1Marie Antoinette in her last prison, however, was not without pitying friends. The fierce communists ordered that she should drink the water of the Seine, drawn as it flowed past her prison-walls; but an honest couple, named Bault, obtained the posts of chief gaolers at the Conciergerie, in the full aim of assuaging the Queen’s wretchedness. Instead of Seine water, the poor prisoner found daily in her cell refreshing draughts of water drawn from that well at Versailles which was the Queen’s chief cellar. She was a great water drinker.

2Madame Bault, to affect harshness, never entered the Princess’s cell, asserting that to do so was to be contaminated. The royal tradespeople of former days—especially the fruit-women—brought little offerings secretly; and so it came about that the Queen, in her last prison and days, ate such pure, simple meals as those which had been her favorite food in the old days—a piece of melon, a handful of figs, a little bread and a glass of water from her favorite well.

3The two gowns which the Queen possessed—one white, the other black,—and which she wore alternately, soon fell to pieces in the damp prison. Her underclothing was always damp when put on, and often her shoes would be completely wet; for between her and the river there was only the part protection of a wall.

4Human nature demands some work. Not allowed writing or sewing materials (Bault’s daughter mended the Queen’s tatters, and gave away the little fragments which she cut away in the process as relics of the poor lady), with a pin she scratched her thoughts upon the driest portion of the walls of her prison. After her death many of these sentences were copied by one of the commissioners. They were mostly German and Italian verses bearing reference to her fate, and little Latin verses from the Psalms. No French did she use, for she had been brought into the land where that language was spoken to be cast into prison, and to suffer death. The drier walls were covered with these mute appeals.

5Some idea may be gained of the cruelty exercised towards the desolate prisoner, when she, asking for a lighter coverlet, and Bault forwarding the request to a high authority, the latter received this reply:—

6“Take care! Another sign of sympathy such as that, and you will visit the guillotine before she does!”

7Another shape of industry did the poor Queen find. She wished to leave her daughter a memento of her last days, and she had nothing to give; so she converted a couple of bone toothpicks into knitting needles, pulled some worsted shreds from the heavy old coverlet which they refused to replace with a lighter, and knitted a—garter. This she, dropped near the friendly Bault, who, with the heart of a father, understanding the poor little bit of workmanship, let fall his handkerchief, and so possessed himself of the little treasure. After her death the tribute reached the young Princess for whom it was worked—truly a message from the grave.

8A few days before her trial, an order, possessed by something of mercy, arrived, by force of which she was relieved from the continuous stare of the guard set to watch her. By this relief, she was enabled to kneel, from which act she had been warned throughout her confinement.

9On October 13th, Fouquier-Tinville notified to Marie Antoinette the fact of her having been indicted for high treason.

10She listened to the reading of the indictment as though to a death-warrant—the shape, in fact, it really took.

11As a matter of form, she chose two counsel for her defence—men who had secretly sought the appointment, and who, afterwards, of course, paid for their pity with their lives.

12On the 14th, at noon, she made as elegant a toilette as she could—hid the rags and the patchiness of her white hair as much as possible, and went up the stone stairs of her dungeon to the judgment-hall above her prison. The passages were full of people, who reviled her as she passed along. She bore her head well up, but she could not change the fallen mouth, the pinched nose, tarnished eyes, and shrunken, weakened body. But the black circles round those eyes artificially increased their failing brilliancy, and they fired glances of scorn and fearlessness at her gibing enemies. She had never possessed the humble, religious feeling and sweet patience which distinguished Louis. A perfectly pure woman, at heart, she was somewhat of a Voltairean; she despised death, and feared no power. We are as we are made; so, in her final trial, she met the scowls of the people, chiefly of women, face to face. Some authorities say that one girl uttered a cry of pity as the Queen passed—she was strangled. These unsexed wretches had undertaken to accompany the Queen to the scaffold with every possible indignity.

13And she stands before her—judges.

14“What is your name?”

15“I am called Marie Antoinette, of Lorraine, in Austria,” she replies, in a low, musical voice.

16“Your condition?”

17“Widow of Louis, formerly King of the French.”

18“Your age?”

19“Thirty-seven.”

20Louquier-Tinville now read the indictment. It was the summing up of all her declared crimes of high birth, condition, and rank. She was quite guilty of all these things. The chief accusations were merely echoes of all that had been whispered of her in the foulest places. She was accused of prodigality, licentiousness, and treason to France.

21She showed no sign of emotion, beyond an unheeded movement of the fingers over the bar of a chair, as though they were recalling some half-forgotten music.

22She answered all questions quite patiently, showed sorrow only when reference was made to the Princess de Lamballe, and only lost her quietude when one Hébert was called. It is to be hoped this man was mad. At all events, he spoke to the Queen’s acts while in the Temple; declared that she was depraved and debauched, and that she had even corrupted her own son, “that she might poison his body and his soul, and so reign in his name over the ruin of his understanding.”

23This man was mad—there can be no doubt upon the point: he even included saintly Madame Elizabeth in this frantic idiotic accusation.

24Heaven be thanked, those present turned upon him, and cried “Shame!” The Queen herself shrank, raising her hand as though to guard her from the wretch.

25But one juryman was nearly as bad as Hébert.

