History of the Girondists Part 26

"Indifference and contempt," said he, "are the fittest weapons with which to combat this pest. Could Europe stoop so low, as to quarrel with the French nation, because some few demagogues and madmen dwell amongst them, and would honour them so far as to reply to them by cannon b.a.l.l.s?"

In a despatch of the prince de Kaunitz, addressed to all the European cabinets, was this phrase,--"Latest events give us cause to hope, for it is evident that the majority of the French nation, struck by the evils they are preparing for themselves, are returning to more moderate principles, and are inclined to restore to the throne the dignity and authority which form the bases of monarchical government." The a.s.sembly remained silent from suspicion, and this suspicion was awakened whilst diplomatic notes and counter notes were exchanged between the cabinet of the Tuileries and the cabinet of Vienna. But no sooner had M. de Lessart descended from the tribune, and the a.s.sembly closed the sitting, than the murmurs of mistrust were changed into loud and sullen exclamations of indignation.

II.

The Jacobins burst out into threats against the perfidious minister and the court, who united in a treasonable combination, called the Austrian Committee, concerted counter-revolutionary plans in the Tuileries, made signals to the enemies of the nation from the very foot of the throne, and secretly communicated with the court of Vienna, and dictated the language necessary to intimidate France. The Memoirs of Hardenberg, the Prussian minister, which have since been published, prove that these accusations were not entirely the dreams of the demagogues; and that in order to promote peace the two courts did all in their power to adopt the same tone with each other. It was resolved that M. de Lessart should be impeached, and Brissot, the leader of the diplomatic committee, the advocate of war, undertook to prove his pretended crimes.

The const.i.tutional party abandoned M. de Lessart, without any defence, to the hatred of the Jacobins; this party had no suspicions, but vengeance to wreak upon M. de Lessart. The king had suddenly dismissed M. de Narbonne, the rival of this minister in the council. M. de Narbonne, feeling himself menaced, caused La Fayette to write a letter, in which he conjured him to remain at his post so long as the perils of his country rendered it necessary.

This step, of which M. de Narbonne was cognisant, appeared to the king an insolent act of oppression against his liberty and that of the const.i.tution. The popularity of M. de Narbonne diminished proportionately as that of the Girondists became greater and inspired them with more audacity. The a.s.sembly began to change its applause into murmurs when he mounted the tribune, whence a short time before he had been shamefully forced to withdraw, because he had wounded the plebeian susceptibility by appealing to the _most distinguished_ members of the a.s.sembly. The aristocracy of his rank showed itself beneath his uniform, whilst the people wished for members of its own stamp in the councils; and thus between the offended king and the suspicious Girondists, M. de Narbonne fell. The king dismissed him, and he went to serve in the army he had organised. His friends did not conceal their resentment. Madame de Stael lost in him her ambition and her ideal at the same time; but she did not abandon all hope of regaining for M. de Narbonne the confidence of the king, and of seeing him play a great political part.

She had sought to render him a Mirabeau, she now dreamed of making him a Monk. From this day she conceived the idea of rescuing the king from the power of the Jacobins and Girondists--of carrying him off through the agency of M. de Narbonne and the const.i.tutionalists--of re-seating him on the throne--of crushing the extreme parties, and establishing her ideal government--a liberal aristocracy. A woman of genius, her genius had the prejudices of her birth; a plebeian, who had found her way to court, it was necessary for her to have patricians between the throne and the people. The first blow at M. de Lessart was dealt by a man who frequented the _salon_ of Madame de Stael.

III.

But a more terrible and more unexpected blow fell on M. de Lessart: the very day on which he thus surrendered himself to his enemies, the unexpected death of the emperor Leopold was known at Paris, and with this prince expired the last faint hope of peace, for his wisdom died with him; and who could tell what new policy would arise from his tomb?

The agitation that prevailed filled every one with terror, and this was soon changed into hatred against the unfortunate minister of Louis XVI.

He had neither known, it was said, how to profit by the pacific disposition of Leopold whilst this prince yet lived, nor to forestall the hostile designs of those who succeeded him in the dominion of Germany. Every thing furnished fresh accusation against him, even fatality and death.

