Within a fortnight, as I have related, the poor Princess de Lamballe’s head was raised on a pike to the window of the Queen’s prison. One Tison’s wife was appointed to look after the Queen; while Simon, afterwards celebrated for his cruelty to the Dauphin, and Rocher, a mere brute, were the gaolers-in-chief.
It was Rocher who never passed by the Queen without blowing clouds of tobacco-smoke in her Majesty’s face.
The walls of the Temple were ablaze with comments upon the royal family. Here might be read an attack upon Louis’s stoutness, there a savage comment upon the Queen. Even the children were not spared. For instance, this sentence was scrawled upon the walls: “What are King’s children? Whelps who ought to be strangled before they are old enough to devour the people.”
The unfortunate captives at last dreaded to take the air; the guard saluted whenever a municipal passed by, but they reversed arms as the King went by.
At last, they limited the number of steps the royal family might take when exercising.
The upper windows of the house overlooking the prison were now the only consolation left to the unhappy royal captives. But that comprehensive freemasonry of misery with which we are all somewhat acquainted, the friends of the fallen family, who were still at liberty, took the upper rooms, from which they could see their King and his family. The captives soon learnt, by almost indescribable signs, the windows which were friendly to them. This one would show a white flower; from another, a hand would be waved; and now and again a placard would be raised for a moment.
On the 24th of September, the King, having fallen asleep after dinner, was aroused by a great tumult in the street, below his window.
It was the people declaring the abolition of royalty, and the declaration of a republic.
“My kingdom,” he said to the Queen, “has passed away like a dream, and it has not been a happy dream. God gave it me, and the people take it away. I pray that France may be happy.”