FALL OF ROBESPIERRE.
Inexplicable Character of Robespierre.--Cécile Regnault.--Fête
in honor of the Supreme Being.--Increase of Victims.--The
Triumvirate.--Suspicions of Robespierre.--Struggle between
Robespierre and the Committee of Public Safety.--Conspiracy against
Robespierre.--Session of the 27th of July.--Robespierre and his
Friends arrested.--Efforts to save Robespierre.--Peril of the
Convention.--Execution of Robespierre and his Confederates.
Robespierre, who was now apparently at the height of his power,
is one of the most inexplicable of men. His moral character was
irreproachable; no bribes could corrupt him; he sincerely endeavored
to establish a republic founded upon the basis of popular liberty
and virtue; and self-aggrandizement seems never to have entered into
his aims. He was not a blood-thirsty man; but was ready, with frigid
mercilessness, to crush any party which stood in the way of his plans.
His soul appears to have been almost as insensible to any generous
emotion as was the blade of the guillotine.[419] He seems to have
mourned the apparent necessity of beheading Danton. Repeatedly he was
heard to say, perhaps hypocritically,
"Oh, if Danton were but honest! If he were but a true Republican! What
would I not give for the lantern of Diogenes to read the heart of
Danton, and learn if he be the friend or the enemy of the Republic?"
Robespierre would gladly have received the aid of Danton's powerful
arm, but, finding his old friend hostile to his measures, he pitilessly
sent him to the guillotine. And yet there is evidence that he at times
was very weary of that work of death which he deemed it necessary to
prosecute.[420]
"Death," said he, "always death; and the scoundrels throw all the
responsibility upon me. What a memory shall I leave behind me if this
lasts! Life is a burden to me."
On the 7th of May, 1794, Robespierre made a very eloquent speech in
the Convention advocating the doctrines of a Supreme Being and the
immortality of the soul. He presented the following decrees, which were
adopted by acclamation:
"_Art. 1._ The French people recognize the existence of the Supreme
Being and the immortality of the soul.
"_Art. 2._ They acknowledge that the worship worthy of the Supreme
Being is one of the duties of man."
There were some unavailing attempts now made to assassinate
Robespierre; one, very singular in its character, by a beautiful
girl, Cécile Regnault, but seventeen years of age. She called at
Robespierre's house and asked to see him. Her appearance attracted
suspicion, and she was arrested. In her basket a change of clothes was
found and two knives. She was led before the Tribunal.
[Illustration: CÉCILE REGNAULT ARRESTED.]
"What was the object of your visit to Robespierre?" the president
inquired.
"I wished," she replied, "to see what a tyrant was like."
"Why did you provide yourself with the change of clothes?"
"Because," she calmly replied, "I expected to be sent to prison and
then to the guillotine."
"Did you intend to stab Robespierre?"
"No," she answered, "I never wished to hurt any one in my life."
"Why are you a Royalist?" the president continued.
"Because," she replied, "I prefer one king to sixty tyrants."
She was sent to the guillotine with all her family relations. The
conduct of this girl is quite inexplicable, and it is doubted
whether she seriously contemplated any crime. When she called to see
Robespierre _she left her knife in her room in a basket_! Eight carts
were filled with victims to avenge this crime.[421]
Robespierre was now so popular with the multitude that all Paris
rallied around him with congratulations.
The 8th of May was appointed as a festival in honor of the Supreme
Being. Robespierre, the originator of the movement, was chosen
President of the Convention, that he might take the most conspicuous
part on the occasion. The morning dawned with unusual splendor. For
that one day the guillotine was ordered to rest. An amphitheatre was
erected in the centre of the garden of the Tuileries, and the spacious
grounds were crowded with a rejoicing concourse. The celebrated painter
David had arranged the fête with the highest embellishments of art.
At twelve o'clock Robespierre ascended a pavilion and delivered a
discourse.
"Republican Frenchmen," said he, "the ever fortunate day which the
French people dedicated to the Supreme Being has at length arrived.
