Microscopic research in 1664

Excerpts from: MICROGRAPHIA: OR SOME Physiological Descriptions OF MINUTE BODIES MADE BY MAGNIFYING GLASSES WITH OBSERVATIONS and INQUIRIES thereupon. By R. HOOKE, Fellow of the ROYAL SOCIETY.
Non possis oculo quantum contendere Linceus,
Non tamen idcirco contemnas Lippus inungi. Horat. Ep. lib. 1.LONDON, Printed by Jo. Martyn, and Ja. Allestry, Printers to the ROYAL SOCIETY, and are to be sold at their Shop at the Bell in S. Paul's Church-yard. M DC LX V.

TO THE KING.
SIR,

I Do here most humbly lay this small Present at Your Majesties Royal feet. And though it comes accompany'd with two disadvantages, the meanness of the Author, and of the Subject; yet in both I am incouraged by the greatness of your Mercy and your Knowledge. By the one I am taught, that you can forgive the most presumptuous Offendors: And by the other, that you will not esteem the least work of Nature, or Art, unworthy your Observation. Amidst the many felicities that have accompani'd your Majesties happy Restauration and Government, it is none of the least considerable that Philosophy and Experimental Learning have prosper'd under your Royal Patronage. And as the calm prosperity of your Reign has given us the leisure to follow these Studies of quiet and retirement, so it is just, that the Fruits of them should, by way of acknowledgement, be return'd to your Majesty. There are, Sir, several other of your Subjects, of your Royal Society, now busie about Nobler matters: The Improvement of Manufactures and Agriculture, the Increase of Commerce, the Advantage of Navigation: In all which they are assisted by your Majesties Incouragement and Example. Amidst all those greater Designs, I here presume to bring in that which is more proportionable to the smalness of my Abilities, and to offer some of the least of all visible things, to that Mighty King, that has establisht an Empire over the best of all Invisible things of this World, the Minds of Men.

