YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

Purchased on the fund
in honor of
CLIVE DAY, '92
Given by
ARTHUR P. DAY, '90
POMEROY DAY, '28
MARVIN B. DAY, '32

A WOMAN OF THE REVOLUTION
THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT

AN EIGHTEENTH -CENTURY
MARQUISE. Emilie du Chatelet
and Her Times. Frank Hamel, Author
of " The Dauphines of France," etc. In one
voIume} demy 8vo, cloth gilt. With a photo
gravure frontispiece and 16 other illustrations,
printed on art paper.
"Mr. Hamel furnishes some vivid and striking
details of the famous men and women of the time,
and his descriptions of the cafes and salons are
lively and entertaining."— The Scotsman.

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A WOMAN OF THE
REVOLUTION
THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT
By FRANK HAMEL
AUTHOR OP
"the dauphines or France," "an eighteenth-century

WITH PHOTOGRAVURE FRONTISPIECE
AND SIXTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS

New York
BRENTANO'S 1911

printed in great Britain

PREFACE
IN writing the biography of a " Woman of the
Revolution " I found myself face to face with
a great difficulty. It was either necessary to presume
a more thorough knowledge of the events of 1789-93
on the part of my readers than is general, or make
constant digressions from the main theme of my story
as it proceeded. Inequalities have resulted from a vain
endeavour to avoid these pitfalls. Inequalities, how
ever, are to be expected when stirring incidents taking
place against a background fraught with huge possi
bilities are viewed through the eyes of a single figure
of the crowd. That figure is of a woman who has
more claim to recognition for her personal characteristics
than for her performance of outstanding actions either
noble or valorous. One of Theroigne's chief charms
lies in her elusiveness. While she has remained
practically unknown to English readers, the French
have never lost interest in the doings of a woman of
whom they knew little that was authentic and in whom
their curiosity was aroused by the imaginative accounts
of Lamartine, Lairtullier, and Lamothe-Langon, on the
one hand, and the coarse satires of the royalist
pamphlets and journals on the other.
Before the publication of Theroigne's " Confessions "
5

6 Preface
in 1892 by M. Strobl-Ravelsberg, all that had been
written concerning her early life was little better than
conjecture. But since that date several biographers,
amongst them M. Marcellin Pellet, M. le Vicomte de
Reiset, and notably M. Leopold Lacour (whose work
is very valuable), have all done much to drag forth from
the mists of obscurity and tradition the history of a
woman who was neither a fiend in human form, as she
has frequently been depicted, nor yet a houri of
transcendent charms and beauty. The latter miscon
ception is speedily dispelled by one account of her
appearance, which credits her with " a wrinkled little
face, a mischievous expression which suited her down
to the ground, and one of those turned-up noses which
may affect the fate of nations." The implication of
her wickedness also falls away in the light of the
remarks of one of her enemies, who summed up her
attitude by saying : " It is difficult to draw the line
between sentiment and policy in her case. She is
capable of anything when she wishes to be pleasant and
useful to those who engage her affections. Her ex
treme simplicity goes as far as abandonment. . . .
She is made for love and close intimacy."
The dramatic possibilities of Theroigne's life, were
turned to account in 1902 by M. Paul Hervieu, the
title-r61e of his drama being interpreted by Mme
Sarah Bernhardt. The stage version led to a dis
cussion of its heroine and brought to light the fact
that the real Theroigne was a striking figure, passionate,
eloquent, determined, fearless, and loyal ; a lover of
liberty, the people's friend, and an advocate of her
sisters' cause. It has been said of her that she was

Preface 7
not a heroine in the best sense, that her faults were
too glaring, her standard of morality too low, that she
had litde nobility, and only enough purity of purpose
to redeem her obvious shortcomings to some extent.
But she possessed adaptability and resource, and better
still versatility. From village maiden and humble
vachere, who wandered in the green meadows or
washed linen on the river banks, she became courtesan
and virtuoso, adorned with fine robes and resplendent
in diamonds. Then, impelled by the rush of events,
she turned patriot and reformer, lavishing the remains
of her wealth on the altar of her adopted country.
She followed with unabated interest the work of the
National Assembly, she became an orator of the streets
and a partisan of the Girondins. The common people,
soldiers, deputies, even nobles and princes were in
fluenced by her personality. She was carried away by
the same fanaticism that led many to the scaffold, but
her fate was even more terrible than theirs, for she
became lost in mania. Brilliant at the beginning of
her career, she was caught in a tangle of unbridled
passions and drawn into a whirl of terror and blood
shed. Thus it was said of her that she typified the
spirit of the Revolution. Perhaps truth is strained in
this search for an effective symbol. But side by side
with the legendary Theroigne who stalks through the
moving scenes of the late eighties and early nineties
like a demon possessed, slaying and leading others to
slaughter, plotting against the life of Marie-Antoinette,
and suffering at the hands of the enraged Jacobins
women, is the no less interesting and far more realistic
figure of the Theroigne of the streets, in her neat

8 Preface
riding-dress and feathered cap, deftly handling her pike
and haranguing the mob from the tribunes of the clubs,
joining in the fetes of Liberty and raising the voice
that had been trained for the concert-hall in the in
spiring revolutionary hymns. This Theroigne, with
her captivating ways of cajoling, bribing, and threatening
by turns, is the one to know and to love. The work
she did for the people's cause was not valueless because
it was sometimes misdirected, and the enthusiasm with
which she inspired the crowd was not to be despised
because, through no fault of her own, the liberty she
and others worked for degenerated into licence.
Frank Hamel.
London, 191 i.

CONTENTS CHAPTER I
THE PEASANT
A journey through the Ardennes — A capture — An inquiry — The
roigne's story — Her childhood — Appearance — Education — A first taste
of romance — An elopement — The injured marquis — His impassioned
letters — Her musical ability — Concerts spirituel — Tenducci — A musical
contract — A journey to Italy— A lawsuit — Outbreak of the Revolution
— Letters to Perregaux — Return to France . . . Pages 17-62

CHAPTER II
THE PATRIOT
Unrest in the capital — The National Assembly — Theroigne's en
thusiasm — In the gardens of the Palais Royal — Theroigne adopts the
tricolour — The taking of the Bastille— Theroigne goes to meet the
King — Provincial riots — At Versailles — New Friends — The march of
the women — The famous 5th and 6th — The Regiment of Flanders —
The gate of the Orangery — Theroigne declares her innocence — A
demonstration of the Rights of Man .... Pages 63- no

CHAPTER III
THEROIGNE'S CLUB
Rise of the political club — The diatribes of the press — The salons
change their tone — Meetings at the Hotel de Grenoble — Gilbert Romme
— Theroigne plays a new role — The Club de la Revolution —
Theroigne and the Actes des Apotres and other journals — The dame
politique — The orator — At the Club des Cordeliers — Theroigne pro
poses a resolution — Marching with the deputies . . Pages n 1-1 52
9

10 Contents
CHAPTER IV
THE CITOVENNES
The part women played in the Revolution — Their supporters —
Women in the clubs— Etta Palm — Contrasted with Theroigne —
Societes Fraternelles des Deux Sexes — The provincial clubs devoted
to the interests of women — The frivolity of certain members — " Long
live women patriots ! " — The youngest citoyenne — A typical meeting.
Pages 153-180
CHAPTER V
FLIGHT AND CAPTURE
Theroigne leaves Paris — Her reasons for this step — The decree of
the Chatelet — Had she a mission in Brabant ? — From Saint-Hubert
to Marcourt — At the White Cross Inn, La Boverie — Van der Noot —
Arrest — The journey to the Tyrol .... Pages 181-214

CHAPTER VI
KUFSTEIN
" Madame Theobald " is led to her cell — An inventory — A piano in
prison — The examining magistrate — Inquiry into her conduct on
October 6th, 1789 — The Dires et Aveux — A surreptitious letter —
Family affairs — The Baron de Selys — A defender of monarchs — The
diamond necklace — A dramatic interview — The doctor's report — Fare
well to Kufstein — Vienna — The Emperor's clemency — Before the
judge — Liberty  Pages 217-258

CHAPTER VII
TO ARMS! TO ARMS!
The tide of the Revolution — Events of 1790 and 1791 — Federation
and emigration— The siege of Bellevue — A triumphant reception—
Theroigne's discourse at the Jacobins Club— Her militant attitude-
Military ardour of Frenchwomen— Provincial regiments— Appeal to the
legislators — Theroigne urges women to arm themselves— Her adven
ture in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine — A patriotic feast—" Mile The
roigne's boudoir"— Chateauvieux— Marie-Joseph Chenier— An imposing
procession— Theroigne follows the Moderates . . Pages 259-305

Contents 1 1

CHAPTER VIII
SULEAU
The demonstrations of June 20th — Where was Theroigne? — Planting
the Tree of Liberty — Nearing the crisis — August loth — Theroigne
incites the crowd to slaughter — In the guard-room at the Feuillants —
Suleau's courage — His death — Royalty takes refuge in the Assembly —
Attack on the Tuileries — Theroigne receives a civic crown. Pages 306-322
CHAPTER IX
BRISSOTINE
Dr. John Moore pays a visit to the Jacobins — His description of
Theroigne — The September massacres — Instability of parties — Did
Theroigne join Dumouriez ? — She baffles her biographers in the winter
of 1792 — Her appeal to the Forty-eight Sections — Her last effective
action in the cause of liberty — The women of the Convention — They
encounter Theroigne and assault her — Her escape — Various accounts
of the affair — Theroigne as seen through the eyes of George Forster.
Pages 323-342
CHAPTER X
LA SALPETRIERE
Fate of the revolutionaries — Theroigne's arrest and detention — Her
brother intercedes on her behalf — He pleads her aberration of intellect
— She is placed in an asylum — Her appeal to Saint-Just — At the
Salpgtriere — Visions in her mania — A visitor and inquiries — Esquirol's
description of her condition — Her death . . Pages 343-355

APPENDIX A
THEROIGNE AND THE ROYALIST PRESS Pages 357-362
APPENDIX B
NOTES ON SOME PORTRAITS OF THEROIGNE DE
MERICOURT Page 363
INDEX  Pages 365-369

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
theroigne, (From a Portrait at the Carnavalet) Frontispiece PAGE
THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT  33
JEROME PETION  5 1
THE FALL OF THE BASTILLE  69
THE MARCH OF THE WOMEN TO VERSAILLES . . -87
THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT  I05
MARC-ETIENNE POPULUS, DEPUTY FOR BOURG-EN-BRESSE . 1 23
THEROIGNE CONDUCTS THE ORCHESTRA AT THE CLUB DE
LA REVOLUTION  141
GILBERT ROMME  159
THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT  177
LEOPOLD II., EMPEROR OF AUSTRIA  1 95
13

14 List of Illustrations PAGI
THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT  213

THE CALL TO ARMS, 1792  231
MARIE-JOSEPH CHENIER  249
BRISSOT  267
SAINT-JUST  30I
THEROIGNE AT THE SALPETRIERE  335

LIST OF CHIEF AUTHORITIES
Actes des Apotres (Les), 1789-91.
Apocalypse (L'), 1790.
Aulard, F. A. " Histoire Politique de la Revolution Frangaise."
 " La Socidte des Jacobins."
Aux 48 Sections. [1792 ?J
Beaulieu, C. F. de. " Essais Historiques," etc.
Buchez et Roux. "Histoire Parlementaire de la Revolution
Frangaise."
Cabanes. " Les Indiscretions de l'Histoire."
Carlyle, T. " French Revolution."
Demarteau. " Etude sur Theroigne de Mencourt " (Revue
Historique).
"Discours prononce" a la Societe Fraternelle des Minimes le
25 Mars, 1792."
Duval, G. L. J. " Souvenirs de la Terreur."
Esquirol, J. E. D. " Des Maladies mentales."
Goncourt, de. " Portraits intimes du XVIII. siecle."
Intermidiaire des Chercheurs (L').
Lacour, L. " Trois Femmes de la Revolution."
Lairtullier, E. " Les Femmes Celebres de 1789 a 1795."
Lamartine. " L'Histoire du Girondins."
Michelet, J. " Les Femmes de la Revolution."
Moniteur (Le).
Moore, John. " A Journal during a Residence in France."
Mortimer-Ternaux. "Histoire de la Terreur, 1792-4."
Pellet, M. " Etude Historique et Biographique sur Theroigne
de Mencourt."
Peltier, J. G. "Histoire de la Revolution du dix Aout, 1792."
Reiset, M. A. de. "La Vraie Theroigne de Mdricourt." (Le
Carnet, 1903.) IS

1 6 List of Chief Authorities
Strobl-Ravelsburg, F. de. "Les Confessions de Theroigne de
Mericourt."
Taine, H. A. " Les Origines de la France contemporaine — La
Revolution."
" Theroigne de Mericourt . . . : Correspondance publiee par le
Vicomte de V  y." (By Lamothe-Langon.)
" Theroigne et Populus . . . : Drame Nationale." (" Precis . . .
sur la vie de Mile Teroigne de Mericour.")
Thiers, L. A. " Histoire de la Revolution Frangaise."
Tourneux. " Bibliographie de l'Histoire de Paris pendant la
Revolution Frangaise."
Villiers, Marc de. "Histoire des Clubs de Femmes et de
Legions d'Amazones, 1793-1848-1871."
Villiers, P. " Souvenirs d'un Deporte."
Vissac, M. de. "Un Conventionnel du Puy-de-D6me. Romme
le Montagnard."
Vitu, A. C. J. " Etudes Litteraires." (Suleau, Frangois.)
And other contemporary journals, pamphlets, etc., mentioned
in the text.

A Woman of the Revolution
Theroigne de Mericourt
CHAPTER I
THE PEASANT
A JOURNEY by post-chaise through the Ardennes
was at all seasons a laborious undertaking in the
eighteenth century. Only the most determined travel
lers cared to attempt it when the hilly forest roads were
rendered almost impassable by snow and ice. In the
February of 1791 two purposeful gendemen were
making their way in wintry weather towards the frontiers
of Luxemburg. They were French imigris, although
nothing in their appearance proclaimed this fact. They
preferred to be on Austrian soil. On the evening of
the fifteenth of the month they reached Liege, but the
urgency of their expedition made it impossible for
them to halt, in spite of fatigue and hunger, and they
pushed on half a league farther to the little village of
La Boverie. Their mission demanded secrecy. Leav
ing the carriage, they proceeded on foot to the straggling
cottages which, together with the little church and a
single inn, composed the village. The inn was their
destination ; it bore the sign of the " White Cross."
Midnight had already struck, but the travellers did not
2 v

1 8 A Woman of the Revolution
approach the house until the night-watchman had gone
his rounds and all was silent. Then they knocked at
the door.
" Who is there ? " inquired some one within.
" Open in the name of his Imperial Majesty," was
the command.
A frightened innkeeper admitted the strangers.
" You have a lady staying here ? Show us to her
room without delay."
The innkeeper's hesitation vanished at a threat.
Unceremoniously the strangers entered the apartment
he indicated. Within all was silent save for the
regular breathing of a woman asleep.
The noise had not awakened her, but when a torch
was brought in the light made her open her eyes.
Seeing two strange men in her room, she sat up in bed
and asked them to account for their presence there.
" I do not know you, gentlemen," she began.
" What do you want with me ? It is odious to disturb
people at this time of night."
One of the intruders answered courteously enough :
" I am commissioned by the Emperor, mademoiselle,
to remove you to a place of safety. Dress yourself
and follow us."
The young woman was not satisfied with this reply.
She asked for more particulars.
" You have enemies, mademoiselle. Your life is in
danger. Your whereabouts have been traced. Those
are coming who would capture you. You must flee,
and at once. We will protect you."
" You ! By what right do you constitute yourselves
my protectors ? "

The Peasant 19
"By the right of friendship, pretty one. By the
right of nationality. Being Austrians we desire to
guard you against your enemies the French aristocrats."
In the meantime the speaker's companion made a
thorough search of the room. Clothes, books, letters —
all the occupant's personal belongings, in short — were
heaped together ready for removal.
Helpless and bewildered, the young woman could
do nothing to prevent this ruthless handling of her
property. Her mild protests were unheeded. She
was told that her papers, if they were left behind,
would lead to her capture.
When she was dressed and had eaten some food,
which was hurriedly put before her, she was taken
to the carriage.
" But of what could my worst enemies accuse
me ? " she asked when told to take her place in the
vehicle. "Of a very serious crime — of being implicated in a
plot to kill the Queen of France."
" It is a lie. I know nothing about it. All I know
is that the people hate the Queen."
"Why?"
" For one thing, she is Austrian — a foreigner. She
does not understand the people's needs. Besides, the
Austrians  " and then, remembering her companions
had claimed to be of that nationality, she lapsed
discreetly into silence.
A passing suspicion grew into a certainty. Her
companions' off-hand manners had already given her
food for reflection, and she realised very soon that her
supposed friends were nothing of the kind. They

20 A Woman of the Revolution
were her captors, and in calling themselves Austrians
they had misrepresented the truth.
In due course the ill-assorted travellers reached
Coblenz, where Metternich, the famous father of a
more famous son, was then staying. This Austrian
minister had French sympathies and was disposed to be
friendly to the little colony of emigre's settled in that
town. The day after their arrival the two men asked for
an audience with the minister, and informed him of
what they had done.
" I congratulate you, gentlemen," replied Metternich
when he heard their story, " but your work is not yet
finished. You must conduct the prisoner to Freiburg
in Breisgau."
These instructions were obeyed. They were
followed by others, stating that the captive was to be
conveyed to the fortress of Kufstein. On March
17th, under the name of Mme Theobald, she was
received there by the governor himself. She had lost
her last chance of escape.
Two months passed. Then one day a carriage
drawn by four horses dashed up to the prison gates
and out stepped an examining magistrate.
" How is Mme Theobald ? " was his first question.
" She is only fairly well," was the reply.
Before long the new-comer was taken to the
prisoner's cell. He was surprised by her charm and
youthful appearance. The purpose of his visit was
to hear her life-history from her own lips. With a
wave of the hand he dismissed the jailer who had
accompanied him, and was left alone with the prisoner.

The Peasant 21
Fixing his steady gaze upon her, he said, " You are
Mile Theroigne de Mericourt, are you not ? "
" Yes, I am she," replied the prisoner simply.
The story she told, supplemented from other
sources, some more, some less reliable, was full of
strange vicissitudes, of ups and downs in fortune, of
struggles and of aspirations — the story of a waif and
stray of lowly birth, who was carried by forces stronger
than herself amidst scenes of bloodshed and horror
into which were drawn at the same time the very
highest in the land of France.
Born on August 13th, 1762, at Marcourt on the
Ourthe, in the province of Luxemburg, some forty
miles from Liege, Anne-Josephe was the daughter of
Pierre Terwaine or Terwagne and his wife Elisabeth
Lahaye. Terwagne became the more euphonious
Theroigne in French, and Anne-Josephe added de
Mericourt from the name of the village where she
was born — a name, she said, for which she had never
had cause to blush. Some biographers have called
her Lambertine, but there appears to be no authority
for this appellation, nor was it a recognised nickname.
Anne-Josephe was the eldest of the family and was
born a year after the marriage of her parents. She
had two brothers ; Pierre-Joseph, born on December
25th, 1764, and Joseph on September 28th, 1767.
Three months later Mme Terwagne died, and, after
being a widower for six years, her husband married
again and reared a second family of nine children, the
eldest of whom was born in 1774.
Terwagne was a well-to-do peasant, but he engaged

22 A Woman of the Revolution
in lawsuits and unsuccessful speculations, and his
affairs became so much involved that he had to mort
gage or sell his land.
When Anne-Josephe was left motherless she went
to stay with an aunt at Liege. There she was sent
to a convent school, and learnt to sew. She made her
first communion about this time. After she had been
at school for a year her aunt married, and refused to
pay any more school fees. She made her niece work
in the house, and turned her into a domestic drudge.
Presently she was set to mind the children. Anne-
Josephe fled from Liege back to her father's house,
only to find that her new stepmother treated her no
better than her aunt had done. Then she and her
two brothers fled from the paternal roof.
The elder of the boys went to Germany, and stayed
with relatives of the name of Campinados. This name
is worth noting, because Mile Theroigne admitted
that she presently assumed it herself. Her younger
brother accompanied her to Xhoris, in the principality
of Stavelot, now in the province of Liege, to stay
with connections of her father's. Here, too, her lines
seemed to have fallen in unpleasant places. She was
now thirteen years old, and was forced to work very
hard, harder almost than her strength allowed ; nor
did she find compensation in the affection of her
relatives. Feeling life to be unendurable, she returned
to her aunt's house at Liege, but was treated there no
better than before. Once more it became necessary to
make a fresh start. In the face of her aunt's protests,
and sacrificing all her childish possessions, Theroigne
escaped from the conditions she found insupportable

The Peasant 23
and went to Sougne, in the province of Limburg,
where she learnt to herd cows. In this humble calling
she spent a year, when, actuated once more by the
uncontrollable restlessness which seems to have been
one of her chief characteristics, she went back to Liege
and took a situation as a seamstress. Still dissatisfied,
she begged hospitality of another aunt of the name of
Clamend, at Xhoris. But no sooner had she arrived
there than she became acquainted with a strange lady,
who apparently took a fancy to her, and asked her
to accompany her to Antwerp and take charge of her
little daughter. Her new employer, however, did not
wish to pay Theroigne's expenses from Xhoris to Ant
werp. Theroigne appealed to her aunt Clamend, who
sided with the girl's grandmother in advising her not
to travel so far with a lady about whom she knew
nothing. Theroigne insisted, and won the day, her
aunt finally contributing towards the travelling ex
penses. Some weeks later Mile Theroigne's new
mistress abandoned her at the inn where they had
been staying in Antwerp, and she might have been
left destitute had it not been for an English lady at
the same place, a certain Mme Colbert, who interested
herself in the girl's forlorn position and engaged her
as a companion and governess to her children.
Theroigne was now sixteen. She had more charm
than actual beauty. She was well grown, but not
tall, with bright eyes and chestnut-coloured hair, rosy
cheeks, and a wonderful vivacity that seemed in
exhaustible. Never for a moment was she dull or
inactive. When she was happy she blossomed like
a flower on which the sun shines. There was a

24 A Woman of the Revolution
sparkle in her eyes, alertness in every change of
expression, and life in every gesture. She often
hummed at her work, and she spoke at this time in
the language of the Walloon peasants, which, crude
as it may be, sounded like music when uttered by
her tuneful voice. There was harmony and a sense
of completeness about Theroigne which made it diffi
cult to remember that she was only an uneducated
girl of the lower classes. Concerning the extent of
her knowledge at this period it is difficult to discover
anything definite. The most that can be said is that
she possessed an insatiable love of learning. She had
been for a short while in a convent school, but the
fact that she had moved from place to place in her
youth made it impossible that she should have had
much opportunity of study. Her letters, even of later
years, are not the letters of a well-taught individual ;
but many of the best-trained women of that day dis
closed the same faults in writing. She confessed that
when a young woman she was very ignorant, and
could hardly read or write ; but this admission was
made under examination in prison, when it was to
her advantage to feign to be illiterate. The appoint
ment of governess which she claimed to have filled
is no guide as to her own attainments, as her teaching,
if it existed at all, was probably most elementary. But
any one who knew the value of education as Theroigne
did — for she continually exhorted her brothers to make
the most of their chances, even at the cost of work
ing all night long — was bound to make the best of
her many opportunities of acquiring information. She
was soon to travel, to live in luxury in several of the

The Peasant 25
capitals of Europe, to study operatic singing, to con
sort with well-informed men, to acquire books and
music, and to gather experience from the wide field
of human struggles and human sorrows ; so that, taking
into account a natural aptitude for assimilating know
ledge, Theroigne cannot be regarded as ignorant or
stupid, although she was by no means brilliant intel
lectually. Her benefactress, Mme Colbert, was the first to
discover her genuine musical talent, and to turn it
to account by allowing her to train her voice. For
four years Theroigne remained in the household of
this lady, who treated her kindly. During that period
they stayed at Ghent, Malines, and Brussels, and from
there they travelled to London. All this time
Theroigne's relatives had no idea of her whereabouts,
and she gave as an excuse for not writing to tell them
her ignorance of this ordinary accomplishment. But
the truth was probably a litde more complex. We
have only Theroigne's own word to go upon as to
the way in which the years of her early womanhood
were spent. She did not wish to divulge anything
that happened to her, for very obvious reasons.
In London a foretaste of romance came into her
life. A rich young Englishman who visited Mme
Colbert's house began paying court to her in a manner
she felt to be honest and, at the same time, delicate.
He was good-looking, persuasive, apparently in
earnest, and he uttered words of passionate love to
this charming untutored girl of twenty. Realising the
difference in their positions, Mme de Colbert, who
took a motherly interest in Theroigne, warned her to

26 A Woman of the Revolution
be on her guard, and finally, when the young man
insisted on continuing his importunities, she forbade
him the house. But he never ceased to write passionate
love-letters to the object of his adoration — Theroigne
does not say that she was unable to read these — and
he walked up and down outside the house for hours
in the hope of catching a glimpse of the woman who
had fascinated him. Theroigne followed the wise
counsels which had been given her, and sent back his
letters with a message that he must write to her no
more. She confessed artlessly that it would have hurt
her terribly if he had obeyed. For a whole year his
attentions in no way relaxed, and his constancy
inspired in her a love as keen as his own.
One evening Mme Colbert was out. The young
man made his way into the house, and with passionate
insistence begged Theroigne to elope with him. At
first she protested, but he would not take her refusals,
and continued to make advances which she found it
difficult to repel. She was on the point of screaming
for help, when he put his hand over her mouth to
silence her, and carried her off by main force to the
carriage which he had waiting. Theroigne spoils this
dramatic account of her abduction by adding that his
promises sounded sincere, and her affection for him
stifled her prudence. She was not an entirely un
willing victim therefore. Her chief sentiment appears
to have been a feeling of regret at leaving her pro
tectress in this unexpected and seemingly ungrateful
manner. The eloping couple, according to Theroigne's
account, went to live upon the young man's estate

The Peasant 27
near London, where they were to have been married.
Her abductor was not of age, and how he came to
have an estate of his own is not explained. At any
rate, he was expecting soon to be in possession of a
considerable fortune. He thought the wise course to
take was to wait until he had inherited his money
before entering into a marriage with a penniless bride
of no family without his parents' consent, feeling
certain that such a step would meet with their entire
disapproval. Theroigne admits in her rather confused
narrative that, had she wished it, she was sure he
would have married her then and there in spite of
everything. She preferred to wait, so that he should
not risk the loss of his fortune.
When at length they were in possession of the
money it brought them no happiness. Theroigne's
lover turned out to be a spendthrift. He took her
to Paris, and there lavished his money on luxury and
vice. Theroigne did her best to check this taste for
excess, but was unable to arrest his downward career.
Feeling certain that it was impossible to hope for her
lover's reform as long as he remained among his boon
companions in Paris, she did everything she could to
persuade him to return to England. At last he agreed
to this plan.
" If," says Mile Theroigne naively, " I had married
my lover when we were back in England we might very
easily have remained happy until this 'day." But
vice had eaten into his heart. He no longer cared
for the simple joys of the country. He returned to
London, and left his mistress behind. She, feeling
assured that it would not be for her happiness to

28 A Woman of the Revolution
bind her life irretrievably to that of this dissolute
young man, decided to flee from him. This she
did, not without much grief, for she still loved him.
It was the year 1787.
Her lover had behaved very generously to her.
She was now in possession of a sum of two hundred
thousand livres. She placed forty or fifty thousand
livres, according to her own statement, out at interest
in the hands of a friend.
There is probably a great deal of truth in this
version of Theroigne's lapse from the path of strict
virtue, yet it must be accepted with caution. Was
the young Englishman of wealth and position her
first lover ? He was not her only lover. Another
story which bears as little guarantee of scrupulous
accuracy as Theroigne's was told by the Baron de
Mengin-Salabert, who arrived at Kufstein in possession
of a detailed report of her past life made out in
connection with the procedure of the Chatelet as to
her doings on the famous 5th and 6th of October,
1789. \
The little one, when about thirteen years of age,
had herded cows, said the clean-shaven, powdered
baron, who had been a priest until the Revolution
had deprived him of his living and sent him to dwell
in the Low Countries. Growing weary of her humble
station, and feeling within her the power to rise to
a very different sphere of life, she determined to
go out into the world and seek her fortune. Her
first venture was in domestic service at Liege, and
this position was not likely to extinguish the fire of
her ambition. Quite to the contrary, declared the

The Peasant 29
facetious baron — who enjoyed his joke more than was
altogether consistent with one who had belonged to
the priesthood — after being a servant she felt herself
more than ever capable of playing the role of mistress,
and, with this end in view, she made the acquaintance
of a young lawyer in the town, who speedily suc
cumbed to her fascination. But growing weary of
the arrangement before long, she looked forward to
fresh adventures, and in this chance favoured her.
One day when she was washing linen on the
banks of the Meuse she began to sing. A romantic
chronicler gives some charming details of her appear
ance. She was wearing a short striped skirt, and the
cambric handkerchief that was pinned across her
shoulders left her beautiful white neck and arms
bare ; no ugly cap hid the luxuriant tresses of her
hair, which were loosely tied together with a ribbon.
Her eyes shone, and her teeth were like pearls. She
was quite alone. Her voice was peculiarly attrac
tive. She gave utterance to a melody which had all
the charm of a siren's song. As the last notes died
away she became aware of a listener. Standing behind
her was a young Englishman " with a form like An-
tinous and the head of Adonis." Fascinated and
enchanted, the new-comer was not long in remarking
that so sweet a maiden was wasted on the menial
occupation of washing, and he proposed that she
should leave her task and accompany him to Spa.
According to the baron's account, Theroigne showed
no coyness, nor did she scruple to leave one protector
for another. A promise that her musical abilities
should be developed was sufficient to make her throw

jo A Woman of the Revolution
caution to the winds. After Spa, the Englishman
took her to London, and fulfilled his word by giving
her a music-master.
She went on the concert-platform and became a
successful performer. Abandoned by her lover, con
tinues the baron, she lived alone, and after three or
four years spent in London went to Italy.
But here the baron went too fast. His zeal had
outstripped his knowledge. He might have dwelt
more carefully on the identity of Theroigne's music-
master. He knew, apparently, nothing of the visit
to Paris.
Theroigne had said very little about the stay there,
speaking more fully of her return to London. One
indiscreet word she had let fall, however, referring to
a certain individual with whom she had had financial
dealings in the French capital.
The second journey to London had been arranged
so unexpectedly that she had not had time to sell her
furniture or to rearrange her investments.
" We left suddenly," she says, " to my great con
tentment, but to the regret of my friends, especially
the one who managed my income for me, and who
desired to keep me in Paris."
Questions as to this individual being forthcoming,
she was obliged to confess, a little reluctantly, that
the gentleman had paid her attentions which had not
altogether escaped her notice, but because he was
elderly she believed that, his years precluded any pos
sibility of a warmer affection for her than might safely
have been indulged in by an uncle. She had accepted
his " more than sympathy " with gratitude and a sense

The Peasant 3.t
of absolute security. He had shown his affection in
a manner suitable to his years and to her position
and tastes. He had given her good advice, he had
had a say in the matter of her household arrangements,
and he wished to teach her French. Nothing could
have been more innocent. " From time to time," she
adds, in that childlike spirit which is so charming,
" I found presents lying on my toilet-table, valuable
presents, without my being able to guess how they
came to be there, or who was the anonymous donor."
At the moment of leaving Paris she discovered all.
The old gentleman was the author of these mysterious
gifts. She did not fail to impress upon her examiners the
surprise that she had felt when she knew the truth.
" He reproached me with my coldness," she declares.
" I confess I thought it very ridiculous that he dared
to speak to me in the way he did. The whole thing
offended me, and I forced him to take back all his
presents. If I had known to whom to send them
in the first instance, certainly I should not have kept
them for a single moment." But here Theroigne
would have done better to spare her indignation and
her hearers' blushes. She implies that there were so
many possible sources from which the presents might
have come, that to trace their origin would have been
no easy task.
" In spite of my honesty," she continues in her
" Confessions," " he was not to be deterred from
writing to me in England and later to Italy " — letters
which she considered most unsuitable. " They wounded
me to the last degree, and I made him aware of it.

32 A Woman of the Revolution
Since then I have had to complain of this man on
various grounds. ..."
All the time she knew that several of the letters
were in evidence against her. Her judges, after read
ing them, were obliged to state that her relations
with their writer, the Marquis de Persan, were not
to be dismissed as lightly as she would have liked
them to be.
A deed was in existence concerning the fifty thousand
livres she was supposed to have placed in the care of the
Marquis at an interest of ten per cent. It was dated
April 2 ist, 1786, and worded as follows :
" Anne Nicolas Doublet de Persan, Chevalier,
Marquis de Persan, Comte de Dun and de Pateau,
acknowledges his liability to Demoiselle Anne-Josephe
Theroigne, minor, living in the Rue de Bourbon-
Villeneuve, to the extent of an annuity for life of
five thousand livres exempt from all tax or deduction,
payable in two sums, at an interval of six months, this
arrangement being made in return for the fifty thousand
livres which the said Marquis de Persan acknowledges
and confesses to have received from the said Demoiselle
Theroigne. He is at liberty to liquidate the debt by
returning the said sum to her."
Was this document genuine, or, which is more
probable, was it a method invented by her protector
to save a young woman's reputation and at the same
time ensure her a good income ? Theroigne kept up
the fiction for several years. She declared she had
amassed her little fortune in England and only in
vested it in Paris. It had been her intention, she said,
to return to her father's house under an assumed

THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT.
From a painting attributed to Greuze.
Reproduced by permission of Braun Clement et Cie.

33

The Peasant 3$
name, explaining that she was a widow whose husband
had left her well provided for. She was prevented
from carrying out this scheme by the untimely death
of her father, as will presently appear. Her affairs
were in the hands of two bankers. One in London,
a Mr. Hammersley (she spelt it Hammerslys), was
probably a partner in Messrs. Ransom, Morland &
Hammersley, of 57, Pall Mall, a firm connected with
musical interests who received subscriptions for operas
and concerts at that time. The other was a well-
known Paris banker, Perregaux (whose name oddly
enough is mixed up with the story of the Queen's
necklace), to whom she wrote voluminous letters,
many of them preserved.
Whence her income was really derived it is difficult
to be certain, but that she had plenty of money at
this period of her life and enjoyed spending it may
be regarded as convincing. Both in London and in
the Rue de Bourbon-Villeneuve, Paris, she led a life
of ease and pleasure ; frequenting the opera, supping
at restaurants, making a stir wherever she went on
account of her youth and beauty, her sparkling eyes
and her dazzling diamonds, her pretence of modesty,
which revealed, when once dispelled, a happy confi
dence and a yielding familiarity. She was fresh and
lithe and charming, and her reserve melted like snow
before the sun of wealth and kindness. Her musical
talents were undeniable and they won success both in
London and Paris. It was said that she sacrificed
everything for notoriety, for triumph on the concert-
platform ; that she exercised lavishly her power to
gather laurels and inspire violent passions ; that she
3

3 6 A Woman of the Revolution
desired to illumine all the gatherings she honoured
by her presence as though she herself were their
centre, their brilliant sun. Her grace, her originality,
the play of her mobile features, her coquetry, taste,
and elocution were gifts which ensured the achieve
ment of her aims. " Persons who like myself used to
frequent the theatres and public places of entertainment
before 1789," wrote Comte Thomas d'Espinchal in
his "Journal de Voyages et de Faits relatifs a la
Revolution," " can remember that only a few years
previously there often appeared at the Opera, and
particularly frequently at the Concert Spirituel, alone
in a large box a fair unknown who called herself
Mme Campinados, covered with diamonds, having
her own carriage, coming from a foreign country,
wearing the air of une fille entretenue, but giving no
account of the resources at her disposal. This was
the same person who, after the Revolution, appeared
under the name of Mile Thdroigne de Mericourt."
D'Espinchal, who accused her wrongfully of many
excesses and even atrocities, described her as litde,
not very pretty, and wearing already a somewhat
dissipated air, although, he said, she did not then
show signs of the Yerocious character she exhibited
later. If it were indeed to M. de Persan that Theroigne
owed her livelihood, the means by which she obtained
her musical training, her luxuries and diamonds,
it can only be admitted that she appears in the
worst light possible, for she neither loved him, nor
did she apparently show the least gratitude to him
for all he gave her. The Marquis was a personage.

The Peasant 37
Born in 1728, he had become a Councillor of the
Parlement of Paris at the age of twenty, and Maitre
des Requetes in 1754. He married a Mile Aymeret
de Gazeau ; and at the time he knew Theroigne, when
he was himself nearly sixty years old, he had a son
over thirty. He was only distantly connected with
Mme Doublet de Persan of salon fame, although
inaccurate biographers made him out to be her son.
During the continuance of the strange relationship
between marquis and peasant-maid — that is to say, for
three or four years — there was a constant struggle for
the supremacy of the love of the former over the
" demon of music " possessed by the latter. But
Theroigne was to win the day, and de Persan was left
disconsolate and disillusioned. Probably their liaison
began in 1785, perhaps in 1784, and before 1787 her
affections, if she ever indulged in any towards him,
had wandered elsewhere, and the connection was
finally broken in the following year. His letters are
full of reproaches, and he condemns her for not having
kept to her bargain — such a bargain as any courtesan
might have made.
" You are right in saying that all things here are a
matter of exchange," he writes, " but it is necessary
that it should be a fair exchange. You know that my
attachment to you will last for ever, and you say in
response that the feelings you have for me will be as
my behaviour merits. There is no equality about this.
When you apparently gave yourself to me, I en
deavoured to obtain for you all that you could desire ;
even going beyond my means to do so. What have I
had in return ? Often harshness, and never a continu-

38 A Woman of the Revolution
ance of the affections which alone give happiness.
Have I found this sweet gentleness, this abandonment,
this confidence that a man who loves has a right to
expect from the woman who is attached to him ? "
Another time he writes to her : " You will not doubt
that it will be a pleasure to me to see you, especially
if you will treat me as a cherished lover. But if you
put on airs I shall be miserable."
At the end of October 1787, about a month
later, he reproaches her anew. " What have I done,
dear one, that you should write to me with the
coldness which is apparent from your last two
letters ? I answered you with sentiments of the
most sincere attachment. I have always counted on
your affection, and I hope that you do not mean to
give me cause for grief; to me who have never
caused you grief. Have I not always done what
ever you wanted ? You desire to part from me ?
You wish to exploit your talent and woo a fortune?
Your mind must be wandering ! I brought you to a
better way of thinking, and you agreed with me when
I had a talk with you some time ago. You made me
pay a year's more annuity than I owed you, so that
you might be furnished with all you required.
Nevertheless I did it.
" Grant me a year to pay off the remainder. You
might very easily do me this favour. I will pay you
every six months, including the interest, and your
income as well. Send me a receipt for the half-year as
a sign that you agree. It seems to me that I merit
this mark of friendship.
" As you say you desire to part from me, I expect

The Peasant 39
you to deal me this blow, although I can hardly
believe that you will wound me so deeply, for I confess
to you that if I saw you exploit your talents and go on
the stage you would be destroying the good opinion
1 have formed of you. I should not think it worthy
of you. I sacrificed everything to hinder you from
making this mistake in connection with David two
years ago. You do not do your true friends justice.
If you have decided not to return to France, sell me
your furniture. I ask this as a privilege. You will
at all events find it ready for you if you return. . . ."
This reference to Giacomo David or Davide, the
great Italian tenor usually known as " David le pere,"
is significant. He was probably the first who inspired
Theroigne with a wish to break away from her
amorous old protector, the Marquis de Persan.
Born at Presezzo, near Bergamo, in 1750, David was
thirty-five when Theroigne met him in Paris in 1785,
whither he had come to take part in the concerts
spirituel which were then at the height of their popu
larity. These concerts, which had become quite a
musical institution in France, dated from the early
years of the reign of Louis XV. They were held in
the Salle des Suisses of the Tuileries on the occasion of
religious festivals when the Opera House was closed ;
that is to say, not more than twenty-four times in the
year. Foreign artists usually met with a courteous
and often an enthusiastic reception there. Among
the most illustrious who sang in Paris at this period
were Cafarelli, Farinelli, Raff, Mme Mara, and Davide.
The first appearance of the last-named was not an
unqualified success, owing, it was said, to the fact that

4° > A Woman of the Revolution
the Parisian public was not then accustomed to the florid
Italian style. But at least he won one devout admirer.
Possessed by the dangerous demon of music already
referred to, Theroigne was suddenly seized by the
desire to follow Davide to Italy and to sing with him
there. Probably the musician, flattered as he may
have felt by the girl's evident adoration, was too
discreet to take advantage of it. It is fairly obvious
that if he had been a willing partner to any such
arrangement, no powers of persuasion exercised by
de Persan would have been sufficient to prevent the
hot-headed Theroigne's " mistake," even at the cost he
mentions of " sacrificing everything." It is far more
likely that Davide's domestic ties were too binding to
permit him to enter into any compromising connection
with a woman, however beautiful. He was rewarded
for his discretion in the person of his talented son
Giovanni, who earned for his father and teacher the
title by which he was known to posterity.
The danger from an attachment to Davide once
averted, de Persan expected to recover his former
influence over his mistress. In this he was mistaken.
Her submission was not to be of long duration. Self-
willed, impulsive, whole-hearted in whatever she set
out to do, already at the mercy of states of exaltation
which were to increase when fed by the excitement
of the Revolution, Theroigne soon broke loose and
followed the musical tendencies which at that moment
called to her more strongly than any other passion.
She describes her return to England, but as regards
her life there all is conjecture. In his letters M. de
Persan upbraids her for her callous disregard of his

The Peasant 41
wishes that she should remain in France. Was she
with a lover, as she declares in her " Confessions," or was
she alone ? Was she secretly married ? Why should
she have concealed the fact ? She never admitted
having had a daughter, although two receipts were
brought forward at her examination in prison which
referred to expenses connected with the death of a little
girl of the name of Frangoise-Louise, otherwise called
Mile Septenville, the daughter of Mile Anne-Josephe
Theroigne, or Campinados. The documents are dated
respectively April 18th and 19th, 1788, and refer
to sums of sixty-seven livres for a doctor of the
name of Cervenon at Paris, and three hundred and
sixty livres for board and other expenses connected
with illness to one called Kertzen. Not a word isv
there as to the child's age, nor a clue as to its father.
One thing at least is certain with regard to her visit
to England. She thought of increasing her means by
singing at concerts, and in trying to find the best music-
master in London she fell into the clutches of the
notorious Tenducci, with whom she was presently to
sign a curious agreement.
Tenducci's career in the United Kingdom had been
chequered by strange adventures. He was born in
1736, at Siena, and in his youth steps had been taken
to render his voice of a peculiar quality and timbre —
a custom which was usual among opera-singers in Italy
of that date, and which survived in the choir of the
Sistine Chapel until the middle of the last century.
About 1760 Tenducci left Italy for England, where he
speedily gained a vast reputation as a singer at Covent
Garden and elsewhere. He was associated with the

42 A Woman of the Revolution
celebrated Dr. Arne, and took part with Peretti and
Miss Brent in this composer's opera, Artaxerxes. In
1764 Walpole heard Tenducci in London, and described
him as " a moderate tenor." Not long after this the
singer went to Ireland, where he disgraced himself by
abducting a young heiress. Villiers tells the story, more
or less accurately, in his " Souvenirs d'un Deporte " :
" Tenducci, the Italian singer, proud of his successes
at the concerts spirituel in Paris, came to London, and
from thence went to Ireland, where, in spite of his
hideous face, this new Abelard managed to please a
young heiress and elope with her. This event, which
made a great deal of noise, was the occasion for a law
suit which for many years kept all England interested
and amused, and almost ended in the hanging of
Tenducci. The laws of the country making no refer
ence to the condition of the singer, the judges were
greatly embarrassed. Tenducci maintained that no
law prevented him from contracting a legitimate
marriage. Everything was arranged, however. The
young Irishwoman was returned to her family a virgin,
and Tenducci was set free from prison to go back to
the stage."
The other side of the story appears in a document
printed in 1768 by Mrs. Dora Tenducci, which she
entitles " A true and genuine narrative of Mr. and
Mrs. Tenducci in a letter to a friend at Bath, giving a
full account from their marriage in Ireland to the
present time." This pamphlet appears to be a true
account of the persecutions which attended the rash
elopement. Tenducci was seized and cast into prison
at Cork, Dora was captured and kept in confinement

The Peasant 43
by relatives who brutally ill-treated her. It appears
that the lovers had met frequently at a friend's house
near Dublin, that Dora's love of music had been the
cause of the original friendship, that her parents had
invited the tenor to their house, and that he had given
her lessons in singing without taking any fees. This
point was of technical importance in the case, for it
was endeavoured to prove against Tenducci that he had
abducted a pupil. The defence was that the young
lady had married him entirely of her own free will.
In the Public Advertiser for September 16th, 1766,
a note occurs in the Irish news to the effect that
" Mr. Tenducci desires, by a letter from his confinement,
as an act of justice, to contradict the mention of his
having been a tutor to the young lady whom he
married." The tenor went so far as to state that he
never was entertained as a singing- or music-master
by any person or persons since he had performed in
the kingdom, had never taught the art of singing, and
consequently had never had a pupil. Nor was he
received by the friends of the young lady — whose
name he would not mention but with the utmost
respect — on any such footing.
The persecution of the young wedded couple went
on for a year. Tenducci was a spendthrift and con
tinually in debt, which fact greatly aggravated the
audacity of his attempt to carry off an heiress. At
length Dora's father ceased to oppose the match.
The young wife's narrative, which had ended in
August 1767, received an additional note by September
that a remarriage had taken place and that she was
allowed to remain with her husband in a chosen retreat.

44 A Woman of the Revolution
Another version of this curious episode is to be
found in the Morning Post for' June 16th, 1781, under
the title of "Authentic Anecdotes of the celebrated
Tenducci." The Journal states that " about fourteen
years ago this remarkable character visited Ireland,
and from his acknowledged capacity in the science of
music, added to a natural pleasantry in his disposition,
which suited the temper of the natives, he soon became
a favourite. The females of Ierne are not proof
against those tender sensations created by ' concord
of sweet sounds ' ; and Tenducci was so unfortunate
as to be the object of a lady's affections, who was
beautiful in person, elegant in her manners, a perfect
proficient in music, and descended from an ancestry
both antient and respectable. After some tender,
stolen interviews on the subject of Almighty Love,
an honourable union was agreed upon, and Cupid
conducted the fair native of Hibernia to a neighbour
ing priest, who joined her in wedlock to this son of
Romulus. It is thought the pages of romantic love
do not furnish such another instance of persecution
as Tenducci suffered in Ireland, in consequence of
this connexion ; but it had no other effect upon the
fond couple, at that time, than to unite them still
stronger in a mutual affection. After many fruitless
efforts made by the family for the purpose of
separating them, it was agreed that they should leave
the kingdom and warble their woodnotes in some
foreign land for a subsistance. The first place these
celebrated fugitives visited after their departure was
the capital of Caledonia ; here they were received
with open arms. Tenducci was remarkable for

The Peasant 45
singing the Scotch music, which, it is acknowledged,
reaches the heart with greater force than the com
positions of any other nation ; and his bride was little
inferior to him, either in the excellence of her voice,
or the elegance of her taste. They continued here
for some time, until he was called to London in
consequence of an engagement at the Opera. On
the expiration of his agreement with the Managers,
they changed the scene, and visited Italy, mutually
participating in all the enjoyments of domestic blandish
ment. But alas, who can command a life of happiness ?
The lady, as she advanced in years, had acquired an
experience destructive of her peace ; she found her
self uneasy, and would sit and sigh 'the live long
night away." Tenducci grew fatigued in his turn,
and a separation ensued : she returned to England,
and shortly after an application was made to the
Conclave at Doctors' Commons for a divorce, which
was obtained to the satisfaction of both parties. On
the completion of this business, Tenducci again visited
Britain ; and so devoted, says our correspondent, is he
to Scotland, that he goes every summer to Edinburgh ;
no foreigner, we are informed, was ever so hospitably
received in that country as Tenducci ; and if we
are not very much deceived, few people entertain a
more grateful sense of past obligations than this
disciple of Calliope."
Tenducci appears on the scene again some twenty
years later in his connection with Theroigne, who, it is to
be hoped, knew nothing of the manner of man he was.
It is in her favour, perhaps, that he deceived her as he
had done many other women. " In spite of his age "

46 A Woman of the Revolution
(which was now over fifty), continues Villiers in his
account, " his ugliness, and his still more hideous
character, . . . Tenducci doted on our illustrious
Comtesse de Campinados. She brought him back to
Paris in 1788, and as she then had many diamonds,
much silver plate, and a quantity of gold, he took
possession of her, refused to leave her, travelled with
her to Italy, devoured all her possessions, and died at
the end of a year.
" Mme Theroigne de Mericourt, having nothing else
left, returned to Paris, where, as is well known, she
became the corypheus of Robespierre's tricoteuses."
Here mistake is heaped on mistake. Tenducci did
not die until the following century, and Theroigne, who
was not absolutely ruined by the musician, never joined
the furies of the guillotine.
The truth, as far as it can be ascertained, was as
follows. In 1785, whilst Theroigne was still presum
ably under the protection of the Marquis de Persan,
though ready to leave him for the first musician or
foreigner with musical abilities who presented himself,
Tenducci was at the height of his reputation as a
teacher, if not as a soloist, in London. In the Morning
Herald and Daily Advertiser for July 2nd of that year,
it may be seen that he had under his care " a pupil
who promises to become the greatest singer that ever
was in this country." This was not Theroigne, but
a sister-in-law to the famous Professor Cramer. " Under
so able a hand," continues the journal, "we do not
doubt that her future fame is assured, particularly when
we remember the improvement he has made in the
voice of the present first opera woman — so powerful

The Peasant 47
a rival will perhaps bring down the insolence of the
supercilious Mara, as well as add honours to Tenducci."
Mme Mara was at the height of her wonderful powers,
and, like other famous opera-singers, was inclined to be
capricious at times.
Theroigne, then, aflame with her desire to sing
before the public, had discovered a musician with a
splendid reputation as a producer of virtuose available
as a teacher. Hideous, repulsive, and a deformity as he
must surely have appeared to her, all physical drawbacks
were forgotten in her ambition and a passionate devo
tion to music. She had admittedly taken up her plan
of singing in order to earn money. " The more," she
adds, with one of her sudden scruples, which appear
oddly out of place when viewed in the light of many
of her actions, " because in England prejudices against
singers hardly exist, or have very little importance.
The position is not regarded unfavourably, especially
if one limits oneself to singing at concerts."
Tenducci' s usual charge for lessons was half a guinea
each, but Theroigne, feeling unable to afford so large
a sum, offered him eight shillings, and consented to
have her lessons at odd hours whenever it suited her
master. Moreover, this price was not to be paid until
she had earned it by singing at concerts. Tenducci
seemed content with this arrangement, and took her
to a lawyer, who drew up an agreement between
master and pupil. It was not surprising that Theroigne,
in spite of her apparent astuteness, was imposed upon
by the unscrupulous musician. For one thing, she
knew little English and less Italian. " There was
not a single person who could have advised me," she

48 A Woman of the Revolution
says in her " Confessions." " I had no experience. I
was acting in good faith, but was dealing with a scamp
who had a very different contract drawn up to the
one he described to me. It did not contain any of
the things we had agreed upon. Everything he
substituted was to my disadvantage. It was a false
agreement in all the clauses, and I had the imprudence
to sign it without having it read over to me and
explained. Amongst other things there was a clause
relating to a forfeit of a thousand louis if I failed to
carry out my part of the contract, and other conditions
which utterly revolted me when at length I had the
deed read and explained to me for the first time in
Italy. A statement was even inserted that I should
sing at the theatre, which was simply a lie, as it would
have been easy for me to prove."
In the contract Theroigne was described by three
different names, which led to considerable confusion.
First of all she appears as Anna Gioseppa le Comte,
an appellation which she said had been given her by
Tenducci ; secondly as Anna Gioseppa Campinados,
which was her grandmother's name, and which she
adopted " by a fantasy which appeared to her quite
innocent " ; and, strangely enough, the third time she
is described as Anna Gioseppa Theroigne Spinster.
This manner of describing her absolutely nonplussed
her examiners at Kufstein. Not recognising the
English word " spinster," and receiving no help from
Theroigne (who had either never known its meaning,
had forgotten, or was resolved for purposes of her
own not to explain that it meant she was unmarried),
they attempted to trace the existence of a possible

The Peasant 49
Mr. Spinster who might have been, had he existed,
the father of her child.
" What does the name conceal," inquired her inter
locutor in prison — " a secret ? "
"You have no right to ask me that question,"
replied Theroigne angrily ; " my private life concerns
no one."
He still pondered. Spinster of the 73rd regiment
in England. Who was he ? A husband ? A lover ?
He would never know. " We cannot force your
confession," he said.
This curious mistake has since been made by other
chroniclers, whose exhaustive research on this point
has likewise proved fruitless.
Having signed the contract drawn up in favour of
the unscrupulous and grotesque musician, she also
agreed to travel with him to Italy, accompanied by
her two brothers and a half-brother. She tells in
her " Confessions " the story of the manner in which
their journey came about.
" Having no distrust, and still acting from good
faith," she declares, " moreover, feeling assured that
the contents of the contract were according to the
arrangement I had proposed, I quietly prepared to
return to my country to offer money to my father,
afterwards meaning to go to Paris and sell the furniture
which I had left there.
" My music-master, whose involved affairs, as I
discovered later, made it necessary for him to flee
from London, ; knew I had money. Being cunning
as well as a rogue, he foresaw, not without reason,
that my father, pleased to have me with him again,

So A Woman of the Revolution
might wish to keep me and my money, and that I
might be compelled to renounce my career as a singer.
My master prepared to come with me for this reason,
under pretext that business was calling him to Paris.
In reality he hoped to obtain the forfeit of a thousand
louis, and to return to London alone to pay his debts."
Here Theroigne credits Tenducci with too much
honesty. " Not knowing the real motives which forced him
to leave England," she continues, " I accepted his
offer, with the intention of doing him a good turn,
and for the sake of continuing my lessons.
" In order not to lose time I carried a small piano
forte in my carriage. This procured for me the
pleasure of singing as often as I wished, even whilst
travelling. So we set out.
" When approaching the Ardennes and near the
village of Jupille, I was suddenly informed of bad news.
My father was dead. I thought I too should die of
grief. It appeared they had written to me at London,
but the letter reached England after my departure.
" I had therefore to modify my plans. After having
given a little money to my stepmother, I took my
brothers with me and went to Paris. There I placed
in the public funds forty thousand livres at eight per
cent., to give me an income of three thousand two
hundred livres. In the meantime my master, installed
with us at Paris for the purpose of attending to his
supposed affairs, found himself very much embarrassed.
The death of my father had spoilt his plans, and he
dared not return to England, as he had nothing where
with to satisfy his creditors.

