A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795 Part 34

To the miseries of war were added revolutionary tribunals, revolutionary armies and committees, forced loans, requisitions, maximums, and every species of tyranny and iniquity man could devise or suffer; or, to use the expression of Rewbell, [One of the Directory in 1796.] "France was in mourning and desolation; all her families plunged in despair; her whole surface covered with Bastilles, and the republican government become so odious, that the most wretched slave, bending beneath the weight of his chains, would have refused to live under it!"

Such were the means by which France was converted into a land of republicans, and such the government to which your patriots a.s.sert the French people were attached: yet so little was this attachment appreciated here, that the mere inst.i.tutions for watching and suppressing disaffection amount, by the confession of Cambon, the financier, to twenty-four millions six hundred and thirty-one thousand pounds sterling a year!

To suppose, then, that the French are devoted to a system which has served as a pretext for so many crimes, and has been the cause of so many calamities, is to conclude them a nation of philosophers, who are able to endure, yet incapable of reasoning; and who suffer evils of every kind in defence of a principle with which they can be little acquainted, and which, in practice, they have known only by the destruction it has occasioned.

You may, perhaps, have been persuaded, that the people submit patiently now, for the sake of an advantage in perspective; but it is not in the disposition of unenlightened men (and the ma.s.s of a people must necessarily be so) to give up the present for the future. The individual may sometimes atchieve this painful conquest over himself, and submit to evil, on a calculation of future retribution, but the mult.i.tude will ever prefer the good most immediately attainable, if not under the influence of that terror which supersedes every other consideration. Recollect, then, the counsel of the first historian of our age, and "suspend your belief of whatever deviates from the laws of nature and the character of man;" and when you are told the French are attached to a government which oppresses them, or to principles of which they are ignorant, suppose their adoption of the one, and their submission to the other, are the result of fear, and that those who make these a.s.sertions to the contrary, are either interested or misinformed.

Excuse me if I have devoted a few pages to a subject which with you is obsolete. I am indignant at the perusal of such falsehoods; and though I feel for the humiliation of great talents, I feel still more for the disgrace such an abuse of them brings on our country.

It is not inapposite to mention a circ.u.mstance which happened to a friend of Mr. D____'s, some little time since, at Paris. He was pa.s.sing through France, in his way from Italy, at the time of the general arrest, and was detained there till the other day. As soon as he was released from prison, he applied in person to a member of the Convention, to learn when he might hope to return to England. The Deputy replied, _"Ma soi je n'en sais rien_ [Faith I can't tell you.]--If your Messieurs (naming some members in the opposition) had succeeded in promoting a revolution, you would not have been in your cage so long--_mais pour le coup il faut attendre."_ [But now you must have patience.] It is not probable the members he named could have such designs, but Dumont once held the same language to me; and it is mortifying to hear these miscreants suppose, that factious or ambitious men, because they chance to possess talents, can make revolutions in England as they have done in France.

In the papers which gave rise to these reflections, I observe that some of your manufacturing towns are discontented, and attribute the stagnation of their commerce to the war; but it is not unlikely, that the stagnation and failures complained of might have taken place, though the war had not happened.--When I came here in 1792, every shop and warehouse were over-stocked with English goods. I could purchase any article of our manufacture at nearly the retail price of London; and some I sent for from Paris, in the beginning of 1793, notwithstanding the reports of war, were very little advanced. Soon after the conclusion of the commercial treaty, every thing English became fas.h.i.+onable; and so many people had speculated in consequence, that similar speculations took place in England. But France was glutted before the war; and all speculations entered into on a presumption of a demand equal to that of the first years of the treaty, must have failed in a certain degree, though the two countries had remained at peace.--Even after a two years cessation of direct intercourse, British manufactures are every where to be procured, which is a sufficient proof that either the country was previously over supplied, or that they are still imported through neutral or indirect channels. Both these suppositions preclude the likelihood that the war has so great a share in relaxing the activity of your commerce, as is pretended.

But whatever may be the effect of the war, there is no prospect of peace, until the efforts of England, or the total ruin of the French finances,*

shall open the way for it.

* By a report of Cambon's at this time, it appears the expences of France in 1792 were eighteen millions sterling--in 1793, near ninety millions--and, in the spring of 1794, twelve and a half millions per month!--The church bells, we learn from the same authority, cost in coinage, and the purchase of copper to mix with the metal, five or six millions of livres more than they produced as money. The church plate, which was brought to the bar of the Convention with such eclat, and represented as an inexhaustible resource, amounted to scarcely a million sterling: for as the offering was every where involuntary, and promoted by its agents for the purposes of pillage, part was secreted, a still greater part stolen, and, as the conveyance to Paris was a sort of job, the expences often exceeded the worth--a patine, a censor, and a small chalice, were sent to the Convention, perhaps an hundred leagues, by a couple of Jacobin Commissioners in a coach and four, with a military escort. Thus, the prejudices of the people were outraged, and their property wasted, without any benefit, even to those who suggested the measure.

