As the election could not take place on the 1st Prairial, since that date was already past, the 20th Fructidor was appointed.
It was hoped that the first act of the French, reunited after such terrible occurrences, would be like that of the Federation at the Champ de Mars—an act of fraternity, and that a hymn would be sung advocating forgiveness of wrongs. It was on the contrary a sacrifice to vengeance! All the pure, disinterested and energetic patriots were driven from the Sections, which began to organize insurrection. The defeated patriots hurried to the Convention, where they related what had happened, thereby putting the Convention on its guard against the Sections. Furthermore they demanded the restoration of their arms, declaring that they would use them in defence of the Republic.
The next day, and the day following, the Convention realized the full danger of the situation when they saw that, out of the forty-eight Sections composing the population of Paris, forty-seven had accepted the Constitution but had rejected the decrees. The Section of the Quinze-Vingts alone had accepted both the Constitution and the decrees.
On the other hand, the armies, two of which were reduced to inaction by the peace with Prussia and with Spain, voted without reserve, amid cries of enthusiasm. The army of the Sambre-et-Meuse, the only one which was still actively engaged, had conquered at Wattignies, raised the[Pg 248] siege of Mauberge, triumphed at Fleurus, given Belgium to France, crossed the Rhine at Dusseldorf, besieged Mayence, and followed with the victories of the Ourthe and the Roer, thus securing the Rhine to France. This army paused upon the battlefield, where it had just won a victory, and over the bodies of the Frenchmen who had just died for liberty, swore fidelity to the Constitution, which, while it put an end to the Terror, still maintained the Republic and the Revolution.
The day which brought the news of this enthusiastic vote was a great one for the Convention and for all true patriots of France. On the 1st Vendémiaire, of the Year IV. (23d September, 1795), the result of the voting was announced. The Constitution was unanimously accepted. The decrees were passed by an immense majority. In some places votes had even been cast for a king—which showed how great was the freedom which had obtained during the two months following the 9th Thermidor.
This news created the greatest excitement in Paris—an excitement at once twofold and varied in character. There was joy among the patriots who sided with the Convention, and fury among the royalist Sections.
Then it was that the Section Le Peletier, known during the Revolution as the Section of the Daughters of Saint Thomas, the most reactionary of all the Sections, and the one whose grenadiers had resisted the men from Marseilles on the 10th of August, set up this decree:
"The power of every constituted body ceases before that of the assembled people."
This decree, favorably voted upon by the Section, was converted into a resolution, and sent to the forty-seven other Sections, who received it with favor. It was a simple method of proclaiming the dissolution of the Assembly.
The Convention was not intimidated. It replied by a declaration and a decree. It declared that if its power was threatened it would retire to one of the provincial towns and there continue to exercise its functions. It decreed[Pg 249] that all the territory conquered on the French side of the Rhine, as well as Belgium, Liège, and Luxemburg, should thereafter belong to France. Thus did it reply to the threat of its overthrow by a proclamation of its grandeur.
The Section, treating with the Convention as power with power, then sent its president, at the head of six members, to notify it of what it termed a Measure of Protection; namely, of a decree issued by the Section declaring that, before the will of the assembled people, the powers of all the constituent bodies should cease.
The president was a young man of twenty-four or five, and although he was dressed quietly, a supreme elegance, due more to his bearing than to his garments, was manifest in his whole person. He was attired fashionably, without exaggeration, in a frock-coat of dark red velvet with jet buttons, and buttonholes worked in black silk. A cravat of white foulard with floating ends swathed his neck; a waistcoat of white piqué with bright blue flowers, trousers of pearl-gray tricot, white silk stockings, pumps, and a low, broad-brimmed hat with a pointed crown, completed his attire. He had the clear, fair complexion of a man of the North or East, eyes both piercing and earnest, and fine white teeth, with full red lips. A tri-color sash, folded in such a way that very little of it was visible save the white, girdled his waist, which was admirably shaped; a sword hung from this sash, and he carried two pistols stuck in it.
He advanced alone to the bar of the Convention, and in that tone of lofty insolence which had not yet descended to the bourgeoisie, or to which that class had not attained, he said in a loud voice, addressing the president, Boissy d'Anglas:
"Citizen-Representative, in the name of the Mother Section, of which I have the honor to be president, and in the name of the forty-seven other Sections—the Section of the Quinze-Vingts alone excepted—I come to announce to you that you are deprived of your powers and that your reign is over. We approve of the Constitution, but we reject the[Pg 250] decrees; you have no right to nominate yourselves. It is for you to deserve our choice, and not to command it."