Your Majesties most humble and most obedient Subject and Servant,
ROBERT HOOKE.
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From hence the World may be assisted with variety of Inventions, new matter for Sciences may be collected, the old improv'd, and their rust rubb'd away; and as it is by the benefit of Senses that we receive all our Skill in the works of Nature, so they also may be wonderfully benefited by it, and may be guided to an easier and more exact performance of their Offices; 'tis not unlikely, but that we may find out wherein our Senses are deficient, and as easily find wayes of repairing them.
The Indeavours of Skilful men have been most conversant about the assistance of the Eye, and many noble Productions have followed upon it; and from hence we may conclude, that there it a way open'd for advancing the operations, not only of all the other Senses, but even of the Eye it self; that which has been already done ought not to content us, but rather to incourage us to proceed further, and to attempt greater things in the same, and different wayes.
'Tis not unlikely, but that there may be yet invented several other helps for the eye, at much exceeding those already found, as those do the bare eye, such as by which we may perhaps be able to discover living Creatures in the Moon, or other Planets, the figures of the compounding Particles of matter, and the particular Schematisms and Textures of Bodies.
And as Glasses have highly promoted our seeing, so 'tis not improbable, but that there may be found many Mechanical Inventions to improve our other Senses, of hearing, smelling, tasting, touching. 'Tis not impossible to hear a whisper a furlongs distance, it having been already done; and perhaps the nature of the thing would not make it more impossible, though that furlong should be ten times multiply'd. And though some famous Authors have affirm'd it impossible to hear through the thinnest plate of Muscovy-glass; yet I know a way, by which 'tis easie enough to hear one speak through a wall a yard thick. It has not been yet thoroughly examin'd, how far Otocousticons may be improv'd, nor what other wayes there may be of quickning our hearing, or conveying sound through other bodies then the Air: for that that it not the only medium, I can assure the Reader, that I have, by the help of a distended wire, propagated the sound to a very considerable distance in an instant, or with as seemingly quick a motion as that of light, at least, incomparably swifter then that, which at the same time was propagated through the Air; and this not only in a straight line, or direct, but in one bended in many angles.
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[Click on images to enlarge]
First, for Microscopes (where the Object we view is near and within our power) the best way of making it appear bright in the Glass, is to cast a great quantity of light on it by means of convex glasses, for thereby, though the aperture be very small, yet there will throng in through it such multitudes, that an Object will by this means indure to be magnifi'd as much again as it would be without it. The way for doing which is this. I make choice of some Room that has only one window open to the South, and at about three or four foot distance from this Window, on a Table, I place my Microscope, and then so place either a round Globe of Water, or a very deep clear plano convex Glass (whose convex side is turn'd towards the Window) that there is a great quantity of Rayes collected and thrown upon the Object: Or if the Sun shine, I place a small piece of oyly Paper very near the Object, between that and the light; then with a good large Burning-Glass I so collect and throw the Rayes on the Paper, that there may be a very great quantity of light pass through it to the Object; yet I so proportion that light, that it may not singe or burn the Paper. Instead of which Paper there may be made use of a small piece of Looking-glass plate, one of whose sides is made rough by being rubb'd on a flat Tool with very find sand, this will, if the heat be leisurely cast on it, indure a much greater degree of heat, and consequently very much augment a convenient light. By all which means the light of the Sun, or of a Window, may be so cast on an Object, as to make it twice as light as it would otherwise be without it, and that without any inconvenience of glaring, which the immediate light of the Sun is very apt to create in most Objects; for by this means the light is so equally diffused, that all parts are alike inlightned; but when the immediate light of the Sun falls on it, the reflexions from some few parts are so vivid, that they drown the appearance of all the other, and are themselves also, by reason of the inequality of light, indistinct, and appear only radiant spots.
But because the light of the Sun, and also that of a Window, is in a continual variation, and so many Objects cannot be view'd long enough by them to be throughly examin'd; besides that, oftentimes the Weather is so dark and cloudy, that for many dayes together nothing can be view'd: And because also there are many Objects to be met with in the night, which cannot so conveniently be kept perhaps till the day, therefore to procure and cast a sufficient quantity of light on an Object in the night, I thought of, and often used this, Expedient.
I procur'd me a small Pedestal, such as is describ'd in the fifth Figure of the first Scheme on the small Pillar AB, of which were two movable Armes CD, which by means of the Screws EF, I could fix in any part of the Pillar; on the undermost of these I plac'd a pretty large Globe of Glass G, fill'd with exceeding clear Brine, stopt, inverted, and fixt in the manner visible in the Figure; out of the side of which Arm proceeded another Arm H, with many joynts; to the end of which was fastned a deep plain Convex glass I, which by means of this Arm could be moved too and fro, and fixt in any posture. On the upper Arm was placed a small Lamp K, which could be to mov'd upon the end of the Arm, as to be set in a fit posture to give light through the Ball: By means of this Instrument duly plac'd, as is exprest in the Figure, with the small flame of a Lamp may be cast as great and convenient a light on the Object as it will well indure; and being always constant, and to be had at any time, I found most proper for drawing the representations of those small Objects I had occasion to observe.
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Observ. I. Of the Point of a sharp small Needle.
As in Geometry, the most natural way of beginning is from a Mathematical point; so is the same method in Observations and Natural history the most genuine, simple, and instructive. We must first endevour to make letters, and draw single strokes true, before we venture to write whole Sentences, or to draw large Pictures. And in Physical Enquiries, we must endevour to follow Nature in the more plain and easie ways she treads in the most simple and uncompounded bodies, to trace her steps, and be acquainted with her manner of walking there, before we venture our selves into the multitude of meanders she has in bodies of a more complicated nature; lest, being unable to distinguish and judge of our way, we quickly lose both Nature our Guide, and our selves too, and are left to wander in the labyrinth of groundless opinions; wanting both judgment, that light, and experience, that clew, which should direct our proceedings.
We will begin these our Inquiries therefore with the Observations of Bodies of the most simple nature first, and so gradually proceed to those of a more compounded one. In prosecution of which method, we shall begin with a Physical point; of which kind the Point of a Needle is commonly reckon'd for one; and is indeed, for the most part, made so sharp, that the naked eye cannot distinguish any parts of it: It very easily pierces, and makes its way through all kind of bodies softer then it self: But if view'd with a very good Microscope, we may find that the top of a Needle (though as to the sense very sharp) appears a broad, blunt, and very irregular end; not resembling a Cone, as is imagin'd, but onely a piece of a tapering body, with a great part of the top remov'd, or deficient. The Points of Pins are yet more blunt, and the Points of the most curious Mathematical Instruments do very seldome arrive at so great a sharpness; how much therefore can be built upon demonstrations made onely by the productions of the Ruler and Compasses, he will be better able to consider that shall but view those points and lines with a Microscope.
Now though this point be commonly accounted the sharpest (whence when we would express the sharpness of a point the most superlatively, we say, As sharp as a Needle) yet the Microscope can afford us hundreds of Instances of Points many thousand times sharper: such as those of the hairs, and bristles, and claws of multitudes of Insects; the thorns, or crooks, or hairs of leaves, and other small vegetables; nay, the ends of the stiriæ or small parallelipipeds of Amianthus, and alumen plumosum; of many of which, though the Points are so sharp as not to be visible, though view'd with a Microscope (which magnifies the Object, in bulk, above a million of times) yet I doubt not, but were we able practically to make Microscopes according to the theory of them, we might find hills, and dales, and pores, and a sufficient bredth, or expansion, to give all those parts elbow-room, even in the blunt top of the very Point of any of these so very sharp bodies. For certainly the quantity or extension of any body may be Divisible in infinitum, though perhaps not the matter.
But to proceed: The Image we have here exhibited in the first Figure, was the top of a small and very sharp Needle, whose point aa nevertheless appear'd through the Microscope above a quarter of an inch broad, not round nor flat, but irregular and uneven; so that it seem'd to have been big enough to have afforded a hundred armed Mites room enough to be rang'd by each other without endangering the breaking one anothers necks, by being thrust off on either side. The surface of which, though appearing to the naked eye very smooth, could not nevertheless hide a multitude of holes and scratches and ruggednesses from being discover'd by the Microscope to invest it, several of which inequalities (as A, B, C, seem'd holes made by some small specks of Rust; and D some adventitious body, that stuck very close to it) were casual. All the rest that roughen the surface, were onely so many marks of the rudeness and bungling of Art. So unaccurate is it, in all its productions, even in those which seem most neat, that if examin'd with an organ more acute then that by which they were made, the more we see of their shape, the less appearance will there be of their beauty: whereas in the works of Nature, the deepest Discoveries shew us the greatest Excellencies. An evident Argument, that he that was the Author of all these things, was no other then Omnipotent; being able to include as great a variety of parts and contrivances in the yet smallest Discernable Point, as in those vaster bodies (which comparatively are called also Points) such as the Earth, Sun, or Planets. Nor need it seem strange that the Earth it self may be by Analogie call'd a Physical Point: For as its body, though now so near us as to fill our eys and fancies with a sense of the vastness of it, may by a little Distance, and some convenient Diminishing Glasses, be made vanish into a scarce visible Speck, or Point (as I have often try'd on the Moon, and (when not too bright) on the Sun it self.) So, could a Mechanical contrivance succesfully answer our Theory, we might see the least spot as big as the Earth it self; and Discover, as Des Cartes also conjectures (Diop. ch. 10. § 9.), as great a variety of bodies in the Moon, or Planets, as in the Earth.
But leaving these Discoveries to future Industries, we shall proceed to add one Observation more of a point commonly so call'd, that is, the mark of a full stop, or period. And for this purpose I observed many both printed ones and written; and among multitudes I found few of them more round or Schem. 2.
Fig. 3. regular then this which I have delineated in the third figure of the second Scheme, but very many abundantly more disfigur'd; and for the most part if they seem'd equally round to the eye, I found those points that had been made by a Copper-plate, and Roll-press, to be as misshapen as those which had been made with Types, the most curious and smothly engraven strokes and points, looking but as so many furrows and holes, and their printed impressions, but like smutty daubings on a matt or uneven floor with a blunt extinguisht brand or stick's end. And as for points made with a pen they were much more ragged and deformed. Nay, having view'd certain pieces of exceeding curious writing of the kind (one of which in the bredth of a two-pence compris'd the Lords prayer, the Apostles Creed, the ten Commandments, and about half a dozen verses besides of the Bible, whose lines were so small and near together, that I was unable to number them with my naked eye,) a very ordinary Microscope, I had then about me, inabled me to see that what the Writer of it had asserted was true, but withall discover'd of what pitifull bungling scribbles and scrawls it was compos'd, Arabian and China characters being almost as well shap'd, yet thus much I must say for the Man, that it was for the most part legible enough, though in some places there wanted a good fantsy well preposest to help one through. If this manner of small writing were made easie and practicable (and I think I know such a one, but have never yet made tryal of it, whereby one might be inabled to write a great deale with much ease, and accurately enough in a very little roome) it might be of very good use to convey secret Intelligence without any danger of Discovery or mistrusting. But to come again to the point. The Irregularities of it are caused by three or four coadjutors, one of which is, the uneven surface of the paper, which at best appears no smother then a very course piece of shag'd cloth, next the irregularity of the Type or Ingraving, and a third is the rough Daubing of the Printing-Ink that lies upon the instrument that makes the impression, to all which, add the variation made by the Different lights and shadows, and you may have sufficient reason to guess that a point may appear much more ugly then this, which I have here presented, which though it appear'd through the Microscope gray, like a great splatch of London dirt, about three inches over; yet to the naked eye it was black and no bigger then that in the midst of the Circle A. And could I have found Room in this Plate to have inserted an O you should have seen that the letters were not more distinct then the points of Distinction, nor a drawn circle more exactly so, then we have now shown a point to be a point.
