THE THRONE DEMOLISHED.
The Country proclaimed in Danger.--Plan of La Fayette for the
Safety of the Royal Family.--Measures of the Court.--Celebration
of the Demolition of the Bastille.--Movement of the Allied
Army.--Conflicting Plans of the People.--Letter of the Girondists to
the King.--Manifesto of the Duke of Brunswick.--Unpopularity of La
Fayette.--The Attack upon the Tuileries, Aug. 10th.--The Royal Family
take Refuge in the Assembly.
The danger to which the country was exposed had now united
Constitutionalists and Republicans, or rather had compelled most of
the Constitutionalists to become Republicans. A patriotic bishop,
whose soul was glowing with the spirit of true Christian fraternity,
addressed the Assembly in an appeal so moving, that, like reconciled
brothers, the two parties rushed into each other's arms to unite in the
defense of that liberty which was equally dear to them all.
On the 11th of July the solemn proclamation was made with great pomp
through the streets of Paris and of France, that _the country was in
danger_. Minute guns were fired all the day. The bells tolled, and the
reveille was beat in all quarters of the city summoning the National
Guard to their posts. A cavalcade of horse paraded the streets with
a large banner containing the inscription, _Citizens, the country is
in danger_. At all the principal places the cortège? halted and the
legislative decree was read. Rendezvous were established in all parts
of the city for the enlistment of volunteers. Unparalleled enthusiasm
pervaded all classes. In Paris alone fifteen thousand were enrolled the
first day.
Petitions were poured in upon the Assembly from all parts of the empire
declaring that the king had forfeited the crown, and demanding his
dethronement. This sudden change, these bold utterances, threw the
court into consternation. The king's life now was in imminent peril,
and he resolved if possible to effect his escape. Several plans were
suggested which seemed to him, with his constitutional feebleness of
purpose, too hazardous to be undertaken. La Fayette, with generous
credulity, still tried to believe the king sincere in his acceptance
of constitutional liberty, and he proposed a plan which would have
saved the king and would have saved France had there been a particle
of sincerity in the bosom of the monarch. It was most noble in La
Fayette thus to forget the insults he had received from the court, and
to peril his life in the endeavor to save a family who had only loaded
him with injuries. His plan, boldly conceived, was as patriotic as it
was humane, and needed but sincerity on the part of the king to secure
its triumphant execution. It was an amiable weakness on the part of La
Fayette still to believe that the king could by any possibility be led
to espouse the Revolution. His proposition was briefly this:
[Illustration: THE COUNTRY PROCLAIMED IN DANGER.]
"General Luckner and I," said he to the king, "will come to Paris to
attend the celebration of the demolition of the Bastille on the 14th
of July. In company with us, the next day, the king with his family
shall visit Compiègne, fifty miles north of Paris. The people will
have sufficient confidence in us to make no opposition. Should there
be opposition we will have a sufficient force of dragoons at hand to
strike by surprise and release you. Ten squadrons of horse-artillery
shall there receive the monarch and conduct him to the army on
the frontiers. The king shall then issue a decided proclamation
forbidding his brothers and the emigrants to advance another step
toward the invasion of France, declaring, in terms which can not be
misinterpreted, his determination to maintain the Constitution, and
announcing his readiness to place himself at the head of the army to
repel the enemy. This decisive measure will satisfy France that the
king is its friend not its foe. The allies can make no headway against
France united under its monarch. The king can then return triumphant to
Paris, amid the universal acclamations of the people, a constitutional
monarch beloved and revered by his subjects."[340]
This was the wisest course which, under the circumstances, could
possibly have been pursued. It was constitutional. It would have been
the salvation of the king and of France. Many of the king's personal
friends entreated him, with tears, to repose confidence in La Fayette,
and to comply with the counsels of the only man who could rescue him
from destruction. But the fickle-minded king was now in the hands
of the queen and the courtiers, and was guided at their pleasure.
All their hopes were founded in the re-establishment of despotism by
foreign invasion. The generous plan of La Fayette was rejected with a
cold and almost insulting repulse.
"The best advice," replied the king, "which can be given to La Fayette
is to continue to serve as a bugbear to the factions by the able
performance of his duty as a general."
The queen was so confident that in a few weeks the allied armies
would be in Paris, and that any acts of disrespect on the part of the
people would only tend to hasten their march, that when Colombe, the
aid-de-camp of La Fayette, remonstrated against the infatuation of so
fatal a decision, she replied, "We are much obliged to your general for
his offer, but the best thing which could happen to us would be to be
confined for two months in a tower."
When La Fayette was thus periling his life to save the royal family he
knew that, by the queen's orders, pamphlets filled with calumny were
composed against him, and were paid for out of the king's salary.[341]
The court was secretly and very energetically recruiting defenders
for the approaching crisis. They had assembled at the Tuileries a
regiment of Swiss mercenaries, amounting to about a thousand men,
who, under rigid military discipline, would be faithful to the king.
