I have lately witnessed a hideous sight. As soon as it was day, the
prison was full of noise, I heard heavy doors open and shut; the grating
of locks and bolts; the clanking of bunches of keys; the stairs creaking
from top to bottom with quick steps; and voices calling and answering
from the opposite extremes of the long corridors. My neighbours in the
dungeons, the felons at hard labour, were more gay than usual. All in
the prison seemed laughing, singing, running, or dancing; I--alone
silent in this uproar, alone motionless in this tumult--listened in
astonishment.
A jailor passed; I ventured to call and ask him “if there were a Fête in
the Prison.”
“A Fête, if you choose to call it so,” answered he; “this is the day
that they fetter the galley-slaves who are to set off to-morrow for
Toulon. Would you like to see them? It would amuse you.”
For a solitary recluse, indeed, a spectacle of any kind was an event of
interest, however odious it might be; and I accepted the “amusement.”
The jailor, after taking the usual precautions to secure me, conducted
me into a little empty cell, without a vestige of furniture, and only a
grated window,--but still a real window, against which one could lean,
and through which one could actually perceive the sky! “Here,” said he,
“you will see and hear all that happens. You will be ‘alone in your
box,’ like the King!”
He then went out, closing on me locks, bolts, and bars.
The window looked into a square and rather wide court, on every side of
which was a large six-storied stone edifice. Nothing could seem more
wretched, naked, and miserable to the eye than this quadruple façade,
pierced by a multitude of grated windows, against which were pressed a
crowd of thin and wan faces, placed one above the other, like the stones
of a wall; and all, as it were, framed in the intercrossings of iron
bars. They were prisoners, spectators of the ceremony, until their turn
came to be the actors.
All looked in silence into the still empty court; among these faded and
dull countenances there shone, here and there, some eyes which gleamed
like sparks of fire.
At twelve o’clock, a large gateway in the court was opened. A cart,
escorted by soldiers, rolled heavily into the court, with a rattling of
irons. It was the Convict-guard with the chains.
At the same instant, as if this sound awaked all the noise of the
prison, the spectators of the windows, who had hitherto been silent and
motionless, burst forth into cries of joy, songs, menaces, and
imprecations, mixed with hoarse laughter. It was like witnessing a
masque of Demons; each visage bore a grimace, every hand was thrust
through the bars, their voices yelled, their eyes flashed, and I was
startled to see so many gleams amidst these ashes. Meanwhile the
galley-sergeants quietly began their work. One mounted on the cart, and
threw to his comrades the fetters, the iron collars, and the linen
clothing; while others stretched long chains to the end of the court and
the Captain tried each link by striking it on the pavement,--all of
which took place under the mocking raillery of the prisoners, and the
loud laughter of the convicts for whom they were being prepared.
When all was ready, two or three low doors poured forth into the court a
collection of hideous, yelling, ragged men; these were the
galley-convicts.
Their entry caused increased pleasure at the windows. Some of them,
being ‘great names’ among their comrades, were saluted with applause and
acclamation, which they received with a sort of proud modesty. Several
wore a kind of hat of prison straw, plaited by themselves, and formed
into some fantastic shape; these men were always the most applauded.
One in particular excited transports of enthusiasm,--a youth of
seventeen, with quite a girlish face. In his prison he had made himself
a straw-dress, which enveloped him from head to foot; and he entered the
court, jumping a summerset with the agility of a serpent. He was a
mountebank condemned for theft, and there was a furious clapping of
hands, and a volley of cheers, for him.
At length the names were called in alphabetical order, and they went to
stand two and two, companions by similar initials; so that even if a
convict had a friend, most likely their chains would divide them from
suffering together.
Whilst they were exchanging their worn-out prison-garments for the thin
and coarse clothing of the galleys, the weather, which had been hitherto
uncertain, became suddenly cold and cloudy, and a heavy shower chilled
their thin forms, and saturated their vesture.
A dull silence succeeded to their noisy bravadoes; they shivered, their
teeth chattered, and their limbs shook in the wet clothes.
One convict only, an old man, retained a sort of gaiety. He exclaimed
laughing, while wiping away the rain, and shaking his fist at the skies,
“This was not in the playbill!”
When they had put on their miserable vestments, they were taken in bands
of twenty or thirty to the corner of the court where the long chains
were extended. At every interval of two feet in these long chains were
fastened short transverse chains, and at the extremity of each of the
latter was attached a square iron collar, which opened by means of a
hinge in the centre and closed by an iron bolt, which is riveted, for
the whole journey, on the convict’s neck. The convicts were ordered to
sit down in the mud on the inundated pavement; the iron collars were
fitted on them, and two prison-blacksmiths, with portable anvils,
riveted the hard, unheated metal with heavy iron hammers.
This was a frightful operation, and even the most hardy turned pale!
Each stroke of the hammer, aimed on the anvil resting on their backs,
makes the whole form yield; the failure of its aim, or the least
movement of the head, might launch them into eternity.
When this operation was finished, the convicts rose simultaneously. The
five gangs joined hands, so as to form an immense circle, and thus ran
round and round in the court, with a rapidity that the eye could hardly
follow. They sung some couplets, in their own idiom, to a melody which
was sometimes plaintive, sometimes furious, often interrupted by hoarse
cries and broken laughter, like delirious ravings, while the chains,
clanking together in cadence, formed an accompaniment to a song more
harsh than their own noise. A large trough was now brought in; the
guards, striking the convicts to make them discontinue their dance, took
them to the trough, in which was swimming I know not what sort of herbs
in some smoking and dirty-looking liquid. Having partaken of it, they
threw the remainder on the pavement, with their black bread, and began
again to dance and sing. This is a liberty which is allowed them on the
day they are fettered and the succeeding night.
I gazed on this strange spectacle with such eager and breathless
attention, that I totally forgot my own misery. The deepest pity filled
my heart, and their laughter made me weep.
Suddenly, in the midst of a profound reverie into which I had fallen, I
observed the yelling circle had stopped, and was silent. Then every eye
was turned to the window which I occupied. “The Condemned! the
Condemned!” shouted they, pointing their fingers at me; and their bursts
of laughter were redoubled.
I was thunderstruck. I know not where they knew me, or how I was
recognized.
“Good day! good night!” cried they, with their mocking sneer. One of the
youngest, condemned to the Galleys for life, turned his shining, leaden
face on me, with a look of envy, saying, “He is lucky! he is to be
_clipped_! Good bye, Comrade!”
I cannot describe what passed within me. I was indeed their “comrade!”
The Scaffold is Sister to the Galleys. Nay, I was even lower than they
were; the convicts had done me an honour. I shuddered: yes! their
“comrade!” I remained at the window, motionless, as if paralyzed; but
when I saw the five gangs advance, rushing towards me with phrases of
disgusting cordiality; when I heard the horrible din of their chains,
their clamours, their steps at the foot of my wall, it seemed to me that
this knot of demons were scaling my cell! I uttered a shriek; I threw
myself against the door violently, but there was no means of flight. I
knocked, I called with mad fury. Then I thought I heard, still nearer,
the horrid voices of the convicts. I thought I saw their hideous heads
appearing on a level with the window; I uttered another shriek of
anguish, and fainted.
* * * * *