if to give the world an early proof of frivolity and incapacity, the first two days of the session were employed in debating a question of etiquette-whether or no, the King should be addressed by the title of "Majesty," and be received in the Chamber with covered or uncovered heads! Within the brief space of forty-eight hours, this important question was decided in two ways: even Vergniaud, the eagle of the Gironde, is said to have spoken on one side, and voted on the other.

It was soon evident, that instead of coming together with the honest intention of supporting the constitution, a majority of the Assembly were busily engaged in preparing its overthrow. The Girondists and Mountaineers, far from regarding the King as equally with themselves, a representative of the nation, charged with the double duty of executing the laws, and of restraining within proper bounds legislative action, by the exercise of the veto power, looked upon him as an enemy to be watched and thwarted at every turn; as a dead weight on the progress of national freedom, to be thrown aside on the first occasion; and as that occasion might not occur as soon as wished, they conspired together to produce it. Such, in a few words, is the story of the second Assembly, as it may be gathered, not only from the pages of M. De Lamartine, but of every other author of reputation who has written of this eventful period. The most distinguished of the provincial deputations was, certainly, that from Bordeaux. It was composed of young men, many of them lawyers, and accustomed to speak in public. Though previous education had made them somewhat familiar with matters connected with the science of government, yet their knowledge was merely theoretical. From the philosophy of the age, they had learned that man has natural rights, but they had not learned from experience how far these rights can be claimed or exercised consistently with the public good. A French proverb says, Parmi les aveugles, les borgnes sont rois;' and thus it fared with the deputies of the Gironde limited as was their knowledge, it sufficed, when combined with ardor and talent, to give them a decided influence over an Assembly composed of men more ignorant and equally inexperienced. One of the chief merits of M. De Lamartine's

work lies in the felicity of his delineations of individual character. His history is a gallery of portraits by the hand of a master. Before we proceed to examine the action of the Girondists as a party, it may not be amiss to make our readers acquainted with the moral characteristics of those men whom that party acknowledged as its leaders.

The first of the Bordeaux deputation in talent and fame was, undoubtedly, Vergniaud-a young man whose early cleverness had attracted the notice and patronage of the celebrated Turgot. Originally intended for the church, he had finished the course of preparatory studies, when, struck by the discordance between his tastes and habits of life, and those that would be required of him as a religious teacher, he withdrew from a profession which he could not conscientiously exercise. Returning home, he gave himself up to the cultivation of poesy and belles-lettres; but the spirit of the orator was strong within him, and having one day been overheard addressing with force and feeling an imaginary audience, it was resolved in family council that he should be a lawyer. Scarcely had he entered on this new career, when the Revolution came to open to his ambition the road of political honors. The little fortune he possessed had been exhausted in the payment of his father's debts; he arrived in Paris a penny less deputy, and his private letters, filled with the details of petty, pecuniary embarrassments, show, that poverty was his companion, even at a time when his eloquence shook France like a reed.

Vergniaud," says the historian, "born at Limoges, and by profession an advocate, was then thirty-three years old, and had early become a convert to the free doctrines of the day. His calm majestic features revealed the consciousness of power. Facility, that concomitant of genius, pervaded his whole nature, moral and physical. Though a lover of ease, he could, whenever necessity required it, rise at once in the fullness of his strength. His brow was thoughtful, his look composed, and on his lips sat a grave, perhaps melancholy expression. The severe thoughts of antiquity had left their impress on his countenance, though modified by the smiling carelessness of youth. Men loved him at the base of the tribune; when he ascended it, they respected and admired him. The first word that he spoke, the first glance

Paris, became closely connected with Brissot, Robespierre, Buzot, and others, who then formed the nucleus of the democratic faction. After the dissolution of the Assembly, he went back to a small country estate near Lyons; but stimulated by the patriotic fervor of his wife, and his own unsatisfied ambition, he soon returned to the capital in search of political preferment, and for a brief period became Minister of the Interior.

Not the least interesting part of M. De Lamartine's work is that which he has given to the memory of the celebrated Madame Roland. She was a woman of great abilities, and possessed many virtues; yet the severe pen of the historian has recorded one anecdote which must tend to diminish the sympathy which otherwise would be felt for the fate of one so able, courageous, and unfortunate. When, on the 20th of June, Marie Antoinette was subjected to the insults of the populace, Madame Roland, on hearing the story, joyfully exclaimed: "How her pride must

have suffered! How I wish I had seen her

in the hour of humiliation!" Cruel words, -that must have recurred to her memory, when she was herself carried to execution, amid the coarse execrations and filthy revilings of the scum of Paris.