A large number of general and subaltern officers, strong royalists,
were provided with lodgings in Paris, awaiting any emergence. Several
hundred royalist gentlemen from the provinces, in chivalrous devotion
to the monarchy, were residing in hotels near the Tuileries, always
provided with concealed weapons, and with cards which gave them
admission at any hour into the palace. Secret bodies of loyalists were
organized in the city, who were also ready to rush, at a given signal,
to the defense of the inmates of the Tuileries. The servants in the
chateaux were very numerous, and were all picked men. There were also
in garrison in Paris ten thousand troops of the line who were devoted
to the king.
With such resources immediately at hand, and with nearly all the
monarchies of Europe in alliance to march to their rescue, it is not
surprising that the king and queen should have felt emboldened to brave
the perils which surrounded them.[342] The Royalists were exultant,
and already, in the provinces of La Vendée and on the Rhone, they had
unfurled the white banner of the Bourbons, were rallying around it by
thousands, and had commenced the slaughter of the patriots who, in
these provinces, were in the minority.
[Illustration: STORMING THE BASTILLE.]
Such was the state of affairs when the 14th of July arrived, the day
for the great celebration of the demolition of the Bastille. The king
and queen could not avoid participating in the ceremonies, though it
was greatly feared that attempts might be made for their assassination.
A breast-plate, in the form of an under waistcoat, was secretly made
for the king, consisting of fifteen folds of Italian silk, strongly
quilted, which was found, upon trial, to be proof against dagger or
bullet. Madame Campan wore it for three days before an opportunity
could be found for the king to try it on unperceived. The king, as he
drew it on, said,
"It is to satisfy the queen that I submit to this inconvenience."
A corset of similar material was also prepared for the queen. She,
however, refused to wear it, saying, "If the rebels assassinate me it
will be a most happy event. It will release me from the most sorrowful
existence, and may save from a cruel death the rest of the family."
The Field of Mars was the site for the festival. Eighty-three gorgeous
tents were reared, representing the eighty-three departments of
France. Before each of these was planted a tree of liberty, from the
tops of which waved the tricolored banner. On one side of this vast
parade-ground there was an immense tree planted, called the tree of
feudalism. Its boughs were laden with memorials of ancient pride and
oppression--blue ribbons, tiaras, cardinals' hats, St. Peter's keys,
ermine, mantles, titles of nobility, escutcheons, coats of arms, etc.
It was in the programme of the day that the king, after taking anew the
oath of fidelity to the Constitution, was to set fire to the tree of
feudalism with all its burden of hoary abuses.
The king and royal family joined the procession at the Tuileries,
and with saddened hearts and melancholy countenances performed their
part in the ceremonies. "The expression of the queen's countenance,"
says Madame de Staël, "on this day will never be effaced from my
remembrance. Her eyes were swollen with tears, and the splendor of her
dress and the dignity of her deportment formed a striking contrast with
the train that surrounded her."
When the procession arrived at the Field of Mars, where an immense
concourse was assembled, the queen took her station upon a balcony
which was provided for her, while the king was conducted slowly through
the almost impenetrable throng to the altar where the oath was to be
administered. The queen narrowly and anxiously watched his progress
with a glass. In ascending the altar the monarch took a false step, and
seemed to fall. The queen, thinking he had been struck by a dagger,
uttered a shriek of terror, which pierced the hearts of all around her.
The king, however, ascended the altar, and took the oath.
The people wished him then to set fire to the feudal tree. But he
declined, very pertinently remarking that there was no longer any
feudalism in France. Some of the deputies of the Assembly then lighted
the pile, and as it was wreathed in flames the shoutings of the
multitude testified their joy. The partisans of the king succeeded in
raising a few shouts of _Vive le Roi_, which lighted up a momentary
smile upon the wan face of the king. But these were the last flickering
gleams of joy. The royal family returned in deepest dejection to the
palace. They were conscious that they had but performed the part of
captives in gracing a triumph, and they never again appeared in the
streets of Paris until they were led to their execution.
The alarming decree of the Assembly that _the country was in
danger_, and the call for every man to arm, had thrown all France
into commotion. The restless, violent, and irresponsible are ever
the first to volunteer for war. These were rapidly organized in the
departments into regiments and battalions, and sent on to Paris.
Thus, notwithstanding the veto of the king, an immense force was fast
gathering in the capital, and a force who felt that the king himself
was the secret treacherous foe from whom they had the most to fear.
