The Circular.
But the Constituted Authorities, all this while? The Legislative
Assembly; the Six Ministers; the Townhall; Santerre with the
National Guard?—It is very curious to think what a City is.
Theatres, to the number of some twenty-three, were open every
night during these prodigies: while right-arms here grew weary
with slaying, right-arms there are twiddledeeing on melodious
catgut; at the very instant when Abbé Sicard was clambering up
his second pair of shoulders, three-men high, five hundred
thousand human individuals were lying horizontal, as if nothing
were amiss.
As for the poor Legislative, the sceptre had departed from it.
The Legislative did send Deputation to the Prisons, to the
Street-Courts; and poor M. Dusaulx did harangue there; but
produced no conviction whatsoever: nay, at last, as he continued
haranguing, the Street-Court interposed, not without threats; and
he had to cease, and withdraw. This is the same poor worthy old
M. Dusaulx who told, or indeed almost sang (though with cracked
voice), the _Taking of the Bastille_,—to our satisfaction long
since. He was wont to announce himself, on such and on all
occasions, as _the Translator of Juvenal_. ‘Good Citizens, you
see before you a man who loves his country, who is the Translator
of Juvenal,’ said he once.—‘Juvenal?’ interrupts Sansculottism:
‘who the devil is Juvenal? One of your _sacrés Aristocrates?_ To
the _Lanterne!_’ From an orator of this kind, conviction was not
to be expected. The Legislative had much ado to save one of its
own Members, or Ex-Members, Deputy Journeau, who chanced to be
lying in arrest for mere Parliamentary delinquencies, in these
Prisons. As for poor old Dusaulx and Company, they returned to
the Salle de Manége, saying, ‘It was dark; and they could not see
well what was going on.’[538]
Roland writes indignant messages, in the name of Order, Humanity,
and the Law; but there is no Force at his disposal. Santerre’s
National Force seems lazy to rise; though he made requisitions,
he says,—which always dispersed again. Nay did not we, with
Advocate Maton’s eyes, see ‘men in uniform,’ too, with their
‘sleeves bloody to the shoulder?’ Pétion goes in tricolor scarf;
speaks ‘the austere language of the law:’ the killers give up,
while he is there; when his back is turned, recommence. Manuel
too in scarf we, with Maton’s eyes, transiently saw haranguing,
in the Court called of Nurses, _Cour des Nourrices_. On the other
hand, cruel Billaud, likewise in scarf, “with that small puce
coat and black wig we are used to on him,”[539] audibly delivers,
“standing among corpses,” at the Abbaye, a short but
ever-memorable harangue, reported in various phraseology, but
always to this purpose: ‘Brave Citizens, you are extirpating the
Enemies of Liberty; you are at your duty. A grateful Commune, and
Country, would wish to recompense you adequately; but cannot, for
you know its want of funds. Whoever shall have worked
(_travaillé_) in a Prison shall receive a draft of one louis,
payable by our cashier. Continue your work.’[540]—The Constituted
Authorities are of yesterday; all pulling different ways: there
is properly not Constituted Authority, but every man is his own
King; and all are kinglets, belligerent, allied, or
armed-neutral, without king over them.