Never did the world which he created exhibit a spectacle so worthy of
his attention. He has beheld tyranny, crime, and imposture reigning on
earth. He beholds at this moment a whole nation, assailed by all the
oppressors of mankind, suspending the course of its heroic labors to
lift its thoughts and its prayers toward the Supreme Being who gave it
the mission to undertake and the courage to execute them."
Having finished his brief address, he descended and set fire to
a colossal group of figures representing Atheism, Discord, and
Selfishness, which the idea of a God was to reduce to ashes. As they
were consumed, there appeared in their place, emerging from the
flames, the statue of Wisdom. After music, songs, and sundry symbolic
ceremonies, an immense procession was formed, headed by Robespierre,
which proceeded from the Tuileries to the Champ de Mars. Here, after
the performance of pageants as imposing as Parisian genius could
invent and Parisian opulence execute, the procession returned to the
Tuileries, where the festival was concluded with public diversions.[422]
The pre-eminence which Robespierre assumed on this occasion excited
great displeasure, and many murmurs reached his ears. Robespierre, the
next day, entered complaints against those who had murmured, accused
them of being Dantonists and enemies of the Revolution, and wished to
send them to the guillotine. Each member of the Convention began to
feel that his head was entirely at the disposal of Robespierre, and
gradually became emboldened to opposition.
The legal process by which victims were arrested and sent to the
guillotine had now become simple and energetic in the extreme. Any
man complained to the Committee of Public Safety of whom he would,
as _suspected_ of being unfriendly to the Revolution. The committee
immediately ordered the arrest of the accused. The eighteen prisons of
Paris were thus choked with victims. Each evening Fouquier Tinville,
the public accuser, received from the Committee of Public Safety a
list of those whom he was to take the next day to the Revolutionary
Tribunal. If the committee, for any reason, had not prepared a list,
Fouquier Tinville was allowed to select whom he pleased. To be
_suspected_ was almost certain death. From the commencement of this
year (1794) the executions had increased with frightful rapidity.
In January eighty-three were executed; in February, seventy-five;
in March, one hundred and twenty-three; in April, two hundred and
sixty-three; in May, three hundred and twenty-four; in June, six
hundred and seventy-two; in July, eight hundred and thirty-five.[423]
Carts were continually passing from the gates of the Conciergerie
loaded with prisoners, who were promptly condemned and sent immediately
to the scaffold. Malesherbes, the intrepid and venerable defender of
Louis XVI., living in retirement in the country, was dragged, with all
his family, to the scaffold. If a man were rich, he was suspected of
aristocracy and was sent to the guillotine. If he were learned, his
celebrity exposed him to suspicion, and his doom was death. If he were
virtuous, he was accused of sympathy for the victims of the guillotine,
and was condemned to the scaffold. There was no longer safety but
in vice and degradation. The little girls who had been led by their
fathers to attend a ball given by the King of Prussia at Verdun were
all arrested, brought to Paris, and condemned and executed. "The
eldest," says Lamartine, "was eighteen. They were all clothed in white
robes. The cart which carried them resembled a basket of lilies whose
heads waved to the motion of the arm. The affected executioners wept
with them." Josephine Beauharnais, afterward the bride of Napoleon, was
at this time in one of the dungeons of Paris, sleeping upon a wretched
pallet of straw, and expecting daily to be led to execution.
Robespierre, St. Just, and Couthon were the three leading men in the
Committee of Public Safety, and were hence called the Triumvirate. All
began now to be weary of blood, and yet no one knew how to stem the
torrent or when the carnage would cease. The Reign of Terror had become
almost as intolerable as the tyranny of the old kings, but not fully
so; the Reign of Terror crushed thousands who could make their woes
heard; despotism crushed _millions_ who were dumb. There was no hope
for France but in some energetic arm which, assuming the dictatorship,
should rescue liberty from the encroachments of kings and from being
degraded by the mob. Robespierre was now the most prominent man in
France and the most popular with the multitude. His friends urged him
to assume the dictatorship.
Jealousy of Robespierre's ambition now began to arise, and his
enemies rapidly increased. Whispers that he had become a traitor
to the Republic and was seeking kingly power began to circulate.
