_Defeats of the French on the Frontier--Decay of
Constitutionalists--They form the Club of Feuillans, and are
dispersed by the Jacobins--The Ministry--Dumouriez--Breach of
confidence betwixt the King and his Ministers--Dissolution of
the King's Constitutional Guard--Extravagant measures of the
Jacobins--Alarms of the Girondists--Departmental Army
proposed--King puts his Veto on the decree, against Dumouriez's
representations--Decree against the recusant Priests--King
refuses it--Letter of the Ministers to the King--He dismisses
Roland, Clavière, and Servan--Dumouriez, Duranton, and Lacoste,
appointed in their stead--King ratifies the decree concerning
the Departmental Army--Dumouriez resigns, and departs for the
Frontiers--New Ministers named from the Constitutionalists--
Insurrection of 20th June--Armed Mob intrude into the
Assembly--Thence into the Tuileries--La Fayette repairs to
Paris--Remonstrates in favour of the King--But is compelled to
return to the Frontiers--Marseillois appear in Paris--Duke of
Brunswick's manifesto._
It is not our purpose here to enter into any detail of military events.
It is sufficient to say, that the first results of the war were more
disastrous than could have been expected, even from the want of
discipline and state of mutiny in which this call to arms found the
troops of France. If Austria, never quick at improving an opportunity,
had possessed more forces on the Flemish frontier, or had even pressed
her success with the troops she had, events might have occurred to
influence, if not to alter, the fortunes of France and her King. They
were inactive, however, and La Fayette, who was at the head of the army,
exerted himself, not without effect, to rally the spirits of the French,
and infuse discipline and confidence into their ranks. But he was able
to secure no success of so marked a character, as to correspond with the
reputation he had acquired in America; so that as the Austrians were few
in number, and not very decisive in their movements, the war seemed to
languish on both sides.
In Paris, the absence of La Fayette had removed the main stay from the
Constitutional interests, which were now nearly reduced to that state of
nullity to which they had themselves reduced the party, first of pure
Royalists, and then that of the _Moderés_, or friends of limited
monarchy, in the first Assembly. The wealthier classes, indeed,
continued a fruitless attachment to the Constitutionalists, which
gradually diminished with their decreased power to protect their
friends. At length this became so contemptible, that their enemies were
emboldened to venture upon an insult, which showed how little they were
disposed to keep measures with a feeble adversary.
[Sidenote: CLUB OF FEUILLANS.]
Among other plans, by which they hoped to counterpoise the omnipotence
of the Jacobin Club, the Constitutionalists had established a counter
association, termed, from its place of meeting,[192] Les Feuillans. In
this club,--which included about two hundred members of the Legislative
Body, the ephemeral rival of the great Jacobinical forge in which the
Revolutionists had their strength and fabricated their thunders,--there
was more eloquence, argument, learning, and wit, than was necessary; but
the Feuillans wanted the terrible power of exciting the popular
passions, which the orators of the Jacobin Club possessed and wielded at
pleasure. These opposed factions might be compared to two swords, of
which one had a gilded and ornamented hilt, but a blade formed of glass
or other brittle substance, while the brazen handle of the other
corresponded in strength and coarseness to the steel of the weapon
itself. When two such weapons came into collision, the consequence may
be anticipated, and it was so with the opposite clubs. The Jacobins,
after many preparatory insults, went down upon and assailed their
adversaries with open force, insulting and dispersing them with blows
and violence; while Pétion, the mayor of Paris, who was present on the
occasion, consoled the fugitives, by assuring them that the law indeed
protected them, but the people having pronounced against them, it was
not for him to enforce the behests of the law, in opposition to the will
of that people, from whom the law originated.[193] A goodly medicine for
their aching bones!
The Constitutional party amidst their general humiliation, had lost
almost all influence in the ministry, and could only communicate with
the King underhand, and in a secret manner,--as if they had been, in
fact, his friends and partisans, not the cause of, or willing consenters
to, his present imprisoned and disabled condition. Of six ministers, by
whom De Lessart and his comrades had been replaced, the husband of
Madame Roland, and two others, Servan[194] and Clavière,[195] were
zealous republicans; Duranthon[196] and Lacoste[197] were moderate in
their politics, but timorous in character; the sixth, Dumouriez, who
held the war department, was the personal rival of La Fayette, both in
civil and military matters, and the enemy, therefore, of the
Constitutional party. It is now, for the first time, that we mention one
of those names renowned in military history, which had the address to
attract Victory to the French banners, to which she so long appeared to
adhere without shadow of changing. Dumouriez passed early from the
scene, but left his name strongly written in the annals of France.
Dumouriez was little in person, but full of vivacity and talent; a brave
soldier, having distinguished himself in the civil dissensions of
Poland; an able and skilful intriguer, and well-fitted to play a
conspicuous part in times of public confusion. He has never been
supposed to possess any great firmness of principle, whether public or
private; but a soldier's honour, and a soldier's frankness, together
with the habits of good society, led him to contemn and hate the sordid
treachery, cruelty, and cynicism of the Jacobins; while his wit and
common sense enabled him to see through and deride the affected and
pedantic fanaticism of republican zeal of the Girondists, who, he
plainly saw, were amusing themselves with schemes to which the country
of France, the age, and the state of manners, were absolutely opposed.
Thus, he held the situation of minister at war, coquetting with all
parties; wearing one evening in the Jacobin Club the red night-cap,
which was the badge of breechless freedom, and the next, with better
sincerity, advising the King how he might avoid the approaching evils;
though the by-roads he pointed out were often too indirect to be trodden
by the good and honest prince, to whom Providence had, in Dumouriez,
assigned a counsellor better fitted to a less scrupulous sovereign. The
King nevertheless reposed considerable confidence in the general, which,
if not answered with all the devotion of loyalty, was at least never
betrayed.[198]
The Republican ministers were scarcely qualified by their talents, to
assume the air of Areopagites, or Roman tribunes. Roland, by himself,
was but a tiresome pedant, and he could not bring his wife to the
cabinet council, although it is said she attempted to make her way to
the ministerial dinners.[199] His colleagues were of the same character,
and affected in their intercourse with the King a stoical contempt of
the forms of the court,[200] although in effect, these are like other
courtesies of society, which it costs little to observe, and is brutal
to neglect.[201] Besides petty insults of this sort, there was a total
want of confidence on both sides, in the intercourse betwixt them and
the King. If the ministers were desirous to penetrate his sentiments on
any particular subject, Louis evaded them by turning the discourse on
matters of vague and general import; and did he, on the other hand,
press them to adopt any particular measure, they were cold and reserved,
and excused themselves under the shelter of their personal
responsibility. Indeed, how was it possible that confidence could exist
betwixt the King and his Republican ministers, when the principal object
of the latter was to procure the abolition of the regal dignity, and
when the former was completely aware that such was their purpose?
