by Eugène Sue
Almost as soon as Robespierre left the tribunal, there were seen to enter the hall first Danton, a man of energy and action, and then Lafayette.
The presence of these two men, personifying respectively action and reaction, revolution and counter-revolution, drew forth from the meeting an obstreperous manifestation, part acclamation, part hisses. The exteriors of these two men offered a contrast in keeping with that of their opinions.
The young Marquis of Lafayette, tall of stature, slim, urbane, presented the accepted type of the grand seigneur. He wore with grace his uniform of commander-in-chief of the National Guard. Booted and spurred, his sword at his side, his hat under his arm, he entered that darksome hall where on every face he could read the sentiments of hostility which he called forth; and yet he advanced with the same aristocratic ease with which he would have presented himself in the Oeil-de-Boeuf, or court circle, at Versailles. His intrepid front bespoke the man insensible to danger; his piercing yet ever indecisive and fugitive glance, revealed a habit of conduct stamped with capability and cunning, yet always veering with his ambitions, and as changeable and diverse as the events which gave them birth; finally, his smile, which was almost invariably affable, courteous and insinuating, seemed to be ever courting popularity.
Danton, though also young and of athletic build, was careless of dress. The ill-restrained mettle of his carriage, his flashing eye, his countenance at once sensual and bold, idealistic and tender; his robust, sanguine and exuberant make-up, all bore testimony to the most contradictory qualities within him, — vices and virtues; energy and weakness; appalling cruelty and inexpressible, deep-seated tenderness; pettiness and heroism.
The presence of Danton in the hall of the Jacobins reawoke, re-excited the people. “There is Danton! There is Danton!” were the words which ran through the assembly with a thrill of curiosity, sympathy and confidence.
Danton mounted the tribunal, and in his thundering voice cried out:
“Citizens, on the result of this session hangs perhaps the safety of the country! The first functionary of the State has disappeared! Here, in this meeting, are assembled the men charged with the regeneration of France — some powerful in their genius, others in their influence! France will be saved if all internal dissension is hushed. That has not yet been done. Experience reveals to us the extent of our woes. I ought to speak, I shall speak, as if I were engraving history for posterity!
“And first,” pursued Danton, indicating Lafayette with a gesture of contempt, “and first I interpellate Monsieur Lafayette, here present. I ask him what he has come to do here — he, at the Jacobins? He the signer of so many projected laws directed against liberty! He who demanded the dissolution of the Jacobin Club, composed almost entirely, according to him, of men without law, subsidized to perpetuate anarchy! He, who triumphantly led the inhabitants of the suburb of St. Antoine to the destruction of the dungeon of Vincennes, that last den of tyranny, and who, the same evening, accorded protection to the assassins who were armed with poniards to assist the King in his flight! Let us not deceive ourselves! That flight is the result of a conspiracy in which the public officials were confederates. And you, Lafayette, who answered with your head for the person of Louis XVI, have you paid your debt?”
In spite of this vehement apostrophe, which drew the applause of the people, Lafayette maintained his imperturbable coolness. He smiled, and indicated with a nod of his head that he wished to reply to the speaker.
“Citizens,” continued Danton, “in order to save France, the people must take great satisfaction, and establish radical reforms. The people is tired of being braved by its enemies. It is anxious to send them back to oblivion. It is not a matter of altering the principle of the irrevocability of the Representatives of the people, but of expelling from the National Assembly and delivering to justice those of the deputies who call down civil war upon France by the audacity of an infamous rebellion. But if the voice of the defenders of the people is smothered, if our guilty officers put the country in danger, I shall appeal from them to posterity. It is for it to judge between them and me!” —
And Danton left the tribunal.
Great was the consternation of the populace, thus a second time deceived in its hopes; for the legitimate accusations hurled by the orator at Lafayette, and the vague proposition to drive the traitors from the Assembly, led to no positive measure, indicated no means of providing for the safety of the nation.
