The Memoirs of Victor Hugo Part 20

Several deputies came up to me, among them M. Marie, M. Roger (of Loiret), M. de Remusat, and M. Chambolle. I related to them the incident of the tearing down of the flag, which was serious in view of the audacity of the attack.

"What is even more serious," said one of them, "is that there is something very bad behind all this. During the night the doors of more than fifteen mansions were marked with a cross, among the marked houses being those of the Princess de Lieven, in the Rue Saint Florentin, and of Mme. de Talhouet."

"Are you sure of this?" I asked.

"With my own eyes I saw the cross upon the door of Mme. de Lieven's house," he replied.

President Franck-Carre met M. Duchatel this morning and said: "Well, how goes it?"

"All is well," answered the Minister.

"What are you going to do about the riot?"

"I am going to let the rioters alone at the rendezvous they arranged for themselves. What can they do in the Place Louis XV. and the Champs-Elysees? It is raining. They will tramp about there all day.

To-night they will be tired out and will go home to bed."

M. Etienne Arago entered hastily at this juncture and said: "There are seven wounded and two killed already. Barricades have been erected in the Rue Beaubourg and in the Rue Saint Avoye."

After a suspension of the session M. Guizot arrived. He ascended the tribune and announced that the King had summoned M. Mole, to charge him with the formation of a new Cabinet.

Triumphant shouts from the Opposition, shouts of rage from the majority.

The session ended amid an indescribable uproar.

I went out with the deputies and returned by way of the quays.

In the Place de la Concorde the cavalry continued to charge. An attempt to erect two barricades had been made in the Rue Saint Honore. The paving-stones in the Marche Saint Honore were being torn up. The overturned omni-buses, of which the barricades had been made, had been righted by the troops. In the Rue Saint Honore the crowd let the Munic.i.p.al Guards go by, and then stoned them in the back. A mult.i.tude was swarming along the quays like irritated ants. A very pretty woman in a green velvet hat and a large cashmere shawl pa.s.sed by amid a group of men wearing blouses and with bared arms. She had raised her skirt very high on account of the mud, with which she was much spattered; for it was raining every minute. The Tuileries were closed. At the Carrousel gates the crowd had stopped and was gazing through the arcades at the cavalry lined up in battle array in front of the palace.

Near the Carrousel Bridge I met M. Jules Sandeau. "What do you think of all this?" he queried.

"That the riot will be suppressed, but that the revolution will triumph."

On the Quai de la Ferraille I happened upon somebody else I knew. Coming towards me was a man covered with mud to the neck, his cravat hanging down, and his hat battered. I recognized my excellent friend Antony Thouret. Thouret is an ardent Republican. He had been walking and speech-making since early morning, going from quarter to quarter and from group to group.

"Tell me, now, what you really want?" said I. "Is it the Republic?"

"Oh! no, not this time, not yet," he answered. "What we want is reform--no half measures, oh! dear no, that won't do at all. We want complete reform, do you hear? And why not universal suffrage?"

"That's the style!" I said as we shook hands.

Patrols were marching up and down the quay, while the crowd shouted "Hurrah for the line!" The shops were closed and the windows of the houses open.

In the Place du Chatelet I heard a man say to a group:

"It is 1830 over again!"

I pa.s.sed by the Hotel de Ville and along the Rue Saint Avoye. At the Hotel de Ville all was quiet. Two National Guards were walking to and fro in front of the gate, and there were no barricades in the Rue Saint Avoye. In the Rue Rambuteau a few National Guards, in uniform, and wearing their side arms, came and went. In the Temple quarter they were beating to arms.

Up to the present the powers that be have made a show of doing without the National Guard. This is perhaps prudent. A force of National Guards was to have taken a hand. This morning the guard on duty at the Chamber refused to obey orders. It is said that a National Guardsman of the 7th Legion was killed just now while interposing between the people and the troops.

The Mole Ministry a.s.suredly is not a Reform one, but the Guizot Ministry had been for so long an obstacle to reform! Its resistance was broken; this was sufficient to pacify and content the child-like heart of the generous people. In the evening Paris gave itself up to rejoicing. The population turned out into the streets; everywhere was heard the popular refrain _Des lampioms! des larnpioms!_ In the twinkling of an eye the town was illuminated as though for a fete.

In the Place Royale, in front of the Mairie, a few yards from my house, a crowd had gathered that every moment was becoming denser and noisier.

