esting or more important, than to show, by reference to these memoirs, the propriety and justice of the different observations, which I have just quoted from Dr. Paley. The queen, for instance, comes from the Tuilleries, some say leaning on the arm of M. de Moustier, others of M. de Malden; but is the conclusion from this that she did not come out at all? Circumstances are mentioned by some, and omitted by others, with respect, for instance, to her seeing La Fayette's carriage.

Again. From some memoirs we should suppose it was Drouet, the postmaster at Menehould, who stopped the carriages at Varennes; from others, that it was Drouet's son; from La Gache's own account, that he had gallopped after a person, when he left St. Menehould, who, he thought, was pursuing the carriages; but it is clear from other accounts that Drouet was in company with Guillaume, and that this person therefore could not have been Drouet, La Gache speaking only of one person; and yet M. de Damas says, that La Gache told him that he had gallopped after two persons soon after he left Menehould; so that apparently it was, after all, Drouet.

Again. From some accounts it might be thought that Drouet entered the town of Clermont; from others, and from his own, that he passed near it and avoided it. There are differences in the detail of what took place with respect to the king and queen; their getting out, their conversation, &c. &c., when the carriages first stopped at Varennes, opposite the house of M. Prefontaine. The Duc de Choiseul speaks of M. de Goguelat's being wounded in the shoulder; M. de Goguelat himself, of receiving one wound in the breast, another in the head; yet was M. de Choiseul by the side of him afterwards for hours. The Duc de Choiseul relates his conversation with the king, while M. de Damas was in conference with him also: it is very important, extremely so, to the king's character in all its particulars. de Damas, when he comes to the corresponding place in his own narrative, takes no notice of it, mentioning only the important point, that after they had made their representations to the king, they saw that he had made up his mind to wait, and not to try force. M. de Vallory mentions, that M.

M.

de Damas reached the king after seven in the morning, soon after M. Deslon, whose conversation with his majesty he reports at length; and he then says, that between eight and nine in the morning, M. de Choiseul and M. de Goguelat appeared; that they had forced their way to the house, and that M. de Goguelat was wounded in the arm. All this is inaccurate. And he then says, that about ten o'clock the two aide-de-camps of La Fayette arrived. In his agitation M. de Vallory seems to have been totally insensible to hours and points of time; but is the conclusion, I must repeat, from the whole of these discrepancies, omissions, and contradictions, to be, that the main facts of the story did not take place, or that the gallant men concerned are not men of veracity? In this manner might I go on to a considerable length, though in any dissertation on the subject I must proceed with more regularity and more circumstantial detail; but you will already see sufficiently what I am endeavouring to exhibit to your reflection. I feel indeed that I am on ground where I have no allotted place or regular position.

The justice, however, of Paley's observation on the character of testimony, "substantial truth under circumstantial variety," having occurred to me again and again while reading these memoirs, and on this occasion by no means for the first time, I thought I might be allowed to mention the circumstance, though the subject itself, I am well aware, is too important to be properly considered by me, or by any one, but in a far more direct and regular manner.

LECTURE XXIII.

FROM THE FLIGHT TO VARENNES, TO THE CLOSE OF THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY.

I

HAVE omitted several particulars that occurred at Varennes, and during the return of the royal family to Paris, because I do not write the History of the French Revolution; but they will, I think, be interesting to you (who are to read it), and I may even now mention a few of them.

There can be no doubt of the king's intentions in this attempt to escape; that he meant no civil war, that he had no design but what he could fully and fairly avow. When he found that all efforts at concealment were in vain, he addressed himself to Sausse, the room was full of people, and expressed himself with a fluency and a frankness, that were in a character like his quite impossible, upon any supposition, but that of his entire sincerity. What his motives had been in leaving the Tuilleries, the nature of his captivity, his wishes and his hopes, all these he laid before his hearers, and he only begged to be taken any where but to Paris; to any town or place where he might assure himself of the real opinions of his people, and freely concur in whatever could contribute to their happiness; that he had no other desire; and that to accomplish such an end, he would make any necessary sacrifices of the rights of his birth and prerogative, or the claims of his own personal interests. The king expressed himself, according to the account of the historians, with a dignity, a goodness of heart, a simplicity, and with a warmth and an eloquence so far beyond what was expected from him, that the greatest impression was made on the bystanders; and even Sausse himself was so struck and affected by it, that he said in an under tone, "Nothing can be more reasonable than what he proposes, but it is now too late;

and my head would answer it, if he was not sent back to Paris."

