The Insurrection in Paris Part 8

MAY 27th.

If it is difficult to realize the present condition of Paris, it is still more difficult to describe it. We creep timidly about the streets, haunted by the constant dread, either of being arrested as belonging to the Commune, pressed into a _chaine_, or struck by the fragment of some chance sh.e.l.l, and oppressed ever by the scenes of destruction and desolation that surround us; the whole forming a combination which produces a sensation more nearly allied to nightmare than to any psychological experience with which I am familiar, but yet requiring some new word to define it. The angry ring of the volleys of execution; the strings of men and women hurried off to their doom; the curses of an infuriated populace; the brutal violence of an exasperated soldiery, are sights and sounds calculated to produce a strange and powerful effect on the mind. Yesterday afternoon I drove over as much of the city already in the occupation of the Versaillists as was consistent with safety. Following the Boulevard Clichy in order to avoid the _chaines_ in the neighbourhood of the Madeleine, I pa.s.sed the scenes of terrible fighting. The Place Clichy was a ma.s.s of barricades and shattered houses, the _facades_ marked with bullets as if pitted with the smallpox, the windows smashed, and the evidences of a fearful struggle visible everywhere. It seemed as if the ground had been disputed here house by house; but from all I can learn of the resistance, the actual defenders of the barricades, though resolute men, were few in number.

One of the most marked characteristics of this fighting has been the cowardice of the many as compared with the courage and resolution of the few; some of the barricades were abandoned by their defenders by hundreds, only ten or a dozen remaining to the last, and holding their ground until they were all killed or wounded. Pa.s.sing up the Rue Lafayette, I reached the Head Quarters of the Fifth Corps, where, happening to know an officer, I was present at the examination of some prisoners who were brought in, as every soldier who thinks he has good ground for suspicion can arrest men or women, and drag them to the divisional tribunal. They are captured in shoals. One lame man with a villanous countenance, who was brought in while I was there, was accused of being a _chef de barricade_, and having been taken in the act. He was put through a short sharp fire of cross-examination, his pockets emptied and his clothes felt, and he was then hurried off to take his place in the ranks of the condemned ones that are forwarded to Versailles.

Instant execution is only ordered in the more extreme cases, excepting where the fighting is actually going on, and then the troops give very little quarter. The bitterness of the belligerents against each other is of a far more intense and sanguinary kind than that which ordinarily exists between combatants. The soldiery, looking at the pedestal on the Place Vendome and at the numerous public buildings which in some form or other are a.s.sociated with their military history, now all smoking ruins, can scarcely contain their rage, and not unnaturally vent it with ferocity on an enemy which deliberately planned the destruction of Paris as the price of victory to the conquerors, and who are even yet endeavouring to carry out their diabolical design of destroying the houses still uninjured by secretly introducing petroleum b.a.l.l.s and fusees into the cellars. I saw a soldier suddenly seize a man as he was apparently harmlessly walking along the street; his pockets were emptied and found to contain cartridges and combustible b.a.l.l.s of various sizes.

Another soldier and a sailor rushed to the spot; the latter drew his revolver, and I expected would have shot the man then and there, but he was satisfied on seeing his comrade p.r.i.c.k him sharply with his bayonet.

The two soldiers then hurried the culprit off in front of them cuffing him occasionally on the head, and accelerating his progress with the points of their bayonets while they cursed him heartily. A small crowd eagerly followed to see his fate, which they loudly hoped would be instant execution; and, looking at the detestable nature of the contents of his pockets and of his intentions, one could scarcely blame either his captors or their sympathizers if they called for vengeance, and long ere this, he has probably ceased to exist. One woman was caught with these fire b.a.l.l.s on two occasions, having succeeded once in escaping. As a general rule, the hand-dog look of the prisoners is their most striking characteristic. I pa.s.sed one gang of about 50 yesterday, and tried in vain, as I walked by their side, to catch a man's eye, or even to see a face turned fairly up to the light of day. With heads bare, and eyes steadily fixed on the ground, they pa.s.sed between rows of people, who howled and hooted at them, and it was not till I reached the head of the short column that I observed a slender figure walking alone in the costume of the National Guard, with long, fair hair floating over the shoulders, a bright blue eye, and a handsome, bold, young face that seemed to know neither shame nor fear. When the female spectators detected at a glance that this seeming young National Guardsman was a woman, their indignation found vent in strong language, for the torrent of execration seems to flow more freely from feminine lips when the object is a woman than if it be one of the opposite s.e.x; but the only response of the victim was to glare right and left with heightened colour and flashing eyes, in marked contrast to the cowardly crew that followed her. If the French nation were composed only of French women what a terrible nation it would be!