[Sidenote: KING'S GUARD DISBANDED.]
The first step adopted by the factions of Girondists and Jacobins, who
moved towards the same object side by side, though not hand in hand, was
to deprive the King of a guard, assigned him by the Constitution, in
lieu of his disbanded _gardes du corps_. It was, indeed, of doubtful
loyalty, being partly levied from soldiers of the line, partly from the
citizens, and imbued in many cases with the revolutionary spirit of the
day; but they were officered by persons selected for their attachment to
the King, and even their name of Guards expressed and inspired an
_esprit de corps_, which might be formidable. Various causes of
suspicion were alleged against this guard--that they kept in their
barracks a white flag (which proved to be the ornament of a cake
presented to them by the Dauphin)--that their sword-hilts were formed
into the fashion of a cock, which announced some anti-revolutionary
enigma--that attempts were made to alienate them from the Assembly, and
fix their affections on the King. The guard contained several spies, who
had taken that service for the purpose of betraying its secrets to the
Jacobins. Three or four of these men, produced at the bar, affirmed much
that was, and much that was not true; and amid the causes they had for
distrusting the King, and their reasons for desiring to weaken him, the
Assembly decreed the reduction of the Constitutional Guard. The King was
with difficulty persuaded not to oppose his _veto_, and was thus left
almost totally undefended to the next blast of the revolutionary
tempest.[202]
Every successive proceeding of the factions tended to show more strongly
that the storm was speedily to arise. The invention of the Jacobins
exhausted itself in proposing and adopting revolutionary measures so
extravagant, that very shame prevented the Girondists from becoming
parties to them. Such was the carrying the atrocious cut-throat Jourdan
in triumph through the streets of Avignon, where he had piled eighty
carcasses into a glacière in the course of one night.[203] A less
atrocious, but no less insolent proceeding, was the feast given in
honour of the regiment of Chateauvieux, whose mutiny had been put down
at Nancy by M. de Bouillé, acting under the express decree of the first
National Assembly.[204]
In a word, understanding much better than the Brissotins the taste of
the vulgar for what was most violent, gross, and exaggerated, the
Jacobins purveyed for them accordingly, filled their ears with the most
incredible reports, and gulled their eyes by the most absurd pageants.
[Sidenote: ALARM OF THE GIRONDISTS.]
The Girondists, retaining some taste and some principle, were left far
behind in the race of vulgar popularity, where he that throws off every
mark of decency bids most fair to gain the prize. They beheld with
mortification feats which they could not emulate, and felt that their
own assertions of their attachment to freedom, emphatic as they were,
seemed cold and spiritless compared to the extravagant and flaming
declamations of the Jacobins. They regarded with envy the advantages
which their rivals acquired by those exaggerated proceedings, and were
startled to find how far they were like to be outstripped by those
uncompromising and unhesitating demagogues. The Girondists became
sensible that a struggle approached, in which, notwithstanding their
strength in the Assembly, they must be vanquished, unless they could
raise up some body of forces, entirely dependent on themselves, to be
opposed in time of need to the Jacobin insurgents. This was indeed
essentially necessary to their personal safety, and to the stability of
their power. If they looked to the national guard, they found such of
that body as were no longer attached to La Fayette wearied of
revolutions, unmoved by the prospect of a republic, and only desirous to
protect their shops and property. If they turned their eyes to the lower
orders, and especially the suburbs, the myriads of pikemen which they
could pour forth were all devoted to the Jacobins, from whom their
leaders received orders and regular pay.
The scheme of a departmental army was resorted to by the Girondists as
the least startling, yet most certain mode of bringing together a
military force sufficient to support the schemes of the new
administration. Five men were to be furnished by every canton in France,
which would produce a body of 20,000 troops, to be armed and trained
under the walls of Paris. This force was to serve as a central army to
reinforce the soldiers on the frontier, and maintain order in the
capital, as occasion should demand. The measure, proposed by the
Girondists, was unexpectedly furthered by the Jacobins, who plainly saw,
that through the means of their affiliated societies which existed in
every canton, they would be able to dictate the choice of so large a
part of the departmental army, that, when assembled, it should add to
the power of their insurrectionary bands at Paris, instead of
controlling them.[205]
The citizens of Paris were disposed to consider this concourse of
undisciplined troops under the walls of the city as dangerous to its
safety, and an insult to the national guard, hitherto thought adequate
to the defence of the metropolis. They petitioned the Assembly against
the measure, and even invoked the King to reject the decree, when it
should pass through that body.
To this course Louis was himself sufficiently inclined; for neither he
nor any one doubted that the real object of the Girondists was to bring
together such an army, as would enable them to declare their beloved
republic without fear of La Fayette, even if he should find himself able
to bring the army which he commanded to his own sentiments on the
subject.
Dumouriez warned Louis against following this course of direct
opposition to the Assembly. He allowed, that the ultimate purpose of the
proposal was evident to every thinking person, but still its ostensible
object being the protection of the country and capital, the King, he
said, would, in the eyes of the vulgar, be regarded as a favourer of the
foreign invasion, if he objected to a measure represented as essential
to the protection of Paris. He undertook, as Minister of War, that as
fast as a few hundreds of the departmental forces arrived, he would have
them regimented and dismissed to the frontier, where their assistance
was more necessary than at home. But all his remonstrances on this
subject were in vain. Louis resolved at all risks to place his _veto_ on
the measure.[206] He probably relied on the feelings of the national
guard, of which one or two divisions were much attached to him, while
the dispositions of the whole had been certainly ameliorated, from their
fear of fresh confusion by means of these new levies. Perhaps, also, the
King could not bring himself at once to trust the versatile disposition
of Dumouriez, whose fidelity, however, we see no reason for suspecting.
Another renewed point of discussion and disagreement betwixt the King
and his ministers, respected the recusant clergy. A decree was passed in
the Assembly, that such priests as might be convicted of a refusal to
subscribe the oath to the civil Constitution, should be liable to
deportation. This was a point of conscience with Louis, and was probably
brought forward in order to hasten him into a resignation of the crown.
He stood firm accordingly, and determined to oppose his _veto_ to this
decree also, [June 12,] in spite at once of all the arguments which the
worldly prudence of Dumouriez could object, and of the urgency of the
Republican ministers.[207]
[Sidenote: DISMISSAL OF ROLAND, ETC.]
