Ange Pitou (Volume 1)

by Alexandre Dumas

  Maillard will command the active army. Without a smile, without a wink, he accepts his appointment.

  Maillard is general commandant of the women of Paris.

  The campaign will not be a long one; but it will be decisive.

  1 A celebrated coffee-house.

  | Go to Contents |

  Chapter XX

  Maillard a General

  IT was really an army that Maillard commanded.

  It had cannon, deprived of carriages and wheels, it is true; but they had been placed on carts. It had muskets, many of which were deficient in locks and triggers, it is true; but every one had a bayonet.

  It had a quantity of other weapons, very awkward ones, it is true; but they were weapons.

  It had gunpowder, which was carried in pocket-handkerchiefs, in caps, and in pockets; and in the midst of these living cartouche-boxes walked the artillery-men with their lighted matches.

  That the whole army was not blown into the air during this extraordinary journey, was certainly a perfect miracle.

  Maillard at one glance appreciated the feelings of his army. He saw that it would be of no use to keep it on the square where it had assembled, nor to confine it within the walls of Paris, but to lead it on to Versailles, and once arrived there to prevent the harm which it might attempt to do.

  This difficult, this heroic task, Maillard was determined to accomplish.

  And in consequence, Maillard descends the steps and takes the drum which was hanging from the shoulders of the young girl.

  Dying with hunger, the poor young girl has no longer strength to carry it. She gives up the drum, glides along a wall, and falls with her head against a post.

  A gloomy pillow,—the pillow of hunger.

  Maillard asks her name. She replies that it is Madeleine Chambry. Her occupation had been carving in wood for churches. But who now thinks of endowing churches with those beautiful ornaments in wood, those beautiful statues, those magnificent basso-relievos, the master-pieces of the fifteenth century?

  Dying with hunger, she had become a flower-girl in the Palais Royal.

  But who thinks of purchasing flowers when money is wanting to buy even bread? Flowers, those stars which shine in the heaven of peace and abundance,—flowers are withered by storms of wind and revolutions.

  Being no longer able to sculpture her fruits in oak, being no longer able to sell her roses, her jessamines, and lilacs, Madeleine Chambry took a drum, and beat the terrible reveille of hunger.

  She also must go to Versailles,—she who had assembled all this gloomy deputation; only, as she is too feeble to walk, she is to be carried there in a cart.

  When they arrive at Versailles, they will ask that she may be admitted into the palace with twelve other women. She is to be the orator; famishing, she will there plead before the king the cause of all those that are starving.

  This idea of Maillard was much applauded.

  And thus by a word Maillard had at once changed every hostile feeling.

  They did not before this know why they were going to Versailles; they did not know what they were going to do there.

  But now they know; they know that a deputation of twelve women, with Madeleine Chambry at their head, is going to supplicate the king, in the name of hunger, to take compassion on his people.

  Somewhere about seven thousand women were there assembled. They commence their march, going along the quays.

  But on arriving at the Tuileries, loud shouts were heard.

  Maillard jumped upon a post in order to be seen by the whole of his army.

  "What is it that you want?" he asked them.

  "We wish to pass through the Tuileries."

  "That is impossible," replied Maillard.

  "And why is it impossible?" cried seven thousand voices.

  "Because the Tuileries is the king's house and its gardens the king's; because to pass through them without the king's permission, would be to insult the king,—and more than that, it would be attacking, in the king's person, the liberty of all."

  "Well, then, be it so," say the women; "ask permission of the Swiss."1

  Maillard went to the Swiss, his cocked hat in his hand.

  "My friend," said he, "will you allow these ladies to go through the Tuileries? They will only go through the archway, and will not do any injury to the plants or trees."

  The only answer the Swiss gave was to draw his long rapier, and to rush upon Maillard.

  Maillard drew his sword, which was full a foot shorter, and their weapons crossed.

  While they were tilting at each other, a woman went behind the Swiss, and gave him a fearful blow upon the head with a broom-handle, and laid him at Maillard's feet.

  At the same time another woman was about to run the Swiss through the body with a thrust of her bayonet.

  Maillard sheathes his sword, takes that of the Swiss under one arm, the musket of the woman under the other, picks up his hat, which had fallen to the ground during the struggle, puts it upon his head, and then leads his victorious troops through the Tuileries, where, in fulfilment of the promise he had made, no sort of damage was committed by them.

  Let us, therefore, allow them to continue their way quietly through the Cours la Reine, and go on towards Sèvres, where they separated into two bands, and let us return to what was going on at Paris.

  These seven thousand women had not very nearly drowned the electors, hanged the Abbé Lefevre and Maillard, and burned the Hôtel de Ville, without making a certain degree of noise.

  On hearing this noise, which had been re-echoed even in the most remote quarters of the capital, Lafayette had hastened towards the Hôtel de Ville.

  He was holding a sort of review at the Champ de Mars. He had been on horseback from eight o'clock in the morning; he reached the square of the Hôtel de Ville just as the clock was striking twelve.

  The caricatures of those days represented Lafayette as a centaur, the body of which was the famous white horse which had become proverbial. The head was that of the commandant of the National Guard.

