At this juncture the germ of a new opinion began to display itself in the south, and Bordeaux felt its full influence. The department of the Gironde had given birth to a new political party in the twelve citizens who formed its deputies. This department, far removed from the _centre_, was at no distant period to seize on the empire alike of opinion and of eloquence. The names (obscure and unknown up to this period) of _Ducos, Guadet, Lafond-Ladebat, Grangeneuve, Gensonne, Vergniaud_, were about to rise into notice and renown with the storms and the disasters of their country; they were the men who were destined to give that impulse to the Revolution that had hitherto remained in doubt and indecision, before which it still trembled with apprehension, and which was to precipitate it into a republic. Why was this impulse fated to have birth in the department of the Gironde and not in Paris? Nought but conjectures can be offered on this subject; and yet perhaps the republican spirit was more likely to manifest itself at Bordeaux than at Paris, where the presence and influence of a court had for ages past enervated the independence of character, and enfeebled the austerity of principle that form the basis of patriotism and liberty. The states of Languedoc, and the habits that necessarily result from the administration of a province governed by itself, could not fail to predispose the inclination of the Gironde in favour of an elective and federative government. Bordeaux was a parliamentary country; the parliaments had every where encouraged the spirit of resistance, and had often created a factious feeling against the king. Bordeaux was a commercial city, and commerce, which requires liberty through interest, at last desires it through a love of freedom. Bordeaux was the great commercial link between America and France, and their constant intercourse with America had communicated to the Gironde their love for free institutions. Moreover Bordeaux was more exposed to the enlightening influence of the sun of philosophy than the centre of France. Philosophy had germed there ere it arose in Paris, for Bordeaux was the birthplace of Montaigne and Montesquieu, those two great republicans of the French school. The one had deeply investigated the religious dogmata, the other the political institutions; and the president Dupaty had long after awakened there enthusiasm for the new system of philosophy. Bordeaux, in addition, was a country where the traditions of liberty and the _Roman Forum_ had been perpetuated in the bar. A certain leaven of antiquity animated each heart, and lent vigour to every tongue, and the town was still more republican by eloquence than by opinion, though there was something of Latin emphasis in their patriotism. It was in the birthplace of Montaigne and Montesquieu that the republic was to take its origin. II.