The History of a Crime Part 31

They were thirsty and weary. In the Rue de Reuilly a man came out of a door with a bottle in his hand, and offered them drink.

Sartin joined them on the way. In the Rue de Charonne they entered the meeting-place of the a.s.sociation of Cabinet Makers, hoping to find there the committee of the a.s.sociation in session. There was no one there. But nothing discouraged them.

As they reached the Place de la Bastille, Dulac said to Schoelcher, "I will ask permission to leave you for an hour or two, for this reason: I am alone in Paris with my little daughter, who is seven years old. For the past week she has had scarlet fever. Yesterday, when the _coup d'etat_ burst forth, she was at death's door. I have no one but this child in the world. I left her this morning to come with you, and she said to me, 'Papa, where are you going?' As I am not killed, I will go and see if she is not dead."

Two hours afterwards the child was still living, and we were holding a permanent sitting at No. 15, Rue Richelieu, Jules Favre, Carnot, Michel de Bourges, and myself, when Dulac entered, and said to us, "I have come to place myself at your disposal."

[9] "There was also a misunderstanding respecting the appointed time.

Some made a mistake, and thought it was nine o'clock. The first arrivals impatiently awaited their colleagues. They were, as we have said, some twelve or fifteen in number at half-past eight. 'Time is being lost,'

exclaimed one of them who had hardly entered; 'let us gird on our sashes; let us show the Representatives to the People, let us join it in raising barricades.' We shall perhaps save the country, at all events we shall save the honor of our party. 'Come, let us to the barricades!' This advice was immediately and unanimously acclaimed: one alone, Citizen Baudin, interposed the forcible objection, 'we are not sufficiently numerous to adopt such a resolution.' But he spiritedly joined in the general enthusiasm, and with a calm conscience, after having reserved the principle, he was not the last to gird on his sash."--SCHOELCHER, _Histoire des Crimes du 2d Decembre_, pp. 130-131.

CHAPTER IV.

THE WORKMEN'S SOCIETIES ASK US FOR THE ORDER TO FIGHT

In presence of the fact of the barricade of the Faubourg St. Antoine so heroically constructed by the Representatives, so sadly neglected by the populace, the last illusions, even mine, should have been dispersed.

Baudin killed, the Faubourg cold. Such things spoke aloud. It was a supreme, manifest, absolute demonstration of that fact, the inaction of the people, to which I could not resign myself--a deplorable inaction, if they understood, a self-treason, if they did not understand, a fatal neutrality in every case, a calamity of which all the responsibility, we repeat, recoiled not upon the people but upon those who in June, 1848, after having promised them amnesty, had refused it, and who had unhinged the great soul of the people of Paris by breaking faith with them. What the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly had sown the Legislative a.s.sembly harvested.

We, innocent of the fault, had to submit to the consequence.

The spark which we had seen flash for an instant through the crowd--Michel de Bourges from the height of Bonvalet's balcony, myself from the Boulevard du Temple--this spark seemed extinguished. Maigne firstly, then Brillier, then Bruckner, later on Charmaule, Madier de Montjau, Bastide, and Dulac came to report to us what had pa.s.sed at the barricade of St. Antoine, the motives which had decided the Representatives present not to await the hour appointed for the rendezvous, and Baudin's death. The report which I made myself of what I had seen, and which Ca.s.sal and Alexander Rey completed by adding new circ.u.mstances, enabled us to ascertain the situation. The Committee could no longer hesitate: I myself renounced the hopes which I had based upon a grand manifestation, upon a powerful reply to the _coup d'etat_, upon a sort of pitched battle waged by the guardians of the Republic against the banditti of the Elysee. The Faubourgs failed us; we possessed the lever--Right, but the ma.s.s to be raised, the People, we did not possess.

