Santerre suggested that poisonous gases should be inclosed in suitable vessels, and fired into the district to poison the atmosphere.
Carrier, the infamous scoundrel who had been appointed commissioner at Nantes, proposed an equally villainous scheme; namely, that great quantities of bread, mixed with arsenic, should be baked and scattered broadcast, so that the starving people might eat it and be destroyed, wholesale.

This would have been carried out, had it not been vigorously opposed by General Kleber, who had now taken the command of one of the armies of the invasion.
The rest of July and the first half of August passed comparatively quietly.

General Toncq advanced with a column into La Vendee, and fought two or three battles, in which he generally gained successes over the peasants; but with this exception, no forward movement was made, and the majority of the peasants remained undisturbed in their homes.
Soon, however, from all sides, the flood of invaders poured in.

No fewer than two hundred thousand men were now under the orders of the French generals, and advanced from different directions, in all cases carrying out the orders of the Convention, to devastate the country, burn down the woods, destroy the crops, and slay the inhabitants.

Five armies moved forward simultaneously, that commanded by Kleber consisting of the veteran battalions of Mayence.
But everywhere they were met.