Marie Antoinette and Her Son

by L. Mühlbach

CHAPTER XVII.

MIRABEAU.

"Count Mirabeau must be won over," Count de la Marck ventured to say one day to Marie Antoinette. "Count Mirabeau is now the mightiest man in France, and he alone is able to bring the nation back again to the throne."

"It is he," replied the queen, with a glow, "who is most to blame for alienating the nation from the throne. Never will the renegade count be forgiven! Never can the king stoop so low as to pardon this apostate, who frivolously professes the new religion of 'liberty,' and disowns the faith of his fathers."

"Your majesty," replied Count de la Marck, with a sigh, "it may be that in the hand of this renegade lies the future of your son."

The queen trembled, and the proud expression on her features was softened.

"The future of my son?" said she. "What do you mean by that? What has Count Mirabeau to do with the dauphin? His wrath follows us only, his hatred rests upon us alone! I grant that at present he is powerful, but over the future he has no sway. I hope, on the contrary, that the future will avenge the evil that Mirabeau does to us in the present."

"But how does it help, madame, if vengeance hurries him on?" asked Count de la Marck, sadly. "The temple which Samson pulled down was not built again, that Samson might be taken from its ruins; it remained in its dust and fragments, and its glory was gone forever. Oh, I beseech your majesty, do not listen to the voice of your righteous indignation, but only to the voice of prudence. Master your noble, royal heart, and seek to reconcile your adversaries, not to punish them!"

"What do you desire of me?" asked Marie Antoinette, in amazement.
"What shall I do?"

"Your majesty must chain the lion," whispered the count. "Your majesty must have the grace to change Mirabeau the enemy into Mirabeau the devoted ally and friend!"

"Impossible, it is impossible!" cried the queen, in horror. "I cannot descend to this. I never can view with friendly looks this monster who is accountable for the horrors of those October days. I can only speak of this man, who has created his reputation out of his crimes, who is a faithless son, a faithless husband, a faithless lover, a faithless aristocrat, and a faithless royalist—I can only speak of him in words of loathing, scorn, and horror! No, rather die than accept assistance from Count Mirabeau! Do you not know, count, that he honors me his queen with his enmity and his contempt? Is it not Mirabeau who caused the States-General to accept the words 'the person of the king is inviolable,' and to reject the words 'and that of the queen?' Was it not Mirabeau who once, when my friends exhorted him to moderation, and besought him to soften his words about the Queen of France, had the grace to answer with a shrug, 'Well, she may keep her life!' Was it not Mirabeau who was to blame for the October days? Was it not Mirabeau who publicly said: 'The king and the queen are lost. The people hate them so, that they would even destroy their corpses?'" [Footnote: The queen's own words.—See Goncourt, "Marie Antoinette," p. 305.]

"Your majesty, Mirabeau said that, not as a threat, but out of pity, and deep concern and sympathy."

"Sympathy!" repeated the queen, "Mirabeau, who hates us!"

"No, your majesty, Mirabeau, who honors his queen, who is ready to give his life for you and for the monarchy, if your majesty will forgive him and receive him as a defender of the throne!"

The queen shuddered, and looked in astonishment and terror at the excited face of Count de la Marck. "Are you speaking of Mirabeau, the tribune of the people," she asked, "the fiery orator of the National Assembly?"

"I am speaking of Count Mirabeau, who yesterday was the enemy of the throne, and who to-day will be a zealous defender, if your majesty will only have it so—if your majesty will only speak a gracious word to him."

"It is impossible, it is impossible!" whispered the queen.

De la Marck continued: "Since he has frequently seen your majesty— since he has had occasion to observe your proud spirit and lofty resignation—a change has taken place in the character of Mirabeau. He is subdued as the lion is subdued, when the beaming eye of a pure soul looks it in the face. He might be of service again, he might be reconciled! He writes, he speaks of his exalted queen with admiration, with enthusiasm; he glows with a longing desire to confess his sins at the feet of your majesty, and to receive your forgiveness."

"Does the king know this?" asked Marie Antoinette. "Has any one told his majesty?"