At the moment of his decease all was ready for hostility. Two hundred thousand men formed a line from Bale to the Scheldt. The duke of Brunswick, on whom rested every hope of the coalition, was at Berlin, giving his last advice to the king of Prussia, and receiving his final orders. Beschoffwerder, the general and confidant of the king of Prussia, arrived at Vienna to concert with the emperor the point and time of attack. On his arrival the prince de Kaunitz hastily informed him of the sudden illness of the emperor. The 27th Leopold was in perfect health, and received the Turkish envoy; on the 28th he was in the agonies of death. His stomach swelled, and convulsive vomitings put him to intense torture. The doctors, alarmed at these symptoms, ordered copious bleeding, which appeared to allay his sufferings; but they enervated the vital force of the prince, who had weakened himself by debauchery. He fell asleep for a short time, and the doctors and ministers withdrew; but he soon awoke in fresh convulsions, and died in the presence of a valet de chambre, named Brunetti, in the arms of the empress, who had just arrived.

The intelligence of the death of the emperor, the more terrible as it was so unexpected, spread abroad instantly, and surprised Germany at the very moment of a crisis. Terror for the future destiny of Germany was joined to pity for the empress and her children: the palace was all confusion and despair; the ministers felt power s.n.a.t.c.hed from their grasp; the grandees of the court, without waiting for their carriages, hurried to the court, in the disorder of astonishment, and grief and sobs were heard in the vestibules and staircases that led to the apartments of the empress. At this moment, this princess, without having time to a.s.sume black, appeared, bathed in tears, surrounded by her numerous children, and leading them to the new king of the Romans, the eldest son of Leopold, she threw herself at his feet, and implored his protection for these orphans. Francis I., mingling his tears with those of his mother and brothers, one of whom was only four years old, raised the empress, and embracing the children, vowed to be a second father to them.

IV.

This catastrophe was inexplicable to scientific men; politicians suspected some mystery; the people poison. These reports of poison, however, have neither been confirmed nor disproved by time. The most probable opinion is that this prince had made an immoderate use of drugs which he compounded himself, in order to recruit his const.i.tution, shattered by debauchery and excess. Lagusius, his chief physician, who had a.s.sisted at the autopsy of the body, declared he discovered traces of poison. Who had administered it? The Jacobins and _emigres_ mutually accused each other, the one party to disembarra.s.s themselves of the armed chief of the empire, and thus spread anarchy amongst the federation of Germany, of which the emperor was the bond that united them; the others had slain in Leopold the philosopher prince, who temporised with France, and who r.e.t.a.r.ded the war. A female was spoken of who had attracted the notice of the emperor at the last _bal masque_ at the court, and it was said that this stranger, favoured by her disguise, had given him poisoned sweetmeats, without its being possible to discover from whose hand they came. Others accused the beautiful Florentine, Donna Livia, his mistress, who, according to them, was the fanatical instrument of a few priests. These anecdotes are the mere chimeras of surprise and sorrow, for the people can never believe that the events which have had so vast an influence over their destiny are merely natural. But crimes, universally approved, are rare; opinion may desire, but never commits them. Crime, like ambition or vengeance, is personal: there was neither ambition nor vengeance around Leopold,--nought but a few female jealousies; and his attachments were too numerous and too fugitive to kindle in the heart of a mistress that love that arms the hand with poison or poignard. He loved at the same time Donna Livia, whom he had brought with him from Tuscany, and who was known in Europe as "La belle Florentine," Prokache, a young Polish girl, the charming countess of Walkenstein, and others of an inferior rank.

The countess of Walkenstein had for some time past been his avowed mistress; he had given her a million (francs) in drafts on the bank of Vienna, and he had even presented her to the empress, who forgave him his weaknesses, on condition that he gave no one his political confidence, which up to that time he had confided to her alone. He was a devoted admirer of the fair s.e.x, and it would be necessary to refer to the most shameful epochs of Roman history to find any emperor whose life was as scandalous as his own; his cabinet was found after his death to be filled with valuable stuffs, rings, fans, trinkets, and even a quant.i.ty of rouge. These traces of debauch made the empress blush when she visited them with the new emperor. "My son," said she, "you have before you the sad proof of your father's disorderly life, and of my long afflictions: remember nothing of them except my forgiveness and his virtues. Imitate his great qualities, but beware lest you fall into the same vices, in order that you may not, in your turn, put to the blush those who scrutinise your life."

The prince in Leopold was superior to the man: he had made trial of a philosophical government in Tuscany, and this happy country yet blesses his memory; but his genius was not suited for a more enlarged field. The struggle, forced on him by the French Revolution, compelled him to seize on the helm in Germany; but he did so without energy. He opposed the temporising policy of diplomacy to the contagion of new ideas; he was the Fabius of kings. To afford the Revolution time was to ensure it the victory. It could be only vanquished by surprise, and stifled in its own stronghold; the genius of the people was its negotiator and accomplice, and its increasing popularity was its army. Its ideas found new adherents in princes, people, and cabinets. Leopold would have given it a share, but the share of the Revolution is the conquest of every thing that opposes its principles. The principles of Leopold could conciliate the Revolution, but his power as the arbitrator of Germany could not conciliate the conquering power of France. His part was a double one, and his position false. He died at a right moment for his renown; he paralysed Germany, and checked the impetus of France, and, by disappearing between the two, he left the two principles to clash together, and destiny to take its course.

