MADAME ROLAND AT THE BAR OF THE CONVENTION.
Dumouriez's attempts to bring about a reconciliation between Madame Roland and Danton proved a failure. Knowing that the latter would be in the adjoining box, the general had offered to escort her to the Opera, where a brilliant reception awaited him. Not caring to be seen in public with this gay Lothario of a Dumouriez, she made some excuse, but afterwards decided on going with Vergniaud. About to enter the Ministerial box, she perceived the bulky Danton, Fabre D'Églantine, and some ladies she thought "of questionable appearance," who, however, it appears, were Danton's wife and her friends. Enough; she retired without being seen by the occupants, whose backs were turned to her. Thus was lost the last chance of healing this unfortunate breach, which, if justified by inherent incompatibility of temperaments, proved so disastrous in its consequences.
Although, for patriotic reasons, Danton was anxious for a conciliation, and entertained a high regard for Roland and much admiration for his wife's genius, he had, after his careless fashion, given the latter a wound difficult for a woman to forgive. Roland had been elected to the Convention for the Department of the Somme, and his wife urged him to resign his ministerial post, the responsibility of which—without the authority which should have attended it—preyed visibly on his health. But the majority of the Convention, considering his services of the greatest importance—and, indeed, he was indefatigable in attending to the circulation of grain and the due provisioning of Paris—pressed him to remain in office. It was then that Danton exclaimed in his forcible way, "Why not invite Madame Roland to the Ministry, too? Everyone knows that Roland is not alone in office." The deputies murmured disapprobation, and one of them very sensibly remarked that it could not signify to the country whether Roland had an intelligent wife capable of assisting him with advice, or whether the services he rendered emanated from himself alone. "This petty attack," he said, "is unworthy of Danton; but I will not imply with him that it is the wife of Roland who rules, for that would be accusing him of incapacity." There was much applause; and the result was that Roland remained in office.
Nowhere is the great political importance attributed by contemporaries to Madame Roland so decisively shown as here. She had now been pushed to the very forefront of the Revolution, visible to all eyes, a mark for envy, to become the favourite target for the venomous calumnies of Marat and the Père Duchesne. Her co-operation in composing and promulgating the numerous writings by which Roland sought to influence public opinion could not remain unknown. The office of one paper, l'Esprit Public, was believed to be under her management, and its articles "due to her prodigious facility" (as worded in Amar's subsequent indictment). Yet, judging from her previous life, and her own assertions, she had not that last infirmity of noble minds, the thirst for fame, but was impelled to action by zeal for the Revolution, and because, as she admits, there was no part that pleased her so well as to be a kind of human Providence.
When the trial of Louis XVI. was preparing, a strange disclosure, which contributed not a little to excite and envenom opinion, was made to the Minister of the Interior. A locksmith, formerly in the King's confidence, acquainted Roland with the existence of an iron chest containing important State papers. To hurry to the Tuileries, empty the contents of the chest into a napkin, carry them home to his wife and examine them with her, was the Minister's first care. In this step one seems to recognise Madame Roland's impulsiveness, and nothing could have been more imprudent. Instead of calling together a commission legally empowered to make a report on these documents, Roland first carefully looked them over, docketed and affixed his seal to each bundle, and not till then handed them over to the Convention. This arbitrary proceeding cannot be justified, though he may have feared that these papers would be tampered with by unscrupulous Committees, capable of interpolating some documentary evidence to serve their private animosity. Had not some vindictive opponent sought to ruin Brissot by the trifling forgery of one letter in a name resembling his, which would have convicted him of traitorous designs? Although Brissot, concious of rectitude, always scorned to defend himself against the vile charges which undermined his reputation.
Roland had now given a handle to misconstruction, of which his enemies were not slow to avail themselves. The documents turned out most compromising to the King at this critical juncture, showing, as they did, that he had never entertained serious intentions of conforming to the Constitution; that he was entirely in the hands of fanatic priests, leaders of the Counter-revolution; that he sought to reign by a system of corruption; that the men he hated most were precisely those who would have saved his throne—Necker, Mirabeau, and Lafayette; and that he had secretly negotiated with the Cabinets of Europe for the invasion of France.
Denunciations and libels of Roland became the order of the day. The rabid Chabot announced with a consequential air in the Convention that a certain Viard had discovered a conspiracy of Royalists in England, who counted on saving the King and re-establishing the Monarchy with the assistance of Roland and Fauchet! Shouts and laughter answered him. No one—certainly not Danton nor Robespierre,—believed in the long-winded tale of this unknown Viard, whom the Committee of Surveillance had dragged from obscurity to pit him against a man who, whatever his shortcomings, was the soul of honour. After Roland had been called, and declared that he had never seen or had any relations whatever with the persons with whom he was pretended to be in correspondence, it was deemed advisable that, as her name had been dragged in, Madame Roland should be cited to the bar.
Here, on this circumscribed arena, shaken by such fierce debates, all members turning towards her—Madame Roland might distinguish amid a confused mass of men the wintry face of Robespierre, Marat, the Angel of Death St. Just, leonine Danton, Condorcet, Brissot, the waspish Guadet, and, above all the others, brave, manly-hearted Buzot, who thrilled at the sight of her, as she entered with that proud, erect bearing of hers, such mingled dignity and sweetness in her expression that the Convention broke into thunders of applause. When the tumult subsided, she explained that Viard, of whom she knew nothing, had obtained an interview with her, under the pretext of giving her an account of what he had seen in London; that, after having let him say his say, she had expressed astonishment at his not communicating such important matters to the Minister instead of herself, who was only on the outskirts of affairs. "Without having too practised an eye," she proceeded, "I concluded that the gentleman was a person who came more to probe our thoughts than for anything else." Her whole speech, necessarily unpremeditated, was so lucid and full of tact that it was followed by prolonged applause, and the honours of the sitting were voted to the Citoyenne Roland. As she passed through the House, her exit was accompanied by continued plaudits; only Marat, inaccessible to admiration, growling dissent.
In the meanwhile, debates concerning the trial of Louis almost exclusively occupied the deputies. Gironde and Mountain were agreed in recognising the King's guilt. His appeal to the foreigner was a crime against the nation, if ever there was one, but as to the judgment to be awarded, opinions were profoundly divided. The Girondins had, from the commencement of their political career, been more decidedly anti-Royalist than the Montagnards. They were the first to invoke the magic name of the Republic. Penetrated with classic ideas, the death of tyrants was an article of their creed; Aristogiton and Brutus were saints in their eyes. We have seen at what an early stage Madame Roland had cried, "Two heads must fall!" Perhaps, had they then fallen, it might have saved incalculable bloodshed. But the aspect of affairs had entirely changed since then, and this change was instinctively felt by the Gironde.
For, before all, the Girondins were humanitarians, and only politicians and statesmen after. It may have been the cause of their failure; but, if so, it became them better than success. One of Brissot's first acts when in power was the abolition of slavery in St. Domingo, and, if attended with unfortunate results, it shows none the less, among many other things, his zeal for the happiness of man. With such tendencies, the attitude of the Gironde towards a fallen monarch was not what it had been when that monarch was surrounded by all the pomp of royalty. As king, was he not virtually dead already? Why revive him then—why bring him once more prominently before the public, and invest him with a factitious pathos by death? Unanimous in their conviction of his guilt and of the urgency of a trial, they were divided in their votes as to the kind of trial and punishment to be chosen. This lamentable schism which split up their ranks unfortunately broke the backbone of their party.