To this description an English physician, who likewise saw it, adds, "It must have had two brains, as motion and sensation were equal, and apparently perfect, in each head and chest, and in all the four arms. It had two hearts, and two sets of lungs; it had also two passages into the stomach, but, as was supposed, only one set of abdominal viscera, as the belly was not larger than that of a common child of that age usually is. The hearts and arteries beat more strongly than was consistent with a long continuance of health. The action of the arteries was plainly seen under the skin."
Mr. Buffon, in the Supplement to his Natural History, has given the figure and description of a monster something similar to this, part of which description I shall give in a note, as a parallel to that of the living child.[15]
I went several times to the National Assembly; the Tribunes, or Galleries, (of which there are three) entered warmly, by applauses and by murmurs and hisses, into the affairs which were treated of.
Letters are franked by the assembly as far as the frontiers, by being stamped with red printers ink, Ass. Nationale.
About this time many hundreds of folio volumes of heraldry, and of the registers of the nobility, were publicly burnt in la Place Vendôme, after due notice had been given of the time and place by advertisements pasted against the walls. A wicked wag observed, that it was a pity all their books of divinity, and almost all those of law and physic, were not added to the pile but he comforted himself with reflecting that ça viendra.
All the coats of arms which formerly decorated the gates of Hôtels are taken away, and even seals are at present engraven with cyphers only.
The Chevaliers de St. Louis still continue to wear the cross, or the ribband, at the button-hole; all other orders of knighthood are abolished. No liveries are worn by servants, that badge of slavery is likewise abolished; and also all corporation companies, as well as every other monopolizing society; and there are no longer any Royal tobacco nor salt shops.
I went once to the Café de la Regence,[16] with the intention of playing a game at chess, but I found the chess-men so very little different in colour, that I could not distinguish them sufficiently to be able to play. It seems it is the fashion for chess-men at present to be made of box-wood, and all nearly of the same colour. I then went to another coffee-house frequented by chess-players, and here the matter was worse; they had, in addition to the above-mentioned fashion, substituted the cavalier, or knight, for the fou, or bishop, and the bishop for the knight, so that I left them to fight their own battles.
Books of all sorts are printed without any approbation or privilêge. Many are exposed on stalls, which are very improper for the public eye. One of these was called the Private Life of the Queen, in two volumes, with obscene prints. The book itself is contemptible and disgusting, and might as well have been called the Woman of Pleasure. Of books of this sort I saw above thirty, with plates. Another was on a subject not fit even to be mentioned.
I read a small pamphlet, entitled "le Christ-Roi, or a Parallel of the Sufferings of Lewis XVI. &c." I can say nothing in favor of it.