“‘The department of the Rhone, and the city of Lyons—the ancient metropolis of industry, and the courageous enemy of oppression. May its liberty, its dignity, and its prosperity be solidly founded on the full enjoyment of those social and natural rights which it has ever defended.’”
One hundred thousand copies of a pamphlet, containing an account of La Fayette’s late triumphal journey were published.
But this triumphal journey occasioned much chagrin among the enemies of French liberty, and the government, already growing more and more hostile to friends of liberty, took petty spite upon some of their officials, as the following will show.
The Paris Constitutional announced that “the minister of the interior has deposed the mayor and deputy-mayor of Vizille from their functions: the former, for having congratulated General La Fayette, upon his arrival in that town; and the latter, for having appeared on horseback when he entered.”
Another French paper says:—
“We stated yesterday the deposition of a mayor for having joined in the honors to La Fayette. We now add the proceedings to which this intended disgrace gave rise. ‘The intelligence of this event,’ says the Précurseur of Lyons, ‘inspired the inhabitants of the commune with the greatest indignation, not being able to conceive why peaceful citizens may not, without crime, honor one of the worthiest public men of the nation. The whole population assembled spontaneously in the public square; there each one expressed his regrets, and recalled with delight the useful and honorable acts of the displaced magistrates. Thence they proceeded to the office of the mayor, where these functionaries still were, and there Mr. Romain Peyron thus spoke, in the name of his fellow-citizens:—
“‘Mr. Mayor and Mr. Deputy: The inhabitants of this commune have learned with the greatest pain that, by a decree of the minister of the interior, you were deprived of the functions you have discharged with so much zeal, and in which you have so justly acquired the confidence and esteem of those whom you had to serve. The motives which have afforded the new ministry a pretext for this act are too honorable to be made a cause for complaint! You are, gentlemen, the first citizens stripped of their official functions for having taken part in the honors paid to General La Fayette! Let us not envy the enemies of the public liberties this poor satisfaction while all France is still echoing with the acclamations which everywhere burst forth upon the passage of this great citizen, and especially in the second city of the kingdom!
“‘The general who was the object of this enthusiasm will live in history, in spite of the calumnies of party men! The people will always recollect that he was, at that time, the zealous defender of legal liberty, which, among us, includes attachment to constitutional monarchy; that, on the 5th and 6th of October, he twice saved the lives of the royal family; that, previously to the 10th of August, he sacrificed his popularity in order to snatch Louis XVI. from the dangers that threatened him; and that, proscribed for his energetic protest at the bar of the Legislative Assembly, and arrested in a neutral country, he expiated, in the dungeons of Austria, the crime of having always faithfully observed the line of duty!
“‘You, gentlemen, you too, fulfilled a duty, in not separating yourselves from all these under your care, in those imposing circumstances when the presence of our magistrates, as the organs of our unanimous sentiments, added a new value to their manifestation, and ensured tranquillity and good order in the midst of our rejoicings.
“‘Receive, therefore, the expression of our thanks and of our regret.’”