1One naturally asks how I became acquainted with all this.

2I have already said that, on leaving Varennes, I had taken a place on the back of the carriage of the King. Happily, I had managed to retain my position, despite the heat, the fatigue, and the dust. Twice only, for a few minutes, had I quitted my location; firstly, to try and assist M. de Dampierre, and, secondly, to procure the water for Madame Elizabeth and the Dauphin. Both times, on my return, I recovered my place. The glass windows of the berlin were let down on account of the heat, and the royal family, not speaking in very low voices, I managed to hear pretty well all that was said.

3This explanation given, I will continue my story, with the history of the rudeness of Pétion, and the courtesy of Barnave.

4There was placed between Madame Elizabeth and Madame Royale, a bottle of lemonade and a glass. Pétion was thirsty, and felt inclined to drink. He took the glass, and handed it to Madame Elizabeth, who took up the lemonade, and filled it.

5“Enough!” said Pétion, lifting his glass as he would have done at a cabaret.

6The Queen’s eyes flashed with anger.

7The Dauphin, with the impatience of a youngster, shifted in his seat; Pétion seized him, and imprisoned him between his legs.

8The Queen said nothing, but again darted a look of menace at Pétion; who, remembering that it might be politic to gain the favor of the King, caressed the Dauphin’s white locks with apparent affection.

9The Dauphin made a grimace expressive of grief.

10The Queen snatched him from Pétion’s legs.

11Barnave, smiling, immediately opened his arms to him.

12The boy seemed willing, and was, therefore, soon installed on Barnave’s knees.

13His instinct shewed him that he would find in Barnave a protector.

14Playing with a button on the coat of the representative, he discovered that a device was inscribed upon it, and, after many efforts, succeeded in reading it.

15The device was, “Live free, or die.”

16The Queen sighed, and regarded Barnave, her eyes filled with tears.

17Barnave’s heart smote him.

18This was his position. He followed his own individual romance in the midst of a royal and terrible history, when suddenly a noise was heard some paces behind the royal carriage.

19The cries and tumult drew Barnave from the magic circle which surrounded him.

20A venerable ecclesiastic approached the carriage, much in the same manner as M. de Dampierre had done, and uplifted his hands and blessed the royal martyr.

21The mob, unsatiated by one murder, rushed upon the priest, and drew him away, to slaughter him in the ditch by the roadside.

22I was on the opposite side of the carriage to where this affair was taking place.

23“M. Barnave, M. Barnave!” cried I; “help, help!”

24At the same moment, M. Barnave, putting his head out of the window, saw what was taking place.

25He placed the Dauphin in the arms of his aunt, and opened the carriage door with such violence and rapidity, that he almost fell out; in fact, he would have fallen, had not Madame Elizabeth caught and retained him by his coat-tails.

26“Oh, Frenchmen!” cried he; “ye are a nation of brave men—would ye become a horde of assassins?”

27At this eloquent appeal, the people let go the priest, who escaped, protected by the outspread arms and eloquent gestures of Barnave.

28The door was again shut, Barnave retook his place, and the Queen said to him, “I thank you, M. Barnave.”

29He bowed his head.

30Before the arrival of the commissaires, the King had eaten alone with his family; but now, after consulting the Queen, he invited them to share his repast.

31Pétion accepted the invitation; Latour-Maubourg and Barnave declined.

32Barnave insisted, however, on waiting on the royal family; but the Queen made him a sign, and he yielded.

33I was one of the guard at the door of the dining-room.

34In the evening, MM. Drouet and Guillaume set out at full speed, to inform the Assembly of what had taken place.

35Drouet came to bid me good-bye.

36“M. Drouet,” said I to him, “you know me, as I am your pupil. I take the greatest interest in that which is going on. It will be something to talk about for the rest of my life. Give the order, before you leave, to have me always placed close to their Majesties. The fatigue will be nothing, and I wish to see all that goes on.”

37“Be it as you wish,” said he, without making the least objection.

38That was the reason why I had been appointed one of the guards that day at the door of the dining-room.

39This is what happened at Dormans.

40After dinner, the three commissaires went into the neighboring room—that is to say, the one at which I mounted guard.

41“Citizens,” said Barnave to them, “we are commissaires of the National Assembly, and not the executioners of the royal family; and to make them proceed under this burning sun is simply to conduct them to the scaffold.”

42“Good!” said Pétion. “What has happened to them has been brought on by their own follies.”

43“Still they are no less King and Queen,” replied M. de Latour-Maubourg.

44“If affairs keep progressing as they do now, it is extremely probable that they will not long even have that title to console them.”

45“Quite right,” said Barnave. “But still I think that, as long as they retain the titles of King and Queen, they ought to be treated as such.”

46“I have no objection,” said Pétion, in an indifferent tone. “Do as you like, most loyal gentlemen.”

47Saying these words, he left the room.

48Barnave and M. de Latour-Maubourg, being alone, decided that the royal carriage should be accompanied only by a cavalry escort, so that it might proceed at a trot, and on the third evening arrive at Meaux.

49At that moment, they relieved guard. I ran to the postmaster at Dormans, who was a friend of M. Drouet’s, and with whom we had lodged on our way to the federation, and prayed him to lend me a horse, to go as far as Meaux, where the royal family would halt, to pass the night in repose.

50In these critical times, paternal feeling elevated itself. The postmaster had seen M. Drouet the evening before, who had announced to him my arrival to-day. He would not let me hire the steed—he gave it to me.

51They arrived at Meaux about six in the evening.

52The King again invited the commissaires to sup with him, as he had before invited them to dine. Pétion accepted the invitation; M. de Latour-Maubourg and Barnave refused it.

53But the Queen, with charming grace, turning towards Barnave, said, “Pray accept it, M. Barnave, as, after the meal, I shall have need of you.”

54Barnave bowed, the King signed to M. de Latour-Maubourg and the two took their places at the royal table.

55They were located in the palace of the Bishop of Meaux, a melancholy-looking place enough, with its dark oak staircase and mysterious and dusty passages.

56I was on guard at the garden gate.

57After dinner, the Queen, who, as she had said to Barnave, had need of him, took his arm, and mounted the staircase to the apartments above, under pretext of seeing a chamber once occupied by Bossuet.

58As for the King, he descended into the gardens with Pétion. Pétion it was who desired the tête-à-tête.

59Pétion, who, apart from his folly, was a good man, and had a good heart, had formed an idea of escape for the King. It was, to allow the three body-guards to go, so that they might disguise themselves as National Guards, and so facilitate their entrance into Paris.

60But, extraordinary to relate, the King could not understand this idea of Pétion’s; and not wishing to be under an obligation to Pétion, and having the absurd suspicion that he wished to assassinate the guards, he refused.

61And yet, on the day when he could have caused Lafayette to be proclaimed Mayor of Paris, he nominated Pétion.

62It was because the Queen hated Lafayette more than the King detested Pétion.

63As for the Queen, no one knows what passed between her and Barnave, except through the account which she afterwards gave to Madame Campan.

64The impression which the young representative produced on the Queen may be summed up in those words.

65“If ever power returns into our hands, the pardon of Barnave is assured in our hearts.”

66The Queen was ready to pardon Barnave for his rebellion; France did not pardon him for his weakness.

67The unhappy orator paid with his head for the few moments of happiness he spent with this second Marie Stuart.

68Perchance he had the same honor as Mirabeau, of kissing her hand.