These five weeks have I dwelt with this idea,--always alone with it, always frozen by its presence, always bent under its weight.
Formerly (for it seems to me rather years than weeks since I was free) I was a being like any other; every day, every hour, every minute had its idea. My mind, youthful and rich, was full of fancies, which it developed successively, without order or aim, but weaving inexhaustible arabesques on the poor and coarse web of life. Sometimes it was of youthful beauties, sometimes of unbounded possessions, then of battles gained, next of theatres full of sound and light, and then again the young beauties, and shadowy walks at night beneath spreading chestnut-trees. There was a perpetual revel in my imagination: I might think on what I chose,--I was free.
But now,--I am a Captive! Bodily in irons in a dungeon, and mentally imprisoned in one idea,--one horrible, one hideous, one unconquerable ideal I have only one thought, one conviction, one certitude,--
Condemned to death!
Whatever I do, that frightful thought is always here, like a spectre, beside me,--solitary and jealous, banishing all else, haunting me for ever, and shaking me with its two icy hands whenever I wish to turn my head away or to close my eyes. It glides into all forms in which my mind seeks to shun it; mixes itself, like a horrible chant, with all the words which are addressed to me; presses against me even to the odious gratings of my prison. It haunts me while awake, spies on my convulsive slumbers, and re-appears, a vivid incubus, in my dreams!
I have just started from a troubled sleep in which I was pursued by this thought, and I made an effort to say to myself, "Oh, it was but a dream!"
Well, even before my heavy eyes could read the fatal truth in the dreadful reality which surrounds me,--on the damp and reeking dungeon-walls, in the pale rays of my night-lamp, in the rough material of my prison-garb, on the sombre visage of the sentry, whose cap gleams through the grating of the door,--it seems to me that already a voice has murmured in my ear,--
"Condemned to death!"
Let me endeavour to recall the circumstances which attended that fatal day.
It was a beautiful morning at the close of August. My trial had already lasted three days; my name and accusation had collected each morning a knot [396] of spectators, who crowded the benches of the Court, as ravens surrounded a corpse. During three days all the assembly of judges, witnesses, lawyers, and officers had passed and repassed as a phantasmagoria before my troubled vision.
The two first nights, through uneasiness and terror, I had been unable to sleep; on the third I had slept, from fatigue and exhaustion. I had left the jury deliberating at midnight, and was taken back to the heap of straw in my prison, where I instantly fell into a profound sleep,--the sleep of forgetfulness. These were the first hours of repose I had obtained after long watchfulness.
I was buried in this oblivion when they sent to have me awakened, and my sound slumber was not broken by the heavy step and iron shoes of the jailor, by the clanking of his keys, or the rusty grating of the lock; to rouse me from my lethargy it required his harsh voice in my ear, his rough hand on my arm.
"Come," shouted he, "rise directly!
I opened my eyes, and started from my straw bed: it was already daylight. At this moment, through the high and narrow window of my cell, I saw on the ceiling of the next corridor (the only firmament I was allowed to see) that yellow reflection by which eyes accustomed to the darkness of a prison recognize sunshine. And oh, how I love sunshine!
"It is a fine day!" said I to the jailor.
He remained a moment without answering me, as if uncertain whether it was worth while to expend a word; then, as if with an effort, he coolly murmured, "Very likely."
I remained motionless, my senses half sleeping, with smiling lips, and my eyes fixed on that soft golden reflection which reverberated on the ceiling.
"What a lovely day!" I repeated.
"Yes," answered the jailor; "they are waiting for you."
These few words, like a web which stops the flight of an insect, flung me back into the reality of my position. I pictured to myself instantly, as in a flash of lightning, that sombre Court of Justice, the Bench of Judges, in their robes of sanguine hue, the three rows of stupid looking witnesses, two gendarmes at the extremity of my bench; black robes waving, and the heads of the crowd clustering in the depth of the shadow, while I fancied that I felt upon me the fixed look of the twelve jurymen, who had sat up while I slept.
I rose: my teeth chattered, my hands trembled, my limbs were so weak that at the first step I had nearly fallen; however, I followed the jailor slowly.
Two gendarmes waited for me at the door-way of the cell; they replaced fetters, to which I as in a dream.
We traversed an interior court, and the balmy air of morning reanimated me. I raised my head: the sky was cloudless, and the warm rays of the sun (partially intercepted by the tall chimneys) traced brilliant angles of light on the high and sombre walls the prison. It was indeed a delicious day.
We ascended a winding staircase; we passed a corridor, then another, then a third, and then a low door was [397] opened. A current of hot air, laden with noise, rushed from it; it was the breath of the crowd in the Court of Justice which I then entered.
On my appearance the hall resounded with clank of arms and the hum of voices; benches were moved noisily; and while I crossed that long chamber between two masses of people who were walled in by soldiers, I painfully felt myself the centre of attraction to all those fixed and gaping looks.
At this moment I perceived that I was without fetters, but I could not recall where or when they had been removed.
At length I reached my place at the bar, and there was a deep silence. The instant that the tumult ceased in the crowd, it ceased also in my ideas: a sudden clearness of perception came to me, and I at once understood plainly, what until then I could not discover in my confused state of mind, that the decisive moment was come! was brought there my sentence!
Explain it who can: from the manner in which this idea came to my mind, it caused me no terror! The windows were open; the air, and the sounds of the City came freely through them; the room was as light as for a wedding; the cheerful rays of the sun traced here and there the luminous forms of the windows, sometimes lengthened on the flooring, spreading on a table, sometimes broken by the angles of the walls; and from the brilliant square of each window the rays fell through the air in dancing golden beams.
The Judges at the extreme of the hall bore a satisfied appearance, probably from the anticipation of their labours being soon completed. The face of the President, softly lighted by a reflected sunbeam, had a calm and amiable expression; and a young counsel conversed almost gaily with a handsome woman who was placed near him.
The Jury alone looked wan and exhausted, but this was apparently from the fatigue of having sat up all night. Nothing in their countenances indicated men who would pass sentence of death.
Opposite to me a window stood wide open. I heard laughter in the Market for Flowers beneath; and on the sill of the window a graceful plant, illumined by sunshine, played in the breeze.
How could any sinister idea be formed amongst so many soothing sensations? Surrounded by air and sunshine, I could think of nought save freedom. Hope shone within me, as the day shone around me; and I awaited my sentence with confidence, as one daily calculates on liberty and life.
In the meantime my counsel arrived; after taking his place he leaned towards me with a smile.
"I have hopes!" said he.
"Oh, surely!" I replied in the same light tone.
"Yes," returned he; "I know nothing as yet of the verdict, but they have doubtless acquitted you of premeditation, and then it will be only hard labour for life!"
"What do you mean, sir?" replied I indignantly; " I would prefer death!"
Then the President, who had only waited for my counsel, desired me to rise. The soldiers carried arms; and, like an electric movement, all the assembly rose at the same instant. The Recorder, placed at a table below the [398] Tribunal, read the verdict, which the Jury pronounced during my absence.
*****
A sickly chill passed over my frame; I leaned against the wall to avoid falling.
"Counsel, have you anything to say why this sentence should not be passed?" demanded the President.
I felt that I had much to urge, but I had not the power,--my tongue was cleaving to my mouth.
My counsel then rose. His endeavour appeared to be, to mitigate the verdict of the Jury, and to substitute the punishment of hard labour for life,--by naming which he had rendered me so indignant! This indignation must again have been powerful within me to conquer the thousand emotions which distracted my thoughts. I wished to repeat aloud what I had already said to him, but my breath failed, and I could only grasp him by the arm, crying with convulsive strength, "No!"
The Attorney-General replied against my counsel's arguments, and I listened to him with a stupid satisfaction. The Judges then left the Court; soon returned, and the President read my sentence.
"Condemned to death" cried the crowd; and as I was led away the assembly pressed on my steps with avidity, while I walked on, confused, and nearly in unconsciousness. A revolution had taken place within me. Until that sentence of Death I had felt myself breathe, palpitate, exist, like other beings. Now I felt clearly that a barrier existed between me and the world. Nothing appeared to me under the same aspect as hitherto. Those large and luminous windows, that fair sunshine, that pure sky,--all was pale and ghastly, the colour of a winding sheet. Those men, women, and children who pressed on my path seemed to me like phantoms.
At the foot of the stairs a black and dirty prison-cart was waiting; as I entered it, I looked by chance around.
"The Condemned Prisoner!" shouted the people, running towards the cart.
Through the cloud which seemed to me to interpose between me and all things, I distinguished two young girls who gazed at me with eager eyes.
"Well," said the youngest, clasping her hands, "it will take place in six weeks."
Well, why not? I remember once reading, "All mankind are condemned to death, with indefinite respites." How then is my position altered?
Since my sentence was pronounced, how many are dead who calculated a long life! How many are gone before me, who, young, free, and in good health, had fully intended to be present at my execution! How many, between this and then, perhaps, who now walk and breathe in the fresh air any where they please, will die before me!
