There is no money, no credit, no confidence, no employment, no bread. Famine, and pestilence, and grief, and rage, and despair brood over the land. Again the people cry to their representatives, “Why do you not give us the promised prosperity and plenty? We have nothing to eat, nothing to wear; our business and trades are at an end. The nations around us are gathering to devour us, and what is the cause of all these woes?” “It is the Girondists,” is the reply; “it is this party among the people’s representatives. They are traitors; they have been bribed; they have joined with foreign aristocrats and kings. They interrupt all our measures, and they are the cause of all your sufferings.” And now the people turn their rage upon the most intelligent and well-meaning portion of their representatives, who have been striving to stem the worst excesses of those who yield entirely to the dictation of the mob. After a period of storms and threats and violence, at length a majority is gained against them, and a decree is passed condemning a large portion of the National Legislature as traitors, while their leaders are borne forth by the exulting mob to a bloody death. Still the distress of the people is unrelieved, and again they clamour for the cause. “It is the party opposed to us,” say the Jacobins, with Robespierre at their head; “they are the traitors; they will not adopt the measures which will save the people from these ills.” “Cut them down!” cries the populace; and again another portion of the people’s representatives are led forth to death. And now Robespierre, the leader of the lowest mob of all, is supreme dictator, and all power is lodged with this coldest-blooded ruffian that ever doomed his fellow-beings to a violent death. This was _the Reign of Terror_, when the mob had gained complete mastery, and this man, its advocate and organ, administered its awful energies. Look, then, for a moment, at the picture. But the horrors of this period are so incredible, the atrocities so monstrous, that the tale will be regarded with distrust, without some previous indication of the causes which led to such results. Let it be remembered, then, that this whole revolutionary movement was, in fact, a war of the common people upon the classes above them. Let it be remembered, too, that the French people, by the press, and by emissaries all over Europe, had invoked the lower classes of all nations to make common cause with them. “War to the palace, and peace to the cottage,” was their watchword. Every throne began to shake, and every person of rank, talents, and wealth felt his own safety involved in the contest. It was thus that the revolutionary leaders felt that they were contending for their lives, against the whole wealth, aristocracy, and monarchical power of Europe.