The French Revolution - Volume 1

ND CONTAGIOUS

IONARY

s. In each city, in each borough, the club is a Center of inflammation which disorganizes the sound parts; and the example of each disorganized Center spreads afar like contagious fumes.3201 Everywhere the same fever, delirium, and convulsions mark the presence of the same virus. That virus is the Jacobin do

reignty of

Jacobin dogma of th

ight is officially

w régime.-Its objec

nsion from Paris

of sovereign power under binding rules"; it does no more than "indicate to citizens" the rules for the elections "to which it invites them to conform." Meanwhile it is subject to the will of the sovereign people, then so-called; it dares not resist their crimes; it interferes with assassins only by entreaties.-Much more; it authorizes them, either by ministerial signature or counter-signature, to begin their work elsewhere. Roland has signed Fournier's commission to Orleans; Danton has sent the circular of Marat over all France. To reconstruct the departments the council of ministers sends the most infuriated members of the Commune and the party, Chaumette, Fréron, Westerman, Auduoin, Huguenin, Momoro, Couthon, Billaud-Varennes,3204 and others still more tainted and brutal, who preach the purest Jacobin doctrine. "They announce openly3205 that laws no longer exist; that since the people are sovereign, every one is master; that each fraction of the nation can take such measures as suit it, in the name of the country's safety; that they have the right to tax corn, to seize it in the laborer's fields, to cut off the heads of the farmers who refuse to bring their grain to market." At Lisieux, agrarian law is preached by Fufour and Momoro. At Douai, other preachers f

nment, the members of the Paris directory,

icers, "with Lafayette a

f the Constituent Assembly, with

the Legislative Assembly, "with Ram

ted to soil their hands with t

sins who were gathered at the pa

et; stand firm until not one of these conspirators remains alive. Your humanity requires you for once to show yourselves inexo

leaders of business and industry; it is sounding, in short, against the whole élite of France, whether of old or recent origin. The Jacobins of Paris, by their journals, thei

tments it establishe

e of this

s destroyed; then the convent of Montrieux, the chateaux of Grasse, of Canet, of Régusse, of Brovaz, and many others, all devastated, and the devastations are made "daily."-It is impossible to suppress this country brigandage. The reigning dogma, weakening authority in the magistrates' hands, and the clubs, "which cover the department," have spread the fermentation of anarchy everywhere. "Administrators, judges, municipal officers, all who are invested with any authority, and who have the courage to use it in forcing respect for law, are one by one denounced by public opinion as enemies of the constitution and of liberty; because, people say, they talk of nothing but the law, as if they did not know that the will of the people makes the law, and that we are the people."3210 This is the real principle; here, as at Paris, it instantly begets its consequences. "In many of these clubs nothing is discussed but the plunderi

ndows. The other witnesses say not a word; but they declare, sotto voce, the reason for their silence. If they should testify, "they would be sure of being killed as soon as the troops should have gone away." The foreman of the jury is himself menaced; after remaining three-quarters of an hour, he finds it prudent to leave the city.-After this the clubs of Beausset and of the neighborhood, gaining hardihood from the impotence of the law, break out into incendiary propositions: "It is announced that after the troops retreat, nineteen houses more will be sacked; it is proposed to behead all aristocrats, that is to say, all the land-owners in the country." Many have fled, but their flight does not satisfy the clubs. Vidal orders those of Beausset who took refuge in Toulon to return at once; otherwise their houses will be demolished, and that very day, in fact, by way of warning, several houses in Beausset, among them that of a notary, are either pulled down or pillaged from

and a dictator in i

e during the

at it will do during the interregnum. Facts, then, as always, furnish the best picture, and

pon and badge; with this club, each member "may go anywhere," and do what seems good to him. At Saint-Afrique they number about eighty, among whom must be counted the rascals forming the seventh company of Tarn, staying in the town; their enrollment in the band is effected by constantly "preaching pillage to them," and by assuring them that the contents of the chateaux in the vicinity belong to them.3214-Not that the chateaux excite any fear; most of them are empty; neither in Saint-Afrique nor in the environs do the men of the ancient régime form a party; for many months orthodox priests and the nobles have had to fly, and now the well-to-do people are escaping. The population, however, is Catholic; many of the shop-keepers, artisans, and farmers are discontented, and the object now is to make these laggards keep step.-In the first place, they order women of every condition, work-g

