and obstreperous adversaries, scattered, inert, and mute.

IV. Turmoil of the elections of 1790.--Elections in 1791.--Effect of
the King's flight.--Domiciliary visits.--Montagne during the electoral
period.

Will they at least be able to vote freely on that day? They are not
sure of it, and, judging by occurrences during the past year, it is
doubtful.--In April, 1790, at Bois d'Aisy, in Burgundy, M. de Bois
d'Aisy, a deputy, who had returned from Paris to deposit his vote,[2123]
was publicly menaced. He was informed that nobles and priests must take
no part m the elections, while many were heard to say, in his hearing,
that in order to prevent this it would be better to hang him. Not far
off; at Ste. Colombe, M. de Viteaux was driven out of the electoral
assembly, and then put to death after three hours of torture. The same
thing occurred at Semur; two gentlemen were knocked down with clubs and
stones, another saved himself with difficulty, and a cure died after
being stabbed six times.--A warning for priests and for gentlemen: they
had better not vote, and the same good advice may be given to dealers in
grain, to land-owners, and every other suspected person. For this is the
day on which the people recover their sovereignty; the violent believe
that they have the right to do exactly what suits them, nothing being
more natural than to exclude candidates in advance who are
distrusted, or electors who do not vote as they ought to.--At
Villeneuve-St.-Georges, near Paris,[2124] a barrister, a man of austere
and energetic character, is about to be elected judge by the district
electors; the proletariat, however, mistrust a judge likely to condemn
marauders, and forty or fifty vagabonds collect together under the
windows and cry out: "We don't want him elected." The cure of Crosne,
president of the electoral assembly, informs them in vain that the
assembled electors represent 90 communes, nearly 100,000 inhabitants,
and that "40 persons should not prevail against 100,000. Shouts redouble
and the electors renounce their candidate.--At Pau, patriots among
the militia[2125] forcibly release one of their imprisoned leaders,
circulate a list for proscriptions, attack a poll-teller with their
fists and afterwards with sabers, until the proscribed hide themselves
away; on the following day "nobody is disposed to attend the electoral
assembly."----Things are much worse in 1791. In the month of June, just
at the time of the opening