THE SECTIONS  
The day the Convention proclaimed the Constitution of the Year III., every one exclaimed: "The Convention has signed its death-warrant."
In fact it was expected that, as in the case of the Constituent Assembly, it would, by a self-sacrifice little understood, forbid to its retiring members election to the Assembly which was to succeed them. It did nothing of the kind. The Convention understood very well that the last vital spark of Republicanism was hidden within its own body. With a people so volatile as the French, who in a moment of enthusiasm had overturned a monarchy which had endured eight centuries, the children of the Republic could not in three years have become so rooted in their habits and customs as safely to be left to follow the natural course of events. The Republic could be adequately guarded only by those who had created it, and who were interested in perpetuating it.
But who were they?
Who, indeed, save the members of the Convention which had abolished the feudal constitution on the 10th of July and the 4th of August, 1789; which had overturned the[Pg 243] throne on the 10th of August, 1792, and which, from the 21st of January to the time of which we are writing, had fought the whole of Europe, had compelled Prussia and Spain to sue for peace, and had driven Austria beyond the frontiers. Therefore, on the 5th Fructidor (August 22), the Convention decreed that the Legislative Assembly should be composed of two bodies—the Council of the Five Hundred and the Council of the Ancients; that the first should comprise five hundred members, upon whom should devolve the duty of originating bills, and the second two hundred and fifty, whose sanction should be necessary to make them law; that these two bodies should include two-thirds of the present Convention, and that one-third only should therefore be composed of new members.
It remained to be seen who should have the responsibility of the choice. Would the Convention itself name those of its members who were to become part of the new body, or would that duty devolve upon the electoral colleges?
On the 13th Fructidor (August 30), after a stormy session, it was decided that the electoral colleges should make the selection. The determination once arrived at, these two days were designated the 5th Fructidor and the 13th Fructidor, respectively.
Perhaps we are dwelling a little longer than is necessary upon this purely historical portion of our work; but we are rapidly approaching the terrible day of the 13th Vendémiaire—the first on which the Parisians heard the sound of cannon in their streets—and we wish to fasten the crime upon its real authors.
Paris then, as now, although in a lesser degree, since its centralization had lasted only four or five years at the time—Paris was then the brain of France. What Paris accepted, France sanctioned. This was clearly demonstrated when the Girondins unsuccessfully attempted to unite the provinces.
Now Paris was divided into forty-eight Sections. These Sections were not royalist; on the contrary, they protested[Pg 244] that they were attached to the Republic. Except for two or three, whose reactionary opinions were well-known, none would have fallen into the error of sacrificing so many citizens, among them some truly great men, for a principle, and then have rejected that principle before it had borne fruit. But Paris, terrified at finding herself knee-deep in blood, stopped short three-quarters of the way and roused herself to fight the Terrorists, who wanted the executions to continue, while the city was desirous that they should cease. So that, without deserting the flag of the Revolution, she showed herself unwilling to follow that flag further than the Girondins and the Cordeliers had carried it.
This flag would then become her own, since it sheltered the remains of the two parties we have named. It would henceforth be that of the moderate Republic, and would carry the device: "Death to the Jacobins!"
But the precautions of the Convention were designed to save those few Jacobins who had escaped the 9th Thermidor, and in whose hands alone the Convention wished to place the holy Ark of the Republic.
Without suspecting it, however, the Sections, fearful of a return of the Reign of Terror, served the royalists better than their most devoted friends could have done.
Never had so many strangers been seen in Paris. The hotels were crowded from cellar to garret. The Faubourg Saint-Germaine, which had been deserted for six months, was crowded with returned emigrés, Chouans, refractory priests, men who had been employed on the military trains, and divorced women.
There was a rumor that Tallien and Hoche had gone ov............