officer, M. Champion, reminds him of his duties, and says with
firmness: "Order the people to retire; order them in the name of the
law; we are threatened with great danger, and you must speak." At last
Petion decides to intervene. "Citizens," he says, "all you who are
listening to me, came to present legally your petition to the
hereditary representative of the nation, and you have done so with the
dignity and majesty of a free people; return now to your homes, for you
can desire nothing further. Your demand will doubtless be reiterated
by all the eighty-three departments, and the King will grant your
prayer. Retire, and do not, by remaining longer, give occasion to the
public enemies to impugn your worthy intentions."
At first this discourse of the mayor of Paris produces but slight
effect. The cries and threats continue. But, after a while, the
crowd, worn out with shouting, and hungry and thirsty as well, begin to
quiet down a little. The most excited cry: "We are waiting for an
answer from the King. Nothing has been asked of him yet." Others say:
"Listen to the mayor, he is going to speak again; we will {207} hear
him." Petion repeats what he said before: "If you do not wish your
magistrates to be unjustly accused, withdraw."
M. Sergent, administrator of police, who had come with the mayor, asked
if any one has ordered the doors leading from the Grand Cabinet to the
Gallery of Diana to be opened, so as to allow the crowd to pass out by
the small staircase into the Court of the Princes. Louis XVI.
overheard this question. "I have had the apartments opened," said he;
"the people, marching out on the gallery side, will like to see them."
A sentiment of curiosity hastened the movements of the crowd. In order
to go out, they had to pass through the State Bedchamber, the Grand
Cabinet, and the Gallery of Diana. Sergent, standing in front of the
door, leading from the OEil-de-Boeuf to the State Bedchamber, unfastens
his scarf and waving it over his head, cries: "Citizens, this is the
badge of the law; in its name we invite you to retire and follow us."
Petion says: "The people have done what they ought to do. You have
acted with the pride and dignity of freemen. But there has been enough
of it; let all retire." A double row of National Guards is formed, and
the people pass between them. The return march begins. A few
recalcitrants want to remain, and keep up a cry of "Down with the veto!
Recall the ministers!" But they are swept on by the stream, and follow
the march like all the rest. While they are going out through the door
between the OEil-de-Boeuf and the State {208} Bed-chamber, the National
Guard prevents any one from entering on the other side, through the
door connecting the OEil-de-Boeuf with the Hall of the Guards.
At this moment, a deputation of twenty-four members of the Assembly
present themselves. Roused by the public clamor announcing that the
King's life is in danger, the National Assembly has called an
extraordinary evening session. The president of the deputation, M.
Brunk, says to the King: "Sire, the National Assembly sends us to
assure ourselves of your situation, to protect the constitutional
liberty you should enjoy, and to share your danger." Louis XVI.
replies: "I am grateful for the solicitude of the Assembly; I am
undisturbed in the midst of Frenchmen." At the same time, Petion goes
to turn back the crowd, who are constantly ascending the great
staircase, and who threaten another invasion. The sentry at the
doorway of the OEil-de-Boeuf is replaced, and the crowd ceases to flock
thither. The circle of National Guards about the sovereign is
increased. A space is formed, and he is surrounded by the deputation
from the Assembly. Acloque, seeing that the tumult is lessening and
the room no longer encumbered by the crowd, proposes to the King that
he should retire, and Louis XVI. decides to do so. Surrounded by
deputies and National Guards, he passes into the State Bedchamber, and
notwithstanding the throng, he manages to reach a secret door at the
right of the bed, near the chimney, which communicates with his
bedroom. He goes through this little door, and some one closes it
behind him.
{209}
It is not far from eight o'clock in the evening. The peril and
humiliation of Louis XVI. have lasted nearly four hours, and the
unhappy King is not yet at the end of his sufferings, for he does not
know what has become of his wife and children. While these sad scenes
had been enacting in the palace, a furious populace had been in
incessant commotion beneath the windows, in the garden and the
courtyards. People desiring to establish communication between those
down stairs and those above, had been heard to cry: "Have they been
struck down? Are they dead? Throw us down their heads!"
