Chapter XXXIII

EXECUTION OF MARIE ANTOINETTE AND MADAME ELIZABETH.

Marie Antoinette in the Temple.--Conspiracies for the Rescue of the
Royal Family.--The young Dauphin torn from his Mother.--Phrensy of
the Queen.--She is removed to the Conciergerie.--Indignities and
Woes.--The Queen led to Trial.--Letter to her Sister.--The Execution
of the Queen.--Madame Elizabeth led to Trial and Execution.--Fate of
the Princess and the Dauphin.

The populace now demanded the head of Marie Antoinette, whom they had long been taught implacably to hate.[401] We left her on the 21st of January in the Temple, overwhelmed with agony. Swoon succeeded swoon as she listened to the clamor in the streets which accompanied her husband to the guillotine. The rumbling of the cannon, on their return, and the shouts of _Vive la Republique_ beneath her windows announced that the tragedy was terminated. The Commune cruelly refused to allow her any details of the last hours of the king, and even Clery, his faithful servant, was imprisoned, so that he could not even place in her hands the lock of hair and the marriage ring which the king had intrusted to him.

Many conspiracies were formed for the rescue of the royal family, which led to a constant increase of the rigors of their captivity. The queen refused to resume her walks in the garden as she could not endure to pass the door of the king's apartment. But, after long seclusion, for the sake of the health of her children she consented to walk with them each day, for a few moments, on the platform of the tower. The Commune immediately ordered the platform to be surrounded with high boards, so that the captives might not receive any tokens of recognition from their friends.

For four months Marie Antoinette, Madame Elizabeth, and the children had the consolation of condoling with each other in their misery. But on the night of the 4th of July the clatter of an armed band was heard ascending the tower, and some commissioners tumultuously entered her chamber. They read to her a decree announcing that her son, the dauphin, was to be taken from her and imprisoned by himself. The poor child, as he listened to the reading of this cruel edict, was frantic with terror. He threw himself into his mother's arms and shrieked out,

"Oh! mother, mother, do not abandon me to those men. They will kill me as they did papa."

The queen, in a delirium of agony, grasped her child and placing him upon the bed behind her, with eyes glaring like a tigress, bade defiance to the officers, declaring that they should tear her in pieces before they should take her boy. Even the officers were overcome by her heart-rending grief, and for two hours refrained from taking the child by violence. The exhausted mother at length fell in a swoon, and the child was taken, shrieking with terror, from the room. She never saw her son again.

A few weeks of woe passed slowly away, when, early in August, she was awakened from her sleep just after midnight by a band of armed men who came to convey her to the prison of the Conciergerie, where she was to await her trial. The queen had already drained the cup of misery to the dregs, and nothing could add to her woe. She rose, in the stupor of despair, and began to dress herself in the presence of the officers. Her daughter and Madame Elizabeth threw themselves at the feet of the men, and implored them not to take the queen from them. They might as well have plead with the granite blocks of their prison.

Pressing her daughter for a moment convulsively to her heart, she covered her with kisses, spoke a few words of impassioned tenderness to her sister, and then, as if fearing to cast a last look upon these objects of her affection, hurried from the room. In leaving she struck her forehead against the beam of the low door.

"Did you hurt yourself?" inquired one of the men.

"Oh no!" was her reply, "nothing now can farther harm me."

A carriage was waiting for her at the door. Escorted by _gens d'armes_ she was conducted, through the gloom of midnight, to the dungeon where she was to await her condemnation.

The world-renowned prison of the Conciergerie consists of a series of subterranean dungeons beneath the floor of the _Palais de Justice_. More gloomy tombs the imagination can hardly conceive. Down the dripping and slimy steps the queen was led, by the light of a tallow candle, until, through a labyrinth of corridors, she approached the iron door of her dungeon. The rusty hinges grated as the door was opened, and she was thrust in. Two soldiers accompanied her, with drawn swords, and who were commanded, in defiance of all the instincts of delicacy, not to allow her to be one moment absent from their sight. The one candle gave just light enough to reveal the horrors of her cell. The floor was covered with mud, and streams of water trickled down the stone walls. A miserable pallet, with a dirty covering of coarse and tattered cloth, a small pine table, and a chair constituted the only furniture. So deep was the fall from the saloons of Versailles.

Here the queen remained for two months, her misery being slightly alleviated by the kind-heartedness of Madame Richard, the wife of the jailer, who did every thing the rigorous rules would admit to mitigate her woes. With her own hand she prepared food for the queen, obtained for her a few articles of furniture, and communicated to her daily such intelligence as she could obtain of her sister and her children. The friends of the queen were untiring in their endeavors, by some conspiracy, to effect her release. A gentleman obtained admittance to the queen's cell, and presented her with a rose, containing a note hidden among its petals. One of the _gens d'armes_ detected the attempt; and the jailer and his wife, for their suspected connivance, were both arrested and thrown into the dungeons.

