THE WILD BEAST OF GEVAUDAN.
In the year 1765, the French, Dutch, and Brussels papers teemed with
marvellous accounts of a monstrous creature, called "The Wild Beast
of Gévaudan," whose ravages for a time spread terror and even despair
among the peasantry of Provence and Languedoc, especially in those
districts of the ancient Narbonne Gaul which were mountainous, woody,
and cold, and where communication was rendered difficult by the want
of good roads and navigable rivers.
In the April of that year a drawing of this animal was sent to the
Intendant of Alençon, entitled "_Figure de la beste_ (sic) _feroce
l'ou nomme l'hyene qui a devoré plus que_ 80 _personnes dans le
Gévaudan_." An engraving of this is now before us, and certainly its
circulation must have added to the confusion of the nature of the
original. This print represents the beast with a huge head, large
eyes, a long tongue, a double row of sharp fangs, small and erect
ears like those of a cat, the paws and body of a lion, with the tail
of a cow, which trails on the ground with a bushy tuft at the end.*
* The History of France records that there appeared a wild beast in
the Forest of Fontainebleau in 1653, which devoured _one hundred and
forty_ persons, before it was killed by twelve mousquetaires of the
Royal Guards!
In December, 1764, it first made its appearance at St. Flour, in
Provence, and on the 20th it devoured a little girl who was herding
cattle near Mende. A detachment of light dragoons, sent in search of
it, hunted in vain for six weeks the wild and mountainous parts of
Languedoc. Though a thousand crowns were offered by the province of
Mende to any person who would slay it, and public prayers were put up
in all the churches for deliverance from this singular scourge, which
soon became so great a terror to those districts, as ever the dragon
was of which we read in the "_Seven Champions of Christendom_."
No two accounts tallied as to the appearance of this animal, and some
of these, doubtless the offspring of the terror and superstition of
the peasantry, added greatly to the dread it inspired. French
hyperbole was not wanting, and the gazettes were filled with the most
singular exaggerations and gasconades.
The groves of olive and mulberry trees, and the vineyards, were
neglected, the wood-cutters abandoned the forests, and hence fuel
became provokingly dear, even in Paris.
In the month of January we are told that it devoured a great many
persons, chiefly children and young girls. It was said by those who
escaped to be larger than a wolf, but that previous to springing on
its victim, by crouching on the ground, it seemed no longer than a
fox. "At the distance of one or two fathoms it rises on its hind
legs, and leaps upon its prey, which it seizes by the neck or throat,
but is afraid of horned cattle, from which it runs away."
It was alleged by some to be the cub of a tiger and lioness; by
others, of a panther and hyena, which had escaped from a private
menagerie belonging to Victor Amadeus, duke of Savoy. A peasant of
Marvejols, who wounded it by a musket shot, found a handful of its
hair, "which stank very much;" he averred it to "be the bigness of a
year-old calf, the head a foot in length, the chest large as that of
a horse, his howling in the night resembled the braying of an ass."
According to collated statements, the beast was seen within the same
hour at different places, in one instance twenty-four miles apart;
hence many persons naturally maintained that there were _two_.
On the 27th December, 1764, a young woman, in her nineteenth year,
was torn to pieces by it at Bounesal, near Mende. Next day it
appeared in the wood of St. Martin de Born, and was about to spring
upon a girl of twelve years, when her father rushed to her
protection. The woodman, a bold and hardy fellow, rendered desperate
by the danger of his child, kept it at bay for a quarter of an hour,
"the beast all the while endeavouring to fly at the girl, and they
would both inevitably have become its prey if some horned cattle
which the father kept in the wood had not fortunately come up, on
which the beast was terrified and ran away."
This account was attested on oath by the woodman, before the mayor
and other civil authorities of Mende, an episcopal city in Languedoc.
On the 9th of January an entire troop of the 10th Light Horse (the
Volontaires Etrangers de Clermont-Prince), then stationed at St.
Chely, was despatched under Captain Duhamel in quest of the animal,
which had just torn and disembowelled a man midway between their
quarters and La Garge. On this occasion the Bishop of Mende said a
solemn mass, and the consecrated Host was elevated in the cathedral,
which was thronged by the devout for the entire day; but the beast
still defied all efforts for his capture or destruction, and soon
after, "in the wood of St. Colme, four leagues from Rhodez, it
devoured a shepherdess of eighteen years of age, celebrated for her
beauty."
