1791. CHAP. rights for which they contended; and in consequence of VII. that resolution the blacks were at once emancipated, and St Domingo obtained the nominal blessing of freedom. But it is not thus that the great changes of nature are conducted; a child does not acquire the strength of manhood in an hour, or a tree the consistency of the hardy denizens of the forest in a season. The hasty philanthropists who conferred upon an ignorant slave population the precipitate gift of freedom, did them a greater injury than their worst enemies. The black population remain to this day, in St Domingo, a memorable example of the ruinous effect of precipitate emancipation. Without the steady habits of civilised society; ignorant of the wants which reconcile to a life of labour; destitute of the support which a regular government might have afforded, they have brought to the duties of cultivated, the habits of savage life. To the indolence of the negro character they have joined the vices of European corruption; profligate, idle, and disorderly, they have declined both in number and in happiness from being the greatest sugar-plantation in 1 Bert. de the world, the island has been reduced to the necessity of i. 193, 201. importing that valuable produce; and the inhabitants, Toul. ii. 98. naked and voluptuous, are fast receding into the state of vi. 403, 405, nature from which their ancestors were torn, two centuries ago, by the rapacity of Christian avarice.1 * Moll. Mém. Lac. i. 215. Deux Amis, 51. disturbances An internal disaster, attended with circumstances of Origin of the equal atrocity, though not on so great a scale, occurred in at Avignon. Avignon. This city, belonging to the Pope, had been the theatre of incessant strife and bloody events ever since the project had been formed, in 1790, by its ardent democrats, to procure its severance from the Ecclesiastical States, and effect its union with the neighbouring and revolutionised provinces of France. This project was rejected by the Constituent Assembly in May 1790, from the appre * The details of this dreadful insurrection, with a full account of the subsequent history of St Domingo, will be given in a succeeding chapter, which treats of the expedition sent by Napoleon to recover that island. It is not the least important incident of the eventful era. Vide infra, chap. XXXVI. VII. 1791. hension of exciting the jealousy of the European powers CHAP. by the open spoliation of a neighbouring and friendly state; but the democratic party, ardently desirous of promoting the union with France, rose in insurrection on the night of the 11th June, chased from the city the papal June 11. legate, who retired to Chambery in Savoy, and put the arms of France over the gates of his palace. With this revolt terminated the government of the Pope in this distant and diminutive possession. A long period of discord and selfgovernment ensued, during which the ruling democrats of Avignon, having shaken off the authority of the Holy See, were striving to effect its junction with France; and at length, on the 14th September, the Constituent Assembly, Sept. 14. on the very last day of its sitting, decreed, amidst loud applause, the annexation of this little state: commencing thus that system of propagandism and foreign aggression, in which revolutionary passions find their natural vent, and which was destined to carry the French arms to the Rév.iv.587. Kremlin, and to bring the Tartars and Bashkirs to the Sept. 15." walls of Paris. 1* 1 Prudhom. Crimes de la Moniteur, 52. of the dis It was predicted, and perhaps expected, by the Revolutionists, both in Paris and Avignon, that this long- Progress agitated incorporation would at once still the furious pas- orders in sions which had so long torn this unhappy community. Avignon. But such was very far from being the case; and the annexation shortly led to a massacre more frightful than any which had yet stained the progress of the Revolution. The municipality passed a decree, ordering the whole Oct. 16. bells and plate of the cathedral and of the churches to be 2 Prudhom. seized and publicly sold. The rural population, roused iv. 16, 20. by the priests, and indignant at this act, as they deemed vi. 374. it, of sacrilege, assembled in crowds, loudly demanding an * "L'Assemblée Nationale, considérant qu'en vertu des droits de la France sur les états réunis d'Avignon et du comtat Venaissin, et conformément au vœu librement et solennellement émis par la majorité des communes et des citoyens de ces deux pays, pour être incorporé à la France, les dits deux états réunis d'Avignon et du comtat Venaissin sont, dès ce moment, partie intégrale de l'empire Français."