The firm refusal of the King disconcerted the measures of the Girondist
counsellors. Madame Roland undertook to make the too scrupulous monarch
see the errors of his ways; and composed, in name of her husband and two
of his colleagues, a long letter, to which Dumouriez and the other two
refused to place their names. It was written in what the Citoyenne
termed "an austere tone of truth;"[208] that is to say, without any of
the usual marks of deference and respect, and with a harshness
calculated to jar all the feelings, affectionate or religious, of him
whom they still called King. Alas! the severest and most offensive
truths, however late in reaching the ears of powerful and prosperous
monarchs, make themselves sternly loud to those princes who are captive
and unfriended. Louis might have replied to this rude expostulation,
like the knight who received a blow from an enemy when he was disarmed,
and a prisoner,--"There is little bravery in this _now_." The King,
however, gave way to his resentment as far as he could. He dismissed
Roland, Servan, and Clavière, and with difficulty prevailed on
Dumouriez, Duranthon, and Lacoste, to retain their situations, and
endeavour to supply the place of those whom he had deprived of office;
but he was obliged to purchase their adherence, by ratifying the decree
concerning the federal or departmental army of twenty thousand men, on
condition that they should rendezvous at Soissons, not at Paris. On the
decree against the priests, his resolution continued unmoved and
immovable. Thus Religion, which had for half a century been so slightly
regarded in France, at length interposed her influence in deciding the
fate of the King and the kingdom.
The three discarded ministers affected to congratulate each other on
being released from scenes so uncongenial to their republican virtues
and sentiments, as the ante-chambers of a court, where men were forced
to wear buckles instead of shoe-strings, or undergo the frowns of ushers
and masters of ceremonies, and where patriotic tongues were compelled to
practise court-language, and to address a being of the same flesh and
blood as their own, with the titles of Sire, and your Majesty. The
unhappy pedants were not long in learning that there are constraints
worse to undergo than the etiquette of a court, and sterner despots to
be found in the ranks of a republic, than the good-humoured and lenient
Louis. As soon as dismissed, they posted to the Assembly, to claim the
applause due to suffering virtue, and to exhibit their letter to those
for whose ears it was really written--the sympathizing democrats and the
tribunes.[209]
They were, accordingly, as victims of their democratic zeal, received
with acclamation; but the triumph of those who bestowed it, was
unexpectedly qualified and diminished. Dumouriez, who spoke fluently,
and had collected proofs for such a moment, overwhelmed the Assembly by
a charge of total neglect and incapacity, against Roland and his two
colleagues. He spoke of unrecruited armies, ungarrisoned forts,
unprovided commissariats, in a tone which compelled the Assembly to
receive his denunciations against his late associates in the ministry.
But although his unpleasant and threatening communications made a
momentary impression on the Assembly, almost in spite of themselves, the
wily and variable orator saw that he could only maintain his ground as
minister, by procuring, if possible, the assent of the King to the
decree against the recusant clergy. He made a final attempt, along with
his ephemeral colleagues; stated his conviction, that the refusal of the
King, if persisted in, would be the cause of insurrection; and, finally,
tendered his resignation, in case their urgent advice should be
neglected. "Think not to terrify me by threats," replied Louis. "My
resolution is fixed." Dumouriez was not a man to perish under the ruins
of the throne which he could not preserve. His resignation was again
tendered and accepted, not without marks of sensibility on the King's
part and his own; and having thus saved a part of his credit with the
Assembly, who respected his talents, and desired to use them against the
invaders, he departed from Paris to the frontiers, to lead the van among
the French victors.[210]
Louis was now left to the pitiless storm of revolution, without the
assistance of any one who could in the least assist him in piloting
through the tempest. The few courtiers--or, much better named--the few
ancient and attached friends, who remained around his person, possessed
neither talents nor influence to aid him; they could but lament his
misfortunes and share his ruin. He himself expressed a deep conviction,
that his death was near at hand, yet the apprehension neither altered
his firmness upon points to which he esteemed his conscience was party,
nor changed the general quiet placidity of his temper. A negotiation to
resign his crown was, perhaps, the only mode which remained, affording
even a chance to avert his fate; but the days of deposed monarchs are
seldom long, and no pledge could have assured Louis that any terms which
the Girondists might grant, would have been ratified by their sterner
and uncompromising rivals of the Jacobin party. These men had been long
determined to make his body the step to their iniquitous power. They
affected to feel for the cause of the people, with the zeal which goes
to slaying. They had heaped upon the crown, and its unhappy wearer, all
the guilt and all the misfortunes of the Revolution; it was incumbent on
them to show that they were serious in their charge, by rendering Louis
a sin-offering for the nation. On the whole, it was the more kingly part
not to degrade himself by his own voluntary act, but to await the period
which was to close at once his life and his reign. He named his last
Ministry from the dispirited remnants of the Constitutional party, which
still made a feeble and unsupported struggle against the Girondists and
Jacobins in the Assembly. They did not long enjoy their precarious
office.
The factions last named were now united in the purpose of precipitating
the King from his throne by actual and direct force. The voice of the
Girondists Vergniaud had already proclaimed in the Assembly. "Terror,"
he said, "must, in the name of the people, burst her way into yonder
palace, whence she has so often sallied forth at the command of
monarchs."[211]
Though the insurrection was resolved upon, and thus openly announced,
each faction was jealous of the force which the other was to employ, and
apprehensive of the use which might be made of it against themselves,
after the conquest was obtained. But however suspicious of each other,
they were still more desirous of their common object, the destruction of
the throne, and the erection of a republic, which the Brissotins
supposed they could hold under their rule, and which the Jacobins were
determined to retain under their misrule. An insurrection was at length
arranged, which had all the character of that which brought the King a
prisoner from Versailles, the Jacobins being the prime movers of their
desperate followers, and the actors on both occasions; while the
Girondists, on the 20th June, 1792, hoped, like the Constitutionalists
on the 6th October, 1789, to gain the advantage of the enterprise which
their own force would have been unable to accomplish. The community, or
magistracy, of Paris, which was entirely under the dominion of
Robespierre, Danton, and the Jacobins, had been long providing for such
an enterprise, and under pretext that they were arming the lower classes
against invasion, had distributed pikes and other weapons to the
rabble, who were to be used on this occasion.
[Sidenote: THE TWENTIETH OF JUNE.]