"The Convention recognizes no power, either that of the Mother Section or of any other," said Boissy d'Anglas; "and it will treat as rebels all who refuse to obey its decrees."
"And we," said the young man, "will treat as oppressor any power which shall try to impose an illegal act upon us."
"Take care, citizen," said Boissy d'Anglas, in his calm voice, which carried hidden menace in it. "No one has a right to raise his voice above that of the president of this assembly."
"Except me," said the young man—"except me, for I am above him."
"And who are you?"
"I am the sovereign people."
"And who then are we whom the people have elected?"
"From the moment that the people reassembled and deprived you of the power with which they had vested you, you ceased to be of importance. Appointed three years ago, you are weakened, wearied, worn out with the struggle of those three years. You represent the needs of an epoch which is past, and which has disappeared. Could any one, three years ago, have foreseen the events which have taken place? Nominated only three days ago, I represent the will of yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow! You were elected by the people. Admitted! But by the people of '92, whose work it was to tear down royalty, to establish the rights of man, and to drive the foreigner from the frontier, to erect scaffolds, to bring down heads which were too high, and to divide property. But your work is done; whether well or ill it matters not; it is done, and the 9th Thermidor gives you your dismissal. To-day, Men of the Storm, you wish to perpetuate your powers, when the needs which created you have disappeared; when royalty is dead, the enemy driven out, and even property is divided, scaffolds are useless. You desire for your own selfish purposes, your own personal ambition, to perpetuate your powers, to control[Pg 251] our choice, and to force yourselves upon the people. The people do not want you. A pure epoch requires pure hands. The Chamber must be purged of the Terrorists, whose names are inscribed in history as the men of September and the men of the guillotine. It must be—it is the logical sequence of the situation, the expression of the conscience of the people, the will of forty-seven Sections; that is to say, of the population of Paris!"
This speech was listened to in astonished silence, but it had scarcely ended in a voluntary pause on the part of the orator, when a terrible uproar burst forth in the Chamber and the tribunes. The young president of the Section Le Peletier had just voiced aloud what every royalist committee, the emigrés, and the Chouans had been whispering at all the street corners for the past fortnight. The question between the monarchists and the Republicans was clearly defined for the first time.
The president of the Convention rang his bell violently to restore order; then, seeing that no attention was paid to it, he put on his hat. Meanwhile the president of the Section Le Peletier, with one hand on his pistols, was calmly waiting until the clamor should have sufficiently subsided for the president of the Convention to reply to him.
It was long before silence could be restored, but order came at last. Boissy d'Anglas made a sign that he wished to speak. He was the very man to reply to such a speaker. The overbearing arrogance of the one was met by the disdainful pride of the other. The monarchical aristocrat had spoken, and the liberal aristocrat was about to reply to him. Although there was a frown upon the president's brow, and his eyes were dark and menacing, his voice was calm.
"You have listened to the orator who has just spoken," he said. "May you judge of the strength of the Convention by its patience. If any man had dared a few months ago to use here the language which the president of the Section Le Peletier has employed, his rebellious utterances would not[Pg 252] have been heard to an end. The orator's arrest would have been immediately decreed, and his head would have fallen upon the scaffold the following day. And why? Because in days of carnage we are in doubt about everything, and we therefore destroy everything that may threaten our rights, that we may doubt no more. In the days of peace we pursue a different course, because we are no longer doubtful about our rights, and because, though attacked by the Sections, we have behind us the whole of France and our invincible armies. We have listened to you without impatience, and we can therefore reply to you without anger. Go back to those who sent you; tell them that we give them three days in which to return to their allegiance, and that if they do not voluntarily obey the decrees within three days we shall compel them to do so."
"And you," replied the young man, "if within three days you have not resigned your commission, if you have not withdrawn the decrees, and have not proclaimed the freedom of the elections, we declare to you that Paris will march against the Convention, and that it will feel the anger of the people."
"Very good," said Boissy d'Anglas; "it is now the 10th Vendémiaire—"
The young man did not allow him to finish.
"On the 13th Vendémiaire," said he; "I give you my word that that will be another bloody date to add to your history!"
And rejoining his companions, he went out with them, threatening the entire assembly with a gesture. No one knew his name, for he had been appointed president of the Section Le Peletier through Lemaistre's instrumentality only three days before.
But every one said: "He is neither a man of the people nor a bourgeois; he must be an aristocrat."