xecutive Power, by which you

at

nything wrong, you are

ied. In the house of the curé of Douyre, "furniture, clothes, cabinets, and window-sashes are destroyed"; they feast on his wine and the contents of his cupboard, throw away what they could not consume, then go in search of the curé and his brother, a former Carthusian, shouting that "their heads must be cut off; and sausage-meat made of the rest of their bodies!" Some of them, a little shrewder than the others, light on a prize; for example, a certain Bourguière, a trooper of the line, seized a vineyard belonging to an old lady, the widow of a physician and former mayor;3219 he gathered in its crop, "publicly in broad daylight," for his own benefit, and warns the proprietress that he will kill her if she makes a complaint against him, and, as she probably does complain of him, he obliges her, in the name of the Executive Power, to pay him fifty crowns damages.-As to the common Jacobin gangsters, their reward, besides food and drink, is perfect licentiousness. In all houses invaded at eleven o'clock in the evening. Whilst the father flies, or the husband screams under the cudgel, one of the villains stations himself at the entrance with a drawn saber in his hands, and the wife or daughter remains at the mercy of the others; they seize her by the neck and maintain their hold.3220 In

tices of the Jaco

panies of the club

r lea

ing an excited mob; sometimes it operates indirectly through the electoral assembly it has had elected, or through the municipality, which is its accomplice. If the administrations are Jacobin, it governs through them. If they are passive, it governs alongside of them. If they are

dice, elect the club candidates under the pretense that "rascals and beggars" must be sent off to Paris to purge the town of them!3226 It would be labor lost to strike people who grovel so well.3227 The faction is content to mark them as mangy curs, to put them in pens, keep them on a leash, and to annoy them.3228 It posts at the entrance of the guard-room a list of inhabitants related to an émigré; it makes domiciliary visits; it draws up a fancied list of the suspected, on

into private chapel

cks and the fist bestowed

x parents to have their children

expulsion o

sonment and transportatio

ch, in its turn, from being prey, became the hunters of game. For three years these strong-armed prowlers have served as the hard-core of local jacqueries; at the present time they form the staff of the universal jacquerie. At N?mes,3230 the head of the Executive Power is a "dancing-master." The two leading demagogues of Toulouse are a shoemaker, and an actor who plays valets.3231 At Toulon,3232 the club, more absolute than any Asiatic despot, is recruited from among the destitute, sailors, harbor-hands, soldiers, "stray peddlers," while its president, Sylvestre, sent down from Paris, is a criminal of the lowest degree. At Rheims,3233 the principal leader is an unfrocked priest, married to a nun, aided by a baker, who, an old soldier, came near being hung. Elsewhere,3234 it is some deserter tried for robbery; here, a cook or innkeeper, and there, a former lackey The oracle of Lyons is an ex-commercial traveler, an emulator of Marat, named C

ies of travel

ruits.-Election of

murd

nd it is probable that the various administrations thought that "in this way they would purge France."3239 To the wretched "bought by the communes," add others of the same stamp, procured by the rich as substitutes for their sons.3240 Thus do they pick over the social dunghill and obtain at a discount the natural and predestined inmates of houses of correction, poor-houses and hospitals, with an utter disregard of quality, even physical, "the halt, the maimed and the blind," the deformed and the defective, "some too old, and others too young and too feeble to support the fatigues of war, others so small as to stand a foot lower than their guns," a large number of boys of sixteen, fourteen, and thirteen; in short, the reprobate of great cities as we now see him, stunted, puny, and natur

them believes himself superior to the law, "as formerly a Condé,3245" and he becomes king on a small scale, self-constituted, an autocratic justiciary and avenger of wrongs, a supporter of patriots and the scourge of aristocrats, the disposer of lives and property, and, without delay or formality, taking it upon himself to complete the Revolution on the spot in every town he passes through.-He is not to be hindered

