Some Consolation to Mankind.
Of the Federation Feast itself we shall say almost nothing. There
are Tents pitched in the Champ-de-Mars; tent for National
Assembly; tent for Hereditary Representative,—who indeed is there
too early, and has to wait long in it. There are Eighty-three
symbolical Departmental Trees-of-Liberty; trees and _mais_
enough: beautifullest of all these is one huge _mai_, hung round
with effete Scutcheons, Emblazonries and Genealogy-books; nay
better still, with Lawyers’-bags, “_sacs de procédure:_” which
shall be burnt. The Thirty seat-rows of that famed Slope are
again full; we have a bright Sun; and all is marching,
streamering and blaring: but what avails it? Virtuous Mayor
Pétion, whom Feuillantism had suspended, was reinstated only last
night, by Decree of the Assembly. Men’s humour is of the sourest.
Men’s hats have on them, written in chalk, “_Vive Pétion;_” and
even, “Pétion or Death, _Pétion ou la Mort_.”
Poor Louis, who has waited till five o’clock before the Assembly
would arrive, swears the National Oath this time, with a quilted
cuirass under his waistcoat which will turn pistol-bullets.[484]
Madame de Staël, from that Royal Tent, stretches out the neck in
a kind of agony, lest the waving multitudes which receive him may
not render him back alive. No cry of _Vive le Roi_ salutes the
ear; cries only of _Vive Pétion; Pétion ou la Mort_. The National
Solemnity is as it were huddled by; each cowering off almost
before the evolutions are gone through. The very _Mai_ with its
Scutcheons and Lawyers’-bags is forgotten, stands unburnt; till
“certain Patriot Deputies,” called by the people, set a torch to
it, by way of voluntary after-piece. Sadder Feast of Pikes no man
ever saw.
Mayor Pétion, named on hats, is at his zenith in this Federation;
Lafayette again is close upon his nadir. Why does the stormbell
of Saint-Roch speak out, next Saturday; why do the citizens shut
their shops?[485] It is Sections defiling, it is fear of
effervescence. Legislative Committee, long deliberating on
Lafayette and that Anti-jacobin Visit of his, reports, this day,
that there is “_not_ ground for Accusation!” Peace, ye Patriots,
nevertheless; and let that tocsin cease: the Debate is not
finished, nor the Report accepted; but Brissot, Isnard and the
Mountain will sift it, and resift it, perhaps for some three
weeks longer.
So many bells, stormbells and noises do ring;—scarcely audible;
one drowning the other. For example: in this same Lafayette
tocsin, of Saturday, was there not withal some faint bob-minor,
and Deputation of Legislative, ringing the Chevalier Paul Jones
to his long rest; tocsin or dirge now all one to him! Not ten
days hence Patriot Brissot, beshouted this day by the Patriot
Galleries, shall find himself begroaned by them, on account of
his limited Patriotism; nay pelted at while perorating, and “hit
with two prunes.”[486] It is a distracted empty-sounding world;
of bob-minors and bob-majors, of triumph and terror, of rise and
fall!
The more touching is this other Solemnity, which happens on the
morrow of the Lafayette tocsin: Proclamation that the _Country is
in Danger_. Not till the present Sunday could such Solemnity be.
The Legislative decreed it almost a fortnight ago; but Royalty
and the ghost of a Ministry held back as they could. Now however,
on this Sunday, 22nd day of July 1792, it will hold back no
longer; and the Solemnity in very deed is. Touching to behold!
Municipality and Mayor have on their scarfs; cannon-salvo booms
alarm from the Pont-Neuf, and single-gun at intervals all day.
Guards are mounted, scarfed Notabilities, Halberdiers, and a
Cavalcade; with streamers, emblematic flags; especially with one
huge Flag, flapping mournfully: _Citoyens, la Patrie est en
Danger_. They roll through the streets, with stern-sounding
music, and slow rattle of hoofs: pausing at set stations, and
with doleful blast of trumpet, singing out through Herald’s
throat, what the Flag says to the eye: ‘Citizens, the Country is
in Danger!’
