k ones.

There was no longer any dike to the torrent. August 1, Louis XVI.
nominated a cabinet composed of loyal men: Joly was Minister of
Justice; Champion de Villeneuve, of the Interior; Bigot de
Sainte-Croix, of Foreign Affairs; Du Bouchage, of the Marine; Leroux de
la Ville, of Public Taxes; and D'Abancourt, of War. But this ministry
was to last only ten days. Certain petitioners at the bar of the {270}
Assembly asked for the deposition of the King in most violent language.
"This measure," says Barbaroux in his Memoirs, "would have carried
Philippe of Orleans to the regency, and therefore his party violently
clamored for it. His creditors, his hirelings, and boon-companions,
Marat and his Cordeliers, all manner of swindlers and insolvent
debtors, thronged public places and incited to this deposition because
they were hungry for money and positions under a regent who was their
tool and their accomplice."

In vain did Louis XVI. display those sentiments of paternal kindness
which had hitherto availed him so little. August 3, he sent a message
to the Assembly, in which he said: "I will uphold national independence
to my latest breath. Personal dangers are nothing compared to public
ones. Oh! what are personal dangers to a King whom men are seeking to
deprive of his people's love? This is the real plague-spot in my
heart. Perhaps the people will some day know how dear their welfare is
to me. How many of my sorrows could be obliterated by the least
evidence of a return to right feeling!"

How did they respond to this conciliatory language? After it had been
read, Petion, the mayor of Paris, presented himself at the bar, and
read an address from the Council General of the Commune, in which these
words occur: "The chief of the executive power is the first link of the
counter-revolutionary chain.... Through a lingering forbearance, we
would have desired the power to ask you for the {271} suspension of
Louis XVI., but to this the Constitution is opposed. Louis XVI.
incessantly invokes the Constitution; we invoke it in our turn, and ask
you for his deposition." The next day the municipality distributed
five thousand ball cartridges to the Marseillais, while refusing any to
the National Guards.

Nevertheless, the Girondins still hesitated. Guadet, Vergniaud, and
Gensonne would have declared themselves satisfied if the three
ministers belonging to their party had been reinstated, and on July 29
they secretly