rily result from the administration of a province
governed by itself, could not fail to predispose the inclination of the
Gironde in favour of an elective and federative government. Bordeaux was
a parliamentary country; the parliaments had every where encouraged the
spirit of resistance, and had often created a factious feeling against
the king. Bordeaux was a commercial city, and commerce, which requires
liberty through interest, at last desires it through a love of freedom.
Bordeaux was the great commercial link between America and France, and
their constant intercourse with America had communicated to the Gironde
their love for free institutions. Moreover Bordeaux was more exposed to
the enlightening influence of the sun of philosophy than the centre of
France. Philosophy had germed there ere it arose in Paris, for Bordeaux
was the birthplace of Montaigne and Montesquieu, those two great
republicans of the French school. The one had deeply investigated the
religious dogmata, the other the political institutions; and the
president Dupaty had long after awakened there enthusiasm for the new
system of philosophy. Bordeaux, in addition, was a country where the
traditions of liberty and the _Roman Forum_ had been perpetuated in the
bar. A certain leaven of antiquity animated each heart, and lent vigour
to every tongue, and the town was still more republican by eloquence
than by opinion, though there was something of Latin emphasis in their
patriotism. It was in the birthplace of Montaigne and Montesquieu that
the republic was to take its origin.

II.

The period of the elections was the signal for a still more obstinate
attack from the public press. The papers were insufficient: men sold
pamphlets in the streets, and the "_Journaux affiches_" were invented,
which were placarded against the walls of Paris, and around which groups
of people were constantly collected. Wandering orators, inspired or
hired by the different parties, took their stand there and commented
aloud on these impassioned productions:--Loustalot, in the _Revolutions
de Paris_, founded by Prudhomme, and continued alternately by Chaumette
and Fabre d'Eglantine; Marat, in the _Publiciste_ and the _Ami du
Peuple_; Brissot, in the _Patriote Francaise_; Gorsas, in the _Courier
de Versailles_; Condorcet, in the _Chronique de Paris_, Cerutti, in the
_Feuille Villageoise_; Camille Desmoulins, in the _Discours de la
Lanterne_, and the _Revolutions de Brabant_;