ST. GEORGES'S DOOM
The _cours criminel_ on the banks of the Seine had been crowded all
day, and the judges seated on the bench began to exhibit signs of
fatigue at their labours. They had sat from ten o'clock in the morning
far into the afternoon, and, now that four o'clock was at hand, it
appeared as if their sitting would be still further prolonged; and
this in spite of the number of cases they had disposed of.
A variety of malefactors, or so-called malefactors, had on that day
received their sentences: some for professing the "reformed religion,"
as they blasphemously--in the judges' eyes--termed it; some for being
bullies and cutthroats; a student aged sixteen had been sentenced to
imprisonment in the Bastille for writing on the walls a distich on
Louis, stating that he had displaced God in the minds of the
French;[9] and a marchioness had been condemned to a fine of twenty
pistoles and to remain out of Paris for a year for having poisoned her
husband; also a spy, a Dutchman, supposed to be in the service of the
accursed Stadtholder and English king, had been condemned to death by
burning, his entrails to be first cut out and flung in his face; and
several petty malefactors--a drunken priest who had read a portion of
Rabelais to his flock instead of a sermon; a lampoonist who had
written a joke on the De Maintenon; an actor who had struck a
gentleman in defence of his own daughter; and a courtesan who had
induced a young nobleman to spend too much money on her--were all
sentenced to the Bastille, to Vincennes, and Bicetre for various
periods.
[Footnote 9: The distich ran:
"La croix fait place au lis, et Jesus Christ au Roi
Louis, oh! race impie, est le seul Dieu chez toi."
For writing it the student remained in prison _thirty-one years_.]
"Now," said Monsieur de Rennie, who presided to-day, when the last of
these wretches had been finished off--"now, is the list cleared? We
have sat six hours." And the other judges, one on either side of him,
repeated his words and murmured, "Six hours!"
"Your lordships have still some other cases," the _procureur du roi_
said, addressing them, "which you will probably be willing to dispose
of to-day. There is one of a man who is thought to have abandoned his
ship in the recent disaster at La Hogue, and to have escaped to Paris,
where he was captured in hiding; and another of three Jansenists who
have blasphemed the faith; also there is a man, an escaped _galerien_,
brought hither from Rambouillet by an officer of the Regiment de
Grance for trial."
"Are the facts clear," asked the presiding judge, "against this man?
If so, the case will not occupy us long, and we will take it
to-night."
"Quite clear," the _procureur_ replied, "so far as I gather."
"Bring him in."
A moment later St. Georges stood in the dock set apart for the
criminals, his hands tied in front of him. And in the court many eyes
were cast toward him as he took his stand. All knew that, for those
who successfully escaped the galleys, there was but one ending if ever
caught again.
"Who gives evidence against this prisoner?" De Rennie asked, looking
at St. Georges under his bushy white eyebrows. "And what is his
name?--Prisoner, what is your name? Answer truly to the court."
"I have no name," St. Georges replied; "I refuse to answer to any."
The judge's eyebrows were lifted into his forehead and down again;
then he observed to his brother judge on his right, with a shrug of
his shoulders, "Contumacious!" and then, because he was a man who
disliked to be thwarted, he exclaimed: "So much the worse for you.
Well, _M. le procureur_, who prosecutes--who is there as witness?"
"The officer who arrested him and afterward brought him to Paris. He
can give your lordships the facts."
"Very well. Why does he not do so? Let him stand forward."
The officer stood forward, in so far that he stood up in the well of
the crowd--his gold-laced, cockaded hat still upon his head, since as
an officer of the king he was entitled to wear it in all other places
but church--and briefly he answered the presiding judge's questions.
Yes, he was a lieutenant of the Regiment de Grance, quartered at
Rambouillet--in his opinion, a miserable hole. His opinion on
Rambouillet, the judge said, frowning, was not required; he would be
good enough to give his name. His name was De Mortemart. De Mortemart!
Perhaps, said the judge, he might be a relative of the Duc de
Mortemart? Yes, the officer replied, he might be; in effect he was a
son of that personage. The judge was pleased to hear it; the duke was
universally known and respected, and--the acoustic qualities of the
court were bad--would M. de Mortemart take a seat on the bench, where
he and his brother judges could better hear him? The officer did not
mind, though he was not inconvenienced where he was, but, of course,
if their lordships desired. And so forth.
