CHAPTER XI. THE BARRICADE OF THE RUE MESLAY
The first barricade of the Rue Saint Martin was erected at the junction of the Rue Meslay. A large cart was overturned, placed across the street, and the roadway was unpaved; some flag-stones of the footway were also torn up. This barricade, the advanced work of defence of the whole revolted street, could only form a temporary obstacle. No portion of the piled-up stones was higher than a man. In a good third of the barricade the stones did not reach above the knee. "It will at all events be good enough to get killed in," said a little street Arab who was rolling numerous flag-stones to the barricade. A hundred combatants took up their position behind it. Towards nine o'clock the movements of the troops gave warning of the attack. The head of the column of the Marulaz Brigade occupied the corner of the street on the side of the boulevard. A piece of artillery, raking the whole of the street, was placed in position before the Porte Saint Martin. For some time both sides gazed on each other in that moody silence which precedes an encounter; the troops regarding the barricade bristling with guns, the barricade regarding the gaping cannon. After a while the order for a general attack was given. The firing commenced. The first shot passed above the barricade, and struck a woman who was passing some twenty paces in the rear, full in the breast. She fell, ripped open. The fire became brisk without doing much injury to the barricade. The cannon was too near; the bullets flew too high.
The combatants, who had not yet lost a man, received each bullet with a cry of "Long live the Republic!" but without firing. They possessed few cartridges, and they husbanded them. Suddenly the 49th regiment advanced in close column order.
The barricade fired.
The smoke filled the street; when it cleared away, there could be seen a dozen men on the ground, and the soldiers falling back in disorder by the side of the houses. The leader of the barricade shouted, "They are falling back. Cease firing! Let us not waste a ball."
The street remained for some time deserted. The cannon recommenced fining. A shot came in every two minutes, but always badly aimed. A man with a fowling-piece came up to the leader of the barricade, and said to him, "Let us dismount that cannon. Let us kill the gunners."
"Why!" said the chief, smiling, "they are doing us no harm, let us do none to them."
Nevertheless the sound of the bugle could be distinctly heard on the other side of the block of houses which concealed the troops echelloned on the Square of Saint Martin, and it was manifest that a second attack was being prepared.
This attack would naturally be furious, desperate, and stubborn.
It was also evident that, if this barricade were carried, the entire street would be scoured. The other barricades were still weaker than the first, and more feebly defended. The "middle class" had given their guns, and had re-entered their houses. They lent their street, that was all.
It was therefore necessary to hold the advanced barricade as long as possible. But what was to be done, and how was the resistance to be maintained? They had scarcely two shots per man left.
An unexpected source of supply arrived.
A young man, I can name him, for he is dead—Pierre Tissié,19 who was a workman, and who also was a poet, had worked during a portion of the morning at the barricades, and at the moment when the firing began he went away, stating as his reason that they would not give him a gun. In the barricade they had said, "There is one who is afraid."
Pierre Tissié was not afraid, as we shall see later on.
He left the barricade.
Pierre Tissié had only his knife with him, a Catalan knife; he opened it at all hazards, he held it in his hand, and went on straight before him.
As he came out of the Rue Saint Sauveur, he saw at the corner of a little lonely street, in which all the windows were closed, a soldier of the line standing sentry, posted there doubtlessly by the main guard at a little distance.
This soldier was at the halt with his gun to his shoulder ready to fire.
He heard the step of Pierre Tissié, and cried out,—
"Who goes there?"
"Death!" answered Pierre Tissié.
The soldier fired, and missed Pierre Tissié, who sprang on him, and struck him down with a blow of his knife.
The soldier fell, and blood spurted out of his mouth.
"I did not know I should speak so truly," muttered Pierre Tissié.
And he added, "Now for the ambulance!"
He took the soldier on his back, picked up the gun which had fallen to the ground, and came back to the barricade. "I bring you a wounded man," said he.
"A dead man," they exclaimed.
In truth the soldier had just expired.
"Infamous Bonaparte!" said Tissié. "Poor red breeches! All the same, I have got a gun."
They emptied the soldier's pouch and knapsack. They divided the cartridges. There were 150 of them. There were also two gold pieces of ten francs, two days' pay since the 2d of December. These were thrown on the ground, no one would take them.
They distributed the cartridges with shouts of "Long live the Republic!"
Meanwhile the attacking party had placed a mortar in position by the side of the cannon.
The distribution of the cartridges was hardly ended when the infantry appeared, and charged upon the barricade with the bayonet. This second assault, as had been foreseen, was violent and desperate. It was repulsed. Twice the soldiers returned to the charge, and twice they fell back, leaving the street strewn with dead. In the interval between the assaults, a shell had pierced and dismantled the barricade, and the cannon began to fire grape-shot.
