DIGITISED MANUSCRIPTS

(° Bi) schemes for a constitution fashioned on the English and American pattern. The danger was in, and came from, Paris. Hmboldened by the apathy of the government, the electors of Paris organized committees and political clubs to stir up the people. The town went mad with political excitement. In every public place of resort, demagogues harangued the mob, and fanned the revolutionary flame. The ministers, hopelessly embarrassed, bewildered the king with contradictory advice, and involved him in the odium which they incurred by their duplicity. While publicly recommending more con- cessions and reforms, privately they insisted on an appeal to the army and civil war. It never occurred to the king to forestall the Assembly and promulgate a constitution, but even this course would not have saved the monarchy. It is not likely that the French nation would have settled down at that crisis under a constitution, seeing that in later times they have never abided for more than a few years by constitutional methods of govern- ment. The queen alone remained calm and collected. ‘She is the only man at Versailles!’ said Mirabeau admiringly of her. She justified his words, not so much by the soundness of her advice as by the intrepidity of her demeanour. ‘I know they will come from Paris and ask for my head,’ she told Madame Campan, ‘but I have learnt from my