To-morrow, perhaps, some resolution passed at a tavern in the suburbs, or some incendiary newspaper just received from Paris, will furnish the spark .-- No other defense against the populace is at hand than the sentimental proclamations of the National Assembly, the useless presence of troops who stand by and look on, and the uncertain help of a National Guard which will arrive too late.

Occasionally these townspeople, who are now the rulers, utter a cry of distress from under the hands of the sovereigns of the street who grasp them by the throat.

At Puy-en-Velay,[1307] a town of twenty thousand inhabitants, the presidial,[1308] the committee of twenty-four commissioners, a body of two hundred dragoons, and eight hundred men of the guard of burgesses, are "paralyzed, and completely stupefied, by the vile populace.

A mild treatment only increases its insubordination and insolence." This populace proscribes whomsoever it pleases, and six days ago a gibbet, erected by its hands, has announced to the new magistrates the fate that awaits them.
" What will become of us this winter," they exclaim, "in our impoverished country, where bread is not to be had! We shall be the prey of wild beasts!" III .-- Public feeling .-- Famine These people, in truth, are hungry, and, since the Revolution, their misery has increased.

Around Puy-en-Velay the country is laid waste, and the soil broken up by a terrible tempest, a fierce hailstorm, and a deluge of rain.