e to be done here."
["The King hesitated, the Queen manifested the highest dissatisfaction.
'What!' said she,' are we alone; is there nobody who can act?'--'Yes,
Madame, alone; action is useless--resistance is impossible.' One of the
members of the department, M. Gerdrot, insisted on the prompt execution of
the proposed measure. 'Silence, monsieur,' said the Queen to him;
'silence; you are the only person who ought to be silent here; when the
mischief is done, those who did it should not pretend to wish to remedy
it.' . . .
"The King remained mute; nobody spoke. It was reserved for me to give the
last piece of advice. I had the firmness to say, 'Let us go, and not
deliberate; honour commands it, the good of the State requires it. Let us
go to the National Assembly; this step ought to have been taken long ago:
'Let us go,' said the King, raising his right hand; 'let us start; let us
give this last mark of self-devotion, since it is necessary.' The Queen
was persuaded. Her first anxiety was for the King, the second for her
son; the King had none. 'M. Roederer--gentlemen,' said the Queen, 'you
answer for the person of the King; you answer for that of my
son.'--'Madame,' replied M. Roederer, 'we pledge ourselves to die at your
side; that is all we can engage for.'"--MONTJOIE, "History of Marie
Antoinette."]
The Queen said to me as she left the King's chamber, "Wait in my
apartments; I will come to you, or I will send for you to go I know not
whither." She took with her only the Princesse de Lamballe and Madame de
Tourzel. The Princesse de Tarente and Madame de la Roche-Aymon were
inconsolable at being left at the Tuileries; they, and all who belonged to
the chamber, went down into the Queen's apartments.
We saw the royal family pass between two lines formed by the Swiss
grenadiers and those of the battalions of the Petits-Peres and the Filles
Saint Thomas. They were so pressed upon by the crowd that during that
short passage the Queen was robbed of her watch and purse. A man of great
height and horrible appearance, one of such as were to be seen at the head
of all the insurrections, drew near the Dauphin, whom the Queen was
leading by the hand, and took him up in his arms. The Queen uttered a
scream of terror, and was ready to faint. The man said to her, "Don't be
frightened, I will do him no harm;" and he gave him back to her at the
entrance of the chamber.
I leave to history all the details of tha
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