A slender young man, with the profile of a Roman medal, a pale
complexion, and flashing eyes, was looking at all this from the upper
part of the terrace beside the water. Unable to comprehend the
long-suffering of Louis XVI., he said in an indignant tone: "How could
they have allowed this rabble to enter? They should have swept out
four or five hundred of them with cannon, and the rest would have run."
The man who spoke thus, obscure and hidden in the crowd, opposite that
palace where he was to play so great a part, was the "straight-haired
Corsican," the future Emperor Napoleon.
{210}
XX.
MARIE ANTOINETTE ON JUNE TWENTIETH.
Louis XVI. had just entered his bedchamber. The crowd, after leaving
the hall of the OEil-de-Boeuf, had departed through the State
Bedchamber, and the King's Great Cabinet, called also the Council Hall.
On entering this last apartment, an unexpected scene had surprised
them. Behind the large table they saw the Queen, Madame Elisabeth, the
Dauphin, and Madame Royale.
How came the Queen to be there? What had happened? At a quarter of
four, when Louis XVI. had left his room to go into the hall of the
Bull's-Eye and meet the rioters, Marie Antoinette, as we have already
said, made desperate efforts to follow him. M. Aubier, placing himself
before the door of the King's chamber, prevented the Queen from going
out. In vain she cried: "Let me pass; my place is beside the King; I
will join him and perish with him if it must be." M. Aubier, through
devotion, disobeyed her. Nevertheless, the Queen, whose courage
redoubled her strength, would have borne down this faithful servant if
M. Rougeville, a chevalier of Saint-Louis, had not aided him to block
up the passage. {211} Imploring Marie Antoinette in the name of her
own safety and that of the King, not to expose herself needlessly to
poniards, and aided by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, they drew her
almost by force into the chamber of the Dauphin, which was near the
King's. MM. de Choiseul, d'Haussonville, and de Saint-Priest, assisted
by several grenadiers of the National Guard, afterwards induced her to
go with her children into the Grand Cabinet of the King, called also
the Council Hall, because the ministers were accustomed to assemble
there.
The Princess de Lamballe, the Princess of Tarento, the Marchioness de
Tourzel, the Duchesses de Luynes, de Duras, de Maille, the Marchioness
de Laroche-Aymon, Madame de Soucy, the Baroness de Mackau, the Countess
de Ginestous, remained with the Queen. So also did the Minister
Chambonas, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts d'Haussonville and de
Montmorin, Viscount de Saint-Priest, Marquis de Champcenetz, and
General de Wittenghoff, commander of the 17th military division. The
Queen and her children occupied the embrasure of a window, and the
large and heavy table used by the ministerial council was placed in
front of them as a sort of barricade.
Meanwhile, Marie Antoinette's apartments and her bedroom on the
ground-floor were invaded. Some National Guards tried vainly to defend
them. "You are cutting your own throats!" shouted the people.
Overwhelmed by numbers, they saw the door of the first apartment broken
down by hatchets. It {212} contained the beds of the Queen's servants,
ranged behind screens. Afterwards they saw the invaders go into Marie
Antoinette's sleeping-room, tear the clothes off her bed, and loll upon
it, crying as they did so, "We will have the Austrian woman, dead or
alive!"
The Queen, however, remained in the Council Hall, where she could hear
the echo of the cries resounding in that of the OEil-de-Boeuf, where
Louis XVI. was, and from which she was separated only by the State
Bedchamber. Toward seven in the evening she beheld Madame Elisabeth,
who, after heroically sharing the dangers of the King, had now found
means to rejoin her. "The deputies who came to us," she wrote to
Madame de Raigecourt, July 3, "had come out of good will. A veritable
deputation arrived and persuaded the King to go back to his own
apartments. As I was told this, and as I was unwilling to be left in
the crowd, I went away about an hour before he did, and rejoined the
Queen: you can imagine with what pleasure I embraced her." In their
perils, therefore, Madame Elisabeth was near both Louis XVI. and Marie
Antoinette.
