VIII. 1792. 1 Bert, de 277. Lac. i. 64, 66, the Arch Arles. by the sublimity of the scene, the wretches hastened the CHAP. work of destruction, lest the hearts of the spectators should be softened ere the massacre began: the Archbishop of Arles repeated, while the murders were going Moll.ix.276, on, the prayer for those in the agonies of death, and they 290. Th.iii. expired, imploring forgiveness for their murderers.1 The cries now became loud for the Archbishop of 30. Arles. "I am he," said the archbishop mildly. Death of Wretch!" exclaimed they, "you have shed the blood bishop of of the patriots of Arles."-"I never injured a human being," replied the prelate. "Then," exclaimed a ruffian, "I will despatch you;" and with that he struck him on the head with his sabre. The archbishop remained motionless, without even raising his hands to his head to avert a second blow. Upon this the assassin struck him across the face with his sabre, and the blood flowed in torrents over his dress; but still he neither moved nor fell a third stroke laid him senseless on the pavement. Another murderer then leapt on his body and plunged his sabre into his breast: it went in so far, that he could not draw it out, and he broke it and paraded the stump, with the watch of the archbishop, which he seized from the dead body, through the streets. Many were offered life on condition of taking the Revolutionary oaths; all refused, and died in the faith of their fathers. Among the slain were several curates, who had been eminent for their charity in the dreadful famine of 1789; they received death from the hands of those whom they had Bert d Moll.ix.277, saved from its horrors. So numerous were the murders 278. Lac. in this prison, that the cells were floating in blood, and it 290, 291. ran in frightful streams down the stairs into the courts of 65, 74, 75. the building.2 2 Pr. Hist. i. Th. iii. 64, 31. Princess The fate of the Princess Lamballe was particularly deplorable. Tenderly attached to the Queen, she at first, Death of the at her own desire, shared her captivity, but was after- Lamballe. wards, by orders of the municipality, separately confined in the Petite Force. When the assassins arrived at her VOL. II. R VIII. 1792. CHAP. cell, she was offered her life if she would swear hatred to the King and Queen: she refused, and was instantly dragged out over a pile of dead bodies, stepping up to the ankles in blood, and then desired to cry-" Vive la Nation!" Speechless with horror, she could not articulate, and was instantly struck down. One of her domestics, whom she had loaded with benefits, gave the first blow. Her graceful figure was quickly stripped of all its clothing, and exposed in that state for two hours to the gaze of the populace. She was then beheaded, and the body torn in pieces, the fragments put on the end of pikes, and paraded through different parts of the city. The head, which, according to the custom of the time, was carefully powdered, was raised on a lance, and first carried to the palace of the Duke of Orleans, who rose from dinner and looked for some minutes in silence at the ghastly spectacle. Madame Buffon, his last favourite, and some other companions of his pleasures, were at table with him at the time. "My God," exclaimed she, "it is thus they will carry my own head through the streets." 1 Bert. do The head was next conveyed to the Temple, and paraded 292. Lac. before the windows of Louis XVI. Ignorant of what 393. Rev. had passed, and attracted by the noise, the King, at the desire of one of the commissioners of the municipality, Deux Amis, proceeded to the window, and, by the beautiful hair, re302. Prud- cognised the bloody remains of his once lovely friend; hom.iv.111. another commissioner, more humane, tried to prevent him xvii. 418, from beholding it. Afterwards, the King was asked if he remembered the name of the person who had shown such barbarity. "No," he replied; "but perfectly the name of him who showed sensibility.' "1% Moll.ix.291, Pr. Hist. i. Mémoires, xlvi. 71. Th. iii. 8. viii. 301, Hist. Parl. 419. Lam. Hist. des Gir. iii. 372, 373. It is a singular circumstance, worthy of being recorded *It is sometimes not uninstructive to follow the career of the wretches who perpetrate such crimes, to their latter end. "In a remote situation," says the VIII. 1792. 32. nary feelings as characteristic of the almost incomprehensible state of CHAP. the human mind during such convulsions, that many of the assassins who put the prisoners to death, showed themselves, on some occasions, feelingly alive to the Extraordiwarmest sentiments of humanity. M. Journiac was of the mur fortunate enough, by a combination of presence of mind derers. and good fortune, to obtain an acquittal from the terrible tribunal in the Abbaye two individuals, strangers to him, pressed his foot to mark when he should speak, and, when acquitted, bore him safe under the arch of spears and sabres through which he had to pass. He offered them money when they had arrived at a place of safety; they refused, and, after embracing him, returned to the work of destruction. Another prisoner, saved in a similar manner, was conducted home with the same solicitude: the murderers, still reeking with the carnage they had committed, insisted on being spectators of the meeting between him and his family; they wept at the scene, and immediately went back with renewed alacrity to the scene of death. After showing Weber, foster-brother to the Queen, who was not known, and escaped by singular presence of mind the fatal tribunal at the Abbaye, a large 1 Weber, ii. heap of dead bodies hacked to pieces and thrown Th. iii. 73, together, the national guards and armed mob embraced 74. Saint him with the warmest feeling, and he was hurried amidst Mémoires, similar demonstrations of joy through a long file of armed Bert. de men.1* It would seem as if, in that convulsive state, all ii. 212, 213. strong emotions rapidly succeed each other in the human most horrid blasphemies, and in the midst of frightful tortures. He had been the principal actor in the murder of the Princess Lamballe.”