On the 20th of June, the Sans Culottes of the suburbs of Saint Marçeau
and Saint Antoine assembled together, armed with pikes, scythes,
hay-forks, and weapons of every description, whether those actually
forged for the destruction of mankind, or those which, invented for
peaceful purposes, are readily converted by popular fury into offensive
arms. They seemed, notwithstanding their great numbers to act under
authority, and amid their cries, their songs, their dances, and the wild
intermixture of grotesque and fearful revel, appeared to move by
command, and to act with a unanimity that gave the effect of order to
that which was in itself confusion. They were divided into bodies, and
had their leaders. Standards also were displayed, carefully selected to
express the character and purpose of the wretches who were assembled
under them. One ensign was a pair of tattered breeches, with the motto,
"Vivent les Sans Culottes." Another ensign-bearer, dressed in black,
carried on a long pole a hog's harslet, that is, part of the entrails of
that animal, still bloody, with the legend, "La fressure d'un
Aristocrat." This formidable assemblage was speedily recruited by the
mob of Paris, to an immense multitude, whose language, gestures, and
appearance, all combined to announce some violent catastrophe.
The terrified citizens, afraid of general pillage, concentrated
themselves,--not to defend the King or protect the National Assembly,
but for the preservation of the Palais Royal, where the splendour of the
shops was most likely to attract the cupidity of the Sans Culottes. A
strong force of armed citizens guarded all the avenues to this temple of
Mammon, and, by excluding the insurgents from its precincts, showed what
they could have done for the Hall of the Legislature, or the palace of
the monarch, had the cause of either found favour in their eyes.[212]
The insurrection rolled on to the hall of the Assembly, surrounded the
alarmed deputies, and filled with armed men every avenue of approach;
talked of a petition which they meant to present, and demanded to file
through the hall to display the force by which it was supported. The
terrified members had nothing better to reply, than by a request that
the insurgents should only enter the Assembly by a representative
deputation--at least that, coming in a body, they should leave their
arms behind. The formidable petitioners laughed at both proposals, and
poured through the hall, shaking in triumph their insurrectionary
weapons.[213] The Assembly, meanwhile, made rather an ignoble figure;
and their attempts to preserve an outward appearance of indifference,
and even of cordiality towards their foul and frightful visitants, have
been aptly compared to a band of wretched comedians, endeavouring to
mitigate the resentment of a brutal and incensed audience.[214]
[Sidenote: MOB FORCE THE TUILERIES.]
From the hall of the Assembly, the populace rushed to the Tuileries.
Preparations had been made for defence, and several bodies of troops
were judiciously placed, who, with the advantages afforded by the gates
and walls, might have defended their posts against the armed rabble
which approached. But there was neither union, loyalty, nor energy, in
those to whom the defence was intrusted, nor did the King, by placing
himself at their head, attempt to give animation to their courage.
The national guards drew off at the command of the two municipal
officers, decked with their scarfs of office, who charged them not to
oppose the will of the people. The grates were dashed to pieces with
sledge hammers. The gates of the palace itself were shut, but the
rabble, turning a cannon upon them, compelled entrance, and those
apartments of royal magnificence, so long the pride of France, were laid
open to the multitude, like those of Troy to her invaders:--
Apparet domus intus, et atria longa patescunt,
Apparent Priami et veterum penetralia regum.[215]
The august palace of the proud house of Bourbon lay thus exposed to the
rude gaze, and vulgar tread, of a brutal and ferocious rabble. Who dared
have prophesied such an event to the royal founders of this stately
pile--to the chivalrous Henry of Navarre, or the magnificent Louis
XIV.!--The door of the apartment entering into the vestibule was opened
by the hand of Louis himself, the ill-fated representative of this lofty
line. He escaped with difficulty the thrust of a bayonet, made as the
door was in the act of expanding. There were around him a handful of
courtiers, and a few of the grenadiers of the national guard belonging
to the section of Filles Saint Thomas, which had been always
distinguished for fidelity. They hurried and almost forced the King into
the embrazure of a window, erected a sort of barricade in front with
tables, and stood beside him as his defenders. The crowd, at their first
entrance, levelled their pikes at Madame Elizabeth, whom they mistook
for the Queen. "Why did you undeceive them?" said the heroic princess to
those around her--"It might have saved the life of my sister."[216] Even
the insurgents were affected by this trait of heroism. They had
encountered none of those obstacles which chafe such minds and make them
thirsty of blood, and it would seem that their leaders had not received
decided orders, or, having received them, did not think the time served
for their execution. The insurgents defiled through the apartments, and
passed the King, now joined by the Queen with her children. The former,
though in the utmost personal danger, would not be separated from her
husband, exclaiming, that her post was by his side; the latter were
weeping with terror at a scene so horrible.
The people seemed moved, or rather their purpose was deprived of that
energetic unanimity which had hitherto carried them so far. Some shouted
against the veto--some against the unconstitutional priests, some more
modestly called out for lowering the price of bread and butcher-meat.
One of them flung a red cap to the King, who quietly drew it upon his
head; another offered him a bottle, and commanded him to drink to the
Nation. No glass could be had, and he was obliged to drink out of the
bottle. These incidents are grotesque and degrading, but they are
redeemed by one of much dignity. "Fear nothing, Sire," said one of the
faithful grenadiers of the national guard who defended him. The King
took his hand, and pressing it to his heart, replied, "Judge yourself if
I fear."[217]
Various leaders of the Republicans were present at this extraordinary
scene, in the apartments, or in the garden,[218] and expressed
themselves according to their various sentiments. "What a figure they
have made of him with the red night-cap and the bottle!" said Manuel,
the Procureur of the Commune of Paris.--"What a magnificent spectacle!"
said the artist David, looking out upon the tumultuary sea of pikes,
agitated by fifty thousand hands, as they rose and sunk, welked and
waved;--"Tremble, tremble, tyrants!"--"They are in a fair train," said
the fierce Gorsas; "we shall soon see their pikes garnished with several
heads." The crowds who thrust forward into the palace and the presence,
were pressed together till the heat increased almost to suffocation, nor
did there appear any end to the confusion.
Late and slow, the Legislative Assembly did at length send a deputation
of twenty-five members, headed by Vergniaud and Isnard, to the palace.
Their arrival put an end to the tumult; for Pétion, the Mayor of Paris,
and the other authorities, who had hitherto been wellnigh passive, now
exerted themselves to clear away the armed populace from the palace and
gardens, and were so readily obeyed, that it was evident similar efforts
would have entirely prevented the insurrection. The "poor and virtuous
people," as Robespierre used to call them, with an affected unction of
pronunciation, retired for once with their pikes unbloodied, not a
little marvelling why they had been called together for such a harmless
purpose.[219]
That a mine so formidable should have exploded without effect, gave some
momentary advantages to the party at whose safety it was aimed. Men of
worth exclaimed against the infamy of such a gratuitous insult to the
crown, while it was still called a Constitutional authority. Men of
substance dreaded the recurrence of such acts of revolutionary violence,
and the commencement of riots, which were likely to end in pillage.
