the facrilege committed against the hallowed fymbol of freedom. of their return; no father fhall clafp them to his bofom with exulting joy, proud of their heroic deeds. Ah, no! their toils, their dangers, and their generous facrifices fhall find no recompence in the fweetnefs of domeftic affection, in the foothing blifs which, after abfence, belongs to home!-alas! their homes are levelled with the ground; they will find no fpot upon which to repofe their wearied limbs but the grave of their murdered parents.— The village of Bedouin was too confined a sphere for the deftroying genius of Maignet. His thirft of blood was not yet allayed, his tafte for defolation was not yet gratified. A wider fcene of ruin fired his imagination, and his creative genius furnished the committee of public fafety with a model for the law of the 22d of Prairial, which banifhed all judicial forms from the revolutionary tribunal of Paris. Maignet, after the deftruction of Bedouin, caufed, what he termed a popular commiffion, to be erected at Orange, for the purpose of trying all the counter-revolutionists of the departments of Vauclufe, and the mouth of the Rhone, without any written evidence, and without a jury. Revolutionary troops were inftantly fummoned to carry fire and fword thro' the village and territory of Bedouin. A municipal commiffion was immediately organized by Maignet, which prefented itfelf wherever there was the hope of fpoil, fpreading every where defolation and death. Five hundred habitations were delivered to the flames; the fruits of the harvest were confumed, and the mandate of Maignet, fatal as the fabled wand of an evil magician, ftruck the rich and luxuriant foil with fudden fterility. The flourishing manufactures of Bedouin fhared the fate of its defolated fields; and all that was faved from the general wreck were the treasures spread by the fruitful filk worm upon the tops of trees by which it is nourished. A tribunal of blood was formed by the order of Maignet, every day the deftined number of victims were marked by the public accufer; and the inhabitants, who were unable to name the guilty perfons, were all involved in one profcription. Those who efcaped the knife of the guillotine fought for fhelter in the depths of caverns, after the conflagration of their habitations, on the ruins of which placards were fixed, forbidding any perfon to approach the fpot. The hollow cliffs re-echoed the moans of the widow and the orphan. Two hundred and eighty young men of Bedouin who had flown to the frontier even before the requifition in order to defend their country, in vain difpatch fucceffive letters, enquiring with fond folicitude after their parents. Thofe gallant young foldiers will return to their native village, their brows bound with the laurels of valeur. Alas! they The committee of public fafety named will find their native village but one fad the judges, who by their conduct juftiheap of ruins!-in vain will they call fied the difcernment with which they upon the tender names of father, of were chofen, and proceeded with revomother, of fifter:-a melancholy voice lutionary rapidity in their work of death. will feem to iffue from the earth that You know,' fays the fecretary of the covers them, and figh, they are no more! commiffion, in a letter to Payan, the For thofe victorious warriors no car of fituation of Orange; the guillotine is triumph is prepared; no mother's tears placed on the front of the mountain, and of tranfport fhall hail the bleffed moment it feems the heads in falling paid it the Twelve or fifteen thousand perfons are imprifoned in thofe departments, fays Maignet, in a letter to Couthon; if I were to execute the decree which orders all confpirators to be brought to Paris, it would require an army to conduct them, and they must be billeted like foldiers upon the road.' Maignet therefore obtained the fanction of the committee of public fafety, which was given without the confent of the convention, to his plan of forming a popular commiffion at Orange. homage homage it deferves.' Sometimes however the majority of the judges of Orange complain in their letters of two of their colleagues, whofe confciences had not altogether attained the height of the revolution. Faurety, the prefident of the commiffion, fays in a letter to Payan, Ragot, Feruex and myself are au pas; Roman Fouvofa is a good creature, but an adherer to forms, and a little off the revolutionary point which he ought to touch. Meillerit, my fourth colleague, is good for nothing, abfolutely good for nothing in the place he occupies; he is fometimes difpofed to fave counter-revolutionary priefts; he muft have proofs as at the ordinary tribunals of the antient fyftem.' Those troublefome fcruples of two of the judges were however fo completely over-ruled by the majority of their colleagues, that the departments of Vauclufe and the mouth of the Rhone became the scenes of the most horrible