, "_une autorité -absolue sur les femmes publiques_." - -During the period which has been thus hastily reviewed and which -commenced soon after the close of the Reign of Terror, three prisons in -succession served for the women of the town: La Force, Les -Madelonnettes, and Saint-Lazare. - -For many years—indeed, until the year after the battle of Waterloo—they -were taken to prison in the keeping of soldiers, who led them through -the streets in broad day; a crowd following, the women in tears or -swearing, the crowd jeering or applauding. If a woman were well known in -the town, there was an attempt to rescue her, and she was often snatched -from the soldiers before the prison was reached. This public scandal, -and bitter humiliation to all women above the most degraded class, was -allowed until the year 1816, when the _femmes publiques_ were conveyed -to prison in a closed car. - -They went to the Force, which has not left a kinder memory than the -Salpêtrière. Prison rule was, an art as yet in its infancy, and there -was scarcely an idea of cleanliness, moral control, or discipline. The -Force, it is said, was "as inconvenient a place as could be found for -its purpose." The infirmary, always an important department of prisons -of this class, was "unwholesome and wretchedly ventilated." The women -were altogether undisciplined, and as workrooms had not been opened they -passed their days in idleness and gaming. In the summer months they -swarmed in the yard; in winter, they slept, played cards, quarrelled, -and fought in dusky and ill-smelling common-rooms. They had no keepers -but men, before whom they displayed the most cynical effrontery. It is -asserted that, on the days on which clean linen was distributed, the -women were accustomed to present themselves before the warders in the -precise state in which Phryne astonished her judges.[25] These things -were noised, and the prefect of police had to devise afresh. In 1828, -the _filles d'amour_ were transferred from the Force to the -Madelonnettes. The record of the Madelonnettes in this connection is not -important, except that here it was attempted to employ the women at some -strictly penal tasks. This project was more fully developed at -Saint-Lazare, to which prison all classes of women of the town were -relegated in 1831. At this date, the number of registered public women -in Paris was 3517. - -Footnote 25: - - Un ancien gardien de la Force nous a dit que le samedi, jour où on - leur donnait des chemises, pendant l'été, elles se mettaient - entirement nues dans le préau pour les recevoir des mains des - gardiens.—_Les Prisons de l'Europe._ - -Before penetrating within the prison of Saint-Lazare, the reader will be -curious to know by what means a woman desirous of doing so enrolled -herself in this singular militia. She must seek the countenance and aid -of a magistrate of Paris, whose task was in equal measure a delicate and -a painful one. Without doubt, it was a strange spectacle; a woman -presents herself before a magistrate and says that, renouncing her -woman's modesty, her hope or desire of an honourable future, she wishes -to be cut off from the world, that she may cast herself _dans la -prostitution publique_. At first sight, she seems to make the magistrate -her accomplice, but that this was not the case the sequel will shew. - -The applicant underwent a most minute interrogation. She was asked if -she were a married woman, a widow, or a spinster; if her parents were -living and whether she lived with them, or why she had separated from -them. She was asked how long she had inhabited Paris, and whether she -had no friends there whose interest the magistrate might evoke for her. -She was asked whether she had ever been arrested, how often, and for -what causes. She was asked whether she had ever followed the calling of -_femme publique_ in any other place, and finally, what were the true -motives of her application. Procès-verbal of the examination was drawn -up, and the applicant had then to be seen by a medical man attached to -the police service. Next, her certificate of birth was asked for, and if -she could not produce it, and had been born out of Paris, she must give -the name of the mayor of her department. The magistrate wrote forthwith -to the mayor, and after setting forth the facts which the applicant had -submitted in her examination, requested him to report upon them, asking -particularly whether the relatives of the woman could not be moved to -induce her to return to them. All this was done in the case where the -girl or woman went alone to solicit her enrollment, but it has to be -said that not infrequently one or both of the parents of the applicant -attended with her at the bureau, to support her request! - -When every effort of the magistrate had proved unavailing, a final -Procès-verbal was prepared, to the effect that such-and-such a female -had requested to be inscribed "_comme fille publique_," and had been -enrolled on the decision of the examining magistrate, "after undertaking -to submit to the sanitary and other regulations established by the -Prefecture for women of that class." Thus, and in all cases by her own -act, was she launched upon those turbid waters. - -Of the 3517 women on the Paris police registers in 1831, 931 were from -Paris and the department of the Seine, 2170 from the provincial -departments, 134 from foreign countries, and the remaining 282 had been -unable or unwilling to satisfy the authorities as to their place of -birth. There were amongst them seamstresses, modistes, dressmakers, -florists, lacemakers, embroiderers, glove-makers, domestic servants, -hawkers, milliners, hairdressers, laundresses, silk-workers, jewellers, -actresses or figurantes, acrobats, and representatives of many other -trades and callings, together with six teachers of music, and one -"landscape painter." As regards the education of this army of outcasts, -rather more than one-half were unable to sign their names on the cards -or badges which they received from the bureau; a somewhat smaller number -appended "an almost illegible signature" (_fort mal, et d'une manière à -peine lisible_); whilst a hundred, or thereabouts, wrote "a neat and -correct hand." - -As for the causes which induced them to cast in their lot with their -sister pariahs, they were traceable for the most part to the weaknesses -or defects of the social organisation. Thus, a majority of the women -pleaded "excess of misery," and the class next in point of numbers were -"_simples concubines ayant perdu leurs amants, et ne sachant plus que -faire_." A large proportion had lost both parents, or had been driven -from home; many had left the provinces to seek work in Paris; some were -widows who could find no other means of supporting their children; and -others were daughters looking for bread for aged parents, or for younger -sisters and brothers. - - ------- - -And now, standing on the threshold of their prison, we may ask what were -the commoner causes which sent these unfortunates to Saint-Lazare. It -has been made sufficiently clear that by the act of procuring their -licences they sold their liberty to the police. This indeed was the sole -condition on which enrolment could be obtained. The _femme publique_, in -becoming such, bought herself an army of masters; the whole force of -police were in authority over her, and almost equally so were their -agents and spies, and the medical men in their employ. She had -subscribed obedience to all the regulations invented by the Préfecture, -and she was under perpetual surveillance. The great power of the police -over her rested on her submission in writing to the prefect's -"_règlements sanitaires_" and his "_mesures exceptionelles de -surveillance_," and infringement of the most arbitrary enactment brought -her within the danger of prison. Failing to render her prescribed visit -to the police doctor, she was almost certain to find herself a day or -two later in Saint-Lazare. Special rules and regulations apart, the -irregularities of life and infractions of common law which at times were -almost inevitable in the calling she had entered on, were amongst the -causes contributive to her troubles with the powers at whose mercy she -had placed herself. On the whole, one gathers that the _fille de joie_ -paid at siege rates for that none too felicitous title. - -She seems to have found herself often on the less desirable side of the -prison door; and as the class of _filles publiques_ in Paris has always -included some of the handsomest and some of the most ill-favoured, some -of the most elegant and some of the least refined, some of the brightest -and some of the most villainous women in the town, it may be supposed -that the floating population of Saint-Lazare (which amounted sometimes -to fourteen hundred) offered a marvellous variety of types. - -It was the place of waiting for women and girls whose applications to be -registered had not been disposed of, and for the women who were to be -tried on police charges; and it was also the place of punishment for -those who had received sentence. - -The position of the untried was in many respects worse than that of the -convicted prisoners. The former had the privilege, to be sure, of hiring -what was called a private room, but if they went in penniless they were -in a bad case indeed. They had no right to the full prison rations, and -were fed strictly on bread and water. The convicted prisoners were -warmly clad in winter, but the untried were not allowed to add to the -clothing they took in with them a wrap or comforter from the prison -wardrobe. In hard weather the public women of the poorer class seem to -have suffered keenly both from hunger and from cold. Untried, and -presumably innocent (and many honest women were sent to Saint-Lazare on -the vaguest accusations or suspicions of the police), they were -compelled to receive the visits of the doctors, which were not always of -the most delicate character. Women awaiting trial sometimes offered -money to escape this humiliation, and the case is recorded of a girl who -preferred suicide to submission. - -It was better, in respect of physical comfort, on the penal side of the -prison. There the women were clad to the season, fed not meanly, and -lodged with a certain decency. The untaught and feckless had opportunity -to learn a trade, for the workrooms were now conducted on a much more -practical principle, and the small bonuses bestowed on the industrious -were to some extent a corrective of the _femme publique's_ inveterate -indolence. There was, for the first time in the history of French penal -discipline, a clean, more or less wholesome, and well ordered infirmary -for the treatment of maladies peculiar to that class. - -In the material point of view, in a word, the prison of Saint-Lazare -was, for convicted prisoners, an infinitely better place than any of its -predecessors. But the régime from the standpoint of morals left more -than a little to desire. - -Certainly, it offered none of the grosser features of the old system. -The male attendants had disappeared. The principle of work had been -established, and discipline was pretty well maintained in the wards, -cells, and refectories. When the women had lived together in all but -absolute idleness, their prison was always in a state of disorder, and -often in a state of uproar. Quarrels were of daily occurrence, and a -quarrel usually issued in a fight. Two women, armed with combs or -holding copper coins between their fingers, stood up to do battle for an -absent lover, whom each claimed for her own; and the other prisoners -made a ring around them, not so much in the interests of fair play, as -to see that each combatant got her due share of "punishment." If the -warders attempted to interfere, they probably retired with broken heads. - -There was almost no restraint upon the women, and the lack of -discipline, which permitted sanguinary fights at any hour of the day, -pervaded the entire system. The _femme publique_ could receive what -visitors she pleased, and her lovers and friends crowded the "parlour," -and laughed, sang, and swore at their ease. They brought her money, -food, clothing, and whatever else she desired. As long as her purse was -filled, she was never without luxuries, and she selected from amongst -her fellow-prisoners some table companion, called a _mangeuse_, with -whom she shared her meals. This companionship was usually a _liaison_, -the character of which permits no more than a reference; the cult of -Sappho was universal in the women's prisons. - -At a pinch for money, or for food more dainty than the prison kitchen -furnished, the women had recourse to the prison usurers. These were old -crones, very familiar with prison, who committed some petty offence -which would entail about a month's confinement; a strictly commercial -speculation on their part. They took in with them a certain sum of -money, with which they bought clothes from, and made loans to, -necessitous prisoners. To procure money a woman would sell the clothes -on her back, until "_elle restait presque nue, et dans un état -indécent_." Others borrowed from the old women at a fixed rate of -interest, which was never less than fifty per cent. These were regarded -as debts of honour, and the payments were punctually made. - -Letters might be written and received without the scrutiny of the -director; and the _écrivains publics_, or scriveners of the prison, were -continuously employed in composing for their illiterate bond-sisters -(always, of course, at a price) epistles to lovers outside, which are -described as _brûlantes d'amour_. All unknown to the authorities, -betrothals of a very curious kind were made through the prison post. - -Five male prisoners at La Roquette, let us suppose, were on the point of -completing their sentences; but the prospect of liberty without a -companion of the other sex held no attractions. Where were the fiancées -to be found? At Saint-Lazare, where five engaging hearts might be -expecting their release at about the same date. - -In the men's prison there was always an artist whose services could be -hired for an affair of this kind, and to him the five gallants would -present themselves, with a request for "a bouquet." - -"Of how many flowers?" asked the artist. - -"Five." - -The artist then traced on paper five separate flowers, to each of which -a number was attached; and the five prisoners made their choice of a -blossom. From La Roquette the "bouquet" was magically wafted to -Saint-Lazare, and once there it seldom failed to reach the hands it was -destined for. The recipient summoned to her four other single hearts, -and each of the five chose her flower. The same mysterious agency which -had introduced the bouquet to Saint-Lazare conveyed a fitting answer to -La Roquette, and the affair was arranged. - -But the new brooms of the Préfecture swept out of the system all these -injurious relaxations. At Saint-Lazare, the director took note of every -letter that passed into or out of the prison, and the _écrivains -publics_ had need to chasten their epistolary style. At Saint-Lazare, -Aspasia had no clothes to sell for pocket-money, for the black gown -striped with blue, which was her daily wear, was the property of the -State. At Saint-Lazare, she could hold no receptions of her lovers; and -the presents of money and jewels with which they sought to solace her -through the post could not be converted into spiced meats; for all -Aspasia's moneys and other valuables were taken care of by the director, -who rewarded her good behaviour with a few sous at a time. At -Saint-Lazare, she could seldom use her comb as a weapon of offence, and -the hours which had been devoted to the duel were absorbed by some -industrial or penal task. - -All this implied a moral reform of no inconsiderable kind; but, as has -been stated, the morals of the new régime were not perfection. The great -shortcoming in this respect was that no attempt was made to classify the -prisoners. - -This, however, in such a prison as Saint-Lazare should have been -regarded by the authorities as a paramount duty and necessity. It has -been suggested, though not yet expressly stated, how great a variety of -types this population embraced. Not all of these were _femmes -publiques_, and of those who belonged to that class by no means all were -of a really abandoned or degraded character. There were prisoners -scarcely out of their teens, who had not yet quite crossed the Rubicon, -and who were importuned day and night by the old and vicious hags to be -rid once for all of their virtue, and betake themselves to the "life of -pleasure." The crones who had traded as clothes-dealers and -money-lenders in the older prisons were not less active in Saint-Lazare, -albeit in another and baser capacity. They acted here as the agents and -procuresses of the women who kept houses of ill-fame in Paris and the -provincial towns. A large proportion of the population of Saint-Lazare -were essentially women of the people, girls fresh from the restraints -and hard monotony of shop and warehouse. They were in prison perhaps for -the first time, paying the penalty of some not very serious offence -against the law. But they would leave the gaol with its taint upon them, -and whither should they go? The young and pretty ones amongst them were -flattered by the addresses and importunities of the harridans who were -there to recruit for the _maisons de tolérance_, and who promised them -silk gowns, fine company, and gold pieces. There were here also wives of -the middle class, whose first false step in life had changed its whole -aspect for them, and who knew that home was closed to them forever. -There were young _filles d'amour_ who had sickened of their calling -almost before the ink had dried on the page of the register which they -had signed, and who longed for a means of escape. - -This was good soil to work in, and it would be unjust to say that it was -quite neglected. The prison was visited by sisters of mercy and other -charitable women, and there were even at that date homes and refuges for -the penitent, whose agents sought in the prison and at the prison door -to rescue the young offenders, and those whose feet were still -half-willing to lead them back to virtue. But for inexperience which -lacked strength of character, and for indecision which had no moral or -religious sign-post, the influence of the prison was omnipotent. Without -separation of the classes there was no hope for the weak, and the -classes were not separated. At the moment of her release, at the door of -the prison itself, the woman who had made no plan for her future found -three to pick from. Philanthropy was ready to receive her into one of -the houses of refuge. But she was hungry and ill-clad, and a toothless -procuress came forward with an offer of clothes, a dinner, and a soft -bed. If she still wavered, there was a skulking limb of the law on the -watch—probably the creature by whom she had been arrested—whose -"protection" was hers if she would accept it; and in this case, at -least, refusal was indeed dangerous. For the police spy knew the -"history of the case" and would dog the steps of his victim. - -It resulted that, up to close upon the middle of the century, the prison -of Saint-Lazare, its intelligent aims notwithstanding, was largely a -recruiting ground for the _maisons de tolérance_ of Paris and the -departments, and a place in which uncertain virtue had every opportunity -to decline into finished vice. The _maisons de tolérance_ have been -mentioned once or twice in this connection, and a word in explanation -will dispose of them. The _femme publique_ had her own house or lodging, -or she lived with others of her calling, under a common roof, a _maison -de tolérance_. Licences for these houses were obtained from the _Bureau -des Mœurs_ by a process similar to, though less tedious than, that which -has been described. The applicant was almost always a retired _femme -publique_, and her request to the prefect was usually composed for her -by an _écrivain public_, who kept an office for the purpose, under the -discreet sign, "_Au tombeau des secrets_." He had two styles of -composition, the plain and the ornate. Adopting the first, he would -write: - - "Monsieur le Préfet: M——, a native of Paris, and inscribed on your - registers during the past eighteen years, has the honour to request - your permission to open a licenced house. Her excellent conduct - during the lengthened period of her connection with a class which is - not remarkable for sober living, will, I trust, be a sufficient - guarantee for you that she will not abuse her new position, etc." - -For a sample of his finer style, the following petition will serve: - - "To his Excellency, the Prefect of Police, whose signally successful - administration has changed the face of Paris. - - "You will be gracious enough, Monsieur le Préfet, to pardon the - importunity of my client, Mme. D——, who solicits your authority to - open forthwith a _maison de tolérance_. She knows and appreciates - the responsibility which this undertaking involves, but the - austerity and circumspection of her conduct, her calm and peaceful - life in the past, proclaim her fitness; and the inquiries which you - may deign to make on my client's account can only result to her - advantage." - -This was the tenor, and these the terms, of the official requests to the -prefect; and if the applicant could show that she was in a position to -support an establishment, she generally received her licence. Amongst -the women whom she lodged, and the frequenters of her house, she was -styled at different periods _maman_, _abbesse_, _supérieure_, _dame de -maison_, and _maîtresse de maison_. During the Consulate and the Empire, -she might be sent to prison as a _femme publique_; but after the -Restoration it became the custom to punish her—on any conviction -involving the conduct of her house—by suppression of her licence. - -If, however, no attempt at classification was made by the prison -director, certain distinctions of rank existed which were generally -acknowledged by the prisoners themselves. The authors of _Les Prisons de -Paris_ mention a class of elegant adventuresses who were always apart in -Saint-Lazare, and who stood as the shining examples of the aristocracy -of vice. The passage is interesting and worth translation: - - "Amongst the class of swindlers, so numerous in Saint-Lazare, who - boast their skill in exploiting the ambitious fools of Paris, you - might recognise beneath the prison cap, so coquettishly worn, dames - whom you had met perchance in the most elegant houses in town, and - whose protection you might have sought. This one was a countess, - that one a baroness, and, rightly or wrongly, the badge of nobility - was painted on the panels of their carriages. Did you need the - friendly word of a minister or the countenance of a capitalist, it - was enough that you were known to have one of these angels for your - friend. There were four of them in the sewing-room of - Saint-Lazare,—rogues and swindlers of the first water! For years - these corsairs have laid violent hands on all fortunes they could - come at, but they continue to hold a position in society which is in - itself a more scathing satire on the morals of the age than any - which I am able to imagine. At intervals, these dames are lodged for - a time at the country's cost in one or other of the houses of - detention, without, however, losing one jot or tittle of their - prestige in the world of fashion! When they reappear, society - receives them open-armed, as poor banished exiles who have returned - to the fatherland, or prodigal children whose wanderings are ended." - -Nothing delighted plebeian Saint-Lazare so much as to hear the -countesses and baronesses discussing the merits, as a gallant, of this -or the other minister, nobleman, poet, or banker of renown; and the -interest culminated when the question arose as to which of the two could -produce the greater number of letters signed by names with which all -Paris was familiar. - -Roving like satellites around these gaudy planets were a small class of -habitual criminals who, out of prison, served the noble adventuresses in -several offices, as spies, go-betweens, receivers, etc. These also -enjoyed a certain celebrity in the prison. One of them used to open -chestnuts with a knife with which, in a passion of jealousy, she had all -but murdered her lover, and which had become an object of the devoutest -worship since the lover had gone to hide his scars under the red jacket -of the galley-slave. Another woman arrived at the prison in a flutter of -pride, eager to display a novel charm which decorated her ears. She also -had lost her latest lover, but _Monsieur de Paris_ had been kind enough -to extract for her two teeth from the head which he had just severed. -The disconsolate mistress had had them set in gold as earrings! Nearly -all these women carried on the neck, arms, and upper portion of the body -specimens of the work of the professional tattooer; they preserved in -this way the names of their successive lovers, and the figured emblems -sometimes included the most ignoble devices. - -Of the licenced women who restricted themselves mainly if not entirely -to the calling of _femme_ _publique_, Saint-Lazare recognised two -separate orders. They were the _Panades_ and the _Pierreuses_. The -_Panades_ carried a high chin in the society of their humbler -associates; they were generally members of some _maison de tolérance_, -where, so long as the mistress found it profitable to maintain them, -they lived in luxurious indolence; fed, and pampered, and extravagantly -dressed; captives, but in gilded fetters. In prison they separated -themselves, as far as it was possible, from the rest, to whom they never -addressed a word. They would be known only by some delicate or romantic -name: Irma, Zélie, Amanda, Nathalie, Arthemise, Balsamine, Léocadie, -Isménie, Malvina, Lodoïska, Aspasie, Delphine, Reine, and Fleur de -Marie. - -The _Pierreuses_ regarded them with the bitterest jealousy, and spited -and abused them at every opportunity. Memories of a gayer past -intensified the feelings of the _Pierreuses_; they too had been -_Panades_ until the _abbesse_ had cast them out, faded and worn, to join -the foot-sore legion of street-walkers. They used to whisper mockingly: -"You may sneer, you _Panades_; but we were like you once, and you'll be -like us;" and as for the prophetic part of the reproof, it was more than -likely to be realised. Like the _Panades_, the _Pierreuses_ had a -peculiar set of names: Boulotte, Rousselette, Parfaite, la Ruelle, la -Roche, le Bœuf, Bouquet, Louchon, la Bancale, la Coutille, Colette, -Peleton, Crucifix, etc. To the _Panade_, prison was a place of horror -and disgrace; to the _Pierreuse_ it was often the kindest home she had; -and as years advanced on her, and the gains of her trade grew ever -miserably smaller, the poor creature felt never so happy as in the hands -of the police, on the once dreaded journey to Saint-Lazare. - -There was a strangely sympathetic side to this saddest of the prisons of -Paris. The sick and worn-out were always tenderly regarded by their -fellow-prisoners, and a woman who brought in with her a child in arms -was an object of intense and almost affectionate interest. If a woman -died in the prison, it was not unusual for the rest to club together to -provide a substantial and costly funeral, and masses for the repose of -her soul. Sometimes the affections of the whole prison, directed upon -one weak girl, had the result of saving her from ruin and insanity. - -In the early years of the Restoration, Marie M——, a pretty peasant girl, -was sent to Saint-Lazare for stealing roses. She had a passion for the -flower, and a thousand mystical notions had woven themselves about it in -her mind. She said that rose-trees would detach themselves from their -roots, glide after her wherever she went, and tempt her to pluck their -blossoms. One in a garden, taller than the rest, had compelled her to -climb the wall, and gather as many as she could,—and there the -_gendarmes_ found her. She was terrified in prison, believing that when -she went out the roses would lure her amongst them again, and that she -would be sent back to Saint-Lazare. - -This poor girl excited the vividest interest amongst the _femmes -publiques_ in that sordid place. They plotted to restore her to her -reason, christened her Rose, which delighted her, and set themselves to -make artificial roses for her of silk and paper. Those fingers, so -rebellious at allotted tasks, created roses without number, till the -cell of Marie M—— was transformed into a bower. An intelligent director -of prison labour seconded these efforts, and opened in Saint-Lazare a -workroom for the manufacture of artificial flowers, to which Marie M—— -was introduced as an apprentice. Here, making roses from morning till -night, and her dread of the future dispelled, the malady of her mind -reached its term with the term of her sentence, and she left the prison -cured and happy. The authors of _Les Prisons de Paris_, from whose pages -her story is borrowed, declare that Marie M—— became one of the most -successful florists in Paris. - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -[Illustration] - - - - - CHAPTER XII. - - LA ROQUETTE. - - -There is to be a flitting of the guillotine. For nearly fifty years -executions in Paris, which are not private as with us, have taken place -immediately outside the prison of La Roquette, known officially as the -_dépôt des Condamnés_. - -Four slabs of stone sunk in the soil, a few yards beyond the gaol door, -mark the spot where, on the fatal morning, at five in summer, and about -half-past seven in winter, the red "timbers of justice" are set up by -the headsman's assistants. - -But La Roquette is to be demolished, and the dismal honour of furnishing -a last lodging to the condemned will be conferred on La Santé. This -change effected, the guillotine will flit to the Place Saint-Jacques. -Criminals of a modest habit will not approve the change, but the -murderer with a touch of vanity (and vanity is notoriously a weakness of -murderers) will doubtless welcome it; for the progress from the prison -to the scaffold will be somewhat longer. - -When the doors of La Roquette are thrown open, the victim, bareheaded -and manacled, has but a few paces to shuffle to the spot where old M. -Deibler awaits him, with his finger on the button of the knife. Between -La Santé and the Place Saint-Jacques there is rather more than the -length of a thoroughfare to be traversed, and, as in the old days, some -form of tumbril will probably be called for. - -It is a pity, of course, for it has been proved abundantly that this -kind of spectacle is anything but good for the public health. Humane and -enlightened opinion on the subject has ceased to be that which Dr. -Johnson gave utterance to. "Sir," said the Doctor to Boswell, -"executions are intended to draw spectators. If they do not draw -spectators, they do not answer their purpose. The old method [Tyburn had -been abolished] was most satisfactory to all parties: the public was -gratified by a procession, the criminal is supported by it; why is all -this to be swept away?" - -The sheriffs of the year 1784 gave the answer in a pamphlet which -exposed all the horrors and indecencies of the public progress to the -gallows. As for the "support" accorded to the criminal, he might, if he -were unpopular, be nearly stoned to death before the hangman could -despatch him. - -Public executions in Paris are not, and have never been, the scandalous -exhibitions that they were in London during the whole of the last -century, but the scene in the neighbourhood of La Roquette for four or -five hours before a guillotining is something less than edifying. - -In leaving its present site for the Place Saint-Jacques the guillotine -will only be returning home. The Place Saint-Jacques was the scene of -punishment for nineteen years and a half; it was dispossessed in favour -of La Roquette in 1851. The first person to suffer death at the Place -Saint-Jacques (the Place de Grève having been abandoned) was an old man -named Désandrieux, sixty-eight years of age, condemned for the murder of -a man whose age was eighty-four. Owing to the disgraceful neglect of the -authorities, Désandrieux lay in prison one hundred and twenty-eight days -before he was led to execution. After him came the parricide, Benoît, -the atrocious Lecenaire, David, the regicides Fieschi, Morey, and Pepin, -and other murderers of greater or less notoriety. The Place -Saint-Jacques saw the guillotine erected thirty-five times, and beheld -the fall of thirty-nine heads. - -At this date the _dépôt des Condamnés_ was remote Bicêtre, which, as we -have seen, was also the gaol from which the criminals convicted in Paris -were despatched on their journey to the _bagne_. - -A vivid picture of the condemned cell, or _cachot du Condamné_, very -painful in its blending of the imaginative with the realistic, is given -in Victor Hugo's _Le Dernier Jour d'un Condamné_. It was a day when that -veil of decent mystery which our age casts over the last torturing hours -of the condemned had not been woven; and callous curiosity could, for a -trifling bribe to the turnkey, uncover the grating behind which the -criminal in his strait waistcoat was couched on mouldy straw. - -It was a veritable journey from Bicêtre to the Place Saint-Jacques, by -way of the Avenue d'Italie and the outer boulevards; midway along the -Boulevard d'Italie the guillotine came in sight, and for five and twenty -minutes before he reached it, the miserable victim had the death-machine -for his horizon, the huge blade gripped between the blood-red arms -gleaming deadlier moment by moment. - -The progress was even longer and more wretched when La Grande Roquette -was substituted for Bicêtre as the prison of the _Condamné à mort_. On a -day in mid-December, 1838, a certain Perrin was carried to death from La -Roquette to the barrière Saint-Jacques. An icy rain was falling, and the -streets beyond the Seine were so choked with mud that at certain points -the vehicle became almost embedded in it, and had to be hauled along by -the crowd. Think of riding to one's death in that fashion! The Abbé -Montès, riding beside the young assassin, saw him shivering, and -insisted on covering him with his own hat. At the scaffold, Perrin was -lifted from the cart almost dead from cold and exhaustion. - -From that date there began to be a talk of changing the place of -execution, but the proposals had no result, and during the next thirteen -years five and twenty murderers traversed the whole length of Paris in -their passage to the guillotine. Amongst them may be named the regicide -Darmés, the terrible and dreaded Poulmann, Fourier, chief of the famous -band of the _Escarpes_, the _garde Général_ Lecompte, who fired on -Louis-Philippe at Fontainebleau, and Daix and Lahr, the assassins of -General Bréar. At length, in 1851, the Place Saint-Jacques ceded its -dubious honours to the Place de la Roquette,—which is now about to -restore them. - -As La Roquette (or properly La Grande Roquette, to distinguish it from -La Petite Roquette, the prison for juvenile offenders, which stands -opposite) is to be abolished, it will be interesting to make a brief -survey of the place in which some of the most celebrated French -criminals of modern times have awaited the visit of M. Deibler, with his -scissors and pinioning straps. - -Here the "toilet of the guillotine" has been performed on Orsini, Piéri, -Verger, La Pommerais, Troppmann, Moreau, Billoir, Prévost, Barré and -Lebiez, Campi, Pranzini, and so many others, down to Vaillant and Emile -Henry. - -It would be impossible even to summarise all that has been said and -written in France in favour of abolishing the guillotine. It was -vigorously advocated during the Revolution itself, while the scaffold -was flowing with blood. - -Under the Convention, Taillefer rose one day with the demand: "Let our -guillotines be broken and burned!" At the sitting of the of "9th -Vendémiaire, year iv," Languinais exclaimed: "Should we not be happy if, -having begun our session by establishing the Republic, we were able to -end it by pronouncing once for all against capital punishment!" - -At the last siting of the Convention, Chénier in energetic terms -denounced the guillotine. A voice called out: "What o'clock is it?" A -voice responded: "The hour of justice." A moment later this vote was -proclaimed: "Dating from the publication of the general peace, the -punishment of death shall be abolished throughout the French Republic." - -That vote has not yet become effective! - -After a long sleep the question re-awoke on the lips of M. de Tracy, son -of the orator who had been amongst the first to entreat that the code of -France might be cleansed of blood. In the same historic mention we must -gather in the names of the Duc de Broglie, the Marquis de -Lally-Tallendal, the Marquis de Pastoret ("A man attacks me; I can -defend myself only by killing him: I kill him. For society to do the -same thing, it must find itself in precisely the same situation.") de -Bérenger, Lafayette, Glais-Bizoin, Taschereau, Appert, Lèon Fancher, and -Guizot the historian. - -"If," added the authors of _Les Prisons de Paris_, "all these -enlightened publicists and statesmen, with M. Guizot amongst them, did -not succeed in pulling down the scaffold, at an epoch when, to quote M. -de Bérenger, the very executioners were weary, it must be concluded, we -suppose, that it is necessary to proceed with prudent hesitation, and, -by a gradual abolition, to convince the most timid and incredulous that -society has nothing to dread from this reform." - -This was written fifty years ago, and as "prudent hesitation" has not -yet attained its goal it is still possible to penetrate within the -condemned hold of La Roquette. - -The prison is chiefly interesting in this day as the fore-scene of the -scaffold. It is built with a wealth of precautions; and escape, if not -impossible by ordinary means, is exceptionally difficult to compass. No -successful flight from La Roquette has been recorded in modern times. - -Three iron _grilles_ and four doors of massive oak conduct to the great -courtyard. The foundations of the prison are in layers of freestone; the -two walls which enclose the buildings are of a thickness proportionate -to their elevation, and the builder took care to efface the angles by -rounded stonework. Buildings surround the courtyard on the north, east, -and west, and the prison chapel occupies the south. - -For the ordinary prisoner (convicts awaiting shipment to the penal -colonies, or undergoing short sentences of hard labour), the day at La -Roquette begins early. The warders are at their posts soon after light, -and the second bell summons the prisoners half an hour later. Thirty -minutes are allowed for dressing, bed-making, and cell-cleaning, and at -the third bell there is a general descent to the yard, each prisoner -receiving his first allowance of bread as he goes down. After half an -hour's exercise the regular labour of the day begins, and at nine -o'clock there is a distribution of soup. Between nine-thirty and ten the -prisoners take another turn in the yard, and the second period of work -lasts till three in the afternoon. At three is served another allowance -of bread, with vegetables or meat according to the day; and from -half-past three to four the courtyard echoes again the monotonous tramp -of hundreds of pairs of sabots. The last sortie—there are four in -all—varies with the seasons; and after supper the prisoners are locked -in for the night. - -Fifty years ago, there was here and there in the _bagnes_, and the -general prisons of France, a priest of exalted ideals, and such -unwearied patience as the task demands, toiling to reclaim the -_Condamnés_ who were his spiritual charge. One such was the Abbé Touzè, -chaplain of La Roquette at about the middle period of our century. The -Abbé set himself to inquire what causes sent men to prison at that day, -what might be done or attempted to prevent them from returning there; -and knowing that the part which thinks may be reached through the part -which feels, it was in the sanctuary of the heart that he began his -experiments on a population whose emotions are none too easily turned to -moral or religious profit. To a Touzè in France, a Horsley in England, -prison is not all the barren vineyard which a lazy chaplain finds it; -and the _aumônier_ of La Roquette did not labour in vain. He has been -mentioned here as a herald of the philanthropic scientist of later days, -who has occasionally done for the prison world what genius alone—with -religious fervour for its basis—can accomplish there. - -When the secret history of the condemned cell comes to be written, the -material will be furnished for a new and important chapter in the -history of criminal psychology; but it must not be a patchwork of lurid -gossip on a background of stale religious sophisms, such as Newgate -chaplains of the last century were not above compiling and selling for -their profit in the crowd on a hanging Monday; nor a mere spicy morsel -for the sensation-hunter, such as, for example, the copious gutter-stuff -printed and circulated about Lacenaire, who drew the gaze of Paris to -the condemned cell of La Roquette some half-century ago. - -Thief, blackmailer, and assassin, this was a wretch whose blood defiled -the scaffold itself, yet his position in the condemned cell was made -little less than heroic. A loathsome murderer, he was for weeks the -fashion in Paris. His portrait was hawked about the quays and -boulevards; - - "from all sides exquisite meats and delicate wines reached his cell; - every day some man of letters visited him, carefully noting his - sarcasms, his phrases composed in drunkenness or studiously - calculated for effect; women, young, beautiful, and elegantly - attired, solicited the honour of being presented to him, and were in - despair at his refusal." - -Criminals as indifferent as, but less notorious or less popular than -Lacenaire, idling the weeks while their appeal was under consideration, -were chiefly anxious as to whether the charity of the curious would keep -them in tobacco until their fate was decided. - -If the tobacco ran out, and the supply seemed not likely to be renewed, -the prisoner sometimes met that and all other unpleasantnesses, -immediate and prospective, by taking his own life—not because he feared -the guillotine, but because suicide (which, with the limited means at -his disposal, was probably far the worse death of the two) offered the -shortest cut to nothingness. - -Lesage, calculating that his _pourvoi_ or appeal would run just forty -days, summed up without a tremor the days that remained to him. -"Thirty-two days I've been here; eight to follow. If I don't get a sou -or two, _je manquerai de tabac_. Five sous a day to smoke, and ten to -drink,—that's not much for a poor chap to ask, the last eight days of -his life!" Seemingly, this modest address to charitable Paris was coldly -answered, for a day or two later Lesage was found dead in his bed. The -companion of his guilt, Soufflard, in the adjoining cell, had already -taken poison. - -In all condemned cells there is a considerable proportion of criminals -for whom the prospect of a violent and shameful death seems to hold no -terrors whatever. The chief warder of Wandsworth prison, an experienced -observer of death on the gallows, assured me that he remembered no -instance in which the victim had needed support under the beam, and he -cited the case of Kate Webster, who, with the halter about her neck, put -up her pinioned hands to adjust it more comfortably. Dr. Corre[26] found -that out of 88 criminals condemned to death, of whom 64 were men and 24 -women, about two-fifths of the men "died in a cowardly manner," whilst -only about one-fifth of the women showed a lack of self-possession. - -Footnote 26: - - _Les Criminels._ - -Let us pass into the _cachot du Condamné à mort_, the condemned cell of -La Roquette. - -Three types are found in the condemned cell: the indifferent, the -penitent, and the impenitent. The indifferent is a lymphatic creature -(there have been several female prisoners of this type), scarcely -susceptible of any normal emotion, and—of whichever sex—as cold in -repentance as in crime. - -The second category includes offenders quite removed from the ordinary -criminal classes. Several of these, impulsive murderers, reprieved from -the gallows, were pointed out to me at Portland last summer, and one I -remembered in particular—a handsome, well-set man, not yet middle-aged, -trudging along under a warder's eye round and round the infirmary yard, -who had been seventeen years in confinement. The impenitent of this -order is such an egoistic maniac as Wainwright, who, the night before -his death, paced the yard of Newgate with the governor, smoking a cigar, -and recounting his successes with women; or he is a criminal of the -great sort, strong in mind as in body, the fearless disciple of a -dreadful philosophy of his own, which lets him face death as boldly as -he inflicts it, and which, at the last, inspires him only with a hatred -of the law that has vanquished him. - -Poulmann was a criminal of this type; an ultra-sanguine temperament, an -athletic form, a constitution physically and morally energetic, an -Herculean force of body, and a pride which the _cachot du Condamné_ -could not reduce. "It shall never be said that Poulmann changed!" was -his first and last confession. A "monstrous atheist," he admitted that -he had prayed for the woman who was condemned with him: "But there can -be no God, since Louise also is to die." Abbé Touzè suggested that the -last days of Louise might be embittered by his impenitence. This shook -him for a moment, but he returned to himself: "No! Poulmann will never -change." - -But, alike for the weak-hearted, the indifferent, and the valiant, the -way to the scaffold is rendered in these days as easy as may be. -Victor Hugo's condemned man in the old, abhorred Bicêtre was turned -out by day among the _forçats_ awaiting their despatch to the _bagne_; -they made sport of him, and ghastly jokes about the "widow" or -guillotine—time-honoured amongst the criminal classes—were pointed -afresh for his benefit. - -His treatment at the hands of the prison officers was scarcely less -callous; no one had a thought or cared that this poor wight was biding -the morning when he should be rudely severed from all the living. - -The position of convicts cast for death in the Newgate of the early -years of this century was every jot as cruel. - -It was thus under the old order; it is more commendable to-day. The -tenant of the condemned cell, withdrawn from the stare of the world, is -surrounded by people who have no desire but to soften the few days or -weeks that remain to him. He is no longer on view at a price. He has -not, like Lacenaire, the privilege of refusing the visits of duchesses, -nor the indignity to endure of being exposed at a few francs per head to -the indecent gaze of sensation-mongers. - -In La Roquette nowadays no one can admire or contemn him until he -shuffles out to meet his fate just beyond the prison door. - -The condemned cell is, as in most modern prisons, both in France and -England, the most comfortable quarters in the building. There are -actually three _cachots des Condamnés_, as there are two in Newgate, and -those in the Paris gaol are better lighted and rather more spacious. - -The last scene of all, though it is a public execution, is no longer a -feast for the ghouls. Justice is done swiftly, and the crowd sees little -more than the preparation in the grey morning hours. The preparations, -however, are sufficiently enticing to draw to the Place de la Roquette -the riff-raff of Paris, the frequenters of the night-houses, of the -boulevards, the women of the town, and some foreign amateurs of the -scaffold who, like George Selwyn, would "go anywhere to see an -execution." - -Selwyn, by the way, would find the spectacle in the Place de la Roquette -tame enough after some that he had witnessed. He went to Paris on -purpose to be present at the torture of the wretched Damiens, who, after -suffering unheard-of pains, was torn asunder by four horses. A French -nobleman, observing the Englishman's interest in the savage scene, -concluded that he must be a hangman taking a lesson abroad, and said: -"_Eh bien, monsieur, êtes vous arrivé pour voir ce spectacle?_"—"_Oui, -monsieur._"—"_Vous êtes bourreau?_" "_Non, monsieur_," replied Selwyn, -"_je n'ai pas l'honneur; je ne suis qu'un amateur_." - -It is after midnight that the rush begins to the spot where the scaffold -is raised, and for hours the throng continues to increase in numbers and -variety. All night there is feeding and drinking in the public-houses -around, and, as it used to be in the Old Bailey, windows commanding a -view of the scene are hired at any price. - -A swarm of pressmen wait through the night just outside the prison gate. -At this time the victim himself is probably unaware that his last hour -is at hand. - -When day has dawned, two carts come out from a street adjoining the -prison, bearing the disjointed pieces of the guillotine. The headsman's -five brawny assistants (one of whom is his son and probable successor) -set up the machine, and the knife falls three or four times to test the -spring. - -Then the guard arrives; and when the city police, the _Gardes de la -République_, and the mounted _gendarmes_ are marshalled, the crowd -behind can see only the top of the guillotine. A place within the cordon -is reserved for the press. - -The genius-in-chief of the ceremony does not appear until the doors of -the prison are thrown open. He is within, preparing the victim, and -coaxing him, when the toilet is finished, to take a cigarette and a -little glass of rum. - -Louis Stanislas Deibler, the _Monsieur de Paris_, came to Paris in 1871, -as assistant headsman to Roch. He had been a provincial executioner, -but, in 1871, a new law ordered that all criminals condemned in France -should be despatched by _Monsieur de Paris_. - -Deibler, who was born in Dijon in 1823, is a joiner by trade. His first -head (as chief executioner) was Laprade's, in 1879, and the case was one -of his worst. Laprade, who had murdered his father, mother, and -grandmother, felt a natural disinclination to join them on the other -side, and struggled so desperately on the scaffold that Deibler had to -thrust his head by main force into the lunette. - -M. Deibler is lame, and usually carries a very old umbrella. "Scenes" on -the scaffold are rare. The victim may struggle for a moment, but it is -only for a moment that, in the practised hands of the assistants, he can -postpone the inevitable. In general, the whole affair lasts but a few -seconds. - -There is no such thing as a "last dying speech" from the guillotine. -Even if the man were not too dazed to speak, time would not be allowed -him. There is time only for the last ministrations of the Church, which -are almost always rejected. - -The instant the criminal is secured on the bascule, M. Deibler touches -the spring, the knife shears through the uncovered neck, there is a -spurt of blood in the air, and all is over. - -The head and body are enclosed at once in a rough coffin, and trundled -off with a guard of mounted _gendarmes_ (officials and priest following -in a cab) to the Champ des Navets, or Turnip Field, at Ivry Cemetery, -where a burial service is read. The remains are then handed over to one -of the medical schools for dissection, and what is left is interred. - - - - - THE END. - - - - -[Illustration] - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - Novels by Tighe Hopkins. - - ---------- - - ="Lady Bonnie's Experiment."= - - (Vol. V. of "Cassell's Pocket Library.") - -"Its sparkle keeps it alive from cover to cover. The whole thing is a -charming bit of _étourderie_, without a dull line in it."—_Athenæum._ - -"A delightful fantasy. Woven with a graceful dexterity which ought to be -pondered by 'prentice story-tellers."—_Daily Chronicle._ - - - Nell Haffenden: - - A Strictly Conventional Story. - - In two volumes. - -"The author sculpts at least half-a-dozen strong individualities, and -introduces us to a variety of shifting scenes, from the studios of -artistic Bohemia to mission work in Eastern London. Wherever we are -taken we are impressed with the conviction that the author knows what he -is writing about, and in the description of the Bloomsbury -boarding-house he is humorous enough to remind us of Martin Chuzzlewit's -first experiences in New York."—_Times._ - - - The Nugents of Carriconna: - - A Story More or Less Irish. - - Fourth edition in one volume. - -"For sheer relaxation there is nothing to beat a really good Irish -story, and the reader who fails to enjoy 'The Nugents of Carriconna' -must be a person of very peculiar sensibilities. A promising opening is -a capital thing in a novel, and Mr. Tighe Hopkins opens admirably. The -situation is one which in capable hands might be turned to very good -account, and the reader is not long in discovering that the author's -hands are very capable indeed. The story of the ill-fated telescope, -which is really the pivot upon which the action of the novel revolves, -is not only most delightful and original in itself, but is told with so -much force, freshness, and prevailing humour, not without a few touches -of powerful pathos, that its success may be regarded as -certain."—_Spectator._ - - - "The Incomplete Adventurer." - - In one volume. - -"Most humorous and delightful."—_Athenæum._ - -"A very clever tale, brilliantly told."—_Academy._ - -"A decidedly amusing variation on the old theme of the elixir of -life."—_Saturday Review._ - -"The hero is a delightful creation."—_Literary World._ - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - FRENCH HISTORY. - - 8° - -By FRANCES ELLIOT. Illustrated with portraits and with views of the old -châteaux. 2 vols., 8°, $4.00. Half-calf extra, gilt tops, $8 00 - -"Mrs. Elliot's is an anecdotal history of the French Court from Francis -I. to Louis XIV. She has conveyed a vivid idea of the personalities -touched upon, and her book contains a great deal of genuine -vitality."—_Detroit Free Press._ - -"Entitled to rank as one of the notable publications. The author has -been an earnest student of the history of France from her childhood, and -she here embodies the result of researches, for which she seems to have -been peculiarly fitted. The familiarity of this work is one of its chief -charms. The present work is charming in manner and carries with it the -impress of accuracy and careful investigation."—_Chicago Times._ - - - WOMAN IN FRANCE DURING THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. - -By JULIA KAVANAGH, author of "Madeline," etc. Illustrated with portraits -on steel. 2 vols., 8°, $4.00. Half-calf extra, gilt tops, $8 00 - -"Miss Kavanagh has studied her material so carefully, and has digested -it so well, that she has been able to tell the story of Court Life in -France, from the beginning of the Regency to the end of the -revolutionary period, with an understanding and a sobriety that make it -practically new to English readers."—_Detroit Free Press._ - - - FRANCE UNDER MAZARIN. - -By JAMES BRECK PERKINS. With a Sketch of the Administration of -Richelieu. Portraits of Mazarin, Richelieu, Louis XIII., Anne of -Austria, and Condé. 2 vols., 8° $4 00 - -"... 'France under Richelieu and Mazarin' will introduce its author into -the ranks of the first living historians of our land. He is never dry, -he never lags, he is never prolix: but from the first to the last, his -narrative is recorded _currente calamo_, as of a man who has a firm -grasp upon his materials."—_N. Y. Christian Union._ - -"A brilliant and fascinating period that has been skipped, slighted, or -abused by the ignorance, favoritism, or prejudice of other writers is -here subjected to the closest scrutiny of an apparently judicial and -candid student...."—_Boston Literary World._ - - - A FRENCH AMBASSADOR AT THE COURT OF CHARLES II.; LE COMTE DE COMINGES. - -From his unpublished correspondence. Edited by J. J. JUSSERAND. With 10 -illustrations, 5 being photogravures. 8° $3 50 - -"M. Jusserand has chosen a topic peculiarly fitted to his genius, and -treated it with all the advantage to be derived, on the one hand, from -his wide knowledge of English literature and English social life, and on -the other, from his diplomatic experience and his freedom of access to -the archives of the French Foreign Office.... We get a new and vivid -picture of his (Cominges') life at the Court of Charles II.... There is -not a dull page in the book."—_London Times._ - - - UNDERCURRENTS OF THE SECOND EMPIRE. - -By ALBERT D. VANDAM, author of "An Englishman in Paris," etc. 8° $2 00 - -"Mr. Vandam is an Englishman, long resident in Paris, and thereby -thoroughly Gallicized in his intellectual atmosphere and style of -thought ... his style is flowing and pleasing, and the work is a -valuable contribution to the history of that time."—_The Churchman._ - - ---------- - - G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS, NEW YORK AND LONDON. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - ● Transcriber's Notes: - ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected. - ○ Unbalanced quotation marks were left as the author intended. - ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. - ○ Names were corrected according to historial records. - ▪ Bérenger should be Béranger - - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-Jean_de_Béranger - - ▪ Bertandière should be Bertaudière - - http://www.emersonkent.com/history_dictionary/bastille.htm - - ○ Spelling was made consistent when a predominant form was found in - this book; otherwise it was not changed. - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Dungeons of Old Paris, by Tighe Hopkins - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DUNGEONS OF OLD PARIS *** - -***** This file should be named 54493-0.txt or 54493-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/4/9/54493/ - -Produced by deaurider, Barry Abrahamsen and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive) - - -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. Special rules, -set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to -copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to -protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project -Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you -charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you -do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the -rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose -such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and -research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do -practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is -subject to the trademark license, especially commercial -redistribution. - - - -*** START: FULL LICENSE *** - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project -Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at -http://gutenberg.org/license). - - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy -all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. -If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the -terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or -entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement -and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" -or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the -collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an -individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are -located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from -copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative -works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg -are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project -Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by -freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of -this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with -the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by -keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project -Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in -a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check -the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement -before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or -creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project -Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning -the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United -States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate -access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently -whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, -copied or distributed: - -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/license - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived -from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is -posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied -and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees -or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work -with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the -work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 -through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the -Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or -1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional -terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked -to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the -permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any -word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or -distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than -"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version -posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), -you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a -copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon -request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other -form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided -that - -- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is - owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he - has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the - Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments - must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you - prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax - returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and - sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the - address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to - the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." - -- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or - destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium - and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of - Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any - money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days - of receipt of the work. - -- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set -forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from -both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael -Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the -Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm -collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain -"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or -corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual -property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a -computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by -your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with -your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with -the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a -refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity -providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to -receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy -is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further -opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER -WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO -WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. -If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the -law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be -interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by -the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any -provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance -with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, -promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, -harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, -that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do -or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm -work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any -Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. - - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers -including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists -because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from -people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. -To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation -and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 -and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive -Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at -http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent -permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. -Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered -throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at -809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email -business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact -information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official -page at http://pglaf.org - -For additional contact information: - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To -SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any -particular state visit http://pglaf.org - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. -To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate - - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm -concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared -with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project -Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. - - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. -unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily -keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. - - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: - - http://www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/old/54493-0.zip b/old/54493-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 2de7c98..0000000 --- a/old/54493-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h.zip b/old/54493-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 3f86027..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/54493-h.htm b/old/54493-h/54493-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index c5dc4e1..