The English papers began to treat the affair of "the wild beast" as a
jest or allegory invented by the Jesuits to render the Protestants
odious and absurd, as it was said to have escaped from the Duke of
Savoy's collection; and "this circumstance is designed," says one
journal, "to point out the Protestants who are supposed to derive
their principles from the ancient Waldensee, who inhabited the
valleys of Piedmont, and were the earliest promoters of the
Reformation."
A writer in a Scottish newspaper of the period goes still farther,
and announces his firm belief that this tormentor of the Gévaudanois
was nothing more or less than the wild beast prophesied in the
Apocalypse of St. John, whereon the scarlet lady was mounted.
Another asserts that it was typical of the whole Romish clergy, and
that its voracious appetite answered to another part of Scripture,
"conceived in the words _eating up my people as they eat
bread_,"--his favourite food being generally little boys and girls of
Protestant parentage.*
* _Edinburgh Advertiser_, 1764.
After a long and fruitless chase, Captain Duhamel, before returning
to quarters at St. Chely, resolved to make a vigorous attempt to
destroy this mysterious scourge of Languedoc; but his extreme ardour
caused his plans to miscarry.
Posting his volontaires, some on horseback, and some on foot, at all
the avenues of a wood to which it had been traced, it was soon roused
from its lair by the explosion of pistols and sound of trumpets.
There was a cry raised of "_Voilà! Gardez la-Bête!_" and Duhamel, an
officer of great courage, who had dismounted, rushed forward to
assail it sword in hand, but had the mortification to see it, with a
terrible roar, spring past the very place he had just quitted.
Two of his dragoons fired their pistols, but both missed. They then
pursued it on the spur for nearly a league, and though seldom more
than four or five paces from it, they were unable to cut it down, and
ultimately it escaped, by leaping a high stone wall which their
horses were unable to surmount; and after crossing a marsh which lay
on the other side, it leisurely retired to a wild forest beyond.
The baffled dragoons reported that it "was as big as the largest park
dog, very shaggy, of a brown colour, a yellow belly, a very large
head, and had two very long tusks, ears short and erect, and a
branched tail, which it sets up very much when running." Fear had no
share in this strange description, for the officers of Clermont's
regiment asserted that the two dragoons were as brave men as any in
the corps; but some declared that it was a bear, and others a wild
boar!
On the 12th of January it attacked seven children (five boys and two
girls) who were at play near the Mountain of Marguerite. It tore the
entire cheek off one boy, and gobbled it up before him; but the other
four, led by a boy named Portefaix, having stakes shod with iron,
drove the beast into a marsh, where it sunk up to the belly, and then
disappeared. That night a boy's body was found half devoured in the
neighbourhood of St. Marcel; on the 21st it severely lacerated a
girl, and (according to the _Paris Gazette_) "next day attacked a
woman, and _bit off her head_!"
The four brave boys who put it to flight received a handsome gratuity
from the Bishop of Mende, and by the king's order were educated for
the army; the _Gazette_ adds that the king gave the young Portefaix a
gift of four hundred livres, and three hundred to each of his
companions.
As females and little ones seemed the favourite food of the beast,
Captain Duhamel now ordered several of his dragoons to dress
themselves as women, and with their pistols and fusils concealed, to
accompany the children who watched the cattle; and the King of France
now offered from his privy purse two thousand crowns, in addition to
the one thousand offered by the province of Mende, for the head of
this terrible animal.
Inspired by a hope of winning the proffered reward, a stout and hardy
peasant of Languedoc, armed with a good musket, set out in search of
it; but on beholding the beast suddenly near him, surrounded by all
the real and imaginary terrors it inspired, he forgot alike his
musket and his resolution; he shrieked with terror and fled, and soon
after "the creature devoured a woman of the village of Jullange, at
the foot of the Mountain of Marguerite."
As the terror was increasing in Gévaudan and the Vivarez, the offered
rewards were again increased to no less than ten thousand livres; by
the diocese of Mende, two thousand; by the province of Languedoc, two
thousand; by the king, six thousand; and the following placard was
posted up in all the towns and cities of the adjacent provinces:--
"By order of the King, and the Intendant of the Province of Languedoc:
"Notice is given to all persons, that his Majesty, being deeply
affected by the situation of his subjects, now exposed to the ravages
of the wild beast which for four months past has infested Vivarez and
Gévaudan, and being desirous to stop the progress of such a calamity,
has determined to promise a reward of six thousand livres to any
person or persons who shall kill the animal. Such as are willing to
undertake the pursuit of him, may previously apply to the Sieur de la
Font, sub-deputy to the Intendant of Mende, who will give them the
necessary instructions, agreeable to what has been prescribed by the
ministry on the part of his Majesty."
