it into the Rhone-stream; which,
once more, bears seaward a horrid cargo. (Moniteur, du 27 Juin, du 31
Aout, 1795; Deux Amis, xiii. 121-9.) Whereupon, at Toulon, Jacobinism
rises in revolt; and is like to hang the National Representatives.--With
such action and reaction, is not a poor National Convention hard
bested? It is like the settlement of winds and waters, of seas long
tornado-beaten; and goes on with jumble and with jangle. Now flung
aloft, now sunk in trough of the sea, your Vessel of the Republic has
need of all pilotage and more.

What Parliament that ever sat under the Moon had such a series of
destinies, as this National Convention of France? It came together to
make the Constitution; and instead of that, it has had to make nothing
but destruction and confusion: to burn up Catholicisms, Aristocratisms,
to worship Reason and dig Saltpetre, to fight Titanically with itself
and with the whole world. A Convention decimated by the Guillotine;
above the tenth man has bowed his neck to the axe. Which has seen
Carmagnoles danced before it, and patriotic strophes sung amid
Church-spoils; the wounded of the Tenth of August defile in handbarrows;
and, in the Pandemonial Midnight, Egalite's dames in tricolor drink
lemonade, and spectrum of Sieyes mount, saying, Death sans phrase. A
Convention which has effervesced, and which has congealed; which has
been red with rage, and also pale with rage: sitting with pistols in its
pocket, drawing sword (in a moment of effervescence): now storming to
the four winds, through a Danton-voice, Awake, O France, and smite
the tyrants; now frozen mute under its Robespierre, and answering his
dirge-voice by a dubious gasp. Assassinated, decimated; stabbed at, shot
at, in baths, on streets and staircases; which has been the nucleus
of Chaos. Has it not heard the chimes at midnight? It has deliberated,
beset by a Hundred thousand armed men with artillery-furnaces and
provision-carts. It has been betocsined, bestormed; over-flooded by
black deluges of Sansculottism; and has heard the shrill cry, Bread and
Soap. For, as we say, its the nucleus of Chaos; it sat as the centre of
Sansculottism; and had spread its pavilion on the waste Deep, where
is neither path nor landmark, neither bottom nor shore. In intrinsic
valour, ingenuity, fidelity, and general force and manhood, it has
perhaps not far surpassed the average of Parliaments: but in frankness
of purpose, in singularity of position, it s