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CHAPTER XXX
THE EXECUTIONER

The Executioner – His Taxes and Privileges —Monsieur de Paris– Victor of Nîmes.

THE executioner is one of the most curious, interesting, and important figures in the history of France in general and of Paris in particular. Going back to the thirteenth century, we find that there already existed an individual whose duty it was to whip, hang, behead, break on the wheel, and burn in the name of the law. He was then called the Executioner of High Justice, and every bailiwick possessed such a functionary. An ordinance of 1264 against blasphemers provides that “anyone who has offended by word or deed shall be beaten, naked, with rods; that is to say, men by a man, and women by a woman, without the presence of any man.” Hence some historians have inferred that the office of bourrelle, or female executioner, existed. This is an error; though it is quite true that the wife or the daughter of the bourreau was usually preferred for the duty of whipping female misdemeanants. As to the rest, an elaborate apprenticeship had to be gone through by the executioner before he was deemed fit for his work, the law stipulating that he must be competent to whip, quarter, break on the wheel, fork, clip off ears, gibbet, dismember, and so forth. For a long time the executioner wore a special costume – a cassock wrought in the colours peculiar to the town in which he operated, and bearing in front the representation of a gibbet, and, behind, that of the scaffold staircase – emblems somewhat too obvious of his infamous profession. So soon as the office of bourreau was permanently established, large taxes were enfeoffed to him, and the executioners of France now became so jealous of their prerogatives that one of them in 1560 sued a gentleman at law because, seizing a thief who tried to take his purse, he had drawn his sword and cut off the rascal’s ear. In thus acting the gentleman was accused of having infringed on the executioner’s rights and invaded his profession, the ear technically belonging to the executioner as one of his perquisites. No less curious than manifold were the taxes and privileges of all kinds enjoyed by this functionary. When he performed an execution on the domain of a monastery he was entitled, amongst other things, to the head of a pig; and the Abbé of Saint-Germain paid him an annual tax of this kind. The heads, moreover, of any pigs found straying in the streets or highways of Paris belonged to the executioner. During the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries the Parisians had permitted their pigs to stroll about in the public thoroughfares; but when the son of Louis le Gros was killed by a fall from his horse, which had stumbled over one of these wandering animals, it was forbidden thenceforth to allow them outside their owners’ premises – though an exception was made in favour of the monks of Saint-Antoine, who were still at liberty to let out their pigs, which were distinguished by a peculiar mark on the ear. Any pig found walking abroad without this mark was now seized by the executioner, who could demand either its head, or, in lieu thereof, four sous. Another of his curious privileges was to levy a tax on young women leading objectionable lives. He received duty, moreover, on the goods vended by different classes of shopkeepers, and could walk into their shops and help himself to a certain fraction of their stock. Still more extraordinary than any hitherto mentioned was the tax he levied on all sick persons living in the suburbs of Paris, who were compelled to pay him four sous apiece every quarter. Some of the tolls taken at bridges went into his pocket. He was permitted to despoil the criminals he put to death. At first he could only take possession of what they had upon them above the girdle; but ultimately he obtained everything. Besides the innumerable imposts and perquisites of all kinds belonging to his office, he received a fixed fee for each execution. This, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, was 15 sous. In 1721 his taxes were for the most part abolished, and in lieu thereof an annual salary of 16,000 francs was assigned to him; though, out of this sum, he had to keep two assistants. In 1793 the National Convention entirely reformed the criminal legislation so far as concerned the executioner. By a decree of 13th June it decided that there should be an executioner to every department of the Republic. He was to be remunerated at the expense of the State. In towns with a population not exceeding 50,000 he was to receive a salary of 2,400 francs, besides another 1,600 francs for two assistants (in the departments), or 4,000 francs for four assistants (at Paris). In the French capital today the bourreau has a fixed salary of 5,000 francs, and 10,000 francs for the maintenance of his formidable machine.

