The French Revolution

T >> Thomas Carlyle >> The French Revolution


From Sunday afternoon (exclusive of intervals, and pauses not final)
till Thursday evening, there follow consecutively a Hundred Hours.
Which hundred hours are to be reckoned with the hours of the Bartholomew
Butchery, of the Armagnac Massacres, Sicilian Vespers, or whatsoever is
savagest in the annals of this world. Horrible the hour when man's soul,
in its paroxysm, spurns asunder the barriers and rules; and shews what
dens and depths are in it! For Night and Orcus, as we say, as was
long prophesied, have burst forth, here in this Paris, from their
subterranean imprisonment: hideous, dim, confused; which it is painful
to look on; and yet which cannot, and indeed which should not, be
forgotten.

The Reader, who looks earnestly through this dim Phantasmagory of the
Pit, will discern few fixed certain objects; and yet still a few. He
will observe, in this Abbaye Prison, the sudden massacre of the Priests
being once over, a strange Court of Justice, or call it Court of Revenge
and Wild-Justice, swiftly fashion itself, and take seat round a table,
with the Prison-Registers spread before it;--Stanislas Maillard,
Bastille-hero, famed Leader of the Menads, presiding. O Stanislas, one
hoped to meet thee elsewhere than here; thou shifty Riding-Usher, with
an inkling of Law! This work also thou hadst to do; and then--to depart
for ever from our eyes. At La Force, at the Chatelet, the Conciergerie,
the like Court forms itself, with the like accompaniments: the thing
that one man does other men can do. There are some Seven Prisons in
Paris, full of Aristocrats with conspiracies;--nay not even Bicetre and
Salpetriere shall escape, with their Forgers of Assignats: and there
are seventy times seven hundred Patriot hearts in a state of frenzy.
Scoundrel hearts also there are; as perfect, say, as the Earth
holds,--if such are needed. To whom, in this mood, law is as no-law; and
killing, by what name soever called, is but work to be done.

So sit these sudden Courts of Wild-Justice, with the Prison-Registers
before them; unwonted wild tumult howling all round: the Prisoners
in dread expectancy within. Swift: a name is called; bolts jingle, a
Prisoner is there. A few questions are put; swiftly this sudden Jury
decides: Royalist Plotter or not? Clearly not; in that case, Let the
Prisoner be enlarged With Vive la Nation. Probably yea; then still, Let
the Prisoner be enlarged, but without Vive la Nation; or else it may
run, Let the prisoner be conducted to La Force. At La Force again their
formula is, Let the Prisoner be conducted to the Abbaye.--"To La Force
then!" Volunteer bailiffs seize the doomed man; he is at the outer gate;
'enlarged,' or 'conducted,'--not into La Force, but into a howling sea;
forth, under an arch of wild sabres, axes and pikes; and sinks, hewn
asunder. And another sinks, and another; and there forms itself a piled
heap of corpses, and the kennels begin to run red. Fancy the yells of
these men, their faces of sweat and blood; the crueller shrieks of these
women, for there are women too; and a fellow-mortal hurled naked into it
all! Jourgniac de Saint Meard has seen battle, has seen an effervescent
Regiment du Roi in mutiny; but the bravest heart may quail at this. The
Swiss Prisoners, remnants of the Tenth of August, 'clasped each other
spasmodically,' and hung back; grey veterans crying: "Mercy Messieurs;
ah, mercy!" But there was no mercy. Suddenly, however, one of these men
steps forward. He had a blue frock coat; he seemed to be about thirty,
his stature was above common, his look noble and martial. "I go first,"
said he, "since it must be so: adieu!" Then dashing his hat sharply
behind him: "Which way?" cried he to the Brigands: "Shew it me, then."
They open the folding gate; he is announced to the multitude. He stands
a moment motionless; then plunges forth among the pikes, and dies of
a thousand wounds.' (Felemhesi, La Verite tout entiere (ut supra), p.
173.)

