determining the claims to national superiority, the boasted and unvarying
controul which the French exercise over their features and accents, is
not a merit; nor those indications of what passes within, to which the
English are subject, an imperfection. If the French sometimes supply
their want of kindness, or render disappointment less acute at the
moment, by a sterile complacency, the English harshness is often only the
alloy to an efficient benevolence, and a sympathizing mind. In France
they have no humourists who seem impelled by their nature to do good, in
spite of their temperament--nor have we in England many people who are
cold and unfeeling, yet systematically aimable: but I must still persist
in not thinking it a defect that we are too impetuous, or perhaps too
ingenuous, to unite contradictions.
There is a cause, that doubtless has its effects in representing the
English disadvantageously, and which I have never heard properly allowed
for. The liberty of the press, and the great interest taken by all ranks
of people in public affairs, have occasioned a more numerous circulation
of periodical prints of every kind in England, than in any other country
in Europe. Now, as it is impossible to fill them constantly with
politics, and as the taste of different readers must be consulted, every
barbarous adventure, suicide, murder, robbery, domestic fracas, assaults,
and batteries of the lower orders, with the duels and divorces of the
higher, are all chronicled in various publications, disseminated over
Europe, and convey an idea that we are a very miserable, ferocious, and
dissolute nation. The foreign gazettes being chiefly appropriated to
public affairs, seldom record either the vices, the crimes, or
misfortunes of individuals; so that they are thereby at least prevented
from fixing an unfavourable judgement on the national character.
Mercier observes, that the number of suicides committed in Paris was
supposed to exceed greatly that of similar disasters in London; and that
murders in France were always accompanied by circumstances of peculiar
horror, though policy and custom had rendered the publication of such
events less general than with us.--Our divorces, at which the Gallic
purity of manners used to be so much scandalized, are, no doubt, to be
regretted; but that such separations were not then allowed, or desired in
France, may perhaps be attributed, at least as justly, to the
complaisance of husbands, as to the discretion of wives, or the national
morality.*
* At present, in the monthly statement, the number of divorces in
France, is often nearly equal to that of the marriages.
I should reproach myself if I could feel impartial when I contemplate the
English character; yet I certainly endeavour to write as though I were
so. If I have erred, it has been rather in allowing too much to received
opinions on the subject of this country, than in suffering my affections
to make me unjust; for though I am far from affecting the fashion of the
day, which censures all prejudices as illiberal, except those in
disfavour of our own country, yet I am warranted, I hope, in saying, that
however partial I may appear to England, I have not been so at the
expence of truth.--Yours, &c.
October 6, 1794.
The sufferings of individuals have often been the means of destroying or
reforming the most powerful tyrannies; reason has been convinced by
argument, and passion appealed to by declamation in vain--when some
unvarnished tale, or simple exposure of facts, has at once rouzed the
feelings, and conquered the supineness of an oppressed people.
The revolutionary government, in spite of the clamorous and weekly
swearings of the Convention to perpetuate it, has received a check from
an event of this nature, which I trust it will never recover.--By an
order of the Revolutionary Committee of Nantes, in November 1793, all
prisoners accused of political crimes were to be transferred to Paris,
where the tribunal being more immediately under the direction of
government, there would be no chance of their acquittal. In consequence
of this order, an hundred and thirty-two inhabitants of Nantes, arrested
on the usual pretexts of foederalism, or as suspected, or being
Muscadins, were, some months after, conducted to Paris. Forty of the
number died through the hardships and ill treatment they encountered on
the way, the rest remained in prison until after the death of
Robespierre.
The evidence produced on their trial, which lately took place, has
revealed but too circumstantially all the horrors of the revolutionary
system. Destruction in every form, most shocking to morals or humanity,
has depopulated the countries of the Loire; and republican Pizarro's and
Almagro's seem to have rivalled each other in the invention and
perpetration of crimes.