Lafayette stepped upon the platform just vacated by Danton. He comfortably established himself there. Then, bowing with a grand air to the assembly, he laid down his hat, and said in a calm voice and with accents of perfect courtesy:
“Gentlemen, one of messieurs my predecessors did me the honor to ask why I had come to the Jacobins. I come to them because it is to them that all citizens should come in these times of crises and alarms. More than ever, gentlemen, must we now fight for liberty. I said among the first: ‘A people that wishes to become free, holds its destiny in its own hands.’ I was never more sure of liberty than after enjoying the spectacle presented to us by the capital during this day.”
After a second obeisance to the audience, no less courteous than the first, the Marquis of Lafayette descended from the tribunal and quickly gained the door of the hall.
CHAPTER IV.
THE KING ARRESTED.
JUNE 26, 1791. — Last night Victoria and I were present at the return of Louis XVI to Paris. The King was arrested at Varennes, on the night of the 22nd of June. Citizen Drouet, an old dragoon and now master-of-the-post at St. Menehould, recognized Louis XVI under his disguise of valet-de-chambre while the coaches of the fugitive King were changing horses in his hostlery. The Queen, armed with a false passport, was traveling under the name of the Baroness of Korff and suite. Citizen Drouet did not dare arrest the fugitives at St. Menehould, the carriages being escorted by one of the detachments of dragoons and hussars which the Marquis of Bouillé, commander-in-chief at Metz, and accomplice in the flight of the King, had stationed along the road from Paris to the frontier. But after the departure of the royal coach Drouet took horse with one of his postillions, and following a short cut, arrived at Varennes ahead of the mysterious travelers. It was midnight. He at once gave the alarm and announced the speedy arrival of Louis XVI. The National Guard assembled under arms, and proceeded to arrest the King immediately upon his entering the town. Louis and his family were conveyed back to Paris by Barnave and Petion, the committee-men whom the Assembly had despatched on that errand.
During the days that elapsed between the King’s flight and his forced return to Paris, diverse shades of opinion made themselves manifest in the capital. Brissot, in his journal, The French Patriot, summed up in clear and concise terms the consequences of the events which for five days had been agitating the city.
“What is to be done in the present circumstances?” said he. “Six plans are proposed: To abolish royalty and substitute for it a Republican government. To let the question of the King and royalty go before the nation for judgment. To judge the King by a national court. To demand his abdication. To remove Louis Capet and name a Regent — and, finally, to leave the King on the throne, and give him an elective cabinet. The first proposition is comprehensive: An end of Kings; let us be Republicans.”
The sentiment for a Republic was growing greatly, as also was the public indignation against Louis XVI, and against the constitutionalist majority of the Assembly. Several causes worked toward these results, chief among them being the manifesto of the Marquis of Bouillé, the monarchist commander, addressed to the people, and winding up with the threat:
I know my forces. Soon your chastisement will serve as a memorable example to posterity! That is how a man must speak to you in whom you at first inspired pity. Accuse no one of conspiracy against your infernal Constitution. The King did not give the orders that have been given: I alone have ordered everything. Against me, then, whet your daggers and prepare your poisons. You shall answer for the days o
f the King to all the Kings of the world. Touch a hair of his head, and there will not remain one stone upon another in Paris. I know the roads. I shall conduct the foreign armies. Farewell, messieurs; I end without comment. You know my sentiments.
MARQUIS OF BOUILLÉ.
These insults, these menaces, addressed to the Revolution, to France in the name of all the Kings of the world by a royalist confidant and accomplice of Louis XVI, by a general who, “knowing the roads, would lead the foreign armies upon Paris, of which he would not leave one stone upon another,” unveiled, with brutal frankness, the plan of the federated sovereigns. Nevertheless, such was the blindness of the National Assembly that instead of declaring the deposition of Louis XVI and bringing him before their bar, they contented themselves with decreeing: “That a guard be given to the King to be responsible for his person, and that the accomplices of his flight be examined by the committee-men of the Assembly, who will also hear the statements of Louis XVI and the Queen.”
We went, Victoria and I, to the Elysian Fields, about six in the evening of the 25th of June, to be present at the entry of Louis into his good city of Paris.
