ice of the strongest
against the weakest, ready to swing round at once on the wind changing,
but all joined together and working to one common end through physical
instinct, the only one that lasts in the immoral, adroit and
volatile being who circulates nimbly about, with no other aim than
self-preservation, and to amuse himself.[3276]--In his dressing-gown,
early in the morning, he receives a crowd of solicitors, and, with the
ways of a "dandified minister," graciously accepts the petitions handed
to him; first, those of ladies, "distributing gallantries among the
prettiest;" he makes promises, and smiles, and then, returning to
his cabinet, throws the papers in the fire: "There," he says, my
correspondence is done."--He sups twice every decade in his fine house
at Clichy, along with three more than accommodating pretty women; he
is gay, awarding flatteries and attentions quite becoming to an amiable
protector: he enters into their professional rivalries, their spites
against the reigning beauty, their jealousy of another who wears a
blonde wig and pretends "to set the fashion." He sends immediately
for the National Agent and gravely informs him that this
head-dress, borrowed from the guillotined, is a rallying point for
anti-revolutionaries, whereupon, the next day, wigs are denounced at
the Commune-council, and suppressed; "Barere roared with laughter on
alluding to this piece of fun." The humor of an undertaker and the
dexterity of a commercial drummer: he plays with Terror.--In like manner
he plays with his reports, and at this latter exercise, he improvises;
he is never embarrassed; it is simply necessary to turn the faucet and
the water runs. "Had he any subject to treat, he would fasten himself on
Robespierre, Herault, Saint-Just, or somebody else, and draw them out;
he would then rush off to the tribune and spin out their ideas; "they
were all astonished at hearing their thoughts expressed as fully as
if reflected in a mirror." No individual on the Committee, or in the
Convention, equaled him in promptness and fluency, for the reason that
he was not obliged to think before he spoke: with him, the faculty of
speaking, like an independent organ, acted by itself, the empty brain
or indifferent heart contributing nothing to his loquacity. Naturally,
whatever issues from his mouth comes forth in ready-made bombast, the
current jargon of the Jacobin club, sonorous, nauseous commonplace,
schoolboy metaphors and simile