Soon after the liberals declared their intention of going to work they found the great hall at Versailles closed and were told curtly that it was being prepared for a royal session. They retired to a near-by tennis-court, lifted the senior representative from Paris, an astronomer named Bailly, to a table, elected him president of their [Pg 194]National Assembly, and took an oath not to disband until they had given France a constitution. A few days later the king summoned all the members of the States General to the great hall, scolded them for their recent acts in a speech written by somebody else, commanded that each order meet in future by itself, and left the hall to the sound of trumpets and martial music. The clergy and the nobles obediently withdrew. The Third Estate and a few liberals from the other orders remained. The king's master of ceremonies, a very important personage indeed, came forward and repeated the king's order. Soldiers could be seen behind him. There was a moment's silence; then Mirabeau, a homely, brilliant nobleman from the south of France, who had been rejected by his own order, but elected by the Third Estate, advanced impetuously toward the master of ceremonies, crying, in a loud voice, "Go tell your master that we are here by the will of the people, and that we shall not leave except at the point of the bayonet." Next he turned to the Assembly and made a motion to the effect that persons laying hands upon any member of the Assembly would be considered "infamous and traitors to the nation--guilty of capital crime." The master of ceremonies withdrew and reported the scene to the king. Louis, weak as water, said: "They wish to remain? Let them." And they did remain, to his undoing. [Illustration: THE BASTILLE From a contemporary print] [Illustration: SIEGE OF THE BASTILLE] Lafayette was in an embarrassing position. He sympathized with the Third Estate, yet he had been elected to represent the nobles, and his commission bound him to vote according to their wishes. He [Pg 195]considered resigning in order to appeal again to the voters of Auvergne; but before he came to a decision the king asked the nobles and clergy to give up their evidently futile opposition. Lafayette took his place with the others in the National Assembly, but refrained for a time from voting. The king and his ministers seemed to have no settled policy. One day they tried to please the Third Estate; on another it was learned that batteries were being placed where they could fire upon the Assembly and that regiments were being concentrated upon Paris. It was upon a motion of Mirabeau's for the removal of these threatening soldiers that Lafayette broke his silence and began to take part again in the proceedings of the Assembly.