the standard was no sooner raised between the republican government on the one hand and the discontented peasantry on the other, than the mass of that united and alarmed population declared itself for their associates; and a great tract of country was thus arrayed in open rebellion, without concert, leader, or preparation. We have the testimony of Madame de L., therefore, in addition to all other good testimony, that this great civil war originated almost accidentally, and certainly not from any plot or conspiracy of the leading royalists in the country. The resident gentry, no doubt, for the most part, favoured that cause; and the peasantry felt almost universally with their masters; but neither had the least idea in the beginning, of opposing the political pretensions of the new government, nor, even to the last, much serious hope of effecting any revolution in the general state of the country. The first movements, indeed, partook far more of bigotry than of royalism, and were merely the rash and undirected expressions of plebeian resentment for the loss of their accustomed pas tors. The more extensive commotions, which followed on the compulsory levy, were equally without object or plan, and were confined at first to the peasantry. The gentry did not join until they had no alternative, but that of taking up arms either against their own dependants, or along with them; and they went into the field, generally, with little other view than that of acquitting their own faith and honour, and scarcely any expectation beyond that of obtaining better terms for the rebels they were joining, or of being able to make a stand till some new revolution should take place at Paris, and bring in rulers less harsh and sanguinary.

It was at the ballot for the levy of St. Florent that the rebellion may be said to have begun. The young men first murmured, and then threatened the commissioners, who somewhat rashly directed a fieldpiece to be pointed against them, and afterwards to be fired over their heads. Nobody was hurt by the discharge; and the crowd immediately rushed forward and seized upon the gun. Some of the commissioners were knocked down-their papers were seized and burntand the rioters went about singing and rejoicing for the rest of the evening. An account, probably somewhat exaggerated, of this tumult was brought next day to a venerable peasant of the name of Cathelineau, a sort of itinerant dealer in wool, who was immediately struck with the decisive consequences of this open attack on the constituted

authorities.

The tidings were brought to him as he was kneading the weekly allowance of bread for his family. He instantly wiped his arms, put on his coat, and repaired to the village market place, where he harangued the inhabitants, and prevailed on twenty or thirty of the boldest youths to take their arms in their hands and follow him. He was universally respected for his piety, good sense, and mildness of character; and, proceeding with his troop of recruits to a neighbouring village, repeated his eloquent exhortations, and instantly found himself at the head of more than a hundred enthusiasts. Without stopping a moment, he led this new army to the attack of a military post guarded by fourscore soldiers and a piece of cannon. The post was sur; prised the soldiers dispersed or made prisoners—and the gun brought off in triumph. From this he advanced, the same afternoon, to another post of two hundred soldiers and three pieces of cannon; and succeeds, by the same surprise and intrepidity. The morning after, while preparing for other enterprises, he is joined by another band of insurgents, who had associated to protect one of their friends, for whose arrest a military order had been issued. The united force, now amounting to a thousand men, then directed its attack on Chollet, a considerable town, occupied by at least 500 of the republican army; and again bears down all resistance by the suddenness and impetuosity. of its onset. The rioters find here a considerable supply of arms, money, and ammunition;—and thus a country is lost and won, in which, but two days before, nobody thought or spoke of insurrection.

If there was something astonishing in the sudden breaking out of this rebellion, its first apparent suppression was not less extraordinary. These events took place just before Lent; and, upon the approach of that holy season, the religious rebels all dispersed to their homes, and betook themselves to their prayers and their rustic occupations, just as if they had never quitted them. A column of the republican army, which advanced from Angers to bear down the insurrection, found no insurrection to quell. They marched from one end of the country to the other, and met every where with the most satisfactory appearances of submission and tranquillity. These appearances, however, it will readily be understood, were altogether deceitful; and as soon as Easter Sunday was over the peasants began again to assemble in arms-and now, for the first time, to apply to the gentry to head them. All this time Madame Lescure and her family remained quietly at

Clisson, and in that profound retreat were ignorant of the singular events to which we have alluded, for long after they occurred. The first intelligence they obtained was from the indefatigable M. Thomasin, who passed his time partly at their château, and partly in scampering about the country, and haranguing the constituted authorities—always in his national uniform, and with the authority of a Parisian patriot. One day this intrepid person came home, with a strange story of the neighbouring town of Herbiers having been taken either by a party of insurgents, or by an English army suddenly landed on the coast; and, at seven o'clock the next morning, the château was invested by two hundred soldiers, and a party of dragoons rode into the court-yard. Their business was to demand all the horses, arms, and ammunition, and also the person of an old cowardly chevalier, some of whose foolish letters had been carried to the municipality. M. de L. received this deputation with his characteristic composure-made the apology of the poor chevalier, and a few jokes at his expense-gave up some bad horses-and sent away the party in great good humour. For a few days they were agitated with contradictory rumours: but at last it appeared that the government had determined on vigorous measures; and it was announced that all the gentry would be required to arm themselves and their retainers against the insurgents. This brought things to a crisis; a council was held in the château, when it was speedily determined that no consideration of prudence or of safety could induce men of honour to desert their dependants, or the party to which, in their hearts, they wished well; and that, when the alternative came, they would rather fight with the insurgents than against them. Henri de Larochejaquelein-of whom the fair writer gives so engaging a picture, and upon whose acts of heroism she dwells throughout with so visible a delight, that it is quite a disappointment to find that it is not his name she bears when she comes to change her own-had been particularly inquired after and threatened; and, upon an order being sent to his peasantry to attend and ballot for the militia, he takes horse in the middle of the night, and sets out to place himself at their head for resistance. The rest of the party remain a few days longer in considerable perplexity. M. Thomasin, having become suspected on account of his frequent resort to them, had been put in prison, and they were almost entirely without intelligence as to what was going on, when one morning,

