[54] -- Henceforth, the
ground their opponents had built on sinks under their feet; the
materials collected by them disintegrate in their hands; their league
dissolves before it is completed, and the incurable weakness of the
party appears in full daylight.
Firstly, in the departments, as at Paris,[55] the party has no roots.
For the past three years all the sensible and orderly people, occupied
with their own affairs, who has no taste or interest in politics,
nine-tenths of the electors, abstain from voting and in this large
mass the Girondins have no adherents. As they themselves admit,[56]
this class remains attached to the institutions of 1791, which they
have overthrown; if it has any esteem for them, it is as "extremely
honest madmen." Again, this esteem is mingled with aversion: it
reproaches them with the violent decrees they have passed in concert
with the "Mountain;" with persecutions, confiscations, every species
of injustice and cruelty; it always sees the King's blood on their
hands; they, too, are regicides, anti-Catholics, anti-Christians,
demolishers and levelers.[57] -- Undoubtedly they are less so than the
"Mountain;" hence, when the provincial insurrection breaks out, many
Feuillants and even Royalists follow them to the section assemblies
and join in their protests.
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