LETTER 2
FAMILY MEMOIRS. — SOUVENIRS OF THE REVOLUTION. — GENERAL CUSTINE. — HEROISM OF HIS DAUGHTER-IN-LAW. — HIS SON. — TRAGIC PRISON SCENE. — EARLY IMPRESSIONS OF INFANCY.
FRANCE is now represented in Prussia by a minister who unites all the requisites of an enlightened modern diplomat. No mysterious airs, no affected reserve, no unnecessary concealment, betray the opinion that he might entertain of his own importance. One scarcely recollects the post he occupies, until reminded of it by the ability with which its duties are fulfilled. Appreciating with the happiest tact the wants and the tendencies of modern society, he tranquilly proceeds in advance of the future, without, however, disdaining the lessons of the past; in a word, he is one of the small remaining number of those men of former times who are now become so necessary to the present.
Originally from the same province as myself, he has related to me details connected with the history of my family, with which I was unacquainted, and from which I derived much gratification. This I admit without hesitation, for that pious admiration with which we contemplate the heroism of our fathers ought not to be identified with pride.
I knew that there existed in the archives of the French legation at Berlin, letters and diplomatic notes possessing a high interest for the world in general, and for myself in particular: they are my father’s.
In 1792, when but twenty-two years old, he was selected by the ministers of Louis XVI, who had then been constitutional king for about a year, to manage a delicate and important mission to the Duke of Brunswick. The object was to induce the duke to decide in refusing the command of the army allied against France. It was hoped, and with reason, that the crisis of our revolution would prove less dangerous to the country and the king, if foreigners did not attempt violently to interfere with its progress.
My father arrived at Brunswick too late. The duke had given his word. The confidence which the character and ability of young Custine inspired in France, was, however, such, that, instead of being recalled to Paris, he was sent to the Prussian court, to make new efforts to detach King William II from that same coalition whose armies the Duke of Brunswick had promised to command. Shortly before the arrival of my father at Berlin, M. de Ségur, the French ambassador in Prussia, had failed in this difficult negotiation. My father was sent to replace him.
Shortly before the arrival of my father at Berlin, M. de Ségur, the French ambassador in Prussia, had failed in this difficult negotiation. My father was sent to replace him.
Circumstances more powerful than the talents or the will of men, rendered futile the negotiations of my father with the Berlin cabinet; but notwithstanding the failure of his object, he obtained the esteem, and even the friendship, of all those with whom business brought him into contact (not excepting the king and the ministers), which indemnified him, personally, for the ill success of his political mission.
When my father was about to return to his government to give an account of his negotiations, his mother-in-law, then a French refugee at the same court at which he represented France as minister, joined her entreaties to those of his other friends at Berlin, to induce him to change his intentions, forsake the constitutional cause, and remain among the émigrés until a more favorable time for serving his country should arrive. These entreaties, though accompanied with the prediction of the evils that would await him on his return, and though the scenes of the 10th of August, the imprisonment imprisonment of Louis XVI, and the frightful anarchy which reigned throughout France, had terrified all Europe, did not influence my father, or deter him from what he considered his duty to those who had employed him, and to whom he owed an account of his mission. True to the ancient motto of his house—“Fais ce que doys, adviegne que pourra,” [1]—and, in spite of the prayers of his friends, he departed for the country where the scaffold was preparing for him.
He found public affairs there in such disorder, as to induce him to renounce politics and join the army of the Rhine, commanded by his father, General Custine. There he honorably served as volunteer in two campaigns, and when the general who had opened the road of conquest to our arms returned to Paris to die, his son accompanied him, to defend him, and to share his fate. It is the diplomatic correspondence of my father, during the period of his mission at the court of Berlin, that our present Prussian minister has kindly permitted me to peruse.
These letters are admirable models of diplomatic style. The maturity of mental power, the justice, yet determined energy of character, the extent of information, the clearness and precision of thought which they evince, are really extraordinary, when the age of the writer is considered. M. de Noailles, who was at the time French ambassador at Vienna, expressed in letters (also preserved in our archives at Berlin) sentiments the most flattering to the new diplomatist, to whom he predicted a brilliant career. Little did he imagine how short that career would be!!
