Chapter XV: Part 15

Robespierre had said to a deputation from Aisne: "In the situation in which it now is, gangrened by corruption, and without power to remedy it, the Convention can no longer save the Republic: both will perish together. The proscription of patriots is the order of the day. For myself, I have already one foot in the tomb, in a few days I shall place the other there; the rest is in the hands of Providence."

Nevertheless he began the attack, urged forward by men who had attached their fortunes to his own, and by the disquietudes which agitated his sour and dissatisfied spirit. He could no longer put up with advice even from his most faithful friends, and the inflexible Saint-Just told him to calm himself; "Empire is for the phlegmatic." A menacing petition from the Jacobins preceded by a few hours a grand discourse from the dictator. He always reckoned on the effect of his discourses, and all the committees, one after another, had suffered from the asperity of his attacks. "The accusations are all concentrated upon me," said he; "if anyone casts patriots into prison in place of shutting up the aristocrats there, it is said that Robespierre wills it. If the numerous agents of the Committee of General Security extend their vexations and rapine in all directions, it is said that Robespierre has sent them; if a new law irritates the property-holders, it is Robespierre who is ruining them; and meanwhile, in what hands are your finances? In the hands of feuillants, of known cheats, of the Cambons, Mallarmes and Ramels. Survey the field of victory, look at Belgium; dissensions have been sown among our generals, the military aristocracy is protected, faithful generals are persecuted, the military administration is enveloped with a suspicious authority; they talk to you of war with academic lightness, as if it cost neither blood nor labor. The truths that I bring you are surely equal to epigrams.

"There exists a conspiracy against public liberty; it owes its force to a criminal coalition which intrigues in the very bosom of the Convention. That coalition has its accomplices in the Committee of General Security, and in the _bureaux_, which they control. Some members of the Committee of Public Safety are implicated in this plot; the coalition thus formed seeks to ruin patriots and the country. What is the remedy for this evil? To punish the traitors, to purify the Committee of General Security, and subordinate it to the Committee of Public Safety; to purify this committee itself, and constitute it the Government under the authority of the National Convention, which is the centre of authority and the chief judicial power. Thus would all the factions be crushed by raising on their ruins the power of justice and liberty. If it is impossible to advocate these principles without being set down as ambitious, I shall conclude that tyranny reigns among us, but not that I ought to hold my tongue; for what can be objected to a man who is right, and who knows how to die for his country? I am put here in order to combat crime, not to govern it. The time has not yet come when good men can serve their country with impunity."

They listened in silence; no applause, no complaint had interrupted the orator. For a long time the Convention had been unaccustomed to see the masters of their fortunes and their lives making appeal to their supreme authority. Their _role_ had long been limited to taking part in oratorical tournaments and voting decrees. They did not yield, however, to the seduction, and their faces remained grave and sombre. No one rose to speak, but they began to exchange a few remarks, and a murmur ran from bench to bench. The glove was thrown down, but as yet no champion advanced to take it up. At length, and as if the courage of all was reanimated at once by the same resolution, Vadier, Cambon, and Billaud-Varennes rose together to mount the tribune. Cambon had been wounded in his just pride as a financier and an honest man; he could scarcely wait his turn.

"It is time," cried he, "to speak the entire truth. Is it I who need to be accused of making myself master in any respect? The man who has made himself master of everything, the man who paralyzes our will, is he who has just spoken--Robespierre." At the same moment and from all lips came the same cries. "It is Robespierre," said Billaud-Varennes. "It is Robespierre," repeated Panis and Vadier. "Let him give an account of the crimes of the deputies whose death he demanded from the Jacobins." And as he hesitated, troubled by the vehemence of the attacks, "You who pretend to have the courage of virtue, have the courage of truth," cried Charlier to him; "name, name the individuals." In the midst of a growing confusion the Assembly revoked the order to print the discourse of Robespierre. It was to the two committees, filled with his enemies, that the denunciation of the dictator was referred.

Robespierre took refuge with the Jacobins; he was troubled by the opposition he had encountered, without being able to draw from it new forces for the struggle. He redelivered his discourse, this time welcomed with loud applause. "My friends," said he, "that which you have just heard is my dying testament. I have seen to-day that the league of the wicked is too strong for me to hope to escape it. I am ready to drink the hemlock."

"I will drink it with thee," cried David. The men of action were less resigned. Henriot spoke of marching on the Convention, but Robespierre still wished to speak; it was the course of May 31st that he wanted to follow. The hall was crowded; people entered without tickets.

"Name thy enemies," they shouted to Robespierre; "name them; we will deliver them to thee." Collot d'Herbois arrived, attempting a few protestations of devotion; he was hooted and constrained to retire. Hesitation and doubt still troubled every spirit and paralyzed every hand. Collot and Billaud-Varennes returned to the Committee of Public Safety. There they found Saint-Just, who had to read a report, but he had not brought it with him. The two new-comers apostrophized him with violence. "Thou art the accomplice of Robespierre; the project of your infamous triumvirate is to assassinate us all, but if we succumb you will not long enjoy the fruit of your crimes--the people will tear you in pieces; thy pockets are full of denunciations against us; produce thy lists." They advanced menacingly; Saint-Just shrank back, very pale. As he went out he promised to read his report next day. Neither of the two parties had as yet taken any effectual measure; they had contracted the habit of being very prodigal of words. Tallien had endeavored to gain over all that remained of the Left; three times he was repulsed by Boissy d'Anglas and his friends. As he returned once more to the charge, "Yes," they at length replied, with an ingenuousness almost cynical, "yes, if you are the strongest." Tallien was intrusted to direct the attack in the Convention.

