down, and the king of France set back upon his throne, otherwise the
same kind of revolt might take place in their countries as well.
Accordingly, the king of Prussia, the king of England, and the emperor
of Austria all made war on the new French Republic. They proposed to
overwhelm the French by force of arms and compel them to put back
their king upon his throne.

Of course, if the soldiers in the armies of these kings had known what
the object of this war was, they would have had very little sympathy
with it, but for years they had been trained to obey their officers,
who in turn obeyed their generals, who in turn obeyed the orders of
the kings. The common soldiers were like sheep, in that they did not
think for themselves, but followed their leaders. They were not
allowed to know the truth concerning this attack on France. They did
not know the French language, and had no way of finding out the real
situation, for there were no public schools in these countries, and
very few people knew how to read the newspapers. The newspapers,
moreover, were controlled by the governments, and were allowed to
print only what favored the cause of the kings.

The French, however, knew the meaning of the war. A young French poet
from Strasbourg on the Rhine wrote a wonderful war song which was
first sung in Paris by the men of Marseilles, and thus has come to be
called "La Marseillaise." It is the cry of a crushed and oppressed
people against foreign tyrants who would again enslave them. It fired
the French army with a wonderful enthusiasm, and untrained as they
were, they beat back the invaders at the hard-fought field of Valmy
and saved the French Republic.

[Illustration: The Reign of Terror]