The complaints which were laid before them of the violent encroachments made on the liberty of the people at large, the Girondists had hitherto answered by timid exhortations to the Commune to be cautious in their proceedings. But, on the 29th of August, they were startled out of their weak inaction, by an assumption of open force, and open villany, on the part of those formidable rivals, under which it was impossible to remain silent.[277] On the night previous, the Commune, proceeding to act upon their own sole authority, had sent their satellites, consisting of the municipal officers who were exclusively attached to them, (who were selected from the most determined Jacobins, and had been augmented to an extraordinary number,) to seize arms of every description, and to arrest suspicious persons in every corner of Paris. Hundreds and thousands of individuals had been, under these usurped powers, committed to the various prisons of the city, which were now filled, even to choking, with all persons of every sex and age, against whom political hatred could allege suspicion, or private hatred revive an old quarrel, or love of plunder awake a thirst for confiscation. The deeds of robbery, of license, and of ferocity, committed during these illegal proceedings, as well as the barefaced contempt which they indicated of the authority of the Assembly, awakened the Girondists, but too late, to some sense of the necessity of exertion. They summoned the Municipality to their bar. They came, not to deprecate the displeasure of the Assembly, not to submit themselves to its mercy,--they came to triumph; and brought the speechless and trembling Pétion in their train, as their captive, rather than their mayor. Tallien explained the defence of the Commune, which amounted to this: "The provisional representatives of the city of Paris," he said, "had been calumniated; they appeared, to justify what they had done, not as accused persons, but as triumphing in having discharged their duty. The Sovereign People," he said, "had committed to them full powers, saying, Go forth, save the country in our name--whatever you do we will ratify." This language was, in effect, that of defiance, and it was supported by the shouts and howls of assembled multitudes, armed as for the attack on the Tuileries, and their courage, it may be imagined, not the less, that there were neither aristocrats nor Swiss guards between them and the Legislative Assembly. Their cries were, "Long live our Commune--our excellent commissioners--we will defend them or die!"[278]