Man after man is cut down; the sabres need sharpening, the killers
refresh themselves from wine jugs. Onward and onward goes the butchery;
the loud yells wearying down into bass growls. A sombre-faced, shifting
multitude looks on; in dull approval, or dull disapproval; in dull
recognition that it is Necessity. 'An Anglais in drab greatcoat'
was seen, or seemed to be seen, serving liquor from his own
dram-bottle;--for what purpose, 'if not set on by Pitt,' Satan and
himself know best! Witty Dr. Moore grew sick on approaching, and turned
into another street. (Moore's Journal, i. 185-195.)--Quick enough
goes this Jury-Court; and rigorous. The brave are not spared, nor the
beautiful, nor the weak. Old M. de Montmorin, the Minister's Brother,
was acquitted by the Tribunal of the Seventeenth; and conducted back,
elbowed by howling galleries; but is not acquitted here. Princess de
Lamballe has lain down on bed: "Madame, you are to be removed to the
Abbaye." "I do not wish to remove; I am well enough here." There is a
need-be for removing. She will arrange her dress a little, then;
rude voices answer, "You have not far to go." She too is led to the
hell-gate; a manifest Queen's-Friend. She shivers back, at the sight of
bloody sabres; but there is no return: Onwards! That fair hindhead
is cleft with the axe; the neck is severed. That fair body is cut
in fragments; with indignities, and obscene horrors of moustachio
grands-levres, which human nature would fain find incredible,--which
shall be read in the original language only. She was beautiful, she
was good, she had known no happiness. Young hearts, generation after
generation, will think with themselves: O worthy of worship, thou
king-descended, god-descended and poor sister-woman! why was not I
there; and some Sword Balmung, or Thor's Hammer in my hand? Her head is
fixed on a pike; paraded under the windows of the Temple; that a still
more hated, a Marie-Antoinette, may see. One Municipal, in the Temple
with the Royal Prisoners at the moment, said, "Look out." Another
eagerly whispered, "Do not look." The circuit of the Temple is guarded,
in these hours, by a long stretched tricolor riband: terror enters, and
the clangour of infinite tumult: hitherto not regicide, though that too
may come.

But it is more edifying to note what thrillings of affection, what
fragments of wild virtues turn up, in this shaking asunder of man's
existence, for of these too there is a proportion. Note old Marquis
Cazotte: he is doomed to die; but his young Daughter clasps him in her
arms, with an inspiration of eloquence, with a love which is stronger
than very death; the heart of the killers themselves is touched by it;
the old man is spared. Yet he was guilty, if plotting for his King is
guilt: in ten days more, a Court of Law condemned him, and he had to die
elsewhere; bequeathing his Daughter a lock of his old grey hair. Or
note old M. de Sombreuil, who also had a Daughter:--My Father is not an
Aristocrat; O good gentlemen, I will swear it, and testify it, and in
all ways prove it; we are not; we hate Aristocrats! "Wilt thou drink
Aristocrats' blood?" The man lifts blood (if universal Rumour can be
credited (Dulaure: Esquisses Historiques des principaux evenemens de
la Revolution, ii. 206 (cited in Montgaillard, iii. 205.); the poor
maiden does drink. "This Sombreuil is innocent then!" Yes indeed,--and
now note, most of all, how the bloody pikes, at this news, do rattle to
the ground; and the tiger-yells become bursts of jubilee over a brother
saved; and the old man and his daughter are clasped to bloody bosoms,
with hot tears, and borne home in triumph of Vive la Nation, the killers
refusing even money! Does it seem strange, this temper of theirs?
It seems very certain, well proved by Royalist testimony in other
instances; (Bertrand-Moleville, Mem. Particuliers, ii.213, &c. &c.) and
very significant.



Chapter 3.1.V.

A Trilogy.

