148] 
dently wished for a return of such 
times as they had formerly enjoyed. 
This party was the most numerous 
in France, but they were forced to 
conceal their sentiments, and they 
were not united. They were of 
course, as usually happens in all 
countries, kept under by a smaller 
number, in possession of the powers 
of government. But, in the capital, 
where the minds of men were stimu- 
lated and fortified in their senti- 
ments and designs, by mutual inter- 
course, and which had so long been 
the seat of intrigues and attempts of 
opposite parties, there was a great 
number of discontented individuals, 
waiting for opportunities of pub- 
licly avowing their sentiments, in op- 
position to those of the’presentrulers, 
and to support them by open force. 
The vigilance of the directory ob- 
viated their designs, and contained 
them within bounds. So_ restless 
and determined, however, were the 
enemies to the present government, 
that, farther to secure the public 
tranquillity, they thought it expedi- 
ent to add another minister to the 
six already appointed by the consti- 
tution, to whom was given the offi- 
cial title of minister of the police. 
Through precautions of this na- 
ture, peace was maintained at Pa- 
ris, but disturbances broke out, oc- 
casionally, in several parts of the re- 
public. The southern departments, 
long a'prey.to that warmth and im- 
petuosity of temper which charac- 
terize their inhabitants, were at this 
time plunged into confusions that 
required the immediate interposition 
of gevernment to suppress them. 
As the people in those parts had 
been particularly ill treated by the 
jacobin party, they had, ever since 
the fall of Koberspierre, meditated 
schemes of vengeance against the ine 
ANNUAL REGISTER, 1796. 
struments of his tyranny, and of the 
many cruelties exercised upon them. 
They executed these Pee to 
their full extent; and many of the 
guilty agents, in the atrocities com- 
mitted among them, were sacrificed 
to their revenge. 
The moderation that governed 
the councils ef those who succeeded 
to the power of Roberspierre, put 
a stop to those executions. The 
prudence of the commissioners sent 
to pacify these departments, had al- 
most restored them to peace and 
utual conciliation, when, unfor- 
titnately for their repose, a man was 
sent to represent and to exercise the 
supreme authority of the state in 
those parts, who had already signa- 
lized himself there by his enormi- 
ties, 
This was the famous Freron, a 
man of courage and abilities, but of 
a fierce and sanguinary disposition. 
The people in those departments 
had filled the places of administra- 
tion, in their respective distriéts, 
with persons of their own chusing. 
These were immediately displaced 
by Freron, who substituted to them 
individuals notorious for their crimes 
and the blood they had shed. He 
reinstituted the societies, and renew- 
ed those revolutionary committees 
that had filled France with such 
horror; and he authorized them to 
break those members of the various 
municipalities whose principles dif- 
fered from their own. 
During several months, the op- 
pressed inhabitants of those depart- 
ments were compelled to submit to 
the tyranny of Freron and his parti- 
zans, who strove with indefatigable 
zeal to re-establish the reign of ter- 
rorism. But the direétory, who felt 
the necessity of putting an end to 
the influence which the jacobins 
"were 
“v 