When the prisons of Nantes overflowed, many hundreds of their miserable
inhabitants had been conducted by night, and chained together, to the
river side; where, being first stripped of their clothes, they were
crouded into vessels with false bottoms, constructed for the purpose, and
sunk.*--
* Though the horror excited by such atrocious details must be
serviceable to humanity, I am constrained by decency to spare the
reader a part of them. Let the imagination, however repugnant,
pause for a moment over these scenes--Five, eight hundred people of
different sexes, ages, and conditions, are taken from their prisons,
in the dreary months of December and January, and conducted, during
the silence of the night, to the banks of the Loire. The agents of
the Republic there despoil them of their clothes, and force them,
shivering and defenceless, to enter the machines prepared for their
destruction--they are chained down, to prevent their escape by
swimming, and then the bottom is detached for the upper part, and
sunk.--On some occasions the miserable victims contrived to loose
themselves, and clinging to the boards near them, shrieked in the
agonies of despair and death, "O save us! it is not even now too
late: in mercy save us!" But they appealed to wretches to whom
mercy was a stranger; and, being cut away from their hold by strokes
of the sabre, perished with their companions. That nothing might be
wanting to these outrages against nature, they were escribed as
jests, and called "Noyades, water parties," and "civic baptisms"!
Carrier, a Deputy of the Convention, used to dine and make parties
of pleasure, accompanied by music and every species of gross luxury,
on board the barges appropriated to these execrable purposes.
--At one time, six hundred children appear to have been destroyed in this
manner;--young people of different sexes were tied in pairs and thrown
into the river;--thousands were shot in the high roads and in the fields;
and vast numbers were guillotined, without a trial!*
* Six young women, (the _Mesdemoiselles la Meterie,_) in particular,
sisters, and all under four-and-twenty, were ordered to the
Guillotine together: the youngest died instantly of fear, the rest
were executed successively.--A child eleven years old, who had
previously told the executioner, with affecting simplicity, that he
hoped he would not hurt him much, received three strokes of the
Guillotine before his head was severed from his body.
--Two thousand died, in less than two months, of a pestilence, occasioned
by this carnage: the air became infected, and the waters of the Loire
empoisoned, by dead bodies; and those whom tyranny yet spared, perished
by the elements which nature intended for their support.*
* Vast sums were exacted from the Nantais for purifying the air, and
taking precautions against epidemical disorders.
But I will not dwell on horrors, which, if not already known to all
Europe, I should be unequal to describe: suffice it to say, that whatever
could disgrace or afflict mankind, whatever could add disgust to
detestation, and render cruelty, if possible, less odious than the
circumstances by which it was accompanied, has been exhibited in this
unfortunate city.--Both the accused and their witnesses were at first
timid through apprehension, but by degrees the monstrous mysteries of the
government were laid open, and it appeared, beyond denial or palliation,
that these enormities were either devised, assisted, or connived at, by
Deputies of the Convention, celebrated for their ardent republicanism and
revolutionary zeal.--The danger of confiding unlimited power to such men
as composed the majority of the Assembly, was now displayed in a manner
that penetrated the dullest imagination, and the coldest heart; and it
was found, that, armed with decrees, aided by revolutionary committees,
revolutionary troops, and revolutionary vehicles of destruction,*
missionaries selected by choice from the whole representation, had, in
the city of Nantes alone, and under the mask of enthusiastic patriotism,
sacrificed thirty thousand people!
* A company was formed of all the ruffians that could be collected
together. They were styled the Company of Marat, and were specially
empowered to arrest whomsoever they chose, and to enter houses by
night or day--in fine, to proscribe and pillage at their pleasure.
Facts like these require no comment. The nation may be intimidated, and
habits of obedience, or despair of redress, prolong its submission; but
it can no longer be deceived: and patriotism, revolutionary liberty, and
philosophy, are for ever associated with the drowning machines of
Carrier, and the precepts and calculations of a Herault de Sechelles,* or
a Lequinio.**--
* Herault de Sechelles was distinguished by birth, talents, and
fortune, above most of his colleagues in the Convention; yet we find
him in correspondence with Carrier, applauding his enormities, and
advising him how to continue them with effect.--Herault was of a
noble family, and had been a president in the Parliament of Paris.
