. No man's life was
safe, least of all those who were known to be friends of the king, who
were nobles, or who had any connection with the court. Some of these
people whose lives were thus in peril at the hands of the bloodstained
and furious mob had been the allies of the United States, and had fought
under Washington in the war for American independence. In their anguish
and distress their thoughts recurred to the country which they had
served in its hour of trial, three thousand miles away. They sought the
legation of the United States and turned to the American minister for
protection.

Such an exercise of humanity at that moment was not a duty that any man
craved. In those terrible days in Paris, the representatives of foreign
governments were hardly safer than any one else. Many of the ambassadors
and ministers had already left the country, and others were even then
abandoning their posts, which it seemed impossible to hold at such a
time. But the American minister stood his ground. Gouverneur Morris
was not a man to shrink from what he knew to be his duty. He had been
a leading patriot in our revolution; he had served in the Continental
Congress, and with Robert Morris in the difficult work of the Treasury,
when all our resources seemed to be at their lowest ebb. In 1788 he had
gone abroad on private business, and had been much in Paris, where
he had witnessed the beginning of the French Revolution and had been
consulted by men on both sides. In 1790, by Washington's direction, he
had gone to London and had consulted the ministry there as to whether
they would receive an American minister. Thence he had returned to
Paris, and at the beginning Of 1792 Washington appointed him minister of
the United States to France.

As an American, Morris's sympathies had run strongly in favor of the
movement to relieve France from the despotism under which she was
sinking, and to give her a better and more liberal government. But,
as the Revolution progressed, he became outraged and disgusted by
the methods employed. He felt a profound contempt for both sides. The
inability of those who were conducting the Revolution to carry out
intelligent plans or maintain order, and the feebleness of the king and
his advisers, were alike odious to the man with American conceptions
of ordered liberty. He was especially revolted by the bloodshed and
cruelty, constantly gathering in strength, which were displayed by
the revolutionists, and he