The executioner is still regarded in France with much of the abhorrence which has always been felt for him; but although he is an outcast from the ordinary world, admission to churches, theatres, promenades, and public places generally is not to-day, as it once was, denied to him. Whenever his place becomes vacant there is a rush of candidates for it more multitudinous and more eager than for any other State office whatsoever. To be “Monsieur de Paris,” as the executioner is styled, seems the pinnacle of ambition with only too large a section of the public. Once, indeed, the post of bourreau, although not, as some have imagined, hereditary, remained long in the same family; and that of Sanson produced seven generations of executioners, from 1688 to 1847. The post has seldom been a sinecure, and it was particularly far from being so during the centuries which followed the thirteenth. Thence, until the eighteenth, the executioner was a terribly busy man, hanging, quartering, and otherwise judicially massacring with scarcely a cessation. Kings with many enemies would sometimes make a pet of him. Louis XI. took a particular fancy to Tristan, whom he called his colleague. This man, by the way, had a genius for his ghastly business, chopping off heads with a dexterity well calculated to excite the favour of a king who had determined that all heads should fall which were difficult to bend.

It was not only upon the persons of criminals that the executioner had to operate. He was sometimes required to burn or behead dummies representing offenders who had eluded capture. Peter the Cruel, King of Castile, having killed one of his subjects, was condemned to death. But as the person of the king was sacred, he was only executed in effigy, the bourreau beheading with his sword an image intended to represent him.

The public executioner has generally been more loathed in France than even in England. And justly so; for in the former country his work for many centuries has been peculiarly infamous, not to say diabolical. In the present day, it is true, “Monsieur de Paris” simply touches a button and his victim, without a struggle or a pang, is no more. But he was not always so humane. Once it was his own hand that dealt slow death and inflicted fiendish torture. It was he who quartered the condemned wretch – who attached horses, that is to say, to his legs and arms, and then drove them in four different directions. It was he who burned or broke on the wheel – the latter an indescribably ghastly operation, in which he used an iron bar to break almost every bone in the victim’s body. It is not surprising, therefore, that even to-day “Monsieur de Paris,” with such a history behind him, should be the object of a detestation which Ketch himself, or Marwood, failed to excite.

The Revolution of 1789, although it swept away his privileges, completely rehabilitated that bourreau whose services it was so frequently to require; and a decree of the Convention decided that thenceforth this functionary should be admitted to the rank of officer in the army. It was even proposed to confer upon him, as executioner, a new and finer title – that of “National Avenger”; and M. Matton de la Varenne was quite eloquent in his praise. “What would become of society?” he said; “of what use would be the judges, of what avail authority, if an active and legitimate force did not exist to avenge outrages committed upon citizens whom it is the care of the law to protect? If the punishment of the guilty is dishonourable to those who administer it, the magistrate who has pronounced the sentence, the notary who has drawn it up, the protractor and the criminal lieutenant who cause it to be executed beneath their eyes should bear part of the dishonour. Why should he who puts the last hand to the work be reputed infamous for duties which are simply the complement of those of the magistrate?” The argument was specious enough; but the difference between the two functionaries named is, after all, precisely the difference existing between a civic corporation which decrees that its town shall be kept clean, and the scavenger whom it hires to scrape the streets.

However, the bourreau became for a time an influential and admired personage. He was sometimes invited to dine at distinguished tables, and embraced as a favourite guest. Ultimately he figured as an autobiographer. The last of the Sansons wrote his own memoirs, together with those of his ancestors, executioners like himself. By no means the least curious fact in the history of the bourreau is that, in former days, he killed with one hand and healed with the other. He was a physician, that is to say; and at his dispensary, in the intervals between his murderous operations, he dealt out medicines to poor people who flocked to him for advice. By far the most famous of these medical bourreaux was Victor of Nîmes. His scientific reputation spread even beyond the boundaries of France. One day an Englishman called upon him for a consultation. This patient had a twisted neck, and had come over to place himself under the treatment of the once-famous school of Montpelier. After having endured all sorts of experiments, he found that his head showed no sign of resuming its normal position, and therefore, wishing his tormentors good day, he went on to Victor. “Can you cure me?” he inquired. The executioner examined him, and then said: “It is a simple case of torticolis. Nothing is easier than to cure you if you will confide in me, and do whatever I command.” The Englishman consented; and after certain preliminaries both surgeon and patient passed from the consulting-room into a more retired apartment. That Victor, besides being a surgeon, was a humorist, seems beyond question. The room now entered was remarkable for nothing in particular – with one exception, namely, that from the ceiling hung a rope, at the end of which was a noose. The doctor ordered his patient to put his head in this noose. For a long time the Englishman hesitated and protested; ultimately he obeyed. Then Victor tightened the noose, hoisted his subject high up in the air, and, using the victim’s legs as a kind of trapeze, went through the most frightful gymnastic exercises. At the end of a quarter of an hour – a mauvais quart d’heure for our countryman – the performance concluded, and the patient was let down – cured.