when they were at breakfast, a party of horse gallops up to the gate, and presents an order for the immediate arrest of the whole company. M. de L. takes this with perfect calmness-a team of oxen is yoked to the old coach, and the prisoners are jolted along, under escort of the national dragoons, to the town of Bressiure. By the time they had reached the place, their mild and steady deportment had made so favourable an impression on their conductors, that they were very near taking them back to their homes; and the municipal officers, before whom M. de L. was brought, had little else to urge for the arrest, but that it did not seem advisable to leave him at large, when it had been found necessary to secure all the other gentry of the district. They were not sent, however, to the common prison, but lodged in the house of a worthy republican, who had formerly supplied the family with groceries, and now treated them with the greatest kindness and civility. Here they remained for several days, closely shut up in two little rooms; and were not a little startled when they saw from their windows two or three thousand of the national guard march fiercely out to repulse a party of the insurgents, who were advancing, it was reported, under the command of Henri de Larochejaquelein. Next day, however, these valiant warriors came flying back in great confusion. They had met and been defeated by the insurgents; and the town was filled with terrors, and with the cruelties to which terror always gives birth. Several hundreds of Marseillois arrived at this crisis to reinforce the republican army, and proposed, as a measure of intimidation and security, that they should immediately massacre all the prisoners. The native leaders all expressed the greatest horror at this proposal, but it was nevertheless carried into effect! The author saw hundreds of those unfortunate creatures marched out of the town, under a guard of their butchers. They were then drawn up in a neighbouring field, and were cut down with the sabre-most of them quietly kneeling and exclaiming, Vive le Roi! It was natural for Madame de L. and her party to think that their turn was to come next, and the alarms of their compassionate gaoler did not help to allay their apprehensions; their fate hung indeed upon the slightest accident. One day they received a letter from an emigrant, congratulating them on the progress of the counter-revolution, and exhorting them not to remit their efforts in the cause. The very day after, their letters were all opened at the municipality, and sent to them

unsealed!

The patriots, however, it turned out, were too much occupied with apprehensions of their own, to attend to any thing else. The national guards of the place were not much accustomed to war, and trembled at the retaliation which the excesses of their Marseillois auxiliaries might so well justify. A sort of panic took possession even of their best corps, nor could the general prevail on his cavalry to reconnoitre beyond the walls of the town. A few horsemen, indeed, once ventured half a mile farther, but speedily came galloping back in alarm, with a report that a great troop of the enemy were at their heels. It turned out to be only a single countryman at work in his field, with a team of six oxen.

There was no waiting an assault with such forces, and, in the beginning of May, 1793, it was resolved to evacuate the place and fall back on Thouars. The aristocratic captives were forgotten in the hurry of this inglorious movement, and, though they listened through their closed shutters with no great tranquillity to the parting clamours and imprecations of the Marseillois, they soon received assurance of their deliverance, in the supplications of their keeper, and many others of the municipality, to be allowed to retire with them to Clisson, and to seek shelter there from the vengeance of the advancing royalists. M. de Lescure, with his usual good nature, granted all their requests; and they soon set off with a grateful escort, for their deserted château. The dangers he had already incurred by his inaction-the successes of his less prudent friends, and the apparent weakness and irresolution of their opponents-now decided M. de Lescure to dissemble no longer with those who seemed entitled to his protection, and he resolved instantly to cast in his lot with the insurgents, and support the efforts of his adventurous cousin. He accordingly sent round, without the delay of an instant, to intimate his purpose to all the parishes where he had influence, and busied himself and his household in preparing horses and arms, while his wife and her women were engaged in manufacturing white cockades. In the midst of these preparations, Henri de Larochejaquelein arrived, flushed with victory and hope, and announced his seizure of Bressiure, and all the story of his brief and busy campaign.

Upon his first arrival in the revolted districts of his own domains he found the peasants rather disheartened for want of a leader-some setting off for the army of Anjou, and others meditating a return to