alike insensible of pity, alike bent on havoc. But, while they murdered, one of them frowned and canted, the other grinned and joked. For our own part, we prefer Jean qui pleure to Jean qui rit.

In the midst of the funereal gloom which overhung Paris, a gaiety stranger and more ghastly than the horrors of the prison and the scaffold distinguished the dwelling of Barère. Every morning a crowd of suitors assembled to implore his protection. He came forth in his rich dressing-gown, went round the antechamber, dispersed smiles and promises among the obsequious crowd, addressed himself with peculiar animation to every handsome woman who appeared in the circle, and complimented her in the florid style of Gascony on the bloom of her cheeks and the lustre of her eyes. When he had enjoyed the fear and anxiety of his suppliants, he dismissed them, and flung all their memorials unread into the fire. This was the best way, he conceived, to prevent arrears of business from accumulating. Here he was only an imitator. Cardinal Dubois had been in the habit of clearing his table of papers in the same way. Nor was this the only point in which we could point out a resemblance between the worst statesman of the monarchy and the worst statesman of the Republic.

of the Girondists, in the murder of the Queen, in the destruction of Lyons, he durst not show himself within that sacred precinct. At one meeting of the society, a member complained that the committee to which the supreme di. rection of affairs was intrusted, after all the changes which had been made, still contained one man who was not trustworthy. Robes pierre, whose influence over the Jacobins was boundless, undertook the defence of his col league, owned there was some ground for what had been said, but spoke highly of Ba rère's industry and aptitude for business. This seasonable interposition silenced the accuser, but it was long before the neophyte could ven ture to appear at the club.

At length a masterpiece of wickedness, unique, we think, even among Barère's great achievements, obtained his full pardon even from that rigid conclave. The insupportable tyranny of the committee of public safety had at length brought the minds of men, and even of women, into a fierce and hard temper, which defied or welcomed death. The life which might be any morning taken away, in conse quence of the whisper of a private enemy, seemed of little value. It was something to die after smiting one of the oppressors; it was something to bequeath to the surviving tyrants a terror not inferior to that which they had Of Barère's peculiar vein of pleasantry a themselves inspired. Human nature, bunted notion may be formed from an anecdote which and worried to the utmost, now turned furiousone of his intimate associates, a juror of the ly to bay. Fouquier Tinville was afraid to Revolutionary Tribunal, has related. A cour- walk the streets; a pistol was snapped at tesan who bore a conspicuous part in the Collot D'Herbois; a young girl, animated ap orgies of Clichy, implored Barère to use his parently by the spirit of Charlotte Corday, power against a head-dress which did not suit attempted to obtain an interview with Robes her style of face, and which a rival beauty was pierre. Suspicions arose; she was searched; trying to bring into fashion. One of the ma- and two knives were found about her. She gistrates of the capital was summoned, and was questioned, and spoke of the Jacobin received the necessary orders. Aristocracy, domination with resolute scorn and aversion. Barère said, was again rearing its front. These It is unnecessary to say that she was sent to new wigs were counter-revolutionary. He had the guillotine. Barère declared from the trireason to know that they were made out of the bune that the cause of these attempts was long fair hair of handsome aristocrats who evident. Pitt and his guineas had done the had died by the national chopper. Every lady whole. The English government had organ. who adorned herself with the relics of crimi-ized a vast system of murder, had armed the nals might justly be suspected of incivism. hand of Charlotte Corday, and had now, by This ridiculous lie imposed on the authorities of Paris. Female citizens were solemnly warned against the obnoxious ringlets, and were left to choose between their head-dresses and their heads. Barère's delight at the success of this facetious fiction was quite extravagant; he could not tell the story without going into such convulsions of laughter as made his hearers hope that he was about to choke. There was something peculiarly tickling and exhilarating to his mind in this grotesque combination of the frivolous with the horrible, of false locks and curling-irons with spouting arteries and reeking hatchets.