The Assembly, dreading conspiracy at home more than open war from
abroad, now sent the king's troops, upon whose fidelity to the nation
they could not rely, to the frontiers. The court opposed this measure,
as they did not wish to strengthen even the feeble resistance which
they supposed the allies would have to encounter, and also wished to
retain these troops for their own protection against any desperate
insurrection of the people. The king consequently wished to interpose
his veto, but was advised that he could not safely adopt that measure
in the then exasperated state of the public mind. The removal of these
troops very decidedly weakened the strength of the Royalists in Paris.
Such was the state of affairs on the 28th of July, when the allied
army, amounting in its three great divisions to one hundred and
thirty-eight thousand men, commenced its march upon France.
[Illustration: THE PRUSSIANS CROSSING THE FRONTIERS OF FRANCE.]
The Duke of Brunswick was to pass the Rhine at Coblentz, ascend the
left bank of the Moselle, and march upon Paris by the route of Longwy,
Verdun, and Chalons. His immense force of cavalry, infantry, and
artillery, with its enormous array of heavy guns and its long lines
of baggage and munition wagons, covered a space of forty miles. The
Prince of Hohenlohe, marching in a parallel line some twenty miles on
his left, led a division of the emigrants and the Hessian troops. His
route led him through Thionville and Metz. The Count de Clairfayt,
an Austrian field-marshal, who has been esteemed the ablest general
opposed to the French during the Revolutionary war, conducted the
Austrian troops and another division of the emigrants along other
parallel roads upon the right, to fall upon La Fayette, who was
stationed before Sedan and Mézieres. It was supposed that he would
easily scatter the feeble forces which Louis XVI. had permitted to be
stationed there; and then he was to press rapidly upon Paris by Rheims
and Soissons.[343]
The friends of liberty now saw no possible way of rescuing France
from its peril and of saving themselves from the scaffold, but by
wresting the executive power from the king and the court, who were in
co-operation with the foe. This could only be done by a _revolution_,
for the Constitution conferred no right upon the Assembly to dethrone
the king. The Girondists or moderate Republicans, detesting the
Jacobins and appalled in view of the anarchy which would ensue from
arming the mob of Paris, wished to have the _Assembly_ usurp the power
and dethrone the king. The Jacobins, who hoped to ride into authority
upon the waves of popular tumult, deliberately resolved to demolish the
throne by hurling against it the infuriate masses of the people. It was
calling into action the terrible energies of the earthquake and the
tornado, knowing that their ravages, once commenced, could be arrested
by no earthly power.
The plan first formed was to rouse the people in resistless numbers,
march upon the Tuileries, take the king a prisoner, and hold him in the
Castle of Vincennes as a hostage for the good conduct of the emigrants
and the allies. The appointed day came, and Paris was thrown into a
state of terrible confusion. But the court had been admonished of the
movement. The palace was strongly defended, and in consequence of some
misunderstanding it was found that there was not sufficient concert of
action to attempt the enterprise.
A new scheme was now formed, energetic and well-adapted to the
effectual accomplishment of its purpose. At the ringing of the tocsin
forty thousand men were to be marshaled in the faubourg St. Antoine.
Another immense gathering of the populace was to rally in the faubourg
St. Marceau. All the troops in the metropolis from the provinces were
to be arrayed at the encampment of the Marseilles battalion. They were
then to march simultaneously to the palace, fill the garden and the
court of the Carrousel, and invest the Tuileries on all sides. Here
they were to encamp with all the enginery of war, and fortify their
position by ditches, barricades, and redoubts. No blood was to be shed.
There was to be no assault upon the palace, and no forcible entry. The
king was to be blockaded, and the Assembly was to be informed that the
populace would not lay down their arms until the king was dethroned,
and the Legislature had adopted measures to secure the safety of the
country.[344] In this plan there was something generous and sublime. It
endeavored to guard carefully against disorder, pillage, and blood. It
was the majestic movement of the people rising in self defense against
its own executive in combination with foreign foes. Barbaroux, the
leader of the Marseillese, sketches this plan in pencil. It was copied
by Fournier, and adopted by Danton and Santerre.[345]
Several of the leaders of the Girondists, anxious to avert the fearful
crisis now impending, wrote a noble letter to the king containing
considerations just and weighty, which ought to have influenced him to
corresponding action. The letter was written by Vergniaud, Gaudet, and
Gensonné, three of the brightest ornaments of the Legislative Assembly.
"It ought not to be dissembled," said these men to the king, "that it
is the conduct of the executive power that is the immediate cause of
all the evils with which France is afflicted, and of the dangers with
which the throne is surrounded. They deceive the king who would lead
him to suppose that it is the effervesence of the clubs, the manoeuvres
of particular agitators and powerful factions that have occasioned and
continued those disorderly movements, of which every day increases the
violence, and of which no one can calculate the consequences. Thus to
suppose is to find the cause of the evil in what are only the symptoms.