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Observ. II. Of the Edge of a Razor.
The sharpest Edge hath the same kind of affinity to the sharpest Point in Physicks, as a line hath to a point in Mathematicks; and therefore the Treaty concerning this, may very properly be annexed to the former. A Razor doth appear to be a Body of a very neat and curious aspect, till more closely viewed by the Microscope, and there we may observe its very Edge to be of all kind of shapes, except what it should be. For examining that of a very sharp one, I could not find that any part of it had any thing of sharpness in it; but it appeared a rough surface of a very considerable bredth from side to side, the narrowest part not seeming thinner then the back of a pretty thick Knife. Nor is't likely that it should appear any otherwise, since as we just now shew'd that a point appear'd a circle, 'tis rational a line should be a parallelogram.
Now for the drawing this second Figure (which represents a part of the Edge about half a quarter of an inch long of a Razor well set) I so plac'd it between the Object-glass & the light, that there appear'd a reflection from the very Edge, represented by the white line abcdef. In which you may perceive it to be somewhat sharper then elsewhere about d, to be indented or pitted about b, to be broader and thicker about c, and unequal and rugged about e, and pretty even between ab and ef. Nor was that part of the Edge ghik so smooth as one would imagine so smooth bodies as a Hone and Oyl should leave it; for besides those multitudes of scratches, which appear to have raz'd the surface ghik, and to cross each other every way which are not half of them exprest in the Figure, there were several great and deep scratches, or furrows, such as gh and ik, which made the surface yet more rugged, caus'd perhaps by some small Dust casually falling on the Hone, or some harder or more flinty part of the Hone it self. The other part of the Razor ll, which is polish'd on a grinding-stone, appear'd much rougher then the other, looking almost like a plow'd field, with many parallels, ridges, and furrows, and a cloddy, as 'twere, or an uneven surface: nor shall we wonder at the roughnesses of those surfaces, since even in the most curious wrought Glasses for Microscopes, and other Optical uses, I have, when the Sun has shone well on them, discover'd their surface to be variously raz'd or scratched, and to consist of an infinite of small broken surfaces, which reflect the light of very various and differing colours. And indeed it seems impossible by Art to cut the surface of any hard and brittle body smooth, since Putte, or even the most curious Powder that can be made use of, to polish such a body, must consist of little hard rough particles, and each of them must cut its way, and consequently leave some kind of gutter or furrow behind it. And though Nature does seem to do it very readily in all kinds of fluid bodies, yet perhaps future observators may discover even these also rugged; it being very probable, as I elsewhere shew, that fluid bodies are made up of small solid particles variously and strongly mov'd, and may find reason to think there is scarce a surface in rerum naturâ perfectly smooth. The black spot mn, I ghess to be some small speck of rust, for that I have oft observ'd to be the manner of the working of Corrosive Juyces. To conclude, this Edge and piece of a Razor, if it had been really such as it appear'd through the Microscope, would scarcely have serv'd to cleave wood, much less to have cut off the hair of beards, unless it were after the manner that Lucian merrily relates Charon to have made use of, when with a Carpenters Axe he chop'd off the beard of a sage Philosopher, whose gravity he very cautiously fear'd would indanger the oversetting of his Wherry.
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To make small shot of different sizes; Communicated by his Highness P.R.
Take Lead out of the Pig what quantity you please, melt it down, stir and clear it with an iron Ladle, gathering together the blackish parts that swim at top like scum, and when you see the colour of the clear Lead to be greenish, but no sooner, strew upon it Auripigmentum powdered according to the quantity of Lead, about as much as will lye upon a half Crown piece will serve for eighteen or twenty pound weight of some sorts of Lead; others will require more, or less. After the Auripigmentum is put in, stir the Lead well, and the Auripigmentum will flame: when the flame is over, take out some of the Lead in a Ladle having a lip or notch in the brim for convenient pouring out of the Lead, and being well warmed amongst the melted Lead, and with a stick make some single drops of Lead trickle out of the Ladle into water in a Glass, which if they fall to be round and without tails, there is Auripigmentum enough put in, and the temper of the heat is right, otherwise put in more. Then lay two bars of Iron (or some more proper Iron-tool made on purpose) upon a Pail of water, and place upon them a round Plate of Copper, of the size and figure of an ordinary large Pewter or Silver Trencher, the hollow whereof is to be about three inches over, the bottom lower then the brims about half an inch, pierced with thirty, forty, or more small holes; the smaller the holes are, the smaller the shot will be; and the brim is to be thicker then the bottom, to conserve the heat the better.
The bottom of the Trencher being some four inches distant from the water in the Pail, lay upon it some burning Coles, to keep the Lead melted upon it. Then with the hot Ladle take Lead off the Pot where it stands melted, and pour it softly upon the burning Coles over the bottom of the Trencher, and it will immediately run through the holes into the water in small round drops. Thus pour on new Lead still as fast as it runs through the Trencher till all be done; blowing now and then the Coles with hand-Bellows, when the Lead in the Trencher cools so as to stop from running.
While one pours on the Lead, another must, with another Ladle, thrusted four or five inches under water in the Pail, catch from time to time some of the shot, as it drops down, to see the size of it, and whether there be any faults in it. The greatest care is to keep the Lead upon the Trencher in the right degree of heat; if it be too cool, it will not run through the Trencher, though it stand melted upon it; and this is to be helped by blowing the Coals a little, or pouring on new Lead that is hotter: but the cooler the Lead, the larger the Shot; and the hotter, the smaller; when it it too hot, the drops will crack and fly; then you must stop pouring on new Lead, and let it cool; and so long as you observe the right temper of the heat, the Lead will constantly drop into very round Shot, without so much as one with a tail in many pounds.
When all is done, take your Shot out of the Pail of water, and put it in a Frying-pan over the fire to dry them, which must be done warily, still shaking them that they melt not; and when they are dry you may separate the small from the great, in Pearl Sives made of Copper or Lattin let into one another, into as many sizes at you please. But if you would have your Shot larger then the Trencher makes them, you may do it with a Stick, making them trickle out of the Ladle, as hath been said.
If the Trencher be but toucht a very little when the Lead stops from going through it, and be not too cool, it will drop again, but it it better not to touch it at all. At the melting of the Lead take care that there be no kind of Oyl, Grease, or the like, upon the Pots, or Ladles, or Trencher.
The Chief cause of this Globular Figure of the Shot, seems to be the Auripigmentum; for, as soon as it is put in among the melted Lead, it loses its shining brightness, contracting instantly a grayish film or skin upon it, when you scum it to make it clean with the Ladle. So that when the Air comes at the falling drop of the melted Lead, that skin constricts them every where equally: but upon what account, and whether this be the true cause, is left to further disquisition.
Much after this same manner, when the Air is exceeding cold through which it passes; do we find the drops of Rain, falling from the Clouds, congealed into round Hail-stones by the freezing Ambient.
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Observ. LIII. Of a Flea.
The strength and beauty of this small creature, had it no other relation at all to man, would deserve a description.
For its strength, the Microscope is able to make no greater discoveries of it then the naked eye, but onely the curious contrivance of its leggs and joints, for the exerting that strength, is very plainly manifested, such as no other creature, I have yet observ'd, has any thing like it; for the joints of it are so adapted, that he can, as 'twere, fold them short one within another, and suddenly stretch, or spring them Schem. 34. out to their whole length, that is, of the fore-leggs, the part A, of the 34. Scheme, lies within B, and B within C, parallel to, or side by side each other; but the parts of the two next, lie quite contrary, that is, D without E, and E without F, but parallel also; but the parts of the hinder leggs, G, H and I, bend one within another, like the parts of a double jointed Ruler, or like the foot, legg and thigh of a man; these six leggs he clitches up altogether, and when he leaps, springs them all out, and thereby exerts his whole strength at once.
But, as for the beauty of it, the Microscope manifests it to be all over adorn'd with a curiously polish'd suit of sable Armour, neatly jointed, and beset with multitudes of sharp pinns, shap'd almost like Porcupine's Quills, or bright conical Steel-bodkins; the head is on either side beautify'd with a quick and round black eye K, behind each of which also appears a small cavity, L, in which he seems to move to and fro a certain thin film beset with many small transparent hairs, which probably may be his ears; in the forepart of his head, between the two fore-leggs, he has two small long jointed feelers, or rather smellers, MM, which have four joints, and are hairy, like those of several other creatures; between these, it has a small proboscis, or probe, NNO, that seems to consist of a tube NN, and a tongue or sucker O, which I have perceiv'd him to slip in and out. Besides these, it has also two chaps or biters PP, which are somewhat like those of an Ant, but I could not perceive them tooth'd; these were shap'd very like the blades of a pair of round top'd Scizers, and were opened and shut just after the same manner; with these Instruments does this little busie Creature bite and pierce the skin, and suck out the blood of an Animal, leaving the skin inflamed with a small round red spot. These parts are very difficult to be discovered, because, for the most part, they lye covered between the fore-legs. There are many other particulars, which, being more obvious, and affording no great matter of information, I shall pass by, and refer the Reader to the Figure.
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Observ. XX. Of blue Mould, and of the first Principles of Vegetation arising from Putrefaction.
The Blue and White and several kinds of hairy mouldy spots, which are observable upon divers kinds of putrify'd bodies, whether Animal substances, or Vegetable, such as the skin, raw or dress'd, flesh, bloud, humours, milk, green Cheese, &c. or rotten sappy Wood, or Herbs, Leaves, Barks, Roots, &c. of Plants, are all of them nothing else but several kinds of small and variously figur'd Mushroms, which, from convenient materials in those putrifying bodies, are, by the concurrent heat of the Air, excited to a certain kind of vegetation, which will not be unworthy our more serious speculation and examination, as I shall by and by shew. But, first, I must premise a short description of this Specimen, which I have added of this Tribe, in the first Figure of the XII. Scheme, which is nothing else but the appearance of a small white spot of hairy mould, multitudes of which I found to bespeck & whiten over the red covers of a small book, which, it seems, were of Sheeps skin, that being more apt to gather mould, even in a dry and clean room, then other leathers. These spots appear'd, through a good Microscope, to be a very pretty shap'd Vegetative body, which, from almost the same part of the Leather, shot out multitudes of small long cylindrical and transparent stalks, not exactly streight, but a little bended with the weight of a round and white knob that grew on the top of each of them; many of these knobs I observ'd to be very round, and of a smooth surface, such as A, A, &c. others smooth likewise, but a little oblong, as B; several of them a little broken, or cloven with chops at the top, as C; others flitter'd as 'twere, or flown all to pieces, as D, D. The whole substance of these pretty bodies was of a very tender constitution, much like the substance of the softer kind of common white Mushroms, for by touching them with a Pin, I found them to be brused and torn; they seem'd each of them to have a distinct root of their own; for though they grew neer together in a cluster, yet I could perceive each stem to rise out of a distinct part or pore of the Leather; some of these were small and short, as seeming to have been but newly sprung up, of these the balls were for the most part round, others were bigger, and taller, as being perhaps of a longer growth, and of these, for the most part, the heads were broken, and some much wasted, as E; what these heads contain'd I could not perceive; whether they were knobs and flowers, or seed cases, I am not able to say, but they seem'd most likely to be of the same nature with those that grow on Mushroms, which they did, some of them, not a little resemble.