Saint-Just had just entered; he had not appeared at the Committee of Public Safety. "You have blighted my heart," he wrote to his colleagues, "I am about to open it at the National Assembly." He presented himself, however, as reporter of the Committee. In seeing him pass, Tallien, occupied in assembling his forces, said loudly, "It is the moment; let us enter." Saint-Just commenced: "I am not of any faction; I fight against all. The course of events has brought it about that this tribune should be perhaps the Tarpeian rock to him who shall come to tell you that the members of the Government--" Tallien did not leave him time to finish; he demanded leave to speak upon a motion of order. "Nor I either; I am not of any faction; I only belong to myself and to liberty. It is I who will make you hear the truth: no good citizen can restrain his tears over the unfortunate condition of public affairs. Yesterday a member of the Government was here alone and denounced his colleagues: to-day another comes to do as much by him; these dissensions aggravate the evils of our country. I demand that the veil be torn away." Applause echoed from all parts of the hall.

Saint-Just wished to continue his speech. "Thou art not reporter," shouted the members. He remained motionless in the tribune, while Billaud-Varennes came and stood beside him. He cast his eyes over the hall. "I see here," said he, "one of the men who yesterday, at the Jacobins, promised the massacre of the National Convention; let him be arrested." The officers obeyed. "The Assembly is at the present time in danger of massacre on every hand," continued Billaud; "it will perish if it is feeble." The contagion of courage spread from man to man; all the deputies stood up waving their hats. "Be tranquil," they cried to the orator; "we will not give way." "You will tremble when you see in what hands you are," continued Billaud; "the armed force is confided to parricidal hands. The chief of the National Guard is an infamous conspirator, the accomplice of Hebert; Lavalette was a noble, driven out of the Army of the North and saved by Robespierre, whom he obeys. The Revolutionary Tribunal is in his hands; everywhere he has made his will supreme, and has sought to render himself absolute master; he has dismissed the best Revolutionary Committee of Paris, he has ceased to frequent the Committee of Public Safety since the day after the decree of the 22d Prairial, which has been so disastrous to patriots. He excites the Jacobins against the Assembly." A few feeble protestations were now heard. "There is some murmuring, I think," said the speaker, insolently.

He was about to continue the course of his accusations; but beside him in the tribune Robespierre had replaced Saint-Just. His natural pallor had become livid, rage sparkled in his glance. "I demand liberty to speak," he cried. A single shout echoed through the hall. "Down with the tyrant! Down with the tyrant!" "I demand liberty to speak," Robespierre violently repeated. Tallien dashed into the tribune. "I demand that the veil be torn away immediately," he cried; "the work is accomplished, the conspirators are unmasked. Yesterday, at the Jacobins, I saw the army of the new Cromwell formed, and I have come here armed with a poignard to pierce his heart if the Assembly has not the courage to decree his accusation. I demand the arrest of Henriot and his staff. There will be no May 31st, no proscription; national justice alone will strike the miscreants."

"I demand that Dumas be arrested," added Billaud-Varennes, "as well as Boulanger [formerly lieutenant of Ronsin in the Vendee]; he was the most ardent yesterday night at the Jacobins."

Meanwhile Robespierre was still in the tribune. Several times he strove to begin speaking, but the same cry drowned his voice, "Down with the tyrant!" The little group of those who were faithful to him, close pressed together, followed him with their eyes without speaking, without seconding his efforts; the mass of the Assembly, so docile a few days before, was agitated with a violence that became more and more hostile. Barere hesitated no longer. It is said that he had prepared two statements; one favorable to and the other hostile to Robespierre. He proposed to abolish the grade of commandant-general, and to call to the bar the mayor Fleuriot and the National agent Payan, to answer there for public tranquillity. The decree was voted; on all sides arose accusations against Robespierre, everyone hastening to denounce him. "I demand liberty to speak, to bring back this discussion to its true end and aim," said Tallien. Robespierre raised his head; "I shall know well how to bring it there," said he, in those imperious accents which formerly cowed the Assembly. Tallien continued without noticing the interruption. "The conspiracy is quite complete in the discourse read and reread yesterday. It is there that I find arms to strike down this man, whose virtue and patriotism have been so much vaunted; this man, who appeared three days only after August 10th; this man, who has abandoned his post at the Committee of Public Safety, in order to come and calumniate his colleagues. It is not necessary to discuss in any particular detail of the tyrant's career; his whole life condemns him."

Robespierre clutched at the tribune with both hands. He no longer sought aid from the "Mountain," henceforth roused against him; he turned his face toward the "Plain." "It is to you pure and virtuous men that I address myself; I don't talk with scoundrels." "Down with the tyrant!" responded the "Plain." Thuriot, who presided, rang his bell. "President of assassins," cried Robespierre, "yet once more I demand liberty to speak." His voice grew feebler. "The blood of Danton is choking him," cried Gamier de l'Aude. "Will this man long remain master of the Convention?" asked Charles Duval. "Let us make an end! A decree, a decree!" shouted Lasseau, at length. "A tyrant is hard to strike down," said Freron, in a loud voice. Robespierre remained in the tribune, turning in his hands an open knife, alone, exposed to the vengeful anger of them all. "Send me to death!" he cried to his enemies. And the voices replied: "Thou hast merited it a thousand times. Down with the tyrant!"