  From the commencement of the Revolution, Lafayette spoke on horseback, Lafayette eat on horseback, Lafayette gave all his orders on horseback.

  It often even happened that he slept on horseback.

  And therefore when by chance he could sleep on his bed, Lafayette slept soundly.

  When Lafayette reached the Quay Pelletier, he was stopped by a man who had been riding at full gallop on a swift horse.

  This man was Gilbert; he was going to Versailles; he was going to forewarn the king of the visit with which he was threatened, and to place himself at his orders.

  In two words he related all that had happened to Lafayette.

  After that he rode off again at full speed.

  Lafayette went on towards the Hôtel de Ville.

  Gilbert went towards Versailles; only as the women were going on the right bank of the Seine, he took the left side of the river.

  The square before the Hôtel de Ville having been vacated by the women, was soon afterwards filled with men.

  These men were National Guards, receiving pay or not receiving it; old French guards, above all, who, having gone over to the people, had lost their privileges of king's guards,—privileges which had been inherited by the Swiss and the body-guards.

  To the noise made by the women had succeeded the noise of the alarm-bell and the drums, calling the people to arms.

  Lafayette made his way through the crowd, alighted from his horse at the foot of the steps, and without paying any attention to the acclamations, mingled with threats, excited by his presence, he began to dictate a letter to the king upon the insurrection which had taken place that morning.

  He had got to the sixth line of his letter, when the door of the secretary's office was violently thrown open.

  Lafayette raised his eyes. A deputation of grenadiers demanded to be received by the general.

  Lafayette made a sign to the deputation that they might come in.
r />   They entered the room.

  The grenadier who had been appointed spokesman of the deputation advanced to the table.

  "General," said he, in a firm voice, "we are deputed by ten companies of grenadiers. We do not believe that you are a traitor; but we are betrayed by the Government. It is time that all this should come to an end. We cannot turn our bayonets against women who are asking us for bread. The Provisioning Committee is either peculating, or it is incompetent; in either case, it is necessary that it should be changed. The people are unhappy; the source of their unhappiness is at Versailles. It is necessary to go there to find the king and bring him to Paris. The Flanders regiment must be exterminated, as well as the body-guards, who have dared to trample under foot the national cockade. If the king be too weak to wear the crown, let him abdicate; we will crown his son. A council of regency will be nominated, and all will then go well."

  Lafayette gazed at the speaker with astonishment. He had witnessed disturbances; he had wept over assassinations; but this was the first time that the breath of revolution had in reality been personally addressed to him.

  This possibility that the people saw of being able to do without the king amazed him; it did more, it confounded him.

  "How is this?" cried he." Have you, then, formed the project of making war upon the king, and of thus compelling him to abandon us?"

  "General," replied the spokesman, "we love and we respect the king; we should be much hurt should he leave us, for we owe him much. But, in short, should he leave us, we have the dauphin."

  "Gentlemen! gentlemen!" cried Lafayette, "beware of what you are doing; you are attacking the crown, and it is my duty not to allow such a step!"

  "General," replied the National Guard, bowing, "we would for you shed the last drop of our blood. But the people are unhappy; the source of the evil is at Versailles. We must go to Versailles and bring the king to Paris. It is the people's will."

  Lafayette saw that it was necessary to sacrifice his own feelings; and this was a necessity from which he never shrank.

  He descends into the centre of the square, and wishes to harangue the people; but cries of "To Versailles! To Versailles!" drown his voice.

  Suddenly a great tumult was heard proceeding from the Rue de la Vannerie. It is Bailly, who in his turn is coming to the Hôtel de Ville.

  At the sight of Bailly, cries of "Bread! Bread! To Versailles!" burst from every side.

  Lafayette, on foot, lost amid the crowd, feels that the tide continues rising higher and higher, and will completely swallow him up.

  He presses through the crowd, in order to reach his horse, with the same ardor that a shipwrecked mariner swims to reach a rock.

  At last he grasps his bridle, vaults on his charger's back, and urges him on towards the entrance of the Hôtel de Ville; but the way is completely closed to him. Walls of men have grown up between him and it.

  "Zounds, General!" cry these men, "you must remain with us."

  At the same time tremendous shouts are heard of "To Versailles! To Versailles!"

  Lafayette wavers, hesitates. Yes, undoubtedly, by going to Versailles he may be very useful to the king; but will he be able to master and restrain this crowd who are urging him to Versailles? Will he be able to command these billows which have swept him from his feet, and against which he feels that he will now have to combat for his own safety?

  Suddenly a man descends the steps, pushes through the crowd, a letter in his hand, and makes such good use of his feet and elbows, particularly the latter, that he at length reaches Lafayette.

  This man was the ever indefatigable Billot.

  "Here, General," said he, "this comes from the Three Hundred."

  It was thus the electors were called.

  Lafayette broke the seal, and began to read it to himself; but twenty thousand voices at once cried out:

  "The letter! the letter!"