Petitions were presented to the Assembly, covered with the names of
thousands, praying that the leaders of the insurgents should be brought
to punishment; while the King demanded, in a tone which seemed to appeal
to France and to Europe, some satisfaction for his insulted dignity, the
violation of his palace, and the danger of his person.[220] But La
Fayette, at the head of an army whose affections he was supposed to
possess, was the most formidable intercessor. He had, two or three days
before, [June 16,] transmitted to the Assembly a letter, or rather a
remonstrance,[221] in which, speaking in the name of the army, as well
as his own, he expressed the highest dissatisfaction with the recent
events at Paris, complaining of the various acts of violation of the
constitution, and the personal disrespect offered to the King. This
letter of itself had been accounted an enormous offence, both by the
Jacobins and the Girondists; but the tumult of the 20th of June roused
the general to bolder acts of intercession.
[Sidenote: LA FAYETTE ARRIVES AT PARIS.]
On the 28th of the same month of June, all parties heard with as much
interest as anxiety, that General La Fayette was in Paris. He came,
indeed, only with a part of his staff. Had he brought with him a
moderate body of troops upon whom he could have absolutely depended, his
presence so supported, in addition to his influence in Paris, would have
settled the point at issue. But the general might hesitate to diminish
the French army then in front of the enemy, and by doing so to take on
himself the responsibility of what might happen in his absence; or, as
it appeared from subsequent events, he may not have dared to repose the
necessary confidence in any corps of his army, so completely had they
been imbued with the revolutionary spirit. Still his arrival, thus
slightly attended, indicated a confidence in his own resources, which
was calculated to strike the opposite party with anxious apprehension.
He appeared at the bar of the Assembly, and addressed the members in a
strain of decision, which had not been lately heard on the part of those
who pleaded the royal cause in that place. He denounced the authors of
the violence committed on the 20th of June, declared that several corps
of his army had addressed him, and that he came to express their horror,
as well as his own, at the rapid progress of faction; and to demand that
such measures should be taken as to ensure the defenders of France, that
while they were shedding their blood on the frontiers, the Constitution,
for which they combated, should not be destroyed by traitors in the
interior. This speech, delivered by a man of great courage and redoubted
influence, had considerable effect. The Girondists, indeed, proposed to
inquire, whether La Fayette had permission from the minister of war to
leave the command of his army; and sneeringly affirmed, that the
Austrians must needs have retreated from the frontier, since the general
of the French army had returned to Paris: but a considerable majority
preferred the motion of the Constitutionalist Ramond, who, eulogizing La
Fayette as the eldest son of liberty, proposed an inquiry into the
causes and object of those factious proceedings of which he had
complained.[222]
Thus happily commenced La Fayette's daring enterprise; but those by whom
he expected to be supported did not rally around him. To disperse the
Jacobin club was probably his object, but no sufficient force gathered
about him to encourage the attempt. He ordered for the next day a
general review of the national guards, in hopes, doubtless, that they
would have recognised the voice which they had obeyed with such
unanimity of submission; but this civic force was by no means in the
state in which he had left them at his departure. The several corps of
grenadiers, which were chiefly drawn from the more opulent classes, had
been, under pretence of the general principle of equality, melted down
and united with those composed of men of an inferior description, and
who had a more decided revolutionary tendency. Many officers, devoted to
La Fayette and the Constitution, had been superseded; and the service
was, by studied contumely and ill usage, rendered disgusting to those
who avowed the same sentiments, or displayed any remaining attachment to
the sovereign. By such means Pétion, the mayor of Paris, had now
authority enough with the civic army to prevent the review from taking
place. A few grenadiers of different sections did indeed muster, but
their number was so small that they dispersed in haste and alarm.
The Girondists and Jacobins, closely united at this crisis, began to
take heart, yet dared not on their part venture to arrest the general.
Meantime La Fayette saw no other means of saving the King than to
propose his anew attempting an escape from Paris, which he offered to
further by every means in his power. The plan was discussed, but
dismissed in consequence of the Queen's prejudices against La Fayette,
whom, not unnaturally, (though as far as regarded intention certainly
unjustly,) she looked upon as the original author of the King's
misfortunes.[223] After two days lingering in Paris, La Fayette found it
necessary to return to the army which he commanded, and leave the King
to his fate.[224]
La Fayette's conduct on this occasion may always be opposed to any
aspersions thrown on his character at the commencement of the
Revolution; for, unquestionably, in June 1792, he exposed his own life
to the most imminent danger, in order to protect that of the King, and
the existence of royalty. Yet he must himself have felt a lesson, which
his fate may teach to others; how perilous, namely, it is, to set the
example of violent and revolutionary courses, and what dangerous
precedents such rashness may afford to those who use similar means for
carrying events to still further extremities. The march to Versailles,
6th October, 1789, in which La Fayette to a certain degree co-operated,
and of which he reaped all the immediate advantage, had been the means
of placing Louis in that precarious situation from which he was now so
generously anxious to free him. It was no less La Fayette's own act, by
means of his personal aid-de-camp, to bring back the person of the King
to Paris from Varennes; whereas he was now recommending, and offering to
further his escape, by precisely such measures as his interference had
then thwarted.
[Sidenote: PETION AND MANUEL SUSPENDED.]
Notwithstanding the low state of the royal party, one constituted
authority, amongst so many, had the courage to act offensively on the
weaker and the injured side. The Directory of the Department (or
province) of Paris, declared against the mayor, imputed to him the blame
of the scandalous excesses of the 20th of June, and suspended him and
Manuel, the Procureur of the Community of Paris, from their offices,
[July 6.] This judgment was affirmed by the King. But, under the
protection of the Girondists and Jacobins, Pétion appealed to the
Assembly, where the demon of discord seemed now let loose, as the
advantage was contended for by at least three parties, avowedly distinct
from each other, together with innumerable subdivisions of opinion. And
yet, in the midst of such complicated and divided interests, such
various and furious passions, two individuals, a lady and a bishop,
undertook to restore general concord, and, singular to tell, they had a
momentary success. Olympia de Gouges was an ardent lover of liberty, but
she united with this passion an intense feeling of devotion, and a turn
like that entertained by our friends the Quakers, and other sects who
affect a transcendental love of the human kind, and interpret the
doctrines of Christian morality in the most strict and literal sense.
This person had sent abroad several publications recommending to all
citizens of France, and the deputies especially of the Assembly, to
throw aside personal views, and form a brotherly and general union with
heart and hand, in the service of the public.
