very
ears; but that he neither was nor could be a Jacobin; that the Revolution
had been suffered to extend even to that rabble of destroyers who,
thinking of nothing but pillage, were ripe for anything, and might furnish
the Assembly with a formidable army, ready to undermine the remains of a
throne already but too much shaken. Whilst speaking with the utmost
ardour he seized the Queen's hand and kissed it with transport,
exclaiming, "Suffer yourself to be saved!" The Queen told me that the
protestations of a traitor were not to be relied on; that the whole of
his conduct was so well known that undoubtedly the wisest course was not
to trust to it; that, moreover, the Princes particularly recommended
that no confidence should be placed in any proposition emanating from
within the kingdom; that the force without became imposing; and that it
was better to rely upon their success, and upon the protection due from
Heaven to a sovereign so virtuous as Louis XVI. and to so just a cause.

[The sincerity of General Dumouriez cannot be doubted in this instance.
The second volume of his Memoirs shows how unjust the mistrust and
reproaches of the Queen were. By rejecting his services, Marie Antoinette
deprived herself of her only remaining support. He who saved France in
the defiles of Argonne would perhaps have saved France before the 20th of
June, had he obtained the full confidence of Louis XVI. and the
Queen.--NOTE BY THE EDITOR.]

The constitutionalists, on their part, saw that there had been nothing
more than a pretence of listening to them. Barnave's last advice was as
to the means of continuing, a few weeks longer, the Constitutional Guard,
which had been denounced to the Assembly, and was to be disbanded. The
denunciation against the Constitutional Guard affected only its staff, and
the Duc de Brissac. Barnave wrote to the Queen that the staff of the
guard was already attacked; that the Assembly was about to pass a decree
to reduce it; and he entreated her to prevail on the King, the very
instant the decree should appear, to form the staff afresh of persons
whose names he sent her. Barnave said that all who were set down in it
passed for decided Jacobins, but were not so in fact; that they, as well
as himself, were in despair at seeing the monarchical government attacked;
that they had learnt to dissemble their sentiments, and that it would be
at least a fortnight before the Assembly could know them well, and
cer