Still the ubiquitous beast remained untaken; and a letter from Paris
of the 13th February relates the terror it occasioned to a party
consisting of M. le Tivre, a councillor, and two young ladies, who
were on their way to visit M. de Sante, the curé of Vaisour.
They were travelling in a berlingo, drawn by four post-horses, with
two postilions, and accompanied by a footman, who rode a
saddle-horse, and was armed with a sabre. The first night, on
approaching the dreaded district, they halted at Guimpe, and next
morning at nine o'clock set forth, intending to lunch at Roteaux, a
village situated in a bleak and mountainous place. The bailiff of
Guimpe deemed it his duty to warn them, as strangers, "that the wild
beast had been often seen lurking about the Chaussée that week, and
that it would be proper to take an escort of armed men for their
protection."
M. le Tivre and the councillor, being foolhardy, declined, and took
the young ladies under their own protection; but they had scarcely
proceeded two leagues when they perceived a post-chaise, attended by
an outrider, coming down the rugged road that traversed the hill of
Credi, at a frightful pace, and pursued by the wild beast!
The leading horse fell, on which the terrible pursuer made a spring
towards it; but M. le Tivre's footman interposed with his drawn
sabre, on which the beast pricked up its ears, stood erect, and
showed its fangs and mouth full of froth, whisked round, and gave the
terrified valet a blow with its tail, covering all his face with
blood. The rest of the narrative is ridiculously incredible, for it
states, that, on perceiving a gentleman levelling a blunderbuss
(which flashed in the pan), the beast darted right through the chaise
of M. le Tivre, smashing the side glasses and escaped to the wood.
"The stench left in the shattered chaise was past description, and no
burning of frankincense, or other method, removed it, so that it was
sold for two louis, and though burned to ashes, the cinders were
obliged, by order of the commissary, to be buried without the town
walls!" (_Advertiser_, 1765).
Eluding the many armed hunters who were now in pursuit of it, in the
early part of February the wild beast was seen hovering in
well-frequented places, on the skirts of the forests adjoining the
fields and vineyards, in the hamlets, and on the highways. In
Janols, the capital of Gévaudanois, it sprang upon a child, whose
cries brought his father to his aid, but ere a rescue could be
effected, the poor little creature was rent asunder.
Three days afterwards, on the Feast of the Purification, five
peasants, going to mass at Reintort de Randon, suddenly perceived it
on the highway before them. It was crouching, and about to spring,
when their shouts, and the pointed staves with which they were armed,
put it to flight. On Sunday, the 3rd February, it was heard howling
in the little village of St. Aman's during the celebration of high
mass. All the inhabitants were in church, "but as they had taken the
precaution to shut up the children in their houses, it retired
without doing any mischief." On the 8th it was perceived within a
hundred yards of the town of Aumont. A general chase through the
snow was made by the armed huntsmen; but night came on before they
came within range of the dreaded fugitive.
In February and March we find it still continuing its ravages through
all the pleasant valleys of the Aisne. At Soissons it worried a
woman to death and partly devoured her. Two girls were brought to
the Hospital of St. Flour in a dying state from wounds it had
inflicted:
"Catherine Boyer, aged twenty years, who was attacked on the 15th of
January at Bastide-de-Montfort; all that part of the head on which
the hair grew is torn away, with a part of the os coronæ, and the
whole pericranium with the upper part of the ear is lost. The
occipital bone is likewise laid bare. The other girl belongs to St.
Just; the left side of her head and neck is carried away, with part
of her nose and upper lip."
On the 1st of March, a man boldly charged it on horseback, but was
thrown, and leaving his nag to its mercy, scrambled away and found
refuge in a mill, where it besieged him for some time, till a lad of
seventeen appeared, whom it lacerated with teeth and claws and left
expiring outside the door. On the road near Bazoches, it tore to
pieces a woman who attempted to save a girl on which it was about to
spring; and four men of that place, armed with loaded guns, watched
all night, near the mangled body, in the hope that it might return;
but the animal was several miles distant, and after biting several
sheep and cows in a farm-yard, was at last severely wounded by
Antoine Savanelle, an old soldier, who assailed it with a pitchfork,
which he thrust into its throat, and he was vain enough to declare
that the wound was mortal and that he must have killed it.
This boast, however, was premature, for it soon reappeared, biting,
tearing, and devouring, and though a man of Malzieu wounded it by a
musket shot, making it roll over with a hideous cry, it was able on
the 9th to drag a child for two hundred yards from a cottage door.
