XXXIX.

than to defeat the plan of invasion. He detested Austria, CHAP. cared little for the royal family of France, despised the émigrés, and looked upon regenerated France more as an admirer than a foe.

Thus, whilst the King of Prussia was hot for advance and invasion, accompanying his army to enforce it, the duke knew how to throw cold water on his zeal, and insisted that the reduction of the fortresses on the Meuse was the only safe way of commencing the war. The flight of Lafayette, however, with the easy capture of Longwy and Verdun, rendered it impossible for the duke to arrest the march of his army into France. He lingered, nevertheless, and gave time to Dumouriez to occupy the several roads and defiles through the hills and forests of the Argonne, by which the Prussians must necessarily advance to Chalons.

Dumouriez called these the French Thermopylæ, and French writers indulge in a lengthened description of them. There does not seem much need of this, the strength of these French Thermopyla being much exaggerated, and the Prussians having found no difficulty in forcing their way through one of the When passes. Dumouriez found this the case, he hastened to evacuate the Argonne, and to concentrate his army on some small eminences near Valmy, protected by rivers. The Prussians poured into the country around and south of them. There was no force between them and Chalons; but they could not leave Dumouriez in the rear. On the 20th of September, the day of the installation of the convention, the Prussians approached and seized the heights of La Lune, opposite to Kellerman, posted on the hill of Valmy. A cannonade from hill to hill, and a few skirmishes in the valley, were all the feats of the day, costing the lives of some 200 men. The Prussians formed more than once a column of attack, their soldiers as well as the French being eager for an engage

CHAP. ment. XXXIX.

But the Duke of Brunswick would not fight, nor allow the king to do so, thus giving up the 'cause of monarchy, and all hopes of saving the royal family of France. "You may say," said a Prussian officer to Göthe, who was present, "that you have seen the commencement of a new epoch in history!"*

* Sybel; Hardenberg; Memoirs of Dumouriez.

535

CHAPTER XL.

THE CONVENTION.

(September 1792 to the Surrender of Toulon, end of 1793.)

THERE was not any marked difference in the elections of the country at large, for the legislative assembly and for the convention, notwithstanding the complete opening of the franchise. One hundred and forty-seven members of the former were re-elected, with about fifty of the Constituent. The number of lawyers diminished; that of judges and mayors, the functionaries of the revolution, was augmented. The Gironde appeared in full, although Brissot and Condorcet were no longer members for Paris.

Whilst France advanced hesitatingly and reluctantly in the path of revolution, Paris, within a year, had made an enormous stride. Robespierre, Danton, Desmoulins, Collot, Billaud, Fabre, and Philippe Égalité were returned for the capital. This extreme party were reinforced too from the provinces-not, indeed, as might be thought, from those of the hot south. In addition to Robespierre, a native of Arras, the north now sent Carrier, Lebon, Lebas, the most sanguinary proconsuls, as well as St. Just, a gentleman from the Soissonnais, the singular complement of Robespierre.

Revolution works a great change in tendencies and views, but is apt, after all, to leave principles much the same. The curse of the old monarchy was, that it could not tolerate any opinion or party save its own, and

CHAP.
XL.

CHAP.

XL.

deemed itself entitled to crush all dissidence by persecution and prison. The revolution adopted the selfsame odious and tyrannical principle, substituting merely the guillotine for the Bastille, and prison-massacres for the dragonnades. And the Jacobins flattered themselves with the idea that they were regenerating and freeing humanity, when, in fact, they were merely continuing the criminal intolerance and stupidity of the ancient régime.

The first act of the convention was to abolish royalty, a necessary consequence of the disesteem and collapse into which it had fallen-so necessary that it was una nimously adopted. On the motion of Collot, the comedian, France was declared a republic. The Girondists hailed it (their hope of preserving the crown for the young dauphin had been abandoned), some with enthusiasm, whilst others, such as Vergniaud, foreseeing that it subjected intelligence to brutality, confessed their misgivings that the Gironde might prove its first victim.

The next act of the convention was to ordain that all municipal and administrative bodies should be re-elected and renewed, and the same was urged with regard to the tribunals. What the Girondists, like Mirabeau, saw the necessity of, was a strong executive, to preserve order and justice, to protect the people, their interests, and their industry, from the suggestions of their own ignorance and envious passions. The executive was now only to be found in the assembly; and the great misfortune was, that a government with real power was not selected from it immediately after the 10th of August, such as could gradually calm down and supersede the permanent action of the insurrectionists. The legislative assembly having failed to do this, the commune and the clubs had grasped power, and showed what would be the spirit of their government in the massacres of September.

XL.

It was these dreadful acts that rendered agreement CHAP. or even tolerance impossible between the parties of the convention. The members of the Mountain either had participated or gloried in these useless massacres, these gratuitous crimes; and the Gironde was not only disgusted with that atrocious blood-spilling, the approbation of which the Mountain put forward as its credo,* but alarmed to find not only their opinions denounced, but their lives aimed at. In the moment of proscription and massacre, Robespierre had denounced the Girondists as sold to Brunswick, and an order of arrest had in consequence been issued against Brissot. Marat had done the same by Roland, and Danton alone prevented its being executed upon the ex-minister. The anarchists had thus lifted up the knife against the Girondists, and these in no measured terms denounced the disciples of

massacre.

It was thus too late, when the convention opened, to effect, not reconciliation indeed-that could not be attempted—but sufferance of each other. This was most unfortunate. Had the Girondists been allowed the lead, Dumouriez would have continued his career of victory, which was only interrupted by the Jacobins. Not only would the foreign enemy have been repulsed and compelled to make peace, but domestic opposition and civil war would have fallen before the efforts of a revolutionary, indeed, but still respectable and humane government. There was no fear but that, both in and out of the assembly, the ultra-democrats would have had ample influence to prevent any treason against the republic, or reaction against its principles. All that was wanting was that one party should respect the other, and confine its struggle for power within constitutional bounds, which would unite every citizen in defence of the country and its liberties.

*Collot d'Herbois in the Jacobins.