Spain came to a rupture with the republic, after having interceded in vain for Louis XVI., and made its neutrality the price of the life of the king.  The German Empire entirely adopted the war; Bavaria, Suabia, and the Elector Palatine joined the hostile circles of the empire.  Naples followed the example of the Holy See, and the only neutral powers were Venice, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, and Turkey.

In order to confront so many enemies, the Convention decreed a levy of 300,000 men.

The Austrians assumed the offensive, and at Liege put our army wholly to the rout.

Meanwhile, partial disturbances had taken place several times in La Vendee.  The Vendeans beat the gendarmerie at Saint Florens.  The troops of the line and the battalions of the National Guard who advanced against the insurgents were defeated.

At the same time tidings of new military disasters arrived, one after the other.  Dumouriez ventured a general action at Neerwinden, and lost it.  Belgium was evacuated, Dumouriez had recourse to the guilty project of defection.  He had conference with Colonel Mack, and agreed with the Austrians to march upon Paris for the purpose of re-establishing the monarchy, leaving them on the frontiers, and having first given up to them several fortresses as a guarantee.  He proceeded to the execution of his impractical design.  He was really in a very difficult position; the soldiers were very much attached to him, but they were also devoted to their country.  He had the commissioners of the Convention arrested by German hussars, and delivered them as hostages to the Austrians.  After this act of revolt he could no longer hesitate.  He tried to induce the army to join him, but was forsaken by it, and then went over to the Austrian camp with the Duc de Chartres, Colonel Thouvenot, and two squadrons of Berchiny.  The rest of his army went to the camp at Famars, and joined the troops commanded by Dampierre.

The Convention on learning the arrest of the commissions, established itself as a permanent assembly, declared Dumouriez a traitor, authorised any citizen to attack him, set a price on his head, and decreed the famous Committee of Public Safety.

V.—–­The Committee of Public Safety

Thus was created that terrible power which first destroyed the enemies of the Mountain, then the Mountain and the commune, and, lastly, itself.  The committee did everything in the name of the Convention, which it used as an instrument.  It nominated and dismissed generals, ministers, representatives, commissioners, judges, and juries.  It assailed factions; it took the initiative in all measures.  Through its commissioners, armies and generals were dependent upon it, and it ruled the departments with sovereign sway.

By means of the law touching suspected persons, it disposed of men’s liberties; by the revolutionary tribunal, of men’s lives; by levies and the maximum, of property; by decrees of accusation in the terrified Convention, of its own members.  Lastly, its dictatorship was supported by the multitude who debated in the clubs, ruled in the revolutionary committees; whose services it paid by a daily stipend, and whom it fed with the maximum.  The multitude adhered to a system which inflamed its passions, exaggerated its importance, assigned it the first place, and appeared to do everything for it.