IV. violence or effusion of blood, in frustrating the designs CHAP. of those who menace the throne-designs which would ere long bring misery on my people." The marshal, 1789. ignorant of the changes of the times, became answer- 1 Lac. vii. able for the safety of the capital, and immediately 64. Mig. established a numerous staff, whose insolence and con- i. 85. Hist. sequential airs only contributed to increase the public 32. discontents.1 i. 47. Th. Parl. ii. 31, The successive arrival of these troops, especially of the 81. German and Swiss regiments, in the neighbourhood of Great agiParis, excited the utmost indignation in the capital, and the capital. entirely dispelled the fond illusions which had prevailed July 1. as to the bloodless character of the Revolution which had now decidedly begun. The troops which had mutinied came by hundreds into the Palais Royal, instigated by the Marquis of Valadi, one of their old officers, where they were liberally supplied with wine, ices, money, tickets for the theatres, and women, by the agents of the Duke of Orleans. Won by such unwonted liberalities, the soldiers unanimously shouted "Vive le Tiers Etat !" The crowds rent the air with their acclamations at the decisive evidences thus afforded, that the forces brought up to support the monarchy had added to the number of its enemies. The Gardes Françaises for a week past had been in a state of open revolt; all the efforts of the officers to make the men return to their duty had proved unavailing. Almost universally the non-commissioned officers took part with the privates, being entirely alienated from the existing government by the powerful stimulants applied to them by the agents of the Revolution, and the impolitic confining of commissions to persons of aristocratic birth. But the foreign regiments in the King's service, consisting wholly of Germans and Swiss, were known to be perfectly steady; and the citizens, surrounded by armed men-some disposed to aid, others to resist them-beheld with mingled feelings of exultation and dismay, the long trains of artillery and cavalry which tation in IV. 1789. 1 Marat, Avis au Peuple, Juillet 1, CHAP. traversed the streets, or took their stations in such a manner as to command all the approaches to Versailles. Marat incessantly stimulated the people in his seditious journal: the whole disturbances, he said, were got up by the ministers and aristocrats, to furnish a pretext for introducing and employing the military; their object was Deux Amis, to dissolve the National Assembly-to excite revolt, and Lab. 138, extinguish it in blood. Calm tranquil resolution, restrained within the bounds of order, could alone defeat their nefarious projects.1* Parl. ii. 37. i. 249, 256. 139, 141. Moniteur, 82. passing the govern ment to the multitude. Meanwhile the reins of power were daily more percepPower daily tibly slipping from the hands of those who yet held them. Phng from Terror of an approaching convulsion, added to the severity already extreme over the whole kingdom, rendered the supplies of grain deficient to an alarming degree in Paris. The bakers' shops were surrounded from morning till night by clamorous crowds demanding bread, and who no sooner were relieved than others equally importunate succeeded. Such was the scarcity, now amounting almost to famine, that part of the bread thus served out was unwholesome, and produced violent internal pains in some persons who took it. This gave rise to new clamours: it was the aristocrats who were adulterating the bread-not content with the pangs of hunger, they were actually poisoning the people. Barnave, Pétion, Buzot, and Robespierre, at the club Breton, exerted themselves to the utmost to fan these discontents, and stimulate to the highest pitch the already excited passions of the multitude. The assembly of electors had met daily at the Hotel de Ville, since the 4th July, to deliberate concern July 4. * "O mes concitoyens! observez toujours la conduite des Ministres pour régler la vôtre. Leur objet est la dissolution de notre Assemblée Nationale, leur unique moyen est la guerre civile. Les Ministres, les aristocrates soufflent la sédition! Eh bien! Gardez-vous de vous livrer à la sédition, et vous déconcerterez leurs perfides manœuvres. Ils vous environnent de l'appareil formidable des soldats, des baïonnettes! Pénétrez leurs projets inflammatoires. Ce n'est pas pour vous contenir, c'est pour vous exciter à la révolte, en aigrissant vos esprits, qu'ils agitent ces instruments meurtriers. Soyez paisibles, tranquilles, soumis au bon ordre: laissez-les combler la mesure: le jour de la justice et de la vengeance arrivera."-MARAT, Avis au Peuple, 1 Juillet 1789. IV. 1789. ing the measures to be adopted, and already began to CHAP. organise that power which, under the name of the Municipality of Paris, soon became so formidable. Numberless pamphlets issued daily from the press, teeming with violent suggestions; and the crowds at the Palais Royal, feigning already to exercise sovereign authority, passed decrees, banishing the leading aristocrats to the distance of one hundred leagues from Paris. The Comte d'Artois, the Princes of Condé and Conti, the Duc de Bourbon, the Abbé Maury, Madame Polignac, Hist. Parl. M. d'Espréménil, and all the leading characters in Bert. de opposition to the Revolution, were denounced in this 269, 273. manner, and their names placarded in all the streets of 331. the capital.1 1 Moll. i. Bailly, i. 83. of Necker In this extremity, the chief minister of the king exhibited only that quality of all others the most fatal in Indecision presence of danger-indecision. Necker was still in office, and the and