"Having created his chiefs, they are of no more account to him than any of a man's creations usually are"; far from being obeyed, the officers are not even respected, "and that comes from resorting to analogies without considering military talent or moral superiority."[3246] Through the natural effects of the system of election, all grades of rank have fallen upon demagogues and blusterers.
"The intriguers, loud-talkers, and especially the great boozers, have prevailed against the capable."[3247] Besides, to retain his popularity, the new officer will go to a bar and drink with his men,[3248] and he must show himself more Jacobin than they are, from which it follows that, not content with tolerating their excesses, he provokes them .-- Hence, after March, 1792, and even before,[3249] we see the volunteers behaving in France as in a conquered country.

Sometimes they make domiciliary visits, and break everything to pieces in the house they visit.

Sometimes, they force the re-baptism of infants by the conventionalist cure, and shoot at the traditional father.

Here, of their own accord, they make arrests; there, they join in with mutineers and stop grain-boats; elsewhere, they force a municipality to tax bread; farther on, they burn or sack chateaux, and, if a mayor happens to inform them that the chateau now belongs to the nation and not to an emigre; they reply with "thrusts," and threaten to cut his throat.[3250] As the 10th of August draws near, the phantom of authority, which still occasionally imposed on them, completely vanishes, and "they risk nothing in killing" whoever displeases them.[3251] Exasperated by the perils they are about to encounter on the frontier, they begin war in the interior.

Provisionally, and as a precaution, they slaughter probable aristocrats on the way, and treat the officers, nobles and priests they meet on the road worse than their club allies.