It was at the house of Roland, that the plot was first formed against King and constitution. Brissot and Robespierrethe Gironde and the Mountain-here met for the same treasonable purpose. Three subjects of disagreement existed between Louis and the Assembly: the first was the law respecting non-juring priests; the second, the enactments against emigration and the emigrants; and the third, the policy of going to war with Austria and Prussia. In obedience to the dictates of conscience, and in conformity to the advice of his ministers, the King had opposed his veto to both decrees. With respect to the first, he was morally right, and politically wrong. The non-juring priests were men whom ill-considered laws had placed in a cruel position;-compelled to choose between the sacrifice of duty, either as citizens, or as ministers of the holy Catholic faith, they preferred disobedience to apostacy, aud became martyrs. The debates of the Assembly on this question, as related by M. De Lamartine, show how easily

men professing the principles of toleration can, under the influence of political excitement, give the lie to their faith, and sink into abettors of persecution. But it was evident, that the King's refusal to sanction the decree, could do no good: as the quick-sighted Dumouriez wisely observed, It was better by assenting to the law to subject the priests to legal penalties, than by refusing assent, to deliver them over to massacre.' It was not, however, the first time that the unhappy Louis had sacrificed policy to conscience. The second point of difference was one on which the King could not yield without violating the best feelings of his nature: he was required to affix his name to a bloody enactment, specially aimed at the members of his family, and at friends whose only crime was fidelity to him. The wisdom of his opposition to the war is more questionable: the Revolution struck at the principle of monarchy; it was evident that sooner or later, the princes of Europe would combine to repress the growth of opinions so fatal to themselves; to suppose it possible, that any diplomacy could either prevent altogether, or even modify the nature of their interference, was a blunder, and to act upon that supposition, was virtually to justify the suspicions of bad faith which the King's enemies had so busily disseminated. And yet, had the decree been signed as soon as presented, would not other causes of quarrel have been found? Let the reader of M. De Lamartine's volumes pass in review the circumstances of the time, and then ask himself, if the ill-fated monarch could have taken any course that would not have led to the same result? the lamb of the fable, at whatever point of the stream he drank, he must have been accused of troubling its waters.

Like

The limits of this review will not permit us to dwell on the events which immediately preceded the fatal 10th of August. The angry debates and insolent denunciations of the Assembly; the insubordination of the army, encouraged by the clubs; the violence of mobs, set on foot by the Girondists and the Mountain; the massacres at Brest and Avignon, forerunners of the bloodshed at Paris; the rising of the 20th of June, when the royal palace was invaded by a mob, led by the butcher Legendre, and the brewer Santerre; the noble inter

ference of Lafayette, proving only personal | courage and political weakness,—all these symptoms and effects of anarchy, are admirably related by the historian, who, whatever may be his own prejudices and predilections, has concealed no fact that can assist the reader in forming a right judgment.

The insurrection of the 10th of August, which involved in one common ruin the King and constitution, was the work of the Girondists, who, notwithstanding causes of jealousy had already arisen between the two factions, were, on this occasion, strongly supported by the Mountain. With the exception of Barbaroux, whose personal exertions had secured the co-operation of several hundred vagabonds from Marseilles and the southern provinces, the most open and active agents in moving the mob of Paris, were Danton, Des Moulins, and Fréron. But when thus lending themselves to the overthrow of the throne in obedience to the babblers of the Assembly, these chiefs of the Mountain well knew, that the fruits of the crime would be gathered by themselves. Like wolves, the two factions had hunted the deer together, and then fought over the bleeding carcase.

Strange as it may seem, it was at this last hour of the monarchy, that the chance was offered to Louis, of annihilating his enemies at a blow, and securing the triumph of the constitution. Notwithstanding the defection of the National Guards, the Swiss troops were victorious in the first onset; they swept their enemies from the Carrousal with a strong hand, and we have the authority of an eye-witness whose judgment, in such matters, never deceived him, for the belief, that had the soldiers been led by a man of energy and capacity, the cause of royalty would have been successful. At a future day, and under circumstances somewhat similar, Napoleon (for it is to him that we allude) proved with what ease a few determined soldiers, under good guidance, can deal with a ferocious mob, who, though strong in numbers, lack the superiority that courage and discipline can give.

