archands, wrote to
Mr. Necker, to recall him, sent his letter open to the Assembly, to be
forwarded by them, and invited them to go with him to Paris the next
day, to satisfy the city of his dispositions; and that night, and
the next morning, the Count d'Artois, and M. de Montesson, a deputy
connected with him, Madame de Polignac, Madame de Guiche, and the Count
de Vaudreuil, favorites of the Queen, the Abbe de Vermont her confessor,
the Prince of Conde. and Duke of Bourbon fled. The King came to Paris,
leaving the Queen in consternation for his return. Omitting the less
important figures of the procession, the King's carriage was in the
centre; on each side of it, the Assembly, in two ranks afoot; at their
head the Marquis de la Fayette, as commander-in-chief, on horse-back,
and _Bourgeois_ guards before and behind. About sixty thousand citizens,
of all forms and conditions, armed with the conquests of the Bastile and
Invalids, as far as they would go, the rest with pistols, swords, pikes,
pruning hooks, scythes, &c. lined all the streets through which the
procession passed, and with the crowds of people in the streets,
doors, and windows, saluted them everywhere with the cries of '_Vive la
Nation_,' but not a single '_Vive le Roi_' was heard. The King stopped
at the _Hotel de Ville_. There M. Bailly presented, and put into his
hat, the popular cockade, and addressed him. The King being unprepared,
and unable to answer, Bailly went to him, gathered from him some
scraps of sentences, and made out an answer, which he delivered to the
audience, as from the King. On their return, the popular cries were
'_Vive le Roi et la Nation_.' He was conducted by a _garde Bourgeoise_,
to his palace at Versailles, and thus concluded such an '_amende
honorable_,' as no sovereign ever made, and no people ever received.

And here, again, was lost another precious occasion of sparing to France
the crimes and cruelties through which she has since passed, and to
Europe, and finally America, the evils which flowed on them also from
this mortal source. The King was now become a passive machine in the
hands of the National Assembly, and had he been left to himself, he
would have willingly acquiesced in whatever they should devise as best
for the nation. A wise constitution would have been formed, hereditary
in his line, himself placed at its head, with powers so large, as to
enable him to do all the good of his station, and so limited, as to
re