lready exceeded his
leave of absence, if he still continued in England
he would be considered as one of the Emigrants,
and consequently his whole property forfeited to
the nation. Such advices were not to be neglected,
and M. de F. was obliged to depart for Paris, but
not, however, without giving me hopes of his
return in some months, that is to say, when the
state of affairs would let him, for at present it
is a very difficult business, for a military man
especially, to obtain leave to absent himself.

On September 26 she writes:--

I can readily believe that the share of
sensibility I know you to be possessed of would
not suffer you to learn the tragical events of
which France has of late been the theatre, without
being much affected. My private letters confirm
the intelligence afforded by the public prints,
and assure me that nothing we there read is
exaggerated. M. de F. is at present in Paris. He
had determined on coming to England, but finds it
impossible to get away.

The crisis of her husband's fate was not far distant. How the tragedy
was led up to by the events of 1793, we do not know; but in February
1794 he was arrested on the charge of suborning witnesses in favour of
the Marquise de Marboeuf. The Marquise had been accused of conspiring
against the Republic in 1793;[31] one of the chief counts against her
being that she had laid down certain arable land on her estate at
Champs, near Meaux, in lucerne, sainfoin, and clover, with the object of
producing a famine. The Marquise, by way of defence, printed a memorial
of her case, stating, among other things, that she had not done what she
was accused of doing, and further, that if she had, she had a perfect
right to do what she liked with her own property. But it was evident
that things were likely to go hard with the Marquise at her trial. The
Comte de Feuillide then came upon the scene, and attempted to bribe
Morel, one of the Secretaries of the Committee of Safety, to suppress
incriminating documents, and even to bear witness in her favour. Morel
drew the Count on, and then betrayed him. The Marquise, her agent and
the Count were all condemned to death, and the Count suffered the
penalty on February 22, 1794.[32]

We cannot tell where Eliza was through thi