PLACES OF BLOOD--PLACE DE LA CONCORDE.
Almost every fine square in Paris has a high-sounding name, For
instance, that spot which has been the theater of so much tragedy, upon
which so much human blood has been poured, is called the _Place de la
Concorde_. It much more appropriately might be called the Place of
Blood. So there are other, many other spots in Paris, which deserve a
scarlet title, and when wandering a stranger through its streets,
whenever I came to one of these, I was strongly inclined to stop and
indulge in reverie. The past history of France and Paris arose before my
mind, and I could not, if I would, away with it. The characters who
acted parts in Paris and perished in those places were before me, and
their histories lent a powerful interest to the spot upon which they
suffered and died. The reader can have no adequate idea of the feelings
with which a stranger visits these places of sad memories, unless he
recalls them to mind, nor will it be out place for me to do so.
A prison was often pointed out to me in which the celebrated Madame
Roland was confined, and the spot upon which she suffered death. I gazed
long at the grim walls which shut out the sunlight from that noble
woman--long upon the stones which drank her blood in the Place de la
Concorde. Her whole history was as vividly before me as if I were living
in the terrible days of blood. Her maiden name was Manon Philipon, and
her father was an engraver. They lived in Paris, where she grew up with
the sweetest of dispositions, and one of the finest of intellects. Her
mother was a woman of refinement and culture. She was excessively fond
of books and flowers, so much so that many years later she wrote, "I can
forget the injustice of men and my sufferings, among books and flowers."
Her parents gave her good masters, and she applied herself to her
studies with ardor and delight. They were never harsh in their treatment
of her, but always gentle and kind. She acted nearly as she pleased, but
seems not to have been spoiled by such a discipline as we might have
expected. When she was only nine years old, Plutarch fell into her
hands, and she was intensely interested in it--more so than with all the
fairy tales she had ever read. From him she drank in republicanism at
that early age. She also read Fenelon and Tasso. She spent nearly the
whole of her time in reading, though she assisted her mother somewhat in
her household duties. The family belonged to the middle-classes, and
despised the debaucheries of the higher and lower orders of the people.
The mother was pious, and Manon was placed for a year in a convent. She
then spent a year with her grandparents, and returned to her father's
house. Her course of reading was very much enlarged, and her attention
was now specially directed to philosophical works. She was thus a great
deal alone, and gave little of her time to gossip and promenade. She
went, however, once to Versailles, and saw the routine of court, but
returned with a great delight to her old books and the heroes in them.
She was dissatisfied with France and Frenchmen. She says: "I sighed as I
thought of Athens, where I could have equally admired the fine arts
without being wounded by the spectacle of despotism. I transported
myself in thought to Greece--I was present at the Olympic games, and I
grew angry at finding myself French. Thus struck by all of grand which
is offered by the republics of antiquity, I forgot the death of
Socrates, the exile of Aristides, the sentence of Phocion."
She began, at last, to repine at her situation. She felt conscious of
her abilities, and that her thoughts were high and noble, and she longed
for a higher position, in which she might use her talents. Her father
grew more and more poor and unable to care for his family, and her
mother was anxious that she should be married. She did not lack offers.
She was beautiful and accomplished, and many suitors presented
themselves, but not one whom she could love. Her mother now died, to her
great sorrow. She now persuaded her father to retire from the business
which he was ruining, and save the little property he had left, and she
retired to a little convent. She prepared her own food, lived very
simply, and saw only her own relations.
It was about this time that Manon became acquainted, through a
school-friend, with M. Roland, who was the younger son of a poor, but
noble family, and whose lot in life was not an easy one. He was now
considerably advanced in years, and was superintendent of the
manufactories at Rouen and Amiens. He had written several works upon
these subjects, and was somewhat celebrated. She took great pleasure in
his society, and after five years of friendship, respected, and perhaps
loved him. He offered himself and was finally accepted. She says: "In
short, if marriage was as I thought, an austere union, an association in
which the woman usually burdens herself with the happiness of two
individuals, it were better that I should exert my abilities and my
courage in so honorable a task, than in the solitude in which I lived."