There was nothing more to hope for, as those two great orators, Michel de Bourges and Jules Favre, with their keen political perception, had declared from the first, save a slow long struggle, avoiding decisive engagements, changing quarters, keeping Paris on the alert, saying to each, It is not at an end; leaving time for the departments to prepare their resistance, wearying the troops out, and in which struggle the Parisian people, who do not long smell powder with impunity, would perhaps ultimately take fire. Barricades raised everywhere, barely defended, re-made immediately, disappearing and multiplying themselves at the same time, such was the strategy indicated by the situation. The Committee adopted it, and sent orders in every direction to this effect.

At that moment we were sitting at No. 15, Rue Richelieu, at the house of our colleague Grevy, who had been arrested in the Tenth Arrondiss.e.m.e.nt on the preceding day, who was at Mazas. His brother had offered us his house for our deliberations. The Representatives, our natural emissaries, flocked around us, and scattered themselves throughout Paris, with our instructions to organize resistance at every point. They were the arms and the Committee was the soul. A certain number of ex-Const.i.tuents, intrepid men, Garnier-Pages, Marie, Martin (de Strasbourg), Senart, formerly President of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, Bastide, Laissac, Landrin, had joined the Representatives on the preceding day. They established, therefore, in all the districts where it was possible Committees of Permanence in connection with us, the Central Committee, and composed either of Representatives or of faithful citizens. For our watchword we chose "Baudin."

Towards noon the centre of Paris began to grow agitated.

Our appeal to arms was first seen placarded on the Place de la Bourse and the Rue Montmartre. Groups pressed round to read it, and battled with the police, who endeavored to tear down the bills. Other lithographic placards contained in two parallel columns the decree of deposition drawn up by the Right at the Mairie of the Tenth Arrondiss.e.m.e.nt, and the decree of outlawry voted by the Left. There were distributed, printed on gray paper in large type, the judgment of the High Court of Justice, declaring Louis Bonaparte attainted with the Crime of High Treason, and signed "Hardouin" (President), "Delapalme,"

"Moreau" (of the Seine), "Cauchy," "Bataille" (Judges). This last name was thus mis-spelt by mistake, it should read "Pataille."

At that moment people generally believed, and we ourselves believed, in this judgment, which, as we have seen, was not the genuine judgment.

At the same time they posted in the populous quarters, at the corner of every street, two Proclamations. The first ran thus:--

"TO THE PEOPLE.

"ARTICLE III.[10]

"The Const.i.tution is confided to the keeping and to the patriotism of French citizens. Louis NAPOLEON is outlawed.

"The State of Siege is abolished.

"Universal suffrage is re-established.

"LONG LIVE THE REPUBLIC.

"To ARMS!

"For the United Mountain.

"The Delegate, VICTOR HUGO."

The second ran thus:--

"INHABITANTS OF PARIS.

"The National Guards and the People of the Departments are marching on Paris to aid you in seizing the TRAITOR, Louis Napoleon BONAPARTE.

"For the Representatives of the People,

"VICTOR HUGO, President.

"SCHOELCHER, Secretary."

This last placard, printed on little squares of paper, was distributed abroad, says an historian of the _coup d'etat_, by thousands of copies.

For their part the criminals installed in the Government offices replied by threats: the great white placards, that is to say, the official bills, were largely multiplied. On one could be read:--

"WE, PREFECT OF THE POLICE,

"Decree as follows:--

"ARTICLE I. All meetings are rigorously prohibited. They will be immediately dispersed by force.

"ARTICLE II. All seditious shouts, all reading in public, all posting of political doc.u.ments not emanating from a regularly const.i.tuted authority, are equally prohibited.

"ARTICLE III. The agents of the Public Police will enforce the execution of the present decree.

"Given at the Prefecture of Police, December 3, 1851.

"DE MAUPAS, Prefect of Police.

"Seen and approved,

"DE MORNY, Minister of the Interior."

On another could be read,--

"THE MINISTER OF WAR,

"By virtue of the Law on the State of Siege,

"Decrees:--

"Every person taken constructing or defending a barricade, or carrying arms, WILL BE SHOT.