196 *“BAILLY. 
decision or doubt. He needs not high-flown expressions 
or protestations in order to convince; nor would an oath 
add authority to his words. He may be deceived, but he 
is never the deceiver. 
I will spare no effort to give to the description of the 
latter part of Bailly’s life, all the correctness which can 
result from a sincere and conscientious comparison of the 
writings published as well by the partisans as by the 
enemies of our great revolution. Such, however, is my 
desire to prevent two phases, though very distinct, being 
confounded together, that I shall here pause, in order to 
cast a scrupulous glance on the actions and on the various 
publications of our colleague. I shall moreover thus 
have an easy opportunity of filling up some important 
lacune. 
I read in a biographical article, otherwise very friendly, 
that Bailly was nominated the very day of, and immedi- 
ately after, the assassination of M. de Flesselles; and in 
this identity the wish was to insinuate that the first Mayor 
of Paris received this high dignity from the bloody hands 
of a set of wretches. The learned biographer, notwith- 
standing his good Will, has ill repelled the calumny. 
With a little more attention he would have succeeded 
better. A simple comparison of dates would have suf- 
ficed. ‘The death of M. de Flesselles occurred on the 
14th of July; Bailly was nominated two days after. 
I will address the same remark to the authors of a Bio- 
graphical Dictionary still more recent, in which they 
speak of the ineffectual efforts that Bailly made to pre- 
vent the multitude from murdering the governor of the 
Bastille (de Launay). But Bailly had no opportunity of 
making an effort, for he was then at Versailles; no duty 
called him to Paris, nor did he become Mayor till two 