The situation was hopeless; the cartridges were exhausted. Some began to throw down their guns and go away. The only means of escape was by the Rue Saint Sauveur, and to reach the corner of the Rue Saint Sauveur it was necessary to get over the lower part of the barricade, which left nearly the whole of the fugitives unprotected. There was a perfect rain of musketry and grape-shot. Three or four were killed there, one, like Baudin, by a ball in his eye. The leader of the barricade suddenly noticed that he was alone with Pierre Tissié, and a boy of fourteen years old, the same who had rolled so many stones for the barricade. A third attack was pending, and the soldiers began to advance by the side of the houses.
"Let us go," said the leader of the barricade.
"I shall remain," said Pierre Tissié.
"And I also," said the boy.
And the boy added,—
"I have neither father nor mother. As well this as anything else."
The leader fired his last shot, and retired like the others over the lower part of the barricade. A volley knocked off his hat. He stooped down and picked it up again. The soldiers were not more than twenty-five paces distant.
He shouted to the two who remained,—
"Come along!"
"No," said Pierre Tissié.
"No," said the boy.
A few moments afterwards the soldiers scaled the barricade already half in ruins.
Pierre Tissié and the boy were killed with bayonet thrusts.
Some twenty muskets were abandoned in this barricade.
19 It must not be forgotten that this has been written in exile, and that to name a hero was to condemn him to exile.
CHAPTER XII. THE BARRICADE OF THE MAIRIE OF THE FIFTH ARRONDISSEMENT
National Guards in uniform filled the courtyard of the Mairie of the Fifth Arrondissement. Others came in every moment. An ex-drummer of the Garde Mobile had taken a drum from a lower room at the side of the guard-room, and had beaten the call to arms in the surrounding streets. Towards nine o'clock a group of fourteen or fifteen young men, most of whom were in white blouses, entered the Mairie, shouting, "Long live the Republic!" They were armed with guns. The National Guard received them with shouts of "Down with Louis Bonaparte!" They fraternized in the courtyard. Suddenly there was a movement. It was caused by the arrival of the Representatives Doutre and Pelletier.
"What is to be done?" shouted the crowd.
"Barricades," said Pelletier.
They unharnessed the horses, which the carter led away, and they turned the cart round without upsetting it across the wide roadway of the faubourg. The barricade was completed in a moment. A truck came up. They took it and stood it against the wheels of the cart, just as a screen is placed before a fireplace.
The remainder was made up of casks and paving-stones. Thanks to the flour-cart the barricade was lofty, and reached to the first story of the houses. It intersected the faubourg at the corner of the little Rue Saint Jean. A narrow entrance had been contrived at the barricade at the corner of the street.
"One barricade is not sufficient," said Doutre, "we must place the Mairie between two barriers, so as to be able to defend both sides at the same time."
They constructed a second barricade, facing the summit of the faubourg. This one was low and weakly built, being composed only of planks and of paving-stones. There was about a hundred paces distance between the two barricades.
There were three hundred men in this space. Only one hundred had guns. The majority had only one cartridge.
The firing began about ten o'clock. Two companies of the line appeared and fired several volleys. The attack was only a feint. The barricade replied, and made the mistake of foolishly exhausting its ammunition. The troops retired. Then the attack began in earnest. Some Chasseurs de Vincennes emerged from the corner of the boulevard.
Following out the African mode of warfare, they glided along the side of the walls, and then, with a run, they threw themselves upon the barricade.
No more ammunition in the barricade. No quarter to be expected.
Those who had no more powder or balls threw down their guns. Some wished to reoccupy their position in the Mairie, but it was impossible for them to maintain any defence there, the Mairie being open and commanded from every side; they scaled the walls and scattered themselves about in the neighboring houses; others escaped by the narrow passage of the boulevard which led into the Rue Saint Jean; most of the combatants reached the opposite side of the boulevard, while those who had a cartridge left fired a last volley upon the troops from the height of the paving-stones. Then they awaited their death. All were killed.
One of those who succeeded in slipping into the Rue Saint Jean, where moreover they ran the gauntlet of a volley from their assailants, was M.H. Coste, Editor of the Evénement and of the Avénement du Peuple.
M. Coste had been a captain in the Garde Mobile. At a bend in the street, which placed him out of reach of the balls, M. Conte noticed in front of him the drummer of the Garde Mobile, who, like him, had escaped by the Rue Saint Jean, and who was profiting by the loneliness of the street to get rid of his drum.