V.

Opinion, already agitated by the death of Leopold, received another shock from the news of the tragical death of the king of Sweden, who was a.s.sa.s.sinated on the night of the 16th of March, 1792, at a masked ball.

Death seemed to strike, one after another, all the enemies of France.

The Jacobins saw its hand in all these catastrophes, and even boasted of them through their most audacious demagogues; but they proclaimed more crimes than they committed, and their wishes alone shared in these a.s.sa.s.sinations.

Gustavus, this hero of the counter-revolution, this chevalier of aristocracy, fell by the blows of his n.o.bility. When he was ready to set forth on the expedition he projected against France, he had a.s.sembled his diet to ensure the tranquillity of the kingdom during his absence.

His vigorous measures had put down the malcontents; yet it was foretold to him, like Caesar, that the ides of March would be a critical period of his destiny. A thousand traces revealed a plot, and his intended a.s.sa.s.sination was rumoured over all Germany before the blow was struck.

These rumours are the forerunners of projected crimes: some indication escapes the heart of the conspirator, and it is by this means that the event is predicted before it happens.

The king of Sweden, warned by his numerous friends, who entreated him to be upon his guard, replied, like Caesar, that the stroke when once received was less painful than the perpetual dread of receiving it, and that if he listened to all these warnings, he could no longer drink a gla.s.s of water without trembling. He braved danger, and showed himself more than ever to the people. The conspirators had made several fruitless attempts during the Diet, but chance had preserved the king.

Since his return to Stockholm, the king frequently went to pa.s.s the day alone at his chateau at Haga, a league from the capital. Three of the conspirators had approached the chateau, at five o'clock on a dark winter's evening, armed with carbines, and ready to fire on the king.

The apartment he occupied was on the ground floor, and the lighted candles in the library enabled them to see their victim. Gustavus, on his return from hunting, undressed, and fell asleep in an arm chair, within a few feet of the a.s.sa.s.sins. Whether it was that they were alarmed by the sound of footsteps, or that the solemn contrast of the peaceful slumber of this prince with the death that threatened him, softened their hearts, they again abandoned their project, and only revealed this circ.u.mstance on their trial after the a.s.sa.s.sination, when the king acknowledged the truth and precision of their details. They were ready to renounce their intention, discouraged by a sort of divine intervention, and by the fatigue of having so long meditated this design in vain, when a fatal occasion tempted them too strongly, and made them resolve on the murder of the king.

VI.

A masked ball was given at the opera, which the king was to attend, and the conspirators resolved to take advantage of the mystery of the disguise and tumult of the fete to strike the blow, without allowing the hand to appear. A short time before the ball the king supped with a few of his most intimate courtiers. A letter was brought to him, which he opened, and reading it jestingly, then threw it on the table. The anonymous writer informed him that he was neither a friend to his person nor an approver of his policy, but that as a loyal enemy he desired to inform him of the death that menaced him. He counselled him not to go to the ball; or, if he persisted, he advised him to mistrust the crowd that might press around him, for that was the signal for the blow to be aimed at him. That the king might not doubt the warning thus given, he recalled to his memory his dress, gesture, his sleep in his apartment of Haga in the evening that he had believed himself quite alone. Such convincing proofs must have struck and intimidated the mind of the prince, but his intrepid soul made him brave, not only the warning, but death: he rose and went to the ball.

VII.

Scarcely had he reached the apartment, when he was surrounded, as he had been warned, by a group of masks, and separated, as if by preconcerted movement, from the body of officers who were in attendance. At this moment an invisible hand fired at his back a pistol loaded with slugs.

The blow struck him in the left flank above the hip. Gustavus fell into the arms of Count d'Armsfeld, his favourite. The report of the fire arm, the smell of powder, the cries of "_fire_," which resounded through the apartment, the confusion which followed the king's fall, the real or feigned anxiety of persons who hurried forward to save him, favoured the escape of the a.s.sa.s.sins: the pistol had been dropped on the ground.

