Page:Works of Thomas Carlyle - Volume 03.djvu/145

FEB. 19, 1791] victoriously cut them out. And so the poor ancient women go their way: to the terror of France and Paris, whose nervous excitability is become extreme. Who else would hinder poor Loque and Graille, now grown so old, and fallen into such unexpected circumstances, when gossip itself turning only on terrors and horrors is no longer pleasant to the mind, and you cannot get so much as an orthodox confessor in peace,—from going what way soever the hope of any solacement might lead them?

They go, poor ancient dames,—whom the heart were hard that did not pity: they go; with palpitations, with unmelodious suppressed screechings; all France screeching and cackling, in loud unsuppressed terror, behind and on both hands of them: such mutual suspicion is among men. At Arnay le Duc, above halfway to the frontiers, a Patriotic Municipality and Populace again takes courage to stop them: Louis Narbonne must now back to Paris, must consult the National Assembly. National Assembly answers, not without an effort, that Mesdames may go. Whereupon Paris rises worse than ever, screeching half-distracted. Tuileries and precincts are filled with women and men, while the National Assembly debates this question of questions; Lafayette is needed at night for dispersing them, and the streets are to be illuminated. Commandant Berthier, a Berthier before whom are great things unknown, lies for the present under blockade at Bellevue in Versailles. By no tactics could he get Mesdames' Luggage stirred from the Courts there; frantic Versaillese women came screaming about him; his very troops cut the wagon-traces; he 'retired to the interior,' waiting better times.

Nay in these same hours, while Mesdames, hardly cut out from Moret by the sabre's edge, are driving rapidly, to foreign parts, and not yet stopped at Arnay, their august Nephew poor Monsieur, at Paris, has dived deep into his cellars of the Luxembourg for shelter; and, according to Montgaillard, can hardly be persuaded up again. Screeching multitudes environ