Marie Antoinette and Her Son Part 59

These she left to all who had loved her. She sent a special word to her brothers and sisters, and bade them farewell.

"I had friends," she says, "and the thought that I am to be forever separated from them, and their sorrow for me, is the most painful thing in this hour; they shall at least know that I thought of them to the last moment."

After Marie Antoinette had ended this letter, whose writing was here and there blotted with her tears, she turned her thoughts to the last remembrances she could leave to her children--a remembrance which should not be profaned by the hand of the executioner. This was her long hair, whose silver locks, the only ornament that remained to her, was at the same time the sad record of her sorrows.

Marie Antoinette, with her own hands, despoiled herself of this ornament, and cut off her long back-hair, that it might be a last gift to her children, her relations, and friends. Then, after a period of meditation, she prepared herself for the last great ceremony of her career--her death. She felt herself exhausted, worn out, and recognized her need of some physical support during the hard way which lay before her. She asked for nourishment, and ate with some relish the wing of a fowl that was brought to her. After that she made her toilet--the toilet of death!

At the request of the queen, the wife of the turnkey gave her one of her own chemises, and Marie Antoinette put it on. Then she arrayed herself in the same garments which she had worn at her trial, with this single change--that over the black woollen dress, which she had often mended with her own hand, she now wore a cloak of white pique, Around her neck she tied a simple kerchief of white muslin, and as she would not be allowed to ascend the scaffold with uncovered head, she put on a plain linen cap, such as was in general use among the people. Black stockings covered her feet, and over these were shoes of black woollen stuff.

Her toilet was at last ended; she was done with all earthly things!

Ready to meet her death, she lay down on her bed and slept.

She was still sleeping when it was announced to her that a priest was there, ready to meet her, if she wanted to confess. But Marie Antoinette had already unveiled her heart before G.o.d: she wanted none of those priests of reason whom the republic had appointed after it had banished or guillotined the priests of the Church.

"As I am not mistress of my own will," she had written to her sister Elizabeth, "I shall have to submit if a priest is brought to me; but I solemnly declare that I will not speak a word to him, and that I shall treat him as a person with whom I wish to have no relations."

And Marie Antoinette kept her word; she did not refuse to allow Geroid to enter; but when he asked her if she wished to receive the consolations of religion from him, she declined.

Then, in order to warm her feet, which were cold, she walked up and down her little room. As it struck seven the door opened. It was Samson, the public executioner, who entered!

A slight thrill pa.s.sed through the form of the queen.

"You have come very early, sir; could you not delay a little?" When Samson denied her request, Marie Antoinette put on her calm, cold manner. She drank, without resistance, a cup of chocolate which was brought to her; she remained possessed, and wore her wonted air of dignity as they bound her hands behind her with thick cords.

At eleven o'clock she left her room, pa.s.sed through the corridor, and ascended the car, which was waiting for her before the prison door. No one accompanied her, no one bade her a last farewell, not a look of pity or compa.s.sion was bestowed upon her by her keepers.

Alone, between the rows of gens d'armes that were placed along the sides of the corridor, the queen advanced, Samson walking behind her, carrying the end of the rope with which the queen's hands were bound, and behind him his two a.s.sistants and the priest. This is the retinue of the queen, the daughter of an emperor, on the way to her execution!

It may be, that at this hour thousands are on their knees, offering their fervent prayers to G.o.d in behalf of Marie Antoinette, whom, in their hearts, they continued to call "the queen;" it may be that thousands are pouring out tears of compa.s.sion for her who now mounts the wretched car, and sits down on the board which is bound by ropes to the sides of the vehicle. But those who are praying and weeping have withdrawn to the solitude of their own apartments, and only G.o.d can see their tears and hear their cries. The eyes which witnessed the queen in this last drive were not allowed to shed a tear; the words which followed her on her last way could express no compa.s.sion.

All Paris knew the hour of the execution, and the people were ready to witness it. On the streets, at the windows, on the roofs, immense ma.s.ses had congregated, and the whole Place de la Revolution (now the Place de la Concorde) was filled with a dark, surging crowd.