Popular applause is proverbially fickle. Robespierre soon found that
he could not carry his measures in the Committee of Public Safety,
and, disgusted and humiliated, he absented himself from the sittings.
He attempted to check the effusion of blood, but was overruled by
those even more pitiless than himself. He now determined to crush
the committee. Political defeat was death. He must either send the
committee to the scaffold or bow his own head beneath the knife. It was
a death-struggle short and decisive. Pretended lists were circulated of
the heads Robespierre demanded. Many in the Convention were appalled.
Secret nightly councils were held to array a force against him. The mob
of Paris he could command. Henriot, the chief of the military force,
was entirely subservient to his will. He reigned supreme and without
a rival in the Jacobin Club. His power was apparently resistless. But
despair nerved his foes.
Three very able men, accustomed to command--Tallien, Barras, and
Fréron--headed the conspiracy against Robespierre. The party thus
organized was called the _Thermidorien_, because it was in the month
of Thermidor (July) that they achieved their signal victory, and,
trampling upon the corpse of Robespierre and of his adherents, ascended
to power. But nearly all these men, of all these parties, seem to have
had no sense whatever of responsibility to God, or of Christianity
as the rule of life. They had one and all rejected the Gospel of our
Savior, and had accepted human philosophy alone as their guide. They
were men, many of them, great in ability, illustrious in many virtues,
sincerely loving their country, and too proud to allow themselves to be
degraded by bribes or plunder. As the general on the battle-field will
order movements which will cut down thousands of men, thus did these
Revolutionists, without any scruples of conscience, send hundreds daily
to the guillotine, not from love of blood, but because they believed
that the public welfare demanded the sacrifice. And yet there was a
cowardly spirit impelling these massacres. No one dared speak a word in
behalf of mercy, lest he should be deemed in sympathy with aristocrats.
He alone was safe from suspicion who was merciless in denunciation of
the suspected. It is, however, remarkable that nearly all the actors
in these scenes of blood, even in the hour of death, protested their
conscientiousness and their integrity.
Robespierre was now involved in inextricable toils. He was weary of
blood. The nation was becoming disgusted with such carnage.[424] He
was universally recognized as the leading mind in the government, and
every act was deemed his act. His enemies in the Committee of Public
Safety plied the guillotine with new vigor, knowing that the public
responsibility would rest on Robespierre. Robespierre was strongly
opposed to that reckless massacre, and yet dared not interfere to save
the condemned. His own dearest friends were arrested and dragged to the
guillotine, and yet Robespierre was compelled to be silent. Earnestly
he was entreated to assume the dictatorship, and rescue France from
its measureless woe. Apparently he could have done it with ease. He
refused; persistently and reiteratedly refused. What were his motives
none now can tell. Some say cowardice prevented him; others affirm that
true devotion to the Republic forbade him. The fact alone remains; he
refused the dictatorship, saying again and again, "No! no Cromwell; not
even I myself."
Robespierre retired for some weeks from the Committee of Public Safety,
while blood was flowing in torrents, and prepared a very elaborate
discourse, to be delivered in the Convention, defending himself and
assailing his foes.
On the morning of the 26th of July Robespierre appeared in the
Convention, prepared to speak. His Jacobin friends, forewarned, crowded
around him, and his partisans thronged the galleries. His foes were
appalled, and trembled; but they rallied all their friends. It was
a decisive hour, and life or death was suspended on its issues. The
speech, which he read from a carefully-prepared manuscript, was long
and exceedingly eloquent. His foes felt that they were crushed, and a
silence as of death for a moment followed its delivery. The printing of
the speech was then voted, apparently by acclamation, and the order for
its transmission to all the Communes of the Republic.
The foes of Robespierre were now emboldened by despair. Their fate
seemed sealed, and consequently there was nothing to be lost by any
violent struggle in self-defense. Cambon ventured an attack, boldly
declaring, "One single man paralyzes the National Convention, and that
man is Robespierre." Others followed with more and more vigorous blows.
