68] ANNUAL: REGISTER, 
horrence in which they asserted that 
they were held. by .the legislative 
-body, as sufficiently appeared by 
the wrath and violence with which 
they reprohated the approach of a 
body of troops near Paris, as if they 
had been enemies. But they would 
prove themselves the friends of 
their country. They had been the 
founders and protectors of its liber- 
ty, and would maintain it against 
its open or concealed, foreign or 
domestic, foes. It was not surpri- 
sing, therefore, that the partizans of 
the formerdespotism, that had crept 
into the-councils,. should betray so 
much enmity to the republican mi; 
litary. 
Royal terror, they said, was now 
substituted to that cruel, terrorism 
which lately oppressed the republic, 
The tribunals hadacquitted assassins 
and conspirators, and condemned, 
without mercy, indiyidualéof known 
patriotism, Brottier, Dunan, Le- 
villeharnois, notoriously, the agents 
of Lewis, were instances of . the re- 
turning influence of royalism, Judge- 
ment hadbeen pronounced in favour 
of these men, notwithstanding their 
manifest guilt. Even the priest 
Poule, who had attempted to m ie 
der Syeyes, had met with an. ac- 
quittal. . The purchasers of national 
estates , were plundered, and .ex- 
_cluded. from. official preferments, 
while recalled emigrants were pro- 
moted to functions. of trust. , So ef- 
fectual and powerful was the influ- 
ence et the royal party, that when 
the law, for suppressing political 
meetings, was proposed in the coun- 
ceil of five hundred, only one mem- 
ber attempted to oppose that evi- 
dent violation of public liberty, but 
he could not even obtain a lrear- 
ing. 
“While royalism was making this 
1797. 
alarming progress at) home, efforts 
were, also used to introduce it into 
the armies. Men, unknown. to 
them,.. had replaced republican of-) 
ficers,..and.this plan was. gaining 
ground. In. the council of. five 
hundred, several members explicitly 
declared, in the debateon the Gen- 
dermerie, that it was necessary. to 
place, at the head of that numerous 
body ,of men, all the- officers that 
had served in it. before the revolu> 
tion, whatever might be their ‘opi- 
nions. What was this but restore 
ing the aristocrats, and the royalists, 
to their commands, and thus deli- 
vering the republic into the hands 
of its. worst enemies ?, Men who 
had been fighting against their 
country, and had incited all Europe 
to. confederate for the destruction 
of its liberty, and the re-e stablish- 
ment of kings and nobles. Could 
the members of , the legislature, 
while betraying their~trust in so 
glaring and scandalous a manner, 
imagine that their protestations of 
attachment. to the interestsof the 
republic would meet with any be- 
lief? The armies. were too well 
persuaded of their, perfidious de- 
sjgns, to endure, any longer, the 
continuance of so much treachery 
and deception: 
Such was the general purport — 
and substance of this celebrated ad- 
dress. It made a profound impres-_ 
sion upon the councils, They. now: 
had a clear conception of the peri- 
lous situation wherein theirconduct 
had placed them, and of the light» 
in. which 4t was viewed by the. most > 
formidable of its opposers,. whom 
they had either neglected, or found © 
it impr, acticable to win over to their 
projects. & 
The suspicion, of roy orn: under 
which they lay, procured ¢redit to 
al 
