The French Revolution (Vol.1-3). Taine Hippolyte
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jacquerie. Camille Desmoulins, one of the orators, commonly there, announces it and urges it in precise terms:
"Now that the animal is in the trap, let him be battered to death … Never will the victors have a richer prey. Forty thousand palaces, mansions, and châteaux, two-fifth of the property of France, will be the recompense of valor. Those who pretend to be the conquerors will be conquered in turn. The nation shall be purged."
Here, in advance, is the program of the Reign of Terror.
Now all this is not only read, but declaimed, amplified, and turned to practical account. In front of the coffee-houses "those who have stentorian lungs relieve each other every evening."1222 "They get up on a chair or a table, they read the strongest articles on current affairs, … the eagerness with which they are heard, and the thunder of applause they receive for every sentiment of more than common hardiness or violence against the present Government, cannot easily be imagined." "Three days ago a child of four years, well taught and intelligent, was promenaded around the garden, in broad daylight, at least twenty times, borne on the shoulders of a street porter, crying out, 'Verdict of the French people: Polignac exiled one hundred leagues from Paris; Condé the same; Conti the same; Artois the same; the Queen—I dare not write it.'" A hall made of boards in the middle of the Palais-Royal is always full, especially of young men, who carry on their deliberations in parliamentary fashion: in the evening the president invites the spectators to come forward and sign motions passed during the day, and of which the originals are placed in the Café Foy.1223 They count on their fingers the enemies of the country; "and first two Royal Highnesses (Monsieur and the Count d'Artois), three Most Serene Highnesses (the Prince de Condé, Duc de Bourbon, and the Prince de Conti), one favorite (Madame de Polignac), MM. de Vandreuil, de la Trémoille, du Châtelet, de Villedeuil, de Barentin, de la Galaisière, Vidaud de la Tour, Berthier, Foulon, and also M. Linguet." Placards are posted demanding the pillory on the Pont-Neuf for the Abbeé Maury. One speaker proposes "to burn the house of M. d'Espréménil, his wife, children and furniture, and himself: this is passed unanimously."—No opposition is tolerated. One of those present having manifested some horror at such sanguinary motions, "is seized by the collar, obliged to kneel down, to make an apology, and to kiss the ground. The punishment inflicted on children is given to him; he is ducked repeatedly in one of the fountain-basins, after which they him over to the mob, who roll him in the mud." On the following day an ecclesiastic is trodden under foot, and flung from hand to hand. A few days after, on the 22nd of June, there are two similar events. The sovereign mob exercises all the functions of sovereign authority, with those of the legislator those of the judge, and those of the judge with those of the executioner.—Its idols are sacred; if any one fails to show them respect he is guilty of lése-majesté, and at once punished. In the first week of July, an abbé who speaks ill of Necker is flogged; a woman who insults the bust of Necker is stripped by the fishwomen, and beaten until she is covered with blood. War is declared against suspicious uniforms. "On the appearance of a hussar," writes Desmoulins, "they shout, 'There goes Punch!' and the stone-cutters fling stones at him. Last night two officers of the hussars, MM. de Sombreuil and de Polignac, came to the Palais-Royal … chairs were flung at them, and they would have been knocked down if they had not run away. The day before yesterday they seized a spy of the police and gave him a ducking in the fountain. They ran him down like a stag, hustled him, pelted him with stones, struck him with canes, forced one of his eyes out of its socket, and finally, in spite of his entreaties and cries for mercy, plunged him a second time in the fountain. His torments lasted from noon until half-past five o'clock, and he had about ten thousand executioners."—Consider the effect of such a focal center at a time like this. A new power has sprung up alongside the legal powers, a legislature of the highways and public squares, anonymous, irresponsible, without restraint. It is driven onward by coffeehouse theories, by strong emotions and the vehemence of mountebanks, while the bare arms which have just accomplished the work of destruction in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, form its bodyguard and ministerial cabinet.
V.—Popular mobs become a political force.
Pressure on the Assembly.—Defection of the soldiery.
This is the dictatorship of a mob, and its proceedings, conforming to its nature, consist in acts of violence, wherever it finds resistance, it strikes.—The people of Versailles, in the streets and at the doors of the Assembly, daily "come and insult those whom they call aristocrats."1224 On Monday, June 22nd, "d'Espréménil barely escapes being knocked down; the Abbé Maury … owes his escape to the strength of a curé, who takes him up in his arms and tosses him into the carriage of the Archbishop of Arles." On the 23rd, "the Archbishop of Paris and the Keeper of the Seals are hooted, railed at, scoffed at, and derided, until they almost sink with shame and rage." So formidable is the tempest of rage with which they are greeted, that Passeret, the King's secretary, who accompanies the minister, dies of the excitement that very day. On the 24th, the Bishop of Beauvais is almost knocked down by a stone striking him on the head. On the 25th, the Archbishop of Paris is saved only by the speed of his horses, the multitude pursuing him and pelting him with stones. His mansion is besieged, the windows are all shattered, and, notwithstanding the intervention of the French Guards, the peril is so great that he is obliged to promise that he will join the deputies of the Third-Estate. This is the way in which the rude hand of the people effects a reunion of the Orders. It bears as heavily on its own representatives as on its adversaries. "Although our hall was closed to the public," says Bailly, "there were always more than six hundred spectators."1225 These were not respectful and silent, but active and noisy, mingling with the deputies, raising their hands to vote in all cases, taking part in the deliberations, by their applause and hisses: a collateral Assembly which often imposes its own will on the other. They take note of and put down the names of their opponents, transmit them to the chair-bearers in attendance at the entrance of the hall, and from them to the mob waiting for the departure of the deputies, these names are from now considered as the names of public enemies.1226 Lists are made out and printed, and, at the Palais-Royal in the evening, they become the lists of the proscribed.—It is under this brutal pressure that many decrees are passed, and, amongst them, that by which the commons declare themselves the National Assembly and assume supreme power. The night before, Malouet had proposed to ascertain, by a preliminary vote, on which side the majority was. In an instant all those against had gathered around him to the number of three hundred. "Upon which a mans springs out from the galleries, falls upon him and takes him by the collar exclaiming, 'Hold your tongue, you false citizen!'" Malouet is released and the guard comes forward, "but terror has spread through the hall, threats are uttered against opponents, and the next day we were only ninety." Moreover, the lists of their names had been circulated; some of them, deputies from Paris, went to see Bailly that very evening. One amongst them, "a very honest man and good patriot," had been told that his house was to be set on fire. Now his wife had just given birth to a child, and the slightest tumult before the house would have been fatal. Such arguments are decisive. Consequently, three days afterwards, at the Tennis-court, but one deputy, Martin d'Auch, dares to write the word "opposing" after his name. Insulted by many of colleagues, "at once denounced to the people who had collected at the entrance of the building, he is obliged to escape by a side door to avoid being cut to pieces," and, for several days, to keep away from the meetings.1227—Owing to this intervention of the galleries the radical minority, numbering about thirty,1228 lead the majority, and they do not allow them to free themselves.—On the 28th of May, Malouet, having demanded a secret session to discuss the conciliatory measures which the King had proposed, the galleries hoot at him, and a deputy, M. Bourche, addresses him in very plain terms. "You must know, sir, that we are deliberating