A vast concourse of people covered the Elysian Fields and Louis XV Place. After great effort we succeeded in drawing near to the double cordon formed by the National Guard to allow a free passage to the royal cortege. A murmur beginning in the distance and drawing nearer and nearer announced the arrival of the King. General Lafayette passed by at a gallop, escorted by a brilliant staff of blue-bonnets, on his way to meet the carriages.
The brave Santerre, so highly esteemed by the inhabitants of the St. Antoine suburb, also passed by on horseback to join the royal escort. He was accompanied by two patriots, Fournier the American, and the Marquis of St. Huruque, one of those aristocrats who embraced the revolutionary cause. Santerre advanced at the head of his battalion, recruited among the districts of St. Antoine. Nearly every citizen in that corps, too needy to purchase a uniform, was dressed in his workman’s habiliments. The greater part of them bore pike-staffs in lieu of guns. The aspect of these men — their half-bared breasts, their honest, energetic and bluff faces, their resolute attitude, their every-day working clothes, and their proletarian woolen caps — offered a striking contrast to that of the “Bearskins,” as were called, from their head-gear, the grenadiers of the National Guard from the districts in the center of Paris, nearly all constitutional monarchists.
Soon, repeated nearer and nearer, were heard the words: “Here comes the King! Here comes Capet! Here are Monsieur and Madam Veto!” All eyes were turned toward the royal equipages. As they drove by, a storm began to gather, the lightning flickered and the thunder growled; the heavens grew dark and lent a doleful illumination to the spectacle of which we were the witnesses. A battalion of the National Guard, preceded by Lafayette’s staff-officers, led the way; then came the two royal coaches. Ah, this was no longer the time of monarchic splendors, paid for out of the sweat of an enslaved people! This was no longer the time of gilded coaches, surrounded by pages and lackeys, and fleetly drawn by eight horses richly caparisoned, preceded by outriders in dashing liveries, escorted by equerries, guards, and gentlemen loaded with gold and silver broideries, and flashing like a dazzling whirlwind along the avenues of the royal parks!
The first of the two carriages in which the royal family and its suite were riding under escort, was an enormous yellow berlin, which had served Louis in his flight. Covered with dust and mire, it was dragged by six post-horses harnessed on with ropes, and mounted by postillions whose hats bore long tricolored ribbons and cockades.
The carriage went by at a walk, giving all a good view of the royal family. Louis XVI was dressed in a maroon suit with a straight collar — his disguise as valet-de-chambre to the pretended Baroness of Korff. He occupied a seat at the right, in the bottom of the berlin, at the side of which General Lafayette strutted on horseback. The bloated face of Louis XVI, imprinted with the spineless inertia of his character, expressed neither fear, nor anger, nor surprise. With his elbow he nudged the Queen, who was seated beside him, and pointed out to her with his finger one of the placards, which bore in large letters the words: “Silence, and remain covered, citizens. The King is to pass before his judges.”
In the front part of the carriage we saw the King’s sister, Madam Elizabeth, her face sad and sweet. She seemed greatly afraid, and held her eyes cast down. Close beside her was Petion, one of the commissioners of the Assembly, grave and severe. The other commissioner, Barnave, one of the chiefs of the Girondin party, a fine-looking young man, attached at times a furtive but passionate gaze upon Marie Antoinette, with whom, according to report, he was already seriously smitten. Between his knees he held the Dauphin, Marie Antoinette’s son, a pretty child with golden curly hair, who laughed and smiled with boyish carefreeness.
The second coach contained the personages of the court who had participated in the King’s escape. Next came a little open carriage trimmed with green twigs from which floated the tricolored flag. In this vehicle, standing erect, in an attitude of triumph, rode Drouet the post-keeper and his postillion William, both of whom had helped bring about the arrest of the King at Varennes.
The procession was closed by the St. Antoine battalion, commanded by Santerre. As it came in sight the people cried with one voice, “Long live the law! Long live the Nation!” Then the storm broke over Paris, and amidst such exclamations, mingled with the crashing of thunder, Louis XVI entered as a prisoner the palace of his fathers.
