STORY OF EULALIE CONTINUED.
I was still mourning for Adrien, when my father wrote me to join him
by the first ship for Martinique, as France had now become a land of
horror, where daily--yea, hourly--massacres took place in every city
and hamlet, and where, under the general title of aristocrats,
priests, nuns, and noblesse were butchered, banished, or maltreated,
with a barbarity worthy of the industrious cruelty of Caffres or
Carib Indians.
In a month after this, I sailed from Havre in the corvette _Egalité_,
and without emotion saw the two light-houses on the steep white brow
of Cape la Hêve sink like stars into the blue evening sea, for I was
more dead to the world than when in the convent of St. Ursule, and
(save for my father's sake) careless whether or not I ever saw the
isle of Martinique.
I shall not detain you with the monotony of the voyage, though its
even tenor was broken by two startling incidents--our flight from a
British frigate, which followed us pertinaciously for ten days, and
shot away some of our spars and sails, and might have taken us, but
for a dark and stormy night, in which we lost sight of each other;
the second incident had more direct reference to myself, for on that
night I had a narrow escape from a monster of the deep.
I was awakened by water pouring into the little berth in which I
slept; when, lo! it was discovered that a swordfish had driven its
nasal weapon into the ship, through a double sheathing of iron, a
planking three inches thick and deep, into one of the frigate's
timbers, where it was found torn from the animal's body.
A fortnight after this, I reached Martinique, to find that the
horrors I had left behind me in France had commenced there with
equal, or, if possible, with greater fury. The inhabitants--white,
black, and coloured--were in revolt; the garrisons were in mutiny,
and all was havock, bloodshed and disorder.
Terrified and bewildered by the scenes that met me, I reached the
citadel of St. Pierre, over which the tricolor had replaced the white
banner of the Bourbons. I was compelled to proceed there on foot,
under a burning sun; for when I inquired at the hotel for a carriage,
I was insulted as an "aristocrat." On reaching the gate of the
fortress, I found the guard in a state of disorder and intoxication,
seated under a verandah, smoking Havannah cigars, and drinking
sangaree. I requested one to lead me to their commander.
"What commander do you mean?" stammered one.
"The commandant," said I indignantly; "M. de Mazancy, Chevalier of
St. Louis, and Sieur de St. Valliere."
"Who the devil are you talking about, citoyenne?" asked a tipsy
corporal with an oath; "we know of no such man, as the assembly has
abolished all such trumpery and orders of nobility."
"_Ma belle_" said another, "you mean old Citizen Mazancy, whom we
have sent to the _gamelle_--where, par Dieu, he has before sent me
and many a better man."
"A bas les aristocrats--vive la nation--vive la Ligne!" cried one or
two others reeling round me.
Paris seemed to have followed me over the sea, for the wretches now
seized me with great rudeness.
"Ouf, my little coquette," said one, tearing off my head-dress, "is
this the latest fashion from Paris?"
I burst into tears, as I knew not what was in futurity for my father
or myself, if such were the state of his garrison, in which he had
maintained a discipline worthy of the proverbial Colonel de Martinet
of the Régiment du Roi; and, indeed, that officer had always been my
father's favorite model. The tipsy corporal was about to insist on
kissing me, when he was roughly thrust aside by a tall dark officer,
in whom, by his fierce eyes, enormous moustache, and cicatriced
forehead, I recognized Thibaud, the son of our old steward at St.
Valliere.
"Rouvigny," I exclaimed; "help me, M. de Rouvigny," while the
soldiers uttered a half-tipsy shout of mockery and anger at the
intrusion of an epaulette.
"Eulalie--Mademoiselle Eulalie here--here in Martinique! what marvel
is this?" he asked; "I am so enchanted to see you, that I am without
words----"
"Excuse me, M. le Lieutenant," said I coldly, for I had now certain
undefined suspicions regarding him; "but be assured that the
enchantment is exclusively your own."
"Mademoiselle," said he, attempting to kiss my hand, "I am honoured."
"That is as may be," I replied sharply: "but lead me to my father."
"Her _father_!" exclaimed the soldiers, in varying tones of surprise
and regret; "_Sang Dieu!_ 'tis the daughter of old Citizen Mazancy."
"Excuse me," said the lieutenant, with a troubled expression; "but at
present this introduction is impossible."
"Impossible!" I reiterated, proudly and indignantly; "_Mon Dieu!_
what do you mean, sir? Does he not command the troops in this
island?"
"He _did_ 'command them.'"
"Did?"
"Oui, mademoiselle."
"Has he, too, been superseded by the National Assembly."
"No, mademoiselle--citoyenne, I mean."
"By whom, then?"