“O everlasting infamy,” exclaims Montgaillard, “that Paris stood
looking on in stupor for four days, and did not interfere!” Very
desirable indeed that Paris had interfered; yet not unnatural
that it stood even so, looking on in stupor. Paris is in
death-panic, the enemy and gibbets at its door: whosoever in
Paris has the heart to front death finds it more pressing to do
it fighting the Prussians, than fighting the killers of
Aristocrats. Indignant abhorrence, as in Roland, may be here;
gloomy sanction, premeditation or not, as in Marat and Committee
of Salvation, may be there; dull disapproval, dull approval, and
acquiescence in Necessity and Destiny, is the general temper. The
Sons of Darkness, “two hundred or so,” risen from their
lurking-places, have scope to do their work. Urged on by
fever-frenzy of Patriotism, and the madness of Terror;—urged on
by lucre, and the gold louis of wages? Nay, not lucre: for the
gold watches, rings, money of the Massacred, are punctually
brought to the Townhall, by Killers sans-indispensables, who
higgle afterwards for their twenty shillings of wages; and
Sergent sticking an uncommonly fine agate on his finger (“fully
meaning to account for it”), becomes _Agate_-Sergent. But the
temper, as we say, is dull acquiescence. Not till the Patriotic
or Frenetic part of the work is finished for want of material;
and Sons of Darkness, bent clearly on lucre alone, begin
wrenching watches and purses, brooches from ladies’ necks “to
equip volunteers,” in daylight, on the streets,—does the temper
from dull grow vehement; does the Constable raise his truncheon,
and striking heartily (like a cattle-driver in earnest) beat the
“course of things” back into its old regulated drove-roads. The
_Garde-Meuble_ itself was surreptitiously plundered, on the 17th
of the Month, to Roland’s new horror; who anew bestirs himself,
and is, as Sieyes says, “the veto of scoundrels,” Roland _veto
des coquins_.[541]—
This is the September Massacre, otherwise called “Severe Justice
of the People.” These are the Septemberers (_Septembriseurs_); a
name of some note and lucency,—but lucency of the Nether-fire
sort; very different from that of our Bastille Heroes, who shone,
disputable by no Friend of Freedom, as in heavenly
light-radiance: to such phasis of the business have we advanced
since then! The numbers massacred are, in Historical _fantasy_,
“between two and three thousand;” or indeed they are “upwards of
six thousand,” for Peltier (in vision) saw them massacring the
very patients of the Bicêtre Madhouse “with grape-shot;” nay
finally they are “twelve thousand” and odd hundreds,—not more
than that.[542] In Arithmetical ciphers, and Lists drawn up by
accurate Advocate Maton, the number, including two hundred and
two priests, three “persons unknown,” and “one thief killed at
the Bernardins,” is, as above hinted, a Thousand and
Eighty-nine,—no less than that.
A thousand and eighty-nine lie dead, “two hundred and sixty
heaped carcasses on the Pont au Change” itself;—among which,
Robespierre pleading afterwards will “nearly weep” to reflect
that there was said to be one slain innocent.[543] One; not two,
O thou seagreen Incorruptible? If so, Themis Sansculotte must be
lucky; for she was brief!—In the dim Registers of the Townhall,
which are preserved to this day, men read, with a certain
sickness of heart, items and entries not usual in Town Books: “To
workers employed in preserving the salubrity of the air in the
Prisons, and persons “who presided over these dangerous
operations,” so much,—in various items, nearly seven hundred
pounds sterling. To carters employed to “the Burying-grounds of
Clamart, Montrouge, and Vaugirard,” at so much a journey, per
cart; this also is an entry. Then so many francs and odd sous
“for the necessary quantity of quick-lime!”[544] Carts go along
the streets; full of stript human corpses, thrown pellmell; limbs
sticking up:—seest thou that cold Hand sticking up, through the
heaped embrace of brother corpses, in its yellow paleness, in its
cold rigour; the palm opened towards Heaven, as if in dumb
prayer, in expostulation _de profundis_, Take pity on the Sons of
Men!—Mercier saw it, as he walked down “the Rue Saint-Jacques
from Montrouge, on the morrow of the Massacres:” but not a Hand;
it was a Foot,—which he reckons still more significant, one
understands not well why. Or was it as the Foot of one _spurning_
Heaven? Rushing, like a wild diver, in disgust and despair,
towards the depths of Annihilation? Even there shall His hand
find thee, and His right-hand hold thee,—surely for right not for
wrong, for good not evil! “I saw that Foot,” says Mercier; “I
shall know it again at the great Day of Judgment, when the
Eternal, throned on his thunders, shall judge both Kings and
Septemberers.”[545]
That a shriek of inarticulate horror rose over this thing, not
only from French Aristocrats and Moderates, but from all Europe,
and has prolonged itself to the present day, was most natural and
right. The thing lay done, irrevocable; a thing to be counted
besides some other things, which lie very black in our Earth’s
Annals, yet which will not erase therefrom. For man, as was
remarked, has transcendentalisms in him; standing, as he does,
poor creature, every way “in the confluence of Infinitudes;” a
mystery to himself and others: in the centre of two Eternities,
of three Immensities,—in the intersection of primeval Light with
the everlasting dark! Thus have there been, especially by
vehement tempers reduced to a state of desperation, very
miserable things done. Sicilian Vespers, and “eight thousand
slaughtered in two hours,” are a known thing. Kings themselves,
not in desperation, but only in difficulty, have sat hatching,
for year and day (nay De Thou says, for seven years), their
Bartholomew Business; and then, at the right moment, also on an
Autumn Sunday, this very Bell (they say it is the identical
metal) of St. Germain l’Auxerrois was set a-pealing—with
effect.[546] Nay the same black boulder-stones of these Paris
Prisons have seen Prison-massacres before now; men massacring
countrymen, Burgundies massacring Armagnacs, whom they had
suddenly imprisoned, till as now there are piled heaps of
carcasses, and the streets ran red;—the Mayor Pétion of the time
speaking the austere language of the law, and answered by the
Killers, in old French (it is some four hundred years old):
‘_Maugré bieu, Sire_,—Sir, God’s malison on your justice, your
pity, your right reason. Cursed be of God whoso shall have pity
on these false traitorous Armagnacs, English; dogs they are; they
have destroyed us, wasted this realm of France, and sold it to
the English.’[547] And so they slay, and fling aside the slain,
to the extent of “fifteen hundred and eighteen, among whom are
found four Bishops of false and damnable counsel, and two
Presidents of Parlement.” For though it is not Satan’s world this
that we live in, Satan always has his place in it (underground
properly); and from time to time bursts up. Well may mankind
shriek, inarticulately anathematising as they can. There are
actions of such emphasis that no shrieking can be too emphatic
for them. Shriek ye; acted have they.
