The French Revolution A History Chapter 2.6.IV. - Subterranean.
by Thomas Carlyle
But judge if there was comfort in this to the Sections all sitting
permanent; deliberating how a National Executive could be put in action!
High rises the response, not of cackling terror, but of crowing counter-
defiance, and Vive la Nation; young Valour streaming towards the Frontiers;
Patrie en Danger mutely beckoning on the Pont Neuf. Sections are busy, in
their permanent Deep; and down, lower still, works unlimited Patriotism,
seeking salvation in plot. Insurrection, you would say, becomes once more
the sacredest of duties? Committee, self-chosen, is sitting at the Sign of
the Golden Sun: Journalist Carra, Camille Desmoulins, Alsatian Westermann
friend of Danton, American Fournier of Martinique;--a Committee not unknown
to Mayor Petion, who, as an official person, must sleep with one eye open.
Not unknown to Procureur Manuel; least of all to Procureur-Substitute
Danton! He, wrapped in darkness, being also official, bears it on his
giant shoulder; cloudy invisible Atlas of the whole.
Much is invisible; the very Jacobins have their reticences. Insurrection
is to be: but when? This only we can discern, that such Federes as are
not yet gone to Soissons, as indeed are not inclined to go yet, "for
reasons," says the Jacobin President, "which it may be interesting not to
state," have got a Central Committee sitting close by, under the roof of
the Mother Society herself. Also, what in such ferment and danger of
effervescence is surely proper, the Forty-eight Sections have got their
Central Committee; intended 'for prompt communication.' To which Central
Committee the Municipality, anxious to have it at hand, could not refuse an
Apartment in the Hotel-de-Ville.
Singular City! For overhead of all this, there is the customary baking and
brewing; Labour hammers and grinds. Frilled promenaders saunter under the
trees; white-muslin promenaderess, in green parasol, leaning on your arm.
Dogs dance, and shoeblacks polish, on that Pont Neuf itself, where
Fatherland is in danger. So much goes its course; and yet the course of
all things is nigh altering and ending.
Look at that Tuileries and Tuileries Garden. Silent all as Sahara; none
entering save by ticket! They shut their Gates, after the Day of the Black
Breeches; a thing they had the liberty to do. However, the National
Assembly grumbled something about Terrace of the Feuillants, how said
Terrace lay contiguous to the back entrance to their Salle, and was partly
National Property; and so now National Justice has stretched a Tricolor
Riband athwart, by way of boundary-line, respected with splenetic
strictness by all Patriots. It hangs there that Tricolor boundary-line;
carries 'satirical inscriptions on cards,' generally in verse; and all
beyond this is called Coblentz, and remains vacant; silent, as a fateful
Golgotha; sunshine and umbrage alternating on it in vain. Fateful Circuit;
what hope can dwell in it? Mysterious Tickets of Entry introduce
themselves; speak of Insurrection very imminent. Rivarol's Staff of Genius
had better purchase blunderbusses; Grenadier bonnets, red Swiss uniforms
may be useful. Insurrection will come; but likewise will it not be met?
Staved off, one may hope, till Brunswick arrive?
But consider withal if the Bourne-stones and Portable chairs remain silent;
if the Herald's College of Bill-Stickers sleep! Louvet's Sentinel warns
gratis on all walls; Sulleau is busy: People's-Friend Marat and King's-
Friend Royou croak and counter-croak. For the man Marat, though long
hidden since that Champ-de-Mars Massacre, is still alive. He has lain, who
knows in what Cellars; perhaps in Legendre's; fed by a steak of Legendre's
killing: but, since April, the bull-frog voice of him sounds again;
hoarsest of earthly cries. For the present, black terror haunts him: O
brave Barbaroux wilt thou not smuggle me to Marseilles, 'disguised as a
jockey?' (Barbaroux, p. 60.) In Palais-Royal and all public places, as we
read, there is sharp activity; private individuals haranguing that Valour
may enlist; haranguing that the Executive may be put in action. Royalist
journals ought to be solemnly burnt: argument thereupon; debates which
generally end in single-stick, coups de cannes. (Newspapers, Narratives
and Documents (Hist. Parl. xv. 240; xvi. 399.) Or think of this; the hour
midnight; place Salle de Manege; august Assembly just adjourning:
'Citizens of both sexes enter in a rush exclaiming, Vengeance: they are
poisoning our Brothers;'--baking brayed-glass among their bread at
Soissons! Vergniaud has to speak soothing words, How Commissioners are
already sent to investigate this brayed-glass, and do what is needful
therein: till the rush of Citizens 'makes profound silence:' and goes home
to its bed.
Such is Paris; the heart of a France like to it. Preternatural suspicion,
doubt, disquietude, nameless anticipation, from shore to shore:--and those
blackbrowed Marseillese, marching, dusty, unwearied, through the midst of
it; not doubtful they. Marching to the grim music of their hearts, they
consume continually the long road, these three weeks and more; heralded by
Terror and Rumour. The Brest Federes arrive on the 26th; through hurrahing
streets. Determined men are these also, bearing or not bearing the Sacred
Pikes of Chateau-Vieux; and on the whole decidedly disinclined for Soissons
as yet. Surely the Marseillese Brethren do draw nigher all days.