The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, Charles Duke Yonge [e book reader android txt] 📗

to be borne by the classes which did not enjoy such privileges.

But, heavy as the grievance of these exemptions was, it was as nothing when compared with the feudal rights claimed by the greater nobles. The peasants on their estates were forced to grind their corn at the lord's mill, to press their grapes at his wine-press, paying for such act whatever price he might think fit to exact, and often having their crops wholly wasted or spoiled by the delays which such a system engendered. The game-laws forbade them to weed their fields lest they should disturb the young partridges or leverets; to manure the soil with any thing which might injure their flavor; or even to mow or reap till the grass or corn was no longer required as shelter for the young coveys. Some of the rights of seigniory, as it was called, were such as can hardly be mentioned in this more decorous age; some were so ridiculous that it is inconceivable how their very absurdity had not led to their abolition. In the marshy districts of Brittany, one right enjoyed by the great nobles was "the silence of the frogs,[14]" which, whenever the lady was confined, bound the peasants to spend their days and nights in beating the swamps with long poles to save her from being disturbed by their inharmonious croaking. And if this or any other feudal right was dispensed with, it was only commuted for a money payment, which was little less burdensome.

The powers exercised by the crown were more intolerable still. The sovereign was absolute master of the liberties of his subjects. Without alleging the commission of any crime, he could issue warrants--letters under seal, as they were called--which consigned the person named in them to imprisonment, which was often perpetual. The unhappy prisoner had no power of appeal. No judge could inquire into his case, much less release him. The arrests were often made with such secrecy and rapidity that his nearest relations knew not what had become of him, but he was cut off from the outer world, for the rest of his life, as completely as if he had at once been handed over to the executioner.[15]

It was impossible but that such customs should produce general discontent, and a resolute demand for a complete reformation of the system. And one of the problems which the minister had to determine was, how to organize the States-general so that they should be disposed to promote such measures as reform as should be adequate without being excessive; as should give due protection to the middle and lower classes without depriving the nobles of that dignity and authority which were not only desirable for themselves, but useful to their dependents; and, lastly, such as should carefully preserve the rightful prerogatives of the crown, while putting an end to those arbitrary powers, the existence of which was incompatible with the very name of freedom.

In making the necessary arrangements, the long disuse of the Assembly was a circumstance greatly in favor of the Government, if Necker had had skill to avail himself of it, since it wholly freed him from the obligation of being guided by former precedents. Those arrangements were long and warmly debated in the king's council. Though the records of former sessions had been so carelessly preserved that little was known of their proceedings, it seemed to be established that the representatives of the Commons had usually amounted to about four-tenths of the whole body, those of the clergy and of the nobles being each about three-tenths; and that they had almost invariably deliberated and voted in separate chambers; and the princes and the chief nobles presented memorials to the king, in which they almost unanimously recommended an adherence to these ancient forms; while, with patriotic prudence, they sought to obviate all jealousy of their own pretensions or views which might be entertained or feigned in any quarter, by announcing their willingness to abandon all the exclusive privileges and exemptions which they had hitherto possessed, and which were notoriously one chief cause of the generally prevailing discontent.

But the party which had originated the clamor for the States-general, now, encouraged by their success, put forward two fresh demands; the first, that the number of the representatives of the Commons should equal that of both the other orders put together, which they called "the duplication of the Third Estate;" the second, that the three orders should meet and vote as one united body in one chamber; the two proposition taken together being manifestly calculated and designed to throw the whole power into the hands of the Commons.

Necker had great doubts about the propriety and safety of the first proposal, and no doubt at all of the danger of the second. His own judgment was that the wisest plan would be to order the clergy and nobles to unite in an Upper Chamber, so as in some degree to resemble the British House of Lords; while the Third Estate, in a Lower Chamber, would be a tolerably faithful copy of our House of Commons. But he could never bring himself to risk his popularity by opposing what he regarded as the opinion of the masses. He was alarmed by the political clubs which were springing up in Paris; one, whose president was the Duc d'Orleans, assuming the significant and menacing title of Les Enrages;[16] and by the vast number of pamphlets which were circulated both in the capital and the chief towns of the provinces by thousands,[17] every writer of which put himself forward as a legislator,[18] and of which the vast majority advocated what they called the rights of the Third Estate, in most violent language; and, finally, he adopted the course which is a great favorite with vain and weak men, and which he probably represented to himself as a compromise between unqualified concession and unyielding resistance, though, every one possessed of the slightest penetration could see that it practically surrendered both points: he advised the king to issue his edict that the number of representatives to be returned to the States-general should be twelve hundred, half of whom were to be returned by the Commons, a quarter by the clergy, and a quarter by the nobles;[19] and to postpone the decision as to the number of the chambers till the Assembly should meet, when he proposed to allow the States themselves to determine it; trusting, against all probability, that, after having thus given the Commons the power to enforce their own views, he should be able to persuade them to abandon the same in deference to his judgment.