The death which my father sought and met in Paris under the influence of a sense of duty, was attended with a circumstance, unknown to the public, that in my opinion invests it with a character of sublimity. The circumstance deserves to be told at length; but as my other parent will occupy a conspicuous part in the story, I will first relate another which will give some idea of her character.
It was while with the army, and before his recall to Paris, that General Custine was apprised of the death of the king. His expressions of indignation on this occasion were not moderated even in presence of the commissioners of the convention. These overheard him say, “I serve my country against foreign invasion, but who would fight for those who now govern us?” These words, reported to Robespierre by Thionville, decided the fate of the general.
My mother at that time lived in a retired manner in a village in Normandy. The moment she learnt the return of General Custine to Paris, this noble-minded young woman conceived it to be her duty to quit her asylum, and her child, who was then quite an infant, to repair to the assistance of her father-in-law, with whom her family had been for some years on bad terms, owing to a difference in political opinions.
It was a great trial to her to part with me, for she was a mother in the truest sense of the word; but misfortune always had the first claim upon her heart.
Could General Custine have been saved, it would have been by the devotion and courage of his daughter-in-law. Their first interview was most touching. No sooner did the veteran recognize my mother than he believed himself safe. In fact, her youth, her extreme beauty, her mingled heroism and timidity, so interested the journalists, the people, and even the judges of the revolutionary tribunal, that the men who were determined on the death of the general, felt it necessary first to silence the most eloquent of his advocates, his daughter-in-law.
The government, however, at that time, had not thrown off all appearance of law; yet the men who hesitated to throw my mother into prison did not scruple to attempt her assassination. The Septembriseurs, as these hired ruffians were called, were placed for several days about the precincts of the Palais de Justice; but though my mother was warned of her danger, nothing could deter her from daily attending the trial, and seating herself at the feet of her father-in-law, where her devoted mien softened even the hearts of his murderers.
Between each sitting of the court she employed her time in privately soliciting the members of the committees and of the revolutionary tribunal. A friend of my father’s, in costume à la carmagnole, generally accompanied her, and waited for her in the antiroom.
In one of the last sittings of the tribunal her looks had drawn tears even from the women in the gallery, commonly called “the furies of the guillotine,” and the tricoteuses of Robespierre. This so enraged Fouquier-Tinville, the chief prosecutor, that he sent secret peremptory instructions to the assassins outside.
After the accused was re-conducted to prison, his daughter-in-law prepared to descend the steps of the palace, in order to regain, on foot and alone—for none dared openly to accompany her—the hackney coach, which waited for her in a distant street. My mother, naturally timid in a crowd, stood trembling at the head of this long flight of steps, pressed on all sides by an enraged and bloodthirsty populace. Her eyes involuntarily sought the spot where Madame de Lamballe had been murdered some time before. She felt her presence of mind departing, as from the ferocious mob the cry, “It is the daughter of the traitor, it is La Custine,” mingled with horrid imprecations, reached her ears. How was she to pass through this crowd of infernal, rather than human beings? Already some, with naked swords, had placed themselves before her; others, half clothed, had caused their women to draw back—a certain sign that murder was about to be enacted. My mother felt that the first symptom of weakness she might betray would be the signal for her death: she has often related to me that she bit her hands and tongue so as to bring blood, in her endeavor to preserve a calm countenance at this juncture. At length she observed a fishwife among the foremost of the crowd. This woman, who was revolting in appearance, had an infant in her arms. Moved by the God of mothers, the daughter of the traitor approached this mother (a mother is something more than a woman), and said to her, “What a sweet babe you have in your arms!” “Take it,” replied the parent, who understood her by one word and glance; “you can return it to me at the foot of the steps.”
The electricity of maternal feeling had thrilled through these two hearts. It communicated itself also to the crowd. My mother took the child, pressed it to her bosom, and held it as an aegis in her arms.