--The Convention, indeed, have partly relinquished their project of destroying all the Kings of the earth, and forcing all the people to be free. But, though their schemes of reformation have failed, they still adhere to those of extirpation; and the most moderate members talk occasionally of "vile islanders," and "sailing up the Thames."*--

* The Jacobins and the Moderates, who could agree in nothing else, were here perfectly in unison; so that on the same day we see the usual invectives of Barrere succeeded by menaces equally ridiculous from Pelet and Tallien--

_"La seule chose dont nous devons nous occuper est d'ecraser ce gouvernement infame."_

Discours de Pelet, 14 Nov.

"The destruction of that infamous government is the only thing that ought to engage our attention."

Pelet's Speech, 14 Nov. 1794.

_"Aujourdhui que la France peut en se debarra.s.sant d'une partie de ses ennemis reporter la gloire de ses armes sur les bordes de la Tamise, et ecraser le gouvernement Anglais."

Discours de Tallien._

"France, having now the opportunity of lessening the number of her enemies, may carry the glory of her arms to the banks of the Thames, and crush the English government."

Tallien's Speech.

_"Que le gouvernement prenne des mesures sages pour faire une paix honorable avec quelques uns de nos ennemis, et a l'aide des vaisseaux Hollandais et Espagnols, portons nous ensuite avec vigueur sur les bordes de la Tamise, et detruisons la nouvelle Carthage."

Discours de Tallien, 14 Nov._

"Let the government but adopt wise measures for making an honorable peace with a part of our enemies, and with the aid of the Dutch and Spanish navies, let us repair to the banks of the Thames, and destroy the modern Carthage."

Tallien's Speech, 14 Nov. 1794.

No one is here ignorant of the source of Tallien's predilection for Spain, and we may suppose the intrigue at this time far advanced.

Probably the charms of his wife (the daughter of Mons. Cabarrus, a French speculator, formerly much encouraged by the Spanish government, afterwards disgraced and imprisoned, but now liberated) might not be the only means employed to procure his conversion.

--Tallien, Clauzel, and those who have newly a.s.sumed the character of rational and decent people, still use the low and atrocious language of Brissot, on the day he made his declaration of war; and perhaps hope, by exciting a national spirit of vengeance against Great Britain, to secure their lives and their pay, when they shall have been forced to make peace on the Continent: for, be certain, the motives of these men are never to be sought for in any great political object, but merely in expedients to preserve their persons and their plunder.

Those who judge of the Convention by their daily harangues, and the justice, virtue, or talents which they ascribe to themselves, must believe them to be greatly regenerated: yet such is the dearth both of abilities and of worth of any kind, that Andre Dumont has been successively President of the a.s.sembly, Member of the Committee of General Safety, and is now in that of Public Welfare.--Adieu.

Amiens, Dec. 16, 1794.

The seventy-three Deputies who have been so long confined are now liberated, and have resumed their seats. Jealousy and fear for some time rendered the Convention averse from the adoption of this measure; but the public opinion was so determined in favour of it, that farther resistance might not have been prudent. The satisfaction created by this event is general, though the same sentiment is the result of various conclusions, which, however, all tend to one object--the re-establishment of monarchy.

The idea most prevalent is, that these deputies, when arrested, were royalists.*

* This opinion prevailed in many places where the proscribed deputies took refuge. "The Normans (says Louvet) deceived by the imputations in the newspapers, a.s.sisted us, under the idea that we were royalists: but abandoned us when they found themselves mistaken." In the same manner, on the appearance of these Deputies in other departments, armies were collecting very fast, but dispersed when they perceived these men were actuated only by personal fear or personal ambition, and that no one talked of restoring the monarchy.

--By some it is thought, persecution may have converted them; but the reflecting part of the nation look on the greater number as adherents of the Girondists, whom the fortunate violence of Robespierre excluded from partic.i.p.ating in many of the past crimes of their colleagues, and who have, in that alone, a reason for not becoming accomplices in those which may be attempted in future.

It is astonis.h.i.+ng to see with what facility people daily take on trust things which they have it in their power to ascertain. The seventy-three owe a great part of the interest they have excited to a persuasion of their having voted either for a mild sentence on the King, or an appeal to the nation: yet this is so far from being true, that many of them were unfavourable to him on every question. But supposing it to have been otherwise, their merit is in reality little enhanced: they all voted him guilty, without examining whether he was so or not; and in affecting mercy while they refused justice, they only aimed at conciliating their present views with their future safety.

The whole claim of this party, who are now the Moderates of the Convention, is reducible to their having opposed the commission of crimes which were intended to serve their adversaries, rather than themselves.

To effect the dethronement of the King, and the destruction of those obnoxious to them, they approved of popular insurrections; but expected that the people whom they had rendered proficients in cruelty, should become gentle and obedient when urged to resist their own authority; yet they now come forth as victims of their patriotism, and call the heads of the faction who are fallen--martyrs to liberty! But if they are victims, it is to their folly or wickedness in becoming members of such an a.s.sembly; and if their chiefs were martyrs, it was to the principles they inculcated.

The trial of the Brissotins was justice, compared with that of the King.