"Keep your drum," cried he to him.
"For what purpose?"
"To beat the call to arms."
"Where?"
"At Batignolles."
"I will keep it," said the drummer.
These two men came out from the jaws of death, and at once consented to re-enter them.
But how should they cross all Paris with this drum? The first patrol which met them would shoot them. A porter of an adjoining house, who noticed their predicament, gave them a packing-cloth. They enveloped the drum in it, and reached Batignolles by the lonely streets which skirt the walls.
CHAPTER VIII. THE BARRICADE OF THE RUE THEVENOT
Georges Biscarrat was the man who had given the signal for the looting in the Rue de l'Echelle.
I had known Georges Biscarrat ever since June, 1848. He had taken part in that disastrous insurrection. I had had an opportunity of being useful to him. He had been captured, and was kneeling before the firing-party; I interfered, and I saved his life, together with that of some others, M., D., D., B., and that brave-hearted architect Rolland, who when an exile, later on, so ably restored the Brussels Palace of Justice.
This took place on the 24th June, 1848, in the underground floor of No. 93, Boulevard Beaumarchais, a house then in course of construction.
Georges Biscarrat became attached to me. It appeared that he was the nephew of one of the oldest and best friends of my childhood, Félix Biscarrat, who died in 1828. Georges Biscarrat came to see me from time to time, and on occasions he asked my advice or gave me information.
Wishing to preserve him from evil influences, I had given him, and he had accepted, this guiding maxim, "No insurrection except for Duty and for Right."
What was this hooting in the Rue de l'Echelle? Let us relate the incident.
On the 2d of December, Bonaparte had made an attempt to go out. He had ventured to go and look at Paris. Paris does not like being looked at by certain eyes; it considers it an insult, and it resents an insult more than a wound. It submits to assassination, but not to the leering gaze of the assassin. It took offence at Louis Bonaparte.
At nine o'clock in the morning, at the moment when the Courbevoie garrison was descending upon Paris, the placards of the coup d'état being still fresh upon the walls, Louis Bonaparte had left the Elysée, had crossed the Place de la Concorde, the Garden of the Tuileries, and the railed courtyard of the Carrousel, and had been seen to go out, by the gate of the Rue de l'Echelle. A crowd assembled at once. Louis Bonaparte was in a general's uniform; his uncle, the ex-King Jérôme, accompanied him, together with Flahaut, who kept in the near. Jérôme wore the full uniform of a Marshal of France, with a hat with a white feather; Louis Bonaparte's horse was a head before Jérôme's horse. Louis Bonaparte was gloomy, Jérôme attentive, Flahaut beaming. Flahaut had his hat on one side. There was a strong escort of Lancers. Edgar Ney followed. Bonaparte intended to go as far as the Hôtel de Ville. Georges Biscarrat was there. The street was unpaved, the road was being macadamized; he mounted on a heap of stones, and shouted, "Down with the Dictator! Down with the Praetorians!" The soldiers looked at him with bewilderment, and the crowd with astonishment. Georges Biscarrat (he told me so himself) felt that this cry was too erudite, and that it would not be understood, so he shouted, "Down with Bonaparte! Down with the Lancers!"
The effect of this shout was electrical. "Down with Bonaparte! Down with the Lancers!" cried the people, and the whole street became stormy and turbulent. "Down with Bonaparte!" The outcry resembled the beginning of an execution; Bonaparte made a sudden movement to the right, turned back, and re-entered the courtyard of the Louvre.
Georges Biscarrat felt it necessary to complete his shout by a barricade.
He said to the bookseller, Benoist Mouilhe, who had just opened his shop, "Shouting is good, action is better." He returned to his house in the Rue du Vert Bois, put on a blouse and a workman's cap, and went down into the dark streets. Before the end of the day he had made arrangements with four associations—the gas-fitters, the last-makers, the shawl-makers, and the hatters.
In this manner he spent the day of the 2d of December.
The day of the 3d was occupied in goings and comings "almost useless." So Biscarrat told Versigny, and he added, "However I have succeeded in this much, that the placards of the coup d'état have been everywhere torn down, so much so that in order to render the tearing down more difficult the police have ultimately posted them in the public conveniences—their proper place."
On Thursday, the 4th, early in the morning, Georges Biscarrat went to Ledouble's restaurant, where four Representatives of the People usually took their meals, Brives, Bertlhelon, Antoine Bard, and Viguier, nicknamed "Father Viguier." All four were there. Viguier related what we had done on the preceding evening, and shared my opinion that the closing catastrophe should be hurried on, that the Crime should be precipitated into the abyss which befitted it. Biscarrat came in. The Representatives did not know hire, and stared at him. "Who are you?" asked one of them. Before he could answer, Dr. Petit entered, unfolded a paper, and said,—
"Does any one know Victor Hugo's handwriting?"