The aspect of the Boulevards is the strangest sight imaginable. I followed them from the Porte St. Martin to the Rue de la Paix. There was fighting at the Chateau d'Eau, and without either a pa.s.s or an ambulance _bra.s.sard_ a nearer approach to the scene of action was undesirable; indeed, until recently, the sh.e.l.ls had been bursting here in every direction, and their holes might be seen in the centre of those pavements heretofore sacred to the _flaneurs_ of Paris. Strewn over the streets were branches of trees; and fragments of masonry that had been knocked from the houses, bricks and mortar, torn proclamations, shreds of clothings half concealing bloodstains, were now the interesting and leading features of that fashionable resort; foot pa.s.sengers were few and far between, the shops and _cafes_ hermetically sealed, excepting where bullets had made air holes, and during my whole afternoon's promenade I only met three other carriages besides my own. The Place de l'Opera was a camping ground of artillery, the Place Vendome a confusion of barricades, guarded by sentries and the Rue Royale a ma.s.s of _debris_. Looked at from the Madeleine the desolation and ruin of that handsome street were lamentable to behold. The Place de la Concorde was a desert, and in the midst of it lay the statue of Lille with the head off. The last time I had looked on that face it was covered with c.r.a.pe, in mourning for the entry of the Prussians. Near the bridge were 24 corpses of Insurgents, laid out in a row, waiting to be buried under the neighbouring paving stones. To the right the skeleton of the Tuileries reared its gaunt sh.e.l.l, the framework of the lofty wing next the Seine still standing; but the whole of the roof of the central building was gone, and daylight visible through all the windows right into the Place de Carrousel. General Mac-Mahon's head-quarters were at the Affaires Etrangeres, which were intact. After a visit there, I pa.s.sed the Corps Legislatif, also uninjured by fire, but much marked by shot and sh.e.l.l, and so along the Quais the whole way to the Mint, at which point General Vinoy had established his head-quarters. At the corner of the Rue du Bac the destruction was something appalling. The Rue du Bac is an impa.s.sable mound of ruins, 15 or 20 feet high, completely across the street as far as I could see. The Legion d'Honneur, the Cour des Comptes, and Conseil d'Etat were still smoking, but there was nothing left of them but the blackened sh.e.l.ls of their n.o.ble _facades_ to show how handsome they had once been. At this point, in whichever direction one looked, the same awful devastation met the eye--to the left the smouldering Tuileries, to the right, the long line of ruin where the fire had swept through the magnificent palaces on the Quai, and overhead again to-day a cloud of smoke, more black and abundant even than yesterday, incessantly rolling its dense volumes from behind Notre-Dame, whose two towers were happily standing uninjured. This fire issued from the Grenier d'Abondance and other buildings in the neighbourhood of the Jardin des Plantes. In another direction the a.r.s.enal was also burning. One marked result of a high state of civilization is, that it has furnished improved facilities for incendiarism, which seem to have been developed even more completely than the means of counteracting them. Along the Quais under the trees, cavalry horses were picketed, and a force was about to leave General Vinoy's head-quarters just as I reached it, to support an attack which was even then being made upon the Place de la Bastille, where the Insurgents were still holding out. On the opposite side of the river were the smoking ruins of the Theatre Chatelet and the Hotel de Ville.

Pa.s.sing through the Place du Carrousel into the Rue de Rivoli, I had a more complete view of the entire destruction which has overtaken the Tuileries and some of the adjoining buildings. The lower end of the Rue de Rivoli towards the Faubourg St. Antoine was densely crowded with troops, and pa.s.sage in that direction was interdicted, while at the other end, near the Place de la Concorde, there was a _chaine_; so I struck once more across to the Boulevards, past the Palais Royal, a large part of which is burnt, wearied and sickened with the waste of ruins through which I had pa.s.sed, and meeting with only one incident, when I found myself in the midst of a panic-stricken throng all running away from a series of cracker-like explosions, which turned out to be cartridges that from some unexplained cause had begun to go off spontaneously under our feet. To-day the firing is more distant and less audible. The insurgents are still holding the heights of Belleville and Pere-Lachaise. In the Jardin des Plantes the loss of the troops was heavy, but up to this time they have won their ground with a less loss than could have been antic.i.p.ated, and the fearful mortality of Generals which characterized the last "_Campagne Parisienne_" has happily not been repeated upon this occasion. So far, no General has been either killed or wounded.

The affair of Belleville is not yet concluded. There is fighting still.

A great fire is raging in the direction of the b.u.t.tes de Chaumont.

Loud reports have been heard within the walls of Mazas, and it is supposed that the hostages have been ma.s.sacred.

Courbet, Amouroux, Gambon, and Valles have been executed.

The night is quiet.

Sh.e.l.ls have fallen on the Boulevard Menilmontant. Great hopes are entertained that the rains will check the conflagration. A few sh.e.l.ls have fallen in the Rue de la Paix. Constant arrests or executions are being made of women who throw incendiary matter down the cellar gratings. Many bodies have been exhumed from under shattered houses, some with large sums of money on them. News reaches us that troops of the Line have occupied Menilmontant and the Cemetery of Pere-Lachaise.

The Federals had declared Pere-Lachaise to be their last stronghold, and that they were prepared to defend it tomb by tomb. The National Guard will be dissolved to-morrow. Upwards of 1,000 prisoners were marched up the Boulevard this morning, escorted by mounted Hussars.

Delescluze has been taken at Villiers le Bel. General Eudes and Ranvier have also been taken. The public buildings destroyed up to the present time are the Tuileries, the Palais Royal, the Ministry of Finance, the Cour des Comptes, the Prefecture of Police, the Palace of the Legion of Honour, the Caisse des Depots, Graineterie, and the Garde Meuble. The Pantheon was saved by a rush of Marines, who cut a slow match before it reached the powder barrels in the crypt. The Chatelet, Lyrique, and Porte St. Martin Theatres have been burnt, also the great barracks of the Rue des Celestins. Part of the roof of St. Eustache has fallen in.

