On their side the revolutionary party assembled that evening at the Jacobins, deplored their defeat, accused every one, and mutually recriminated on each other.  “See,” said their orators, “what underhand work has been accomplished in one night; what a triumph of corruption and fraud!  The members of the former Assembly have mixed with the new members in the chamber, and have infused into the ears of their successors those concessions that have ruined them.  After the sitting of that evening they mingled with the groups in the Palais Royal, spread alarm around, hinted of a second flight of the king, prognosticated trouble and anarchy, and made the people of Paris, who prefer their own private interests to the public weal, fear the utter destruction of confidence and the depression of the public credit.  Can this venal race resist such arguments?”

All the real feelings of Paris were infused the next day into the attitude and discourses of the Assembly.  “At the opening of the sitting,” says a Jacobin, “I took my place amongst the deputies who were discussing the best means to obtain the repeal of the decree.  I remarked that the decree having been carried the previous evening almost unanimously, it appeared impracticable to reckon upon so sudden and so scandalous a change of opinion.  ‘We are sure of the majority,’ was their reply.  I quitted my seat and took another, where precisely the same conversation passed.  I then took refuge in that part of the chamber that had been so long the sanctuary of patriotism:  there I heard the same arguments, the same apostacy.  All had been purchased in the course of the night, and the best proof that this work of corruption had been accomplished before the deliberation is, that all the orators who spoke against the decree had their speeches ready written.  Whence arises this surprise of the patriots?  Because the well-intentioned members of the Assembly do not know each other; they have not met or reckoned their numbers here.  It is true that you have opened your doors to receive them:  they have entered this room to examine your countenance and ascertain your forces; but they are not as yet associated and knit together; nor have they acquired, by frequent visits here, and by listening to your discourses, that confidence and patriotism that form the great and good citizen.”

The people, who sighed for repose after so many exciting scenes, destitute of work, money, and food, and intimidated by the approach of a severe winter, saw with indifference the attempt and the retraction of the Assembly, and suffered the deputies who had supported the decree to be insulted with impunity.  Goupilleau, Couthon, Basire, Chabot, were threatened in the very Assembly by the officers of the national guard.  “Beware!” said these soldiers of the people, bought over to the cause of the throne; “we will not suffer the Revolution to advance another step.  We know you—­we will watch you—­you shall be hewed to pieces by our bayonets.”  These deputies, seconded by Barrere, came to the Jacobins’ club, to denounce these outrages; but no effect was produced, and they gained nothing save expression of sterile indignation.