"I should not have taken the liberty of speaking to your majesty about these things if the king had not authorized me," replied Count de la Marck, bowing. "His majesty recognizes it to be a necessary duty to gain Mirabeau to the throne, and he hopes to have in this matter the cooperation of his exalted wife."

Marie Antoinette sadly shook her head. "I will speak with his majesty about it," she said, with a sigh, "but only under circumstances of extreme urgency can I submit to this, I tell you in advance."

But the case was of extreme urgency, and when Marie Antoinette had seen it to be so, she kept her word and conformed to it, and commissioned Count de la Marck to tell his friend Mirabeau that the queen would grant him an audience.

But in order that this audience might be of advantage, it must be conducted with the deepest secrecy. No one ought to suspect that Mirabeau, the tribune of the people, the adored hero of the revolution—Mirabeau, who ruled the National Assembly, and Paris itself, whom the freest of the free hailed as their apostle and saviour, who with the power of his eloquence ruled the spirits of thousands and hundreds of thousands of men,—no one could suspect that the leader of the revolution would now become the devoted dependant upon the monarchy, and the paid servant of the king.

Two conditions Mirabeau had named, when Count de la Marck had tried to gain him over in the name of the king: an audience with the queen, and the payment of his debts, together with a monthly pension of a hundred louis-d'or.

"I am paid, but not bought," said Mirabeau, as he received his first payment. "Only one of my conditions is fulfilled, but what will become of the other?"

"And so you still insist on having an audience with the queen?" asked La Marck.

"Yes, I insist upon it," said Mirabeau, with naming eyes. "If I am to battle and speak for this monarchy, I must learn to respect it. If I am to believe in the possibility of restoring it, I must believe in its capacity of life; I must see that I have to deal with a brave, decided, noble man. The true and real king here is Marie Antoinette; and there is only one man in the whole surroundings of Louis XVI., and that is his wife. I must speak with her, in order to hear and to see whether she is worth the risking of my life, honor, and popularity. If she really is the heroine that I hold her to be, we will both united save the monarchy, and the throne of Louis XVI., whose king is Marie Antoinette. The moment is soon to come when we shall learn what a woman and a child can accomplish, and whether the daughter of Maria Theresa with the dauphin in her arms cannot stir the hearts of the French as her great mother once stirred the Hungarians." [Footnote:Mirabeau's own words.—See "Marie Antoinette et sa Famille." Far M. de Lescure. p. 478.]

"Do you then believe the danger is so great," asked La Marck, "that it is necessary to resort to extreme, heroic measures?"

Mirabeau grasped his arm with a sudden movement, and an expression of solemn earnestness filled his lion-like face. "I am convinced of it," he answered, "and I will add, the danger is so great, that if we do not soon meet it and in heroic fashion, it will not be possible to control it. There is no other security for the queen than through the reestablishment of the royal authority. I believe of her, that she does not desire life without her crown, and I am certain that, in order to keep her life, she must before all things preserve her crown. And I will help her and stand by her in it; and for this end I must myself speak with her and have an audience." [Footnote: Mirabeau's own words.—See Count de la Marck, "Mirabeau," vol. 21. p. 50.]

And Mirabeau, the first man in the revolution had his audience with
Marie Antoinette, the dying champion of monarchy.

On the 3rd of July, 1790, the meeting of the queen and Mirabeau took place in the park of St. Cloud. Secrecy and silence surrounded them, and extreme care had been taken to let no one suspect, excepting a few intimate friends, what was taking place on this sequestered, leaf-embowered grass-plat of St. Cloud.

A bench of white marble, surrounded by high oleander and taxus trees, stood at the side of this grass-plat. It was the throne on which Marie Antoinette should receive the homage of her new knight. Mirabeau had on the day before gone from Paris to the estate of his niece, the Marchioness of Aragan. There he spent the night; and the next morning, accompanied by his nephew, M. de Saillant, he walked to the park of St. Cloud.

At the nether gate of the park, which had been left open for this secret visit, Mirabeau took leave of his companion, and extended him his hand.

