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L'Orme

<h4>CHAPTER XXVI.</h4> "Beware how you stand between a lion and his prey," said Garcias, releasing my arm; "and let me tell you, Sir Count, it were a thousand times easier to tear his food from the hungry jaws of the wild beast, than to save from the fury of this oppressed people the patron and chief of all their oppressors." "You are wrong, Garcias! you are wrong!" replied I: "since I have been a prisoner here at the arsenal, I have had full opportunity to see and judge whether he wished to be your oppressor or not; and, on my honour, no man would more willingly have done you justice, and punished those who injured you, had he been allowed to hear the evils that were committed under the name of his authority." "That, then, was his crime!" replied Garcias. "He should have heard--he should have known the wrongs and miseries of the people he governed. All in life depends on situation, and in his, indolence was a crime--a crime which has been deeply, but not too deeply expiated. Believe me, Count Louis, that kings and governors, who suffer injustice to be committed, deserve and will ever meet a more tragic fall than those even who commit it themselves." "But see," cried I, "they are going to mutilate the bodies; for Heaven's sake, stop them, and let them not show themselves utterly savages." "What matters it?" asked he; "the heads they are about to strike off will never feel the indignity; but speak to them if you will, and try whether you can persuade them from their wrath.--Ho! stand back, my friends," he continued, addressing the people, who even glared upon him with somewhat of fierceness in their look, as he interrupted their bloody occupation;--"hear what this noble Frenchman has to say to you, and respect him, for he is my friend." "Viva Garcias!" shouted the people. "Viva el Librador!" and, standing forward, I endeavoured, as well as I could, to calm their excited feelings. "My good friends," said I, "you all know me to be sincerely the well-wisher of Catalonia and the cause of freedom. Many who are here present, saw me dragged through the streets of Barcelona, no later than this morning; tied like a slave, and insulted, as I went, by the brutal soldiery, your enemies and mine, for no other cause but that I was a Frenchman, and that the French are friendly to the Catalonians. I therefore have good cause to triumph in your success, and to participate in your resentment; but there is a bound, my friends, within which resentment should always be confined, to mark it as grand, as noble, as worthy of a great and generous people. It is just, it is right, to punish the offender, to smite the oppressor, and to crush him with is own wrong." A loud shout announced that this was the point where the angry flame still burned most furiously. "But," continued I, "is it right, is it just, is it noble, to insult the inanimate clay after the spirit has departed? Is it dignified? Is it grand? Is it worthy of a great and free people like the Catalonians?" "No, no," cried one or two voices amongst the better class of the insurgents; "do not insult the body." "No, indeed!" proceeded I; "it is beneath a people who have done such great and noble deeds. The moment you attempt to degrade that corpse by any unbecoming act, what was an act of justice becomes an act of barbarity; and instead of looking on that unhappy man as a sacrifice to justice, all civilized people must regard him as the victim of revenge. You, my friend--you," I continued, addressing the man who had been kneeling on the body for the purpose of cutting off the head with a long girdle knife, and who still glared at it like a wolf disappointed of its prey--"you, I am sure, would be the last to sully the justice of the Catalonians with a stain of cruelty. A few hours ago this unhappy man possessed riches, and power, and friends, and kindred--all the warm blessings of human existence--you have taken them from him--all! Is not that punishment enough? You have sent him to the presence of God to answer for his sins--let God then judge him; and reverencing the sanctity of that tribunal to which you yourselves have referred him, take up the frail remains of earth, and laying them side by side with the faithful, the noble, the generous-hearted slave, whose self-devotion we all admire, and whose death we all regret, bear them silently to the high church, and deliver them into the hands of some holy priest, to pray that God may pardon him in heaven the faults which you have punished upon earth. Thus shall you show, my friend, that it is justice you seek, not cruelty. Thus shall your friends esteem you, your enemies fear you, and your deeds of this day descend as an example to nations yet unborn." In a multitude there is always a latent degree of good feeling amongst the majority, which, in moments of tumult and action, is overborne by the more violent and excitable passions of human nature; but once get the people to pause and listen, and mingle with your speech a few of those talismanic words which compel the evil spirit, vanity, to the side of good, and every better sentiment, thus encouraged, will come forth, and often lead them to the greatest and noblest actions. When