be adjudged guilty of the same crime that such as should be convicted during their absence, should forfeit their estates and property during their own lives, but not to the prejudice of their children; that all such persons holding offices should be adjudged to have forfeited the same: that all such being officers in the army and navy, should be considered as deserters; and that Frenchmen, enlisting men to attack the frontiers, should be adjudged guilty of high treason. It could not be expected that the King should ratify a decree so severe against men who had been guilty of no other crime than that of faithfully adhering to the monarchy and the monarch. He withheld his sanction for the present, and did that which any other just and humane prince would have done in similar circumstances. Determined to support the constitution, to which he had sworn, he would not encourage or connive at preparations for war against it; but, concerned for the personal rights and safety of men whom he esteemed and loved, he resolved to attempt a reconciliation between the French government and the emigrants, by the mild method of admonition and persuasion. He had dispatched letters again and again, even before the violent decree of the assembly, to all the princes, earnestly entreating them to return; and used all his endeavours by a public proclamation, as well as by all the private influence he possessed, to recall the emigrants to the bosom of their country, and to retain those who were inclined to emigrate.

Dec. 14, 1791. The King, on the same day that he refused his sanction to the decree against the emigrants, had previously given it to another decree of the assembly, requiring the Count of Provence, his eldest brother, to return to the kingdom within the space of two months. The French princes, in answer to the King's repeated letters, persisted in their refusal to acknowledge the constitution accepted by his Majesty, and declared their views to be the re-establishment and respect of the Roman catholic religion and its ministers, and to restore to the King his liberty and legislative authority. The King would probably have approved heartily of the constitution, had a few modifications been made to satisfy his conscience as to religion, and his feelings with regard to his family and the nobles. But still, harsh as it was in these respects, there was not any reason to doubt of his sincerity in his earnest and repeated letters to the princes. His piety, the sacrifices he had often made to humanity, the gentleness and the timid hesitation and irresolution of his character, all conspire to preclude every idea of duplicity on the part of the King on this occasion. It is also to be observed, that whatever repugnance may have been felt by their Majesties to so great a retrenchment of the royal authority, it could not be, and in fact it is well enough known, that it was not their wish that the ancient monarchy should be restored by external force, under the direction and auspices of the princes; whose victorious entrance and re

**The Prince of Condé, the Count de Provence, and the Count d'Artois.

*

establishment

establishment in France must eclipse what remained of the splendor of the crown, throw a cloud of disgust and even contempt on their Majesties, as being incapable of maintaining a throne which they had restored, and put all places of power and trust in the hands of their party. From the commencement of the revolution the court of France was divided into different parties: that of the Count d'Artois, under the direction of M. de Calonne, who had been disgraced at the instigation of the Queen in 1788; and that of this princess, to which the other was in direct opposition. When their Majesties attempted their escape to Montmedi, and were stopped at Varennes, neither the Count d'Artois, the Prince of Condé, nor M. de Calonne were in the secret: nor did they receive any intelligence before they read it in the newspapers. To suppose that there was a secret collusion and concert between their Majesties and the princes, appeared in reality to those who were acquainted with the court of France, and on whose authority we give these facts, not only improbable, but extravagant. Yet it must be owned that there were not wanting many circumstances which might naturally nourish suspicion in the breasts of such a people as the French; of whom it is a characteristic that they are at once prone to suspicion and credulity: a paradox that will not appear altogether inexplicable to those who reflect on the extreme sensibility of their temper, and that a momentary be

lief attends the vivid conception of every object. His Majesty's letter to his officers, when he fled to Montmedi, evidently tended to throw all things into confusion.* When the King accepted the constitution of 1791, he should have done it firmly and frankly; and, at the same time, given positive orders to his brothers and the other emigrants to disarm: though they would have been involved in disastrous consequences by a refusal, he had still in reserve the power of pardon. The manner too in which he accepted the constitution, and the observations he made on it, were not calculated to inspire a belief and confidence in his sincerity."It appears to me," said the King, "that the constitution does not possess that energy of execution and administration which are necessary to impress the movement and preserve the unity of so vast an empire." This observation was just: but it was imprudent to make it. In this qualified acceptance, the republicans imagined that they saw hypocrisy,-and the constitutionalists, a King protesting against laws entrusted to his execution. It would be hard to censure with severity the conduct of the King at this crisis: he was sincere, but deficient in decision and vigour: he had penetration to discover the defects of the constitution; but not to foresee the consequence of his strictures. There are some other circumstances naturally tending to produce a suspicion of the sincerity of the King, which it may be natural in this place to mention. It

* A measure not altogether dissimilar to that of James II. of England, who, before his flight into France, caused the great seal to be thrown into the river Thames.

was

The first step they took for the accomplishment of this end, was, by all means to get rid of the usual marks of respect to his Majesty's person: in which insolence they were encouraged by dissentions and even bickerings in the cabinet. Feb. 6, 1792. Condorcet, ap

One of their methods of insult consisted in accusing the Queen of every abominable crime: another, in singing songs, in which the King was treated with ridicule, insolence, and even with menaces of violence.

.

the 22d of January, for a declaration to the Emperor, in the name of the King," That he cannot any longer hold a political correspondence with any sovereign but in the name of the French nation, and according to the powers with which he was invested by its national assembly;-that the King should be invited to intreat the Emperor, as head of the house of Austria, to live in peace with the French nation; that the King should he invited to declare to the Emperor, that if he should not give a satisfactory answer to the above decree before the first of March, it should be held equivaleut to a declaration of war." He was conducted under a strong guard to Orleans, to take his trial before the high court, appointed for the trial of the state criminals. M. de Lessart, it was alledged, was a leading member of what was called the Austrian Committee: a junto, it was pretended, whose business it was to correspond with the court of Vienna, for the purpose of facilitating the entrance of the Germans into France, and their march to Paris; but which existed only, as clearly appeared on a public trial, in the suspicious imaginations of the Jacobins nor is it thought by many that its existence was seriously believed, even by the leaders of that party, though it was deemed good policy to spread this fable; which was done by methods in which great subtlety of contrivance was combined with extreme profligacy.

The king was allowed by the constitution, besides the national guards of honour, eighteen hundred men for a guard, or householdtroops, to be paid from the civil list, and wearing an uniform dif

ferent from that of the national assembly.

The necessity of making great sacrifices to popularity constrained the King to compose this body of officers and soldiers, taken half from the national guards and half from the line:-But instead of chusing that half which was to be taken from the national guards, out of the body of the national guards of Paris, among whom it was of great importance that he should be popular, and where the character of those chosen could be better known, his Majesty was prevailed on to allow a certain number to be named by each department of France. Those departments in which men of character presided, sent very good men; but others sent a set of worthless fellows; who, soon after their arrival at Paris, were received in the Jacobin clubs; where they were prompted to make daily accusations, ridiculous indeed, but well adapted to excite the animosity of the people against their comrades of the King's guards;— against whom a lively jealousy was excited among the whole of the national guards at Paris. Continual disputes took place between the two corps; which would cer tainly have occasioned bloodshed, had not the King ordained that they should do duty at the palace alternately; assuring them, at the same time, that the highest proof they could give him of their attachment, would be to live amicably together. The new guards did every thing in their power to cement an union: but it happened too often that some of the national guards, more envious or irritable than the rest, complained, that the King and

Queen