"I do," said Biscarrat. He looked at the paper. It was my proclamation to the army. "This must be printed," said Petit. "I will undertake it," said Biscarrat. Antoine Bard asked him, "Do you know Victor Hugo?" "He saved my life," answered Biscarrat. The Representatives shook hands with him.
Guilgot arrived. Then Versigny. Versigny knew Biscarrat. He had seen him at my house. Versigny said, "Take care what you do. There is a man outside the door." "It is a shawl-maker," said Biscarrat. "He has come with me. He is following me." "But," resumed Versigny, "he is wearing a blouse, beneath which he has a handkerchief. He seems to be hiding this, and he has something in the handkerchief."
"Sugar-plums," said Biscarrat.
They were cartridges.
Versigny and Biscarrat went to the office of the Siècle; at the Siècle thirty workmen, at the risk of being shot, offered to print my Proclamation. Biscarrat left it with them, and said to Versigny, "Now I want my barricade."
The shawl-maker walked behind them. Versigny and Biscarrat turned their steps towards the top of the Saint Denis quarter. When they drew near to she Porte Saint Denis they heard the hum of many voices. Biscarrat laughed and said to Versigny, "Saint Denis is growing angry, matters are improving." Biscarrat recruited forty combatants on the way, amongst whom was Moulin, head of the association of leather-dressers. Chapuis, sergeant-major of the National Guard, brought them four muskets and ten swords. "Do you know where there are any more?" asked Biscarrat. "Yes, at the Saint Sauveur Baths." They went there, and found forty muskets. They gave them swords and cartridge-pouches. Gentlemen well dressed, brought tin boxes containing powder and balls. Women, brave and light-hearted, manufactured cartridges. At the first door adjoining the Rue du Hasard-Saint-Sauveur they requisitioned iron bars and hammers from a large courtyard belonging to a locksmith. Having the arms, they had the men. They speedily numbered a hundred. They began to tear up the pavements. It was half-past ten. "Quick! quick!" cried Georges Biscarrat, "the barricade of my dreams!" It was in the Rue Thévenot. The barrier was constructed high and formidable. To abridge. At eleven o'clock Georges Biscarrat had completed his barricade. At noon he was killed there.
CHAPTER XIV. OSSIAN AND SCIPIO
Arrests grew more numerous.
Towards noon a Commissary of Police, named Boudrot, appeared at the divan of the Rue Lepelletier. He was accompanied by the police agent Delahodde. Delahodde was that traitorous socialist writer, who, upon being unmasked, had passed from the Secret Police to the Public Police Service. I knew him, and I record this incident. In 1832 he was a master in the school at which were my two sons, then boys, and he had addressed poetry to me. At the same time he was acting the spy upon me. The Lepelletier divan was the place of meeting of a large number of Republican journalists. Delahodde knew them all. A detachment of the Republican Guard occupied the entrances to the café. Then ensued an inspection of all the ordinary customers, Delahodde walking first, with the Commissary behind him. Two Municipal Guards followed them. From time to time Delahodde looked round and said, "Lay hold of this man." In this manner some score of writers were arrested, among whom were Hennett de Kesler.20 On the preceding evening Kesler had been on the Saint Antoine barricade. Kesler said to Delahodde, "You are a miserable wretch." "And you are an ungrateful fellow," replied Delahodde; "I am saving your life." Curious words; for it is difficult to believe that Delahodde was in the secret of what was to happen on the fatal day of the Fourth.
At the head-quarters of the Committee encouraging information was forwarded to us from every side. Testelin, the Representative of Lille, is not only a learned man, but a brave man. On the morning of the 3d he had reached, shortly after me, the Saint Antoine barricade, where Baudin had just been killed. All was at an end in that direction. Testelin was accompanied by Charles Gambon, another dauntless man.21 The two Representatives wandered through the agitated and dark streets, little followed, in no way understood, seeking a ferment of insurgents, and only finding a swarming of the curious. Testelin, nevertheless, having come to the Committee, informed us of the following:—At the corner of a street of the Faubourg Saint Antoine Gambon and himself had noticed a crowd. They had gone up to it. This crowd was reading a bill placarded on a wall. It was the Appeal to Arms signed "Victor Hugo." Testelin asked Gambon, "Have you a pencil?" "Yes," answered Gambon. Testelin took the pencil, went up to the placard, and wrote his name beneath mine, then he gave the pencil to Gambon, who in turn wrote his name beneath that of Testelin. Upon this the crowd shouted, "Bravo! these are true-hearted men!" "Shout 'Long live the Republic!'" cried Testelin. All shouted "Long live the Republic!" "And from above, from the open windows," added Gambon, "women clapped their hands."
