Page:Works of Thomas Carlyle - Volume 04.djvu/281

 principles of Sansculottism. Simon taught him to drink, to swear, to sing the carmagnole. Simon is now gone to the Municipality: and the poor boy, hidden in a tower of the Temple, from which in his fright and bewilderment and early decrepitude he wishes not to stir out, lies perishing, 'his shirt not changed for six months'; amid squalor and darkness, lamentably, —so as none but poor Factory Children and the like are wont to perish, and not be lamented!

The Spring sends its green leaves and bright weather, bright May, brighter than ever: Death pauses not. Lavoisier, famed Chemist, shall die and not live: Chemist Lavoisier was Farmer-General Lavoisier too, and now 'all the Farmers-General are arrested'; all, and shall give an account of their moneys and incomings; and die for 'putting water in the tobacco' they sold. Lavoisier begged a fortnight more of life, to finish some experiments: but 'the Republic does not need such'; the axe must do its work. Cynic Chamfort, reading these inscriptions of Brotherhood or Death, says, 'it is a Brotherhood of Cain': arrested, then liberated; then about to be arrested again, this Chamfort cuts and slashes himself with frantic uncertain hand; gains, not without difficulty, the refuge of death. Condorcet has lurked deep, these many months; Argus-eyes watching and searching for him. His concealment is become dangerous to others and himself; he has to fly again, to skulk, round Paris, in thickets and stone-quarries. And so at the Village of ClamarsClamart [sic], one bleared May morning, there enters a Figure ragged, rough-bearded, hunger-stricken; asks breakfast in the tavern there. Suspect, by the look of him! 'Servant out of place, sayest thou?' Committee-President of Forty-Sous finds a Latin Horace on him: 'Art not thou one of those Ci-devants that were wont to keep servants? Suspect!' He is haled forthwith, breakfast unfinished, towards Bourg-la-Reine, on foot: he faints with exhaustion; is set on a peasant's horse; is flung into his damp