Among the striking changes brought about by the reaction after Thermidor was that it put two extreme parties in violent antagonism, {226} with the Convention and reasonable public opinion as a great neutral ground between them. One of these was the party of the defeated Jacobins, raging at their downfall, convinced that without their guidance the Republic must perish. The other was that of the _Muscadins_, the scented and pampered golden youth, led by the _conventionnel_ Freron, asserting loudly their detestation of sans-culottism and democratic raggedness, breaking heads with their sticks when opportunity offered. During the excitement of Carrier's trial the Muscadins made such violent demonstrations against the Jacobins that the Committee of Public Safety ordered the closing of the club. But neither the Committee nor the Muscadins could destroy the Jacobin himself. Fleurus had been followed by continued success. Jourdan and Pichegru drove the Austrians before them and overran the Low Countries to the Rhine. Then in October Pichegru opened a winter campaign, invaded Holland, and, pushing on through snow and ice, occupied Amsterdam in January and captured the Dutch fleet, caught in the ice, with his cavalry under Moreau. At the same time Jourdan was operating further east, and, sweeping up the valley of the Rhine, cleared {227} the Austrians from Koeln and Coblenz. Further along the Rhine the Prussians now only held Mainz on the French side of that river. To the south the generals of the Republic occupied all the passes of the Alps into Italy, and pushed triumphantly into Spain. With their hand full of these successes the Committee of Public Safety opened peace negotiations at the turn of the year. With peace established the Committee would be able to transmit its power to a regular constitutional government. As the year 1795 opened, the interior situation began to get acutely troublesome once more. Although the Convention was pursuing a temperate course, relaxing the rigour of the revolutionary legislation on all sides, its concessions did not satisfy, but only encouraged, the reactionary party. Worse than this, however, the winter turned out the worst since 1788, for shortage of food. The Parisian mob, however much it had now lost of its insurrectional vigour, felt starvation no less keenly than before, and hunger made doubly dangerous the continued strugglings of Jacobins and Muscadins for power. The Convention tried hard to steer a safe course between them.