of the Council, June 11. "The King," says Dumouriez,
"listened to this impudent diatribe with admirable patience, and said
with the greatest coolness: 'M. Roland, you had already sent me your
letter; it was unnecessary to read it to the Council, as it was to
remain a secret between ourselves.'" Dumouriez was summoned to the
palace the following morning, June 12. He found the King in his own
room, accompanied by the Queen. "Do you think, Monsieur," said Marie
Antoinette, "that the King ought to submit any longer to the threats
and insolence of Roland and the knavery of Servan and Claviere?"--"No,
Madame," he replied; "I am indignant at them; I admire the King's
patience, and I venture to ask him to make an entire change in his
ministry. Let him dismiss us on the spot, and appoint men belonging to
neither party."--"That is not my intention," said Louis XVI. "I wish
you to remain, as well as Lacoste and that good man, Duranton. Do me
the service of ridding me of these three factious and insolent persons,
for my patience is exhausted."--"It is a dangerous matter, Sire, but I
will do it." As a condition of remaining in the ministry, Dumouriez
exacted the sanction of the two decrees. There was another ministerial
council the same evening. Roland, Servan, and Claviere were more
insolent and acrimonious than usual. Louis XVI. closed the session
with mingled dissatisfaction and dignity.

At eight o'clock that evening (June 12), Servan, {165} the Minister of
War, went to Madame Roland and said: "Congratulate me! I have been
turned out."--"I am much piqued," replied she, "that you should be the
first to receive that honor, but I hope it will not be long before it
will be decreed to my husband also." Madame Roland's prayer was
granted. The virtuous Minister of the Interior received his letters of
dismissal the next morning. As Duranton, who delivered it at the
Ministry of Justice, was slowly drawing it from his pocket,--

"You make us wait for our liberty," said Roland; and, taking the
letter, he added, "In reality that is what it is." Then he went home
to his wife to announce to her that he was no longer minister.

Madame Roland, with the instinct of hatred, saw at once how to obtain
revenge. "One thing remains to be done," she cried; "we must be the
first to communicate the news to the Assembly, sending them at the same
time a copy of the letter to the King which must have caused it." This
idea pleased the ex-