The married couple visited Switzerland and England, and then settled
down near Lyons, with her husband's relations. She had one child--a
daughter--and her life and happiness consisted in taking care of her and
her husband. She thus gives a beautiful picture of her life:
"Seated in my chimney corner at eleven, before noon, after a peaceful
night and my morning tasks--my husband at his desk, and his little girl
knitting--I am conversing with the former, and overlooking the work of
the latter; enjoying the happiness of being warmly sheltered in the
bosom of my dear little family, and writing to a friend, while the snow
is falling on so many poor wretches overwhelmed by sorrow and penury. I
grieve over their fate, I repose on my own, and make no account of those
family annoyances which appeared formerly to tarnish my felicity."
The revolution came amid all their sweet and quiet pleasure, but found
her ready for it. M. Roland was elected to the National Assembly, to
represent Lyons. The family at once repaired to Paris, and the house of
Roland was at once the rendezvous for the talented, the men of genius,
but more especially the Girondists, as the more conservative of the
republicans were called. The genius and beauty of Madame Roland soon
became known, and made her house the fashionable resort of the _elite_
of Paris. The arrest of the king filled her with alarm. She was not
willing to push matters to such extremes. She was one of the noblest of
republicans, out she was merciful and moderate in some of her views. Her
husband again retired to the country--to-Lyons. Amid the solitude of
their own home she grew discontented. She could not, having tasted the
sweets of life in Paris, abandon it without a pang of sorrow. The
following winter a new ministry was formed of the Girondists, and her
husband was named minister for the interior. They again returned to
Paris, and now in greater state. Roland was one of the most honest men
of the revolution, but was so precise and methodical in his papers which
were prepared for the public, that without the assistance of his wife,
his success would have been far less than it was.
M. Roland wishing to save the king, if possible, determined upon
remonstrating with him upon his course. Madame Roland wrote the letter
of remonstrance, though, of course, it appeared in his name. It was bold
and severe, and accomplished no good. The result of it was, that Roland
was dismissed from the office, and retired to private life. Soon after,
however, he was recalled under the republic, and endeavored to do his
duty. Madame Roland writes in September of this year: "We are under the
knife of Marat and Robespierre. These men agitate the people and
endeavor to turn them against the National Assembly." She and her
husband were heartily and zealously for the republic, but they were
moderate, and entirely opposed to those brutal men who were in favor of
filling Paris and France with blood. Madame Roland writes, later:
"Danton leads all; Robespierre is his puppet; Marat holds his torch and
dagger: this ferocious tribune reigns, and we are his slaves until the
moment when we shall become his victims. You are aware of my enthusiasm
for the revolution: well, I am ashamed of it; it is deformed by monsters
and become hideous." Madame Roland now struggled to overthrow the
Jacobins--but was only overthrown herself. She was at this time
celebrated for her wit and beauty. A writer of that time says of her:
"I met Madame Roland several times in former days: her eyes, her figure,
and hair, were of remarkable beauty; her delicate complexion had a
freshness and color which, joined to her reserved yet ingenuous
appearance, imparted a singular air of youth. Wit, good sense, propriety
of expression, keen reasoning, _naive_ grace, all flowed without effort
from her roseate lips."
During the horrible massacres of September Roland acted with great
heroism. While the streets of Paris ran with human blood, he wrote to
the mayor, demanding him to interfere in behalf of the sufferers. Marat
denounced him as a traitor, and from that moment his life was in danger.
Madame Roland was charged with instigating the unpopular acts of her
husband by the radicals, and she was in equal danger with her husband.
After the execution of the king, Roland became discouraged, and
convinced that he could do no more for France, and he retired with his
wife to the country. Here they lived in constant danger of arrest.
Roland finding the danger so great, made good his escape, but she was
arrested a short time after. She had retired to rest at night, when
suddenly her doors were burst open and the house filled with a hundred
armed men. She was instantly parted from her child and sent off to
Paris. One of the men who had her in charge, cried out, "Do you wish the
window of the carriage to be closed?" "No, gentlemen," she replied,
"innocence, however oppressed, will never assume the appearance of
guilt. I fear the eyes of no one, and will not hide myself."