"The little hands of women applauding are a good sign," said Michel de Bourges.
As has been seen, and we cannot lay too much stress upon the fact, what the Committee of Resistance wished was to prevent the shedding of blood as much as possible. To construct barricades, to let them be destroyed, and to reconstruct them at other points, to avoid the army, and to wear it out, to wage in Paris the war of the desert, always retreating, never yielding, to take time for an ally, to add days to days; on the one hand to give the people time to understand and to rise, on the other, to conquer the coup d'état by the weariness of the army; such was the plan discussed and adopted.
The order was accordingly given that the barricades should be but slightly defended.
We repeated in every possible form to the combatants,—
"Shed as little blood as possible! Spare the blood of the soldiers and husband your own."
Nevertheless, the struggle once begun, it became impossible in many instances, during certain excited hours of fighting, to moderate their ardor. Several barricades were obstinately defended, particularly those in the Rue Rambuteau, in the Rue Montorgueil, and in the Rue Neuve Saint Eustache.
These barricades were commanded by daring leaders.
Here, for the sake of history, we will record a few of these brave men fighting outlines who appeared and disappeared in the smoke of the combat. Radoux, an architect, Deluc, Mallarmet, Félix Bony, Luneau, an ex-Captain of the Republican Guard, Camille Berru, editor of the Avénement, gay, warmhearted, and dauntless, and that young Eugène Millelot, who was destined to be condemned at Cayenne to receive 200 lashes, and to expire at the twenty-third stroke, before the very eyes of his father and brother, proscribed and convicts like himself.
The barricade of the Rue Aumaire was amongst those which were not carried without resistance. Although raised in haste, it was fairly constructed. Fifteen or sixteen resolute men defended it; two were killed.
The barricade was carried with the bayonet by a battalion of the 16th of the line. This battalion, hurled on the barricade at the double, was received by a brisk fusillade; several soldiers were wounded.
The first who fell in the soldiers' ranks was an officer. He was a young man of twenty-five, lieutenant of the first company, named Ossian Dumas; two balls broke both of his legs as though by a single blow.
At that time there were in the army two brothers of the name of Dumas, Ossian and Scipio. Scipio was the elder. They were near relatives of the Representative, Madier de Montjau.
These two brothers belonged to a poor but honored family. The elder had been educated at the Polytechnic School, the other at the School of Saint Cyr.
Scipio was four years older than his brother. According to that splendid and mysterious law of ascent, which the French Revolution has created, and which, so to speak, has placed a ladder in the centre of a society hitherto caste-bound and inaccessible, Scipio Dumas' family had imposed upon themselves the most severe privations in order to develop his intellect and secure his future. His relations, with the touching heroism of the poor of the present era, denied themselves bread to afford him knowledge. In this manner he attained to the Polytechnic School, where he quickly became one of the best pupils.
Having concluded his studies, he was appointed an officer in the artillery, and sent to Metz. It then became his turn to help the boy who had to mount after him. He held out his hand to his younger brother. He economized the modest pay of an artillery lieutenant, and, thanks to him, Ossian became an officer like Scipio. While Scipio, detained by duties belonging to his position, remained at Metz, Ossian was incorporated in an infantry regiment, and went to Africa. There he saw his first service.
Scipio and Ossian were Republicans. In October, 1851, the 16th of the line, in which Ossian was serving, was summoned to Paris. It was one of the regiments chosen by the ill-omened hand of Louis Bonaparte, and on which the coup d'état counted.
The 2d of December arrived.
Lieutenant Ossian Dumas obeyed, like nearly all his comrades, the order to take up arms; but every one round him could notice his gloomy attitude.
The day of the 3d was spent in marches and counter-marches. On the 4th the combat began. The 16th, which formed part of the Herbillon Brigade, was told off to capture the barricades of the Rues Beaubourg, Trausnonain, and Aumaire. This battle-field was formidable; a perfect square of barricades had been raised there.
It was by the Rue Aumaire, and with the regiment of which Ossian formed part, that the military leaders resolved to begin action.
At the moment when the regiment, with arms loaded, was about to march upon the Rue Aumaire, Ossian Dumas went up to his captain, a brave and veteran officer, with whom he was a favorite, and declared that he would not march a step farther, that the deed of the 2d of December was a crime, that Louis Bonaparte was a traitor, that it was for them, soldiers, to maintain the oath which Bonaparte violated; and that, as for himself, he would not lend his sword to the butchery of the Republic.
