CHAPTER XII
PROVINCIAL PLEASURES
That same day Roland put into execution part of his plans for
his guest's amusement. He took Sir John to see the church of
Brou.
Those who have seen the charming little chapel of Brou know that
it is known as one of the hundred marvels of the Renaissance;
those who have not seen it must have often heard it said. Roland,
who had counted on doing the honors of this historic gem to Sir
John, and who had not seen it for the last seven or eight years,
was much disappointed when, on arriving in front of the building,
he found the niches of the saints empty and the carved figures
of the portal decapitated.
He asked for the sexton; people laughed in his face. There was
no longer a sexton. He inquired to whom he should go for the
keys. They replied that the captain of the gendarmerie had them.
The captain was not far off, for the cloister adjoining the church
had been converted into a barrack.
Roland went up to the captain's room and made himself known as
Bonaparte's aide-de-camp. The captain, with the placid obedience of
a subaltern to his superior officer, gave him the keys and followed
behind him. Sir John was waiting before the porch, admiring, in
spite of the mutilation to which they had been subjected, the
admirable details of the frontal.
Roland opened the door and started back in astonishment. The
church was literally stuffed with hay like a cannon charged to
the muzzle.
"What does this mean?" he asked the captain of the gendarmerie.
"A precaution taken by the municipality."
"A precaution taken by the municipality?"
"Yes."
"For what?"
"To save the church. They were going to demolish it; but the
mayor issued a decree declaring that, in expiation of the false
worship for which it had served, it should be used to store fodder."
Roland burst out laughing, and, turning to Sir John, he said:
"My dear Sir John, the church was well worth seeing, but I think
what this gentleman has just told us is no less curious. You
can always find--at Strasburg, Cologne, or Milan--churches or
cathedrals to equal the chapel of Brou; but where will you find
an administration idiotic enough to destroy such a masterpiece,
and a mayor clever enough to turn it into a barn? A thousand
thanks, captain. Here are your keys."
"As I was saying at Avignon, the first time I had the pleasure
of seeing you, my dear Roland," replied Sir John, "the French
are a most amusing people."
"This time, my lord, you are too polite," replied Roland. "Idiotic
is the word. Listen. I can understand the political cataclysms
which have convulsed society for the last thousand years; I can
understand the communes, the pastorals, the Jacquerie, the
maillotins, the Saint Bartholomew, the League, the Fronde, the
dragonnades, the Revolution; I can understand the 14th of July,
the 5th and 6th of October, the 20th of June, the 10th of August,
the 2d and 3d of September, the 21st of January, the 31st of May,
the 30th of October, and the 9th Thermidor; I can understand
the egregious torch of civil wars, which inflames instead of
soothing the blood; I can understand the tidal wave of revolution,
sweeping on with its flux, that nothing can arrest, and its reflux,
which carries with it the ruins of the institution which it has
itself shattered. I can understand all that, but lance against
lance, sword against sword, men against men, a people against
a people! I can understand the deadly rage of the victors, the
sanguinary reaction of the vanquished, the political volcanoes
which rumble in the bowels of the globe, shake the earth, topple
over thrones, upset monarchies, and roll heads and crowns on the
scaffold. But what I cannot understand is this mutilation of the
granite, this placing of monuments beyond the pale of the law, the
destruction of inanimate things, which belong neither to those
who destroy them nor to the epoch in which they are destroyed;
this pillage of the gigantic library where the antiquarian can
read the archeological history of a country. Oh! the vandals,
the barbarians! Worse than that, the idiots! who revenge the
Borgia crimes and the debauches of Louis XV. on stone. How well
those Pharaohs, Menæs, and Cheops knew man as the most perversive,
destructive and evil of animals! They who built their pyramids,
not with carved traceries, nor lacy spires, but with solid blocks
of granite fifty feet square! How they must have laughed in the
depths of those sepulchres as they watched Time dull its scythe
and pashas wear out their nails in vain against them. Let us
build pyramids, my dear Sir John. They are not difficult as
architecture, nor beautiful as art, but they are solid; and that
enables a general to say four thousand years later: 'Soldiers,
from the apex of these monuments forty centuries are watching
you!' On my honor, my lord, I long to meet a windmill this moment
that I might tilt against it."
And Roland, bursting into his accustomed laugh, dragged Sir John
in the direction of the château. But Sir John stopped him and
asked: "Is there nothing else to see in the city except the church?"
