ADOLPHUS’S HISTORY OF FRANCE. 
Marquis de Bouillé was directed to march 
against the insurgents, that a consider- 
able force was rapidly collected, and 
that he appearcd at the gates of Nancy 
before the mutineers were informed that 
he had commenced his march. “ His 
presence produced a momentary awe: 
the revolted soldiers, on his summons, 
delivered up Messrs. Malseigne and de 
Noue; but before the gates could be 
thrown open, with fatal levity they re- 
sumed their arms, and pointed a cannon 
against the troops which had advanced 
within thirty paces of the gates.” 
On a reference to the Marquis’s own 
account of this affair, we find that M. 
de Malseigne was the officer who was 
charged with the execution of the de- 
cree of the national assembly, and the 
Marquis merely with a commission to 
render him every assistance, and employ 
arms if the insurgents persisted in re- 
bellion. Soon after the passing of this 
decree, De Bouillé, who had long been 
commandant of Metz and of the pro- 
vinces des Evéchés, received an order 
from the king to take under his com- 
mand the troops of Lorraine, Alsace, 
' Franche-Compté,and Champagne; these 
united to the garrison of Metz, formed 
an army consisting of an hundred and 
ten battalions, and a hundred and four 
squadrons. ‘There was reason to sus- 
pect, however, that a majority of these 
troops had not preserved their fidelity 
to their sovereign. The insurrection at 
Nancy in the mean time became more 
alarming ; the garrison was composed. 
of four battalions of the king’s regiment, 
accounted one of the best in’ France ; 
of two battalions of Swiss; and the re- 
giment of mestre de camp, which were 
cavalry.. To these were joined five or 
six thousand men from the town and 
neighbourhood, who had opened the 
arsenals, whence they had taken five 
thousand musquets, had seized on the 
powder magazines, and loaded eighteen 
pieces of cannon. The soldiers had 
plundered the military chest; exacted 
money of the constituted authorities, 
under pain of hanging the municipal 
officers and commissioners for the de- 
partment, in case of refusal; and had 
actually imprisoned several of their 
officers, and among others the general 
officer that commanded them. 
Such was the situation in which M. 
de Malseigne found Nancy; it is not to 
be wondered at, therefore, that the de- 
cree of the assembly should be treated 
267 
with derision, and that the officer who 
proclaimed it was glad to escape from 
an attempt made to seize him, to Lunes 
ville, where there was a body of carbi- 
neers, consisting of eight squadrons, 
who had hitherto conformed to military 
duty. 
The garrison at Nancy, enraged at 
the escape of Malseigne, proceeded in 
martial order to Luneville, for the pur- 
pose of compelling the carbineers to de- 
liver him into their hands. This out- 
rage on the person of a brother officer, 
who had been expressly appointed by 
the national assembly to proclaim and 
enforce its decree, first prompted the 
Marquis to assemble some troops and 
march against Nancy. The carbincers 
refused to deliver up Malseigne, and a 
slight engagement ensued between the 
two parties; the very next day, how- 
ever, these fickle cowards arrested their 
general, and sent him under an escort to 
Nancy, where the soldiers of the gar- 
rison threw him into prison. Informa- 
tion of this latter circumstance decided 
the Marquis to attempt a rescue, thouch 
under considerable apprehension of dis- 
obedience among his own troops, which 
consisted, morcover, only of three thou- 
sand infantry and fourteen hundred ca~ 
valry, while the town of Nancy con- 
tained no less than ten thousand men in 
arms. Preferring, on the score of pru- 
dence as well as of humanity, persuasion 
to hostility, on the morning of the 30th 
of August the Marquis introduced a 
proclamation into the town, command. 
ing the people to conform to the decrees 
of the assembly, and deliver up the most 
factious of their chiefs ; four and twenty 
hours were allowed them to prepare an 
answer. After some ineffectual nego- 
tiations between the parties, the Marquis 
begun his march: he had proceeded 
within half a league of the town, when 
he was met by a deputation, to whose 
proposals he gave the same answer as 
before, allowing an hour for decision: 
this hour expired ; and at four o’clock in 
the afternoon his advanced guard ap- 
proached the gates of the town, which 
were defended by troops and armed in- 
habitants with several pieces of canncn. 
Within a few paces from one of these 
gates, another deputation advanced from 
the town, who assured the Marquis that 
his orders should be instantly obeyed, 
that the regiments were already leaving 
the town, and repairing to the place he 
had appointed, and that the two general 
