Would you believe it? I was so ignorant a young fellow, that I had no
idea of the meaning of the words; however, I entered the citizen’s room
without fear, and sat down in his ante-chamber until I could be
admitted to see him.
Here I found very few indications of his reverence’s profession; the
walls were hung round with portraits of Robespierre, Marat, and the
like; a great bust of Mirabeau, mutilated, with the word Traître
underneath; lists and republican proclamations, tobacco-pipes and
fire-arms. At a deal-table, stained with grease and wine, sat a
gentleman, with a huge pigtail dangling down to that part of his person
which immediately succeeds his back, and a red nightcap, containing a
TRICOLOR cockade as large as a pancake. He was smoking a short pipe,
reading a little book, and sobbing as if his heart would break. Every
now and then he would make brief remarks upon the personages or the
incidents of his book, by which I could judge that he was a man of the
very keenest sensibilities—“Ah, brigand!” “O malheureuse!” “O
Charlotte, Charlotte!” The work which this gentleman was perusing is
called “The Sorrows of Werter;” it was all the rage, in those days, and
my friend was only following the fashion. I asked him if I could see
Father Schneider? he turned towards me a hideous, pimpled face, which I
dream of now at forty years’ distance.
“Father who?” said he. “Do you imagine that citizen Schneider has not
thrown off the absurd mummery of priesthood? If you were a little older
you would go to prison for calling him Father Schneider—many a man has
died for less;” and he pointed to a picture of a guillotine, which was
hanging in the room.