As all Delineation, in these ages, were it never so Epic, 'speaking
itself and not singing itself,' must either found on Belief and provable
Fact, or have no foundation at all (nor except as floating cobweb any
existence at all),--the Reader will perhaps prefer to take a glance with
the very eyes of eye-witnesses; and see, in that way, for himself, how
it was. Brave Jourgniac, innocent Abbe Sicard, judicious Advocate Maton,
these, greatly compressing themselves, shall speak, each an instant.
Jourgniac's Agony of Thirty-eight hours went through 'above a hundred
editions,' though intrinsically a poor work. Some portion of it may here
go through above the hundred-and-first, for want of a better.

'Towards seven o'clock' (Sunday night, at the Abbaye; for Jourgniac
goes by dates): 'We saw two men enter, their hands bloody and armed with
sabres; a turnkey, with a torch, lighted them; he pointed to the bed of
the unfortunate Swiss, Reding. Reding spoke with a dying voice. One of
them paused; but the other cried Allons donc; lifted the unfortunate
man; carried him out on his back to the street. He was massacred there.

'We all looked at one another in silence, we clasped each other's hands.
Motionless, with fixed eyes, we gazed on the pavement of our prison;
on which lay the moonlight, checkered with the triple stancheons of our
windows.

'Three in the morning: They were breaking-in one of the prison-doors. We
at first thought they were coming to kill us in our room; but heard,
by voices on the staircase, that it was a room where some Prisoners
had barricaded themselves. They were all butchered there, as we shortly
gathered.

'Ten o'clock: The Abbe Lenfant and the Abbe de Chapt-Rastignac appeared
in the pulpit of the Chapel, which was our prison; they had entered by a
door from the stairs. They said to us that our end was at hand; that
we must compose ourselves, and receive their last blessing. An electric
movement, not to be defined, threw us all on our knees, and we received
it. These two whitehaired old men, blessing us from their place above;
death hovering over our heads, on all hands environing us; the moment is
never to be forgotten. Half an hour after, they were both massacred, and
we heard their cries.' (Jourgniac Saint-Meard, Mon Agonie de Trente-huit
heures, reprinted in Hist. Parl. xviii. 103-135.)--Thus Jourgniac in
his Agony in the Abbaye.

But now let the good Maton speak, what he, over in La Force, in the same
hours, is suffering and witnessing. This Resurrection by him is greatly
the best, the least theatrical of these Pamphlets; and stands testing by
documents:

'Towards seven o'clock,' on Sunday night, 'prisoners were called
frequently, and they did not reappear. Each of us reasoned in his own
way, on this singularity: but our ideas became calm, as we persuaded
ourselves that the Memorial I had drawn up for the National Assembly was
producing effect.

'At one in the morning, the grate which led to our quarter opened anew.
Four men in uniform, each with a drawn sabre and blazing torch, came up
to our corridor, preceded by a turnkey; and entered an apartment close
to ours, to investigate a box there, which we heard them break up. This
done, they stept into the gallery, and questioned the man Cuissa, to
know where Lamotte (Necklace's Widower) was. Lamotte, they said, had
some months ago, under pretext of a treasure he knew of, swindled a sum
of three-hundred livres from one of them, inviting him to dinner for
that purpose. The wretched Cuissa, now in their hands, who indeed lost
his life this night, answered trembling, That he remembered the fact
well, but could not tell what was become of Lamotte. Determined to find
Lamotte and confront him with Cuissa, they rummaged, along with this
latter, through various other apartments; but without effect, for we
heard them say: "Come search among the corpses then: for, nom de Dieu!
we must find where he is."

'At this time, I heard Louis Bardy, the Abbe Bardy's name called: he was
brought out; and directly massacred, as I learnt. He had been accused,
along with his concubine, five or six years before, of having murdered
and cut in pieces his own Brother, Auditor of the Chambre des Comptes at
Montpelier; but had by his subtlety, his dexterity, nay his eloquence,
outwitted the judges, and escaped.

'One may fancy what terror these words, "Come search among the corpses
then," had thrown me into. I saw nothing for it now but resigning
myself to die. I wrote my last-will; concluding it by a petition and
adjuration, that the paper should be sent to its address. Scarcely had I
quitted the pen, when there came two other men in uniform; one of them,
whose arm and sleeve up to the very shoulder, as well as the sabre,
were covered with blood, said, He was as weary as a hodman that had been
beating plaster.