JEROME PETION

51

The Peasant 53
" He tried therefore to persuade me to leave for
Italy. He represented all the advantages which would
accrue in the way of education for my brothers. He
insisted above all on the facilities I should have in that
country for perfecting myself as a musician. One
of my brothers who had also a taste for music would
be in a good school, and so forth.
" In short, I decided to take the journey to Italy, I,
my three brothers, and my master. Tenducci promised
to reimburse me for the expenses of the journey. In
the interest of my brothers, in the interest of my art,
I thought I was doing the right thing in undertaking
this fatal journey."
The actual date at which this ill-assorted couple left
London is difficult to determine. In April 1787
Tenducci appears to have been still teaching in the
English capital, as on May 3rd of that year one of
his pupils was singing "for the first time on any stage"
at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. With regard
to his indebtedness, the declaration of his bankruptcy
is to be found in the London Qazette of February
: 2-1 6th, 1788, in which he is described as Ferdinando
Tenducci, now or late of Dean Street, Soho, music-
seller, dealer, and chapman. He was cited to surrender
himself to the Commissioners on February 21st
and 28th, and on March 29th. This is all the
evidence from which the date of departure may
be conjectured, but it is safe to assume that it was
somewhere between May 1787 and February 1788.
Nor can the length of their stay in Paris be definitely
fixed. A letter written by the Marquis de Persan
shortly after Theroigne had left for Italy throws some
4

54 A Woman of the Revolution
light on her movements. From it Theroigne would
appear to have shown him but scant consideration, nay,
hardly bare courtesy. He complained that he was not
allowed the privilege of seeing her alone for more than
a few moments, after all that he had done for her. It
was with difficulty she had obtained his acquiescence
to her visit to London, and she far outstayed the limit
he had fixed for the journey. On her return to Paris
she had broken entirely away from his influence. There
is one significant passage in the letter. " You were
always duped," he says, " by all the Italians and
foreigners with whom you made friends." This state
ment throws a light on Theroigne's revolutionary
career. She was led far too easily by her companions.
De Persan' s letter reveals his bitter disappointment in
her. " My sentiments towards you will never change,"
he writes ; " can you say that you have anything to
complain of in me ? It is true that I could not come
to see you before you left. Two reasons prevented
me. Business was the first, the second was that I
knew I had very little influence on your manner of
thinking. When you left for England, it was only
to be for two months. You remained there for six.
On your return to France I saw you still had the
same passion for music. You were bound by relations
with a virtuoso in whose company you intended to
go to Spain. From Paris you went to your own
country. After that you were taken by a desire to
go to Italy. Can I find in that the slightest mark
of friendship and gratitude for me ? With difficulty
I saw you alone for a quarter of an hour. I foresaw

The Peasant 55
what would happen with your master. You always
treated me badly, though I never did aught but good
to you, and you were always duped by all the Italians
and foreigners with whom you made friends.
" You were right to give me particulars about
yourself and your family. No one will ever take a
greater interest in them than I. If you believed
that I neglected you, it is necessary for you to let
me know as soon as your season at Genoa ends. You
will have proved by then how the one who has sworn
to love you for ever will have carried out his bargain.
What did you tell me when you went to England ?
That it would not interrupt our friendship ; yet when
you return to France, I know that you have entered
into an engagement for five years. Did you ever keep
a single promise that you gave me ? Tell me, which
of us two has a right to complain of the other ? Yes,
chere amie, you have treated both my heart and my
purse very badly.
" Adieu, dear one. Count on the feelings with
which you have inspired me, and which, in spite of
the wrong you have done me, will only end with the
life of him who will love and honour you always.
"De Persan.
" P.S. — I see with pleasure the progress you have
made in your studies, because you write French far
better than you did. It is strange that you should
grow perfect in this language whilst you are in Italy.
I fear the demon of music which possesses you. It
has not helped you at all so far."
The Marquis was a shrewd man of the world and

56 A Woman of the Revolution
perhaps no one understood Theroigne better than he
at this period. He foresaw that her impetuosity
might be the cause of her undoing. It was apparent
in everything she undertook ; in her music, her friend
ships, her revolutionary activities. She advanced
blindly, without pause or forethought, and she dashed
herself against the obstacles which appeared in her path
without calculating the danger she ran of injuring
her own powers and leaving the obstruction exactly
where it stood before. Of stuff like this martyrs are
made !
She had not been in Genoa for long before she
realised that Tenducci was utterly unscrupulous.
She broke away from him as soon as she could.
" My master threw off his mask," she explains in
her "Confessions." "He told me I should have to carry
out all the clauses of our agreement. He endeavoured
to force me to sing at the theatre of this town. I
felt it was an outrage. I took the advice of honour
able people. I wrote to my friends. I consulted my
lawyers. All of them assured me that under the
circumstances my contract was absolutely null and
void. " During these proceedings my master spread
calumnies about me everywhere. But people knew
him as well as me. My friends sent me infamous
letters which he had written about me and which I
produced against him. The man I had loved even
sent me, by an express from London, information about
my professor with an extract from bankruptcy pro
ceedings, accompanied by the advice of an English
lawyer.

The Peasant 57
"I obtained justice. I was at last free of him, but
I lost the expenses of the voyage and two hundred
louis which I had advanced on the lessons he had
still to give me. The disdain that people have for
singers in Italy and the unpleasantness I had ex
perienced disgusted me with a musical career, as
much for myself as for my brother. The latter, who
had been sent by me to Naples when my lawsuit
took place at Genoa, was recalled ; I did not wish him
to continue his studies. Being rather more accustomed
to economy, I thought we had enough to live on."
Had she but realised it, the price she had paid
for being rid of so dangerous a companion as Tenducci
was a cheap one.
When she had been there about a year the stay
at Genoa began ,to weary her, and she thought of
going to Rome. What she did in Genoa can only be
surmised. The lawsuit, the fact that she had trusted
her master only to be deceived, the mere idea of being
connected with the stage against her will gave her a
feeling of distaste for the life she had been leading.
It must be confessed that her scruples concerning the
continuation of a musical career appear so inconsistent
with her ambitions and general attitude towards life that
a suspicion creeps in as to whether she has been mis
judged in other respects. It is impossible not to call
in question her sincerity, if not her uprightness.
Perhaps her friendship with the Marquis Durazzo had
something to do with this question of her future, or
perhaps after her quarrel with Tenducci she found the
avenues to musical success closed to her. Some of
the experience she had gained was all to her advantage.

58 A Woman of the Revolution
In the course of study a classical singer acquires
general information which is useful in other walks of
life. Theroigne's financial position was now becoming
insecure. She found it difficult to obtain the supplies
from de Persan which she had come to regard as her
chief resource. She borrowed money from Durazzo
and from Perregaux, and tried to establish a corre
spondence between these two, who were both of them
financiers. She wrote to the latter concerning the
former : " I should be charmed to be the means of
making the letters of so delightful a gentleman accept
able to you. Command my services. I expect to
make some stay in this lovely town."
On March 9th, 1789, she wrote from Genoa to
thank Perregaux for the trouble he had taken to
obtain payment for her from M. de Persan, and
enclosed all the necessary papers to make such for
malities easier in the future, as another six months'
income was already due. Her letter is simple and
businesslike, although somewhat discursive, as her
letters to her Paris banker always were. He seems
to have been as easily wound round her little finger
as most of her other friends, and she never hesitates
to ask for his financial help both on behalf of herself
and her brothers, although, in his case, she was never
lacking in gratitude.
"I am much obliged to you, monsieur," she con
tinues, " for the kindness you have shown in permit
ting me to draw upon you whilst I was waiting to be
paid. I beg you to send a draft of a hundred louis
to your correspondent at Genoa, with an order to pay

The Peasant 59
M. Dourazzo and to give me the rest, so that I can
meet the expenses of my voyage to Rome ; and, at
the same time, it would be convenient if you had the
kindness to send me a letter for your correspondent at
Rome, to whom you can give my money when I am
paid. " As regards my diamonds, I will send them to you
when I reach Rome, and you can keep them until my
talents permit me to return to England.
" If you will be so kind as to send me letters of
recommendation for Rome and Naples, where I hope
to go when I have stayed in Rome some time, I
should be extremely obliged. I shall write also to
M. Hammerslys. He has already recommended me
to his correspondent at Genoa. I owe him a great
deal for all the marks of esteem which he has given
me. I had the honour yesterday to dine with your
friend the English Consul, who, for your sake, has
shown me a great deal of politeness whilst I have
been at Genoa.
" I beg your pardon for bothering you with so
many things. But I have something else to ask of you.
I believe that you can render me a service. This
would be all the more agreeable to me since I shall not
have to have recourse to my supposed friends again.
" I came to Italy to sing and to study. I brought
with me my three brothers — one of them is studying
painting, and the two others a commercial life. As I
am obliged to travel, I wished to establish the eldest
at Liege, where we have relatives who are in business.
I have need of three thousand livres, or three thousand
five hundred livres, in order to purchase a manager-

60 A Woman of the Revolution
ship for my eldest brother, so that the income derived
from it will be enough for his needs while he is study
ing in an office.
" Nevertheless I have reflected that if I should die
you would lose your money. I wish to render this
service to my brother, and I am rather embarrassed
about it. If only you would advance the sum for a
year, you should receive half of it back every six
months, with the interest, and you would be entirely
repaid in a year, counting from next month. If you
will do that for me, I assure you I should be extremely
obliged. I would have asked Mr. Hammerslys in
stead, but as my income is from France, I thought it
would be simpler to make the proposition to you. I
beg you to give me an answer to this by return of
courier, as I shall not decide upon any other course
until I know what you think about it.
" Your servant, "Anne-Josephe Theroigne.
" Please address your answer to the English Consul's,
your correspondent at Genoa."
Impulsive as ever, she changed her mind almost
immediately after despatching the letter and, instead of
awaiting a reply, sent her brother to Paris with a
second appeal dated March 22nd. " I beg you to give
ten louis to my brother who will hand you this letter,"
she writes : " he is the one of whom I spoke to you
who is going to Liege. You will then have the kind
ness to send three thousand livres to Liege, not to
include the ten louis which you will give him for his
journey.

The Peasant 61
" Please send the money to your correspondent as I
have already advised, with orders that it is only to be
used for the purchase of this appointment, and that he
will have the kindness to pay the same in my brother's
name, for fear that they would make him pay more
than the business was worth, or counsel him to invest
his money less solidly. I have no other fears on his
behalf, for the young man is very sensible, and I hope
that, considering his good carriage and manners, you
will be persuaded to take an interest in him. It is
true that I have no real claim to so much service and
good-nature on your part. You hardly know me, and
I can only ask for the generosity of a kindly heart
from you. So that I hope my brother will awaken
your interest on his own behalf, and that you will
do your best in order that he may be well recom
mended at Liege. You will therefore please give him
a letter of recommendation. He has need of nothing
beyond advice and protection, because he will be
established at Liege as soon as his talents and faculties
enable him to start in business. That is why I beg
you to give him a letter to your correspondent in order
that the latter may take him into his office and teach
him. I ask no more of you than this."
She informed Perregaux that she was leaving for
Rome and asked him to address his reply to the Poste
Restante of that town.
Her concern for the happiness of her brothers is
one of Theroigne's noble traits. They were hardly
ever out of her thoughts, and whenever she had any
money she willingly shared it with them.
Her younger brother, who was to be a painter, was

62 A Woman of the Revolution
to begin his studies at Rome. Theroigne did not
make a protracted stay in the Eternal City. The stir
and movement of the Revolution in France could not
long remain hidden. Reports of the doings in Paris
reached her ears and excited her latent curiosity.
As soon as her brother was settled in lodgings she
left Rome and made her way back to France. What
happened to her half-brother at this juncture does not
appear. He was called Pierrot and eventually he be
came a soldier.
When she was back in Paris Theroigne wrote to
Perregaux to thank him for the care he had taken
of her books and for his thoughtfulness in returning
them to her as soon as she gave him a permanent
address. Then followed the usual request for a favour
on behalf of her brother Joseph. " I hope, monsieur,"
she writes, " that you have not forgotten my request
and that you have sent a letter of recommendation on
behalf of my brother at Rome. If by any chance you
have not yet done so, I beg you to recollect this
matter and to ask your correspondent to watch over
his progress and over his person whilst he is staying
en pension, in order that we may be able to judge what
sort of an education they are giving him. I shall be
extremely obliged to you."
With Theroigne it was a case of "Love me, love
my brothers."

CHAPTER II
THE PATRIOT
THESE first rumours of the Revolution which
reached her at Rome produced a great impression
upon Theroigne. " When I learnt that a National
Assembly was in process of formation and would be
open to every one, I was enraptured by the idea," she
says in her " Confessions." In that hour the patriot was
born. In that hour the aspirant singer, the adventuress
in search of culture, fine raiment, and jewels, died
in her. She forgot that she was not French by
nationality, she forgot that she had been spending a
life of luxury and ease in Paris ; she remembered only
that she had been a peasant, that her sympathies were
with the French people, and that in a struggle for liberty
she must take their part. Her natural love of life and
movement, her thirst for knowledge and experience, her
need of a definite form of expression for her energies,
made it inevitable that she should be drawn into the
whirlpool where these qualities might be utilised and
satisfied. But as yet no thought of such activity
had entered her mind ; she was simply the student, and
desired to understand more of the political crisis which
was shaking the country to its very foundations. Hence
her interest in the National Assembly and her desire
to be present at its sittings, and to learn something
63

64 A Woman of the Revolution
of the constitutional measures brought up there for
debate. Fascinated by the prospect of witnessing the grand
and extraordinary spectacle which she believed was
about to unfold before the gaze of an astonished and
applauding world, she had hurriedly put her affairs in
order so that she might be able to depart for France
without delay. It was the nth of May, 1789, when
she reached the capital, full of curiosity and expectation,
a woman whose heart beat wholly for the people, and
who was willing to devote her untiring powers to their
services. At first she felt strangely bewildered after her return,
not in the least realising the meaning of what was going
on around her. Paris was changed as well as herself.
There was a murmur of expectancy, an undercurrent
of discontent she could not fathom. The French were
no longer the happy, busy, gay people she had known.
They gathered into knots and groups at the street-
corners, in the wine-shops, and in the public gardens.
They scowled and muttered threats, they spoke loudly
and gesticulated wildly, or they whispered ominously,
which was the most dangerous of all. They spat, they
swore, they stamped, and flourished the newspapers
they were reading, full of a tremendous purpose at
which Theroigne could only guess. She looked for
old friends who could explain matters to her, but it
was not easy to find any one who had leisure enough
to repeat to her eager ears all that had taken place
in the past few months, with which they were already
perfectly familiar. It was not the time for retrospect ;
the hour of the forward march had struck. In her

The Patriot 65
doubt she turned to the papers for enlightenment ; and
the reason of the people's agitation, which at first was
dim to her comprehension, grew gradually clearer.
The people were perishing, unable to pay the price
of bread, unable to find work ; or if at work, then
wretchedly under-paid, over-taxed, burdened with dues,
an oppressed multitude, " a vast herd scattered far
beyond the visible horizon, everywhere ill-used, starved,
and fleeced."
Women, hearing the price of food was dearer, gave
vent to shrieks of rage, men cursed their own impo
tence — both compelled to these forms of expression by
fear of actual starvation. Women and men stood for
hours in the queues outside the bakers' shops, fighting
for the sour, earthy lumps of dough which did duty
for the staff of life. Women robbed the grain markets,
men attacked loaded carts on the main roads, supposing
their burden to be grain. The determination of these
plunderers was extraordinary ; nothing seemed to tire
or repulse them. Violence produced violence. It was
not easy to stay the hand of the desperate workmen
who were fighting grimly for a bare existence.
Theroigne recognised no place for herself in this
general hubbub, and remained quietly waiting in her
lodgings at the Hotel de Toulouse. She tried to
occupy herself with the music which had hitherto been
her greatest solace. She hoped that if strife were to
come, as it seemed it must, she too might share the
people's struggle and help them, if only with her voice,
to regain their freedom. The fever that was in the
air was creeping into her blood. Insidious, slow but
sure, the poison of class-hatred was spreading more and

66 A Woman of the Revolution
more, and threatening an outbreak between the antagon
istic forces which must result eventually in bloodshed.
How, then, should Theroigne remain immune from this
infection ? " The general stir and excitement affected
me very soon," she says significantly. " I had no under
standing of the unacknowledged rights of the people,
but I naturally loved liberty. An instinct, a keen
feeling which I could not define, made me approve of
the Revolution without in the least knowing why, for I
had but little instruction."
Presently she learnt, fragment by fragment, at the
sittings of the National Assembly, and from talks with
some of the deputies, the needs of the people, the evils
they desired to remedy, and the means that were
proposed in order to bring about these longed-for
results. When Theroigne arrived in Paris the first riot of
importance had already taken place at the factory of
the paper-maker Reveillon, the employer who was
accused of believing fifteen sous a day enough for
any journeyman. Theroigne might have learnt some
thing there of the starvation wages of the people and.
their sufferings. She was too late also for the opening
of the States General at Versailles on May 5th, and
only heard afterwards of the terrible disappointment
of the populace when it was found that the Government
had made no definite proposals of reform, and that
Necker, in the opinion of the black-robed deputies of
the Tiers-etat, had utterly failed to grasp the situation.
What had they not hoped from his speech ! Being
ordered to confer on the subject of their legislative
powers with commissioners of the other two orders,

The Patriot 67
those of the third, among whom were Garat, Thouret,
Volney, Barnave, and le Chapelier, debated for a
fortnight to no purpose, as Target, Mounier, and
Rabaut de Saint-Etienne had to confess in consultation
with their colleagues. On June 10th they decided on
the bold step of inviting the nobility and clergy to
join them. All to no purpose. Then they declared
themselves ready to form a separate entity. On
June 17th, on the motion of Sieyes, the deputies
of the Tiers-etat constituted themselves the National
Assembly, the legislative body which should be open
to all, and to the sittings of which Theroigne was
looking forward with an eagerness which seems strange
in one who had lived her previous life.
Theroigne's interest in the Revolution was not
allowed to slacken for want of events to feed it during
the first few weeks of her return to Paris. On
June 4th the Dauphin died, and the Queen was
plunged in grief. It was left to the friends of the
Comte d'Artois, her brother-in-law, to complain of
the people's insolence in taking matters into their
own hands, and to attempt to discipline the rebellious
Tiers-etat by announcing that there should be no royal
session, which, owing to the closing of the Salle des
Menus, brought about the celebrated oath of the
tennis-court. On June 23rd the postponed session
took place, and the Tiers-etat, inspired to the step
by the stirring words of Mirabeau, defied the Crown.
A few days later the nobles and the clergy, at the
King's request, accepted the invitation previously offered,
and the union of the three orders was complete. The
people's parliament had taken definite shape.

68 A Woman of the Revolution
Theroigne was not slow to profit by the privileges
accorded her of listening to the debates. "The
National Assembly," she says, " seemed to me a
fine and noble spectacle ; I was struck by its majesty.
I experienced emotions of an elevated nature there,
and my soul soared to unknown heights. At first I
did not understand much of all these discussions and
deliberations, but gradually a light glowed in me, and
I realised clearly the position of the people as opposed
to that of the privileged classes. Then my sympathies
for the former grew greater, the better informed I
became, and were transformed into an ardent love when
I was persuaded that justice and right were on the side
of the people."
At first, according to her own account, Theroigne
was quite content to remain a spectator among the
crowds. She walked in the streets and squares,
questioning one person and then another, trying to
understand their hopes, their fears, and their struggles.
The early years of hardship she had endured had never
been forgotten, and served now to awaken her quick
sympathies with their sufferings. Her independent
and resourceful nature rebelled at the thought of
oppression for others. Her heart thrilled with com
passion. Her mind demanded time for reflection.
One of the busiest spots in Paris at that day was
the gardens of the Palais Royal, which had been
thrown open to the people by the Duc d'Orleans.
This space was surrounded by cafes, wine-shops, book
sellers', and gambling-hells, all of them places where
eager people congregated to hear the news which came
through from Versailles in a constant stream, brought

THE FALL OF THE BASTILLE.
From a drawing by Thevenin.

The Patriot 71
by the agents of the Duke. In the gardens themselves
men spoke treason and women cried revolt. Those
who shouted loudest against the existing form of
government received the most applause. Self-con
stituted politicians gave voice to impossible schemes
for the regeneration of the social system ; they spoke
of extinguishing privileges, of establishing numerical
sovereignty, of applying the teachings of Rousseau's
" Contrat Social." A huge audience of the floating
population applauded their diatribes, however chimeri
cal or fanatic — failures, for the most part, in the arts
or at the bar, unemployed clerks and officials, pro
fessional gamblers, touts, loungers, foreigners : all, in
short, who had no settled calling. The orators,
mounted on chairs or tables, gesticulated more and
more wildly, the crowds of agitators swayed and
rocked with the strength of their emotions. Closer
and closer the people thronged, until they became
so tightly packed that, as Arthur Young described
the scene, an apple thrown from a balcony on to the
moving floor of heads would not have reached the
ground. Those who were in favour of monarchy, aristocracy,
law, and order dared not venture into the gardens if
they valued unbroken bones and whole skins. They
ran the risk of being ducked in the fountains, of
having to dodge chairs that were flung at them, or if
not chairs then stones, bottles, or other dangerous
and unpleasant missiles. And physical activity once
aroused, windows were shattered, doors were battered
in, pavements torn up, and trees uprooted. Friends,
on the other hand, were carried in procession' shoulder
5

72 A Woman of the Revolution
high. People were no longer judged by appearance or
Wealth, but by their attitude towards the new move
ment. Theroigne realised that in this spot she could
learn much. "At the Palais Royal, where I went to
walk nearly every day," she says, " I assisted at the
dawn of the new era. That which struck me most
was the air of goodwill. Egoism seemed to have
disappeared from all our hearts. There was no longer
a distinction between the classes. We elbowed one
another, we chatted as though in the home circle.
The rich, at this moment of fermentation, mixed
willingly with the poor and deigned to speak to them
as though they were their equals. In short, all the
countenances appeared to have undergone a change.
Each one dared to show forth his character and natural
faculties in public. I saw many who, although covered
with rags, wore a heroic air. However little sensibility
one possessed, it was not possible to witness such a
spectacle with indifference."
On July 1 2th the Palais Royal gardens were the scene
of an organised debate. Necker had been dismissed
the previous evening, and in the morning rumour was
busily spreading to that effect. The populace hastened
to its usual meeting-place. Camille Desmoulins, not
yet famous, enthusiast, thinker, and orator, was present
in the gardens that Sunday morning. He leapt upon
a table and cried, " To arms, to arms ! " He moved
the crowd by his eloquence ; he gave them a green
cockade as a symbol of their purpose. They stripped
the leaves from the trees and wore them in their hats.
And then he led them in procession through the town,
wax busts of Necker and the Due d' Orleans being

The Patriot 73
carried in triumph at the head of the column. The
people pillaged and sacked the bakers', the butchers', the
wine-shops, and the gunsmiths', and as the evening
wore on the rioting became more pronounced and
dangerous. The crowd tried to recruit all who passed, even the
peaceable people on pleasure intent, or those returning
from some place of entertainment. All who were
stopped were forced to answer the invariable question,
" On which side are you ? " Women rolling along in
their carriages found ruffians at their horses' heads, and
stepped out into the mud in dainty shoes to cry
" Vive le Tiers-etat ! " Dirty ragamuffins, only half
clad, approached well-dressed people to beg in the
name of the Tiers-etat.
Theroigne was in the streets accompanied by a
servant. An intense curiosity impelled her to see all
she could. Armed men passed and repassed, besides
many who were in search of weapons. She deliberately
stopped some of the soldiers and put the favourite
question to them :
" Are you for the Tiers-etat ? "
The proceeding was not always a safe one. An
officer resented the liberty she had taken and threatened
to arrest her. She fled, and he followed, until, dis
covering that she had no one with her but the maid,
and appeared to be actuated merely by curiosity, he
gave up the pursuit.
On the following morning the crowd was even
greater, there were more armed men than before.
They had guns, swords, and pikes. The green cockade
was to be seen in all their hats. Theroigne followed

74 A Woman of the Revolution
the practice and adorned herself with the prevailing
colour. From her account, it would seem that she had
not noticed the green cockade before, in which case she
could not have been present at Camille Desmoulins's
meeting. Green was the colour of the d' Artois
liveries, and was soon discarded for the tricolour.
Theroigne followed the change of fashion without
delay. She was hardly able to control her excitement,
and was as much aware as any one of the coming
struggle. That day, the 13th, the electors of Paris, chosen by
the districts for the purpose of sending deputies to the
States General, having refused to disperse, flocked to
the H6tel de Ville. The hours were occupied in
forming the National Guard of Paris. At first this
body was composed of twelve thousand volunteers, the
number being rapidly increased to four times twelve
thousand. The duty of the Guard was to maintain
order in the streets. They had not been enrolled a
moment too soon. On the following day the Bastille
fell. Theroigne had been in the capital one month and
three days. She had so far done nothing except to
try to grasp the position of the people and understand
what was going on. But her chroniclers do not allow
that she needed so much time to look about her. They
accuse her falsely of being already active in the revolu
tionary ranks by July. " From the first gathering of
the crowds she appeared in the streets, and devoted her
beauty to serve as an ensign to the people," writes the
poetic Lamartine. "Dressed in a riding-habit of the
colour of blood, a plume of feathers in her hat, a

The Patriot 75
sabre at her side, and two pistols in her belt, she
hastened to join every insurrection."
The populace thronged about the great prison on the
evening of the 13th. The ringleaders interspersed the
cries for arms with cries of " To the Bastille." De
Launay ordered up the drawbridges ; he knew what was
threatened. On the morning of the 14th the pre
dominating cry was first for arms. The tocsin rang at
daybreak from the tower of every church ; shops were
closed and barricaded. A report spread that there
were arms in plenty at the Hotel des Invalides. Pat
riots rushed tumultuously towards this possible source.
Theroigne, says the incorrigible romancier, LairtuUier,
was at their head. Pauline d'Aumez and Louise
Bourgeoise, as determined Republicans as herself,
followed her lead. The Governor, worthy Sombreuil,
denied admittance to the rabble, assuring any one who
would listen that he must first send to Versailles for
orders. Turning a deaf ear to all such expostulation,
the crowd invaded the halls, rooms, vaults, and gardens,
seized cannon and musketry, which they dragged and
carried to the H6tel de Ville. In the shortest possible
space of time not a musket or a sabre remained visible
to hiiman eye at the Invalides. " Theroigne was every
where," continues the unscrupulous LairtuUier. " She
gave the orders, they were obeyed; she had detach
ments of men placed at the barriers, she seized the
dispatches which the Court were sending from
Versailles to Paris — in short, she organised^the un
disciplined masses who were newly armed." Truly a
valiant Theroigne, literally inspired, not unlike the
Maid of Orleans, for she knew nothing of soldiering.

76 A Woman of the Revolution
Lamartine calls her a name that does not suit her — the
impure Joan of Arc of the public streets.
Encouraged by their success in obtaining arms, the
people were ready for action. They joined the large
crowd already besieging the Bastille. Cries of " Let us
storm the prison ! " were added to the already existing
babel. The little garrison summoned the assailants to
retire. It is an oft-told tale — a well-known tale.
Those attacking persisted. Two men mounted the
roof of the guard-house and broke the chain of the
bridge with axes. Down came the bridge with a
rattie and clatter ; no less quickly the rabble were
on it and across it, making for the next bridge over
the second moat. A discharge of musketry brought
them to a stand. But the mob was desperate ; the
firing continued for four, five hours. De Launay had
half a mind to put a lighted match to the powder
magazine, and take decisive measures by blowing up
the fortress. Was it the garrison opposed him, or
did he fail for want of resolution ? Instead, all of a
sudden, came the word of surrender. The Bastille
had fallen. The rush of the crowd, the seizure of
de Launay, the infinite danger of a young woman
thought to be his daughter, the escape of the Swiss,
the triumphant rescue of the seven dazed prisoners,
the bloodshed which neither Hulin's nor Elie's word
could hinder ; all these things are familiar to every
one : yet even reliable historians have over-coloured
a picture which had more than enough of the dramatic
element in it, without their aid. De Goncourt, writ
ing of Theroigne, gives a stroke of unsurpassed
imaginative genius. She "leapt with joy, she was

The Patriot 77
carried away by the crowd, gunpowder blackened her,
blood stained her. Beat the drums, sound the tocsins,
let the people march on. She ran furious, brandishing
death and destruction. She armed herself at the
Invalides. She took a tower at the 'Bastille ! " Such
a feat is too marvellous to be passed over in silence.
Dusaulx1 places her in the rank of the conquerors,
and many have followed him. Lamartine bestowed
upon her the sabre d'honneur, adding that it was voted
to her on the breach by the victors.
Lamothe-Langon, an even more picturesque liar than
LairtuUier, heaps detail on detail regarding her
presence at the Bastille on the unforgotten 14th.
She showed herself first in the hottest fire, urged on
her brother patriots, encouraged them when they
weakened, brought them back to the charge if panic
terror turned them momentarily aside.
"I still seem to be in the midst of that famous day,"
are words he attributes to her. " I hear the sharp
whisde of the balls, the thunder of the artillery, the
clamours of the multitude, the cries of the wounded,
the despair of the mothers and wives whose sons and
husbands had perished in this holy cause. All remains
vividly present to me, both in my mind and in my
heart. Glorious moment, intoxicating day ! How
quickly you passed ! "
Having forced a capitulation, the people penetrated
into the last refuge of despotism ; the cowardly
defenders who had turned the guns upon them
had the impudent audacity to receive them with
apparent joy, and dared to mingle with the cries
1 " De l'lnsurrection parisienne et de la prise de la Bastille."

78 A Woman of the Revolution
of " Long live the people ! " cries of " Long live the
King!" " Where is the governor ? " demanded Theroigne.
They pointed him out to her.
" Assassin of the people ! " she cried ; " you will
be conducted to the H6tel de Ville, there to render
your account." She made a signal. They gave him
no time to reply. They threw themselves upon
him ; they dragged him towards the Place de la
Greve. So he died. But Theroigne did not stay to see the
end ; she hastened to help others to free the prisoners.
When the search was over, the captives freed, The
roigne exclaimed : " What, citizens ! shall we leave
this fortress standing to menace us anew with its fatal
tyranny ? No ; we must raze it to the ground. We
must leave the spot now occupied by its walls free to
the air that will disperse the despotic miasma it has
exhaled." This speech was received with the acclamations it
deserved, and, placing her in an arm-chair which had
escaped destruction when the Governor's house was
burnt, they crowned her with laurels and carried her
in triumph to the Hotel de Ville, the crowd waving
aloft branches laden with foliage, and uttering cries of
victory. "It is the triumph of beauty," remarked a voice.
It was Lafayette speaking.
Romancists of the class to which Lamothe-Langon
belongs are plausible only up to a certain point. Be
yond that they are carried away by their own visions.
The arm-chair saved from the flames, and the part

The Patriot 79
played by Lafayette in the scene, are altogether
absurd. Theroigne's own account of the same day is refresh
ing in its simplicity after the bombast of her chroniclers.
"I was at the Palais Royal," she says in her "Con
fessions," " when the news came that the Bastille was
taken. The populace gave way to a noisy and pro
longed pleasure. Many wept for joy, crying that
there would be no more Bastille, no more lettres de
cachet." It seems very unlikely that she should have
invented that natural remark, but simplicity was, of
course, her role. Denials were her safe course, since
there was no proof against her. Her accuser, the
Chevalier Maynard de la Valette, in his notes entitled
"Dires et Aveux de Demoiselle Theroigne," declares
she was present when, after the taking of the Bastille,
de Launay was massacred, that she wished to search
the cells and release the prisoners. Dressed as a man,
her musket on her shoulder, she hurried through the
streets of the capital. She saw the scene with her
own eyes, he insists ; she saw the Prince de Lambesc
trample an old man to death under the hoofs of his
horse. That was on the 12th. It was her word
against her accusers, and Theroigne adhered to her
original statement. In spite of several assertions to
the contrary, her name does not appear in the lists
of the "citoyens vainqueurs de la Bastille" contained
in the national archives, on which are inscribed those
of some six thousand insurrectionists.
Nor, in spite of her supposed exhortation to the
people to raze the Bastille to the ground, does she
mention a word in her " Confessions " concerning the

80 A Woman of the Revolution
demolition of the fortress. This work was officially
ordered the day after the surrender, and was pursued
without interruption until May 15th, 1791. It was
directed by the patriot Palloy, who thought only of
the glory of his task and not at all of the money it
might have brought him. He gave away a number
of interesting objects found in the prison, and, later,
was reduced to indigence. The materials of the edifice
were removed, and some of the stones were employed
in the construction of the upper part of the Pont de
la Concorde. The site remained open, and various
plans were put forward for its disposal. Palloy wished
it to be turned into a Place de la Liberte, in which a
simple but majestic column should stand. Theroigne
desired that a palace should be erected there, in which
the sittings of the National Assembly were to be held.
She made a stirring speech on the subject before the
Club des Cordeliers, and, though her motion was
carried, the plan fell through. Some forty years after
the surrender of the Bastille the Column of July,
which now adorns the Place, was commenced, the
summit being crowned by a bronze Genius of Liberty.
Theroigne described herself as a mere spectator
during the demonstrations of July 12th to the 14th,
but she admitted taking an active part in the events
of the 17 th of the month, when Louis XVI. paid a
visit to Paris to consecrate the triumphs of the Revolu
tion. Dressed in a white riding-habit and a neat
round hat, Theroigne marched in the ranks of the
soldiers to meet the King. He had taken the sacra
ment that morning, made his will, said farewell to
the weeping and harassed Queen, and set forth from

The Patriot 81
Versailles accompanied by some of the Garde du Corps
and the hundred deputies appointed by the National
Assembly to escort him. The new mayor, Bailly,
received him at the gate and handed him the keys.
As he drove through the streets of Paris the people
greeted him with amity. They trusted him to give
them food. At the Hotel de Ville Louis was met
by the electors of Paris. The occasion was a solemn
one. The tricolour was everywhere in evidence. The
King appeared upon the balcony, a tricolour cockade
in his hat, and spoke to the enthusiastic people. Then
others spoke, among them Lally-Tollendal, who made
a telling speech and became the real hero of the day.
To him was deputed the task of reporting what had
taken place to the National Assembly. Meanwhile
"the Restorer of French Liberty," wearied with his
unusual duties, was returning to the palace, still
accompanied by the hopeful and now joyous crowd.
Thus passed Theroigne's first day of active parti
cipation in the Revolution. She was interested in the
people's attitude when they cheered the King at the
H6tel de Ville. The cries of " Vive la Nation ! " had
been silenced. They were soon to be heard again. A
partial tranquillity reigned in Paris, and the highest in
the land, d'Artois and Conde amongst them, seized the
opportunity to flee from the capital. But the air of
security was a treacherous one, liable to disappear at any
moment. Instances of minor violence occurred now
and again. Petty thieving, cases of knifing, cudgelling,
and so forth made the streets unsafe. Marauders grew
bold enough to tear off the jewels women were wear
ing and remove even the silver buckles off their shoes.

82 A Woman of the Revolution
Ruffians of the lowest type begged, threatened, and
robbed those who were better off than themselves.
In the provinces riots broke out everywhere and
blazed throughout the remainder of July, August,
and the beginning of September. The tocsin rang in
villages and towns, the drums rolled, and cannon were
mounted ready for use. Houses were broken into
and destroyed. On July 3 1 st the town hall of Strass-
burg was pillaged. The populace rushed into the
building, and forthwith there was " a shower of shutters,
sashes, chairs, tables, sofas, books and papers, and
then another of tiles, boards, balconies, and fragments
of woodwork." The public archives were scattered
to the winds. At Maubeuge in July the rioters forced
open the prison, demolished the octroi offices and
harbour offices, and carried off the custom and excise
stores. Havoc succeeded havoc. Furniture was
smashed, valuables thrown into the street and trampled
on, eatables demolished, houses left empty, ruined,
blackened by fire, or hacked about so as to be un
inhabitable. The spirit of revolution spread rapidly through
Caen, Rouen, Besancon, and Lyons. At Troyes the
rioters demanded that the octroi should be suppressed,
since this had been done in the capital. Chateaux
were burning and their owners deserting them in fear
of their lives. The upheaval was terrifying, and in
Paris a murmuring undercurrent testified to the fact
that the good impression made upon the people by the
King's visit was speedily dying out. Distrust towards
the Court, more especially towards the Queen, was
increasing daily, fed by suggestive articles in new

The Patriot 83
journals calculated to inflame the people, and by the
stirring denunciation spoken by orators at hastily im
provised gatherings. Meanwhile royalty grasped
nothing apparently beyond its own divine right, and
the Queen, proud Marie-Antoinette, would fain have
brushed aside the meaningless signs of a chaos which
she could not understand, and which she regarded as
an unwarranted annoyance which must and should be
. speedily removed.
Incidents were not wanting at this hour to fill the
heart and stir the imagination of Theroigne. There
was Foulon, the old man not unconnected with the
story of hay and thistles, hanged to the lantern once,
twice, three times before he died and his head struck
off to be carried on a pike ; Berthier, who was butchered
with such gross accompanying details as make descrip
tion impossible. At these things she shuddered, but
turned her attention with great willingness to the
exciting meeting in the National Assembly on August
4th, when the reports from the country were read and
new decrees adopted. The Declaration of the Rights
of a Man and of a Citizen — words for ever on
Theroigne's lips — was passed before the close of
August. She admitted that she felt an irresistible
enthusiasm in the doings of the legislative body, and
in order the better to assist at the sittings of the
Assembly she decided to go and live at Versailles.
She arrived there at the commencement of the debates
on the Declaration of Rights. She took lodgings in
the Rue de Noailles with a widow whose name, when
questioned, she could not recollect, although she was
able to describe the exact position of the house in

84 A Woman of the Revolution
the turning off the grand avenue leading to the castle
gates. She lived at Versailles all through the summer,
and there made the acquaintance of Petion and of
Joseph-Honore, brother of the Abbe Sieves. Both
these friends visited at her house. The former was a
lawyer from Chartres, grizzled though not old, of
sturdy build, and with a fine soul for the violin. The
love of music they possessed in common was as strong
a bond as their love of the people between Theroigne
and the future mayor of Paris.
In September the Assembly was making but little
progress with its work, and want of confidence in its
efficiency became more and more marked. Misery
and insecurity increased. The Court persisted in its
nonchalant policy. Paris was defied by the bringing
in of additional troops. On September 23rd the
Regiment of Flanders was marched into Versailles to
remain stationed there as a precaution. It was
customary in the case of such arrivals to entertain the
new-comers, and on October ist a great banquet was
given at Versailles by the officers of the Bodyguard
to these battalions. The festivities became the occasion
of a royalist demonstration. Tricoloured cockades
were torn off and trampled under the feet of the
revellers. White cockades and black ones for the
Queen were hastily donned in their place, the national
toasts supposed to be in usage were forgotten, the
company sang lustily : " O, Richard ! 6 mon roi ! "
Royalist feeling was allowed full expression. The
Queen openly rejoiced at the prospect of a lightening
of her burdens. Were not there people enough who
were good, loyal, and true ? What if some soldiers

The Patriot 85
had deserted and sided with the populace ? What if
others wavered ? Authority must be re-established.
Her 'must' was law, and she believed it would be
easily carried out. She had the indiscretion to
show her thoughts and to express approval not only
of the spirit with which the banquet went, but also
because the royalist acclamations continued throughout
the whole of the next day and echoed the singing in
her heart.
Meanwhile these signs of disaffection to the Revo
lution, coming to the ears of the people in an ex
aggerated form, caused immediate alarm and suspicion
amongst them. Something must be done to hinder
the royalists from giving expression to these unde
sirable sentiments.
The King should be brought to Paris with as little
delay as possible. The people willed it. They had
suffered as much as they would suffer. It was time
to ameliorate the conditions of starvation under which
they laboured. Thousands were ready to submit
plans to this end, and to direct, control, advise, even
lead those who would become responsible for organi
sing them. Hunger had so far invaded the homes
of the poor that maddened women were ready to
sacrifice life in redressing the horrors which were
causing themselves and their children slowly to perish.
If there was no bread in Paris, they would fetch it
from Versailles, and fetch those too whose duty it was
to see they were supplied. Their opportunity came.
"Men made the 14th of July," says Michelet, "the
6th of October was the day of women. Men took the
royal Bastille, women took royalty itself." Because

86 A Woman of the Revolution
the complaints of man did not receive the attention
their urgency demanded, a woman organised a revolt
among members of her sex. She ran to the Cafe de
Foy, a meeting-place where agitators swarmed, and
there she loudly denounced the royalists. Theroigne
was not present. Neither was she in the Halles when
a young woman beating a drum gathered her sisters
round her and marched them to the Hotel de Ville.
There were hundreds of them, washerwomen, bare
footed beggars, street-rovers, seamstresses, flower-girls,
scavengers, who followed their leaders into the town
hall, and tore or burned all the documents on which
they could lay their hands, saying there had been
enough scribbling while they were starving — they
meant to have more practical help.
Maillard saved them from riot and disaster by
offering to lead them to Versailles, and so the march
began, cannon clattering, pikes bristling, hair streaming,
arms swinging, women's garments fluttering in the
breeze. Some men wore women's clothes, but were
distinguished by hairy chins and raucous voices.
They helped to swell the ranks of those who were
to advance against the military, in the hope that
soldiers would not fire on women.
That was a tramp to Versailles of hungry desperate
human beings, all intent on one purpose, all full of
protest — against the Queen !
That day Marie-Antoinette visited the Petit
Trianon for the last time and looked regretfully at
the depredations of early autumn among her flower
beds. She saw nothing symbolic in this decay. No
thought of the dissolution with which the monarchy

THE MARCH OF THE WOMEN TO VERSAILLES.

The Patriot 89
was threatened entered her mind. But a messenger
came to fetch her to the palace, and there, as she
faced the first angry mob it had ever been her fate
to see, she must surely have reflected on the triumphal
entry into Paris she had made as Dauphine, when the
people had cried themselves hoarse in praising her
and her life had opened full of a roseate promise
which had enchanted her. Years had passed since
that time, dangerous years in which the rosy prospect
had gradually faded, vanished, and been replaced by
black menace. In that hour long ago she had visited
her people to win their love ; at this hour in the
present the people visited her to refuse hers with
scorn. Horrible threats they voiced against her, loud
curses and expressions so coarse that it seemed im
possible women could have spoken them. In a frenzy
they swore to cut her throat, and to scatter her bones
to the winds. They were maddened by suffering,
these women, and in their madness meant to make
" the Austrian " suffer too. In this they were to
succeed, before many days had passed, better than
they would have believed possible. And Theroigne —
where was she ?
Carlyle says the brown-locked demoiselle with pike
and helmet acted gunneress " with haughty eye and
serene fair countenance," comparable, some thought, to
Joan of Arc, others to Pallas Athene. "To horse,"
cries de Goncourt, " when the hour of October struck,
with red plumes, riding-habit of red silk, this radiant
Penthesilea, this Amazon of Rubens, riding-whip in
hand, pistols in her girdle, galloping in her triumph,
in front of the rabble, smiling, with sleeves rolled
6

9° A Woman of the Revolution

i

to the elbow — it is the beauty of Liege, bringing to
Versailles pikes which are asking for heads and
women who demand the destruction of the Queen."
Lamartine too, not to be behindhand, writes : " On
the days of October she had led the women of Paris
to Versailles, on horseback, by the side of the ferocious
Jourdan, called ' the man with the long beard.' She
had brought back the King to Paris : she had followed
without emotion the heads of the Gardes du Corps,
stuck on pikes as trophies." But for sheer imagina
tion Lamothe Langon again outrivals all other
accounts and describes Theroigne's doings in those
early days of October with additional details unheard
of elsewhere.
The tocsin woke Theroigne from a stupor. For
four days and four nights she had not had a moment's
rest. She had been indefatigable, running hither and
thither stirring up the people. Mounted on a wagon,
seated on a board, she described to the people at every
street corner what had happened at the banquet on
October ist. She aroused their anger, excited their
fury, demanded vengeance in the name of the national
cockade which had been insulted.
The crowd applauded ; it pressed round her. She
hurried from place to place — from the Palais Royal to
the Hotel de Ville, to the Tuileries, along the quays,
over the bridges, through the boulevards. Everywhere
crowds gathered to hear her speak, everywhere she was
heard with attention and respect. Mirabeau blamed
her enthusiasm, Bailly thought it ill-timed, Lafayette
begged her to be less heroic. These were traitors who
called themselves moderate patriots ! Robespierre,

The Patriot 91
Danton, and Marat applauded her. She was their
inspiration. She had spent the night in the streets. When she
awoke from a short nap she saw before her a group of
women armed with pistols and cudgels ; behind stood
men with pikes and halberds. They were waving flags,
brandishing their arms, growing impatient. When her
eyes opened she was greeted by the cry of " Vive Meri
court, la jolie Mericourt ! Vivat ! Vivat ! "
She stood up, there where she had snatched an hour's
sleep under the statue group of Louis XIV. in the
Place des Victoires, there where some kind friend
had thrown over her a protecting coverlet, and spoke
to the people.
" Friends, comrades, citizens," she said, " we must
not waste time here. At Versailles our cockade was
profaned. At Versailles we must demand vengeance.
I thank you for your care of me ; offer it rather to
the country which has more need of it."
A unanimous shout of approval filled the air. The
people embraced one another, shook hands and kissed.
They crowded round Theroigne to seize her hand and
to kiss that too. " Follow me," she cried, " follow
me to Versailles." A responsive roar burst from a
thousand throats.
" We want bread," she went on : " let us seek it
at Versailles. The people have been insulted. Where ?
At Versailles. Where shall they be avenged ? At
Versailles. Where are the tyrants ? Who are they ?
The aristocrats at Versailles. Where are the deputies,
our liberators ? At Versailles again. It is from there
they menace us, there they prepare our punishment,

92 A Woman of the Revolution
there where our enemies plot to harm us. Let us go
to them, let us stop them in their wicked courses,
let us judge them, sacrifice them, and when their
corpses lie stretched where we have slain, people will
see them and cry, 'National justice has passed this
way. After this moving speech the crowd marched to the
Hotel de Ville. There stood Maillard. At a sign
from him, Theroigne, rallying her feminine battalion,
started for Versailles. She was at the head of some
two or three thousand citoyennes, as well as three or
four hundred good patriots. On the road they danced,
they sang, they joked, they cried " Vive la Nation ! "
and "Vive Mericourt!" Thus in due course they
reached Versailles. . . . !
But Theroigne, in her " Confessions," tells a very
different story. How could she march with the women
to Versailles, when she was already there ? It was
stupid, she thought, of people to make such statements.
She had been staying near the palace the whole summer,
and on the evening of October 5th she had seen
the draggled procession of the women arrive. They
had started at sunrise from Paris, every woman met
with on the way being urged into the ranks, which
grew and swelled as each mile passed. At first they
shouldered high their improvised arms and grumbled
loudly at starvation. But after trudging weary miles
they had no breath left to cry for bread. Rain and
mud, hunger and fatigue, sobered the most eager
amongst them — at least until there was a chance of
practical gain by shouting. Market-women and fish
wives, kitchen wenches, thieves, slatterns, and worse,

The Patriot 93
the scum and rabble of the female population of Paris,
" ten thousand Judiths," nearing their journey's end
started clamouring anew for food, cried " Vive le Roi ! "
and sang " Henri IV." and patriotic songs in tuneless
voices. Maillard had done his work well. He had brought
a straggling mob of despairing women within range
of royalty and legislation. He took some into the
Assembly House, where it was arranged that a depu
tation should go to the King. Louis XVI. had
been brought back hastily from hunting, and, gazing
from the palace windows, saw that strange doings were
afoot. Mounier agreed to lead the women into the
royal presence, and insisted on a calm and dignified
diplomacy. It was no light task he undertook, as
appears from his own account : " The women crowded
round me," he writes, " declaring that they wanted
to accompany me to the King's palace. I had much
trouble to make them understand that only six would
be able to see the King, but that did not prevent a
large number from swelling the procession.
" We were on foot, in the mud, with a heavy rain
falling. A considerable crowd of the inhabitants of
Versailles lined both sides of the avenue which led to the
chateau. The women of Paris formed various groups,
mixed with a certain number of men, for the most part
dressed in rags and tatters, their appearance ferocious
and their gestures menacing. They were armed with
muskets, old pikes, hatchets, iron sticks, and large
poles. ... A party of armed men approached us to
escort the deputation. The strange and numerous

94 A Woman of the Revolution
cortege by which the deputies were assailed was takelt
for a riotous mob ; the Garde du Corps rushed at us
and dispersed us in the mud. . . . We rallied and
thus advanced to the chateau. We found ranged on the
square the Garde du Corps, a detachment of dragoons,
the Regiment of Flanders, the Swiss Guards, the
Invalides, and the militia of Versailles. We were
recognised and received with honour. We crossed
between the lines and had great difficulty to prevent
the crowd from following us. In place of the six
women to whom I had promised an entry into the
palace, I had to admit a dozen."
Before the palace stretched the wide Place d' Armes,
guarded all along the gilded railings. Through the
three avenues which diverge into the Place the scum
of the crowd frothed and bubbled. The women
tempted the soldiers with pence and caresses. They
acted with the coarsest motives and stirred up wicked
passions. Corruption was at work.
Within the palace council followed council. The King
received the deputation gracefully ; the Queen, so near
to danger, so unaware of bodily peril, used her quick
brain to think of some way out. What was it to be ?
Flight ? Retirement to a neighbouring town perhaps ?
At one time the order was given that horses should be
harnessed. How to escape from the clamouring mob
outside ! The rain had ceased, but clouds still rolling
up merged into the darkness of early evening. From
the palace windows the shining wet stones of the court
yard looked uninviting, and beyond the railing, out
there in the road, the wild beasts clamoured for their
prey. One bright spot remained in all that gloom.

The Patriot 95
Lafayette was marching from Paris with his men. The
troops still stood at guard, their lines unbroken.
Would they have to be withdrawn before he joined
them ? On that point the issue of the day might hang.
The main body of women had sought shelter from
the downpour anywhere in the neighbourhood of the
palace. As it cleared some came forth again and the
crowd increased ; the murmuring and jostling grew
ever more pronounced. Theroigne, who had spent the
afternoon at the sitting of the National Assembly, had
come out at five o'clock to see the crowd of women,
and moved, alert and eager, from group to group,
questioning, expostulating, praising their courage, and
aching with sympathy for their suffering. Her mother-
heart was full of love for them — such mother-love as
since her babe had died had had no other outlet. She
gave it to the people there and then.
She had left the Assembly Hall before the deputies
separated, and her friend Petion, meeting her later,
offered to take her home out of the rain and the mud
and away from the sights of misery. But she refused.
She preferred to see what was going on. " I went
with him," she says in her "Confessions," "to the corner
of my street, where he left me. I pushed my way
through as far as the barrier. There I saw on one
hand the Regiment of Flanders, on the other the Body
guard and the people armed with guns. Pushing my
way along, I met three or four unfortunates who were
weeping. They said to me that they had not had a
mouthful of bread for three days. I took them near
to my lodgings and fetched bread from there which
I divided amongst them."

