Note 17 — Chapter III · PREPARATIONS OF THE PARISIANS FOR THE DEFENCE OF THE CITY. THE GUARDS, AND CITY WATCH, JOIN THE CITIZENS. THE ARMED CITIZENS APPOINT A COMMANDER IN CHIEF. CONDUCT OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY DURING THE DISTURBANCES AT PARIS. THEY PUBLISH A DECLARATION OF RIGHTS,—AND OFFER THEIR MEDIATION WITH THE CITIZENS,—WHICH IS HAUGHTILY REFUSED BY THE KING. PROCEEDINGS AT PARIS ON THE FOURTEENTH OF JULY. TAKING OF THE BASTILLE. THE MAYOR SHOT. PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY AT VERSAILLES. APPEARANCE OF THE KING IN THE ASSEMBLY. HIS SPEECH.

The supplying of Paris with provision always depended on a nice arrangement of circumstances, capable of being controlled by the government of the state. It is not like London, and other great cities, the local position of which was previously pointed out by nature, and of which the welfare depends on the great and perpetual movements of commerce, which they themselves regulate. To cut off the provision from London, you must block up the port, and interdict in an open manner an intercourse, on which the wealth of the nation in a great measure depends. Paris, on the contrary, might be famished in a few days by a secret order of the court. All the people of the place would feel the effect, and no person be able to ascertain the cause. These considerations render it easy to account for the continued scarcity of provision in Paris during the summer of 1789. No person can doubt, but the court viewed the revolution with horrour; and that, among the measures which they took to prevent it, they would not overlook so obvious an expedient, as that of cutting off the supplies from the capital; as they supposed the people would lay the blame on the new order of things, and thus be disgusted with the revolution.