tes the gibbet
with a wreath, is a friend indeed.

If ever the character of a people were repugnant to amity, or inimical to
connection, it is that of the French for the last three years.--*

* The editor of the _Courier de l'Egalite,_ a most decided patriot,
thus expresses himself on the injuries and insults received by the
King from the Parisians, and their municipality, previous to his
trial:

"I know that Louis is guilty--but are we to double his punishment
before it is pronounced by the law? Indeed one is tempted to say
that, instead of being guided by the humanity and philosophy which
dictated the revolution, we have taken lessons of barbarity from the
most ferocious savages! Let us be virtuous if we would be
republicans; if we go on as we do, we never shall, and must have
recourse to a despot: for of two evils it is better to choose the
least."

The editor, whose opinion of the present politics is thus expressed, is
so truly a revolutionist, and so confidential a patriot, that, in August
last, when almost all the journalists were murdered, his paper was the
only one that, for some time, was allowed to reach the departments.

In this short space they have formed a compendium of all the vices which
have marked as many preceding ages:--the cruelty and treachery of the
league--the sedition, levity, and intrigue of the _Fronde_ [A name given
to the party in opposition to the court during Cardinal Mazarin's
ministry.--See the origin of it in the Memoirs of that period.] with the
licentiousness and political corruption of more modern epochs. Whether
you examine the conduct of the nation at large, or that of its chiefs and
leaders, your feelings revolt at the one, and your integrity despises the
other. You see the idols erected by Folly, degraded by Caprice;--the
authority obtained by Intrigue, bartered by Profligacy;--and the perfidy
and corruption of one side so balanced by the barbarity and levity of the
other, that the mind, unable to decide on the preference of contending
vices, is obliged to find repose, though with regret and disgust, in
acknowledging the general depravity.

La Fayette, without very extraordinary pretensions, became the hero of
the revolution. He dictated laws in the Assembly, and prescribed oaths
to the Garde Nationale--and, more than once, insulted, by the triumph of
ostentatious popularity, the humiliation and distress of a