-Décret, 14 Sept. 1791; Moniteur, 15 Sept. 1791, p. 1073. Deux Amis, VII. 1791. CHAP. account of the dilapidation and embezzlement of the municipality; and having got hold of Lescuyer, the clerk to the municipality, they murdered him on the spot; and a woman, with her scissors, scooped out the eyes of the dead body. 53. at Avignon. Oct. 30. The revenge of the popular party was slow, but not the Massacres less atrocious. In silence they collected their forces; and at length, when all assistance was absent, surrounded the city. The gates were closed, the walls manned, so as to render all escape impossible, and a band of assassins, headed by Jourdan, nicknamed " "Coupe-tête"-already signalised by his atrocity on the 6th October, when the royal family were brought from Versailles to Paris-sought out, in their own houses, the individuals destined for death. Sixty unhappy wretches, including thirteen women, were speedily seized and thrust into prison, where, during the obscurity of night, the murderers wreaked their vengeance with impunity. One young man put fourteen to death with his own hand, and at length only desisted from excess of fatigue; the father was brought to witness the massacre of his children, the children that of the father, to aggravate their sufferings; twelve women perished after having undergone tortures worse than death itself; an old priest, remarkable for a life of beneficence, who had escaped, was pursued, and sacrificed by the objects of his bounty. A mother big with child was thrown, yet alive, into a ditch filled with dead bodies and quicklime ; a son having thrown himself into his father's arms to save his life, they were precipitated, locked in each other's embrace, into the ditch, where they were found both dead, with their lips pressed together. The women were violated before being murdered; and such was the fury of the people that they actually devoured human hearts, and had dishes served up formed of the bodies of their victims.* The recital of these atrocities excited the utmost commiseration in the Assembly. Cries of indignation arose on all * "Comment oublier ces repas barbares de cœurs palpitans, et ces festins inouis où les entrailles fumantes servirent de mets !"-PRUDHOMME, iv. 21. 1792. VII. sides; the president fainted after reading the letter which CHAP. communicated its details. But this, like almost all the other crimes of the popular party during the progress of 1792 the Revolution, remained unpunished. The Legislature, after some delay, felt it necessary to proclaim an amnesty, March 29, and some of the authors of this massacre afterwards fell the victims, on the 31st May, of the sanguinary passions of which they had given so cruel an example. In a revolution, the ruling power, themselves supported by the populace, can rarely punish its excesses: the period of 1 Lac. i. 213. reaction must be waited for before this can in general be Toul. ii. 97. attempted; and thus vice advances with accelerated strides iv. 21. Hist. from the very magnitude of the crimes committed by 421. itself.1 Prudhom. Parl. xii. ministry, All these accumulated horrors and disasters, though 54. brought about by the passions of the Revolution, were Fall of the ascribed by the Jacobins of Paris to the resistance opposed and admisby the King's ministers to the progress of its principles. Grondiss It was their fanaticism which roused the rural population; to power. it was their gold which hired miscreants to commit these atrocities, in order to bring discredit on the Revolution; it was they who famished the people; it was they who hindered the sales of grain, who depreciated the assignats, and had ruined St Domingo. The clamour soon became universal, irresistible. The people believed everything they were told; and, as usual in the presence of danger, divisions soon appeared among the ministers themselves. The one half, led by de Lessart and Bertrand de Molleville, were inclined to the aristocratic and decided-the other, headed by Narbonne and Cahier de Gerville, to the democratic and conceding side. Sensible of the weakness of their adversaries, the popular leaders in the Assembly pushed their advantages, and preferred an accusation against the two former of the ministry. Though they were baffled for some time by the ability and presence of mind of Bertrand de Molleville, yet at length the King was obliged to yield, and make a total change in his councils. The principle adopted in the formation VII. 1792. CHAP. of the new ministry was the same as that acted on in 1Mig. i. 164. 224. Th. ii. 55. war.1 Dumourier was forty-seven years of age when he was acter, indefatigable activity, impetuosity of disposition, Lac. i. 224. land. 56. Austere in character, simple in manners, firm in prin- age |