The Whites and the Blues

by Alexandre Dumas

The man must indeed have inspired profound disgust when Whites and Blues, citizens and soldiers, approved thus unanimously of an act which was open to such criticism from the standpoint of the right.

As for François Goulin, he had no very clear idea of what was impending over him until he saw the Chouans join and fraternize with his escort. Taken by men wearing the Republican uniform, rolled up and tied in his sheet before they had answered his questions, thrown into a carriage with the executioner, his dear friend, and following in the wake of his beloved machine, it will be readily understood how impossible it was that the truth should have dawned upon him.

But when he saw the pretended hussars exchanging jokes with the Chouans, who walked along the embankment at their side; when, after persistently asking what they intended to do with him, and why they had entered his domicile and laid violent hands upon his person, he was presented, by way of reply, with a placard announcing his own execution; then, indeed, did he realize the full gravity of his predicament, unless he were rescued by the Republicans, or his captors should be moved to pity, two chances so extremely problematical that he could place no dependence upon them.

His first idea was to address the executioner and impress upon him that he was to obey no one save himself, since he had been sent from Paris with the injunction to obey him in all things. But the man was himself so cast down, and looked around with such a haggard eye, being firmly convinced that he was to die in the same place and at the same hour with the man whose custom it was to put others to death, that the unhappy François Goulin soon saw that he had nothing to expect from that quarter.

Then he thought of crying out, appealing, entreating for help; but all the faces expressed such utter indifference that he shook his head and said to himself: "No, no, it is useless."

Thus they reached the foot of the hill. There the Chouans made a halt. They wished to take off their borrowed costumes and put on their own uniform, which consisted of the vest, breeches and gaiters of the Breton peasant. A number of curious people had already gathered there. The bills had accomplished wonders; from six and even eight miles in the country round, people were hastening to the spot. Everybody knew that this was the same François Goulin who had no other name throughout the Vendée and at Nantes than the Drowner.

The guillotine shared with him in their curiosity. The instrument was wholly unknown in this corner of France, which bordered upon Finistère (finis terrœ, the end of the earth). Men and women questioned each other as to how it worked, where the condemned man was placed, and how the knife went up and down. People who did not know that Goulin was the hero of the occasion addressed him, asking for information. One of them said to him: "Do you believe a person dies as soon as his head is cut off? When I cut off the head of a goose or a duck it lives for more than a quarter of an hour afterward."

And Goulin, who was no more sure than he that death was instantaneous, writhed in his bonds and said to the executioner: "Did you not tell me one day that the heads of the people who had been guillotined gnawed at the bottom of your basket?"

But the executioner, stupefied with terror, either did not reply at all, or only mumbled such incoherent words as revealed the mortal fear which was upon him whose lips were thus clogged.