DIPLOMATIC ACTIVITY AND POMP IN THE 17TH CENTURY

Excerpts from: MEMOIRS OF LADY FANSHAWE, WIFE OF SIR RICHARD FANSHAWE, BT. AMBASSADOR FROM CHARLES II. TO THE COURTS OF PORTUGAL & MADRID WRITTEN BY HERSELF CONTAINING EXTRACTS FROM THE CORRESPONDENCE OF SIR RICHARD FANSHAWE EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY BEATRICE MARSHALL AND A NOTE UPON THE ILLUSTRATIONS BY ALLAN FEA

We remained some time behind in Ireland, until my husband could receive his Majesty's commands how to dispose of himself. During this time I had, by the fall of a stumbling horse, being with child, broke my left wrist, which, because it was ill-set, put me to great and long pain, and I was in my bed when Cork revolted. By chance that day my husband was gone on business to Kinsale: it was in the beginning of November 1650. [Footnote: These events happened in November 1649.] At midnight I heard the great guns go off, and thereupon I called up my family to rise, which I did as well as I could in that condition. Hearing lamentable shrieks of men, women, and children, I asked at a window the cause; they told me they were all Irish, stripped and wounded, and turned out of the town, and that Colonel Jeffries, with some others, had possessed themselves of the town for Cromwell, Upon this, I immediately wrote a letter to my husband, blessing God's providence that he was not there with me, persuading him to patience and hope that I should get safely out of the town, by God's assistance, and desired him to shift for himself, for fear of a surprise, with promise that I would secure his papers.

So soon as I had finished my letter, I sent it by a faithful servant, who was let down the garden-wall of Red Abbey, and, sheltered by the darkness of the might, he made his escape. I immediately packed up my husband's cabinet, with all his writings, and near 1000 pounds in gold and silver, and all other things both of clothes, linen, and household stuff that were portable, of value; and then, about three o'clock in the morning, by the light of a taper, and in that pain I was in, I went into the market-place, with only a man and maid, and passing through an unruly tumult with their swords in their hands, searched for their chief commander Jeffries, who, whilst he was loyal, had received many civilities from your father. I told him it was necessary that upon that change I should remove, and I desired his pass that would be obeyed, or else I must remain there: I hoped he would not deny me that kindness. He instantly wrote me a pass, both for myself, family, and goods, and said he would never forget the respect he owed your father. With this I came through thousands of naked swords to Red Abbey, and hired the next neighbour's cart, which carried all that I could remove; and myself, sister, and little girl Nan, with three maids and two men, set forth at five o'clock in November, having but two horses amongst us all, which we rid on by turns. In this sad condition I left Red Abbey, with as many goods as were worth 100 pounds which could not be removed, and so were plundered. We went ten miles to Kinsale, in perpetual fear of being fetched back again; but, by little and little, I thank God, we got safe to the garrison, where I found your father the most disconsolate man in the world, for fear of his family, which he had no possibility to assist; but his joys exceeded to see me and his darling daughter, and to hear the wonderful escape we, through the assistance of God, had made.

But when the rebels went to give an account to Cromwell of their meritorious act, he immediately asked them where Mr. Fanshawe was? They replied, he was that day gone to Kinsale. Then he demanded where his papers and his family were? At which they all stared at one another, but made no reply. Their General said, 'It was as much worth to have seized his papers as the town; for I did make account to have known by them what these parts of the country are worth.'

But within a few days we received the King's order, which was, that my husband should, upon sight thereof, go into Spain to Philip IV. And deliver him his Majesty's letters; and by my husband also his Majesty sent letters to my Lord Cottington and Sir Edward Hyde, his Ambassadors Extraordinary in that Court. Upon this order we went to Macrome to the Lord Clancarty, who married a sister of the Lord Ormond; we stayed there two nights, and at my coming away, after a very noble entertainment, my Lady gave me a great Irish greyhound, and I presented her with a fine besel-stone.

From thence we went to Limerick, where we were entertained by the Mayor and Aldermen very nobly; and the Recorder of the Town was very kind, and in respect they made my husband a freeman of Limerick. There we met the Bishop of Londonderry and the Earl of Roscommon, who was Lord Chancellor of that Kingdom at that time. These two persons with my husband being together writing letters to the King, to give an account of the kingdom, when they were going down stairs from my Lord Roscommon's chamber, striving to hold the candle at the stairs' head, because the privacy of their despatch admitted not a servant to be near, my Lord Roscommon fell down the stairs, and his head fell upon the corner of a stone and broke his skull in three pieces, of which he died five days after, leaving the broad seal of Ireland in your father's hands, until such time as he could acquaint his Majesty with this sad account, and receive orders how to dispose of the seals. This caused our longer stay, but your father and I being invited to my Lord Inchiquin's, there to stay till we heard out of Holland from the King, which was a month before the messenger returned, we had very kind entertainment, and vast plenty of fish and fowl. By this time my Lord Lieutenant the now Duke of Ormond's army was quite dispersed, and himself gone for Holland, and every person concerned in that interest shifting for their lives; and Cromwell went through as bloodily as victoriously, many worthy persons being murdered in cold blood, and their families quite ruined.

From hence we went to the Lady Honor O'Brien's, a lady that went for a maid, but few believed it: she was the youngest daughter of the Earl of Thomond. There we stayed three nights. The first of which I was surprised by being laid in a chamber, when, about one o'clock I heard a voice that wakened me. I drew the curtain, and in the casement of the window, I saw, by the light of the moon, a woman leaning into the window, through the casement, in white, with red hair and pale and ghastly complexion: she spoke loud, and in a tone I had never heard, thrice, 'A horse'; and then, with a sigh more like the wind than breath she vanished, and to me her body looked more like a thick cloud than substance. I was so much frightened, that my hair stood on end, and my night clothes fell off. I pulled and pinched your father, who never woke during the disorder I was in; but at last was much surprised to see me in this fright, and more so when I related the story and showed him the window opened. Neither of us slept any more that night, but he entertained me with telling me how much more these apparitions were usual in this country than in England; and we concluded the cause to be the great superstition of the Irish, and the want of that knowing faith, which should defend them from the power of the Devil, which he exercises among them very much. About five o'clock the lady of the house came to see us, saying she had not been in bed all night, because a cousin O'Brien of her's, whose ancestors had owned that house, had desired her to stay with him in his chamber, and that he died at two o'clock, and she said, 'I wish you to have had no disturbance, for 'tis the custom of the place, that, when any of the family are dying, the shape of a woman appears in the window every night till they be dead. This woman was many ages ago got with child by the owner of this place, who murdered her in his garden and flung her into the river under the window, but truly I thought not of it when I lodged you here, it being the best room in the house.' We made little reply to her speech, but disposed ourselves to be gone suddenly.