—D'ABRANTÈS, iii. 264. * "Le même homme, s'étant tourné de mon côté pour montrer un tas de cadavres percés et hachés à coups de sabre, me dit d'un air hagard et féroce'Vous voyez, citoyen soldat, que nous punissons les traîtres comme ils le méritent.' Je reçus encore l'accolade fraternelle. Je passai ensuite de bras en bras à plus de cent pas, toujours embrassé par les gardes nationaux du faubourg St Antoine, et par une infinité d'autres gens presque tous ivres. Délivré enfin de toutes ces caresses, les deux hommes armés qui me donnaient le bras, me conduisirent dans une église, où se trouvait réuni le petit nombre de personnes que le tribunal populaire avait épargné.”—WEBER, ii. 265, 266. 265, 266, Meard, Rév. xlvi. 349. Moll. Mém. CHAP. breast and the mind, wrought up as by the interest of VIII. a tragedy, is prepared alike for the most savage deeds of 1792. cruelty, or the tenderest emotions of pity. 33. When massacre was so universal, it may well be conMassacre of ceived that the Swiss, who had been made prisoners on the Swiss. the 10th of August, fifty-four in number, had no chance of escape. The non-commissioned officers and privates were massacred in their cells without even the form of trial; the officers were brought for a few minutes before Maillard's tribunal, and then turned out to be hewn down by the populace. The Swiss, locked in each other's arms, hesitated at first to go through the fatal wicket, and loudly called for mercy, on the ground that they had only obeyed their orders. "There must be an end of this," cried Maillard; "let us see who will go out first." "I will be the first," exclaimed a young officer with a noble air. "Show me the gate: let us prove we do not fear death.” So saying, he rushed forward with his hands over his head into the uplifted sabres, and perished on the spot. Unable to restrain their impatience, the people broke in and despatched them where they stood. Rapid as the progress of destruction was, it did not keep pace with the wishes of Marat, who came to the Abbaye, and said— "What are these imbeciles about? They do their work very slowly; by this time ten thousand might have been destroyed. Bid them be quick, and earn more money.' In some of the prisons they spared the galley-slaves, who Crimes de were immediately associated with them in their labours : a hundred and eighty prostitutes, at the Salpetrière, were 125. Duval, saved to minister to the pleasures of the assassins, and Terreur, ii. three hundred escaped at the other prisons from the same Lam. Hist. motive: but all the old women were murdered without mercy, and among them many between eighty and ninety years of age.1 1 Prudhom. la Rév. iv. 100, 114, Souv. de la 259, 269. des Gir. iii. 342. Similar atrocities were committed in all the other prisons. Two hundred and eighty-nine perished in the Conciergerie. One woman there was, by an unprece VIII. 1792. 34. the Concier dented refinement of cruelty, put to death in a way so CHAP. inexpressibly frightful that the pen can hardly be brought to recount it.* At the Grand Châtelet nearly as many perished. The bodies of the slain in these two prisons Massacres in were dragged out and heaped upon the Pont Notre-Dame, gerie, Biwhere those female furies, aptly termed the "leeches of the cêtre, and Salpetrière. guillotine," turned them curiously over, and piled them on carts, by which they were conveyed, dripping with blood, so as to leave the track of the vehicle marked by a red line, to the quarries of Mont Rouge, where they were thrown into vast caverns. Above eleven hundred persons, confined for political causes, perished in the different prisons of Paris during these massacres, which continued, with no interruption, from the 2d to the 6th September. When the other captives were all destroyed, the assassins, insatiable in their thirst for blood, besieged the Bicêtre, containing several thousand prisoners confined for ordinary offences, having no connection with the state. They defended themselves with such resolution that it became necessary to employ cannon for their destruction. Seven guns were brought up and opened their fire, which beat down the gates; but the felons within fought with desperate resolution. The multitude, however, were resolutely bent on blood, and continued the contest, by unceasingly bringing up fresh forces, till the felons were overpowered, and all put to death. It took two days, however, to destroy them. At length the murders ceased, from the complete exhaustion of the assassins. The remains of the victims iv. 114, 120. were thrown into trenches, previously prepared by the Hist. i. 293. municipality for their reception; they were subsequently Duval, ii. conveyed to the catacombs, where they were built up, and 266, 269. still remain the monument of crimes which France would Moll.ix.298. Sismondi, willingly bury in oblivion-unfit to be thought of, even vi. 397. in the abodes of death.1 * "Les assassins lui coupèrent les mamelles; après cette barbare et cruelle incision, on lui passa dans la matrice un bouchon de paille, qu'on ne lui ôta que pour la fendre d'un coup de sabre."-PRUDHOMME, Crimes de la Révolution, iv. 1 Prudhom. Lac. Pr. Th. iii. 83. Bert. de |