THREE:The triumph of the mob had consummated the triumph of Jacobinism. The Republic was at length established, but not to the benefit of the Girondists. The ruin of royalty, for which they had so zealously laboured, was in reality their own ruin. The Jacobins, and at their head the sanguinary Robespierre, were left without a rival, except in that mob by which they worked, and which was destined to destroy them too. Danton appeared before the Assembly on the morning of the 10th, at the head of a deputation of the Commune, to state what had been done, and said plainly, "The people who send us to you have charged us to declare that they think you worthy of their confidence, but that they recognise no other judge of the extraordinary measures to which necessity has forced them to recur than the French nationour sovereign and yoursconvoked in primary Assemblies." This was announcing without disguise that the Clubs were the supreme authorities. The Assembly felt its weakness and professed to approve of everything. Next, the new Ministers were chosen; Roland, as Minister of the Interior; Servan, as War Minister; and Clavire as Minister of Finance. But to these were added Danton as Minister of Justice, Mong as Minister of the Marine, and Le Brun as Minister of Foreign Affairs. They were to receive instructions, not from Louis, but from the Assembly. And now came into full light the mortal antagonism of the Assembly and the Clubs, and the real ascendency of the latter. The Assembly voted for the education of the Dauphin; the Clubs called for the utter removal of royalty. The Assembly recommended an active campaign against Foreign Powers, but mercy to the vanquished; the Clubs called for instant and universal vengeance on all supporters of royalty, who, they said, had intended to massacre the people and bring in the Prussians. They declared that there was no need of electoral bodies to form a new Assembly, but that every man, and some said every woman, was entitled to vote; and they insisted that the people ought to come in arms to manifest their wishes to the legislative body. This was plainly-avowed mob rule. Marat argued loudly for this and for purging France, as he called it, by cutting off every man, woman, and child that was not for mob rule; and Robespierre demanded the removal of the Assembly as effete and the summoning of a Convention. His advice was adopted, and the National Democratic Convention was convoked for the 21st of September. In the interval the Royalists were murdered in the prisons, and the Revolutionary Commune established at Paris. News of the most alarming character arrived from the frontier, Lafayette had gone over to the enemy, and the Prussians had taken Longwy.
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THREE:Meanwhile, the American emissaries were both busy and successful at the Court of France. Though the Government still professed most amicable relations towards Great Britain, it winked at the constant sale of the prizes taken by American privateers, or those who passed for such, in their ports. The Government had, as we have seen, supplied the insurgents with money and arms. It was now arranged between Silas Deane and the French Minister, Vergennes, that the supplies of arms and ammunition should be sent by way of the West Indies, and that Congress should remit payment in tobacco and other produce. The French Government supplied the American agents with money for their purchases of arms and necessary articles for the troops, also to be repaid in tobacco. Two of the ships sent off with such supplies were captured by the British men-of-war; but a third, loaded with arms, arrived safely. To procure the money which they could not draw from Europe, Congress made fresh issues of paper money, though what was already out was fearfully depreciated. They voted a loan also of five millions of dollars, at four per cent. interest. They authorised a lottery to raise a like sum, the prizes to be payable in loan-office certificates. These measures only precipitated the depreciation of the Government paper; people refused to take it; and Washington, to prevent the absolute starvation of the army, was endowed with the extraordinary power of compelling the acceptance of it, and of arresting and imprisoning all maligners of the credit of Congress. Congress went further, and passed a resolution that their bills ought to pass[237] current in all payments, trade, and dealings, and be deemed equal in value to the same sum in Spanish dollars; and that all persons refusing to take them should be considered enemies to the United States; and the local authorities were called upon to inflict forfeitures and other penalties on all such persons. Still further: the New York convention having laid before Congress their scheme for regulating the price of labour, produce, manufactured articles, and imported goods, it was adopted. But these arbitrary and unscientific measures the traders set at defiance, and the attempts to enforce them only aggravated the public distress. Loans came in slowly, the treasury ran low, the loan offices were overdrawn, and the issue of bills of credit was reluctantly recommenced; ten additional millions were speedily authorised, and as the issue increased, the depreciation naturally kept pace with it. The Commissioners in France were instructed to borrow money there, but the instructions were more easily given than executed.The Emigrants had continued to flock to Coblenz, and their number, with their families, now amounted to nearly one hundred thousand of the most wealthy and influential class in France. They continued to make preparations for war, and it is no wonder that the people of France beheld their menacing attitude with uneasiness. Though the king publicly wrote letters to the Emigrants, desiring them to return to their country, and employ themselves as good citizens under the Constitution, there was a strong suspicion that he privately gave them different advice. That the king did maintain a secret correspondence with some of the insurgents is certain; but it is neither proved, nor does it appear probable, that he sanctioned their intention of making war on the country. But their obstinate absence drove the Assembly now to such severe measures against them as compelled Louis to exercise his veto in their favour, and he thus destroyed his popularity with the public, and caused himself to be considered as really in league with the Emigrants. Nevertheless, it was the advice of all the king's Ministers, as well as it appears to have been his own feeling, that they should return, for they[388] might have added immensely to the influence in favour of the throne. Louis, therefore, again exhorted the Emigrants to return; but they continued inflexible. He next wrote to the officers of the army and navy, deploring the information that he had received that they were quitting the service, and that he could not consider those his friends who did not, like himself, remain at their posts; but this was equally ineffectual, and the Minister of War reported to the Assembly that one thousand nine hundred officers had deserted. The Assembly was greatly incensed; the Girondists deemed it a good opportunity to force the king to deal a blow at the nobility and at his own brothers. On the 20th of October Brissot ascended the tribune, and demanded measures of severity against the Emigrants. At the close of the debate a decree was passed requiring the king's brothers to return to France within three months, on pain of forfeiting all their rights as citizens, and their claims as princes on the succession to the Crown. On the 9th of November a second decree was passed, declaring that all Frenchmen assembled on the frontiers were suspected of conspiracy against the country; that all such as should continue there till the 1st of January should be treated as traitors; that princes and public functionaries should become amenable to the same punishments; that the incomes of all such Emigrants, from lands, moneys, or offices, should from the present moment be sequestrated; that a court should be appointed in January to try them; and that any Frenchman, after this, crossing the frontiers, or found guilty of endeavouring to seduce the people from their allegiance, should be put to death.
Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book.