'Baudin de la Chenaye was called; sixty years of virtues could not save
him. They said, "A l'Abbaye:" he passed the fatal outer-gate; gave a
cry of terror, at sight of the heaped corpses; covered his eyes with
his hands, and died of innumerable wounds. At every new opening of the
grate, I thought I should hear my own name called, and see Rossignol
enter.

'I flung off my nightgown and cap; I put on a coarse unwashed shirt, a
worn frock without waistcoat, an old round hat; these things I had sent
for, some days ago, in the fear of what might happen.

'The rooms of this corridor had been all emptied but ours. We were four
together; whom they seemed to have forgotten: we addressed our prayers
in common to the Eternal to be delivered from this peril.

'Baptiste the turnkey came up by himself, to see us. I took him by the
hands; I conjured him to save us; promised him a hundred louis, if he
would conduct me home. A noise coming from the grates made him hastily
withdraw.

'It was the noise of some dozen or fifteen men, armed to the teeth; as
we, lying flat to escape being seen, could see from our windows: "Up
stairs!" said they: "Let not one remain." I took out my penknife; I
considered where I should strike myself,'--but reflected 'that the blade
was too short,' and also 'on religion.'

Finally, however, between seven and eight o'clock in the morning, enter
four men with bludgeons and sabres!--'to one of whom Gerard my comrade
whispered, earnestly, apart. During their colloquy I searched every
where for shoes, that I might lay off the Advocate pumps (pantoufles de
Palais) I had on,' but could find none.--'Constant, called le Sauvage,
Gerard, and a third whose name escapes me, they let clear off: as for
me, four sabres were crossed over my breast, and they led me down. I was
brought to their bar; to the Personage with the scarf, who sat as judge
there. He was a lame man, of tall lank stature. He recognised me on the
streets, and spoke to me seven months after. I have been assured that
he was son of a retired attorney, and named Chepy. Crossing the Court
called Des Nourrices, I saw Manuel haranguing in tricolor scarf.' The
trial, as we see, ends in acquittal and resurrection. (Maton de la
Varenne, Ma Resurrection in Hist. Parl. xviii. 135-156.)

Poor Sicard, from the violon of the Abbaye, shall say but a few words;
true-looking, though tremulous. Towards three in the morning, the
killers bethink them of this little violon; and knock from the court. 'I
tapped gently, trembling lest the murderers might hear, on the opposite
door, where the Section Committee was sitting: they answered gruffly
that they had no key. There were three of us in this violon; my
companions thought they perceived a kind of loft overhead. But it was
very high; only one of us could reach it, by mounting on the shoulders
of both the others. One of them said to me, that my life was usefuller
than theirs: I resisted, they insisted: no denial! I fling myself on the
neck of these two deliverers; never was scene more touching. I mount on
the shoulders of the first, then on those of the second, finally on
the loft; and address to my two comrades the expression of a soul
overwhelmed with natural emotions. (Abbe Sicard: Relation adressee a un
de ses amis, Hist. Parl. xviii. 98-103.)

The two generous companions, we rejoice to find, did not perish. But it
is time that Jourgniac de Saint-Meard should speak his last words, and
end this singular trilogy. The night had become day; and the day has
again become night. Jourgniac, worn down with uttermost agitation, has
fallen asleep, and had a cheering dream: he has also contrived to make
acquaintance with one of the volunteer bailiffs, and spoken in native
Provencal with him. On Tuesday, about one in the morning, his Agony is
reaching its crisis.