It dropped its prey unhurt; but on the same evening, we are told that
it partly devoured a young woman near the village of Miolonettes, and
committed other ravages, the mere enumeration of which would weary
rather than astonish, though it was stated that not less "than twenty
thousand men" (a sad exaggeration surely), noblesse, hunters,
woodmen, and soldiers, were in pursuit of it, under the Count de
Morangies, an old maréchal de camp, who passed a whole night near the
body of the half-devoured girl, in the vain hope that the monster
would return within range of his musket.
Great astonishment and ridicule were excited in England by these
continued details, and under date of 13th March, a pretended letter
from Paris, headed "Wonderful Intelligence!" went the round of the
press.
"The wild beast that makes such a noise all over Europe, and after
whom there are at least thirty thousand regular forces and seventy
thousand militia and armed peasants, proves to be a descendant on the
mother's side from the famous Dragon of Wantley, and on the father's
side from a Scotch Highland Laird. He eats a house as an alderman
eats a custard, and with the wag of his tail he throws down a church.
He was attacked on the night of the 8th instant, in his den, by a
detachment of fourteen thousand men, under the command of Duc de
Valliant; but the platoon firing, and even the artillery, had only
the effect of making him sneeze; at last he gave a slash with his
tail by which we lost seven thousand men; then making a jump over the
left wing, made his escape."
Elsewhere we find:--"Yesterday, about ten in the morning, a courier
arrived (in London) from France, with the melancholy news that the
wild beast had, on the 25th instant, been attacked by the _whole_
French army, consisting of one hundred and twenty thousand men, whom
he totally defeated in the twinkling of an eye, swallowing the whole
train of artillery and devouring twenty-five thousand men."
But still in Languedoc, lovers who had lost their brides, brothers
their sisters, and parents their children, armed with guns and
spears, beat the mountain sides and wild thickets for this animal,
the existence of which was considered nearly or quite fabulous in
London.
It would seem to have been deemed so in Holland, too, for the
_Utrecht Gazette_, after detailing how bravely a poor woman of La
Bessiere, name Jane Chaston, defended her little children against the
beast, which appeared in her garden and tore one with its teeth,
states that whatever scoffers might say, its existence was no longer
doubtful, adding, "that unless we believe in the accounts of it which
come from France, we must reject the greatest part of the events to
which we give credit, as being of much less authority."
Louis XV gave a handsome gratuity to Jane Chaston for her courage and
tenderness in defending her children, but we are not informed how or
with what she was armed.
The Duc de Praslin received a report from the Comte de Montargis, who
commanded the troops in the neighbourhood of La Bessiere, to the
effect that, three days after the adventure of Jane Chaston, a party
of eighty dragoons, _en route_ to join their regiment, fell in with
the beast, and rode at full speed towards it. When first discovered
it was one hundred and fifty yards distant, and fled into a hollow
place, which was environed by marshes and water, and then they
endeavoured to hunt it forth by dogs. They opened a fire upon it
with their carbines; but as the rain was falling in torrents, all
these flashed in the pan, save _one_, which went off without effect.
"The rain," continues the report, which is not very flattering to M.
le Comte's cavalry, "not only hindered aid from coming to the
troopers (the explosion of the carbine and their incessant cries of
'the beast! the beast!' having alarmed the whole neighbourhood), but
by filling up the hollows with water, made them unable any longer."
Three-quarters of an hour after this the beast appeared in a field
where tiles were made, at the base of Mount Mimat, where there is a
hermitage dedicated to St. Privat, partly hewn out of the rock. This
was then inhabited by an aged recluse and an officer of artillery, a
reformed _roué_, who had dwelt with him for eighteen months, by way
of penance. From the window they could plainly see the beast
gambolling playfully on the grass, and climbing up the trees like a
squirrel; but being without arms, they shut and made fast the door of
the grotto, near which it remained watching for half an hour. This
time the officer employed in making a sketch of it, which next day he
sent to the Bishop of Mende; and here, perhaps, we have the startling
engraving which was produced by the Intendant of Alençon.
The Comte de Montargis forwarded this sketch to the Duc de Praslin,
to whose office the people flocked in multitudes to behold it; but
public opinion was divided as to whether the animal was a lynx or a
bear; "but I am certain," adds the writer of the news, "that if it
was brought to the fair of St. Germain, it would draw more spectators
than the famous Indian bird."
