to his civil compeers, was reinstated in his administrative
functions; during the Terror, he was intimate with all the Terrorists,
being one of the important men of Troyes.--The mayor of the town,
Gachez, an old soldier and ex-schoolmaster, is of the same stuff as
this baker's apprentice. He, likewise, was a Vendean hero; only, he was
unable to distinguish himself as much as he liked, for, after enlisting,
he failed to march; having pocketed the bounty of three hundred livres,
he discovered that he had infirmities and, getting himself invalidated,
he served the nation in a civil capacity. "His own partisans admit that
he is a drunkard and that he has committed forgery." Some months after
Thermidor he is sentenced to eight years imprisonment and put in the
pillory for this crime. Hence, "almost the entire commune is against
him; the women in the streets jeer him, and the eight sections meet
together to request his withdrawal." But Representative Bo reports that
he is every way entitled to remain, being a true Jacobin, an admirable
terrorist and "the only sans-culotte mayor which the commune of Troyes
has to be proud of."[33100]

It would be awarding too much honor to men of this stamp, to suppose
that they had convictions or principles; they were governed by
animosities and especially by their appetites,[33101] to satiate which
they[33102] made the most of their offices.--At Troyes, "all provisions
and foodstuffs are drawn upon to supply the table of the twenty-four"
sans-culottes[33103] to whom Bo entrusted the duty of weeding-out the
popular club; before the organization of "this regenerating nucleus"
the revolutionary committee, presided over by Rousselin, the civil
commissioner, carried on its "gluttony" in the Petit-Louvre
tavern, "passing nights bozing" and in the preparation of lists of
suspects.[33104] In the neighboring provinces of Dijon, Beaune, Semur
and Aignayle-Duc, the heads of the municipality and of the club always
meet in taverns and bars. At Dijon, we see "the ten or twelve Hercules
of patriotism traversing the town, each with a chalice under his
arm:"[33105] this is their drinking-cup; each has to bring his own
to the Montagnard inn; there, they imbibe copiously, frequently, and
between two glasses of wine "declare who are outlaws." At Aignay-le-Duc,
a small town with only half a dozen patriots "the majority of whom can
scarcely write, most of them poor, burdened with families, and living
without doin