d and
envenomed their hate. The king, from a religious scruple, had for too
long suspended the execution of the decree of reunion. Trembling to
infringe upon the domain of the church, he deferred his decision, and
his impolitic delays gave time for crimes.

France was represented in Avignon by mediators. The provisional
authority of these mediators was supported by a detachment of troops of
the line. The power, entirely municipal, was confided to the
dictatorship of the municipality. The populace, excited and agitated,
was divided into the French or revolutionary party, and the party
opposed to the reunion by France and the Revolution. The fanaticism of
religion with one, the fanaticism of liberty with the other, impelled
the two parties even to crimes. The warmth of blood, the thirst of
private vengeance, the heat of the climate, all added to civil passions.
The violences of Italian republics were all to be seen in the manners of
this Italian colony, of this branch establishment of Rome on the banks
of the Rhone. The smaller states are, the more atrocious are their civil
wars. There opposite opinions become personal hatreds; contests are but
assassinations. Avignon commenced these wholesale assassinations by
private murders.

On the 16th of October a gloomy agitation betrayed itself by the mobs of
people collecting on various points, particularly consisting of persons
enemies of the Revolution. The walls of the church were covered with
placards, calling on the people to revolt against the provisional
authority of the municipality. There were bruited about rumours of
absurd miracles, which demanded in the name of Heaven vengeance for the
assaults made against religion. A statue of the Virgin worshipped by the
people in the church of the Cordeliers had blushed at the profanations
of her temple. She had been seen to shed tears of indignation and grief.
The people, educated under the papal government in such superstitious
credulities, had gone in a body to the Cordeliers to avenge the cause of
their protectress. Animated by fanatical exhortations, confiding in the
divine interposition, the mob, on quitting the Cordeliers, and
increasing as it went, hurried to the ramparts, closed the doors, turned
the cannon on the city, and then spread themselves through the streets,
demanding with loud clamours the overthrow of the government. The
unfortunate Lescuyer, notary of Avignon, secretary (_greffier_) of the
municipality, more