might hope to regain position by some
brilliant stroke such as he could execute only without the restraint
of orders and on his own initiative. His hopes grew, or seemed to, as
his suit was not rejected, and he wrote to Joseph on September
twenty-sixth that the matter of his departure was urgent; adding,
however: "But at this moment there are some ebullitions and incendiary
symptoms." He was right in both surmises. The Committee of Safety was
formally considering the proposition for his transfer to the Sultan's
service, while simultaneously affairs both in Paris and on the
frontiers alike were "boiling."

Meantime the royalists and clericals had not been idle. They had
learned nothing from the events of the Revolution, and did not even
dimly understand their own position. Their own allies repudiated both
their sentiments and their actions in the very moments when they
believed themselves to be honorably fighting for self-preservation.
English statesmen like Granville and Harcourt now thought and said
that it was impossible to impose on France a form of government
distasteful to her people; but the British regent and the French
pretender, who, on the death of his unfortunate nephew, the dauphin,
had been recognized by the powers as Louis XVIII, were stubbornly
united under the old Bourbon motto, "All or nothing." The change in
the Convention, in Paris society, even in the country itself, which
was about to desert its extreme Jacobinism and to adopt the new
constitution by an overwhelming vote--all this deceived them, and they
determined to strike for everything they had lost. Preparations, it is
now believed, were all ready for an inroad from the Rhine frontier,
for Pichegru to raise the white flag and to advance with his troops on
Paris, and for a simultaneous rising of the royalists in every French
district. On October fourth an English fleet had appeared on the
northern shore of France, having on board the Count of Artois and a
large body of emigrants, accompanied by a powerful force of English,
composed in part of regulars, in part of volunteers. This completed
the preliminary measures.

With the first great conflict in the struggle, avowed royalism had
only an indirect connection. By this time the Paris sections were
thoroughly reorganized, having purged themselves of the extreme
democratic elements from the suburbs. They were well drilled, well
armed, and enthusiastic for resistance to the decree of the Conventi