  Lafayette was therefore compelled to read the letter aloud. He makes a sign to request that they will be silent. Instantaneously, and as by a miracle, silence succeeds to the immense tumult; and Lafayette reads the following letter, not one word of which was lost by the people:—

  "Seeing the state of circumstances and the desire of the people, and on the representation of the commandant-general that it was impossible to refuse, the electors assembled in council authorize the commandant-general, and even order him, to repair to Versailles.

  "Four commissaries of the district will accompany him."

  Poor Latayette had absolutely represented nothing to the electors, who were by no means disinclined to leave some portion of the responsibility of the events which were about to happen on his shoulders. But the people,—they believed that he had really made representations, and this coincided so precisely with their views that they made the air ring with their shouts of "Long live Lafayette!"

  Lafayette turned pale, but in his turn repeated, "To Versailles"

  Fifteen thousand men followed him, with a more silent enthusiasm, but which was at the same time more terrible than that of the women who had gone forward as the advanced guard.

  All these people were to assemble again at Versailles, to ask the king for the crumbs which fell from the table of the body-guards during the orgies of the 1st of October.

  1 The porter, or gate-keeper.

  | Go to Contents |

  Chapter XXI

  Versailles

  AS usual, they were completely ignorant at Versailles of what was going on at Paris.

  After the scenes which we have described, and on the occurrence of which the queen had openly congratulated herself, her Majesty was resting herself after her fatigue.

  She had an army; she had her devotees; she had counted her enemies; she wished to begin the contest.

  Had she not the defeat of the 14th of July to avenge? Had she not the king's journey to Paris—a journey from which he had returned with the tricolored cockade in his hat—to forget, and to make her court forget it also?

  Poor woman! she but little expected the journey which she herself would be shortly compelled to take.

  Since her altercation with Charny, she had scarcely spoken to him. She affected to treat Andrée with her former friendliness, which had for a time been deadened in her heart, but which was forever extinguished in that of her rival.

  As to Charny, she never turned towards or looked at him, but when she was compelled to address herself to him upon matters regarding his service, or to give him an order.

  It was not a family disgrace; for on the very morning on which the Parisians were to leave Paris to come to Versailles, the queen was seen talking affectionately with young George de Charny, the second of the three brothers, who, in contradiction to Olivier, had given such warlike counsels to the queen on the arrival of the news of the capture of the Bastille.

  And in fact, at nine in the morning, as the young officer was crossing the gallery to announce to the huntsman that the king intended going out, Marie Antoinette, returning from Mass in the chapel, saw him, and called him to her.

  "Where are you running thus, sir?" said she to him.

  "As soon as I perceived your Majesty I ran no longer," replied George; "on the contrary, I instantly stopped, and I was waiting humbly for the honor you have done me in addressing me."

  "That does not prevent you, sir, from replying to my question, and telling me whither you are going."

  "Madame," replied George, "I am on duty to-day, and form part of the escort. His Majesty hunts to-day; and I am going to the huntsman to make arrangements for the meet."

  "Ah! the king hunts again to-day," said the queen, looking at the big dark clouds which were rolling on from Paris towards Versailles. "He is wrong to do so. The weather appears to be threatening; does it not, Andrée?"

  "Yes, Madame," absently replied the Countess de Charny.

  "Are you not of that opinion, sir?"

  "I am so, Madame; but such is the king's will."

  "May the king's will be done
, in the woods and on the highroads!" replied the queen, with that gayety of manner which was habitual with her,and of which neither the sorrows of the heart nor political events could ever deprive her.

  Then turning towards Andrée:—

  "It is but just that he should have this amusement," said the queen to her in a whisper.

  And then aloud to George:—

  "Can you tell me, sir, where the king intends hunting?"

  "In the Meudon wood, Madame."

  "Well, then, accompany him, and watch carefully over his safety."

  At this moment the Count de Charny had entered the room. He smiled kindly at Andrée, and shaking his head, ventured to say to the queen:—

  "That is a recommendation which my brother will not fail to remember, Madame, not in the midst of the king's pleasures, but in the midst of his dangers."

  At the sound of the voice which had struck upon her ear, before her eyes had warned her of the presence of Charny, Marie Antoinette started, and turning round:

  "I should have been much astonished," said she, with disdainful harshness, "if such a saying had not proceeded from the Count Olivier de Charny."

  "And why so, Madame?" respectfully inquired the count.

  "Because it prophesies misfortune, sir."

  Andrée turned pale on seeing that the color fled from her husband's cheeks.

  He bowed without offering a reply.

  Then, on a look from his wife, who appeared to be amazed at his being so patient:—

  "I am really extremely unfortunate," he said, "since I no longer know how to speak to the queen without offending her."

  The "no longer" was emphasized in the same manner as a skilful actor would emphasize the more important syllables.

  The ear of the queen was too well exercised not to perceive at once the stress which Charny had laid upon his words.

  "No longer!" she exclaimed sharply, "no longer; what mean you by no longer?"

  "I have again spoken unfortunately, it would appear," said De Charny, unaffectedly.

  And he exchanged a look with Andrée, which the queen this time perceived.

  She in her turn became pale, and then her teeth firmly set together with rage.