He was one of Robespierre's Committee of Public Welfare, and being
in some way implicated in a charge of treachery brought against
Simon, another Deputy, was guillotined at the same time with Danton.
** Lequinio is a philosopher by profession, who has endeavoured to
enlighten his countrymen by a publication entitled "_Les Prejuges
Detruits,_" and since by proving it advantageous to make no prisoners
of war.
--The ninety Nantais, against whom there existed no serious charge, and
who had already suffered more than death, were acquitted. Yet, though
the people were gratified by this verdict, and the general indignation
appeased by an immediate arrest of those who had been most notoriously
active in these dreadful operations, a deep and salutary impression
remains, and we may hope it will be found impracticable either to renew
the same scenes, or for the Convention to shelter (as they seemed
disposed to do) the principal criminals, who are members of their own
body. Yet, how are these delinquents to be brought to condemnation?
They all acted under competent authority, and their dispatches to the
Convention, which sufficiently indicated their proceedings, were always
sanctioned by circulation, and applauded, according to the excess of
their flagitiousness.
It is worthy of remark, that Nantes, the principal theatre of these
persecutions and murders, had been early distinguished by the attachment
of its inhabitants to the revolution; insomuch, that, at the memorable
epoch when the short-sighted policy of the Court excluded the Constituent
Assembly from their Hall at Versailles, and they took refuge in the Jeu
de Paume, with a resolution fatal to their country, never to separate
until they had obtained their purposes, an express was sent to Nantes, as
the place they should make choice of, if any violence obliged them to
quit the neighbourhood of Paris.
But it was not only by its principles that Nantes had signalized itself;
at every period of the war, it had contributed largely both in men and
money, and its riches and commerce still rendered it one of the most
important towns of the republic.--What has been its reward?--Barbarous
envoys from the Convention, sent expressly to level the aristocracy of
wealth, to crush its mercantile spirit, and decimate its inhabitants.*--
* When Nantes was reduced almost to a state of famine by the
destruction of commerce, and the supplies drawn for the maintenance
of the armies, Commissioners were sent to Paris, to solicit a supply
of provisions. They applied to Carrier, as being best acquainted
with their distress, and were answered in this language:--_"Demandez,
pour Nantes! je solliciterai qu'on porte le fer et la flamme dans
cette abominable ville. Vous etes tous des coquins, des contre-
revolutionnaires, des brigands, des scelerats, je ferai nommer une
commission par la Convention Nationale.--J'irai moi meme a la tete
de cette commission.--Scelerats, je serai rouler les tetes dans
Nantes--je regenererai Nantes."_--"Is it for Nantes that you
petition? I'll exert my influence to have fire and sword carried
into that abominable city. You are all scoundrels, counter-
revolutionists, thieves, miscreants.--I'll have a commission
appointed by the Convention, and go myself at the head of it.--
Villains, I'll set your heads a rolling about Nantes--I'll
regenerate Nantes."
Report of the Commission of Twenty-one, on the conduct of Carrier.
--Terrible lesson for those discontented and mistaken people, who,
enriched by commerce, are not content with freedom and independence, but
seek for visionary benefits, by becoming the partizans of innovation, or
the tools of faction!*
* The disasters of Nantes ought not to be lost to the republicans of
Birmingham, Manchester, and other great commercial towns, where "men
fall out they know not why;" and where their increasing wealth and
prosperity are the best eulogiums on the constitution they attempt
to undermine.
I have hitherto said little of La Vendee; but the fate of Nantes is so
nearly connected with it, that I shall make it the subject of my next
letter.
[No Date or Place Given.]
It appears, that the greater part of the inhabitants of Poitou, Anjou,
and the Southern divisions of Brittany, now distinguished by the general
appellation of the people of La Vendee, (though they include those of
several other departments,) never either comprehended or adopted the
principles of the French revolution. Many different causes contributed
to increase their original aversion from the new system, and to give
their resistance that consistency, which has since become so formidable.
