Yours ever,
S.
I shall not write again before our departure.
572.
Lord Sheffield to Edward Gibbon.
Paris, July 8th, 1791.
The system of getting rid of the King will not do. The night before last the principal men of the Committees, the Chiefs of the National Assembly, about 100 in number, met, and after a considerable debate, they resolved that the Constitution should be maintained, and that the person of the King is inviolable. Only two of them, Messrs. Dumont and Petier, were of a different opinion, and they argued for a tryal. La Clos,[175] the friend of the Duke of Orleans, the night preceding the Jacobins, vigorously insisted on a Tyral and a Regency, but it is known that a great majority of the National Assembly wish to restore the King and to put him in the situation he held before his flight, and to give him a Council. The Queen not being a part of the Constitution, they do not intend to take any notice of her; much management is necessary to keep the people quiet, and the Chiefs dare not as yet bring forward moderate measures. The National Guard wish to get rid of the King. The resolution I mention in the beginning of this letter is intended to be kept secret as much as possible for the present. The measure will be carried with some difficulty. I have scarce a moment. On Monday we attend the Apotheosis of Voltaire.[176] On Tuesday next we go to the National Assembly for the last time (having the President's Box), and on Wednesday we talk of setting out for La Suisse, but I must stop a day or two at Dijon and one or two perhaps at Besançon. We suppose the Websters lost, because we have not heard from them.
Yours,
S.