Chapter XVII: Part 17

What I have hitherto written you will understand as applicable only to the troops employed on the frontiers. There are some of another description, more cherished and not less serviceable, who act as a sort of police militant and errant, and defend the republic against her internal enemies--the republicans. Almost every town of importance is occasionally infested by these servile instruments of despotism, who are maintained in insolent profusion, to overawe those whom misery and famine might tempt to revolt. When a government, after imprisoning some hundred thousands of the most distinguished in every class of life, and disarming all the rest, is yet obliged to employ such a force for its protection, we may justifiably conclude, it does not presume on the attachment of the people. It is not impossible that the agents of different descriptions, destined to the service of conciliating the interior to republicanism, might alone form an army equal to that of the Allies; but this is a task, where the numbers employed only serve to render it more difficult. They, however, procure submission, if they do not create affection; and the Convention is not delicate.

Amiens, Sept. 30, 1794.

The domestic politics of France are replete with novelties: the Convention is at war with the Jacobins--and the people, even to the most decided aristocrats, have become partizans of the Convention.--My last letters have explained the origin of these phaenomena, and I will now add a few words on their progress.

You have seen that, at the fall of Robespierre, the revolutionary government had reached the very summit of despotism, and that the Convention found themselves under the necessity of appearing to be directed by a new impulse, or of acknowledging their participation in the crimes they affected to deplore.--In consequence, almost without the direct repeal of any law, (except some which affected their own security,) a more moderate system has been gradually adopted, or, to speak more correctly, the revolutionary one is suffered to relax. The Jacobins behold these popular measures with extreme jealousy, as a means which may in time render the legislature independent of them; and it is certainly not the least of their discontents, that, after all their labours in the common cause, they find themselves excluded both from power and emoluments. Accustomed to carry every thing by violence, and more ferocious than politic, they have, by insisting on the reincarceration of suspected people, attached a numerous party to the Convention, which is thus warned that its own safety depends on repressing the influence of clubs, which not only loudly demand that the prisons may be again filled, but frequently debate on the project of transporting all the "enemies of the republic" together.

The liberty of the press, also, is a theme of discord not less important than the emancipation of aristocrats. The Jacobins are decidedly adverse to it; and it is a sort of revolutionary solecism, that those who boast of having been the original destroyers of despotism, are now the advocates of arbitrary imprisonment, and restraints on the freedom of the press. The Convention itself is divided on the latter subject; and, after a revolution of five years, founded on the doctrine of the rights of man, it has become matter of dispute--whether so principal an article of them ought really to exist or not. They seem, indeed, willing to allow it, provided restrictions can be devised which may prevent calumny from reaching their own persons; but as that cannot easily be atchieved, they not only contend against the liberty of the press in practice, but have hitherto refused to sanction it by decree, even as a principle.

It is perhaps reluctantly that the Convention opposes these powerful and extended combinations which have so long been its support, and it may dread the consequences of being left without the means of overawing or influencing the people; but the example of the Brissotins, who, by attempting to profit by the services of the Jacobins, without submitting to their domination, fell a sacrifice, has warned their survivors of the danger of employing such instruments. It is evident that the clubs will not act subordinately, and that they must either be subdued to insignificance, or regain their authority entirely; and as neither the people nor Convention are disposed to acquiesce in the latter, they are politicly joining their efforts to accelerate the former.

Yet, notwithstanding these reciprocal cajoleries, the return of justice is slow and mutable; an instinctive or habitual preference of evil appears at times to direct the Convention, even in opposition to their own interests. They have as yet done little towards repairing the calamities of which they are the authors; and we welcome the little they have done, not for its intrinsic value, but as we do the first spring flowers--which, though of no great sweetness or beauty, we consider as pledges that the storms of winter are over, and that a milder season is approaching.--It is true, the revolutionary Committees are diminished in number, the prisons are disencumbered, and a man is not liable to be arrested because a Jacobin suspects his features: yet there is a wide difference between such toleration and freedom and security; and it is a circumstance not favourable to those who look beyond the moment, that the tyrannical laws which authorized all the late enormities are still unrepealed. The Revolutionary Tribunal continues to sentence people to death, on pretexts as frivolous as those which were employed in the time of Robespierre; they have only the advantage of being tried more formally, and of forfeiting their lives upon proof, instead of without it, for actions that a strictly administered justice would not punish by a month's imprisonment.*

* For instance, a young monk, for writing fanatic letters, and
signing resolutions in favour of foederalism--a hosier, for
facilitating the return of an emigrant--a man of ninety, for
speaking against the revolution, and discrediting the assignats--a
contractor, for embezzling forage--people of various descriptions,
for obstructing the recruitment, or insulting the tree of liberty.
These, and many similar condemnations, will be found in the
proceedings of the Revolutionary Tribunal, long after the death of
Robespierre, and when justice and humanity were said to be restored.

A ceremony has lately taken place, the object of which was to deposit the ashes of Marat in the Pantheon, and to dislodge the bust of Mirabeau-- who, notwithstanding two years notice to quit this mansion of immortality, still remained there. The ashes of Marat being escorted to the Convention by a detachment of Jacobins, and the President having properly descanted on the virtues which once animated the said ashes, they were conveyed to the place destined for their reception; and the excommunicated Mirabeau being delivered over to the secular arm of a beadle, these remains of the divine Marat were placed among the rest of the republican deities. To have obliged the Convention in a body to attend and consecrate the crimes of this monster, though it could not degrade them, was a momentary triumph for the Jacobins, nor could the royalists behold without satisfaction the same men deploring the death of Marat, who, a month before, had celebrated the fall of Louis the Sixteenth! To have been so deplored, and so celebrated, are, methinks, the very extremes of infamy and glory.

