otiated by Bonne-Carrere, the director at the Ministry
of Foreign Affairs, by which Madame de Beauvert was supposed to have
gained large sums. The wife of the Minister of the Interior had a
grudge against the favorite of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "She
is Dumouriez's mistress," said she; "she lives in his house and does
the honors at his table, to the great scandal of sensible men, who are
friendly to good morals and liberty. For this license on the part of a
public man charged with State affairs marks too plainly his contempt
for decorum; and Madame de Beauvert, Rivarol's sister, very well and
very unfavorably known, is surrounded by the tools of aristocracy,
unworthy in all respects." One evening, after dinner, Roland, "with
the gravity belonging to his age and character," as his wife says, gave
a lecture on morality to the Minister of Foreign Affairs apropos of
this matter. At first Dumouriez made jesting replies, but afterwards
showed temper and appeared displeased with his entertainers.
Thereafter he seldom visited the Ministry of the Interior. Reflecting
on this, Madame Roland said to her husband: "Though not a good judge of
intrigue, I think worldly wisdom would dictate that the hour has come
for getting rid of Dumouriez, if we wish to avoid being ruined by him.
I know very well that you would be unwilling to lower yourself to such
an {160} action; and yet it is plain that Dumouriez must be seeking to
disembarrass himself of those whose censure has offended him. When one
undertakes to preach, and does so in vain, he must either punish or
expect to be molested."

Thenceforward, Madame Roland formed a distinct group within the
ministry, composed of her husband, Claviere, and Servan, who had just
replaced De Grave as Minister of War. While Dumouriez, Lacoste, and
Duranton (whom Louis XVI. called "the good Duranton") allowed
themselves to be affected by the King's goodness, and sincerely wished
to save him, their three colleagues, inspired by the spiteful Madame
Roland, had but one idea: to destroy him. "Roland, Claviere, and
Servan," says Dumouriez in his Memoirs, "no longer observed any
moderation, not merely with their colleagues, but with the King
himself. At every meeting of the Council they abused the mildness of
this prince, in order to mortify and kill him with pin-pricks."

It was Servan who proposed forming a camp of twenty thousand federates
around Paris. He thought it would be a sort of