Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. V, No. XXV, June, 1852

by Various

You do not perhaps remember that the Palais du Luxembourg was at one period used as a prison. Some of those splendid saloons which you so much admire were once bordered with cells hastily erected with rough planks, the centre of the area being used as a common room for the whole of the prisoners. When the Revolution of 1798 broke out in France, I was the junior partner of an English house doing business in a certain kind of merchandise in the Rue St. Honoré. I was very young, almost a lad, indeed, but I had invested the whole of my small fortune in the concern. I was active and sedulous, and I devoted my entire energies to the prosecution of our joint interests, which throve considerably. When the troubles came, my partners, who conceived that they had grounds for apprehension, resolved to quit the country; and they offered me the whole of the business upon terms so advantageous that I did not feel justified in refusing them. I had never meddled with politics (for which, indeed, I had no talent or inclination), I was too young to have any enemies or to be suspected of partisanship; so I closed with the offer that was made me, and resolved to brave the perils of the time, making my business the sole object of my care and solicitude, and leaving all things else to take their course. I pursued this plan rigidly, avoiding all participation in the excitement of the period, and not even conversing on the subject of public affairs, concerning which upon all occasions I professed, what indeed was the truth, that I knew nothing. I went on thus for some years, and amidst all the horrors and vicissitudes of the Revolution my business throve prosperously. I experienced no sort of interruption—never received a single domiciliary visit from any one of the factions upon whom the sovereign authority so suddenly devolved—and, to all appearance, had escaped suspicion under each and all of the rapidly-changing dynasties. I had well-nigh doubled my wealth by unwearied diligence, and had long banished all thought of peril in the course I was pursuing, when, one rainy night in the summer of 1793, I was roused from my rest after I had been a full hour asleep in bed, compelled to hurry on a few clothes at a minute's notice, pushed into a carriage waiting at my door, and driven off to a midnight tribunal. Arrived at the Hôtel de Ville, I requested to hear the charge which had been made against me but was desired to hold my peace. I was brought there for identification, and not for a hearing, the ruffian in office informed me, and it would be time enough for me to hear the charge when I was called upon to answer it. It was in vain that I pleaded the injustice of such a proceeding; I was obliged to submit to their pleasure. A pen was put into my hand, and I was ordered to write my protest, if I had any to make. I did so in a few words, claiming protection as a French citizen. The presiding scoundrel pretended to compare my writing with some imaginary seditious document of which it was not possible that I could have been the author, and at once committed me to prison. I was kept in waiting while some other pretended examinations were gone through, and then, in company with three more unfortunates, was driven off to the Luxembourg, where, at about two o'clock in the morning, I was bundled into a cell furnished with a straw paillasse and rug, a deal table and a single chair, and lighted by a small lamp suspended aloft out of my reach.

When I could find time to reflect upon the sudden calamity which had overtaken me, I could come to no other conclusion than that I had been made the victim of the cupidity of some villain or villains who had contrived to incarcerate me out of the way, while they made a plunder of my property. The imputation of seditious correspondence, which I knew to be nothing but a pretense, bore me out in this conjecture; and upon thinking the matter over again and again, I came to the conviction at last, that, bad as the matter was, it might have been much worse. I thought I saw that there was little chance of my being brought up for trial, as it would be more for the interest of my enemies, whoever they were, to keep me out of the way, than to bring me before a tribunal which might or might not condemn me to death, but which could hardly fail of discovering the motive of my abduction and imprisonment. Thus I got rid of the fear of the guillotine, and I soon found another cause for gratulation in the fact that I had not been searched. I had a considerable sum of money in my pocket-book, and, by a piece of good fortune, the book containing my banking-account was in the breast-pocket of my overcoat, which I had put on on the previous evening in consequence of a sudden storm, and which, on hearing the pattering rain, I had instinctively seized upon coming away. Before I lay down upon my miserable couch I contrived effectually to secrete my valuables, in the fear that they might be abstracted in case I should be so fortunate as to sleep. I had been locked in by the jailer, and I imagined that the ten square feet which limited my view would confine all my motions during the term of my imprisonment. In spite of all my anxieties and the disagreeable novelty of my position, I fell off to slumber about sunrise, and into a pleasant dream of home in England, and the sunny fields of childhood.

