from occupying seats in the middle of the hall, between the raised benches on either side. And to the last party belonged all the men most distinguished either for statesman-like perceptions or for eloquence, Mirabeau himself agreeing with them in all their leading principles, though he never formally enrolled himself in the ranks of any party.
The majority of the Constitutionalists were as loyal to the king's person and dignity as the extreme Royalists; their most eloquent speaker, a young lawyer named Barnave, at the first opening of the States had even sought to open a direct communication with the court, begging Madame de Lamballe[1] to assure the queen of the wish of himself and all his friends to maintain the king in the full enjoyment and exercise of what he called a Constitutional authority, borrowing the idea and expression from the English Government. But though Marie Antoinette had no objection to the king of his own accord renouncing portions of the power which had been claimed and exerted by his predecessors, she would not hear of the States taking upon themselves to impose such sacrifices on him, or to curtail his authority by any exercise of their own; and she rejected with something like disdain the support of those whose alliance was only to be purchased on such conditions. Barnave, like Mirabeau, felt insulted; determined to revenge himself, and for a while united himself to the fiercest of the Republicans; while the Right, with incredible folly, often played into his hand, joining the Left, of which many members avowedly aimed at the abolition of royalty, and with none of whom they had one opinion or sentiment in common to defeat the Constitutionalists, with whom they practically had but very slight differences. And thus, as with a base pusillanimity, many, both of the Right and of the Plain, fled from the country after the tumults of October, the mastery of the Assembly gradually fell into the hands of that party which contained by far fewer men of ability or honesty than either of the others, but which surpassed them both in distinctness of object, and in unscrupulous resolution to carry out its views.
But the events of July, the mutiny of the troops, the successful insurrection of the mob, the destruction of the Bastile, and the visit of Louis to Paris, had been a series of damaging blows to the Government; and as each successive exploit gave encouragement to the movement party, events proceeded with extreme rapidity. Necker, who returned to Versailles on the 27th of July, showed more clearly than ever his unfitness for the chief post in the administration at such a crisis, by devoting himself solely to financial arrangements, and omitting to take, on the part of the crown, the initiative in any one of the reforms which the ting had promised. Those he permitted to be intrusted to a committee of the Assembly; and the committee had scarcely met when the Assembly took the matter into its own hands; and in a strange panic, and at a single sitting, swept away the privileges of both Nobles and clergy, those who seemed personally most concerned in their maintenance being the foremost in urging their suppression. A member of the oldest nobility proposed the abolition of the privileges of the Nobles. A bishop moved the extinction of tithes; Bretons, Burgundians, Provencals, renounced for their fellow- citizens the old distinctions and immunities to which each province had hitherto clung with an unyielding if somewhat unreasoning attachment; and the whole was crowned by the Archbishop of Paris proposing a celebration of the
Though he could not avoid seeing the mischievous character of many of the resolutions thus tumultuously passed, and though his royal assent to them was asked in language unceremonious and almost peremptory in its curtness, Louis could not bring himself, or perhaps did not venture, to refuse his sanction to them. He had laid down a rule for himself to refuse no concession except such as on religious grounds his conscience might revolt from; and on the 18th he signified his formal acceptance of the resolutions, and of the title of 'Restorer of French Liberty.' It was an act of great weakness, and was rewarded, as such acts generally are, by further encroachments on his authority. The progress of the Left was not even arrested by a quarrel between some of its members (who, being clergymen, were not inclined to be reduced to beggary by the extinction of their incomes), and Mirabeau, who, not unnaturally, bore the priests especial ill-will. Before the end of the month, the Assembly even deprived the king of the power of withholding his assent from measures which it might pass, enacting that he should no longer possess an absolute 'veto,' as it was called, and Necker, exhibiting on this question an incapacity more glaring than even his former conduct had displayed, induced the king to yield this point also; and to express his own preference for what its contrivers called a suspensive veto-a power, that is, of withholding his assent to any measure till it had been passed by two successive Assemblies. The discussions on this most momentous point had been very vehement in the Assembly itself; and, besides the greatness of the principle involved in the decision, they have a peculiar importance as showing that Mirabeau had not the absolute power over the minds of the members which he believed himself to possess; since he contended with all the energy of his temper, and with irresistible force of argument, against a vote which, as he declared, could only take the power from the king to vest it in the Assembly, and yet was wholly unable to carry more than a small minority with him in his opposition.