And then, what has life for me, that I should regret? In truth, only the dull twilight and black bread of a prison, a portion of meagre soup from the trough of the convicts; to be treated rudely,--I, who have been education; to be brutalized by turnkeys without feeling; not to see a human being who thinks me worthy of a word, or whom I could address; incessantly to [399] shudder at what I have done, and what may be done to me,--these are nearly the only advantages of which the executioner can deprive me!
Ah! still it is horrible.
Seen from afar, the appearance of that edifice is rather majestic. It spreads to the horizon in front
of a hill, and at a distance retains something of splendour,--the look of a Royal Palace. But as you
approach it, the Palace changes to a ruin, and the dilapidated gables shock the sight. There is a
mixture of poverty and disgrace soiling its royal facades; without glass or shutters to the
windows, but massive crossed-bars of iron instead, against which is pressed, here and there, the
ghastly face of a felon or a mad-man.
For first few days I was treated with a degree of attention which was horrible to me,--the civilities of a turnkey breath of a scaffold. Luckily, at the end of some days habit resumed its influence; they mixed me with the other prisoners in a general brutality, and made no more of those unusual distinctions of politeness which continually kept the executioner in my memory.
This was not the only amelioration. My youth, my docility, the cares of the Chaplain of the prison; and above all some words in Latin which I addressed to the keeper, who did not understand them, procured for me a walk once a week with the other prisoners, and removed the strait-waistcoat with which ! was paralyzed. After considerable hesitation they have also given me pens, paper, ink, and a night-lamp. Every Sunday after Mass I am allowed to walk in the Prison-court at the hour of recreation; there I talk with the prisoners, which is inevitable. They make boon companions, these wretches. They tell me their adventures,---enough to mortify one; but I know they are proud of them. They also try to teach me their mystic idioms,--an odious phraseology grafted on the general language, like a hideous excrescence; yet sometimes it has a singular energy, a frightful picturesqueness. To be hung is called "marrying the widow," as though the rope of the gallows were the widow of all who had been executed! At every instant mysterious, fantastic words occur, base and hideous, derived one knows not whence; they resemble crawling reptiles. On hearing this language spoken, the effect is like the shaking of dusty rags before you.
These men at least pity me, and they alone do so. The jailors, the turnkeys,--and I am not angry
with them---gossip [400] and laugh, and speak of me in my presence as of a mere animal.
"Why not? If all around me is monotonous and hueless, is there not within me a tempest, a struggle, a tragedy? This fixed idea which possesses me, does it not take every hour, every minute a new form, becoming more hideous as the time approaches? Why should I not try to describe for myself all the violent and unknown feelings I experience in my outcast situation? Certainly the material is plentiful; and, however shortened my life may be, there will still be sufficient in the anguish, the terrors, the tortures, which will fill it from this hour until my last, to exhaust my pen and ink! Besides, the only means to decrease my suffering in this anguish will be to observe it closely; and to describe it will give me an occupation. And then, what I write may not be without its use. This journal of my sufferings, hour by hour, minute by minute, torment after torment, if I have strength to carry it on to the moment when it will be physically impossible for me to continue,--this history necessarily unfinished, yet as complete as possible, of my sensations, may it not give a grand and deep lesson? Will not there be in this process of agonizing thought, in this ever increasing progress of pain, in this intellectual dissection of a condemned man, more than one lesson for those who condemned? Perhaps the perusal may render them less heedless, when throwing a human life into what they call 'the scale of justice.' Perhaps they have never reflected on the slow succession of tortures conveyed in the expeditious formula of a sentence of death. Have they ever paused on the important idea, that in the man whose days they shorten there is an immortal spirit which had calculated on life, a soul which is not prepared for death? No! they see nothing but the execution, and doubtless think that for the condemned there is nothing anterior or subsequent!"
These sheets shall undeceive them. Published, perchance, some day, they will call their attention a few moments to the suffering of the mind; for it is this which they do not consider. They triumph in the power of being able to destroy the body, almost without making it suffer. What an inferior consideration is this! What is mere physical pain compared to that of the mind? A day will come, and perhaps these memoirs, the last revelations of a solitary wretch, will have contributed--
That is, unless after my death the wind carries away these sheets of paper into the muddy court,
or unless they [401] melt with rain when pasted to the broken window of a turnkey.
*****
What! sunshine, spring, fields full of flowers and birds, the clouds, trees, nature, liberty, life,--these are to be mine no more!
Ah, it is myself I must try to save! Is it really true that this cannot be, that I must die
soon,--to-morrow, today perhaps; is it all thus? Oh, heavens! what a dreadful idea,--of destroying
myself against the prison wall!
Three days of delay, after sentence is pronounced, for the prisoner's final plea to annul it.
The plea forgotten for a week in a Court of Assize, before it is sent to the Minister; a fortnight forgotten at the Minister's, who does not even know that there are such papers, although he is supposed to transmit them, after examination, to the "Cour de Cassation."
Then classification, numbering, registering; the guillotine-list is loaded, and none must go before their turn! A fortnight more waiting; then the Court assembles, rejects twenty pleas together, and sends all back to the Minister, who sends them back to the Attorney-General, who sends them back to the executioner; this would take three more days.
On the morning of the fourth day the Deputies of the Attorney-General and Recorder prepare the order of execution; and the following morning, from day-break, is heard the noise of erecting the scaffold, and in the cross-streets a commotion of hoarse voices.
Altogether six weeks. The young girl's calculation was right! I have now been at least five weeks
(perhaps six, for I dare not reckon) in this fatal prison; nay, I think I have been even three days
more.
I leave a mother, I leave a wife, I leave a child,--a little girl of three years old, gentle, delicate, with large black eyes and chestnut hair. She was two years and one month old when I saw her the last time.
Thus after my death there will be three women without son, without husband, without father,--three orphans in different degrees; three widows by act of law.
I admit that I am justly punished; but these innocent creatures, what have they done? No matter; they will be [402] dishonoured, they will be ruined; and this is justice!
It is not much on account of my poor old mother that I feel thus wretched; she is so advanced in years, she will not survive the blow; or if she still linger a short time, her feelings are so blunted that she will suffer but little.
Nor is it for my wife that I feel the most. She is already in miserable health, and weak in intellect; her reason will give way, in which case her spirit will not suffer while the mind slumbers as in death.
But my daughter, my child, my poor little Mary, who is laughing, playing, singing, at this moment,
and who dreams of no evil! Ah, it is the thought of her which unmans me!
I have omitted to say that night and day there is a sentry on guard outside the door of my cell; and
I never raise my eyes towards the square grating without encountering his eyes, open, and fixed
on me.
Above where I sleep there are two flaming hearts, pierced with an arrow; and beneath is written "Amour pour la vie." Poor wretch! it was not a long engagement.
Beyond this, a three-sided cocked hat, with a small figure coarsely done beneath, and the words, "Vive l'Empereur!"
On the opposite wall is the name of "Papavoine." The capital P is worked in arabesques and embellished with care. A verse of a popular drinking-song.
A Cap of Liberty, cut rather deeply into the stone, with the words beneath of "Bories, La République!"
Poor young man! he was one of the four subaltern officers of La Rochelle. How horrible is the idea of their (fancied) political necessity, to give the frightful reality of the guillotine for an opinion, a reverie, an abstraction!--And I! I have complained of its severity!-I who have really committed crime--
Ah, what have I seen! I can go no farther in my research! I have just discovered, drawn with chalk
in the corner of the wall, that dreadful image, the representation of that scaffold, which even at
this moment is perhaps being put up for my execution! The lamp had nearly fallen out of my
trembling hands!
Besides the name of Papavoine, I tore away an enormous cobweb, thick with dust, and filling the angle of the wall. Under this web there were four or five names perfectly legible, among others of which nothing remained but a smear on the wall,--DAUTAN, 1815. POULAIN, 1818. JEAN MARTIN, 1821. CASTAING, 1823.
As I read these names, frightful recollections crowded on me. Dautan was the man who cut his brother in quarters, and who went at night to Paris and threw the head into a fountain, and the body into a sewer. Poulain assassinated his wife. Jean Martin shot his father with a pistol as the old man opened a window. And Castaing was the physician who poisoned his friend; and while attending the illness he had caused, instead of antidote, gave him more poison. Then, next to these names, was Papavoine, the horrible madman who stabbed children to death in his phrenzy.
"These," I exclaimed, as a shudder passed over me, "these, then, have been my predecessors in this cell. Here, on the same pavement where I am, they conceived their last thoughts,--these fearful homicides! Within these walls, in this narrow square, their last steps turned and returned, like those of a caged wild-beast. They succeeded each other at short intervals; it seems that this dungeon does not remain empty. They have left the place warm,--and it is to me they have left it. In my turn I shall join them in the felons' cemetery [404] of Clamart, where the grass grows so well!"