She was shut up in prison at once. She asked for books--for Plutarch,
and Thompson's Seasons. On the 24th of June she was liberated, and then
suddenly rearrested. This deception was more than cruel, it was
infamous. She was placed in the prison of St. Pelaige--a filthy and
miserable place. The wife of the jailor pitied her and gave her a neat,
upper apartment, and brought her books and flowers, and she was
comparatively happy again. It was in this prison that she wrote her own
memoirs. She usually kept a stout heart, but at times when thoughts of
her husband and child came over her, she was overwhelmed with grief.
The chief Girondists now began to fall under the stroke of the
guillotine, and her turn was quickly coming. The day that her friend
Brissot perished, she was transferred to the _Conciergerie_ the prison
which suggested this sketch of her to my mind. I went over this prison,
and the very apartment was pointed out to me in which Madame Roland was
confined. Here she spent her last days, and wretched days they were,
indeed. But she conducted herself nobly and courageously through all.
The mockery of a trial was held, and she wrote her own defense, a most
eloquent production. She was sentenced to death in twenty-four hours.
Twenty-two victims had just poured out their blood, and she was to
follow their example. A French writer speaks of her at that time as
"full of attractions, tall, of an elegant figure, her physiognomy
animated, but sorrow and long imprisonment had left traces of melancholy
on her face that tempered her natural vivacity. Something more than is
usually found in the eyes of woman, beamed in her large, dark eyes, full
of sweetness and expression. She often spoke to me at the grate, with
the freedom and courage of a great man. This republican language falling
from the lips of a pretty French woman, for whom the scaffold was
prepared, was a miracle of the revolution. We gathered attentively
around her in a species of admiration and stupor. Her conversation was
serious, without being cold. She spoke with a purity, a melody, and a
measure which rendered her language a soul of music of which the ear
never tired. She spoke of the deputies who had just perished with
respect, but without effeminate pity; reproaching them even for not
having taken sufficiently strong measures. Sometimes her sex had
mastery, and we perceived that she had wept over the recollection of her
daughter and husband."
She was led out to execution on the 10th of November, on that place of
blood--_La Concorde_. She was dressed in white, and inspired the
multitudes who saw her with admiration. Another victim accompanied her.
She exhorted him to ascend first, that his courage might not be shaken
by witnessing her death. She turned to the statue of Liberty,
exclaiming, "Oh, Liberty! how many crimes are committed in thy name."
She was thirty-nine years of age, and though she ended her life thus
young, she had achieved immortality.
M. Roland was at this time in safety in Rouen, but when he heard of the
death of his noble wife, he resolved to give himself up at once to the
authorities. The interests of his child, however, tempted him to another
course. Should he give himself up he would certainly perish, and by the
law of France his possessions would be confiscated, and would not,
therefore, descend to his child. Were he to die, even by his own hand,
the case would be different--he would save the property for his child.
Five days after his wife perished upon the scaffold, he fell upon his
sword on a high road near Rouen. The following lines were found upon his
person:
"The blood that flows in torrents in my country dictates my resolve:
indignation caused me to quit my retreat. As soon as I heard of the
murder of my wife, I determined no longer to remain on an earth tainted
by crime."
I had occasion often while in Paris to cross the street of the _Ecole de
Medicine_. It is a rather pleasant street, and leads into the street of
_Ancienne Comedie_, named so after the _Theater Francaise_, which was
formerly located upon it. Just opposite it is a _cafe_ which Voltaire
used to frequent, and I have stopped to take a cup of chocolate in it.
But one day I hunted up number eighteen of the street of _Ecole de
Medicine_. The house was one which Marat used to occupy in the time of
the great revolution. We paused a moment upon the threshold, and then
passed up a flight of stairs and entered the room where Marat used to
write so many of his blood-thirsty articles. A little room at that time
opened out of it, and in the apartment was a bath-room. He often wrote
in his bath in this room.
