d its rage, and guided its fury, when and where they listed. The
friendship of the mob was secured and retained by ever pandering to
their passions. The Jacobins claimed to be exclusively the friends of
the people, and advocated all those measures which tended to crush the
elevated and flatter the degraded. Robespierre, Danton, Marat, were
now the idols of the populace.

On the morning of the 30th of May, 1793, the streets of Paris were
darkened with a dismal storm of low, scudding clouds, and chilling
winds, and sleet and rain. Pools of water stood in the miry streets,
and every aspect of nature was cheerless and desolate. But there was
another storm raging in those streets, more terrible than any
elemental warfare. In locust legions, the deformed, the haggard, the
brutalized in form, in features, in mind, in heart--demoniac men,
satanic women, boys burly, sensual, blood-thirsty, like imps of
darkness rioted along toward the Convention, an interminable multitude
whom no one could count. Their hideous howlings thrilled upon the ear,
and sent panic to the heart. There was no power to resist them. There
was no protection from their violence. And thousands wished that they
might call up even the most despotic king who ever sat upon the throne
of France, from his grave, to drive back that most terrible of all
earthly despotisms, the despotism of a mob. This was the power with
which the Jacobins backed their arguments. This was the gory blade
which they waved before their adversaries, and called the sword of
justice.

The Assembly consisted of about eight hundred members. There were
twenty-two illustrious men who were considered the leaders of the
Girondist party. The Jacobins had resolved that they should be accused
of treason, arrested, and condemned. The Convention had refused to
submit to the arbitrary and bloody demand. The mob were now assembled
to coerce submission. The melancholy tocsin, and the thunders of the
alarm gun, resounded through the air, as the countless throng came
pouring along like ocean billows, with a resistlessness which no power
could stay. They surrounded the Assembly on every side, forced their
way into the hall, filled every vacant space, clambered upon the
benches, crowded the speaker in his chair, brandished their daggers,
and mingled their oaths and imprecations with the fierce debate. Even
the Jacobins were terrified by the frightful spirits whom they had
evoked. "Down with the Girondists!"