"I do not know," he said, and his voice, which so often had made the windows of the assembly hall shake with its thunder, was now weak and tremulous, "I do not know why this dreadful presentiment creeps over me all at once, and why voices whisper to me, 'Turn, back, Mirabeau, turn back! Do not step over the threshold of this door, for there you are stepping into your open grave!' "

"Follow this voice, uncle, there is still time," implored M. de Saillant; "it is with me as it is with you. I, too, have a sad, anxious feeling!"

"May they not have laid snares for me here?" whispered Mirabeau, thoughtfully. "They are capable of every thing, these artful Bourbons. Who knows whether they have not invited me here to take me prisoner, and to cast me, whom they hold to be their most dangerous enemy, into one of their oubliettes, their subterranean dungeons? My friend," he continued, hastily, "wait for me here, and if in two or three hours I do not return, hasten to Paris, go to the National Assembly, and announce to them that Mirabeau, moved by the queen's cry of distress, has gone to St. Cloud, and is there held a prisoner."

"I will do it, uncle," said the marquis, "but I do not believe in any such treachery on the part of the queen or her husband. They both know that without Mirabeau they are certainly lost, and that he, perhaps, is able to save them. I fear something entirely different."

"And what do you fear?"

"I fear your enemies in the National Assembly," said M. de Saillant, and with a pained expression. "I fear these enraged republicans, who have begun to mistrust you since you have begun to speak in favor of royalty and mon archy, and since you have even ventured to defend the queen personally against the savage and mean attacks which Marat hurls against Marie Antoinette in his journal, the Ami du Peuplt."

"It is true," said Mirabeau, with a smile, "they have mistrusted me, these enraged republicans, since then, and they tell me that Petion, this republican of steel and iron, turned to Danton at the close of my speech, and said: 'This Mirabeau is dangerous to liberty, for there is too much of the blood of the count flowing through the veins of the tribune of the people. Danton answered him with a smile: 'In that case we must draw off the count's blood from the tribune of the people, that he may either be cured of his reactionary disease or die of it!'"

"And when they told Marat, uncle, that you had spoken angrily and depreciatingly of his attacks upon the queen, he raised his fist threateningly, and cried: 'Mirabeau is a traitor, who wants to sell our new, young liberty to the monarchy. But he will meet the fate of Judas, who sold the Saviour. He will one day atone for it with his head, for if we tap him for his treachery, we shall do for him what Judas did for himself. This Mirabeau Judas must take care of himself."

"And do you suppose that this disputatious little load of a Marat will hang me?" asked Mirabeau, with a scornful smile.

"I think that you must watch him," answered M. de Saillant. "Last evening, in the neighborhood of our villa, I met two disguised men, who, I would swear, were Perion and Marat; and on our way here, as I looked around, I feel certain that I saw these same disguised figures following us!"

"What if it be?" answered Mirabeau, raising himself up, and looking around him with a proud glance. "The lion does not fear the annoying insect that buzzes about him, he shakes it off with his mane or destroys it with a single stroke of his paw. And Mirabeau fears just as little such insects as Petion and Marat; they would much better keep out of his way. I will tread them under foot, that is all! And now, farewell, my dear nephew, farewell, and wait for me here!"

He nodded familiarly to his nephew, passed over the threshold, and entered the park, from whose entrance the popular indignation had long since removed the obnoxious words, De par la Reine, the garden belonging now to the king only because the nation willed it so.

Mirabeau hastened with an anxious mind and a light step along the walk, and again it seemed to him as if dark spirits were whispering to him, "Turn back, Mirabeau, turn back! for with every step forward you are only going deeper into your grave." He stopped, and with his hand-kerchief wiped away the drops of cold sweat which gathered upon his forehead.

"It is folly," he said, "perfect folly. Truly I am as tremulous as a girl going to her first rendezvous. Shame on you, Mirabeau, be a man!"

He shook his head as if he wanted to dispel these evil forebodings, and hastened forward to meet Count de la Marck, who appeared at the bending of the allee.

"The queen is already here, and is waiting for you, Mirabeau," said the marquis, with a slight reproach in his voice.

Mirabeau shrugged his shoulders instead of replying, and went on more rapidly. There soon opened in front of them a small grass-plat, surrounded by bushes, and on the bench opposite, the lady in the white, neat dress, with a straw hat on her arm, her hair veiled with black lace—that lady was Marie Antoinette.