Other jailers were provided for the prison, M. and Madame Bault; but they also had humane hearts, and wept over the woes of Marie Antoinette. The queen's wardrobe consisted only of two robes, one white, one black, and three chemises. From the humidity of her cell these rapidly decayed, with her shoes and stockings, and fell into tatters. Madame Bault was permitted to assist the queen in mending these, but was not allowed to furnish any new apparel. Books and writing materials were also prohibited. With the point of her needle she kept a brief memorandum of events on the stucco of her walls, and also inscribed brief lines of poetry and sentences from Scripture.

On the 14th of October the queen was conducted from her dungeon to the halls above for trial. Surrounded by a strong escort, she was led to the bench of the accused. Her accusation was that she abhorred the Revolution which had beheaded her husband and plunged her whole family into unutterable woe.

The queen was dressed in the garb of extreme poverty. Grief had whitened her hair, and it was fast falling from her head. Her eyes were sunken, and her features wan and wasted with woe.

"What is your name?" inquired one of the judges.

"I am called Marie Antoinette of Lorraine, in Austria," answered the queen.

"What is your condition?" was the next question.

"I am widow of Louis, formerly King of the French," was the reply.

"What is your age?"

"Thirty-seven."

The long act of accusation was then read. Among other charges was the atrocious one of attempting, by depravity and debauchery, to corrupt her own son, "with the intention of enervating the soul and body of that child, and of reigning, in his name, over the ruin of his understanding."

The queen recoiled from this charge with a gesture of horror, and, when asked why she did not reply to the accusation, she said,

"I have not answered it because there are accusations to which nature refuses to reply. I appeal to all mothers if such a crime be possible."

The trial continued for two days. When all the accusations had been heard, the queen was asked if she had any thing to say. She replied,

"I was a queen, and you took away my crown; a wife, and you killed my husband; a mother, and you deprived me of my children. My blood alone remains. Take it; but do not make me suffer long."

At four o'clock on the morning of the 16th she listened to her sentence condemning her to die. In the dignity of silence, and without the tremor of a muscle, she accepted her doom. As she was led from the court-room to her dungeon, to prepare for her execution, the brutal populace, with stampings and clappings, applauded the sentence. Being indulged with pen and paper in these last hours, she wrote as follows to her sister:

"October 16th, half past four in the morning.

"I write you, my sister, for the last time. I have been condemned,
not to an ignominious death--that only awaits criminals--but to go
and rejoin your brother. Innocent as he, I hope to show the same
firmness as he did in these last moments. I grieve bitterly at
leaving my poor children; you know that I existed but for them and
you--you who have, by your friendship, sacrificed all to be with us.
In what a position do I leave you. I have learned, by the pleadings
on my trial, that my daughter was separated from you. Alas! my poor
child. I dare not write to her. She could not receive my letter. I
know not even if this may reach you. Receive my blessing for both.

"I hope one day, when they are older, they may rejoin you and rejoice
in liberty at your tender care. May their friendship and mutual
confidence form their happiness. May my daughter feel that, at her
age, she ought always to aid her brother with that advice with which
the greater experience she possesses and her friendship should
inspire her. May my son, on his part, render to his sister every care
and service which affection can dictate. Let my son never forget the
last words of his father. I repeat them to him expressly. _Let him
never attempt to avenge our death._"

Having finished the letter, which was long, she folded it and kissed it repeatedly, "as if she could thus transmit the warmth of her lips and the moisture of her tears to her children." She then threw herself upon the pallet and slept quietly for two or three hours. A few rays of morning light were now struggling in through the grated bars of the window. The daughter of Madame Bault came in to dress her for the guillotine. She put on her white robe. A white handkerchief covered her shoulders, and a white cap, bound around her temples by a black ribbon, covered her hair.

It was a cold autumnal morning, and a chill fog filled the streets of Paris. At eleven o'clock the executioners led her from her cell. She cordially embraced the kind-hearted daughter of the concierge, and, having with her own hands cut off her hair, allowed herself to be bound, without a murmur, and issued from the steps of the Conciergerie. Instead of a carriage, the coarse car of the condemned awaited her at the gateway of the prison. For a moment she recoiled from this unanticipated humiliation, but immediately recovering herself she ascended the cart. There was no seat in the car, and, as her hands were bound behind her, she was unable to support herself from the jolting over the pavement. As she was jostled rudely to and fro, in the vain attempt to preserve her equilibrium, the multitudes thronging the streets shouted in derision. They had been taught to hate her, to regard her not only as the implacable foe of popular liberty, which she was, but as the most infamous of women, which she was not. "These," they cried, "are not your cushions of Trianon."

It was a long ride to the scaffold, during which the queen suffered all that insult, derision, and contumely can inflict. The procession crossed the Seine by the _Pont au Change_, and traversed the _Rue St. Honore_. Upon reaching the Place of the Revolution the cart stopped for a moment near the entrance of the garden of the Tuileries. Marie Antoinette for a few moments contemplated in silence those scenes of former happiness and grandeur. A few more revolutions of the wheels placed her at the foot of the guillotine. She mounted to the scaffold, and inadvertently trod upon the foot of the executioner.

"Pardon me," said the queen, with as much courtesy as if she had been in one of the saloons of Versailles. Kneeling, she uttered a brief prayer, and then, turning her eyes to the distant towers of the Temple, she said,

"Adieu, once again, my children; I go to rejoin your father."