especially the great boozers, have

and stop grain-boats; elsewhere, they force a municipality to tax bread; farther on, they burn or sack chateaux, and, if a mayor happens to inform them that the chateau now belongs to the nation and not to an émigré; they reply with "thrusts," and threaten to cut his throat.3250 As the 10th of August draws near, the phantom of authority, which still occasionally imposed on them, completely vanishes, and "they risk nothing in killing" whoever displeases them.3251 Exasperated by the perils they are about to encounter on the frontier, they begin war in the interior. Provisionally, and as a precaution, they slaughter probable aristocrats on

n the cabinet of the M

Bordeaux.-Bordeaux

ons-sur-Marne to L

e and the respons

.-The programm

able, arranged in proper order; his replies are noted in brief on the margin; he has a map of France before him, and, placing his finger on the southern section, he moves it along the great highway across the country. At every stage he recurs to the paper file of letters, and passing innumerable repo

him on an ass, found refuge, with great difficulty, in his country-house. They go there for him, however, fetch him back to the public promenade, and there they kill him. A number of brave fellows who interfered were charged with incivism, and severely handled. Repression is impossible; the department writes to the Minister that "at this time it would be impolitic to follow the matter up." Roland knows that by experience. The letters in his hands show him that there, as in Paris, murder engenders murder. M. d'Alespée; a gentleman, has just been assassinated at Nérac; "all reputable citizens formed around him a rampart with their bodies," but the rabble prevailed, and the murderers, "through their obscurity," escaped.-The Minister's finger stops at Bordeaux. There the federation festivities are marked with a triple assassination.3256 In order to let this dangerous moment pass by, M. de Langoiran, vicar-general of the archbishopric, had retired half a league off; in the village of Cauderan, to the residence of an octogenarian priest, who, like himself; had never meddled with public matters. On the 15th of

horities of Achères, along with many of the inhabitants, have gone to Oison and Chaussy, where everything is smashed, broken up and carried off On the 16th of September six armed men went to the house of M. de Vaudeuil and obliged him to return the sum of 300 francs, for penalties pretended to have been paid by them. We have been notified that M. Dedeley will be visited at Achères for the same purpose to-day. M. de Lory has been similarly threatened... Finally, all those people there say that they want no more local administrations or tribunals, that the law is in their own hands, and they will execute it. In this extremity we have decided on the only safe course, which is to silently accept all the outrages inflicted upon us. We have not called upon you for protection, for we are well aware of the embarrassment you labor under."-The best part of the National Guard, indeed, having been disarmed at the county-town, there is no longer an armed force to put riots down. Consequently, at this same date,3259 the populace, increased by the afflux of "strangers" and ordinary nomads, hang a corn-inspector, plant his head on the end of a pike, drag his body through the streets, sack five houses and burn the furniture of a municipal officer in front of his own door. Thereupon, the obedient municipality sets the arrested rioters free, and lowers the price of bread one-sixth. Above the Loire, the dispatches of Orne and Calvados complete the picture. "Our district," writes a lieutenant of the gendarmerie,3260

at Gisors, in the Eure, at Chantilly, and at Clermont in the Oise, at Saint-Amand in the Pas-de-Calais, at Cambray in the Nord, at Retel and Charleville in the Ardennes, at Rheims and at Chalons in the Marne, at Troyes in the Aube, at Meaux in Seine-et-Marne, and at Versailles in Seine-et-Oise.3266-Roland, I imagine, does not open this file, and for a good reason; he knows too well how M. de Brissac and M. Delessart, and the other sixty-three persons killed at Versailles; it was he who signed Fournier's commission, the commander of the murderers. At this very moment he is forced to corresp