Mirabeau stopped in his walk, and fixed a long, searching look upon her. When he turned again to his friend, his face was pale, and bore plain traces of emotion.

"My friend," whispered he to La Marck, "I know not why, but I have a strange feeling! I have not wept since the day on which my father drove me with a curse from the house of my ancestors, but, seeing yonder woman, I could weep, and an unspeakable sympathy fills my soul."

The queen had seen him, too, and had grown pale, and turned tremblingly to the king, who stood beside her, half concealed by the foliage.

"There is the dreadful man!" said Marie Antoinette, with a shudder. "My God! a thrill of horror creeps through all my veins, and if I only look at this monster, I have a feeling as though I should sicken with loathing!" [Footnote: The queen's own words. See "Madame du Campan," vol. II.]

"Courage, my dear Marie, courage," whispered the king. "Remember that the welfare of our future, and of our children, perhaps, depends upon this interview. See, he is approaching. Receive him kindly, Marie. I will draw back, for you alone shall have the honor of this day, and monarchy has in you its fairest representative."

"But remain so near me, sire, that you can hear me if I call for help," whispered Marie Antoinette.

The king smiled. "Fear nothing, Marie," he said," and believe that the danger for Mirabeau is greater than for you. The name of criminal will be fastened not to us, but to Mirabeau, if it shall be known that he has come to visit us here. I will withdraw, for there is Mirabeau."

And the king withdrew into the thicket, while Mirabeau stopped near the queen, and saluted her with a profound bow.

Marie Antoinette rose from her marble seat. At this moment she was not the queen giving an audience, but the anxious lady, advancing to meet danger, and desirous to mitigate it by politeness and smiles.

"Come nearer, count," said Marie Antoinette, still standing. But as he approached, the queen sank slowly upon the seat, and raised her eyes to Mirabeau, with an almost timid look, who now did not seem to her a monster, for his mien was disturbed, and his eyes, which had always been represented as so fearful, had a gentle, respectful expression.

"Count," said the queen, and her voice trembled a little "count, if I found myself face to face with an ordinary enemy, a man who was aiming at the destruction of monarchy, without seeing of what use it is for the people, I should be taking at this moment a very useless step. But when one talks with a Mirabeau, one is beyond the ordinary conditions of prudence, and hope of his assistance is blended with wonder at the act." [Footnote: The queen's own words.—See "Marie Antoinette et sa Famille" Par M. de Lescure, p. 484.]

"Madame," cried Mirabeau, deeply moved, "I have not come here as your enemy, but as your devoted servant, who is ready cheerfully to give his life if he can be of any service to the monarchy."

"You believe, then, that it is a question of life, or, if you prefer, of death, which stands between the French people and the monarchy?" asked the queen, sadly.

"Yes, I am convinced of that," answered Mirabeau. "But I still hope that we can answer the question in favor of the monarchy, provided that the right means are applied in season."

"And what, according to your views, are the right means, count?"

Mirabeau smiled and looked with amazement into the noble face of the queen, who, with such easy composure, had put into this one short question what for centuries had perplexed the greatest thinkers and statesmen to answer.

"Will your majesty graciously pardon me if I crave permission, before I answer, to put a question in like manner to my exalted queen?"

"Ask on, count," replied Marie Antoinette, with a gentle inclination of her head.

"Well, madame, this is my question: 'Does your majesty purpose and aim at the reestablishment of the old regime, and do you deem it possible to roll the chariot of human history and of politics backward?"

"You have in your question given the answer as well," said Marie Antoinette, with a sigh. "It is impossible to reerect the same edifice out of its own ruins. One must be satisfied if out of them a house can be built, in which one can manage to live."

"Ah, your majesty," said Mirabeau, with feeling, "this answer is the first ray of light which breaks through the heavy storm-clouds! The new day can be descried and hailed with delight! After hearing this noble answer of your majesty, I look up comforted, and the clouds do not terrify me longer, for I know that they will soon be past—that is, if we employ the right means."

"And now I repeat my question, count, What, according to your view, are the right means?"

"First of all, the recognition of what is wrong," answered Mirabeau, "and then the cheerful and honest will to do what is found to be necessary."

