MARAT'S TRIUMPH.
Robespierre now demanded an act of accusation against the Girondists. Resistance was hopeless. The inundation of popular fury was at its flood, sweeping every thing before it. The most frightful scenes of tumult took place in the Convention, members endeavoring by violence to pull each other from the tribune.[394]
The whole Convention was now in a state of dismay, eighty thousand infuriate men surrounding it with artillery and musketry, declaring that the Convention should not leave its hall until the Girondists were arrested. The Convention, in a body, attempted to leave and force its way through the crowd, but it was ignominiously driven back. Under these circumstances it was voted that the leaders of the Girondists, twenty-two in number, should be put under arrest. This was the 2d of June, 1793.[395]
The Jacobins, having thus got rid of their enemies, and having the entire control, immediately decided to adopt a new Constitution, still more democratic in its character; and a committee was appointed to present one within a week. But the same division which existed in the Convention between the Jacobins and the Girondists existed all over France. In many of the departments fierce battles rose between the two parties.
In the mean time the Allies were pressing France in all directions. The Austrians and Prussians were advancing upon the north; the Piedmontese threading the passes of the maritime Alps; the Spaniards were prepared to rush from the defiles of the Pyrenees, and the fleet of England threatened every where the coast of France on the Mediterranean and the Channel.[396]
With amazing energy the Convention aroused itself to meet these perils. A new Constitution, exceedingly democratic, was framed and adopted. Every Frenchman twenty-one years of age was a voter. Fifty thousand souls were entitled to a deputy. There was but a single Assembly. Its decrees were immediately carried into execution.[397]
Danton, Robespierre, and Marat were now the idols of the mob of Paris and the real sovereigns of France. All who ventured opposition to them were proscribed and imprisoned. Members of the Republican or Girondist party every where, all over France, were arrested, or, where they were sufficiently numerous to resist, civil war raged.
At Caen there was a very beautiful girl, Charlotte Corday, twenty-five years of age, highly educated and accomplished. She was of spotless purity of character, and, with the enthusiasm of Madame Roland, she had espoused the cause of popular constitutional liberty. The principles of the Girondist party she had embraced, and the noble leaders of that party she regarded almost with adoration.
When she heard of the overthrow of the Girondists and their imprisonment, she resolved to avenge them, and hoped that, by striking down the leader of the Jacobins, she might rouse the Girondists scattered over France to rally and rescue liberty and their country. It was a three days' ride in the diligence from Caen to Paris. Arriving at Paris on Thursday the 11th of July, she carefully inspected the state of affairs, that she might select her victim, but confided her design to no one.