I know not whether it is to be imputed to the national character, or to that of the French republicans only, but the cruelties which have been committed are usually so mixed with licentiousness, as to preclude description. I have already noticed the conduct of Le Bon, and it must suffice to say, his agents were worthy of him, and that the female prisoners suffered every thing which brutality, rapaciousness, and indecency, could inflict. Mr. D____ was, in the mean time, transferred from prison to prison—the distress of separation was augmented by their mutual apprehensions and pecuniary embarrassments—and I much fear, the health and spirits of both are irretrievably injured.
I regret my impatience in coming here, rather than waiting the arrival of my friends at home; for the changes I observe, and the recollections they give birth to, oppress my heart, and render the place hateful to me.—All the families I knew are diminished by executions, and their property is confiscated—those whom I left in elegant hotels are now in obscure lodgings, subsisting upon the superfluities of better days—and the sorrows of the widows and orphans are increased by penury; while the Convention, which affects to condemn the crimes of Le Bon, is profiting by the spoils of his victims.
I am the more deeply impressed by these circumstances, because, when I was here in 1792, several who have thus fallen, though they had nothing to reproach themselves with, were yet so much intimidated as to propose emigrating; and I then was of opinion, that such a step would be impolitic and unnecessary. I hope and believe this opinion did not influence them, but I lament having given it, for the event has proved that a great part of the emigrants are justifiable. It always appeared to me so serious and great an evil to abandon one's country, that when I have seen it done with indifference or levity, I may perhaps have sometimes transferred to the measure itself a sentiment of disapprobation, excited originally by the manner of its adoption. When I saw people expatiate with calmness, and heard them speak of it as a means of distinguishing themselves, I did not sufficiently allow for the tendency of the French to make the best of every thing, or the influence of vanity on men who allow it to make part of the national characteristic: and surely, if ever vanity were laudable, that of marking a detestation for revolutionary principles, and an attachment to loyalty and religion, may justly be considered so. Many whom I then accused of being too lightly affected by the prospect of exile, might be animated by the hope of personally contributing to the establishment of peace and order, and rescuing their country from the banditti who were oppressing it; and it is not surprising that such objects should dazzle the imagination and deceive the judgment in the choice of measures by which they were to be obtained.
The number of emigrants from fashion or caprice is probably not great; and whom shall we now dare to include under this description, when the humble artizan, the laborious peasant, and the village priest, have ensanguined the scaffold destined for the prince or the prelate?—But if the emigrants be justifiable, the refugees are yet more so.
By Emigrants, I mean all who, without being immediately in danger, left their country through apprehension of the future—from attachment to the persons of the Princes, or to join companions in the army whom they might deem it a disgrace to abandon.—Those whom I think may with truth be styled Refugees, are the Nobility and Priests who fled when the people, irritated by the literary terrorists of the day, the Brissots, Rolands, Camille Desmoulins, &c. were burning their chateaux and proscribing their persons, and in whom expatriation cannot properly be deemed the effect of choice. These, wherever they have sought an asylum, are entitled to our respect and sympathy.
Yet, I repeat, we are not authorized to discriminate. There is no reasoning coldly on the subject. The most cautious prudence, the most liberal sacrifices, and the meanest condescensions, have not insured the lives and fortunes of those who ventured to remain; and I know not that the absent require any other apology than the desolation of the country they have quitted. Had my friends who have been slaughtered by Le Bon's tribunal persisted in endeavouring to escape, they might have lived, and their families, though despoiled by the rapacity of the government, have been comparatively happy.*
* The first horrors of the revolution are well known, and I have seen no accounts which exaggerate them. The niece of a lady of my acquaintance, a young woman only seventeen, escaped from her country-house (whilst already in flames) with her infant at her breast, and literally without clothes to cover her. In this state she wandered a whole night, and when she at length reached a place where she procured assistance, was so exhausted that her life was in danger.—Another lady, whom I knew, was wounded in the arm by some peasants assembled to force from her the writings of her husband's estates. Even after this they still remained in France, submitted with cheerfulness to all the demands of patriotic gifts, forced loans, requisitions and impositions of every kind; yet her husband was nevertheless guillotined, and the whole of their immense property confiscated.
Retrospections, like these, obliterate many of my former notions on the subject of the Emigrants; and if I yet condemn emigration, it is only as a general measure, impolitic, and inadequate to the purposes for which it was undertaken. But errors of judgment, in circumstances so unprecedented, cannot be censured consistently with candour, through we may venture to mark them as a discouragement to imitation; for if any nation should yet be menaced by the revolutionary scourge, let it beware of seeking external redress by a temporary abandonment of its interests to the madness of systemists, or the rapine of needy adventurers. We must, we ought to, lament the fate of the many gallant men who have fallen, and the calamities of those who survive; but what in them has been a mistaken policy, will become guilt in those who, on a similar occasion, shall not be warned by their example. I am concerned when I hear these unhappy fugitives are any where objects of suspicion or persecution, as it is not likely that those who really emigrated from principle can merit such treatment: and I doubt not, that most of the instances of treachery or misconduct ascribed to the Emigrants originated in republican emissaries, who have assumed that character for the double purpose of discrediting it, and of exercising their trade as spies.
The common people here, who were retained by Le Bon for several months to attend and applaud his executions, are still dissolute and ferocious, and openly regret the loss of their pay, and the disuse of the guillotine.
—I came to Arras in mourning, which I have worn since the receipt of your first letter, but was informed by the lady with whom my friends lodge, that I must not attempt to walk the streets in black, for that it was customary to insult those who did so, on a supposition that they were related to some persons who had been executed; I therefore borrowed a white undress, and stole out by night to visit my unfortunate acquaintance, as I found it was also dangerous to be seen entering houses known to contain the remains of those families which had been dismembered by Le Bon's cruelties.