I was awoke soon after seven o'clock by the sound of laughter and loud voices mingled with the twanging of a lute. I started up, and seeing that the door of my cell was standing ajar, I bent forward and looked out. My apparition in a red night-cap was received with a burst of merriment loud and prolonged from some fifty well-dressed individuals seated on chairs or lounging on tables in the centre of a large arena, surrounded on all sides with cells, the counterpart of my own. They hailed me as "Le Bonnet Rouge," and wished me joy of my advent among them. Making my toilet as speedily as possible, I joined them with the best grace I could, and requested to be allowed the pleasure of their society, if, as I supposed from what I saw, the rules of the prison permitted me the indulgence. A young man politely stepped forward, and volunteered to instruct me in the constitution and the etiquette of the society into which I had been so abruptly introduced. He was the model of courtesy and good breeding, and soon initiated me into the mysteries of the association which the prisoners had set on foot for the purpose of relieving the tedium of confinement, and for banishing the gloomy shadow of speedy and certain death impending over the major part of them. He informed me that we were at liberty either to take our meals in common at the general table in the saloon where we then were, or to withdraw with our several messes to our own cells; but that no gentleman who could not show a cheerful countenance, under the peculiar circumstances of the case, was expected to make his appearance either at dinner or supper, or, indeed, in the saloon at all, save for the purpose of periodical exercise. He argued that a dejected and sorrowful face, though it might be allowable in the case of a solitary prisoner, was clearly an offense against the whole assembly, each of whom having his own burden to bear, was entitled to at least as good an example of courage as he could furnish himself; and that upon those grounds they had come to the understanding, which was perfectly well known and acted upon among them, that those who had not sufficient fortitude to oppose a smile to the scowl of Fate should confine their sorrows to their own cabins, and not disturb the enjoyments, short-lived as they were, nor unsettle the constancy of their fellows by the parade of unavailing dejection. He added, that if I could conduce to the amusement of their circle by any means, no matter how, I should be regarded in the light of a benefactor; that they had music, public debates, and dramatic representations, though without scenery or appropriate dresses; and that in all or any of these amusements I might take a part if I chose, and might feel sure of their candid appreciation of my endeavors. He then, with the utmost sang froid, gave me to understand that their first violin would that morning leave them, though he would give them a parting cavatina before he mounted the tumbril, which would call on its way to the guillotine about twelve o'clock. Fifteen other gentlemen of their community were bound on the same voyage; they were liable to such deductions from their social circle, he was sorry to say—and he shrugged his shoulders—on occasions far too frequent for their repose; but then they were constantly receiving fresh additions, and their number was generally very nearly if not quite complete. He told me that among the twenty or thirty gentlemen conversing so cheerfully at the next table, seven would die that morning, and apologized for not pointing out the particular individuals, on the score of its being hardly polite to do so.

I was perfectly horrified at the communication of my voluble companion. Though living so long in the very centre and focus of revolution, I had kept so carefully clear of the terrible drama which had been acting, and had been so wrapped up in my own concerns, that I was altogether unprepared for the recognition of such a state of feeling on the subject of certain, sudden, and murderous death, as I now found existing around me. It required all the courage and self-control I was master of to repress the natural exclamations of dismay that rose to my lips. I thanked my new friend for his courtesy, expressed my determination not to appear in the social circle at any time when my spirits were not up to the mark, and, bowing ceremoniously, withdrew to my own cell to ruminate alone upon what I had heard. You may imagine what passed in my mind. I had been religiously educated in a Protestant country; I had never, even in France, neglected the daily duties of religion. I had knelt, morning, and evening, from my earliest childhood, to my father's God; and I had devoutly sought the especial direction of his providence both in taking the step which led me to Paris in the first instance, and in that which had fixed me there when my partners had fled in apprehension of calamity. The idea of death had been to me always one of unmingled solemnity; and the thought of opposing laughter and merriment to the grim aspect of the grisly king was abhorrent to my imagination. I remained all the morning in my cell, a prey to miserable and anxious thought. I heard the cavatina played with firmness and brilliancy by the musician who knew to a certainty that within an hour he would be a headless corpse. I heard the tumbril drive up to the door which was to convey sixteen of my fellow-prisoners to feed the dripping ax. I saw them defile past my cell as the jailer checked them off on his list, and heard them respond gayly to the "Bon voyage" of their companions ere they departed in the fatal cart which was to carry them "out of the world."

There is, however, a force in circumstances strong enough to overcome the habits and instincts of a life-time. I had not been a month in the Luxembourg before the idea of death by violence, once so terrible and appalling, began to assume a very different aspect in my mind. Our society consisted of above a hundred in number, and the major part of them, incarcerated for political offenses, were but in the position of losers in a game in which they had played the stake of life for the chance of power. They paid the penalty as readily and as recklessly as they had played the game; and the spectacle which their fate presented to my view, though it never reconciled me to their repulsive indifference to the importance of life, yet gradually undermined my own estimate of its value. Every means of amusement that could be thought of was resorted to for diversion. Plays were acted night after night, the female characters being personated by the youngest of the party in robes borrowed from the wardrobe of the jailer's wife. Concerts were got up, and the songs of all nations were sung with much taste to the accompaniment of the lute in the hands of an old professor, who, it afterward came out, had been imprisoned by mistake, because he bore the name of an offender. Card-parties sat down to play every evening; and men would continue the game, and deal the cards with a steady hand, though they heard their names called over in the list of those who were to grace the guillotine on the morrow. It was rare that executions followed on two successive days; there was often, indeed, a respite for a fortnight together; but I noticed with a shudder that, whenever the cells were all occupied, an execution, and usually of a large number, speedily followed.