A partiality for their ancient customs, an attachment to their Noblesse,
and a deference for their Priests, are said to characterize the brave
and simple natives of La Vendee. Hence republican writers, with
self-complacent decision, always treat this war as the effect of
ignorance, slavery, and superstition.
The modern reformist, who calls the labourer from the plough, and the
artizan from the loom, to make them statesmen or philosophers, and who
has invaded the abodes of contented industry with the rights of man, that
our fields may be cultivated, and our garments wove, by metaphysicians,
will readily assent to this opinion.--Yet a more enlightened and liberal
philosophy may be tempted to examine how far the Vendeans have really
merited the contempt and persecution of which they have been the objects.
By the confession of the republicans themselves, they are religious,
hospitable, and frugal, humane and merciful towards their enemies, and
easily persuaded to whatever is just and reasonable.
I do not pretend to combat the narrow prejudices of those who suppose the
worth or happiness of mankind compatible but with one set of opinions;
and who, confounding the adventitious with the essential, appreciate only
book learning: but surely, qualities which imply a knowledge of what is
due both to God and man, and information sufficient to yield to what is
right or rational, are not descriptive of barbarians; or at least, we may
say with Phyrrhus, "there is nothing barbarous in their discipline."*
*"The husbandmen of this country are in general men of simple
manners, naturally well inclined, or at least not addicted to
serious vices." Lequinio, Guerre de La Vendee.
Dubois de Crance, speaking of the inhabitants of La Vendee, says,
"They are the most hospitable people I ever saw, and always disposed
to listen to what is just and reasonable, if proffered with mildness
and humanity."
"This unpolished people, whom, however, it is much less difficult to
persuade than to fight." Lequinio, G. de La V.
"They affected towards our prisoners a deceitful humanity,
neglecting no means to draw them over to their own party, and often
sending them back to us with only a simple prohibition to bear arms
against the King or religion."
Report of Richard and Choudieu.
The ignorant Vendeans then could give lessons of policy and
humanity, which the "enlightened" republicans were not capable of
profiting by.
--Their adherence to their ancient institutions, and attachment to their
Gentry and Clergy, when the former were abolished and the latter
proscribed, might warrant a presumption that they were happy under the
one, and kindly treated by the other: for though individuals may
sometimes persevere in affections or habits from which they derive
neither felicity nor advantage, whole bodies of men can scarcely be
supposed eager to risk their lives in defence of privileges that have
oppressed them, or of a religion from which they draw no consolation.
But whatever the cause, the new doctrines, both civil and religious, were
received in La Vendee with a disgust, which was not only expressed by
murmurs, but occasionally by little revolts, by disobedience to the
constitutional authorities, and a rejection of the constitutional clergy.
Some time previous to the deposition of the King, Commissioners were sent
to suppress these disorders; and though I doubt not but all possible
means were taken to conciliate, I can easily believe, that neither the
King nor his Ministers might be desirous of subduing by force a people
who erred only from piety or loyalty. What effect this system of
indulgence might have produced cannot now be decided; because the
subsequent overthrow of the monarchy, and the massacre or banishment of
the priests, must have totally alienated their minds, and precluded all
hope of reconcilement.--Disaffection, therefore, continued to increase,
and the Brissotines are suspected of having rather fostered than
repressed these intestine commotions,* for the same purpose which induced
them to provoke the war with England, and to extend that of the
Continent.
* Le Brun, one of the Brissotin Ministers, concealed the progress of
this war for six months before he thought fit to report it to the
Convention.
--It is impossible to assign a good motive to any act of this literary
intriguer.
--Perhaps, while they determined to establish their faction by "braving
all Europe," they might think it equally politic to perplex and overawe
Paris by a near and dangerous enemy, which would render their continuance
in power necessary, or whom they might join, if expelled from it.*
* This last reason might afterwards have given way to their
apprehensions, and the Brissotins have preferred the creation of new
civil wars, to a confidence in the royalists. These men, who
condemned the King for a supposed intention of defending an
authority transmitted to him through whole ages, and recently
sanctioned by the voice of the people, did not scruple to excite a
civil war in defence of their six months' sovereignty over a
republic, proclaimed by a ferocious comedian, and certainly without
the assent of the nation. Had the ill-fated Monarch dared thus to
trifle with the lives of his subjects, he might have saved France
and himself from ruin.
