The government, however, at that time, had not thrown off all appearance of law; yet the men who hesitated to throw my mother into prison did not scruple to attempt her assassination. The Septembriseurs, as these hired ruffians were called, were placed for several days about the precincts of the Palais de Justice; but though my mother was warned of her danger, nothing could deter her from daily attending the trial, and seating herself at the feet of her father-in-law, where her devoted mien softened even the hearts of his murderers.
Between each sitting of the court she employed her time in privately soliciting the members of the committees and of the revolutionary tribunal. A friend of my father’s, in costume à la carmagnole, generally accompanied her, and waited for her in the antiroom.
In one of the last sittings of the tribunal her looks had drawn tears even from the women in the gallery, commonly called “the furies of the guillotine,” and the tricoteuses of Robespierre. This so enraged Fouquier-Tinville, the chief prosecutor, that he sent secret peremptory instructions to the assassins outside.
After the accused was re-conducted to prison, his daughter-in-law prepared to descend the steps of the palace, in order to regain, on foot and alone—for none dared openly to accompany her—the hackney coach, which waited for her in a distant street. My mother, naturally timid in a crowd, stood trembling at the head of this long flight of steps, pressed on all sides by an enraged and bloodthirsty populace. Her eyes involuntarily sought the spot where Madame de Lamballe had been murdered some time before. She felt her presence of mind departing, as from the ferocious mob the cry, “It is the daughter of the traitor, it is La Custine,” mingled with horrid imprecations, reached her ears. How was she to pass through this crowd of infernal, rather than human beings? Already some, with naked swords, had placed themselves before her; others, half clothed, had caused their women to draw back—a certain sign that murder was about to be enacted. My mother felt that the first symptom of weakness she might betray would be the signal for her death: she has often related to me that she bit her hands and tongue so as to bring blood, in her endeavor to preserve a calm countenance at this juncture. At length she observed a fishwife among the foremost of the crowd. This woman, who was revolting in appearance, had an infant in her arms. Moved by the God of mothers, the daughter of the traitor approached this mother (a mother is something more than a woman), and said to her, “What a sweet babe you have in your arms!” “Take it,” replied the parent, who understood her by one word and glance; “you can return it to me at the foot of the steps.”
The electricity of maternal feeling had thrilled through these two hearts. It communicated itself also to the crowd. My mother took the child, pressed it to her bosom, and held it as an aegis in her arms.
Man, as the child of nature, resumed his superiority over man brutalized under the influence of social evils. The “civilized” barbarians were vanquished by two mothers. She, who was mine, descended, thus rescued, into the court of the Palais de Justice, unsaluted by even an abusive word. She returned the infant to her who had lent it: they parted without interchanging a syllable: the place was not favorable to thanks or explanations, and they never saw each other afterwards; but assuredly the souls of these mothers will meet in another world.
The young woman thus miraculously saved, could not save her father-in-law. He died, and to crown the glory of his life, the veteran soldier had the courage to die a Christian. A letter to his son attests this humble sacrifice, the most difficult of all, in an age of practical crimes and philosophical virtues. In proceeding to the scaffold he embraced the crucifix. This religious courage ennobled his death, as much as his military courage ennobled his life; but it gave great offense to the Brutuses of Paris.
During the trial of General Custine, my father had published a sober but manly defense of the former’s political and military conduct. This defense, which had been placarded on the walls of Paris, only served to bring upon the author the hatred of Robespierre. He was imprisoned soon after the death of his father. At this period the Reign of Terror was making rapid progress: to suffer arrest was to receive sentence; the process of trial had become a mere form.
From:
LETTERS FROM RUSSIA
ASTOLPHE DE CUSTINE
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