*****
I am neither visionary nor superstitious, but it is probable these ideas caused in my brain a feverish excitement; for, whilst I thus wandered, all at once these five fatal names appeared as though written in flames on the dark wall; noises, louder and louder, burst on my ears; a dull red light filled my eyes, and it seemed to me that my cell became full of men,--strangers to me. Each bore his severed head in his left hand, and carried it by the mouth, for the hair had been removed; each raised his right band at me, except the parricide.
I shut my eyes in horror, and then I saw all even more distinctly than before!
Dream, vision, or reality, I should have gone mad if a sudden impression had not recalled me in
time. I was near fainting, when I felt something cold crawling over my naked foot. It was the
bloated spider, whom I had disturbed. This recalled my wandering senses. Those dreadful
spectres, then, were only the fumes of an empty and convulsed brain. The sepulchre is a prison
from whence none escape. The door of the tomb opens not inwards!
A jailor passed; I ventured to call and ask him "if there were a Fête in the Prison."
"A Fête, if you choose to call it so," answered he; "this is the day that they fetter the galley-slaves who are to set off tomorrow for Toulon. Would you like to see them? It would amuse you."
For a solitary recluse, indeed, a spectacle of any kind was an event of interest, however odious it might be; and I accepted the "amusement."
The jailor, after taking the usual precautions to secure me, conducted me into a little empty cell, without a vestige of furniture, and only a grated window,--but still a real window, against which one could lean, and through which one could actually perceive the sky! "Here," said he, "you will see and hear all that happens. You will be 'alone in your box,' like the King!"
He then went out, closing on me locks, bolts, and bars.
The window looked into a square and rather wide court, on every side of which was a large six-storied stone edifice. Nothing could seem more wretched, naked, and miserable to the eye than this quadruple façade, pierced by a multitude of grated windows, against which were pressed a crowd of thin and wan faces, placed one above the other, like [405] the stones of a wall; and all, as it were, framed in the intercrossings of iron bars. They were prisoners, spectators of the ceremony, until their turn came to be the actors.
All looked in silence into the still empty court; among these faded and dull countenances there shone, here and there, some eyes which gleamed like sparks of fire.
At twelve o'clock, a large gateway in the court was opened. A cart, escorted by soldiers, rolled heavily into the court, with a rattling of irons. It was the Convict-guard with the chains.
At the same instant, as if this sound awaked all the noise of the prison, the spectators of the windows, who had hitherto been silent and motionless, burst into cries of joy, songs, menaces, and imprecations, mixed with hoarse laughter. It was like witnessing a masque of Demons; each visage bore a grimace, every hand was thrust through the bars, their voices yelled, their eyes flashed, and I was startled to see so many gleams amidst these ashes. Meanwhile the galley-sergeants quietly began their work. One mounted on the cart, and threw to his comrades the fetters, the iron collars, and the linen clothing; while others stretched long chains to the end of the court and the Captain tried each link by striking it on the pavement,--all of which took place under the mocking raillery of the prisoners, and the loud laughter of the convicts for whom they were being prepared.
When all was ready, two or three low doors poured forth into the court a collection of hideous, yelling, ragged men; these were the galley-convicts.
Their entry caused increased pleasure at the windows. Some of them, being 'great names' among their comrades, were saluted with applause and acclamation, which they received with a sort of proud modesty. Several wore a kind of hat of prison straw, plaited by themselves, and formed into some fantastic shape; these men were always the most applauded.
One in particular excited transports of enthusiasm,--a youth of seventeen, with quite a girlish face. In his prison he had made himself a straw dress, which enveloped him from head to foot; and he entered the court, jumping a somerset with the agility of a serpent. He was a mountebank condemned for theft, and there was a furious clapping of hands, and a volley of cheers, for him.
At length the names were called in alphabetical order, and they went to stand two and two, companions by similar initials; so that even if a convict had a friend, most likely their chains would divide them from suffering together.
Whilst they were exchanging their worn-out prison-garments for the thin and coarse clothing of the galleys, the weather, which had been hitherto un. certain, became suddenly cold and cloudy, and a heavy shower chilled their thin forms, and saturated their vesture.
A dull silence succeeded to their noisy bravadoes; they shivered, their teeth chattered, and their limbs shook in the wet clothes.
One convict only, an old man, retained a sort of gaiety. He exclaimed laughing, while wiping away the rain, and shaking his fist at the skies, "This was not in the playbill!"
[406] When they had put on their miserable vestments, they were taken in bands of twenty or thirty to the corner of the court where the long chains were extended. At every interval of two feet in these chains were fastened short transverse chains, and at the extremity of each of the latter was attached a square iron collar, which opened by means of a hinge in the centre and closed by an iron bolt, which is riveted, for the whole journey, on the convict's neck. The convicts were ordered to sit down in the mud on the inundated pavement; the iron collars were fitted on them, and two prison-blacksmiths, with portable anvils, riveted the hard, unheated metal with heavy iron hammers.
This was a frightful operation, and even the most hardy turned pale! Each stroke of the hammer, aimed on the anvil resting on their backs, makes the whole form yield; the failure of its aim, or the least movement of the head, might launch them into eternity.
When this operation was finished, the convicts rose simultaneously. The five gangs joined hands, so as to form an immense circle, and thus ran round and round in the court with a rapidity that the eye could hardly follow. They sung some couplets, in their own idiom, to a melody which was sometimes plaintive, sometimes furious, often interrupted by hoarse cries and broken laughter, like delirious ravings, while the chains, clanking together in cadence, formed an accompaniment to a song more harsh than their own noise. A large trough was now brought in; the guards, striking the convicts to make them discontinue their dance, took them to the trough, in which was swimming I know not what sort of herbs in some smoking and dirty-looking liquid. Having partaken of it, they threw the remainder on the pavement, with their black bread, and began again to, dance and sing. This is a liberty which is allowed to them on the day they are fettered and the succeeding night.
I gazed on this strange spectacle with such eager and breathless attention, that I totally forgot my own misery. The deepest pity filled my heart, and their laughter made me weep.
Suddenly, in the midst of a profound reverie into which I had fallen, I observed the yelling circle had stopped, and was silent. Then every eye was turned to the window which I occupied. "The Condemned! the Condemned!" shouted they, pointing their fingers at me; and their bursts of laughter were redoubled.
I was thunderstruck. I know not where they knew me, or how I was recognized.
"Good day! good night? cried they, with their mocking sneer. One of the youngest, condemned to the Galleys for life, turned his shining, leaden face on me, with a look of envy, saying, "He is lucky! he is to be clipped! Good-bye, Comrade!"
I cannot describe what passed within me. I was indeed their "comrade?' The Scaffold is Sister to the Galleys. Nay, I was even lower than they were; the convicts had done me an honour. I shuddered: yes! their "comrade!" I remained at the window, motionless, as if paralyzed; but when I saw the five gangs advance, rushing towards me with phrases of disgusting cordiality; when I heard the horrible din of their chains, their clamours, their steps at the foot of my wall, it seemed to me that this knot of demons were scaling my cell! I uttered a shriek; I threw myself against the door violently, but there was no means of flight. I knocked, I called with mad fury. Then I thought I heard, still nearer, the horrid voices of the convicts. I thought I saw their hideous heads appearing on a level with the window; I uttered another shriek of anguish, and fainted.
*****
No matter! I could stretch my limbs at their ease between these coarse sheets; and under this blanket, thin as it was, I felt the gradual decrease of that horrible chill in the marrow of my bones, to which I had lately been accustomed.--I slept again.
A loud noise awakened me at daylight. The noise came from without; my bed was beside the window, and I sat up to see from what it arose. The window looked into the large Court of the Bicêtre, which was full of people. Two lines of veterans had difficulty in keeping the crowd away from a narrow passage across the Court. Between this double rank of soldiers, five long wagons, loaded with men, were driven slowly jolting at each stone; it was the departure of the convicts.
These wagons were open, and each gang occupied one. The convicts, in consequence of their iron collars being attached to the centre chain, are obliged to sit back to back, their feet hanging over the sides of the wagon; the centre chain stretched the whole length of the cart, and on its unfastened end the Sergeant stood with his loaded musket. There was a continual clanking of the prisoners' chains, and at each plunge of the wagon their heads and pendant limbs were jolted violently. A quick penetrating rain chilled the air, and made their wet slight vesture cling to their shivering forms. Their long beards and short hair streamed with wet; their complexions were saturnine; they were shivering, and grinding their teeth with mingled rage and cold. But they had no power of moving; once riveted to that chain, each becomes a mere fraction of that hideous whole which is called the Gang. Intellect must abdicate,--the fetters condemn it to death; and the mere animal must not even hunger but at certain hours. Thus fixed, the greater part half clad, with bare heads, and no rest for their feet, they begin their journey of twenty-five days; the same sort of wagons, the same portion of dress being used in scorching July as in the cold rains of November. One would almost [408] think that man wishes Heaven to take part in his office of executioner.