Robespierre was amazed at the audacity. The charm of his invincibility
was gone. It soon appeared that there was a strong party opposed
to Robespierre, and by a large majority it was voted to revoke the
resolution to print the speech.
Robespierre, mute with alarm, left the Convention, and hastened to his
friends in the Club of Jacobins. He read to them the speech which the
Convention had repudiated. They received it with thunders of applause
and with vows of vengeance. Robespierre, fainting with exhaustion,
said, in conclusion,
"Brothers, you have heard my last will and testament. I have seen
to-day that the league of villains is so strong that I can not hope to
escape them. I yield without a murmur! I leave to you my memory; it
will be dear to you, and you will defend it."
Many were affected even to tears, and, crowding around him, conjured
him to rally his friends in an insurrection. Henriot declared his
readiness to march his troops against the Convention. Robespierre,
knowing that death was the inevitable doom of the defeated party,
consented, saying,
"Well, then, let us separate the wicked from the weak. Free the
Convention from those who oppress it. Advance, and save the country. If
in these generous efforts we fail, then, my friends, you shall see me
drink hemlock calmly."
David, grasping his hand, enthusiastically exclaimed, "Robespierre,
if you drink hemlock, I will drink it with you." "Yes," interrupted a
multitude of voices, "all! we all will perish with you. To die with
you is to die with the people."
One or two of Robespierre's opponents had followed him from the
Convention to the Hall of the Jacobins. Couthon pointed them out and
denounced them. The Jacobins fell upon them and drove them out of the
house wounded and with rent garments. With difficulty they escaped with
their lives. Robespierre witnessed this violence, and dreading the
effects of a general insurrection, withdrew his consent to adopt means
so lawless and desperate. He probably felt that, strongly supported as
he was, he would be able the next day to triumph in the Convention.
"At this refusal," says Lamartine, "honest, perhaps, but impolitic,
Coffinhal, taking Payan by the arm and leading him out of the room,
said,
"'You see plainly that his virtue could not consent to insurrection.
Well! since he will not be saved, let us prepare to defend ourselves
and to avenge him.'"
The night was passed by both parties in preparing for the decisive
strife of the next day. The friends of Robespierre were active in
concerting, in all the quarters of Paris, a rising of the people to
storm the Convention. Tallien, Barras, Fréron, Fouché, slept not.
They were informed of all that had passed at the Jacobins, and their
emissaries brought them hourly intelligence through the night of the
increasing tumult of the people. They made vigorous preparations for
the debate within the walls and for the defense of the doors against
the forest of pikes with which it was about to be assailed. Barras was
intrusted with the military defense. It was resolved that Robespierre
should be cried down and denounced by internal tumult and not permitted
to speak. Each party, not knowing the strength of its opponents, was
sanguine of success.
The morning of the 27th of July dawned, and as Robespierre entered the
Convention, attired with unusual care, and with a smile of triumph
upon his lips, silence and stillness reigned through the house. St.
Just, in behalf of Robespierre, commenced the onset. A scene of tumult
immediately ensued of which no adequate description can be given.
Robespierre immediately saw that his friends were far outnumbered by
his foes, and was in despair. Pale and excited, he attempted to ascend
the tribune. Tallien seized by the coat and dragged him away, while
cries of _Down with the tyrant_ filled the house.[425]
"Just now," shouted Tallien, taking the tribune from which he had
ejected Robespierre, "I demanded that the curtain should be withdrawn;
it is so; the conspirators are unmasked and liberty will triumph. Up
to this moment I had preserved utter silence because I was aware that
the tyrant had made a list of proscriptions. But I was present at the
sitting of the Jacobins. I beheld the formation of the army of this
second Cromwell, and I armed myself with this poniard, with which to
pierce his heart if the National Convention had not the courage to
order his arrest."
[Illustration: ROBESPIERRE ATTEMPTING HIS DEFENSE.]
With these words he drew a dagger and pointed it menacingly at the
breast of Robespierre. At the same time he moved the arrest of
Henriot and others of the leading men of that party. The motion was
tumultuously carried. In vain Robespierre attempted to gain a hearing.