After having voluntarily exposed herself to all the anguish of the
invasion of the OEil-de-Boeuf, the courageous Princess was with the
Queen in the Council Hall, when the crowd, coming through the State
Bed-chamber, arrived there. The horde marched through it, carrying
their barbarous inscriptions like so many ferocious standards. "One of
these," says Madame {213} Campan in her Memoirs, "represented a gibbet
from which an ugly doll was hanging; below it was written: 'Marie
Antoinette to the lamp-post!' Another was a plank to which a bullock's
heart had been fastened, surrounded by the words: 'Heart of Louis XVI.'
Finally, a third presented a pair of bullock's horns with an indecent
motto." Some royalist grenadiers belonging to the battalion called the
_Filles-Saint-Thomas_, were near the council-table and protected the
Queen. Marie Antoinette was standing, and held her daughter's hand.
The Dauphin sat on the table in front of her. At the moment when the
march began, a woman threw a red cap on this table and cried out that
it must be placed on the Queen's head. M. de Wittenghoff, his hand
trembling with indignation, took the cap and after holding it for a
moment over Marie Antoinette's head, put it back on the table. Then a
cry was raised: "The red cap for the Prince Royal! Tri-colored ribbons
for little Veto!" Ribbons were thrown down beside the Phrygian cap.
Some one shouted: "If you love the nation, set the red cap on your
son's head." The Queen made an affirmative sign, and the revolutionary
coiffure was set on the child's fair head.
What humiliations were these for the unhappy mother! What anguish for
so haughty, so magnanimous a queen! The galley-slave's cap has touched
the head of the daughter of Caesars, and now soils the forehead of her
son! The slang of the {214} fish-markets resounds beneath the
venerable arches of the palace. How bitterly the unfortunate sovereign
expiates her former triumphs! Where are the ovations and the
apotheoses, the carriages of gold and crystal, the solemn entries into
the city in its gala dress, to the sound of bells and trumpets? What
trace remains of those brilliant days when, more goddess than woman,
the Queen of France and Navarre appeared through a cloud of incense, in
the midst of flowers and light? This good and beautiful sovereign,
whose least smile, or glance, or nod, had been regarded as a precious
recompense, a supreme favor by the noble lords and ladies who bent
respectfully before her, behold how she is treated now! Consider the
costumes and the language of her new courtiers! And yet, Marie
Antoinette is majestic still. Even in this horrible scene, in presence
of these drunken women and ragged suburbans, she does not lose that
gift of pleasing which is her special dower. At a distance they curse
her; but when they come near they are subjugated by her spell. Her
most ferocious enemies are touched in their own despite. A young girl
had just called her "_Autrichienne_." "You call me an Austrian woman,"
replied she, "but I am the wife of the King of France, I am the mother
of the Dauphin; I am a Frenchwoman by my sentiments as wife and mother.
I shall never again see the land where I was born. I can be happy or
unhappy nowhere but in France. I was happy when you loved me."
Confused by this gentle {215} reproach, the young girl softened.
"Pardon me," she said; "it was because I did not know you; I see very
well now that you are not wicked." A woman, passing, stopped before
the Queen and began to sob. "What is the matter with her?" asked
Santerre; "what is she crying about?" And he shook her by the arm,
saying: "Make her pass on, she is drunk." Even Santerre himself felt
Marie Antoinette's influence. "Madame," he said to her, "the people
wish you no harm. Your friends deceive you; you have nothing to fear,
and I am going to prove it by serving as your shield." It was he who
took pity on the Dauphin whom the heat was stifling, and said: "Take
the red cap off the child; he is too hot." He too, it was, that
hastened the march of the procession and pointed out to the people the
different members of the royal family by name, saying: "This is the
Queen, this is her son, this her daughter, this Madame Elisabeth."
At last the crowd is gone. The hall is empty. It is eight o'clock.
The Queen and her children enter the King's chamber. Louis XVI., who
finds them once more after so many perils and emotions, covers them
with kisses. In the midst of this pathetic scene some deputies arrive.
Marie Antoinette shows them the traces of violence which the people
have left behind them,--locks broken, hinges forced off, wainscoting
burst through, furniture ruined. She speaks of the dangers that have
threatened the King and the insults offered to herself. Perceiving
that Merlin de {216} Thionville, an ardent Jacobin, has tears in his
eyes, she says: "You are weeping to see the King and his family so
cruelly treated by people whom he has always desired to render happy."
