officers of the detachments posted by Bouille sought in vain to rescue the
king; the dragoons and hussars feared or refused to support them. Bouille,
apprised of this fatal event, hastened himself at the head of a regiment
of cavalry. But it was too late; on reaching Varennes, he found that the
king had left it several hours before; his squadrons were tired, and
refused to advance. The national guard were on all sides under arms, and
after the failure of his enterprise, he had no alternative but to leave
the army and quit France.

The assembly, on hearing of the king's arrest, sent to him, as
commissioners, three of its members, Petion, Latour-Maubourg, and Barnave.
They met the royal family at Epernay and returned with them. It was during
this journey, that Barnave, touched by the good sense of Louis XVI., the
fascinations of Marie Antoinette, and the fate of this fallen family,
conceived for it an earnest interest. From that day he gave it his
assiduous counsel and support. On reaching Paris the royal party passed
through an immense crowd, which expressed neither applause nor murmurs,
but observed a reproachful silence.

The king was provisionally suspended: he had had a guard set over him, as
had the queen; and commissioners were appointed to question him. Agitation
pervaded all parties. Some desired to retain the king on the throne,
notwithstanding his flight; others maintained, that he had abdicated by
condemning, in a manifesto addressed to the French on his departure, both
the revolution, and the acts which had emanated from him during that
period, which he termed a time of captivity.

The republican party now began to appear. Hitherto it had remained either
dependent or hidden, because it had been without any existence of its own,
or because it wanted a pretext for displaying itself. The struggle, which