96 A Woman of the Revolution
It was this act which led to her undoing. She was
accused of bestowing not only bread, but money, and
that for the purpose of corrupting the soldiers.
" Already Pallas Athene (inihe shape of Demoiselle
Theroigne)," says Carlyle, " is busy with Flandre and
the dismounted Dragoons. She, and such women as
are fittest, go through the ranks ; speak with an earnest
jocosity ; clasp rough troopers to their patriot bosom,
crush down spontoons and musketoons with soft arms :
can a man, that were worthy of the name of man,
attack famishing patriot women? "
Carlyle gave no credence to the oft-repeated story
that Theroigne distributed money as well as bread.
" Money she had not," he says, " but brown locks, the
figure of a heathen goddess, and an eloquent tongue
and heart."
Michelet writes of the soldiers of Flanders, who
were asked not to fire : " Women had cast themselves
amongst them, entreating them not to hurt the people.
A woman then appeared . . . who seemed not to have
walked in the mire with the others, but had doubdess
arrived later " — he is one of the few historians who
are correct in not making Theroigne lead the women
to Versailles. " She threw herself at once among the
soldiers," this handsome young woman, " a native of
Liege, lively and passionate . . . interesting, original,
and strange, with her riding-habit and hat, and a sabre
by her side, speaking and confounding equally French
and the patois of Liege, and yet eloquent. She was
laughable, yet irresistible. Theroigne, impetuous,
charming, and terrible, was insensible to every obstacle.
She had had amours ; but now she felt but one passion

The Patriot 97
(one violent and mortal passion), which cost her more
than life : her love for the Revolution. She followed
it with enthusiasm."
Michelet says that Theroigne, having addressed the
Regiment of Flanders, gained the men over and dis
armed them so completely that they gave away their
cartridges like brothers to the National Guard of
Versailles. She would have been the first to laugh
heartily had she heard of this tribute to her powers. It
was also said of her that she spoke to the sentinel near
the Orangery Gate and asked him to close it ; whether
to keep the mob from going in or royalty from coming
out (since there was talk of flight), history says not.
Some of the women had taken shelter in the
guard-house of the Regiment of Flanders, but the
largest number poured into the Salle des Menus to
rejoin their friends who had remained with Maillard.
The galleries were a forest of pikes and iron clubs. The
women grew more and more turbulent, the men rather
more quiet and subdued. A determined lady of the
gutter seized the presidential chair. Others equally
determined sprawled over the benches of the deputies,
ousting their rightful occupants. They shouted, sang,
and gesticulated, giving unsolicited embraces to all they
fancied, and scorning those they disliked.
The women of the deputation, returning from the
palace, had a story of gracious promises to tell. At
their head was a. charming spokeswoman, Louison
Chabray, slim and fair, who had had the supreme
honour of feeling the King's touch upon her arm.
But all their enthusiasm was discredited. The mob
jeered at their optimism, and threatened them with

98 A Woman of the Revolution
physical violence. They escaped with some difficulty
and returned to do their work again and bring back an
undertaking in writing.
When at length Mounier came back into the As
sembly Hall, bread was brought in, and the hungry
crowd ate and grew good-humoured. " Let us hear
our darling mother Mirabeau," cried the eager women.
But Mirabeau refused to speak more than a word,
and that was to chide them for interrupting the
deputies. Hour after hour the women sat in the house, feed
ing when they could get food, talking amongst them
selves, some singing, some snoring. The drone of
the speakers continued. Theroigne had long since
gone home. " I did not leave my rooms again," she
says, " although I knew that they had convoked the
deputies for a night sitting."
All that evening there was danger of rioting, and
the royalist troops were withdrawn within the palace
grounds. At midnight Lafayette arrived at Versailles
with twenty thousand National Guards. Now at last
an air of security was established, and the Court feared
the rebellious people no longer. There was darkness
and comparative quiet in the palace, and the Queen
slept. But the wakeful deputies continued discussing
and confabulating in the National Assembly, still sur
rounded by unwashed women in soaking rags, who
occupied the seats usually reserved for beauty of
the highest rank, richly , apparelled. And Theroigne
slept too, or says she slept. On the truth of
her statement a great deal depended. She was
accused of being one of those who broke into the

The Patriot 99
palace in the early dawn. " It is difficult to believe that
she slumbered through the sitting of the National
Assembly, because she never missed the meetings if
she could help it, and this was an important one.
She had taken lodgings at Versailles for the sole
purpose of being present at them all. But Jf she had
owned to wakefulness it would have been difficult to
prove her innocence.
The Queen had rested perhaps three hours when an
unexpected noise aroused her. She heard cries, and a
curse coupled with her name. The crowds were
breaking into the palace. She heard the snapping of
bars, the crash of doors breaking inwards, the feet
of the rebels in the passage. It was growing light,
and she fled from her apartments for her life.
Theroigne swears in her "Confessions" that she knew
nothing of this attempt on the Queen's safety. At
the time she was hastening back to the National
Assembly. At six o'clock the doors were not yet
opened. The National Guard was on duty before
the palace, and she saw a huge crowd assembled.
" I moved about amongst the groups of people,"
she declares, " in order to overhear what was being
said. They spoke about the aristocrats, and I joined
in and spoke no good of them. Then I attempted
to glide in among the ranks of the National Guard,
attracted by the clamouring of the people as they were
fighting with the Bodyguard. But I could not see
what was going on distinctly.
" At last the Assembly opened its doors. I went to
my usual seat in Tribune No. 6. The Hall was almost
empty. Only a few of the deputies of the noblesse were

ioo A Woman of the Revolution
present. Under the circumstances they demanded that
the National Assembly should be transported to the
Hercules Gallery in the palace. It seemed to me and
to all those present in our tribune that a removal of the
representatives would wound and violate the decrees of
the National Assembly. We made strenuous opposi
tion to this. All thought it would be better if a
numerous deputation was sent to the King. This
was agreed upon."
In the courtyard a group of armed men and women
surrounded a squad of the National Guard and made
them fire on the King's men. Two of the Bodyguard
were seized and their heads cut off and impaled on
pikes. Lafayette, ever on the alert, ordered the
National Guard to fire, and averted further bloodshed.
The mob roared " Bring the King to Paris." Louis
showed himself on the balcony. Marie-Antoinette
came too, pale and dignified. She held the hands of
Madame Royale and the child Dauphin, but the people
cried " No children, no children," and they were sent
in again. It is all so well known ; it was all so tragic.
As she stood there a man in the crowd levelled his
musket as though to fire on the Queen. She did not
flinch, and Lafayette stooping to kiss her hand put an
end to hostile demonstration.
By one o'clock the King had promised to leave
Versailles. At this news men and women danced
together with a new sense of fraternity. Holding
hands they sang and splashed in the last night's mud.
It was a masquerade of death and hunger and captivity.
Whither were they about to drag the royal family ?
A start was made towards the capital. The people,

The Patriot 101
having captured the baker, the baker's wife, and the
baker's boy, were temporarily content. They marched
on foot, they rode in carts, the women bestrode the
cannon. The heads of the slain soldiers, raised on
pikes, were an emblem of their triumph, and on the
route a halt was made at the hairdressers' shop to
have the hair powdered, curled, and daubed with
cream. Women carried loaves on pikes or branches of
trees. Many who marched that day were to remem
ber it till they died.
The King was in the capital, the legislative body
followed and took up its position in the riding-school.
Theroigne was to be found near her source of inspira
tion. But the debt she incurred on those October
days was still to be paid. On August 6th, 1790, a
warrant was issued by the Chatelet for her arrest. Re
ferring to this she wrote to Perregaux on August 26th,
from Liege : " I have been very astonished to learn
this news. Was it to be expected that having taken
no part in all that was said or done on the days of the
5th and 6th, I should be accused of complicity in the
supposed conspiracy? . . . As I am unable to judge
how far the malignity of those who have denounced
me has gone, if you wish to do me a service it will be
well for you to learn as much as you can of the crimes
of which I am accused. If they are serious I shall
have to defend myself, and to do this I should have to
utter nothing but the simple truth."
There was very little definite evidence against her.
The Chatelet began the inquiry into the events of
October in the following December. By July 1790 it
was completed. As many as four hundred depositions

102 A Woman of the Revolution
were included in the printed report, and of these only
two or three contained a reference to Theroigne. One
man deposed to having seen a lady he believed was
Mile Therouene de Montesurt (sic) on the morning
of the 6th, amongst the " brigands " who came from
Paris to Versailles, dressed as a man, with a tall gentle
man dressed as a woman. A cure of the name of
Francois-Xavier Veytard declared that on the evening
of the 5th, when the Regiment of Flanders was drawn
up in two lines in the Avenue of Versailles, a lady
dressed in a red riding-habit, as far as he could judge
of the colour in the dim evening light, went up and
down the ranks of the soldiers, holding a basket in her
hand, from which the soldiers took small packets and
soon afterwards withdrew to their barracks. He
understood that this woman's name was Therouenne.
His evidence was given on March 9th, 1790.
A priest called Tournacheau de Montveran made
a deposition on May ist following, in which he stated
that he was staying at an hotel in the Rue de
l'Orangerie, and, in company with several friends
between 4 and 5 o'clock on October 5th, he noticed
from the window several women and men disguised
as women, amongst whom was one attired in a scarlet
riding-habit, on horseback. She was followed by a
jockey also dressed in red. He had been told that
this woman, whom he had seen previously at the
Assembly and had recognised since, was Mile
Therouenne de Mericourt. She had approached the
sentinel who guarded the gate near the Orangery, and
very soon afterwards the sentinel had closed the gate.
Every one imagined that this was done by the instruc-

The Patriot 103
tions of the said Therouenne, who thereupon, followed
by the same women, went off through the Rue de la
Surintendance. There was also a Mile Gauthier who, looking from
a window in the Rue de l'Orangerie, saw a woman who
was so tall that she thought it must be a man, and
this person was accompanied by a woman of ordinary
figure on horseback, dressed in a riding-habit, who
dismounted and spoke to the sentinel at the gate of
the Orangery.
When questioned about the closing of this gate,
Theroigne admitted that she might have spoken to
the sentinel, but that when she did so the gate was
shut, and consequently she could not have been
responsible for giving an order. Nor would any
soldier of the Bodyguard have obeyed her instructions,
for she was not known to them.
The accounts vary so much, and are so vague, that
very little weight can be attached to them. Veytard,
who said he saw Theroigne distributing small parcels
out of a basket, made the value of such evidence
dubious by declaring that it was not light enough to
distinguish whether she was wearing a scarlet riding-
habit. When questioned as to the colour of this
garment, Theroigne acknowledged that she possessed
such a costume, as well as a similar one in white and
in black, but that she could not remember what she
wore on that particular day. She treated with con
tempt the statements of the witness who declared
she was on horseback. " If any one can prove that
I was riding," she answered boldly, when faced by
this accusation, "I consent to any punishment they

104 A Woman of the Revolution
may care to inflict." She deliberately denied having
seen any woman moving about among the soldiers
of the Regiment of Flanders for the purpose of inciting
them to break rank and revolt. In her opinion the
regiment had remained calm and ranged in battle
order. Apart from the witnesses who had named Theroigne
more or less accurately, there were several who de
scribed her without mentioning her name. A certain
Cornier de la Dodiniere said he saw a woman dressed
in a scarlet riding-dress and round hat passing from
group to group and speaking to many people. The
next day an officer of the National Guard of Paris,
meeting him in a cafe, had said to him that he could
not forget the charming appearance of a woman
dressed all in red whom he had seen haranguing and
exciting his men to go to the National Assembly
and to seize some captives there, whose names she
mentioned, and that she had gone so far as to address
the superior officer at the head of the battalion, who
had given instructions that she was to be chased away.
Another soldier, of the name of Saint-Gobert, a
lieutenant of Volunteer Chasseurs, described a young
and pretty woman whom he had noticed in the ranks,
dressed in a riding-habit, wearing a hat with black
plumes, who spoke to the volunteers of his company,
and that this -lady said to him and to his comrades
that they were to go to the National Assembly, and
that she would then indicate the real enemies of the
nation. He had begged the lady to withdraw, and
not to cause disorder in the ranks, but, not succeeding
in making her take her departure, he had fetched the

THEROIGNE DE MERICOURT.
From the drawing by Raffet.

i=5

The Patriot 107
captain, who, when he arrived, expressed his wish that
the lady would go away without delay. She had at
last submitted to his repeated commands, but un
willingly, remarking scornfully as she went that she
had believed she was appealing to good citizens.
Whatever proofs may be put forward to clear
Th6roigne's name of all imputations of evil-doing,
this account is remarkably characteristic of her methods.
It may or may not have been she, but it sounds exactly
like her.
La Valette in his accusation said that, during the
riots at Versailles, Theroigne, dressed like a man,
had mingled with the crowd and distributed bread.
At her orders, he declared, the gates of the Orangery
had been closed to hinder the people from entering
the palace grounds. When she was captive, and they
were driving towards Coblenz, he tried to sound her
on these points, and said to her : " Mademoiselle, I
still seem to see you leading the market-women to
Versailles. It was an imposing sight. And you at
their head on horseback, you looked  "
But she interrupted him. " I ? There you make
a great mistake, monsieur. I was not in that famous
procession at all. I was not living in Paris at that
time. I stayed at Versailles the whole of the summer
of 1789."
He apologised for his error. He said he must have
seen her in the streets of Versailles.
" I did what others did," she answered, " neither
more nor less. I wanted to watch the mob arrive
from Paris."
" But in the evening you entered the palace  "
7

io8 A Woman of the Revolution
" No, monsieur. I did not go into the palace, nor
even into the palace grounds. The Bodyguard refused
admittance to any one. I only went as far as the
park railings. The gates were all shut."
When asked why the crowd had massacred two of
the guard, she said she thought that the soldiers were
themselves to blame for this horrible catastrophe.
The people regarded them as inveterate partisans of
the court. Irritated by the sullen and equivocal
conduct of the aristocracy, they wished to give weight
to their demands by showing activity. It was greatly
to be regretted that they should have resorted to
murderous violence. But at that moment it was
perhaps inevitable that it should have happened, for
it was necessary to use force to obtain liberty from
despotism. If royalty had voluntarily acceded to the
more than legitimate claims of the people, who had
been reduced to slavery for long enough, if the clergy
and the nobility had freely renounced feudal rights,
there would have been neither licence nor spilt blood.
" Misery begets misery," she cried, " crime begets
crime." The peasant who is born into the world has
no other heritage than the ill-treatment of his lord.
More than this she refused to admit to her captor.
It was the parrot-like cry of the people, which she
had had a thousand opportunities of hearing. " In
my eyes," she continued, " aristocracy, however
illustrious its origin, is of no more importance than
the lowest of the middle classes, or the most obscure
but honest peasant. All these tides and dignities are
often but a cloak for worthlessness. . . . Hereditary
nobility is a ridiculous anomaly. It is high time to

The Patriot 109
open the eyes of the people, who are purposely kept
sunk in brutishness. The peasant is obliged to work
and to moisten with his sweat the land which belongs
to another, whilst the other declares that he has a
right to exact this toil. The lord of the land illtreats
his subjects. He demands from them a blind
obedience, and inflicts tortures worse than death. The
revenues obtained from the soil do not belong to
those who cultivate it, and the fruit of their rough
toil is foolishly dissipated by the capitalists. They
scatter and waste enormous sums in gambling and
other vices."
These remarks aroused her hearer. In a passion he
enquired how she dared to speak of the aristocracy
with such disdain. " Every one is free to dispose of
his goods as he may wish, mademoiselle," he cried
angrily. " I do not deny it," she replied, " but it is none
the less true that it is the result of flagrant injustice
that a small portion of society is gorged with wealth
whilst thousands, nay, millions of brave people are
living a life of misery — to die a death by starvation.
What has the Government done to remedy this fearful
state of things. Nothing ! Absolutely nothing !
Ought the people to consent to suffer for ever and to
want necessities when so many aristocrats have super
fluities, and plunge into the grossest of pleasures !
Never ! It is just and necessary to expel all these
sluggards and idlers. They are useless ; nay, worse,
they are harmful. ..."
The Comte de la Valette trembled with passion.
She had touched on a weak spot, his aristocratic pride.

no A Woman of the Revolution
He thought that her words were meant specially to
humiliate him. He cried out that she lied, that there
was not a word of truth in all she had said.
She replied boldly that, on the contrary, she had
spoken nothing but the truth. The abuses which she
had described must end. The country would never
know happiness until it was delivered from the crushing
privileges enjoyed by the clergy and the nobility. It
was necessary that all should enjoy freedom as well as
the bread to which they were entitled. Then she
began to discuss the Rights of Man.
La Valette refused to listen to her any longer. At
that moment the carriage in which they were travelling
gave a jolt, and almost overturned. The Count,
mastered by his ill-temper, jumped out, and, snatching
the whip, beat the driver soundly for his clumsiness.
Theroigne begged him to desist in the name of all
that was human. Her prayers only augmented the
fury of the blows. He ceased when the handle of
the whip smashed in his hand, and throwing away the
pieces, he cried, " So much for the Rights of Man."
Theroigne was silent. She was weeping bitterly.

CHAPTER III
THEROIGNE'S CLUB
THE French have always been gregarious and
communicative. They have always loved to
discuss their interests, and to express in words their
fears and agitations, as well as their rejoicing and
admiration. This national trait was remarkably notice
able throughout the eighteenth century. It was the
age of opinion. The thinkers of the day emulated
one another in making public their ideas. An irre
sistible impulse to teach, to lead, to convert, or at
least to state probabilities and possibilities, began some
where near the close of Louis XIV.'s reign — that is
to say, in the youth of Voltaire and Rousseau — and
increased slowly throughout the Regency, more quickly
in the second half of Louis XV.'s reign, whilst in the
seventies and eighties the impulse became uncontrol
lable. To speak one must have an audience, and to
gather an audience one must have a meeting-place. In
the early part of the century people met at the cafes
and in the salons to air their views and imbibe the
new philosophical ideas that were spreading rapidly
through the country. No sooner was there a whisper
of revolt than these places became inadequate to hold
the masses who wished to utter volumes of complaints
and to formulate plans for the amelioration of con-

112 A Woman of the Revolution
ditions. A new oudet had to be found for them, and
was found in the shape of political clubs. At first
these were few and held in secret, but after the open
ing of the States General they multiplied in numbers,
subdivided and re-formed until they became a recognised
institution of revolutionary France. They were the
best medium for an interchange of ideas, and they
issued pamphlets and journals in a never-ceasing, ever-
increasing stream.
One of the most- important was first formed by a
small section of the deputies of Brittany, and was
called the Breton Club. Although its members were
full of the new ideas which were spreading everywhere
they did not in any way hold extreme views at this
time. They were frankly royalists. But as time
passed a new tone entered into the debates. On June
9th, 1789, Boulle wrote of the society: "For some
days our salon has been the rendezvous of all good
citizens." Meetings were then taking place every
evening. As most of the members were in the
National Assembly, the meeting-house of the club was
at Versailles, but in October it naturally followed the
Court and legislative body to Paris, and was presendy
installed in the Convent of the Dominicans or Jacobins
in the Rue Saint-Honore. Although the official
name of the club was changed in February 1790 to
the Societe des Amis de la Constitution, it was soon to
be known far better by the tide of the Jacvbins Club,
and under that famous name became a political force.
The great difference between this society and other
political clubs, such as had already been known in
England for a century and a half, was its system of

Theroigne's Club 113
affiliation. The number of members had grown so
rapidly, the ideas disseminated by the club's adherents
were so popular, and its endeavour to reach Frenchmen
— and even Frenchwomen — in every part of the country
so insistent, that it was decided to form a nucleus in
each town of people who held the same ideas, and had
similar aims to those who had easy access to the
mother-society in Paris. Thus was born a mighty
organism, spreading its tentacles throughout France.
As was to be foreseen, with the growth of revolutionary
ideas, the opinions with which the club had begun its
sittings evolved on similar lines, the strength of the
extreme Left becoming ever more and more a pre
dominating factor.
There is no room in a volume which purports to
be a biography to tell the history of the clubs. The
ramifications of the old ones, the forming of new and
ever more daring ones, the gradual change of thought
from monarchism to republicanism would fill volumes
of their own. But because one aspect, and an im
portant aspect, of Theroigne's revolutionary career
was closely bound up with the clubs — she frequented
them, she did her utmost to be elected a member of
one of the most important, and she helped to organise
one of her own — some digression on the subject of
clubs is necessary. Her interest in them led her to
study them carefully and to endeavour to grasp and
explain the changes in Paris life which had been brought
about by the great upheaval, one of the most notice
able being connected with this very question of the
growth of the political societies. It is a baffling point
in the character of Theroigne that, considering her

114 A Woman of the Revolution
irregular youth and upbringing, she should not merely
have turned to the exciting and stimulating side ot
the people's fight for freedom, but preferred to throw
her whole heart into her desire to understand the
causes of their wretchedness and the serious questions
involved in attempting to obtain a better state of
affairs. She must have been possessed of powers of
reasoning and observation superior to those usually
bestowed upon women who are content with a liveli
hood so precariously obtained as hers had been.
But Theroigne was a law unto herself, and must not
be judged by the standards applied to other women
of her class. When she studied the matter of clubs
she found that they were springing up around her
like mushrooms. The first one in Paris which was
really worthy of the name had been opened in
April 1782, by Boyer, in the Rue Sainte-Nicaise. It
was called the Club Francais. Three years later the
Duc d'Orleans, who admired everything English and
American, opened a Club de Boston. But it was not
till the outbreak of the Revolution that the real
utility of club life became apparent, and the idea
spread so quickly that there were soon several hun
dreds in Paris.
The most advanced club of all was the Club des
Cordeliers, run by Danton, Camille Desmoulins,
and Marat. The Club de 1789, installed near the
Palais Royal, revelling in dinners under the auspices
of Sieyes, Lafayette, Bailly, and Mirabeau, was turned
into the Club de la Constitution Monarchique, its
members being friends to despotism under the mask
of moderation, and later it became the Feuillants.

i

Theroigne's Club 115
The motto of the Club des Impartiaux was " Justice,
Truth, and Constancy." The Cercle Social had a
branch society, named the Confederation Universelle
des Amis de la Verite, and there were numerous
others of importance, all with views more or less
advanced, because clubs with moderate ideas had but
litde hold on the popular imagination.
So enormous was the influence wielded by these
ever-spreading organisations, that the legislative body
began to see a danger to the peace of the country in
their continued growth, and in 1791 adopted certain
propositions limiting their powers, which were chiefly
exercised in two directions. They had the right to
petition, and used it by presenting to the Assembly
addresses which were in reality orders in the disguise
of requests, and they had the right to stick bills in
public places. This made it possible for them to
placard Paris over at any moment with declarations
which, being assimilated speedily by the man in the
street, evoked a chorus of similar opinion throughout
the breadth of the country. These privileges were
to be curtailed, and for that purpose the assembly
drew up certain clauses, declaring that no society,
club, or association of citizens could have any
recognised political existence, could exercise the
slightest influence over the acts of constituted powers
and legal authorities, nor appear under any pretext
collectively to present petitions or form deputations,
or to assist at public ceremonies under various
penalties. A decree to this effect was adopted on
September 29th, but in practice it very soon proved
inefficacious.

116 A Woman of the Revolution
As well dam a flood with shifting sand. By that
date the clubs had become an ungovernable^ an
incalculable force, and no legislative means could
stop their clamour. The journals alone which poured
from their presses were capable of swaying public
thought. Their discussions and articles filtered
through their own institutions to the more general
if less highly organised groups which met in the
salons, the cafes, the restaurants, the booksellers',
and libraries, to the wine-shops, and the gatherings at
street-corners and in the public gardens. All these were
centres of commotion. The cafes, which for the past
fifty years had been the resort of men of letters, wits,
dramatic critics, lawyers, and artists, intent on discuss
ing the latest achievements in their own particular
profession, were now used as places where the political
measures of the day were brought up for debate, and
where the latest news from the Assembly could be
gleaned at all hours. The Cafe Hottot on the Terrace
of the Feuillants and almost at the doors of the
Assembly Hall, and the Cafe de Foy, at first patriotic,
and then monarchic, were two of the most important.
The latter in its second stage was the refuge for aristo
cratic disputants, Knights of Saint Louis, soldiers, and
financiers, with huge wigs and square-toed shoes,
armed with cudgels, sword-sticks, and canes weighted
with lead, who read nothing but monarchical pro
positions, uncovered their heads whenever royalty was
mentioned, and played dominoes to while away the
time when waiting for news. The Cafe Procope, once
of theatrical fame, had to change its style, and was held
in suspicion by all good partisans of the Revolution.

Theroigne's Club 117
Unless a cafe took a political tone the people had no
use for it, as was proved by the speedy passing away of
the Cafe Flore, whose habitu6s were bound by a vow
not to mention affairs of government. The Cafe de la
Justice was frequented chiefly by excited legal lights,
the Cafe de la Republique by patriots who were keen
on being informed in the speediest and most reliable
manner of what was going on. The Cafe de Valois
was another rendezvous of royalists — Rivarol, for in
stance, Champcenetz, who wrote a satiric letter about
Theroigne, and Peltier, who was one of the fairest-
minded of her opponents. In May 1790 this cafe,
which had originally been founded by Abbe Sieyes
under the auspices of the Duc d'Orleans, became such
a hot-bed of aristocracy that the patriots made a descent
upon it and cleansed the Augean stables with fumes
of gin.
Booksellers' shops were found convenient for the
sale of royalist and counter-revolutionary journals,
brochures, libels, pamphlets, and printed questions of
the order of the day. They were sold openly and
secredy. Sometimes there were printing-presses on
the premises, issuing and manifolding publications of
a seditious nature without place or date or name.
One of the most notorious monarchical booksellers was
Gattey, whose business was in the Palais Royal. He
was said to be a police spy, and his shop was invaded
more than once, his stock burned, and the place " dis
infected of the breath of bad citizens " by fumigations
of vinegar and sugar. A complete edition of the
Actes des Apotres was sacrificed at one of these holo
causts, and at length Gattey found it too dangerous

n8 A Woman of the Revolution
to sell this scurrilous royalist paper and announced
that he would take no further part in its publication
and distribution.
The editors and chief contributors, Peltier, Rivarol,
Champcenetz, Mirabeau, Tonneau, and Suleau — Th6-
roigne knew them well by name, and hated them
well — usually held their meetings at the house of the
Marquise de Champbonas. The paper was discussed
and made up at the Restaurateur Beauvilliers, near to
Gattey's shop, where diners evangeliques were held to
which only the initiated were admitted. The apostles
took copious notes of the conversation and dished it
up in spicy insults addressed against the patriots.
Theroigne was as frequently the subject of their
coarse jests as any one. The attacks on her make
astonishing reading. By what virtue — or vice — did
she become the butt of fifty satirical publications ?
Why was she chosen especially to be pilloried in a
hundred ways, as patriot, Amazon, orator, and mis
tress ? She had splendid enemies — the aristocrats —
and there must have been something remarkable about
her to have kept her so persistently an object of their
spite. It was said that she was driven to madness
by their satires and caricatures, and the Petit Gauthier
described a raid she made on her own account upon
one of the places where these libels were on sale.
" The brazen-faced Theroigne," it wrote, " after walk
ing the day before yesterday in the Camp des Tartares,
in the Palais Royal, entered a shop where caricatures
were sold, and had the effrontery to say to the dealer
in them, that if she continued to display those which
ridiculed other people besides the executive powers,

Theroigne's Club 119
the nobility and the clergy, she would come, accom
panied by some patriots, and tear them up." The
saleswoman threatened the "ci-devant pucelle" with a
burning torch, causing her to flee and leave one of
her shoes behind her in her haste.
Besides the Petit Gauthier, otherwise called the
Journal de la Cour et de la Ville, and the Actes des
Apotres, her chief calumniators, the Sabbats Jacobites,
which brought into fashion the word " canaillocratie,"
and the Apocalypse were among the worst offenders.
The standing joke referred to by them was her sup
posed marriage with the Deputy Populus, i.e. the
People. Of this bon mot they never seemed to tire.
It was turned this way and that way and exploited
for all and more than it was worth. A play on the
subject ran through many numbers of the Actes des
Apotres, and was eventually published separately in
1790 under the title of "Theroigne et Populus, ou le
triomphe de la democratic, drame national en vers
civiques." 1 Attached was a " Pr6cis sur la vie de Made
moiselle Teroigne de Mericour," in which her supposed
lover is described in satirical terms. Beaulieu asserts
that she had never met the deputy for Bourg-en-Bresse,
who was at this time aged about fifty-five. " Although
Populus," remarks the writer, describing the real man,
"is only four feet seven inches and three lines tall,
he possesses that agreeable sloping curve of the
shoulders which denotes profundity of thought, multi
plicity of studies, and the habits of meditation. More
over, although he is between thirty and sixty-five
years old, he does not wear the dissipated air which
See Appendix A

120 A Woman of the Revolution
distinguishes many young Frenchmen. His hair, of
the most beautiful dappled grey, arranged in curls
and plastered down behind his ears, suits his face
remarkably well, giving it more breadth and im
portance ; and behind it is fastened tightly in a net
and bobs about on his shoulders, giving the impres
sion of the august and majestic character of one who
represents the nation. Never has any deputy had
more the air of a deputy than this honourable
deputy." Naturally enough the form in which the satires were
couched was one that had especial power to wound.
Theroigne was not the only one subjected to the
drastic wit of the royalists. Monarchism in the press
never ceased to aim poisoned darts at the people, and
ironic raillery, lies, and calumny fanned the flame of
hatred and gave rise to insurrectionary outbursts. In
many respects the journals have small historical value,
and throw little light on the course of events. It is
enough to say that the obscene diatribes of the aristo
crats denote a significant lack of dignity unpardonable
in the governing class.
The Revolutionary journals, on the other hand, were
distinguished by an earnest belief in the justice of their
cause. Whilst the royalists were content to jest
coarsely in and out of season, Desmoulins, Brissot,
and Marat were voicing the call of freedom in their
respective journals — Les Revolutions de France et de
"Brabant, Le Patriote, and L 'Ami du Peuple.
The clubs, the cafes, the book-shops, with their vast
stream of topical publications, were thus the means
through which the new and revolutionary ideas spread

Theroigne's Club 121
like wildfire to the bulk of the people, indiscriminately,
without favour or that personal and social note which
relationship, acquaintance, or friendship gives. Yet
this element existed and must not be undervalued.
It was to be found chiefly among the feminine gather
ings in the semi-privacy of the salons. Those of the
capital had changed in tendency at the first signs of the
struggle between the classes and the masses. Philoso
phy, reform, and revolution formed the new keynotes
of intercourse; charm, culture, literature, and learning —
all the graces of the old regime, in short — were relegated
to the background. Earnestness superseded gaiety,
discussion took the place of chat and gossip, and
personal ambition pushed aside social intimacy. Some
of the gatherings were turned into conferences " like
tragedies without women," some were political whirl
pools of rage and ferment, some were training-schools
for orators and pamphlet-writers, and again others were
not unlike forcing-houses where guests were to be
converted with the least possible delay to a belief in the
"illusion of the happiness of humanity." All of them
without exception were touched by the dread shadow
of coming trouble and were enshrouded in the dark
cloud of suspense.
In Mme Necker's salon friends of the ministers
assembled, and she tried to win from the Abbe Sieyes
and Clermont-Tonnerre the good opinion of the
National Assembly for her husband. Mme de StaeTs
social-political activity dated from 1786. Mme de
Simiane and Mme de Coigny's receptions were at their
height. Mme de Tesse opened wide her doors to
exponents of the new ideas. The Princess von Hohen-

122 A Woman of the Revolution
zollern received politicians of the Left, amongst them
Beauharnais, Abbe Dillon, Barnave, and the Lameths.
At Mme de Beauharnais's house Dorat, Colle, Pezay,
and Bonnard held meetings, which were homely in
character. The Comtesse de Genlis — Walpole referred
to her later as the too-well-known woman who fled to
Switzerland — entertained Brissot, Camille Desmoulins,
and the friends of the Duc d'Orleans. The Duke of
Bedford gave balls to the Revolutionaries. The wife
of Talma, the spirituelle Julie, gathered in the Rue
Chantereine many guests of political importance,
Roucher, Roland, the painter Greuze, the orator
Vergniaud, and Marie-Joseph Chenier, who was later
to be associated with Theroigne in the organisation of
the fete to the soldiers of Chateauvieux. After the
death of her husband Mme Helvetius settled in her
country house at Auteuil with her two daughters,
Mme de Mun and Mme d' Andlau, whom Franklin
had rechristened " the stars." A large number of
thinkers frequented this salon — Condorcet, the aristo
crat-republican, Cabanis, Mirabeau's doctor, who married
Mme de Condorcet's sister, Volney the traveller,
Chamfort the witty moralist, whose sallies, said Mme
Roland, " make you laugh and think at the same
time — a very rare occurrence." Mirabeau was his
friend, and Sieyes profited by his ideas. " I have just
composed a work," said Chamfort one day to de
Lauraguais. " Oh, a book ? " inquired the latter. " No,
not a book ; I am not so foolish. Only the title of a
book ; but the title is everything. 1 have given it to
Sieyes. He can say what he will ; people will remember
nothing but the title"— which was " What is the Third

MARC-ETIENNE POPULUS, DEPUIY FOR BOURG-EN-BRESSE.
From an engraving in the Bibliotheque Nationale.

'23

Theroigne's Club 125
Estate ? Nothing. What ought it to be ? Every
thing." Morellet, having deserted the salon of Mme Helve
tius, commenced rival gatherings of his own on Sundays,
at which the Suards were present. At the houses of
Mme Lameth and Mme Dumas there were a great
number of Montagnards, at Mme Roland's many of
the Girondins. At Mme d' Angivillers " all the
Revolution " was made welcome, and, as might be
expected, the number of her guests was not exceeded
in any other drawing-room. She was a very fascinating
hostess. Gouverneur Morris went there as well as to
the Condorcets', whose house he described as the centre
of thinking Europe, where distinguished persons from
far and near were to be found, perhaps the most attractive
feature being the philosopher's lively and sympathetic
wife. This salon was presently known as the Foyer de
la Republique, and all with monarchical tendencies
avoided it thereafter.
After these important and representative salons — and
there were many others — the unpretentious gatherings
held by Theroigne in her apartments at the Hotel de
Grenoble, Rue de Bouloi, may at first seem insignificant.
Nothing like as powerful, they nevertheless had a great
deal in common with the political assemblies organised
by Mme Roland. Their aims were the same.
Theroigne would have scorned the word " salon." She
preferred to use the word "club." Her receptions had
little that was social in their aspect, everything that
was political, and it was necessary for her to minimise
their importance as much as possible when questioned
on the subject by the examining magistrate at Kufstein.
8

126 A Woman of the Revolution
She succeeded in making it appear that the organisation
of the club at her Hotel was one of the most harmless
in existence. She was afraid of being implicated in
plots and conspiracies, and denied having been con
nected with any revolutionary receptions. Yet nowhere
was the purpose more definite, the labour for liberty
more earnest and from the heart. She tells something
of the origin of these meetings in her " Confessions."
" When the National Assembly was installed in Paris,"
she writes, " I followed it. I lodged at the Hotel de
Grenoble in the Rue de Bouloi. I continued to be
present at the sittings morning and evening. Every
one knew me from seeing me so often. The people
and the deputies liked me as much on account of my
patriotism as for my private conduct. ... I proposed
to those who came most often to the Tribune of the
Feuillants to join in making a political society. They
approved of my idea. Whilst this growing club
assembled in my house it numbered some twelve or
thirteen members."
The society was called the Club of the Amis de la
Loi, but must not be confused with one of the same
name founded in 1791 by Osselin. The chief person
associated with Theroigne in founding the society was
Gilbert Romme the mystic. The friendship of this
high-minded idealist — it has been said that he was one
of the purest characters of the Revolution — does more
to reinstate Theroigne amongst the virtuous than the
constant reflections of the royalist pamphlets to prove
her abandonment. " Romme," says Michelet, " with
the face of Socrates, had his profound understanding,
the austere mildness of a sage, of a hero, of a martyr."

Theroigne's Club 127
Like his brother Charles Romme, the mathematician,
Gilbert consecrated himself to the sciences. He was
born at Riom in 1750 and had many followers among
his countrymen in mountainous Auvergne. He sat
in the National Convention, was a Montagnard, helped
to produce the republican calendar and in 1793 stabbed
himself to cheat the guillotine. At the time of his
association with Theroigne he had under his charge a
son of a Russian noble, Count Strogonoff, familiarly
called Otcher. This descendant of despots was
educated by him, in the latest ideas on liberty, and
accompanied him to the sittings of the National
Assembly and the clubs.
Romme was the president of Theroigne's society,
and amongst the members were several of his country
men, Beaulieu, Larminat, Sponville, and Romme's
nephew Tailhard. Otcher was made librarian. The
meetings took place three times a week — on Tuesdays,
Fridays, and Sundays from seven till ten in the evening.
A month later only two meetings were held, on
Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Theroigne did everything she could to make the
club a success and worked hard to recruit new mem
bers. She proposed that her brother should join it,
but the idea was negatived on the ostensible grounds
that he knew very little French ; actually, it was said,
because he had lived at his sister's expense on money
none too honestly come by.
When the club started Theroigne was put in charge
of the papers and documents, but she soon handed
over this responsibility to Chapsal. She took part in
all the discussions, knew as much as the other members

128 A Woman of the Revolution
concerning the legislation of the country, and cham
pioned more hotly than any of them the rights of
her sex. She thought women should be far more inde
pendent and rely less on the protection of men than
they had been accustomed to do.
From March ioth onwards M. de Larminat pre
sided at the meetings, Sponville and Daguet were
secretaries. Maret, the future Duc de Bassano and de
Bosc d' Antic, son of Louis XV.'s doctor and friend of
Mme Roland, joined the society about this time. The
members sought to affiliate popular committees with
the departments. The aims of the club were written
out by Romme * under the title of " Association
Populaire." " The project," said Romme, " is the result of
several conversations in which Mile Theroigne pointed
out that it would be of great importance at this
moment to have an establishment which made it an
object to learn the degree and the means of influence
possessed by each member of the National Assembly."
This idea resulted in the formation and development
of the society. Other plans were added and the whole
grew into an important organisation, its purpose being
" to give a new impulse to manners ; to educate the
people to an understanding of the dignity of its rights ;
to enlighten it upon its real interests and upon the
degree of confidence and esteem that it owes to the
zeal, the knowledge, and the virtues of its representa
tives in the National Assembly ; to display before it
the advantages of the Revolution ; to spread, as far
1 MS. by Romme in the possession of M.Marcellin Pellet. "Theroigne
de Mencourt," p. 39.

Theroigne's Club 129
as possible, a knowledge of the daily workings of the
Assembly ; to reawaken the patriotism which had be
come extinct in the souls or some who were discouraged
or fearful ; to hold back some of the too excitable
spirits who might be carried away by their excess
of zeal ; to spare impatient readers the laborious and
objectionable research among the multitude of pam
phlets and periodical publications with which we are
inundated ; to offer to good citizens a choice of
literature already prepared for their use in a reading-
room open to associates ; to correspond with the
provinces, to spread information concerning good
books and fine deeds, and to gather from these sources
fresh inspirations, new motives of encouragement ; to
focus the scattered rays of public opinion and to dis
sipate the clouds, with which black, vile, and hypo
critical souls intentionally obscure them in order to
alarm others ; and to direct a searching light upon the
tribunal without censuring its decisions, in order that
those marked by wisdom and maturity may acquire an
impressive and redoubtable character in the eyes of
those who would betray the public cause, but may
inspire with confidence those who believe in the
people's good."
A society with such aims should surely have been
above reproach, even though its archivist was " a
woman who was fatally dangerous to the young and
inexperienced." * Romme was absolutely convinced
that the members of the Amis de la Loi were as
blameless in their morals as they were upright in their
opinions. Theroigne appears in an altogether new,
1 " Romme le Montagnard," Marc de Vissac.

i3° A Woman of the Revolution
but perhaps none the less fascinating light. It is easy
to picture her in a quakerish gown of grey, her flam
boyant riding-habits laid temporarily aside, her smile
subdued for the time, the merry twinkle of her eye
veiled by her lashes, her forehead puckered by a little
frown in token of her earnestness, and her brain ever
busy with fresh plans for the furtherance of the club's
purposes. Her ideas were carefully sifted by Romme,
and carried out practically. The work was divided
into various departments. There was a committee
of annotation, whose duty it was to attend the sittings
of the National Assembly ; a bibliographical committee,
charged with the examination and censorship of the
publications and documents for the perusal of the
society ; an information bureau, which gathered in
the news and rumours of the town, and attended
the sittings of the- Commune and of the Chatelet ;
and an editorial department, which issued weekly
reports of the work done by the various committees.
Neither Romme nor Theroigne spared themselves in
perfecting the details of this somewhat complicated
machinery. The arrangements for the library and
reading-room were left chiefly to the young Russian
Count. For the sake of the number of his own
countrymen who were members, Romme desired that
a translation should be made of " The Declaration of
the Rights of Man " into the vernacular of Limagne
d' Auvergne. Theroigne describes a little ceremony that took place
at one of her meetings. " One day," she said, " I had
the idea that it would be a good thing if the people
gave civic crowns or cockades to the best patriots of

Theroigne's Club 131
the National Assembly. A motion to this effect,
directed by M. Romme and others, and signed by the
people, was adopted. Seven cockades were given to
the seven members of the Committee of the Constitu
tion. All the world wished to contribute to the small
expense which this occasioned me. But by reason
of my patriotic zeal, I did not accept. I took the
cockades to M. l'Abbe Sieyes, whom I considered
the most worthy of public gratitude and esteem.
Monsieur l'Abbd came to my house in person to
thank me."
This account of a club, with all its dry-as-dust
details of organisation, not differing much from many
similar institutions, may be contrasted with an imaginary
one — for the French have the power of caricature
developed to a marvellous degree, and when they told
the story of a revolutionary political gathering they
knew how to make it humorous, even to the point
of fantasy. Such a description was published in the
Actes des Apotres at the beginning of 1790, and is
worth repeating, if only because Theroigne played an
important part in it, and figured in the accompany
ing illustration. The skit was entitled the " Club de
la Revolution,", and tells a long-winded story of the
Marquis de ^Condorcet, who conceived the clever plan
of converting the Pantheon opposite the Palais Royal
into a Temple of Liberty, and calling it the Club de la
Revolution, or Portico of France. The opening of
the establishment took place amidst solemn celebra
tions. Some five hundred members, chosen from
amongst the most zealous defenders of the people, lent
it brilliancy. The Abbe de Sieyes was chosen president.

132 A Woman of the Revolution
A like number of ladies, being the most ardent up
holders of the Rights of Man, were adjudged worthy
of the privilege of being incorporated in the society, and
Mile Theroigne de Mericourt was elected prhidente
by her concitoyennes. She was installed on the spot,
and presented with the instrument proper and necessary
to the rights and duties of her post. The functions
required of her were more onerous than those expected
of the president. The little bell usual in such cases
was enlarged upon this occasion, and was provided with
a handle and clapper of remarkable size. The hall was
especially decorated, and there was dancing, four
quadrilles serving to open the ball.
Everybody who was anybody among the revolutionists
was present. The Duc d'Aiguillon, dressed as the Queen
of Hungary, danced the minuet with the Chevalier Malo
de Lameth attired as the King of Prussia. In spite of
their good disguises these two were recognised. This
dance was followed by a contredanse, in which M. de
Clermont Tonnerre took part, wearing an iron mask.
M. de Champcenetz fils danced with a lady disguised
as Venus. M. Guillotin, the political doctor, danced
not to his own instrument of torture, but a solemn
minuet with Mile Samson. Robespierre, disguised as
a cherub, thought it would be better to substitute a
tight-rope dance, but to this the grave doctor objected.
A pas de quatre followed, performed by Mirabeau
attired like a royal tiger, with a mask of Paris
mud, Brissot dressed like the wandering Jew, Mme
Olympe de Gouges disguised as a young Indienne, and
Mme de Condorcet masquerading as the Infanta of
Zamora. The fandanga, the caloula, and the bamboula

Theroigne's Club 133
were danced, Talleyrand being among the many who
took part in tfiese fantastic steps. Next came a per
formance by Target, who walked the tight-rope, and
to him Sieyes presented a colossal pyramid, which being
reversed he was ordered to balance to the best of his
ability on its point. This ingenious symbol repre
sented the Constitution. Thouret, in the garb of a
harlequin, then sang a song entitled, " Ah ! comme
il y viendra," and Target, in the endeavour to respond
with " J 'ai plus que vous le poignet ferme," took a
false step and came toppling down, pyramid and all.
After some more turns of a similar character, Mira
beau, disguised in red, white, and blue, danced a
figure representing the Constitution of England,
which had remained unaltered for a complete century.
Barnave was also present, and, masked in the head of
a shark, and with his coat laced with principles, was
intended to represent the Rights of Man.
Much more of the same kind of satire followed,
including a detailed description of the illustration to
the scene, which was called the "Opening Ceremony of
the Club de la Revolution."
Mile Theroigne de Mericourt is here to be seen
directing the orchestra and handling two bells which
weighed no less than forty-four pounds each.
Harmonious as were the musical instruments, the
noise from the boxes on the left, rising above them,
often made it impossible to hear oneself speak. The
costume of Mile Theroigne is the same she wore at
Versailles when, at the head of the national army, she
routed a brigade of the bodyguard. Her scarlet
riding-habit, her black plumes, her chestnut locks, were

134 A Woman of the Revolution
the rallying-sign. She was always to be found on the
road taken by the routed. Medias inter ccedes exultat
Amazon. In a manner similar to the lictors of the
Roman Consuls, the august coupe-tit e carried national
forces in front of our heroine, who commanded a
detachment of five hundred warriors as dependable as
herself. The picture also shows Target doing his tight-rope
act, Sieyes climbing up the folding ladder to give him
the inverted pyramid. Not far from Theroigne is
Barnave wearing the shark mask, and in the back
ground Mme de Stael is arm-in-arm with M. de
Champcenetz. But to return to Theroigne's club. Naturally
enough both her friends and enemies were quick to
express in complimentary or derogatory terms their
opinion of her attempt at establishing one of her own
on purely political lines. Champcenetz was perhaps
the most satirical among her opponents. His account,
or supposed account, appeared in a letter purporting
to be from him, and printed in the Actes des Apotres.
It forms a remarkable contrast to her own simple
story of the meetings at her house.
" Chance," he wrote, " gave me the acquaintance of
Mile Theroigne de Mericourt. The charm of her
face, the graces of her wit, and, far more than that, her
ardent love of liberty, attracted me to this adorable
woman. She might be called the muse of democracy,
or, still better, Venus giving lessons on public rights.
Her society is a lyceum, her principles those of the
portico. She might have those of the arcade if she
desired. Among her pupils may be counted Abbe

Theroigne's Club 135
Sieyes, Petion de Villeneuve, Barnave, and the happy
Populus, whose prodigious arts of pleasing and
inexhaustible love she will soon crown, alas! by a
marriage which will be the misfortune of my life.
The pieces most applauded, most eloquent, most civic
of their discourse at the Assembly have been composed
or inspired by her. The Hotel de Grenoble, Rue de
Bouloi, where she lodges, has become the central
point of the great interests of regenerated France.
There the discovery was made of that administrative
power, unknown to the ancients, so simple in its
organisation, so imposing in its details, and so
ingenious in its progress that it will immediately re
place the three other powers, however little the
mechanism of political societies is perfected. There
the foundations of this royal democracy, which has
all the advantages of republics, without having the
inconveniences of monarchies, are laid ; there is
built, with the hands of philanthropy, the edifice of the
liberty of the blacks, already so advanced in Martinique ;
. . . there the project ripens of making d 'Avignon the
eighty-fifth department of France ; there the enter
prises of aristocrats are disconcerted ; there, in short,
are prepared those luminous motions which are at
the same time the admiration of the capital and the
stupefaction of the provinces."
Le Rodeur, which endeavoured to protect the
much-maligned Theroigne from her arch enemies,
" The Apostles," had also a word to say on her
startling enterprise. In its columns she was de
scribed as an amiable young lady of two-and-twenty,
who hastened to return from Rome to the banks of

136 A Woman of the Revolution
the Seine in order to protect the dawning liberty of
the French. She took up the people's cause, and her
enthusiasm for the rights of man soon made itself felt.
Revolutionary committees, it was declared, were held
at her house, where a thousand nails were driven into
the machinery of the Constitution, and a policy was
followed which so enraged the forty-five apostles that
in their utter aristocratic impotence they permitted
themselves every outrage, every poignant atrocity,
that jealous fury could devise.
Among this more or less excellent fooling, the
general opinion appeared to be, especially in royalist
circles, that she might have turned her unquestionable
charms to better account. All sorts of lies were told
concerning the number and identity of her associates.
The deposition of the Comte de la Valette, entitled
" Dires et Aveux," represented her as being in close
relation with the heads of the democracy, whom she
received frequently at her house. " Besides the Duc
d'Orleans," he declares, " who was her great and
principal friend, one might meet at her salon the Dues
de Liancourt and de Broglie, the Comte de Mirabeau,
Abbe Sieyes, and many others, all of them deputies
and partisans of the people."
Baron Mengin Salabert on the same subject said
that when the States General was assembled she invited
to her house the most rabid democrats, among them
Barnave, Robespierre, Chapelier, and Mirabeau. " This
new Lais turned their heads," he continues, " and they
soon made of her a veritable Aspasia to whose house
they came to take lessons in politics, eloquence, and
legislation. The continual association with courtesans

Theroigne's Club 137
usually enervates both soul and body, and often is
conducive to the loss of fortune, health, repose, and
honour. The four philosophers mentioned did not
fear such effects, least of all from the financial point
of view. They were soon reinforced by twenty
other deputies, among whom were the Abbe Sieyes
and the Abbe Gouttes, in spite of his white hairs.
"They took an hotel, at which they lodged this
marvellous young woman. There they conspired.
It was at her house that they formed the project of
corrupting the French guards. Dressed as a man,
she went alone, from one end of Paris to the other,
through all the barracks. She harangued the soldiers
hour after hour, and in the end distributed money
amongst them. Thirty thousand livres were given
by her in a fortnight ! The memorable manifestation
of the 5th and 6th of October was prepared by her.
The Duc d'Orleans frequented her salon. He used
to go there at night, as well as several of those
attached to his house. They gave themselves up to
their usual orgies."
All this is the creation of a vivid imagination.
Theroigne denied that she had ever spoken to the
Duc d'Orldans. She said, moreover, that, though
she knew Robespierre, Chapelier, and the Abbe Gouttes
by sight, she had never spoken to them and never
invited them to her house. If she had been intimate
with them, she would have thought it a great honour.
When asked whether she had given supper-parties at
Versailles, she denied that too.
" When Paris was filled with clubs," says Beaulieu,
a more reliable authority, " she was to be seen at one

138 A Woman of the Revolution
or two every evening, after having harangued crowds
in every quarter of the town all day long, giving out
at the clubs her motions and instructions, and hurrying
back to her house to do the honours for her visitors.
It would be difficult to find another example of such
activity." He accused her of having utterly ruined
certain persons of considerable repute. " Rather
neglected at the outbreak of the Revolution," he
continues, in his " Essais Historiques," "weary of
pleasures which had been too well paid, the little
Mericourt thought of taking up a political career.
She dressed herself in a riding-habit, crowned her
pretty head with a little hat a la Henri Quatre, and
in this attire mixed with the crowd of speakers who
never ceased to discuss affairs of State in the tribunes
and gangways of the National Assembly."
Her singular appearance soon attracted much atten
tion. At first it was thought she was there to win
the admiration which means much to one of her sex
and age. But this was quite a mistake. " The most
innocent gallantry made her frown, and the voluptuous
Cypris was suddenly metamorphosed into a grave and
severe Minerva. This clever pretence imposed on
everybody, pricked their dignity, provoked the affec
tions of those who thought she was pretty, and little
was wanting to turn all the politicians into passionate
lovers. " Several of the deputies paid court to the courtesan,
among others the famous Petion, with whom she
often had conferences. They also pretended that
Populus, the deputy, was one of her lovers. But the
truth was that she did not know him. The authors

Theroigne's Club 139
of the Actes des Apotres made a pun on the word
Populus, meaning people, and her marriage to Populus
meant the marriage with the people."
No one gave more praise to the philosophic senti
ments uttered by the fair Theroigne, in Beaulieu's
opinion, than the Abbe Sieyes. He was her particular
god. She openly paid homage and adoration to his
talents and virtues. Mirabeau's immorality she sternly
deplored. She was told to make allowances for him
on account of his weakness for the fair sex, but this
she refused to do, and went so far as to show her
disapproval in strong terms.
The authors of the " Histoire de la Revolution par
deux amis de la Liberie " said much the same. It is
suggested that Beaulieu collaborated with Kerverseau
and Clavelin in this work, and he may have written
or revised their account of Theroigne. "We have
seen wise men fall in love with this small person, who
rejected their advances with a Lacedemonian pride,"
they say. " When they learnt that this scrupulous
beauty was nothing more nor less than a jille entretenue,
abandoned by a lover she had ruined, they laughed
heartily." The most intimate connections of this " Luxemburg
prude," as they call her, were with the brother of
Abbe Sieyes and Romme, one of the most zealous
followers of the Abbe. Romme, who had since
become deputy in the national convention, was at
that time tutor to a young Russian noble, Count
Strogonoff, who was amused by the intimacy between
the two. Theroigne was pretty, Romme was a sort
of Quaker, affecting the most austere modesty ; he

140 A Woman of the Revolution
took no care of his person, and was not good to look
upon. He was an obscure metaphysician, a political
alchemist whose ridiculous dissertations it was quite
impossible to follow. Nothing was more comic, they
said, than to hear the little Theroigne trying to
appreciate her master's mysticism, and to see these
two, so different in appearance and manner, laughing
together at their audacious discoveries.
The Deux Amis put her age at twenty-three or four
at the time they knew her. They admitted her pretti-
ness, but said that she pushed her reserve to extremes,
that the most innocent pleasantries made her blush and
the least coaxing annoyed her. Nevertheless men
were usually her companions. She joined in all the
groups, was to be found in all the clubs and at all the
revolutionary fetes. After spending the morning in
the public tribunes of the National Assembly she
spoke in the evening at the Cordeliers and at the
Jacobins. Lamartine and Goncourt have taken their accounts
of Theroigne's salon from the less accurate sources, of
which there are many. Both make Mirabeau her
guest as well as Camille Desmoulins. Goncourt adds
the names of Brissot, Chenier, Clootz, Fabre "d'Eglan-
tine, Momoro, Saint-Just, and Robespierre. Lamartine
mentions Danton and Ronsin also. " Romme, the
mystical republican," he says, " infused into her mind
the German spirit of illuminatism. Youth^ love,
revenge, and the contact with this furnace of a revolu
tion, had turned her head, and she lived in the intoxi
cation of passions, ideas, and pleasures. Connected at
first with the great innovations of '89, she had passed

THEROIGNE CONDUCTS THE ORCHESTRA AT THE CLUB DE LA REVOLUTION.