Cries of "Down with the tyrant" filled the house, and menaces,
reproaches, and insults were heaped upon him without measure. The
wretched man, overwhelmed by the clamor, turned pale with indignation,
and shouted "President of assassins, will you hear me?" "No! no! no!"
seemed to be the unanimous response. In the midst of the uproar Louchet
moved the arrest of Robespierre. The proposition was received with
thunders of applause.[426] The brother of Robespierre, a young man
of gentle, affectionate nature and many virtues, who was universally
esteemed, now rose, and said,
"I am as guilty as my brother. I have shared his virtues, I wish to
share his fate."
Robespierre instantly interposed, saying, "I accept my condemnation.
I have deserved your hatred. But, crime or virtue, my brother is not
guilty of that which you strike in me."
Shouts and stamping drowned his voice. As cries of _Vive la République_
rose on all sides, Robespierre quietly folded his arms, and, with a
contemptuous smile, exclaimed, "The Republic! it is destroyed; for
scoundrels triumph." It was now three o'clock in the afternoon. The two
Robespierres, Couthon, St. Just, and Lebus were led by _gens d'armes_
from the Convention across the Place du Carrousel to the Hôtel de
Brionne, where the Committee of General Safety were in session. A crowd
followed the prisoners with derision and maledictions. As they entered
the Carrousel a procession of carts, containing forty-five victims on
their way to the guillotine, met them.
After a very brief examination Robespierre was sent to the Luxembourg.
His confederates were distributed among the other prisons of Paris. The
Mayor of Paris and Henriot were in the mean time active in endeavors
to excite an insurrection to rescue the prisoners. The following
proclamation was issued from the Hôtel de Ville:
"Brothers and friends! the country is in imminent danger! The wicked
have mastered the Convention, where they hold in chains the virtuous
Robespierre. To arms! to arms! Let us not lose the fruits of the 18th
of August and the 2d of June."
Henriot, waving his sword, swore that he would drag the scoundrels who
voted the arrest of Robespierre through the streets tied to the tail of
his horse. This brutal man was now in such a state of intoxication as
to be incapable of decisive action. Flourishing a pistol, he mounted
his horse, and, with a small detachment of troops, galloped to the
Luxembourg to rescue his friend. He was met on the way by the troops of
the Convention, who had been ordered to arrest him. They seized him,
dragged him from his horse, bound him with their belts, and threw him
into a guard-house, almost dead-drunk. In the mean time the populace
rescued all the prisoners, and carried them in triumph to the mayor's
room at the Hôtel de Ville. Robespierre, however, notwithstanding the
most earnest entreaties of the Jacobins and the municipal government,
refused to encourage or to accept the insurrection, or to make escape
from arrest. "Made prisoner," writes Lamartine, "by command of his
enemies, he resolved either to triumph or fall submissive to the law
only; added to which, he firmly believed the Revolutionary Tribunal
would acquit him of all laid to his charge; or, if not, and if even
condemned to death, 'the death of one just man,' said he, 'is less
hurtful to the Republic than the example of a revolt against the
national representation.'"
News was brought to the Hôtel de Ville of the arrest of Henriot.
Coffinhal, Vice-president of the Revolutionary Tribunal, immediately
rallied the mob, rushed to the Tuileries, released Henriot, who was by
this time somewhat sobered, and brought him back to the Hôtel de Ville.
Henriot, exasperated by his arrest, placed himself at the head of his
troops and marched with a battery against the Convention. At this stage
of the affair no one could judge which party would be victorious. The
city government, with the populace at its disposal, was on one side;
the Convention, with its friends, on the other.[427]
It was now seven o'clock in the evening, and the deputies of the
Convention, fully conscious of their peril, seemed almost speechless
with terror. Robespierre and his confederates were rescued and
protected by the city government; the mob was aroused, and the
National Guard, under their leader, Henriot, were marching against
the Convention. The Revolutionary Tribunal, which alone could condemn
Robespierre, it was feared would acquit him by acclamation. He would
then be led back in triumph to the Convention, and his foes would
be speedily dragged to the guillotine. The dismal tolling of the
tocsin now was heard; in the Jacobin Club the oath was taken to live
or die with Robespierre; the rallying masses were crowding in from
the faubourgs; cannon were pointed against the Convention; and three
thousand young students seized their arms and rendezvoused as a
body-guard for Robespierre.