And now the drums of the guards stationed before the Conciergerie began to beat. The great white horse, (which drew the car in which the queen sat, side by side with the priest, and facing backward,) was driven forward by a man who was upon his back. Behind Marie Antoinette were Samson and his a.s.sistants.

The queen was pale, all the blood had left her cheeks and lips, but her eyes were red! Poor queen, she bore even then the marks of much weeping! But she could shed no tears then! Not a single one obscured her eye as her look ranged, gravely and calmly, over the ma.s.s, up the houses to the very roofs, then slowly down, and then away over the boundless sea of human faces.

Her face was as cold and grave as her eyes, her lips were firmly compressed; not a quiver betrayed whether she was suffering, and whether she shrank from the thousand and ten thousand scornful and curious looks which were fixed upon her. And yet Marie Antoinette saw it all! She saw a woman raise a child, she saw the child throw her a kiss with its little hand! At that the queen gave way for an instant, her lips quivered, her eyes were darkened with a tear! This solitary sign of human sympathy reanimated the heart of the queen, and gave her a little fresh life.

But the people took good care that Marie Antoinette should not carry this one drop of comfort to the end of her journey. The populace thronged around the car, howled, groaned, sang ribald songs, clapped their hands, and pointed their fingers in derision at Madame Veto.

The queen, however, remained calm, her gaze wandering coldly over the vast mult.i.tude; only once did her eye flash on the route. It was as she pa.s.sed the Palais Royal, where Philippe Egalite, once the Duke d'Orleans, lived, and read the inscription which he had caused to be placed over the main entrance of the palace.

At noon the car reached its destination. It came to a halt at the foot of the scaffold; Marie Antoinette dismounted, and then walked slowly and with erect head up the steps.

Not once during her dreadful ride had her lips opened, not a complaint had escaped her, not a farewell had she spoken. The only adieu which she had to give on earth was a look--one long, sad look- -directed toward the Tuileries; and as she gazed at the great pile her cheeks grew paler, and a deep sigh escaped from her lips.

Then she placed her head under the guillotine,--a momentary, breathless silence followed.

Samson lifted up the pale head that had once belonged to the Queen of France, and the people greeted the sight with the cry, "Long live the republic!"

That same evening one of the officials of the republic made up an account, now preserved in the Imperial Library of Paris, and which must move even the historian himself to tears. It runs as follows: "Cost of interments, conducted by Joly, s.e.xton of Madelaine de la Ville l'Eveque, of persons condemned by the Tribunal of the Committee of Safety, to wit, No. 1 . . . ." Then follow twenty-four names and numbers, and then "No. 25. Widow Capet:

For the coffin, . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 francs.

For digging the grave,. . . . . . . . . 25 francs."

Beneath are the words, "Seen and approved by me, President of the Revolutionary Tribunal, that Joly, s.e.xton of the Madelaine, receive the sum of two hundred and sixty-four francs from the National Treasury, Paris, llth Brumaire. Year II. of the French Republic.

Herman, President."

The interment of the Queen of France did not cost the republic more than thirty-one francs, or six American dollars.

CHAPTER XXV.

KING LOUIS THE SEVENTEENTH.

The "one and indivisible republic" bad gained the victory over the lilies of France. In their dark and unknown graves, in the Madelaine churchyard, King Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette slept their last sleep. The monarchy had perished on the guillotine, and the republicans, the preachers of liberty, equality, and fraternity, repeated triumphantly: "Royalty is forever extinguished, and the glorious republic is the rising sun which is to bring eternal deliverance to France."

But, in spite of this jubilant cry, the foreheads of the republican leaders darkened, and a peculiar solicitude took possession of their hearts when their eyes fell upon the Temple--that great, dismal building, that threw its dark shadows over the sunny path of the republic. Was it regret that darkened the brows of the regicides as they looked upon this building, which had been the sad prison of the king and queen? Those hearts of bronze knew no regret; and when the heroes of the revolution crossed the Place de la Guillotine, on which the royal victims had perished, their eyes flashed more proudly, and did not fall even when they pa.s.sed by the Madelaine churchyard.

