17^ HISTORY OF FRANCE. [chap. the guillotine on the 2ist of January, 1793, with the utmost piety and resolution, making it his last charge to his family that his death might not be revenged, and his prayer that his blood might not be visited on his people. The effect was at once to rouse the anger of all Europe. In Britanny and the part of Anjou called La Vendee, where the people were very religious, and where the nobles had been a kindly, much-loved race, the death of the king increased the anger that had been e.xcited by the removal of the nonjuring priests ; and the discontent of the people was brought to a height by a forced levy of the young men as soldiers. Here there was a great rising of peasants led by the nobles. Altogether there was a s pirit of reaction. General Dumouriez began to treat with fhe Austrians, who had recovered Belgium, but was detected and fled into their camp. Soon after the king's death, France declared war against England. The moderation of the Girondins was hateful to the frenzy of the Jacobins, and their whole body was arrested with the exception of six who escaped. A Tribunal was appointed with the power of judging and sentencing plotters at once without appeal. The arrest of the Girondins, which was the work of the Paris mob, produced a civil war, for the men arrested were many of them the deputies from the greatest towns in France, and the best known men in the country. Marseilles, Lyons, Bourdeaux, and Toulon rose in revolt against the tyranny of the Mountain. Marat, the M'orst of the Parisian demagogues, was looked on with such horror that a girl named Charlotte Corday stabbed him to the heart, hoping thus to free the country from its miseries. 13. The Reign of Terror, i/cij; 1 794. — The death of Marat did but enhance the fury of those who thought that all the old landmarks must fall. At the same time the defeat of the French armies and the entry of the foreigners upon French soil, made it necessary to form a government of absolute power in order to save the republic from destruction. England, Austria, Prussia, Spain, and Naples were all combined against it. On every side France seemed to be sinking before its enemies. The Austrians and the English drove before them the army of Dumouriez, captured the towns of Cond d and 'alenciennes, and were only prevented from marcTiing oirTans by' their own errors. The Prussians invaded Elsass. Toulon gave itself up to the English, and declared Lewis XVI L king.