d they finish him with clubs and sabers, while the municipal council "have barely time to drive off the carriage containing the ladies."-Accordingly, national justice, in the hands of the volunteers, has its sudden outbursts, its excesses, its reactions, the effect of which it is not advisable to wait for. For example, at Cambray,3269 a division of foot-gendarmerie had just left the town, and it occurs to them that they had forgotten "to purge the prison". It returns, seizes the keeper, takes him to the H?tel-de-ville, examines the prison register, sets at liberty those whose crimes seem to it excusable, and provides them with passports. On the other hand, it kills a former royal procureur, on whom addresses are found tainted with "aristocratic principles," an unpopular lieutenant-colonel, and a suspected captain.-However slight or ill-founded a suspicion, so much the worse for the officer on whom it falls! At Charleville,3270 two

entry live, even when veterans in the service of freedom; Roland, foremost in his files, finds heartrending letters addressed directly to him, as a last recourse. Early in 1789, M. de Gouy d'Arcy3273 was the first to put his pen to paper in behalf of popular rights. A deputy of the noblesse to the Constituent Assembly, he is the first to rally to the Third-Estate; when the liberal minority of the noblesse came and took their seats in the hall of the Communes, he had already been there eight days, and, for thirty months, he "invariably seated himself on the side of the 'Left.'" Senior major-general, and ordered by the Legislative Assembly to suppress the outbreak of the 6,000 insurgents at Noyon, "he kept his rigorous orders in his pocket for ten days"; he endured their insults; he risked his life "to save those of his misguided fellow-citizens, and he had the good fortune not to spill a drop of blood." Exhausted by so much labor and effort, almost dying, ordered into the country by his physicians, "he devoted his income to the relief of poverty"; he planted on his own domain the first liberty tree that was erected; he furnished the volunteers with clothes and arms; "instead of a fifth, he yielded up a third of his revenue under the forced system of taxation." His children live with him on the property, which has been in the family four hundred years, and the peasantry call him "their father." No one could lead a more tranquil or, indeed, a more meritorious existence. But, being a noble, he is suspected, and a delegate from the Paris Commune denounces him at Compiègne as having in his house two cannon and five hundred and fifty muskets. There is at once a domiciliary visit. Eight hundred men, infantry and cavalry, appear before the chateau d'Arcy in battle array. He meets them at the door and tenders them the keys.

de Montrosier, an old retired officer, which is the opening of the hunt. Afterwards they fall upon two ecclesiastics with pikes and sabers, whom their game-beaters have brought in from the country, then on the former curé of Saint-Jean, and on that of Rilly; their corpses are cut up, paraded through the streets in portions, and burnt in a bonfire; one of the wounded priests, the abbé Alexandre, is thrown in still alive.3280-Roland recognizes the men of September, who, exposing their still bloody pikes, came to his domicile to demand their wages; wherever the band passes it announces, "in the name of the people," its "plenary power to spread the example of the capital." Now, as 40,000 unsworn priests are condemned by the decree of August 26 to leave their departments in a week and France in a fortnight, shall they be allowed to depart? Eight thousand of them at Rouen, in obedience to the decree, charter transports, which the riotous population of bot

d then to the department bureau "to denounce aristocrats"; on the way they continue to strike the tottering old man, who falls down; they then decapitate him, place pieces of his body on pikes, and parade these about. Meanwhile, in this same town, twenty-two gentlemen; at Beaune, forty priests and nobles; at Dijon, eighty-three heads of families, locked up as suspected without evidence or examination, and confined at their own expense two months under pikes, ask themselves every morning whether the populace and the volunteers, who shout death cries through the streets, mean to release them in the same way as in Paris.3284-A trifle is sufficient to provoke a murder. On the 19th of August, at Auxerre as the National Guard is marching along, three citizens, after having taken the civic oath, "left the ranks," and, on being called back, "to make them fall in," one, either impatient or in ill-humor, "replied with an indecent gesture". The populace, taking it as an insult, instantly rush at them, and shoving aside the municipal body and the National Guards, wound one and kill the other two.3285 A