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/54493-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,10235 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" /> - <title>The Dungeons of Old Paris, by Tighe Hopkins—A Project Gutenberg eBook</title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style type="text/css"> - body { margin-left: 8%; margin-right: 8%; } - h1 { text-align: center; font-weight: normal; font-size: 1.4em; } - h2 { text-align: center; font-weight: normal; font-size: 1.2em; } - p { text-indent: 0; margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; text-align: justify; } - .li-p-first {margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .li-p-last {margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .li-p-mid {margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .li-p-only { margin-top: inherit; margin-bottom: inherit; } - sup { vertical-align: top; font-size: 0.6em; } - .fss { font-size: 75%; } - .sc { font-variant: small-caps; } - .large { font-size: large; } - .xlarge { font-size: x-large; } - .small { font-size: small; } - abbr { border-bottom-width: thin; border-bottom-style: dotted; } - .lg-container-l { text-align: left; } - @media handheld { .lg-container-l { clear: both; } } - .linegroup { display: inline-block; text-align: left; } - @media handheld { .linegroup { display: block; margin-left: 1.5em; } } - .linegroup .group { margin: 1em auto; } - .linegroup .line { text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em; } - div.linegroup > :first-child { margin-top: 0; } - .linegroup .in1 { padding-left: 3.5em; } - .linegroup .in2 { padding-left: 4.0em; } - .linegroup .in4 { padding-left: 5.0em; } - ul.ul_1 {padding-left: 0; margin-left: 2.78%; margin-top: .5em; - margin-bottom: .5em; list-style-type: disc; } - ul.ul_2 {padding-left: 0; margin-left: 6.94%; margin-top: .5em; - margin-bottom: .5em; list-style-type: circle; } - ul.ul_3 {padding-left: 0; margin-left: 11.11%; margin-top: .5em; - margin-bottom: .5em; list-style-type: square; } - div.footnote > :first-child { margin-top: 1em; } - div.footnote p { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - div.pbb { page-break-before: always; } - hr.pb { border: none; border-bottom: thin solid; margin-bottom: 1em; } - @media handheld { hr.pb { display: none; } } - .chapter { clear: both; page-break-before: always; } - .figcenter { clear: both; max-width: 100%; margin: 2em auto; text-align: center; } - div.figcenter p { text-align: center; text-indent: 0; } - .figcenter img { max-width: 100%; height: auto; } - .id001 { width:500px; } - @media handheld { .id001 { margin-left:19%; width:62%; } } - .ic002 { width:100%; } - .ig001 { width:100%; } - .table0 { margin: auto; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 0%; width: 100%; } - .nf-center { text-align: center; } - .nf-center-c0 { text-align: left; margin: 0.5em 0; } - .nf-center-c1 { text-align: left; margin: 1em 0; } - p.drop-capa0_1_0_8 { text-indent: -0.1em; } - p.drop-capa0_1_0_8:first-letter { float: left; margin: 0.100em 0.100em 0em 0em; - font-size: 250%; line-height: 0.8em; text-indent: 0; } - @media handheld { - p.drop-capa0_1_0_8 { text-indent: 0; } - p.drop-capa0_1_0_8:first-letter { float: none; margin: 0; font-size: 100%; } - } - .c000 { margin-top: 1em; } - .c001 { page-break-before: always; margin-top: 1em; } - .c002 { margin-top: 4em; } - .c003 { border: none; border-bottom: thin solid; margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 45%; width: 10%; margin-right: 45%; } - .c004 { page-break-before:auto; margin-top: 4em; } - .c005 { border: none; border-bottom: thin solid; margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 42%; width: 15%; margin-right: 43%; - margin-top: 2em; } - .c006 { margin-left: 8.33%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c007 { vertical-align: top; text-align: right; padding-right: 1em; } - .c008 { vertical-align: top; text-align: left; } - .c009 { margin-left: 8.33%; margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c010 { page-break-before:auto; margin-top: 2em; } - .c011 { margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c012 { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c013 { margin-left: 5.56%; font-size: 85%; text-indent: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; - margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c014 { text-decoration: none; } - .c015 { font-size: 85%; } - .c016 { margin-left: 5.56%; font-size: 85%; } - .c017 { margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c018 { margin-top: 2em; } - .c019 { margin-left: 2.78%; text-indent: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; - margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c020 { text-indent: 0; margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c021 { margin-left: 8.33%; font-size: 85%; margin-top: 0.5em; - margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c022 { margin-left: 11.11%; font-size: 85%; } - .c023 { margin-left: 5.56%; font-size: 85%; margin-top: 0.5em; - margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c024 { margin-left: 5.56%; text-indent: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; - margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c025 { margin-left: 5.56%; margin-top: 2em; font-size: 85%; text-indent: 1em; - margin-bottom: 0.5em; } - .c026 { border: none; border-bottom: thin solid; margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 43%; width: 14%; margin-right: 43%; } - .c027 { border: none; border-bottom: thin solid; margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 42%; width: 15%; margin-right: 43%; } - .c028 { text-indent: 1em; } - body {width:85%; max-width:45em; margin:auto; } - </style> - </head> - <body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Dungeons of Old Paris, by Tighe Hopkins - -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/license - - -Title: The Dungeons of Old Paris - Being the Story and Romance of the most Celebrated Prisons - of the Monarchy and the Revolution - -Author: Tighe Hopkins - -Release Date: April 6, 2017 [EBook #54493] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DUNGEONS OF OLD PARIS *** - - - - -Produced by deaurider, Barry Abrahamsen and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/cover.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div><span class='small'>The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div id='f01' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/f01.jpg' alt='IN THE GRIP OF THE BASTILLE.' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>IN THE GRIP OF THE BASTILLE.</p> -</div> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> - -<div> - <h1 class='c001'><span class='xlarge'>The Dungeons of Old Paris</span></h1> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> -<div class='nf-center c002'> - <div><span class='large'>Being the Story and Romance</span></div> - <div><span class='large'>of the most Celebrated Prisons</span></div> - <div><span class='large'>of the Monarchy and</span></div> - <div><span class='large'>the Revolution</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> -<div class='nf-center c002'> - <div>By</div> - <div class='c000'><span class='large'>Tighe Hopkins</span></div> - <div class='c000'>Author of "Lady Bonnie's Experiment," "Nell Haffenden," "The</div> - <div>Nugents of Carriconna," "The Incomplete Adventurer,"</div> - <div>"Kilmainham Memories," etc.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<hr class='c003' /> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>Illustrated</div> - </div> -</div> - -<hr class='c003' /> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> -<div class='nf-center c002'> - <div>G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS</div> - <div class='c000'>NEW YORK AND LONDON</div> - <div class='c000'>The Knickerbocker Press</div> - <div class='c000'>1897</div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> -<div class='nf-center c002'> - <div><span class='sc'>Copyright, 1897, by</span></div> - <div>G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS</div> - <div>Entered at Stationers' Hall, London</div> - <div>By <span class='sc'>Ward & Downey</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 class='c004'>CONTENTS.</h2> -</div> -<hr class='c005' /> -<p class='c006'>CHAPTER</p> -<table class='table0' summary=''> -<colgroup> -<col width='7%' /> -<col width='92%' /> -</colgroup> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='1'>I</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch01'><span class='sc'>Introduction</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='2'>II</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch02'><span class='sc'>The Conciergerie</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='3'>III</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch03'><span class='sc'>The Dungeon of Vincennes</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='4'>IV</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch04'><span class='sc'>The Great and Little Châtelet and the Fort-l'Évêque</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='5'>V</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch05'><span class='sc'>The Temple</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='6'>VI</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch06'><span class='sc'>Bicêtre</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='7'>VII</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch07'><span class='sc'>Sainte-Pélagie</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='8'>VIII</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch08'><span class='sc'>The Abbaye</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='9'>IX</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch09'><span class='sc'>The Luxembourg in '93</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='10'>X</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch10'><span class='sc'>The Bastille</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='11'>XI</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch11'><span class='sc'>The Prisons of Aspasia</span></a></td> - </tr> - <tr><td> </td></tr> - <tr> - <td class='c007'><abbr title='12'>XII</abbr>.</td> - <td class='c008'><a href='#ch12'><span class='sc'>La Roquette</span></a></td> - </tr> -</table> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 class='c004'>ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2> -</div> -<p class='c006'><a href='#f01'><span class='sc'>In the Grip of the Bastille</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p008a'><span class='sc'>Madame Dubarry</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p032a'><span class='sc'>Cell of Marie Antoinette in the Conciergerie</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p036a'><span class='sc'>The Keep or Dungeon of Vincennes</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p062a'><span class='sc'>Mirabeau on the Terrace of Vincennes</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p080a'><span class='sc'>The Great Châtelet</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p096a'><span class='sc'>The Temple Prison</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p138a'><span class='sc'>A Turnkey</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p164a'><span class='sc'>A Street Scene during the Massacres</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p172a'><span class='sc'>The Gallant Swiss</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p196a'><span class='sc'>The Bastille</span></a></p> - -<p class='c009'><a href='#i_p216a'><span class='sc'>Plan of the Bastille</span></a></p> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p001.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> -<div class='nf-center c002'> - <div><span class='xlarge'>THE DUNGEONS OF OLD PARIS.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch01' class='c010'>CHAPTER I. <br /> <br /> INTRODUCTORY.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'><i>Triste comme les portes d'une prison—Sad as the -gates of Prison</i>, is an old French proverb which -must once have had an aching significance. To the -citizen of Paris it must have been familiar above most -other popular sayings, since he had the menace of a -prison door at almost every turn! For the "Dungeons -of Old Paris" were well-nigh as thick as its -churches or its taverns. Up to the period, or very -close upon the period, of the Revolution of 1789, -everyone who exercised what was called with quite -unconscious irony the "right of justice" (<i>droit de justice</i>), -possessed his prison. The King was the great -gaoler-in-chief of the State, but there were countless -other gaolers. The terrible prisons of State—two of -the most renowned of which, the Dungeon of Vincennes -and the Bastille, have been partially restored -in these pages—are almost hustled out of sight by the -towers and ramparts of the host of lesser prisons. To -every town in France there was its dungeon, to every -puissant noble his dungeon, to every lord of the manor -his dungeon, to every bishop and Abbé his dungeon. -The dreaded cry of "<i>Laissez passer la justice du Roi!</i>" -"Way for the King's justice!" was not oftener heard, -nor more unwillingly, than "Way for the Duke's justice!" -or "Way for the justice of my lord Bishop!" For -indeed the mouldy records of those hidden dungeons -and torture rooms of château and monastery, the <i>carceres -duri</i> and the <i>vade in pace</i>, into which the hooded -victim was lowered by torchlight, and out of which -his bones were never raked, might shew us scenes yet -more forbidding than the darkest which these chapters -unfold. But they have crumbled and passed, and -history itself no longer cares to trouble their infected -dust.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Scenes harsh enough, though not wholly unrelieved -(for romance is of the essence of their story), are at -hand within the walls of certain prisons whose names -and memories have survived. I have undone the bolts -of nearly all the more celebrated prisons of historic -Paris, few of which are standing at this day. One or -two have been passed by, or but very briefly surveyed, -for the reason that to include them would have been -to commit myself to a certain amount of not very necessary -repetition. I fear that even as the book stands I -must have repeated myself more than once, but this has -been for the most part in the attempt to enforce points -which seemed not to have been brought out or emphasised -with sufficient clearness elsewhere. Dealing -with prisons which were in existence for centuries, -and some of which were associated with almost every -great and stirring epoch of French history, selection -of periods and events was a paramount necessity. -The endeavour has been to give back to each of -these cruel old dungeons, Prison d'État, Conciergerie, -or Maison de Justice, its special and distinctive character; -to shew just what each was like at the most -interesting or important dates in its career; and, as far -as might be, to find the reason of that dreary proverb, -"Sad as the gates of Prison." Light chequers the -shades in some of these dim vaults, and the echoes of -the dour days they witnessed are not all tears and -lamentations. Something is shewn, it is hoped, of -every kind of "justice" that was recognised in Paris -until the days of '89, when everything that had been, -fell with the terrific fall of the monarchy:—feudal -justice, the justice of absolute kings and of ministers -who were but less absolute, provosts' and bishops' -justice, and the justice of prison governors and lieutenants -of police. Often it is no more than a glimpse -that is afforded; but the picture as a whole is, perhaps, -not altogether lacking in completeness. Once -inside a prison, the prisoner is the first study; and -there are no more moving or pitiful objects in the annals -of France than the victims of its criminal justice -in every age. Slit the curtain of cobweb that has -formed over the narrow <i>grille</i> of the dungeon, put -back on their shrill hinges the double and triple doors -of the cell, peer into the hole that ventilates the conical -<i>oubliette</i>, and one may see once more under what -conditions life was possible, and amid what surroundings -death was a blessing, in the days when Paris was -studded with prisons, when every abbot was free to -wall-up his monks alive, and every seigneur to erect -his gallows in his own courtyard.</p> - -<p class='c012'>For during all these days, dragging slowly into -ages, justice has seldom more than one face to shew -us: a face of cruelty and vengeance. The thing -which we call the "theory of punishment" had really -no existence. Punishment was not to chasten and -reform; it was scarcely even to deter; it was mainly -and almost solely to revenge. What the notion of -prison was, I have tried briefly to explain in the chapters -on "The Conciergerie," "The Dungeon of Vincennes," -and, I think, elsewhere. We are strictly to -remember, however, that the vindictive idea of punishment, -and the idea of prison as a place in which (1) to -hold and (2) to torment anyone who might be unfortunate -enough to get in there, were not at all peculiar to -France. The history of punishment in our own country -leaves no room for boasting; and France has not -more to reproach herself with in the memory of the -Bastille, than we have in the actual and visible existence -of Newgate. France has <i>Archives de la -Bastille</i>; we have Howard's <i>State of Prisons</i> and -Griffiths's <i>Chronicles of Newgate</i>. We are not to -forget that, in the "age of chivalry" in England, it -was unsafe for visitors in London to stroll a hundred -yards from their inn after sunset; and that, in the -reign of Elizabeth, Shakespeare might have penned -his lines on "the quality of mercy" within earshot of -the rabble on their way to gloat over the disembowelling -of a "traitor," or flocking to surround the stake -at which a woman was to die by fire. In a word, the -sense of vengeance, and the thirst for vengeance, which -underlay the old criminal law of France, and of all -Europe, were not less the basis of our own criminal -law until well on into the second quarter of this century. -But the French, it would seem, have paid the -cost of their quick dramatic sense. They have -handed down to us, in history, drama, and romance, -the picture of Louis XI. arm in arm with his torturer -and hangman, Tristan; the spectacle of the noble -whose sword was convertible into a headsman's axe; -and of the abbot whose girdle was ever ready for use -as a halter. Histories akin to these (and, at the -root, there is more of history than of legend in all of -them) are to be delved out of our own records; but -the French have been more candid in the matter, and -a good deal more skilled with the pen in chronicles of -the sort.</p> - -<p class='c012'>On the other hand, England never had quite such -bitter memories of her prisons as France had of hers. -The struggle for freedom in England was never a -struggle against the prisons; and it was not consciously -a struggle against the prisons in France. -But the destruction of a prison was the beginning -of the French Revolution; and when the Revolution -was over, its first historians took the prisons of -France as the type and example of the immemorial -tyranny of their kings. In one important respect, -therefore, the dungeons of old Paris stand apart from -the prisons of the rest of Europe.</p> - -<p class='c012'>I had proposed to myself, in beginning this introductory -chapter, to attempt a comparison, more or -less detailed, between these ruined and obliterated -prisons of historic Paris and the French or English -prisons of to-day. But a final glance at the chapters -as they were going to press counselled me to abstain. -There is no point to start from. The old and the -new prisons have a space between them wider than -divides the poles. The key that turned a lock of the -Châtelet, Bicêtre, or the Bastille will open no cell of -any modern prison, French or English. Punishment -is systematised, and has its basis in two ideas,—the -safety of peoples living in communities, and the cure -of certain moral obliquities; or, it is quite without -system, and means only the vengeance of the strong -upon the weak. Between the prison which was intended -either as a living tomb, or as a starting-place -for the pillory, the whipping-post, or the scaffold; and -the prison which proposes to punish, to deter, or to -reform the bad, the diseased, the weak, or the luckless -members of society, there is not a point at which -comparison is possible.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p006.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p007.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch02' class='c004'>CHAPTER II. <br /> <br /> THE CONCIERGERIE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>If walls had tongues, those of the Conciergerie -might rehearse a wretched story. This is, I -believe, the oldest prison in Europe; it would speak -with the twofold authority of age and black experience. -Give these walls a voice, and they might say:</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Look at the buildings we enclose. There is a -little of every style in our architecture, reflecting the -many ages we have witnessed. Paris and France, in -all the reigns of all the Kings, have been locked in -here, starved here, tortured here, and sent from here -to die by hanging, by beheading, by dismembering by -horses, by fire, and by the guillotine. We have found -chains and a bitter portion for the victims of all the -tyrannies of France,—those of the Feudal Ages, those -of the Absolute Monarchy, those of the Revolution, -and those of the Restoration. There is no discord, -trouble, passion, or revolution in France which is not -recorded in our annals. Politics, religion, feuds of -parties and of houses, private rancours and the enmities -of queens, the vengeance of kings and the jealousies -of their ministers, have filled in turn the vaults -of this little city of the dead-in-life. We have seen -the killing of the innocent; the torment of a Queen; -the tears of a Dubarry and the stoicism of a hideous -Cartouche; the collapse of a Marquise de Brinvilliers -under torture and the silent heroism of a Charlotte -Corday on her way to the guillotine; the bold immodesty -of a La Voisin on the rack and the solemn -abandon of the 'last supper' of the Girondins. We -have seen the worst that France could shew of wickedness -and the best that it could shew of patriotism; we -have seen the beginning and the end of everything -that makes the history of a prison."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Most French writers who have touched upon the -Conciergerie seem to have felt the oppression of the -place; their recollections or impressions are recorded -in a spirit of melancholy or indignation.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"Ah, that Conciergerie!" exclaims Philarète Chasles; "there -is a sense of suffocation in its buildings; one thinks of the prisoner, -innocent or guilty, crushed beneath the weight of society. -Here are the oldest dungeons of France; Paris has scarcely -begun to be when those dungeons are opened."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The strain of Dulaure, the historian of Paris, is not -less depressing:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"The Conciergerie, the most ancient and the most formidable -of all our prisons, which forms a part of the buildings of the -Palais de Justice, one time palace of the kings, has preserved to -this day the hideous character of the feudal ages. Its towers, its -courtyard, and the dim passage by which the prisoners are admitted, -have tears in their very aspect. Pity on the wight who, -condemned to sojourn there, has not the wherewithal to pay for -the hire of a bed! For him a lodging on the straw in some dark -and mouldy chamber, cheek by jowl with wretches penniless like -himself."<a id='r1' /><a href='#f1' class='c014'><sup>[1]</sup></a></p> -<div class='footnote c015' id='f1'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r1'>1</a>. <i>Histoire de Paris.</i></p> -</div> - -<div id='i_p008a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p008a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>MADAME DUBARRY.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>In the days when Paris had not so much as a gate -to shut in the face of the invader, the citizen raftsmen -of the Seine thought it well to have a prison, and -"dug a hole in the middle of their isle." This, it -seems, was the sorry beginning of the Conciergerie; -but the details of that vanished epoch are scant. -Palace and prison are thought to have been constructed -at about the same date: the palace, which -was principally a fortress, was the residence of the -kings; the Conciergerie was their dungeon. Rebuilt -by Saint Louis, the Conciergerie became in -part—as its name implies—the dwelling of the Concierge -of the palace. According to Larousse, the -Concierge "was in some sort the governor of the -royal house, and had the keeping of the King's -prisoners, with the right of <i>low</i> and <i>middle</i> justice" -(<i>basse et moyenne justice</i>). In 1348, the Concierge -took the official title of <i>bailli</i>; the functions and privileges -of the office were enlarged, and it was held -by many persons of distinction, amongst whom was -Jacques Coictier, the famous doctor of Louis XI. As -the practice was, in an age when every gaoler "exploited" -his prisoners, the concierge-bailli taxed the -victuals he supplied them with, and charged what he -pleased for the hire of beds and other cell-equipments; -while it happened more than once, says Larousse, -"that prisoners who were entitled to be released on -a judge's order, were detained until they had paid all -prison fees." On such a system were the old French -gaols administered. The office of concierge-bailli, -with its voluminous powers, and its manifold abuses, -was in existence until the era of the Revolution.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Justice under the old régime counted sex as nothing. -The physical weakness and finer nervous organisation -of woman were allowed no claim upon its mercy. -Primary or capital punishment, as to burning and beheading, -was the same for women as for men, and -the shocking apparatus of the torture chamber served -for both sexes. The elaborate rules for the application -of the Question published in Louis XIV.'s reign -(and abolished only in the reign of Louis XVI.) -specified the costume which women <i>and girls</i> should -wear in the hands of the torturer.<a id='r2' /><a href='#f2' class='c014'><sup>[2]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f2'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r2'>2</a>. "Si c'est une femme ou fille, lui sera laissé une jupe avec sa chemise et sera -sa jupe liée aux genoux."</p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>The black walls of the torture chamber in the Conciergerie, -with their ring-bolts and benches of stone, -gave back the groans of many thousands of mutilated -sufferers. There were the "Question ordinary" and -the "Question extraordinary"; and if the first failed -to extract a confession, the second seems almost always -to have been applied. The extravagant cruelty -of the age frequently added sentence of torture to the -death sentence; and this was probably done in every -case in which the condemned was thought to be withholding -the name of an accomplice. Far on into the -history of France these sentences were dealt out to, -and executed upon, women as well as men; and with -as artistic a disregard of human pain or shame in the -one sex as in the other.</p> - -<p class='c012'>We are in the presence of a high civilisation, or at -least a highly boasted one, in the days of Louis XIV.; -but public sentiment is not offended by the knowledge -that a woman is being tortured by the <i>questionnaire</i> -and his assistants in the Conciergerie; nor are many -persons shocked by seeing a woman on the scaffold -semi-nude in the coarse hands of the headsman, or -struggling amid blazing faggots in a Paris square. -Nowadays, whether in France or in England, the -<i>mauvais quart d'heure</i> (which, at the guillotine or on -the gallows, is usually a half-minute at the utmost) -pays the score of the worst of criminals; but in the -advanced and cultured France of the seventeenth and -eighteenth centuries a Marquise de Brinvilliers must -pass through the torture chamber on her way to the -block, and a Ravaillac and a Damiens (after a like -ordeal) are put to death in a manner which sends a -thrill of horror through Europe, and which is not -afterwards outdone in any camp of American Red -Indians.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The extraordinary criminal drama of the Marquise -de Brinvilliers has been vulgarised not a little by -legend, by romance, and by the stage; but is there -cause for wonder that a series of crimes which made -Paris quake from its royal boudoirs to the extremities -of its darkest alleys should have inspired writers to -the fourth and fifth generations?</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the hands of De Brinvilliers and her lover and -accomplice, the Gascon officer Sainte-Croix, poison -became a polite art; and the accident of marriage -associated the Marchioness with an industrial art -which was of great renown in Paris,—I mean, the -Gobelin Manufacture, or Royal Manufacture of Crown -Tapestries. From the fourteenth century, in the Faubourg -Saint-Marcel and on the Bièvre River—the water -of which was considered specially good for dyeing -purposes,—there were established certain drapers and -wool-dyers; and amongst them, in 1450, was a -wealthy dyer named Jean Gobelin, who had acquired -large possessions on the banks of the river. His -business, after his death, was continued by his son -Philibert, who made it more than ever profitable, and -who on his death-bed bequeathed handsome portions -to his sons. The family divided between them, in -1510, ten mansions, gardens, orchards, and lands. -Not less fruitful were the labours of their successors, -and when the name of Gobelin had grown into celebrity, -the popular voice bestowed it, says Dulaure, -upon the district in which their establishment was -situated.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Immensely enriched, the Gobelins ceased to occupy -themselves with business, and took over various employments -in the magistracy, army, and finance. -Some of them succeeded in obtaining the rank and -title of Marquis. From the middle of the sixteenth -to the middle of the seventeenth century, the Gobelins -held high offices, or married into office; and -were notable amongst the merchant princes whose -illustrious coffers and power to assert themselves won -places for them amid the hereditary aristocracy of -France. Into this family entered by marriage, in -1651, Marie Marguerite d'Aubrai, daughter of the -<i>Lieutenant Civil</i>, or Civil Magistrate of Paris. Her -husband, Antoine Gobelin, was the Marquis de Brinvilliers; -a title which she was to cover with an infamy -as great and enduring as the fame of the -Gobelin Tapestries.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Marquise's gallantries (a term which in the -seventeenth century embraced a greater variety of -moral eccentricities than the Decalogue has provided -for) were quite eclipsed by her celebrity as a poisoner. -With her performances in this art—in which she -seems to have been trained by Sainte-Croix—began -that incredible series of murders, and attempted -murders, known as <i>L'Affaire des Poisons</i>, which both -characterised and lent a <i>special</i> character to the -morals of the age of the Grand Monarque.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was the accidental death of her lover, in 1675, -which exposed and brought the vengeance of the -law on La Brinvilliers. Sainte-Croix was conducting -some experiment with poisons in his laboratory, when -the glass mask with which he had covered his face -suddenly broke, and he fell dead on the spot. Letters -of Mme. de Brinvilliers were amongst the suspicious -objects found in the laboratory by the police, -and she fled to London. One of Sainte-Croix' servants -was put to the Question, and his confession did -not improve the situation of the Marquise. Leaving -London, she hid by turns in Brussels and Liège; and -in a convent in the latter town she was discovered by -the detective Desgrais, who got her out by a ruse, -and brought her back to Paris. Her appearance in -the torture chamber of the Conciergerie was not long -delayed. All her fascinations failed her with those -bloodless cross-examiners, and as she persisted in -denying one charge after another, she saw the executioner -and his attendants make ready the apparatus -for the torture by water. She summoned a little -shew of raillery: "Surely, gentlemen, you don't think -that with a figure like mine I can swallow those three -buckets of water! Do you mean to drown me? I -simply cannot drink it." "Madame," replied the examiner-in-chief, -"we shall see"; and the Marchioness -was bound upon the trestle.</p> - -<p class='c012'>For a time her courage sustained her, but, as the -torture grew sharper, avowals came slowly, which -must have amazed the hardened ears that received -them.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Who was your first victim?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"M. d'Aubrai—my father."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You were very devout at this time, attending -church and visiting hospitals?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I was testing the powers of our science on the -patients. I gave poisoned biscuits to the sick."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You had two brothers?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Yes ... we were two too many in my family. -Lachaussée, Sainte-Croix' valet, had instructions to -poison my brothers; they died in the country, with -some of their friends, after eating a pigeon-pie which -Lachaussée used to make to perfection."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You poisoned one of your children?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Sainte-Croix hated it!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You wanted to poison your husband?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Sainte-Croix for some reason prevented it. After -I had administered the poison, he would give my -husband an antidote."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Before she was released from the trestle, Madame's -confession was complete. Sainte-Croix, imprisoned -in the Bastille, on a <i>lettre-de-cachet</i> obtained by M. de -Brinvilliers, had there made the acquaintance of an -Italian chemist, named Exili, who had taught him -the whole art and mystery of poison. Exili's cell in -the Bastille was the first laboratory of Sainte-Croix, -who proved afterwards so apt a pupil that, as his -mistress and accomplice avowed, he could conceal a -deadly poison in a flower, an orange, a letter, a glove, -"or in nothing at all."</p> - -<p class='c012'>After sentence of death had been passed on this -most miserable woman, she was denied the consolations -of the Church, but a priest found courage to -give her absolution as she was carried to the scaffold. -The Marchioness was followed to her death by the -husband whom she had tried in vain to send to <i>his</i> -death, and who, it is said, wept beside her the whole -way from the Conciergerie to the Place de Grève. -Conspicuous in the enormous crowd assembled in -the square were women of fashion and rank, whom -the noble murderess rallied on the spectacle she had -provided for them. One of the ladies was that distinguished -gossip, Madame de Sévigné, who wrote -the whole scene down for her daughter on the following -day. De Brinvilliers was beheaded, and her body -burnt to ashes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This signal example—the torture, beheading, and -burning of a peeress of France—was signally void of -effect.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The secrets of Sainte-Croix and La Brinvilliers had -not been buried with the one, nor scattered with the -ashes of the other. Four years later, Paris talked of -nothing but poison and the revival of the "black art" -which was associated with it; and, in 1680, the King -established at the Arsenal a court specially charged -to try cases of poisoning and magic. The notoriety -of the widow Montvoisin, more commonly known as -La Voisin, who dealt extensively in both arts, was -inferior only to that of the Brinvilliers. Duchesses, -marchionesses, countesses, and other high dames of -the Court were concerned in this scandal, and Louis -himself was active in seeking to bring the culprits of -title to justice,—or to get them out of the way. He -sent a private message to the Comtesse de Soissons, -advising her that if she were innocent she should go -to the Bastille for a time, in which case he would -stand by her, and that if she were guilty, it would be -well for her to quit Paris without delay. The Comtesse, -who was "famous at the Court of Louis XIV. -for her dissolute habits," fled and was exiled to Brussels; -the Marquise d'Alluye or d'Allaye was banished -to Amboise, Mme. de Bouillon to Nevers, and M. de -Luxembourg was imprisoned for two years in the -Bastille. A far more terrible expiation was prepared -for La Voisin.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Outwardly, this was a woman of a grosser type -than the Marchioness Brinvilliers. The Marchioness, -is described as "<i>gracieuse, élégante, spirituelle et polie</i>." -La Voisin was a repellent fat creature, as coarse in -speech as in appearance. Yet she lived as a woman -of society (<i>en femme de qualitè</i>); and composed and -sold to the beauties and gallants of the Court, poisons, -charms, philters, and secrets to procure lovers or to -outwit rivals; she called up spirits for a fee, and would -shew the Devil if one paid the tariff for a glimpse of -that celebrity.<a id='r3' /><a href='#f3' class='c014'><sup>[3]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f3'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r3'>3</a>. Dulaure.</p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>Her attitude in the Salle de la Question of the -Conciergerie became her well. She cursed, flouted -the examiners, and "swore that she would keep on -swearing" if they racked her to pieces. "Here's -your health!" she cried, when the first vessel of -water was forced down her throat; and, as they -fastened her on the rack,—"That 's right! One -should always be growing. I have complained all -my life of being too short." It is said that, having -been made to drink fourteen pots of water during the -water torture, she drank fourteen bottles of wine with -the turnkeys in her cell at night. Her sentence was -death at the stake, and on her way to the place of -execution she jeered at the priest who accompanied -her, refused to make the <i>amende honorable</i> at Notre-Dame, -and fought like a tigress with the executioners -on descending from the cart. Tied and fettered on -the pile, she threw off five or six times the straw -which was heaped on her. Sévigné, who looked on, -detailed the scene with animation, and without a -touch of feeling, in a letter to her daughter.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Confounding the real crimes with chimerical ones, -the new court continued to prosecute poisoners and -"sorcerers" together; and even at that credulous and -superstitious date, when judges listened gravely to the -most baseless and fantastic accusations, there were -persons interrogated on charges of sorcery who had -the spirit to laugh both judges and accusers in the -face. Mme. de Bouillon said aloud, on the conclusion -of her examination, that she had never in her life -heard so much nonsense so solemnly spoken (<i>n'avait -jamais tant ouïdire de sottises d'un ton si grave</i>); -whereat, it is chronicled, his Majesty "was very -angry." It was not until the bench itself began to -treat as mere charlatans the wizards of both sexes -who appeared before it, that trials for sorcery and -"black magic" fell away and gradually ceased.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was the Conciergerie which presided over the -examination, torture, and atrocious punishment of -Ravaillac, the assassin of Henri IV., and Damiens, -who attempted the life of Louis XV. Ravaillac, the -first to occupy it, left his name to a tower of the -prison.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"You shiver even now in the Tower of Ravaillac," say MM. -Alhoy and Lurine in <i>Les Prisons de Paris</i>,—"that cold and -dreadful place. Thought conjures up a multitude of fearful -images, and is aghast at all the tragedies and all the dramas -which have culminated in the old Conciergerie, between the -judge, the victim, and the executioner. What tears and lamentations, -what cries and maledictions, what blasphemies and vain -threats has it not heard, that pitiless <i>doyenne</i> of the prisons of -Paris!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Ravaillac, most fearless of fanatics and devotees, -said, when interrogated before Parliament as to his -estate and calling, "I teach children to read, write, -and pray to God." At his third examination, he -wrote beneath the signature which he had affixed to -his testimony the following distich:</p> - -<div class='lg-container-l c016'> - <div class='linegroup'> - <div class='group'> - <div class='line'>"Que toujours, dans mon cœur,</div> - <div class='line'>Jésus soit le vainqueur!"</div> - </div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c017'>and a member of Parliament exclaimed on reading it, -"Where the devil will religion lodge next!"</p> -<p class='c012'>He was condemned by Parliament on the 2d of -May, 1610, to a death so appalling that one wonders -how the mere words of the sentence can have been -pronounced. Our own ancient penalty for high treason -was a mild infliction in comparison with this. -Before being led to execution, Ravaillac did penance -in the streets of Paris, wearing a shirt only and carrying -a lighted torch or candle, two pounds in weight. -Taken next to the Place de Grève, he was stripped -for execution, and the dagger with which he had -twice struck the King was placed in his right hand. -He was then put to death in the following manner. -His flesh was torn in eight places with red-hot pincers, -and molten lead, pitch, brimstone, wax, and -boiling oil were poured upon the wounds. This -done, his body was torn asunder by four horses; the -trunk and limbs were burned to ashes, and the ashes -were scattered to the winds.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Eight assassins had preceded Ravaillac in attempts -on the life of Henri IV., and six of them had paid -this outrageous forfeit. The torments of the Conciergerie -and the Place de Grève were bequeathed -by these to the regicide of 1610, and Ravaillac left -them a legacy to Robert François Damiens.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The <i>Tower of Ravaillac</i> was equally the <i>Tower of -Damiens</i>. François Damiens, a bilious and pious -creature of the Jesuits, not unfamiliar with crime, -pricked Louis, as his Majesty was starting for a drive, -with a weapon scarcely more formidable than a penknife. -He was seized on the spot, and there were -found on him another and a larger knife, thirty-seven -louis d'or, some silver, and a book of devotions,—the -assassins of the Kings of France were always pious -men. "Horribly tortured," he confessed nothing at -first, and it is by no means certain what was the -nature or importance of his subsequent avowals. -But, although there is little question that Damiens -was merely the instrument of a conspiracy more or -less redoubtable, no effort was made to arraign, -arrest, or discover his supposed accomplices. The -examination and trial, conducted with none of the -publicity which such a crime demanded, were in the -hands of persons chosen by the court, "persons suspected -of partiality," says Dulaure, "and bidden to -condemn the assassin without concerning themselves -about those who had set him on—which gives colour -to the belief, that they were too high to be touched" -(<i>que ces derniers étaient puissans</i>).</p> - -<p class='c012'>One hundred and forty-seven years had passed -since the Paris Parliament's inhuman sentence on -Ravaillac, but not a detail of it was spared to -Damiens on the 28th of March, 1757. Enough of -such atrocities.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the days of the Regency there was in one of -the suburbs of Paris a tea-garden which was at once -popular and fashionable under the name of La Courtille. -In the groves of La Courtille, on summer evenings, -amid lights and music, russet-coated burghers -might almost touch elbows with "high-rouged dames -of the palace"; and here one night Mesdames de -Parabère and de Prie brought a party of elegant -revellers. As one of the guests strolled apart, humming -an air, he was approached softly from behind, -and a hand was laid upon his shoulder.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"My gallant mask, I know you! So you have left -Normandy, eh? Well, you have made us suffer much, -but I fancy it will be our turn now. One of our cells -has long been ready for you, and you shall sleep at -the Conciergerie to-night. Cartouche!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Yes, it was indeed the great Cartouche whom a -deft detective had trapped on the sward of La Courtille. -The capture was a notable one, and the next -day and for many days to come Paris could not make -enough of it,—Paris which had suffered beatings, -plunderings, and assassinations at the hands of Cartouche -and his band for ten years past. He lay three -months at the Conciergerie, and every day his fame -increased. The Regent's finances and the "ministerial -rigours" of Dubois were disregarded; Cartouche -was a godsend to rhymesters, journalists, wits, -and diners-out; pretty lips repeated the dubious history -of his amours, and a theatrical gentleman announced -a "comedy" named after the distinguished -cut-throat. Cartouche awaited stoically enough death -by breaking on the wheel. It required a severe application -of the Question to bring him to a betrayal -of his band, but "his tongue once loosed, he passed -an entire night in naming the companions of his -crimes." The villain even denounced "three pretty -women who had been his mistresses."</p> - -<p class='c012'>He consented one day to the visit of a person -whose indiscreet candour was passing cruel. This -was the dramatist Legrand who, with his <i>Cartouche</i> -comedy in preparation, sought the "local colour" of -the condemned cell. Cartouche had the vanity which -characterises the great criminal, and willingly allowed -himself to be "interviewed"; he answered all -Legrand's questions, and then asked one himself: -"When is your piece to be represented?" "On the -day of your execution, my dear Monsieur Cartouche." -"Ah, indeed! Then you had better interview the -executioner also; he will come in at the climax, you -see."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Having entertained the playwright with his wit, the -murderer next essayed the part of patriot, and said -to his Jesuit confessor, Guignard, in speaking of the -assassination of Henri IV.:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"All the crimes that I have ever committed were the merest -peccadilloes (<i>de légères peccadilles</i>) in comparison with those which -your Order is stained with. Is there any crime more enormous -than to take the life of your King, and such a King as that was? -The noblest prince in the universe, the glory of France, the -father of his country! I tell you that if a man whom I were pursuing -had taken refuge at the foot of the statue of Henri IV., I -should not have dared to kill him."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The condition of the Conciergerie at this date was -at all events better than it had been two or three centuries -earlier. No Mediæval prisons were fit to live -in. Sanitation was a science as yet undreamed of in -Europe, and even had there been such a science, it is -improbable that the inmates of prisons would have -tasted its advantages. In the Middle Ages, nothing -was more remote from the official mind, from the -minds of all judges, magistrates, governors, gaolers, -and concierges, than the notion that prisoners should -live in wholesome and decent surroundings. Two -very definite ideas the Middle Ages had about prisons, -and only two: the first was, that they should be -impregnable, and the second was, that they should be -"gey ill" to live in; and their one idea regarding the -lot of all prisoners and captives was, that it should be -beyond every other lot wretched and unendurable.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the age we live in, civilised governments setting -about the building of a new prison do not say to their -architects, "You must build a fortress which prisoners -cannot break, and you must put into it a certain quantity -of conical cells below the level of the ground, in -which prisoners may be suffocated within a given -number of days," but, "You must build a prison of -sufficient strength; and in planning your cells you -must secure for every prisoner an ample provision of -space, air, and light." Those are the supreme differences -between ancient and modern gaols. Prison in -the old days was of all places the least healthy to live -in; nowadays, it is often the most healthy. Good -control and strict surveillance confer security upon -prisons which are not built as fortresses; but nothing -gives such immense distinction to the new system, by -contrast with all the earlier ones, as the elaborate and -minute regard of everything which may make for the -physical well-being of the prisoners.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Then comes the moral question; and from the -standpoint of morals the situation tells even more in -favour of the modern system. Imprisonment should -never be cruel; but, when the prisoner is fairly tried -and justly sentenced, it should always be both irksome -and disgraceful. The disgrace of prison, however, -depends upon the absolute impartiality of the -tribunal and the soundness of public sentiment. Nobody -is disgraced by being sent into prison in a -society in which arrest is arbitrary, and in which arraignment -at the bar is not followed by an honest -examination of the facts. Princes of the blood, -nobles, ministers, and judges and magistrates themselves -were equally liable with the commonest offenders -against the common law to be spirited into prison, -and left there, without accusation and without trial, -during many centuries of French history. Most -tribunals were corrupt, and during many ages all -were at the mercy of the Crown. A Daniel on the -bench was rare, and in great danger of being hanged; -and public sentiment was not yet articulate.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In such insecurity of justice, imprisonment could -carry with it no social stigma, as it carries inevitably -in these days. But, where there is no shame in imprisonment, -there is no question of the reform of the -prisoner, and this—one of the main endeavours of -modern penal systems—was not only quite ignored -by the old régime, but was an aspect of the matter to -which it was entirely indifferent, and which had evidently -no place whatever in its conceptions. In the -progress of civilisation, no institution has been so -completely transformed as the prison. It was an instrument -of vengeance; it is seeking, not at present -too successfully, to be an instrument of grace.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Prisons neglected or encumbered with filth are -natural hotbeds of disease, and epidemic sicknesses -were frequent. In 1548, the plague broke out in the -Conciergerie, and then for the first time an infirmary -was established in the prison, though I cannot find -that it made greatly for the comfort of the sick. -Doctor's work was grudgingly and carelessly done in -the prisons of those days, and there was no great disposition -to hinder the sick from yielding up the -ghost; the bed or the share of a bed allotted to the -patient was always wanted. The Conciergerie was -devastated by fire in 1776, and this visitation resulted -in a royal command to rehabilitate the whole interior -of the prison. In this attempt to realise the generous -thought of his minister Turgot, Louis XVI. did not -imagine, we may be sure, that he was preparing a last -lodging for Marie Antoinette!</p> - -<p class='c012'>Here then we stand on the threshold of the Conciergerie -of the Revolution—the ante-chamber of the -scaffold, in the fit words of Fouquier-Tinville.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was at four o'clock on the morning of the 14th -of October, 1793, at the close of the sitting of the -revolutionary tribunal, that the dethroned and widowed -Queen was brought to the Conciergerie. Poor, -abandoned, outraged Queen, they thrust her into one -of their common cells, and gave her for attendant a -galley-slave named Barasin. This must have been a -brave, good fellow, with a loyal heart under his galley-slave's -vest, for at the risk of his life he waited -devoutly and devotedly on the queenly woman, a -queen no longer, who could in nothing reward his -devotion. One should name also the concierge Richard, -who shewed himself not less a man in his care -of the "beautiful high-born," and who for his humanity -to her was stripped of all his goods.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The gendarmes guarded her last hours, sat there in -the cell with her, though republican modesty allowed -the intervention of a screen.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It is known what a sublime dignity sustained her to -the end; and indeed almost the worst was over when -she had quitted Fouquier-Tinville's bar, after the -"hideous indictment" and the condemnation. She -withdrew to die, and she could die as became a -Queen. Louis had gone before her, and all the -mother's dying thoughts and prayers must have been -for the children who were to live after her—how long, -she knew not. She sat in the dingy cell, clasping her -crucifix, waiting her call to the tumbril; "dim, dim, -as if in disastrous eclipse; like the pale kingdoms of -Dis!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>From this time on to the end of the Reign of Terror, -the Conciergerie offered such a spectacle as was -never seen before within the walls of any prison. -The guillotine</p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>"smoked with bloody execution."</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c017'>The Revolution was eating not her enemies only but -her children, and those victims and prospective victims, -men and women, old and young, filled the cells -of the Conciergerie, the chambers, the corridors, and -the yards. They swarmed there in disorder, dirt, -and disease, guarded and bullied by drunken turnkeys, -who had a pack of savage dogs to assist them. -They went out by batches in the tumbrils, to leave -their heads in Samson's basket, and ever fresh parties -of proscribed ones took the places of the dead. -"I remained six months in the Conciergerie," says -Nougaret, one of the historians of the period, "and -saw there nobles, priests, merchants, bankers, men -of letters, artisans, agriculturists, and honest <i>sans-culottes</i>." -Often as this population was decimated, -Fouquier-Tinville filled up the gap; and throughout -the whole of the Terror the condemned and the untried -proscribed ones, herded together, seldom had -space enough for the common decencies of life.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Then some sort of classification was attempted, and -three orders were established in the prison. The -<i>Pistoliers</i> were those who could afford to pay for the -privilege of sleeping two in a bed. The <i>Pailleux</i> lay -huddled in parties, in dens or lairs, on piles of stale -straw, "at the risk of being devoured by rats and -vermin." Nougaret remarks that in some cells the -prisoners on the floor at night had to protect their -faces with their hands, and leave the rest of their persons -to the rats. The <i>Secrets</i> were the third class of -prisoners, who made what shift they could in black -and reeking cells beneath the level of the Seine.</p> - -<p class='c012'>And the sick in the infirmary? Listen once more -to Nougaret in his <i>Histoire des Prisons de Paris et des -Départemens</i>:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"There were frightful fevers there, and you took your chance -of catching them. The patients, lying in pairs in filthy beds, -were in as wretched a plight as ever mortals found themselves in. -The doctors hardly condescended to examine them. They had -one or two potions which, as they said, were 'saddles for all -horses,' and which they administered quite indiscriminately. It -was curious to see with what an air of contempt they made their -rounds. One day, the head doctor approached a bed and felt -the patient's pulse. 'Ah,' said he to the hospital warder, 'the -man's better than he was yesterday.' 'Yes, doctor, he's a good -deal better,—but it's not the same man. Yesterday's patient is -dead; this one has taken his place.' 'Really?' said the doctor, -'that makes the difference! Well, mix this fellow his draught.'"</p> - -<p class='c012'>When the prisoners were to be locked in for the -night, there was always a great to-do in getting the -roll called. Three or four tipsy turnkeys, with half-a-dozen -dogs at their heels, passed from hand to hand -an incorrect list, which none of them could read. A -wrong name was spelled out, which no one answered -to; the turnkeys swore in chorus, and spelled out another -name. In the end, the prisoners had to come -to the assistance of the guards and call their own roll. -Then the numbers had to be told over and over again, -and the prisoners to be marched in and marched out -three or four times, before their muddled keepers -could satisfy themselves that the count was correct.</p> - -<p class='c012'>One seeks to know what the feeding was like in the -"ante-chamber of the guillotine." When, in the midst -of the Terror, Paris was pinched with hunger, the pinch -was felt severely in the Conciergerie. Rations ran desperately -short, and a common table was instituted. -The aristocrats had to pay scot for the penniless, and -came in these strange circumstances to "estimate -their fortunes by the number of <i>sans-culottes</i> whom -they fed, as formerly they had done by the numbers -of their horses, mistresses, dogs, and lackeys."</p> - -<p class='c012'>All histories, memoirs, chronicles, and legends are -agreed that the Conciergerie of the Revolution was a -frightful place. The political prisoners endured all -the horrors, physical and mental, of an unparalleled -régime. Sick and unattended, hungry and barely -fed, cold and left to shiver in dark and naked cells—these -were amongst the ills of the body. But greater -by far than these must have been the pangs of the -mind.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Nearly all of these prisoners, men and women both, -regarded death as a certainty; before ever they were -tried, from the moment that the outer door of the -prison had closed behind them, the guillotine was as -good as promised to them. They had no help to -count on from without, they had not even the animating -hope of a fair hearing by an upright judge. The -judgment bar of Fouquier-Tinville did not pretend to -be impartial.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Nevertheless, though the blade of the guillotine -was suspended over all heads, and fell daily upon -many, an air of mingled serenity and exaltation -reigned throughout the gaol. There were few tears, -and there was no weak repining. Morning and evening, -the political prisoners chanted in chorus the -hymns of the Revolution, and these were varied by -witty verses on the guillotine, composed in some instances -by prisoners on the eve of passing beneath -the knife. Some had brought in with them their -favourite books, and reading led to long discussions, -of which literature, science, religion, and politics were -alternately the themes. Devoted priests like the -Abbé Emory went about making converts, and opposing -their efforts to those of the militant atheist, -Anacharsis Clootz, who styled himself the "personal -enemy of Jesus Christ." For recreation, old games -were played and new ones invented. Imagine a -crowd of prisoners of both sexes, living in daily expectation -of the scaffold, who played for hours together -at the <i>guillotine</i>! A hall of the prison was -transformed into Tinville's tribunal, a Tinville was -placed on the bench who could parody the voice and -manner of the terrible original, the prisoner was arraigned, -there were eloquent counsel on both sides, -and witnesses; and when the trial was finished, and -the inevitable sentence had been pronounced, the -guillotine of chairs and laths was set up, and amid a -tumult of applause the wooden blade was loosed and -the victim rolled into the basket. Sometimes the -game was interrupted, and there was a general rush -to the window to catch the voice of the crier in the -street,—"Here's the list of the brigands who have -won to-day at the lottery of the blessed guillotine!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Famous figures, and a few sublime ones, detach -themselves from the groups: a Duc d'Orléans, a Duc -de Lauzun, a General Beauharnais (who writes to -his wife Josephine that letter of farewell which she -shewed to Bonaparte at her first interview with him), -Charlotte Corday, the great chemist Lavoisier (on -whose death Lagrange exclaimed, "It took but a -moment to sever that head, and a hundred years will -not produce one like it"), Danton the Titan of the -Revolution, Camille Desmoulins, and Robespierre -himself.</p> - -<p class='c012'>One evening, a few days after the death of Marie -Antoinette, the twenty-two Girondins, condemned to -die in twenty-four hours, passed into the keeping of -Concierge Richard. These were some of the most -heroic men of the Revolution, "the once flower of -French patriotism," Carlyle calls them; tribunes, prelates, -men of war, men of ancient and noble stock, -poets, lawyers. One of their number had killed himself -in court on receiving sentence, and the dead -body was carried to the prison, and lay in a corner of -the room in which the twenty-two spent their last -night. They gathered at a long deal table for a farewell -supper, at which, says Thiers, they were by -turns, "gay, serious, and eloquent." They drank to -the glory of France, and the happiness of all friends. -They sang solemnly the great songs of the Revolution, -and at five in the morning, when the turnkey -came to call the last roll, one of them arose and declaimed -the <i>Marseillaise</i>. A few hours later, the -twenty-two went chanting to their death; and the -chant was sustained until the last head had fallen.</p> - -<p class='c012'>These are amongst the loftier memories of those -bloody days. It is impossible within the limits of a -chapter to give a tithe even of the names that were -written in the registers of the <i>maison de justice</i> of the -Revolution. Well, indeed, might Fouquier-Tinville -have named it the ante-chamber of the guillotine, for -two thousand prisoners, drawn from all the other gaols -of Paris, went to the scaffold from the Conciergerie. -And they died, most of them, as children of a Revolution -should die; virgin girls were no longer timid, -women were weak no longer, when their turn came -to mount the steps of the scaffold. A sense of -patriotism so high and pure and penetrating as to -resemble the spiritual exaltation and abandonment -of the Christian martyrs seemed to extinguish in the -frailest breasts the natural fear of death. "<i>On meurt -en riant, on meurt en chantant, on meurt en criant: -Vive la France!</i>"</p> - -<p class='c012'>The fierce political interests of the revolutionary -period absorb all others; those who are not Fouquier-Tinville's -victims languish obscurely in their cells, or -travel towards the guillotine almost unnoticed. But -who is this in a condemned cell of the Conciergerie in -the year '94, not sent there by sentence of Tinville? -It is honest, unfortunate Joseph Lesurques, unjustly -convicted of the murder of a courier of Lyons,—one -of the saddest miscarriages of justice. English play-goers -are familiar with the dramatic version of the -story, which gave Sir Henry Irving the material of -one of his most remarkable creations. In the drama, -playwright's justice snatches Lesurques from the tumbril -within sight of the guillotine, but the Lesurques -of real life fared otherwise. He died, innocent and -ignorant of the crime, but the shade of the murdered -courier had a double vengeance, for the actual assassin, -Dubosc, was taken later, and duly stretched on -the <i>bascule</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the Napoleonic era, the Conciergerie lost two-thirds -of its lugubrious importance. It continued to -receive prisoners of note, but their sojourn was brief; -the prison of the Terror passed them on to Sainte-Pélagie, -Bicêtre, the Temple, or the Bastille. With -the return to France of the dynasty of Louis XVI., -the old gaol went suddenly into mourning, as one may -say, for Marie Antoinette. When Louis XVIII. commanded -the erection of an "expiatory monument" in -the Rue d'Anjou, the authorities of the Conciergerie -made haste to blot out within its walls all traces of -the Queen's captivity. They broke up the mean and -meagre furniture of her cell, the wooden table, the -two straw chairs, the shabby stump bedstead, the -screen behind which her gaolers had gossiped in -whispers; and the cell itself ceased its existence in -that form, and was converted into a little chapel or -sacristy. Some poor prisoner with a thought above -his own distresses may be praying there to-day for -the soul of Marie Antoinette.</p> - -<div id='i_p032a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p032a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>CELL OF MARIE ANTOINETTE IN THE CONCIERGERIE.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>A ghostly souvenir of 1815 may give us pause for a -moment. There is no need to rehearse the story of -Marshal Ney, bravest of the sons of France, Napoleon's -<i>le brave des braves</i>, whose surpassing services in -the field might have spared him a traitor's end. A -few days after he had "gathered into his bosom" the -bullets of a file of soldiers in the Avenue de l'Observatoire, -behind the Luxembourg, the public prosecutor, -M. Bellart, was entertaining at dinner the great -men of the bar, the army, and society. At midnight, -the door of the inner salon was suddenly thrown open, -and a footman announced: <i>Le Maréchal Ney!</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>M. Bellart and his guests, smitten to stone, looked -dumbly towards the door. The talk stopped in every -corner, the music stopped, the play at the card-tables -stopped. In a moment, the tension passed. It was -not the great Marshal, nor his astral. It was a blunder -of the footman, who had confounded the name -with that of a friend of the family, M. Maréchal -Aîné.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p033.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p034.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch03' class='c004'>CHAPTER III. <br /> <br /> THE DUNGEON OF VINCENNES. <br /> <br /> I.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>Louis XI. strolled one day in the precincts of -Vincennes, wrapped in his threadbare surtout -edged with rusty fur, and plucking at the queer little -peaked cap with the leaden image of the Virgin stuck -in the band. There was a smile on the sallow and -saturnine face.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At his Majesty's right walked a thick-set, squab -man of scurvy countenance, wearing a close-fitting -doublet, and armed like a hangman. On the King's -left went a showy person, vulgar and mean of face, -whose gait was a ridiculous strut.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Louis stopped against the dungeon and tapped the -great wall with his finger.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"What's just the thickness of this?" he asked.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Six feet in places, sire, eight in others," answered -the squab man, Tristan, the executioner.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Good!" said Louis. "But the place looks to me -as if it were tumbling."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"It might, no doubt, be in better repair, sire," observed -the showy person, Oliver, the barber; "but as -it is no longer used——"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Ah! but suppose I thought of using it, gossip?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Then, sire, your Majesty would have it repaired."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To be sure!" chuckled the King—"If I were to -shut you up in there, Oliver, you could get out, eh?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I think so, sire."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"But you, gossip," to his hangman, "you'd catch -him and have him back to me, <i>hein?</i>"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Trust me, sire!" said Tristan.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Then I'll have my dungeon mended," said Louis. -"I'm going to have company here, gossips."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Sire!" exclaimed Oliver. "Prisoners so close to -your Majesty's own apartments! But you might hear -their groans."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Ha! They groan, Oliver? The prisoners groan, -do they? But there's no need why I should live in -the château here. Hark you both, gossips, I'd like -my guests to groan and cry at their pleasure, without -the fear of inconveniencing their King."</p> - -<p class='c012'>And the King, and his hangman, and his barber fell -a-laughing.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>From that day, in a word, Louis ceased to inhabit -the château of Vincennes, and the dungeon which -appertained to it was made a terrible fastness for his -Majesty's prisoners of State. It was already a place -of some antiquity. The date of the original buildings -is quite obscure. The immense foundations of the -dungeon itself were laid by Philippe de Valois; his -son, Jean le Bon, carried the fortress to its third -story; and Charles V. finished the work which his -fathers had begun.</p> - -<p class='c012'>All prisons are not alike in their origin. In the -beginnings of states, force counts for more than legal -prescripts, and ideas of vengeance go above the -worthier idea of the repression of crime. Such-and-such -a prison, renowned in history, is the expression -in stone and mortar of the power or the hatred of its -builders. Thus and thus did they plan and construct -against their enemies. There was no mistaking, for -example, the purpose of the architect of the Bastille,—it -must be a fortress stout enough to resist the enemy -outside, and a place fit and suitable to hold and to -torture him when he had been carried a prisoner -within its walls.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But Vincennes, in its origin, at all events, may be -viewed under other and softer aspects. Those prodigious -towers, for all the frightful menace of their -frown, were not first reared to be a place of torment. -The name of Vincennes came indeed, in the end, to -be not less dreadful and only less abhorrent than that -of the Bastille. A few revolutions of the vicious -wheel of despotism, and the King's château was -transformed into the King's prison, for the pain of -the King's enemies, or of the King's too valiant subjects. -But the infancy and youth of Vincennes were -innocent enough, a reason, perhaps, why it was always -less hated of the people than the Bastille. Vincennes -lived and passed scathless through the terrors and -hurtlings of the Revolution; and presently, from its -cincture of flowers and verdant forest, looked down -upon that high column of Liberty, which occupied -the blood-stained site of the vanquished and obliterated -Bastille.</p> - -<div id='i_p036a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p036a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>THE KEEP OR DUNGEON OF VINCENNES.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>King Louis lived no more in the château, and his -masons made good the breaches in the dungeon which -neglect, rather than age, had occasioned. When it -stood again a solid mass of stone,—</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Gossip," said Louis to his executioner and torturer-in-chief, -"if there were some little executions to be -done here quietly and secretly—as you like to do -them, Tristan—what place would you choose, <i>hein</i>?