ssue of eloquent impostures,
and of fallacious promises[86].

[Footnote 86: It was the performance of the Duke of
Otranto.]

"_The Committee of Government to the French._

"Frenchmen,

"Under the difficult circumstances, in which the reins of government
were entrusted to us, it was not in our power, to master the course of
events, and repel every danger: but it was our duty, to protect the
interests of the people, and of the army, equally compromised in the
cause of a prince, abandoned by fortune and by the national will.

"It was our duty, _to preserve_ to our country the precious remains of
those brave legions, whose courage is superior to misfortune, and who
have been the victims of a devotion, which their country now claims.

"It was our duty, to save the capital from the horrors of a siege, or
the chances of a battle to maintain the public tranquillity amid the
tumults and agitations of war, _to support the hopes of the friends of
liberty_, amid the fears and anxieties of a suspicious foresight. It
was above all our duty, to stop the useless effusion of blood. We had
to choose _between a secure national existence_, or run the risk of
exposing our country and its citizens to a general convulsion, that
would leave behind it neither hope, nor a future.

"_None of the means of defence_, that time and our resources
permitted, nothing that the service of the camps or of the city
required, have we neglected.

"While the pacification of the West was concluding, plenipotentiaries
went to meet the allied powers; and all the papers relative to this
negotiation have been laid before our representatives.

"The fate of the capital is regulated by a convention: its
inhabitants, whose firmness, courage, and perseverance, are above all
praise, will retain the guarding of it. _The declarations of the
sovereigns of Europe must inspire too great confidence, their promises
have been too solemn, for us to entertain any fears of our liberties,
and of our dearest interests, being sacrificed to victory._

"_At length we shall receive guarantees_, that will prevent the
alternate and transient triumphs of the factions, by which we have
been agitated these five and twenty years; that will terminate our
revolutions, and _melt down under one common protection_ all the
parties, to which they have given rise, and all those, against which
they have contended.

"Those guarantees, which have hitherto exist