Thus they: at the foot of the Scaffold. The Royal Family is now reduced to two: a girl and a little boy. The boy, once named Dauphin, was taken from his Mother while she yet lived; and given to one Simon, by trade a Cordwainer, on service then about the Temple-Prison, to bring him up in principles of Sansculottism. Simon taught him to drink, to swear, to sing the carmagnole. Simon is now gone to the Municipality: and the poor boy, hidden in a tower of the Temple, from which in his fright and bewilderment and early decrepitude he wishes not to stir out, lies perishing, 'his shirt not changed for six months;' amid squalor and darkness, lamentably, (Duchesse d'Angouleme, Captivite a la Tour du Temple, pp. 37-71.)--so as none but poor Factory Children and the like are wont to perish, unlamented!
The Spring sends its green leaves and bright weather, bright May brighter than ever: Death pauses not. Lavoisier famed Chemist, shall die and not live: Chemist Lavoisier was Farmer-General Lavoisier too, and now 'all the Farmers-General are arrested;' all, and shall give an account of their monies and incomings; and die for 'putting water in the tobacco' they sold.
(Tribunal Revolutionnaire, du 8 Mai 1794 (Moniteur, No. 231).) Lavoisier begged a fortnight more of life, to finish some experiments: but "the Republic does not need such;" the axe must do its work. Cynic Chamfort, reading these Inscriptions of Brotherhood or Death, says "it is a Brotherhood of Cain:" arrested, then liberated; then about to be arrested again, this Chamfort cuts and slashes himself with frantic uncertain hand; gains, not without difficulty, the refuge of death. Condorcet has lurked deep, these many months; Argus-eyes watching and searching for him. His concealment is become dangerous to others and himself; he has to fly again, to skulk, round Paris, in thickets and stone-quarries. And so at the Village of Clamars, one bleared May morning, there enters a Figure, ragged, rough-bearded, hunger-stricken; asks breakfast in the tavern there.
Suspect, by the look of him! "Servant out of place, sayest thou?"
Committee-President of Forty-Sous finds a Latin Horace on him: "Art thou not one of those Ci-devants that were wont to keep servants? Suspect!" He is haled forthwith, breakfast unfinished, towards Bourg-la-Reine, on foot: he faints with exhaustion; is set on a peasant's horse; is flung into his damp prison-cell: on the morrow, recollecting him, you enter; Condorcet lies dead on the floor. They die fast, and disappear: the Notabilities of France disappear, one after one, like lights in a Theatre, which you are snuffing out.
Under which circumstances, is it not singular, and almost touching, to see Paris City drawn out, in the meek May nights, in civic ceremony, which they call 'Souper Fraternel, Brotherly Supper? Spontaneous, or partially spontaneous, in the twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth nights of this May month, it is seen. Along the Rue Saint-Honore, and main Streets and Spaces, each Citoyen brings forth what of supper the stingy Maximum has yielded him, to the open air; joins it to his neighbour's supper; and with common table, cheerful light burning frequent, and what due modicum of cut-glasses and other garnish and relish is convenient, they eat frugally together, under the kind stars. (Tableaux de la Revolution, para Soupers Fraternels; Mercier, ii. 150.) See it O Night! With cheerfully pledged wine-cup, hobnobbing to the Reign of Liberty, Equality, Brotherhood, with their wives in best ribands, with their little ones romping round, the Citoyens, in frugal Love-feast, sit there. Night in her wide empire sees nothing similar. O my brothers, why is the reign of Brotherhood not come!
It is come, it shall come, say the Citoyens frugally hobnobbing.--Ah me! these everlasting stars, do they not look down 'like glistening eyes, bright with immortal pity, over the lot of man!'--One lamentable thing, however, is, that individuals will attempt assassination--of Representatives of the People. Representative Collot, Member even of Salut, returning home, 'about one in the morning,' probably touched with liquor, as he is apt to be, meets on the stairs, the cry "Scelerat!" and also the snap of a pistol: which latter flashes in the pan; disclosing to him, momentarily, a pair of truculent saucer-eyes, swart grim-clenched countenance; recognisable as that of our little fellow-lodger, Citoyen Amiral, formerly 'a clerk in the Lotteries!; Collot shouts Murder, with lungs fit to awaken all the Rue Favart; Amiral snaps a second time; a second time flashes in the pan; then darts up into his apartment; and, after there firing, still with inadequate effect, one musket at himself and another at his captor, is clutched and locked in Prison.
(Riouffe, p. 73; Deux Amis, xii. 298-302.) An indignant little man this Amiral, of Southern temper and complexion, of 'considerable muscular force.' He denies not that he meant to "purge France of a tyrant;" nay avows that he had an eye to the Incorruptible himself, but took Collot as more convenient!
Rumour enough hereupon; heaven-high congratulation of Collot, fraternal embracing, at the Jacobins, and elsewhere. And yet, it would seem the assassin-mood proves catching. Two days more, it is still but the 23d of May, and towards nine in the evening, Cecile Renault, Paper-dealer's daughter, a young woman of soft blooming look, presents herself at the Cabinet-maker's in the Rue Saint-Honore; desires to see Robespierre.
Robespierre cannot be seen: she grumbles irreverently. They lay hold of her. She has left a basket in a shop hard by: in the basket are female change of raiment and two knives! Poor Cecile, examined by Committee, declares she "wanted to see what a tyrant was like:" the change of raiment was "for my own use in the place I am surely going to."--"What place?"--"Prison; and then the Guillotine," answered she.--Such things come of Charlotte Corday; in a people prone to imitation, and monomania! Swart choleric men try Charlotte's feat, and their pistols miss fire; soft blooming young women try it, and, only half-resolute, leave their knives in a shop.
O Pitt, and ye Faction of the Stranger, shall the Republic never have rest; but be torn continually by baited springs, by wires of explosive spring-guns? Swart Amiral, fair young Cecile, and all that knew them, and many that did not know them, lie locked, waiting the scrutiny of Tinville.