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I've chosen one, sire; a beautiful chamber on -the first floor. The walls are thick enough to stifle -the cries of an army; and if you lift the stones of the -floor here and there, you find underneath the most -exquisite <i>oubliettes</i>! Ah! sire, they understood high -politics before your Majesty's time."</p> - -<p class='c012'>King Louis caressed his pointed chin, and laughed:</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I think it was Charles <i>the Wise</i> who built that -chamber."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"No, sire; it was John <i>the Good</i>!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Ah, so! Go on, gossip. My dungeon is quite -ready, eh?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Quite ready, sire."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To-morrow, then, good Tristan, you will go to -Montlhéry. In the château there you will find four -guests of mine, masked, and very snug in one of our -cosy iron cages. You will bring them here."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Very good, sire."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You will take care that no one sees you—or -them."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Yes, sire."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"And you will be tender of them, gossip. You are -not to kill them on the way. When we have them -here—we shall see. Start early to-morrow, Tristan. -As for friend Oliver here, he shall be my governor of -the dungeon of Vincennes, and devote himself to my -prisoners. If a man of them escapes, my Oliver, -Tristan will hang you; because you are not a nobleman, -you know."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Sire," murmured the barber, "you overwhelm me."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Your Majesty owed that place to me, I think," -said Tristan.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Are you not my matchless hangman, gossip? No, -no! Besides, I'm keeping you to hang Oliver. Go -to Montlhéry."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Thus was Vincennes advanced to be a State prison, -in 1473, when Louis XI. held the destinies of France. -From that date to the beginning of the century we -live in, those black jaws had neither sleep nor rest. -As fast as they closed on one victim, they opened to -receive another. At a certain stage of all despotic -governments, the small few in power live mainly for -two reasons—to amuse themselves and to revenge -themselves. One amuses oneself at Court, and a -State prison-controlled from the Court—is an ideal -means of revenging oneself. The tedious machinery -of the law is dispensed with. There is no trouble of -prosecuting, beating up witnesses, or waiting in suspense -for a verdict which may be given for the other -side. The <i>lettre de cachet</i>, which a Court historian -described as an ideal means of government, and which -Mirabeau (in an essay penned in Vincennes itself) -tore once for all into shreds, saved a world of tiresome -procedure to the King, the King's favourites, and -the King's ministers. For generations and for centuries, -absolutism, persecution, party spirit, public and -private hate used the <i>lettre de cachet</i> to fill and keep -full the cells and dungeons of the Bastille and Vincennes. -It was, to be sure, a two-edged weapon, -cutting either way. He who used it one day might -find it turned against him on another day. But, by -whomsoever employed, it was the great weapon of its -time; the most effective weapon ever forged by irresponsible -authority, and the most unscrupulously -availed of. It was this instrument which, during hundreds -of years, consigned to captivity without a limit, -in the <i>oubliettes</i> of all the State prisons of France, that -"<i>immense et déplorable contingent de prisonniers célèbres, -de misères illustres</i>."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Vincennes and the Bastille have been contrasted. -They were worthy the one of the other; and at several -points their histories touch. In both prisons the -discipline (which was much an affair of the governor's -whim) followed pretty nearly the same lines, and -owed nothing in either place to any central, preconceived -and ordered scheme of management. Prisoners -might be transferred from Vincennes to the -Bastille, and from the Bastille again to Vincennes. -For the governor, Vincennes was generally the stepping-stone -to the Bastille. At Vincennes he served -his apprenticeship in the three branches of his calling—turnkey, -torturer, and hangman. Like the callow -barber-surgeon of the age, he bled at random, and -used the knife at will; and his savage novitiate -counted as so much zealous service to the State.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But Vincennes wears a greater colour than the Bastille. -It stood to the larger and more famous fortress -as the <i>noblesse</i> to the <i>bourgeoisie</i>. Vincennes was the -great prison, and the prison of the great. Talent or -genius might lodge itself in the Bastille, and often so -did, very easily; nobility, with courage enough to -face its sovereign on a grievance, or with power -enough to be reckoned a thought too near the throne, -tasted the honours of Vincennes. To be a wit, and -polish an epigram against a minister or a madam of -the Court; to be a rhymester, and turn a couplet -against the Government; to be a philosopher, and -hazard a new social theory, was to knock for admission -at the wicket of the Bastille. But to be a stalwart -noble, and look royalty in the eye, sword in -hand; to be brother to the King, and chafe under the -royal behest; to be a cardinal of the Church, and -dare to jingle your breviary in the ranks of the -Fronde; to be leader of a sect or party, or the head -of some school of enterprise, this was to give with -your own hand the signal to lower the drawbridge of -Vincennes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At seasons prisoners of all degrees jostled one -another in both prisons; but in general the unwritten -rule obtained that philosophy and unguarded wit went -to the Bastille; whilst for strength of will that might -prove troublesome to the Crown ... <i>voilà le -donjon de Vincennes!</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>Yes, Vincennes was the <i>State</i> prison, the prison for -audacity in high places, for genius that could lead the -general mind into paths of danger to the throne. The -fetters fashioned there were for a Prince de Condé to -wear, a Henri de Navarre, a Maréchal de Montmorency, -a Bassompierre or a Cardinal de Retz, a Duc -de Longueville or a Prince Charles Edward, a La -Môle and a Coconas, a Rantzau or a Prince Casimir, -a Fouquet or a Duc de Lauzun, a Louis-Joseph de -Vendôme, a Diderot or a Mirabeau, a d'Enghien.</p> - -<p class='c012'>History, says a French historian, shews itself never -at the Bastille but with manacles in one hand and -headsman's axe in the other. At Vincennes, ever and -anon, it appears in the rustling silks of a king's favourite, -who finds within the circle of those cruel walls -soft bosky nooks and bowers, for feasting and for -love. Sometimes from the bosom of those perfumed -solitudes, a death-cry escapes, and the flowers are -spotted with blood: Messalina has dispensed with a -<i>lettre de cachet</i>. At one epoch it is Isabeau de Bavière, -it is Catherine de Médicis at another; what need to -exhaust or to extend the list? Catherine made no -sparing use of the towers of Vincennes. It was a -spectacle of royal splendours on this side and of royal -tyrannies on that; banquets and executions; the songs -of her troubadours mingling with the sighs of her -captives. Often some enemy of Catherine, quitting the -dance at her pavilion of Vincennes, fell straightway into -a cell of the dungeon, to die that night by stiletto, or -twenty years later as nature willed. Yes, indeed, -Vincennes and the Bastille were worthy of each other.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Two mysterious echoes of history still reach the -ear from what were once the vaulted dungeons of -Vincennes. The note of the first is gay and mocking, -a cry with more of victory in it than of defeat, -and one remembers the captivity of the Prince de -Condé. The other is like the sudden detonation of -musketry, and one recalls the bloody death of the -young Duc d'Enghien, the last notable representative -of the house of Condé.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Prince de Condé's affair is of the seventeenth -century. It was Anne of Austria, inspired by Mazarin, -who had him arrested, along with his brother the -Prince de Conti and their brother-in-law the Duc de -Longueville. A lighter-hearted gallant than Condé -never set foot on the drawbridge of Vincennes. On -the night of his arrival with De Conti and the duke, -no room had been prepared for his reception. He -called for new-laid eggs for supper, and slept on a -bundle of straw. De Conti cried, and De Longueville -asked for a work on theology. The next day, and -every day, Condé played tennis and shuttle-cock with -his keepers; sang and began to learn music. He -quizzed the governor perpetually, and laid out a garden -in the grounds of the prison which became the -talk of Paris. "He fasted three times a week and -planted pinks," says a chronicler. "He studied -strategy and sang the psalms," says another. When -the governor threatened him for breaches of the rules, -the Prince offered to strangle him. But not even -Vincennes could hold a Condé for long, and he was -liberated.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Briefer still was the sojourn of the Duc d'Enghien—one -of the strangest, darkest, and most tragical -events of history. In 1790, at the age of nineteen, -he had quitted France with the chiefs of the royalist -party. Twelve years later, in 1802, he was living -quietly at the little town of Ettenheim, not far from -Strasbourg; in touch with the forces of Condé, but -not, as it seems, taking active part in the movement -which was preparing against Napoleon. A mere -police report lost him with the First Consul. He -was denounced as having an understanding with the -officers of Condé's army, and as holding himself in -readiness to unite with them on the receipt of instructions -from England. Napoleon issued orders for his -arrest, and he was seized in his little German retreat -on March 15, 1804. Five days later he was lodged -in the dungeon of Vincennes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Here the prison drama, one of the saddest enacted -on the stage of history, commences. "<i>Tout est mystérieux -dans cette tragédie, dont le prologue même commence -par un secret.</i>" (Everything is mysterious in -this tragedy, the very prologue of which begins with -a secret.)</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Duke had married secretly the Princess Charlotte -de Rohan, who, by her husband's wish, continued -to occupy her own house. The daily visits of the -constant husband were a cause of suspicion to the -agents of Napoleon. They said that he was framing -plots; he was simply enjoying the society of his wife. -He was engaged, they said, in a conspiracy with -Georges and others against the life of Napoleon; he -was but turning love phrases in the boudoir of the -Princess.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The mystery accompanied the unfortunate prisoner -from Ettenheim to Strasbourg, from Strasbourg to -Paris, and went before him to Vincennes. Governor -Harel was instructed to receive "an individual whose -name is on no account to be disclosed. The orders -of the Government are that the strictest secrecy is to -be preserved respecting him. He is not to be questioned -either as to his name or as to the cause of his -detention. You yourself will remain ignorant of his -identity."</p> - -<p class='c012'>As he was driven into Paris at five o'clock on -the evening of March 20th, the Duke said with a fine -assurance:</p> - -<p class='c012'>"If I may be permitted to see the First Consul, it -will be settled in a moment."</p> - -<p class='c012'>That request never reached Napoleon, and the -prisoner was hurried to Vincennes. His only thought -on reaching the château was to ask that he might -have leave to hunt next day in the forest. But the -next day was not yet come.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The mystery does not cease. The military commission -sent hot-foot from Paris to try the case were -"<i>dans l'ignorance la plus complète</i>" both as to the name -and the quality of the accused. An aide-de-camp of -Murat gave the Duke's name to them as they gathered -at the table in an ante-chamber of the prison to inquire -what cause had summoned them. D'Enghien was -abed and asleep.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Bring in the prisoner," and Governor Harel fetched -d'Enghien from his bed. He stood before his judges -with a grave composure, and not a question shook him.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Interrogated as to plots against the Emperor's -life, taxed with projects of assassination, he answered -quietly that insinuations such as these were insults to -his birth, his character, and his rank."<a id='r4' /><a href='#f4' class='c014'><sup>[4]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f4'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r4'>4</a>. <i>Histoire du Donjon de Vincennes.</i></p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>The inquiry finished, the Duke demanded with -insistence to see the First Consul. Savary, Napoleon's -aide-de-camp, whispered the council that the -Emperor wished no delay in the affair,<a id='r5' /><a href='#f5' class='c014'><sup>[5]</sup></a> and the -prisoner was withdrawn.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f5'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r5'>5</a>. It is moderately certain at this day that everyone representing Napoleon in -this miserable affair of d'Enghien <i>mis</i>-represented him from first to last.</p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>Some twenty minutes later a gardener of the château, -Bontemps by name, was turned out of bed in a -hurry to dig a grave in the trenches against the Pavilion -de la Reine; and the officer commanding the guard -had orders to furnish a file of soldiers.</p> - -<p class='c012'>D'Enghien sat composedly in his room against the -council-chamber, writing up his diary for his wife, and -wondering whether leave would be given him to hunt -on the morrow. Enters, once more, Governor Harel, -a lantern in his hand. It was on the stroke of midnight.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Would monsieur le duc have the kindness to -follow?" It is still on record that the governor -was pale, looked troubled, and spoke with much -concern.</p> - -<p class='c012'>He led the way that conducted to the Devil's -Tower. The stairs from that tower descended -straight into the trenches. At the head of the staircase, -looking into the blackness beyond, the Duke -turned and said to his conductor: "Are you taking -me to an <i>oubliette</i>? I should prefer, <i>mon ami</i>, to be -shot."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Monsieur," said Harel, "you must follow me,—and -God grant you courage!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"It is a prayer I never yet needed to put up," -responded d'Enghien calmly, and he followed to the -foot of the stairs.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Shoulder arms!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>A lantern glimmering at either end of the file of -soldiers shewed d'Enghien his fate. As the sentence -of death was read, he wrote in pencil a message to -his wife, folded and gave it to the officer in command -of the file, and asked for a priest. There was -no priest in residence at the château, he was told.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"And time presses!" said the Duke. He prayed a -moment, covering his face with his hands. As he -raised his head, the officer gave the word to fire.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Volumes have been written upon this tragedy, but -to this day no one knows by whose precise word the -blood of the last Condé was spilled in the trenches of -Vincennes. That d'Enghien was assassinated seems -beyond question—but by whom? Years after the -event, General Hullin, president of the commission, -asserted in writing that no order of death was ever -signed; and that the members of the commission, still -sitting at the council-table, heard with amazement the -volley that made an end of the debate. Napoleon -bore and still bears the opprobrium, but the proof -lacks. Yet who, under the Consulate, dared shoot -a d'Enghien, failing the Consul's word? The stones -of Vincennes, wherein the mystery is locked, have -kept their counsel.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Let the curtain be drawn for a moment on the -last scene in the tragedy of La Môle and Coconas. -It is a lurid picture of the manners of the time—the -last quarter of the sixteenth century, Charles IX. on -the throne. The tale, which space forbids to tell at -length, is one of love and jealousy, with the wiles of -a <i>soi-disant</i> magician in the background. The prime -plotter in the affair was the Queen-Mother, Catherine -de Médicis. La Môle was the lover of Marguerite -de Navarre; Coconas, the lover of the Queen's friend, -the Duchesse de Nevers. Arrested on a dull and -senseless charge of conspiring by witchcraft against -the life of the King, the two courtiers were thrown -into Vincennes. The first stage of the trial yielding -nothing, the accused were carried to the torture -chamber, and there underwent all the torments of -the Question. After that, being innocent of the -charge, they were declared guilty, and sentenced to -the axe.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Justice" was done upon them in the presence of -all Paris, wondering dumbly at the iniquity of the -punishment.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Night had fallen, and the executioner was at supper -with his family in his house in the tower of the -pillory. All good citizens shunned that accursed -dwelling, and those who had to pass the headsman's -door after dark crossed themselves as they did so. -All at once there was a knocking at the door.</p> - -<p class='c012'>On his dreadful days of office the "Red Man" -sometimes received the stealthy visit of a friend, -brother, wife, or sister, come to beg or purchase a -lock of hair, a garment, or a jewel.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"There's money coming to us," said the headsman -to his wife. He opened the door, and on the -threshold stood a man, armed, and two women.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"These ladies would speak with you," said the -man; and as the headsman stood aside, the two ladies, -enveloped in enormous hoods, entered the house, -their companion remaining without.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You are the executioner?" said an imperious -voice from behind an impenetrable veil.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Yes, madame."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You have here ... the bodies of two gentlemen."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The headsman hesitated. The lady drew out a -purse, which she laid upon the table. "It is full of -gold," she said.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Madame," exclaimed the "Red Man," "what do -you wish? I am at your service."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Shew me the bodies," said the lady.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Ah! madame, but consider. It is terrible!" said -the headsman, not altogether unmoved. "You would -scarcely support the sight."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Shew them to me," said the lady.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Taking a lighted torch, the headsman pointed to a -door in a corner of the room, dark and humid.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"In there!" he said.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The lady who had not yet spoken broke into an -hysterical sob. "I dare not! I dare not! I am terrified!" -she cried.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Who loves should love unto death ... and -in death," said she of the imperious voice.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The headsman pushed open the door of a cellar-like -apartment, held the torch above his head, and -from the black doorway the two ladies gazed in silent -horror upon the mutilated spoils of the scaffold. In -the red ooze upon the bare stone floor the bodies of -La Môle and Coconas lay side by side. The severed -heads were almost in their places, a circular black -line dividing them from the white shoulders. The -first of the two ladies, with heaving bosom, stooped -over La Môle, and raised the pale right hand to her -lips.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Poor La Môle! Poor La Môle! I will avenge -you!" she murmured.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Then to the executioner: "Give me the head! -Here is the double of your gold."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Ah! madame, I cannot. I dare not! Suppose -the Provost——"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"If the Provost demands this head of you, tell him -to whom you gave it!" and the lady swept the veil -from her face.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The headsman bent to the earth: "Madame the -Queen of Navarre!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"And the head of Coconas to me, maître," said the -Duchesse de Nevers.<a id='r6' /><a href='#f6' class='c014'><sup>[6]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f6'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r6'>6</a>. In effect, Margaret of Navarre bore away the head of La Môle, and the -Duchesse de Nevers that of Coconas. It is said that La Môle on the scaffold -bequeathed his head to the Queen.</p> -</div> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Amongst Louis XV.'s State prisoners, a long and -picturesque array, may be singled out for the present -Prince Charles Edward, son of the Pretender. Under -the wind of adversity, after Culloden, Prince Charles -was blown at length upon French soil. Louis was -gracious in his offer of an asylum, and courtly France -was enthusiastic over the exploits and fantastic -wanderings of the young hero. All went gaily with -him in Paris until the signatures had been placed to -the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. Then the wind began -to blow from the east again.</p> - -<p class='c012'>One morning the visit was announced of MM. de -Maurepas and the Duc de Gèvres.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Gentlemen," said Prince Charles to his friends, -"I know what this visit bodes. His Majesty proposes -to withdraw his hospitality. We are to be -driven out of France."</p> - -<p class='c012'>His handful of followers were stupefied, but the -Prince was right. M. de Maurepas announced himself -as commanded by the King to request Prince -Charles Edward's immediate departure from France.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Sir," returned the Prince, "your King has given -me shelter, and the title of brother."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Monseigneur," said M. de Maurepas, "circumstances -have changed——"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To my advantage, sir! For over and above the -rights which Louis XV. has acknowledged in me, I -have those more sacred ones of misfortune and persecution."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"His Majesty, monseigneur, is beyond doubt deeply -touched by your misfortunes, but the treaty he has just -signed for the welfare of his people compels him now -to deny you his succour."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Does your King indeed break his word and oath -so lightly?" said Prince Charles. "Is the blood of a -proscribed and exiled prince, to whom he has but just -given his hand, so trifling a matter to him?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Monseigneur," said de Maurepas, "I am not here -to sustain an argument with you. I am only the bearer -of his Majesty's commands."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Then tell the King from me that I shall yield only -to his force."</p> - -<p class='c012'>This was on December 10, 1748.</p> - -<p class='c012'>When Louis's emissaries had retired, Prince Charles -announced his intention of going to the Opera in the -evening. His followers feared some public scandal, -and did their utmost to dissuade him.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"The more public the better!" cried the Prince in -a passion.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In effect, he drove to the Opera after dinner. De -Maurepas had surrounded the building with twelve -hundred soldiers, and as the Prince's carriage drew -up at the steps, a troop of horse encircled it, and -he himself was met with a brusque request for his -sword.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Come and take it!" said young Hotspur, flourishing -the weapon.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In a moment he was seized from behind, his hands -and arms bound, and the soldiers lifted him into -another carriage, which was forthwith driven off at a -gallop.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Where are you taking me?" asked the Prince.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Monseigneur, to the dungeon of Vincennes."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Ah, indeed! Pray thank your King for having -chosen for me the prison which was honoured by the -great Condé. You may add that, whilst Condé was -the subject of Louis XIV., I am only the guest of -Louis XV."</p> - -<p class='c012'>M. du Châtelet, governor of Vincennes at that -epoch, had received orders to make the Prince's imprisonment -a rigorous one, and fifty men were specially -appointed to watch him. But du Châtelet, a -friend and admirer of the young hero, took his part, -and counselled him to abandon a resistance which -must be worse than futile, "You have had triumph -enough," said the prudent du Châtelet, "in exposing -the feebleness and cowardice of the King."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Prince Charlie's detention lasted but six days. He -was liberated on December 16th, and left Paris in the -keeping of an officer of musketeers to join his father -in Rome.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Absolutism, <i>l'arbitraire</i>, all through this period was -making hay while the sun shone, and playing rare -tricks with the liberties of the subject. Vincennes -was a witness of strange things done in the name of -the King's justice. Take the curious case of the -Abbé Prieur. The Abbé had invented a kind of shorthand, -which he thought should be of some use to the -ministry. But the ministry would none of it, and the -Abbé made known his little invention to the King of -Prussia, a patron of such profitable things. But one -of his letters was opened at the post-office by the -<i>Cabinet Noir</i>, and the next morning Monsieur l'Abbé -Prieur awoke in the dungeon of Vincennes. He inquired -the reason, and in the course of months his -letter to the King of Prussia was shewn to him.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"But I can explain that in a moment," said the -Abbé. "Look, here is the translation."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The hieroglyphs, in short, were as innocent as a -verse of the Psalms, but the Abbé Prieur never quitted -his dungeon.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A venerable and worthy nobleman, M. Pompignan -de Mirabelle, was imprudent enough to repeat at a -supper party some satirical verses he had heard touching -Madame de Pompadour and De Sartines, the -chief of police. Warned that De Sartines had filled -in his name on a <i>lettre de cachet</i>, M. de Mirabelle -called at the police office, and asked to what prison -he should betake himself. "To Vincennes," said De -Sartines.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To Vincennes," repeated M. de Mirabelle to his -coachman, and he arrived at the dungeon before the -order for his detention.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Once a year, De Sartines made a formal visit to -Vincennes, and once a year punctually he demanded -of M. de Mirabelle the name of the author of the -verses. "If I knew it I should not tell you," was the -invariable reply; "but as a matter of fact I never heard -it in my life." M. de Mirabelle died in Vincennes, a -very old man.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A Swiss, by name Thoring, in the service of Madame -de Foncemargue, told a dream in which his mistress -had appeared to him with this message: "You -must assassinate the King, and I will save you. You -will be deaf and dumb until the deed is accomplished."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The man was clearly of unsound mind, but weak -intellects were not allowed to murder kings in their -sleep, and he was cast into Vincennes. Twenty years -later he was seen chained by the middle to the wall of -his cell, half naked and wholly mad.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But we may leave the prisoners for a while, and -throw a glance upon the great castellany itself. It is -best viewed, perhaps, as it stood at the commencement -of the eighteenth century. Nine gigantic towers -composed the fortress. A tenth out-topped them—the -tower of the dungeon, distinguished as the royal -manor. Two drawbridges gave access to the prison -proper, the one small and very narrow, the other of -an imposing size, to admit vehicles. Once beneath -the wicket, the prisoner saw himself surrounded on -every side by walls of prodigious elevation and thickness. -He stood now immediately at the foot of the -dungeon, which reared its vast height above him. -Before beginning the ascent, three heavy doors must -be opened for him, and that which communicated directly -with the dungeon could be unfastened only by -the joint action of the turnkey from within and the -sergeant of the guard from without. Straight from -this inner door rose the steep staircase which led to -the dungeon towers. There were four of these towers, -one at each angle, and communication between -them was by means of immense halls or chambers, -each defended by its own iron-ribbed doors.</p> - -<p class='c012'>To each of the four towers, four stories; and at -each story a hall thirty feet long, and from fifteen to -eighteen feet wide. At the four corners of the hall, -four dismal chambers—the prisoners' cells. These -cells were like miniature fortresses. A solid outer -door being opened, a second one presented itself. -Beyond the second was a third; and the third, iron-plated -on both sides, and armed with two locks and -three bolts, was the door of the cell. The three doors -acted upon one another in such a manner that, unless -their secret were known, the second barred the first, -and the third barred the second. Light entered the -cells through four loopholes, of which the inner -orifices were a foot and a half in width, and the outer -only six inches.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the great halls on which the cells opened, prisoners -were exercised for a limited time (never more -than an hour) on rainy days, or when the orders of -the governor forbade them to descend to the walled -garden of the dungeon.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The hall of the first floor, celebrated in the annals -of barbarism, was called the <i>Salle de la Question</i>, or -torture chamber. It had its stone benches, on which, -the miserable creatures were placed to wait and watch -the preparations for their torment; and great iron -hoops or rings attached to the walls, to compress -their limbs when the Question was to be put. Hard -by this frightful chamber—which was fitted with every -contrivance for the infliction of bodily suffering—were -certain diminutive cells, deprived of light and air, and -furnished with plank beds, on which prisoners were -chained for a moment of repose between the first and -second applications of the torture.<a id='r7' /><a href='#f7' class='c014'><sup>[7]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f7'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r7'>7</a>. Up to the reign of Louis XVI., every prison in Paris and the principal -courts of justice had a torture chamber, and precise rules existed as to the -various kinds of torture that might be resorted to, the mode in which each was -to be applied, the persons who were to be present during the Question, the -preliminary examination of the prisoner by a surgeon, the manner of binding, -stretching, etc., together with the minutest details respecting the several forms -of the Question, and the means to be employed to restore the sufferer for a -second application.</p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>On the ground floor of the dungeon were the -dark cells. These were in no way connected with -the <i>Salle de la Question</i>, but served as the abodes for -months, or even for years, of those unhappy prisoners -against whom absolutism had a special grudge, or -whom the governor took a pleasure in reducing to -the last extremity of misery. Here was a bed hollowed -in the stone wall, and littered with mouldy -straw; and rings in the wall and floor for waist-chains -and leg-irons. Such a dwelling as this might receive -the unfortunate whose <i>lettre de cachet</i> bore the appalling -legend: <i>Pour être oublié!</i>—(<i>To be forgotten!</i>).</p> - -<p class='c012'>But there were darker profundities yet in this -Tartarus of the Kings of France. Almost as far -as its towers rose above the ground, the dungeon -plunged downwards in subterranean abysses, deep -below deep. How many victims sank in those -secure abysses, and were silently extinguished!</p> - -<p class='c012'>In a place which witnessed so many last earthly -moments, a chapel was a necessity. Hasty absolution -was often given for the crimes real or imaginary -which were so rudely expiated within the royal -manor; and sometimes prisoners were carried in a -dying state from the <i>Salle de la Question</i> to receive -the last rites of the Church in one of the three small -chapel cells with double doors. Here, on the very -threshold of death, one lay in semi-darkness to hear -the mass which was pronounced on the other side of -the wall. Over the chaplain's apartment was the -singular inscription, <i>Carcer sacerdotis</i> (<i>Prison of the -Priest</i>), which allows the inference that the chaplain, -whilst in the exercise of his functions, was not allowed -to communicate with the outer world.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A narrow stone staircase of two hundred and sixty-five -high steps, obstructed at frequent intervals by -sealed doors, conducted to a small and well made -terrace at the very top of the dungeon. It is probable -that this terrace is still in existence.<a id='r8' /><a href='#f8' class='c014'><sup>[8]</sup></a> It was -little used—perhaps because it was the pleasantest -place in the prison,—but tradition has represented -Mirabeau as taking an occasional airing on that -superb summit. The little lantern-shaped tower -placed here contained the chapel which was once -the oratory of the Kings of France. Some nerve -must have been needed for Majesty to pray at ease, -whilst crushing with its knees that mass of human -wretchedness!</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f8'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r8'>8</a>. Vincennes is now a fort and artillery barracks, and may neither be sketched -nor photographed.</p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>The great court below was parcelled into little -close gardens, where, under rigid surveillance, favoured -prisoners took their dreary exercise.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Few prisons the like of Vincennes have been -erected. Those tremendous towers, those almost -impenetrable walls, those double and triple doors -garnished with iron, the trenches forty feet in depth, -those wide outer galleries to give the sentries command -at every point—what more could genius and -industry invent to combat the prisoner's passion for -liberty? There were, indeed, few escapes from Vincennes. -The prisoner who broke prison from the -Bastille, and won his way into the trenches, nearly -always made good his flight; but in the trenches of -Vincennes, if he ever reached them, he was more -helpless than a rat in a bucket. The architect of -Vincennes was up some half-hour earlier than the -architect of the Bastille.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Twice every hour of the twenty-four the patrol -made a complete tour of the dungeon; and night -and morning, before the closing and opening of the -doors, the trenches (which were forbidden to the -turnkeys except by express order) were surveyed -from end to end, that no letters might be thrown -there by prisoners upon whom the State had set a -seal like that of the <i>Masque de Fer</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Over and above all these <i>précautions barbares</i>, the -sentries had orders to turn the eyes of every passerby -from the dungeon towers. No one might stand -or draw bridle in the shadow of Vincennes. It might -be a relative or friend seeking to learn in what exact -cell the captive was lodged! From light to dusk, the -sentry reiterated his changeless formula: <i>Passez votre -chemin!</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>We have yet to see what life the prisoners led.</p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div>II.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>The hour, the manner, and the circumstances of -his reception at Vincennes were little adapted to -lessen the apprehensions of a prisoner regarding the -fate that awaited him. It was generally at night -that the arrest was effected, and the dismal ceremony -of admission lost nothing amid the general gloom of -the scene, streaked here and there by the thin light -of the warders' lanterns. It would have been distressing -enough to pass into that black keep as the -King's prisoner, after a fair trial in open court, and -with full knowledge of the term of one's captivity; -how much more so to find oneself thrust in there on -some vague or fabulous charge, a victim not of offended -laws but of some cold caprice of vengeance, to -stay the pleasure of an enemy who might forget his -prisoner before he forgot his wrath. At Vincennes -as in the Bastille, prisoners lived on, hopelessly forgotten, -years after the death of their accusers.</p> - -<p class='c012'>On arrival at the dungeon the prisoner was searched -from head to foot, and all papers, money, or other -valuables were taken from him. This was done -under the eyes of the governor, who then, preceded -by two turnkeys, led his charge up that steep, narrow -and winding staircase which has been described. -One vast hall after another was slowly traversed, -with frequent halts for the unbarring of doors which -creaked on their rusty hinges. The flicker of the -lanterns amid that sea of shadows brought into dim -evidence huge locks and padlocks, loopholes and -casements, garnished with twisted iron bars; and -every footfall found an echo in the vaulted ceilings.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At the end of this oppressive journey, the prisoner -came to his den, a miserable place containing a -wooden stump bedstead, a couple of rush chairs, and -a table stained with the dishes of every previous -occupant. If it were past the hour at which prisoners -were served with supper, he would probably be denied -a morsel of food; and the governor left him, after -bestowing his first injunction: "I would have you -remember, monsieur, that this is the house of -silence."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The prisoner had now to keep himself in patience -until the governor decided on his lot—that is to say, -on the life that he should lead. There was no ordered -system such as regulates the existence of an army of -convicts undergoing sentence of penal servitude in -these days. The power of the governor was all but -autocratic, and though he made constant reference to -"the rules," he interpreted those shadowy prescriptions -entirely as it pleased him. "It is the rule," said -the governor, when enforcing some petty tyranny. -"It is not the rule," he said, when denying some -petty favour. Sometimes the prisoner was forbidden -by superior order the use of books and writing -materials, but more frequently such an order issued -from the lips of the governor himself. If permission -to read and write were accorded, new difficulties arose. -There was no special library attached to the dungeon, -and as the governor's tastes were seldom literary, his -store of books was scanty, and the volumes were -usually in the keeping of those few prisoners whom -he favoured. As for writing materials, little books -of note-paper were sparsely doled, each sheet numbered -and to be accounted for; and no letter could -leave the prison without the governor's scrutiny.</p> - -<p class='c012'>As the prisoner read and wrote, so also did he eat -and drink, by favour of the governor. An allowance -sufficient for each prisoner's maintenance was authorised -and paid by the State, but most of the King's -bounty contributed to swell the governor's private -fortune. The tariff allowed and paid out of the royal -treasury was:</p> -<p class='c019'>For a prince of the blood, about £2 <i>per diem</i>.</p> - -<p class='c019'>For a marshal of France, about £1 10<i>s.</i></p> - -<p class='c019'>For a lieutenant-general, about £1.</p> - -<p class='c019'>For a member of Parliament, about 15<i>s.</i></p> - -<p class='c019'>For an ordinary judge, a priest, a captain in the -army, or an official of good standing, about 7<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i></p> - -<p class='c019'>For a barrister or a citizen of means, about 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i></p> - -<p class='c019'>For a small tradesman, about 1<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>At such rates as these, all prisoners should have -been well cared for in those days; but the truth is -that the governors who entered Vincennes with small -means left it rich men. Not only the moneys allotted -for food, but the allowances of wood, lights, etc., were -shamelessly pilfered; and prisoners who were unable or -forbidden to supplement the royal bounty from their -own purses were often half-starved and half-frozen in -their cells. As for the quality of the food, warders and -kitchen-assistants sometimes tried to sell in Vincennes -meat taken from the prison kitchen, but it had an ill -name amongst the peasants: "That comes from the -dungeon; it's rotten." On the other hand, wealthy -prisoners who enjoyed the governor's favour, or who -could bring influence to bear on him from without, -were allowed to beguile the tedium of captivity by -unlimited feasting and drinking. The inmate of one -cell, lying in chains, dirt, and darkness, might be kept -awake at night by the tipsy strains of his neighbour -in the cell adjoining. Governors avaricious above -the common generally had their dark cells full, so as -to be able to feed on bread and water the prisoners -for whom they received the regular daily tariff. -Ordinarily, there were but two meals a day, dinner -at eleven in the morning and supper at five in -the evening; hence, if your second ration were insufficient, -you must go hungry for eighteen hours. -A privileged few were allowed a valet at their own -charge, but the majority of the prisoners of both sexes -were served by the turnkeys.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The turnkeys visited the cells three times a day, -rather as spies, it seems, than as ministers to the -needs of the prisoners. "They came like heralds of -misfortune," says one. "A face hard, expressionless, -or insolent; an imperturbable silence; a heart proof -against the sufferings of others. Useless to address -a question to them; a curt negative was the sole response. -'I know nothing about it,' was the turnkey's -eternal formula."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Some prisoners, but by no means all, were allowed -to walk for an hour a day in one of the confined -gardens at the base of the tower; always in company -with a warder, who might neither speak nor be -spoken to. As the hour struck, the exercise ceased.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Such seems to have been the external routine of -life at Vincennes. Beneath the surface was the perpetual -tyrannous oppression of the governor and his -subordinates on the one side, and on the other a -weight of suffering, extended to almost every detail -of existence, endured by the great majority of the -prisoners; silently even unto death in some instances, -but in others not without desperate resistance, long -sustained against overwhelming odds.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The recital of Mirabeau's captivity throws into -curious relief the inner life of the dungeon. The -governor was a certain De Rougemont, of most unrighteous -memory, whom Latude describes as having -written his name in blood on the walls of every cell. -Elsewhere the same narrator says that prisoners occasionally -strangled themselves to escape the rage of -De Rougemont, who was seventeen years in charge -of Vincennes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The fiery, impetuous Mirabeau was ceaselessly at -variance with this "despotic ape," who delighted in -trying to repress by the most contemptible annoyances -that irrepressible spirit. Complaint was a fault -in the eyes of De Rougemont, impatience a crime.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The future tribune,<a id='r9' /><a href='#f9' class='c014'><sup>[9]</sup></a> whose head was always in the -clouds, complained incessantly and was impatience -incarnate. Night or day he gave his gaoler no peace. -Mirabeau's lodging in the fortress was a small tower-chamber -between the second and third story, rarely -visited by the sun; it was in existence fifty years ago, -and bore the number 28. De Rougemont began by -submitting him to all the rigours of "the rules." -Mirabeau demanded leave to write, it was refused; -to read, it was refused; to take a daily airing, it was -refused. He could not get scissors to cut his hair, -nor a barber to dress it for him. He was four -months in altercation with De Rougemont before he -could obtain the use of a blunt table-knife. He could -not get at his trunk to procure himself a change of -linen.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f9'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r9'>9</a>. He was imprisoned mainly on the order of the Marquis de Mirabeau, his -father, whose lifelong jealousy of that brilliant son is matter of history; a -finished example of the domestic bully, and a matchless humbug and hypocrite, -whose every action gave the lie to his by-name <i>Friend of Man</i>. In the course -of his life, the Marquis procured no fewer than fifty <i>lettres de cachet</i> against -members of his own family.</p> -</div> - -<div id='i_p062a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p062a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>MIRABEAU ON THE TERRACE OF VINCENNES.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>"Is it by 'the rules' that my trunk is kept from -me?" he demanded of the governor.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"What need have you of your trunk?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Need! I want clothes and linen. I am still wearing -what I brought into this rat-hole!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"What does it matter? You see no company -here."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I am to go foul, then, because I see no company! -Is that your rule? Once more, let me have my -trunk."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"We have not the key of it."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Send for a locksmith,—an affair of an hour."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Where am I to find the hour? Have I no one -and nothing else to attend to? Are you the only -prisoner here?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"That is no answer. You are here to take care of -your prisoners. Give me my trunk, I tell you!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"<i>It is against the rules.</i> We shall see by-and-bye."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"As usual! 'We shall see.' In the meantime perhaps -you will have the goodness to send a barber to -shave me and cut my hair."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Ah! I must speak about that to the minister."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"What! The minister's permission to——"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Yes. <i>It is the rule.</i>"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Indeed! The doctor said as much, but I refused -to credit him."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You were wrong, you see!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Now that I remember, he told me something else, -that in the present state of my health a bath, with as -little delay as possible, was indispensable. Perhaps he -did not mention that to you?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I fancy he did say something about it."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Oh, he did! But the King and the Government -have not debated it yet, I suppose? Well, sir, I want -a bath and I'm going to have one."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You have no right to give orders here, sir."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Nor have you the right to withhold what the -doctor prescribes for me."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"M. de Mirabeau, you are insolent. Do you forget -that I represent the King?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"He could not be more grotesquely represented. -The distance between you and his Majesty is short, -sir."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The governor (to make the joke more apparent) -was short and of a full habit. He went out speechless, -and Mirabeau would doubtless have felt the -effects of his rage had it not been for the interest -of Lenoir, Lieutenant-General of Police, who was -always ready to stand between the prisoner and the -vengeful gaoler. Through Lenoir, who won for him -the intercession of the Princesse de Lamballe, Mirabeau -got the use of books and pen, and some other -small indulgences. He wrote to his father: "Will -you not ease me of my chains? Let me have friends -to see me; let me have leave to walk. Let me exchange -the dungeon for the château. There as here I -should be under the King's hand, and close enough to -the prison, if I should abuse that measure of liberty." -The implacable <i>Friend of Man</i> vouchsafed no response -to this entreaty. The prisoner buried himself -in the books that were given him, but they were for -the most part "<i>de mauvais auteurs</i>," who had nothing -to teach him. He flung them from him one by one, and -as he paced his cell he began those brilliant improvisations -which were soon to electrify France, and which -struck absolutism at its root. In this way he worked -out the scheme of the <i>lettres de cachet</i>, that work of -flaming eloquence in which the genius of liberty approaches, -seizes, and strangles the dragon of despotism. -Deprived of all but his pen, Mirabeau let fall -from the height of his dungeon on the head of royalty -that thunderbolt of a treatise. Since De Rougemont -would never, for a hundred chiefs of police, have aided -him with materials for this purpose, he tore out of all -the books he could lay hands on the fly-leaves and -blank spaces, and covered them with his fine close -writing. Each completed slip he concealed in the -lining of his coat, and in this manner did the tribune -compose and preserve his work, every page of which -was a prophecy of the coming Revolution. When -inspiration lacked for a time, he prostrated himself -on the flags of his cell and wept for his absent mistress, -or he renewed hostilities with De Rougemont. -The battle of the trunk was followed by the battle of -the looking-glass.</p> - -<p class='c012'>He could not go through his toilet without a looking-glass, -he insisted; and in a letter to the governor -which must have filled several manuscript pages he -exhausted his logic and his sarcasm in enforcing this -modest request. He got his mirror in the end, and -then renewed his fruitless correspondence with his -father, and made an eloquent attempt to move the -clemency of the King. "Deign, sire, to save me from -my persecutors," he wrote to Louis. "Look with -pity on a man twenty-eight years of age, who, buried -in full life, sees and feels the slow approach of brutish -inertia, despair, and madness, darkening and paralysing -the noblest of his years." M. Lenoir himself -placed this letter in the King's hands, but nothing -came of it for Mirabeau, who continued in the pauses -of astonishing literary labours his fight for liberty from -behind his prison bars. By clamours and entreaties -he succeeded at length in forcing his way through -them.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Amongst the prisoners of renown of the eighteenth -century Latude must not pass unnoticed. His sojourn -in and escape from the Bastille have been much more -widely bruited than his captivity at Vincennes, where -also he did things wonderful and suffered pains and -indignities incredible. Needless to say that he gave -his guards the slip, and equally needless to add that -he was recovered and brought back. His second incarceration -was in one of De Rougemont's <i>cachots</i> -(De Rougemont always had a <i>cachot</i> available), from, -which, on the surgeon's declaration that his life was -in danger, he was removed to a more habitable chamber. -On his way thither he found and secreted one -of those handy tools which fortune seemed always to -leave in the path of Latude, and used it to establish -a most ingenious means of communication with his -fellow-prisoners. No one ever yet performed such -wonders in prison as Masers de Latude. No one accomplished -such unheard-of escapes. No one, when -retaken, paid with such cruel interest the penalty of -his daring. Was the man only a splendid fable, as -some latter-day sceptics have suggested? The question -has been put, but no one will ever affirm it with -authority, and the weight of the evidence seems to lie -with Latude the man and not with Latude the legend.</p> - -<p class='c012'>No great distance separated the chamber of Latude -from the <i>cachot</i> of the Prévôt de Beaumont. The -Prévôt was a great criminal: he had had the courage -to denounce and expose that gigantic State fraud, -the <i>pacte de famine</i>, in which the De Sartines before -named and other persons of consequence were involved. -Those were not the days for Prévôts de -Beaumont to meddle as critics with criminal ventures -of this sort, and the Prévôt had his name written on -the customary form. He spent twenty-two years in -five of the State prisons of France, and fifteen of -them in the dungeon of Vincennes.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"There is not in the <i>Saints' Martyrology</i>," he wrote (in the -record which he gave to the people of the Revolution of his experiences -in the dungeon of the Monarchy), "such a tale of -tribulations and torments as were suffered by me on twelve separate -occasions in the fifteen years of my captivity at Vincennes. -On one occasion I was confined four months in the <i>cachot</i>, nine -months on another occasion, eighteen months on a third; of my -fifteen years in the dungeon, <i>seven years and eight months</i> were -passed in the black hole. The cruel De Sartines never ceased -to harry me; the monster De Rougemont surpassed the orders -of De Sartines. Yes, I have lain almost naked and with fettered -ankles for eighteen months together. For eighteen months at a -time, I have lived on a daily allowance of two ounces of bread -and a mug of water. I have more than once been deprived of -both for three successive days and nights."<a id='r10' /><a href='#f10' class='c014'><sup>[10]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f10'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r10'>10</a>. I have summarised here the extracts in the original from the pamphlet of -the Prévôt de Beaumont quoted at great length by the authors of the <i>Histoire -du Donjon de Vincennes</i>. As a curiosity of prison literature, the Prévôt's -pamphlet, if correctly cited, goes above the little eighteenth-century work on -Newgate by "B. L. of Twickenham."</p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>The dramatic interest of the Prévôt's imprisonment -culminates in an assault upon him in his cell, -renewed at four several ventures by the whole strength -of the prison staff "and the biggest dog that I have -ever seen." The Prévôt had devoted five years to -the stealthy composition of an essay on the <i>Art of -True Government</i>, which was actually a history of the -<i>pacte de famine</i>. His attempts to get it printed were -discovered by the police, and the attack on his cell -was designed to wrest from him the manuscript. He -sets out the affair in detail with the liveliest touches—"First -Round," "Second Round," etc.—shews -himself levelling De Rougemont with a brick in the -stomach, the dog with a blow on the nose, and blinding -a brace of warders with the contents of his slop-bucket. -At last, faced by an order in the King's -writing, he allowed himself to be transferred from -Vincennes to Charenton, on the express understanding -that his precious manuscript should be transferred -with him. The Prévôt himself arrived duly at Charenton, -but he never again set eyes on the essay on the -<i>Art of True Government</i>. De Rougemont had arranged -that it should be stolen on the journey, and -the manuscript was last seen in the archives of the -Bastille.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Mirabeau was not the only polemic of genius who -helped to sharpen against the gratings of Vincennes -the weapons of the dawning Revolution. Was not -Diderot of the <i>Encyclopedia</i> there also? He paid by -a month's rigorous imprisonment in the dungeon, and -a longer period of mild captivity in the château, the -publication of his <i>Letter on the Blind for the Use of -those who See</i>. This, at least, was the ostensible reason -of his detention; the true reason was never quite -apparent. At the château he was allowed the visits -of his wife and friends, and amongst the latter Jean -Jacques Rousseau was frequently admitted. Literary -legend is more responsible than history for the statement -that the first idea of the <i>Social Contract</i> was the -outcome of Rousseau's talks with Diderot and Grimm -in the park of Vincennes.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Year after year, reign after reign, the picture rarely -changes within the four walls of the dungeon. Vincennes -was perhaps fuller under Louis XV. than in -the reigns of preceding or succeeding sovereigns, but -the difference could not have been great. During -the twenty years of Cardinal Fleury's ministry under -Louis XV., 40,000 <i>lettres de cachet</i> were issued by -him, mostly against the Jansenists. Madame de Pompadour -made a lavish use of the <i>lettres</i> in favour of -Vincennes; Madame Dubarry bestowed her patronage -chiefly on the Bastille. Richelieu at one epoch, -Mazarin at another, found occupants in plenty for the -cells of Vincennes. It was Richelieu who passed a -dry word one day apropos of certain mysterious deaths -in the dungeon.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"It must be grief," said one.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Or the purple fever," said the King.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"It is the air of Vincennes," observed Richelieu, -"that marvellous air which seems fatal to all who do -not love his Majesty."</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Ministers themselves were apt to fall by the weapon -of their own employment. A minister of Louis XIV., -who had chosen for his proud device the motto, <i>Quò -non ascendam?</i>—<i>What place too high for me?</i>—and -whom chroniclers have suspected of pretensions to the -gallant crown of Mademoiselle de la Vallière, fell one -day from a too giddy pinnacle plump into the dungeon -of Vincennes. It was Fouquet the magnificent.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Up to a point, Fouquet was the best courtier in -France. The King's passion was for pomp and glitter; -the minister cultivated a taste for the dazzling. -Louis was prodigal to extravagance; Fouquet became -lavish <i>jusqu'à la folie</i>. The King dipped both hands -into the public moneys; the minister plunged elbow-deep -into the coffers of the State. The King offered -to his servitors fêtes the most sumptuous; the minister -regaled his friends with spectacles beyond compare. -Then Louis wearied of this too splendid emulation, -and Fouquet the magnificent was attached. He all -but sacrificed his head to his lust of rivalry; but Louis -relented, and took from him only his goods and his -freedom. Despoiled and dishonoured, the ex-minister -fared from prison to prison,—Vincennes, Angers, -Amboise, Moret, the Bastille, and Pignerol. <i>Quò non ascendam?</i>—<i>Whither -may I not mount?</i> The unfortunate -minister, who had thought to climb to the -sun of Louis XIV., sank to his death in a <i>cachot</i>.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The contrasts presented by the diverse fates of -certain prisoners are sufficiently striking. Fouquet -was preceded at Vincennes by Cardinal de Retz, the -last prisoner of distinction whom Anne of Austria -sent to the dungeon. The Cardinal's was a gilt-edged -captivity. He lived <i>en prince</i> at Vincennes; he had -valets, money, and a good table; great ladies came -to distract him, friends to flatter him, and players to -divert him. Literature, politics, gallantry, and the -theatre—the Cardinal found all of these at Vincennes. -When he chanced to remember his priestly quality, -he obtained leave to say mass in the chapel of the -château, "carefully concealing the end of his chain -under the richest of vestments." But the chain was -there, and the lightest of fetters grows heavy in -prison;—the Cardinal resolved on flight.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was a clever and most original plan. On a certain -day, a party of the Cardinal's friends, mounted as -for a desperate ride, were to assemble under the walls -of the keep, and at a given signal were to whirl away -in their midst a man attired at all points like the -Cardinal himself. A rope hanging from a severed -bar in the window of the cell was to give his guards -to suppose that the prisoner had escaped that way; -but all this while the Cardinal was to lie <i>perdu</i> in a -hole which he had discovered on the upper terrace of -the prison. When the excitement over the imaginary -flight had subsided, and the vigilance of the sentries -was relaxed, the Cardinal was to issue from his hiding-place, -disguised as a kitchen-man, and walk out of -the dungeon. It might have succeeded, but the elements -played into the hands of Anne d'Autriche. A -storm blew up on the night that the Cardinal was to -have quitted his chamber, and the wind closed a heavy -door on the staircase that led to the terrace. All the -Cardinal's efforts to wrest it open were unavailing, -and he was forced to return to his cell. He was -removed to the château of Nantes, and the imaginative -daring of his flight from that place has ranked it -high in the annals of prison-breaking.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>One echo more shall reach us from these lugubrious -caverns. Towards the beginning of the eighteenth -century, a young man, Du Puits by name (victimised -by an Italian Abbé into forging orders on the King's -treasury), received as cell-companion the Marquis de -la Baldonnière, a reputed or suspected alchemist. -Du Puits, a laughing philosopher now on the verge -of tears, recovered his spirits when he learned the -new-comer's name.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I heard all about you, sir, before I came here," -he said. "I was secretary to M. Chamillart, the -minister, and you were often talked of at the bureau. -I told M. Chamillart that if you could turn iron into -gold, it was a pity you were not appointed manager -of the iron mines. But it is never too late to turn -one's talents to account, monsieur le marquis, and as -a magician of the first water you shall effect our -escape."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The achievements of the noble wizard came short -of this end, but they were far from contemptible. -He took surreptitious impressions in wax of the keys -dangling from the very belt of the warder who visited -them, and manufactured a choice set of false -ones, which gave the two prisoners the range of the -dungeon. There was no night watch within the -tower, and when the warders had withdrawn after -the prisoners' supper-hour, Du Puits and the Marquis -ran up and down the stairs, and from hall to hall, -called on the other prisoners in their cells, and made -some agreeable acquaintances, including that of a -pretty and charming young sorceress. Trying a new -lock one night, they found themselves in the governor's -pantry—after this, some rollicking supper -parties. The feasts were organised nightly in one -cell or another, Du Puits and the Marquis furnishing -the table from the ample larder of the governor. -Healths were being drunk one night, when the door -was rudely opened, and the guests found themselves -covered by the muskets of the guard. An unamiable -prisoner whose company they had declined had exposed -the gay conspiracy, and there were no more -supper parties.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The last years of Vincennes as a State prison have -little of the interest either of romance or of tragedy. -Its fate in this respect was settled by Mirabeau's -<i>lettres de cachet</i>. Vincennes was the only prison of -which he had directly exposed the callous and cruel -régime, and the ministry thought well to close it, as a -small concession to the rising wrath of the populace. -In 1784, accordingly, Vincennes was struck off the -list of the State prisons of France. A singular and -oddly ludicrous fate came upon it in the following -year, when it was transformed into a sort of charitable -bakery under the patronage of Louis XVI.! The -<i>cachot</i> in which the Prévôt de Beaumont had lain -hungry for eighteen months, and for three days without -food, was stored with cheap loaves for the working -people of Paris. A little later, the dungeon was a -manufactory of arms for the King's troops. After -the destruction of the Bastille, Vincennes was attacked -by the mob, but Lafayette and his troops saved it -from their hands. Under the Republic it was used -for a time as a prison for women. The wretched fate -of the Duc d'Enghien, Napoleon's chief captive in -this fortress, has been told; and there is only to add -that the last prisoners who passed within the walls of -Vincennes were MM. de Peyronnet, de Guernon -Ranville, de Polignac, and Chantelauze, the four -ministers of Charles X. whose part in the "Revolution -of July" belongs to the history of our own times. -Brave old General Daumesnil, "Old Wooden-Leg," -who died August 17, 1832, was the last governor of -the Dungeon of Vincennes.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p074.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p075.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch04' class='c004'>CHAPTER IV. <br /> <br /> THE GREAT AND LITTLE CHÂTELET, AND THE FORT-L'ÉVÊQUE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>Louis VI., called le Gros, whose reign was from -1108 to 1137, did much to enlarge and to embellish -the mean and narrow Paris of his day. He -built churches and schools both in the Cité and beyond -the river, and thanks to the lectures of Abelard -his schools were famous. He built a wall around the -suburbs, and for the further defence of the Cité he -set up the two fortresses called Le Grand and Le -Petit Châtelet, "at the extremities of the bridge -which united the Cité with the opposite bank."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Here was established the court of municipal justice, -and here the Provost of Paris had his residence. The -prison of the Châtelet became one of the most celebrated -in Paris, and prison and fortress were not completely -demolished until 1802.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The functions of the Châtelet—<i>cette justice royale -ordinaire à Paris</i>—were great and various. It was -charged in effect, says Desmaze,<a id='r11' /><a href='#f11' class='c014'><sup>[11]</sup></a> with the maintenance -of public safety in the capital, with the settlement -of divers causes, with the repression of popular -agitations, with the ordering of corporations and -trades, with the verification of weights and measures. -It punished commercial frauds, defended "minors -and married women," and kept in check the turbulent -scholars of the University. Its magistrates were -fifty-six in number; it had its four King's Counsel and -its King's Procurator; its clerk-in-chief and his host of -subordinates; its receivers, bailiffs, and ushers; its -gaolers and its sworn tormentor; its "sixty special -experts"; its surgeon and his assistants, including a -<i>sage-femme</i> or mid-wife; and its two hundred and -twenty <i>sergents à cheval</i>.