The Paris Sketch Book of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh; and the Irish Sketch Book. William Makepeace Thackeray

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      With that coat and wig, Cartouche left home, father, friends, conscience, remorse, society, behind him. He discovered (like a great number of other philosophers and poets, when they have committed rascally actions) that the world was all going wrong, and he quarrelled with it outright. One of the first stories told of the illustrious Cartouche, when he became professionally and openly a robber, redounds highly to his credit, and shows that he knew how to take advantage of the occasion, and how much he had improved in the course of a very few years’ experience. His courage and ingenuity were vastly admired by his friends; so much so, that, one day, the captain of the band thought fit to compliment him, and vowed that when he (the captain) died, Cartouche should infallibly be called to the command-in-chief. This conversation, so flattering to Cartouche, was carried on between the two gentlemen, as they were walking, one night, on the quays by the side of the Seine. Cartouche, when the captain made the last remark, blushingly protested against it, and pleaded his extreme youth as a reason why his comrades could never put entire trust in him. ‘Psha, man!’ said the captain, ‘thy youth is in thy favour; thou wilt live only the longer to lead thy troops to victory. As for strength, bravery, and cunning, wert thou as old as Methuselah, thou couldst not be better provided than thou art now, at eighteen.’ What was the reply of Monsieur Cartouche? He answered, not by words, but by actions. Drawing his knife from his girdle, he instantly dug it into the captain’s left side, as near his heart as possible: and then, seizing that imprudent commander, precipitated him violently into the waters of the Seine, to keep company with the gudgeons and river-gods. When he returned to the band, and recounted how the captain had basely attempted to assassinate him, and how he, on the contrary, had, by exertion of superior skill, overcome the captain, not one of the society believed a word of his history; but they elected him captain forthwith. I think his Excellency Don Rafael Maroto, the pacificator of Spain, is an amiable character, for whom history has not been written in vain.

      Being arrived at this exalted position, there is no end of the feats which Cartouche performed; and his band reached to such a pitch of glory, that if there had been a hundred thousand, instead of a hundred of them, who knows but that a new and popular dynasty might not have been founded, and ‘Louis Dominic, premier Empereur des Frances,’ might have performed innumerable glorious actions, and fixed himself in the hearts of his people, just as other monarchs have done, a hundred years after Cartouche’s death.

      A story similar to the above, and equally moral, is that of Cartouche, who, in company with two other gentlemen, robbed the coche, or packet-boat, from Melun, where they took a good quantity of booty—making the passengers lie down on the decks, and rifling them at leisure. ‘This money will be but very little among three,’ whispered Cartouche to his neighbour, as the three conquerors were making merry over their gains; ‘if you were but to pull the trigger of your pistol in the neighbourhood of your comrade’s ear, perhaps it might go off, and then there would be but two of us to share.’ Strangely enough, as Cartouche said, the pistol did go off, and No. 3 perished. ‘Give him another ball,’ said Cartouche: and another was fired into him. But no sooner had Cartouche’s comrade discharged both his pistols, than Cartouche himself, seized with a furious indignation, drew his: ‘Learn, monster,’ cried he, ‘not to be so greedy of gold, and perish, the victim of thy disloyalty and avarice!’ So Cartouche slew the second robber; and there is no man in Europe who can say that the latter did not merit well his punishment.

      I could fill volumes, and not mere sheets of paper, with tales of the triumphs of Cartouche and his band: how he robbed the Countess of O——, going to Dijon, in her coach, and how the Countess fell in love with him, and was faithful to him ever after; how, when the lieutenant of police offered a reward of a hundred pistoles to any man who would bring Cartouche before him, a noble Marquess, in a coach-and-six, drove up to the hôtel of the police; and the noble Marquess, desiring to see Monsieur de la Reynie, on matters of the highest moment, alone, the latter introduced him into his private cabinet; and how, when there, the Marquess drew from his pocket a long curiously shaped dagger: ‘Look at this, Monsieur de la Reynie,’ said he; ‘this dagger is poisoned!’

      ‘Is it possible?’ said M. de la Reynie.

      ‘A prick of it would do for any man,’ said the Marquess.

      ‘You don’t say so!’ said M. de la Reynie.

      ‘I do, though; and, what is more,’ says the Marquess, in a terrible voice, ‘if you do not instantly lay yourself flat on the ground, with your face towards it, and your hands crossed over your back, or if you make the slightest noise or cry, I will stick this poisoned dagger between your ribs, as sure as my name is Cartouche!’

      At the sound of this dreadful name, M. de la Reynie sunk incontinently down on his stomach, and submitted to be carefully gagged and corded; after which Monsieur Cartouche laid his hands upon all the money which was kept in the lieutenant’s cabinet. Alas! and alas! many a stout bailiff, and many an honest fellow of a spy, went, for that day, without his pay and his victuals.

      There is a story that Cartouche once took the diligence to Lille, and found in it a certain Abbé Potter, who was full of indignation against this monster of a Cartouche, and said that when he went back to Paris, which he proposed to do in about a fortnight, he should give the lieutenant of police some information, which would infallibly lead to the scoundrel’s capture. But poor Potter was disappointed in his designs; for, before he could fulfil them, he was made the victim of Cartouche’s cruelty.

      A letter came to the lieutenant of police, to state that Cartouche had travelled to Lille, in company with the Abbé de Potter, of that town; that, on the reverend gentleman’s return towards Paris, Cartouche had waylaid him, murdered him, taken his papers, and would come to Paris himself, bearing the name and clothes of the unfortunate Abbé, by the Lille coach, on such a day. The Lille coach arrived, was surrounded by police agents; the monster Cartouche was there, sure enough, in the Abbé’s guise. He was seized, bound, flung into prison, brought out to be examined, and, on examination, found to be no other than the Abbé Potter himself! It is pleasant to read thus of the relaxations of great men, and find them condescending to joke like the meanest of us.

      Another diligence adventure is recounted of the famous Cartouche. It happened that he met, in the coach, a young and lovely lady, clad in widow’s weeds, and bound to Paris, with a couple of servants. The poor thing was the widow of a rich old gentleman of Marseilles, and was going to the capital to arrange with her lawyers, and to settle her husband’s will. The Count de Grinche (for so her fellow-passenger was called) was quite as candid as the pretty widow had been, and stated that he was a captain in the regiment of Nivernois; that he was going to Paris to buy a colonelcy, which his relatives, the Duke de Bouillon, the Prince de Montmorenci, the Commandeur de la Trémoille, with all their interest at Court, could not fail to procure for him. To be short, in the course of the four days’ journey, the Count Louis Dominic de Grinche played his cards so well, that the poor little widow half forgot her late husband; and her eyes glistened with tears as the Count kissed her hand at parting—at parting, he hoped, only for a few hours.

      Day and night the insinuating Count followed her; and when, at the end of a fortnight, and in the midst of a tête-à-tête, he plunged, one morning, suddenly on his knees, and said, ‘Leonora, do you love me?’ the poor thing heaved the gentlest, tenderest, sweetest sigh in the world; and, sinking her blushing head on his shoulder, whispered, ‘Oh, Dominic, je t’aime! Ah!’ said she, ‘how noble is it of my Dominic to take me with the little I have, and he so rich a nobleman!’ The fact is, the old Baron’s titles and estates had passed away to his nephews; his dowager was only left with three hundred thousand livres, in rentes sur l’état—a handsome sum, but nothing to compare to the rent-roll of Count Dominic, Count de la Grinche, Seigneur de la Haute Pigre, Baron de la Bigorne; he had estates and wealth which might authorise him to aspire to the hand of a duchess, at least.

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