The only way to establish the public tranquillity is for the king to
surround himself with the confidence of his people. This can only be
done by declaring, in the most solemn manner, that he will receive
no augmentation of his power that shall not be freely and regularly
offered him by the French nation without the assistance or interference
of any foreign powers.
"What would be, perhaps, sufficient at once to re-establish confidence
would be for the king to make the coalesced powers acknowledge the
independence of the French nation, cease from all farther hostilities,
and withdraw the troops that menace our frontiers. It is impossible
that a very great part of the nation should not be persuaded that the
king has it in his power to put an end to the coalition; and while that
coalition continues and places the public liberty in a state of peril,
it is in vain to flatter the king that confidence can revive."
The court regarded this letter as insolent, and the king returned an
answer which declared that he should pay no attention whatever to its
suggestions.
On the 30th of July the troops from Marseilles had arrived, five
hundred in number, composed of the most fiery and turbulent spirits
of the South. The clubs and journals and shouts of the people had for
some time been demanding of the Assembly the suspension of the king.
But the Assembly, restrained by respect for the Constitution, hesitated
in the adoption of a measure so revolutionary and yet apparently so
necessary. The insurrection now planned, unless it could be quelled by
the king's forces, was sure to accomplish its end. If the Assembly did
not in its consternation pronounce the throne vacant, or if the king
did not in his terror abdicate, the whole royal family was to be held
in a state of blockade, and it could not be disguised that they were
in danger of falling victims to the rage of the ungovernable mob. This
was the plan deliberately formed and energetically executed. It was
patriotism's last and most terrible resort. Humanity is shocked by the
measure. Yet we must not forget that foreign armies were approaching,
and the king was in complicity with them, and thwarting all measures
for effectual resistance. The court was organizing the partisans of the
king to unite with the foreigners in all the horrors of civil war. A
nation of twenty-five millions of freemen were again to be enslaved.
All the patriots who had been instrumental in securing liberty for
France were to be consigned to exile, the dungeon, and the scaffold.
If ever a people were excusable in being thrown into a state of blind
ungovernable fury, it was the people of France in view of such threats.
Paris was in this state of panic when the atrocious proclamation of
the Duke of Brunswick reached the city. The king had sent a secret
embassador, Mallet du Pan, to the allies, suggesting the tone of
the manifesto he wished them to issue. Some of his suggestions they
adopted, and added to them menaces as cruel and bloody as any deeds
ever perpetrated by a mob.
"Their majesties," said the duke in this manifesto, "the emperor,
and the king of Prussia, having intrusted me with the command of the
combined armies, assembled by their orders on the frontiers of France,
I am desirous to acquaint the inhabitants of that kingdom with the
motives which have determined the measures of the two sovereigns, and
the intentions by which they are guided."
He then stated that one object which the sovereigns had deeply at heart
was "to put an end to the anarchy in the interior of France; to stop
the attacks directed against the throne and the altar, to re-establish
the regal power, to restore to the king the security and liberty of
which he is deprived, and to place him in a condition to exercise the
legitimate authority which is his due."
He then declared, in violation of all the rules of civilized warfare,
that "such of the national guards as shall have fought against the
troops of the two allied courts, and who shall be taken in arms, shall
be punished as rebels against their king." This doomed every French
patriot who should resist the invaders to be shot or hanged.
"The inhabitants of cities, towns, and villages," continued this savage
declaration, "who shall dare to defend themselves against the troops of
their imperial and royal majesties, and to fire upon them either in the
open field or from their houses, shall be instantly punished with all
the rigor of the laws of war, and their houses demolished or burned.
"The city of Paris and all its inhabitants without distinction, are
required to submit immediately to the king, to set him at entire
liberty, to insure to him, as well as to all the royal personages,
the inviolability and respect which subjects owe their sovereigns.
Their imperial and royal majesties hold the members of the National
Assembly, of the department, of the district, of the municipality, and
of the National Guard of Paris, the justices of the peace, and all
others whom it may concern, personally responsible with their lives
for all that may happen; their said majesties declaring, moreover, on
their faith and word as emperor and king, that if the palace of the
Tuileries is forced or insulted, that if the least violence, the least
outrage is offered to their majesties the king and queen and to the
royal family, if immediate provision is not made for their safety,
their preservation, and their liberty, they will take an exemplary and
ever-memorable vengeance, _by giving up the city of Paris to military
execution and total destruction, and the rebels guilty of outrages to
the punishments they shall have deserved_."[346]
This ferocious document was printed in all the Royalist papers in
Paris on the 28th of July. The king immediately issued a message
disavowing any agency in the manifesto. But the people no longer had
any confidence in the word of the king. Paris was thrown into a state
of terrible agitation. The forty-eight sections of Paris met, and
commissioned the mayor, Pétion, to appear before the General Assembly,
and petition, in their name, the dethronement of the king. On the 3d
of August, Pétion, at the head of a numerous deputation, presented
himself before the Assembly. In an address, calm, unimpassioned, but
terrible in its severity, he retraced the whole course of the king from
the commencement of the Revolution, and closed with the solemn demand
for the dethronement of Louis XVI., as the most dangerous enemy of the
nation. The Assembly was embarrassed by its desire to adhere to the
Constitution which it had sworn to obey. The dethronement of the king
was not a _constitutional_ but a _revolutionary_ act. A long and stormy
debate ensued, during which the hall was flooded with petitions against
the king. The king's friends were again intensely anxious to secure his
escape. But the king would not listen to their plans, for he was so
infatuated as to believe that the Duke of Brunswick would soon, by an
unimpeded march, be in Paris for his rescue.