I began to address the Catalonians, all I could obtain was bare attention; but, as they heard their own deeds spoken of and commended, they gathered round me, pressing one another for the purpose of hearing. I gained more boldness as I found myself listened to; and, seeming to take it for granted that they possessed the feelings I sought to instil into them, I gradually brought them to the sentiments I wished. The great majority received with shouts the proposal of carrying the bodies to the cathedral, and the rest dared not oppose the opinion of the many. I had fancied Garcias cold--nay, savage, from the check he had laid upon me at first; but the energy with which he pressed the execution of my proposal, before the fickle multitude had time again to change, cleared him in my opinion, and we prepared to return to the city as friends. At this moment, however, I perceived the loss of my little companion, Achilles, and mentioned the circumstance to Garcias, who gave orders to search for him; but the poor player was to be found nowhere, and I began to entertain serious apprehensions, that, in case of his having fled, he might be massacred by the first body of the insurgents he encountered. Garcias instantly took advantage of this possibility, making it an excuse for positively prohibiting all promiscuous slaughter; and so great seemed his influence with the people, from the very extraordinary services he had rendered to their cause, that I doubted not his orders would be received as a law. The news of the Viceroy having been taken, had by this time collected the great body of the insurgents round us; and on a proposal from Garcias, they proceeded, in somewhat a tumultuous manner, to elect a council of twelve, who were to have a supreme command of the army, as they called themselves, and to possess the power of life and death over all prisoners who might hereafter be taken. Garcias, as might naturally be expected, was appointed president of this council, and commander-in-chief of the army; and as a representative of the town of Lerida, the alcayde of that city was chosen, he having joined the insurgents from the first breaking out of the insurrection. Added to these were several popular and respectable citizens of Barcelona, with a wealthy merchant of Taragona; and much to my surprise, I was myself eventually proposed to the people, and my name received with a shout, which, from having opposed the fury of the populace in its course, I had not at all expected. Though whoever has once guided a popular assembly even against their inclination, becomes in some degree a favourite with them, this was not, I believe, the sole cause of the confidence they reposed in me. The idea of assistance from France was their great support in their present enterprise; and without staying to inquire whether he possessed any official character, the very knowledge that they had a Frenchman in their councils gave them a sort of confidence in themselves, which their ill-cemented union required not a little. Involved as I now was in the insurrection, I did not refuse the office they put upon me, and my reason was very simple: I hoped to do good, and to act as a check upon men whose passions were still excited. When all this was concluded, a sort of bier was formed of pikes bound together, and the bodies of the viceroy and his slave placed thereon. Six stout Barcelonese porters raised it from the ground and marched on: the insurrectionary council followed next; and then the populace, armed with a thousand varied sort of weapons; and thus, in half-triumphant, half-funereal procession, we returned towards the city. As we went, Garcias, with a rapidity of thought and clearness of arrangement which eminently fitted him for a leader in such great, but irregular, enterprises as that in which he was now engaged, sketched out to me his plans for organizing the people, maintaining the civil government of the province, repelling any attempt to reimpose the yoke which the nation had cast off, raising funds for the use of the common weal, and gradually restoring that order and tranquillity which had of course been lost in the tumultuous scenes of the last two days. He took care, also, to despatch messengers in every direction through the town, bearing strict commands to all the various posts of the insurgents, that no more blood should be spilt without form of trial; and two of the members of the council also were detached on a mission to the corregidor and other civil officers of the city, requiring their union with the great body of the Catalonian people, for the purpose of maintaining and cementing the liberties which they had that day reconquered. His wise conduct, in both respects, produced the most beneficial effects. The news of the cessation of bloodshed spread like lightning through the city, and induced many of the Catalonian nobility, who previously had not known whether the insurrection was a mere democratical outrage, or a really patriotic effort for the good of all, to come forth from their houses and give their hearty concurrence to an enterprise, whose leaders showed so much moderation. At the gate of the cathedral, also, we were met by the corregidor and all the chief officers of