Les sacrefices forces (BM 1868,0808.5885)

A satire on the sitting of the States-General on the night of Aug. 4-5. Marie Antoinette stands at an anvil on which she is breaking the crown, her hammer raised to strike; piles of plate and jewels, with a star of the order of St. Louis, lie at her feet. Beside her the little Dauphin sits on the ground wearing an enormous cocked hat in which is a tricolour cockade. He holds a broken sceptre, and says, with one hand to his eye as if weeping, "qu'on me laisse au moins ce Joujou." The Queen says, "et a moi trois petits Soupers, par Semaine." Behind her a grinning demon blows with bellows a fire in which a piece of plate is being melted. Behind them is the hooded chimney of a smithy. On the right Louis XVI turns the screw of a stamping-machine as if making buttons, piles of which lie at his feet. He says, "Je Sacrifierai tout, pourvu que la Chasse me reste et quelques morceaus de Fer pour les terns de pluie."
Behind, a file of three men enters through a door; they carry on their heads piles of plate which they are taking to the smithy. Their leader is an aristocrat, hat in hand; the other two are members of the clergy; the last says "Stop Thief", looking to the right, towards two men with large moneybags standing in a second doorway; one of these says to the other "Emportez Vite,... à Turin et en Passant le feu à tous les Moulins." He is surreptitiously taking money-bags from a cupboard inscribed 'Cabinet de Largent pour La Nation'; some of the bags are inscribed 'Maison de Ville'. 19 Aug 1789.

Hand-coloured etching