Taking the Bastile (15 page)

‘To go in the first place to the College Louis-le-Grand, appears to me quite logical,’ sententiously observed Pitou; ‘since it was for that purpose that we came to Paris.’

‘Go, get a musket, a sabre, a weapon of some kind or other from some one or other of those idle fellows who are lying on the pavement yonder,’ said Billot, ‘and let us at once go to the college.’

Pitou, with every necessary precaution, approached the dragoon who happened to be the nearest to him, and, after having assured himself that he was really dead, took from him his sabre, his musketoon, and his cartouche-box. But, while thus arming himself, Pitou directed his ear towards the Place Vendome.

‘Ho, ho !’ said he, ‘it appears to me that the Royal Germans are coming this way again.’

And, in fact, the noise of a troop of horsemen returning at a foot-pace could be heard. Pitou peeped from behind the corner of the coffee-house called La Regence, and perceived, at about the distance of the market of St Honor6, a patrol of dragoons advancing, with their musketoons in hand.

‘Oh, quick I’ cried Pitou, ‘they are coming back.’

Billot cast his eyes around him. to see if there was any

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means of offering resistance. There was scarcely a person in the square.

‘Let us go, then,’ said he, ‘to the College Louis-le-Grand.’

They pursued their way without meeting with any impediment, till they reached the Place Louis XV.; but there Billot and Pitou fell in with the column which had left them to proceed to the Invalides, and which had been stopped short in its progress.

‘Well 1’ cried Billot, ‘what is the matter?’

‘The matter is that we cannot go across the Bridce Louis XV.’

‘But you can go along the quays.’

‘All passage is stopped that way too.’

‘And across the Champs Elysees?’

‘That also.’

‘Then let us go over the bridge at the Tuileries.’

The proposal was a perfectly natural one; and the crowd, by following Billot, showed that they were eager to accede to it. But they saw sabres gleaming half way between them and the Tuileries Gardens. The quay was occupied by a squadron of dragoons.

‘Why, these cursed dragoons are everywhere,’ murmured the farmer.

‘I say, my dear Monsieur Billot,’ said Pitou, ‘I believe that we are caught.’

‘Pshaw 1 they cannot catch five or six thousand men; and we are five or six thousand men, at least.’

The dragoons on the quay were advancing slowly, it is true, but they were visibly advancing.

‘The Rue Royale still remains open to vis. Come this way : come, Pitou.’

Pitou followed the farmer as if he had been his shadow. But a line of soldiers was drawn across the street, near the St Honor6 gate.

‘Ah, ah P murmured Billot; ‘you may be in the right, friend Pitou.’

In fact, by a skilful manoeuvre, the Prince de Lambesq had surrounded not only the rebels, but also those who had been drawn there from mere curiosity; and, by preventing all egress by the bridges, the quays, the Champs Elys6es, and the Rue Royale and Les Feuillants, he had enclosed them in a bow of iron, the string of which was represented by the walls of the Tuileries Gardens, which it would be very difficult to escalade, and the iron gate

9 8 TAKING THE BASTILLE

of the Pont To urn ant, which it was almost impossible to force. Billot reflected on their position; it certainly was not a favourable one; however, as he was a man of calm, cool mind, full of resources when in danger, he cast his eyes around him, and perceiving a pile of timber lying beside the river,

‘I have an idea,’ said he to Pitou i ‘come this way.’

Billot advanced towards the timber, and seizing the end of a large block, said to Pitou, ‘Help me to carry this.’

Pitou. for his part, without questioning him as to his intentions, caught hold of the other end of the piece of timber. They were soon upon the quay again, bearing a load which five or six men of ordinary strength would have found difficult to raise. Strength is always a subject of admiration to the mob, and although so compactly huddled together, they made room for Billot and Pitou to pass through them,

‘Tell me, now, Father Billot,’ inquired Pitou, after having carried the timber some thirty yards, ‘are we going far in this way?’

‘We are going as far as the gate of the Tuileries.’

‘Hoi ho!’ cried the crowd, who at once divined his intention. And it made way for them more eagerly even th^” before. In five minutes they had reached the iron gate.

‘Now, my boyi,’ cried Billot, ‘once, twice, thrice.’ And the joist, directed with a furious impetus, struck the lock of the gate with resounding violence.

