SENIOR DEPUTY OF THE COMMUNES. 175 



pretensions of the courtiers on the eve of an immense 

 revolution ? When the Greeks of the Lower Empire, 

 instead of going on the ramparts valiantly to repel the 

 attacks of the Turks, remained night and day collected 

 around some sophists in their lyceums and academies, 

 their sterile debates at least related to some intellectual 

 questions ; but at Versailles, there was nothing in action, 

 on the part of two out of three orders, but the most mis- 

 erable vanity. 



By an express arrangement, decreed from the begin- 

 ning, among the Members of the Communes, the Dean 

 or President had to be renewed every week. Notwith- 

 standing the incessant representations of Bailly, this leg- 

 islative article was long neglected, so fortunate did the 

 Assembly feel in having at their head this eminent man, 

 who to undeniable knowledge, united sincerity, modera- 

 tion, and a degree of patriotism not less appreciated. 



He thus presided over the Third Estate on the me- 

 moral^le days that determined the march of our great 

 revolution. 



On the 17th of June, for instance, when the Deputies 

 of the Communes, worn out with the tergiversations of 

 the other two orders, showed that in case of need they 

 would act without their concurrence, and resolutely 

 adopted the title of National Assembly, they provided 

 against presumed projects of dissolution, by stamping as 

 illegal all levies of contribution which were not granted 

 by the Assembly. 



Again, on the 20th of June, when the Members of the 

 National Assembly, affronted at the Hall having been 

 closed and their meetings suspended without an official 

 notification, with only the simple form of placards and 

 public criers, as if a mere theatre was in question, they 



