Prisoners’ Evening Service: A Scene of the French Revolution

“From their spheresThe stars of human glory are cast down.Perish the roses and the flowers of kings,Princes and emperors, and the crown and palmsOf all the mighty, wither’d and consumed!Nor is power given to lowliest innocenceLong to protect her own.” Wordsworth.D’Aubigné, an aged Royalist--Blanche, his daughter, a young girl.

Blanche. What was your doom, my father? In thine armsI lay unconsciously through that dread hour.Tell me the sentence! Could our judges look,Without relenting, on thy silvery hair?Was there not mercy, father? Will they notRestore us to our home?

D’Aubigné. Yes, my poor child!They send us home.

Blanche. Oh! shall we gaze againOn the bright Loire? Will the old hamlet spire,And the gray turret of our own chateau,Look forth to greet us through the dusky elms?Will the kind voices of our villagers,The loving laughter in their children’s eyes,Welcome us back at last? But how is this?Father! thy glance is clouded--on thy browThere sits no joy!

D’Aubigné. Upon my brow, dear girl!There sits, I trust, such deep and solemn peaceAs may befit the Christian who receives,And recognises in submissive awe,The summons of his God.

Blanche. Thou dost not mean----No, no! it cannot be! Didst thou not sayThey sent us home?

D’Aubigné. Where is the spirit’s home?Oh! most of all, in these dark, evil days,Where should it be--but in that world serene,Beyond the sword’s reach and the tempest’s power,--Where, but in heaven?

Blanche. My father!

D’Aubigné. We must die.We must look up to God, and calmly die.Come to my heart, and weep there! For awhileGive nature’s passion way; then brightly riseIn the still courage of a woman’s heart.Do I not know thee? Do I ask too muchFrom mine own noble Blanche?

Blanche, (falling on his bosom.) Oh! clasp me fast!Thy trembling child! Hide, hide me in thine arms--Father!

D’Aubigné. Alas! my flower, thou’rt young to go--Young, and so fair! Yet were it worse, methinks,To leave thee where the gentle and the brave,The loyal-hearted and the chivalrous,And they that loved their God, have all been swept,Like the sere leaves, away. For them no hearthThrough the wide land was left inviolate,No altar holy; therefore did they fall,Rejoicing to depart. The soil is steep’dIn noble blood; the temples are gone down;The voice of prayer is hush’d, or fearfullyMutter’d, like sounds of guilt. Why, who would liveWho hath not panted, as a dove, to flee,To quit for ever the dishonour’d soil,The burden’d air! Our God upon the cross--Our king upon the scaffold--let us thinkOf these--and fold endurance to our hearts,And bravely die!

Blanche. A dark and fearful way!An evil doom for thy dear, honour’d head!O thou, the kind, the gracious! whom all eyesBless’d as they look’d upon! Speak yet again--Say, will they part us?

D’Aubigné. No, my Blanche; in death,We shall not be divided.

Blanche. Thanks to God!He, by thy glance, will aid me--I shall seeHis light before me to the last. And when--Oh, pardon these weak shrinkings of thy child!--When shall the hour befall?

D’Aubigné. Oh! swiftly now,And suddenly, with brief, dread interval,Comes down the mortal stroke. But of that hourAs yet I know not. Each low throbbing pulseOf the quick pendulum may usher inEternity!

Blanche, (kneeling before him.) My father! lay thy handOn thy poor Blanche’s head, and once againBless her with thy deep voice of tenderness--Thus breathing saintly courage through her soul,Ere we are call’d.

D’Aubigné. If I may speak through tears!--Well may I bless thee, fondly, fervently,Child of my heart!--thou who dost look on meWith thy lost mother’s angel eyes of love!Thou, that hast been a brightness in my path,A guest of heaven unto my lonely soul,A stainless lily in my widow’d house,There springing up, with soft light round thee shed,For immortality! Meek child of God!I bless thee--He will bless thee! In his loveHe calls thee now from this rude stormy worldTo thy Redeemer’s breast! And thou wilt die,As thou hast lived--my duteous, holy Blanche!In trusting and serene submissiveness,Humble, yet full of heaven.

Blanche, (rising.) Now is there strengthInfused through all my spirit. I can riseAnd say, “Thy will be done!”

D’Aubigné, (pointing upwards.) See’st thou, my child!Yon faint light in the west? The signal starOf our due vesper-service, gleaming inThrough the close dungeon-grating! MournfullyIt seems to quiver; yet shall this night pass,This night alone, without the lifted voiceOf adoration in our narrow cell,As if unworthy fear or wavering faithSilenced the strain? No! let it waft to heavenThe prayer, the hope, of poor mortality,In its dark hour once more! And we will sleep,Yes--calmly sleep, when our last rite is closed.

The last days of two prisoners in the Luxembourg, Sillery andLa Source, so affectingly described by Helen Maria Williams, in herLetters from France, gave rise to this little scene. These twovictims had composed a simple hymn, which they sang together in a lowand restrained voice every night.