Theroigne's Club 143
from their arms into those of rich voluptuaries, who
purchased her charms dearly. Courtesan of opulence,
she became the voluntary prostitute of the people ;
and like her celebrated prototypes of Egypt and of
Rome, she lavished upon liberty the wealth she
derived from vice." Duval is quite as extreme : " All
who had vowed hatred against royalty, all who thirsted
after royal blood, were admitted with enthusiasm to
her lodging, and feted and caressed there. She was
the Duchesse de Montpensier of the gutters, as well as
the wicked and vindictive sister of the Guises."
A remarkable picture of a vampire which, as far
as Theroigne was concerned, was scarcely true to
nature !
In spite of all that was written by those who pre
ferred to depict her as a bloodthirsty individual march
ing through the dramatic scenes of the Revolution
with the intention of slaying and destroying, it is
evident that at this time at least she was far more the
dame politique than the warrior. She had put her
whole heart into the success of the society which had
its head-quarters at her house, and when it became
obvious that the venture was not going to succeed she
was sincerely grieved. She found it impossible to
recruit new members, and suggested every means of
sustaining the dying interest in the club, which had
only had a lease of three months of life. " When the
association which had first held its meetings in my
rooms was dissolved," she says, " I proposed to form
a new one. I was guided in all my propositions only
by the love of good and the glory to be acquired
by rendering myself useful to the nation. But I had
9

144 A Woman of the Revolution
not enough talent for this, nor enough experience, and,
alas ! I was only a woman."
The idea of forming a new club having been
abandoned, a proposal was started that the original
members should join the Club des Cordeliers, but some
of them objected to this scheme. Theroigne herself
would have rejoiced in being permitted to work on an
equal footing with the men who were giving time,
money, and life itself for the good of their country.
But here too she was debarred by sex. The ambitions
and patriotism of a woman were not to be taken
seriously at that date. She had done her best to draw
Sieyes into her little circle, feeling convinced that with
his authority behind her she would be able to secure
a certain amount of attention wherever she wished to
make herself heard. In this respect her project failed
and she had to remain contented with receiving the
great constitution-builder by proxy in the person of
his brother. Nevertheless she obtained a consider
able, though by no means unlimited, influence.
According to Beaulieu her assistance was regarded as
invaluable in cases where stragglers were to be won
over, or the discouraged to be strengthened, so re
markable were her powers of persuasion. She was
always present in the tribunes or neighbourhood of
the Assembly, sometimes dressed in a Greek costume,
at the head of the shouting rabble, and to her was
relegated the duty of leading the applause or hooting.
She had an extraordinary vivacity, an alert imagination,
and but little wit, declared the same writer, whatever
may have been said by those who in 1789 regarded her
as a prodigy. Her head was full of verses by those

Theroigne's Club 145
great poets who had the most exalted Republican ideas.
She repeated them with wonderful fire, in a jargon
which was half French, half Flemish, which amused her
hearers and sounded delightful on lips that were to all
appearance sweet and innocent.
Theroigne had undoubtedly the gift of oratory.
Some of her worst detractors admitted so much. The
Petit Gauthier, royalist among the royalists, and full of
coarse and satiric jesting, described "the Brabantian
nymph " as carrying away her audience by sheer fervour
when speaking at a bookseller's in the Palais Royal, in
spite of the fact that what she said was so unreasonable
that the aristocrats " shrugged their shoulders for very
pity," and forced her to cut short her remarks before
she had done her speech.
Baudet, who often saw her at gatherings near the
Tuileries, declared that she spoke more with confidence
than with the word of the orator. Her costume was
neither elegant nor bizarre. It consisted of a common
green riding-habit and a hat with a black feather. She
was small and well-shaped, with good features and a
complexion the colour of a russet pear, owing to the
out-of-door life she led.
Evidence of her oratorical abilities was given by
Hyde de Neuville, a royalist whose grandfather had
fled from England with Charles Stuart in 1745. Hyde
de Neuville had followed the royal cause staunchly
from the opening of the Revolution, and wherever he
could gather a crowd he harangued it upon its duty.
He declared that Marie- Antoinette had become to him
an object of romantic devotion and that he could see
no higher aim in life than to work for her in this

146 A Woman of the Revolution
manner. However much he ran the danger of being
menaced and pursued, he never allowed his zeal to
lessen. " One day," he writes in his Memoirs, " I was so
little circumspect as to apostrophise Theroigne de
Mericourt, already known by her audacious immorality
and revolutionary declarations. She was haranguing
the people from the Feuillants Terrace, and did not
refrain from trying to persuade them by the use of
pompous phrases, born of the Revolution, which
were the shameful products of fanaticism, ignorance,
and the perversity of our political charlatans. We
began by discussion and we ended in dispute.
" This orator in petticoats gave vent to a thousand
coarse insults and endeavoured to excite the crowd
against me, but for once the populace was inclined to
be generous. People listened to me without murmur
ing. A man entered the group and shouted in an
imperious tone that I was an aristocrat and must be
left in peace. He was disappointed that I did not get
angry, for he liked to hear plain speaking. Then he
came close to me and said in a low tone, ' Now you
have done enough, little aristocrat ; get out of this,'
and I followed his advice, which was good."
Hyde de Neuville described Theroigne as an un
fortunate courtesan, who although still young in years
had aged before her time. He remarked on the
facility with which she expressed herself, and described
her carriage as upright, her figure as fine, and her per
sonality as stamped with shamelessness and effrontery.
Conflicting accounts lead to the belief that Thdroigne,
who was usually shy, retiring, and modest, lost all

Theroigne's Club 147
appearance of bashfulness when roused by the excite
ment of her cause and made a bold impression upon
her hearers. Her first serious attempt at a speech
which has been recorded was made at the Club des
Cordeliers, the fiery off-shoot of the Jacobins Club.
It was reported by Camille Desmoulins in the Revolu
tions de France et de Brabant, and, it must be con
fessed, is coloured by the eloquent personality of its
transcriber. Theroigne was imbued with the idea that
it was time the National Assembly should be housed in
a palace worthy of its great aims. She came to air
these views before the tribunal of the club.
An usher announced to the president of the gather
ing that a young woman desired to enter. Every one
thought that she must be a petitioner. No one
expected that a preliminary question was going to be
put, so that the surprise was enormous when the
celebrated Mile Theroigne came forward and asked
leave to speak and propose a resolution. It was
unanimously agreed to admit her to the bar. One
honourable member was overcome by his enthusiasm
on seeing her. He cried, " Here is the Queen of Sheba
who has come to see the Solomon of the districts."
"Yes," replied Theroigne to this challenge, with
much presence of mind, " it is the reputation of your
wisdom which brings me into your midst. Prove that
you are Solomon, and that you have been chosen to
build a temple, and then hasten to erect a temple to the
National Assembly. That is the object of my motion.
Can good patriots much longer endure to see the
executive power lodged in the finest palace in the world,
whilst the legislative power has to dwell in tents ;

148 A Woman of the Revolution
sometimes in the Salle des Menus-plaisirs, sometimes at
the tennis-court, sometimes in the riding-school, like
the ark's dove that has nowhere to rest its feet ? The
last stone of the last cell of the Bastille has been
brought to the Senate, and M. Camus regards it every
day with delight where it lies deposited in the archives.
The ground on which the Bastille stood is vacant ;
a hundred thousand workmen require occupation.
Why do we delay, illustrious Cordeliers, model of the
districts, patriots, republicans, Romans, who hear me ?
Hasten to open a subscription in order to erect a
palace for the National Assembly on the site of the
Bastille. All France will hasten to second you in this.
She only awaits the signal ! Give it. Invite all the
best workmen, the most celebrated artists ; send for the
famous architects ; cut down the cedars of Lebanon,
and the firs of Mount Ida. Ah, if stones could move
of their own free-will it is not for the building of the
walls of Thebes they would do so, but to construct the
temple of Liberty ! We must give our gold and our
jewels to enrich and embellish this edifice. I will give
mine first as an example. You have been told that
the French are like Jews, people who have become
idolaters. The crowd is moved through its senses.
It is needful to give it outward and visible images upon
which it may bestow its worship. Turn its glances
from the Pavilion de Flore, the colonnades of the
Louvre, to let them rest on a basilica more beautiful
than Saint Peter's at Rome and Saint Paul's in London.
The veritable temple of the Eternal, the only worthy
one, is a temple in which the declaration of the Rights
of Man has been spoken. The French in the National

Theroigne's Club 149
Assembly claim the rights of men and citizens. There
without a doubt is a sight upon which the Supreme
Being can turn His gaze with delight ; there is the
form of worship He will accept with greater pleasure
than tenor and bass voices raised in the Kyrie eleison
or a Salvum fac regem."
" Imagine," added Desmoulins, " the effect of a
discourse so animated and sparkling with symbols
borrowed indiscriminately from Pindar and the Holy
Scriptures." When the outburst of applause which greeted her
speech had calmed down, her motion was discussed
and adopted. The club charged its President Pard,
its ex-President Danton, its Vice-President Fabre
d'Eglantine, as well as Camille Desmoulins and
Dufour ny de Villiers, to draw up a»i address on the
subject and distribute it in the districts and departments.
Enthusiasm ran riot.
But in the end the idea came to nothing. It was
not altogether new. A month before a certain Mme
Desormeaux had brought forward a similar scheme.
Perhaps Thdroigne borrowed it from her. Her elo
quence certainly drew more people's attention to it.
Thdroigne's grammar was not perfect by any means,
but she never lacked inspiration. She had an ulterior
motive in making this appeal to the people. She
hoped to be admitted to the district with a consultative
vote — that is to say, she desired to be accepted as a
member on the same terms as a man might have been.
But this was denied her. The Assembly agreed with
its president, who moved a vote of thanks to this
charming citoyenne for her resolution. He declared

i5° A Woman of the Revolution
that since the Council of Macon had acknowledged
the fact that women are possessed of a soul and intellect
like men, no one could prevent them from making so
good a use of their faculties as Thdroigne had done,
and that she or others of her sex would be listened
to with pleasure if they wished to propose measures
they believed to be advantageous to their country.
But — and then came the bitter pill — it was impossible
to admit her to the club as a member with a right
to speak, leaving out of the question altogether the
power to vote.
Although this repulse was a great disappointment
to her, she did not dwell on it, and in her own account
of the affair only referred to her success.
" I went to the Club des Cordeliers," she says in her
" Confessions," " and made the following proposition :
'It is necessary to open a subscription list to build
a hall which may be worthy of the representatives of
the nation, and to invite the most celebrated artists in
Europe to hold a consultation regarding plans and
a style of decoration. Women must renounce their
jewels and all such superfluities as are incompatible
with the austerity of manners and simplicity of habits
which ought to be the rule in a time regenerated by
liberty. These vain ornaments ought to be sacrificed,
on the altar of our country.' My motion was
adopted." Thdroigne's attitude was not received with acclama
tions from the press. The Observateur of March 4th,
1790, whilst it described her as a young heroine who
played a role in the Revolution as brilliant as that
of Gildippe and Clorinda at the siege of Jerusalem,

Theroigne's Club 151
nevertheless pooh-poohed her idea of building a palace
for the National Assembly, on the grounds of the
expense at a time when the kingdom was plunged into
profound and universal misery. "Had she any idea,"
they inquired, " as to the immense sums which would
have to be consecrated to such an enterprise?" Before
this was done, it would be better that the effects of the
monstrous inequality of private fortune should be re
moved. "Imagine," continues the Observateur, address
ing their victim, " if you have the courage to do so, four
thousand invalids cooped up in one house, placed four
by four, even six by six, in beds where air so pestilential
circulates that the most robust health does not come in
contact with it without peril. . . . There, if you have
eloquence to spare, would be an object worthy of your
talents. Moreover," they concluded, " it would be
absurd to wish to add to the edifices of a town which
is already almost deserted. Would it not be better,"
they advised her, "to keep within the bounds of a
modest silence than to make oneself conspicuous by
making such ill-timed propositions ? "
The Observateur Feminin, which should have sup
ported the doings of a woman, merely stated that
Theroigne had astonished the Cordeliers, had made
all Paris laugh, and had laid claims to great notoriety.
The royalists made very sarcastic comments on the
affair. " This heroine of the boudoir," they said,
" proposes resolutions in her district. She considers
the King is too well lodged and the Assembly too
badly. Mile Thdroigne, by her masculine courage,
her patriotism, and her flashing eloquence, is in a fair
way to make people forget her sex."

iS2 A Woman of the Revolution
But that was just what Thdroigne failed to do, to
her own great regret. Without being unwomanly she
desired to be a reformer, and that was denied her. It
seemed to her hard and cruel that this should be so.
She tells an incident in her " Confessions " which
emphasises the annoyance to which she was subjected.
" The day when the deputies went to Notre-Dame,
to sing the Te Deum, they sent me a ticket to be
present at the ceremony," she writes. " But I arrived
there too late, and could not get through the crowd.
Several patriot deputies invited me to walk with them
in the procession. The desire to see such a solemn
spectacle, and also the honour of joining the deputies
in a public ceremony, made me accept their offer. So
I went part of the way in their ranks. There were
many who cried 'Ho! A woman deputy! That is
singular ! ' Some priestly aristocrats who noticed this
expostulated with me. I took their advice and retired.
There were a great number of people who, like myself,
were marching in the procession with the deputies
without being deputies themselves. But they were
men. At this moment, feeling extremely humiliated,
I acknowledged the force and the persistence of the
masculine pride and prejudice which oppressed my sex,
and kept it in bondage."
Urged on by such experiences, Theroigne devoted
herself to the cause of women's emancipation.

CHAPTER IV
THE CITOYENNES
THEROIGNE'S enthusiasm on behalf of her sex
was to lead her far ; through martyrdom,
through triumph, through degradation, to an appalling
fate at last. Many women there were who loved as
much and suffered as much and were as much in
earnest as she, and probably not one of them all re
gretted or felt remorse for what they had done.
The Revolution gave them many opportunities.
They were longing to show their metde, their powers
of endurance, their patriotism, and their unselfishness.
A common cause urged them to do the thing that has
always seemed a difficult task for women to achieve,
namely, to unite in a common purpose, to form a
combination which should give them power to solve
the problems of their existence. Theroigne saw the
need of this union and advocated it with all her
strength. That she was not more successful as a
leader was perhaps the fault of circumstance and con
ditions rather than of herself, and yet she was lacking
in some quality which should have brought her into
closer sympathy with other women. She understood
men better, and was perhaps not tolerant enough of
feminine scruples nor faithful enough to the laws of
social convention. But any deficiency in tact and
i53

154 A Woman of the Revolution
intuition was counterbalanced by her application to
practical detail and her genuine desire to understand
and master the situation. Had she realised more
clearly the temper of the women with whom she had to
deal her task would have been easier and more prolific
in results.
Serious upheavals which have for their aim the
establishment of new and improved conditions have
always found women ready to participate in bringing
about social reforms that touch them closely. So it
was at the time of the French Revolution. The ideals,
aims, and faith in the future which dwelt in the hearts
of men stirred also in the bosoms of the women of the
country. Yet there was this difference. Men were
fighting for the liberty of the race ; women desired in
addition the liberty of the sex. The misery, poverty,
and degradation from which the masses suffered were
shared by them equally, but the political and civil
rights for which men struggled were doubly debarred
to them.
They not only determined therefore to stand side by
side with men in the great forward movement, but
they desired to make their powers so much appreciated
that their companions would realise their worth, and
bestow freely upon them the reward they were seeking.
This was no easy task. Men were ready in that day,
as in any other, to ridicule the claims of women to a
political and social equality with themselves. But
although the great body of men had still to be con
verted, women were not without advocates amongst
them. Their chief champion at this time perhaps was
Condorcet, marquis and republican, who wrote in his

The Citoyennes 155
"Lettres d'un Bourgeois de Newhaven a un citoyen
de Virginie," etc. (1787), that women should be con
sidered as both eligible and elective, and that the idea
must be combated that they were illogical and in
capable of being placed on a footing equal to men.
If, he said, the number of women who have received
an exact and continuous education be compared with
the number of men who have enjoyed the same
advantages, it will be seen that the repeated opinion
that the former possess no initiative cannot be regarded
as proved, and he added, " I am afraid of getting into
bad odour with them if they read this article, for I
am speaking of their claims to equality, and not of
their natural empire."
Condorcet's enthusiasm was not shared by many of
his colleagues, and led to but little practical outcome.
Women grew discontented and felt that justice was not
being done to them. Those who were most in earnest
demanded definite rights as women citizens, but they
could not master the art of unity and combination,
and isolated appeals received no attention.
In spite of the fact, however, that they were refused
their chief demands, the efforts they made towards more
freedom were not entirely in vain.
They won privileges of speech, of conscience, of
appeal, as well as the right to petition, which was
valuable ; they could no longer be arrested or im
prisoned except as directed by law, and they gained,
at least temporarily, a right to divorce.
Considering that they were ready to sacrifice their
all, life itself if need be, to obtain their desires, these
advantages may seem but an inadequate result of

156 A Woman of the Revolution
strenuous labours, but it would be misleading to sup
pose so, for much of the emancipation of women has
been based upon the exertions of that period, and the
real origin of the feminist movement, although the
word " feminist " was not then applied to it, dates from
the revolutionary attempt to emancipate humanity.
The political weight of their opinions may be largely
discounted, perhaps, but the fact of their presence and
personal influence in all that went on cannot be denied.
Women were in the vanguard of the mobs ; they
swarmed in the galleries of the Assembly and of the
clubs. They marched in processions, festive or riotous,
and invaded the bakers' shops. They filled the prisons,
surfeited the guillotine, and joined with men in acts
of bloodshed and violence which proved the state of
desperation they had been goaded into, but did litde
credit to the restraint and modesty always regarded
as among the more feminine virtues. Women were
keenly interested in all the debates ; they prepared
speeches, they wrote discourses, they organised meet
ings, they embroidered flags and banners, they made
shirts and knitted stockings, they sacrificed their
jewels and other luxurious tastes on the altar of liberty.
Gone were the habits and frivolities of the old regime,
gone the coquetry and dilettantism of the days of
monarchy ! From the highest to the lowest they
demanded work — a legitimate means of earning an
independent livelihood, bread that they might eat under
terms of liberty, and they asked further that men
should not be allowed to exercise such trades as they
considered were essentially suited to women. " Leave
us at least the needle and the spinning-wheel," they

The Citoyennes 157
pleaded, and then with a sigh of revolt they added
" Is our device always to be ' Work, obey, and be
silent ' ? "
Truly their lot in the Revolution was a hard one.
They had so little glory, so much suffering and
sacrifice. They were prevented, except in isolated
cases, from distinguishing themselves on the battle
field, or in the legislative house, side by side with
men, but their punishment was as heavy as that
meted out to their brothers. " Women have the
right to mount the scaffold," cried Olympe de Gouges ;
" they ought to have an equal right to mount the
tribunal." Where was justice ? Whilst in the hope
of receiving their due, women searched ardently for
an outlet for their pent-up energies. Not content to
work and wait passively in the home, they desired
to give some picturesque or dramatic exhibition of
their eagerness to play an active part. This led some
of them to offer their jewels publicly to the country
on September 7th, 1789. The president of the
National Assembly rose to ask the house for an
audience for those ladies who wished to vouchsafe
this proof of patriotism. There was a sudden hush
in the Assembly, and then a burst of applause as the
women filed in, simply attired in white, without
ornament of any kind. An usher was appointed to
show them into seats, and a discourse was read which
set forth their willingness to give up their jewels,
" which they would blush to wear when patriotism
demanded the sacrifice."
Then the president thanked these generous women
in the name of the Assembly, and one by one they

158 A Woman of the Revolution
stepped forward, casket in hand, to place their offerings
on the president's table. By these and similar means
some hundreds of thousands of francs were collected
and distributed among the poor.
But the real centre of attraction to women was
the club. Even as Thdroigne had quickly realised
the growing power and importance of this institution,
other women saw also that here might be found the
very opening which they were seeking for their
enthusiasm. But if they imagined that men would
admit them even here on equal terms with themselves
they were utterly mistaken. In a few instances their
presence at meetings was allowed within certain limits,
and before long many of the societies organised a
joint or branch section which was open to both sexes ;
but those women who believed themselves to be born
orators, and were anxious to air their views upon a
platform, were, with a few exceptions, doomed to
disappointment. And this state of affairs led eventually
to the formation of women's clubs.
One of the first of the clubs to see a woman on its
platform was the Cercle Sociale ; the incident, how
ever, was unexpected and unrehearsed. This society
had a hall in the Palais Royal, capable of seating some
three thousand people. It had a large membership
at a subscription of eight livres a month, and its
motto, inscribed in prominent lettering above the
speaker's head, was, " Bring each a ray of light."
On November 26th, 1790, one Charles Louis Rousseau
was endeavouring somewhat unsuccessfully to~perform
the injunction of the motto with reference more par
ticularly to woman's political position.

GILBERT ROMME.

159

The Citoyennes 161
" Have women influence in government?" he asked,
" and, if so, by what means can this influence be used
in enhancing the prosperity of the State ? What civil
and political rights should be possessed by women in
the best-governed country ? " and other questions
bearing on the same subject.
Instead of dealing with the matter in a straight
forward and practical fashion, the speaker strung
together a number of platitudes, interspersed his speech
with ill-timed complimentary phrases meant to flatter
his fair audience, and punctuated the whole with
theatrical gesticulations which wearied the less im
pressionable of his hearers, so that at last the president,
fearing that this uninspiring speech would never end,
took it upon himself to suspend the sitting. This
was an unexpected blow to feminism, and a woman
of commanding figure rose and asked a question in
ringing tones, plainly heard throughout the hall.
" Gentlemen," she said, " is it possible that the
Revolution, which has for its object the attainment
of the rights of man, can be the cause of Frenchmen
showing injustice and dishonesty to women ? Other
speakers have been listened to with patience. Why
should the one who pleads the cause of women be
interrupted ? I demand, in the name of the women
citizens present, that M. Rousseau be allowed to
proceed." At these remarks there was general applause. The
speaker was asked herself to continue. But her
modesty prevented her saying more than a very few
words. She blamed the Frenchmen for having become
corrupt and enfeebled. " Since our compatriots have
10

1 62 A Woman of the Revolution
imitated the Romans, let us imitate the virtues and
patriotism of the Roman women," she cried. There
was a general desire amongst them to elect her
prisidente, but she refused.
This woman, Etta Palm by name, of Dutch extrac
tion, and called Adders before her marriage, worked
as well or even better than Thdroigne in her sisters'
cause. She did several notable things in the move
ment, attempting to federate the women's societies
and establish a correspondence among them similar
to that carried on by the Jacobins. The oath taken
by the members of these societies was worded as
follows : " I swear to be faithful to the nation, to the
law, and to the king. I swear to help my husband,
my brothers, and my children to fulfil their duties to
the State as far as possible. I swear to teach my
children, and all those over whom I have authority,
to prefer death to slavery."
Etta placed herself at the head of those who pleaded
for civic and intellectual education. Thdroigne, after
seeing her own club fail, and realising something of the
ever-increasing dangers in which France was becoming
involved, veered over to those who desired military
privileges and made their chief aim a share in the
national defence. Etta desired to raise a statue to the
wife of Phocion, in order that women might have
before their eyes a model of wisdom, modesty, and
simplicity — virtues which were both moral and civic.
Thdroigne, realising the futility of opposing force
with humility and goodness, would rather have con
structed a temple to Bellona, so that she might
command her votaries to kneel before the altar of

The Citoyennes 163
the goddess and utter a prayer for strength and ability
in arms.
But this warlike attitude developed its full force
only when constitutional measures had failed. This
was not until after her return from Kufstein. Until
then she remained watching the work that other
women were doing in the very* field she was trying
to enter herself, the field of political labour. Busy
as she was with her own affairs, she found time to
appreciate the efforts that other women were making
to join the clubs or, this being denied them, to found
societies of their own.
Etta Palm was one of the prime movers in this
direction. She set forth in the following terms the
part she thought women ought to play in these
institutions :
Citizens, she declared, have united in the eighty-
three departments to defend the " Constitution. Do
you not think, gentlemen, that their wives and the
mothers of families could unite in imitation of them to
make it beloved ? La Socidtd des Amis de la Verite
is the first society which has admitted us to patriotic
meetings." Then she referred to the provincial towns,
Creil, Alais, Bordeaux, and others, that had followed
this example. " Would it not be useful," she con
tinued, " if a patriotic society of citoyennes was formed
in each section of the capital, and if a central and
federative circle invited all the societies of the eighty-
three departments to correspond with them ? " And
then followed a detailed and apparently practical plan
of federal organisation. Among other duties, women
were to combine to protect young country girls who

164 A Woman of the Revolution
arrived in the capital without friends, acquaintances, or
money, and who ran great perils in an unknown city,
to look after public education and bring up the rising
generation to be strong and healthy citizens. Charity
schools were to be under their immediate supervision,
and workshops were to be founded at which girls from
six to thirteen were to be taught some suitable trade in
order that later they might help to support the family :
in short, every form of poverty or misery, every un
fortunate or starving woman, was to have a sacred
claim upon the assistance of the club.
Unlike Theroigne, Etta Palm was no orator. " If,"
she said, " the construction of my phrases is not
according to the rules of the French Academy, it is
because I consulted my heart rather than the diction
ary." She declared that women were superior to men
in vivacity of imagination, in delicacy of sentiment,
in their resignation during trouble, strength in grief
and pain, patience in suffering and both in generosity
of soul and patriotic zeal. Thus she summed up the
feminine virtues. She spoke of the sacrifice of jewels
and adornment, and thought that as a reward civic
crowns should replace the gew-gaws which could only
be regarded as the outward signs of frivolity and
luxury. She also advocated union to be achieved by
the elimination of all personal hate and enmity. This
was one of the chief doctrines preached by Thdroigne.
" In that case," cried Etta Palm, meaning if they were
all united, " what could fifty thousand vile aristocrats
do against three hundred thousand soldiers of
liberty ? " All these arguments were used by the
chief women leaders in the movement. On April ist,

The Citoyennes 165
1792, only a few short months after Theroigne's
triumphant return from her imprisonment in Austria,
Etta Palm appeared at the bar of the Legislative As
sembly as spokeswoman of a deputation of women who
demanded :
Firsdy, that public education as already established
for boys should be extended also to girls.
Secondly, that women of twenty-one should be de
clared of age.
Thirdly, that perfect equality of rights should exist
between boys and girls.
Fourthly, that divorce should be legalised.
Although these suggestions were bold for her day,
Etta was not among the most advanced of the women
reformers. Her strength lay in her restraint. She
had no militant plans like Theroigne, and took no
violent measures like Rose (or Claire) Lacombe, who
from 1893 onwards became the leader of the most
revolutionary women's club and allied herself with the
emigre's. Long before that date mixed societies had
been formed which became a distinctive feature of the
club organism. These Societes Fraternelles des Deux
Sexes, as they were called, were very distinctive in their
way, and gave to the women who were longing to find
an oudet for their turbulent feelings the opportunity
to join in political meetings and express their utter
contempt for all existing conditions, especially those
which limited their civic powers. Theroigne was one
amongst those who availed herself freely of these
privileges, and it is therefore interesting to trace the
origin and growth of these hybrid institutions. The
first of them was opened at Paris in the early autumn

1 66 A Woman of the Revolution
of 1790 and held its sittings id one of the halls at
the Jacobins. The original instigator was a poor and
very earnest boarding-house proprietor of the name
of Claude Dansard. Moved by a spirit of patriotism,
he caused to assemble many artisans, street vendors of
fruit and vegetables, and labourers with their wives and
children. The meetings took place in the evenings
and on Sundays, and their object was the reading and
interpretation of the laws framed by the National
Assembly and the Declaration of the Rights of Man.
Dansard provided the light required at these gather
ings. He always produced from his pocket a candle-
end, flint and tinder-box. When the sitting was
prolonged the light threatened to fail, and a subscription
was raised among those present to purchase more
candles, and the reading was continued amidst general
satisfaction. At first these humble reunions had something of a
social importance, and probably the admission of wives
and children was an astute move on the part of
Dansard, but presently the social side was merged
entirely in the political influence they assumed. In
the spring of 1791 the club took the name of "Socidtd
Fraternelle des Patriotes des Deux Sexes. Defenders
(later Friends) of the Constitution." Well-known
individuals, both men and women, appeared there.
Mme Robert, nee Keralio, wife of the journalist, who
edited and translated many works, was one of the most
noteworthy. She advocated reform in the hospitals,
" those places founded by public philanthropy for the
relief of suffering humanity, where humanity is perhaps
most shamefully ill-treated and persecuted." She

The Citoyennes 167
endeavoured to obtain the appointment of female
as well as male inspectors, believing that the details
of administration which would escape the notice of
men would be observed by the quick eye of a woman.
" They would taste the soup and see whether the meat
was fit to eat," she said. But these women were not
to be chosen from the luxurious and idle classes.
They were to be working-women who understood
their business. Mme Robert desired to institute
hospitals for the diseased, workhouses for the poor,
and houses of correction for the evil-doers. Mme
Roland, who joined the society after the flight to
Varennes, did not like Mme Robert, and described
her as a small woman, intellectual, clever, and proud —
but a little inconsistent. Mme Moitte, who had led
the women on to sacrifice their jewels on the altar
of. the country, was a member of the society, and Etta
\ Palm, as well as Pauline Ldon. Thdroigne was not
'in Paris during the days of its early popularity, but
she attended the meetings after her return in the
spring of 1792. Among the men were Danton,
Tallien, Roederer, and Hebert.
" Curiosity took me a single time only to one of
the public sittings of the Socidtd Fraternelle," writes
Mme de Genlis in her Memoirs. " It was a spectacle
at once original, terrifying, and ridiculous. The
women of the people spoke there, although they did
not mount the tribune, but they frequently interrupted
the speakers, and uttered long dissertations without
leaving their places." Lamartine compared the
fraternal society very favourably with the more violent
assemblies organised by women. " This union," he

1 68 A Woman of the Revolution
said, " was composed of educated women, who dis
cussed with more decency the social questions analogous
to their sex, such as marriage, maternity, the education
of children, the institutions of relief, and the assistance
of humanity. They were the philosophers of their sex.
Robespierre was their oracle and their idol. The
Utopian and vague character of its institutions was
conformable to the genius of women, more adapted
to dream of the social happiness than to form the
mechanism of societies." If this were the truth, it
represents but a small section of thought, for the
usual temper of the women who joined these clubs
was to the highest degree electrical.
Another important fraternal society was the Societe
Fraternelle des Deux Sexes de la Section Saint-
Genevidve — later called, of the Panthdon Francais.
The original regulations were issued on December 1 6th,
1790. In November 1793 this society gave a civil
fete in honour of Lepelletier and Marat at the un
veiling of their statues in the Place de l'Estrapade.
Theroigne was an active member of the Socidtd
Fraternelle des Minimes. Its president was Tallien,
and it had rather more warlike aims than some of the
fellow-societies. The Socidtd Fraternelle de la Section
des Sans-Culottes was one of the more advanced in its
views regarding the position of women. Its regula
tions, which were published on July 17th, 1793,
declared " that the right of acquiring and spreading
instruction and enlightenment belonged to both sexes
equally, therefore citoyennes were admitted without
distinction to share the patriotic works of the society."
The Societe fraternelle des Amis de la Patrie held

The Citoyennes 169
meetings in Trinity Church, Rue Saint-Denis, and was
composed of all good citizens and citoyennes who were
true patriots and republicans. Persons were admitted
to membership on presentation by four members.
They took an oath as follows : "We swear to be
faithful to the French nation, to which we have the
happiness to belong, and to the law ; to maintain the
Republic, one and indivisible ; Liberty and Equality,
which yield our happiness and the destruction of
tyrants ; to defend individuals and property or to die
defending them." The women's names were entered
in a special register.
The Socidtd Patriotique et Fraternelle des Citoyens
de la Section du Thdatre-Francais met in the Grands-
Augustins, and in June 1 791 published measures of
safety and vigilance with regard to the careful choice
of electors upon whom depended that of the deputies
to the Legislative Assembly.
Most of the sections had fraternal societies, and
most of these societies made special rules for their
women members. A clause in the rules of the Union
Fraternelle des Gobelins explained that citoyennes
admitted into the society would be separated from
the citizens. Women were not expected to contribute
to the working expenses of the club. But neither
were they encouraged to speak, and this was a serious
deprivation to those who were burning with ideas and
plans for the amelioration of conditions, and desired
above all things to help their brothers in the coming
struggle for liberty.
The silence thus imposed upon them was litde to
the taste of the eager women, and no doubt gave them

170 A Woman of the Revolution
the idea of organising clubs of their own. In the
provinces the idea was seized upon with avidity. In
hundreds of small towns the women co-operated in
arranging meetings, in holding demonstrations, in
giving voice to loyal aims, in subscribing patriotic
gifts, and in many other ways demonstrating their
love for their country. Almost every popular society
admitted women.
An important, and in many ways typical, women's
club was formed at Lyons towards the summer of
1 79 1. It was called the Association des Citoyennes
de Lyon particulierement ddvoudes a la Nation et a la
Loi. As the name implies, one of its chief aims
was to make a study of the new laws. The flag of
the society was deposited at the church of Saint-Jean.
Strong religious and puritanical sentiments seem to
have been characteristic among the members. They
eschewed the wearing of jewels as adornments un-
suited to the natural beauty of the human figure, because
their brilliancy competed with that of the eyes and
complexion, and because by their very brightness they
drew attention to themselves which ought to be
bestowed upon the individual. They refused to wear
garments which constricted the figure in a manner
never intended by nature, or which hid under loose
folds the beautiful lines of the form. The hair was
neatly dressed without artificial adornments. Simpli
city in everything was the motto. Good manners
were essential. It was ruled that there were never to
be more than three men present at the meetings lest
a greater proportion of men to women should be
deemed immodest. No girl under eighteen years of

The Citoyennes 171
age was admitted unless accompanied by her mother
or an aunt. To be eligible for membership it was
necessary to be introduced by three citoyennes, to
pay a subscription of ten sols per month, to attend
meetings, which were held on Sundays after vespers,
regularly, and to take the oath of the society, which
was a strong confession of patriotism. There were
also stringent rules with regard to silence. Four
officials were appointed to see that order was strictly
kept. They were placed in different parts of the
hall and were called surveillantes. Should any woman
break the rule that only one speaker was allowed to
speak at a time, she was liable to a fine, and if the
hubbub grew general the president immediately
terminated the sitting.
Naturally enough this society did not escape the
gibes of those who believed it impossible to maintain
law, order, and quiet among a body of enthusiastic
women. But at least it appears to have been carried
on in a manner which allowed no room for any breach
of circumspection. Not so in the case of other clubs
in which men were present. At Chauny, for instance,
pleasantries were indulged in during the meetings
which consisted in blowing out the lights and dis
charging squibs beneath the skirts of the women.
One day two of the members, one of them being
among the best known of the orators, were dismissed
for attempting to scratch each other's eyes out.
Another day the speaker was interrupted by the
cracking of nuts. The president chided the culprit
and begged her to refrain from this amusement during
the meeting. She replied that if he would crack the

172 A Woman of the Revolution
nuts for her it would save a lot of trouble. There
upon he told her that severe punishment was meted
out to those who disturbed the gathering of the
popular societies. At this she burst out laughing, and
before he could finish what he had to say she left the
hall, skipping out in an indecorous and frisky manner.
At this club a new form of the Lord's Prayer was
used, addressed to the king, which ran : " Our father
who art at the Tuileries, respected be thy name; thy
reign come again; thy will be done in Paris as it is
in the provinces. May all rascals who seek to steal
our bread be hanged on lanterns, and deliver us above
all from the machinations of the National Assembly.
Amen." At Coutances in the Popular Society the citoyennes
were seated in a special gallery, but they overflowed
into the hall so often and behaved with so much
frivolity — going so far on one occasion as to embrace
the speaker — that the committee thought it well to
make such physical demonstrations impossible, " since
the nation gained nothing from such exhibitions, and
morality might lose a great deal." Jealous husbands
were averse at this club to their wives sitting amongst
members of the other sex " unless the galleries were
well lighted." The men of Cherbourg grew tired of
admitting women to their gatherings, and from August
30th, 1 79 1, members of the fair sex were excluded.
Nor were they allowed to be present at private sittings
of the Amis de la Constitution at Saint-Servan on
account of the " proverbial incontinence of women's
language." At Villenauxe-la-Grande disturbances also took place,

The Citoyennes 173
and it was found necessary in order to secure public
tranquillity that all women should be seated oh the
left side of the house and all men on the right. It was
here that a rumour was rife of women sticking pins
and needles in the president's chair.
Women were allowed in the hall of the Amis de
la Libertd et de l'Egalite at Colmar ; but upon com
plaints of flippancy being made, they were relegated
to a separate gallery. Once, when there happened
to be no speakers, the president adjourned the house
and proposed that all present should go and dance the
carmagnole round the Tree of Liberty ; a proposition
which was very well received.
The citoyennes were so coquettish at Bayeux that
by the aid of silky ribbons they transformed their
cockades into a gay and unseemly adornment so un
suitable in the eyes of the Popular Society that a
request was made to them not to wear their cockades
en bazin and to cease looking like actresses.
Although such incidents make it appear that the
women of the provincial clubs were not as serious-
minded in their work as the men, this must not be
regarded as the truth. Most of them were in deadly
earnest, and if, in some of the things they did, lighter
feminine moods became apparent, these were only in
contrast to the business they achieved.
There were women's clubs at Cognac, Orldans, and
Angouleme ; and at Bordeaux, according to one
account, there were no fewer than three separate
feminine societies. At Valence there were two clubs
which admitted women. At Bourges the Popular
Society allowed women to be present at its meetings, and

174 A Woman of the Revolution
several members offered to make shirts for the defenders
of the country. Others presented various articles of
more or less value. A gift of Phrygian bonnets at
Saint-Calais was received with delighted cries of
" Long live women patriots ! " A large number of
women at Moulins made clothes for the volunteers,
whilst those of Grenoble knitted socks and scarves.
At Honfleur charitable women formed a Philanthropic
Committee and excited the people's liberality, dis
tributing considerable results among the poor. Gene
rosity was a prevalent quality among the patriotic
women. When the Mayor of Beaumont-le-Roger
called a meeting in the church to read the laws to
the people, he took out his watch to look at the
time, and patriotic women citizens demanded that
he should offer it upon the altar of the country.
When he refused they became riotous. The citoy
ennes of Fontainebleau, Brest, and Lorient were
very active ; all the children in the last place were
taught patriotic songs, and the women formed a
masonic lodge of their own. At Tours they swore
terrible oaths to cherish the country and destroy the
aristocrats. They blessed flags, sang stirring songs,
and danced to patriotic music. This society boasted
the youngest citoyenne of all. An ecclesiastic with
revolutionary tendencies brought his whole family to
the Popular Society and made a little speech. "My
daughter Cornelia," he said, " who is eight months
old, will be presented by her mother and taken on
to the platform by her nurse. She will enjoy in
anticipation the delights of true republicanism in the
midst of you." Children were encouraged by their

The Citoyennes 175
mothers to show precocious enthusiasm. At Rouen,
where orators of the fair sex were allowed upon the
platform, a child of eight, whose name was Rose
Renant, made a speech to the Popular Society. " How
can I describe to you without shuddering," declared
this imp, " the terrible grief I should feel if I saw
my dear papa or mamma, my relatives, friends, and
neighbours suffer beneath the blows of villain aristo-.
crats, or fall under their tyranny ? Rather than that
such a terrible misfortune should overcome me, I
would wish that the fury of the nobility should be
directed against me alone."
Rose was not the only child patriot. At Dijon
there was a club called the Jeunes Amies de la
Rdpublique, of which the members were all between
eight and sixteen years of age. They held meetings
and harangued their mothers. One of their spokes
women, a girl called Henriette Ecureux, deplored
the fact that she was not old enough to have served
her country, but she prayed for all good patriots, and
had begun to weave laurel wreaths for the occasion
of their triumphal return. Lamartine mentions a
club of children between twelve and fourteen called
" Red Children," the baptism of blood upon the
heads of these precocious republicans.
Dijon, at any rate, possessed a far more serious
institution in the shape of a v«^men's club called
successively Amies de la Constitution, de l'Egalitd,
and de la Rdpublique. Its aim was to republicanise
the Dijon ladies. The standard of the society was
blessed at the church of Saint-Michel on May 30th,
179 1, and was afterwards deposited in the Hall of

176 A Woman of the Revolution
Parlement, where the Amis de la Constitution
met. In September of that year the president of
the women's club asked the members of the men's
club to send an address to all the affiliated clubs
" inviting their sisters in the eighty-three departments
to organise and form societies, so that they might'
play a serious part in the events which might follow
upon war."
Meetings were organised sometimes for the strangest
reasons. The Boulonnaises held a demonstration
against bachelors, and gave a ball excluding these
selfish individuals, " the fete being intended for
respectable men." The women of Neuberg were so
enthusiastic that young women swore not to marry
any but citizens who had fought in the armies. The
lady members of the Socidtd . Fraternelle des Deux
Sexes de Paris had sworn not to marry aristocrats.
This example was followed at Nantes, where an oath
to this effect appeared in verse :
Nous, dames du district Nantais,
Femmes, veuves et demoiselles,
Savoir faisons a tous Francais.
Surtout qu'etant tres democxates,
Nous ne pouvons voir sans horreur
Ces gens sans esprit et sans coeur
Que Ton appelle aristocrates. . . .
The Bdarnaises were eligible for election as members
of the Popular Society, but were discontented because
they could not vote. At Blois, being forbidden to
wear the distinctive tricolour ribbon, the citoyennes
formed a society of their own.
An account of a characteristic meeting held at one1
of the women's clubs on December 30th, 1792, may

T1I&KOIGNB DE MERICOURT.
From an engraving by Devritz oi a portrait in the Bibliotheque Nationale.

"77

The Citoyennes 179
fidy close a chapter which is intended to convey some
impression of the unrest and ferment seething in the
minds of the women throughout France during the
earlier part of the Revolution. The gathering took
place in the presence of representatives of three united
administrative bodies.
After the meeting had been opened in the usual
manner by the woman president, the minutes of the
last meeting were read and approved, and then one
of the citoyennes demanded that before the pro
ceedings went any further the Marseillaise should be
sung. A young citizen called Maitre and a woman
citizen of the name of Charton sang the hymn,
accompanied by music and with a chorus in which
all the members joined. Music was also played
during the arrival of the representatives of the three
administrative bodies, who took seats near the
president. T Ley wore distinctive badges.
Citoyenne Charton made a speech from the platform,
extolling the glory and felicity of the work of looking
after and assisting good patriots. Then a Mme
Charpin tendered a proposition that Bishop Lamour-
ette should compose a new catechism from which
children might learn not only the principles of
religion, but "also of true republicanism. Citoyenne
Pere mounted the platform next, and spoke of the
glorious Revolution, which she laid , to the honour
of the philosophers. She emphasised the urgency
of propagating popular societies, in order that the
youth of the country might be instructed in the
new laws. Two other women addressed the meeting,
and then a young citoyenne recited Chapters VII.
11

180 A Woman of the Revolution
and VIII. of Rousseau's "Contrat Social," followed
by the Declaration of the Rights of Man. Then
she said a patriotic prayer. This was succeeded by
recitations from other works, namely, " The Cate-
chisme de la Rdpublique " and the " Almanach de
Pere Gerard," as well as further chapters of the
" Contrat Social " declaimed by various men and
women. After that a distribution took place of
prizes given by the members of the district, of the
department, and of the municipality. Citizen Chaine,
who had been presented with a sabre, took an oath
never to use it except for the purpose of destroying
the enemies of the Republic.
The Marseillaise was sung a second time, and the
proceedings ended.
These were sober and heartfelt doings. In other
places dancing and jollity, even gambling and feasting,
went on, but the women who took part in these
gaieties were in the minority. Demonstrations by
Catholic women who had suffered on account of the
departure of refractory priests formed yet another side
of the spirit shown by women in revolt.
As time went on a desperate and dangerous note
entered into the club organism, and women of a
different type herded together with sinister purpose.
Thdroigne was to come into contact with them to
her cost. But that was not until a combination of
circumstances had made it necessary for her to leave
the scene of the Revolution, temporarily at least.

CHAPTER V
FLIGHT AND CAPTURE
PARIS was not the safest place for Theroigne.
She must have been aware of this. She pre
tended she knew nothing of the kind, and that the
reasons which took her into the country were of the
most ordinary and commonplace character. It was
quite natural that, when brought face to face with
her judges, she should have thought it wise to give
a glib explanation of the causes which led to her
leaving the capital. In order to sustain her role of
perfect innocence it was necessary to appear to know
nothing of any possible danger awaiting her there.
In the very simplicity of Thdroigne's account lies its
cleverness. " I liked Paris very much," she says naively, " but
I had not enough money to remain there for long.
Besides, I had charged myself with the care of my
brothers, whom I did not wish to abandon. I was not
paid my income of five thousand livres, and I did
not know when the payment would take place. More
over, I had anticipated my resources. I had an
advance made of one thousand crowns for two years,
and for a long time I had had my diamonds in pawn.
I was greatly in debt, and, in short, I had no other
resources except a necklace worth twenty-five louis.
181

1 82 A Woman of the Revolution
" If I had remained in Paris under the conditions in
which I was then living, the whole sum would soon
have been spent, and I should have been under the
obligation of contracting new debts. It was therefore
necessary to change my manner of living or to leave.
Much in the public eye, accustomed to a somewhat
luxurious existence, which I led less from taste than
from amour-propre, it was difficult for me, unless I dis
appeared from the scenes familiar to me, to carry out
my projects of economy."
This is not the speech of one whose heart was in
the people's cause ! This is not the real Theroigne,
burning with ambition, reckless, impulsive, and ever
ready for new adventure ! "I resolved then and there to
leave society and to live apart, ignored and unknown,"
she continues, as though all her life she had "preferred
oblivion to notoriety. " I took the name of Poitiers,
and then I could more freely accommodate my manner
of dressing and my expenses to my modest means."
Because she had done what she had done in Paris
under the name of Thdroigne, because the royalist
journals contained that name in almost every number
that was issued from their unholy presses, perhaps
her object in assuming another was of more significance
than the mere discarding of the gaudy amazones and
other trifling extravagances she had indulged in. But
still she flirts with the idea that flight had not been
necessary. " I asked myself often whether I should
stay in France or whether I should return to my own
country," she says, and then brings out the reason
why she went so far away. " The arrival of my
brother Pierre in Paris from Lidge, where he had

Flight and Capture 183
gone when he had left Genoa, decided me to take the
road to my native land."
Then she becomes bolder. She refers to the annoy
ance caused her by the royalists ; she admits that a
rumour of arrests issued from the Chatelet had reached
her, but she says nothing of her intense wish to free
the people, and her heartfelt interest in the progress
of the Revolution. " I confess that I left the stage
of the Revolution without too much regret, because
I ^uflefed "every day from unpleasantnesses in the
tribunes of the National Assembly. There were
always some aristocrats there to whom my zeal and
my candour were displeasing. They deluged me with
sarcasms without ceasing. They annoyed me ; they
laid traps for me. Certain patriots even, instead of
encouraging, defending, and rendering me justice,
turned my efforts into ridicule. That is the
truth. ~
" Besides, I was assured that they had given infor
mation against me at the Chatelet for the affair of
October 5th and 6th. Having done nothing those
famous days, I did not fear anything. Afterwards,
however, they frightened me by telling me of the
partiality of the tribunal. I had made many enemies,
they said, and enemies against whom all resistance
would be in vain.
"The underhand dealings of my enemies, my pecu
niary position, which had become very precarious — all,
in short, urged me to leave Paris. So I left for Lidge
by the diligence."
It is a very plausible story, so plausible that it leaves
a doubt as to Theroigne's sincerity as a reformer.

184 A Woman of the Revolution
Had she felt deeply then, could she have concealed
her feelings under so trivial a tone ?
When she left Paris by the diligence, Thdroigne
found the vehicle full of aristocrats, who discussed the
patriots in anything but gentle terms. In order to
avoid the society of these " coarse people,' ' she
changed her seat, and followed the diligence in a small
carriage. In the carriage she made the acquaintance
of a certain M. Barrachin, and informed him in
confidence that she was going into a retreat in order
to study. He gave her a letter of recommendation
to a bookseller in Liege, which she accepted but did
not use.
At Rheims she left her carriage, which was going
no farther, and drove to Paliseul in a mail-cart.
There she hired a horse, and rode into Saint-Hubert.
She put up at a little inn, where she met an officer
and a merchant. From the latter she bought some
handkerchiefs to give to her friends at Marcourt.
The officer, who recognised the moment she opened
her mouth that she had come from Paris, spoke very
disdainfully of the Revolution. Here apparendy
Thdroigne forgot the part she was playing, which
consisted in appearing to take but a lukewarm interest
in the French position. She says she spoke hody
against despotism, and that a spirited argument en
sued. It turned upon the patriots of Brabant. At
this name her judges pricked up their ears, for ac
cording to more than one account the real reason of
Thdroigne's absence from Paris was that she had
been sent in company with others by the Jacobins to
spread revolutionary propaganda in this province,

Flight and Capture 185
She stated boldly that in reply to the officer's con
demnation of the unrest among the peasants she had
declared their cause was just, and that Emperor
Joseph II. had wrongfully suppressed their privileges
and restrained their rights. So excited was she on
this question that she was unable to contain herself.
" He had the intention of giving up Brabant in ex
change for Bavaria," she cried, " because, forsooth,
he said that he liked towns that had been burnt better
than those that were in revolt." In speaking thus
to the Emperor's officer she was very indiscreet, and
exposed herself to insult. She merely relates that
she felt this need of outspokenness, and did not try
to defend it. Joseph II. 's death, in February 1790,
put an end to the reforms which he had endeavoured
to institute in the Low Countries, and which had
aroused disturbance and discontent amongst the people.
His project to annex Bavaria had already come to
naught through the interference of Frederick the
Great. Joseph's successor, Leopold II., did everything
possible to restore order in the afflicted provinces.
Had it been true that Thdroigne's mission was to
Brabant, she would hardly have been likely to dwell
on this episode in her " Confessions."
From Saint-Hubert she set off on horseback to
Marcourt. At an isolated farm in the midst of the
forest she dismounted, and sought refreshment in the
shape of new milk. It crossed her mind that she
would like to remain in this quiet spot, or at least
to return there when she had seen her relations at
Marcourt ; but the farm belonged to the monks of
Saint-Hubert, and they could not give her a lodging.

1 86 A Woman of the Revolution
At last she reached her native village. " I cannot
express the pleasure I felt," she said, " in arriving,
the joy of seeing my village again, the house where
I was born, my uncle, and indeed my early comrades.
I quite forgot about the French Revolution. Every
evening I went to the veilUe, when with my friends
I joined in all the games of my youth. On Sundays
we went to dance, to run, and to play at prisoner's
base in the open meadows."
She had a dispute with the village miller because,
as she thought, he charged too much for his flour,
but he answered her rudely when she spoke to him
about it, and she could not get him to look at the
matter from the people's point of view. She also
thought it wrong of the cure to accept an income
for his work whilst his parishioners were practically
starving. But, because she had known him in the
days of her childhood, she wrote a letter to Perregaux
begging him to send a hundred crowns that he might
distribute it amongst the poor, and then she changed
her mind, and ordered the amount to be spent in
warm underclothing, because the curi would not
accept a gift of money.
She had not forgotten any of her old friends, and
never grew tired of telling stories about the wonderful
things she had seen and done in the Revolution.
" She boasted of having prevented the Queen from
leaving France, and showed proudly a fragment of
one of her diamond necklaces," says De Goncourt.
" She gathered the young men together, questioned
them closely, taught them the revolutionary ideas and
songs that were in vogue in Paris, and spread the

Flight and Capture 187
spirit of revolt around her." If it be true that she
did any of these things she was very careful not to
say so. The reference to the Queen's necklace may
be regarded as absurd. The jewels she had in her
possession were her own.
After staying in Marcourt for a month, Thdroigne
left there to go to Liege, where her brother Pierre
was awaiting her arrival. The regret she felt at
saying good-bye to the friends of her early youth
was counterbalanced by the hope of continuing her
musical studies at Lidge.
She travelled by boat to this city, and the boat
man recommended an inn he knew. Whilst she was
waiting there for a room to be made ready for her,
she went into the common sitting-room, which was
crowded with Flemings. At first she thought they
were patriots, but she found that their opinions differed
vastly from her own and that it was impossible to carry
on a fair argument. She left the room to escape from
their unpleasant remarks.
The very next day her brother fetched her from
Liege and took her to La Boverie, a little village
half a league away, where she stayed at the White
Cross Inn. For a time she lived there very quietly,
seeing no friends, taking no part in the public meet
ings or gatherings held at Lidge, and, indeed, rarely
leaving her lodgings except to fetch the Gazette and
other journals from a bookseller's shop in the neigh
bouring town. She soon found the country dreary.
She missed the stir and excitement of the Revolution.
She dared not confess that she would have liked to
return to Paris, but she spoke of going to Brabant

1 88 A Woman of the Revolution
instead. She went so far as to take out her pass
port, and then changed her mind. She felt that she
had not enough money to indulge this fancy, and
discarded it for the sake of her brothers. The only
way to save expense was to remain in her retreat.
If she left it she would be wronging those who were
dependent on her. By this time she had pawned her
last diamond necklace. Her income had been antici
pated. Her board and lodging at La Boverie was
costing her five crowns a month. Her banker, Perre
gaux, sent her only four louis every month. Many
of her jewels, left at the Mont de Pidtd in Paris,
had been sold because she could not afford to redeem
them. The Mont de Pidtd was at that time a recent institu
tion in France. On December 9th, 1777, Louis XVI.
issued Letters Patent stating that the good effects
produced by Monts de Pidtd in the different coun
tries and provinces of Europe, especially in Italy,
Flanders, and Hainault, left no doubt that such
establishments, both in Paris and in the principal
towns in France, would result in advantage to the
people. It was hoped that their existence would pre
vent the " disorders introduced by usury " which had
ruined many families. Three days later Parlement
registered the decree for governmental pawn-shops.
Thdroigne took advantage of this method of bor
rowing money. Between June 1789 and May 1790
she had pledged valuables to the extent of between
seven and eight thousands of livres, consisting of
gold and diamond bracelets, sets of silver plate and
spoons, cruets and stoppers, a golden casket, and

Flight and Capture 189
diamond rings, earrings, and a necklace. The rule
was that the securities for loans were kept for a
year, and, if not claimed by then, were sold a month
later. Theroigne's last jewel was pledged at Liege, and
afterwards her letters to M. Perregaux, whilst they
make clear her devotion to her brothers, deal chiefly
with her increasing financial straits.
" I thank you very much for having sent me the
report of the proceedings of the Chatelet," she wrote
on October 16th, "and I must thank you also for
having accepted the little arrangement which I pro
posed to you. If you will kindly advance three
months' money to my brother, in order that he may
have my things returned, you will greatly please me.
According to our arrangement of four louis a month,
that will be twelve louis you will have to give him,
and for three months you will send nothing to Lidge.
If my brother requires your help or advice in arrang
ing my little affairs, or in having my things returned
to me more cheaply, I would be obliged, monsieur,
if you would continue your kindness to me. I should
be afraid of bothering you too much if I did not
rely especially on the pleasure you have taken in
helping me."
She wrote to Perregaux again from Liege on De
cember 2nd, 1790, still referring to the pledged
jewels. " Your letter was a very agreeable surprise to me
when I saw from it that you had the kindness to
redeem those of my effects which I had regarded as
sold," she says. "I do not know how to express

i9° A Woman of the Revolution
the gratitude with which the nobility of your act
inspires me. I shall always remember your devotion.
I accept your generous offer to redeem my bracelets
and sell them when you can get a fair price for them.
I shall leave it in your hands. As for the silver plate
and the casket, please do not allow these to be sold.
" I beg of you to send some one to pay the interest
on a loan of eleven hundred livres, the term of which
expires on the 9th of this month, and the acknow
ledgment of which I enclose in my letter with two
others, one for a hundred and forty livres and the
other for ninety livres. If the effects referred to in
the two last have been sold they will give you the
balance due, if they are not I should be grateful if
you would redeem them, and hope that you will soon
be able to sell the bracelet and recoup yourself for
your further advances. I still have a number of
diamonds to sell, and should like to get rid of them,
as the interest is ruinous. I will send you my contract
immediately, with the other papers, so that you will
know what M. de Persan owes me. You have
promised to help me with your advice, so that I and
my brothers may be paid, and for this we shall be
eternally grateful to you.
"I am subscribing to the Journal ,jde^iy8g, which
I wish to receive at Liege. It will be necessary to
add a trifle for this. You will do me a great favour
if you send the enclosed receipt to the office of the
paper and arrange this little matter for me. I ask
you to do a great many things, don't I ? If you dare
to say ' yes,' you will deal me a terrible blow." It is
not often Thdroigne gives such a feminine touch

Flight and Capture 191
to her letters, but her constant demands for money
grow rather wearisome.
Her dislike of inactivity soon became overwhelming,
and her restlessness increased every time she walked in
the meadows of La Boverie or on the banks of the
Meuse and met groups of patriots from Brabant. She
could hear the roar of distant cannon, and her curiosity
to learn the result of the fighting was so intense that
she questioned those she met. Then a strange thing
took place. She was suspected of being an imperial
spy, and was arrested and taken to Tilleur, where she
speedily undeceived her captors and told them her real
views. Nevertheless, because they were not satisfied
with her statements regarding van der Noot, they
wanted to take her to Namur. Her eldest brother and
the people at the White Cross Inn did their best to
see that she was set free at the first possible moment.
" It is true I was a patriot," she says, " but not with
the same principles as van der Noot, for I never sup
ported the nobility and I did not see that it was
necessary for my country to declare its independence.
I only desired that the people should be represented
and that abuses should be removed."
To understand Thdroigne's attitude towards van der
Noot, it is necessary to remember that the third estate
of Brabant was upholding the very principles of the
social and political system which the third estate in
France was seeking to destroy. Joseph II. represented
in many ways the progressive spirit of the day and,
finding the estates intractable, dissolved them and
cancelled the form of constitution known as the
Joyous Entry, together with the ancient liberties of

192 A Woman of the Revolution
the province. Hendrik van der Noot, advocate to the
sovereign council of Brabant, a man of but mediocre
talents, though courageous and animated by his love
of justice, became the people's idol and organised a
riot in Brussels which spread throughout the district.
Van der Noot was closely identified with the cause of
malcontent hierarchy. He published a " Memoir on
the Rights of the People of Brabant," but his teachings
were disputed by a growing democratic party which
had imbibed French theories from the emissaries of
that country, who were busy in 1790 in inciting the
masses to demand a free National Assembly on the
principle of their own. The Congress at Brussels
employed force against the rebels. On the accession of
Leopold, he offered, as already stated, to restore the
liberties of the Austrian Netherlands of which they
had been deprived in his brother Joseph's reign, and
demanded in return that the province should swear
allegiance to himself. If his terms were not accepted
by November 21st he threatened to enforce them, and
sent soldiers to supplement the Austrian troops already
at Luxemburg. The republican leaders made a vain
effort to improve the position, and Leopold, refusing to
grant an extension of time for consideration, dispatched
troops on the 22nd of the month to Brussels. Re
sistance was impossible. Van der Noot and his col
leagues fled, the Congress dissolved itself, and the
Belgian Republic, after being in existence but a few
months, ceased to be.
Mrs. Elliott, who was in Brussels in the spring of
1790, saw something of the revolt in the Low Countries.
When she desired to leave for England, permission

Flight and Capture 193
was refused her, and in an interview with van der
Noot she learned that this was because she was sus
pected of being of the party of the Duc d'Orldans.
She assured him that this was not so ; that she always
was a royalist and ever should be such ; that she was
neither a van der Nootist nor a Vonckist. " I wit
nessed many terrible scenes in Brussels, similar to those
in France," writes Mrs. Elliott. " I saw poor creatures
murdered in the streets because they did not pull their
hats off to Capuchins, or for passing a bust of van der
Noot without bowing very low. His busts were all
over the town and even in the theatres. Van der Noot
was a very odd-looking man. He was, I fancy, about
forty, rather tall and thin. He was full of vivacity,
and did not look ill-natured, though very ugly. I
never shall forget his dress. It was a Quaker-coloured
silk coat lined with pink and narrow silver-lace, a white
dimity waistcoat, white cotton stockings, net ruffles
with fringe round them, and a powdered bob-wig."
On the subject of van der Noot's flight, Thdroigne
wrote in her letter of December 2nd to Perregaux:
"You know doubtless that the Estates, van der Noot
and his satellites, formerly the idols of the people, who
have to-day become the object of their hate and their
mistrust, have been treated as they deserved. Mme
Pineau's house has been pillaged, van der Noot has had
to save himself from the just vengeance of the people
whom he betrayed and sacrificed to his personal interests,
and they have tried in vain to rekindle fanaticism by
renewed processions, which have not had the slightest
influence on the spirit of the people, who have had their
eyes opened. They say that in the end the party of

192 A Woman of the Revolution
the province. Hendrik van der Noot, advocate to the
sovereign council of Brabant, a man of but mediocre
talents, though courageous and animated by his love
of justice, became the people's idol and organised a
riot in Brussels which spread throughout the district.
Van der Noot was closely identified with the cause of
malcontent hierarchy. He published a " Memoir on
the Rights of the People of Brabant," but his teachings
were disputed by a growing democratic party which
had imbibed French theories from the emissaries of
that country, who were busy in 1790 in inciting the
masses to demand a free National Assembly on the
principle of their own. The Congress at Brussels
employed force against the rebels. On the accession of
Leopold, he offered, as already stated, to restore the
liberties of the Austrian Netherlands of which they
had been deprived in his brother Joseph's reign, and
demanded in return that the province should swear
allegiance to himself. If his terms were not accepted
by November 21st he threatened to enforce them, and
sent soldiers to supplement the Austrian troops already
at Luxemburg. The republican leaders made a vain
effort to improve the position, and Leopold, refusing to
grant an extension of time for consideration, dispatched
troops on the 22 nd of the month to Brussels. Re
sistance was impossible. Van der Noot and his col
leagues fled, the Congress dissolved itself, and the
Belgian Republic, after being in existence but a few
months, ceased to be.
Mrs. Elliott, who was in Brussels in the spring of
1790, saw something of the revolt in the Low Countries.
When she desired to leave for England, permission

LEOPOLD II., EMPEROR OF AUSTRIA.