A halt was made. The signal of attack was awaited; the two officers, the old captain and the young lieutenant, conversed in a low tone.
"And what do you want to do?" asked the captain.
"Break my sword."
"You will be taken to Vincennes."
"That is all the same to me."
"Most certainly dismissed."
"Possibly."
"Perhaps shot."
"I expect it."
"But there is no longer any time; you should have resigned yesterday."
"There is always time to avoid committing a crime."
The captain, as may be seen, was simply one of those professional heroes, grown old in the leather stock, who know of no country but the flag, and no other law but military discipline. Iron arms and wooden heads. They are neither citizens nor men. They only recognize honor in the form of a general's epaulets. It is of no use talking to them of political duties, of obedience to the laws, of the Constitution. What do they know about all this? What is a Constitution; what are the most holy laws, against three words which a corporal may murmur into the ear of a sentinel? Take a pair of scales, put in one side the Gospels, in the other the official instructions; now weigh them. The corporal turns the balance; the Deity kicks the beam.
God forms a portion of the order of the day of Saint Bartholomew. "Kill all. He will recognized his own."
This is what the priests accept, and at times glorify.
Saint Bartholomew has been blessed by the Pope and decorated with the Catholic medal.22
Meanwhile Ossian Dumas appeared determined. The captain made a last effort.
"You will ruin yourself," said he.
"I shall save my honor."
"It is precisely your honor that you are sacrificing."
"Because I am going away?"
"To go away is to desert."
This seemed to impress Ossian Dumas. The captain continued,—
"They are about to fight. In a few minutes the barricade will be attacked. Your comrades will fall, dead or wounded. You are a young officer—you have not yet been much under fire."
"At all events," warmly interrupted Ossian Dumas, "I shall not have fought against the Republic; they will not say I am a traitor."
"No, but they will say that you are a coward."
Ossian made no reply.
A moment afterwards the command was given to attack.
The regiment started at the double. The barricade fired.
Ossian Dumas was the first who fell.
He had not been able to bear that word "coward," and he had remained in his place in the first rank.
They took him to the ambulance, and from thence to the hospital.
Let us at once state the conclusion of this touching incident.
Both of his legs were broken. The doctors thought that it would be necessary to amputate them both.
General Saint-Arnaud sent him the Cross of Honor.
As is known, Louis Bonaparte hastened to discharge his debt to his praetorian accomplices. After having massacred, the sword voted.
The combat was still smoking when the army was brought to the ballot-box.
The garrison of Paris voted "Yes." It absolved itself.
With the rest of the army it was otherwise. Military honor was indignant, and roused the civic virtue. Notwithstanding the pressure which was exercised, although the regiments deposited their votes in the shakos of their colonels, the army voted "No" in many districts of France and Algeria.
The Polytechnic School voted "No" in a body. Nearly everywhere the artillery, of which the Polytechnic School is the cradle, voted to the same effect as the school.
Scipio Dumas, it may be remembered, was at Metz.
By some curious chance it happened that the feeling of the artillery, which everywhere else had pronounced against the coup d'état, hesitated at Metz, and seemed to lean towards Bonaparte.
Scipio Dumas, in presence of this indecision set an example. He voted in a loud voice, and with an open voting paper, "No."
Then he sent in his resignation. At the same time that the Minister at Paris received the resignation of Scipio Dumas, Scipio Dumas at Metz, received his dismissal, signed by the Minister.
After Scipio Dumas' vote, the same thought had come at the same time to both the Government and to the officer, to the Government that the officer was a dangerous man, and that they could no longer employ him, to the officer that the Government was an infamous one, and that he ought no longer to serve it.
The resignation and the dismissal crossed on the way. By this word "dismissal" must be understood the withdrawal of employment.
According to our existing military laws it is in this manner that they now "break" an officer. Withdrawal of employment, that is to say, no more service, no more pay; poverty.
Simultaneously with his dismissal, Scipio Dumas learnt the news of the attack on the barricade of the Rue Aumaire, and that his brother had both his legs broken. In the fever of events he had been a week without news of Ossian. Scipio had confined himself to writing to his brother to inform him of his vote and of his dismissal, and to induce him to do likewise.
His brother wounded! His brother at the Val-de. Grâce! He left immediately for Paris.
He hastened to the hospital. They took him to Ossian's bedside. The poor young fellow had had both his legs amputated on the preceding day.
At the moment when Scipio, stunned, appeared at his bedside, Ossian held in his hand the cross which General Saint-Arnaud had just sent him.
