The Revolutionary organisation did not reach its full vigour till the
autumn of 1793, when the prospects of France were at their worst. Custine,
who was brought up from Alsace to take command of the Army of the North,
found it so demoralised that he was unable to attempt the relief of the
fortresses which were now besieged by the Allies. Conde surrendered to the
Austrians on the 10th of July; Valenciennes capitulated to the Duke of York
a fortnight later. In the east the fortune of war was no better. An attack
made on the Prussian army besieging Mainz totally failed; and on the 23rd
of July this great fortress, which had been besieged since the middle of
April, passed back into the hands of the Germans. On every side the
Republic seemed to be sinking before its enemies. Its frontier defences had
fallen before the victorious Austrians and English; Brunswick was ready to
advance upon Alsace from conquered Mainz; Lyons and Toulon were in revolt;
La Vendee had proved the grave of the forces sent to subdue it. It was in
this crisis of misfortune that the Convention placed the entire male
population of France between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five at the
disposal of the Govenment, and turned the whole country into one great camp
and arsenal of war. Nor was there wanting a mind equal to the task of
giving order to this vast material. The appointment of Carnot, an officer
of engineers, to a seat on the Committee of Public Safety placed the
military administration of France in the hands of a man who, as an
organiser, if not as a strategist, was soon to prove himself without equal
in Europe.

[The Allies seek each their separate ends.]

Nevertheless, it was to the dissensions and to the bad policy of the Allies
more than to the energy of its own Government that France owed its safety.
The object for which the Allies professed to be carrying on the war, the