By this time my husband had received orders from the King to give the Lord Inchiquin the seals to keep until farther orders from his Majesty. When that business was settled, we went, accompanied by my Lord Inchiquin and his family, four or five miles towards Galway, which he did not by choice, but the plague had been so hot in that city the summer before, that it was almost depopulated, and the haven as much as the town. But your father hearing that, by accident, there was a great ship of Amsterdam bound for Malaga, in Spain, and Cromwell pursuing his conquests at our backs, resolved to fall into the hands of God rather than into the hands of men; and with his family of about ten persons came to the town at the latter end of February, [Footnote: Probably January, as in a subsequent page Lady Fanshawe says, she embarked for Galway in the beginning of February.] where we found guards placed that none should enter without certificates from whence they came; but understanding that your father came to embark himself for Spain, and that there was a merchant's house taken for us, that was near the sea-side, and one of their best, they told us, if we pleased to alight, they would wait on us to the place; but it was long from thence, and no horses were admitted into the town.
* * *
As soon as the King had notice of the Queen's landing, he immediately sent my husband that night to welcome her Majesty on shore, and followed himself the next day; and upon the 21st of May the King married the Queen at Portsmouth, in the presence-chamber of his Majesty's house.

There was a rail across the upper part of the room, in which entered only the King and Queen, the Bishop of London, the Marquis de Sande, the Portuguese Ambassador, and my husband: in the other part of the room there were many of the nobility and servants to their Majesties. The Bishop of London declared them married in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; and then they caused the ribbons her Majesty wore to be cut in little pieces, and, as far as they would go, every one had some. [Footnote: As it must be inferred that Lady Fanshawe derived her information from her husband, who, she says, was present, her account of the ceremony is deserving of attention, because some doubts have been entertained as to the manner in which it was solemnised.-See Bishop Kennett's Historical Register, p. 693.]

Upon the 29th of May their Majesties came to Hampton Court, where was all that pretended to her Majesty's service, and all the King's servants, ladies and other persons of quality, who received her Majesty in several rooms, according to their several qualifications.

The next morning, about eleven o'clock, the Duchess of Ormond and her daughter, the now Lady Cavendish, and myself, went to wait on her Majesty as soon as her Majesty was dressed; where I had the honour from the King, who was then present, to tell the Queen who I was, saying many kind things of me to ingratiate me with her Majesty, whereupon her Majesty gave her hand to me to kiss, with promises of her future favour. After this we remained in Hampton Court, in the Requests' lodgings, my husband being then in waiting until the 10th day of August, upon which day he received his despatches for Ambassador to Portugal.

His Majesty was graciously pleased to promise my husband his picture, which afterwards we received, set with diamonds, to the value of three or four hundred pounds, his Majesty having been pleased to give my husband, at his first going to Portugal, his picture at length, in his garter-robes: my husband had also by his Majesty's order, out of the wardrobe, a crimson velvet cloth of state, fringed and laced with gold, with a chair, a footstool, and cushions, and two other stools of the same, with a Persian carpet to lay under them, and a suit of fine tapestry hanging for that room, with two velvet altar-cloths for the chapel, and fringed with gold, with surplices, altar cloths, and napkins, of fine linen, with a Bible, in Ogleby's print and cuts, two Common Prayer-books, in folio and quarto, with eight hundred ounces of gilt plate, and four thousand ounces of white plate; but there wanted a velvet bed, which he should have had by custom.
* * *
On Monday the 31st of August 1662, we set sail for Lisbon, and landed the 14th of September, our style, between the Conde de St. Laurence's house and Belem, God be praised! all in good health. As soon as we had anchored, the English Consul, with the merchants, came on board us; but we went presently to a house of the Duke of Aveiros, where my husband was placed by his Majesty when he was there before, in which he had then left his chief Secretary and one other, with some others of his family. The first that visited incognito there, for he was not to own any till he had made his entry, was the King of Portugal's Secretary, Antonio de Sousa: there came about that time also the Earl of Inchiquin, and Count Schomberg, to visit us. The 28/18th day, my husband went privately on board the frigate, in which he came with all his family; to whom the King sent a nobleman to receive him on shore, with his own and Queen-mother's, and very many coaches of the nobility. As soon as they met, there passed great salutations of cannons from the ships to the frigate in which my husband came, and from our ships to the King's forts, and from all the forts innumerable shots returned again.

So soon as my husband landed, he entered the King's coach, and the nobleman that fetched him, whose name I have forgot. Before him went the English Consul, with all the merchants; on his right hand went four pages; on the left side the coach, by the horses' heads, eight footmen all clothed in rich livery; in the coach that followed went my husband's own gentlemen, after the coach of state empty, and those that did him the favour to accompany him: thus they went to the house where my husband lodged. The King entertained him with great plenty of provisions in all kinds, three suppers and three dinners, and all manner of utensils belonging thereunto, as the custom of that country is.
* * *
On the 10th of October, stilo novo, my husband had his audience of his Majesty in his palace, at Lisbon; going in the King's coach with the same nobleman and in the same form as he made his entry. The King received him with great kindness and respect, much to his satisfaction. On the 11th, Don Joam de Sousa, the Queen's Vidor, came from her Majesty to us both to welcome us into the country. On the 13th, her Majesty sent her chief coach, accompanied by other coaches, to fetch my husband to the audience of her Majesty, where she received him very graciously; and the same day he had audience of Don Pedro, the King's brother, at his own palace. Saturday, the 14th, her Majesty sent her best coach for me and my children. When we came there, the Captain of the Guard received me at the foot of the stairs; all my people going before me, as the custom is. On each side were the guards placed, with halberds in their hands, as far as the presence-chamber door. There I was received by the Queen's Lord Chamberlain, who carried me to the door of the next room, where the Queen was. Then the Queen's principal lady, as our groom of the stole, received me, telling me she had command from the Queen to bid me welcome to that Court, from the ships to the frigate in which my husband came, and from our ships to the King's forts, and from all the forts innumerable shots returned again.
* * *
On Wednesday the 18th of June, my husband had his audience of his Catholic Majesty; who sent the Marquis de Malpica to conduct him, and brought with him a horse of his Majesty's for my husband to ride on, and thirty more for his gentlemen, and his Majesty's coach with the guard that he was captain of. No Ambassador's coach accompanied my husband but the French, who did it contrary to the King's command; who had before, upon my husband's demanding the custom of Ambassadors accompanying all other Ambassadors that came into this Court at their audience, replied, that although it had been so, it should be so no more; saying, it was a custom brought into this Court within less than these twenty-five years, and that it caused many disputes, for which he would no more suffer it. To this order all the Ambassadors in this Court submitted but the French, whose Secretary told my husband, at his coming that morning, that his Master, the Ambassador, said that his Catholic Majesty had nothing to do to give his Master orders, nor would he obey any of them; and so great was this work of supererogation on the part of the French, that they waited on my husband from the palace home, a compliment till that time never seen before.

About 11 o'clock set forth out of his lodgings my husband thus:--First went all those gentlemen of the town and palace that came to accompany him: then went twenty footmen all in new liveries of the same colour we used to give, which is a dark green cloth with a frost upon green lace; then went my husband's gentlemen, and next before himself his camaradoes two and two:

Mr. Wycherley and Mr. Lorimer,
Mr. Godolphin, Sir Edward Turner,
Sir Andrew King, Sir Benjamin Wright,
Mr. Newport and Mr. Bertie.