Gustavus did not lose his presence of mind for a moment. He ordered the doors to be immediately closed, and desired all to unmask. Carried by his guards into an apartment in the opera-house, he was confided to his surgeons. He admitted some of the foreign ministers into his presence, and spoke to them with all the calmness of a strong mind. Even his pain did not inspire him with any feeling of vengeance. Generous even in death, he demanded anxiously if the a.s.sa.s.sin had been apprehended. He was told that he was unknown. "Oh G.o.d, grant," he said, "that he may not be discovered."

Whilst the king was receiving the first attentions, and being conveyed to the palace, the guards stationed at the doors of the ball-room compelled all to take off their masks, asked their names, and searched their persons: nothing suspicious was discovered. Four of the chief conspirators, men of the highest n.o.bility in Stockholm, had succeeded in escaping from the apartment in the first confusion produced by the report of the pistol, and before the doors had been closed. Of nine confidants or accomplices in the crime, eight had already gone away without exciting any suspicion: only one was left in the apartment, who affected a slow step and calm demeanour as guarantees of his innocence.

He left the apartment last of all, raising his mask before the officer of police, and saying, as he looked steadfastly at him, "As for me, sir, I hope you do not suspect me." This man was the a.s.sa.s.sin.

They allowed him to pa.s.s; the crime had no other evidence than itself, a pistol, and a knife, sharpened as a poignard, found beneath the masks and flowers on the floor of the opera. The weapon revealed the hand. A gunsmith at Stockholm identified the pistol, and declared he had recently sold it to a Swedish gentleman, formerly an officer in the guards, named Ankastroem. They found Ankastroem at his house, neither thinking of exculpation nor of flight. He confessed the weapon and the crime. An unjust judgment, he averred, in which however the king spared his life, the wearisomeness of an existence which he had cherished to employ and make ill.u.s.trious at its close for his country's advantage, the hope, if he succeeded, of a national recompence worthy of the deed, had, he declared, inspired this project; and he claimed to himself alone the glory or disgrace. He denied all plot and all accomplices. Beneath the fanatic he masked the conspirator.

He failed in his part, after a few days, beneath the truth and his remorse. He avowed the conspiracy, named the guilty, and the reward of his crime. It was a sum of money, that had been weighed, rix-dollar by rix-dollar, against the blood of Gustavus. The plot, planned six months before, had been thrice frustrated, by chance or destiny--at the diet of Jessen, at Stockholm, and at Haga. The king killed, all his favourites--all the instruments of his government--must be sacrificed to the vengeance of the senate and the restoration of the aristocracy.

Their heads were to have been carried at the tops of pikes, in the streets of the capital, in imitation of the popular punishments of Paris. The duke of Sudermania, the king's brother, was to be sacrificed. The young monarch, handed over to the conspirators, was to serve as a pa.s.sive instrument to re-establish the ancient const.i.tution, and legitimate their crime. The princ.i.p.al conspirators belonged to the first families in Sweden; the shame of their lost power had debased their ambition, even to crime. They were the Count de Bibbing, Count de Horn, Baron d'Erensward, and Colonel Lilienhorn. Lilienhorn, commandant of the guards, drawn from misery and obscurity by the king's favour, promoted to the first rank in the army, and admitted to closest intimacy in the palace, confessed his ingrat.i.tude and his crime; seduced, he declared, by the ambition of commanding, during the trouble, the national guard of Stockholm. The part played by La Fayette in Paris seemed to him the ideal of the citizen and the soldier. He could not resist the fascination of the perspective; half-way in the conspiracy, he had endeavoured to render it impossible, even whilst he meditated it.

It was he who had written the anonymous letter to the king, in which the king was warned of the failure in the attempt at Haga, and that which threatened him at this fete; with one hand he thrust forward the a.s.sa.s.sin--with the other he held back the victim, as though he had thus prepared for himself an excuse for his remorse after the deed was done.

On the fatal day he had pa.s.sed the evening in the king's apartments--had seen him read the letter--had followed him to the ball. Enigma of crime--a pitying a.s.sa.s.sin! the mind thus divided between the thirst for, and horror of, his benefactor's blood.

VIII.

Gustavus died slowly: he saw death approach and recede with the same indifference, or the same resignation; received his court, conversed with his friends, even reconciled himself to the opponents of his government, who did not conceal their opposition, but did not push their aristocratic resentment to a.s.sa.s.sination. "I am consoled," he said, to the Count de Brahe, one of the greatest of the n.o.bility and chief of the malcontents, "since death enables me to recover an old friend in you."