The sympathy which La Fayette had manifested for the royal family
had now ruined him in the esteem of the populace. He was every where
denounced as a traitor, and a strong effort was made to compel the
Assembly to indite a bill of accusation against him. But La Fayette's
friends in the chamber rallied, and he was absolved from the charge of
treason by a vote of four hundred and forty-six against two hundred
and eighty. The populace was so exasperated by this result that they
heaped abuse upon all who voted in his favor, and several of them were
severely maltreated by the mob. The National Assembly had now become
unpopular. It was ferociously denounced in the club of the Jacobins and
in all the corners of the streets. In the mean time the insurrectionary
committee, formed from the Jacobin club, were busy in preparation for
the great insurrection. All hearts were appalled, for all could see
that a cloud of terrific blackness was gathering, and no one could tell
what limit there would be to the ravages of the storm.
At midnight, on the 9th of August, the dismal sound of the tocsin was
heard. From steeple to steeple the boding tones floated through the
dark air. A thousand drums beat the alarm at the appointed rendezvous,
and the booming of guns shook the city. In an hour all Paris was in
tumult. The clatter of iron hoofs, the rumbling of heavy artillery,
the tramp of disciplined battalions, and the rush and the clamor of a
phrensied mob, presented the most appalling scene of tumult and terror.
A city of a million and a half of inhabitants was in convulsions. The
friends of the king hurried to the palace, announcing with pale lips
that the terrible hour had come. The event needed no announcement, for
the whole city was instantly trembling beneath earthquake throes. The
king, the queen, the two children, and Madame Elizabeth had assembled
tremblingly in one of the rooms of the palace, as lambs huddle together
when wolves are howling round the fold. Marie Antoinette was imperially
brave, but she could not in that hour look upon her helpless son and
daughter and not feel her maternal heart sink within her. Louis XVI.
had the endurance of a martyr, but he could not, unmoved, contemplate
the woes of his family.
The friends of the king speedily rallied, and brought up all their
forces for his defense. The apartments of the palace were filled with
Royalist gentlemen armed with swords, pistols, and even with shovels
and tongs. Nine hundred Swiss guards, upon whom it was thought reliance
could be reposed, were placed on the stairs, in the halls, and the
large saloons. Six or eight hundred mounted dragoons were in one of the
court-yards. Several battalions of the National Guard, who were most
friendly to the king, were stationed in the garden with twelve pieces
of artillery.[347] The defenders of the palace amounted in all to about
four or five thousand men. But many of these were very lukewarm in
their loyalty, and might at any moment be expected to fraternize with
the populace.[348]
Pétion, the mayor, was sent for. He came, and after an awkward
interview retired, leaving Mandat, who was general-in-chief of the
National Guard, commander of the troops at the Tuileries. It was a
sultry night. Every window at the Tuileries was thrown open, and the
inmates listened anxiously to the uproar which rose from every part
of the city. The queen and Madame Elizabeth ascended to a balcony
opening from one of the highest stories of the palace. The night was
calm and beautiful, the moon brilliant in the west, and Orion and the
Pleiades shining serenely in the east.[349] There the queen and the
princess stood for some time, trembling and in silence as the peal of
bells, the clangor of drums, the rumbling of artillery wheels, and the
shouts of the advancing bands, filled the air. From every direction,
the east, the west, the north and the south, the portentous booming
of the tocsin was heard, and infuriated insurgents, in numbers which
could not be counted, through all the streets and avenues, were pouring
toward the palace. The bridges crossing the river echoed with their
tread, while the blaze of bonfires and the gleam of torches added to
the appalling sublimities of the scene.[350]
The queen broke the silence. Pointing to the moon she said, "Before
that moon returns again, either the allies will be here and we shall be
rescued, or I shall be no more. But let us descend to the king."