The decree was voted in the midst of tumult. "I ask to share the lot of my brother," cried the younger Robespierre. "It is understood," said Lanchet, "that we have voted the arrest of the two Robespierres, of Couthon, and Saint-Just." "I ask to be comprised in the decree," protested Lebas, faithfully devoted to Saint-Just. "The triumvirate of Robespierre, Couthon, and Saint-Just," said Freron, "recalls the proscriptions of Sylla. Couthon is a tiger thirsting for the blood of the National representatives; he has dared to speak at the Jacobins of five or six heads of the Convention; our corpses were to be the steps for him to mount the throne!" The paralytic made a gesture of bitter disdain. "I _mount_ the throne!" said he.

Thuriot proclaimed the decree; the acclamations that re-echoed were furious, intoxicated with the joy of triumph. "Long live liberty! Long live the Republic! Down with the tyrants; to the bar with the accused." The officers, still bewildered with such an abrupt and sudden change, had not dared to lay a hand upon the fallen dictator; rage broke forth in the ranks of the Assembly. Robespierre and his brother, Saint-Just, Lebas, descended slowly to the place lately reserved for their enemies. Couthon had just placed himself there. The decree of arrest dispersed them in different prisons; they had set out when the Assembly suspended its sitting for an instant. "Let us go out together," said Robespierre. The crowd, like the Assembly, gazed on them without acclamations and without manifesting any sympathy for them; their army was re-forming elsewhere.

The Commune of Paris and the club of the Jacobins had not laid down their arms. An officer was sent to the Hotel de Ville to announce the decree, which dismissed Henriot and summoned the Mayor to appear at the bar. He naively demanded a receipt for his message. "On a day like this we don't give receipts," replied the Mayor. "Tell Robespierre to have no fear, for we are here."

The Commune, in fact, was active, while the Committees of the Convention, stupefied at their own victories, were letting precious time slip past. Already Henriot, half drunk, galloping along the streets, stirred up the people, crying out that their faithful representatives were being massacred, delivering over to insults Merlin de Thionville, and sending to death the convoy of victims for the day. These the inhabitants of the Faubourg St. Antoine set about delivering, from compassion and from a vague instinct that the arrest of Robespierre necessarily brought about a cessation of executions. The General Council had sent to the jailers of the prisons an order to refuse to aid in the incarceration of the accused. Robespierre and his friends were successively brought to the Mairie. They found themselves again free at the head of an insurrection precipitately got up, but directed by desperate men, who felt their lives in danger if power escaped from them. Henriot, arrested for a moment, and conducted to the Committee of General Security, had been delivered by Coffinhal at the head of a handful of men. He was again on horseback, and was menacing in the hall of their sittings the Assembly, which had again come together.

The tocsin rang forth a full peal; the gates of Paris were closed. The rising tumult of the insurrection reached the ears of the deputies; each minute some inauspicious news arrived. It was said that the gunners of the National Guard, seduced by Henriot, were coming to direct their artillery against the palace. Collot d'Herbois mounted slowly to the chair and seated himself there. "Representatives," said he, with a firm voice, "the moment has come for us to die at our posts; miscreants have invaded the National palace." All had taken their places; while the spectators fled from the galleries with uproar and confusion. "I propose," said Elie Lacoste with a loud voice, "that Henriot be outlawed." At the same moment the dismissed commandant ordered his men to fire.

Fearful and troubled, the gunners still hesitated. A group of representatives went forth from the hall and cried, "What are you doing, soldiers? That man is a rebel, who has just been outlawed." The gunners had already lowered their matches, while Henriot fled at full gallop. Barras had just been named commandant of the forces in his place; seven representatives accompanied him. "Outlaw all those who shall take arms against the Convention or who shall oppose its decrees," said Barere; "as well as those who are eluding a decree of accusation or arrest." The decree was voted; an officer of the Convention boldly accepted the duty of bearing it to the Commune. The National agent, Payan, seized it from him, and for bravado read it with a loud voice before the crowd that was thronging in the hall of the Hotel de Ville. He added these words which were not in the decree, "and all those found at this moment in the galleries." The spectators disappeared as if struck with terror at the name of the law. Times were changed. The mobile waves of public opinion no longer upheld the tyrants overthrown by the accomplices who had now become their enemies.

It was, without saying it, and possibly without knowing it, the feeling of this public abandonment and reprobation which paralyzed the energy of the five accused. Robespierre had arrived pale and trembling in all his limbs; he had been tranquillized with difficulty. When Couthon, who alone was retained for a time in the prison of La Bourbe, was at last brought to the Hotel de Ville, he found the Council solely occupied with the attack on the Convention, without making any efforts for rousing the populace or for the vigorous resumption of power. "Have the armies been written to?" he asked. "In the name of whom?" said Robespierre, disheartened but calm. "Of the Convention which exists wherever we are; the rest are but a handful of factious men, who are about to be dispersed by armed force." Robespierre reflected; he shook his head. "We must write in the name of the French people," said he. The words "_Au nom du peuple_" were found in his handwriting on a sheet of paper.

