the most complete moral and literary education, and who thus prepare them for the liberal professions of society.  Danton’s father died young.  His mother had married again to a manufacturer of Arcis-sur-Aube, who had (and himself managed), a small cotton mill.  There is still to be seen near the river, without the city, in a pleasant spot, the house, half rustic half town built, and the garden on the banks of the Aube, where Danton’s infancy was passed.

His step-father, M. Ricordin, attended to his education as he would have done that of his own child.  He was of an open communicative disposition, and was beloved in spite of his ugliness and turbulence; for his ugliness was radiant with intellect, and his turbulence was calmed and repented of at the least caress of his mother.  He pursued his studies at Troyes, the capital of Champagne.  Rebellious against discipline, idle at study, beloved by his masters and fellow pupils, his rapid comprehension kept him on an equality with the most assiduous.  His instinct sufficed without reflection.  He learned nothing; he acquired all.  His companions called him Catiline—­he accepted the name, and sometimes played with them at getting up rebellions and riots, which he excited or calmed by his harangues—­as if he were repeating at school the characters of his after life.

XI.

M. and Madame Ricordin, already advanced in years, gave him, after his education was finished, the small fortune of his father.  He came to finish his studies in law at Paris, and bought a place in parliament as a barrister, where he practised little and without any notoriety.  He despised chicanery; his mind and language had the proportions of the great causes of the people and the throne.  The Constituent Assembly began to stir them.  Danton, watchful and impassioned, was anxious to mingle with them:  he sought the leading men, whose eloquence resounded throughout France.  He attached himself to Mirabeau; became connected with Camille Desmoulins, Marat, Robespierre, Petion, Brune (afterwards the marshal), Fabre d’Eglantine, the Duc d’Orleans, Laclos, Lacroix, and all the illustrious and second class orators who then “fulmined over” Paris.  He passed his whole time in the tribunes of the Assembly, in the walks, and the coffee-houses, and his nights in the clubs.  A few well-seasoned words, some brief harangues, some bursts of mysterious lightning:  and above all, his hair like a horse’s mane, his gigantic stature, and his powerful voice, made him universally remarked.  Yet beneath the purely physical qualities of the orator men of intelligence remarked great good sense and an instinctive knowledge of the human heart.  Beneath the agitator they discerned the statesman.  Danton in truth read history, studied the ancient orators, practised himself in real eloquence, that which enlightens in its passion, and beneath his actual part was preparing another much superior.  He only asked the movement to raise him so high that he might subsequently control it.