June 6, 1793.—A singular chance placed in my hands to-day a note written by Robespierre. I hastened to take a copy, as it was of the greatest interest. It sums up in a few firm and concise lines the policy which he purposes henceforth to impress upon the Jacobin party, which, since the 31st of May, is master of power:
There must be one will.
In order that it may be Republican, there must be Republican ministers, Republican journals, Republican deputies, a Republican government. The Republic can not establish itself save with honest and Republican officials.
The foreign war is a deadly scourge so long as the body politic is suffering from the convulsions of revolution, and from divided counsels. The present insurrection must be sustained until the proper measures be taken to save the Republic. The people must rally to the Convention, and the Convention must serve the will of the people. The insurrection must extend further and further, on the same plan; the sans-culottes must be paid and remain in the cities. They must be furnished with arms, encouraged, and enlightened.
JUNE 7, 1793.—I received this day a letter from Victoria, in fulfilment of her promise to write me each week. Not to mention the profound grief her absence caused us, our uneasiness over her was extreme, in spite of the assurances she gave us in her farewell letter. She now informed me that Oliver's health was improving, and that his spirits were returning. She did not despair of bringing him back to reason and the practice of his civic duties. She was living, she told me, at some distance from the capital; and she could not yet disclose to us the mainsprings of her mysterious conduct, and the reticence of her correspondence.
JUNE 10, 1793.—The majority of the Convention has just made recognition of the value of the passive insurrection of May 31, by adopting the appended resolution:
The National Convention declares that in the days of May 31 to June 4 the general revolutionary council of the Commune and the people of Paris powerfully co-operated to save the liberty, the unity and the indivisibility of the Republic.
JULY 12, 1793.—Upon a report from the committee rendered by St. Just, the Girondin members of the Convention were on the 10th of July declared traitors to the country, and outlawed. Several other adherents of that party were sent before the revolutionary tribunal.
JULY 19, 1793.—Last Saturday, July 13, Marat was assassinated, between seven and eight in the evening. His assailant was Marie Anne Charlotte Corday D'Armans, the daughter of an ex-nobleman, whose usual abode was Caen, one of those hot-beds of federal insurrection fomented by the Girondins. Simulating the role of a victim who besought assistance and protection from the Friend of the People, Charlotte Corday solicited an interview with him. Worn out and unwell, Marat was taking a bath, but yielding to compassion for the young girl who implored his aid, he consented to receive her. Introduced into his presence, Charlotte Corday struck him with a knife. He died almost instantly. I record this new assassination as an abominable crime! The beauty, the youth, the resolute character of Charlotte Corday in no wise lessen her guilt. It is vain to compare her with Brutus. He struck down Caesar, the undoubted tyrant of his country, whereas the patriotism of Marat, the Friend of the People, had never been called into question. Taken to-day before the revolutionary court presided over by Fouquier-Tinville, the accused woman confessed her connection with the Girondin party, of which she plainly was the instrument. She prided herself on having dealt Marat his death blow, the condign punishment, she said, for his crimes. Unanimously condemned by the jury to death, Charlotte Corday suffered on the scaffold the penalty for homicide.