And this defeat may have had some share in prompting him to countenance and aid, if indeed he was not the original contriver of, a plot which was undoubtedly intended to produce a change in the whole frame-work of the Government. The harvest had been bad, and at the beginning of September Paris was suffering under a scarcity almost as severe as had ever been felt in the depth of winter. The emergency was so great that the king sent all his plate to the Mint to be melted down, to procure money to purchase food for the starving citizens; and many patriotic individuals, Necker himself being among the most munificent, gave their plate and jewels for the same benevolent object. But relief procured from such sources was unavoidably of too limited a character to last long. Though Necker proposed and the Assembly voted taxes of prodigious amount, they could not at once be made available, and some of the lower classes were said to have died of actual famine. In their distress the citizens looked to the king, and attributed their misery in a great degree to his ignorance of their situation, which was caused by his living at Versailles. They nicknamed him the 'Baker,' as if he could supply them with bread, and began to clamor for him at least to take up an occasional residence among them in in his capital. From raising a cry, the step was easy to organize a riot to compel him to do so. And to this object the partisans of the Duke of Orleans, assisted, if not prompted, by Mirabeau, now began to apply themselves, hoping that the result would be the deposition of Louis and the enthronement of the duke, who might be glad to take the great orator for his prime minister.
So certain did the conspirators feel of success, that they took no pains to keep their machinations secret. As early as the middle of September intelligence was received at Versailles that the Parisians would march upon that town in force, on the 5th of October; and the Assembly was greatly alarmed, believing, not without reason, that the object of the intended attack was to overawe and overbear them. The magistrates of the town were even more terrified, and besought the king to bring up at least one regiment for their protection. And, prudent and reasonable as the request was, the compliance with it furnished the agents of sedition with pretexts for further violence.
A regiment, known as that of Flanders, was sent for from the frontiers, and speedily arrived at Versailles, when, according to their old and hospitable fashion, the Body-guard,[2] who regarded Versailles as their home, invited the officers, and with them the officers of the Swiss Guard, and those of the town militia also, to a banquet on the 1st of October. The opera-house, as had often been done in similar instances, was lent for the occasion; and the boxes were filled with the chief ladies of the court and of the town, and also with many members of the Assembly, as spectators. So enthusiastic were the acclamations that greeted the toast of the king's health, that, though Marie Antoinette had previously desired that the royal family should not appear to have any connection with the entertainment, the captain of the guard, the Count de Luxembourg, had no difficulty in persuading her that it would but be a graceful recognition of such spontaneous and sincere loyalty at such a time if she were to honor the banquet with her presence, though but by the briefest visit. Louis, too, accepted the proposal with greater warmth than usual, and when the royal pair with their children-the queen, as was her custom, leading one in each hand- descended from their apartments and walked through the banquet-hall, the enthusiasm was redoubled. The spectators, among whom were many members of the Assembly, caught the contagion. Loyal cheers resounded from every part of the theatre, and the feelings excited became so fervid that some officers of the National Guard, who were among the guests, reversed their new tricolor cockade, and, displaying the white side outermost, seemed to have resumed the time-honored badge under which the army had reaped all its old glories. The band struck up a favorite air from one of the new operas, 'Peut-on affliger ce qu'on aime?' which those who saw the anxiety which recent events had already stamped upon the queen's majestic brow could hardly avoid applying to their royal mistress; and when it followed it up by Blondel's lamentation for Richard, 'O Richard, O mon roi, l'univers t'abandonne,' the first notes of the well-known song touched a chord in every heart, and the whole company, courtiers, ladies, soldiers, and deputies, were all carried away in a perfect delirium of loyal rapture. The whole company escorted the royal family back to their apartments; though it was remarked afterward that some of the soldiers, who on this occasion were the most vociferous in their exultation, were, before the end of the same week,