other places, it arrives too late.-Eight officers of the Royal-Pologne regiment, in garrison at Auch, some of them having been in the service twenty and thirty years, had been compelled to resign owing to the insubordination of their men; but, at the express desire of the Minister of War, they had patriotically remained at their posts, and, in twenty days of laborious marching, they had led their regiment from Auch to Lyons. Three days after their arrival, seized at night in their beds, conducted to Pierre-Encize, pelted with stones on the way, kept in secret confinement, and with frequent and prolonged examinations, all this merely put their services and their innocence in stronger light. They are taken from the prison by the Jacobin mob; of the eight, seven are killed in the street, and four priests along with them, while the exhibition of their work by the murderers is still more brazen than at Paris. They parade the heads of the dead all night on the ends of their pikes; they carry them to the Place des Terreaux into the coffee-houses; they

head, threaten to smother the aunt in her bed, hold the child over a deep well, and thus extort from the farmer or proprietor even as much as 4,000 or 5,000 francs. Generally the farmer keeps silent, for, in case of complaint, he is sure to have his buildings burnt and his olive trees cut down.3293-On the left bank, in the Isère, Lieutenant-colonel Spendeler, seized by the populace of Tullins, was murdered, and then hung by his feet in a tree on the roadside;3294-in the Dr?me, the volunteers of Gard forced the prison at Montélimart and hacked an innocent person to death with a saber;3295 in Vaucluse, the pillaging is general and constant. With all public offices in their hands, and they alone admitted into th

ficially, they keep funds raised for the central government for local uses; they institute penalties against their inhabitants seeking refuge in France; they organize tribunals, levy taxes, raise troops, and undertake military expeditions.3299 Assembled together to elect representatives to the Convention, the electors of the Bouches-du-Rh?ne were, additionally, disposed to establish throughout the department "the reign of liberty and equality," and to this effect they found, says one of them, "an army of 1,200 heroes to purge the districts in which the bourgeois aristocracy still raises its bold, imprudent head." Consequently, at Sonas, Noves

omplices, formally present themselves at the department bureau, and invite the administrators to join them in fraternizing with the people. The administrators, suspecting nothing, accompany them, each arm in arm with a municipal officer or delegate of the club. They scarcely reach the square when there rushes upon it from every avenue a troop of red-caps lying in wait. The syndic-attorney, the vice-president of the department, and two other administrators, are seized, cut down and hung; another, M. Debaux, succeeding in making his escape, hides away, scales the ramparts during the night, breaks his thigh and lies there on the ground; he is discovered the next morning; a band, led by Jassaud, a harbor-laborer, and by Lemaille, calling him self "the town hangman," come and raise him up, carry him away in a barrow, and hang him at the first lamppost. Other bands dispatch the public prosecutor in the same fashion, a district administrator, and a merchant, and then, spreading over the country, pillage and slay among the country houses.-In vain has the commandant of the place, M. Dumerbion, entreated the municipality to proclaim martial law. Not only does it refuse, but it enjoins him to order one-half of his troops back to their barracks. By way of an offset, it sets free a number of soldiers condemned to the galleys, and all that are confined for insubordination.-Henceforth every shadow of discipline vanishes, and, in the following month, murders multiply. M. de Possel, a navy administrator, is taken from his dwelling, and a rope is passed around his neck; he is saved just in time by a bombardier, the secretary of the club. M. Senis, caught in his country-house, is hung on the Place du Vieux Palais. Desidery, a captain in the navy, the curé of La Valette, and M. de Sacqui des Thourets, are

have flushed with shame; for to the reprimands dispatched by him to the

ublic prosecutor; have you denounced those guilty of simi

rn enemy of anarchy," to "the good and incorruptible Minister of the Interior, his only repro

ons being truly useful when they forestall evils, it being very sad to be obliged

etter," which announces four murders, but calls attention to the

w to communities of pot-breakers.32109-But, on this territory, he is defeated by his own principles, while the

always at the feet of the municipality, we have declared our

Minister of the Interior, look twice before censuring the exercise of popular sovereignty. This soverei

this is what we have done.32111.. What! when all France was resounding with that long expected proclamation of the abolition of tyranny, you were wi

volutionary expeditions, nomadic garrisons, p

uses or do not complain of the sovereign people suppressing them in advance.... You, sir, with so many reasons for it, would do well to recall your insults and redeem the wrongs you have inflicted before we happen to render them public."... "Citizen Minister, people flatter

he has just noted over are not a thoughtless eruption, a passing crisis of delirium, but a manifesto of the victor

atever is vicious has gone into hiding or has been exterminated." The programme is very precise, and acts form its