Between the crowd and the convicts a horrible dialogue was maintained,--abuse on one side, bravadoes on the other, imprecations from both; but at a sign from the Captain I saw the sticks of the Guard raining indiscriminate blows into the wagon, on heads or shoulders, and all returned to that kind of eternal calm which is called "order." But their eyes were full of vengeance, and their powerless hands were clenched on their knees.
The five wagons, escorted by mounted gendarmes and guards on foot, passed slowly under the high arched door of the Bicêtre. The crowd followed them: all vanished like a phantasmagoria, and by degrees the sounds diminished of the heavy wheels, clanking fetters, and the yells of the multitude uttering maledictions on the journey of the convicts. And such was their happy beginning!
What a proposition my counsel made! The Galleys! I was right to prefer death; rather the Scaffold
than what I had seen!
Not ill? No truly, I am young, healthful, and strong; the blood flows freely in my veins; my limbs obey my will; I am robust in mind and body, constituted for a long life. Yes, all this is true; and yet, nevertheless, I have an illness, a fatal illness,--an illness given by the hand of man!
Since I came out of the Infirmary a vivid idea has occupied me,--a thought which affects me to madness; namely, that I might have escaped, had they left me there! Those Physicians, those Charity Sisters seemed to take an interest in me. "To die so young! and by such a death? One would have imagined they pitied me by their pressing round my bed. Bah! it was curiosity! I have no chance now! My plea will be rejected, because all was legal; the witnesses gave correct evidence, the counsel pleaded well, the Judges decided carefully. I do not reckon upon it, unless--No! folly; there is no hope. The plea is a cord which holds you suspended over an abyss, and which you feel giving way at each instant until it breaks. It is as if the axe of the Guillotine took six weeks to fall.
If I could obtain my pardon!--pardon! From whom, for what, and by what means? It is impossible
that I should be pardoned. They say an example is requisite.
I sat thus, my heavy and fevered head within my hands, my elbows on my knees, my feet on the bar of the chair; for dejection had made me stoop, and sink within myself, as if I had neither bone nor muscular power.
The stifling air of the prison oppressed me more than ever; I still fancied the [409] noise from the convicts' chains rung in my ears; I was almost overcome. I wished that some guardian spirit would take pity on me, and send even a little bird to sing there, opposite, on the edge of the roof.
I know not if it were a spirit of good or evil which granted my wish; but almost at the moment I uttered it, I heard beneath my window a voice,--not that of a bird, but far better--the pure, fresh, velvet voice of a young girl of fifteen!
I raised my head with a start; I listened with avidity to the song she sung. It was a slow and plaintive air,--a sad yet beautiful melody. As I gathered the sense of the words, I cannot describe my pain and disappointment, while the stanzas of prison-dialect marred the sweet music.
I heard no more. I could listen to no more. The meaning, half-hidden, half-evident, of this horrible lament,--the struggle between the felon and the police; the thief he meets and despatches for his wife; his dreadful explanation to her: "I have sweated an oak" ("I have assassinated a man"); the wife who goes to Versailles with a petition, and the King indignantly exclaiming that he "will make the guilty man dance where there is no floor!"-and all this sung to the sweetest air, and by the sweetest voice that ever soothed human ear! I was shocked, disgusted, overcome. It was a repulsive idea that all these monstrous words proceeded from a fresh rosy mouth: it was like the slime of a snail over a rosebud!
I cannot express what I felt; I was at once pained and gratified. The idiom of crime, a language at once sanguinary and grotesque, united to the voice of a young girl, that graceful transition from the voice of childhood to the voice of woman,--all these deformities of words delightfully sung, cadenced, rounded!
Ah, how infamous is a prison! It contains a venom which assails all within its pestilential reach. Everything withers there, even the song of a girl of fifteen!
If you find a bird within its courts, it has mud on its wing. If you gather a beauteous flower there,
it exhales poison!
*****
What can be the meaning of what has since happened? The turnkey on duty came into my cell; he took off his cap, bowed to me, apologized for disturbing me, and making an effort to soften his rough voice, inquired what I wished to have for my breakfast--
A shudder has come over me. Is it to take place to-day?
The Governor of the prison himself came to visit me. He asked me how he could serve or accommodate me; he expressed a hope that I had no complaint to make respecting him or his subordinates; and he inquired with interest regarding my health, and how I had [410] passed the night. On leaving me, he called me "Sir!"
Oh, it surely is for to-day!
This Governor, with his benign smile, his soft words, his eye which flatters and spies, his coarse heavy hands,--he is the incarnation of a prison!
Ah, hapless creature! what will become of me? What will they do with me?
Let me record what has happened. At half-past six the door of my cell was opened; an old man with white hair entered, dressed in a brown great-coat.
He unfastened it, and beneath I saw the black cassock and bands of a priest. He was not the usual Chaplain to the prison, and I thought this appeared ominous. He seated himself opposite to me, with a quiet smile; then shook his head, and raised his eyes to heaven. I understood him.
"My son!" said he, "are you prepared?"
I answered, in a low tone, "I am not prepared--but I am ready."
Then my sight became troubled; a chill damp pervaded my frame. I felt the veins on my temples swelling, and a confused murmur in my ears.
Whilst I vacillated on my chair as though asleep, the old man continued speaking,--at least, so it appeared to me, for I think I remember seeing his lips move, and his hand raised.
The door opened again; the noise of the lock roused me from my reverie, and the Priest from his discourse. A person dressed in black entered, accompanied by the Governor of the prison, and bowed profoundly to me; he carried a roll of paper.
"Sir," said he, with a courteous smile, "I have the honour to bring you a message from the Attorney-General."
The first agitation was over; all my presence of mind returned, and I answered in a firm tone, "Read on, Sir."
He then read a long. technically-expressed paper, the purport of which was the rejection of my plea. "The execution will be to-day," added he; "we shall leave this for the Conciergerie Prison at half-past seven. My dear Sir, will you have the extreme goodness to accompany me at that hour?"
For some instants I had no longer listened to him; for while his eyes were fixed on the paper the Governor was occupied talking to the Priest; and I looked at the door which they had left half open!...Ah, hapless me! Four sentinels in the corridor. Again I was asked when I would be ready to go.
[411] "When you please," I said; "at your own time."
"I shall have the honour of coming for you, then, in half an hour," said he, bowing; and all the party withdrew.
Oh for some means of escaping, Good heavens! any means whatever! I must make my escape! I must! Immediately! By the doors, by the windows, by the roof! Even though in the struggle I should destroy myself!
Oh, rage! demons! malediction! It would take months to pierce this wall with efficient tools. And
I have not one nail, nor one hour!
Alas! and I saw that four others did the same! I rose, and advanced one step. It appeared to me I could not make a second. My head was so heavy, and my limbs so feeble; but I made an effort to conquer my weakness, and assumed an appearance of firmness.
Prior to leaving the cell, I gave it a final look; I had almost become attached to it. Besides, I left it empty and open, which gives, so strange an appearance to a dungeon.
It will not be long untenanted. The turnkeys said they expected some one this evening,--a prisoner who was then being tried at the Court of Assizes.
At the turn of the corridor the Chaplain rejoined us; he had just breakfasted.
At the threshold of the goal, the Governor took me by the hand; he had reinforced my escort by four veterans.
By the door of the Infirmary a dying old man exclaimed, "Good-bye, we shall soon meet again!"
We arrived in the courtyard, where I could breathe again freely, and this refreshed me greatly; but we did not walk long in the open air. The carriage was stationed in the first court. It was the same which had brought me there,--a sort of oblong van, divided into two sections by a transverse grating of close wire. Each section had a door; one in the front, one in the back of the cart; the whole so dirty, so black, so dusty, that the hearse for paupers is a state carriage by comparison! Before I buried myself in this moving tomb, I cast a look round the yard,--one of those despairing looks which seem to ask a miracle. The court was already encumbered with spectators. Like the day when the convicts departed, there was a slight, chilling shower of the season; it is raining still, and doubtless there will be rain all the day,--which will last when I am no morel We entered the van. The messenger and a gendarme, in the front compartment, the Priest, myself, and a gendarme in the other, with four mounted gendarmes around the carriage. As I entered it, an old grey-eyed woman who stood near exclaimed, "I like seeing this, even better than seeing the galley convicts!"
I can conceive this. It is a spectacle more easily taken in at one view. Nothing divides the attention; there is but one man, and on this isolated being [412] there is as much misery heaped as on all the other convicts together. The van passed with a dull noise under the gateway, and the heavy doors of the Bicêtre were closed after us. I felt myself moving, but in stupor, like a man fallen into a lethargy, who can neither move nor cry out, and who fancies he feels that he is being buried alive. I listened vaguely to the peals of bells on the collars of the post-horses which drew the van, the iron wheels grating over various substances in the road, the cracking whips of the postillion, the galloping of the gendarmes round the carriage, all seemed like a whirlwind which bore me away.