The fighting still continues round the Chateau d'Eau. There will be no difficulty, however, in disarming the National Guard. Valles fought for his life, and received a sabre cut across the face and several bullets before he finally fell close to the Tour St. Jacques. Rows of bodies line the quays awaiting burial where they fell. The individuals arrested will be tried by Court-Martial at Versailles. The Court-Martial will commence its sittings on Monday. Many women and children have been executed around the Luxembourg, having been convicted of firing on soldiers. Fort Bicetre is still in Federal hands, but the garrison is said to have exhausted its ammunition. Bergeret gave the order for burning the Tuileries. General Douai, by promptness of action, prevented the fire spreading to the Louvre. Humour has it that Delescluze and Pyat, disguised as beggars, were recognized in the Rue du Pet.i.t Carreau, and shot. Thirteen women have just been executed after being publicly disgraced in the Place Vendome. They were caught in the act of spreading petroleum. Such papers as have appeared announce the execution of the Archbishop of Paris and the cure of the Madeleine.

The Column Vendome is to be rebuilt.

With an English friend I this morning made my way along the line of Boulevards running east of the Madeleine. A marvellous change had come over them since yesterday; they were crowded with troops of the Line and civilians fraternizing with them, and wandering about to look for the traces of the recent conflict without danger of being shot from windows or being pressed into the service of the Communists to build or fight behind a barricade. It was our plan to make for the Hotel de Ville, and we took the Bourse in our way. Everything was so quiet that we half hoped the fighting in that part of Paris at any rate was over, and we were in consequence greatly astonished to hear near us the furious beating of the _rappel_, as regulars were all about. We thought for a moment a hot conflict was at hand, but we had forgotten, not unnaturally, considering how long it is since we had seen or heard of them, the Party of Order. It was they who were rallying valiantly at the Bourse round the new tricolour banner and a few gentlemen who wore tricolour _bra.s.sards_ or pretty bunches of tricolour riband, and whose general tidiness and freshness contrasted strikingly with the grimy, business-like look of the real soldiers close by. These were streaming into the Place des Victoires, close by, receiving cheers and congratulations from the people about in the square or at the windows, who seemed delighted to see them. The men were in capital spirits, and told us they were carrying everything before them, that the Insurgents fought often well enough so far as mere pluck went, but were everywhere outmanoeuvred, and at nearly every barricade found themselves taken at once in front, flank, and rear. This exactly tallied with what we had already heard and seen. An officer told his men to keep a sharp look out on the windows of the houses about, lest they should be surprised by a fusillade. "No fear of that," said a _bourgeois_; "not a gun will be fired at you in this Quarter." This looked peaceful enough, and we were considerably astonished therefore as we went up a street a little further on, the Rue d'Aboukir, I think, to find ourselves facing a barricade about 150 yards off, manned, and with a flag floating over it that looked very red. We stared hard and long, but the flag was unmistakably red, and therefore, supposing any Regulars to advance, we were directly between two fires. We accordingly turned into a side street and waited patiently, as it seemed impossible that Regulars and Reds so near each other should escape collision. The Regulars were sure to come on; the only question was whether the Reds would run. As I looked up another parallel street, the Rue de Clery, I think, I found the question answered in an odd way. There, within thirty yards, were two officers of Reds lounging leisurely about and stopping now and then to talk to people at doors. I suppose they were told of the near approach of the Regulars, for they turned back in the direction of their barricade. But meantime the Regulars had advanced, and, therefore, the enemies were at one moment within 40 paces of each other, though, being in different streets, they were unconscious of each other's near vicinity. Both parties seemed, as they well might, thoroughly at home, the people, whatever might be their secret sympathies, showing a decent appearance, at least, of impartiality to all men with arms in their hands, and yet in a few minutes or seconds--for there was now no doubt that they were about to fight--everybody was on the _qui vive_, getting ready to escape if necessary. The extraordinary feature of these Paris street fights is that many of them go on with a crowd of non-combatants, men, women, and children, as close to them on both sides as if the whole affair were a theatrical representation of a sensational melodramatic kind, where a good deal of powder and blue lights would be burnt, but no bullets or lives would be spent. In streets in which fighting actually occurs no one of course shows except combatants, and these show as little as possible, lying down or sheltering behind extempore barricades and windows. The people indoors, as may be supposed, do not keep near them, as the bullets fired down the sides of the streets under cover of doorways or corner houses glance and ricochet about in the wildest way. Scarcely a window escapes if the fight lasts long, but adjoining streets running at right angles to the fighting ground are for the moment comparatively safe, and the people crowd about the doorways in these, the more venturesome getting close to street corners, and every now and then cautiously craning their necks round to see, if possible, whether shots tell.