The last day Marat lived, was the 13th of July, 1793, and it was spent
in this little room. He was the monster of the revolution, loved the
sight of blood as a tiger does, and his influence over the multitude
gave him power to sacrifice whoever he pleased. If he but pointed his
long finger at a man or woman, it was death to the victim. No one was
safe. Under his devilish prompting, already some of the truest
republicans in France had been beheaded, and every hour some unfortunate
man or woman fell beneath his hellish ferocity. Should a fiend be
allowed to personate liberty longer? Should a wretch whose very touch
scorched and blistered, whose breath was that of the lake of fire, any
longer be allowed to pollute France with his presence? These were the
questions which presented themselves to the mind of a young
country-girl. Who would have thought that the young and beautiful
Charlotte Corday would have taken it upon herself to answer these
questions and avenge the murdered innocents?
She had learned to love, to adore liberty, among the forests and hills
of her native country. She saw Marat perpetrating murders of the
blackest die in the name of liberty. He went further still, he
sacrificed her friends--the friends of liberty. She resolved that _the
wretch should die_. No one could suspect the dark-haired girl.
Enthusiastic to madness, she flew to Paris with but one thought filling
her breast--that she was amid the terrors of that time, in the absence
of all just law, commanded by God to finish the course of Marat.
Everything bent to this idea. She cared nothing for her own
life--nothing for her own happiness. She came to the threshold of the
house many a time and was turned away--she could not gain admittance.
Marat's mistress was jealous of him, and Charlotte Corday had heard of
this and feared that it would be impossible to see him alone. She
therefore wrote to the monster, and with great eloquence demanded a
private interview. The request was granted.
On the morning of the 13th of July she came in person, and Marat ordered
that she be shown into his room. He lay in his bath, with his arms out
of water, writing. He looked up at her as she entered, and asked her
business. She used deception with him, declaring that some of his
bitterest enemies were concealed in the neighborhood of her country
home. She named, with truth, some of her dearest friends as these
enemies. "They shall die within forty-eight hours," said Marat. This was
enough--in an instant she plunged a dagger, which she had concealed
about her person, to the center of his heart.
She was executed for this deed upon the _Place de la Concorde_. They
tell the story in France, to show how modest she was, that after her
head had fallen from the body a rough man pushed it one side with his
foot, _and her cheeks blushed scarlet_. Marat was interred with great
pomp in the Pantheon, but a succeeding generation did better justice to
his remains, for they were afterward, by order of government,
disinterred and thrown into a common sewer. I scarcely ever stopped on
the _Place de la Concorde_ without thinking of Charlotte Corday, and
bringing up the dreadful scene in Marat's house, and her own execution.
I fancied her as she appeared that day--a smile upon her face, a wild
enthusiastic joy in her eyes, as if she had executed her task, and was
willing, glad, to leave such a horror-stricken land. No man can doubt
the purity of Charlotte Corday's character. She was no ordinary
murderer. She did not act from the promptings of anger, or to avenge
private wrongs. She felt it to be her duty to rid France of such an
unnatural monster, and undoubtedly thought herself God's minister of
vengeance.
Another spot which may justly be denominated a place of blood, is the
Conciergerie. It is yet as grim and awful as ever, in its appearance.
The spot is still shown in the stones where the blood ran from the
swords of the human butchers. If the history of this prison were
written, it would make a dozen books, and some of the most heart-rending
tragedies would be unfolded to the world. The great and good, and the
wretchedly vile, have together lived within its walls and lost their
hopes of life, or their desire for it. I could never pass it without a
shudder, for though it was not so much a place of execution as a
prison, yet so terrible a place was it that many a prisoner has
joyfully emerged from its dark walls to the scaffold. It has witnessed
the death of many a poor man and woman, stifled with its foul air, its
horrid associations, and the future with which it terrified its inmates.
Many a noble heart has been broken in its damp and dimly-lighted cells,
for it has existed for many centuries. As early as 1400 it was the scene
of wholesale butchery, and on St. Bartholomew's night, its bells rang
out upon the shuddering air, to add their voice with the others, which
filled every heart with fear.