"By the people, citoyenne--the nation as represented by the free
citizens of Martinique, who now decline to recognize an officer who
was sent here by Louis XVI., and is resolutely bent on upholding the
name and authority of the boy in the Temple, whom he names Louis
XVII."
"Oh, what is this you tell me, sir!" I exclaimed, clasping my hands;
"my father----"
"Is a state prisoner."
"Where, monsieur--where? Lead me to him--to my father--my dear
father, whom I have come so far to see, and to make the depository of
my sorrows," I implored, in a passion of grief, as his thin and
reverend figure seemed to rise before me; "M. Rouvigny, lead me to
him."
"Mademoiselle, I tell you it is impossible; but you shall see him
to-morrow."
"When?"
"At noon."
"Where?"
"In this barrack-yard," he replied gloomily.
"How, monsieur,--how?"
"_Tonnerre de Ciel!_" said the ruffian, casting off all disguise,
"with a handkerchief at his eyes, and a platoon of twelve muskets
levelled at his breast. You have reached Martinique in good time to
see how we handle those who have so long trodden the people under
foot."
I wrung my hands, and would have sunk on hearing those terrible
tidings so coldly, so savagely announced, had not Rouvigny grasped my
arm.
"Oh, my father!" I gasped; "and I--I----"
"Must meantime, as an aristocrat, become my prisoner," said he, while
his cruel and sinister eyes sparkled with an expression which there
was no mistaking, and by which I could not fail to be struck by
greater horror and dismay.
"Your prisoner!" I exclaimed, while the light seemed to pass from my
eyes, the life from my crushed heart, and the strength from my limbs,
as I became insensible, and remember no more until the following day.
By the rays of the sun that played upon the wall, I suspected that
noon,--the time at which I was to see my father--must already have
arrived. I started on discovering that I was a prisoner in one of
the vaulted chambers of the citadel of St. Pierre.
My present situation, the last words of Rouvigny, and the danger that
menaced my helpless father, all rushed, with returning life, upon me,
and I sank back on the truckle-bed, to which, no doubt, the soldiers
had, overnight, conveyed me. My wretched apartment was a mere stone
vault. Near me, a pitcher of water was placed upon a stool. I drank
thirstily, and on rising looked about me.
My prison had two windows or horizontal slits, grated with iron; and
through these the sun's rays struggled feebly in. From one I could
perceive the two slender spires of the town, and the road beyond it,
winding over a green hill to Fort Royal, with the bright glassy bay
of St. Pierre full of shipping. From the other, I could perceive the
courtyard of the citadel, where, already, the soldiers of the
garrison were gathering with arms in their hands and a sullen
expression in their faces.
Anon I heard the rolling of drums echoing in the fortifications, and
then the troops fell into their ranks by companies. The officers who
commanded them were no longer like the decorated chevaliers of old
France. They were taken from the ranks--men of the people--and were
divested of all ornaments, epaulettes, or lace; and as a badge of
office, wore each a tricoloured sash over their plain blue surtouts;
while in scorn of powder and trimming, their coarse black hair
streamed in uncombed masses from beneath their large cocked hats. My
heart grew sick on beholding them; for here, as in Paris, it was too
evident that the religion of nature,--the power of the sovereign
people,--liberty, equality, and fraternity,--with other political
cant of the time, and of the murderous sections of the capital,
together with bloodshed, robbery, and outrage, were triumphant and
victorious. In confirmation of this several cries reached me.
"A bas les aristocrats!"
"Down with the Red Ribbon!"
"Vive le bon citoyen Rouvigny! Vive la République démocratique et
sociale!"
These came chiefly from an excited mob of revolutionists, who poured
like a living tide into the citadel, to fraternize with the soldiers
of the line--now accepted children of the new _régime_. Among their
mass of squalor, rags, and filth, crime, and intoxication, were
hundreds of white women and French mulatto girls; like the ancient
Bacchantes of Greece, more than half nude, crowned by garlands of
vine-leaves, with wildness in their faces, frenzy in their gestures,
and dishevelled hair; clashing cymbals and brandishing knives that
were stained with the blood of many of the secular clergy, Jesuits,
and wealthiest planters. They sang the "Carmagnole," and many
obscene ditties, while dancing and gyrating in mad groups around two
ruffians, each of whom bore upon his pike a human skull.
There were the ghastly heads of two of my father's favourite
officers, MM. de la Bourdonaye and St. Julian, both young and noble
gentlemen of Dauphiny, who were accused of no other crime than being
descended from two of the best houses in France, and who had been
murdered in cold blood in the vaults of the citadel. In very
mockery, as it were, each poor skull had on a wig nicely powdered,
and loyally tied with white ribbons. The heads were borne before a
prisoner who was ignominiously bound with ropes, and led forward
between an escort whose bayonets were fixed.
