The Day of Poniards.
Or, again, what means this visible reparation of the Castle of
Vincennes? Other Jails being all crowded with prisoners, new
space is wanted here: that is the Municipal account. For in such
changing of Judicatures, Parlements being abolished, and New
Courts but just set up, prisoners have accumulated. Not to say
that in these times of discord and club-law, offences and
committals are, at any rate, more numerous. Which Municipal
account, does it not sufficiently explain the phenomenon? Surely,
to repair the Castle of Vincennes was of all enterprises that an
enlightened Municipality could undertake, the most innocent.
Not so however does neighbouring Saint-Antoine look on it:
Saint-Antoine to whom these peaked turrets and grim donjons,
all-too near her own dark dwelling, are of themselves an offence.
Was not Vincennes a kind of minor Bastille? Great Diderot and
Philosophes have lain in durance here; great Mirabeau, in
disastrous eclipse, for forty-two months. And now when the old
Bastille has become a dancing-ground (had any one the mirth to
dance), and its stones are getting built into the Pont
Louis-Seize, does this minor, comparative insignificance of a
Bastille flank itself with fresh-hewn mullions, spread out
tyrannous wings; menacing Patriotism? New space for prisoners:
and what prisoners? A d’Orléans, with the chief Patriots on the
tip of the Left? It is said, there runs “a subterranean passage”
all the way from the Tuileries hither. Who knows? Paris, mined
with quarries and catacombs, does hang wondrous over the abyss;
Paris was once to be blown up,—though the powder, when we went to
look, had got withdrawn. A Tuileries, sold to Austria and
Coblentz, should have no subterranean passage. Out of which might
not Coblentz or Austria issue, some morning; and, with cannon of
long range, “_foudroyer_,” bethunder a patriotic Saint-Antoine
into smoulder and ruin!
So meditates the benighted soul of Saint-Antoine, as it sees the
aproned workmen, in early spring, busy on these towers. An
official-speaking Municipality, a Sieur Motier with his legions
of _mouchards_, deserve no trust at all. Were Patriot Santerre,
indeed, Commander! But the sonorous Brewer commands only our own
Battalion: of such secrets he can explain nothing, knows nothing,
perhaps suspects much. And so the work goes on; and afflicted
benighted Saint-Antoine hears rattle of hammers, sees stones
suspended in air.[346]
Saint-Antoine prostrated the first great Bastille: will it falter
over this comparative insignificance of a Bastille? Friends, what
if we took pikes, firelocks, sledgehammers; and helped
ourselves!—Speedier is no remedy; nor so certain. On the 28th day
of February, Saint-Antoine turns out, as it has now often done;
and, apparently with little superfluous tumult, moves eastward to
that eye-sorrow of Vincennes. With grave voice of authority, no
need of bullying and shouting, Saint-Antoine signifies to parties
concerned there that its purpose is, To have this suspicious
Stronghold razed level with the general soil of the country.
Remonstrance may be proffered, with zeal: but it avails not. The
outer gate goes up, drawbridges tumble; iron window-stanchions,
smitten out with sledgehammers, become iron-crowbars: it rains
furniture, stone-masses, slates: with chaotic clatter and rattle,
Demolition clatters down. And now hasty expresses rush through
the agitated streets, to warn Lafayette, and the Municipal and
Departmental Authorities; Rumour warns a National Assembly, a
Royal Tuileries, and all men who care to hear it: That
Saint-Antoine is up; that Vincennes, and probably the last
remaining Institution of the Country, is coming down.[347]
Quick, then! Let Lafayette roll his drums and fly eastward; for
to all Constitutional Patriots this is again bad news. And you,
ye Friends of Royalty, snatch your poniards of improved
structure, made to order; your sword-canes, secret arms, and
tickets of entry; quick, by backstairs passages, rally round the
Son of Sixty Kings. An effervescence probably got up by d’Orléans
and Company, for the overthrow of Throne and Altar: it is said
her Majesty shall be put in prison, put out of the way; what then
will _his_ Majesty be? Clay for the Sansculottic Potter! Or were
it impossible to fly this day; a brave Noblesse suddenly all
rallying? Peril threatens, hope invites: Dukes de Villequier, de
Duras, Gentlemen of the Chamber give tickets and admittance; a
brave Noblesse is suddenly all rallying. Now were the time to
“fall sword in hand on those gentry there,” could it be done with
effect.
