proper, however, had no genuine desire for war, as the risks outweighed the advantages. Events eventually justified the fears of the Court, and Brissot's sanguine faith in French arms and the cause of the Revolution, more than they did the cautious apprehensions of Robespierre.
At this period Brissot was not only all-powerful in the Assembly; his direct or indirect influence pervaded all its committees, and, on the break-up of the Narbonne Administration, he imposed a Ministry of his own on the Government. He had now reached the height of his influence, and, while bestowing place and power on those whom similarity of political views had made his friends, he himself, poorer than Robespierre, went about in a shabby old out-at-elbows coat, while his wife in person used to iron out his three shirts on some sixth floor of a lodging. In the teeth of this Spartan disinterestedness, his opponents did not blush afterwards to accuse Brissot of intrigue and place-hunting!
As the members of the Executive were excluded from the Chamber in which the ruling power actually resided, the leader of the Girondins, averse from crippling his own influence or that of the chief members of his party, looked out for men not yet practically involved in politics, while qualified by previous experience for public life. His choice fell upon Roland de la Platière, as Minister of the Interior. It seemed a happy idea, seeing that for the last thirty-five years of his life the latter had not only been professionally led to comprehend the economic and commercial conditions of his country, but had also studied them with the eye of the philosopher,
On the 23rd of March 1792, Roland entered the