Shriek who might in this France, in this Paris Legislative or
Paris Townhall, there are Ten Men who do not shriek. A Circular
goes out from the Committee of _Salut Public_, dated 3rd of
September 1792; directed to all Townhalls: a State-paper too
remarkable to be overlooked. “A part of the ferocious
conspirators detained in the Prisons,” it says, “have been put to
death by the People; and it,” the Circular, “cannot doubt but the
whole Nation, driven to the edge of ruin by such endless series
of treasons, will make haste to adopt _this_ means of public
salvation; and all Frenchmen will cry as the men of Paris: We go
to fight the enemy, but we will not leave robbers behind us, to
butcher our wives and children.” To which are legibly appended
these signatures: Panis, Sergent; Marat, Friend of the
People;[548] with Seven others;—carried down thereby, in a
strange way, to the late remembrance of Antiquarians. We remark,
however, that their Circular rather recoiled on themselves. The
Townhalls made no use of it; even the distracted Sansculottes
made little; they only howled and bellowed, but did not bite. At
Rheims “about eight persons” were killed; and two afterwards were
hanged for doing it. At Lyons, and a few other places, some
attempt was made; but with hardly any effect, being quickly put
down.
Less fortunate were the Prisoners of Orléans; was the good Duke
de la Rochefoucault. He journeying, by quick stages, with his
Mother and Wife, towards the Waters of Forges, or some quieter
country, was arrested at Gisors; conducted along the streets,
amid effervescing multitudes, and killed dead “by the stroke of a
paving-stone hurled through the coach-window.” Killed as a once
Liberal now Aristocrat; Protector of Priests, Suspender of
virtuous Pétions, and his unfortunate Hot-grown-cold, detestable
to Patriotism. He dies lamented of Europe; his blood spattering
the cheeks of his old Mother, ninety-three years old.
As for the Orléans Prisoners, they are State Criminals: Royalist
Ministers, Delessarts, Montmorins; who have been accumulating on
the High Court of Orléans, ever since that Tribunal was set up.
Whom now it seems good that we should get transferred to our new
Paris Court of the Seventeenth; which proceeds far quicker.
Accordingly hot Fournier from Martinique, Fournier _l’Americain_,
is off, missioned by Constituted Authority; with stanch National
Guards, with Lazouski the Pole; sparingly provided with
road-money. These, through bad quarters, through difficulties,
perils, for Authorities cross each other in this time,—do
triumphantly bring off the Fifty or Fifty-three Orléans
Prisoners, towards Paris; where a swifter Court of the
Seventeenth will do justice on them.[549] But lo, at Paris, in
the interim, a still swifter and swiftest Court of the _Second_,
and of _September_, has instituted itself: enter not Paris, or
that will judge you!—What shall hot Fournier do? It was his duty,
as volunteer Constable, had he been a perfect character, to guard
those men’s lives never so Aristocratic, at the expense of his
own valuable life never so Sansculottic, till some Constituted
Court had disposed of them. But he was an imperfect character and
Constable; perhaps one of the more imperfect.