Man, as the child of nature, resumed his superiority over man brutalized under the influence of social evils. The “civilized” barbarians were vanquished by two mothers. She, who was mine, descended, thus rescued, into the court of the Palais de Justice, unsaluted by even an abusive word. She returned the infant to her who had lent it: they parted without interchanging a syllable: the place was not favorable to thanks or explanations, and they never saw each other afterwards; but assuredly the souls of these mothers will meet in another world.
The young woman thus miraculously saved, could not save her father-in-law. He died, and to crown the glory of his life, the veteran soldier had the courage to die a Christian. A letter to his son attests this humble sacrifice, the most difficult of all, in an age of practical crimes and philosophical virtues. In proceeding to the scaffold he embraced the crucifix. This religious courage ennobled his death, as much as his military courage ennobled his life; but it gave great offense to the Brutuses of Paris.
During the trial of General Custine, my father had published a sober but manly defense of the former’s political and military conduct. This defense, which had been placarded on the walls of Paris, only served to bring upon the author the hatred of Robespierre. He was imprisoned soon after the death of his father. At this period the Reign of Terror was making rapid progress: to suffer arrest was to receive sentence; the process of trial had become a mere form.
My mother had obtained permission to see her husband daily. Ascertaining that his death was determined, she put in requisition every means that might enable him to escape. By aid of large bribes and larger promises, she won over even the daughter of the jailer to second her design.
My father was not tall. He was slightly and elegantly made. It was arranged therefore that he should put on the clothes of his wife in the prison, that she should dress herself in those of the jailer’s daughter, and while the latter was to reach the street by another stair, the prisoner and his wife were to pass out together by the ordinary passage, which the two women had been, purposely, in the habit of doing very frequently.
Everything was duly arranged, and a day fixed, for the execution of this plan. On that day my mother, full of hope that it was her last visit, repaired to the prison, though only on the previous evening the convention had published a decree against all who should aid or connive at the escape of a political prisoner.
This monstrous law was purposely placed before the eyes of the prisoners. My mother, on arriving at the appointed hour, found Louise, the young woman whose goodwill as well as interested services services she had enlisted, in tears, on the prison stairs. Upon inquiring the cause, she learnt, to her in-expressible surprise, that it was owing to her husband having peremptorily refused to entertain any further the projected plan of escape. My mother, fearing they had been betrayed, turned, without reply, to gain her husband’s apartment. Louise followed her, and apprised her, in a low voice, that he had read the law. She immediately guessed the rest. She knew his inflexible character, and his high and delicate sense of honor: despair almost deprived her of all physical power. “Come with me,” she said to Louise, “you will have more influence with him than I; for it is in order to avoid exposing your life that he is about to sacrifice his own.”
They both entered together, and a scene commenced which may be better imagined than described. Never but on one single occasion did my mother summon sufficient fortitude to describe it to me. Suffice to say, that nothing could shake the stoical resolution of the young prisoner: the two women on their knees, the weeping wife, the agonized mother reminding him that his child would be an orphan, the stranger urging the utmost willingness to risk her life in his service, —all was unavailing. The sentiments of honor and of duty were stronger in the soul of this man than love of life, than love for a tender and exquisitely beautiful woman, than the impulses of paternal affection. The time accorded to my mother for her visit was passed in useless remonstrances. She had, at length, to be carried out of the chamber. Louise conducted her into the street, where our friend M. Guy de Chaumont-Quitry awaited her with an anxiety that may be easily imagined.
“All is lost,” said my mother; “he will not save himself.”
“I was sure he would not,” replied M. de Chaumont-Quitry.
This answer, worthy of the friend of such a man, appears to me almost as sublime as the conduct to which it referred.
And of all this the world has hitherto known nothing. Supernatural virtue passed unobserved in a time when the sons of France were as lavish of their heroism as they had been of their genius fifty years before.
My mother saw her husband but once more after this scene. By means of money she procured permission to bid him the last adieu, when condemned, and in the conciergerie.
This solemn interview was disturbed by so singular a circumstance, that I have felt some hesitation before concluding to recount it. It will appear like an invention of the tragicomic genius of Shakespeare, but it is strictly true. In all scenes and circumstances, reality is more strange than fiction.
