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the origins of contemporary france-3-第36部分
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severe for Mandrin;'42' because their war is not merely on public
persons and property; as his was; but on the possessions; the
proprieties; and the lives of private individuals。 One detachment
alone; at one time; extorts in Cavaillon 25;000 francs; in Baume
12;000; in Aubignon 15;000; in Pioline 4;800; while Caumont is taxed
2;000 francs a week。 At Sarrians; where the mayor gives them the keys;
they pillage houses from top to bottom; carry off their plunder in
carts; set fire; violate and slay with all the refinements of torture
of so many Hurons。 An old lady of eighty; and a paralytic; is shot at
arms length; and left weltering in her blood in the midst of the
flames。 A child five years of age is cut in two; its mother
decapitated; and its sister mutilated; they cut off the ears of the
curé; set them on his brow like a cockade; and then cut his throat;
along with that of a pig; and tear out the two hearts and dance around
them。'43' After this; for fifty days around Carpentras; to which they
lay siege in vain; the unprovoked; cruel instincts of the chauffeurs
manifested at a later date; the ancient cannibalistic desires which
sometimes reappear in convicts; and the perverted and over…strained
sensuality found in maniacs; have full play。
On beholding the monster it has nourished; Avignon; in alarm; utters
cries of distress。'44' But the brute; which feels its strength; turns
against its former abettors; shows its teeth; and exacts its daily
food。 Ruined or not; Avignon must furnish its quota。 〃In the
electoral assembly; Mainvielle the younger; elected elector; although
he is only twenty…two; draws two pistols from his belt and struts
around with a threatening air。〃'45' Duprat; the president; the better
to master his colleagues; proposes to them to leave Avignon and go to
Sorgues; which they refuse to do; upon this he orders cannon to be
brought; promises to pay those who will accompany him; drags along the
timid; and denounces the rest before an upper national court; of which
he himself has designated the members。 Twenty of the electors thus
denounced are condemned and proscribed; Duprat threatens to enter by
force and have them executed on the spot; and; under his leadership;
the army of Mandrins advances against Avignon。 Its progress is
arrested; and; for two months; restrained by the two mediating
commissioners for France; they reduce its numbers; and it is on the
point of being disbanded; when the brute again boldly seizes its prey;
about to make its escape。 On the 21st of August; Jourdan; with his
herd of miscreants; obtains possession of the palace。 The municipal
body is driven out; the mayor escapes in disguise; Tissot; the
secretary; is cut down; four municipal officers and forty other
persons are thrown into prison; while a number of houses belonging to
the fugitives and to priests are pillaged; and thus supply the bandits
with their first financial returns。'46' Then begins the great
fiscal operation which is going to fill their pockets。 Five front
men; chosen by Duprat and his associates; compose; with Lécuyer as
secretary; a provisional municipal body; which; taxing the town
300;000 francs and suppressing the convents; offers the spoils of the
churches for sale。 The bells are taken down; and the hammers of the
workmen engaged in breaking them to pieces are heard all day long。 A
strong…box full of plate; diamonds; and gold crosses; left with the
director of the Mont…de…Piété; on deposit; is taken and carried off to
the commune; a report is spread that the valuables pawned by the poor
had been stolen by the municipality; and that those 〃robbers had
already sent away eighteen trunks full of them。〃 Upon this the women;
exasperated at the bare walls of the churches; together with the
laborers in want of work or bread; all the common class; become
furious; assemble of their own accord in the church of the Cordeliers;
summon Lécuyer to appear before them; drag him from the pulpit and
massacre him。'47'
This time there seems to be an end of the brigand party; for the
entire town; the populace and the better class; are against them;
while the peasants in the country shoot them down wherever they come
across them。 Terror; however; supplies the place of numbers; and;
with the 350 hired killers bravos still left to them; the extreme
Jacobins undertake to overcome a city of 30;000 souls。 Mainvielle the
elder; dragging along two cannon; arrives with a patrol; fires at
random into the already semi…abandoned church; and kills two men。
Duprat assembles about thirty of the towns…people; imprisoned by him
on the 31st of August; and; in addition to these; about forty artisans
belonging to the Catholic brotherhoods; porters; bakers; coopers; and
day…laborers; two peasants; a beggar; a few women seized haphazard and
on vague denunciations; one of them; 〃because she spoke ill of Madame