outrages against humanity. Multitudes had already perifhed by the murderous commiflion of Orange, and multitudes in the gloom of prifons awaited the fame fate, when the fall of Robespierre ftopped the torrent of human blood. Amid the mafs of far-fpread evil, amid the groans of general calamity, no doubt many a figh of private forrow, has never reached the ear of fympathy, and many a victim has fallen unpitied and unknown. Some of the martyrs of Maignet's tyranny have, however, found afad hiftorian of the penfive plain;' and the fate of monf. de M's family, which I have heard related much in detail by an old female fervant who was the companion of their misfortunes, is not the least affecting of those tales of forrow. NOTE. The military expreffion of marching au pas, to the beat of drum, became a fort of cant term, much in ufe during the tyranny of Robefpierre; and adherents to the principles and doctrines of the day was fignified by faying je fuis au pas. M. de M, formerly a noble, lived with his fon, an only child, at Marseilles, where he was generally refpected, and where, during the progrefs of the revolution, he had acted the part of a firm and enlightened patriot. After the fatal events of the 31st of May, he became fufpected of what was called federalism by the jacobin party, which ufurped the power in that city, and punished with imprisonment or death all those who had honourably protefted against the tyranny of the mountain faction. M. de M- was warned of the danger by a friend, time enough to fly from the city, accompanied by an old female fervant, who entreated to fhare the fortune of her matter. His wife died fome years before the revolution; and his fon, an amiable, and accomplished young man, of twenty-four years of age, had, a few weeks before his father's flight, been called upon by the first requifition, and had joined the army of the Pyrennes. M. de M, after wandering as far as his infirmities would permit (for, although only in his fixty-third year, his frame was much debilitated by a long courfe of ill health) took refuge in a folitary habitation, at a few leagues diftance from Ariquon, and in one of the wildeft parts of that romantic country. The mountains feem to close the fcene upon the traveller, till by a narrow cleft it again opens into a fall valley, where this little hermitage, for fuch was the afpect of the dwelling, was placed. This unfrequented valley was rich with pafturage, and bounded by lofty hills, wooded cliffs, and in fome parts, by large grotefque rocks with fharp peaks, that role above the foliage of the hanging forefts. Not far from this ruftic habitation, a clear torrent rolls with no fcanty stream down a bold rock, into which its fall had worn grots and caverns, which were luxurioully decorated with fhrubs for ever watered by the fpray. The torrent not falling from a very confiderable height, produced founds more foothing than noify, and, without having the power of exciting the fenfation of fublimity, awakened that of penfive pleafing melancholy. This fequeftered valley, H 2 rich rich in the wild graces of nature, had efcaped the decorations of French art, and no jets d'eaux, clipped trees, and alleys who have brothers,' deformed its folitary receffes. Far above, and at some distance, arofe the lofty mountain of Ventoux, covered with its eternal fnows; that mountain which Petrarch climbed, in fpite of the fleep rocks that guard its afcent, and from the fummit of which he gazed upon the Alps, the boundary of his native country, and fighed; or caft his looks on the waves of the Mediterranean which bathe Marseilles, and dafh themselves against Aignes-Mortes; while he faw the rapid Rhone flowing majeftically along the valley, and the clouds rolling beneath his feet. Such was the scene where M. de M-fought for refuge, and where he theltered himself from the rage of his ferocious perfecutors. He had, foon after, the anguifh of hearing that his brother, who had a place in the adminiftration of one of the fouthern departments, and who had taken an active part on the fide of the Gironde, had perifhed on the fcaffold. M. de M found means to inform his fifter-in-law of the place of his retreat, to which he conjured her to haften with her daughter, and fhare the little property which he had refcued from the general wreck of his fortune. His old fervant Marianne, who was the bearer of this meffage, returned, accompanied by his niece: her mother was no more: the had furvived only a few weeks the death of her hufband. The interview between made moiselle Adelaide de M and her uncle produced thofe emotions of overwhelming forrow, that arife at the fight of objects which intereft our affections, after we have fuftained any deep calamity in thofe moments, the paft rushes on the mind with uncontroulable vehemence; and mademoiselle de M, after having long embraced her uncle, with an agony that choaked all utterance, at length pronounced, in