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f11'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r11'>11</a>. <i>Le Châtelet de Paris.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>All in all, the Châtelet was one of the most formidable -powers in Paris. The court of the Châtelet comprised -four divisions, administered by councillors who -sat in rotation. The four sections were distinguished -as the <i>parc civil</i>, the <i>présidial</i>, the <i>chambre du conseil</i>, -and the <i>chambre criminelle</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But the Prison of the Châtelet is our principal concern. -Although, says Desmaze, the prison was instituted -for the safe-keeping and not for the maltreatment -of the accused, the law's design was too often eluded -or ignored. Much the same might be said in respect -of any other prison in Europe at that epoch. Antique -papers cited by Desmaze show, nevertheless, that -Parliaments of Paris sought by successive decrees to -modify the rigour of the prisoner's lot, to restrain the -cupidity of his gaolers, and to maintain decent order -within the prison. There were provisions against -gambling with dice, rules for the distribution of alms -amongst the prisoners, and penalties for those who -absented themselves from chapel. In 1425, a new -<i>ordonnance</i> fixed the scale of fees (<i>geôlage</i>) which -prisoners were to pay to the governor or head gaoler -on reception. (This ironic jest of compelling persons -to pay for the privilege of going to prison obtained -for centuries in Newgate.) A count or countess was -charged ten livres, a knight banneret (<i>chevalier -banneret</i>) passed in for ten sols, a Jew or a Jewess -for half that sum; and so on to the end of the scale. -There were particular injunctions as to the registering -of prisoners, and as to the mode of keeping the prison -books. The bread served out was ordered to be -<i>de bonne qualitè</i>, and not less than a pound and a half -a day for each prisoner: in 1739, the baker who supplied -the Châtelet was condemned to a fine of 2000 -livres for adulterating the prisoners' bread. A special -ration of bread and meat was distributed at the -Châtelet on the day of the annual feast of the confraternity -of drapers, and the goldsmiths of Paris -gave a dinner on Easter Day to such of the prisoners -as would accept their bounty.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The deputies of the <i>Procureur Général</i> were instructed -to visit the prison once a week, to examine -and receive in private the requests and complaints of -the prisoners, and to see that the doctors did their -duty by the sick. The first Presidents of the Paris -Parliament seem to have visited the Châtelet frequently -from the end of the fourteenth to the middle -of the sixteenth century.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>But there was one circumstance which, in Mediæval -Paris and in the Paris of a much later date, -must have gone far to nullify all good intentions -and humane precautions of kings and parliaments -alike. Under an <i>ordonnance</i> of July, 1319, Philippe -le Long decreed that the governorships of gaols -should be sold at auction. The purchasers were, of -course, to be "respectable persons" (<i>bonnes gens</i>), -who should pledge their word to deal humanely by -(<i>de bien traiter</i>) the prisoners; but of what use were -such provisos? In no circumstances, indeed, could a -saving clause of any description ensure the proper -administration of a prison the governor of which had -bought the right to make private gain out of his -prisoners. For this was what the selling of gaolerships -came to. Having paid for his office (having -bought it, moreover, over the heads of other bidders), -the governor recouped himself by fleecing his wealthy -prisoners and by stinting or starving his poorer ones. -It was no worse in France than elsewhere; until Howard -demanded reform, prisoners in Newgate were -plundered right and left under a similar system, and -those who could not pay the illegal fees of the governor -and his subordinates were lodged in stinking -holds, and fed themselves as they could.</p> - -<p class='c012'>We shall see what the prisons of the Châtelet and -the Fort-l'Évêque were like amid the luxuries and -refinements which surrounded them in the eighteenth -century. An <i>ordonnance</i> of 1670 had enjoined that -the prisons should be kept in a wholesome state, and -so administered that the prisoners should suffer nothing -in their health. Never, says Desmaze, was a -decree so miserably neglected.</p> - -<p class='c012'>What are the facts? He quotes from an "anonymous -eighteenth-century manuscript" ("by a magistrate") -entitled: <i>Projet concernant l'établissement</i> -<i>de nouvelles Prisons dans la Capitale</i>. The Fort-l'Évêque -and the Châtelet are turned inside out for -such an inspection as Howard would have made with -a gust.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the court or principal yard of Fort-l'Évêque, -thirty feet long by eighteen wide, from four to five -hundred prisoners were confined. The prison walls -were so high that no air could circulate in the yard; -the prisoners were "choked by their own miasma." -The cells "were more like holes than lodgings"; and -there were some under the steps of the staircase, six -feet square, into which five prisoners were thrust. -Other cells, in which it was barely possible to stand -upright, received no light but from the general yard. -The cells in which certain prisoners were kept at their -private charge were scarcely better. Worst of all -were the dens belowground. These were on a level -with the river, water filtered in through the arches -the whole year round, and even in the height of -summer the sole means of ventilation was a slit -above the door three inches in width. Passing before -one of the subterranean cells, it was as though one -were smitten by fire (<i>on est frappé comme d'un coup de -feu</i>). They gave only on to the dark and narrow galleries -which surrounded them. The whole prison was in -a state of dilapidation, threatening an immediate ruin.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Châtelet was "even more horrible and pestilential." -The prison buildings, having no external -opening, received air only from above; there was -thus "no current, but only, as it were, a stationary -column of air, which barely allowed the prisoners to -breathe." This is far from a realisation of the <i>ordonnance</i> -of 1670! Like the Fort-l'Évêque, the Châtelet -had its horrors of the pit. Dulaure<a id='r12' /><a href='#f12' class='c014'><sup>[12]</sup></a> has a curious -passage on the subject. It appears, says one of the -best of the historians of Paris, that prisoners were let -down into a dungeon called <i>la fosse</i>, as a bucket is -lowered into a well; here they sat with their feet in -water, unable to stand or to lie, "and seldom lived -beyond fifteen days." Another of these pits, known -as <i>fin d'aise</i> (a name more bodeful than the Little -Ease of old Newgate), was "full of filth and reptiles"; -and Dulaure adds that the mere names of -most of the Châtelet cells were "frightfully significant."</p> -<div class='footnote c015' id='f12'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r12'>12</a>. <i>Histoire de Paris.</i></p> -</div> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The Provost of Paris, rendering justice in the -King's name, took cognisance of all ordinary causes, -of capital crimes, and of petty offences. His officers -arrested and imprisoned "all manner of criminals, -vagabonds, and disturbers of the public peace." In -the reign of Philippe-Auguste, he was charged with -the duty of "bringing to justice the Jews" who at -that epoch were "accused of seeking to convert -Christians to Judaism, of taking usurious interest, -and of profaning the sacred vessels which the churches -gave them in pledge." After the King, said Pasquier, -the Provost of Paris was the most powerful man in -the kingdom.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The headsman of Paris depended on the jurisdiction -of the Châtelet. There was a small chamber in -the prison called the <i>réduit aux gehennes</i>, where, when -an execution was to take place, Monsieur de Paris -received the Provost's warrant. In 1418, the headsman -Capeluche was himself sentenced to be beheaded, -and in the <i>réduit aux gehennes</i> he put the -new Monsieur de Paris through his facings with the -axe.</p> - -<div id='i_p080a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p080a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>THE GREAT CHÂTELET.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>An account of the sentences decreed by the Châtelet -would be little less than a history of punishment -in France. The Châtelet gave reasons for its sentences, -a practice not followed by the superior courts. -Terrible were the pains and penalties decreed sometimes -from beneath the Provost's dais. Torture -wrung some avowal from the frothy lips of the accused, -and then he was shrived and carried to the -place of execution. The fierce canonical law lent its -ingenuity in punishment to the judges of the Châtelet; -but many of the penalties, such as hanging, -beheading, burning, whipping, mutilation, and the -pillory, are found on our own criminal registers of -the same period. Coiners and forgers were boiled -alive; there is an entry of twelve livres for the purchase -of a cauldron in which to boil to death a <i>faux -monnoyeur</i>. In 1390, a young female servant, convicted -of stealing silver spoons from her master, was -exposed in the pillory, suffered the loss of an ear, -and was banished from Paris and its environs, "not -to return under penalty of being buried alive." For -the crime of marrying two wives, one Robert Bonneau -was sentenced to be "hanged and strangled." -Geoffroy Vallée was burned, in 1573, for the publication -of a pamphlet entitled <i>The Heavenly Felicity of -the Christians, or the Scourge of the Faith</i>; and, in -1645, a bookseller was sent to the galleys "for having -printed a libel against the Government."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Some of the old registers of the Châtelet examined -by Desmaze showed entries of charges of pocket-picking -and card-sharping at public processions, fairs, -and spectacles. Little thieves defended themselves -before the magistrates in the style familiar at Bow -Street to-day,—a lad of fifteen charged with stealing -handkerchiefs from pedestrians said he had "picked -up one in the street."</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The Châtelet, or rather the Little Châtelet, was the -Provost's residence until the end of the sixteenth century. -In 1564, the Provost was Hugues de Bourgueil, -"distinguished for the possession of a terrific hump -and a beautiful wife." One day Parliament consigned -to the cells of the Little Châtelet a young Italian, -accused of having set up in Paris a "gambling-house -and fencing-saloon," where he corrupted the morals -of the young nobility, "teaching them a thousand -things unworthy of Christians and Frenchmen."</p> - -<p class='c012'>In his quality of Italian, the prisoner, Gonsalvi by -name, invoked the protection of Catherine de Médicis. -The Queen-Mother, while respecting the decree -of Parliament, recommended the young compatriot -to the Provost's particular care. De Bourgueil accordingly -lodged him in his own house, where Gonsalvi -was soon on intimate terms with the family. -One night he eloped with the Provost's wife. Madame -had contrived to possess herself of the keys of -the prison, thinking that if she let loose the whole -three hundred prisoners, M. le Prévôt would have a -good night's work on hand, and the course would be -clear for her lover and herself. And so it resulted; -for the Provost, faithful to his duty, despatched horse -and foot after his three hundred fugitives, and let -Madame and Gonsalvi take their way.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The next day, an errant wife was missing from the -Little Châtelet, but at night the keys were turned as -usual on the full contingent of three hundred prisoners. -It was the scandal of this affair, say MM. Alhoy -and Lurine, which decided the King to shift the -Provost's residence from the Châtelet to the Hôtel -d'Hercule, wherein was presently installed Nantouillet, -"successeur de ce pauvre diable de Bourgueil."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Nantouillet was not too well off, it would seem, in -the Hôtel d'Hercule. No sooner was he established -there than he was bidden to prepare for the visit of -three Kings,—France, Poland, and Navarre,—who -would do themselves the pleasure of lunching with -him. Nantouillet, who had just declined to marry a -cast-off mistress of the King of Poland, suspected -some scheme of vengeance on their Majesties' part; -he could not, however, refuse to spread his board for -them. He spread it, and the Kings came down and -swept it bare. They swooped upon Nantouillet's -silver plate and sacked his coffers of fifty thousand -francs. There was a fierce fight in the Hôtel, but -the Kings got away with the plunder. On the following -day, the First President of Parliament waited -upon Charles IX. and said that all Paris was shocked; -and his Majesty in reply bade him "not trouble himself -about that." This <i>tableau moral</i> of the period is -presented by several historians.</p> - -<p class='c012'>With such examples in the seats of Royalty, one -can feel little surprise at the charges of venality, and -worse, which were brought from time to time against -the Provosts. In the reign of Philippe le Long, a -certain wealthy citizen lay under sentence of death in -the Châtelet. The Provost Henri Caperel made him -a private proposal of ransom, a bargain was struck. -Dives was set free, and the Provost hanged some -obscure prisoner in his stead. Provost Hugues de -Cruzy is said to have trafficked openly at the Châtelet -in much the same way, Royalty itself sharing the -booty with him. Now and again, justice took her -revenge; and both Henri Caperel and Hugues de -Cruzy finished on the gallows. The noble brigand, -highwayman, and cut-throat, Jourdain de Lisle, who -led a numerous band in the fourteenth century, bought -the interest of the Provost of Paris; and the Châtelet -"refused to take cognisance of his eighteen crimes, -the least of which would have brought to an ignominious -death any other criminal." A new Provost had -to be appointed before Jourdain de Lisle, tied to the -tail of a horse, could be dragged through the streets -of Paris to the public gallows. He had married a -niece of Pope Jean XXII., and when justice had been -done, the curé of the church of Saint-Merri wrote to -Rome: "Scarcely had your Holiness's nephew been -hanged, when, with much pomp, we fetched him from -the gibbet to our church, and there buried him <i>honorablement -et gratis</i>."</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Ordinarily, the Châtelet relied for its defence upon -the archers of the Provost's guard, a reedy support -when the mob turned out in force. It was seized in -1320 by the <i>Pastoureaux</i>, a swarm of peasants who -had united themselves under two apostate priests, and -who said they were "going across the sea to combat -the enemies of the faith and conquer the Holy Land." -To rescue some of their number who had been arrested -and thrown into the Châtelet, they marched on that -place, broke open the gaol, and effected a general delivery -of the prisoners, as Madame de Bourgueil was -to do some two centuries later.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Between the conflicting powers of the Châtelet, as -represented by the Provost of Paris, and the University, -which was accountable only to the ecclesiastical -tribunals, and intensely jealous of any interference -by the secular arm, a long and bitter struggle was -sustained. In 1308, Provost Pierre Jumel hanged a -young man for theft on the highway. Unfortunately -for Jumel, this was a scholar of the University, and -the clergy of Paris went in procession to the Châtelet -and briefly harangued the Provost: "Come out of -that, Satan, accursed one! Acknowledge thy sin, and -seek pardon at the holy altar, or expect the fate of -Dathan and Abiram, whom the earth swallowed." -While they were thus engaged, a messenger came from -the Louvre with the announcement that the King -had sacrificed his chief magistrate to the wrathful -demands of the clergy and University. For a like -encroachment on the sacred privileges of the University, -Guillaume de Thignonville was degraded from -his office of Provost, led to the gallows, and there -compelled to take down and kiss the corpses of two -students whom he had hanged for robbery.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In 1330, Hugues Aubriot, in his capacity of Provost, -lent the shelter of the Châtelet to a party of -Jews flying for their lives before the mob. This -service to the causes of humanity and public order -renewed against the Provost an ancient enmity of -the clerics and University, by whom, in the words of -MM. Alhoy and Lurine, "it was determined that -Aubriot should be ruined." Condemned by the ecclesiastical -tribunal "for the crime of impiety and -heresy," he was ordered to be "preached against and -publicly mitred in front of Notre-Dame." On his -knees, he demanded absolution of the bishop, and -promised an offering of candles for his iniquity in befriending -the Jews. "His crimes were read aloud by -the Inquisitor of the Faith, and the bishop consigned -him to perpetual imprisonment, with the bread of sorrow -and the water of affliction, as an abettor of the -Jewish infidelity, and a contemner of the Christian -faith." From that, the Provost descended to an -<i>oubliette</i> of the Fort-l'Évêque.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The Fort-l'Évêque, in the Rue Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois, -was one of the two prisons of the Bishop -of Paris. Its <i>oubliettes</i> were subterranean dungeons, -separated from one another by stout timbers. The -prisoners, attached to a common chain, were fastened -to the wall by iron rings, in such a manner that they -could not approach one another. They never saw -their gaolers, and their meagre rations were handed -in through a narrow wicket in the door. Hugues -Aubriot occupied his <i>oubliette</i> for many years. In the -insurrection of the <i>Maillotins</i> he was discovered by the -rioters and set free. In 1674, the Bishop's jurisdiction -was reunited with that of the Châtelet, but the -prison of the Fort-l'Évêque was in existence until 1780.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Dulaure says that the penalties imposed by the -episcopal court were inflicted in various places, according -to the gravity of the offence. Sentences of hanging -or burning were carried out beyond the precincts -of Paris; but if it were "a mere bagatelle of cutting -off the culprit's ears," justice was done at the Place -du Trahoir.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>In the middle of the seventeenth century, the Fort-l'Évêque -was the prison for "debtors and refractory -comedians"; and about a hundred years later, in -1765, it received the entire company of the Comédie-Française. -The episode is one of the oddest in the -history of the House of Molière. A second-rate member -of the famous troupe, named Dubois, who had been -under medical treatment for some malady, refused -to pay the doctor's bill. Mademoiselle Clairon, the -tragic actress, delicate on the point of honour, summoned -the rest of the company, and it was resolved -to appeal to M. de Richelieu, <i>gentilhomme de la -chambre</i>. This functionary treated it as "an affair of -vagabonds," and told the company to settle it amongst -themselves. Dubois, accordingly, was put out of the -troupe. His daughter carried her father's grievance -and her own charms (<i>elle met en œuvre tous ses charmes</i>) -to the Duc de Fronsac, through whose intervention -she succeeded in forcing for Dubois the doors of the -Comédie-Française. But the company were resolved -not to act with him again, and put a sudden stop to -the performances of that very successful piece, the -<i>Siège de Calais</i>. De Sartines, of the police, now came -forward in the pretended interests of the public, and -ordered the arrest of Dauberval, Lekain, Molé, Brisard, -Mademoiselle Clairon, and others of the company. -The public, however, were on the side of the -players, and Mademoiselle Clairon and her fellows -had a semi-royal progress to the Fort-l'Évêque; -roses and rhetoric were showered on them, and <i>les -plus nobles dames de Paris</i> disputed the honour of -attending the tragédienne to the threshold of the -prison. Their captivity lasted, nevertheless, for five and twenty -days; but the final victory was with the -players, for Dubois was dismissed with a pension, -and appeared no more on the stage of the Théâtre -Français.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Fêted every day in her chamber in the ecclesiastical -prison—for there was scarcely question of an <i>oubliette</i> -in her case,—receiving the visits of noblemen and -dames of fashion, artists, wits, and poets, Mademoiselle -Clairon had small leisure to bethink her that, under -the litter of flowers pressed by her dainty feet, lay the -bones of whole generations of victims of the church's -tyranny; victims of those too familiar charges of -magic, heresy, and sacrilege.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Yet (I quote again from MM. Alhoy and Lurine) -had she in the still night lent a listening ear to those -grey walls, the wailing murmurs of the phantoms of -Fort-l'Évêque might have chilled her heart:—</p> - -<p class='c013'>"We expiated in the <i>oubliettes</i> of the Fort-l'Évêque, under the -reign of Francis I., the wrong of believing in God without believing -also in the infallibility of the Pope. Look ... there -is blood on our shrouds!"</p> - -<p class='c013'>"We are two poor Augustine monks. They accused us, in -Charles VI.'s time, of being idolaters, invokers of evil spirits, -utterers of profane words. They accused us of making a pact -with the powers below; our only crime was believing that our -science might heal the madness of the King. Look ... -there is blood on our shrouds!"</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I am the sorcerer of the château of Landon. I promised an -Abbé of Citeaux to find, by magic, a sum of money that had -been stolen from him. Alas! it was a dear jest for me; torture, -and death on the Place de Grève. Look ... there is blood -upon my shroud!"</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I am a poor madman. I thought that heaven had given me -the glorious mission of sustaining on earth the servants of Jesus -Christ. I went humbly to the bishop and said: The envoy of -God salutes you! They brought me here to an <i>oubliette</i>, and I -left it only with the headsman. Look ... there is blood -on my shroud!"</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The factions of the Armagnacs and the Bourguignons -cost Paris a river of blood in the early years -of the fifteenth century, and the massacre of the Armagnacs -in May-August, 1418, was a terrible affair. -On the first day, five hundred and twenty-two were -put to the sword by the Bourguignons in the streets -of the capital. Every Armagnac, or suspected -Armagnac, was laid hold of, and the prisons overflowed -with the captives. The Bourguignons assailed -the Châtelet, "and the threshold of the prison became -the scaffold of fifteen hundred unfortunates." The -attack upon the Châtelet was renewed by the Bourguignons -in August; and the Provost of Paris, powerless -to check or even to stem their fury, bade them -at length "Do what they would": <i>Mes amis, faites</i> -<i>ce qu'il vous plaira</i>. This time the prisoners organised -a defence, and a regular siege began. On the north -side of the fortress was a lofty terrace, crowning the -wall, so to say, and running the length of the prison. -Here the imprisoned Armagnacs threw up barricades, -but the Bourguignons reared scaling-ladders, and made -light of climbing the walls, sixty feet in height. The -attack on the one side and the defence on the other -were long, bloody, and desperate; but the advantage -was with the assailants. Foiled at this point and that, -they fired the prison; and where the flames did not -penetrate, they hacked their way in, and drove their -game to take refuge on the heights. As the fire -soared upwards, the Armagnacs flung themselves over -the walls, and were caught upon the pikes of the -Burgundians, "who finished them with axe and -sword."</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The name of Louis XI., which is writ large in the -histories of the Bastille and the Dungeon of Vincennes, -attaches to one curious episode in the history -of the Châtelet. In 1477, on the day of the festival -of Saint Denis, Louis "took the singular fancy of -giving their liberty" to the prisoners of the Great and -Little Châtelet. A chronicler of this fact, evidently -puzzled, "hastens to add" that at that epoch the two -Châtelets "held merely robbers, assassins, and vagabonds. -Not even to honour the memory of Saint -Denis could Louis bring himself to liberate his political -prisoners in Vincennes and the Bastille." It was -in Louis XI.'s reign that one Chariot Tonnelier, a -hosier turned brigand, lying in the Châtelet on a score -of charges, and dreading lest the Question should -weaken him into betrayal of his companions, snatched -a knife from a guard at the door of the torture chamber, -and deliberately cut his tongue out.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The Fort-l'Évêque and the Little Châtelet were -suppressed in 1780, in virtue of an <i>ordonnance</i> of Louis -XVI., countersigned by Necker; and the prisoners -were transferred to La Force. The buildings, which -were even then in a state of ruin, were thrown down -two years later. The Great Châtelet existed as a -prison for another decade, and the fortress itself was -not demolished until 1802-4. A triumphal column -replaced the ancient dungeon of the Provosts of Paris.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p091.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p092.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch05' class='c004'>CHAPTER V. <br /> <br /> THE TEMPLE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>When they came to Paris in the twelfth century, -the Templars obtained leave to settle -in the Marshes, whose baleful exhalations cost the -town a plague or two every year. In no long time -they had completely transformed that dismal and pestilential -swamp. Herculean labours witnessed as their -outcome oaks, elms, and beeches growing where the -rotten ooze had bred but reeds and osiers. Vast buildings, -too, arose as if by magic, with towers and turrets -protecting them, drawbridges, battlemented walls, -and trenches. The principal tower of the pile enclosed -the treasure and arsenal of the Order, and -four smaller towers or turrets served as a prison -for those who had transgressed the stark monastic -rules. On the broad terrace of the Temple three -hundred men had space for exercise at cross-bow -and halberd.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Philip III. bestowed a royal recompense on the -laborious monks who had reclaimed those miasmatic -marshes and given new means of defence to the capital; -and towards the close of the thirteenth century -the Templars had become an extraordinary power -in France. In Paris they exercised large justiciary -rights, and had their gallows standing without the -Temple walls. They were concerned in all enterprises, -civil, political, and military; their sovereignty -was such that princes had to reckon with them, on -pain of contact with the monkish steel. They had -great monopolies of grain, and owned some of the -richest lands in the kingdom; they touched the revenues -of from eight to ten thousand manors. The -Templars guarded at need the towns, treasures, and -archives of royalty; and kings, popes, and nobles were -their visitors and guests.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The fortress dwelling of the Temple which had -sprung fairy-like from the foul marshes of Paris shone -with a splendour above that of the royal residence. -Twenty-four columns of silver, carved and chased, -sustained the audience-chamber of the grand master; -and the chapter-hall, paved in mosaic, and enriched -with woodwork in cedar of Lebanon, contained -sixty huge vases of solid gold and a veritable armoury -of Arabian, Moorish, and Turkish weapons, chiselled, -damascened, and crusted with precious stones. The -private chamber of every knight of the Order was -distinguished by some particular object of beauty; -whilst the chambers of the officers and commanders -were stored with riches "so that they were a wonder -to behold."</p> - -<p class='c012'>How great a gulf separated the wealthy and powerful -Templars of Paris from those "poor brothers of -the Temple who rode two on one horse, lived frugally, -without wives or children, had no goods of their -own, and who, when they were not taking the field -against the infidels, were employed in mending their -weapons and the harness of their horses, or in pious -exercises prescribed for them by their chief."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The first institution of the Order of the Temple -dates from the year 1118, when "certain brave and -devout gentlemen" obtained from King Baudouin -III. "the noble favour of guarding the approaches -to Jerusalem." The Council of Troyes, in 1128, -confirmed the religious and military Order of the -Templars. The knights clothed themselves in long -white robes adorned with a red cross; and the -standard of the Order, called the <i>Beaucèant</i>, was white -and black, for an emblem of life and death,—death -for the infidels and life for the Christians of the -Holy Land. Bravery in battle was almost an article -of their faith; no Templar would fly from three -opponents.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the day of their military and political power, the -Templars of France acknowledged none but the -authority of the grand master of the Order, and -treated with royalty as between power and power. -Up to the reign of Philippe le Bel, the Kings of -France were little more than courtiers of the Temple, -Royalty knocked humbly at those august, defiant -portals, for leave to deposit within them its treasures -and its charters, or to solicit a loan from the golden -coffers of the knights. Not so, however, Philippe -le Bel.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This was the sovereign who, in 1307, broke the -power of the Knights Templars of France. The -act of accusation which he flung at the Order proscribed -its members as "ravening wolves," "a perfidious -and idolatrous society, whose works, nay, -whose very words soil the earth and infect the air." -The last grand master, Jacques de Molay, seized by -the King's Inquisitor, passed through the torments of -the torture chamber, and thence to the torments of -the stake. The Knights of the Temple in their turn, -loaded with chains, were led before the Inquisitor, -Guillaume de Paris, to answer his charges of heresy -and idolatry. The Templars were pursued through -all the States of Europe, the Pope encouraging the -hue and cry. Jacques de Molay, and his companion -in misfortunes, Gui, Dauphin of Auvergne, were -burned alive in Paris; and the persecution of the -Templars lasted for six years. Their Order was -abolished, and most of their wealth was bestowed by -Philippe upon the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The prison of the Temple became a prison of the -State; and the Temple and the Louvre were the -forerunners of the Bastille. The Dukes of Aquitaine -and Brabant were confined in the Temple under -Philippe V. and Philippe de Valois, the Counts of -Dammartin and Flanders under King John. Four -sovereigns, indeed, Charles VII., Louis XI., Charles -VIII., and Louis XII., seemed to have forgotten the -dungeon which the Templars had bequeathed them -(they might well have done so, since Mediæval Paris -had its prisons at every turn); and the cells and -chambers in the great tower of the Temple remained -closed,—to be opened no more until after the 10th of -August, 1792.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But there were social passages of interest in the -history of this famous fastness, and it was not unfitting -that Francis I., the magnificent monarch of the -Renaissance, should repair the palace of the Templars, -restore those historic ruins, re-establish the spreading -gardens, gild afresh those illustrious halls,—re-create, -in a word, the once brilliant dwelling of the Chevaliers -of the Cross: in 1540, the Temple became the -sumptuous abode of the Grand Priors of France.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the last years of the seventeenth century, -Philippe de Vendôme, prince of the blood and knight -of Malta, was named Grand Prior of the Temple. -He would have his priory worthy of the gallant and -graceful Court of the Palais-Royal; and the handsomest -and most amiable of ladies, and the finest and -gayest of wits were bidden to his historic suppers. -The oaks that had shadowed the cross of Jacques de -Molay lent their shelter now to "all the gods of -Olympus," summoned within the green enclosure of -the Temple by the lively invocations of La Fare and -de Chaulieu.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the eighteenth century, this same enclosure had a -population of four thousand souls, divided into three -distinct classes. There was first the house of the -Grand Prior, the dignitaries of the Order, and certain -nobles; then, a numerous body of workers of all -grades; and lastly, a rather heterogeneous collection -of debtors who were able to elude their creditors -within these precincts, in virtue of a Mediæval prescript—which -justice ceased to respect in 1779.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At this epoch, the Government of Louis XVI.—as -if with a presentiment of what the Temple was -shortly to become for the King of France—ordered -the demolition of the old fortress of the Templars. -But the destroyers of 1779 overthrew only a portion -of the tower; the dungeon itself remained, to be -witness of a royal agony.</p> - -<div id='i_p096a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p096a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>THE TEMPLE PRISON.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>See, then, at length, after the revolution of the -10th of August, Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette -prisoners in the prison of the Temple! Marie -Antoinette, most imprudent and most amiable, most -unfortunate and most calumniated of women; Louis -XVI., poor honest gentleman, whose passive intelligence -drew from Turgot this prophetic word: -"Sire, a weak prince can make choice only between -the musket of Charles IX. and the scaffold of Charles -I." The King was without force and without prestige; -the Queen was incapable either of giving or of -receiving a lesson in royalty.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Taciturn, and subject to sudden fits of temper; as -much embarrassed by his wife as by his crown, Louis -divided his time between hunting and those little -harmless hobbies which showed that, had the fates -desired, he might have made an excellent artisan. -As for Marie Antoinette, what rôle was there for her, -the victim of perpetual suspicion, in the midst of a -tremendous political reaction? It was reproached -against her, not without reason, that she could never -fashion for herself the conscience of a queen. She -felt herself a woman, young and beautiful; she forgot -that she was also the partner of a throne. Full of -personal charm, liking to toy with elegant pleasures, -wedded to a man so little made for her, surrounded -by gallant courtiers whom her beauty and graces -intoxicated, Marie Antoinette had her share of ardent -emotions, and more than once she was at last forgetful -of her pride, <i>cette pudeur des reines</i>; but her position -at the Court of France was so false and so -complicated that, let her have done what she would, -she might not have escaped the abyss towards which -her own feet impelled her.</p> - -<p class='c012'>To the Temple, then, they were hurried, Louis and -his family, on the 14th of August, 1792. The tower of -the fortress was allotted to them, and a portion of the -palace and all the adjacent buildings were levelled, so -that the dungeon proper was completely isolated. The -space of garden reserved for their daily exercise was -enclosed between lofty walls. Louis occupied the first -floor of the prison and his family the second. Every -casement was protected by thick iron bars, and the -outer windows were masked in such a manner that -the prisoners obtained scarcely a glimpse of the world -beyond their cage. Six wickets defended the staircase -which led to the King's apartment; so low and -narrow that it was necessary to squeeze through them -in a stooping posture. Each door was of iron, heavily -barred, and was kept locked at all hours. After Louis' -imprisonment, a seventh wicket with a door of iron was -constructed at the top of the stairs, which no one could -open unassisted. The first door of Louis' chamber was -also of iron; so here were eight solid barriers betwixt -the King and his friends in freedom,—not counting -the dungeon walls. A guard of some three hundred -men watched night and day around the Temple.</p> - -<p class='c012'>These costly preparations on his Majesty's account -(great sums, it is said, were spent on them) were not -completed in a day, and in the meantime the Royal -family inhabited that portion of the palace of the -Temple which had been left standing. In his daily -walks in the garden, King Louis looked on at the -building of his last earthly mansion, and must have -noticed the desperate haste with which the builders -worked! In the middle of September, he passed into -the shades of the dungeon.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Once locked in there, he was forbidden the use of -pens, ink, and paper; no writing materials were allowed -him until the national convention had commanded -his appearance at the bar.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The large chamber assigned to the King was partitioned -into four compartments; the first served as -a dining-room, the second was Louis' bed-chamber, -and his valet slept in the third; the fourth was a little -cabinet contrived in a turret, to which the royal -prisoner was fond of retiring. His bed-chamber was -hung in yellow and decently furnished. A little clock -on the chimney-piece bore on its pedestal the words -"Lepante, Clockmaker for the King." When the convention -had decreed France a republic, Louis' gaolers -scratched out the last three words of the inscription. -They hung in his dining-room the declaration of the -rights of the Constitution of 1792, at the foot of which -ran the legend: "First year of the Republic." This -was their announcement to Louis that he had fallen -from his king's estate.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Like a murderer of these days in the condemned -hold, Louis had two guards with him night and day. -They passed the day in his bed-chamber, following -him to the dining-room when he took his meals; and -in the dining-room they slept at night, after locking -the doors of the apartments.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Their captivity was full of indignity for the illustrious -unfortunates, whose guards were incessantly suspicious. -If Louis addressed a question during the -night to the valet who slept close to him, the answer -must be spoken loudly. The members of the family -were not allowed to whisper in their conversations, -and if at dinner Louis, or his wife, or his sister chanced -to speak low in asking anything of the servant who -waited on them, one of the guards at the door cried, -"<i>Parlez plus haut!</i>"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Apart from suspense as to the future, a terrible -dreariness must have marked those days in the Temple. -The early morning was given by the King to -his private devotions, after which he read the office -which the Chevaliers of the Order of the Saint-Esprit -were accustomed to recite daily. His piety was not -without its inconveniences to himself. The table was -furnished with meat on Fridays, but Louis dipped a -slice of bread in his wine glass with the remark: -"<i>voilà mon diner!</i>" To the gentle suggestion that -such extreme abstinence might be dispensed with, he -replied: "I do not trouble your conscience; why -trouble mine? You have your practices, and I have -my own; let each hold to those which he believes the -best."</p> - -<p class='c012'>His devotions engaged the King until nine o'clock, -at which hour his family joined him in the dining-room,—that -is to say, during the period in which it -was still permitted him to communicate with them. -He sat with them at breakfast, eating nothing himself; -he had made it a rule in prison to fast until the -dinner-hour. After breakfast the King took his son -for lessons in Latin and geography, and whilst Marie -Antoinette taught their daughter, sister Elizabeth -plied her needle. The children had an hour's play -at mid-day, and at one o'clock the family assembled -for dinner. The table was always well supplied, but -Louis ate little and drank less, and the Queen took -nothing but water with her food.</p> - -<p class='c012'>After dinner the parents amused their children -again as best they could, round games at the table -being the favourite recreation. To these poor little -pleasures succeeded reading and conversation, and at -nine the prisoners supped. After supper, Louis took -the boy to his bed-chamber, where a little bed was -placed for him beside his own. He heard him recite -his prayers, and saw him to bed. Then he returned -to reading, and fell to his own prayers at eleven. -When the doomed King, husband, and father was -denied the solace of his family, the time that he had -devoted to them was given almost wholly to his -books. The Latins were his favourite authors, and -a day seldom passed on which he had not conned -afresh some pages of Tacitus, Livy, Seneca, Horace, -Virgil, or Terence. In French he was especially -fond of books of travel. He read the news of the -day as long as he was supplied with it, but his not -unnatural interest in the affairs of revolutionary -France seemed to trouble his gaolers, and the newspapers -were withdrawn from him. Thrown back -upon his books, he studied more than ever, and on -the eve of his death he summed up the volumes he -had read through during the five months and seven -days of his captivity in the Temple: the number was -two hundred and fifty-seven.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Towards the end he suffered some brusque interruptions -of his ignominious solitude. Three times -he awoke to find a new valet in his bedroom. Chamilly's -place in this capacity was taken by Hue, and -Hue was succeeded by Cléry, who was all but a -stranger to the King. Chamilly and Hue barely -came off with their lives in the prisons to which they -were removed from the Temple. The abandoned -King took shock upon shock with not a little fortitude. -He was skimming his Tacitus one day when -the cannibals of September stopped under his window -to brandish on a pike the bleeding and disfigured -head of the Princess Lamballe.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Severely as they had guarded him, his gaolers -began to double their precautions. The concierge -of the dungeon, the chief warder,—all, in a word, -who were specially charged with the keeping of the -King, were themselves constituted prisoners of the -Temple. Did you wait on Louis, or were you suffered -to approach him, your person was searched -minutely at the governor's discretion. Not the commonest -instrument of steel or iron was allowed to be -carried by anyone who went near the King: Cléry -was deprived of his penknife. Every article of food -passed into the prison for Louis' table was rigorously -examined; and the prison cook had to taste -every dish, under the eyes of the guard, before it -was permitted to leave the kitchen. Never was -suicide more strenuously denied to a man who had -no thought of it.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The prisoners themselves were not spared the indignity -of the search. Louis, his wife, and his sister -had their cupboards, drawers, and closets ransacked; -they were spoiled of knives, scissors, and curling-irons. -Louis' pains were prolonged to the end. The -courage he had mustered for death, and it was a very -commendable portion, failed him a moment at the -last. In his confessor's hands, on the morning of his -death, whilst the carriage was waiting for him in the -courtyard, he halted in his prayers. He had, as he -thought, caught a note of tears on the other side of -the partition, and he dreaded a second last embrace. -His ear strained at the wall, whilst the priest's hand -was on his head. But there was no weeping there, -for Marie Antoinette was on her knees under her -crucifix; and Louis went down to his carriage. There -is no need to tell again the last scene of all....</p> - -<p class='c012'>Marie Antoinette was removed to the Conciergerie, -which she quitted only for the scaffold. After -the parents had passed under the knife, the young -dauphin and his sister Marie Thérèse continued in -the prison of the Temple "the sorrowful Odyssey of -the Royalty of France." The daughter of Marie -Antoinette must quit the Temple to go into exile, -the son of Louis XVI. must die wretchedly in the -prison of his father. The "education" of the poor -little dauphin was entrusted to Simon the shoemaker, -whose wife, it is said, used to teach him ribald songs. -He had a charming face and a crooked back, "as if -life were already too heavy for him." In the hands -of those singular preceptors he came to lose nearly -all his moral faculties, and the sole sentiment which -he cherished was that of gratitude, "not so much for -the good that was done him—which was small—as -for the ills that were spared him. Without uttering -a word, he would precipitate himself before his guards, -press their hands, and kiss the hems of their coats."<a id='r13' /><a href='#f13' class='c014'><sup>[13]</sup></a> -After the retreat of Simon, who had not used his -gentle captive over-tenderly, the dauphin's imprisonment -was somewhat kinder, though he continued to -be watched as closely as before. His gaoler one day -asked him: "What would you do to Simon, little -master, if you were to become king?" "I would -have him punished as an example," answered the -young Capet. He had had no news of Simon for -two years, and did not know that the ungentle shoemaker -had perished on the scaffold.<a id='r14' /><a href='#f14' class='c014'><sup>[14]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f13'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r13'>13</a>. Nougaret.</p> -</div> -<div class='footnote c015' id='f14'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r14'>14</a>. Idem.</p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>The little dauphin's own untimely death, while still -a prisoner in the Temple, induced more than one -audacious adventurer to seek to assume the mask of -Louis XVI's son. Hervagaut, Mathurin Bruneau, -and more recently the Duc de Normandie essayed in -turn the rôle of pretender, "draped in the shroud of -Louis XVII." The first-named, condemned in 1802 -to four years' imprisonment, died ten years later in -Bicêtre. The second, tried at Rouen in 1818, received -a sentence of seven years; and the Duc de -Normandie ended his days in Holland.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Convention seems to have given no political -prisoners to the tower of the Temple, which was -again a prison of State under the Directory, the -Consulate, and the Empire.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was the Directory which consigned to the -Temple the celebrated English Admiral, Sir Sidney -Smith, M.P. for Rochester, who had defended Acre -against Napoleon, and who was arrested at Havre -"on the point of setting fire to the port." He was -transferred to the Temple from the Abbey, the order -of transfer bearing the signature of Barras.</p> - -<p class='c012'>On the 10th of May, 1798, certain friends of the -Admiral, disguised in French uniform, presented to -the concierge of the Temple a document purporting -to be an order of the Minister of War for the removal -of Sir Sidney to another prison. The concierge fell -into the trap, and bade adieu to his prisoner, who, a -few days later, found himself safe in London.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The mysterious conspiracy of the Camp de Grenelle -furnished the Temple with a batch of one hundred -and thirty-five prisoners; and the <i>coup d'État</i> which -swept them in proscribed also the editors of twenty-two -French journals. During the next eight years -the most distinguished of the "enemies of the Republic" -whose names were entered on the Temple -register were Lavalette; Caraccioli, the Ambassador -of the King of Naples to the Court of Louis XVI.; -Hottinguer, the banker of the Rue de Provence; Hyde -de Neuville; the journalist Bertin; Toussaint-Louverture, -the hero of Saint-Domingue, who had written -to Buonaparte: "<i>Le premier homme des noirs au premier -homme des blancs</i>"; the two Polignacs, the Duc -de Rivière, George Cadoudal, Moreau, and Pichegru.</p> - -<p class='c012'>General Pichegru, arrested on the 28th of February, -1804, "for having forgotten in the interests of the -English and the Royalists what he owed to the -French Republic," was found dead in his cell on the -6th of April following, having strangled himself with -a black silk cravat. Moreau, liberated by the First -Consul, took service in the ranks of the enemy, and -was slain by a French bullet before Dresden, in 1813.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Toussaint-Louverture's detention in the Temple is -an episode which reflects little credit upon the military -and political history of the Consulate. Certainly -the expedition of Saint-Domingue, under the command -of General Leclerc, Napoleon's brother-in-law, -makes a poor page in the annals of that period. -After having received Toussaint-Louverture's submission, -Leclerc, afraid of the great negro's influence, -made him a prisoner by the merest trick, and despatched -him to France. Confined at first in the -Temple, he was afterwards removed to the fort of -Joux, where he died in April, 1803.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Five years after this, in June, 1808, the prisoners -of the Temple were transferred by Fouché's order to -the Dungeon of Vincennes. Amongst them was -General Malet, that bold conspirator who, in 1812, -"<i>devait porter la main sur la couronne de l'Empereur</i>."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The tower of the Temple was demolished in 1811, -and, four years later, Louis XVIII. instituted, on the -ruins of the ancient dwelling of the Templars and -the prison of Louis XVI., a congregation of nuns, -who had for their Superior a daughter of Prince de -Condé.</p> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p106.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p107.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch06' class='c004'>CHAPTER VI. <br /> <br /> BICÊTRE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>"Where there are monks," exclaimed brusquely -the authors of <i>Les Prisons de Paris</i>, -"there are prisoners." The folds of the priestly -garb concealed a place of torment which monastic -justice, with a grisly humour, named a <i>Vade in Pace</i>; -the last bead of the rosary grazed the first rings of a -chain which bore the bloody impress of the sworn -tormentor. At Bicêtre, as at the Luxembourg, ages -ago, big-bellied cenobites sang and tippled in the cosy -cells piled above the dungeons of the church.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Bicêtre—more anciently Bissestre—is a corrupt -form of Vincestre, or Winchester, after John, Bishop -of Winchester, who is thought to have built the -original château, and who certainly held it in the -first years of the thirteenth century. It was famous -amongst the pleasure-houses of the Duc de Berri, -who embellished it with windows of glass, which at -that epoch were only beginning to be an ornament of -architecture—"objects of luxury," says Villaret, "reserved -exclusively for the mansions of the wealthiest -seigneurs." In one of the rather frequent "popular -demonstrations" in the Paris of the early fifteenth -century, these "objects of luxury" were smashed, and -little of the château remained except the bare walls. -It was rebuilt by the Duc de Berri, a noted amateur -of books, and was by him presented to an order of -monks in 1416.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A colony of Carthusians under St. Louis; John of -Winchester under Philippe-Auguste; Amédée le -Rouge, Count of Savoy, under Charles VI.; the -Bourguignons and the Armagnacs in the fifteenth -century; the canons of Notre-Dame de Paris under -Louis XI.; the robbers and <i>bohèmiens</i> in the sixteenth -century; the Invalides under Cardinal Richelieu, and -the foundlings of St. Vincent de Paul,—all these preceded -at Bicêtre the vagabonds, the <i>bons-pauvres</i>, the -epileptics and other diseased, the lunatics, and "all -prisoners and captives." In becoming an asylum and -hospital, in a word, Bicêtre became also one of the -most horrible of the countless prisons of Paris; it -grew into dreadful fame as "the Bastille of the canaille -and the bourgeoisie."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The enormous numbers of the poor, the hordes of -sturdy mendicants who "demanded alms sword in -hand," and the soldiers who took the road when they -could get no pay, became one of the chief scourges -of Paris. Early in the seventeenth century it was -sought to confine them in the various hospitals or -houses of detention in the Faubourg Saint-Victor, -but under the disorders and weaknesses of the Government -these establishments soon collapsed. Parliament -issued decree after decree; all strollers and -beggars were to be locked up in a prison or asylum -specially appropriated to them; the buildings were -commenced and large sums of money were spent on -them, but they were never carried to completion. In -course of time the magistrates took the matter in -hand, dived into old records, but drew no counsel -thence, for the evil, albeit not new, was of extraordinary -proportions; went to the King for a special -edict, and procured one "which ordered the setting up -of a general hospital and prescribed the rules for -its governance." The château of Bicêtre and the -Maison de la Salpêtrière were ceded for the purpose.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Children and women went to the Salpêtrière; at -Bicêtre were placed men with no visible means of subsistence, -"widowers," beggars, feeble or sturdy, and -"young men worn out by debauchery." Before taking -these last in hand, the doctors "were accustomed -to order them a whipping."</p> - -<p class='c012'>This destiny of Bicêtre is pretty clear, and as hospital -and asylum combined it should, under decent -conduct, have played a useful part in the social -economy of Paris. But the absolutism of that age -had its own notions as to the proper functions of -"hospitals," and the too familiar <i>ordres du roi</i>, and -the not less familiar <i>lettres de cachet</i> (which Mirabeau -had not yet come forward to denounce), were presently -in hot competition with the charitable <i>ordonnances</i> of -the doctors. Madness was a capital new excuse for -vengeance in high places, and the cells set apart for -cases of mental disease were quickly tenanted by -"luckless prisoners whose wrong most usually consisted -in being strictly right." Bicêtre, it must be admitted, -did the thing conscientiously, and with the -best grace in the world. Rational individuals were -despatched there whom, according to the authors of -<i>Les Prisons de Paris</i>, Bicêtre promptly transformed -into imbeciles and raging maniacs.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Indeed the "philanthropists" and the criminologists -of the early part of this century need not have -taxed their imaginations for any scheme of cellular -imprisonment. The system existed in diabolical perfection -at Bicêtre. That much-abused "depôt" of -indigent males, "widowers," and young rakes had an -assortment of dark cells which realised <i>à merveille</i> the -conditions of the vaunted programme of the penitentiary—isolation -and the silence of the tomb. Buried -in a <i>cabanon</i> or black hole of Bicêtre, the prisoner endured -a fate of life in death; he was as one dead, who -lived long, <i>tête-à-tête with God and his conscience</i>. If -a human sound penetrated to him, it was the sobbing -moan of some companion in woe.</p> - -<p class='c012'>There was a subterranean Bicêtre, of which at this -day only the dark memory survives. For a dim idea -of this, one has to stoop and peer in fancy into a far-reaching -abyss or pit, partitioned into little tunnels: -in each little tunnel a chain riven to the wall; at the -end of the chain a man. Now there were men in -these hellish tunnels who had been guilty of crimes, -but far oftener they stifled slowly the lives or the intelligences, -or both, of men who had done no crimes -at all. Innocent or guilty, Bicêtre in the long run -had one way with all its guests; and when the -prisoners and their wits had definitely parted company, -the governor of the prison effected a transfer -with his colleague the administrator of the asylum. -It was expeditious and simple, and no one asked -questions or called for a report.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It is on record, nevertheless, that existence in -underground Bicêtre was a degree less insupportable -than a sojourn in the <i>cabanons</i>. Hear the strenuous -greet of Latude, with its wonted vividness of -detail:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"When the wet weather began, or when it thawed in the winter, -water streamed from all parts of my cell. I was crippled with -rheumatism, and the pains I had from it were such that I was -sometimes whole weeks without getting up.... In cold -weather it was even worse. The 'window' of the cell, protected -by an iron grating, gave on the corridor, the wall of which was -pierced exactly opposite at the height of ten feet. Through this -aperture (garnished, like my own window, with iron bars), I received -a little air and a glimmer of light, but the same aperture -let in both snow and rain. I had neither fire nor artificial light, -and the rags of the prison were my only clothing. I had to break -with my wooden shoe the ice in my pail, and then to suck morsels -of ice to quench my thirst. I stopped up the window, but the -stench from the sewers and the tunnels came nigh to choke me; -I was stung in the eyes, and had a loathsome savour in the -mouth, and was horribly oppressed in the lungs. The eight and thirty -months they kept me in that noisome cell, I endured -the miseries of hunger, cold, and damp.... The scurvy -that had attacked me showed itself in a lassitude which spread -through all my members; I was presently unable either to sit or -to rise. In ten days my legs and thighs were twice their proper -size; my body was black; my teeth, loosened in their sockets, -were no longer able to masticate. Three full days I fasted; they -saw me dying, and cared not a jot. Neighbours in the prison -did this and that to have me speak to them; I could not utter a -word. At length they thought me dead, and called out that I -should be removed. I was in sooth at death's gate when the -surgeon looked in on me and had me fetched to the infirmary."<a id='r15' /><a href='#f15' class='c014'><sup>[15]</sup></a></p> -<div class='footnote c015' id='f15'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r15'>15</a>. <i>Mémoires.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>Whether Masers de Latude existed, or was but a -creature projected on paper by some able enemy of La -Pompadour, those famous and titillating <i>Mémoires</i> -are excellent documents—all but unique of their kind—of -the prisons of bygone France. If the question -be of the Bastille, of the Dungeon of Vincennes, of -Charenton, or of Bicêtre, these pungent pages, with a -luxuriance and colour of realistic detail not so well nor -so plausibly sustained by any other pen, are always -pat and complete to the purpose. To compare great -things with small, it is as unimportant to inquire who -wrote <i>Shakespeare</i> as to seek to know who was the -author of the <i>Mémoires</i> of Latude. It is necessary -only to feel certain that the writer of this extraordinary -volume was as intimately acquainted with the -prisons he describes as Mirabeau was with the -Dungeon of Vincennes, or Cardinal de Retz with the -château de Nantes. His book (an epitome of what -men might and could and did endure under the absolute -monarchy, when his rights as an individual were -the least secure of a citizen's possessions) is the main -thing, and the sole thing; the name and identity of -the author are not now, if they ever were, of the most -infinitesimal consequence.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>A fine sample of the work of Bicêtre, considered as -a machine for the manufacture of lunatics, is offered -in the person of that interesting, unhappy genius, -Salomon de Caus. A Protestant Frenchman, he -lived much in England and Germany, and at the age -of twenty he was already a skilled architect, a painter -of distinction, and an engineer with ideas in advance -of his time. He was in the service of the Prince of -Wales in 1612, and of the Elector Palatine, at Heidelberg, -1614-20. In 1623 he returned to live and work -in France, <i>dans sa patrie et pour sa patrie</i>. He became -engineer and architect to the King.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Eight years before his return to France, De Caus -had published at Frankfort his <i>Raison des Forces -Mouvantes</i>, a treatise in which he described "an -apparatus for forcing up water by a steam fountain," -which differs only in one particular from that of Della -Porta. The apparatus seems never to have been constructed, -but Arago, relying on the description, has -named De Caus the inventor of the steam engine.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It is not, however, with the inventive genius that -we are concerned, but with the ill-starred lover of -Marion Delorme. The minister Particelli took De -Caus one day to the <i>petit lever</i> of the brilliant and -beautiful Aspasia of the Place Royale. Particelli, -one of the most prodigal of her adorers, wanted De -Caus to surpass, in the palace of Mademoiselle -Delorme, the splendours he had achieved in the -palace of the Prince of Wales. "At my charge, look -you, Monsieur Salomon, and spare nothing! Scatter -with both hands gold, silver, colours, marble, bronze, -and precious stuffs—what you please. Imagine, seek, -invent,—and count on me!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>But Monsieur Salomon had no sooner seen the -goddess of Particelli than he too was lifted from the -earth and borne straight into the empyrean. At the -moment of leaving her, when she suffered him to kiss -her hand, and let him feel the darts of desire which -shot from those not too prudish eyes, Salomon de -Caus "<i>devint amoureux à en perdre la tête</i>." Thenceforth, -in brief,</p> - -<p class='c013'>"His chief good and market of his time"</p> - -<p class='c020'>was to obey and anticipate every wild and frivolous -fantasy of Marion Delorme. Michel Particelli's hyperbolical -commission should be fulfilled for him beyond -his own imaginings! He threw down the palace -of Marion and built another in its place. The new -palace was to cede in nothing to the Louvre or Saint-Germain. -With his own hands Salomon de Caus -decorated it; and then, at the bidding of his protector, -Particelli, he consented, <i>bon grè, mal grè</i>, to -paint the picture of the divinity herself.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Alone one morning with his delicious model," the -distracted artist flung brushes and palette from him, -and cast himself at her feet. "<i>Mon cœur se déchire, -ma tête se perd.... Je deviens fou, je vous aime, -et je me meurs!</i>" It was a declaration of much in -little, and Marion, a <i>connaisseuse</i> of such speeches, -absolved and accepted him with a kiss.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Installed by right of conquest in that Circean -boudoir, which drew as a magnet the wit and gallantry -of Paris, Salomon stood sentinel at the door -"like a eunuch or a Cerberus." Brissac and Saint-Evremont -received the most Lenten entertainment, -and the proposals of Cinq-Mars were rejected. -Marion was even persuaded to be not at home to -Richelieu himself. But the happy Salomon grew unhappy, -and more unhappy. Every moment he came -with a sigh upon some souvenir, delicately equivocal, -of the <i>vie galante</i> of his mistress; and when love began -to feed upon the venom of jealousy, his complacent -goddess grew capricious, vexed, irritated, -and at length incensed. After that, she resolved -coldly on Salomon's betrayal. It was the fashion of -the age to be cruel in one's vengeance. Marion -penned a note to Richelieu:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I want so much to see you again. I send with this the little -key which opens the little door.... You must forgive everything, -and you are not to be angry at finding here a most learned -young man whom the love of science and the science of love have -combined to reduce to a condition of midsummer madness. Does -your friendship for me, to say nothing of your respect for yourself, -suggest any means of ridding me instantly of this embarrassing -lunatic? The poor devil loves me to distraction. He is -astonishingly clever, and has discovered wonders—mountains -that nobody else has seen, and worlds that nobody else has imagined. -He has all the talents of the Bible, and another, the -talent of making me the most miserable of women. This genius -from the moon, whom I commend to your Eminence's most particular -attention, is called Salomon de Caus."</p> - -<p class='c012'>A missive of that colour, from a Marion Delorme -to a Richelieu, was the request polite for a <i>lettre de -cachet</i>. Salomon de Caus was invited to call upon -the Cardinal. Behind his jealous passion for his mistress, -Salomon still cherished his passion for science, -and he went hot-foot to Richelieu with his hundred -schemes for changing the face of the world, with steam -as the motive power. It must have been a curious -interview. At the end, Richelieu summoned the captain -of his guard.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Take this man away."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Where, your Eminence?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To what place are we sending our lunatics just -now?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To Bicêtre, your Eminence."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Just so! Ask admission for Monsieur at Bicêtre." -So, from the meridian of his glory, Salomon de Caus -hastened to his setting, and at this point he vanishes -from history. Legend, not altogether legendary, -shows him once again.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Some eighteen months or two years after he had -been carried, "gagged and handcuffed," to Bicêtre, it -fell to Marion Delorme (in the absence of her new -lover Cinq-Mars) to do the honours of Paris for the -Marquis of Worcester. The marquis took a fancy to -visit Bicêtre, which had even then an unrighteous -celebrity from one end of Europe to the other. As -they strolled through the <i>quartier des fous</i> a creature -made a spring at the bars of his cell.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Marion—look, Marion! It is I! It is Salomon! -I love you! Listen: I have made a discovery which -will bring millions and millions to France! Let me -out for God's sake! I will give you the moon and all -the stars to set me free, Marion!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Do you know this man?" said Lord Worcester.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"I am not at home in bedlam," said Marion, who -on principle allowed no corner to her conscience.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"What is the discovery he talks of?" asked Lord -Worcester of a warder.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"He calls it steam, milord. They've all discovered -something, milord."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Lord Worcester went back to Bicêtre the next -morning and was closeted for an hour with the madman. -At Marion Delorme's in the afternoon he said:</p> - -<p class='c012'>"In England we should not have put that man into -a madhouse. Your Bicêtre is not the most useful -place. Who invented those cells? They have wasted -to madness as fine a genius as the age has known."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Salamon de Caus died in Bicêtre in 1626.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Earlier than this, Bicêtre the asylum shared the evil -renown of Bicêtre the prison. To prisoners and patients -alike popular rumour assigned an equal fate. -The first, it was said, were assassinated, the second -were "disposed of." Now and again the warders and -attendants amused themselves by organising a pitched -battle between the "mad side" and the "prison side"; -the wounded were easily transferred to the infirmary, -the dead were as easily packed into the trench beneath -the walls.