estation!"

Camille Desmoulins thus justifies the absence of Danton, himself, and
Freron, by asserting that Danton had fled from proscription and
assassination to the house of his father-in-law, at Fontenay, on the
previous night, and was tracked thither by a band of La Fayette's spies;
and that Freron, whilst crossing the Pont Neuf, had been assailed,
trampled under foot, and wounded by fourteen hired ruffians; whilst
Camille himself, marked for the dagger, only escaped by a mistake in his
description. History has not put any faith in these pretended
assassinations of La Fayette.

Camille, invisible all day, repaired in the evening to the Jacobins.

XIII.

In the mean while the crowd began to congregate in vast masses in the
Champ-de-Mars--agitated, but inoffensive--the national guard, every
battalion of whom La Fayette had ordered out, were under arms. One of
the detachments which had arrived that morning in the Champ-de-Mars,
with a train of artillery, withdrew by the quays, in order that the
appearance of an armed force might not irritate the people. At twelve
o'clock the crowd assembled round the "altar of the country" (_autel de
la patrie_), not seeing the commissioners of the Jacobin club, who had
promised to bring the petition to be signed, of their own accord chose
four commissioners of their number to draw up one. One of the
commissioners took the pen, the citizens crowded round him, and he wrote
as follows:--

"On the altar of the country, July 13th, in the year III.
Representatives of the people, your labours are drawing to a close. A
great crime has been committed; Louis flies, and has unworthily
abandoned his post--the empire is on the verge of ruin--he has been
arrested, and has been brought back to Paris, where the people demand
that he be tried. You declare he shall be king. This is not the wish of
the people, and the decree is therefore annulled. He has been carried
off by the two hundred and ninety-two _aristocrates_, who have
themselves declared that they have no longer a voice in the National
Assembly. It is annulled because it is in opposition to the voice of the
people, your sovereign. Repeal your decree: the king has abdicated by
his crime: receive his abdication; convoke a fresh constitutive power;
point out the criminal, and organise a new executive power."

This petition was laid on the altar of the country, and quires of paper,
placed at the four corners of the altar, received six th