"Well, tell me, what is it that is wrong?"

Mirabeau bowed, and then began to speak to her in his clear, sharp way, which was at the same time so full of energy, of the situation of France, the relation of the various political parties to one another, to the court, and the throne. In strongly outlined sentences he characterized the chiefs of the political clubs, the leaders of the parties in the National Assembly, and spoke of the perilous goal which the demagogues, the men of the extreme Left, aimed at. He did not, from delicacy, speak the word "republican," but he gave the queen to understand that the destruction of the monarchy and the throne, the annihilation of the royal family, was the ultimate object aimed at by all the raving orators and leaders of the extreme Left.

The queen had listened to him with eager, fixed attention, and, at the same time, with a dignified composure; and the earnest, thoughtful look of her large eyes had penetrated and moved Mirabeau more and more, so that his words came from his lips like a stream of fire, and kindled a new hope even in himself.

"All will yet be well," he cried, in conclusion; "we shall succeed in contending with the hidden powers that wish to undermine your majesty's throne, and to take from the hands of your enemies these dangerous weapons of destruction. I shall apply all my power, all my eloquence to this. I will oppose the undertakings of the demagogues; I will show myself to be their public opponent, and zealously serve the monarchy, making use of all such means of help as are adapted to move men's minds, and not to trouble and terrify them, as if freedom and self-government were to be taken from them, and yet which will restore the credit and power of the monarchy."

"Are you, then, with honest and upright heart, a friend of ours?" asked Marie Antoinette, almost supplicatingly. "Do you wish to assist us, and stand by us, with your counsel and help?"

Mirabeau met her inquisitive and anxious look with a cordial smile, a noble and trustworthy expression of face. "Madame," he said, with his fine, resonant voice, "I defended monarchical principles when I saw only their weakness, and when I did not know the soul nor the thoughts of the daughter of Maria Theresa, and little reckoned upon having such an exalted mediator. I contended for the rights of the throne when I was only mistrusted, when calumny dogged all my steps, and declared me guilty of treachery! I served the monarchy, then, when I knew that from my rightful, but misled king, I should receive neither kindness nor reward. What shall I do now, when confidence animates my spirit, and gratitude has made my duties run directly in the current of my principles? I shall be and remain what I have always been, the defender of monarchy governed by law, the apostle of liberty guaranteed by the monarchy." [Footnote: Mirabeau's own words.—See "Memoires du Comte de Mirabeau," vol III., p. 290.]

"I believe you, count," cried Marie Antoinette, with emotion. "You will serve us with fidelity and zeal, and with your help all will yet be well. I promise yon that we will follow your counsels, and act in concord with you. You will put yourself in communication with the king; you will consult him about needful matters, and advise him about the things which are essential to his welfare and that of the people."

"Madame," replied Mirabeau, "I take the liberty of adding this to what has already been said. The most necessary thing is that the royal court leave Paris for a season!"

"That we flee?" asked Marie Antoinette, hastily. "Not flee, but withdraw," answered Mirabeau. "The exasperated people menace the monarchy, and therefore the threatened crown must for a while be concealed from the people's sight, that they may be brought back to a sense of duty and loyalty. And, therefore, I do not say that the court must flee; I only say it must leave Paris, for Paris is the furnace of the revolution! The royal court must withdraw, as soon as possible, to the very boundaries of France! It must there gather an army, and put it under the command of some faithful general, and with this army march against the riotous capital; and I will be there to smooth the way and open the gates!"

"I thank you, count, I thank you!" cried Marie Antoinette, rising from her seat. "Now, I doubt no more about the future, for my own thoughts coincide with those of our greatest statesmen! I, too, am convinced the court ought to leave Paris—that it must withdraw, in order to escape new humiliations, and that it ought to return only in the splendor of its power, and with an army to put the rebels to flight, and breathe courage into the timid and faithful. Oh! you must tell the king all this; you must show him that our removal from Paris is not only a means of salvation to the crown, but to the people as well. Your words will convince the noblest and best of monarchs; he will follow your counsels, and, thanks to you, not we alone, but the monarchy will be saved! No, go to the work, count! Be active in our behalf; bring your unbounded influence, in favor of the king and queen, to bear upon all spirits, and be sure that we shall be grateful to you so long as we live. Farewell, and remember that my eye will follow all your steps, and that my ears will hear every word which Mirabeau shall speak in the National Assembly."