It was also in the name of the people that Barras and his companions reunited the battalions of the sections which slowly assembled; some had recalled their men from the Hotel de Ville. The new military school, the Ecole de Mars, had not appeared well disposed toward Lebas, who had written to the Commandant Labreteche to hinder his pupils from ranging themselves under the banners of the Convention; the young men marched willingly at the request of Barras. The gunners collected on the Place de Greve permitted Leonard Bourdon to approach. "Go!" said Tallien to him, "and let the sun when it rises find no more traitors living." The crowd dispersed on hearing the proclamation which outlawed the Commune of Paris. The gunners abandoned their pieces; a few hours later they came to seek them to protect the Convention. "Is it possible," cried Henriot, as he came forth from the Hotel de Ville, "that these scoundrels of gunners have abandoned me? Presently they will be delivering me to the Tuileries!" He ran to announce the desertion to the assembled Council-General. Coffinhal, indignant at his cowardice, seized him by the shoulder and pushed him out by the window. The agents of the police arrested him in a sewer.

Meanwhile the section of the Gravilliers had put itself in marching order, commanded by Leonard Bourdon and by a gendarme named Meda, intelligent and devoted, and who had acquired an ascendency over those around him. He advanced toward the Hotel de Ville without encountering any obstacle. Meda cried, in mounting the flight of steps, "Long live Robespierre!" He penetrated into the hall, obstructed by the crowd; the club of the Jacobins was deserted, Legendre had had the door closed; all the leaders of the Revolution were assembled round the proscribed representatives. They were discussing and vociferating, without ardor, however, and without any true hope. Robespierre was seated at a table, his head on his left hand, his elbow supported by his knee.

Meda advanced toward him, pistols in hand. "Surrender, traitor!" he cried. Robespierre raised his head. "It is thou who art a traitor," he said, "and I will have thee shot." At the same instant the gendarme fired, fracturing the lower jaw of Robespierre. As he fell, his brother opened the window, and, passing along the cornice, leaped out upon the Place. He was dying when they came to pick him up.

Saint-Just, leaning over toward Lebas, said, "Kill me." Lebas, looking him in the face, replied: "I have something better to do," pressing the trigger of his pistol. He was dead when a fresh report resounded from the staircase; Meda, who pursued Henriot, had just drawn on Couthon; his bearer fell grievously wounded. The prisoners, formerly all-powerful, now dying or condemned, were collected in the same room; thither Robespierre and Couthon had been brought; the corpse of Lebas lay on the floor; the crowd who besieged the gates wanted to throw the wounded into the river. Couthon had great difficulty in making it understood that he was not dead; Robespierre could not speak, and was carried on a chair to the door of the Convention. A feeling of horror manifested itself in the Assembly, "No, not here! not here!" was the cry. A surgeon came to attend to the wounded man in the hall of the Committee of Public Safety; he recovered from his swoon, and walked alone toward his chair; until then he had been extended upon a table, a little deal box supporting his wounded head. The blood flowed slowly from his mouth, and at times he made a movement to wipe it away; his clothes and his face were smeared with it. Robespierre appeared insensible to the injuries of those who surrounded him; he made no complaint, inaccessible and alone in death as in life. They carried him to the Conciergerie, where Saint-Just and Couthon had just arrived. All had been outlawed; no procedure, no delay, retarded their execution. Saint-Just, looking at a table of the _Rights of Man_ hanging in the hall, said, "It is I, however, who have done that."

The Conciergerie slowly filled; with Dumas, Fleuriot, Payan, Lavalette, a large proportion of the members of the Council-General had been arrested. The prisoners already retained here were pressing to the bars of their windows, curious as to the noise that reached their ears, and the vague rumors which had already excited mortal fears among the informers. Before the room where were imprisoned Madame de Beauharnais and Madame de Fontenay (afterward Madame Tallien), a woman appeared, who, in a marked manner, held up a stone (_pierre_), enveloped it in her dress (_robe_), and then made a gesture of beheading. The prisoners comprehended, a thrill of joy pervaded their gloomy abode; all the oppressed believed themselves already delivered.

It was five o'clock, and the carts had just drawn up as usual at the gate of the prison, but this time they waited for the executioners. The procession defiled before a dense crowd; all the windows were full of spectators, all the shops were open, and joy sparkled in every countenance. Robespierre and his friends had wearied with executions the people of Paris; the sanguinary emotions to which they had been so long accustomed regained their first relish; it was Robespierre that they were about to see die. He was half stretched out in the cart, livid, and with a blood-stained cloth round his face. When the executioner snatched it from him on the scaffold, a terrible cry was heard, the first sign of suffering the condemned had given. To this shriek cries of joy responded from all around, which were repeated at each stroke from the fatal axe. In two days a hundred three executions violently sealed the vengeance of the Convocation. The justice of God and that of history bide their time.

Robespierre had successively vanquished all his enemies; clever and bold, protected and served by his reputation for virtue, seconded by the growing terror which his name inspired, he had usurped the entire power, and confiscated the Revolution for the profit of despotism. He succumbed under the blows of those who had constantly pushed him to the front; wearied or frightened by the tyranny whose vengeance they themselves dreaded. The hands which overthrew the terrible dictator were not pure hands, and revolutionary passions continued to animate many minds, but the public instincts did not err for an instant. The conquerors of the 9th Thermidor could in their turn seize upon power, and the greater number of them had had no other intention; but they might no longer spill blood at their pleasure without hindrance and without control. The culminating point of sufferings and crimes had been attained. Without wishing it and without knowing it, from envy or from fear, the "_Thermidoriens_," as they began to be called, in striking down the triumvirate had changed the course of the Revolution. The nation, always prompt to concentrate upon the name of one man its affections or its hatreds, panting and lacerated as it was, began to breathe; the prisoners ceased to expect death daily; their friends already hoped for their liberty; timid people ventured forth from their hiding-places; the bold loudly manifested their joy. People dared to wear mourning for those who had died on the scaffold; widows came forth from houses in which they had kept themselves shut up; absent ones reappeared in the bosom of their families. Robespierre was no more.