Then my husband, in a very rich suit of clothes of a dark fillemorte brocade laced with silver and gold lace, nine laces, every one as broad as my hand, and a little silver and gold lace laid between them, both of very curious workmanship; his suit was trimmed with scarlet taffety ribbon; his stockings of white silk upon long scarlet silk ones; his shoes black, with scarlet shoe-strings and garters; his linen very fine, laced with very rich Flanders lace; a black beaver, buttoned on the left side, with a jewel of twelve hundred pounds value. A rich curious-wrought gold chain, made in the Indies, at which hung the King his Master's picture, richly set with diamonds, cost 300 pounds which his Majesty, in great grace and favour, had been pleased to give him at his coming home from Portugal. On his fingers he wore two rich rings; his gloves trimmed with the same ribbon as his clothes. All his whole family were very richly clothed, according to their several qualities. Upon my husband's left hand rode the Marquis of Malpica, Captain of the German guard, and the Mayor-domo to his Majesty, being that week in waiting: by him went all the German guard, and by them my husband's eight pages, clothed all in velvet, the same colour as our liveries; next them followed his Catholic Majesty'scoach, and my husband's coach of state with four black horses, the finest that ever came out of England, none going in this Court [Footnote: i.e., Within the royal residence. Out of the city it was allowed to use six horses, as will be presently seen. ] with six but the King himself. The coach was of rich crimson velvet, laced with a broad silver and gold lace, fringed round with a massy silver and gold fringe, and the falls of the boot so rich that they hung almost down to the ground: the very fringe cost almost four hundred pounds. The coach was very richly gilt on the outside, and very richly adorned with brass work, with rich tassels of gold and silver hanging round the top of the curtains round about the coach. The curtains were of rich damask, fringed with silver and gold; the harness for six horses was richly embossed with brass work; the reins and tassels for the horses of crimson silk, silver and gold. This coach is said to be the finest that ever entered Madrid with any Ambassador whatsoever. Next to this followed the French Ambassador's coach; then my husband's second coach, which was of green figured velvet, with green damask curtains, handsomely gilt, adorned on the outside, with harness for six horses, suitable to the same. The four horses were fellows to those that drew the rich coach when we went out of town, using always six. After this followed my husband's third coach, with four mules, being a very good one, according to the fashion of this country. Then followed many coaches of particular persons of this Court.

Thus they rode through the greatest streets of Madrid, as the custom is; and alighting within the palace, my husband was conducted up by the Marquis, all the King's guards attending, through many rooms, in which were infinite numbers of people, as there were in the streets to see him pass to the palace up to a private drawing-room of his Catholic Majesty's, where my husband was received with great grace and favour by his Majesty. My husband, being covered, delivered his message in English, interpreted afterwards by himself in Spanish. After this my husband gave his Catholic Majesty thanks for his noble entertainment from our landing to this Court, to which his Catholic Majesty replied, 'That, as well for the great esteem he had ever had for his person, as the greatness of his Master whom he served, he would be always glad to be serviceable to him.'

A Trip to Paris in August 1792

Excerpts on events in Paris in August 1792 as observed by an Englishman, Richard Twiss, and recorded in: A TRIP TO PARIS, IN JULY and AUGUST, 1792. LONDON: PRINTED AT THE Minerva Press, AND SOLD BY WILLIAM LANE, LEADENHALL-STREET, AND BY MRS. HARLOW, PALL-MALL. M.DCC.XCIII. PRICE THREE SHILLINGS Entered at Stationers Hall.

