ree of liberty in
the little town of Bedouin; sixty-three of the inhabitants were
executed; the rest fled. "I have wished to give the national vengeance a
grand character," wrote Maignet to the Committee of Public Safety, "and
I have ordered that the town should be given to the flames. If you think
this new measure too rigorous, let me know your wishes, and do not read
my letter to the Convention." To the complaints of Rovere,
representative of Vaucluse, Robespierre replied, "We are content with
Maignet; he knows well how to guillotine." Joseph Lebon established an
orchestra close by the guillotine; he caused the _Ca ira_[44] to be sung
during the executions, which he witnessed from his balcony. Formerly a
priest and well esteemed, he was moderate at the outburst of the
Revolution, but his reason had yielded to the dizziness of despotic
power; it was of a veritable madman that Barere said: "Lebon has
completely beaten the aristocrats, and he has protected Cambrai against
the approaches of the enemy; besides, what is there that is not
permitted to the hatred of a republican against the aristocracy? The
Revolution and revolutionary measures must only be spoken of with
respect. Liberty is a virgin whose veil it is culpable to raise."

For some time Robespierre had appeared but rarely at the Committee of
Public Safety; he reserved himself for the department of general police,
that is to say, the direction of the "Terror" throughout France.
Underhand dissensions and jealousies began to creep in among these
criminals, secretly disquieted by projects of which they were
reciprocally suspicious. Billaud-Varennes and Collot d'Herbois dreaded
Robespierre and began to conspire against him. Robespierre established
himself with the Jacobins, as in an impregnable fortress. The President
and Vice-President of the Revolutionary Tribunal, and the commandant of
the armed forces, Henriot, awaited his orders. They pressed him to take
action against the enemies whom he had himself denounced to the
Jacobins. "Formerly," said he, "on the 13th Messidor [July 1st], the
underhand faction that has sprung from the remnant of the followers of
Danton and Camille Desmoulins attacked the committees _en masse_; now
they prefer to attack a few members in particular; in order to succeed
in breaking the bundle, they attribute to a single individual that which
appertains to the whole Government. They dare not say that the
Revolutionary Tribunal has been ins