[225] Mounier, who was strongly in favor of two chambers and an absolute veto, in his Report to his Constituents, writes, in reference to some private and friendly conferences held at this time:
"These conferences, twice renewed, were unsuccessful. They were recommenced at the house of an American known for his abilities and his virtues, who had both the experience and the theory of the institutions proper for maintaining liberty. He gave an opinion in favor of my principles."
This American was unquestionably Thomas Jefferson. He saw the peril with which the Revolution was menaced, and that freedom needed as strong a guard against the blind impulses of the populace as against the encroachments of the court. Two houses might perhaps have checked the rush to ruin, but could hardly have averted the disaster. For ages the nobles had been "sowing the wind." It was the decree of God that they should "reap the whirlwind." "He visiteth the iniquities of the fathers upon the children."
[226] Brouillon: le Lettre de M. d'Estaing à la Reine (in Histoire Parlementaire, vol. iii., p. 24).
[227] "Le ministre de la guerre multiplia les congés de semestre, afin d'avoir un corps de volontaires royaux, composé de douze cent cents officiers."—Villiaumé, p. 34.
[228] Moniteur, vol. i., p. 568. Histoire de Deux Amis de la Liberté, t. iii.
[229] Thiers, vol. i., p. 106.
[230] "M. de la Fayette has been so calumniated, and his character is nevertheless so pure, so consistent, that it is right to devote at least one note to him. His conduct during the fifth and sixth of October was that of continual self-devotion, and yet it has been represented as criminal by men who owed their lives to it. The spirit of party, feeling the danger of allowing any virtues to a Constitutionalist, denied the services of La Fayette, and then commenced that long series of calumnies to which he has ever since been exposed."—Thiers, vol. i., p. 108.
[231] Thiers, vol. i., p. 111.
[232] "I saw her majesty in her cabinet an instant before her departure for Paris. She could scarcely speak. Tears poured down her face, to which all the blood in her body seemed to have mounted. She did me the favor to embrace me, and gave her hand to M. Campan to kiss, saying to us, Come immediately to take up your abode in Paris. We are utterly lost; dragged probably to death. Captive kings are always very near it."—Madame Campan, vol. ii., p. 84.