I must explain to you, that the Jacobins have lately been composed of two parties--the avowed adherents of Collot, Billaud, &c. and the concealed remains of those attached to Robespierre; but party has now given way to principle, a circumstance not usual; and the whole club of Paris, with several of the affiliated ones, join in censuring the innovating tendencies of the Convention.--It is curious to read the debates of the parent society, which pass in afflicting details of the persecutions experienced by the patriots on the parts of the moderates and aristocrats, who, they assert, are become so daring as even to call in question the purity of the immortal Marat. You will suppose, of course, that this cruel persecution is nothing more than an interdiction to persecute others; and their notions of patriotism and moderation may be conceived by their having just expelled Tallien and Freron as moderates.*

* Freron endeavoured, on this occasion, to disculpate himself from
the charge of "moderantisme," by alledging he had opposed
Lecointre's denunciation of Barrere, &c.--and certainly one who
piques himself on being the pupil of the divine Marat, was worthy of
remaining in the fraternity from which he was now expelled.--Freron
is a veteran journalist of the revolution, of better talents, though
not of better fame, than the generality of his contemporaries: or,
rather, his early efforts in exciting the people to rebellion
entitle him to a preeminence of infamy.

Amiens, October 4, 1794.

We have had our guard withdrawn for some days; and I am just now returned from Peronne, where we had been in order to see the seals taken off the papers, &c. which I left there last year. I am much struck with the alteration observable in people's countenances. Every person I meet seems to have contracted a sort of revolutionary aspect: many walk with their heads down, and with half-shut eyes measure the whole length of a street, as though they were still intent on avoiding greetings from the suspicious; some look grave and sorrow-worn; some apprehensive, as if in hourly expectation of a _mandat d'arret;_ and others absolutely ferocious, from a habit of affecting the barbarity of the times.

Their language is nearly as much changed as their appearance--the revolutionary jargon is universal, and the most distinguished aristocrats converse in the style of Barrere's reports. The common people are not less proficients in this fashionable dialect, than their superiors; and, as far as I can judge, are become so from similar motives. While I was waiting this morning at a shop-door, I listened to a beggar who was cheapening a slice of pumpkin, and on some disagreement about the price, the beggar told the old _revendeuse_ [Market-woman.] that she was _"gangrenee d'aristocratie."_ ["Eat up with aristocracy."] _"Je vous en defie,"_ ["I defy you."] retorted the pumpkin-merchant; but turning pale as she spoke, _"Mon civisme est a toute epreuve, mais prenez donc ta citrouille,"_ ["My civism is unquestionable; but here take your pumpkin."] take it then." _"Ah, te voila bonne republicaine,_ ["Ah! Now I see you are a good republican."] says the beggar, carrying off her bargain; while the old woman muttered, _"Oui, oui, l'on a beau etre republicaine tandis qu'on n'a pas de pain a manger."_ ["Yes, in troth, it's a fine thing to be a republican, and have no bread to eat."]

I hear little of the positive merits of the convention, but the hope is general that they will soon suppress the Jacobin clubs; yet their attacks continue so cold and cautious, that their intentions are at least doubtful: they know the voice of the nation at large would be in favour of such a measure, and they might, if sincere, act more decisively, without risk to themselves.--The truth is, they would willingly proscribe the persons of the Jacobins, while they cling to their principles, and still hesitate whether they shall confide in a people whose resentment they have so much deserved, and have so much reason to dread. Conscious guilt appears to shackle all their proceedings, and though the punishment of some subordinate agents cannot, in the present state of things, be dispensed with, yet the Assembly unveil the register of their crimes very reluctantly, as if each member expected to see his own name inscribed on it. Thus, even delinquents, who would otherwise be sacrificed voluntarily to public justice, are in a manner protected by delays and chicane, because an investigation might implicate the Convention as the example and authoriser of their enormities.--Fouquier Tinville devoted a thousand innocent people to death in less time than it has already taken to bring him to a trial, where he will benefit by all those judicial forms which he has so often refused to others. This man, who is much the subject of conversation at present, was Public Accuser to the Revolutionary Tribunal--an office which, at best, in this instance, only served to give an air of regularity to assassination: but, by a sort of genius in turpitude, he contrived to render it odious beyond its original perversion, in giving to the most elaborate and revolting cruelties a turn of spontaneous pleasantry, or legal procedure.--The prisoners were insulted with sarcasms, intimidated by threats, and still oftener silenced by arbitrary declarations, that they were not entitled to speak; and those who were taken to the scaffold, after no other ceremony than calling over their names, had less reason to complain, than if they had previously been exposed to the barbarities of such trials.--Yet this wretch might, for a time at least, have escaped punishment, had he not, in defending himself, criminated the remains of the Committee, whom it was intended to screen. When he appeared at the bar of the Convention, every word he uttered seemed to fill its members with alarm, and he was ordered away before he could finish his declaration. It must be acknowledged, that, however he may be condemned by justice and humanity, nothing could legally attach to him: he was only the agent of the Convention, and the utmost horrors of the Tribunal were not merely sanctioned, but enjoined by specific decrees.

