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This was Danton's culmination. As we look back, the weakness of the Germans seems to have been psychological rather than physical.
She decreed that on every year on the 5th of April, the anniversary of Danton's death, a service should be held in the chapel of the convent for the repose of his soul. To those who objected to this edict she answered: "Do you know many for whom it is more necessary to implore God's mercy?"
Haven't I said it?" "That is where we require your help," Le Chapelier put in. "There must be men of patriotic feeling among the more advanced of your pupils. M. Danton's idea is that a little band of these say a half-dozen, with yourself at their head might read these bullies a sharp lesson." Andre-Louis frowned. "And how, precisely, had M. Danton thought that this might be done?"
But while all were happy at Danton Hall, save Captain Danton's second daughter, once the gayest among them, the days flew by, and Eveleen Danton's wedding-day dawned. Such a lovely December day, brilliant, cloudless, warm just the day for a wedding. The little village church was crowded with the rich and the poor, long before the carriages from the Hall arrived.
Superbly the Lion of the Revolution faced the judges and the mob, and demanded a hearing. Robespierre uplifted eyebrows and half-smiled, vulpinely. His rapid exchange of looks with the Court seemed to say: "Well, we have got to listen to this crazy man, but be on guard!" The president, Jacques-Forget-Not, took the cue and acceded to Danton's request.
The most powerful member of the Committee of Public Safety was Robespierre, who, although he was insignificant in person and a tiresome speaker, enjoyed a great reputation for republican virtue. He disapproved alike of Danton's moderation and of the worship of Reason advocated by the commune. It was, of course, impossible for Robespierre to maintain his dictatorship permanently.
Father Francis came up in the course of the day; and when he was leaving, I called him into the library, and told him the truth. I cannot tell you how shocked he was at Rose's perfidy, or how distressed for Kate's sake. He agreed with me that it was best to say nothing until Captain Danton's return. He came that night. It was late nearly eleven o'clock, and I and Thomas were the only ones up.
At one moment, with positive ferocity, he lashes the memory of former friends and colleagues sent by himself to the guillotine; at another he dilates upon the virtue of magnanimity in lofty, Platonic strains. With Danton's implacable foe it was indeed a case of "Roses, roses, all the way. Thus I enter, and thus I go."
In the fair, slight, girlish body of the child-soldier there lived a courage as daring as Danton's, a patriotism as pure as Vergniaud's, a soul as aspiring as Napoleon's.
His own strength lay in several facts: he had been Danton's follower; he had been an officer, and was appointed for that reason commanding general against the Paris sections; he had been shrewd enough to choose Bonaparte as his agent so that he enjoyed the prestige of Bonaparte's success; and in the new society of the capital he was magnificent, extravagant, and licentious, the only representative in the Directory of the newly aroused passion for life and pleasure, his colleagues being severe, unostentatious, and economical democrats.
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