period; a fourth part
of them going out monthly. The Convention will no more lie under bondage
of Committees, under terror of death; but be a free Convention; free
to follow its own judgment, and the Force of Public Opinion. Not less
natural is it to enact that Prisoners and Persons under Accusation shall
have right to demand some 'Writ of Accusation,' and see clearly what
they are accused of. Very natural acts: the harbingers of hundreds not
less so.

For now Fouquier's trade, shackled by Writ of Accusation, and legal
proof, is as good as gone; effectual only against Robespierre's Tail.
The Prisons give up their Suspects; emit them faster and faster. The
Committees see themselves besieged with Prisoners' friends; complain
that they are hindered in their work: it is as with men rushing out of
a crowded place; and obstructing one another. Turned are the tables:
Prisoners pouring out in floods; Jailors, Moutons and the Tail of
Robespierre going now whither they were wont to send!--The Hundred and
thirty-two Nantese Republicans, whom we saw marching in irons, have
arrived; shrunk to Ninety-four, the fifth man of them choked by the
road. They arrive: and suddenly find themselves not pleaders for life,
but denouncers to death. Their Trial is for acquittal, and more. As the
voice of a trumpet, their testimony sounds far and wide, mere atrocities
of a Reign of Terror. For a space of nineteen days; with all solemnity
and publicity. Representative Carrier, Company of Marat; Noyadings,
Loire Marriages, things done in darkness, come forth into light: clear
is the voice of these poor resuscitated Nantese; and Journals and Speech
and universal Committee of Mercy reverberate it loud enough, into
all ears and hearts. Deputation arrives from Arras; denouncing the
atrocities of Representative Lebon. A tamed Convention loves its own
life: yet what help? Representative Lebon, Representative Carrier must
wend towards the Revolutionary Tribunal; struggle and delay as we will,
the cry of a Nation pursues them louder and louder. Them also Tinville
must abolish;--if indeed Tinville himself be not abolished.

We must note moreover the decrepit condition into which a once
omnipotent Mother Society has fallen. Legendre flung her keys on the
Convention table, that Thermidor night; her President was guillotined
with Robespierre. The once mighty Mother came, some time after, with a
subdued countenance, begging back her keys: the keys were restored