In this critical hour the Convention, nerved by despair, adopted those
measures of boldness and energy which could alone save them from
destruction. As they were deliberating, Henriot placed his artillery
before their doors and ordered them to be blown open. The deputies
remained firmly in their seats, saying, "Here is our post, and here we
will die." The friends of the Convention, who crowded the galleries,
rushed out and spread themselves through the streets to rally defenders
for the laws. Several of the deputies also left the hall, threw
themselves among the soldiers, and, remonstrating with them, pointed to
Henriot, and said,
"Soldiers! look at that drunken man! who but a drunkard would ever
point his arms against his country or its representatives? Will you,
who have ever deserved so much from your country, cast shame and
dishonor on her now?"
[Illustration: DEMONSTRATION AGAINST THE CONVENTION, HEADED BY HENRIOT.]
The Convention had outlawed Henriot and appointed Barras to the
command of the National Guard in his place. The soldiers began to
waver. Henriot, affrighted, put spurs to his horse and fled. Barras,
an energetic man, was now in command, and the tide had thus suddenly
and strongly turned in favor of the Convention. It was now night, and
the gleam of ten thousand torches was reflected from the multitudes
surging through the streets. Barras, on horseback, with a strong
retinue, traversed the central quarters of Paris, rallying the citizens
to the defense of the Convention. Eighteen hundred bold, well-armed
men were soon marshaled before the doors. With two other bands he
marched along parallel streets to the Place de Grève, where he drove
off the disorderly crowd and secured all the approaches to the Hôtel
de Ville. Robespierre was still in one of the rooms of the Hôtel de
Ville, surrounded by his confederates and by the members of the city
government. They implored him to authorize an insurrection, assuring
him that his name would rally the populace and rescue them all from
inevitable death. But Robespierre persistently refused, declaring that
he would rather die than violate the laws established by the people.
A detachment of soldiers, sent by Barras, cautiously ascended the
steps, and entered the _Salle de l'Egalité_ to rearrest the rescued
prisoners. As they were ascending the stairs Lebas discharged a pistol
into his heart and fell dead. The younger Robespierre leaped from the
window into the court-yard, breaking his leg by his fall. Coffinhal,
enraged in contemplating the ruin into which the drunken imbecility of
Henriot had involved them, seized him and threw him out of a window of
the second story upon a pile of rubbish, exclaiming,
"Lie there, wretched drunkard! You are not worthy to die on a scaffold!"
Robespierre sat calmly at a table, awaiting his fate. One of the _gens
d'armes_ discharged a pistol at him. The ball entered his left cheek,
fracturing his jaw and carrying away several of his teeth. His head
dropped upon the table, deluging with blood the papers which were
before him. The troops of the Convention now filled the Hôtel de Ville,
arresting all its inmates. The day was just beginning to dawn as the
long file of prisoners were led out into the Place de Grève to be
conducted to the hall of the Convention.[428]
First came Robespierre, borne by four men on a litter. His fractured
jaw was bound up by a handkerchief, which was steeped in blood. Couthon
was paralytic in his limbs. Unable to walk, he was also carried in the
arms of several men. They had carelessly let him fall, and his clothes
were torn, disarranged, and covered with mud. Robespierre the younger,
stunned by his fall and with his broken limb hanging helplessly down,
was conveyed insensible in the arms of two men. The corpse of Lebas
was borne next in this sad train, covered with a table-cloth spotted
with his blood. Then followed St. Just, bareheaded, with dejected
countenance, his hands bound behind him. Upward of eighty members
of the city government, bound two and two, completed the melancholy
procession.
It was five o'clock in the morning when the captives were led to the
Tuileries. In the mean time Légendre had marched to the assembly-room
of the Jacobins, dispersed them, locked their doors, and brought the
keys to the President of the Convention.[429]
Robespierre was laid upon a table in an anteroom, while an interminable
crowd pressed in and around to catch a sight of the fallen dictator.