The republican answered: "Yes, Madame, I weep, but it is for the
misfortunes of the mother of a family, not for the King and Queen; I
hate kings and queens." A deputy accosted Marie Antoinette, saying in
a familiar tone: "You were very much afraid, Madame, you must admit."
"No, Monsieur," she replied, "I was not at all afraid; but I suffered
much in being separated from the King at a moment when his life was in
danger. At least, I had the consolation of being with my children and
performing one of my duties." "Without pretending to excuse
everything, agree, Madame, that the people showed themselves very
good-natured." "The King and I, Monsieur, are convinced of the natural
goodness of the people; it is only when they are misled that they are
wicked."--"How old is Mademoiselle?" went on the deputy, pointing to
Madame Royale.--"She is at that age, Monsieur, when one feels only too
great a horror of such scenes."
Other deputies surround the Dauphin. They question him on different
subjects, especially concerning the geography of France and its new
territorial division into departments and districts, and are enchanted
by the correctness of his replies.
An officer of Chasseurs of the National Guard enters the King's
chamber. This officer had shown {217} the utmost zeal in protecting
his sovereign and had had the honor of being wounded at his side. He
is congratulated. The Dauphin perceives him. "What is the name of
that guard who defended my father so bravely?" he asks.--"Monseigneur,"
replies M. Hue, "I do not know; he will be flattered if you ask him."
The Prince runs to put his question to the officer, but the latter, in
respectful terms, declines to answer. Then M. Hue insists. "I beg
you," he cries, "tell us your name."--"I ought to conceal my name,"
replies the officer; "unfortunately for me, it is the same as that of
an execrable man." The faithful royalist bore the same name as the man
who had caused the arrest of the royal family at Varennes the previous
year. He was called Drouot.
The hour for repose has come at last. It is ten o'clock. Certain
individuals still complain: "They took us there for nothing; but we
will go back and have what we want." Still, the storm is over. The
crowd has evacuated the palace, the courtyards, and the garden. The
Assembly closes its sessions at half-past ten. Petion said there: "The
King has no cause of complaint against the citizens who marched before
him. He has said as much to the deputies and magistrates." Finally,
as the deputies were about to separate after this exciting day, one of
them, M. Guyton-Morveau, remarked: "The deputation which preceded us,
has doubtless announced to you that all is now tranquil. We remained
with the King for some time, and saw nothing which could {218} inspire
the least alarm. We invited the King to seek some repose. He sent an
officer of the National Guard to visit the posts, and the officer
reported that there was nobody in the palace. His Majesty assured us
that he desired to remain alone; we left him; and we can certify to you
that all is quiet."
{219}
XXI.
THE MORROW OF JUNE TWENTIETH.
In the morning of June 21 there were still some disorderly gatherings
in front of the Tuileries. On awaking, the Dauphin put this artless
question to the Queen: "Mamma, is it yesterday still?" Alas! yes, it
was still yesterday, it was always to be yesterday until the
catastrophes at the end of the drama. It was just a year to a day
since the royal family had furtively quitted Paris to begin the fatal
journey which terminated at Varennes. This souvenir occurred to Marie
Antoinette, and, recalling the first stations of her Calvary, the
unfortunate sovereign told herself that her humiliations had but just
begun. Her lips had touched only the brim of the chalice, and it must
be drained to the dregs.
Meanwhile, visitors were arriving at the Tuileries one after another to
condole with and protest their fidelity to the King and his family.
When Marshal de Mouchy made his appearance, the worthy old man was
received with the honors due to his noble conduct on the previous day.
When the invasion began, Louis XVI., in order not to irritate the
rabble, had given his gentlemen a formal order to withdraw, but {220}
the old marshal, hoping that his great age (he was seventy-seven) would
excuse his presence in the palace, had refused to leave his master.