The wounded man turned towards the aide-de-camp who had brought it, and said to him,—
"I will not have this cross. On my breast it would be stained with the blood of the Republic."
And perceiving his brother, who had just entered, he held out the cross to him, exclaiming,—
"You take it. You have voted "No," and you have broken your sword! It is you who have deserved it!"
20 Died in exile in Guernsey. See the "Pendant l'Exil," under the heading Actes et Paroles, vol. ii.
21 Died in exile at Termonde.
22 Pro Hugonotorum strage. Medal struck at Rome in 1572.
CHAPTER XV. THE QUESTION PRESENTS ITSELF
It was one o'clock in the afternoon.
Bonaparte had again become gloomy.
The gleams of sunshine on such countenances as these last very short time.
He had gone back to his private room, had seated himself before the fire, with his feet on the hobs, motionless, and no one any longer approached him except Roquet.
What was he thinking of?
The twistings of the viper cannot be foreseen.
What this man achieved on this infamous day I have told at length in another book. See "Napoleon the Little."
From time to time Roquet entered and informed him of what was going on. Bonaparte listened in silence, deep in thought, marble in which a torrent of lava boiled.
He received at the Elysée the same news that we received in the Rue Richelieu; bad for him, good for us. In one of the regiments which had just voted, there were 170 "Noes:" This regiment has since been dissolved, and scattered abroad in the African army.
They had counted on the 14th of the line which had fired on the people in February. The Colonel of the 14th of the line had refused to recommence; he had just broken his sword.
Our appeal had ended by being heard. Decidedly, as we have seen, Paris was rising. The fall of Bonaparte seemed to be foreshadowed. Two Representatives, Fabvier and Crestin, met in the Rue Royale, and Crestin, pointing to the Palace of the Assembly, said to Fabvier, "We shall be there to-morrow."
One noteworthy incident. Mazes became eccentric, the prison unbent itself; the interior experienced an undefinable reverberation from the outside. The warders, who the preceding evening had been insolent to the Representatives when going for their exercise in the courtyard, now saluted them to the ground. That very morning of Thursday, the 4th, the governor of the prison had paid a visit to the prisoners, and had said to them, "It is not my fault." He brought them books and writing-paper, a thing which up to that time he had refused. The Representative Valentin was in solitary confinement; on the morning of the 4th his warder suddenly became amiable, and offered to obtain for him news from outside, through his wife, who, he said, had been a servant in General Leflô's household. These were significant signs. When the jailer smiles it means that the jail is half opening.
We may add, what is not a contradiction, that at the same time the garrison at Mazas was being increased. 1200 more men were marched in, in detachments of 100 men each, spacing out their arrivals in "little doses" as an eye-witness remarked to us. Later on 400 men. 100 litres of brandy were distributed to them. One litre for every sixteen men. The prisoners could hear the movement of artillery round the prison.
The agitation spread to the most peaceable quarters. But the centre of Paris was above all threatening. The centre of Paris is a labyrinth of streets which appears to be made for the labyrinth of riots. The Ligue, the Fronde, the Revolution—we must unceasingly recall these useful facts—the 14th of July, the 10th of August, 1792, 1830, 1848, have come out from thence. These brave old streets were awakened. At eleven o'clock in the morning from Notre Dame to the Porte Saint Martin there were seventy-seven barricades. Three of them, one in the Rue Maubuée, another in the Rue Bertin-Poirée, another in the Rue Guérin-Boisseau, attained the height of the second stories; the barricade of the Porte Saint Denis was almost as bristling and as formidable as the barrier of the Faubourg Saint Antoine in June, 1848. The handful of the Representatives of the People had swooped down like a shower of sparks on these famous and inflammable crossroads. The beginning of the fire. The fire had caught. The old central market quarter, that city which is contained in the city, shouted, "Down with Bonaparte!" They hooted the police, they hissed the troops. Some regiments seemed stupefied. They cried, "Throw up your butt ends in the air!" From the windows above, women encouraged the construction of the barricades. There was powder there, there were muskets. Now, we were no longer alone. We saw rising up in the gloom behind us the enormous head of the people. Hope at the present time was on our side. The oscillation of uncertainty had at length become steady, and we were, I repeat, almost perfectly confident.
There had been a moment when, owing to the good news pouring in upon us, this confidence had become so great that we who had staked our lives on this great contest, seized with an irresistible joy in the presence of a success becoming hourly more certain, had risen from our seats, and had embraced each other. Michel de Bourges was particularly angered against Bonaparte, for he had believed his word, and had even gone so far as to say, "He is my man." Of the four of us, he was the most indignant. A gloomy flash of victory shone in him. He struck the table with his fist, and exclaimed, "Oh! the miserable wretch! To-morrow—" and he struck the table a second time, "to-morrow his head shall fall in the Place de Grève before the Hôtel de Ville."
