THE MAN WITH THE IRON MASK.
INTRODUCTION.
Arrival of the Man with the Iron Mask at the Bastille—His Death—General Reflections on this celebrated Prisoner—Motives which determined the present Writer to make fresh Researches concerning him—Plan and Object of the Work.
About three o’clock in the afternoon of September 18, 1698, the Sieur de Saint-Mars, coming from the Isles Sainte-Marguerite, made his entry into the château of the Bastille, of which fortress he had just been appointed governor. Accompanying him, and borne along in his litter, was a prisoner, whose face was covered with a black velvet mask, and of whom Saint-Mars, with an escort of several mounted men-at-arms, had been the inseparable and vigilant gaoler, throughout the long journey from Provence. Saint-Mars had halted at Palteau, an estate situated between Joigny and Villeneuve-le-Roi, which belonged to him, and for a long time the old inhabitants of Villeneuve used to recall having seen the mysterious litter traversing in the evening the principal street of their town. The remembrance of this apparition has been perpetuated in the district, and the singular incidents characterizing it, related by the former to each new generation, have been handed down to our own days. The care taken by Saint-Mars at meal-times to keep his prisoner with his back to the windows, the pistols which were always to be seen within reach, of the suspicious gaoler, the two beds which he caused to be placed side by side, so many precautions, so much mystery, excited the lively curiosity of the assembled peasants, and formed an incessant subject of conversation among them. At the Bastille, the prisoner was placed in the third room south of the Tower of La Bertaudière, prepared for him by the turnkey Dujonca, who, some days previous to his arrival, had received a written order to that effect from Saint-Mars.[1]
Five years afterwards, on Tuesday, November 20, 1703, at four o’clock in the afternoon, the drawbridge of the formidable fortress was lowered and gave passage to a sad and mournful train. A few men, bearing a dead body, having for sole escort two subordinate employés of the Bastille, silently issued forth and directed their steps towards the cemetery of the Church of Saint-Paul. Nothing could be more thrilling than the sight of this group gliding along furtively under shadow of the falling night. Nothing could be more utterly abandoned, and, in appearance, more obscure, than these unknown remains followed by two strangers, in a hurry to fulfil their task. Around the grave as, the evening before, around the bed of the dying man, there were no signs of sorrow or of regret. The prisoner of Provence had fallen ill on the Sunday. His illness having suddenly increased during the following day, the chaplain of the Bastille had been sent for; too late, however, to allow him time to go in quest of the last sacraments, yet still sufficiently early to enable him to address some rapid and common-place exhortations to the dying man. On the register of the Church of Saint-Paul he was inscribed under the name of Marchialy. At the Bastille he had always been known as the Prisoner of Provence.[2]
Such is the mysterious personage who, unknown and abandoned to the obscurity of a prison during the latter part of his existence, became, a few years after his death, celebrated throughout the entire world, and the romantic and piquant remembrance of whom has, for more than a century, charmed the imagination of all, attracted universal attention, and exercised uselessly the patience and sagacity of so many minds. Become the hero of the most famous of legends, he has had the rare privilege of everywhere exciting the curiosity of the public, without ever either wearying or satiating it. At all epochs and among all classes, in England, Germany, Italy, as well as France, in our own days, as in the time of Voltaire, people have manifested the utmost anxiety to penetrate the secret of this long imprisonment. Napoleon I. greatly regretted not being able to satisfy this desire.[3] Louis Philippe, too, discussed this problem, the solution of which he acknowledged himself ignorant of;[4] and, if other sovereigns[5] have pretended they were acquainted with it, their contradictory statements lead us to believe that they were no better informed, but that in their eyes the knowledge and transmission of the dark secret ought to be counted among the prerogatives of the crown.
In the long list of writers whom the Man with the Iron Mask, the sphinx of our history, has attracted and tempted, are many illustrious names, as well as some less known now-a-days. During thirty years, Voltaire, Fréron, Saint-Foix, Lagrange-Chancel, and Father Griffet took part in a brilliant joust, in which each of the adversaries succeeded a great deal better in overthrowing his opponent’s opinions than in securing the triumph of his own.
Many times, and in our own days even, has the debate been resumed, then momentarily abandoned, then recommenced again. Far and near new theories have been broached, invariably supported by vague and weak proofs, and soon overthrown by strong and valid objections. Fifty-two writers[6] have by turns endeavoured to throw light upon this question, but without success; and it can be affirmed that a century of controversy and of exertion has not yet dissipated the mysterious gloom in which Saint-Mars’ celebrated prisoner is enveloped.
So many successive checks, by still further stimulating curiosity, have caused it to be believed that it was impossible to arrive at an incontestable and definitive result. Every new explanation having been victoriously repelled almost as soon as started, people have despaired of ever attaining the truth, and some have even gone so far as to proclaim it as being beyond human reach. “The story of the Iron Mask,” says M. Michelet,[7] “will probably for ever remain obscure,” “The Man with the Iron Mask will very likely always be an insoluble problem,” has been said elsewhere;[8] and M. Henri Martin declares that “history has not the right of pronouncing an opinion on what will never emerge from the domain of conjecture.”[9]