195

Flight and Capture 197
broke away from him, and went over to the democratic
party., and, as a Vonckist, gave vent to her revengeful
feelings against van der Noot much in the same
strain that Thdroigne did when writing to Perregaux.
Indeed, the warmth of feeling she put into her
remarks to this friend contrast strangely with the
colourless and guarded tone of her confessions under
examination. In this same letter of December 2nd
she gives him to understand that she was charmed
to hear of Duport-Dutertre's appointment to be
Keeper of the Seals. The advocate had won this
post through the influence of Lafayette, replacing
Champion de Cicd. He was one of the presumed
authors of the " Histoire de la Revolution par deux
Amis de la Libertd," and ended his life on the scaffold
in November 1793.
" He alone will be charged with the notification of
the decrees of the National Assembly," says Thdroigne.
" This will enrage the party of the Blacks, who can
no longer revenge themselves by trying to ridicule
virtue. I hope that justice, patriotism, and good
manners will accompany all the actions of the one
whose elevation is an application of the principles of
the rights of man and of the citizen, to which the
King at first refused his acceptance ; by the choice
of such a minister he appears to wish to turn away
the just suspicions which his past conduct inspired.
If this is in good faith, it is one more triumph for
the Revolution.
"I shall return to France in six months," she
continues. " If I were there now I would present a
cockade to the generous citizen who gave such a
12

198 A Woman of the Revolution
good example by denouncing that infamous Assonville
who bought votes to have himself elected Juge de
Paix." And she begs him, if possible, to discover
the name of this excellent patriot and send it to her
when he writes, addressing his letter to M. Francois
Person, at Saint-Esprit couronne sur Meuse a Lidge.
But in her " Confessions " she says nothing of these
opinions and enthusiasms, nor does she refer to her
intention to return to Paris. On the contrary, she
states that she settled down so happily among her
relatives that she resolved never to return to France.
Some of her cousins went to see her at La Boverie,
and invited her to the fair at Xhoris. She went there
accompanied by her brother, and stayed with her
uncle, while Pierre returned to the White Cross Inn
without her. Then she sent him to Paris to fetch
her remaining belongings, and ordered him to bring
back her younger brother, whom she could no longer
afford to keep idle in the capital. They all met again
at La Boverie.
There was a distinct danger at this time that Lidge
and the surrounding country would become the centre
of an insurrection. Numbers of soldiers were arriving
every day, and it was said that they would be billeted
on the inhabitants. Rumours to this effect made
Theroigne decide to return to Xhoris and settle down
there for a time. She went so far as to purchase a
piece of land, and her uncle promised to give her a
small house, for all of which she was to pay at her
leisure. This plan was looked upon unfavourably
by the authorities of the little village. Thdroigne
was still regarded with suspicion. Then it was found

Flight and Capture 199
that the situation at Lidge was not as acute as had
been feared. The Imperialist soldiers bore themselves
with restraint, and there was no fighting. Again
Thdroigne changed her plans. She had not yet paid
for her land, and so there was no reason why she
should not return to La Boverie. She was still
troubled because she had not received her income
for three years, and she kept up the myth that fifteen
thousand livres were owing to her. At any rate, she
made the story serve as a good excuse for a journey
to Paris, which was to have the ostensible reason of
looking after her business affairs. But when she had
taken out a fresh passport, her brothers objected to
her departure. They feared — who can say what ?
Perhaps that she would be arrested and imprisoned ;
at the best that she would become unsettled and be
drawn again into the dangerous stream of a political
career. After much discussion, Thdroigne abandoned
her plan, and to all appearances settled down to a
hum-drum country life, commenced a new course of
study, and busied herself in guarding her brothers'
interests. She invested in a new supply of linen,
and was about to make other changes in her household
arrangements, when a thunderbolt fell. She was
captured by aristocrats. In her picturesque language
she says : " They achieved a masterpiece by drawing
me pitilessly from my lair and arresting me without
the slightest grounds for their action."
And she maintained her innocence to the last.
The Austrians entered Lidge on January 12th, 1791.
On February 15th the Comte de la Valette, with his
companions, the Comte de Saint-Malon and a sub-

200 A Woman of the Revolution
officer Lechoux, captured Thdroigne by a ruse at La
Boverie. They had official authority for their daring
act. Mercy-Argenteau, at that time ambassador to
the Emperor in the Low Countries, addressed a letter
to Kaunitz on February 6 th, in which he wrote :
" Zealots are arriving here. There is one of the name
of Carra in the country, who is an enemy to all
authority. I shall have him closely watched. They
also mention the woman called Thdroigne de Mericourt,
who was at the head of the Queen's enemies on
October 5th and 6th. She is to be found in the
province of Luxemburg, and carries on a correspond
ence with our enrages of Paris and of Lidge. A
Frenchman furnished with good letters of recommend
ation came to ask my permission to kidnap her secretly,
herself and her papers ; I gave my sanction, and ordered
the escort to be strengthened by a small mounted
patrol. If the capture is made they will conduct the
prisoner to Freiburg, there to await whatever fate may
be decided upon as most suitable for her."
It was only natural that the man who had spent
long and laborious years in safeguarding the interests
of Marie-Antoinette should be strongly prejudiced
against any one whose good faith towards the Queen
had been impugned by so much as a breath of sus
picion. Thdroigne, however innocent she may have
been otherwise, had allowed her tongue free rein.
This fact alone, and it must have reached his ears, was
enough to make Mercy-Argenteau judge her unheard.
Nor was it only the minister who judged. The press
had a great deal to say in the matter ; much of it
humorous, some of it serious.

Flight and Capture 201
The Journal General announced the news of her
arrest in these terms : " The well-beloved of Populus,
the confidante of Mirabeau, the famous Thdroigne, has
been arrested near Luxemburg, and conducted to Vienna
in Austria. They assert that the Jacobins Club intends
to send an army of five hundred thousand National
Guards to menace the Emperor if he refuses to
release this heroine, since it is of importance to their
principal members that she should not betray their
secrets." The Moniteur of April 10th states in its correspond
ence from Vienna of March 19th that "People speak
of a prisoner of state who is being brought to Vienna ;
they presume arriving from the Low Countries (it is
said from Brussels). Rumour reports that this indi
vidual is a woman who made herself conspicuous in
France during the Revolution. They call her Mile
Thdroigne de Mdricourt. The oddest remarks are
made on this subject. They presume that this girl,
being implicated by the proceedings commenced by the
Court of the Chatelet in Paris concerning the fatal days
of October 5th and 6th, 1789, and having taken to
flight, the Emperor has the right to have her seized
on his territory, and that His Imperial Majesty has
also the right to have her judged by his tribunals, and
even to condemn her to the extreme penalty of the
law. This revolting absurdity is only worthy of
refutation. It would be ignominious for the subjects
of the Emperor to suspect His Imperial Majesty of
being capable of such an attempt, in which indignity
would be allied with barbarism."
The royalists rejoiced greatly when they heard of the

202 A Woman of the Revolution
arrest of Thdroigne. They celebrated the event of
her consequent death in verses, beginning :
Ecoutez, grande nation,
Et pretez grande attention :
La demoiselle Theroigne
Vient d'attraper un coup de peigne
Qui defrise ses grands projets :
Helas f c'etaient~He grands forfaits!
and concluding :
Et tandis que nous devisons
Avec nos petites chansons,
Autour du cou de la donzelle,
Un bourreau tourne une ficelle.
Pleurez, malheureux Populus,
i Car votre maitresse n'est plus !
Fortunately for Thdroigne things were not quite as
bad as that. She had not suffered the extreme penalty
of the law.
The idea that Thdroigne had left Paris in 1790 to
fulfil a revolutionary mission in her own country was
developed in a pamphlet by M. Carra, dated April ist,
which denounced Marechal Bender to the Jacobins.
" The society," said the denunciation, " sent Mile
Thdroigne to complete the great work of propaganda
in Brabant. This heroine merited this flattering dis
tinction in every way. She had given proofs of her
powers on the ever-memorable days of October 5 th
and 6th. Since this epoch Mile Thdroigne has rendered
the most important services to the society. Her
indefatigable zeal and her unceasing activity have made
more proselytes than the papers of our most celebrated
journalists could ever do. You know, gentlemen, that
J am more given by nature to injure than to praise

Flight and Capture 203
people ; you know, besides, that Mme Carra, my honour
able spouse, merits and possesses all my affections ; so
that there is no reason why you should suspect my
motives or my good faith when I shower praise upon
the illustrious lady for whom we are all weeping.
" Mile Mericourt left Paris after having received our
orders, and being well furnished with assignats, to go
and execute our schemes. Four or five zealous patriots
set off in her company, in order to co-operate with all
their might in the propagation of the great movement.
She started by making an opening at Brussels, but
found this stage unworthy of her talents. She made,
I can assure you, some important conquests in very
little time by the aid of assignats and punch, of punch
and assignats. Already many of the Brabant people
had adopted our principles, already general feeling was
veering over to our side. I was already flattering
myself that I should see my patriotic works made
welcome in this country, already I had made my
creditors understand that the results of our subscriptions
for the Annals of the club would be sufficient to pay
my debts — and all this as a result of the invaluable
assistance of Mile Theroigne de Mericourt. Oh,
shame, oh, despair ! Mile Thdroigne has been
hanged, and our projects have come to naught."
He then went on to say that Marechal Bender, " the
inhuman monster derived from the forests of Hungary,"
failings to be moved by the charms of the nymphlike
Thdroigne, had seized her person, and had had her
executed in a twinkling of an eye, chasing her fellow
workers out of Brabant. After a further out-pouring
of his wrath against the said Mardchal Bender a

204 A Woman of the Revolution
resolution was passed that he should be hanged for
hanging the immortal Thdroigne.
The royalist journal, the Feuille du Jour, of March
ist, 1 79 1, after saying that Theroigne had been arrested
by French officers, went on half in joke} half seriously :
"They say that having learnt that Mile Thdroigne
was at Namur, these young soldiers went there, de
manded dinner, paid their court to her ; and since Mile
Thdroigne, in exercising the apostleship, has not re
nounced the benefices of gallantry, the gentlemen in
question had no trouble in overcoming her scruples.
In the effusion of her confidence and love she divulged
the motives and secrets of her mission and gave up
all her papers relating to matters in Brabant. They
believed that she was dangerous enough to have her
pointed out to the Government and to see that she was
taken prisoner. Some declared that they only saw
fit to give her up out of spite when they recognised
that her health was no better than her politics."
This scurrilous paper added to its suggestive re
marks that "the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau had
reassured her fully, telling her that she was safe from
all peril so long as nothing was laid to her charge ;
but if the suspicions against her were confirmed, he
would use all his influence and all his credit to have
her hanged." Before the end of the month they had
completed her sentence. " They say that Mile
Thdroigne has been hanged. Weep, oh friends ..."
The pessimistic views taken by these journals were
never destined to be literally fulfilled, but the truth
was serious enough to affect the victim of the capture
and her friends to a considerable degree.

Flight and Capture 205
Theroigne's arrest made a great impression on her
brothers. The eldest wrote to Perregaux to tell him
that she had disappeared. " They say my sister has
been taken back to Paris by the police. If that is
the case, can she have been kidnapped by force by any
lover that she may have in the capital, or has she been
accused of anything ? Monsieur, I implore you to
use every possible means to secure her release, and to
inform me at the same time who could have occasioned
this nocturnal removal. You would greatly oblige
not only my said sister but also myself, being a great
help to me in my suspense. ..."
The reference to Theroigne's possible lovers has
been taken a"s prejudicial to the Minerva-like attitude
she was supposed to have adopted since her return
to Italy. But it seems natural enough that her brother,
not knowing, or not wishing to appear to know, of
what political crime she could be accused, should
imagine her disappearance might bear a personal inter
pretation. A great deal of Thdroigne's charm lies in the fact
that mystery constantly surrounds her actions. Ap
parently innocent and without reproach, invariably
able to convince her accusers of her own uprightness
when brought into personal contact with them, the
impartial judge, when far removed from the bewilder
ment engendered by her presence and naive assertions,
cannot fail to be assailed by many a doubt. She had
had more than one lover in her youth, then why this
sudden return to virtue unless, as has been suggested,
her health had been destroyed by her mode of living ?
She had taken an active and earnest part in the

206 A Woman of the Revolution
revolutionary movement in Paris, then why this ab
solute collapse of enthusiasm when living in a district
of the Low Countries where as strong an undercurrent
of revolt existed ? She had never joined in any plot
for the removal of the Queen, then why the determined
persecution by the French emigres ? She had, in short,
been but one of a thousand with similar aims and had
done nothing to justify her being singled from the
crowd for vilification, then why the unceasing diatribes
of the royalist press ? These are problems it is not
easy to answer. Innocent or not, Theroigne was to
suffer penalty for even the appearance of guilt.
Meanwhile she was being borne relentlessly farther
and farther from her home and from all those she
loved. At Coblenz her captors were hailed by the
people as saviours of the monarchy. The news of
the identity of the prisoner had spread like wildfire and
the emigres gave a special banquet to celebrate the
event. They drank to the glory of France, and were
convinced that the secrets of the revolutionists were
now at their mercy. From Coblenz the way led
through Worms, where they stayed to greet the Prince
de Condd, who had chosen this spot as his retreat.
Saint-Malon communicated the story of the arrest,
and so awakened Condd's curiosity that he desired
to see the beautiful captive, and approached her as
she was seated in the carriage that was to bear her to
prison. She received him with disdain and deliber
ately turned her back upon him, refusing to speak
a word. After the carriage had left Worms, Saint-Malon
upbraided her for her want of respect to a prince of

Flight and Capture 207
the blood, and went so far as to accuse her of ill-
breeding. " Spare your words," she cried : " I do not need your
advice. I know very well indeed to whom I owe
respect." " You are getting angry," said Saint-Malon.
" Not at all. But no true patriot can honestly greet
the Prince de Condd," she continued. " He is one of
the worst enemies of the nation. Here, even, in this
foreign country, he incites and foments intrigues
against France. All the world knows the treason of
which the Prince is guilty. He is a traitor." And
then remembering that her words might be a menace
to her own safety, she became suddenly silent.
This did not altogether suit the plan of her captors.
They wanted to strike while the iron was hot, to force
some admission from her which might be a condemna
tion from her own lips. They tried every means in
their power — threats, cajoling, anger, pleading, and even
love-making and flattery. " I cannot believe," said
Saint-Malon, " that you, so pretty, so fascinating, have
renounced love for ever. Hear me, I beg of you.
You must know that I love you tenderly ; you are
divine. I can no longer be silent. Give me leave
respectfully to kiss your little white hands, fresh as the
petals of the clematis."
He tried to seize her hand. She withdrew it
roughly, then he endeavoured to slip one arm about
her, and she, poor girl, unprotected and at the mercy
of a scoundrel, struck at him savagely. Maddened by
this insult, he threw aside his mask and disclosed him
self in his true colours of a jailer.

208 A Woman of the Revolution
" Your conduct will cost you dear, mademoiselle ;
you will not soon forget me."
" And yours has been such that I could not forget
you if I would, monsieur. I shall always think of you
as a man I despise and hate with all my soul," she
replied hotly.
He gave her one more chance of reflecting, and
promised to help her if she would answer all his
questions frankly.
" I can only reflect that you wish to set a trap for
me," she said, and added nothing but the assurance of
her innocence and good faith.
The five days' journey from Coblenz to Freiburg
was a period of misery, both mental and physical, to
the prisoner. She arrived at the latter town in a state
bordering on collapse.
Freiburg, in Breisgau, was then an important Austrian
garrison town. The Commander, Colonel Rudler von
Greiffenstein, had his hands full at that time keeping
order in the place, on account of the number of French
emigres who took refuge there, and the disturbances
and conspiracies consequent on their presence. Her
captors lodged Thdroigne at the Negre Inn, and were
so fearful lest she should escape them that they asked
the commander to allow them to have military help in
guarding her.
Freiburg was chiefly of importance, as far as
Thdroigne was concerned, because it was there that
her escort was changed and she was well-rid of the
importunate Saint-Malon. Her new guardian, the
Baron de Landresc, who had received orders to take
her to Kufstein, was a very different kind of man.

Flight and Capture 209
He treated his prisoner with kindness and respect.
The Baron and Thdroigne, accompanied by two or
three officers, left Freiburg on March 9th with the
ostensible object of journeying to Innsbruck and
Vienna. When she heard that she was to be taken to the
Austrian capital, Thdroigne could hardly contain her
excitement. " The Emperor is at Vienna," she cried ;
" I will ask for an audience. I shall have speech with
him, and he will hear me. I can tell the Court of
Austria the most astonishing things."
As they proceeded towards Altdorf, Thdroigne began
to show more friendliness towards the Baron. She
felt that he was well-disposed towards her, and began
to chatter freely. "As you are aware," she began,
" I have joined the patriots and taken up the noble
cause of the people. Our motto is Liberty and
Equality. I am devoting all my efforts to promote
the general welfare. Even women have their share
of work to do, and can help mightily in furthering the
progress of civilisation. It is only necessary that their
desire to do so should be strong enough. It ought
to be the aim of every well-born individual to succour
the unfortunate and the oppressed. In this great work
there need be no distinction made_ between men and
women." She denied utterly that the part she had played in
the Revolution was an active one. " I refused to be
drawn into any plot or cabal," she maintained. " This
fact has made me wonder over and over again how
I come to be in this position. I have never committed
a crime. I am innocent. It is true that I took an

2io A Woman of the Revolution
interest in political questions, but I did what a hundred
thousand other people have done. Logically speaking,
then, if I am to be put in prison, they too should
share my fate."
The next stopping-place was Innsbruck, which was
usually a sleepy little town. But the arrival of a fair
political prisoner had been reported in the newspapers,
and the inhabitants one and all turned out to see her.
When the carriage and four in which she travelled
rolled up, the market-place was crowded, and Landresc,
concerned for the security of his prisoner, hurried her
into the inn. The Archduchess Elizabeth, who was
then at Innsbruck, was vastly interested in Thdroigne,
and commanded an interview. It is not on record
whether the daughter of the people made one of
her usual blunt speeches against the aristocracy and
monarchy on this occasion.
At Schwaz Thdroigne was taken ill, and though she
struggled on as far as Woergl, she declared at this
little village that she could travel no farther, and
demanded a particular kind of medicine to mitigate
her fever. The Baron was in a dilemma. He was
not convinced that her attack of illness was genuine.
He feared she might be contemplating some plan of
escape. Nor did he think it wise to give her medicine
of her own prescribing. How was he to be sure that
it did not contain some deadly poison which would
rob the aristocrats of their prey ? To make security
doubly sure he made the apothecary swear that
the stuff was innocuous, and even went so far as
to swallow a dose himself as a precaution against
treachery.

Flight and Capture 2 1 1
As soon as Thdroigne felt better and was able to
continue the journey, she expressed her earnest wish
to hasten on to Vienna, convinced that there she
would be allowed to resume her liberty. Landresc
was faced with the difficult task of telling her the
truth — that he had been ordered to conduct her as far
as the fortress of Kufstein, and that there he was to
leave her. At this news Thdroigne was overcome by
despair. Her evident grief and distress softened the
Baron's heart. Thdroigne had the gift of knowing
how to work on any man's feelings. She asked a last
favour of him.
"You are the only friend I have left," she pleaded.
"Think how disconsolate those must be who once
cared for me and do not now know where I am
or what has happened to me. My poor brother, who
loves me tenderly  "
" But what can I do ? " interrupted the Baron.
" Help me to communicate with Pierre. Deliver
a letter to him. I should feel gratitude towards you
until my dying day."
The Baron uttered not a word. To consent to
serve as an intermediary for a State prisoner, to help
her to correspond with her relatives, would be to defy
all regulations, and to lay himself open to the gravest
consequences. It says something for Thdroigne's persuasive powers
that even here she obtained her desire. The letter
was written, was sent off, and reached its destination
in due course. It would be indiscreet to expect to
know definitely by whose timely assistance this came
to pass.

in A Woman of thefRevolution
The letter contained some account of her arrest :
" My dear Brother," she writes,
" Among the individuals who have seized my
person there were two French officers and one im-
piriaux. They did not show me any special order.
1 do not know by whose instructions nor why I
have been arrested, which is terrible. The two French
men informed me verbally, however, that it was on
account of the affairs of Brabant, but I saw that it
was quite the contrary, for they never ceased to
question me on the events of the French Revolution.
They even employed a ruse and finesse, pretending
to be just and honest, with the intention of 4 drawing
out my confidences. They did not raise their masks
until we reached Freiburg, where they showed the
greatest enmity against the patriots and the greatest
interest in finding me guilty."
She begged her brother to go to Vienna at once,
and to ask permission from the Emperor for her to
be taken there so that he might hear her own version
of the affair. " I would give everything that I have,"
she declared, "for the chance of speaking to the
Emperor, for I feel certain that he did not give orders
for my arrest." The thought of sleeping in a prison
terrified her, she said, and she complained of ill-health,
fearing she knew not what evil consequences if she
were not speedily released.
But Pierre-Joseph did not dream of going to Vienna.
He dreaded lest he should be implicated in his sister's
alleged plots. Instead, he appealed once more to
Perregaux, telling him that he had received a letter

THEROIGNE DE MKRICOURT.
From a crayon drawing by Danlou in the possession of M. le Vicomte de Reiset
and reproduced by kind permission of the owner.

Flight and Capture 215
from his sister since her disappearance. In order to
keep him informed of what was going on, and be
cause he wanted him to help in freeing her, he sent
him her letter. " But you know," he writes, " that
since the day of her capture I have followed up her
affairs keenly with my aunt at Liege, yet all our en
deavours have been fruitless." Thdroigne's enemies
were not content with seizing her person ; they cal
umniated her, he stated, in all the public journals.
Her aunt had employed two lawyers, who agreed that
a memoir should be printed containing her justification,
that it should be published in Paris, and that a
deputy of the Assembly should be found who would
take the trouble to write to Mercy-Argenteau, and to
send him a copy of the memoir. Pierre asked Perre
gaux to help him with the printing of this document,
which could not be done at Lidge, as it was forbidden
to print anything without the permission _ of the
authorities, and it~~was not possible for him to present
himself for the purpose of gaining permission.
" I have learnt," continues Thdroigne's brother,
"that M. l'Abbd Sidyesihas spoken several times very
kindly of my sister to M.  . This man was
deputy for Liege at Paris during the Revolution. I
am sure that if we explained things as they are to
him he would gladly take it upon himself to write
to Brussels." He then begged Perregaux to ask his
brother to see about this matter, and to speak to the
deputy, who had known Theroigne well, because it
was unlikely that he would think harshly of the faults
she had committed in France, which, moreover, were
already relegated to oblivion because the National
13

ii 6 A Woman of the Revolution
Assembly had issued a decree cancelling all the warrants
of arrest.
" I am examining the papers," concludes Pierre-
Joseph, " but you will see more clearly than I how
to act for the best. I shall owe you a debt of eternal
gratitude, and would gladly pay it by shedding my
blood for you."
From this letter it is apparent that Thdroigne's
brother was not entirely convinced of her innocence.
Possibly he too was mystified by the extraordinary
inconsistencies in her character.
Whilst these negotiations were being undertaken
on her behalf Thdroigne was passing through new
and unpleasant experiences.

CHAPTER VI
KUFSTEIN
ON the frontiers of the Tyrol and Bavaria stands
an imposing fortress, with dungeons and batde-
ments, dominating the surrounding country. Art,
brought to bear upon remarkable natural qualifications,
rendered this place practically impregnable.
It was March 1 7th, at nine o'clock in the morning,
when Theroigne and her escort arrived before the
forbidding walls of Kufstein. She was overwhelmed
by dread at the thought of the fate in store for her.
" Unfortunate being that I am," she cried. " I have
been condemned — innocent, I swear it — to a convict's
cell, to unheard-of tribulations and sufferings. What
you have been told of me, monsieur, is an infamous
calumny. Help me to escape from the doom that
awaits me."
Landresc, deeply moved by her piteous plight,
turned away his head.
She sobbed, she gave way to hysterical shrieks, she
declared it would be better to die at once than to
endure captivity. Nothing could calm her.
Presently the governor of the prison, Captain
Andre Schoeniger, appeared upon the scene. He was
accustomed to these outbreaks of despair. All the
217

218 A Woman of the Revolution
prisoners enacted the same tragedy in a lesser or
greater degree. All declared themselves martyrs.
Schoeniger had been well prepared for the kind
of prisoner he had to expect. He had been instructed
to have her strictly guarded, but she was to be treated
humanely. There was to be no brutality.
The Captain himself conducted " Madame Thdo-
bald " to her cell. This was an unusual honour,
rarely accorded to any. prisoner, except those of
peculiar distinction.
The approach to the upper regions of the fortress
was not one to inspire hope of freedom in the captive's
breast. Hewn through huge and unscalable rocks,
the way to the prison wound through a narrow and
dark subterranean passage, up countiess flights of
stairs, climbing ever higher and higher into what
was a well-nigh impenetrable fastness. After mounting
more than two hundred steps a little court was
reached, where there was a revolving bridge and
massive doors heavily barred with iron. Once beyond
that, and the prisoner said good-bye to the outer
world — for who knows how long ? Then more
mounting upward, in a tower this time, the way
becoming more narrow and more gloomy, and the
air more damp. At last a second door as black and
solid as the first was reached. It led into the prison
proper. Fainting and breathless the prisoner stood
still, unable to move another step. Schoeniger, taking
her by the arm, urged her on. No prisoner was
allowed to loiter there. There was a second tower
to mount, more of the huge stone steps built into
walls so thick that no voice could echo there ; even

Kufstein 2 1 9
the breath seemed stifled. Thdroigne felt she knew
what burial alive would mean.
The passage widened out into a vault, and that
in turn into a courtyard, open to the sky at last.
Round about were high walls containing many
windows, strongly barred. And here every sign of
the way they had come was lost. The four sides
of the court appeared alike in every particular.
Which of the closed apertures was the one that led
out of this horrible trap ? It was impossible to
remember. How could any prisoner dwell for an
instant on the thought of escape through those
bewildering labyrinths of brick and rock, guarded
as they were at regular intervals by armed sentries.
Far better death than captivity in such a place !
The cell into which Thdroigne was led was not
terrible. It had two windows, one looking into the
courtyard, the other into the surrounding mountains.
The furniture was of white wood, and of the plainest
description. It communicated with a room occupied
by the sentry. No one could enter her apartment
without being challenged by the guard.
The captain ordered an inventory to be taken of
the prisoner's possessions. They were not numerous.
A hat, two gowns, a silk kerchief, a brown cloak
trimmed with fur, a muff, two pairs of shoes, four
undergarments, five handkerchiefs, ten pairs of silk
stockings, and a belt comprised the whole of her
wardrobe. There was nothing like a riding-habit,
and no weapons.
The governor thought she was but ill provided for.
Just then his eye fell upon some books.

220 A Woman of the Revolution
" What have we here ? " he cried.
The soldier read out the titles. Works of Seneca
complete works of de Mably, and Plato's Dialogues.
" She _ must be a blue-stocking," said the governor,
laughing ; but his manner implied a new accession of
respect. There was nothing else to account for except a few
silver spoons, some silver buttons, and other gewgaws.
These were placed in a casket and locked away. The
search ended, the governor retired, and the prisoner
was left alone. She heard the heavy door close and
the bolts shot.
She fell on her knees and called for mercy. She
wrung her hands, tears streaming down her cheeks.
There was no answer to her cry.
A week passed in a kind of mental stupor ; she
sobbed, she raged, and then, worn out, she slept. At
regular intervals meals were brought to her. She was
allowed to choose her own food. Whenever the
governor came into the room, which was fairly often,
she asked him about her trial. " When will it begin ? "
was her invariable question.
" I know nothing." His reply never altered.
At last her longing for an occupation became so
extreme that she plucked up courage and begged
Schoeniger to allow her to have a piano. " Music
passes the time pleasantly," she said in her wheedling
manner. The governor was dumbfounded at such an audacious
request. " I beg of you to obtain for me this harmless amuse-

Kufstein 221
ment," she urged, wearing the air of innocence and
childlike joyousness which never failed to fascinate.
" Madame," he replied, endeavouring to speak
sternly, " it is quite out of my power to procure
you this privilege."
" Oh ! " Her disappointment was evident from her
voice. " But, you might  "
" What ? " She knew there was more to come.
She was all eagerness.
" Well, write to Vienna to the Conseil de Guerre.
It may be  "
She asked him sweetly whether he could not do her
the favour of writing himself. She felt sure her
request would have more weight coming from him.
He had no power to refuse so simple a plea. As he
was leaving the room she laid one hand on his arm.
" Monsieur," she said, "just one thing more. Could
you trace for me the three receipts which were taken
from me at the time of my arrest. I asked them to
send them to my brother Pierre. If they have gone
astray the loss would be a serious one. The amount
is some two thousand three hundred and eighty-four
livres." To this the amenable 'governor': also agreed. He
was treating the prisoner with enormous consideration.
He sent for all the papers which had been seized at
La Boverie.
For a fortnight Thdroigne was all impatience. Then
the use of a piano was accorded her. She was over
joyed, and practised her singing every day. But soon
the whoiQ of her repertory was exhausted. It wag

222 A Woman of the Revolution
impossible to obtain any new music. When her
memory failed her she attempted to improvise, but she
did not care for her own compositions and soon
exhausted her resources. Then she began to complain
anew of the weariness of incarceration.
Had she but been able to compare her lot with that
to be endured throughout the Terror by the aristocrats
in the French prisons, how happy she might have
thought herself! She had light and air, good food
and repose, her jailers were kind in the main, and
her case was by no means hopeless, whilst they had
none of these consolations and many unspeakable
hardships. What were her sufferings when regarded
in the light of the tortures and agony they were to
undergo ? Penned by the score into tiny evil-smelling
cells, into which the light of day hardly penetrated, fed
on bad bread, putrifying meat, adulterated wine, and
rotten vegetables, subjected to the vilest insults, coarse
jests, and even physical violence, unable to utter a
complaint lest a murmur should produce more terrible
punishment still, they waited with smiling faces and
brave mien to hear the creak of the tumbril and the
click of the guillotine.*
But Theroigne knew nothing of these horrors, and
felt her own sufferings well-nigh unendurable because
her imagination called up nothing worse. Confinement
in itself meant death to her.
The governor, in order to dispel the stupor of
misery into which she had fallen, told her that the
examining magistrate, M. Francois Le Blanc, would
arrive before long from his home in Constance, and
that then the inquiry into her case would take place,

Kufstein 223
This news threw her into a state of great excitement.
" When will he come ? To-morrow — the day after ? "
she asked eagerly.
But no exact information was vouchsafed her.
Spring was coming, and even the stern discipline of
prison life seemed to relax somewhat under the benign
influence of the gentler mood of the year. Theroigne
was permitted to walk in an enclosed court, where the
trees were in bud, and she could hear the singing of
birds. The governor now showed her every care. He
realised that she was taking her imprisonment too
much to heart. Her health was breaking. She was
troubled by hallucinations, torturing visions which
unnerved her, and at night she suffered from ghastly
dreams which left her sleepless. She sighed for her
freedom, for her own country, for those she loved.
There was no human being near her in whom she
could confide. She was falling into a rapid decline.
As the days passed Captain Schoeniger dreaded that he
might lose his prisoner by death.
On May 28th Le Blanc arrived. He asked for
the prisoner's papers. He had already been assured
that they contained nothing compromising. He had
received his instructions from Prince Kaunitz. They
were definite and, at the same time, lenient. Le
Blanc's aim was to arrive if possible at the simple
truth rather than to attempt to force a confession
of guilt.
" However probable it appears that the prisoner has
committed the crime of high treason," ran his in-
structions? " it is impossible to have proof of it unless

224 A Woman of the Revolution
she furnishes it herself by her own confession. It
is necessary, therefore, to ask her for a statement of
the principal circumstances and conditions of her life
in France as well as outside this country. It is
indispensable to ascertain whether at any time in her
life she played a public part, and if so, where, when,
and how. Especially should it be made clear what
part she took in the revolt of the women on
October 6th, 1789.
" The commissioner is authorised to say that he
is not reflecting the views of the Emperor in making
her feel the rigour of the law. A free and sincere
confession would be preferred. She must show her
self worthy of the monarch's clemency. Moreover,
the result of the inquiry will depend essentially on
the agreement of her confession and depositions with
the knowledge already obtained concerning the most
salient points of her conduct.
" Her fanatic enthusiasm for everything connected
with the idea of democracy is well known. The
prisoner should therefore be warned that the Court
has in its hands several infallible means of recognising
the truth of the answers she will make to the questions
put to her. The least reticence, a single lie in her
depositions, will suffice to class her in the category
of persons suspected, dangerous, incorrigible, and who
ought to be kept away from all chance of doing harm.
" In any case, all hope that she will ever see her
country again must be destroyed. If, on the one
hand, this causes her affliction, on the other she will
feel more free to speak without fear arid to adhere
strictly to the truth.

Kufstein 225
" Since, having nothing more to fear from the resent
ment of people who might be compromised by her
admissions, and having no further interest in pro
pitiating those from whom she might expect ulterior
advantages, she will keep back nothing of what she
knows. " Evidently she has had relations with important
people. Had she really the political influence with
which opinion has endowed her? In case this is
answered in the affirmative, who are her accomplices,
and what are their names ? Why did she leave Paris
to install herself near Lidge? What does she know
of the organisation of the Jacobins Club ? In what
manner does she speak concerning the royal family
of France ? "
These are leading questions. Answered fully they
would have left but litde of Thdroigne's hopes, aims,
and intentions to the imagination.
On all other points Le Blanc was allowed latitude.
It was his wish to inspire the prisoner with confidence.
At their first interview Thdroigne promised to tell
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
truth. Her interrogator commended this laudable decision.
He assured her that the Austrian Government did not
mean to punish her for any political crimes of which
she might have been guilty in France.
"They have deceived the Emperor," she replied
excitedly. "By means of insidious reports, some
persons have clearly influenced the prince by imputing
to me certain views or actions, and this has been the
cause of my detention But they will have to render

226 A Woman of the Revolution
me justice. They will realise that I am but a simple
woman, charmed with the idea of liberty and the
welfare of the people. In that I cannot be held to
be guilty. On this account, and because you have
said yourself that the Austrian Government is quite
indifferent to my past doings in France, I hope for
my release. Begin to question me as soon as you like.
I am ready."
Le Blanc told her that a few days would be given
her for calm meditation, in order that she might go
through the facts she had to tell carefully, and have
them clear and exact in her own mind. This did not
altogether please the prisoner. She had had so much
time for calm meditation already that solitude had
driven her almost crazy. Nor did the commissioner's
next remark please her much better. He told her
he had to wait for the clerk who was to draw up
the inquiry in writing.
" Is not that clerk one of the two Frenchmen who
captured me and took me to Freiburg ? " she inquired
suddenly. Le Blanc was astounded by her perspicacity.
" I know nothing," he answered evasively. " Surely,
mademoiselle, you must be mistaken in thinking that
your captors were Frenchmen. They were Dutch."
" Dutch ? " she repeated. " Don't tell me they were
Dutch. You have been ill informed, monsieur, or
some one has been trying to deceive you, or, perhaps,
you are trying to dupe me. I maintain against every
thing said to the contrary that my captors were officers
and French aristocrats. I recognised them not only
by the details of their military dress, but also by

Kufstein 227
their caustic, insidious, and hateful manners — in short,
by their discourteous treatment of me, and by their
speech." And then she added angrily : " Moreover,
monsieur, if one of those two Frenchmen comes here
to perform the services of a clerk, I will not answer
so much as a single syllable. I would die rather than
be subjected to a process marked by such partiality.
Having been born in the Low Countries, my sovereign
can only be of the House of Hapsburg. And there
fore I have the right to be tried by no one but the
Emperor's officials."
Le Blanc was surprised to learn that she had not
been born in France.
She assured him that she was Austrian.
" I will never consent to be judged by Frenchmen,"
she repeated more firmly than before, " and most
certainly not by one of those who seized me at La
Boverie. Take care that I am never brought face to
face with either of the rascals. They have reason
to know already that they cannot force me to speak."
She had in mind the intolerable degradation of the
journey from Coblenz to Freiburg.
Le Blanc was stupefied by her proud and obstinate
bearing. He could never have believed that any one
as much worn by illness as the prisoner could have
shown such strength of will. He realised that she
was not an ordinary woman. There was nothing
vulgar about her manners ; no bold gestures, and
no coarse tones. She had a large amount of personal
magnetism, a powerful charm in which energy and
grace made a strange contrast. Even the way she
poured vituperation on the head of her captors, calling

228 A Woman of the Revolution
them vile, contemptible, wanting in tact, in education,
even in humanity, had something of the sublime in it.
She was the image of assaulted virtue pointing the
finger of scorn at vice. It was Theroigne's gift to
put others in the wrong and keep her own position
unassailable. The story of her early youth and upbringing, and
of her doings in Paris before the close of 1789, was
told with a simplicity that was wonderfully clever.
Her answers were put in writing, and she signed
a document to the effect that the questions had been
put to her by the investigating magistrate and were
recognised by her as being those of His Majesty the
Emperor and King, and that the responses were in
substance those she had made.
After she had been sworn the examination began
in all seriousness on May 31st, and went on for some
weeks, broken only by delays occasioned by the illness
of the prisoner and the arrival of La Valette at Kufstein
with his indictment against Thdroigne, which included
some 122 articles, and was entitled, "Dires et Aveux
de Demoiselle Thdroigne." Le Blanc exercised his
authority in refusing to allow La Valette to be present
at his interviews with the prisoner.
In the course of the inquiry it was discovered that
Thdroigne had communicated with her brother since
she had been taken captive. She refused to disclose
the means by which she had dispatched her letter.
" You are trying to shield your accomplice," said
Le Blanc ; " is not that so ? "
Thdroigne grew red and turned away her eyes.
She admitted that this was true.

Kufstein 229
"Be frank and fear nothing," said the examining
magistrate. " Only tell me the truth."
She remained immovable as a statue. Her face had
grown pale.
" I only desire to know the name of your accomplice.
He shall not be punished."
Still Thdroigne uttered not a word.
" Mademoiselle, answer me," continued Le Blanc.
" Monsieur, I must not speak. Have pity on me."
" I give you my word of honour, no harm shall
come to him."
" Will you give me a promise in writing ? " asked
the prisoner glibly.
Pained as he was by this evidence of her mistrust,
Le Blanc agreed. He inquired carefully concerning
the contents of the letter. Thdroigne could not re
member exactly what she had written. She was ac
cused of using the expression " I beg you to address
yourself to the National Assembly in order that it
may force the King to claim my freedom as a French
woman ? "
" If I used such a phrase," responded Thdroigne,
" it was very stupid of me, because I am not a
Frenchwoman. And if I wrote the words ' force the
King' I employed an improper term. The King of
France cannot be forced. He can only be requested
to put his laws into execution. As for addressing
myself to the National Assembly, which represents
the sovereign, to whom in a free country the humblest
individual can present a petition, I perhaps was within
my rights in suggesting this. But I did not do it
in spite of the right I had, which I can prove. I

23° A Woman of the Revolution
was kidnapped by French aristocrats who did not
show me the Emperor's warrant. Therefore it is
not surprising that I should believe they were acting
on behalf of their own sovereign."
She was told that her arrest had been ordered at
Brussels by Mercy-Argenteau.
"These same aristocrats," she added, unmoved by
this information, "never ceased to insult me and to
ridicule the officers of the French Army. I know
nothing of the political aspect of my arrest. But,
without a doubt, from whichever point of view it is
considered, it was most certainly a malicious, base, and
cruel trick. The intriguing underlings who conceived
' the sublime plan of arresting me will not remain
triumphant. The Prince de Kaunitz, whose wisdom
and supreme worth are known throughout Europe,
and, above all, the Emperor, who has already made
his reign illustrious by various deeds of justice and
humanity, will recognise the fact that they have been
deceived. Therefore I remain tranquil."
This speech throws a fresh light on Thdroigne's
intuition and her persuasive gifts. She was not stupid,
la petite Thdroigne ; and being assured once more that
no harm should come to her accomplice in the delivery
of a letter to her brother, she gaily made a descrip
tion of an individual easily recognisable as the amiable
but unfortunate Baron de Landresc.
She was permitted to send another letter to her
brother at Lidge. It was dated June 26th, 1791.
" I cannot express to you," she writes, " the regrets
and grief which I have suffered from being deprived
of your company for so long. You will have ex-

231

Kufstein 233
perienced the same feelings. I have often imagined
your sorrow and anxiety, and this has contributed no
little in aggravating my sadness and exaggerating the
misfortune of my captivity. Nevertheless I must
render justice to the manner in which I am treated ;
they take every possible care of me, but, in spite of
that, my brother, it is always very hard to be deprived
of liberty when one does not deserve it. I confess to
you that I should prefer death to being deprived much
longer of the pleasure of seeing you, my family, and
my friends. However, you must reassure yourself,
my brother, and reassure those who are interesting
themselves on my account in this unfortunate affair ;
for I have reason to hope much from the enlightened
justice of his Imperial Majesty, who will free me as
soon as he knows the truth. I hope to see you again
before two months have passed. Imagine how much
pleasure it will give me, after having had so much
grief! Please express my thanks to those who have
interested themselves on my behalf, and have taken
steps to have me released. Give my kind remem
brances to all my friends ; say that I hope to have
permission to write to them soon, and that I shall see
them again before long — at least, they tell me I may
hope that this will be so, and, if they do me justice,
this hope will be realised. I have not the slightest
doubt of that.
" I do not know in the least how our affairs stand,
my brother : whether you are still boarding with
Francois Person ; whether you have enough money
to pay for your lodgings ; whether you have had a
coat made, for you were in need of one before I was

234 A Woman of the Revolution
taken prisoner ; whether you have paid what I owe
at La Boverie and at Xhoris ; and whether you have
received three acknowledgments of loans from the
Mont de Pidtd in Paris, which I gave to those who
escorted ,me to prison in order that they might be
remitted to you."
One of these loans had already lapsed at the time
of her arrest, but she hoped the others might be
redeemed. She repeated herself in her anxiety to hear
how her brothers were faring pecuniarily, and to be
assured that they wanted for nothing. Then she went
on to complain of her health, which she hoped would
soon improve, and looked forward to the time when
they should all live together as they had planned,
" misfortune having ceased to dog their footsteps."
She recommended her brother to study diligently, to
take lessons from the same masters she had had before
her arrest, and to send her as much news as possible.
Her correspondence was, without doubt, intended
for the eye of her jailers, who supervised all her
letters. They struck a very domestic note. The
most interesting of them, perhaps, and the one which
throws most light on her tastes and habits, was written
on July 29th, 1 79 1.
" My dear brother," she began, " I will say no
more of the impatience I have to see you again, for
your own feelings will give you an idea of it. I am
quite as anxious on your behalf as you can be on mine.
What have you been doing ? Where have you been
all these six months that I have been in prison ? Are
you continuing your studies, or have you had the
misfortune, as a counter-blow to mine, to lose all

Kufstein 235
this time owing to want of money or credit ? I am
dying to hear your news. Where is my little brother ?
Is he still at Xhoris, and is he studying ? Tell him
to write to me. I keep feeling afraid that either of
you should be wanting something, although you ought
to have received the three hundred livres which I
was expecting when they achieved the masterpiece of
arresting me." And then she goes on to deplore their
troubles, trusts there is money enough, and asks
once more about the acknowledgments for her jewels.
There is a great deal of repetition in her letters.
" Unfortunately I do not yet know when I shall
be able to see you again, but I still hope to have
justice done me. I have been strictly forbidden to
tell you anything concerning my affairs. I shall con
tent myself with telling you that I have been outside
the fortress walking with MM. the Magistrate and the
Commandant, and that I cannot go outside the prison
nor receive anybody without the permission of these
two gentlemen, who are very kind to me.
" Perhaps you have been obliged to sell my piano
forte for very little, in spite of the fact that it cost
me thirty louis. That would grieve me, because I
love music, and I shall no longer have the means to
get another one ; but, after all, it is but a small mis
fortune. . . . Have you looked after our belongings
at La Boverie ? I am afraid lest my dresses should be
spoilt, especially the woollen ones, if you have not
had them put out to air. Above all things, I re
commend my books to your care. Do not lend them
to anybody. Use them for your instruction, and
that of our brother.

236 A Woman of the Revolution
" Besides, you might ask the farmer's wife whether
I forgot a parcel when I went off in the night with
those who arrested me. The parcel contained some
dresses, books of Seneca and de Mably.1 Please go
yourself and see whether it was not left on the table.
And be sure and let me know if you have found it,
or if the farmer's wife found it, yes or no. Do not
forget to go yourself and look for the five volumes
of Seneca's letters which were in the parcel, and three
volumes of de Mably, and my Indian morning
gowns." And then she proceeds to tell her brothers to study
day and night, to arm themselves with noble pride,
to remember that virtue is the only good, to write
to her often, and to remember her kindly to her
friends. Perhaps Thdroigne's brothers were hardly worthy
of the love and forethought she lavished upon them.
The whole (family seemed cursed with shiftlessness,
which indicated that they came of a bad stock.
Thdroigne' had done her brothers but a mistaken
kindness in providing for their wants from her own
purse. If her gains were really ill-gotten, as appears
to have been the case, she did them a very bad service
indeed. No sooner was her support withdrawn than
Pierre-Joseph, thrown upon his own resources, which
were of a most unconvincing nature, was at his wit's
end to discover any means of livelihood. He tried
to obtain money from his sister's banker, Perregaux,
1 According to the inventory of Theroigne's possessions taken by the
governor at Kufstein, these books were in the parcel of her belongings
there. It is possible she was kept in ignorance of this.