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The very name of Bicêtre—dungeon, madhouse, -and <i>cloaca</i> of obscene infamies—became of dreadful -import; not the Conciergerie, the Châtelet, Fort-l'Évêque, -Vincennes, nor the Bastille itself inspired -the common people and the bourgeoisie with such -detestation and panic fear. The general imagination, -out-vieing rumour, peopled it with imps, evil genii, -sorcerers, and shapeless monsters compounded of -men and beasts. Mediæval Paris, at a loss for the -origins of things, ascribed them to the Fairies, the -Devil, or Julius Cæsar. It was said that the Devil -alighted in Paris one night, and brought in chains to -the "plateau de Bicêtre" a pauper, a madman, and a -prisoner, with which three unfortunates he set agoing -the prison on the one side and the asylum on the -other, to minister to the <i>menus plaisirs</i> of the denizens -of hell. Such grim renown as this was not easily -surpassed; but at the end of Louis XIV.'s reign the -common legend went a step farther, and said that the -Devil had now disowned Bicêtre! Rhymes sincere -or satirical gave utterance to the terror and abhorrence -of the vulgar mind.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Throughout the whole of the eighteenth century, up -to the time of the Revolution, say MM. Alhoy and Lurine,<a id='r16' /><a href='#f16' class='c014'><sup>[16]</sup></a> -Bicêtre continued a treatment which in all respects -is not easily paralleled: the helot's lot and -labour for pauperism; the rod and worse for sickness -of body and of mind; the dagger or the ditch, upon -occasion, for mere human misfortune. Till the first -grey glimmer of the dawn of prison reform, in the -days of Louis XVI, Bicêtre offered to "mere prisoners" -the "sanctuary of a lion's den," and lent boldly -to king, minister, nobles, clergy, police, and all the -powers that were, the cells set apart for the mad as -convenient places for stifling the wits and consciences -of the sane.</p> -<div class='footnote c015' id='f16'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r16'>16</a>. <i>Les Prisons de Paris.</i></p> -</div> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>In 1789, Paris had thirty-two State prisons. Four -years later, the Terror itself was content with twenty-eight. -One of the earliest acts of that vexed body, -the National Assembly, was to appoint a commission -of four of its members to the decent duty of visiting -the prisons. The commissioners chosen were Fréteau, -Barrière, De Castellane, and Mirabeau. Count -Mirabeau at least—whose hot vagaries and the undying -spite of his father had passed him through the -hands of nearly every gaoler in France—had qualifications -enough for the task!</p> - -<p class='c012'>The commissioners found within the black walls of -<i>ce hideux Bicêtre</i> a population of close upon three -thousand creatures, including "paupers, children, -paralytics, imbeciles and lunatics." The administrative -staff of all degrees numbered just three hundred. -The governor, knowing his inferno, was not too willing -to accord a free pass to the explorers, and Mirabeau -and his colleagues had to give him a taste of -their authority before he could be induced to slip the -bolts of subterranean cells, whose inmates "had been -expiating twenty years the double crime of poverty -and courage," against whom no decree had been pronounced -but that of a <i>lettre de cachet</i>, or who had -been involved, like the Prévôt de Beaumont, in the -crime of exposing some plot against the people's welfare. -Children were found in these cells chained to -criminals and idiots.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>In April, 1792, Bicêtre gave admission to another -set of commissioners. This second was a visit of -some mystery, not greatly noised, and under cover of -the night. It was not now a question of diving into -moist and sunless caverns for living proofs (in fetters -and stinking rags) of the hidden abuses of regal -justice. The new commissioners came, quietly and -almost by stealth, to make the first official trial of the -Guillotine.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The invention of Dr. Guillotin (touching which he -had first addressed the Constituent Assembly in December, -1789: "With this machine of mine, gentlemen, -I shall shave off your heads in a twinkling, and -you will not feel the slightest pain") does not date in -France as an instrument of capital punishment until -1792; but under other names, and with other accessories, -Scotland, Germany, and Italy had known a similar -contrivance in the sixteenth century. In Paris, where -sooner or later everything finishes with a couplet, the -newspapers and broadsheets, not long after that midnight -<i>essai</i> at Bicêtre, began to overflow gaily enough -with topical songs (<i>couplets de circonstance</i>) in praise -of the Doctor and his "razor." Two fragmentary -samples will serve:—</p> -<p class='c021'>Air—"Quand la Mer Rouge apparut."</p> -<div class='lg-container-l c022'> - <div class='linegroup'> - <div class='group'> - <div class='line'>"C'est un coup que l'on reçoit</div> - <div class='line in2'>Avant qu'on s'en doute;</div> - <div class='line'>A peine on s'en aperçoit,</div> - <div class='line in2'>Car on n'y voit goutte.</div> - <div class='line'>Un certain ressort caché,</div> - <div class='line'>Tout à coup étant laché,</div> - <div class='line in2'>Fait tomber, ber, ber,</div> - <div class='line in2'>Fait sauter, ter, ter,</div> - <div class='line in4'>Fait tomber,</div> - <div class='line in4'>Fait sauter,</div> - <div class='line in2'>Fait voler la tête ...</div> - <div class='line in2'>C'est bien plus honnête."</div> - </div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c1'> -<div class='nf-center c022'> - <div>II.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c023'>"Sur l'inimitable machine du Mèdecin Guillotin, propere à -couper les têtes, et dite de son nom Guillotine."</p> -<p class='c021'>Air—"Du Menuet d'Exaudet."</p> -<div class='lg-container-l c022'> - <div class='linegroup'> - <div class='group'> - <div class='line'>"Guillotin,</div> - <div class='line in1'>Médecin</div> - <div class='line in1'>Politique,</div> - <div class='line in1'>Imagine un beau matin</div> - <div class='line in1'>Que pendre est inhumain</div> - <div class='line in1'>Et peu patriotique;</div> - <div class='line in1'>Aussitôt,</div> - <div class='line in1'>Il lui faut</div> - <div class='line in1'>Un supplice</div> - <div class='line in1'>Que, sans corde ni poteau,</div> - <div class='line in1'>Supprime du bourreau</div> - <div class='line in1'>L'office," etc.</div> - </div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>It was on the 17th of April, 1792, that proof was -made of the first guillotine—not yet famed through -France as the nation's razor. Three corpses, it is -said (commodities easily procured at Bicêtre), were -furnished for the experiment, which Doctors Guillotine -and Louis directed. Mirabeau's physician and -friend Cabanis was of the party, and—a not unimportant -assistant—Samson the headsman, with his -two brothers and his son. "The mere weight of the -axe," said Cabanis, "sheared the heads with the swiftness -of a glance, and the bones were clean severed -(<i>coupés net</i>)" Dr. Louis recommended that the knife -should be given an oblique direction, so that it might -cut saw-fashion in its fall. The guillotine was definitely -adopted; and eight days later, the 25th of April, -it settled accounts with an assassin named Pelletier, -who was the first to "look through the little window," -and "sneeze into the sack (<i>éternuer dans le sac</i>)."</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Four months after the first trial of the "inimitable -machine" Bicêtre paid its tribute of blood to the red -days of September. In Bicêtre, as elsewhere in Paris, -that Sunday, 2d of September, 1792, and the three -days that followed were long remembered. "All -France leaps distracted," says Carlyle, "like the -winnowed Sahara waltzing in sand colonnades!" In -Paris, "huge placards" going up on the walls, "all -steeples clangouring, the alarm-gun booming from -minute to minute, and lone Marat, the man forbid," -seeing salvation in one thing only—in the fall of -"two hundred and sixty thousand aristocrat heads." -It was the beginning or presage of the Terror.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The hundred hours' massacre in the prisons of -Paris, beginning on the Sunday afternoon, may be -reckoned with the hours of St. Bartholomew. "The -tocsin is pealing its loudest, the clocks inaudibly striking -three." The massacre of priests was just over -at the Abbaye prison; and there, and at La Force, -and at the Châtelet, and the Conciergerie, in each of -these prisons the strangest court—which could not be -called of justice but of revenge—was hurriedly got -together, and prisoner after prisoner, fetched from his -cell and swiftly denounced as a "royalist plotter," was -thrust out into a "howling sea" of <i>sans-culottes</i> and -hewn to pieces under an arch of pikes and sabres. -"Man after man is cut down," says Carlyle; "the -sabres need sharpening, the killers refresh themselves -from wine-jugs." Dr. Moore, author of the <i>Journal -during a Residence in France</i>, came upon one of the -scenes of butchery, grew sick at the sight, and -"turned into another street." Not fewer than a -thousand and eighty-nine were slaughtered in the -prisons.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The carnage at Bicêtre, on the Paris outskirts, was -on the Monday, and here it seems to have been of -longer duration and more terrible than elsewhere. -Narratives of this butchery are not all in harmony. -Prud'homme, author of the <i>Journal des Révolutions de -Paris</i>, says that the mob started for Bicêtre towards -three o'clock, taking with them seven pieces of cannon; -that a manufactory of false paper-money -(<i>assignats</i>) was discovered in full swing in the -prison, and that all who were concerned in it were -killed without mercy; that Lamotte, husband of the -"Necklace Countess," was amongst the prisoners, -and that the people "at once took him under their -protection"; that the debtors and "the more -wretched class of prisoners," were enlarged; and -that the rest fell under pike, sabre, and club.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Barthélemi Maurice contradicts Prud'homme wholesale. -The attack was at ten in the morning, he says, -and not at three; there were no cannon; the paper-notes -manufactory existed only in M. Prud'homme's -imagination; prisoners for debt were not lodged in -Bicêtre; the sick and the lunatics suffered no harm; -and the famous Lamotte "never figured in any register -of Bicêtre."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Thiers<a id='r17' /><a href='#f17' class='c014'><sup>[17]</sup></a> insists upon the cannon, says the killing -was done madly for mere lust of blood, and that the -massacre continued until Wednesday, the 5th of -September.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f17'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r17'>17</a>. <i>Histoire de la Révolution.</i></p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>Peltier in his turn, royalist pamphleteer, gives his -version of the tragedy. This Bicêtre, says Peltier, -was "the den of all the vices," the sewer, so to speak, -of Paris. "All were slain; impossible to figure up -the number of the victims. I have heard it placed at -as many as six thousand!" Peltier is not easily -satisfied. "Eight days and eight nights, without one -instant's pause, the work of death went forward." -Pikes, sabres, and muskets "were not enough for the -ferocious assassins, they had to bring cannon into -play." It was not until a mere handful of the -prisoners remained "that they had recourse again to -their small-arms" (<i>que l'on en revenait aux petites -armes</i>).</p> - -<p class='c012'>Doubtless the most accurate account of this merciless -affair is contained in the statement made to -Barthélemi Maurice by Père Richard, <i>doyen</i> of the -warders of Bicêtre, and an eyewitness. It may be -summarised from the pages of MM. Alhoy and -Lurine:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"Master Richard traced on paper the three numbers, 166, 55, -and 22,—What are those? I asked him.—166, that is the number -of the dead.—And 55 and 22, what are they?—55 was the number -of children in the prison, and only 22 were left us. The -scoundrels killed 33 children, besides the 166 adults.—Tell me -how it began.—They came bellowing up at ten that Monday -morning, all in the prison so still that you might have heard a fly -buzzing, though we had three thousand men in that morning.—But -you had cannon they say; you defended yourselves.—Where -did you get that tale, sir? We had no cannon, and we didn't -attempt to defend ourselves.—What was the strength of the -attacking party?—A good three thousand, I should say; but of -those not more than about two hundred were active, so to speak. -—Did they bring cannon?—It was said they did, but I saw none, -though I looked out of the main gate more than once.—What -were their arms, then?—Well, a few of them had second-hand -muskets (<i>de méchants fusils</i>), others had swords, axes, bludgeons -(<i>bûches</i>), and bills (<i>crochets</i>), but there were more pikes than anything -else.—Were there any well-dressed people amongst them?—Oh, -yes; the 'judges' especially; though the bulk of them -were not much to look at.—How many 'judges' were there?—A -dozen; but they relieved one another.—If there were judges, -there was some sort of formality, I suppose. What was the procedure? -How did they judge, acquit, and execute?—They sat -in the clerk's office, a room down below, near the chapel. They -made us fetch out the register; looked down the column of -'cause of imprisonment,' and then sent for the prisoner. If you -were too frightened to feel your legs under you, or couldn't get -a word out quick, it was 'guilty' on the spot.—And then?—Then -the 'president' said: 'Let the citizen be taken to the Abbaye.' -They knew outside what that meant. Two men seized him by -the arm and led him out of the room. At the door he was face -to face with a double row of cut-throats, a prod in the rear with -a pike tossed him amongst them, and then ... well, there -were some that took a good deal of finishing off.—They did not -shoot them then?—No, there was no shooting.—And the acquittals?—Well, -if it was simply, 'take the citizen to the Abbaye,' -they killed him. If it was 'take him to the Abbaye,' with <i>Vive la -nation</i>! he was acquitted. It wasn't over at nightfall. We -passed the night of the 3d with the butchers inside the prison; -they were just worn out. It began again on the morning of the -4th, but not quite with the same spirit. It was mostly the children -who suffered on the Tuesday.—And the lunatics, and the -patients, and the old creatures—did they get their throats cut -too?—No, they were all herded in the dormitories, with the doors -locked on them, and sentinels inside to keep them from looking -out of window. All the killing was done in the prison.—And -when did they leave you? At about three on Tuesday afternoon; -and then we called the roll of the survivors.—And the -dead?—We buried them in quicklime in our own cemetery."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The hideous <i>mise-en-scène</i> of Père Richard is, at the -worst, a degree less reproachful than that of Prud'homme, -Peltier, or M. Thiers.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>There was one worthy man at Bicêtre, Dr. Pinel, -whose devotion to humanitarian science (a form of -devotion not over-common in such places at that day) -very nearly cost him his life at the hands of the revolutionary -judges. Dr. Pinel, who had the notion that -disease of the mind was not best cured by whipping, -was accused by the Committee of Public Safety (under -whose rule, it may be observed, no public ever went -in greater terror) of plotting with medical science for -the restoration of the monarchy! It was a charge -quite worthy of the wisdom and the tenderness for -"public safety" of the <i>Comité de Salut Public</i>. Pinel, -disdaining oratory, vouchsafed the simplest explanation -of his treatment at Bicêtre,—and was permitted -to continue it.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Not so charitable were the gods to Théroigne de -Mericourt, a woman singular amongst the women of -the Revolution. Readers of Carlyle will remember -his almost gallant salutations of her (a handsome -young woman of the streets, who took a passion for -the popular cause, and rode on a gun-carriage in the -famous outing to Versailles) as often as she starts -upon the scene. When he misses her from the procession, -in the fourth book of the first volume, it is:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"But where is the brown-locked, light-behaved, fire-hearted -Demoiselle Théroigne? Brown eloquent beauty, who, with thy -winged words and glances, shalt thrill rough bosoms—whole steel -battalions—and persuade an Austrian Kaiser, pike and helm lie -provided for thee in due season, and alas! also strait waistcoat -and long lodging in the Salpêtrière."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Théroigne was some beautiful village girl when the -echo first reached her of the tocsin of the Revolution. -She thought a woman was wanted there, and trudged -hot-foot to Paris, perhaps through the self-same quiet -lanes that saw the pilgrimage of Charlotte Corday. -In Paris she took (for reasons of her own, one must -suppose) the calling of "unfortunate female"—the -euphemism will be remembered as Carlyle's—and -dubbed herself the people's Aspasia—"l'Aspasie du -peuple." In "tunic blue," over a "red petticoat," -crossed with a tricolour scarf and crowned with the -Phrygian cap, she roamed the streets, "<i>criant</i>, <i>jurant</i>, -<i>blasphémant</i>," to the tune of the drum of rebellion. -One day the women of the town, in a rage of fear or -jealousy, fell upon her, stripped her, and beat her -through the streets. She went mad, and in the first -years of this century she was still an inmate of Bicêtre. -When the "women's side" of Bicêtre was closed, in -1803, Théroigne was transferred to the Salpêtrière, -where she died.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>During the hundred years (1748-1852) of the -prisons of the Bagnes—those convict establishments -at Toulon, Brest, and Rochefort, which took the -place of the galleys, and which in their turn gave -way to the modern system of transportation,—it was -from Bicêtre that the chained cohorts of the <i>forçats</i> -were despatched on their weary march through -France. The ceremony of the <i>ferrement</i>, or putting -in irons for the journey, was one of the sights of -Paris for those who could gain admission to the -great courtyard of the prison. At daybreak of the -morning appointed for the start, the long chains and -collars of steel were laid out in the yard, and the -prison smiths attended with their mallets and portable -anvils; the convicts, for whom these preparations -were afoot, keeping up a terrific din behind -their grated windows. When all was ready for them, -they were tumbled out by batches and placed in rows -along the wall. Every man had to strip to the skin, -let the weather be what it might, and a sort of smock -of coarse calico was tossed to him from a pile in the -middle of the yard; he did not dress until the toilet -of the collar was finished. This, at the rough hands -of the smith and his aids, was a sufficiently painful -process. The convicts were called up in alphabetical -order, and to the neck of each man a heavy collar was -adjusted, the triangular bolt of which was hammered -to by blows of a wooden mallet. To the padlock was -attached a chain which, descending to the prisoner's -waistbelt, was taken up thence and riveted to the next -man's collar, and in this way some two hundred <i>forçats</i> -were tethered like cattle in what was called the <i>chaine -volante</i>. The satyr-like humours of the gang, singing -and capering on the cobbles, shouting to the echo the -name of some criminal hero as he stepped out to -receive his collar, and sometimes joining hands in a -frenzied dance, which was broken only by the savage -use of the warder's bâtons—all this was the sport of -the well-dressed crowd of spectators.</p> - -<p class='c012'>As far as the outskirts of Paris, the convicts were -carried in <i>chars-à-bancs</i>, an armed escort on either -side; and when the prison doors were thrown open -to let them out, the whole canaille of the town was -waiting to receive them with yells of derision, to -which the <i>forçats</i> responded with all the oaths they -had. This was one of the most popular spectacles of -Paris until the middle of the present century.</p> - -<p class='c012'>An essential sordidness is the character most persistent -in the history of Bicêtre—a dull squalor, with -perpetual crises of unromantic agony. There is no -glamour upon Bicêtre; no silken gown with a domino -above it rustles softly by lantern-light through those -grimy wickets. It is not here that any gallant prisoner -of state comes, bribing the governor to keep his table -furnished with the best, receiving his love-letters in -baskets of fruit, giving his wine-parties of an evening. -In the records of Vincennes and the Bastille the novelist -will always feel himself at home, but Bicêtre has -daunted him. It is poor Jean Valjean, of <i>Les Misérables</i>, -squatting "in the north corner of the courtyard," -choked with tears, "while the bolt of his iron -collar was being riveted with heavy hammer-blows." -This is the solitary figure of interest which Bicêtre -has given to fiction.</p> - -<p class='c012'>If a shadowy figure may be added, it is from the -same phantasmagoric gallery of Victor Hugo. Bicêtre -was the prison of the nameless faint-heart who -weeps and moans through the incredible pages of -<i>Le Dernier Jour d'un Condamné</i>. Then, and until -1836, Bicêtre was the last stage but one (<i>l'avant-dernière -étape</i>) on the road to the guillotine. The -last was the Conciergerie, close to the Place de -Grève. The shadow-murderer of <i>Le Dernier Jour -d'un Condamné</i>—for there is no real stuff of murder -in him, and he is the feeblest and least sympathetic -puppet of fiction—is useful only as bringing into relief -the old, disused, and forgotten <i>cachot du Condamné</i>, -or condemned cell, of Bicêtre. It was a den eight -feet square; rough stone walls, moist and sweating, -like the flags which made the flooring; the only -"window" a grating in the iron door; a truss of -straw on a stone couch in a recess; and an arched -and blackened ceiling, wreathed with cobwebs.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Starting out of sleep one night, Hugo's condemned -man lifts his lamp and sees spectral writings, figures -and arabesques in crayons, blood and charcoal dancing -over the walls of the cell—the "visitors' book" of -generations of <i>Condamnés à mort</i> who have preceded -him. Some had blazoned their names in full, with -grotesque embellishments of the capital letter and a -motto underneath breathing their last defiance to the -world; and in one corner, "traced in white outline, a -frightful image, the figure of the scaffold, which, at -the moment that I write, may be rearing its timbers -for me! The lamp all but fell from my hands."</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p130.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p131.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch07' class='c004'>CHAPTER VII. <br /> <br /> SAINTE-PÉLAGIE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>The prison of Sainte-Pélagie owed its name to a -frail beauty whom play-goers in Antioch knew in -the fifth century of this era. Embracing Christianity, -she forsook the stage, and built herself a cell on the -Mount of Olives. The Church bestowed on her the -honours of the Calendar.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Twelve centuries later, in the reign of Louis XIV., -a Madame de Miramion, inspired by the memory, not -of Pélagie the <i>comédienne</i>, but of Sainte-Pélagie the -recluse, built in Paris a substantial Refuge for young -women whose virtue seemed in need of protection. -Letters-patent were obtained from the King, and -Madame de Miramion sought her recruits here and -there in the capital; gathering within the fold, it was -said, a considerable number "who had no longer anything -to fear for their virtue." But the rule of the -house was strait, and one by one Madame's young -persons absconded, or were withdrawn from her keeping -by their parents. Nothing daunted, and sustained -by her fixed idea of making penitents at any price, -Madame de Miramion descended boldly upon the -haunts of Aspasia herself, and there laid hands on all -those votaries of Venus who were either weary of -their calling or whose calling was wearying of them. -The crown of the <i>joyeuse vie</i> fits loosely, and the -lightest shock unfixes it. Madame's campaign in -this quarter was successful, and she was soon at the -head of a battalion of more or less repentant graces. -New letters-patent were granted by a Majesty so desirous -of the moral well-being of his female subjects, -the establishment of Sainte-Pélagie was confirmed, -and, thanks to the invaluable assistance of the police, -the complement of Magdalens was maintained. -Sainte-Pélagie continued its pious destiny until the -days of the Revolution, when the cloister of the Magdalens -became a prison.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>As a prison, Sainte-Pélagie (which is in existence -to-day as a <i>maison de correction</i>, or penitentiary) has -known many and strange guests. From 1792 to 1795, -it held a mixed population of both sexes, political -prisoners and others. Between the years 1797 and -1834, debtors of all degrees were confined there, and -at one period the debtors shared the gaol with a -motley crew of juvenile delinquents. Under the -Restoration and under the two Empires Sainte-Pélagie -served the uses of a State prison. The first Napoleon -had the cells in constant occupation. The -Restoration sent there, within the space of a few -days, one hundred and thirty-five individuals, arrested -by the police of Louis XVIII. for their connection, -as officers, with the old Imperial Guard. Innumerable -indeed, from 1790 onwards, were the victims -who found a lodging, not of their choosing, behind -the ample walls which the widow Miramion had consecrated -a shelter for tottering virtue or gallantry in -mourning for its past. The men of the Revolution -found Sainte-Pélagie excellently suited to their needs; -Madame de Miramion had housed her Magdalens -strongly. In form a vast quadrilateral, the buildings -were easily converted to the uses of a prison; and at -a later date the prison was arranged in three divisions. -On the west side were confined petty offenders under -sentences ranging between six months and one year. -The debtors' was the second division; and here also -were imprisoned young rogues, thieves, and vagabonds, -and (up to 1867) "certain men of letters and -journalists." The east side seems to have been reserved -principally for political offenders. But the -divisions were never very strictly observed; and a -political prisoner relegated by mischance or for lack -of space to the west side of the prison was treated in -all respects as a common criminal. Ordinary prisoners -were kept at work, and received a small percentage -on the profits of their industry. Political -prisoners, journalists, and "men of letters" were exempted -from labour; and a third class called <i>pistoliers</i>, -purchased this exemption at a cost of from six -to seven francs a fortnight.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was by order of the Convention that Sainte-Pélagie -was transformed from a convent-refuge into -a prison, and during the revolutionary period a crowd -of unknown or little-known suspects passed within its -keeping before being summoned to the bar. Not a -few quitted it only for the scaffold.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Madame Roland was cast there on the 25th of -June, 1793. Three years earlier, Carlyle notes her -at Lyons, "that queen-like burgher woman; beautiful, -Amazonian-graceful to the eye" with "that strong -Minerva-face." We shall return to Madame Roland, -wife of the "King's Inspector of Manufactures."</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the same month, if not on the same day, were -sent to Sainte-Pélagie the Comte de Laval-Montmorency, -and the Marquis de Pons. In August of the -same year went to join them (not now with popular -acclamation, as when, in 1765, Mademoiselle Clairon -and her fellow players were haled to the Châtelet) -nine ladies of the Théâtre-Français. After the 9th -Thermidor (July 27, 1794), which saw the sudden -downfall and death of Robespierre, Sainte-Pélagie -received most of the victims of the reaction,—the -<i>Tail</i> of Robespierre,—including the Duplaix family.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>Madame Roland had known the indignities of a -revolutionary prison before her sojourn at Sainte-Pélagie. -Imprisoned first in the Abbaye, it was -from there that she wrote:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I find a certain pleasure in enforcing privations on myself, in -seeing how far the human will can be employed in reducing the -'necessaries' of existence. I substituted bread and water for -chocolate, at breakfast; a plate of meat with vegetables was my -dinner; and I supped on vegetables, without desert."</p> - -<p class='c012'>But having "as much aversion from as contempt -for a merely useless economy" (<i>autant d'aversion que -de mépris pour une économie inutile</i>), Madame Roland -goes on to say that what she saved by the retrenchments -of her own cuisine she spent in procuring extra -rations for the pauper prisoners of the Abbaye; -and adds: "If I stay here six months I mean to go -out plump and hearty [<i>je veux en sortir grasse et -fraîche</i>] wanting nothing more than soup and bread, -and with the satisfaction of having earned certain -<i>bénédictions incognito</i>."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Transferred to Sainte-Pélagie, this heroic woman -of the people saw herself confounded with women of -the town (the descendants of the widow Miramion's -Magdalens), thieves, forgers, and assassins. She -made the best of the situation, cultivated flowers in -a box in the window of her cell, and wrote incessantly. -When told that her name had been included in the -process against the Girondins, she said: "I am not -afraid to go to the scaffold in such good company; I -am ashamed only to live among scoundrels." Her -friends had contrived a plan for her escape, but could -not induce her to profit by it: "Spare me!" she cried. -"I love my husband, I love my daughter; you know it; -but I will not save myself by flight." When the axe -fell on the heads of the twenty-two Girondins, October -31, 1793 (10th Brumaire of the Republican -calendar), Madame Roland was removed to the -Conciergerie. Knowing well the fate that awaited -her, she lost neither her courage nor her beautiful -tranquillity; and used to go down to the men's wicket -of the prison, exhorting them to be brave and worthy -of the cause. In the tumbril, on her way to the guillotine, -she was robed in white, her superb black hair -floating behind her; and at the place of execution, -bending her head to the statue of Liberty, she murmured: -"O Liberty! what crimes are done in thy -name!"—<i>O Liberté! que de crimes on commet en ton -nom!</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>It was not Madame Dubarry's to show this sublime -fortitude in death; but after all one dies as one must. -Sainte-Pélagie will tell us that poor Dame Dubarry -was the feeblest and most faint-hearted of its recluses -of the Revolution. She wept, and called on heaven -to save her, and shuffled and cut her cards, and consulted -the lines in her hand; and when her name was -called at the wicket on the fatal morning, she swooned -on the flags of the prison, and was carried scarcely -animate to the tumbril.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The story of governor Bouchotte, who had charge -of Sainte-Pélagie at this terrible epoch, is a noble one. -The September massacres had begun, and the red-bonnets -in detachments were sharing the butchery at -the prisons. The Abbaye, the Carmes, the Force, -and the Conciergerie had given them prompt entrance; -the turnkeys saluting the self-styled judges, -say MM. Alhoy and Lurine, as the grave-digger salutes -the hangman. Not so governor Bouchotte of -Sainte-Pélagie. The mob swarmed at the doors, but -to their clattering on the panels no answer was vouchsafed. -Pikes, hammers, and axes resounded on the -solid portals, but silence the most complete reigned -behind them.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Can citizen Bouchotte have been beforehand -with us?—<i>Le citoyen Bouchotte, nous aurait-il devancés?</i>" -cried one. "Not an aristocrat voice to be -heard! Bouchotte has perhaps finished them off -himself."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The neighbouring houses were ransacked for tools -proper to effect an entrance, and the doors were burst -open. The mob poured in; and there, bound hand -and foot on the flags in the courtyard of the prison, -they found the governor and his wife.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Citizens," cried Bouchotte, "you arrive too late! -My prisoners are gone. They got warning of your -coming, and after binding my wife and myself as you -see us, they made their escape."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Bouchotte was taken at his word, he and his wife -were released from their cords, and the red-bonnets -went off to wreak a double vengeance at Bicêtre. -At the risk of his own and of his wife's life, the admirable -Bouchotte had tricked the cut-throats. He had -uncaged his birds and given them their liberty -through a private postern, and had then ordered -his warders to tie up his wife and himself. Honour -to the brave memory of Bouchotte! The history of -the French Revolution has few brighter passages -than this.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Nougaret gives us a curious picture of the interior -of Sainte-Pélagie under the bloody rule of Robespierre.<a id='r18' /><a href='#f18' class='c014'><sup>[18]</sup></a> -The prison itself he describes as "damp and -unwholesome" (<i>humide et malsaine</i>). There were -about three hundred and fifty prisoners, detained -they knew not why, for they were not allowed to -read the charges entered on the registers.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f18'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r18'>18</a>. <i>Histoire des Prisons de Paris et des Départements.</i></p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>To each prisoner was allotted a cell six feet square, -"with a dirty bed and a mattress as hard as marble." -The turnkey's first question to a new-comer was: -"Have you any money?" If the answer was, Yes, -he was supplied with "a basin and a water-jug and -a few cracked plates, for which he paid triple their -worth." If the prisoner entered with empty pockets, -it was: "So much the worse for you; for the rule -here is that nothing buys nothing" (<i>on n'a rien pour -rien</i>). In this plight, says Nougaret, the prisoner -was obliged to sell some poor personal effect in order -to obtain the strictest necessaries of life. "A citizen -who occupied, in the month of Floréal, cell number -10 in the corridor of the second story, sacrificed -for twenty-five francs a gold ring worth about -£20, to procure for himself those same necessities." -The rations at this date consisted of "a pound and -a half of bad bread and a plate of flinty beans [<i>haricots -très-durs</i>], larded with stale grease or tallow." -Prisoners who could afford it paid an exorbitant -price for a few supplementary dishes. Later, the diet -was rather more generous.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Although communication between the prisoners -was forbidden, they had invented a sort of club; perhaps -the most singular in the annals of clubdom. -The "meetings" were at eight in the evening, but no -member left his cell. Despite the thickness of the -doors, it was found that, by raising his voice, a -prisoner could be heard from one end of the corridor -to the other; and by this means the members of the -club exchanged such news as they had gleaned during -the day from the warders on duty. In order -that no one might be betrayed or compromised (in -the event of the conversation being overheard by the -gendarmes posted under the windows), instead of -saying "I heard such-and-such a thing to-day," the -formula was, "I dreamt last night."</p> - -<div id='i_p138a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p138a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>A TURNKEY.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>When a candidate presented himself (that is to say, -when a new prisoner arrived), the president inquired, -in behalf of the club, his name, quality, residence, and -the reason of his imprisonment; and if the answers -were satisfactory he was proclaimed a member of the -society in these terms: "Citizen, the patriots imprisoned -in this corridor deem you worthy to be -their brother and friend. Permit me to send you the -<i>accolade fraternelle</i>!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Two circumstances excluded from membership of -the club,—to have borne false witness at Fouquier-Tinville's -bar, and to have been concerned in the -fabrication of false <i>assignats</i>. The club held its -"meetings" regularly, until the date at which the -prisoners were allowed to exercise together in the -corridors.</p> - -<p class='c012'>We saw Madame Roland, "brave, fair Roland," at -the men's wicket of Sainte-Pélagie, passionately exhorting -them; and Comtesse Dubarry answering her -summons to the guillotine by a swoon.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Another woman, not famous yet, but destined to -fame, was on the women's side of Sainte-Pélagie in -1793: Joséphine de Beauharnais, who was to stand -one day with Napoleon on the throne. A tradition -of the prison affirmed that Joséphine left her initials -carved or traced on a wall of her cell.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>The Terror seems almost to have emptied Sainte-Pélagie, -and it is not until the days of the Empire -that we find its cells once more in the occupation of -political prisoners. Prisoners of that quality were -not lacking there in Buonaparte's despotic era; but -(and this may have been of design) the registers were -not too well kept, and prisoners' names and the -motives of their imprisonment are hard to arrive at. -Had we the lists in full, however, they would excite -small interest at this day. Between 1811 and -March, 1814, when the records were more precise, -two hundred and thirty-four persons were confined -in this prison for causes more or less political. In -April, 1814, we have the Russian Emperor giving -their freedom to some seventy of the prisoners of -Napoleon. The Restoration sends the officers of the -old Imperial Guard to Sainte-Pélagie. The record -of the Hundred Days, so far as this prison is concerned, -is a clean one; but Charles X. continues the -use of Sainte-Pélagie as a prison of State, and Béranger, -Cauchois-Lemaire, Colonel Duvergier, Bonnaire, -Dubois, Achille Roche, and Barthélemy are amongst -the names on the gaoler's books. The Constitutional -Monarchy from 1830 to 1848, the Republic succeeding -it, and the reign of Napoleon III. (who swept into it -five hundred citizens in the space of a few days) kept -alive the political tradition of Sainte-Pélagie. M. -Rochefort, who had his turn there from 1869-1870, -was one of the last of Napoleon III.'s prisoners, to -whom the revolution of the 4th of September gave -back their liberty. From that date, the "political -boarders" of Sainte-Pélagie were few, the governments -of MM. Thiers and De Broglie preferring -rather to suppress newspapers than to pursue their -editors.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Under the Empire and the Restoration the -organisation and administration of Sainte-Pélagie -evidently left much to be desired. It was not rare, -says one chronicler, for accused persons to remain six -or seven months without being interrogated.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A certain M. Poulain d'Angers lay there a quarter -of a year quite ignorant as to the cause of his arrest. -Another accused, a certain M. Guillon, who had -been attached to the Emperor's Council, weary of the -perpetual shufflings of the police of the succeeding -reign, constituted himself a prisoner <i>de facto</i> without -having received judgment; and remained six months -a captive, although there was no entry against his -name: one morning, they showed him the door, -<i>malgré lui</i>. An adventure which befell this gentleman -attests sufficiently the disorder which reigned in -the prison service.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Being to some extent indisposed, the doctor had -given M. Guillon an order for the baths. Not -knowing in what part of the prison the infirmary was -situated, he presented his order to a tipsy turnkey, -who promptly opened the door which gave on the -Rue du Puits-de-l'Ermite. M. Guillon, a free man -without being aware of it, took the narrow street to -be a sentry's walk, and went a few paces without finding -any one to direct him. Returning to the sentry -at the door, he inquired where were the baths. -"What baths?" said the sentinel.—"The prison -baths." "The prison baths," said the sentinel, "are -probably in the prison; but you can't get in there."—"What? -I can't get into the prison! Am I outside -it, then?"—"Why, yes; you're in the street; you -ought to know that, I should think." "I did not -know it, I assure you," said M. Guillon; "and this -won't suit me at all." He rang the prison bell, and -was readmitted; and the recital of his adventure restored -to sobriety the turnkey who had given him his -freedom.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was related that under the Directory a criminal -condemned to transportation managed to conceal -himself in Sainte-Pélagie, persuaded that there at all -events he was safe, nor were his hopes deceived.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>It appears to have been after the Revolution of -1830—that brief week of July which "paragons -description"—that some kind of method was attained -or attempted in the management of Sainte-Pélagie. -A new wing had been built, which was reserved for -the politicals,—but the builder had reckoned without -his guests, and without the King's Attorney. It was -considered that thirty-six beds in ten chambers, to say -nothing of a small spare dormitory, would be accommodation -enough for prisoners of this class. At the -same epoch, a droll idea took possession of the -administration. It was, that if the <i>gamins</i> and -'prentice-thieves raked into the police-courts were -mixed pell-mell with the political prisoners, the former -might get a polish on their morals, and the latter an -agreeable distraction! As a scheme of reform for -the artful dodger it was perhaps elementary, but it -shewed at least a kindly anxiety on the part of the -administration to prepare diversions for political -offenders. Alas! it was a dream; for there were -presently so many political delinquents to be accommodated, -that the question was no longer how to -distract their captivity, but how to lodge the new-comers. -The artful dodger was exiled.</p> - -<p class='c012'>More buildings were called for, and another court; -and the political wing of Sainte-Pélagie became a -colony by itself. A colonist of the early thirties bestowed -on it the following appreciation:—"Sainte-Pélagie -is death by wasting (<i>le supplice par la langueur</i>), -torture by ennui, homicide by process of decline. It -is a sort of pneumatic machine applied to the brain, -which saps and exhausts it by inches. It is not an -active irritation, and it is nothing resembling repose. -It is not Paris, and it is not a desert solitude. It is a -<i>mélange</i> of everything: air, a modicum; elbow-room, -rather less; friends, one or two; bores, any number. -It is a prison with a mirage of the world; a world not -made for a prison. It is not severe, and it is infinitely -wearisome. It is a kind of civilised police; it is a prodigious -and perpetual paradox.... Sainte-Pélagie -is insupportable!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Here is another appreciation of about the same -date:—"Sainte-Pélagie is a hurly-burly (<i>pêle-mêle</i>) of -all imaginable ideas and opinions; a species of political -Pandemonium. The <i>Caricature</i> runs foul of the -<i>Quotidienne</i>, the <i>Courrier de l'Europe</i> elbows the <i>Revolution</i>, -the <i>Gazette</i> pirouettes between the <i>Tribune</i> -and the <i>Courrier Français</i>.... All colours and all -races, all ages and all tongues are confounded. It is -a Babel; it is a common camp in which friends and -foes are flung together after a general rout. As a -huge anomaly it is curious to see, but it has the depressing -effect of a monster!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Let us turn to the debtors' side. Dulaure quotes -in this connection a description given by De la Borde -in his <i>Memoirs</i>, which is worth translating:</p> - -<p class='c012'>"The debtors' wing of Sainte-Pélagie, which is intended -to accommodate a hundred, has one hundred -and twenty and sometimes one hundred and fifty -tenants. The building is in three stories, each story -consisting of one narrow corridor, the rooms in which -receive no light except from loopholes beneath the -roof. There are no fire-places in the rooms, some of -which are cruelly cold, whilst in others the heat is -unbearable. With proper space for three persons -at the most, they are generally made to hold from five -to six; and the dirt everywhere is revolting. The -wretched occupants can only take exercise in a corridor -four feet wide, and a courtyard thirty feet -square. For years they have asked in vain for some -contrivance which would give them a proper current -of air; there is not a decent ventilator in the place. -In winter they are locked in from eight <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> until -seven <span class='fss'>A.M.</span>; and, whatever his necessities, not one of -the five or six cell-mates can possibly quit his cell between -those hours. The dirtiest and worst-kept part -of the whole prison is the infirmary. Two or three -patients are put into one bed,—an excellent means of -spreading the itch, and other maladies."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The reproach of this unseemly state M. de la Borde -laid upon the chiefs of the prison service for their -indifference, and the subordinates for their wholesale -negligence.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>To obtain leave to visit a friend on the debtors' -side, you climbed the dingy staircase of the Préfecture -de Police, to the office marked <i>Bureau des Prisons</i>, -where orders were issued for the principal gaols; and -you took your place in the waiting-room amongst a -very motley crowd whose relatives or acquaintances -had been "put away" for murder, arson, forgery, -house-breaking, or a simple difficulty with a creditor.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Furnished with the necessary passport, a literary -Frenchman made the pilgrimage to Sainte-Pélagie -seventy years ago, and wrote a most interesting account -of his visit. The authors of <i>Les Prisons de -Paris</i> transferred it to their entertaining pages, and -I cannot do better than translate from them. It -chanced to be pay-day in the prison, that is to say, -the day on which the debtors received the stingy -pittance which their creditors were compelled to pay -them once a month,—an excellent opportunity of observing -the stranded victims of the most nonsensical -law in the universe. To clap into prison a man who -could not satisfy his creditors, and thereby to encourage -the indolent debtor in his indolence and to dry -up for the industrious debtor all possible sources of -industry, was perhaps, in this country as in France, -the summit of folly ever attained by legal enactment.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I found myself in a world of which those who have described -it only from the other side of the wall have given us an entirely -false notion. Where were all the gaieties which the novelists -and the rhymesters have depicted for us? Where were the -bevies of fair women who, as we have been assured, flock here -by day to scatter the cares of the forlorn imprisoned debtor? I -strained my ear in vain for any note of those bacchic concert-parties -and mad festivities (<i>ces bruyants éclats de l'orgie</i>) which are -to be met with in the novels. I threw a glance into the courtyard, -and calculated the amount of space which each man could -claim in the only spot in the whole prison where there is any -circulation of air; I came to the conclusion that, when the -prisoners were assembled here of an evening, after their friends -had left, each might possess for himself a fraction of a fraction -of a square yard of mother earth."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The debtors trooped down to the office to finger -their doles.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I watched a procession of artisans and labourers, whose -speech and costume contrasted oddly with the title of 'merchants' -(<i>négociants</i>), under which their creditors had filched them -from the workshops and yards to which they belonged; next, -some physiognomies of men of the world, some representatives -of the middle classes, and a crowd of young bloods (<i>étourneaux</i>).</p> - -<p class='c013'>"One of the first comers was an officer, decorated and seamed -with wounds, who had been four times in Sainte-Pélagie to purge -the same debt. After five months' captivity he came to an arrangement -with his creditor, to whom he owed a couple of thousand -francs, agreeing to pay him in ninety days five hundred -more. He was let out, failed to redeem the debt, and returned -to take up his old quarters in Sainte-Pélagie. At the end of a -year, he acknowledged a debt of three thousand francs to the -same creditor, and obtained six months' grace. He paid a thousand -on account, could not furnish a penny more, and went back -to prison for the third time. Thus, after nearly three years in -prison, the captain owes one-third more than he did on first -coming in, and has paid a thousand francs to boot,—to encourage -his creditor.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"The old fellow who followed him was a monument of the -speculative spirit of a certain class of creditors. He was half-blind, -and had lost his left arm; his whole debt amounted to -£20. Eight days before the King's birthday his creditor cast -him into Sainte-Pélagie, in the hope that one of the civil-list -bonuses would fall to the old man. Unhappily, the hope was -not realised, and the creditor is now looking forward to next -year's list.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"Amongst the swarm of debtors, I recognised my old water-carrier, -who needed little coaxing to tell me the story of his imprisonment.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"Léonard was a native of Auvergne. After hawking water in -buckets for several years, his ambition rose to a water-cart; and -behold him now with his sphere of operations extended from the Rue -du Faubourg-Poissonnière to the Marais. Unluckily for Léonard -the water-cart was not yet his own property, and he began to fall -into arrears with his monthly payments. When the arrears had -become what the bailiffs call an 'exploitable' sum, Léonard was -haled to the bar. Here he suddenly ceased to be a water-carrier; -they promoted him to the rank of 'merchant,' and under that -style and dignity they condemned poor Léonard for debt. In this -strait Léonard thought, "Why not become bankrupt at once?" -but when he went to deposit his balance-sheet they told him he -was not a 'merchant' at all, but a mere water-carrier. Fifteen -days later, Léonard had joined the ranks of the impecunious in -Sainte-Pélagie.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"His next idea was to lodge an appeal, and his brother was -willing to bear the costs; but Léonard's debt was a bagatelle of -£12, and the lawyer whom he consulted said that the blessings -of appeal were reserved for persons owing £20 and upwards. -The code of the Osages, if they have one, probably does not contain -such exquisite burlesque as this.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I asked Léonard what had become of his wife. 'Oh,' he -said, 'poor Jeanne has gone back to Auvergne; otherwise they'd -have had her too, for they made Jeanne a "merchant" also' (<i>elle -était aussi négociante</i>).</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I gave Léonard a trifle, and he went off to drink it. It is the -commonest recreation, when it can be indulged; and the majority -of the debtors, when their day of liberation comes, return to -their homes with the two incurable habits of idleness and liquor."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Another who came to touch his allowance was a -tradesman whose clerk had robbed him of one thousand -crowns. "The tradesman being unable in consequence -to meet his engagements is condemned to -spend five years in Sainte-Pélagie, and from the -grating of his cell he can see in the penal wing the -scoundrelly clerk, who gets off with six months' imprisonment!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Another comes</p> - -<p class='c013'>"tripping cheerfully through the crowd; he is receiving his last -payment; in a few days he will be a free man. An anonymous -letter has loosed his bonds with the happy tidings that his -creditor has been dead a year, and that a speculative bailiff -has been prolonging his captivity on the chance of the debt -being paid into his own pocket."</p> - -<p class='c012'>To this victim of a negligent law succeeded two -who had made the law their dupe. One was an officer -who had had himself arrested for debt to escape -joining an expedition to Morea. The other was a -tradesman "who was nobody's prisoner but his own, -and who had arranged with a friend to deposit the -monthly allowance for food. He was speculating on -the article of the code which gave a general exemption -from arrest for debt to all who had passed five -consecutive years in the gaol."</p> - -<p class='c012'>A new-comer, "with his face all slashed," was</p> - -<p class='c013'>"recounting the details of the siege he had sustained in his house -against the bailiff's men. He had wanted to give himself up -without fuss, but was told when he presented himself at the office -that a person condemned for debt must be forcibly arrested (<i>doit -être appréhendé au corps avec brutalité</i>), and pitched into a cab -under the eyes of all the loungers on the foot-way,—who no -doubt often imagine that they are assisting at the capture of some -eminent criminal. This enterprise on the part of the bailiff and -his men is charged to the unfortunate debtor, and the field of -battle is as often as not some public thoroughfare."</p> - -<p class='c012'>But by far the most interesting and sympathetic -personality on the debtor's side of Sainte-Pélagie at -this date was the American Colonel Swan. The nature -and amount of the colonel's debt are not set out, -but the interest seems to have been the main cause -of offence, and he had made it a matter of conscience -to refuse payment.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"The French law had ordered his temporary arrest, and, -twenty years after his incarceration, he was still 'temporarily' -in confinement. Compatriot and friend of Washington, Colonel -Swan had fought in the War of Independence with Lafayette, -and the grand old French republican often bent his white head -beneath the wicket of the gaol, on a visit to his brother-in-arms."</p> - -<p class='c012'>His own private means, the aid of wealthier friends, -or even a successful project of escape, might have restored -him to the free world; but so greatly had he -used himself to his captivity, that no thought of liberty -seems ever to have crossed his mind.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"It was not altogether without emotion that one saw this -comely veteran—whose features were almost a copy of Benjamin -Franklin's—pacing the narrow and sombre passages of the prison, -drawing a breath of air at the loop-hole above the little garden. -His long robe of swanskin or white dimity announced his coming, -and it was both curious and touching to see how the groups -of prisoners made way for him in the corridors, and how some -hastened to carry into their cells the little stoves on which they -did their cooking, lest the fumes of the charcoal should offend -him."</p> - -<p class='c012'>This respect and love of the whole prison the old -colonel had justly won; not a day of his long confinement -there but he had marked by some service of -kindness, for the most part mysterious and anonymous. -No hungry debtor went in vain to the door -of the colonel's little cell; and often, seeking a supper, -the petitioner went away with the full price of -his liberty.</p> - -<p class='c012'>There were two classes in the debtors' wing; those -with certain resources of their own to supplement the -miserable allowance of their creditors, and those who -were dependent for their daily rations on the handful -of centimes allowed them by law.</p> - -<p class='c012'>These last used to hire their services to the others -for a gratuity, and were among the regular suitors of -Colonel Swan's inexhaustible bounty. They were -known in the prison as "cotton-caps" (<i>bonnets de -coton</i>). One of these, hearing that the American had -lost his "cotton-cap," went to beg the place. The -colonel knew all about the man, a poor devil with a -large family, stranded there for a few hundred francs. -He asked a salary of six francs a month.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"That will suit me very well," said the colonel; -and, opening a little chest, "here is five years' pay in -advance." It was the amount precisely of the man's -debt,—and a fair instance of the colonel's benefactions.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Towards the year 1829, prisoners taking their airing -in the garden saw an old man strolling an hour -or two in the day on the high terrace or gallery at -the top of the prison. It was Colonel Swan, for -whom, in failing health, the doctor had demanded -that privilege. He had accepted it gratefully, but—as -if admonished from within—he said to the doctor: -"My proper air is the air of the prison; this breath -of liberty will kill me."</p> - -<p class='c012'>A few months later, the cannon of the 27th of -July was belching in the streets of Paris. On the -28th, the doors of the "commercial Bastille" were -thrown open, and the prisoners went out.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Colonel Swan, who went out with them, died on the -29th.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>There were a few clever escapes, <i>evasions</i> as the -French call them, from Sainte-Pélagie. What was -known as the <i>procès d'Avril</i>, 1835, resulted in the -condemnation of Guinard, Imbert, Cavaignac, Marrast, -and others, who were lodged in the political wing. -Forty of them joined in a scheme of evasion, and a -subterranean passage was dug from the north-east -angle of the prison into the garden of No. 9, Rue -Copeau. The tunnel, nearly twenty yards in length, -was completed on the 12th of July, and of the forty -prisoners twenty-eight made good their escape from -Sainte-Pélagie the "insupportable."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The excitement of a well-conducted escape is contagious, -and in September of the same year the Comte -de Richmond, who gave himself out as the son of -Louis XVI., with his two friends in durance, Duclerc -and Rossignol, broke prison ingeniously enough. By -bribery or some other means, Richmond procured a -pass-key which gave admission to the sentry-walk; -and, head erect and a file of papers under his arm, he -walked boldly out, followed by Rossignol and Duclerc. -To the sentinel who challenged them, the Count with -perfect <i>sang-froid</i> introduced himself as the director -of the prison; "and these gentlemen," he added, -"whom you ought to know, are my chief clerk, and -my architect." The sentry saluted and let them pass, -and M. de Richmond and his friends opened the door -and walked out.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In 1865, an Englishman named Jackson, condemned -to five years' hard labour, managed to get -himself transferred to Sainte-Pélagie. On a wet wild -night in the last week of January, he squeezed out of -his cell, crawled over the roof to a convenient wall, -and by the aid of a cord and grappling iron let himself -down into the street. The night was pitchy black, -rain was falling in torrents, the sentry was in his box, -and Jackson footed it leisurely home.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Better than these, however, was the escape of -Colonel Duvergier, one of the State prisoners of -Charles X. Colonel Duvergier had been condemned -to five years' "reclusion" for no apparent reason -except that he was one of the most distinguished soldiers -of his day. The story of his escape is one of -the happiest in the romantic annals of prison-breaking, -but the credit of the affair rests principally with a -young littérateur, a certain Eugène de P——.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Colonel Duvergier was on the political, and Eugène -de P—— on the debtors' side of Sainte-Pélagie, but -they had succeeded in establishing a correspondence -by letter; and Eugène, not over-eager for his own -liberty, seems to have taken upon himself to procure -the colonel's. With Colonel Duvergier was one Captain -Laverderie, and the colonel refused to go out -unless the captain could share his escape. Eugène -de P—— said the captain should go also, and the -plot went forward.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The first step was to get the colonel and his friend -from the political to the debtors' side of the prison, -and this was contrived at the exercise hour. When -the political prisoners were being marched in, to give -place to the debtors—there being but one exercise -yard for the two classes—Duvergier and Laverderie -escaped the warder's eye, and hid in the garden, until -the debtors came out for their constitutional. Nowadays, -the warder would have counted his flock, both -on coming out and on going in; but the colonel and -the captain seem to have had no difficulty, either in -attaching themselves to the debtors or in taking refuge, -after the exercise hour, in the cell of a debtor -who was a party to the scheme.</p> - -<p class='c012'>So far, however, the fugitives had succeeded only -in changing their quarters in the prison; and the next -step was to procure for them two visitors' passes. -These passes, deposited with the gate-warder when -visitors entered, were returned to them as they left -the prison. How to place in the warder's hands passes -bearing the names of two "visitors" who had not -entered the prison? The adroit Eugène thought it -not too difficult.</p> - -<p class='c012'>He had a friendly warder at the gate who was -much interested in some sketches which Eugène was -making in the prison, and went down to him one day -with his portfolio in his hand. "A few fresh sketches -you might like to look at." While the Argus of the -gate was amusing himself with Eugène's drawings, -Eugène himself feigned astonishment at the number -of visitors to the prison, as evidenced by the quantity -of passes lying loose on the table. He expressed no -less surprise that the warder should have so little care -of them; why not keep the passes in a handy case, -such, for example, as Eugène used for his drawings?</p> - -<p class='c012'>The warder thought he would ask the governor -for one. "You needn't trouble the governor," said -Eugène; "take mine. Look, what could be better!" -and in filling the portfolio with the visitors' passes, he -slipped in two others.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At that psychological instant, Duvergier and Laverderie -presented themselves at the gate.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Your names, messieurs?" and they gave the -names which were entered on Eugène's passes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The passes were turned up, the warder handed -them over, and—still thanking Eugène for his present—bowed -the fugitives out of the prison.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p154.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p155.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch08' class='c004'>CHAPTER VIII. <br /> <br /> THE ABBAYE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>It was the monks, as tradition wills it, who hollowed -out the cruel cells of the Abbaye de -Saint-Germain-des-Près. The architect Gomard, insisting -that cells were not included in the bond, withdrew -when he had put his last touches to the cloisters. -But in 1630, or thereabouts, no monastery was complete -without its <i>oubliettes</i>, and the prior commanded -his brethren to finish the work of the too-scrupulous -Gomard. Thus was the Abbaye equipped as an -abbaye should be.</p> - -<p class='c012'>What power indeed, spiritual or temporal, had not -the privilege in those days of setting up its pillory, -its gallows, its pile of faggots built around a stake! -In Paris alone at this date some twenty separate -jurisdictions possessed the right to fatten victims for -the scaffold, and it might almost be said that the -municipal divisions of the capital had gibbets for -their boundaries.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In 1674, however, the situation changed somewhat. -The authority of the Châtelet was enlarged by royal -edict, which gathered to it the rights and privileges -of all the lesser corporations, and confiscated the halters -and the faggots of private justice. This was a -general blow, which none took more to heart than -the prior of the Abbaye of Saint-Germain-of-the-Meadows. -He had enjoyed the rights of "high," -"middle," and "low" justice; he had imprisoned, -tortured, and despatched at his holy pleasure. Forthwith, -he composed and addressed to Louis XIV. <i>un -mémoire éloquent</i>, which touched that pious heart. -The Royal will consented to restore to the prior a considerable -portion of his ancient jurisdiction. Within -the extensive bounds of the monastery and its appanages, -the holy father might still consider himself -gaoler, tormentor, and executioner.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But his prison was now large beyond his pious -needs, and little by little the Abbaye took a more -secular character. The cells which the restricted -powers of the prior could no longer charge to the -full, were set apart for young noblemen and others -whose parents or guardians had an interest in narrowing -their borders. It was an age when parents -and guardians had an almost unlimited authority over -sons, daughters, and wards; and when fathers and -uncles seldom thought twice about applying for a -<i>lettre de cachet</i>. Sometimes young rakes were put -into temporary seclusion for quite satisfactory reasons; -but very often the legal powers of parents and -guardians were used with abominable cruelty; and -young men were imprisoned for years, suffering the -treatment of criminals, merely to gratify the rancour -of a near relative; or were even, where there was a -fortune in question, confined expressly with the design -that they should be secretly got rid of. A father -could or did authorise a gaoler to treat his innocent -son with a rigour that goes almost beyond belief; to -forbid him to petition anyone for release; to keep -him in solitary confinement; to feed him on the most -meagre rations. The nephew of a General Wurmser, -who had designs upon the young man's fortune, had -him imprisoned in the Abbaye on some vague charge -of dissipation. The young man was only twenty -years of age, but he entered the Abbaye with the -fixed conviction that his uncle did not intend ever to -release him, and this conviction was confirmed by the -hint conveyed to him by a turnkey, that he was to be -sent to the fortress of Pierre-Encise, or Ham. Within -a week, he had committed suicide in his cell.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Occasionally, young bloods of the period did penance -in the Abbaye for practical jokes of a rather -questionable morality. A certain D——, a spend-thrift -of the first rank (who, however, rose afterwards -to great honour in the army), was at the last pinch -to settle his gaming debts. An uncle from whom he -expected a goodly legacy lay sick unto death in his -Hôtel, and D—— gave out that the patient desired -the attendance of a notary. The notary arrived, and -the uncle dictated a will entirely in his nephew's favour. -This being published, loans were forthcoming. -But the sequel was less satisfactory; for D—— presently -found himself a prisoner in the Abbaye, and his -friend, the Chevalier de C——, in a cell of the Bastille; -the former for having personated a moribund -uncle, and the latter for having aided and abetted -him in the swindle.