Marie Antoinette was aware of this hatred of the people to her person. She knew that her presence beside the king would be a provocation to assassination. This was the motive that restrained her to remain alone with her children in the bed-chamber. The king hoped that she was forgotten, but it was the queen particularly the women of this mob sought and called for in terms the most offensive for a wife, a woman, and a queen.
The king was scarcely surrounded by the masses of people in the Œil de Bœuf than the doors of the sleeping apartment were beset with the same uproar and violence. But this party was principally composed of women. Their weaker arms were not so efficient against oaken panels and stout hinges. They called to their assistance the men who had carried the piece of ordnance into the Salle des Gardes, and they hastened to them. The queen was standing up, pressing her two children to her bosom, and listening with mortal anxiety to the vociferations at her door. She had near her no one but M. de Lajard, minister of war,—alone, powerless, but devoted; a few ladies of her suite, and the Princesse de Lamballe, that friend of her happy and unhappy hours. Daughter-in-law of the Duc de Penthièvre, and sister-in-law of the Duc d'Orleans, the Princesse de Lamballe had succeeded in the queen's heart to that deep affection which Marie Antoinette had long entertained for the Comtesse de Polignac. The friendship of Marie Antoinette was adoration. Chilled by the coldness of the king, who had the virtues only, and not the graces of a husband; detested by the people, weary of the throne, she gave vent in private predilections to the overflow of a heart equally desirous and void of sentiment. This favouritism was even accused; the queen was calumniated in her very friendships.
The Princesse de Lamballe, a widow at eighteen, free from any suspicion of levity, above all ambition and every interest from her rank and fortune, loved the queen as a friend. The more adverse were the fortunes of Marie Antoinette, the more did her young favourite desire to share them with her. It was not greatness, but misfortune, that attracted her. Surintendante of the household, she lodged in the Tuileries, in an apartment adjacent to the queen, to share with her her tears and her dangers. She was sometimes obliged to be absent in order to go to the Château de Vernon to watch over the old Duc de Penthièvre. The queen, who foresaw the coming storm, had written to her some days before the 20th of June a touching letter, entreating her not to return. This letter, found in the hair of the Princesse de Lamballe after her assassination, and unknown until now, discloses the tenderness of the one and the devotion of the other.
"Do not leave Vernon, my dear Lamballe, before you are perfectly recovered. The good Duc de Penthièvre would be sorry and distressed, and we must all take care of his advanced age, and respect his virtues. I have so often told you to take heed of yourself, that if you love me you must think of yourself; we shall require all our strength in the times in which we live. Oh do not return, or return as late as possible. Your heart would be too deeply wounded; you would have too many tears to shed over my misfortunes, you who love me so tenderly. This race of tigers which infests the kingdom would cruelly enjoy itself if it knew all the sufferings we undergo. Adieu, my dear Lamballe; I am always thinking of you, and you know I never change."
Madame Lamballe, contrary to this advice, made all haste to return, and clung to the queen as though she sought to be struck with the same blow. By her side were also other courageous women,—the Princesse de Tarente, Latrémouille, Mesdames de Tourzel, de Mackau, de La Roche-Aymon.
M. de Lajard, a cool soldier, responsible to the king and himself for so many dear and sacred lives, collected in haste by the secret passages which communicated with the sleeping chamber and the interior of the palace, several officers and national guards wandering about in the tumult. He had the queen's children brought to her, in order that their presence and appearance, by softening the mob, might serve as a buckler to their mother. He himself opened the doors. He placed the queen and her ladies in the depth of the window. They wheeled in front of this the massive council-table, in order to interpose a barrier between the weapons of the malcontents and the lives of the royal family. Some national guards were around the table on each side, and rather in advance of it. The queen, standing up, held by the hand her daughter, then fourteen years of age.