the city, accompanied by a large posse of alguacils and halberdiers attached to their official station. These officers, as a body, declared their willingness to co-operate with the liberators of their country; for though they had received their offices from the King of Spain, they were Catalonians before they were Spaniards. This annunciation produced a shout from the people, which gave notice to the Chapter of the Cathedral of our approach, and coming forth in their rich robes, they received with the solemn chant of the church the bodies of the unhappy Viceroy and his slave. When the corpses had been laid before the high altar, the Bishop himself came forward to the portal, and addressed the people, who heard him with reverential attention; while the leaders of the revolution which had just been effected, clothed indeed in wild and various vestments, but dignified in air and look, by the consciousness of great deeds, spread on one side of the gate, and the nobility and high municipal officers ranged themselves on the other, leaving room for the populace to catch the words of the prelate. "My children," said the old man, "you have this day done great and fearful deeds; and sure I am, that the motives which impelled ye thereunto were such as ye could in conscience acknowledge and maintain. I myself can witness how long ye endured oppressions and injuries, almost beyond the patience of mortal men--your children and brothers slaughtered, your wives and sisters insulted, and God's altars overturned and profaned. May Heaven forgive ye for the blood ye have spilt; but as some of the innocent must have perished with the guilty, I enjoin you all to keep to-morrow as a strict and rigorous fast, to confess you of your sins, and to receive absolution; after which, may God bless and prosper you, and strengthen you in the right." The good Bishop's speech was received with shouts by the populace, who took it for granted that it proceeded entirely from love and affection towards them, though, individually, I could not help thinking that there was a slight touch of fear in the business, as the prelate was well aware that in pulling down one house the neighbouring ones are very often injured; and perhaps he might think, that in overthrowing the edifice of Castilian dominion in Catalonia, the populace might shake the power of the church also. I know not whether I did him wrong, but of course I did not give the benefit of my thoughts to any of the rest; and when he had done, we took our departure from the Cathedral, and proceeded towards the Viceroy's palace, which Garcias named for his head-quarters. As we went, we were encountered by a large body of the insurgents who had just concluded the pillage of a house in the same street, belonging to the Marquis de Villafranca, general of the galleys. They were of the lowest order of the populace; and we heard that a good deal of blood had been shed, and various enormities committed by them, which, as yet, it would have been dangerous to punish. Advancing with loud shouts, they hailed us as their brother patriots, from which appellation the better part of the insurgents were somewhat inclined to shrink, receiving their fraternal salutations with much the shy air of a parvenu when visited by his poor relations. I must say, however, that never did a more brutal rabble meet my sight. Amongst other instances of their savage ignorance was one, which at the same time strongly displayed the spirit of the vulgar Catalonians. In rifling the Marquis de Villafranca's house, they had found, amongst other rare and curious articles which that officer took great delight in collecting, a small bronze figure, representing a negro, the body of which contained a clock. At the same time, the works were so contrived, as to make the eyes of the figure move; and when the mob surrounded the table on which it was placed, the little negro continued to roll his eyes round and round upon them, in so bold and menacing a manner, that the whole multitude were frightened, and dared not approach! From his love of study, and search for everything that was curious and antique, it had long been rumoured, amongst the lower orders, that the marquis had addicted himself to magic, and they instantly fixed upon this ingenious piece of clockwork as his familiar demon. Under this impression, it was long before any one dared to touch it, as, after having signed it with the cross, and even held up a crucifix before it, it still continued to roll its eyes upon them with most sacrilegious obstinacy. At length, one more courageous than the rest dashed to pieces the glass which covered it, and seizing hold of the unfortunate clock, tied it to the end of a pike, and carried it out into the street. When we encountered them, the first thing we beheld was this bronze figure, borne above the heads of the people. They instantly exhibited it to us with great triumph, assuring us that they had caught the Marquis de Villafranca's familiar, and were about to carry it to the chief inquisitor, that it might be consigned to its proper place, with all convenient despatch. For my own part, I could scarcely refrain from laughing; and as Garcias seemed to take the matter quite seriously, I explained to