</p> - -<p class='c012'>When Howard was making his memorable progress -through the "Lazzarettos of Europe," the Abbaye -was amongst the prisons which he visited. He notes -that there were "five little cells in which as many as -fifty men were sometimes massed together." The -Abbaye had undergone yet another transformation, -and was now the principal military prison of Paris. -It was reserved chiefly for the soldiers, both officers -and privates, of the <i>Gardes Françaises</i>; but delinquents -of other regiments were sent there also; and -a turbulent place the Abbaye seems to have been in -the days before the Revolution. For, up to '89, the -French army recruited itself as best it could, and -principally from amongst the masses of the unemployed -and the vagabond classes. They were bought -by recruiting sergeants, or swept into the ranks by -the press-gangs, and it may be supposed that the -stuff out of which the rank-and-file was manufactured -was sometimes of the rottenest. Moreover, there -was little spirit amongst the officers to induce them -to train up into good fighting-men and self-respecting -citizens the peasants, beggars, and outcasts of whom -they found themselves in command. The swaggering, -aristocrat captain, lording it over the colonel, -who was perhaps a mere soldier of fortune, scorned -the men beneath him. His military rank, added to -the colossal difference in social rank between the -nobility and the people, gave him a double sense of -superiority; there was no <i>esprit de corps</i>, no feeling -of comradeship in arms; but, on the one side, a perpetual -and galling assertion of authority, and, on the -other, a continuous struggle to secure some amount -of recognition and freedom.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Insubordinate soldiers were continually being thrust -into the Abbaye, and there were strange scenes within -those walls.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the year 1784, say the authors of <i>Les Prisons de -l'Europe</i>, two military prisoners were finishing their -scanty meal.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Our last day together, Desforges," said one. -"You go to château Trompette, I to Valenciennes. -"We're in for twenty years of it!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Yes, and for what, Dessaignes?" said the other. -"For a quarrel with a clod of an officer risen from -the ranks. Twenty years!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"My dear Desforges," said the young aristocrat. -"It is not a cheerful prospect.—Warm here, isn't it? -Trees in leaf, and flowers smelling sweet—out there. -Out there, where liberty lies, Desforges. Come, -shall we be free?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Free! There are four bolts to the door, and another -door at the end of the corridor."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Who talks of forcing bolts?" said Dessaignes. -"At what hour do they exercise us?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"At six, as usual, I suppose."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Yes; and once in the courtyard there is but one -door to open."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"True; but the means of opening it?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Dessaignes whipped up his mattrass, and displayed -a pair of cavalry pistols (<i>pistolets d'arcon</i>) and a long -dagger.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Where—" began his friend.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"The barrister who came to see me yesterday conveyed -the arsenal under his robe. Now, are these -the keys to open a cage like ours?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"None better! But I make one condition," said -Desforges,—"that we are not to kill anyone."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"There will be no necessity. We shall go down -armed to the courtyard; one of us will entice the -concierge near the door, and the other will cover him -with a pistol. A little determination is all we shall -need."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Six o'clock struck, and the gaoler came to conduct -the prisoners to the courtyard. They descended -with their weapons in their pockets, and once in the -yard Dessaignes was for losing not a moment. Their -guard was the only attendant within sight, and as -Desforges held him in talk, Dessaignes suddenly -stepped behind and seized him by his coat-collar. -The startled gaoler prepared to summon help, but -before he could get out a word Dessaignes clapped a -pistol to his forehead.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Speak but one syllable," said he in a whisper, -"and you will never utter another. Come, your -keys!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Never!" replied the gaoler.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Your soul to God, then, for your hour has come!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>The gaoler felt the muzzle at his forehead, and -saw the glitter in the eyes of his captor. He hesitated.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"A second more, and I fire. Reflect!" said Dessaignes, -quietly.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The gaoler's hand was already moving towards his -keys when, all at once, his collar burst in the grip of -Dessaignes, and he fell backwards. At the same instant, -and by accident, Dessaignes' pistol exploded. -The crack brought a dozen warders on the scene.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Quick!" cried Dessaignes to his fellow-prisoner; -"up-stairs again!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>They gained their cell, Dessaignes shut and bolted -the door, and together they barricaded it with all the -furniture they could lay hands on.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"How much powder have we?" asked Desforges, -under his breath.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"About four charges, but we shall not need it," -replied Dessaignes. "Wait; I'll give them their -answer."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The warders hammered vainly at the door.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Gentlemen," called Dessaignes, "we may be induced -to capitulate, but we shall not yield to force. -You had better desist. We have powder enough -here to blow the Abbaye to the gate of heaven."</p> - -<p class='c012'>A murmur of alarm arose on the other side of the -door, and silence followed.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"You see!" observed Dessaignes, "these pious -chaps will not mount unprepared into the presence of -their Maker!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>The posse of warders was, in fact, withdrawn.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"But what shall we do next?" asked Desforges.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"For the present," said Dessaignes, "we shall wait. -They will be wanting to make terms with us."</p> - -<p class='c012'>But the night passed, and no offer of capitulation -was received. Two other things lacking were, supper -in the evening and breakfast in the morning. The -enemy had apparently changed their tactics; the -blockade of the prisoners was complete, and so was -the famine. The day wore on, and night came again; -but not the paltriest offer of terms, nor a bowl of thin -soup. The next day broke with a prospect as barren.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Towards noon a deputation was heard approaching.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"If you don't give us something to eat," cried Dessaignes, -"sooner than die of hunger we will blow up -the prison."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To the gate of heaven. You have already said -so," replied the voice of the governor.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Then you mean to sacrifice all the innocent persons -in the place?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Not at all! We have made our dispositions. -The other prisoners have been removed. You two -can ascend heavenwards as soon as you please."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Dessaignes glanced at his friend, and the expressions -on both faces must have been interesting.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To be candid," said Desforges, "my stomach -sounds a parley."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"My own offers the same advice," said Dessaignes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Let us follow it," said Desforges.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Gentlemen," called Dessaignes through the key-hole, -"the war is over. Some bread, if you please, a -bottle of wine, and a plate of meat. Those are our -simple conditions of capitulation."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Agreed to; and the door was opened. A legal -gentleman came from the King to hold an enquiry; -but as Dessaignes' pistol had done no harm to anyone, -and as the two prisoners had conducted their -little campaign in a modest and inoffensive manner, no -addition was made to their sentence,—which indeed was -the equivalent of a "life" sentence at the present day. -They were transferred to the Conciergerie, where -their bonds were not too tight; their families kept them -in money, and they received and dined their friends.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Desforges, the younger of the pair, seemed willing -to accept his fate; but Dessaignes, whose blood was -always tingling, ached for liberty. He watched his -visitors out of the prison with hungry eyes. After -all, the least cruel of prisons is a cage, and the wings -will beat against the bars. Who knows what freedom -means but the man who hears his lock turned -nightly by some other man's hand?</p> - -<p class='c012'>One night, the two young prisoners had been allowed -(an affair of a bribe) to give a dinner to some -friends. The looseness of the rules permitted the -presence also of the principal warders, whom the -hosts took care to fill with wine. The table was surrounded -by men in the sleep of liquor, and Dessaignes -and Desforges slipped out, and presented themselves -at the inner door of the prison. It was past midnight, -and the turnkey was asleep in his chair. Dessaignes -took a key from his belt at a venture, and -tried the lock. It creaked, and the turnkey awoke. -Dessaignes turned and stabbed him, and he slept in -death. The first door was passed.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At the second door the turnkey was awake. So -much the worse for him. Dessaignes' dagger was -out and in again, and the turnkey dropped. Another -key, another lock; the second door was passed.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At the third and outer door, the warder stood beyond -the grille, safe, and shouted the alarm. The -prisoners turned to retreat, but the third warder's cry -had summoned another, who, quick to see the situation, -slammed the first door to; and between the first -door and the third Dessaignes and Desforges were -trapped.</p> - -<p class='c012'>One warder murdered outright, a second on the -point of death,—the fate of the assassin and his comrade -could not be long in doubt. A prisoner gave -evidence that he had been bribed to drug the first -gate-warder; and both Dessaignes and Desforges -were sentenced to be "broken alive." The decree -was passed on the 1st of October, 1784, signed by -Louis XVI., at the express request of two of his -ministers, and carried out publicly in every terrible -detail.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But darker scenes than this are preparing at the -Abbaye. It was here that the Revolution may be -said to have begun, and here that some of its worst -crimes were perpetrated.</p> - -<div id='i_p164a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p164a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>A STREET SCENE DURING THE MASSACRES.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>In June of 1789, there lay in the Abbaye certain -soldiers of the <i>Gardes Françaises</i>, charged with refusing -to obey their orders, out of sympathy with the -National Assembly. Their situation in the prison -became known, and a clamour arose for their release. -"À l'Abbaye! à l'Abbaye!" was the cry; two -hundred men set out from the Palais-Royal, and four -thousand arrived at the prison gates. Every door of -defence was staved in, and in less than an hour from -the commencement of the attack, the democratic -<i>Gardes</i> were released, and borne in triumph through -Paris. This was one of the first demonstrations of -the popular will. How quickly that will felt and appreciated -its strength, and in what abandonment of -cruel passion it was to find expression, most readers -have learned. There is nothing in the annals of the -world to be compared with the series of events in the -Paris prisons in '92, to which history has given the -name of the September Massacres. In that deliberate -slaughter, over one thousand men and women -perished, hewn in pieces in the prisons or at the -prison doors. The revolutionary committees had -packed the gaols with "suspected" persons, mostly -innocent of anything that could be laid to their -charge; and there they awaited such death as might -be decreed for them: salvation was all but hopeless. -There was talk at first of burning them <i>en masse</i> in -the prisons; then of thrusting all the prisoners into -the subterranean cells, and drowning them slowly by -pouring or pumping water on them. Assassination -pure and simple seems to have been resolved upon -"as a measure of indulgence." A mock form of trial -was held at all the prisons, that the butcheries might -be given an appearance of legality.</p> - -<p class='c012'>On Sunday, the 2d of September, '92, the barriers of -the city were closed, and early in the afternoon the -tocsin clanging from every steeple in Paris called up the -butchers to their work. Some thirty priests were faring -in five hackney carriages to the Abbaye prison, -and with them the slaughter was begun. One coach -reached the prison with a load of corpses; the occupants -of the other four—Abbé Sicard excepted—were -killed as they alighted. Prisoners in the Abbaye -watched the carnage from behind their bars, and -said: "It will be our turn next."</p> - -<p class='c012'>To one of these prisoners, Journiac Saint-Méard, -one time captain in the King's light infantry, we shall -for the present attach ourselves. His <i>Agony of -Thirty-eight Hours</i> (<i>Mon agonie de trente-huit heures</i>), -much read at the beginning of the century, is amongst -the best of the contemporary records, and from that I -shall translate at some length.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This slow deliberate killing of the priests was done, -he says, amid a silence inexpressibly horrible; and as -each fell, a savage murmur went up, and a single -shout of <i>Vive la nation</i>! Women were there encouraging -the men, and fetching jugs of wine for them. -Someone in the crowd pointed to the windows of the -prison and said: "There are plenty of conspirators -behind there; and not a single one must escape!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Towards seven in the evening, two men with sabres, -their hands steeped in blood, entered the prison, and -began to carry out the prisoners for slaughter.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"The unfortunate Reding lay sick on his bed, and begged to -be killed there. One of the men hesitated, but his companion -said, '<i>Allons donc!</i>' and he slung him across his shoulder to -carry him out, and he was killed in the street."</p> - -<p class='c013'>"We looked at one another in silence, but presently the cries -of fresh victims renewed our agitation, and we recalled the words -of M. Chantereine as he plunged a knife into his heart: 'We are -all destined to be massacred.'"</p> - -<p class='c013'>"At midnight, ten men armed with sabres, and preceded by -two turnkeys with torches, came into our dungeon, and ordered -us to range ourselves along the foot of our beds. They counted -us, and told us that we were responsible for one another, swearing -that if one of us escaped, the rest should be massacred, without -being heard by the President. The last words gave us a -little hope, for until then we had had no idea that we might be -heard before being killed."</p> - -<p class='c013'>"At two o'clock on Monday morning, we heard them breaking -in one of the prison doors, and thought at first that we were -about to be slaughtered in our beds, but were a little reassured -when we heard someone outside say that it was the door of -a cell which some prisoners had tried to barricade. We learned -afterwards that all who were found there had their throats cut."</p> - -<p class='c013'>"At ten, Abbé Lenfant, confessor of the King, and the Abbé de -Chapt-Rastignac appeared in the pulpit of the chapel which -served for our prison, and informing us that our last hour was -approaching, invited us all to receive their blessing. An indefinable -electric movement sent us all to our knees, and, with -clasped hands, we received it. Those two white-haired old men -with hands outstretched in prayer, death hovering above us, and -on every side environing us: what a situation, what a moment, -never to be forgotten!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Saint-Méard goes on to say how, during that morning, -they discussed among themselves what was the -easiest way in which to receive death. The slaughter -in the streets never stopped, and some of them went -from time to time to the window to observe and make -reports.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"They reported that those certainly suffered the most and -were the longest in dying who tried in any way to protect their -heads, inasmuch as by so doing they warded off the sabre-cuts -for a time, and sometimes lost both hands and arms before their -heads were struck. Those who stood up with their hands behind -their backs seemed to suffer least, and certainly died soonest.... -On such horrible details did we deliberate."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Towards afternoon, overwhelmed by fatigue and -anxiety, Saint-Méard threw himself on his bed and -slept. He awoke after a comforting dream, which he -felt certain was an omen of good fortune. But he -and the others were now consumed by thirst; it was -twenty-six hours since they had had anything to -drink. A gaoler fetched them a jug of water, but -could tell them nothing as to their fate.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The long agony of waiting drew to an end.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"At eleven at night, several persons armed with swords and -pistols ordered us to place ourselves in single file, and led -us out to the second wicket, next to the place where the -trials were being held. I got as near as I could to one of -our guards, and managed little by little to engage him in conversation."</p> - -<p class='c012'>This man was an old soldier and a Provençal, and -when he found that Saint-Méard could talk the rude -patois of that district—scarcely intelligible in Paris—he -grew quite friendly, fetched him a tumbler of wine -to hearten him, and counselled him as to what he -should tell the judges. The Provençal let him stand -where he had a glimpse of the court, and he saw two -prisoners thrust to the bar and condemned almost -unheard; a moment later, their death-cries reached -his ears.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Two hours passed thus; it was one o'clock in the -morning, but still the judges heard, condemned, and -sent their victims out to die by sword and hatchet in -the street, where in places the blood was ankle deep, -and the dead lay in piles.</p> - -<p class='c012'>All at once Saint-Méard heard his name called. -"After having suffered an agony of thirty-seven -hours, an agony as of death itself, the door opened -and I was called. Three men laid hold of me, and -haled me in."</p> - -<p class='c012'>By the glare of torches,</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I saw that dreadful judgment bar, where liberty or death lay -for me. The President, in grey coat, sword at his side, stood -leaning against a table, on which were papers, an ink-stand, -pipes, and bottles. Around the table were ten persons, sitting or -standing, two of whom were in sleeveless jackets and aprons; -others were asleep, stretched on benches. Two men in shirts all -smeared with blood kept the door; an old turnkey had his hand -on the bolt....</p> - -<p class='c013'>"Here then stood I at this swift and bloody bar, where the -best help was to be without all help, and where no resources of -the mind were of avail that had not truth to rest upon.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"'Your name, your calling?' said the President, and one of -the judges added: 'The smallest lie undoes you.'</p> - -<p class='c013'>"'My name,' I answered, 'is Journiac Saint-Méard; I served -twenty-five years as an officer in the army. I stand before you -with the confidence of a man who has nothing to reproach himself -with, and who is therefore not likely to utter falsehoods.'</p> - -<p class='c013'>"'It will be for us to judge of that,' responded the man in -grey."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The trial proceeded. Saint-Méard was accused of -having edited the anti-revolutionary journal, <i>De la -cour et de la ville</i>, but showed satisfactorily that he -had not done so. Accused next of recruiting for the -emigrants, at which there was an ominous murmur, -"Gentlemen, gentlemen," pleaded the prisoner, "the -word is with me at present, and I beg the President -to maintain it for me,—I never needed it so sorely!" -"That's true enough!" laughed the judges, and the -court began to shew itself more sympathetic. Saint-Méard, -though, was not yet off the gridiron. "You tell -us continually," said one impatient judge, "that you -are not this and you are not that! Be good enough -then to tell us what you are."—"I was once frankly -a Royalist." Another and louder murmur; but the -President put in: "We are not here to sit in judgment -on opinions, but on their results"; words of -precious augury for the prisoner, who went on to say -that he was well aware the old régime was done with, -that there was no longer a Royalist cause, and that -never had he been concerned in plots or Royalist -conspiracies, for he had never in his life been concerned -in public affairs of any kind. He was a -Frenchman who loved his country above all things.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The questioning and cross-questioning came to an -end, and the President removed his hat. "I can find -nothing to suspect in Monsieur. What do you say; -shall I release him?" and the voice of the judges -was for liberty. Thus finished, at two o'clock in the -morning, the "thirty-eight hours' agony" of Journiac -Saint-Méard. He survived it some twenty years.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Alas for the hundreds upon hundreds whose agony -of yet longer duration finished under the arch of -pikes!</p> - -<p class='c012'>The escapes were not many. Abbé Sicard, the -benevolent founder of the Deaf-and-Dumb Institute, -was set free on the earnest petition in writing of one -of his pupils. Beaumarchais, author of the <i>Mariage -de Figaro</i>, evaded the clutches of the judges after a -terrible period of suspense in the Abbaye. The old -Marquis de Sombreuil was saved by his daughter. -She clung to his neck, imploring the cut-throats to -spare him to her. "Say, then," said one of them, -dipping a cup into the blood at his feet: "Wilt thou -drink <i>this</i>?" The brave girl gulped it down; the mob -threw up their weapons with a roar of applause, and -opened out a way for both through their dripping -ranks.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But few fared as these did. President Maillard, of -the grey coat, who was so well satisfied with Saint-Méard, -did not release, perhaps, one in fifty amongst -the accused at the Abbaye. He is accused of "carrying -about heads, and cutting up dead bodies." Billaud-Varennes -went about from group to group of the -assassins who were massed in parties, encouraged -them in the name of the tribunal, and promised that -each man should be paid a louis for his "labour."</p> - -<p class='c012'>A contemporary sketch depicts him delivering a -speech on "a table of corpses" against the door of -the Abbaye: "Citizens, you are slaughtering the enemies -of France. You are doing your duty." Indiscriminate -killing had been the legal order of the day. -There was no question of the guillotine during the -September massacres. Every citizen who could arm -himself was a Samson by privilege of the prison -judges; and popular justice, called "severe justice -of the people," made the butcheries of September a -people's fête. It was not so much an act of patriotism -to assist in them as a dereliction of duty to hold aloof. -The "Septemberers" have been condemned as cannibals; -but they were common ratepayers of Paris to -whom the government of the day offered money to -kill as many "enemies of the republic" as should be -delivered to them. Most of these "enemies of the -republic" were persons to whom the republic was -scarcely known by name, and who asked only to be -ignored by it. They were killed in batches during -the September of '92, merely because they happened -to be thrust out at one particular door of their prison. -You came out at this door, and were received with -cheers; you came out at the next door, and were -hacked in pieces. Which door it was, depended upon -the vote of the judges; and this, as a rule, was the -determination of a moment. Saint-Méard's trial of -an hour was one of the longest.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The mere business of killing went forward until -numbers had lost their significance, and the lists of -the dead were but approximately reckoned. They -are all set down in black and white, and may still be -read—so many killed "in the heap" (<i>en masse</i>), so many -"after judgment" (<i>après jugement</i>)—but the figures -have never been proved; and one seeks in vain to -reckon the total, after the "three hundred families -belonging to the Faubourg St. Germain," who were -"thrown into the Abbaye in a night"; and the "cartload -of young girls, of whom the oldest was not -eighteen," and who, "dressed all in white in the -tumbril, looked like a basket of lilies." After this -batch, were guillotined all the nuns of the convent -of Montmartre.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Then there were the Swiss Guards, "remnants of -the 10th of August," to whom Maillard said; "Gentlemen, -you may find mercy outside, but I am afraid -we cannot grant it to you here." The youngest of -them, "in a blue frock-coat," elected to go first. "Since -we must die," he said, "let me show the way"; then, -dashing on his hat, he presented himself at the door -where the butchers stood ready to receive him; a -double row of them,—sabre, bayonet, hatchet, or -pike in hand. For a moment he looked at them, -quite coolly; then, seeing that all was prepared, he -threw himself between their ranks, and "fell beneath -a thousand blows."</p> - -<div id='i_p172a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p172a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>THE GALLANT SWISS.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>When the killers began to flag, brandy mixed with -gunpowder was served to them. A woman passes, -carrying a basket of hot rolls; they beg them of her, -and the bread, before being eaten, is "soaked in the -wounds of the still breathing victims."<a id='r19' /><a href='#f19' class='c014'><sup>[19]</sup></a> The brigands -of the Abbaye were not more than from thirty -to forty in number. Amongst them, says Nougaret, -"one youth, mounted on a post, distinguished himself -by his ferocity in killing. He said that he had lost -his two brothers on the 10th of August, and meant to -avenge them. He boasted of having cut down fifty -to his own weapon. Another brigand prided himself -on a total of two hundred!"</p> -<div class='footnote c015' id='f19'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r19'>19</a>. Nougaret.</p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>Women looked on, adds the same authority, "sitting -in carts on piles of dead bodies, like washerwomen -on dirty linen. Others flung themselves upon -the corpses, and tore them with their teeth, danced -round them, and kicked them. Some of these Furies -cut off the ears of the dead, and pinned them on their -bosoms."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Some ten months after this carnage, tranquil amid -the din of the Terror, lies beautiful Charlotte Corday, -in her cell within the Abbaye walls. Her hour has -not yet come; she bides it in perfect peace. By-and-bye -she will go to the Conciergerie, and thence the -next morning to the guillotine. Samson will lift the -fair head when he has struck it off, and smite the cheek -with his crimson paw, amid universal plaudits. "I -have found the sweetest rest here these two days," -she writes from prison; "I could not be better off, -and my gaolers are the best people in the world." A -memory of her lives as she tripped smiling up the -steps of the scaffold, her hair cropped under a little -close-fitting cap, and wearing, by order of her judges, -a hideous red shirt, which descended to her feet. "She -blushed and frowned on the executioner when he -plucked the tippet from her bosom. Two moments -after, the knife fell on her."</p> - -<p class='c012'>After the Revolution, the Abbaye was again a military -prison, and its subterranean dungeons were in -existence in 1814. "The principal of these," wrote -one who had inspected it, "is as horrible as any in -Bicêtre; sunk thirty feet below the level of the ground, -and so fashioned that a man of average height could -not stand up in it. One could scarcely remain here, -says the doctor himself, more than four and twenty -hours without being in danger of one's life."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Abbaye was demolished in 1854.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p174.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p175.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch09' class='c004'>CHAPTER IX. <br /> <br /> THE LUXEMBOURG IN '93.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>This was, above all others, the aristocratic prison -of the Revolution. It was fitly chosen for the -reception of that brilliant contingent of nobles, just -ready to fly the country, whom the famous Law of -the Suspects had routed from their hôtels in Paris. -To confine them in the Luxembourg, converting that -ancient and renowned palace into a dungeon of aristocrats, -was in itself an apt stroke of vengeance on -the part of the people. Few indeed of the historic -dwellings of Paris could have put them more forcibly -in mind of the tyrannies of kings and regents, of the -splendid and licentious fêtes and orgies of princes and -princesses of the blood, the cost of which was wrung -from the lean pockets of those who were told to eat -cake when there was no bread in the cupboard! Had -not Marie de Médicis passed here, and Gaston de -France, and Duchesse de Montpensier, and Elizabeth -d'Orléans, who gave it to Louis XIV., and Louis -XVI., who gave it, in 1779, to Monsieur his brother, -who after the days of storm and terror was to reign, -not too satisfactorily, as Louis XVIII.? Was it not -here that Duchesse de Berri, in the early years of the -eighteenth century, held those surprising revels the -details of which may be read only in secret and unpublished -memoirs? Sedate historians merely hint -at them.<a id='r20' /><a href='#f20' class='c014'><sup>[20]</sup></a> And, palace though it was, the revolutionary -judges might have found ready to their hands -at the Luxembourg, bars, bolts, fetters and dungeons -enow. For that "symbolic hierarchy" of palace, -cloister, and prison, proper to all princely and noble -dwellings of the old régime, had existed at the Luxembourg; -and during long years the penal justice of -priest and monk had passed that way.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f20'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r20'>20</a>. "Dans son Palais-Royal, au Palais de Luxembourg où demeurait la duchesse -de B——, se célébraient le plus ordinairement ces parties de débauche. -L'on y voyait les acteurs figurer quelquefois avec un costume qui consistait à -n'en point avoir; et les princes, les princesses, se livrer sans pudeur aux désordres -les plus dégoûtans."—Dulaure, vol. viii., p. 187.</p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>This was the place to which the noble and courtly -suspects were conveyed by hundreds in August, 1793. -One can imagine, though but very faintly, with what -feelings they resigned themselves into the hands of -concierge Benoît. Their King had been decapitated; -their Queen, a prisoner elsewhere, was expecting her -husband's fate. They knew how little their sovereign's -life had weighed in the people's balance; was -it likely that theirs would be of greater weight? -Judgment and death disquieted them.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"A diverting spectacle in its way," wrote one sarcastic -prisoner, "to see arriving in a miserable hackney-coach -two marquises, a duchess, a marchioness, -and a count; all ready to faint on alighting, and all -seized with the megrims on entering." Dames of -great rank came with their brisk femmes de chambre, -old noblemen with their valets, youths separated from -their governors and tutors,—children even; whole -battalions of the most distinguished suspects, the -very flower of the aristocracy of France. The dungeons -were not requisitioned, but hasty preparations -had been made for them. Under concierge Benoît's -polite and sympathetic conduct, they mounted the -splendid staircase—up which had flitted in a costume -of no weight at all the unblushing guests of De Berri—to -the splendid chambers, picture-gallery, ball-room, -salon, dining-room, and the whole sumptuous suite, -which rude partitions of naked lath and timber had -converted into some semblance of prison lodgings. -The wide windows had been armed with iron bars, -and guards were posted at every story.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The gallant company of French suspects found -some of the chambers in the occupation of a party of -English suspects, who had been placed under arrest -some weeks earlier, "as a response to the insults -offered by the English government to the Republic" -(<i>pour répondre aux insultes dirigées par le gouvernement -anglais contre la République</i>). Amongst them -were Miss Maria Williams, who had gone to France, -pen in hand, to see what liberty, equality, and fraternity -were like in practice (and who returned to write -one of the dullest books on record); and Thomas -Paine, who was studying "The Rights of Man" under -alarming aspects.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This was the first Battue; the royalist suspects of -Republican France were the second.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The salons of the palace, made into prison chambers, -were named afresh. Miss Williams and her -sister occupied the chamber of <i>Cincinnatus</i>; hard by -were the chambers of <i>Brutus</i>, <i>Socrates</i>, and <i>Solon</i>; -and the derisive name of <i>Liberty</i> was given to the -room in which nobles under special guard were confined -in the strictest privacy. High personages, -whose titles but a little while before might have -made their gaolers tremble, were lodged in every -quarter of the palace. In this cabinet were Marshal -de Mouchy and his wife, "rigorous observers of -courtly etiquette"; a little way off, in chambers no -bigger than prison cells, the Comte de Mirepoix, the -Marquis de Fleury, President Nicolai, M. de Noailles, -and the Duc de Lévi.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Parlous in a high degree as the situation was for -all of them, they did not at this date suffer any -special discomfort, the deprivation of liberty excepted. -Their captors were satisfied at having them -under lock and key, and did not insult their captivity. -A gossiping history, which may be history or -fable, describes a visit of Latude to one of the political -prisoners, a certain M. Roger. The great prison-breaker -laughed the Luxembourg to scorn: "A -prison? You call this a prison, <i>mon cher</i>? I call it -a <i>bonbonnière</i>, a <i>boudoir</i>!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Indeed, to be precise, the Luxembourg was not exactly -a Bastille. There were sad and evil days in -store for these suspects, but they were days as yet -distant. For the present, heart-questionings apart, it -was not too dismal a confinement; and rumour went -so far as to hint that there were relaxations of an -evening which would not have discredited the character -of the Luxembourg of history.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The palace-prison might be compared to an unseaworthy -vessel in which one shipped for a compulsory -voyage, in dangerous waters, with a doubtful chart. -One might reach port, or founder in mid-ocean. Meanwhile, -there was no choice but to sail; and the rotten -ship had good berths and was well-provisioned.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Luxembourg was not as yet governed as a -prison, the suspects of the Revolution were under no -extraordinary restraint, there was no surveillance, and -the sentries allowed the prisoners to come and go as -they pleased within the wide walls of the palace and -its gardens. Their friends called upon them, and they -wrote and received letters. One of them had a dog -in his chamber which used to fetch and carry messages -and packets between the "prison" and free Paris. A -confectioner outside was allowed to furnish whatever -was ordered for the tables, and the rich paid ungrudgingly -for the poor. Plain <i>sans-culottes</i> came in as suspects -with the nobles, and were regularly fed by them.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"How many are you feeding?" asked one marquis -of another.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Twelve; and pretty hungry ones."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Well, what do you give them?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Meat at dinner always, and dessert."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"That's not so bad. My fellows want meat twice -a day, and coffee once a week."</p> - -<p class='c012'>A strained position made matters easier. The -nobles kept apart from the plebs, and took their -share of snubs from the "common patriots" whom -their purses kept in food; but a sense of general -danger minimised the hostilities of class. Succour, -whenever needed, was never lacking. The regulation -mattress for the beds is described as "of about -the thickness of an omelette" and the bolster "of -the leanest"; but bolsters and mattresses ran short in -a month or two, and the men stripped themselves of -coats and waistcoats to make beds for the women. It -was a camp or caravanserai, with the style of a court.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The aristocrats assembled of an evening in a common -room which was always called the salon, powdered -and dressed in the fashion, saluted one another -by the titles which they had ceased to own, and -disputed precedence as at Versailles. Visits were -paid and returned, and never was a fool's paradise so -scrupulously ordered. It was admirable in its way; -the old order would die by rule.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The prisoners were fortunate in their concierge, -Benoît. A veteran of seventy, gentle and genial, with -a heart as fine as the manners of his royalist prisoners, -he smoothed all paths, and ushered in a new-comer to -a lodging of four bare walls and a naked floor with -an apology that transformed it into a royal boudoir. -He seemed to know all his guests as they arrived, -and placed them where he thought they would find -the easiest entertainment and the most congenial -company. He played the part of master of ceremonies, -and put each guest into his proper niche. -In Benoît's hands, the marquis who had arrived without -his valet found himself handling the broom, fetching -water, and taking his turn at the spit, as if the -custom of a lifetime had used him to those offices. -It was Benoît who learned at once what money a -prisoner had brought in with him, and who saved the -needy suspect the humiliation of begging his meals, -by a whisper in the ear of a good-natured noble.</p> - -<p class='c012'>By-and-bye, the suspects had the gratification of -knowing that their perils, present and to come, were -shared by the enemy himself. There arrived as a -prisoner one evening a president of the revolutionary -tribunal. It was one Kalmer, a German Jew, -and reputed millionaire (he had an income of about -£8000), who had been active in filling the chamber-cells -of the Luxembourg. He presented himself in -sabots and a costume of the shabbiest simplicity, and -his reception was of the coolest. He displayed from -the first a voracious appetite, and every day an ass -laden with provisions was brought for him to the -palace door. The ex-president seemed well disposed -to end his days eating and drinking in the Luxembourg, -and was not a little shocked on receiving the -news that he had been sentenced to death, "for conspiring -secretly with the enemy abroad." He went -to the guillotine without a benediction.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Came next the much more notable Chaumette, ex-sailor, -ex-priest, and recently Procureur of the Commune, -in which capacity he had been foremost in -demanding and promoting the Law of the Suspects. -He was as chapfallen as a wolf in a snare, but he did -not escape the mordant jests of the company. It was -Chaumette who had declared in the Chamber that -"you might almost recognise a suspect by the look -of him." He himself was recognised on the instant.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Sublime Procureur!" exclaimed one, "thanks to -that famous requisition of yours, I am suspect, thou -art suspect, he is suspect; we are suspect, you are -suspect, they are all suspect"—which indeed was the -case, for at that date, as Carlyle says, "if suspect of -nothing else, you may grow," as came to be a saying, -"Suspect of being Suspect."</p> - -<p class='c012'>One night, the wildest rumour circulated in the -prison. It was said that Danton, Camille Desmoulins, -Hérault de Séchelle, Lacroix, Philippeaux, and -others, the head and front of the party of the Moderates, -had been arrested by Robespierre's order, and -were to be sent forthwith to the Luxembourg. It was -even so; and the next night the news sped through -every corridor of the palace that Danton and his fellows -had arrived, and were with the concierge. The -prisoners swarmed to the reception room, and gratified -their eyes with that unlooked-for spectacle. The -brilliant Camille, whose young wife was a prisoner -with him, was denouncing the tribunal in a storm of -passion; Danton bade him be calm: "When men act -with folly," he said, "one should know how to laugh -at them." Then, recognising Thomas Paine, he said: -"What you have done for the liberty of your country, -I have tried to do for mine. I have been less fortunate -than you! They will send me to the scaffold; -well, I shall go there cheerfully enough!" Camille -Desmoulins had brought with him some rather melancholy -reading—Hervey's <i>Meditations</i> and Young's -<i>Night Thoughts</i>. The merry Réal, who had arrived -a day or two earlier, exclaimed against these works: -"Do you want to die before your time? Here, take -my book, <i>La Pucelle d'Orléans</i>; that will keep your -spirits up!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>General Dillon, who was of the earliest batch of -suspects, was amongst the first to visit the imprisoned -Moderates in the chamber which had been set apart -for them.<a id='r21' /><a href='#f21' class='c014'><sup>[21]</sup></a> Camille was still fuming, and Danton -playing the part of moderator. Lacroix was debating -with himself whether he should cut his hair, or wait -till Samson dressed it for him. Another of the party, -Fabre d'Eglantine, lay sick in bed, tenderly nursed by -his comrades. He was saved for the scaffold, for -the turn of the Moderates was not long delayed. At -the brief trial of the party, Danton and Camille -showed a characteristic front to their judges. "You -ask my name!" thundered the Titan of the Revolution. -"You should know it! It is Danton, a name -tolerably familiar in the Revolution. As for my abode, -it will soon be the Unknown, but I shall live in the -Pantheon of history!" "My age," answered Camille, -"is the age of the good <i>sans-culotte</i> Jesus Christ; an -age fatal to Revolutionists!" Returning to the Luxembourg -after condemnation, he said to Benoît: "I -am condemned for having shed a tear or two over the -fate of other unfortunates. My only regret is that I -was not able to be of better service to them." Camille -wrote with one of the wittiest pens of his day, and -busied himself in the Luxembourg with a comedy -called <i>The Orange</i>, the model of which was Sheridan's -<i>School for Scandal</i>. He had evoked in a greater -degree than any other of the Moderates the sympathies -of the suspects in the Luxembourg, and up to -the last there was a general belief in the prison that -both he and Danton would be saved by the intervention -of Robespierre. But Robespierre could not, if -he would. Executioner Samson received in due -course his order to proceed with them—a document -drawn up in the style and almost in the terms of a -commercial invoice—and made his own note in pencil -at the foot: "One cart will be enough." Even at the -steps of the guillotine, Camille turned to denounce -the crowd. "Leave that canaille!" said Danton, -quietly; "we are done with it." To the headsman -Danton said, as he stood on the scaffold: "You must -show my head to the people. It is a head worth -looking at."</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f21'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r21'>21</a>. "This general," says Nougaret, in his dry way, "drank a great deal. In his -sober moments, he played at trictrac."—Vol. ii., p. 61.</p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>This hecatomb of the Moderates sent a thrill of -fear through the Luxembourg. Whose turn next?</p> - -<p class='c012'>Up to this date, the principal political prisoners had -enjoyed unrestrained communication with their friends -outside, and General Dillon had private news twice a -day from the tribunal. Two days after the bloody -despatch of the Moderates, the prisoners of the Luxembourg -were confined to their chambers. Evening -receptions and parties of trictrac (in one's sober intervals) -were suppressed; communication of every kind -was forbidden; and the journals of the day, which -had been freely circulated in the prison, were no longer -admitted. The prisoners awaited "in silence and -fear" the explanation of this rigorous <i>consigne</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was the outcome of the first of those rumours of -a "plot in the prison." A certain Lafflotte, a suspect -of low origin, denounced General Dillon and one -Simon (nicknamed in the prison Simon-Limon) as -the author of a secret conspiracy. The revolutionary -journals were full of the affair, but it was never very -clearly explained, nor, for that matter, was any precise -explanation ever offered of other prison plots -so-called. There were pretended discoveries and -expositions of plots in the Luxembourg, Saint-Lazare, -Bicêtre, and the Carmes. That the prisoners of the -Revolution in all these goals were eager to recover -their liberty, is a statement which may pass without -dispute; and it is no less natural to suppose that -they would have seized upon any means that offered -a reasonable hope of escape. But the truth seems to -have been, and it is rather curious in the circumstances -(though the presence of so many women and -children would have multiplied the difficulties) that no -concerted efforts to break prison were ever made by -the suspects. Statements or rumours to the effect -that they were planning a forcible release for themselves, -and that, once out of prison, they intended to -put Paris to the sword, should have been regarded as -quite too silly for credence. Surely those poor aristocrats -had given proof enough of their weakness! -Of all the enemies of the Republic, they were the -least capable of harming it.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Dillon and Simon, nevertheless, were delivered -over to Samson. The terror had begun for the -prisoners of the Luxembourg.</p> - -<p class='c012'>An unexpected calamity succeeded. Benoît, most -humane and benevolent of concierges, was arrested. -It was as if the father had been snatched from his -family, and the suspects were inconsolable; they had -lost their best friend within the prison. The tribunal -acquitted him, but he did not return to his post. -Benoît had two successors at the Luxembourg within -a space of weeks, the second of whom was a man -who would have been regarded with terror in any -French prison at that epoch. This was Guiard, who -had been fetched expressly from Lyons, where he had -acquired a hideous celebrity as gaoler of the "Cellar -of the Dead," the name bestowed upon the dungeon -or black hole in which the victims of the <i>commission -populaire</i> passed their last hours between condemnation -and execution.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A few days after the removal of Benoît, the prisoners -awoke one morning to find that sentinels had -been posted at every door. A stolid police officer -named Wilcheritz, a Pole by birth, who had been -nominated to a principal post in the prison, came -round with the order that there was to be no communication -between the suspects. They, believing -that they were on the eve of another September -massacre, prepared to bid each other farewell. On -this occasion, however, it was merely a question of -stripping them of their belongings. Money, paper -notes, rings, studs, pins, shoebuckles, penknives, -razors, scissors, keys, were gathered in cell after cell, -and deposited in a heap in one of the larger rooms; -no notes or inventory being taken. Wilcheritz and -his inquisitors were the objects of some pleasantries -which, it is said, "annoyed them greatly." One -prisoner, after handing over his writing-case was -asked for his ring. "What!" said he, "isn't the -stationery enough? Are you setting up in the -jewellery line too?" Another, when it was pointed -out to him that he had retained the gold buckles of -his garters, replied: "I think, citizens, you had better -undress me at once." They entered the cell of the -playwright Parisau. "Citizens," said the author, "I -am really distressed; you have come too late. I had -three hundred livres here, but another citizen has -just relieved me of them. I hope that you will have -better luck elsewhere. They tell me, however, that -you are leaving us fifty livres apiece, and as I have -only just five and twenty, no doubt you will make up -the sum to me." "Oh no, citizen," returned the -stolid Pole.—"Ah! I see. You are merely 'on the -make,' citizen. It is unfortunate in that case that -there are gentry in the prison more active than you. -However, if you follow the other citizen, I dare say -you will catch him up, and then you can settle -accounts with him. You are the ocean, citizen, and -all the little tributaries will join themselves to you."</p> - -<p class='c012'>In another apartment it was proposed to carry off -his silver coffee-pot from a prisoner, who, to preserve -it, explained that it was "not exactly silver," -but "some sort of English metal." That was possible, -observed Wilcheritz, for he had one just like it himself. -"Ah!" returned the prisoner, "now that you -mention it, I remember there was another like mine -in the prison!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Suspects belonging to the working-classes,—tailors -shoemakers, engravers, and the like—were allowed to -retain the tools of their crafts; and the barbers -received their razors in the morning, returning them -to the gaolers at night.</p> - -<p class='c012'>To all requests addressed to him by the prisoners, -imploring information as to their fate, the phlegmatic -Pole made answer: "Patience! Justice is just. This -durance will not endure for ever. Patience!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>Patriots and nobles were now massed in hundreds -within the same walls, shared the same chambers, and -were fed from the same kitchen; and all alike were -now in the same state of siege. What news penetrated -within the palace-prison was not the most -inspiriting; the tumbrils were moving steadily to the -guillotine, and in the copies of the <i>Courrier Republicain</i> -which were smuggled into the Luxembourg, the -principal intelligence was the "Judgment of the -Revolutionary Tribunal, which has condemned to -death" thirty, forty, fifty, or sixty "conspirators."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Word was passed that the <i>commissions populaires</i> -were to take in hand the cases of the suspects, which -was more comforting to the patriots than to the -nobles; but the days crept on, and nothing happened.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The prisoners amused themselves by teasing -Wilcheritz, a fair butt for raillery, who carried out his -orders imperturbably, but was never a bully. The -day came of the "Feast of the Supreme Being," and -citizen Wilcheritz honoured it with a radiant suit. -His big feet were cramped in a pair of new shoes -with the finest of silver buckles. One of the -despoiled suspects fancied or pretended that he -recognised the buckles, and a whisper went round. -The prisoner whose coffee-pot had been appropriated -came to the rescue. "Citizens," he said, "those -buckles don't look to me like silver. They are <i>a sort -of English metal</i>." "They have been in my family -for three generations, citizens, I assure you. I had -them long before the visitation," stammered Wilcheritz. -"The visitation" had grown to be the polite -mode of reference to the act of spoliation. "Citizen," -said the defender of Wilcheritz, "your answer is -complete. You told us the other day that no good -Republican should stoop to wear jewellery, but no -citizen here would have the heart to claim your shoebuckles."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The coming of Guiard as concierge (<i>cet homme -féroce</i> is Nougaret's dismissal of him) quenched all -pleasantries, and made the palace-prison a prison -complete. Two suspects hopeless of being brought -to the bar, had committed suicide by throwing themselves -from their windows; Guiard ordered that no -prisoner should approach within a yard of his window. -The sentries had orders to enter every cell and -chamber, with drawn sabres, at midnight, rouse the -occupants from their beds, and count them. At -intervals, all through the night, they were to hail one -another loudly in every corridor: "<i>Sentinelles, prenez-garde -à nous!</i>" so that there should be no sleep for the -prisoners. No letters were allowed to pass out from -or into the prison; and no visitors were admitted.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Meals could no longer be sent in from the confectioner's, -and a common table was established. At -noon precisely, the bell was struck for dinner, and -the nine hundred prisoners were ranged in the -corridors, each with his <i>couvert</i> under his arm, a -wooden fork, knife, and spoon. They descended by -batches to the dining-room, marching two and two, -and this singular procession was half an hour on its -journey. Arriving at the dining-room, three hundred -took their places at the table, three hundred waited -with their backs to the wall, and three hundred cooled -their heels in the passage.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At this time, all money and paper notes, having -been taken from them, the suspects were receiving an -allowance of about two shillings a day, though it is -not quite clear what they were to spend it on.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At the distribution one morning, Guiard said significantly: -"There won't be quite so many to receive -it to-morrow!" That same night, a long row of -tumbrils stopped under the walls of the Luxembourg, -and one hundred and sixty-nine prisoners were -dragged from bed to fill them.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was the first seizure on the grand scale, and in a -few minutes the whole prison was in confusion and -panic terror. The warders were heard going from -door to door, and calling the names of the victims; -one from one chamber, two, three, or four from -another. Here were sobbings and loud wails, and -clinging embraces; husbands and fathers trying to -animate the weeping women whom they were leaving; -priests called for in the dark to bless together -for the last time two who were to be separated. No -one dared descend to the great gallery, but elsewhere -there were frightened rushings to and fro; meetings -and partings in darkened doorways and half-illumined -corridors; friend seeking friend, and women and -girls imploring with streaming eyes for leave to say -good-bye again to the lost ones who were already -seated in the tumbrils. Happy were the friends and -whole families who were despatched together. In -one moving instance, weeping was turned into joy. -A family of father, mother, and two daughters were -divided; the younger daughter was left behind, -almost distracted; her name was not upon the list. -Presently came another warder with another list. -The girl started from the empty bed on which she -had thrown herself, snatched the list from the gaoler, -and read her own name there. Carrying the sheet, -and with a face beaming as if a free pardon had -been handed to her, she ran down the corridor, -crying: "Mamma, I have found my name! See, it is -here! Now we shall die together!" So by minutes, -of which each minute was an æon, that night of -horror was exhausted, and at daybreak the long file -of tumbrils dragged scaffold-wards.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Not less wretched was the situation of the hundreds -who remained. Racking fears were their portion -day and night; death was in their hearts. Every -evening a new list came in. The "ferocious" Guiard -had a very suitable assistant in a turnkey called -Verney, whose duty is was to read out the roll of the -proscribed, and who did it with a terrible art, dallying -with the syllables of a name, and pausing to watch -the strained faces around him. Sometimes instead -of reading the list, he would pass it round, when the -struggle to reach it prolonged the agony. An eyewitness -of the scene has left a description:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"In the evening, those prisoners who were allowed to do so assembled -in one of the large rooms and played, or made a pretence -at playing, vingt-et-un, chess, and other games. While these were -in progress, the terrible Verney, head turnkey, appeared, bringing -what was called the lottery list. This little paper contained the -names of those who were to go the same night to the Conciergerie, -and the next morning to the guillotine. The fatal list went round -amid the most pitiful silence. Those who found their names on -it rose pale and trembling from the table, embraced and bade -farewell to their friends, and left us. Verney would then produce -the evening paper, where we read the list of the day's -dead,—the dead who had been at the table with us the night -before! I was playing chess one evening with General Appremont, -General Flers looking on. I had just put him in check -when the summons came for him, and Verney carried him off. -Flers took the vacant seat, with a pretence of finishing the game, -when he too was called. This officer had proved his courage in -battle a score of times, but I have never seen terror so horribly -painted on any human countenance. His whole visage seemed -undone, and when he struggled to his feet, he could scarcely -support himself. He gave me his hand, speechless, and staggered -from the room."<a id='r22' /><a href='#f22' class='c014'><sup>[22]</sup></a></p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f22'> -<p class='c024'><a href='#r22'>22</a>. <i>Les Prisons de l'Europe.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>In the Luxembourg as in the other prisons at this -epoch there were miserable creatures, also under lock -and key, who made a kind of trade of denouncing -their fellows. The Luxembourg had seven of these -spies, who assisted in preparing the lists, "embellishing" -them, as they said, with details which they had -scraped together or invented in the prison. These -wretches enjoyed and boasted of the terror which -they inspired; and the chief of them, Boyaval (a -tailor by trade, who had served in and deserted from -the Austrian army), used to say that anyone who -looked askance at him in the Luxembourg might -count on spending the next night in the Conciergerie! -Scarcely a suspect whom Boyaval denounced escaped -the guillotine, and one night he scandalised the -prison by offering love to a young widow of a day, -whose husband he had sacrificed. The husband was -an artist, who had painted portraits in the Luxembourg -of nobles who had reason to suppose that they -would leave their families no other legacy. He was -accused of assembling the nobles in his room, and -plotting with them against the Republic. As lightly -as this, during the Terror, were lives devoted to -Samson, in every prison in Paris. The "plots" were -not credible, and it is impossible at this date to -suppose that they were ever credited; but Paris was -still obedient to the word of the Danton whom it had -guillotined, that "one must strike terror into the -aristocrats"; and these "prison plots" served to fill -the tumbrils to the last.</p> - -<p class='c012'>An epidemic of sickness came to crown the sufferings -of the dwindling population of the Luxembourg. -They were reduced almost to the last extremity of -despair. They had no news from without, except the -nightly list of the proscribed, and the nightly journal, -with its monotonous tale of executions. Between -morning and evening, there was no other event, -except the swift good-bye at night to the friends or -relatives whose names were mumbled out by Verney. -A silence almost unbroken had settled on the prison; -parties of ghosts assembled at dinner, and whispered -together in the common-room until bedtime. Their -misery culminated in the epidemic of sickness. The -rations had been cut down to one meal a day, and -Guiard was the caterer. The wasted prisoners sent -back their rotten meat to the kitchen, and lived on -bread and thin soup. Half the prison fell ill; poisoned -or underfed. Doctor's aid could be had only on a -warrant from the police, and applications remained a -week or a fortnight at the bureau. Samson had a -rival in diseased or exhausted nature; and Guiard's -requiem for the dead was an unvarying formula: -"Peste! there's another lost to the guillotine!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>This agony of a season was dissolved in an hour. -The "walking corpses" (<i>les cadavres ambulans</i>) of -the Luxembourg were recalled to life by the revolution -of the 9th of Thermidor. It came with the din of -the tocsin, and the beat to arms which, until that day -had gathered the rabble to follow the tumbrils to the -guillotine. The tocsin continued, and the rattle of -the drums increased, and the trampling of feet towards -the Luxembourg grew louder. The remnant of the -suspects gathered in the gallery: the last massacre -was to come. No! The doors were burst open; a -shout went up. Robespierre had fallen. The Reign -of Terror was finished.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p194.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p195.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch10' class='c004'>CHAPTER X. <br /> <br /> THE BASTILLE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='c025'>"... if once it were left in the power of any, the highest, magistrate to -imprison arbitrarily whomever he or his officers thought proper (as in France is -daily practised by the Crown), there would soon be an end of all other rights -and immunities."—<span class='sc'>Blackstone.</span></p> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>After enduring for centuries an oppression as -rigorous and as cruel as any nation had ever -been subjected to, this idea dawned, almost in an -hour, upon the mind of France. It did not matter -that the King who occupied the throne at this time -was, if not at all a wise one, at least one of the most -humane, and distinctly the best intentioned, and the -only French sovereign who had ever really cared to -soften the lot of his prisoners. He did not soften -their lot in the least, because he was weak and indolent, -and in the hands of the least honest of his ministers; -but his predecessors, almost without exception, -had lent their efforts or their sanction to the support -of that old malignant policy, descended from the -feudal times, that prison was properly a place of -torment. The quick aspiration of liberty, born at -last of a wretchedness that was past enduring, inflamed -the heart of the whole nation. It took Paris, -as it were, by the throat. What thing in Paris -opposed itself most visibly to the "natural rights" -and liberty of man? Paris said: The Bastille! Up -then, and let the Bastille go down. They went there, -a very ordinary crowd of rioters, and overturned it. -The Bastille, which the superstitious fears of ages -had thought impregnable, fell like an old ruined -house (which it was) in a midsummer gust. But the -fall of it shook Europe to its foundations, and before -the dust had vanished, it was seen that the Bastille -had carried with it the throne of France, and every -shred and vestige of the system which that throne -represented.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This then must have been the most terrible prison -in Europe? Not at all. It was the most renowned; -and, as a prison, no other name is ever likely to be -greater than, or as great as, the Bastille; but at the -time of its destruction it was no more than the shadow -of its ancient self, and at no period of its existence -was it a worse place than any other of the old State -prisons of France. Vincennes was quite as cruel a -hold as the Bastille had ever been; there were, I think, -uglier dens in the Châtelet and in Bicêtre; and the -torture chamber of the Conciergerie had perhaps witnessed -more inhuman spectacles than any other prison -in Paris.</p> - -<div id='i_p196a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p196a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -<div class='ic002'> -<p>THE BASTILLE.</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>But when, in July, 1789, a prison was to be destroyed, -as the chief symbol of the tyranny of kings, it was -upon the Bastille that Paris marched, as by instinct. -Why was this prison abhorred above all the rest? -Mainly because what had once been a fact had survived -as a tradition,—that the master of the Bastille -was the master of France; and the master of the -Bastille was, of course, the King. In its beginnings, -the Bastille was merely a gate of Paris, as Newgate -was originally nothing more than the New Gate of -London. It came next to be a very common little -fort, for the defence of the Seine against the English -and other pirates. But it grew by-and-bye to be a -stout castle and prison, over against the royal residence -of Vincennes; and when, on the approach of -an insurgent force, the King could signal from his -window at Vincennes to his commandant in the Bastille, -just opposite, and the guns of both places could -be primed in time, the plain between them was secure. -The Bastille came thus to hold a place quite distinct -from that of any other prison in Paris, and one -which threatened in a much higher degree the liberties -of the citizens. It was considered impossible of -capture; and while the King's standard shook over -the great towers of the Bastille, Paris and France -were secure to him; and, in the popular imagination, -his principal stronghold was also his principal prison. -In this point of view, and it was the popular point of -view, the Bastille was a double menace to Paris. It -was the King's best means of keeping importunate -subjects at arm's length, and it was also the most -redoubtable of the prisons he could shut them in. -Both ideas were to some extent erroneous. The -Bastille, considered as a fort, was never as formidable -as its name; and, as a prison, the Kings of France -seldom favoured it above the Dungeon of Vincennes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But let us seek now to put the Bastille in its proper -and exact place amongst the historic gaols of France. -In recent years, one or two French writers of distinction, -and others of no distinction whatever, have -come forward as the apologists of this too famous -keep, who would persuade us that it was not only a -very tolerable sort of prison, but even, in cases, a -rather desirable place of retirement, for meditation, -and philosophical pursuits. M. Viollet-le-Duc has assured -us, quite gravely, that the famed <i>oubliettes</i> (the -bottoms of which were shaped like sugar loaves, so -that prisoners might have no resting-place for their -feet) were merely ice-houses! It is not denied that -these cells existed, and those who care to believe that -a Mediæval architect built them under the towers of -the Bastille as store-chambers for ice to cool the governor's -or the prisoners' wine, are entirely welcome to -do so. These were amongst the places of torment in -which Louis XI. kept the Armagnac princes, who -were taken out twice a week to be scourged in the -presence of Governor l'Huillier, and "every three -months to have a tooth pulled out." The author of -<i>The Bastille Unveiled</i> has attempted to explain away -the iron cage in which the same King confined Cardinal -Balue for eleven years, and which, I believe, is -still in existence. An English apologist (whose work -extends to two bulky volumes) says that "prisoners -were less harshly treated in the Bastille than in other -French and English prisons"; that "the accusations -of prisoners having been tortured in the Bastille -have no serious foundation"; that the majority of the -chambers "were comfortable enough"; that one of -the courtyards "resembled a college playground, in -which prisoners received their friends, and indulged -in all kinds of games." We hear of tables which -were so sumptuously furnished (three bottles of wine -a day, amongst other comforts) that the prisoners -complained to the governor that he was feeding them -too well. We are presented with printed rules to -show how carefully the sick were to be attended to, -and what were to be their ghostly ministrations -in their final hours. We are told, without a smile, that -it was really not so easy for people to get into the Bastille -as the world in general has supposed; and that, -once there, their situation was not too helpless, inasmuch -as the governor must present to the minister -every day a written report upon the conditions of the -prison. Under the pen of this or the other indulgent -writer, the horrors of the Bastille have vanished as by -process of magic. Unfortunately, the horrors are, -with quite unimportant exceptions, facts of history.