"Mounier was at last able to depart. He hastened to resume his place as
president before the arrival of that vast army from Paris, whose projects
were not yet known. He reentered the hall; but there was no longer any
Assembly; it had broken up; the crowd, ever growing more clamorous and
exacting, had demanded that the prices of bread and meat should be
lowered. Mounier found in his place, in the president's chair, a tall,
fine, well-behaved woman, holding the bell in her hand, who left the
chair with reluctance. He gave orders that they were to try to collect
the deputies again; meanwhile, he announced to the people that the King
had just accepted the constitutional article. The women, crowding about
him, then entreated him to give them copies of them; others said: 'But,
Monsieur President, will this be very advantageous? Will this give bread
to the poor people of Paris?' Others exclaimed: 'We are very hungry. We
have eaten nothing to-day.' Mounier ordered bread to be fetched from the
bakers. Provisions then came in on all sides. They all began eating in
the hall with much clamour."
At midnight Lafayette arrived at the head of twenty thousand men of the
National Guard. To the amazement of the soldiers and onlookers, he dared
to pass unattended through the palace doors to the Bull's Eye. "He
appeared very calm," says Madame de Stael, Necker's observant daughter.
"Nobody ever saw him otherwise.
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