ment, are averse from risking their lives and properties in
the cause of Brissot or Condorcet.--At Amiens, where almost every
individual is an aristocrate, the fugitive Deputies could not procure the
least encouragement, but the town would have received Dumouriez, and
proclaimed the King without opposition. But this schism in the
legislature is considered as a mere contest of banditti, about the
division of spoil, not calculated to excite an interest in those they
have plundered and oppressed.
The royalists who have been so mistaken as to make any effort on this
occasion, will, I fear, fall a sacrifice, having acted for the most part
without union or concert; and their junction with the Deputies renders
them suspicious, if not odious, to their own party. The extreme
difficulty, likewise, of communication between the departments, and the
strict watch observed over all travellers, form another obstacle to the
success of any attempt at present; and, on the whole, the only hope of
deliverance for the French seems to rest upon the allied armies and the
insurgents of La Vendee.
When I say this, I do not assert from prejudices, which often deceive,
nor from conjecture, that is always fallible; but from unexceptionable
information--from an intercourse with various ranks of people, and a
minute observance of all. I have scarcely met with a single person who
does not relate the progress of the insurgents in La Vendee with an air
of satisfaction, or who does not appear to expect with impatience the
surrender of Conde: and even their language, perhaps unconsciously,
betrays their sentiments, for I remark, they do not, when they speak of
any victory gained by the arms of the republic, say, Nous, or Notre
armee, but, Les Francais, and, Les troupes de la republique;--and that
always in a tone as though they were speaking of an enemy.--Adieu.
June 30, 1793.
Our modern travellers are mostly either sentimental or philosophical, or
courtly or political; and I do not remember to have read any who describe
the manner of living among the gentry and middle ranks of life in France.
I will, therefore, relieve your attention for a moment from our actual
distresses, and give you the picture of a day as usually passed by those
who have easy fortunes and no particular employment.--The social
assemblage of a whole family in the morning, as in England, is not very
common, for the French do not generally breakfast: when they do, it is
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