Kufstein 237
from the sale of his sister's jewels, and from a certain
Baron de Selys, governor of the principality of
Stavelot, who had received Thdroigne at his chateau
in a more or less friendly spirit during her recent
stay in the neighbourhood. It was said that Thdroigne's
father had once been the Baron's tenant, and that he
had known her when she was a little girl. He had
been inspired to renew the acquaintance partly by
curiosity, partly by a desire to find out her views
and her motive for leaving Paris and visiting her
own country. In a letter dated October ist, 179 1,
he wrote that he had only invited her and her brothers
so that he might be kept informed of their acquaint
ances, their doings, and any plans they might attempt
to put into execution " in order to be useful to the
good cause." He took this step at the instigation
of the Comte de Maillebois, who was the principal
agent of the French emigre' princes. As he learnt
nothing which could in any way incriminate Thetfoigne,
this would appear to be additional evidence in favour
of her entire aloofness from an active part in the
insurrection at Lidge.
Although he had little to complain of in her political
attitude, his friendship for her was to be the cause
of great annoyance in other directions, both domestic
and financial. The Baron de Selys had married a
charming lady some twenty years his junior, and had
daughters of his own. Unaware of the risk of in
troducing a woman of Thdroigne's character into the
bosom of his family, or perhaps in spite of it, he had
once or twice invited her to dine at his Chateau de
Fanson. During these visits she had fulfilled their

238 A Woman of the Revolution
purpose by being emboldened to tell him some of
her private affairs. In order to strengthen her pleasant
relations with the Selys family Thdroigne had asked
to be allowed to give lessons on the harpsichord to
his daughters. This privilege was refused her. More
over, it was discovered that during some walks they
had taken in company she had given several French
books to the eldest girl, who was called Victoire,
and to prevent any such communication the parents
took Victoire to Maestricht. The girl, however,
found means to receive news of her friend. The
mother discovered that letters passed between them,
and this underhand traffic was put a stop to. Soon
afterwards the family returned to Lidge.
On the first day of the year 1791, the Baron re
turning at midday to the Hotel de la Cour-de-France,
where he was then staying with his family, found to
his surprise that Thdroigne was with his wife, and
that she was weeping bitterly. Victoire was also in
tears. Thdroigne had met them as they were coming
from mass, and followed them to the hotel. She had
begged anew to be allowed to give the girl music
lessons, but the Baroness refused as before. She for
bade her to continue any relations whatever with
Victoire, and threatened to have her shut up in a
convent if she attempted to communicate with her
daughter. At this Thdroigne had screamed loudly,
and had begged her to show respect for the rights
of man. Thereupon Mme de Selys ordered her
haughtily to take her departure. At this moment
the Baron appeared on the scene. There was renewed
bewailing. Theroigne, exasperated, flung the strongest

Kufstein 239
epithet she knew at him. She called him a zealous
defender of monarchs ! The Baron put an end to
this absurd situation by gently and politely showing
her to the door. They separated without bearing
each other any ill-will, but Theroigne, as is not
unusual with women of her type, insisted on having
the last word. " Oh," she said scornfully, " how
can a brave and gallant man like you live with a
woman so insupportably proud ! "
Various causes were at work to involve the Baron
in expense on behalf of the woman, who, attractive
as she might be personally, had made it definitely
clear that she was not an individual worthy of great
confidence, and that all services performed on her
account were likely to be but ill repaid. A very
short time elapsed before Pierre Theroigne began to
importune de Selys both for himself and for his sister.
"Very soon after Mile Thdroigne was so rudely
captured near Lidge," wrote the Baron on March 6th,
1792, "her brother, who often stayed with an aunt
half a league from my castle, made the acquaintance
of a certain R. Labeye, who for many years has super
vised the workmen on my estate. Through this
Labeye, M. Thdroigne and his uncles and aunts
asked me to try to obtain information as to what
had become of his sister. I made some inquiries,
and found she had taken the route to Breisgau."
Pierre-Joseph went to the castle frequently, and,
complaining of not receiving help from Paris, begged
de Selys to do what he could to assist him. In order
to rid himself of these importunities the Baron sug
gested that the young fellow should make a journey

240 A Woman of the Revolution
to Kufstein himself in order to obtain definite news
of his sister, and he even bestirred himself to obtain
a passport for Pierre, which described him as a young
man of good reputation, aged about twenty-four, well
made, and above the average height, with chestnut-
coloured hair. But this proposed journey came to
nothing, which was perhaps fortunate, under the
circumstances, as Thdroigne was then on the point
of leaving the prison for Vienna, and her brother
would probably have arrived too late.
She, on her part, was moving heaven and earth to
have the pawned jewels restored to her, and set about
this task in the most diplomatic manner imaginable.
She began by thanking M. le Blanc for all his kind
ness to her at Kufstein.
" You have been a benefactor to me," she remarked.
" I feel convinced that you will never abandon me.
And I do not doubt that you will do everything
you possibly can to obtain for me the favour of an
audience with the Emperor."
" That will not be altogether easy," replied Le
Blanc. " You have too high an opinion of my influence.
Don't delude yourself in that belief."
Thdroigne seized upon this occasion to express her
views on humanity in general and politics in par
ticular. She grew wonderfully animated, and her
powers of fascination increased with her excitement.
She was well informed upon all the questions of the
day.. She expressed accurate ideas of right and justice,
and defended them with all the single-mindedness
of which a woman led by intuition can be capable.
" I have learnt to know men," she declared boldly,

Kufstein 241
" and I esteem them but little, for I have been
deceived over and over again. "You, too, must admit
thafTthe feeling I have against the French noblesse is
a legitimate aversion. I might be able to pardon
the persecutions and personal insults which they have
showered upon me, but can I ever forget that they
have sought to ruin me and reduce me to beggary,
as well as all those who are dear to me ? "
" What ! what's that ? " asked Le Blanc in astonish
ment. " Where do you get that dreadful idea from ? "
" If am not set free speedily I shall lose the re
mainder of my fortune. Do you wish to know more ?
Well, I will tell you. Here is the receipt for a
diamond necklace which was left at the Mont de
Pidtd of Lidge. The interest is overdue ; and if I
remain a prisoner, and am unable to redeem the
pledge, my necklace will be sold, and  "
Her voice broke.
Le Blanc inquired what sum was owing. She told
him that the necklace was worth more than six
thousand livres, and that two thousand were required
to get it back.
" It means a small fortune to me," she cried, " and
the loss of it would be a terrible blow both to me and
mine." " That is true," said Le Blanc. " You must let me
have the receipt. I will send it to Coblenz. Metter
nich will have the interest paid up to date before your
trial comes to an end. We will save the necklace."
Thdroigne hardly knew how to express her gratitude.
Le Blanc sent his report, and the minister put the
matter in the hands of the Baron de Selys, who was

V

242 A Woman of the Revolution
then living at Lidge. Inquiries were immediately
made. Meanwhile Pierre-Joseph had told Labeye about the
necklace, and begged him to ask the Baron to redeem
it. Mme de Selys, hearing of the jewels, obtained the
influence of some relative at the Mont de Pidtd and
went to inspect them.
"At the close of 1 791 my wife saw the necklace,
and at the prayer of Sieur Thdroigne wished to redeem
it," wrote Selys, in the letter of March 6th. "But
as Sieur Theroigne was unable to produce the receipt,
madame was obliged to give security at the Mont
de Pidtd in case the receipt was produced by anybody
else. I learnt, on returning from a voyage, that the
necklace had been redeemed, and was at my house,
which did not give me any particular pleasure."
M. de Selys told this story of the necklace to
Perregaux, and added that, in spite of his displeasure,
and somewhat against his will, he had taken charge of
the receipts sent to Pierre-Joseph, and had redeemed,
from the Mont de Pidtd at Paris, two ear-rings and
a ring. He was not rewarded for his trouble. It
came to his ears that Pierre's real reason for not going
to the Tyrol was that he feared to be arrested himself
because he had been told that the Baron de Selys
was pardy responsible for the capture of his sister,
and was waiting to seize the brother too before appro
priating Mile Theroigne's redeemed jewels for his own
uses. The Baron was naturally disgusted when he
heard of these absurd aspersions on his character. He
wished to rid himself as quickly as possible of all
Thdroigne's relatives, and, hoping to obtain her consent

Kufstein 243
to sell the jewels for the benefit of her brother, he
wrote a letter to her personally, and took steps to
assure himself that it would reach her. In it he told
her that her relatives were all well, and greatly desired
to see her again. Leonard Clamend, her uncle, who
lived at Xhoris, had lost his mother. Her youngest
brother, Pierrot, had left Xhoris for Marcourt. Pierre-
Joseph was still at Lidge, and told him he was making
good use of his time. Having thus dismissed the
trivial family gossip, he explained that he had helped
both her brothers several times with sums of money,
the last being an amount of five louis the very day
before the one on which he wrote. He had also
redeemed her jewels as she had directed, and informed
her that her brother Pierre wished to sell them and
buy himself an interest in some business, which, he
was told by Pierre, was a plan of her own. He asked
her to agree definitely to this arrangement, as her
brother was without resources, and could get no
answer from Perregaux although he had written more
than once.
Before this letter reached Kufstein Thdroigne was
on her way to Vienna, and Le Blanc himself replied
to it on November 21st, 1791, informing the Baron
that she would soon be free, and able to answer his
questions in person.
This, to her, highly desirable state of affairs was
brought about by Le Blanc's conviction that the
prisoner had been arrested under a misapprehension.
Finding that her account differed in almost every
particular from that of her chief accuser, La Valette,
he decided to confront the two of them, in spite of her

244 A Woman of the Revolution
objection ever to be brought face to face with her
persecutor. La Valette was introduced into the prison
under the name of Legros on July 6th, and this
dramatic interview was to be the final act of the
inquiry into the charges brought against the prisoner.
When Thdroigne recognised the Chevalier who had
been brought into her cell without warning, she rose
from her bed like an infuriated tigress. She was
trembling and gasping with the strength of her
emotion. Her stifled breathing and the glare of anger
in her eyes showed plainly the hatred she bore this
adversary. Le Blanc, who was present, began to fear
the result of so much excitement upon her already
enfeebled health.
After repeating the substance of h s accusations,
La Valette said proudly : " I persist in my declarations,
and maintain all my depositions to the letter."
" And I refuse to alter a single word of what I have
said," added Thdroigne. Her voice rang out ; she
drew herself up, and at that moment she held herself
like a great lady, and faced her accuser with a dignified
pose that was both graceful and full of energy. Her
conscience was at rest, and she was inspired by a know
ledge of her own innocence.
Le Blanc saw that nothing was to be gained by
prolonging the interview. Influenced, no doubt, by
her obvious honesty, by the straightforwardness of
her replies, and no less, it must be confessed, by the
personal magnetism which affected even better men
than the inquiring magistrate, he became convinced,
little by little, that she had never made an attempt to
assassinate the Queen of France, and, as no proof

Kufstein 245
existed of her having incited the people of Brabant
to rebellion, he could not bring home to her any worse
accusation than that of being a misguided young
woman. At the end of June his sympathies had been deeply
enlisted by her evident sufferings and ill health. He
sent for the local doctor, who seemed unable to cure
her. Then he called in an illustrious physician, Dr. de
Mdderer, who came all the way from Constance, where
he was enjoying a holiday, at the request of his old
friend and colleague.
Mdderer had a world-wide reputation. He arrived
at Kufstein at the end of July. He recognised at once
that Thdroigne's physical condition was anything but
satisfactory, and that her mind was deeply troubled.
Continuous excitement, unrelieved suspense, and grief
had worked havoc on her constitution, and had re
duced her to a state bordering on mental aberration.
Something had to be done at once to relieve the
strain upon her mind, lest her brain should become
unbalanced. At all costs her thoughts must be dis
tracted, unless it was possible to offer her the only
remedy which could be thoroughly efficacious — namely,
the release which would naturally terminate her anguish.
The doctor's report is interesting, both as it stands
and as evidence of the strange effects of " Revolution
fever " with which many people in France became
afflicted about this period.
" In accordance with an order given me on the 14th
of the month," ran the report, " I went on the 23rd to
see the French prisoner detained here. I stated that
her physical ills were easily curable, and I gave instruc-

246 A Woman of the Revolution
tions to that effect. But I found her moral condition
utterly degenerate, and, as a result of continued physical
and mental strain, I feared she might at any time give
way to a serious disorder, and that the abuse of her
constitution might lead to the contraction of a dangerous
disease. " I therefore considered it to be my duty to report
this state of things, and the condition of the prisoner's
mind to the authorities, and to beg that she might
have every possible care, because if she did not, the
treatment I had ordered would be likely to fail,
and immediate aggravations of her state were likely to
set in.
" How many people gifted with these extraordinary
powers, if they employ them continually on one idea, as
occurred and still occurs in the case of this highly-
strung prisoner, are liable to weaken and destroy both
body and mind so completely as to have great difficulty
in restoring them ! This is an acknowledged fact, and
is so generally known that it is unnecessary to furnish
proofs of it. • " Kufstein, 25/7/1791."
Le Blanc, having received this report, communicated
it at once to Kaunitz, and demanded his authority for
transferring the prisoner. Kaunitz put the matter
before the Emperor, who ordered Thdroigne to be
brought to Vienna.
In the early days of August 1791 a coach and four
left Kufstein on its way to the Austrian capital, and
its occupants were Thdroigne, Le Blanc, Mdderer, and
a clerk. The greatest precautions were taken to ensure the

Kufstein 247
prisoner's safety. So far she had been known as Mme
Thdobald, now she was called Mme Lahaye. The
journey was made by very slow stages. Thdroigne's
health did not permit of quick travelling. At this
time a number of emigres were making their way to
Vienna, amongst them the famous Mme de Polignac,
who was accompanied by her family. Her cortege,
consisting of several carriages and many servants,
traversed the same road on the same day that Thdroigne
passed that way.
At that date Vienna was still a fortified town. The
travellers arrived late at night, and certain formalities
had to be gone through before they were admitted.
The heavy carriage was at last allowed to proceed, and
rolled on through deserted streets until it pulled up
before a small house where one called Antoine Schlosser
lived with his wife. This domicile had been designated
by the secret police as a suitable house of detention for
Madame Lahaye. She was very well looked after
there, and had a servant of her own to wait on her.
She was permitted to take walks, and was treated, in
short, as though she were no longer in prison.
By August 31st Le Blanc had drawn up a long
report of her case for the court in which she was to
be tried. Delays ensued, as invariably happens in such
cases. Theroigne had, perforce, to remain idle and in
suspense. She was pursued by fresh anxieties. Sup
posing her persecutors should succeed in prejudicing
the Court against her ! Nothing could satisfy her
but the one thing she desired above all others — her
liberty. Le Blanc provided her with money, and though

248 A Woman of the Revolution
she accepted considerable sums from him they were
not sufficient for her requirements. Thdroigne, like
most women of her class who have the capacity for
getting their friends to supply them with means, had
neither a knowledge of economy nor arithmetic to help
her to make good use of funds. Ducats burnt her
fingers. She spent them here and there prodigally
or out of sheer generosity. She had soon disposed of
many hundreds of florins. The only friend besides
Le Blanc she had in Vienna was her uncle, the banker
Campinado. She went to him and asked him to obtain
more money for her. Then she persuaded him to
dispatch a letter to Perregaux expressing her needs.
In doing this she broke her parole. She had promised
Le Blanc to write no letters and send no word to
her friends concerning her whereabouts. The letter
was dated September 15th, and was very guarded in
its statements.
" Monsieur (it ran),
"I can say very little except that my affairs
are not yet settled, and that I am not yet free. Whilst
waiting to examine the depositions of the generous
French chevaliers, they are treating me very well. I
am no longer in prison. I am in a special house where
they look after me as well as they possibly can. I
can walk about everywhere, and go into the public
streets with a companion. I think they would even
let me go alone on parole. But although I appreciate
all that has been done to ameliorate my unjust position,
I confess frankly that I am none the less unhappy.
Nothing gives me pleasure if I have not liberty, and

N*

Ik.:.

'-.-

MARIE-JOSEPH CHENIER.

249

Kuf stein 25 f
besides, although I can go everywhere and speak to
everybody, I am nevertheless j^solated and cannot speak
to any one of my affairs, nor say who I am, nor describe
the position in which I find myself. Therefore I can
make no real friends, nor receive advice from a living
soul. I am forced to remain inactive whilst I have
reason to fear that my cowardly persecutors will do
everything possible to prejudice those against me in
whose hands my fate lies. Nevertheless the conclusion
of this intrigue approaches. I hope that they will no
longer take the Emperor's religion in vain, that truth
and justice will triumph, and that I shall be free to
go where I will, because I defy them to discover that
I have done wrong, unless they attribute it to me on
account of my opinions from which they greatly differ.
Besides, it would be a bad way to correct patriotism
by impeding liberty. I beg you to send as soon as
possible twenty louis to my brother. I do not know
how our money matters stand. If you have received
the half-yearly payment of my income of 3,200 livres,
please send the money to my brother, who is at Liege,
chez Francois Person, at the Saint Esprit couronnd sur
Meuse.
"Theroigne.
" P.S. — I cannot tell you where I am, but perhaps I
shall soon have permission to write freely to my friends.
Give my kindest regards to all those who know me,
and who speak of me. I require forty louis for my
self. I shall try and let you know where you can
send them. Sell my diamonds, which are ruining me
in interest. I pray you to take heed of all my re
quests."

252 A Woman of the Revolution
On October 4th she signed a declaration in which
she agreed to live in whatsoever place might be fixed
upon by the authorities. This limitation did not
trouble her greatly. Her chief desire was to be' set
free. The delay had made her terribly impatient.
" Will your report never be done ? " she asked
Le Blanc nearly every day.
He counselled her to keep calm.
Then she varied her question. " Will they let
me go ? " she pleaded.
" I cannot tell you," replied the magistrate.
When she heard that a formal verdict was to be
issued she was delighted. She was determined to have
a copy of the criminal proceedings. She knew that
every Dutch citizen was entitled to a copy.
Le Blanc reminded her that the report would em
body all her letters and private papers, and that the
mystery of her life would be bared for every one to
read it. But this did not seem to trouble her. Ail
she desired was that her motives should be understood,
and her innocence vindicated. As for her private life,
that concerned no one. Le Blanc made a quiet
reference to the Marquis de Persan. Even the thought
of this episode becoming public property did not
distress her.
" What did the old man matter to me ? " she re
plied ungratefully. " I hate the very thought of him."
Le Blanc took it upon himself to scold her for her
rashness in wishing to be regarded as a political prisoner
of importance, and for posing as a martyr. He dis
suaded her from her plan of having the report of

Kufstein 253
her trial published and distributed. He gave her a
hint that there was a chance of her obtaining compensa
tion for her imprisonment, and casually inquired the
age of her brothers. She told him that one was
eighteen, one twenty-two, and the third was married
in Paris. Le Blanc praised her for the anxiety and
solicitude she showed on their behalf, and suggested
that possibly the Emperor might allow them to enter
the army — as lieutenants.
" That would be magnificent," she cried.
Le Blanc's trust in the prisoner was somewhat
shaken when she told him that without his knowledge
she had been allowed two interviews with Prince
Kaunitz and one with the Emperor. She declared
triumphantly that the latter had given her permission
to return to her own country.
The examining magistrate was furious because she
had managed to arrange all this behind his back. He
threatened to have her clapped into prison again.
A fortnight later, on November 24th, Mme Lahaye
was summoned to the court.
She was received sternly by the judge, who re
proved her in a long speech.
" So, madame," he began, " it is not enough that
we should have to read columns of lamentable de
tails concerning the incidents of the French Revo
lution in your proces-verbal and other documents
relating to your affairs, but you consider it necessary to
add your personal opinions with regard to the causes
of this catastrophe. Not content with describing
terrible and bloodthirsty scenes in poetical language,
you do not hesitate — madly anxious to proselytise

254 A Woman of the Revolution
as you are — to try to persuade us that the reasons
you give for your revolutionary frenzy are excellent
ones. ... It is your democratic fanaticism, and that
of others like you, which is at the root of the evil.
It is culpable and is the cause of the present impossible
state of France. Is his Majesty Louis XVI. the
author of the troubles and scandals of Paris and of
Versailles ? Not at all ! It is the mad folly of such
as yourself. Without the demoniacal passion which
possesses you and blinds you, you and your co
religionists in Paris, there would be no cries, no
tumults, no struggles, no tears, and no blood in the
streets of the capital. And you call this the fulfilment
of your duties as a good citizen. . . ." And he
proceeded to heap vituperation upon her head.
She replied proudly :
" My ideas are what they are, and it is useless to
use such grand words and gestures to contradict them.
The truth is that I am a fervent patriot and a good
citoyenne. You condemn the republic : that is your
duty. I, on the other hand, condemn the monarchy :
I think I am right in doing so. Besides I have only
one hope. It is that the principles of '89 and the
| acknowledgment of the Rights of Man should spread
.j throughout Europe and to every country in the world.
In this work 1 have tried to help. I have not com
mitted any crimes, and nobody can produce a proof
to the contrary ! "
"You think so! But the Chatelet of Paris has
nevertheless stigmatised you as a dangerous person . . .
7 it would be a good idea to shut you up in a convent.
\ There, submitting to a severe but human rule, you

Kufstein 255
would lead a tranquil life and be set free on the day you
gave an understanding never again to rail at society."
" That day would never come ! . . . I swear  "
She uttered the words in a strident voice.
After pointing out to her that, in accordance with
the doctors' depositions, it was within his power to
have her shut up for the safety of the public health,
he explained at some length that she ought to know
that her fate — nay, life itself — hung entirely in the
power of the Government and the Emperor.
At his first words Thdroigne seemed to feel every
vestige of the hope of freedom in which she had
indulged oozing away, and she was overcome with
despair, but at his mention of the Emperor she raised
her head, and gravely looked at the man who was
torturing her. She had faith in the clemency of
Leopold II.
There was a short pause, and then she heard the
deep tones of the judge once more addressing her,
" Hear the Emperor's will."
" Yes, monsieur," she replied. " I am ready to
face the worst. Speak."
" He has ordered a change of residence for you."
A smile spread over her face.
"To-morrow you will leave Vienna. Councillor
le Blanc is instructed to hand over to you the sum
of six hundred florins."
" What is that amount for ? " she asked, her lips
quivering. " For the expenses of your journey."
" What journey, monsieur ? Put me out of sus
pense, I beg, as you love me."

256 A Woman of the Revolution
" To-morrow you leave for Brussels."
" Ah ! " she cried. " A thousand thanks, monsieur.
What am I to do at — Brussels ? "
" You will go thence to Lidge."
"And there?" Her voice trembled with excite
ment, her eyes were shining, her face full of an
unearthly light.
" At Lidge you will be allowed your  "
" Great heavens ! My liberty ? "
" You have guessed right, Mile Thdroigne. Your
liberty. Perfect liberty."
With reference to these proceedings the \Moniteurt
contains two interesting notes. The first appears in
the issue of November 16th, 1791, under news from
Vienna of October 29th. It reads as follows :
" M. de Plank [le Blanc], charged to inquire into
the case of the famous Mile Thdroigne de Mericourt,
still imprisoned at Kufstein, under the pretext of an
attempt on the life of the Queen of France, has just
arrived here. He has submitted to the Emperor the
protocol of the inquiry and proceedings. The result
is that it appears they arrested this youngs lady on
insufficient evidence, and that the accusations against
her have no foundation in fact."
The second note appears in the issue of December
22nd, 1 79 1, under news from Vienna of December 3rd :
" The Emperor has set at liberty Mile Theroigne,
and has given orders that the expenses of her journey
should be paid. This individual, having been de
tained for a long time in the fortress of Kufstein
in the Tyrol, was conducted to Vienna to be questioned

Kufstein 257
on the supposed plot against the life of the Queen
of France."
The Petit Gauthier announced the fact of The
roigne's release in its issue of December 15 th in
the following terms :
" The vicious [only they used a stronger word]
creature who is called Theroigne de Mdricourt, the
same who on October 6th, 1789, planned the most
horrible of crimes, is now at Brussels. She presented
herself before the worthy Minister Metternich. Her
savage audacity has not been diminished by her sojourn
in Austrian dungeons. She had the atrocious im
pudence to say before the minister : Is it not just
to sacrifice a handful of nobles to millions of citizens ?
The apparition of this wandering corpse [another
stronger term] exasperates all the honest people in
this country. She is staying at the sign of I Homme
Sauvage, who was never as barbaric as she."
But Thdroigne was free. For the moment, at any
rate, she could afford to ignore these coarse jests.
On January 5th, 1792, she wrote to Perregaux
from Brussels : " Now that I am free, that 1 am
sure of being able to go wherever I wish, that I am
content with the justice done me by the Emperor, I
feel that I ought to say that during the time of my
unjust detention they treated me kindly enough.
" As for your aristocrats, they employed the basest
means, the most infamous intrigues, in their endeavour
to make me lose my liberty for ever. I assure you
that if it had depended only on them I should still
be in the fortress of Kufstein. Such is the character
of French noblemen !

258 A Woman of the Revolution
" I should be much obliged, monsieur, if you would
send me thirty louis, which kindly change in Paris.
If you have only assignats I should lose less that way.
I beg you to send me what I ask by the first courier, as
I have not a centime to pay either lodging or board.
Please address your reply to the poste restante, Brussels."
From Brussels Thdroigne also wrote to the Baron
de Selys to tell him of her interview with Leopold II.,
but unfortunately this letter has been lost. A refer
ence occurs to it, however, on the back of the copy
of the Baron's reply. De Selys jotted down notes
as to the contents of the letter, consisting of an account
of a talk with the Emperor, and questions as to what
had been done with her jewels and the amount of the
money which had been lent to her brothers.
For some time afterwards the Baron heard no further
news of Thdroigne except vague rumours that she had
returned to Paris.
The difficulty about the jewels was not settled,
however. On February 23rd, 1792, Thdroigne wrote
to Perregaux from Paris asking him to reclaim the
diamond necklace from the Baron de Fancon, as she
now called him.
Altogether she had pawned thirteen articles of
jewellery, and had received a sum of nearly eight
thousand livres in loans on them.
Her pecuniary difficulties were as insistent as before,
and notes of this period to Perregaux all contain
requests for money.
Poverty seemed but a trifling drawback in view of
her glorious liberty. Was she not free to plunge
afresh into the intense excitement of the Revolution ?

CHAPTER VII
TO ARMS! TO ARMS!
THEROIGNE had left Paris at the beginning of
May 1790. She returned early in 1792, after
an absence from the capital of nearly two years. The
amnesty which abolished proceedings against all active
revolutionists had been proclaimed on September 1 5th,
1 79 1. The tide of the Revolution was sweeping on
to its flood, and event after event had taken place in
which Theroigne had been debarred from playing any
part. Almost the day she left there had been a massacre
of the National Guard at Montauban, and this outrage
was reflected in the mournful streets of Paris. About
this time, too, there had been an outburst in the
provincial towns of Federations, or Feasts of Union,
at which all men declared themselves brothers. In
spiriting scenes of this character had been held at
Lyons in May, at Lille early in June, and in other
towns, causing a very fever of Federation to enter
the blood of all the French people. The result of
this infectious spirit was the arranging of a general
fete for the whole of France, timed to take place on
the anniversary of the Fall of the Bastille. The story
of the famous Feast of Pikes will never be forgotten.
The work on the Champ de Mars getting behind-
259

260 A Woman of the Revolution
hand, the people, both men and women, turned out
in thousands to dig and delve, to wheel earth about,
and fashion it into mounds for seats. Students,
cavaliers, monks, nuns, shop-keepers, children, grey
beards, beggars, nobles, and Court ladies took their
turn at digging, day and night, in rain or shine.
Who can forget that Abbe Sieyes and de Beau
harnais tugged at the same cart ? Even the King
was not spared. He wielded his spade to the joyous
accompaniment of the people's applause.
Theroigne would have been in her element here.
It was a thousand pities that she could neither handle
shovel nor trundle barrow ; that her cheery voice was
not heard encouraging others in their toil (they were
few, after all, who needed encouragement) ; that she
could not be heard chanting in flute-like notes the
inspiring " Ca ira," which was not yet the horrible
" Ca ira " it later became. She missed the sight of
thousands of delegates from the provinces, representing
tens of thousands of armed men, taking sacred oath
on the altar of the country to maintain the new
Constitution. The King was present, the members
of the National Assembly, the army of Paris, and
an imposing array of citizens. The impressive cere
mony began with a mass. It was at that mass the
story was told of Talleyrand, still known as the
Bishop of Autun, that when he approached the altar
he whispered in the ear of Lafayette : " Whatever
you do, don't make me laugh ! " Absurd probably,
but it is the kind of story that remains in the
memory. Through these and all the happenings of 1790

To Arms! To Arms! 261
Thdroigne was far away from Paris, regretting the
reasons that made it wise for her to remain in hiding.
She probably heard as much as most people of the
disaffection in the army and mutinies among the
soldiers in various districts of the country. The riots
at Nancy in August 1790, involving the Swiss of
Chateauvieux, led directly to the fete in April 1792,
given to those who were taken prisoner. Theroigne
helped to organise it.
At the opening of the year 1791 a great inclination
to emigrate was noticed on the part of the nobility,
a desire shared also by royalty. The story of that
emigration is long enough and exciting enough to
fill volumes. Throughout France people were steal
ing more or less openly to the frontiers, longing
to be safely across the borders ; gathering in little
coteries in out-of-the-way spots ; homeless wanderers
setting forth in their great travelling coaches with
fear in their hearts, often only too well justified,
that they might never see their beautiful chateaux
again. In the minds of the masses the word that rever
berated was Federation, in the minds of the classes
it was Emigration. Both possessed but one idea — the
former to be knit more closely together in the centre
of things, the latter, on the contrary, to spread out
and scatter. The lowest in the land were affected by
the prevailing tendency as well as the highest. Even
those closely related to the King — his brothers, for
instance — were not immune from the epidemic of
flight, and among those who carried it into effect
with success were the forlorn maiden ladies, Mesdames,

262 A Woman of the Revolution
Louis XVI.'s elderly aunts. On February 19th they
left Bellevue, their home, arousing a clatter of dis
cussion over this pathetic escape. The people, unable
to detain their persons, absolutely refused to allow
the luggage to follow, and invaded their household
with a view to seizing all their possessions.
Among the many unwarrantable calumnies uttered
and written against Thdroigne is one by a chronicler
who goes so far as to make her play a part in the
doings of that day, although, in reality, she was many
miles from the scene of action. This trifler — vaude-
villiste he has been called — is Georges Duval, who,
in his " Souvenirs de la Terreur," says of Thdroigne :
" She commanded the mob of male and female bandits
who came to besiege Bellevue on February 19th, 1791.
They arrived, brandishing pikes and sabres, in the
Court of Honour, and perceiving the door which led
into the apartments of the chateau open, they entered
and crowded into all the corners, inspected the coffers,
visited the armouries, looked under the beds, and
forced their pikes into the mattresses of Mesdames
in the same manner as was done at Versailles into
those of the Queen. It was, in short, another 5th
of October." Nothing was found ; their prey had
escaped them ; and the people gave way to trans
ports of rage. Thdroigne, in her position of leader,
incited them to set fire to the castle. They were
about to carry out this order when something hap
pened to change the trend of their thoughts. Their
wanderings by torchlight had brought them to the
dining-room, where supper was served. The sight of
food made them forget their purpose. They flocked

To Arms! To Arms! 263
round the table like harpies and seized upon the
various dishes, nor did they spare the wine.
Meanwhile the National Guard had been sum
moned from Versailles, but did not arrive in time
to prevent these depredations. It is here that the
author of the narrative allows his imagination to get
so much the better of his discretion that he accuses
Thdroigne of being drunk and in a fit of frenzy
snatching up a lighted torch. "Those who love me
will follow me and fire the chateau," she cried. With
Jeanne_le Duc and others close upon her heels, she
tore through the apartments, intent on her wicked
deed, when a second discovery caused a diversion.
A huge chest had been found in a little-used apart
ment, in which at first it was thought the princesses
themselves might be concealed. This was not the
case, but the capture was hardly less valuable, since
it yielded booty in the shape of plate, jewels, and
other rich treasure. At this moment the National
Guard arrived, and put a stop to the nefarious schemes
of the intending pillagers, and the phantom Thdroigne
disappears from the scene.
Thdroigne saw none of the doings of the Day of
Poignards on February 28 th, nor of the immediate
results of the suppression of the barriers in the spring.
She was not in Paris when Mirabeau died on April 2nd,
nor for his magnificent funeral on the 4th. She was
spared the excitement of the flight to Varennes in
June and the return of the royal family under the
guardianship of her friends Petion and Barnave. Her
enthusiasm would have reached fever-heat and her
tears of pride have been shed freely on July nth

264 A Woman of the Revolution
when the remains of Voltaire were borne in triumph
to the Pantheon, had she been there to see.
Only a few days later the people's great petition
demanding the deposition of the King was laid on
the altar of the country, which still stood on the Champ
de Mars. This petition was the result of the people's
displeasure with the National Assembly, which, still
profoundly monarchical, hesitated to declare that the
King, who had turned his back on the throne, had
forfeited his right to sit there. The Club des Jacobins,
growing more powerful day by day, and with whose
ideals those of Thdroigne coincided, had said, "We
no longer recognise Louis XVI." The Club des
Cordeliers, going a step farther, added, " Nor any
other king." Thus was Republicanism born.
The mighty petition was soon covered by thousands
of signatures. The National Assembly, taking fright
at this demonstration of feeling, ordered Lafayette
and Bailly to march troops to the scene of action,
and there proclaim martial law. After in vain com
manding the people three times to retire, the soldiers
fired on the crowd, and covered the altar of the
country with dead and dying. The conflict dealt
a serious blow to the popularity of Bailly and
Lafayette. From July 1789 to September 1791 the National
Assembly had worked faithfully at the Constitution,
according to the oath sworn in the Tennis-court.
When finished, the new laws comprised thousands of
decrees. When the Constitution was completed, the
King, released from his suspension by the Assembly,
was invited to take his oath of acceptance, and he did

To Arms! To Arms! 265
so on the 14th. Afterwards the National Assembly,
in whose sittings Theroigne had shown indefatigable
interest, declared its work completed. Before separating,
and at the instigation of Robespierre, who proposed
the resolution, the Assembly decided that none of
its members should take a part in the new legislative
body, which, under the name of the Legislative
Assembly, met first on October ist, 1791, the day
after the dissolution of its predecessor. Like the
Constituent Assembly, the new body was composed
of seven hundred and forty-seven members. It sat
until September 21st, 1792, and then transmitted its
power to the National Convention, which proclaimed
a republic. Long before that date Thdroigne had thrown herself
with a new vigour into the tide of popular affairs.
As she passed through the streets of Paris on her
return in January she was greeted as a martyr and
a saint. Litde knots of people gathered round her
as she told her adventures, and she was urged to
mount a platform, where all could see the woman
who had suffered imprisonment in an Austrian jail
for the sake of liberty. She was wearing a short
skirt, a soldier's jacket, and a hat with a long feather.
The warm greeting of the people thrilled and excited
her. All her past misery was forgotten. She shook
hands heartily with those who pressed round to
welcome her, and promised to put renewed energy
into her labour for the cause. Thus, by slow degrees,
she made her way to the Club des Jacobins, where
she expected, and rightly expected, to be received in
triumph.

266 A Woman of the Revolution
Her visit was in the nature of a surprise. The
usual business was proceeding.
The hall in which this influential club met was fitted
up in nearly the same style as the one in which the
legislative body sat. The tribune, or pulpit, from
which the members spoke was opposite to that in
which the president was seated. There was a table
for the secretaries and galleries for a large audience
of strangers of both sexes, in one as in the other.
Men were appointed to walk through the hall and
command, or at least solicit, silence when the debate
became turbulent, after the fashion of the ushers at
the Assembly. Nor had their efforts much more
success here than there. The bell of the president,
the cries of those whose business it was to keep order,
were equally disregarded in stormy debates in both
places. That day there was no uproar in the house, only
the low drone of the members' voices discussing the
possibilities of the opening year.
It was January 26th, 1792. Gaudet was in the
president's chair, and Lostalot described to the assem
bled company an Englishman's scheme for putting the
people through certain new tactical exercises which
in six weeks were guaranteed to render them equal
to trained troops — a Utopian idea which can hardly
have worked out in practice. Hion proposed That the
National Assembly be asked to replace the battalions
of Paris by French guards and soldiers of the people.
Danton supported this proposition. Lasource and
Robespierre disagreed over the question of public
contributions to funds, the latter asserting that this

267

To Arms! To Arms! 269
motion was put forward to distract public attention
from more important questions. This remark caused
such a tumult of objections that the president was
obliged to interfere. The babel of excited voices, the
splutters and ejaculations, died away. A diversion was
caused by the arrival of a deputation from one of the
fraternal societies. A proposition was made by the
leader of the deputation that a petition should be
addressed to the Assembly requesting that certain
galleries recently opened to those who possessed
influence should be as free to the public as the others.
Again there were cries and gesticulations and the
murmur of the crowd. Lostalot, who had taken the
president's place, remarked that denunciations of this
nature touched upon constitutional matters, and could
not be dealt with by the society. At this moment
the tinkle of the president's bell announced a new
speaker. It was Dufourny. Looking round the full
house, he said he had something of importance to
communicate. A woman, celebrated for her devotion
to the State and for the persecutions she had suffered
at the hands of tyranny during her stay in Austria,
was present in the hall that day. He believed the
assembled members would like to show in the usual
manner their appreciation of a martyrdom endured
for the people's cause. He would call upon Mile
Thdroigne de Mdricourt — for it was she — to come
forward and receive the greetings of the Assembly.
His words were drowned in loud applause, and
many members rose from their seats and hastened to
the back of the hall, where Thdroigne was standing
amonj^a_crowd of women. They insisted on escorting
~"i6

270 A Woman of the Revolution
her to a prominent place in the centre. As she came
forward, smiling, a slim, small figure, her chestnut
locks loose beneath the feathered cap, her coat, her
short skirt, and even her shoes adorned with tricolour
ribbons, there was a moment's tense silence, then a
tumultuous uproar ; then silence again.
" Friends," she said, stretching out her arms as
though to embrace every one.
" Vive Mile Thdroigne ! " came the stirring cry
from hundreds of throats. She was reaping the reward
of months of suffering. She was keenly alive to the
interest her sex and her misfortunes had aroused.
At the first pause she spoke, thanking the assembled
company for their gracious reception. Her words
were simple, but her tones thrilled her hearers.
Never had her gift of oratory appeared to better
advantage. When she ceased speaking Dufourny addressed a
few graceful phrases to her, expressing the pleasure
experienced by the members of the Jacobins Club
in seeing her back in their midst.
These remarks were received by a second ovation,
and many patriots, among the most enthusiastic of
whom was the Abbe Sidyes, hastened to pay court to
her in person.
Theroigne was then requested to continue her
narrative, but this she refused to do, saying she would
write down an account of her imprisonment and read
it at some future date.
On January 29th Lostalot announced that Mile
Thdroigne had intended on that day to give them
a description of her misfortunes during her stay in

To Arms! To Arms! 271
Austria, but was unable to fulfil her promise. She
proposed to acquit herself of the obligation she had
contracted towards the society on the following
Wednesday. On February ist, at the request of a deputy,
Thdroigne read the discourse she had prepared before
the assembly of Jacobins. It was proposed that her
account should be amplified in a memoir, but no traces
occur of this having been printed.
She told her adventures with candour and picturesque-
ness. She praised the Emperor highly, said little in
favour of Prince Kaunitz, and declared that the patriots
had friends and partisans everywhere — in the Low
Countries, in Germany, even in Leopold II. 's palace.
She urged them on to action, and succeeded that day
in thoroughly rousing the Jacobins.
" The society bore witness to the keenest indignation
against her infamous persecutors," said Brissot's Journal,
the Patriote Francais, in its number of February 4th,
1792, " as well as the highest admiration for the
constancy she has shown. This lover of the people
has pointed out the best, nay, the only, means of
establishing our liberty on a firm basis ; it is to bring
war against the rebels and despots who menace us with
hostilities, and yet fear them more than we do."
Her account finished, Thdroigne stood silent, the
cynosure of all eyes. The president rang his bell,
and Lanthenas rose to address thanks to her in person.
" Love of liberty," he began, " placed by nature in
every heart, made you cherish our glorious Revolution,
mademoiselle. Your sentiments have drawn perse
cutions upon you. That is a certain claim upon our

272 A Woman of the Revolution
esteem. Your example demonstrates to all the friends
of liberty the power of this silent resistance, which
is based on the elevated ideals of the soul, and by
means of which the most feeble individuals have often
made tyrants pale before them. The innate energy at
the back of this resistance has often been possessed by
women in such a large degree as to seem almost a
supernatural gift in the eyes of ignorant people. In
this enlightened age men will be moved by sheer
natural inclination whenever your sex reveals grace
accompanied by civic virtue, a combination which must
eternally excite our enthusiasm. Brave citoyenne,
repeat what you have done and suffered for the sake
of liberty in all assemblies which public interest gathers
together, even as you did here in our presence. And
believe that wherever true French hearts beat, you will
have accomplished something useful in the advancement
of universal freedom."
Then the staunch Jacobin Manuel stood up to
speak. " Once there was a time," he said, " when a
certain society of men desired to know whether women
possessed a_soul. As a matter of fact this society was
composed chiefly of priests, double-faced gentlemen
who always wear an air of contempt towards women, in
order that it may not seem as though they cared too
much for them. ... If our forefathers indulged in so
low a conception of womanhood, it was because they
were not free, for liberty would have taught them, as it
has taught us, that it is quite as easy for nature to
create Portias as Scasvolas. You have just been listening
to one of the first Amazons of liberty. She has been a
martyr to the Constitution. I demand that she should

To Arms! To Arms! 273
partake of the honours of this meeting as woman
president, seated by the president's side."
Delighted as she was with her enthusiastic reception,
with the halo of martyrdom which public opinion had
placed upon her brow, Thdroigne had no intention of
resting upon her laurels. She knew it was time for
action, she realised in a flash the change that had come
about in the attitude of the people since her departure,
two years earlier. To them the alteration had been
gradual, to her it seemed sudden, and therefore the
more significant, the more appalling.
Whilst Marie-Antoinette sat in her boudoir earnestly
planning an invasion that might save her husband, his
country, and their child, never doubting that grape-
shot would teach the rebellious French a lesson it was
high time they learnt, while she wrote letters to her
brother, the Emperor, and to Mercy-Argenteau, in the
hope of producing the result that was nearest to her
heart, Thdroigne in her humble and untutored way
was doing her utmost to help in bringing these
same schemes to naught. The Queen incited men
to war upon the kingdom over which she ruled; the
woman of the people called to her sisters to arm them
selves and try to defend the country that was thus
betrayed. Although she did not flourish a sabre as fiercely as
the notorious Alexandrine Barreau, or hop as gaily
in the bayonet dance as the sisters Fernig, Theroigne
was all aflame in the great cause.
First and foremost an orator of the cross-roads, a
clubist of the streets, she was so inspired by the military
ardour of women throughout the provinces that she

274 A Woman of the Revolution
attempted to organise in Paris a battalion of warriors
on the lines of those already in existence in the country.
In Angers as early as 1789 women had desired to
enrol in the auxiliary services. " We, mothers, sisters,
wives, and lovers of the young citizens of Angers,"
they said in a petition to the authorities, " declare
that if there should be an outbreak of war occasioning
the departure of troops from the town, we desire to
join with the country in protecting our interests ; and
since we are not qualified to use force, we wish to make
it our duty to Took after the "baggage, food, and various
preparations for the marching of the soldiers, which
services might well depend on us, for we prefer the
glory of sharing their danger to the security of shameful
inaction." Two years later these women subscribed a thousand
livres to purchase a flag for the volunteers of the
National Guard. This example was followed by the
women of Brest and Nantes. At Aunay a " corps
d'Amazones natipnales " was formed by women who
swore to be faithful to the Nation, to the Law, and to
the King — ill-natured people added, to their husbands
or lovers !
From the summer of 1790 onwards several legions
of women warriors were formed.
At Creil the uniform worn was a white tunic, short
skirt, plain cap, a cockade worn on the breast, and a
federal badge of gilded leather which bore the Gallic
cock on one side, with an inscription " Citoyenne de
Creil," and on the other side a laurel wreath round
three hearts, with the device " 1' Union fait notre
vertu." The officers wore white tunics faced with

To Arms! To Arms! 275
red cuffs and collars, with white braiding and district
buttons, blue hats with white plumes, and a wide
tricolour sash. They were armed with javelins.
The uniform of the Fernig corps was a white tunic
with breeches, waistcoat, collar and cuffs of various
colours, according to the division. The breeches were
slashed a la Portugaise, and a brass helmet and flowing
plume completed the equipment. These women cUt
their hair short in order to obviate the necessity of
dressing it in a manner which might cause them to
look conspicuous.
A manifesto was issued by the women of Maubeuge
to the effect that they were ready to fight. " At the
moment when the country appears to be menaced by
a cruel war," it ran, " instigated by traitors who push
their rascality to the extent of themselves bearing arms
against a kingdom of which by rights they should be
the supporters, we hasten to make known to you our
patriotism and our devotion to the country. We are
determined to spill the last drop of our blood rather
than to cringe under the yoke of tyrants and despots."
Their offer was not received with unmixed approval.
Grateful France thanked the intrepid citoyennes for
their sublime devotion, and, since she relied with confi
dence on the worth and valour of her brave soldiers,
she advised the women to use their talents in deeds
of a less warlike nature. At Lalinde the women swore
to shed their blood drop by drop rather than live
under the yoke of tyranny. Patriots of the fair sex
at Limoges wished to form a battalion which might
share the work of the National Guard.
The women of Vic-en-Bigorre sent an appeal to the

276 A Woman of the Revolution
National Assembly, saying that they desired to be
regarded as an example of all the Christian, civil, and
patriotic virtues, especially with reference to carrying
out the laws. They had armed themselves in order
to serve, in case of need, as auxiliary troops to the
National Guard, thereby demonstrating to the country
that their courage would not be found wanting as a
last resource. Their flag was elaborately embroidered
with a device on one side, "J'dleve un ddfenseur a
la Patrie," representing a mother sacrificing her son
on the altar of the country, and on the other " L'hy-
men et l'amour couronnent le guerrier citoyen," a
young citoyenne crowning a hero before the altar of
Hymen. The women of Harcourt offered a flag to the
National Guard bearing the motto " Libres ou mourir."
On January 31st, 1792, the women citizens of the
town of Belves placed in the hands of the president
of the Legislative Assembly a declaration in which
they swore to consecrate their lives in upholding the
Constitution, and to take up arms, either for the de
fence of their homes or to fight side by side with their
sons and brothers.
As early as January 1789, owing to riots at Grenoble,
the women of that town wrote to the King to say that
they objected to bring children into the world if they
were destined to live in a country overridden by
despotism. Battalions of these women were formed,
and they shouldered their pikes with a bold air that
was truly edifying.
' The women of Versailles were enthusiastic warriors.
In white uniforms with tricoloured sashes, they formed

To Arms! To Arms! 277
a deputation which marched into the Assembly Hall
in August 1792, and announced that they were pre
pared to guard the town while the men went to the
front. At Rambervillers the women swore to do
battie beside their sons and brothers on the ramparts.
Two hundred women enlisted in the Legion Juste
at Frie, and on August 9th, 1790, elected a certain
Mme Feurier to be their colonel. A few days later,
on the occasion of the consecration of their flag, mass
was said, then there was a review, a banquet, and a
ball. So great was the enthusiasm that " the troop
of both sexes embraced to the sound of repeated
vivats." When the National Guard was reorganised at
Pdrouges in the spring of 1793, it was found that
over one hundred women were serving in the ranks.
Others were enrolled in various sections of the re
publican armies, and some women certainly saw active
service, but no body of citoyennes had the glory of
facing the enemy's fire. One at least took the command
of soldiers. At Mormant a Mme de Moulins wrote
to the volunteers, " My nephew, who is an aristocrat,
has refused the honour of acting as colonel of your
National Guard, so I propose to command you myself."
Her bold plan was hailed with enthusiasm. A fine
military reception was given to the lady in question,
and she was so deeply touched by this exhibition of
feeling that she displayed the national cockade and
armed herself with a sabre.
Thdroigne knew how to appreciate the spirit which
animated these women. All over the country they
were ready to defend themselves. Their warlike atti-

278 A Woman of the Revolution
tude was expressed very clearly indeed in a letter
printed on February 27th, and distributed at the insti
gation of Tallien in his capacity of president of La
Socidtd Fraternelle sdante aux Minimes. Thdroigne
was a member of this society, and made one of her
most telling speeches on presenting the members with
a flag. She thoroughly approved of the sentiments
contained in the letter which appeared immediately
after her triumph at the Jacobins, and to which over
three hundred signatures were appended.
The appeal was made to the Legislative Assembly.
" Legislators," it began, " women patriots present
themselves before you to claim their individual right
to defend life and liberty.
" Everything warns us of a speedy and violent up
heaval. Our fathers, our husbands, and our brothers
may perhaps fall victims to the fury of our enemies.
Is there any one who can hinder us from the privilege
of avenging them or of dying beside them ?
"We are women citizens, and can never be indifferent
to the fate of our country. Your predecessors en
trusted the Constitution to our hands as well as yours.
How can we guard this trust unless we have arms
to defend it against the onslaught of enemies ? Legis
lators, we require arms, and we come to obtain per
mission to carry them. Our want of physical jtrength
is no obstacle ; courage and intrepidity will stand us
in good stead; the love of our country and hatred
of tyrants will make it easy for us to brave every
, danger. Do not suppose that it is our intention to
abandon the care of our family and household, always
dear to our affections, for the sake of rushing out to

To Arms! To Arms! 279
meet the enemy. No, gentlemen, we only ask to be
in a position to defend ourselves. You dare not, and
society cannot, refuse us this right which nature has
given us ; unless it be claimed that the Declaration of
the Rights of Man has no application to women, and
that the latter ought to allow themselves to be
slaughtered like sheep without any attempt at a
struggle. " Does any one believe that the tyrants would spare
us ? No, they will remember the 5th and 6th of
October, 1789.
" But people tell us that men are armed for the
purpose of defending us. That may be so ; never
theless, we reply, why deprive us of the power to
co-operate in this defence, and of the pleasure of
prolonging their days at the cost of ours ? Do they
know for certain the number and strength of our
hidden enemy ? Will there be only one fight ? Are
our lives worth more than theirs ? And are not our
children as much orphans when they lose their father
as when they lose their mother ? Then why not make
use of all the sources of civicism and purest zeal in
order to dismay aristocracy and overthrow despotism —
zeal which level-headed men may call fanaticism and
exaggeration, but which is the only natural outcome
of hearts burning with love for the public welfare?
" Doubtless, gentlemen, most perfect success will
crown the justice of our cause. In that case we
should enjoy the delight of having contributed to
the victory. But if by the cunning of our enemies,
or through the treason of any on our side, the victory
should remain in the hands of the unjust, would it

280 A Woman of the Revolution
not be cruel to condemn us to await a shameful death
in our houses, and all the horrors which would precede
it, or, worse still, the doom of surviving all we hold
most dear — our family and our liberty ?
" Gentlemen, you cannot contemplate such possi
bilities unmoved ; and if, for reasons we cannot grasp,
you refuse our just demands, the women whom you
have raised to the rank of citoyennes by giving this
title to their husbands, the women who have enjoyed
the first-fruits of liberty, who have conceived the hope
of bringing into the world free men, and who have
sworn to live free or to die, these women will never
consent to give birth to slaves ; they will die sooner,
and to keep their oath a poignard thrust in their
bosom shall deliver them from the degradation of
slavery. They will die thus, regretting not life, but
the uselessness of their death ; regretting that they
were prevented from dipping their fingers in the
impure blood of an enemy to the country and avenging
some of their fellow citizens."
And then followed their demands :
" We hope to obtain from your justice and equity,
firstly, permission to procure pikes, pistols, and sabres,
even guns, for those who have strength to use them,
in accordance with and submission to the police regula
tions ; secondly, to assemble on fete days and Sundays in
the Champ de la Fdddration, or other convenient place,
to exercise and manoeuvre with the said arms; and
thirdly, to name as our commanders certain former
French Guards, always in conformity to the regula
tions prescribed by the wisdom of the mayor for good
behaviour and public tranquillity."

To Arms! To Arms! 281
Such, then, was the temper of the women, and all
the early months of 1792 this warlike spirit seethed
in Paris. Everything possible was done to obtain
arms. They collected money for the fabrication of
pikes, and numbers of these weapons were made
specially for women. One may be seen at the Car
navalet to-day, beautifully finished, light, yet strong,
and the handle adorned with a design of laurel branches
and a Phrygian bonnet.
Naturally enough the royalist journals expressed
their views on the matter, and pointed out Thdroigne's
aims with a satirical finger.
"A superb deputation of women arrived armed
with pikes," declared the Sabbat s Jacobites, describing
the day Theroigne arrived to read her statement before
the club. " They opened the discussion by warning the
honourable members of the. house that their visit
was only a rehearsal of a farce which they intended to
perform the foUowing day in the National Assembly.
The colonel of this feminine squadron was the incom
parable Mile Thdroigne de Mericourt. This new
Penthesilea, having made the most charming remarks
to all the members of the sublime Aeropagus, closed
her discourse with lines sung to the air ' Ne v'la-t'il
pas que j 'aime ' :
II faut pour etre utile enfin
A notre Rdpublique
Que chaque femme ait a la main
Une superbe pique.''
The Petit Gauthier of March 14th said : " The
martial fire which the Bourrique des Jacobins, Mile
Thdroigne, put into her command last Sunday of

282 A Woman of the Revolution
the patriotic manoeuvres of those ladies who are ready
to shed their blood in order to keep the Assembly
in its place, was so active that the moustaches of
the said lady came unfastened and were lost."
But such poor jesting as this was not likely to
damp the ardour of Thdroigne herself nor of the
numbers who sympathised with her.
The Patriote Francais praised her warlike language,
and pointed out that her leaning was towards the
Brissotins, as opposed to the Robespierrists. On
the question of war she was prepared to side with
those who were presently known as the Girondins.
But her great wish was, as already stated, to do for
Paris what others had done for the provinces, namely,
to organise a battalion of women soldiers.
A reference to her scheme appeared in an article on
pikes in Les Revolutions de Paris, dated Februaryfi 8ith :
"On July 14th next," it explained, "twenty-five
millions of pikes will exist in France. In imitation
of our early ancestors, who never assembled in the
Champ de Mars without being armed with lance and
shield, twelve million citizens able to bear arms and
to carry a pike will gather on the Champ de la
Fdddration. Pikes, however, are forbidden to women ;
let it not displease the famous Thdroigne and the
phalanx of Amazons that she proposes to establish and
to command ! "
Apart from drilling and manoeuvring, there was
enough occupation for the eager women. Petitions,
discourses, presentation of flags, and the acquirement of
pikes were the chief signs of activity at this time.
A tricoloured flag of Liberty and two pikes were

To Arms! To Arms! 283
presented by the affiliated citoyennes to the Socidtd des
Cordeliers at their sitting of Sunday, March nth.
The presentation was made with the usual speech.
" The women who bring you the flag of Liberty,"
said the spokeswoman, " know well how to speak, the
language of freedom. Though our arms may be toov
feeble to defend it, at least our hearts' desire is to
inspire you with sentiments no less worthy of a
Pompey or a Brutus. For long enough you have
rotted in the degradation of servitude. The hour has
struck. Arise ! " — with much more to the same
theatrical effect.
A reply was made by Lebois, president of the
Socidtd des Amis des Droits de l'Homme.
"Generous Citoyennes," it ran,
"The Society of the Friends of the Rights
of Man receives with the deepest gratitude the tri
colour flag which you have presented, accompanied by
two pikes. Beneath this august emblem of liberty,
it swears to march towards victory, for victory is certain
when one fights for the safety of the country, and
under the eyes of wives and sisters. You have doubled
our courage, you will share our triumphs.
" The gift you have made to us will never perish.
Your standard will float in the enclosure of our
assemblies like a living gauge of your civic virtues
and of the fraternity which unites us."
Only a few days later Theroigne was the chief figure
in a similar ceremony.
She made a stirring appeal to women to emancipate

284 A Woman of the Revolution
themselves. At that day most women's ideas, especially
on religion and politics, were coloured by those of
husband or father. In her struggle for liberty Thdroigne
applied particularly to women for help. She desired
them to realise for themselves the duties of citizenship
and their civil rights. She desired above all that her
sex, without neglecting their duties in the home, should
have a share in the direction of the affairs of the
country. Her remarks were delivered in the declama
tory style of the day, and show signs of an incomplete
education, besides being reminiscent of certain authors
— for instance, de Mably, who based his ideals on the
political civilisation of Greece and the Republic of
Sparta, — but they display her views and aspirations in a
manner both brilliant and intelligent, and throw a great
deal of light on the feminist movement of that day.
The discourse was delivered to the Socidtd Frater
nelle des Minimes on March 25th, 1792, the fourth
year of liberty, by Mile Thdroigne, in presenting a
flag to the citoyennes of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine.
The hall was crowded, hundreds of women were
there, excited and gesticulating ; the tense expectancy
which is always startling among French audiences was
tuned up to breaking pitch. Of a sudden there
was silence, and a thousand eyes were turned upon
the slim figure of the speaker as she rose from her
seat on the platform.
" Citoyennes," she began, " although we have gained
victories, although a tyrant is dead, a treacherous
minister has been accused of high treason, and the
Assembly exhibits an energy which revives the hope
of the Friends of the Country, we are, nevertheless,

To Arms! To Arms! 285
still, and always, in danger. Without entering into
the details that are already known to you, I will only
repeat those things which I believe cannot be recalled
to your memory too often, in order to beg that you
may reflect seriously upon the present situation. Do
not lose sight of the fact that the torches of civil war
are ready to be lighted, that the standard of the
counter-revolution is displayed in various parts of
the empire ; that it is visible everywhere, but more
especially in Paris ; that paid scoundrels have formed
a plan with regard to the internal disunion of the
country, which they are following up with the utmost
determination, with a view to organising parties who
will prove fatal to liberty if your vigilance does not
defeat the criminal plots concocted by our enemies.
" Citoyennes, do not let us forget that we owe our
selves wholly to our country ; that it is our most
sacred duty to tighten our bonds of union and con
fraternity, and to spread the principles of steadfast
energy, in order to prepare ourselves with as much
wisdom as courage to repulse the attacks of our
enemies. " Citoyennes, we can destroy the thread of these
intrigues by generous devotion. To arms ! To arms !
Nature, as well as the law, gives us the right to arm.
Let us show men that we are not inferior to them
either in virtue or in courage. Let us show Europe
that Frenchwomen know their rights, and are amongst
the most enlightened of eighteenth-century people, in
despising those who are prejudiced, who, because they
are prejudiced, are absurd, and often immoral, in that
they make a crime of virtue.
17

286 A Woman of the Revolution
" The attempts which the executive power can make
in the future to regain public confidence will be
nothing more than dangerous traps which we must
distrust : whilst our manners are not in accordance
with our laws, authority will not lose the hope of
profiting by our vices to put us in chains. It is quite
obvious, and you may expect it, that they will put the
loud talkers and scoundrelly pamphleteers forward in
order to try and shake our purpose, in order to employ
the weapons of ridicule, of calumny, and all the lowest
methods which are usually employed by vile people to
smother the transports of patriotism in feeble souls.
" But, Frenchwomen, since the progress of enlight
enment calls upon you to reflect, compare what we
are now with that which we ought to be in the social
order. To understand our rights and our duties it
is necessary to take reason as our arbiter, and to be
guided by her ; thus we shall distinguish the just from
the unjust. What then can be the consideration which
could stay us, which could hinder us from doing the
right thing when it is evident that we can do it and
that we ought to do it ? We will arm because it is
reasonable that we should prepare to defend our rights,
our hearths and homes, and that we should not do
justice to ourselves and our responsibilities to the
country if the pusillanimity which we have acquired
in bondage should still have sufficient sway over us
to prevent us from doubling our powers. According
to all accounts, it is impossible to doubt that the
example of our devotion will awaken in the souls of
men public virtues and an overwhelming passionate
love of glory and of the country. We shall thus

To Arms I To Arms! 287
maintain liberty by emulation, and the social perfection
resulting from this fortunate concurrence.
" Frenchwomen, I say to you once more, let us
rise to the utmost height of our destiny, let us break
our chains ; it is time at last that women should throw
aside their shameful inactivity in which ignorance,
pride, and the injustice of men have kept them bound
for so long. Let us return to the time when our
mothers, the Gauls and the proud Germans, spoke in
the public Assemblies, and fought beside their husbands
to repulse the enemies of Liberty. Frenchwomen,
the same blood runs in our veins to-day. What we
did at Beauvais, at Versailles on October 5th and 6th,
and in several other important and decisive circum
stances, proves that we are not strangers to magnanimous
sentiments. Let us recover our energy, then ; for if
we desire to preserve our liberty it is needful that
we should prepare to do things the most sublime.
At the present moment such things appear extra
ordinary, perhaps even impossible, owing to the
corruption of manners, but shortly, when enlighten
ment and the progress of public spirit have had an
effect, they will become simple and easy.
" Citoyennes, why do we not enter into rivalry
with men ? They pretend that they alone have rights
to glory. No, indeed no. . . . We also wish to
merit a civic crown, to sue for the honour of dying
for a liberty which is perhaps dearer to us than to
them, because the effects of despotism weigh still more
heavily on our heads than on theirs.
" Yes, generous Citoyennes, all of you who hear
me, let us arm, let us go and exercise two or three

288 A Woman of the Revolution
times a week in the Champs Elysdes, or on the
Champ de la Fdddration, let us start a list of French
Amazons upon which all those who really love their
country will come and enrol their names. We will
meet again immediately to discuss means for organising
a battalion on the lines of that of the pupils of the
Patrie, of the Veillards, or of the sacred Battalion
of Thebes. In conclusion, may I be allowed to offer
a tricolour flag to the Citoyennes of the Faubourg
Saint-Antoine." Amidst a thunder of applause she
sat down.
It was arranged that the first Assembly of the
Citoyennes would be held on Monday, April 2nd,
at five o'clock in the afternoon, in the hall of the
Socidtd Fraternelle des Minimes, Place Royale.
Thdroigne's military plans, although not entirely
her own idea, were not derived directly from any
special individual. Paris was in a state of intense
anxiety and ferment. The people were arming against
internal enemies, and war from without appeared to
be inevitable. From the beginning of February the
nation had accepted the situation. From the begin
ning of March, which opened with the decision of
Prussia to join Austria in invading France, and also
by the death of Emperor Leopold, which retarded the
actual movement, the suspense had grown more and
more acute. It was felt that no stone should be left
unturned, and Theroigne thought she recognised
available material for use in defending the country
among the earnest and eager women. But the ways
of a capital are different from those of provincial cities ;
and in exploiting her scheme for mobilising legions

To Arms! To Arms! 289
of women Theroigne found herself face to face with
various difficulties which in the end proved insur
mountable. She had failed on the purely political
side when endeavouring to organise her Club des
Amis de Loi ; her attempt to raise a club of armed
women was no more successful. In the early part
of April she worked hard to enrol members in the
Faubourg Saint-Antoine, but on the 12th of the
month her enthusiasm received a severe check. She
made herself unpopular among the very individuals
she was trying to help. People at this time were
growing fickle, and suspicious of their best friends.
The hero of to-day was the outcast of to-morrow.
Almost every hour brought a new personality into
the limelight, and relegated one who had been a
favourite to the shadows in the background. New
parties were springing up, new and ever more daring
opinions were being expressed, and he who did not
venture to the extreme of rabid republicanism was
in danger of being left behind in the race, or, worse
still, of being trampled to death by those who were
rushing pell-mell to the limit.
Theroigne's adventure might have proved very
serious. As it was she received a shock from which
it took her some time to recover. She was busy
with her recruiting work in the Faubourg Saint-
Antoine when the crowd set upon her and handled
her roughly. She owed her safety to the intervention
of the Commissioners of the Section of the Enfants-
Trouvds, who, after making her promise not to return
and cause further disturbances in that quarter, sent her
away under an escort of the National Guard.