The Convention had revolted almost unanimously against the tyrant; scarcely was he struck down, when it found itself again a prey to divisions. Public demonstrations of joy and relief were manifested everywhere, and this disquieted some of the leaders of the conspiracy formerly directed against Robespierre; they had thought to overthrow him in order themselves to occupy his place, and already they perceived that two tendencies were manifesting themselves in the country. The one, feeble as yet in the Convention, and with no other point of support than the remnant of the Right, disposed to retrace the course of events, and even to visit upon their authors the iniquities committed; the other, disquieted and gloomy, determined to defend the Revolution at any hazard, even though it might be at the price of new sacrifices. The small party of the Thermidorians, Tallien at their head, began to form themselves between these two irreconcilable parties. The reaction as yet bore no definite name, it did not and could not exercise any power; desired or dreaded, it was at the bottom of every thought, it influenced all decisions, often rendering them apparently contrary. The terrible glory of Robespierre, and the crushing weight that rests upon his memory, are due to the sudden transformation effected by his death. In outward semblance, and for some time longer, the customary terms were employed, but the character of the situation was radically changed.

FOOTNOTES:

[41] Public accuser before the Revolutionary Tribunal.--ED.

[42] Decoys; literally, sheep.--ED.

[43] The royalist War of La Vendee against the Republic was now raging.--ED.

[44] "It will go." One of the most popular songs at the beginning of the Revolution (1789), said to have been suggested by Benjamin Franklin, who, in speaking of the progress of the American Revolution, said: "Ca ira" meaning, "It will succeed."--ED.

THE DOWNFALL OF POLAND

A.D. 1794

SIR ARCHIBALD ALISON

That the French Revolution was not more actively interfered
with by the powers of Eastern Europe was largely due to the
fact that they were all busy with a spoliation of their own.
When Kosciuszko, the great Polish patriot and hero, failed
in his endeavor to rescue his country from foreign thraldom,
the doom of the ancient kingdom was sealed. In the following
year (1795) the third and final partition of Poland--between
Russia, Austria, and Prussia--was made. This destruction of
a heroic nationality was bewailed by the friends of liberty
throughout the world, and it was told in passionate regret
how "Freedom shrieked, as Kosciuszko fell."

Although brave and liberty-loving, the people of Poland had
not kept pace with political progress among the more
advanced nations. In the fourteenth century Poland had risen
to her greatest power. Her political character, from ancient
days, was peculiar, being at once monarchical and
republican. But she had a feudalism of her own, which
survived long after the European feudal system was outgrown
by other nations. Her political system was cumbrous and
lacking in unity. The first partition, by the powers above
named (1772), left her in still worse disorder. A new
constitution proved unsatisfactory, one party favoring it,
another seeking to overthrow it. Russian interference was
invoked, the Polish patriots resisted, but in 1792 they were
defeated, and Russia, with Prussia, made the second
partition of Poland in 1793.

In 1794 Kosciuszko was made commander-in-chief and dictator
of Poland. The insurrection began with the murder of the
Russians in Warsaw. But the Poles suffered from their own
dissensions as before, and met with the disaster that led to
their national extinction.

There is a certain degree of calamity which overwhelms the courage; but there is another, which, by reducing men to desperation, sometimes leads to the greatest and most glorious enterprises. To this latter state the Poles were now reduced. Abandoned by all the world, distracted with internal divisions, destitute alike of fortresses and resources, crushed in the grasp of gigantic enemies, the patriots of that unhappy country, consulting only their own courage, resolved to make a last effort to deliver it from its enemies. In the midst of their internal convulsions, and through all the prostration of their national strength, the Poles had never lost their individual courage, or the ennobling feelings of civil independence. They were still the redoubtable hussars who broke the Mussulman ranks under the walls of Vienna, and carried the Polish eagles in triumph to the towers of the Kremlin; whose national cry had so often made the Osmanlis tremble, and who had boasted in their hours of triumph that if the heaven itself were to fall they would support it on the points of their lances. A band of patriots at Warsaw resolved at all hazards to attempt the restoration of their independence, and they made choice of Kosciuszko, who was then at Leipsic, to direct their efforts.[45]

This illustrious hero, who had received the rudiments of military education in France, had afterward served, not without glory, in the War of Independence in America. Uniting to Polish enthusiasm French ability, the ardent friend of liberty and the enlightened advocate for order, brave, loyal, and generous, he was in every way qualified to head the last struggle of the oldest republic in existence for its national independence. But a nearer approach to the scene of danger convinced him that the hour for action had not yet arrived. The passions, indeed, were awakened; the national enthusiasm was full; but the means of resistance were inconsiderable, and the old divisions of the Republic were not so healed as to afford the prospect of the whole national strength being exerted in its defence. But the public indignation could brook no delay; several regiments stationed at Pultusk revolted, and moved toward Galicia; and Kosciuszko, albeit despairing of success, determined not to be absent in the hour of danger, hastened to Cracow, where on March 3d he closed the gates and proclaimed the insurrection.