'By the glare of two torches, I now descried the terrible tribunal,
where lay my life or my death. The President, in grey coats, with a
sabre at his side, stood leaning with his hands against a table, on
which were papers, an inkstand, tobacco-pipes and bottles. Some ten
persons were around, seated or standing; two of whom had jackets and
aprons: others were sleeping stretched on benches. Two men, in bloody
shirts, guarded the door of the place; an old turnkey had his hand on
the lock. In front of the President, three men held a Prisoner, who
might be about sixty' (or seventy: he was old Marshal Maille, of the
Tuileries and August Tenth). 'They stationed me in a corner; my
guards crossed their sabres on my breast. I looked on all sides for my
Provencal: two National Guards, one of them drunk, presented some appeal
from the Section of Croix Rouge in favour of the Prisoner; the Man in
Grey answered: "They are useless, these appeals for traitors." Then the
Prisoner exclaimed: "It is frightful; your judgment is a murder." The
President answered; "My hands are washed of it; take M. Maille away."
They drove him into the street; where, through the opening of the door,
I saw him massacred.

'The President sat down to write; registering, I suppose, the name of
this one whom they had finished; then I heard him say: "Another, A un
autre!"

'Behold me then haled before this swift and bloody judgment-bar, where
the best protection was to have no protection, and all resources of
ingenuity became null if they were not founded on truth. Two of my
guards held me each by a hand, the third by the collar of my coat. "Your
name, your profession?" said the President. "The smallest lie ruins
you," added one of the judges,--"My name is Jourgniac Saint-Meard; I
have served, as an officer, twenty years: and I appear at your tribunal
with the assurance of an innocent man, who therefore will not
lie."--"We shall see that," said the President: "Do you know why you
are arrested?"--"Yes, Monsieur le President; I am accused of editing the
Journal De la Cour et de la Ville. But I hope to prove the falsity"'--

But no; Jourgniac's proof of the falsity, and defence generally, though
of excellent result as a defence, is not interesting to read. It is
long-winded; there is a loose theatricality in the reporting of it,
which does not amount to unveracity, yet which tends that way. We shall
suppose him successful, beyond hope, in proving and disproving; and skip
largely,--to the catastrophe, almost at two steps.

'"But after all," said one of the Judges, "there is no smoke without
kindling; tell us why they accuse you of that."--"I was about to do
so"'--Jourgniac does so; with more and more success.

'"Nay," continued I, "they accuse me even of recruiting for the
Emigrants!" At these words there arose a general murmur. "O Messieurs,
Messieurs," I exclaimed, raising my voice, "it is my turn to speak; I
beg M. le President to have the kindness to maintain it for me; I never
needed it more."--"True enough, true enough," said almost all the judges
with a laugh: "Silence!"

'While they were examining the testimonials I had produced, a new
Prisoner was brought in, and placed before the President. "It was one
Priest more," they said, "whom they had ferreted out of the Chapelle."
After very few questions: "A la Force!" He flung his breviary on
the table: was hurled forth, and massacred. I reappeared before the
tribunal.

'"You tell us always," cried one of the judges, with a tone of
impatience, "that you are not this, that you are not that: what are you
then?"--"I was an open Royalist."--There arose a general murmur; which
was miraculously appeased by another of the men, who had seemed to take
an interest in me: "We are not here to judge opinions," said he, "but
to judge the results of them." Could Rousseau and Voltaire both in one,
pleading for me, have said better?--"Yes, Messieurs," cried I, "always
till the Tenth of August, I was an open Royalist. Ever since the Tenth
of August that cause has been finished. I am a Frenchman, true to my
country. I was always a man of honour."

'"My soldiers never distrusted me. Nay, two days before that business
of Nanci, when their suspicion of their officers was at its height,
they chose me for commander, to lead them to Luneville, to get back the
prisoners of the Regiment Mestre-de-Camp, and seize General Malseigne."'
Which fact there is, most luckily, an individual present who by a
certain token can confirm.

'The President, this cross-questioning being over, took off his hat and
said: "I see nothing to suspect in this man; I am for granting him his
liberty. Is that your vote?" To which all the judges answered: "Oui,
oui; it is just!"'