I have been told by a gentleman who was at school with Fouquier, and has had frequent occasions of observing him at different periods since, that he always appeared to him to be a man of mild manners, and by no means likely to become the instrument of these atrocities; but a strong addiction to gaming having involved him in embarrassments, he was induced to accept the office of Public Accuser to the Tribunal, and was progressively led on from administering to the iniquity of his employers, to find a gratification in it himself.

I have often thought, that the habit of watching with selfish avidity for those turns of fortune which enrich one individual by the misery of another, must imperceptibly tend to harden the heart. How can the gamester, accustomed both to suffer and inflict ruin with indifference, preserve that benevolent frame of mind, which, in the ordinary and less censurable pursuits of common life, is but too prone to become impaired, and to leave humanity more a duty than a feeling?

The conduct of Fouquier Tinville has led me to some reflections on a subject which I know the French consider as matter of triumph, and as a peculiar advantage which their national character enjoys over the English--I mean that smoothness of manner and guardedness of expression which they call "aimable," and which they have the faculty of attaining and preserving distinctly from a correspondent temper of the mind. It accompanies them through the most irritating vicissitudes, and enables them to deceive, even without deceit: for though this suavity is habitual, of course frequently undesigning, the stranger is nevertheless thrown off his guard by it, and tempted to place confidence, or expect services, which a less conciliating deportment would not have been suggested. A Frenchman may be an unkind husband, a severe parent, or an arrogant master, yet never contract his features, or asperate his voice, and for this reason is, in the national sense, "un homme bien doux." His heart may become corrupt, his principles immoral, and his disposition ferocious--yet he shall still retain his equability of tone and complacent phraseology, and be "un homme bien aimable."

The revolution has tended much to develope this peculiarity of the French character, and has, by various examples in public life, confirmed the opinions I had formed from previous observation. Fouquier Tinville, as I have already noticed, was a man of gentle exterior.--Couthon, the execrable associate of Robespierre, was mildness itself--Robespierre's harangues are in a style of distinguished sensibility--and even Carrier, the destroyer of thirty thousand Nantais, is attested by his fellow-students to have been of an amiable disposition. I know a man of most insinuating address, who has been the means of conducting his own brother to the Guillotine; and another nearly as prepossessing, who, without losing his courteous demeanor, was, during the late revolutionary excesses, the intimate of an executioner.

*It would be too voluminous to enumerate all the contrasts of
manners and character exhibited during the French revolution--The
philosophic Condorcet, pursuing with malignancy his patron, the Duc
de la Rochefoucault, and hesitating with atrocious mildness on the
sentence of the King--The massacres of the prisons connived at by
the gentle Petion--Collot d'Herbois dispatching, by one discharge of
cannon, three hundred people together, "to spare his sensibility"
the talk of executions in detail--And St. Just, the deviser of a
thousand enormities, when he left the Committee, after his last
interview, with the project of sending them all to the Guillotine,
telling them, in a tone of tender reproach, like a lover of romance,
"Vous avez fletri mon coeur, je vais l'ouvrir a la Convention."--
Madame Roland, in spite of the tenderness of her sex, could coldly
reason on the expediency of a civil war, which she acknowledged
might become necessary to establish the republic. Let those who
disapprove this censure of a female, whom it is a sort of mode to
lament, recollect that Madame Roland was the victim of a celebrity
she had acquired in assisting the efforts of faction to dethrone the
King--that her literary bureau was dedicated to the purpose of
exasperating the people against him--and that she was considerably
instrumental to the events which occasioned his death. If her
talents and accomplishments make her an object of regret, it was to
the unnatural misapplication of those talents and accomplishments in
the service of party, that she owed her fate. Her own opinion was,
that thousands might justifiably be devoted to the establishment of
a favourite system; or, to speak truly, to the aggrandisement of
those who were its partizans. The same selfish principle actuated
an opposite faction, and she became the sacrifice.--"Oh even-handed
justice!"

I do not pretend to decide whether the English are virtually more gentle in their nature than the French; but I am persuaded this douceur, on which the latter pride themselves, affords no proof of the contrary. An Englishman is seldom out of humour, without proclaiming it to all the world; and the most forcible motives of interest, or expediency, cannot always prevail on him to assume a more engaging external than that which delineates his feelings.

If he has a matter to refuse, he usually begins by fortifying himself with a little ruggedness of manner, by way of prefacing a denial he might otherwise not have resolution to persevere in. "The hows and whens of life" corrugate his features, and disharmonize his periods; contradiction sours, and passion ruffles him--and, in short, an Englishman displeased, from whatever cause, is neither "un homme bien doux," nor "un homme bien aimable;" but such as nature has made him, subject to infirmities and sorrows, and unable to disguise the one, or appear indifferent to the other. Our country, like every other, has doubtless produced too many examples of human depravity; but I scarcely recollect any, where a ferocious disposition was not accompanied by corresponding manners--or where men, who would plunder or massacre, affected to retain at the same time habits of softness, and a conciliating physiognomy.

We are, I think, on the whole, authorized to conclude, that, in determining the claims to national superiority, the boasted and unvarying controul which the French exercise over their features and accents, is not a merit; nor those indications of what passes within, to which the English are subject, an imperfection. If the French sometimes supply their want of kindness, or render disappointment less acute at the moment, by a sterile complacency, the English harshness is often only the alloy to an efficient benevolence, and a sympathizing mind. In France they have no humourists who seem impelled by their nature to do good, in spite of their temperament--nor have we in England many people who are cold and unfeeling, yet systematically aimable: but I must still persist in not thinking it a defect that we are too impetuous, or perhaps too ingenuous, to unite contradictions.