him in French that the supposed familiar was nothing but a piece of mechanism, ingenious enough, but not at all uncommon. He cut me short, however, praised the crowd for their zeal, and bade them by all means carry the demon to the inquisitor, and then disperse for the night. "Reasoning with such a mob as that," said he, as he went on, "is as vain as talking to the winds or the seas. The only way of managing them, is to leave them in possession of all their prejudices and follies, but to turn those prejudices and follies to the best purposes one can. You see that cart, Monsieur de l'Orme, with its great clumsy wheels, which are not half so good as the light wheels that we have in Navarre and Arragon, but if I wanted to send a load quickly to the port, I would not think of sitting down to take off those wheels--to make lighter, and to put them on--but would, of course, make use of the cart as I found it. Thus, when you want to guide a multitude, never attempt to give them new ideas, but take advantage of those which they have already got." We had now arrived at the viceregal palace; and, leaving Garcias to make what arrangements he thought proper for the accommodation of the five hundred men which he had brought with him from Lerida, and for organizing the people of Barcelona into a sort of irregular militia, the insurrectionary council repaired to the great hall, and, with the corregidor and alcayde, sat till midnight, deciding on the fate of all those persons that the various parties of the armed multitude thought fit to bring before it. The task was somewhat a severe one; for every person that did not know another brought him before the council, if he could, and if he could not he was himself brought. Their zeal, however, in this respect, began to slacken as night fell; and it was only the more resolute and exasperated part of the insurgents that continued their perquisitions for Castilians, and other suspected persons, patrolling the streets of the city in bodies of tens and twelves, and making every one they met give an account of himself and his occupations. As it was the sincere wish of every member of the council to allay the popular fury, and stop the effusion of blood, various extraordinary shifts were we obliged to make for the purpose of saving many of the poor wretches that were brought before us, from the more inveterate and bloodthirsty of the insurgents. The part we had to play was certainly a very difficult one; for we were surrounded by men over whom we had not the check of long established control, and whose inflamed passions and long-smothered revenge was not half quenched with all the gore that had already drenched the streets of Barcelona. Blood was still their cry, and they contrived to find out almost every individual who had been in any way connected with the Castilian government of the province, and drag him before us. Our very principal object was to check their indiscriminate cruelty, and yet, if we refused in every instance to gratify them in their revenge, it was likely we should annul our own authority, and that the populace would betake themselves again to the massacres which we sought to prevent. Under these circumstances, upon the plea of weariness and want of time to examine thoroughly, we committed greater part of the unfortunate wretches, whom we were called to notice, to the government prison, sending off the most violent of the insurgents to renew their patrol in the streets, upon the pretence of fearing that during their absence some of the more obnoxious persons should escape. The prison we took care to surround with a strong guard of the men from Lerida, the major part of whom had served in the old Catalonian militia, and were consequently in a very good state of subordination, looking up also to Garcias almost as a god, from his having led them on to two such signal victories as that which they had achieved that day, and the morning of the day before. At midnight the corregidor rose, and addressing me by the name which Garcias had given me, the Count de l'Orme, requested me to lodge at his house, as most probably I had not apartments prepared in the city. I willingly accepted his hospitality, and, escorted by a strong body of alguacils, we proceeded to his dwelling, where a very handsome chamber was assigned to me, and I was preparing to go to rest after a day of such excessive excitement and fatigue, when I was interrupted by some one knocking at the door. I bade him come in, and to my great surprise I beheld my little attendant, Achilles, completely dressed in Spanish costume; though, to own the truth, his haut de chausse came a good way below his knees, and his just-au-corps hung with rather a slovenly air about his haunches. His hat, too, which was ornamented with a high plume, fell so far over his forehead as to cover his eyebrows, which were themselves none of the highest; and, in short, his whole suit seemed as if it intended to eat him up. "Ah, my dearly beloved lord and master!" cried the little player, "thank God, that when I celebrate my februa in memory of my deceased friends, I shall not have to call upon your name among the number; though I little thought that you would get out of the hands of that dreadful