Mainvielle。〃 Jourdan supplies the executioners; the apothecary Mende;
brother…in…law of Duprat; plies them with liquor; while a clerk of
Tournal; the newsman; bids them 〃kill all; so that there shall be no
witnesses left。〃 Whereupon; at the reiterated orders of Mainvielle;
Tournal; Duprat; and Jourdan; with a complications of hilarious
lewdness;'48' the massacre develops itself on the 16th of October and
following days; during sixty…six hours; the victims being a couple of
priests; three children; an old man of eighty; thirteen women; two of
whom are pregnant; in all; sixty…one persons; with their throats slit
or knocked out and then cast one on top of each other into the
Glacière hole; a mother on the body of her infant; a son on the body
of his father; all finished off with rocks; the hole being filled up
with stones and covered over with quicklime on account of the
smell。'49' In the meantime about a hundred more; killed in the
streets; are pitched into the Sorgues canal; five hundred families
make their escape。 The ousted bandits return in a body; while the
assassins who are at the head of them; enthroned by murder; organize
for the benefit of their new band a legal system of brigandage;
against which nobody defends himself。'50'
These are the friends of the Jacobins of Arles and Marseilles; the
respectable men whom M。 d'Antonelle has come to address in the
cathedral at Avignon。'51' These are the pure patriots; who; with
their hands in the till and their feet in gore; caught in the act by a
French army; the mask torn off through a scrupulous investigation;
universally condemned by the emancipated electors; also by the
deliberate verdict of the new mediating commissioners;'52' are
included in the amnesty proclaimed by the Legislative Assembly a month
before their last crime。 … But the sovereigns of the Bouches…du…Rh?ne
do not regard the release of their friends and allies as a pardon:
something more than pardon and forgetfulness must be awarded to the
murderers of the Glacière。 On the 29th of April; 1792; Rebecqui and
Bertin; the vanquishers of Arles; enter Avignon'53' along with a
cortége; at the head of which are from thirty to forty of the
principal murderers whom the Legislative Assembly itself had ordered
to be recommitted to prison; Duprat; Mainvielle; Toumal; Mende; then
Jourdan in the uniform of a commanding general crowned with laurel and
seated on a white horse; and; lastly; the dames Duprat; Mainvielle and
Tournal; in dashing style; standing on a sort of triumphal chariot;
during the procession the cry is heard; 〃The Glacière will be full
this time! 〃 On their approach the public functionaries fly; twelve
hundred persons abandon the town。 Forthwith each terrorist; under the
protection of the Marseilles bayonets; resumes his office; like a man
at the head of his household。 Raphel; the former judge; along with his
clerk; both with warrants of arrest against them; publicly officiate;
while the relatives of the poor victims slain on the 16th of October;
and the witnesses that appeared on the trial; are threatened in the
streets; one of them is killed; and Jourdan; king of the department
for an entire year; begins over again on a grand scale; at the head of
the National Guard; and afterwards of the police body; the same
performance which; on a small scale; he pursued under the ancient
régime; when; with a dozen 〃armed and mounted〃 brigands; he traversed
the highways; forced open lonely houses at night; and; in one chateau
alone; stole 24;000 francs。
V。
The other departments。 Uniform process of the Jacobin conquest。
Preconceived formation of a Jacobin State。
The Jacobin conquest takes place like this: already in during April;
1792; through acts of violence almost equal to those we have just
described; it spreads over more than twenty departments and; to a
smaller degree; over the other sixty。'54' The composition of the
parties is the same everywhere。 On one side are the irresponsible of
all conditions;
〃squanderers who; having consumed their own inheritance; cannot
tolerate that of another; men without property to whom disorder is a
door open to wealth and public office; the envious; the ungrateful
whose obligations to their benefactors the revolution cancels; the
hot…headed; all those enthusiastic innovators who preach reason with a
dagger in their hand; the poor; the brutal and the wretched of the
lower class who; possessed by one leading anarchical idea; one example
of immunity; with the law dumb and the sword in the scabbard; are
stimulated to dare all things
On the other side are the steady…going; peaceable class; minding their
own business; upper and lower middle class in mind and spirit;
〃weakened by being used to security and wealth; surprised at any
unforeseen disturbance and trying to find their way; isolated from
each other by diversity of interests; opposing only tact and caution
to persevering audacity in defiance of legitimate means; unabl
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