The Uprising of June 20, i'/^2 19 



at the decree of the assembly or at the insinuations made against 

 the national guard by the minister of war. They declared by 

 another decree that the assembly could not listen to petitions 

 which were the result of criminal intrigue. The Right, indignant 

 at this decision, retired from the hall and when the president 

 accorded the petitioners the honors of the session, the Left by a 

 motion of adjournment disposed of the petitioners and of the 

 question which they had forced upon the assembly.*^ 



Ill 



The Fall of the Girondist Ministry 



By the middle of June, the feeling of unrest, discontent, and 

 fear had become general and pronounced. There was danger, it 

 was believed, from the so-called Austrian faction, the Prussian 

 army was approaching, treason existed everywhere and grain 

 was getting dearer.^ 



Anarchy actually reigned. Would the assembly fill Paris with 

 an army of national guards? Partisans and adversaries of the 

 camp of federcs were continually on the point of coming to 

 blows. A street orator came into the garden of the Tuileries to 

 read a libel, preach the assassination of the king and foretell his 

 overthrow.^ Marat, although he had been condemned, continued 



" Ternaux, Histoire de la terreur, I, 116; Moniteur, XII, 635. The 

 Moniteur here states that the Left was the first to retire, but this is 

 apparently a misstatement, as it was the Left that carried the measure 

 against the petitioners. 



' Lindet, Correspondance, Si^; Lescure, Correspondance secrete, 601-03, 

 Lettre 20, Paris, 16 juin, 1792; Roederer, Chroiiique de cinquante jours, 3. 



"June 12, Delfaux, a member of the Right, denounced to the assembly a 

 Hbel that an orator had read to a crowd in the garden of the Tuileries. 

 Referring to Louis XVI, he said : " But this monster uses his power and 

 his treasure to oppose the regeneration of the French. A new Charles 

 IX, he wishes to bring upon France desolation and death. Go, cruel one, 

 your crimes will have an end. Damiens was less culpable than you. He 

 was punished with more horrible tortures for having wished to deliver 

 France from a monster. And you, whose attempt is twenty-five million 

 times greater, go unpunished. But tremble, tyrants, there is a Scaevola 

 among us." Moniteur, XII, 642. 



215 