Paris is one of the most singular cities in the civilized world for one
thing--for the atrocities which it has witnessed. Certainly, in modern
times no city in the world has been the scene of such hideous acts as
the city of the fine arts. Deeds have been done within a century, which
would put a savage to the blush. The place is still pointed out where a
poor girl was burned by a slow fire. She had wounded a soldier, and as a
punishment, she was stripped naked, her breasts cut off, her skin
slashed by red hot sabres, while she was being burned. Her yells could
be heard over half Paris.
Think, too, of later times--when Louis Napoleon aimed his cannon at the
houses of inoffensive people, and shot down, in cold blood, some of the
best inhabitants of Paris. A more hellish act was never perpetrated in
this world of ours than that--yet he is the patron of modern
civilization, and is on excellent terms with the amiable Queen Victoria.
I do not wonder that Rousseau argued that the primitive and savage
condition of man is to be preferred to French civilization. This is one
phase of Paris life as it is to-day, and as it always has been, and it
is right that the stranger should not pass it by.
Paris is crowded with such places as these I have been describing--spots
to which bloody histories cling. The paving-stones are, as it were, red
to this day with the blood they drank in the times of the revolution.
* * * * *
PLACE DE LA CONCORDE.
There is no public square or place in the world, which in broad
magnificence surpasses the _Place de la Concorde_. The stranger can form
little idea of it, except by personal inspection. Stand in the center
and look which way you will, something grand or beautiful greets the
eye. Look toward the south, and see the fine building which contains the
senate chamber, the bridge over the Seine, and the _Quai de Orsay_. To
the north, and see the row of buildings named Place de la Concorde, with
their grand colonnades and the pretentious Madeleine. To the east, and
there the green forest of the Tuileries gardens, with its rich array of
flowers and statuary--and the palace--greets you, and farther away the
grand towers of Notre Dame. Or look where the sun sets--the Elysian
fields are all before you with their music and dancing and shows; their
two long promenades, and in the distance Napoleon's grand triumphal
arch.
To look at the Place de la Concorde itself, you should stand upon the
bridge across the Seine--from its center look down upon the great open
_plaza_, see the wonderful fountains, gaze up at the obelisk of Luxor in
the center, and you will be struck with admiration of the grand scene
before you.
But I confess that I was attracted to the Place de la Concorde more by
the historical associations connected with it, than by its present
magnificence. Leaning upon the parapet of the bridge and looking down
upon the Seine, a pleasant July morning was present to my imagination,
and a crowd was gathered upon the place to witness an execution. The
slight form of a beautiful woman passes up yonder winding steps to the
block. Her hair is dark--not so dark, though, as her genius-lighted eyes
-and her forehead is white and nobly pure. She kneels, bows down her
head to the block, and is forever dead. It was Charlotte Corday, the
enthusiast, who assassinated Marat in his bath. I have seen the place
where she killed him--have looked at the very threshold where she waited
so long before she gained admittance. The house is standing yet, and the
room where Marat lay in his bath writing--where he looked up from his
manuscript at Charlotte Corday and promised death to some of her dearest
friends in a provincial town--where she plunged her dagger to the center
of his black heart!
It was on the Place de la Concorde that Louis XVI expiated the crimes of
his ancestors upon the scaffold. One still October day the sweet though
proud Marie Antoinette came here, also, to die. The agony that she
suffered during her trial, and the day that she perished upon the
scaffold, no human thought can reckon. The French revolution taught a
fearful lesson to kings and queens; that if they would rule safely, it
must be through the hearts of their subjects, otherwise the vengeance of
an insulted and oppressed people will be sure to overtake them.
One April day, amid sunshine and rain, that man of dark eyes, lofty
brow, and proud stature, the magnificent Danton, walked up the fatal
steps and knelt down to death. How strange! The man before whose nod
all Paris had trembled as if he had been a god--the man whose eloquence
could thrill the heart of France, was now a weak creature beneath the
iron arm of Robespierre. He had sentenced hundreds to death upon this
spot, and was now condemned himself, by his old associate, to taste the
same bitter cup which he had so often held to the lips of others. This
act alone will fix the stain of ferocious cruelty upon the character of
Robespierre, however conscientious he may have been.
