went the length of resolving to separate the dauphin from his mother, on
the plea of providing for his education; but the means which the Girondins
took to secure their triumph for the moment defeated them. La Fayette did
not keep the secret. One of his friends gave information to the king of
the plot that was in contemplation, and the next day the
Constitutionalists mustered in the Assembly in such strength that neither
Girondins nor Jacobins dared bring forward the infamous proposal.

But Louis and Marie Antoinette reasonably regarded the attack on them as
only postponed, not as defeated or abandoned. They began to prepare for
the worst. They burned most of their papers, and removed into the custody
of friends whom they could trust those which they regarded as too valuable
to destroy; and at the same time they sent notice to their partisans to
cease writing to them. They could neither venture to send nor to receive
letters. They believed that at this time the plan of their enemies was to
terrify them into repeating their attempt to escape; an attempt of which
the espial and treachery with which they were surrounded would have
insured the failure, but which would have given the Jacobins a pretext for
their trial and condemnation. But this scheme they could themselves defeat
by remaining at their posts. Patience and courage was their only possible
defense, and with those qualities they were richly endowed.

A vital difference of principle distinguished the old from the new
ministry: the former had wished to preserve, the majority of the latter
were resolved to destroy, the throne; and the means by which each sought
to attain its end were as diametrically opposite as the ends themselves.
Bertrand and De Lessart, the ministers who, in the late administration,
had enjoyed most of the king and queen's confidence, had been studious to
preserve peace, believing that policy to be absolutely essential for the
safety of Louis himself. Because they entertained the same opinion, the
new ministers were eager for war; and, unhappily Dumouriez, in spite of
his desire to uphold the throne, was animated by the same feeling. His own
talents and tastes were warlike, and his office enabled him to gratify
them in this instance. For the conciliatory tone which De Lessart had
employed toward the Imperial Government, he now substituted a language not
only imperious, but menacing. Prince Kaunitz, who still presided over the
administration at