nants at Savenay. Although
fighting continued long afterwards this proved the end of the Vendean
grand army.

These victories were immediately followed by judicial repression. The
_conventionnel_ Carrier organized a Revolutionary Tribunal at Nantes, and
committed worse horrors than Fouche had at Lyons. Finding a rate of 200
executions a day insufficient he invented the noyade. River barges were
taken, their bottoms were hinged so as to open conveniently, and
prisoners, tied in pairs, naked and regardless of sex, were taken out in
them, and released into the water. At Nantes, like at Arras and several
other points, the proceedings of the Revolutionary Tribunals and of the
gangs who worked the prisons, were marked by gross immorality in dealing
with the women prisoners. At Nantes, Carrier, {200} most thorough and
most infamous of the Terrorists, is said to have caused the death of
15,000 persons in four months.

The fury of the Revolution, which turned to frenzy and dementia at
Nantes, blazed into a marvellous flame of patriotic energy on the
frontiers. Nearly half a million men were enrolled in the course of
1793. A new volunteer battalion was added to each battalion of the old
army, the new unit being named a _demi-brigade_. Rankers were pushed up
to high command, partly by political influence, partly for merit.
Jourdan, an old soldier, a shop-keeper, became general of the army of the
north, and on the 15th of October defeated Coburg at Wattignies. The
brilliant Hoche, ex-corporal of the French guards, was placed at the head
of the army of the Moselle. Pichegru, the son of a peasant, took over
the army of the Rhine. Under these citizen generals new tactics replaced
the old. Pipe-clay and method gave way to Sans-culottism and dash. The
greatest of the generals of the Revolution said: "I had sooner see a
soldier without his breeches than without his bayonet." Rapidity,
surprise, the charging column, the helter-skelter pursuit, were the
innovations of {201} the new French generals. They translated into terms
of tactics and strategy, Danton's famous apostrophe, "Audacity, more
audacity, yet more audacity!"

[1] See Chap. XVII.

{202}

CHAPTER XIV

THERMIDOR

Danton had fallen fast in popularity and influence since the moment
when, after the fall of the Gironde, he had appeared to dominate the
situation. On the 12th of October, weary, sick at heart, disgusted at
the triumph of the Heberti