Théroigne de Méricourt was barely eighteen in '89, when the first rumblings of the storm were heard. Plunging headlong into the vortex of Revolution, she soon acquired for her daring the names of "the Amazon of Liége" and "the Jeanne d'Arc of the Revolution;" while her surpassing beauty procured for her the title of "La Belle Liégoise." Attired in a blood-coloured silk riding-habit, and a hat surmounted by a magnificent plume of feathers, she made herself conspicuous in all those deadly conflicts between the People and the Royalists. She was first amongst the infuriate mob who burst open the gates of the Invalides and seized the cannon. She was foremost in the storming of the Bastille, June 14th, 1789; and such was her reckless valour on this occasion, that the victors, assembling on the spot, voted her a _sabre d'homme_. Another of the heroines who joined in the attack on the Bastille, afterwards joined the army, and fought against the enemies of the Republic, for which she was made Captain of Artillery. Her husband was a soldier. On the 5th of October, Théroigne and Rose led eight or ten thousand starving Parisian Women against Versailles. Previous to this, Rose had commanded a body of Furies in the attack on the Hôtel de Ville, August 7th. Théroigne rode to Versailles astride on a cannon. By her side came Cut-Throat Jourdan, the "Man with the Long Beard." The expedition owed its success almost entirely to the Amazon of Liége. The triumph of the people was complete. _Le Boulanger, la Boulangère, et le petit Mitron_ were brought to Paris, escorted by a seething, howling mob, preceded (as a hint to the aristocrats) by two pikes, on which were placed the heads of two Gardes-du-Corps. Several Poissardes performed the return journey on the backs of cannon. For a time the popularity of Théroigne de Méricourt and Rose Lacombe was unbounded; they were estimated by the Parisians as the first of their sex. Rose founded a female club on the same plan as the Jacobins, and became the chief speaker there. Théroigne held a club at her own house, and frequently spoke at the "Old Cordeliers," of which Danton and Camille Desmoulins were the leaders. Speaking of the enthusiasm with which her orations were received, Camille says "Her similes were drawn from the Bible and Pindar. It was the eloquence of a Judith." One evening Théroigne proposed that the Temple of the Representatives of the People should be erected on the site of the Bastille, the scene of their first triumph. "To found and embellish this edifice," said she, "let us strip ourselves of our ornaments, our gold, our jewels. I will be the first to set the example." And with these words she tore off all her jewels and flung them on the table.