With the enthusiastic promise of allegiance to the plan on their own
part and that of their regiments, Calvert quitted the society of these
officers, and, certain of the hearty co-operation of enough troops to
make the safety of the King and Queen amply assured, he proceeded, by
way of the Mozelle, to Coblentz. He arrived at that city on the 26th of
July, and was immediately granted an interview with the great
Prince-Elector of Treves, but recently established in his splendid new
palace on the Rhine, and the commander-in-chief of the allied army, his
Grace the Duke of Brunswick.
Though Calvert had journeyed with all possible speed, he was come a day
too late, and he heard with inexpressible alarm and chagrin of the
imprudent manifesto issued by the Duke but the day before. Surely no
other great general of the world ever made so colossal, so fatal a
blunder. In that arrogant and sanguinary manifesto could be heard the
death-knell of the unhappy King of France, or so it seemed to Calvert,
who was so deeply impressed with the rashness and danger of his Grace's
diplomacy that he made no attempt to conceal the alarm he felt.
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