The spectacle seemed but to have aroused the energies of Marie
Antoinette. The spirit of her imperial mother glowed in her bosom.[351]
Her cheeks were pale as death, her lips were compressed, her eyes
flashed fire, and, as she returned to the room where her husband stood
bewildered and submissive to his lot, she approached a grenadier, drew
a pistol from his belt, and, presenting it to her husband, said,
"Now, sire! now is the time to show yourself a king."
But Louis XVI. was a quiet, patient, enduring man, with nothing
imperial in his nature. With the most imperturbable meekness he took
the pistol and handed it back to the grenadier. The mayor, Pétion, an
active member of the Jacobin Club, had manifested no disposition to
render effectual aid in the defense of the palace. But lest it should
seem that he was heading the mob, he had reluctantly signed an order,
as he left the Tuileries, authorizing the employment of force to repel
force.
The insurgents had organized an insurrectional committee at the Hôtel
de Ville, and immediately sent a summons for Mandat to present himself
before them. Mandat, misinformed, understood that the summons came
from the municipal government, and, as in duty bound, promptly obeyed.
He had hardly left the palace ere word was brought back to the king
that he had been assassinated by the mob. There was no longer any
leader at the palace; no one to organize the defense; no one to issue
commands. The soldiers in the court of the Tuileries and in the Garden
were looking listlessly about and bandying jokes with the mob who were
crowding against the iron railing.[352]
It was, however, now decided that the king should descend into the
courts of the Carrousel, in the rear of the palace, and into the
Garden, in front, to review the troops and ascertain the spirit with
which they were animated.
The king was very fat, had an awkward hobbling gait, and a countenance
only expressive of a passionless nature. He was dressed in a plain
mourning-suit, with silk stockings, and buckles in his shoes. His dress
was quite disarranged. In the early part of the night he had thrown
himself upon a sofa for rest, and thus his hair, which was powdered and
curled on one side, was without powder and in disorder on the other.
Apprehensive that he might be assassinated before morning, he had
spent some time in devotional exercises with his confessor, and his
cheeks deathly pale, his swollen eyes and his trembling lips, plainly
showed that he had been weeping. Thus he presented the aspect but of
a king in his degradation. Had he been a spirited man, in uniform,
mounted on horseback, he might, perhaps, have rallied the enthusiasm
of the troops. As it was he could excite no other emotion than that of
compassion, blended, perhaps, with contempt.
It was five o'clock of one of the most brilliant of summer mornings
as the king, followed by the queen and his children, and accompanied
by six staff officers, descended the marble stairs of the Tuileries
and entered the royal court. The music of martial bands greeted him,
the polished weapons of the soldiers gleamed in the rays of the sun as
they presented arms, and a few voices rather languidly shouted _Vive le
Roi_. Others, however, defiantly shouted _Vive la Nation_, thus showing
that many of those who were marshaled for his defense were ready to
unite with his assailants. The king stammered out a few incoherent
words and returned to the palace.
The appearance of the queen in this terrible hour riveted every eye and
excited even the enthusiasm of her foes. Her flushed cheek, dilated
nostril, compressed lip, and flashing eye invested her with an imperial
beauty almost more than human. Her head was erect, her carriage proud,
her step dignified, and she looked around her upon applauding friends
and assailing foes with a majesty of courage which touched every heart.
Even the most ardent patriots forgot for the moment their devotion
to liberty in the enthusiasm excited by the heroism of the queen.
Re-entering the palace, the queen, in despair, ascended the stairs to
the saloon, saying,
"All is lost. The king has shown no energy. A review like this has done
us more harm than good."
The king, however, instead of ascending to his apartment, passed
through the palace into the Garden to ascertain the disposition of
the troops stationed there. With his small retinue he traversed the
whole length of the Garden. Some of the battalions received him
with applause, others were silent, while here and there voices in
continually increasing numbers cried, "_Down with the veto; down with
the tyrant_." As the king turned to retrace his steps, menaces and
insults were multiplied. Some of the gunners even left their guns and
thrust their fists in his face, assailing him with the most brutal
abuse. The clamor penetrated the interior of the palace and the queen,
turning pale as death, sank into a chair, exclaiming,
"Great God! they are hooting the king. We are all lost."
The king returned to the palace, pale, exhausted, perspiring at every
pore, and overwhelmed with confusion and shame. He immediately retired
to his cabinet. Roederer,[353] chief magistrate of the Department of
the Seine, who had witnessed the hostile disposition of the troops,
now hastened to the chateau and asked permission to speak to his
majesty in private, with no witnesses but the royal family. He entered
the royal cabinet and found the king with his elbows resting on his
knees and his face buried in his hands. All retired but the royal
family and the king's ministers.
"Sire," said M. Roederer, "you have not a moment to lose. Neither the
number nor the disposition of the men here assembled can guarantee your
life or the lives of your family. There is no safety for you but in the
bosom of the Assembly."