There is a cause, that doubtless has its effects in representing the English disadvantageously, and which I have never heard properly allowed for. The liberty of the press, and the great interest taken by all ranks of people in public affairs, have occasioned a more numerous circulation of periodical prints of every kind in England, than in any other country in Europe. Now, as it is impossible to fill them constantly with politics, and as the taste of different readers must be consulted, every barbarous adventure, suicide, murder, robbery, domestic fracas, assaults, and batteries of the lower orders, with the duels and divorces of the higher, are all chronicled in various publications, disseminated over Europe, and convey an idea that we are a very miserable, ferocious, and dissolute nation. The foreign gazettes being chiefly appropriated to public affairs, seldom record either the vices, the crimes, or misfortunes of individuals; so that they are thereby at least prevented from fixing an unfavourable judgement on the national character.

Mercier observes, that the number of suicides committed in Paris was supposed to exceed greatly that of similar disasters in London; and that murders in France were always accompanied by circumstances of peculiar horror, though policy and custom had rendered the publication of such events less general than with us.--Our divorces, at which the Gallic purity of manners used to be so much scandalized, are, no doubt, to be regretted; but that such separations were not then allowed, or desired in France, may perhaps be attributed, at least as justly, to the complaisance of husbands, as to the discretion of wives, or the national morality.*

* At present, in the monthly statement, the number of divorces in
France, is often nearly equal to that of the marriages.

I should reproach myself if I could feel impartial when I contemplate the English character; yet I certainly endeavour to write as though I were so. If I have erred, it has been rather in allowing too much to received opinions on the subject of this country, than in suffering my affections to make me unjust; for though I am far from affecting the fashion of the day, which censures all prejudices as illiberal, except those in disfavour of our own country, yet I am warranted, I hope, in saying, that however partial I may appear to England, I have not been so at the expence of truth.--Yours, &c.

October 6, 1794.

The sufferings of individuals have often been the means of destroying or reforming the most powerful tyrannies; reason has been convinced by argument, and passion appealed to by declamation in vain--when some unvarnished tale, or simple exposure of facts, has at once rouzed the feelings, and conquered the supineness of an oppressed people.

The revolutionary government, in spite of the clamorous and weekly swearings of the Convention to perpetuate it, has received a check from an event of this nature, which I trust it will never recover.--By an order of the Revolutionary Committee of Nantes, in November 1793, all prisoners accused of political crimes were to be transferred to Paris, where the tribunal being more immediately under the direction of government, there would be no chance of their acquittal. In consequence of this order, an hundred and thirty-two inhabitants of Nantes, arrested on the usual pretexts of foederalism, or as suspected, or being Muscadins, were, some months after, conducted to Paris. Forty of the number died through the hardships and ill treatment they encountered on the way, the rest remained in prison until after the death of Robespierre.

The evidence produced on their trial, which lately took place, has revealed but too circumstantially all the horrors of the revolutionary system. Destruction in every form, most shocking to morals or humanity, has depopulated the countries of the Loire; and republican Pizarro's and Almagro's seem to have rivalled each other in the invention and perpetration of crimes.

When the prisons of Nantes overflowed, many hundreds of their miserable inhabitants had been conducted by night, and chained together, to the river side; where, being first stripped of their clothes, they were crouded into vessels with false bottoms, constructed for the purpose, and sunk.*--

* Though the horror excited by such atrocious details must be
serviceable to humanity, I am constrained by decency to spare the
reader a part of them. Let the imagination, however repugnant,
pause for a moment over these scenes--Five, eight hundred people of
different sexes, ages, and conditions, are taken from their prisons,
in the dreary months of December and January, and conducted, during
the silence of the night, to the banks of the Loire. The agents of
the Republic there despoil them of their clothes, and force them,
shivering and defenceless, to enter the machines prepared for their
destruction--they are chained down, to prevent their escape by
swimming, and then the bottom is detached for the upper part, and
sunk.--On some occasions the miserable victims contrived to loose
themselves, and clinging to the boards near them, shrieked in the
agonies of despair and death, "O save us! it is not even now too
late: in mercy save us!" But they appealed to wretches to whom
mercy was a stranger; and, being cut away from their hold by strokes
of the sabre, perished with their companions. That nothing might be
wanting to these outrages against nature, they were escribed as
jests, and called "Noyades, water parties," and "civic baptisms"!
Carrier, a Deputy of the Convention, used to dine and make parties
of pleasure, accompanied by music and every species of gross luxury,
on board the barges appropriated to these execrable purposes.

--At one time, six hundred children appear to have been destroyed in this manner;--young people of different sexes were tied in pairs and thrown into the river;--thousands were shot in the high roads and in the fields; and vast numbers were guillotined, without a trial!*

* Six young women, (the _Mesdemoiselles la Meterie,_) in particular,
sisters, and all under four-and-twenty, were ordered to the
Guillotine together: the youngest died instantly of fear, the rest
were executed successively.--A child eleven years old, who had
previously told the executioner, with affecting simplicity, that he
hoped he would not hurt him much, received three strokes of the
Guillotine before his head was severed from his body.

--Two thousand died, in less than two months, of a pestilence, occasioned by this carnage: the air became infected, and the waters of the Loire empoisoned, by dead bodies; and those whom tyranny yet spared, perished by the elements which nature intended for their support.*

* Vast sums were exacted from the Nantais for purifying the air, and
taking precautions against epidemical disorders.