the accents of defpair, the names of father and of mother, M. de Mendeavoured to fupply to his unfortunate niece the place of the parents he had loft, and forgot his own evils in this attempt to footh the affliction of this interefting mourner, who, at nineteen years of age, in all the bloom of beauty, was the prey of deep and fettled melancholy. She had too much fenfibility not to feel his tender cares, and often restrained her tears in his prefence, because they gave him pain. When thofe tears would no longer be fuppreffed, the wandered out alone, and, feating herfelf on fome fragment of rock, foothed by the murmurs of the hollow winds and moaning waters, indulged her grief without controul. In one of thofe lonely rambles, facred to her forrows, he was awakened from melan choly mufing by the fudden appearance of her coufin, the fon of M. de Mwho, after having repeatedly exposed his life during a long and perilous campaign, in the fervice of his country, returned-to find his home deferted and his father an exile. Such were the rewards which the gallant defenders of liberty received from the hands of tyrants. The young man flew to his father's retreat, where the first object that met his eyes was his lovely coulin, whom he had a few months before beheld in all the pride of youthful beauty; her cheek flushed with the gay fuffufion of health, and her eye fparkling with pleasure. That cheek was now covered with fixed palenefs, and that eye was dimmed with tears; but mademoifelle de Mhad never appeared to him fo interefting as in this moment. Two young perfons placed together in fuch peculiar circumftances, muft have had hearts infenfible indeed, had they conceived no attachment for each other. The fon of M. de M—, and Adelaide, who both poffeffed an uncommon fhare of fenfibility, foon felt, that while all beyond the narrow cleft which feparated the little valley from the rest of the world was mifery and diforder, whatever could give value to existence was to be found within its favage boundary, in that reciprocal affection which foothed the evils of the paft, and fhed a foft a foft and cheering ray over the gloom knew the place of his retreat, fought of the future. The fcene in which they for an afylum in his dwelling. M. de were placed was peculiarly calculated M received his fugitive friends to cherish the illufions of paffion; not with affectionate kindnefs. But a few merely from difplaying thofe fimple and days after their arrival their retreat was romantic beauties, the contemplation of difcovered by the emiffaries of Maignet, which foftens while it elevates the af- the narrow pafs of the valley was guardfections-it had alfo that local charm ed by foldiers; the houfe was encomwhich endears to minds of tafte and paffed by a military force; and M. de fentiment fpots which have been cele- M- was fummoned to depart with brated by the powers of genius. Pe- the confpirators whom he had dared to trarch, the tender, the immortal Pe- harbour, in order to appear with them tarch, had trod thofe very valleys, had before the popular commiflion establishclimbed thofe very rocks, had wandered ed at Orange. This laft ftroke his una thofe very woods-and the two young happy niece had no power to fuftain. perfons, who both understood Italian, All the wounds of her foul were fuddenly when they read together the melodious and rudely torn open; and altogether frains of that divine poet, found them- overwhelmed by this unexpected, this felves tranfported into new regions, and terrible calamity, which filled up the forgot for a while that revolutionary measure of her afflictions, her reafon engovernment exifted. From thofe dreams, tirely forfook her. With frantic agony hofe delightful illufions, they were the knelt at the feet of him who comwakened by a letter, which a friend manded the troop; the implored, the ad fellow-foldier of young de M-wept, fhe fhrieked; then ftarted up Corveyed to him, in which he conjured and hung upon her uncle's neck, preffing to return immediately to the army, him wildly in her arms. Some of the if he would fhun being claffed among foldiers propofed conducting her alfo the fufpected or the profcribed. to the tribunal; but the leader of the Young de M confidered the de- band, whether touched by her distress, fence of his country as a facred duty or fearful that her defpair would be which he was bound to fulfil. He in- troublefome on the way, perfuaded them tantly prepared to depart. He bid to leave her behind. She was dragged adieu to his father and Adelaide with from her uncle, and locked in a chamtears wrung from a bleeding heart, and ber, from whence her fhrieks were ore himself away with an effort, which heard by the unfortunate old man till * required the exertion of all his forti- he had paffed the narrow cleft of the de to fuftain. After having paffed valley, which he was deftined to behold the cleft which enclofed the valley, he no more. His