A shriek rose to my lips, but died there, as I clutched my
prison-bars, and swung on them madly; for in this prisoner, who was
greeted with a yell, I recognized my father--my father, Louis de
Mazancy--the Sieur de St. Valliere, the first gentleman of Dauphiny,
and Premier Chevalier of the Grand Cross of St. Louis.
Firmly, erect, and proudly, the old man strode to his doom. He wore
the white uniform of the old French line. His hair was powdered and
dressed _à la_ Louis XV.; his orders were glittering on his breast;
his aspect was singularly calm, dignified, and sweetly venerable. He
was resolved to die with honour to the garb he wore, the race he
sprang from, and the old monarchy of the Capets, the Valois, and the
Bourbon, which, in that hour of shame and peril, he felt he
represented; and, in defiance of the living tide of _canaille_ who
surrounded him, he repeatedly exclaimed with a clear and loud
voice,--"Vive le Roi, Vive Louis XVII., King of France and Navarre!"
Yells, and the ominous flashing of brandished weapons followed him;
the loud voice of Thibaud de Rouvigny was heard commanding silence;
and he was obeyed, being now elected commander of the forces in the
new republican state of Martinique. Such sudden elevations were not
unusual in those days of the subversion of all right and rule. A
poor sergeant of marines, named Jean-Baptist Bernadotte, was thus
made colonel-in-chief of a battalion of mutineers, while all his
officers were ironed and cast into prison. Unlike Rouvigny, who
murdered many of his hapless superiors in cold blood, Bernadotte's
first act of authority, was to order the release and dismissal of all
who bore commissions under King Louis.*
* I need scarcely remind the reader that "poor" Sergeant Bernadotte,
to whom Eulalie referred, the most distinguished of all "the children
of the Republic," died in 1822, Marshal Prince of Ponte Corvo, and
King of Sweden.
The unfortunate chevalier saw them take his epaulettes and sash from
his shoulders and tread them under foot; he saw his sword broken over
his head and flung away, and he only vouchsafed a scornful smile; but
when the red ribbon and gold cross of St. Louis, with its motto
_Bellicoe Virtutis Proemium_, was rent from his breast, "the iron
seemed to enter his soul," and a scarlet flush rose to his pale thin
temples; for this badge of long and faithful military service he
valued more than all the heraldic honours of the line of Mazancy. To
have it torn thus from his breast, and trampled under the foot of
Thibaud de Rouvigny--the clown whom he had brought from his
Seigneurie in Dauphiny--the wretch whom he fostered and promoted--oh,
it was a bitterness too much even for an old soldier's philosophy.
M. le Chevalier Dutriel endeavoured to lessen these degradations, but
the attempt nearly cost him his own life.
"My cross," I heard my father exclaim; "take it! Bravely was it won
when leading Frenchmen--yea, the fathers of many among you--at
Belleisle, in Western Florida, and under La Fayette, for the freedom
of America. The hands of our anointed king gave it to me, and those
of rebels cannot degrade it."
"Down with the aristocrat!" cried the troops.
"A la lanterne!" added the copper-coloured Bacchantes.
"Down with the enemy of France, of liberty, and the people!" shouted
the multitude.
My father now proceeded to accuse Rouvigny of ingratitude, and of
seducing the garrison from their allegiance; but, as in the case of
their royal master, the drums were ordered to beat that his voice
might not be heard.
Rouvigny now unsheathed his sword, and pointing to the prison window,
on the bars of which I clung, said something to my father, who
trembled and turned towards it. Still more to embitter his last
moments, the wretch was no doubt informing him of the vicinity of his
only child, for he stretched his fettered hands towards the grating,
with a piteous expression in his venerable face.
"Father--father!" I exclaimed, but at that moment Rouvigny forced him
down upon his knees; a handkerchief was bound over his eyes; I saw
the gleam of arms as the firing platoon drew up, and a coffin was
borne through the excited mob, who parted before and collapsed behind
it, like the waves of the sea round a vessel. I was voiceless,
breathless, powerless! I could not even pray!
I sank upon my knees and muffled my head in the skirt of my dress, to
shut out the dreadful sound that was sure to follow all I had seen;
but _that sound_--the death-volley which slew my father, seemed to
split my ears, like rolling thunder! .......
When I looked again, the multitude were yelling and whooping round a
prostrate and bleeding form, which was thrust into a rude coffin and
borne away by black slaves, while the naked Bacchantes of whom I have
spoken danced hand in hand around it, and, as it disappeared, a
blessed insensibility came over me.
Such was the fate of my father, the Sieur de Mazancy, commander of
the royal troops in Martinique.
