Mirabeau, in favor of the veto for life, saw the crowd imploring him with tears in their eyes to change his opinion: "Monsieur le Comte, if the King obtains this veto, what will be the use of a National Assembly?
We shall all be slaves "[1427] Outbursts of this description are not to be resisted, and all is lost.
Already, near the end of September, the remark applies which Mirabeau makes to the Comte de la Marck: "Yes, all is lost; the King and Queen will be swept away, and you will see the populace trampling on their lifeless bodies." Eight days after this, on the 5th and 6th of October, it breaks out against both King and Queen, against the National Assembly and the Government, against all government present and to come; the violent party which rules in Paris obtains possession of the chiefs of France to hold them under strict surveillance, and to justify its intermittent outrages by one permanent outrage.
V .-- The 5th and 6th of October.
Once more, two different currents combine into one torrent to hurry the crowd onward to a common end .-- On the one hand are the cravings of the stomach, and women excited by the famine: "Now that bread cannot be had in Paris, let us go to Versailles and demand it there; once we have the King, Queen, and Dauphin in the midst of us, they will be obliged to feed us;" we will bring back "the Baker, the Bakeress, and the Baker's boy." -- On the other hand, there is fanaticism, and men who are pushed on by the need to dominate.
"Now that our chiefs yonder disobey us,--let us go and make them obey us forthwith; the King is quibbling over the Constitution and the Rights of Man--make him approve them; his guards refuse to wear our cockade--make them accept it; they want to carry him off to Metz--make him come to Paris, here, under our eyes and in our hands, he, and the lame Assembly too, will march straight on, and quickly, whether they like it or not, and always on the right road."-- Under this confluence of ideas the expedition is arranged.[1428] Ten days before this, it is publicly alluded to at Versailles.

On the 4th of October, at Paris, a woman proposes it at the Palais-Royal; Danton roars at the Cordeliers; Marat, "alone, makes as much noise as the four trumpets on the Day of Judgment." Loustalot writes that a second revolutionary paroxysm is necessary." "The day passes," says Desmoulins, "in holding councils at the Palais-Royal, and in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, on the ends of the bridges, and on the quays...

in pulling off the cockades of but one color....

These are torn off and trampled under foot with threats of the lamp post, in case of fresh offense; a soldier who is trying to refasten his, changes his mind on seeing a hundred sticks raised against him."[1429] These are the premonitory symptoms of a crisis; a huge ulcer has formed in this feverish, suffering body, and it is about to break.
But, as is usually the case, it is a purulent concentration of the most poisonous passions and the foulest motives.

The vilest of men and women were engaged in it.