On Saturday the 11th of July, at three in the afternoon, Necker was sitting down with his wife and a certain friend to dinner: the excellent dinner of a man worth four millions of money—doubtfully acquired. Ten thousand men lay at arms within an hour of Versailles; at all the issues of Paris were troops amounting to at least two divisions more—mainly German cavalry: one regiment at Charente, Samade; one regiment at Ivry; one, of German hussars, at the Champ de Mars; one, of Swiss infantry, with a battery, at the Étoile (where is now the Arc de Triomphe). Two more, German, south of the river; a whole camp at the northern gate—and many others. No food could enter the city save by leave of that circle of arms.... To Necker, so sitting there at table, was brought a note from the King; he opened it: it told him he was ordered out of office and ordered out of the kingdom too. He finished his dinner, and then took horse and coach and drove away along the Brussels road.
There followed three days which very much resembled, to the Queen and the General Staff of the Resistance, those days during which a general action is proceeding at the front and a stream of accounts, true and false, exaggerated, distorted, coming pell-mell and in the wrong order, confuse rather than inform the anxious ears at headquarters far in the rear. Men tore galloping to and fro continually up and down the twelve miles of road between the palace and the gates of Paris. “Paris had risen.” “No, only an unarmed mob parading the streets.” “Yes, there had been a collision with Lambesc’s cavalry.”... On Sunday, late, a cloud of dust was Lambesc’s orderly coming to Versailles with news: there had been no bloodshed. Monday more rumours: “They are forging weapons.”... “They cannot move: ... they lack ammunition.”... “They have formed patrols: ... the streets are patrolled.” Then, at night, fires were reflected on the cloudy sky down the valley—the populace were burning the Octroi Barriers.
It was determined by the chiefs of the army to force the northern gate of Paris and so to subdue the tumult—but there was neither fear nor haste: the tumult was a mere civilian tumult: the thousands roaring in Paris had no arms—and then what about organisation? How can a mob organise? Tuesday came, the 14th of July, a memorable day, and in the forenoon news or rumours reached Versailles that a stock of arms had been sacked. It was the arsenal—no, this time came details; it was the Invalides that had been sacked—twenty thousand muskets. More news: powder had been found and seized by the mob; in the great square before the Town Hall a jolly priest, sitting astride of a barrel, was seeing to the serving out of powder and of ball—one almost heard the firing. “The Bastille has most of the ammunition in Paris. No mob can take that! the pieces have been trained on the street a whole fortnight since.” “The Bastille has checked the mob.” “No, they have sacked that also, with all its ammunition.” “They have captured artillery.” “Nonsense! a mob cannot capture guns!” Then again, more definite and certain, longer accounts, eye-witnesses, as the afternoon drew on to evening. One: “It has fallen.” Another: “I saw the governor killed ... a thousand men in the crowd were hit, but the crowd kept on.... How many dead? A hundred, at least a hundred.” “They have cannon on Montmartre—the northern gate cannot be forced.” Berthier wrote to the King alone: “To-night the troops will master the streets.” And meanwhile, like a chorus of human voices to all this roar of powder, the Assembly was pouring out decisions and acting the moral sovereign manfully in the face of material arms—sitting “permanently.” Even at midnight, when nearly all was known and the popular victory assured, Bailly the Speaker was still sitting there presiding after a sitting of seventy-two hours over the drowsy Commons. And they had voted! They had voted regrets for Necker; they had voted the responsibility of all advisers of the King for these calamities: they had voted bankruptcy “infamous.” So many moral broadsides fired at the Queen.
The morning of the 15th dawned; the firing had ceased, the smoke had rolled away, and with the new day the issue of the action lay plain. Paris had conquered.
The King alone with his brother, unarmed, unguarded, walked to the Parliament House and announced the withdrawal of the mercenaries; the Queen—bitterness of irony!—had to stand smiling, with her children, at the central balcony of the palace above the courtyard and to receive the ardent homage of the people for the failure of her great design—in a few months, in October, she was to stand on that balcony again.
All that day and the next the King sat anxiously with his Council debating only one thing—Marie Antoinette’s purpose that he should fly. She urged it with vehemence: her jewels were packed and ready—they would fly to Metz and conquer in a civil war. But the majority outweighed her, notably old Broglie, who feared the issue of German mercenaries against French troops—and the King remained. She with angry tears gave way: it was decided that the King should, upon the contrary, seek Paris on the morrow, accept and legalise the acts of the city, its new popular armed force, its new elected Mayoralty—La Fayette the chosen head of the one, Bailly occupying the other.
AUTOGRAPH NOTE OF LOUIS XVI, RECALLING NECKER,
ON THE 16TH OF JULY, AFTER THE FALL OF THE BASTILLE
The royal plan had failed: let the King accept the new conditions and meet Paris half-way. Such were the decisions, and Louis wrote to Necker recalling him—the abortive Ministry of the Resistance was ended.
But that night, in the dead darkness, Artois fled from the coming terror; old Vermond also, the friend and tutor; Enghien, Condé, many another; and the Queen, with passionate love, compelled one who was now once more her friend to fly: the Madame de Polignac. She fled and was saved, bearing with her two ill-spelt, blotted lines in Marie Antoinette’s untrained and hurried hand: “Good-bye, dearest of my friends; it is a dreadful and a necessary word. Good-bye!”