My prison had two windows or horizontal slits, grated with iron; and through these the sun's rays struggled feebly in. From one I could perceive the two slender spires of the town, and the road beyond it, winding over a green hill to Fort Royal, with the bright glassy bay of St. Pierre full of shipping. From the other, I could perceive the courtyard of the citadel, where, already, the soldiers of the garrison were gathering with arms in their hands and a sullen expression in their faces.
Anon I heard the rolling of drums echoing in the fortifications, and then the troops fell into their ranks by companies. The officers who commanded them were no longer like the decorated chevaliers of old France. They were taken from the ranks—men of the people—and were divested of all ornaments, epaulettes, or lace; and as a badge of office, wore each a tricoloured sash over their plain blue surtouts; while in scorn of powder and trimming, their coarse black hair streamed in uncombed masses from beneath their large cocked hats. My heart grew sick on beholding them; for here, as in Paris, it was too evident that the religion of nature,—the power of the sovereign people,—liberty, equality, and fraternity,—with other political cant of the time, and of the murderous sections of the capital, together with bloodshed, robbery, and outrage, were triumphant and victorious. In confirmation of this several cries reached me.
"A bas les aristocrats!"
"Down with the Red Ribbon!"
"Vive le bon citoyen Rouvigny! Vive la République démocratique et sociale!"
These came chiefly from an excited mob of revolutionists, who poured like a living tide into the citadel, to fraternize with the soldiers of the line—now accepted children of the new régime. Among their mass of squalor, rags, and filth, crime, and intoxication, were hundreds of white women and French mulatto girls; like the ancient Bacchantes of Greece, more than half nude, crowned by garlands of vine-leaves, with wildness in their faces, frenzy in their gestures, and dishevelled hair; clashing cymbals and brandishing knives that were stained with the blood of many of the secular clergy, Jesuits, and wealthiest planters. They sang the "Carmagnole," and many obscene ditties, while dancing and gyrating in mad groups around two ruffians, each of whom bore upon his pike a human skull.
There were the ghastly heads of two of my father's favourite officers, MM. de la Bourdonaye and St. Julian, both young and noble gentlemen of Dauphiny, who were accused of no other crime than being descended from two of the best houses in France, and who had been murdered in cold blood in the vaults of the citadel. In very mockery, as it were, each poor skull had on a wig nicely powdered, and loyally tied with white ribbons. The heads were borne before a prisoner who was ignominiously bound with ropes, and led forward between an escort whose bayonets were fixed.
A shriek rose to my lips, but died there, as I clutched my prison-bars, and swung on them madly; for in this prisoner, who was greeted with a yell, I recognized my father—my father, Louis de Mazancy—the Sieur de St. Valliere, the first gentleman of Dauphiny, and Premier Chevalier of the Grand Cross of St. Louis.
Firmly, erect, and proudly, the old man strode to his doom. He wore the white uniform of the old French line. His hair was powdered and dressed à la Louis XV.; his orders were glittering on his breast; his aspect was singularly calm, dignified, and sweetly venerable. He was resolved to die with honour to the garb he wore, the race he sprang from, and the old monarchy of the Capets, the Valois, and the Bourbon, which, in that hour of shame and peril, he felt he represented; and, in defiance of the living tide of canaille who surrounded him, he repeatedly exclaimed with a clear and loud voice,—"Vive le Roi, Vive Louis XVII., King of France and Navarre!"
Yells, and the ominous flashing of brandished weapons followed him; the loud voice of Thibaud de Rouvigny was heard commanding silence; and he was obeyed, being now elected commander of the forces in the new republican state of Martinique. Such sudden elevations were not unusual in those days of the subversion of all right and rule. A poor sergeant of marines, named Jean-Baptist Bernadotte, was thus made colonel-in-chief of a battalion of mutineers, while all his officers were ironed and cast into prison. Unlike Rouvigny, who murdered many of his hapless superiors in cold blood, Bernadotte's first act of authority, was to order the release and dismissal of all who bore commissions under King Louis.*