Having, by means of the regiments which had revolted, and the junction of some bodies of armed peasants--imperfectly armed, indeed, but full of enthusiasm--collected a force of five thousand men, Kosciuszko left Cracow, and boldly advanced into the open country. He encountered a body of three thousand Russians at Raslowice, and, after an obstinate engagement, succeeded in routing it with great slaughter. This action, inconsiderable in itself, had important consequences; the Polish peasants exchanged their scythes for the arms found on the field of battle, and the insurrection, encouraged by this first gleam of success, soon communicated itself to the adjoining provinces. In vain Stanislaus disavowed the acts of his subjects; the flame of independence spread with the rapidity of lightning, and soon all the freemen in Poland were in arms. Warsaw was the first great point where the flame broke out. The intelligence of the success at Raslowice was received there on April 12th and occasioned the most violent agitation. For some days afterward it was evident that an explosion was at hand; and at length, at daybreak on the morning of the 17th, the brigade of Polish guards, under the direction of their officers, attacked the governor's house and the arsenal, and was speedily joined by the populace. The Russian and Prussian troops in the neighborhood of the capital were about seven thousand men; and after a prolonged and obstinate contest in the streets for thirty-six hours, they were driven across the Vistula with the loss of above three thousand men in killed and prisoners, and the flag of independence was hoisted on the towers of Warsaw.

One of the most embarrassing circumstances in the situation of the Russians was the presence of above sixteen thousand Poles in their ranks, who were known to sympathize strongly with these heroic efforts of their fellow-citizens. Orders were immediately despatched to Suvaroff to assemble a corps and disarm the Polish troops scattered in Podolia before they could unite in any common measures for their defence. By the energy and activity of this great commander, the Poles were disarmed brigade after brigade, and above twelve thousand men reduced to a state of inaction without much difficulty--a most important operation, not only by destroying the nucleus of a powerful army, but by stifling the commencement of the insurrection in Volhynia and Podolia. How different might have been the fate of Poland and Europe had they been enabled to join the ranks of their countrymen!

Kosciuszko and his countrymen did everything that courage or energy could suggest to put on foot a formidable force to resist their adversaries; a provisional government was established and in a short time a force of forty thousand men was raised. But this force, though highly honorable to the patriotism of the Poles, was inconsiderable when compared with the vast armies which Russia and Prussia could bring up for their subjugation. Small as the army was, its maintenance was too great an effort for the resources of the kingdom, which, torn by intestine factions, without commerce, harbors, or manufactures; having no national credit, and no industrious class of citizens but the Jews, now felt the fatal effects of its long career of democratic anarchy. The population of the country, composed entirely of unruly gentlemen and ignorant serfs, was totally unable at that time to furnish those numerous supplies of intelligent officers which are requisite for the formation of an efficient military force; while the nobility, however formidable on horseback in the Hungarian or Turkish wars, were less to be relied on in a contest with regular troops, where infantry and artillery constituted the great strength of the army, and courage was unavailing without the aid of science and military discipline.

The central position of Poland, in the midst of its enemies, would have afforded great military advantages, had its inhabitants possessed a force capable of turning it to account; that is, if they had had, like Frederick the Great in the Seven Years' War, a hundred fifty thousand regular troops--which the population of the country could easily have maintained--and a few well-fortified towns, to arrest the enemy in one quarter, while the bulk of the national force was precipitated upon them in another. The glorious stand made by the nation in 1831, with only thirty thousand regular soldiers at the commencement of the insurrection, and no fortifications but those of Warsaw and Modlin, proves what immense advantages this central position affords, and what opportunities it offers to military genius like that of Skrynecki to inflict the most severe wounds even on a superior and well-conducted antagonist. But all these advantages were wanting to Kosciuszko; and it augments our admiration of his talents, and of the heroism of his countrymen, that with such inconsiderable means they made so honorable a stand for their national independence.

No sooner was the King of Prussia informed of the revolution at Warsaw than he moved forward at the head of thirty thousand men to besiege that city; while Suvaroff, with forty thousand veterans, was preparing to enter the southeastern parts of the kingdom. Aware of the necessity of striking a blow before the enemy's forces were united, Kosciuszko advanced with twelve thousand men to attack the Russian General, Denisoff; but, upon approaching his corps, he discovered that it had united to the army commanded by the King in person. Unable to face such superior forces, he immediately retired, but was attacked next morning at daybreak near Sekoczyre by the allies, and after a gallant resistance his army was routed, and Cracow fell into the hands of the conquerors. This check was the more severely felt, as about the same time General Zayonscheck was defeated at Chelne and obliged to recross the Vistula, leaving the whole country on the right bank of that river in the hands of the Russians.

These disasters produced a great impression at Warsaw; the people as usual ascribed them to treachery, and insisted that the leaders should be brought to punishment; and although the chiefs escaped, several persons in an inferior situation were arrested and thrown into prison. Apprehensive of some subterfuge if the accused were regularly brought to trial, the burghers assembled in tumultuous bodies, forced the prisons, erected scaffolds in the streets, and after the manner of the assassins of September 2d, put above twelve persons to death with their own hands. These excesses affected with the most profound grief the pure heart of Kosciuszko; he flew to the capital, restored order, and delivered over to punishment the leaders of the revolt. But the resources of the country were evidently unequal to the struggle; the paper money, which had been issued in their extremity, was at a frightful discount; and the sacrifices required of the nation were, on that account, the more severely felt, so that hardly a hope of ultimate success remained.