My mother, Delphine de Sabran, was one of the most lovely women of those times. The devotion she displayed to her father-in-law, assures to her a glorious place in the annals of a revolution in which the heroism of the women has often atoned for the ferocity and fanaticism of the men.
She met my father for the last time, with composure, embraced him in silence, and sat with him for three hours. During this time not a word of reproach was spoken. The, perhaps, too elevated sentiment which had cost him his life was forgiven; not a regret was breathed outwardly: it was felt that the unhappy victim had need of all his powers to prepare for the sacrifice. But few words passed between the condemned man and his wife. At length my name was pronounced; this was too much—my father entreated pardon— and my mother did not name me again.
In these heroic times death became an exhibition in which the victims felt their honor staked not to betray fear before their executioners. My poor mother respected in her husband, so young, so handsome, so full of mind, and formerly so happy, the necessity he felt for preserving all his courage for the trial of the morrow. The last proof that can be given of an elevated character appeared then a primary duty, even in the eyes of a naturally timid woman: so true it is that the sublime is always within the reach of characters that are sincere! No woman could be more sincere than my mother; and no person could display more energy in trying circumstances. Midnight was drawing nigh, and fearing that her fortitude would support her no longer, she rose to retire.
Their interview had taken place in a room which served as a hall of entrance to several apartments of the prison: it was spacious, and lighted by a single candle. Suddenly, one of the doors, hitherto unnoticed, opened. A man with a dark lantern in his hand, and grotesquely clad, issued from it. He was a prisoner proceeding to visit another in a different apartment. His costume was ludicrous in the extreme, and his visage was highly rouged. This ridiculous apparition appeared before the two young people in the moment of their darkest despair. Without thinking that the object of the rouge was—not to beautify a withered face but, probably, to prevent a man of proud spirit from appearing pale before the scaffold of the morrow—they involuntarily burst into a loud and frightful fit of laughter: a nervous electricity triumphed for one moment over the bitterest anguish of the soul. The effort they had so long made to conceal from each other their feelings, had irritated the fibers of the brain: they were thus suddenly overcome by a sense of the ridiculous, the only emotion doubtless for which they were unprepared; and in spite of their efforts, or rather in consequence of their efforts to remain calm, their laughter became inordinate, and speedily degenerated into frightful spasms. The guards, whose revolutionary experience had enlightened them on the nature of this phenomenon, had pity on my mother. The unhappy wife was carried away in convulsions: such was the last interview of this young couple, and such were the stories that nursed my infancy. My mother had commanded these subjects never to be named to me, but the common people love to recount the catastrophes they have survived. The servants scarcely spoke to me of anything but the misfortunes of my parents; and never shall I forget the consequent impression of terror which I experienced in my earliest intercourse with the world.
My first sentiment was that of a fear of life, a sentiment which must be more or less participated in by all, for all have their measure of woes to fill up. It was doubtless this sentiment which taught me to comprehend the Christian religion, before even I had been instructed in it. I felt from my infancy that my lot had been cast in a place of exile.
To return to my father:—after he had regained his composure, he occupied himself with preparing for the stern trial that impended, and towards morning wrote to his wife a letter admirable for the fortitude which it displays. It has been preserved in the memoirs of the times, together with that of my grandfather’s to this same son; whose death is to be attributed, first, to a sense of duty, which would not permit him to remain a refugee at the court of Berlin; secondly, to the part he took in the defense of his parent; and, thirdly, to his refusal to save himself at the risk of the life of a young and unknown female.
If his enemies could not speak of his memory without respect, what must have been the sentiments of his friends!
M. Girard, his old tutor, preserved for him the tenderest affection. On being suddenly apprised of his fate, he was seized with an apoplectic fit, and died almost immediately.
My father had a simplicity of manners and a modesty which disarmed envy, at a time when it reigned without control, and which account for the admiration his merits inspired.
He must doubtless have thought more than once during his last night, of the predictions of his friends at Berlin; but I do not believe that he even then repented of the part he had taken. He was one of those with whom life, however bright its hopes, appears little compared with the testimony of a pure conscience. That land is not to be despaired of which produces men in whose hearts the sense of duty is stronger than the sentiments of affection. [1]Do thy duty, let come what will.
