Part 10 (2/2)

”Does he take patriots for bandits?” exclaimed the officer, angrily. ”If I am on guard here when his coach enters the city, he will receive the lesson he deserves. You said you had pa.s.sports, I think?”

”Here they are!”

The officer took the papers that Coursegol handed him and examined them carefully.

”These papers were drawn up two years ago,” said he. ”Where have you spent these years?”

”My daughter has been ill and we were obliged to stop at numerous places on the way. We made long sojourns at Dijon and at Montereau; but you will notice, citizen, the pa.s.sports bear the endors.e.m.e.nt of the authorities of those towns.”

”So I perceive. Very well, you will be taken before the Commissioners and if your papers prove all right, as I believe they are, you will be allowed to remain in the city.”

The young lieutenant turned away to give an order to one of his soldiers; then suddenly he approached Coursegol and said kindly, in a low voice:

”You seem to be worthy people, and I should be very sorry if any misfortune happened to you. Paris is not a safe abode just now.

Yesterday they began to put the prisoners to death, and, perhaps, you and your daughter would do well to wait until the fury of the populace is appeased.”

”But we belong to the people,” replied Coursegol. ”We have nothing to fear; moreover, I know a good patriot who will be responsible for us if necessary: Citizen Bridoul, who keeps a wine-shop on the Rue Antoine.”

”At the sign of the Bonnet Rouge?” cried the officer.

”The very same,” replied Coursegol, boldly, though until now he had been ignorant of the sign which distinguished his friend Bridoul's establishment.

”Bridoul is a true patriot. Thanks to him, you will incur no risk! You will now be conducted to the Commissioners.”

”Many thanks for your kindness, lieutenant,” said Coursegol.

And taking Dolores' arm in his, he followed the soldier who was to conduct them to the munic.i.p.al authorities. There, they underwent a fresh examination, and Coursegol responded as before. As people who desired to enter Paris at such a time could hardly be regarded with suspicion, Coursegol and Dolores were walking freely about the streets of the city a few moments later, surprised and alarmed at the sights that met their eyes at every turn. The last witnesses of the grand revolutionary drama are disappearing every day. Age has bowed their heads, blanched their locks and enfeebled their memories. Soon there will remain none of those whose testimony might aid the historian of that stormy time in his search after truth; but among the few who still survive and who in the year 1792 were old enough to see and understand and remember, there are none upon whom the recollection of those terrible days in September is not indelibly imprinted. Since the tenth of August, Paris had been delivered up to frenzy and bloodshed. The arrest of the royal family, the rivalry between the Commune and the Convention, the bitter debates at the clubs and the uprising of the volunteers were more than enough to throw the great city into a state of excitement, disorder and terror.

Business was paralyzed; the stores were for the most part closed; the aristocratic portions of the city deserted; emigration had deprived France of thousands of her citizens; the streets were filled with a fierce, ragged crowd; the luxury upon which the artisan depended for a livelihood was proscribed; famine was knocking at the gates; gold had disappeared; places of amus.e.m.e.nt were broken up; the gardens and the galleries of the Palais-Royal alone remained--the only rendezvous accessible to those who, even while looking forward to death, frantically desired to enjoy the little of life that remained. Such was the aspect of affairs in Paris.

With the last days of August came the news of the capture of Longwy by the Prussians, the siege of Terdun, and the warlike preparations of Russia and Germany. This was more than enough to excite the terror of the Parisians and to arouse their anger against those whom they called aristocrats and whom they accused of complicity with the enemies of the nation.

On the 29th of August, by the order of the Commune, the gates were closed. It was impossible to enter Paris without a pa.s.sport endorsed by examiners appointed for the purpose. No one was allowed to leave the city on any pretext whatever. The Parisians were virtually prisoners.

Every house, every apartment was visited by inspectors. Rich and poor were alike compelled to submit. Every suspicious article was seized, and the man in whose dwelling it was discovered was arrested. The inspectors performed their tasks with unnecessary harshness, ruthlessly destroying any valuable object upon which they could lay their hands. They rapped upon the walls to see if they contained any secret hiding-place; they pierced the mattresses with their swords and poignards. After these visits thousands of citizens were arrested and conducted to the Hotel de Ville, where many were detained for thirty hours without food, awaiting their turn to appear before the members of the Commune. After their examination some were released; others were thrown into the prisons, which were soon crowded to such a degree that there was not room for a single newcomer by the first of September. If room could not be found, room must be made; and the following day, the second of September, twenty-four prisoners, chiefly priests, were led before the mayor, adjudged guilty of treason, crowded into fiacres and taken to the Abbaye, where they were executed immediately on their arrival.

After this, their first taste of blood, the executioners hastened to the Chatelet and to the Conciergerie, where they wrought horrors that the pen refuses to describe, sentencing to death the innocent and the guilty without giving them any opportunity to defend themselves. Night did not appease the fury of the butchers. On the third of September they killed again at the Abbaye, at the Force and at the Bernardins prisons; and on the fourth they continued their work of death at La Salpetriere and Bicetre.

For three days the tocsin sounded. Bands of sans-culottes and tricoteuses, thirsting for blood, traversed the streets, uttering cries of death; and no one seemed to think of checking their sanguinary fury.

A prey to a truly remarkable panic, when we consider the relatively small number of a.s.sa.s.sins, the terrified citizens remained shut up in their houses. The National a.s.sembly seemed powerless to arrest the horrors of these tragical hours; the Commune seemed to favor them.

Of all those days that inspire us with such horror, even now, after the lapse of nearly a century, the darkest was that which witnessed the execution of the Princesse de Lamballe, who perished for no other crime than that of love for the queen. Beheaded, and thrown at first upon a pile of corpses, her body was afterwards despoiled of its clothing and exposed to the view of an infamous mob. One of the bandits dared to separate from this poor body, defiled with mud, and later by the hands of its murderers, the lovely head that had surmounted it; others, dividing it with a brutality that nothing could soften, quarrelled over the bleeding fragments. Then began a frightful ma.s.sacre. Like wild beasts, bearing these spoils of the head as trophies of victory, the band of a.s.sa.s.sins rushed down the Rue de Sicile to carry terror to the heart of Paris.

It was nearly noon when Coursegol and Dolores, having pa.s.sed the Bastile, entered the Rue Saint Antoine to find a dense crowd of men, women and ragged children yelling at one another and singing coa.r.s.e songs. Some of the National Guard were among the throng; and they were stopped every few moments by the people to shout: ”Vive la Nation!” the patriotic cry that lent courage to the hearts of the soldiers of the Republic n.o.bly fighting for the defence of our frontiers, but which had been caught up and was incessantly vociferated by the ruffians who inaugurated the Reign of Terror. All carriages that attempted to pa.s.s through this moving crowd were stopped, and their occupants were obliged to prove their patriotism by mingling their acclamations with those of the mob. The audacity and brutality of the sans-culottes knew no bounds.

Woe to him who allowed his face to betray his sentiments, even for a moment! Terror, pity, sadness, these were crimes to be cruelly expiated.

Coursegol had hesitated to enter the Rue Saint Antoine. He feared to come in contact with this excited mult.i.tude, but the more alarming the great city which she saw for the first time appeared to Dolores, the more anxious she was to find shelter at Bridoul's house. But Bridoul's house was in the Rue Saint Antoine; and, to reach it, it was absolutely necessary to make their way through the crowd, or to wait until it had dispersed. But when would it disperse? Was it not dangerous to remain much longer without an asylum and a protector? This thought terrified Dolores, and, longing to reach her place of destination, she urged Coursegol to proceed.

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