This celebrated fair was then held in a large meadow contiguous to
the ancient Abbey of St. Germain-des-Prés, and was the grand
rendezvous of all the dissipated society of Paris, to whom its
gaming-tables, booths, theatres, cafes, cabarets, formed a
never-ending source of attraction.
In April the beast devoured a young woman of twenty, who was watching
some cattle. After that event the country became quite deserted;
though its preference for the fair sex seemed very decided, no men
would work in the fields, herd the flocks, or go abroad, save in
armed bands.
The _Brussels Gazette_ of May records a new phase in the history of
the beast. Of eighteen persons whom it had bitten, thirteen are
stated to have died raving mad. One patient began to howl like a
dog, on which he was bled copiously, and chained hand and foot.
Endued with terrible strength, he burst his bonds, and raved about in
wild frenzy, destroying everything that came in his way, until he was
shot down by an officer with a double-barrelled gun, when attempting,
with a crowbar, to break into a country-house near Broine, where
thirty persons had taken refuge from him.
About six in the evening of the 1st of May, the Sieur Martel de la
Chaumette, whose château was at St. Alban's, in the bishopric of
Mende, perceived, from a window, an animal which he was certain could
be no other than the wild beast of Gévaudan. It was in a grass
meadow, seated on its hind legs, and was gazing steadfastly at a lad,
about fifteen years of age, who was herding some horned cattle, and
was all unaware of its vicinity and ulterior views. The Sieur de la
Chaumette summoned his two brothers, and armed with guns they issued
forth in pursuit of the animal, which fled at their approach.
The youngest overtook it in the forest, and put a ball into it at
sixty-seven paces; it rolled over three times, which enabled the
elder Chaumette to put in another ball at fifty-two paces, on which
it fled, and escaped, losing blood in great quantities. Night came
on, and the pursuit was abandoned; but next day the Chaumettes were
joined by the Sieurs d'Ennival, father and son, and a band of
hunters. Its trail and traces of blood were found, and followed for
a great distance, but they tracked it in vain.
The Sieur de la Chaumette, who had slain a great many wolves,
declared that the animal he had seen in the meadow was _not_ one; but
his description of its appearance coincided exactly with that given
by the Sieur Duhamel of the 10th Light Horse, and with the sketch
made by the military hermit of St. Privat. The Chaumettes were in
great hopes that the two bullets had slain the monster; but on the
day following, at five in the evening, at a spot five leagues distant
from the château, it devoured a girl fourteen years of age, and the
terror of the people increased, as the beast seemed to have a charmed
life, and to be almost bullet-proof.
The picked marksmen of fifty parishes now joined in the chase. Two
remarkably fine dogs of the Sieur d'Ennival were so eager in the
pursuit, that they left the hunt far behind, and, as they were never
seen again, were supposed to have been killed and eaten. The society
of the knights of St. Hubert, in the city of Puy, composed of forty
men, joined in the crusade against this denizen of the wilds of
Languedoc; but it was not until the end of September, 1765, that it
was ultimately vanquished and slain by a game-keeper and the Sieur
Antoine de Bauterne, a gentleman of Paris, who set out for Gévaudan
on purpose to encounter it.
After a long, arduous, and exciting chase, through forest and over
fell, on bringing it to bay at fifty yards, he shot it in the eye.
Mad with pain and fury, it was crouching prior to springing upon him,
when his companion, M. Rheinchard, gamekeeper to Louis, Duke of
Orleans (son of Philip, so long regent of France), by a single
bullet, in a vital spot, shot it dead.
It was then measured, and found to be five feet seven inches long,
thirty-two inches high, and only one hundred and thirty pounds in
weight. On the 4th of October, the Sieur de Bauterne, who was
extolled as if he had been the victor of another Steenkirk or
Fontenoy, arrived triumphantly in Paris, and had the honour to
present it to the king; and then great was the astonishment and the
disappointment of all who saw this animal--the terrible wild beast of
Gévaudan, whose sanguinary career had for so many months excited such
dismay there and wonder elsewhere--and found that it was only a wolf
after all, and not a very large one! Horace Walpole, fourth Earl of
Orford--the brilliant and witty Walpole of Strawberry Hill--saw the
carcass as it lay in the queen's antechamber at Versailles, and
asserts that it was simply a common wolf. Its nature accounted for
some of the peculiarities it exhibited during its ravages, as the
wolf, according to Weissenborn, destroys every other creature it can
master, and, on a moderate calculation, consumes during the year
about _thirty times_ its own weight of animal substance; and to
increase the list of its crimes, it has, he adds, in many instances,
communicated hydrophobia to man.