Chapter IX: IN THE AISNE--(continued)

Laon--A feudal fortress home--Chauny and the green monkeys of
Rabelais--The festival of the jongleurs and the learned dogs--A
damsel of Chauny on English good sense and Queen Victoria--A
region of parks and châteaux--The cradle of the French Monarchy--How
the Revolution robbed France--The rural reign of pillage
and murder--Horrors committed in the provinces during 1789--Arthur
Young and Gouverneur Morris on the general depravation
and lawlessness--The National Assembly a mere noisy 'mob'--The
outbreak of crime which preceded the Terror--The truth
about Madame Roland--Her hatred of Marie Antoinette and her
thirst for blood--The legend of the Gironde--Brissot de Warville
on robbery as a virtuous action--The relations of the French
Revolution to property--France more free before 1789 than after
it--The laws against emigrants--Girls of fourteen condemned to
death--Emigration made a crime, that property might be pillaged--How
Irène de Tencin defended the family estate--The story of
the Saporta family--The Laonnais in the 18th century--Wide-spread
ruin of its churches, convents, and châteaux--Destruction
of accumulated capital--How syndicates of rogues stole bronzes,
brasswork, and monuments--The story of two châteaux--The
bishop's château at Anizy--The burghers and the seigneurs in
the 16th century--The local 'directory' in 1790--Wreck, ruin,
and robbery--The Château of Pinon--Once the property of a
granddaughter of Edward III. of England--A domain of the Duc
d'Orléans--A tragedy of love and murder--Death of the Marquis
d'Albret--How Pinon passed to the family of De Courvals--The
present owner an American lady--The finest château in the
Laonnais--What has the Laonnais gained from the ruin of the
Anizy? 186-225