similar means, attacked two of the most eminent friends of liberty in France. It is needless to say, that these imputations were not only false, but destitute of all show of truth. Nay, they were demonstrably absurd; for the assassins to whom Barère referred rushed on certain death, a sure proof that they were not hirelings. The whole wealth of England would not have bribed any sane person to do what Charlotte Corday did. But when we consider her as an enthusiast, her conduct is perfectly natural. Even those French writers who are childish enough to believe that the English government contrived the inferna! But though Barère succeeded in earning the machine, and strangled the Emperor Paul honourable nicknames of the Witling of Terror, have fully acquitted Mr. Pitt of all share in and the Anacreon of the Guillotine, there was the death of Marat and in the attempt on Roone place where it was long remembered to bespierre. Yet on calumnies so futile as those his disadvantage, that he had, for a time, talked which we have mentioned, did Barère ground the language of humanity and moderation. a motion at which all Christendom stood That place was the Jacobin Club. Even after aghast. He proposed a decree that no quarter he had borne the chief part in the massacre' should be given to any English or Hanoverian

oldier. Iis Carmagnole was worthy of the | lains. Not an Englishman whom the republi roposition with which it concluded. That cans could reach is now living. How many e Englishman should be spared, that for the prisoners should you guess that we have ves of George, for the human machines of made? One single prisoner is the result of York, the vocabulary of our armies should this great day." contain such a word as generosity, this is what the National Convention cannot endure. War to the death against every English soldier. If last year, at Dunkirk, quarter had been refused to them when they asked it on their knees, if our troops had exterminated them all, instead of suffering them to infest our fortresses by their presence, the English government would not have renewed its attack on our frontiers this year. It is only the dead man who never comes back. What is this moral pestilence which has introduced into our armies false ideas of humanity? That the English were to be treated with indulgence was the philanthropic notion of the Brissotines; it was the patriotic practice of Dumourier. But humanity consists in exterminating our enemies. No mercy to the execrable Englishman. Such are the sentiments of the true Frenchman; for he knows that he belongs to a nation revolutionary as nature, powerful as freedom, ardent as the saltpetre which she has just torn from the entrails of the earth. Soldiers of liberty, when victory places Englishmen at your mer-conspire against us in the grave. Armies will ey, strike! None of them must return to the servile soil of Great Britain; none must pollute the free soil of France."

And now this bad man's craving for blood had become insatiable. The more he quaffed, the more he thirsted. He had begun with the English; but soon he came down with a proposition for new massacres. "All the troops," he said, "of the coalesced tyrants in garrison at Condé, Valenciennes, Le Quesnoy, and Landrecies, onght to be put to the sword unless they surrender at discretion in twenty-four hours. The English, of course, will be admitted to no capitulation whatever. With the English we have no treaty but death. As to the rest, surrender at discretion in twenty-four hours, or death, these are our conditions. If the slaves resist, let them feel the edge of the sword." And then he waxed facetious. "On these terms the Republic is willing to give a lesson in the art of war." At that jest, some hearers worthy of such a speaker, set up a laugh. Then he became serious again. "Let the enemy perish," he cried; "I have already said it from this tribune. It is only the dead man who never comes back. Kings will not

not fight against us when they are annihilated. Let our war with them be a war of extermination. What pity is due to slaves whom the emperor leads to war under the cane; whom the King of Prussia beats to the shambles with the flat of the sword; and whom the Duke of York makes drunk with rum and gin?" And at the rum and gin the Mountain and the gal

The Convention, thoroughly tamed and silenced, acquiesced in Barère's motion without debate. And now at last the doors of the Jacobin Club were thrown open to the disciple who had surpassed his masters. He was admitted a member by acclamation, and was soon se-leries laughed again. lected to preside.

