uard
that they move off; through sensibility, in order not to witness such
sights: such is the resistance! In the meantime the crowd invade the
staircases, beat down and trample on the guards they encounter, and
burst open the doors with imprecations against the Queen. The Queen runs
off; just in time, in her underclothes; she takes refuge with the King
and the rest of the royal family, who have in vain barricaded themselves
in the oeil-de-Boeuf, a door of which is broken in: here they stand,
awaiting death, when Lafayette arrives with his grenadiers and saves
all that can be saved--their lives, and nothing more. For, from the crowd
huddled in the marble court the shout rises, "To Paris with the King!" a
command to which the King submits.

Now that the great hostage is in their hands, will they deign to accept
the second one? This is doubtful. On the Queen approaching the balcony
with her son and daughter, a howl arises of "No children!" They want to
have her alone in the sights of their guns, and she understands that. At
this moment M. de Lafayette, throwing the shield of his popularity over
her, appears on the balcony at her side and respectfully kisses her
hand. The reaction is instantaneous in this over-excited crowd. Both
the men and especially the women, in such a state of nervous tension,
readily jump from one extreme to another, rage bordering on tears. A
portress, who is a companion of Maillard's,[1443] imagines that she
hears Lafayette promise in the Queen's name "to love her people and be
as much attached to them as Jesus Christ to his Church." People sob and
embrace each other; the grenadiers shift their caps to the heads of the
body-guard. Everything will be fine: "the people have won their King
back."--Nothing is to be done now but to rejoice; and the cortege moves
on. The royal family and a hundred deputies, in carriages, form the
center, and then comes the artillery, with a number of women bestriding
the cannons; next, a convoy of flour. Round about are the King's Guards,
each with a National Guard mounted behind him; then comes the National
Guard of Paris, and after them men with pikes and women on foot, on
horseback, in cabs, and on carts; in front is a band bearing two severed
heads on the ends of two poles, which halts at a hairdresser's, in
Sevres, to have these heads powdered and curled;[1444] they are made to
bow by way of salutation, and are daubed all over with cream; there are
jokes and shouts