EXECUTION OF TWO CRIMINALS, WITH A BEHEADING MACHINE.
ON the 4th of August a criminal was beheaded, in the Place de Grêve. I did not see the execution, because, as the hour is never specified, I might have waited many hours in a crowd, from which there is no extricating one's self. I was there immediately after, and saw the machine, which was just going to be taken away. I went into a coffee-house and made a drawing, which is here engraven. It is called la Guillotine, from the name of the person who first brought it into use in Paris: that at Lisle is called le Louison, for a similar reason. In English it is termed a maiden.
Machines of this kind are at present made use of for executions throughout all France, and criminals are put to death in no other manner.
The following is the account of an execution, which I had from an eye-witness.
The crowd began to assemble at ten in the morning, and waited, exposed to the intense heat of the sun in the middle of July, till four in the afternoon, when the criminals, a Marquis and a Priest, were brought, in two coaches; they were condemned for having forged assignats [paper money].
The Marquis ascended the scaffold first; he was as pale as if he had already been dead, and he endeavoured to hide his face, by pulling his hair over it; there were two executioners, dressed in black, on the scaffold, one of which immediately tied a plank of about 18 inches broad, and an inch thick, to the body of the Marquis, as he stood upright, fastening it about the arms, the belly, and the legs; this plank was about four feet long, and came almost up to his chin; a priest who attended, then applied a crucifix to his mouth, and the two executioners directly laid him on his belly on the bench, lifted up the upper part of the[36] board which was to receive his neck, adjusted his head properly, then shut the board and pulled the string which is fastened to the peg at the top of the machine, which lifted up a latch, and down came the axe; the head was off in a moment, and fell into a basket which was ready to receive it, the executioner took it out and held it up by the hair to show the populace, and then put it into another basket along with the body: very little blood had issued as yet.
The Priest was now taken out of the coach, from which he might have seen his companion suffer; the bloody axe was hoisted up and he underwent the same operation exactly. Each of these executions lasted about a minute in all, from the moment of the criminal's ascending the scaffold to that of the body's being taken away. It was now seen that the body of the Marquis made such a violent expiration that the belly raised the lid of the basket it was in, and the blood rushed out of the great arteries in torrents.
The windows of the Place de Grêve were, as usual on such occasions, filled with ladies. Many persons were performing on violins, and trumpets, in order to pass the time away, and to relieve the tediousness of expectation.
* * *
I went once to Versailles; there is hardly any thing in the palace but the bare walls, a very few of the looking-glasses, tapestry, and large pictures remaining, as it has now been near two years uninhabited. I crossed the great canal on foot; there was not a drop of water in it.
In the Menagerie I saw the Rhinoceros, which has been 23 years there; there is likewise a lion, with a little dog in the same den, as his companion, and a zebra.
The collection of orange trees cannot be matched in any country where these trees do not grow naturally; the number is about six hundred, the largest trunk is about fifteen inches in diameter, and the age of the most ancient of these trees exceeds three centuries.
* * *
LION Dogs and Cats are common in Paris.
The lion-dog greatly resembles a lion in miniature; the hair of the fore part of its body is long, and curled, and the hinder part short; the nose is short, and the tail is long and tufted at the extremity; the smallest are little larger than guinea-pigs; these are natives of Malta, and are the most valuable; those which are produced in France are considerably larger, and the breed degenerates very soon. Their general colour is white; they are frequently called Lexicons, which word is derived, not from a dictionary, but from a French compound word of nearly the same sound, descriptive of one of their properties.
The lion-cat comes originally from Angora, in Syria. It is much larger than the common[51] cat; its hair is very long, especially about the neck, where it forms a fine ruff, of a silvery whiteness and silky texture, that on the tail is three or four inches long; these cats frequently spread their tails on their backs, as squirrels do. The colour is generally white, but sometimes light brown; they do not catch mice. This beautiful species does not degenerate speedily, and it appears to thrive better in Paris than in any other part of Europe. The figures of both these animals are in Buffon's Natural History.
About the Palais Royal persons are frequently found who offer for sale white mice in cages; these are pretty little animals, their fur is snow white, and their eyes are red and sparkling. Other persons carried for sale canary-birds, linnets, and two or three other sorts of small birds, perched on their fingers; these birds had been rendered so tame that they did not attempt to fly away.
* * *
There is a school at the point of the isle of St. Louis, in the river Seine, to teach swimming; persons who chuse to learn in private pay four louis, those who swim among others, half that sum, or half-crown a lesson; if they are not perfect in that art in a season, (five summer months) they may attend the following season gratis.
* * *
THE common people are in general much better clothed than they were before the Revolution, which may be ascribed to their not being so grievously taxed as they were. An English Gentleman who has gone for many years annually from Calais to Paris, remarks, that they are almost as well dressed on working days at present, as they were on Sundays and holidays formerly.
All those ornaments which three years ago were worn of silver, are now of gold. All the women of the lower class, even those who sit behind green-stalls, &c. wear gold ear-rings, with large drops, some of which cost two or three louis, and necklaces of the same. Many of the men wear plain gold ear-rings; those worn by officers and other gentlemen are usually as large as a half-crown piece. Even children of two years old have small gold drops in their ears. The general dress of the women is white linen or muslin gowns, large caps which cover all their hair, excepting just a small triangular piece over the forehead, pomatumed, or rather plaistered and powdered, without any hats: neither do they wear any stays, but only corsets (waistcoats or jumps.) Tight lacing is not known here, nor yet high and narrow heeled shoes. Because many of the ladies ci-devant of quality have emigrated or ran away, and that those which remain in Paris, keep within doors, I saw no face that was painted, excepting on the stage. Most of the men wear coats made like great-coats, or in other words, long great-coats, without any coat: this in fine weather and in the middle of summer made them appear to me like invalides. There is hardly any possibility of distinguishing the rank of either man or woman by their dress at present, or rather, there are no ranks to distinguish.
The nation in general is much improved in cleanliness, and even in politeness. The French no longer look on every Englishman as a lord, but as their equal.
* * *
BATTLE AND MASSACRE AT THE TUILERIES.
ON Thursday, the 9th of August, the legislative body completed the general discontent of the people, (which had been raised the preceding day, by the discharge of every accusation against la Fayette) by appearing to protract the question relative to the king's déchéance (forfeiture) at a time when there was not a moment to lose, and by not holding any assembly in the evening.
The fermentation increased every minute, in a very alarming manner. The mayor himself had declared to the representatives of the nation, that he could not answer for the tranquillity of the city after midnight. Every body knew that the people intended at that hour to ring the alarm-bell; and to go to the château of the Tuileries, as it was suspected that the Royal Family intended to escape to Rouen, and it is said many trunks were found, packed up and ready for taking away, and that many carriages were seen that afternoon in the court-yard of the Tuileries.
At eight in the evening the generale,(a sort of beat of drum) was heard in all the sections, the tocsin was likewise rung, (an alarm, by pulling the bells of the churches, so as to cause the clappers to give redoubled strokes in very quick time. Some bells were struck with large hammers.)
All the shops were shut, and also most of the great gates of the hotels; lights were placed in almost every window, and few of the inhabitants retired to their repose: the night passed however without any other disturbance; many of the members of the National Assembly were sitting soon after midnight, and the others were expected. Mr. Petion, the mayor, had been sent for by the king, and was then in the château; the number of members necessary to form a sitting, being completed, the tribunes (galleries) demanded and obtained a decree to oblige the château to release its prey, the mayor; he soon after appeared at the bar, and from thence went to the commune (mansion-house.)
It was now about six o'clock on Friday morning (10th) the people of the fauxbourgs (suburbs) especially of St. Antoine and St. Marcel, which are parted by the river, assembled together on the Place de la Bastille, and the crowd was so great that twenty-five persons were squeezed to death. At seven the streets were filled with-armed citizens, that is to say, with federates (select persons sent from the provinces to assist at the Federation, or confederacy held last July 14) from Marseille, from Bretagne, with national guards, and Parisian sans-culottes, (without breeches, these people have breeches, but this is the name which has been given to the mob.) The arms consisted of guns, with or without bayonets, pistols, sabres, swords, pikes, knives, scythes, saws, iron crows, wooden billets, in short of every thing that could be used offensively.
A party of these met a false patrol of twenty-two men, who, of course, did not know the watch-word. These were instantaneously put to death, their heads cut off and carried about the streets on pikes (on promena leurs têtes sur des piques.) This happened in la Place Vendôme; their bodies were still lying there the next day. Another false patrol, consisting of between two and three hundred men, with cannon, wandered all night in the neighbourhood of the theatre français: it is said they were to join a detachment from the battalion of Henri IV. on the Pont-neuf, to cut the throats of Petion and the Marseillois, who were encamped on the Pont St. Michel (the next bridge to the Pont-neuf) which caused the then acting parish assemblies to order an honorary guard of 400 citizens, who were to be answerable for the liberty and the life of that magistrate, then in the council-chamber. Mandat, commander-general of the National Guard, had affronted M. Petion, when he came from the château of the Tuileries, to go to the National Assembly; he was arrested and sent to prison immediately.
The insurrection now became general; the Place du Carrousel (square of the Carousals, a square in the Tuileries, so called from the magnificent festival which Lewis XIV. in 1662, there gave to the queen and the queen-mother) was already filled; the king had not been in bed; all the night had probably been spent in combining a plan of defence, if attacked, or rather of retreat; soon after seven the king, the queen, their two children (the dauphin, seven years old, and his sister fourteen) Princess Elizabeth, (the queen's sister, about 50 years old) and the Princess de Lamballe, crossed the garden of the Tuileries, which was still shut, escorted by the National Guard, and by all the Swiss, and took refuge in the National Assembly, when the Swiss returned to their posts in the château.