My mind was so stupefied with grief that I only conceived ideas as in a dream. I saw the blue towers of Nôtre Dame in the distance. "Those who will be on the tower with the flag will see my execution well," said I to myself, smiling stupidly.
I think it was at that moment that the Priest addressed me again; I patiently let him speak. I had already In my ears the noise of the wheels, the galloping horses, and the postillion's whip; therefore it was only one more incomprehensible noise. I listened in silence to that flow of monotonous words, which deadened my thoughts, like the murmur of a brook; and they passed before my torpid mind, always varied yet always the same, like the crooked elms we passed by the roadside. The short and jerking voice of the messenger in the front of the van suddenly aroused me.
"Well, Chaplain," said he, in almost a gay tone, "what news have you today?"
The Chaplain, who spoke to me without ceasing, and who was deafened by the carriage, made no answer.
"Well, well! How the van rattles; one can hardly hear oneself. What was I saying to you, Chaplain! Oh, aye!--do you know the great news of Paris to-day?"
I started as if he were speaking to me.
"No," said the priest, who had at last heard him, "I have not had time to read the papers this morning: I shall see them this evening. When I am occupied in this way all day, I order my servant to keep the papers, and I read them on my return."
"Bah!" replied the other, "it is impossible that you have not heard what I mean. The news of Paris--the news of this morning."
It was now my turn to speak; and I said, "I know what you mean."
The Messenger looked at me. "You? really! and pray what is your opinion about it?"
"You are inquisitive," said I.
"How so, sir?" replied he. "Every one should have a political opinion: I esteem you too much to suppose that you are without one. As to myself, I am quite in favour of re-establishing the National Guard. I was a serjeant in my company; and, faith! it was very agreeable to--"
I interrupted him by saying, "I did not think this was the subject in question.''
"What did you suppose, then? You professed to know the news."
"I spoke of something else with which Paris is also occupied to-day."
[413] The fool did not understand, and his curiosity was awakened.
"More news! Where the deuce could .you learn news. What is it, my dear sir? Do you know what it is, Chaplain? Do let me hear all about it, I beg. I like news, you see, to relate to the President; it amuses him."
He looked from one to the other, and obtained no answer.
"Well," said he, "what are you thinking of?"
"I am thinking," said I, "that I shall be past thinking, this evening."
"Oh, that's it," returned he. "Come, come, you are too sad. Mr. Castaing conversed on the day of his execution."
Then, after a pause, he continued: "I accompanied Mr. Papavoine on his last day. He wore his otter-skin cap, and smoked his cigar. As for the young men of La Rochelle, they only spoke among themselves, but still they spoke. As for you, I really think you are too pensive, young man."
"Young man?" I repeated. "I am older than you; every quarter of an hour which passes makes me a year older."
He turned round, looked at me some minutes with stupid astonishment, and then began to titter.
"Come, you are joking; older than I am? why, I might be your grandfather."
"I have no wish to jest," I answered gravely. He opened his snuff-box.
"Here, my good sir, don't be angry. Take a pinch of snuff, and don't bear malice."
"Do not fear," said I; "I shall not have long to bear it against you." At this moment the snuff-box which he extended to me came against the grating which separated us. A jolt caused it to strike rather violently, and it fell, wide open, under the feet of the gendarme.
"Curse the grating!" said the messenger; then turning to me, he added, "Now, am I not unlucky? I have lost all my snuff!"
"I lose more than you," said I.
As he tried to pick up his snuff, he muttered between his teeth, "More than I! that's very easily said. No more snuff until I reach Paris! It's terrible."
The Chaplain then addressed him with some words of consolation; and I know not if I were pre-occupied, but it seemed to be to be part of the exhortation of which the commencement had been addressed to me.
By degrees conversation increased between the Chaplain and the officer; and I became again lost in thought. The vas was stopped for a minute before the toll-gate, and the inspector examined it. Had it contained a sheep or an ox which was going to be slaughtered, they would have required some money; but a human head pays no duty!
We passed through the gates, and the carriage trotted quickly through those old and crooked streets of the Faubourg St. Marceau and the city, which twist and cross each other like the many paths of an ant-hill. On the pavement of these narrow streets the rolling of the wheels became so noisy and rapid that I could hear no other sound, though I saw that people exclaimed, as the van passed, and bands of children followed its track. I fancied also I occasionally saw in the cross-streets ragged men displaying in their hands a bundle of [414] printed papers, their mouths open as if vociferating something, while the passers stopped to purchase.
Half-past eight struck by the palace clock as we arrived in the court of the Conciergerie Prison. The sight of its wide staircase, its dark chapel, its sombre gates, made me shudder; and when the carriage stopped, I fancied the beatings of my heart stopped also.
But I collected my strength; the door was opened; with the rapidity of lightning I jumped from the
moving prison, and passed between two lines of soldiers; already there was a crowd formed on
my path.
I was then taken to the Governor, into whose charge the Officer gave me. They made an exchange. The Director told him to wait a moment, as he had some "game" for him to take back in the Van to the Bicêtre. No doubt it was the man condemned to-day. He is to sleep to-night on the bundle of straw which I have not had time to wear out.
"Oh, very well," said the Officer to the Governor, "I will wait with pleasure; we can make out the two papers together, and it will be very convenient."
They then placed me in a small room adjoining the Governor's office, and left me, locked in, alone.
I know not of what I was thinking, or how long I had been there, when a sudden and loud burst of laughter in my ear dispersed my reverie.
I raised my eyes with a start. I was no longer alone in the cell; a man was beside me. He was about fifty-five years old, middle-sized, wrinkled; stooping, and bald: with a sinister cast in his grey eyes, and a bitter sneer on his countenance; he was dirty, half clothed, ragged, disgusting.
We looked at each other steadfastly for some moments; he prolonging his bitter laugh, while I felt half astonished, half alarmed.
"Who are you?" said I to him at last. "That is a funny question," said he. "I am a friauche."
"A friauche?" said I; "what does that mean?"
This question redoubled his merriment.
"Why," cried he, in the midst of a shout of laughter, "it means that they will play the same game with my head in six weeks hence, as they will with thine in six hours! Ha! ha! ha! thou seem'st to understand now!"
And truly I was pale, and my hair stood on end. This, then, was the other condemned prisoner, the one just sentenced, whom they expected at the Bicêtre; the heir of my cell.
He continued: "Never mind! Here's my history. I am son of a famous thief; it is a pity that they gave him one day a hempen cravat; it was during the 'reign of the Gallows by the grace of Heaven.' At six years of age I had neither father nor mother; in summer I turned somersets in the dust on the high-road, that carriage-travellers might throw me money; in winter I walked [415] with naked feet in the mud, in ragged clothes, and blowing on my purple hands to excite pity. At nine years old I began to use my fingers; at times I emptied a pocket or a reticule; at ten years old I was a pilferer: then I made acquaintances, and at seventeen I became a thief. I broke into a shop, I robbed the till; I was taken and sent to the Galleys. What a hard life that was! Sleeping on bare boards, drinking plain water, eating black bread, dragging a stupid fetter which was of no use; sun-strokes and whip-strokes: and then all the heads are kept shaved, and I had such fine chestnut hair! Never mind! I served my time; fifteen years. That wears one famously!
"I was two-and-thirty years old; one fine morning they gave me a map of the road, a passport, and sixty-six francs, which I had amassed in my fifteen years at the Galleys, working sixteen hours a-day, thirty days a-month, twelve months a-year. Never mind! I wished to be an honest man with my sixty-six francs; and I had finer sentiments under my rags than you might find beneath the cassock of a priest. But deuce take the passport! It was yellow, and they had written upon it 'Freed convict.' I was obliged to show this at every village, and to present it every week to the mayors of the towns through which I was ordered to pass. A fine recommendation! a galley-convict! I frightened all the folk, and little children ran away, and people locked their doors. No one would give me work; I expended the last of my sixty-six francs,--and then-one must live. I showed my arms, fit for labour; the people shut their doors.
I offered my day's work for fifteen sous, for ten sous, for five sous! and no one would have me. What could be done? One day being hungry, I knocked my elbow through a baker's window; I seized on a loaf, and the baker seized on me. I did not eat the loaf, yet I was condemned to the Galleys for life, with three letters branded on my shoulder; I'll show them to you if you like. They call that sort of justice the relapse. So here I was, a returned horse. I was brought back to Toulon,--this time among the Green-caps (galley-slaves for life); so now I decided to escape. I had only three walls to pierce, two chains to break, and I had one nail! I escaped. They fired the signal gun; for we convicts are, like the Cardinals of Rome, dressed in red, and they fire cannons when we depart! Their powder went to the sparrows! This time, no yellow passport, but then no money either. I met some comrades in the neighbourhood who had also served their time or broken their chains. Their captain proposed to me to join the band. They killed on the highways. I acceded, and I began to kill to live. Sometimes we attacked a Diligence, sometimes it was a post-chaise, sometimes a grazier on horseback. We took the money, we let the horses go, and buried the bodies under a tree, taking care that their feet did not appear; and then we danced on the graves, so that the ground might not seem fresh broken.
