n of the
king, than any previous act of violence, or that it increased their
eagerness to escape with as little delay as possible. Indeed, the queen
regarded the public welfare as equally concerned with their own in their
safe establishment in some town to which they should also be able to
remove the Assembly, so that that body as well as themselves should be
protected from the fatal influence of the clubs of Paris, and of the
populace which was under the dominion of the clubs.[6] Accordingly, on the
20th of April, she writes to the emperor[7] that "the occurrence which has
just taken place has confirmed them more than ever in their plans. The
very guards who surrounded them are the persons who threaten them most.
Their very lives are not safe; but they must appear to submit to every
thing till the moment comes when they can act; and in the mean time their
captivity proves that none of their actions are done by their own accord."
And she urges her brother at once to move a strong body of troops toward
some of his fortresses on the Belgian frontier--Arlon, Vitron, or Mons--in
order to give M. de Bouille a pretext for collecting troops and munitions
of war at Montmedy. "Send me an immediate answer on this point; let me
know, too, about the money; our position is frightful, and we must
absolutely put an end to it next month. The king desires it even more than
I do."

As May proceeds she presses on her preparations, and urges the emperor to
accelerate his, especially the movements of his troops; but the Count
d'Artois and his followers are a terrible addition to her anxieties.
Leopold had told her that the ancient minister, Calonne, always restless
and always unscrupulous, was now with the count, and was busily stirring
him up to undertake some enterprise or other;[8] and her reply shows how
justly she dreads the results of such an alliance. "The prince, the Count
d'Artois, and all those whom they have about them, seem determined to be
doing something. They have no proper means of action, and they will ruin
us, without our having the slightest connection with their plans. Their
indiscretion, and the men who are guiding them, will prevent our
communicating our secret to them till the very last moment."

To Mercy she is even more explicit in her description of the imminence of
the danger to which the king and she are now exposed than she had been to
her brother. As the time for attempting to escape grew nearer, the
embassado