Paris (France) -- Description and travel; Paris (France) -- History
the orchestra played the air, "_O Richard! O mon roi! l'univers
t'abandonne_," the king suddenly appeared in the royal box facing them,
leading the queen, who bore the Dauphin in her arms. Then was the air
repeated, and amid a scene of wild enthusiasm the royal family were
rapturously acclaimed with clapping of hands and deafening shouts of
"_Vive le roi! Vive la reine! Vive le dauphin!_" Ladies distributed
white cockades, the Bourbon colour, and the tricolor was trodden
underfoot. Intoxicated soldiers danced under the king's balcony, and
next morning it was discussed at a breakfast given at the hôtel of the
bodyguards whether they should march against the National Assembly. And
this within three months of the taking of the Bastille and when Paris
was in the grip of famine!
The news of the mad orgy goaded the people to fury, and on 5th October
an insurrectionary army of 10,000 women advanced on Versailles and
encamped on the vast open space in front of the gates. As we stand in
the Cour de Marbre, we may lift our eyes to that balcony of the first
floor where, on 6th October, Marie Antoinette stood bravely forth,
holding her two children by the hand and confronting the vociferating
people. At their cry, "No children!" she gently pushed the little
Dauphin and his sister back into the room, and with folded arms, for she
at least lacked not courage, gazed calmly at them in regal dignity, to
be answered by shouts of "_Vive la reine!_" It was the last time she
trod the palace of Versailles. The same day king, queen and children
went their way amid that strange procession to Paris, the women crying:
"We need not die of hunger now. Here are the baker, the baker's wife and
the baker's boy." The palace of the Tuileries was hastily prepared for
their reception and for the first time Louis XVI. entered its gates.
Camille Desmoulins has described in his Memoirs how on 11th July he was
lifted on a table in front of the Café Foy, in the garden of the Palais
Royal, and delivered that short but pregnant oration which preceded the
capture of the Bastille on the 14th, warning the people that a St.
Bartholomew of patriots was contemplated, and that the Swiss and German
troops in the Champ de Mars were ready for the butchery. As the crowd
rushed to the Hôtel de Ville, shouting "To arms!" they were charged by
the Prince de Lambesc at the head of a German regiment, and the first
blood of the Revolution in Paris was shed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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