Danton now contemplated what was done after Napoleon had reigned and lived, after Louis XVIII had reigned and died, after Charles X had been driven from the French throne—the giving of a King to France, not belonging directly to the hated Bourbons, but to the younger branch, the Orleanists, the leader of whom, Philip Equality, had voted Louis XVI’s death. He was never crowned; he died on the scaffold. His son, Louis Philippe, ultimately became King of France.
Philip Equality refused the proposal.
Meanwhile, the Convention was becoming a mere field of battle. On one particular night, the two sides clash—a poniard is drawn, a pistol is clapped to a breast, and murder is nearly done. It is felt that one party must be swept away, or nothing will be done. The moderate party, the Girondists, twenty-two in all, are to-night nearer the scaffold by a long journey than they were in the morning.
Marat is declared a traitor by two hundred and twenty voices, against ninety-two. Marat defies the vote, throws himself into the arms of the people, and is borne home in triumph.
The people rise in his favor.
On the 24th of April (the Queen has been waiting death during three months) Marat is strong enough to appear and defy Parliament. He commands them to declare him innocent of treason. This defiance is carried to the thousands of armed men waiting the issue outside the House of Assembly. A cannon-like roar from the people declare their will—and he is pronounced innocent.
The people place him on a plank, the throne of the people, and bear him through the streets, after crowning him with flowers.
“It is you, the people,” he cries, “who crown themselves upon my head. I am the King of Poverty. May every head, which would rear itself above the level of the people soon fall, when I cry ‘Kill!’”
A few days, and, in his arrogance, he says to his brother Conventionists, “I hold you as a little water in the palm of this hand; and as readily as I spill it, so I can spill the blood of all of you!”