"Now," the judge said with great sweetness, when he had reached the
exalted elevation, "would M. de Mortemart give himself the trouble to
state how the fellow before them had fallen into his hands?" M. de
Mortemart did give himself the trouble--telling, however, exactly what
he thought fit, and also omitting many facts which he did not feel
disposed to mention--to wit, he contented himself by saying that the
"gentleman" in the dock had been betrayed by a woman into their
hands--a "treacherous reptile" he termed her--but he said nothing
about St. Georges having acknowledged that he had been a soldier of
France once, and had afterward fought on the English side against
France. To his young and chivalrous mind it was, indeed, a terrible
thing that any Frenchman should join with England against his own
country, but--he did not say so to the judge trying that man. The case
was bad enough against him without that.
In answer to further questions put with great politeness and an
evident desire on the judge's part not to bore the son of the Duc de
Mortemart too much, he stated that according to orders, he had
escorted the gentleman in trouble to Paris, and that he had ridden by
that gentleman's side all the way, treating him as well as possible.
Yes, he was bound to say he sympathized with the prisoner (he did not
say that he wished to Heaven the prisoner had availed himself of many
opportunities he had given him of escaping); he thought he had been
hardly treated--especially by the woman who was, in truth, a viper.
Did he mean to say, the judge asked almost apologetically, that he had
allowed the prisoner to ride unbound by his side? Yes, he did mean to
say so; the prisoner had made no attempt, either, to take advantage of
the license. Did Monsieur de Mortemart think that was wise on his part
as an officer? Yes, on his part as an officer he did think so. He
_was_ an officer; not"--and here he cast his eye on the turnkeys and
jailers in the court"--"the _canaille_." And, in effect, the prisoner
was before the court; that justified him.
After this the judges ceased to ask the Duc de Mortemart's son any
further questions, but went on with other matters. One of the
_canaille_, a jailer, was put on the witness stand and questioned
briefly. "Speak, fellow," said the president in a totally different
tone from that which he had hitherto used to the duke's son, "have you
examined the prisoner--is he branded?"
"He is, my lord, on his shoulder; an undoubted _galerien_."
"Enough! Stand down."
"Prisoner," addressing St. Georges, "what have you to say?"
"Nothing. Do your worst."
"No justification of your quitting the galleys?"
"Nothing that you would accept as such. Yet this I will say: I did not
escape of my own attempt; the galley I was in was sunk by an English
admiral off their coast; almost all were lost. I was saved and taken
back to England."
"So! That may make a difference. What was the galley's name?"
"L'Idole."
Here the judge on the president's right hand leaned over to him and
said: "This may be the truth. I had a nephew, an officer, on board
L'Idole--she was sunk."
"Allowing such to be the case, prisoner, how comes it you are back in
France?"
"I desired to return, and took the first opportunity."
"Ay, he did," suddenly roared out a voice in the court. "And ask him
how he returned, my lord; ask him that!"
In an instant all eyes were turned to the place whence the sound came,
and the presiding judge became scarlet in the face at any one having
the presumption to so bawl at him in the court. "Exempts," he cried,
"find out the ruffian who dares to outrage the king's justice by
bellowing before us thus. Find him out, I say, and bring him before
us!"
It required, however, very little "finding out," since he who had so
cried was the man whom the _procureur_ du Roi had spoken of as having
abandoned his ship at La Hogue and fled to Paris, and was now present
as a prisoner in the court to be tried for his offence. Nor was there
much need to hustle and drag him forward, since he came willingly
enough--he thought he saw here an immunity from punishment--if
punishment be deserved--a chance of escape by the evidence he could
give.
"Who is the fellow?" asked De Rennie, when, partly by the man's own
willing efforts and partly by pushings and jostlings, he had been got
on to the witness stand with two jailers on either side of him. "Who
is he?"
"He is, my lord," the _procureur du roi_ said, "the man who is charged
with deserting his ship at La Hogue and fleeing to Paris. He says,
however, he can give evidence against the _galerien_ here which will
also go far to absolve him of his desertion--if your lordships will
hear him."
"Ay," said De Rennie, "we will hear him very willingly. But," he said,
addressing the sailor, "tell no lies, fellow, in hope of escaping your
own punishment. Understand that! And understand, also, that you must
justify your own desertion."