CHAPTER XXXI
PÈRE-LACHAISE

The Cemeteries of Clamart and Picpus – Père-Lachaise – La Villette and Chaumont – The Conservatoire – Rue Laffitte – The Rothschilds – Montmartre – Clichy.

BEFORE crossing the river to the left bank, we must say a few words about some of those districts of Paris which are reached naturally, and as a matter of course, by the great thoroughfares; the ancient estate, for instance, of Mont-Louis, where, for the last two centuries, has been established the cemetery known as Père-Lachaise.

The cemeteries of Paris may be distinguished locally, or by the special character belonging to several of them. Each important district has its own cemetery: that of Montmartre, for instance, on the north, that of Mont-Parnasse on the south of Paris. The cemetery of Clamart was reserved, until the Revolution, for the bodies, dissected or undissected, of those who had died in hospital. It is now the last resting-place of criminals who have passed beneath the guillotine. The Picpus cemetery, at present a more or less private cemetery in which only privileged persons are buried, was formerly a place of interment for those who had distinguished themselves in insurrections and civil wars. There reposes La Fayette in the earth of the locality mingled with earth sent from America, in memory of the important part played by La Fayette in the American War of Independence.

Père-Lachaise, the most celebrated and most interesting of all the cemeteries, owes its name to the famous confessor of Louis XIV., who proposed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes – the edict which accorded a certain toleration to the Protestants of France – and who celebrated the secret marriage of Louis XIV. to Mme. de Maintenon. Father Lachaise was a Jesuit with whom the idea of toleration could find no favour. The Duke de Saint-Simon, in his famous memoirs, gives a very favourable account of him, and while describing him as a “strong Jesuit,” adds that he was “neither fanatical nor fawning.” Although he advised the king to revoke the Edict of Nantes, he was no party to the active persecution by which the revocation was followed.

The burial-ground of Père-Lachaise occupies the ancient domain of Mont-Louis, a property given to Father Lachaise by the king, and which in time became known exclusively by the name of its owner. It is for the most part an aristocratic cemetery. Although it contains monuments characterised by a solemnity befitting the idea of eternity, it is by no means the depressing, melancholy, awe-inspiring place which one might expect so vast a necropolis to be. On the one side wealth lies buried, on the other indigence. In juxtaposition to magnificent monuments, shaded with shrubs and graced with flowers, is the common trench, formed by two immense dikes dug in a sterile soil, where the poor sleep their last. There nothing but cold and dreary solitude meets the eye; whilst a few paces off stand Gothic chapels, sarcophagi, pyramids, obelisks, and artistic emblems of every kind – objects expressive, for the most part, of posthumous pride. Here social distinctions are marked with an ostentation painful to see: titles, coats of arms, escutcheons appearing in the marble or the stone. As to the inscriptions, these, written in a variety of styles – now pompous, now epigrammatic, now melodramatic – are frequently fantastic and seldom appropriate. Common to all the epitaphs, however widely they differ in other respects, is the uniform virtue which they ascribe to their subjects. In this connection a few words from the caustic pen of M. Benjamin Gastineau deserve reproduction. “At Père-Lachaise,” he says, “you find nothing but good fathers, good mothers, good brothers, good husbands, faithful wives, true friends, noble hearts, angels flown to heaven, white flowers, chaste spouses, seraphim of perfection. Not a traitor, not a coward, not a hypocrite, not a knave, not an egotist!”