multitude so safely as you have done." I welcomed my little attendant as his merits deserved; and congratulating him on his fine new feathers, asked him how he had contrived to escape the fury of the people, without even having been brought before the council. "Why, to speak sooth, I escaped but narrowly," answered little Achilles; "and but that my lord loves not the high and tragic style, I could tell my tale like Corneille and Rotrou--ay, and make it full, full of horrors. But to keep to the lowly walk in which it is your will to chain my soaring spirit; when I saw that poor unhappy Viceroy faint, and a great many folks coming along the shore with lances, and muskets, and knives, and a great many other things, which are occasionally used for worse purposes than to eat one's dinner, I looked out for a place where my meditations were not likely to be interrupted by the clash of cold iron, and seeing none such upon the shore, I betook me to a small piece of green turf that came slanting down from the hill to the beach, and there I began to run faster than I ever plied my legs on an upland before. The exercise I found very pleasant, and God knows how long I should have continued it, especially as some of the folks on the beach, seeing me run, pointed me out with their muskets, that their friends might admire my agility, and I began to hear something whistle by my head every now and then in a very encouraging manner; but just when I got to the top of the hill--plump--I came upon a mob twice as big as the other. Instantly they seized me, and asked me a thousand questions, which I could not answer, for I did not understand one of them; when suddenly one fellow got hold of me, threw me down, and--blessed be the sound from henceforth for ever, Amen!--though he held a knife to my throat, and stretched out his arm in a very unbecoming manner, he at the same time muttered to himself,--'Diantre!' between his teeth, in a way that none but a true-born Frenchman could have done it.--'Diantre!' cried he, grasping my throat.--'Diantre!' replied I, in the same tone.--'Diantre!' exclaimed he, letting go his hold, and opening his mouth wider than before.--'Diantre!' repeated I, devilish glad to get rid of him.--'Foutre! the fellow mocks me!' cried he, drawing back his knife to run it into my gizzard.--'Ah!' exclaimed I, 'if your poor dear father could see you now about to murder me, what would he say?'--'Diable!' cried he, 'are you a Frenchman?'--'Certainly,' answered I, 'nothing less, though a little one.'--'And do you know my father?' exclaimed he, catching me in his arms, and hugging me very fraternally.--'Not a whit,' answered I: 'I wish I did, for then possibly you would for his sake show me how I can save my throat from these rude ruffians.'--'That I will, for our country's sake,' answered he, and helping me up, he told some half dozen dogged-looking fellows, who had remained to help him to stick me, a long story, full of Spanish oses and anoses, which seemed to satisfy them very well, for instead of running me through, they hugged me till I was nearly strangled, crying out, Viva la Francia! all the while. "After this, my companion, who is the corregidor's French cook, gave me a green feather, which has ever since proved the best feather in my cap; for this green, it seems, is the colour of the Catalonians, and since I put it in my hat, every one I have met has made me a low bow. The cook and myself swore eternal amity on the field of battle, and instead of going on to murder the Viceroy, by which nothing was to be got, we went back, and joined the good folks who had just broken into the palace of the general of the galleys. There had been a little assassination done before we came up; but the general himself had got off on board his ships, and the multitude were taking care of his goods and chattels for him. I entered into their sentiments with a fellow feeling, which is quite surprising; and while great part of them were standing staring at a foolish little black figure that rolled its eyes, and were swearing that it was first cousin to Beelzebub, I got hold of a drawer, in which were these pretty things," and he produced a string of clear-set diamonds of inestimable value: "these I brought away for your lordship," he added; "they are too good for me, and I had just heard you were safe and sound, and a great man amongst the rebels. For my part, I satisfied myself with a handful or two of commoner trash in the shape of gold pieces, and this suit of clothes, with a few lace shirts and other articles of apparel, which I thought you might want." I had by this time got into bed, but I could not refrain from examining the diamonds, which were certainly most splendid. After I had done, I returned them to Achilles, telling him, of course, that I could not accept of anything so acquired; upon which he took them back again very coolly, saying, "Very well, my lord, then I will keep them myself. Times may change, and your opinion too. If I had not taken them, some Catalonian rebel would, and therefore I will guard them safely as lawful plunder," and so saying, he left me to repose. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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