The soldiers who were on guard in the interior of the garden, hastened to resist this invasion. But at the third stroke the gate gave way, turning violently on its hinges, and through that gaping and gloomy mouth the crowd rushed impetuously. From the movement that was then made, the Prince de Lambesq perceived at once that an opening had been effected which allowed the escape of tnoso whom he had considered as his prisoners. He was furious with disappointment He urged his horse forward in order the better to judge of the position of affairs. The dragoons who were drawn up behind him imagined that the order had been given to charge, and they followed him. The horses, going off at full speed, could not be suddenly pulled up. The men, who wished to be revenged for the check they had received on the square before the Palais Royal, scarcely endeavoured to

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restrain them. The prince saw that it would be impossible to moderate their advance, and allowed himself to be borne away by it. A sudden shriek ottered by the women and children ascended to heaven crying for vengeance against the brutal soldiers.

A frightful scene then occurred, rendered still more terrific by the darkness. Those who were charged upon became mad with pain; those who charged them were mad with anger. Then a species of defence was organised from the top of a terrace. The chairs were hurled down on the dragoons. The Prince do Lambesq, who had been struck on the head, replied by giving a sabre cut to the person nearest to him, without considering that he was punishing an innocent man instead of a guilty one, and an old man more than seventy years of age fell beneath his sword. Billot saw this man fall, and uttered a loud cry. In a moment his carbine was at his shoulder. A furrow of light for a moment illuminated the darkness, and the prince had then died, had not his horse, by chance, reared at the same instant. The horse received the ball in his neck, and fell It was thought that the prince was killed; the dragoons then rushed into the Tuileries, pursuing the fugitives, and firing their pistols at them. But the fugitives having now a greater space, dispersed among the trees. Billot quietly reloaded his carbine.

‘Come along, come along,’ said Billot; and he went by the terrace by the water side, until he had got ahead of the line of troops, which were advancing along the quay; but this time as rapidly as they could, to give their aid to the Lambesq dragoons, should such aid be necessary.

When they reached the end of the terrace, Billot seated himself on the parapet and jumped on to the quay. Pitou followed his example.

ONCB upon the quay, the two countrymen saw glittering on the bridge near the Tuileries the arms of another body of men, which, in all probability, was not a body of friends; they silently glided to the end of the quay and descended the bank which leads along the Seine. The clock of the Tuileries was just then striking eleven. When

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they had got beneath the trees which line the banks of the river, fine aspen trees and poplars, which bathe their feet in its current, the farmer and Pitou threw themselves upon the grass and opened a council of war. The question was to know whether they should remain where they were, in comparative safety, or whether they should again throw themselves into the tumult and take their share of the struggle which was going on, and which appeared likely to be continued the greater part of the night. The question being mooted. Billot awaited the reply of Pitou.

Pitou had risen very greatly in the opinion of the farmer. In the first place, by the knowledge of which he had given proofs the day before, and afterwards by the courage of which he had given such proofs during the evening. Pitou instinctively felt this, but instead of being prouder from it, he was only the more grateful towards the good farmer.

‘Monsieur Billot,’ said he, ‘it is evident that you are more brave, and I less a poltroon than I imagined; but still the bravest man in the world may be killed by a ball.’

‘And what then?’ inquired the fanner.

‘And then, my dear sir, thus it is : as you stated, on leaving your farm, that you were coming to Paris for an important object ‘

Oh 1 confound it, that is true, for the casket.’

‘Well, then, did you come about this casket yes, or no?’

‘I came about the casket, by a thousand thunders, and for nothing else.’

‘If you should allow yourself to be killed by a ball, the affair for which you came cannot be accomplished.’

‘In truth, you are ten times right, Pitou.’

‘Do you hear that crashing noise those cries?’ continued Pitou, encouraged by the farmer’s approbation; ‘wood is being torn like paper, iron is twisted as if it were but hemp.’

‘It is because the people are angry, Pitou.’

‘But it appears to me,’ Pitou ventured to say, ‘that the king is tolerably angry too.’

‘How say you, the king?’

‘Undoubtedly : the Austrians, the Germans, the Kainserliks, as you call them, are the king’s soldiers. Well 1 if they charge the people it is the king who orders them to charge and for him to give such an order, he must be angry too.’

