AT the moment when the queen appeared with the king and their son on the stage of the theatre, an immense acclamation, as sudden and as loud as the explosion of a mine, was heard from the banqueting table and boxes. The inebriated soldiers, the officers delirious with wine and enthusiasm, waving their hats and sabres above their heads, shouted, “Long live the king I long live the queen! long live the dauphin!”
The bands immediately played, “Oh, Richard! oh, my king!”
The allusion of this air had become so apparent, it so well expressed the thoughts of all present, it so faithfully translated the meaning of this banquet, that all, as soon as the air began, immediately sang the words.
The queen, in her enthusiasm, forgot that she was in the midst of inebriated men; and the king, though surprised, felt, with his accustomed sound sense, that it was no place for him, and that it was going beyond his conscientious feelings; but weak, and flattered at once more finding a popularity and zeal which he was no longer habituated to meet from his people, he, by degrees, allowed himself to be carried away by the general hilarity.
De Charny, who during the whole festival had drunk nothing but water, followed the king and queen. He had hoped that all would have terminated without their being present, and then it would have been but of slight importance; they might have disavowed, have denied everything; but he turned pale at the thought that the presence of the king and queen would become an historical fact.
But his terror was increased greatly when he saw his brother George approach the queen, and encouraged by her smile, address some words to her.
Charny was not near enough to hear the words, but by his brother's gestures he could comprehend that he was making some request.
To this request the queen made a sign of assent, and suddenly taking from her cap the cockade she wore upon it, gave it to the young man.
De Charny shuddered, stretched forth his arms, and uttered a cry.
It was not even the white cockade—the French cockade—which the queen presented to her imprudent knight; it was the black cockade,—the Austrian cockade; the cockade which was so hateful to French eyes.
What the queen then did was no longer a mere imprudence; it was an act of absolute treason.
And yet all these poor fanatics, whom God had doomed to ruin, were so insensate that when George de Charny presented to them this black cockade, those who wore the white cockade threw it from them; those who had the tricolored one trampled it beneath their feet.
And then the excitement became so great that unless they had wished to be stifled with their kisses, or to trample under foot those who threw themselves on their knees before them, the august hosts of the Flanders regiment felt obliged to retreat towards their apartments.
All this might have been considered as a sample of French folly, which the French are always ready enough to pardon, if these orgies had not gone beyond the point of enthusiasm; but they soon went much farther.
Good royalists, when eulogizing the king, must necessarily somewhat ill-treat the nation.
That nation, in whose name so much vexation had been offered to the king that the bands had undoubtedly the right to play:—
“Pent on affliger ce qu'on aime?”
“Can we afflict those whom we love?”
It was while this air was being played that the king, the queen, and the dauphin withdrew.
They had scarcely left the theatre when, exciting each other, the boon companions metamorphosed the banqueting-room into a town taken by assault.
Upon a signal given by Monsieur de Perseval, aide-de-camp to the Count d'Estaing, the trumpets sounded a charge.
A charge, and against whom Against the absent enemy.
A charge! music so enchanting to French ears that it had the effect of transforming the stage of the Opera-House at Versailles into a battle-field, and the lovely ladies who were gazing from the boxes at the brilliant spectacle were the enemy.
The cry “To the assault!” was uttered by a hundred voices, and the escalade of the boxes immediately commenced. It is true that the besiegers were in a humor which inspired so little terror that the besieged held out their hands to them.
The first who reached the balcony was a grenadier in the Flanders regiment. Monsieur de Perseval tore a cross from his own breast and decorated the grenadier with it.
It is true that it was a Limbourg cross,—one of those crosses which are scarcely considered crosses.
And all this was done under the Austrian colors, with oud vociferations against the national cockade.
Here and there some hollow and sinister sounds were uttered.
But, drowned by the howling of the singers, by the hurrahs of the besiegers, by the inspiring sounds of the trumpets, these noises were borne with threatening import to the ears of the people, who were, in the first place, astonished, and then became indignant.
It was soon known outside the palace, in the square, and afterwards in the streets, that the black cockade had been substituted for the white one, and that the tricolored cockade had been trampled under foot. It was also known that a brave officer of the National Guard, who had, in spite of threats, retained his tricolored cockade, had been seriously wounded even in the king's apartments.
Then it was vaguely rumored that one officer alone had remained motionless, sorrowful, and standing at the entrance of that immense banqueting-room converted into a circus, wherein all these madmen had been playing their insensate pranks, and had looked on, listened to, and had shown himself, loyal and intrepid soldier as he was, submissive to the all-powerful will of the majority, taking upon himself the faults of others, accepting the responsibility of all the excesses committed by the army, represented on that fatal day by the officers of the Flanders regiment; but the name of this man, wise and alone amid so many madmen, was not even pronounced; and had it been, it would never have been believed that the Count de Charny, the queen's favorite, was the man, who, although ready to die for her, had suffered more painfully than any other from the errors she had committed.
