And this defeat may have had some share in prompting him to countenance and aid, if indeed he was not the original contriver of, a plot which was undoubtedly intended to produce a change in the whole frame-work of the Government. The harvest had been bad, and at the beginning of September Paris was suffering under a scarcity almost as severe as had ever been felt in the depth of winter. The emergency was so great that the king sent all his plate to the Mint to be melted down, to procure money to purchase food for the starving citizens; and many patriotic individuals, Necker himself being among the most munificent, gave their plate and jewels for the same benevolent object. But relief procured from such sources was unavoidably of too limited a character to last long. Though Necker proposed and the Assembly voted taxes of prodigious amount, they could not at once be made available, and some of the lower classes were said to have died of actual famine. In their distress the citizens looked to the king, and attributed their misery in a great degree to his ignorance of their situation, which was caused by his living at Versailles. They nicknamed him the "Baker," as if he could supply them with bread, and began to clamor for him at least to take up an occasional residence among them in in his capital. From raising a cry, the step was easy to organize a riot to compel him to do so. And to this object the partisans of the Duke of Orleans, assisted, if not prompted, by Mirabeau, now began to apply themselves, hoping that the result would be the deposition of Louis and the enthronement of the duke, who might be glad to take the great orator for his prime minister. So certain did the conspirators feel of success, that they took no pains to keep their machinations secret. As early as the middle of September intelligence was received at Versailles that the Parisians would march upon that town in force, on the 5th of October; and the Assembly was greatly alarmed, believing, not without reason, that the object of the intended attack was to overawe and overbear them. The magistrates of the town were even more terrified, and besought the king to bring up at least one regiment for their protection. And, prudent and reasonable as the request was, the compliance with it furnished the agents of sedition with pretexts for further violence.