The combined Russian and Prussian armies, about thirty-five thousand strong, now advanced against the capital, where Kosciuszko occupied an intrenched camp with twenty-five thousand men. During the whole of July and August the besiegers were engaged in fruitless attempts to drive the Poles into the city; and at length a great convoy, with artillery and stores for a regular siege, which was ascending the Vistula, having been captured by a gentleman named Minewsky at the head of a body of peasants, the King of Prussia raised the siege, leaving a portion of his sick and stores in the hands of the patriots. After this success the insurrection spread immensely and the Poles mustered nearly eighty thousand men under arms. But they were scattered over too extensive a line of country in order to make head against their numerous enemies--a policy tempting by the prospect it holds forth of exciting an extensive insurrection, but ruinous in the end, by exposing the patriotic forces to the risk of being beaten in detail. Scarcely had the Poles recovered from their intoxication at the raising of the siege of Warsaw when intelligence was received of the defeat of Sizakowsky, who commanded a corps of ten thousand men beyond the Bug, by the Russian grand army under Suvaroff. This celebrated General, to whom the principal conduct of the war was now committed, followed up his successes with the utmost vigor. The retreating column was again assailed on the 19th by the victorious Russians, and after a glorious resistance driven into the woods between Janoff and Biala, with the loss of four thousand men and twenty-eight pieces of cannon. Scarcely three thousand Poles, with Sizakowsky at their head, escaped into Siedlice.

Upon receiving the accounts of this disaster, Kosciuszko resolved, by drawing together all his detachments, to fall upon Fersen before he joined Suvaroff and the other corps which were advancing against the capital. With this view he ordered General Poninsky to join him, and marched with all his disposable forces to attack the Russian General, who was stationed at Maccowice; but fortune on this occasion cruelly deceived the Poles. Arrived in the neighborhood of Fersen's position he found that Poninsky had not yet come up; and the Russian commander, overjoyed at this circumstance, resolved immediately to attack him. In vain Kosciuszko despatched courier after courier to Poninsky to advance to his relief. The first was intercepted by the Cossacks, and the second did not reach that leader in time to enable him to take a decisive part in the approaching combat. Nevertheless the Polish commander, aware of the danger of retreating with inexperienced troops in presence of a disciplined and superior enemy, determined to give battle on the following day, and drew up his little army with as much skill as the circumstances would admit.

The forces on the opposite sides in this action, which decided the fate of Poland, were nearly equal in point of numbers; but the advantages of discipline and equipment were decisively on the side of the Russians. Kosciuszko commanded about ten thousand men, a part of whom were recently raised and imperfectly disciplined; while Fersen was at the head of twelve thousand veterans, including a most formidable body of cavalry. Nevertheless, the Poles in the centre and right wing made a glorious defence; but the left, which Poninsky should have supported, having been overwhelmed by the cavalry under Denisoff, the whole army was, after a severe struggle, thrown into confusion. Kosciuszko, Sizakowsky, and other gallant chiefs in vain made the most heroic efforts to rally the broken troops. They were wounded, struck down, and made prisoners by the Cossacks who swarmed over the field of battle; while the remains of the army, now reduced to seven thousand men, fell back in confusion toward Warsaw.

After the fall of Kosciuszko, who sustained in his single person the fortunes of the Republic, nothing but a series of disasters overtook the Poles. The Austrians, taking advantage of the general confusion, entered Galicia, and occupied the palatinates of Lublin and Sandomir; while Suvaroff, pressing forward toward the capital, defeated Mokronowsky, who, at the head of twelve thousand men, strove to retard the advance of that redoubtable commander. In vain the Poles made the utmost efforts; they were routed with the loss of four thousand men; and the patriots, though now despairing of success, resolved to sell their lives dearly, and shut themselves up in Warsaw to await the approach of the conqueror. Suvaroff was soon at the gates of Praga, the eastern suburb of that capital, where twenty-six thousand men and one hundred pieces of cannon defended the bridge of the Vistula and the approach to the capital. To assault such a position with forces hardly superior was evidently a hazardous enterprise; but the approach of winter, rendering it indispensable that if anything was done at all it should be immediately attempted, Suvaroff, who was habituated to successful assaults in the Turkish wars, resolved to storm the city. On November 2d the Russians made their appearance before the glacis of Praga, and Suvaroff, having in great haste completed three powerful batteries and breached the defences with imposing celerity, made his dispositions for a general assault on the following day.

The conquerors of Ismail advanced to the attack in the same order which they had adopted on that memorable occasion. Seven columns at daybreak approached the ramparts, rapidly filled up the ditches with their fascines, broke down the defences, and pouring into the intrenched camp carried destruction into the ranks of the Poles. In vain the defenders did their utmost to resist the torrent. The wooden houses of Praga speedily took fire, and amid the shouts of the victors and the cries of the inhabitants the Polish battalions were borne backward to the edge of the Vistula. The multitude of fugitives speedily broke down the bridges; and the citizens of Warsaw beheld with unavailing anguish their defenders on the other side perishing in the flames, or by the sword of the conquerors. Ten thousand soldiers fell on the spot, nine thousand were made prisoners, and above twelve thousand citizens, of every age and sex, were put to the sword--a dreadful instance of carnage which has left a lasting stain on the name of Suvaroff and which Russia expiated in the conflagration of Moscow. The tragedy was at an end. Warsaw capitulated two days afterward; the detached parties of the patriots melted away, and Poland was no more. On November 6th Suvaroff made his triumphant entry into the blood-stained capital. King Stanislaus was sent into Russia, where he ended his days in captivity, and the final partition of the monarchy was effected.