The different characters of the king and queen were marked when the decree of the National Assembly was brought them. La Fayette's aide-de-camp, M. de Romeuf, was known to them, and they had not expected that he at least would have been the bearer of it. The king took it hastily from his hand and read it. "There is no longer a king in France," he said, and threw it on the bed where the dauphin and the princess were lying. "It shall not soil my children," said the queen, snatching it up and throwing it on the ground. "And is it you?" she said, turning to the aidede-camp. "Better I than another," replied M. de Romeuf; "I who know how to respect you, madam, as does my general, who is any thing but an enemy." "Oh, he," said the queen," he has nothing in his head but his United States and his American republic: he will see what a French republic is. Where is your decree? the insolents!" M. de Romeuf soothed her at last, and overcame her by the genuine sympathy which he exhibited, and by the tears (he was still young) that started to his eyes. Well, save then," said the queen, save those gentlemen there, when we are gone,M. de Damas, the Duc de Choiseul, and the rest."

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Her words were not in vain: their lives were saved, as I have already mentioned, and saved by M. de Romeuf at the hazard of his own. It was a miserable night that the royal family had to pass at Varennes, as if a man, whose life was at issue, was to wait for the verdict of his judges, not for a few minutes, but for many, many hours. It was a miserable night; and it must have been again a miserable eight days, that they had to undergo, while they were returning to their prison, for it was a journey of eight days, as the national guards had to march on foot before them—the queen's hair turned grey in the course of it.

Being now the middle of June, the heat and dust were intolerable; but what were these? "Where the greater malady is fixed," as Lear said to the storm, "the lesser is scarce felt." Near St. Menehould, they had to see the Count de Dampierre rush to their carriage door to offer them, what testimony he yet could, of his loyalty and affliction; and they had scarcely

heard the few words he could pronounce, amid his sighs and his tears, when they had to witness the sad consequences of his generous devotion to them, to see the people falling upon him and tearing him from his hold, and as the carriage went on, to hear his parting cries, and to leave him to be massacred behind them.

The same horror, the same agony, would have been again experienced near Meaux, but at Chalons they had been joined by the three commissioners from the National Assembly. A poor priest was in like manner endeavouring to make his way to the carriage, when he was seized by the national guards and by the multitude, who were evidently in the act of dragging him away to the same barbarous fate. "Save him! save him!" cried the queen to Barnave, who instantly rushed from the carriage, and by the generous fury and indignation of his cries and expostulations, rescued the unhappy man, and shamed the monsters by whom he was surrounded.

The conversation in the carriage between the deputies and the royal family had at length become free and unembarrassed, and turned upon all the important subjects that alone could occupy their minds. The king, the queen, and Me. Elizabeth, displayed each the particular graces and amiable qualities which belonged to their respective characters. The spectacle thus presented, of misfortune at least and the instability of every thing human, was lost upon the hard republican nature of the vulgar Pétion; but not so, on the mind of Barnave, a man of genius and of eloquence, and who could not be unmoved by all that was so fitted to interest his taste and melt his heart. He was never wanting during the journey in every mark of respect that he could pay. When they arrived at the Tuileries he fulfilled his promise to the queen, and by his personal exertions saved the lives of the gentlemen of the body guard who were on the carriage, and who would otherwise have been butchered on the spot; and he ever after rendered the king and the royal family every kind office of assistance and advice, which, as a member of the other side of the National Assembly, and a distinguished leader at the time, it was competent for him toafford.

When you come to read the history, you will perceive that the conduct of the National Assembly, when the first intelli