Levoz, tired of waiting for a decision from the Imperial Chamber, leased his Club to a manager, Paul Redouté, who opened it with dancing added to the attractions of dice and cards. The Bishop sent 200 soldiers to Spa, who closed the Club tables, and forbade all gaming except in the rooms to which he had granted the monopoly. A warrant was issued for the arrest of Redouté and M. Ransonnet, who had fought in the American War of Independence, and was now a leader among the disaffected party in Liége. The latter fled to Brussels, where the Brabant revolution against Joseph II. was approaching its climax, and sent letters to Liége, in which he said that a plan was on foot to establish a republic consisting of Brabant and the Principality of Liége. Would it not, he asked, be a glorious work to confine the Bishops to their Apostolic mission, as in the days of St. Hubert? Words like these made a deep impression at a time when the old influences of tradition and custom were beginning to lose their force. [Illustration: PONT DU PROPHÈTE, PROMENADE MEYERBEER, SPA WOODS] In the spring and summer of 1789 there was much suffering among the poor, owing to a bad season; and the Bishop arranged to celebrate July 21, the anniversary of his election, by a distribution of bread among the destitute. But before July 21 came, horsemen had galloped up the Valley of the Meuse with tidings of the wonderful things which had been done in France. 'Workers of iniquity,' Bassenge wrote, 'behold Paris, and tremble!' The Bastille had fallen on July 14, and a month later almost to a day, on August 16, the revolution in Liége began. For two days the people did nothing but march about the streets; but very early on the morning of Tuesday the 18th the tocsin was sounding over the town, and soon the market-place was filled by an immense crowd, all wearing cockades of red and yellow, the national colours. Baron de Chestret marched at the head of 200 armed men into the Hôtel de Ville, and expelled the burgomasters. This was followed by the election, at the famous Perron, of new burgomasters, one of them being Baron de Chestret, who, later in the day, went with a number of the insurgents to the Bishop's palace at Seraing, and demanded his presence in the city, and his written approval of what had been done. The Bishop, adorned with a red and yellow cockade, was hurried to Liége by the mob, who crowded round his carriage, shouting, blowing trumpets, and beating drums. The horses were taken out, and the rioters drew him to the Hôtel de Ville, and brought him into a room where the light of a single candle showed a number of men waiting for him sword in hand. A threatening voice came from the darkness, saying, 'The nation demands your signature. Make haste!' and the Bishop forthwith signed a number of documents which were placed before him, without waiting to read the contents. On the morrow he returned to Seraing; but a few days later he departed secretly for Tréves.