Perhaps the strangest thing about a Paris street fight is that up to the very last moment one sees people running quietly along, utterly unconscious of danger, right between two lines of fire, with loaded mitrailleuses within a hundred yards of them. One minute before the fight I am describing began this morning, an old lady, with a large market basket on her arm, was leisurely walking down the Rue d'Aboukir between the barricades and soldiers mustering quietly at the corner of the Rue Montmartre. She was probably making way to the Halles Centrales close by to get something for breakfast, in happy ignorance of the fact that at that very moment soldiers were firing, as far as we could see, right into it. I found afterwards that the Reds were then in occupation of it, and had loop-holed the Church of St. Eustache, which they held in great force. Shouts of warning from the crowd standing near me at the corner of the Rue Montmartre made her at last quicken her pace, though I doubt whether she quite understood them or knew her danger. I scarcely know whether Paris combatants at this period are considerate enough to wait till the ground is clear of non-combatants, or whether out of politeness each side was waiting for the other to fire first. In any case the regulars did not wait long. A colonel of the Staff, with cane in one hand and in the other a map of Paris, studying, stood at the corner of a side street, gave his men the order to commence instantly. A soldier on each side took a step forward, and exposing himself as little as possible fired up at the barricade. After he had fired he fell back to reload, and another all ready took his place, so that, though there were at first very few men--not more than 20 perhaps--firing was pretty hot. Quick came back the response of the Reds, and whizzing went their bullets down the street, or crashing against projecting corners of the houses, so near one's ears that it was at first hard to keep from dodging, despite one's convictions that only Irish guns shoot round corners. Ricochet b.a.l.l.s were not only not more dangerous, but probably were less dangerous, at the corner than farther off. Some stood as near as they could to the soldiers. It would be impossible to do this with the Reds, as they would insist one's taking up a rifle and shooting or being shot; but the Regulars, so far from forcing, would not even allow an amateur to indulge in fancy shooting. But taking hurried shots round a corner at men crouched hundreds of yards off behind well-built barricades is too slow work to be satisfactory, and the officials came and began to show signs of impatience. The leader, from a safe post of observation, was able to take a cool searching view of the situation, and ordered some of his men, whose numbers were gradually increasing as they hurried up the street below, ducking heads and hugging walls, to mount some of the corner houses, while others extemporized a barricade in the street. To mount the houses was easy enough, though the door of one had to be broken in, and presently we heard gla.s.s tumbling down as muzzles of rifles were poked through the upper panes, and soon sharp cracks and thick puffs of smoke leaping out showed that the men had settled down to their work. The barricade was a more difficult matter, as it had to be made full in front of the enemy's fire; but it was contrived with wonderful coolness and rapidity, the civilians about eagerly bringing stones. Two or three barrels appeared as if by magic.

By pushing the barricade cautiously across the street, by lying down under cover of one bit as they built another, the Regulars soon had cover enough to fire comparatively at ease straight up at the barricade, while their comrades at the windows took it from above in flank. I was sometimes within a few feet of them, and was much struck by their coolness and military common sense, if I may use the expression. They did the work before them in a quiet, business-like way, in what, during the late war, was considered by some the best feature of Prussian fighting, not shirking risk when it was necessary, but, on the other hand, not needlessly exposing themselves for the sake of swagger, especially of the officers. This morning, the officers not being wanted, had the sense to keep quietly out of harm's way and smoke their cigarettes like unconcerned civilians when not giving orders to their men. The Reds, on the other hand, fought capitally, keeping up a brisk and well-directed fire. Yet, strange to say, n.o.body was wounded; I mean on our side.

MAY 28th.

A week has elapsed to-day since the Versailles troops established themselves inside the _enceinte_, and the fighting has been incessant ever since; this is hard work enough for the a.s.sailants, who number nearly 150,000 men; but for the soldiers--if soldiers they can be called--of the Commune, the effort has already been almost superhuman.

Gradually diminishing in numbers, constantly finding themselves forced upon a smaller area, and, therefore, the target of a more concentrated fire, hemmed in upon all sides, with ammunition and provisions falling short, exposed to a heavy rain, which has been falling incessantly for 48 hours, unable to seek repose in any spot sheltered from the sh.e.l.ls of the enemy, which are pouring in unremitting showers upon every corner of their position, the situation of the Insurgents is desperate in the extreme, and it cannot be denied that they are fighting with an energy and a heroism worthy of a better cause. Reports are so varied and contradictory as to the fate of their leaders that even the Generals of the French army do not know positively who is commanding them; but if the prisoners are to be believed, the irrepressible Cluseret has again risen to the surface, and is the heart and soul of the defence. As the position of the Insurgents becomes desperate, it seems to produce a greater ferocity on both sides. The rebels neither ask nor give quarter; they have made up their minds that death, whether as combatants or as prisoners, is their only alternative, and men and women seem to be lashed up to a frenzy which has converted them into a set of wild beasts caught in a trap, and rendering their extermination a necessity. I went yesterday to the Jardin des Plantes, as the entire left bank of the Seine is now in the hands of the Government troops, and found M.

Decaisne, the celebrated botanical professor, still safe and sound, after having pa.s.sed through three days of unparalleled suspense. On Wednesday the _rappel_ had been beaten by the Insurgents, and notice was publicly given that the Pantheon was to be blown up at 2 o'clock. The result was a general "stampede" of the inhabitants in an agony of terror and dismay. For two or three hours women and children came pouring out of the doomed quarter, unable to save any of their property, and not even yet a.s.sured that they had escaped the limits of the explosion. At 5 o'clock no explosion had occurred, and the rumour spread that the attempt had failed for want of a sufficient quant.i.ty of powder. I told you how the Pantheon was saved; the people went back to their houses, only to witness severe street fighting, the result of which was to drive the Insurgents slowly across the river, where they made a fierce stand at a _tete du pont_ erected at the end of the bridge of Austerlitz. This had only been carried the evening before my visit to it, and bore all the marks of an actual battlefield. Here were eight or ten bodies strewn behind the barricade, with groups of women and young children gathered round inspecting them, and lifting, with a morbid curiosity, the cloths which had been thrown over them to conceal their distorted countenances.

These men had been killed in hard fighting, men and accoutrements were strewn thickly around, the houses were smashed and riddled with shot.

