… Manibus date lilia plenis.
We however strewed over the tombs of Labédoyère and Ney not lilies, but violets, for my friend Mrs W[allis], who was of our party, has a great aversion to the lily.
We have just heard of Didier's capture and execution at Grenoble.[64] There are continual reports of insurrections and plots, but it is now well known that the most of them are got up by the Ultras to entrap the unwary. The French people seem sunk in apathy and to wish for peace at any rate; nothing but the most extreme provocation will induce them to take up arms; but then, if they once do so, woe to the Chambre Introuvable, as the present Chamber of Deputies is called; certainly such a set of venal, merciless and ignorant bigots and blockheads never were collected in any assembly. There have occurred several scandalous scenes at Nîmes and other places. The Protestants are openly insulted and threatened, and the government is either too weak to prevent it, or, as is supposed, secretly encourages those excesses. In fact in Paris there are two polices; the one, that of the Government, the other, and by far the most troublesome, that of Monsieur[65] and the violent Ultra party, or as they are collectively called the Pavilion Marsan.[66] The priests are at work everywhere trumping up old legends, forging communications from the Holy Ghost, receiving letters dropped from heaven by Jesus Christ, and all this is done with the idea of working on fanatical minds, to induce them to commit acts of outrage and violence on those whom the priests designate as enemies to the faith, and on weak ones, with the idea of frightening them into restoring the lands and property which they have purchased or inherited and which formerly belonged to emigrants or to the Church.
A lady of my acquaintance (to give you an idea of the arts of these holy hypocrites) sent for a priest to confess and to receive absolution, not from any faith in the efficacy of the business, but merely from a desire of conforming to the ceremonies of the national worship. The priest arrived, but began by apologizing to her that he was sorry he could not administer to her the sacrament of absolution; she, surprized, asked the reason; he answered that it was because her uncle had purchased Church lands, which she inherited, and that unless she could resolve to restore them to the church, he could not think of giving her absolution. The lady was at a loss whether to be indignant at his impudence or to laugh outright at his folly. She however assumed a becoming gravity and sang-froid, and told him that he was very much mistaken if he thought he had got hold of a simpleton or a bigot in her; that she had sent for him merely with the idea of conforming to the national worship, and not with the most remote persuasion of the necessity or efficacy of his or any other priest's absolution; she added: "Your conduct has opened my eyes as to the views of all your cloth; I see you are incurable. I shall never send for any of you again; and be assured this anecdote shall not be forgotten. You may retire." The priest, abashed and mortified in finding himself mistaken in his supposed prey, stammered an excuse and retired.
I intend to remain at Paris until after the marriage ceremony of the Duke and Duchess of Berri, and I shall then proceed to Lausanne. It is expected there will be some disturbance on the occasion of this marriage.
I have witnessed an execution by the guillotine on the Place de Grève near the Hôtel de Ville. The criminal was guilty of a burglary and murder. It is the only execution (except political ones) that has taken place at Paris for the last six months, whereas in England they are strung up by dozens every fortnight. Independent of there being far less crimes committed in France than in England, the French code punishes but few offences with death.
Why is not the sanguinary English criminal code with death in every line—why is it not reformed, I say? 'Twould be well if our legislators, instead of their puerile and frothy declamations against revolutionary principles and the ambition of Napoleon, would occupy themselves seriously with this subject. But then the lawyers would all oppose the simplification of our Code. They find by experience that a complicated one, obstructed by customs, statutes and acts of Parliament, difficult to be correctly interpreted, and frequently at variance with each other, is a much more profitable thing, a much wider and more lucrative field for the exercise of their profession, than the simplicity of the Code Napoléon; and they would die of rage and despair at the thought of anybody not a lawyer being able to interpret the laws himself. Now as our country gentlemen and members of Parliament are always much inclined to take lawyer's advice, and are besides fully persuaded and convinced that there are no abuses whatever in England and that everything is as it should be, there is no hope of any amelioration in this particular. All reasoning and argument is lost on such political optimists.
The punishment of the guillotine certainly appears to be the most humane mode of terminating the existence of a man that could possibly be invented. The apparatus is preserved in the Hôtel de Ville, and is never exposed to view or erected on the place of execution, till about an hour before the execution itself takes place. At the hour appointed the criminal is brought to the scaffold, fastened to the board, placed at right angles with the fatal instrument, the head protruding thro' the groove, which embraces the neck; the executioner pulls a cord, the axe descends and the head of the criminal falls into a basket. The whole ceremony of the execution does not take three minutes when the criminal once arrives at the foot of the guillotine. There is none of that horrible struggling that takes place in the operation of hanging.
June 21st, 1816.
The ceremony of the marriage of the Duke and Duchess of Berri passed off quietly enough. Several people, it is true, were arrested for seditious expressions, but no tumult occurred. A great apprehension seemed to prevail lest something should occur, but the gendarmerie and police were so vigilant that all projects, had there been any, would have proved abortive.