"Formerly, my lord," replied Roland, "before they made a hay-loft
of it, I should have asked you to come down with me into the
vaults of the Dukes of Savoy. We could have hunted for that
subterranean passage, nearly three miles long, which is said to
exist there, and which, according to these rumors, communicates
with the grotto of Ceyzeriat. Please observe, I should never
offer such a pleasure trip except to an Englishman; it would
have been like a scene from your celebrated Anne Radcliffe in
the 'Mysteries of Udolpho.' But, as you see, that is impossible,
so we will have to be satisfied with our regrets. Come."
"Where are we going?"
"Faith, I don't know. Ten years ago I should have taken you to
the farms where they fatten pullets. The pullets of Bresse, you
must know, have a European reputation. Bourg was an annex to
the great coop of Strasburg. But during the Terror, as you can
readily imagine, these fatteners of poultry shut up shop. You
earned the reputation of being an aristocrat if you ate a pullet,
and you know the fraternal refrain: 'Ah, ça ira, ça ira--the
aristocrats to the lantern!' After Robespierre's downfall they
opened up again; but since the 18th of Fructidor, France has
been commanded to fast, from fowls and all. Never mind; come
on, anyway. In default of pullets, I can show you one thing,
the square where they executed those who ate them. But since
I was last in the town the streets have changed their names. I
know the way, but I don't know the names."
"Look here!" demanded Sir John; "aren't you a Republican?"
"I not a Republican? Come, come! Quite to the contrary. I consider
myself an excellent Republican. I am quite capable of burning off
my hand, like Mucius Scævola, or jumping into the gulf like Curtius
to save the Republic; but I have, unluckily, a keen sense of the
ridiculous. In spite of myself, the absurdity of things catches
me in the side and tickles me till I nearly die of laughing. I am
willing to accept the Constitution of 1791; but when poor Hérault
de Séchelles wrote to the superintendent of the National Library
to send him a copy of the laws of Minos, so that he could model
his constitution on that of the Isle of Crete, I thought it was
going rather far, and that we might very well have been content
with those of Lycurgus. I find January, February, and March,
mythological as they were, quite as good as Nivose, Pluviose, and
Ventose. I can't understand why, when one was called Antoine
or Chrystomome in 1789, he should be called Brutus or Cassius
in 1793. Here, for example, my lord, is an honest street, which
was called the Rue des Halles (Market Street). There was nothing
indecent or aristocratic about that, was there? Well, now it
is called--Just wait (Roland read the inscription). Well, now
it is called the Rue de la Révolution. Here's another, which
used to be called Notre Dame; it is now the Rue du Temple. Why
Rue du Temple? Probably to perpetuate the memory of that place
where the infamous Simon tried to teach cobbling to the heir of
sixty-three kings. Don't quarrel with me if I am mistaken by
one or two! Now here's a third; it was named Crèvecoeur, a name
famous throughout Bresse, Burgundy and Flanders. It is now the
Rue de la Federation. Federation is a fine thing, but Crèvecoeur
was a fine name. And then you see to-day it leads straight to
the Place de la Guillotine, which is, in my opinion, all wrong.
I don't want any streets that lead to such places. This one has
its advantages; it is only about a hundred feet from the prison,
which economized and still economizes the tumbrel and the horse
of M. de Bourg. By the way, have you noticed that the executioner
remains noble and keeps his title? For the rest, the square is
excellently arranged for spectators, and my ancestor, Montrevel,
whose name it bears, doubtless, foreseeing its ultimate destiny,
solved the great problem, still unsolved by the theatres, of
being able to see well from every nook and corner. If ever they
cut off my head, which, considering the times in which we are
living, would in no wise be surprising, I shall have but one
regret: that of being less well-placed and seeing less than the
others. Now let us go up these steps. Here we are in the Place
des Lices. Our Revolutionists left it its name, because in all
probability they don't know what it means. I don't know much
better than they, but I think I remember that a certain Sieur
d'Estavayer challenged some Flemish count--I don't know who--and
that the combat took place in this square. Now, my dear fellow,
here is the prison, which ought to give you some idea of human
vicissitudes. Gil Blas didn't change his condition more often
than this monument its purposes. Before Cæsar it was a Gaelic
temple; Cæsar converted it into a Roman fortress; an unknown
architect transformed it into a military work during the Middle
Ages; the Knights of Baye, following Cæsar's example, re-made it
into a fortress; the princes of Savoy used it for a residence;
the aunt of Charles V. lived here when she came to visit her
church at Brou, which she never had the satisfaction of seeing
finished. Finally, after the treaty of Lyons, when Bresse was
returned to France, it was utilized both as a prison and a
court-house. Wait for me a moment, my lord, if you dislike the
squeaking of hinges and the grating of bolts. I have a visit
to pay to a certain cell."