fufferings were acute, again turned back to gaze once more on but they were not of long duration. The the fpot which contained all his treasure. day of his arrival at Orange, he was Adelaide, after his departure, had no led before the popular commiffion, confolation but in the fad yet dear in- together with his friends, and from dalgence of tender recollections; in thence immediately dragged to execuhedding tears over the paths they had tion. trod, over the books they had read together. Alas, this unfortunate young lady had far other pangs to fuffer than the Lender repinings of abfence from a beloved object! Some weeks after the departure of her lover, the departments of Vauclufe and the mouth of the Rhone were defolated by Maignet. Two profcribed victims of his tyranny, who were the friends of M. de M, and In the mean time mademoiselle de M, releafed by Marianne from the apartment where fhe had been confined by the merciless guards, wandered from morning till evening amid the wildest receffes of the valley, and along the mott rugged paths fhe could find. She was conftantly followed in her rambles by her faithful fervant, who never loit fight of her a fingle moment, and who retains retains in her memory many a mourn- clothes? I begged very hard for himI told them I had no father and inother but him-If you are Charles, begone, begone!-They're coming-they're on the way-I fee them upon the rock!That knife-that bloody knife!" ful complaint of her difordered mind, many a wild expreffion of defpair. She often retired to a final nook near the torrent, where her uncle had placed a feat, and where he ufually paffed fome hours of the day. Sometimes fhe feated herself on the bench; then started up, and, throwing herfelf on her knees before the fpot where her uncle used to fit, bathed it with floods of tears, Dear old man,' fhe would cry, your aged head! They might have left me a lock of his grey hairs. When the foldiers come for me, Marianne, you may cut off a lock of mine for Charles-Poor Charles! It is well he's gone-I fee the guillotine behind those trees!—and now they drag up a weak old man!they tie him to the plank !-it bendsoh heaven!' . The acute affliction with which young de M heard of the murder of his father was ftill aggravated by the tidings he received from Marianne of the fituation of his beloved Adelaide. Her image was for ever prefent to his mind; and unable to fupport the bitterness of thofe pangs which her idea excited, he again found means to obtain leave of abfence for a few weeks, and haftened to the valley. He found the habitation deferted-all was dark and filent: he flew through the apartments, calling upon the name of Adelaide, but no voice answered his call. He left the house, and walked with hafty steps along the valley. As he paffed a cavern of rocks, he heard the moans of Adelaide-he rushed into the cavern-she was feated upon its flinty floor, and Marianne was fitting near.Adelaide caft up her eyes as he entered, and looked at him earnestly-he knelt by her fide, and preffed her hand to his bofom- I don't know you,' faid Adelaide. Not know me!' he cried, Such were the ravings of the difordered imagination of this unfortunate young lady, and which were fometimes interrupted by long intervals of filence, and fometimes by an agony of tears. Her lover watched over her with the moft tender and unwearied affiduity; but his cares were ineffectual. The life of Adelaide was near its close. The convulfive pangs of her mind, the extraordinary fatigues she had fuffered in her wanderings, the want of any nourishment, except bread and water fince the obftinately refufed all other food, had reduced her frame to a ftate of incurable weakness and decay. She A fhort time before the expired, she recovered her reason, and employed her laft remains of ftrength in the attempt to confole her wretched lover. fpoke to him of a happier world, where they should meet again, and where tyrants fhould oppreis no more-she grafped his hand-she fixed her eyes on his-and died. With the gloomy filence of defpair, with feelings that were denied the relief of tears, and were beyond the utterance of complaint, this unfortunate young man prepared with his own hands the grave of her he loved, and himself covered her corpfe with earth. The laft offices paid by religion to the dead, the hallowed taper, the lifted crofs, the folemn requiem, had long fince vanished, and the municipal officer returned the duft to duit with unceremonious fpeed. The lover of Adelaide chofe to perform himself thofe fad functions for the object of his tenderness, and might have exclaimed with our poet, not know Charles! if you are Charles,' the refumed fullenly, you're come too late 'tis all over!-Poor old What though no weeping loves thy man!' the cried, rifing haftily from the afhes grace, ground, and clafping her hands toge- Nor polish'd marble emulate thy face; ther. don't you fee his blood on my What |