After this, several days passed; of these I have little other
recollection than hearing from time to time sounds of tumult; the
echo of musket-shots, and wild cries from the town of St. Pierre,
where the republicans of all colours were leaguing with the blacks
and revolted troops to destroy the wealthy planters and their
families. Overcome in mind and body by the terror I had endured, and
a horror of my present position, I would have sunk altogether, but
for the kindness and ministrations of Benoit le Noir, an old Obeah
negro of my father's, who had obtained the office of sweeping the
prisons and cleansing the scaffold in the citadel, and who, almost
forced me to eat some cakes made of a delicate fruit, and to drink
from time to time the contents of a gourd bottle, which he carried in
his wallet of grass-matting. The beverage it contained was vidonia
wine and citron juice, seasoned with sugar and nutmeg; it refreshed
and sustained me, and I remember more than once drooping my aching
head upon the shoulder of this old slave and weeping bitterly, for in
my loneliness I felt how true it is that,
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.
After the first paroxysm of grief was past and I had become tolerably
resigned, I was visited by Thibaud de Rouvigny. I remembered how my
father had upbraided him, and the part he had performed at his
execution--let me rather call it murder!--and I received him with
coldness almost loathing. But he only smiled, seated himself upon my
truckle bed, and persisted in endeavouring to console me. Let me
hasten over an interview, the result of which makes me now despise
myself! But, oh, what was I, a poor girl broken in heart and crushed
in spirit!
He told me that, as an aristocrat, I was doomed to death by the laws
which had regenerated France; laws, which the provisional government
of Martinique recognized; that the warrant for my execution had
already been signed by _him_; but that one way remained by which I
could be saved.
"A way--oh! name it, monsieur," said I imploringly.
"Marriage with a citizen--a child of the Republic."
"Oh, this is adding absurdity to cruelty--insult to misfortune," I
replied with clasped hands.
"_Tonnerre de Ciel!_ mademoiselle," said he, "or shall I rather say
Citoyenne Eulalie?--be calm, and listen to a friend."
"Friend!" I reiterated with a scornful shudder.
M. Rouvigny smiled coldly.
He then proceeded to say how long he had loved me; that he would cast
himself and his power (he had succeeded my poor father in his civil
and military authority) at my feet; but I turned from him with the
aversion he merited. The scar on his brow grew black with rage--his
cheeks crimsoned and his eyes glared; I was terrified--yea,
fascinated by fear, even as when yonder horrid reptile reared its
head at me this evening.
Alas! I had not the courage of Charlotte Corday, or others who, like
her, shall live in history.
To be brief, I felt myself too young, too unprepared, too fond of
life and full of hope for the future, to die yet; and to be spared
the horror of a public assassination----"
She paused.
"You consented to marry this villain," said I, with a tone almost of
pique, "this Thibaud Rouvigny?"
"I did." (She shuddered like one in an ague.) "What mercy could I
expect from Rouvigny? 'Twas his brother who clove with a hatchet the
head of the helpless, innocent, and lovely Princess de Lamballe, and
who held it aloft on a pike, with her beautiful golden hair waving
around the bloody staff, as he thrust it against the barred window of
that chamber in which Marie Antoinette was seated with the captive
Louis, in the Tower of the Temple. His family were all in the
sections of Paris. _Mon Dieu!_ they were a generation of tigers!
"To satisfy my scruples, the curé of the Ursuline chapel at St.
Pierre performed the burlesque of a marriage ceremony _in secret_,
for all religion is abolished in the colonies as in France, and thus
sanctified, to save my miserable life, I became the bride--the victim
of Rouvigny----"
She paused again and wept, while her flushing face was bowed upon her
snow-white hands.
"And this is your story, madame?"
"Yes."
"It is a sorrowful one."
"God alone knows what may be its sequel."
"But you left Martinique----"
"A fugitive."
"How?"
"The coarseness and cruelty of Rouvigny drove me almost mad, but they
supplied me with courage; and three weeks after my--(can I call it
marriage?)--by the aid of Benoit, the faithful old negro, I escaped
from the citadel, and reached a small merchant vessel which was bound
for Havre under American colours. The master took pity upon me, for
my father had once done him a service. We put to sea; a new hope
began to fill my heart--the hope that _freedom_, a homeless,
friendless, and penniless freedom inspired--when, within a day's sail
of St. Lucia, we were captured by the British frigate _Adder_ (whose
captain our false colours failed to deceive), and taken to this
island, where the Governor, in commiseration of my misfortunes,
assigned to me this pretty villa of Roscobelle, and a little income."
"And you are now happy?" said I, taking her hands in mine.
"Almost--for I am free."
"Is this M. Rouvigny still at Martinique?"
"Yes, as commandant."
"Good! we shall soon be there, and perhaps, madame, it may be my
happy lot to avenge you," I exclaimed, with an ardent impulse which
her story and misfortunes both inspired.
Such was the adventurous narrative of Eulalie, ere the conclusion of
which the early hours of morning surprised us.