But I will not dwell on horrors, which, if not already known to all Europe, I should be unequal to describe: suffice it to say, that whatever could disgrace or afflict mankind, whatever could add disgust to detestation, and render cruelty, if possible, less odious than the circumstances by which it was accompanied, has been exhibited in this unfortunate city.--Both the accused and their witnesses were at first timid through apprehension, but by degrees the monstrous mysteries of the government were laid open, and it appeared, beyond denial or palliation, that these enormities were either devised, assisted, or connived at, by Deputies of the Convention, celebrated for their ardent republicanism and revolutionary zeal.--The danger of confiding unlimited power to such men as composed the majority of the Assembly, was now displayed in a manner that penetrated the dullest imagination, and the coldest heart; and it was found, that, armed with decrees, aided by revolutionary committees, revolutionary troops, and revolutionary vehicles of destruction,* missionaries selected by choice from the whole representation, had, in the city of Nantes alone, and under the mask of enthusiastic patriotism, sacrificed thirty thousand people!

* A company was formed of all the ruffians that could be collected
together. They were styled the Company of Marat, and were specially
empowered to arrest whomsoever they chose, and to enter houses by
night or day--in fine, to proscribe and pillage at their pleasure.

Facts like these require no comment. The nation may be intimidated, and habits of obedience, or despair of redress, prolong its submission; but it can no longer be deceived: and patriotism, revolutionary liberty, and philosophy, are for ever associated with the drowning machines of Carrier, and the precepts and calculations of a Herault de Sechelles,* or a Lequinio.**--

* Herault de Sechelles was distinguished by birth, talents, and
fortune, above most of his colleagues in the Convention; yet we find
him in correspondence with Carrier, applauding his enormities, and
advising him how to continue them with effect.--Herault was of a
noble family, and had been a president in the Parliament of Paris.
He was one of Robespierre's Committee of Public Welfare, and being
in some way implicated in a charge of treachery brought against
Simon, another Deputy, was guillotined at the same time with Danton.

** Lequinio is a philosopher by profession, who has endeavoured to
enlighten his countrymen by a publication entitled "_Les Prejuges
Detruits,_" and since by proving it advantageous to make no prisoners
of war.

--The ninety Nantais, against whom there existed no serious charge, and who had already suffered more than death, were acquitted. Yet, though the people were gratified by this verdict, and the general indignation appeased by an immediate arrest of those who had been most notoriously active in these dreadful operations, a deep and salutary impression remains, and we may hope it will be found impracticable either to renew the same scenes, or for the Convention to shelter (as they seemed disposed to do) the principal criminals, who are members of their own body. Yet, how are these delinquents to be brought to condemnation? They all acted under competent authority, and their dispatches to the Convention, which sufficiently indicated their proceedings, were always sanctioned by circulation, and applauded, according to the excess of their flagitiousness.

It is worthy of remark, that Nantes, the principal theatre of these persecutions and murders, had been early distinguished by the attachment of its inhabitants to the revolution; insomuch, that, at the memorable epoch when the short-sighted policy of the Court excluded the Constituent Assembly from their Hall at Versailles, and they took refuge in the Jeu de Paume, with a resolution fatal to their country, never to separate until they had obtained their purposes, an express was sent to Nantes, as the place they should make choice of, if any violence obliged them to quit the neighbourhood of Paris.

But it was not only by its principles that Nantes had signalized itself; at every period of the war, it had contributed largely both in men and money, and its riches and commerce still rendered it one of the most important towns of the republic.--What has been its reward?--Barbarous envoys from the Convention, sent expressly to level the aristocracy of wealth, to crush its mercantile spirit, and decimate its inhabitants.*--

* When Nantes was reduced almost to a state of famine by the
destruction of commerce, and the supplies drawn for the maintenance
of the armies, Commissioners were sent to Paris, to solicit a supply
of provisions. They applied to Carrier, as being best acquainted
with their distress, and were answered in this language:--_"Demandez,
pour Nantes! je solliciterai qu'on porte le fer et la flamme dans
cette abominable ville. Vous etes tous des coquins, des contre-
revolutionnaires, des brigands, des scelerats, je ferai nommer une
commission par la Convention Nationale.--J'irai moi meme a la tete
de cette commission.--Scelerats, je serai rouler les tetes dans
Nantes--je regenererai Nantes."_--"Is it for Nantes that you
petition? I'll exert my influence to have fire and sword carried
into that abominable city. You are all scoundrels, counter-
revolutionists, thieves, miscreants.--I'll have a commission
appointed by the Convention, and go myself at the head of it.--
Villains, I'll set your heads a rolling about Nantes--I'll
regenerate Nantes."
Report of the Commission of Twenty-one, on the conduct of Carrier.

--Terrible lesson for those discontented and mistaken people, who, enriched by commerce, are not content with freedom and independence, but seek for visionary benefits, by becoming the partizans of innovation, or the tools of faction!*

* The disasters of Nantes ought not to be lost to the republicans of
Birmingham, Manchester, and other great commercial towns, where "men
fall out they know not why;" and where their increasing wealth and
prosperity are the best eulogiums on the constitution they attempt
to undermine.

I have hitherto said little of La Vendee; but the fate of Nantes is so nearly connected with it, that I shall make it the subject of my next letter.

[No Date or Place Given.]