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The government of the Bastille was precisely similar -to the government of the other State prisons of -France. Edicts notwithstanding, these prisons were -practically the <i>property</i> of their successive governors. -To this unwritten rule the Bastille was not an exception. -The governor in possession at this or that epoch -might or might not be the creature of the minister -through whose interest he had bought his office at a -sometimes exorbitant price; it was, at all events, understood -that, whatever limits were set to his authority, -he was fully entitled to get back his purchase money; -and this, as had been shown, he could seldom do except -by villainously ill-using his prisoners. There -were governors who did not do this, and then indeed -came a blessed period for the prisoners. Then -food was good and plentiful, the faggots were not -stinted in the fire-place, the beds were not rotten and -lousy, the foul linen went to the wash, and the threadbare -clothes were replaced, the cells were made proof -against wind and rain, the governor was prompt in -looking into grievances, and all went as well for the -prisoner as it was possible that it should go in a gaol -of old Paris. But when a new Pharaoh arose, who -was avaricious, and a tyrant, and a bully, and who had -bought his prison as a speculative investment, then -the clouds gathered again, and the wind blew again -from the east, and the old tribulations began afresh. -Now, as the records of all the French prisons of history -leave no doubt as to the fact the bad governors -were many, and the good governors were few, and -that within his prison walls the governor was only less -than omnipotent, readers of these pages will not expect -often to find prisoners of the Bastille regaling -themselves with three bottles of wine a day, or asking -to have their tables ordered more plainly, or receiving -the free visits of their friends, or playing at "all kinds -of games" in courtyards resembling college playgrounds. -Sprigs of the nobility and young men of -family, shut up for a time for making too free with -their money, or for running away with a ballet-dancer, -had perhaps not too much to complain of in the Bastille; -there were certain prisoners of rank, too, who -came off lightly; and now and again there were other -prisoners who enjoyed what were called the "liberties -of the Bastille," and who were allowed a restricted intercourse. -But the general rules for the keeping and -conduct of prisoners in the Bastille were of the severest -description, and they were carried out for the most -part with inflexible rigour. Privations and humiliations -of all kinds were inflicted on them; and redress -for injuries, or for insults, or for mean and illegal annoyances, -the outcome of the governor's spleen, was -not more easy to obtain in the Bastille than in the -Dungeon of Vincennes.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The statement that "it was not so easy to enter -into the Bastille" is from Ravaisson, the compiler of -the <i>Archives de la Bastille</i>. He gives his reasons, -which are sufficiently curious. Incarcerations, says -Ravaisson, were accomplished with the utmost care, -and the Government insisted upon the most stringent -precautions, inasmuch as, "acting with absolute -authority, it felt the danger of an uncontrolled responsibility." -Sore indeed would be the task of -proving by example that the absolute monarchy had -many compunctions on this score, when tampering -with the liberties of its subjects. "Extreme care -was taken to avoid errors and abuses" in effecting -incarcerations in the Bastille; and the great safeguard -was that "each <i>lettre de cachet</i> was signed by the King -himself, and countersigned by one of his ministers!" -One need go no further than this. M. Ravaisson -spent from fifteen to twenty years in studying and -arranging the archives of the Bastille, and his knowledge -of his subject must have been immense. Was -this the writer from whom one would have expected -the suggestion that the King and his minister, in -signing a <i>lettre de cachet</i>, took care to assure themselves -that no injustice was being done, and made -themselves immediately and personally responsible -for the guilt of the victim whom it was to consign to -captivity in the Bastille? Leave aside the cases in -which the document was used to imprison a person -in order that charges or suspicions might afterwards -be inquired into,—though there are countless instances -to show, (1) that no proper investigation was held, -and (2), that the clearest proofs of innocence were -not always sufficient to procure the prisoner's liberation. -But what shall be said of the cases, infinitely -more numerous than these, in which no charge was -ever formulated, and in which none could have been -formulated, save some fictitious one inspired by private -greed, hatred, or vengeance? Where in these -cases was that "greatest care" which "was taken to -prevent errors and abuses"? Kings and their ministers -sent to the Bastille and other prisons many thousands -of prisoners who had no justice, and who never -expected justice. But these same "closed letters," -duly signed and sealed, were the instruments of imprisoning -hundreds of thousands of other persons—to -whom life was sweet and liberty was dear—in -whose affairs neither King nor minister had the most -shadowy interest, and whose very names most probably -they had never heard of. During the reign of -one King, Louis XV., one hundred and fifty thousand -<i>lettres de cachet</i> were issued. For how many of -those was Louis himself responsible? They carried -his signature, but is it necessary at this day to say -that the King wrote his name upon the blank forms, -which the minister distributed amongst his friends? -The lieutenant-general of police also had his blank -forms at hand, in which it was necessary only to insert -the names of the victims. Wives obtained these -forms against their husbands, husbands against their -wives, fathers against their children, men-about-town -against their rivals in love, debtors against their -creditors, opera-dancers against the lovers who had -slighted them. If one but had the ear of the King, -or the King's mistress, or the King's minister, or the -King's chief of police, or of a friend or a friend's -friend of any of these potentates, there was no grudge, -jealousy, or enmity which one might not satisfy by -means of a <i>lettre de cachet</i>,—that instrument which -was so sure a safegard against the "errors and abuses" -of imprisonment, because it carried the signature of -the King and his minister! And the cases in which -these scraps of paper were used merely for the ruin, -the torment, or the temporary defeat of a private -enemy, often had the cruelest results. The enemy -and the enmity were forgotten, but the <i>lettre de cachet</i> -had not been cancelled, and the prisoner still bided -his day. Persons who had never been convicted of -crimes, and other persons who had never been guilty -of crimes, lay for years in the Bastille, forgotten and -uncared for. "There are prisoners who remain in -the Bastille," said Linguet (who spent two years there), -"not because anybody is particularly anxious that -they should remain, but because they happen to be -there and have been forgotten, and there is nobody -to ask for their release." Captain Bingham, the -English apologist of the Bastille, discussing the cases -of certain criminals who were arbitrarily dealt with by -<i>lettres de cachet</i>, says that in England at the present -day they "would be prosecuted according to law, and -most probably committed to prison." Very good! -But is there no difference between the situation of -the criminal who, after conviction in open court, is -sent to prison for a fixed term of weeks, months, or -years, and that of the "criminal" who goes to prison -uncondemned and untried, and who cannot gauge the -length of his imprisonment? Far enough from being -"not so easy" to get into the Bastille, the passage -across those two drawbridges and through those five -massy gates was only too dreadfully simple for all -who were furnished against their wills with the "open -sesame" of the <i>lettre de cachet</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The interior of the Bastille had nothing worse to -show than has been discovered in the chapters on -Vincennes, the Châtelet, and Bicêtre. There were, -perhaps, uglier corners in the two last-named prisons -than in either of the two more famous ones. The -Bastille, however, has stood as the type, and the almost -plutonic fame which it owes to romance seems likely -to endure. Romance has not been guilty of much -exaggeration, but this saving clause may be put in, -that what has been written of the Bastille might have -been written with equal truth of most other contemporary -prisons. Its eight dark towers, its walls of -a hundred feet, its drawbridges, its outer and its four -great inner gates, its ditches, its high wooden gallery -for the watch, and its ramparts bristling with cannon,—these -external features have been of infinite service -to romance, and romantic history. But within -the walls of the Bastille there was nothing extraordinary. -Lodging was provided for about fifty prisoners, -and it was possible to accommodate twice that -number.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The fifth and last gate opened into the Great Court, -some hundred feet in length and seventy in breadth, -with three towers on either side. The Well Court, -about eighty feet by five and forty, lay beyond, with -a tower in the right and a tower in the left angle. -Each tower had its name; those in the Great Court -were <i>de la Comté</i>, <i>du Trésor</i>, <i>de la Chapelle</i>, <i>de la Bazanière</i>, -<i>de la Bertaudière</i>, and <i>de la Liberté</i>; those in -the Well Court were the <i>du Coin</i> and the <i>du Puits</i>. -The comely garden on the suburban side of the -château was closed to all prisoners by order of De -Launay, the last governor of the Bastille, who also forbade -them the use of the fine airy platforms on the -summit of the towers. The main court was then -the only exercise ground, a dreary enclosure which -Linguet describes as insufferably cold in winter ("the -north-east wind rushes through it") and a veritable -oven in summer.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The <i>oubliettes</i> have been mentioned. Besides these -there were the dungeons, below the level of the soil; -dens in which there was no protection from wind or -rain, and where rats and toads abounded. The ordinary -chambers of the prisoners were situated in the -towers. The upper stories were the <i>calottes</i> (skull-caps), -residence in which seems to have been regarded -as only better than that belowground. "One can only -walk upright in the middle." The windows, barred -within and without, gave little light; there was a -wretched stove in one corner (which had six pieces of -wood for its daily allowance during the winter months), -and one has no reason to doubt the statements of -prisoners, that only an iron constitution could support -the extremities of heat and cold in the <i>calottes</i>. In -contrast to these, there were rooms which had fair -views of Paris and the open country. The lower -chambers looked only on the ditches; all the chambers -(and the stairs) were shut in by double doors -with double bolts; and all, with the exceptions of -those which a few privileged persons were allowed -to upholster at their own cost, were furnished in the -most beggarly style. But in all of these respects, -nothing was worse in the Bastille than elsewhere.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In principle, the dietary system here was the same -as in other State prisons. The King paid a liberal -sum for the board of every prisoner, but the governor -contracted for the supplies, and might put into his -pocket half or three-fourths of the amount which he -drew from the royal treasury. In the Bastille, as in -other prisons, there were periods when the prisoners -were fed extremely well; and in all these prisons -there were persons who, by favour of the Government -or the governor, kept a much more luxurious -table than was allowed to the rest. But one must -take the scale of diet which was customary. Two -meals a day were the rule. On flesh days, the dinner -consisted of soup and the meat of which it had been -made; and for supper there were "a slice of roast -meat, a ragout, and a salad." Sunday's dinner was -"some bad soup, a slice of a cow which they call -beef, and four little pâtés"; supper, "a slice of roast -veal or mutton, or a little plate of haricot, in which -bones and turnips are most conspicuous, and a salad -with rancid oil." On three holidays in the year, -"every prisoner had an addition made to his rations -of half a roast chicken, or a pigeon." Holy Monday -was celebrated by "a tart extraordinary." There was -always or usually dessert at dinner, which "consists -of an apple, a biscuit, a few almonds and raisins, -cherries, gooseberries, or plums." Each prisoner received -a pound of bread a day, and a bottle of wine. -De Launay's method of supplying his prisoners with -wine was no doubt the usual one. He had the right -of taking into his cellars about a hundred hogsheads, -free of duty. "Well," says Linguet, "what does he -do? He sells his privilege to one Joli, a Paris publican, -who pays him £250 for it; and from Joli he -receives in exchange, for the prisoners' use, the commonest -wine that is sold,—mere vinegar, in fact."<a id='r23' /><a href='#f23' class='c014'><sup>[23]</sup></a> A -prisoner of the same period sums up the matter thus: -"There is no eating-house in all France where they -would not give you for a shilling a better dinner than -is served in the Bastille."</p> -<div class='footnote c015' id='f23'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r23'>23</a>. <i>Mémoires sur la Bastille.</i></p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>Apart from all exceptional hardships and privations, -the oppression of the first months of captivity in the -Bastille must have been very terrible. The prisoner -who was not certain of his fate, and who did not know -to whom he owed his imprisonment, lay under a suspense -which words are inadequate to describe. Mystery -and doubt environed him; his day-long silence -and utter isolation were relieved only by the regular -visits of his gaoler. He was not allowed to see anyone -from without, and could not get leave to write or -receive a letter. Nothing could be done for him, he -was told, until his examination had been concluded; -and this was sometimes delayed for weeks or months. -If he were a person of some consequence in the -State, powerful enough to have enemies at Court, his -examination in the council-chamber of the Bastille -was conducted in a manner quite similar to (and -probably borrowed from) that adopted by the Inquisition. -He was asked his connection with plots or -intrigues which he had never heard of; he was -coaxed or menaced to denounce or betray persons -with whom perhaps he had never associated; papers -were held up before him which he was assured contained -clear proofs of his guilt; and he might be told -that the King had unfortunately been inflamed against -him, and would not hear his name. If, mystified by -threats, hints, and arguments which had no meaning -for him, he asked to be confronted by an accuser or -witnesses, his request was not allowed. These were -the exact methods of the Inquisition. The lieutenant -of police, or the commissioner from the Châtelet, -who presided over the interrogation, would not hesitate -to tell the accused that his life was at stake, and -that if his answers were not complete and satisfactory -he would be handed over forthwith to a <i>commission -extraordinaire</i>. Every device was resorted to (says -the author of the <i>Remarques politiques sur le château -de la Bastille</i>) in order to draw from the prisoner -some sort of admission or avowal which might compromise -either himself or some other person or persons -in whom the Government had a hostile interest. -The examiner might say that he was authorised to -promise the prisoner his freedom, but if he allowed -himself to be taken by this ruse it was generally the -worse for him; for, on the strength of the confession -thus obtained, he was told that it would be impossible -to release him at present, but every effort would be -made, etc. If the ministry had reason to suspect that -the prisoner was really a dangerous character, and -involved in political intrigue, there was little hesitation -in resorting to torture.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Ravaisson says that only two kinds of torture were -applied in the Bastille; the "boot," and the torture -by water. Well, these were sufficient; but it is to be -remembered that the archives of the Bastille date -only from about the middle of the seventeenth century, -and it is improbable that the <i>Salle de la Question</i> of -this prison was less horribly equipped than that of -any other. The ordeal of the "boot" needs no description; -for the torture by water, the victim was -bound on a trestle, and water was poured down his -throat by the gallon, until his sufferings became -unendurable. Torture was practised in the Bastille as -long as it was practised in any other French prison; -a man named Alexis Danouilh underwent the Question -there ("ordinary" and "extraordinary") in 1783—after -the date at which Louis XVI. had forbidden -and abolished it by royal edict. To so small an extent -had the absolute sovereigns of France control over -the administration of their own prisons of State!</p> - -<p class='c012'>At no point in the existence of an ordinary captive -of the Bastille is there any occasion to exaggerate his -pains. Such as they were, they were very real; and -scant reason is there to wonder at the bitterness, the -vehemence, and even the violence of tone which characterises -the memoirs or narratives of those who had -endured them. The apologists of the Bastille will -beg us to believe that the histories of Linguet and -certain others are mendacious, have been refuted, and -so forth. The gifted, caustic Linguet, who is one of -their particular bugbears, was not the most upright -man, nor the most scrupulous writer, in the France of -his day; but the essential parts of his narrative are -confirmed by the statements of a host of others. It -is not because Linguet has said that the Bastille walls, -which were from seven to twelve feet thick, were from -thirty to forty feet thick (which he might quite possibly -have supposed) that we are to discredit his -account, highly wrought as it is, of the general conditions -of life within the prison. It is not more highly -wrought than the accounts of other prisoners of the -Bastille, the accuracy of which has not been questioned. -These other histories are plentiful, and we -are under no necessity of resting upon the better-known -narratives which, for their qualities of style or -their greater picturesqueness, have been so often reproduced. -Far on into the eighteenth century—indeed -until within a few years of our own—there -lay in the Bastille victims of public or private injustice, -whose complainings, stifled in its vaulted ceilings, -have sent us down a faint but faithful echo. What -of Bertin de Frateaux, who was walled in there from -1752 until his death in 1782? What of Tavernier, who, -imprisoned in 1759 (after a previous ten years' sojourn -in another gaol), was liberated only by the wreckers -of the Bastille, on the 14th of July, 1789? Here, too, -in 1784, lies the Genoese, Pellissery, imprisoned, in -1777, for publishing a pamphlet on the finances of -Necker. Dishonourable terms of release are offered -him which he will not accept, although "rheumatic in -every joint, scorbutic, and spitting blood for fifteen -months, owing to the atrocious treatment I have had -here during seven years." Here, two years later, is -Brun de la Condamine, the inventor of an explosive -bomb, which he has importuned the ministry to make -test of. After a captivity of four years and a half, -enraged at the indignities he receives, he makes a -wild attempt to escape. Here, at the same period, is -Guillaume Debure, the oldest and most respected -bookseller in France, lodged in the Bastille for refusing -to stamp the pirated copies of works issued by his -brethren in the trade; treated apparently like a common -malefactor, and released only on the indignant -representations of the whole bookselling fraternity of -Paris. Thus lightly was the liberty of the subject -held, even while the Revolution was fermenting.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The prisoner who was released never knew until -then the full bitterness of the treatment he had endured. -It was perhaps the acutest part of his sufferings, -that the letters he had written to family and -friends, the entreaties he had addressed to ministers, -magistrates, and chiefs of police, brought him never -a word in answer. It was thus that was produced in -so many cases that sense of utter desolation and -abandonment by the whole world which resulted in -the madness of very many prisoners. Those who -were restored to liberty with their reason unimpaired -learned that their letters and petitions had never been -received. They had never, in fact, passed out of the -Bastille. It was well to have the truth of this at any -time; but we are to remember the prisoners who died -in the belief that their dearest ones had denied them -one kind or sympathetic word. When the Bastille -was sacked, piles of letters were found which had -never passed beyond the governor's hands. Amongst -them was one which (considering the circumstances -of the writer, and the fact that no line was ever vouchsafed -him in response) may be regarded as perhaps -the very saddest ever penned: "If for my consolation," -wrote the prisoner to the lieutenant of police, -"Monseigneur would have the goodness, in the name -of the God above us both, to give me but one word -of my dear wife, her name only on a card, that I might -know she still lives, I would pray for Monseigneur to -the last day of my life." This letter was signed -"Queret Démery," a name known to nobody, but -which will be remembered while the Bastille is remembered. -One does not choose to ask, were there even -a chance of an answer, how many other letters not -less piteous than this were read and drily docketed by -governors of the Bastille.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This inveterate and almost inviolable secrecy in -which the government of the Bastille enwrapped the -majority of its prisoners seems on the whole to have -been the most cruel feature of its policy. After reading -some fifty volumes of cells with rats in them, and -dungeons frozen or fiery, and torture rooms, and filthy -beds, and food not enough to keep life on, one is -shocked to find that the due and natural poignancy of -sympathy with human suffering begins insensibly to -weaken. But this refinement of pain, inflicted as a -part of the routine, upon the common prisoners of -the Bastille, revives the sense of pity. It was the -habit to pretend that prisoners who were dungeoned -there were not in there at all. Asked as to the fate -of this prisoner or the other, ministers would respond -with a blank look, assure the questioner that they had -never heard the prisoner's name, and that, wherever -he might be, he was certainly not in the Bastille. -The governor and chief officers of the prison, who -saw the prisoner every day, would say that he was -not in their keeping, and that no such person was -known to them. The common practice of imprisoning -men in the Bastille under names other than their own -made these denials easy. At other times, when it -was desired to prejudice his friends or society against -a prisoner, the answer would be, that the less said -about him the better. The nominal cause of his imprisonment, -his friends were told, was not the real -one; the Government had their information, and if it -could possibly be published the prisoner would be -known in his true character. The prisoner himself -was often told that his friends had ceased to believe -in his innocence, or that they thought him dead, or -that they had given up all hope of procuring his -release. The Bastille and the Inquisition were singularly -alike in their methods.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Dreary beyond expression must have been the -daily round for all but the privileged few. "Every -hour was struck on a bell which was heard all through -the Faubourg St. Antoine." The sentries on the -rampart challenged one another ceaselessly throughout -the night. There were prisoners in solitary confinement -to whom no other sounds than these ever -penetrated, except the grating of the key in the lock -which announced the daily visits of the gaoler. This -was the life of such prisoners as the Iron Mask, and -of Tavernier, who told his liberators that, during the -thirty years of his captivity, he had passed nineteen -consecutive ones without crossing the threshold of his -cell. Exercise in the yard, for those who enjoyed -this favour, was limited to an hour a day, and this -period might be reduced to a few minutes if there -were many prisoners to be exercised in turn,—for, in -general, the utmost care was taken to prevent them -from meeting one another. If a stranger were shewn -into the yard, the prisoner who was taking his mouthful -of air had to retreat to a cabinet in the wall. -These walks were solitary, except for the presence of -a dumb sentinel; and, unless the prisoner were now -and then permitted or compelled to share his chamber -with a fellow-captive, not less solitary was his whole -existence. The most stringent rules were in force -respecting the admission of friends or relatives. -"Strangers cannot enter the Bastille," ran the official -injunction, "without very precise orders from the -governor"; and such rare interviews as were permitted -took place in the council-chamber, in the -presence of this officer or his deputy. The length of -the interview was always fixed in the letter which the -visitor bore from the lieutenant of police, and nothing -might be said relative to the cause of the prisoner's -detention.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A certain Mme. de Montazau, visiting her husband -in the Bastille, took with her a little dog, and, -while pretending to caress it in her own Portuguese -tongue, was trying to tell Montazau what efforts she -was making for his release. "Madame," interrupted -De Launay, his gaoler's instinct aroused, "if your dog -does not understand French you cannot bring him -here." Even such poor barren visits as these were of -the rarest possible occurrence.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But, M. Ravaisson will tell us, prisoners were frequently -visited by the lieutenant of the King or some -other high personage. It would be more to the -point to say that such visits were occasionally inflicted, -for the comfort that prisoners derived from -them was slender. Abbé Duvernet receives the visit -of the minister Amelot, who tells him that he can -have nothing to complain of, since he has had access -to the prison library. The Bastille library, by the -way, seems to have been founded not by the Government, -but by a prisoner who was confined there early -in the eighteenth century. Abbé Duvernet had -made a catalogue of the collection. "I have catalogued -your library," he replied to the minister, "and -there are not ten volumes in it which a man of ordinary -education would trouble himself to read. Library, -indeed! Listen, monsieur: when a man has -had the hardihood to expose one of the blunders of -you ministers, you will spend any quantity of money -to be avenged on him. You will hunt him to Holland, -England, or the heart of Germany, if it costs -the State two thousand pounds. But to afford a little -solace to the poor devils in your Bastille, by buying -a few books for them to read—no! I dare be sworn -that Government has not spent ten pounds on books -for this place since the Bastille was built!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Well, monsieur l'Abbé," said Amelot, "may I ask -why you are here?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Why am I here! Because you yourself gave -some one a <i>lettre de cachet</i>, which had your own name -and the King's attached to it. I am very sure that -his Majesty knows nothing of my detention, or the -motive of it; but <i>you</i> can scarcely pretend to the -same ignorance. Or, will you have me believe that -you set your signature to these <i>lettres</i> without knowing -what it is that you are signing?" Then, turning -to Lenoir, the Lieutenant of Police, the Abbé asked: -"Do <i>you</i>, sir, demand <i>lettres de cachet</i> of M. Amelot -without giving him a reason? Come, as you are -both here together, perhaps one of you will be good -enough to tell me what is the excuse for my imprisonment." -I have condensed this interview from <i>Les -Prisons de Paris</i>. It is not likely that ministers and -chiefs of police were often faced in this style by prisoners -of the Bastille, but it is probable enough that -most interviews of the kind ended with the same -fruitless inquiry on the part of the prisoner.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It may be inferred from this how much protection -was afforded to prisoners by the daily reports of the -governor or the major to the minister, who was nominally -responsible for the Bastille. These reports, in -fact, seem to have been merely a part of the system -of espionage which was regularly practised there. -The governor writes:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"I have the honour to inform you that the sieur Billard was -engaged with the sieur Perrin yesterday, from six to nine in the -evening.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"This morning M. de la Monnoye saw and spoke with Abbé -Grisel a good half-hour.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"M. Moncarré had an interview with his wife in the afternoon, -in accordance with your instructions.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"In obedience to your instructions of the 28th of this month, -I have handed letters to Abbé Grisel and M. Ponce de Lèon.—I -am, etc."</p> - -<div id='i_p216a' class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p216a.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<p class='c013'>The library which Abbé Duvernet dismissed with -contempt was not at the disposal of every prisoner. -Both books and writing materials were in the nature -of indulgences, and doled out sparingly. The rule -was terribly precise on the subject of relaxations of -any kind. It stated, in so many words, that: "As -regards a prisoner, the governor and the officers of -the château cannot be too severe and firm in preventing -the least relaxation in the discipline of the Bastille; -they cannot pay too much attention to this, -nor punish too severely any act of insubordination." -How often was that rule interpreted in favour of a -sojourn in the dungeon or the "ice-chamber"?</p> - -<p class='c013'>Not only the governor and his immediate subordinates, -but every turnkey, sentinel, guard of the watch, -and invalid soldier on the staff was a gaoler and spy -in himself. The inferior attendants of the Bastille -were encouraged and sometimes directly charged to -feign sympathy with a political prisoner, in order to -lure him into some indiscreet avowal; but in the discharge -of their ordinary duties they were enjoined to -be watchful and mute. Amongst their orders were -the following:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"The sentinels will arrest immediately anyone of whom they -have the slightest suspicion, and will send for a staff-officer to -settle the matter.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"The sentinel will not let out of his sight, on any pretext, -prisoners who are exercising in the court. He will watch carefully -to see whether a prisoner drops any paper, note, or packet. -He will be careful to prevent prisoners from writing on the walls, -and will report upon everything he may have remarked whilst on -duty.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"When the corporal of the guard or any inferior officer is ordered -to accompany a prisoner who may have leave to walk in -the garden or on the towers, it is expressly forbidden him to hold -any conversation with the prisoner. The officer is there solely -to guard the prisoner, and to prevent him from signalling to anyone -outside the walls."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Prisoners of a devout character must have been -shocked by the studiously cynical mode of worship in -the Bastille. The chapel was a dingy den on the -ground floor of the prison, which Howard describes -as containing</p> - -<p class='c013'>"five niches or closets; three are hollowed out of the wall, the -others are only in the wainscot. In these, prisoners are put one -by one to hear mass. They can neither see nor be seen. The -doors of these niches are secured on the outside by a lock and -two bolts; within, they are iron-grated, and have glass windows -towards the chapel, with curtains, which are drawn at the <i>Sanctus</i>, -and closed again at the concluding prayer."</p> - -<p class='c012'>As not more than five prisoners were present at each -mass, only ten could hear it each day. "If there is -a greater number in the castle, either they do not go -to mass at all (which is generally the case with the -ecclesiastics, prisoners for life, and those who do not -desire to go) or they attend alternately: because there -are almost always some who have permission to go -constantly."</p> - -<p class='c012'>If a prisoner, sick and at the point of death, asked -that masses might be said for his soul, he was told -that it was not customary for masses to be said in the -Bastille, either for the living or for the dead. "No -prayers are offered up in the Castle," ran the word, -"except for the King and the Royal Family." If it -were promised him that he should be prayed for in a -church outside the prison, he was sent out of captivity -with a lie in his ear; for information of his death was -withheld from his family. He was buried by night -and in secrecy in the graveyard of St. Paul's, and the -record of his name and rank in the parish register -"were fictitious, that all trace of him might be obliterated." -The register of the Bastille, in which his real -name and station were recorded, was a volume closed -to the world. That false book of the dead, which a -turnkey edits by his lantern's glimmer in the sacristy -of St. Paul's, adds a mountain's weight to the sins of -the keepers of the Bastille. There is no reason why -its memory should not increase in detestation.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p219.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p220.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch11' class='c004'>CHAPTER XI. <br /> <br /> THE PRISONS OF ASPASIA.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>It is not easy, in telling the story of the prisons of -old Paris, to avoid mention of the subject with -which this chapter is concerned. That subject is not, -however, an attractive one, and readers whom it -repels are invited to let the chapter go.</p> - -<p class='c012'>According to the authors of <i>Les Prisons de l'Europe</i>, -Charlemagne was the first monarch of France who -"formally punished" the calling of the <i>femme publique</i>. -His edict swept the field, so to speak; the -<i>femme publique</i> (known then, however, as the <i>femme -du monde</i>) and all who gave asylum to her were absolutely -banned. The prison, the whip, and the pillory -were their portion; the keepers of houses of -ill-fame had to carry the pillory on their backs to the -market-place, and the women whom they lodged had -to stand in it. This edict, completely prohibitive, -was in force during four centuries, and its principal -result seems to have been to augment the custom of -Aspasia. She and her industry increased a thousand-fold.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The state of France in this respect struck Saint -Louis with horror on his return from the Holy Land. -His <i>ordonnance</i> of 1254 bade the women of the town -renounce their calling, on pain of being deprived of -house and clothing, "even of the clothes in which -they stood up." If, after being warned, these women -continued as before, they were to be banished the -country. But, wiser and more humane than Charlemagne, -Saint Louis set apart for repentant Magdalens -a shelter in the convent of the Filles-Dieu, and -drew from his private purse the moneys to lodge and -maintain two hundred of them.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The new law, enforced with as much rigour as the -old one, proved every whit as impotent. Aspasia -went her ways in secret, and devised many arts. She -borrowed the manners and the costume of her more -respectable sisters (<i>Les prostituées singèrent les manières -et le costume des femmes honnêtes</i>), glided into -the churches, and went with sidelong glances through -the most frequented places of the town. This clandestine -pursuit of the calling, and the hypocrisy -which of necessity it bred on every side, were beyond -measure distressing to Saint Louis. A good king, -and a pious one, he considered the matter deeply, -and then, in the interests, as he believed, of public -and private morals, he resolved upon a novel and -hazardous measure. It was, to allow the <i>femmes publiques</i> -a degree of liberty, and the exercise of their -calling, under certain strict conditions. Amongst -other regulations, they were to live in houses specially -appointed to them, and these houses were to be -closed at six o'clock in the evening, no person being -allowed to enter them after that hour.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Thus, strangely enough in one point of view, the -King who won the name of "Saint," and whose -memory has been justly cherished, was the first to -give legality in France to the calling of Aspasia. Yet -this was also the King who, above all others on that -throne, had sought to keep in check the moral disorders -of his kingdom. It was only when he had -seen that measures of repression were of worse than -no avail, inasmuch as the immorality of the town -appeared always to increase in proportion to the -stringency of laws, whilst the secrecy of the traffic -confounded the <i>femme du monde</i> with the "respectable" -woman, that he resolved upon giving to the -former a domain and status of her own. In this manner, -the unrecognised <i>femme du monde</i> was transformed -into the <i>femme publique</i>, a woman with a -standing of her own, and with the King's authority to -prosecute her mournful industry.</p> - -<p class='c012'>She entered under the special jurisdiction of the -Provosts of Paris, who from time to time made various -enactments on her account. Thus, in 1360, the -chief magistrate forbade the <i>femmes publiques</i> to wear -certain specified apparel in the streets; and, in 1367, -a police order confined them to particular streets in -Paris, "a measure rendered necessary by their unseemly -behaviour in all places, to the great scandal -of everyone."<a id='r24' /><a href='#f24' class='c014'><sup>[24]</sup></a> During the next two hundred years -they were occasionally transferred from one quarter -of Paris to another, and Parliament more than once -took upon itself to "regulate their costume."</p> - -<p class='c012'>In 1560, an edict given at Orleans formulated -afresh the stern prohibitions of Charlemagne. Once -more, the calling of Aspasia was forbidden throughout -the whole of France. The difficulties of enforcing -this new-old <i>ordonnance</i> were great everywhere, -but nowhere so great as in the capital; and the -Provost, it is said, was five years in concerting his -measures. The statement is easily credited. Paris -herself was little in sympathy at that date with laws -to restrict the liberty of Aspasia; and it cannot be -said that the average citizen had received much -encouragement to virtue from the examples of the -Court, the nobility, the clergy, or the magistracy itself. -Dulaure asserts in his <i>Histoire de Paris</i> that "<i>La -prostitution était considérée à l'égal des autres professions -de la société</i>." The <i>femmes publiques</i>, he adds, formed -a corporation by themselves, received their patents, -as it were, from the hands of Royalty, "<i>et même -étaient protégées par les rois. Charles VI. et Charles -VII. ont laissé des témoignages authentiques de cette protection.</i>" -The commerce to which was extended the -august protection of the throne "<i>était encore favorisé -par le grand nombre de célibataires, prêtres et moines, -par le libertinage des magistrats, des gens de guerre, etc. -Les femmes publiques, richement vêtues, se répandaient -dans tous les quartiers de cette ville, et se trouvaient -confondues avec les bourgeoises, qui, elles-mêmes, -menaient une vie fort dissolue</i>." Provosts of Paris -sometimes refused to put in force laws which themselves -had framed against the "daughters of joy"; -and in so refusing they seem usually to have had -with them the sympathies of the town.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f24'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r24'>24</a>. <i>Les Prisons de l'Europe.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>This being in general the attitude of society in -Paris, it might be thought that the attempt to revive -the code of Charlemagne would be received with -small popular favour. It appears to have been received -with no favour whatever. Seven years, from -1560 to 1567, did the Provost prepare his way, and -then the edict was launched. It was read aloud at -either end of every street in which Aspasia had her -dwelling, and in several of these streets a violent resistance -was offered, by the women as well as by -their friends and protectors, to the not too-willing -agents of the law. By main force at length the -women were taken as by press-gang, their streets -were closed, the temple of Venus was demolished, -and there were once more no <i>femmes publiques</i> in Paris.</p> - -<p class='c012'>So, at least, did the Law assure itself; what then -had become of them? As may be supposed, the -great majority were still in Paris. Not a few were in -prison (but for short periods only); the rest were -scattered throughout the town, or in the villages surrounding -Paris. As in the days of Charlemagne, and -before the second decree of Saint Louis, Aspasia had -merely disguised herself. No Magdalen repented on -the order of the State. She sought a retreat until the -passing of the storm, and in a little while the history -of the affair repeated itself: <i>la prostitution clandestine -inonda Paris</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Matters continued apparently without the slightest -improvement until 1619, when the authorities could -devise no better plan than a renewal of the prohibitions -of 1565. The <i>femmes publiques</i> were commanded by -proclamation to betake themselves to some domestic -or other occupation, or to quit the town and suburbs -within four and twenty hours. The utter infeasibility -of the injunction is not more striking than its stupendous -absurdity. Imagine the whole corporation of -Aspasias, <i>richement vêtues</i>, converting themselves at a -day's notice into seamstresses, cooks, or chambermaids. -It would have been so easy for them to find -employers! Saint Louis had shewn himself more -generous, more thoughtful, and more sensible in -opening his private purse to lodge and maintain the -would-be penitents of the order amongst the recluses -of the Filles-Dieu. Needless to say, the foolish and -impossible decree was quite barren of result. During -the next sixty-five years, that is to say until 1684, no -definite legal action was taken with respect to the -position of the <i>femme publique</i>. Unlicenced and -unacknowledged, she fared well or ill according to the -laxity or the vigilance of the bench and police, who -sometimes harried and sometimes tacitly or openly -abetted her. The secret or semi-open practice of her -calling was often as profitable as the pursuit of it by -sanction of the Crown, but it was attended by the -risks of an illegal industry, and in seasons when -provosts or lieutenants of police shewed an unwonted -activity, Aspasia went to prison. Thus she fared, -now sparkling in the finest company, now pinched for -a meal, and now doing penance on the prison flags, -or perhaps sick (eight to a bed) in Bicêtre hospital, -until 1684. At that date, another move was resolved -upon, and for the second time Aspasia had the -gracious permission of the State to style herself -<i>femme publique</i>, and to sell her liberty to the police, -to buy <i>une licence de débauche</i>,—for this was what it -came to.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At the period arrived at, it was no longer merely a -question of irregularities to be repressed, but of the -public health to be preserved; and in the new regulations -the hospital was named along with the prison. -From this time forward, a brief interval under the -Consulate excepted, it does not seem to have been -questioned in France that women who chose to do -so, or who might be driven to do so, were entitled -under specified conditions to enter on the calling of -<i>femme publique</i>. What steps must be taken to secure -the dubious privileges of the order, and what dissuasions -were employed by the magistrate who -dispensed them, will presently be shewn.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Up to the reign of Louis XIV., the monarch responsible -for the provisions of 1684, there was no -special prison for the women of this class, who, when -under lock and key, were herded with female -offenders of all degrees. The first special prison for -the <i>femmes publiques</i> was the Salpêtrière, built by -Louis XIV., under the designation of "Hospital -General." At this era, the women arrested were not -put upon their trial, nor was any formal judgment -pronounced against them. They were under the sole -jurisdiction of the newly appointed lieutenant of -police, who dispatched them to prison on the -King's warrant, which took the form of a <i>lettre de -cachet</i>. Curious, that the <i>fille de joie</i> should be -placed in this respect on a footing of equality with -the prince of the blood, the nobleman, and the -prelate!</p> - -<p class='c012'>At about the end of the eighteenth century (say, -towards 1770), the police authorities distinguished -two classes of women of the town, the <i>femmes publiques</i>, -or authorised women, and a numerous and -unlicenced class, of more dissolute habits, officially -stigmatised as <i>débauchées</i>. To strengthen the line of -demarcation between the two classes, the <i>femmes -publiques</i>, or the majority of them, were inscribed on -the police registers (paying a fee of twenty sous), and -being to a certain extent <i>protégées</i> of the State, the -treatment accorded to them was generally of a more -lenient character. The terms of their imprisonment -(for soliciting in the streets or public places, for brawling -and rioting, for signalling from their windows, -etc.,) were entirely at the discretion of the lieutenant of -police; but it would appear that they were frequently -released, at the request or on the bond of a parent, -sister, or other relative, after a brief confinement. -The houses in which the members of the unlicenced -class lived together were continually raided by -the police, who descended upon them after dark, -"<i>parce que les femmes en étaient arrivées à ce degré -de scandale, qu'on ne pouvait plus les arrêter pendant -le jour, à cause du désordre qu'elles causaient, -et des collisions qu'excitaient leurs amants et autres -adhérents</i>."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Eighteenth-century documents concerning these -houses are still to be read, and some of them have a -curiously modern flavour. There are complaints of -householders, and the reports of the police agents -whom these complaints set in motion. A certain, M. -Ledure, writing under date of the 23d of July, 1785, -asks the attention of the police to an unlicensed -house of ill-fame adjoining his own, and details his -annoyances with a freedom of expression which debars -translation. The burden of his protest is, that -being a gentleman with a family of daughters, and -the holder of a position which obliges him to entertain -"des personnes de distinction," his existence is -rendered intolerable by the worse than light behaviour -of the "females over the way." He can scarcely -even get into his own house of an evening.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"To satisfy M. Ledure," runs the police report, -"we began by visiting, in Beaubourg Street, the house -in which the women complained of were lodging. -We arrested there, Marguerite Lefèbvre, the other -women having taken themselves off.... In response -to the complaints of the residents in Rohan -Street, against the women living at No. 63, we forced -an entry there, and arrested the woman Rochelet, and -the two <i>filles d'amour</i> kept by her. We fetched them -out, to take them to Saint-Martin"—a house of -detention, from which the women were transferred to -the Salpêtrière,—"but, although our guard was -composed of five men with fixed bayonets, we were -so set upon by the man Rochelet, a hairdresser, and -twenty blackguards with him, that we had to let the -women go."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The origin of the prison of Saint-Martin, abolished -by Louis XVI., is quite unknown. It was a small -confined place with a villainous reputation. Regarded -by the authorities as a temporary lodging for both -classes of public women, a sort of fore-chamber of -the Salpêtrière, no attempt was ever made to render -it decently habitable. The dark and dirty cells were -absolutely destitute of furniture; a truss of straw, -thrown from time to time on the stone floor, was -both bed and bedding. The food was strictly in -keeping; all that the prison gave was a loaf of black -bread a day, and whilst prisoners who could afford it -were allowed to do a little catering for themselves, -the rest soaked their black bread in the soup provided -by charitable societies.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Every petition to improve Saint-Martin was -answered by the formula that no one stayed there -above a few days, which was a callous misstatement -of the facts. It is true that the women arrested "by -order of the King" were not detained after their -<i>lettres de cachet</i> had been obtained; but the women -of the other class, who were arrested by simple act -of police, and tried at the bar as ordinary offenders, -lay for weeks or months at Saint-Martin, awaiting the -pleasure of a judge of the Châtelet. When the -cases to be disposed of were numerous, a part only -were heard, and the women whose fate was still to be -pronounced were remanded for a further period of -weeks or months to Saint-Martin. It was thus not -less a prison in the ordinary meaning of the word -than what the French call a <i>dépôt</i>; and when its inconveniences -were no longer to be endured, Louis -XVI. abolished and demolished it, and constituted by -letters-patent the Hôtel de Brienne as a <i>prison des -femmes publiques</i>, under the name of <i>La Petite Force</i>. -This continued to be the temporary prison until the -revolutionary era, and here at least the women had -air to breathe and beds to lie on.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The first rules for the conduct of the Salpêtrière -were issued from Versailles in April, 1684, over the -signatures of Louis XIV. and his minister Colbert.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The women were to hear mass on Sundays and -Saints' days; to pray together a quarter of an hour -morning and evening, and to submit to readings from -"the catechism and pious books" whilst they were at -work.</p> - -<p class='c012'>They were to be soberly attired in dark stuff -gowns, and shod with sabots; bread and water with -soup were to be their portion; and they were to sleep -on mattresses with sufficient bed-gear.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The nature of their tasks was left to the discretion -of the directors, but the labour was to be "both long -and severe." After a period of probation, prisoners -of approved behaviour might be employed at lighter -occupations, and receive a small percentage of the -profits, which they were to be at liberty to spend on -the purchase of meat, fruit, "<i>et autres rafraîchissements</i>."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Swearing, idleness, and quarrelling with one -another were to be punished by a diminution of -rations, the pillory, the dark cell, or such other pains -as the directors might think proper to inflict.</p> - -<p class='c012'>These continued to be the rules for the prisons of -the <i>femmes publiques</i>; their spirit is modern, but we -shall see later on to what extent they were enforced.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In no long time, indeed, after the decrees of 1684, -the conditions of life in the Salpêtrière seem to have -been little if at all better than those in Saint-Martin. -Six women shared a cell by night; the one bed which -was supposed to hold them all accommodated four; -two of whom slept at the head and two at the foot, -while the two latest comers made shift on the bare -floor. When one of the bed-fellows got her discharge, -or went sick to Bicêtre, the elder of the floor-companions -took the vacant place in the bed, resigning -her share of the boards to a new <i>fille d'amour</i>. -Complaints evoked the cut-and-dried response that -the bed was intended to hold six. The cells were -always damp, and "<i>il y régnait absolument, et surtout -le matin, une odeur infecte, capable de faire reculer</i>." -Despite the lack of sanitation, and the fact that the -food was always of an inferior quality, the death-rate -was not abnormal in the Salpêtrière.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Such was the first regular prison of the <i>femmes -publiques</i>, and its régime. The sensible intentions of -Louis XIV. were never realised, nor does the -character of the monarch himself permit it to be -inferred that he was very seriously concerned on the -subject. The Salpêtrière continued to receive, if not -to chasten, the "daughters of joy" until two days -before the September massacres, when, as the beds -for six were wanted for political prisoners, they were -restored to liberty.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The year '91 saw the overthrow of everything, and -the women of pleasure, so-called, entered upon -halcyon days. Aspasia, left to her own devices, was -"regarded as exercising an ordinary trade." Scandals -and disorders followed, and when the public -health was again in danger, there being neither control -nor supervision of this traffic, a new census of -the women was ordered. This was in 1796, but the -work was so badly done that the opening days of the -Directory found the situation more deplorable, if -possible, than ever. Strange to say, the dissolute -Directory (which admitted to its salons "gallant -dames" who lacked nothing of the status of <i>filles -d'amour</i> save inscription on the police registers) -turned a severe eye upon the morals of the public. -The police were bidden to be active in the haunts of -Aspasia, but Aspasia had not forgotten the Republican -doctrine of liberty, and when haled before the -bench she gathered her lovers and friends about her -in such numbers, that the cloud of witnesses in her -favour quite overawed the magistrates, who were fain -to let her go free.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The Consulate renewed the attack. It was at this -era that the Central Bureau, which displaced the old -office of Lieutenant of Police, was created, with a -special sub-department called the <i>Bureau des Mœurs</i>. -This department gave its attention principally to the -sanitary aspects of the matter. Then was established -the <i>Préfecture de Police</i>; and the new prefect, M. -Dubois, ordered a fresh numbering of the women, -which was made in 1801. The police, however, continued -to ask for larger powers, which, to be brief, -were conferred on them by article 484 of the <i>Code -Pénal</i>. There were here revived at a stroke the -<i>ordonnances</i> of 1713, 1778, and 1780, which gave to the -heads of police, "<i>une autorité absolue sur les femmes -publiques</i>."</p> - -<p class='c012'>During the period which has been thus hastily reviewed -and which commenced soon after the close of -the Reign of Terror, three prisons in succession served -for the women of the town: La Force, Les Madelonnettes, -and Saint-Lazare.</p> - -<p class='c012'>For many years—indeed, until the year after the -battle of Waterloo—they were taken to prison in -the keeping of soldiers, who led them through the -streets in broad day; a crowd following, the women -in tears or swearing, the crowd jeering or applauding. -If a woman were well known in the town, there was -an attempt to rescue her, and she was often snatched -from the soldiers before the prison was reached. -This public scandal, and bitter humiliation to all -women above the most degraded class, was allowed -until the year 1816, when the <i>femmes publiques</i> were -conveyed to prison in a closed car.</p> - -<p class='c012'>They went to the Force, which has not left a kinder -memory than the Salpêtrière. Prison rule was, an -art as yet in its infancy, and there was scarcely an -idea of cleanliness, moral control, or discipline. The -Force, it is said, was "as inconvenient a place as -could be found for its purpose." The infirmary, -always an important department of prisons of this -class, was "unwholesome and wretchedly ventilated." -The women were altogether undisciplined, and as -workrooms had not been opened they passed their -days in idleness and gaming. In the summer months -they swarmed in the yard; in winter, they slept, -played cards, quarrelled, and fought in dusky and -ill-smelling common-rooms. They had no keepers -but men, before whom they displayed the most cynical -effrontery. It is asserted that, on the days on -which clean linen was distributed, the women were -accustomed to present themselves before the warders -in the precise state in which Phryne astonished her -judges.<a id='r25' /><a href='#f25' class='c014'><sup>[25]</sup></a> These things were noised, and the prefect -of police had to devise afresh. In 1828, the <i>filles d'amour</i> -were transferred from the Force to the -Madelonnettes. The record of the Madelonnettes -in this connection is not important, except that here -it was attempted to employ the women at some -strictly penal tasks. This project was more fully developed -at Saint-Lazare, to which prison all classes of -women of the town were relegated in 1831. At this -date, the number of registered public women in Paris -was 3517.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f25'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r25'>25</a>. Un ancien gardien de la Force nous a dit que le samedi, jour où on leur -donnait des chemises, pendant l'été, elles se mettaient entirement nues dans -le préau pour les recevoir des mains des gardiens.—<i>Les Prisons de l'Europe.</i></p> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>Before penetrating within the prison of Saint-Lazare, -the reader will be curious to know by what -means a woman desirous of doing so enrolled herself -in this singular militia. She must seek the countenance -and aid of a magistrate of Paris, whose task -was in equal measure a delicate and a painful one. -Without doubt, it was a strange spectacle; a woman -presents herself before a magistrate and says that, renouncing -her woman's modesty, her hope or desire of -an honourable future, she wishes to be cut off from the -world, that she may cast herself <i>dans la prostitution -publique</i>. At first sight, she seems to make the -magistrate her accomplice, but that this was not the -case the sequel will shew.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The applicant underwent a most minute interrogation. -She was asked if she were a married woman, -a widow, or a spinster; if her parents were living and -whether she lived with them, or why she had separated -from them. She was asked how long she had -inhabited Paris, and whether she had no friends there -whose interest the magistrate might evoke for her. -She was asked whether she had ever been arrested, -how often, and for what causes. She was asked -whether she had ever followed the calling of <i>femme -publique</i> in any other place, and finally, what were the -true motives of her application. Procès-verbal of the -examination was drawn up, and the applicant had -then to be seen by a medical man attached to the -police service. Next, her certificate of birth was asked -for, and if she could not produce it, and had been -born out of Paris, she must give the name of the -mayor of her department. The magistrate wrote -forthwith to the mayor, and after setting forth the -facts which the applicant had submitted in her examination, -requested him to report upon them, asking -particularly whether the relatives of the woman could -not be moved to induce her to return to them. All -this was done in the case where the girl or woman -went alone to solicit her enrollment, but it has to be -said that not infrequently one or both of the parents -of the applicant attended with her at the bureau, to -support her request!</p> - -<p class='c012'>When every effort of the magistrate had proved -unavailing, a final Procès-verbal was prepared, to the -effect that such-and-such a female had requested to be -inscribed "<i>comme fille publique</i>," and had been enrolled -on the decision of the examining magistrate, "after -undertaking to submit to the sanitary and other regulations -established by the Prefecture for women of -that class." Thus, and in all cases by her own act, -was she launched upon those turbid waters.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Of the 3517 women on the Paris police registers in -1831, 931 were from Paris and the department of the -Seine, 2170 from the provincial departments, 134 from -foreign countries, and the remaining 282 had been unable -or unwilling to satisfy the authorities as to their -place of birth. There were amongst them seamstresses, -modistes, dressmakers, florists, lacemakers, -embroiderers, glove-makers, domestic servants, hawkers, -milliners, hairdressers, laundresses, silk-workers, -jewellers, actresses or figurantes, acrobats, and representatives -of many other trades and callings, together -with six teachers of music, and one "landscape painter." -As regards the education of this army of outcasts, -rather more than one-half were unable to sign their -names on the cards or badges which they received -from the bureau; a somewhat smaller number appended -"an almost illegible signature" (<i>fort mal, et -d'une manière à peine lisible</i>); whilst a hundred, or -thereabouts, wrote "a neat and correct hand."</p> - -<p class='c012'>As for the causes which induced them to cast in -their lot with their sister pariahs, they were traceable -for the most part to the weaknesses or defects of the -social organisation. Thus, a majority of the women -pleaded "excess of misery," and the class next in point -of numbers were "<i>simples concubines ayant perdu leurs -amants, et ne sachant plus que faire</i>." A large proportion -had lost both parents, or had been driven -from home; many had left the provinces to seek work -in Paris; some were widows who could find no other -means of supporting their children; and others were -daughters looking for bread for aged parents, or for -younger sisters and brothers.</p> -<hr class='c003' /> -<p class='c012'>And now, standing on the threshold of their prison, -we may ask what were the commoner causes which -sent these unfortunates to Saint-Lazare. It has been -made sufficiently clear that by the act of procuring -their licences they sold their liberty to the police. -This indeed was the sole condition on which enrolment -could be obtained. The <i>femme publique</i>, in becoming -such, bought herself an army of masters; the -whole force of police were in authority over her, and -almost equally so were their agents and spies, and the -medical men in their employ. She had subscribed -obedience to all the regulations invented by the Préfecture, -and she was under perpetual surveillance. -The great power of the police over her rested on her -submission in writing to the prefect's "<i>règlements sanitaires</i>" -and his "<i>mesures exceptionelles de surveillance</i>," -and infringement of the most arbitrary enactment -brought her within the danger of prison. Failing to -render her prescribed visit to the police doctor, she -was almost certain to find herself a day or two later -in Saint-Lazare. Special rules and regulations apart, -the irregularities of life and infractions of common -law which at times were almost inevitable in the calling -she had entered on, were amongst the causes contributive -to her troubles with the powers at whose -mercy she had placed herself. On the whole, one -gathers that the <i>fille de joie</i> paid at siege rates for -that none too felicitous title.</p> - -<p class='c012'>She seems to have found herself often on the less -desirable side of the prison door; and as the class of -<i>filles publiques</i> in Paris has always included some of -the handsomest and some of the most ill-favoured, -some of the most elegant and some of the least refined, -some of the brightest and some of the most -villainous women in the town, it may be supposed -that the floating population of Saint-Lazare (which -amounted sometimes to fourteen hundred) offered a -marvellous variety of types.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was the place of waiting for women and girls -whose applications to be registered had not been disposed -of, and for the women who were to be tried on -police charges; and it was also the place of punishment -for those who had received sentence.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The position of the untried was in many respects -worse than that of the convicted prisoners. The -former had the privilege, to be sure, of hiring what -was called a private room, but if they went in penniless -they were in a bad case indeed. They had no -right to the full prison rations, and were fed strictly -on bread and water. The convicted prisoners were -warmly clad in winter, but the untried were not allowed -to add to the clothing they took in with them -a wrap or comforter from the prison wardrobe. In -hard weather the public women of the poorer class -seem to have suffered keenly both from hunger and -from cold. Untried, and presumably innocent (and -many honest women were sent to Saint-Lazare on the -vaguest accusations or suspicions of the police), they -were compelled to receive the visits of the doctors, -which were not always of the most delicate character. -Women awaiting trial sometimes offered money to -escape this humiliation, and the case is recorded of a -girl who preferred suicide to submission.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was better, in respect of physical comfort, on the -penal side of the prison. There the women were clad -to the season, fed not meanly, and lodged with a certain -decency. The untaught and feckless had opportunity -to learn a trade, for the workrooms were now -conducted on a much more practical principle, and -the small bonuses bestowed on the industrious were -to some extent a corrective of the <i>femme publique's</i> -inveterate indolence. There was, for the first time -in the history of French penal discipline, a clean, -more or less wholesome, and well ordered infirmary -for the treatment of maladies peculiar to that class.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the material point of view, in a word, the prison -of Saint-Lazare was, for convicted prisoners, an infinitely -better place than any of its predecessors. But -the régime from the standpoint of morals left more -than a little to desire.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Certainly, it offered none of the grosser features of -the old system. The male attendants had disappeared. -The principle of work had been established, -and discipline was pretty well maintained in the -wards, cells, and refectories. When the women had -lived together in all but absolute idleness, their prison -was always in a state of disorder, and often in a state -of uproar. Quarrels were of daily occurrence, and -a quarrel usually issued in a fight. Two women, -armed with combs or holding copper coins between -their fingers, stood up to do battle for an absent lover, -whom each claimed for her own; and the other prisoners -made a ring around them, not so much in the -interests of fair play, as to see that each combatant -got her due share of "punishment." If the warders -attempted to interfere, they probably retired with -broken heads.