The same healing overture, as it would have been called in the civil
dissensions of England, was brought before the Assembly, [July 9,] and
recommended by the constitutional Bishop of Lyons, the Abbé L'Amourette.
This good-natured orator affected to see, in the divisions which rent
the Assembly to pieces, only the result of an unfortunate error--a
mutual misunderstanding of each other's meaning. "You," he said to the
Republican members, "are afraid of an undue attachment to aristocracy;
you dread the introduction of the English system of two Chambers into
the Constitution. You of the right hand, on the contrary, misconstrue
your peaceful and ill-understood brethren, so far as to suppose them
capable of renouncing monarchy, as established by the Constitution. What
then remains to extinguish these fatal divisions, but for each party to
disown the designs falsely imputed to them, and for the Assembly united
to swear anew their devotion to the Constitution, as it has been
bequeathed to us by the Constituent Assembly!"
This speech, wonderful as it may seem, had the effect of magic. The
deputies of every faction, Royalist, Constitutionalist, Girondist,
Jacobin, and Orleanist, rushed into each other's arms, and mixed tears
with the solemn oaths by which they renounced the innovations supposed
to be imputed to them. The King was sent for to enjoy this spectacle of
concord, so strangely and so unexpectedly renewed. But the feeling,
though strong,--and it might be with many overpowering for the
moment,--was but like oil spilt on the raging sea, or rather like a shot
fired across the waves of a torrent, which, though it counteracts them
by its momentary impulse, cannot for a second alter their course. The
factions, like Le Sage's demons, detested each other the more for having
been compelled to embrace, and from the name and country of the
benevolent bishop, the scene was long called, in ridicule, "_Le Baiser
d'Amourette_," and "_La réconciliation Normande_."[225]
The next public ceremony showed how little party spirit had been abated
by this singular scene. The King's acceptance of the Constitution was
repeated in the Champ de Mars before the Federates, or deputies sent up
to represent the various departments of France; and the figure made by
the King during that pageant, formed a striking and melancholy parallel
with his actual condition in the state. With hair powdered and dressed,
with clothes embroidered in the ancient court-fashion, surrounded and
crowded unceremoniously by men of the lowest rank, and in the most
wretched garbs, he seemed something belonging to a former age, but which
in the present has lost its fashion and value. He was conducted to the
Champ de Mars under a strong guard, and by a circuitous route, to avoid
the insults of the multitude, who dedicated their applauses to the
Girondist Mayor of Paris, exclaiming "Pétion or death!" When he ascended
the altar to go through the ceremonial of the day, all were struck with
the resemblance to a victim led to sacrifice, and the Queen so much so,
that she exclaimed, and nearly fainted. A few children alone called,
"Vive le Roi!" This was the last time Louis was seen in public until he
mounted the scaffold.[226]
The departure of La Fayette renewed the courage of the Girondists, and
they proposed a decree of impeachment against him in the Assembly [Aug.
8]; but the spirit which the general's presence had awakened was not yet
extinguished, and his friends in the Assembly undertook his defence with
a degree of unexpected courage, which alarmed their antagonists.[227]
Nor could their fears be termed groundless. The constitutional general
might march his army upon Paris, or he might make some accommodation
with the foreign invaders, and receive assistance from them to
accomplish such a purpose. It seemed to the Girondists, that no time was
to be lost. They determined not to trust to the Jacobins, to whose want
of resolution they seem to have ascribed the failure of the insurrection
on the 20th of June. They resolved upon occasion of the next effort, to
employ some part of that departmental force, which was now approaching
Paris in straggling bodies, under the name of Federates. The affiliated
clubs had faithfully obeyed the mandates of the parent society of the
Jacobins, by procuring that the most stanch and exalted Revolutionists
should be sent on this service. These men, or the greater part of them,
chose to visit Paris, rather than to pass straight to their rendezvous
at Soissons. As they believed themselves the armed representatives of
the country, they behaved with all the insolence which the consciousness
of bearing arms gives to those who are unaccustomed to discipline. They
walked in large bodies in the garden of the Tuileries, and when any
persons of the royal family appeared, they insulted the ladies with
obscene language and indecent songs, the men with the most hideous
threats. The Girondists resolved to frame a force, which might be called
their own, out of such formidable materials.
[Sidenote: BARBAROUX.]
Barbaroux, one of the most enthusiastic admirers of the Revolution, a
youth, like the Séide of Voltaire's tragedy,[228] filled with the most
devoted enthusiasm for a cause of which he never suspected the truth,
offered to bring up a battalion of Federates from his native city of
Marseilles, men, as he describes them, who knew how to die, and who, as
it proved, understood at least as well how to kill. In raking up the
disgusting history of mean and bloody-minded demagogues it is impossible
not to dwell on the contrast afforded by the generous and self-devoted
character of Barbaroux, who, young, handsome,[229] generous,
noble-minded, and disinterested, sacrificed his family happiness, his
fortune, and finally his life, to an enthusiastic though mistaken zeal
for the liberty of his country. He had become from the commencement of
the Revolution one of its greatest champions at Marseilles, where it had
been forwarded and opposed by all the fervour of faction, influenced by
the southern sun. He had admired the extravagant writings of Marat and
Robespierre; but when he came to know them personally, he was disgusted
with their low sentiments and savage dispositions, and went to worship
Freedom amongst the Girondists, where her shrine was served by the fair
and accomplished Citoyenne Roland.
The Marseillois, besides the advantage of this enthusiastic leader,
marched to the air of the finest hymn to which liberty or the Revolution
had yet given birth. They appeared in Paris, where it had been agreed
between the Jacobins and the Girondists, that the strangers should be
welcomed by the fraternity of the suburbs, and whatever other force the
factions could command. Thus united, they were to march to secure the
municipality, occupy the bridges and principal posts of the city with
detached parties, while the main body should proceed to form an
encampment in the garden of the Tuileries, where the conspirators had no
doubt they should find themselves sufficiently powerful to exact the
King's resignation, or declare his forfeiture.
