The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France by Charles Duke Yonge (reading books for 5 year olds txt) 📖

with their manifest sympathy with the rioters. At first, out of mere shame, the National Guard attempted to justify themselves: "they had been told," they said, "that the Body-guard were the aggressors; that they had attacked the people." "Do you pretend to believe," said the gallant marquis, "that two hundred men have been mad enough to attack thirty thousand?" The argument was irresistible; they declared that if the Body-guard would assume the tricolor, they would stand by them as brothers. And, by a reaction not uncommon at such times of excitement, the two regiments became reconciled in a moment. As no tricolor cockades could be procured, they exchanged shakos, and, in many cases, arms. And presently, when the Coup-tetes, after mutilating the bodies of two of the Body-guard who had been killed on the previous evening, were preparing to murder two or three more who had fallen into their hands, the National Guard dashed to their rescue, shouting out, with a curious identification of their force with the old French army, that "they would save the Body-guard who saved them at Fontenoy," and brought them off unhurt.

Balked of their expected prey, the rioters grew more furious than ever; in useless wrath they kept firing against the walls of the palace, and shouting out a demand for the queen to show herself. She, with her children, was still in the king's apartment, where the princesses, the ministers, and a few courtiers were also assembled. Necker, in an agony of terror and distress, sat with his face buried in his hands, unable to offer any advice; La Fayette, who had just arrived, dwelt upon the dangers which he had run, though no one else knew what they were, and assured the king of the power which he still possessed to allay the tumult, if the reasonable demands of the people (as he called them) were granted. Marie Antoinette alone was undaunted and calm; or, at least, if in the depths of her woman's heart she felt terror at the sanguinary and obscene threats of her ruffianly enemies, she scorned to show it. When the firing began, M. de Luzerne, one of the ministers, had quietly placed himself between her and the window; but, while she thanked him for his devotion, she begged him to retire, saying, with her habitually gracious courtesy, that it was her place to be there,[6] not his, since the king could not afford to have so faithful a servant endangered. And now, holding her little son and daughter, one in each hand, she stepped out on the balcony, to confront those who were shouting for her blood. "No children!" was their cry. She led the dauphin and his sister back into the room, and, returning to the balcony, stood before them alone, with her hands crossed and her eyes looking up to heaven, as one who expected instant death, with a firmness as far removed from defiance as from supplication. Even those ruthless miscreants were awed by her magnanimous fearlessness; not a shot was fired; for a moment it seemed as if her enemies had become her partisans. Loud shouts of "Bravo!" and "Long live the queen!" were heard on all sides; and one ruffian, who raised his gun to take aim at her, had his weapon beaten down by those who stood near him, and ran some risk of being himself sacrificed to their indignation. But this impulse of respect, like other impulses of such a people, was short-lived, and presently the multitude began to raise a shout, which expressed the original purpose which had led the majority to march upon Versailles. "To Paris!" was the cry, and again La Fayette volunteered his advice, urging the king to comply with the request. By this time Louis had learned the value of the marquis's loyalty. But he had no alternative. It was evident that the rioters had the power of compelling compliance with their demand. And accordingly he authorized the marquis to promise that he would remove his family to Paris, and a few minutes afterward he himself went out on the balcony with the queen, and himself announced his intention, with the view of giving his act a greater appearance of being voluntarily resolved upon. Soon after midday he set out, accompanied by the queen, his brother the Count de Provence, his sister the Princess Elizabeth, and his children. It was a strange and shameful retinue that escorted the King of France to his capital. One party of the rioters, with Maillard and another ruffian named Jourdan, the chief of the Coupe-tetes, at their head, had started two hours before, bearing aloft in triumph the heads of the mangled Body-guards, and combining such hideous mockery with their barbarity that they halted at Sevres to compel a barber to dress the hair on the lifeless skulls. And now the royal carriage was surrounded by a vast and confused medley; market-women and the rest of the female rabble, with drunken gangs of the ruffians who had stormed the palace in the morning, still brandishing their weapons, or bearing loaves of bread on their pike-heads, and singing out that they should all have enough of bread now, since they were bringing the baker, the bakeress, and the baker's boy to Paris.[7] The only part of the procession that bore even a decent appearance was a small escort of 'different regiments--the Guards, the National Guards, and the Body-guards; many of the latter still bleeding from the wounds which they had received in the conflict and tumult of the morning. A train of carriages containing a deputation of the members of the Assembly also followed; Mirabeau himself having just earned a motion that the Assembly was inseparable from the king, and that wherever he was there must be the place of meeting for the great council of the nation. Yet, in spite of the confidence which their presence might have been expected to diffuse among the mob, and in spite of the hopes of coming plenty which the rioters themselves announced, the royal party was not even yet safe from further attacks. Some ruffians stabbed at the royal carriage as it passed with their pikes, and several shots were fired at it, though fortunately they missed their aim and no one was injured.[8]

