"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 B? 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."[100]
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,[101] to satiate which
they[102] 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[103] to whom B? 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.
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