Robespierre : $b the story of Victorien Sardou's play adapted and novelized under his authoritySardou, Victorien
General
Robespierre : $b the story of Victorien Sardou's play adapted and novelized under his authority
Sardou, Victorien
Robespierre, Maximilien, 1758-1794 -- Fiction
Words! Rhetoric! these were his arms. Speech was not incriminating,
but actions were. Words were forgotten, actions lived as facts, and
Robespierre kept as clear of these as possible. During the most
startling manifestations of that horrible revolutionary struggle, he
was never seen, though the work of his hand could be traced
everywhere, for far from retiring he carried fuel to the flames,
knowing well that every one would be swallowed up in the fratricidal
strife. When the danger was over and victory assured, he would
re-appear fierce and agitated, thus creating the illusion that he had
taken part in the last battle, and suffered personally in the contest.
Where was he at the insurrection of Paris, the 10th of August, 1792,
when the populace invaded the Tuileries, and hastened the fall and
imprisonment of the King, whom they sent to the scaffold some months
later? Where was he a few days later, the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th of
September, when armed bands wandered through Paris, forcing the
prison doors, and butchering the hostages? Where was he during the
riots of February, 1793, when the famished populace prowled about
Paris asking for bread? Where was he the evening of the 1st of May,
when eighteen thousand Parisians assailed the National Convention to
turn out the traitor deputies? Where was he two days after, on the
2nd of June, when the insurrection recommenced?
Hidden, immured, barricaded, walking to and fro like an encaged
tiger-cat, excited and agitated, shaken with doubts, cold beads of
perspiration standing on his forehead, breathless to hear any news
which his agents and detectives might bring him, and only breathing
freely again when the result was known.
For this man was a coward. And was this known? No! Not then! All
that was known was what he wished to make public; that he was poor,
that he was worthy in every respect of the title of "Incorruptible"
given to him by a revolutionist in a moment of enthusiasm. And, in
truth, he was free from any venal stain, and knew that in this lay
the greater part of his strength.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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