To the queen the journey was more painful than to any one else. A few weeks before she had congratulated Mademoiselle de Lamballe on not being a mother--perhaps the bitterest exclamation that grief and anxiety ever wrung from her lips; and now the keenest anxieties of a mother were indeed added to those of a queen. The procession moved with painful slowness. No provisions had been taken in the carriage, and the little dauphin was suffering from hunger and begging for some food. Tears, which her own danger could not bring to her eyes, flowed plentifully as she witnessed the suffering of her child. She could only beg him to bear his privations with patience; and she had the reward of the pains she had always taken to inspire him with confident in her, in the fortitude with which, for the rest of the day, he bore what to children of his age is probably the severest hardship to which they can be exposed.[9]

So vast and disorderly was the procession that it was nine o'clock at night before it reached Paris. Bailly again met the royal carriage at the barrier, and, re-assuming the tone of coarse insult which he had adopted on the king's previous visit, had the effrontery to describe the day so full of horror to every one, and of humiliation and agony to those whom he was addressing, as a glorious day. It was at such moments as these that Louis's impassibility assumed the character of dignity. He disdained to notice the mayor's insolence, and briefly answered that it was always with pleasure and with confidence that he found himself among the inhabitants of his good city of Paris. He proceeded to the Hotel de Ville, where the council of civic magistrates was sitting; and where the president addressed him in language which afforded a marked contrast to that of the mayor, calling him "an adored father who had come to visit the place where he could meet with the greatest number of his children." And it seemed as if Bailly himself had become in some degree ashamed of his insolence; for now, when Louis desired him, in reply to the president's address, to repeat the answer which he had made to him at the barrier, he merely said that the king had come with pleasure among the Parisians. "The king, sir," interrupted the queen, "added, 'and with confidence.'" "Gentlemen," said Bailly, "you hear her majesty's words. You are happier in doing so than if I myself had uttered them." The whole company burst into one rapturous cheer, and at their request the king and queen showed themselves for a few minutes at the windows, beneath which, late as the hour was, a vast multitude was still collected, which received them with vociferous cheers. And then the royal family, quitting the Hotel, drove to the Tuileries, where their attendants had been hastily making such preparations as a few hours allowed for their reception.

Since the completion of the Palace at Versailles the Tuileries had been almost deserted.[10] The paint and gilding were tarnished, the curtains were faded, many most necessary articles of furniture were altogether wanting; and the whole was so shabby that it attracted the notice of even the little dauphin. "How bad, mamma," said he, "every thing looks here." "My boy," she replied, "Louis XIV. lived here comfortably enough." But they had not yet decided on making it their permanent residence. La Fayette, who had tried to induce the king to promise to do so, had been distinctly refused; and for some days Louis did not make up his mind. But, after a time, the fear, if he should propose to return, to Versailles, of being met by an opposition on the part of the Assembly or the civic magistrates, which he might be unable to surmount, or, if he should again settle there, of his absence from the city furnishing a pretext for fresh tumults, caused him to announce his intention of making Paris his principal abode for the future. He gave orders for the removal of some furniture and of the queen's library to the Tuileries; and, with something of the apathy of despair, began to reconcile himself to his new abode and his changed position.


CHAPTER XXVI.

Feelings of Marie Antoinette on coming to the Tuileries.--Her Tact in winning the Hearts of the Common People.--Mirabeau changes his Views.-- Quarrel between La Fayette and the Duc d'Orleans.--Mirabeau desires to offer his Services to the Queen.--Riots in Paris.--Murder of Francois.-- The Assembly pass a Vote prohibiting any Member from taking Office.--The Emigration.--Death of the Emperor Joseph II.--Investigation into the Riots of October.--The Queen refuses to give Evidence.--Violent Proceedings in the Assembly.--Execution of the Marquis de Favras.

The comment made by Marie Antoinette on quitting Versailles was that "they were undone; they were being dragged off, perhaps to death, which was never far removed from captive sovereigns;[1]" and such henceforward was her prevailing feeling. She may occasionally, prompted by her own innate courage and sanguineness of disposition, have cherished a short-lived hope, founded on a consciousness of the king's and her own purity of intention, or on a belief, which she never wholly discarded, in the natural goodness of heart of the French people when not led astray by demagogues; and of their impulsive levity of disposition, which seemed to make no change of temper on their part impossible; but her general feeling was one of humiliation for the past and despair for the future. Not only did the example of Charles I., whose fate was ever before her eyes, fill her with