"The grating of bolts and the squeaking of hinges is not a very
enlivening sound, but no matter. Since you were kind enough to
undertake my education, show me your dungeon."
"Very well, then. Come in quickly. I see a crowd of persons who
look as if they want to speak to me."
In fact, little by little, a sort of rumor seemed to spread
throughout the town. People emerged from the houses, forming
groups in the streets, and they all watched Roland with curiosity.
He rang the bell of the gate, situated then where it is now, but
opening into the prison yard. A jailer opened it for them.
"Ah, ah! so you are still here, Father Courtois?" asked the young
man. Then, turning to Sir John, he added: "A fine name for a
jailer, isn't it, my lord?"
The jailer looked at the young man in amazement.
"How is it," he asked through the grating, "that you know my name,
when I don't know yours?"
"Good! I not only know your name, but also your opinions. You
are an old royalist, Père Courtois."
"Monsieur," said the jailer, terrified, "don't make bad jokes
if you please, and say what you want."
"Well, my good Father Courtois, I would like to visit the cell
where they put my mother and sister, Madame and Mademoiselle
Montrevel."
"Ah!" exclaimed the gatekeeper, "so it's you, M. Louis? You may
well say that I know you. What a fine, handsome young man you've
grown to be!"
"Do you think so, Father Courtois? Well, I can return the compliment.
Your daughter Charlotte is, on my word, a beautiful girl. Charlotte
is my sister's maid, Sir John."
"And she is very happy over it. She is better off there than here,
M. Roland. Is it true that you are General Bonaparte's aide-de-camp?"
"Alas! I have that honor, Courtois. You would prefer me to be
Comte d'Artois's aide-de-camp, or that of M. le Duc of Angoulême?"
"Oh, do be quiet, M. Louis!" Then putting his lips to the young
man's ear, "Tell me, is it true?"
"What, Father Courtois?"
"That General Bonaparte passed through Lyons yesterday?"
"There must be some truth in the rumor, for this is the second
time that I have heard it. Ah! I understand now. These good people
who were watching me so curiously apparently wanted to question
me. They were like you, Father Courtois: they want to know what
to make of General Bonaparte's arrival."
"Do you know what they say, M. Louis?"
"Still another rumor, Father Courtois?"
"I should think so, but they only whisper it."
"What is it?"
"They say that he has come to demand the throne of his Majesty
Louis XVIII. from the Directory and the king's return to it;
and that if Citizen Gohier as president doesn't give it up of
his own accord he will take it by force."
"Pooh!" exclaimed the young officer with an incredulous air bordering
on irony. But Father Courtois insisted on his news with an
affirmative nod.
"Possibly," said the young man; "but as for that, it's news for
me. And now that you know me, will you open the gate?"
"Of course I will. I should think so. What the devil am I about?"
and the jailer opened the gate with an eagerness equalling his
former reluctance. The young man entered, and Sir John followed
him. The jailer locked the gate carefully, then he turned, followed
by Roland and the Englishman in turn. The latter was beginning
to get accustomed to his young friend's erratic character. The
spleen he saw in Roland was misanthropy, without the sulkiness
of Timon or the wit of Alceste.
The jailer crossed the yard, which was separated from the law
courts by a wall fifteen feet high, with an opening let into
the middle of the receding wall, closed by a massive oaken door,
to admit prisoners without taking them round by the street. The
jailer, we say, crossed the yard to a winding stairway in the
left angle of the courtyard which led to the interior of the
prison.
If we insist upon these details, it is because we shall be obliged
to return to this spot later, and we do not wish it to be wholly
unfamiliar to our readers when that time comes.
These steps led first to the ante-chamber of the prison, that
is to say to the porter's hall of the lower court-room. From
that hall ten steps led down into an inner court, separated from
a third, which was that of the prisoners, by a wall similar to
the one we have described, only this one had three doors. At
the further end of the courtyard a passage led to the jailer's
own room, which gave into a second passage, on which were the
cells which were picturesquely styled cages. The jailer paused
before the first of these cages and said, striking the door:
"This is where I put madame, your mother, and your sister, so
that if the dear ladies wanted either Charlotte or myself, they
need but knock."
"Is there any one in the cell?"
"No one"
"Then please open the door. My friend, Lord Tanlay, is a
philanthropic Englishman who is travelling about to see if the
French prisons are more comfortable than the English ones. Enter,
Sir John."