It appears, that the greater part of the inhabitants of Poitou, Anjou, and the Southern divisions of Brittany, now distinguished by the general appellation of the people of La Vendee, (though they include those of several other departments,) never either comprehended or adopted the principles of the French revolution. Many different causes contributed to increase their original aversion from the new system, and to give their resistance that consistency, which has since become so formidable. A partiality for their ancient customs, an attachment to their Noblesse, and a deference for their Priests, are said to characterize the brave and simple natives of La Vendee. Hence republican writers, with self-complacent decision, always treat this war as the effect of ignorance, slavery, and superstition.

The modern reformist, who calls the labourer from the plough, and the artizan from the loom, to make them statesmen or philosophers, and who has invaded the abodes of contented industry with the rights of man, that our fields may be cultivated, and our garments wove, by metaphysicians, will readily assent to this opinion.--Yet a more enlightened and liberal philosophy may be tempted to examine how far the Vendeans have really merited the contempt and persecution of which they have been the objects. By the confession of the republicans themselves, they are religious, hospitable, and frugal, humane and merciful towards their enemies, and easily persuaded to whatever is just and reasonable.

I do not pretend to combat the narrow prejudices of those who suppose the worth or happiness of mankind compatible but with one set of opinions; and who, confounding the adventitious with the essential, appreciate only book learning: but surely, qualities which imply a knowledge of what is due both to God and man, and information sufficient to yield to what is right or rational, are not descriptive of barbarians; or at least, we may say with Phyrrhus, "there is nothing barbarous in their discipline."*

*"The husbandmen of this country are in general men of simple
manners, naturally well inclined, or at least not addicted to
serious vices." Lequinio, Guerre de La Vendee.

Dubois de Crance, speaking of the inhabitants of La Vendee, says,
"They are the most hospitable people I ever saw, and always disposed
to listen to what is just and reasonable, if proffered with mildness
and humanity."

"This unpolished people, whom, however, it is much less difficult to
persuade than to fight." Lequinio, G. de La V.

"They affected towards our prisoners a deceitful humanity,
neglecting no means to draw them over to their own party, and often
sending them back to us with only a simple prohibition to bear arms
against the King or religion."
Report of Richard and Choudieu.

The ignorant Vendeans then could give lessons of policy and
humanity, which the "enlightened" republicans were not capable of
profiting by.

--Their adherence to their ancient institutions, and attachment to their Gentry and Clergy, when the former were abolished and the latter proscribed, might warrant a presumption that they were happy under the one, and kindly treated by the other: for though individuals may sometimes persevere in affections or habits from which they derive neither felicity nor advantage, whole bodies of men can scarcely be supposed eager to risk their lives in defence of privileges that have oppressed them, or of a religion from which they draw no consolation.

But whatever the cause, the new doctrines, both civil and religious, were received in La Vendee with a disgust, which was not only expressed by murmurs, but occasionally by little revolts, by disobedience to the constitutional authorities, and a rejection of the constitutional clergy.

Some time previous to the deposition of the King, Commissioners were sent to suppress these disorders; and though I doubt not but all possible means were taken to conciliate, I can easily believe, that neither the King nor his Ministers might be desirous of subduing by force a people who erred only from piety or loyalty. What effect this system of indulgence might have produced cannot now be decided; because the subsequent overthrow of the monarchy, and the massacre or banishment of the priests, must have totally alienated their minds, and precluded all hope of reconcilement.--Disaffection, therefore, continued to increase, and the Brissotines are suspected of having rather fostered than repressed these intestine commotions,* for the same purpose which induced them to provoke the war with England, and to extend that of the Continent.

* Le Brun, one of the Brissotin Ministers, concealed the progress of
this war for six months before he thought fit to report it to the
Convention.

--It is impossible to assign a good motive to any act of this literary intriguer.

--Perhaps, while they determined to establish their faction by "braving all Europe," they might think it equally politic to perplex and overawe Paris by a near and dangerous enemy, which would render their continuance in power necessary, or whom they might join, if expelled from it.*

* This last reason might afterwards have given way to their
apprehensions, and the Brissotins have preferred the creation of new
civil wars, to a confidence in the royalists. These men, who
condemned the King for a supposed intention of defending an
authority transmitted to him through whole ages, and recently
sanctioned by the voice of the people, did not scruple to excite a
civil war in defence of their six months' sovereignty over a
republic, proclaimed by a ferocious comedian, and certainly without
the assent of the nation. Had the ill-fated Monarch dared thus to
trifle with the lives of his subjects, he might have saved France
and himself from ruin.

When men gratify their ambition by means so sanguinary and atrocious as those resorted to by the Brissotines, we are authorized in concluding they will not be more scrupulous in the use or preservation of power, than they were in attaining it; and we can have no doubt but that the fomenting or suppressing the progress of civil discord, was, with them, a mere question of expediency.

The decree which took place in March, 1793, for raising three hundred thousand men in the departments, changed the partial insurrections of La Vendee to an open and connected rebellion; and every where the young people refused going, and joined in preference the standard of revolt. In the beginning of the summer, the brigands* (as they were called) grew so numerous, that the government, now in the hands of Robespierre and his party, began to take serious measures to combat them.

* Robbers--_banditti_--The name was first given, probably, to the
insurgents of La Vendee, in order to insinuate a belief that the
disorders were but of a slight and predatory nature.

--One body of troops were dispatched after another, who were all successively defeated, and every where fled before the royalists.