Though acknowledging the many claims of the Girondists to distinction, history will not hide the fact, that political sagacity was not among the number. The very qualities they possessed were of a char

acter to mar their usefulness: they lived in a world of their own imagining, and were blind to the exigencies of the real world around them. They wished to try, on a large scale, the value of theories of government borrowed from antiquity, and applicable only to petty states. Their chief error was, in not adopting the existing constitution, and endeavoring to cure its defects by wise and sober legislation. Every exercise of the King's prerogative was met by these misguided men, as if it were an outrage on public liberty. Their decree against non-juring priests produced civil war; their enactments against the emigrants led to further emigration; they sought war with Europe, and, as if to incapacitate the nation for the conflict, labored at the same moment to disorganize the army; and at last, when the royal authority had been humbled and trampled upon, they had recourse to an insurrection of the people, to overturn the government and consign its acknowledged head to the prison and the scaffold. Such was their conduct when assailing royalty, or what they were pleased to term tyranny. What was it when acting on the defensive? when called upon to resist a party more thoroughly imbued than themselves with the levelling principle, and which had grown up in their shadow? Forgetting that they had risen through an insurrection, they did not suspect that they might fall by one. The weapon which they had used with such effect against Louis, lay at their feet, and, without a struggle, they permitted another hand to grasp it. The time of action was lost in idle debate. They trusted to the inviolability of public character, when they had themselves violated it in the person of their King. short, notwithstanding their acknowledged abilities, every step taken by the Girondists, from first to last, bore the stamp of that fatuity which goes before destruction.

In

M. De Lamartine has given an interesting account of their last night upon earth. It was spent in philosophic discussions, almost as imaginative as their political speculations. We know not whether the speech on the immortality of the soul, attributed to Vergniaud, was his or not; no reporter could have been present, and the memory of the priest who was permitted to console their last moments, could scarcely have carried

away more than its substance. We remember a pleasing volume entitled, "The Last Supper of the Girondists," written by Nodier. It was avowedly a work of the imagination in its details, but claimed to be founded in truth. What is true in it, was probably derived from the same sources that have served M. De Lamartine, as there is a similarity between the two accounts. We shall close this brief notice of the Girondists by offering to our readers the following extract from a work little known, written by one of that party, who, escaping from Paris at the time of their downfall, had the good fortune to remain undiscovered till the Reign of Terror had past. We allude to Louvet, whose position enabled him to see and lament the want of foresight and political courage of his friends. When the Convention was organized, the Girondists were the strongest; the designs of Robespierre and the Mountain were sufficiently developed, nor had the popularity of the former reached a height to set punishment at defiance. A little energy at that time, would probably have changed the whole current of future events.

"The Convention," says Louvet, "began its reign on the 21st of September, and the next day, Robespierre and Marat preached insurrection against it in the club; a few weeks after, the first named dared to complain publicly of what he called the calumnies which had been circulated respecting him, and to ask who was his accuser? Instantly, I sprung into the tribune; the accusation which I brought against him produced a strong sensation; more than fifty deputies rose to bear witness to the reality of the crimes I had denounced, the least of which was sufficient to bring that man to the scaffold. If Pétion, who had not then lost his great influence,-if Pétion, whom I appealed to by name, had spoken one quarter of what he knew, a decree would have been obtained on the spot against Robespierre and his accomplice. But Pétion, Guadet, Vergniaud, never answered my appeal, and another (Brissot) was weak enough to blame me in his journal for having brought the accusation. Nevertheless, Robespierre was so astounded, that he requested eight days to prepare his defence. At the time appointed, the tribunes were filled by his friends, as early as nine o'clock. The dictator spoke two hours, but did not refute a single charge. My reply would have crushed him, yet the Girondists united with the Mountain in preventing me from speaking. This fatal mistake struck me to the heart; from this moment, I felt assured that the men of the dag

ger would prevail against the men of principle."

Making due allowance for the personal feelings of Louvet, there is but little doubt that his story is true in the main at the decisive moment, his friends lacked decision. As for the chief of the "men of the dagger," or to speak more correctly, the "men of the axe,' we shall say but little. There appears to us (though M. De Lamartine thinks differently) very little mystery about the character of Robespierre. At the outset of his career, he was a philanthropist, and like most philanthropists, hid no small portion of selfishness under his general love of humanity. It is singular that both he and Marat wrote against capital punishment. That he had some ability is certain, from the influence he exercised on all whom he approached. The man who gives rise to strong emotions in others, whether of hatred or friendship, cannot have been an ordinary man; but that he had genius, or even exalted talents, we see no evidence. He seems to have possessed moral courage, and to have known the value of perseverance, and to this tenacity of purpose may be attributed his success.

We are not aware that the historian has adduced in his work any new facts of great importance, but he has certainly presented men and things in a new light. Whatever may be thought of the accuracy of his views either of public affairs or of private character, they are at least offered in a way to command attention. Perhaps the present age is too near to that which witnessed the monstrous spectacle of a nation in a state of anarchy, to judge calmly of the men who were successively borne to the surface by the agitation of the political waters. Yet it seems to us evident, that not one of these heroes of a day was striving for a great principle. The love of power was the besetting sin of all-the love of the people, a mere mask to hide their egotism. That this was the case with the Girondists is a fact recognized by M. 'De Lamartine, who seems, as he proceeded in his labors, to have become less and less disposed to look upon them favorably, and at last, to have even doubted the sincerity of their attachment to the goddess with the cap and spear. Robes