Prison Journals During the French Revolution. Duras Louise Henriette Charlotte Philippine (de Noailles) de Durfort
de Tourzel, came with a message from her mother, asking me to supper; and Madame de Chevigné invited me to breakfast next morning. I accepted the second invitation with pleasure. I had never known these ladies intimately. They were the only ones belonging to the court who were in the house. I had only met them at the houses of my acquaintances.
The fatigue I had undergone the day before made me sleep. I had scarcely risen when Mademoiselle Lèfvre, the sister-in-law of the steward of Mouchy, came to my room to give me information concerning the inhabitants of our prison, and advice about my own arrangements, – all of which was very useful to me. It is a very sad thing to find oneself utterly alone in the midst of a crowd. Monsieur Notté paid me a visit; I did not find his face so severe as it had seemed on the arrival of our party, when he stood beside the commissioner of the Revolutionary army. He spoke pleasantly to me, and told me that, as the prisoners were very much crowded in their lodgings, he thought it best to put some one with me in a little cabinet which was under my control. In order to enter it one had to pass through my room. He allowed me to select the person, and I chose the hospital sister who had come from Beauvais, with me. She was a good woman, the daughter of a village farrier, without education, but a great help to me in the daily needs of life. I had an opportunity to show her my gratitude for it all during a severe illness of hers, when I acted not only as her nurse, but also as her physician, as she was not willing to see a doctor. She frequently gave me proof of the fact that when one has not received certain ideas in youth it is impossible to comprehend some of the simplest things. I would alter my phrases in every possible way in order to enable her to understand what I meant, – among other things respect for opinion, etc. She remained with me until I was removed to Paris, and was never annoying to me. This was a great blessing, since our companionship was enforced. I soon began to pay visits among our colony, which was composed of very incongruous material. There were priests, nobles, nuns, magistrates, soldiers, merchants, and a large number of what were called 'sans-culottes,' from all parts of the country, and who were excellent people. I had near me a mail-carrier, a barmaid, and other domestics, whom I highly esteemed. They had become greatly attached to a venerable curate from Beauvais who lodged with them. They called him their father, rendered him many services, and took perfect care of him during a serious illness which he had while in prison. I first learned something of the character and habits of our companions, and which of them seemed most honest. They told me that we had among us samples of all sorts of persons and opinions. There were priests, real confessors of Jesus Christ, to be revered on account of their patience and their charity, others who had renounced their profession, and declared from the pulpit that they had formerly only uttered fables. One of these unprincipled priests, a man still very young, who had served in a regiment, often said that he did not know why he was kept in prison, for on every occasion since the Revolution he had done whatever he had been desired to do. When civic festivals were given in the village of Chantilly he had been the composer of couplets. He wore habitually the national uniform. We had two abbesses, – the abbess of the Parc-aux-Dames and the abbess of Royal-Lieu, Madame de Soulanges, who was nearly eighty years old, and had been under-governess to Madame Louise at Fontevrault, and was tenderly beloved by her. During her sojourns in Compèigne the princess used to go to see her every day. (Madame Louise, daughter of Louis XV., a Carmelite at St. Denis, had been brought up at the abbey of Fontevrault, together with Madame Victoire and Madame Sophie.)
I discovered, soon after my arrival at Chantilly that loss of liberty unites neither minds nor hearts, and that people are the same in prison as in the world at large, – jealous, intriguing, false; for there were among us many spies, – an epithet, however, which was often lightly bestowed. I endeavoured to be polite to every one, and intimate only with a very small circle.
I made some visits every day, and received visitors after dinner, during which time I also worked. Sometimes some patriots whom I recognized quite well, pretended to be aristocrats, so as to make me talk; it was without doubt the most disagreeable part of the day. The time passed without great weariness, for I filled it up with prayer and reading, and a little walking in a courtyard, walled on four sides, and very dreary looking. At first we were able to go to the grating and talk with persons outside; but it was not desired that we should do this, and to prevent it planks were placed over the grating. These concealed the outer view and made communication impossible. On the third story there were terraces on the leads, upon which all our windows opened; and these windows, in several instances, also served as doors; only one person could pass through them at a time. It was really a comical sight, this file of prisoners, dressed in all sorts of costumes, and going around and around like a panorama. We were frequently obliged to stop on account of the great number of promenaders. Mademoiselle de Pons, who played on the piano, accompanied on the violin by Monsieur de Corberon (an officer of the French Guards, who was afterwards guillotined), entertained us most agreeably; she occupied one of the apartments of which I have just spoken. The view from it was very pleasant, – the most beautiful rippling waters, numerous villages, a superb forest, fine buildings belonging to the château, and a green lawn most charming to look upon. I thoroughly examined every portion of our prison. Several of the large rooms had been divided by plank partitions which were only six or seven feet high. Those who occupied these compartments during the winter suffered excessively from cold. In the rooms which were not so divided there were put as many as twenty-five persons. I noticed the arrangement of one of these communities, in which the curtain-less beds were placed so close together that during the day the prisoners, in order to move around, were obliged to pile them up on top of one another. Here is a list of the individuals occupying this room: A republican general and his wife, a curate from Noyon, twenty-seven years old, several young men, two estimable mothers of families, with five or six daughters from fourteen to twenty years. In another there were a soldier with two or three nuns. The one next to mine contained a general, called Monsieur de Coincy, eighty-three years old, who still retained his strength, his wife, his son, his daughter, a nun of the Visitation, and Mesdemoiselles de Grammont-Caderousse, the eldest of whom was about fourteen. A special annoyance in our prison was the mingling of the sexes in the same lodging. I was the more thankful for my little cell. Marchand, the commissioner of the Revolutionary army, came to make me a visit; he found nothing to complain of in the furnishing of my apartment, which was composed of a servant's bed, two chairs, and a table. The beds and the trunks served as seats when the company was too numerous. Generally luxury was an offence to him. I told him he could find no fault with mine. I was mistaken; he answered that I as well as my parents had once had too much of it. He went from one end to the other of the place, and took it into his head, in order to annoy those ladies who seemed somewhat careful of their toilets, to order them to have their hair cut off; and he also sent sans-culottes to sleep in their rooms. These poor fellows were as much worried at this as those who were compelled to submit to it. They used to come as late as they possibly could and go away very early in the morning. They were very well behaved, with the exception of a cobbler from Compiègne, of whom his hosts complained bitterly; he was ill-tempered and annoying. One of his comrades, probably better reared, came near dying of colic through his politeness in not wishing to awaken those with whom he was forced to lodge.
Care had been taken, in order to avoid too active a correspondence between the prisoners and outsiders, to send those who were inhabitants of the district of Senlis to the abbey of St. Paul at Beauvais, and those of Beauvais, to Chantilly. We could not write even to our parents, nor could we receive news from them without a great deal of trouble. Of all the privations we were forced to undergo, this was the hardest to bear. While Notté was at the head of the house, the prisoners continually complained of him, though our situation was endurable. The wretched are naturally fault-finding.
I assured them that if he went away it would be worse for us; and so it actually happened. This man was passionate but not wicked. I had found out that one should never ask him anything in the presence of other persons, because he feared lest they might be indiscreet; but in private he was quite accommodating. I never had any reason to complain of him. By one of the strange chances of the Revolution, he is now in want, and at the very time when I am writing this memoir, is soliciting my protection, which I would willingly grant him if it were better worth having.
I was generally strictly obedient to the rules of the household, and consequently had to endure fewer annoyances than those who strove to evade them. It is true that they changed so frequently that it was difficult to keep the run of them.
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