LE GOURMAND: AN INCIDENT OF LOUIS XVI.’S FLIGHT FROM PARIS
(From a caricature of the period).
This caricature, which is neither signed nor dated, is simply entitled ‘Le Gourmand;’ though Jaime, in his Histoire de la Caricature, states that it represents Louis XVI. at Varennes. According to Carlyle, however, the king reached Varennes at eleven o’clock at night, was at once arrested in his carriage, and taken to Procureur Sausse’s house. Here he ‘demands refreshments, as is written; gets bread-and-cheese, with a bottle of Burgundy, and remarks that it is the best Burgundy he ever drunk.’ At six o’clock the following morning he left Varennes, escorted by ten thousand National Guards. Very likely there may have been a story current at the time to the effect that the arrest was due to the king’s halting to gratify his appetite. Or the caricature may represent some incident that occurred, during his return to Paris, as he passed through the Champagne district, and halted at the Hôtel de Rohan at Epernay.
[240] ] De Goncourt’s Société Française pendant la Révolution.
[241] ] Ibid.
[242] ] St. Aubin’s Expédition de Don Quichotte.
[243] ] Aux voleurs! aux voleurs! quoted by De Goncourt.
[244] ] Lettres du Père Duchêne, quoted by De Goncourt.
[245] ] Les Célébrités du Vin de Champagne, Epernay, 1880.
[246] ] Journal de ce qui s’est passé d’intéressant à Reims en 1814.
[247] ] Ibid.