</p> - -<p class='c012'>There was almost no restraint upon the women, -and the lack of discipline, which permitted sanguinary -fights at any hour of the day, pervaded the entire system. -The <i>femme publique</i> could receive what visitors -she pleased, and her lovers and friends crowded the -"parlour," and laughed, sang, and swore at their ease. -They brought her money, food, clothing, and whatever -else she desired. As long as her purse was -filled, she was never without luxuries, and she selected -from amongst her fellow-prisoners some table companion, -called a <i>mangeuse</i>, with whom she shared her -meals. This companionship was usually a <i>liaison</i>, the -character of which permits no more than a reference; -the cult of Sappho was universal in the women's -prisons.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At a pinch for money, or for food more dainty than -the prison kitchen furnished, the women had recourse -to the prison usurers. These were old crones, very -familiar with prison, who committed some petty -offence which would entail about a month's confinement; -a strictly commercial speculation on their part. -They took in with them a certain sum of money, with -which they bought clothes from, and made loans to, -necessitous prisoners. To procure money a woman -would sell the clothes on her back, until "<i>elle restait -presque nue, et dans un état indécent</i>." Others borrowed -from the old women at a fixed rate of interest, -which was never less than fifty per cent. These were -regarded as debts of honour, and the payments were -punctually made.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Letters might be written and received without the -scrutiny of the director; and the <i>écrivains publics</i>, or -scriveners of the prison, were continuously employed -in composing for their illiterate bond-sisters (always, -of course, at a price) epistles to lovers outside, which -are described as <i>brûlantes d'amour</i>. All unknown to -the authorities, betrothals of a very curious kind were -made through the prison post.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Five male prisoners at La Roquette, let us suppose, -were on the point of completing their sentences; -but the prospect of liberty without a companion of -the other sex held no attractions. Where were the -fiancées to be found? At Saint-Lazare, where five -engaging hearts might be expecting their release at -about the same date.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the men's prison there was always an artist whose -services could be hired for an affair of this kind, and -to him the five gallants would present themselves, -with a request for "a bouquet."</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Of how many flowers?" asked the artist.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Five."</p> - -<p class='c012'>The artist then traced on paper five separate flowers, -to each of which a number was attached; and the five -prisoners made their choice of a blossom. From La -Roquette the "bouquet" was magically wafted to -Saint-Lazare, and once there it seldom failed to reach -the hands it was destined for. The recipient summoned -to her four other single hearts, and each of the -five chose her flower. The same mysterious agency -which had introduced the bouquet to Saint-Lazare -conveyed a fitting answer to La Roquette, and the -affair was arranged.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But the new brooms of the Préfecture swept out of -the system all these injurious relaxations. At Saint-Lazare, -the director took note of every letter that -passed into or out of the prison, and the <i>écrivains publics</i> -had need to chasten their epistolary style. At Saint-Lazare, -Aspasia had no clothes to sell for pocket-money, -for the black gown striped with blue, which was her -daily wear, was the property of the State. At Saint-Lazare, -she could hold no receptions of her lovers; -and the presents of money and jewels with which -they sought to solace her through the post could not -be converted into spiced meats; for all Aspasia's -moneys and other valuables were taken care of by -the director, who rewarded her good behaviour with -a few sous at a time. At Saint-Lazare, she could seldom -use her comb as a weapon of offence, and the -hours which had been devoted to the duel were absorbed -by some industrial or penal task.</p> - -<p class='c012'>All this implied a moral reform of no inconsiderable -kind; but, as has been stated, the morals of the new -régime were not perfection. The great shortcoming -in this respect was that no attempt was made to classify -the prisoners.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This, however, in such a prison as Saint-Lazare -should have been regarded by the authorities as a -paramount duty and necessity. It has been suggested, -though not yet expressly stated, how great a variety -of types this population embraced. Not all of these -were <i>femmes publiques</i>, and of those who belonged to -that class by no means all were of a really abandoned -or degraded character. There were prisoners scarcely -out of their teens, who had not yet quite crossed the -Rubicon, and who were importuned day and night by -the old and vicious hags to be rid once for all of their -virtue, and betake themselves to the "life of pleasure." -The crones who had traded as clothes-dealers and -money-lenders in the older prisons were not less active -in Saint-Lazare, albeit in another and baser capacity. -They acted here as the agents and procuresses of the -women who kept houses of ill-fame in Paris and the -provincial towns. A large proportion of the population -of Saint-Lazare were essentially women of the -people, girls fresh from the restraints and hard monotony -of shop and warehouse. They were in prison -perhaps for the first time, paying the penalty of some -not very serious offence against the law. But they -would leave the gaol with its taint upon them, and -whither should they go? The young and pretty ones -amongst them were flattered by the addresses and -importunities of the harridans who were there to recruit -for the <i>maisons de tolérance</i>, and who promised -them silk gowns, fine company, and gold pieces. -There were here also wives of the middle class, -whose first false step in life had changed its whole -aspect for them, and who knew that home was closed -to them forever. There were young <i>filles d'amour</i> -who had sickened of their calling almost before the -ink had dried on the page of the register which they -had signed, and who longed for a means of escape.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This was good soil to work in, and it would be unjust -to say that it was quite neglected. The prison -was visited by sisters of mercy and other charitable -women, and there were even at that date homes and -refuges for the penitent, whose agents sought in the -prison and at the prison door to rescue the young -offenders, and those whose feet were still half-willing -to lead them back to virtue. But for inexperience -which lacked strength of character, and for indecision -which had no moral or religious sign-post, the influence -of the prison was omnipotent. Without separation -of the classes there was no hope for the weak, -and the classes were not separated. At the moment -of her release, at the door of the prison itself, the -woman who had made no plan for her future found -three to pick from. Philanthropy was ready to receive -her into one of the houses of refuge. But she was -hungry and ill-clad, and a toothless procuress came -forward with an offer of clothes, a dinner, and a soft -bed. If she still wavered, there was a skulking limb -of the law on the watch—probably the creature by -whom she had been arrested—whose "protection" -was hers if she would accept it; and in this case, at -least, refusal was indeed dangerous. For the police -spy knew the "history of the case" and would dog -the steps of his victim.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It resulted that, up to close upon the middle of the -century, the prison of Saint-Lazare, its intelligent -aims notwithstanding, was largely a recruiting ground -for the <i>maisons de tolérance</i> of Paris and the departments, -and a place in which uncertain virtue had -every opportunity to decline into finished vice. The -<i>maisons de tolérance</i> have been mentioned once or -twice in this connection, and a word in explanation -will dispose of them. The <i>femme publique</i> had her -own house or lodging, or she lived with others of her -calling, under a common roof, a <i>maison de tolérance</i>. -Licences for these houses were obtained from the -<i>Bureau des Mœurs</i> by a process similar to, though -less tedious than, that which has been described. -The applicant was almost always a retired <i>femme -publique</i>, and her request to the prefect was usually -composed for her by an <i>écrivain public</i>, who kept an -office for the purpose, under the discreet sign, "<i>Au -tombeau des secrets</i>." He had two styles of composition, -the plain and the ornate. Adopting the first, -he would write:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"Monsieur le Préfet: M——, a native of Paris, and inscribed -on your registers during the past eighteen years, has the honour -to request your permission to open a licenced house. Her excellent -conduct during the lengthened period of her connection -with a class which is not remarkable for sober living, will, I -trust, be a sufficient guarantee for you that she will not abuse her -new position, etc."</p> - -<p class='c012'>For a sample of his finer style, the following petition -will serve:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"To his Excellency, the Prefect of Police, whose signally successful -administration has changed the face of Paris.</p> - -<p class='c013'>"You will be gracious enough, Monsieur le Préfet, to pardon -the importunity of my client, Mme. D——, who solicits your -authority to open forthwith a <i>maison de tolérance</i>. She knows and -appreciates the responsibility which this undertaking involves, -but the austerity and circumspection of her conduct, her calm -and peaceful life in the past, proclaim her fitness; and the inquiries -which you may deign to make on my client's account can -only result to her advantage."</p> - -<p class='c012'>This was the tenor, and these the terms, of the -official requests to the prefect; and if the applicant -could show that she was in a position to support an -establishment, she generally received her licence. -Amongst the women whom she lodged, and the frequenters -of her house, she was styled at different -periods <i>maman</i>, <i>abbesse</i>, <i>supérieure</i>, <i>dame de maison</i>, -and <i>maîtresse de maison</i>. During the Consulate and -the Empire, she might be sent to prison as a <i>femme -publique</i>; but after the Restoration it became the -custom to punish her—on any conviction involving -the conduct of her house—by suppression of her -licence.</p> - -<p class='c012'>If, however, no attempt at classification was made -by the prison director, certain distinctions of rank -existed which were generally acknowledged by the -prisoners themselves. The authors of <i>Les Prisons de -Paris</i> mention a class of elegant adventuresses who -were always apart in Saint-Lazare, and who stood as -the shining examples of the aristocracy of vice. The -passage is interesting and worth translation:</p> - -<p class='c013'>"Amongst the class of swindlers, so numerous in Saint-Lazare, -who boast their skill in exploiting the ambitious fools of Paris, -you might recognise beneath the prison cap, so coquettishly -worn, dames whom you had met perchance in the most elegant -houses in town, and whose protection you might have sought. -This one was a countess, that one a baroness, and, rightly or -wrongly, the badge of nobility was painted on the panels of their -carriages. Did you need the friendly word of a minister or the -countenance of a capitalist, it was enough that you were known to -have one of these angels for your friend. There were four of them -in the sewing-room of Saint-Lazare,—rogues and swindlers of -the first water! For years these corsairs have laid violent hands -on all fortunes they could come at, but they continue to hold a -position in society which is in itself a more scathing satire on the -morals of the age than any which I am able to imagine. At -intervals, these dames are lodged for a time at the country's -cost in one or other of the houses of detention, without, however, -losing one jot or tittle of their prestige in the world of fashion! -When they reappear, society receives them open-armed, as poor -banished exiles who have returned to the fatherland, or prodigal -children whose wanderings are ended."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Nothing delighted plebeian Saint-Lazare so much -as to hear the countesses and baronesses discussing -the merits, as a gallant, of this or the other minister, -nobleman, poet, or banker of renown; and the -interest culminated when the question arose as to -which of the two could produce the greater number -of letters signed by names with which all Paris was -familiar.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Roving like satellites around these gaudy planets -were a small class of habitual criminals who, out of -prison, served the noble adventuresses in several -offices, as spies, go-betweens, receivers, etc. These -also enjoyed a certain celebrity in the prison. One -of them used to open chestnuts with a knife with -which, in a passion of jealousy, she had all but -murdered her lover, and which had become an object -of the devoutest worship since the lover had gone to -hide his scars under the red jacket of the galley-slave. -Another woman arrived at the prison in a flutter of -pride, eager to display a novel charm which decorated -her ears. She also had lost her latest lover, but -<i>Monsieur de Paris</i> had been kind enough to extract for -her two teeth from the head which he had just -severed. The disconsolate mistress had had them set -in gold as earrings! Nearly all these women carried -on the neck, arms, and upper portion of the body -specimens of the work of the professional tattooer; -they preserved in this way the names of their successive -lovers, and the figured emblems sometimes included -the most ignoble devices.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Of the licenced women who restricted themselves -mainly if not entirely to the calling of <i>femme</i> -<i>publique</i>, Saint-Lazare recognised two separate orders. -They were the <i>Panades</i> and the <i>Pierreuses</i>. The <i>Panades</i> -carried a high chin in the society of their humbler -associates; they were generally members of some -<i>maison de tolérance</i>, where, so long as the mistress -found it profitable to maintain them, they lived in -luxurious indolence; fed, and pampered, and extravagantly -dressed; captives, but in gilded fetters. In -prison they separated themselves, as far as it was -possible, from the rest, to whom they never addressed -a word. They would be known only by some delicate -or romantic name: Irma, Zélie, Amanda, Nathalie, -Arthemise, Balsamine, Léocadie, Isménie, Malvina, -Lodoïska, Aspasie, Delphine, Reine, and Fleur de -Marie.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The <i>Pierreuses</i> regarded them with the bitterest -jealousy, and spited and abused them at every opportunity. -Memories of a gayer past intensified the -feelings of the <i>Pierreuses</i>; they too had been <i>Panades</i> -until the <i>abbesse</i> had cast them out, faded and worn, to -join the foot-sore legion of street-walkers. They used -to whisper mockingly: "You may sneer, you <i>Panades</i>; -but we were like you once, and you'll be like us;" -and as for the prophetic part of the reproof, it was -more than likely to be realised. Like the <i>Panades</i>, -the <i>Pierreuses</i> had a peculiar set of names: Boulotte, -Rousselette, Parfaite, la Ruelle, la Roche, le Bœuf, -Bouquet, Louchon, la Bancale, la Coutille, Colette, -Peleton, Crucifix, etc. To the <i>Panade</i>, prison was a -place of horror and disgrace; to the <i>Pierreuse</i> it was -often the kindest home she had; and as years advanced -on her, and the gains of her trade grew ever -miserably smaller, the poor creature felt never so -happy as in the hands of the police, on the once -dreaded journey to Saint-Lazare.</p> - -<p class='c012'>There was a strangely sympathetic side to this -saddest of the prisons of Paris. The sick and worn-out -were always tenderly regarded by their fellow-prisoners, -and a woman who brought in with her -a child in arms was an object of intense and almost -affectionate interest. If a woman died in the prison, -it was not unusual for the rest to club together to -provide a substantial and costly funeral, and masses -for the repose of her soul. Sometimes the affections -of the whole prison, directed upon one weak girl, had -the result of saving her from ruin and insanity.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In the early years of the Restoration, Marie M——, -a pretty peasant girl, was sent to Saint-Lazare for -stealing roses. She had a passion for the flower, and -a thousand mystical notions had woven themselves -about it in her mind. She said that rose-trees would -detach themselves from their roots, glide after her -wherever she went, and tempt her to pluck their blossoms. -One in a garden, taller than the rest, had -compelled her to climb the wall, and gather as many -as she could,—and there the <i>gendarmes</i> found her. -She was terrified in prison, believing that when she -went out the roses would lure her amongst them -again, and that she would be sent back to Saint-Lazare.</p> - -<p class='c012'>This poor girl excited the vividest interest amongst -the <i>femmes publiques</i> in that sordid place. They -plotted to restore her to her reason, christened her -Rose, which delighted her, and set themselves to make -artificial roses for her of silk and paper. Those -fingers, so rebellious at allotted tasks, created roses -without number, till the cell of Marie M—— was -transformed into a bower. An intelligent director of -prison labour seconded these efforts, and opened in -Saint-Lazare a workroom for the manufacture of -artificial flowers, to which Marie M—— was introduced -as an apprentice. Here, making roses from -morning till night, and her dread of the future dispelled, -the malady of her mind reached its term with -the term of her sentence, and she left the prison -cured and happy. The authors of <i>Les Prisons de -Paris</i>, from whose pages her story is borrowed, declare -that Marie M—— became one of the most successful -florists in Paris.</p> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p250.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p251.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - <h2 id='ch12' class='c004'>CHAPTER XII. <br /> <br /> LA ROQUETTE.</h2> -</div> -<p class='drop-capa0_1_0_8 c011'>There is to be a flitting of the guillotine. For -nearly fifty years executions in Paris, which are -not private as with us, have taken place immediately -outside the prison of La Roquette, known officially as -the <i>dépôt des Condamnés</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Four slabs of stone sunk in the soil, a few yards -beyond the gaol door, mark the spot where, on the -fatal morning, at five in summer, and about half-past -seven in winter, the red "timbers of justice" are set -up by the headsman's assistants.</p> - -<p class='c012'>But La Roquette is to be demolished, and the -dismal honour of furnishing a last lodging to the condemned -will be conferred on La Santé. This change -effected, the guillotine will flit to the Place Saint-Jacques. -Criminals of a modest habit will not approve -the change, but the murderer with a touch of vanity -(and vanity is notoriously a weakness of murderers) -will doubtless welcome it; for the progress from the -prison to the scaffold will be somewhat longer.</p> - -<p class='c012'>When the doors of La Roquette are thrown open, -the victim, bareheaded and manacled, has but a few -paces to shuffle to the spot where old M. Deibler -awaits him, with his finger on the button of the knife. -Between La Santé and the Place Saint-Jacques there -is rather more than the length of a thoroughfare to be -traversed, and, as in the old days, some form of tumbril -will probably be called for.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It is a pity, of course, for it has been proved -abundantly that this kind of spectacle is anything but -good for the public health. Humane and enlightened -opinion on the subject has ceased to be that which -Dr. Johnson gave utterance to. "Sir," said the -Doctor to Boswell, "executions are intended to draw -spectators. If they do not draw spectators, they do -not answer their purpose. The old method [Tyburn -had been abolished] was most satisfactory to all parties: -the public was gratified by a procession, the -criminal is supported by it; why is all this to be -swept away?"</p> - -<p class='c012'>The sheriffs of the year 1784 gave the answer in a -pamphlet which exposed all the horrors and indecencies -of the public progress to the gallows. As for -the "support" accorded to the criminal, he might, if -he were unpopular, be nearly stoned to death before -the hangman could despatch him.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Public executions in Paris are not, and have never -been, the scandalous exhibitions that they were in -London during the whole of the last century, but the -scene in the neighbourhood of La Roquette for four -or five hours before a guillotining is something less -than edifying.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In leaving its present site for the Place Saint-Jacques -the guillotine will only be returning home. -The Place Saint-Jacques was the scene of punishment -for nineteen years and a half; it was dispossessed in -favour of La Roquette in 1851. The first person to -suffer death at the Place Saint-Jacques (the Place de -Grève having been abandoned) was an old man -named Désandrieux, sixty-eight years of age, condemned -for the murder of a man whose age was -eighty-four. Owing to the disgraceful neglect of the -authorities, Désandrieux lay in prison one hundred -and twenty-eight days before he was led to execution. -After him came the parricide, Benoît, the atrocious -Lecenaire, David, the regicides Fieschi, Morey, and -Pepin, and other murderers of greater or less notoriety. -The Place Saint-Jacques saw the guillotine -erected thirty-five times, and beheld the fall of thirty-nine -heads.</p> - -<p class='c012'>At this date the <i>dépôt des Condamnés</i> was remote -Bicêtre, which, as we have seen, was also the gaol -from which the criminals convicted in Paris were -despatched on their journey to the <i>bagne</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A vivid picture of the condemned cell, or <i>cachot du -Condamné</i>, very painful in its blending of the imaginative -with the realistic, is given in Victor Hugo's <i>Le -Dernier Jour d'un Condamné</i>. It was a day when -that veil of decent mystery which our age casts over -the last torturing hours of the condemned had not -been woven; and callous curiosity could, for a trifling -bribe to the turnkey, uncover the grating behind which -the criminal in his strait waistcoat was couched on -mouldy straw.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was a veritable journey from Bicêtre to the Place -Saint-Jacques, by way of the Avenue d'Italie and the -outer boulevards; midway along the Boulevard d'Italie -the guillotine came in sight, and for five and twenty -minutes before he reached it, the miserable victim had -the death-machine for his horizon, the huge blade -gripped between the blood-red arms gleaming deadlier -moment by moment.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The progress was even longer and more wretched -when La Grande Roquette was substituted for Bicêtre -as the prison of the <i>Condamné à mort</i>. On a day -in mid-December, 1838, a certain Perrin was carried -to death from La Roquette to the barrière Saint-Jacques. -An icy rain was falling, and the streets -beyond the Seine were so choked with mud that at -certain points the vehicle became almost embedded in -it, and had to be hauled along by the crowd. Think -of riding to one's death in that fashion! The Abbé -Montès, riding beside the young assassin, saw him -shivering, and insisted on covering him with his own -hat. At the scaffold, Perrin was lifted from the cart -almost dead from cold and exhaustion.</p> - -<p class='c012'>From that date there began to be a talk of changing -the place of execution, but the proposals had no -result, and during the next thirteen years five and twenty -murderers traversed the whole length of Paris -in their passage to the guillotine. Amongst them -may be named the regicide Darmés, the terrible and -dreaded Poulmann, Fourier, chief of the famous band -of the <i>Escarpes</i>, the <i>garde Général</i> Lecompte, who -fired on Louis-Philippe at Fontainebleau, and Daix -and Lahr, the assassins of General Bréar. At length, -in 1851, the Place Saint-Jacques ceded its dubious -honours to the Place de la Roquette,—which is now -about to restore them.</p> - -<p class='c012'>As La Roquette (or properly La Grande Roquette, -to distinguish it from La Petite Roquette, the prison -for juvenile offenders, which stands opposite) is to be -abolished, it will be interesting to make a brief survey -of the place in which some of the most celebrated -French criminals of modern times have awaited the -visit of M. Deibler, with his scissors and pinioning -straps.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Here the "toilet of the guillotine" has been performed -on Orsini, Piéri, Verger, La Pommerais, -Troppmann, Moreau, Billoir, Prévost, Barré and -Lebiez, Campi, Pranzini, and so many others, down -to Vaillant and Emile Henry.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It would be impossible even to summarise all that -has been said and written in France in favour of -abolishing the guillotine. It was vigorously advocated -during the Revolution itself, while the scaffold -was flowing with blood.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Under the Convention, Taillefer rose one day with -the demand: "Let our guillotines be broken and -burned!" At the sitting of the of "9th Vendémiaire, -year iv," Languinais exclaimed: "Should we not -be happy if, having begun our session by -establishing the Republic, we were able to end it by -pronouncing once for all against capital punishment!"</p> - -<p class='c012'>At the last siting of the Convention, Chénier in -energetic terms denounced the guillotine. A voice -called out: "What o'clock is it?" A voice responded: -"The hour of justice." A moment later -this vote was proclaimed: "Dating from the publication -of the general peace, the punishment of death -shall be abolished throughout the French Republic."</p> - -<p class='c012'>That vote has not yet become effective!</p> - -<p class='c012'>After a long sleep the question re-awoke on the -lips of M. de Tracy, son of the orator who had been -amongst the first to entreat that the code of France -might be cleansed of blood. In the same historic -mention we must gather in the names of the Duc de -Broglie, the Marquis de Lally-Tallendal, the Marquis -de Pastoret ("A man attacks me; I can defend myself -only by killing him: I kill him. For society to -do the same thing, it must find itself in precisely the -same situation.") de Bérenger, Lafayette, Glais-Bizoin, -Taschereau, Appert, Lèon Fancher, and Guizot the -historian.</p> - -<p class='c012'>"If," added the authors of <i>Les Prisons de Paris</i>, -"all these enlightened publicists and statesmen, with -M. Guizot amongst them, did not succeed in pulling -down the scaffold, at an epoch when, to quote M. de -Bérenger, the very executioners were weary, it must -be concluded, we suppose, that it is necessary to -proceed with prudent hesitation, and, by a gradual -abolition, to convince the most timid and incredulous -that society has nothing to dread from this reform."</p> - -<p class='c012'>This was written fifty years ago, and as "prudent -hesitation" has not yet attained its goal it is still -possible to penetrate within the condemned hold of -La Roquette.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The prison is chiefly interesting in this day as the -fore-scene of the scaffold. It is built with a wealth of -precautions; and escape, if not impossible by ordinary -means, is exceptionally difficult to compass. No -successful flight from La Roquette has been recorded -in modern times.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Three iron <i>grilles</i> and four doors of massive oak -conduct to the great courtyard. The foundations of -the prison are in layers of freestone; the two walls -which enclose the buildings are of a thickness proportionate -to their elevation, and the builder took -care to efface the angles by rounded stonework. -Buildings surround the courtyard on the north, east, -and west, and the prison chapel occupies the south.</p> - -<p class='c012'>For the ordinary prisoner (convicts awaiting shipment -to the penal colonies, or undergoing short sentences -of hard labour), the day at La Roquette -begins early. The warders are at their posts soon -after light, and the second bell summons the prisoners -half an hour later. Thirty minutes are allowed for -dressing, bed-making, and cell-cleaning, and at the -third bell there is a general descent to the yard, each -prisoner receiving his first allowance of bread as he -goes down. After half an hour's exercise the regular -labour of the day begins, and at nine o'clock there is -a distribution of soup. Between nine-thirty and ten -the prisoners take another turn in the yard, and the -second period of work lasts till three in the afternoon. -At three is served another allowance of bread, with -vegetables or meat according to the day; and from -half-past three to four the courtyard echoes again -the monotonous tramp of hundreds of pairs of sabots. -The last sortie—there are four in all—varies with the -seasons; and after supper the prisoners are locked in -for the night.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Fifty years ago, there was here and there in the -<i>bagnes</i>, and the general prisons of France, a priest of -exalted ideals, and such unwearied patience as the -task demands, toiling to reclaim the <i>Condamnés</i> who -were his spiritual charge. One such was the Abbé -Touzè, chaplain of La Roquette at about the middle -period of our century. The Abbé set himself to inquire -what causes sent men to prison at that day, -what might be done or attempted to prevent them -from returning there; and knowing that the part -which thinks may be reached through the part which -feels, it was in the sanctuary of the heart that he -began his experiments on a population whose emotions -are none too easily turned to moral or religious -profit. To a Touzè in France, a Horsley in England, -prison is not all the barren vineyard which a -lazy chaplain finds it; and the <i>aumônier</i> of La -Roquette did not labour in vain. He has been mentioned -here as a herald of the philanthropic scientist -of later days, who has occasionally done for the -prison world what genius alone—with religious fervour -for its basis—can accomplish there.</p> - -<p class='c012'>When the secret history of the condemned cell -comes to be written, the material will be furnished -for a new and important chapter in the history of -criminal psychology; but it must not be a patchwork -of lurid gossip on a background of stale religious -sophisms, such as Newgate chaplains of the last century -were not above compiling and selling for their -profit in the crowd on a hanging Monday; nor a -mere spicy morsel for the sensation-hunter, such as, -for example, the copious gutter-stuff printed and circulated -about Lacenaire, who drew the gaze of Paris -to the condemned cell of La Roquette some half-century -ago.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Thief, blackmailer, and assassin, this was a wretch -whose blood defiled the scaffold itself, yet his position -in the condemned cell was made little less than heroic. -A loathsome murderer, he was for weeks the fashion -in Paris. His portrait was hawked about the quays -and boulevards;</p> - -<p class='c013'>"from all sides exquisite meats and delicate wines reached his -cell; every day some man of letters visited him, carefully noting -his sarcasms, his phrases composed in drunkenness or studiously -calculated for effect; women, young, beautiful, and elegantly -attired, solicited the honour of being presented to him, and were -in despair at his refusal."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Criminals as indifferent as, but less notorious or -less popular than Lacenaire, idling the weeks while -their appeal was under consideration, were chiefly -anxious as to whether the charity of the curious -would keep them in tobacco until their fate was -decided.</p> - -<p class='c012'>If the tobacco ran out, and the supply seemed not -likely to be renewed, the prisoner sometimes met -that and all other unpleasantnesses, immediate and -prospective, by taking his own life—not because he -feared the guillotine, but because suicide (which, with -the limited means at his disposal, was probably far -the worse death of the two) offered the shortest cut -to nothingness.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Lesage, calculating that his <i>pourvoi</i> or appeal would -run just forty days, summed up without a tremor the -days that remained to him. "Thirty-two days I've -been here; eight to follow. If I don't get a sou or -two, <i>je manquerai de tabac</i>. Five sous a day to -smoke, and ten to drink,—that's not much for a poor -chap to ask, the last eight days of his life!" Seemingly, -this modest address to charitable Paris was -coldly answered, for a day or two later Lesage was -found dead in his bed. The companion of his guilt, -Soufflard, in the adjoining cell, had already taken -poison.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In all condemned cells there is a considerable -proportion of criminals for whom the prospect of a -violent and shameful death seems to hold no terrors -whatever. The chief warder of Wandsworth prison, -an experienced observer of death on the gallows, -assured me that he remembered no instance in which -the victim had needed support under the beam, and -he cited the case of Kate Webster, who, with the -halter about her neck, put up her pinioned hands to -adjust it more comfortably. Dr. Corre<a id='r26' /><a href='#f26' class='c014'><sup>[26]</sup></a> found that -out of 88 criminals condemned to death, of whom 64 -were men and 24 women, about two-fifths of the -men "died in a cowardly manner," whilst only about -one-fifth of the women showed a lack of self-possession.</p> - -<div class='footnote c015' id='f26'> -<p class='c012'><a href='#r26'>26</a>. <i>Les Criminels.</i></p> -</div> -<p class='c012'>Let us pass into the <i>cachot du Condamné à mort</i>, the -condemned cell of La Roquette.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Three types are found in the condemned cell: the -indifferent, the penitent, and the impenitent. The -indifferent is a lymphatic creature (there have been -several female prisoners of this type), scarcely susceptible -of any normal emotion, and—of whichever -sex—as cold in repentance as in crime.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The second category includes offenders quite removed -from the ordinary criminal classes. Several -of these, impulsive murderers, reprieved from the -gallows, were pointed out to me at Portland last -summer, and one I remembered in particular—a handsome, -well-set man, not yet middle-aged, trudging -along under a warder's eye round and round the infirmary -yard, who had been seventeen years in confinement. -The impenitent of this order is such an -egoistic maniac as Wainwright, who, the night before -his death, paced the yard of Newgate with the governor, -smoking a cigar, and recounting his successes with -women; or he is a criminal of the great sort, strong -in mind as in body, the fearless disciple of a dreadful -philosophy of his own, which lets him face death -as boldly as he inflicts it, and which, at the last, inspires -him only with a hatred of the law that has -vanquished him.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Poulmann was a criminal of this type; an ultra-sanguine -temperament, an athletic form, a constitution -physically and morally energetic, an Herculean -force of body, and a pride which the <i>cachot du Condamné</i> -could not reduce. "It shall never be said -that Poulmann changed!" was his first and last confession. -A "monstrous atheist," he admitted that he -had prayed for the woman who was condemned with -him: "But there can be no God, since Louise also is -to die." Abbé Touzè suggested that the last days of -Louise might be embittered by his impenitence. This -shook him for a moment, but he returned to -himself: "No! Poulmann will never change."</p> - -<p class='c012'>But, alike for the weak-hearted, the indifferent, and -the valiant, the way to the scaffold is rendered in -these days as easy as may be. Victor Hugo's condemned -man in the old, abhorred Bicêtre was turned -out by day among the <i>forçats</i> awaiting their despatch -to the <i>bagne</i>; they made sport of him, and ghastly -jokes about the "widow" or guillotine—time-honoured -amongst the criminal classes—were pointed -afresh for his benefit.</p> - -<p class='c012'>His treatment at the hands of the prison officers -was scarcely less callous; no one had a thought or -cared that this poor wight was biding the morning -when he should be rudely severed from all the living.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The position of convicts cast for death in the Newgate -of the early years of this century was every jot -as cruel.</p> - -<p class='c012'>It was thus under the old order; it is more commendable -to-day. The tenant of the condemned cell, -withdrawn from the stare of the world, is surrounded -by people who have no desire but to soften the few -days or weeks that remain to him. He is no longer -on view at a price. He has not, like Lacenaire, the -privilege of refusing the visits of duchesses, nor the -indignity to endure of being exposed at a few francs -per head to the indecent gaze of sensation-mongers.</p> - -<p class='c012'>In La Roquette nowadays no one can admire or -contemn him until he shuffles out to meet his fate -just beyond the prison door.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The condemned cell is, as in most modern prisons, -both in France and England, the most comfortable -quarters in the building. There are actually three -<i>cachots des Condamnés</i>, as there are two in Newgate, -and those in the Paris gaol are better lighted and -rather more spacious.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The last scene of all, though it is a public execution, -is no longer a feast for the ghouls. Justice is -done swiftly, and the crowd sees little more than the -preparation in the grey morning hours. The preparations, -however, are sufficiently enticing to draw to the -Place de la Roquette the riff-raff of Paris, the -frequenters of the night-houses, of the boulevards, -the women of the town, and some foreign amateurs of -the scaffold who, like George Selwyn, would "go anywhere -to see an execution."</p> - -<p class='c012'>Selwyn, by the way, would find the spectacle in the -Place de la Roquette tame enough after some that he -had witnessed. He went to Paris on purpose to be -present at the torture of the wretched Damiens, who, -after suffering unheard-of pains, was torn asunder by -four horses. A French nobleman, observing the -Englishman's interest in the savage scene, concluded -that he must be a hangman taking a lesson abroad, -and said: "<i>Eh bien, monsieur, êtes vous arrivé -pour voir ce spectacle?</i>"—"<i>Oui, monsieur.</i>"—"<i>Vous êtes -bourreau?</i>" "<i>Non, monsieur</i>," replied Selwyn, "<i>je -n'ai pas l'honneur; je ne suis qu'un amateur</i>."</p> - -<p class='c012'>It is after midnight that the rush begins to the -spot where the scaffold is raised, and for hours the -throng continues to increase in numbers and variety. -All night there is feeding and drinking in the -public-houses around, and, as it used to be in the Old -Bailey, windows commanding a view of the scene are -hired at any price.</p> - -<p class='c012'>A swarm of pressmen wait through the night just -outside the prison gate. At this time the victim -himself is probably unaware that his last hour is -at hand.</p> - -<p class='c012'>When day has dawned, two carts come out from a -street adjoining the prison, bearing the disjointed -pieces of the guillotine. The headsman's five brawny -assistants (one of whom is his son and probable successor) -set up the machine, and the knife falls three or -four times to test the spring.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Then the guard arrives; and when the city police, -the <i>Gardes de la République</i>, and the mounted <i>gendarmes</i> -are marshalled, the crowd behind can see only -the top of the guillotine. A place within the cordon -is reserved for the press.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The genius-in-chief of the ceremony does not appear -until the doors of the prison are thrown open. -He is within, preparing the victim, and coaxing him, -when the toilet is finished, to take a cigarette and a -little glass of rum.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Louis Stanislas Deibler, the <i>Monsieur de Paris</i>, -came to Paris in 1871, as assistant headsman to Roch. -He had been a provincial executioner, but, in 1871, -a new law ordered that all criminals condemned in -France should be despatched by <i>Monsieur de Paris</i>.</p> - -<p class='c012'>Deibler, who was born in Dijon in 1823, is a joiner -by trade. His first head (as chief executioner) was -Laprade's, in 1879, and the case was one of his worst. -Laprade, who had murdered his father, mother, and -grandmother, felt a natural disinclination to join them -on the other side, and struggled so desperately on the -scaffold that Deibler had to thrust his head by main -force into the lunette.</p> - -<p class='c012'>M. Deibler is lame, and usually carries a very old -umbrella. "Scenes" on the scaffold are rare. The -victim may struggle for a moment, but it is only for a -moment that, in the practised hands of the assistants, -he can postpone the inevitable. In general, the whole -affair lasts but a few seconds.</p> - -<p class='c012'>There is no such thing as a "last dying speech" -from the guillotine. Even if the man were not too -dazed to speak, time would not be allowed him. -There is time only for the last ministrations of the -Church, which are almost always rejected.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The instant the criminal is secured on the bascule, -M. Deibler touches the spring, the knife shears -through the uncovered neck, there is a spurt of blood -in the air, and all is over.</p> - -<p class='c012'>The head and body are enclosed at once in a rough -coffin, and trundled off with a guard of mounted -<i>gendarmes</i> (officials and priest following in a cab) to -the Champ des Navets, or Turnip Field, at Ivry -Cemetery, where a burial service is read. The remains -are then handed over to one of the medical -schools for dissection, and what is left is interred.</p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c002'> - <div>THE END.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='figcenter id001'> -<img src='images/i_p265.jpg' alt='' class='ig001' /> -</div> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c002' /> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div><span class='xlarge'>Novels by Tighe Hopkins.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<hr class='c026' /> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div><span class='large'><b>"Lady Bonnie's Experiment."</b></span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>(Vol. V. of "Cassell's Pocket Library.")</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>"Its sparkle keeps it alive from cover to cover. The whole thing is a -charming bit of <i>étourderie</i>, without a dull line in it."—<i>Athenæum.</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>"A delightful fantasy. Woven with a graceful dexterity which ought to be -pondered by 'prentice story-tellers."—<i>Daily Chronicle.</i></p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div><span class='large'>Nell Haffenden:</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>A Strictly Conventional Story.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>In two volumes.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>"The author sculpts at least half-a-dozen strong individualities, and introduces -us to a variety of shifting scenes, from the studios of artistic Bohemia to -mission work in Eastern London. Wherever we are taken we are impressed -with the conviction that the author knows what he is writing about, and in the -description of the Bloomsbury boarding-house he is humorous enough to remind -us of Martin Chuzzlewit's first experiences in New York."—<i>Times.</i></p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div><span class='large'>The Nugents of Carriconna:</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>A Story More or Less Irish.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>Fourth edition in one volume.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>"For sheer relaxation there is nothing to beat a really good Irish story, and -the reader who fails to enjoy 'The Nugents of Carriconna' must be a person of -very peculiar sensibilities. A promising opening is a capital thing in a novel, -and Mr. Tighe Hopkins opens admirably. The situation is one which in -capable hands might be turned to very good account, and the reader is not long -in discovering that the author's hands are very capable indeed. The story of -the ill-fated telescope, which is really the pivot upon which the action of the -novel revolves, is not only most delightful and original in itself, but is told with -so much force, freshness, and prevailing humour, not without a few touches of -powerful pathos, that its success may be regarded as certain."—<i>Spectator.</i></p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div><span class='large'>"The Incomplete Adventurer."</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>In one volume.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>"Most humorous and delightful."—<i>Athenæum.</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>"A very clever tale, brilliantly told."—<i>Academy.</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>"A decidedly amusing variation on the old theme of the elixir of life."—<i>Saturday -Review.</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>"The hero is a delightful creation."—<i>Literary World.</i></p> -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div><span class='xlarge'>FRENCH HISTORY.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>8<span class='large'>°</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>By <span class='sc'>Frances Elliot</span>. Illustrated with portraits and with views of the -old châteaux. 2 vols., 8<span class='large'>°</span>, $4.00. Half-calf extra, gilt tops, $8 00</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Mrs. Elliot's is an anecdotal history of the French Court from Francis I. to Louis -XIV. She has conveyed a vivid idea of the personalities touched upon, and her book -contains a great deal of genuine vitality."—<i>Detroit Free Press.</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>"Entitled to rank as one of the notable publications. The author has been an earnest -student of the history of France from her childhood, and she here embodies the result -of researches, for which she seems to have been peculiarly fitted. The familiarity of this -work is one of its chief charms. The present work is charming in manner and carries -with it the impress of accuracy and careful investigation."—<i>Chicago Times.</i></p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div><span class='large'>WOMAN IN FRANCE DURING THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>By <span class='sc'>Julia Kavanagh</span>, author of "Madeline," etc. Illustrated with -portraits on steel. 2 vols., 8<span class='large'>°</span>, $4.00. Half-calf extra, gilt tops, $8 00</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Miss Kavanagh has studied her material so carefully, and has digested it so -well, that she has been able to tell the story of Court Life in France, from the -beginning of the Regency to the end of the revolutionary period, with an -understanding and a sobriety that make it practically new to English -readers."—<i>Detroit Free Press.</i></p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div><span class='large'>FRANCE UNDER MAZARIN.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>By <span class='sc'>James Breck Perkins</span>. With a Sketch of the Administration of -Richelieu. Portraits of Mazarin, Richelieu, Louis XIII., Anne of -Austria, and Condé. 2 vols., 8<span class='large'>°</span> $4 00</p> - -<p class='c012'>"... 'France under Richelieu and Mazarin' will introduce its author into the -ranks of the first living historians of our land. He is never dry, he never lags, he is never -prolix: but from the first to the last, his narrative is recorded <i>currente calamo</i>, as of a -man who has a firm grasp upon his materials."—<i>N. Y. Christian Union.</i></p> - -<p class='c012'>"A brilliant and fascinating period that has been skipped, slighted, or abused by the -ignorance, favoritism, or prejudice of other writers is here subjected to the closest scrutiny -of an apparently judicial and candid student...."—<i>Boston Literary World.</i></p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div><span class='large'>A FRENCH AMBASSADOR AT THE COURT OF CHARLES II.; LE COMTE DE COMINGES.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>From his unpublished correspondence. Edited by <span class='sc'>J. J. Jusserand</span>. -With 10 illustrations, 5 being photogravures. 8<span class='large'>°</span> $3 50</p> - -<p class='c012'>"M. Jusserand has chosen a topic peculiarly fitted to his genius, and treated it with -all the advantage to be derived, on the one hand, from his wide knowledge of English -literature and English social life, and on the other, from his diplomatic experience and -his freedom of access to the archives of the French Foreign Office.... We get a new -and vivid picture of his (Cominges') life at the Court of Charles II.... There is -not a dull page in the book."—<i>London Times.</i></p> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> -<div class='nf-center c018'> - <div><span class='large'>UNDERCURRENTS OF THE SECOND EMPIRE.</span></div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class='c012'>By <span class='sc'>Albert D. Vandam</span>, author of "An Englishman in Paris," etc. 8<span class='large'>°</span> $2 00</p> - -<p class='c012'>"Mr. Vandam is an Englishman, long resident in Paris, and thereby thoroughly Gallicized -in his intellectual atmosphere and style of thought ... his style is flowing and -pleasing, and the work is a valuable contribution to the history of that time."—<i>The -Churchman.</i></p> -<hr class='c027' /> - -<div class='nf-center-c0'> - <div class='nf-center'> - <div>G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS, <span class='sc'>New York and London</span>.</div> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='pbb'> - <hr class='pb c000' /> -</div> - <ul class='ul_1 c002'> - <li>Transcriber's Notes: - <ul class='ul_2'> - <li>Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected. - </li> - <li>Unbalanced quotation marks were left as the author intended. - </li> - <li>Typographical errors were silently corrected. - </li> - <li>Names were corrected according to historial records. - <ul class='ul_3'> - <li>Bérenger should be Béranger -<p class='li-p-last c028'> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-Jean_de_Béranger</p> - </li> - <li>Bertandière should be Bertaudière -<p class='li-p-last c028'> http://www.emersonkent.com/history_dictionary/bastille.htm</p> - </li> - </ul> - </li> - <li>Spelling was made consistent when a predominant form was found in this book; - otherwise it was not changed. - </li> - </ul> - </li> - </ul> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Dungeons of Old Paris, by Tighe Hopkins - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DUNGEONS OF OLD PARIS *** - -***** This file should be named 54493-h.htm or 54493-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/4/9/54493/ - -Produced by deaurider, Barry Abrahamsen and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive) - - -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. Special rules, -set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to -copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to -protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project -Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you -charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you -do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the -rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose -such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and -research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do -practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is -subject to the trademark license, especially commercial -redistribution. - - - -*** START: FULL LICENSE *** - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project -Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at -http://gutenberg.org/license). - - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy -all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. -If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the -terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or -entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement -and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" -or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the -collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an -individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are -located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from -copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative -works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg -are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project -Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by -freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of -this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with -the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by -keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project -Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in -a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check -the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement -before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or -creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project -Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning -the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United -States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate -access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently -whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, -copied or distributed: - -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/license - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived -from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is -posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied -and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees -or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work -with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the -work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 -through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the -Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or -1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional -terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked -to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the -permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any -word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or -distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than -"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version -posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), -you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a -copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon -request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other -form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided -that - -- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is - owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he - has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the - Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments - must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you - prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax - returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and - sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the - address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to - the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." - -- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or - destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium - and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of - Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any - money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days - of receipt of the work. - -- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set -forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from -both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael -Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the -Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm -collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain -"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or -corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual -property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a -computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by -your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with -your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with -the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a -refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity -providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to -receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy -is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further -opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER -WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO -WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. -If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the -law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be -interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by -the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any -provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance -with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, -promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, -harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, -that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do -or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm -work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any -Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. - - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers -including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists -because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from -people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. -To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation -and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 -and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive -Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at -http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent -permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. -Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered -throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at -809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email -business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact -information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official -page at http://pglaf.org - -For additional contact information: - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To -SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any -particular state visit http://pglaf.org - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. -To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate - - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm -concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared -with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project -Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. - - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. -unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily -keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. - - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: - - http://www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - - -</pre> - - </body> - <!-- created with ppgen.py 3.56m on 2017-04-05 23:05:25 GMT --> -</html> diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 8b269fe..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/cover.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/f01.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/f01.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c89ee71..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/f01.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p001.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p001.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 25762c1..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p001.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p006.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p006.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e4ff984..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p006.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p007.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p007.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 1486711..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p007.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p008a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p008a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 702d22b..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p008a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p032a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p032a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 39f5edc..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p032a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p033.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p033.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 9d38110..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p033.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p034.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p034.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a18ad17..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p034.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p036a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p036a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index ec88133..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p036a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p062a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p062a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index ece1314..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p062a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p074.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p074.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index af81b59..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p074.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p075.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p075.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f0a5ff9..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p075.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p080a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p080a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index d1b4a63..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p080a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p091.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p091.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index fc56e01..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p091.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p092.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p092.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 8f85532..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p092.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p096a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p096a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 81f3dd9..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p096a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p106.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p106.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 77d2470..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p106.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p107.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p107.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 8a87799..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p107.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p130.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p130.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e0e4d07..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p130.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p131.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p131.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 2276ea7..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p131.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p138a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p138a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index b5fc120..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p138a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p154.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p154.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e2dbee4..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p154.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p155.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p155.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 92c8789..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p155.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p164a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p164a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 493da2c..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p164a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p172a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p172a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 38a1030..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p172a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p174.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p174.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e010de1..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p174.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p175.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p175.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 423d450..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p175.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p194.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p194.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f782380..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p194.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p195.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p195.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f43992f..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p195.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p196a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p196a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 7b15fe8..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p196a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p216a.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p216a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 186fe63..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p216a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p219.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p219.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 5681f6f..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p219.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p220.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p220.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 7c558a2..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p220.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p250.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p250.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 367f7ff..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p250.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p251.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p251.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c632d53..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p251.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54493-h/images/i_p265.jpg b/old/54493-h/images/i_p265.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a7fc8a0..0000000 --- a/old/54493-h/images/i_p265.jpg +++ /dev/null |