"I need tell no lies," the man replied, a rough, bull faced and
throated man, with every mark of a seaman about him, "to justify
myself. And there was no desertion. _Mon Dieu!_ was Tourville a
deserter when he went ashore from L'Ambitieux? If so, then I am one,
for I went with him."
"Tell your tale," De Rennie exclaimed angrily, the man's utter want
of respect irritating him, "and speak no slander against the king's
officers."
"Slander!" the sailor repeated--"slander! How slander? I am
Tourville's own coxswain; acted under his orders----"
"Go on!" roared the judge. "Your evidence against the prisoner. Your
evidence!"
Briefly the man's evidence was this--and as he told it all in the
court knew that the fate of the prisoner was sealed. After that
nothing could save him.
The man _was_ Tourville's coxswain--he produced a filthy, water-soaked
paper from his breast to prove it--had been with him in Le Soleil
Royal, had gone with the admiral when he transferred his flag to
L'Ambitieux, had taken that flag from the lieutenant's hands and, with
his own, hauled it up on the latter vessel.
"But," continued the man, "it was not for long. The English had got us
in shoal water, their fireships and attenders came at us and burned
us; their boarding parties came in two hundred boats--we could do
nothing after the first resistance! And among those boarding
parties"--and he lifted his finger and pointed at the prisoner in the
dock--"was one in command of that man--that, standing there in the
dock."
"Fellow!" exclaimed the judge, "this is a Frenchman. Beware!--no
lies."
"I tell no lies. It is the truth. Ask him. He was on the deck of
L'Ambitieux with a dozen other boat crews; we could not resist; their
whole fleet came over our sides; the admiral and I left in the same
boat, he bade us all save ourselves, gave us our freedom, disbanded
us. Send for him, ask him if I am a deserter. Ask, too, that man, if
he fought not against us on the English side."
"You hear," De Rennie said, looking toward St. Georges, "the charge
against you--that you, a Frenchman, fought on the English side against
your country. Answer the court, is it true?"
With all eyes turned on him--the pitying eyes of De Mortemart, the
scowling eyes of the judges, and the vindictive eyes of most people in
the court, who, having been hitherto inclined to sympathize with the
prisoner, now only thirsted for his death--St. Georges drew himself up
and faced his inquirer. Then, a moment later, he said: "It is true."
Those words were the signal for an indescribable hubbub in the court.
Men muttered fiercely, "Burn him, burn him!" women shrieked to one
another that no wonder the English devils had beaten France when
Frenchmen fought on their side, forgetting the mothers that bore them;
and De Mortemart, muttering between white lips: "My God! nothing can
save him," left the court. The coxswain, too, who but a quarter of an
hour before had heard hissed in his ears the words "_lache_,"
"_deserteur_," "_miserable_," and other epithets, was now the centre
of a group of turnkeys and exempts, all asking him why he had not told
them before that he was a hero?
Meanwhile the _procureur du roi_, arrayed in his scarlet gown, sat at
his table arranging his papers--there would be no further trials that
day, he knew, the Jansenists and others would have to wait--and
glancing up now and again at the other three scarlet-robed figures on
the bench, conferring with their heads close together. Presently,
however, a nod from De Rennie to the _greffier_ caused that official
to bawl out orders for silence in the court, and forced the muttering
men and shrieking women to hold their tongues. They did so, willingly
enough, too; they knew what was coming.
"Are your lordships prepared to deliver judgment?" asked the
_procureur du roi_, carrying out the usual formula and pushing his
papers away and rising as he addressed them.
"We are prepared," the president replied.
"I pray your lordships do so."
"The sentence of the court is that the prisoner be taken to the Hotel
de Ville, and from there to the Place de Greve, and there broken on
the wheel till he is dead."
More murmurings, more exclamations from the nervous, excited crowd,
and then a hush, while again the _procureur's_ voice was heard:
"I pray your lordships to appoint a day and hour on which your
righteous sentence shall be carried out."
"The decree of the court is that the sentence be carried out at the
daybreak following the time when forty-eight hours shall have elapsed
from now."
"In the name of justice I thank your lordships.--Prisoner," and the
_procureur_ turned to him, "you hear and understand your sentence?"
"Yes, I hear and understand it."