And there arose vivats within doors and without; 'escort of three,' amid
shoutings and embracings: thus Jourgniac escaped from jury-trial and the
jaws of death. (Mon Agonie (ut supra), Hist. Parl. xviii. 128.) Maton
and Sicard did, either by trial, and no bill found, lank President Chepy
finding 'absolutely nothing;' or else by evasion, and new favour of
Moton the brave watchmaker, likewise escape; and were embraced, and wept
over; weeping in return, as they well might.

Thus they three, in wondrous trilogy, or triple soliloquy;
uttering simultaneously, through the dread night-watches, their
Night-thoughts,--grown audible to us! They Three are become audible: but
the other 'Thousand and Eighty-nine, of whom Two Hundred and Two were
Priests,' who also had Night-thoughts, remain inaudible; choked for ever
in black Death. Heard only of President Chepy and the Man in Grey!--



Chapter 3.1.VI.

The Circular.

But the Constituted Authorities, all this while? The Legislative
Assembly; the Six Ministers; the Townhall; Santerre with the National
Guard?--It is very curious to think what a City is. Theatres, to
the number of some twenty-three, were open every night during these
prodigies: while right-arms here grew weary with slaying, right-arms
there are twiddledeeing on melodious catgut; at the very instant when
Abbe Sicard was clambering up his second pair of shoulders, three-men
high, five hundred thousand human individuals were lying horizontal, as
if nothing were amiss.

As for the poor Legislative, the sceptre had departed from it. The
Legislative did send Deputation to the Prisons, to the Street-Courts;
and poor M. Dusaulx did harangue there; but produced no conviction
whatsoever: nay, at last, as he continued haranguing, the Street-Court
interposed, not without threats; and he had to cease, and withdraw. This
is the same poor worthy old M. Dusaulx who told, or indeed almost
sang (though with cracked voice), the Taking of the Bastille,--to our
satisfaction long since. He was wont to announce himself, on such and
on all occasions, as the Translator of Juvenal. "Good Citizens, you
see before you a man who loves his country, who is the Translator of
Juvenal," said he once.--"Juvenal?" interrupts Sansculottism: "who the
devil is Juvenal? One of your sacres Aristocrates? To the Lanterne!"
From an orator of this kind, conviction was not to be expected. The
Legislative had much ado to save one of its own Members, or
Ex-Members, Deputy Journeau, who chanced to be lying in arrest for mere
Parliamentary delinquencies, in these Prisons. As for poor old Dusaulx
and Company, they returned to the Salle de Manege, saying, "It was dark;
and they could not see well what was going on." (Moniteur, Debate of 2nd
September, 1792.)

Roland writes indignant messages, in the name of Order, Humanity, and
the Law; but there is no Force at his disposal. Santerre's National
Force seems lazy to rise; though he made requisitions, he says,--which
always dispersed again. Nay did not we, with Advocate Maton's eyes,
see 'men in uniform,' too, with their 'sleeves bloody to the shoulder?'
Petion goes in tricolor scarf; speaks "the austere language of the
law:" the killers give up, while he is there; when his back is turned,
recommence. Manuel too in scarf we, with Maton's eyes, transiently saw
haranguing, in the Court called of Nurses, Cour des Nourrices. On the
other hand, cruel Billaud, likewise in scarf, 'with that small puce coat
and black wig we are used to on him,' (Mehee, Fils ut supra, in Hist.
Parl. xviii. p. 189.) audibly delivers, 'standing among corpses,' at
the Abbaye, a short but ever-memorable harangue, reported in various
phraseology, but always to this purpose: "Brave Citizens, you are
extirpating the Enemies of Liberty; you are at your duty. A grateful
Commune, and Country, would wish to recompense you adequately; but
cannot, for you know its want of funds. Whoever shall have worked
(travaille) in a Prison shall receive a draft of one louis, payable
by our cashier. Continue your work." (Montgaillard, iii. 191.)--The
Constituted Authorities are of yesterday; all pulling different ways:
there is properly not Constituted Authority, but every man is his own
King; and all are kinglets, belligerent, allied, or armed-neutral,
without king over them.