Months passed away. I was unhappy beyond expression, from the want of sympathy and of occupation. I had been allowed to receive a box of clothes and linen from my residence; and my servant had put a few English books into the box, with a design to relieve the tedium of confinement. Among the books was Baxter's "Call to the Unconverted." It came into my head that I might find occupation in translating this work into French, and that by circulating it very cheaply among the populace I might perhaps do something to stem the course of bloodshed and profanity in which all seemed hurrying headlong forward. I procured writing-materials, and shutting myself up several hours a day in my cell, commenced the translation. I did not make very rapid progress; my attention was too much distracted by what was going on around me to permit me to do much during the day. At eleven at night we were locked in our cells, and then I generally wrote for a quiet hour before going to bed.

I had been thus engaged for some three or four months, and had completed more than half my undertaking, when, as I sat one morning at my writing, one of the attendants knocked at my cell door, and announced a visitor in the person of an Englishman, who, having been consigned to prison, had inquired if any of his fellow-countrymen were in confinement, and having been referred to me, now sought an introduction. I rose, of course, immediately, and proceeded to offer him such welcome as the place afforded. He was a man already stricken in years of a rather forbidding aspect, but with the fire of intellect in his restless eye. He introduced himself to me as Thomas Paine, the author of the "Rights of Man," and he hoped he might add, the consistent friend of liberty, though for the present at least, he had lost his own. I condoled with him as well as I could, and assisted in installing him in a cell next to mine which happened to be vacant. I may confess that I was much more astonished than gratified by the accession of such a companion; but as he never sought to intrude upon my privacy, I was enabled to proceed with my work unmolested. I made him acquainted with the etiquette of the prison, and the necessity of a cheerful face if he went into company; and he warmly approved of the regulation, though he rarely complied with it, as he kept himself almost constantly in his cell. He wrote for several hours every day; and told me that he was approaching fast toward the completion of a work, which, under the title of "The Age of Reason," would one day make a noise in the world, and do something toward putting the forces of Priestcraft to the rout. At my request, he lent me a portion of the manuscript, which having perused with indignation, I returned with my unqualified condemnation, at which he laughed good-humoredly, and said I had been too effectually nursed in prejudices to be able to judge impartially. I did not return the confidence with which he had honored me by making him acquainted with the purpose for which I was laboring. The winter of '93-94 was nearly over before I had got my manuscript in a fit condition to be put into the hands of the printer. I remember being much troubled in the preparation of the last few pages by the crowded state of the prison. Not only were all the cells occupied, but a full half of them contained a couple of inmates each, and I was obliged myself to purchase immunity from partnership with a stranger at a considerable sum. We who had been long in prison knew well enough what to look for from such a state of things, and every night after supper we expected the summons of the bell which preceded the reading over of the black list. It came at last after a respite of eighteen days, an interval which had caused many to hope that these judicial slaughters were at an end. The first stroke of the bell produced a dead silence, and we listened with horror while twenty-seven names were deliberately called over, together with the numbers of the cells in which their owners domiciled. I saw Mr. Paine seated in his cell, and clutching the door in his hand, as he looked sternly through the partial opening upon the face of the jailer as he read over the list. When it was concluded, he shut himself in, and I heard him moving about at intervals during the whole night. I did not sleep myself, and I felt sure that he did not attempt to sleep.

When the victims were mustered the next morning previous to the arrival of the tumbrils which were to bear them to death, the jailer declared that the number was short by one; that he was bound to furnish the full complement of twenty-eight, which he asserted was the number he had read off the night before. He was requested to refer to the list, and read it again; but, by some strange management this could not be found.

"Gentlemen," said the jailer, "you must manage it among you somehow: it is as much as my own head is worth—though to be sure heads are at a discount just now—to send short weight in bargains of this sort. Be so good as to settle it among yourselves." At these words a volunteer stepped forward. "What signifies a day or two more or less?" he cried, "I will go! Gentlemen, do not trouble yourselves—the affair is finished!" A light murmur of applause was deemed a sufficient reward for his gratuitous act of self-devotion, which under different circumstances might have won an immortality of fame. The voluntary victim could have been barely five-and-twenty. He was allowed to lead off the dance in the grim tragedy of the morning. He did so with an alacrity altogether and exceedingly French. I do not recollect his name; his exploit was no more than a three days' wonder.

From what reason I know not, but it began to be rumored that one of the Englishmen ought to have completed the condemned list; and suspicions of dishonorable conduct on the part of Paine were freely whispered about. They were perhaps founded on the fact of his being constantly in communication with the jailer, who brought him almost daily dispatches from some of his Jacobin friends. It was reported sotto voce that he had bribed the jailer to erase his name from the list; though, as he had never been brought to trial, nor, as far as I know, was aware, any more than myself, of the specific charge made against him, I do not see that that was very probable—a form of trial at least being generally allowed to prisoners.