United States or Burundi ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The former, having occupied Frankfort, was driven back to the Rhine; the latter defeated the Allies at Valmy, but failed in the task of coming to Custine's support at the proper moment for combined action. Meantime the agitation in Paris had taken the form of personal animosity to "Louis Capet," as the leaders of the disordered populace called the King.
"Monsieur Marc, they will never let us into Valmy." "Not all of us, not you I alone." "Alone? Monsieur Marc, you would never venture " "Never venture? As God lives, Perrault, I would venture to the gates of hell for just five minutes with Louis of France, and you know it." "But it is impossible." "Desperate, not impossible.
And the boy shook off the restraining hand impatiently. "You come from Valmy and are like all the rest of them. Monsieur La Mothe, let us go and thank Grey Roland." But as he followed the Dauphin out of the room La Mothe asked himself whether, even with Ursula de Vesc's help, the end of the story could possibly be Love, Peace, and Faith.
The commander-in-chief was the septuagenarian Duke of Brunswick, well known for his failure at Valmy in 1792 and his recent support to the policy of complaisance to France.
Perhaps it was as he spoke of this last the door had opened. It was then he had hoped he might be far from Valmy the day his passion of soul was stirred.
Thus the map, the date, the soil, the contours of Crecy field make the traditional spot at which the King of Bohemia fell doubtful; the same factors make it certain that Drouet did not plunge haphazard through Argonne on the night of June 21, 1791, but that he must have gone by one path which can be determined. Or, again, take that prime question, why the Prussians did not charge at Valmy.
"There was a courier from Valmy to-day," said Villon, speaking for the first time, and, as it seemed, irrelevantly. Commines turned upon him sharply. "What has that to do with it? He brought letters from the King addressed to me. Monsieur La Mothe knows their contents." "And for Jean Saxe," retorted Villon; "letters from the King for Jean Saxe and Monsieur d'Argenton!"
Though the grey eyes kindled and the kindliness in them grew yet more kindly, though the soft embroideries in the delicate lawn were ruffled by a quicker breath, the natural perversity of her sex must needs answer perversely, and Ursula de Vesc blew up his siege trench with a bombshell. "Monsieur La Mothe, were you ever at Valmy?" "Yes, mademoiselle."
In part it was a dread of failure, in part the inexpressible revolt of nature against an inevitable sacrifice, in part the sinister suggestions inseparable from Valmy itself. And how could he escape from that suggestiveness?
Monsieur La Mothe may set his own life on the hazard to save the Dauphin but he may not speak with him! That is Valmy gratitude and the King's miserable, jaundiced mind. And his commission is cancelled! What that commission is I do not know, but, thank God! Monsieur La Mothe, you are freed from it, whatever it is, since it came out of Valmy."
Word Of The Day