CHAPTER IX

IN THE AISNE--(_continued_)

Laon--A feudal fortress home--Chauny and the green monkeys of Rabelais--The festival of the jongleurs and the learned dogs--A damsel of Chauny on English good sense and Queen Victoria--A region of parks and châteaux--The cradle of the French Monarchy--How the Revolution robbed France--The rural reign of pillage and murder--Horrors committed in the provinces during 1789--Arthur Young and Gouverneur Morris on the general depravation and lawlessness--The National Assembly a mere noisy 'mob'--The outbreak of crime which preceded the Terror--The truth about Madame Roland--Her hatred of Marie Antoinette and her thirst for blood--The legend of the Gironde--Brissot de Warville on robbery as a virtuous action--The relations of the French Revolution to property--France more free before 1789 than after it--The laws against emigrants--Girls of fourteen condemned to death--Emigration made a crime, that property might be pillaged--How Irène de Tencin defended the family estate--The story of the Saporta family--The Laonnais in the 18th century--Wide-spread ruin of its churches, convents, and châteaux--Destruction of accumulated capital--How syndicates of rogues stole bronzes, brasswork, and monuments--The story of two châteaux--The bishop's château at Anizy--The burghers and the seigneurs in the 16th century--The local 'directory' in 1790--Wreck, ruin, and robbery--The Château of Pinon--Once the property of a granddaughter of Edward III. of England--A domain of the Duc d'Orléans--A tragedy of love and murder--Death of the Marquis d'Albret--How Pinon passed to the family of De Courvals--The present owner an American lady--The finest château in the Laonnais--What has the Laonnais gained from the ruin of the Anizy? 186-225