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gust, 1792, to the Jacobins of Lyons: "Tell me how many heads have been c

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Vol. XIII. pp. 59-63 (14th of July, 3 Decr

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15th of September, p. 483.-

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IV. 91, 142. Discourse of M. Fockedey, administrator of the dep

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come when this prophecy must be fulfilled: The rich shall be put in the place of the poor, and the poor in the place of the rich."-"If a half of their property be left them the rich will still be happy."-"If the laboring people of Lyons are destitute

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or the 28th of August

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verran both the city (Castres) and the country. They forcibly entered the houses of the citizens, broke the furniture to pieces, and pillaged everything that fell into their hands. Girls and women underwent shameful treatment. Commissioners sent by the district and the

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of the Var, May 27, 1792.-Letter of the minister, Duranthon, M

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Montpensier, "Mémoires," p. 11. At Aix one of his guards said to the sans-culotte who were breaking into the room where he had been placed: "Citizens, by what orde

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ay 23.-Letters of the administrators of the department, May

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town, has been burnt; another broken into, with a destruction of the furniture and a part of the dinner-service, and doors and windows broken open and smashed; several houses visited, under the pretense of arms or powder being concealed in them; all that is found with private persons and dealers not of the factious party is carried off; tumultuous shouts, nocturnal assemblages, plots for pillage or burning; disturbances caused by the sale of grain, searches under this pretext in private granaries, forced prices at current reductions; forty l

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e juge-de-paix of Saint-Afrique, and report by the department commissioners, Nov

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xis Bro, a voluntee

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tion he is obliged to address a petition to the exec

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of Capdenet,

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alzeng, wife of Guibal a mill

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he commune of Brusque; Aussel, curé of Versol

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n of Anne T

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as, of Martin syndic-attorney of the commune of Brusque, of Virot, of

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l-carder; Louis Grand, distri

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.-Cf. Louis Guibert, "le Parti Gir

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. Restoration of the Arras municipality. J

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at Caen and a

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ample, a

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tters of a Wittness to the French Rev

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or thirty years gave up his arms to a boy w

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g pages.-Albert Babeau, "Histoire de T

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t Régime," 38

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3217. Letter of Castanet, a

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. Letter of M. Alquier to the fir

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"Histoire du

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Ternaux, II

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menced against an old deserter at the head of the municipality, and tried for robbery. They threatened to stab the judge if he recommenced the trial. Numerous gangs of vagabonds overrun the country, pillaging and putting to

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441, details concerning Chalier by his companion Chassagnon.-"Ar

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for he has just returned to Marseilles and is about to pre

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is report of June 27, 1792, Albert Dubayet e

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214. Letter of an inhabitant of Nogent-le-Rotrou (Eure). "Out of 8,000 inhabitants one-half require assistance, and two-thirds of these are in a sad stat

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tter of General Biron, Aug. 23, 1792).-2

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o see that most the volunteers about to join the army are old men or very young boys."-C. Rousset, Ibid., 74, 108, 226 (Letter of Biron, Nov. 7, 1792); 105 (Letter

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n volunteers.-"Archives Nationales," BB, 16703. Letter by Labarrière aide-de-camp of General Flers, Antw

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en, under date of Dec.27, 1791: "The national guards, who have turned out as volunteers, are in many instances that corrupted scum of overgrown population of which large cities purge themselves, and which, without constitutions to support the fatigues... of war, have every vice and every disease which can render them the scourge of their friends and the laughing stock of their foes."-Buchez et Roux, XXVI. 177. Plan of the administrators of Hér

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er of the directory of

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the commune of Roye, Oct. 8, 1792 (in relation to the violence committed b

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Condés were proud princes from a branc

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to the Minister of War, March 19, 1793): "Since we have had the gendarmes with us at Ostend there is nothing but disturbance every day. They attack the officers and volunteers, take the liberty of pulling off epaulettes and talk