This plan failed through the cowardice of Santerre, the chief leader of
the insurgents of the suburbs, who had engaged to meet the Marseillois
with forty thousand men. Very few of the promised auxiliaries appeared;
but the undismayed Marseillois, though only about five hundred in
number, marched through the city to the terror of the inhabitants, their
keen black eyes seeming to seek out aristocratic victims, and their
songs partaking of the wild Moorish character that lingers in the south
of France, denouncing vengeance on kings, priests, and nobles.[230]
In the Tuileries, the Federates fixed a quarrel on some grenadiers of
the national guard, who were attached to the Constitution, and giving
instant way to their habitual impetuosity, attacked, defeated, and
dispersed them. In the riot, Espremenil, who had headed the opposition
to the will of the King in Parliament, which led the way to the
Convocation of Estates, and who had been once the idol of the people,
but now had become the object of their hate, was cut down and about to
be massacred. "Assist me," he called out to Pétion, who had come to the
scene of confusion,--"I am Espremenil--once as you are now, the minion
of the people's love." Pétion, not unmoved, it is to be supposed, at the
terms of the appeal, hastened to rescue him. Not long afterwards both
suffered by the guillotine,[231] which was the bloody conclusion of so
many popular favourites. The riot was complained of by the
Constitutional party, but as usual it was explained by a declaration on
the part of ready witnesses, that the forty civic soldiers had insulted
and attacked the five hundred Marseillois, and therefore brought the
disaster upon themselves.
[Sidenote: DUKE OF BRUNSWICK'S MANIFESTO.]
Meanwhile, though their hands were strengthened by this band of
unscrupulous and devoted implements of their purpose, the Girondists
failed totally in their attempt against La Fayette in the Assembly, the
decree of accusation against him being rejected by a victorious
majority. They were therefore induced to resort to measures of direct
violence, which unquestionably they would willingly have abstained from,
since they could not attempt them without giving a perilous superiority
to the Jacobin faction. The Manifesto of the Duke of Brunswick, and his
arrival on the French frontier at the head of a powerful Prussian army,
acted upon the other motives for insurrection, as a high pressure upon a
steam-engine, producing explosion.
It was the misfortune of Louis, as we have often noticed, to be as
frequently injured by the erroneous measures of his friends as by the
machinations of his enemies; and this proclamation, issued [July 25] by
a monarch who had taken arms in the King's cause, was couched in
language intolerable to the feelings even of such Frenchmen as might
still retain towards their King some sentiments of loyalty. All towns or
villages which should offer the slightest resistance to the allies, were
in this ill-timed manifesto menaced with fire and sword. Paris was
declared responsible for the safety of Louis, and the most violent
threats of the total subversion of that great metropolis were denounced
as the penalty.[232]
The Duke of Brunswick was undoubtedly induced to assume this tone, by
the ease which he had experienced in putting down the revolution in
Holland; but the cases were by no means parallel. Holland was a country
much divided in political opinions, and there was existing among the
constituted authorities a strong party in favour of the Stadtholder.
France, on the contrary, excepting only the emigrants who were in the
Duke's own army, was united, like the Jews of old, against foreign
invasion, though divided into many bitter factions within itself. Above
all, the comparative strength of France and Holland was so different,
that a force which might overthrow the one country without almost a
struggle, would scarce prove sufficient to wrest from such a nation as
France even the most petty of her frontier fortresses. It cannot be
doubted, that this haughty and insolent language on the part of the
invaders, irritated the personal feelings of every true Frenchman, and
determined them to the most obstinate resistance against invaders, who
were confident enough to treat them as a conquered people, even before a
skirmish had been fought. The imprudence of the allied general recoiled
on the unfortunate Louis, on whose account he used this menacing
language. Men began to consider his cause as identified with that of the
invaders, of course as standing in diametrical opposition to that of the
country; and these opinions spread generally among the citizens of
Paris. To animate the citizens to their defence, the Assembly declared,
that the country was in danger; and in order that the annunciation might
be more impressive, cannon were hourly discharged from the hospital of
the Invalids--bands of military music traversed the streets--bodies of
men were drawn together hastily, as if the enemy were at the gates--and
all the hurried and hasty movements of the constituted authorities
seemed to announce, that the invaders were within a day's march of
Paris.[233]
These distracting and alarming movements, with the sentiments of fear
and anxiety which they were qualified to inspire, aggravated the
unpopularity of Louis, in whose cause his brothers and his allies were
now threatening the metropolis of France. From these concurring
circumstances the public voice was indeed so strongly against the cause
of monarchy, that the Girondists ventured by their organ, Vergniaud, to
accuse the King in the Assembly of holding intelligence with the enemy,
or at least of omitting sufficient defensive preparations, and proposed
in express terms that they should proceed to declare his forfeiture. The
orator, however, did not press this motion, willing, doubtless, that the
power of carrying through and enforcing such a decree should be
completely ascertained, which could only be after a mortal struggle with
the last defenders of the Crown;[234] but when a motion like this could
be made and seconded, it showed plainly how little respect was preserved
for the King in the Assembly at large. For this struggle all parties
were arranging their forces, and it became every hour more evident, that
the capital was speedily to be the scene of some dreadful event.
FOOTNOTES:
[192] The site of the old convent of the Feuillans.
[193] Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 76.
[194] Servan was born at Romans in 1741, and died at Paris in 1808. "He
was," says Madame Roland, "an honest man in the fullest signification of
the term; an enlightened patriot, a brave soldier, and an active
minister; he stood in need of nothing but a more sober imagination, and
a more flexible mind."--_Memoirs_, part i., p. 72.
[195] Clavière was born at Geneva in 1735, "where," says M. Dumont, "he
became one of the popular leaders: shrewd and penetrating, he obtained
the credit of being also cunning and artful: he was a man of superior
intellect: deaf from his youth, and, deprived by this infirmity of the
pleasures of society, he had sought a compensation in study, and formed
his education by associating politics and moral philosophy with
trade."--Being denounced by Robespierre, to avoid the guillotine, he
stabbed himself in his prison, June 9, 1793. His wife poisoned herself
on the following day.
[196] Duranthon was born at Massedon in 1736. In December, 1793, he was
dragged before the revolutionary tribunal, and guillotined. "He was an
honest man, but very indolent: his manner indicated vanity, and his
timid disposition and pompous prattle made him always appear to me no
better than an old woman."--MAD. ROLAND, part i., p. 71.
[197] "A true jack-in-office of the old order of things, of which he had
the insignificant and awkward look, cold manner, and dogmatic tone. He
was deficient both in the extensive views and activity necessary for a
minister."--MAD. ROLAND, p. 70. He died in 1803.
[198] Thiers, tom. ii., p. 59; Mignet, tom. i., p. 64; Lacretelle, tom.
ix., p. 89.
[199] So says Des Ferrieres, and pretends that Madame Roland's
pretensions to be presented at the ministerial parties being rejected,
was the first breach to the amicable understanding of the ministers. But
nothing of this sort is to be found in her Memoirs, and we are confident
she would have recorded it, had the fact been accurate.--S.
[200] The court nicknamed the new ministry, "Le Ministère sans
culottes."