290 A Woman of the Revolution
" All the world has heard that the infamous The
roigne escaped with no little difficulty last Thursday
from the chastisement which the people of the Fau
bourg Saint-Antoine wished to inflict upon her," said
the Folies d'un Mois with reference to this affair.
"The evening before she had been proposing that
the women should arm themselves with the pikes
that men refused to carry. She returned accompanied
by prostitutes. No sooner was she recognised than
the cry was raised : ' Here she comes ; let's beat
her ! ' She took refuge from her persecutors in the
Church of the Enfants-Trouvds, where she found the
Commissioners of the Section, who deliberated whether
they should send her before the magistrate, as they
ought to have done. In the end, however, they
dismissed her without any punishment, and, to save
her from the indignation of those who were pursuing
her, they had her escorted to a carriage by a dozen
National Guards."
She was fortunate in her escape. The time was
coming when she would not be let off so easily.
But the matter did not rest there. On the 13 th
the Socidtd des Ddfenseurs des Droits de l'Homme
et Ennemis du Despotisme, which held its meetings
in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, sent a deputation to
denounce Mllejrhdroigne to the Jacobins Society.
The deputation accused her of having caused
troublesome excitement in the Faubourg Saint-An
toine, because she wished to assemble the women of
that quarter three times a week and form a club ;
and had invited them to a feast or civic banquet,
and had made use of the names of MM. Robespierre,

To Arms! To Arms! 291
Collot d'Herbois, and Santerre, probably without
authorisation. The deputation, moreover, accused
Thdroigne of having imposed upon the women of
this quarter by showing them a list of supposed
signatures for this civic feast, the signature of Mme
Santerre being recognised by the commissioners as
in the handwriting of Mile Theroigne.
In reply to a question put to Robespierre as to
the use of his name in this connection, he declared
that he had never had any special dealings with
Mile Thdroigne. A year earlier she had denied a
personal acquaintance with him. She knew him by
sight, she says in her " Confessions " ; but then, who
did not ? But she had never spoken to him. She
would have regarded his acquaintance as an honour.
M. Santerre, when approached on the same subject,
was more inclined to defend her. He announced
that he had heard rumours of disturbances in the
Faubourg Saint-Antoine of which Mile Thdroigne
might have been the cause without actual intention.
With regard to the supposed false signature of Mme
Santerre, the list was not supposed to be of signatures,
but of the names of those people who desired to take
part in the fete.
Probably the trouble caused by the desire on
Thdroigne's part to form a women's club was the
fault of the women themselves. The files de la Pitii
had been induced to join the meetings, and the nuns,
who were responsible for their education, made objec
tion. Then violence had been resorted to. The men
of the quarter, continued Santerre, preferred to find
their homes in order when they came in from work,

292 A Woman of the Revolution
rather than to come back to an empty house and
wait for their wives to return later from meetings at
which they acquired a spirit the opposite of gentle.
No doubt they had looked askance at meetings which
were to be held three times a week. "All these
considerations," he concluded, "produced the dis
turbances of which I have advised Mile Thdroigne
to avoid a repetition, and I have suggested that she
would do well to renounce her plans. I have no
doubt that, after reflecting on these disturbances,
which she certainly never meant to cause, as evil-
intentioned people might accuse her of wishing to do,
she will renounce her plans of her own free will."
What could unhappy Thdroigne do? Her ardour
was considerably damped by the blow she had re
ceived to a popularity which had increased by leaps
and bounds throughout February and March. She
was forced to abandon the idea of training women
to take an active part in warfare, and instead she
turned for solace to a more picturesque line of demon
stration, and joined lustily in the civic banquets and
fetes that were dear to the hearts of the people.
That same evening, March 25 th, a large number
of the conquerors of the Bastille, of the inhabitants
of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, and the strong men of
the Halles, met at the Halle Neuve. Thence the
guests hastened to the Champs Elysdes, where the
banquet was to take place. Bonnets of liberty, carried
on pikes adorned with the national colours, preceded
the procession, which marched to the sound of drums
and music. Gaiety and good-fellowship were the key
notes of this feast. Patriotic toasts were drunk, and

To Arms! To Arms! 293
patriotic songs and dances formed a feature of the
evening. Pdtion was there and Saint-Huruge.
This feast was the subject of many jests in the
royalist press, and Thdroigne's presence did not escape
comment. " La Theroigne played a part in the fete,"
says the Folies d'un Mots. " She stood upon the table
and drank to the health of the patriots of Brabant,
Lidge, and all the universe. A Hercules of the Halle
called Nicolas was there dressed in a bonnet-rouge,
a white vest and breeches. The people asked him to
kiss her, and she permitted it once, but she put on
high-and-mighty airs and refused when all who were
present shouted out bis to encourage Nicolas to begin
again." The Sabbats Jacobites described the civic banquet in
a curious sketch, a " civic interlude," entitled " Mile
Thdroigne's Boudoir." The boudoir itself was a
wonderful place. " On a kind of toilet-table stood
a pot of vegetable rouge, a poignard, some ringlets
of false hair, a brace of pistols, the Almanack du Pere
Gerard, a cap, the Declaration of the Rights of Man,
a red woollen bonnet, a comb, a bottle of toilet
vinegar, a torn lace fichu, the Chronique de Paris,
and the Courrier de Gorsas." In one corner was a
cross bedstead and mattress ; beside it lay an enormous
pike, and a riding-habit of Utrecht velvet. On the
walls hung pictures of the taking of the Bastille, the
death of Foulon and Berthier, the day of the 6th
October, the assassination of Favras, the murders at
Nimes, Montauban, and so on. Theroigne appeared
in niglige of the most fascinating kind — shoes of red
morocco, black woollen stockings, blue damask skirt,

294 A Woman of the Revolution
a pierrot of white bazin, a tricoloured fichu, and a
gauze cap of flame colour surmounted by a green
pompon. Her make-up was also tricolour ; white,
brick red, and very deep blue. Basire comes upon
the scene, and sitting down beside her takes her hand.
First he sings a song. Then growing emboldened,
makes advances which she repulses, saying she is not
in a playful mood. Thereupon he accuses her of
loving another.
" No, my friend," she replies, " but the country is
in danger, and although I love you sincerely I love
the country still more. In moments of crisis surely
I may be permitted to forget you for her sake."
Basire begins to suspect that she prefers Chabot to
him, but she answers him that she never sees the
" old monk." Both these men were her friends, neither
were her lovers. According to a little verse they were
inseparable companions :
Connaissez-vous Monsieur Basire ?
Connaissez-vous Monsieur Chabot ?
Chabot vaut bien Monsieur Basire
Et Basire Monsieur Chabot.
Les talents de Monsieur Basire
Valent ceux de Monsieur Chabot,
Et lorsqu'on appercoit Basire
L'instant apr&s on voit Chabot,
Car Chabot n'est rien sans Basire
Et Basire rien sans Chabot.
At last Basire is forced to believe that Chabot is not
his rival in Mile Thdroigne's affections, and he suggests
that he is deeply jealous of Pdtion.
To this Theroigne gravely replies : " I esteem M.
Pdtion greatly. The friendship I have for him might

To Arms ! To Arms ! 295
easily have deepened into love on Sunday, March 25th
of this year. It was on that day that Messieurs the
Port-piques of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine gave a
splendid repast to Messieurs the Hercules of the
Halles. Jerome Pdtion, as mayor of Paris, was at the
banquet. If you had seen with what grace, what ease,
he replied to all the toasts they drank to him ! He
went from table to table crying ' Long live the Nation ! '
and humming the air 'Ca ira' — in a word, the festivities
were charming."
Thdroigne had evidently not mastered the excitement
aroused in her by her discourse at the Socidtd des
Minimes that evening. She describes the baptism of
the child of a drummer's wife, when Mme Tremblay,
wife of a patriot printer, and Mile Calon, the daughter
of the deputy, officiated at the font in the role of
godmothers, and vin de Suresnes was used instead of
holy water. Pdtion was the godfather, and the baby
was named Pdtion-Nationale-Pique. " How sorry I
was not to be chosen as godmother ! " she cries. " I
would have added three more names to the pretty ones
already chosen which would have been quite equal
to them — Lanterne, Assignat, and Bonnet-rouge."
Basire's jealousy is by no means assuaged by this
story. "Then I see," he says, "that M. Pdtion has
really taken my place in your heart."
" By no means," replies the adroit Thdroigne.
" I love M. Pdtion for his civic virtues, his patriotism,
his devotion to public affairs, his talent for denuncia
tion, his earnestness at the Jacobins. In a word, it
is the nation that I love in him, for he is the most
worthy representative of it ; but you shall be none

296 A Woman of the Revolution
the less my lover, I swear it by my deeds of
October 6th."
And together they go off amicably to denounce
the aristocrats at the Jacobins.
The same paper, the Sabbats Jacobites, satirised the
arrangements made for the fete of the Chateauvieux,
describing how a group of three thousand women
were to be chosen from the habituees of the Palais
Royal, the Dames des Halles, and the Socidtd
Fraternelle. They were to be dressed in red ribbons
and red pierrot costumes, bearing a pike in one hand
and a pamphlet containing extracts from " The Rights
of Man " in the other. Miles Theroigne and Calon
were to be at the head of the procession. As a matter
of fact, Theroigne took a very active part in preparing
for this fete to the Swiss, which was intended to revive
public spirit. She had been busy with the organisation
from the beginning of the month.
On March ist Gorsas wrote to Palloy saying :
" Mile Thdroigne wishes to see you and talk with
you, comrade. Please fix a day and hour when I
can accompany her to your house. She particularly
wishes to speak to you of a proposed fete for
Chateauvieux." Three days later the question came up at the
Jacobins, Thdroigne being spokeswoman for a depu
tation sent by the Socidtd Fraternelle to propose a
plan for a patriotic feast, " in order to tune up
public spirit to its highest pitch," as she aptly expressed
it. She gave such a long description of the proposed
fete that Bronsonnet interrupted her, saying that
Louis XIV. had been in the habit of giving fetes

To Arms I To Arms! 297
when he had forced other nations into submission,
and that it was unthinkable that any one should
propose similar measures in France now she was
free, and at a moment when she might be forced to
declare war against several nations.
Thdroigne replied that what she proposed was not
so much a fete as a ceremony, and she went on reading.
Thuriot, the President, did not discourage her, and
in the end Bronsonnet and Restaut were commissioned
to examine into the plans submitted.
Throughout the month controversy raged hotly
round the forty unfortunate Swiss of Chateauvieux
who had been condemned to the galleys and sent to
Brest for revolt, murder, and pillage at Nancy in
August 1790. Opinion was divided as to whether
they were heroes or outcasts, as to whether they were
to be feted or reviled. Collot d'Herbois pleaded for
them, crying himself hoarse. Roucher opposed him,
and insults were hurled from one to the other, the
latter accusing the former of " rushing at him as
though to strike him with the oar the Swiss had
brought him from the galleys." Marie-Joseph Chdnier
associated himself with Thdroigne in championing the
cause of the soldiers ; Andrd Chdnier, on the other
hand, wrote immortal verses denouncing the affair.
" This fete that is preparing for these soldiers is
attributed to enthusiasm," he declared. " For my
part I confess I do not perceive this enthusiasm. . . .
How, then, is the honour of Paris interested in feting
the murderers of our brothers ? ... In a city that
respected itself such a fete would be met by silence
and solitude, the streets or public places would be

298 A Woman of the Revolution
abandoned, the houses shut up, the windows deserted,
and the flight and scorn of the passer-by would tell
history what share honest and well-disposed men took
in this scandalous and bacchanalian procession."
Dupont de Nemours assailed Pdtion on the same
subject. The walls of Paris were covered with placards
for and against. The discussion was hottest in the
Jacobins Club. The press devoted columns to it ;
the masses, adoring everything theatrical and emphatic,
were on the side of the celebrations. But Thdroigne
worked on steadily against all opposition, and on that
same fateful March 25th presented a petition, jointly
with Marie- Joseph Chdnier and David the painter, to
the Council General of the Commune.
" M. the Mayor and Gentlemen," it runs,
"In a few days from now we shall have
amongst us the soldiers of the Chateauvieux. Their
irons have fallen off at the vote of the Assembly ; their
persecutors have escaped the penalty of the law, but
not the stain of ignominy. Soon these generous soldiers
will see again the Champ de Mars, where their resistance
to despotism prepared the way for a reign of law ;
soon they will embrace their brothers-at-arms, these
brave French guards with whom they shared a heroic
disobedience. " Fraternal liberality and well-deserved honours will
acquit the country of the debt it has contracted
towards the soldiers of Chateauvieux. Thus the
efforts of good-citizenship should be encouraged.
This moving fete will everywhere be the terror of
tyrants, the hope and consolation of patriots. Thus

To Arms! To Arms! 299
we will prove to Europe that the people, unlike
despots, are not ungrateful, and that a nation which has
become free knows how to reward the supporters of
its liberty, as it knows how to strike down conspira
tors, even on the steps of the throne.
" Numerous citizens have charged us with a mission
to you, which we fill with confidence and joy. They
invite you, by our voice, to be witness of this fete
which civism and. the arts will render imposing and
memorable. It is to be hoped that the magistrates
of the people will consecrate with their presence the
triumph of the martyrs of the people's cause. They
have preserved, even in chains, that inward and moral
liberty of which all the kings in the world are unable
to deprive them. The country has engraved on their
irons the oath to live free or to die, as it has engraved
it on their swords, and on their national pikes, as
it has engraved it in your hearts, in ours, and in those
of all true Frenchmen. " Marie-Joseph Chenier
" Theroigne
"David
"HlON," ETC.
The municipal body approved of the petition and
invitation ; the former was printed and distributed to
the Forty-eight Sections, the latter was courteously
accepted. In this enterprise Theroigne is found in excellent
company. Marie-Joseph Chdnier was the poet of the
Revolution. He won fame with his play "Charles
IX.," of which Camille Desmoulins said : " This piece

300 A Woman of the Revolution
has advanced our cause better than the days of
October." Like Theroigne he was pursued with
venomous attacks by the Actes des Apotres. His
inspired features speak of his deep love of humanity
and of his lofty aspirations towards freedom and
justice. He composed numerous patriotic and re
publican hymns, among which the " Chant du depart "
shared with the Marseillaise the glory of guiding
the soldiers to victory. David did for art what
Chenier did for poetry. Not content with using
his brush to depict some of the events of the Re
volution, he took an active part in public affairs,
especially in organising picturesque fetes like the one
to celebrate the release of the Swiss of Chateauvieux.
The soldiers were set free in February, 1792, and
marched on foot to Paris, where they arrived on
April 9th. They were accompanied by crowds of
citizens and two deputies-extraordinary of Brest. From
Versailles the crowd increased enormously, and the
shouts of " Vive la Nation ! " became deafening. The
procession made for the Hotel de Ville, where, after
much dispute, and the matter being put thrice to the
vote, they were admitted to the Assembly.
Tallien drew up on April 2nd the programme of the
fete, which was fixed for April 15th, a Sunday.
A detachment of mounted gendarmes was to ride at
the head of the procession, preceded by trumpeters,
and followed by a battalion of the National Guard
of Paris, a band, and gendarmes on foot. Then a
number of men and women citizens, eight abreast,
were to carry in their midst the Declaration of the
Rights of Man ; then another band. A second group

SAINT-JUST.

To Arms! To Arms! 303
of citizens and citoyennes carried arms and tools
employed in the Conquest of Liberty on July 14th,
1789. These were to surround a model of the Bastille
and the flag of the fortress, which were borne turn and
turn about by citizens of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine,
conquerors of the Bastille, and former French Guards
dressed in their uniforms.
A battalion of veterans followed.
A third group included the flags of England,
America, and France, united by tricoloured ribbons
to indicate an alliance, and carried by citizens repre
senting the free peoples. These were to be preceded
by busts of Franklin, Sidney, J. J. Rousseau, and
Voltaire, carrfed by citizens of the countries where
these great men were born, and surrounded by pupils
from the schools.
The book of the French Constitution, carried by
fathers of families, their wives, mothers, and young
citizens, to whom it was confided by the Representa
tives of the Nation, formed the fourth group.
National Guards marched between the groups.
The fifth group was composed of deputies, muni
cipal officers, members of the various administrations,
judges of the Civil and Criminal Tribunals, and
deputies of the Forty-eight Sections.
These were to be followed by citizens who had been
victims of despotism and oppression, others carrying a
model of the galleys, and still more carrying oars
decorated with flowers and ribbons.
Then followed forty citoyennes carrying as many
trophies, made out of the chains the soldiers had worn,
and banners bearing emblems and inscriptions in the
18

304 A Woman of the Revolution
honour of liberty. In the centre of the group was an
ancient sarcophagus, on which were traced the names
of twenty-three soldiers immolated by an arbitrary
judgment to the vengeance of their officers and to the
resentment of Bouilld.
Another sarcophagus of the same kind was con
secrated to the names of the National Guards who
died victims of their zeal in executing the law. These
two funereal monuments were inscribed with the
legend : " Bouille and his accomplices alone are
guilty." Then came the Car of Liberty, drawn by twenty
horses, harnessed four abreast.
It was a solemn and imposing festival.
In an earlier plan for the fete it had been suggested
that the town of Brest should be represented by a
woman partly veiled and showing signs of profound
grief, whilst another woman, dressed to represent Paris,
was to approach, embrace, and console her with
promises of blessings to come. It was supposed that
Theroigne would have taken one of these parts had
not the idea been given up in favour of the statue
of Liberty.
A few days after the fete her popularity received
another check, this time at the hands of her former
friend, Collot d'Herbois. The occurrence happened
at the Jacobins on April 23rd. Collot d'Herbois,
who was speaking, congratulated himself on the fact
that Thdroigne whilst at the Cafe Hottot on the
Terrace of the Feuillants had declared that she with
drew her confidence from him and from Robespierre.
This statement was received with much laughter.

To Arms! To Arms! 305
Theroigne was in the women's gallery. Irritated by
the speaker and the tittering among the audience, she
leapt over the barrier which separated her from the
main body of the hall, avoiding all attempts to restrain
her, rushed to the platform, and insisted on speaking.
Her excitement was intense, her gestures highly ani
mated. A tumult ensued, which the president found
it impossible to quell. At length he put on his
hat and suspended the sitting. Thdroigne was led
crestfallen from the hall. The trouble had arisen
because a rupture had occurred between the Brissotins
and the Robespierrists, and Theroigne, in spite of her
friendship for Basire and her recent alliance with
Collot d'Herbois, had declared herself Brissotine.
A writer in the Correspondance Litteraire Secrete
summed up the matter thus on April 28th : " MM.
Collot d'Herbois, Robespierre, Chabot the ex-monk,
and Tallien are opposed to MM. Brissot, Condorcet,
Fauchet, Gaudet, and Vergniaud. A reconciliation
is rendered more difficult than it would otherwise be
because several women are taking part in the quarrel.
These are Mme de Condorcet, Mme de Stael, and
Mile Thdroigne."
After this date Thdroigne's name is frequently
coupled in the royalist press with those of Mme de
Stael and Mme de Condorcet.

CHAPTER VIII
SULEAU ^
DID Theroigne take part in the demonstrations
of June 20th ? The authoritative chroniclers
give no definite evidence that she did. The deeds
of that day were of the stirring character in which
she delighted, and if she was not at least an interested
spectator there must have been a good reason for
her absence.
France was afflicted by additional calamity. Besides
internal strife, discontent, revolt, and scarcity of food,
the allied powers, Austria and Prussia, were threat
ening utter devastation, particularly from the north.
Patriotism was ready to burst forth in the south in
the hope of saving France — for the blame of the dis
aster rested, according to the people's opinion, on the
King's shoulders. The day on which the power of
the masses could no longer be kept in check was at
hand. After much demur permission had been granted
for a petition to be presented to the Assembly by
armed men. The citizens of the Faubourg Saint-
Antoine were gathered ready to march to the palace.
The streets were filled with agitated crowds, National
Guards, demonstrators armed with pikes, the porters
of the markets, women waving branches of trees, little
children joining in the general clamour. Petion, the
306

Suleau 307
mayor, had doubled the guard at the Tuileries, but
took no steps to prevent the formation or progress
of a procession. It was impossible. A repetition of
the massacre of the Champ de Mars would have
been an irretrievable mistake. The crowd swelled
and swelled, until by eleven o'clock in the morning
it was an irresistible human force ready to overflow
in any direction suggested by its leaders. There was
no talk of violence. This was to be a peaceable fete ;
one of the fetes ever beloved of the masses during
the Revolution. It was proposed, said Roederer, to
plant a tree of liberty almost at the door of the
palace. At the earliest hour of the morning this leafy
symbol of budding summer and renewed hope was
already hoisted on a cart in anticipation of its tri
umphal journey. Surely this was a project after
Thdroigne's own heart. Planting trees of liberty, even
though they came no nearer to the Tuileries than the
garden of the Capuchins, was not an amusement to
be indulged in every day. Her friend Saint-Huruge
was one of the leaders of the mob ; Santerre was
another. Maton de la Varenne declared that Theroigne
was a third. But his opinion is of little value, for
his remarks concerning her are full of inaccuracies.
He called her " a miserable creature, small, wrinkled,
and sickly, who blushed at the least coaxing ways of
men, and who by an appearance of wit, although no
real powers of attraction, had captivated and ruined
several," and he accused her of trying to foment an
insurrection at Vienna !
With her or without her, the people, intent on
their fete, swarmed from east, west, north, and south,

308 A Woman of the Revolution
but chiefly east, to make their way into the grave
presence of the country's legislators. A peaceable
and good-humoured crowd, but nevertheless a crowd
excitable and unrestrainable. The petitioners, without
asking by your leave or with your leave, rushed into
the hall. The Assembly, roused by this irregularity,
rose to close the sitting. The intruders withdrew.
Thereupon permission was given them to make an
orderly advance. The petition was read at the bar.
It contained the usual plea for freedom from op
pression, and in addition a demand that the King
should have no will but that of the law. There was
no manifestation of republicanism as yet. Dancing,
singing, and full of joviality, the encouraged petitioners
made their way out through the hall, and thence
towards the Tuileries, accompanied at a safe distance
by battalions of the National Guard. In their turn
they were followed by a rabble of women, armed men
carrying waving flags, a bullock's heart raised high
upon a pike, with the gruesome inscription, " Heart
of an aristocrat," and a pair of ragged breeches hoisted
in the air, bearing the legend, " Vivent les sans-culottes
— Tremble, oh Tyrants."
At the palace admittance was at first refused, but
presently, by the King's order, the gates were unbarred.
The mob shouted hoarsely for the King, and cries of
"Down with the veto !" rang through the air. Santerre
was among the last to come from the Assembly, and
his followers had a cannon with them which was drawn
up to the royal gate, and presently, some say, up the
staircase of the palace itself. The daring of such a deed
whetted the already tense excitement of the people.

Suleau 309
Pouring into the palace, they rushed into the
apartments, seeking for the King. When at length
he appeared, calm and imperturbable, as was his usual
attitude in the face of danger, he was urged to enter
one of the large apartments in order that a petition
might be read to him. There he was asked to step
upon a bench, and one of the rabble held up his red
cap on a pike. Amidst general applause the King
placed it on his head. Demarteau, who is usually a
reliable chronicler, says that Thdroigne marched at the
head of the people of the faubourgs, who invaded the
Tuileries, and forced the King to place the bonnet-rouge
on his head. The extravagant Duval declares that
on June 20th Theroigne appeared at the head of a
crowd of brigands who invaded the King's apartments,
and helped to push one of the wheels of the cannon
which was hoisted into the hall where the people had
forced the King to appear before them. When Pdtion
arrived she went to shake hands with him ; and when
he commanded the people to withdraw, she said to him
in a tone of reproach, " I believe we might have ended
the whole matter to-day ! "
Meanwhile the Queen was with difficulty dissuaded
from joining the King. She stood with her children
beside her, surrounded by grenadiers, watching the
rabble invading the sanctity of the private apartments
with a sense of unutterable disgust in her heart and
an expression of staunch indifference on her features.
With her own hand she placed the obnoxious bonnet-
rouge on the head of her little son, and when Santerre,
speaking to her in friendly terms, relieved the child
of this disfiguring headgear, she appeared conciliatory

310 A Woman of the Revolution
enough, although a shudder swept over her frame. At
length, after an invasion of the palace lasting three
hours, the people took their departure, induced to do
so by Petion and Santerre. The Queen hastened to
join the King, who, finding himself still adorned with
the red cap, tossed it from him in a fit of impetuous
anger. Thus passed, harmlessly enough, one invasion of
the palace by the people. Their next visit was to have
more serious consequences. In July the fever of unrest
became more and more pronounced ; every peasant in
the country dropped the handles of his plough, betook
himself to the mayoralty, saw the proclamation that the
country was in danger, and returned, a soldier at heart,
the cockade in his cap. If in June the royal family
had been exposed to a sense of unbearable humiliation,
in July they were dominated by fear — fear of death by
the sword, by poison, or perhaps worse, by judicial
condemnation. The last hope of flight was dwindling
away, the last hope of rescue by foreign forces was
dead ; nothing remained but the dumb pain of impo
tence, the inability to escape from an unrelenting fate.
And so in a slow agony the days passed, bringing
nearer and still more near the crisis which was to deter
mine the bitter end of the royal household. Repub
licanism had come suddenly to life. During the first
days of August one word sounded ominously in the
ears of those who loved their rulers — " dethronement."
It was a thought which spurred the people to action ;
it was the keynote of the deeds of the terrible ioth.
There is no room for doubt as to Thdroigne's move
ments on that day. She played a conspicuous role

Suleau 3 1 1
in one of the dramatic incidents which made up the
tragic scenes of the attack upon the palace. In this
incident she and Suleau were the two chief actors.
The de Goncourts say bluntly, " On August ioth
Thdroigne murdered Suleau." It was natural that so
bold an assertion should lead to questions as to the
motive of the crime. Various motives were imputed
to her. The most romantic stories were woven about
the event. At first it was supposed that Theroigne
had vowed vengeance upon some young seigneur who
had betrayed her in early life, and, coming face to face
with him, had wreaked her vengeance and wiped out
her wrongs by his death. Lamartine is responsible
for perpetrating this dramatic but improbable version
of what took place. He does not mention August ioth,
but dates the tragedy as from the massacres of Septem
ber. " Her ascendancy during the emeutes was so
great," he says, "that with a single sign she condemned
or acquitted a victim ; and the royalists trembled to
meet her. During this period, by one of those chances
that appear like the premeditated vengeances of destiny,
she recognised in Paris the young Belgian gentleman
who had seduced and abandoned her. Her look told
him how great was his danger, and he sought to avert
it by imploring her pardon. 'My pardon,' said she, 'at
what price can you purchase it ? My innocence gone,
my family lost to me, my brothers and sisters pursued
in their own country by the jeers and sarcasms of
their kindred ; the malediction of my father, my exile
from my native land, my enrolment amongst the
infamous caste of courtesans ; the blood with which
my days have been and will be stained ; that imperish-

3i2 A Woman of the Revolution
able curse attached to my name, instead of that immor
tality of virtue which you have taught me to doubt.
It is for this that you would purchase my forgiveness.
Do you know any price on earth capable of purchasing
it ? ' The young man made no reply. Thdroigne
had not the generosity to forgive him, and he perished
in the massacres of September. In proportion as the
Revolution became more bloody, she plunged deeper
into it. She could no longer exist without the feverish
excitement of public emotion."
That may be fine writing, but it is not the truth.
If Thdroigne felt personal animus against Suleau, a
plausible explanation might be that she knew of him
as one of the authors who had poured forth incessant
abuse of her in the pages of the Actes des Apotres.
But it is difficult, almost impossible, to apportion
her exact share in the murder of the royalist. The
crowd was thirsty for victims. Suleau was one of
the most prominent and most hated of those prisoners
who offered a chance of assuaging the rioters' lust for
blood. Did Thdroigne make any special movement,
even the slightest push, to precipitate his fate ? If
she did, was not her action quite possibly the out
come of the mad passions which dominated the crowd
rather than any deliberate desire to destroy a per
sonal enemy ? With grave questions such as these
unanswered it is not possible to be sure that an
accusation of wilful intent to murder against her
would be just. On the other hand, to hold her
innocent is impossible. Only a few moments earlier
she had been speaking to the crowd of people, sway
ing them to her lightest will ; and though it is true

Suleau 313
that they had escaped her control, it seems probable
that had she urged them to stay their hands Suleau
might have been saved — at least, for the time being.
There is one important point in her favour. The
first victim of all was the Abbe Bouyon, editor of
Les Folies d'un Mots — also guilty of maligning Thd
roigne, and no doubt equally an object of her hate ;
but it has never been suggested that she was in any
degree implicated in his death. Carried away by the
tragic turn the Revolution was taking, she may have
come to the point when she was tainted by the
general belief that no measures short of violence and
massacre were possible. If that be the case, she had
gone a long way since the day when she had desired
to take only an academic interest in the political
upheaval — when she had been a reformer, and not
a fighter. In this attitude she was not alone ; hun
dreds, nay, thousands, had been infected by the same
thirst for blood — the spirit which led, within the suc
ceeding twelve months, to the excesses committed in
the name of liberty under the shadow of the guillotine.
If Thdroigne must be blamed for the responsibility
of one man's death, she had, at least, far less upon
her conscience than hundreds of the men with whom
she was working and struggling side by side. In
her normal state she was not by nature cruel — quite
the reverse ; and if she were guilty of an act of
cruelty to Suleau, the abnormal conditions of the
hour in which the deed was done must not be ignored
when estimating her culpability.
Suleau's position was enough to bring the manner
of his death into particular prominence. He was

314 A Woman of the Revolution
very well known by the patriots as well as by the
royalists. Born in Picardy in 1758, he had studied
and travelled much, returning to Paris in August
1789. He was many-sided. In his composition was
a little of the soldier, a little of the lawyer, a good
deal of the writer, and, first and foremost, the ad
venturer. He threw himself with the peculiar vivacity
and gaiety natural to him into the thick of the
activities. Before long he was arrested for Use-nation,
then newly a punishable crime, and was arraigned
before the Chatelet. His trial was a judicial comedy.
He railed and mocked at the accusation, at the
judges, at the people, at the whole world. In April
1790 he was released, but he had not learned
wisdom. Hot-headed as ever, he made himself well
hated as a pamphleteer, being largely responsible for
the notoriety attained by the Actes des Apotres. Still
his love of danger and intrigue were unsatiated.
His characteristics won for him the nickname of
" Chevalier de la Difficulte."
At the close of 1791 he went to Coblenz and
worked amongst the Smigris with more energy than
discretion, conspiring with foreign princes, and acting
against the national interests of France. As was not
surprising for a man of his class and temperament,
he gained the hatred of the patriots without ingrati
ating himself with the noblesse. Neither the French
aristocracy nor the foreign powers trusted him or
took his efforts seriously, and this blow to his pride
kept him temporarily inactive. But in August he
had been working on the side of the royalist party.
He was amongst those who, dressed in the uniform

Suleau 3 1 5
of the National Guard, were sent out to report on
the condition and temper of the people. It was said
that on the morning of the 9th Suleau told his
friend Le Sourd that he had been warned by Camille
Desmoulins that a price had been placed upon his
(Suleau's) head, and Camille had offered him a refuge
at his own house, which he refused. Le Sourd met
him twice during the succeeding twenty-four hours —
the first time he was following in the track of Pdtion,
who had been ordered to the bar of the Legislative
Assembly to give an account of the chances of public
tranquillity, the second time was shortly before his
arrest, when he invited Le Sourd to his house in the
Place Vendome to take refreshments. " It was then,"
says his friend, " that, leaving the terrace of the
Feuillants and crossing the court, he was arrested.
The too famous Thdroigne de Mdricourt was estab
lished there on a makeshift platform. She did not
know Suleau, but he had been pointed out to her
by the chiefs of the conspiracy as a necessary victim.
One of the furies round her having named him to
her, she designated him to one of the hired assassins
near to her, who thereupon massacred him. His
body was dragged to the right-hand corner of the
Place Vendome, under our very windows, and was
placed there with those of eight other victims."
A dramatic account of the affair, which, however,
in many details is wanting in accuracy, is from the
pen of Baron Thiebault, Lieutenant-General in the
French Army.
On the night of August 9th preparations had been
made at the Tuileries to repel the threatened attack

316 A Woman of the Revolution
of the people. False patrols had been ordered to sally
forth dressed as National Guards, their apparent object
to keep the peace ; in reality to slaughter the people
if the chance came. Drums rolled, there was the
clash of arms, the tocsin boomed. A skirmish between
the false and the real Guards was in progress, and
many of the former were carried prisoner to the
guardroom in the Cour de Feuillants.
Hearing this news, the people crowded into the
court early in the morning of the ioth.
" The courtyard was getting fuller and fuller, and
the cries became appalling," writes Thiebault. " I
determined then to send La Fargue to the officer
commanding the Butte des Moulins battalion, which
was assembled fourteen hundred strong in the Place
Vendome, asking for reinforcements. He would
only have to cross the Rue Saint-Honord, while
two hundred men would suffice to clear the court
yard of the Feuillants, and enable us to close the gates
and disperse the rabble. But the commander, whose
name I have forgotten, replied that without orders he
could not detach a man outside his section. La
Fargue replied, ' Well, sir, if they cut our throats
and murder our prisoners you will have one advantage,
namely, that of being in a front-row box.' "
Thiebault tried a last resource, since he could not
get reinforcements. He rushed into the midst of the
crowd, mounted on one of the two guns which stood
in the courtyard, and harangued the people from this
improvised platform. " Are you Frenchmen ? " he
cried. " So are we no less. Are you patriots ? So
are we no less. But you will cease to be worthy

Suleau 3 1 7
of one or the other title if you cannot get beyond
the detestable idea of replacing justice by assassina
tion. You will indeed be rebels, for the Assembly
has put the prisoners under our guardianship. What
have you then to demand ? It can be only one thing,
namely, that the prisoners — against nearly all of whom,
by the way, there is no charge — should not escape.
Well, I answer for them on my honour. I will be
responsible with my own head, and, if that is not
guarantee enough, I will add to their guard any three
of you whom you like to choose."
Some of the crowd made answer, to which Thiebault
replied, endeavouring by every means in his power to
gain time. Just as he was congratulating himself on
the success of his efforts Theroigne de Mdricourt
entered the courtyard. She was dressed in a black
felt hat with a black plume, a blue amazone, and
carried pistols and a dagger in her belt. " She was
a dark girl of about twenty," writes Thiebault, "and,
with a sort of shudder I say it, very pretty, made
still more beautiful by her excitement. Preceded and
followed by a number of maniacs, she cleft her way
through the crowd, crying ' Make room ! make room ! '
went straight to the other gun and leapt upon it. . . .
Having heard what was going on, she had hurried
up from Robespierre's house, and, confident in her
influence with the populace, she had come to restore
all its ferocity to the mob. As long as I live that
creature will be present before my eyes ; the sound
of her voice will ring in my ears as she uttered the
first sentence of her discourse. ' How long,' she
shrieked, ' will you let yourselves be misled by empty

318 A Woman of the Revolution
phrases ? ' I tried to answer, but I could no longer
make myself heard. A thousand voices greeted with
applause every word that she uttered."
Compelled to silence and at the end of his wits,
Thiebault got off the gun and forced his way through
the angry crowd back to the guardroom. He shut
and locked the door behind him. Furious, the mob
hurled themselves against it. The upper part was of
glass ; it splintered, the broken panes flying into the
defenders' faces. At the end of a narrow passage were
a score of men armed with bayonets and loaded
muskets. To force their way through the passage
or through the iron-barred window meant loss of life
to all who attempted it. The mob halted.
" They found it more dignified," continued Thie
bault, " to put me on my trial, their beautiful fury,
Mile de Mdricourt, presiding, and to condemn me,
unanimously and by acclamation, to death. I never
saw her again after that day, but, though I am as
susceptible as most men to the influence of women,
I certainly never met another woman who, in half
an hour, could have left on my mind a recollection
of her which a thousand years would not weaken."
Suleau's handsome face and upright bearing made
him appear a conspicuous figure. Seeing the danger
of his fellow prisoners, he cried : " Comrades, I believe
that the people mean to shed blood to-day, but perhaps
one victim will satisfy them. Let me go to them.
I will pay for all." He accompanied these words with
an attempt to leap from the window, but he was kept
back by the National Guard. It was at this moment
that the mob burst into the building. The first victim

Suleau 3 1 9
was a harmless dramatic author of the name of Bouyon,
who was carried forth into the courtyard and rent
limb from limb. Suleau was seized and despoiled
of his uniform and arms. As he struggled, Theroigne,
who had rushed into the guardroom at the head of
the crowd, caught sight of him.
The accounts accuse her of a fury which knew no
bounds. " Where is the Abbe Suleau ? " she cried,
and then, coming face to face with him, she hurled
more personal questions at him. "Am I the mistress
of Populus ? Am I old ? Am I hideous ? " And,
throwing herself upon him, she seized him by the
throat and dragged him into the thick of the murderous
rabble. Hundreds of arms were stretched out to
avenge her. Suleau fought like a lion attacked by
twenty madmen, but before a moment had passed
he was pierced by a dozen swords, and his body
was flung out into the Place Vendome with those of
eight or nine more victims.
" Thus perished the amiable Suleau," writes the
royalist Peltier, who was an eye-witness of these scenes,
"whose gaiety, candour, and friendship endeared him
to me."
At the time of his death Suleau was thirty-five, and
had recently married Adela Hall, the daughter of the
artist. The fact that he left a young widow to mourn
his death made the horror of it more poignant.
" Ah, amiable Suleau," wrote his friend Peltier,
" since the hand of thy young wife could not perform
the last fond duty of closing thy eyes in death, let
friendship at least be allowed to scatter a few flowers
over thy ashes. Thou art no more ! It was thy fate
19

320 A Woman of the Revolution
to expire with French monarchy. Thy loyalty has
already received its reward ; in dying first thou hast
not been witness to the long series of disasters which
have made us every day since experience a thousand
deaths." The murder of the royalists whetted the excite
ment of the people. Rushing from the guardroom
through the courtyard, they joined the crowd who
were marching on to attack the palace.
The King and Queen, being informed that they
were no longer safe in the Tuileries, had decided to
seek refuge with the legislative body in the Salle
de Manege. " The King is going to the Assembly ;
make room ! " cried Roederer. At first no obstacle
was placed in the way of a free passage, and crest
fallen royalty defiled by the staircase leading to the
terrace of the Feuillants, where the crowd hemmed
it in. After a delay of a quarter of an hour, after
urging and pleading, and the employment of slight
physical compulsion, a way was cleared for the King,
and his Majesty was permitted to resume the path
which led for ever from the Tuileries. The Queen
had lost her usual fortitude, and her face showed signs
of tears; Madame Royale wore the bewildered look
of fear which was becoming habitual; the Dauphin,
wearied and sickly, was borne on the shoulders of a
grenadier. In the Assembly chamber the King took his seat
beside the president. But the legislative body were
hindered by convention from debating openly in the
King's presence, and decided that the royal family

Suleau 321
must retire into a small box used by the reporters
of a certain journal, which was partitioned off at the
back of the hall. There for fourteen hours they
remained without repose or refreshment, cramped in
this prison that was but a few feet square. Inside
the hall the drone of the speakers' voices continued,
outside the ominous murmur of a gathering throng
was heard. The hot sun poured down upon the
Queen as she sat there, causing her to fall into a
drowsy nightmare that was but half sensation. Then
a new sound stirred her into consciousness ; it was the
boom of guns, the crash of falling glass and masonry,
the shrieks of the wounded and dying.
The story of that attack upon the Tuileries has been
told over and over again, and while the details grow
wearisome, the horror of it must ever seem acute.
The abode of royalty had become a battleground. The
rabble, possibly still unaware of the King's departure,
beat down the courtyard gates and turned their guns
upon the palace. The royalists, reluctant to fire
on the people, hoped that conciliatory measures might
stem the rush of the aggressive crowd. But a short
parley showed their hope was vain. Shots were dis
charged on both sides. The Swiss entrenched on
the main stairway were subjected to a shower of balls.
Rushing out from the barrier, they opened a fusillade
on the Marseillais, and for a moment it appeared that
the people might be successfully driven back. It was
then that the ill-advised written order to cease firing
was handed to the Swiss. The Marseillais and Bretons
rallied and stormed the palace. They massacred those
of the Swiss who were still within, they sacked the

322 A Woman of the Revolution
royal abode, destroying the last vestige of the King's
authority. The republicans were the men of the
hour, and with them terror reigned in Paris.

The immediate result of that day as far as Thdroigne
was concerned was a reward. In the Moniteur of
September 3rd an entry occurs announcing that the
federes had bestowed upon Miles Theroigne, Lacombe,
and Reine Audu civic crowns for distinguishing them
selves by their courage on August ioth.

CHAPTER IX
BRISSOTINE
DURING many days republican fever ran riot in
the blood of the people. The King and Queen
were in the Temple. There was much to be said,
much to be done, not a moment to waste. At the
Jacobins Club this stress made itself felt as much as
anywhere. There was something in the tone there
which portended great issues. One intimate glimpse
of Theroigne, showing her at this moment of tense
calm before the storm, we owe to Dr. John Moore,
who had been studying the events of that week to
some purpose. He had obtained a full view of the
Queen, and had deplored the change in her appearance.
" Her beauty is gone. No wonder ! " he writes.
A few days later, on the 1 7th, he visited the Jacobins,
where " there was not, properly speaking, a debate, but
rather a series of violent speeches," and saw the daughter
of the people.
" There were abundance of women in the galleries,"
he continues, " but as there were none in the body of
the hall where the members were seated, I was surprised
to see one enter and take her seat amongst them. She
was dressed in a kind of English riding-habit, but her
jacket was the uniform of the National Guards. On
inquiry I was informed that the name of this Amazon
323

324 A Woman of the Revolution
is Mademoiselle Thdroigne ; she distinguished herself
in the action of the ioth by rallying those who
fled, and attacking a second time at the head of the
Marseillais. " She seems about one or two and thirty,1 is some
what above the middle size of women, and has a smart
martial air, which in a man would not be disagreeable."
That day the partisans of Robespierre were so loud
in their demonstrations that any speaker whose senti
ments happened not to be quite in accord with theirs
was howled down and the tribune given up to some
one who had a more palatable doctrine to propound.
The great issues were about to begin at the point
of the knife. The people, having steeped their hands
in crime and bloodshed, were not brought back easily
within bounds of moderation.
At the beginning of September massacres were
carried out systematically. Butchers stalked through
the jails slaughtering the prisoners like sheep. There
was carnage everywhere — at the Abbaye, at the
Chatelet, at La Force, at the Conciergerie, the Bicetre,
and La Salpetriere, the place of durance vile of which
Thdroigne was before long to gain an extended know
ledge. It is impossible to depict the disorder that existed,
or to explain the paralytic inaction of those in authority
and of the masses of more peaceable inhabitants, who did
not even denounce the doings of the murderers, or
attempt to interfere with this wholesale slaughter.
The blood that was being spilt incited all who had
shared in the spilling to continue their gruesome
1 Dr. Moore overestimated her age.

Brissotine 325
labours. The women of the Revolution joined in
these diabolical doings. Following in the footsteps
of Billaud- Varennes, who, wading through blood, cried
"Bring wine for the brave toilers who are about to
deliver the nation from its foes," they remarked '
facetiously that they were carrying dinner to the
husbands who were at work in the prisons.
In contrast to their ferocious attitude, such brave
royalist women as Elizabeth Cazotte and Mile de
Sombreuil, amongst others, stand out as wonderful
examples of courage, sacrifice, and filial piety. The
former, throwing herself between her father and his
would-be assassins, cried, " Strike, if you must, you
scoundrels, but you will not get at him except over my
dead body " ; and the latter was credited with having
gulped down without a murmer of disgust a glass
containing the blood of an aristocrat — a nauseous
draught forced upon her by the murderous demagogues
as the price of her father's release.
It is impossible to say with certainty whether
Thdroigne, excited as she was by her activities on
August ioth, restrained herself from staining her hands
with additional crime during these days of unbridled
licence. The best evidence that can be put forward
in favour of her innocence is the fact that she with
drew her support from the extreme party to bestow
it upon the cause of the moderates.
August ioth had put the Girondins temporarily in
power. On September 21st the Convention superseded
the Legislative Assembly. The Girondins formed the
Conservative party, with Brissot, Vergniaud, and Gaudet
at their head. On the Left were the extremists, the

326 A Woman of the Revolution
Montagnards, led by Robespierre, Marat, Danton,
the Duc d'Orleans, now called Philippe Egalitd, and
Thdroigne's former friend, Collot d'Herbois. The
hostility was acute, and, taking into consideration
the trend of affairs, could have but one end. It was
the desire of the Moderates to destroy the ascendancy
of those whom they believed to be responsible for the
massacres, and to disperse the hired bands of assassins
who were giving expression to the feeling of revenge
dominating the masses. This task was no easy one.
Against them were the triumvirate of front-rank repub
licans, Robespierre, Danton, and Marat. More
organising power and diplomacy, less brilliancy and
oratory, would have been needed by the Girondins to
bring to book such strong and obstinate antagonists.
Between the extreme parties there vacillated and tem
porised the Centre of the Convention. Hating Marat
and all his works, yet dreading the power of the
Commune, they extended no definite help to the Right.
The struggle, often renewed, yet never decisive,
gradually strengthened the position of the Montag
nards, to whom the entire sympathies of the Jacobins
were now given — no mean support, taking into con
sideration that the galleries of the house were usually
filled with their adherents, who noisily shouted down
the Girondins, whilst encouraging their opponents with
applause. The internal situation, being thus unstable, was
much complicated by the position of foreign affairs.
For a while the French had been successful in the
battlefield. War had been declared against the King
of Sardinia, and French troops occupied Savoy. Cus-

Brissotine J27
tine, with 18,000 men, had succeeded in driving the
Prussians before him in Lorraine, capturing Mainz and
Frankfort. The allied army retreating, Dumouriez set
out to invade Belgium.
At this point a vague rumour is heard of Thd
roigne. In the Correspondance Littiraire Secrete of
October 20th a note states that she had returned to
her native country just when the army of Dumouriez
was facing the Prussians there and about to make
war on the Low Country. A strange report to have
come into print if it contained no truth, yet it is
not substantiated by any biographer. Dumouriez,
having left Paris on October 17 th, reached Liege on
November 27th. On the 9th of that month Thdroigne
wrote a letter from Paris to Perregaux, from which it
is clear that she was in worse financial straits than
ever before, for she sent a messenger with an appeal
to No. 9, Rue Mirabeau, addressed to " Citizen Perre
gaux, or to his clerk, should he be absent," in the
following urgent terms : " Citizen, I beg you will
give the hundred livres you promised me yesterday to
the woman who brings this letter." On January 28th
following she made another application to M. de Lim
bourg, friend of the Baron de Selys, who was then
at Theux, near Lidge, about her jewels. This note
was signed "La Citoyenne Theroigne," and addressed
from the Rue Saint-Honord, No. 273, near the
Jacobins. By that time Dumouriez was back in Paris.
If, therefore, she had really been with his army, the
visit to her own country was a short one and can have
had but little significance. At any rate, the conqueror
of Jemappes had no great opinion of her ability, for,

328 A Woman of the Revolution
in his " Memoirs," after especially praising Mme
Roland and Mme Necker, he classes Mile la Brousse,
Mme de Stael, Mme Condorcet, Pastoret, Coigny, and
Thdroigne as " either artful females, like those who
haunted the courts of former times, or differing in
nothing from the vulgar and furious women of the
faubourgs of Paris."
Between August ioth, then, and the beginning of
May 1793, Thdroigne has baffled her biographers.
More important personages were commanding atten
tion. The execution of the King in January, the
anguish of the Queen, the slow crushing of the
Girondins, the rise of the Montagnards, kept every
chronicler busy. Thdroigne was doubtless living in
the rooms near the Jacobins, frequenting the clubs,
perhaps holding gatherings of her own and mingling
more or less conspicuously with the street crowds in
these, some of the most anxious months in all the
history of the Revolution. On the whole, she had
probably a good reason for remaining comparatively
quiet. In the spring the position of the Girondins
was becoming critical. Failing in their foreign policy,
in their attempt to save the King, as well as in main
taining any pretence of internal equilibrium, they were
tottering before the downfall.
At this hour of internal dissension, of wavering in
the sections, of military disaster (caused in part by
Dumouriez's treachery in allying himself with Coburg),
of rebellion in La Vendde, of the interference of
England under Pitt's policy, of utter lawlessness and
anarchy, Thdroigne chose to declaim a stirring appeal
to the sections, exhorting them to rally and make a

Brissotine 329
final stand. There was much of her usual fire, of her
wonderful power to carry her audience with her, in
the speech, which was afterwards printed and placarded
on the walls throughout the city. Although diffuse
and containing many grammatical errors, its fervour
outweighs such deficiencies. It is a typical publication
of that day, and throws a glaring light upon the
desperate condition of affairs and the internal disunion
of the country. It has rarely, if ever, been quoted
in full, and not at all in English. Addressed to
the Forty-eight Sections, it was printed by Dufart,
Rue Saint-Honore, on blue-grey paper, and runs as
follows :
" Citizens ! Hear me ! I am not going to utter
fine phrases ; I am going to tell you the pure and
simple truth. Where do we stand ? All the con
flicting passions which have been aroused are liable
to carry us away. We are almost on the edge of
the precipice. Citizens, let us stop and reflect. It is
time. On my return from Germany, almost eighteen
months ago, I told you that the Emperor had a pro
digious number of agents here to sow discord amongst
us, in order to prepare civil war at a distance, and
that his plan was to cause it to break out at the
moment when his satellites should be ready to make
a general effort to invade our territory. That is where
we stand ! They have reached the point of a denoue
ment, and we are ready to fall into the trap. The
preliminary altercations of civil war have taken place
already in some sections. Pay attention, then, and let
us examine calmly who are the instigators, in order
that we may recognise our enemies.

33° A Woman of the Revolution
" Misfortune be on your head, citizens, if you allow
such scenes to be renewed. If people come to fisticuffs,
and use abusive language, unworthy of citizens, they
will soon go farther, and I can foresee that their
passions will be heated to such a point that it will
no longer be in your power to hinder the explosion.
These manoeuvres have three aims — civil war, there
is no doubt, that of justifying the calumnies of kings,
and of their slaves, who pretend that it is not possible
that the people can assemble to exercise its sovereignty
without abusing it. This is a branch of the great
conspiracy against democracy.
" Citizens, let us grasp democracy so firmly that
it can never escape us. Baffle these intrigues by your
rectitude, your justice, and your wisdom. By these
means you will give the lie to your calumniators.
"What about their wish to detain, for as long as
possible, the remainder of the contingent which Paris
ought to furnish to march against the rebels in the
Vendde ? They desire, it would appear, that instead
of carrying help to our brothers they should have
to come amongst us to restore harmony. It is actu
ally the aim of the King's agents to create a diversion,
to weaken us by setting one against the other, for,
whilst we flew at one another's throats, the rebels —
backed up by the English, who would not be long
in descending upon our shores, if the intrigues of
Pitt continue to shackle us, and to hinder us from
seriously considering our position, during that time — the
rebels, I say, who, to our shame be it known, are more
united and firm in defending despotism and religious
prejudices than we are to defend liberty, will make

Brissotine 331
better progress than we are able to calculate, because
we have not their passionate force, since men who
have placed themselves midway between victory and
death fight in desperation. In agreement with the
Imperialists, the Prussians, and the coalition of powers,
they will advance from every side. Our armies and
our generals, not knowing if they are fighting for
the Republic, or for the parties, or for a tyrant whom
they justly fear to see raise himself as in Rome to
put an end to the discords, will grow discouraged.
" Besides, the feeble citizens, those who up till now
have remained undecided, but who would declare
themselves if our unity and strength received a strong
impetus, discouraged by these same motives and seduced
by perfidious promises such as are contained in the
Proclamation of Coburg, would remain in their waver
ing state. And so if we fall into the trap prepared
for us, and the kings succeed in producing an outburst
of civil war amongst the most fiery citizens, and
seducing or discouraging the others, how shall we save
ourselves from their satellites ? How shall we stem
this torrent of hostility on the part of enemies who will
combine their efforts at the very moment when we
shall be most divided against ourselves ? Oh, terrible
thought ! It is impossible to pursue it.
" Citizens, let us stop and reflect or we are lost.
The moment has arrived when it is to the interest
of all to reunite, to sacrifice our hates and our passions
for the public welfare. If the voice of the country, the
sweet hope of fraternity, does not inspire us, let us
consider our closest interests. All united, we are none
too strong to repulse our numerous enemies from

332 A Woman of the Revolution
without, and those who have already raised the standard
of rebellion. Nevertheless I warn you that our enemies
will make no distinction between the parties ; we shall
all be confounded on the day of vengeance. I can say
that there is not a single patriot who has made himself
conspicuous during the Revolution concerning whom
I have not been questioned. All the inhabitants of
Paris are indiscriminately proscribed, and I have heard
those who wished to make me depose against the
patriots say a thousand times that it would be necessary
to exterminate half the French to subdue the other
half. To exterminate us, vile slaves ! It is you we
should exterminate. Danger is going to reunite us,
and we are going to show you what men who desire
liberty, and who work for the cause of the human race,
can do. We shall all march forth, rich and poor alike,
and those who, having the necessary means, send sub
stitutes will be covered with infamy. Surely, then,
it is in vain, tyrants of the earth, that you send your
agents here, that you scatter your gold ! The French
are too clever to be caught in the trap you have set for
them, and to go astray. We desire liberty, and will
defend ourselves with our last drops of blood. Eternal
justice is on our side, and only lies and crime on yours.
Judge your cause and ours, and say to whom shall
be the victory.
" The smallest things sometimes lead to the greatest.
The Roman women disarmed Coriolanus and saved
their country.
" Recollect, citizens, that previous to August ioth
not one of you broke the silken thread which separated
the terrace of the Feuillants from the Tuileries gardens.