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Wimpfen, Dec. 30, 1791).-"Souvenir

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al Wimpfen, Jan. 20, 1792).-Lette

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of Servan, Minister of War, to Roland, June 12, 1792: "I frequently receive, as well as yourself and the Minister of Justice, complaints against the national volunteers. They commit the most reprehensible offenses daily in places where the

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d already taken the road to Rhodez to join their respective regiments." Nothing remains of the chateau of Privesac but a heap of ruins. The houses in the village "are filled to over flowing with pillaged articles, and the inhabitants have divided the owners' animals

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aid gendarmes, especially the gunners, with naked sabers in their hands, always threatening. The citizen mayor especially was treated most outrageously by the said gunners... forcing him to dance on the Place d'armes, to which they resorted with violins and where they remained until midnight, rudely pushing and hauling him about, treating him a

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out to be placed before the reader, sometimes occur in these files. I pursue

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iteur, XIII, 383, re

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, 3271. Letter of the admin

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municipal officers of Clairac, July 20.-Letter of

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umber for July 28, (le

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ter of the administrators of Haute-Vie

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of the directory of the district of Neuvill

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and council-general of the commune of Orleans, Sept 16 and 17. (The di

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he lieutenant of the gendarmerie of Dampierre,

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same kind.-Letter of the municipal officers of Ray, Sept 24.-Letter of M. Desdo

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ter of the administrators of

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rnaux, III. 3

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port of the Rouen municipality on the riot of Aug. 29.-Letters of the department-administrators, Sept 18 and

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Sept. 7, 1792): "Our troops burn with a desire to meet the enemy. The massacre reported to have taken place in Paris do

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nicating with the enemy.-"Archives Nationales," F7; 3249. Letter of the district-administrators of Senlis, Oct. 31 (Aug. 15). At Chantilly, M. Pigean is assassinated in the midst of 1,200 persons.-C.

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, III. 378, 594 an

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tionales," F7, 3249. Letter of the department-administrators of the Eure, Sept. 11 (

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convention, Oct. 31 (with a copy of the documents sent by t

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Marshal Lückner's army). "The Parisian volunteers again threatened to have several heads last evening, among others those of the marshal and his aids. He had threatened to return some deserters to their regiments.

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ments relating to the case of M. de Fos

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, Jan. 28, 1793. He states that he has entered no complaint, and if anybody has done so for him he is much displeased. "A suit might place me in the greatest danger, from my knowled

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r, which, if copied entire, would show the character of the gentleman of 1789. Lots of heart, m

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18, 1792). Visit to the chateau de Catteville, Sept. 7, by the national guard of the neighborhood. "The national guard get drunk, break the furniture to piece

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don the French soil!" He is guillotined at Paris, Thermidor

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stants under Lo

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Hez and in the park belonging to M. de Fitz-James, now national property, "the finest trees are sold on the spot, cut down, and carried off."-F7, 3268, Letter of the overseer of the national domains at Rambouillet, Oct. 31. Woods devastated "at a loss of more than 1

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beau, I.504

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rnaux, III. 3

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Nationales," F7, 3239. Official report

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the convention, on the part of various districts and departments, containing the names of priests demanding pass

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mark on it which serves for their recognition on the road, and which excites against them the fury of the volunteers. "A majority of the soldiers filled the air with their cries of 'Death to kings and priests!' "-Sauzay, III. ch. IX., a

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Marne et de ses monuments,"

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here in this town, were on the 18th transferred to Semur, no reason for our detention being given, and where we have in vain demanded a trial from the directory of the district, which body, making no examination or inquiry into our case, sent us on the 25th, at great expense, to Dijon, where the department has imprisoned us again without, as before, giving any reason therefore."-The directory of the department writes "the communes of the towns and of the country arrest persons suspected b

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onne, Aug. 20 and 21.-Ibid., F7, 3255. Letter of the commissary, Bonnema

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, which he gives them.-Letter of the same. Sept. 1. "Every day repressive means are non-existent. Juges-de-paix before whom complaints are made dare not report them, nor try citizens who cause themselves to be feared. Witnesses dare not give testimony for fear of being maltreated or pillaged by the criminals.

