DIGITISED MANUSCRIPTS

( 28 ) officers should be spared, once inside the fortress they massacred its defenders, and then set about razing it to the ground. Some few days later, Foulon, one of the un- popular ex-ministers of the king, had foolishly ventured abroad. At a time of great distress among the people he was credited with having made the remark: ‘If the rabble have no bread, let them eat grass.’ Though disguised as a work- man, he was recognised and captured, and, after having been insulted and maimed, was hanged on a lamp-post in the street. His head was then cut off and borne aloft upon a pole, the mouth stuffed with grass. The crowd then bent its course to the house of Foulon’s son-in-law, Berthier, who had incurred unpopularity in the discharge of his official duties. Having forced him to kiss the mangled trophy of their rage, these fiends dealt out to Berthier the same hideous fate they had inflicted on Foulon. When the news of the taking of the Bastille reached Versailles late in the night, the old Duke de Liancourt awakened the king to give him the information. ‘Why, itis a riot !’ exclaimed the king. ‘Sire, say it is a revolution,’ answered the duke. No measures were taken to quell the insurrection. Neither at this crisis, nor at any subsequent moment when prompt decision and energy were demanded, did the king rise to the occasion. To his credit,