The barricade, a formidable earthwork and battery, was pounded into a mere heap--everything betokened a bitter struggle; and, indeed, I had already heard from a Staff officer that the Line had lost more heavily at this point than elsewhere. Pa.s.sing along the side of the ca.n.a.l, we endeavoured to reach the Bastille, but were stopped by a battery which was firing at Pere-Lachaise, and which was receiving sh.e.l.ls in reply from the cemetery. We therefore retraced our steps past the long gaunt skeleton of the Prefecture of the Police, which was still smoking, and which had contained a body of political prisoners incarcerated by the Insurgents, but released by them in order to work at barricades. This proved their salvation, as they were enabled to effect their escape on the approach of the troops. It is reported, nevertheless, that some still lie buried beneath these smouldering ruins. To the right of the Bastille we could see a heavy volume of smoke rising apparently from a point corresponding to the position of the prison of Mazas. We are still in utter darkness as to the fate of the Archbishop and the clergy in confinement with him, but the tragedy of the Dominicans leaves us little hope. About 20 of these priests were imprisoned on Friday, the 19th, at Fort Bicetre. On Thursday, when this had to be abandoned, they were hurried away to the Gobelins on the promise of being set at liberty.

Instead of this they were driven to work on the barricades, then dragged to a prison in the Avenue d'Italie. At half-past 4 in the afternoon they were visited by a certain M. Cerisier with a company of the 101st battalion of the National Guards, who deliberately loaded in their presence. The outside door of the prison was then thrown open, and they were ordered to leave it one by one. As they marched out singly they were shot successively by order of Cerisier, with the exception of the narrator of the occurrence, and one or two others who were either missed or slightly wounded and escaped. Twelve bodies of these unhappy men have already been recovered.

There is also no doubt that M. Gustave Chaudey, one of the princ.i.p.al editors of the _Siecle_, and a literary man of some eminence and high character, who had incurred the displeasure of the Communists, has been shot by them. On the other side the executions are wholesale. It is estimated that upwards of 2,000 persons have been shot already on the left bank of the Seine alone, evidently a small proportion of the total number. Wherever women and children are to be observed leaning over the parapet of the Seine intently regarding some object below, one may be sure that the attraction is a group of hideously mutilated corpses of men who have been brought down to the river side, and then with their backs to the wall have met their doom. On the sloping roads leading down from the _quai_ to the river may also be seen inequalities where the road has been recently disturbed and where the freshly-turned earth indicates burial-places. Not far from these bodies were lying several dead horses, from which the people were cutting steaks. The inside of the Hotel de Ville presents a curious scene, the solid ma.s.ses of stone and lime of which the rubbish is composed having fallen in in the form of a crater, which fills up the whole central place. Under this mound are said to be buried from 200 to 300 Insurgents who were unable to escape at the last moment, and thus fell the victims of the conflagration they had themselves originated. The mutilation of the ornamental work of this magnificent specimen of architecture is simply hideous; there is scarcely a square inch of the _facade_ untouched by shot or sh.e.l.l. Anxious, if possible, to judge of the progress of the attack which was being made on the Insurgent position at Pere-Lachaise, I reached the Place Chateau d'Eau, which had been taken the day before from the Insurgents. I found it, however, impossible to go beyond the angle of the Wall near the Ambigu. Here a small crowd was collected which was dispersed by a shot just as I approached, and the place itself was a solitary desert, for it was swept from the heights of Belleville down the Faubourg du Temple. Pa.s.sing along the Boulevard Magenta, we obtained from the point where the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis traverses the Rue Lafayette, a view of an Insurgent barricade, on which a red flag was still flying, and which was turned by the troops while we were there. We were looking down the long, straight line of street totally deserted, and in the far distance watching the barricade, beyond which rose the occasional puffs of smoke from a musketry fire, when we suddenly saw the red trousers scampering across in twos and threes, and then in larger numbers, and knew that the barricade had been taken, and that it was safe to come out of our cover and walk on the opposite side of the street. All this time the whistling and bursting of the sh.e.l.l overhead was as incessant and loud as I have ever heard on the field of battle. We were directly in the line of fire between Montmartre and Pere la Chaise, although completely protected from it, as everything pa.s.sed overhead. But the terrific rushing through the air of the projectiles, and the cracking and bursting at each end when they reached their destination, made a music which it requires a Parisian education thoroughly to appreciate. Heavy volumes of smoke rose from the besieged quarter, and the destruction of life and property upon the doomed area which the Insurgents have chosen as their final stronghold must be something appalling. Near the angle of the street at which we stood lay the dead body of a man, covered with a cloth, who had been shot not many hours before in an adjoining Court. It was evident from the looks and tone of the inhabitants of this neighbourhood that their sympathies were strongly with the Communists. They muttered gloomily and savagely to each other, scarcely daring to raise their suspicious glances from the ground, for they knew not which of their neighbours might not have denounced them, and that the day of danger was by no means past.

Probably two-thirds of the men now gathered at their shopdoors had fought actively for the Commune. At the Prevote of the 5th corps I had an interesting instance of the effect of denunciations. While there some men who had been intrusted with the arrest of General Henry returned from their expedition. General Henry, it will be remembered, was one of the earliest leaders of the movement, and I went down to see where he had openly established himself as Commander-in-Chief of the National Guard in the Vaugirard quarter. About the 16th of March, or two days before the Revolution several attempts were made to arrest him but the task was so dangerous that they all failed. Throughout the movement this man has exhibited daring and intelligence, and his capture is much desired. In consequence of the information received his haunt was visited, and the result I saw in the shape of a blue Prussian overcoat stained with blood and perforated with a bullet-hole, a tunic still more b.l.o.o.d.y and torn, a very jaunty braided jacket quite clean and new, a Prussian undress cap, and a very handsome sword. The proprietor had evidently been wounded, and had succeeded in evading his captors, if still alive, by some secret contrivance, which, however, the honour of the denouncer was pledged to discover; it was evident that he had provided himself with a Prussian uniform, in the hope of pa.s.sing through the German lines, and the blood on his coat would seem to indicate that he had made the attempt and failed. From this barrack, just prior to my visit, had been removed several wounded children, most of them under eight years old. One of the most horrible features of the war in a thickly-peopled city is to be found in the sufferings which it entails upon the innocent who are thus early familiarized with scenes of blood and violence, and who too often, unfortunately, are themselves the victims of them. The _gamins_ of Paris love to dabble in petroleum and play with lucifer matches, and revel in destruction and conflagration.