The Hero of two Worlds is on his white charger; blue Nationals,
horse and foot, hurrying eastward: Santerre, with the
Saint-Antoine Battalion, is already there,—apparently indisposed
to act. Heavy-laden Hero of two Worlds, what tasks are these! The
jeerings, provocative gambollings of that Patriot Suburb, which
is all out on the streets now, are hard to endure; unwashed
Patriots jeering in sulky sport; one unwashed Patriot “seizing
the General by the boot” to unhorse him. Santerre, ordered to
fire, makes answer obliquely, ‘These are the men that took the
Bastille;’ and not a trigger stirs! Neither dare the Vincennes
Magistracy give warrant of arrestment, or the smallest
countenance: wherefore the General “will take it on himself” to
arrest. By promptitude, by cheerful adroitness, patience and
brisk valour without limits, the riot may be again bloodlessly
appeased.
Meanwhile, the rest of Paris, with more or less unconcern, may
mind the rest of its business: for what is this but an
effervescence, of which there are now so many? The National
Assembly, in one of its stormiest moods, is debating a Law
against Emigration; Mirabeau declaring aloud, ‘I swear beforehand
that I will not obey it.’ Mirabeau is often at the Tribune this
day; with endless impediments from without; with the old unabated
energy from within. What can murmurs and clamours, from Left or
from Right, do to this man; like Teneriffe or Atlas unremoved?
With clear thought; with strong bass-voice, though at first low,
uncertain, he claims audience, sways the storm of men: anon the
sound of him waxes, softens; he rises into far-sounding melody of
strength, triumphant, which subdues all hearts; his rude-seamed
face, desolate fire-scathed, becomes fire-lit, and radiates: once
again men feel, in these beggarly ages, what is the potency and
omnipotency of man’s word on the souls of men. ‘I will triumph or
be torn in fragments,’ he was once heard to say. ‘Silence,’ he
cries now, in strong word of command, in imperial consciousness
of strength, ‘Silence, the thirty voices, _Silence aux trente
voix!_’—and Robespierre and the Thirty Voices die into
mutterings; and the Law is once more as Mirabeau would have it.
How different, at the same instant, is General Lafayette’s street
eloquence; wrangling with sonorous Brewers, with an ungrammatical
Saint-Antoine! Most different, again, from both is the
Café-de-Valois eloquence, and suppressed fanfaronade, of this
multitude of men with Tickets of Entry; who are now inundating
the Corridors of the Tuileries. Such things can go on
simultaneously in one City. How much more in one Country; in one
Planet with its discrepancies, every Day a mere crackling
infinitude of discrepancies—which nevertheless do yield some
coherent net-product, though an infinitesimally small one!
Be this as it may. Lafayette has saved Vincennes; and is marching
homewards with some dozen of arrested demolitionists. Royalty is
not yet saved;—nor indeed specially endangered. But to the King’s
Constitutional Guard, to these old Gardes Françaises, or Centre
Grenadiers, as it chanced to be, this affluence of men with
Tickets of Entry is becoming more and more unintelligible. Is his
Majesty verily for Metz, then; to be carried off by these men, on
the spur of the instant? That revolt of Saint-Antoine got up by
traitor Royalists for a stalking-horse? Keep a sharp outlook, ye
Centre Grenadiers on duty here: good never came from the “men in
black.” Nay they have cloaks, _rédingotes;_ some of them
leather-breeches, boots,—as if for instant riding! Or what is
this that sticks visible from the lapelle of Chevalier de
Court?[348] Too like the handle of some cutting or stabbing
instrument! He glides and goes; and still the dudgeon sticks from
his left lapelle. ‘Hold, Monsieur!’—a Centre Grenadier clutches
him; clutches the protrusive dudgeon, whisks it out in the face
of the world: by Heaven, a very dagger; hunting-knife, or
whatsoever you call it; fit to drink the life of Patriotism!
So fared it with Chevalier de Court, early in the day; not
without noise; not without commentaries. And now this continually
increasing multitude at nightfall? Have they daggers too? Alas,
with them too, after angry parleyings, there has begun a groping
and a rummaging; all men in black, spite of their Tickets of
Entry, are clutched by the collar, and groped. Scandalous to
think of; for always, as the dirk, sword-cane, pistol, or were it
but tailor’s bodkin, is found on him, and with loud scorn drawn
forth from him, he, the hapless man in black, is flung all too
rapidly down stairs. Flung; and ignominiously descends, head
foremost; accelerated by ignominious shovings from sentry after
sentry; nay, as is written, by smitings, twitchings,—spurnings,
_à posteriori_, not to be named. In this accelerated way,
emerges, uncertain which end uppermost, man after man in black,
through all issues, into the Tuileries Garden. Emerges, alas,
into the arms of an indignant multitude, now gathered and
gathering there, in the hour of dusk, to see what is toward, and
whether the Hereditary Representative is carried off or not.