Is there a man’s heart that hears it without a thrill? The
many-voiced responsive hum or bellow of these multitudes is not
of triumph; and yet it is a sound deeper than triumph. But when
the long Cavalcade and Proclamation ended; and our huge Flag was
fixed on the Pont Neuf, another like it on the Hôtel-de-Ville, to
wave there till better days; and each Municipal sat in the centre
of his Section, in a Tent raised in some open square, Tent
surmounted with flags of _Patrie en Danger_, and topmost of all a
Pike and _Bonnet Rouge;_ and, on two drums in front of him, there
lay a plank-table, and on this an open Book, and a Clerk sat,
like recording-angel, ready to write the Lists, or as we say to
enlist! O, then, it seems, the very gods might have looked down
on it. Young Patriotism, Culottic and Sansculottic, rushes
forward emulous: That is my name; name, blood, and life, is all
my Country’s; why have I nothing more! Youths of short stature
weep that they are below size. Old men come forward, a son in
each hand. Mothers themselves will grant the son of their
travail; send him, though with tears. And the multitude bellows
_Vive la Patrie_, far reverberating. And fire flashes in the eyes
of men;—and at eventide, your Municipal returns to the Townhall,
followed by his long train of volunteer Valour; hands in his
List: says proudly, looking round. This is my day’s harvest.[487]
They will march, on the morrow, to Soissons; small bundle holding
all their chattels.
So, with _Vive la Patrie, Vive la Liberté_, stone Paris
reverberates like Ocean in his caves; day after day, Municipals
enlisting in tricolor Tent; the Flag flapping on Pont Neuf and
Townhall, _Citoyens, la Patrie est en Danger_. Some Ten thousand
fighters, without discipline but full of heart, are on march in
few days. The like is doing in every Town of France.—Consider
therefore whether the Country will want defenders, had we but a
National Executive? Let the Sections and Primary Assemblies, at
any rate, become Permanent, and sit continually in Paris, and
over France, by Legislative Decree dated Wednesday the 25th.[488]
Mark contrariwise how, in these very hours, dated the 25th,
Brunswick shakes himself “_s’ébranle_,” in Coblentz; and takes
the road! Shakes himself indeed; one spoken word becomes such a
shaking. Successive, simultaneous _dirl_ of thirty thousand
muskets shouldered; prance and jingle of ten-thousand horsemen,
fanfaronading Emigrants in the van; drum, kettle-drum; noise of
weeping, swearing; and the immeasurable lumbering clank of
baggage-waggons and camp-kettles that groan into motion: all this
is Brunswick shaking himself; not without all this does the one
man march, “covering a space of forty miles.” Still less without
his Manifesto, dated, as we say, the 25th; a State-Paper worthy
of attention!
By this Document, it would seem great things are in store for
France. The universal French People shall now have permission to
rally round Brunswick and his Emigrant Seigneurs; tyranny of a
Jacobin Faction shall oppress them no more; but they shall
return, and find favour with their own good King; who, by Royal
Declaration (three years ago) of the Twenty-third of June, said
that he would himself make them happy. As for National Assembly,
and other Bodies of Men invested with some temporary shadow of
authority, they are charged to maintain the King’s Cities and
Strong Places intact, till Brunswick arrive to take delivery of
them. Indeed, quick submission may extenuate many things; but to
this end it must be quick. Any National Guard or other unmilitary
person found resisting in arms shall be “treated as a traitor;”
that is to say, hanged with promptitude. For the rest, if Paris,
before Brunswick gets thither, offer any insult to the King: or,
for example, suffer a faction to carry the King away elsewhither;
in that case Paris shall be blasted asunder with cannon-shot and
“military execution.” Likewise all other Cities, which may
witness, and not resist to the uttermost, such forced-march of
his Majesty, shall be blasted asunder; and Paris and every City
of them, starting-place, course and goal of said sacrilegious
forced-march, shall, as rubbish and smoking ruin, lie there for a
sign. Such vengeance were indeed signal, “an _insigne
vengeance:_”—O Brunswick, what words thou writest and blusterest!
In this Paris, as in old Nineveh, are so many score thousands
that know not the right hand from the left, and also much cattle.
Shall the very milk-cows, hard-living cadgers’-asses, and poor
little canary-birds die?
Nor is Royal and Imperial Prussian-Austrian Declaration wanting:
setting forth, in the amplest manner, their Sanssouci-Schonbrunn
version of this whole French Revolution, since the first
beginning of it; and with what grief these high heads have seen
such things done under the Sun: however, “as some small
consolation to mankind,”[489] they do now despatch Brunswick;
regardless of expense, as one might say, of sacrifices on their
own part; for is it not the first duty to console men?
Serene Highnesses, who sit there protocolling and manifestoing,
and consoling mankind! how were it if, for once in the thousand
years, your parchments, formularies, and reasons of state were
blown to the four winds; and Reality Sans-indispensables stared
you, even you, in the face; and Mankind said for itself what the
thing was that would console it?—