Such was the blindness of the Assembly in its bourgeois egotism, in its mistrust of the people, in its absurd hatred of republican government, that it still thought to impose upon France the authority of this King, disgraced, despised even by his own partisans, and convicted of perjury, treason, and conspiracy with the foreigner.
CHAPTER V.
THE DAY OF THE FIELD OF MARS.
JULY 17, 1791 (Midnight). — I have just returned to our lodging, my spirits still in the grip of horror and affright. I have been at the massacre of the Field of Mars. Curses upon Lafayette!
The recital of this mournful event, which must be charged to the bourgeoisie, will be of service to the sons of Joel.
From early morning, the weather was magnificent. Not a cloud flecked the azure of the sky. A great mass of people, myself among them, directed their steps toward the Field of Mars, men, women and children in holiday apparel. Every face breathed joy, and on all countenances shone satisfaction. At least as many women as citizens were in the throng. They, also, felt a legitimate pride in being able to prove their devotion to civic duty by affixing their names to a petition destined for the National Assembly.
About half after eight in the morning, as I reached Great Rock, near one of the gates of the esplanade of the Field of Mars, I heard shouts, and almost immediately the crowd before me turned and fell away on either side, as if a prey to some unspeakable horror. Then I saw approaching the giant Lehiron, marching at the head of a band of his brigands — Lehiron, whom I had thought killed by Franz of Gerolstein, but who, recovered from his wound, reappeared before my eyes. On the end of a pike the villain carried a freshly severed head; one of his disciples carried a second head likewise transfixed on a pike-staff, and shouted: “Death to the aristocrats! To the lamp-post with the enemies of the people!” Several vixens, drunk and in tatters, had joined the assassins and echoed their cries of death. In the group I recognized, through their feminine masquerade, Abbot Morlet and his god-son, little Rodin.
The band of murderers with their frightful trophies passed before me like a horrid vision.
At last, about two o’clock in the afternoon, a deputation of Jacobins arrived. The spokesman informed the eager and attentive crowd that an address proposed the evening before had been withdrawn by the club, as it might be construed as a rebellion against the Assembly. The people were for an instant rendered dumb by disappointment. A number of voices cried out:
“Then draw us up another petition. We will si
gn it!”
The Jacobin spokesman and four chosen from among his fellow delegates, Citizens Peyre, Vachart, Robert, and Demoy, drew up on the instant an address, which Citizen Demoy read, as follows:
“ON THE ALTAR OF THE COUNTRY,
“FIELD OF MARS, JULY 17 OF THE YEAR III OF LIBERTY.
“Representatives of the Nation:
“You are approaching the end of your labors. A great crime has been committed. Louis XVI flees, unworthily abandons his post. The citizens arrest him at Varennes. He is brought back to Paris. The people of the capital immediately demand that the fate of the guilty one be left undecided until an expression of opinion be obtained from the eighty-three departments of France. A multitude of addresses demanded of you that you pass judgment on Louis XVI. You, gentlemen, have prejudged him innocent and inviolable!
“Legislators, such was not the opinion of the people. Justice must be done.
“Everything compels us to demand of you, in the name of all France, that you reconsider your decision, that you hold that the offense of Louis XVI is proven; that the King, by the very fact of his flight, has abdicated.
“Receive, then, his abdication.
“Legislators, convoke a new constituent power, which will proceed in a truly national manner to deal with this guilty King, and above all to the organization of a new executive power.
“Signed:
“PEYRE,
“VACHART,
“ROBERT,
“DEMOY.”
The reading of the petition, concise, measured in terms, but marked with energy, was received with unanimous applause. Its summary tenor, repeated from mouth to mouth down the whole length of the Field of Mars, received the assent of everyone. Then began an admirable scene. The petitioners, men, women and children, forming in long files, in perfect order, to the left of the staging, stopped one by one at the foot of the Altar of the Country, placing their signatures upon the thick book, whose many pages were bound together with lacings, and then descended on the other side of the stage; and all without confusion, without outcry, as if each were deeply conscious of the importance of the civic act.