Mirabeau bowed respectfully. "Madame," said he, "when your exalted mother condescended to favor one of her subjects with an audience, she never dismissed him without permitting the favored one respectfully to kiss her hand."

"It is true," replied Marie Antoinette, with a pleasant smile, "and in this, at least, I can follow the example of my great mother!"

And, with inimitable grace, the queen extended her hand to him. Mirabeau, enraptured, beside himself at this display of courtesy and favor, dropped upon his knee and pressed his lips to the delicate, white hand of the queen.

"Madame," cried he, with warmth, "this kiss saves the monarchy!" [Mirabeau's own words.—See "Memoires de Mirabeau," vol iv., p. 208.]

"If you have spoken the truth, sir," said the queen, with a sigh, rising and dismissing him, with a gentle inclination of her head.

With excited and radiant looks, Mirabeau returned to his nephew, who was waiting for him at the gate of the park.

"Oh!" said he, with a breath of relief, laying his hand upon the shoulder of Saillant, "what have I not heard and seen! She is very great, very noble, and very unhappy, Victor! But," cried he, with a loud, earnest voice, "I will save her—I will save her!" [Footnote: "Marie Antoinette et sa Famille," p 480.]

Mirabeau was in earnest in this purpose; and not because he had been bought over, but because he had been won—carried away with the noble aspect of the queen—did he become from this time a zealous defender of the monarchy, an eloquent advocate in behalf of Marie Antoinette. But he was not now able to restrain the dashing waves of revolution; he could not even save himself from being engulfed in these raging waves.

Mirabeau knew it well, and made no secret of the peril of his position. On the day when, before the division, he spoke in defence of the monarchy and the royal prerogative, and undertook to decide the question of peace or war—on that day he first announced himself openly for the king, and raised a storm of excitement and disgust in the National Assembly. Still he spoke right bravely in behalf of the crown; and while doing so, he cried, "I know well that it is only a single step from the capitol to the Tarpeian rock!"

Step after step! And these successive steps Mirabeau was soon to take. Petion had not in vain characterized Mirabeau as the most dangerous enemy of the republic. Marat had not asserted, without knowing what he said, that Mirabeau must let all his aristocratic blood flow from his veins, or bleed to death altogether! Not with impunity could Mirabeau encounter the rage of parties, and fling down the gauntlet before them, saying, at the same moment, "He would defend the monarchy against all attacks, from what side soever, and from what part soever of the kingdom they might come."

The leaders of the republican factions knew very well how to estimate the power of Mirabeau; they knew very well that Mirabeau was able to fit together the fragments of the crown which he had helped to break. And, to prevent his doing this, they knew that he must be buried beneath these fragments.

Soon after his interview with the queen—after his dissenting speech in behalf of the prerogative of the king—Mirabeau began to fail in health. His enemies said that it was only the result of over- exertion, and a cold which he had brought on by drinking a glass of cold water during a speech, in the National Assembly. His friends whispered about a deadly poison which had been mingled with this glass of water, in order to rid themselves of this powerful and dangerous opponent.

Mirabeau believed this; and the increasing torpor of his limbs, the pains which he felt in his bowels, appeared to him to be the sure indications of poison given him by his enemies.

The lion, who had been willing to crouch at the foot of the throne for the purpose of guarding it, was now nothing but a poor, sick man, whose voice was lost, and whose power was extinguished. For a season he sought to contend against the malady which was lurking in his body; but one day, in the midst of a speech which he was making in behalf of the queen, he sank in a fainting-fit, and was carried unconsciously to his dwelling. After long efforts on the part of his physician, the celebrated Cabanis, Mirabeau opened his eyes. Consciousness was restored, but with it a fixed premonition of his approaching death.

"I am dying!" he said, softly. "I am bearing in my heart the funeral crape of the monarchy. These raging partisans want to pluck it out, deride it, and fasten it to their own foreheads. And this compels them to break my heart, and this they have done!" [Footnote: Mirabeau's own words.—See "Memoires sur Mirabeau," vol. iv.,. p. 296.]