The officers and National Guards in the guard-house there, in order to get them away from the Maine, shouted: "On to the Bastille!" and, marching arm-in-arm, placed themselves at the head of a column, which fell in joyously behind them and started off shouting: "On to the Bastille!" The procession marched hat in hand round the Column of July, to the shout of "Hurrah for Reform!" saluted the troops ma.s.sed in the Place with the cry of "Hurrah for the line!" and went off down the Faubourg Saint Antoine. An hour later the procession returned with its ranks greatly swelled, and bearing torches and flags, and made its way to the grand boulevards with the intention of going home by way of the quays, so that the whole town might witness the celebration of its victory.

Midnight is striking. The appearance of the streets has changed. The Marais quarter is lugubrious. I have just returned from a stroll there.

The street lamps are broken and extinguished on the Boulevard Bourdon, so well named the "dark boulevard." The only shops open to-night were those in the Rue Saint Antoine. The Beaumarchais Theatre was closed. The Place Royale is guarded like a place of arms. Troops are in ambush in the arcades. In the Rue Saint Louis, a battalion is leaning silently against the walls in the shadow.

Just now, as the clock struck the hour, we went on to the balcony listening and saying: "It is the tocsin!"

I could not have slept in a bed. I pa.s.sed the night in my drawing-room, writing, thinking and listening. Now and then I went out on the balcony and strained my ears to listen, then I entered the room again and paced to and fro, or dropped into an arm-chair and dozed. But my slumber was agitated by feverish dreams. I dreamed that I could hear the murmur of angry crowds, and the report of distant firing; the tocsin was clanging from the church towers. I awoke. It was the tocsin.

The reality was more horrible than the dream.

This crowd that I had seen marching and singing so gaily on the boulevards had at first continued its pacific way without let or hindrance. The infantry regiments, the artillery and cuira.s.siers had everywhere opened their ranks to let the procession pa.s.s through. But on the Boulevard des Capucines a ma.s.s of troops, infantry and cavalry, who were guarding the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and its unpopular Minister, M. Guizot, blocked the thoroughfare. In front of this insurmountable obstacle the head of the column tried to stop and turn; but the irresistible pressure of the enormous crowd behind pushed the front ranks on. At this juncture a shot was fired, on which side is not known. A panic ensued, followed by a volley. Eighty fell dead or wounded. Then arose a general cry of horror and fury: "Vengeance!" The bodies of the victims were placed in a tumbril lighted by torches. The crowd faced about and, amid imprecations, resumed its march, which had now a.s.sumed the character of a funeral procession. In a few hours Paris was bristling with barricades.

THE TWENTY-FOURTH.

At daybreak, from my balcony, I see advancing a noisy column of people, among whom are a number of National Guards. The mob stops in front of the Mairie, which is guarded by about thirty Munic.i.p.al Guards, and with loud cries demands the soldiers' arms. Flat refusal by the Munic.i.p.al Guards, menacing clamours of the crowd. Two National Guard officers intervene: "What is the use of further bloodshed? Resistance will be useless." The Munic.i.p.al Guards lay down their rifles and ammunition and withdraw without being molested.

The Mayor of the Eighth Arrondiss.e.m.e.nt, M. Ernest Moreau, requests me to come to the Mairie. He tells me the appalling news of the ma.s.sacre on the Boulevard des Capucines. And at brief intervals further news of increasing seriousness arrives. The National Guard this time has definitely turned against the Government, and is shouting: "Hurrah for Reform!" The army, frightened at what it did yesterday, appears resolved not to take any further part in the fratricidal struggle. In the Rue Sainte Croix la Bretonnerie the troops have fallen back before the National Guard. At the neighbouring Mairie of the Ninth Arrondiss.e.m.e.nt, we are informed, the soldiers are fraternising and patrolling with the National Guard. Two other messengers in blouses arrive almost together: "The Reuilly Barracks has been taken." "The Minimes Barracks has surrendered."

"And from the Government I have neither instructions nor news!" says M.

Ernest Moreau. "What Government, if any, is there? Is the Mole Ministry still in existence? What is to be done?"

"Go to the Prefecture of the Seine," advises M. Perret, a member of the General Council. "It isn't far to the Hotel de Ville."

"Well, then, come with me."

They go. I reconnoitre round the Place Royale. Everywhere reign agitation, anxiety and feverish expectation. Everywhere work is being actively pushed upon barricades that are already formidable. This time it is more than a riot, it is an insurrection. I return home. A soldier of the line, on sentry duty at the entrance to the Place Royale, is chatting amicably with the vedette of a barricade constructed twenty paces from him.

At a quarter past eight M. Ernest Moreau returns from the Hotel de Ville. He has seen M. de Rambuteau and brings slightly better news.