Hot Fournier, ordered to turn thither by one Authority, to turn
thither by another Authority, is in a perplexing multiplicity of
orders; but finally he strikes off for Versailles. His Prisoners
fare in tumbrils, or open carts, himself and Guards riding and
marching around: and at the last village, the worthy Mayor of
Versailles comes to meet him, anxious that the arrival and
locking up were well over. It is Sunday, the ninth day of the
month. Lo, on entering the Avenue of Versailles, what multitudes,
stirring, swarming in the September sun, under the dull-green
September foliage; the Four-rowed Avenue all humming and
swarming, as if the Town had emptied itself! Our tumbrils roll
heavily through the living sea; the Guards and Fournier making
way with ever more difficulty; the Mayor speaking and gesturing
his persuasivest; amid the inarticulate growling hum, which
growls ever the deeper even by hearing itself growl, not without
sharp yelpings here and there:—Would to God we were out of this
strait place, and wind and separation had cooled the heat, which
seems about igniting here!
And yet if the wide Avenue is too strait, what will the Street
_de Surintendance_ be, at leaving of the same? At the corner of
Surintendance Street, the compressed yelpings became a continuous
yell: savage figures spring on the tumbril-shafts; first spray of
an endless coming tide! The Mayor pleads, pushes, half-desperate;
is pushed, carried off in men’s arms: the savage tide has
entrance, has mastery. Amid horrid noise, and tumult as of fierce
wolves, the Prisoners sink massacred,—all but some eleven, who
escaped into houses, and found mercy. The Prisons, and what other
Prisoners they held, were with difficulty saved. The stript
clothes are burnt in bonfire; the corpses lie heaped in the ditch
on the morrow morning.[550] All France, except it be the Ten Men
of the Circular and their people, moans and rages, inarticulately
shrieking; all Europe rings.
But neither did Danton shriek; though, as Minister of Justice, it
was more his part to do so. Brawny Danton is in the breach, as of
stormed Cities and Nations; amid the Sweep of Tenth-of-August
cannon, the rustle of Prussian gallows-ropes, the smiting of
September sabres; destruction all round him, and the rushing-down
of worlds: Minister of Justice is his name; but Titan of the
Forlorn Hope, and _Enfant Perdu_ of the Revolution, is his
quality,—and the man acts according to that. ‘We must put our
enemies in fear!’ Deep fear, is it not, as of its own accord,
falling on our enemies? The Titan of the Forlorn Hope, he is not
the man that would swiftest of all prevent its so falling.
Forward, thou lost Titan of an _Enfant Perdu;_ thou must dare,
and again dare, and without end dare; there is nothing left for
thee but that! ‘_Que mon nom soit flétri_, Let my name be
blighted:’ what am I? The Cause alone is great; and shall live,
and not perish.—So, on the whole, here too is a swallower of
Formulas; of still wider gulp than Mirabeau: this Danton,
Mirabeau of the Sansculottes. In the September days, this
Minister was not heard of as co-operating with strict Roland; his
business might lie elsewhere,—with Brunswick and the
Hôtel-de-Ville. When applied to by an official person, about the
Orleans Prisoners, and the risks they ran, he answered gloomily,
twice over, ‘Are not these men guilty?’—When pressed, he
“answered in a terrible voice,” and turned his back.[551] Two
Thousand slain in the Prisons; horrible if you will: but
Brunswick is within a day’s journey of us; and there are Five-and
twenty Millions yet, to slay or to save. Some men have
tasks,—frightfuller than ours! It seems strange, but is not
strange, that this Minister of Moloch-Justice, when any suppliant
for a friend’s life got access to him, was found to have human
compassion; and yielded and granted “always;” “neither did one
personal enemy of Danton perish in these days.”[552]
To shriek, we say, when certain things are acted, is proper and
unavoidable. Nevertheless, articulate speech, not shrieking, is
the faculty of man: when speech is not yet possible, let there
be, with the shortest delay, at least—silence. Silence,
accordingly, in this forty-fourth year of the business, and
eighteen hundred and thirty-sixth of an “Era called Christian as
_lucus à non_,” is the thing we recommend and practise. Nay,
instead of shrieking more, it were perhaps edifying to remark, on
the other side, what a singular thing Customs (in Latin, _Mores_)
are; and how fitly the Virtue, _Vir-tus_, Manhood or Worth, that
is in a man, is called his _Morality_, or _Customariness_. Fell
Slaughter, one the most authentic products of the Pit you would
say, once give it Customs, becomes War, with Laws of War; and is
Customary and Moral enough; and red individuals carry the tools
of it girt round their haunches, not without an air of
pride,—which do thou nowise blame. While, see! so long as it is
but dressed in hodden or russet; and Revolution, less frequent
than War, has not yet got its Laws of Revolution, but the hodden
or russet individuals are Uncustomary—O shrieking beloved brother
blockheads of Mankind, let us close those wide mouths of ours;
let us cease shrieking, and begin considering!