Lebois in the _Ami du peuple_ tried to
incite the soldiers to revolt, and for a while there were rumours of a
military rising. The trial of Babeuf and his accomplices was fixed to take
place before the newly constituted high court of justice at Vendome. On
Fructidor 10 and 11 (27th and 28th of August), when the prisoners were
removed from Paris, there were tentative efforts at a riot with a view to
rescue, but these were easily suppressed. The attempt of five or six
hundred Jacobins (7th of September) to rouse the soldiers at Grenelle met
with no better success. The trial of Babeuf and the others, begun at
Vendome on the 20th of February 1797, lasted two months. The government for
reasons of their own made the socialist Babeuf the leader of the
conspiracy, though more important people than he were implicated; and his
own vanity played admirably into their hands. On Prairial 7 (26th of April
1797) Babeuf and Darthe were condemned to death; some of the prisoners,
including Buonarroti, were exiled; the rest, including Vadier and his
fellow-conventionals, were acquitted. Drouet had succeeded in making his
escape, according to Barras, with the connivance of the Directory. Babeuf
and Darthe were executed at Vendome on Prairial 8 (1797).

Babeuf's character has perhaps been sufficiently indicated above. He was a
type of the French revolutionists, excitable, warm-hearted, half-educated,
who lost their mental and moral balance in the chaos of the revolutionary
period. Historically, his importance lies in the fact that he was the first
to propound socialism as a practical policy, and the father of the
movements which played so conspicuous a part in the revolutions of 1848 and
1871.

See V. Advielle, _Hist. de Gracchus Babeuf et de Babouvisme_ (2 vols.,
Paris, 1884); P. M. Buonarroti, _Conspiration pour l'egalite, dite de
Babeuf_ (2 vols., Brussels, 1828; later editions, 1850 and 1869), English
translation by Bronterre O'Brien (London, 1836); _Cambridge Modern
History_, vol. viii.; Adolf Schmidt, _Pariser Zustaende wahrend der
Revolutionszeit von 1789-1800_ (Jena, 1874). French trans. by P. Viollet,
_Paris pendant la Revolution d'apres les rapports de la police secrete,
1789-1800_ (4 vols., 1880-1894); A. Schmidt, _Tableaux de la Revolution
francaise, &c._ (Leipzig, 1867-1870), a collection of reports of the secret
police on which the above work is based. A full report of the trial at
Vendome was published in four volumes at Pari