were substituted for patriotism and obedience to the law.  They passed with a gloomy air beneath the windows of that Assembly they had so lately protected; still more sadly and more silently beneath the windows of the palace of that monarchy, whose cause rather than whose king, they had just defended.  Bailly, calm and glacial as the law—­La Fayette, resolute and stern as a system, knew not how to awake any feeling beyond that of imperious duty.  They furled the red flag, stained with the first drops of blood; and dispersed, battalion after battalion, in the dark streets of Paris, more like gendarmes after an execution, than an army returning from a victory.

Such was this “Day of the Champ-de-Mars,” which gave a reign of three months to the Assembly, by which they did not profit; which intimidated the clubs for a few days, but which did not restore to the monarchy or to the public tranquillity the blood it had cost.  La Fayette had on this day the destiny of the monarchy and the republic in his hands:  he merely re-established order.

XVI.

The next morning Bailly appeared before the Assembly to report to them the triumph of the law.  He displayed the heartfelt sorrow of his mind, and the masculine energy that formed part of his duty.

“The conspiracy had been formed,” said he; “it was necessary to employ force, and severe punishment has overtaken the crime.”  The president approved, in the name of the Assembly, of the mayor’s conduct, and Barnave thanked the national guard in cold and weak language, whilst his praises seemed near akin to excuses.  The enthusiasm of the victors had already subsided, and Petion perceiving this, rose and said a few words concerning a projet de decret that had just been proposed, against those who should assemble the people in numbers.  These words, in the mouth of Petion, who was well known to be the friend of Brissot and the conspirators, were at first received with sarcastic cries by the cote droit, and then with loud applause from the cote gauche and the tribunes.  The victory of the Champ-de-Mars was already contested in the Assembly, and the clubs re-opened that evening.  Robespierre, Brissot, Danton, Camille Desmoulins, and Marat, who had for some days past disappeared, now took fresh courage, for the hesitation of their enemies reassured them,—­by constantly attacking a power that was contented to remain on the defensive, they could not fail to weary it out, and thus, from accused they transformed themselves into accusers.  Their papers abandoned for a short time, became more malignant from their temporary panic, and heaped ridicule and odium on Bailly and La Fayette.  They aroused the people to vengeance by displaying unceasingly before their eyes the blood of the Champ-de-Mars.  The red flag became the emblem of the government and the winding-sheet of liberty.  The conspirators figured as victims, and constantly kept popular excitement on the rack, by imaginary stories of the most odious persecutions.