£12 Jeanette Needham. 
believed that the government possessed the means to carry out 
the policy announced in the royal session. All sorts of positive 
steps were taken to enforce its program. First and foremost 
stood the exclusion of the public from the hall. The hesitancy 
of the government—amounting practically to a refusal—in re- 
ceiving a deputation from the national assembly which desired 
to protest against the military guard about the hall, was but 
another side of the governmental policy. 
The king had the speeches and declarations printed and sent 
copies to the three orders.!. They appeared in the conservative 
papers devoted to government interests, as well as in the more 
radical organs of popular opinion.2 Heralds were notified to 
cry them in the streets of Versailles, but this order was not 
executed, because ‘‘the heralds had colds.’ The people of all 
France were to be reached by despatching copies of these docu- 
ments to the intendants in the provinces. Biauzat incorporated 
in the report to his constituents on June 26, the copy of a letter 
from the government to the intendant of his own généralité. 
It ran as follows: ‘‘I hasten to send you, sir, some copies con- 
taining the discourses and the declarations given by His Majesty 
at the session which he held the 23d of this month in the estates- 
general of the kingdom. The intention of the king is that you 
have them printed immediately and posted in your généralité 
and distributed to the principal officers of the municipalities 
and even to the syndics of the parishes. It is possible that 
false notions respecting the object of this session may have been 
given; and the prompt knowledge of the truth can only inspire 
confidence and confirm more and more the paternal intentions of 
His Majesty.’ Biauzat, however, warned his constituents not 
1 Proces-verbal, No. 6,2; Procés-verbal . . . de la noblesse, 252; Barmond, 
Récit, 267. 
2 Etats-généraux, Extrait du journal de Paris, 1, 94-107; Mercure de France: 
Journal Politique de Bruxelles, No. 27, 27-37. 
3 Lettres et bulletins de Barentin @ Louis XVI, LV, bulletin, dated 
June 24: “ J’avais donné des ordres pour faire crier les lois émanées hier de 
Votre Majesté; elles ne le sont pas encore, et sur la demande faite 4 
plusieurs crieurs pourquoi ils ne criaient pas, ils ont répondu qu’ils étaient 
enrhumés.”’ 
4 Biauzat, II, 143. 
226 
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