Three years later, under the rule of the apostles of liberty, fraternity, and equality, there were thousands of prisons of the State crammed with prisoners, besides the supplementary prisons hastily arranged in the ancient convents, palaces, and colleges of Paris.
ONE:The camp of Dumouriez lay close at hand, and he had been very good to them; but there would probably be fighting very shortly, and it was said that he and many of his officers had been proscribed by the Convention. It would, she thought, be safer for Mademoiselle dOrlans to go and give herself up at Valenciennes, when she would most likely only be exiled, if that; than to be taken with Mme. de Genlis, as they would then be sent prisoners to Valenciennes and to the scaffold. And it was a great chance if they could pass the French posts.
ONE:One evening, during his coucher, the conversation turning upon difficulties in the financial situation owing to the refusal of the parliaments of the different provinces to enregister certain taxes, a man highly placed in the Kings household remarked
THREE:Defended the King! A fine defence, truly! You might as well say that if I give a man poison, and then, when he is in the agonies of death, present him with an antidote, I wish to save him. For that is the way your grandfather defended Louis XVI.The liaisons of Mme. Tallien had nothing doubtful about them.
THREE:He was then living in the Luxembourg, and having made all preparations, he went to bed as usual and drew the curtains; the valet-de-chambre, who always slept in a bed rolled into his room, went away to undress. When he was gone, the Comte de Provence got up, passed into his dressing-room, where his devoted friend and confidant, M. dAvaray, awaited him and helped him to dress. Passing out by a small door that was not guarded, they got into a carriage waiting for them in the courtyard of the Luxembourg and drove away.
Louis XV. was upon the throne; the manners and customs of the ancien rgime were in full force, though mitigated and softened by the growing enlightenment and liberalism which were spreading not only in the literary and professional circles, but amongst the younger generation in all classes.It was necessary to settle the succession to the estates of the Duchesse dAyen, and it was impossible to arrange this without the meeting of the family. The Vicomte de Noailles was in America, the Marquis de Thsan in Germany, Mme. de Montagu was on the list of emigres, and could not enter France. Her part of the inheritance had been confiscated, but M. Bertmy, the old family lawyer, had bought and transferred it to the rest of the family, to be given her in better times.The great avenue was a fashionable promenade on Sundays and ftes, and to Lisette and her friend Mlle. Boquet, both of whom grew prettier every year, it was a great amusement to walk there with the mother and step-father of the former. The Grand-Opra being close by, when the performance was over, which then was at half-past eight, it was the fashion, on summer nights, for every one to come out and walk about these gardens, where sometimes until two oclock in the morning it was a scene of enchantment. People belonging to the court and society, bourgeois, actors, musicians, the demi-monde all went there. Every well-dressed woman in the evening carried a large bouquet of flowers, the scent of which filled the air, groups of people scattered about sang or played the harp, violin, or guitar, especially on moonlight nights; amateurs and artistes too, the delicious music of Saint Georges, Alsoredo and Garat often attracted crowds of listeners.Shortly after this he called upon the Comte de Vaudreuil at Versailles one morning just after he was up, and confided to him a financial scheme by which he expected enormous profit, ending by offering M. de Vaudreuil a large sum of money if he would undertake to make it succeed.
