“Above all, madame, do not forget that I foresee a great difficulty in bringing out the three principal members of the family. They may possibly think themselves safer in the Temple than on the high-road. The personal risk which you are running makes me shudder. Your courage is worthy of the admiration of all Europe, and if any harm comes to you, as the result of so heroic an enterprise, I shall be among those who will deplore it most.” Three days later another letter came to Ketteringham, telling of the good progress of the attempt. Peltier was going to despatch his servant to Amiens, whither the Baron d’Auerweck had gone, and the latter would in this way receive his instructions. But there was no time to lose. The storm was muttering in Paris. Pressed by the “Forward” groups, frightened by the redoubled insurrections, the Convention had been compelled to proceed to the trial of the King. “Circumstances are becoming so urgent,” wrote Peltier, “that we have not a moment to lose; they talk of trying the King so as to calm down the insurrections that are breaking out everywhere.” And, indeed, it was necessary to make haste. After the discovery of the papers in the famous “Iron Press” in the Tuileries, the Convention had agreed that the King should appear before them. On December 10 Robert Lindet made his report, and the next day Barbaroux presented “the deed enunciating the crimes of Louis Capet.” On the same day the King appeared before the bar of the Convention, there to answer the thirty-one questions which were put to him. Like lightning, this terrifying news crossed the Channel, and reached London in a few hours. Peltier’s rooms filled with horrified people, “who met there all day long to weep and despair.” “I cannot conceal from you, madame,” wrote Peltier that evening to his friend, “that the danger to the Royal Family is very great at this moment. Truly I cannot hope that they will still be alive at the end of the fortnight. It is heartrending. You will have seen the English papers. You will have read Robespierre’s abominable speech, and how it was applauded by the Tribunes; and, above all, you will have seen about these new documents, which have been twisted into a crime of the unhappy King’s because people _will not_ see that all the steps he took to regain his authority were taken for the good of his people, and that his sole object was to save them by force if necessary from the evils which are destroying them, now that they no longer have a King.” But even yet all was not lost. If they arrived too late to save the King, there was still the Dauphin, “to whom every one should look.” In a few days the Baron d’Auerweck would be in Paris, and they would know exactly how much they might still hope for.