If the former were condemned without proof, their partizans should remember, that the revolutionary jury pretended to be influenced by the same moral evidence they had themselves urged as the ground on which they condemned the King; and if the people beheld with applause or indifference the execution of their once-popular idols, they only put in practice the barbarous lessons which those idols had taught them;--they were forbidden to lament the fate of their Sovereign, and they rejoiced in that of Brissot and his confederates.--These men, then, only found the just retribution of their own guilt; and though it may be politic to forget that their survivors were also their accomplices, they are not objects of esteem--and the contemporary popularity, which a long seclusion has obtained for them, will vanish, if their future conduct should be directed by their original principles.*

* Louvet's pamphlet had not at this time appeared, and the subsequent events proved, that the interest taken in these Deputies was founded on a supposition they had changed their principles; for before the close of the Convention they were as much objects of hatred and contempt as their colleagues.

Some of these Deputies were the hirelings of the Duke of Orleans, and most of them are individuals of no better reputation than the rest of the a.s.sembly. Lanjuinais has the merit of having acted with great courage in defence of himself and his party on the thirty-first of May 1792; but the following anecdote, recited by Gregoire* in the Convention a few days ago will sufficiently explain both his character and Gregoire's, who are now, however, looked up to as royalists, and as men comparatively honest.

* Gregoire is one of the const.i.tutional Clergy, and, from the habit of comparing bad with worse, is more esteemed than many of his colleagues; yet, in his report on the progress of Vandalism, he expresses himself with sanguinary indecency--"They have torn (says he) the prints which represented the execution of Charles the first, because there were coats of arms on them. Ah, would to G.o.d we could behold, engraved in the same manner, the heads of all Kings, done from nature! We might then reconcile ourselves to seeing a ridiculous embellishment of heraldry accompany them."

--"When I first arrived at Versailles, (says Gregoire,) as member of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, (in 1789,) I met with Lanjuinais, and we took an oath in concert to dethrone the King and abolish n.o.bility." Now, this was before the alledged provocations of the King and n.o.bility--before the const.i.tution was framed--before the flight of the royal family to Varennes--and before the war. But almost daily confessions of this sort escape, which at once justify the King, and establish the infamy of the revolutionists.

These are circ.u.mstances not to be forgotten, did not the sad science of discriminating the shades of wickedness, in which (as I have before noticed) the French have been rendered such adepts, oblige them at present to fix their hopes--not according to the degree of merit, but by that of guilt. They are reduced to distinguish between those who sanction murders, and those who perpetrated them--between the sacrificer of one thousand victims, and that of ten--between those who a.s.sa.s.sinate, and those who only reward the a.s.sa.s.sin.*

* Tallien is supposed, as agent of the munic.i.p.ality of paris, to have paid a million and a half of livres to the Septembrisers or a.s.sa.s.sins of the prisons! I know not whether the sum was in a.s.signats or specie.--If in the former, it was, according to the exchange then, about two and thirty thousand pounds sterling: but if estimated in proportion to what might be purchased with it, near fifty thousand. Tallien has never denied the payment of the money-- we may, therefore, conclude the charge to be true.

--Before the revolution, they would not have known how to select, where all were objects of abhorrence; but now the most ignorant are casuists in the gradations of turpitude, and prefer Tallien to Le Bon, and the Abbe Sieyes to Barrere.

The crimes of Carrier have been terminated, not punished, by death. He met his fate with a courage which, when the effect of innocence, is glorious to the sufferer, and consoling to humanity; but a career like his, so ended, was only the confirmation of a brutal and ferocious mind.*

* When Carrier was arrested, he attempted to shoot himself, and, on being prevented by the Gens-d'armes, he told them there were members of the Convention who would not forgive their having prevented his purpose--implying, that they apprehended the discoveries he might make on his trial. While he was dressing himself, (for they took him in bed,) he added, "_Les Scelerats!_ (Meaning his more particular accomplices, who, he was told, had voted against him,) they deserved that I should be as dastardly as themselves." He rested his defence entirely on the decrees of the Convention.

--Of thirty who were tried with him as his agents, and convicted of a.s.sisting at the drownings, shootings, &c. two only were executed, the rest were acquitted; because, though the facts were proved, the moral lat.i.tude of the Revolutionary Jury* did not find the guilt of the intention--that is, the culprits were indisputably the murderers of several thousand people, but, according to the words of the verdict, they did not act with a counter-revolutionary intention.

* An English reader may be deceived by the name of Jury. The Revolutionary Jury was not only inst.i.tuted, but even appointed by the Convention.--The following is a literal translation of some of the verdicts given on this occasion:

"That O'Sulivan is author and accomplice of several noyades (drownings) and unheard-of cruelties towards the victims delivered to the waves.

"That Lefevre is proved to have ordered and caused to be executed a noyade of men, women, and children, and to have committed various arbitrary acts.

"That General Heron is proved to have a.s.sa.s.sinated children, and worn publicly in his hat the ear of a man he had murdered. That he also killed two children who were peaceably watching sheep.

"That Bachelier is author and accomplice of the operations at Nantes, in signing arbitrary mandates of arrest, imposing vexatious taxes, and taking for himself plate, &c. found at the houses of citizens arrested on suspicion.