The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France Part 31

[5] Feuillet de Conches, vi., p. 499. The letter is neither dated nor signed.

[6] Lanjuinais had subsequently the singular fortune of gaining the confidence of both Napoleon and Lounis XVIII. The decree against him was reversed in 1795, and he became a professor at Rennes. Though he had opposed the making of Napoleon consul for life, Napoleon gave him a place in his Senate; and at the first restoration, in 1814, Louis XVIII named him a peer of France. He died in 1827.

[7] Some of the apologists of the Girondins--nearly all the oldest criminals of the Revolution have found defenders, except perhaps Marat and Robespierre--have affirmed that the Girondins, though they had not courage to give their votes to save the life of Louis, yet hoped to save him by voting for an appeal to the people; but the order in which the different questions were put to the Convention is a complete disproof of this plea.

The first question put was, Was Louis guilty? They all voted "Oui"

(Lacretelle, x., p. 403). But though on the second question, whether this verdict should be submitted to the people for ratification, many of them did vote for such an appeal being made, yet after the appeal had been rejected by a majority of one hundred and forty-two, and the third question, "What penalty shall be inflicted on Louis?" (Lacretelle, x., p.

441) was put to the Convention, they all except Lanjuinais voted for "death." The majorities were, on their question, 683 to 66; on the second, 423 to 281; on the third, 387 to 334; so that on this last, the fatal question, it would have been easy for the Girondins to have turned the scale. And Lamartine himself expressly affirms (x.x.xv., p.5) that the king's life depended on the Girondin vote, and that his death was chiefly owing to Vergniaud.

[8] Goncourt, p. 370, quoting "Fragments de Turgy."

[9] "S'en defaire."--_Louis XVII., sa Vie, son Agonie, sa Mort_, par M. de Beauchesne, quoting Senart. See Croker's "Essays on the Revolution," p.

266.

[10] d.u.c.h.esse d'Angouleme, p. 78.

[11] See a letter from Miss Chowne to Lord Aukland, September 23d, 1793, Journal, etc., of Lord Aukland, ii., p. 517.

[12] "Le peuple la recut non seulement comme une reine adoree, mais il semblait aussi qu'il lui savait gre d'etre charmante," p.5, ed. 1820.

[13] Great interest was felt for her in England. In October Horace Walpole writes: "While a.s.semblies of friends calling themselves _men_ are from day to day meditating torment and torture for his [Louis XVI.'s] heroic widow, on whom, with all their power and malice, and with every page, footman, and chamber-maid of hers in their reach, and with the rack in their hands, they have not been able to fix a speck. Nay, do they not talk of the inutility of evidence? What other virtue ever sustained such an ordeal?"

Walpole's testimony in such a matter is particularly valuable, because he had not only been intimately acquainted with all the gossip of the French capital for many years, but also because his princ.i.p.al friends in France did not belong to the party which might have been expected to be most favorable to the queen. Had there been the very slightest foundation for the calumnies which had been propagated against her, we may be sure that such a person as Madame du Deffand would not only have heard them, but would have been but too willing to believe them. His denunciation of them is a proof that she knew their falsehood.

[14] Goncourt, p. 388, quoting _La Quotidienne_ of October 17th, 18th.

[15] The depositions which the little king had been compelled to sign contained accusations of his aunt as well as of his mother.

[16] As we shall see in the close of the letter, she did not regard those priests who had taken the oath imposed by the a.s.sembly, but which the Pope had condemned, as any longer priests.

The End