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oland," published by Madame Bancal

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eplies with consternation and says that there must be a prosecution.)-Official report of the 9th of September, and letter of the municipality, Sept. 11.-Memorandum of the officers of the Royal-Polog

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nales," Letter of

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ble to tolerate their refusal to join in communal corporate pagan observances. He insisted that

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them down, you are all lost.-" Ibid.,, May 17, 1790: "Our rural districts are much dissatisfied with the decree on feudal privileges... A reform is necessary, in which more chateaux must be burnt. It would not be a serious evil were there not some danger of the enemies of the Revolution profiting by these discontents to lessen the confidence of the people in th

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xt day at Saint-Urcize they break into the house of the former curé, devastate or pillage it, and "sell his furniture to different persons in the neighborhood." The same treatment is awarded to sieur Vaissier, mayor, and to lady Lavalette; their cellars are forced open, barrels of wine are taken to the public square, and drinking takes place from the tap. After this "the volunteers go in squads into the neighboring parishes and

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syndic-attorney of the Gard, Sept. 8: "I beg, sir, that this letter may be considered as confidential; I pray

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3227. Letter of the municipal

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her Audiffret, belonging to the Comtat; he was slashed with a saber in prison Aug.25. Report of the surgeon, Oct. 17: "The wounded man has two gashes more on the head, one on the left c

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u of conciliation, Oct. 28.-Letter of an inhabitant of Avignon, Oct. 7.-Other

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Aug. 24.-Letter of the syndic-attorney of the department (with a letter of the municipality of Aubagne), Sept. 22, etc., in which M. Jourdan, a ministerial officer, is accused of "aristocracy." A guard is assigned to him. About midnight the guard is overcome, he is carried off, and then

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mmunist revolutionaries arranging for the break-up of formerly power

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f Var, having called a meeting of commissaries at Avignon to provide for the defense of these regions, the Minister says: "This step, subversive of all government, nullifies the general regulations of the executive power."-"Ar

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awn up and sent to the National Assembly. The commissioners will be empowered to suspend the district administrations, municipal officers, and generally all public functionaries who, through incivism or improper conduct, shall have endangered the public weal. They may even arrest them as well as suspected citizens. They will see that the law regarding the disarming of suspected citizens and the banishment of priests be faithfully executed."-Ibid., F7, 3195. Letter of Truchement, comm

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ux, "Mémo

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ive council according to the official statement of the municipality of Coste. On the 27th of September Montbrion, commissioner of the administration of the Bouche-du-Rh?ne, sends two messengers to fetch the furniture to Apt. On reaching Apt Montbrion and his colleague Bergier have the vehicles unloaded, putting the most valuable effects on one cart, which they appropriate to themselves, and dr

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n this file the entire correspondence of

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owing days.-That of the three administrative bodies, Sep.

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n income of 50,000 francs, and the lover of Saunier, an opera-dancer. "He is a good fellow," exclaims Pasquier's bandy-legged guardian: "we have just made hint marry. Look here, we said to him, it is time that to put a stop to that behavior! Down with prejudice! Marquises and dancers ought to marry each other. He made her his wife, and it is well he did; otherwise he would have been done

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etter of the administrators of the C?

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he administrators of the Bouche-du-Rh?ne, Oct

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the administrators of the Orne, Sept. 7, an

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ken up. Can the commune of Saint-Firmin, indeed, have persuaded itself that it is sovereign, as the letter states? and have the citizens composing it forgotten that the sovereign is the entire nation, and not the forty-four thousandth part of it? that Saint-Firmin is simply a fraction of it, contributing its share to endowing the deputies of the National Convention, the administrators of departments and districts with the power of acting for the greatest advantage of the commune,

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al bureau of the Roue

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ess are omitted at the end of these letters, and no doubt purposely.) Roland replies (Dec. 31): "While fully admiring the civism of the brave Marseilles people,... do not fully agree with you on the exercise of