It was the Sections that began the movement, those Sections whose action was to have been so restricted, and which, upon the contrary, were becoming the permanent organs of expression in the capital. The Section Mauconseil on the 22nd of October sent in a petition for the dismissal of the cabinet and appealed to the National Assembly. The Section of the National Library followed suit three days later, and sent its petition not only to the Assembly but to the King. It must be remembered that the legend of a good king deceived by his advisers held at the time. Indeed, it survived the flight to Varennes; it partly survived the 10th of August, and only the research of recent times has proved clearly the continual intrigue of which the King was the head. On the 27th Mauconseil came forward again with a petition to the mayor, Bailly, to call the general council of the Commune and consider the complaints. Fourteen other Sections backed this petition. Bailly hesitated, and while he temporised, all the forty-eight Sections named commissioners and sent them to an informal gathering at the Archbishopric.[78] Danton was a member of this big committee and was made secretary. He drew up an address; the mayor was twice summoned to call the general council of the Commune. Hesitating and afraid, Bailly finally did so, and after a violent debate the resolution passed. Bailly was sent by the town to “present the Commune at the bar of the Assembly and demand the recall” of the Ministers of Justice, War, and the Interior—De Cicé, La Tour du Pin, and St. Priest. Danton was taken out of the informal body to which he had acted as secretary, and asked to be the orator of the legal Commune. There followed on the 10th of November a very curious scene. Bailly pitifully apologising with his eyes brought in the representative body of Paris. It was present for the first time in the National Parliament, and before three years were over Paris was to be the mistress of the Parliament. At present they were out of place; their demand frightened them. It needed Danton’s voice to reassure them and to bring the opposing forces to a battle. His voice, big, rough, and deep, perhaps with a slight provincial accent, helped to strengthen the false idea that the gentlemen of the Parliament had formed. This Danton, of whom they heard so much, had appeared suddenly out of his right place—for he had no official position—and the Right was furious. Yet Danton’s harangue was moderate and sensible. There is, indeed, one passage on the position of Paris in France which is interesting because it is original, but the bulk of the speech is a string of plain arguments. This passage is as follows:—