I grew old this way, hiding in the ,bushes, sleeping in the air, hunted from wood to wood, but at least free and my own master. Everything has an end, and this like the rest; the gendarmes [416] one night caught us at our tricks; my comrades escaped; but I, the oldest, remained under the claw of these cats in cocked hats. They brought me here. I had already mounted all the steps of the justice-ladder, except one. Whether I had now taken a handkerchief or a life was all the same for me. There was but one 'relapse' to give me,--the executioner. My business has been short: faith, I began to grow old and good for nothing. My father married the widow (was hanged); I am going to retire to the Abbey of Mont-à-Regret (the Guillotine); that's all, comrade!"
I remained stupefied during the recital. He laughed louder than at the beginning, and tried to take my hand. I drew back in horror.
"Friend," cried he, "you don't seem game. Don't be foolish on the scaffold: d' ye see? There is one bad moment to pass on the board, but that's so soon done. I should like to be there to show you the step! Faith, I've a great mind not to plead, if they will finish me with you to-day. The same Priest will serve us both. You see I'm a good fellow, eh? I say, shall we be friends?"
Again he advanced a step nearer to me.
"Sir," I answered, repulsing him, "I decline it."
Fresh bursts of laughter at my answer.
"Ha, ha, ha! Sir, you must be a Marquis."
I interrupted him, "My friend, I require reflection: leave me in peace."
The gravity of my tone rendered him instantly thoughtful. He shook his grey and nearly bald head, while he murmured between his teeth, "I understand now,--the Priest!"
After a few minutes' silence, he said to me, almost timidly,--
"Sir, you are a Marquis; that is all very well; but you have on such a nice great-coat, which will not be of much use to you. The Executioner will take it. Give it to me, and I will sell it for tobacco."
I took off my great-coat, and gave it to him. He began to clap his hands with childish joy; then looking at my shirt-sleeves, and seeing that I shivered, he added, "You are cold, Sir; put on this; it rains, and you will be wet through; besides, you ought to go decently on the wagon!"
While saying this, he took off his coarse, grey woollen jacket, and put my arms into it, which I allowed him to do unconsciously. I then leaned against the wall, and I cannot describe the effect this man had on me. He was examining the coat which I had given him, and uttered each moment an exclamation of delight. "The pockets are quite new! The collar is not in the least worn! It will bring me at least fifteen francs. What luck! I shall have tobacco during all my six weeks."
The door opened again. They were come to conduct me to the room where the condemned finally await their execution; and the guard was also come to take the other prisoner to the Bicêtre. He placed himself, laughingly, amongst them, and said to the gendarmes,--
"I say, don't make a mistake! We have changed skins, the gentleman and I; don't take me in his
place. That won't suit me at all, now that I can have tobacco for six weeks!"
It was not from indifference, or from charity, that I let him take it. No; but because he was stronger than I! If I had refused, he would have beaten me with those great coarse hands. Charity, indeed! I was full of bad feeling; I should like to have strangled him with my own hands, the old thief!--to have trampled him under my feet.
I feel my heart full of rage and bitterness, and my nature turned to gall: the approach of violent
death renders one wicked.
Oh, my poor little girl! In six hours more thy Father will be dead,--something to be dragged about the tables of lecturing rooms; a head to be cast by one party, a trunk to be dissected by another; then all to be thrown together into a bier, and despatched to the felons' burial-ground. This is what they are going to do with thy Father; yet none of them hate me, all pity me, and all could save me! They are going to kill me, Mary, to kill me in cold blood,--a ceremonial for the general good. Poor little girl! thy Father, who loved thee so well, thy Father who kissed thy little white neck, who passed his hands so fondly through the ringlets of thy silken hair, who danced thee on his knee, and every evening joined thy two little hands to pray to God!
Who will do all this for thee in future? Who now will love thee? My darling child, what wilt thou do for my presents, pretty play things, and kisses? Ah, unfortunate Orphan! What wilt thou do for food and raiment?
If the Jury had seen thee, my pretty little Mary, they would have understood it was wrong to kill the Father of a child three years old.
And when she grows up, what will become of her? Her Father will be one of the disgraces of Paris. She will blush for me and at hearing my name; she will be despised, rejected, reviled, on account of him who loved her with all the tenderness of his heart. Oh, my little Mary, whom I so idolized! can it be true that thou wilt encounter shame and horror through me?
Oh! can it be true that I shall die before the close of day? Those distant shouts which I hear, that
mass of animated spectators who are already hastening to the Quays, those gendarmes preparing
in their barracks,--is it all for me? Yes, I--myself am going to die?--[418] this actual self which is
here, which lives, moves, breathes,--this self which I touch and can feel!
The very name of it is frightful, and I cannot understand how I have hitherto been able to write and utter it. The idea I attach to this hateful name is vague, undefined, and therefore more sinister. I construct and demolish in my mind continually its hideous scaffolding.
I dare not ask a question about it; yet it is dreadful not to know what it is, and how to act. I fancy there is a sort of hollow, and that you are laid on your face, and--
Ah, my hair will be white before my head falls!
They are probably doing the same now. Eleven o'clock has just struck. No doubt they are greasing the slide.
Oh, unhappy creature! this time l shall not turn away, my head.
Oh! I must see my lawyer; he shall discover some new plea to urge in mitigation of my sentence.
How can I thus write when every point of his eloquence has already failed, and been unanswerably
refuted!
This morning I was bewildered; I scarcely heard what he said; his words seemed to me useless, and I remained indifferent; they glided away like those [419] drops of rain off the window-panes of my cell.
Nevertheless, when he came just now to my room, his appearance did me good. Amongst all mankind he is the only one who is still a brother for me, I reflected; and I felt an ardent thirst for good and consoling words.
When he was seated on the chair, and I on the bed, he said to me,-"My son,--"
This word opened my heart. He continued:
"My son, do you believe in God?"
"Oh, yes, Father!" I answered him.
"Do you believe in the holy Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman Church?"
"Willingly," said I.
"My son," returned he "you have an air of doubt."
Then he began to speak. He spoke a long time; he uttered a quantity of words. Then, when he had finished, he rose, and looked at me for the first time since the beginning of his discourse, and said "Well?"
I protest I had listened to him with avidity at first, then with attention, then with consideration.
I also rose and said, "Sir, leave me for a time, I beg of you."
He asked. "When shall I return?"
"I will let you know, Sir."
Then he withdrew in silence, but shaking his head as though inwardly exclaiming, "An Unbeliever."
No! low as I have fallen, I am not an unbeliever. God is my witness that I believe in Him. But how did that old man address me? Nothing to be felt, nothing to affect me, nothing to draw forth tears, nothing which sprung from his heart to enter into mine,--nothing which was addressed from himself to myself.
On the contrary, there was something vague, inaccentuated, applicable to any case and to none in particular: emphatic where it should have been profound, flat where it ought to have been simple; a species of sentimental sermon and theological elegy. Now and then a quotation in Latin; here and there the names of Saint Augustine and Saint Gregory, and others of the Calendar. And throughout he had the air of reciting a lesson which he had already twenty times repeated; seeming to go over a theme almost obliterated in his memory from being so long known; but not one look in his eyes, not one accent in his voice, to indicate that he was interested!
And how could it be otherwise? This Priest is the head Chaplain of the Prison; his calling is to console and exhort,--that is, he lives by it. Condemned felons are the spring of his eloquence; he receives their confession, and prays with them, because he keeps his place by it. He had advanced in years in conducting men to death from his youth, he has grown accustomed to that which makes others shudder. The dungeon and scaffold are every-day matters with him.
He receives notice the preceding evening that he will have to attend some one the following day, at a certain hour. He asks, "Is it for the Galleys or an execution?" and he asks no more respecting them, but comes next day as a matter of course.
Oh that they would bring me, instead o! this man, some young curate, some aged Priest, taken by chance from the [420] nearest parish! Let them find him at his devotional studies, and without warning, say to him, "There is a man who is going to die, and it is reserved for you to console him. You must be there when they bind his hands; you must take a place in the fatal cart, with your crucifix, and conceal the executioner from him. You must pass with him through that horrible crowd which is thirsting for his execution; you must embrace him at the foot of the scaffold, and you must remain there until his soul has flown!"
When they have said this, let them bring him hither, agitated, palpitating, all shuddering from
head to foot. Let me throw myself into his arms; then kneel at his feet, and he will weep, and we
will weep together; and he will be eloquent, and I shall be consoled, and my heart will unburthen
itself into his heart,--and I shall receive the blessed hope of Redemption, and he will take my
Soul!
I have been wrong, perhaps, not to attend to him more; it is he who is good, while I am the reverse. Alas! it was not my fault. The thought of my violent death has spoiled and hardened all within me.
They have just brought me food, as if I could possibly wish for it! I even tried to eat, but the first
mouthful fell untasted from my lips.
