that he would to the most minute particular have done so, if he had had an assembly to deal with who had formed a similar resolution. And those nearest the king's person, however different their original opinion may have been, must have confirmed him in this resolution, provided they wished well to the royal family: but all the dawnings of concord and tranquillity that seemed ready to open at this period on the French nation disappeared with the constituent assembly.

The committee which had been employed for a considerable time in digesting and arranging the constitutional decrees had now concluded its labour. The whole was read to the assembly on the 4th of August 1791. It was then debated article by article, and on the 3d of September presented to the king, who was at the same time restricted by the assembly to accept or reject the whole without exception or observation. On the 13th of the same month, being attended by a deputation of sixty members, the king went to the assembly, and sanctioned the assent which he had the day before sent in writing, by an oath to be faithful to the nation, and to employ the powers vested in him for the maintenance of the constitution; and on the 30th of September the assembly was terminated by its own spontaneous dissolution.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

The Legislative Assembly-The King determined to adhere scrupulously to the Constitution-The Gironde determined on a Republic-The King's Household Guards-Formation of the King's and the Queen's Household-A new Hardship put on the Clergy-The Velo exercised-Confusion this produces in the Assembly-Unforeseen Events in the Revolution-Disagreement among the King's Ministers-M. de Narbonne-M. de Bertrand-Administration dissolved.

UNFORTUNATELY for France the legislative assembly contained less wisdom than its predecessor. It was composed of men not only less respectable from their rank in

society, but in general of inferior abilities. There were in it however a few men of distinguished talents, a greater number of a considerable share of learning; but the ideas of both those classes on the subject of government had not been matured by long reflection nor corrected by experience. The remainder, forming by far the greatest proportion, consisted of men with no pretension to knowledge, some of them of impetuous characters and enthusiastic imaginations, who had been elected merely on account of their zeal and activity in the revolution.

From this account of the second or legislative assembly, nothing very wise or politic was to be expected in their conduct; but it could hardly have been conceived that they would have begun by so childish a measure as they really did, namely, contesting the prerogatives and ho、 nours which the preceding assembly had left with the king. Having met on the 1st of October, they verified their powers, chose their president and secretaries, took the oath to maintain the constitution decreed by the constituent assembly in the years 1789, 1790, and 1791, and never to propose or consent to any law contrary to it; and immediately after they decreed, contrary to what had been the usage during the former assembly, that when the king should repair to the present one for the ceremony of what they call l'ouverture de la séance, their president should have the first and the king the second place. This ridiculous conduct of the assembly was considered as highly insolent by the king's council, which was unanimously for resisting it; but the king himself found a method of eluding at once the contest and the humiliation, by observing, that as the constitution did not ordain that he should go in person to the assembly, either for the ouverture or any other purpose, he would on the present occasion allow the ouverture to take place without his appearing.

This new pretension of the assembly was viewed with indignation by the public in general, as well as by the king's council; which when the assembly understood, and

were informed of the resolution the king had taken, they annulled their foolish decree, and his majesty then consented to open the session in person, which he did by a very judicious speech.

Sometime previous to the opening of this assembly, M. de Thevenard, ministre de la marine, having resigned that office, the king expressed a desire that M. Bertrand de Moleville should be his successor, and desired M. de Montmorin, ministre de l'intérieur, to communicate his desire to that gentleman. In a letter written by him to the president of the national convention in November 1792, M. Bertrand declares that he had great unwilling. ness to accept of the office, because at that time he harboured doubts respecting the king's disposition towards the constitution, which determined him to decline the offer made to him in the king's name by M. de Montmorin. But upon receiving a pressing letter, written by the king himself, he requested to have a moment's conference with his majesty; which being agreed to, he was presented to the king the following day by M. de Lessart. M. Bertrand then expressed his sense of the honour that was intended for him; but that he might be enabled to serve his majesty with efficacy, he begged to be informed of his majesty's real disposition respecting the constitution, and what was the conduct he expected his ministers were to observe on that subject. To which the king answered,

I have been informed of your scruples. I do not blame you for them; it is reasonable you should know what is expected from you. I acknowledge that I do not approve of every article of the constitution. I am convinced that if the assembly had not precluded all observations, by confining me to a simple acceptance or refusal, I could have indicated certain alterations which they would have approved. But that is over; I have accepted and sworn to maintain it such as it is, and I am resolved to be strictly faithful to my engagement, expecting that my ministers will conform their conduct in all respects to the same plan. I am the more determined strictly and literally to.

adhere to every article of the constitution, because it is the best means of shewing to the nation its excellencies or defects, and what alterations they may find it necessary to make.' M. Bertrand having expressed his satisfaction at hearing sentiments so conformable to his own, added, May I presume to ask whether those are the sentiments of the queen His majesty assured him they were; which was confirmed to him by the queen herself the same day, when M. Bertrand was presented to her.

་

These circumstances are mentioned from good authority, in support of what has been above asserted with regard to the disposition of the king and queen at the opening of the legislative assembly; and if that assembly had sincerely concurred in the same sentiments, order and prosperity might from this date have been restored to France under the influence of a limited monarchy. But the Rochefoucaults, the Mouniers, and the Lally Tolen. dals had forsaken the assembly. Mirabeau was dead. The Lameths, Adrien Duport, La Fayette, Barnave, and other sincere supporters of the constitution, could not be members of the second assembly by that most impolitic decree which excluded all who had been of the first. The same decree excluded Robespierre; but his malevolent spirit haunted the club of Jacobins, and was there as active and mischievous as ever. The promoters of the late insurrection, instead of being pursued with vigour and brought to trial, were allowed to appear again in the capital, and some of them were chosen members of the assembly; particularly Brissot, who in a short time became the centre of that circle, so well known under the name of the Gironde-many of them men of talents unquestionably, but all of them in their hearts republicans, and therefore very dangerous members of a legislative assembly belonging to a monarchical constitution.

It is impossible to reflect upon the conduct of this party of the Gironde without being persuaded that their object from the beginning was to wean the minds of their

countrymen from monarchy, even in the mildest form. They imagined that the constitution itself contained that within it which rendered freedom insecure, and would sooner or later be the means of bringing back that despotic government which they justly abhorred as the greatest of all earthly curses, and which in the meantime retarded the establishment of that republican government, which in visionary beauty appeared to their imaginations as the greatest of all political blessings. They thought that to have lopped the extravagant branches of monarchy was not sufficient; that the trunk itself must be entirely eradicated, before the tree of liberty could take firm root in France. They dreaded that taste for pomp and for the splendour of royalty which they believed still to exist in the hearts of their countrymen. If the king himself should not be disposed to extend the power of the crown beyond the limits of the constitution, they thought him under the influence of those who would make him attempt it; and that if the attempt should fail in his reign, it might succeed in that of his successor. But at this period so far were some of those who had the greatest sway among the Brissotine party from fearing the perfidious attempts of the king against the constitution, that they were now persuaded that past experience, his natural love of justice, his unambitious disposition, had determined him to adhere strictly to it, and to lend a deaf ear in future to whatever might be suggested to induce him to a contrary conduct; what they most dreaded was that the king's natural love of justice, his affability, and all the mild virtues of his character, would revive the seeds of loyalty which lay concealed in the hearts of the people, and occasion the restoration of a government more arbitrary than that which had been overturned. To blast those seeds entirely, and prevent so pernicious an harvest, they used means which never can be justifiable in a creature so fallible in judgment, so circumscribed in his views, and so limited in his faculties, as man. Rumours of new plots and conspiracies, of an Austrian com