If Barère had been able to effect his purFor a time he was not without hope that his pose, it is difficult to estimate the extent of the decree would be carried into full effect. Intel- calamity which he would have brought on the ligence arrived from the seat of war of a sharp human race. No government, however averse contest between some French and English to cruelty, could, in justice to its own subjects, troops, in which the republicans had the ad- have given quarter to enemies who gave none. vantage, and in which no prisoners had been Retaliation would have been, not merely justimade. Such things happen occasionally in fiable, but a sacred duty. It would have been all wars. Barère, however, attributed the fe- necessary for Howe and Nelson to make every rocity of this combat to his darling decree, and French sailor whom they took walk the plank. entertained the Convention with another Car-England has no peculiar reason to dread the magnole. introduction of such a system. On the con"The republicans," he said, "saw a divisiontrary, the operation of Barère's new law of war in red uniform at a distance. The red-coats would have been more unfavourable to his are attacked with the bayonet. Not one of countrymen than to ours; for we believe that, them escapes the blows of the republicans. All | from the beginning to the end of the war, there the red-coats have been killed. No mercy, no never was a time at which the number of French indulgence, has been shown towards the vil-prisoners in England was not greater than the

* M. Hippolyte Carnot does his best to excuse this

decree. His abuse of England is merely laughable. England has managed to deal with enemies of a very different sort from either himself or his hero. One disgraceful blunder, however, we think it right to

notice

M Hippolyte Carnot asserts that a motion similar to that of Barete was made in the English Parliament by the late Lord Fitzwilliam. This assertion is faise. We defy M. Hippolyte Carnot to state the date and terms of the motion of which he speaks. We do not accuse him of intentional misrepresentation; but we confidently accuse him of extreme ignorance and temerity. Our renders will be amused to learn on what authority he has ventured to publish such a fable He quotes, not the Journals of the Lords. not the Parliamentary Debates; ut a ranting message of the Executive DirecCory to the Five Hundred, a message, too, the whole meaning of which he has utterly misunderstood.

number of English prisoners in France; and So, we apprehend, it will be in all wars while England retains her maritime superiority. Had the murderous decree of the Convention been in force from 1794 to 1815, we are satisfied that, for every Englishman slain by the French, at least three Frenchmen would have been put to the sword by the English. It is therefore, not as Englishmen, but as members of the great society of mankind, that we speak with indig nation and horror of the change which Barère attempted to introduce. The mere slaughter would have been the smallest part of the evil. The butchering of a single unarmed man in cold blood, under an act of the legislature,

punishment which the court could inflict was death.

peace with the other. On the seventh of Thermidor, he pronounced in the Convention a panegyric on Robespierre. "That representative of the people," he said, "enjoys a reputation for patriotism, earned by five years of exertion, and by unalterable fidelity to the principles of independence and 1 berty." On the eighth of Thermidor, it became clear that a decisive struggle was at hand. Robespierre struck the first blow. He mounted the tribune and uttered a long invective on his opponents. It was moved that his discourse should be printed; and Barere spoke for the printing. The sense of the Convention soon appeared to be the other way; and Barère apologized for his former speech, and implored his colleagues to abstain from disputes, which would be agree

Robespierre proposed this decree. When he had read it, a murmur rose from the Convention. The fear which had long restrained the deputies from opposing the committee was overcome by a stronger fear. Every man felt the knife at his throat. "The decree," said one, "is of grave importance. I move that it be printed, and that the debate be adjourned. If such a measure were adopted without time for consideration, I would blow my brains out at once." The motion for adjournment was seconded. Then Barère sprang up. “It is impossible," he said, "that there can be any difference of opinion among us as to a law like this, a law so favourable in all respects to patriots; a law which insures the speedy punish-able only to Pitt and York. On the next day, ment of conspirators. If there is to be an adjournment, I must insist that it shall not be for more than three days." The opposition was overawed; the decree was passed; and, during the six weeks which followed, the havoc was such as had never been known before.