More daring than their elders, they stick with their mothers to barricades after the father of the family has deemed it prudent to retire, and numerous are the stories of their heroism and courage.

Unfortunately, their propensities for arson render them liable to be shot, and it is sad to see how many children are often comprised in a band of prisoners. I went underground to the cells in which the prisoners were confined at the Prevote, and wandered along narrow, subterranean pa.s.sages, where the noisome exhalations were almost stifling, into dark cells, where the eye got at last sufficiently accustomed to the light to distinguish the relics left by the prisoners: here a pair of stays of which some female prisoner had divested herself, there a red c.o.c.kade, all kinds of articles of clothing steeped in slime of indescribable foulness; and cowering at one end of the corridor a dozen prisoners waiting to know their fate. They were more respectable than usual, and not apparently of a very sanguinary type. They were all men. To-day no less than a hundred women were marched down the streets in one gang. The papers are so full of false reports that it is scarcely safe to give news which has not been verified. Thus, unless I had seen the Genius of Liberty on the top of the column in the Place de la Bastille, and visited the Jardin des Plantes, I might have reported the accounts, of which the papers are full, of the destruction of the figure on the Column and of the animals and rare plants in the gardens, which you will be happy to hear are all in a state of perfect health and preservation. I am afraid, however, it is only too true that half the Gobelins are destroyed, and that 67 of the "Freres de la Doctrine Chretienne" have been shot by their fellow-Christians of the Commune. A friend of mine saw Madame Milliere in a prisoners' gang, and we have authentic intelligence to-day that her husband, one of the most pestilent of the apostles of Fraternity and wholesale slaughter, has been executed.

The streets are full of the National Guards of Order, carrying their rifles to the different depots to be given up, for the disarmament of the entire National Guard has been determined on, and it is to be hoped that this most useless body in time of foreign invasion and most dangerous one in moments of internal trouble will be extinguished and abolished for ever throughout all the towns of France. Meantime the Boulevards and streets from which the fighting has receded are slowly waking into life, the tricolor waves from the windows in token of loyalty and sympathy with the Government, and at least two cafes are open on the Boulevards, but as yet only here and there the shutters of a shop are lowered.

The roar of the batteries from Montmartre is still continuous, but it is hardly possible that the Insurgents can continue the struggle for 24 hours longer.

Fighting was going on at Belleville about an hour ago, but still there is every reason the believe that the insurrection is virtually over. A great number of prisoners, escorted by cavalry, have just been marched down the Boulevards. They were said to be 5,000, but this is probably an exaggeration. They came from the b.u.t.tes Chaumont, where many of them have been kept two days and a half without food. A more villainous collection of faces I never beheld. There were many women, among them some in men's clothes, some as _cantinieres_ or _ambulancieres_, and very young boys and old men. Nearly 1,500 were Regular soldiers, or at least wore their uniform. Their coats were turned inside out, as a mark of disgrace. As they pa.s.sed through the crowd lining each side of the Boulevards they were met with cries of "_A mort, c.r.a.pule, fusillez-les!_" Four women in the Amazon uniform and the Regulars excited special indignation. One prisoner, near the New Opera, refused to march, and was twice stabbed with bayonets. He was then tied to a horse's tail, and afterwards placed on the horse, but he threw himself off, and again refused to march. He was put into a cart and carried off to the nearest place of execution to be shot. Another prisoner, who also refused to march, was dragged by the hands and hair of the head along the road. The crowd called out to the soldiers to shoot him, and declared that but for the presence of the soldiers they would themselves execute summary justice on him. The troops, headed by the Marquis de Galifet, were loudly cheered as they pa.s.sed.

I went early this morning to Pere-Lachaise. Sh.e.l.ls were still falling so thickly near the Boulevard du Temple that no one was allowed to pa.s.s. I had to go a very roundabout way to get to the Place Bastille, as at numerous barricades everybody who pa.s.sed was compelled to a.s.sist in pulling them down. The barricades were of astonishing strength. Behind the barricade on the Boulevard Mazas lay three bodies of National Guards--apparently shot in its defence. A little lower down on the Boulevard Voltaire lay seven men dead, as if they had there made their last desperate stand. There were some old gray-headed men among them. We were told that their bodies were left there for recognition, and women occasionally came up and claimed them. The Regulars had also suffered severely there, but their dead had been immediately removed. Further on, the stone barricades had been protected by a second line of large sacks stuffed with rags and papers, and piled upon each other. At the corner of Rue Roquette lay over 70 corpses of men, executed for being found with arms in their hands. They lay piled over each other, and the pavement and gutters streamed with blood. The crowd were not allowed to approach them. We entered Pere-Lachaise and found it full of troops, chiefly of the Marine Brigade. There is no truth in the stories that the cemetery was defended tomb by tomb. There had been no bayonet or even fusillade fighting there, but the sh.e.l.ls had shattered many of the tombs, here and there laying bare the coffins below. The position was so strong that the Marines could account for its abandonment only by the fact that the Insurgents were utterly disorganized for want of leaders.