The hall of the Assembly was in the old monastery of the Feuillants,
situated on the western side of the Garden, where the Rue de Rivoli
now runs. The royal family could consequently descend into the Garden,
which was filled with troops collected there for their defense, and
crossing the Garden could enter the hall with but little exposure.
But such a refuge to the high-spirited queen was more dreadful than
death. It was draining the cup of humiliation to its dregs.
"Go to the Assembly!" exclaimed the queen; "never! never will I take
refuge there. Rather than submit to such infamy I would prefer to be
nailed to the walls of the palace."
"It is there only," M. Roederer replied, "that the royal family can
be in safety. And it is necessary to escape immediately. In another
quarter of an hour, perhaps, we shall not be able to command a retreat."
"What," rejoined the queen, "have we no defenders? Are we alone?"
"Yes, madame," replied Roederer, "we are alone. The troops in the
Garden and in the court are fraternizing with your assailants and
turning their guns against the palace. All Paris is on the march.
Action is useless. Resistance is impossible."
A gentleman present, who had been active in promoting reform, ventured
to add his voice in favor of an immediate retreat to the Assembly. The
queen turned upon him sternly, and said,
"Silence, sir, silence! It becomes you to be silent here. When the
mischief is done, those who did it should not pretend to wish to remedy
it."[354]
M. Roederer resumed, saying, "Madame, you endanger the lives of your
husband and your children. Think of the responsibility which you take
upon yourself."
The king raised his head, fixed a vacant stare of anguish for a moment
on M. Roederer, and then, rising, said, "Marchons" (_Let us go_).
The queen, unable any longer to shut her eyes to the fatality, turning
to M. Roederer, eagerly added, "You, sir, are answerable for the life
of the king and for that of my son."
"Madame," M. Roederer replied, "we undertake to die by your side, but
that is all we can promise." It was then eight o'clock in the morning.
A guard of soldiers was instantly called in, and the melancholy cortège
left the palace. The Swiss troops and the loyalist gentlemen, who
filled the apartments, looked on in consternation and despair. There
was no apparent escape for them, and they seemed to be abandoned to
their fate. As the king was crossing the threshold he thought of his
friends, and his heart seemed to misgive him. He hesitated, stopped,
and, turning to M. Roederer, said, "What is to become of our friends
who remain behind?" M. Roederer pacified the king by assuring him,
though falsely, that by throwing aside their arms and their uniform
they would be able to escape in safety.
They then entered the Garden and crossed it, unopposed, between the
two files of bayonets. The leaves of autumn strewed the paths, and the
young dauphin amused himself in kicking them as he walked along. It is
characteristic of the mental infirmities of the king that in such an
hour he should have remarked, "There are a great many leaves. They fall
early this year."
When they arrived at the door at the foot of the staircase which led to
the hall of the Assembly, they found an immense crowd of men and women
there blocking up the entrance. "They shall not enter here," was the
cry; "they shall no longer deceive the nation. They are the cause of
all our misfortunes. Down with the veto! Down with the Austrian woman!
Abdication or death!"
"Sire," said one, in compassionate tones to the king, "Don't be afraid.
The people are just. Be a good citizen, sire, and send the priests and
your wife away from the palace."
The soldiers endeavored to force their way through the crowd, and, in
the struggle, the members of the royal family were separated from each
other. A stout grenadier seized the dauphin and raised him upon his
shoulders. The queen, terrified lest her child was to be taken from
her, uttered a piercing shriek. But the grenadiers pressed forward
through the crowd, and, entering the hall with the king and queen,
placed the prince royal on the table of the Assembly.
The illustrious Girondist M. Vergniaud was in the chair. The king
approached him and said,
"I have come hither to prevent a great crime. I thought I could not be
safer than with you."
"You may rely, sire," Vergniaud replied, "on the firmness of the
Assembly. Its members have sworn to die in supporting the rights of the
people and the constituted authority."
The king took his seat. There were but few members present. A mournful
silence pervaded the hall as the deputies, with saddened countenances
and sympathetic hearts, gazed upon the king, the queen, Madame
Elizabeth, the beautiful young princess, and the dauphin, whom the
queen held by the hand. All angry feelings died in presence of the
melancholy spectacle, for all felt that a storm was now beating against
the throne which no human power could allay.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 340: La Fayette's Memoirs.