And now the evil was beyond endurance. That timid majority which had for a time supported the Girondists, and which had, after their fall, contented itself with registering in silence the decrees of the committee of public safety, at length drew courage from despair. Leaders of bold and firm character were not wanting; men such as Fouchè and Tallien, who, having been long conspicuous among the chiefs of the Mountain, now found that their own lives, or lives still dearer to them than their own, were in extreme peril. Nor could it be longer kept secret that there was a schism in the despotic committee. On one side were Robespierre, St. Just, and Couthon; on the other, Collot and Billaud. Barère leaned towards these last, but only leaned towards them. As was ever his fashion when a great crisis was at hand, he fawned alternately on both parties, struck alternately at both, and held himself in readiness to chant the praises or to sign the death-warrant of either. In any event his Carmagnole was ready. The tree of liberty, the blood of traitors, the dagger of Brutus, the guineas of perfidious Albion, would do equally well for Billand and for Robespierre.

the ever-memorable ninth of Thermidor, came the real tug of war. Tallien, bravely taking his life in his hand, led the onset, Billaud followed; and then all that infinite hatred which had long been kept down by terror burst forth, and swept every barrier before it. When at length the voice of Robespierre, drowned by the president's bell, and by shouts of "Down with the tyrant!" had died away in hoarse gasping, Barère arose. He began with timid and doubtful phrases, watched the effect of every word he uttered, and, when the feeling of the Assembly had been unequivocally manifested, declared against Robespierre. But it was not till the people out of doors, and especially the gunners of Paris, had espoused the cause of the Convention, that Barère felt quite at ease. Then he sprang to the tribune, poured forth a Carmagnole about Pisistratus and Catiline, and concluded by moving that the heads of Robespierre and Robespierre's accomplices should be cut off without a trial. The motion was carried. On the following morn. ing the vanquished members of the committee of public safety and their principal adherents suffered death. It was exactly one year since Barère had commenced his career of slaughter, by moving the proscription of his old allies, the Girondists. We greatly doubt whether any human being has ever succeeded in packing more wickedness into the space of three hundred and sixty-five days.

The first attack which was made on Robes- The ninth of Thermidor is one of the great pierre was indirect. An old woman named epochs in the history of Europe. It is true Catharine Thèot, half maniac, half impostor, that the three members of the committee of was protected by him, and exercised a strange public safety who triumphed were by no means influence over his mind; for he was naturally better men than the three who fell. Indeed, prone to superstition, and, having abjured the we are inclined to think that of these six statesfaith in which he had been brought up, was men the least bad were Robespierre and St. looking about for something to believe. Ba- Just, whose cruelty was the effect of sincere rère drew up a report against Catharine, which fanaticism operating on narrow understandings contained many facetious conceits, and ended, and acrimonious tempers. The worst of the as might be expected, with a motion for send-six was, beyond all doubt, Barère, who had no ing her and some other wretched creatures of both sexes to the Revolutionary Tribunal, or, in other words, to death. This report, however, he did not dare to read to the Convention himself. Another member, less timid, was induced to father the cruel buffoonery; and the real author enjoyed in security the dismay and vexation of Robespierre.

Barère now thought that he had done enough on one side, and that it was time to make his

faith in any part of the system which he upheld by persecution; who, while he sent nis fellow-creatures to death for being the third cousins of royalists, had not in the least made up his mind that a republic was better than a monarchy; who, while he slew his old friends for federalism, was himself far more a federalist than any of them; who had become a murderer merely for his safety, and who continued to be a murderer merely for his pleasure

The tendency of the vulgar is to embody resistance. The surviving Girondist deputies every thing. Some individual is selected, and who had concealed themselves from the ven often selected very injudiciously, as the repre- geance of their enemies in caverns and garrets, sentative of every great movement of the pub- were re-admitted to their seats in the Conven lic mind, of every great revolution in human tion. No day passed without some signal affairs; and on this individual are concentrated reparation of injustice; no street in Paris was all the love and all the hatred, all the admira. without some trace of the recent change. In tion and all the contempt, which he ought right- the theatre, the bust of Marat was pulled down fully to share with a whole party, a whole sect, from its pedestal and broken in pieces, amidst a whole nation, a whole generation. Perhaps the applause of the audience. His carcass no human being has suffered so much from was ejected from the Pantheon. The celebrated this propensity of the multitude as Robespierre. picture of his death, which had hung in the He is regarded not merely as what he was, an hall of the Convention, was removed. The envious, malevolent zealot; but as the incar- savage inscriptions with which the walls of the nation of Terror, as Jacobinism personified. city had been covered disappeared; and in The truth is, that it was not by him that the place of death and terror, humanity, the watch system of terror was carried to the last extreme. word of the new rulers, was everywhere to be The most horrible days in the history of the seen. In the mean time, the gay spirit of Revolutionary Tribunal of Paris, were those France, recently subdued by oppression, and which immediately preceded the ninth of Ther- now elated by the joy of a great deliverance, midor. Robespierre had then ceased to attend wantoned in a thousand forms. Art, taste, the meetings of the sovereign committee; and luxury, revived. Female beauty regained its the direction of affairs was really in the hands empire-an empire strengthened by the remem of Billaud, of Collot, and of Barère. brance of all the tender and all the sublime virtues which women, delicately bred and reputed frivolous, had displayed during the evil days. Refined manners, chivalrous sentiments, followed in the train of love. The dawn of the Arctic summer day after the Arctic winter night, the great unsealing of the waters, the awakening of animal and vegetable life, the sudden softening of the air, the sudden blooming of the flowers, the sudden bursting of whole forests into verdure, is but a feeble type of that happiest and most genial of revolutions, the revolution of the ninth of Thermidor.