As to the queen, she had returned to her own apartments, completely giddy from the magic of the scene.
She was soon assailed by a throng of courtiers and flatterers.
“See,” said they to her, “what is the real feeling of your troops; judge from this whether the popular fury or anarchical ideas, which has been so much spoken of, would withstand the ferocious ardor of French soldiers for monarchical ideas.” And as all these words corresponded with the secret desires of the queen, she allowed herself to be led away by these chimeras, not perceiving that De Charny had remained at a distance from her.
By degrees, however, the noises ceased; the slumber f the mind extinguished all the ignes-fatui, the phantasmagoria of intoxication. The king, besides, paid a visit to the queen at the moment she was about to retire, and let fall these words, replete with profound wisdom:—
The imprudent man! by this saying, which to any other person but the one to whom it was addressed would have been a warning and sage counsel, he had revivified in the queen's mind feelings of provocation and resistance which had almost subsided.
“In fact,” murmured she, when the king had left her, this flame, which was confined to the palace this evening, will spread itself in Versailles during the night, and to-morrow will produce a general conflagration throughout France. All these soldiers, all these officers, who have this evening given me such fervent pledges of their devotedness, will be called traitors, rebels to the nation, murderers of their country. They will call the chiefs of these aristocrats the subalterns of the stipendiaries of Pitt and Coburg, of the satellites of power, of the barbarians, the savages of the North.
“Each of these heads which has worn the black cockade will be doomed to be fixed to the lamp-post on the Place de Grève.
“Each of those breasts from which so loyally escaped those shouts of 'Long live the queen!' will, on the first popular commotion, be pierced with ignoble knives and infamous pikes.
“And it is I, again—I, always I, who have been the cause of all this! I shall have condemned to death all these brave and faithful servants,—I, the inviolable sovereign. They are hypocritically left unassailed when near me, but when away from me will be insulted from hatred.
“Oh, no, rather than be ungrateful to such a degree as that, towards my only, my last friends,—rather than be so cowardly and so heartless, I will take the fault upon myself. It is for me that all this has been done; upon me let all their anger fall. We shall then see how far their anger will be carried; we shall see up to which step of my throne the impure tide will dare to ascend.”
And to the queen, animated by these thoughts, which drove sleep from her pillow, and on which she meditated during the greater part of the night, the result of the events of the next day was no longer doubtful.
The next day came, clouded over with gloomy regrets, and ushered in by threatening murmurs.
On that day the National Guards, to whom the queen had presented their colors, came to the palace with heads cast down and averted eyes, to thank her Majesty.
It was easy to divine from the attitude of these men that they did not approve what had occurred, but on the contrary, that they would have loudly disapproved it had they dared.
They had formed part of the procession, and had gone out to form part of the Flanders regiment; they had received invitations to the banquet, and had accepted them. Only, being more citizens than soldiers, it was they who during the debauch had uttered those disapproving words which had not been heeded.
These words on the following day had become a reproach, a blame.
When they came to the palace to thank the queen, they were escorted by a great crowd.
And taking into consideration the serious nature of the circumstances, the ceremony became an imposing one.
The parties on both sides were about to discover with whom they would have to deal.
On their side, all those soldiers and officers who had so compromised themselves the evening before, were anxious to ascertain how far they would be supported by the queen in their imprudent demonstrations, and had placed themselves before that people whom they had scandalized and insulted, that they might hear the first official words which should be uttered from the palace.
The weight of the whole counter-revolution was then hanging suspended over the head of the queen.
It was, however, still within her power to withdraw from this responsibility.
But she, proud as the proudest of her race, with great firmness cast her clear and penetrating gaze on all around her, whether friends or enemies, and addressing herself in a sonorous voice to the officers of the National Guards:—
“Gentlemen,” said she, “I am much pleased at having presented you with your colors. The nation and the army ought to love the king as we love the nation and the army. I was delighted with the events of yesterday.”
Upon these words, which she emphasized in her firmest tone of voice; a murmur arose from the crowd, and loud applause re-echoed from the military ranks:
“We are supported,” said the latter.
“We are betrayed,” said the former.
Thus, poor queen, that fatal evening of the 1st of October was not an accidental matter; thus, unfortunate woman, you do not regret the occurrences of yesterday; you do not repent. And so far from repenting, you are delighted with them.
De Charny, who was in the centre of a group, heard with a sigh of extreme pain this justification,—nay, more: than that, this glorification of the orgies of the king's guards.
The queen, on turning away her eyes from the crowd, met those of the count; and she fixed her looks on the countenance of her lover in order to ascertain the impression her words had produced upon him.
“Am I not courageous?” was the import of this look.
“Alas, Madame, you are far more mad than courageous,” replied the gloomy countenance of the count.