"M. de La Fayette seemed not to have been quite discouraged by the
ill-success of his former embassy; for on the 10th of July M. de Lally
came to me with a long letter written by M. La Fayette from his army,
in which he drew a plan, ready as he said, for execution, to open the
way for the king through his enemies, and to establish him in safety
either in Compiègne or in the north part of France, surrounded by his
constitutional guards and his faithful army,"--_Bertrand de Moleville._]
[Footnote 341: "That there should be no more sympathy," says Professor
Smyth, "expressed by the king or the Royalists ever after, with the
elevated nature of the principles of La Fayette or the steadiness of
his loyalty, whenever he saw, as he thought, the king in danger, is
quite intolerable; and there are no occasions on which the royal party
appear to so little advantage as when it is desirable that they should
show some little candor, some common justice to La Fayette."--_Lectures
on French Revolution_, vol. ii., p. 298.]
[Footnote 342: History of the Girondists, Lamartine, vol. ii., p. 36.]
[Footnote 343: "Russia and England secretly approved the attacks of the
European league, without as yet co-operating with it."--_Mignet_, p.
142. The British _government_ were at this time restrained from active
measures by the British _people_, the great mass of whom sympathized
with the French in their struggle for liberty.]
[Footnote 344: "The chiefs," says Bertrand do Moleville, "of the
Gironde faction, who had planned the insurrection, did not, at that
time, intend to overset the monarchy. Their design was to dethrone
the king, make the crown pass to his son, and establish a council of
regency."]
[Footnote 345: Lamartine's History of the Girondists, vol. 2, p. 40.
Barbaroux, one of the most active of the leaders in this movement, "a
man of genius, fine affections, and noble sentiments," in his memoirs
writes, "It was our wish that this insurrection in the cause of liberty
should be majestic as is Liberty herself; holy as are the rights which
she alone can ensure, and worthy to serve as an example to every
people, who, to break the chains of their tyrants, have only to show
themselves."]
[Footnote 346: "The greatest sensation was produced in our own country
of Great Britain, and all over Europe, by a manifesto like this, which
went in truth to say, that two military powers were to march into a
neighboring and independent kingdom to settle the civil dissensions
there as they thought best, and to punish by military law, as rebels
and traitors, all who presumed to resist them. No friend to freedom
or the general rights of mankind could, for a moment, tolerate such
a procedure as this. Even the success of the Jacobins and Anarchists
was thought preferable to the triumph of invaders like these."--_Prof.
Smyth's Lectures on the Fr. Rev._, vol. ii., p. 326.]
[Footnote 347: The Garden of the Tuileries includes an area of about
sixty-seven acres. A whole army could encamp there.]
[Footnote 348: One of the officers of the staff said to Madame Campan,
in the midst of this scene of terror and confusion, "Put your jewels
and money into your pockets. Our dangers are unavoidable. The means
of defense are unavailing. Safety might be obtained from some degree
of energy in the king; but that is the only virtue in which he is
deficient."--_Madame Campan_, vol. ii., p. 240.]
[Footnote 349: Roederer, Chronique de Cinquante Jours.]
[Footnote 350: "List! through the placid midnight; clang of the distant
storm-bell. Steeple after steeple takes up the wondrous tale. Black
courtiers listen at the windows opened for air; discriminate the
steeple-bells. This is the tocsin of St. Roch; that, again, is _it_
not St. Jaques, named _de la Boucherie_? Yes, messieurs! or even St.
Germain l'Auxerrois, hear ye it not? The same metal that rang storm two
hundred and twenty years ago; but by a majesty's order then; on St.
Bartholomew's Eve!"--_Carlyle_, vol. ii., p. 138.]
[Footnote 351: "The behavior of Marie Antoinette was magnanimous in the
highest degree. Her majestic air, her Austrian lip and aquiline nose,
gave her an air of dignity which can only be conceived by those who
beheld her in that trying hour."--_Peltier._]
[Footnote 352: Where the iron railing now stands which separates the
spacious court of the Tuileries from the Carrousel, so called because
Louis XIV., in 1662, held a great tournament here, there were, in 1792,
rows of small houses and sheds. The court was then divided by railings
into three divisions. The central one, which was rather larger than the
others, was called the Cour Royale. The king's troops were stationed in
these courts, while the insurgents were filling the Carrousel. These
court-yards, now thrown into one, afforded Napoleon ample space for the
review of his troops.]
[Footnote 353: M. Roederer, a constitutional monarchist, was one of
the most illustrious men of the Revolution. Denounced by the Jacobins
he was compelled, like La Fayette, to seek refuge in flight. Upon
Napoleon's return from Egypt he aided effectually in rescuing France
from anarchy, and in establishing the Consulate and the Empire. He
co-operated cordially with the Emperor in his plans of reform, was the
chief instrument in concluding a treaty between France and the United
States, and took a large share in the regeneration of the Kingdom of
Naples by Joseph Bonaparte. When Napoleon fell beneath the blows of
allied Europe, Roederer, in sadness, withdrew to retirement.--_Enc.
Am._]
[Footnote 354: Madame Campan, vol. ii., p. 274, note.]