The alarm-bells, which were incessantly ringing, the accounts of the carrying heads upon pikes, and of the march of almost all Paris in arms; the presence of the king, throwing himself, as it were, on the mercy of the legislative body; the fierce and determinate looks of the galleries; all these things together had such an effect on the National Assembly, that it immediately decreed the suspension of Lewis XVI. which decree was received with universal applause and clapping.
At this moment a wounded man rushed into the Assembly, crying, "We are betrayed, to arms, to arms, the Swiss are firing on the citizens; they have already killed a hundred Marseillois."
This was about nine o'clock. The democrats, that is to say, the armed citizens, as beforementioned, had dragged several pieces of cannon, six and four pounders, into the carousel square, and were assembled there, on the quais, the bridges, and neighbouring streets, in immense numbers, all armed; they knew the king was gone to the National Assembly, and came to insist on his déchéance (forfeiture) or resignation of the throne. All the Swiss (six or seven hundred) came out to them, and permitted them to enter into the court-yard of the Tuileries, to the number of ten thousand, themselves standing in the middle, and when they were peaceably smoking their pipes and drinking their wine, the Swiss turned back to back, and fired a volley on them, by which about two hundred were killed; the women and children ran immediately into the river, up to their necks, many jumping from the parapets and from the bridges, many were drowned, and many were shot in the water, and on the balustrades of the Pont-royal, from the windows of the gallery of the Louvre.
The populace now became, as it were, mad, they seized on five cannon they found in the court yard, and turned them against the château; they planted some more cannon on the Pont-royal and in the garden, twenty-two pieces in all, and attacked the château on three sides at once. The Swiss continued their fire, and it is said they fired seven times to the people's once; the Swiss had 36 rounds of powder, whereas the people had hardly three or four. Expresses were sent several miles to the powder-mills, for more ammunition, even as far as Essonne, about twenty miles off, on the road to Fontainebleau. The people contrived however to discharge their twenty-two cannon nine or ten times. From nine to twelve the firing was incessant; many waggons and carts were constantly employed in carrying away the dead to a large excavation, formerly a stone quarry, at the back of the new church de la Madeleine de la ville l'Eveque (part of the Fauxbourg St. Honoré, thus called.)
Soon after noon the Swiss had exhausted all their powder, which the populace perceiving, they stormed the château, broke open the doors, and put every person they found to the sword, tumbling the bodies out of the windows into the garden, to the amount, it is supposed, of about two thousand, having lost four thousand on their own side. Among the slain in the château, were, it is asserted, about two hundred noblemen and three bishops: all the furniture was destroyed, the looking-glasses broken, in short, nothing left but the bare walls.
Sixty of the Swiss endeavoured to escape through the gardens, but the horse (gendarmerie nationale) rode round by the street of St. Honoré, and met them full butt at the end of the gardens; the Swiss fired, killed five or six and twenty horses and about thirty men, and were then immediately cut to pieces; the people likewise put the Swiss porters at the pont-tournant (turning bridge) to death, as well as all they could find in the gardens and elsewhere: they then set fire to all the casernes (barracks) in the carousel, and afterwards got at the wine in the cellars of the château, all of which was immediately drank; many citizens were continually bringing into the National Assembly jewels, gold, louis d'ors, plate, and papers, and many thieves were, as soon as discovered, instantly taken to lamp irons and hanged by the ropes which suspend the lamps. This timely severity, it is supposed, saved Paris from an universal pillage. Fifty or sixty Swiss were hurried by the populace to the Place de Grêve, and there cut to pieces.
At about three o'clock in the afternoon every thing was tolerably quiet, and I ventured out for the first time that day.
The quais, the bridges, the gardens, and the immediate scene of battle were covered with bodies, dead, dying, and drunk; many wounded and drunk died in the night; the streets were filled with carts, carrying away the dead, with litters taking the wounded to hospitals; with women and children crying for the loss of their relations, with men, women, and children walking among and striding over the dead bodies, in silence, and with apparent unconcern; with troops of the sans-culottes running about, covered with blood, and carrying, at the end of their bayonets, rags of the clothes which they had torn from the bodies of the dead Swiss, who were left stark naked in the gardens.
One of these sans-culottes was bragging that he had killed eight Swiss with his own hand. Another was observed lying wounded, all over blood, asleep or drunk, with a gun, pistols, a sabre, and a hatchet by him.
The courage and ferocity of the women was this day very conspicuous; the first person that entered the Tuileries, after the firing ceased, was a woman, named Teroigne, she had been very active in the riots at Brussels, a few years ago; she afterwards was in prison a twelvemonth at Vienna, and when she was released, after the death of the Emperor, went to Geneva, which city she was soon obliged to leave; she then came to Paris, and headed the Marseillois; she began by cleaving the head of a Swiss, who solicited her protection, and who was instantaneously cut in pieces by her followers. She is agreeable in her person, which is small, and is about twenty-eight years of age.
Many men, and also many women, as well of the order of Poissardes (which are a class almost of the same species and rank with our fishwomen, and who are easily distinguished by their red cotton bibs and aprons) as others, ran about the gardens, ripping open the bellies, and dashing out the brains of several of the naked dead Swiss.
At six in the evening I saw a troop of national guards and sans-culottes kill a Swiss who was running away, by cleaving his skull with a dozen sabres at once, on the Pont-royal, and then cast him into the river, in less time than it takes to read this, and afterwards walk quietly on.
The shops were shut all this day, and also the theatres; no coaches were about the streets, at least not near the place of carnage; the houses were lighted up, and patroles paraded the streets all night. Not a single house was pillaged.
The barracks were still in flames, as well as the houses of the Swiss porters at the end of the gardens; these last gave light to five or six waggons which were employed all night in carrying away the dead carcases.
THE next day, Saturday the 11th, about an hundred Swiss who had not been in the palace placed themselves under the protection of the National Assembly. They were sent to the Palais Bourbon escorted by the Marseillois, with Mr. Petion at their head, in order to be tried by a court-martial.
The people were now employed, some in hanging thieves, others with Mademoiselle Teroigne on horseback at their head, in pulling down the statues of the French Kings.
* * *
BEHEADING. DEAD NAKED BODIES.
BUT to return to those "active citizens, whom aristocratic insolence has stiled sans-culottes, brigands."
On Sunday, they dragged a man to the Hôtel de Ville, before a magistrate, to be tried, for having stolen something in the Tuileries as they said. He was accordingly tried, searched, and nothing being found on him, was acquitted; n'importe, said these citizens,[91] we must have his head for all that, for we caught him in the act of stealing. They laid him on his back on the ground, and in the presence of the judge, who had acquitted him, they sawed off his head in about a quarter of an hour, with an old notched scythe, and then gave it to the boys to carry about on a pike, leaving the carcase in the justice-hall.
At the corner of almost every chief street is a black marble slab, inserted in the wall about ten feet high, on which is cut in large letters, gilt, Loix et actes de l'autorité publique (laws and acts of the public authority) and underneath are pasted the daily and sometimes hourly decrees and notices of the National Assembly. One of these acquainted the citizens, that Mandat (the former commander-general of the national guards) had yesterday undergone the punishment due to his crimes; that is to say, the people had cut off his head.
During several days, after the day I procured all the Paris newspapers, about twenty, but all on the same side, as the people had put the editors of the aristocratic papers, hors d'état de parler (prevented their speaking) by beheading one or two of them, and destroying all their presses.
They, about this time, hanged two money changers (people who gave paper for louis d'or, crowns, and guineas) under the idea that the money was sent to the emigrants.
On the Saturday morning, at seven, I was in the Tuileries gardens; only thirty-eight dead naked bodies were still lying there; they were however covered where decency required; the people who stript them on the preceding evening, having cut a gash in the belly, and left a bit of the shirt sticking to the carcase by means of the dried blood. I was told, that the body of a lady had just been carried out of the Carousel square; she was the only woman killed, and that probably by accident. Here I had the pleasure of seeing many beautiful ladies (and ugly ones too as I thought) walking arm in arm with their male friends, though so early in the morning, and forming little groups, occupied in contemplating the mangled naked and stiff carcases.
* * *
Here an officer of the national guard who had been present during the whole of the battle of the 10th, said to me, "La journeé a eté un peu forte, nous avons eu plus de quinze cens des notres de tués," (the day was rather warm; we have had more than fifteen hundred of our own people killed.) This was confirmed by many more of the officers there, with whom I had a quarter of an hour's conversation, and they all estimated the number of the slain at above six thousand, which may probably be accounted for in the following manner, but a demonstration is impossible.
Some assert that there were eight hundred Swiss soldiers in the château of the Tuileries; others but five hundred: let us take the medium of six hundred and fifty. They had, as every one allows, six and thirty charges each, and they fired till their ammunition was expended. This makes above three and twenty thousand shot, every one of which must have taken place, on a mob as thick as hailstones after a shower: but allowing for the Swiss themselves, who were killed during the engagement, which diminishes the number of shot, and then allowing likewise, that of two thousand persons who were in the palace, we here say nothing of the remaining thirteen or fourteen hundred, most of whom were firing as well as they could, perhaps it may not appear exaggerated to say, that out of above twenty thousand shot, four thousand must have taken place mortally; and this includes the fifteen hundred of the national guard, which were certainly known to be missing. Of the other two thousand five hundred slain, the number could not so correctly be ascertained, as they consisted of citizens without regimentals or uniform, and of sans-culottes, none of whom were registered. All the persons in the palace were killed; of these, few, if any, were taken away immediately, whereas when any of the adverse party were killed, there were people enough who were glad of the opportunity of escaping from this slaughter, by carrying away the corpse. We must then reflect on the number of waggons and carts employed all night in the same offices, and then we shall see great reason to double the number of the slain, as has been done in various publications.
No idea of this number could be formed by seeing the field of battle, because several bodies were there lying in heaps, and of the others not above two or three could be seen at a time, as the streets were after the engagement filled with spectators, who walked among and over the carcases.
Of the feelings of these spectators, I judge by my own: I might perhaps have disliked seeing a single dead body, but the great number immediately reconciled me to the sight.