When men gratify their ambition by means so sanguinary and atrocious as
those resorted to by the Brissotines, we are authorized in concluding
they will not be more scrupulous in the use or preservation of power,
than they were in attaining it; and we can have no doubt but that the
fomenting or suppressing the progress of civil discord, was, with them,
a mere question of expediency.
The decree which took place in March, 1793, for raising three hundred
thousand men in the departments, changed the partial insurrections of La
Vendee to an open and connected rebellion; and every where the young
people refused going, and joined in preference the standard of revolt.
In the beginning of the summer, the brigands* (as they were called) grew
so numerous, that the government, now in the hands of Robespierre and his
party, began to take serious measures to combat them.
* Robbers--_banditti_--The name was first given, probably, to the
insurgents of La Vendee, in order to insinuate a belief that the
disorders were but of a slight and predatory nature.
--One body of troops were dispatched after another, who were all
successively defeated, and every where fled before the royalists.
It is not unusual in political concerns to attribute to deep-laid plans
and abstruse combinations, effects which are the natural result of
private passions and isolated interests. Robespierre is said to have
promoted both the destruction of the republican armies and those of La
Vendee, in order to reduce the national population. That he was capable
of imagining such a project is probable--yet we need not, in tracing the
conduct of the war, look farther than to the character of the agents who
were, almost necessarily, employed in it. Nearly every officer qualified
for the command of an army, had either emigrated, or was on service at
the frontiers; and the task of reducing by violence a people who resisted
only because they deemed themselves injured, and who, even in the
estimation of the republicans, could only be mistaken, was naturally
avoided by all men who were not mere adventurers. It might likewise be
the policy of the government to prefer the services of those, who, having
neither reputation nor property, would be more dependent, and whom,
whether they became dangerous by their successes or defeats, it would be
easy to sacrifice.
Either, then, from necessity or choice, the republican armies in La
Vendee were conducted by dissolute and rapacious wretches, at all times
more eager to pillage than fight, and who were engaged in securing their
plunder, when they should have been in pursuit of the enemy. On every
occasion they seemed to retreat, that their ill success might afford them
a pretext for declaring that the next town or village was confederated
with the insurgents, and for delivering it up, in consequence, to murder
and rapine. Such of the soldiers as could fill their pocket-books with
assignats, left their less successful companions, and retired as invalids
to the hospitals: the battalions of Paris (and particularly "the
conquerors of the Bastille") had such ardour for pillage, that every
person possessed of property was, in their sense, an aristocrat, whom it
was lawful to despoil.*
* _"Le pillage a ete porte a son comble--les militaires au lieu de
songer a ce qu'ils avoient a faire, n'ont pense qu'a remplir leurs
sacs, et a voir se perpetuer une guerre aussi avantageuse a leur
interet--beaucoup de simples soldats ont acquis cinquante mille
francs et plus; on en a vu couverts de bijoux, et faisant dans tous
les genres des depenses d'une produgaloite, monstreuse."
Lequinio, Guerre de la Vendee._
"The most unbridled pillage prevailed--officers, instead of
attending to their duty, thought only of filling their portmanteaus,
and of the means to perpetuate a war they found so profitable.--Many
private soldiers made fifty thousand livres, and they have been seen
loaded with trinkets, and exercising the most abominable
prodigalities of every kind."
Lequinio, War of La Vendee.
"The conquerors of the Bastille had unluckily a most unbridled
ardour for pillage--one would have supposed they had come for the
express purpose of plunder, rather than fighting. The stage coaches
for Paris were entirely loaded with their booty."
Report of Benaben, Commissioner of the Department of Maine and
Loire.