26“Why does not the accused answer?” this foul wretch asked.

27“I do not answer,” she said—and once again, it is said, she looked radiantly beautiful in her momentary indignation—“because these are accusations to which nature refuses a reply.”

28She turned to the women, with whom the court was crowded.

29“I appeal from him to all mothers present.”

30To the honor of these women be it said, they cried Hébert down—and so he passes out of this history.

31The Queen met questions having reference to the King with equal calmness. It being alleged that she endeavored to obtain ascendancy over him through his mental weakness, she replied, “I never knew that character of him. I was but his wife, and it was my duty and my pleasure to yield to his will.”

32By not one word, tending to save herself, did she injure the memory of her husband.

33One line in the trial is enough to show what a mockery it was.

34The Public Prosecutor cried, “All France bears witness against this woman!”

35For form’s sake, the jury deliberated an hour. She was recalled to hear her sentence, but the cheering and screaming of the people told her its terrors before the judge spoke—death!

36Nine months since the King died, and now there was an end to her weary waiting.

37Asked if she had anything to say why the sentence of death should not be carried out, she respected herself in her very silence, and turned away, as though quite prepared for execution.

38It was now five in the morning, and her last day was come. At half-past five she was permitted to write a letter to the King’s sister, Madame Elizabeth. This lady never saw it. The document was found long afterwards amongst the papers of one Couthon.

39“I write to you, my sister,” she begins, “for the last time. I have been condemned, not to an ignominious death—that only awaits criminals—but to go and rejoin your brother. Innocent as he, I hope to show such firmness as the King’s in his last moments. I grieve bitterly at leaving my poor children. You know that I lived but for them and you—you who, in your love, have sacrificed all for us. I learnt, at my trial, that you are separated from my little girl. In what a position I leave you! I dare not write to her; they would not give her my letter, and, indeed, I do not know that you will receive this.”

40Some words of this final letter are inexpressibly touching. “Let my son never forget his father’s last words. Let him never seek to avenge our deaths!”

41She then goes on to apologize for the child’s possible conduct to her, after the influence over him necessarily obtained by Simon, his tutor, and meekly she urges that he is so young he is incapable of knowing what he does.

42“Think of me always,” she says, in conclusion. “Good heaven, and my children! How heart-rending it is to leave them for ever—for ever!”

43This letter being finished, she kissed each page lovingly, and folded it.

44So far, the Republic had not entirely declared against high heaven, and priests were still recognised by those who had subscribed to the articles of the Revolution, and one of these men was offered to Marie Antoinette to aid her in her last moments. She refused to see him. The Convention (still sitting) insisted upon one of these officials accompanying her to the scaffold. There was no devotion amongst them. All hesitated, for all feared that the Queen would be torn to pieces on her way to the scaffold.

45One proffered his help.

46“Thank you,” said the Queen; “I have no need of your services, though I am a great sinner. But I am about to receive a great sacrament.”

47“Martyrdom,” said the priest, in a low voice; and he bowed and retired.

48She prayed alone.

49However, she had been secretly informed that at a certain house on her way to execution a minister would be stationed, who would give her absolution as she passed in the cart.

50She dressed herself in the white gown, put a white cap on, bound with a black ribbon—and so came before the people.

51Then she drew back—her queendom still remained. She had not thought the people so fallen that she should be taken to the scaffold in the common cart. The King had been taken to death at least in such a vehicle as he had been accustomed to.

52Alas! When Louis died all pity had expired; with her death, all France was to gasp with thirst for blood.

53She mounted the cart—her hands having been bound behind her, and in the midst of a raging crowd. The cart swayed, and she could scarcely keep her seat on the plank.

54She grew red and pale by turns, as she was dragged through the mob. The patience and pity exhibited by the King she could not imitate. Her lips were bitter each moment; but she never took her dry, hot eyes from the raging people.

55Suddenly, her head falls humbly, and, her hands being tied, she makes the sign of the cross by three motions of the head.

56Her pride had passed with that unseen blessing from the house on her way to execution. When the Palace of the Tuileries came in view—the place where she had spent nearly half her life—tears fell down her face.

57A few turns of the wheels, and she was at the foot of the scaffold.

58Reaching the place, accidentally she trod upon one of the executioners’ feet.

59“Pardon me,” she said, in a sweet, courtly voice.

60She knelt for an instant, rose, stretched her neck towards the distant towers of the Temple, and cried, “Good-bye, my children! I am going to your father.”

61She did not, like her husband, speed to Heaven. It was rather that she fled from earth.

62The executioner was trembling more than his victim, so that she suffered a long agony of a few moments after she was upon the plank.

63The assistant executioner took his brother’s place.

64The head fell. It was taken up and carried around the scaffold.

65“Long live the Republic!” saluted this brave display.

66The Revolution thought itself avenged—it was befouled.

67She came a foreigner—and they killed her.

68Thus she died. Frivolous in prosperity, she died with intrepidity. Her misfortune was her mistrust of the people in her early days—her catastrophe, that all the sin and wickedness of the Court was laid to her account.

69Called upon to fill a throne, those who called her gave her not even a tomb—for you may read in a parish register, “For the coffin of the Widow Capet, six shillings!”

70With her life, France threw away all Christian mercy. Crimson swept over the breadth and length of the land.