The tombs of Père-Lachaise are frequently remarkable, not merely as fine specimens – or even masterpieces – of sculptural art, but on account of the illustrious personages who slumber beneath them. The magnificent tomb of Héloise and Abailard would justify a page of description, whilst the story of their romantic love sufficed, as we know, to inspire even the frigid pen of Alexander Pope with passion. From this ancient tomb a few steps will take the visitor into the company of the illustrious dead of a later day. Here is the monument of Frederick Soulié, the vehement and impassioned novelist – a simple marble slab, surmounted by a cross, and eloquently inscribed with his mere name. The tomb of the composer Chopin is not far off. In the front appears a medallion portrait of this brilliant genius, whilst, on the tomb itself, Cleslinger has sculptured a poetic figure, breaking the lyre he bears, and in an attitude of profound despair. Hard by is the tomb of Vivant Denon. Upon it his statue, by Cartelier, stands, still smiling with that smile which, as a French historian has ingeniously said, “pleased, turn by turn, Louis XV., Mme. de Pompadour, Voltaire, Louis XVI., Robespierre, and Napoleon.”

The most sumptuous monument in the cemetery is that of the Russian Princess, Demidoff. Its height is prodigious. Its semi-Oriental architecture, at once severe and beautiful, is highly imposing. It consists of a rich temple adorned with ten columns of white Carrara marble, supporting a magnificent canopy. On the sarcophagus rests a crown. This monument is said to have cost 120,000 francs.

The stage is represented in this silent city. Here sleeps Mlle. Duchenois, once the rival of Mlle. Georges. At no great distance from where she lies a chapel stands over the remains of the last great Célimène, Mlle. Mars; whilst the name inscribed on a little sarcophagus in the Greek style shows us that even Talma had to die.

Among the host of illustrious names inscribed on the stones of Père-Lachaise must be mentioned those of Laharpe, Beaumarchais, Molière, and La Fontaine. The relics of the two last were transferred to this cemetery at the same time as those of Héloise. Nor, finally, can we forget the monument raised to the famous General Foy. In the inscription which it bears an ingenious and eloquent use is made of the General’s celebrated utterance in the Chamber of Representatives: “Yesterday I said I would not yield except to force. To-day I come to keep my word.”

The cemetery of Père-Lachaise has two special quarters: one reserved for Protestants, the other for Jews. The monuments of the former present, by their austere simplicity, a striking contrast to the elegant or sumptuous mausoleums in the Catholic burial-ground. Most of the tombs bear, as their sole emblem, a representation of the Bible, open at a page reflecting upon the ultimate way of all flesh. The Jewish cemetery is situated behind the monument of Héloise and Abailard. On entering it the visitor sees, to the right, a funeral chapel in the Greek style, which is the tomb of Rachel. Further on, to the left, is that of the Rothschild family.

Lastly, at the summit of the hill of Père-Lachaise, covering an area newly annexed, is the Mussulman cemetery, provided with a mosque. The Princess of Oude and one of her relatives were its first occupants.

On the 27th of May, 1871, Père-Lachaise became the scene of a horrible slaughter. Five days previously the Army of Versailles had penetrated into Paris. The troops of the Commune, despite a desperate resistance, had had to withdraw to one or two points of retreat: among others to Père-Lachaise. On the 27th some battalions of Marines, forming part of the corps of General Vinoy, invaded the cemetery. There was a fearful hand-to-hand fight over the tombs. Into the very vaults the marines pursued the insurgents who had spiked their guns and fled. Two days afterwards the cemetery was a litter of broken weapons, empty bottles, and other profane rubbish.

During the last few years a corner of the cemetery of Père-Lachaise has been set apart for cremations. Paris, which claims to be first in so many things and which is so often justified in these pretensions, did not establish a crematorium until long after the city of Milan had done so.