took his place regularly at the council-table; but his ministers. power was nearly extinct, from the revolt of the commons, and the calamitous consequences of the measures he had so strenuously advocated. Every one saw that he had lost the command of the movement, that his influence with the popular leaders was at an end; and that even the Assembly, which his counsels had elevated to such fearful preponderance, was likely itself to become the sport of fiercer, and more impetuous passions among the people. Firmer hands, a more intrepid heart, were looked for to hold the rudder when the vessel was drifting on the breakers. The war party in the council, without actually displacing Necker, virtually supplanted him in the direction of affairs. The troops arrived without his orders, and were destined, he knew not to what purpose. In truth, he was at a loss what to propose, and his only resource was to do nothing-the usual expedient in difficulty of temporising characters, and the inevitable result, in the end, of following popular opinion. If he adopted or agreed to vigorous measures, his popularity was gone, IV. 1789. CHAP. and would in a few weeks be shivered to atoms. The King could as little see his way through the overwhelming difficulties with which he was surrounded, and which the defection of the troops had so fearfully aggravated. He could only cling to the hope that the presence and strength of the military would overawe the turbulent in the city, and a returning sense of their duty restrain the demagogues in the Assembly. If not, he proposed, as a last resource, to concede the whole fundamental laws of a free constitution, agreeably to the cahiers of the deputies, and, i. 273, 291. having made the best provision he could for the finances, dissolve the Assembly. But he was determined, in no Bert. de circumstances whatever, to make the military act against the people; and in truth the temper of many of them, as the event proved, was such that it would have been impossible, for they would not have done so.1 I Necker, Rév. Franc. De Stael, i, 231, 233. Moll. i. 274. Toul. i. 76, 77. Lac. vii. 94, 98. 84. More violent views of the war party in the council. 66 But though the intentions of the King were thus moderate and pacific, he was in a manner overridden in his own council by the more decided leaders, whom the imminence of the danger had raised up to a preponderating influence. The Comte d'Artois, the Polignacs, M. de Breteuil, and nearly all the courtiers, were of this party; and their language was as menacing as their real measures were inefficient, and their means of action feeble. The young officers openly spoke of throwing the deputies out of the windows, and dissolving the Assembly by force. They have made fools of us hitherto," said they; "but this time we have sharpened our swords." Patrols and sentinels were stationed in every direction round Versailles : the communications were often intercepted by hussars: a camp for twenty thousand men was traced out between that palace and Paris: the foreign regiments were daily arriving, to the manifest augmentation of the mutinous spirit of the guards. The powers of the old Marshal de Broglie were very extensive, embracing even the direction of the household troops; and he had offered "to disperse, with fifty thousand men, all that rabble of famished wolves IV. 1789. 1 Mém. du Rocham Mém. du who hoped to devour the high noblesse. A single discharge CHAP. of musketry will be enough to revive the monarchical power, instead of the republican influence which has overshadowed it." But in the midst of this military confidence, the essential measures necessary to justify it were neglected. No reviews took place by the King or the Maréchal royal family, to confirm the spirit of such of the troops as beau, i. 350. still preserved their allegiance; no commanding stations Comte de were seized or strengthened, and the military positions of Montsier, the capital were totally neglected. Nor were any precau- 14, 15. tions taken to preserve the soldiers from the contagion Deux Amis, of the city, from whence wine and money were sent in 253, 256. profusion to the camp and crowds of courtesans, who embraced the soldiers, saying, "Comrades, belong to us, and you shall want nothing."1 i. 195. Necker, ii. i. 243, 244, Lab. iii. 164, 167. 85. Mirabeau in the troops. Meanwhile the Assembly, for the first week after the union of the orders, were occupied with the details of Speech of protests lodged by individual members of the clergy and the Assem nobles, regarding their remaining, or not remaining, in the bly against united States-general. But the growing accumulation of the troops, and rumours which began to spread of Necker's influence in the council being on the decline, roused them again to decided measures. The great reliance of the leaders of the movement was on the well-known humanity of the King, and the influence of the Swiss minister, who, they were aware, would never endanger his popularity by decided measures. But the prospect of his fall, and the presence of the military, warned them of the necessity of resuming the offensive. Mirabeau again stood forth on this occasion, and never did he sway with more power the energies of that fierce democracy. On the 8th July he July 8. introduced a motion, which was received with enthusiastic applause, to the effect that a petition should be presented to the King, praying him to remove the troops, and raise an urban guard in Paris and Versailles, for the preservation of public order.2 The petition, read and adopted next day, is a model of condensed eloquence, and invaluable as a July 9. 2 Hist. Parl. Dum. 104, 106. |