The sh.e.l.ling, however, had been sufficiently vigorous to compel the troops to retire after they took it last night, and to return for reinforcements. They retook the position early this morning. The Insurgents had abandoned a battery of seven guns which commanded the whole position. We could see from it that sharp fighting was still going on at Belleville, probably the last stronghold. As we pa.s.sed the prison of La Roquette, we heard about ninety rifle-shots and then a mitrailleuse, and were told by the troops that prisoners were being executed. We had great difficulty in pa.s.sing through the Faubourg St.

Antoine, and were stopped by at least five _cordons_ of sentries. They told us that the Insurgents were _en fuite_, that the Quartier was _suspect_, and that, therefore, n.o.body was allowed to pa.s.s. When we got through, many people asked us to put their letters into the post for them, as they were close prisoners. The streets were filled with arms and equipments.

Only a few houses in Belleville still hold out. The Insurgents are surrendering by thousands. The insurrection is considered over.

Most of those who founded the Comite du Salut Public have been taken.

The Insurgents are being shot by hundreds. In the Faubourg St. Antoine great numbers of men and women were found carrying petroleum, and at once shot.

The _Moniteur_ says that Felix Pyat and Paschal Grousset left Paris yesterday in a balloon, which pa.s.sed over Niort towards the sea.

MAY 29th.

By Sat.u.r.day evening the various Corps of the Versailles troops, steadily converging on the Insurgents from the North, South, and West, had forced them into their last strongholds of Pere-Lachaise, and at the b.u.t.tes Chaumont, in Belleville; and M. THIERS on Sat.u.r.day announced that the final attack would be made on Sunday morning. But the troops waited no longer to finish their terrible work. On Sat.u.r.day Pere-Lachaise was taken by General VINOY; in the evening the b.u.t.tes Chaumont were carried by General LADMIRAULT. The two corps united, and the remaining Insurgents were forced into narrow s.p.a.ce at the edge of the _enceinte_, where they are hemmed in between the Versailles troops and the Prussians, and must surrender or be killed. They have also been driven out of all the Forts except Vincennes, and those who hold that Fort have asked the Bavarian troops outside to permit their escape. At five o'clock yesterday all fighting had ceased.

"The Revolution is crushed;" but at what a cost, and amid what horrors!

"Peace," says M. THIERS, "is about to be restored, but it will not succeed in relieving all honest and patriotic hearts of the profound sorrow with which they are afflicted." We know not, indeed, how or when such relief is to come; for ruin has been wrought and crimes have been perpetrated which will leave on Paris and on Frenchmen an ineffaceable brand. After the first appalling news of the great conflagrations, a faint hope had arisen that the ultimate result might prove less disastrous than had been apprehended, and it is true that a few of the n.o.ble buildings which were thought doomed have escaped. But the almost universal wreck would of itself almost obliterate for the moment the sense of relief, and the material ruin now const.i.tutes the least horror in the scene. It is sufficiently distressing to picture every Quarter of the great Capital, which but the other day was the beauty of the world, scarred by conflagrations, torn by sh.e.l.ls, pitted with musketry, and stained with blood. It is terrible to think that in a city "like Paris"

fire and sword, and instruments of destruction still more h.e.l.lish, have swept from West to East, and from South to North; that most of its n.o.ble palaces are but gaunt and blackened walls, and its finest streets laid in heaps of as utter ruin as the mounds of Nineveh. The mind is overwhelmed by the mere physical spectacle of this whirlwind of blazing destruction suddenly bursting over a n.o.ble city so near us, which we knew so well, and the inhabitants of which were but yesterday our neighbours and our friends. But even this is overpowered by the awful human ruin which it expresses and reflects. On both sides alike we hear of incredible acts of a.s.sa.s.sination and slaughter. The Insurgents have fulfilled, so far as they were able, their threats against the lives of their hostages as mercilessly as their other menaces. The Archbishop of PARIS, the Cure of the Madeleine, President BONJEAN, with priests, gendarmes, soldiers, and other victims to the number of 64, have been shot, and 168 others were only saved by the arrival of the troops. This ma.s.sacre of distinguished and inoffensive men is one of those crimes which never die, and which blacken for ever the memory of their authors.

But in the spirit of murder and hatred it displays the Communists seem not very much worse than their antagonists. It sounds like trifling for M. THIERS to be denouncing the Insurgents for having shot a captive officer "without respect for the laws of war." The laws of war! They are mild and Christian compared with the inhuman laws of revenge under which the Versailles troops have been shooting, bayoneting, ripping up prisoners, women and children, during the last six days. We have not a word to say for the black ruffians who, it is clear, deliberately planned the utter destruction of Paris, the burning of its inhabitants, and the obliteration of its treasures; but if soldiers will convert themselves into fiends in attacking fiends, is it any wonder if they redouble the fiendishness of the struggle? Fury has inflamed fury, and hate has embittered hate, until all the wild pa.s.sions of the human heart have been fused into one vast and indistinguishable conflagration.

So far as we can recollect there has been nothing like it in history.