"Criminal, have you a kind heart?" "No!" answered I, impatiently. The abruptness of my answer seemed to disconcert him. Nevertheless, he began again, hesitatingly,--
"People are not wicked for the pleasure of being so?"
"Why not?" answered I. "If you have nothing but that to say to me, leave me in peace. What is your aim?"
"I beg your pardon, Criminal," he returned; "I will only say two words, which are these: If you could cause the happiness of a poor man, and that it cost you nothing, would you not do so?"
I answered gravely, "Surely, you cannot allude to me as having power to confer happiness?"
He lowered his voice and assumed a mysterious air, which ill-suited with his idiotic countenance.
"Yes, Criminal, yes,--happiness! fortune!" whispered he; "all this can come to me through you. Listen here, I am a poor gendarme; the service is [421] heavy, the pay is light; my horse is my own, and ruins me. So I put into the lottery as a counterbalance. Hitherto I have only missed by not having the right numbers. I am always very near them. If I buy seventy-six, number seventy-seven comes up a prize. Have a little patience, if you please; I have almost done. Well, here is a lucky opportunity for me. It appears, Criminal, begging your pardon, that you are to be executed to-day. It is a certain fact that the dead who are destroyed that way see the lottery before it is drawn on earth. Promise that your spirit shall appear to me tomorrow evening, to give me three numbers,--three good ones, eh? What trouble will it be to you? and I am not afraid of ghosts. Be easy on that point. Here's my address: Popincourt Barracks, staircase A, No. 26, at the end of the corridor. You will know me again, won't you? Come even to-night, if it suits you better."
I would have disdained to reply to such an imbecile, if a mad hope had not crossed my mind. In my desperate position there are moments when one fancies that a chain may be broken by a hair.
"Listen," said I to him, acting my part as well as a dying wretch could. "I can indeed render thee richer than the King. I can make thee gain millions, on one condition."
He opened his stupid eyes.
"What, what? I will do anything to please you, Criminal."
"Then instead of three numbers I promise to tell you four. Change coats with me."
"Oh, is that all?" cried he, undoing the first hooks of his uniform cheerfully.
I rose from my chair; I watched all his movements with a beating heart. I already fancied the doors opening before the uniform of a gendarme; and then the prison--the street--the town--left far behind me! But suddenly he turned round with indecision, and asked,--
"I say,--it is not to go out of this?"
I saw that all was lost; nevertheless, I tried one last effort, useless as it was foolish.
"Yes, it is," said I to him; "but as thy fortune will be made--"
He interrupted me.
"Oh, law, no! on account of my numbers! To make them good, you must be dead, you know!"
I sat down again, silent, and more desponding, from all the hope that I had conceived.
I was again a child,--a laughing, healthy schoolboy, playing, running, shouting with my brothers, in the broad green walks of the old garden where my first years were passed.
And then, four years later, behold me there again, still a child, but a passionate dreamer. And there is a young girl in the garden,--a little Spaniard, with large eyes and long hair, her dark polished skin, her rosy lips and cheeks, [422] the Andalusian of fourteen, named Pepa. Our mothers had told us to "go and run together;" we had talked instead. 0nly the year before, we used to play and quarrel and dispute together. I tyrannized over Pepita for the best apple in the orchard; I beat her for a bird's nest. She cried; I scolded her, and we went to complain of each other to our mothers. But now--she was leaning on my arm, and I felt proud and softened. We walked slowly, and we spoke low. I gathered for her some flowers, and our hands trembled on meeting. She spoke to me of the birds, of the sky above us, of the crimson sunset behind the trees; or else of her school-fellows, her gown and ribbons. We talked in innocence, but we both blushed. The child had grown into a young girl. After we had walked for some time, I made her sit down on a bank; she was smiling. I was serious.
"Sit down there," said she, "there is still daylight; let us read something. Have you a book?"
I happened to have a favourite volume with me. I drew near her, and opened it by chance. She leaned her shoulder against mine, and we began to read the same page. Before turning the leaf, she was always obliged to wait for me. My mind was less quick than hers. "Have you finished?" she would ask, when I had only just commenced. 'then our heads leaned together, our hair mixed, our breath gradually mingled, and at last our lips met.
When we again thought of continuing our reading it was starlight. I shall remember that evening all my life!
Oh, heaven! All my life!
And nevertheless, oh,--imperfection of human laws and human nature!-I was not ill-disposed.
Suddenly the enormous bell resounded; its deep vibration shook the air, making the heavy tower rock, and the flooring start from the beams. The noise had nearly upset me. I tottered, ready to fall, and seemed on the point of slipping over the pent-houses. In an agony of terror I lay down on the planks, pressing them closely with both my arms,--speechless, breathless, with this formidable sound in my ears, while beneath my eyes was the precipice, a profound abyss, where so many quiet and envied passengers were walking.
Well, it appears to me as if I were again in that belfry; my senses seem again giddy and dazzled;
the booming of that bell seems to press on my brain, and around me I no longer see that tranquil
and even life which I had quitted (where other men walk still) except from a distance, and beyond
a terrible abyss.
I have convulsive startings, and from time to time my pen falls from my hand as if by a galvanic shock. My eyes ache and burn, and I suffer greatly in all my limbs.
In two hours and three-quarters hence, all will be cured.
[424] "There is, in this same town, at this same hour, and not far from hence, in another Palace, a man who also has guards to all his gates; a man alone, like thee, in the crowd,--with this difference, that he is as high as thou art low. His entire life is glory, grandeur, delight. All around him is love, respect, veneration; the loudest voices become low in speaking to him, and the proudest heads are bent. At this moment he is holding a Council of Ministers, where all coincide with his opinions; or else he thinks of the Chase to-morrow, or the Ball for this evening, feeling certain that the Fête will come, and leaving to others the trouble of his pleasures.
"Well, this man is of flesh and blood like thee! And in order that at this instant the scaffold Should
fall, and thou be restored to life, liberty, fortune, family, it would only be requisite for him to write
his name at the foot of a piece of paper; or even that his carriage should meet thy fatal cart! And
he is good, too, and perhaps would be glad to do it; and yet it will not be done!"
*****
I have speculated upon Death and Eternity until my mind seems bewildered by its own horrible
fantasies. My ideas wander. Oh, for a Priest,--a Priest who could instruct met I must have a Priest,
and a crucifix to embrace. Alas! here is the same Priest again!
The Chaplain was seated at the foot of my bed, reading prayers.
"Have I slept long?" I inquired of him.
"My son," said he, "you have slept an hour. They have brought your child, who is waiting in the next room; I would not allow them to awaken you."
"Oh," cried I, "my darling child! Let them bring in my idolized child!"
Mary looked at me with astonishment. Caressed, embraced, devoured with kisses, she submitted quietly; but, from time to time, cast an uneasy look towards her Nurse, who was crying in the corner.
At length I was able to speak. "Mary," I exclaimed. "My own little Mary!" and I pressed her violently against my breast, which was heaving [425] with sobs. She uttered a little cry, and then said, "Oh, you hurt me, sir."
"Sir!" It is nearly a year since she has seen me, poor child! She has forgotten me, face, words, voice; and then who could know me with this beard, this dress, and this pallor?
What! already effaced from that memory,--the only one where I wished to survive! What! already, no longer a Father, am I condemned to hear no more that word, so soft in the language of children that it cannot remain in the language of men, "Papa?"
And yet to have heard it from that sweet mouth, once more,--only once more,--that is all that I would have asked in payment for the forty years of life they will take from me.
"Listen, Mary," said I to her; joining her two little hands in mine. "Do you not know me?"
She looked at me with her bright beautiful eyes and answered,-"Oh, no, indeed."
"Look at me well," I repeated. "What! dost thou not know who I am?"
"Yes, sir," she answered. "You are a gentleman."
Alas! while loving one being on earth, loving with all your deep affection, having that being before you, who sees and looks at you, speaks and answers you, and yet knows you not! You wish for consolation but from this one being, who is the only one that does not know that you require it because you are going to die
"Mary," I continued, "hast thou a papa?"
"Yes, sir," said the child.
"Well, then, dearest, where is he?"
She raised her large eyes in astonishment:--
''Ah, then you don't know, sir? Papa is dead."
Here she began to cry: I nearly let the little angel fall
"Dead !" I exclaimed: "Mary, knowest thou what it is to be dead?"
"Yes, sir," she answered. "He is in earth and in Heaven;" and she continued of her own accord, "I pray to God for him morning and evening at mamma's knees."
I kissed her on her forehead. "Mary, say to me thy prayer."
"I could not, sir; a prayer you do not say in the middle of the day. Come to-night to my house, and you shall hear me say it."
This was enough. I interrupted her.
"Darling Mary, it is I who am thy papa."
"You!" returned she.
I added, "Wouldst thou like me for thy papa?"
The child turned away. "No, sir; my papa was much prettier."
