,Sr£ FRANCE. 



nation some of the heavy charges contained in its declaration of waf 

 against the king of Hungary and Bohemia, now emperor of Ger- 

 many. On the 26th day of the same month, the Prussian monarch 

 issued a concise exposition of the reasons which determined him to 

 take up arms against France. He pleaded his alliance with the 

 emperor ; and that, as sovereign of a German state, he was bound to 

 interfere 10 prevent the violation of the rights of the German princes 

 of Alsace and Lorrain, and the invasion of the territories of others ; 

 and he concluded by honestly avowing that it was his intention to 

 repress the too great liberty of France, which might afford a danger- 

 ous example to neighbouring countries. At the same time the duke 

 of Brunswick, general of the combined armies of Austria and Prus- 

 sia, published, at Coblentz, a declaration to the inhabitants of France, 

 conceived in the most haughty and presumptuous terms : he declar- 

 ed his intention of putting a stop to the anarchy which prevailed in 

 France, and of restoring the king to his power ; and yet he afterwards 

 says his design was not to interfere in the internal government. It 

 is unnecessary to dwell on the other parts of this insolent memorial ; 

 in which France was already regarded as a conquered country, and 

 directions were given to the magistrates, national guards, and inhabi- 

 tants at large : but the threat that the city of Paris should be given up 

 to military execution, in case the least outrage should be offered to 

 the king, queen, or royal family, is worthy of a Hun. 



The excesses of the night between the 9th and 10th of August we 

 relate with pain. At midnight the alarm-bell sounded in every quar- 

 ter of Paris, the generate was beat, and the citizens flew to arms. The 

 palace of the Thuilleries was attacked by the multitude ; and the 

 king, queen, and royal family, were forced to take refuge in the 

 national assembly. At first the Swiss guards (who were obnoxious 

 to the people, and had been ineffectually proscribed by repeated 

 decrees of the assembly, the king not being allowed to have a foreign 

 guard) repelled the populace ; but these being reinforced by the 

 Marseillois, and federates from Brest, (bodies which the Jacobins 

 seem to have brought to Paris to balance the Swiss) and by national 

 guards, the gates of the palace were burst open. The artillery joined 

 the assailants. The consequences were, that, after a slaughter of 

 about four hundred on each side, the Swiss guards were exterminat- 

 ed, and the palace ransacked. 



The month of September seemed pregnant with the total ruin of 

 French freedom ; while the three following months reversed the 

 scene, and exhibited a tide of success on the part of France, perhaps 

 unexampled in modern history. It is with infinite concern that we 

 direct the attention of our readers to the prison scene, which occurred 

 on the 2d and 3d of September. The horrid massacre of the de- 

 fenceless prisoners, and other aristocrats, which took place at that 

 period, is an eternal disgrace to the Parisian populace ; who, in their 

 fury, spared not even that gentle sex which all civilized nations hold 

 in the highest respect. The number of the slain has doubtless been 

 exaggerated, as usual ; yet supposing that, by the most moderate 

 account, only two thousand perished, the enormity of the deed 

 remains the same. Some extenuation might be offered for the 

 affair of the 10th of August in which a people, who supposed them- 

 selves betrayed to slavery and all its evils, so recently experienced 

 and shaken off, assumed their revenge and their cause into their own 

 hands ; but no defence can be offered for this unnecessary crime. Had 