It is not unusual in political concerns to attribute to deep-laid plans and abstruse combinations, effects which are the natural result of private passions and isolated interests. Robespierre is said to have promoted both the destruction of the republican armies and those of La Vendee, in order to reduce the national population. That he was capable of imagining such a project is probable--yet we need not, in tracing the conduct of the war, look farther than to the character of the agents who were, almost necessarily, employed in it. Nearly every officer qualified for the command of an army, had either emigrated, or was on service at the frontiers; and the task of reducing by violence a people who resisted only because they deemed themselves injured, and who, even in the estimation of the republicans, could only be mistaken, was naturally avoided by all men who were not mere adventurers. It might likewise be the policy of the government to prefer the services of those, who, having neither reputation nor property, would be more dependent, and whom, whether they became dangerous by their successes or defeats, it would be easy to sacrifice.

Either, then, from necessity or choice, the republican armies in La Vendee were conducted by dissolute and rapacious wretches, at all times more eager to pillage than fight, and who were engaged in securing their plunder, when they should have been in pursuit of the enemy. On every occasion they seemed to retreat, that their ill success might afford them a pretext for declaring that the next town or village was confederated with the insurgents, and for delivering it up, in consequence, to murder and rapine. Such of the soldiers as could fill their pocket-books with assignats, left their less successful companions, and retired as invalids to the hospitals: the battalions of Paris (and particularly "the conquerors of the Bastille") had such ardour for pillage, that every person possessed of property was, in their sense, an aristocrat, whom it was lawful to despoil.*

* _"Le pillage a ete porte a son comble--les militaires au lieu de
songer a ce qu'ils avoient a faire, n'ont pense qu'a remplir leurs
sacs, et a voir se perpetuer une guerre aussi avantageuse a leur
interet--beaucoup de simples soldats ont acquis cinquante mille
francs et plus; on en a vu couverts de bijoux, et faisant dans tous
les genres des depenses d'une produgaloite, monstreuse."
Lequinio, Guerre de la Vendee._

"The most unbridled pillage prevailed--officers, instead of
attending to their duty, thought only of filling their portmanteaus,
and of the means to perpetuate a war they found so profitable.--Many
private soldiers made fifty thousand livres, and they have been seen
loaded with trinkets, and exercising the most abominable
prodigalities of every kind."
Lequinio, War of La Vendee.

"The conquerors of the Bastille had unluckily a most unbridled
ardour for pillage--one would have supposed they had come for the
express purpose of plunder, rather than fighting. The stage coaches
for Paris were entirely loaded with their booty."
Report of Benaben, Commissioner of the Department of Maine and
Loire.

--The carriages of the army were entirely appropriated to the conveyance of their booty; till, at last, the administrators of some departments were under the necessity of forbidding such incumbrances: but the officers, with whom restrictions of this sort were unavailing, put all the horses and waggons of the country in requisition for similar purposes, while they relaxed themselves from the serious business of the war, (which indeed was nearly confined to burning, plundering, and massacring the defenceless inhabitants,) by a numerous retinue of mistresses and musicians.

It is not surprizing that generals and troops of this description were constantly defeated; and their reiterated disasters might probably have first suggested the idea of totally exterminating a people it was found so difficult to subdue, and so impracticable to conciliate.--On the first of October 1793, Barrere, after inveighing against the excessive population of La Vendee, which he termed "frightful," proposed to the Convention to proclaim by a decree, that the war of La Vendee "should be terminated" by the twentieth of the same month. The Convention, with barbarous folly, obeyed; and the enlightened Parisians, accustomed to think with contempt on the ignorance of the Vendeans, believed that a war, which had baffled the efforts of government for so many months, was to end on a precise day--which Barrere had fixed with as much assurance as though he had only been ordering a fete.

But the Convention and the government understood this decree in a very different sense from the good people of Paris. The war was, indeed, to be ended; not by the usual mode of combating armies, but by a total extinction of all the inhabitants of the country, both innocent and guilty--and Merlin de Thionville, with other members, so perfectly comprehended this detestable project, that they already began to devise schemes for repeopling La Vendee, when its miserable natives should be destroyed.*

* It is for the credit of humanity to believe, that the decree was
not understood according to its real intention; but the nation has
to choose between the imputation of cruelty, stupidity, or slavery--
for they either approved the sense of the decree, believed what was
not possible, or were obliged to put on an appearance of both, in
spite of their senses and their feelings. A proclamation, in
consequence, to the army, is more explicit--"All the brigands of La
Vendee must be exterminated before the end of October."

From this time, the representatives on mission, commissaries of war, officers, soldiers, and agents of every kind, vied with each other in the most abominable outrages. Carrier superintended the fusillades and noyades at Nantes, while Lequinio dispatched with his own hands a part of the prisoners taken at La Fontenay, and projected the destruction of the rest.--After the evacuation of Mans by the insurgents, women were brought by twenties and thirties, and shot before the house where the deputies Tureau and Bourbotte had taken up their residence; and it appears to have been considered as a compliment to these republican Molochs, to surround their habitation with mountains of the dead. A compliment of the like nature was paid to the representative Prieur de la Marne,* by a volunteer, who having learned that his own brother was taken amongst the enemy, requested, by way of recommending himself to notice, a formal permission to be his executioner.--The Roman stoicism of Prieur accepted the implied homage, and granted the request!!

* This representative, who was also a member of the Committee of
Public Welfare, was not only the Brutus, but the Antony of La
Vendee; for we learn from the report of Benaben, that his stern
virtues were accompanied, through the whole of his mission in this
afflicted country, by a cortege of thirty strolling fiddlers!