Hapless men in black; at last _convicted_ of poniards made to
order; convicted “Chevaliers of the Poniard!” Within is as the
burning ship; without is as the deep sea. Within is no help; his
Majesty, looking forth, one moment, from his interior
sanctuaries, coldly bids all visitors “give up their weapons;”
and shuts the door again. The weapons given up form a heap: the
convicted Chevaliers of the poniard keep descending pellmell,
with impetuous velocity; and at the bottom of all staircases, the
mixed multitude receives them, hustles, buffets, chases and
disperses them.[349]
Such sight meets Lafayette, in the dusk of the evening, as he
returns, successful with difficulty at Vincennes: Sansculotte
Scylla hardly weathered, here is Aristocrat Charybdis gurgling
under his lee! The patient Hero of two Worlds almost loses
temper. He accelerates, does not retard, the flying Chevaliers;
delivers, indeed, this or the other hunted Loyalist of quality,
but rates him in bitter words, such as the hour suggested; such
as no saloon could pardon. Hero ill-bested; hanging, so to speak,
in mid-air; hateful to Rich divinities above; hateful to Indigent
mortals below! Duke de Villequier, Gentleman of the Chamber, gets
such contumelious rating, in presence of all people there, that
he may see good first to exculpate himself in the Newspapers;
then, that not prospering, to retire over the Frontiers, and
begin plotting at Brussels.[350] His Apartment will stand vacant;
usefuller, as we may find, than when it stood occupied.
So fly the Chevaliers of the Poniard; hunted of Patriotic men,
shamefully in the thickening dusk. A dim miserable business; born
of darkness; dying away there in the thickening dusk and dimness!
In the midst of which, however, let the reader discern clearly
one figure running for its life: Crispin-Cataline
d’Espréménil,—for the last time, or the last but one. It is not
yet three years since these same Centre Grenadiers, Gardes
Françaises then, marched him towards the Calypso Isles, in the
gray of the May morning; and he and they have got thus far.
Buffeted, beaten down, delivered by popular Pétion, he might well
answer bitterly: ‘And I too, Monsieur, have been carried on the
People’s shoulders.’[351] A fact which popular Pétion, if he
like, can meditate.
But happily, one way and another, the speedy night covers up this
ignominious Day of Poniards; and the Chevaliers escape, though
maltreated, with torn coat-skirts and heavy hearts, to their
respective dwelling-houses. Riot twofold is quelled; and little
blood shed, if it be not insignificant blood from the nose:
Vincennes stands undemolished, reparable; and the Hereditary
Representative has not been stolen, nor the Queen smuggled into
Prison. A Day long remembered: commented on with loud hahas and
deep grumblings; with bitter scornfulness of triumph, bitter
rancour of defeat. Royalism, as usual, imputes it to d’Orléans
and the Anarchists intent on insulting Majesty: Patriotism, as
usual, to Royalists, and even Constitutionalists, intent on
stealing Majesty to Metz: we, also as usual, to Preternatural
Suspicion, and Phoebus Apollo having made himself like the Night.
Thus, however, has the reader seen, in an unexpected arena, on
this last day of February 1791, the Three long-contending
elements of French Society, dashed forth into singular
comico-tragical collision; acting and reacting openly to the eye.
Constitutionalism, at once quelling Sansculottic riot at
Vincennes, and Royalist treachery from the Tuileries, is great,
this day, and prevails. As for poor Royalism, tossed to and fro
in that manner, its daggers all left in a heap, what can one
think of it? Every dog, the Adage says, has its day: _has_ it;
has had it; or will have it. For the present, the day is
Lafayette’s and the Constitution’s. Nevertheless Hunger and
Jacobinism, fast growing fanatical, still work; their-day, were
they once fanatical, will come. Hitherto, in all tempests,
Lafayette, like some divine Sea-ruler, raises his serene head:
the upper Æolus’s blasts fly back to their caves, like foolish
unbidden winds: the under sea-billows they had vexed into froth
allay themselves. But if, as we often write, the _sub_marine
Titanic Fire-powers came into play, the Ocean bed from beneath
being _burst?_ If they hurled Poseidon Lafayette and his
Constitution out of Space; and, in the Titanic melee, sea were
mixed with sky?