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216 enemies could only be reached by striking at the Revolution first, then let their enemies triumph. Mountain and Gironde equally shrank from the terrible conflict; and the consequence was, that when Puisaye, appointed second in command by General Wimpfen, marched his five or six hundred men, chiefly from the remotest parts of Brittany, towards Vernon, near Évreux, to meet the forces of the Mountain coming from Paris, the combatants had so little confidence in their cause that, without striking a blow, they took to flight, leaving neither wounded nor killed. The Mountain, with generous sagacity, had gone on the tack of treating the insurrection in the Calvados as a pardonable error, born of the intrigues of a few conspirators, and the result was that the inhabitants were only too eager to testify their adhesion to the ruling powers.

Under these distressing circumstances, General Wimpfen dropped the mask of semi-Republicanism with which he had hitherto deluded the Girondins, showed himself under his true Royalist colours, and informed them bluntly that there remained only one means of promptly and effectively attaining their object, that was to open negotiations with England, for which he already possessed the necessary facilities, if they would entrust matters to his hands. The founders of the Republic were horror-stricken. Without consulting with each other, they rose as one man, and broke up the Conference in indignant silence. If they erred in not carrying out to the letter Vergniaud's heroic proposal, they speedily retrieved their error, and so saved France from impending ruin. But they themselves were now effectually ruined; there was no longer any abiding for them in Calvados. The