He watched to the very last over his kingdom; nominated the Duke of Sudermania regent, inst.i.tuted a council of regency, made his friend Armsfeld military governor of Stockholm, surrounded the young king, only thirteen years of age, with all that could strengthen his position during his minority. He prepared his pa.s.sage from one world to another, awaiting his death, so that it should be an event to himself alone. "My son," he wrote, a few hours before he died, "will not come of age before he is eighteen, but I hope he will be king at sixteen;" thus predicting for his successor that precocity of courage and genius which had enabled him to reign and govern before the time. He said to his grand almoner, in confessing himself, "I do not think I shall take with me great merits before G.o.d, but at least I shall have the consciousness of never having willingly done harm to any person." Then, having requested a moment's repose to acquire strength, in order to embrace his family for the last time, he bid adieu, with a smile, to his friend Bergenstiern, and, falling asleep, never waked again.

The prince royal, proclaimed king, mounted the throne the same day. The people, whom Gustavus had emanc.i.p.ated from the yoke of the senate, swore spontaneously to defend his inst.i.tutions in his son. He had so well employed the day, which G.o.d had allowed him between a.s.sa.s.sination and death, that nothing perished but himself, and his shade seemed to continue to reign over Sweden.

This prince had nothing great but his soul, nor handsome but his eyes.

Small in size, with broad shoulders, his haunches badly set on, his forehead singularly shaped, long nose, large mouth, the grace and animation of his countenance overcame every imperfection of figure, and rendered Gustavus one of the most attractive men in his dominions; intelligence, goodness, courage, beamed from his eyes, and pervaded his features. You felt the man, admired the king, appreciated the hero.

There was heart in his genius, as there is in all really great men. Well informed, deeply read, eloquent, he applied all his endowments to the empire; those whom he had conquered by his courage, he vanquished by his generosity, and charmed by his language. His faults were display and pleasure; he liked the glory of those enjoyments and amours which are found and pardoned in heroes; his vices were those of Alexander, Caesar, and Henri IV. The revenge of a disgraceful amour had something to do with the conspiracy which destroyed him; to resemble these great men, he only wanted their destiny.

When almost a child, he had rescued himself from the tutelage of the aristocracy; in emanc.i.p.ating the throne, he had emanc.i.p.ated the people.

At the head of an army, recruited without money, and which he disciplined by its enthusiasm, he conquered Finland, and went on from victory to victory to St. Petersburgh. Checked in his greatness by a revolt of his officers, surrounded in his tent by his guards, he had escaped by flight, and had gone to the succour of another portion of his kingdom, invaded by the Danes. Again a victor against these deadly enemies of Sweden, the grat.i.tude of the nation had restored to him his repentant army; and his sole vengeance was in again leading them to conquest.

He had subdued all without, tranquillised all within, and had only one ambition left--disinterested from every consideration but fame--to avenge the forsaken cause of Louis XVI., and to secure from her persecutors a queen whom he adored at a distance. This was the vision of a hero; it had but one mistake--his genius was vaster than his empire.

Heroism with disproportioned means makes the great man resemble an adventurer, and transforms gigantic designs into follies. But history does not judge like fortune, and it is the heart rather than success that makes the hero. The romantic and adventurous character of Gustavus is still the greatness of a restless and struggling soul in the pettiness of its destiny. His death excited a shriek of joy amongst the Jacobins, who deified Ankastroem; but their burst of delight on learning the end of Gustavus, proved how insincere was their affected contempt for this enemy of the const.i.tution.

IX.

These two obstacles removed, nothing now kept France and Europe on terms but the feeble cabinet of Louis XVI. The impatience of the nation, the ambition of the Girondists, and the resentment of the const.i.tutionalists wounded through M. de Narbonne, united them to overthrow this cabinet.

Brissot, Vergniaud, Guadet, Condorcet, Gensonne, Petion, their friends in the a.s.sembly, the council-chamber of Madame Roland, their Seids amongst the Jacobins balanced between two ambitions--equally open to their abilities--to destroy power or seize on it. Brissot counselled this latter measure. More conversant with politics than the young orators of the Gironde, he did not comprehend the Revolution without government; anarchy, in his opinion, did not destroy the monarchy more than it did liberty. The greater were events, the more necessary was the direction of them. Placed disarmed in the foremost rank of the a.s.sembly and of opinion, power presented itself, and it was necessary to lay hands upon it. Once in their grasp, they would make of it, according to the dictates of fortune and the will of the people, a monarchy or a republic. Ready for any thing that would allow them to reign in the name of the king or of the people, this counsel was pleasing to men who had scarcely emerged from obscurity, and who, seduced by the facility of their good fortune, seized on it at its first smile. Men who ascend quickly, easily become giddy.

Still a very profound line of policy was disclosed in the secret council of the Girondists, in the choice of the men whom they put forward, and whom they presented for ministers to the king.