The unhappy man was overwhelmed with reproaches and insults, and
feigned death to escape this moral torture. The blood was freely
flowing from his wound, coagulating in his mouth, and choking him
as it trickled down his throat. The morning was intensely hot; not a
breath of pure air could the wounded man inhale; insatiable thirst and
a burning fever consumed him; and thus he remained for more than an
hour, enduring the intensest pangs of bodily and mental anguish. By
order of the Convention, he and his confederates were then removed to
the Committee of General Safety for examination; from which tribunal
they were sent to the Conciergerie, where they were all thrown into the
same dungeon to await their trial, which was immediately to take place
before the Revolutionary Tribunal.
[Illustration: ROBESPIERRE LYING WOUNDED ON THE TABLE OF THE CITY HALL.]
A few hours of pain, anguish, and despair passed away, when at three
o'clock in the afternoon the whole party were conveyed to that
merciless court which was but the last stepping-stone to death. The
trial lasted but a few moments. They were already condemned, and it was
only necessary to prove their identity. The Convention was victorious,
and no man of the Revolutionary Tribunal dared to resist its will.
Had the Commune of Paris conquered in this strife, the obsequious
Tribunal, with equal alacrity, would have consigned the Deputies to the
guillotine.
At five o'clock the carts of the condemned received the prisoners.[430]
The long procession advanced through the Rue St. Honoré to the Place
de la Révolution. The fickle crowd thronged the streets, heaping
imprecations upon the man to whom they would have shouted hosanna had
he been a victor. Robespierre, his brother, Couthon, Henriot, all
mangled, bleeding, and with broken bones, were thrown into the first
cart with the corpse of Lebas. As the cart jolted over the pavement
shrieks of anguish were extorted from the victims. At six o'clock they
reached the steps of the guillotine. Robespierre ascended the scaffold
with a firm step; but, as the executioner brutally tore the bandage
from his inflamed wound, he uttered a shriek of torture which pierced
every ear. The dull sullen sound of the falling axe was heard, and the
head of Robespierre fell ghastly into the basket. For a moment there
was silence, and then the crowd raised a shout as if a great victory
had been achieved and the long-sought blessings of the Revolution
attained.[431]
[Illustration: ROBESPIERRE AND HIS COMPANIONS LED TO EXECUTION.]
Thus died Robespierre, in the thirty-fifth year of his age. His
character will probably ever remain a mystery. "His death was the date
and not the cause of the cessation of terror. Deaths would have ceased
by his triumphs, as they did by his death. Thus did Divine justice
dishonor his repentance, and cast misfortune on his good intentions,
making of his tomb a gulf filled up. It has made of his memory an
enigma of which history trembles to pronounce the solution, fearing to
do him injustice if she brand it as a crime, or to create horror if she
should term it a virtue. This man was, and must ever remain, shadowy
and undefined."[432]
Twenty-two were beheaded with Robespierre. The next day seventy who
were arrested at the Hôtel de Ville were sent to the guillotine. The
following day twelve more bled upon the scaffold. In three days one
hundred and fourteen perished, untried, by that tyranny which had
supplanted the tyranny of Robespierre.[433]
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 419: "Mr. Alison gives currency to an atrocious slander
against Robespierre, for which he has adduced no authority, and which
is contradicted by the whole evidence of Robespierre's life. 'He
(Philippe Egalité) was detained,' says Alison, 'above a quarter of
an hour in front of the Palais Royal, by order of Robespierre, who
had asked in vain for the hand of his daughter in marriage, and had
promised, if he would relent in that extremity, to excite a tumult
which would save his life.'"--_Life of Robespierre, by G.H. Lewes_, p.
265.]
[Footnote 420: "Danton regarded the austere principles of Robespierre
as folly. He thought that the Republicans could not maintain their
power but by surrounding themselves with the consideration which wealth
confers, and he consequently thought it necessary to close their eyes
against the sudden acquisition of wealth of certain Revolutionists.