Louis, as a matter of course, adopted his advice; and, after several different towns--Blois, Tours, Cambrai, and Compiegne among them--had been proposed as the place of meeting, he himself decided in favor of Versailles,[20] as that which would afford him the best hunting while the session lasted. The queen in her heart disapproved of every one of these resolutions. She saw that Necker had, as she had foreboded, sacrificed the king's authority by his advice on the two first questions; and she perceived more clearly than any one the danger of fixing the States- general so near to Paris that the turbulent population of the city should be able to overawe the members. She pressed these considerations earnestly on the king,[21] but it was characteristic of the course which she prescribed to herself from, the beginning, and from which she never swerved, that when her advice was overruled she invariably defended the course which had been taken. Her language, when any one spoke to her either of her own opinions and wishes, or of the feelings with which the different classes of the nation regarded her, was invariably the same. "You are not to think of me for a moment. All that I desire of you is to take care that the respect which is due to the king shall not be weakened;[22]" and it was only her most intimate friends who knew how unwise she thought the different decisions that had been adopted, or how deep were her forebodings of evil.


CHAPTER XXIII.

The Reveillon Riot.--Opening of the States-general.--The Queen is insulted by the Partisans of the Duc d'Orleans.--Discussions as to the Number of Chambers.--Career and Character of Mirabeau.--Necker rejects his Support. --He determines to revenge himself.--Death of the Dauphin.

The meeting of the States-general, as has been already seen, was fixed for the 4th of May, 1789; and, as if it were fated that the bloody character of the period now to be inaugurated should be displayed from the very outset, the elections for the city of Paris, which were only held in the preceding week, were stained with a riot so formidable as to be commonly spoken of in the records of the time as an insurrection.[1]

One of the candidates for the representation of the Third Estate was a paper-maker of the name of Reveillon, a man eminent for his charity and general liberality, but one who was believed to regard the views of the extreme reformers with disfavor. He was so popular with his own workmen, who were very numerous, and with their friends, who knew his character from them, that he was generally expected to succeed. The opposite party, who had candidates of their own, and had the support of the purse of the Duc d'Orleans, were determined that he should not; and no way seemed so sure as to murder him. Bands of ferocious-looking ruffians were brought in from the country districts, armed with heavy bludgeons, and, as was afterward learned, well supplied with money; and on the morning of the 28th of April news was brought to the Baron de Besenval, the commander of the Royal Guards, that a mob of several thousand men had collected in the streets, who had read a mock sentence, professing to have been passed by the Third Estate, which condemned Reveillon to be hanged, after which they had burned him in effigy, and then attacked his house, which they were sacking and destroying. They even ventured to attack the first company of soldiers whom De Besenval sent to the rescue; and it was not till he dispatched a battalion with a couple of field-pieces to the spot that the plunderers were expelled from the house and the riot was quelled. Nearly five hundred of the mob were killed, but when the Parliament proceeded to set on foot a judicial inquiry into the cause of the tumult, Necker prevailed on the secretary of state to suppress the investigation, as he feared to exasperate D'Orleans further by giving publicity to his machinations, which he did not yet suspect either the extent or the object.[2]

A momentary tranquility was, however, restored at Paris; and all eyes were turned from the capital to Versailles, where the first few days of May were devoted to the receptions of the States-general by the king and queen, ceremonies which might have had a good effect, since the bitterest adversaries of the court were favorably impressed by the grace and affability of the queen; but which many shrewd judges afterward believed to have had a contrary influence, from the offense taken by the representatives of the Commons at some of the details of the ancient etiquette, which on so solemn an occasion was revived in all its stately strictness. The dignitaries of the Church wore their most sumptuous robes. The Nobles glittered with silk and gold lace; jeweled clasps fastened plumes of feathers in their hats; orders glittered on their breasts; and many a precious stone sparkled in the hilts of their swords. The representatives of the Commons were allowed neither feathers, nor embroidery, nor swords; but were forced to content themselves with plain black cloaks, and an unadorned homeliness of attire, which seemed as if intended to