And here, too, on that same day, Camille Desmoulins, the mad author and
revolutionist-editor, ended his young life. Many a time with his
comic--yet sometimes awfully tragic--pen, had he pointed with laughter
to the Place de la Concorde, and its streams of human blood. And now the
strange creature who one day laughed wildly in his glee and another was
all tears and rage, followed Danton, the man he had worshiped, to the
block. Robespierre was his old friend, he had written his praises upon
many a page, yet now he stood aloof, and raised not a hand to save the
poor editor, though he besought his aid with passionate eloquence.
Three months later, and the Place de la Concorde witnessed the closing
scene of the revolution. On the 28th of the following July, Robespierre
and St. Just perished together on the scaffold. He whose very name,
articulated in whispers, had made households tremble as with a
death-ague, had lost his power, and was a feeble, helpless being. Cruel,
stern, without a feeling of mercy in his heart, awful to contemplate in
his steel severity, he was, after all, almost the only man of the
revolution who was strictly, sternly, rigidly honest. No one can doubt
his integrity. He might have been dictator if he would, and saved his
life, but the principles which were a part of his very nature, would not
allow him to accept such power, even from the people. His friends plead
with streaming eyes; it was a case of life or death; but he said,
"Death, rather than belie my principles!" and he perished.
As I looked down upon the very spot where stood the scaffold, and saw
that all around was so peaceful, I could hardly realize that within half
a century such a terrible drama had been enacted there--a drama whose
closing acts illustrate the truth of that scripture which saith, "Whoso
taketh the sword shall perish by the sword."
Louis XVI. first ascends the scaffold, looking mournfully at Danton, but
saying never a word; and then Vergniaud, the pure of heart, executed by
his friend Danton; then Danton, thinking remorsefully of Vergniaud and
cursing Robepierre; and last, Robespierre!
The Place de la Concorde was originally an open spot, where were
collected heaps of rubbish, but in 1763 the authorities of the city of
Paris determined to clear it up and erect upon it a statue in honor of
Louis XV. The statue was destroyed by the populace in 1792, and the
place named _Place de la Revolution_. In 1800 it took the name it at
present retains. In 1816 Louis XVIII. caused the statue of Louis XV. to
be replaced, though still later that of Louis XVI. was erected here, and
the former placed in the Champs Elysees.
The obelisk of Luxor is perhaps the most prominent feature of the place.
It is a magnificent relic of Egypt, and is one of two obelisks which
stood in front of the temple of Thebes. It was erected fifteen hundred
and fifty years before Christ, by Sesostris, in the eighteenth Egyptian
dynasty. Mehemet Ali made a present of the obelisk to the French
government. On account of its enormous size, great difficulty was
experienced in removing it to Paris. A road was constructed from the
obelisk to the Nile, and eight hundred men were occupied three months in
removing it to the banks of the river, where was a flat-bottomed vessel
built expressly for it. A part of the vessel had to be sawed off to
receive it, so great was its size. It descended the Nile, passed the
Rosetta bar, and with great care was towed to Cherbourg. It must be
remembered that the obelisk is a single stone, seventy-two feet high,
and weighs five hundred thousand pounds. On the 16th of August, 1836, it
was drawn up an inclined plane to the top of the pedestal where it now
stands. In the following October, the public ceremony of placing it
occurred, in the presence of the royal family, and more than a hundred
and fifty thousand other persons.
[Illustration: Place de la Concorde.]
The cost of removal from Thebes to Paris was two millions francs, but
not a life was lost from the beginning to the end of the transaction. It
stands upon a single block of gray granite, the total height of obelisk
and pedestal being about a hundred feet.
There are two fountains upon the Place, dedicated, one to Maritime, the
other to Fluvial navigation. The basin of each is fifty feet in
diameter, out of which rise two smaller ones, the latter inverted. Six
tall figures are seated around the larger basins, their feet resting on
the prows of vessels, separated from each other by large dolphins which
spout water into the higher basins. But the beauty of the Place de la
Concorde is not so much the result of any one feature as the combination
of the whole, and as such it is unequaled in Europe.
From the Place de la Concorde one has a fine view of the Arch of
Triumph, which was erected by Napoleon in honor of his great victories.