FOOTNOTES:

[45] Thaddeus Kosciuszko was born in 1755, of a poor but noble family, and received the first elements of his education in the corps of cadets at Warsaw. There he was early distinguished by his diligence, ability, and progress in mathematical science, insomuch that he was selected as one of the four students annually chosen at that institution to travel at the expense of the State. He went abroad, accordingly, and spent several years in France, chiefly engaged in military studies; from whence he returned in 1778, with ideas of freedom and independence unhappily far in advance of his country at that period. As war did not seem likely at that period in the north of Europe, he set sail for America, then beginning the War of Independence, and was employed by Washington as his adjutant, and distinguished himself greatly in that contest beside Lafayette, Lameth, Dumas, and so many of the other ardent and enthusiastic spirits from the Old World. He returned to Europe on the termination of the war, decorated with the order of Cincinnatus, and lived in retirement till 1789, when, as King Stanislaus was adopting some steps with a view to the assertion of national independence, he was appointed major-general by the Polish Diet. In 1791 he joined with enthusiasm in the formation of the Constitution which was proclaimed on May 5th of that year.--ED.

THE RISE OF NAPOLEON

THE FRENCH CONQUEST OF ITALY

A.D. 1796

SIR WALTER SCOTT

Napoleon, regarded by many as the most remarkable man of
modern times, took control of the forces of the French
Revolution and directed them toward purposes little dreamed
of by the earlier leaders of the uprising. The excesses of
the Reign of Terror had caused such a reaction that even in
Paris men began to talk of restoring the monarchy, and in
1795 a new tumult began, due in part to the efforts of the
Royalists. Once more a mob marched against the hall of the
National Convention; and the general of the national troops
in the city, uncertain what to do, gladly left affairs in
the hands of a subordinate, one of the few remaining French
officers who had received a regular military training under
the old _regime_. This lesser general, a young man of
twenty-six, was Napoleon Bonaparte, who had already won
repute as a military engineer. Bonaparte met the mob as no
Paris mob had yet been met. He had a row of cannon loaded
with grape-shot, and these were fired to kill. Many of the
rabble fell, the rest fled in dismay. "That whiff of
grape-shot," says Carlyle, "ended the Revolution."

Bonaparte, made much of by the Convention he had defended,
was appointed commander of the army fighting on the Italian
frontier. Ever since Valmy, Revolutionary France had been
compelled to defend herself against civil war within and the
attacks of the foreign monarchs, friends and relatives of
Louis XVI, from without. The tremendous energy of her
aroused people had made her equal to the task. She had
conquered Holland and the German lands west of the Rhine,
she had forced both Prussia and Spain to sue for peace. But
England from her island throne, and Austria, the most
powerful of France's continental foes, the most closely
related to the murdered Queen Marie Antoinette, were still
threatening the French borders. The Austrians held most of
Italy and it was against them that Napoleon was despatched.
He was the first to carry the war away from the French
border line and into the heart of the countries of her foes.

France was starving; and Napoleon from the treasuries of
Italy sent her unlimited supplies; sent her splendid works
of art. No wonder the impoverished people hailed him with
delight as their preserver. No wonder the purer aspirations
after liberty perished in the passion for conquest, spoils,
and that Frenchest of French vanities, "_la gloire_."

Napoleon has himself observed that no country in the world is more distinctly marked out by its natural boundaries than Italy. The Alps seem a barrier erected by nature herself, on which she has inscribed in gigantic characters "Here let ambition be staid." Yet this tremendous circumvallation of mountains, as it could not prevent the ancient Romans from breaking out to desolate the world, so it has been in like manner found, ever since the days of Hannibal, unequal to protect Italy herself from invasion. The French nation, in the times of which we treat, spoke indeed of the Alps as a natural boundary, so far as to authorize them to claim all which lay on the western side of these mountains, as naturally pertaining to their dominions; but they never deigned to respect them as such when the question respected their invading, on their own part, the territories of other states which lay on or beyond the formidable frontier. They assumed the law of natural limits as an unchallengeable rule when it made in favor of France, but never allowed it to be quoted against her interest.

During the Revolutionary War, the general fortune of battle had varied from time to time in the neighborhood of these mighty boundaries. The King of Sardinia possessed almost all the fortresses which command the passes on these mountains, and had therefore been said to wear the keys of the Alps at his girdle. He had indeed lost his dukedom of Savoy, and the county of Nice, in the last campaign; but he still maintained in opposition to the French a very considerable army, and was supported by his powerful ally the Emperor of Austria, always vigilant regarding that rich and beautiful portion of his dominions which lies in the North of Italy. The frontiers of Piedmont were therefore covered by a strong Austro-Sardinian army, opposed to the French armies to which Napoleon had been just named commander-in-chief. A strong Neapolitan force was also to be added, so that in general numbers their opponents were much superior to the French; but a great part of this force was cooped up in garrisons which could not be abandoned.

It may be imagined with what delight the General, scarce aged twenty-six, advanced to an independent field of glory and conquest, confident in his own powers, and in the perfect knowledge of the country which he had acquired, when, by his scientific plans of the campaign, he had enabled General Dumorbion to drive the Austrians back, and obtain possession of the Col di Tenda, Saorgio, and the gorges of the higher Alps. Bonaparte's achievements had hitherto been under the auspices of others. He made the dispositions before Toulon, but it was Dugommier who had the credit of taking the place. Dumorbion, as we have just said, obtained the merit of the advantages in Piedmont. Even in the civil turmoil of 13th Vendemiaire, his actual services had been overshaded by the official dignity of Barras, as commander-in-chief. But if he reaped honor in Italy the success would be exclusively his own; and that proud heart must have throbbed to meet danger upon such terms; that keen spirit have toiled to discover the means of success.