To the north of Père-Lachaise extend the hillsides of Ménilmontant and Belleville, commanding, from innumerable points, a magnificent view, and memorable for the defence of Paris conducted from these heights in 1814. Belleville is the scene of more than one remarkable incident in the novels of Paul de Kock, the Maid of Belleville being as much associated with this suburban eminence as the Maid of Orleans with that of Montmartre. The vast region of Belleville and Ménilmontant is chiefly inhabited by the workpeople of Paris, who have here their headquarters. Close at hand is the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, communicating in a direct line with the Rue Saint-Antoine – street and faubourg both celebrated in the annals of popular insurrection. The streets and faubourgs of Saint-Denis and Saint-Martin belong equally to the workmen’s quarter, which includes, moreover, La Villette and Chaumont, with its quarries. Here all the vagabonds and malefactors of Paris used at one time to seek refuge. Napoleon III., who systematically made war upon this class of the population, cleared the Buttes Chaumont and caused the slopes to be covered with picturesque gardens. In the valley is an artificial lake fed by one of the tributaries of the Saint-Martin canal. The gardens of the Buttes Chaumont belong to what used to be known as the District of the Fights, or Quartier des Combats, so called from the fights between dogs and bulls or other animals which here took place until the time of the Revolution. These, with some modifications, were continued up to the first years of Louis Philippe’s reign. Here Jules Janin found the subject of his famous novel, “L’âne mort et la femme guillotinée” – a story written, according to some, in order to turn into ridicule the sensational novelists of the day; according to others, with the view of attracting and forcing attention by means of exaggerated and monstrous sensationalism.

Returning from the heights which bound Paris on the north, by the Rue du Faubourg Poissonnière, we find at the corner of this street and of the Rue Bergère the building in which has existed, since the Revolution, the National Conservatory of Music and Declamation. The great musical academy had its origin in a school of singing and declamation established in 1784 in order to prepare singers for the Opéra. To this institution was added in 1786 a school of dramatic declamation, which had the honour of producing Talma. But the Conservatory of Music, as it now exists, owes its organisation to the Revolution. Founded in virtue of a decree dated August 3rd, 1795, it had for its first director the illustrious Cherubini, who was replaced by Auber, to whom has succeeded M. Ambroise Thomas, the composer of Mignon and of Hamlet. The students are admitted by competition, and the teaching is gratuitous. Prizes are adjudged every year, and of these the most important is the so-called Prix de Rome, which enables its holder to study for a certain number of years in the great Italian city. The concerts of the Conservatoire are famous throughout Europe; and fortunate indeed is the visitor to Paris who can succeed in obtaining a place at concerts which are supported and attended exclusively (except, of course, in case of forced absence) by permanent subscribers. The orchestra which takes part in these concerts is of the finest quality, the principal instruments being all in the hands of the professors of the establishment – the first instrumentalists, that is to say, of France.

The Rue Laffitte, formerly known as the Rue d’Artois, by which, in the neighbourhood of the Conservatoire, one reaches the best part of the Boulevard, has, since the Revolution of 1830, borne the name of the celebrated banker and politician whose mansion was the rendezvous of the Opposition Deputies during the so-called “days of July.” Laffitte is, in some sense, the hero of a charming tale published by the so-called Saint-Germain under the title of “Story of a Pin.” At the office of a Paris banker, a young man in search of employment has been refused by reason of there being no vacancy. As, however, he goes away in a dejected mood, he is seen to pick up a pin; and this indication of order and economy has such an effect upon the banker that he is called back and at once appointed to a supplementary chair. It is said that a friend of Laffitte’s, also out of employment, hearing of the success of this “pin trick,” as he termed it, resolved to try it himself. At the next office where he applied for a situation his conversation and general demeanour so pleased the principal that he was all but engaged, when, in order to determine the matter, he went through the gesture of picking up a pin – which he had held all the time between his fingers. “What was that?” asked the head of the firm. “A pin,” was the reply. “A pin?” repeated the principal. “A man who would take a pin out of my office would take a cheque. Good morning, sir.”

