La Chesnaye, who had succeeded to the command of the National Guard in consequence of Mandat's death, put himself at the head of the escort. This was formed of detachments from the most loyal battalions, the Petits-Pères, the Suite des Moulins, and the Filles-Saint-Thomas, re-enforced by about two hundred Swiss, commanded by the colonel of the regiment, Marquis de Maillardoz, and the major, Baron de Bachmann. The cortège reached the great staircase by way of the Council Hall, the Royal Bedchamber, the OEil-de-Boeuf, the Hall of the Guards, and the Hall of the Hundred Swiss. As he was passing through the OEil-de-Boeuf, Louis XVI. took the hat of the National Guard on his right, and replaced it by his own, which was adorned with white feathers. The guard, surprised, removed the King's hat from his head and carried it under his arm.
When Louis XVI. arrived at the foot of the stairs in the Pavilion of the Horloge, his thoughts recurred to the faithful adherents who had so uselessly devoted themselves to his defence, and whom he was leaving at the Tuileries without watchword or direction. "What is going to become of all those who have stayed up stairs?" said he.—"Sire," replied Roederer, "it seemed to me that they were all in colored coats. Those who have swords need only lay them off, follow you, and go out through the garden."—"That is true," returned Louis XVI. In the vestibule, a little further on, as he was about to quit the fatal palace which fate had condemned him never to re-enter, he had a last moment of scruple and hesitation. He said again: "But after all, there are not many people on the Carrousel."
"True, Sire," replied Roederer; "but the faubourgs will soon arrive, and all the sections are armed, and have assembled at the municipality; besides, there are neither men enough here, nor are they determined enough to resist the actual gathering on the Carrousel, which has twelve pieces of artillery."
The die is cast; Louis XVI. abandons the Tuileries. Respect alone restrains the grief and indignation that move the Swiss soldiers and the noblemen whose weapons and whose blood have been refused. They looked down from the windows at the cortège, or better, the funeral procession of royalty. It was about seven o'clock in the morning. The escort was drawn up in two lines. The members of the department formed a circle around the royal family. Roederer walked first. Then came the King, with Bigot de Sainte-Croix, Minister of Foreign Affairs, at his side; the Queen followed, giving her left arm to M. du Bouchage, Minister of Marine, and her right hand to the Dauphin, who held Madame de Tourzel with the other; then Madame Royale and Madame Elisabeth, with De Joly, Minister of Justice; the Minister of War, D'Abancourt, leading the Princess de Lamballe. The Ministers of the Interior and of Taxes, Champion de Villeneuve and Le Roux de la Ville, closed the procession. The air was pure and the morning radiant. The sun lighted up the garden, the marble sculpture, and the sheets of water. Birds sang under the trees, and nature smiled on this day of mourning as if it were a festival.
Looking at the populace, Madame Elisabeth said: "All those people have gone astray; I should like them to be converted; I should not like them to be punished." Tears stood in the eyes of the little Madame Royale. The Princess de Lamballe said mournfully: "We shall never return to the Tuileries!" The Prince de Poix, the Duke de Choiseul, Counts d'Haussonville, de Vioménil, de Hervilly, and de Pont-l'Abbé, the Marquis de Briges, Chevalier de Fleurieu, Viscount de Saint-Priest, the Marquis de Nantouillet, MM. de Fresnes and de Salaignac, the King's equerries, and Saint-Pardoux, the equerry of Madame Elisabeth, followed the sad procession. They passed through the grand alley unobstructed as far as the parterres, then turned to the right, toward the alley of the chestnut trees. There a halt of some minutes occurred, in order to give time for warning the Assembly. Louis XVI. looked down at a heap of dead leaves which had been swept up by the gardeners after a storm the night before. "There are a good many leaves," said the King; "they are falling early this year." It was only a few days before that Manuel had written in a journal that the King would not last until the falling of the leaves. Perhaps Louis XVI. remembered the prophecy of the revolutionist; the Dauphin, with the carelessness belonging to his age, amused himself by kicking about the dead leaves, the leaves that had fallen as his father's crown was falling at this moment.
Before the royal family could enter the Assembly chamber, it was necessary that the step the King had taken should be announced to the deputies. The president of the department undertook this commission. A deputation of twenty-four members was at once sent to meet Louis XVI. They found him in the large alley at the foot of the terrace of the Feuillants, a few steps from the staircase leading up to it, and which goes as far as the lobby through which one enters the hall occupied by the National Assembly. "Sire," said the leader of the deputation, "the Assembly, eager to contribute to your safety, offers to you and your family an asylum in its midst."
During this time, the terrace and the staircase had become thronged by a furious crowd. A man carrying a long pole cried out in rage: "No, no; they shall not enter the Assembly. They are the cause of all our troubles. This must be ended. Down with them!" Roederer, standing on the fourth step of the staircase, cried: "Citizens, I demand silence in the name of the law. You seem disposed to prevent the King and his family from entering the National Assembly; you are not justified in opposing it. The King has a place there in virtue of the Constitution; and though his family has none legally, they have just been authorized by a decree to go there. Here are the deputies sent to meet the King; they will attest the existence of this decree." The deputies confirmed his words. Nevertheless, the crowd still hesitated to leave the way clear. The man with the pole kept on brandishing it, and crying: "Down with them! down with them!" Roederer, going on to the terrace, snatched the pole and flung it into the garden. The crowd was so compact that in the midst of the squabble some one stole the Queen's watch and her purse. A man with a sinister face approached the Dauphin, took him from Marie Antoinette, and lifted him in his arms. The Queen uttered a cry. "Do not be frightened," said the man; "I will do him no harm." Another person said to Louis XVI.: "Sire, we are honest men; but we are not willing to be betrayed any longer. Be a good citizen, and don't forget to drive away your shavelings and your wife." Insults and threats resounded from all sides. Finally, after an actual struggle, the royal family succeeded in opening a passage. They made their way with difficulty through the narrow lobby, choked with people, penetrated the crowd, and entered the session chamber. It was there that royalty, humiliated and overcome, was to lie at the point of death under the eyes of its implacable enemies.