Fourteen hundred prisoners, who had surrendered at Savenay, among whom were many women and children, were shot, by order of the deputy Francastel, who, together with Hentz, Richard, Choudieu, Carpentier, and others of their colleagues, set an example of rapine and cruelty, but too zealously imitated by their subordinate agents. In some places, the inhabitants, without distinction of age or sex, were put indiscriminately to the sword; in others, they were forced to carry the pillage collected from their own dwellings, which, after being thus stripped, were consigned to the flames.*

* "This conflagration accomplished, they had no sooner arrived in
the midst of our army, than the volunteers, in imitation of their
commanders, seized what little they had preserved, and massacred
them.--But this is not all: a whole municipality, in their scarfs of
office, were sacrificed; and at a little village, inhabited by about
fifty good patriots, who had been uniform in their resistance of the
insurgents, news is brought that their brother soldiers are coming
to assist them, and to revenge the wrongs they have suffered. A
friendly repast is provided, the military arrive, embrace their
ill-fated hosts, and devour what they have provided; which is no
sooner done, than they drive all these poor people into the
churchyard, and stab them one after another."
Report of Faure, Vice-President of a Military Commission at
Fontenay.

--The heads of the prisoners served occasionally as marks for the officers to shoot at for trifling wagers, and the soldiers, who imitated these heinous examples, used to conduct whole hundreds to the place of execution, singing _"allons enfans de la patrie."_*

* Woe to those who were unable to walk, for, under pretext that
carriages could not be found to convey them, they were shot without
hesitation!--Benaben.

The insurgents had lost Cholet, Chatillon, Mortagne, &c. Yet, far from being vanquished by the day appointed, they had crossed the Loire in great force, and, having traversed Brittany, were preparing to make an attack on Granville. But this did not prevent Barrere from announcing to the convention, that La Vendee was no more, and the galleries echoed with applauses, when they were told that the highways were impassable, from the numbers of the dead, and that a considerable part of France was one vast cemetery. This intelligence also tranquillized the paternal solicitude of the legislature, and, for many months, while the system of depopulation was pursued with the most barbarous fury, it was not permissible even to suspect that the war was yet unextinguished.

It is only since the trial of the Nantais, that the state of La Vendee has again become a subject of discussion: truth has now forced its way, and we learn, that, whatever may be the strength of these unhappy people, their minds, embittered by suffering, and animated by revenge, are still less than ever disposed to submit to the republican government. The design of total extirpation, once so much insisted on, is at present said to be relinquished, and a plan of instruction and conversion is to be substituted for bayonets and conflagrations. The revolted countries are to be enlightened by the doctrines of liberty, fanaticism is to be exposed, and a love of the republic to succeed the prejudices in favour of Kings and Nobles.--To promote these objects, is, undoubtedly, the real interest of the Convention; but a moralist, who observes through another medium, may compare with regret and indignation the instructors with the people they are to illumine, and the advantages of philosophy over ignorance.

Lequinio, one of the most determined reformers of the barbarism of La Vendee, proposes two methods: the first is, a general massacre of all the natives--and the only objection it seems susceptible of in his opinion is, their numbers; but as he thinks on this account it may be attended with difficulty, he is for establishing a sort of perpetual mission of Representatives, who, by the influence of good living and a company of fiddlers and singers, are to restore the whole country to peace.*--

*"The only difficulty that presents itself is, to determine whether
recourse shall be had to the alternative of indulgence, or if it
will not be more advantageous to persist in the plan of total
destruction.

"If the people that still remain were not more than thirty or forty
thousand, the shortest way would doubtless be, to cut all their
throats (egorger), agreeably to my first opinion; but the population
is immense, amounting still to four hundred thousand souls.--If
there were no hope of succeeding by any other methods, certainly it
were better to kill all (egorger), even were there five hundred
thousand.

"But what are we to understand by measures of rigour? Is there no
distinction to be made between rigorous and barbarous measures? The
utmost severity is justified on the plea of the general good, but
nothing can justify barbarity. If the welfare of France
necessitated the sacrifice of the four hundred thousand inhabitants
of La Vendee, and the countries in rebellion adjoining, they ought
to be sacrificed: but, even in this case, there would be no excuse
for those atrocities which revolt nature, which are an outrage to
social order, and repugnant equally to feeling (sentiment) and
reason; and in cutting off so many entire generations for the good
of the country, we ought not to suffer the use of barbarous means in
a single instance.

"Now the most effectual way to arrive at this end (converting the
people), would be by joyous and fraternal missions, frank and
familiar harangues, civic repasts, and, above all, dancing.

"I could wish, too, that during their circuits in these countries,
the Representatives were always attended by musicians. The expence
would be trifling, compared with the good effect; if, as I am
strongly persuaded, we could thus succeed in giving a turn to the
public mind, and close the bleeding arteries of these fertile and
unhappy provinces."
Lequinio, Guerre de La Vendee.

And this people, who were either to have their throats cut, or be
republicanized by means of singing, dancing, and revolutionary Pans
and Silenus's, already beheld their property devastated by pillage
or conflagration, and were in danger of a pestilence from the
unburied bodies of their families.--Let the reader, who has seen
Lequinio's pamphlet, compare his account of the sufferings of the
Vendeans, and his project for conciliating them. They convey a
strong idea of the levity of the national character; but, in this
instance, I must suppose, that nature would be superior to local
influence; and I doubt if Lequinio's jocund philosophy will ever
succeed in attaching the Vendeans to the republic.