Robespierre, on the contrary, flattered himself that he could establish
a republic in France based on virtue, and when he was thoroughly
persuaded that Danton was an obstacle to that system he abandoned
him."--_Biographie Universelle._]
[Footnote 421: Du Broca.]
[Footnote 422: "Robespierre had a prodigious force at his disposal.
The lowest orders, who saw the Revolution in his person, supported him
as the best representative of its doctrines and interests; the armed
force of Paris, commanded by Henriot, was at his command. He had entire
sway over the Jacobins, whom he admitted and ejected at pleasure; all
important posts were occupied by his creatures; he had formed the
Revolutionary Tribunal and the new committee himself."--_Mignet_, p.
256.]
[Footnote 423: Thiers, vol. iii., p. 68, note from Quarterly Review.]
[Footnote 424: Prudhomme, a Republican, who wrote during this period of
excitement, has left six volumes of the details of the Reign of Terror.
Two of these contain an alphabetical list of all the persons put to
death by the Revolutionary Tribunals. He gives the following appalling
statement of the victims:
Nobles 1,278
Noble women 750
Wives of laborers and artisans 1,467
Nuns 350
Priests 1,135
Men not noble 13,623
------
Total sent to the guillotine 18,603 18,603
Women who died of premature delivery 3,400
Women who died in childbirth from grief 348
Women killed in La Vendée 15,000
Children killed in La Vendée 22,000
Men slain in La Vendée 900,000
Victims under Carrier at Nantes 32,000
Victims at Lyons 31,000
----------
Total 1,022,351
This list, appalling as it is, does not include those massacred in the
prisons, or those shot at Toulon or Marseilles.]
[Footnote 425: The full report of this terrible scene, as contained
in the Moniteur of the 11th Thermidor, is one of the most exciting
narratives in history. In the conflict Robespierre appears immeasurably
superior to his opponents in dignity and argument. But he is
overwhelmed and crushed by the general clamor. He struggles valiantly,
and falls like a strong man armed.]
[Footnote 426: "In the height of the terrible conflict, when
Robespierre seemed deprived by rage of the power of articulation,
a voice cried out, '_It is Danton's blood that is choking you_.'
Robespierre, indignant, recovered his voice and courage to exclaim,
'Danton! Is it, then, Danton you regret? Cowards! why did you
not defend him?' There was spirit, truth, and even dignity in
this bitter retort--the last words that Robespierre ever spoke in
public."--_Quarterly Review._]
[Footnote 427: The state of the times is illustrated by the fact that
Barrere is reported to have gone to the Convention with two speeches
in his pocket, one assailing Robespierre and the other defending him.
He knew not which party would triumph, and he was prepared to join the
strongest.]
[Footnote 428: Though it has generally been represented that
Robespierre attempted to commit suicide, the evidence now seems to be
conclusive that he did not. See Lamartine's History of the Girondists,
vol. iii., p. 527.]
[Footnote 429: Légendre, the butcher, was a deputy of the Convention.
He was a man of extraordinary nerve, and had been one of the most
furious members of the society of Jacobins.--_Biog. Universelle._]
[Footnote 430: There is some confusion respecting the dates of these
events; but we follow the dates as given by Lamartine.]
[Footnote 431: "Robespierre," said Napoleon, "was by no means the worst
character who figured in the Revolution. He opposed trying the queen.
He was not an atheist; on the contrary, he had publicly maintained the
existence of a Supreme Being in opposition to many of his colleagues.
Neither was he of opinion that it was necessary to exterminate all
priests and nobles, like many others. Marat, for example, maintained
that it was necessary that six hundred thousand heads should fall.
Robespierre wanted to proclaim the king an outlaw, and not to go
through the ridiculous mockery of trying him. Robespierre was a
fanatic, a monster, but he was incorruptible, and incapable of robbing
or causing the deaths of others either from personal enmity or a desire
of enriching himself. He was an enthusiast, but one who really believed
that he was acting right, and died not worth a sou. In some respects
Robespierre may be said to have been an honest man."--_Napoleon at St.
Helena_, p. 590.]