Yes, they had broken it—this great strong heart, in which the funeral crape of monarchy lay. At first the physician and his friends hoped that it might be possible to overcome his malady, but Mirabeau was not flattered by any such hope; he felt that the pains which were racking his body would end only with death.

After one especially painful and distressing night, Mirabeau had his physician Cabanis and his friend Count de la Marck summoned to his bed, and extended to them both his hands. "My friends," he said to them with gentle voice and with peaceful face, "my friends, I am going to die to-day. When one has been brought to that pass, there is only one thing that remains to be done: to be perfumed, tastefully dressed, and surrounded with flowers, so as to fall agreeably into that last sleep from which there is no waking. So, call my servants! I must be shaved, dressed, and nicely arrayed. The window must be opened, that the warm air may stream in, and then flowers must be brought. I want to die in the sunshine and flowers." [Footnote: Mirabeau's words.—See "Memoires sur Mirabeau," vol. iv., p. 298.]

His friends did not venture to oppose his last wish. The gladiator wanted to make his last toilet and be elaborately arrayed in order to fall in the arena of life as a hero falls, and even in death to excite the wonder and the applause of the public.

All Paris was in this last scene the public of this gladiator; all Paris had, in these last days of his battle for life, only one thought, "How is it with Mirabeau? Will he compel the dreadful enemy Death to retire from before him, or will he fall as the prey of Death?" This question was written on all faces, repeated in all houses and in all hearts. Every one wanted to receive an answer from that still house, with its closely-drawn curtains, where Mirabeau lived. All the streets which led thither were, during the last three days before his death, filled with a dense mass of men, and no carriage was permitted to drive through the neighborhood, lest it should disturb Mirabeau. The theatres were closed, and, without any consultation together, the merchants shut their stores as they do on great days of national fasting or thanksgiving.

On the morning of the fourth day, before life had begun to move in the streets of Paris, and before the houses were opened, a cry was heard in the great highways of the city, ringing up into all the houses, and entering all the agitated hearts that heard it: "Flowers, bring flowers! Mirabeau wants flowers! Bring roses and violets for Mirabeau! Mirabeau wants to die amid flowers!"

This cry awoke slumbering Paris the 2d of April, 1791, and, as it resounded through the streets, windows and doors opened, and hundreds, thousands of men hastened from all directions toward Mirabeau's house, carrying nosegays, bouquets, whole baskets of flowers. One seemed to be transferred from cool, frosty spring weather to the warm, fragrant days of summer; all the greenhouses, all the chambers poured out their floral treasures to prepare one last summer day for the dying tribune of the people. His whole house was filled with flowers and with fragrance. The hall, the staircase, the antechamber, and the drawing-room were overflowing with flowers; and there in the middle of the drawing-room lay Mirabeau upon a lounge, carefully dressed, shaved and powdered, as if for a royal festival. The most beautiful of the flowers, the fairest exotics surrounded his couch, and bent their variegated petals down to the pale, death-stricken gladiator, who still had power to summon a smile to his lips, and with one last look of affection to bid farewell to his weeping friends—farewell to the flowers and the sunlight!

On his lofty brow, on his smiling lips, there was written, after Death had claimed him, after the gladiator had fallen, "The dying one greets you!"

The day of his death was the day of his last triumph; and the flowers that all Paris sent to him, were to Mirabeau the parting word of love and admiration!

Four times daily the king had sent to inquire after Mirabeau's welfare, and when at noon, on the 2d of April, Count de la Marck brought the tidings of his death, the king turned pale. "Disaster is hovering over us," he said, sadly, "Death too arrays himself on the side of our enemies!"

Marie Antoinette was also very deeply moved by the tidings. "He wanted to save us, and therefore must die! The burden was too heavy, the pillar has broken under the weight; the temple will plunge down and bury us beneath its ruins, if we do not hasten to save ourselves! Mirabeau's bequest was his counsel to speedy and secret flight! We must follow his advice, we must remove from Paris. May the spirit of Mirabeau enlighten the heart of the king, that he may be willing to do what is necessary,—that he may be willing to leave Paris!"