Laffitte was the most generous of millionaires. One of the Rothschilds assured the famous actress Rachel that if he had lent money to everyone who asked him he should at last have had to borrow five francs of her. This was in all probability the mere plea of Dives, unwilling to be too much put upon by Lazarus. Laffitte seems to have been ready to lend to anyone who really deserved assistance; and a strange story is told of his advancing a sum of money to an officer of whom he knew nothing. The officer had been gambling and had lost 5,000 francs which did not belong to him. It was necessary to restore this amount to the regimental chest or be for ever disgraced. Laffitte listened to the officer’s story, counted out to him the 5,000 francs, and took a receipt, together with a promise that the money should be repaid at the rate of 250 francs a year. “It will take you a long time to pay it off at that rate,” said Laffitte, “and who knows whether you will ever bring me the first instalment?” The officer, however, swore that he would keep his word – and, exactly to the day when the first payment became due, brought to the banker his first 250 francs. Laffitte, however, while complimenting him on his punctuality, declared himself unable to receive such a contemptibly small sum, and told his debtor to keep it for another year, when he must bring him 500. On the officer’s return, at the expiration of another twelvemonth, with the increased amount, Laffitte exclaimed: “Yes; I see you are a man of honour. Keep the money and take back your note of hand.” It is to be hoped that Heine, living in Paris at the time, heard this story, though he did not profit by its teaching; for it was one of his amusing if cynical maxims, that a man had more chance of getting a loan from a poor friend, anxious to appear better off than he really was, than from a rich one whose pecuniary position was above question.

After the Revolution of 1830 Laffitte was appointed Minister of Finance and President of the Council. This just man could not, however, succeed in pleasing either of the sections into which the Chamber was divided. His own party thought him too lukewarm, too unprogressive, while the Legitimists could not forget his alliance with the party of Revolution.

The Rue Laffitte may well be regarded as the headquarters of finance, for, in addition to the banking-house of Laffitte, the French branch of the Rothschilds has here for more than half a century been domiciled. The Rothschilds of Paris, like those of London, Frankfort, Vienna, and Naples, are descendants of the Mayer-Rothschilds who founded the first of the Rothschild banking-houses at Frankfort a century ago. Born at Frankfort-on-the-Maine in 1743, Mayer Anselm Rothschild belonged to a Jewish family of small means. He received, nevertheless, a good education and studied for some time with the view of becoming a Rabbi. Commerce and finance had, however, greater attractions for him than the Law and the Prophets, and, thanks to his industry and intelligence, he soon found himself the possessor of a small amount of capital. He had established himself in the Juden-gasse; and here, faithfully assisted by his young wife, he occupied himself with dealings of the most varied kinds. He had familiarised himself with financial operations at a bank where he had been engaged as clerk; and after his marriage he quickly became known by his enterprise, honesty, and tact to the great financial houses of Frankfort, Mayence, and Darmstadt, who often entrusted him with important commissions. Mayer Rothschild was forty-six years of age when the French Revolution broke out; and it was in the midst of the troubles caused by this great convulsion that he found his first great opportunity of enriching himself. Immediately after the Reign of Terror, when, in 1794, the French armies were replying to the German invasion by themselves invading Germany, the smaller German princes became panic-stricken, and fled with such haste towards the Elbe that some of them had not time to carry away all their gold. Among the illustrious fugitives was the Elector of Hesse-Cassel, who possessed more ready money than all his brethren of the German Federation united. Finding it imprudent, if not impossible, to take with him in his travelling-carriage heaps of silver and gold, he resolved to place a portion of his treasure in the hands of trustworthy persons, and one of those selected was Mayer Rothschild of Frankfort. Two millions of florins were confided to him on the simple understanding that he should restore the money at the conclusion of peace. The war, however, lasted for years; and during this period the talents confided to the Hebrew banker were not allowed to lie buried in a napkin. He put them out at interest, made loans to the Governments and to the military commanders and commissaries on all sides; speculated, in short, with the money carefully and judiciously, without permitting himself to be influenced by any of the prejudices of patriotism. Ubi bene, ibi patria, was the motto of the Hebrew at the beginning of the century, and naturally enough; for in a privileged society he was without privileges and almost without rights. Every career was closed to him except those of medicine and money-making; and in making money it was enough for the Hebrew to make it lawfully. There is no record of Mayer Rothschild’s having lent anything to the French Republic, which had liberated the Jews from every burden, every disability, weighing upon them in other countries. But he made advances to Napoleon and also, with fine impartiality, to England, Napoleon’s most consistent foe. Any prince, moreover, reigning or deposed, could, if he possessed the requisite security, count upon the Frankfort financier for pecuniary aid.