She was bound to the plank, and as it sank to its place the gleaming axe slid through the groove, and the head of the queen fell into the basket. The executioner seized the gory trophy by the hair, and, walking around the scaffold, exhibited it to the crowd. One long cry of _Vive la Republique!_ arose, and the crowd dispersed.

While these fearful scenes were passing, Madame Elizabeth and the princess remained in the tower of the Temple. Their jailers were commanded to give them no information whatever. The young dauphin was imprisoned by himself.

Six months of gloom and anguish which no pen can describe passed away, when, on the night of the 9th of May, 1794, as Madame Elizabeth and the young princess, Maria Theresa, were retiring to bed, a band of armed men, with lanterns, broke into their room, and said to Madame Elizabeth,

"You must immediately go with us."

"And my niece?" anxiously inquired the meek and pious aunt, ever forgetful of self in her solicitude for others. "Can she go too?"

"We want you only now. We will take care of her by-and-by," was the unfeeling answer.

The saint-like Madame Elizabeth saw that the long-dreaded hour of separation had come, and that her tender niece was to be left, unprotected and alone, exposed to the brutality of her jailers. She pressed Maria Theresa to her bosom, and wept in uncontrollable grief. But still, endeavoring to comfort the heart-stricken child, she said,

"I shall probably soon return again, my dear Maria."

"No, you won't, citoyenne," rudely interrupted one of the officers. "You will never ascend these stairs again. So take your bonnet, and come down."

The soldiers seized her, led her down the stairs, and thrust her into a carriage. It was midnight. Driving violently through the streets, they soon reached the gateway of the Conciergerie. The Revolutionary Tribunal was, even at that hour, in session. The princess was dragged immediately to their bar. With twenty-four others of all ages and both sexes, she was condemned to die. Her crime was that she was sister of the king, and in heart hostile to the Revolution. She was led to one of the dungeons to be dressed for the scaffold. In this hour Christian faith was triumphant. Trusting in God, all her sorrows vanished, and her soul was in perfect peace.

With her twenty-two companions, all of noble birth, she was placed in the cart of the condemned, her hands bound behind her, and conducted to the guillotine. Madame Elizabeth was reserved to the last. One by one her companions were led up the scaffold before her, and she saw their heads drop into the basket. She then peacefully placed her head upon the pillow of death, and passed away, one of the purest and yet most suffering of earthly spirits, to the bosom of her God.

The young dauphin lingered for eighteen months in his cell, suffering inconceivable cruelties from his jailer, a wretch by the name of Simon, until he died on the 9th of June, 1795, in the tenth year of his age. Maria Theresa now alone remained of the family of Louis XVI. She had now been in prison more than two years. At length, so much sympathy was excited in behalf of this suffering child, that the Assembly consented to exchange her with the Austrian government for four French officers.

On the 19th of December, 1795, she was led from the Temple, and, ample arrangements having been made for her journey, she was conducted, with every mark of respect and sympathy, to the frontiers. In the Austrian court, love and admiration encircled her. But this stricken child of grief had received wounds which time could never entirely heal. A full year passed before a smile could ever be won to visit her cheek. She subsequently married her cousin, the Duke of Angouleme, son of Charles X. With the return of the Bourbons she returned to her ancestral halls of the Tuileries and Versailles. But upon the second expulsion of the Bourbons she fled with them, and died, a few years ago, at an advanced age, universally respected. Such was the wreck of the royal family of France by the storm of revolution.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 401: Thomas Jefferson, during his residence in Paris, formed a very unfavorable opinion of Marie Antoinette. Speaking of the good intentions of Louis XVI., he says, "But he had a queen of absolute sway over his weak mind and timid virtue, and of a character the reverse of his in all points. This angel, as gaudily painted in the rhapsodies of Burke with some smartness of fancy but no sound sense, was proud, disdainful of restraint, indignant at all obstacles to her will, eager in pursuit of pleasure, and firm enough to hold to her desires or perish in their wreck. Her inordinate gamblings and dissipations, with those of the Count d'Artois and others of her clique, had been a sensible item in the exhaustion of the treasury, which called into action the reforming hand of the nation; and her opposition to it, her inflexible perverseness and dauntless spirit led herself to the guillotine, drew the king on with her, and plunged the world into crimes and calamities which will for ever stain the pages of modern history. I have ever believed that had there been no queen there would have been no revolution. The king would have gone hand in hand with the wisdom of his sounder counselors, who, guided by the increased lights of the age, wished only, with the same pace, to advance the principles of their social Constitution. The deed which closed the mortal course of these sovereigns I shall neither approve nor condemn."--_Life of Jefferson, by Randall_, vol i., p. 533.

As Jefferson was intimate with La Fayette and other prominent popular leaders, it is evident that these views were those which were generally entertained of the queen at that time. It is deeply to be regretted that no subsequent developments can lead one to doubt that they were essentially correct. While we weep over the woes of the queen we must not forget that she was endeavoring with all her energy to rivet the chains of unlimited despotism upon twenty-five millions of people.]