Battle
must be the final test, and the whole aristocracy of Europe was certain,
Frenchmen knew, to succor the French aristocracy in distress.
So in the winter of 1790 the French fugitives congregated at Coblentz on
the German frontier, persuaded that they were performing a patriotic
duty in organizing an invasion of their country even should their onset
be fatal to their relatives and to their King. And Louis doubted not
that he also did his duty as a trustee of a divine commission when he in
one month swore, before the Assembly, to maintain the constitution
tendered him, and in the next authorized his brother, the Comte
d'Artois, to make the best combination he could among his brother
sovereigns for the gathering of an army to assert his divine
prerogative. On June 21, 1791, Louis fled, with his whole family, to
join the army of Bouille, with intent to destroy the entire race of
traitors from Mirabeau and Lafayette down to the peasants. He managed
so ill that he was arrested at Varennes, and brought back whence he
came, but he lied and plotted still.
Two years had elapsed between the meeting of the States-General and the
flight to Varennes, and in that interval nature had been busy in
selecting her new favored class.
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