, and, worse
still, black cockades; and grain grows still more scarce. One Monday
morning, maternity awakes to hear children weeping for bread, must forth
into the streets. _Allons_! Let us assemble! To the Hotel de Ville, to
Versailles, to the lantern! All women gather and go; crowds storm all
stairs, force out all women; there is a universal "press of women." Who
will storm the Hotel de Ville, but for shifty usher Maillard, who
snatches a drum, beats his Rogues' March to Versailles! And after them
the National Guard, resolute in spite of _Mon General,_ who, indeed,
must go with them--Saint-Antoine having already gone. Maillard and his
menads demand at Versailles bread; speech with the king for a
deputation. The king speaks words of comfort. Words? But they want
"bread, not so much discoursing!"

Towards midnight comes Lafayette; seems to have saved the situation;
gets to bed about five in the morning. But rascaldom, gathering about
the chateau, breaks in. One of the royal bodyguard fires, whereupon the
deluge pours in, would deal utter destruction but for the coming of the
National Guard. The bodyguard mount the tri-colour. There is no choice
now. The king must from Versailles to Paris, in strange procession;
finally reaches the long-deserted Palace of the Tuileries. It is
Tuesday, October 6, 1789.

And so again, on clear arena under new conditions, with something even
of a new stateliness, we begin a new course of action. Peace of a father
restored to his children? Not only shall Paris be fed, but the king's
hand be seen in that work--_King Louis, restorer of French liberty!_

Alone of men, Mirabeau may begin to discern clearly whither all this is
tending. Patriotism, accordingly, regrets that his zeal seems to be
getting cool. A man stout of heart, enigmatic, difficult to unmask!
Meanwhile, finances give trouble enough. To appease the deficit we
venture on a hazardous step, sale of the clergy's lands; a paper-money
of _assignats_, bonds secured on that property is decreed; and young
Sansculottism thrives bravely, growing by hunger. Great and greater
waxes President Danton in his Cordeliers section. This man also, like
Mirabeau, has a natural _eye_.

And with the whole world forming itself into clubs, there is one club
growing ever stronger, till it becomes immeasurably strong; which,
having leased for itself the hall of the Jacobins' Convent, shall, under
the title of the Jacobins' Club, become memorable to all