d the poor gentlemen. A great
statesman appeared, a man named Mirabeau. Under his leadership, the
third estate defied the king, and the temper of the people was such
that the king dared not force them to do his will. In the midst of
these exciting times, a mob attacked the great Paris prison, the
Bastille. They took it by storm, and tore it to the ground. This
happened on the fourteenth of July, 1789, a day which the French still
celebrate as the birthday of their nation's liberty. All over France
the common people rose in revolt. The soldiers in the army would no
longer obey their officers. The king was closely watched, and when he
attempted to flee to Germany was brought back and thrown into prison.
Many of the nobles, in terror, fled from the country. Thus began what
is known as the French Revolution.

[Illustration: The Palace of Versailles]

As soon as the king was thrown into prison and the people of France
took charge of their government, a panic arose throughout the courts
of Europe. Other kings, alarmed over the fate of the king of France,
began to fear for themselves. They, too, had taxed and oppressed their
subjects. They felt that this revolt of the French people must be put
down, and the king of France set back upon his throne, otherwise the
same kind of revolt might take place in their countries as well.
Accordingly, the king of Prussia, the king of England, and the emperor
of Austria all made war on the new French Republic. They proposed to
overwhelm the French by force of arms and compel them to put back
their king upon his throne.

Of course, if the soldiers in the armies of these kings had known what
the object of this war was, they would have had very little sympathy
with it, but for years they had been trained to obey their officers,
who in turn obeyed their generals, who in turn obeyed the orders of
the kings. The common soldiers were like sheep, in that they did not
think for themselves, but followed their leaders. They were not
allowed to know the truth concerning this attack on France. They did
not know the French language, and had no way of finding out the real
situation, for there were no public schools in these countries, and
very few people knew how to read the newspapers. The newspapers,
moreover, were controlled by the governments, and were allowed to
print only what favored the cause of the kings.

The French, however, knew the meaning of the war. A young French poet
from Strasbourg o