<000005>Had not this been sufficient to put a stop to all idea of going to France, the sights which met them as the little party entered Turin would have done so.
Ah! cried he. I have just met the Emperor as I came to you. I had only time to rush under a portico and am dreadfully afraid he recognized me.Reluctantly they separated in May, Pauline returning to Wittmold with more luggage than she brought from there, namely, a large box of clothes from America, a present from George de la Fayette to the emigrs at Wittmold, and a trunk full of clothes belonging to M. de Beaune, which Mme. de la Fayette had found and brought from Auvergne, and which, though they were somewhat old-fashioned, he was delighted to get.Most people at that time, like those before the flood, had no idea of the possibility of the coming destruction.
THREE:ROBESPIERRE was dead, and Tallien, for the time, reigned in his stead; and with him and over him, Trzia, or, as she may be called, Mme. Tallien, for although Tallien before spoke of her as his wife, it was only after the 9th Thermidor that some sort of marriage ceremony was performed. But the name she now received, amongst the acclamation of the populace, was Notre Dame de Thermidor. For it was she who had brought about the deliverance of that day; for her and by her the Terror had been broken up; and although the Thermidoriens, led by Tallien, Barras and Frron, had re-established or continued the Comit de Salut Public, the greater number of the blood-stained tyrants who ruled the Revolution still remained, and many horrors and tyrannies for some time longer went on; still there was at once an enormous difference. The revolutionary gang had, of course, [336] not altered its nature, those of whom it was composed were the same, cruel, remorseless, and steeped in crimes; but however much they wished it they could not continue to carry on the terrorism against which the anger of the populace was now aroused.
I cant, he said. I am obliged to go to another village.Half beside herself with anxiety and fear for the fate of the royal family and of all respectable people, Lisette, her child, and the nurse or nursery [87] governess went to the diligence at midnight, escorted by M. Le Brun, Louis Vige, and M. Robert, the landscape painter, an intimate friend of theirs, who never left the diligence, but kept close to its doors as it lumbered along through the narrow dark streets to the barrire du Tr?ne. For the terrible faubourg Saint Antoine had to be passed through, and Lisette was dreadfully afraid of it.Her first care had been to release from the Carmes her fellow-prisoners, Josphine de Beauharnais and Mme. dAiguillon, who now formed an intimate part of her society and that of Barras. To them also came Mme. de Stael, wife of the Swedish Ambassador, the beautiful Mme. Regnault-de-Saint-Jean-dAngely, Mme. Cambys, and many others thankful to escape from the shadows of prison and death to the light of liberty and pleasure. The restraints of religion and morality were, of course, non-existent; liaisons and [338] licence were the order of the day, and Trzia was not likely to be an exception to the general custom. She had, besides her daughter by Tallien, other children, who, as no other name belonged to them, were called Cabarrus. And her being or calling herself Talliens wife was no reason why she should renounce her natural right to love any one else where, when, and as often as she pleased.Yet his delineation of the society of the day was so true that somebody remarked about his play, Le Cercle, that Poinsinet must have been listening at the doors. He was drowned in Spain while crossing the Guadalquivir.Dtestables flatteurs, prsent le plus funeste,