A child of noble beauty and precocious maturity, the anxieties of the family in the midst of whom she had grown up had already reflected their weight and sorrow in her features. Her blue eyes, her lofty brow, aquiline nose, light brown hair, floating in long waves down her shoulders, recalled at the decline of the monarchy those young girls of the Gauls who graced the throne of the earlier races. The young daughter pressed closely against her mother's bosom, as though to shield her with her innocence. Born amidst the early tumults of the Revolution, dragged to Paris captive amidst the blood of the 6th of October, she only knew the people by its turbulence and rage. The Dauphin, a child of seven years old, was seated on the table in front of the queen. His innocent face, radiant with all the beauty of the Bourbons, expressed more surprise than fear. He turned to his mother at every moment, raising his eyes towards her as though to read through her tears whether he should have confidence or alarm. It was thus that the mob found the queen as it entered and defiled triumphantly before her. The calming produced by the firmness and confidence of the king was already perceptible in the faces of the multitude. The most ferocious of the men were softened in the presence of weakness—beauty—childhood. A lovely woman, a queen, humiliated,—a young innocent girl,—a child, smiling at his father's enemies, could not fail to awaken sensibility even in hatred. The men of the suburbs moved on silent, and as if ashamed, before this group of humiliated greatness. Some of them the more cowardly made as they passed derisive or vulgar gestures, which were a dishonour to the insurrection. Their indignant accomplices checked them in their insolence, and made these dastards quit the room as speedily as possible. Some even addressed looks of sympathy and compassion, others smiles, and others a few familiar words to the dauphin. Conversations, half menacing, half respectful, were exchanged between the child and the throng. "If you love the nation," said a volunteer to the queen, "put the bonnet rouge on your son's head." The queen took the bonnet rouge from this man's hands, and placed it herself on the dauphin's head. The astonished child took these insults as play. The men applauded, but the women, more implacable towards a woman, never ceased their invectives. Obscene words, borrowed from the sinks of the fish-market, for the first time echoed in the vaults of the palace, and in the ears of these children. Their ignorance in not comprehending their meaning saved them from this horror. The queen, whilst she blushed to the eyes, did not allow her offended modesty to lessen her lofty dignity. It was evident that she blushed for the people, for her children, and not for herself. A young girl, of pleasing appearance and respectably attired, came forward and bitterly reviled in coarsest terms l'Autrichienne. The queen, struck by the contrast between the rage of this young girl and the gentleness of her face, said to her in a kind tone, "Why do you hate me? Have I ever unknowingly done you any injury or offence?" "No, not to me," replied the pretty patriot; "but it is you who cause the misery of the nation." "Poor child!" replied the queen; "some one has told you so, and deceived you. What interest can I have in making the people miserable? The wife of the king, mother of the dauphin, I am a Frenchwoman by all the feelings of my heart as a wife and mother. I shall never again see my own country. I can only be happy or unhappy in France. I was happy when you loved me."
This gentle reproach affected the heart of the young girl, and her anger was effaced in a flood of tears. She asked the queen's pardon, saying, "I did not know you, but I see that you are good." At this moment Santerre made his way through the crowd. Easily moved, and sensitive though coarse, Santerre had roughness, impetuosity, and feelings easily affected. The faubourgs opened before him and trembled at his voice. He made an imperious sign for them to leave the apartment, and thrust these men and women by the shoulders towards the door in front of the Œil de Bœuf. The current advanced by opposite issues of the palace, and the heat was suffocating. The dauphin's brow reeked with perspiration beneath the bonnet rouge. "Take the cap off the child," shouted Santerre; "don't you see he is half stifled." The queen darted a mother's glance at Santerre, who came towards her, and placing his hand on the table, he leaned towards Marie Antoinette and said, in an under tone, "You have some very awkward friends, madame; I know those who would serve you better!" The queen looked down, and was silent. It was from this moment that may be dated the secret understanding which she established with the agitators of the faubourgs. The leading malcontents received the queen's entreaties with complacency. Their pride was flattered in raising the woman whom they had degraded. Mirabeau, Barnave, Danton had in turns sold or offered to sell the influence of their popularity. Santerre merely offered his compassion.
XXIII.
The Assembly had again resumed its sitting on the news of the invasion of the Château. A deputation of twenty-four members was sent as a safeguard for the king. Arriving too late, these deputies wandered in the crowded court-yard, vestibules, and staircases of the palace. Although they felt repugnance at the idea of the last crime being committed on the person of the king, they were not very grievously afflicted in their hearts at this long-threatened insult to the court. Their steps were lost in the crowd, their words in the uproar. Vergniaud himself, from a top step of the grand staircase, vainly appealed to order, legality, and the constitution. The eloquence, so powerful to incite the masses, is powerless to check them. From time to time the royalist deputies, highly indignant, returned to the chamber, and, mounting the tribune, with their clothes all in disorder, reproached the Assembly with its indifference. Amongst these more conspicuously, Vaublanc, Ramond, Becquet, Girardin. Mathieu Dumas, La Fayette's friend, exclaimed, as he pointed to the windows of the Château, "I am just come from there; the king is in danger! I have this moment seen him, and can bear witness to the testimony of my colleagues MM. Isnard and Vergniaud in their unavailing efforts to restrain the people. Yes, I have seen the hereditary representative of the nation insulted, menaced, degraded! I have seen the bonnet rouge on his head. You are responsible for this to posterity!" They replied to him by ironical laughter and uproarious shouts. "Would you imply that the bonnet of patriots is a disgraceful mark for a king's brow?" said the Girondist, Lasource; "will it not be believed that we are uneasy as to the king's safety? Let us not insult the people by lending it sentiments which it does not possess. The people do not menace either the person of Louis XVI. or the prince royal. They will not commit excess or violence. Let us adopt measures of mildness and conciliation." This was the perfidious lulling of Pétion, and the Assembly was put to sleep by such language.