The siege of Jerusalem may afford some parallel, but Roman soldiers never so utterly lost their self-control as the Versailles troops appear to have done. We are beggared for words to describe the scene, and exclaim that it is h.e.l.l upon earth. It is nothing less. There are all the physical and all the moral accessories. Fire and brimstone, storm and tempest, torture, insult, hatred, despair, all forms of malice, murder, and destruction, have been raging in Paris during the last few days. Women forgetting their s.e.x and their gentleness to commit a.s.sa.s.sination, to poison soldiers, to burn and to slay; little children converted into demons of destruction, and dropping petroleum into the areas of houses; soldiers in turn forgetting all distinctions of s.e.x and age, and shooting down prisoners like vermin, now by scores and now by hundreds,--all combine to enact on civilized ground, and within the sight and hearing of their fellow-men, scenes which find a parallel only in the infernal regions imagined by prophets and poets. This is what human nature is capable of; for Frenchmen are men, and we shudder for our race. But, at all events, what hope is to be seen for France in this seething abyss? This tragedy is the end of eighty years of revolutions, of an eighty years' struggle after Liberty and Fraternity, eighty years of attempts again and again renewed to rebuild French Society on a new and harmonious basis. The end is a fiercer hatred, deeper divisions, wilder pa.s.sions, and more eternal distrust. Will these six days of savage devastation tend to heal the existing breach between the lower and the middle cla.s.ses of France? Will the mutual slaughter of soldiers and citizens tend towards that essential condition of a happy State; mutual confidence between the Army and the People? Will the blood of another butchered Archbishop sow the seeds of peace between the Priests and their Socialist foes? That which we seem at present to see in this outbreak of h.e.l.l is the permanent creation of yawning abysses between cla.s.ses, inst.i.tutions, memories, and men. Paris may, perhaps, be rebuilt; but what is to wipe out the blood with which every street of Paris is now stained, and when will women cease to hand down to their children the envenomed hatreds of May, 1871? Where, above all, are the signs of that combined generosity, firmness and foresight in statesmen or soldiers which alone could lay the first stone of reconciliation? The prospect is too black for France and for Europe for us to dare look forward. We have no heart at present to balance the faults and crimes of the two sides, or to a.s.sign the relative blame. We only see the worst outburst ever yet displayed of human pa.s.sions; we see it at the close of fifteen centuries of Christian civilization; we see it in one of the most gifted races of the world, and we know not where to look for hope or consolation.

MAY 30th.

Paris is perfectly tranquil. Shops are opening. The streets are crowded with people examining the amount of damage done. Prisoners in groups of a hundred are being marched under escort down the Boulevards. Fighting ceased about 3 yesterday afternoon. A few shots were fired from the windows at Belleville, where frightful scenes are said to have been enacted. The more desperate characters, felons and escaped _forcats_ of the worst description, turned at the last moment on their own comrades because they refused to continue the fight. Some women murdered with knives two young men for the same reason. In consequence of the firing from the windows, an immense number of executions occurred. The park of the b.u.t.tes Chaumont was strewn with corpses. The soldiers were so furious that the officers found it necessary to warn strangers of the danger of incurring suspicion. A few of the inhabitants of Belleville were declaring openly to pa.s.sers by that the affair was not yet over, and that terrible reprisals would be wreaked upon the soldiers. These boasts have not yet been fulfilled, but general apprehensions are, nevertheless, entertained that those of the insurgents who have escaped justice will try to inaugurate a secret system of arson and a.s.sa.s.sination. Constant discoveries of petroleum are still being made.

The danger is increased by the fact that women, who, on account of their s.e.x, are more likely lo escape notice, are really the most desperate.

Great precautions are taken at night. The streets are full of sentries and all circulation is strictly forbidden. Any one who ventures out without the pa.s.sword runs the risk of being locked up all night. There are diversities of opinion relative to the Archbishop's fate even now.

Some people affirm that he has escaped; but the evidence is in favour of his having been murdered at La Roquette.

Fears are entertained of an epidemic consequent upon the hurried burial of so many dead under the pavement of the streets.

MAY 31st AND JUNE 1st.

The search for Insurgents from house to house is still going on vigorously. It is still very hard either to leave or even to enter Paris, Gourde, the Communist Minister of Finance, has been found. It is said by Insurgents that Cluseret ought to be among the last batch of prisoners taken at Fort Vincennes. This being their last place of refuge it is expected that many other ringleaders will be discovered.

The Communist commander of that Fort sent to the Bavarian General a list of his officers and men, requesting for the former pa.s.ses into Switzerland, for the latter pa.s.ses into France. After various negotiations, the affair was left in the hands of General Vinoy, and it was agreed that all the garrison of Vincennes, having never fired a shot, should be detained prisoners only temporarily; but that all fugitives who had taken refuge there should be surrendered unconditionally. The garrison eagerly consented to the terms, and at once put their chiefs in prison. Orders were found on many of them, signed Ulysse Parent, for the burning of the Hotel de Ville, the Bourse, and other places.

The Luxembourg is to replace temporarily the Hotel de Ville, and the Staff has already moved there. Everything is going on quietly enough in most parts of Paris, but in the Belleville Quarter life is still unsafe.

Not only shots are fired from windows, but occasionally Insurgents fire off revolvers upon officers at a few yards' distance. Many fear that, notwithstanding the large numbers of the Insurgents caught, and the terrible example made, enough have escaped to give further trouble, if not by open resistance, at least by arson and secret a.s.sa.s.sination. The severities, moreover, exercised by the military authorities have produced a pretty strong feeling of reaction against them, and in some of even the least revolutionary Quarters the troops are scarcely popular, certainly not so popular as when they entered Paris. The Insurgents find many sympathizers to hide them, and a.s.sist their escape from Paris.