More than once, with a strength rejuvenated by devotion, he had
succeeded in repulsing persons whose violence made him tremble for the
King's life. As soon as she saw the marshal, Marie Antoinette made
haste to say: "I have learned from the King how courageously you
defended him yesterday. I share his gratitude."--"Madame," he replied,
alluding to those of his relatives who had figured among the promoters
of the Revolution, "I did very little in comparison with the injuries I
should like to repair. They were not mine, but they touch me very
nearly."--"My son," said the Queen, calling the Dauphin, "repeat before
the marshal, the prayer you addressed to God this morning for the
King." The child, kneeling down, put his hands together, and looking
up to heaven, began to sing this refrain from the opera of _Pierre le
Grand_:--
_Ciel, entends la priere
Qu'ici je fais:
Conserve un si bon pere
A ses sujets._[1]
After the Marshal de Mouchy came M. de Malesherbes. Contrary to his
usual custom, the ex-first {221} president wore his sword. "It is a
long time," some one said to him, "since you have worn a
sword."--"True," replied the old man, "but who would not arm when the
King's life is in danger?" Then, looking with emotion at the little
Prince, he said to Marie Antoinette: "I hope, Madame, that at least our
children will see better days!"
And yet, even for the present there still remained a glimmer of hope.
Hardly had the invaders left the palace than invectives against them
rose from all classes of society. The calmness and courage of the King
and his family found admirers on every side. The departments sent
addresses demanding the punishment of those who had been guilty.
Royalist sentiments woke to life anew. One might almost believe that
the indignation caused by the recent scandals would produce an
immediate reaction in favor of Louis XVI. Possibly, with an energetic
sovereign, something might have been attempted. On the whole, the
insurrection had obtained nothing. Even the Girondins perceived the
dangerous character of revolutionary passions. Honest men stigmatized
the criminal tendencies which had just displayed themselves. It was
the moment for the King to show himself and strike a great blow. But
Louis XVI. had neither will nor energy. Letting the last chance of
safety which fortune offered him escape, he was unable to profit by the
turn in public opinion. Nothing could shake him out of that easy
patience which was the chief cause of his ruin.
{222}
Marie Antoinette herself was opposed to vigorous measures. She still
desired to try the effects of kindness. Learning that a legal inquiry
was proposed into the events of June 20, and foreseeing that M. Hue
would be called as a witness, she said to this loyal servant: "Say as
little in your deposition as truth will permit. I recommend you, on
the King's part and my own, to forget that we were the objects of these
popular movements. Every suspicion that either the King or myself feel
the least resentment for what happened must be avoided; it is not the
people who are guilty, and even if it were, they would always obtain
pardon and forgetfulness of their errors from us."
During this time the Assembly maintained an attitude more than
equivocal. It contained a great number of honest men. But, terrorized
already, it no longer possessed the courage of indignation. It grew
pale before the menaces of the public. By cringing to the rabble it
had attained that hypocritical optimism which is the distinctive mark
of moderate revolutionists, and which makes them in turn the dupes and
the victims of those who are more zealous.
If the majority of the deputies had said openly what they silently
thought, they would not have hesitated to stigmatize the invasion of
the Tuileries as it deserved. But in that case, what would have become
of their popularity with the pikemen? And then, must they not take
into account the ambitions of the Girondins, the hatreds of the
Mountain party, {223} and the rancor of Madame Roland and her friends?
Was it not, moreover, a real satisfaction to the bourgeoisie to give
power a lesson and humiliate a sovereign? Ah! how cruelly this
pleasure will be expiated by those who take delight in it, and how they
will repent some day for having permitted justice, law, and authority
to be trampled under foot!
When the session of June 21 opened, Deputy Daverhoult denounced in
energetic terms the violence of the previous day. Thuriot exclaimed:
"Are we expected to press an inquiry against forty thousand men?"
Duranton, the Minister of Justice, then read a letter from the King,
dated that day, and worded thus: "Gentlemen, the National Assembly is
already acquainted with the events of yesterday. Paris is doubtless in
consternation; France will hear the news with astonishment and grief.
I was much affected by the zeal shown for me by the National Assembly
on this occasion. I leave to its prudence the task of investigating
the causes of this event, weighing its circumstances, and taking the
necessary measures to maintain the Constitution and assure the
inviolability and constitutional liberty of the hereditary
representative of the nation. For my part, nothing can prevent me, at
all times and under all circumstances, from performing the duties
imposed on me by the Constitution, which I have accepted in the true
interests of the French nation."