Constitutum est, ut quisquis eum HOMINEM dixisset fuisse,
capitalem penderet poenam.
—St. Augustine, “Of the God Serapis,” l. 18, “de Civ. Dei,” c. 5.
(It was decreed, that whoso should say that he had been a MAN,
should suffer the punishment of a capital offence.)
Robespierre was reclining languidly in his fauteuil, his cadaverous countenance more jaded and fatigued than usual. He to whom Catherine Theot assured immortal life, looked, indeed, like a man at death’s door. On the table before him was a dish heaped with oranges, with the juice of which it is said that he could alone assuage the acrid bile that overflowed his system; and an old woman, richly dressed (she had been a Marquise in the old regime) was employed in peeling the Hesperian fruits for the sick Dragon, with delicate fingers covered with jewels. I have before said that Robespierre was the idol of the women. Strange certainly!—but then they were French women! The old Marquise, who, like Catherine Theot, called him “son,” really seemed to love him piously and disinterestedly as a mother; and as she peeled the oranges, and heaped on him the most caressing and soothing expressions, the livid ghost of a smile fluttered about his meagre lips. At a distance, Payan and Couthon, seated at another table, were writing rapidly, and occasionally pausing from their work to consult with each other in brief whispers.
Suddenly one of the Jacobins opened the door, and, approaching Robespierre, whispered to him the name of Guerin. (See for the espionage on which Guerin was employed, “Les Papiers inedits,” etc., volume i. page 366, No. xxviii.) At that word the sick man started up, as if new life were in the sound.
“My kind friend,” he said to the Marquise, “forgive me; I must dispense with thy tender cares. France demands me. I am never ill when I can serve my country!”
The old Marquise lifted up her eyes to heaven and murmured, “Quel ange!”
Robespierre waved his hand impatiently; and the old woman, with a sigh, patted his pale cheek, kissed his forehead, and submissively withdrew. The next moment, the smiling, sober man we have before described, stood, bending low, before the tyrant. And well might Robespierre welcome one of the subtlest agents of his power,—one on whom he relied more than the clubs of his Jacobins, the tongues of his orators, the bayonets of his armies; Guerin, the most renowned of his ecouteurs,—the searching, prying, universal, omnipresent spy, who glided like a sunbeam through chink and crevice, and brought to him intelligence not only of the deeds, but the hearts of men!
“Well, citizen, well!—and what of Tallien?”
“This morning, early, two minutes after eight, he went out.”
“So early?—hem!”
“He passed Rue des Quatre Fils, Rue de Temple, Rue de la Reunion, au Marais, Rue Martin; nothing observable, except that—”