No, it was not the recollection of the deed that saddened the brows of the potentates of the republic when they looked at the dismal Temple, but the recollection of him who was not yet dead, but who was still living as a captive in the gloomy state-prison of the republic.

This prisoner was indeed only a child of eight years, but the legitimists--and there were many of them still in the country-- called him the King of France; and priests in loyal Vendee, when they had finished the daily ma.s.s for the murdered king, prayed to G.o.d, with uplifted hands, for grace and deliverance for the young captive at the Temple, the young king, Louis XVII.

"Le roi est mort--Vive le roi!"

There were, it must be confessed, among the royalists and legitimists many who thought of the young prisoner with bitterness and anger, and who accused and blamed him as the calumniator of his mother! As if the child knew what he was doing when, at the command of his tormentor Simon, he wrote with trembling hand his name upon the paper which was laid before him in the open court. As if the poor innocent boy knew what meaning the dreadful questions had, which the merciless judges put to him, and which he answered with no, or with yes, according as his scrutinizing looks were able to make out the fitting answer on the hard face of Simon, who stood near him. For the unhappy lad had already learned to read the face of the turnkey, and knew very well that every wrinkle of the forehead which was caused by him must be atoned for with dreadful sufferings, abuses, and blows.

The poor boy was afraid of the heavy fist that came down like an iron club upon his back and even on his face, when he said any thing or did any thing that displeased Simon or his wife; and therefore he sought to escape this cruel treatment, confirming with his yes and no what Simon told the judges, and what the child in his innocence did not understand! And therefore he subscribed the paper without reluctance in which he unconsciously gave evidence that disgraced his mother.

With this testimony they ventured to accuse Marie Antoinette of infamy, but the queen gave it no other answer than scornful silence and a proud and dignified look, before which the judges cast down their eyes in shame. Then after a pause they repeated their question, and demanded an answer.

Marie Antoinette turned her proud and yet gentle glance to the women who had taken possession in dense ma.s.ses of the spectators' gallery, and who breathlessly awaited the answer of the queen.

"I appeal to all mothers present," she said, with her sad, sonorous voice--" I ask whether they hold such a crime to be possible."

No one gave audible reply, but a murmur pa.s.sed through the ranks of the spectators, and the sharp ear of the judges understood very well the meaning of this sound, this language of sympathy, and it seemed to them wiser to let the accusation fall rather than rouse up the compa.s.sion of the mothers still more in behalf of the queen. Her condemnation was an event fixed upon, the "guilty" had been spoken in the hearts of the judges long before it came to their lips, and brought the queen to the guillotine.

Marie Antoinette referred to this dreadful charge in the letter which she wrote to her sister-in-law Elizabeth in the night before her execution, a letter which was at the same time her testament and her farewell to life.

"May my son," she wrote, "never forget the last words of his father!

I repeat them to him here expressly: 'May he never seek to avenge our death!' And now I have to speak of a matter which surely grieves my heart, I know what trouble this child must have occasioned you.

Forgive him, my dear sister; think how young he is, and how easy it is to induce a child to say what people want to have him say, and what he does not understand. The day will come, I hope, when he shall better comprehend the high value of your goodness and tenderness to both of my children." [Footnote: Beauchesne, "Louis XVII., sa Vie, son Agonie," etc., vol. i. ., p. 150, facsimile of Marie Antoinette's letter.]*

At the same hour when Marie Antoinette was writing this, there was a dispute between Simon and his wife, who had been ordered by the Convention to watch that night, in order that the enraged legitimists might not make an effort to abduct the son of the queen.

They were contending whether the execution would really occur the next day. Simon, in a jubilant tone, declared his conviction that it would, while his wife doubted. "She is still handsome," she said, gloomily, "she knows how to talk well, and she will be able to move her judges, for her judges are men."