thither. This defection of contemptuous diplomatic Dumouriez
falls heavy on the fine-spoken high-sniffing Hommes d'etat, whom he
consorted with; forms a second epoch in their destinies.

Or perhaps more strictly we might say, the second Girondin epoch,
though little noticed then, began on the day when, in reference to this
defection, the Girondins broke with Danton. It was the first day of
April; Dumouriez had not yet plunged across the morasses to Cobourg, but
was evidently meaning to do it, and our Commissioners were off to arrest
him; when what does the Girondin Lasource see good to do, but rise,
and jesuitically question and insinuate at great length, whether a main
accomplice of Dumouriez had not probably been--Danton? Gironde grins
sardonic assent; Mountain holds its breath. The figure of Danton,
Levasseur says, while this speech went on, was noteworthy. He sat erect,
with a kind of internal convulsion struggling to keep itself motionless;
his eye from time to time flashing wilder, his lip curling in Titanic
scorn. (Memoires de Rene Levasseur (Bruxelles, 1830), i. 164.) Lasource,
in a fine-spoken attorney-manner, proceeds: there is this probability to
his mind, and there is that; probabilities which press painfully on him,
which cast the Patriotism of Danton under a painful shade; which painful
shade he, Lasource, will hope that Danton may find it not impossible to
dispel.

"Les Scelerats!" cries Danton, starting up, with clenched right-hand,
Lasource having done: and descends from the Mountain, like a lava-flood;
his answer not unready. Lasource's probabilities fly like idle dust; but
leave a result behind them. "Ye were right, friends of the Mountain,"
begins Danton, "and I was wrong: there is no peace possible with these
men. Let it be war then! They will not save the Republic with us: it
shall be saved without them; saved in spite of them." Really a burst of
rude Parliamentary eloquence this; which is still worth reading, in
the old Moniteur! With fire-words the exasperated rude Titan rives and
smites these Girondins; at every hit the glad Mountain utters chorus:
Marat, like a musical bis, repeating the last phrase. (Seance du 1er
Avril, 1793 in Hist. Parl. xxv. 24-35.) Lasource's probabilities are
gone: but Danton's pledge of battle remains lying.

A third epoch, or scene in the Girondin Drama, or rather it is but
the completion of this second epoch, we reckon from the day when the
patience of virtuous Pet