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‘You are right, and you are wrong, Pitou, and I will presently make you comprehend how this can be.’

‘I do not ask anything better, but I doubt it.’

‘See you now, Pitou, there are two parties at court; 1 that of the king, who loves the people, and that of the queen, who loves the Austrians. On the king’s side, are Monsieur Turgot and Monsieur Necker, on the queen’s, Monsieur de Breteuil and the Polignacs. The king is not the master, since he has been obliged to send away Monsieur Turgot and Monsieur Necker. It is therefore the queen who is the mistress; therefore all goes badly. Do you see, Pitou, the evil proceeds from Madame Deficit, and Madame Deficit is in a rage, and it is in her name that the troops charge; the Austrians defend the Austrian women, that is natural enough.’

‘Your pardon, Monsieur Billot,’ said Pitou, interrupting him, ‘but deficit is a Latin word, which means to say a want of something. What is it that is wanting?’

‘ Zounds 1 why money, to be sure; and it is because money is wanting, it is because the queen’s favourites have devoured this money which is wanting, that the queen is called Madame Deficit. It is not, therefore, the king who is angry, but the queen. The king is only vexed vexed that everything goes so badly.’

‘I comprehend,’ said Pitou; ‘but the casket?’

‘That is true, that is true, Pitou; these devilish politics always drag me on farther than I would go yes, the casket, before everything. You are right, Pitou; when I shall have seen Doctor Gilbert, why then, we can return to politics it is a sacred duty.’

‘There is nothing more sacred than sacred duties, said Pitou.

‘ Well, then, let us go to the College Louis-le-Grand, where Sebastian Gilbert now is, ‘ said Billot. He was already on his feet, and Pitou was about to rise when the half-hour struck.

‘But,’ said Billot, ‘at half-past eleven o’clock, the college of Louis-le-Grand must, it would appear to me, be closed. And then, in the dark, we might fall into some ambuscade; it seems to me that I see the fires of a bivouac in the direction of the Palace of Justice, I may be arrested, or I may be killed; you are right, Pitou, I must aot be arrested I must not be killed.

Pitou thought he could not do better than to repeat the words of Billot.

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‘Yon are right,’ he repeated, lying down again upon the grass, ‘you mast not allow yourself to be killed, dear Monsieur Billot,’

And the conclusion of this phrase died away in Pitou’s throat. He was fast asleep.

Billot did not perceive it. ‘Listen to me,’ said he, ‘I have an idea. Notwithstanding all the precautions I am taking, I may be killed. If that should happen, you ought to know what you will have to say to Doctor Gilbert in my stead : but you must be mute, Pitou.’

Pitou heard not a word of this, and consequently made no reply.

‘Should I be wounded mortally, and not be able to fulfil my mission, you will, in my place, seek out Doctor Gilbert, and you will say to him do you understand me, Pitou?’ added the farmer, stooping towards hia companion, ‘and you will say to him why, confound him, he is positively snoring, the sad fellow I’

All the excitement of Billot was at once damped on ascertaining that Pitou was asleep; and he laid himself down by Pitou’s side, without grumbling very seriously. And the day broke about three hours after they had gone to sleep, or rather, we should say, after their senses were benumbed. When they again opened their eyes, Pitou had lost nothing of that savage countenance which they had observed the night before. Only there were no soldiers to be seen, the people were everywhere. The people arming themselves with pikes, hastily manufactured, with muskets, which the majority of them knew not how to handle. Immediately after the retreat of the soldiers, the populace had pillaged the palace called the Garde-Meuble. And the people dragged towards the Hotel do Ville two small pieces of artillery. The alarm-bell was rung from the towers of Notre-Dame, at the Hotel de Ville, and in all the parish churches. There were seen issuing and from where no one could tell but as from beneath the pavement, legions of men and women, squalid, emaciated, in filthy rags, half naked, who, but the evening before, cried, ‘ Give ut bread I ‘ but now vociferated, ‘ Give ut arms I ‘ Nothing could be more terrifying than these band* of spectres, who, during the last three months, had poured into the capital from the country, passing through the city gates silently, and installing themselves in Paris, where famine reigned, like Arabian