Brissotine 333
Sometimes the least thing will stay the most forcible
outpouring of passions with greater success than all the
force that might be opposed to it.
" Consequently I propose that in each section there
shall be chosen six of the most virtuous citoyennes, the
gravest for their age, to conciliate and reunite the
citizens, to remind them of the dangers by which
the country is threatened. They shall wear a wide
sash, on which will be inscribed the words £ Friendship
and Fraternity.' Every time there is a general assembly
of the section, they shall gather for the purpose of
calling to order every citizen who stands aside and
who does not respect the liberty of opinions, which
is so necessary in forming a good public spirit. Those
who have gone astray, but nevertheless have good inten
tions, and love their country, will be silent. But if those
of bad faith who have been bribed by the aristocrats,
by the enemies of the democracy, and the agents of the
king to interrupt, to speak abusively, and to come
to blows, show no more respect for the voices of the
citoyennes than for that of the president, we shall at
least have the means of knowing them. And a note
can be taken of their names in order that inquiries may
be prosecuted on their account. These citoyennes
can be changed every month. Those who show the
highest virtue, firmness, and patriotism in the glorious
ministry of reuniting the citizens, and of obtaining
respect for the liberty of opinions, might be re-elected
for the space of a year. Their reward would be to
have a special place at our national fetes, and to super
intend the educational institutions consecrated to our
sex.

334 A Woman of the Revolution
" There, citizens, is an idea which I submit to your
notice." The nature of Theroigne's plans for those of her
own sex who could share in the active work of the
Revolution had undergone a distinct modification since
1792. She no longer desired that women should arm
and fight side by side with men ; it was better that
they should occupy themselves with the spreading of
propaganda and bringing encouragement to those who
vacillated. This was the work she wished her sisters to do,
and to this she urged them with all the strength
she possessed. But as far as can be judged her propo
sitions were not received with enthusiasm. They were
too openly Girondist, although the Gironde is not
mentioned in her speech. The broadside is dated only
by internal evidence. The Proclamation of Coburg
was issued on April 5th, 1793, but there are still later
references : firstly to the scenes of violence at the begin
ning of May in various sections which had been provoked
by the Decree of the Commune on the ist of the
month proclaiming the necessity of raising a Parisian
army to march against the Venddans ; as well as to a
supplementary decree by the Convention on the 8 th,
relative to the numbers which each section was to
furnish. The exact date is of importance, because
Thdroigne had thrown her last effective die in the
cause of liberty. Within a week of her proud protest
she was to be utterly humbled, and her dignity was
to have fled from her for ever. Like many another
who suffered for an excess of zeal, she was destroyed

\ i

THEROIGNE AT THE SALPETRIERE.
From an engraving at the Bibliotheque Nationale after a drawing hy Gabriel.

335

Brissotine 337
by the very passions she had been instrumental in
arousing. An event occurred in the second week of
May which was a downward step in her deplorable fate.
There were women in Paris who were growing ever
more lawless, and who were banding together in various
societies for more or less nefarious purposes.
From the beginning of the year the more violent of
them had formed a political organisation called the
Club de Citoyennes Rdvolutionnaires. They demanded
a hall for their meetings, they sent deputations to the
authorities, they conspired riotously to bring about the
downfall of the Girondins. They did duty as sentries,
they crowded the tribunes of the Conventions, and
influenced the debates by their shrieks and vocifera
tions. They were only one step less abandoned than
the so-called furies orTricoteuses, Robespierre's knitting-
women, who were drawn from the scum of Paris —
women from the gutters, from the thieves' dens,
viragoes and unfortunates. No deeds that could be
devised were too criminal, too extravagant, or too
outrageous for the perpetration of these outcasts.
They acted as spies, they escorted prisoners to jail
and to the guillotine, hurling blasphemies in their
tortured ears; they danced to the noisy, wild revolu
tionary songs, and gave way openly to drunkenness
and debauchery. They were paid for hooting and
applauding, for demanding revenge, punishment, death,
or destruction according to the signal given by those
who employed them, and distributed amongst them
the wages of their shame.
The group of women who made it their business to
do the dirty work of the Jacobins, hounding down the
20

33 8 A Woman of the Revolution
Girondins, gathering both within and without the
Convention, mounting guard at the doors to intercept
those who were not of their party, opposing all by
word or action who held other views from theirs, had
become a menacing feature of the days of trouble and
tumult during May. On the 15th, Thdroigne, passing
along the terrace of the Feuillants, came boldly down
the street and close to the door of the Convention
encountered these dangerous women. Exactly what
took place it is difficult to state, but a conflict between
the women appears to have arisen on the subject of
Brissot. The restless, scheming journalist, whom
Carlyle described as " a man of the windmill species
that grinds always, turning towards all winds, not in
the steadiest manner," had been hunted out of the
Jacobins Club in the previous October, and since that
had been particularly hated by the extremists.
Theroigne's friendship for him, or at least her sympathy
with his aims, was no secret. " Down with Brissot
and the Brissotins," cried the Megaeras, perhaps see
ing the object of their contempt and hatred. Thdroigne
intervened, calling to them to be silent. They hooted
and derided her. Furious and outraged by their
threats, she tried to gain ascendancy over the aggressive
rabble by means of her old gift, oratory. But the
tongue in this case was not a sufficiently effective
weapon against their determination to inflict physical
chastisement. She had no other resources. The ex
cited citoyennes refused to listen. Seizing her roughly,
they stripped her clothes from her back, and beat her
unmercifully. There was no opportunity for self-
defence against such numbers. Only by chance was

Brissotine 339
she rescued in the nick of time, and thus escaped death.
It might have been better for her if the mad and
wicked creatures who set upon her had then and there
been allowed to finish their gruesome purpose.
Among the accounts of the affair one occurs in the
Police Report of May 1 6th, describing it as follows :
" The women who gather at the doors of the Con
vention yesterday placed a detachment of their body
at the doors of the first tribunes at nine o'clock in the
morning, to hinder the women favoured by the deputies
from passing in with admission cards. They per
formed this self-imposed task with insolence of the
worst kind. . . . Citoyenne Theroigne, beaten by
these furies, told them she would sooner or later make
them bite the dust."
Another is to be found in the Courrier des Diparte-
ments of May 1 7 th :
" A heroine of the Revolution experienced a slight
check the day before yesterday on the terrace of the
Feuillants. Mile Theroigne, who, it was said, was
recruiting^ women for the Rolandin faction, unfortu
nately addressed herself to the followers of Robespierre
and of Marat, who, not wishing to augment the army
of Brissotins, seized the female recruiter and fusti
gated her with great activity. The Guard arrived and
saved the victim from the fury of these indecent
maniacs. Marat, who was passing, took the beaten
one under his protection."
The Revolutions de Paris of the 18th says : "For the
last few days a number of women have been policing
the Tuileries gardens and the corridors of the National
Convention. They have taken it upon themselves to

34° A Woman of the Revolution
examine all the cockades and stop the people whom
they suspect of wavering. It was they who on the
15 th of the month gave the whip to Thdroigne, calling
her Brissotine."
The story told by Barras in his " Memoirs " is
somewhat different, but is interesting because it ampli
fies the suggestion in the Courrier des Dipartements that
Marat came to Theroigne's rescue.
" One of the early feminine notabilities of 1789, who
had not ceased to bestir herself, Mile Thdroigne —
very well known in Paris, owing especially to her
democratic sentiments having become suspected of
backsliding — was arrested by the populace and brought
before the committee with head-quarters at the Feuil
lants to the repeated cries of { To a lamp-post with
her ! ' The crowd became so great, so considerable
and threatening, that the members of the committee
despaired of saving the unfortunate Amazon ; when
Marat arrived on the scene the danger was imminent
for the members of the committee, who were delaying
handing her over to the mercies of the mob. Marat
said to them, ' I will save her.' Leading Mile
Thdroigne by the hand, he showed himself to the
enraged people, saying : 'Citizens, are you bent on
attempting the life of a woman ? Are you going to
sully yourselves with such a crime ? The law alone
has the right to strike. Show your contempt for this
courtesan and reserve your dignity, citizens.' The
word of the friend of the people quieted the gathering.
Marat, taking advantage of this moment of calm,
dragged Mile Theroigne away and led her into the hall
of the Convention, his bold action saving her life."

Brissotine 341
Among the many accounts of the assault by her
historians were those by Michelet, who accused the
Montagnards ; by Gabriel her contemporary, who spoke
of the furies of the guillotine, Lamartine following his
example ; the Goncourts say by Sans-Jupons ; Lalanne
by women of the Socidtd Fraternelle ; Restif de la
Breton by the royalist women of the Halles ; Duval,
who is usually amongst the most vivid, contented him
self by saying that she was attacked " by the crowd
that gathered round her." As to the result of her
punishment there is little doubt. For weeks Theroigne
was ill and wretched. She had suffered both in mind
and body. Mdderer, when he had examined her state
of health at Kufstein, had foreseen that excitement and
overstrain were dangerous for her and that there was a
tendency to mental affliction. He might have warned
her that in throwing herself heart and soul into the
people's cause she would be stricken by a fever that
would attack the seat of reason itself.
One of the most reliable pen-pictures of Theroigne
was written at this period by George Forster, President
of the University of Mainz, who was nominated by the
people of that city to be their representative at Paris
in the beginning of the Revolution. He dwelt on her
intellectual gifts, threw light upon her position, and
foreshadowed the brain trouble that was to overtake
her before long.
" Imagine," he says, " a five- or eight-and-twenty
year-old brown-haired maiden, with the most candid
face, and features which were once beautiful, and are
still partly so, and a simple steadfast character full of
spirit and enthusiasm ; particularly something gentle

342 A Woman of the Revolution
in eye and mouth. Her whole being is wrapped up
in her love of liberty. She talked much about the
Revolution ; her opinions were without exception
strikingly accurate and to the point. The ministry at
Vienna she judged with a knowledge of facts which
nothing but peculiar readiness of observation could
have given.
" She is from Luxemburg, and is naturally most eager
for the freedom of her own country and for Germany.
She speaks nothing but French, fluently and energeti
cally, though not altogether correctly. But who speaks
it correctly now ? She has a strong thirst for instruc
tion ; says she wishes to go into the country and
there study to supply the deficiencies of her education.
She wishes for the company of a well-informed man,
who can read and write well ; and is ready to give him
his board and two thousand livres a year. She is no
more than a peasant-girl, she said, but has a taste
for learning. She must still have enough to live upon,
although she said she had used up her income, for
she lives in quite good condition here and keeps a
carriage. " Six or seven weeks ago the furies who sit in the
tribunes of the Convention dragged her out into the
garden of the Tuileries, beat her about the head with
stones, and would have drowned her in the basin if
help had not fortunately arrived. But since that
time she has frightful headaches and looks wretchedly
ill." The worst was to come.

CHAPTER X
LA SALPETRIERE
FEW of the revolutionaries escaped a violent end.
Nearly all Theroigne's associates suffered the
final penalty of the law. Brissot, Barnave, Saint-Just,
and Basire were guillotined. Petion's body was found
partially devoured by wild dogs in a field whither he
had fled from the scaffold. Romme stabbed himself
to escape the executioners, Condorcet took poison for -
the same purpose. Collot d'Herbois was deported.
The deaths of Robespierre, Marat, Danton are familiar
to every one. But the fate that was meted out to
Theroigne was as tragic as all these, and many may
agree more tragic still.
For over twenty years she was shut up in a mad
house, babbling of liberty, of equality, and of the rights
of man.
Many of her biographers stated that she went mad
as a result of the ill treatment at the hands of the
Jacobins women ; Lamartine, de Goncourt, and Michelet
are amongst the number. Beaulieu says that soon after
the assault she was in an asylum ; but Forster, as we
know, saw her about two months later, and there
appeared to be nothing worse the matter with her than
that she complained of bad headaches.
On July 5th she was still attending to financial
343

344 A Woman of the Revolution
matters and wrote a business letter to MM. Le Couteulx
et Cie, bankers to the Baron de Selys, about the settle
ment of a sum of one thousand five hundred and
fifty-six livres claimed by the Baron. The letter
contains reference to the much-disputed jewellery. A
receipt was sent to her on the 9th of the month. That
autumn — it was the autumn that witnessed the execu
tion of Marie-Antoinette — perhaps not till early in the
following year, she suffered from mental aberration,
which caused her to commit some absurdity or other
which led to her arrest. Her brother Joseph, whom
she had helped to train as an artist in Rome, published
a notice in the spring of 1794, warning the authorities
that his sister's mental condition did not warrant her
administering her own estate, and begging that she
might be put under restraint for the sake of her own
safety and of those about her. It is quite probable
that he knew the risk she ran of imprisonment, and
feared lest harsher treatment would be her lot when
confined in a dungeon than if she were placed in a
madhouse. An order to this effect was made out on
June 30th, 1794, but by that time Theroigne had been
in a house of detention for three days. Her room
on the fourth floor of the Rue Honore, No. 273,
had been entered, her papers seized and sealed, and
amongst her possessions was a sabre which the police
confiscated. Then Joseph Terwagne, perhaps fearing the guillotine
for her, again addressed the authorities. He informed
them that the mental state of his sister being incurable
madness, he was prepared to take entire charge of her,
and desired to claim her liberty. He offered to make

La Salpetriere 345
himself entirely responsible, and to provide her with
every form of assistance which humanity and fraternity
could suggest. Moreover, he promised to take every
precaution rendered necessary and prudent by her
condition. He was convinced that her arrest was
the result of actions performed under aberration of
intellect. On September 20th, 1794, her madness was certified
to as of some standing, and she was removed from
the house of detention in the Section Le Peletier and
placed in an asylum in the Faubourg Marceau, no great
distance from her brother's abode in the Rue Croule-
barbe. In her lucid moments she appealed to friends
or strangers to assist her in getting free. Once she
leaned out of the window and called to a neighbour, "
who interested himself unavailingly in her position.
Another time she had addressed a letter to Saint-Just,
the olive-complexioned deputy for Aisne, which was
afterwards found among his papers, and which bears
evidences of a wandering mind. This letter was
written two days before Saint-Just shared the fate of
Couthon and Robespierre on July 28th, 1794.
" Citizen Saint- Just," she writes, " I am still under
arrest. I have lost precious time. I have written to
you to beg you to send me two hundred livres, and
to come and see me. I received no reply. I do not
feel much gratitude towards the patriots for leaving me
here, bereft of everything. It seems to me that they
ought not to be indifferent that I am here, and that
I am doing nothing. I sent you a letter in which I say
that it is I who said I had friends in the palace of the
Emperor, that I was unjust as far as Citizen Bosque was

346 A Woman of the Revolution
concerned, and that I am sorry about it. They told
me that I had forgotten to sign the letter. That was
want of attention on my part. I should be charmed to
see you for a moment. If you cannot come to me,
if your time does not permit it, could I not be accom
panied on the way to see you ? I have a thousand
"things to say to you. It is necessary to establish the
union ; it is necessary for me to develop all my plans,
to continue to write as I have written. I have great
things to say. I can assure you that I have made
progress. I have neither paper, nor light, nor any
thing ; but even then it would be necessary that I
should be free to be able to write. It is impossible to
do anything here. My stay has taught me something,
but if I remain longer, if I remain longer without doing
anything, without publishing anything, I should learn
to despise the patriots and the civic crown. You know
that there has been discussion, both about you and me,
and that the proof of union is in the results. There
must be fine writings to give strong impulses. You
know my principles. I am grieved never to have
spoken to you before my arrest. I presented myself
at your house. They told me that you were diminagi.
It is to be hoped that the patriots will not leave me a
victim to. intrigue. I can still repair everything if you
will aid me. But it is necessary that I should be where
I shall be respected, for they neglect no means of show
ing contempt for me. I have already spoken to you
of my plan. Whilst waiting until this can be arranged,
until I have found a house where I can be safe from
intrigue, where I can be worthily surrounded by virtue,
I beg that they will send me back home.

La Salpetriere 347
" I shall be under a thousand obligations if you will
lend me two hundred livres.
" Farewell."
By this time Thdroigne had been reduced to a sad
state of helplessness. Carlyle describes it well :
"The poor demoiselle's head and nervous system,
none of the soundest, is so tattered and fluttered that
it will never recover ; but flutter worse and worse till
it crack : and within year and day we hear of her
in madhouse and strait-waistcoat, which proves per
manent ! Such brown-locked figure did flutter, and
inarticulately jabber and gesticulate, little able to speak
the obscure meaning it had, through some segment of
the eighteenth century of time."
Villiers saw her at the Hotel Dieu in 1797, and
described the vacant stare, the meaningless utterances
which fell from her lips. On December 9th of that
year she was transferred to the Salpetriere ; from
there she went, on January nth, 1800, to the Petites
Maisons, where she remained until her return to the
Salpetriere on December 7th, 1807.
Her romantic chroniclers follow her even into the
retreat of the insane.
The letters " published by the Vicomte de V  y,"
written in reality by Lamothe Langon, purport to be
her correspondence when at La Salpetriere. Their
author claims that they contain the charms of fiction
united with positive reality, of history more engaging
than romance. He made her say : " The tranquillity
of the spot is insupportable. One might sleep through
the whole day. The cannon of the Pont Neuf never

348 A Woman of the Revolution
thunders. There is no singing of the 'Marseillaise'
or the ' Carmagnole ' in the neighbouring streets. . . .
The sovereign people, where are they ? " Strange
visions of crowds appeared to her in that quiet cell.
She rarely knew she was alone. " All our old friends
become our enemies ; follow one after the other. . . .
If you could only see how they look at me ; if you
could only hear their plaints ! . . . Danton, for
example ! . . . And Suleau — Suleau. He rarely
leaves me. He speaks litde ; he stands apart ; he
places himself by the window, against the door.
Sometimes he appears enveloped in the curtains of
my bed, only his mutilated and bleeding head show
ing. . . . The rascal ! He mocks at me, he offends
my sight. . . . And I, sometimes I am frightened.
Sometimes I charge at him, when he is not looking,
and bury my finger-nails deep in his expressionless
eyes." Other ghostly visitors appear : Robespierre, his
brother, Robespierre le Jeune, Egalitd, and Mirabeau.
" The Count chuckles, the Prince grinds his teeth
together, the lawyer plays foolish tricks. They say
that their suffering is great. They are experiencing
terrible pains and penalties below. They await me."
And they vanish.
Another chronicler gives a still more lurid glimpse
of her madness.
" She was seized with a fever," he says, " during
which she raved of nothing but bloody heads and of
devils demanding her as their prey. 'Do you not
see,' she would exclaim, 'hell open under my feet,
ready to swallow me up ! Do you not see Suleau,

La Salpetriere 349
with his head on, though bleeding, calling out to me,
" Thdroigne, you are my assassin ! the furies of hell
are waiting for you, to torment you through all
eternity !
But enough of such sensationalism.
Towards 1808 Thdroigne had periods of greater
lucidity, and recognised among the visitors at the
Salpetriere an official personage who had played a part
in the Revolution. She heaped insults on his head,
reproaching him for having betrayed the cause of the
people. Several names have been suggested for this
individual, among them those of Sidyes and of Reg-
naud de Saint-Jean d'Angdly. At this time the latter
was busying himself on her behalf, being anxious to
improve her condition if possible.
On March 21st, 1808, he addressed a letter to the
Prefect of the Department of Ourthe :
" Monsieur," he wrote, " I beg you to make every
inquiry possible at Mdricourt, near to Lidge, concern
ing the family of Mile Theroigne.
" She has some money of her own, yet her relatives
have left her in the hospital without resources and in
a most deplorable condition.
" I beg you will obtain all possible information as
quickly as you can concerning the goods possessed and
still in the possession of Mile Thdroigne.
" It is believed that this unfortunate being has been
robbed." The Prefect of Ourthe put the matter into the
hands of a subordinate, the sous-Prefect of Huy, on
March 26th, 1808 ; but it was not until May 1809
that a reply came to this appeal. It was written to

35° A Woman of the Revolution
the sous-Prefect of Huy on April 28th, 1809, by
Sieur N. Biron, the Mayor of Filat, as follows :
"When I received the letter which you did me
the honour to write me on the 19th of this month,
I hastened, sir, to make every inquiry possible con
cerning the supposed village of Mdricourt, where
the family of Mile Thdroigne were said to have
resided. " However, no village of this name exists in the
district of Xhoris, nor in the canton of Ferrieres.
But in seeking more deeply into the object of your
inquiry, I have obtained some information concerning
a lady who was known by this name, and who may
have been a native of Mdricourt in the department of
Sambre and Meuse.
"At the rise of the Revolution there arrived at
Xhoris an adventuress, dressed in a riding-habit and
known as Theroigne de Mdricourt, who was visiting
some of her relatives of the name of Terwagne in this
district. " This lady spent some months in this country, and
I believe I saw her myself sometimes in masculine
1 clothes flirting with the coquettes of the neighbour
hood, and sometimes in clothes more befitting her sex
and in the company of certain frivolous young men.
She suddenly disappeared, and they said that she went
back to Paris, from which city she apparently had
come thither."
Then he went on to say that the name of the family
was Terwagne, but at that distance it was impossible
for him to obtain better information concerning her
relatives, although at Xhoris she might have distant

La Salpetriere 351
connections who were living a simple and regular life
on small but definite means.
During the interval which had occurred since his
inquiry and the answer to it, Regnaud de Saint-Jean
d'Angely had become Minister of State and might
no doubt have used his authority to ameliorate the
conditions in which Theroigne was living. Perhaps
he had forgotten her existence by then, or, which is
quite as probable, the authorities assured him that the
manner in which she lived was more that of her own
choice than of necessity. No change was made in her
surroundings. The last account of her is a medical one written by
Esquirol in his work on " Insanity," but it gives an
exaggerated picture of her actions in the Revolution.
" Tdroenne or Theroigne de Mericourt," he writes,
" was a celebrated courtesan, born in the city of
Luxemburg. She was of medium height, had chest
nut-coloured hair, large blue eyes, a changeful physiog
nomy, and a sprightly, free, and even elegant carriage.
The girl, in the opinion of some of honourable birth,
and in that of others springing from the rank of
courtesans, acted a truly deplorable part during the
first years of the Revolution. She was then from
twenty-eight to thirty years of age. She devoted her
self to the various chiefs of the popular party, to
whom she was of service in most of the riotous dis
turbances, and attempted, especially on the 5 th and
6th of October, 1789, to corrupt the Regiment of
Flanders, by leading into its ranks women of ill-fame,
and by distributing money among the soldiers. In
1790 she was sent into the city of Lidge to arouse the

352 A Woman of the Revolution
people. She there took a military rank. She made
herself remarkable among this unbridled populace,
which was sent to Versailles on the 5th and 6th of
October, 1790. The Austrians arrested her in the
month of January 1791. She was conducted to
Vienna and confined in a fortress. The Emperor
Leopold saw her, conversed with her, and caused her
to be set at liberty in December of the same year.
She returned to Paris, and once more appeared upon
the stage during the period of the Revolution. She
then made herself conspicuous upon the terraces of the
Tuileries, and on the rostrum, haranguing the people
with boldness, in_order to bring them back to moderation
and the Constitution. This course cannot'liuitTfer
long. The Jacobins shortly repair to Tdroenne, and
we immediately see her appear, a red bonnet upon her
head, a sword by her side, and a pike in her hand,
commanding an_ army of women. She took an active
part in the events of September 1792. Although it
may not be proved that she participated in the massa
cres, it is said, nevertheless, that she entered the court
of the abbey and with her sword cut off the head of
an unfortunate man whom they were conducting to
the tribunal of this prison. We are assured that it
was a former lover.
" When the Directory was established and__popular
associations ^ceased,. Thdroigne lost her reason. She
was taken to a house in the Suburb St. Marceau.
They found among the papers of Saint-Just a letter
from her, dated July 26th, 1794, in which signs of
a wandering intellect are shown. In November 1800
she was sent to the Salpetriere, and in the following

La Salpetriere 353
month was transferred to the Petites Maisons, where
she remained seven years. When the Administration
of Hospitals caused the insane to be removed from the
Petites Maisons, Thdroigne returned to the Salpetriere,
September 1807. She was then about forty-seven
years of age. At the time of her admission she was
very much agitated, reviling and threatening everybody,
speaking only of liberty, of committees, of public
safety, revolutionary committees, and accusing all who
approached her of being moderates and royalists. In
1808 a distinguished personage, who had figured as
chief of a party, visited the Salpetriere. Theroigne
recognised him, raised herself from the bed of straw
upon which she was lying, and overwhelmed the visitor
with abusive language ; accusing him of having
abandoned the popular party, and of being a Moderate,
to whom a decree of the Committee of Public Safety would
soon do justice.
"In 1 8 1 o she becomes more composed, and falls
into a state of dementia, which enables us to observe
traces of her early prevailing ideas. Thdroigne was
unwilling to wear any clothing. Every day, both
morning and^evening, and many times a day, she
waters her bed, or rather the straw of it, with several
buckets of water, lies down, and covers herself with.
her sheet only in summer, and with both sheet and
coverlid in winter. She amuses herself in walking with
naked feet in her cell, which was flagged with stone,
and inundated with water. Severe cold causes her to>
change this regimen in no respect. Never have they
succeeded in inducing her to sleep in a night garment,
nor to employ a second covering. During the last
21

354 A Woman of the Revolution
three years of her life she was provided with a very
large morning gown, which, however, she rarely put
on. When it froze, and she had not water in
abundance, she was accustomed to break the ice, and
take the water which she obtained from it and wet
her body, particularly her feet.
" Although in a small and gloomy cell, very damp
and without furniture, she enjoys good health, and
pretends to be occupied with very important matters.
She smiles at persons who accost her, and sometimes
replies hastily, ' I don't know you,' and conceals
herself under her covering. It is rare that she replies
correctly. She often says, ' I do not know ; I have
forgotten.' If they insist she becomes impatient, and
talks to herself in a low voice. She articulates phrases,
interspersed with the words fortune, liberty, committee,
Revolution, rascal, warrant, decree, etc. She applies
many of them to the Moderates. She is angry and
transported with passion when opposed, especially
: when they desire to prevent her from taking water.
She once bit a companion with so much fury as to
;. take out a piece of flesh. The disposition of this
woman had therefore outlived her understanding.
She rarely leaves her cell, generally remaining there
in bed. . . . She takes but few steps, most frequently
proceeding upon all fours, and extends herself upon
the ground. ... 1 have seen her devour straw,
feathers, dried leaves, and morsels of meat lying in
the dirt. She drinks cistern water whilst they wash
the courts, although it may be dirty, preferring this
drink to every other.
" I endeavoured to induce her to write. She traced

La Salpetriere 355
a few words, but was never able to complete a
sentence. She never gave any indication of hysteria.
When we wished to obtain her portrait in 1816 she
willingly sat for it, but appeared to attach no im
portance to the work of the painter. . . ." This was
the extraordinary representation of Theroigne by
Gabriel. On May ist, 181 7, her physical health gave way.
She was taken to the infirmary, where she died on
June 9th, at the age of fifty-seven, without for a
moment being restored to reason. An autopsy showed
the abnormal condition of her brain.
Thus, at the hour when the great Napoleon was
wearing out his life in distant Saint Helena, the career
of Theroigne de Mdricourt came to its sad close. It
was difficult to see again, in the blotched, livid, and
fleshless creature she had become, the heroic charm,
the clear flaming eyes of the woman of the people,
whose great love had not been lavished upon a man
or upon men, but upon an ideal, the passion for justice, I
for liberty — for the Revolution.

APPENDIX A
THEROIGNE AND THE ROYALIST PRESS
REFERENCE has been made in the text to the treatment
of Theroigne by the Royalist Press. Among the many
journals which caricatured her, the Actes des Apotres was per
haps the worst offender. The skit entitled "Club de la
Revolution" appeared in N0.23. N0.32 contains a letter dated
February 2nd, 1790, written from the H6tel de Grenoble, in
which Theroigne is supposed to say:
" Your journal, monsieur, being consecrated to the purpose of
spreading throughout the universe the new principles intended to
ensure the happiness of France and of all other nations, I beg you
to insert in one of your first demagogic works the beginning of a
poem I wish to dedicate to one of the most illustrious sovereigns
who has filled the chair of the nation with capability and weight.
My righteous impatience to sing the praises of this great genius does
not allow me to wait for the conclusion of the work which I have
the honour of addressing you, if the public will deign to accept this
feeble attempt by a feminine national muse. She dare not flatter
herself that she will score a success with it, unless on account of
the important topic she handles, a topic which should render her
poem interesting to all posterity.
" I am, with admiration of your demagogy, monsieur, your very
humble and obedient servant, equal in rights and in knowledge
of man,
" Theroigne de Mericourt,
" Wife of the Modern Sovereign."
Then follows a so-called " herio-natio-epi-constitutiono-politico-
comic " poem entitled " La Targetade:" beginning :
Je chante ce lourdaud, president de la France,
Et par droit de manege et par droit d'importance.
357

35 8 Appendix A
The first part of the Populus play referred to on page 119
appears in No. 38. Populus, Mirabeau, and Barnave are repre
sented as her lovers. The Abbe Sieyes also plays a part.
In one act she is made to say :
O destins fortunes, triomphe glorieux !
Vingt senateurs par jour remplissant tous mes voeux
Accourent a mes pieds, d'une flamme immortelle
Presenter a l'amour une offrande nouvelle.
She swears to Populus that she loves no one but him. Never
theless, Populus has been told that Mirabeau is his rival. He
offers to fight him ; an offer that Mirabeau refuses on principle,
for he never fights. The farce continues. Two more lovers
appear, Barnave and Anon, under which guise Camille Des
moulins was indicated. At length the Secretary of the Assembly
arrives and tells Theroigne that before the end of the day she
must privately choose between her lovers. In doubt, Theroigne
soliloquises : O ciel, dans quel incertitude
Flottent mes sens et mes esprits !
She appeals to Mirabeau, regretting that she is not permitted to
divide her affections amongst several, and asks him to remain at
her feet at least till Populus comes. But he flees from her cry
ing, " Que le diable t'emporte."
In the end she makes it up with Populus.
Thdroigne
Tu me verras, malgre ce soupcon trop injuste,
Fidele a mes serments comme la diete auguste.
Populus
Dans cet heureux espoir, sans doute, il m'est bien doux
De mettre, avec mon cceur, un trone a tes genoux.
Theroigne
Protege ces noeuds saints, 6 dieu de la patrie !
Et que les Populus qui nous devront la vie,
De 1'aristocratie ardens persecuteurs,
Deviennent potentats et regenerateurs ;
Puisse le tendre amour sur leur jeune visage
Imprimer d'un epoux la seduisante image ;
Et que regulateurs des destins de Petat,
Chacun d'eux, soit un jour president du senat.
and so the play closes.

Thdroigne and the Royalist Press 359
The following appears in No. 47 of the same journal. " This
morning the beautiful Mericourt, displeased with her maid, spoke
harshly to her. The servant, making a mistaken application of
the first article of the Declaration of the Rights of Men and ¦
Women,. dared to use her hands against our incomparable friend,
and knocked her down in a manner quite new to Mile Theroigne.
The neighbours say she fell backwards and appeared to go into
convulsions. Then she remained quiet for a time as though she
were dead." A bulletin as to her condition appeared in No. 49.
" This divine maiden, restored by heaven . . . was within an ace
of death." Doctors, surgeons, and apothecaries were called in to
relieve her, and the treatment which brought about a cure was by
applications of discourses by M. de Gouay d'Arcy on her left
temple, perorations by Target, and a harangue by Mirabeau
steeped in salts of ammonia.
For a few numbers she was left in peace, and then followed
coarse jokes in which Target and Mme de Stael figured.
In No. 94 Robespierre is supposed to refer to her in a letter to
one Mile Suzanne Forber. "You know Mile Thdroigne ?" he
writes. " We often speak of you. She is going to be married,"
and he proceeds to ask his correspondent to look up certain
records at Arras, her home, in order that she may trace
Theroigne's descent from the noble family of the Comte de
Terouenne. Some numbers later the reply to this letter comes,
in which there is given a remarkable genealogical tree from which
the "Semiramis of* the Revolution," as Suzanne Forber names
her, is supposed to have sprung.
In the interval another letter from Thdroigne appears to her
virtuous friends the Apostles, in which she signs herself " frater
nally as demagogically, your sincere and faithful friend."
In No. 98 a marriage has been arranged between Quichotte-
Hudibras-Rodomant-Gavachin, hitherto known as the Marquis
de Saint-Huruge, and Demoiselle Madelon-Friquet-Dulcinee-
Theroigne de Mericourt, majeure a"ans et mineure de coutume,
a widow by her first marriage with Cromwell-Honore-Mirabeau ;
and this affords great distress to Populus.
Some numbers later she is affianced to Populus again, and a
grand account of the national marriage celebrated at Surenne, near
Pj«ris, between M. Populus and Dlle Theroigne de Mere-y-court,
is given.

360 Appendix A
The marriage day of Dona Terouenne was announced by a
discharge of 60 guns in honour of the 60 districts of Paris, and
60 presidents were invited to the ceremony. The priest who
pronounced the nuptial blessing called her the rositre ginirale
of the French empire, the star of the nation three times, the star
of 39 provinces of the kingdom, the torch of 83 departments,
and the people cried three times "Vive Terouenne, vive Populus,
vive Robespierre ! " There was a dinner, opera, ballet, and
altogether a brilliant fete, after which Lady Terouenne, mounting
her good steed, rides off to quell an insurrection and leaves
Populus repining. At the close of twenty-eight printed pages he
is consoled and all ends well with the verse :
J'aimais Terouenne et j'ai perdu son cceur,
Pendant trois jours, mon ame en fut emue ;
Mais, a la fin, jugeant mieux mon malheur,
Je vis que ce n'etait qu'une fille perdue.
The Apocalypse was a short way behind the Actes des Apdtres
in profuseness of ridicule, but not at all in coarseness. In its
pages Mme de Stael becomes a joint victim with Theroigne. In
No. 3 the following appears : " Carried away by her patriotism,
Thdroigne made a speech at the Jacobins. She spoke with that
victorious eloquence which masters minds and obtains votes.
Suddenly her voice grew weak, and in the middle of a phrase
she went off into a dead faint. General consternation ensued.
Barnave, Mirabeau, Le Chapelier, and Robespierre rushed to
wards the daughter of the Revolution and made her inhale
aromatic vinegar. Dr. Guillotin was unfortunately absent, and
Populus, distracted, ran to find him."
No. 4 contains a letter to the authors of the Apocalypse
purporting to be from Mirabeau's head jockey. He has had
the pleasure of reading the pages of their journal in Mile
Theroigne's boudoir when he went there to deliver his master's
Jove-letters. He describes a banquet followed by a picnic to
Longchamp, at which Theroigne, dressed in her favourite riding-
habit, led the way mounted on a superb English bay. Mirabeau
followed in a gorgeous "wiski." Then came a number of others,
and in the rear Mme de Stael and Talleyrand in a berline.
When the cavalcade reached the Bois de Boulogne, the wheels of
the wiski became entangled in the trees and it overturned,

Theroigne and the Royalist Press 361
precipitating its occupant upon mother earth. Unfortunately
Le Chapelier's horses rushed upon the debris of the wiski aid
his cabriolet was upset, whilst the berline came down ipon the
Test. The resulting jumble must be read in the original to be
appreciated. In No. 7 there is a rechristening of many of the Paris streets.
The Rue des Boucheries was to be renamed Rue Barnave ; the
Rue du Brave, Mirabeau ; the Rue Tire-Boudin, Rue de Stael,
and so on ; while the Rue des Sept-Voies was to be known in
future as Rue Theroigne.
Coarse jests run likewise through Nos. 10, 12, 14, 16, 18,
and 19.
The Journal de Pie of February nth, 1792, remarks that
Theroigne was received well by the Jacobins, and that she had
reversed her principles. A few days later the following appears
in its pages : " Mme D., having said aloud some days ago when
she saw Mile Thdroigne de Mericourt that she wore a Jacobin
air, was accosted in the Rue S. Martin, near the Cafd de l'Estrade,
by four sansculottes who struck her a violent blow on the chest
which knocked her down. She was saved from the hands of
these brigands by an honest gentleman of her acquaintance who
put them to flight. Some one cried out, ' We must complain
to M. Petion.' One of the brigands turned round and shouted
back, ' He won't hurt us.' We leave it to honest folk to make
their comments on this expression, clear as it is to us."
On February 27th, 1792, there is an account of ajiufil between
Theroigne and a lady aristocrat. They did not catch hold of
each other by the hair, as the spectators half expected they
would, but they arranged a meeting in the Bois de Boulogne.
Instead of using gunpowder, their seconds loaded the pistols
with powder for the hair, and all the shots missed fire. This
joke displeased the principals so deeply that they avenged them
selves upon the perpetrators for the affront offered to their
courage. The Martyrologe National, the Chronique du Manege, and
the Feuille du Jour were amongst the papers that amused
themselves at Theroigne's expense. A quotation from the pages
of Le Rodeur will serve to complete this short account of her
claims to be regarded as a never-failing target for the shafts of wit
let loose by aristocrat pamphleteers :

362 Appendix A
" ' Le Rodeur ' reuni au chroniqueur secret de la
Revolution
" Mile TifrP^grre, who continually appears as the object of the
good and bad pleasEffiries of MM. the soi-disant forty-five directors
of the National Company of the Actes des Apotres, is not an
imaginary being, as many ignorant people have believed. She
is an amiable young lady of two-and-twenty, born in the Luxem
burg. She was at Rome when M. Bailli sounded at Versailles
the destruction of all the orders, and hastened to return to the
banks of the Seine to protect the dawning liberty of the French.
Her enthusiasm for the rights of man soon made itself felt, and,
as she took up the cause of the people with great warmth, the
forty-five apostles imagined an intrigue between her and M. Populus.
This admirable girl has neither father nor mother ; but she enjoys
an income of ten thousand livres, which she shares with the
honourable architects of the French Constitution. The honorables
to whom she gives dinner have praised her; she has become
noticeable in the Salle du Manege, assisting regularly at all the
meetings, at all the debates, and encouraging by gesture and
voice the honourable members. Revolutionary committees have
been held at her house. They have driven many nails into the
machinery of the Constitution ; they have so exalted the rights
of man that the forty-five apostles, seized by utter aristocratic
impotence, have permitted themselves every form of ridicule and
detraction that jealous rage could devise. Into what gall have
they not dipped their pens of base alloy in the process of
besmirching so vast a reputation as that of _our__heroine ! How
correct was Voltaire when he called envy the eighth human sin !
But that which will astonish our descendants and the centuries
which are still in the embryo in the abyss of time, is that among
the friends of Mile Theroigne there is not one who has dared
publicly to take up the cause of this adorable nymph and to
prove her inviolable in the eyes of the forty-five apostles. The
honorables have maintained a far too modest silence in this
matter, and have contented themselves with meriting the superb
device of Louis IV. : " Regna Assignata
Page terra marique parta."

APPENDIX B
NOTE ON SOME PORTRAITS OF THEROIGNE DE
MERICOURT
r. A PAINTING at the Musee Carnavalet attributed to Vestier.
Jr\. Thdroigne is wearing a ribbon in her fair hair and a
fichu over a yellow bodice. Frontispiece.
2. A painting at the Musee Carnavalet. Artist unknown.
3. A painting attributed to Greuze, exhibited at the Trocadero
in 1878. Described by Henry Jouin in "Notices des Portraits
Nationaux" (1879). "En buste, la tete tournee vers 1'epaule
gauche ; robe bleue, ouverte, fichu croise ; ceinture blanche ;
grand bonnet sur les cheveux." Page 33.
4. Portrait at the Bibliotheque Nationale, wearing a cap of
linen over her hair, which falls over her shoulders in ringlets.
One breast uncovered. Reproduced by Dayot.
5. A drawing by Danlou; wearing an Amazon hat with tri
coloured ribbons. In the possession of the Vicomte de Reiset
and reproduced in the Carnet. Page 213.
6. An engraving by Devritz of No. 4. Page 177.
7. Portrait appearing as a frontispiece to M. Marcellin Pellet's
" Life of Theroigne," and discovered by him.
8. A sketch by Raffet reproduced in Lamartine's "Histoire
des Girondins," inspired probably by the portrait in the
Bibliotheque Nationale. Page 105.
9. The profile drawing by Gabriel, made at the La Salpetriere
in 18 1 6 when Thdroigne was mad. This is the only authentic
portrait. Page 335.

363

INDEX

Actes des Apotres (Les), 117, 119,
131, 134, 139, 300, 314
Aiguillon, Duc de, 132
Arne, Dr., 42
Artois, Comte d', 67, 74, 81
Audu, Reine, 322
Bailly, 81, 114, 264
Barnave, 67, 122, 134, 135, 136,
263, 343
Ban-as, 340
Barreau, Alexandrine, 273
Basire, 294, 295, 343
Bastille, 74. 75. 76, 77, 79- 80, 85,
299 ; Plate of Fall of the Bas
tille, 69
Baudet, 145
Beauharnais, 122, 260
Bedford, Duke of, 122
Bender, Marechal, 202, 203
Berthier, 83, 293
Billaud- Varennes, 325
Bosc d'Antic, 128
Bouille, 304
Bouyon, Abb6, 313
Brent, Miss, 42
Brissot, 120, 122, 132, 140, 325,
338. 343 ". Portrait, 267
Broglie, Due de, 136
Bronsonnet, 296, 297
Campinados, Mme, Theroigne
known as, 22, 36, 41, 46
Carra, 200, 202, 203
Cazotte, Elizabeth, 325
Cervenon, 41
Chabot, 294, 305
Chabray, Louison, 97
Chamfort, 122
Champcenetz, 117, 118, 134
Chapelier, 67, 136, 137
Charton, Mme, 179

Chateauvieux, 122, 261, 296, 297-
3°o. 3°3- 3°4
Chdnier, Andre:, 297, 298
Chenier, M. J., 122, 297, 298 ;
Portrait, 249
Clamend, Leonard, 243
Clamend, Mme, 23
Clermont Tonnerre, 121, 132
Cloots, A., 140
Club des Cordeliers, 80, 114, 140,
144, 147. 150
Club des Feuillants, 114, 126
Club des Jacobins, 140, 147, 162,
201, 225, 264, 265, 290, 295, 296,
298, 3°4. 326, 352
Colbert, Mme, 23, 25, 26
Collot d'Herbois, 291, 297, 304,
305, 326, 343
Conde, Prince de, 82, 206
Condorcet, 122, 125, 131, 154, 155,
343
Condorcet, Mme de, 132, 305, 328
" Contrat Social," 180
Couthon, 345
Cramer, Professor, 46
Custine, 326
Daguet, 128
Dansard, 166
Danton, 114, 140, 149, 167, 266,
326, 343, 348
Dauphin (Louis XVII.), 309, 320
David, Giacomo, 39, 40
David, J. L., 298, 299, 300
Day of Poignards, 263
De Launay, 75, 76, 78, 79
Desmoulins, Camille, 74, 114,
120, 122, 140, 147, 149, 299,
3iS
Dufourny, 269, 270
Dumouriez, 327, 328
Dupont de Nemours, 298

365

366

Index

Duport-Dutertre, 197
Durazzo, Marquis, 57, 58, 59
Ecureux, Henriette, 175
Elie, 76
Elizabeth, Archduchess of Austria,
210
Elliott, Mrs., 192, 193
Espinchal, Comte Thomas d', 34
Esquirol, 35 1
Fabre d'Eglantine, 140, 149
Fauchet, Abbe, 305
Feast of Pikes, 259, 260
Fernig Sisters, 273, 275
Forster, George, 341
Foulon, 83, 293
Franklin, Benjamin, 303
Frederick the Great, 185
Freiburg in Breisgau, 208, 209,
227
Gabriel, 341
Garat, 67
Gattey, 117
Gaudet, 266, 305, 325
Genlis, Comtesse de, 122, 167
Girondins, 326, 328, 337, 338
Gorsas, 296
Gouttes, Abbe, 137
Greiffenstein, Rudlervon, 208
Greuze, 122
Guillotin, Dr., 132
Hall, Adela, 319
Hammersley, 35, 59, 60
Hebert, 167
Helvetius, Mme, 122, 125
Hion, 266, 299
Hulin, 76
Hyde de Neuville, 145, 146
Joseph II., Emperor of Austria,
185, 191
Kaunitz, Prince, 246, 253, 271
Kertzen, 41
Kufstein, 20, 125, 163, 208, 217,
240, 245, 256, 257
La Boverie, 17, 187, 188, 191, 198,
221, 227, 234, 235

Lacombe Rose (Claire), 165, 322
La Fargue, 316
Lafayette, 78, 95, 98, ioo, 1 14
Lahaye, Elizabeth, 21
Lahaye, Mme, Theroigne known
as, 247, 253
Lally-Tollendal, 81
Landresc, Baron de, 208, 209, 217,
230
Lanthenas, 271, 272
Larminat, 127, 128
Lasource, 266
Le Blanc, Francois, 222-30, 240,
241, 243-9, 256
Lechoux, 200
Le Comte, Mme, Theroigne known
as, 48
Le Couteulx et Cie, 344
Legislative Assembly, 265, 315,
320
Leon, Pauline, 167
Leopold II., Emperor of Austria,
185, 201, 212, 224, 225, 227,
230, 240, 246, 251, 253, 255, 256,
258, 271, 273, 288, 352 ; Portrait,
'95
Lepelletier, 168
Le Sourd, 315
Liancourt, Due de, 136
Lostalot, 266-70
Louis XIV., 296
Louis XV., 1 1 1
Louis XVI., 67, 80-2, 85, 90, 93,
100, 101, 151, 188, 229, 254, 260,
261, 264, 306, 308-10, 320, 323,
328
Madame Royale, 320
Maillard, 86, 92, 93, 97
Maillebois, Comte de, 237
Manuel, 272
Mara, Mme, 46, 47
Marat, 114, 120, 168, 326, 339, 340,
343
Maret, 128
Marie Antoinette, 19, 67, 80, 82-4,
89, 94, 98-106, 186, 200, 244,
256, 262, 273, 309, 310, 320, 321,
323, 328, 344
Mederer, 245, 246, 341
Meersch, van der, 194
Mengin-Salabert, Baron, 28, 29,
30, 136

Index

367

Mercy-Argenteau, 200, 204, 215,
230, 273
Mesdames, 261, 262
Metternich, 20, 241, 257
Minimes, Societe Fraternelle des,
168, 278, 284, 288
Mirabeau, 67, 98, 114, 118, 122,
132, 136, 139, 140, 194,201,263,
348
Mirabeau ("Tonneau"), 118
Momoro, 140
Montagnards, 326, 328, 341
Montveran, Tournacheau de, 102
Moore, Dr. John, 323, 324
Morellet, 125
Mounier, 67, 93, 98
Napoleon, 355
National Assembly, 63, 66-8, 80,
81, 83, 84, 95, 99-101, 104, 126,
128, 131, 151, 157, 216,229, 26o»
264, 265
National Convention, 265
Necker, 66, 72
Necker, Mme, 121, 122
Noot, Hendrik van der, 192-7
Olympe de Gouges, 132, 157
Orleans, Duc d' (Philippe Egalite),
68, 69, 117, 124, 136, 137, 326,
348
Palais Royal, 68, 72, 79
Palloy, 80, 296
Palm, Etta, 161-5, 167
Pare, 149
Peltier, 117, 118, 319
Peretti, 42
Perregaux, 35, 58, 101, 186, 188,
189, 193, 205, 215, 242, 248, 257,
258, 327
Persan, Marquis de, 32, 36, 37,
53, 58, 190, 248; agreement
with Theroigne, 32 ; his letters,
„ 37-9. 4o, 53-5
Person, M. Francois, 198, 233,
251
Petion, JerOme, 84, 95, 135, 138,
263, 293, 295, 298, 206, 207,
309.310, 315; Portrait, 510
Pitt, William, 328
Poitiers, Mme, Theroigne takes
name of, 182

Polignac, Mme de, 247
Populus, 119, 120, 135, 138, 139,
201, 319; Portrait of, 123
Rabaut de Saint-Etienne, 67
Regnaud de Saint-Jean d'Angely,
349. 351
Renant, Rose, 175
Restaut, 297
Reveillon, 66
Rivarol, 117, 118
Robert, Mme (nee Keralio), 166,
167
Robespierre, 46, 132, 136, 137,
140, 265, 266, 290, 291, 304, 305,
326, 337, 343, 345. 348
Robespierre le Jeune, 348
Roederer, 167, 307
Roland, 122
Roland, Mme, 122-5, 128, 167,
328
Romme, Charles, 127
Romme, Gilbert, 126-31, 139, 343 ;
Portrait, 159
Ronsin, 140
Roucher, 297
Rousseau, Charles Louis, 158, 161
Rousseau, J. J., 1 11, 180, 303
Saint-Huruge, 293, 307
Saint-Just, 140, 343, 345, 352;
Portrait, 301
Saint-Malon, Comte de, 199, 206,
207
Salpetriere, La, 347, 349, 352, 353
Santerre, 291, 292, 303, 309, 310
Santerre, Mme, 291
Schlosser, Antoine, 247
Schoeniger, Andre, 217-23
Selys, Baron de, 237-43, 258, 327,
344
Selys, Mme de, 238, 239, 242
Selys, Victoire de, 238
Septenville, Francoise- Louise, 41
Si6yes, Abbe, 67, 84, 114, 117, 121,
122, 131, 133-7, 139, 215, 260,
270, 349
Sieyes, Joseph-Honor6, 84
Sombreuil, Mile de, 325
Sponville, 127, 128
Stael, Mme de, 121, 134, 305, 328
Strogonoff, Count (Otcher), 127,
130, 139

368

Index

Suleau, F., 118, 311-15, 318-20,
348 ; his birth, 314 ; trial, 314 ; at
Coblenz, 314; his death, 315
Tailhard, 127
Talleyrand, 133, 260
Tallien, 167, 168, 305
Talma, Julie, 122
Target, 67, 133. 134.
Tenducci, Dora, 42-5
Tenducci, Ferdinando, his birth,
41 ; career in United Kingdom,
41-5 ; and Dr. Arne, 42 ; elopes
with an heiress, 42 ; imprisoned,
42 ; in debt, 43, 49 ; his pupils,
46 ; agreement with Theroigne,
47, 48 ; in Paris, 50 ; declared
bankrupt, 53 ; breaks his con
tract, 56, 57
Terwagne, Joseph, 2 1, 53,61,62,340
Terwagne, Pierre, Senior, 21, 50,
235
Terwagne (or Theroigne), Pierre,
Junior, 21, 53, 60-2, 187, 191,
198, 199, 212, 215, 221, 230-6,
239, 242, 243, 253
Terwagne, Pierrot, 62, 243
Theobold, Madame, Theroigne
known as, 20, 218
Theroigne de Mericourt, Anne-
Josephe, birth, 21 ; at convent
school, 22 ; herds cows, 22 ;
appearance, 23 ; education, 24 ;
in London, 25 ; elopes, 26 ; her
musical abilities, 30, 35 ; letters
from the Marquis de Persan,
31. 37-9- 54. 55! meets David,
39 ; her daughter, 41 ; relations
with Tenducci, 41, 45-53, 56,
57 ; in Genoa, 56, 60 ; her
finances, 58-61, 187, 188, 237,
247 ; in Rome, 62 ; interest in
the National Assembly, 63, 66,
68; at the Hdtel de Toulouse,
65 ; in the gardens of the Palais
Royal, 68, 72, 79; on July 14th,
75. 76, 77, 78; on July 17th,
80, 81 ; on October 5th and 6th,
85-109 ; at Versailles, 92, 107 ;
evidence against her, 101-7 ; her
democratic views, 108-10, 207 ;
her club, 113, 125-31, 134-44;
and the royalist press, 118-20,

151, 180, 197, 200, 256, 257,
281, 282, 293-6, 312, 357-62;
figures in a caricature of a club,
133, 134: plate, 141 ; her powers
of oratory, 145-9, 3l7, 3r8 ; at
the Club des Cordeliers, 147-
50 ; marches with the deputies,
152; works for the women's;
cause, 152, 157, 158, 162 ; mem
ber of the Societe Fraternelle
des Minimes, 168 ; her speech
there, 282-8; leaves Paris, 181-4;
afraid of arrest, 183 ; travels to
Marcourt, 1 84-6; her mission
to Brabant, 185, 188, 191, 194-8,
202-4 ; her jewels, 187, 188,
258; at La Boverie, 187, 188,
191, 198-200 ; and van der
Noot, 191, 193 ; and Mercy-
Argenteau, 200,. 204, 230; her
arrest, 202, 204, 205 ; at Coblenz,
206 ; and the Prince de Conde,
207 ; at Freiburg in Breisgau,
208 ; letters to her brother, 212,
230-34; at Kufstein, 221-43;
obtains a piano, 221, 222; her
suffering, 222, 223 ; at the Cha
teau de Fanson, 237 ; and the
Baron de Selys, 237-9, 242, 243 ;
and La Valette, 244 ; her ill
health, 245-8: called Mme
Lahaye, 247 ; letter to Perre
gaux, 248, 257 ; and Le Blanc,
252, 253; in court, 253-6; re
turns to Paris, 258; supposed
doings at Bellevue, 262, 263 ;
reception by the Jacobins, 265-
73 ; her military ardour, 273,
277, 281-4; she receives a
check, 289-92 ; at a civic ban
quet, 292, 293 ; her boudoir,
293-6 ; and the Swiss of
Chateauvieux, 296-304 ; and
Marie-Joseph Chenier, 299, 300 ;
and Mme de Stael, 305 ; and
the demonstrations of June 20,
306-10; on August 10, 311-13,
317-20 ; kills Suleau, 319 ;
receives a civic crown, 322 :
John Moore's description of,
323, 324 ; and the September
massacres, 325 ; and Dumouriez,
327, 328 ; her stirring appeal

Index

369

to the 48 sections, 328-34 ; as
saulted by the Jacobins women,
338-41 ; description by George
Forster, 341, 342 ; her madness,
343 ; arrest, 344 ; letter to Saint-
Just, 345, 346 ; at the Salpetriere,
347-55 ". death, 355 ; Portraits,
Appendix B, 363 ; Plates,
frontispiece, 33, 105, 177, 213,
335
Thiebault, Baron, 315-18
Thouret, 67, 133
Thuriot, 297
Tuileries, 307, 308, 309, 320, 321,
352

Valette, Chevalier Maynard de la,
79, 107-10, 136, 199, 228, 243,
244
Varennes, 263
Vergniaud, 305, 325
Versailles, 68, 81, 83, 84, 90-94,
96, 98, 107, 262, 263, 352 ; march
of the women to, 86 et seq
Veytard, Francois-Xavier, 102, 103
Volney, 67, 122
Voltaire, ill, 264, 303
Walpole, 122
Young, Arthur, 7 1

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