es
bestowed on the Jacobins, how much such combinations are to be dreaded.
Their merit, it appears, consisted in the subversion of the monarchical
government, and their crime in ceasing to be useful as agents of tyranny,
the moment they ceased to be principals.

I am still sceptical as to the conversion of the Assembly, and little
disposed to expect good from it; yet whatever it may attempt in future,
or however its real principles may take an ascendant, this fortunate
concurrence of personal interests, coalition of aristocrats and
democrats, and political rivalry, have likewise secured France from a
return of that excess of despotism which could have been exercised only
by such means. It is true, the spirit of the nation is so much
depressed, that an effort to revive these Clubs might meet no resistance;
but the ridicule and opprobrium to which they have latterly been subject,
and finally the manner of their being sacrificed by that very Convention,
of which they were the sole creators and support, will, I think, cool the
zeal, and diminish the numbers of their partizans too much for them ever
again to become formidable.

The conduct of Carrier has been examined according to the new forms, and
he is now on his trial--though not till the delays of the Convention had
given rise to a general suspicion that they intended either to exonerate
or afford him an opportunity of escaping; and the people were at last so
highly exasperated, that six thousand troops were added to the military
force of Paris, and an insurrection was seriously apprehended. This
stimulated the diligence, or relaxed the indulgence, of the commission
appointed to make the report on Carrier's conduct; and it being decided
that there was room for accusation, the Assembly confirmed the decision,
and he was ordered into custody, to be tried along with the Revolutionary
Committee of Nantes which had been the instrument of his crimes.

It is a circumstance worth noting, that most of the Deputies who
explained the motives on which they thought Carrier guilty, were silent
on the subject of his drowning, shooting, and guillotining so many
thousands of innocent people, and only declared him guilty, as having
been wanting in respect towards Trehouard, one of his colleagues, and of
injuring the republican cause by his atrocities.

The fate of this monster exhibits a practical exposition of the enormous
absurdity of such a government. He is himself tried for th