the assassination fouler.  He was a butcher of men, and he boasted of it.  It was he who had thrust his hands into the open breasts and plucked forth the hearts of Foulon and Berthier.[14] It was he who had cut off the head of the two gardes-du-corps, de Varicourt and des Huttes, at Versailles, on the 6th of October.  It was he who, entering Paris, bearing the two heads at the end of a pike, reproached the people with being content with so little, and having made him go so far to cut off only two heads!  He hoped for better things at Avignon, and went thither.

There was at Avignon a body of volunteers called the army of Vaucluse, formed of the dregs of that country, and commanded by one Patrix.  This Patrix having been assassinated by his troop, whose excesses he desired to moderate, Jourdan was elevated to the command by the claims of sedition and wickedness.  The soldiers, when reproached with their robberies and murders, similar to those of the Gueux of Belgium, and the sans-culottes of Paris, received the reproach as an honour, and called themselves the brave brigands of Avignon.  Jourdan at the head of this band, ravaged and fired le Comtal, laid siege to Carpentras, was repulsed, lost five hundred men, and fell back upon Avignon, still shuddering at the murder of Lescuyer.  He resolved on lending his arm and his troop to the vengeance of the French party.  On the 30th of August Jourdan and his myrmidons closed the city-gates, dispersed through the streets, going to the houses noted as containing enemies to the Revolution, dragging out the inhabitants—­men, women, aged persons, and children,—­all, without distinction of age, sex or innocence, and shut them up in the palace.  When night came, the assassins broke down the doors and murdered with iron crow-bars these disarmed and supplicating victims.  In vain did they shriek to the national guard for aid:  the city hears the massacre without daring to give any signs of animation.  The daring of the crime chilled and paralysed every citizen.  The murderers preluded the death of the females by derision and insults which added shame to terror, and the agonies of modesty to the pangs of murder.  When there were no more to be slain they mutilated the carcases, and swept the blood into the sewer of the palace.  They dragged the mutilated corpses to La Glaciere, walled them up, and the vengeance of the people was stamped upon them.  Jourdan and his satellites offered the homage of this night to the French mediators and the National Assembly.  The scoundrels of Paris admired—­the Assembly shook with indignation, and considered this crime as an outrage; whilst the president fainted on reading the recital of this night at Avignon.  The arrest of Jourdan and his accomplices was commanded.  Jourdan fled from Avignon, pursued by the French; he dashed his horse in to the river of the Sargue:  caught in the middle of the river, by a soldier, he fired at him and missed.  He was seized and bound, and punishment awarded him, but the Jacobins compelled the Girondists to agree to an amnesty for the crimes of Avignon.  Jourdan making sure of impunity, and proud of his iniquities, went thither to be revenged on his denouncers.