Page:Works of Thomas Carlyle - Volume 03.djvu/79

JULY 14, 1790] is on the Seine. When eye fails, ear shall serve; and all France properly is but one Amphitheatre; for in paved town and unpaved hamlet men walk listening; till the muffled thunder sound audible on their horizon, that they too may begin swearing and firing! But now, to streams of music, come Federates enough,—for they have assembled on the Boulevard Saint-Antoine or thereby, and come marching through the City, with their Eighty-three Department Banners, and blessings not loud but deep; comes National Assembly, and takes seat under its Canopy; comes Royalty, and takes seat on a throne beside it. And Lafayette, on white charger, is here, and all the civic Functionaries; and the Federates form dances, till their strictly military evolutions and manœuvres can begin.

Evolutions and manœuvres? Task not the pen of mortal to describe them: truant imagination droops;—declares that it is not worth while. There is wheeling and sweeping, to slow, to quick and double-quick time: Sieur Motier, or Generalissimo Lafayette, for they are one and the same, and he is General of France, in the King's stead, for four-and-twenty hours; Sieur Motier must step forth, with that sublime chivalrous gait of his; solemnly ascend the steps of the Fatherland's Altar, in sight of Heaven and of the scarcely breathing Earth; and, under the creak of those swinging Cassolettes, 'pressing his sword's point firmly there,' pronounce the Oath, To King, to Law, and Nation (not to mention 'grains' with their circulating), in his own name and that of armed France. Whereat there is waving of banners, and acclaim sufficient. The National Assembly must swear, standing in its place; the King himself audibly. The King swears; and now he the welkin split with vivats: let citizens enfranchised embrace, each smiting heartily his palm into his fellow's; and armed Federates clang their arms; above all, that floating battery speak! It has spoken,—to the four comers of France. From eminence to eminence bursts the