It had never occurred to those three tyrants, that in overthrowing Robespierre, they were overthrowing that system of terror to which they were more attached than he had ever been. Their object was to go on slaying even more mercilessly than before. But they had misunderstood the nature of the great crisis which had at last arrived. The yoke of the committee was broken for ever. The Convention had regained its liberty, had tried its strength, had vanquished and punished its enemies. A great reaction had commenced. Twenty-four hours after Robespierre had ceased But, in the midst of the revival of all kind to live, it was moved and carried, amidst loud and generous sentiments, there was one por bursts of applause, that the sittings of the Re-tion of the community against which mercy volutionary Tribunal should be suspended. Bil- itself seemed to cry out for vengeance. The laud was not at that moment present. He en-chiefs of the late government and their tools tered the hall soon after, learned with indigna- were now never named but as the men of blood, tion what had passed, and moved that the vote should be rescinded. But loud cries of "No, no!" rose from those benches which had lately paid mute obedience to his commands. Barère came forward on the same day, and adjured the Convention not to relax the system of terror. Beware, above all things," he cried, "of that fatal moderation which talks of peace and of clemency. Let aristocracy know that here she will find only enemies sternly bent on vengeance, and judges who have no pity." But the day of the Carmagnoles was over: the restraint of fear had been relaxed; and the hatred with which the nation regarded the Jacobin dominion broke forth with ungovernable violence. Not more strongly did the tide of public opinion run against the old monarchy and aristocracy, at the time of the taking of the Bastile, than it now ran against the tyranny of the Mountain. From every dungeon the prisoners came forth, as they had gone in, by hundreds. The decree which forbade the soldiers of the Republic to give quarter to the English, was repealed by an unanimous vote, amidst loud acclamations; nor, passed as it was, disobeyed as it was, and rescinded as it was, can it be with justice considered as a blemish on the fame of the French nation. The Jacobin Club as refractory. It was suppressed without

the drinkers of blood, the cannibals. In some parts of France, where the creatures of the Mountain had acted with peculiar barbarity, the populace took the law into its own hands, and meted out justice to the Jacobins with the true Jacobin measure; but at Paris the punishments were inflicted with order and decency; and were few when compared with the num ber, and lenient when compared with the enor mity, of the crimes. Soon after the ninth of Thermidor, two of the vilest of mankind, Fou quier Tinville, whom Barère had placed at the Revolutionary Tribunal, and Lebon, whom Barère had defended in the Convention, were placed under arrest. A third miscreant soon shared their fate, Carrier, the tyrant of Nantes. The trials of these men brought to light horrors surpassing any thing that Sueton.us and Lampridius have related of the worst Cæsars. But it was impossible to punish subordinate agents who, bad as they were, had only acted in ac cordance with the spirit of the government which they served, and, at the same time, to grant impunity to the heads of the wicked ad ministration. A cry was raised, both within and without the Convention, for justice on Collot, Billaud, and Barere.

Collet and Billaud, with all thei-vices, appear to have been men of resolue natures.