Père Courtois having opened the door, Roland pushed Sir John
into a perfectly square cell measuring ten or twelve feet each
way.
"Oh, oh!" exclaimed Sir John, "this is lugubrious."
"Do you think so? Well, my dear friend, this is where my mother,
the noblest woman in the world, and my sister, whom you know,
spent six weeks with a prospect of leaving it only to make the
trip to the Place de Bastion. Just think, that was five years
ago, so my sister was scarcely twelve."
"But what crime had they committed?"
"Oh! a monstrous crime. At the anniversary festival with which
the town of Bourg considered proper to commemorate the death
of the 'Friend of the People,' my mother refused to permit my
sister to represent one of the virgins who bore the tears of
France in vases. What will you! Poor woman, she thought she had
done enough for her country in giving it the blood of her son
and her husband, which was flowing in Italy and Germany. She was
mistaken. Her country, as it seems, claimed further the tears
of her daughter. She thought that too much, especially as those
tears were to flow for the citizen Marat. The result was that
on the very evening of the celebration, during the enthusiastic
exaltation, my mother was declared accused. Fortunately Bourg
had not attained the celerity of Paris. A friend of ours, an
official in the record-office, kept the affair dragging, until
one fine day the fall and death of Robespierre were made known.
That interrupted a good many things, among others the guillotinades.
Our friend convinced the authorities that the wind blowing from
Paris had veered toward clemency; they waited fifteen days, and on
the sixteenth they told my mother and sister that they were free.
So you understand, my friend--and this involves the most profound
philosophical reflection--so that if Mademoiselle Teresa Cabarrus
had not come from Spain, if she had not married M. Fontenay,
parliamentary counsellor; had she not been arrested and brought
before the pro-consul Tallien, son of the Marquis de Bercy's
butler, ex-notary's clerk, ex-foreman of a printing-shop, ex-porter,
ex-secretary to the Commune of Paris temporarily at Bordeaux;
and had the ex-pro-consul not become enamored of her, and had
she not been imprisoned, and if on the ninth of Thermidor she
had not found means to send a dagger with these words: 'Unless
the tyrant dies to-day, I die to-morrow'; had not Saint-Just
been arrested in the midst of his discourse; had not Robespierre,
on that day, had a frog in his throat; had not Garnier de l'Aube
exclaimed: 'It is the blood of Danton choking you!' had not Louchet
shouted for his arrest; had he not been arrested, released by
the Commune, recaptured in spite of this, had his jaw broken
by a pistol shot, and been executed next day--my mother would,
in all probability, have had her head cut off for refusing to
allow her daughter to weep for citizen Marat in one of the twelve
lachrymal urns which Bourg was desirous of filling with its tears.
Good-by, Courtois. You are a worthy man. You gave my mother and
sister a little water to put with their wine, a little meat to
eat with their bread, a little hope to fill their hearts; you
lent them your daughter that they might not have to sweep their
cell themselves. That deserves a fortune. Unfortunately I am not
rich; but here are fifty louis I happen to have with me. Come,
my lord."
And the young man carried off Sir John before the jailer, recovered
from his surprise and found time either to thank Roland or refuse
the fifty louis; which, it must be said, would have been a remarkable
proof of disinterestedness in a jailer, especially when that jailer's
opinions were opposed to those of the government he served.
Leaving the prison, Roland and Sir John found the Place des Lices
crowded with people who had heard of General Bonaparte's return to
France, and were shouting "Vive Bonaparte!" at the top of their
lungs--some because they really admired the victor of Arcola,
Rivoli, and the Pyramids, others because they had been told,
like Père Courtois, that this same victor had vanquished only
that Louis XVIII. might profit by his victories.
Roland and Sir John, having now visited all that the town of Bourg
offered of interest, returned to the Château des Noires-Fontaines,
which they reached before long. Madame de Montrevel and Amélie
had gone out. Roland installed Sir John in an easy chair, asking
him to wait a few minutes for him. At the end of five minutes
he returned with a sort of pamphlet of gray paper, very badly
printed, in his hand.
"My dear fellow," said he, "you seemed to have some doubts about
the authenticity of that festival which I just mentioned, and
which nearly cost my mother and sister their lives, so I bring
you the programme. Read it, and while you are doing so I will
go and see what they have been doing with my dogs; for I presume
that you would rather hold me quit of our fishing expedition
in favor of a hunt."
He went out, leaving in Sir John's hands a copy of the decree of
the municipality of the town of Bourg, instituting the funeral
rites in honor of Marat, on the anniversary of his death.
