This is what we wrote on the subject on 26 November 1849, in an epilogue to Comte Hermann,—one of our best dramas,—an epilogue not written to be spoken, but to be read, after the fashion of German plays—
"The death penalty, as applied to-day, has already undergone a great modification, not with respect to its final issue, but with regard to the details which precede the last moments of the condemned.
"Twenty years ago, executions still took place in the centre of Paris, at the most stirring hour of the day and before the greatest possible number of spectators. Thus an external means of support was provided for the doomed man against his own weakness. It did not make the sufferer into a repentant criminal, but a species of cynical victor, who, instead of confessing God upon the scaffold, bore testimony against the inadequacy of human justice, which could, indeed, kill the criminal, but was powerless to extinguish the crime.
"Now, it is quite otherwise. A step has been taken towards the abolition of capital punishment, by transporting the instrument of execution almost outside the precincts of the town, choosing the hour when the majority of the inhabitants of Paris are still asleep, only allowing the criminal during his last moments the rare witnesses that chance or excessive curiosity may attract to the scaffold.
"Nowadays, it is left to the priests who devote themselves to the salvation of the souls of the doomed to tell us if they find as much hardness of heart in the journey between Bicêtre and the barrière Saint-Jacques as they used to find in the journey from the Conciergerie to the place de Grève; and whether there are more tears shed at the foot of the crucifix now, at four o'clock in the morning, than formerly, at four in the afternoon. We firmly believe so. Yes, there are more repentances in the silence and solitude than there ever were in the tumult of the crowd. Now, let us consider that the act of execution, supported by the eager looks of the people, does not correct them or instruct them but only hardens their hearts; let us suppose that the execution takes place in the prison, with priest and executioner as sole witnesses; that, instead of the guillotine,—which, according to Dr. Guillotin, only occasions a feeling of a slight chill on the neck, but which, according to Dr. Sue, causes terrible suffering,—the sole means of execution used is electricity, which kills like lightning, or even one of those stupefying poisons which act like sleep; will it not happen that the hearts of the doomed will soften still more in the night and silence and solitude, than in the open air, were it even at four o'clock in the morning, and in the presence of the few witnesses who are present at the execution, but who, few though they be, will none the less say to the criminal's companions, to his prison friends, 'un tel est bien mort!' that is to say I such a one died without repenting, pushing the crucifix away from him?"
Since that time, the guillotine has come still nearer to the condemned man: now, they execute in front of the gates of the prison de la Roquette. It is but a few steps from that to executing inside the prison itself. And to descend from the prison courtyard into the dungeon itself is but a single step!
[CHAPTER XIV]
The peregrinations of Casimir Delavigne—Jeanne Vaubernier—Rougemont—His translation of Cambronne's mot—First representation of Teresa—Long and short pieces—Cordelier Delanoue and his Mathieu Luc—Closing of the Taitbout Hall and arrest of the leaders of the Saint-Simonian cult
Whilst the Opéra-Comique was rehearsing Teresa, the Théâtre-Français was preparing for a great occasion. Casimir Delavigne, the dramatic Coriolanus, after having been rejected by the Volscians of the boulevards, with Marino Faliero in his hand, instead of falling beneath the dagger of M. de Mongenet, had been received back triumphantly into the Théâtre-Français. The flight, after all, had been but a passing coolness after the immense success of the École des Vieillards. Casimir had had a sort of decline; Mademoiselle Mars had not been able to uphold the Princesse Aurélié, a kind of Neapolitan imbroglio which everybody has forgotten to-day, happily for the memory of its author. Then the presence of Victor Hugo and myself at the Théâtre-Français annoyed Casimir Delavigne. He well understood that his popularity was only a political one: he possessed neither the lofty poetry of Victor, nor the movement and life of my ignorant and incorrect prose; in a word, he was ill at ease when close to us. He gave vent to a phrase concerning me which well summed up his thought—
"The work that deuced Dumas does is bad; but it prevents people from seeing the goodness of mine."