The two divisions hung nervously, the one east, the other west of the fortress, making a show to dispute the passage of the river against forces three times their own in number and indefinitely their superiors in training and every quality of arms: on the 28th[[42]] of September, at dawn, Coburg crossed where he chose both above and below the town; of the French divisions one was swept, the other hunted, into the fortress—before noon the thing was done, and the French force—happy to have escaped with but a partial panic—was blocked and held. With the next day the strain began, for the Austrians drove the surrounding peasantry within the walls and in the same hour burnt the stores accumulated outside. On the third day the first of the horses within Maubeuge was killed for food.
[42]. Not, as Jomini says, the 29th.
Drouet, for all his high heart, doubted if the Republic could deliver them and knew the sudden extremity of the town. He imagined a bold thing. On the 2nd of October, the fourth day of the siege, he took a hundred dragoons—men of his own old arm—and set out across the Austrian lines by night: he designed a long ride to the Meuse itself and the sending of immediate news to the Committee of the hunger of Maubeuge: he feared lest those civilians in Paris should imagine that a week, ten days, a fortnight were all one to the beleaguered town, and lest they should frame their plan of relief upon the false hope of a long siege. So he rode out—and the enemy heard the hoof-beats and caught him. They put that dark man in chains; they caged him also and made him a show. In Brussels, Fersen, with a dreadful curiosity, went to peep at his face behind the iron bars; in Paris the woman whose chance of flight he had destroyed at Varennes sat and awaited her judges.
Three days passed in Maubeuge and all the meat, salted and fresh, was sequestrated. The manuscripts in the monastery were torn up for cartridges: everything was needed. On the next day, the 6th of October, all hay and straw were commandeered. On the next, the 7th, a census of the food remaining showed, for over 30,000 adult men and all the women and children besides, barely 400 head, and of these more than three-quarters were small sheep in poor condition. Upon the 10th such little grain as the town contained was seized by the Commandant. The next day the whole population was upon half rations and the townsmen were struggling with the soldiery. Upon the morrow again, the 12th, counsel was taken of the desperate need to advise the Government that the place was all but gone, and it was designed that by night such as might volunteer should bear the news or perish in crossing the lines.
That evening, the evening of the 12th, after dark, Marie Antoinette was led out from her cell for that preliminary Interrogation which, in French procedure, precedes the public trial. They led her from her little cell, through the narrow passages, into a great empty hall. Two candles, the only lights in that echoing darkness, stood upon the table.
She was in a deep ignorance of her position and of Europe. The silence of the room corresponded to the silence within her: its darkness to the complete loneliness of her heart. She did not know what were the fortunes of the French army, what advance, if any, had been made by their enemies—whom she still regarded as her rescuers. She knew nothing of the last desperate risk upon the frontier which the Republic ran; she knew nothing of the steps by which she had been brought to this position, the demand in Parliament for her execution as the news from the front got worse and worse: the summoning of the Court: the formation of the Bench that was to try her. Least of all did she know that the extreme mad group whom Hébert led had gone to her little sickly son suggesting to him (probably believing what they suggested) nameless corruptions from her hand: to these they believed he had been witness, nay, himself a victim; she did not know that to these horrors that group had caused the child’s trembling signature to be affixed.... He had sat there swinging his legs in the air from the high chair in which they had placed him to question him: he had answered “Yes” to all they suggested ... he was her little son! She, imprisoned far off from him, knew nothing of that hellish moment. She was utterly deserted. She saw nothing but the dark empty room and the two pale candles that shone upon the faces of the men who were soon to try her: they marked in relief the aquiline face of the chief judge Herman. The other faces were in darkness.
Certain questions privately put to her were few and simple, a mere preliminary to the trial; she answered them as simply in her own favour. Her dress was dark and poor. She sat between two policemen upon a bench in the vast black void of the unfurnished hall and answered, and, when she had answered, signed. She answered conventionally that she wished the country well, that she had never wished it ill; she signed (as they told her to sign) under the title of the “widow of Capet.” They named two barristers to defend her, Chauveau-Lagarde and Tronçon Ducourdray, and she was led back to her cell and to her silence. Next day, the 13th, these lawyers were informed, and came to consult with her.