I covered her with kisses and tears. She tried to escape from my arms, crying,--
"Sir, you hurt me with your beard." Then I replaced her on my knees, devouring her with my eyes, and continued,--
"Mary, canst thou read?"
"Yes," she answered, "I can read very well. Mamma makes me read my letters."
"Well, then, read a little to me," said I, pointing to a printed paper which she held crumpled in one of her dimpled hands.
She shook her pretty head, saying,--
[426] "Oh, dear me! I can only read fables."
"But try, my darling. Come, open your paper."
She unfolded the paper, and began to spell with her finger, "S E N--sen,--TENCE--tence,--Sentence." I snatched it from her hands. It was my own sentence of death she was reading to me!
Her nurse had bought the paper for a penny. To me it had cost more.
No words can convey what I felt; my violence had alarmed the child, who was ready to cry.
Suddenly she said to me,--
"Do give me back my paper; I want to play with it!"
I restored her to her nurse.
"Take her hence!" and I fell back in my chair, gloomy, desolate, in despair! Now they may come: I
care for nothing more; the last fibre of my heart is broken,
It is done. Now I must fortify myself, and think firmly of the Executioner, the cart, the gendarmes, the crowd in the street and the windows.
I have still an hour to familiarize myself with these ideas. All the people will laugh and clap their hands, and applaud; yet among those men, now free, unknown to jailors, and who run with joy to an execution,--in that throng there is more than one man destined to follow me sooner or later, on the scaffold.
More than one who is here to-day on my account, will come hereafter on his own.
At three o'clock they came to tell me it was time. I trembled as if I had thought of any thing else during the last six hours, six weeks, six months. It produced on me the effect of something quite unexpected. They made me cross corridors, and descend stairs, they pushed me through a low door into a sombre room, narrow, arched, and scarcely lighted by a day of rain and fog. A chair was in the centre, on which I seated myself at their desire. Some persons were standing near the door; and beside the Priest and gendarmes, there were three men. The first of these, the tallest and oldest, was stout, with a red countenance. This was HE.
This was the Executioner,--the servant of the Guillotine; the others were his own servants. When I was seated, these walked quietly behind me; then suddenly I felt the cold of steel in my hair, and heard the grating action of scissors. My hair, cut carelessly, fell in heavy locks on my shoulders, and the executioner removed them gently with his coarse hand.
The parties in the room spoke in subdued tones. There was a heavy dull sound from without, which I fancied at first was caused by the river; but a shout of laughter soon proved to me it came from the crowd.
A young man near the window, who was writing with a pencil, in his pocketbook, asked one of the turnkeys, what was the name of the present operation? He was answered "The Toilet of the Condemned." From this I gathered that he was preparing the Report for to-morrow's newspaper. One of the servants then removed my waistcoat, and the other one taking my hands, placed them behind me, and I felt the knots of a cord rolled slowly round my wrists; at the same time the other took off my cravat. My linen,--the only remains of former times,--being of the finest quality, caused him a sort of hesitation for a moment; but at length he began to cut off the collar.
At this dreadful precaution, and the sensation of the steel touching my neck, a tremor passed over me, and a stifled groan escaped; the man's hand trembled.
"Sir," said he, "I beg your pardon; I fear I've hurt you."
The people shouted louder in the street. A tall red-faced man offered a handkerchief, steeped in vinegar, for me to inhale.
"Thank you," said I to him, in the firmest tone I could summon, "it is needless; I am recovered."
Then one man stooped down and fastened a small cord to my ankles, which restricted my steps; and this was again tied to the cord around my wrists; finally, the tall man threw my jacket over my shoulders, and tied the sleeves in front. All was now completed.
Then the Priest drew near with his Crucifix.
"Come, my son," said he.
The man raised me by my arms; and I walked, but my steps were weak and tottering. At this moment the folding doors were thrown open. A furious clamour, a chill breeze, and a strong [428] white light reached me in the shade. From the extreme of the dark chamber I saw through the rain a thousand yelling heads of the expectant mass. On the right of the doorway, a range of mounted gendarmes; in front, a detachment of soldiers; on the left, the back of the cart, with a ladder. A hideous picture, with the appropriate frame of a prison-door.
It was for this dream moment that I had reserved my courage. I advanced a few steps, and appeared on the threshold.
"There he is! there he is!" bellowed the crowd. "He's come out at last!" and the nearest to me clapped their hands. Much as a king might be loved, there could not be more greeting for him.
The tall man first ascended the cart. "Good morning, Mr. Sampson!" cried the children hanging by the lamp-posts. One of his servants next followed. "Bravo, Tuesday! cried out the children, as the two placed themselves on the front seat.
It was now my turn, and I mounted with a firm step.
"He goes well to it!" said a woman beside the gendarmes.
This atrocious commendation gave me courage. The Priest took his seat beside me. They had placed me on the hindmost seat, my back towards the house. I shuddered at that last attention. There is a mixture of humanity in it.
I wished to look around me,--gendarmes before and behind: then crowd! crowd! crowd! A sea of heads in the street. The officer gave the word, and the procession moved on, as if pushed forward by a yell from the populace.
"Hats off! hats off!" cried a thousand voices together, as if for the King. Then I laughed horribly also myself, and said to the Priest, "Their hats-my head."
We passed a street which was full of public-houses, in which the windows were filled with spectators, seeming to enjoy their good places, particularly the women.
There were also people letting out tables, chairs, and carts; and these dealers in human life shouted out, "Who wishes for places?"
A strange rage seized me against these wretches, and I longed to shout out to them, "Do you wish for mine?"
The procession still advanced. At each step the crowd in the rear dispersed; and I saw, with my wandering eyes, that they collected again farther on, to have another view. I know not how it was, that notwithstanding the fog and the small white rain which crossed the air like gossamer, nothing which passed around escaped me; every detail brought its torture; words fail to convey my emotions. My great dread was lest I should faint. Last vanity! Then I endeavoured to confuse myself into being blind and deaf to all, except to the Priest, whose words I scarcely heard amidst the tumult. I took the Crucifix and kissed it.
"Have mercy on me," said I. "O my God!"
And I strove to engross myself with this thought.
But every shake of the cart disturbed me; and then I became excessively chilled, as the rain had penetrated my clothes, and my head was bare.
[429] "Are you trembling with cold, my son?" demanded the Priest.
"Yes," answered I. "Alas! not only from cold."
At the turn to the Bridge, the women expressed pity at my being so young. We approached the fatal Quay. My hearing and sight seemed about to fail me. All those voices, all those heads at the windows, at doors, at shop fronts, on lamp-posts; these thirsting and cruel spectators; this crowd where all knew me, and I knew none; this road paved and welled with human visages,--I was confounded, stupefied, senseless. There is something insupportable in the weight of so many looks being fixed upon one. I could scarcely maintain my place on the seat, and lent no further attention to the Priest. In the tumult which surrounded me, I no longer distinguished exclamations of pity from those of satisfaction, or the sounds of laughter from those of complaint. All formed together a noise in my ears like sounding brass.
My eyes read mechanically the signs over the shops.
Once I felt a painful curiosity to look round on that which we were approaching.
It was the last mental bravado, and the body would not aid it; for my neck remained paralyzed, and I could not turn it.
And the cart went on, on. The shops passed away; the signs succeeded each other,--written, painted, gilt; and the populace laughed while they tramped through the mud; and I yielded my mind, as persons do in sleeping. Suddenly this series of shops ended as we turned into the square; the voice of the mob became still more loud, yelling and joyous; the cart stopped suddenly, and I had nearly fallen on my face. The Priest held me up.
"Courage!" murmured he.
They next brought a ladder to th6 back of my cart. I leaned on the arm of the Priest and descended. I made one step, and turned round to advance another, but I had not the power; beyond the lamp I saw something startling....
Oh, it was THE REALITY!
I stopped as if staggered by a blow.
"I have a last declaration to make," cried I, feebly.
And then they brought me up here. I asked them to let me write my last wishes; and they unbound
my hands; but the cord is here, ready to be replaced.
I intreated him to procure my pardon; I begged it with clasped hands, and dragging myself on my knees at his feet.
He asked, with a fatal smile, if that were all I had to say to him?
"My pardon, my pardon!" I repeated. "Oh, for mercy's sake, five minutes more! Who knows, my pardon may come. It is so horrible at my age to die in this manner. Reprieves have frequently arrived even at the last moment! And to whom would they show mercy, sir, if not to me?"
That detestable Executioner! He came in to tell the Judge that the execution was ordered for a certain hour, [430] which hour was at hand, and that he was answerable for the event.
"Oh, for mercy's sake! Five minutes to wait for my pardon," cried I, "or I will defend myself!"
The Judge and the Executioner went out. I am alone,--at least with only two gendarmes present.
That horrible throng, with its hyena cry! Who knows but that I shall escape from it, that I shall be
saved? If my pardon,--it is impossible but that they will pardon me! Hark! I hear some one coming
upstairs!
See also the Essay, "Capital Punishment."