I looked at him.
"No," said I, "this man's head shall not fall."
"What do you mean?"
"I do not wish it."
"Why?"
"Because," said I, "if after such a crime we allow Louis Bonaparte to live we shall abolish the penalty of death."
This generous Michel de Bourges remained thoughtful for a moment, then he pressed my hand.
Crime is an opportunity, and always gives us a choice, and it is better to extract from it progress than punishment. Michel de Bourges realized this.
Moreover this incident shows to what a pitch our hopes had been raised.
Appearances were on our side, actual facts not so. Saint-Arnaud had his orders. We shall see them.
Strange incidents took place.
Towards noon a general, deep in thought, was on horseback in the Place de la Madeleine, at the head of his wavering troops. He hesitated.
A carriage stopped, a woman stepped out and conversed in a low tone with the general. The crowd could see her. The Representative Raymond, who lived at No 4, Place de la Madeleine, saw her from his window. This woman was Madame K. The general stooping down on his horse, listened, and finally made the dejected gesture of a vanquished man. Madame K. got back into her carriage. This man, they said, loved that woman. She could, according to the side of her beauty which fascinated her victim, inspire either heroism or crime. This strange beauty was compounded of the whiteness of an angel, combined with the look of a spectre.
It was the look which conquered.
This man no longer hesitated. He entered gloomily into the enterprise.
From twelve to two o'clock there was in this enormous city given over to the unknown an indescribable and fierce expectation. All was calm and awe-striking. The regiments and the limbered batteries quitted the faubourg and stationed themselves noiselessly around the boulevards. Not a cry in the ranks of the soldiery. An eye-witness said, "The soldiers march with quite a jaunty air." On the Quai de la Ferronnerie, heaped up with regiments ever since the morning of the 2d of December, there now only remained a post of Municipal Guards. Everything ebbed back to the centre, the people as well as the army; the silence of the army had ultimately spread to the people. They watched each other.
Each soldier had three days' provisions and six packets of cartridges.
It has since transpired that at this moment 10,000 francs were daily spent in brandy for each brigade.
Towards one o'clock, Magnan went to the Hôtel de Ville, had the reserve limbered under his own eyes, and did not leave until all the batteries were ready to march.
Certain suspicious preparations grew more numerous. Towards noon the State workmen and the hospital corps had established a species of huge ambulance at No. 2, Faubourg Montmartre. A great heap of litters was piled up there. "What is all this for?" asked the crowd.
Dr. Deville, who had attended Espinasse when he had been wounded, noticed him on the boulevard, and asked him, "Up to what point are you going?"
Espinasse's answer is historical.
He replied, "To the end."
At two o'clock five brigades, those of Cotte, Bourgon, Canrobert, Dulac, and Reybell, five batteries of artillery, 16,400 men,23 infantry and cavalry, lancers, cuirassiers, grenadiers, gunners, were echelloned without any ostensible reason between the Rue de la Paix and the Faubourg Poissonnière. Pieces of cannon were pointed at the entrance of every street; there were eleven in position on the Boulevard Poissonnière alone. The foot soldiers had their guns to their shoulders, the officers their swords drawn. What did all this mean? It was a curious sight, well worth the trouble of seeing, and on both sides of the pavements, on all the thresholds of the shops, from all the stories of the houses, an astonished, ironical, and confiding crowd looked on.
Little by little, nevertheless, this confidence diminished, and irony gave place to astonishment; astonishment changed to stupor. Those who have passed through that extraordinary minute will not forget it. It was evident that there was something underlying all this. But what? Profound obscurity. Can one imagine Paris in a cellar? People felt as though they were beneath a low ceiling. They seemed to be walled up in the unexpected and the unknown. They seemed to perceive some mysterious will in the background. But after all they were strong; they were the Republic, they were Paris; what was there to fear! Nothing. And they cried, "Down with Bonaparte!" The troops continued to keep silence, but the swords remained outside their scabbards, and the lighted matches of the cannon smoldered at the corners of the streets. The cloud grew blacker every minute, heavier and more silent. This thickening of the darkness was tragical. One felt the coming crash of a catastrophe, and the presence of a villain; snake-like treason writhed during this night, and none can foresee where the downward slide of a terrible design will stop when events are on a steep incline.
What was coming out of this thick darkness?
23 16,410 men, the figures taken from the Ministry of War.