[201] When Roland, whose dress was somewhat like that of a Quaker,
appeared at court in shoestrings, the usher approached him with a severe
look, and addressed him, "How, sir, no buckles?"--"Ah," said Dumouriez,
who laughed at all and every thing, "all is lost."--S.--ROLAND, part
ii., p. 8; MIGNET, tom. i., p. 166.
[202] Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 109.
[203] Prudhomme, tom. ii., p. 271.
[204] Bouillé's Memoirs, p. 215.
[205] Mignet, tom. i., p. 172; Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 114; Dumouriez,
vol. ii., p. 350.
[206] Dumouriez, vol. ii., p. 353.
[207] Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 116; Mignet, tom. i., p. 173; Dumouriez,
vol. ii., p. 360.
[208] "Je sais que le langage austère de la vérité est rarement
accueillé près du trone."--See the Letter in Prudhomme, tom. iii., p.
82.
[209] Prudhomme, tom. iii., p. 92.
[210] Dumouriez, tom. ii., p. 392; Mignet, tom. i., p. 173; Lacretelle,
tom. i., p. 240.
[211] Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 136.
[212] Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 131.
[213] The passage of the procession lasted three hours.--See Lacretelle,
tom. ix., p. 135; Thiers, tom. ii., p. 133
[214] It may be alleged in excuse, that the Assembly had no resource but
submission. Yet, brave men in similar circumstances have, by a timely
exertion of spirit, averted similar insolencies. When the furious
Anti-Catholic mob was in possession of the avenues to, and even the
lobbies of, the House of Commons, in 1780, General Cosmo Gordon, a
member of the House, went up to the unfortunate nobleman under whose
guidance they were supposed to act, and addressed him thus: "My lord, is
it your purpose to bring your rascally adherents into the House of
Commons? for if so, I apprise you, that the instant one of them enters,
I pass my sword, not through his body, but your lordship's." The hint
was sufficient, and the mob was directed to another quarter. Undoubtedly
there were, in the French Legislative Assembly, men capable of conjuring
down the storm they had raised, and who might have been moved to do so,
had any man of courage made them directly and personally responsible for
the consequences.--See Wraxall, vol. i., p. 247, for the story of Lord
George Gordon and General Gordon; but the Editor is informed, that the
person who really threatened Lord George in the manner described, was
Colonel Holroyd, now Lord Sheffield.
[215] Dryden has expanded these magnificent lines, without expressing
entirely either their literal meaning or their spirit. But he has added,
as usual, beautiful ideas of his own, equally applicable to the scene
described in the text:--
"A mighty breach is made; the rooms conceal'd
Appear, and all the palace is reveal'd;
The halls of audience, and of public state--
And where the lovely Queen in secret sate,
Arm'd soldiers now by trembling maids are seen
With not a door, and scarce a space between."
_Æneid_, book ii.--S.
[216] Prudhomme, tom. iii., p. 117; Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 139; Madame
Campan, vol. ii., p. 212.
[217] Prudhomme, tom. iii., p. 117; Mignet, tom. i., p. 178; Lacretelle,
tom. ix., p. 142; Campan, vol. ii., p. 212.
[218] Napoleon was a witness of this scene from the gardens of the
Tuileries. "While we were leading," says De Bourrienne, "a somewhat idle
life, the 20th June arrived. We met that morning, as usual, in a
coffee-room, Rue St. Honoré. On going out we saw approaching a mob,
which Buonaparte computed at five or six thousand men, all in rags, and
armed with every sort of weapon, vociferating the grossest abuse, and
proceeding with rapid pace towards the Tuileries. 'Let us follow that
rabble,' said Buonaparte to me. We got before them, and went to walk in
the gardens, on the terrace overlooking the water. From this station he
beheld the disgraceful occurrences that ensued. I should fail in
attempting to depict the surprise and indignation aroused within him. He
could not comprehend such weakness and forbearance. But when the King
showed himself at one of the windows fronting the garden, with the red
cap which one of the mob had just placed upon his head, Buonaparte could
no longer restrain his indignation. 'What madness!' exclaimed he; 'how
could they allow these scoundrels to enter? They ought to have blown
four or five hundred of them into the air with cannon; the rest would
then have taken to their heels.'"--DE BOURRIENNE, tom. i., p. 49.
[219] "By eight o'clock in the evening they had all departed, and
silence and astonishment reigned in the palace."--MIGNET, tom. i., p.
178.
[220] Jomini, Hist. des Guerres de la Révolution, tom. ii., p. 53;
Dumont, p. 343.
[221] For the letter itself, see Annual Register, vol. xxxiv., p. 206.
[222] Thiers, tom. ii., p. 154; Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 153.
[223] Madame Campan, tom. ii., p. 224.
[224] "He was burnt in effigy by the Jacobins, in the garden of the
Palais Royal."--PRUDHOMME, tom. iii., p. 131.
[225] Lacretelle, tom. ix., p. 161. After the dissolution of the
Legislative Assembly, L'Amourette returned to Lyons, and continued there
during the siege. He was afterwards conducted to Paris, condemned to
death, and decapitated in January, 1794. The abbé was the author of
several works, among others, "Les Délices de la Religion, ou Le Pouvoir
de l'Evangile de nous rendre heureux."
[226] "The expression of the Queen's countenance on this day will never
be effaced from my remembrance; her eyes were swollen with tears; the
splendour of her dress, the dignity of her deportment, formed a contrast
with the train that surrounded her. It required the character of Louis
XVI., that character of martyr which he ever upheld, to support, as he
did, such a situation. When he mounted the steps of the altar, he seemed
a sacred victim, offering himself as a voluntary sacrifice. He
descended; and, crossing anew the disordered ranks, returned to take his
place beside the Queen and his children."--M. DE STAËL, vol. ii., p. 53.
[227] "To the astonishment of both parties, the accusation against La
Fayette was thrown out by a majority of 446 to 224,"--LACRETELLE, tom.
ix., p. 190.
[228] Le Fanatisme.
[229] Madame Roland describes him as one "whose features no painter
would disdain to copy for the head of an Antinous."--_Memoirs_, part i.,
p. 146.
[230] "I never," says Madame de la Rochejaquelein, "heard any thing more
impressive and terrible than their songs."
[231] Espremenil suffered by the guillotine in June, 1793; but Pétion,
becoming at that time an object of suspicion to Robespierre, took refuge
in the department of the Calvados, where he is supposed to have perished
with hunger; his body being found in a field half devoured by wolves.
[232] See Annual Register, vol. xxxiv., p. 229.
[233] Thiers, tom. ii., p. 145.